A Tale of Two Toothbrushes.

And now for a story.

My sister Heelya is particular about her teeth, which is understandable. She's had so many teeth drilled we joke that her mouth is a member of OPEC.

Because we didn't have dental coverage growing up we rarely saw the dentist. He was a haggler anyway, or at least that's what my dad said.

Of my two sisters Heelya spazzes out the quickest over things like germs and toenails. My dad likes to joke that my youngest sister PK should've been a doctor. She was always operating on the family, always carrying around a satchel of medieval looking tools, offering to fix our skin ailments, ingrown hairs, blisters, that sort of thing.

It was disgusting. I partially blame my Opa who owned the exact same kit - a zippered pouch of metal nail files, clippers, tweezers, and whatever other crevice digging devices might accompany such things. PK coveted the pouch as a little girl and whenever we visited my grandparents she would help herself to it in the cabinet with the bath towels and immediately start picking at her feet blisters. She was a figure skater so blisters ravaged her feet.

Soon she assumed ownership of the best tweezers in my house, the ones my father filed into daggers with points so sharp you could pierce the skin in one pinch, or kill an intruder under hostage circumstances. Regardless none of this has anything to do with the story I'm about to tell.

We all shared one bathroom - me, PK, Heelya, my mom, my dad and on weekends whatever friends had spent the night. Our toothbrushes never fit in one of those cup things with the holes in it. No matter what cup thing my mom purchased there were only four holes in it. God friggen forbid someone use the same color toothbrush, the same no-name brand Reach toothbrush and risk mistaken brush identity. 

I pity my sister Heelya, but she should've known better when she purchased a blue toothbrush. My father had a blue toothbrush and unlike the time we all decided to label our toothbrushes with masking tape and my father labeled his Jerry Maguire because it was 1996 and all his girls had crushes on a pre-douchey Tom Cruise, unlike that time this time his blue toothbrush was not labeled.

For weeks, maybe months, my sister Heelya would wake up for school and brush her teeth with the same toothbrush my father had used to brush his teeth three hours earlier. By the time she grabbed the brush the bristles would be dry. She was totally clueless.

Until one day, she woke up earlier, reached for her brush and realized it was wet and the bristles were flattened. Over her morning bowl of cereal she asked my father, "Dad, what toothbrush are you using?"

Story goes he walked into the bathroom, reached for what he thought was his toothbrush and said, this one.

"Omigod," my sister shrieked. 

Or so I think this is how it ends. When I called my dad this morning to confirm the details he said, "Yeesus Christ. Did your sister call you complaining about some kind of mouth virus?"

Meet Ricci.

My friend Ricci is a bit of an inspiration. She's reading this so I'll refrain from using clichés. When we first started at the same newspaper in Sarasota we were instructed by the editor to avoid clichés like the plague.

Like the plague.

The first time I set out to write a novel I started a chapter about Ricci that went something like ...

"She was frazzled. Maybe she was nervous, or the opposite of nervous. Now that I know her, I know she's what my father would call a sparkplug, but like the blue scooter she bought one month earlier from a man in North Sarasota, sometimes Ricci's would misfire. When that happened if we were there for her, she'd be OK. On her first day of work she took out a watermelon, sliced it in half, pulled out a shaker of salt and doused it right there at her desk."

We became fast friends. We signed up for salsa-dancing classes. We swam opposite laps in the same lane at the YMCA pool. At Halloween we carved disturbing faces into pumpkins. We took photographs of each other jumping in the air for no reason other than the pictures looked cool. We drank two-for-one vodka cranberry tumblers at the same bar downtown. When I started riding a bike, Ricci got one too. We shared clothes. We fought. The worst fight we ever had was on top of the Ringling Bridge and I swear on my father's temper, I never fought with anyone like I did with Ricci that day. We yelled at a decibel so fierce passing coots on Bird Key shot us the stink eye. Then we moved on.

We canoed. We kayaked. I dragged her to cheesy films. She dragged me to dark arty films. We sat for hours on Shell Beach reading magazines and gossiping. We dissected each other like 8th graders skinning bullfrogs. I was 23 and she was 22.

When Ricci announced last year she was moving to Africa I never doubted it. Senegal, she said. Dakar, to be exact. She had a plan, but it was a Ricci plan. She'd photograph Senegalese women and freelance for any outfit that would pay while living with an African family in the city. She'd live there for three months, return to the states, move to Chicago and start working for American newspapers again. Two months in she called me using another American journalist's international cell phone.

"Any word on when you're come back?"
"I don't know," she said. "I'm going to extend my stay."

It's been six months. She's back in town for just a week to shoot a wedding in Jacksonville. My grill master friend Roger threw her a BBQ Wednesday night and because Ricci's a tough one to tie down for more than 15 minutes I managed a partial interview. 

--

Distracted by a pan of fudge brownies being passed around, she snatches one and says, "They don't have brownies in Africa. Do you know how special this is? Wait. Are you writing this? Don't write this. They probably have brownies in Africa."

