For a while now, when there’s a bird Soren doesn’t know and we ask what it is, he’ll respond with “hornbill.”

The blocks seen in the above picture have little images on the sides that don’t have letters or numbers. We play with the blocks by building things and by identifying the images. Tonight, it went something like this.

Ben: What’s that? (Image is a bird or bird-like item.)

Soren: Hornbill.

Ben: No, it’s a [whatever]. (Side note: we don’t know what all of the things are.)

Me: LOL

Ben: What’s that? (Image is some sort of animal-related thing.)

Soren: Hornbill.

Ben: No, it’s a [whatever].

Me: Haha LOL

Ben: What’s that? (Image is a star.)

Soren: Star-hornbill.

Me: [Cries.]

It was awesome because he knew I thought it was funny so he kept doing it. Watching a kid develop a sense of humor is just about the best thing ever.

This reminded me of that old Saturday Night Live skit where Sean Connery says “swords” all the time. Apparently you can make me laugh by doing nothing more than repeating a word in the right situation.

SNL – Celebrity Jeopardy (NSC) by nasuacara

I apologize in advance for how long this is going to be. In an effort to keep things as short as possible, here are some links where you can get more information about what’s going on, including a link to a pdf of the draft ordinance:

• Denver Post: “Protests greet final passage of Denver homeless camping ban” (includes links to related articles)
• Huffington Post: “Homeless Camping Ban: Denver City Council Passes City-Wide ‘Urban Camping’ Ban”
• Alliance for Sustainable Colorado: “New Denver City Ordinance to Simply Mask Homelessness, Not Solve It”
• Westword: “For the homeless, ‘urban camping’ is no picnic”
• pdf of the ordinance.

Here is the draft version of the ordinance:

Sec. 38-86.1. – Unauthorized camping on public or private property prohibited.
(a) It shall be unlawful for any person to camp upon any private property without the express written consent of the property owner or the owner’s agent, and only in such locations where camping may be conducted in accordance with any other applicable city law.
(b) It shall be unlawful for any person to camp upon any public property except in any location where camping has been expressly allowed by the officer or agency having the control, management and supervision of the public property in question.
(c) No law enforcement officer shall issue a citation, make an arrest or otherwise enforce this section against any person unless:
(1) The officer orally requests or orders the person to refrain from the alleged violation of this section and, if the person fails to comply after receiving the oral request or order, the officer tenders a written request or order to the person warning that if the person fails to comply the person may be cited or arrested for a violation of this section; and
(2) The officer attempts to ascertain whether the person is in need of medical or human services assistance, including but not limited to mental health treatment, drug or alcohol rehabilitation, or homeless services assistance. If the officer determines that the person may be in need of medical or human services assistance, the officer shall make reasonable efforts to contact and obtain the assistance of a designated human service outreach worker, who in turn shall assess the needs of the person and, if warranted, direct the person to an appropriate provider of medical or human services assistance in lieu of the person being cited or arrested for a violation of this section. If the officer is unable to obtain the assistance of a human services outreach worker, if the human services outreach worker determines that the person is not in need of medical or human services assistance, or if the person refuses to cooperate with the direction of the human services outreach worker, the officer may proceed to cite or arrest the person for a violation of this section so long as the warnings required by paragraph (1) of this subsection have been previously given.
(d) For purposes of this section:
(1) “Camp” means to reside or dwell temporarily in a place, with shelter, and conduct activities of daily living such as eating, sleeping or the storage of personal possessions in such place. The term “shelter” includes, without limitation, any tent, tarpaulin, lean-to, sleeping bag, bedroll, blankets, or any form of cover or protection from the elements other than clothing.
(2) “Designated human service outreach worker” shall mean any person designated in writing by the manager of the Denver Department of Human Services to assist law enforcement officers as provided in subsection (c), regardless of whether the person is an employee of the department of human services.
(3) “Public property” means, by way of illustration, any street, alley, sidewalk, pedestrian or transit mall, bike path, greenway, or any other structure or area encompassed within the public right-of-way; any park, parkway, mountain park, or other recreation facility; or any other grounds, buildings, or other facilities owned or leased by the City or by any other public owner, regardless of whether such public property is vacant or occupied and actively used for any public purpose.

