Plagiarizing Mia

My mom, in her infinite creativity, has decided that she will not be called Grandma at her young age (and she is young enough that I won't reveal her age...but I'll give you hint. If I'd had Lyric at the same age as my mom had me, Lyric would be driving already. Startling no?) .

I never really picture my mom as a "grandma," (grandmas should be...older? matronly? rounder? something). And her excitement for an alternative way of being called "grandma" concerned me a bit when she paused a long pause before revealing the name she'd be requiring my tiny girl offspring to call her. I figured she'd go with the ever popular Nana, in tribute to our Italian half. Almost! But not.

She came up with "Mia," which means "mine" in Italian. And I think it's perfect. :)

So speaking of my mom, I am going to reprint an excerpt from a couple of emails here, because I find that my own grandmother has not fulfilled my storytelling requirements of "gee, gram, tell me what it was like when you were a kid" as much as I'd like. But my mom, much more a storyteller (no, this is not always good, but in some cases, very much so), responded today to one of my emails mentioning a laundry delivery service. I really liked her reply, so I am archiving it here, for posterity.

I suppose it isn't actually plagiarism, but merely copyright violation, to reprint her cool story without permission, but I wanted to share it with you and someday with the fetus.

when i was little and we lived in the city, we had "the laundry man." it was quite handy, big bag went out, big bag came back and everything was magically clean and folded :)

of course, this was during the time of "the man" - as in the italian neighborhood fruit peddler, the vegetable man, the milk man, and most importantly, the lupini man. later, when we moved to the suburbs we lost everyone except the milk man, but we added the home juice man.

and so, everything comes full circle.the return of the laundryman!

(here I queried for more info on the lupini man, who particularly interested me)

yep - Lupini man brought ceci, lupini, red and plain pistachios, cashew, etc., on a little wooden cart. lupini man gave you whichever one you asked for in a little waxed paper bag. they were like a nickle or dime or quarter or somethin'. it was an incredibly big treat cuz he didnt come every day and even if he had, that didnt mean we could have it everytime.

oooh, and how could i 4get the snowcone man (metal cart w/shaved ice and lottsa colored bottles) - we hardly ever got to have that cuz it would "freeze our bellies," uknow. oh yeah, and the ice cream man ... which was, specifically, the good humor man. yummy, fancy ice cream bars with stuff inside them. :)

man, I really miss those mans.

now, for some odd reason, neither the ice cream bars from the good humor man, nor the italian ice we got at - yes, wait for it - the italian ice store, was expected to "freeze our bellies". yet, when the other ice cream truck came by with the highly suspicious soft-serve vanilla and chocolate cones, there was some belly-freezing concerns. the worst, tho, was the completely evil FROZEN BANANA that would likely kill us cuz the banana could be bad and we'd never know until it was 2late. whew!

And the winner is....

Looks like we're down to Stiles and Willow. Kaitlyn and Halley got no love, despite their "K" and "comet" appeal.

All five names (including Lyric) have been in the running since last September, but Stiles has always been the frontrunner for the middle name. And we're already set on Lyric for a first name.

So, I guess we'll see if she looks like a Lyric Stiles once they airlift her from my belly next month. Stay tuned!

Thanks to the vast majority of you who provided your votes on our daughter-to-be's potential name in the spirit in which it was requested. It's nice to know which names people hear a good ring in, and which names people perceive as original vs. too original vs. overdone.

We had Baby School for the last two nights and it's me most of today to recover. So I'll explore all THAT fun with you when I have more time to write this evening.

Thanks for playing!

Best spoof video

From Fark TV, sent to me by my boss: Click here

Requires sound.

You have to stick with it. The intro is damned funny (a little loud), but the core of the commercial is even funnier.

Awesome.

Oh, no! It's...The Mask!

My best friend and I have had many a laugh about The Mask.

No, not this one.











Nope....But this might be preferable.











No...but I may send away for this one.







Nuh uh. But you're getting warm.








It's The Mask...of Pregnancy.
(du du du dummmm)

We were sure The Mask of Pregnancy didn't really exist, that it was the Bogie Man of the What to Expect books. Never saw a woman with it, never saw any signs of it on our own pregnant selves, never heard of anyone suffering from it. Never even saw a picture of it.

Til now. I saw it this week..in my mirror. Weep.

Like most everything else tied to my vanity, no one else--my husband, coworkers, cats--can see it on me. But I assure you it's there. It looks and feels like a mild heat rash, a sort of reddish-brown-dotted rawness on my cheeks, a spreading inflammation of my intermittent rosacea. My husband says it's my freckles, and that might be partially true, but it's definitely way more than that. Plus, aren't I at least supposed to get a bit of a tan when I get freckles? No fair.