What American thing do you miss the most?
R: Diet Mountain Dew.
(Roger butts in and says, "That's a direct affront to me because I forgot to buy you Diet Mountain Dew for the party.")

R: Yes. 

What was your biggest worry on the flight back to Sarasota?
R: That I'd be that girl. The 'This one time in Africa' girl.'

Yeah, because you know in a room full of journalists we've got no tolerance for self promoters.
R: It's a lot easier though. I don't talk as much as I used to. In Africa I don't speak the language fluently so I guess it's easier for me to stay quiet now.

Has anything changed here in the six months you've been gone? (Roger butts in again and says, "Yeah, I got better looking.")
R: Yes. Roger got better looking.

How do you describe Sarasota to your peeps in Senegal?
R: There's a lot of money and a lot of white people in Sarasota who don't dance well. I have a proven theory - the more oppressed you are the better you dance. Dancing and money are inversely related.

What's it like buying the necessities in Senegal. Like tampons?
R: There are too many choices here. I don't deal well with decisions, you know that. In Senegal it's like you have one brand. One choice. I prefer that.

What's the most annoying response you've gotten from people in the states?
R: The jokes about Islam.

Do you rock that yellow dress in Senegal?
R: The lady I buy vegetables from gives me a hard time if I show my knees.

Is it weird as a journalist to come home to journalists?
R: Being around journalists ... you guys listen better. Not to sound like a jerk or anything, but journalists are better listeners. I think there is a greater appreciation here for stories. Nobody's eyes are glazing over when they see me.

Do the Senegalese have dogs?
R: No. There are no cute dogs over there. Mangy, mangy dogs. Nobody really has pets. Some foreigners have dogs. My friend has a dog but he keeps him on the roof. They're not as nice to their dogs as we are over here. They kind of have a lot more shit to deal with, you know? Dogs aren't extensions of their lives.

That's a direct affront to me. And the pug.

R: Sorry it's true.

What's the nastiest thing you ate?
R: The goat intestine. That process ... it was ... well, to see the goat alive, being killed, dead and then eaten. I don't know. It was weird because the night before the goat was killed I had a dream that I died.

Did you use a fork to stab the goat innards?
R: Everyone eats with their hands. But it's like whenever they pray their hands must be clean and since they're Muslims they pray fives times a day. The cab drivers keep sanitizer in their cars. And with eating you usually end up eating with everyone out of one giant bowl. At first it bothered me but it doesn't anymore. Not after I realized how clean everyones hands are.

What's the crapper like?

I peed in a hole in the ground when I was staying with Mama's family. There was no shower curtain. The bathroom was all tiled. It's like a self-cleaning vehicle. The water and soap from the shower washes everything in the room. I hate shower curtains now.

You're mostly the same Ricci. But you've changed somehow ...
R: I'm more calm now. I've got more faith not just in God, but in myself.

Epilogue: Ricci takes spectacular pictures. Some photographers get lucky. Not Ricci. She's a wrangler. She stands on chairs. She climbs trees. She lies on streets. She zooms in on faces. She zooms out on action. Expressions are the hardest thing to capture and Ricci does it consistently. When pictures aren't contrived, imagine for a second what the person taking them looks like. When Ricci takes pictures she looks like a chipmunk hunting for nuts, then storing them in her cheeks before winter.

The photo above is by Ricci. For more like it visit Ricci Media.

Griffingate.

This story is based on actual events.

Here I sit, in bed on a Wednesday night while my Kathy Griffin-loving boyfriend sleeps heavily beside me. Dreaming of Griffin no doubt.

I outed Joe a Griffinite early in our relationship. His KG tendencies were glaring. For example: stalling on Bravo whenever My Life on the D-List was on, reciting two-bit KG jokes and insisting I dye my hair red, cut my bangs short and curl them under like a German puff pastry.

Well, those last two are a lie. But I'm sure the bangs crossed his mind.

Before you throw your hands in the air and call me a lying rat, understand that the first time I saw My Life On The D-List, it was at Joe's apartment. The second and third time - Joe's again.

"You're in love with Kathy Griffin," I cried.

"No, I'm not."

"Yes you are. You love her rolled bangs."

"What are you talking about?"

"You want Griffin."

And so it went on. And on. Whenever an opportunity presented itself to call Joe a card-carrying Griffinite, I would and still do.

"Yes, you're right," he'd sigh, humoring me like you would a child. "I'm in love with Kathy Griffin,"

This faux-admission was satisfaction enough. I was, and am, the most obnoxious girl on the swing set.

Up until last week Joe's Griffin fascination was limited to my unfettered whims. He had tuned in three times to Life on the D-List, confessed once that yes he thought the show was entertaining and like always my self-fulfilling delusions and knack for exaggeration had convinced me Joe was president of the Kathy Club. But alas, as evidence waned I tired of the game. If the KG glove don't fit, I must acquit. Eventually I forgot that my boyfriend was a closeted Griffinite.

