Speaking of Sunday Summary

Pardon My Dust: I'll be doing a cleanup on my tags because I have 7 million of them...

And more importantly, shortly, shortly, Salami & Orchids will be getting a new little sister blog, "Blauthor, Blauthor!", and all things writing and book-related will be posted over there. By me, of course, still by me. Blauthor will launch so soon, in fact, that the next book review will be posted only there. I'm in the process of moving copies of S&O's previously posted book reviews to Blauthor for convenience/posterity.

Anoter aspect of Blauthor, that I'm very excited about, is I'll be blooking (blogging a book) my novel Superstore, and hopefully other fiction works in the future. Stay tuned, fun stuff is coming!

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Speaking of Fun Stuff Coming: I won the Piney Woods Tatter's October Event! The package is on its way and I'm so, so excited. I haven't been able to tat much with money being so tight, so when the box arrives the lace-making will begin! I'll post pictures of the work- maybe even do a tatting tutorial-- how cute would that be? I've been meaning to post more crafty things. I will.

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Wednesday Weigh Ins: For real. Starting Wednesday. Lisa's getting married in less than a year, so I have less than a year to lose 40-70 pounds. You and me, we're doing this together. We're going to exercise, we're going to count calories, we're going to kick some major ass.

And I meant what I said about getting other bloggers involved. I want stats. I want stories. I want pictures. I want recipes.

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WTF Snow: When I write these things I keep a tab with the "Compose Post" window up and I leave little notes to myself so I remember what I wanted to talk about. The notes I leave are almost never the little titles I give at the head of each section because it usually needs to stew in my head a little before a satisfying pun distills.

This title, however, is exactly what I wrote. And it bears repeating: WTF Snow.

I figured I had another month before I would need to complain about snow, but no. No, not this year. In weather's defense, I heard a rumor that this was the first pre-Halloween snow since 1952. This shocked me because 1952 means it happened before my parents were born. Holy crap.

Now let me tell you about snow. No, let me tell you about winter. Winter is the bastard cousin of that most excellent of seasons, autumn, and ugly little sister of that second most excellent of seasons, spring.

In other words, winter sucks. Don't get me wrong, I dig the whole "cold" thing. My windows haven't been closed for a minute since my dad took my air conditioner out for the season. But I hate the dryness. I hate the general dryness outside, and I really hate that that dryness is compounded by the use of heaters. Blegh.

I have a humidifier in the shape of an elephant. His name is Archimedes, after my favorite Disney character.

Look how awesome this little guy is.

...what was I saying?

Right. Winter sucks and I don't like it. And it's encroaching on my favorite season.

Because winter's a jerk.

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Speaking of Things I Don't Like: It's Halloween. Not a fan, to be honest. I'm all for celebrating horror and dressing up and drinking (In college I hung out with theater kids, it's what they did once or twice a month. ...Come to think of it, my non-theater friends did it on occasion, too.) but...I just don't get into it when it's forced on me, I guess. Like Valentine's Day.

In high school I had a religious faze...like a seriously religious faze. Boy did I hate Halloween then! I remember grumbling about pagans a lot.

I am, however, looking forward gorging myself on candy before I start counting every calorie.

Mmm...candy.

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Upcoming Posts: Fuller Fashion, The Lion King review, Why I Love My Antidepressant, and the upcoming launch of Blauthor, Blauthor!

Sore Sunday Summary

7 Mile- Rode my bike 7 miles yesterday, oooooh yeah. I've lost a little weight since my doctor took away milk and vegetables, but I noticed a little bump in my numbers lately and I think it could be Lyrica's weight gain side-effect rearing its ugly head...so now, not only is it not working but it's also making me even bigger. Fantastic.

But my appointment with Dr. S. is coming up, so that will be good.

My legs huuuuurt. My goodness. It was much too far for my first time out in weeks...but I needed to get Herbert's birthday present on the off-chance I ever see him again now that he's at school all the time. Oh, Herbert.

Speaking of Herbert, it's his 25th birthday today. I wish a very merry birthday to a very sweet, and very darling, young man. He's a good boy, and I'm lucky to know him.

And, speaking of weight, now that I think of it, I'd like to be 140 pounds or less for Lisa's wedding next September, so I've got a little less than a year to lose 40 pounds-- which is why I'm instituting Wednesday Weigh-Ins. Wednesday Weigh-Ins will include pictures of both the scale and me to watch the pounds slip off, and information on health and fitness, and I'll try to get some other bloggers in on it as well so it'll be like a...like a blog for health kind of thing. It'll be cute. Maybe we could do like a battle of the sexes-- whichever side loses more weight gets...gets...gets, at the very least, bragging rights.

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Family Fishermen: Today was the annual Governor's Tournament...I think. Anyway, it was some fishing tournament my dad and his brothers and close friends go to every year to lose epic-ly. They did not disappoint this year.

One interesting thing they learned, though, is that not only is there something a seagull won't eat, but that they could also vomit. Who knew? Seagulls eat rotting fish heads and out of garbage cans, but gag after eating kielbasa.

So do I, seagulls...so do I.

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Pants, Pants, Pants, and Pants: Many pants do be dealt with in the household. My parents love having a seamstress in the house, they make me fix everything. I have to let out my dad's pants, I need to hem mine, Mom and I went pants shopping...lots of pants.

Which reminds me, I need to write that letter to the director of my old high school's spring musical to offer my services as a costumer. I figure, why not? It's something to do. Maybe I can even get $20 out of the deal. Shoot.

The thing is, I'm so exhausted after subbing...I'm really, really afraid I won't be able to handle everything...guess I won't know for sure until I try, eh?

Sometimes I wonder what I'd do if I wasn't sick. Like go to school for design, maybe...audition for Project Runway...or textile restoration, I was thinking about that for a little while.

