Momnesia

I burned the crap out of my soup pot.
It's black and charred and smells a lot.
I called my husband, teary-eyed:
"Thanksgiving is done! The pot is fried!"
But he never panics; never fears.
My husband knows Wal-Mart is near.
And so when ends his radio show,
Off to the store my hero will go.
And while he's shopping on turkey day,
I'll try to wave the smell away -
But all that cooks is now on hold.
It's a story as new as it is old:
No matter how hard I work to prepare,
Something burns - I'm just glad it wasn't my hair.

-2 DAY SALE- Friday, November 28 & Saturday, November 29 50% OFF Fall & Winter Clothing Summerville Child 1505 Monte Sano Ave. Augusta, GA 30904 706-496-8228

We're driving to Emmie's school this morning just after 7 a.m. The sky was bright, the result of clouds diffusing the sun's light, but the sun was still low on the horizon...

Emmie: "I think it's sun-times!"
Me: "It is sun-times. Look over there and you can see that the sun is coming up."
Emmie (peering out the passenger's side window, down Central Avenue): "I see it! He waked up! ...I wanna gib him a hug."
Me: "Me, too... but, you know, we can't really hug the sun, because the sun is made of fire."
Emmie (thinking): "He gon' burn us?"
Me (giggling): "It's nothing personal."
Emmie: "An' we gon' be fire?"
Me: "Probably."
Emmie (dreamily, in a way that kind of freaks me out): "An da cars gon' be fire... an' da gas gon' be fire... an' da road gon' be fire... an' da home gon' be fire..."
Me: "Mmmhmm..."
Emmie: but he don't hab no faces."
Me: "Who - the sun?"
Emmie (sadly): "Yeah..."
Me (chuckling): "No, the sun doesn't really have a face, honey. We just draw one on it to give it personality."
Emmie (nodding as though she knows what the word 'personality' means): An' so he can eat.
Me (sniggering): "Um, maybe, but what would the sun eat?"
Emmie (frowning cutely): Um... um... OH! I know! Sunflowers!

February: She may be weary, women do get weary, seeing that same shabby couch… and lamp shade and recliner, for that matter, especially in the inclement, stay-in-the-house month of February. It's also a great month for spring and summer cruises.

March: Whether they're off on an early spring cruise or just getting a jump start on warm weather vacation planning, the good news is that this is the month luggage is likely to move, along with stormy weather outerwear. And Master’s Week approaches!
April: Now that spring cleaning is done, they can't help but notice how grungy the walls look compared to the rest of your polished and bright abode. Fix it up, or get away, consumers say!

May: It's Memorial Day and the traditional kickoff of summer. They can spend the first long weekend of the year in your backyard or at a picnic – spend big bucks on a big-ticket appliance.
June: Summertime and the living is easy – and consumers are looking for portable entertainment devices like DVD and mp3 players. Their cell phone plans are probably running out, too.
July: Now that the heat is really on, consumers may notice that ceiling fan isn't quite up to the job. And if they also stock up on crafts supplies often marked down at this time of year, you can play indoors in comfort.
August
Ah, summer’s swan song, and school’s surge. Whether it’s preschool or Princeton, certain consumer items always sell in this month of transition.
October
Old cars start to look worse for wear as the weather cools. Or they get repaired to stave off the cold. The rabid Christmas fans begin their shopping early.
December
Used to be you had to wait until after December to get good buys on holiday-related gifts and goodies. But not in today's market.

