I Just Want to say That I Love My Husband...

David & Lucy, 2 of the 3 loves of my life...

I feel I have to publicly declare my love before you read this post because David’s been doing some freaky business in my kitchen and he’s messing up my kitchen happiness and so although I adore him and want you to understand he’s my best friend and an incredible father to the girls and a wonderful patient - dare I say, saint-like - husband to me and my difficult self, he’s also a big freak.

And he’s cramping my style.

See, there is not a fad this man has not loved. If it has been invented by Ron Popeil, sold on TV for $19.99, written up in some magazine or promoted as the next life-changing, anti-aging, cancer-killing, energy-enhancing, environment-supporting, cholesterol-reducing, fountain-of-youth thing, my husband has bought it.

And not just bought it and used it like a sane person. No, David has taken it on as his new lifestyle.

Australian Bush-wacker.

Take for instance his sudden obsession with powdered fruit – 54 kinds of fruit all ground up into a powder that you can drink when added to water. He did this to avoid actually eating the fruit.

“Why eat fruit one at a time when I can eat 54 fruits I one sitting?” he says to me, with little grains of fruit powder hanging in his beard.

That's what I want...a man with ground up fruit clinging to his body hair.

That little, tiny black speck thing on the right side of the rock is my husband. Not that I was worried or anything.

Doesn't that big boulder he's climbing look like it might tip over? Not that I was worried or anything.




Yep, that's him. These were taken in Joshua Tree. Not that I was worried or anything.


David with Lucy and her friend, Carson climbing the rocks. Not worried about that inappropriate activity either.

Anyway, a 3 month supply of his powdered fruit came in like these enormous tubs that were too big to fit in any NYC-sized cupboard and so they piled up unattractively on the kitchen counter and every three months the wacka-doodles at the company sent a bunch more of their enormous tubs, automatically charging David’s credit card another whopping $85.98 and of course, David was headed off to Hatha Yoga or whatever the next fad was and had finished lecturing me about how I would grow old and withered with my leathery skin hanging off my face and he would drink his fruit and look 29 and hot with his face like George Hamilton.

The gi-normous tubs kept coming and we kept getting billed and David kept forgetting because he had dropped these fruit people like yesterday’s Hatha Yoga and one day when I was hormonal and pregnant I yelled at some poor phone operator and threatened to send the tubs to her house if she didn’t stop our order immediately and then I think I threatened her puppy or something equally offensive and they wiped us off the roster for good.

Apparently, fruit powder doesn’t make you a nicer person.

David & Edie, looking for trouble on the playground.

Then, there was David’s “personal productivity” period where he obsessively read “personal productivity” literature and performed long tireless sermons about how I could save like 2 minutes a day if I just spent 100 hours setting up some kind of personal organizational system and then, there was lots of talk about how it would be better if I were organized just like him which made me consider setting a up a “personal productivity” system where I just stopped listening to him and that would save me like 3 hours a day.

Another rock climbing trip to The Gunks, in New Paltz. David feeds Lucy cereal in the hotel.

Now, I am faced with David’s latest obsession - The Rosedale Diet.

He’s in my kitchen this morning pointing out carbs on our plates like they were meal worms that had fallen into our food. He actually said to me, “If you put that spoon in your mouth that rice will convert to sugar and your body will burn it instead of fat…Tsk Tsk”

He "tsked" me. Freak.

America's Next Top Model Wanna-Be

David came home a week or so ago with a new diet book (this Rosedale thing) in his hand and declared that he would no longer eat pasta, rice, booze, bread, anything with sugar or fat. And then he mumbled something this morning with his head in the refrigerator about maybe only eating meat a couple times a week and how maybe I could cook with less butter.

Then, he amended himself and said butter was good, but the V word was mentioned (vege-freaka-tarian) in several different ramblings and I had to leave before some family mandate was declared and David started pulling duck fat and slab bacon out of the back of the fridge and hucking it into the trash.

Now, I'm in Starbucks licking my wounds, spending the girls college fund on venti black iced teas and hoping no one will steal my lap top when I go to the bathroom. The worst part of this little melodrama is that his new diet...excuse me, I mean "lifestyle" (apparently "diets" don't work, but "lifestyles" do or so it goes in the sermon) has helped him lose enough weight to make him weigh less than me and to make matters worse after the pregnancy, we now have the same shoe size.

