the good part of kicking the habit:
(besides the fact that your mind stops worrying that every pain in your little toe is cancer, and don't have to hear your mother say "i just don't want to bury you" anymore, AND that you can enjoy small things like breathing)...
you have an excuse to do anything. when you are quitting smoking, your cautious doctor says "up the adivan dosage". your husband says "go shopping! get shoes!". you can eat cupcakes all day, you can eat ice cream every night, and you can lie in bed allllll day long, or frantically do things, or be a complete bitch, or ignore pressing problems, and everyone is like "no, no. it's fine. you're quitting smoking".

i need to be a bad girl and i don't know how.

i guess most of what i mean when i say "i want to be a bad girl" is that i want to be young. now, i know 29 is not considered over the hill yet, but this is the oldest I've ever been. when i say i need to be bad, I mean i want to be young enough not to consider all the repercussions of my actions. i know that there are different phases in everyone's lives, and i'm ok with that. i. am. ok. with. that. totally. fine. as it just so happens, however, i haven't lived through my current phase yet- career, newlywed, suburbia. i know how to be bad and fuck around. i know how to do it really well. married? i don't really know how to be married. career? i've never had more than a job. suburbia? i moved to a city the very first day i could.
so how can one be a bad married girl without being a complete psycho? how can one be a bad-ass teacher? and suburbia... what does one DO here?
i've thought about swinging, but my heart's not in it.
i've considered dressing exclusively in black, but i'm just not angsty enough anymore.
i guess i'm pretty much done with my addictions.
i mean, i'm pretty much primed to get into politics at this point, my record is so sparkley clean. i just can't reconcile that I have ended up with a clean record.

it looks like a lot of kerry/edward's policy plans about education will be essentially adding more staff to Teach For America. if not, they are just planning the exact same program under a different name.
i don't like their idea of giving out stipends or rewards to teachers who have significant improvement in their classrooms, bascially because they are based on standardized tests and a teacher that teaches to that test is not, in my humble opinion, a very good teacher. a good teacher will teach with the test in mind, but not as the main focus.
but when i find out 1/3 of high schoolers in this country are not graduating, i say "do something, guys, and do it FAST!" i'll eat my humble pie if necessary, if that means more children are graduating.

no matter where you stand politically, you've got to admit that democrats surely must have better food at their parties. i don't know what republicans eat-- probably something very bland and white in color-- but over at the move on potluck party, some of the options were:

• artichoke, water chestnut & parmesan souffle
• hamburgers AND turkey burgers AND garden burgers
• heirloom tomato salad with mozzaralla and basil
• homemade guacomole
• so many dips i wouldn't know where to start
• so many desserts. all homemade. cookies with reese's pieces, cupcakes, pies of all sorts
• fruit and goooooood cheeses

tomorrow we are going to an 85-person moveon.org party to watch the dnc with our fellow suburban democrats.
the BIG question here is that i'm going to make cupcakes... how should they be decorated? red, white, and blue frosting? can you think of something cuter? a big J on each of them?
send advice, and send it fast.

13-year-olds don't like you to take pictures of them. FUN!


i was wrong about teaching 3rd grade. they moved me and i will be teaching 8th grade english. this is good for the long term, and ok for the short term. i was pretty excited about being with little ones and not being called names and all that, but i also know this is a challange i can handle and it's working at a school i really love, with people i really love (including this princess). i also believe the school has a lot of potential, and the administrators are great role models. i'm not complaining (for the moment). i can't wait to start decorating my classroom. i have all sorts of ideas here.
as for the big quit, it's on and off. some moments i think "this is a breeze". other moments i'm ready to knock out the next guy i see for a cigarette. i'm really working on a minute by minute basis here.

so far i am one day without a cigarette.
report from day one: i am incredibly achy, which i didn't expect. every muscle hurts, my skin hurts, my toes hurt, my hair hurts. i hear this is the nicotine leaving my system. whatever it is, i'm not thrilled. it feels like a really bad hangover. i have short periods of irritability. none of this is unexpected, but that doesn't make it painless.
i am chewing the nicorette gum in an effort to have something to do when i want to smoke.
i went to lush to get myself lots of bath and body treats. it makes me feel infinitely better. wish me luck on day 2.

