The Chronicles of Marge

SYTYCD Season 5: Welcome Back

The long wait is over. SYTYCD is back and I can actually use the word "glee" to describe how I feel right now. Speaking of which, last night I was still living off the high of the pilot show called Glee that aired Tuesday and added fuel to the fire of my long-term romance with musical comedy, particularly when it interprets pop culture in such a refreshing and feel-good way. And if there are doubters among you, just check out the show's rendition of Don't Stop Believing on youtube. I'm not going to admit to you how many times I've watched it since Tuesday. That would just be embarrassing. Also embarrassing: the volume at which I sang along.

Anyway, the best show in the world is back, and I finally have something to write about. I joined two of my girlfriends, a bowl of pasta, and some zucchini chocolate cake last night for the premiere. And let's put out there what every single SYTYCD devotee knows: the auditions aren't the best part, but you still watch and enjoy them nonetheless. So I'm not going to recap every audition episode, as I need to savor these last hours of sleep before I start staying up until midnight every Wednesday so I can pour my heart out in words over this show. However, here's what we got a taste of last night:

• Mary Murphy first in puffy sleeves in NYC and later in what I can only describe as chest chaps in Denver. Mary: Your fashion tribute to the cowboy history of the Mile High City was touching, but there's no reason to tap into your inner vaquero now. I would rather see you in a boa. Also, less Botox next time. From your lips north, nothing moved. And I think those tears at the end may have been tears of nostalgia for the loss of movement in your face that you had no idea you would miss, rather than tears of joy at seeing that guy dancing in his little man shorts. Although he was good, really good.
• About an hour in, Jason called me on the phone and gave this astute observation: "Tabitha and Napoleon add nothing to the show." I second (Bleeding Love from last year outstanding). Comments like, "Nice," and "Really nice," are really stupid. That's what you write in someone's high school yearbook when you don't really like them but were passed their yearbook to sign anyway. "You're a really nice girl" basically means "I couldn't have cared less about your existence over the last 13 years and your big bangs are ugly." Tabitha and Napoleon: this isn't high school, and if you're having trouble with your words, get a thesaurus or leave the show.
• How long does it take Sonya to do her hair every day?
• Same-sex ballroom??? I think the topple at the end proves why we haven't heard of this yet. Although I would like to see them try the samba, as in Hip Hip Chin Chin from Season 3. That could be really entertaining. 
• A Star Wars cat—correction, LION?? Honey, go home and take your meds.
• Finally, my girl crush on Cat Deeley in back. I also really want her job.

Gettin' Out the Razor

We are going to a wedding in New York this weekend for Jason's cousin, and the question of what to wear has completely taken over my life—this coming from someone who is washing dishes in her bathtub and just discovered the mummified bodies of several dead mice between some studs in her kitchen wall. As if I have nothing else to think about. Anyway, it took me two months to buy the dress, one month to find a matching pair of shoes that I would actually wear again, and two hours with pliers and wire to make some jewelry to go with the ensemble. In addition, my aunt knitted me a shawl in less than a day and is mailing it to me as we speak, so you know it's serious when the whole family gets involved. I even went to the Super Target last night and bought makeup. Yes, that would be makeup for me. To put on my face. Yeah, you know Marge is having some type of life crisis when she applies something other than Oil of Olay SPF 15 to her face. The crisis escalated when somehow I managed to make it home with a lipstick that perfectly matches the color of my lips, and which I now can't return. I guess this is why people go to the makeup counter at Belk. I, personally, would rather vomit, so I'm stuck with lips this weekend that look exactly like the ones I already had.

I would even go as far to say that I've put more effort into what I'm wearing to this wedding than I did to my own wedding. Hell, I should quit attending weddings, and instead just get married again every time because that experience for me was one of the least stressful in my life—and for those of you surprised by this statement, you've apparently never overdosed on laxatives in the middle of a 'effin cow pasture in New Mexico. Trust me, getting married is easy. Anyway, maybe my grand amount of effort stems from this nagging feeling of aging. I don't feel old or ugly, but I feel like the edge of the cliff is just there and that I could topple over at any time and end up some middle-aged woman in pleated pants, which reminds me of an interesting conversation I had with my mother-in-law over the weekend. She said that she was talking to a friend about how, as a woman, you reach this point in your life where you realize that no one is looking at you anymore. You used to be young and vibrant and could turn a head, but then all of a sudden, it passes, and it's kind of sad to realize that you'll never have that anymore—you'll never be that woman ever again. So maybe this is why I am obsessed all of a sudden. Maybe each occasion for dressing up that I have could be my last as a young, vibrant thing. I've never considered myself to be a head-turner or one of the pretty girls, but I've always felt young, and I've always felt like I could bring it if I wanted.

So why not go the extra mile for what may be the last time as an almost bright young thing. I might even shave my legs in the hope that all this effort is worth it—as in, please god, let there be an open bar!! I also hope I don't return with the swine flu, which I can totally envision happening to me. I mean, who doesn't feel a little bit like they've contracted some H1N1 after they've spent three days with their extended family anyway, regardless of how much you like them. But no worries. I'm taking the necessary precautions and am fortifying my system with so much echinacea that I'll end up growing a purple cone flower out of my ass before this is all over.

