Queen Mediocretia of Suburbia

Putting the TMI in absentminded

Month: February 2023

  • Kids / Brothers

    Every woman without children needs an arsenal of reasons to defend that decision. People with children want to know “why not,” especially the ones who never asked themselves “why.” I have plenty of reasons, but now that my brother Dave’s gone I realize I have more. He required a lot of emotional care, and of…

  • This is a Real Thing You Can Buy

    I need to look up recipes using this.

  • A Long-Awaited Victory

    I don’t like seeing unexpected FedEx envelopes on my doorstep. (FedUnEx?) I half-expected a document for Gary about his new car, but it was a document from the Kidney Foundation about the old car. Our donation couldn’t go through, because the title didn’t show proof that the car had been paid off, and if I…

  • February Rogue Bear News

    The Saint Louis Zoo houses a particular type of bear I always understood to be a spectacled bear. According to Wikipedia it is a bear known variously as a spectacled, South American, Andean, short-faced, mountain, jukumari, ukumari, or ukuku bear. Saint Louisans, correct me if I am wrong, but was it the spectacled bear who…

  • Kindness

    Our work project meeting took a break for lunch, and while I did turn off my video, I did not mute. For the past three years this would have been fine, because lunch is when you do the laundry, and make dinner. Who stays at their desk listening to the phone at lunch? Who? People…

  • Weekly Paint Progress: 2/23

    This week the sea went from this: … to this. I know it doesn’t like I did anything. But I worked on the cloud, and I darkened the area where Big Rock A meets Big Rock B, and I carried the green over into the wave. And I added three rocks, though only two were…

  • Costume Dramas of My Youth: Jennie

    So, after watching Lillie I redoubled my efforts to find Jennie:Lady Randolph Churchill, the 1970’s miniseries I watched with my Mom when I was 11 or 12. Cruelly, it isn’t shown in the U.S. for whatever reason. Is it like that one libelous book on the JFK assassination? Has it been suppressed since the 70s?…

  • Costume Dramas of My Youth: Lillie

    In my continuing quest to find a venue to watch my seminal costume drama, Jennie, I made a detour and found Lillie, about Lillie Langtry. I must have seen this in my early teens and forgotten it, because it was full of references I have carried with me for life. They take license and have…

  • The Assessment Office

    I made a mistake two years ago when I donated the red Mini. Somehow that screwed up my personal property tax. (In Missouri we pay a yearly tax on any pricey non-home items we own.) With some guidance from the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV), I did better when we donated the Fit. I had…

  • Challenge

    In 2008, around the time of Dave Louis, a small sports car challenged my little red Mini at a stoplight. This is how I behaved. Fifteen years later? A small purple sports car challenged my new electric Mini at a stoplight. This time, I looked at the little purple car on my right VROOM-ing away…