Here are 100 words to describe 2009, according to a coalition of top trend-spotters:

• Austerity
• Authenticity
• Badoo
• Basic
• Blue
• Busy
• Change
• Classic
• Cloud
• Community
• Compliance
• Connectivity
• Control
• Conviction
• Core
• Crisis
• Debt
• Deflation
• Demur
• Earthy
• Eco
• Enough
• Ergomorphic
• Eviction
• Experience
• Family
• Factual
• Fear
• Free
• Frugal
• Gardening
• Grateful
• Green
• Haptics
• Home
• Honest
• Hopeful
• Indebted
• Inflation
• Infrastructure
• Intimacy
• Juncture
• Keepsake
• Local
• Meta
• Natural
• Overwhelmed
• Pamphlet
• Patina
• Payoff
• Polarisation
• Privacy
• Protectionism
• Prudery
• Purpose
• Quality
• Reassurance
• Recession
• Recovery
• Redundancy
• Regulation
• Resentment
• Resignation
• Renovation
• Restraint
• Risk
• Saving
• Security
• Serious
• Shaken
• Shortage
• Shredding
• Simplicity
• Slow
• Smart
• Sparkle
• Spike
• Stress
• Stagflation
• Struggling
• Surviving
• Technophobic
• Telepresence
• Thrift
• Tired
• Traditional
• Trustworthy
• Uncertain
• Unfashioning
• Unplugged
• Unwind
• Unwired
• Virtual
• Volatile
• Water
• White
• Xenophobic
• Yearning
• Zeitgeist

Emmie: "Sound like beempeed! Woot, Mama! I tate my penterture wif my methometer!"

Translation: "Hear that beeping?! That signifies that I am officially a 'big girl,' as I am capable of taking my own temperature with this digital thermometer! Recognize my abilities and tremble before my superiority! And give me ice cream!"

Lots of people accuse our newspaper of being "a liberal rag." Coming from outside this area as I do, I find it to be - generally speaking - more centrist that it's perceived in Augusta. But it's certainly farther left than the conservative enclave in which we publish.

Hmm. That sounded accusatory. I meant it merely as factual.

Our efforts are generally focused on telling a good story that is also balanced and accurate, and on entertaining people. That's what alt-weeklies do: long-form journalism, arts and entertainment, and humor.

Sometimes our humor falls short. And then sometimes they let me write about zombie escape plans. Try and find THAT kind of necessary, life-saving, survival information in The Augusta Chronicle! Ha!

In contrast, the local daily is decidedly more conservative than we are. It's more conservative than a lot of papers - and stands in stark contrast to the Atlanta-Journal & Constitution, which is what I read growing up. Or, whatever incarnation of the present brand that existed at the time. Does anyone else remember getting both the morning and afternoon papers? Anyone? Bueller? Who had the time to read all that?!

Anyhoodle... the really funny thing is that these labels - conservative, liberal, centrist - are relative for most people. Take this gem from today's rants and raves section of the Chronicle's website: "THIS IS A RANT to your newspaper. Ever since that socialist communist was elected president, you've been featuring his picture on the front page every day. I don't remember President Bush's picture being on the front page every day after he was elected. Print this if you got the guts and courage to, 'cause you're lilly-livered just like the rest of the communist Democrats."

See? The way something looks to them is the way it is. (And, also, John Wayne is alive and living in Augusta! "Lilly-livered?") To that person, the Chronicle staff is a bunch of communist Democrats. From across the street where we sit, the Chronicle staff is a bunch of nice people who think differently than we do about stuff, but for whom we'd buy many beers at Stillwater if given the chance. At least, the editorial staff. The sales staff... yeah. We're not allowed to play their reindeer games.

Anyway, my point is that perception is reality. Bob Barr, for example, would probably take the Chronicle's editorial staff (Hi, Mike! Not criticizing you guys!) to task about their recent editorials on the business bail-outs. I know I would.

Perspective is so important in politics and journalism. Who can sit down and list the various characteristics that actually define the positions of the political poles? (ASU Political Science department, you are exempt from this pop quiz) I think you'll find there's a lot of confusion among the general public, and thus there's a lot of confusion about how balanced print journalism actually is.

People don't remember the original political recipe. They go into their mental card catalog (Gah! I'm old!) and find that the writing on the recipe cards has smeared and blurred. They can't distinguish between the instructions (as an example) for cultural conservatism and political conservatism. So they take what they think they remember, mix in a bit of free-market economics, blend in some nebulously defined emotional or religious convictions. Dash of xenophobia optional. Or, if they don't have the time to bake their own set of beliefs, they can just go to the market and purchase a box of Rush Limbaught or Austin Rhodes brand (hi, Austin! Not criticizing you! Just saying some people don't bother to think for themselves!) (Hi, Rush! I'm TOTALLY criticizing you!).