Until two weeks ago ...

On our way home from Tampa after Father's Day dinner at his parents, I hit play on his car stero and Griffin's standup act For Your Consideration came on.

I made an indigested face as I went angry ape on the eject button.

"A-ha!" I screamed, holding the Griffin CD in the air like I'd ripped out a still-beating heart. "I knew it, Griffinite."

"It's not mine," he snapped.

"Whatever, crazy Griffinite."

(This is ridiculous, he said. You planted it. What? I shrieked. Am I that absurd? My brother borrowed the car, he explained. It's probably his.)

And thus I dropped the conversation. Was it because I finally believed I had contrived 75 percent of this infatuation? And even if that was the case, ain't no shame in a 25 percent crush on Kathy Griffin.

I dropped it was because I wanted to listen to the CD and see for myself if the ginger was worth her weight in bangs.

She is. Here's why.

A guide to pug babies.

Milk Bone. Smells like corn chips. Makes for a good game of tug-of-war and that's about it. Oma prefers this baby to the others because she says she can hold one end without it sliming her fingers.

Pug Baby Jr. A Ty Beanie Baby from Hamburg, NY. By far the dog's favorite toy. Smells like vomit. Makes for a good game of fetch. Is often lost under/in bed. When touched wet will disgust even the most hardy of dog lovers. Both eyes are gone. I sewed the sockets shut.

The Singing Cat. The only pug baby with a functioning sound box. Contrary to what you'd expect, The Singing Cat doesn't meow but rings instead. Whenever it goes off Joe thinks my cell phone is ringing.

The Hamburger Baby. Squeaks. Is the least favorite of the dog's pug babies. The Hamburger Baby is like the fat kid at recess. The last one picked for dodge ball.

Pug Baby Sr. The dog's second favorite baby. Eyes, ear,muzzle and tail are easily chewed off. Sewn three times, re-stuffed once.

Elfin Baby. Needs to be sewn. Not a favorite. Came from Japan. A present from my Japanese exchange student, Yuuki. Used to have a hat.

Housed.

I interviewed a woman for the newspaper this week whose voice mail message said: "You've reached Diane. I'm not here right now. Please leave me a message and before you hang up tell me one good thing about your life."

In the five seconds the message played two thoughts flashed through my head. 1.) This is a business call. You're setting up an interview. Just leave the basics. You're too longwinded to go into what's good 

about your life anyway. And then 2.) Don't puss out. Tell her you're looking at houses with Joe tonight. She asked you. 

So I left a message for Diane Lane - not the actress, the Sarasota massage therapist who goes by Lane instead of her long spitty German name - and at the end of my reporter's message I said, "And the one good thing about my life right now is that tonight I'm looking at houses with my boyfriend."

After I said it I immediately felt like a 9 year old. But whatev. Isn't the first time I sounded like a child. Won't be the last. 

Here's a rundown of the four grownup houses we looked at Thursday:

House No. 1

The Bachelor Pad of Girlfriend Past

A guy in his early 30s still lived there. He was in the shower when our Realtor knocked on the door. His dogs - a white Maltese-y dog and big white beaky dog - were going ape shit in the living room.

I suspected our Realtor was not a dog man since he grimaced when our pug grunted in his direction at the apartment before we left. 

"You don't know with dogs," he said, unlocking the door and then closing it right away as the big white beaky dog tried to nose his way out.

Joe concurred.

I said, c'mon no biggie. Open the door. Aint no two fluffy white dogs gonna scer me.

Joe gave me The Look. The 'Stop it Bamm-Bamm Rubble' look. So I clutched my hands behind my back and rocked on the heels of my ballet slippers. 

"Do you want me to open this door and risk Joe losing his nuts?" The Realtor asked.

I thought about making a joke about cheaper birth control and then didn't. No, I said. You're right. We should wait for the man in the shower to cage his two foofy dogs.

Inside, the house was decorated like Paige Davis' Trading Spaces crew had gone to town on it. Orange and green walls. Blue walls. Big wooden blocks spelling out the word D R E A M nailed to a dayglo wall in the living room. The 30-something dude in the shower had by then emerged toweling off his hair and I couldn't help but concoct scenarios as I studied the guy's weight lifting bench in the living room. Perhaps his girlfriend had painted the place like Trading Spaces, nailed D R E A M letters to the wall and then several months later dumped him for a guy with bigger muscles. Now he was selling the house because he was heartbroken, or fed up with women and his Trading Spaces house with the D R E A M letters on the wall. One look at the guy's sad sacky face and I wanted to whisper bad karma in Joe's ear. So we passed.

