L U N A T A L K with Eva Moon

New Year’s Dissolutions

For as long as I can remember my family has celebrated New Year’s Day with deadly sins: Sloth and Gluttony. There may have been others, but they kept it from us kids. We even call it The Day of Sloth and Gluttony, or S&G Day. Our family are the high priests of S&G, but all seekers are welcome to the temple on the appointed day. Like any ancient religion, it has its inviolable traditions whose origins may be lost in the mists of time but are slavishly followed none-the-less. Among the rites of S&G Day are:

• The Ritual Attire. Absolute comfort is paramount. Sweats are tolerable, but the preferred vestments are pajamas, robe and slippers. All day.
• The Altar of Food. The centerpiece is a Honey Baked Ham. Always. Everything else is negotiable as long as there’s obscene amounts of it: bread, bagels, lox, macaroni salad, coffee, mimosas, cookies, brownies, chips. Nibble as often and as much as you like. You can start your diet tomorrow.
• The Watching of Spectacles. Starting with the Tournament of Roses Parade and continuing with football for the rest of the day.
• The Jigsaw Puzzle. A 1000-piece puzzle is opened every year and finished by the end of the day.
• The Suspension of Authority. No one can tell anyone what to do on S&G Day. Your path is self-determined. Just know that if your path involves anything remotely healthy or virtuous, you’ll piss everyone off.

I started wondering how it all got started so I called my parents. My mother filled me in. It evolved over the years, but here’s the story:

My dad’s parents owned and ran a boarding school in Los Angeles. My dad grew up there. I remember staying there for a week or so each summer. From the beginning of their marriage, my folks threw big, wild parties. They used to line the floor with mattresses from the school so revelers would have some place to collapse in relative comfort. In the morning everyone would crawl to the buffet and eat left over party food. That was the embryonic start, but more was needed before a mere common circumstance blossomed into an annual ritual.

Enter: The Color TV. My family was the first in our neighborhood to own a color TV. I remember this too - all the neighbors oohing and aahing over the wretched color and my father endlessly twiddling with the dials to try to make the grass green, the people not green and the picture stay put in the middle of the screen. Once the possibility of seeing the Rose Parade in color arose, nothing could keep them away. Being the hospitable sorts, my mom whipped up ever larger vats of macaroni salad.

No one can remember how the Jigsaw Puzzle came to be traditional. But not everything needs explaining. Some things are ordained from on high and accepted on faith. It is our duty to observe the rituals, even if we do not understand them.

This year, the S&G Puzzle is somewhat ruined for me. Someone who Knows Who She Is and Who Will Pay Dearly when next I see her, gave me a 3000 piece puzzle for Christmas and it has consumed the last week. I finished it today, though one piece is AWOL. I suspect cats. I don’t have much stomach for another puzzle, but it’s that or football.

Eventually, my sisters and I grew up and moved away and it fell to the next generation to keep the S&G flame alive. Which we do with devotion. And, like a true priestess of the faith, I am sharing it with you in the hopes that it will spread.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of the S&G creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that for one whole day we can do whatever the hell we want without guilt.”

I have a dream that one day from the red hills of Georgia to the suburban tech enclaves of Washington we will be able to sit down together at a table of Honey Baked Ham and that really good challah.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Arizona where my folks live, a state withering with the heat of the desert, will be transformed into an oasis of chips and guacamole.

I have a dream where we when instead of getting started on resolutions friends and families across this nation will gather sleepily on New Year’s morning to parades, puzzles and provender.

I have a dream where instead of strife, injustice and war, our leaders loll bloated and somnolent on crumb-strewn sofas.

And when this happens, when we find all the edge pieces of the puzzle, when the parade is over, when the games begin, when the last bottle of champagne has been popped, we will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old spiritual, “Stuffed at last! Stuffed at last! thank God Almighty, we are stuffed at last!”

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Erev Xmas

‘Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house kids were hyperventilating. They were small and their little skins were hardly up to the task of containing the enormous fizzing excitement of a Christmas that seemed simultaneously imminent and maddeningly remote. As a distraction, I decided to have them help make gingerbread men. At right: Alan, 3, post baking, first year AC (anno cookie), below, Alan, 22, or 19 AC.

It was a howling success and has evolved into an annual rite with enough arcane rituals, required elements and passionate devotion to surpass the Catholic Church. The boys are in their twenties now and any time I float the idea of maybe skipping it this year, I’m greeted with gasps of horror so intense most of the air is sucked from the room and the windows bow inward.

