Last night after a long meeting I was covering for the newspaper, J met me at the door of our house with a glass of wine. I can’t stress enough the importance of this moment, the many, many instances in which I’ve wished someone would meet me at the door with a glass of wine, just like on television. People in sitcoms and movies are always meeting their beloved at the door with a glass of wine after a long hard day. To have it actually happen was absolutely lovely.

Wait, it gets even better. Sitting on the bed in the (clean!) bedroom was a bag from one of my favorite stores. As my birthday falls directly after Christmas and New Years, I sometimes get the shaft on birthday presents (I usually forgive people this grievous error and get on with my life). This year was particularly busy and although I got nothing the day of, J’s been promising me a present ever since. Last night he made good on that promise and presented me with an adorable little tea pot, matching cups and a few different kinds of tea as a belated gift.

I was so giddy about all the wonderful stuff going on that I didn’t even notice the most obvious surprise. A TV, it sounded like. A TV in the bedroom.

We live in a really small house and having a TV in the bedroom has never been easy. When we decided - about a year ago - to try and put this little TV we had in there so we could watch late night talk shows and all while drifting off to sleep, J had to pull this wooden garden table out of the carport and arrange it in the corner of the room so we could place the television on top. It looked kind of unnatural sitting there, wedged in beside the bookcase, and we didn’t have anything fancy - like cable or a remote - but we didn’t care.

That TV - the first TV - was a free donation given to us by my friend Max who didn’t want it anymore. Since it was free and used, and who knows how old, it wasn’t that upsetting when, while watching a movie one night, the television made a whirring sound and turned off. And never turned back on again.

That was several months ago and we never replaced the TV, or even thought about it, really. It was simply a truth. The television we’d clumsily set up in our bedroom died, and so now our only option was to read before bed, which is really my favorite anyway. Except when I get extremely pumped to watch Letterman, or when I’m feeling ambitious, Conan, but don’t feel I can muster all the energy it would require to watch either show in the living room and then make it all the way into the bedroom - a yard away, at least - to go to sleep.

So when I realized that the noise I heard and fuzzy picture I saw could only mean one thing - that we had a new TV in the bedroom I was, needless to say, very excited. And! Get this! There was a remote, too! Which J whipped out in order to show me how he could switch between the four or so channels we get in there, just like magic. No more falling asleep with the TV on because no one could make it over to the corner of the room to turn it off! A REMOTE!

J explained that while out buying my present, he’d purchased the new television at WalMart for a very reasonable price - thought it would be nice for us to be able to watch a movie at night, or maybe the news in the morning every now and before even fully waking up. I couldn’t agree more. It was a really great night. So I picked up my wine and sat down on the bed - I couldn’t have been any more content - and told J what an amazing husband he was, and thanked him for my belated birthday presents, that I loved, and realized he hadn’t heard me, so I told him again, “thank you so much,” and he still didn’t hear me, and that’s when I realized there was no way I was going to get his attention in order to sing his praises or anything else, and that the romance of the night had sort of fizzled after a strong five minute stint, as he was very, very deeply involved in an episode of “Law and Order.”

J and I spent part of the weekend at the Bay house, truly relaxing after a few busy weeks. We’ve both been working and travelling a lot and it felt good to watch movies and go to sleep early, and also, for one of us - I’m not naming names - to spend a few interupted hours birding and spot two new species to add to his life list. Which means, happily, for someone else, that this particular person won’t be moaning and groaning about how he “hasn’t seen a new bird since this past summer in Maine” and expecting a great deal of sympathy.

My parents were attending an auction - a fundraiser for a local non-profit - Saturday night, and came back to the house late, almost midnight, to join us. They arrived with several boxes and baskets full of auction booty which they promptly unwrapped to show us. An Italian-looking statue of the baby Jesus. A large, imposing angel with outstretched wings. “The neighbors, they’re really going to start to wonder about us,” my mother laughed, while my father jokingly draped a rosary over the Christ-child’s outstretched palms.

