THE TART HAS MOVED!

I got a freakin' dot com! So hold onto your hats and head on over to www.ekristinanderson.com!

Appropriately enough, one of the first posts over there is going to be about the EPIC giveaway I'm having for UNSUNG YA. So, seriously, don't miss that. Tell your friends, update your RSS feeds and your Google Reader. Eat vegetables. (That last part only if you want to. I'm currently eating a whoopie pie for breakfast.)

LOVE YOU ALL!

xEmily

Seeing as I've let blogging go by the wayside...

Quick announcement: Two of my poems are in the current issue of Orbis, a quarterly journal based in the UK. I'd sent in work a while ago and had nearly forgotten about it when their lovely editor emailed me to let me know they were interested. Hoorah! The issue came in the mail today and it looks great - you might should (Texan lingo) pick it up!

In other news, I am so over moving. I feel like I've been moving since January, and, in a way, have been. It took half of February to get all of our stuff out of the old place and smoosh it into the new place. I sort of hate it - tiny kitchen, tiny bedrooms, not enough room for all my books. For shame! So please excuse the lack of forthcoming recipes...until our next move in July.

Having consulted various coworkers, it seems that most people have a box or two that doesn't get unpacked every time they move. For me, this box has multiplied. I've moved about four times in the last five years and with every move comes another box. It tends to be a box of keepsakes - stuff that I don't need but want - that has no place on display. I.e. notebooks I kept in college and mix tapes from my high school boyfriend (sorry, Mark).

But knowing we won't be staying in our current place for very long, Mark and I have been ridiculously unmotivated when it comes to unpacking. I tried unpacking the kitchen before giving in to frustration - where will I put my breadmaker, my kitchenaid mixer, my food processor, my toaster(s), my microwave, my electric kettle, etc etc with just one outlet...over the sink? So depressing.

And of course most of my shoes are still in boxes - I mostly wear sneakers or boots to work, since I'm on my feet all day, so no need to unpack the stilettos, right? Same for most of my going out clothes and jewelry. Actually, the only boxes that I've completely unpacked are books, and only fiction. While nonfiction has been confined to Mark's closet, the kids books and adult literature are on the shelves in alphabetical order.

Naturally living with so many of my posessions packed away has lead me to wonder if I have too much stuff. Or rather, it's made this wondering a little louder. I'm a packrat and a materialist and I was always that kid in college who managed to fit way more in a dorm room than seemed natural. I've been considering the idea of getting rid of some things, but usually this comes down to the sentimental value and the nagging what-if possibilities that I'll need said things in the future. I'm hopeless.

At least I'll have things ready to go in July. The only thing worse than unpacking is packing, right?

Things I want to do this year

I don't really like making new year's resolutions. I think that those sorts of decisions and goals shouldn't be reserved to a one-time, year-long commitment. Also, I don't like setting myself up to fail. I like setting goals that I know I can reach. Call me gutless, but that's how I do.

Of course, I have some fairly lofty goals for myself in the coming year. I want to finally finish at least one of my manuscripts so I can start rewrites. Maybe it won't be the first novel I publish, but it will be the first novel I finish, not counting the 300-handwritten-page epic I wrote about Hanson when I was 16. Oh yes, you read that right. Details may or may not be available upon request. Sadly, the notebooks in which I wrote this masterpiece are somewhere in my parents' house in Maine. The world suffers.

I also promised the boyfriend I would learn to drive this year. I'm really really REALLY terrified of driving. I took driver's ed. just after turning 17. FYI my birthday is in December (I like presents) and I grew up in suburban Maine. Do the weather-math and you'll realize exactly what I was up against. Throw in my crotchety, nervous instructor and my soon-to-be-diagnosed bipolar disorder (questions welcome) and panic disorder (funsies!), you can see why I remain a pedestrian at 26. That's why I moved to New York after college. However, I now live in Austin, and Mark is sick of driving me everywhere. Crap. Pray for me/send any extra Valiums this way.

I want to learn to read faster. Is this sort of lame? Maybe. If only because I don't know if it's possible. But I basically want to read twice as many books as I read this year (I think it was like 40-50 but I don't have an official count) without actually spending more time reading. This is only because I don't think I could actually spend anymore time reading than I already do while maintaining a social life, eating, sleeping, and keeping my job without ripping a huge hole in the spacetime continuum. Sad Christmas. But my rate of book intake > rate at which I read books > rate at which I get rid of books. In fact that last bit stands at a fairly certain 0. Again, Mark is none too pleased that when we move in a couple of weeks half of our boxes will be filled with words.

