JustJuli's Open Salon Blog

Made: Molotov Cocktails

Wed, 25 Aug 2010 12:08:42 -0400

Babysitting was one thing I succeeded at in high school. I was in demand in my neighborhood because of my little bag. Not to toot my own horn, but I was kind of the freakin’ Mary Poppins of Arlington Heights with this bag. It was my little craft bag and it was full of construction paper and pipe cleaners and googly eyes. Even more important than the stuff and the instructions to make egg carton caterpillars was the fact that I liked it. I think that’s what kept the kids interested; they knew I wasn’t just giving them busy work because I was so excited about doing the projects myself. Yes, I was a Teenage Craft Nerd. I loved making crayon melts and paper mache.

It was stress-relief. It took me away from the AP French class that I was failing and was sure would ruin my future forever. (I would be living in a cardboard box under a freeway because of that F! It would go on my PERMANENT record! I still hyperventilate a little at the memory. The things I worry about now…it almost makes me nostalgic.) But craft time with the kids put my mental energy into something manageable. Like tissue paper flowers. You can bet your sweet ass that now that I have kids of my own we have jars of pompons and googly eyes and glitter glue littering the house. In fact, in my glee, I bought them waaay too soon. All a two-year-old knows how to do with googly eyes is throw them all over the floor. Repeatedly.

The other thing is: I’ve always been stunningly bad at making things. Hilariously bad. I wish I’d saved a sewing project from those high school days. In a fit of ambition I decided to make a dress from old tablecloths. I took apart one of my princess-seamed dresses and used the pieces as a pattern. Pretty crafty eh? Well, it went downhill from there. I lack any kind of skill with a sewing machine. It’s amazing I didn’t sew my fingers to the dress. The neckline ended up looking like someone with palsy and a bad caffeine habit had drawn it and one sleeve was longer than the other. The hemline traveled from knee to shin randomly. I still wore it a couple of times, though, to the immense amusement of all who saw me. Hey! I MADE this dammit!

I can’t help myself. I love to make things. I love to read about projects and I dream big DIY dreams. And I screw it up so so so bad. Lately I’m into this thing called upcycling. You take things that would normally go into the garbage or recycling bin and make them into useful or beautiful things for your home. (In theory at least) I found these instructions for a wine bottle torch and immediately wanted to make it. My husband was skeptical, but kept it to himself, mostly.

The first step was getting to the hardware store. The wine bottles, I have. Oh do I have. I’ve been saving them for awhile for another project that is bound to end in an emergency room visit: the bottle cutter. I plan to cut them into lovely vases and drinking glasses. Meanwhile they sit and collect dust.

So off to get hardware. When I first entered the Home Depot I encountered a young man in the tell-tale orange vest and held out my computer print-out grinning sheepishly, “Does any of this look familiar to you? Do you know where I might find it?” He peered at the picture and pointed me towards the plumbing aisle where I found a lovely older man with a thick old country (not sure which one) accent. He was infinitely amused by me and absolutely delighted to help me find all my copper fittings and caps. After handing me the last piece he said, “Now the wine bottle is something we don’t have,” with a wink at me. I assured him I had the bottles with a blush and a thank you feeling like a stupid girl with a stupid idea. A stupid girl who drinks too much wine.

The biggest obstacle to overcome was the three foot length of threaded metal rod I had to cut down into six inch pieces. I wandered around the Home Depot plaintively asking, “But can’t you cut it for me?” with my sad doe eyes. No dice. I haven’t done any real sawing since shop class in junior high. This would be interesting. After working up a useless sweat and working through my swear-word collection using the wrong kind of hacksaw, my husband found the metal saw. Now we both worked up a sweat and sore shoulders but we actually managed to cut through the rod. (Helpful tip: applying downward pressure with a saw does not help your cause at all. It makes things harder and slower, in fact. My shoulder can tell you that. Move the saw back and forth fast and light. It’s all in the friction, baby. See Mr. P? I did learn something in shop class! Just took me awhile to remember.)

So now I had all the pieces and only had to put the torches together. I blistered my hand screwing the metal plates onto our fence, but I managed them all. I liked the placement. Now I just had to fill the bottles with tiki torch fuel and put the wicks together. It was around the third bottle when the wick slipped that I started to have some fears creep up on me. The wick went less than halfway into the bottle. That meant there was a lot of tiki fuel in these bottles. Like, whoa, a lot.

