But Call Me Betsy

I appear to be in love with NJ. I've been to various parts of it 3 times in the last two weeks--last weekend for Tara's bridal shower, then Saturday for Julie and Danny's baby shower, and then yesterday to go to the ocean. It's really not a bad drive, but I'm done with it for the next two months, unless we stay over night. Shawn bought a mantel remnant from Restore on Sunday and our friend Carrie was nice enough to drive us over to pick it up in her hot blue truck. The mantel is now situated in the lounge/record player room/parlor. We need help deciding what to put in the area where the fire would typically go. Here are five suggestions: 1. Of course, candles, but that's kind of cliche. 2. An aquarium but who knows where we'd find an aquarium that's two feet high by two inches wide and wouldn't the fish get stuck sideways? Shawn said, Hey, we can build our own aquarium. I said, You realize it has to be waterproof right? He said, We'll calk it shu...

You have to say the title in a spooky voice ala Lady in the Water, the new movie that looks possibly really stupid though I confess I had a bad dream about it last night; a bad dream about a movie I haven't even seen. I think in the dream, this woman was pushed over a bridge and was drowning over and over again and haunting people because of it. But okay I just watched the movie trailer with QuickTime and it appears that it's about this fairy tale woman who shows up in a pool and accidentally unleashes these bad people from another world. Huh? But I digress. The original purpose for the title is in reference to Henri's new hiding place. When moving in, we discovered Shawn's boxspring wouldn't fit and so we had to saw it in half. The attempt was somewhat unsuccessful in that it disallowed for later putting the springs on an actual frame. Instead, it's on the floor as though we're still in college. There are two perfect rips on either side of the boxspring ...

We're having one today for a student worker who is leaving---she's going off to law school at Drexel. I think the last time I went to a pizza party was maybe in tenth grade and it was probably with the church youth group I belonged to (for the sole purpose of trying to make Rob Dittmer fall in love with me. Didn't work). We didn't drink or smoke or swear so pizza and Jesus were all we had. Oh, and Christian rock (RD was in a Christian rock band that actually toured for awhile to a bunch of venues and churches). It seems like we were always having pizza parties in middle school--could it possibly have happened every Friday? No, I think it was more like something at the end of the year. Good Luck in 8th Grade Pizza Parties!! Reminds me of slumber parties which I never liked because there was always one hyper girl who tried to force everyone to stay awake all night long as though that were the coolest thing ever. And you had to play "Light as a Feather...Stiff as a B...

That's the book we're reading for the September book club and though I've never read any other Tom Wolfe books, I dove right into this one and like it a lot. He has one line I read this morning where he describes a timid mother as "a lab rabbit" which I thought captured her perfectly. More Fishtown news: *Kali told me that there was a naked fifteen year old girl standing outside of Crazy Fish peeing the other night (this is the bar near the house where I've gone by myself and met a 58 year old guy who bought me a shot before going off to meet is young mistress. After he left, I had a conversation with an older lady who was drinking and smoking and she told me about how she had cancer). Later, a friend from work dismissed the naked kid, saying she had spotted a 40 year old woman naked and peeing outside of a bar in Center City, so maybe it's just a new fad. *I am scared of teen boys in long white t-shirts. They're on every corner. Kali is not scared of ...

Dear Joey, I realize we barely know each other, but from the moment I first saw your well-oiled, muscular body at the Cave on Saturday night, I understood that we are meant to be together. Remember what you were wearing? Remember how you came out on-stage in those cute overalls with a white wife beater and construction boots? You carried a Goodrich tire which you bounced seductively right in front of me. The room rang with the screams of women and young ladies waving dollar bills toward you. Cameras flashed in your doe eyes, making you blink, though you never once faltered in your striptease. I saw soon-to-be-married women in their Bachelorette gear jumping up and down, overweight suburban secretaries, and bleached blond, fake tanned ho's vying for your attention. You gave the crowd a brave, toothy grin while simultaneously ripping off your pants to reveal your tight spandex underwear. It was so beautiful. That's when you glanced over at me. I hope you could see that I wasn...