At the very least my kids will have the best Halloween costumes on the block.

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The Great Curl Project: I've made a great stride in the curl project. I'm still overwhelmed with insane amounts of frizz, but Dove's Damage Therapy Daily Moisture shampoo has been a big help in the battle. I've also stopped brushing my hair-- full stop, and I only brush it when it's dripping with conditioner to minimize breakage, damage, and tangles. I shower at about 4 now, then leave my hair in a loose braid until I'm about to go to bed, when I put in 9 foam curlers on the ends of my hair and sleep in a satin cap. My hair's so soft now, and the curls are very pretty and natural looking, I'm pretty happy. I wish there was less frizz, of course, but I think there's been major improvement. I'll include a picture in the Wednesday Weigh-In post.

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Upcoming Posts: The Lion King Review, Actor Analysis: Zooey Deschanel, reviews of Helen Keller's The World I Live In and Phillipa Gregory's The Constant Princess, and the first Wednesday Weigh In.

Saturday Summary and the Electric Mayhem

To those uninitiated to the Saturday Summary here at Salami & Orchids, it's basically just random things that occur to me or happen to me through the week before that aren't really posts in themselves, but are entertaining/informative nonetheless.

New Beginnings: The Food Network or "Background Music" launched a new show Thursday called "Sweet Genius"...basically "Chopped: Desserts". If you don't watch Chopped I insist you do so immediately, it's like Iron Chef turned up to 11. In each of three rounds (appetizer, entree, and dessert) a chef is removed from the competition based on the taste, originality, and plating of a dish made from 3-5 mystery ingredients introduced at the beginning of each round, starting the first round with 4 chefs. The mystery ingredients range from average fruits, vegetables, and meats to the craziest or foreign fruits, vegetables, and meats, or pre-prepared items like boxed Mac & Cheese, teething biscuits, Raisinettes, or hot cross buns. The chefs have to transform the ingredients and make them fit into their dishes seamlessly. The winner receives a $10,000 prize.

It's freaking awesome.

So Sweet Genius takes the same format (4 chefs; 3 rounds; mystery ingredients; $10,000 prize) and applies it to desserts. Unfortunately, it's not exactly the same. What they changed is kind of disappointing, they added strange gimmicks. The show is hosted and judged by one guy instead of three judges and hosted by Ted Allen of "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" fame. Instead of Ted and the judges explaining the more obscure mystery ingredients, the 2 mystery ingredients are revealed and described by a kind of creepy, disembodied, robotic woman's voice. The judge also gives the chefs an "inspiration" and only one of the mystery ingredients, then the second is introduced halfway through the round. It's pretty annoying.

And I wish there were more judges-- more judges means more opinions, and if you have a judges that doesn't particularly enjoy an ingredient a chef used (like on Chopped, judge Scott Conant hates raw onions) then another judge that likes them balance each other out.

Don't get me wrong, I'll still watch the crap out of it, but I won't be as happy about it as I could be.

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Nephew Talk: Oh, the boys, the boys, the boys...

Deb and Mick's son Manny is still struggling in kindergarten, but nothing more than expected, really. He hasn't been to the behavioral specialist yet, but the school's child study team is meeting with Mick and Deb on Monday, so it'll be interesting. What we currently think is happening is mild to moderate Asperger's or high-functioning Autism with a severe Auditory Processing Disorder, but it's all speculation, we just have to wait. The waiting is frustrating, though, because the poor boy is being punished at school for not listening or following directions. The thing is, he doesn't care he's being punished-- he has no concept of being in trouble or doing anything wrong, he just floats through the day while his teachers cite him to his parents as being a behavioral problem...we're much more upset about it than he is. It's a strange situation.

Arthur and Janet's son Sean has started preschool, and after being sick only one day of his life he came out of two weeks of preschool with two ear infections, pink eye, and a cold. Poor little thing. We're going to see him next weekend because he's turning two on October 2nd, and I'm so excited. I miss his little face. We talk to him on the phone a lot-- Arthur and Janet put the phone on speaker so we all get to talk to each other and talk to him. It's interesting because we can actually talk to him and ask him questions about his day and he can answer, mostly "yes" and "no" but when he babbles he does it with purpose, he's trying to tell you something-- which is leaps and bounds from a conversation you have with Manny. Even when Manny is trying to tell you something most of what he says is gibberish.

Manny did tell me yesterday that his brain is in his head, though, so that's pretty cool.

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Told You I was Bad: You know, or should know, that I want you all to learn from my mistakes (The Internship from Hell). Remember when I said I had $10 in library fines in Saturday Summary +8? Turns out it was actually $33 because they thought I'd lost the books. They ended up only charging me $15 because I "found" them...oops.

I got out 3, and I'll probably get all three done and reviewed before I finish Middlemarch because it's so enormous, so look forward to more book reviews coming soon.

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Apparently nobody has an answer as to why people (like me) have vinegar cravings. That's really, really annoying...when I Google something random I want an answer, damn it. At least I got an answer for Why I Crave Junk Food When I'm Sick...apparently it's because getting sick as stressful to the body as emotional stress, the same emotional stress that also makes you want junk food. Interesting.

Oh my god, I WANT VINEGAR. I'm seriously considering just dumping a ton on my dinner...just thinking about that is making my mouth water. Or maybe for a snack tonight I'll roast some potatoes and dip them in some...

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Finishing up today I'd like to say a great big Happy Birthday to one of history's greatest entertainers: Mr. Jim Henson. I grew up on Sesame Street, The Dark Crystal, Labyrinth, and The Muppet Show and it breaks my heart that he's gone, that there will never be anything new from him.

At least his spirit lives on.

