Fan mail

Dear Heelya's students,

I'm sorry it's taken me so long to return your letters. They've sat in a pile on my kitchen table for days now.

I've read them and re-read them so many times while eating my morning cereal that I've memorized many of your sentiments.

Per your request, I'm posting your last correspondences on my Lance. Per your teacher's request, I wont use your names.

(FYI: I'm pen-pals with my sister's students in Buffalo. They're elementary school kids and I love getting letters from them. They like to ask me about the pug, the weather, Joe and random things like: Do you drool? Do you like people in your town? Do you like snakes? Or, do you eat Snickers bars? I like to nickname them and ask them how they spend their weekends. Sometimes I draw them maps of Florida and explain where poisonous snakes lurk. One time I drew them a map of my living room with an arrow identifying where Joe usually sits on the couch and where the pug sleeps next him. Sometimes Joe writes to them. Sometimes I send them newspaper stories I've written or pictures I've taken. I like to tell them stories about Ro and I, because Ro is the speech pathologist at their school and they're always blown away by the fact that we know each other. And I always, always tell them to keep writing. Their letters are awesome! They make my heart sing.)

---

Dear Ms. Kurpiela,

Can you come and visit my classroom? I like Spiderman soo much!

Me and my brother went to Disney on Ice. My mom didn't go.

October the 12th is my birthday and then comes Halloween. My hair looks crazy today. My mom didn't finish it before school so I took it out and shook it. Happy Valentine's Day!

Are you glad about your mom? Do you like the people in your town? I like the people in my town.

I can't wait to hear back from you!

Love,

@#!!@&*$

--

Hi Ms. Kurpiela!

I like your dog Cubbie. Yes, I am a clean person. Every day I wear a button up shirt tucked in. I have boots and dress pants. I get in the tub every day, sometimes in the morning. Sometimes at night.

I got new glasses! They are tinted blue. Do you have glasses?

What do you do for fun?

I like to play PlayStation 2. My dad has PlayStation 3. My sister has a Wii. My brother has a silver PlayStation 2 like me. It is so much fun playing it!

We're growing beans in the classroom, but mine didn't grow. Everyone else has beans that are growing besides me.

See ya later, alligator.

@#!!@&*$

--

Dear Ms. Kurpiela,

I am a new student in Ms. Kurpiela's class.

Do you have any dogs? I have a dog. She is a Beagle and is 10 years old.

My sister likes monkeys.

How are you doing today? Do you work?

I love cars.

I am Native American.

I listen to drum CDs and my favorite artist is Johnny Cash. My favorite Johnny Cash song is "When You Get the Blues."

Who is your favorite artist?

I am 7 years old. How old are you?

What is the weather like in Florida during the winter?

Today in Buffalo it is seven degrees! It is freezing!

Nice to meet you.

Your friend,

@#!!@&*$

--

Dear Ms. Kurpiela,

How are you? I am doing good.

I went to a Build A Bear workshop. I made a brown bear. I love him. His name is Chocolate. He has a red bow tie and a book. We got lots of snow yesterday. I like to stay inside when it snows so I don't get cold.

How is Joe and your dog?

You should come visit sometime at school.

Last week I went to Disney on Ice. I saw Mickey, the Ducky, Aladdin, the mermaid, Woody and Buzz and the Chipmunks.

I had pretzels, popcorn and a drink. It was yummy!

Love,

@#!!@&*$

--

Dear Ms. Kurpiela,

I like to say hi to parents, not teachers, that say good morning.

I'm looking at a Monster Inc. Book. Could you send me a Hero coloring sheet?

Do you ever take kids to a playground?

I went to a zoo and the elephants weren't there. I wanted to see if they were falling in the water.

I saw a book about skating at my house and I hope we go soon.

Good day,

@#!!@&*$

--

Dear Ms. Kurpiela,

I like to ride my bike too. I have a big blue and red bike. I ride it really fast, but stay out of the street.

I am in a new class. Write me back still.

Do you watch TV a lot?

My favorite show is SpongeBob. I hope to hear from you soon!

From,

@#!!@&*$

--

Dear Ms. Kurpiela,

I am a new student. I like my new school and my teachers too.

My favorite subject is math. It's my favorite because I am really good at it.

I am good at drawing too!

When I am not in school I like to play in the park. It is sooo fun!

