I had onions for lunch

Now you know. I didn’t have JUST onions but I thought it was important to tell you that they were a big part of that particular meal.

If I was alone in the world I would have onions for lunch every day. And for dinner. I could even squeeze them into breakfast. Actually I could more than squeeze them in. Have you ever had a plain bagel with scallion cream cheese, tomato and red onion? Or an omelette that’s so full of onions and peppers that you can’t really see the egg?

I’m in the office today and the rest of my team is either off or working from home. In fact the entire floor is pretty vacant so I thought I was safe. I’ve been trying to have salads at least once a day and nothing makes a salad better than…yep.

Alone in the office. No in-person meetings. The next human I’ll see today will be at 6:30pm. Hours after consumption. I had no choice. The stars were aligned.

It’s been a tough couple of weeks. An insane work schedule mixed with the usual family obligations mixed with unexpected health scares (my mom – who is recovering like a champ). Can you blame me for letting off some steam? Going a little crazy? Letting my hair down? Sure I could have turned to alcohol and drugs – I still may – but for now, this will do.

Anyway – I gotta go brush my teeth and eat a pack of mints.

Internet traps

I’m stuck on a plane for 5 hours. Even worse, I have wifi so I can’t miss one work email. To take my mind off work for a nano minute I decided to surf the internet. Which for me means the following in this order:
– People.com
– Huffington Post (entertainment section)
– Us Weekly.com
– D Listed.com
– CNN.com (week in photos, travel)

I can usually do all this in about 5 minutes or less. I retain nothing, but I’m quick.
But sometimes something online pulls me into a black hole. Usually that black hole is called Pinterest – but sometimes it’s not a fun ride. Sometimes it messes with my emotional state.
And I’m already half nuts.
Maybe it’s because I’m leaving the family for a week long trip but the photo below got to me. Actually it killed me.
A mother tried to smuggle her kid in a suitcase to Spain.
She sent him through the X-ray machine.
I don’t know the full story. Maybe she couldn’t buy a ticket. Maybe she didn’t have a visa for him. Maybe things were so bad at home that all of this was worth the effort. Maybe this was the last option they had.
Maybe I’m tired and overly sensitive. Maybe it’s because I’m pretty sure this little boy has been through worse. I dunno. I don’t know why I can’t stop thinking about this picture.
You know what I do know?
I have no problems. Zero.
This is what happens when I try to read things other than crap online. Lesson learned.

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A girl named Sue

A few years ago I was invited to join a group of gals on a girls weekend. They all grew up together or met in college and have stayed in touch since. I met one of those gals when she moved a few blocks down from me almost 7 years ago – and now I cannot live without her (or her family).

This past weekend was their annual trip and I joined in the fun.

We stayed in a cute little (actually it was pretty big) apartment right in the heart of St.Mark’s Place in NYC. Very hip. Very cool. Just like us 🙂

I can’t go into too many of the stories because we are moms, teachers, responsible employees that love our jobs and, well, we did some non-mom, non-teacher, non-responsible things.

Here’s what I can tell you about… we ate some really good food. Drank some really good wine. Those were the two themes of the weekend in general. Where should we eat? Where should we drink? We went dancing! We hit a cool, hipster flea market in Brooklyn and saw a celebrity (Jesse Tyler Ferguson from Modern Family). We ubered all over the place. And we laughed. Boy did we laugh. Sometimes at other people, but mostly at each other.

One of the best laughs we got this weekend was at my expense (what’s new). I had never met one of the gals that joined us, she grew up with most of the other crew but this was her first time with me. Somehow during introductions on the first day, I missed that her name was Chris. I am almost positive someone said her name was Sue. Or I heard the word Sue and associated it with her, or she looked like a Sue or something. Doesn’t matter. Her name was Chris!

Now, you would think that during the next 12 hours someone would correct me right? Wrong. I must have had multiple conversations where I directed a question at Sue/Chris. “Isn’t this breakfast great Sue?”. “Sue, do you like the flea market?” “Sue, how many kids do you have?”. MORTIFYING.

Finally, after a couple of glasses of wine on Saturday night someone pulled me over and said,”who are you talking about? Chris?”. Shoot me now. Dead. Oh the horror! The horror! Then I started blaming.

“Why didn’t you tell me?!!” I shouted! “You should have told me”, I cried! But I know why no one told me. It was funnier this way. They are all evil. Including Chris/Sue.

Anyway – here’s some pics to take your mind off my stupidity. The first pic includes Chris (she’s the one smiling sheepishly on the right). There’s some prerequisite post-wine selfies. A shot of all of us at Supper. Which was this fantastic Italian restaurant where we had dinner. So we had Supper for dinner. Get it? Hilarious. To us.

There’s also a picture of the flea market  and some info about it if you want to check it out yourself, a shot of our friend Jesse Tyler, and a shot of one of the gals dancing with the Phantom of the Opera – who also happened to be letting off some steam at the gay 80s club we danced at all night (until 11:30pm).

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