I want to walk more. Because a) Texas makes you fat and b) walking makes you un-fat. Also, carbon footprint blah blah blah. I already take the bus a ton, but walking is way more good for you. Plus, we're moving to a neighborhood where walking is more fun. Right now we live off a major roadway and there's really nowhere to walk to. Plus, most of the streets are dead ends and cul-de-sacs. So new place = more walking.

And, of course, an important goal for this year is to finish watching ALL SEVEN SEASONS of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I know I can accomplish this goal, since I bought the ENORMOUS box set and started watching it with Mark last week. Despite his initial protests, he's now as addicted as 16-year-old me was. We are halfway through season two and are having so much fun with it. Why can't Buffy still be on the air? The world would be a better place, you know it.

Completely OK at Forking

I miss Amelia. I miss her so much. Amelia is the big sister I never had. She fills in all the gaps left by a dramatic teenhood and a funny relationship with my mother. She tells me what I need to hear, and sometimes what I want to hear, but would never sugar-coat something important. She's the only person I know who fully appreciates driving fast down the interstate blasting Bryan Adams ("Summer of 69") and singing along until the third verse at which point we sort of mumble forgotten lyrics (RIP Amelia's car's speakers). She doesn't make fun of me for having too many cats...usually. And she gives the best hugs ever (sorry, Mark). I really miss her.

Amelia moved to Arizona in February, shortly after I moved to Texas. It's great for her - AZ is where her family is, it's her home base, and, as an Army wife and sometimes-single mother (when the hubby is overseas), she needs all the support she can get. But it sucks for me, 'cause it's way farther to her house now than it used to be. You could listen to that Bryan Adams song at least a billion more times.

I love my life here, and as much as I'd like to cut myself in two and have my left hand with Amelia and my right hand with Mark, I hear that science hasn't advanced enough for this to be possible. So I do what I can. I listen to Sunny Day Real Estate and The Appleseed Cast and all that great emo music that was cool before the bad haircuts and black eyeliner of recent years. I keep a loaf of bread she made me in the freezer (we were saving it for sandwiches but then we forgot to get the sandwich meat and then it was Amelia bread so how could I eat it?), I tell anyone who will listen about my fabulous BFF, I chuckle every time I see the flashlight she gave me (inside jokes are awesome), and I bake my little heart out.

Amelia and I both grew up with a love for baking. She is a perfectionist, and rightfully so. I swear, if she weren't such a good Christian who didn't want to show up Jesus, she could make water from wine. She makes the hard stuff look easy. I marvel at the ease with which she makes biscuits - the first time I visited her, last June (it's almost our anniversary), she made me biscuits for breakfast, but had run out of white flour, and used whole wheat. Amelia claims they weren't that great, but I swear, to this day, they are the best biscuits I've ever had.

This winter I was at her house and she pulled from her freezer a bag of rolled peanut butter dough (see how she even plans such simple things ahead? I would never have the patience), and together we made hash marks in them with forks. I told her how this past Christmas, in all the hullabaloo of my mother's baking frenzy (my sister and I counted about 25 different types of cookies that she baked enormous batches of for the neighbors, work, family, etc.) I'd been banned from forking the peanut butter cookies because I wasn't being neat enough. Amelia thought this was funny and told me I did a fine job. So today, as I made peanut butter cookies (an amalgam of several internet recipes, posted below), I couldn't help but to text my best friend and tell her how much I missed her, and her faith in my fork-hashing skills.

In response she called me, my phone showing a silly kissy-face photo of her, blasting a tinny "Summer of 69." She told me she would send me good-hashing vibes, and I guess it worked, 'cause the cookies came out both pretty and delicious. Neither of us really like peanut butter cookies all that much, either. But they're fun to make, and these have extra brown sugar for extra chewiness and pb and chocolate chips for extra yumminess. I know it's summer, but with a little AC, what's turning the oven on, if it reminds you of your dearest amigo?

Amelia-Chip* Peanut Butter Cookies:

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 cup natural crunchy peanut butter
1 + 1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1 large egg
1 tablespoon water
1/2 cup chocolate chips
1/2 cup peanut butter chips

*No actual Amelias contained in this cookie. Mostly because we like Amelia, but also because Amelia would taste gross, even though she's awesome.