My main problem here is that the law, as it currently stands (with no additional resources added to the Denver community as a result of the law) does nothing to solve the problem of homelessness. It just says Denver doesn’t want to deal with homeless people other than to allow for their arrest if the police feel like it.

A Hypothetical

The law is also, if I can be blunt (and I can), a stupid law. Let’s say a police officer finds a homeless guy (we’ll call him Ralph) sleeping on the 16th Street Mall at 2:00 a.m. Here’s what the ordinance says should happen. First, the officer orally tells Ralph to stop being homeless on the 16th Street Mall. I suppose Ralph could comply in one of two ways — he could magically obtain a home on the spot, or he could leave the 16th Street Mall and go be homeless somewhere else. Option 1 is impossible and option 2 doesn’t solve the problem because Ralph is still homeless. If he fails to comply, the officer gives him something in writing telling him that if he fails to comply, he may be cited or arrested. This is great because we totally need to use more paper, and if someone didn’t magically obtain a home on the spot or go be homeless somewhere else when verbally requested to do so, I’m sure receiving the same request in written form will make all the difference.

Then the real fun begins. The officer gets to “attempt[] to ascertain whether the person is in need of medical or human services assistance, including but not limited to mental health treatment, drug or alcohol rehabilitation, or homeless services assistance.” Before continuing with our hypothetical, I have some questions. Why does the officer just have to attempt? Shouldn’t she have to actually ascertain? What standards does she use when attempting to ascertain whether Ralph needs medical or human services assistance? Why doesn’t the ordinance provide these standards? Will there be standards (If so, who makes them?), or does an officer just get to use her own judgment? By the way, I hope serious crimes aren’t happening while this attempt to ascertain business is going on, because this ordinance doesn’t provide extra funding to the police to help with the extra work they’re going to have.

So, let’s say the officer determines that Ralph may be in need of human services assistance. Now she “shall make reasonable efforts to contact and obtain the assistance of a designated human service outreach worker.” What are reasonable efforts? Assuming she, through reasonable efforts, contacts a designated human service outreach worker, that worker “shall assess the needs of the person and, if warranted, direct the person to an appropriate provider of medical or human services assistance in lieu of the person being cited or arrested for a violation of this section.” How, exactly, does that work? Let’s call our designated human service outreach worker Bob, because that’s fewer letters. Does Bob make this assessment based only on what the officer tells him? Does the cop say, hey, Ralph, come use my phone so you can talk to Bob so Bob can assess your needs? Does the cop take Ralph to wherever Bob works so Ralph can stand in line with all the other homeless people who have been rounded up that night? How much time does this take? If Bob determines that Ralph needs human service assistance and directs him to an appropriate provider of human service assistance, does Ralph have to go right then even though the provider probably isn’t open in the middle of the night? While waiting at the door, will Ralph be approached by police and told to stop being homeless again, or does Ralph get a free pass for the rest of that night?

Now, let’s say our officer is unable to obtain the assistance of Bob or any other human service outreach workers. (How many human service outreach workers are working in the middle of the night in Denver every day? I assume [just kidding, I don't really] there are several, because this ordinance does not provide for additional human service outreach workers.) Let’s say Bob is in the bathroom and doesn’t answer his phone, and any other human service outreach workers are busy with other homeless people. In that case, the officer is free to arrest Ralph. Yay, Ralph goes to jail. This is great because Denver is rolling in extra tax dollars and jail space. If Bob determines that Ralph is not in need of medical or human service assistance, or Ralph refuses to cooperate with what Bob tells him to do, Ralph can be arrested. This is great for the reasons listed above.