House No. 2

The House That Mortgage Fraud Destoryed

A foreclosure behind Publix. A woman who speaks only Spanish cosigned on the house for her friend who skipped town, ran off with the appliances and left her with a sub-prime mortgage she couldn't afford. The house wasn't bad save for a dead cockroach and a master bedroom smaller than the one we have now. But, c'mon no closet! Most females have a symbiotic relationship with their closets. Without closets our species is endangered. Pass.

House No. 3

The Bookish Bungalow With a Bum View

Ah yes. Our favorite. The one pictured above. A 1920s bungalow in Old Northeast with a porch large enough to tap dance on. Since I get too dreamy-eyed and gung-ho about these things I will ask a passing Joe for his opinion. (Sorry he's no longer asleep. PK just made pancakes and sausage for breakfast - important stuff to wake up to.) 

Says Joe: "I thought it was very ... it looked like it needed the least amount of work." (Typical practical, calculated Joe.)  "I liked the hardwood floors. I liked that it was open. I liked that it was airy. I liked the living room and dining room. I thought the kitchen kind of sucked. I didn't like that it was near that road ..."

By that road he means 4th Street. As we stood on the porch and praised and critiqued the house, paperbag-toting bums filed in and out of the gas station across the street. Tis House No. 3's biggest downfall. However not a deal-breaker. Since I'm pregnant with a novel and looking for a place I can write in I determined this house with it's sweet bungalow charm, ginormous front porch and awesome view of 4th Street shenanigans, has some serious storytelling potential. A keeper, for now.

House No. 4

John Belushi Lived Here

We were the most excited about this doosie based on the photos our Realtor e-mailed us. However when we got there after ten minutes of getting lost, turning around and getting lost again, we determined the place was too Addams Family meets Animal House. The porch swing was great. The upstairs/downstairs thing was cool. The rotting windows? Not so much. There was no yard to speak of. Only a "side yard" about the size of a bathroom, fenced in by deteriorating wooden planks that the current homeowner used to store his random crap in. The house would have been cooler if Joe and I were Phi Sigma Kappas. So we passed.

The goal: 10 houses by the time we leave next month for our romp through the Florida panhandle.

Ready for his money shot.

Lance, meet Heath. Heath, meet Lance. You guys have not been officially introduced. But today I think is perhaps a good day for you two to meet.

A little background on Heath ...

Joe conceived Heath one January afternoon in a fit of obsessive compulsion. Heath is a composition/compulsion notebook filled with my boyfriend's daily budget. In it he accounts for every receipt, every deposit, every bill (cell phone, electric, rent, car, fancy expensive haircuts, etc.) And over the last several months Heath has become such a thing of beauty that just opening its pages is like discovering the DaVinci code or an ancient Dead Sea scroll.

Heath is omnipresent. He is the Buddha of our budget.

If we go to CVS and buy two pints of ice cream, Heath knows. If I skimp on groceries resulting in a rash of Carrabba's takeout, Heath knows. If the price of gas goes up today, Heath knows by tomorrow. If Heath could talk he would sound like Rain Main. "Ten minutes to Wapner. Gotta get my boxer shorts at K-Mart. Gotta keep a receipt. Definitely gotta keep a receipt."

When Joe created this thing he scribbled 2008 Financial Ledger on the notebook's cover and when Heath Ledger died I crossed out "Financial" and wrote "Heath" in it's place. I'm a morose celebriholic I know. (For more on Heath see the April post Dreamy for broken down ferris wheels.)

Today was a big day for Heath. Today was like Heath's first day of kindergarten. Joe and I got approved for two mortgages and looked at four grownup houses in our St. Pete neighborhood ... but more on that later as I'm tired, ready for bed and filled with pizza. Adventures in Real Estate: Take One.

The naked part was easy.

This is a story I wrote for my paper that was scooped before publication by the big hairy daily in town. Since it never saw the light of day, here's an unfinished version: 

STRIPPERELLA, Feb. 18, 2008

Let’s play a word association game. I say a word. You say what immediately comes to mind.

I say pole. You say north.

I say dance. You (maybe) say shake.

I say pole dance. You say stripper. (It’s OK. It doesn’t mean you snap ones under garter belts on the weekends.)

Unless you’re a firefighter and your association with poles is of the lifesaving variety, most people hear pole dance and think stripper.

You’re not alone in this conjecture. Even Nicole Phillips, the instructor of Cherry Blossom Pole and Exotic Dance Fitness gets inundated with stripper jokes whenever she talks about her new teaching gig. 

Curious. I decided to take her class.

Beam me up hottie.

Before reporting for pole duty, I Google it first.

Pole dancing, according to the Wikipedia entry, requires muscular endurance, coordination and sensuality. Several hits later I discover that pole dancing is also the next big thing since Richard Simmons sweated to the oldies.

It was exactly one year ago that The New York Times ran a story on how pole-dancing parties were dethroning Tupperware parties in the Jersey suburbs. I dubiously eye my salad in a Tupperware container. Smirking, I think if this thing catches on like Tupperware, I’ll be buying my Aunt Shirley stilettos for Christmas.

