Shower Daze

LP's & Mike's shower part deux went down at the Lightkeeper's House in Cohasset this past weekend. Gorgeous apple green hydrangeas, a view of Cohasset harbor and room full of well-coiffed ladies (except WMD & Bags who, while well-coiffed, ain't no ladies) added up to another beautiful day spent in a shower daze -- and another pile of well-deserved loot for the to-be-Dell'Olios. It was a smashing afternoon that was only enhanced by Jamie Cullem on the Pod, and post-pinots with a miniature pug pillow at Atlantica.


(Photo (RIGHT): View from the Lighthouse Keeper's house where we've decided to host a "We're Turning 40" soiree when the time comes. It's still several years away for most of us. For others, it's not quite so far off - i.e, Jimmy)


(Photo (LEFT): Nic, Annie & Heidi power up for the shower)







(Photo (RIGHT): What's in that tea, Andree?)





(Photo (LEFT): Damnit, Cameo. My batteries are dead)

Ode to My Volvo

Sunday evening around 7 p.m., I was rounding a treacherous curve on Mt. Blue Street in Norwell when I hit a boulder and my car flipped over. I don't remember the accident but when I came to, my car was upside down and I was sitting by the side of the road with some woman who lived nearby. She said she saw me climb out of my overturned car and called 911. I don't remember climbing out of the car, but I do remember that it was totaled except for the Volvo-steel cage that houses the passengers. I was taken to the South Shore hospital, given a battery of CAT scans, X-rays and MRIs and ultimately the only injury I sustained was a serious facial beat-down from the airbag - not even a slight concussion. They told me I was lucky to be alive but I felt lucky for much more than that. Lucky that Caroline and Paul were not in the car with me. Lucky that I was wearing my seatbelt. Lucky to be able to return home the next day looking like a bloated troll. Lucky to be able to hug James, Caroline & Paulie a little harder. (I even kissed Vito on the lips). I'm lucky to be icing my face, updating the Pointy Universe, and searching for a new Volvo on a Tuesday night.

Random Quizzilla

1. Name a job that you would hate to have.
Maybe it's a side effect of the PTSD I have from a late-90s stint in high-tech PR but I would hate to sell any kind of technology product or service. It's not so much the technology -- much of which I find interesting -- but the industry culture at large. For some reason, tech companies always seem to be located in sterile suburban office parks right off major highways. While working at a sterile suburban office park right off 128, I often had the opportunity to leave the office on business travel. Unfortunately, it was always for another sterile suburban office park right off a major highway. It didn't matter if it was San Francisco or Bowling Green, Kentucky. It was all the same. I'd spend my days whoring about for media coverage for gel-coiffed 20-something guys with names like "Kenneth," whom I am certain masturbated to their own press clips judging from the sudden onset of exuburance whenever they saw their names in print (even in publications like Supply Chain Systems Magazine.) One of the more heinous "Kenneths," whose company's office park was right outside of San Fran, was a bit of a schizo. He would ignore you while angrily pecking at his Palm Pilot and then challenge you to a friendly game of Foozball. He'd mercilessly eviscerate a press release you wrote and then offer you a Bud Light in the middle of the work day -- just to show you how fun-loving he was when he wasn't being such a hardass. I hated this man. Worse, he forced me and my colleagues to socialize with him and his unctuous colleagues each night. He not only made us wear golf shirts with corporate logos (he only had size XLs. I looked like an 11-year-old playing dress up in her father's shirt) but he took us -- good god make it stop -- to the Olive Garden. I vividly remember thinking I'm five minutes from San Francisco and I'm having dinner at the Olive Garden with a bunch of assholes. After dinner, I escaped. I took a cab to Vesuvio by myself and chain smoked away the self-loathing. Thank goodness for the dot.com bust.

2. Name 3 things that are on your desk at home or work.
Color Wonder finger paints, a diet coke, and a mixed CD from JAL with all my favorite gay-boy dance tunes that I play whenever I need a chair-dancing break. It's like a mini-vacation. BTW-Thanks, Jim.

3. If you could change occupations, what would you want to do?
I'd be a lounge singer at a swanky hotel bar. Because Lady Owls Love Hotel Bars (LOLHB).