One of my favorite things to do is play Hide and Go Seek and run around.

My best friend is nice and I like her a lot.

I have seven sisters and brothers. They are really cool!

I like Keyshia Cole! I can sing some of her songs.

It is really nice to meet you. I can't wait to get a letter back.

Love,

@#!!@&*$

--

Dear Ms. Kurpiela,

Your job is cool!

There is drool on the floor.

From,

@#!!@&*$

--

Dear Ms. Kurpiela,

What did you have to eat yesterday?

Do you like snakes?

Are you sad?

Love,

@#!!@&*$

--

Dear Ms. Kurpiela,

Do you have a pool?

I like school.

I do not like tools.

I do not like drool.

I am cool.

Bye,

@#!!@&*$

--

I'm still here!

This is my 100th post. It's a post I started at midnight about two weeks ago but fell asleep in the middle of writing. When I woke up the next morning, I was 27 years old, had a 9 a.m. phone interview with a mathematician from Maine, a cover story due about a ballet dancer from Houston and plans to go to the beach (see left) with my best friend Ro and sister Heelya.

I didn't know I had it in me to stick with the Lance. I figured I'd get bored with it. Tire of writing about myself, my friends, my family, the odd ducks and lovable strangers that cross my path and make me laugh, cry, whisper and cuss.

I thought I'd get distracted. Find a new way to spend time while Joe was asleep. Take up abstract painting. Join a knitting circle. Volunteer at a nursing home. Start trading stocks online.

But here I am. Still Lancing. Truth is, I can't shake it. I find a story in everything. So much so that's it's annoying. If you were to ask me to write 500 words on the sound a potato chip makes when it's chewed, I'd give you 600 words and a sidebar on the texture of french onion dip.

In the picture above you'll find me on the left, Ro in the middle and Heelya on the right. Joe took it the night the girls arrived from Buffalo, just before we unfolded the pull-out sofa in his Man Cave and the girls fell asleep in a cocoon of down-filled blankets.

Ro and Heelya like nests. They like to burrow and they like to snuggle. I know because I spent many nights curled up beside either one of them, prattling on about things girls prattle on about.

Ro sleeps with her mouth open and Heelya talks and eats in her sleep. One night, when we were teenagers, I heard Heelya murmur something about French fries. Another night I caught her in the refrigerator, rummaging through the crisper for cheese slices.

Growing up, Heelya and I slept in bunk beds, alternating between the top and bottom bunk every few months. Whenever Heelya slept on top, I'd lay on the bottom with my feet planted on the planks of her bed, kicking her up in the air a good three inches just to aggravate her. One night when I was on the top bunk and Heelya was on the bottom bunk, my mattress fell through the weakened planks and landed on top of her head.

Basically Ro, Heelya and I spent the weekend laughing, catching up on nonsense, drinking beer and telling old stories around the campfire. There's much more of course, but I'd be here all day if I were to write about it all. So I guess I'll write about April 10, my birthday.

We had plans to go out to a Japanese steakhouse – me, Joe, Heelya, Ro and my sister PK – when around 7 p.m. PK, who lives an hour away, called to tell me she got in a car accident.

"Don't freak, Heid. I'm fine," she said, explaining that her car was towed from the scene and that the cop gave her a ride back to her apartment, and that for every day her car was in impound she would be charged a grotesque $100.

To avoid this monetary raping and to get PK up to St. Pete for my bachelorette weekend, I had no other choice but to load everyone in my car, drive an hour south to Sarasota, free the crinkled Escort from the impound lot and pick up PK – birthday or no birthday.

So at 9 p.m., with Joe in the front seat and Ro, Heelya and PK in the back, I pulled off a desolate street in North Sarasota, into a gravel parking lot guarded by angry dogs with no manners, where a Bubba with a belly like a bass drum unlocked a prison-high fence and mumbled that my sister's car could be freed for $250 cash.

(Note: Heelya is in a Sophia Loren sun dress. Ro is in a Doris Day skirt. And Joe is wearing the faux suede gentleman's blazer he reserves for television appearances and birthday parties. Remember, we were supposed to be at a Japanese steakhouse, sipping sake and watching a chef chop onions in the air using a Hattori Hanzo samurai sword.)