I thought about the fact that I was putting the wick together. Me. Not a product designer or skilled craftsman or even a factory machine. I was responsible for making this thing work safely. I started to sweat. I looked at the bottles again and realized what I had was essentially a Molotov cocktail. I mean, that’s what they are right? Bottles filled with gasoline and then a rag they light and toss. Oh dear god, I’m attaching a Molotov cocktail to my wooden fence. Visions of party guests impaled with shards of glass shrapnel and my fence and house going up in a tiki-lit fireball flashed through my mind. Ok. Deep breath. Just wrap that damn wick tight. (The instructions re: the wick simply say, “You obviously do not want it to fall in.” Yeah. Do you think?!) Lots and lots of Teflon tape on that sucker. (Helpful hint to avoid glass shrapnel death: I found another site where someone put these things together and to save fuel he filled half the bottle with water. Oil floats on top and voila. Quite a bit less scary and gas-bomb-like.)

So here they are:

My fence-mounted Molotov cocktails. Aren’t they purty?

Eat, Pray, Love: The Staycation

Mon, 9 Aug 2010 09:08:12 -0400

Well, I’ve been away from my blog for awhile now on a fantastical voyage of self-discovery to lands far-flung.

No.

No. I haven’t actually. I’ve been stewing in self-pity and body odor and I haven’t left the house in weeks because I now telecommute. Living the dream. Help. Me.

Ahem! No need for the maudlin! Even those of us who lack a publisher that can fund a “Send me to Italy, India, and Indonesia So I Can Have a Questionable Epiphany” world tour can have a life-changing journey of beauty a la Elizabeth Gilbert. Check it out! World Market (love your wine, guys) has Eat, Pray, Love movie tie-ins. Because drinking Republic of Tea from a white elephant pot before you meditate in front of your Buddha blinds is completely like going to India or Bali. In fact, they say if you hold the pasta bowls up to your ear you can hear the fountains of Rome. Ahhhh…..

My journey begins with a failed attempt to run another marathon which, when you think about it is exactly like a failed marriage. Or…you know….not.

Hey we’re on the cheap here. Cheap crisis. Cheap-as-free travel. Or complete lack of travel. We go now to:

The Living Room

A Tale about the Pursuit of Pleasure

“Food Porn is So a Valid Lifestyle Choice”

I have mixed up a pitcher of mojitos and a nearly bathtub-sized bowl of fresh guacamole and now I am going to watch Man vs. Food with my beloved. If you are not familiar with the show, the host/star Adam Richman travels to various cities and attempts food challenges in each of them. Things like downing a whole-cow-sized steak in an hour or a burger the size of a tractor tire or buffalo wings spicy enough to melt chrome. It’s not a show I thought I would like at all, but since my husband introduced me to it I’ve become strangely addicted. I cannot explain the allure except to say it is excess in its most excessive glory.

We are watching one of the hot wing challenges which always fascinate me because I can handle about a cold-oatmeal level of heat in most of my food. Watching someone eat at Adam’s level of vigor seems to inspire the competitor in me. Can’t run on my bad knee? Depressed and inactive? Well, I will eat with gusto then! (Makes complete sense) What was once appreciation of mint and lime and creamy avocado has degraded into shoveling and guzzling. But ain’t it America baby? Passion = gluttony! And little pink houses for you and me.

Soon my beloved and I are giggly and groping and making juvenile jokes about chicken. (Is it weird to get turned on by food porn? Yes. Yes it is. And now we move on to the next plot point such as it is). We make off to the bedroom for furtive sexy-time while the dogs are still fooled into thinking we’re coming back to the living room because we left the tv on. (Sexy-time on a bed covered in dog hair is so very Gilbertian. So much like billowy mosquito netting blowing in tropical breezes.)

Afterwards we pass out in over-indulged comas. Around 2 am I wake with a terrible feeling that someone has tilted the bed up on two legs and sent it spinning.

