Fluid Pudding

I drove Harper to school this morning and as I listened to Quichotte on the way home, an Italian cricket started talking to the imaginary black-and-white boy who is now able to stay awake when the man who imagines him is asleep—and it was just so wonderful. When I pulled into the garage and searched for the blue peanut M&M that Harper had dropped (she’s 14 and can choose her own breakfast food), I decided I would visit Fluid Pudding today. (I didn’t yet find the M&M, and the key word in this sentence is YET.)

It has been a while, hasn’t it? Here’s a gigantic photo of my nose taken to show you that I added another hole to it.

I told myself I’m entirely too old for a double-pierced nose, but then I told myself that California is on fire. And then I thought about the Kurdish student who talked to our political science class back in 1991 and I bet his family has better things to worry about than noses. Just remember: Nobody cares about your nose.

I tried to do Inktober during October, but then I accepted the fact that I can be lazy with commitments.

After graduating from college, I worked as a unit secretary in a surgical intensive care ward. When patients returned to the ICU from heart surgery, I was the one who ordered chest x-rays and EKGs and post-op meds. I knew that Dr. C’s patients required much less aftercare than Dr. S’s patients. I was working when the on-call anesthesiologist showed up drunk in the middle of the night as a patient was being prepped for emergency surgery. (Fun side notes: An orderly who also volunteered for the eye bank once asked me on a date to join him as he harvested eyeballs. I declined. I sometimes wore a stethoscope.)

Anyway, tomorrow my dad is going to be a patient and I’m going to be bringing annoying nervous energy to the waiting room for at least four hours. (I wouldn’t choose my nervous self as a friend. I don’t like her very much.) Dad’s surgeon is very good and the hospital is very good and isn’t it so strange how things can feel far away and close up at the same time?

Last weekend I spent some time heating up needles and poking them through the hands of tiny plastic babies. We have 180 tiny plastic babies in the house and each and every one of them is delightful, as tiny plastic babies often are.

When my phone shoots this at me, it makes me crazy happy.

Do.

I participated in a gnome knit-along last month and now I’m an old lady who knits gnomes. Because gnomes are my latest flapdoodling flumadiddle, I spent some time doing a little research. (If one says they are into something, one must be prepared to have a conversation about that thing. To not be prepared is to be ridiculous.)

Four Fun Facts About Gnomes:
1. They’re vegetarians, and they love potatoes.
2. They can run 35 miles per hour and are seven times stronger than the average human.
3. Garden gnomes like to tell sad stories.
4. Siberian gnomes have sex with trolls and are big on revenge.

My gnome doesn’t yet have a gname (HA HA HA HA HA!), but when a name comes to her it will reflect the fact that she’s got tickets to the Fishbone show. She just might have sex with a troll, but it will be on her own terms and whatever, man. Dave Eggers mentions her in his latest novel, and that’s cool but it doesn’t make her like him any more. She’ll see you this weekend at the Lebanese nacho dump.

Her friends are strongly recommending that she get a restraining order against this guy.

What they don’t know is that she can make two phone calls and have him dead by morning.

I’ve been going through a thing lately, and I’m trying to not use words I typically rely on (also known as words on which I typically rely), so I will NOT describe it as a funk. Here: I’m napping in a tub filled with cold and slimy doldrums, and it’s a deep tub and I’m avoiding things I typically love and this needs to stop.

Please join me on a doldrum-beating adventure. It begins now. (You’re already here. You may as well stay.)

Here we have sourdough toast with goat cheese, cucumber slices, and honey. I ate it a few weeks back at Upshot, and it fit my mood perfectly. Toast that fits your mood. Not many people can say they’ve had perfect mood-matching toast.

I’m currently dressed like a goldfish cracker. Proof:

A friend saw these socks and thought of me, and a sock compliment feels just as good as perfect mood-matching toast.

Six months ago, my migraine doctor told me to lose ten pounds, get back to yoga, and start practicing mindfulness. I have done none of those things. NONE OF THEM. A few months ago, I decided to reward myself with overalls when the ten pounds were gone, and then a few weeks ago I found a pair I loved: So I ordered them anyway! They’re slightly too small, so that whole ten pounds thing is definitely still a thing. BUT I love these overalls as much as anyone can love a pair of jeans from Gap with a flap and straps. (And poetry.)