I run to the office bathroom, change out of my work attire and into something more aerodynamic, something more pole-worthy.

Phillips’ class is held every Friday night in Rosemary Court, a colorful klatch of cottages off Central Avenue in Sarasota’s Rosemary District. Before I go any further suffice it say this is not where I expected to pole dance.

Rosemary Court is adorable with its babbling Zen garden in the middle of a semi-circle of clapboard cracker shacks dedicated to wellness. Yoga. Pilates. Meditation. Aikido. Outside the semi-circle of holistic empowerment, Central Avenue still tries to catch up. Since we’re talking sexuality here, lets just say that when Sarasota bloomed into adulthood the Rosemary District hit puberty.

As I walk past the Zen garden and through the door marked “Pole and Exotic Dance Fitness” I imagine the voice of the Rosemary District cracking as it says, “Wait for me guys. I’m on my way.”

 The Clark Kent factor. 

Phillips is tiny, lithe, like a portable pole dancer. Like someone you might hire to baby-sit your kids. I had expected someone more, I don’t know, burlesque?

She works at a Sarasota engineering firm where she spends most of her days seated quietly behind a desk. She says when she started pole dancing two years ago she felt like she was leading a double life. Typist by day. Pole girl by night. 

“It’s like my superhero personality,” she says, giggling. “Only I know I can do this super cool thing. At night it’s kind of like I come out of the phone booth.”

From second grade on Phillips, 26, was a competitive cheerleader, but she tired of most fitness routines and dabbled in yoga, Pilates and the gym. But all of these, she says were such a chore.

How the pole entered her life is as non-sexy a story as choosing a college major. She researched it on the Internet, purchased a pole for her house and practiced for six months before contacting Vertical Dance, a school out of England often credited with pioneering pole fitness.

Like any fitness instructor, Phillips wanted legitimate certification so she completed a six-month program over the Internet, turning in written exams and session plans, student teaching pole fitness classes and performing routines via web cam.

“It was something that was important to me. I’m not just some girl doing that pole thing,” says Phillips.

In November she started offering pole lessons to the public. Surprisingly she wasn’t the only lass in town looking to spin. One Sarasota woman celebrated her 59th birthday with a pole party.

“I hope I celebrate my 59th birthday with a pole party,” Phillips says.

 

Idle hands make farting noises.

The pole is slippery from my sweat. And thanks to the wall of mirrors that spans the front of the room I can't escape the fact that I move more like a mechanical bull.

The amateur class consists of five women 40-ish in age, all of whom ask me to not identify them. Pole dancing has a bad reputation they say, which baffles me because a.) all of them are way better than me at this and b.) pole dancing is supposed to be empowering not humiliating.

One woman, we’ll call her Dallas (her idea, not mine) signed up for Phillips’ six-week session in January. Beaming and sweating Dallas confesses she lost 14 pounds in Phillips’ class.

“I’m a powerful woman,” says Dallas. “So this is an opportunity for me to get in touch with that other softer side.”

Turns out Dallas is a motivational speaker in town. She travels up and down the Gulf Coast pitching her inspirational two-cents to salesmen in Sarasota's male-dominated boat industry. 

“You don’t dress like a girl. You don’t talk like a girl,” says Dallas of her day job. “You kind of have to address the guys on their own wavelength.”

I praise her for stepping outside her comfort zone and then foolishly attempt a cross-legged fireman spin mid-conversation.

As I spin, I hug the pole like I’m a toddler clinging to my mother’s legs. Be sexy, I repeat. Slither. Wither. Be Demi. Be Elizabeth Berkley. Be Madonna! TLC’s Red Light Special comes on and I shake it off. I attempt one more serpentine motion with the pole between my legs and a death grip above my head, and as my clammy palms make their way down the steel beam a farting noise triggers immediate rubbernecking and at least one eye-roll from a woman in the class.

 Kyle, my coworker and cameraman, smirks and snaps a picture for the story.

Goddammit. It was my hands, I want to shout. My hands! But I don’t because that would be Turrets of me, so I step aside to make room for Dallas since she and I are sharing a pole.

“Ah,” she says grimacing. “It’s you whose been making the pole so sweaty.”

Great. I’m certifiable slime. I run to the bathroom to wash my dirty hands while Phillips, at the front of the class, demonstrates a Cirque Du Soleil bridge move. 

When I return, I sit the next move out and hide behind my Bic pen, scribbling notes in a reporter’s pad. In the margins I write things like: sux hairy monkey balls, strippers need raises, go to Cheetah Lounge tonight and bring fifties.

Epilogue.

Three days later my arms were still sore. I felt like I bench-pressed my coworkers. No, I felt like I bench-pressed my coworkers whilst they polished bowling balls dressed in chain mail. And to think I clumsily swung around a strippers pole in front my coworker Kyle, who photographed the whole sorry display for the paper — spandex, fart noises and all — only to have the story scooped Monday morning by a schlubby male Herald Tribune reporter.

