2010 May

That’s My Daughter in the Water

May 20, 2010 By The Well Read Hostess 11 Comments

Yesterday as I was driving from work to my daughter’s kindergarten to be the helping mommy for Writing Workshop Time, WXPN, a most excellent local public radio station played Loudon Wainwright’s song, That’s My Daughter.

Drivin’ and cryin’.

Here’s a quiz for you.

I cried because:

a) I’m a hormonal heap

b) High school teachers in late May are crazy people

c) I have Daughter Guilt

d) All of the above

If you chose “d” …

Like me, my daughter can do a cartwheel and be instantly happy.
Like me, my daughter sleeps better when her bedroom is clean.
Like me, my daughter loves to make up stories.
Like me, my daughter usually has her hair out of place and her clothes might be a little rumpled.
Like me, my daughter is busy busy busy and sometimes we don’t care so much about the hair and clothes.
Like me, my daughter has eyes that make people say things along the lines of, “She looks like trouble!” or “Wanna go on a date?” (Vis a vis my daughter? The answer is no. Also me. About the dating. The trouble? No comment. For both of us.)
Like me, my daughter loves her some carbs.
Like me, my daughter experiences the world in extremes. All or nothing. Black or white. Fittingly, Loudon Wainwright’s son, Rufus, wrote a song about this, Cigarettes and Chocolate Milk.
Like me, my daughter takes care of her friends, and sometimes strangers.
Like me, my daughter feels responsible when things go wrong…the other day she dissolved into tears and threw herself into my arms because the dog was misbehaving and it was “HER FAULT” because she’d left her bedroom door open, as if that’s a crime, and the dog could get to her stuffed animals to swipe them and drag them around the house in a deranged game of doggy keep away.
Like me, my daughter is harder on herself than she is on anyone else.
Like me, my daughter feels crippling guilt if she thinks she’s hurt someone.
Like me, my daughter likes to make things special, she uses lots of glitter, whereas I tend towards baking and hauling out the good china.

Everything she sees
she says she wants.
Everything she wants
I see she gets.

That’s my daughter in the water
everything she owns I bought her
Everything she owns.
That’s my daughter in the water,
everything she knows I taught her.
Everything she knows.

Everything I say
she takes to heart.
Everything she takes
she takes apart.

That’s my daughter in the water
every time she fell I caught her.
Every time she fell.
That’s my daughter in the water,
I lost every time I fought her.
I lost every time.

Every time she blinks
she strikes somebody blind.
Everything she thinks
blows her tiny mind.
That’s my daughter in the water,
who’d have ever thought her?
Who’d have ever thought?
That’s my daughter in the water,
I lost everytime I fought her
Yea, I lost every time.

psstt…click there and you can hear part of the song.

Part II

It was my dad’s birthday.

I made a cake. You know, like I do. Next to the cinnamon chocolate torte, this might be the best cake I’ve ever made…OK, top three. Maybe four. I adapted the recipe from Epicurious. It seems like a lot of work, but it wasn’t so arduous. And totally worth it.

The good people at Bon Appetit from whence the recipe came, feel that making lemon curd yourself is a valuable use of your time. I’m here to give you permission to go to Trader Joe’s and buy it. It will be better and you’ll have enough time to go do something meaningful, like watch an episode of Mad Men or go out and get your nails done. Plus, I burned the crap out of it when I made it because I got busy trying to do my OWN nails and then I was annoyed and had to go to Trader Joe’s anyway or send my mom for me but whatever. You need three cups of lemon curd. If you want to make it yourself, click to Epicurious.

OTHERWISE…

Lemon Curd Layer Cake

(The word “curd” should be changed to something that doesn’t sound like a by-product of spoiled milk. I might actually start a Facebook group to lobby for this. )

Make the frosting first because it needs 4 hours + to chill so that it doesn’t slide off the cake when you slather it on.

Beat 3/4 cup powdered sugar and 1 1/4 cups lemon curd in a large bowl for a teensy minute. Then beat in 2 cups whipping cream until firm peaks form. Or it looks like frosting. Either one. Stick it in the fridge stick it in the fridge. For hours.

Preheat the oven to 350. Butter and flour three 9 inch cake pans. For some reason, three layer cakes always make people go, “Oooohhhhh three layers!!” whereas two layers make people go, “That’s nice.” The recipe said you should line the bottom of each pan with parchment, but I forgot to do this and it was no big deal.

Whisk 1 1/2 cups cake flour (which is actually just flour with 1 TB cornstarch mixed in per cup and sifted), 1/2 cup sugar, 2 1/2 tsp. baking powder, and a little bit of salt in a large bowl. Add 4 egg yolks, 1/4 cup vegetable oil, 1/4 cup orange juice, about a lemon’s worth of grated lemon peel, and 3/4 cup of lemon curd. Don’t stir it.