In stark contrast to the European-type religious art my mother so adores, my parents had also won a few gift baskets, the most noteworthy being a “Mint Julep Basket” that contained a bottle of whiskey, some sugar, a mint julep recipe and some cups. They very kindly gave that to us, because I guess they figured they didn’t really need a cutely disguised theme basket that - when you really get down to it - is pretty much just a basket of whiskey. Especially since, I don’t know if any of you have ever tried, but mint juleps are one of those drinks that are kind of hard to make, and when you can just open a nice bottle of wine, well, what’s the point?

Luckily J and I are at an age when we still believe such ventures noble, so this was a major score. I’m sure there will come a day when I feel the same way about receiving a fantastic and very old sculpture of a saint or something, but for now, my youth is still intact enough that going home with a mint julep-making kit is a really, really good deal.

The other day I logged into my MySpace account to find yet another long lost memory from my best friend Jennifer, who also recently, you may remember, brought me that other reminder of my star-studded, high-fashion teenage years.

I can’t believe I haven’t talked more about my CCD experience yet on this blog (for you non-catholics out there, that’s Sunday School). Because, honestly, it was a pretty amazing experience. And I don’t mean it was amazing in the way the nuns and Sunday School teachers wanted it to be amazing for us. Like, as in, I got very into the Virgin Mary and whispered prayers to her in times of trouble. I played the Virgin Mary in one of our CCD Christmas productions, and if you don’t think I got hell from my friends for that, well, you’re wrong.

Those Christmas pageants, by the way, were truly outstanding, if by “outstanding” you understand “excruciating.” We’d practice for maybe about 20 minutes the week prior to performing. Needless to say, our parents LOVED it. I can’t quite remember the choice words my father used explain just how much he did not want to attend those Christmas pageants but he may have said something like, “Oh JESUS Christ, not another Christmas pageant,” and then gone to “park the car” for a really, really long time while my mother was forced to enter the auditorium alone and wait (this, “parking the car,” by the way, was a method my father used to get out of going to mass, too - he’d say something along the lines of, “Kathy, kids, go ahead in and get a seat - you know how hard it is to park on Sunday mornings around here…” and then he’d never show up, and after communion we’d find him sitting outside the church in his car listening to classical music, or maybe smoking a cigar or something).

The only redeeming thing about my CCD experience - besides the entertainment factor - was that Jennifer had to go, too, and that made it a lot more fun.

I can’t quite remember the nun’s name, which is funny, because she certainly was around an awful lot. She treated us CCD kids worse than the kids who were actually enrolled in Catholic school, disgusted, I suppose, that our parents had not opted for the full immersion experience, although she looks pretty pleased in the above picture. Maybe because she was getting rid of us. It must have been taken, I’m guessing, towards the end of our Sunday School experience. Once you were confirmed, and your soul safely dedicated to Christ, I guess our parents figured we didn’t really need the continued education. Also, by that age, we were obviously getting so hot that no one could really concentrate on praying anymore, so it was clearly time to move on.

The other day I was very casually browsing the internet - I’ve learned to very casually browse the internet since any meaningful or intense browsing noramally leads me to believe I’m dying of cancer - when I stumbled upon this site called Skin Deep, developed by something called the Environmental Working Group.

Now, I don’t know who this Environmental Working Group is, or whether I should listen to them, but on this Skin Deep site (see where even a casual internet search for cosmetics leads you?) you can type in any sort of personal product and learn all about the product, and how it is rated by these environmental people, i.e. is my Clinique Superdefense going to kill me?

Ok, alright. I know this is where I tend to get melodramatic and I should calm down, but I should never EVER be told these sorts of things - sorts of things, for example, like that some personal products we use over and over again might be building up in our bodies and over time harming our health. I know perfectly well you have to take information like this in moderation, and I really do try in many aspects of life. I, for instance, like to know where most of my meat and produce comes from. Because, hey, I’ve seen those chicken trucks hauling crates full of unhappy chickens, and that’s disgusting. But also because when I think about my world, I like to think about happy animals, and also happy people that care for them and get paid a decent wage. And happy people, instead of, say, blind orphans, making my clothes. Stuff like that. But if you really, really start to investigate, it’s hard to live your life this way and never be a hypocrite. Sometimes I really want a new H&M shirt, and it costs $8, and it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to realize that some pretty cheap labor may have been involved.