The Bathroom

The Pursuit of Devotion

“Praying to the Porcelain God”

Have you ever had that dreadful moment of realization that you are far drunker than you thought you were a moment ago? You were taking it slow. Having, yes, maybe a silly conversation with your friends at the bar, but it wasn’t like you were falling off the stool or slurring or anything. (At least it didn’t sound like it to you). Then you get up and…..oh….you sit right back down. Time for some water.

Well at 2 am in bed it was way too late for me. The guacamole has already begun its arduous journey back out of my body the way it came in.

Oh dear God.

Anyone who doesn’t think you can get spiritual while vomiting has not had the dry heaves. I guarantee you it is a Come to Jesus moment. Please…Vishnu…Jehovah….Allah…Buddha…sweet baby Jesus…make it stop.

Between bouts I lie back down and am so still a bird would think me an inert object, as the guru said. I chant my mantra: “I am not nauseous. I am not nauseous. I am not nauseous. I am not….agghhhhhh”

Then it is back to supplication before my disgusting altar. (Seriously. When is the last time I cleaned the thing?) Oh God. I am humbled before you. I am a foolish mortal. I swear I will never drink again. Suddenly the bargaining ego is vomited up (there’s nothing left in there anyway; it wouldn’t surprise me to find a kidney in the bowl at this point) and I achieve acceptance. The vomiting will be done when it is done. Not my will, oh Universe. I am merely a vessel for the vomit. I achieve peace.

Then I puke again.

The Kitchen

The Pursuit of Balance or at Least a Decent Hangover Cure

“Even in My Eyeballs I Feel Different”

In the morning light, as I look through bleary eyes at my darling children chasing each other around the house with the pure innocent exuberance only the very young have, I gather myself together. I tell my wide-eyed young in my sweetest voice that it would pain me greatly to have to throw them off the roof this morning, but if they don’t play quietly….well, Mommy can’t be responsible for her actions. My two-year-old gives me a time-out. This is, frankly, exactly what I need.

I look around the kitchen at the dirty dishes and dog hair on my floor and feel the guac standing at the back of my throat, ready for another appearance. And really, this is like the miracle of the fucking loaves and fishes because I have vomited everything in my body but my eyeballs. I give thanks to the universe for the abundance it has seen fit to bestow upon me. I suddenly realize what’s really important in life……. What’s that? Love of family? Be real. It’s money. Moneymoneymoneymoneymoney. My kitchen is not and never will be Bali and when do you think is the last time Elizabeth Gilbert did dishes anyway? I could be as balanced as a zen-master if I could just have a tenth of those book royalties. I feel the peace of true wisdom settle over me.

Then I puke again.

Thoughts on Eating and Addiction

Tue, 13 Apr 2010 11:04:22 -0400

When I fall apart I do it in all areas of my life at once. Collapsing isn’t really something you can compartmentalize.Exhaustion tends to affect everything. I have quit running, writing/posting, and going to Weight Watchers meetings. In many ways I feel like an addict re-lapsing.

It feels like addiction when I slide into bags of Easter candy and bottles of wine. I am not consuming them out of the joy of eating as Francis Lam describes so well. This consumption is about obliteration. I want to dissolve. It is the opposite of a gastronomic experience. An experience like that is about being alive in all your senses: taking the time to smell, feel the textures of the foods, look at the colors, really taste and absorb all the flavors.I have experienced food in this way and it is pure joy.

Addictive eating is 180 degrees in the other direction. It is about self-hatred and anesthetizing your feelings. It is, in some strange way, barely about the food at all. It is a gulping unaware consumption that never truly fills you. It is knowing that what you are doing is unhealthy and unhelpful, but feeling powerless to stop, being unable to find the better way. It is hiding in your dark kitchen with a box of mass-produced chocolate cookies that aren’t even that good and eating every single one even though you’re not hungry and you know they aren’t worth it. For that first soft chocolatey bite you feel a tiny bit better so you keep repeating the first bite over and over again. Even though you quickly start sliding into feeling worse rather than better.

Suddenly now you’re pissed. Every voice that has ever mocked you and your pathetic weakness is ringing in your head now. Your mother who takes food out of your hands and tells you you’re not really hungry. The dance teacher who calls you into her office to say, “I’m concerned for your health.” And your own voice disgusted and hissing, “What the hell is wrong with you? Why can’t you get it together? Normal people don’t act this way. Normal people know how to stop.” And this, of course, doesn’t help. Sometimes it spurs more eating. The food sits there mute and comforting and blameless.

