Evil Cookies

On Friday, we made good on a promise to Baby Girl to visit American Girl (AG) in Atlanta. It is good that we have to drive 2 hours to AG because I am all in favor of the way AG encourages girls to be active and pursue hobbies, but the fact that the doll hair salon was booked solid during a weekday and the doll hairstyles at the doll salon were $25 (which is more than I pay for my real breathing human being kids whose hair actually grows to get their hairs cut) just doesn't sort of sit well with me. Millions of kids won't have enough for dinner tonight but Fancy Nancy's doll got a new tiara. Alas, this is neither here nor there.

The real thrust of this story is how we went to Atlanta on Friday and en route, we stopped at McDonald's drive-thru for an orange juice. I know. Very tall order. I felt pangs of mom guilt for not ordering something for the kids in the backseat, however, and the thought occurred to me that those boxes of McD's cookies that I remember from my childhood would not be the worst car snack ever.

I asked the drive-thru attendant if they still sold those boxes of cookies.

"Yes we sell them. Totes," he said, which I thought was an uncharacteristically casual answer, even for a drive-thru operator at McDonald's. It tickled me so. "Totes," he said. Like Totes Magotes.

But then my tab came to $6 and I was all Blue Ivy with my hands. Like, no sir. An OJ and a box of cookies DO NOT cost six moneys.

At the first window, I saw my receipt and I saw that Totes was actually referring to the receptacle in which the cookies would be delivered. Okay. So I suppose I should be used to the rate of inflation and the space age packaging, seeing as the last time I bought these cookies was clearly 1989, using a variety of dimes and pennies from my grandpa's ashtray.

The second window attendant asked me if I could pull over to the parking space #1 because the cookies weren't quite ready yet. And I was all, what is going on here? Do you have to hand-select them for the totes? What is fast about this fast food?!

Ding went the bell, though, and the 2nd window attendant said, "Oh, they're done. Do you want 13 or 14 cookies?"

This was a HUGE question of economy here. I mean, do I go with the lucky 13 or the pleasantly even cookie census? Wait, who chooses LESS cookies when given an option by Ronald??

Then the attendant handed me the most geometrically pleasing tote full of warm, ooey-McGooey chocolate chip goodness.

I ate 2.

The kids each at 3.

I then got my first speeding ticket in the South.

I ate the rest of the cookies. Those cookies are pure evil.

Glad we got that extra one.

Review: Detroit: An American Autopsy by Charlie LeDuff

Simply cannot recommend enough Detroit: An American Autopsy by Charlie LeDuff. A former NYT reporter returns to DET as a native son.

If you want to understand everything that has happened in recent years in America, Detroit is your learning lab. The ramifications of corporate greed on the middle class and abject poverty? Look at Detroit. The unintentional handover of power, from politicians who are too concerned with padding their own pockets, to the gangs that eventually rule the streets.

LeDuff's writing is at times absolutely perfect. I've been studying journalism for a fair bit and I cannot even fathom his methods. This book has easily cracked my top 10 if not my top 5.

I have visited Detroit a number of times and love catching lunch at Mugsie's in Corktown, or visiting the Science museum. There are pockets of wonderful things happening and LeDuff does not manage to highlight these as well as he could. Still, there is courage and truth mined from the stories he shares on his journalistic beat. I couldn't get enough.

I would lend you my copy but of course I bought it for Loverpants only to abscond with it :)

What I want to remember about Christmas 2013

- Seeing Frozen with the Stanwicks and my babies.- Taking many walks out in the legit MidWestern cold - Cousin Sean with hilarious running commentary about Settlers of Catan - Cousins Colleen, Kathleen and Maureen waxing humorous re: Buzzfeed - Mom running a beauty spa with Baby Girl - The old man "making it rain" per Connor - Goobs and the iPad book - Umma letting me sleep until obscene hours - Apa being persuaded that he would be able to sell his house for a million dollars if he adopted a digital thermometer - Joe keeping the kiddies entertained from the trunk - Winter hike even though my kiddies were wearing the worst whineypants

- Little Man's new "funny face." - Yoga at Inner Bliss; Tammy telling everyone, "I bet you are all thinking Santa's not going to bring you anything," and me feeling confident about the opposite.