megfowler.com

But a better shot of the new bangs:

And whoa on the camera phone. That baby is decent.

Via my camera phone.

And um, unstyled and frizzy.

And um, no makeup.

I’ve never seen a real firefly.

A warm peach straight off the tree is like holding love in your hand.

A good towel snap is better than a firecracker.

The best dreams are the ones you can’t recall… but you can’t stop smiling when you wake up.

Hockey makes up for the fact that our national animal is the beaver.

I believe everyone can dance. Just not to the same song.

Sometimes I wish I was still getting my life perspective from Peanuts.

The best form of therapy I know is chopping vegetables.

When I’m so happy that I close my eyes, what I see is the one thing I’ve never been able to put into words.

When my feet are tanned, I am always more right with the world.

The more expensive the sunglasses, the sooner I’ll break them.

Every boy I ever thought twice about has at least five songs attached to him in my heart.

My mother’s laugh is what my laugh is becoming.

If randomness was a virtue, I’d be a saint.

Because it should be a tradition, y’all.

I’m posting more stuff I love in, simply in honour of Friday. I never really run out, anyway.

THINGS I LOVE

Eating a million pounds of juicy summer cherries
Cracking up publicly at a text message
White sundresses
Freckles
Odd brown shirts you buy for $7 at Old Navy that make you look 20% more fun
Men with deep voices
The Colbert Report
My old Thierry Mugler Angel perfume
Giant tufts of pale pink cotton candy
Americano Mistos
What a Fool Believes
Salmon sashimi
Scrabulous on Facebook
My mom coming to get me when I was dizzy/teary at work
Mark Ronson
Twittering
LISTS
How loudly I can snap my fingers
Interpretive dance at work
My heterolifemate Catherine
The upcoming Fantasy Football season
When I manage to say the right thing, against all awkward odds
Open deck doors
Aviator glasses
Bounce softener
Foggy nights
Hot pink toenails
Bouquets in just one colour (pink, white, green…)
The idea of having my own advice column
Fudgesicles
Long drives
Fresh salsa
Hoop earrings
YOU!

As I said last time…

I challenge everyone to post a love list on their own blogs, even if you think it’s horribly cheesy and eye-rolling. And if you have no blog, do it in the comments here! Celebrate something good.

I want to know what you love!

Today’s list comes to you courtesy of the arachnid that decided to scale the majestic heights of ME.

Basically, Mr. Shirt Spider left me twitching like a junebug in a skillet. Every time my hair touches my neck, I do an odd sort of squealy dance.

(Which sounds like Steely Dan, but is very different.)

I’ve decided that the only solution to my issue is to cleanse my jittery, flappy-armed soul with a complete list of all the things/sensations/experiences that COMPLETELY skeeve me out. The Skeeve List, as it were.

If you decide to make your own Skeeve List on your own blog, please link to it in the comments. And if you don’t have a blog, fill up the comments with skeevitude. Everyone loves a good skeeve.

I’m twitching involuntarily RIGHT NOW!

THE TOP 30 SKEEVES

1. The noise that junebugs make, slamming into lightbulbs.
2. The smooshy dark green sliminess of no-longer-fresh lettuce.
3. Teeth covered in lipstick.
4. Clammy handshakes.
5. Touching Styrofoam with freshly-trimmed fingernails.
6. Deep, chest-clearing coughs by people you don’t know in your immediate proximity (elevator, bus, coffee shop lineup, TB clinic waiting room)
7. Silverfish.
8. The sound of cottage cheese doing anything at all.
9. Pickled things that should not be pickled (eyeballs, eggs, hooves, lips, ears)
10. Canned gravy.
11. Guys who refer to their friends as “the posse.”
12. Moist towelettes.
13. Earwigs on ceilings (HE’S GOING TO FALL INTO YOUR EAR AND EAT YOUR BRAIN!)
14. People who pat your back weakly when they hug you.
15. Chains lodged in chest hair.
16. Axe body spray.
17. Those neon car lights under the chassis (or whatever the correct term would be.) Custom, yo!
18. Mouth-open eating of any kind.
19. Jellied salads.
20. Gas station bathrooms.
21. Excessive mayo in sandwiches.
22. Blue foods.
23. Leather bikinis.
24. Ultimate Fighting.
25. Men in unlined bathing suits. STOP IT.
26. Costco-size Velveeta.
27. Spiders that are not in gardens or the desert somewhere, stalking insects for documentaries.
28. Humidity.
29. Black bra, white t-shirt.
30. Sour cream and onion chips.