Sleep well, Mr. Henson, and thank you for making me laugh, feel, and learn in my past, present, and future.

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Upcoming Posts really do include Fight Club & Self Injury, as well as Chandler's and my review of The Lion King, the first appointment with my new doctor, and a pause in posting due to the return of the pain. And in lieu of next week's Saturday Summary I'll be posting all day from New Jersey to Maryland and back.

Remember to return any overdue library books!!

Saturday Summary Plus 8

-10: The end of an era: (Jon and) Kate Plus 8 aired its series finale this week. It was interesting to look back and remember what the show was like before Kate became unbearable and the whole thing became awkward and contrived. I wish they hadn't sold out like they did, what made the show special in the first place was that it was real.

It takes a strong, strong person not to change under those circumstances, though. I like to think I'd be able to maintain my sense of self with people throwing hundreds of thousands of dollars at me but of course there's no way of knowing.

Those poor kids. At least with Jon around Kate's...self...was diluted by some kind of sanity, but now it's just them and her. I don't envy them even a little.

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+ 20: A new feature I'm thinking of starting is actor analyses; articles detailing the careers of actors and actresses, strengths and weaknesses, upcoming projects, whatnot...I'm excited about it. Blanc and I are going to talk about our joint movie reviews on Monday, so once we get that figured out we'll have that going, too.

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Still: Jobs for Smart People-- Anyone? Anyone? Why am I getting so much traffic from such a random, unrelated place? Not that I'm complaining, just curious.

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Gaaaah: My GYN still hasn't called. Frick. Now what? Do I call him Monday? Or wait? This is such unnecessary stress...I mean, does he think the ultrasound cured something? Like, "Oh, the ultrasound is clean, no big deal." Frick again.

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Dusk: Alright, look. I'm not going to lie to you, I do enjoy a little Twilight. It all started when Robert Pattinson jumped out of that tree in the fourth Harry Potter movie, you know? He's a handsome boy. The first movie was a couple months from coming out and I knew Robert Pattinson had been cast as this Edward there'd been so much talk about, so I was curious what the deal was. I mean, there had been a big to-do about the Harry Potter books that I ignored and would come to regret having done, so why not? Plus Gayle said she liked them and they were worth giving a shot.

So I did. No, they're not great triumphs of literature, but they're entertaining enough...beach reads, you could say. In fact, one of my first ideas for the other blog I've been playing with (but haven't launched...I'll let you know) was rewriting Twilight to make it suck less-- but the Twilight camp is really, really serious about suing people and I don't want to be sued. I'd've been doing it as a parody and critique but it'd be walking a very, very fine line of fair use and...I really don't want to be sued.

That being said the movies are amusing as well, Robert is still handsome, and the soundtracks are about the closest I get to modern music anymore. Debra enjoyed the books so we see the movies together. Breaking Dawn was my favorite of the books, so I'm looking forward to seeing the movie-- especially since the trailer just came out.

And it looks alright, much better than the others so far. How fantastically busted do they make Kristen Stewart look? Holy crap. It's worth it just for that.

Yeah, not a fan of hers.

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The Final Frontier: Is it just me or has NASA been discovering stuff all over the place all of a sudden? I mean, I've widened the parameters of my StumbleUpon preferences, so maybe I just haven't noticed it before, but it just seems like as soon as they ended the space missions they're discovering stuff left and right. Planets similar distances from their star as we are to ours (superearths), water, even a planet with two suns like Tatooine!

I want us to find life elsewhere so badly. I really do. Just to know what their lives are like...it's so exciting.

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I've Been a Bad, Bad Girl: I've managed to rack up $10 in library fines. Oops.

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Back to the Future: You know how we look at old-timey ads now and we're like, "Geez, people were stupid! They took cocaine for toothaches!" or whatever? 50 years from now people are going to look back and wonder why we're so obsessed with colon health. Probiotics, regulatory yogurt, pills, powders, candies...we're going to look ridiculous. If you're so worried get a magnesium supplement.

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On that note...upcoming posts include: Helen Keller, Fight Club and Self Injury (for real!), and Badass Catholic Grandmothers.

Busy Busy Saturday Summary

The past couple of days have been crazy busy for me, sorry about that, not neglecting you.

Thursday was my ultrasound. So here's

Ultrasounding Off: So what with the possible endometriosis, I had a pelvic ultrasound ordered by the GYN. Genius idea, really, when someone is having lower abdominal pain, let's take a stick and jab it around those places that hurt. The conversation between me and the technician went like this

Me: *flinch*

Tech: Are you okay?

Me: Mm-hmm!

...

Me: *flinch*

Tech: Are you okay?

Me: Mm-hmm!

Repeat that 7 or 8 times. I had to keep saying "Mm-hmm" because it hurt too much to talk. And you know what else sucks about those things? The technician isn't allowed to tell you anything. And they won't let you see the screen. So you could have massive tumors hanging off your internal organs, but they can't say anything. Like when I broke my leg (Spaz Girl Walking), I asked the nurse taking my X-rays and she couldn't tell me. She did make a face, though, so I knew, but really. You're scared and in pain, knowing is infinitely better than knowing something's wrong but not knowing what.

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Friday: I overslept like, 5 hours for going on errands with my mom, but the more pressing matter was a phone call from Debra. It's sad, but I predicted this: Manny isn't doing well in school. I'm no expert, but I'd say his social, life, and motor skills put him at about age 3. I know it's hard to think of 5 year olds as being self-sufficient, but they do need to be (to an extent) in order to be able to handle school.

They need to be able to feed themselves, they need to be able to follow a set of directions, they need to be able to go to the bathroom alone. Manny's having trouble with these things. He's also getting in trouble because he gets frustrated very easily (common with autism) when he has trouble with things. My poor boy, I wish I could hug him. Maybe I can talk my mom into visiting tomorrow.