So at 9:15 p.m., with dapper Joe in the front seat and Ro, Heelya and ATM card-less PK in the back, I pulled into a SunTrust bank and withdrew enough money to recover a bent 1998 Ford Escort.

PK was pouting. I was bitching. Joe was deciding whether we should refuse to pay the after-hours fee. Ro was insisting the charges be itemized and Heelya was bitching about my bitching, suggesting I should just be happy we were all together.

And to be honest, though I was irritated and driving with night-blindness through a ghetto on my birthday, I was, actually, ecstatic we were all together.

When we returned to the impound lot with money in hand, the Bubba behind the gate barked at another Bubba to, "chain up the Escort and move 'er out," at which point Joe lost his cell phone in the dusty abyss.

As we followed the tow truck driver back to PK's apartment, and as Joe began frantically searching the car for his cell phone, I remarked that my 1997 Honda Civic was dogging it with so many bodies weighing it down.

"Shit," Joe muttered. "I must have dropped my cell phone in the parking lot."

"You sure it's not under the seat?" I asked.

"No," he replied. "I checked there."

"You sure it's not in the glove box?" Ro asked.

"No, I checked there."

"What about in my purse?" I asked.

"I looked through your purse."

"Did you check in the door?" Ro asked.

"It's not there."

"What about under the seat?" Holly asked.

"IT'S NOT UNDER THE SEAT!"

And then the car fell silent until we got to PK's apartment ...

Around midnight, after PK's car had been towed to her apartment and after we had returned to the impound lot for a third time to comb the dusty abyss for Joe's cell phone, and after we had returned to St. Pete, ordered two large pizzas, nibbled on leftover ice cream cake and opened presents, I settled into bed, exhausted, content and three years away from 30.

You see, I've been a little stressed lately. I'm not exactly sure why. I seem to be working things out in my dreams though, because every day I wake up a little less wound. I wonder if it's wedding stuff. Work stuff. Money stuff. The fact that I just paid the government $1,400 in taxes – half of my pathetic life savings. Or that I still can't clear up the pug's eczema, or stick to the novel I suck at writing or finish the novel by my bed I suck at reading.

One things for sure. My friends, my family and my fiance keep me grounded. Without them, I'd lose my head.

I tend to digest life better when I'm driving. I think it's because it's the only time I sit still and concentrate on getting from point A to point B. On my way home from the Tampa airport after I had dropped off Ro and Heelya at Southwest Airlines' curbside check-in, I started sobbing so much my temples hurt.

When I got home, Joe walked with me to the bike shop to pick up my Bianchi and I cried some more. I told him my heart breaks every time I have to say goodbye, and he told me to keep my chin up and sang me a stupid pop song to make me laugh.

And it worked I suppose, because on the walk home I saddled up my Bianchi like Lance Armstrong and pedaled fiercely from point A to point B; Joe running like a bull behind me with my purse slung over his shoulder, trying to keep up, looking hysterical and lovely at the same time.

--

PS. Ro & Heelya – I miss you and love you. See you in June when we ride 62.5 miles in The Ride For Roswell.

PPS. To my succulent readers – I'm alive and well. Thank you all for checking in on me! I received e-mails, Facebook messages, TWITTER greetings, younameit, wondering where the hell I'd gone. Thanks to yesterday's deep tissue massage, I'm back to my narcissistic self. I plan on catching up on all your blogs this weekend from my new Sky Chair.

Cheap thrills.

Meet my new wheels. She's a real Bianchi. 

Light as a feather and the color of a robin's egg, my Bianchi came from Goodwill. She's got pizza-cutter tires and handlebars shaped like my pug's tail.

When I wedged her into the front seat of my Honda Civic, she contorted into a kind of fetal position, which made me think perhaps Bianchi was scared or sad, having just been pulled abruptly from the bike pile at a tidy Goodwill store on 4th Street in St. Petersburg.

She's a 23-year-old Italian with a stubborn saddle, caged pedals, soft tires and a nervous tick. I think her rear break might be chaffing against the rim, but with the proper tools and gentle touch she'll be prime for riding long distances. 

I hadn't intended to get a 1986 Italian racing bike. My sister Heelya and best friend Ro are visiting next week and I wanted a third bicycle so we could pedal the Pinellas Trail together. I've been eyeing a tricked-out mountain bike for a month now and was fixing to shell out $500 for a better (and I mean way better) bike than the one I pedal now, but today's little lesson in negotiation and good will has prompted me to forgo a new model in favor of a more seasoned cougar.

