CHIPS AND SMIDGES

• My breath stinks right now. Onions. And whatever else those wizard Mexicans put in their crack salsa. After yoga I met Jim and Dustin and his lady friend at Miguel’s for dinner. I polished off a basket of chips single-handedly, consumed at least a pint of salsa, made a quesadilla disappear in seconds even though there was a smidge of guac on the tips (ick), and then battled Jim for the last bites of fried ice cream. Yogis eat, people. We eat like nobody’s business.

• I have a bald spot in my left eyebrow right now and I don't want to talk about it.

• Lately—and justifiably methinks—my arms are my pride and joy.

• Something very important has happened. I found jeans that fit. I am 32 years old, and I finally found jeans that fit. I’m short, I’ve got thighs, and I do not have any chest to speak of. It is therefore a royal pain in my ample ass to find me clothes that fit. If pants are short enough they’re too tight through the thighs. If a shirt fits around my waist it’s too baggy in the bosom. Enter Banana Republic Petites. All my work clothes that fit without alterations are BR Petites. In a blow of brilliance I realized that those people make jeans too! I now have three pair and Goodwilled all of my ill-fitting denim. 

• Today I got new perfume. My mom got a new knee. 

• Last week it was a year since my sweet James made a Tiffany box descend from the sky in yoga class in order to ask me to marry him. We were already happy together. We're happier now. He makes me feel secure and protected. He feels loved and supported. We complement each other. We're partners. He is my best friend. Please God, never let him die.

• I startle very easily. I get so far in my head that Jim will bang on the walls and stomp his feet up the stairs so that I hear him coming, because if he doesn't and then walks in the room without my having heard him, I scream. “But you don’t live alone,” he’ll tell me. This is true. It is also irrelevant. Yesterday I apparently forgot that there is a mirror on the wall in the closet, peripherally glimpsed the shadow of my own reflection, and screamed.

• Ben had a bad dream this morning and when he came in our room frightened—as kids do—and told me about it he said that he dreamed that “there were bad men in the house and they were teleporting out.” I was torn between sympathy for his distress and delight that an eight-year-old used the word “teleporting” straight out of a dead sleep at 5:30AM.

• On Sunday I tore through my closet for ten minutes looking for this one bra. I found it on me.

• To answer everyone’s absolute favorite question of late: No. Despite the line local church leaders have been fed, absolutely no one mistreated in the infidelity disaster has received even an attempt at an apology from Mark and Carrie. Not wronged spouses. Not kids. No one. So probably don’t believe that made-amends garbage. It’s garbage.

• Yesterday my dad texted me to say that he “nearly worships” my husband because he “is a warrior.”

• My grandma did the whole boat-from-Ireland-to-America-and-signed-the-leger-at-Ellis-Island thing. It’s not infrequent I’m told, “You look Irish.” No shit. I’m pail as paper. My hair turns reddish even when it’s dyed brown. Most of those splotches on my skin are freckles. I dig The Chieftains. I look dynamite in green. Notwithstanding, I forgot that it was St. Patrick’s Day. 

• I have a hair appointment tomorrow. Hence by law today was my very best hair day.