2005-02-15 - 9:48 p.m.

On the internal soundtrack: "And the Glory of the Lord", Handel's "Messiah"

Monday, January 31st, 2005

So, around here we keep Pringles on hand. Specifically, Pringles "con grasa reducida", or "reduced-fat". This does NOT mean it contains Olestra, as I am fond of pointing out to guests. It means, rather, that they use less oil when they make them, so they're not so greasy. I buy Pringles on sale and store them in a specific cabinet in the kitchen or in the foyer closet.

Poindexter is a big pain in the ass and eats a lot of Pringles. He has a sandwich at least once a day and eats Pringles with them. Whereas I will get a small pile of about 6-8 Pringles, he eats at least a full serving of 16 Pringles, probably more.

So today, we had hoagies, which really need potato chips to go with them, and I was fussing over my new coat (see below) and came down to the living room as he was finishing up his hoagie. He was eating... tortilla chips.

Evelynne: Don't we have any Pringles?
Poindexter: Nope.
Evelynne: WE'RE OUT OF PRINGLES!??!
Poindexter: Yep.
Evelynne: WE HAD A FULL CAN THIS WEEKEND! WHERE DID IT GO!? YOU EAT TOO MANY PRINGLES!!!
Poindexter: I thought we were out of them last week and then you showed up with three Pringle cans and I thought you had a secret stash of them somewhere.
Evelynne: THEY WERE IN THE PRINGLE CABINET!!! Are you sure we don't have ANY? Are there any in the office? [Runs up to the kitchen and office to look, slamming doors progressively louder as none are found. Stomps down to the foyer.] GODDAMMIT! I'M GOING OUT!
Poindexter: You're crazy.
Evelynne: I CAN'T ENJOY MY HOAGIE WITHOUT POTATO CHIPS!

So I went out, found 'em on sale and well-stocked, so I bought seven cans. I was in line behind a woman who bought two cans, one reduced-fat, one ranch. I told her how my husband had eaten all the Pringles. She looked at me and said, "I'm glad I got here before you did." I told her there were plenty left.

I got back in the house and continued to be "mad" at Poindexter:

Poindexter: Wow! That's lotta Pringles.
Evelynne: THEY'RE *MY* PRINGLES! YOU CAN'T HAVE *ANY*!

I sat down with my hoagie, opened a can, put 6-8 chips on my plate (splitting them in half like I like 'em), and nestled that can and the bag of cans next to my legs. Poindexter sat down on the other side of me and reached over for the peanuts, which were on the floor next to the bag.

Evelynne: STOP STEALING MY PRINGLES!
Poindexter: We're married. They're OUR Pringles.
Evelynne: Part of being married is COMMUNICATION! You are not effectively COMMUNICATING to me the state of our Pringle stash!
Poindexter: You can't eat all those Pringles. [takes one off my plate]
Evelynne: AAAAAAAAGH! OH MY GOD I HATE YOU! YOU SUCK!!!
Poindexter: [laughs delightedly and kisses me]

I rarely see him as happy as he is when I am screaming at him in mock anger. He's happy when his mother does it, too. I'm sure the neighbors must think I'm the biggest shrew because they don't hear him laughing in delight. I am much louder than he is at these times.

So that was my evening.

And in other news, I caved to the OMG I LOVE IT I WANT IT today and bought the coat. Didn't get to see Barry, though. :(

Are you sick of hearing about my tug of war between my inner tweed freak and my inner miser? If not, read on.

This coat is on a level with the pink tweed hat, I know. It's okay if you hate it. BUT I LOVE IT. I CAN'T HELP IT. I thought about it for two days, went back, tried it on, left the store to go to another to buy a beloved but MUCH CHEAPER shirt ($12), then came back and caved, even though it was crappily made. I justified it to myself in the following ways:

1. I LOVE IT.
2. I can afford it.
3. I have been good about buying things that are practical, sensible, and will last a long time. It's okay to splurge on something ridiculous once in a while. I'll wear it to death from now through April.
4. The only time anybody sees me, I'm wearing a coat. If I'm going to splurge on anything, it should be a coat, especially since I can wear it every day.

I am still feeling bad about its crappily-made-ness, and thinking I should return it since it was overpriced, so I hung it on the office door, tags on, so I could think about it. Every now and then I look over at it and my chest constricts with red-tweed-love.

I'm insane.

P.S. As I was about to post this, Poindexter came over and played with my hair.

Poindexter: "Whatcha doing?"
Evelynne: Writing. About the coat and the Pringles.
Poindexter: [maniacal look on face] I'm going to take ALL THE PRINGLES to work! While you are SLEEPING!
Evelynne: You SUCK!
Poindexter: [laughs delightedly]

Mutually satisfying weirdness -- that's love, all right.

