Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Christmas is about giving and receiving crap.

It’s that time of year again. It’s officially December and everyone is bracing themselves for the holidays. My relatives have begun the month long process of holiday shopping for a large family, and part of that process is hassling everyone for gift ideas. Though I’m no longer a bright eyed kid, I’m still one of the youngest in my immediate family. So like I did when I was 10, I am expected to make a Christmas List.

Writing a list of my personal material desires should be easy. Lately being materialistic has provided a certain amount of comfort; where hearts and bodies fail, objects remain. Collecting, organizing, using, and admiring my possessions all create a life where the other kinds of living have become impossible.

But a Christmas list is the particular and peculiar task of asking for things from other people. Trusting them to choose the color and flavor and texture wisely. Guessing the amount of money they’re willing to spend on you and choosing a gift that’s in their price range. Preventing relatives from opposite sides of the family tree from buying you the same gift.

The easiest thing of all should be asking for things that you want. What do I want? To wiggle my way out from under this mountain of debt. To stop living from paycheck to paycheck. To establish enough financial stability to become self employed. To marry someone with great health insurance.

I’m no stranger to crafting a Christmas List around practical needs rather than superfluous desires. College taught me the art of asking for non-perishable food and appreciating your grandmother’s habit of buying you socks. But even then I knew how to add a few items to give the list some personality. Now I am so strictly set to my priorities that anything other than food and medication is bought at a lower quality for a paltry sum at thrift stores. Thrift store shopping is my one hobby, my one pleasurable activity, and even that serves the double purpose of acquiring household necessities.

I tried the usual trick of requesting gift certificates. Where from you ask? Pharmacies and grocery stores. If hospitals gave out gift certificates I’d ask for those. My one eureka moment came when I thought to ask for stamps and a memory foam pillow. And then I even managed to ask for a perfume which seduced me from the sample page of a Vogue magazine. But if anyone actually gives it to me, I’ll feel guilty they had to spend that kind of money in a recession. Even the memory foam pillow seems indulgent.

I put money on the list, like I always do. I’m aware it’s tacky, but I actually pray to god to win the lottery. If I’m going to have the gall to ask the divine presence in the universe to fatten my wallet, I might as well ask my relatives too.

The bottom line is, I have a lot of crap. I have enough crap. I don’t need more crap. Sure I’d like a scanner or a better camera but I’m low on rich relatives. Right now my Christmas list looks more like a grocery list. And believe me I’ve been trying. But as easy as it was to ask for stupid plastic crap when I was ten, is as hard as it is now. I have all the crap I want except all the crap I can’t have.


Christmas 2005:  All those gifts were for my sister and I.

Monday, November 23, 2009

Self-aware denial.

There’s a threshold for awful beyond which the human mind cannot sustain itself. I have found in the last year, when things have pushed beyond the ordinary limits of unpleasant, I have suddenly boomeranged into a more sustainable state of self-aware denial. I have mastered a whole arsenal of self-defense mechanisms and by all appearances become what others call “strong”.

A Good Housekeeping magazine on my living room floor has a picture of Michael J. Fox grinning and saying, “Happiness is a choice.” The article is all about how he’s found the silver lining on his the pile of crap god personally assigned to him. Though there’s a certain sickly saccharine quality to the advice that he doles out, the underlying message remains potent. Generally if there’s any way for me to be not-miserable, I take it. If it is at all possible to ignore the nasty, disturbing shadows that lurk around every corner of my life path, then I do. I’m totally conscious of my efforts, and so therefore I am more comfortable than I imagine I would be if my denial were less intentional. If there’s something I can do to actually improve my situation, I do it. But generally most of my problems require little more than time, and therefore a great deal of patience and, that insidious word see on motivational posters the world over, perseverance. And indulging in the few pleasures still allowed to me (television, chocolate, gossip) is one of the few ways I’ve found to pass the long hours between now and the better days that I can only assume will one day arrive.

Still, my sarcastic optimism seems to be a terrible way of communicating my situation to others. My off-color blog entries that attempt to squeeze some silver lining out of my own pile of crap come off more like a Hunter S. Thompson imitation than a genuine attempt to look at the brighter side of what is in fact pretty damn sucky. My periods of secrecy created rumors more dramatic than the truth, and my bouts of compulsive honesty have numbed my audience to my dramatic flair for telling the truth. The funny thing is, whenever I have been brave, and been flippant about the dark times, I may put others at ease but I may have done myself a disservice.  Maybe people have no idea what's really going on.

