Clareified

“We used to come here after work all the time,” my mother said taking a sip from the glass filled with a pink liquid.
Mai tai, I think. Maybe.
“Who would pay,” I asked, skimming the menu of ten dollar appetizers and thirty dollar entrees. Even if I weren’t unemployed, which I am, this would not have been my first choice for a casual mother/daughter lunch outing.
But she had insisted. A week of job rejections and fighting with dry cleaners, had taken its toll on my mood and I had been properly bribed to leave the house.
“We would chip up. Everyone would put in. The people who didn’t drink got screwed,” she took another sip, “I never got screwed!” She threw her head back as she laughed.
My mother is almost 70. She doesn’t much resemble the woman who raised me two or three decades ago. Her gait is cautious after double knee replacement surgery, she’s noticeably shorter and her face is gaunt after a doctor-ordered drastic weight loss. She has also taken to lengthy chats, if not with me, then with strangers — I rescued the poor waitress from being regaled with tales of my mom and her coworkers’ adventures in this very restaurant those many decades ago. And so now, she tells me the story.
“I’ve got to put money in the meter,” I say digging in my coat for my car keys and a credit card.
It was a rainy day. Cold.
I got to my car, which, by all calculations had another ten minutes left, and found the tell-tale orange-backed New York City parking ticket.
If my life were a movie, I would have ripped it from beneath the wipers, crumpled it in my fist, thrown it to the ground and then promptly gotten another ticket for littering.
I checked my muni meter slip and my calculation error actually went the other way, I had almost 20 minutes of legal parking left on the slip.
I looked around for the traffic cop, but nothing. The ticket was 17 minutes old.
I was getting wet and the ticket was getting soggy. I jogged back to the restaurant and slammed the ticket on the table.
The busboy unhelpfully said “uh oh. I know what that is,” in a ridiculous sing songy voice that made me want to rip out his throat.
“What happened? I thought you were keeping track of the time?”
“I DID! I got a ticket ANYWAY!”
“How could you get a ticket if you were keeping track?”
“Because the traffic cop is an idiot and claims he didn’t see a ticket on my dashboard.” (New York switched from individual meters to this central box where you paid for 10 minute increments and then put a slip on your dashboard to show how long you’re allowed to park there till.)
The busboy, who was still lingering, chimed in that if I had a slip that was valid at the same time as the ticket, I could fight it.
“Yeah, right,” I said glumly pushing a chicken leg closer to my mother’s side.
He and my mom began a lengthy conversation of all the times he got a ticket and went to court and beat it.
“There. See?” she said when he left, “you just go down there and tell them.”
“Do you want to hear all my stories of tickets that I got where I caught the cop in a lie on the stand or my car got towed for a sign that used to be on that corner and nobody gave a shit and I just had to pay it?”
I was angry and tears started to fall.
“Are you crying?” She put down her fork.
“No,” I said wiping my face.
“Women who cry for nonsense are stupid or weak. Which one are you?”
I looked up and, at once, recognized her face.

I don’t like vanilla/vanilla cupcakes anymore. They just taste bland to me now — like chewing flour.

I blame Mary and her freaking Jesus cupcakes for this.

When I was in Vegas, I found this great bakery called the Cupcakery.  They had these awesome lemon cupcakes that did the trick. I ate like five of them everyday. On my last day, I tried these caramel filled chocolate cupcakes that were also pretty boss.

So now, I wander the streets of New York City looking for cupcakes to eat. I’ve acquired a taste for red velvet, but only with cream cheese frosting. And so far only from Billy’s. When one doesn’t have a job, good cupcakes are very important. And when one doesn’t have a job, one spends hours wondering what it means to have lost the taste for that which one so loved at one time.

Beardo’s face looks like a terrorist
He says that face hair will help Lundqvist
Don’t believe that though, it sounds crazy
Beardo doesnt shave cause he’s lazy.

To all the moms in the Clareiverse

Me: Don’t stay at Taj. They’ve had four murders and carjackings in the last 16 months.
Pi: But it’s so cheap! And centrally located!
Me: O_o Did you hear me say murders and carjackings?
Pi: I’ll valet!

I finally met the not-at-all-baby-Xander!

Sadly, I was not able to covert him to the ways of Patriots Nation or the congregation of Tom Brady’s hair. We had taken the shuttle to the Eastside from Times Square. New York has painted a bunch of the shuttle cars in Rangers color and pictures, so I was teaching toddler Xander to say “Go Rangers,” and love New York hockey.

