Working My Nerves

My beloved Sassy used to have a recurring feature called "Working Our Nerves"; I'm picking up the baton.

I avoided getting political after the election.  My guy won, and there was no need to gloat.  But damn, craziness abounds. People are floating some straight-up ridiculous stuff. I don't comment when it's posted on Facebook because I use that site to keep up with people and talk about what I'm watching on Netflix, not to get into arguments.  It's silly and pointless.  Still, it's reached the point where I have to say something.  Here's the deal: Barack Obama is a Democrat, and a centrist one at that.  He is not a Nazi, and if you think that he is, or that he's anything close to that, you are contributing nothing of worth to the discussion.  All you are doing is a fostering an environment in which disagreeing with someone means distrusting him at at best and hating him at worst.  We should strive for respectful disagreement; spewing venomous bullshit isn't helping anything. And don't accuse me of being a hypocrite for calling this stuff venomous bullshit: that's what it is.  There is not an effective synonym for bullshit in the English language; I've tried finding one to no avail.

Les Mis: A Fangirl's Review

(Spoilers abound, but we all know the story by now, right?)

Oh, Les Miserables.  I wanted to love you.  I was one of those girls who fell in love with you at a fairly young age, and it happened completely through my cassette tape of the original Broadway cast album.  (I didn't see the show until at least three years of obsessive soundtrack listening.) Like so many other girls (not that I realized it at the time), I knew that Eponine was not just the role I was born to play but my sister in unrequited love.  No one could understand her like me!  When I finally saw the show, it was bliss.  Oh, how I cried--beginning, middle, end.  Les Mis rocked my world.

Christmas WTFery: The Polar Express

I took Charlotte to a special showing of The Polar Express this morning.  I figured it would be a fun, Christmas-y thing to do since we won't be decorating or making crafts (see last year's Christmas entry for more on that).  I've never read the book, nor had I seen the movie, so I was a blank slate.  What follows is not a review; it's more like a Festivus-style airing of grievances.

A Quest

Me, resting.

I know that I should be on a quest for something substantial: enlightenment, maybe, or adventure.  But no--I'm far shallower than that.  I have been wearing boot-cut jeans for fifteen years, dammit.  I want something else.  So I'm on a quest for non-boot-cut jeans that don't make me look like I'm walking around on two state-fair turkey legs.  Because y'all: I am pear-shaped.  A size medium top at J. Crew fits like a dream, but I have to wear pants so big that they can barely bring themselves to carry them in the store.  It's ridiculous.  And the conventional wisdom for pear-shaped people is that we must wear boot-cut jeans to balance ourselves out.  I get it.  But...fifteen years.  I need a change.

Anatomy of a Mental Health Day

I didn't go to work yesterday, and y'all, it was awesome.  Here's what I did:

• Slept an hour later than usual, then had some coffee and read Jezebel.
• Got Charlotte ready for school, dropped her off, and went back home. I could totally handle being a stay-at-home mother of a school-age child.
• Walked on the treadmill while watching Season 3 of RuPaul's Drag Race (Manila and Delta Work's LSFYL to "Macarthur Park" was pretty incredible), then had some candy.  As one does.
• Made some soup.
• Had delicious soup while watching What Not to Wear.

That was pretty much it.  It doesn't sound like much, but I haven't taken a sick day when no one was sick since before Charlotte was born, and it felt like such a luxury.  I might have to do it again sometime in the next six years.

Haiku Review: Rosebud Salve

Note: Back when I was lucky enough to advise the finest trio of student jornalists [sic] ever, one of our recurring features was the haiku review.  In honor of them, I'm bringing it back.  

Let's get one thing straight: I am a lip balm addict.  I love the stuff, and I'm on a perpetual quest for the perfect one.  Currently I use Burt's Bees, but I feel about it the way Republicans do about Mitt Romney: it's okay, I guess, but I'm certainly not enthusiastic about it.   (Burt's Bees Fantastically Fresh shower gel is another story; my devotion to it knows no bounds. And actually, it's body wash and not shower gel, but the phrase body wash grosses me out.) Enter Rosebud Salve.  I've read a bazillion celebrities raving about it in InStyle, and I finally picked some up in Sephora the other day.  It's available in a lovely, retro tin and a charmless tube; I opted for the tube because I don't want to stick my fingers in goop.  Anyway, here's the verdict:

Makes my lips feel so
Fine, unfortunately smells
Like baby diapers.

Best albums of the '90s, according a non-eminent non-music critic

I absolutely, without a doubt, indisputably am a product of the 1990s.  I love the '90s the way Baby Boomers love the 1960s--in an uncritical, hazy way that makes me quite annoying.  The '90s are, as the adage says, like sex and pizza: even when they were bad, they were still pretty good.  So, in that spirit, here's my list of the top albums of the '90s.