No one sees these struggles in the dark, but they see the results you wear on your body every day. They see the results of the weight loss work too and when people compliment weight loss I feel just as strange as when I feel the disapproving silence that surrounds any gain. Do they really know what goes on in the dark hours?

Still, I am lucky. I would never compare myself to a heroin addict or even a nicotine addict. The physical danger and emotional hell of those addictions far exceeds what I do and I know that. I am glad and grateful I haven’t managed to hook myself on drugs or drink. I am lucky that I don’t seem to have that kind of addictive personality.

It is interesting, though, how like a twelve-step meeting Weight Watchers can be sometimes. People on the message boards talk about “working the program” in much the same way I’ve heard AA people talk about their program. I’ve heard, “it works if you work it,” in both groups. In both situations you come to meetings after trying everything else after “hitting bottom.” In both places you will hear stories of misery before the program and hope after joining. In both places you will talk about one-day-at-a-time-but-for-the-rest-of-your-life. I’m not judging either group, mind you. I’m not an alcoholic, I don’t know what that struggle is, but I imagine it’s at least as lonely as struggling with food issues and joining with other people who are similarly struggling has to be powerful. And sometimes it’s powerfully isolating when you don’t feel connected to those people. That’s what happened with me, I think.

Can food really be addictive? I know it’s not the same as other addictions. It is more subtle and because of this, harder to understand. The people who believe weight and food issues are just about willpower and weakness do not understand. The people who believe we just need to get over what society tells us about “bad food” and “bad fat people” don’t understand either. I don’t believe in moralizing food. A candy bar is not “bad” and does not make me a bad person if I eat it but, these foods are different. They affect me differently than “real” food. Food that is highly processed and full of fat, salt and sugar affect my body and mind in completely different ways than whole foods. I have existed both ways and eating real food is better. My moods are more even and I have more energy. Eating fruits and vegetables and lean protein makes for better fuel and they taste wonderful in a different way than a fast food cheeseburger. It takes time to get to like that taste better, but it can happen, I’ve done it. The thing that sucks is that the addictive food always has that power to pull me back in when I’m stressed or depressed. I’ve used it to make myself feel better for a long time. Those neural pathways are built. I feel them. I feel them drawing me to the old comforts during hard times.

I will probably re-join Weight Watchers. I eat better when I’m on the program, quite simply because it forces consciousness of what I’m putting in my body. When I keep track of what I eat, then I eat more vegetables and fruits and whole grains and drink more water. Sometimes I want to chuck it all, though, all the platitudes and pithy quotes. All the tough love and all-knowingness of the long-standing members. I could certainly do with not paying for this service. (The whole for-profit thing is one big difference between WW and AA or OA, for that matter) Mostly, though, I want to be someone who doesn’t think so much about what she eats, but I know, even if I never join another diet program I will never be a person who just eats. Food is not that simple for me. It never will be.

The Sleep Deprivation Chronicles

Wed, 17 Mar 2010 13:03:13 -0400

Ada Calhoun has a very interesting piece on the battle over “crying it out.” This is something that very directly impacts my life as a mother of two toddlers. There are few things that can screw up your life more than not getting the sleep you need. There’s a reason sleep deprivation is considered torture. So I’m all about reading everything out there. I’m open to ideas, people. It seems like Sleep Training or Attachment Parenting are the only two options sometimes, though, and, like everything else, people like to set them up as polar opposites and have them duke it out in a robot rock ‘em sock ‘em ring of their own creation. I especially enjoyed that Dr. Sears was made out to be an extremist. Here's a quote from his website, "Follow your heart rather than some stranger's sleep-training advice, and you and your baby will eventually work out the right nighttime parenting style for your family." Yeah. He sounds like a real jihadist.

I think the comparisons are false and stem from false assumptions like all parents choose one or the other and commit to these ideas completely. I have two toddlers. I let one cry it out (sort of) and the other co-sleep to her heart’s content (kind of). What I am doing is to survive and “whatever works” is my life motto. So I don’t fit completely in either camp (if these camps really even exist) I did not want to wear or sleep with my baby indefinitely. That’s why pregnancy ends y’all. And with Crying it Out? The big secret that no one tells you? You don’t just do it once. It is not this one week session of misery and then golden child goes to bed without a single issue forever after. If it was I would have let them cry until their eyes bled.