Oh the humanity.

Why I love Joe.

Because when I say, "I want something salty" at 10 p.m. on a Sunday night he cuts up two potatoes and makes me french fries. 

O Buffalo.

What is it about Buffalo? It's a ghostly city lined with crumbling steel mills, surrounded by brick buildings with their windows punched out. The outskirts of the city, a town called Lackawanna, looks like the bottoms of a pair of muddy worn out jeans. The inside of the city on cold winter days from the top of the Skyway bridge is a kind of Gotham City snow globe. When you move away from Buffalo and tell people where you're from they shiver and say, "Sure glad you got outta there, aint ya?"

That's the thing about Buffalo. Most of the people I talk to who grew up there and no longer live there rarely speak ill of the place. (We save that for the people who remain.)

Tim Russert is a good example, rest his pundit soul. Ani DiFranco is another good example. Even Johnny Rzeznik from the blasted Goo Goo Dolls gets misty-eyed when he talks about Buffalo ...

Rather than listen to me go on and on about why I love Buffalo, its pierogies and chicken wings, its dark old soul and puffy winter coat'ed people, I'm going to, in honor of Russert, post bits of what other people have said about the place. Here goes:

+

"It's a really beautiful old place. It felt really good to be back where I grew up. It's sort of that whole getting-back-to-your-roots thing only that sounds cliche, but there's definitely a different kind of dramatic tension there than in L.A. ... It just reminded me that this is who you are. This is where you're from. It's never anything to be ashamed of, and it actually gave me strength to have a sense of my own history. It's so easy to come out to L.A. as an outsider and plant your head so far up your own ass you can disappear."

- Johnny Rzeznik on returning to Buffalo after the success of his 1998 album, Dizzy Up the Girl. The band recorded its next album in a 100-year-old Masonic ballroom in the city.

+

"Like a typical Buffalonian I came back. There's a high recidivism rate in this town. You can check out any time you like but you can never leave, so I'm back living two blocks from the hospital I was born in. It's the community I desired all along, all those lonely folk singer-in-a -car days. It's finally being realized."

- Singer Ani DiFranco in an NPR interview on her decision to purchase a 137-year-old church in Buffalo and turn it into a concert hall.

+

"A few weeks before Dad's 75th birthday, I called him and announced, "I'm finally in a position to buy you a new car." For his whole life, Big Russ bought only used cars, and when I was a boy, I used to say, "Dad, someday I'm going to buy you a brand-new Cadillac."

I sent him Cadillac, Mercedes and Lexus catalogs. "Look them over," I told him. "You can have any car you want, with any options. It's a birthday present. When I come for Thanksgiving, we'll pick it up."

On Thanksgiving, visiting Dad in Buffalo, I said, "Okay, which one?"

"Let's go for a ride," he said. We got into his Chevy Caprice and drove to Jack Adkins Ford. A tall, thin man with a Buffalo Bills jacket came out to greet us.

"This is Charlie," Dad said. We shook hands. "He gave me a good number on my trade-in. Charlie, show him the car."

"We followed Charlie into the showroom. There, all shined up, was a black Crown Victoria. I couldn't believe it. "Dad, it's a cop car!"

"Isn't she beautiful?" he said. He opened the trunk. "You can get three suitcases in there, and two cases of beer."

As we were heading home, I said, "Dad you could have had whatever you wanted - a Cadillac, a Mercedes, a Lexus - but you chose a Crown Vic. Do you really think it's better?"

"No of course not," he replied. "But if I came home with a fancy Cadillac, do you know what people would say? 'His kid made it, and now he's too big for us.' This is who I am."

- Tim Russert, from "Big Russ & Me."

+

"There's a part of the country could drop off tomorrow in an earthquake. Yeah it's out there on the cutting edge, the people move, the sidewalks shake. And there's another part of the country with a land that gently creaks and thuds, where the heavy snows make faucets leak in bathrooms with free-standing tubs. They're in houses that are haunted, with the kids who lie awake and think about all the generations past who used to use the dripping sink.

And sometimes one place wants to slip into the other just to see, what it's like to trade its demons for the restless ghost of Mrs. Ogilvey. She used to pick the mint from her front yard to dress the Sunday pork. Sometimes Southern California wants to be Western New York.

It wants to have a family business in sheet metal or power tools. It wants to have a diner where the coffee tastes like diesel fuel. And it wants to find the glory of a town they say has hit the skids, and it wants to have a snow day that will turn its parents into kids. And it's embarrassed, but it's lusting after a SUNY student with mousy brown hair who is taking out the compost, making coffee in long underwear.

- Folk singer Dar Williams, from "Southern California Wants to Be Western New York."

Baguette ball for domestic home runs

Wondering what to do with your French baguettes when they are no longer edible? 

