The sun is chasing away a few wisps of lingering fog this morning. There is frost on the rooftops that I can see from my office. Downstairs, my husband is still in bed, still recouping from yesterday’s 4:20 am wake-up time, and having to travel to San Francisco and back in a matter of 12 hours.

It is ridiculously quiet. I’m going to go have breakfast and see if my city – and my beloved – wake up in the next half hour. I’m guessing they won’t. While I do that, you enjoy these links:

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My friend Kurtis just started a blog. It’s called Kourteous. It’s absolutely insane … and therein may lie the brilliance.

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Ohio artist Amy Casey’s city scapes are delightfully odd. They’re what you’d expect if 9-year-olds were allowed to be civil engineers and gravity was no obstacle – which, for the record, would be AWESOME.

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Sometimes eating at chain restaurant won't leave you feeling dirty and sad inside. Really.

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In high school, I ate fast food nearly every day.

While my colon now involuntarily spasms at the thought, I lunched at Burger King on Mondays through Fridays for the better part of my junior and senior years. And yet, miraculously, I was far thinner than I am now. It was clearly a superpower of youth, one that I am unable to explain. In the words of Madonna, life is a mystery.

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Rand and I have been home for twenty-three days. Twenty-three. This is the longest stretch of time we’ve both been home together for nearly a year. It’s also the gestation period for a female human (Edit: No, no it’s not. I’m just seeing if you were paying attention.) And it’s roughly the amount of time I need to spend in one place before I start going absolutely bat-shit insane.

Even on a good day, I tend to lean pretty far towards the crazy end of the sanity spectrum. But leave me at home for three weeks, and I start to go a little bonkers. I’ve plotted it all on this chart.

It took me forever to find a picture of Velma from Scooby-Doo that wasn't all porny. I severely am bothered by this.

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In lieu of traveling, I’ve started doing things. Weird things. Like working out (I’m actually unable to walk down the stairs of my home right now because yesterday I paid a trainer to put me through hell. I literally paid her to do things which, had we lived in Medieval times, would have been fit punishment for the crime of, I don’t know, being able to read. Don’t fool yourselves, kids: THERE WAS NO RENAISSANCE. The Dark Ages are alive and well, in the weight room at Gold’s Gym). I’ve fixed clothing that’s needed to be mended since 2006 and is consequently no longer in style. I even started tackling that huge pile of bills that keeps accumulating on my desk (I was waiting until it grew so big that it became sentient and learned to pay itself. I was going to name it “Final Notice.” But I grew impatient.)

And then last night, in anticipation of a friend coming over for dinner, I made namecards for the table. Nevermind that there would only be the three of us. And that we all knew each other very well. And we all sit in the same place every time we have dinner together. And that the names were completely made up.

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There were lots of countesses anticipated at dinner.

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This one was the crowd favorite:

"This ... this is the greatest name, ever."

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I got less and less creative the more of these I made.

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And towards the end, I sort of stopped trying.

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I also made a strawberry, apple, and blueberry pie for dessert. We ate half of it, and none of us – not Lady Janet Smith (nee Fartsmonger), the honorable Viscount Herschel Bumnuzzler, nor Baron Von Hugenstein – had any regrets about this.

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But really, I think maybe these namecards are a sign of something …

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Like that I need to get on the road soon before I start organizing my sock drawer according to the feelings that each pair invokes, or writing a book of etiquette with an entire chapter dedicated to cat birthdays.

WTF, Everywhereist. KEEP IT TOGETHER. Life at home should not be crazier than the baggage claim at Newark.

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On Halloween day, I headed to the Tribeca firestation made famous in Ghostbusters. That night, I channeled Margot Tennenbaum on the streets of midtown, eating stick after stick of candy cigarettes.

The next day, I realized I wasn’t yet done paying pilgrimage to movie locations or obsessing over Wes Anderson.

And so, on the first day of November, which was bright and clear and curiously warm, I left our hotel with a specific goal in mind: I was going to see the house on Archer Ave that Royal Tenenbaum bought in the winter of his thirty-fifth year.

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Last week, I found out there was a trailer for Wes Anderson’s new movie, Moonrise Kingdom. I haven’t watched it yet. Not because I’m not interested – I am. I just like having it there, waiting for me. Knowing I can enjoy it whenever I want. It’s something I occasionally do with cupcakes. I sit and look at them. I enjoy having them there. It’s almost better than actually eating them.

Almost.

Anderson is a polarizing figure for a lot of people. Even I, from my perch of adoring fandom, am able to see he’s not perfect. The sentimentality of The Life Aquatic felt forced. Darjeeling Limited was unnecessarily misogynistic. But most of the time, he strikes the right cord, and makes me believe that life is meant to be full of sepia tones and musical vignettes and narration by Alec Baldwin.

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I’m still at home, and my city is still covered in snow. Supposedly it will all melt today, and we’ll be left with puddles and sopping wet piles of mud, which is perhaps for the best, as that is what we are used to.

Having spent the last few days in pajamas, I’m looking forward to the sartorial challenge of dressing for 100% humidity and 4o degrees. While I look online for rainboots I can’t afford, you enjoy these links (and stay warm and dry, will you?)

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I am completely digging these Movie Posters from an Alternate Timeline. Bonus points to the artist for including the late, great Sal Mineo.

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Dear, lord. Kids today. Tweets from 25 angry kids who couldn’t do their homework because Wikipedia was blacked out. Really? You’re allowed to use WIKIPEDIA for homework nowadays? I … I need a cookie. (via Nomadic Matt)

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Midsummer in New York, the heat bounced off the buildings and the pavement, straight onto us.

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It’s mid-January, and I find myself thinking about ice cream.

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It’s been snowing for days here in Seattle, effectively shutting the town down. Buses are stranded on hills, schools are closed, and Rand and I have done our best not to go all “Shining” on each other while stuck indoors together (except for a brief bit of hatchet chopping which he really had coming, it’s all been rather pleasant).

Snow rarely happens in Seattle. We might get a few inches over a few days, but it’s been ages since we’ve seen this much snowfall, and actually had it stick around. The first night, the streets were filled with people. The park near our home was a snowball battlefield, and at least a dozen snowmen had been erected.

And … um, speaking of things being erected … (Note: if you work in a particularly conservative environment, you might not want to keep reading) let me tell you about the snow sculpture we encountered in the park.

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Note: Due to yesterday’s SOPA blackout (which I spent in my pajamas, eating M&M cookies and I REGRET NOTHING) this week’s WTF Wednesday is appearing today. Which, I’m told, is a Thursday. But really, who’s keeping track?

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Looks lovely, right? But WAIT, there's more.

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I began questioning authority at a tender young age. This is in no small part due to my Floridian primary school education, which could have caused the most obedient of children to stand up and scream, “WHAT IN THE HELL IS GOING ON AROUND HERE?”.

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Because life shouldn't be censored.

Hi folks,

I’m afraid I have to go and get all political on you. I’m truly sorry. You know how desperately I try not to be informed about, well, anything (for proof, please note the time I got Greenwich and North Greenwich mixed up. Or when I claimed that leprechauns were from Scotland.)

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