I think it’s fair to interpret this ordinance as making homeless people illegal in Denver (compliance requires one to stop being homeless or leave the city or, I suppose if you want to get technical, sleeping outside with no shelter other than the clothes you’re wearing and no possessions you couldn’t store on your body, which would be dangerous in the winter and pretty much impossible), which I think is completely disgusting. I also think it’s unfair to require homeless people to sleep in shelters. And it’s ridiculous to have this law on the books while there is not nearly enough shelter space for the homeless people of Denver and there are not nearly enough resources to deal with homelessness. The right way to do things would’ve been to set up the resources and then, if necessary, start talking about making a law.

Support for the Anti-Homeless Law

As a side note, every comment I’ve seen on the internet that’s in favor of the law has been something like this:

• I own a business and sometimes homeless people sleep by it. (This is especially rich coming from restaurant owners who opened restaurants in areas where many homeless people have been sleeping for years.) This makes me and my customers uncomfortable.
• I see homeless people on the street. Sometimes they talk to me and ask me for money. This makes me uncomfortable.

Holy crap. You know what I do when a homeless person asks me for money? I generally decline to give him or her any money because I don’t have any. Then I go on my way. If it’s an especially egregious interaction, I might complain to Ben when I get home or write a blog post bitching about it. Because here’s the thing. Unlike the people who support this law because homeless people make them uncomfortable, I don’t believe I’m entitled to live in a world where nothing ever makes me feel uncomfortable. Hell, if I got to make things that make me uncomfortable declared illegal, people who support this ordinance would be illegal.

Let’s Talk About Albus Brooks

Here’s a fun (to me) tangent. To try to get an understanding of where he was coming from when drafting and sponsoring this ordinance, I spent some time on my City Councilman Albus Brooks’s Facebook page. I ended up becoming even more disgusted. The most recent post was this:

Tonight was not about winners or losers, it was about beginning a long process of providing smart services to individuals that need it the most. Time and patient application, not rhetoric, will reveal the true nature of this ordinance. Now it’s time to begin working on securing support for the next step-a 24 hour resource center.

I have so many questions. Shouldn’t the true nature of this ordinance have been revealed before it was passed? Shouldn’t Albus Brooks have begun working on securing support for the next step, a 24-hour resource center, before working to get this law passed? Shouldn’t he maybe have not only secured support but also built/established this center before working to get this law passed?

Here’s an exchange from the comments under the above entry:

Rachel: When I spoke at East High the day after you did, a girl said that you made the bill seem like a “bowl full of cherries” and she was dead on. Sketchy politicking, a lack of knowledge about the population this will affect, and a lack of humility in really listening to those who work with them. Bringing diverse communities together? When you have folks like Charlie Brown backing you on issues such as this, you know you have lost your roots.

Albus: Rachel, that was one girl, how about the whole class. You only get half the story, your view is flawed. To be apart of transformation you need to see the whole picture. Sad that we can’t work together because of pride. Smh

First of all, it’s a part. Second, I have more questions. Why does he think she only has half the story? Why hasn’t he told the other half? Why does he assume her view is flawed because she disagrees with him? How does Albus Brooks expect anyone to see the whole picture when he doesn’t even seem to know what it is? To what pride is he referring? How did he determine that they can’t work together? It sounds to me like he’s making a personal attack on Rachel. Also, I can’t take you seriously if you use “Smh” in a professional capacity. But hey, because Albus Brooks thinks personal attacks are cool, I think Albus Brooks is a dismissive, patronizing, smug elitist who doesn’t know what he’s doing.