The Making of the Cookies

The recipe is more or less from the Joy of Cooking to the extent that I follow any recipe. I don’t bake much because I am constitutionally unfit to actually measure anything. Perhaps someone who bakes all the time can eyeball it, but being baking-impaired, I force myself to dig out measuring thingies. It’s a true measure of a mother’s devotion.

A critical part of the ritual is never to use a cookie cutter. From early childhood, I have put knives into the hands of my children and let them cut the dough any way they like. Beyond monitoring the battlefield enough to make sure most body parts stay clear of the dough, I try not to interfere.

There is a sort of reverse evolution to cookies hand cut by children. The first pan are close approximations of people, angels and Christmas trees. But this gets old fast and the second pan devolves into simpler forms: stars, moons, and letters of the alphabet consisting of straight lines. Then there’s the mutant pan with zombies, rockets, UFOs and aliens. By the fourth pan, we’re down to triangles and Rorschach inkblot tests (Is that an amoeba or the pope?).

The Frosting of the Cookies.

The frosting is traditionally from a can in my cooking universe. Except this year. We’re snowed in for the first time ever on Christmas and I was forced to make frosting. It was harrowing, but has been given the “acceptable” rating by the cookie priests. On top of the frosting goes massed sprinkles and drools of colored icing from tubes.

We’re not talking Martha Stewart here. It’s about letting the process belong to the children. With the suppurating mounds of gooey frosting, bleeding candy dots and dripping ropes of red and green gel viscera they look more like something out of the Alien dinner scene than the cover of Gourmet, but the kids love them.

I’m looking at this year’s creations and wishing I’d taken pictures each year. They’re always artistic, but this year they’re more in the Keith Haring way than Jackson Pollock.

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Neither snow nor…

Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.

Do you hear me, Redmond couriers? Where’s the mail? Hmmm?

Snow is on the “no stay” list.

I’m just saying.

Snow did not stay us. We walked two miles through the lovely snow to the market in 20F temperatures, had a bite of lunch, shopped for groceries (read: wine) and walked back. Uphill. With bags of supplies slowly pulling my arms from their sockets. I was sweating by the time we got home. When I checked the thermometer, I discovered the temperature had soared t 22F. No wonder! But we have wine enough for several days now. Gotta see to the essentials!

Here are some pix:

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I was promised at least 6 inches

Of snow. On Wednesday. We watched the windows all day. Not a flake.

One of my father’s jokes: Snowfall is like a one night stand: You never know how many inches you’re going to get or how long it’s going to last.

But that’s an old people’s joke. Now we have the National Weather Service. We have Doppler radar. A Google search of “local weather report” yields 181,000 results. We should be getting a good, long gander in weather’s pants.

Wednesday was an exercise in delayed gratification. The 100% certainty of snow turned out to be some other universe’s definition of 100%.

The ground did not get its carpet of white. At least we had our new carpet indoors, right? They were supposed to finish up installing it Wednesday. All that remained was the stairs. They arrived bright and early with the goods and started ripping and pounding. At the end of it they were… six inches short. We have a bare riser and not another scrap of carpet anywhere in sight. How can you install 2000 square feet of carpet and not have enough for one more stair riser? Hmmmm?

It’s on order now and will arrive eventually. They say.

The other six inches I was anticipating Wednesday finally arrived early Thursday.

We woke to a world pillowed and quilted in white. I know snow is no big deal to some of you. And I know it’s a big pain in the ass to some of you. But I was raised in mostly snowless climes, so it’s always a small miracle when it happens. We bundled up and trundled out before dawn. The snow was soft and drifting on the ground, fine and light as dust. Ankle deep and deeper. Tiny flakes swirled and glittered in the cones of light beneath streetlamps. Don’t sneer, snow people. Try to remember for a moment what it was like when you were a kid.

By the end of the day we had 11 inches. The street was full of children with sleds and snowboards and the air was sharp and glassy with cold. Another walk under streetlamps powdered our pants nearly to the knee and the snow gleamed violet in the darkness of the woods.

Maybe gratification is all the sweeter for being delayed.

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Eight Crazy Latkes

Latkes are made from potatoes. Potatoes. Let me say it again, in case you missed it: Po. Tay. Toes. It’s a tradition! Without it, I’d feel as shaky as… as…

Then I saw this. Eight different latke recipes. One for each day of Hanukkah. Potato, of course. Salmon. Zucchini. Banana. Creamy Lemon. Chocolate. Pumpkin…

At first it was shocking but then, suddenly the world shifted. I was floating free in a universe of limitless possibility - far, far beyond mere creamy lemon. Zucchini? Puh-leez! Banana? Pfft! If you’re going to throw tradition to the winds, why be a plodding pedestrian? Why be a mere muggle?