Worse, American politics seems to have taken a "pick a team" approach. Does the below graph explain part of the reason why? Is it the fault of the (shudder) "drive-by media?"


more music charts

Sigh...

I don't know. I hope not. Especially considering the vast wealth of information that exists on the International Truth Machine, thanks to Al Gore. I mean, does anyone even know that there's a philosophy called "liberal conservatism?" Well, how about the idea of "conservative liberalism?" It also exists! As well: "libertarian conservatism!" Wait... did I hear someone just scream "blasphemer!"? Or was that my subconscious?

We try very hard to remain true to the philosophies that guide us at The Metro Spirit and Metro Augusta Parent: factual reporting, accurate current events analysis, support of democratic ideals (thus our annual Metro's Best competition), sound business ethics, and the pursuit of beer.

I can't tell you by what principles The Augusta Chronicle operates, but I think one can tell from its editorial page writing that they're not aiming for the middle of the road when it comes to journalism.

And when the major media organization in an city, state, or country leans in one direction, it's even more important for alternative media to present a different perspective. It helps an informed citizenry to stay, well, informed, as opposed to conditioned. That's why there's a Washington Post AND a Washington Times. That's why the Boston Herald exists alongside the Boston Globe...

... because an informed citizenry is essential to the continuation of American democratic ideals. Our system of government required participation. Successful participation demands sound decision-making. And sound decision-making can only be achieved through knowledge of the issues.

Barring a surprising population explosion, Augusta will never be a so-called "two paper town." But that doesn't mean that any one media outlet has all the answers. We hope you find answers in your well-reasoning mind, after assimilating all the information you can (you know, amidst work, home, and the rest of your life).

All we ask is that you don't believe everything you read on the Internet.

A.W.: "Laundry, folding laundry, dishes, cleaning... I hate it all."
J.C.: "Wow, J's a lucky man."
A.W.: "He does a lot of that stuff. Of course, between the Steve Madden game..."
J.C.: "Steve Madden?"
A.W.: "Wait... John Madden?"
J.C.: "Yeah. I think Steve Madden's a shoe."











Actually, they kind of resemble each other...

AUGUSTA, GA. - A string of red arrows greeted me on Gordon Hwy. No left turns for miles. At a certain time of day the lights are scheduled to change only once every 15 minutes or so, so I drove to a cross street closer to home. Red arrows.

"Where we go-eend?" Emmie asked.
"Home."
"Oh."

At the next cross street, more red arrows. I drove on. And the next. And the next. From Highland to Milledgeville and on to Kissingbower, nothing but red lights. I finally hooked a left into the old Winn-Dixie and cut through the parking lot.

"WHERE are we GO-EEND?!" Emmie demanded.
"Well, I'm going home. Where are you going?"
"Uh!" she squealed in disgust at a question so willfully ignorant. "I not dry-beend!"

So I signed up for a 2-year plan with Suncom with a free phone, 1,000 minutes, free mobile-t0-mobile and whatnot.

Then came T-Mobile. They bought up Suncom with a surprising quickness, changed the rate plans all up and forgot to transfer me onto their network. Texts refused to send. Voice mails disappeared into the air. It became impossible for me to receive a call unless it was from another T-Mobile customers.

And then I went over my minutes, for which they charged me an outrageous amount of money. The irony? A great number of those minutes were spent either on the phone with T-Mobile, or apologizing to people for the number of calls that the network had dropped because they no longer support my telephone model.

Fast forward: For two weeks, my phone has been largely useless except to make or receive calls aimed at other T-Mobile customers, and if I want to have the same number of minutes from another company, it will double my monthly expenditure. There's an unlock/SIM card operation that the T-Mobile store might be able to perform in order to save my contract's life, but it's an experimental procedure not yet recommended by the FCC.

