November 23, 2009 | Other Bloggers

You guys all know about Neil’s Great Interview Experiment, right? This year I got the privilege of interviewing Hilly from Snackiepoo.

If you don’t read her, you really should. Need proof? Read this.

Now without further ado, behold Hilly (and my mad interviewing skillz):

1) Where the hell is your about page?
It’s right here! Okay okay, to be fair, I created it *after* you asked me this question because I wanted to be able to say I made an About Page just for you!  The truth is that I took down my About Page right after I got separated and moved to Florida because I honestly had no idea what I was “about” at the time.  It’s amazing how loss of any kind can mess with your mind so much that you forget that even though some of your outside forces have changed, who you are on the inside basically remains the same.  I spent too much time in my marriage letting both him and the marriage define me and now, I define myself.  It was actually awesome to go write my About Page last weekend and have it be way easy peasy lemon squeezy.  Thanks for asking this question…you pushed me in a good direction!

2) What is the best book you ever read? Fiction? Non-Fiction?
These questions are always the hardest because for me “best” is always subjective and is ever-changing with my mood and what I’m going through in my life.  I will have to say that there are two works of Fiction that have always stuck with me and they are classics.  I love both Of Mice and Men and Jane Eyre for very different reasons, obviously.  Even though they both are about very different things, there’s a twistiness about their insides that speaks to me.  As far as Non-Fiction goes, this is going to make me sound soooo uncool but I cannot stand Non-Fiction books in general.  I know that’s a very broad statement so let me backtrack…I don’t generally prefer Non-Fiction even though I will read something if I get in the mood.  I generally go for books that will help my guts like The Purpose Driven Life or The Four Agreements.  I think the best work of Non-Fiction I’ve ever read though has to be The Bible, which some would argue is Fiction.  To me, it’s not.

3) What is your favorite movie of all time and why?
Dude, again with the favorites!  I kid, I kid…mostly.  I was just having a discussion about this with a group of people the other day and we decided that it’s really hard to say you have a favorite movie because really, each genre that exists is so different.  I mean, I can watch Pride & Prejudice (Colin Firth BBC version), Gone With the Wind, and The Wizard of Oz over and over again and never tire of them.  When I’m in a chick flick mood, Bridget does it for me every time.  When I’m in the mood for horror, I have a penchant for those Hellraiser dudes even though the acting in those movies is horrible!  When I am in the mood for a musical, I put on Grease or Into the Woods.  I guess if I really truly had to pick a favorite though, it would be Pulp Fiction.  Or maybe The Princess Bride.  Or maybe Moulin Rouge.  Yikes!  Actually, if I really seriously totally have to pick ONE?  Amélie.

4) Name your top three albums of all time.
Ahhhh, okay…this one will be a wee bit easier.  Mostly. I mean, you are totally having me define myself here today!  It’s all crazy for a girl who normally just talks about emotional bullshit.
1.  Tori Amos – Little Earthquakes
2. Depeche Mode – Black Celebration
3.  Sarah Brightman – Eden

5) If you were sentenced to death what would you choose for your last meal?
I’d probably be too nervous to eat but if I had to?  Crispy chicken tacos (made with an oily-ass shell), dripping with cheese and meat then a nice filet mignon that melted in  mah mouth followed by the most decadent chocolate lava cake ever made.  Oh, and a diet coke.

6) Why do you blog?
I think that the main reason I blog is that I like the sense of community and the friendships that come from knowing someone so intimately.  I know people from all different walks of life, different careers, different relationship choices, etc and it is so amazing to see that deep down inside, most of us are the same.  We have the same needs, wants and feelings on a base level.  I’m always inspired when people write me to thank me for being so open about this divorce process and moving forward because they too are going through it and had no idea that someone out there was feeling exactly the same way.  The second reason that I blog is purely therapeutic.  I can’t afford a therapist so I just sit down and write whatever emotions come to me and let that all flow into whatever I have to say on any given day.  I sometimes (but not often) worry that people who read my blog think that they only emotions I have are the ones that get expressed here when the reality is that I probably pour way more confusion and sadness or anger or whatever onto this blog so that it’s NOT in my soul.

7) What is your favorite blog? (No fair saying one of your own)
Um yeah, way to get me in trouble, Sarah!  I was going to go to my Google Reader and start comparing and contrasting the blogs that I read so that I could make an informed decision and not hurt anyone’s feeling but…fuck it.  I will just go with the first blog that popped into my head when I read this.  I love Faiqa’s blog, Native Born.  She is such an amazing and intelligent woman with a fortitude like none I’ve ever seen before.  She has a way with words that draws you in and makes you feel like she’s talking specifically to you.  She’s just got a way about her (thanks Billy Joel).  These are two of my favorite posts she has written: She Didn’t *Have* To Ask For Her Heart In A Box and Upsy Daisy In The Bed Of Roses. But don’t just read the ones I like…read them all!

* * *

You can read where Natalie interviewed me on her blog The Bobby Pin.

Posted by Goon Squad Sarah @ 12:35 pm | 5 Comments  

November 1, 2009 | Conspiracy Theories, Other Bloggers

This is for Beth.

Feel free to play along.