Tuesday, February 15th, 2005

I realized that it's been about two weeks since I posted. I'm avoiding it because work is busy (in a fun, productive way) and I haven't figured out how to handle posting and work, so I just avoid posting. All is well, though.

What I do instead of posting, since it doesn't suck me in as much, is look at the Fall 2005 Ready-to-Wear slide shows at vogue.co.uk. I found out that I like some Anna Sui pieces, even though I can't quite see myself wearing head-to-toe Anna Sui. I like this outfit, minus the fussy boots. What I'm trying to do is find out which trends from last fall will still be present next fall, so that I can buy stuff I like (gold and brocade, in particular) at the 80% off sales that are happening now.

Poindexter was sick last week, and I have a scratchy throat for the second day in row, but I am sleeping a lot and ingesting vitamin C/zinc/echinacea pills in a perhaps vain attempt to stave it off. We shall see.

Anyway, I wrote this last week so I figure I'll post it so y'all don't forget I exist.

My husband is a creature of habit. He has routines for everything, from getting dressed to showering to making his sandwiches. He drinks water until noon, then he switches to Coke, then after he finishes his dinner Coke he has juice until bedtime. Unless caffeine is an issue (as when driving long distances), he ALWAYS drinks Coke. At work, he eats lunch precisely at noon. He won't eat lunch before noon as a general rule (I, on the other hand, eat when I'm hungry, whether that's 10:45 or 1:30).

He's been like this as long as we've been a couple. He told me right off that when he's on a travel assignment, for example, having his routines helps make him comfortable in a strange place. And I am comfortable knowing what his routines are and being able to anticipate them.

Every now and then, though, he'll CHANGE SOMETHING. And it freaks me out. He switched to root beer for a few months once. As long as we'd been a couple, he drank Coke. Water in the morning, Coke from lunchtime on. Only Coke. Not Pepsi. Then one day he says, "I'm thinking about switching to root beer." I was flabbergasted.

On planes, we both like to get Mr. & Mrs. T's Bloody Mary Mix. We just get the mix. We've been doing this for almost ten years, every time we travel. Occasionally at our favorite brunch place he will get a Virgin Mary.

When we flew back from California, Poindexter was in first class (one of those weird last-minute situations where it was cheaper than coach) and we were able to get me upgraded. He orders "a bloody mary". The flight attendant brings it over with two little airplane bottles of vodka. I looked at Poindexter in surprise and said, "Are you gonna have some o' that?" He had a little tiny smirk at that side of his mouth and said, "I'm thinkin' about it."

Evelynne: *gape*
Poindexter: What?
Evelynne: *gape*
Poindexter: What?! [he knows perfectly well what]
Evelynne: You NEVER ... I have NEVER seen you put vodka in your bloody mary mix!
Poindexter: [smirking, one-shouldered shrug] It's free. It's after noon. We're in first class.

Sometimes I think he does this just to freak me out.

Anyway, one other habit that Poindexter used to have was that he loved to drink coffee. At some point it started to bother his stomach, and he couldn't drink it anymore. He has told me about his coffee routines of yore, how he drank his coffee, putting just a tiny bit of milk in it to change the color, and about the coffee he drank out of the machines in college. But none of this was familiar to me because I've never seen him do it. Occasionally he would try to drink some coffee -- his mom gets the low-acid Sumatra -- but after a few days it would start to irritate his stomach again, so it's never become a habit.

Well.

The other day at work he was IMing me about how sleepy he was, and I said, "Have a little coffee, just half a cup or something." And I started Googling low acid coffee, looking to see about special beans. But what REALLY looked interesting was the cold brewer. Apparently the cold-brew method doesn't release acids and oils from the beans, the things that irritate people's stomachs. And supposedly it made for a smoother cup of coffee. I saw that there was a 30-day money-back guarantee on the thing, which was all I needed to be convinced, and ordered one.

We are SERIOUSLY impressed. It seems like a very weird way to make coffee, but damn if it doesn't taste really good. It's smoother, has less "bite", and no bitter aftertaste. Just a pure smooth coffee flavor. We agreed that it "tastes more like coffee" -- I think what I mean myself is that it tastes more like coffee smells. You know how after drinking hot-brewed coffee you have a kind of film in your mouth afterwards of bitter coffeeness? That doesn't happen with the cold brewer. We brought the concentrate over to our friends' house (they are day-long coffee drinkers) and they were also bowled over by how good it tasted and are planning to get one of their own.

So now I'm watching Poindexter go through his coffee routine. :) He doesn't just drink his coffee, he cuddles with his cup. Wraps his fingers around it and holds it when he's not sipping. Now if I could just get used to the coffee breath.

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