His new "lifestyle" makes me feel like crap.

At least I know it'll only last another couple of weeks...

xxoo YM

P.S. For those of you who might consider writing me to tell me how mean I am to my husband, just know that he's been asking me for the last two days when I was going to "send him up" on my blog.

This is what you get, dear hearts, when you dance with celebrity.

Continue Reading...

The Hot Diggity Dog Challenge

I’m making this short today because I shouldn’t be blabbering on with you folks all day about vaginas and things that make vaginas feel tingly. I do have some standards. A few. Anyway, I’m on a writing deadline and you are serious distraction, my friends. A lovely distraction.

I’ve been memed by Evil Chef Mom who has asked me to write a six word memoir. And she has demanded that I be “funny”, “bizarre” and “touching”. No pressure or anything. Heres a recent picture of Evil Chef Mom:

And another:

So, here's my six word memoir, the six words that say everything about me:

Urine on floor. Cheese in potty.

Perhaps, I should work on the touching part...Well, I went with this one because it's the chaotic, crazy, totally adventure-driven, loud, imperfect and perfectly wonderful messiness of our lives that I love so much. Okay, I guess that's touching. And I even got food in there...

Now for your first challenge...

The six word memoir challenge is pretty difficult. It's not easy to sum it all up in 6 measly words, so instead of me memeing people right and left and shaming them into participating with my Catholic guilt arsenal (which is large and powerful) if you want to do it, just let me know in the comments section and I’ll post your sites and links this weekend, so people can check them out.

Now, challenge number 2: I want you to make your own hot dogs.

That's right you heard me. You can stop bitching about all the nitrates in the Oscar Meyer's and all those little pieces of intestinal backwash and guts scraped into a trowel by some minimum wage worker at the slaughterhouse that you know are taking up residence in your bratwurst. Now, you can free yourself of the salmonella-drenched innards thanks to my friend NTSC at The Art of the Pig - a man who really knows his way around a pork butt. Check out his blog - this guy is serious about charcuterie. The things he and his wife do in the kitchen are inspiring.

I love these dogs and so do the kids and they are pretty easy to make. Plus, because you have to do it in steps and let the meat sit over night in the fridge, it's manageable with kids streaming through the house pretending to be airplanes and knocking over the furniture because there's no last minute time crunch. The main thing is keeping the meat cold while you work with it. As always, I tested this recipe while breastfeeding and it can't be that difficult if I can do it one-handed.

It's time to up the game...What's it gonna be the meme or the dogs???

xxoo YM

Hot Dogs From Scratch

From The Art of The Pig, who got it from a course on Sausage Making at CIA.

Ingredients

10 oz lean ground beef

1/2 lb smoked fatty bacon, minced

1 Tbs salt

1 Tbs sugar

1/2 tsp onion powder

1/4 tsp ground white pepper

1/4 tsp ground coriander

1/4 tsp ground nutmeg

1 pinch garlic powder (be generous, use more)

6 oz crushed ice

1 oz nonfat dry milk

Method

1. Place the bowl to the food processor in the freezer, place blade in ice bath.
2. Combine ground beef with seasonings, place in freezer along with bacon until semi-frozen
3. In the food processor place the meat and the ice; process to a smooth texture until the temperature reaches 40 F.
4. Add the bacon and process until well blended and temperature reaches 50 F
5. Add dry milk and process to mix in.
6. Pipe onto plastic wrap, roll, tie every 6 inches. Refrigerate overnight.
7. The next day poach in water at 170 F until internal temperature of 155 F; shock in ice water.
8. Unwrap and refrigerate until ready to use.

Continue Reading...

Hoo-Ha Spray: 101

Dear Readers -

Now you've done it. You've made me go off on a tangent and write about something completely ridiculous and inane and not anything I'm supposed to be writing about...

And having to do with vaginas. I'm writing about vaginas.

Completely your fault, commenters.

