Under The Influence

Last night while I lay bundled and warm in my bed the flakes began to fall. Fat, peaceful flakes; softly lit by the street lamps they swirled and twirled to the earth, dusting rooftops and tree limbs with their magic, quieting the air around, lulling the world into a deep winter sleep, putting us all under its spell.

Under the influence of an afternoon turned quiet and still I padded around the house in thick sweat pants, fluffing up the corners of my nest, watching the ground slowly disappear under a thick dusting of sugar. I simmered a pot of soup and brought out the heavy boots from storage while The Holbs shoveled the driveway snow.

Under the influence of a back yard turned winter wonderland the dogs ran, biting mouthfuls of snow. Their barks echoing against the snowy sky, they chased and chased until blissfully exhausted, panting and shivering under the wet snow that clings to their fur.

Under the influence of a night turned frigid I crank on the heaters, light all the candles, pullout the blankets, turn on the Christmas music. My pulse slows, my mind quiets, soft dreams find the room to s-t-r-e-t-c-h. Some knitting and some football and some cold toes in warm socks for me, and a Monday looming with nowhere to be but in this house, under the influence of snow on snow.

And snow and snow and snow.

UPDATED > My Own PERRRRSONAL Brand Of Heroin

Image via the awesomeness of the Internet

The place where you talk about New Moon,

why you're SEEING IT

why you're NOT SEEING IT,

what you LOVED,

what you HATED,

what made you SQUIRM WITH SECOND-HAND EMBARRASSMENT,

what made you you LAUGH AT THE WRONG TIME,

or at the RIGHT TIME,

and what made you you DIE INSIDE FROM HOW AWESOME IT WAS,

That place is

RIGHT HERE

in the comments.

(please and thanks)

* * * * * * * *

If you are sitting on the fence

and are not sure you would like to participate,

then here,

accept this gift:

Now you owe me.

(I'll be updating this post with my thoughts)

(You know, once I see it)

(I am seeing it EXTREMELY LATE TONIGHT)

(So I can't promise you coherency)

(But then, neither could Stephenie Meyer)

(Not to mention our dearest RPattz)

(Nor stutter-brain Kristen Stewart)

(for that matter)

Oh,

for fun,

my previous thoughts on the subject

**UPDATE**

Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh? Oh my gosh. I liked it. I really liked it!

I mean, it was ridiculous, Robert Pattinson? Somebody tell the guy to stand up straight and get some charisma!

And could there be any less chemistry between these actors?

And the cheesy soap opera music in the background?

BUT.

Hello, shirtless Jacob! Easily, Taylor Lautner and Kristen Stewart carried this movie.

There wasn't even any awkward stuttering!

BUT.

The part when Jacob and Bella were thiiiiis close to kissing? The Holbs leaned over and whispered, "Dude, he's going to fall in love WITH HER BABY" and I couldn't stop laughing for five minutes.

There really is no difference between junk food for the body and junk food for the brain. You take it in, it feels good even though you know how bad it really is, and then afterwards you feel disgusting and carry around the bloat with you for three days as a reminder of what you've done.

I know you know what I mean.

BUT.

I loved it. It was, shockingly, well done.

I'm still not sure how I feel about all this.

AND.

The last five seconds of the movie? Completely, stupidly fantastic.

Sir Barnabus MacDufflePants

This is a post about my stupid dog Barney.

Ohh Barney, Barney, Barney.

Now, I know that you all come here for two things: The Holbshunk (who is so dreamy these days or so I've been told), and Peter Pan, who is basically the dog equivalent of Maya Angelou. The Holbs is hot and The Pan is bizarre; together they make up the bulk of my life's interestingness. If ever I need a moment of entertainment I like to look at Peter Pan and see what he can come up with for me. Usually he's doing something weird, like analyzing the pattern of the wood grain on the furniture or sitting forlornly under the bag of doggie toys hung just out of his reach making needy eyes at me. That dog is always thinking about something, you know. You can stare into Peter's beady little eyes and see the depths of the oceans, the heights of the mountains, the eternities of the Heavens, the square root of Pi. He is just a weird little dog.

And then, there's Barney.

Barney is stupid.

You stare into Barneys eyes and all you see is liquid goofiness.

Sometimes The Holbs calls him Blackey and I think that sounds horribly racist, but don't you?