4. How much cash do you usually carry with you?
I've always got a pimp wad in my purse and I'm certain the buttoned-down clerks at my Panera Bread satellite office think I'm a stripper. I need to pay my babysitters in cash every day. That, coupled with my current love affair with Supreme Omelet sandwiches (sans fromage) and Turbo Hots at the Dunkie's drive-thru requires frequent trips thru the Bank of America ATM. I hope disclosure of this information does not get me mugged at the Derby Shoppes next week.

5. What word or phrase do you use most frequently?
"That's insane." This week, it's been "Chill, Jimmy, it's only basketball."

Erin Go Taco

As planned, we did not spend St. Paddy's Day feasting on corned beef, cabbage and pints of Guinness but enchiladas, guacamole and Patron margaritas. We headed off to Acapulco's in Cohasset with the Nortons and the Drinans, whose company alone always inspires fiesta -- and it's a good thing because Acapulco's was not what I was expecting. Harshly-lit, ambiance-starved, and overrun with small children, the restaurant is basically a Mexican Bickfords.

Dining here beneath the dropped ceilings was probably not unlike the "dining in" experience the Bags recently had at their Chinese "take-out" place, Feng Shui. Adding to our bemusement were some non-sequiturian menu selections, including "Make Your Own Combo" where the Combo Tijuana and Combo Mexicali allow you "choice of one" entree. As most upright individuals would note --one choice does not a combo make. James noted this in his order: "I'll have the Taco Combo. In other words, I'll have a Taco."

Other than that, the meals were OK but the bar was shuttered at 10 p.m. So, after some extemporaneous Catholic bashing over our leftover drinks, we swung by Star's to enjoy some obligatory irish music and abundant green foam hats. While Katie N. and I distracted the irish singer with a green foam hat, James N. grabbed his guitar for an impromptu set. All in all the evening resembled a St. Paddy's of yesteryear, minus the Dunkin Donuts cups.

**NOTE: For some reason, Blogger is having technical difficulties with photo uploads today, which, judging from my photos, is in everyone's best interest.

Wetting the Shamrock

Ah, St. Paddy's Day; the unrestrained joys of my youth are flashing before me.

Every March 17th, I can almost smell the beer-soaked floors of the Midnight Court. It's similar to an acid flashback (not that I would know) but instead of going psychedelic at the sound of a Pink Floyd tune, I get a scent memory when I hear an Irish song like Black Velvet Band -- something that is unavoidable on this day. I'm not sure how the Midnight Court, which closed in the early 1990s, got lodged in my Limbic system as I've indulged in the uisce beatha in numerous places on March 17ths past.

Most of my St. Pat's memories from high school sort of blur together but they all involve, in some capacity, drinking peppermint schnapps out of a Dunkin Donuts cup in M Street Park in South Boston. In college, LP and I used to flee the 413 area code to drink green beer and see McMurphy (bums up!) at the Midnight Court. And we'd stay there for about 12 hours. (I believe I just answered my own question on how the scent memory got lodged in my brain.) In my 20s, I recall a movable, Bass Ale-fueled feast with assorted co-workers that began in some questionable South Boston establishments and sloshed back toward downtown as the day wore on. However, St. Patrick's Day eventually became a non-event for many, many years as we grew annoyed by inebriated, step-dancing fools like ourselves and began to scorn all the green drunken sentimentality. I don't feel this way anymore, however.

Right now, James and I are in the grips of a fierce Mexican jones that has gone unquenched for several months. That said, we'll likely be wetting the shamrock at Acapulco's this evening. A few years back we went out to dinner at a Lebanese restaurant on St. Patrick's Day and there were Italian musicians playing Irish drinking songs, the bulk of which were dedicated to a frail blue-haired bird named Mrs. DiBona. Who knows what Acapulco's might have in store? At least we'll have some green guac.

If you have a moment today, check out this English-Gaelic translator where you can learn to say "Happy St. Patrick's Day" or "I'll have the same as the man on the floor."

Slainte!

Oh Deer

( << This is not a photo of the deer I saw)

I was about to jump into the shower the other morning when I was frozen like a deer in a neon shower cap. I was in our upstairs bathroom, which after living here a year still lacks window treatments. Out of the corner of my eye, I glimpsed an animal walking along the brook that runs behind our house. I instantly experienced the requisite heart palpitations and fight-or-flight adrenaline that often accompany my unexpected confrontations with nature, or when I see a bee in the house.

