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Monday, monday, or enough is enough.

When asked what could possibly be worse that a government shutdown, I must admit that the words “Barbie Movie” come immediately to mind…

I am over just abut everything right about now because my landlord postponed (AGAIN!) the repair of my damaged and collapsed ceilings in our apartment for another 2 days.

Here are a few other things I am finished with:

How can anybody really think that the Affordable Healthcare Act is worse for our republic than shutting down the government? Maybe they are afraid that Obamacare will actually work.

Really North Carolina? You guys are still trying to make it hard-if-not-impossible for those citizens you deem undesirable to vote? Like we don’t see what you’re doing with your new voting law?

Why does anybody ever let their kids watch Barbie movies?

I’m sorry, did you say Placenta Art Prints?

I’m over everybody pretty much just getting guns whenever, no matter how insane or violent they might be. I am not, however, over Jon Stewart agreeing with me:

WHAT???? An iPod stand for a toddler training potty? Is nothing sacred?

And then, finally, on a more positive note, when I ran accross this letter from a grandfather scolding his daughter for disowning her gay son, I thought, perhaps, there is hope for us yet…

Flaming Lips pay homage to the mother of rock-as-art

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Wayne Coyne and Yoko Ono… two extraordinary front people shared the stage at Terminal 5 and clearly had the time of their lies.

Just a quick shout out to the Flaming Lips (one of my all-time favorite bands, for reasons far too numerous to mention) for bringing rock icon Yoko Ono on stage and providing the most perfect sonic backdrop for her singular vocal propulsions.

It’s moments like these that keep me coming back for more, despite my advanced age (should we even be allowed to go to rock shows past the age of 30?) and my early-the-next-day start time (all you parents of 5 year olds hear me here, right?) The show was a spectacle of lights, confetti, smoke machines, silver orbs and swirling walls of sound enveloping a set of slightly sad songs that somehow still make you feel good in the end. In other words, typical Flaming Lips fare. I will never tire of it.

At the end of the show, they left the stage, with just this last word for us to absorb. I think it says it all.

Because this is, evidently, all we need.

The bright side, literally…

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When in doubt, go with the basics, but add a little twist. (There I go again with the magazine-style captions. Sorry…)

So my office is not the only room that needs a little work… Our bathroom ceiling is pretty cracked, too, with huge amount of paint falling down, a broken light fixture… the works. Too embarrassing even for me to take a photo of. But we’re taking advantage of this little fix-it moment to really eliminate all of the eye sores at once (not counting my excessive stuff, which is going to take a long long time to expunge.)

We’re going for a super simple new fixture in the bathroom and changing the yellow color to a heather grey. We chose a charcoal grey for the light, but I secretly have a hankering for this red version, so I put it up here instead. Maybe one of you will get the red version and I can come over to visit it.

I’ll be sure to do a whole before/after story once we have an after to speak of.

Still waiting…

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Here it is, My new reality. Please let it not be forever, because it’s already been 10 days…

Here’s what my office looks like currently. I have been waiting most of the day for our landlord’s son to turn up to fix the gaping hole in my ceiling. I am writing this as a means to alleviate some of the extreme feelings of frustration that are surging over my psyche in waves.

Bright side? We’ve also had leak damage in the dining room, bathroom and master bedroom that is going to finally be addressed. I’ve moved all sorts of stuff (oh I have too many things, I know!) into plastic covered piles which means we will be able to paint much of our apt while everything is a mess.

But man am I tired of this chaotic style of living. It’s exhausting. My husband doesn’t want to come home and my daughter keeps worrying that the house will never go back to normal…

Please everyone out there in the world, say a prayer for us. We are going to need all the help we can get.

Monday, monday: Some random links to get you going

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Cute kitten, or international spy?

No rhyme or reason with the links this week. Sort of like my life.

Turns out that some of our most effective spies aren’t human at all.

It also turns out the best thing we can do for our kids at school is to talk to them at home.

Learn how to say no. And then when you get good at it, please teach me.

Joanna Goddard shares a friend’s recipe for homemade masala chai… perfect for the change in season.

You can see all sorts of sculptures by world class artists for free in NYC if you know where to look.

