Bad news: Our espresso machine died this morning.

Good news: A gift card my boss gave me at our wedding for Hold Everything that we've never used is also good at Williams-Sonoma. Hello, new espresso machine!

Totally unrelated good news, although it is about awakeness and thus could be at least tangentially linked to espresso machines (though in this case it isn't): Matilda is taking her first real nap of the day today; she's been either fully awake or catnapping since 7:00 this morning, which makes today the most awake day she's ever had -- potentially, maybe, just maybe, good sleepy news for tonight.

Also unrelated good news: She is even more absurdly cute when awake than when asleep. Also, she's gaining enough weight and getting enough heft to her that it's possible to snuzzle her up and raspberry her belly without fear of breaking her.

Have already worked 30 hours this week.

That is appallingly wrong.

Change of weather/season at all can be tough on the brain. {{{Bitches}}}

I had an absurdly fun night at quilt night. One of my favorite ladies (we'll call her Pat, because, well, that's her name) asked me tonight if I was ready to go on a date with Mr. Smiley (that's what she calls her gardener). So, I look at dear Pat and say, not exactly quietly (but out of ear of my mother!), "Is he the one with the nice ass?" Oh, my! I've never seen any grown woman turn so red! She's all, "I said that, didn't I? I said he has a nice ass? I'm a horrible grown woman--talking about my gardener with the nice ass. So, you wanna date him?" So, we all spent the rest of the night conspiring on how I could suddenly show up some day while he's working. Apparently, he's Brazilian, smiles all the time, has a nice ass, and LOVES American girls. What could possibly be better?

I wanted to ask Pat if I should get a Brazilian wax in preparation for the meeting, but I figured I'd embarrassed her enough for one night...I didn't need to potentially explain to a bunch of women my mother's age what a Brazilian wax was...and have my mother walk in on it. I just smiled while I thought about it.

(eta: not that I think that all of the women there would be clueless about the waxing, but there would be at least one...and the explaining would have been hysterical with a little help from my friends.)

Nice asses are ... nice.

Wint-O-Green LifeSavers make everything more fun, including anxiety attacks.

Today was a long day.

I've got to figure out what to write for my personal statement for the Israel volunteer program. 400 words about why I want to go. I'm horrible at getting this into words -- I've got three sentences so far. Anybody have suggestions on what to write? There are only so many ways I can say "because I want to help out." My mom suggested also saying something like "so that people there can see that people here care about what's going on," but I'm not sure I can get 350 more words out of just that.

Hil, could you mention your last trip, and that you (if you did) found it moving to be in the land of your more ancient ancestors? Is there any kind of connection you could make between your desire to help and the fact that so many Jewish Israelis are Holocaust survivors or the offspring of same? Could you say something about wanting to counter all the war, aggression and destruction in the world by building something up, which seems to be an act of peace? Could you say something about it being a mitvah?

I have all these coulds, because I don't know why you want to help other than that you're a good woman, and because the idea has captured your mind and heart in some way or another.

Could you say something about wanting to counter all the war, aggression and destruction in the world by building something up, which seems to be an act of peace?

Oooh, thanks. That's exactly what I was trying to say but couldn't put into words.

According to the comments the tiny creature in the tiara is a baby hamster.

Also, Hil, how can you help out? What skills do you have that can be put to use?

But Meschantes recommends ordering a size 4-6 inches smaller than your natural waistline, because their corsets can -- with proper training -- reduce your waist by that much.

Sadly, these days I can lace my meschantes corset shut, and it's not THAT tight, when I do.

Of course, I ordered a new corset (from Timeless Treasures--$99 for an underbust corset, though not custom), and went by their guidelines, and apparently should've ordered a smaller size--when I tried my friend's on by myself, I thought it'd be perfect, but having her lace me into it Saturday night, it was basically laced shut. I think it's because my middle is all smushy.

(Edit: That said, I LOOOOOOOVE my new corset, which is black with white pinstripes, and fits great, and looks super super hot, and I can't wait until I can put up pictures!)