At the beach/ Julie and Julia

Hi to all five of you out there, ok maybe I have picked up a few more readers lately but that is beside the point. I never started this blog with the intention of having a wide audience one day. I just enjoy it. I am at the beach with my crew and in-laws and it is ohh say, 6:30 AM. Yikes, who is dumb enough to be up at 6:30 AM writing on a blog at the beach on "vacation" no less?


Me that's who. *** Side note - to anyone foolish enough to wonder why I put quotes around the word vacation, you must not be a mom. If you want to know why they are there, go ask one.





I was sleeping somewhat peacefully when I was awakened by a screaming, annoyed 17 month old in the pack and play nearby, evidently he was also annoyed - thus the screaming. This in turn set off the other alarm which is my doodle. She was sleeping in the king size bed with me and one of her sisters. So I get fussy baby settled in with me and he calms down, miraculously my Doodle does too, only now, I can't sleep anymore. So I pick up my headset and commence listening to the last CD of the book I have been listening to for the past 3 days - Julie and Julia. You may have heard of the movie that is now out with MerylStreep playing Julia Childs and Amy Adams playing Julie. Anyway, it was entertaining enough to keep me listening to the end but annoying as all get out at the same time.





I don't want to spend a lot of time on going over the plot but you can go here and watch a trailer if you are that interested. I may or may not go see the movie but I do love Meryl so that is a remote possibility. The remoteness is due to the fact that I


A. Love movies more than almost anything and therefore have a line up that is pretty extensive so Julie and Julia falls pretty far down the line and


B. I have five kids and only get to see movies when my parents are in town and


C. My entertainment budget has been severely cut back due to recent economy and current beach trip which we really can't afford but I am oh so grateful to be at.





Anyway, I love cooking but by no stretch of the imagination could I ever believe that I would be capable of accomplishing what the author set out to do which is cook her way through Julia Child's famous book Mastering the Art of French Cooking, every single recipe in one year. First of all time, second money, third I refuse to eat organ meat. Anything that is used by the body to think, collect toxins, deliver waste or purify blood is off limits. Maybe I am as culinary as a vanilla wafer but I have a healthy respect for the limits my stomach can handle.





So, Julie Powell, the author has a few things in common with me, however, there are two huge differences that really cut me off from empathizing with the "heroine" of this story -


One, she is an atheist, though not so much in a "How stupid can you all be?" kind of way, but more of a "whatever, I haven't got time for that mess" which is almost as bad. But, when I read things by nonbelievers it doesn't necessarily anger me it just means that any insight I glean from said book is worthless since its not coming from a greater place. It means no words in her writing have truly been inspired because what is inspiration if it doesn't come from the greatest Author of all times?


And, almost as bad- she is staunchly anti-republican.


Why I don't know? I am not staunchly anti-democrat. They have their few points. I don't beleaguer them that. They are green and sympathetic and have a couple of other redeeming qualities right? ( I can hear two people in my head screaming at me that this is NOT TRUE!, my dad and my best friend's husband.) So why the anti R hatred? Her parents live in TEXAS. That's a pretty conservative state right? She calls Republicans various insulting things throughout the book which I won't dignify by repeating here. But I kept thinking to myself, she has most-likely been dumped by one somewhere in her history. I don't know and it doesn't matter anyway. The author seems genuinely off-put at the end of the book because Julia is offended or critical of her project/blog and I wonder if it has anything to do with the two points mentioned above. I say, HELLO, course she is offended you twit, she was 91 when she read your blog and you say F*** every other line. 91 year olds don't like that word very much and neither do most civilized people, even if we occasionally yell it out in frustration when the kids aren't around.





Oh well, so she doesn't like Republicans, but she has effectively snubbed potentially half of her readership whom she says "don't read the Dining Section of the paper" I beg to differ, I do read that section and I have no idea where she got that idea? Just because I am against murdering unborn babies, believe in families, the sanctity of life, responsibility for oneself, keeping the money I earn to spend as I see fit, choosing which charities I donate to, smaller government and of course SARAH PALIN, this, this qualifies me as some old stogy cigar-smoking rich buracrat? Huh?





Ok, this was a really long post on a seriously random topic but it had to be done. I couldn't sleep anyway, what with the drooling monkey and his two sisters next to him in my bed.
Psst, Julie Powell, they are probably going to be REPUBLICAN CATHOLICS TOO. And well fed I might add.