Barnaby MacDuff joined our family on a stupid day in July. I can't really say what possessed us to go into the pet store that day. We were just tooling around town coming up with random things to entertain ourselves with ("Wanna get a soda?" "Sure!" "Wanna walk the mall?" "Sure!" "Wanna buy a dog?" "Why not?") and then there we were, staring into the eyes of the cutest, sweetest, tiniest, stupidest little baby Scottie. Words don't do it justice, the cuteness.

He was only barely six weeks old, which is a travesty if you know anything about puppy development. Puppies should not be taken from their mothers before they are are at least ten weeks old. We saw that little dude sitting there in that cold metal cage and I just knew it was too soon for him, that he was grieving and alone, that he needed littermates, that he needed a mama.

So, duh. We brought that stupid dog home so I could breastfeed him.

When Barnaby sits it is not with the daintiness of a tender Peter Pan, who sits almost in slow motion, his back erect, his ears perked just-so. If Peter Pan had pinkies they would constantly be up. Peter Pan is a gentleman. When Barnaby sits he just collapses onto the ground with a heavy THUNK, legs spewed every which way. Either it is deliberate or not, I haven't decided yet. I mean, maybe he selects his resting spot ahead of time and then artfully dives into it or something or else maybe he really is just ambling along with no preconceived strategy to life until something deep within his psyche shouts FALL! and then, thunk. I guess depending on your perspective on life it is either one of these things.

Sometimes I like to play a little game with Barnaby when he is laying on the couch. I stand in front of him with my arms folded and just look at him. The minute we make eye contact his tail is rotating fast enough to propel a small jet airliner. Thunk-thunk-thunk-thunk-thunk it goes against the back of the couch, his eyes open as wide as they will go while he lays there like a dead fish. I turn my back to him and the thunking slows, until it stops and he sighs. I give him a minute and then I turn around again and look at him, and whump-whump-whump-whump goes his tail against the couch again. I can do this for hours.

Barnaby MacDuff will make you fall in love. He has these stupid soulful eyes - one look and you're a goner. Everybody loves Barnaby MacDuff, but do not mistake, Barnaby MacDuff does not love you. Barnaby MacDuff is not a lover. Barnaby MacDuff is a fighter. All day long he prowls the back yard fence just looking for someone to have a scrape with. He barks at dogs ten times his size like he stands a chance. He growls at two hundred pound men and has challenged the elderly to a duel on more than one occasion. He is brave, make no mistake. He will take you down, man.

Barnaby MacDuff is always getting himself into trouble. He is just so stupid, it is like trouble follows him around, fascinated by the amount of sheer stupidity it can convince Barney into. After all, Barnaby has a bottomless appetite for adventure.

I imagine that the minute we leave the house it goes something like this:

Barney:

HEY! GARBAGE! WANNA WANNA? HUH HUH?!

Peter:

{sighs patiently}

I told you I am contemplating the eternities tonight, weird dog. I do not have time for your childishness. There is too much suffering in the world for me to be concerned with the contents of the bathroom trash receptacle. Besides, I love my mother and I would never.

Barney:

. . . OKAY! LET'S GO!

And then I come home to used q-tips and empty toothpaste tubes dotted with teeth marks and dried out bleach wipes scattered all over the carpet and I'm like, What the ? And then there's stupid Barney with a stupid little look on his face like WU-OH! Meanwhile Peter Pan is off penning a sonnet under the bed or reading Proust or whatever. I swear to you this is how it is around here.

And then this is my favorite part. I look Barney square in his guilty little eyes, put one hand on my hip, point a finger at him with the other, and I growl. Ohhhhhhhhhhhh . . .

His lip curls up over his teeth and he smiles a crooked little smile at me.

Barrrrrrneeeyyyyyyyyy. You have to say it softly at first, like something's coming, something mean and nasty and angry. He'll scooch down on his belly and duck his head down with his ears cockedd back, but his tail wags violently, giving him away.

BAAARRRRRRNNNEEEEYYYYYY I growl. I get right up into his face and he starts to squirm, grunting and wiggling in pure guilty delight.

YOU BAD BOYYYYYYY! I like to tug on his beard for emphasis.

That is his cue and he is off, circling the room at dizzying speeds, growling and huffing and skipping and running into my legs with his head as a battering ram. This is his apology. It is just adorable.

