Archive for December, 2009
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Christmas in the Deep South Days 1 and 2: The Road Trip
We left DC at 7 Wednesday morning with an 18 hour road trip ahead of us. All the way through Virginia our path was lined with three feet of gray crust. I take back what I said about the snow being so beautiful and not wanting to leave it behind. The night before our departure, I cleaned out the fridge and found some vegetables in the bottom drawer that had been forgotten in the aftermath of Turkeyocalypse. There was a colony of white, spore-like mold growing on this unidentifiable vegetation. It looked just like the snow outside – a fungus on the city. I am trying to preserve the memory of the pure white snow in my mind, the way it was on Saturday. I guess I never thought about the road grime that would be scraped up by the ploughs or the slushy, half-frozen mud that would surround the crosswalks. I feel like a naïve girl who thought the world pure and perfect but who is now having her eyes opened to its true blackness. I am disappointed.
So, by the time we got to Alabama, I was somewhat surprised to see green grass, green trees, and the occasional flower. I really shouldn’t be surprised by this. After spending 27 years in the Deep South, I am well acquainted with the weather patterns. It does seem that time moves slower down here. It is still early fall. There are a few dead leaves on the ground but some greenery remains. The temperatures are pleasant. I may have packed too heavily in a very literal sense. Instead of heading south in a car, I feel like I just headed three months back in a time machine.
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Let It Snow
I have never seen this much snow at once in my entire life! Today was great. I never stopped being amazed by the snow. Aquarius and I went on an adventure to the movie theater. From our apartment, we walked down to City Place taking pictures along the way. We saw Avatar – amazing movie. Then we headed back pausing at the only open restaurant , Asian Bistro, for some lunch. The hot soup and spring rolls gave me the energy I needed to finish my trudge through the snow. This odyssey took the entire afternoon. Of course the movie was long, but the snow was slow going for me.My only experience with snow has been the few inches we got last year and a few inches when I lived in Paris. In Louisiana, they sometimes claim that it is going to snow, but it always ends up being sleet, freezing rain, or tiny snow flakes that melt three feet above the ground. I do remember once or twice getting maybe an inch of actual snow. This was enough to take all of the snow from three neighbors’ yards to make one snowman. Normally, it just rains and then temperatures fall below freezing causing hazardous road conditions, lots of freaking out, and school closures. I realize now that what we sometimes labeled as “snow” in Louisiana was actually just sleet. For more of my observations on Louisiana weather, see my post October is Here.
Needless to say, I acted like a little kid today. Aquarius, who briefly lived in Colorado, was laughing at me because I could not stop giggling. I had trouble getting used to the snow hitting me in the face, and it took a little practice to perfect the technique of walking on the powder without slipping. At some points I was nearly knee deep. I decided against making any snow angels because I was worried that I might get lost in a drift. I can imagine myself sinking straight through the white powder and not being able to dig myself out. I’ve always thought of snow as being picturesque and tranquil, and this seemed true despite the grimy-looking, snow-ploughed roads. The city was at its quietest. My only regret about the snow is that on Wednesday I will have to leave it all behind for Louisiana. This is my first real chance at a white Christmas and it won’t happen for me. We haven’t been back in a year and a half, and our parents are becoming impatient for our visit. It will be an interesting journey. I will try to update more than just Wednesday and Saturday with some interesting observations on the South. I will also try to get pictures of some donks.
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Aquarius and Housework
I have finally finished grading semester exams for three classes, semester research papers for one class, and semester projects for another! My reward: nearly a month of winter vacation. My school has very long breaks for which I am grateful, but last summer I almost got bored. That was when I started planning this blog.
One bonus of being off is that I will not have to resort to asking Aquarius for help around the house. Sometimes during the school year this becomes a necessity due to the long hours I spend prepping five different subjects. Unfortunately, it does not always go well. The man may be brilliant when it comes to anything with an IP address, and he is even excellent in the kitchen, but his domesticity stops there. When housework is involved, he suddenly becomes mentally handicapped. Here are a few examples. (Apparently, I am liking lists lately.)
1. Laundry. I asked him to wash some jeans. He successfully sorted through the laundry hamper to identify anything that fell into said category. He managed to wash them on the proper setting, and a few hours later, after I reminded him that they were still wet, he even put them in the dryer. When I took them out to fold, a pair of my jeans was missing. They were not in the washing machine, or the dryer, or the laundry hamper or on the floor anywhere in-between. The next day, I found them behind the washing machine. He still claims he has no idea how that could have happened.
2. Soap. We moved here with three giant, un-opened bottles of refill hand soap for the kitchen and bath. It seems that every time Aquarius went to Target, he was convinced that hand washing was about to come to an end unless he bought more soap. For a long time, the cabinet under my sink was a soap storage space. It’s been two years since I last needed to buy any.
3. Vacuuming. He claims that this is the one thing he doesn’t mind doing, yet my request once evoked a quick glance downward and the response, “The carpet doesn’t look dirty.” I promised him that if he would just vacuum anyway, he would suck up enough cat hair to make a small doggie sweater. I think he was amazed at what the carpet can hold while still “looking” clean.