In my last post, the message boards were hot with questions about the mysterious spray now known as "The Hoo-Ha Spray". Apparently, single people, the married folks without kids, some men, people outside the continental U.S. and C-Sectioniers missed the whole Hoo-Ha boat.

So, allow me to get you up to speed. This is The Hoo-Ha Spray.

They give you a couple cans of this stuff when you leave the hospital after having a vaginal delivery. It's like a parting gift or something, along with a good talking to about how you shouldn't starve your child or drown her in the bath tub or sleep for like the next three months. In fact, they tell you to constantly wring your hands with worry over things like meningitis, SIDS, improperly installed car seats and those long cords that help you move the blinds up and down that could wrap around your child's neck like an anaconda and snuff the life out of her.

Seriously, between the intense pain in your crotch and the debilitating worry, it's a wonder you don't just douse yourself with kerosene, set yourself on fire and get the pain over with immediately. But you don't because some opinionated jack ass in the form of a relative or know-it-all friend who already has kids, will tell you that no matter how hard it is now, it will only get worse when they are teenagers and smarter, faster and able to totally pull the wool over your eyes.

So, you come to terms with the fact that stationery and helpless is a blessing and now is as good as it gets.

Not that it matters because you are still delirious from the 47 hours of labor and the three straight hours of pushing out of your vagina the largest bowel movement of your entire colon-cracking life and you are convinced that the hospital nurses are high on crack because they let amateurs like you and your husband leave the hospital with a fragile newborn, because even though you don't let it show, you guys have absolutely no friggin' idea what you're doing and this kid is surely in danger of being dropped, stepped on, left in the car seat on the car roof or licked by the family dog.

Butt no matter what's happening, that little bottle of Hoo-Ha spray is your constant companion after you give birth. It isn't as good as booze, let's say or valium or...booze, but it's close. You see, during the birth process, your genitals can swell into a raw, bulbous inhuman malformation that looks like this:

The genitals of two women, just minutes after their vaginal deliveries

The spray is to alleviate the intense pain you are feeling as you hobble home in your loose fitting sweat pants with your low-hanging bulbous nether regions feeling all steamy, pink, swollen, inhuman and humungous. You also get to sit on this inflatable donut (when you get to sit down) because the thought of your Babboon genitals actually touching a chair or supporting the 90 extra pounds you've gained in the pregnancy is nearly unbearable and so you have to carry around a bag big enough to hold your cans of Hoo-ha, your inflatable donut, your bottle of Colt 45 and a super-sized box of maxi pads because there's sooooo much happening down under that there will not be enough Maxi in all of Duane Reade to satisfy your needs.

Forget diapers and wipes, that designer diaper bag the in-laws bought you is crammed with stuff to make your vagina feel better.

I bet you wished you hadn't asked...

That's enough about the vagina.

xxxooo YM

P.S. Special thanks to the ever-creative Evil Chef Mom, who coined the term "Hoo-Ha Spray" and is probably a life-long abuser of all tingly vagina sprays, devices and accoutrement. I don't know this for sure, but she's definately the type.



Continue Reading...

Can Drink Now Per Doctors Orders...Send Booze

This is what it said in the subject line of the e-mail I received yesterday from my friend Sharleen who just had a baby girl a few weeks ago and who I have not seen since the baby was born...because I am a bad bad friend.

This is what her e-mail said:

According to two independent pediatricians, beer is required drinking by nursing mothers...and wine has been suggested by a midwife to keep postpartum blues at bay .... who knew.

would type more, however, I have yet to master typing with one hand while barracuda child trashes my breast.

Will satisfy my longing for your company, by reading your blog and consuming required beverages. doctor's orders!

Must get together. Need insanity check.

Hugs, Shar~

A cry for help indeed. So, I'll be packing up a few things in a basket and heading up to see her at the house in Connecticut. Here's what will be in the basket:

1. A twelve pack of coronas (a few for us, some for sharing with others)
2. A small bag of lemons.
3. A cute but impractical and expensive dress for the baby that she'll never actually wear except maybe at Thanksgiving, but by then it will be too small.
4. Diapers.
5. Nipple salve.
6. A bottle of Sauvignon Blanc...(in case we have to share with others more)
7. A big brother gift for Benny, who is probably still recovering from sibling-induced post traumatic stress disorder
8. A game for the kids that will keep them so amused (or catatonic) for hours that we can talk and hang out like chicks from our single days (Does such a game actually exist?)
9. Some extra cans of that spray stuff they give you in the hospital to make your vagina feel better, 'cause a happy vagina is a happy woman
10. Another bottle of Sauvignon Blanc (for sharing...or for me)
11. Some nice thick steaks for the grill.
12.A warm tin of these onion strings, which are like sex, which is good since the doctor still isn't allowing that.