Still, I have no interest in wearing a serious face and giving out personal details about my health problems (unless they are about poop or drugs, and therefore at least somewhat funny or compelling). I’d rather sell my story to my friends like a dirty joke or an Oprah reccomended novel.  I'd like to wander sleepy eyed through the gray area between OK and the kind of awful you never admit to, and let my life just happen to me.

Unlike other blog entries, this has no theme, no inspiration. I got into a weird, thoughtful, blah mood and decided to write some of my thoughts down. I don’t know that it actually ends up being as revealing as it is cathartic. I wanted to show how I maintain the balancing act between optimism and sarcasm, fool’s paradise and reality. I always say to others, if you’re self aware, then I think that it’s OK. And I couldn’t write this blog entry if I wasn’t self aware. So I guess it’s OK.  Even if it is a little self indulgent.

Saturday, November 21, 2009

Drugs are pretty remarkable things.

Growing up, my family did not use medications unless absolutely necessary. When I flew through a double plated glass door at the tender age of 12, the doctors tried to recommend oral antibiotics to prevent my wounds from getting infected. I didn’t take them. My mom allowed me some say in my treatment, but I was already hardwired to the idea that too many antibiotics crippled children’s immune systems. Psychiatric medications were met with even greater skepticism; hyperactivity and distractibility were considered traits inherent to childhood rather than problems in need of treatment.

But sometime during my adolescence, when my mother’s own chronic illness took hold, the family policy was totally reversed. To this day, there’s a fruit bowl filled with orange plastic prescription bottles on my parent’s kitchen counter.

This year I began my own collection. My medicine cabinet is as equally filled with over the counter solutions as it is prescriptions. My collection of remedies for “GI disturbances” is particularly large. Pills to keep my crap soft, pills to prevent the crap from getting too soft. Pills to get the crap moving, pills to slow it down. There’s more than just pills stored in my bathroom; there are suppositories and enemas and medicated wipes, all with the singular purpose of replacing my youthfulness with an old woman’s sour countenance. Though I must admit, many of these products have been familiar to me since I was only 14. It was my freshman year in college when I was first forced to explain that enemas were not actually a sexual device, despite the famous fetish of Marilyn Monroe. Some people have a fetish for feet, but that doesn’t make them sex organs.

And despite my family’s change of policy, my own reluctance to take prescription medication continued into my early twenties. In the last year, many hospital staff members have been surprised at my apparent lack of experience with drugs. During one particular hospitalization, I was given a shot of morphine to relax the blood vessels around my heart. I complained to the nurse that my brain was on fire. She said, “You haven’t taken many opiates, have you? It will go away in a little bit.” Though she was not rude, she still had an annoyed tone that indicated she expected a twenty something like me to just be grateful I was being given such great narcotics. Later that night, at about 5 a.m., the nurse finally convinced me to stop watching Lifetime movies and to take a sleeping pill instead. They gave me an Ambien®. It wasn’t long before I buzzed the nurse and complained, “I feel drunk. Am I supposed to feel drunk?” She literally seemed shocked at my apparent inexperience with drugs of this kind. “Yes, that’s supposed to happen.” I slept through the night and through most of the following day, despite hourly blood draws and an ultrasound of my chest.

But after that particular lesson on the startling effectiveness of certain medications, I was taught through experience the uselessness of meds in the face of “interactions” and “contraindications”. Medications for migraines can cause heart problems, and medications for heart problems can cause migraines. When you have heart problems, you can’t eat grapefruits. When you have migraines, you shouldn’t drink coffee even though coffee helps with migraines. And when you’re anxious and tired, you are particularly screwed, for no immediate solution for one will not make the other worse.

So while I am enjoying the amazing effectiveness of my anti biotic at controlling the infection that was troubling my throat, nose, and ear, I am missing work due to the “significant gastro-intestinal disturbances” that are (according to my pharmacist) “notorious side effects” of this medication.

But I’m not complaining out of self pity. I still have health insurance and my tax-sheltered Flexible Spending Account has turned my many prescription co-pays into the help I need to pay rent. And as I’ve said before, some of the drugs still available to me have very few interactions and their side effects are on the more pleasant end of the spectrum. It’s not exactly problematic to be swimming in a sea of orange plastic bottles, but it’s definitely symptomatic. Of what, exactly? Don’t ask me. I just write this blog because I’m kind of narcissistic. And I don’t want to get rusty.

