girls are weird.

23 August 2006

and no one got hit by lightning

I'm at home today; my cold has moved down into my chest. There's a lot of room down there, so why not. Anyhoo, here are some pictures from Sunday's christening, and I'm pleased to say that a plague of locusts did not descend upon me. Some pictures of note: cream tea in a graveyard (no, really) and Tom Baker's headstone (no, really). In all seriousness, it was a fantastic day and I'm honoured to be godmummy to this lovely little boy.

I must take this opportunity to apologise to my dog. Not only did I remove his blog from this site, I no longer update his picture page and he has to put up with stuff like this on a daily basis:

Video Hosting - Upload Video - Video Sharing

I'm so sorry, Jaspey. I promise to make it up to you.

[posted by: Lisa Durbin] --

20 August 2006

see you in the funny papers

We made today's edition of the Sunday Express magazine, albeit with the wrong URL. If anyone reading this is wondering why this blog doesn't mention babies, stretchmarks, toddler temper tantrums, and the astonishing variety of nappy sizes, please click here to go to my baby blog.

To see a bigger pic of the Express interview, click here.

[posted by: Lisa Durbin] --

18 August 2006

fairy godmother

I'm at home today with a miserable, stinking, streaming, crappy ass cold. My throat, eyes, and face hurt. That's right, my face hurts. (Which reminds me of that old schoolground joke: "Does your face hurt? 'Cos it's KILLING me!" har har har) The only one home with me right now is the dog, and he's ignoring me in favour of a nap on his beanbag. Man's best friend, indeed.

I'm trying to get lots of rest today so that I'm in reasonable shape on Sunday, when Paul and I become godparents to our little cousin Marcus. I've never been a godmother before, and I'm sincerely hoping that the vicar won't ask me if I actually attend church or subscribe to any particular religion. Maybe I could mention that I have indeed been baptised and confirmed, and then say something like "Pardon? Coming!" and dash out the door. I envision the following:

Vicar: "Do you promise to help raise Marcus following the beliefs of the Church of England?"
Me: "Um. Yes?"
[All the lights go out, a loud clap of thunder is heard.]
Loud echoey disembodied male voice: "Pfffft!! As if!"
[A plague of locusts descends, completely ruining the afternoon's cream tea and annoying several relatives.]

In all seriousness, I am over the moon to be a godmother to this lovely little boy. His mum Gail is Jack's "guide mother" (we are heathens, remember?) and she purposely booked her son's christening to fall exactly a year after Jack's naming ceremony. Made me all weepy when she told me, it did. So here's hoping that the cold goes away, the locusts descend elsewhere, and the cream tea is enjoyed by all.

[posted by: Lisa Durbin] --

17 August 2006

an interview with ayun halliday: virtual book tour stop #17

[Copy of today's post on the baby blog.]

So I get an email in my inbox from a lady called Ayun Halliday, asking if I'd like to participate in her virtual book tour for her new book Mama Lama Ding Dong. Suuuuuuure, I thought as my fingers flew to look her up on Amazon. Oh good lord, she's a real author who's published stuff and everything! Rightyo, sign me up then.

It's touted as a "mothering memoir", although that doesn't really do it justice. It's a fun, witty, razor-sharp collection of observations from a mother who can write. We here at blog from : a baby headquarters had the pleasure of interviewing Ms. Halliday for today's stop on her virtual book tour. Please, no shoving and no flash photography.

1. Welcome to blog from : a baby! Are there any demands* you would like to make for this particular stop on your tour? *(I worked in bookstores for many years in Montreal and witnessed peculiar author requests during book signings. For example, Anne Rice demanded Puffs tissues and Tab cola, neither of which was actually available for purchase in Canada. Indeed.)

Oh my god, I can make demands? Shoot, I wish I'd known about this clause for the 16 virtual venues preceding yours on this tour!

As for Puffs, I don't need no stinkin' designer Kleenex! Toilet paper's fine for the likes of me.

2. How about this weather, eh? Pffft! (Lisa's note to Ayun: in Britain, it is mandatory to begin all conversations by complaining about the weather.)

I can't get too complain-y with it today, mate! It was a sunny 82 in NYC today - The kids & I took the subway to the beach at Coney Island! They went on the Free Fall and the Tilt-A-Whirl. We took in the freak show. The East German guy who pulls a surgical glove over his head and inflates it by exhaling in short bursts was there. I bought a $3 Corona from an enterprising, unlicensed vendor patrolling the filthy sand. So, I don't feel inclined to complain about the weather. Not today.

3. Why do an online tour of mummy blogs to promote Mama Lama Ding Dong? How did you come up with the idea?

I had to delay the bricks-and-mortar tour for my most recent book, Dirty Sugar Cookies, because my husband's new play was slated to begin previews the same week that the book was published, and one of us needed to be emotionally and physically available for the children. Afraid that, deprived of the usual shuck and jive, the book might sink like a stone, I went on a virtual tour in support of it, and while that was a lot of work, it was also a lot of fun, not to mention good for sales. Dirty Sugar Cookies is a culinary memoir, so most of the stops on that tour were food blogs, with the occasional lit blog thrown in to spice things up a bit. For Mama Lama Ding Dong, there was never any question that mummy bloggers would provide the most appropriate and enthusiastic venues. While it's thrilling to see one's name in the newspaper, it's important to remember that yesterday's newspaper lines today's bird cages. Web content, for better or worse, hangs around much longer.

I have to admit that I cribbed the blog tour idea (with permission) from my fellow author (and mummy blogger), Andi Buchanan. I'm not sure where she got the idea, but apparently there are a bunch of inspirational business-shelf authors who've been making the virtual rounds for years!

