Sweetney

What the whole foods have taught me

As part of my New Year, New Me, Get Off Your Ass And Get Healthy Program (patent and trademark pending) -- or NYNMGOYAAGHP for short -- I have, among other things, taken to eating as God and Nature originally intended. Meaning: of the earth, of the expensive whole foods, ruthlessly excising-- much as a surgeon would a cancerous, pus-filled tumor -- all edibles from my diet that are processed, sugarified, or otherwise manufactured and nutritionally unholy. Well, with the possible single exception of Rold Gold Tiny Twists Pretzels. Because jesus christ people, I may be strong, but I'm not a fucking superwoman.

Rold Gold Tiny Twists are my sole nutritional weakness. My tiny, twisted dietary achilles heel, if you will.

I'll Bite

(click)

Oh, I'm not afraid. You can't scare me. And I'll fuckin' prove it.

Ready? OK!

1. SJ of I, Asshole. I recently told her -- exact quote here -- that she makes me feel gutless. And yes, that's a compliment. Of some sort.

2. Patrick of Bad News Hughes. Totally my homeboy. Some day I want to get drunk with him and watch him set stuff on fire. (Or, you know, whatever.)

3. The Sweet Juniper! Team. I like to think that if we lived near each other, we'd be the best of friends. I like to think that.

4. Steven Berlin Johnson. Dude can write about a Cholera epidemic in the mid 19th Century and make it fucking enrapturing. Seriously.

And yoooou?

Product Placement

It pains me to report that illness continues unabated over here at the sweetney household. I was up at least half of last night, coughing and blowing my nose in the most honking, unladylike manner. Some time well after midnight, I finally snuck into M_'s room and dug up her stash of Vics Vapo-Rub -- left over from her brief time in the east coast Rave scene -- and slathered that shit on like I was a turkey being basted for Thanksgiving dinner. This alone allowed me to breathe and get some sleep, but somehow the combination of mentholated grease and head cold congestion seems to have done something weird to my brain, as I've suddenly been overtaken with bizarre, uncharacteristic thoughts of baking. I can't make sense of it, but for whatever reason my brain craves fresh baked bread, almost as if an equation were formed in my mind suggesting that if only I'd had oven-fresh baked goods, this tragic illness wouldn't have befallen me. ONLY WARM, TASTY MUFFINS CAN SAVE ME NOW.

I have no idea either.

But regardless, I must soldier on. And so let me embark on the catching-up by first imparting the following teensy-weensy nuggets of consumerist wisdom, gleaned from the past week's worth of experience:

Dig If U Will The Picture...

1. It took $41.75 to fill up my car's gas tank yesterday (a 1998 Toyota Camry... because I'm a Mom). Please insert into your mind a picture of my head exploding.... now.

2. The bathing suit, she has arrived. It will probably be a week or so before I get up enough nerve to actually try it on though. Details at 11.

3. My pal Kelly had her bachelorette party this weekend (apparently in the basement of a haunted sanitorium or something), and one photo from that night in particular I think speaks to what the bachelorette party experience should ideally be all about.

4. My best moment of my day so far? Checking my cell phone and finding a text message from Amy on it, including a photo of her with a very special someone... but I'll let her do the honors.

5. Oh no, FUCK, wait, my other very best moment of the day so far? Getting an email from one of my real-life heroes about a little sumpin-sumpin that down the line will be revealed (shhh!). But seriously, I SWOONED.

Is there an emoticon for that?

6. Preschooler Anarchy Update: I'm happy to report that M_ rapidly came to her senses and stopped acting like a complete crazy person... at least FOR THE MOMENT. Truth be told, I now suspect she actually was fighting off some sort of virusy-type bug thingy that day last week when she totally and completely lost her shit (later in the afternoon she had a temperature and seemed mighty glassy-eyed and woozy). And well, you know, WHEW! Dodged that bullet! Now I can go back to my accustomed (and much-beloved) non-parenting version of parenting! Wheeeee!

7. And now here it is, your moment of zen.

meanwhile, over at BlogHer.

i kid because i love.

today in retro slang and nostalgia.

utter randomness sent to me this morning by jamie:

So many years back our friend Ryan Nelson used “tits” (short for “tits on glass,” TOG should be a common IM abbrev in my world) and about a year ago it boomeranged on me to cause a revival of the high school term in my vocab.

Most recently though, “wicked” has made a come back in a strong strong way. I think it is because I found the Sox so disappointing this year which kicked off a wave of nostalgia for (in no particular order):

- Marvelous (love of whom never leaves me)
- Jimmy Rice (fuck the sportswriters that aren't voting him in), Tony Perez (natch), Freddie Lynn, Yaz, Nomah...
- Fenway, obstructed view
- Golden Age Celtics (well 80s, that's my golden age for them, pour some out for Bias, too)
- The sketchy 80s Brockton Mall (someone got shot there last week. No sir. Yessir. No sir. Yessir.Wicked.)
- Military base livin'

has anyone else ever heard of this “tits on glass” thing before? i'm thinkin' maybe jamie made that shit up.

anyway, i would noM_te the following additions:

- “rad” (obviously)
- choose your own adventure books (esp. the mystery of chimney rock)
- dirt bike rides through rattlesnake-infested plains of colorado on the way to school
- classic looney tunes, esp. roadrunner
- chutes and ladders! whee!
- polaroids
- cinderella city, denver co.
- “retarded”
- scooby doo (pre-scrappy-doo only, please)
- damnation alley; clash of the titans
- john mcenroe, back in the day

man. maybe its this head-cold that's beginning to fester in my various facial orifices, but i think i'm getting a little misty here...

time machine.

my four things thing.

cuz all the cool kids are doing it.

inspired by dinosaurs.

to do a little brainstorming...

sweetney: making you feel superior, one blog post at a time
sweetney: now with more starfucking
sweetney: i have no idea what i mean either
sweetney: the scent of ennui, with light undertones of crippling anguish
sweetney: the frank stallone of mommyblogging
sweetney: not yet completely dead inside
sweetney: your alternative to having healthy human relationships in real life
sweetney: hating everyone equally
sweetney: smell the magic
sweetney: Offensive Coordinator for Team Interweb
sweetney: i do not have the vapors

sweetney: putting the ass back in sass

there! my work is done!

the year in annoyance.

blood pressure a little low? not feeling queasy enough this afternoon? howdy-boy, do i have a list for you!

ps to the retrocrush folks: though not making rank on your list, extraordinarily large, technicolor adverts existing in non-delineated space aligned with the content-body of your post qualifies as HIGHLY annoying. ahem.

pps: to the retrocrush folks: but otherwise you guys are aces.

“blogerrhea.”

taking a page from styro, newly absorbed into The BORG (aka The LJ):

Four Jobs You’ve Had in Your Life: DJ; Bookstore Clerk; University Instructor; Writer/Editor.

Four Movies You Could Watch Over and Over: Showgirls; Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle; The Royal Tenenbaums; Manos: The Hands of Fate (MST3K version, natch).

Four Places You’ve Lived: Detroit; Washington DC; Baltimore; East Lansing (MI).

Four TV Shows You Love to Watch: LOST; Buffy; The Amazing Race (until this past “family” season, when they screwed it all up. BASTARDS.); The Wire.

Four Places You’ve Been on Vacation: Cairo, Egypt; Amsterdam; Athens, Greece; Vegas, Baby.

Four Websites You Visit Daily: sweetney; flickr; LJ; del.icio.us.

Four of Your Favorite Foods: mac+cheese; licorice (red); pad thai; vegetable korma.

Four Places You’d Rather Be: anyplace warm and sunny with M_, jamie and friends..

Four Albums You Can’t Live Without: Pavement “Wowee Zowee”; Elliott Smith, “XO”; Neutral Milk Hotel “In An Aeroplane Over The Sea”; The Shins, “Chutes Too Narrow”.

uberlist 2006.

so i got an email this evening from danielle, daring me (though not double dog daring me... pussy) to participate in some sort of new year's resolutionfest called The Uberlist. and though reluctant initially, i've ultimately decided that i feel good enough about me inside me to reach higher, run farther, and publicly post my list of demands of the new year. 2006 better fucking step up, man, or i'm gonna be pissed.

however, i'm not going to be peer pressured into setting up a fixed number of goals to achieve (Ms. Dare Ya is at number 106 on her list... and apparently INSANE); i'll just list as many accomplishments -- both large and small -- as seems appropriate, relevant, and personally useful, adding to the to-do list below over the next couple of days as i think of things.

fyi, danielle's uberlist intro:

The goal isn't to accomplish every single item, or to judge myself by the amount I am able to accomplish (admirably noted by my complete failure to do much of anything last year), rather to remind myself that there are small things I can do on a regular basis nourish my spirit and soul. I hope that posting the list and keeping regular track of my progress incites me to do more this year.

alrighty then. with all that in mind, i say: let's do this thing.

my uberlist, 2006:

1. walk stupid dog every day.
2. frame (or have framed professionally) all the art we've bought in the past 2 years.
3. take the freaking vitamins.
4. finish painting the attic.
5. visit utah! see beth! see and openly mock celebrities!
6. write 6 poems i like.
7. read Infinite Jest.
8. go to atlanta! smooch styro! make sure patrick is in attendance (ahem, cough.)!
9. (re)learn guitar.
10. be a positive force in the world, to the world.
11. sing more.
12. BlogHer 2006! wooot!
13. clean and organize the basement.
14. watch The Decalogue.
15. do not let the blog turkeys trolls get me down.
16. tell my friends how awesome they are.
17. juice-fast one day a week.
18. be nicer to myself.
19. make the damn mosaic crap already.
20. find some way to see xine.
21. work with debbie to make RnR an actual non-profit.
22. say no (but not to drugs. heh.) more often.
23. be more spontaneous. RIGHT NOW.
24. (as much as it makes me want to throw up) use the day planner, dork.
25. take M_ somewhere special -- just me and her -- every week.
26. assume the best.
27. take risks.
28. get new driver's license (and burn current one with PHOTO OF BLOATED-CORPSE-ME).
29. write mixtape piece for rockheals.
30. forgive.
31. presuming the achievement of #6: do a reading in DC and/or B-more.