I'd stopped wearing much make-up (or dying my hair, waxing, or just about everything else) out of pure disinterest and laziness. A sort of "what's the point, I'm fat and living a sex-free existence anyway). It was a welcome weakening of my vanity, perhaps. And as it appears my Stila foundation is no match for it anyway.

And no, I'm not posting a photo so you can either say "Eee gads woman!" or "What mask?"

Instead, I'm going to the Mac store.

My dear friend recently Anita informed me of Mac's progressive, hippie-centric values (no animals, etc) and I'm stoked. Thanks Anita!

No thanks to you, Lyric, mask-making, brain-sucking baby that you are.

The Baby That Ate My Brain

I cannot remember anything. Nothing at all.

Saw a movie this weekend. Can't remember what it was. Husband told me the name. Barely rang a bell. Husband told me the plot. Was a faint ringing in the distance, but still not much. Was like it was 5 years ago we saw it. And it was about the end of the world. Whoops.

Can't remember anyone's name at work. Everyone looks the same suddenly. Like I'm seeing them through Lyric's eyes, and she's all "Oh look, another white guy with corporate hair. Whatever." I think she probably just calls everyone Bob. "Hey Bob! Great meeting!"

And another thing! (More name chatter...)

Neither of the names Halley or Kaitlyn rival, say, Emily, in the name popularity contest. Kaitlyn and Halley (note, that's Halley, like alley, like the Comet, not Hailey, like rocks falling on my head) may not be as obscure as, say, Lyric or Willow, but they definitely aren't the Jennifers of the upcoming generation.

And I really wasn't shooting entirely for "obscure" but rather, "meaningful to me." If I had an aunt Emily I adored, I might choose Emily, regardless of its convention.

Chatting virtually with friends about potential names before I make a final call on the big day is fun! So please don't think I'm asking because I'm totally second guessing everything. That's a big chauvinistic, really. (She's not sure about the middle name! She's pregnant and hormonal!)

Now, if you want to know about hormonal freak outs, how about my entire house being a shambles so that my fat, immobile pregnant ass can't get around without tripping because it's taking Kevin four times as long to paint (I told him so, repeatedly) the rooms, and he's going out of town for the next two weekends for work even though the painting won't be done, and the baby is coming in 37 days, and I don't really have anything for her to wear or be wiped or changed or fed with yet, and my back hurts so freaking much I can't walk some days, and when my back isn't hurting, my esophagus is having an acid hole burned through it so that I can't sleep more than four hours a night during this last month which I thought I was going to be my last month of sleep for the next four years.

It's the Name Game! Now with 50% more names!

A few days ago, in a 5000 treatise, I suggested I might want to replace Lyric Stiles with Lyric Kaitlin. On blog and off, I was summarily overrruled.

So, cute as I think it is, and much as I love a "K" for the spawn of Kevin and Kari, I'm convinced that Lyric Kaitlyn should not replace Lyric Stiles for two reasons:

1. I didn't know Kaitlyn was one of the names du jour for my fetus' generation. Apparently it's almost like "Ann," "Lynn," and "Marie," -- names that seem to irritate most adult women who own them.

2. The last consonant of Lyric runs smack into the first one in Kaitlyn. Auditory confusion ensues. Bad poetic karma. Whatever, it's doesn't work.

But I have two *other* names I'd forgotten I was once considering. Ready?

Lyric Willow
That's my favorite tree, and I love, love, love trees. A lot. All the time. When drunk, I am often found hugging one in the park across the street. I'm a tree lover and tree hugger. Weeping willows rule.


And if you watched Buffy, you know the keywords: Wiccan, witchcraft, smart, nerdy, sweet, silly, kind, funny, and bad ass.

Lyric Halley
As in "the comet." As mentioned earlier, I've been concerned that "Lyric" pushes the fetus too firmly into the arts.

As also mentioned, she's going to be an astronomer. This name choice could add the balance she needs to be both poetic *and* scientific.

(Note: I'm currently pronouncing Halley old-school: Hay-lee. But I would likely go modern to properly match pronunciation to spelling: Hal-lee)

What say you, blogwatchers?

Ms. Lyric Stiles McCarthy?
Ms. Lyric Willow McCarthy?
Ms. Lyric Halley McCarthy?

(I just noticed they all have an L in the middle. Interesting. I had an unknown L fetish.)

I won't tell you what the Y-chromosome carrier thinks until I hear from you.

Alanis, you've won me back

My husband sent this video to me, I assume, to make me feel middle-aged.


I felt like my grandmother looked when she saw her first Prince video 25 years ago. Mortified.

Then he tried to make me watch another--this time, a cover version. I'm all "No way, I'm not clicking. I can't take the horror. I can't take the pain of feeling too old to even get it." But he talked me into it
I loved Jagged Little Pill so much, but when Ms. Morrisette did all her India hippie music, she lost me. If you stick with this cover song, however, you'll understand why with each line-by-line vocal reenactment, Alanis has won me back to being a huge fan. Awesome.