Note: The recipes for some of these are still under wraps in the Eva Moon test kitchens.

Eva’s Eight Nights of Latkes

First night: Bacon Latkes. You know you want them. You can smell the sacrilege already, can’t you? Go ahead. Piss off the old folks. In fact, why not serve bacon, ham and shrimp latkes for a traif trifecta?

Second night: Valium Latkes. The holidays are a stressful time. Are the kids are overexcited and underfoot? Driving you nuts? Relax! You’ll want to gauge the dosage carefully, but with practice you can knock the little buggers out for as long as you want: long enough for a hot bath or a weekend getaway. It’s your choice.

Third night: Candy Corn Latkes. To mark the official end of autumn, dig out that half bag of leftover Halloween candy corn you squirreled away in the cupboard behind the oatmeal and stir it in. Fry as usual. Let cool unless you like blisters.

Fourth night: Altoid Latkes. Curiously strong.

Fifth night: Jello Shot Latkes. Without our traditions, life would be as shaky as…

Sixth night: White Widow Latkes. If you had to google it, you can’t have one. Well, OK, maybe one. The first one’s free. After that I’ll have to charge you.

Seventh night: Viagra Latkes. Makes a firmer latke. Warning: Too many may cause blindness. For Hanukkah candles that burn longer than four hours, contact your rabbi.

Eighth night: Potato Latkes. Sorry. In any universe these are required eating. Here’s how traditional potato latkes are made (and no, I don’t care how your grandma used to make them): Approximate proportions: 2 potatoes, grated, 1/2 onion, grated, 1 egg, 1 handful of flour, salt, pepper. You only want enough egg and flour to keep it from being hash browns. Heat plenty of oil in a cast iron skillet and drop big spoonfuls of the stuff into the sizzling oil. Brown well on both sides, blot on paper towels. Serve with sour cream. Applesauce is OK if people are whining for it. We never actually manage to get them out of the kitchen. Everyone burns their fingers. It’s a tradition.

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Fluffy Pillow of Falsehood

Overheard in New York has nothing on Overheardinmyfamily. I can only imagine what a person passing by would make of overheard bits of the odd and rambling exchanges that pass for normal chat around here. I take that back. “Odd and rambling” is entirely inadequate to describe conversations that have produced such gems as:

“Well, yes, but their razor-sharp talons are made of papier mache…” or

“Not if each tomato had its own jetpack.”

That last one was the end of a longish session trying to solve the problem of too many trucks clogging the highways. It began with a suggestion to have goods transported by dirigibles. The pitfall with dirigibles, of course, is that they use dangerous, flammable gas - a problem that could be solved if the dirigibles were deflated and carried by trucks. It went downhill from there.

The kids are home for the holidays now and a walk was proposed despite the precipitous arrival of a new ice age last night. Apart from the incessant whining about the cold, it was a pretty walk along the Sammamish River that produced sightings of cormorants, a river otter and rather chilled-looking great blue heron. It also produced the following:

ME (a propos of something I can’t remember now): You know, glass is a fluid too.

20-SOMETHING KNOW-IT-ALL SON: Actually, that was debunked. If glass were a fluid, those glass bottles they found in Egyptian tombs would have been puddles. Old window glass that’s thicker on the bottom than the top was made imperfectly and glaziers found windows were sturdier with the thick end at the bottom.

HUSBAND: Another beloved myth dashed to the ground.

ME: I’d rather be tied to the cold train tracks of truth than sleep on a fluffy pillow of falsehood.

OTHER SON: I’m rather fond of the fluffy pillow of falsehood, myself.

KNOW-IT-ALL son: I don’t want my own pillow, but I love destroying other people’s pillows.

He may have a sociopathic streak, but he makes us laugh. It’s good to have the family back together for the holidays.

Now, where’s my pillow?

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Too Hip to Crotch Walk

I suspect Overheard In New York is playing games with us. Twice in one day they tossed out the term “crotch walk.” My natural assumption was that even though I’d never heard it, if I were to ask my kids they’d roll their eyes so far back in their heads they could watch their hair grow from the inside, sigh dramatically and wag their heads at the tragedy of having such a hopelessly dinosaurific mother. Where have you been?

But ossified or not, I was curious. I mean, you can imagine what it is, right? Well, it turns out that, as least as far as the internets know, crotch walking is still slang of the future. Some snooping around turned up very little - a couple of short, incoherent videos too dim to share here and none of which agreed. Is it walking with a hip thrust on each step? Strutting while grabbing your crotch? Gingerly stepping to avoid irritating a rash? It’s not even in Urban Dictionary yet.