Preheat your oven to 350°. In a medium-sized bowl combine the dry ingredients: flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. In a large mixing bowl use an electric mixer (or a really strong hand) to blend the peanut butter and the butter until smooth and creamy. Blend in the sugar, and then add the egg and the water. When thoroughly blended, slowly add the dry ingredients. The dough should be soft but crumbly. Stir in the chocolate and peanut butter chips (if you want, Nestle makes some fun "swirl" chocolate chips, including a milk chocolate/peanut butter blend. I used two cups of these instead of one cup of each kind). Using your hands pinch bits of dough from the bowl and form into small 1-2 inch balls. Roll the dough in your palms, but don't over-handle! Set the balls of dough about an inch apart on a non-stick cookie sheet, and using the back of a fork, make hash marks in the dough. This will flatten the dough some, but be aware that they still will spread out by baking! Bake the cookies from 10-15 minutes. Let cool on a drying rack (wax paper on a counter top works just as well) and enjoy with a loved one. Or by yourself. Or send them to your best friend in Arizona (if she likes peanut butter cookies).

PS, Amelia, I made this one after you called, because your vibes helped me hash a heart:

Morse-Adkins Cat Motor Lodge

Last night being Saturday night, Mark and I were actually going to do the whole date night thing and see that new M. Night Shyamalan movie at the nearest theater. We were about to leave when he realized he'd lost his wallet and after scouring the house for an hour still couldn't find it. While we still could have made the movie, I'm a broke book store employee and can't afford movie tickets for two until pay day (if I want to eat this week). We changed plans, drove out to Waterloo Video and rented some horror films — The Eye (the original Chinese version), Teeth, and Ab-Normal Beauty (another Chinese film). We came home (with sodas from Sonic, of course) still mourning the loss of Mark's wallet, but on our way in heard some noise in the bushes. It sounded like a cat, so we started taking a mental inventory of our animals. All but one stay inside at all times, and that one wasn't out. So we started calling —here, kitty, kitty etc — until out walked a black beauty of an animal, mewling. She immediately flopped over at Mark's feet begging to be loved.

It's hot enough in Texas for people, but, for a domestic animal that clearly has spent most of its life indoors, the summer sun is brutal. We couldn't leave this poor girl outside so Mark scooped her up and we brought her directly into our bathroom where she would be safe, but still separate from the resident population. I wish this was the first time this had happened to us, but apparently there is some neon sign on the front of our house: FREE FOOD. CAT MOTEL.

Two of our other cats are charity cases. Mocha, the irritable Siamese came to me back in New York when a room mate neglected her and I just took her on when the girl moved out. And Turkleton, our big Abyssinian mix, lived under our porch for several months before we deemed it too hot for him to live out there anymore. This is in addition to the two cats we adopted on purpose: my Maine Coon, Telemachus and Mark's three-legged calico, Beatrice. Seriously, we are not wanting for cats.

But people keep dumping their animals, which I guess shouldn't be shocking to me, since it's a crisis in just about every area, urban or rural. The impression I get of Austin, though, is of a caring, neighborly community full of activists and leaders and people who should give a shit about their pets. I've called every veterinarian in the area, as well as the Town Lake Animal Center (where all lost pets in Austin are registered), the SPCA, and the Animal Trustees of Austin. No one has called them about their missing cat.

We really can't afford to keep this baby girl, even though we are already growing attached, so we're hoping to find a friend to take her in if we can't locate her family. I met one family today who were hoping that their lost kitty was the one we found, but it just wasn't in the cards, and they're the only possible family that Craigslist has turned up. My biggest fear is that someone thought it would be a good idea to get a black cat on Friday the 13th - for a prank or a party or just for funsies - then thought better of it and ditched her. Thankfully, she's in good spirits anyway.

I'm pretty sure that my readers are the proverbial choir, but, seriously guys, lets take care of these furry creatures, at least for karma's sake.

The Dynamic is All to Boom

Recently, my boyfriend and I watched that episode of The Simpsons where Milhouse and his mom move to Capital City and Milhouse goes all bling bling and Bart is instantaneously lonely. I've never had my best friend move away before. Until Amelia left.

I moved to Austin last month, just in time to catch some quality time with my best friend, Amelia, before she moved back to her home state of Arizona. This move occurred on Friday. Amelia, the trooper, drove all 900 miles in one day. And I rode the bus wearing my "Where the heck is Copperas Cove, TX? t-shirt that Amelia brought me from her now former town.


I found myself at some of the places Amelia and I went the first time I came to Austin, and looking for her favorite ice cream flavor (Vosges Naga - a curry flavor - weird but delicious!) at Whole Foods. I couldn't write about it. Standing at the bus stop I texted her:

"Some jerk is taking up the whole bus stop bench with his leg."
"Lame!"
"Ew now he moved and his fat hairy crack is falling out of his pants!"
"Better crack than junk!"
"Toats."

The bus was late. It was just after rush hour. A long trail of traffic stretched down Lamar from the stop light. Two old men in a pick up truck were waving and moving their lips. In New York I would have ignored them, but apparently in Texas talking to strangers on the side of the road is totally normal and almost expected. I took off my headphones.