I pulled into Goodwill today with two $20 bills in my wallet, feeling good about myself, my friends and the world. I'm on a new cash-only budget thanks to $3,000 in fraudulent charges at a Panama stereo store. My debit card number was stolen last week (perhaps in cyberspace) and when the bank told me I'd have have to wait a week for my new card, I decided now was as good a time as any to pay homage to my parents by paying for everything in cash. 

Peering into the back stockroom at G.W., I asked one of the employees if there were any decent bikes for sale. One guy perked up and said, "Sure. We got a Tour de France bike out front."

I figured he was pulling my chain, (bike pun!) but as I followed him out front to the parking lot where the robin egg blue Bianchi was parked, the vintage bike stuck out like Christie Brinkley ...                                                                                      

... in a sea of Tonya Hardings.

"It suits you," the guy said.

"I'll take it," I replied, not knowing how much it would cost, but assuming not much.

So I wheeled it into the store and up to the counter, where an employee with a name tag that said JAYME asked, "You buying that bike?"

"Yup," I said.

"Do you know how much it costs?" He asked incredulously. 

"Um. No. How much does it cost?"

"Fifty bucks," he said.

Before I could even get a word out, the man in line behind me said, "No way is that bike worth fifty bucks. Man, you're rippin' the girl off. Give it to her for 25."

A woman standing in line behind the man chimed in:

"Fifty dollars! She's gonna have to put new tires on that bike!"

"It's an expensive racing bike," the Goodwill clerk snapped. 

"It was an expensive bike," scoffed the man behind me. "Man, that thing is old! Being that she's a girl, she's gonna have to pay someone to fix those tires."

Slightly embarrassed by the attention I had drawn, but thrilled by its sitcom appeal, I quietly said to the clerk, "It's OK. I came here thinking I'd get a deal. No biggie."

Upon further inspection of the name tag, I noticed that JAYME was the store manager and as I turned to push the Bianchi back to the bike pile, Jayme sighed and said, "Alright. $35 and that's as low as I'll go."

Forking over my money, I nodded at the male chauvinist behind me, grateful for his cojones. Although I don't usually take kindly to being treated like a damsel, in this case I curtsied, grabbed my bicycle and headed home. 

--

This isn't my first love affair with a 1980s bicycle. I was once infatuated with a clunker 10-speed named Ross. For more on that torrid romance click here.

While my Opa was sleeping

Joe's in Hampton, Va. for Phish's first reunion concerts.

Me and the pug? We're at my Oma and Opa's place, enjoying an alternate weekend in Nokomis, Fla.

(Oma and Opa = German for Grandma and Grandpa.)

They live about an hour from me in a wooded mobile home park called The Royal Coachman – the quaintest retirement community on the Gulf Coast. And in my journalistic opinion, the best retirement community on the Gulf Coast.

PK will join me tomorrow for sun tannin' by the Royal Coachman pool and home cooked German meals in Oma's lanai. Until then, it's just me and the pug sleeping on a pullout sofa, listening to the sound of clocks tick and motorcycles rev muffler-lessly into the night.

Oma told me a story tonight that I'll share with you briefly before I fall asleep under these downy blankets.

It started first with Opa pinching his gray hair, which hangs in a kind of sparse dutch boy when it's freshly cut.

"Gerhard," Oma said. "The barber tuk a lot off dis time."

"Ja. That is because I told him to," said Opa. "Every time I go to him he schnibbles only a little around mein ears, so I have to come back two, tree veeks later. I told him to take it all off at vonce. I pay to get mein hair cut, so cut it mensch!"

Smiling, Oma reached around Opa's head and touched the bristled ends of his hair. She asked if I remembered tiptoeing up to him as a little girl – my sisters and I – clipping plastic barrettes in his hair while he was sleeping.

I remembered it vaguely.

Opa, who has a hard time remembering most things, remembered it like it happened yesterday.

--

PS. Photo by R., a 23-year-old aspiring writer and "general bohemian gadabout" living in Sydney, Australia. For her flickr photostream click here.

Independence, 1950

This one's for my Nana.

We were sitting around the kitchen table Christmas night – my mom, my sisters, Nana and me. And for whatever reason PK got on the subject of homesickness.