And then I laugh and laugh while I scratch his stupid ears and he wags that stupid tail. Because how do you stay mad at a stupid dog who loves getting into trouble that much?

And then I clean up his stupid mess, while Peter watches reruns of Arrested Development on my laptop.

* * * *

Whenever people come to the house I have to ask them,

Who is your favorite?

I know what kind of person you are

By which dog you select.

There's no real right answer

(Except there totally is.)

So, I'm curious.

Indulge me?

I'd Like To Teach The World To Sing

Don't you just love these two knuckleheads?

I am feeling pretty amorous feelings about my life today to tell you the truth.

I don't know, it's just the way the clouds leaned in close to kiss the mountains, the way Maggie jumped with excitement when she saw me for our walk and how she told me she'd been so excited to tell me about her weekend. Something about how the leaves swirled around our feet as we dodged kids on bikes in the afternoon scurry, and how afterwards I ran the fastest and strongest and freest run I've ever been able to run before, and how I even remembered to fold The Holbsy's laundry too.

How can you not love a day like that?

I hummed Jingle Bells all the way through my grocery shopping. The tune gave me the just the pep I needed to maneuver the crowded aisles and not get upset when I was violently cart-boxed at the jam section. I just hummed my little hum until the aisleways reopened and I could look both ways and cross myself for good luck before venturing out and risking spinal cord injury again. I mean, the WinCo is a scary place on a Tuesday afternoon! Scary but lovely! When I got back to the car I saw that miraculously I had completed my grocery rounds in under sixteen minutes! I mean, who does that? It was a Christmas miracle!

A word on the WinCo, if you like. The WinCo is a CRAZY PLACE. If you've never been to the WinCo in Moscow before then you'd never know the thrill that is taking your life into your own hands to buy bread and a gallon of rice milk. It is just pure craziness in there. It's like I go to WinCo and then so does the whole town, all at the same time, and it is people! carts! food! lines! screaming children! bulk wheat!

Now that I consider it truthfully, I do not really think it possible that there are enough homes in the Moscow area to house all of the people who seem to magically appear inside the WinCo when I walk through the doors. They are like extras in a movie, existing solely to flesh out the aisles, these fake people with their fake carts full of fake food that you just know they're not going to eat because as soon as you leave the store someone will call CUT and these people will just vaporize into thin air. I'm fairly certain that the WinCo mystically becomes empty and creepy and dark as a vacant hangar the moment the doors slide shut behind me. Otherwise, how to explain it? I mean, that really is the most logical way.

Also I bought five kinds of mustards!

True story, The Holbs texted me today like so as I was chatting it up with my friend K-to-the-Endall:

Were you trying to make a statement by buying ten different mustards?

Are you as enamored by that as I am? Swoon! (I hate that word a little bit.) What kind of a statement could you possibly make with mustards?

I mean, there was this one time when I made him a week's worth of peanut butter and honey sandwiches for work all at once because he kept nagging at me to make him a lunch every morning, so then he just had to take these soggy sandwiches to work all week and isn't that funny? I mean, that was definitely a statement-making food decision, but mustards?

(I did buy him real mayonnaise today which, well, if that's not a statement of deep and abiding love then I give up.)

The loving truth is that as I pushed my cart down the aisle while singing of Santa Claus and his impending sojourn to the southern parts of the globe I happened to spot all these mustards just sitting there being all cute and diverse and mustardly, and I just fell in love with them. I mean, I fell in love with mustards.

Mustard! Good heavens! Dijon and Honey Dijon and Sweet Mustard and Sweet Hot Mustard and Spicy Mustard and Deli Mustard, all with cute cartoony German men on the front wearing a handlebar mustache and lederhosen, I mean, come on! What a world to live in with so many choices of mustards! And what do you do with mustards? I mean, really. Such attention to detail here! I had to buy them all because they were like a family. My family. My family of mustards.

Don't you love that?

I find I just want to kiss things. Can I kiss you? Here, I will kiss Petey.

Oh! Here's another! I loved going to K-to-the-Endalls house tonight and getting forgetful and going to the right house number but on the wrong street only to find the creepiest house in all of Moscow. The creepiest. What are the odds of that happening? I loved calling her to tell her that her house was scary and having her say in an offended tone No, my house is Charming. I loved the relief I felt when I realized that she did not in fact live in some rapist's back yard but rather in a lovely and really very charming and well lit part of town. Because Moscow isn't scary by definition you know but I was still pretty sure I was about to die anyway.