I also made killer cinnamon rolls last night. Found the recipe here at Whipped the Blog's Ultimate Cinnamon Rolls. Incredible. They were delicious, and I managed to make them without brown sugar (I substituted white) and vanilla (I substituted nothing). I can't imagine how good they're going to be when I'm able to make them for real because these were awesome. And pretty easy, too.

Oh, and my two cents, when you're cutting the individual rolls off the log it's way easier to use the thread than it is a knife.

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Today: Today I got to hang out with one of my best friends from high school, Linus. Aaaah, Linus is awesome. We had a long talk about relationships and work and family...it was great.

I also picked up a study book for the GREs. Holy crap, I'm going to fail, I'm going to fail so hard. I've got the language part, that'll be fine, but oh, man. The math? Not good, not good at all. Flipping through the book I saw triangles. TRIANGLES. I know the area of a triangle is one half times base times height, but that's all I remember about triangles. Crap.

At least I have the book...

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Upcoming Posts: Movies based on books has been postponed as Blanc came up with a great idea for tandem movie reviews so we're going to talk about that. The Fight Club & Self Injury post is still coming, I just need to feel good about the final draft. Tomorrow will be the obligatory September 11th post, of course. Also definitely coming is a review of Bridget Jones' Diary, the novel, and I might have a substituting job this week and those are always entertaining.

Stay tuned, it should be a good week.

Unemployed Saturday Summary

Jobs for Smart People: I'm getting a strange number of visitors coming from a site called "Jobs for Smart People"-- anybody know why? Is it some kind of publicity stunt of theirs, to make me curious and use them to find a job?

The job search is continuing, of course...one goose egg after another. My mother was talking to her hairdresser about her search for a receptionist and she said that she was getting all these applications from people with crazy amounts of experience, but she couldn't hire them because as soon as something better came along they'd leave and she'd be left without a receptionist. I already have two resumes (and a million cover letters...), one for educational jobs and one for craft jobs, but maybe I need a third for the secretary jobs I'm applying for, and make another set of cover letters that include a line about sincerity and loyalty for positions I'd stick with. Couldn't hurt...I mean, things couldn't possibly get worse.

The upside is that school is restarting so I'll be able to sub again...it's not great money but it's good enough for now. It'll make for some interesting posts, anyhow.

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In a similar vein, a friend of mine-- with a master's degree-- has gotten a job in cable installation. Another friend, also without gainful employment, is going to grad school, like I'm probably going to do. Blanc got a job in a call center.

I never wanted to go to grad school. In fact, the reason I didn't go into Library Science to begin with was that I didn't want to go to grad school...now there's no choice. I know I brought this up last week but it's all sitting on my head...I'm starting to get tension headaches again. I need to go lay down.

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Upcoming Posts: The Story of Joanna: The Worst Best Name Ever, Movies Based on Books, and Ultrasounding Off.

Category 1 Saturday Summary

Category 1: It's just raining here in Jersey, still, things won't start to get interesting for a few hours, yet. Arthur and Janet live in Maryland, between the ocean and bay, so we're pretty nervous about them but we've been in touch throughout the day and they're just getting wind and rain so far. Gayle lives in an area that has been evacuated, but she says as far as she knows nobody's been leaving...Mr. Yikes, the father of the man I was named after (The Name of a Hero) lives in another evacuated county three blocks from the ocean and like, 1.5 from the bay and he's refusing to leave.

Lots of reason to be nervous. Especially since I heard the wind and rain pick up as I typed this. Again, no knowing when the next post will be as New Jersey has already been designated a federal disaster area before the storm even got here, and massive and long power outages are likely. Nothing to do but wait.

And take pictures. I just started documenting now as the wind is starting to get stronger and gusty. (4:30 pm, Eastern)

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Nostalgia Gone Wrong: Have you ever seen those old timey newspapers you can get printed for, generally, older people? Well, old-timey as in they're the person's actual birthdate's local newspaper? I saw an older gentleman reading one the day I went to visit Gayle. He was sitting in front of me so I was reading the reflection of it in the window from my seat. I like doing that. Anyway, I thought it was weird, because it's not like they remember anything from then, it's not like they can be nostalgic, remembering when that story about the bank robbers was a big deal because they were too busy being born that day to look at the paper. Maybe if they got copies from like, their 5th birthday or something, it might spark some memories.

Like, I remember clearly that Operation Desert Storm started on my 3rd birthday, January 16, 1991, because we were having my party in the kitchen and my mother yelled at my father because he was watching TV instead of joining the party. And I remember the TV was all in shades of green because they were showing night-vision footage, so for me that newspaper, or even the day after, would be a memory for me. You know, people dying and stuff.

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Intelligent Design: Returning S&O fans will notice some changes in the comments and that the background no longer looks like the childhood bedroom of Jackson Pollock's daughter.

It turns out that Blogger/Blogspot's commenting system seriously sucks. Comments aren't threaded or threadable and difficult to manage, so I switched to DISQUS commenting which looks a lot better now that the bugs are straightened out, like when the comments' font color was automatically set to the background color, rendering the comment itself invisible and the thing wouldn't let me change it. Tyler at DISQUS is awesome and I'm thankful for his help straightening all this out.

And yes, the background is much more sedate and not so vomit-y. I'm still struggling with the header, though, it and I are having it out. I'll win. Eventually.

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Intel Inside: Have you seen those Windows commercials where they're like, "Susan doesn't think she needs to update her 4 year old computer, so we built a PC store in her house!"

Seamus here, my laptop, is 5 years old and still as awesome as they day I got it. Yeah, people need to update, but don't be silly with this every couple years crap. You don't fool me for a second.

(Think it worked?)

