Just because

I don’t know where she finds these things but they are so freaking cute.

Maybe now Hilary Duff will shut up about the damned rain already

BoingBoing has amazing pictures of Katrina as it wreaks havoc down south.

Bow to your partner

The LA Times looks at how we choose the people we date.

Apparently most people make a decision about a potential partner within 30 seconds of meeting them. If you've read Blink, this actually makes sense.

Thoughts on grief while high on allergy drugs

For some reason, this year’s allergy season is kicking my ass. Yesterday Lunchboy and I hibernated in his house, sprawled on the couch with an ever-growing mountain of used tissues accumulating around us. All my faith in Claritin is GONE. While I was staring at the television, hoping for a reprieve from the sneezing and the itchy throat, I caught Top Gun on one of the movie channels. How does a movie classic like that get so much worse over time? Kelly McGillis wears way too much lipstick and Tom Cruise is just....ew. He used to be semi-attractive but after his recent Katie Holmes-based Scientology ranting, I can’t even watch his chipmunk-cheeked former self without wincing. Not even the volleyball scene. And that’s saying a lot.

Anyway, after watching Top Gun 60-70 times in middle school, I can now get through Goose’s death without tearing up. Oh, the melodrama. But in my allergy haze, it struck me that at no point is Maverick ever allowed to mourn Goose and that this is a serious oversight. Charlotte, Viper, Carole--they all kept telling Maverick not to stop flying just because Goose is dead, that he has to let go and move on. Hello?!?!?!? His best friend just died in a really traumatic way and no one will let Maverick cry, process, or deal with the loss at all. Which got me to thinking about how grief is such a taboo topic in general (and this is how hopped up I was, that Top Gun got me thinking about anything serious whatsoever).

I want to know why it’s not okay to be weak when it comes to grief. Because if there’s one experience that should make weakness okay, it’s dealing with loss. No one can be strong all the time and no one should have to be. Grief is an ugly, messy, undefinable experience. As anyone who’s ever lost someone (or something) knows, grief can take you down at the knees and dog you for years, twisting your insides around when you least expect it. Loss affects everyone differently and the only universal truth about grief is that you’re not supposed to show it in public. Grief is for when you close the door, when you pull your covers over your head, when you hide your face in your hands so no one can see the tears.

Maybe if Maverick had actually cried when he gave Goose’s personal effects to Meg Ryan, a generation or two of men wouldn’t feel like they had to be pillars of stone during emotional times.

And maybe I should get myself some Allegra so I don’t let bad 1980s movies launch me into tangents.

Why I will never be mistaken for someone from my parent's generation

Every time I hear the first few bars of "Son of a Preacher Man" on the radio, I immediately assume the song is Cypress Hill, "Hits from the Bong."

Crouch no more

Is it me or is this just brilliant? Not that I need to write my name in the snow or anything, but still.

Four seasons in one day

Fall is on its way. On my way home yesterday, I passed a maple tree whose upper leaves were starting to turn a faint shade of orange. After months of heat and humidity, the air is dry and the temp is hovering in the 70s. It's lovely--I wish it could be this way all the time. There's something about fall weather that touches the soul. All those sparklingly clear days, when the sun is so bright and golden that it really does look like the world is glowing.

That said, I'm in complete seasonal denial, mostly about the fact that fall leads to winter. For a long time I honestly thought I'd be back on the west coast before winter arrived, but Boston is looking more and more permanent. As much as I love the change of seasons--something I missed terribly in CA--the thought of biting cold and endless darkness makes me recoil. When we're little, we're encouraged to explore our future vocations. But I'm 30 and when I grow up I want to be a snow bird.

Found out

Apparently my word is CRAP. I come across as sweet and innocent, yet underneath it all I have a quite nasty streak. Gossiping and being critical of others comes a bit too naturally to me. And people will begin to see through the sickly sweet exterior soon.

Interesting. I kinda thought the nasty streak was public knowledge (not unlike my addiction to celebrity gossip), but okay. Thanks to The Insider for the link.

