No Sleep Till

I have not slept more than four hours a night for the past three nights.  I won't delve into the details of why, because I do not want this blog to become all cats, all the time, but let's just say that it involves Franco's new discovery that having a dance party on my torso at 2 AM equals a late-night feeding.

In all honesty, I actually hate sleeping and wish I didn't need so much of it.  Your life will be over before you know it and you'll have spent 33% of your time on Earth asleep!  I get angry with myself when 10 PM rolls around every night and I can barely keep my eyes open.

I wonder what I could accomplish with that 33% of extra life time, since, sleep or no sleep, I am basically a zombie at work anyway.

I could finally make Mom and Dad proud by utilizing that bartending degree they paid for!

My apartment would be spotless.

I could learn new languages!

I could finally get around to doing what I really want to do.

But let's be realistic here.  I know exactly what I would be doing with my extra time.

My New Favorite Game

I have a new game called "Where's Franco?" 

I often lose him in the nooks and crannies of our small apartment that happen to be busting at the seams.  When I think I have looked everywhere, I panic, entering worst-case-scenario mode bestowed upon me by my dear mother.  I begin to believe he has somehow grown three feet taller, evolved 3 million years to develop opposable thumbs, and gained supercat strength to open a window and jumped 20 feet to his broken-bodied, bloody death. 

Or worse, that he's managed to weasel his way inside the wall and has gotten his voluptuous, curvaceous body stuck back there and I'll never find him, until I hear his sad meowing somewhere back there with all the rotting mouse carcasses, but the fire department can't get him out in time before he starves to death, because being the diva that he is, he turns his nose up at eating rotting mouse carcass. 

Or worst of all, that he's somehow unlocked both locks on the door, with those new opposable thumbs, and escaped into our building's hallways, leading to a hefty fine from our apartment management company!

I am starting to realize that I am going to be the world's most paranoid helicopter parent.  My unborn kids have a lot of freaking out to look forward to.  I can't wait to pass it on to them for my grandchildren, the way Sandy H. has passed it on to me.

Luckily, we usually find Franco.  Where's Franco?

Some of these are the guest towels. 
And yes, I plan only on lint-rolling them before handing them off to you.
Martha would not approve.

Martha's Calendar

I remember the first time I made my mom buy me picked up a copy of Martha Stewart Living.  It was the summer of 1998 and Sandy H. and I were driving through New England after my summer at Choate (I wasn't quite fall-winter-spring semester Choate material).  We were in Maine and I was snuggled in the back seat of the rental station wagon with the July MSL, adorned with a cover picture of a beautiful homemade yogurt-currant-blueberry parfait: a perfect 4th of July cover that drew me in to a lifetime of domestic low self-esteem.

As we drove past the Bush complex in Kennebunkport, I finished digesting my MSL, and I confirmed exactly what I always knew I wanted to be when I grew up: rich.  And a collector of fine antique pie birds, an owner of magnificent Friesians, a grower of prize gourds, an entertainer of white people, and an all-around domestic goddess, even though I despise the title "domestic goddess."

I had this new idea for a blog last night and then I got really sleepy and dozed off for a little while and woke up being pissed off that I had totally forgotten about my new blog idea.  Then I picked up my November issue of MSL and turned to one of the first features that I have always found wildly entertaining: Martha's Calendar.  And then I remembered my new blog idea.

Martha's Calendar is totally and utterly absurd and worth the subscription price just to get a small glimpse into her schedule.  I've read that it's cut down by at least 90% for each day, and it's still beyond what any human is capable of doing if you work at a full-time job and need to fit in at least four hours of craptastic TV a day.

I'm not entirely sure, but in 2011, I might be living Martha's Calendar for a year and blogging about it.  It's kind of an aggressive goal, because when I told Derrick about it, he said, "Did you see what you would need to do on November 5th?  She's traveling to Manitoba to watch the polar bear migration, then she's touring the arctic tundra and viewing the northern lights."

Yeah, that would be hard to do.  So would all the gardening and composting and taking care of the chicken coops, what with the fact that I live in a one-bedroom apartment in the middle of a major urban center.  It's also not entirely original, in more ways than one.  It could be great for me though; I've been dying for an excuse to start horseback riding again!  And I know Derrick is tired of eating lemon-rosemary grilled chicken with steamed carrots.  Wouldn't he just love it if I whipped up some farro salad with oven-roasted grapes and autumn greens with parsnip-apple mash?  What the f**k is farro?

I may just have to settle for going to the zoo and watching the polar bears migrate from their feed bin to their lap pool, and viewing the light-polluted sky of north Philadelphia.  Which would be technically, if not Martha-perfectly, correct.

As if I needed another reason to love her.  
Would you please look at those ridunk Frenchies.

Wieners

Last night prior to attending stopping by my first Phillies game, Derrick and I attended a smashingly successful tailgate hosted by some new friends and the only other idiots people to bring an SUV to Center City Philadelphia other than the Prestons.  It's like some magnetic force draws Southerners to one another when they are outside of their natural habitat.  Perhaps it's the unspoken knowledge that once you get to Wal-Mart, you're going to be so glad you have that SUV, even if you only go six times a year. 

At one point, Derrick pointed out another aggressive tailgate going on behind us in the parking lot, and I noticed a gentleman on crutches who had sidled up to the side of their truck.  Suddenly the sight and sound of liquid being poured onto the asphalt filled my senses.  "Wound my soul.  Is he peeing?" I asked.  Derrick insisted, "No, he's pouring out a cooler." No way.  They wouldn't make the guy on crutches pour out the ice chest.  Derrick said, "No, he's peeing." 

The crutched gentleman unleashed a torrent of urine, and on and on it went, forming a pond fit enough for a few solid koi.  I couldn't look out of disgust, yet I couldn't look away!  When would it end?  How dare he subject his fellow tailgaters and bystanders to this torture when Philadelphia, in all its glory, provides endless and convenient facilities?

When the pain was finally over, Derrick handed me my dinner: a wiener.  It looked sort of like this, except replace Martha with Derrick, who is like Martha in some ways:

Yum.

And now, a wiener puppy in a hot dog bun.  CUTE!

Wifey

Yesterday I came home from the gym to find my husband baking butterscotch scones and reading the September issue of Martha Stewart Living.  After briefly speculating on whether or not I had entered into a same-sex marriage, I came to realize that he would actually do anything to avoid studying for his accounting exam tomorrow. 

He also made two balls of pizza dough, researched recipes for blackberry cobbler, and declared that his next baking adventure would entail making bread of some sort.  His precious heart broke upon discovering that we do not own a bread pan, but bittersweet relief overcame him when I told him I had asked for one for my birthday.

He did manage to procrastinate in one manly way, though: he brewed a fresh batch of homemade beer, which is currently fermenting beneath our AC unit in the bedroom in a big, beautiful bucket.  Will it be drinkable?  Only time will tell.  But we'll have at least 50 bottles of whatever it is.