COME SKEEVE WITH ME!

1. Just how bananas I’d look if the paparazzi followed ME around all day long.

2. If moms should transition to “BFF” status before their kids turn 25.

3. Why someone isn’t following me around with a tray of pastries. And also? Why I nearly typed “pasties” there.

4. If eating salsa at 10 pm was part of the reason I didn’t sleep for longer than half an hour last night.

5. Why, for the thousandth time in a row, the sun is emerging on Monday after a crappy weather weekend.

6. How to be honest about frustration without resorting to crabbiness.

7. If I have time this week to bring sexy back.

8. How one actually gets up the gumption to redecorate… and I don’t just mean ripping out pages from magazines and going, “And that colour paint… and those pillows….”

9. Why a shirt I hate can go stainless for years, but a shirt I love seems to pull dirt out of thin air.

10. If I will ever stop cringing at the term “skinny jeans.”

Afraid I’ve forgotten how to sleep in.

In love with Bill Kurtis.

Impatient with myself.

Craving a lemon-brown sugar crepe.

Oddly sore, but still fending off dizzy.

Considering coffee.

Needing to do laundry.

Quite freckly.

Liberal… and not just with the hot sauce.

Conservative… and not just with actually wearing underwear when I go out at night.

Wishing I was at a cabin on an island, just waking up with a cup of coffee on the dock.

Very good at making salsa.

More like my mother than I think.

Missing my camera.

Looking around at a cluttered room with a sigh.

In the mood to dance.

Running out of clothes that are in decent shape.

Thankful for wireless internet.

Seeking a bit of inspiration.

Working on my consistency.

All done with the dishes.

Laughing at David Sedaris.

Highly imperfect, in every way.

A closet Optimist, wearing my Realist t-shirt. With Pessimist earrings.

I’m having one of those weeks where dealing with my health is like dealing with an overtired three year-old.

In other words? You can’t deal with it.

You just want to put it to bed where tears will ensue, and then? Sleep.

Ahhh, sleep.

Sleep would be awesome if sleeping was something I did with any facility, but you can bet I’d be far more skilled at the whole process if I were an overtired three year-old.

And that, my friends, is what we call talking in circles. Thank you. Now I’m dizzy.

But.

I’ve had to come up with things to do instead of sleeping that make life bearable when I’m tripping out on migraines, getting “haha! no baby for you, but how about THIS!” morning nausea, dealing with see-saw mood swings (which I can look at with eerie objectivity, even as I threaten the entire produce section with a loaded banana, weeping for my youth), and indulging in “magic internal sauna” hot flashes.

My current favourite coping mechanism is to focus on things that make me HAPPY. Not that I’m unhappy right now — mostly just mildly irked and impatient with myself and my body. But the more you focus on the things that make you happy, the more you realize just how much capacity for happiness you have and LO! Life is better.

I know what you’re thinking: “Meg, Pollyanna totally invented that. And Maria from Sound of Music.”

Yes, yes. I know. But we’re not going to talk blue satin sashes or chandelier crystals right now, people. That stuff is for nuns and little girls and I am neither (AM NOT! SHUT UP!)

We’re talking about this…

THINGS THAT MAKE ME HAPPY JUST TO LOOK UPON THEM. WHICH IS DIFFERENT FROM THINGS I LOVE BECAUSE THINGS I LOVE DON’T ALWAYS MAKE ME HAPPY (HELLO MEN!) AND YES, THEY ARE PRIMARILY SHALLOW.

Mrs. John L. Strong Red Purse Cards.

This literally made me laugh until I cried at work. Especially the other passengers questioning him.

The Lipstick Mini Calla bouquet. here

This man’s extraordinary eye for style and personality in a photo.

The magical power this could have over my face.

This. Come ON NOW. My future husband is fully a Beaker/Paul Bettany/John Cusack/Jacques Pepin/Tom Brady hybrid (Don’t even try and imagine it, it will BLOW YOUR MIND.)

This mirror. I need a mirror. Not to look at myself in (gah!) but to reflect jolly light about my room.

The entire contents of this website.

I TOLD YOU I NEEDED ONE.