I went to an outdoor market with a friend yesterday, and we came across a number (that number might be five or six) of perfect spots for gathering with enjoyable people. I have so many imaginary plans for this very spot, and one of them includes a kerosene lamp and bread pudding:

Finally, it’s my favorite time of year. Despite the fact that the temperatures are still hitting 90° and I’m not sure we’ll ever have another proper cardigan season, we do have these:

Update: I’m still marching to the beat of my own doldrums. (Such clever wordplay!) I’ll keep working on it. Thai food for lunch and gnome knit-alongs and Fiona Apple on my Chill Mix… Gah.

The last time I visited with you, I said something about updating the site every day in September. It didn’t happen, and my excuse is a good one. You see, I’ve been contending with some peculiar feelings since September 1, and it’s because of this:

My very first album was Kiss Alive! and if I remember correctly, it was given to me for Christmas in 1975. Last week, on the morning of September 1, I pulled up the album and my 5-year-old brain (now 44 years old) remembered the lyrics AND the song order. (My brain is messed up in so many ways, but it has held on to the fact that “She” comes after “Parasite”. I’m so intrigued with the things that are gone and the things that remain.)

I remember having such a crush on Peter Criss when I watched Kiss Meets the Phantom of the Park with my sister when I was eight years old. (That’s me on the left with the cardigan and turtleneck. My mom made the pants I was wearing.)

I went to my very first KISS concert last week and Paul Stanley is now 67 and Gene Simmons is 70, and when Gene Simmons did the “God of Thunder” bloody mouth thing in the 70s, it was spooky because of Satan. Now it’s spooky because it smells like it could be a pulmonary embolism.

Also, just so you know, Paul Stanley still sucks on his finger. I didn’t know how to react to it in the 70s, and I don’t know how to react to it now.

So, I’ve become a little obsessed with KISS. Did you know that Paul Stanley was born without an ear? Did you know that his speaking voice sounds like this?

There are so many other things we could be talking about right now. I’m in the midst of a gnome knit-along. I’ve been on an eyebrow adventure. I’ve been knitting and watching Downton Abbey and I bought some overalls and I removed a birthmark from my leg using only a pair of scissors! (It’s not healing very well, so I may save that story until I’ve led it toward a happy ending.)

But also, this is happening.

Thank you, Krystofer.

I quit my website for three weeks, but then I came back. And the first thing really is the first thing: Stephanie asked about this rainbow box of mini skeins.

I’m going to choose a neutral color and make this cowl.

Also, Catherine asked for yarn/pattern matches, and here we go!

Those four skeins will turn into one of these.

These will be this.

Those? This!

This! (It’s already over halfway done.)

Those will be this, and I’m crazy excited because the Fall KAL starts on Sunday, so I’ll definitely have the cardigan finished before December. The color is called Later, Gator! The sweater pattern is Elton. Obviously, this will be my Crocodile Rock Cardigan.

I’m thinking about daily Fluid Pudding updates in September to get back in the habit. I’m going to a KISS concert in five days. I’ve taken a liking to dark chocolate covered blueberries. I’ll be back sooner than you think.

I will not be seeing “The Art of Racing in the Rain.” I can’t even think about the book without feeling the face pain I get when I cry like a cheerleader, and I didn’t even read the book. (I read “Racing in the Rain”, which is the young adult version of TAoRitR. When I finished RitR, I had to close my bedroom door and do a quick Sob ‘n’ Nap.) This morning I watched an interview with the actors from the movie, and I could barely get through the interview without inflicting TMJD upon myself. I’m medicated to the point where I’m physically incapable of crying, and someday I’m going to blow up like a gigantic combustible teapot.

(Also: Mass shootings. I’m pissed. We should all be pissed. I’ve reached the point where I think things like, “Well, if I’m meant to die in a white guy terrorist attack, I’m meant to die in a white guy terrorist attack.” Thinking things like that used to be akin to “If I’m meant to die by slipping on the bathroom floor and falling forehead first onto the horn of a baby rhinoceros…” Anymore, it’s akin to “If I’m meant to forget my debit card when I go to the grocery store…”)

I’m back from Chicago and it may have been my happiest Stitches Midwest experience yet. We tried on sweaters and rubbed yarn against our necks and ate cheesecake and I said the F word a lot (always appropriately) in front of my mom because we’re buddies.