Scrolling through earlier entries on his Facebook page (which he lists on Twitter as his website, so I assume it functions as an official site), I discovered that when people left respectful comments that are critical of what was then the proposed law, he gave responses like this (extra assholery bolded):

I am disappointed you did not call our office and seek to understand what was being offered before you jump to conclusions. 1. When this bill is released it will be accompanied with 300-350 bed(please call me so I can give you detail…s 7203378888) 2. New services to the top 200 district court offenders ( which are all homeless) 3. We are currently in talks with the Mayors office to develop a 24 hr shelter through a public private partnership run by a non profit the first 24 hour resource center for homeless in this city. Lastly, I had businesses support me, but a GROUNDSWELL of D8 community support, would be happy to show you .
_______
I am surprised at you, I thought you would at least call or email me to find out the facts before you jump to conclusions like everyone else. First i want to know what are you doing as an engaged residents is doing to get people off of the streets? It will take a the community but the community has not been engaged in what is actually going on there are only few advocates actually working on solutions and MANY naysayers throwing daggers. This is what I am doing with this bill 1. We opened up a church in our district house women who are homeless nightly 2. Waivers to increase shelter space in two specific shelters. 3. Working in conjunction with the Mayors office to develop a 24 hour resource center for homeless individuals.

The way he responds to concerned citizens is completely unacceptable. It’s not their job to call his office to hear his explanation. It’s his job to get his explanation out there. He sounds defensive and, frankly, a little creepy. The smiley face doesn’t help. His plans are vague and there is no evidence that any actual work has been completed. Where are the 300-350 beds (I added that “s” for him)? What are the new services to the top 200 offenders? Being “currently in talks” means nothing has actually happened. Having the support of businesses and a GROUNDSWELL of D8 community support does not negate the fact that some people disagree with this law or do anything to substantively address the issues. Some of the people who oppose this law, like me, live in D8. Also, asking a concerned citizen what he’s doing to get people off the streets is unacceptable and makes Albus Brooks look defensive. It also makes me think that if I ever contact Albus Brooks with a concern, he’ll just ask me what I’ve done to solve the problem, which is not really what I’m looking for from my Councilman. If the community has not been engaged, why hasn’t he been trying to get them engaged?

Finally, I respectfully suggest that he hire a professional editor.

I considered sending my concerns to Albus Brooks directly, but I don’t see the point of giving him the chance to say that he’s disappointed in me for forming an opinion based on the information he’s put out there or to virtually shake his head at me. Albus, you’re welcome to contact me should you like to discuss my concerns further.

All that said, maybe there is good news for the homeless people of Denver. I’m working on finding out his address (as you may have guessed, he did not return to the thread to post it) so I can let everyone know they’re invited to stay at Albus Brooks’s place.

I wanted to write a meaningful post about Mother’s Day that included lots of gloriously photographed moments from our meaningful day, but, and I hate to use this term, meh.

This year, Mother’s Day fell right in the middle of one of those bad PMS times I get every few months. I also felt kind of achy in the morning so I took some Ibuprofen before running, which resulted in Ibuprofen tummy later in the day. Apparently I’m 900 years old. I took like 2 pictures all day and didn’t get one shot of Soren wearing the cutest shirt I’ve ever seen.

Wait. Let’s focus on the positive for a minute. Even though I didn’t feel great, I ran, and I was glad I did. Our brunch was insane mad deliciousness (recipe coming soon). Our traditional Mother’s Day activities, which include going to Al’s Pine Garden and Nursery (I can’t say enough good things about this place) and sitting in the back yard planting stuff, were delightful.

The problem, if there is one, aside from my general malaise, is that I think we’ve lost our ability to make a day feel special. Do you know what I mean? And the subset of the problem is that I’m not even sure what I’d want to do to make a day feel special. Like, I don’t want to spend the day at a spa (I mean, I wouldn’t turn it down, but that’s not really my thing) or have breakfast in bed or anything. But once in a while I kind of want something that makes that day feel different from every other day. So I suppose that’s something I should work on.