(That is not Vito >>>)

At first I thought the animal was a coyote and prayed Vito was not sniffing around in the bushes out back. But I quickly realized it was a deer. It took a few moments to identify because I've always expected the first deer I'd see would be some majestically-antlered buck like Bambi's dad. Instead, I saw a little doe -- two of them, actually -- drinking from the brook, completely unaware of their shower-capped spectator. I yelled downstairs to James so he could show Caroline. It's a true milestone as it's the first time we've seen a non-domestic animal in our midst since moving here last April -- and the experience was nothing like the false alarm of last fall.

"HIGH" TEA

It was not your typical afternoon in Jefferson, Mass. For those of you who are challenged in your knowledge of 508 geography, Jefferson is a part of Holden, a lovely enclave just outside of Worcester. Here, a bridal shower for LP, like the Olympic torch, officially ignited the chain of events that will lead up to the nuptials on May 6.



WMD's sisters hosted a bridal tea, but very well knew they'd have to accessorize the bridesmaids to downplay our vulgarness, as well as MoHO Di's & Jess' church cleavage. On hand were gorgeous vintage hats that more proper ladies of days gone by may have worn to high tea. LP's hat resembled an elegant wedding cake and most of the b-maids looked like they'd stepped out of a Jane Austen novel -- the very picture of ladylike restraint. The hat I chose was made from sheep-sheared Cookie Monster -- a muppet who is the very picture of zero self control. I must admit, I got attached to my hat by the end of the day even though Lisa and I kept inhaling some of its blue microscopic feather particles.

("Nice lids, ladies," says Pope Benedict)

Regardless of their proper appearances, everyone's inner Cookie Monster busted out at the sweets table, a spread that made everyone wish they'd worn their buffet pants instead of their Sunday best. If LP had taken off her hat, it likely would have been consumed as well. I'm still coming down from my sugar high, a feeling that gives "high tea" a whole new dimension. That said, if this Saturday's event was a preview of things to come, we're in for some good times between now and May 6th.

Baby Bags

Come September, the world will welcome a Baby Bags! Congratulations to Celine & Keith, who are going to be the best parents any wee one could ask for. Just ask Patch.

Random Quizzilla

1) Have you ever ridden on a moped?
Yes. Bermuda, Spring Break 1988.

2) What is the farthest place you've ever traveled to?
Italy or Hawaii -- not sure which one is farther geographically. I'll look that up on Google Earth and get back to you.

3) How would you describe the sound of your voice?
I cringe when I hear my voice on tape. I think I sound like Alice from the Brady Bunch. When I was a smoker, I liked the sound of my voice. It was raspier, smoother and much less grating. I wish I could get that voice back without slowly killing myself.

4) Favorite song(s) in the 6th grade?
I have a vivid memory of sixth grade because it was so traumatic. Spirits in the Material World by the Police. The Message by Grand Master Flash. Ebony & Ivory by Paul McCartney & Stevie Wonder. Goody Two Shoes by Adam Ant. I could go on and on here. Repressed memory: I was really into On the Wings of Love by Jeffrey Osbourne for awhile because an MDC "skate guard" from Porazzo skating rink gave me the "45" and a shrinkwrapped rose from Store 24 one afternoon. I thought it was cool but now I realize I was likely being courted by a pedophile. I think he was 20. Ick. It's a creepy story that is compounded by the fact that On the Wings of Love is probably one of the worst songs ever next to Get out of my Dreams, Get into my Car by Billy Ocean.

5) Name a quality you despise.
Self righteousness. In the case of Imette St. Guillen, the poor young woman from Mission Hill who was killed in NYC: There are so many sanctimonious idiots on the radio and TV implying she is somehow responsible for her own murder because she was drunk at 4 a.m. in NYC. Some people are so desperate to believe they could never meet the same fate that they're playing the "she brought it on herself" card. Anyone with a life has been in Imette's situation more than once. The only difference is luck, not superior morals. It's bad enough her family has to listen to the gruesome details of her death over and over again, not to mention this nonsense from "well-meaning" individuals with their misguided teaching moments.

Cream Shop Friday: A Dreama Come True

For all who have been wondering where Dreama's been the past few months, the kitty's out of the bag. Apparently, she's taken up with the Cloon. Glad to see George has finally come to his senses and moved to Connecticut. One question: Did he bring his pig with him?