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Mad Me: Talking about popcorn again.

I think Orville Redenbacher is missing out on a major selling point of their pop-up bowl idea. It's really convenient and I enjoy them and use them, but they're not telling people the hands-down best part of the whole deal.

The top and bottom panels of the bowl are transparent. You can actually watch the popcorn popping when it's in the microwave instead of just on slow-motion YouTube videos. How do you not mention that to people? "Not only does the bag turn into a bowl, but you get to watch your popcorn actually popping!"

I should go into advertising.

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The wind and rain have died down again. (5:00 pm, Eastern)

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Corporate Slime: They're seriously making a Charlie's Angel's TV show. A new one, I mean. Why? For the life of me I can't figure it out. I can't understand why executives, because that's who I blame, do these things. What does this say about us? No wonder the world thinks America has no culture of its own, it can't stop copying off itself for two minutes. The best revamp so far is the latest Star Trek movie, but damnit, that's even more of a continuation than anything else...

I know for a fact there are people with legitimately original ideas in the world, in this country. I have to put my faith in the fact that art will find its way through the muck but...it's still a depressing state of things. (Point Blanc)

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Not Depressing: Another from the wonder that is mental_floss: Pygmy Shetland Ponies!!!

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( 5:30 pm, Eastern) Arthur and Janet lost power.

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A Little Project Runway: And I wanted drama! Holy crap. Ugly, ugly clothes and ugly, ugly people. I'm very disappointed that Josh turned out to be such a douche, I was beginning to really like him.

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Clever Girl: Disney is re-releasing The Lion King in 3D for a couple of weeks, which is such a great idea for them. Take a classic, a movie people love, and put it in a format that people hate so you know for sure it's the format of the movie people don't like instead of it possibly being just the movie itself. Clever. Problem is it's still not going to go well, because even if people liked those stupid glasses or things cheesily popping in your face like Star Tours or Muppet*Vision 4D, it's waaaay too expensive now.

It's a valiant effort, though, Disney.

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Last Complaint: Anyone else notice the trends on the Food Network anymore? Two in particular: lemon and panko breading. Yes, a little lemon can really brighten up a dish, and yes, panko breading is wonderfully crunchy-- but holy crap, they're putting whole lemons into every single recipe anymore. It's just too, too much.

And I do enjoy panko breading from time to time, but let's be honest, it cuts your mouth like ground glass. Or Captain Crunch.

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Upcoming Posts: Just "English Food I Miss" and Hurricane Irene pictures. Please feel free to send your own images and stories to plummyjo@gmail.com

Oops...Sunday Summary

My bad. Completely forgot what day it was yesterday.

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Baked: I've been baking eggs daily now, God, it's so tasty...in fact, I think I'm going to do a recipe post and see how that goes. Lisa has a cooking blog, by the way, and it's awesome. I don't read it as often as I should, but to be honest I end up missing her too much. Give it a look, though, she's a charming girl that makes tasty food. She hasn't baked eggs, though...oh, man, now I want an egg. A baked one.

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What Upppppp: Salami & Orchids is now a full-fledged member of the Blog Catalog!! See our shiny new badge at the bottom of the column on the right-hand side. I definitely need a header picture now...I'm working on a few designs, I'd like to get something up in the next month or so.

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Project Runway!!: Holy cow, Nina's a bitch. Did you see it? The new episode's challenge was to make a dress for Nina Garcia, who wears essentially the same 2 things over and over again in one of maybe four different colors. So after the designers had time to sketch they each had an individual meeting with Nina herself where she changed everything about the designer's designs and, I think, didn't give them enough range to actually design anything! Heidi was a much, much better client that...one...time. The poor designer's choices were reduced to "sheath dress" and "pants and blouse" with sedate colors and patterns. Complete snooze fest. Especially since there's so little drama this season! The "coming next week" commercials show more clashes between the designers, and while I'm not looking for another Wendy Pepper I'd like somebody to show a little personality.

And can I just say that Anya is freaking awesome or a total liar? According to her she only learned to sew 4 months before starting Project Runway? She's either a genius or she's faking it...I mean, really, it doesn't make sense, "I never dyed fabric before but I just managed to turn a nasty mustard fabric to a gorgeous, rich chocolate"..."I don't really know how to sew but let me put out perfect pieces every time." I'm kind of excited to see how this ends, is she really a prodigy or is she Project Runway's biggest fake ever?

Sometimes, when I'm really stressed about my lack of job and job prospects and plummeting financial situation (got a letter yesterday from my credit card company...apparently I'm not allowed to make charges anymore, so add that to the list of Internship from Hell fallout), I wonder about just pulling out another student loan and going to grad school for either fashion design or library/information science...things are going to get worse before they get better anyway, so why not pretend to have a little freedom? I mean, if I did the online course for library/information science, I could still substitute during the day and make a little cash...I don't know. I don't know. I don't know what to do. Anyway, at this point I'd have to wait until the spring semester, so I guess I'll just see how this semester goes before I make a decision...anyway....

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Air Supply: The Hershey Air Delight/Aero bar is killing me, knowing it's out there so freely available and I haven't had it yet. I'll have it...in the next week, I swear I'll have it. Don't know what I'm talking about? Here (7th paragraph) or here.

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Comedy's Guardian Angel: There's a couple of celebrity deaths that get to me every once in a while, and Phil Hartman is one of them. I forget if I StumbleUpon'd this or what but it made me cry. Phil sent this letter in response to a fan that had sent a letter and tape of his stand-up in 1997, at the height of his career. The fact that Phil took the time to listen and respond like this just underlines the fact that we didn't just loose an incredible comedian, but an amazing human being as well.

Plus his analysis of amateur comedy matches that of mine and Blanc's (Point Blanc), and I can't help but feel a little proud of that. Here's the letter, and it's handwritten, to boot.