I also love the fact that we established that I can blog about this and she will not think I am a dork.

Because I am a dork, and I would deserve it, you know.

What a world!

* * * *

What, you want more? Well, I have it on the D-L that there are more chicken hijinks happening at Nat Nests, and also there's a really interesting marital advice request at Ask The Rat that could really use your eyeballs and the wisdom connected to them via ocular nerves or spinal cords or whatever is that holds it all together. You're welcome!

There Is A Reason Being Called Chicken Aint Good, And Other Musings For Your Internetly Perusal

I have been pondering all night on what I should tell you about my day. What did I do today that in the retelling would make you feel all sparkly inside? What was so great and so fantastic and so filled with magic that I would be selfish to withhold? What happened to me today that will so bless and inspire the Internet world that I will have done my good deed for my lifetime and will die in peace someday knowing that the world was a better place for what I had typed on my poor Mac (which I am pretty sure is going to give up the ghost at any minute and then what will I do with myself, I mean, what?) I am going for the gusto here today! This is not just for entertainment, you know! This is important stuff!

Should I wax poetic for you about how I happened to cash in my last FREE DRINK coupon at the McDonalds today, right smack dab on the nose of the last-day-to-cash-it-in deadline? It could be a life changer, that story! It was like the heavens opened and God said, Natalie, Thou Shalt Have Soda! God would totally say something like that to me.

Truthfully it was a stroke of pure dumb luck. I was scrambling to assemble an assortment of doodads and odds and ends that I needed for some errands and then there it was, peeking out at me from the bottom of the reusable grocery bag that always forgets to come inside with me when I do my grocery shopping. It said FREE DRINK and I went, OH REALLY? and then I declared, YOU ARE COMING WITH ME! and then the lady at the drive-thru shouted THIS IS THE LAST DAY! and I said NO CHEESING?! And then I danced a little dance in the car while I sipped it and I just knew that things would be okay! This twenty minute episode of my afternoon was enough to make all of my day worthwhile, so I could tell you all about it, and possibly it could change your life? No?

Or I could share with you how I found the perfect go-out-and-run time! Should I tell you about that? I mean, it may not sound as impressive to you as it is unto me, but okay, allow me to lay the groundwork for this discovery first so that you may revel in its incredibleness or not at your own discretion.

Now. As anybody knows, running in the evening is the best. It just is, I'm not going to go into specifics. Okay, I am. Evening running is the best because your muscles are loose and your mind is full to bojangles and because by then you could really use the stress release so you pound it out and take a shower and go to bed and it's like the perfect thing. Evening runs are just the reason for the season. But, sun sets, Daylight Savings, snow, ad infinitum etc, I'm not going to get into it. So. That's out.

Then there's morning runs. Anyone who is anybody will know that mornings are the very worst possible times for running. (Don't even try to talk me out of this one. Okay, go ahead and try. But I am very stubborn, just ask my husband.) Here is why morning runs are the Brad Pitts: you are cranky, your bones haven't fully solidified yet, your muscles are still irked from you sleeping on them all wrong, the cold air is rude, your feet are entirely disconnected from your body and try to scurry off behind you while your shoulders get all hunched up past your forehead. The result is you look like some weird kind of dancing gypsy running all floosy like down the street and not to mention it hurts like what. It does! When I run in the mornings I always keep having to stop and pout and gasp and wonder why the world is trying to kill me, so, that's out.

I'd never tried the glorious 1:30 run just after oatmeal until just today my friends and I have to tell you, life has suddenly found reason. My muscles were just loose enough, it was still light out, I had acquired enough thoughts throughout the morning to sustain 30 minutes of ponderage, my feet stayed solidly connected to my ankles, shoot, everybody was happy. And then I decided the 1:30 run is like the Empire Strikes Back of runs. It's not got to the Ewoks part yet and it also has the better theme music. So. As you can see I hardly need to say too much more about it here, and now that I'm done I'm pretty sure that's not what I was meant to tell you for your life to change because actually that was pretty pointless, so let's move on.

Maybe what I really should be telling you about is my sushi date?