"Take 190 from I35!"
"That's...true"

Before the traffic moved, I told the old man about Amelia and he told me that she was lucky, and gave Cove the thumbs-down. I texted her again.

"Some old dude in a truck saw me at the bus stop and gave me directions to Cove."
"Oman laffo!"
"Srs. He said you're lucky!"
"Don't I know it!"

And she is. She's going back to Arizona where her family is, and a lot of her friends. She'll have people to help her with her little girl while her husband is in Iraq.

On Thursday night, before the Great Escape from Texas, we had our last hurrahs. Mark took us to the Alamo Drafthouse to see Be Kind, Rewind - it was hilarious and sentimental, and artsy enough to quell Mark (who is just about the biggest movie snob ever). We found our friends Katy and Sarah (like little sisters to Amelia and I both) and frolicked on 6th street. I watched her almost lick the building that houses Emo's, a very scenester nightclub that Amelia never actually made it to during her time here. We shared a peach-flavored cigarette from Sarah's 75-cent pack (don't tell my gran. I don't really smoke). We laughed at the skinny sorority girls wearing their teeny tiny uniforms. We let her dogs out in my yard, where they peed on my fence. And, in the morning, she came in to wake me up, told me that I didn't have to get out of bed, and said goodbye to my cats, and then to me.

I miss her.

And Then There Were Five

It's official: I'm off to Texas.

If you'd asked me a year ago if I were ever going to move to one of the redneckiest states in the nation, I would have given you the evil eye. However, after having visited the lovely city of Austin, its suburbs, and also having roadtripped to San Antonio, I'm making one of the craziest moves of my life. I blame my boyfriend, Mark, who has enticed me to join him there. Despite my lovely Brooklyn, and all the seductions of the city that never sleeps, he didn't want to come here. And, well, my roots are barely planted, so as a writer, why not wander?

After the initial shock of friends and family wears off, they've been asking a lot of questions. How will you get there? Are you living together? Are you living TOGETHER together? How will you get around? What about your job? And, finally: What about your cats?

As you all know, I have two special cats. On the left, Telemachus, my 16lb+ Maine Coon with a heart of gold and the will to snuggle. On the right, Mocha, the small but plump (about 10lbs, where she should be 6 or 7) Siamese that was abandoned by several owners before finding her way to me and peeing on my carpets and kitchen counter. More on that later. These animals are family and of course are making the trip with me to the Lone Star State. Most likely by plane. Because of Mocha's nervous habit of urinating-at-will, the plane ride is a huge concern. I brought her to the vet on Saturday to find out that, well, she needs kitty Prozac.

I shit you not, the vet gave her antibiotics in case of an infection, but assured me that her pee problems are most likely the result of anxiety. Given her abandonment issues and past on the harsh streets of the Boston 'burbs, I can't say I blame the poor girl. But cat Prozac? I thought this was the sort of thing that only ridiculous celebrities and crazy show dog breeders would recommend, not a nice, friendly neighborhood veterinarian. Mocha has run up a nice list of veterinary bills for me already - her former owner ditched her with me when she moved out of my current apartment. At the time Mocha had ear mites which lead to her scratching her ear so hard she gave herself a hematoma that required surgery. She also needed to be dewormed and demited.

So why, after all this, are Mark and I adopting another cat? No, wait for it:

a three-legged calico kitten whom Mark has insisted upon naming Imogen Beatrice SQL Fleeterson should the adoption papers go through. Yes, this is our soon-to-be-lovespawn.

She's precious! Just look at that face! She apparently suffered some nerve damage to one of her front legs before she was rescued from the streets of Austin and had to have that leg amputated.

I'm a veterinarian's dream.

So, in Austin, I will have three cats, a new house, and a new job. Which, of course, all ties into this post. I want to be a veterinarian. Sort of.

Whenever I take the cats to the vet I wish I'd had the brains to stick to biology and the stomach to do veterinary school. I know I couldn't handle a lot of the things vets do - invasive surgeries, euthanasia, etc. But, why not get a job at a veterinary office? Yes, right now I have a fairly successful publishing career under way. I am looking at a ton of publishing venues from University presses to Austin-based magazines. But if the price is right, so is a change of pace. And, hey, I bet I'd get a good deal on veterinary services for the animals, seeing as I have several sickies to take care of.

Given the fact that I have no experience in animal clinics or shelters, this is just another pipe dream. But, I can volunteer. With any luck Mark will keep me from bringing home every stray animal I encounter, and I can help some orphan cats and pups stay healthy and happy. And, with that in mind, I have two hungry cats waiting for me to finish this up so I can cuddle and feed them. Cat Lady Out.