Category Archives: journalism

Shopping

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Ah-ha! At last they admit it! I always knew that somewhere in the Wal-Mart “Manual for Luring Innocent Shoppers Into Our Lair and Tempting Them With Shiny Pretty Things At Low Low Prices,” there was a whole section devoted to “Impulse Items.” You know, those things such as a five-pound bag of potato chips, a complete manicure-in-the-car-while-you-drive kit and a new coffee table … in a box … that you never knew you needed until you see them in all their glory and before you know it, you’ve added them to your cart along with dog food, doughnuts and a Dora the Explorer backpack. So who slipped up and revealed the secret?  Or maybe the “Impulse Items” signage is itself part of the devious plan. I mean, who can resist checking out the aisle and seeing if indeed it’s full of things we suddenly and impulsively want to buy? Well, actually, I resisted. But only because I saw some Pretty Shiny Things in the next aisle over and then somehow inexplicably came home with a new mixer plus new sets of pots, pans, knives and  — and I never ever hardly ever am usually too busy doing charity work to cook.

And I know this is late and you’ve probably already seen Sex and the City 2, but in case you haven’t and you’re now waiting for the DVD, read my column http://www.timesdaily.com/article/20100618/COLUMNISTS/100619794 to find out the one true thing this fantasy movie says about women.

Packing

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Whether I’m traveling on a 10-day vacation or an overnight stay at grandson Capt. Adorable’s house, I overpack. I can’t help it. It’s not that I’m a fashionista and I have to change clothes three times a day and always be perfectly and impeccably dressed. On the contrary, I’m pretty low maintenance and can even wear a pair of blue jeans, like, three days in a row. It’s just that I’m wishy-washy and notoriously indecisive and when I’m standing in my own closet it takes me many many minutes to figure out what to wear. So when I’m packing to go somewhere I have to plan for that. I mean, how do I know in advance what I might think that I want to wear? I have to include all the choices I would mull over so I can dilly-dally in front of my luggage  the same was I hem-and-haw in my closet at home. The result, of course, is that I end up with 2 1/2 tightly packed bags for a friend’s out–of-town wedding weekend, my husband as always brings along only a half-empty tote and I’m highly embarrassed when we stop on the way to visit another friend and she’s got everything she needs for a two-week tour of Italy tucked into A KID-SIZED BACKPACK. Read more in my weekly newspaper column at http://www.timesdaily.com/article/20100604/NEWS/100609931, and share your packing tips. Please!!!

Of Closets and Purses

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Yup, this is a car full of clothes. And while it’s my car, they are not my clothes. A couple of us helped a friend moved this past weekend. “All I’ll have to do is some cleaning and move some things out of the closets,” she said. And we said, “Sure, we can handle that. No problem.” I volunteered for the closet transport, but that was before I remembered that my friend LOVES clothes and LOVES shopping and has the wardrobe to prove it. Yikes! Younger Daughter was around to help with the first closet of winter clothes in my friend’s spare bedroom, which only filled my back seat. This is the contents of my friend’s double closet that held her spring and summer things, which you know here in the South accounts for 75 percent of what we wear. “You’re not going to put this on your blog, are you?” my friend asked, nervously. “And when you do, just don’t say my name.” But, honestly, I was impressed with how organized and efficient her closet system was. I tried to duplicate that as I filled up the closets in her new house, but I’m afraid she’s going to have to redo.

And if she had known how big a slob I actually am, she may not have entrusted her closets to me.  I’ve learned how to disguise my tendency toward total chaos and yuckiness, but my husband could certainly tell her.  As a journalist, however, I’ve pledged to tell only the truth. So I revealed all my disgusting habits — well, some, anyway — in my weekly newspaper column at http://www.timesdaily.com/article/20100528/NEWS/100529900. Read it at your own peril.

Lost and Found

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I had a 24-hour run of very weird things happen to me — well, weird in my world, at least. Some of this may be slightly gross, so you have been warned. First, I lost my underwear. What happened was that I was visiting Older Daughter and I was taking a shower in 2-year-old grandson Capt. Adorable’s bathroom. I brought clean clothes in and took off my pajamas and underwear and then when I got out of the shower and got dressed in my clean clothes and gathered up my already-worn clothes, I could not find my underwear. Anywhere. Completely disappeared. I looked in all the towels and under the rugs, but nada. I even wondered if they’d gotten tangled up in the clean clothes — cargo capris and a T-shirt — I’d just put on but they didn’t seem to be there anywhere. (Notice how I’m trying to avoid the use of the word “underpants” since I am a good Southern girl and we just don’t use language like that out loud in mixed company.) My son-in-law gives my 2-year-old grandson Capt. Adorable his bath in that bathroom and I really didn’t want either of them to find my missing … well, you know, but a thorough search turned up nothing.  So I sort of forgot about the mystery and went on about the day — playing outside, going out for lunch, meeting and greeting — until a few hours later when I returned to the bathroom. And as I was leaving, I felt something soft skitter down my leg and there on the floor was the missing article of clothing. It apparently had gotten tangled up in my pants and had only then worked its way down. Very strange. And what I want to know is: Has this happened to anybody else? Is there an epidemic of underwear falling out of people’s pants legs? Do I need to be on the lookout for this?