Joe and I use ours to play baseball with in our apartment. Sometimes we pitch the dog's toys. Sometimes we pitch Koosh balls as I'm crazy about Koosh balls. 

Since we don't recycle because St. Pete makes it impossibly inconvenient to, and since I'm a creature of convenience who has a hard time not recycling in the Green Age, and since I often find myself hyper-actively lobbing Koosh balls at Joe's face like the reincarnation of a closeted Rosie O'Donnell, I turned this baguette into a bat. (Well, the properties of air and yeast turned this baguette into a bat, but whatev.) I found it takes the edge off excess energy and recycle guilt. 

Baguettes harden faster than Ron Jeremy so be resourceful and batter up. 

Meet PK.

My sister PK got in last night via 1998 Ford Escort with her friend Erika. Here's a Q&A with the Buffalo recruit:

What are you doing right now?
What does it look like I'm doing? I'm desperately looking for a job. [Closes the St. Pete Times.]

What was the worst part of the drive down from Buffalo?
West Virginia. Not knowing if my car would make it over the hills.

What was the best part of the drive?
The final hotel. The fact that the bed was so huge despite it being disgusting.

How many items of clothes can you fit in one of those vacuum-sealed bag?
Over 50 items.

Do you have them sorted according to item?
No I was stupid I didn't do that. Now I just have bags exploding and I have to pick through them.

What's your future apartment's must-have amenity?
This sounds really bad, but a washer and dryer in the apartment or in the apartment vicinity.

Good luck with that.
OK. Air conditioning. It must have air conditioning.

What's the most you're willing to spend on an apartment?
Assuming it's just me and depending on the job, no more than $800.

Any idea yet on how you're going to meet a man?
Networking.

What are you a CEO or something?
I know what I'm talking about.

Is there anything you forgot to pack?
Yes. My Pantene Pro-V Anti-Frizz Serum. (Points to head.)

What kind of music did you guys listen to on the drive down?
We hardly listened to music although Leona Lewis' Bleeding came on every time we got off our route. And then every time we got back on the route Leona Lewis' Bleeding would come on again.

What is your dream job?
My dream job? I really don't know what it is. Just a place where I feel comfortable and work with people who are nice. I don't care what kind of job it is.

What about Florida do you predict is going to drive you batty?
The traffic, the old people and people with that Florida air about them.

Florida air?
You know what I mean.

No I don't.
Like DeAnna from The Bachelorette.

Is she from Florida?
She's from Georgia. That's close enough.

[PK's friend Erika walks in the room and sits on the couch beside her.]

Erika, what kind of driver is PK?
I think Pam would agree with me. We had some moments. We had some oh shit moments.

PK, what kind of driver is Erika?
Erika couldn't drive because she's too long for my car and I also have lifts under my seat so she couldn't drive. I told her I wouldn't put her through that torture.
Erika: She kept saying 'those lanky legs can't fit in this car.' My legs would probably get stuck on the pedal. It would be full gas the whole time.

What's your fast food count at?
P: I took coupons with me for McDonald's and I showed Erika how proud I was to have them and she said they only take them in New York and Pennsylvania. We didn't discover that until West Virginia so we ended up at BK and she got cinnamon buns.
E: Only for a dollar though. I woofed those down. They put something in those.
P: You felt great after those cinnamon buns.
E: And for only a $1.

Spot any snazz vanity plates along the way?
P: Pretty Pam was our favorite plate.

Someone had a pretty Pam plate?
P: Believe it or not there are some pretty Pams out there.

What's the garbage situation look like in your car?
E: All our fast food accumulated by my feet.
P: It kept getting higher and higher until we returned the old McDonald's wrappers at the window of a new McDonald's.

What are your plans for tomorrow?
P: Frying at the beach.

What brand vegetable oil did you pick up at CVS?
P: It's Banana Boat.

Any noticeable differences between the north and the south?
E: Oh God everyone was so friendly. We had to get used to that, how friendly people are. People here are really big at staring.
P: Like the guys at the gas station who made animal noises.
E: We had a group of guys making animal noises in Virginia. Like farm noises, actually I don't even know if they were farm animals. I think they were wild animal noises.
P: It was like we got out of the car ... like we were being birthed. Like it was labor.
E: And we're both stretching and I see them out of the corner of my eye and I said, 'Pam lets slide back in the car.'
P: They walked out of their way to our side of the pump.
E: They were gross industrial workers.
P: And they were making animal noises.

What's the first thing you're going to buy for your apartment?
E: You need bedding.
P: Well, I need a bed.

PS. The picture above is of a space-saving-air-sucking bag packed with clothes.

Why we move.

This one goes out to my mom, who reads Lance regularly and whom I imagine is at this very moment standing in my sister PK’s empty bedroom crying.

My youngest sister, PK is moving to Florida this weekend. Last we spoke, PK was stuffing the remainder of her bedroom into boxes, sleeping on my parents’ living room couch because her bedroom was uninhabitable. (I imagine my mother said: “Jesus Christ it looks like a bomb went off in here,” her favorite expression for describing four pairs of discreetly tossed socks and an unmade bed.)

