I don't like Easter. It seems to me like the sad little cousin of Christmas, destined to live in the shadow of the biggest American holiday. Easter has no compelling and uplifting narrative, like the story of Jesus' birth. Instead it has the story of Jesus' torture...
At the age of 44, I know I am middle-aged. I don't have a problem with this. It's only logical: middle-aged means you're roughly halfway through your life. In fact the next time someone tries to argue that being in our 40s -- or even late 30s -- is not middle-aged, I...
Bilingual brain
It occurs to me that anyone who has just started reading my blog might wonder why I have chosen to stay child-free. The reasons appear in a post I wrote over five years ago, at the age of 39. Take a look. This post also contains the phrase "at the...
Have you heard of Heart Attack Grill in Arizona? The founder and owner, Jon Basso, used to work for Jenny Craig, encouraging people to eat well and slim down. According to the interview he did with Nightline a couple of weeks ago (you can watch it here), he is...
I've noticed a change in how people respond to my statement, "I don't have kids." When I was in my 20's and 30's, people took this comment in stride, maybe because I seemed young enough to still have children or maybe because they knew I wasn't married, so it seemed...
December is my favorite month. I've been telling people that and I'm stunned by their response. Each person has replied, "Why?" I don't understand this question. We are neck-deep in Christmas decorations, Christmas music, Christmas goodies, Christmas parties and...
Because we weren't conflating food with emotional fulfillment enough.
Images of Halloween invoke death, decay and the unknown. They're the taboo subjects that spooked us as over-imaginative children and that we'll fear again as we get close to our own physical collapse. But the reason Halloween is my second favorite celebration is that...
I'm drawn to horror stories, horror movies and all things dark. When I was seven years old and first learned to read, I started with the ghost story books at the library. I kept going until I had read every ghost story book for my age group in the place. In my teens I...
I am not a vegetarian. I have never been a vegetarian. I have been friends with vegetarians, lived among them and even dated them, but I have never, ever joined them in their meatless way of eating. Yet people think I am one. Friends who have known me for years, who...
Before I saw Sex in the City II, I imagined writing a long, insightful post about it. Instead, I came out of the movie not feeling much of anything. Then I forgot about it.But I made a commitment, so here's as much energy as I feel it deserves. This movie took a stab...
I have run my personal Facebook experiment and it is over. In January 2009, I opened an account because I wanted to see what a friend's girlfriend looked like. I stayed for way too long. It was like a crowded party with all these people I hadn't seen in a long time...
In the summer of 1999, I was a 33-year-old, never-married, dating-fixated, straight woman whose TV got the HBO channel. I didn't have a boyfriend, I was ready for love and, yes, I was hooked on Sex and the City. One of the series strengths was its willingness to...
[I originally posted this on January 5, 2006. I'm running it again because I like how it shows that the heart of Christmas isn't Jesus. There's a long history to this holiday that has included more gluttony and sex than Christ.] Recently the History Channel aired...