And the weirdness only continued: The next day I was late for a hair appointment but the salon was closed when I got there so I left to run more errands and then the stylist got there after all and thought I was late but I came back and we were each glad we hadn’t given in to our impulses to leave scathing voice mails. So I got in the chair and she started cutting and all of a sudden she asked me if I had any old pantyhose. (Yes, even when it’s 95 degrees and 95 percent humidity, we Southern women will still wear pantyhose.) Turns out hair salons are collecting the hair that usually ends up on the floor and sending it to the Gulf for use in buoys that will soak up some of the oil spill. And also collecting pantyhose to put the hair in. The stylist and I debated the merits of used versus new pantyhose for oil-soaking-up and didn’t reach any conclusion. But my hair did contribute to the cause.

Then I needed lunch but my favorite downtown lunch place turned out apparently not to be my favorite since it had closed two weeks ago and I didn’t even know. So then I craved a veggie burger from Burger King but the nearest BK had a note on the door saying its broiler was broken although they could still fry anything you wanted. Add in road work and detours everywhere. So there you go.

But all was well this morning because my weekly column in the Florence, Alabama, TimesDaily ran next to a story about “Sex and the City” fashion so my column and photo is right next to a the headline that reads “Fabulous at any age.”  Yes, ma’am. I’ll take any adjacent and reflected glory I can get.

Snoring

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Okay, everybody out there who sleeps with a snorer, raise your hands. Just as I thought: A lot of you all know what I’m talking about here. Oh, I love my husband deeply and he’s a great guy and where would I be without him? But he snores. And here’s the thing: He sort of knows he snores. He’ll snore and I’ll wake up and then he’ll wake up and ask me if he was snoring and I’ll say “yes” and he’ll say “sorry” and then he’ll immediately go back to sleep and … start snoring again. At home this is not a problem since there are other sleeping spots to choose from. And when we’re on the road we usually try to get those two-room suites with a couch. But sometimes in some situations there’s nowhere to go. A couple of weeks ago that’s exactly what had happened: It was 2 a.m. and we had a long and tiring day ahead of us (my husband actually had two long and tiring days ahead of him) and we had one bed in one room. Luckily, I came up with a creative solution. Sort of, at least. Read my weekly newspaper column at http://www.timesdaily.com/article/20100521/ARTICLES/5215000 to find out what it was and tell me what you think.

Goat Cheese

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Recently I went to Elkmont, Alabama, to learn about goats. Well … actually to learn about goat cheese. And what I learned is that goat cheese basically is an empty canvas and you as the goat-cheese artist can design whatever tasty creation you want. Humble Heart Farms in Elkmont has a herd of about 100 goats and sells flavored goat cheese at local farmer markets and other retailers and to Huntsville-area upscale restaurants. Plus, you can take tours of the farm as well as sign up for a cheese-making class. If you’ve never had flavored goat cheese, you are in for a treat — I especially love herbed goat-cheese on crackers and honey-flavored goat cheese on gingersnaps. Yum! So one sunny Saturday morning, several of us eager goat-cheese-fans gathered in the Humble Heart cheese-making kitchen. After a quick tutorial on how to turn goat milk into goat cheese, we got bowls of plain cheese and an array of intriguing ingredients to experiment with. Find out what we came up with at http://www.timesdaily.com/article/20100519/ARTICLES/5195000.

Jackson, Mississippi

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When my Dear Husband asked me to go with him to the annual Mississippi/Louisiana Associated Press Managing Editors awards luncheon this past week, I had no idea we’d be going to one of Jackson, Mississippi’s old-school-and-proud-of-it landmarks: The Capital Club. Established in 1947, it’s downtown near the governor’s mansion and the state capitol — commanding an impressive view from atop the Capital Towers building. I could just imagine all sorts of high-powered conferences going on while high-powered politicians and business folks conferred over their hand-carved roast beef. I loved all the upscale details, too — from the leather furniture in the library to the lemons and limes used in the flower arrangement. And you know I love a fancy bathroom. This one had those lovely big mirrors with chairs and makeup counters and glass decanters of hand lotion — why can’t Wal-Mart do something like this??? Dear Husband picked up a first-place award for headline writing (His paper, the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal in Tupelo, got a total of 26 awards — sweet!) and gave a talk to the group on why he’s optimistic about the future of newspapers — gaining extra points for mentioning both me and grandson Capt. Adorable. And rumors that we got thrown out of the dining room are greatly exaggerated. Truly! After we loaded up our plates at the lunch buffet (the gumbo, sweet corn muffins and fresh coconut cake were especially delicious) we thought we were supposed to sit in the main dining room with what looked to be a core group of Mississippi movers and shakers. Turns out we journalists had our own room — away from the movers and shakers. Probably a wise move. Learn more about the Capital Club at http://www.capitalclubms.com.