I'm so buying stock in 3M

Today I gave up on Victoria’s Secret entirely and just went with a sweater over a lined camisole. This is a pretty bold move, since my office is kept at roughly 40 degrees Fahrenheit. In my opinion, ditching the bra for a camisole is one of the benefits of being small-breasted (although I like to think of my girls as perky and athletic rather than small per se). However, there are few benefits (fashion-wise, that is) to having slutty nipples. I have to admit that I really envy women whose nipples don’t stand at attention because of a slight breeze, a 2-degree change in temperature or because, you know, there’s air in the air. When it comes to getting dressed on the weekends, I give myself permission to damn the torpedoes and take a break from trying to hide the headlights, but work is different. Work requires creativity when wearing a camisole.

Work requires Scotch tape.

I bow to the Scotch tape. It's better than sticky pseudo-bra cups, or what my ex-best friend and I called Foozbas. It’s simple, painless and cost-effective. And it frequently saves the day. Like at Lunchboy’s friend’s wedding last week, when the temperature dropped below 75 and my summer dress just didn’t insulate the way it was supposed to. He looked mystified when I asked him to get some Scotch tape from the front desk of the hotel.

“What’s it for?” he asked. “What should I tell them if they ask?” But he went down to the desk and got it. Then he stood there with a startled but fascinated look on his face as I pulled down my dress and applied a few pieces.

Of course, because I was doing it in front of him, I bungled the whole thing and ended up looking like my chest was covered in little bits of cardboard. Failure. As. A. Woman. Not only can I not prevent myself from spilling all over every piece of clothing I own, I can’t even tape my own nipples effectively.

So he redid it for me. I’m not sure he’ll ever look at Scotch tape the same way. And now my secret's out.

The things we do for love

A look at closet withdrawal and other fashion-related strategies dreamed up by women who spend many nights away from home:

L: “I can't imagine simply picking out what I want to wear in the moment - it's an exciting dream for me!”

Moxie: “Like in the morning, standing in front of the closet with a towel wrapped around your head, deciding what to wear to work?? What a concept. ”

L: “Right.”

Moxie: “And not trying to put together an outfit but realizing that half of it is in the apartment where you are not.”

L: “Exactly! And not having to only choose “safe” outfits that you already know will work because you can’t experiment when you don’t have readily available backup. One thing I hate about bag-packing is that I can’t take risks.”

Moxie: “I’ve taken to wearing my PJs to Lunchboy’s house so I don’t have to pack another outfit. And then he looks in the laundry basket and wants to know how I go through so many clothes.”

L: “The boys don’t get that packing work clothes is awful because they get all wrinkled and smashed.”

Moxie: “And carrying around a bunch of hangers is a pain.”

L: “I think it's funny that most likely women are the most concerned about this stuff, yet we're the ones doing most of the shuttling back and forth.”

L aptly calls it Bag Lady Syndrome--the weird, limbo-like state that we, as women who stay at our boyfriends’ houses a LOT, navigate on a daily basis. It isn’t an issue of inequity, and we’re not really complaining about it because that would be snotty. When the boys have apartments all to themselves, it just makes more sense to be there rather than share real estate with a roommate. Not only does it mean that we live out of bags and spend a lot of time staring at our wardrobes trying to plan outfits days in advance, though, it also means that “home” becomes a relative term. Is home where you spend most of your time, or is it where you store your things and collect your mail? There’s no real answer, especially when you’re nowhere near ready to shift residences and move in together. Instead, there’s this vague feeling of displacement that persists no matter where I end up sleeping. My apartment is still cozy and comfortable, despite my roommate’s best efforts to make it otherwise, but it no longer feels like I belong there. L says she feels the same way. We’ve decided the boys have it easy. They may come stay at our places every so often, but they sometimes have to be reminded of what we do in order to spend time with them.

Sometimes I really get what Ms. Klein is saying.

Go jump in the lake

The Morning News has a database of swimming holes in the U.S. So handy for those random weekend swimming urges.

