Never underestimate the power of a handmade treasure on a Monday. I got this at the Torpedo Factory  in Alexandria, Virginia during my east coast days, and it always warms my soul. The color is soothing and rustic, the handle is exquisite, and I can remember the man who made it and sold it to me. Also, the Torpedo Factory makes me think of Old Town ice cream, which is a memory bound to make anyone's day better. This treasure has the perfect little spot at the top of the handle for my thumb to sit, and holding it just so makes me think of all the lovely desks it's been to with me, and how far we've yet to go.

I have this horrible, ego-maniacal habit of checking my blog statistics. I like seeing the numbers, and where people are coming from, but what I most want to know is what it is that people are googling, in desperation, and somehow finding my blog. It's almost always delightfully hilariously mortifying. Which is probably how they feel. huh. For a long time, the most popular google hit was "Girl Scout Cookies Spain", because once I wrote a post about girl scout cookies , and how much I love them, and how much we adults need the shining light that is a girl scout cookie delivery to look forward to every year.  To all of you trying to find out how to get girl scout cookies in Spain, I am sorry. I have no idea. But there is a FABULOUS bakery down the street from the Oviedo Cathedral that can hook you up with a chocolate dipped pretzel thing. Recently, my sister-in-law and I have been writing a lot about the Bachelor (oh, you didn't notice?) and at first I teased her...

Lacey:  ‪Turns out Utah is the perfect place to fall in love.  What's wrong with me then? Lorraine:  ‪hahahahahahhaha.  you just have to move to park city, learn to ride horses, drop yourself down a cavernous hole in the ground in a bikini, run in the rain, and then make a fool of yourself on National TV, and you TOO can find overwhelming, synthesized, temporary love! Lacey:  ‪That's a tall order.  I'll get started right away.   ‪So what do you think Samantha did to tick Ben off so much?   He sent her packing with no mercy.   ‪He must have been completely turned off by her ingratitude.   She didn't get much camera time.  Maybe she was annoying and rude. Lorraine:  ‪well Nicki goes in there and acts gracious, leaves herself completely open and kind, and actually winning a few points from me, and THEN in a perfect show of timing (almost producer made magic timing) Samantha shows up right after her and very immaturely...

My friend is getting her new lungs today. I'm so thankful to the person who lost their life, but gave something up to others, even in death.  Go Charity. The person Charity, and the act of charity. Both awesome.

As I mentioned a few posts ago, I recently decided to fast on behalf of my friend. She is still awaiting her double lung transplant, but she is getting stronger every day, making her chances of having a successful transplant better and better with every breath she takes. I'm so proud of her. I admit that the act of fasting for a meager 16 hours or so was actually a really enlightening experience, and something that brought me a lot of peace, silence, and strangely, motivation.  I like that there is this very literal, physical thing that we can do for someone else when they are physically ailing. Not only because it makes you feel a little less helpless, and shows your devotion to someone or to a higher power, but also because this extremely physical act, this gnawing of hunger throughout the day, makes you think about your body good and hard for a minute. I think I forgot about my body. I think about my mind, about NPR, about driving my car, about kissing my husband. ...

In light of me not being able to properly edit the embarrassingly dramatic live-blog that Lacey and I endured last week on the bachelor, I've decided to spare you, and only provide my Post Bachelor G-Chat Highlight. Lorraine: AHHHHH!!!!! Shawntel!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  I don't believe it. Lacey: Crazy right? Lorraine: I love her! Dan had a crush on her Brad's season! I'm watching right now. Lacey: I know I liked her a lot too. She made me want to be a mortician. Lorraine: hahaha, great conversation starter for any dating reality show. make the model die. Make the model be dead, and then you or Shawntel (or both of you) can formaldehyde her. Lacey: I'd relish the opportunity. Lorraine: oh no, I've started off the bachelor convo prematurely. We're half live-blogging hahah. That's how sick I've become. I can't even WAIT. Lacey: I don't know. It makes it kind of exciting! Discussing it with you as you discover it is thrill...

Or as I'd like to call it, Episode Too Much Cleavage. Lacey: What we learned in this episode: Ben likes small towns, southerners, and women wearing Osh Kosh B'Gosh. Lorraine: ‪I loved when that little girl was trying to think of what to call it. "the lady...wearing the, the..."‬ and we all knew exactly who she meant. Lacey: ‪I breathed a huge sigh of relief when she was finally forced into that gingerbread costume. Think of the children!‬ Lorraine: ‪by far my favorite part of the entire show was the 0.5 second shot of Blakely, deep inside the cavernous gingerbread man costume, with her million dollar smile, saying "NIIICE!" when Ben took his clothes off.‬ I replayed it. thrice. I want to have it forever in a repeating animated .gif Lacey: ‪I didn't even notice! I'll have to have a re-screening.‬ ‪I've decided that Kacie B. continues to rank #1 this week, especially in light of her baton twirling skills. That was excellent. You can...

There was a big debate about the word "Illin" recently in the New York Times crossword puzzle . In this case, illin is a good thing. This blog be illin. Yo. Let's move on. What is your current obsession? Lately I’ve had the hankering to give the bedroom portion of our new home some more life. It has some great characteristics, but as the “new” part of the house, it lacks the verve of the other rooms. I’ve recently acquired some pops of the color marigold, and I have ambitions plans to do a series of stripes in the middle of the wall to emulate the colors in the Grand Staircase National Park in Southern Utah. I need to spend some time on pinterest, methinks.  What is your weirdest obsession? After a long hiatus from doing it as a child, I’ve started recently to start collecting model breyer horses again. I can’t stop myself, because I am 12. No, that's not true, I can stop anytime I want. REALLY. What are you wearing today? I’m wearing a black dress I origin...

I'm not really a fasting woman. Truth be told, I think the last time that I abstained from eating out of religious observance was for Ramadan when I was in college, so I think that it's probably been awhile since I really took the time to think about the meaning of it at all. I don't know if God hears a chorus of grumbling of stomachs and washes the people over with his mercy. I don't know if prayer can or should change the outcome of things, or if the trivial sacrifice of well fed middle class white people in America means anything to an onmipotent being who has watched murder and war and malady the world over for thousands of years. In this case, I don't know if I can even bring myself to ask God to change his mind if his mind is made up. But this Sunday, regardless, I'll be observing a fast. Have you ever met a person only once, and that person changed you forever after?  That's how I felt about meeting Charity. She exuded grace to me, and at the time...

Lorraine: Lacey. We need to talk. It's important. It's about...the Bachelor. Lacey: Did you watch? Lorraine: I did. Lacey: Me too. Lorraine: I really want to like the horse girl, for obvious reasons, but the way she spells her name: LINDZI. And, you know, her face. I was surprised she got the first impression rose Lacey: Me too a little. But she seems nice and pretty normal which means she'll either go far, or be written off by the producers. Lorraine: hahahha you may have a point there. also, um JENNA!!!!! Lacey: psycho She scares me! Lorraine: my favorite part is actually watching her try to interact with Ben. she hasn't said a single normal thing to him yet. not one thing. "Good Things End Badly" hahahahahhaha Lacey: It's true. She's unstable. While we're talking about Jenna, let's talk about Monica. Why do they keep casting the "villains" from Salt Lake City? They're giving us a bad name! Lorraine: hahahah...