Things I learned while totally unable to sleep last night

If you visit the Galapagos islands, you can get really close to the animals, but you must stick to the trails and be accompanied by a guide at all times.

The Steve Martin-Beyonce Pink Panther remake is a truly terrible movie.

There is a section of water (in South America, I think?) where the jellyfish are so protected and safe that they no longer have the ability to sting. You can dive amongst them and touch them.

The ending of Rebecca the book is a bit different than Rebecca the movie. Also, if I was casting a remake, I'd pick Romola Garai for the second Mrs. de Winter, Helen Mirren for Mrs. Danvers, and, hmm...Colin Firth? for Maxim. Still thinking on that last one.

Flooding has hit New Jersey, Westchester, and Connecticut due to yesterday and Monday's heavy rains.

Summer food idea: grilled tuna London broil with a wasabi sauce, paired with grilled pineapple. Sounds delish, right? I got up and ate a handful of dry frosted shredded wheat at that point. Unfortunately, Barbecue U is an otherwise boring cooking show.

The Thirteenth Amendment was passed because some worried that Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation was more a symbol, a piece of rhetoric, and that southern states would find a way around it.

It's really weird going back to work having not slept since the time you left yesterday. On the one hand you feel like you were just here and on the other hand you feel like you've been through a year in the meantime. Jury's still out.

Yes, I do want to see that movie. Why, don't you??

Thirty more minutes till I take off for Brooklyn at a trot, ready to hop in the car and head down to Maryland for Liz's birthday and some time with the kiddos...I'm sorry I won't get to see my family on this trip, but until someone really does invent a Hot Tub Time (or Travel) Machine, there's just never enough time...

Have a great weekend!

This is not how to dissent.

You know WWJDefinitelyNotD? Threaten people's lives, send hate mail (sometimes with powder enclosed), shout racist names, cut people's propane tanks...

Up close and personal.

I cringe from political debate among my friends and family members. Chris will tell you about the gymnastics I do to avoid hot button topics at family gatherings (because it makes me uncomfortable to be around arguments AND because I get so disheartened realizing that people I love have views that I am, in some cases, sickened by). So I wasn't going to post anything on my blog 'cause I didn't want to ruffle any feathers.

But then I thought, literally thought, "WWJD?" and decided I really can't hide the light under a bushel.

I am so happy that we passed health care reform, and so proud of President Obama and the of those of any political persuasion who have entered into an open and logical debate with a willingness to look at the facts rather than relying on rhetoric and lies and a kneejerk partisan "no."

Do I think the bill is perfect? No. (But it's a great start.) Will I, in fact, eventually be a tiny bit worse off, if I go by this snippet from a NYTimes editorial?

"The legislation will impose an excise tax in 2018 designed to drive employers and their workers away from the highest-cost insurance policies, which typically provide generous benefits at little out-of-pocket cost to the workers. Health economists consider the excise tax a very strong cost-control measure, because if workers have to pay more of the cost themselves, they and their doctors are apt to think more carefully about whether a test or procedure is really needed."

Yep! I've got fabulous health care through my job right now. From the sounds of this I'll have to pay more in the future. But you know what?

Not everyone in America has great health care. Or any health care. We're something like the worst-off nation for our economic level in terms of the health care our citizens receive.

And a lot of people in this country, people I know, people I love, live in fear of a layoff because due to their preexisting condition, they will not be able to obtain health care otherwise. This is not political schma-schma-schma. This is personal f*&$ing experience.

Well, now they will.

So I am 100% willing to take that tradeoff. And if I am ever fortunate enough to be in the above-$250k ranks, I will continue to feel that the benefits to all are more than worth any personal inconvenience.

I don't talk about it a lot, but I consider myself a Christian. And though the WWJD movement of my teens was corny, sure, it can come in useful when you're looking ahead at two paths and trying to choose one. Looking at the health care debate, there was never any question WWJD.

This is a great, great thing. Thank you,  Mr. President, for refusing to let this one die.

I got tagged!

Oops. A month ago, Katie tagged me, and I ... didn't notice until now! I'm a bum. Okay, this is going to be very boring, but here you go, KC:

I usually shower at night so that I can sleep for 20 extra minutes in the morning. I have a facewash that's orange with some beads in it...I can't remember the brand. In the mornings, when I get up, I use Aveeno Moisturizing Lotion, which I don't know if it's supposed to go on your face but I put it there anyway because it feels nice and it doesn't seem to be packed with chemicals.