There must be some Toros in the atmosphere

Victoria's Secret has yet to manufacture a bra that can stand up to the rigors of office air conditioning. I don't care about high tech, I care about not flashing my headlights at everyone in the building. Summer is wonderful, but at least winter means you can dress for cold inside and outside. Right now going from home to office is like stepping from the African tundra into the Arctic ice circle, and whose body knows how to handle that in a professional capacity?

Narm RIP

I am haunted by the end of last night's series finale of Six Feet Under. The image of Claire driving off down the 10, on her way to a new life in NYC, the future that she can't see or anticipate unfolding as she goes. I like the sense of the unforeseen, the idea of a full, rich life's worth of happiness and experience just waiting for us to get there, even if we can't see it coming. The idea of possibility, of renewal and fulfillment hidden behind a curtain of difficulty, was beautifully played out. Even when things are seriously fucked up, they will come aright again.

It's disarming how things come full circle in ways you don't expect. I watched the very first episode of SFU with Glenn in our first apartment in Arlington a million years ago. It became our Sunday night ritual, and his interpretive dance to the opening theme was our in joke. I stopped watching during the fourth season, when the show got too negative and macabre for me, and I struggled through this season, supplementing the actual show with reading recaps online. But I'm glad I watched last night. When a show that's been a part of your life wraps for good, that ending can be unexpectedly powerful (which is why I cried like a baby through the last episode of Sex and the City, and why I did NOT cry during the long horror that was the end of Voyager). Curled up on Lunchboy's couch, I alternated between being horrified and touched by the show's final montage. Did we really need to know how all the major characters died? Yes and no. But despite the sadness of seeing Keith get shot and Rico keeling over on a cruise ship, I felt glad to know that they all moved on after Nate died. He really was the evil seed.

I'm not sure if Lunchboy understood why I was on the verge of tears, and I didn't want to get into it. Suffice it to say that the world is a happier place now that Alan Ball has moved on to other projects.

Another reason why my apartment building rocks

At 12:45pm last night, my first floor neighbor was watching a back episode of Buffy in his PJs with the window wide open.

Scottie doesn't know

There's nothing like a violently stormy Sunday for indulging one's taste in lowbrow humor. Eurotrip AND Wedding Crashers--woohoo. While I was on the aethetician's table today, waiting for my pre-vacation waxing hell to begin, I read a great profile of Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson that quotes the NYT on the new comedy mafia cabal comprising Vaughn, Wilson, Ben Stiller, Jack Black and Will Ferrell. So all during Wedding Crashers, I was waiting for the other mafiosi to show up. At least Ferrell didn't disappoint.

It took three tries for me to figure out who Matt Damon was in Eurotrip. His cameo is right up there with Brad Pitt's role in True Romance as one of the all-time best under-the-radar performances, at least in my little biased book.

The thunderstorms today were so loud that we could hear the thunder over the movie and over the muzak playing in the supermarket. Why no one thought that I was hopped up on drugs in the supermarket is a miracle because I was jumping like a scared rabbit every time the booming shook the building. The strange weather colored the entire day, making Boston feel like a tropical outpost in an atmospheric war. And that doesn't happen too often. Every movement felt heavy and damp. Silent in their misery, the cats elongated themselves on the hardwood floor, perhaps under the misinformed but understandable notion that horizontality = coolness. It was a weird day.

Off to RI tomorrow.

En vacances

Next week Lunchboy and I are off to attend a wedding in Rhode Island and then spend a few days in Newport, before heading out to Tanglewood for the weekend. I’m really looking forward to some R&R by the ocean and in the mountains (the East Coast version of mountains). Roof decks and whirlpools won’t hurt, either.

One of the women in my Wednesday afternoon yoga class acted surprised when I told her I was taking a vacation with the boyfriend.

“I’m seeing someone but it’s only been like 4 months, so we’re not taking trips together or anything,” she told me.

OK, are we insane for taking a trip together after 4 months?

Carmen soothed my fears. “The trip is a test, but 4 months is a good time for a test like that. Plus, it’s summer. And it’s not like you’re leaving the country.”

True.

Okay, deep breath. I’m ready for fun.