To end on a positive note, here’s something I said on Mother’s Day last year, which reminds me that being a mom is way more important than having a special day:

I like being a mom more than I’ve ever liked anything and more than I ever thought I would. Sometimes right after I read Soren a bedtime story (Ben and I alternate bedtime story reading), he’s sitting in my lap and I put my face in his hair and it’s like at that exact second every moment we’ve ever spent together, from right now to back to before I even knew he existed, stretches out to the end of the universe and back and I know everything I’ve ever done in the world made sense somehow because it got me here and this is exactly where I’m supposed to be, right here with you and I love you more than I ever even imagined I could ever love anything and you are the best thing in the world.

This is Rickie Fowler. I love him. I would watch golf if it were all hipsters and thugs. Can golf get some thugs? Let’s have a beer.

Mother’s Day recipes that don’t suck.

I love love love the idea of Mother’s Day brunch, but so does everybody else in the world and I don’t like dealing with crowds or waiting or food quality that suffers when a restaurant is super-busy. I’d rather stay home and make something from White Lace Inn, a little bed & breakfast in Door County, Wisconsin. I highly recommend one of the French toasts or egg bakes, because you assemble them the night before, so all you have to do on Mother’s Day is put something in the oven. I’m making my own version of the Spicy 3-Cheese Cornbread Egg Bake, and I’ll post a recipe if it’s good. Also don’t forget the mimosas.

I love maxi skirts.

I assume you’ve seen that Ann Taylor ballet maxi skirt that’s everywhere lately? It’s absolutely beautiful but, in my opinion, $176 is way too expensive even with the current 30% off offer. It’s also dry clean only. Do people still buy dry clean only stuff? I try to avoid it as much as possible for all things except, say, wedding dresses.

I found a good alternative. Here is a sort of similar look at a much better price and in a lower-maintenance fabric — the Billabong Long Way Tiered Maxi Skirt.

The Ann Taylor skirt is elegant and this is hippie, which means I love it. It’s also $46, machine washable, and perfect for sitting on the ground at the park eating sandwiches and wrangling toddlers, which, if you ask me, is when you want to wear a maxi skirt. Sorry for party shopping.

I can affect the game.

White Sox pitcher Chris Sale is loading the bases as we speak and I’m teaching Soren that, through some type of metaphysical awesomeness I don’t understand, we can affect the outcome of a sporting event that is occurring 1,000 miles away from us. He’s jumping on the couch screaming, “GO CHRIS SALE!” And I might be doing the same thing.

There are two things that are going to destroy the NBA. The first is shitty, ridiculous officiating. First of all, there is no reason “superstars” should get more favorable calls than any other player. A foul is a foul, period. Every foul should be called the same way no matter who’s on the giving end and who’s on the receiving end. And fewer fouls should be called because that shit is boring (if I wanted to sit around watching guys shoot free throws I’d — well, I’d punch myself and then get shitfaced because WTF) and it stops the flow of the game.

The second thing that’s going to destroy the NBA is the flopping. Flopping is #2 on my sports shit list, right after concussions, serious health issues, and suicide with respect to current and former NFL players. The first part of the problem with flopping is that guys do it at all. The second part of the problem is that shitty, ridiculous referees end up rewarding them by calling fouls when they see a flop. Like, oh man, dude is falling to the ground, which must mean someone hacked him. No. He’s just flopping.

Blake Griffin is an NBA superstar known for his aggro dunks. He’s also a goddamn flopping flopper, which kind of doesn’t make sense because you’d think someone so allegedly badass would be able to function like an adult instead of flopping. One time, he hit himself with his own hand and flopped. Seriously.

My favorite Blake Griffin flopping video was this one, which made me LOL.

It’s funny how at age 28, I was older than I am now.