Fashion and TV

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Sometimes I truthfully do not understand fashion. Looking at this photo, you probably would think that this is a rack of leftover curtain fabric that somebody found in the back of an upholstery shop that closed in 1987 and had not been touched since then … sort of like an ugly-fabric time capsule. But, no. This is a rack of for-sale-now-get-’em-while-they’re-hot leggings at a teen-friendly mall store whose name I will not reveal because I like their cheap jewelry and I don’t want to have to put on dark glasses to shop there — but think along the lines of “Sue 21.” I promise you I had dresses made out of some of this fabric back when we also wore stirrup pants and big oversized sweatshirts with appliqued puppy dogs. Not pretty. I know that girls wear these with denim minis and look adorable, but I still have a hard time reconciling bad floral prints with high style. I can’t figure out if teenagers are wearing these ironically or if they really think these are cute or if they’re just happy to find something to wear for $9.99. Or maybe all of the above?

And while you’re pondering the future of leggings, think about TV, too. Seems to me that there are some really good shows on now — shows that combine comedy with intelligence and real life. Well, at least more real life than we’re used to on sitcoms. Modern Family, Cougar Town, Community, Parks and Rec — they all are on my list of favorites, and I bet they’re on yours too. Read my weekly newspaper column on the state of TV sitcoms at http://www.timesdaily.com/article/20100507/ARTICLES/5075004 and let me know what you think.

Nashville, Tennessee

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This is what downtown Nashville, Tennessee — one of my favorite places ever — normally looks like, with the Cumberland River in its proper place. But you know from news reports and Youtube what it looked like after a weekend of record rainfall. Freakin’ unbelieveable. Cleanup is starting as floodwaters that killed at least 20 people and caused an estimated hundreds of millions of dollars in damage in Middle Tennessee gradually begin to recede. We are so grateful that friends and family there suffered only fixable problems: ruined carpets, soggy furniture, flooded-out cars and power outages. By all accounts, cleanup is going to be a major challenge. Keep up with the latest news and find ways to help by at http://www.tennessean.com/, site of Nashville’s daily newspaper, the Tennessean.

And while you’re clicking around the Interwebs, I’d love for you to read my newspaper column from this past week at http://www.timesdaily.com/article/20100430/ARTICLES/4305004. It’s about a friend and local businesswoman, Marigail Mathis, who died a couple of weeks ago from cancer complications. I say she was a friend, but actually I never went to her house or ate lunch with her or saw a movie or any of the things you normally do with friends. Yet, she made me feel as if I were a friend. She made everybody she met feel that way — she was warm and generous and supportive and encouraging, all within a three-minute conversation standing in the middle of her clothing store. Marigail was one of those special folks you just feel happy to know. She’s already missed.

Babies

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Ain’t technology wonderful? Here I am, stuck in the basement obsessively keeping up with weather and tornado warnings on TV, radio and computer all at the same time — and smiling with delight at new pics of my week-old nephew. Born to my younger brother and my sweet-and-precious-even-though-she’s-a-Yankee sister-in-law in Maine, this adorable baby does have an actual name but to me he’ll never outgrow what his parents-to-be called him when he was only a tiny image on a sonogram: Splinter, as in A Little Piece of Wood. Can’t you just smell that precious new baby goodness? Splinter’s mom and dad will make excellent parents, and “big brother” Thule, their Siberian Husky, will help, I’m sure. And in no time whatsoever, it’ll be two years later and, just like grandson Capt. Adorable, Splinter will be playing with trains and flirting with girls and demanding yellow crayons instead of red ones. And by the way, it’s a lot harder to build these train tracks then it looks! Not to mention any names, but one day somebody decided to help the Captain lay out a new configuration and that person got hopelessly confused and couldn’t even create a simple circle that would bring Thomas back to the station safe and sound. Thankfully, the Captain had it figured out. And I believe “laying toy train tracks” should be added to the list of brain-boosting activities.

And on another rant, I climbed up on a (Dove for Sensitive Skin) soap box in my weekly newspaper column, http://www.timesdaily.com/article/20100423/ARTICLES/4235001,  and explained exactly why I’m mad at Tiger Woods, Michael Phelps, John Edwards and Kate Gosselin. I mean, it’s fine to make mistakes and do stupid things and choose wrongly — just don’t look me (and by “me,” I mean all of us) in the eye and lie about it. Except if you’re on Survivor. Then I sort of expect you to lie. And tell me all about it.