Not always a girl's best friend

Ok., this really bothers me:

ALI LANDRY GETS ENGAGED
Sexy actress Ali Landry is hoping for better marriage luck the second time around, after getting engaged to director Alejandro Monteverde. Landry dumped her first husband, former "Saved by the Bell" star Mario Lopez, last year, after just two weeks of marriage. Landry has decided to give love another try after recently accepting Monteverde's marriage proposal in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, after 10 months of dating. She says of her 1920s Edwardian-style round-cut diamond, "It's huge! I'm so happy!" The pair plan to walk down the aisle in the spring.

Ali Landry did not have a good time last summer. She married Mario and then found out he’d cheated on her with a stripper at his bachelor party.

I read way too much US Weekly and People. There it is.

So let me clarify that I am glad to hear she’s found new happiness and love. But it bothers me that her ring is the focal point of that happiness. If huge diamond rings are all it takes to make her happy, then she should have bought one for herself instead of waiting for a guy. I guess I’m just tired of how ring-focused our culture has become. Whenever people get engaged, especially celebrities, it’s all about the ring. Symbols are an important part of major life transitions like marriage, but it’s sad to see all the emphasis placed on the external stuff. Maybe if people paid more attention to the relationship instead of the ring and the wedding, there would be fewer divorces.

First and ten

The Patriots’ pre-season starts tomorrow night and, as I suspected, the way to Lunchboy's heart lies not through his zipper or his stomach but through his TiVo.

Do I care about football? Historically, no. But the beginning of football season matters because, for the first time in my life, I’m dating a football fan.

Part of being a good girlfriend or boyfriend is learning to like (or at least appreciate) the things that your significant other finds interesting. Sometimes this process is easier than others. Over the years, I’ve dated a Pink Floyd-loving music major, an acapella singer with a running fetish, a photographer obsessed with cycling, and a manic Red Sox fan. Not all of my exes’ interests grabbed me--I never thought The Wall was a seminal work of cinematography—but the point was that being open to their interests broadened my horizons and hopefully it went both ways. Football, however, might be a different story.

Now, let it be known that I’m a good Boston native—I love me some home team action. Loyalty to the Red Sox, the Celtics, the Bruins and the Patriots runs in my blood. I've watched the past few Super Bowls to see our boys kick some butt.

Part of it is that football games take FOREVER to be played. Lots of really big men in tight pants crowd onto the field and throw the ball. They stop every two minutes to reconsider their strategy. Then they play for another 30 seconds and then they stop again. Every so often there’s some excitement when someone scores a touchdown or runs the whole length of the field.

Maybe my trepidation stems from the fact that I just don’t understand the finer points of the game. Will I learn them? Yes. Will I like it? I’ll certainly give it my best. After all, Lunchboy does yoga and runs stairs with me. He's into Entourage and, if I asked him to, he'd TiVo Anne of Green Gables for me while keeping the snarky comments to a minimum.

Not only do pro football games go on for hours, they are on TV ALL THE TIME--Sunday afternoons, Monday nights, and the occasional Thursday evening. Pre-season is Friday night lights, baby. If you're a fan, it's a given that you sew your ass into the couch at game time, but if it's a beautiful day outside I have a hard time stomaching the idea of watching TV rather than going for a hike or something.

OK, maybe I’m being a girl about this.

But give me a break. If you’re not a team sports kind of person, games like football are an acquired taste, sort of like learning to enjoy strong cheeses, hot yoga or graphic novels. Or the color orange. Growing up, I was athletic but always into sports that had a more independent edge—gymnastics, diving, running, crew, yoga. Soccer and softball and field hockey, which were the sports of choice in my happy little suburb, were just not my thing.

Some people have really strong feelings about fantasy football. I just think it’s sort of amusing. What I really hate is the trend toward pink sports paraphernalia. Because women can only get into sports if the hats and T-shirts are pink, right? *retch* You’ll catch me wearing a pink Patriots hat when my body is cold and dead. Then again, football is played during the winter, so I might be both anyway.

Walking down to Camelot

My idea of the perfect rainy afternoon alone.

Dr. Feelgood

It's official--cuddling and hugging are good for your health.