When we tried crying it out with Aidan, it was more than the classic three nights of misery. (Personally I found the Crying it Out message boarders to be a hell of a lot more self-righteous and insufferable than the attachment parents. They were always quick to point out that sure it was hard (What are you, some kind of wimp? Get a spine!), but little Johnny cried less and less each night and by the third night- it’s always by the third night- there’s something magical about that third night- little Johnny was sleeping like an angel. If it doesn’t work for you, well, dude, you’re doing it wrong. Maybe it's message boards that are the problem.) Aidan cried for almost two weeks with some nights being great and others terrible, but she did get better and eventually comforted herself back to sleep on her own. Then came the Fateful Date Night.

New parents have pressure on all sides. If you’re a mom you’re supposed to be back to pre-pregnancy shape a week after delivery. If you’re a dad you’re supposed to be nurturing your marriage and romancing your wife with date night right away. (Or, let’s be honest, after almost a year of spotty sex you’re desperate to get laid.) So we tried the date night thing and it was good to unload the child on someone else for awhile. We were tearing each other apart by this time. Aidan needed to be nursed almost constantly and I am a person who needs at least a six hour stretch of sleep once a week to be any kind of a human being. Pair this with a nasty case of mastitis that had me alternately screaming and weeping as I nursed and you have a divorce in the making. My poor husband stood there during one of these painful nursing sessions not knowing what to do. Wanting to fix it and being completely helpless. We were both miserable beyond words and there was no one to take it out on except each other.

Date night was an attempt to remember why we were doing this whole thing after all. Re-capture a little magic. I hope we did. Frankly, I don’t remember. What I do remember is the aftermath. We picked Aidan up from my mother-in-law’s late and the child had passed out. No big deal right? We tried to carry her out to the car gently and put her into her car seat to go home. Well, car seats these days are a nightmare of twelve-point harness straps and buckles. We got one arm in, I think, before she started screaming. And these screams? I can’t even describe them. She was at least six months old at this point. I thought I had heard everything she could dish out. This sounded as though we were simultaneously sawing her right arm off with a rusty blade and boiling her left arm in oil. We finished buckling her like the Marx brothers on methamphetamines and drove off with her screaming the whole way home. And sleep after that? Forget it. And the next night? Guess what? Like we never cried it out in the first place. We were back to square one. This is the sleep trainer’s dirty little secret. Any kind of tiny change in a kid’s schedule can undo everything you’ve done. And every kid does not respond the way little Johnny responds.

With our second child, Sidney, we co-slept. For the first year it was absolutely ideal. I got more sleep than I ever had trying to lay Aidan down in her crib soooo carefully like a house of cards in a high wind, knowing the slightest head tilt would wake her. With Sidney I ignored all the “you’ll smother her” crap and slept surrounded by blankets and pillows. There’s actual photographic evidence of this too. You can call DCFS now. And I SLEPT! Ah GOD! Blessed sleep. I would pass out halfway through nursing the kid with my boob hanging out in the trashiest of fashions. It was glorious.

Now we are trying to get her out of our bed. It has been a comedy of errors the whole way through. We put her crib in the guest bedroom and attempted to cry it out. I have never seen a child as determined as Sidney. She would fall asleep standing up in the crib, clutching the bars in her little fists. I went in once and tried to lay her down. Her grip was like iron and, of course, my attempt to move her woke her and inspired a new fit of wailing. Some of the sleep training books suggest you stand in the room with the child and “comfort them” without picking them up. What a joke. This pissed my daughter off even more. I was standing right next to her and not picking her up, which was all she wanted. She did not want me to touch her if I was not going to pick her up. We gave that nonsense up right quick. We now had another child to think about waking with this endless screaming.

The next phase of sleep deprivation involved laying a mattress on the floor and one of us, usually my husband now because when I lay next to her all she wanted was boob (takes after her father I always say) lying next to her until she fell asleep and then sneaking out of the room. This worked to varying degrees as well. As often as not, my husband would just pass out with her and sleep the whole night in the other bedroom. If he did make it out without waking her she would wake at least once a night and we would have to repeat the process. The lesson here seems to be: “suffer now or suffer later, but you will suffer.”

