But In Other News

Next Sunday we will have a "home visit" from a representative of a rescue agency to see if we are fit parents for a DOG. I am both over the moon that they liked our application, and terrified at what a massive life change this may be. We have been scouring PetFinder for months now oooh-ing and aaah-ing over different dogs, but this one seems perfect for us and has been fostered with cats and is very gentle with no aggression issues nor prey drive, and is a big mellow guy in the house. So we will see what happens! I just remind myself that, just like having a baby, a million people do this all the time and it will be fine no matter what.

Speaking of having a baby, I need to get on that. I am hoping that we will concieve when we are out in Dallas for Ashbloem's wedding. I am super fertile THAT WEEKEND and feel like it would be lucky somehow. I know that is completely irrational. I just would love to have a weekend of wild hotel sex and fun times to celebrate my good friend's wedding and get pregnant that way. I've found I've been weirdly superstitious about this, about the "vibe" surrounding conception, which is nonsense.

You know what drives me crazy? Shitty examples and sloppy writing in the New York Times. Yeah, my writing is sloppy at times on this blog. Guess what, it's a blog that now like 6 people read. I'm not Cathy Horyn, writing:

What separates the nerdish Bruce Banner, who morphs into the Incredible Hulk, from the mousy Luisa Annan, who as the outlandish Marchesa Casati aspired to look like a wild animal and for one Belle Époque-era ball wore a necklace of live, writhing snakes?
The answer is nothing. They each make their claim on the world by becoming Another.

Well, no, because Bruce Banner CANNOT HELP becoming The Hulk, and Luisa Annan decided to put on a costume. Sloppy work, Cathy. You should have picked Catwoman instead of The Hulk.

In this vein, I had a troubling interaction with my sister-in-law a month or so ago. We were discussing homeschooling and she was singing the praises of some program that used a method called "stylistic writing" which I guess was meant to encourage liberal use of the thesaurus.

Me: What do you mean by "stylistic"? I asked, politely.

SIL: Stylistic! she said, you know, where instead of "blue" you would say "cerulean", or "devoured" instead of "ate"...

Me: Do you mean "stylized"? I asked, again, being as neutral as I possibly could.

SIL: No, I mean STYLISTIC!

Sigh. It did not seem kind or appropriate to state that over my dead body would I use a homeschool curriculum that encourages your kids to be shitty, shitty, shitty writers.

And lo! I got my tax rebate in the bank account today! What a joke! But at least there will be cash on hand to pay a certain adoption fee if it comes to that!