Oh, Phil, wherever you are, you're missed.

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Skunk Update: Holy crap. We've now caught 6 skunks, my neighbor's dog (Eppy) was sprayed the night before last (the night we caught the sixth skunk), and last night we saw two more. Two more. I can't even tell you how bad the back yard smells since Eppy got sprayed. It's like the stupid wilderness out here.

My mother taped a car freshener to the wall of our porch.

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I Blame Jesse Eisenberg: Whoever put games on Facebook was an evil genius. And you know who the evilest of those geniuses is? Zynga. Zynga Games actually hired a behavioral psychologist to ensure their games are addicting. And not like as a consultant, I mean they have a behavioral psychologist on staff. Time Magazine did an article on it here. Farmville, Cafe World, FrontierVille? Designed to be addicting and they produce their own publicity as gamers need to ask their friends to send them "items" a hundred times a day in order to advance in the game-- that or pay cash to buy those "items". Actual cash.

Evil. I wasn't kidding.

But, believe it or not, there are games on Facebook that don't require the harassment of everyone you know in order to progress in the game. My favorite is The Secret Plant Society, a farming puzzle game where you don't need friends. Seriously. You don't have to have a single friend and you can play the exact same game as those people with a million friends playing. The good news is that it's not annoying. The bad news is that since it doesn't generate ridiculous amounts of crap all over people's newsfeeds it doesn't get the attention it deserves. Really, give it a try.

Also, friend me! Plum Jo now has a Facebook account, and you can bet she plays The Secret Plant Society. Sooner or later I'll come up with perks for Facebook friends because you'll totally deserve them.

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Catinca Untaru: First off, how awesome is that name? Catinca Untaru. Anyway, if you haven't seen The Fall you absolutely should for the incredible cinematography, the absolutely gorgeous scenery (and I'm not just talking about Lee Pace, who couldn't possibly be more adorable), and for Catinca Untaru.

There has never been a performance like hers in the history of cinema. She was nine years old during filming and she delivers the most natural characterization...ever. She makes Gary Oldman look like a ham and Tom Hanks a scenery chewer.

If her performance is so great, you say, why wasn't she nominated for an Oscar? I'll tell you why. She's Romanian. A film's producer fills out the forms that get a film recognized by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, who then send the producer's...let's call them nominations, to the members of the appropriate branch of the Academy who then vote on whether or not the producer's nominees are actually nominated.

Here's where Catinca's nationality comes into play. How many Hollywood roles can you think of that call for a young girl with a Romanian accent?

Exactly.

So the producers don't want to give her the free publicity of an Oscar nom because, really, what could she do with it? Better to give it to an actress they may be able to use again and therefore use the "Academy Award Nominee/Winner" title where they can get some mileage out of it.

Which is sad, because if anyone deserves it, it was her.

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Speaking of movies, Blanc's got a movie review theory that's just genius. To paraphrase, why not have different critics per genre? An Oscar bait sucker isn't going to like the latest superhero movie, and the two really shouldn't be judged by the same criteria. Read the awesomeness here.

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Upcoming Posts: I will get the FC analysis up at some point...I will. And a review of Philippa Gregory's The Queen's Fool, and the baked egg recipe because I have to share the deliciousness. The world deserves to know how to get the tasty.

Have a beautiful week, dolls.

Sunday Summary!!

In no particular order...


Big Brother is Spamming: Salami & Orchids' first follower, the young woman who I have decided will be my Gayle King should I ever become rich and famous, had to close her Twitter account last week because it was hacked by some sort of spammer that actually sent me an "@landofgilli" (LandofGilli) tweet and also sent out a general tweet. How creepy is that? Assuming her password wasn't "Password" who takes the time to hack someone else's account just to post some spam? Or if it was a machine, what the hell? It scrolled through every combination until it hit? My passwords are now going to be the maximum length with letters and caps and punctuation...


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Bleeding Gums Murphy: Those couple of teeth that are probably fractured (Show Me Your Teeth) are killing me slowly. Now they're starting to ache more often...I retrained myself to eat so I don't touch them, thereby avoiding the lightning strike that is biting into something with them, so now I don't know for sure if it still hurts that badly and I sure as death don't want to find out. God, I need a job. 


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In the Land of the Blind...: How awesome do 24 hour, 30 day contacts sound? What does that save a month, 58 insertions and removals? And you only have to buy 12 pairs a year! I get away with wearing my two-weekers for a whole month so I  can make do with only buying a 6 month supply, but I still have to take them out every night because they get too dry otherwise. Preliminary cost analysis sets them about even-- hoooooly crap. That's probably about as close to being normal-sighted as I'm ever going to get without surgery.


OH, and can I just say that people sound like morons when they say "I'm legally blind without my glasses"?! Being "legally blind" means that your vision is worse than 20/200 WITH CORRECTIVE LENSES. WITH. Having vision problems without corrective lenses just means you need corrective lenses. See? Pun intended, damnit. 


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Honesty in Advertising?:I saw a commercial the other day for Crest Invigorating Mouth Wash. I'm pretty sure "invigorating" is a euphemism for "burns like whoa". 


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Pointless Whine: For some reason my "G" button has been deciding not to work, so every time I use it I have to make sure that it actually appeared where I wanted it to. It's extremely annoying, and I just wanted to complain


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Herbert: Herbert and I talked for almost 5 hours very early this morning... we've both been so sick and I've been so depressed so I'm reaching out to him but it's hard for him to respond because I can't be relying on him so hard to pull me out of these funks, and he doesn't want to encourage my being even more emotionally attached to him because we disagree so much on marriage and children. Part of me wants desperately to meet someone else and to fall so incredibly in love with them that the Herbert thing becomes irrelevant...but part of me knows that even if that does happen it won't change the fact that Herbert and I truly have incredible chemistry. 