I remember sitting in our naked Andersonville apartment, listening to stuff like Get Involved by Raphael Saadiq (still one of my favorite songs of all time, here wait you can listen to it now),

waiting for the delivery guys to come with our furniture. When it arrived, I realized with dismay that it was too big for our living room, which always looked like it was overflowing with a couch set at a jaunty angle because that was the only option; gigantic chair; large Pottery Barn coffee table; and huge entertainment center we got from, I think, Carson’s. This was around the same time I bought a huge dining room table and chairs from Pottery Barn, which is funny because now that I’m to the point where I’m old enough to actually want a legitimate dining room table, I’d never shell out the $$$ on Pottery Barn stuff, which really isn’t my style, but I will have this dining room table and chairs until the end of time because I suspect they will last that long and at least I had the foresight to get chairs that are not the same color as the table.⁴

When my ex-husband⁵ and I moved to our condo in Oak Park, this large, traditional furniture fit right in. It was lovely, if I can use the word “lovely,” which I’d prefer not to but it seems to fit here. It looked something like this.

My ex-husband and I had the most amicable divorce of all time. I don’t really talk about him here, but it’s maybe worth saying that I think he’s an awesome person and hope he’s exceptionally happy now. We just weren’t right for each other in the long run — no hard feelings, on my part at least. We split everything pretty much right down the middle, and I got all the stuff because I was the one still living in the condo and I was the one who cared about all the stuff.

So this furniture came with me when I ended up with Ben and we moved to Nederland, Colorado. It didn’t really fit there, either. It was like the girl who hits her groove in high school and then spends the rest of her life wondering why everybody isn’t always telling her how awesome she is. It was a little much for Ned, but it fit and was fine. It was a tight squeeze when we moved to our apartment in Baker, too, but we didn’t mind because it was temporary.

When we moved to our house, the furniture didn’t really fit, either. It was also a little worse for the wear, having suffered through years of cat scratches and, well, cat puke. It happens. Eventually, we bought a modern sectional and put the couch, gigantic chair, and coffee table in the basement. The entertainment center currently is used for storage in Soren’s room.

I have a hard time getting rid of things. As a person who has the word “impermanence” (in Chinese⁶) tattooed on my arm,  the deep attachments I form to inanimate objects bother me a lot. This sort of thing makes me feel weak, lame, and shallow. But I’ve always been like that, since childhood when I used to make sure all my stuffed animals, dolls, and Barbies were sitting comfortably at all times. To this day, if I see a random toy on the floor at Target, for example, I have to pick it up and put it back on the shelf, face up, where I hope it’s happy. I’m always adjusting the stuff in Soren’s crib.⁷ I’m so lame.

So this furniture sat in our basement for years. It’s especially hard for me to part with something nice, and the couch and gigantic chair, in particular, are very nice. Custom made, even, and I’m not a person who has custom-made shit. Maybe we’ll use this stuff again one day. Maybe we’ll need it, when we’re somehow destitute and can never afford furniture again.⁸ Maybe we’ll have a large room of some sort one day that needs large furniture, and we’ll have a home for stuff I bought when I was living a totally different life a long time ago.

On a philosophical level, I understand that thoughts and attachments like this probably in some way hold me back. From what I don’t know. But they make me feel weighted down, I guess you could say, and I know that’s not good. Plus, Ben is always annoyed by all my stuff, which has gradually taken over the basement, the garage, and even the attic that doesn’t even have a floor and that can be accessed only by precariously perched ladder in the bathroom. So I finally agreed to get rid of the couch and the gigantic chair.

The good thing about living in the hood is that, if you put anything by the dumpsters,⁹ somebody will take it. So I agreed that Ben could take the couch and the gigantic chair to the dumpsters.

The people who live two doors down from us, right by the dumpsters, are hippies. They like to take stuff people bring to the dumpsters. They wanted the couch and the gigantic chair. So Ben helped the neighbors bring the furniture into the house, and I felt a little happy that my old stuff that was very nice even if not in the best condition found a new home.

Today, I walked past the neighbors’ house and saw the gigantic chair unceremoniously sitting on the porch, its legs scattered around it. I thought about how it had rained a lot lately, and the chair was probably wet and soggy. I was sad about it. Which is silly, because it’s something I didn’t need any more, and it’s somewhere doing something, maybe, for someone, and that’s the best I could hope for, really.