Gib was all “I guess there is no reason for him to inherit his parents’ allegiance to the St. Louis Blues…but if you start talking football, the Patriots can be no higher than tenth!” Then he gave me the Robert DiNero “I’m watching you” eye scissors.
Welp.

Xander is a super expressive adorable little kid. We had met for dinner the night before at Artichoke pizza and he, in no uncertain terms, did not like Artichoke’s burned double baked crusts. He took a bite, chewed for a second and then spit it the hell out! I laughed. His dad went across the street to buy him cheeze its for dinner. #NewYorkPizzaFail

I gave him a mini subway car that I bought at Carrie’s Brooklyn children’s store, Monk’s Trunk.
“What do you say?” his mom asked.
“Thank you, Miss Dawn.”
MISS!!! HOW CUTE IS THIS CHILD?! Pretty darn.

The next day, Petitedov, Xander, Gib and I set off to walk across the Brooklyn bridge. I was running late and I guess they had been waiting in the lobby for a while, because as soon as he saw me, Xander was all “OK! Now, LET’S GO!”

We walked through Times Square where we encountered Buzz Lightyear, Elmo and Mickey Mouse. Xander? Not impressed.

I think he did like the Rangers train, though.

As we walked across the bridge, Petitedov and I made the mistake of showing him there were cars driving below our feet. He got scared that the cars were going to hit him and then decided the best course was to just not walk anymore.

Poor Gib had to carry him the whole way, so we decided to only go halfway. Since we were already downtown, I figured we should go see the Statue of Liberty. Gib tried to get Xander to walk through City Hall park, but he refused. And then threw himself on the ground and his big blue eyes filled with water and perfect drops of tears poured down his itty bitty face.
“DDDAAAAADDDDYYYYY CCAAAAN YOU HEEEELLLPPP MMMMEEEEE”? He wailed.

Gib was all trying to be stern “you will not be rewarded for this behavior” parent. But all the women in the park watching, Pdov and I included, were like “he’s sooooo cuutteee! His eyelashes are so pretty with the teardrops on them!”

Girls are the worst.

Xander decided to just suck it up and finish walking the ten feet through the park and at the end, Gib said “ok, now I’ll carry you, if you ask nicely.”
“Daddy, can I please pick you up?”
“Yeah, he hasn’t mastered pronouns yet” Gib said, picking the boy up.
We went down to lower Manhattan to see the sights and then took a bus back uptown to ride the Central Park carousel.

I think Xander was a little scared of the horses, but he was braver than Petitedov, who refused to ride it all. Chicken.
Xander, all rested from his bus nap, decided to lead us through the park.
We ended the trip in an Eloise approved fashion, with a stop at the Plaza!

Petitedov says I look like a celebrity:

All in all, it was a nice visit and Xander restored my “I’m still cool to toddlers” ego after Fisch’s almost two-year-old, totally crushed it by refusing to acknowledge my existence with so much as eye contact. #Cry

It’s super late, but a huge Clareified congratulations to @thisisnotapril and @jnassi on their mega super fantastic amazeballs wedding.

I had so so so much fun. April looked absolutely gorgeous (OMG! You’re a pretty Kardashian!)

Jason was also very dapper.

Their families were also SO nice! I just can’t with how cute everyone was.

I want to tell a bunch of stories, but what happens in Vegas… um… er… who are we kidding?

The wedding was held in a phat mansion in the middle of the Las Vegas desert and there was a pool. Big thanks to Maid of Honor @bettyunderground for stopping me at the point in the evening when I thought swimming in said pool was an awesome idea.

In my defense (I LOVE defending myself) I was one of the first people at the open bar and I didn’t have change, so I tipped the bartender really well for my white wine. So, he gave me another at the same time. And then when I came back to bring back one of the glasses so it didn’t look like I was double fisting, he gave me another. Of course, I had to drink that one really fast, otherwise, again with the double fisting. I went in search of some food at that point…and that’s when I saw the glimmering inviting blue pool. “IT MATCHES MY DRESS! LET’S GO SWIMMING!”

See?? So not fault!

Anyway, after my fancy swimming was all thwarted, I went back to the bar because I figured I needed some water. It was a totally different bartender, so I waited in line. There were three people ahead of me and I was concentrating real hard on staying upright. Water. Water. Water. Water.

One person in front now.

Water would soon be mine.