We've Only Just Begun

The kitchen destruction began over a week ago, and folks, this is no joke. I think a lot of people don't understand what it means when we say we are redoing the kitchen. Most folks think of a paint job, some new hardware, and maybe a shiny-ass granite counter top, and voila! Kitchen remodeled. And of course, Most Folks (and trust me, most of you are included in that group) imagine that we've hired a professional member of Four Inches of Ass Crack While on the Job to do the work for us. But Most Folks are dead wrong. Neither Jason nor I were brought up by parents who ever paid anyone else to do anything. I mean, where is the excitment in that? I think my parents decided to forgo family vacations to exotic places like Disney World because raising small children in a house without staircase railings was much more of an adventure and cost a lot less money. And for the family Mathes: why not go ahead and solve all of your children's possible lifelong bathroom insecurities at a young age and skip indoor plumbing altogether. Yeah, if you can squat in tick-infested woods in the middle of the night, you can go to the bathroom anywhere.

Also, neither Jason nor I believe in doing anything halfway, which means that there are no cowards living in the Casa Mathes. Just crazies. Behold:

When I got home from work last Friday, I could tell that Jason was nervous. We had talked about studs and subflooring, but he was afraid he had gone too far and that I might construe this as an "Irreconcilable Difference" and file some papers and leave him with the house in its current state because why the hell would I want to learn to rewire the kitchen by myself? But alas, I walked through the door and was immediately reminded of my childhood, and I called my mother that evening and thanked her for bringing her children up in a construction zone. Little did she or my father know then how it would condition me for my adult life. Because right now, all I really want to do is curl up in a special cover and sit on the kitchen floor, surrounded by old nails and splinters of wood, while The Carpenter's "We've Only Just Begun" plays in the background, because, really, this feels like home, and I might as well get used to it, because this may be my life for the foreseeable future.

A Bit More Frequent

I have not written in forever. It's really hard to do when you sit at a computer for 8 to 9 hours a day and you come home and the weather is lovely and there are exciting things to do outside, like work with compost and stare at plants, without fear of mosquitoes. And because I've written that sentence, I'm sure that next week I'll be sitting indoors covered in calamine lotion and wondering what the hell is going on with the tomatoes because I can't get out there to them for the swarm of enemy combatants in my yard. Anyway, there is a lot going on outside and I can't miss out on that part of life just to write a bit about nothing—which is to say, I don't understand those people who update their facebook status every 33 minutes because it's really important that I know about their trip to the grocery store to buy a pint of Ben & Jerry's Cherry Garcia, which they consumed while watching Grey's Anatomy, and the fact that there are still dirty dishes on their kitchen counter, and I'm all like, "You are obviously inside, fool, so it shouldn't be hard to clean that shit up," and also, DO YOU THINK I CARE? And HOW DO YOU HAVE TIME FOR ALL THESE UPDATES? I should start adding my status. It would go something like this, "Margaret just drank a fiber drink and hopes to see results within the week." And my facebook friends are now relieved I never post a status update.

So my mom came to visit for the weekend, during which she took a long nap at our house. Jason finds the practice in my family of napping while visiting relatives strange, but really, it's the best way to say, "I'm comfortable in your space, and I don't have to worry about coming up with conversation that leads to questions like, 'Do you use a slow cooker?'" which I actually posed to my mother over the weekend because, apparently, I have nothing else to offer. In addition to the napping, I accompanied my mother on a quest for shoes and a dress, which took us to the mall and some stores that don't contain the initials H and M in their names. This could have turned out horribly, but I am proud to say that I maintained very good behavior while looking through the capri pants at Coldwater Creek and the elastic-waisted pants at the Chico's. One day when I can no longer suck in my stomach on command, I may have a different opinion about those clothes, but for now, hell no.

Anyway, my mom left this morning before 8 because she had to get back to the dogs. Sometimes I think she loves them more than she loves her children, but I really don't blame her. The dogs are still at home, there for her when no one else is. They've never moved away, never dated assholes, and never rejected her gifts of clothing. In addition, nothing builds that sense of unconditional parental love quite like having someone pee on your kitchen floor in the wee morning hours. And for those of you shocked at the ill-trained manner of my parents' dogs, please note the following: Newman is elderly, blind, and deaf; he has survived heart worms, a virus of unknown origin that took the life of another beloved dog, and being bitten by a copperhead twice within 2 weeks; he also moves his bowels now while walking because those muscles just aren't the same as they used to be. So the fact that he only pees on the kitchen floor is a blessing, and we have all started preparing ourselves emotionally for The Big Sleep that will happen one day soon and cause my father to cry. Let's just hope my dad isn't in Istanbul or some place equally exotic when it happens.

PS  Since writing the above this morning, I was bitten six times by mosquitoes in the yard this afternoon and killed four of them. I immediately went inside the house, and curled up into a fetal position. I looks like I will be writing more frequently now.