Le monde de fromage de Kate

Said by a blood relative this very day:

Charles and Ashley got new ultrasound pictures today (again EXPLICIT photos), and were not very pleased with them. I must admit that the translucency of a fetus can, indeed, be disconcerting.

Charles took it upon himself to draw an alternative, more “precise” version.

Portrait of a First Daughter (in utero) by Her Loving Father

What can I say? At least she’s opaque in his version. Ah – and they’ve opted for the highly-evolved new-fangled triped child with the ultra sleek super-digited dominant hand.

I think this explains a great deal about my family.

Evidently, it’s ‘all Greek’ to Movable Type™ 3.16. My past entries have inexplicably morphed so that every apostrophe, dash, accent grave, accent egu and all quotation marks have turned into various combinations of epsilons, trademark symbols, and “a’s” with umlauts and those little “accent” hats. I thought for a moment it was IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet), but the trademark symbols belied that conclusion. I manually corrected several of my most recent entries, but if anyone has clever tricks by which I might employ some variety of Universal correction, I’m all ears.

Do not, no matter how tempting, get slightly tearful and use the term verklempt at a job interview.* If you do make the ever-so regrettable blunder of saying it once – whatever you do – DO NOT REPEAT IT. It might be especially disastrous if you reiterate the expression as your “parting shot” while walking out the door. You will become “unforgettable” in the WRONG way.

*Steer clear of it in Utah, at least – especially in West Valley City. (G)oy Weh!!!

P.S. And a super-festive Cinco di Mayo a usted hacia fuera allí.

Yesterday I dropped a bag of groceries on my bare feet. Had it been anyone else in the whole WIDE WORLD, it might have been a parcel of marshmallows, bunches of parsley and ten or so Kool-Aid™ packets – perhaps several teensy fluffy pillows? ‘Twas I, though, so it was a bag full of one-pound tin cans (at least nine). The sailor-like invectives flew in a blue cloud about the kitchen, as I bemoaned the inferior quality of those damn grocery sacks with handles and how they break at the most inconvenient moments. And I did the dance of the bruised (must be said as two syllables in Shakespearean fashion) feet. Yes, it might seem illogical or contraindicated to dance on your bruised (remember- two syllables) feet, but one cannot help it. Woe is me.

Here’s the best part: The bag did not break. I, through my extraordinary and UNEQUALLED talent, had managed to empty the bag’s contents on my feet, WITHOUT BREAKING A THING! I’m magic, a little. Some day I will learn to use my powers for good (like Oprah).

Introducing my new fetus niece:

She’s a DANCER (see that high kick?)

Visit Purple Monkey Dishwasher and you can see additional fetal photos (WARNING: Some of the photos are EXPLICIT; in fact, they are all NUDE), as well as a picture of Charles and Ashley’s soon-to-be Kansas home (and their tractor?).

SPIDER ON THE COMPUTER DESK RIGHT WHERE I WAS ONLY MERE SECONDS AGO LEANING MY… MYSELF! That is downright SWAGGERING EFFRONTERY! It is simply unpardonable and to be punished immediately by death. *Squish.* Sorry, Jodi!

AND something has bitten me on the ankle! What if it was the bite of the dreaded brown recluse, which has a necrotizing effect on human tissue? My elder sister will forevermore wear on her body a testament to the results of such a bite; she is, I kid you not, missing a little chunk of flesh from her back! And don’t forget the gangrene lady who DIED from such a bite!

The “easy” identification of the brown recluse is supposed to be comforting. There is a violin or “fiddle”-shaped marking on the cephalothorax of these spiders (which is why they are often referred to as “fiddle-back” spiders in the South), but this marking can be faint (arbitrarily), especially if the spider has just molted. Thanks. Ever so helpful.

But wait:

The most definitive physical feature of recluse spiders is their eyes: most spiders have eight eyes that typically are arranged in two rows of four but recluse spiders have six equal-sized eyes arranged in three pairs, called dyads. There is a dyad at the front of the cephalothorax (the first main body part to which the legs attach) and another dyad on each side further back. (Thank you, University of California Statewide Integrated Pest Management Program. You seem to think you know a lot even though the Brown Recluse DOES NOT LIVE IN CALIFORNIA.)

What in the hell are you supposed to do precisely? Nicely ask the possibly deadly spider to hold still so you can get up RIGHT NEXT TO IT and count its little eyeballs – one, two, three, four, five… – and see if they are in the appropriate pattern of three dyads? That’s so reassuring to those of us who are myopic. PHEW! Eight eyes! It’s just a Hobo Spider…which…which also has a horrific necrotizing bite…RUN AWAY! RUN AWAY!!!!!!

Hello, my name is Kate and I am an arachnophobic.

But can you really BLAME ME? We have such festive spiders here (I forgot to mention the Black Widow – hurrah – and the Yellow Sac Spider, Tarantulas, and MORE). And the most treacherous ones prefer to lurk in piles of things or hide in your laundry or sneak up your bedskirt!!! If you don’t think that’s quite disturbing enough, please take a look at this article from the American College of Physicians. Apparently, there was enough confusion that the ACP-ASIM felt the need to help doctors tell between the bite of the Brown Recluse and CUTANEOUS ANTHRAX. Good grief – don’t tell me spider bites are nothing to worry about when a major health organization includes them in a discussion of BIOTERRORISM. By the way, take a look at photos (which I will not be posting); I think you will agree that cutaneous anthrax looks a lot more innocuous than the spider bite.

Huzzah! You delve into some of the myriad unsorted emails in your box and your may uncover TREASURE. Here’s another lovely James Lileks tidbit (I say that like someone is going to remember the Lileks’ Ode I included in 2003):

Mmmmm. Man. That’s the other benefit of Atkins: cheese is no longer The Enemy. I’ve started exploring the options. I’ve always been cheese-curious, to be frank. But it’s a daunting world, and sometimes you commit to a wedge at the store only to find you don’t like it when you get it home. But this Irish cheddar – when I die, I want to be filled with this cheese. I want people to see the box lowered in the earth and think there goes a man who is great with cheese. If I’m going to feed the worms I might as well give them a banquet instead of sawdust and formadehyde. . . [NOTE: Yes, that should be "formaldehyde" - It's nice that I'm not the only one to make spelling mistakes.]

Mmmm. Man. Wow.

I’m realizing that I should have included a bigger section of that 2003 Lileks’ (Lileks’s????? I never can decide.) piece. Well, tomorrow is another day; AS GOD IS MY WITNESS, I SHALL NEVER GO HUNGRY AGAIN!

That’s too sad (and misquoted, I think?) to even include an attribution. Ugh.