Of course, when that dude steps away with his beverage in hand, the original bartender is magically back and handing me a glass of wine. This is what a wedding with Jesus must have been like back in the day.

Fueled by pure alcohol, at this point, I danced and danced and laughed the whole night. Seriously, what a kick ass party. I did a mean shimmy to Hava Nagilah Hava! And almost limboed during the “a little bit softer now…Shout!…a little bit softer now… Shout!” dance. April even jumped off the chair during the lifting up of the bride and groom on the chairs part. She then did a back flip and stuck the landing. Even the Chinese judge gave her a 9.9!

I cannot say even about how cute her bridesmaids were too.

There was “Inappropriate Bridesmaid” @brandius who tried to pick up German tourists for us and whose job it was to be elevator bouncer. And Texas belle bridesmaid Kat, who did everyone’s makeup and brought enough double sided tape to hide bra straps for two weddings and of course, cute as a button bridesmaid, Hala, who didn’t threaten to punch me in the face even though I kept saying her name as “Hoolllaaaa” and doing the raise the roof arms.
This is probably why I don’t get invited to any of the dinners F-train and Kaz have all the time.
Last, but certainly, not least was the gay bff bridesmaid, Joel. Who even got his pedicure in the bridal colors. He was totally funny and sweet. Usually, I am super shy around strangers and tend to silently drink the night away in a corner somewhere, but everyone was so funny, with just the right amount of wicked that I totally felt like I fit in.

Plus, when you almost die in a van on a Las Vegas highway with people, you bond.
Seriously. I almost died in a van. Down by the desert.

And then there was me, I was watching-the-Rangers-game-responsibility-shirking bridesmaid. I am the worst.

Maybe that’s why I don’t get invited to dinners with F-train and Kaz.

I stayed at the Imperial Palace (The Imperial Palace is neither imperial, nor a palace: discuss.) It was next to O’Shea’s, which was being torn down that weekend. In anticipation of its destruction, they were doling out free shots every hour on the hour, so the sidewalk outside my hotel smelled of vomit vomit and dried vomit. When I got home, I basically, dumped all my regular clothes into a washer and sent the fancy clothes to the dry cleaners.

Yesterday, I had this awesome conversation with the dry cleaners:

Me: Um… where are my clothes that I dropped off a week ago for next day cleaning?

Lady: Well… we think maybe someone take. We hope they bring back.

Me: You lost my clothes?

Lady: Clothes not lost. Someone take maybe. We wait. See if they bring back maybe.

Me: So, do you know who took them?

Lady: No. Someone. Maybe.

O_O
RIP to all my puhrty dresses:

And this, ladies and gentlemen, is why I don’t have nice things.

Huh. Maybe That’s why I don’t get invited to dinners with F-train and Kaz!

Read the whole thing.

The Descendants
Full disclosure: I cannot take any movie seriously once a main character takes off running aimlessly after hearing bad news. I just can’t. I start laughing everytime and that’s it – especially since those moments are accompanied by the most ridiculous dramatic music and (usually) rainfall. So, about twenty minutes in, this movie, which is supposed to be the poignant story of a husband who finds out his comatose wife was cheating on him and is left with two daughters to raise and a family legacy to protect, loses me. But, that may just be me. Also, the crazy secretary from Arrested Development plays a dramatic role as the wife of the man the coma wife had the affair with and well, I just think it was poor casting cause I kept waiting for her to be funny.

Return of the Secaucus 7
This movie is dumb. It was on EW’s list of best movies about reunions of college friends, and as my reunion is coming up, I thought I should see what I was in for. Bah. It’s not interesting. It might have been a better movie if they had started from the last ten minutes – instead of just ending the movie abruptly just when the characters got interesting.

Our Idiot Brother
I fell asleep watching this movie with F-train. The next day, I put it back on, he walks in the room and goes “trust me, it was better when you were asleep.” He was right. Blech.

Tower Heist
This movie wasn’t the worst. It’s about the staff at a hotel planning to steal back the money lost in their pensions from the pension fund manager. It’s silly and implausible, but fun.

Mirror Mirror
Ugh. This movie could have been great. It’s like, they had all the pieces for a great movie and then just put them in all the wrong order and, instead, we get this mess. In a movie about Snow White and the Evil Queen they’ve GOT NO APPLE BITING AND JULIA ROBERTS NEVER SAYS “MIRROR MIRROR ON THE WALL WHO’S THE FAIREST OF THEM ALL?” W.T.F? EPIC FAIL.