She remarked that she has good days and bad days. That some days, no matter how many romantic comedies she watches, or how much chocolate ice cream she eats, she cannot shed the veil of homesickness that shrouds her every move.

Because I'm hard-headed and fail miserably at making my sisters feel better when given the opportunity to do so, I didn't tell PK that when I was 22 and living alone in Sarasota, I Googled the distance between North Collins, N.Y. and the Gulf Coast of Florida. And that every time I cried out of homesickness, I'd remind myself that 1,269 miles is pretty good chunk of space.

Putting my pangs of sadness to good use, I wrote a math equation.

For every one mile I was separated from my family I would devote one day to giving Sarasota a fair shake. Rounding up slightly, I divided 1,269 miles by 365 days, giving myself 3.5 years to make a go at in Sarasota. If after 3.5 years I was still sad as hell, missing home, or craving a new adventure, I'd throw in my beach towel, pack up my things and leave.

But of course I didn't tell my sister any of this as we were sitting around the kitchen table. Because the happy ending to this story is, after 3.5 years I met Joe.

Instead it was my Nana who piped up.

"I was terribly homesick when I was living in Arkansas," she said.

Dumbfounded, we asked, "WHAT? Arkansas? WHEN?"

My Nana – who raised her family next door to her sisters' houses, across the street from her brothers' houses, and literally within footsteps of the house she grew up in – lived in Arkansas. Arkansas? I don't think even my mother knew Nana lived in Arkansas.

Captivated, my sisters and I urged her to continue with the story, the likes of which goes something like this:

Nana's father owned grape fields stretching the length of Brant-North Collins Road. Nana and her six brothers and sisters grew up in these fields. And if they were doing poorly in school their father, my great-grandfather, would pull them out of class and stick them on the farm.

My Nana, the middle child, was whip smart, with a wicked sense of humor, and strong arms from playing softball and picking grapes. When Nana was 18 her father sent her to Sturkie, Ark. for the summer, where he owned a strawberry canning factory with his brother, Louie.

"Dottie," he told his daughter. "I'm too tied up in local affairs to travel south. I need someone to keep an eye on the Arkansas factory."

My great-grandfather had gotten wind of some shady dealings in Arkansas, and Nana, being whip smart, was as good an ambassador as any, so he sent her.

It was 1950, and Nana, together with a girl named Vicky and a guy named Vinnie, crossed the Arkansas/Missouri line in a dusty Cadillac with the windows rolled down.

Nana, wearing a sundress and feeling ridiculously independent, remembers pulling over for breakfast at a diner with fly strip-yellow lighting. She remembers Vinnie, who was older, perverted, and a friend of her fathers, muttering under his breath that if the waitresses' tits weren't rubber, he'd eat them. She remembers she and Vicky slapping Vinnie's hands away when he went to pinch the waitress' ass, and she remembers thinking: my father sent me to Arkansas with this creep?

She was dating my Papa at the time, so of course she missed him and wrote him letters every day. When she heard that he was dating someone else – another girl named Dorothy – she brushed it off, because, as she says, "the other Dorothy wasn't a threat."

One time, Vinnie handed Nana a letter. He asked her to drive it to a post office in St. Louis, Mo. Any post office, so long as it was in St. Louis. Nana says she figured the guy was fooling around with some lass in Arkansas, but that his wife back home thought he was in St. Louis. Whatever the situation, she didn't care. It was nice to take a break from strawberry canning and get behind the wheel of a Cadillac.

When Nana got back to Brant, she scolded Papa for "philandering around," (with another Dorothy no less.) Two years later she and Papa got married. They had five children, including my mother, the second-to-the-youngest, who was born in 1960.

Nana says she found the other Dorothy's sweater pin in Papa's possession, and that Papa tried to pawn it off as a gift for her. But she knew better.

She held onto it for few years. It was after all, a name pin, and Dorothy was her name too. Whenever she'd see The Other Dorothy around town, she'd think, Ha! I've got your pin at home. But eventually she lost it, threw it out, or whatever happens to things like that.

As she talked about Arkansas ("It was awful. I couldn't wait to come home.") her eyes sparkled. Sure she was homesick, but I could tell, the memory of her independence thrilled her.