Pictured above is the potential for four sweaters and three cowls. The three grey speckled skeins in the second column will be wound first so that I can dress like this in the fall:

(Actually, I’ll probably put a long-sleeved shirt under the sweater and wear it with jeans so I can be a little Gilmore Girls about it.)

Not pictured above is the linen Christmas yarn that will enable me to look like this in a year or so:

School starts tomorrow and we now have a freshman and a junior in the house. Let’s go ahead and call it fall, which means it’s time for marching band competitions, and Thanksgiving is right around the corner. I need to get started on that sweater.

Several years ago, I read an article about the glorification of busy and it stuck with me because at the time, I knew a lot of people whose constant gig was to beat their drums and blow their trumpets about how tied down they were.

Did I tell you that I’ve taken on a full-time freelance gig? It will fill my schedule through December and I love it completely. (It combines medical stuff and writing stuff, so all of those Grey’s Anatomy episodes are finally paying off!) The only problem? It’s keeping me busy. Jolly busy.

I’m not complaining. It’s just that I’ve now become one of those people who can’t do things because they’re grinding behind a computer screen with tight deadlines. Ah, but my friend Kelly recently posted a photo of a ring and it inspired the hell out of me. I now wear my freelance ring when I’m working (and also when I’m not working). Bird by bird.

I’m leaving town on Friday to spend the night in Chicago with Tempe and my mom. It’s our eleventh trip to the yarn show and I’m ready to get whatever it takes to make this. Also, because it’s a thing to wear something you’ve made, I recently finished my Swoop. (It still needs to be blocked.)

We have a bunch of frogs in our yard and a bunch of flies in the house. I’m trying to decide how to either get the flies out or bring the frogs in.

The Ben Folds book will be delivered to me on Tuesday. And so, Angie waits, Angie waits, Angie waits…

I knew this was a Magritte.

I knew this was a Magritte.

I had no idea this was a Magritte. It’s a ham sitting on a jacket in the sun, and it was painted during his périod vache, or “nasty style.” (I think it’s time for me to have a périod vache.)

I knew this was a Mondrian.

I had no idea this was a Mondrian. It’s an oil painting of a farm in Holland, and it was painted before he went all abstract on us.

I fell in love with the Art Institute of Chicago on Sunday. We weren’t able to spend much time there, but our abbreviated tour was 45% of a funnel cake which is so much better than no funnel cake at all.

Because we were a little rushed, I fell into the tired habit of seeing the paintings I already know instead of exploring the things I don’t know.

As we walked out of one of the modern art galleries, a docent asked if I had picked a favorite. “SO many favorites!” I said, afraid of giving the wrong answer. “What is YOUR favorite?”

“That’s easy,” he replied. “It’s de Kooning’s ‘Interchanged’.” He then asked if we wanted to see it, which we did, so he led us to this.

I remembered walking past it a few minutes earlier and not giving it any attention. This time, I was totally in as the docent did his thing.

Docent: The thing I love about de Kooning is that he can do whatever he wants, just like we can all do whatever we want. Not many artists feel comfortable with “I want to, I can, so I will.” Let me know when you see the horse. See? He wants to add a horse, he can add a horse, so he does add a horse. You want to, you can, so you do. It’s inspirational. Now, turn around and take a look at ‘Excavation.’

Docent: The more you look at it, the more you are rewarded. With teeth. A dog. A bird.

I walked away with a new favorite.

Another favorite? Reading things as if I’m in on a secret.

Because the previous entry is just sort of a bummer with the gut bugs and whatever, I decided to stop by today and share my joy grid from last week. (When it comes to being on the top of a page, joy is the rock to bacteria’s scissors every single time.)

Guess which little person I am? Here’s a hint: I haven’t left the country in the past 6,209 days, and I haven’t seen an errant puppy for at least three months.

That’s right, Encyclopedia Brown. AND, you know what this means, don’t you? It means that I probably ate something with poop on it.

So here we are.

(I now walk around with Clorox wipes in my holster. No one else is going to get a poop bug. At least not on my watch!)

((I’ll be fine.))