And then I was sad about being sad about a chair.
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Notes
1. We were not yet married at the time.
2. We lived in the little apartment building in the heart of Andersonville in Chicago that always had a Swedish flag displayed. Sometimes, Swedish tourists would buzz us to say hi. It was a tiny place but I loved living there.
3. Where do you stand on the couch/sofa issue? I suspect sofa is the better answer, but I always say couch. Is this a midwestern thing? Until the day I die, I will refuse to utter midwesternisms such as “pop” and “supper,” but goddamn if I don’t say “couch.”
4. When in doubt, always get furniture that isn’t too matchy-matchy. Bedroom sets, for example, should not exist.
5. We were married at this point.
6. For what it’s worth, which I suspect is not much, my ex-husband is half Chinese.
7. I suspect Soren is too old for a crib and has been napping on a cot at daycare for ages, but since we put the crib on its lowest setting, he hasn’t climbed out or complained about being in there and I’m frankly terrified by the thought of a toddler being able to get up and move freely throughout the house while Ben and I are sleeping.
8. I have a distinct memory of my maternal grandmother, from whom I get my claustrophobia, keeping a large number of canned goods in her basement. The stash was well-organized and neat enough to not be alarming, but I suspect it was motivated by thoughts similar to the ones I have sometimes wherein I think I’ll never be able to buy anything ever again.
9. Where we live, there are several dumpsters in the alley at the end of the block. This is where you take your garbage. We do have curbside (or, well, alleyside) recycling pickup.

We busted our asses to get there on time today and got there to find . . .  well, a bunch of people standing around what I presume were the Chihuahua races but, not being 6’7″, I couldn’t see a damn thing but the backs of people’s heads. So that was a bummer. So we met up with some pals and had an average beer and, surprisingly, come cheap food that wasn’t bad at all (including vegetarian red chili, which I didn’t know was a thing but was freaking awesome). Then the clouds came in and it got cold as hell and I had to bike home while having to pee (I thought it wasn’t that urgent but, when biking home in the biting cold wind, realized it was). So that was that.

The good news is that the Chihuahua races presented the opportunity for the inaugural wearing of my fancy new hat. The Kentucky Derby, which I object to on moral grounds because I don’t believe horse racing to be completely lacking in animal cruelty, always makes me want to wear a fancy hat and, I don’t know, go around being fancy. I don’t really have the opportunity go around being fancy, so sometimes I’ll take advantage of something where it might be marginally acceptable to go around being sort of fancy. So I wore my hat to the Chihuahua races, which are kind of like the Kentucky Derby only with more beer and fewer rich people, and it wasn’t, as they say, no thing.

Next year, I will get to the Chihuahua races very, very early so I can get a spot in the front row. Or I’ll ask Javale McGee to come with so I can sit on his shoulders. Also we are totally bringing Sadie, who can pass as a Chihuahua if you’re drunk and don’t know about min pins.

AP Photo/Peter Kramer

Soren does this thing where sometimes he refers to other women as mommy. It used to happen more often than it does now and include women on tv and in real life. My favorite mommy of all time was Erin Andrews because I think it’s safe to assume that if my child erroneously refers to Erin Andrews as mommy, it’s because mommy looks like Erin Andrews such that it’s only logical that he’d mistake Erin Andrews for mommy. Mommy has a long history of being fond of Erin Andrews.

It doesn’t happen all that often any more, but when it does, it tends to be at Argonaut (big liquor store) and involve allegedly hot women. At least this is how Ben reports it, because the mommy sightings don’t happen when mommy is around. After a trip to Argonaut, Ben will say that Soren picked out several hot mommies at the store. Of course, I interpret this as meaning that I’m hot, because that’s logical. Right?