For the helluvit, I Googled the distance between Sturkie, Ark. and Brant, N.Y. It's 946 miles. Or by my coping calculations, two and half years.
--

PS. Happy Birthday Nana, four days late.

Riding coach with PK

Hello again!

In keeping up with my merry self-deprecating elf of a sister, here's a third installment in the PK Q&A series.

For those of you new to Lance. I'll recap.

In June, my sister PK arrived in St. Petersburg, Fla. without her Pantene Pro-V anti-frizz hair serum, and a viral Leona Lewis song stuck in her head.

By August, she had a roommate and two jobs - a nine-fiver at a highfalutin Sarasota preschool and a night gig at an Italian restaurant.

Since then she's gotten her own apartment in Sarasota with a washer, a dryer, a $400 couch and nothing else. She lives alone and without cable TV. On weekends I drive down from St. Pete to grab hash browns and omelets with her at the Waffle Stop diner.

We just returned from the hinterlands of Western New York, where we celebrated Christmas with our family, and shocked the bejesus out of my father with a surprise 50th birthday party at the North Collins Senior Citizen Center.

(Hello Aunt Karyn! Hello Rebecca! Thank you, Erik for your handwritten Christmas card. It's stuck to our fridge with a Led Zeppelin magnet. Dad, I'm sorry I bitched about your dial-up Internet. Mom, I'm sorry I bitched about North Collins' lack of modern conveniences. Heelya, I'm sorry I bitched about bridesmaid dresses. I promised you all shout-outs, or in some cases, apologies. Nana & Papa: I have a post brewing in your honor. It involves a Cadillac, men's underwear, and a girl named Vicky.)

But enough about that. My third interview with PK took place on a Southwest Airlines flight from Buffalo to Tampa. The guy sitting next to us got an earful, but to keep him happy I slid the latest issue of GQ - the one with Jennifer Aniston naked on the cover - into the magazine compartment in front of my seat.

--

What are your airplane pet peeves?

PK: As in in the airplane? The airport? Or overall?

In the airplane.

My feet don't touch the ground and they fall asleep.

Who is the ideal person to be sitting next to in an airplane?

Generally someone who doesn't want to talk because I like to sleep. I don't want to feel the need to make small talk.

If you could sit next to any famous person on an airplane, who would it be?

A male dancer from Thunder From Down Under.

Do you think he'll drop trou mid-flight?

Maybe in the bathroom.

Why don't you eat your airplane snacks?

I'm not hungry.

But they're free.

You appreciate my snacks more. You get excited when I give them to you.

That's true. How would you describe your trip back home this Christmas?

Bittersweet.

How so?

It's nice to have so many people around that know you well. You don't constantly feel the need to explain where you're coming from. I miss that. But it's nice to feel independent. I know I'm going back to my own place. Do you know what I mean? I look at (North Collins) and I think, there's nothing there for me besides my friends and family.

But that's all you need, beyotch!

I agree. But I think ... how do I word it? It's hard to explain. It's weird talking to my good friends and they're talking about people I graduated with or other people I went to school with and the things they're doing and I'm sort of glad I got out of there. I mean to be able to say, I experienced things.

Snob.

I was stuck in a rut.

What do you miss the most about home?

Weird things, like being able to, in the middle of the day while Dad's at work, go out for lunch with Mom, or meet up with Holly. I constantly knew I had someone to do something with ... when I had free time.

Do you have people to do stuff with in Sarasota?

Yeah, I guess more so now. But it's always me making the effort. All you need is someone to be there to talk to. It used to be I would call George (her best friend in North Collins) and she'd be like, 'sure. I'll be right over.' People are a lot less empathetic in Florida. Is that the word I'm looking for? I've come to learn that people are less attached to their friends.

Isn't that just called growing up?

It probably has something to do with that.

This was your first trip home since you moved away seven months ago. What was the first thing you noticed about the parent's place when you walked in?

Everything looks so dark and wood-like. In Florida it's all cool colors and tile. Back home everything is dark, warm colors and wood. Mom Nana-fied our bedrooms. I get a kick out of how I slept in a twin-sized bed for 22 years. I move out and it becomes a full - with a plush pillow-top mattress.

Do you like what Mom did to your room?

It looks very nice, it's just very ... it's the same thing she did to your room. They've become guest bedrooms.

Did you feel like a guest?

A bit. Until Mom said, 'why don't you vacuum?' And we got in a fight over a can opener. Then it was like I never left.