The final stage in sleeplessness has been our possibly ill-conceived idea to move the two girls into one room. I thought Sidney just needed company. And how do people in one-room shacks do it anyway? I think this is a first-world problem. Anyway, there is a light at the end of the tunnel. It may be a train. But the girls are sleeping better. There are still bad nights. Last night was one of them. I ended up in the spare room with both of the girls in bed with me, but this wasn’t until four am. At least I had a good six hours before then.

Ms Calhoun gives some excellent advice in her piece, “Everyone needs a devil's advocate so they don't get wedded to an extreme position.” Absolutely. I believe in reading opposing arguments. (When I actually have time to read) Except that these shouldn’t really be opposing arguments. Bits of each philosophy are important. Children need to learn independence and parents need their own lives. Children also need nurturing and support and giving that to them is not necessarily being undisciplined. My experience is that parenting is a big messy area of grey and a whole lot of mistakes and I’m only four and a half years into this whole thing. So you’ll forgive me if I look a little skeptically at Ms Calhoun’s final statement that, “Those two nights of agony nearly three years ago were almost insignificant -- except insofar as they saved our life.” I do wish her well, though, and I hope her son continues his healthy sleep habits. I just wish she had taken her own advice on the middle ground.

You Say Tomato, I Say Shut Up

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 17:03:02 -0400

I admit it. I’ll pick up a book based solely on the title and this one caught my eye: You Say Tomato, I Say Shut Up. It made me giggle and I had just finished a rather bitter fight with my husband and wanted some company in feeling miserable and self-righteous and suspected I might find it in this book.

After I examined the cover I realized that one of the authors is Annabelle Gurwitch who I enjoyed immensely on TBS Dinner and a Movie, a show that featured two hosts presenting a movie and cooking some movie-themed dinner while you watched. Annabelle’s wit was sarcastic and wacky. I loved her personality. Well, she found a great match in Jeff as both a life partner and writing partner. They are the couple you want to invite to your cocktail party. They make even the most painful personal events fodder for comedy.

The book is structured in “he says” “she says” conversations with marriage fun facts between chapters. It’s kind of like being in the middle of a marital spat or counseling session, only funny and enjoyable. In both really lovey and really angry couples the outsider can feel alienated, I think, because the couple is so focused on each other to the exclusion of the rest of the world. This book lets you in on the inside joke. And it is very relatable, at least in my experience, my marriage not quite being a source of unending emotional and sexual bliss. It’s close, you know, but not quite there. Jeff compares their book to the marriage self-help books: “I like to think of the authors of those books as the Daniel Boones and Davy Crocketts of the new frontier of marriage. And if they are Boones and Crocketts, then you should think of Annabelle and me and our book as the Donner party.”

As the self-proclaimed “Gurus of wrong,” Annabelle and Jeff take us through their courtship, marriage and the birth of their son Ezra who came into the world with serious birth defects. I think their sense of humor was a lifeline through that very tough time. One of the first signs of VACTERL, the condition Ezra was born with, is having no anus. This is a major problem that has to be corrected with surgery, but it's also kind of funny in a dark way. As Annabelle was coming out of the anesthesia from her c-section they told her about the problems with her newborn son she replied, "No anus? What happens if he's gay?" and when informed they would be surgically creating one she said, "Great. My son was born in Los Angeles and they're already making him an asshole!" I wish I could be that witty in the face of adversity.

The book is a great deal of fun while still being an intimate look at a real marriage. Through it all you get a sense of Annabelle and Jeff as a loving committed team. Maybe they don't know what they're doing (who does?) Maybe they're doing it wrong, but thirteen years says different. And if they're doing it wrong, I want to be wrong in the same way.

Annabelle describes when she felt them cohering as a couple: "It's not as if Jeff and I were combining our lives and by doing so we were bringing out the best and brightest qualities in each other. On the contrary we were mixing up our worst and our weirdest, but all signs were indicating that our boundaries had been changed forever. Maybe we were like Georgia and Russia. Sometimes Georgia is part of Russia. Sometimes Georgia is an independent state. And sometimes they go to war and fight like hell with each other." Through all of it, though, is love and some damn funny stories.