Then I use Bare Escentuals face powder, a gift for my birthday from Liz. I have to mix two shades together because they didn't have one that matched my face. I use Nars blush, kohl eyeliner on the top lids (my stub of liner is too worn down to read the brand and unfortunately I think Sephora has discontinued it), and Maybelline mascara. That's usually it. If I'm feeling fancy I'll use some peachy Bare Escentuals eyeshadow or some gold Cover Girl eyeshadow that I stole Erika left at my mom's house after the wedding. If I'm feeling low maintenance I'll skip the eyeliner and rub shimmery lotion on my cheeks instead in a bid for "fresh faced."

Ta da!

:-p

Long pent-up.

So all that insomnia I had last spring and summer that went away after the wedding? Is back in the past few weeks. I had up until 2009 always been a person who fell asleep at the drop of a hat, so I don't really know how to deal with it. I tried Tylenol PM Sun and Mon night and it made me sleep but uneasily--waking up unrested. Last night--let's not even talk about it. (How can it feel like "last" night when you sort of feel like it's been going on uninterrupted for eight hours?) And though I know it's not technically her fault, it's making me detest the woman who lives in the apartment above us.

For one thing she doesn't maintain a consistent schedule. In fact I wonder if she's got a spy cam installed in my apartment because no matter how I try to shake my own pattern up--going to bed at 10, going to bed at 11:30, going to bed at 1--it's just as soon as I'm finally drifting off that she decides to clomp around her own bedroom, which wakes me up with a start and gets my heart pounding in a way that I can't calm down. If I crawl into the living room, hoping to escape her foot-clods, she decides she needs a snack from the kitchen. If I watch two hours of TV (what do they call it: late late night? early morning? the witching hour?*) and finally doze off around 3:30 or 4 on our angular couch, she gets up to pee, waking me up again with a clomp and a start! It's not like she sleeps late, either (even on weekends, which are her vacuum day--good to know she's so on top of her dust situation but IT SURE DOESN'T SOUND TO US like she has rugs, so maybe a nice quiet SWEEPING would do?): some mornings she gets up at FIVE. The bedroom clock is next to my head. So I know.

Now, this is her right. She pays rent here too. But you know what? My ballet teacher taught me to walk like a cat. And this woman walks like an elephant. Sometimes I swear she sits up, stretches, yawns, swings her legs over the side of the bed, and slides her feet into nice comfy morning WOODEN CLOGS. But in point of fact I'm listening to her march back and forth above the dining room as I type this and I can tell that she's barefoot. Leaden, but unshod.

Yesterday evening Chris and I were walking down our block and he hissed, "That woman we just passed is the one upstairs." He's met her--I haven't. And luckily for her, I wasn't looking this time either--my glimpse was only enough to tell me that, surprisingly, she was slender and not the size of the water buffalo she sounds like. "Luckily for her" because if I ever recognize her in the stairwell, I really don't know what I might do. Chase her down the sidewalk with my own vacuum cleaner, maybe.

*Here's what's on TV at that time of night: Tyler Perry sitcoms. Fashion show recaps (from these I observed sleepily and approvingly that Zac Posen is one of the few designers to employ a racially diverse runway cast). Cool In Your Code. Home shopping channels--this can be nice for dropping off to sleep if you turn the volume down low, because they talk in a fairly steady and uninterrupted way and the lighting doesn't flicker too much since they're just showing jewelry. What I think I need as a sleep aid is football, so maybe I will order Chris the Saints Super Bowl DVD just so I can throw it on next time Clompy McClomperson takes her rage out on her floorboards.--That's the thing, though. Everyone gets mad and needs to stomp now and then, I understand that. This woman isn't mad. She's just either unbelievably oblivious, or passive aggressively trying to drive us out. I know it gets loud on the Wednesdays I have my friends over for ANTM. But the show is over at TEN. Scale it the F back, lady!

Lord, there she goes again. I wish I was taping this just to give you guys a taste. Those of you in houses (or on the top floor)--please sleep uninterruptedly for me tonight.

I'm still alive

I posted a Liberty for Target review over on the other blog.

Hi, how are you guys? Sorry I've been missing. Work's been crazy. But we've had spring temps this week, which has done wonders for my mood!