From One Ice Cream Lover to Another

I remember that it had been another cold day on campus, and dozens of us students were huddling together inside the small lounge near the only food machines for a quarter mile either way. A news channel was droning on and on about something I couldn’t give a flip about and I was finally having a nice moment with a high school friend I hadn’t been able to meet up with for a long while. I remember being hungry and shivery and kind of in a mood. My College Algebra class was kicking my ass and I was fairly certain…

My Most Embarrassing Moments: Part Two (a.k.a. I’m Number One!)

When I look back onto my middle school career, I am often surprised by how much things that happened over decades ago can still make me blush and feel terribly uncomfortable. They’re really not things that I invite back in my life to relive over and over, but, rather, subconscious memories that I never took time to internalize and deal with at the actual moment that they occurred. And, as an adult, when I find myself in an emotional state that I can’t control with the various coping mechanisms I have cultivated over the years, I am wide open to…

A Tale of Irrational Culinary Desire (and Frustrating Summer Road Construction) 

It wasn’t supposed to be a troublesome drive home after spending an afternoon bingeing Bridgerton (Again? Yes, again!) with my mom, but I somehow managed to make it exciting and pathetic all at once. The plan had been to eat pizza or “bad for you” equivalent during the show, but I ended up just eating some leftover Mexican food that I had saved from an extremely needed confab with some of my besties that exact morning. Not because I didn’t have it in me to eat just for the sake of eating, but because I just couldn’t bring myself to…

Is This a Mess? Yes, but it is My Mess.

I tried not to watch Bridgerton again. I really did. But it has such a chokehold on me that I can’t even get through my day without thinking of one of those fictional characters living in that fictional world, going on with their fictional lives, having the best fictional sex and -fictional drama, etc., etc., etc… Just when I feel that I am, as a fully non-fictional entity, capable of functioning in a non-fictional world, I grab the remote control and re-immerse myself to a world that would probably be my very last choice if I ever had the pleasure…

Mini Musings: You Can’t Stop the Beat

This is a test of the emergency broadcast system. Someone (we won’t name who) is trying to get her shit together so that she can get back into the writing game. It’s been almost a year and a half since she has had any interest in putting her musings to blog. Life marched on and she somehow managed to take not only the road less taken, but the road that most people never even see. She fell into a life of leisure, sloth, and lethargy and finally (finally) decided to get a little bit of work done—here, there, and everywhere. …

Mini Musings: I Did Some Things This Week! (But…)

I finally wrote a blog post. (But I wasn’t terribly clever about it.) I washed the dishes before I put them in the dishwasher. (But I waited as long as I could to see if the hubby would do it first.) I fed the dog. (But he decided to fast that day.) I walked the dog. (But he was mad at me because it wasn’t longer.) I rubbed the dog’s tummy. (But I think I enjoyed it more than he did.) I walked. Inside. (But I never took my hands off the treadmill’s handlebar.) I walked. Outside. (But I only…

Work in Progress…

I don’t like looking in the mirror. Ever. I have memorized when to turn my head just slightly enough to avoid what I see there. I used to have a full-length mirror in the bedroom but it (mysteriously) died a horrific death. I’m not saying that I broke the thing on purpose, but I’m not NOT saying that I did. And I must admit, it was something that really helped ease the anxiety in my life. Not too long ago, I shared with a good friend something that happens to me every time I get up in the morning. I…

Scenes from a Lunch

Scene 1: Driving up the road on her lunch break, our main character is contemplating the easiest way to get to her fast food burrito. She quickly calculates the time savings of taking the street nearest to the high school (even though there’s a lower speed limit) instead of the main thoroughfare (where she will most likely be met with two extra minutes of delay due to street light patterns). Without having consciously made a decision, her muscle reflex jerks the steering wheel to the right and on to the neighborhood street. She is immediately waylaid by a traffic jam…

To Sir, with Love

Dear Sir,  I want to thank you so much for sitting next to us at the end of the bar today. It’s usually not my favorite thing in the world when someone decides to saddle up next to me when there are literally no other people in the room. And I think what made your visit even more special was the fact that you decided to park it specifically two chairs beside me, as opposed to choosing to plop down next to the hubby (who would be happy to chat about absolutely anything). I’m really not sure what vibe I…

I’m Getting Too Old for This Sh*t

When the hubby asked me if I wanted to sneak out on a Sunday night to go to the concert, I was astoundingly, excitedly, extremely meh about the whole idea. It meant leaving the kid alone again (it’s beginning to become a habit and I’m starting to feel a little dirty about it) while we pretended to be cool and hip and ready to party on a whim. But I’ve been in a weird headspace since I’ve retired and I was pretty sure I could muster up the strength to roll off the couch after the sun went down. While…