So if anyone out there knows where I can get 1,000 minutes a month for $39.99, I'd love to talk to you. Give me a call. If you can.

AUGUSTA, GA. - We had a scare yesterday when we found out that a patient who was at University with Scott - and had the same disease - has died. The 74-year-old avid cyclist, who had been feeling fine and even biking again, passed away a couple of days ago. His lungs had been hit hard by the disease, and his body never really fully recovered.

So when a friend called and tensely told me not to let Scott reschedule his appointment, I made sure he'd still planned on going this morning. And then I told him the news of the gentleman's death. He got quiet.

"I wish you hadn't told me that," he gritted through his teeth.
"I'm sorry," I said, watching his reaction carefully.

So when 11:45 rolled around, my brain slowed to a crawl. I continued to work, but as a robot. When my phone rang at 12:30, I snatched it up.

"You wanna hear some good news?" Scott said, with joy and relief in his voice.
"What?"
"My bloodwork isn't quite where it should be, but it's almost normal," he said.

I let out my breath with a whoosh - and then sucked it back in again.
"What does that mean?"
"My hemoglobin should be at - I think he said 12.5 - and it's hovering just under 12," he said.
"What about your B levels?"
"Fine."
"What about your... other stuff?"
"All fine."

I exhaled one final time, relieved.
"Thank god. So, what's the next step?"
"Just keep taking my multivitamins, keep allowing my body rest when it needs it, and stay on the medications as is," he said.
"So we just keep on keepin' on?"
"Yep."
"That's awesome," I said, a grin paining my cheeks.

Again, we probably have six more months before he's totally back to normal, but it's all good right now.

A.C. and I are riding to work together, past MCG on 13th Street.

"Wow, what's up with all the golf carts?" she exclaims.
"Where?"
"I just didn't expect to see 10 golf carts running down the sidewalk this morning," she laughs.
"Where?"
She points. I only see one.
"I only see one."
"There's another one back there," she gestures behind us.
...
"Um, that's only two."
"Yeah, I was rounding up."

Is it weird that I totally want to live in this?

AUGUSTA, GA - So this weekend we lost our collective mind and decided to take ELEVEN people - mostly short folks - to Riverbanks Zoo. It made for a full Saturday of being-outside-ness, an activity that, frankly, I can't stand because of it necessitates close proximity to the estimated 900 thousand different kinds of living insects that populate the outside. Really, is it necessary that there are so many?

Not that the children noticed. They were too busy being normal tweens, vamping for the camera and shrieking with delight.

Except my daughter. MY daughter was trying to pull a Dorothy Parker /Sylvia Plath kind of move by opening Amber's sliding van door while they were doing 70 MPH down I-20. Great. Couldn't she have inherited my - well, I'll think of something - instead of my tendency towards overwrought teenage histrionics? Or, could she at least wait until she is 12 to start demonstrating them?

Luckily, nothing happened. Amber pulled over, got the demon-child re-situated, engaged the child locks and we made it to the zoo on time, with all accounted for. We patted tortoises, rode the carousel, watched a 3D Spongebob Squarepants movie that made me throw up (huzzah!), ate overpriced and very dry burgers, bought overpriced pappy crap from the gift shop, and shoved all five of the children into one photo booth for pictures.

But the highlight of the day - besides Emmie getting to eat her first ICEE (for the love of god don't try to take it from her), was the pony rides.






At $5 a pop, I don't even want to think about how much those rides cost us. Check out the last photo, of Annie McFanny, and the zoo staffer leading the horse. Do you see the expression on her face? That's not a candid moment. That's how she looked and talked all day. What's up with that? Is she some kind of indentured servant?

Anyhoodle...

Poor Jim was the only man along for the ride, except for little Conner, who's not yet quite old enough to offset the wave of estrogen that was me, Amy, Kerri and her 6-month-old daughter, the Lovely Lila, and a pregnant Amber. Yes, menfolk, there was talk of tampons at one time.



Being the good sport he is, Jim spent much of the day on reconnaissance (a word I didn't realize that I could spell) when one - or more - of us wandered off.