Shawn has made it into the cover story for the latest version of Philadelphia Weekly with his brilliant urban planner knowledge. There's even a picture of him looking earnest and heartfelt in his beard. Took the number 3 bus again today. Interesting mix of people on board, including an overweight woman with an oxygen tube up her nose, lugging the tank in a large white handbag. It's much more precarious to hold coffee on the bus than on the subway because the bus stops more suddenly, sending people swaying into one another. It's exciting that way. In other news, just a minor complaint about what "kids-these-days" are wearing. Like, I think it's cool to be comfortable in your clothes. It beats the hell out of the clothes I wore in middle school--tight designer jeans (except I didn't have designer jeans), long sleeved shirts with lyrex sparkles, tons of hair spray and bangle bracelets, sweatshirts with "Relax, Don't Do It!" air-brushed across t...

Our old neighbor-ladies wanted to know why we got rid of all that perfectly good dog-stained carpet in the house (they saw it sitting outside for the garbage people to pick up). Francis, who had a carton of Marlboro Lights next to her, asked me if there was something wrong with the carpet. I didn't know exactly how to answer because I didn't want to say, Yes, the carpet was super ugly and smelly and then have her say that she has the exact same carpeting or that she was best friends forever with the previous owner. I also didn't want to sound frivolous or like we were ripping it up to increase the value of the house because we don't plan on sticking around forever. I think I said something like, Oh, we just love hard wood floors so much! Three guys from Mambo Movers did most of the packing and unpacking for us. I highly recommend them, but only if you yourself can refrain from carrying boxes, etc. It's difficult to stand there in the shade while they trek in and out...

Seriously, I feel like it's a competition lately among the YAT (Young and Talentless) to see who can make it on the front covers of US Weekly and People because of their anorexia. They need to publish really gross pictures of people with anorexia--like, let's see the bald patch on the back of Nicole Ritchie's bubble head or the fur growing on the stomach of Keira Knightley or let's talk about how everyone in Hollywood has an eating disorder. Does no one notice that Nicole Kidman has for the last decade or so weight about 90 pounds and 5 pounds of that is her heavy curly hair? I can see a bunch of actor's agents talking to their clients, Look, just stop eating for like 3 weeks. We've got an awards ceremony coming up and you haven't been in the public eye for months! You need to shrivel up! We are going to need to see ribs and collarbones and I don't care what it takes. Also, am I supposed to feel bad? I know Hollywood is competitive and cut-throat and you...

I can't wait! My friend Julie just sent me the link to the trailer.

In two days, we move to Fishy Fish Town and there will be no turning back. The difference in neighborhoods is striking. Bella Vista is more anonymous, the residents keep to themselves, and you hardly ever see the same person twice. In Fishy Fish, I've met about twenty-five percent of the population already. Let's see...There's Daniel, the possibly stoned clerk at Circle Thrift off Frankford who gave us a deal on the ugly sofa and chair we bought Saturday. Then I met the butcher across the street who gave me advice on how to unclog my bathroom sink (hey, use a plunger). The man working at the ice cream shop/pizzeria/drug store on the corner of Norris and Memphis already calls me sweetheart, and our next door neighbor's name is Eugene. I met Angela the disgruntled teen on Friday night and her little dog whose name escapes me. My friend Kali and I were introduced to two other dogs, a hyper Pekinese named Sandy and a lab type dog named Lou-Lou (I think). In Bella Vista, I k...

