Walk With Me

I've been riding my bike anytime I need to go somewhere locally (and just for fun), but the other day really topped it. I packed two empty half-gallon milk bottles into my back pack, rode over to the Food Co-op, traded the bottles for two full ones, picked up some eggs and butter, and then rode home. I feel like I should tie-dye something, or weave something from hemp. But it feels *good* to be an Earth Mama, even while it's vaguely embarrassing.

I've been biking and walking a lot, and it's been very good. Pittsburgh really does have the best city parks in the whole wide world: (In fact, the 2008 International Urban Parks Conference is going to be here this year.) Need proof? Fine: Here are some pictures I took while walking right near the field where The Boy has soccer practice:


Okay, this one isn't in the park, but from the park. Look how hilly Pittsburgh is! How'd you like to live in that house on the end?


This is sort of in the park. I haven't stood on railroad tracks since I was a kid. They still smell of creosote, and it still smells good.



Did I mention this park is in Oakland, the part of the city that comprises the University of Pittsburgh (the building in the background is the Cathedral of Learning, which the [stupid, mean] kids who went to small, private Duquesne University referred to as the Height of Ignorance. Charmed, I'm sure.), Carnegie Mellon University, and 9,000 hospitals? But if you're willing to take just a little walk, you can pretend you're in the woods. I do like Pittsburgh.


Under the Bridge. (Sorry.)


This bridge.

Don't you wish you lived here? And if you already do, aren't you glad?

Best Web Comic Ever

David Foster Wallace, the hottest footnote fetishist in the world, is one of my secret boyfreinds.

I found the comic at Pictures for Sad Children.

Practically Perfect in Every Way (No, Not ME.)

You know how there are some writers you just like spending time with, no matter what they're writing about? Well, Jennifer Niesslein--co-editor of Brain, Child magazine--is like that for me. She's the kind of writer who makes you feel like she's just hanging out to talk to you, and that she's glad you're in on the conversation.

She's written a book called Practically Perfect in Every Way, which is her account of the time she spent follwing the advice of all the major self-help gurus in an attept to become, well, practically perfect in every way. I read the book last year, because I couldn't pass up her writing or that title, and it didn't disappoint. Much of the book is very funny, but the best parts come when Niesslein looks at herself and her life with her family and wonders just what perfect is, and who gets to decide that.

If you've ever thought you or your life needed improving--especially if you've found yourself standing sheepishly in the Self Help section of the bookstore, hoping against your better instincts that a book could help you along--you'll appreciate Niesslein's book.

TV Commercial

The Boy and I are spending this evening pretending it's not Turn Off Your TV Week; we're flicking back and forth between CNN for the results of the PA primary and game seven of the Fliers/Caps series . . . talk about awesome TV! Go Hillary! Go Caps!

But we just saw a commercial for Just for Men's Touch of Gray hair color, wherein middle age men frolic on the beach with hot women, flashing peace signs and saying things like, "Never trust anyone over 90," all to the tune of Sunshine of Your Love. GAH! Again, I say GAH!

Look:



Sweet Fancy Moses, but those Baby Boomers drive me MAD!

Two Movies

One holds up, and one doesn't:

Wayne's World was cute in 1993, but I'm watching it with The Boy right now (because we heard Bohemian Rhapsody on the radio, which reminded me that he'd probably like the movie), and while it's not at all inappropriate for the boy, it's also not at all good.

Valley Girl, on the other hand, is still awesome. I got it from the library and watched it while The Boy was at Pitt's Blue & Gold game this evening. It's 25 years old, and still sweet and funny. The clothes are really dated, but the story still works. Speaking of the clothes, the girls look kind of silly (Julie, the main character, wears a big Woody Woodpecker pin at one point), especially with the nasty colors, but they're still really cute over all. The guys, however, look like total tools except for Nicolas Cage--he's never been as cute as he was then (he's adorable on the beach, especially). Look at the clothes the guys are wearing at the mall, and then watch them all dancing at the party. Priceless:



Here's a little Randy From Hollywood High:



To summarize: Wayne's World=Bad; Valley Girl=Totally Awesome!

Inspiration

The Kids in the Hall

They're back! And cuter than ever!

Bookshelves

Look!  It's a whole blog dedicated to nothing but bookshelves!  Swoon!  Love!  Covet!  Exclaim!

This folding bookcase DOOR is my favorite--you have to scroll down to see what's really going on.  I'd love to have a house that this would make sense in.

I'm Giddy as a Baby On a Swing*

Okay, maybe not that giddy, but I can't say I'm not thrilled about all the sunshine we've had lately. Yes, it poured icy rain over The Boy's soccer game Sunday, but it's been chilly and sunny--my personal favorite combination--for days.

I happen to live across the street from one of the greatest city parks in all the land, so I've been taking some lovely walks, trying to cure my Nature Deficit Disorder. (Maybe there's no such thing, but the phrase has stuck in my head since I first heard about it on NPR.) Being out on the trails makes me happy. As does the fact that I can take a picture with the camera on my cell phone, e-mail it to myself, and then add it to a blog post. I don't mind saying that it might as well be magic, for all I know how it works, but I really appreciate it.