Anyway, I brought the issue of all the chemicals we are exposed to every day up to a bunch of my close girl friends who I email with very regularly, and my friend Lisa sent us a link to the following National Geographic article, in which a reporter had his body analyzed for a variety of chemicals and was unpleasantly surprised to find out how many showed up, and in big quantities, too. This, naturally, added to my fear.

Believe me, I can really go off the deep end with this sort of thing. Luckily I usually reel myself back in on my own, and within a couple hours of getting all worked up. That’s partly because I have a pretty short attention span, but more importantly, it’s because I realize that the line between “concerned” and “totally fucking crazy” is very, very thin. And I don’t want my husband to come home one day to find me dressed in all natural burlap eating organic bananas and constructing a bomb shelter. Plus, every once in a while, I really enjoy wandering into Bath and Body Works to check out what amazing new synthetic fragrances they’ve got in there and I don’t see myself ever getting to the point where I don’t find that kind of thing relaxing.

What I will do, maybe, is try and use a little less. That’s exactly what these environmental watchdog people advise, and I think it’s reasonable. Try not, for example, to use 45 million products in one day, because you know what? You don’t need that many. And if all that comes out of this little bit of sensible advice is that I spend less money a year on things like cuticle cream, well, that’s good. And if I end up not dying from my really excellent smelling coconut-scented shampoo, well, that’s good too.

I realize I’ve neglected my blog over the past week. I’ve been too busy to post for the most part, which is really saying a lot because if you read this thing, you know that I am rarely too busy to post a simple blog entry.

But somehow, finally, I managed to get pretty busy and in the midst of it all, I decided to visit my grandmother this weekend. She recently had surgery and has been staying in a rehabilitation facility in New Jersey, near my aunt. I came up with this perfect plan. I’d drive up to visit my friend Sara, who lives in Media, PA - just outside Philly - Friday night, drive to New Jersey the next day, drive back to see my parents in D.C. Sunday night, and then be back home in Chapel Hill Monday morning.

However, as trips often do, this one didn’t go exactly as expected. I’ll spare you full disclosure for the sake of your time, and because I don’t want you all to think I’m a wimp, but basically, in the span of 48 hours, I encounted the worst road conditions I’d ever seen in my life (and thus suffered through a very terrifying ice-storm-related driving experience for many, many hours), saw some good friends, drank lots of wine, got violently sick, spent quality time in a rehab facility, had my tire slashed (or, had a deer, with antlers, run headfirst into my tire, who knows), waited hours upon end to get it fixed, and eventually made it home.

The thing is, of course, most of the weekend - getting to see my good friends and family - was absolutely wonderful and I’m glad I went. I’m simply explaining the recent dearth of online writing, just in case any of you were wondering what in the name of God were going on, as I know so many of you, one or two at least, check this blog every day, and I like to deliver.

To make it up to you, I promise some decent posts in the near future. I don’t foresee holding to that promise being a problem because J, with the advent of this spring-like weather, has been getting very into birds again, pointing out the species that alight on the feeder outside our living room window with the enthusiasm of a three-year-old who’s just gotten into some fingerpaints, and I assure you, that, alone, is enough to fill a few pages.

Should we need to be reminded why we love the place where we live, there is usually a sign. I remember on the coldest of cold nights in Boston becoming giddy upon entering a particularly warm bar packed with all my friends, so happy that we’d all braved the cold (there was no choice, it was always cold) to socialize. As a child growing up in D.C., it was a trip to the National Mall to ride the carousel, and when I got a little bit older, a trip to the same grand stretch of city to stare at the Capitol Building, which I still say is one of the most beautiful buildings I’ve ever seen.