4. Online writing is becoming more prevalent and "regular people" are becoming as well known as published authors through mediums such as blogs. Do you think that people are buying less books on topics like motherhood because they can read boatloads of advice for free on web sites? How do you "compete" with this as a published author?

I think the two compliment each other. People who like to read like to read, period. I enjoy the information superhighway aspect of the web, the fun of clicking through dozens of links, unsure of what I'm going to find, but I also enjoy the sensual aspects of the printed page, the weight of a book in my purse, the idea that I can sneak in a couple of paragraphs while waiting in line at the post office.

Also, my sense of most blogs is that the posts come pretty much off the top of the author's head, which is what gives them their sense of immediacy, however inflammatory it may be. Books go through numerous edits, so presumably, the author has given some thought to what she's saying; it's not so much of a postcard from the id.

Look at it this way: homemade chocolate chip cookies taste great. So does half a tube of Pillsbury Ready-to-Bake, nuked for 30 seconds in the microwave. Must one cancel out the other? I think not.

5. How do you think your book will be received by a British audience? Is the subject matter universal?

The Secretary of Defense assures me the citizens will rush into the streets throwing rose petals. If your intelligence contradicts this, please advise ASAP.

I think the subject matter is fairly universal, at least throughout the Western World. Mothers who can't relate at all are probably inhabit the extreme ends of social class - to a desperately strapped single mother who can barely scrape together her child's daycare with the minimum wage she receives at Walmart, I must seem like a pampered matron who doesn't have anything to complain about. And to the wealthiest of the wealthy, whose employees handle the laundry and meals, I'm some sort of boho kook, rolling around in a hovel. And that's just the Western world! I'm sure your average mom in Darfur has completely different parameters for what constitutes stress.

As far as loving our children, and hoping for their continued health and happiness, and comprehending that life as we knew it before children has been irrevocably altered, yes, that I think is universal.

6. What's surprised you most about being a mother?

The physically grueling aspect. The carrying, the juggling, the deferment of one's own comfort to accommodate the human being squirming on one's lap at meal time, the alarum that bids one to wake in the middle of the night, trying to use a public toilet without putting the baby on the floor, the constant dressing and undressing, the impossibility of anything but the most military of showers.

7. What is the most annoying myth about motherhood you've come across, either in everyday life or in the media?

That motherhood confers frumpiness rather than respect. Though Saturday Night Live's "Mom Jeans" commercial is pretty funny.

8. And finally, will you promise to tell all of your American friends that it doesn't always rain in England, the food is actually quite tasty, and surprisingly, some people have rather nice sets of teeth?

Oh, we've heard all about your heat wave and Nigella Lawson and your dazzling choppers! But I'll endeavor to keep spreading the word.

[posted by: Lisa Durbin] --

15 August 2006

krispy krack

I'm fairly certain that Krispy Kreme coats their doughnuts in some sort of highly addictive drug. I went in to said establishment on Sunday to purchase one doughnut and while I was in the queue, a spotty young lad leaned over to me and said "Are you interested?" "Erm...in what?" I asked. "A hot, fresh doughnut - a free taster." He handed me a sticky warm doughnut that went down in three bites, and as I took the last bite, the girl behind the counter asked how many doughnuts I'd like. "Two. No, three! THREE!" I paid for my goods and left feeling a little bit dirty and ashamed.

Now the odd part is, around ten minutes after eating the free doughnut, I was hungry again. Coincidence? I think not.

[posted by: Lisa Durbin] --

13 August 2006

or not

We do apologise - apparently Jack and I are not in today's Sunday Express magazine. We shall scan the article in and post it here whenever it does go public.

If any of you did run out and buy a copy (that would be all one of you: Paul), I hope you enjoyed the free Paul Weller CD. Jack found it very tasty.

[posted by: Lisa Durbin] --

11 August 2006

waiting for richard and judy to call

For those of you in the UK, Jack and I will be appearing in the Sunday Express' magazine this weekend. A nice journalist lady got in touch with me about baby blogging and interviewed me (and two others, I think), and then a nice photographer man came over and took our picture. I actually don't have twelve chins in the picture; I'm all agog.

Yeah it ain't the Guardian, but it'll be a nice souvenir for Jack.

[posted by: Lisa Durbin] --

09 August 2006

pump it up

I really love water pressure. Seriously, I love the kind of showers that rinse your hair in under ten seconds, blast off the first four layers of your skin, and pummel you into consciousness every morning. We have the water pressure of a vigorous watering can, so you can imagine my glee when Paul decided to tear the en suite bathroom apart last weekend and confirmed that we will get a new shower pump.

I don't care how pathetic this makes me sound; I believe that one of life's pleasures is a good shower. There is nothing worse than standing under a trickle of water, flapping my hair about in an attempt to get the shampoo out, but it only keeps getting soapier. When you've got a small child, time is of the essence. You don't have the luxury of taking a long steamy shower, you've got to get in and out in three minutes before your child starts screaming or figures out how to work the oven.

Water pressure makes me happy. This has absolutely nothing to do with my fireman fixation, I'll have you know.

[posted by: Lisa Durbin] --

03 August 2006

do you know the muffin woman?

I learn some great colloquialisms from Heat magazine, the latest of which is "muffin tops". This is the condition in which your jeans are slightly too tight and all of your fat squishes up and spills over the top of the waistband, giving you the appearance of a muffin. I laughed heartily when I read this phrase until one day, I saw the muffin staring back at me in the mirror. It's like someone left me too long to rise and my doughy middle has exploded in protest. If you poke my tummy, I make a "hee hee!" noise.

Perhaps I should forego cake Friday from now on. And maybe not eat the giant box of chocolates sitting on my desk. Or go to America for two weeks in October.

I'm doomed.

[posted by: Lisa Durbin] --