today is my last day of smoking.
i have been a smoker for 16 years now, and the bottom line is if i don't quit, i will die. well, i will die anyway, but i will certainly die decades sooner if i don't quit smoking. this addiction is not pretty, in the slightest way, and i am going to have to give up this ugliness if i want to keep on living. the most frightening part of this is... shhh... i like the ugliness. i'm sure it sounds pretty unbelievable to the pretty non-smokers out there, but smoking has ingrained itself very deeply into my identity. i have had a cigerette in my hand since i was 13 years old, and before that i pretty much don't remember. do you know what it's like to give up something you've been literally holding on to so tightly with your measly little hands FOR 16 YEARS?!? you may actually know, in which case you are to contact me immediately with help. because i will need help. i know this because i've done this before. i've quit three times in 16 years- once for two years (ages 15-17), once for a few months (age 22), and last time, for a whopping month (age 26). i can tell you right now that smoking is barely a physical addiction for me. i go 8 hours- easy- without smoking. the psychological addiction, however, is a whole different beast. i do not know how to get in the car without a cigerette, i do not know how to finish a meal without a cigerette, i do not know how to go through a day without a cigerette. i am not kidding here- i do not know how to do it. i also do not know who i am when i am not a smoker, and i know from the last time that i quit, that i have a lot of identity issues wrapped up in this smoking thing. i identify as a bad-girl- a drinking, smoking, sleeping-around type of girl. one who you wouldn't want your son to go out with. but the fact is, i'm not really a drinker, i'm not a drug-user of any sort, i'm not sleeping with anyone but my husband, and my last little pillar of bad-girlness, the cigerettes, are now going to be gone. how can i be a bad girl anymore? i live in suburbia, for the love of god. i'm a teacher. i'm married. i cook a lot. i make the bed every day. nothing about my life even whispers "bad", let alone screams it out, the way i think it does.
i'm going to end this post here. ironically, or not, my mom just called with news that my step-dad has bladder cancer, and this all seems both poignant and self-indulgent.

is there anything, ANYTHING better than being in the woods, with your friends, and your dogs, and watching movies, and eating, and reading books, and being outside, and sleeping, and then doing it all again? NO, there is not, especially when there is cream cheese frosting on the premises.

dear readers,
i hope you do not have a day where you slam your finger in the door TWICE in one day, and get bitten by an unknown bug on your privates. that is my hope for you.

i received very tentative news that i will be teaching 3rd grade next year. it makes me so excited! i don't think 3rd graders call their teacher a "fucking bitch" OR a "fucking liar". i almost can't imagine a day of work without that now...
it just feels like you could DO so much more with a class that you have all day, rather than for 45 minute periods. also, i won't be in the janitor's closet. also, you can include art in the curriculum. also, they are cute and not hormonal. also, they are eager to please. also, i'll be at ONE school all day. i do hope this works out... if not, it will probably be elementary anyway, so i'll go ahead and get excited.
insert smiling face here.

tomorrow i will post the pictures i took of our cute little town where you are forever searching for kevin and winnie and the soundtrack of the wonder years plays constantly in your mind...
but today i am just too damn crampy, moody, and couch-ridden to do anything fancy like upload pictures. 11:30 p.m. and the love of my life is heading out to find me french fries & a vanilla milkshake. pms food & drinking food is oh-so-similar.

bed-wetter
a few months ago, i wet the bed for the first time as an adult. i woke up one morning at about 4:45 a.m., peeing in the bed. now, most people might have felt disgust or fear when this happened. not me! i was downright giddy. do i know why? no, i do not, but that was my immediate feeling upon waking... giddiness. i rose from the bed, went to the bathroom to finish up, changed clothes and went to crawl back in bed to get a few more minutes of sleep. but i couldn't go back to sleep, i was laughing too much. i woke up the lovely beau to inform him of the incident, and he could not figure out why i was so happy. quite frankly, i still do not know why this tickled me so much, but i can still remember the feeling of waking up and thinking "omigod, i peed in the bed" and then giggling like a hyena. it was such a unique feeling as an adult- to lose such control and do something so outrageous. i never did fall back to sleep, because i couldn't get over the feeling i had upon waking. now, i'm sure if i was a chronic bed-wetter who had to wear hot and un-sexy depends every night, i would feel very different, but this was a one-time situation and it still tickles me to think about it. i guess i am just a freak like that.