***

Note--The following includes mostly girly stuff:

I just read Jennifer Weiner's newest book, Certain Girls. I've liked Jennifer Weiner since I read her first book, Good in Bed; she's one of those writers for whom I actually spring for the hardback, because I like to give her my money. I'm glad I bought this one, because I still like her, but . . . I didn't love the book like I'd hoped. Certain Girls is a sequel to Good In Bed, picking up about ten years later. I don't know if my tastes have changed since reading it, or if Weiner has changed as a writer, but I just didn't feel this one the way I did most of her others. Generally her books suck me right in, and I read them in a matter of hours. I got this one Sunday morning, and didn't finish it until last night.

The book had its good moments, for sure, but I ended up feeling kind of manipulated. I don't know. This was almost like a Sue Miller or Meg Wolitzer, but . . . not quite. Maybe Weiner was trying to go for something a little more "higher brow women's fiction" but her editor wanted to stick with pure chick lit? Either way, it almost didn't work. Still, I like Weiner and I hope she keeps writing--I'd miss her if she gave it up.

In other girly news, I've been thinking about Romance. Not because I have a man-friend or anything, but, maybe because it's spring. Anyway, I've come to the conclusion that I have issues with Grand Romantic Gestures (TM). For example, do you know the scene in Better Off Dead when Lane takes Monique to the empty restaurant and feeds her a TV dinner? I think that’s totally sweet, and would have loved it. Lane ruins the whole thing for me, though, when he pulls out his saxophone and plays a solo. Monique sits there smiling, presumably thrilled. I would have sat there smiling, all right, but I would have been mortified. And I would have had a very hard time not laughing—out of nervousness if nothing else.

How is that romantic? What is the correct/desired behavior in that situation? Are you supposed to eat? Sit there staring? Are you genuinely supposed to be swept away by the music, staring at your smooth-blowing beloved, frozen in time?

I just don’t get it. Although I’m okay with (to continue citing John Cusack roles) Lloyd Dobler’s In Your Eyes stunt, because if you were moved to feel romantic toward him, you could go outside and lock eyes, and he would just put down the boom box so you could jump into his arms. Not so with that stupid sax, though.

Look at him over there. Sigh. Even all these years later (I think he's aging beautifully; the saggy, craggy face works well for him), I'd leave my husband for him. Oh, wait! I don't have a husband! And he doesn't have a wife! If he'd just hang out in the greater Pittburgh area once in a while, I know we'd be brilliant together.

Important issues covered here, right? Sigh. I'd better go get some lunch.

*It Might As Well Be Spring--Oscar Hammerstein

Soccer in the City

The Boy plays soccer, which is an oddly foreign thing to me; I grew up in a western Pennsylvania thirty miles and a million light years away from the western PA he’s growing up in. (That’s a good thing, for the most part.) Playing soccer was unheard of when I was a kid—most of the boys I knew played football in the fall, basketball in the winter, and baseball in the spring from the time we entered school. That changed, of course, as some of the boys became better at one sport, or picked up wrestling, or realized they weren’t cut out for sports at all, but one thing was certain: There was no soccer in my hometown in the 70s and 80s.

(Notice that I said that, “most of the boys I knew.” That was on purpose. Girls couldn’t play football, couldn’t play girls’ basketball until junior high, and couldn’t play girls’ softball until they were ten. Little girls didn’t have sports, but they could take dance lessons, gymnastics, and . . . BATON.)

Something changed while I was in college, though, and now soccer is as common in western PA (and my hometown) as it seems to be anywhere else in America. That’s fine with me, despite the fact that I chafe at being called a soccer mom. Ick.

I’m also not crazy about the Everyone’s a Winner mentality that surrounds so much of youth soccer. Because you know what? Everyone’s NOT a winner. It’s not that I’m some kind of competitive freak, driven to see my kid plow over other kids in an unrelenting march to be victorious, but I don’t see why it’s so bad for kids to learn that some people are better at some things than others are.

Take The Boy, for example. He played in an indoor recreation league over the winter, and played well enough to be invited to try out for the city’s more competitive travel league. He was flattered and did try out, and was offered a spot on what is clearly the team’s B Squad. (The team is divided into two teams who practice together but have separate game schedules, and the team The Boy is on is nowhere near as good as the team he’s not on: They were shut out 8-0 in a scrimmage.) That’s all fine by me, but what’s NOT fine by me is the fact that I was chastised by the team’s manager when I referred to it as the B Team: “We don’t like to use that kind of terminology.”

What a bunch of crap! Every kid on both teams knows which team is better (8-0), so why do we have to act like it’s a secret? Stupid.

Anyway, the point of this whole post wasn’t to criticize. (Imagine that.) I wanted to write about the fact that The Boy’s team played a game in the suburbs last Sunday. I am the first person to admit that Pittsburgh is more of a big town than it is a city, and that it certainly isn’t the most diverse big town in the world, but I was proud of the fact that The Boy’s team isn’t made up only of white boys, as the suburban team was.