Evidently, memory and fiction are more akin than we might think.

I do not have a harding problem compared to these people.

Wrapping it up

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These sandwich wraps from Provisions for Food52 are the perfect combination of stylish and sustainable. (ugh. that sounded like a magazine caption…) Photo courtesy of Food52.

I save and reuse my zip-loc bags. It drives my husband crazy, because I wash them and hang them up like flags all over the kitchen to dry. They are plastic, and hence automatically evil, I know, but they are damned useful. And I figure if I am using them over and over again, they’re less wasteful, right?

Kind of right. But really, if I could figure out some way to eradicate them from my kitchen drawer without sacrificing functionality, I would be a happy woman.

Turns out, I’m one step closer to Nirvana now that my friend Deborah Copaken Kogan tipped me off to these sandwich wraps from Food52′s online shop (called Provisions, which is kind of confusing for me as that is the name of the health food store I love in Sag Harbor, but whatever.)

Made in Georgia out of vintage fabrics (but with a stain resistant nylon interior) these wraps are machine washable and built to last. Plus they are pretty enough to cheer a person up when he or she is all groggy making lunch for the kids before everybody wakes up and the chaos of the day begins.

I haven’t gotten any yet, but I’m totally ordering myself up a set just as soon as I work out why the image isn’t loading properly for this post. I swear.

Lose yourself in the thicket

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I generally try to avoid falling into the iphone/ipad-as-babysitter trap: we don’t have a TV, our movie watching is fairly limited (Ummm, except for this summer, when I totally broke all my rules and watched a movie pretty much every day with my daughter mostly to give myself a break from being her solo-camp counselor/playmate/chef/confidante, etc. More on that later.)

But I digress. What I want to say is that while I don’t often use electronics with my kid, there are times (horrible traffic jams, 6 hour flights, etc) when a good app can be a lifesaver.

Thicket:Classic is one of my favorite of these apps. I found the above video on youtube (where there is a video for pretty much everything, thank you very much) and if you watch it, you’ll get a pretty good idea of what it does.

It’s an interactive art piece incorporating sound and motion where the possibilities are mesmerizing and endless. And the sounds, for the most part, are soothing rather than jarring over-computerized harmonic barbie voices singing about boys. (OK, I admit that I come as close to hating those musical Barbie movies as a person can come without other people being worried about said person’s priorities) I have Thicket on my phone, though I imagine it’d be pretty great on an iPad, too.

And, to be honest, it’s as captivating for adults as it is for kids.

Monday, monday, or is less really more?

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I am not the Collyer Brothers. My office doesn’t look anywhere near as bad as this place looked. My problem is not insurmountable… right?

This past week, I have been forced to come to terms with a less-than-beautiful reality abut myself. I am a hoarder. There. I’ve said it. I’m sure my minimalist husband (if he ever even bothers to read these posts) will be laughing out loud at his desk, or shaking his head in disbelief at my admission. Maybe this will convince him to believe in God. Who knows? But here it is, in black and white.

Now, I am no Collyer Brother (see photo above for the extremes to which those Harlem based brothers took the fine art of hoarding) but I do have a problem. I realized this because it took me an entire week to clear out my office so that my landlord can come in and fix my ceiling (see last week’s post for details.) A whole week.

I have vinyl records that have not been touched for half a decade, magazine tear sheets from the 90′s (some of them were actually kind of good though– stay tuned for a future post featuring a few great things I forgot I’d noticed from back in the day) manuals for every piece of electronic equipment I have ever owned (plus the cords, attachments and accessories to go with them) and I could go on and on. In fact, I swore, back in January, that I was going to clear out the chaos. Clearly I haven’t gotten very far.

Someday, this (fill in the blank) might be useful, I say to myself. But I fear I may be wrong. In fact, I know I’m wrong, and now the fact that I’ve had to move so many of my piles of junk (did I say that?) into various other locations in my apt has forced me to see my situation clearly.

I am facing a challenge: I must not restore the office to it’s previous state of inglorious excess once the ceiling is repaired.

And so the battle begins with me looking on the internet for some kind of solace and inspiration to aid me in the struggle I am about to face.

