This is Your Brain on Grants

Tonight when I left work I swung by Festival Foods for "a loaf of bread, a carton of milk, and a stick of butter." I have officially become an old Sesame Street sketch.

My life lately is like this: workworkworkworkworkworkworkeatworksleepworkworkworkeat BUT I am escaping this weekend to attend Chilifest. We haven't attended since 2006 (really?!), and this year I'll be bringing "Chili Sin Carne" from Vegan with a Vengeance. Photos and recipe and debauchery to follow. I sincerely hope we skip the "vomit on the gnomes" sequence, but I wouldn't mind if the Green Ghost showed up again.

Seriously, grants have eaten my brain, which now feels like a bowl of chili sin carne minus the spices, tomatoes, peppers, and onions. So basically my brain feels like a bowl of smashed, overcooked beans. I'll blame my bean-brain for the following:

I recently paid $78 for an oil change, tire rotation, and car wash. They also topped off the fluids. Was I ripped off, or is that a reasonable sum to pay for these services in total? I'm still confused.

Last weekend, J and I had a long, spirited conversation about "things we remember about our neighborhood roller rinks, circa 1982." I found it entertaining enough to make a note: Blog about this later! And later came, and I couldn't remember a damn thing about the conversation other than neon-dyed fur skate covers. And giant dice. Wait...wait....it's coming back to me....didn't the air smell like popcorn and sweaty Dr. Scholl's inserts? And the blisters...dear God, I almost forgot about the blisters...

My sister has convinced my two and a half year-old nephew that fig newtons are "candy bars." I find this absolutely brilliant and hilarious. I'm hoping I can adopt this technique with J. "Mmmm, this tof--I mean STEAK is delicious! Want some more kale--ifornia style tacos?"

It's now possible for me to get drunk on three beers consumed in a five hour timeframe. When the hell did this happen? Oh, right. Probably when I got my compost tumbler, installed my bird feeding station, and started taking a quarter cup of vitamins and supplements per day in an effort to stave off age-related degeneration. Like Bean Brain.

Also, I forgot to tell you I'm (intentionally) growing mushrooms in our spare room! I got one of those spiffy mushroom kits for Christmas, and there are currently cute lil' teeny fungal pinheads poking from the planting medium. My brain-on-grants finds this very entertaining.

I keep forgetting to schedule my next hair appointment. I haven't been to the salon since July. Think I'm overdue? Let's ask my roots. They have a very strong opinion on the matter.

Oh God, I just need to go to bed. One needs at least eight hours of sleep if one is to avoid accidentally replacing the word "public" with "pubic" in a Federal grant proposal.