I came across one source suggesting it’s a law-enforcement term for a particular type of shoplifting wherein a woman in a loose skirt grips items between her thighs and walks out. Apparently this is a common way to make off with whole hams and small appliances.

So what’s the deal? Is Overheard on that much of the bleeding edge? Did they overhear new slang or are they making it up? Could I make new slang? If I casually start inserting, oh, say “choxymoron” into blog posts and conversation, will it spread? Would I want to unleash such a word on an unsuspecting world?

The danger is slim. Despite years of flogging it, renown eludes me. Even my youtube video of Light the Fucking Candles is creeping glacially towards 2,000 views after nearly two months while a grainy security video of a teenager dropping a pizza has gotten 200,000 views in a single day. I do not have the knack for popular.

In any case, this post gives me a rare opportunity to feel hip enough to crotch walk from here to the post office with a box of fresh, homemade baklava for the person who comes up with the best definition of choxymoron.

And do watch out for a woman who can sashay casually down a street with an espresso maker between her thighs.

UPDATE: My kids assure me that they heard the term at least two years ago and it’s a stupid manner of leading each step with a pelvic thrust. Some self-crotch-grabbing may be included for emphasis. The term is derisive, in their opinion.

UPDATE 2: A youth golf coach friend says she sees this walk frequently among young men who wear those super-baggy jeans. If they walked in a normal upright posture, they’d never stay up. And the winner of the box of baklava (just baked today) is: Dreah.

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No Twine For Me

It’s an odd, almost dreamlike experience to ride in a car wedged into the cargo area between a mattress and the door with no view but straight up at a sliver of sky. The sky is brilliant blue with streaks of foamy white swirled through it as if by the hand of some meteorological barista. Occasionally the bony fingertips of winter trees stir the edges. Freeway signs pass too quickly to read. One time a jet swam by, silent as a trout. I can’t get my bearings, but I’m not too concerned. I know the route well enough to make rough guesses and it’s more pleasant to slip into the sky and just drift. It’s a brief respite from the stress.

We’re on our way home from IKEA. A trip that began badly. I know where IKEA is. I’ve been there before. You can see the damn blue and yellow sign thrusting up above surrounding office parks and car dealerships from the freeway. If you’re on the right freeway, it turns out. But no matter! We got there eventually and joined the throngs. We were on a mission to buy a sofa bed. Alan emptied his room when he moved out. He’s coming home for the holidays and I hate to make the boy sleep on the floor. Call me a doting mom, I don’t care.

We found the sofa bed we were looking for. w00t! And some great little glass tumblers just like the ones they serve wine in at Greek cafes and a lamp and some purple storage boxes. All with friendly Swedish names. So far so good. There was even a short line at checkout. Score!

Not so fast. The one woman in front of us apparently bought one of every item in the store under $10. And that covers a lot of inventory. She didn’t buy two of anything, so each item had to be scanned separately. It took over 40 minutes to check her out, what with price checks (she couldn’t pass on the orange, electric candelabra no matter how long it took the poor harried woman on the other end of the walkie-talkie to find one with a tag on it). Her total came to $561.57. A number burned on my hyperventilating psyche forever. The cashier was sweat-streaked at panting at the end of it.

She gave us a 15% discount for “being patient.” Maybe we seemed patient. The internal eyerolling alone should have registered on the richter scale. The mutterings of my husband peeled the skin off the back of my neck.

Then: Sofa Bed Meets Honda Fit. I love my Fit. They don’t call it that for nothing. I swear it’s bigger inside than outside. It took several tries, a passle of colorful language and cost me the rearview mirror, but damnit, we wedged it in and shut the hatch. No twine for this girl.

No twine comes at a cost though: no passenger seat. We were doing good to keep most of the driver’s seat.

That’s all right. I like the view of the sky. For a peaceful half hour I don’t have to think about taking it OUT of the car.

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Lamaze for Home Decorating

Mazel tov! You are entering a new phase of your lives. You must be very excited. All the planning, waiting and preparation are nearly over and soon you will be welcoming a bundle of new carpet into your home. There are a few things you should know for when the big day arrives.

So many people dive into home decorating without thinking it through. One partner (typically the wife) will say, “Honey, I’ve been thinking…” (the four most expensive words a spouse can utter) “Don’t you think it’s time we replaced the carpets?” The other partner (typically the husband) thinks “Sure I’ve gotten kind of tired of having all this excess money and peace” but what he says is, “sure.” Fatal words.