And in North Carolina, it’s this time of year. The weather starts to turn warm again - even before it’s really appropriate people jump the gun and have got their flip flops on and as night falls, get really, really cold, because let’s face it, it’s not summer YET, but the season is on it’s way and we can’t wait.

I’m always amazed how excited I get - how everyone seems to get - when the warm weather returns because it never really gets that cold in North Carolina so it’s not like we’ve been that hard up. I think that down here it’s not so much that we’ve been braving a harsh winter per se, and need a break - it’s more that when even the most subtle hint of the new season (the birds, the girls in flowered dresses, the lone daffodil) appears, we feel we are returning to the norm. Snow in Chapel Hill is like a nationally sanctioned day of rest. Nobody knows what to do so they cower indoors. But in the warm weather, these people, they flourish.

In addition, there’s all the basketball, and with North Carolina’s men’s team winning the ACC championship game this weekend, well, everyone is in a very good mood.

If anyone would like to share some thoughts about they place they live, or the warmer season approaching, please do so in the comments, because I’d love to hear what’s going on with my friends (and some strangers) all over the country.

When I started out on this adventure - just saying what I feel - I didn’t intend to launch a campaign against everything I hate. I just wanted to stop being so sensitive to everyone’s feelings (individuals and entire groups of people) and remark upon some things I thought were funny without worrying what people would think of me. Like, initially, I thought a great entry would be to talk about how my father, as of late, kind of seems to think he’s a black person. I mean, he’s not speaking or acting differently or anything like that. He is just really, really into black people, and black history and black art. I mean, my parents have got African American art piling up in the bathtubs at their house (I’m totally serious) because there is no room for it, and don’t think my mother has anything to do with this - the truly amazing amount of African American art that’s in the house -because, if anything, she’s getting annoyed. Not that she doesn’t like it, she does, it’s just the sheer obsession. My dad, he’s got sculptures, and paintings and just, you know, stuff, EVERYWHERE, and not only that, he’s got about 50 really large books on African American history and then, well, then there’s the fact that he wore head-to-toe Ethiopian gear on Christmas Day (he’s got an Ethiopian friend, of course, who sends him this stuff) - oh, and by the way, here’s a link to a picture of him with his Ethiopian clothes on standing in front of one of those millions of paintings I mentioned.

That’s the kind of thing I originally thought I’d write about, but it turned out getting stuff off my chest - railing against the things I dislike - was a lot more fun. Plus, I loved all the comments you guys wrote. And I think, as Tom commented on my last post, I should do it more regularly. Once a week. So stay tuned. Maybe every Wednesday, because honestly, Wednesdays aren’t good for much else.

And while I’m still on a roll, I can’t stand the song “Hotel California” by the Eagles, I didn’t enjoy the movie “Garden State,” and that’s right, J, Jeff Buckley’s music makes me want to puke, especially “Lilac Wine.” WHO WRITES A TERRIBLE BALLAD CALLED “LILAC WINE” FOR CHRIST’S SAKE? And I don’t care that he drowned in the ocean. Get over it.

About a year and a half ago I started getting all these frantic emails from my female friends urging me to read a novel called “The Time Traveler’s Wife,” by Audrey Niffenegger. If you’re a girl, you’ve probably read it, and you probably aren’t going to like what I’m going to say here in this public forum, and that is: I didn’t like this book. Also, it didn’t make me cry.

CALM DOWN. I mean, what ever happened to people being allowed to have opinions about things like books and music and movies without the threat of being yelled at or even brutally maimed?