Did you vacuum?

Yes, only the bedroom though. She told me I could stop.

Did the can opener fight get resolved?

Oh my God. I was going to wrap my white elephant gift for Nana's, and Mom said to Dad, 'Look what she's giving away? These nice mugs and an electric can opener? I struggle with my can opener every day, and she's just giving this good one away?' Things got heated and eventually I offered it to her, but she refused to keep it because she said it would remind her of this argument. It blew up into her saying how everything is given to me and how nothing is ever good enough. I said, 'Mom, that has nothing to do with it. I just like crank can openers.'

But she took the can opener. I saw her opening a can of corn on Christmas.

I refused to wrap it. On Christmas she was ranting and raving about how it cuts like butter.

What does your apartment in Sarasota look like?

It's barren. I've been told it looks like I got robbed.

Yet you invested in a grown-up sofa from a fancy furniture store?

Yes, it's my prized possession. I lint roll it once every two days.

Are you ever going to put out the rug I gave you?

Not until I get a kitchen table.

When are you getting a kitchen table?

Not until I look around for a good deal.

When are you going to get cable?

I plan on getting cable in January to start the new year, but I might put if off one more month. I sort of got my fix at Mom and Dad's. There's nothing wrong with watching Legends of the Fall for the 9th time.

Your TV gets an analog signal. You know you're going to have to get a converter box when cable goes digital next month.

Wait ... wait ... I've got an itch. On my shoulder blades.

I got it.

No ... to the left. I mean right ...

What cool rigamarole did you get for Christmas?

My America's Next Top Model pajamas are cool, even though Dad says they're too sexy for a single girl to be wearing. I say, even more reason to wear them. No one is going to see me in them.

Do people in Buffalo tell you your blood has thinned in Florida? I get that a lot.

Yeah, God forbid you complain about six-degree weather. Suddenly you've got thin blood and brittle bones.

Brittle bones? Do people in Buffalo have thick bones?

Apparently.

You didn't check your ice skates on the plane because of the blades, right?

That would be correct. I also didn't want my ice skates getting whipped out at security - like, 'whose are these?' I wouldn't want to claim them even though they're $600 skates.

Why are you ashamed of your skates?

I'm just ashamed of the smell. They have a pungent odor from my sweat.

You could have brought your flute on the plane.

Probably not. It could be used as a club.

What's your theory behind Buffalo zits? I see you've gotten a few.

Let me tell you. I haven't broken out this rapidly and this profusely in a long time. My theory? I think there are a few things that play into it. A.) The lack of sunshine. B.) The well water. C.) The stress of our family.

Do you think you'll move back home?

Not at this point in my life. I'm sort of like in between. I feel like I don't know what I'm doing. There are days I think I want to live in a foreign country and there are days I want to move home.

What if you meet a man?

I don't think I'm going to meet a Florida man. They're not my type.

Joe's a Florida man.

He's a rare find.

--

PS. Yes, the couch pictured above is PK's most prized possession.

A Tale of Two Toothbrushes.

And now for a story.

My sister Heelya is particular about her teeth, which is understandable. She's had so many teeth drilled we joke that her mouth is a member of OPEC.

Because we didn't have dental coverage growing up we rarely saw the dentist. He was a haggler anyway, or at least that's what my dad said.

Of my two sisters Heelya spazzes out the quickest over things like germs and toenails. My dad likes to joke that my youngest sister PK should've been a doctor. She was always operating on the family, always carrying around a satchel of medieval looking tools, offering to fix our skin ailments, ingrown hairs, blisters, that sort of thing.

It was disgusting. I partially blame my Opa who owned the exact same kit - a zippered pouch of metal nail files, clippers, tweezers, and whatever other crevice digging devices might accompany such things. PK coveted the pouch as a little girl and whenever we visited my grandparents she would help herself to it in the cabinet with the bath towels and immediately start picking at her feet blisters. She was a figure skater so blisters ravaged her feet.

Soon she assumed ownership of the best tweezers in my house, the ones my father filed into daggers with points so sharp you could pierce the skin in one pinch, or kill an intruder under hostage circumstances. Regardless none of this has anything to do with the story I'm about to tell.