Posted by Goon Squad Sarah @ 12:09 pm | 11 Comments  

September 2, 2009 | Food, Friends, I Just Logged On My Internet, Other Bloggers

I’m not that great of a cook, but I like food.

Gabe does most of the quality cooking in this joint, but I try to do at least half of the cooking.

This is why I was on the internet trying to figure out how to hard boil an egg.

I mean, yes, I know you boil eggs in a pan with water in it on the stove, but I was looking for cooking times. Hard boiled eggs always trip me up.

I went to my handy dandy search engine and I searched for “perfect hard boiled egg”.

And you want to hear something crazy? I chose the third entry because it looked the most promising and it just so happens that I personally knew the person who wrote the article.

I don’t mean that I met her at a book signing or we were introduced once at a cocktail party. I mean she used to be my boss.

I just took 40 minutes finding a picture of us together from BlogHer ‘07 and it turns out I look like a crazy person with balloon head and so I won’t post it, but thanks to the glory that is Flickr (and the genius of Isabel via twitter):

Picture Courtesy  Mom2Summit flickr pool

We are the two in the middle. I am the pasty one. She is the one with the pretty hair.

My whole point is that what are the odds that I find a random recipe on the internet and it turns out to be written by someone I actually know? Maybe this web isn’t so wide after all.

And also, thanks, Stefania. My eggs were perfect.

Posted by Goon Squad Sarah @ 1:15 pm | 8 Comments  

August 3, 2009 | Books, Other Bloggers

It starts like this:

My first therapist’s name was Neil Diamond, but he didn’t wear sequins, didn’t bring me flowers, and most certainly did not turn on my heartlight…

I read a lot and not many books have me laughing out loud during the freaking prologue.*

The book is called Rage Against the Meshugenah: Why it Takes Balls to Go Nuts and it was written by one of my favorite writers, Danny Evans.

Yes, THAT Danny Evans. Dad Gone Mad, people. Another one of us bloggers has gone legit.

And Danny makes us look good.

The truth is that I have been a huge fan of his for a couple of years now and I would probably say nice things about his book even if it sucked, but I don’t have to.

I was a little concerned that a book about clinical depression would be a real downer. There are certain topics that hit close to home and “Rage” hit on a couple of these for me. For example, besides just being sports fans and bloggers Danny and I have something else in common, we both lost any faith we had (and by faith I mean a belief system, like me in the corner, me in the spotlight kind of faith) after a miscarriage.

We also have this in common:

I don’t like waking up. I like being awake, obviously, because that is when all the good sports are on TV. But the actual transition from sleep to alertness kind of bums me out.

See? I didn’t have to worry about anything written by Danny being a drag, even if it was a memoir about depression.

There was one thing I should have been concerned about. I should have been worried about reading “Rage Against the Meshugenah” in public. You see, I read the end of the book on the train home from New York. Not to ruin the book for you, but the part where his daughter is born made me cry. Not just a few tears, but the kind of crying where your nose runs and all the people on the train look at you funny and your husband is embarrassed because it probably looks like he did something to make you cry like that.

I assure you (and my fellow train passengers) that it was not Gabe, but Mr. Evans that was making me cry like that and then four minutes later making me laugh just as hard as I had previously cried so that I looked like either an asshole or like I was having the worlds worst mood swings ever.

I am not going to tell you what made me laugh like that because I want you to read the book. I want you to buy the book. I ended up with two copies** of it and I am considering buying another one just because I feel like I should be doing more to contribute to Danny success.

He certainly deserves it.

Rage Against the Meshugenah goes on sale tomorrow (August 4th) and you should all read it because if you like what I write, you will love what Danny writes.

(more…)

Posted by Goon Squad Sarah @ 3:45 pm | 11 Comments  

June 29, 2009 | Friends, Other Bloggers

I have a friend that I have known for twenty years. 

Really, we met in 10th grade.

Okay, I don’t really want to talk about the fact that 10th grade was actually 20 years ago, but what I do want to talk about it this – Lori is pregnant with her first child. 

I am giddy. I love babies. I don’t want any more of my own babies but I love other people’s babies. Especially the ones that I can buy weird stuff for without feeling creepy. 

As a bonus, Lori and her husband moved up to my neck of the woods so when the baby is born I will be able to go over to their house whenever I want and hold her, and sing to her, and cuddle her, and smell her little baby head and hand her to one of her parents when she is poopy and then I can go home and sleep for at least seven hours in a row.

Here comes the part I really, really want to tell you about. Even though we all live in the D.C suburbs now, our parents are all still in Florida. A couple of weeks ago Lori’s Mother-in-law threw her a baby shower when she was back home. I couldn’t be there, but since I was driving to Florida to see my parents and my mom was at Lori’s shower and I drove and Lori and Matt flew I brought back some of the bigger shower gifts in my car.

You know the thieving airlines would have charged them a fortune.

Did I mention Lori has a blog? Yes, it is called I’m Not Crazy, Just Well Mixed.

If she isn’t crazy then somebody is going to have to explain this card I got from her in the mail.

See? Crazy. I have been telling people she was nuts since 1989 and now I finally have my proof.

Posted by Goon Squad Sarah @ 6:00 pm | 6 Comments