For those of you who haven’t read this book, it’s about, well, here’s some of the synopsis from Amazon.com:

(by the way, if you have no time for synopses that involve brutally confusing melodrama, you should probably skip ahead to where I start writing again)

“Niffenegger has written a soaring love story illuminated by dozens of finely observed details and scenes, and one that skates nimbly around a huge conundrum at the heart of the book: Henry De Tamble, a rather dashing librarian at the famous Newberry Library in Chicago, finds himself unavoidably whisked around in time. He disappears from a scene in, say, 1998 to find himself suddenly, usually without his clothes, which mysteriously disappear in transit, at an entirely different place 10 years earlier-or later. During one of these migrations, he drops in on beautiful teenage Clare Abshire, an heiress in a large house on the nearby Michigan peninsula, and a lifelong passion is born. The problem is that while Henry’s age darts back and forth according to his location in time, Clare’s moves forward in the normal manner, so the pair are often out of sync.”

Sad, huh?

Not really? I TOTALLY AGREE. In a world with car bombs and starvation and racism and life-threatening illnesses and love stories that are actually sad (listen to StoryCorps on NPR, for instance, if you really want to start bawling), I don’t feel I have time for tales as weirdly contrived as this. I mean, in your typical time travel story - take “Back to the Future” - the time traveler goes back in time, their mother falls in love with them or whatever, and then they return to the present. In “The Time Traveler’s Wife,” this guy Henry is continually going back and forth between periods of just a few years and the present so not only are you royally confused, but it’s just so unbelievable. You’re supposed to sit there and be ok with the fact that this guy was just born with this ability. I think the author even informs us that, before birth, he would disappear from his mother’s womb or something. Seriously.

To counter the unbelievable nature of this terribly tragic gift, however, Niffenegger gives Henry these very human traits. Like the fact that time travel makes him feel sick. So not only is he constantly leaving the woman he loves, but every time he time travels he ends up somewhere cold and naked and nauseous, and you want to feel sorry for him, but it’s really hard, because, I mean - that time I got food poisoning? I was cold and well - not naked - but nauseous, and that was REAL. A REAL THING THAT HAPPENS TO HUMANS.

Also, the book, as you may have guessed, is ultra serious. Not one even mildly funny thing occurs in this novel. And I like humor interspersed with my grief.

So what I’m saying is that it was hard for me to find this book sad, even though I’d been promised by fanatics that I would cry the whole way through. One person told me that the reason the book was so sad was that it was a love that “truly, could never be.” I guess so but I didn’t end up feeling that bad for the characters. Call me heartless, but I’m not. I cry all the time while reading, and maybe in a later post I’ll list all the books that will really move you, with good reason.

Again, I’m only sharing my opinions this week so go ahead and read the book if you so desire. The entire rest of the world pretty much - critics included - will tell you that it’s “totally so amazing.” The only person who sided with me was our friend Kristen, who didn’t get what was so great about “The Time Traveler’s Wife,” either, thus proving her immeasurable awesomeness (Kristen, I’m really sorry to take you down with me and I hope people aren’t beating you up at work right now).

There are things I don’t write about on my blog. I’ve never written about any job I’ve had - even when I worked in very close proximity with a 70-year-old southern woman who used the term “coloreds” on a regular basis and sometimes expressed pity for everyone who hadn’t been Saved, because them there people, they were going to Hell - because I’ve never wanted to be unprofessional and get fired, even if the material is really, really good.

I also try to avoid writing anything that would hurt anyone’s feelings - things I’m told in privacy, railing against anyone’s beliefs or passions, or just generally being ignorant and mean. I practice these manners in life, too. Being nice is important. And civilized.

Then there are things I don’t write about because for one reason or another, I’m just a little scared to put it out there.

But this week I decided to let down my guard and spill it.

And I’ll start with this: I hate Asheville, North Carolina. I know, I know, it’s not that shocking if you haven’t been there or have no idea what I’m talking about, but believe me, people love Asheville, North Carolina, and to boldly proclaim that I hate it there, well, could get me banned from the state. Or worse.

The crazy thing is every time I go to Asheville - a town nestled among mountain chains in the western part of the state, I think I love it. At first.

First of all, it’s gorgeous out there. You drive and drive and the air becomes cleaner and the views are spectacular and the town is adorable, complete with organic restaurants and boutiques and quaint inns. There are always a good number of people out in the streets walking dogs, holding hands, and you look out your car window and think, “Damnit, I am happy to be ALIVE!”