I only knew other white kids when I was growing up, and most of them were Catholics of either Italian or Eastern European descent; my world didn’t look at all like the world Sesame Street brought into my living room. I didn’t know any black kids, or Jewish kids, or Indian kids, or Hispanic kids. Everyone I grew up with was pretty much exactly like me, and woe to those (especially the boys) who weren’t.

Thirty miles and twenty-five years later, though, The Boy knows and hangs out with kids from a bunch of different backgrounds. Hooray for soccer in the city, right? Or is it even that big a deal? I mean, yes, the kids all look different, and have names like Yakob and Hakim and Talus and Freisle to go along with the Dylans and Haydens, but . . . is that good enough? Are the differences in these kids just in their names, looks, and holiday celebrations? Is that really making a contribution toward peace and harmony? Because isn’t that what “embracing diversity” is supposed to do?

TV Time

Well, I didn't go for the walk in the sunshine yesterday. The soccer parents got an e-mail from the team's manager asking for a parent or two to hang around throughout the practice, as one of the coaches had his tires slashed in the parking lot last week.


Do you know what this means? It means I had an excuse to sit on my ass! OF COURSE I didn't mind staying at the field through the whole practice--I am *very* good at sitting for 90 minutes, after all.


That doesn't mean that I didn't take time to appreciate my life, however, because I mean business about that. Want to know what I did? I took my laptop and spent most of the hour-and-a-half watching episodes from the first season of How I Met Your Mother on DVD (there is something to be said for watching TV sitting on a blanket outside). The first season is something like 22 episodes on three DVDs, and I've now made it through the first two. I got the set from the library and it's due back soon, so I'm hoping to get through the last episodes by Saturday.


I haven't watched a sit-com with any regularity since Friends, so I don't know what else is out there and what I might be missing, but I think HIMYM is very well done. My Friends memories are pretty hazy, especially if I try to think back to the first season, but I think I can argue that HIMYM is better all around. The writing is better, the acting is better . . . the Friends cast was relatively new to TV, if I remember correctly (I think the only ones I'd seen before were Chandler and Monica, whose real names I can't remember . . . wait . . . Courtney Cox and . . . not David Schwimmer, not Matt LeBlanc, WHAT is his NAME? I've been trying to rely less on Google, and I don't want to look it up . . . MATTHEW PERRY!!!!!!!!!! Thank GOD! Matthew Perry!).


Ahem. I've been worried about early-onset Alzheimer's brought on by the use of anti-anxiety medicine, so things like this are kind of a big deal. Forgive me.


SO. HIMYM. Where was I? Oh, yes: The cast. How can you go wrong with Jason Segel (Freaks & Geeks) and Alyson Hannigan (Buffy)? You can't. And Neil Patrick Harris*! He's brilliant at being attractive and repulsive at the same time, and I love him. I hadn't seen the other two principals before, but they do more than hold their own with their more experienced cast mates. I even love Bob Saget as the voice of Future Ted, who--in the year 2030--is telling his son and daughter the story of . . . how he met their mother. [I will admit that I harbor tender feelings for the cast of Full House (aside from Dave Coulier--I never liked that Joey for a minute).]


HIMYM called itself a love story in reverse. It's about friends and love and relationships and all the stuff Friends was about, but it seems more real to me, which I think is weird, since I was nearly the same age as the Friends characters, and am a good ten years older than the HIMYM characters . . . but maybe that's why it works better? Because (in my best crone voice) it's nice to see what the young people are up to these days?


Sigh.


Whatever. I know I'm late to the party, and that that show has enough awards to prove its worth without my endorsement, but it's funny and clever and sometimes sweet without being cloying, and it's just good TV about characters you can actually care about. If you haven't seen it and your library has the DVDs, I recommend it.


One final thing: I can't decide whether it's better to take the approach of my secret boyfriend, David Foster Wallace, and riddle my posts with footnotes for all of my digressions, as with the Neil Patrick Harris remark below, or to keep stuffing things into parentheses. If you have an opinion, I'd like to hear it.



*I'm not sure why he plays the same sort of role when he's playing himself in Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle. Is it because he's gay and playing hard against stereotype? Or playing hard to mock a straight stereotype? But I suppose that's an investigation for another post.

Hello

Welcome to Get Shirty, established to share with you my plans for and progress toward world domination.

Not really. But I am hoping to share some plans and progress here, with the idea that writing things down will make me more accountable for following through.

You see, I am a the very model of a modern major cliche: Approaching middle-age, overweight, struggling with money, lazy, and generally crabby. I'm not unhappy, mind you, but I tend to be . . . a bit of a curmudgeon, and I'm okay with that. What I'm not okay with is the fact that I'm sort of complacent, and letting time fly by. I'm not going to run out and pierce my navel or date a twenty-year-old boy or anything, but I *am* going to try to make more of an effort to appreciate my life.

Saying that makes me cringe, because it sounds so Pollyanna-ish, but it's true. I'm not going to give up my favorite past time of reading on the couch (soon it'll be warm enough to read on the porch--yay!), but I do want to spend more time out in the world. And I'm also thinking that I might want to look into acting more like a grown-up. (More on that later.)

We'll see how it goes. I'm going to take a walk tonight, which is a step (boo!) in the right direction.

And now . . . to work.