I was rushing to get ready to go out the other night, and I had a huge mishap with my mascara. Without even thinking, because I didn’t have to think because I’m living in 2017 and what I was about to do is entirely second-nature to me, I grabbed a Q-tip and in mere seconds my face no longer resembled that of a sobbing raccoon.  And I had to reflect, even as I was running out to the car, that life with Q-tips is miraculous.  And how did we even function as individuals and as a society before Q-tips?  Did people not wear mascara, for fear of the possible hideous and irreparable results of one false move?

Of course I had to look at the entry for Q-tips on Wikipedia. It’s under their generic name, “cotton swabs” (and apparently “cotton buds” in Britain; who knew?).  Here’s a bit of history:  “The cotton swab is a tool invented in the 1920s by Leo Gerstenzang after he attached wads of cotton to toothpicks. His product, which he named ‘Baby Gays,’ [Blogger’s Note: WTF is that all about?] went on to become the most widely sold brand name, ‘Q-tips,’ with the Q standing for ‘quality.'”

Anyone who knows me or who has read my work will know that I absolutely adore animals. I love cats, but for the past several years we’ve only had dogs in our family.  I love dogs.  Honestly, I just adore them.  And so, I am, of course, moved and mesmerized by the fact that “dog” is “god” backwards.  Wow.  Just wow.  There must be some cosmic significance in that.

But here’s where my wonder goes astray.  It’s only in English, right?  Am I missing another language where that’s also the case?  Dieu and chien?  Uh, no.  Hund and Gott?  Nope.  Perro and dios?  You get where I’m going with this…

P.S.  I’m serious, shit like this keeps me up at night…  Also, please note that I gave the word for “god” in German an initial cap because they give all nouns initial caps.  It’s not a statement of preference on my part.

What, for the love of all things gracious and sublime, is going on with people dropping consonants all over the damn place?  I watch a lot of television.  Well, I don’t actually watch it much of the time.  It’s on in the background when I’m writing.  That’s just the best way for me to compose.  The low-volume television chatter is like a lovely little white noise soundtrack while I put words together.

But sometimes I do focus on what’s happening on the screen, especially when I’m looking for a plot point or a character trait or a special turn of phrase.  It’s a nice distraction while my mind buzzes on a subconscious level.  And I’ve been noticing while I focus on televised offerings that more and more PEOPLE ARE NOT PRONOUNCING CONSONANTS!

I’m serious; I hear the sentence “It’s kew,” for “It’s cute.”  I hear “I dih-int” for “I didn’t.”  When I’m watching my much-loved Say Yes to the Dress, I hear “sah-in” when the wedding gown is clearly made of “SAT-in.”

For a lover of our glorious English language, it’s just too damn much.  What are we, speaking French?  Let’s pretend we’re speaking German and do as they do…pronounce EV-ER-Y FUCK-ING LET-TER, FOR FUCK’S SAKE!

Grated cheese is one of the best things in the world. And iced tea; that’s also one of the best things in the world.  It’s even better with a splash of lemonade.  Not a full-on Arnold Palmer.  Just a splash.

I could never do a low-carb diet.  If I had to give up pasta (or noodles, as we called it in my youth), I would… I just wouldn’t even see the point of going on.  Ditto with bread.  But more so with pasta.

Smoothies are really soothing.  There’s a reason those two words share so many letters.

Potato chips?  The best thing ever created?  Yeah, pretty much.  Pizza is also a miracle.  I don’t say that glibly, nor do I think I’m devaluing the word “miracle” by declaring that pizza is one.

If you take a scoop of vanilla ice cream and a scoop of strawberry ice cream and you put them in the same bowl and you let them get a little soft and you mash them up into a mixture, it will be one of the best things in the world.  Trust me on this.

Our beagle Maggie is kind of obnoxious when the time comes for her to be fed.  I say that with love.  Our three four-legged kids get breakfast, dinner, and a third meal just before we go to bed (because if they didn’t, they would wake us up at maybe three o’clock in the morning demanding food; I mean, demanding it).  And each time, Maggie whimpers and paces and occasionally bays because we’re not getting her food ready fast enough.

Maggie is a beagle.  Maggie loves to eat.  I say all this about our precious girl because I am basically just like Maggie vis-a-vis food.  Without the baying.  Most of the time.

I am such a feminist.  I am such a proud feminist.  I am such a proud, furious feminist.

How did the word “feminism” ever get a negative connotation?  I’m guessing it’s because the patriarchy didn’t like women getting uppity.

Don’t get me started…

Women haven’t had the vote for 100 years yet in the United States.  We’ve never had a female president.  And look at the rest of the world.  In Saudi Arabia, women aren’t allowed to drive.

Don’t anyone try to tell me that feminism isn’t necessary or that it’s negative or it’s too aggressive or any of that other undermining shit.