And Scott? You all knew that was coming, right? He spent the day sleeping. No cow slobber for him, I'm afraid; no refreshing odor of elephant dung.

He also missed out on: "No, Emmie, DO NOT CLIMB IN THERE WITH THE MONKEYS;"



and he missed several hundred renditions of, "Come back here RIGHT NOW, young lady;"



and one very delightful tantrum that ended with, "Look, I'm sorry that you dropped your random-ass stick into the giraffe exhibit, but mommy is not going to climb down there and get kicked in the head. Just go pick up another stick, honey."

Actually, as it turns out, giraffes don't kick when they fight. They do this weirdo neck-swinging/head-butting thing.

Emmie and I are snuggling in her bed, reading a book about "Finding Nemo."

"Can you find the pirate?" I ask, and she frowns in concentration.

"No! I not see da pirate!" she says.

"I'm just joking! There's no pirate," I laugh.

"Awwww, you mate a joke," she laughs. "Can you find da elephant?"

I pretend to look.

"NO! I mate a joke, too, mama!" she laughs uproariously. "Elephant not lib in da oshun!"

We giggle and kick our legs under the blanket. Then she puts on her serious face.

"I don' like da pirates," she says.

"No?"

"Nuh-uh," she shakes her curls. "Dey gonna slap me in da face."

... "Uh, what?"

"Mmmhmm! Dey gon' slap me in my face," she nods vigorously, as she flips pages in the book.

"Why are the pirates going to slap you in face?"

"Cause da pirates are da bad man," she explains. "Dey slap me in da face. But den I gon' get my arr-matey, an' I gon' slap DEM in da face."

What the hell is she talking about? "Honey, who's going to slap you in the face?" I ask.

She sighs and clutches my face in her hands: "Lithen to me. Da pirates. Dey are bad people. Dey gon' slap me, but I gonna slap DEM in da face wif my arr-matey, and den dey gon' cry cry cry and run away and I sabe your life!"

... We stare at each other for a few moments. She is intense. I am unnerved.

"I see. And who told you this?"

She goes back to flipping pages in her book: "I did."

"You told yourself this?"

"Uh-huh."

...

"And what happens after they run away?"

"Den the woof come. But I arready got my arr-matey, so I gon' slap HIM in da face and he gon' run away."

"Really."

"Yep."

"What if the wolf just wants to be friends?"

She whips her head around to look at me, incredulity etched across her face. "NO! Da woof is bad! He bite bite bite! But I gon' slap him wif my arrmatey, an' he gon' run away!"

"There's a lot of slapping going on around here. What's up with that?"

She looks up at the ceiling. I snort into her pillow.

"No, honey, what's this slapping thing you've gotten on? Why are so concerned about pirates slapping people?"

"Cause... cause... cause.." she trails off. I wait...

..."cause dey bad!" she finishes. I can't really argue with that.

"Oh."

"You see? You unnerstan' me, mama?" she asks, one hand on my cheek.

"Yes."

"You say, 'Yes, ma'am,'" she commands. I grin, and she laughs.

"Yes, ma'am. Pirates bad. Wolves bad. We slap them with our arrmateys," I sum up.

"Berry good. Now go sleepies. I gon' go play peeyooter," she says, and slides off the bed onto the floor.

"Um, excuse me...?" I call, and she turns and shoots back into the bed, laughing.

"Iss time for night-night?" she giggles, as we both laugh.

"Yes, time for night-night," I chuckle.

"Okay, mama. I lub you. You a good girl."

"Thanks, doodle."

"You welcome."

AUGUSTA, GA. - So this morning I demonstrated why I have a category of blog entry entitled "Stupid Wife Tricks." Because all day I was just a walking accident waiting to happen, as my mother would say. Except it did happen. Repeatedly.

First, I got up this morning, ran to the bank to deposit a check, and left my ATM card in the machine. Dang.

