Superpowers

My sister Anna has a superpower. She can grab a random handful of crackers and then, without thinking or counting, slice the exact amount of cheese she needs for a 1:1 cracker to cheese ratio. It doesn't just work with cheese, but also pickles.

We were talking about our superpowers while walking Greenlake tonight. I asked Francie if she has one.

"I'm pretty good at knowing random dates," she said.

Anna: "Oh, like, people's birthdays?"

Francie: "Well, no. Not necessarily. Just certain random dates."

Anna: "What do you mean?

Francie: "Hmmm..."

Anna:  "Like, Christmas?!"

Francie: "Aaah, I don't know! Just certain dates—nevermind!"

And we laughed. As far as superpowers go, it was weak. Nothing compared to automatically slicing the exact amount of cheese required. But Francie does have a better superpower—it's responding to emails really fast. On any family email thread, she's always the first to answer back. Good job, Fronk!

My superpower is probably the ability to recap a TV show episode in a minute or less. I've also never cut my fingernails or toenails, yet they remain the perfect length.

What's yours?

Cheers,
Margaret

P.S. I made this on some Chinese app called MyIdol. I'm sure you've seen it making the rounds. The app is difficult to navigate, as it's all in Chinese, but I suggest sticking with it.

Do you think it looks like me?

We should be florists / Serial Ep 9 Review

Holy hell. It's 11:30pm. I'm sweating like a pig. My foot blisters are throbbing. I've got 30 minutes to write this thing. Here it goes.

I've just returned from a pre-nuptial gathering at Char's flat. She's getting married tomorrow. Her and Francie went to Sainsbury's, picked up a few bouquets of flowers, brought them back to the flat and we worked our magic on them. Magic none of us knew we had. But boy, did we turn those supermarket flowers into luxurious, boutique blossoms. As Nina Garcia would say, "They look expensive." The ultimate compliment. 

But really, you can't quite tell from the photo, but they look AMAZING. Turns out, it's not that hard. We may have missed our calling to run a flower shop. 'Margaret & Sisters Florist', we could have named it. I suppose it's not too late for a career change.

Gal talk!

I made the executive decision to keep the TV off during our bouquet-making session (shocking, I know). After all, what's the wedding eve night for if not a bit of gal talk! Here's what we covered:

• Dr. Oz turning out to be a quack (Francie didn't know)
• Birth canals. We reckon mine is large, judging by my wide hips (let's hope so!)
• Pizza, and how good it is (we split one, but wished we each had our own)
• The potential of HR departments, and the reality of HR departments (why they hafta be so ruuuude)

Serial Episode 9 Review

First, can you believe there's not going to be a new episode next week? I think I speak for all of us when I say: F-you, Thanksgiving. Waiting two weeks is going to feel like forever.

Anyhoo. For me, Serial episodes fall into one of two categories:

1) Evidence-based episodes. Lots of new tidbits to stew on (even though they never add up to anything)

- OR -

2) Narrative episodes. Not too many new facts, but a clear story arc that makes me ask: why is she choosing to say this now? Is she setting us up for a fall? What's her angle?

This week's episode falls under the second category. It was really interesting. Really, really sad. But it didn't leave me questioning the evidence (or lack there of). It left me wondering why Sarah would choose this time to present quite an Adnan-friendly episode, putting him back in our good graces after the Jay episode. Is she starting to slowly build up a clearer case for Adnan's innocence? Or is she getting us back on his side, only to blindside us with something damning next week? Or, could it really be true that she has no idea how the series will end? I can't believe that. I think she knows more than she's letting on.

OMG. FIVE MINUTES LEFT.

Gotta go.

- M