See ya soon, Shar!

And really, these onion strings are heaven.Try them with dipping sauces. But make a generous amount - the whole family will devour them.

xxxooo YM

Onion Strings (adapted from The Art of the Pig & The Pioneer Woman Cooks )

1 large onion
2 cups buttermilk
2 cups flour
1 scant tablespoon salt
Lots of black pepper 1
/4 to 1/2 teaspoon Cayenne Pepper
Canola Oil
A wedge or two of lemon (optional)

Slice onion very thin. I used a mandolin to get them very skinny. Place in a baking dish and cover with buttermilk for at least one hour. Combine dry ingredients and set aside. Heat oil to 375 degrees or shimmering on the surface. Grab a handful of onions, throw into the flour mixture, tab to shake off excess, and plunge them into hot oil. Fry for a few minutes and remove with a slotted spoon as soon as golden brown. Repeat until onions are all fried. Heap them on a plate and give 'em a little squeeze of lemon and serve with a pot of ketchup and another of my cilantro mayonnaise for dipping.

The Yummy Mummy's Spicy Cilantro Mayonnaise

Mayo (home-made or from a jar)
Cilantro (chiffonade)
Salt (to taste)
Lemon (a squeeze)
Sambal Olek (optional, for heat)

Combine well in a bowl and serve with onion strings, right next to the ketchup Continue Reading...

More Grocery Shopping with Small Children: Another Photo Journal

David was finishing the taxes yesterday and so I took the kids on one of our grocery shopping expeditions to Pathmark. It was Sunday right after church (not for us, other people's church) and so it was a bit of a zoo.

And as usual, there were firemen. There are always firemen in Pathmark. If you missed my last shopping trip, which also has NYC firemen, go here. If not, keep reading...


The girls are in the shopping trolley and ready to go. Lucy is wearing a "crown" which, as you know, is an important accessory when shopping.

I wanted to wear my crown but it was at the cleaners. With my tiara and sash.


We make it through nearly the whole vegetable aisle in harmony. There is a loud burst of song right around the eggplants. Lucy regales the vegetable shoppers with "Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini", one of my favorites, which seems to really offend this little old woman who is trying to wedge by us with her walker/shopping-cart-combo-mobile to get to the leeks and she gives us a snotty look, which I think is uncalled for, but Lucy thinks it's a sign of approval or something, and smiles and sings the "Itsy Bitsy" song even louder and with more gusto and doesn't stop until we're near the mangos.

This is the little old woman.


This is the little old woman in an itsy bitsy teeny weenie bikini.



When we get to the tomatoes, Lucy is fascinated with the plum tomatoes and their shape and wants her own bag.


This seems like a precocious thing except what she really wants to do is hang the bag over the side of the cart and say, "Help me! Help me! I'm falling!" in a tiny squeaky mouse voice and then, let the bag go falling to the ground and I have to bend over and pick it up only to have her do the exact same thing, like 5 minutes later.

By the time we got to the fish counter, the tomatoes have tragically vanished in a horrible mining accident. Their remains were never found.

Sad, really.



Here is where I mess up. I start talking to Charmaine, who works behind the fish counter, about her new baby, her breastfeeding, her pumping, her sleep and feeding schedule and I forget for a moment that I actually have children, who are weirdly quiet and amusing themselves in the cart and so, while my back is turned, horrible crimes are being committed against the herbs.


Edie sets the herbs free, like a PETA volunteer in an animal testing facility.


And then throws them on the floor around the cart.

Someone should sing "Born Free" here.



I give the herbs to a 3 year old for safe keeping. What am I? Snorting glue?

I never actually make it home with the herbs.


