I brought the curl back and the golf hat

yesterday morning while i was brushing my teeth rogray told me something shocking. apparently our cat harper had told him that she was going to go golfing.

at first i didn't believe him because, well, she's a cat and cats can't golf. but then harper sent me these pictures that she took from her iphone: (how she can afford an iphone is beyond me since all she does all day is sleep, eat, attack things that aren't there and then sleep again but there is a lot about her that doesn't add up.)







golfing. cats.

who knew?

I'm gonna lay down in the spa

last year, literally, hazlet was kind of enough to give gift certificates for spa manicure/pedicures to koogs and myself for our birthdays. because koogs and i are lame it took us a full year to get around to using them.

rogray & hazlet's hubby, mr. gouldwood, wished us well as we went to get our nails did:



mr. gouldwood was showing us that he and rogray were going to be doing fun manly things like trying on clothes that are pink.

after a delicious 90 minutes of soaking, buffing, massaging and painting koogs and i emerged from the spa looking as if our fingers were dripping in jewels. we met up with hazlet at brunch to see what she might think:



hazlet likes the red!! i've never, ever painted my nails any other color bur clear so i am very happy to see that she liked it. but what about koogs' nails? will she go for the deep purple-red that she opted for?



and it's a YES!!! woo-hoo. . .after thanking hazlet through some deep transatlantic meditation that we are sure made it all the way to london to her and her new baby we parted ways and i went home to find this happening:



rogray is writing a paper for a class he's taking on WWI & WWII. he has devised an intricate system of note taking on index cards and even harper is overwhelmed:



i mean what the hell? is that just a bunch of paper toys for her to attack or is it some kind of giant puzzle that will lead her to lots of friskies and catnip? oh, it's neither. it's knowledge. about the world.

inevitably, even harper finds this knowledge thing intriguing:



since i wasn't writing a paper i decided to do some reading in front of our fireplace:



and promptly took an hour long nap. that's right. a dvd called radiant fireplace relaxed me like an actual fireplace and put me to sleep. . .because i'm cool like that.

don't wake me, i'm tired

this is how i felt all day today. . .

I've Gotta Have Faith

it is very rare on this blog that i comment on my friend's doings because, well, this blog is about me so you are stuck reading about me from my perspective in my voice and you WILL. LOVE. IT.

but this time i need to devote a post to one friend's doing because it is insanely major and impressive and fills me with such pride i simply cannot refrain from mentioning it to you, the 4 people who read this here site.

my friend, the reverend k, has published a book!!!!

it's called the faith between us and you can buy it here, here, or any online bookseller. or you can do what rogray and i did: went to our local barnes and noble and bought it in person. from the bookstore.

i can't imagine how surreal it must be to see your book sitting on the shelf of one of your neighborhood bookstores but i imagine it's pretty surreal since it was fairly surreal to call one of my neighborhood bookstores and talk to someone in the comparative religion section and have this interaction:

me: "hey, do you have the faith between us?"

them: "yes."

me: "will you put it on hold for me?"

them: "yes."

all i wanted to tell the guy was "dude, my friend totally co-wrote that shit." but instead i said "thanks" and rogray went and picked it up.

and i was filled with pride the moment i saw my friend's name on the cover and his picture on the inside. and now i have begun to read it.

and it is beautiful. it is a conversation through essays between two 30-something men -- one a catholic, one a jew, both who both believe in and cultivate their faith. it is honest and brave and delicate and full of curiosity and acceptance. so please, please go buy this book and read it. and then buy a copy and give it to your friend or family member or hairdresser. . .anyone you think might enjoy such a thing.

thank you.

a little horsy named Paul Revere

this past weekend rogray and i jumped in a car and drove up to boston for a little sight-seeing trip and to visit his sister holgray (who i totally want to call hogray but rogray thinks that she wouldn't like it because then it's like her first name is ho but that's why i think it's funny because she's so not ho-ey).

saturday was a day of rain -- literally rain -- all day -- non-stop. but did that stop us intrepid tourists? NO!!

we forged ahead and went to quincy, ma (the birthplace of dunkin donuts) to tour the adams family estate. we started off at the mini-museum and tried on some colonial fashions:



apparently our forefathers drank dunkin donuts' coffee.

we hopped on a trolly



and proceeded on the tour of which there are no pictures because a: we weren't allowed to take pictures inside the houses and b: did i mention that it didn't stop pouring rain all day with wind gusts up to 30mph?

that night we went over to cambridge for a mini college reunion with his friends from his freshman year dorm. there was a lot of " you haven't changed a bit" going around but i imagine that with all of the marriages and babies they had all, in fact, changed quite a bit. you know -- like less pot smoking, no more platonic napping and less hair on the top of the head but more hair on the backs of the men.