One day, mon cher. One day.

I used to be a camp director. I remain impossibly evil.

A vision of my distant future, as incited by my dear friend and torturer, Eric. He brought his into my home. I swear I found Martin weeping in a corner from insecurity. As much as an iBook can weep. It looks like he’s just sitting there not doing anything, but you can feel his hurt every time the little breathing light sighs.

This t-shirt.

Ahhh, happy.

I just ate half a can of Pringles (WHY IS THERE A WIKIPEDIA ENTRY FOR PRINGLES? I was, however, intrigued to learn of the ‘Consomme’ and ‘Devil Hot’ varieties.)

This is a) not good for me, I realize, BUT b) happens to be the indulgence I credit with settling my hormonally induced nausea and my dizzy head. I have no proof to back up this contention. But I’m sticking to it in a last-ditch effort to justify the amount of sodium I just consumed.

In other anutritional news… (I just invented a word! Like ‘amoral’ or ‘apathetic’, I’m using ‘anutritional’ to designate foods unconcerned with their own nutritional value… unlike soy, which just beats you over the head with healing powers. I’m so tired of hearing about soy like it was the cotton candy-flavoured cure for cancer. Anyway, if this word already exists, don’t tell me. Did I mention hormone-addled?)

I am now craving Cheese Whiz on celery. I don’t even like Cheese Whiz. I DO like celery, but I think it’s only supposed to be served with hot wings and blue cheese dip. Correct me if I’m wrong.

I’m listening to Pachelbel’s Canon in an effort to calm myself, but all it’s doing is making me think of weddings. My co-worker informed me that she has a recording where they’ve inserted wave sounds into the piece. Now, every time she hears it, all she wants to do is pee.

I think that would make for a hell of a good wedding prank.

I’ve switched to Doobie Brothers: ‘What a Fool Believes.’ Now, have you ever heard more happy keyboards on a sad song? It’s totally confusing to process the lyrics within the bouncy framework of the melody… which is, actually, exactly how I’m feeling right now. If Morrissey wrote a song with ABBA, that would be the personification of my current flow of thought.

I was going to roast a chicken for my dinner, but then I realized I didn’t have a roasting pan. How sad is that? 33 and no roasting pan. I don’t know why I’m hanging my hat on the absence of culinary equipment as an indicator of delayed personal development, but it just seems like I should be able to roast by now. I know I’ve roasted before. How did I do it? Did I own one before? Did I lose it in my divorce? Wait, was I ever divorced? Was he a nice guy? Should I have given it another chance?

Not if the bastard took my roaster, I shouldn’t. He was always so selfish. And not just in the kitchen, nudge nudge.

I feel like lying down and napping for the rest of the decade. It’s not really practical, though, because one still needs to eat and work and pay rent and obsess about Apple products, right? You can’t just shut down. Besides, I can’t nap to save my life.

(Well, okay… maybe to save my life. But if someone was holding a gun to your head, could you really drift off? I’d think you’d be kind of afraid to close your eyes or snuggle in or think nice thoughts about Paul Bettany. “You mean if I nap, you won’t kill me? Alright then, where’s my Vellux blanket and my white noise machine? I want to live!”)

I guess I will just make it through the evening and maybe go to bed at a reasonable time like a reasonable girl. Either that, or (as per my usual habit) I will discover I feel better by 8 pm and proceed to stay up another four hours just to revel in the magic of normalcy.

I wish there was a way to combine doing laundry and getting a pedicure and eating sushi and falling in love and swimming into a single act. Because that would be an even better way to spend four hours. One can only revel so much in their normalcy before they start to seem weird or Ohioan.

And on that note… I have to go get groceries. How are you?

For Darren:

1. What is your favorite word?

Bliss

2. What is your least favorite word?

Apathy

3. What turns you on?

Passion

4. What turns you off?

Predictability

5. What sound or noise do you love?

The squeak of guitar strings

6. What sound or noise do you hate?

My neighbours at 4 am

7. What is your favorite curse word?

Damn

8. What profession other than your own would you like to attempt?

Interior designer

9. What profession would you not like to do?

Nun

10. If Heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the Pearly Gates?

“Dude, I told you to watch out for the sharp dropoffs.”

Go do it on your blog, and come back to give us the link in comments. And if you don’t have a blog, just do it here!