FIrst off, evidence that I’m not so bad. A video documentary about the Collyer Brothers, who’s living room is pictured above. I am nowhere near this bad.

E. L. Doctorow, one of my favorite authors, wrote a beautiful sad poetic novel from the point of view of these two characters that is well worth reading. But if you don’t have time to read long form books, this NY Times review will do in a pinch.

Sometimes I find myself wishing that my place would just burn down, forcing me to start from scratch. Until I remember what happened to Q-Tip and how many records , recordings, digital files, equipment etc he lost.

There are countless online venues that claim they will help me. There is actually a website called: be more with less.

There’s also one called minimally minimal, which takes forever to load, but has nice stuff on it. Though maybe I like it because it’s all about getting more stuff, albeit minimally designed…

Brooklyn designer Jessi Arrington mitigates her love for acquiring clothes by only buying (and wearing) secondhand. I think she makes an exception for underwear.

But at the end of the day, I love homes that are all full of color and personality and look like my friend Lili’s place. Far from minimal, I know. Perhaps I’m a lost cause…

Covering your tracks

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Sure breaking up is hard to do, but at least the aftermath has gotten a little easier, thanks to the fine folks at KillSwitch.

Call me crazy, but I cannot get behind all of this extreme sharing everybody is supposed to be doing online. Yes, I have a blog, yes you all now know that my office ceiling has crumbled, but I don’t feel compelled to tell you everything I’ve eaten this week, or show you photos of me at parties with people just a tiny bit cooler than you so you feel kind of bad, or photos of my offspring doing extraordinary things like clapping her hands or being a messy eater. Not that this stuff isn’t cute or interesting, but I just don’t think it needs to be a part of my permanent public record. You are welcome to come over if you have a burning desire to see how much food my daughter spills at each meal.

Well happy day, I have just come upon an app that helps you to un-share. Aptly called KillSwitch, it will go onto Facebook and, with just a few hints to get it started, erase all traces of a particular individual from your Facebook page.

Billed as a break-up tonic, it promises to make “breakups suck less” by getting rid of all of those “kissy pictures, gushy posts and sappy statuses.” Which will probably be doing us all a favor, because lets be honest, how many of you really want to spend your spare time looking at photos of other people kissing?

Mind you, I am nowhere near breaking up with my almost-perfect husband. I just want to celebrate the fact that there are people out there, hard at work trying to help save us from our over-sharing selves. That there are folks who actually want to help us to let go and move on like we used to back in the day.

Thank you, KillSwitch people.for helping to make the world a better place. May you live long and prosper.

Monday, Monday, or looking on the bright side.

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Look what I found this morning when I turned on the lights in my office!

The long (lovely, but still long) summer vacation is finally over. School has started again, hallelujah. Routines have settled back into play. All is good with the world.

Oh no wait…

When we woke up on Saturday morning, we discovered that our tenants (we rented our place while we were in San Francisco this summer) left us a little goodbye gift. In the form of fleas. So much for renting to people with dogs ever again. Sorry dog lovers.

So instead of a relaxing weekend getting settled back into our place after being away for so long, we went on full offensive to get rid of the fleas. Plus we called the pros, who will be taking the fight to the next level over the next few days.

Then, this morning, I turned on the light in my office only to discover that a good part of the ceiling has fallen in. Yep. So fun. A good part of today, therefore, will be spent clearing rubble, relocating my piles of belongings, and cleaning. I did a little research and found this article full of good dusting tips.

But I must maintain a positive attitude. I must. No matter how much I want to cry, or how covered with dust my record collection is at this moment. According to the Huffington Post, my good attitude may even reduce my chances of heart problems. (Though there are times when I wonder if it might not just be easier to have a heart attack and get it all over with quickly.)

So now I will look at things that make me feel good about the world…

Like Tess Giberson’s new collection for Spring 2014.

Pretty much any post on the Ace Hotel’s blog. I mean, it’s called Everything Will Be OK, for crying out loud.

Making yummy pink lemonade popsicles.

Just the fact that Stripes exists is proof that the world isn’t all bad…