here is the night told primarily through what the kids did:

this kid brought the cute:



and this one brought the adorable:



we brought the wacky:



and crisco brought the pain in his shoulder:



which you'd think his wife, an acupuncturist, would have taken care of but she was too busy smiling:



then the kids went bonkers:







we went back to the home of the harvard educated and continued our festivities over one of the best gin & tonics i've had in a long time and were treated to the sweet sound of kids with musical instruments:





the next day holgray treated us to brunch and took us for a lovely sightseeing walk through the back bay down to the charles river:





look how lovely holgray looks in this picture and then look closely at rogray. . .why is she so happy and he so confused?



we stopped to kiss this guy:



who holgray thought was einstein but turned out to be some musician and then we decided to pay homage to the dude who invented ether:



after that we went back to holgray's in the south end, got in the car, drove past fenway park and made our way home with a vow to return to good ole' beantown to tour the site of the great molasses flood of 1919 and take a little witch tour.

as holgray said, we like to go to the best places!

famous faces

so i get to work today and open up my email and there is a message from my dad with the subject "Fan Club."

naturally, i assume he is writing to tell me that i have one and that they are selling crosswords and cupcakes t-shirts and having online discussions about how hilarious i am and whether or not rogray's hair looks better when it's really long or really short but. . .[sigh] no. it turns out i do not have a fan club.

but guess who does?

MY DAD!!!!

and guess where his fan club lives on the internets?

FACEBOOK!!!!

oh, yeah, my 67 year old dad has a fan club devoted to him on facebook organized by some of his students. they discuss the shirts that he wears, where he vacations, quotes -- i mean this is a legitimate fascination with my father.

so i joined facebook to see it and let me tell you -- this thing might be one of the most hilarious happenings on the world wide web i have ever seen.

and, i'm not gonna lie, i was filled with pride that my martini & margarita making, glasses wearing, pontificating father is cool enough to have a facebook profile.

i mean, do one of your parents have a facebook fan club?

yeah, i didn't think so.

we are family: part deux

later that night my sister and her crew all showed up. they had to come late because monkey #1 had a track meet and he totally got a medal -- granted i think when the track meet is a bunch of 4-5 year olds everyone gets a medal -- but that's because they are all winners. they were very tired as evidenced by daisy's yawn:



i'm with ya' puppy -- i feel like that every night around 9:30. (btw -- this is, like, the perfect dog -- totally quiet and calm, acts like a hoover around the table but doesn't really beg, and is super cute.)

the next morning we got up and went to the river to look for ducks and monkey #2 was excited for the chance to tote his big boy backpack:



this boy has serious love for that backpack -- he didn't go so far as to bathe with it but he did have the backpack next to the bathtub -- his love runs deep.

once we got to the river monkey #1 set about teaching monkey #2 all about feeding ducks:



dadgo summoned us to the bridge and we fed the little floaters from there:





but once that got old the monkeys wanted to experience nature -- mainly monkey #1. we decided that monkey #1 is going to have his own nature show on the discovery channel called "the naked naturalist" -- which i guess is like saying automatic teller machine machine because aren't naturalists nudists? but that's not the kind of naturalist i mean -- i mean the two things he loves the most seem to be being naked and being in nature.

let's play my new favorite game a la where's waldo. . .i call it "spot the monkey":







after relaxing by the river and a quick hike we came home for lunch and an even quicker nap and then headed back out for some fishing! see you think i'm all new york city girl but i'm totes a country girl. i mean look at me:



i'm a fisherwoman! here's dadgo putting a worm on the hook for my sister:



and here's me watching him (warning: not my best picture):



see? totally country.

we all fished:



but only momgo actually caught a trout. go, momgo, go!



here's our fishy:



which was then gutted and cleaned by the lovely woman who owns and runs the trout pond:







the next morning momgo cooked fishy up:





i de-boned it in one fell swoop (see? country!):



and then, much to monkey #1's horror, we ate it:



with eggs and toast. because that is how you eat a trout and oh my goodness it was so so good.

after our hearty breakfast we went for hike numero dos to what was once a waterfall but is now a dribble down a rock thanks to the extreme drought that part of the country is going through:



that rock face use to be covered in rushing water and now it's so dry little daisy can run up like it ain't no thang.

monkey #1 continued to commune with nature:



while rogray and i posed in all of our adorableness (finally! one good picture):



and then we headed back. my sis and her crew headed home leaving momgo, dadgo, rogray and me to eat leftovers and watch a movie. the next day we headed back to nyc feeling refreshed, loved, and full.

oh, and yes, that is a reflective vest rogray is wearing in that last picture -- we didn't want him to be confused for a bear and get shot. if that's not family acceptance i don't know what is.