i have an enormous, pink-cheeked, heart-swelling crush on monchacha.com. it’s the kind of site that makes me wish i knew a thing or five about making websites.

the following conversation with grandma, on my birthday and the day she was discharged from the hospital, pretty much sums it up. me: “i’m very happy.” grandma: “am i happy? yes, i am happy.” me: “no, grandma. i’m happy!” grandma: “yes, i am very happy.”

hemming my pants with masking tape and staples, driving my car for the first time, smiling at cute boys when they look away, listening to night swimming on repeat, wondering about the future, crying about the past, i am 17, again. * buying furniture that can’t be assembled in three steps, taking a new way […]

i don’t know if it’s that i spoke to my grandma on the phone the other day and, while she is getting better, she still sounds so old and tired and far away, or that my father is still awaiting his biopsy results, or that i am turning 27 (TWENTY SEVEN) on friday, but i […]

this morning i woke up and decided it was a Teenage Fanclub kind of morning, so i pulled the cds off the shelf, sat them beside me in the car, slipped Songs from Northern Britain into my cd player, and drove with my windows down. i sang all the way to work.

i’ve borrowed a puppy to shamelessly plug, since i don’t have one of my own. everybody, meet esther, quite possibly the world’s sassiest dog ever.

it was love at first bite. saturday, kiehl and i took a field trip to porto's, the glendale bakery everyone had been telling me about. oh, man. we had to wipe the drool off our chins: fruit tarts, biscotti and cheesecake, oh my!

i am in love with the line– “all of this aggravation ain't satisfactioning me.” –from the re-mix of elvis's a little less conversation

so, like, if i were the kind of person who bitched all the time about every little thing that pissed her off, i’d probably tell you about the guy who cut me off last night on the sunset strip, and while i was at it, i’d probably mention that i hate that part of town […]

it only took an hour and a half, enough time for me to grab a latte and cinnamon roll at the coffee cart, read kurt cobain’s journal entries in last week’s newsweek and begin this week’s list of good things. i also made friends with a 2-year-old girl with pigtails tied with yellow pom-poms. i […]

i tell myself, christine, you have to keep it together. but this is the hard part: the waiting. the being strong. the hoping for the best. it’s strange how my comfort comes in your understanding. you know how i feel because you’ve been there. in fact, you have more to mourn because you lost someone […]

the boy who ate a banana split for dinner is my new hero.

i’m wearing the medal she gave me. i forgot i had it and i forgot she gave it to me, until thursday night, when i was looking for a silver chain to wear around my neck. it was nestled in in a tiny pouch at the bottom of my jewelry box. it’s heart-shaped and silver, […]