(I’ve never been sure whether Soren refers to other women as mommy because they remind him of me or because his understanding of women in general is that they’re mommies. It’s probably the latter, but I’ll never miss the opportunity to subtly advocate for the position that Erin Andrews and attractive women buying beer remind someone of me.)

The same thing has never happened with daddy, despite the fact that I watch a lot of sports, which, I presume, is an area rife with the opportunity to find daddies. Until today. Soren and I went to the fancy Whole Foods,¹ mainly to get some gluten,² tofu,³ seitan, and a birthday card for daddy (I wouldn’t normally buy a birthday card at Whole Foods but, full disclosure, I’m too lazy to go to a whole ‘nother store just to buy a card when I’m at a store that sells cards). Right before Soren picked out a birthday card for daddy (it features a dog wearing a tiara made from actual rhinestones, which would not have been my first choice for a birthday card for my husband, but now that I think about it, it’s an admirable choice), he saw this hippie dude with a beard going into the bathroom. “Daddy!” he said to the guy. The guy smiled and said hi to him, which was nice.

But then I was all, hey wait a minute. Why that guy? Ben doesn’t look like a hippie dude with a beard. And what if that dude thinks I’m hanging out with my kid at Whole Foods shopping for a new daddy and he’s it? Oh man that’s how Lifetime movies or an episode of Fatal Encounters start.

So anyway, Ben looks like a random hippie dude with a beard and I look like Erin Andrews. Yep.

Notes
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1. I hate the word “clusterfuck,” but lunchtime-ish trips to this particular Whole Foods location qualify. To deal with it, I fantasize about doing non-Whole-Foodsy things at Whole Foods. Today, I thought about how it would be fun to tailgate in the Whole Foods parking lot with friends and the people you encounter on Twitter who seem really cool and always make you laugh. We’d blast Aphex Twin and have a nice spread of food and an endless supply of cocaine (just kidding about the cocaine, of course, it’s just that you need to be sufficiently scandalous) and a large basket of free-range eggs we’d throw at people driving Audis. What’s up with people driving Audis? I used to think people who drove BMWs were assholes, but people driving Audis asshole them out of the water these days. So aggressive and annoying, and so likely to be at the Cherry Creek Whole Foods for lunch, where they’d get some kind of bland salad — you know, the kind that has way too much oil and not nearly enough flavor even after you add salt like 3 times — and aggressively jangle their keys while waiting in a line that doesn’t move quickly enough. In other news, when I go to a store looking like complete ass and there’s no self-checkout, I’m going to get in the line of the cashier who looks the most like the put-upon mom from an 80s movie.
2. If you’re ever at Whole Foods looking for the gluten, it’s in the gluten-free section. It took me so long to find it I felt like an urban pioneer (like a boss, I don’t ask for directions). I ended up in the gluten-free section, where I was met with, like, an entire wall of little bags of gluten-free flours and shit, and it seemed like the kind of place that would have a little bag of gluten, but then I thought it would be mean and/or weird to put the gluten right where the people who can’t/don’t eat gluten would be shopping. So I looked all over the store and when I didn’t find it anywhere, I figured I’d have to order it online, which is what I always do for everything but then sometimes I feel bad for not shopping local and all that shit, not that buying gluten from the Cherry Creek Whole Foods really counts but whatever. It really seemed like if it was going to be anywhere, it was going to be in the gluten-free aisle, so I headed back over there and finally found it, in a box instead of a little bag, which might be why I missed it in the first place.
3. Soren and I are big fans of the tamari tofu from the Whole Foods salad bar. We don’t go to Whole Foods very often, but when I ask Soren if he wants to go to Whole Foods, his response is always, “Go to Whole Foods and get tofu!” Then when we get to Whole Foods, he’s all, “Tofu! Hooray!” And then someone at Whole Foods smiles at this and I feel bad for thinking that going to Whole Foods makes me want to do coke and throw eggs at cars.