Saturday, November 14, 2009

An education in the buzz.

I have to admit that college didn’t really work the way it was supposed to. The academic aspect of my education has been almost entirely useless except to help me sound smart at dinner parties. But being suspended between adolescence and real adulthood for five years had its advantages. I’ve had my fair share of hedonistic adventures in the realms of recreational chemical experimentation. And nothing else could’ve prepared me for the drugs that doctors give.

The idea for this blog entry occurred to me while lying awake in bed sometime between late Wednesday night and early Thursday morning. But let me digress…

I recently reintroduced caffeine back into my diet. I’ve never been the kind of coffee drinker that my mother was (two pots a day) and even at the height of my caffeine usage I still preferred fancy drinks that were more chocolate and whipped cream than espresso. When I had to go straight edge for health reasons earlier this year, caffeine was an easy sacrifice, though a few milligrams snuck into my blood stream via the occasional green tea. But, forgive my language, chronic fatigue is a bitch and a little caffeine goes a long way to maintaining functionality during the long afternoons at work.

Well, I had under estimated my sensitivity on this occasion; apparently 8 hours is not adequate buffer time for caffeine to exit the blood stream. At about three a.m., four brain racing hours into a nasty case of insomnia, I gave in and took a cocktail of pills that has never failed to put me under before. The following four hours did not include sleep.  Instead I was treated to a heavy floating cool tingly warm fuzzy body buzz and a few mild visual hallucinations. The combination was actually a recommendation from my doctor, and I’ve taken it more than a few times before with unmemorable results. Something about the addition of caffeine , insomnia, and maybe the recent increase in dosage of my SNRI… as the kids say, I was trippin’.

I remember thinking, I’m going to have to remember this combination later. Of course that’s something a poet thinks in the midst of a cerebral euphoria which makes every thought seem beautiful and important. The exhaustion next day was enough to deter any future attempts at recreating the blood chemistry. I’m not the party monster I once was.

During my early twenties I was the average student. I drank like a fish, I smoked like a chimney, and I dabbled like the liberal middle class English major that I was. There are things that no one ever tries, except in cautionary tales of overdoses and car crashes. And then there are things that almost everyone tries, even the cute virgin Jesus freak that works in the children’s section of the library. And then there’s a buffet table of “wild” experiences from which people like me pick and choose. I was never as feral as some of my lady friends, but no one called me naïve. Thanks to a combination of common sense, good luck, and good friends I always came out on the other side of my debauchery with hardly more than a hangover.

So when I found myself watching whispy gray ghosts of silver light dancing around the ceiling, thinking magical thoughts that I prayed I would remember in the morning, I didn’t freak out. I took my temperature, checked my body for signs of allergic reaction, drank a tall glass of water, and just rode it out.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, if the medications to treat my illnesses have pleasant side effects, than please and thank you. I’ll be happy to get high, doctor.


Some photographic evidence of my wilder days...

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Sex sells almost as well as fear.

Although I usually discuss my shopping experiences in my other blog, I decided that despite my deep love of wigs and face paint, Halloween stores are just full of crap.

My friends and I visited two Halloween Boutiques last weekend. At the first one, Closet Classics, we had no luck. When we complained about the lack of “plus sized” costumes (which in Halloween Costume terms is anything more than a size 8) the owner said, “I didn’t think anyone other than anorexics would want to wear something like that.” Because chicks with big butts and big tits don’t want to be whorish super heroes, too. Ugh.  Not liking that lady right now.

The next place, Halloween Express, was better.  It was large and well stocked, even though the floor was a gross grease-stained cement.



Now, most of the costumes I discovered could each yield a thesis worth of social commentary.  Like, a Halloween Store isn't complete without hooker boots...



And although I could let the photos speak for themselves, I am going to indulge my desire to categorize and comment.

Making the ordinary and everyday overtly sexual is nothing new to Halloween, but this year I discovered some newly whore-ified professions...





And public servants aren’t the only ones subjected to the sex worker makeover, apparently inanimate objects and fictional serial killers are also open to re-interpretation (read the brick house packaging carefully)...





Then there are the costumes that turn childhood memories into sex fantasies...