I’m sure you got an earful when announced the news to your family and friends. They’ve been through it too and aren’t shy about sharing their stories of the mixed-up deliveries, chaos, labor and all the things that can go wrong. You nodded your heads and smiled, thinking “not us!” or “they’re just exaggerating!”

But let me assure you, it’s best to be as prepared as you can be, so I’ve put together a little list for you.

Lamaze for Home Decorating.

This program is based on the philosophy that home decorating is a natural process for which homeowners are uniquely designed. If you follow these basic principles your inner Martha will guide you painlessly through the process.

Phase one: Early labor.

The big moment is almost upon you but the pain is tolerable. You scout grocery stores, snagging boxes and bribe your kids to pack all the books and drag them to the garage. If there is any discomfort during this phase, focus on a pleasing image - say a photo of a fantasy home swathed in acres of creamy new rugs, take a deep cleansing breath and yell at them to get back at it or they can pay their own goddamn tuition next quarter. This phase may last several days.

Phase two: Transition.

The kids have gone back to school and the house is still alarmingly full of things. Keep your focus, take quick panting breaths as you drop the glass top of the dining room table on your fingers. Be prepared for strong emotions to arise during this phase. It’s not uncommon for normally loving couples to engage in blaming and cursing. “Never again! I am never going through this fucking hell again as long as I live!” and “It’s your fault, you bastard. I’ve been after you for years to get rid of all your crap.” Relax. This is nature’s way of preparing you for phase three.

Phase three: Pushing.

It’s the big moment at last! The carpet guys have arrived in the truck and are stumping through the house. Unfortunately, you had been told they were going to do the downstairs Tuesday and the upstairs Thursday, but Esteban informs you they’re doing the downstairs and half the upstairs today. It’s a mad sprint to haul beds and bookcases out of rooms, clear the armoire in the hall and hustle the cats into the spare room. (Cats who celebrated the happy event with an all-night barf-party. Just try it on the new carpets, gatos.)

The reality is, while it’s good to do what you can to get ready, nothing will really prepare you for the day… the noise! the chaos! the mess! the dizzying speed with which your entire life dissolves in turmoil. But eventually, it’s over and then it’s just you and your partner at home with your brand new carpet. Peace at last!

Oh wait. Did you look in the garage?

Phase four: the afterbirth…

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Levitation. Please.

I’ve been avoiding writing about this. I don’t want to seem ungrateful. I am profoundly grateful that I have a job and a home and the wherewithal to recarpet it. I just wish I didn’t actually have to live through the recarpeting part. At nine a.m. in the morning, Hell comes knocking at the door. Carrying 2000 sq. ft. of carpet.

We’re paying for a dozen years of benign neglect of our home. But the time has come to face up to it, roll up the sleeves, gird the loins and… pack up everything.

You see, it turns out that you can’t actually replace the carpet in your house if there’s anything sitting ON the carpet. You basically have to move out. In the absence of pixie dust or levitating devices we have to rely on primitive methods: child labor.

I am not the pack rat type. I swear. I’ve always got a bag for Goodwill or a box for Half Price Books. I don’t shop. Much. I have closets - rooms even - that are virtually empty. And yet somehow, this vast ringing emptiness has disgorged dozens upon dozens of boxes full of residential effluvia: Books, papers, LPs (irreplaceable, one-of-a-kind ones that must be preserved, even if we don’t have a turntable), casettes (same story), CDs, vases, candles, DVDs, cables, lamps, instruments + parts, and… stuff.  Stuff now piled in the garage. Stuff waiting still to be added to the pile before the carpeteers arrive in the morning.

I’ve become a big fan of freecycle.org, a network for matching up trash with treasure-seekers. And it works. That bagful of empty DVD cases? No fewer than eight people in my immediate area wanted them! Old jigsaw puzzles, a broken marble end table, a pair of ancient stereo speakers were snatched up in minutes. (the marble for a wood sculptor who wanted it for bases for her artwork). I am still looking for a home for a single folding bar stool with a broken leg. Any takers? It’s mostly stable. So far.

But on top of the sheer effort of packing twelve years of residency into one garage, is the personal blame. When pressed the spouse does not deny that our ratty, stained, twenty-year-old carpet needs replacing. But even so, every box, every reminder, every slightest inconvenience is my fault.

But I’m tough. I’ll endure the glaring, muttering, moaning and sighing for a few more days. When it’s all over and we’re riding high on the chemical outgassing of our new carpets, all the hassle will be forgotten.

Until it’s time to put everything back.

Here’s my new posting for freecycle.org: WANTED: Levitation device (Redmond).

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