4. Dishwashing. I have, on occasion, found the silverware drawer empty. This seems strange because 16 place settings should be plenty for only two people. When I asked for an explanation, I learned that Aquarius does not like putting away silverware; so he doesn’t. He only takes all of the clean dishes out of the dishwasher and adds the dirty dishes to the clean silverware which gets rewashed. If I ask him to do the dishes more than once in a row, this adds up.
How is it that someone smart enough to get into Mensa can be such a bumbling idiot when it comes to the simple things? The list was a wonderful invention that assures you only get what you need at the store. I don’t like folding laundry, but I don’t just keep on washing it to procrastinate putting it away. Housework is not something I have enjoyed in the past, but I think it is growing on me. After seeing something done completely wrong, there is a certain satisfaction in doing it efficiently yourself.
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Crazy Louisiana Redneck
Last Sunday Aquarius and I were eating brunch at a local Silver Spring restaurant which was showing the Saints vs. Redskins game on TV’s mounted over the bar. I thought it mildly interesting that my former home state was playing my new home state. I’m not a football fan. In fact, I wouldn’t even notice if the sport ceased to exist, but I recognize that others treat it as a sacred ritual. It seems that some people take it a little too seriously. I have posted for your entertainment a video of a guy from Louisiana who, for some inexplicable reason, bet against the Saints. Apparently, the Saints were the winners which made this guy the loser. The wager – he promised his friends that they could shoot his TV if the Saints won. I always thought that this sort of scenario involved acquisition of the waged item. Thus, he would have betted one friend, and that friend would be watching two football games at once this weekend. In Louisiana though, logic gets thrown out the window along with expensive electronics. Unfortunately, this is the sort of thing that makes me embarrassed to admit that I’m from Louisiana. I fear that most people assume all Louisianans are rednecks.You only need to watch up until they start charging at the TV; after that it is pretty boring. Here are three things to notice about this video.
1. We must accept the possibility that the TV was already broken and that the whole thing is staged. That would make this redneck fairly intelligent. He did manage to get his face on Fox News after all. On the other hand, if it really was a working TV as I suspect, this guy is an idiot to waste such an expensive piece of electronics. The truth is he probably has enough disposable income that it makes no difference to him. The cost of living in the Deep South is so low that most people can afford big houses, nice cars, and expensive gadgets. But even if this guy could replaced his TV the next day, the whole thing seems wasteful.
2. One of the shooters does indeed get out of the truck with an already opened beer in hand. He gets out of the back seat, so at least he wasn’t driving. In Louisiana, it used to be legal to have an open container in a vehicle as long as the driver was not drinking it. So basically, you could drink and drive as long as you handed your drink to your buddy when an officer pulled you over. This is still a well accepted practice in much of LA.
3. Everything in this video, except for the cars and the house, were probably purchased at Wal-Mart: the TV, the guns, the beer, the Saints’ jerseys, the football helmet, the camera filming the video, even the plants on the porch. If it were an option, they guy with the tattoo on the back of his head would have gotten that done at Wal-Mart as well. This may be a marketing angle that Wal-Mart has overlooked. You can already have your nails done , your picture made, your prescriptions filled, and your taxes filed, so why not add a tattoo parlor.
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Top 3 Thanksgivings
T-shirt design courtesy of my friend Paul the Pisces.
I’ve been having trouble getting into the holiday spirit as was evident in my Thanksgiving post. Even though the Turkeyocalypse t-shirts didn’t work out, I ended up having the best Thanksgiving ever thanks to my amazing friends. After reflecting, I realized that there have only been three Thanksgivings that were memorable and fun. Here they are in ascending order:
#3 2008 Ellicott City, MD -Aquarius and I spent this holiday alone. We cooked a humble meal of two tiny hens, some green beans, and some mashed potatoes. There was not even enough for left-overs. On a side note, upon realizing that the Chinese do not celebrate Christmas, we ordered Chinese food on Christmas Day. We never even bothered to put up a tree.
#2 2002 Paris, France – Aquarius came to visit me during my study abroad. We ate Greek food for lunch, pizza for dinner, and pretended it wasn’t a holiday. When we realized that Aquarius had lost his passport, we went by the U.S. Embassy to figure out how he was going to get back to the States. It, of course, was closed.
#1 Turkeyocalypse 2009 Silver Spring, MD – 6 friends, 1 baby, 1 giant bird. At one point the turkey was in my bathtub. Let me explain. Aquarius uses Alton Brown’s method which requires brining the turkey in a bucket or a cooler for up to 16 hours. Our styrofoam cooler sprung a leak. To free up the sink, it had to be moved to the tub in case the leak grew. Afterward I had to clean the bathtub out of fear that someone might have a cut on their foot and get salmonella poisoning from taking a shower.