Some costumes are clearly intended to be pervert and pedophile bait...





Now, fear sells just as well as sex.  I found only one truly terrifying costume...



And we can’t forget the offensive costumes.  Some costumes are offensive because they aren't really costumes.  I mean, maybe your parents didn't have as many old hippy friends as my parents did, but this guy is a dead ringer to someone who was a guest at my parents' wedding.



But there's more than one way to be offensive, sometimes all it takes is a big ol' dose of misogynystic sexism...



And then there's the method of being offensive by creating grotesque caricatures of beloved public figures.  Is it just me or does that mask on the right look like a demonic Barack Obama?



And just so I don't come off like a dissapproving curmudgeon, here are some things I'd actually buy if I had the money... 







I miss the days when my uncle ran a haunted house and I'd get this stuff at wholesale prices.  Then again my hat collection is probably big enough.

A woman in a man's store.

I wanted to post this as a follow up to my entry on “glamping” from my other blog.

Last night Mike and I went on a date: thrift stores, dinner, and a movie. In between Goodwill and Salvation Army Mike noticed the massive sign of Gander Mountain glowing in the night.



In attempt to win some girl friend points, I volunteered to go in with him. After stepping two feet into the bright fluorescent man’s world, and discovering a pile of small bottles containing lady deer piss, I realized I was a little out of my element.



I live in Wisconsin, and many of my aunts and cousins cross “gender boundaries” and engage in the male typified activities of hunting, fishing, and camping. I myself always did enjoy camping, but I failed archery in gym class and never wore blaze orange.



So I decided to spend my time photographing my discoveries.



There were actually as many women in the store as there were men. A lot of the merchandise had transformed its violent purpose with a bright shade of “breast cancer awareness” pink.





Pink wasn’t the only woman-targeted marketing ploy.



There were times when the merchandise seemed a bit subversive, and once or twice it seemed as though I was in some kind of sex shop. I was like, is that a camouflaged gimp suit?



And of course the whole time I was thinking, I totally need to blog about this.  But as a warning to everyone else out there: taking pictures with a bright pink i-Phone while clunking around in high heeled cowboy boots and shimmery lipstick is a really great way to get noticed in a store like Gander Mountain.

Friday, October 23, 2009

That's life...

I earned five straight years of A's in college english courses and all I got was this lousy blog.

Thursday, October 15, 2009

Excited over sucky things.

Today I read the Wikipedia entry for Ehler-Danlos Syndrome and got excited. I e-mailed my mom right away. She’d heard of it too, agreed the similarities were plentiful. She was as eager to hear the geneticist’s test results as I was. If I had it, then I probably inherited it from her.

They say that no news is good news, but they are pretty much wrong. People often cannot fathom why I seem eager to be told that I have Multiple Sclerosis or Parkinson’s disease. They’ve heard about the symptoms and they cringe at the possibility. Who’d want tremors and numbness? Who’d want to carry that label around for the rest of their life?

The thing is, I’m already sick. I’ve already got a grab bag of horrible symptoms like ordinary evil itchy welts, good ol' fashioned fecal incontinence, and hallucinations induced by migraines instead of recreational drugs. Now, I would like to know why.

For a while my doctors and I were pretty sure I had MS. Having Multiple Sclerosis would not have been the worst thing in the world. It’s rarely fatal, and it’s got more than one organization dedicated to improving the lives of its’ sufferers. My wonderfully sensitive and compassionate doctor consoled me when the test results came back negative. “I’m sorry, I know that you want answers.” She knew I didn’t want Multiple Sclerosis; I just wanted an effing explanation.

In the best of cases, a diagnosis can even mean a cure. And although I’ve long since given up on the idea of a magic pill or a miraculous therapy (pain killers and massage will have to do), I know that the details of successful treatment are better crafted by doctors who understand why your symptoms are happening. The ointment to treat one kind of rash makes another kind of rash worse. And sadly the diagnostic procedure in many cases is to give the patient the medication for the suspected illness, and if the patient improves, then the doctors assume their assumption is right. If that sounds iffy to you, imagine being the guinea pig given medicated cream for ringworm when you really have eczema. The itching was so awful I cried.

So now, I’m trying not to fall into the trap of self-diagnosis. Many “perfect fit” diagnoses have come and gone, and this particular disorder would be no cakewalk. Although Ehlers-Danlos is rarely fatal it can have potentially life threatening complications. It’s not as straightforward as their depression theory but not as terrifying as their multiple heart attacks theory.

