Sujatin’s Neighborhood

This morning I posted here on Vox, started a batch of cookies, then took the dogs for a walk. I felt totally fine. Immediately upon returning from my walk, however, I am stricken with sneezing and a stuffy nose. Sure enough, I have a cold, as if someone just flipped a switch. What the HELL is up with that?

Serves as my reminder to choose fear's opposite

“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket- safe, dark, motionless, airless--it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.”

“This is one of the miracles of love: It gives a power of seeing through its own enchantments and yet not being disenchanted.”

This month has been positively shameful. I blame a lot of it on how Await Your Reply totally wrecked me, and made everything else seem boring and unimportant. I only finished two books in November and I didn't like one of them. How sad am I? But, well, this is my last week of class and now the time I've devoted to reading some 425+ student pages a month can be spent on other things.

BOOK ACQUIRED
Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger
Exit Ghost by Philip Roth

BOOKS READ
The Complete Essex County by Jeff Lemire: Sweeping and brilliant graphic novel about hockey, forgiveness, loneliness, and family in Canada.

Totally Killer by Greg Olear: Despite being a sort of homage to American Psycho, a bad choice in point of view ruins what could have been a pretty funny novel about murder, babyboomers, and 1991.

CURRENTLY READING
Juliet, Naked by Nick Hornby

There are certain pieces of art -- music, books, movies, tv shows -- that click with you in ways that are hard to define. Oftentimes mere words cannot explain the feelings you have for certain things. The heart wants what it wants, right? Though I have tried, I still can't explain what it was about the Wakefield Twins of Sweet Valley that had me entranced for years on end. I can't adequately explain how the music of The Replacements exhilarates me and makes me feel understood and not alone all at the same time.

Nor can I explain why I love Dawson's Creek so much. It's a silly teen drama that I fell in love with when I was much too old to be in the show's target audience. I remember having a great time making fun of my parents who were early-fans of the Dawson's Creek/Felicity night on the WB. Little did I know, three short years later I would be the biggest fan of Dawson's Creek.

It caught me when I was at my weakest. I was working a crap job in Customer Service, living alone for the first time, and fighting a battle with pneumonia where the doctor made me choose between staying in my apartment for 10 days or going to the hospital to rest.

I opted for the home quarantine and it was then I caught my first episode. It was the one where Pacey kissed Joey. That's all it took and I was hooked. I watched the show religiously for the next two years. Then I proceeded to Netflix the hell out of the entire series so I could get the full Dawson's Creek experience.

It didn't end there. Once I moved into Supergenius HQ and had cable, I began to TiVO the show on any time it was shown. I'd watch it every night and it ruled. But then I got laid off in the winter of 08 and by that summer decided that I needed to slash my cable budget. I dropped down a level, saving myself a measly $13 a month (seriously Comcast, are you fucking kidding me?) and thus ended my Dawson's supply. There was much sadness throughout the land.

Over the years I've spent a lot of time debating the merits of purchasing each of the six seasons of Dawson's on DVD. But somehow I always held back, mostly because I am cheap. But then they released the Complete Series as a box set for only $81. I could not resist, and snapped it up immediately.

There was much rejoicing throughout the land when it landed on my doorstep. However, after making my way through 2.5 seasons I've discovered that one of the discs is flawed. It won't play the finale of season 3, which is a very important episode. It is here where Joey makes the decision to ditch whiny, crybaby Dawson and spend the summer sailing to Key West with Pacey.

So, what's a girl to do? I, of course, e-mail customer service at Sony Pictures Home Entertainment whereby I was told to pack up my entire Boxed Set send it to their giant conglomerate and then spend the next three to five weeks with my fingers crossed praying that they return a working set to me.

Perfect solution, huh?

I don't think so. While I am all for sending them a proof of purchase, and even sending back the defective disc for a new one, the idea of just sending something I paid hard-earned money for into the void doesn't sit well with me. And why does it take so long? Three to five weeks? It took Amazon 2-days to get the set to me, apparently it takes the makers of the boxed set a couple of fortnights to get a working product to me.

I call bullshit. 

Do you have any idea how much my Thanksgiving was ruined? RUINED! It was ruined by the fact that I am hopelessly, utterly in love with a song that talks about pie in a positive light. I spent the entire holiday breaking singing about pie.

I am so ashamed.

I'm not sure I'll get to making all of it, but I am set for the following menu for Thanksgiving.

There are a couple of extra chairs at the table if you're interested!

Now I'd better get prepping because so far all I've made is the cranberry sauce.

Thanksgiving 2009

Deviled eggs

Variety of cheeses with French bread

 

Corn Lemongrass Soup with crab and mussels

Arugula Fennel Mint Prosciutto Pomegranate Salad

 

Turkey – brined and deep fried

Cranberry sauce – with ginger and Cointreau

Traditional Stuffing with pancetta          

Mashed new potatoes with skins on, and mascarpone and chives

Gravy -

Pearl onions roasted with a port reduction and bay

Green beans sauteed with wildrice, mushrooms, bell peppers and pinenuts

 

Crème Brule

Pumpkin pie with whipped creme

There's much to be grateful for and I try to remind myself of that every day.

Some days I forget. 

But I'm glad there's one day of the year when we in the United States are invited to take stock of the abundance in our lives. I hope each of you are with people who are grateful for YOU this year and who express it.

Happy Thanksgiving!  

As most of you know, I've been keeping a blog on iwilldare.com for over nine years. It's a lot of content -- 7,193 posts (and that's not included the hundreds of posts I deleted, mostly about sandwiches and what a fuckwit my boss Shakey McDougal was) and 18,198 comments.

In the last year I've noticed a new trend, e-mails from people begging me to delete some asinine comment they made back in 2002. It seems all those annoying teenagers who had a lot to say about Donnie Darko and being bored in study hall have discovered the Internet has a long memory. Now, when they Google themselves (or their e-mail addresses) they're embarrassed to discover that something they said on a website five years ago is the #1 result.

Ha!

I'm of two minds when it comes to deleting the comments. Part of me thinks I should just delete them and be done with it. It doesn't take a lot of time, and most of the time the comment is not a great loss to the Internet. Of course, the other part of me is all, "Suck it up, loser. I refuse to edit my website because you were an obnoxious 15-year-old, let this be a lesson to you!"

What would you do?