By this time Monday PK will be in St. Pete, schlepping her bags up my concrete stairs. Hopefully most of her crap stays in the car as I’ve informed her that the JoeHo pad is not spacious.

It takes big balls to move away from home, or at least that’s what people say. “You’re brave to just pack up and start over,” …that’s another thing people say. And in a state where the locals say Coke not pop. The blasphemy!

Blah. It’s not about the size of your cajones, or about being brave. It’s about gravity. Some people can’t help it. They move because they can’t stay. The only math problem I ever solved went something like: a train is traveling 75 mph in a southern arc. Picture you’re waving goodbye in the distance. Are you a.) sitting in the train car or b.) standing at the depot?

Me? I’d be goddamned if I was the one standing at the depot, especially at PK’s age. At 22 I was the one in motion.

Since my sisters and I never went away to college we never experienced the thrill of buying our first bottle of shampoo as an independent apartment-renting adult. I was never a very domestic bird, yet when I left the nest four years ago I barked “Bring on the shower curtain purchased at Target,” like I was a gum-snapping football coach. I got my jollies off once just buying a vacuum cleaner at K-Mart.

Back home we rarely cooked meals for ourselves, since it felt like mom catered to our individual schedules, wrapping leftovers in tinfoil in the fridge, leaving notes on the countertop explaining what tinfoil packet contained what. In college my commitments and my sisters’ commitments were split between school, part time jobs and close-knit friends, most of whom we befriended in the 4th grade.

Moving to a town where no one knows who you are is like hurling a white canvas at a painter and demanding he go to town on it in every color imaginable. “Make me something pretty out of this lily-white canvas. Or don’t. It’s up to you really. Only problem is, if you don’t you’ll feel unfulfilled, empty and nostalgic for the wild paintings of your past. You painted before. Paint again.”

I never experienced growing pains like I did when I moved to Sarasota. Was it because I moved 1,200 miles away or because I was approaching 25? I heard of the Quarterlife Crisis, I’m well aware of the annoying narcissistic mid 20s meltdown. Just when I thought my moving to sunny Florida had exaggerated this, my best friend Ro confessed that she too was feeling bat shit crazy and she’d only moved across town.

If our infant-selves could speak, we’d make scholarly observations about our bodies stretching, pulling and tugging like Gumby dolls. Going from six pounds to twenty in six month’s time. If we could speak as infants we’d say, “shit this sucks, but shit this is cool!” It’s traumatizing so we cry. We wail because after all, we’re babies.

At 23 it wasn’t much different. "Shit this sucks, shit this is cool" is pretty much how I felt for a few years. The growing pains weren't physical but my reaction to them was still the same. I was still a baby.

After one year as a reporter I quit my job and started working at a marble yard, counting slabs of granite in the 90-degree heat, making deliveries of cement and stone tile to waterfront homes. Working here I stopped pissing on the rich and feeling sorry for myself as I was scrounging away money to purchase a car to replace my broken down ’86 Civic. I knew eventually I wouldn’t have to pedal a bike to work every day alongside day laborers, who for obvious reasons didn't have drivers licenses. At 23 I knew, like my Nana says, that it would pass.

I was bloated from a diet of Reese Cups and Miller Lite; a bona fide decision maker making decisions far from home, showering behind a Target curtain, pining away for my next big move. So I bought a car, took the summer off, drove across the country, fell in love with Wyoming and Idaho and Oregon and Missouri. I returned to Sarasota in the fall and fell in love with Joe.

I didn’t know what decisions were until I moved away. I remember making a piss poor one once when I first arrived to Sarasota, agreeing to watch a coworker’s child on a Saturday evening and assuming I’d have enough time to squeeze in a mid-morning bike ride, I rode 40 miles out to Longboat Key. I realized when I reached the shores of Whitney Beach that there was no way in hell I was making it back to watch that kid. And the one person I knew in town who could pick my ass up wasn't answering the phone.

Mom, this is a long one so I apologize for that. PK is going to be OK. You remember how I used to call you homesick, crying and bitching then proclaiming happiness then wallowing in self-pity all in one day?

I like to believe I'm in the clear now. It took three years and in those three years I grew stronger and meaner and nicer, tougher and happier. Would I still feel this way if I moved five miles up the street from you? I don’t know. PK won’t know either. Sometimes you don’t know why you leave a place until you arrive somewhere else.

Please tell PK I cleaned the bathroom toilet in the spare bedroom. She knows where the key is. I’ll see her Monday night when I get out of work.

PS. The picture above was taken near a waterfall in Oregon.

Snide & The City.

Since I spent my morning responding to this review of Sex & The City: The Movie I might as well post it here too. How cute that the guy who wrote the review is named Lance too.

For better reviews click here and here.