I revert to an old winner - I dole out chunks of bread. This is not my idea, Edie clunks me on the head with the loaf until I get the hint.

I'm still trying to throw whatever groceries I think we need into the cart. I think quickly. I am a tribal warrior in Pathmark - sleek, fierce, cunning, one crazy eye ball on the leg of lamb, another hunting for the kielbasa. And all before the villagers can rise up against me.

Mrrreowwwwww!!!


I break bread with the hostiles in the dairy aisle.


I oversee the ceremonial hurling of the cottage cheese.


I try to pry the single whole fat plain yogurt out of the back of the dairy case while a villager regales us with a song on the didgeridoo.

Or a loaf of bread.

Ah...a day in the life of a tribal warrior.


By the time we get to aisle 12, we have a rather deep and philosophical discussion about cumin and what we use it for and then each of the girls wants to hold a bottle of their own cumin, which means we now have enough cumin in the house to make Mexican food for a small Latin American country.

And then for some reason, we are all so fascinated with the many bottles of spices, we feel we cannot leave and the girls stare at the shelf as if they were playing a Princess movie back there and it takes us 15 minutes just to get out of this aisle.


By leaving, I upset the delicate balance of the universe. And Edie blows a gasket.


And then we're on the boob. And sadly, I'm taking a picture of my boob in a supermarket.


And once we're on the boob, there really is no getting off (because my breasts are that good) and so I shop with Lucy attached to my nipple for nearly the duration of the trip.



Lucy is amazed and experiences an epiphany when she learns that pasta can come in the shape of a wheel.


Lucy and I ponder whether we should buy pigs feet.

And then, out of thin air, we run into a group a firemen.


And here's the thing about New York City firemen. They love to get their picture taken. And they love to buy beans and pasta. It's like the only aisle they ever go in.

Check out the guy on the right with his hands in his fire pants. He has modeled before, hasn't he?


Picking our nose in the check out. We're keepin' it real.



And Edie is still on the boob.

Okay, I'm way prettier than this picture. This is what I usually look like.



And this...


And this..


That's right. I look a lot like Heidi Klum.

Let's just go with that.

Back to shopping...


The check out, usually a nerve-testing gauntlet of malcontent, went pretty well this trip because Lucy decided the rice was like a cuddly doll.


And she spent a lot of the time hugging it and comforting it like it was her crying baby, which kept her amused. And Edie, high on breast milk, all basking in the after-glow, decides to play in the shopping cart.

I put my breast back in my shirt. And load the $220 of groceries into the trolley.


"I've been waiting for you, Obi-Wan. We meet again, at last. The circle is now complete. When I left you, I was but the learner; now *I* am the master."

I have no idea why I just went to the trouble to find this quote but now that I spent 12 minutes on it, I'm keeping it in here.


We have a small issue with the sticker before we leave - Lucy wants to take it off because it's ripped. It's ripped, of course, because she was playing with it and ripped it, but we can't talk about that because it's like entering the 5th circle of hell to explain that kind of thing to a 3 year old. So we have to stop and ask for a new one and put it on just so, in the exact right place before we can take it outdoors.

And this takes like ten minutes, which is fine because where the hell do I have to go anyway?


Lucy carries the bag of rice out of the store.


And then Lucy drops the bag in the middle of the floor, stopping the person behind us from moving her cart forward and sprints to the gum ball machines, like her underpants are on fire, leaving me to bend over and grab the rice off the floor, while Edie is breastfeeding in my arms, apologizing to the person who was halted by the rice barricade and giving the security guy the evil eye for giving me the evil eye because we have created a traffic jam coming into and out of the store.

This is the security guy...


And this is the face he made.

And then after I give the "No gum because it has sugar" speech and Lucy gives me the "I love sugar in my gum" speech, we agree to disagree and she gets busy with another activity.


She insists on holding the door open for incoming shoppers, even though the doors are electronic and so people walking out look at her like, "Why the hell is that kid standing in the door getting in my way?" and apparently they think she is a street orphan busking for change.

But all she gets is a few pats on the head. Bummer.


And then, we walk to our house a block away for like the next 45 minutes.

xxxooo YM
Continue Reading...