There are worthwhile historic landmarks in Asheville, too, like the Biltmore Estate and author Thomas Wolfe’s childhood home.

Asheville is surrounded by smaller mountain towns (some of which I do love) and you can take a drive along the Blue Ridge Parkway in the autumn and just about die from the beauty of it all.

Almost everyone I know is crazy about this place. If you happen to mention you’re taking a trip out there they exclaim, “Asheville?! OH MY GOD I LOVE ASHEVILLE!” and that’s how you know.

But I’ve finally come to grips with the fact that I can’t stand that place, and I’ll tell you why - it’s awful. Sure, it looks great at first, for all the reasons I described above, but spend a little time there and you start to notice some pretty annoying stuff. Like all the hippies. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve got nothing wrong with most hippies. Hippies that, you know, are concerned about shit. These hippies, however, are mostly concerned with running around barefoot and gathering in the center of town to, Jesus, I don’t know, share and eat bean sprouts and not take care of their children.

A little of that goes a long way, and believe me, the “we’re so carefree we don’t even mind that we’re wearing dirty clothes” attitude permeates the entire town, and then add to that the fact that Asheville, for whatever reason, seems to be the place where “creative” types go to just be free and live, man, so there are cars painted all the colors of the rainbow and, like, ten street fairs going on at once and one time I saw this impromptu parade materialize out of thin air. Just individuals marching around being individuals I guess. It kind of made me want to throw myself off a cliff.

It’s up to you to judge for yourself, of course, and there really are a lot of great things to do and see there and a lot of great places to eat and drink, but unfortunately I haven’t yet been able to get past the other stuff in order to settle down and enjoy it.

What really summed Asheville up for me was this one night I was walking around with my brother, Vinnie, and his friend Bryan. This was over the summer when Vinnie’s band was down here in North Carolina playing a few shows, and I’d driven to Asheville for the night to see the them. Afterwards, the three of us were just walking around, talking about the town, and I remember Bryan made the excellent point that, “hippies - they’re all into simplicity and just living on the basics - but then they sell things like beads, which are totally, totally unecessary,” and all of a sudden we noticed we were being followed by a drunk, shirtless midget, who stopped us and asked us for a dime. A dime. So we gave him one and he went on his way. I don’t know why, but it would have been a lot better if he’d asked us for a couple bucks or something. Honestly, what in the name of God is going on when a drunk midget actually asks if you “can spare a dime” like you’re in some crazy surrealistic film? That’s Asheville for you. I don’t think I’m going back.

I was enjoying a long, hot shower this morning (after sleeping off the rum drinks I had last night at a friend’s party), getting ready for a day of perhaps a little work, but definitely heading out to a bar watch the Duke/Carolina game, and definitely not going to church or anything like that, when I realized I’m not really doing this whole Lent thing properly this year. Sure, making an effort to spend less time in front of the computer and more time outside, ensuring the dogs (and me) get exercise, is noble, in it’s way, but it’s not really sacrifice, you know? And that’s what Lent is all about. Giving up something you love in the name of God and self-restraint and getting to tell everyone what you gave up, and then feeling really, really awesome and self-righteous about that.

It took only seconds for me to come up with the appropriate indulgence. Something I’d miss, but could certainly survive without, like giving up the things I’ve given up in the past - television, meat, Fig Newtons - that presented a challenge and, at the 40 days’ end, a sense of accomplishment: celebrity gossip. It’s not like I’m immersed in the stuff all day long but I do check the website The Superficial on a very regular basis and have been known to throw one or two, um, less-than-intellectual magazines into my basket when I’m at the grocery store picking up some cereal and bananas and whatnot.

So I’ll soldier onwards in what’s left of this solemn season trying my best to avoid the sagas of Britney and Anna Nicole’s baby, although I’m not so naive as to think I’ll be able to avoid it altogether. I mean, this is America, after all, and this stuff is showing up on CNN.