Combine 8 egg whites and 1/4 tsp cream of tartar and beat the hell out of it using an electric mixer (duh) until soft peaks form. Gradually add 1 cup sugar and beat beat beat. Switch bowls and use the same mixer to mix the yolk mixture until it’s smooth and then fold in (no mixer) the egg whites.

Divide the batter equally into the three pans. I’m going to interrupt here and say that I think this last bit of instruction was actually insulting to your intelligence. Unless you want a really crooked and unevenly baked cake, obviously you would divide the batter equally. Bake for about 25 minutes. Cool completely. If you remembered to use parchment, peel it off or else your guests will be eating paper.

The original recipe has some fancy pants business about a piping bag and decorating the top of the cake with poofs and swirls. Don’t bother. Here’s what you do:

cake, 1/3 cup lemon curd spread around, 1 cup frosting spread around, cake, 1/3 cup lemon curd spread around, 1 cup frosting spread around, cake, frosting all the hell over the place. I threw some blueberries on there to cover up some messy bits.

Happy birthday. From the daughter in the water.

**photo coming…when I find the camera. Like me, my daughter hides things. In this case, the camera.

Filed Under: Facts of Life, In the Kitchen, Parent of the Year

Audience Participation

May 10, 2010 By 7 Comments

Listen up, people. What I’m scribbling here requires some work on your part. Click where you are told to. It’s Monday, which is never good, so I’m a little out of sorts. Just do as you’re told. Clicky clicky.

A while ago, I wrote this, (did you click? Good) which I’m really proud of. And I don’t hang myself out on that particular “proud of myself” limb very often. One of the comments directed me here, and yesterday, that particular website directed readers back to me. Nice, tidy circular motion. Pleasing.

So you’ve done your clicky clickies as you were instructed, which is good. But if you aren’t sufficiently impressed with this woman, Caitlin, you didn’t spend enough time at Operation Beautiful. She is 25 years old. What she has accomplished, and so clearly not with the intention of furthering her own interests but with a kind of selfless ambition that can’t be taught, is nothing short of astonishing. I can think of any number of people who have accomplished great feats that began movements or cultural revolutions or paradigm shifts – Oprah, the Google boys, Lance Armstrong – but their ambition kicked over into high gear for their own benefit, not that there’s anything wrong with that (I mean that, I’m not being snarky, for a change).

You know what you have to do, right? Put a package of sticky notes and a new pen in your purse, pocket, glove compartment (does anyone actually put gloves in the glove compartment?), wherever, and get busy. We’ve got work to do.

Filed Under: Bloggers Like Us, Mama Like, On the Nightstand

In Loco Parentis

May 7, 2010 By 5 Comments

Apparently I’m taking the week off from writing.

Couldn’t really tell you what that’s about, other than I just wasn’t feeling it this week. No muse. No time. No energy. No inspiration. And the only political thing worthy of my attention and pointed jabs was this, and Jon Stewart always does it better:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart

Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c

Family Research Council’s European Gaycation

www.thedailyshow.com

Daily Show Full Episodes

Political Humor

Tea Party

Skip to about minute 6 for the truly excellent bit

It’s May. Hooray for May. Except that I’m in the final stretches of the academic year marathon and I’m at that stage where people tend to bonk or collapse from heat exhaustion or start pooping themselves because they’ve lost control of their involuntary muscular system. Note, I said “people,” not “me.” I am not pooping myself. Yes. It’s early days in May.

I adore my kids. I’m having fun hanging out with them and I’m tired of feeling like being with them and saying “yes” to doing cartwheels in the yard (my daughter has discovered that her elderly mother can do an excellent cartwheel and now tells everybody, not to mention the fact that she frequently demands that I demonstrate the cartwheels for any houseguests) and giving underdogs on the swing is cutting into my writing time.

So I’m giving myself a free pass. It’s a weird thing to feel guilty about not doing something that you don’t actually HAVE to do and you really only do for your own pleasure anyway. But there it is. I’m not feeling guilty about not having anything to write this week.

Not feeling guilty about the things I usually feel guilty about feels so good that I’m merrily crossing other usually guilt-provoking “responsibilities” off my list. Everybody should do this, particularly in May.

What I’m not feeling guilty about that I would normally feel guilty about:

The pan I used to make green curry vegetables and chicken for dinner two nights ago is still in the sink.
There is so much dog hair on the couch that I might have to just douse it in kerosene and light it on fire (the couch, not the dog).
The laundry situation is so out of control that I can no longer tell what is dirty and what is clean in the laundry room and have been, hence, relying on the sniff test to figure out what to wear in the morning.
We’re eating a lot of pizza and chicken nuggets at our house these days.
I’ve got a huge stack of overdue library books sitting in my kitchen.
The dog keeps shredding stuffed animals and there is fluff all over the carpet in every room. And has been for at least a week.
And a bunch of other things, but I don’t really feel like going into it all now, and I don’t feel guilty about that either.

Filed Under: Bloggers Like Us, Facts of Life, Keeping it Real