But this disorder could explain why I was a contortionist for the circus in college. It could explain why my skin is so translucent that you can see delicate blue veins crisscrossing my chest. It could explain the fistful of skin that can be stretched off of my belly. And it could explain all the pain. And if I can’t have a cure, I would love an explanation.

Glamping in Milan

I posted a miniature memoir to my fashion & style blog.
Although I didn't want to repost it in its entirety, I thought I should still share it with these readers.

I explain my personal relationship with the "low culture" of the midwest, and how it is being appropriated by the "high culture" of the world's thriving fashion metropolises.

I talk about mullets and hunting and haute couture.

Enjoy!

Monday, October 12, 2009

I kind of miss getting crap faced.

Do you want to know why teen-agers are always the most sullen, awkward people at family gatherings? Because they’re too old to be intoxicated by the bright shiny lights and presents, and too young to get drunk. There’s this growing up moment when you realize it’s 11:00 am, and someone is passing out hot buttered rums.  They casually ask if you want one. Now, finally, you understand why this is fun for the adults. They had to stay up until four in the morning wrapping gifts (far more expensive than the ones their parents gave them), and the reward is getting kind of lit in the A.M.  You get kind of buzzed and eat all this great food.  Suddenly you are noticing how delightfully kitschy your overly opinionated uncle’s moustache is.  It’s Christmas and you actually have fun for the first time since you grew boobs and started worrying about being cool.

Yeah, I am from Wisconsin, and I have a lot of relatives. My family tree has so many roots and branches it looks like a bucket of fishing bait wearing a giant clown wig. (That is not be a metaphor for the quality of my genetics, I just couldn’t think of any other image with as many twisting, growing lines.)  Every year I have a minimum of 5 distinct Family Christmas Celebrations, one of which requires the use of a Days Inn Convention Center. The older women get drunk, talk loudly, and bask in the feast their working hands have wrought.

The first time I got drunk, I was sipping good whiskey around a bonfire in the unused field of a cemetery. Me and the other Academic Decathlon team members and a few yearbook staff. The nerdiest kids at East High felt as cool as a group of misfits out of a John Hughes film. Then there was college, and I became a connoisseur of heavy beers and fine silver tequilas. I got A’s in all my English courses, because really what do you think English majors do? We have long conversations and even longer parties. My early twenties was spent being brilliant, feeling brilliant.

And then I got sick, and a little bit older. I quit drinking.  I got a little boring.

Now, make no mistake: I understand alcoholism. One of the most painful experiences of my adult life involved a “break up” with my closest friend, whose alcoholism had made him a greater burden than a new puppy. New puppies are a lot of fun, but god they are exhausting. And I was the one cleaning up after the puppy, while everyone else just rubbed its ears. Yeah, clearly I’ve been there. But a lot of people aren’t alcoholics; they work hard and enjoy a good hot buttered rum before noon on Christmas.

And god, do I miss that. I had a few glasses of champagne on my Birthday, and I danced around for hours on a cloud. But for two days afterward my blood was replaced with lead. I was not the same invincible college student, taking shots of tequila with her dad after her grandfather’s funeral.

Alcohol isn’t necessary. Neither is whip cream on your pie, but it can be nice. It makes things feel special. And come on, for many responsible and healthy adults, it’s fun. It has transformed many otherwise uninteresting situations into the best of parties, the best of youth.

Now I eat ice cream and go to bed early. Lately I’ve been slowly walking across the bottom of the public pool of life. I can’t help but be nostalgic for times that were never simpler, but always lively. Maybe diving into the pool got me here, but it was a lot more fun than dipping my toe.

It's what all the best poets do, when they are young.


Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Boxes and Boxes and Boxes of Crap

I have been the worst kind of pack rat for as long as I can remember. It doesn’t take a crystal ball to clearly see my future as a crazy old cat lady surrounded by piles of old magazines and boxes of weird objects. Being an “imaginative” (see also: slightly insane) crafter has always been one of the primary reasons for hoarding. Magazines can’t be thrown away because they can be used for collages. Worn, stained t-shirts might be too gross for Goodwill but they make nice rags, and the unstained bits can always find their way into a quilt. Then there’s the more unusual odds and ends.