I just need to accept the fact that when Herbert says he loves me he doesn't mean what I mean when I say I love him, and there's no hope of anything changing between us any time soon. 


I just wish it didn't hurt so much. 


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A Series of Shocking Surprises: I was at Dunkin Donuts the other day and the cashier gave me 3 free donuts when I was only buying 2, for a total of 5 donuts. Just for me. Fat admirer, much? And who'd've thought free donuts would ever be annoying? Not me. Don't get me wrong, I ate the hell out of them, but that's not the point. 


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Pop Into: Orville Redenbacher popcorn is vastly superior to PopSecret. PopSecret uses larger kernels which, while producing a nice, fluffy popped-- what's the singular of popcorn? Is it still kernel?-- piece, it leaves bigger bits of shell to get stuck in your teeth and gums. I read that microwaving a bowl of water before you microwave popcorn helps produce fluffier pops because of the increased humidity. I love popcorn because anything that's a vehicle for butter is fine by me.


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Ever wonder what Bitchface from The Internship From Hell looks like?

Augrah from The Dark Crystal. I'm not exaggerating as much as you'd think-- it was absolutely the first thing that came to mind the first time I saw her. Bitchface was just paler and with cheap black hair dye. 


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Posts to Anticipate: Etsy's Hobogate or "Faux-Bo" Controversy, My Guiltiest Pleasure, and an analysis of Fight Club from an angle that, believe it or not, hasn't already been analysed to death. In fact, preliminary research for this particular post has proven...slim. It should be good, if I don't screw it up. 

This Week's Saturday Summary

So, with the family troubles I got a little behind this week on my planned posts. I'll get to them, just not right now.  I may be able to explain the family thing soon, and thank goodness for that because I'm bursting to tell.

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The stress of the family thing is getting to me. I've still got that tension headache and my fibromyalgia pain is out of control. My hands hurt so badly typing this- my fingertips as they hit the keys and the muscles in my hands as I move them to type. Aches run up and down my limbs, my lower back is tied in knots, and the bottoms of my feet are screaming from the knives shoved into them.

Every few minutes a random patch of skin begins to tickle, like there's a bug crawling on me-- an ant, maybe, or spider, but there's never actually anything there. Then every few hours one of the "bugs" "bites" me, a deep, sharp, unrelenting pinch in one random place on my body that doesn't stop until it feels like it. Nothing stops it. I just have to wait. It doesn't matter if I cry out or writhe or try to smack the "bug" away or push on it or brush it away; anything to try to remind the nerve what real sensation is...it doesn't matter.

I can't scratch an itch, change my clothes, or shower because the burning of my skin afterwards...it's like fire. If I forget for a second and try scratch an itch, for example, the patch of skin I scratch burns for minutes afterward.

Can you see why, before my diagnosis, I didn't leave my bed? And doubled in size? Also because this situation makes me crave doughnuts like a fucking lunatic. God, I'd pay...a lot... for a chocolate-frosted cream filled...or a glazed cream filled...or strawberry frosted...or, um, anything, really.

So everything is taking a backseat to that.

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There was fuck all on TV last night so I rewatched The Dark Knight. I forgot how freaking awesome that movie is. Did you know I'm a major Batman fan? Always have been. I used to wake up early every day when I was like, 3, to watch the 60s Batman TV show. My 7th birthday party theme was Batman. I was Catwoman for Halloween one year. The 60s Batman: The Movie was the first DVD I ever bought ($2, baby!). I love Batman. I'm so freaking excited for The Dark Knight Rises, I can't even think about it without smiling, and I feel like hell right now. And I'm smiling.

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Weren't commercials supposed to stop being so loud?

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I need to lay down...more tomorrow, of course.

Saturday Summary!

Sorry to start this post with a downer, but my comments on facebook to the contrary, what happened to Amy Winehouse is a tragedy. As with what happens so often with talented people, Amy lost her battle with mental illness and drug addiction (here). I hope she finds peace now, wherever she is. While I agree with the philosophy that you can't be helped if you don't want it, I do think a successful intervention can make someone want it. Like I said in My Story, the consequences of continuing must be worse than the pleasures of continuing in order to get through to the addict. Unfortunately for talented, famous, or powerful people it's too easy for them to find people willing to enable them (like Michael Jackson). The human body can take an incredible beating as it's main objectives are to remain alive and procreation, but eventually enough is enough. It's terribly sad, and a real shame that the world has lost another incredible artist.

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On a lighter note, I just saw a commercial for Papa John's pizza and I just want to say that Papa John's was the worst buffalo wings I ever had. When I'm sick or ill I sometimes get random food cravings and late-ish one night I had to have buffalo wings and my favorite place to get wings wasn't answering their phone so I had to find someplace else open and willing to deliver. Papa John's fit the bill and I figured, how bad could they be?

The answer is really bad. I don't know if they forgot to fry them or what, but they were plain water boiled-- the skin was soggy and the meat had no taste and the sauce was essentially ketchup.

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I differentiate between "sick" and "ill" because...because it makes sense to do so. "Sick" is an infection, bacterial or viral, like a sinus infection or mono or a cold and "ill" is the fibromyalgia or depression (and lately the IBS/Endometriosis drama).

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Tomorrow we're celebrating my father's birthday so I probably won't post. Mickey, Debra, and Manny are coming, along with my mother's cousin Truly. Truly is short for "Truly Awesome"-- she's one of my favorite relatives. She's my mother's age, but she's a motorcycle-riding, church choir singing, jug band member (literally) with a million stories to tell. She's a good time.

