Halloooooooooooo, friends! Oh my, it's good to see you.



I mean, truly. How long has it been since we've really sat down and had a chat? It has to have been at least Monday.



You don't come by, you don't leave comments. The Woodside grows cold with neglect.



Don't you love me anymore?



What if I give you a little smile?



Eye twinkles? Does that do it for you?



Laughs? Oh ho, my darlings, I find you disarming and hilarious.



Oh, wait! SECRET WEAPON: elbow chub. The Woodside has that in spades.



Ah, that's better. Now you are back, under my spell once again. You had me worried there for a moment.



This world ain't gonna take over itself, you know.

So I need to tell you something, and I need you to suspend your disbelief. What I am about to say is absolutely true, but it won't be easy for you to understand or accept. You may feel yourself growing agitated, incredulous, and perhaps even sputtery when I say what I'm about to say, but I swear on Jake, French fries, and the wrath of trees that I am not lying:

This person is my twin.



OK, that's hard even for me to believe, but my mother assures me that this is the case. I've been tempted to question her further, but she's all, "LABOR PAINS!" and according to recorded history we were ridiculously massive, hungry, greedy little fetuses taking up all her inside space, so I've decided to let her have this one.

Still it's a little unbelievable.

To make matters even more ridiculous, this person (let's see him again for comparison, shall we?)



is building a house. A whole residential structure, with a solid roof and reliable plumbing and electrical wiring he installed himself that meets something they apparently call "code."

I bought the Woodside ready-made and it doesn't have any of those things.

He traipses about this house—a building that wasn't even meant to be a house, something he just put together out of an old Water Works tank-storage midcentury lean-to mishmash with some tools I can't identify and more sweat than can be measured and something he has in his head called "imagination."

I know, it baffles me. I'm like a dog faced with unfamiliar stairs.



I visited this little weekend project, TwinFin having put "erecting a house" where his "drinking margaritas" should be, and noted that this particular talent—being able to craft a functioning homestead out of an empty brick shell—is rather popular with the ladies. They were stunned by his prowess.



I, on the other hand, did my usual utterly concrete and incomprehending wanderings throughout the newly sheetrocked space, pretending I understand in any way how the floor plan will ultimately pan out. Luckily he's added some helpful labels for the spatially impaired such as myself.



That's where the cows will roam, I think.

Everything is very bright and light-flooded and filled with the soothing sense that just because it's raining outside does not mean it will feel damp inside.



A girl could get used to that.

I think we'd all like to tell TwinFin how amazed we are at his dedication and energy, how awed we are by his enormous talent, but mostly we're sort of stunned into silence, listening to him mutter about inspections while he walks around ON THE ROOF LIKE A CRAZY PERSON IT IS VERY HIGH COME DOWN FROM THERE.

So in case I forgot to mention it, we're all very proud of him.



But I get to be proudest. He's my twin.

It's the weekend, finalmente. Take a BIG bite out of it!



Something to ponder: Did everyone think that guy who coined the phrase "TGIF" was an embarrassing nerd? I find needlessly acronyming things to be an infuriating habit.

POH.

Today's post is brought to you by Things I Think Are Pretty That Are Not Stella. As you will perhaps notice, it is a short list. That's not because I don't think a lot of things are pretty, it's just because I have a very short attention span. I'm like Dug from Up, except that where he might say, "Well hello there ... SQUIRREL!" I'm all, "I like Cheetos ... NIECE!"

It's a very attractive trait.



yellow m&ms on a brown countertop.



modesty.



the little brown dog who lost his wag. (we're hoping it will return to full strength in the next few days. strange ailments—it's how i know he's mine.)



foodimentary guy, hard at work.



lavender in winter.



the most brilliant interior designer i know has this hanging in his courtyard as art. it's a plain white canvas that got left in the garage and started to mildew. that is why he's brilliant. even if tfin thinks it's "gross."



NIECE!

Oops.

I hate that I've been away from the Woodside for so long—there have been epic numbers of dramatic falls, awkward encounters, conversation failures, job changes, car fiascos, and dangerous run-ins with trees since last we spoke—but I'm afraid there just isn't any time in my life anymore.

And by that I mean "time not spent drinking Cabernet on the sofa while staring dumbly at the television and trying to figure out what Oprah's preaching at me this week. Also, brushing unidentifiable food crumbs off my person and out of my hair."

There are always those times the world has you under its thumb, and in times like those sometimes there's only one thing left to do: Sometimes you just gotta roll over.

ACK! It's Monday. How the crap did that happen? Yes, it's Monday. You know how I know? Because I came off sounding like a jerk and/or an idiot in 78% of my communication today, including e-mails, phone calls ("Oh hai, Toyota. Yes, that was me that left my license tag on the car when I turned it in"), and face-to-face discourse. Also I'm missing J something fierce. Oh! And I have $90 to my name. Until Thursday.

Batting 1,000 I am not. But I shall spare you the remaining litany of Reminders Why I Am Something of a Professional Jackass and share some shots I took yesterday. Because yesterday was crisp and sunny and cloudless and ... not Monday.


Note: I don't dress this well now, and I'm allegedly a grownup.


Stella is scandalized by my sartorial mishaps.


Truly, I would wear these in my size. Considering that I was once asked "why [I] don't tip over," these may be my size.


What? It's hyperbolic license. Sheesh.


Sigh. There is nothing more adorable on this planet. You should see me with my thighs wrapped in horizontal stripes and ruffles across my bum. This is genetic cuteness, people.


She never believes a word I say.


I'll be your dancer. Dancer for tummy. Do what you want me to do.


I apologize. Was that inappropriate?


I swoonz.


Samantha hates the camera, but the light was too pretty not to risk her accusatory glare.


Handsomeness.


Sabbath confession: I covet my father's neighbor's dog.


I know! Don't tell J.


Hm. I do not trust that face. I'm totally going to be sold out. Remember, Stella, aunts are the ones who keep your secrets.

This is what happens when you tell the dog to smile.



What happens after you tell the dog to smile is that you do an indelicate face plant into the nearby snow.

The momster is, as a rule, an enormous fan of holidays, but always with a twist. When I was a kid there was no Santa Claus, but there were Christkindls. There was no tooth fairy, but the birthday fairy left you a pretty new outfit at the end of your bed every year. There was no Easter Bunny, but there were still baskets, filled with trinkets and plastic eggs and that bizarre but ubiquitous fake grass.

On Valentine's Day, there were heart-shaped gelatin snacks and notes in your lunchbox, hugs and small presents and shiny red apples with a thick river of peanut butter running through the middle.

So for me, Valentine's Day has always been a family holiday, with none of the cloying romance and all of the laughing and teasing and needling and cocktails. It's a riot.



Or it will be, maybe next year when the celebration doesn't fall during nap time.

I've been clinging to that day lately, because there was so much that this week has not been—cheerful, positive, supportive, relaxed.



I'm very lucky to have such an utterly insane family—a circle of uniquely amazing and loony kindred spirits.



My family doesn't all have to be biologically related to me; they just have to be people who wear their crazy like a brand, so I can recognize it and match it with my own and know that I have people. There's something warm and sparkly about loving someone really really hard who drives you completely nuts.



It's also a good defense for the next time you drive them completely nuts.



So as this baffling and unpredictable week marches on, I remember: "They say that good things take time, but really great things happen in a blink of an eye."



Yes, I just quoted Miley Cyrus as Hannah Montana. That's MY crazy. Look familiar?