Imagine There's No Heaven

So this morning the guys on the radio were talking about this: a pay-per-view seance purporting to contact John Lennon. Anyone see this thing? Apparently the message Lennon's shade sent back was "Peace is the message" or something like that. There was an aural contact (ghosts manipulate sound equipment and leave messages, and this sounded like John); visual contact (looked like a face swarming up into the camera; said face, according to the Ghost Hunter interviewed on KFOG, could have been anyone). So I'm wondering, anyone see this, and if so, what did you think?

I'm a Geek

But you knew that, right?

One of the passions the girls and I developed this winter/spring was for Project Runway, a weirdly addictive reality show where a bunch of clothing designers vie for a big prize that will help them in their career. The show is filled with outsize personalities, people you love to hate, people you love despite the fact that their talent is clearly not quite up to the others--all that gooey reality show goodness. And because when I was a kid I wanted to be a clothing designer (no one who looks at me now would believe that, since most days I am Mom Shlub, and quite cheery about it) I find it rivetting.

Okay, so last week when we were in NY on holiday we went to the huge Toys R Us in Times Square so that Younger Girl could take photos for her classmates, who didn't believe there was a three-storey high ferris wheel inside the store. We wandered through the store and into the Barbie section (which is a huge temple to all things Barbie and is, of course, pinkpinkpink) and there collided with a bit of Project Runway neepery. One of the projects on this season's show had been to design an outfit for a new "My Scene" Barbie. The winning designer was Nick Verreos, a very talented designer who was eliminated from the contest just short of the final three.

So there, as we turned a corner, was Nick's Barbie. All three of us (SG, YG and I) giggled and shrieked and said "Oh my God!" and agreed that while it looked miles better on a full-sized adult human, it was really cute. And Sarcasm Girl turned to me and said, "God, I'm such a geek!" Then, accusingly, "God, you're such a geek." Guilty as charged.

Bunny for Dinner

Our traditional Easter feast is Bunny Meatloaf. Note: no bunnies are harmed in the making of this meatloaf. In fact, it's standard meatloaf, in she shape of a sitting rabbit (ie., one large oval loaf, with a smaller "head" loaf at one end) which is frosted with mashed potatoes, surrounded with a green vegetable (the friend who first showed me this silly recipe used green beans, but I have a slightly higher chance of getting the kids to eat broccoli than green beans, so this year it was broccoli), with paper ears, and eyes and nose made of cranberries or raisins or something like that (we used to use jelly beans, which make admirable eyes...but the die runs in the mashed potato, and there's something disconcerting about an Easter Bunny with pinkeye).

Yesterday my sister-in-law and her family came down from Sebastopol and partook of the Bun; for dessert we had an array of berries, strawberry syrup (which is basically the leftover syrup from some strawberry preserves I made in the morning), ice cream, and left over fudge which people started crumpling and sprinkling on the ice cream.

We had two Easter egg hunts--the one for the girls, first thing in the morning, and a second one mid-afternoon (in the back yard, since the sun briefly consented to emerge and smile) for the cousins and girls together. By the end of the night we were all in chocolate shock, but pleasantly so. And the Bunny was all gone.

Seasonal Products

Sometimes someone with too much time on his or her hands can come up with something wonderful: for example, a new brand of peeps. Excellent with coffee or an ale.

Beta Girl

So, two weeks ago, Younger Girl had her ice skating competition and won. Granted, in her class there was only one other contestant, but by gum, the girl came in first. Not only that, but this morning when she got to class we discovered that she's graduated from the Alpha to Beta lessons. "Beta is just like Alpha, only you have to do it all backwards." Sort of like Ginger Rogers with Fred Astaire: backward, in heels. Or at least skates.

Scary Treats

So I stopped off at Safeway last night, on my way back from a school meeting that wasn't (short story: meeting at 7:30 turned out to have been at 7:30am, dammit). The lines, which were very long for 8pm, wound past the ice cream locker, and I was examining the different sorts of ice cream and "novelties" available--Haagen Dasz bars, Ben and Jerry cones, Whole Fruit juice bars, Scooby Doo Push-up Pops...and then I saw it. Fear Factor Push Up Pops: sour sherbet with either a sherbet "eyeball" set in it, or with what looks like ribbons of sherbet blood streaming down it. It's the faux gross out that sells: the flavor is strawberry or lemon or something like that; only the appearance is troubling. If you're going for true gross-out, wouldn't it make more sense to have classic-looking ice cream novelties with surprise flavors like liver or dust-bunny?

April 3

Huzzah. Sent all the tax stuff off to the accountant today, a good week earlier than last year. He knows us, nothing wildly out of tune has shown up, with any luck the wretched mass of stuff to send to the IRS should be here by the end of the week. How about you? Filed yet?