PostBoy and MathGirl: Planning A Honeymoon in Costa Rica

Rex's son, PostBoy, recently announced his engagement to the lovely, gracious MathGirl. They plan to marry in February 2009, followed by a Costa Rican honeymoon.

Since our good friends Brent and Fitz travelled to Costa Rica last summer, they are lending a hand in planning the couple's trip, complete with helicopter volcano tours and ripcord travel through the jungles and canyons.

Brent's first tip is to stay at the Makanda Hotel in Miguel Antonio., and to use Nature Air prop planes to get around the country instead of wasting valuable time driving on the rutted and curvy roads.

We'll be posting about Costa Rica here from time to time over the next six months, and would welcome your comments and suggestions if you've travelled to or live there.

Brent's Mama is Coming for Thanksgiving: The Silver Ladle Joke

Brent's mama has made plans to visit Brent and Fitz's new home in Westchester, New York, for Thanksgiving, which prompted us to re-tell the silver ladle story over lunch today:

Brent invites his mama to spend a long weekend at his new home in the country. When Mama arrives, she can't help but notice how hot Fitz is, and how the two boys exchange glances across the room. Brent tells her that they are just roommates, they have a strictly platonic relationship, and assures her that nothing is going on between them. Mama enjoys a nice dinner and weekend visit, and goes back home to South Carolina.

Two weeks later Fitz says to Brent, "It's funny, but ever since your mother came for the weekend, I can't find my silver gravy ladle." Brent writes his mother a letter saying, "Mama, I'm not saying that you did take the silver gravy ladle, and I'm not saying that you did not take the silver gravy ladle, but the fact remains, it has been missing since you came to visit."

Mama wrote a letter back to Brent saying, "Son, I'm not saying that you do sleep with Fitz, and I'm not saying that you do not sleep with Fitz, but the fact remains... if Fitz was sleeping in his own bed, he would have found the silver ladle under his pillow by now."

Brent, the Dirt Devil, and the Office Cleaning Lady

Every now and then, I've blogged about the goings on in the office suite our company rents from Greedy Lizworld Landlady in New York City, but the story I'm about to tell really takes the cake...

Back in December, Brent was planning a trip south with Fitz to visit his in-laws over the holidays, and he wanted to buy a nice Christmas present for Mrs. Brick. Now, while Brent has exquisite taste and would have preferred to shop at Tiffany or Chanel, Fitz and the Brick Family have a tradition of practical Christmas gifts. Brent's in-laws are also very green and energy-conscious, and Mrs. Brick had mentioned that she was most interested in how to avoid spending energy on cleaning her home.

To give you a sense of what Brent was up against here, the Brick family finds unusual ways of saving energy in and around the house. While their home is on a nice acre or so of land, the Bricks don't own a gas or electric power lawnmower...instead, they have two goats, Lance and Thelma, who are in charge of keeping the backyard trim without wasting energy. When the kitchen floors get a little dirty, the Bricks call Lance and Thelma in from the backyard to lick up the spills. But for Christmas 2007, Fitz's mama was looking for a gift that would let her modernize her housekeeping routine without wasting energy.

The good news is, Brent was able to find a better way for the Bricks to save energy. He went online and ordered a Dirt Devil AccuCharge Stick Vac. It uses 70% less energy than traditional vacuums, making AccuCharge the first cordless cleaning technology to earn Energy Star approval. Sounds like a happy ending, right? Well, the story doesn't end here.

As he frequently does, Brent had his Dirt Devil AccuCharge Stick Vac shipped to our office here at LizWorld NYC, and it arrived in a shiny, well-labeled Dirt Devil box...if he had shipped it south to the in-laws, the gift would have been no surprise for Mrs. Brick. In addition to being greedy, our LizWorld Landlady is nosy as all get out. She saw the box in the mail room, decided that Brent and Rex and I were dissatisfied with LizWorld's Macedonian cleaning lady, and fired her on the spot. Brent came in early the next morning to find the cleaning lady weeping in our office, trying to explain the situation in broken English, mostly involving a lot of pointing at the box and the words "no good, no good."

Brent went straight to Greedy LizWorld Landlady's office and explained that the energy-saving Dirt Devil was a Christmas gift for his mother-in-law, and demanded an immediate call to the president of the cleaning company to reinstate our cleaning lady who had done nothing wrong. Our cleaning lady was so grateful that she took Brent out for a festive, traditional Macedonian brunch in which few words were spoken but a good time was had by all, including a helping of goat cheese fritters in honor of Thelma and Lance.

Taking the Fall for Brent's Peccadilloes (Again)....or How I Became a Cub Scout Den Mother

Do you like my uniform? I was the winning bidder for this hot little number on eBay last Halloween, when Brent decided that he would march proudly in the Greenwich Village Halloween Parade as a Cub Scout Den Mother, along with his troop of impressionable young boys. When bidding on this item, Brent did not want to appear sick and twisted to the Midwestern Mom who was selling it on eBay...so he used my eBay UserID and our office shipping address to acquire the lovely blouse, skirt, and cap combo. I'm not sure where he got the coordinating "women in comfortable shoes" pumps to wear in size 11.

After a successful Halloween Parade experience and his subsequent move to the suburbs, Brent no longer needs the Cub Scout Den Mother Uniform. He's not likely to be dressing in drag for the neighborhood Halloween parade this year and would prefer that his new nosy neighbors not ask too many questions when groping through his closets. I am, of course, charged with the task of unloading it.

In his recent efforts to find an antique kitchen table to fit his Mount Vernon decorating scheme, Brent experienced one of the issues of shopping "face to face" through Craigslist. While he ended up with the perfect kitchen table, Brent was frightened by what could have happened to the elderly couple who sold it to him if they let the wrong type of "buyer" into their home. And I'd rather not expose myself to the type of buyers who might be in the market for Brent's lightly used Cub Scout Den Mother Uniform.

We found a solution through iSold It, a "bricks and mortar" service in Brent's neighborhood (and yours), where would-be sellers can drop off any and all items you wish to sell. Then your local iSold It store sells it on your behalf, to a huge audience, on eBay. iSoldIt does all the work, photographing and listing your item on eBay. They send you a link so you can watch the action on eBay as it unfolds. After the item sells, iSoldIt collects the payment and ships your item to the winning bidder. Once the transaction is complete, they send you a check.

Problem solved, Cub Scout Den Mother Uniform unloaded. No prying eyes or curious visitors to Brent's natural habitat.

My Girls Want A Dog

An ongoing conversation in our household is when/if we can get a dog. My younger daughter really, really, really wants a dog, mommy....but my older daughter is allergic to most (if not all) breeds. This weekend, we visited Brent, Fitz, and their dogs, Sophie (pictured above) and Rocky (who looks like Toto from the Wizard of Oz). Sophie is the sweetest, and my girls were all over her....but Benadryl was necessary, so I'm afraid there's no pit bull in our future. I've heard that there are certain breeds like cockapoos and wheaton terriers that don't shed and are thought to be less likely to trigger an allergic reaction. We try to expose my daughter to different breeds to test her allergies....maybe we should visit an American Animal Care Center to learn more about the best breeds for allergic kids, and borrow one for a weekend to test it out.