We all shared one bathroom - me, PK, Heelya, my mom, my dad and on weekends whatever friends had spent the night. Our toothbrushes never fit in one of those cup things with the holes in it. No matter what cup thing my mom purchased there were only four holes in it. God friggen forbid someone use the same color toothbrush, the same no-name brand Reach toothbrush and risk mistaken brush identity. 

I pity my sister Heelya, but she should've known better when she purchased a blue toothbrush. My father had a blue toothbrush and unlike the time we all decided to label our toothbrushes with masking tape and my father labeled his Jerry Maguire because it was 1996 and all his girls had crushes on a pre-douchey Tom Cruise, unlike that time this time his blue toothbrush was not labeled.

For weeks, maybe months, my sister Heelya would wake up for school and brush her teeth with the same toothbrush my father had used to brush his teeth three hours earlier. By the time she grabbed the brush the bristles would be dry. She was totally clueless.

Until one day, she woke up earlier, reached for her brush and realized it was wet and the bristles were flattened. Over her morning bowl of cereal she asked my father, "Dad, what toothbrush are you using?"

Story goes he walked into the bathroom, reached for what he thought was his toothbrush and said, this one.

"Omigod," my sister shrieked. 

Or so I think this is how it ends. When I called my dad this morning to confirm the details he said, "Yeesus Christ. Did your sister call you complaining about some kind of mouth virus?"

Me and Sophia Petrillo would rock this too.

Balls. I've been told I can't post about "Lost." As much as I want to rip into the show, Joe has informed me that in order to give an accurate critique of the tangent-tastic, scuzz opera I have to rent all the seasons on DVD. Apparently watching only 10 episodes doesn't cut it for Siskel & Joe-bert. So, I must wait and Lance must remain nonpartisan on topics such as "Lost." (I knew this topic would rile him more than Towelie.)

So instead let me pontificate on Stein Mart. Why I'm rip roaring crazy over Stein Mart, the shopping plaza department store that, on the surface, sells merch to outfit an old biddy and old biddy condominiums.

There's a Stein Mart up the road from me, in a Publix plaza maybe two, three miles away. Whenever I go there (and it is often) I feel like I'm going to my favorite Q-tipped Aunt's house for mint juleps and scrabble. The women who work there are sweet as pumpkin pie and call me hon. The first time I walked in there, brand new to St. Pete and on a mission to find a lamp for our new apartment, a lone male employee walked up to me in housewares and asked if I needed help. I never saw the Stein Male again, though he was just as helpful and fatherly as the ladies were doting and maternal. (I think they keep him chained up behind the swinging door in housewares, where he works on Sudoku puzzles and if needed is unchained briefly for heavy lifting.)

Since that day I've returned to Stein Mart perhaps two dozen times. I purchased all my family's Christmas gifts there and traveled with an extra suitcase to Buffalo with all these oddities inside - rubber boots with enormous flowers on them for my sister, Heelya; a blue, blue handbag for my sister PK, pug slippers for my mom, the list goes on ...

People have said to me (particularly those family members mentioned above): "What the hell are you doing at Stein Mart, Bea Arthur?

And to them I say: "The place rocks my socks. I got the ass-iest pair of jeans* ever at Stein Mart."

Some of the other things I've purchased there:
1. Two blankets
2. Pillows
3. Green shirt that I am wearing to the left on this Lance
4. Our kitchen table, which Joe and I call Grandpa's snack tray
5. Bed sheets
6. White granny sweater
7. The butt jeans*

*And it's thanks to my Stein Mart sistahs that I even own the butt jeans at all. I almost bought a frilly, caketopper dress instead for this wedding we went to last week, but Jesus no I didn't really want to buy it and upon seeing my scrunched up face as I half-heartedly twirled for them in the dressing room, the Stein Mamas told me, "Hon, if you really like the jeans better, get the jeans."

Which is precisely what I did.

My theory is, is that I'm sister-less and mom-less here. PK, Heelya, mom, Nana, Aunt Winnie ... they're all up in Buffalo. The ladies at Stein Mart fill that void. Perhaps I wouldn't even shop at Stein Mart if these women lived here. Perhaps I specifically sought a Gouda cheesy department store in an attempt to stir up substitute retail relatives so that when I go shopping it's like I'm shopping with my ladies back in Buffalo again, which leads me to my final point of the morning - PK is moving here in less than three weeks.

Things are gonna get funky.