Oh my galoshes!

Given the torrential downpour today, I am super glad that I bought my new pair of black and white polka dot galoshes over the weekend.
Not only did they keep my feet dry and warm all day, but they looked adorable.

Best off all, they fed my insane love of smelling things: These galoshes smell like a tire store, that's how pungent their rubbery scent is.

I smell everything I come in contact with - and I mean everything - but since I got them on Saturday, they've really pushed me to my scent limit. They were so strong at first that I had to put them in the stairwell!

But I got used to their heady odor after a few days and now I find it comforting.
I love that I can literally say "Oh my galoshes!" and not have it not be a lie because I finally, at age 31, have my very first pair of galoshes ... now if only I could find a yellow pair to match my Paddington slicker!

I'm ready for AARP Magazine.

I always knew I was born too late.

Some of my favorite music is from my mom's era, like Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, etc, while some is music I know would make her late father, my beloved Pop-Pop, proud: Sinatra, Martin, Darin, Bennett.

Most of my favorite movies are old, and Steve McQueen is my most favorite actor ever.

I love reading classic books by classic authors: Kerouac, Capote and am currently reading "The Portable Dorothy Parker."

So it's completely natural that this old soul in a young(ish) woman would be drawn to my mother's AARP magazine.
I started reading it a few years ago and fell in love with the writing. It's so good, no, it's better than that, it's stellar.

It's a smart read for anyone, especially for someone around my age who has parents in the AARP age bracket. There is so much to learn about what to expect with their aging and I've seen some good financial tips (none of which I follow, which is stupid), and some of their people and area profiles are just great.

Case in point, this month's issue included a story about a New Jersey native, who couldn't wait to get out of the Garden State when he came of age, taking a trek down the coastline to places that I loved going on summer vacations, like Long Beach Island and Atlantic City and rediscovering his roots.

I highly recommend pilfering your parents' copy next month, if they subscribe.
If not, I won't charge you for this great Christmas present idea ...

Where are all my vampires?

Last year at this time, I was being ravaged by my annual cold.
Being that I absolutely adore Halloween, this was unacceptable.

I had a fantastic cheerleader costume that I simply would not miss wearing, so I holed up in my apartment the week before the holiday in hopes to kill the germs.
I crashed on my uber-comfy couch with tissues, what was practically an 8-ball of OTC meds, maybe one or three vodka and OJs (for vitamin C, natch) and the remote.

To my utmost joy, I found so many Halloween-related shows and movies on my cable. Thankfully, none of them were the blood-fest slasher flicks that frighten me so, I'm talking the real deal: old black & white classic horrors, where what you see isn't as frightening as what you don't, or what's implied. By far, my favorites were the many versions of "Dracula" starring the king of the Counts, Bela Lugosi.



I also enjoyed watching shows about my freaky obsession with the real Dracula, Vlad the Impaler, on The History Channel.

So this year, I was super excited to revisit my classically scary friends. Much to my disappointment, I've not seen a lineup like last year's all stars. WTF?

Is this not the haunting season? I mean, today, the Saturday night before Halloween, there should be more marathons of Dracula, Wolfman, Frankenstein and the like, then I can shake a stick at.
Instead, crickets.

Here I was, prepared to not leave my jammies today, save for a Target run (where I picked up the most adorable black and white polka dot galoshes, BTW) and sloth in front of the tube. Instead, after a sad trip through the guide channel, I shut the TV off and mustered up the strength to give the house a long overdo thorough cleansing - how very unvampire-like of me!
Now, I feel like I can't stop cleaning - it's like once you kill the lazy bug, you get into overdrive.

"Guess I'll watch my personal copy of "Dracula" now," she said with a frown.
Well, at least her house is sparkling clean ...

Chase, I hardly knew ye, yet I despise thee ...

I did an interview that ran later than expected today, so by the time I left the office for lunch, we were well past my normal 12:30 p.m. feeding time.

In other words, we were entering dangerous Nikki territory.

Needless to say, once we were seated at a local chain by a delightfully friendly hostess, I was about ready to eat the menu - I was that hungry. We placed our orders the second our server came to offer drinks.

This is right around the time we were most ignorantly introduced to a bastard child I would like to call, oh, let me just pull the name out of my arse, Chase. Chase was a kid who had a jerk for a mother, a mother who let her rotten spawn run rampant throughout the restaurant, disturbing everyone in his wake.

As if it wasn't bad enough that the kid was being an asshole as he ran around screaming at the top of his high-pitched lungs, his mother would shout at him from their booth - which, as fate would so punish us, was right behind us.

"Chase, sit down!"
"Shh, Chase."
"Chase, get over here."
"Chase, do you want ice cream?"