I allowed my Holbsdude to take me on a real schfancy dinner date tonight on account of he had some making up to do if you follow (do you follow?), and while seated and waiting for our waitress to take our order I got to practice my best Randy Lovin act with the Korean menu items. We lived in Korea for a few years when I was a kid and I can never see the world Bulgogi without hearing my dad's voice in my head and picturing the way he pulls his chin back on the "bul." So I got to Bulgogi at the table under my breath to my heart's content while my patient Holbsgogi made the order. Rainbow Roll, tempura, some tuna for me because I looooove the mercury (so tasty!), and then for something new, a hand roll and an order of japchae.

And that is when I finally met the sushi of my nightmares, my sushi nemesis if you will, my sushi antihero. It kicked my butt and made me gag and I started to question my ability to do brave things anymore. This is not an exaggeration! It. Was. Bleak. Suddenly I was a hack, a total sushi hack, and I felt so ashamed. I wanted to cry.

My life as I knew it was gone, changed in an instant thanks to some dumb sushi chef. I would no longer be able to brag about my culinary heroism. My tales of taste bud dominance would no longer impress or inspire! I would be no more the adventuresome food girl who happily gulps kimchi like it's no big thing and drowns tacos in the spiciest of habanero. No, those days were gone, fading into the distance, while my spicy tuna laughed in my face and called me names. I had entered into the realm of the wussy. I could see it, pale and nerdy on my horizon. I gulped and faced the new life ahead of me, resigned and determined to face it like a big girl, this new life of inhalers and pocket protectors and sun block and allergies and "my delicate constitution!" and basically I was becoming my husband. I put down my chop sticks in defeat. I sighed heavy.

Then I entered the angry stage of my grief. I mean, who in their right mind serves three pounds of ground up spicy tuna wrapped in the saltiest gag-inducing nori wrap of ever and calls that food? I mean, I almost died. No really I almost died!

Then came acceptance, as I remembered we can't really afford sushi these days anyway. So.

Well, that obviously wasn't it either.

I think what I will tell you instead is a little ditty about the stinky raw chicken that I've been too chicken to throw away. It is the most interesting thing about my day, after all, now that I really stop to consider things. So I bought this stupid chicken last week for a recipe which turned out delicious but didn't require use of all of him, so I had these extra chicken legs left over that I'd decided to save. I thought naively that I could learn to get over my chicken aversion, and also think of something glamorous and chickeny and tasty that would wow my husband into thinking I was some kind of goddess. You know, kill two chickens with one stone. But I didn't ever use this chicken because the fact is I just hate chicken. Because chicken is the rudest.

(One time when we were dating the Holbs got salmonella from an Artic Circle chicken sandwich and puked and puked and puked while I stalwartly decided to love him anyway and bring him Gatorades even when the threat of vomit explosions were at their highest and vomit and Natalie go together like Bert and Ernie and girl muppets. See? Rude.)

So there was this chicken flesh still rotting slowly in the fridge, dead and clammy and stinky. I mean it was fresh and completely edible but every time anybody opened the fridge an odor would emerge into the air like unto a waft of lusty raw chicken farts. I don't like chicken. I don't like chicken! I'm sorry but I just hate chicken!

So I checked with The Holbs.

Can I throw this away? I asked, feeling ashamed for considering throwing away perfectly good nasty chicken body parts when there are starving people in China. (Are there anymore?)

Better do something with it! he advised.

I pondered my options.

Chicken noodle soup a la barf?

Chicken and dumplings and retching?

Chicken enchiladas, smothered in e. coli? Or whatever?

I mean, The Holbs likes chicken but guys, he wouldn't even make me a Crystal Lite tonight, so . . .

So I threw those mother effers out. I did it. I took matters into my own hands! I took back ownership of my fridge, and my destiny! Two dollars and fifty cents worth of perfectly fine, perfectly farty, perfectly nasty little chicken legs, double wrapped in plastic and held as far away from my body as possible by hands covered in oven mitts while I held my breath and plugged my nose and prayed for salvation. I dumped those suckers straight into the garbage bin outside with a Good Riddance and a Praise Jesus! And then when I came back inside it was like the aura in my little kitchen had miraculously changed, the evil spirits had been purged, light and life and little butterflies reigned again and I knew that things were going to be okay. I took charge today, I did! And you can too!

And that is the story that will change your life. I mean, I'm pretty sure anyway.

How do you like to eat your chicken?

Maybe some day I will give it

(and the stupid spicy tuna)

another go?