My top three Thanksgivings have one thing in common besides the miles of separation from family: a lack of tradition. Every year it’s the same superficial family members, the same bland spread, and the same boring politically correct conversation. The only thing that changes from year to year at my family’s Thanksgiving get-together is the intoxicating strength of my Great-Aunt’s sweet potato casserole. She keeps a bottle of Bourbon in her pantry just for making this particular dish (she’s Baptist and doesn’t believe in drinking). My cousins and I have noticed the yearly increase in alcoholic intensity and speculate that she has been using the same bottle of Bourbon since the late 80’s. It must be aging on her shelf. I am sad that I missed these drunken sweet potatoes, but I am grateful to have been able to plan my own menu. Normally I have to wait for a phone call from that year’s organizer so that I can sign up for my contribution . This is sort of a formality since I am always one of the last family members called. All the good stuff has been taken, so I am left with the choice between picking up rolls at Roadhouse Grill or making an unappetizing casserole. This always seems ridiculous because Aquarius is an amazing cook. One year even the rolls were taken and we had to make Corn Casserole. Since I can’t be trusted to be creative, I was provided with the family recipe. This recipe had either been printed on a typewriter or had been copied from a cookbook with a publication date of 1950. It called for a no. 2 can of corn. Good thing I had Google to find out what that meant. I don’t even like corn casserole, but when has a lack of flavor ever stopped tradition?
So, should Turkeyocalypse be a tradition? It doesn’t really matter as long as the holidays include great friends, amazing food, strong wine, and maybe a little Wii. I’m not one for doing something just because it was done last year.
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I’m Still Below the Mason-Dixon Line!
When Aquarius and I were preparing to move from Shreveport to Maryland, we got a lot of unexpected negativity about moving this far North. This seemed to come mostly from my family members who consider themselves northerners in comparison to our cousins in New Orleans and Baton Rouge. People were fairly happy about Aquarius’s new job, but we got an ear full about how much we were going to hate it “up there.” I found this odd coming from people who had never lived outside of Louisiana, Texas or Mississippi. Nevertheless, we got their expert opinions on the bitter cold weather and the terrible snow storms we would face each winter. We were also warned about all of the damn Yankees, but I’m still not sure what is supposed to be so scary about people who live in the North. We may as well have been moving to New York or Canada; the reaction would have been the same.
Once we were settled in Maryland and had officially become northerners in the eyes of our friends and family in the Bayou State, our regional citizenship didn’t feel drastically different. Admittedly, none of my new neighbors welcomed me with baked goods, but no one chastised me for saying “y’all” either. (As a side note for any southern readers, the contraction of “you all” is not spelled “ya’ll.” Keep in mind that apostrophes are placed where letters have been removed.) As I began to learn more about my new home state, I was startled to realize that I was still living in the South. We had never driven past the Mason-Dixon Line. I remembered learning in elementary school that the Mason-Dixon Line separates North and South, but I had apparently forgotten where this invisible division is located.
This makes me ask: Which states make up the South? Maryland was never part of the Confederacy, yet it is south of the line. I don’t really feel like I live in the South. The number of churches does not exceed the number of schools, people are generally well educated and easy to understand, and interracial couples are not denied marriage licenses. So, if the historic Mason-Dixon line is false, who decides what constitutes the South? A quick survey of my Louisiana friends on Facebook revealed widely differing opinions on this topic. Many Louisianans don’t think that Virginia is part of the South, but I imagine there are many Virginians who would disagree. So, why is there so much discord on where to draw this cultural line, and why is there so much negativity toward my new place of residence? Could it be regional pride or simply the confusion between the South and the Deep South? My guess is maps. U.S. southerners don’t have maps. Without maps, they cannot divide the United States into definable regions. That seems like a clear enough answer.
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Door Décor
Aquarius recently made the discovery that our front door is magnetic, and since then, our door has exploded with magnetic decoration. He was wandering around the house distraught that our small white-board had no home due to the lack of a magnetic refrigerator. In our old apartment, we would use this for reminders and short grocery lists. I was about to stop him from putting a nail in the wall for this trivial item when we realized that it would stick to the door. It was immediately a race to adorn our entrance with as many items as possible: grocery list, homeless refrigerator décor, invitations, dry erase marker, and the like. I now have a place to post the picture of my little brother, Scorpio, which my mom sent me by snail mail.Upon this discovery, my mother-in-law mailed me a set of French poetry magnets. This allowed me to leave Aquarius little messages like, “Je veux du miel sur les seins” or “Je porte un bikini.” I only do this to confuse him because he knows very little French, and such phrases, being out of character for me to say, make him wonder if he has misunderstood. I ended up putting the French poetry on a board in my classroom so that my students can explore their creativity. No, I did not remove words like “les seins.” They are going to look these up anyway, so why not let them have a little harmless fun?
Inside the package that contained my magnetic poetry, I also found a piece of paper. My mother-in-law had enclosed a printout of a Wikipedia article. Across the top was written in uniform cursive, “I thought you might like this article.” I have never heard of anyone printing a Wikipedia article. When I go home for Christmas I will be conducting a lesson on copying and pasting links into emails. Maybe I should provide a Power Point tutorial complete with the printed handout for note taking.
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