I tend to be a bit nomadic, which is at odds with my inability to part with material possessions. When packing my belongings, I begin months before the actual move. And inevitably, in the last week, I find myself staring down a strange conglomeration of totally random and seemingly useless objects. A bent fork, a piece of silver rope, a pile of dominoes. So I grab a cardboard box, label it miscellaneous, and transport it to my new domain.



Though moving rarely happens more than once a year, this process also happens on a smaller scale every single time I clean. Small piles of bits and baubles gather on the corner of a night stand, only to be dumped into some nearby decorative box.



Though my initial intention is to use that poker chip on a scrapbook page, or give this profane plastic pencil topper as a gag gift, usually it just doesn’t happen. The boxes themselves remain intact, and have become their own collection. After years squirreling these “boxes of miscellany” I read a feng shui article that said the first and most important way to achieve good chi flow is cleaning out the clutter. The last 9 months of my life definitely indicate some serious blockages in my chi arteries. Time to open the little treasure troves and admit they are really boxes of junk.




I have to confess I am averse. Sure there’s my usual issue of fearing change. But also there’s an artistic composition to some of these boxes. Take out the contents, lay them out, and there seems to be a story. Sometimes it might be a confusing story, like why is there a purple plastic lobster next to an old retainer, but still it does ignite the imagination.



So, as I am prone to do when unable to preserve something physically, I am photographing a small sampling of these “boxes of miscellany” so that at least some documentation remains. Stock piling digital images is a bit more reasonable. And I don’t think it’s as likely to clog my chi.

Thursday, September 24, 2009

Butter is the most important food.

One thing that most people know about me is that I love butter. I mean, really really love butter.

My borderline-psychotic obsession with this creamy yellow dairy product was inspired by my Belgian-German-Polish-Wisconsinite grandmother. As a child, she would fry sirloin steaks in butter, so they sat on the plate in a savory brown liquid with soft floating bubbles of grease. She would lather butter on chocolate poptarts fresh from the toaster until they were slick and shiny. She smeared a decent portion on the bun beneath any sausage, be it bratwurst or hot dog. To this day, these foods seem naked without cow’s gift to man. If a sane person would adorn a certain food with an only slightly unhealthy amount of butter, I am guaranteed to overdo it. Some of my favorite foods are meaningless by themselves. Rice, pasta, and popcorn are mere vehicles for the savory flavor of that pale yellow heaven.

If I run out of butter, I feel as though my entire kitchen is empty. I cannot cook without it. I am paralyzed by fear that whatever I make will taste horribly bland and dry and will look up at me sadly from the plate and beg for a smooth fatty puddle to enrich it.

This obsession makes me infamous among my friends. Any guy I’ve ever dated, any roommate I’ve ever lived with, and any friend that has ever accompanied me to a restaurant has recoiled in horror when witnessing my butter usage for the first time. At sea food restaurants, the tiny cup of melted butter is never enough. I let crab meat soak in the bright yellow liquid, using a fork to lift the meat still dripping into my mouth. Toast slices with diner breakfasts are always inadequately buttered. I recoil in horror when someone orders dry toast. The idea repulses me. What is the point of toast without butter? It seems as absurd as a life without love. I put butter on sandwiches that are also going to have mayonnaise on them. I put butter in chicken fried rice and pad thai. I put butter on any cooked vegetable on my plate. When someone serves me something, saying “it already has butter on it” I always add more.

I’ve tried to be discreet about my severe butter addiction. I add the few extra clumps of butter to my food when no one is looking, I hide the butter pad wrappers under my plate. But eventually everyone becomes suspicious when my whole plate glistens. And when they finally catch me putting table spoons of butter on a handful of cooked zucchini, they realize that I’ve been doing this all along.

The only place I draw the line is eating raw butter. Though I’ve heard stories of people eating a stick of butter coated in sugar like a candy bar, I couldn’t imagine. Though I admit that deep fried butter sounds delicious, and I’ve put away a sizeable amount of raw cookie dough that wasn’t much more than sugar and butter.

When I’ve lived alone, I’ve put away a pound of butter in a week. My cholesterol is, thankfully, still within a normal range for a young woman like myself. But of course eventually old age is going to catch up to me and I am going to be forced into a world of bland, dry food.

But until then I can take comfort in knowing that at least Paula Deen knows how I feel.