Best part of my father's birthday, though, is the pecan pie. It's his favorite and we only ever get it on Thanksgiving and his birthday so we have to enjoy it while it's there. Yum.

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The Great Job Search!! Update: I've applied to so many places I'm losing track. I wanted to start putting "biracial" on the applications but it turns out Slavic doesn't count as a race, it's just a subset of Caucasian so I'm stuck being white.

I thought I might be able to get away with it because we don't claim a nationality because the area has been so turbulent. When my mother's grandparents were still over there they were living in Austria-Hungary, but then after a war (probably WWI...I'm not good at geography) the area where they were became Czechoslovakia, but that's not there anymore either. People without a country.

Herbert makes fun of me because when I talk I do that Mid-Western "O" thing where you elongate the long O sound, like in "toast". I noticed my mother did it, too, which lead to me researching the origin and it turns out that because so many Slavs immigrated to the Mid-West their accent became or influenced the regional accent. He still thinks it's funny.

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Why is it that at 4 o'clock I can't stop yawning, but then at midnight when I want to go to bed I'm wide awake? Stupid body.

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Coming posts for next week will include The Story of How I Broke My Leg, Our Culture of Awesome, and an update on Eva & Hitler & Me & Herbert.

The First-Ever Salami & Orchids "Saturday Summary"!

Discovered where the phantom posts were if, by any chance, anyone was wondering about those phantom posts, which I doubt, but whatever. They were drafts that the nifty blogger editor had saved for me. Nice of it. A little annoying, but nice of it. 


I also discovered the font changer thingy. Not the best selection but I found a good serif that wasn't Times New Roman. I'm a serif kind of girl. Book Antiqua. Garamond. Palatino Linotype. And now Georgia, apparently. 


SO. I made an email address last night to tie to this blog because my only email address is my full name which, while professional, poses certain problems when dealing with strangers. No offense, strangers, I just have a unique name so it wouldn't be hard to track me down and rape me. Not like you would. Or anyone would. Or would want to. But it could be like that scene in The Jerk, where the crazy guy picks Steve Martin's name (well, Navin Johnson's name) out of the phonebook randomly and decides to kill him. It could be like that. ANYWAY, yes, the point of all of this is that I made an email specifically for contacts from this blog so feel free to email me at PlummyJo@gmail.com and I'll get right back to you :)


Oh, and get this. While I was trying to connect my two gmail addresses- which is harder than you might think and I still don't think I did it right- Google was like, "You have suspicious activity on your account. Please verify you're human." Gee, thanks, Google. Make your shit easier to figure out solo and maybe I wouldn't look like a robot. And even if I was, wouldn't I know what I was doing? You could just program me to work and I would instead of screwing everything up. 


So there. 


Changing subject:


I have a one-off comment about Edible Arrangements that's too long for Twitter (LandofGilli) so it's going here. They're really pretty and all, but unless you're having a party you've got a ton of fresh cut fruit that has a very short shelf-life. Recognizing this problem when we got one after my uncle died we came up with the only solution to this problem: Sangria. And it was delicious. It wasn't one of the ones with the chocolate-dipped fruit because whoever sent it to us was cheap (just kidding, I don't even remember who it was or if those were even available at the time, really), but if it had been the chocolaty kind of course you wouldn't put the chocolate in the wine. I'm just saying it's a lot of cut fruit all at once. 


..."Chocolaty" looks wrong but it's right. I hate that. 


What may become a regular feature until it's completed...The Great Room Reorganization!! Seeing as job prospects are...nonexistent...my childhood bedroom is becoming my early adulthood bedroom. The first thing I need to do is put my memory foam pad over my mattress pad because I think the mattress pad is too tight over the memory foam so it's smushing it when I'm supposed to be the one smushing it. But then I want to move my bed and my standing lamp and my TV and my bookcase...I'll have to post before and after pictures because just about everything is going somewhere that it isn't currently.


Another could-be regular feature...The Great Curl Project!! This is a disaster. My hair and I do not get along- its nature is quite unlike mine...I imagine my personality to be less wild than my dark red tangle (speaking of, the new Pixar/Disney Princess is a redheaded curly archer! I'm a reddish headed curly archer! It's called Brave and I'm sure it'll come up again) So I've been reading through and posting in the Long Hair Community's forums (here) and it turns out that part of the reason my hair and I disagree is because I was, essentially, raised to mistreat it. It's not some hippie thing (though be sure you can find it on there), it's just that all of my copious curls come from my father- and men are not generally wealths of information on proper hair care. I imagine my father would use a bar of Irish Spring in his hair without a second thought. My mother's hair is pin straight, so she doesn't know what to do with frizz and ringlets. So, of course she did my hair when I was little- and she did it just like her's, with a brush. Apparently (as my frustrations made abundantly clear) brushes are NOT GOOD for curls, and is the reason why my hair feels like cotton candy every time I run a brush through it. 

                                                                      Brushes are bad. 


So...now I'm learning how to take care of my hair properly. "But Jo!" You say, "Shouldn't you have figured this out, like, a decade ago? You're 23!" To which I say to you, when I was sick and depressed and lying in bed for 10 years I didn't care what my hair looked like. I was too depressed to care and on the odd day that I needed to look nice for something (concert, wedding, funeral, what-have-you) I didn't know how to make it happen and would be miserable and feel hideous which only furthered my determination to not leave my bed ever. 


So, yes. I'm a 23 year-old college graduate learning how to be a teenage girl. And it's not going so well. Granted it's only been 2 days, but those 2 days have been miserable failures. Sigh. Perseverance. 


What a mess this post is. 


*Ting!* Brilliant idea. Saturdays are henceforth to be Saturday Summaries on Salami & Orchids. A round-up of my random thoughts and plans for future posts. I'm awesome. 


And now it's naptime. Have a lovely evening.