Then I ran home to make some breakfast, forgot about the bread in the oven, and didn't remember until the smoke alarm started going off. I ran into the kitchen, slipped on a wet spot on the floor, and skidded across the linoleum to a stop. It's a good thing I did because there was so much smoke in the room that if I'd walked in, I'd probably have passed out from lack of oxygen.

After that, I got a call from a woman who looked up online after finding my bank card in the ATM. Samantha Smith, I love you. She wouldn't take any money for the service she did by googling me and meeting me at the Wachovia with my card. "No, I just know how hard it is to get a new one. Those 10 days feel like forever," she said.

But meeting her made me late to meet a friend, who was nice enough to drive everyone to Kackleberry Farm. I ran out of the bathroom and tossed on my clothes when she came in, and exited in a hurry. "Did your mommy just get out of the shower?" she teased Emerson. Hey, you're lucky I didn't leave body parts behind.

Once there, we found out that they don't take check cards. Thank god we all had enough cash - but can I recommend that, since Queensboro National Bank & Trust is a sponsor - that they perhaps consider placing an ATM on the premises?

The first activity was a giant inflatable yellow pillow. It's like one of those kiddie jumping castles, but without walls - and it's enormous. Like the big kids we sometimes are, T.C. and I jumped up on the surface with the little kids (while the teens looked on in bemused embarassment for a while before deciding, as a group, that a short trial might have an acceptable level of coolness). And then I slipped on the side and did a sideways face-plant while trying to - oh, hell; I don't know what I was trying to do. But I got back up laughing, and kept on jumping until Emmie was ready to move on to my next attempt to do bodily harm...

... something like this:


... or this:


But I got through the rest of the day almost without incident through the corn maze, the hay jump, the lassoing, the pig races, the petting zoo, the corn cob launcher, the sand pile, the swing set and even the random yellow jackets buzzing around our hot dogs.



We all did well, even when Emmie (who's just three years old) decided that she could not live without trying the zip line. I should have heeded the cosmic warning when - while running along with her to make sure she didn't fall off the zip line and hurt herself - I stepped in a hole and almost went flying off into yet another face plant. But that near escape only emboldened me. After Emmie rode the zip line about a dozen times, it was nearing time to go, but I wanted to ride their crazy-tall tunnel slide with Emmie before we left.

The force by which she had come careening out of the slide in the past didn't concern me. I'm much heavier, I reasoned, and thus the friction would be greater and slow us down. Plus, I'd plant my shoes against the sides if that theory was wrong.

It was all wrong. From the moment I gently pushed off the top I saw that this short ride would not end well. My shoes slid harmlessly, comically, against the slick interior. My 10% lycra pants did nothing to combat our slide of doom.

So this is how we would end, I thought. Nearly four years of worrying about the many things that could kill my child and at the end, it would be my rapidly descending ass.

We shot out of the slide with my legs at an odd angle from straining to slow our roll. I planted my feet as best I could and rolled with Emmie in my arms. No hard-boiled detective could have done any better to protect his charge. She hopped up, laughing, and ran off to climb the slide again. But the moment of impact shot through my leg like an explosion. I envisioned, along with the pain, that my leg was snapping mid-tibia. Human legs just don't bend like that. I came to a stop in the sand and stayed there.

"Are you alright?" a woman's voice called after a moment. Eyes closed against the sun and brain reeling with the weight of my own retardation, I raised my thumb in response. She chuckled. "We've got a mother down! Hurt mommy!"

Thanks, lady. I felt sand seeping through the waistband of my pants and into my underwear. That was as good a reason as any to sit up. I looked around. No one was particularly interested in my recreation of Joe Theismann's famously videotaped broken leg.

See it here... and cringe with me:


So I stood up... not so bad. Actually, it didn't hurt enough for me to worry about. So I took a step... and almost fell down again. It DID hurt. But it wasn't broken. I limped over to where T.C. stood.

"You okay?" she asked, amused.
I burst into laughter: "No, man! My leg freaking hurts!"
She nodded: "I saw you shoot out of the tube like a rocket. What were you thinking?"
"I was thinking, 'Oh, shit!'"