today i made homemade cupcakes- chocolate with cream cheese icing. YUM! as i was making them, i thought "what are two people going to do with 30 cupcakes?" but i will tell you what those two people did- ATE THEM! they have been here for about 3 hours, and already half (15, for those who can't do them math) are gone in our stomachs. as a matter of fact, i had to force myself to eat dinner so that i could justify eating so many cupcakes afterwards.

my gmail account has finally been fixed. only one month of daily phone calls and emails and it's done.
i feel free again.

some thoughts on marriage three weeks and three days in (i believe this is the lint-remover anniversary):

1. you may get a joint bank account and somebody else will know how much you spend on shoes
2. you will still not know whether to use your old last name or your new last name
3. you will still giggle when you refer to your "husband"
4. your husband will not let you spend the macy's gift certificates you received for the wedding on new clothes
5. you will not be able to take that job teaching english in morocco
6. your husband's wedding ring will still be damn sexy

if nothing else gets done this summer, i have got my student loans into deferment. that is all i really needed to accomplish.

counteracting the woes of the world:
grandmother soothes burglar to sleep

yesterday, i had the opportunity to look at cookbooks from the 1930's-1950's. most fascinating to me was not the recipes, which were not particularly appetizing, but the underlying rhetoric in all of the etiquette tips. a few striking noticables:

• apparently setting a table correctly is "just like a mathematical equation"
• you should be sure to invite guests in different professions to keep conversation alive
• sometimes people have outdoor fires. they are sure "a father and a handy boy can get a fire going"
• children should be allowed to the event as an opportunity to socialize them (are they dogs?)
• jello molds are popular at every party
• you can hold a dinner without a maid, if female family members are willing to pitch in
• packing your families' lunch is important and should reflect your feelings about them (i hate you = pb&j? this 2004 woman doesn't know!) and your love for them. since most people are underweight, you should try to fill them up.

i wonder what they'll be saying about my chi-chi vegetarian cookbooks in 50 years!

does anyone out there draw comics? is so, email me at nbrown@mills.edu. i'd like to talk to you.

so pathetic

really, what sort of neighborhoodie are you going to get when you live in mountain view? i got the love of my life (just trying out that pseudonym) one that says MISSION for his last birthday, but it would be very uncool to get one for myself that says MISSION now, being that i'm no longer a resident. pennisula? lame again. it's like getting one that says "bridge and tunnel". oy.
maybe TEACHER? i don't know... please offer suggestions.
maybe "suburban wasteland

last night, i had the honor of meeting this lovely lady. we bought purses, ate crepes, ate ice cream and had a genuinely good time. it was my first experience meeting someone who i only knew from over the internet. luckily, she did not take offense to the things i said, unlike others online recently who i have been pissing off. i have to say, i've been online for awhile now and have managed to avoid rubbing anyone wrong (at least to my knowledge!). now, TWICE in 24 hours, i've gotten people all riled up. i have come to the conclusion that because i am not as engaged in the world as i usually am, this being summer vacation and all, i have developed some sort of social retardation and my finesse with words was left at school. hopefully i'll get it back come september!

wow. you ask a polite question about politics and get told that you're "pro land squatting murderistic filthy lying terrorists. What's there to say to such a self hating ignorant fool?"

i didn't realize i was self-hating! it's probably because my pimples. or the fact that i can't gain weight. or my low pay as a teacher. or my debts. or my lack of knowledge at building things. or my anxiety disorder. there are just so many reasons to be self-hating. i'm glad somebody told me!
isn't it exciting to find out you are an ignorant fool? it must be because i read too much. or because i don't watch that much tv. maybe if i watched more tv, i would be less foolish.

my bank account balance is showing signs of not being my friend anymore.