While I was saying in my head: "Chase, would you like a sock in your mouth or a punch in the face?" It was ridiculous.

I grew up in a restaurant family whose parents had always said that, in addition to the smoking/non-smoking sections, there should be a no children section, to which I wholeheartedly agree.

I know kids are the most important thing in a parent's life, as they very well should be, without question. However, there is a time and a place for them to be seen and heard, and when they are screaming and running around like jerks in public is so not one of them.

No, I do not have children of my own yet, but I can damn well guarantee that my child will not act like that. I never did, and I wasn't raised to get away with acting like that in public. If he was having a behavioral problem that day, I understand. That's when you quietly ask for the check and get the kid out of there. No one deserves to have their meal ruined by a kid whose mother can't control him.

I had to do everything in my power to not go off on Chase's mother. Apparently, the hostess made a remark about the kid running around - which, even as a non-mom, I know is not safe in a restaurant with servers and hot food nearby - and his mother heard.

She found the manager and told him as they were finally leaving that she was not happy about it because, and I quote, "I am a good tipper and it's not like we were causing a scene." Uh really? Then why did everyone in the room look around at each other and let out a sigh of relief at the quiet front that descended upon us with your departure?

Our server apologized profusely for Chase's disturbance, not that she was in any way to blame. Hell, Chase isn't even to blame. I blame his classless ass of a mother. I can only image what she came from.

Thanks the heartburn, jerk!

Cat-mandu.

Sometimes you just have to hit the local buffet, which is something I did tonight.
Often the favorite of the old folks (and formerly my very own beloved parents), there are always sights to be seen - I think it's kind of a good glimpse into our society after seeing how people behave at such dining establishments.
Like, for instance, the way they fill their plate like they'll never eat ever again, or picking off said plate while they are still filling it. Ugh.

But the best part about eating there, aside from a fabulous trough of fresh mac & cheese, is just sitting back and watching.
There's the elderly man who can barely walk that tugs on my heart strings. There's the rude people who push you or try to budge in front of you. There's the kids running rampant.

Tonight, there was the cat pee-scented elderly man.
I kinda fell in like with him when he stood behind us in line and said, "Well look at that," all-put out about the long line to pay. He was dressed like your average old man and looked somewhat dapper in his awesome Members Only jacket, something I will never find passe or out of style.

Then I got a scent of him.
The unmistakable scent of his cats wafted from him like the steam rising off that hot and yummy mac & cheese. I couldn't get away from him fast enough. And to think he reminded me a little of Ted Knight!

As fate would have it - and I should have predicted it would - cat man sat right behind us, so we got to enjoy him the entire meal.
That's what I get I guess ...

E Merritt freeze out

While I adore Fall, it makes me dread what follows it: Winter. I live in the coldest house in the WORLD. I swear I can see my breath most of the time.

No matter what I set my heat on, I still freeze my arse off and rely on a lil space heater in my living room and bathroom.

My apartment is without insulation, which was brilliant on the builder's part oh-so-many years ago. As I type this, I am wearing a turtleneck sweater, a puffy vest, jeans, shoes and am contemplating using my Weekender fingerless gloves. But I think that might be just a smidge de trop, as they say in France.

Short of lighting a bonfire, what the heck can a girl without insulation to do??

A lone drifter.

There are certain songs that just "get" me every time.
"Goodnight Saigon" by Billy Joel. Tear.
"Wind Beneath My Wings" by Bette Midler and "Proud to be an American," ditto.
The church song "On Eagle's Wings?" I weep until there is nothing left.
Then there are the songs that make me yearn for romance - songs like "Beginning to See the Light" (especially when sung by Bobby Darin, swoooon) and "Slip Away" by Clarence Carter.
Let me first explain that I have become addicted to the standards, or "Great American Songbook" as Sirius is billing the Sinatra channel.
All the songs conjure up visions in my head of dapper gents and classy dames dancing the night away together at the Rainbow Room in Manhattan as they tip back martinis and everyone is a writer, poet, artist or musician. Can't you just hear the glasses clinking? Smell the smoke swirling up from the pearl cigarette holder?
One song stands out so much - the first time I heard it was on an episode of "Sex and the City," the one where Big moves to Napa. And from the first sweeping verse of "Moon River," I was hooked.
My favorite version is sung by Andy Williams. Last night I heard it while getting ready for bed and I stood in the doorway of my living room transfixed. My legs ached to be swept across a shiny dance floor by a man who thinks the sun rises and sets on my smile because we are "Two drifters off to see the world. There's such a lot of world to see. We're after the same rainbow's end-- waiting 'round the bend ..."
Ahh, a girl has to be unrealistic sometimes right?