Here's a little cautionary tale for youse all, though I'm not yet sure what the lesson is. I think it has something to do with drunk driving, but not really as no one was harmed in the making of this story. Went to happy hour with co-workers on Friday night--to Ludwig's AGAIN and had four tall beers in about fifteen minutes. Left there to go meet Shawn and friends at the Fishtown house and drank another beer. Decided that I must leave that instant and demanded my car keys from Shawn. Drove home and could not find a parking space (in the one loop I made) and so parked the car somewhat illegally in the free municipal lot between 7th and 8th street off Christian. Walked to my apartment, devoured fistfuls of cereal straight from the box, and went to bed. Shawn arrived home a few hours later, but I barely noticed. The next morning, Shawn left to get started on the house and Liz delivered about 25 boxes for him to use when he packs, which I'm guessing will happen about 1...

Henri has his routine. It includes meowing in the morning after my alarm has gone off, wobbling to the food bowl when I fill it, pooping on the floor in the office, hiding in the bathroom closet, and this, his ten minutes of love per day: And here is a picture of yours truly's legs in H&M pull up stockings ($7.50), stepping on the landing of our new house before ripping the shit out of the floor.

The World Cup is ruining my life. It causes my boyfriend to drink too much on Saturday afternoons and pass out face first on our bed and lie there for hours drooling all over the quilt my mother made. It has caused me to drink too much and be similarly out -of-order too. It has caused Shawn's little work crush to replan her life around where he might or might not show up for the game so she can stand around smoking nervously and trying not to look at him and to also pretend that I'm not there. There is nothing I love more than to spend my 4th of July crushed in a booth in a crowded bar full of drunk Penn graduate students trading unclever quips throughout the match (including one fat guy with a mullet who yelled, "Motherf-ing faggot!" to my favorite player, that German goalie after the ball got away from him in the last minute and a half). Two more games to go. May the best team win and win quickly.

Or "Happy Independence Day!" We're celebrating the 4th by watching the World Cup at Ludwig's. I think Germany is playing Bangladesh. We're rooting for Germany. It's interesting to watch a game that lasts ninety plus minutes and where usually only one or two goals are scored the entire time. Is it rude for me to finish my book in the bar? Because I'm reading Wally Lamb's She's Come Undon e after having finished his later book last week, I Know This Much is True . I didn't think I'd like either book that much as they have Oprah's stamp of approval and god knows I'm snotty about that kind of stuff, but they've both been enjoyable reads. Would've been even better if I'd been able to read them while lying on the beach, but we're stuck here for the time being. Carrie was telling us this story yesterday about how her friend Andy's girlfriend called him "common" because he wouldn't take a hard enough st...

Shawn and I have become the kind of people who should wear their keys on their jeans. We actually went to Home Depot to buy shit yesterday. For the uninitiated, here's an array of the items you can purchase at HD: a spanking new toilet, Sponge Bob wallpaper, curtains, ugly Oriental rugs, shrubs, Martha Stewart's Living magazine, Diet Coke, candy bars, door knobs, doors, a mini saw, a chain saw, chain link fences, ceiling fans, sauna tubs, and flooring. I know this may not be surprising to everyone, but it was overwhelming to me. I couldn't believe we were standing in the aisle evaluating toilet seat lids. I mean, it's a toilet. Sometimes, I think it's better to have fewer options. Then we went back to the house in Fishy-Fish town and proceeded to pull up nails and staples in the floor with the newly purchased nail and stapler tool and I went up to the big bedroom and ripped up the carpet in there. We discovered one part of the landing that was lined in newspaper ...

I was owed vacation time and then we have the fourth of July off anyway and so here I am in day three of a mini break from work, much needed in some ways though the weeks fly by. I don't really know what to write about today because I'm in a funk. One funny but not so funny thing is this kid at work, John, was telling me about the crack whores in his neighborhood. He lives around 15th and Girard and he says that you can see the women, day or night, trolling the streets in tight spandex and little tops, sometime swith a titty hanging out. They always say something to him like, You want some, white boy? If he doesn't answer, they get more aggressive so he usually says something. There's one woman, Cookie, who walks around with her shirt yanked up in one hand and her pants yanked down with the other and she says, Give me some money for these! They take their customers to an abandoned building, crawling underneath this hole in the wall that they've covered with cardbo...