if it is true that "an object in motion stays in motion", then i am up for the award of Object Not In Motion. everytime i have a sort of break in employment, it becomes clear that i have an insanely acute puratanical work ethic that must not be disturbed by having any sort of extended free time. when i am without aim for days, or weeks, or months, at a time, everything becomes an effort i am not willing to submit to. when i am an object in motion (oim), i can be busy from dawn till dusk- rising early, tending to things, making phone calls, engaging in the world. when i become an object not in motion (onim), i rise at noon and can't even seem to take the 10 necessary steps outside to empty the garbage. aimless does not suit me, and i am not fulfilled by participating in little projects from noon till dusk. i need people, and a purpose, in a desparate sort of way. somehow, in it's own twisted way, work provides this. now, i know that i will read this blog entry in, say, october, and want to kill my summer-self for this sort of time-wasting and self-indulgence. i will once again become a bitter, tired oim that wants nothing more than a day off. i don't know why the grass is always greener on this particular area for me. when i have time, i need a purpose. when i have a purpose, i need time. where, oh where, is the happy medium?

ooh-la-la.
wedding pics.

made by hand from twigs and vines


inside, a room with a view


my husband (omigod! that word!) and the belle

last night's meal:
mache salad with avocado, grapefruit, toasted macadamia nuts and a citrus vinegrette
smoked mozzarella and scallion potato cakes with creme fraice
lemon pots de creme

eaten outside with lovely friends... i love summer.

i'm not quite sure how i lucked into this, but tonight i'm getting paid $75 to talk about shoes. before the focus group tonight, we had to take pictures of ourselves in our 5 favorite outfits, our five favorite shoes, our closets, etc. gave me good reason to straighten up the closet a bit. then we had to fill out this paperwork about how we felt in the shoes, why we like them, etc.
with the energy i've put into this minor activity, it is clear i need to get out a bit more. being at home all day might not be the most healthy thing for me. suggestions for hobbies?

can i gloat a little?
oh, go ahead.

my husband has a book coming out in january. he co-edited a series of essays entitled "FILTH: Dirt, Disgust, and Modern Life". it's all about shit- literally (and dirt and waste and sewage).
could a lady be any more proud of her husband? he writes about poop, for the love of god!

i definitely see a shit-themed party for the release. mmmm, what to serve?

in celebration of our independence today, we made ourselves free of fireworks celebrations and headed to burlingame to see Fahrenheit 9/11.
oddly enough, there were a slew of little people everywhere we went- to dinner, the movies, on the street. i suddenly remembered that burlingame was holding the annual little people's conference, and while i am accustomed to being a tall lady, tonight made me feel particularly broad in the height region.

my big goal for tomorrow is not to sleep until noon. it really fucks with your day.

the" mountain view voice" has a blurb this week about every boy who got promoted to an eagle scout.

some thoughts on marriage- 1 week in:

1. wedding rings are damn sexy on your husband
2. apparently, changing your name is not some big official form- you just go to the dmv, etc., and show them your marriage certificate. it's more like a personal choice.
3. it takes more than a week to really get used to the idea that you are a wife
4. seeing your wedding pictures makes you giddy all over again
5. you suddenly have new stuff and nowhere to put your old stuff
6. you may want to make more desserts (again, this could be personal choice)
7. you may scour the internet, looking for articles on feminist marriages. you may reflect again on gloria steinem's recent nuptials.
8. you may want to start writing articles for online sites about how to be a young, married feminist.
9. you may then realize you do not qualify as a young bride.
10. the dog will still need to be walked. the bathroom will still need to be cleaned. your bills still come. you are exempt from nothing.

can you believe i STILL cannot access my gmail account? it has been over two weeks now-- obviously, it got thrown by the wayside for a bit with the wedding and all- but SERIOUSLY, google, can you not do something here? it's hard, because i love google, i really do. i use them numerous times a day, but this whole email situation has really got me riled up. their complete lack of customer support is a little questionable. i realize it's a free service, but if you are offering a service, you need to back it up a little bit. i am back to harrassing all the folks there with my sob story.
and for the record, married life is GREAT!