Oh, and you know what I really hate?  I really hate mansplaining.  I mean, really hate it.

I do however think that the word “mansplaining,” solely as a construct, is fucking brilliant.

I will say this though about my upbringing, and it’s kind of surprising… My parents were born in the 1920s.  My mom grew up in Europe.  And both of my parents, despite being of their generation, were more-than-reasonably okay in terms of not trying to limit my options because I’m female.  I’m really happy about that.

You know how there are certain movies that aren’t especially brilliant, but when you’re scrolling through the channels and you see that they’re on, they’re kind of deliciously not brilliant and there are moments that you kind of enjoy in them, and somehow you’ve ended up seeing them a lot because they’re kind of addictive, despite being entirely not brilliant?  Here are a few of the ones that fall into that category for me:

The Rocker

Couples Retreat

That remake of Arthur with Russell Brand

And apropos movies, here are my Top Five Favorites of All Time.

Casablanca

Random Harvest

Now, Voyager

Victor, Victoria

Moonstruck

Reading is the best thing in the world.

I honestly don’t think anything needs to be added to that statement.

If I could have a wish for one ability, it would be to be able to sing beautifully.  I can’t sing.  I can’t hear the notes and I can’t match them.  I love music.  I love singing.  My husband has a gorgeous singing voice.  He says sometimes I sing in “perfect thirds.”  Other than understanding that that has something to do with harmonizing, I have no idea what he’s talking about.

I always knew — I mean, from a very early age — that I didn’t want to have children.  I always knew that I wanted to have pets.  And at some point after I got married (because, being any only child, that was the only way I was going to get nieces and nephews), I knew that I wanted to be one of those legendarily crazy, legendarily fabulous aunts.

I swear, my nieces and nephews had better be reading this blog post right now, and they had better start making incredibly laudatory comments about me in the comment section below.  Heads up, kids; I haven’t written my will yet, and the jury is still out on who’s going to get what…

I am convinced that my hair can hear me when I call my stylist to make an appointment for a cut and color.

I usually wait too long to schedule an appointment.  I’m so lazy and I’m so easily distracted. So even though I write in my calendar that I should call for an appointment after a certain amount of time has elapsed since my last appointment, I generally end up adding a few weeks to that.  So what happens is I wake up one day and my hair is too long and it’s suddenly driving me crazy.  So I call my stylist and I beg for an appointment as soon as possible, and my hair hears that, and the next day, when I wash and blow-dry it, it looks fabulous. And I’m thinking, maybe I don’t need to get it cut and colored just yet.

I guess my hair just really hates being cut and colored, because, I swear, it does that to me every time.  It’s like it pushes me to the limit, and then I go nuts, and it realizes that it has gone too far, and it resolves to behave.

I do want to add that I know that I am obviously taking this whole anthropomorphizing everything too far… But… I’m still not entirely sure that my hair isn’t a sentient being unto itself…

Do I even need to add that the opinions expressed herein are entirely my own?  Though I bet that if our three senior dogs gave it even a few minutes of thought, they would all agree with me on just about everything I’ve expounded on. Especially the part about the ice cream.

The post Because Sometimes Your Thoughts Just Demand to be Random… appeared first on Heidi Mastrogiovanni.

Okay, so I have to own up to something of which I am not proud…

Let me tell you a little story…about me…being insufferable.

The scene of my epic breakdown of grace and decorum was one of the meetings of the fabulous book club to which I belong.

It’s called the Roaring Laughter Ladies Book Club. The women in it are among the most wonderful people in my world and in the world. Kind, smart, caring, hilarious, delightful, loyal…you get the idea; you can pretty much fill in any laudatory adjective here and it will apply to them. This is not hyperbole. They rock.

And I was being insufferable in their company…

So this post is, in addition to being a confession, an apology to my lovely friends, who deserve much better than they got from me on that terrible day.

Please imagine that the voice saying these words is using a tone that is smug, sneering, and singsong… In short, all the things you don’t want a voice you are hearing to be.

Needless to say, this is me, gassing on and on at the book club meeting…

“I just hate when people use the word ‘read’ as a noun. I hear it all the time. It was a good read. What is that all about? It’s a verb! To read! I hate when people make verbs into nouns! Why does our beautiful language have to change? That’s called evolving? I call it DE-volving!”

And then I sat back with a self-righteous, tight little smile, and continued to chug the delicious wine/champagne/vodka (I think it was champagne for me on that particular day) that we always have at our gatherings.

There were a few moments of silence, during which my dear friends were, I suspect and fear, thinking “Jeez, is she a pill, or what?”

And then there was a response, and please forgive me, because I don’t remember who said this… Whichever Roaring Laughter Lady said it, please jump right in and claim your due applause in the Comments section of this post.

“But that happens with ‘walk’ all the time…”

And I froze as soon as I heard that sentence being completed.

Because I immediately realized that I had nothing to say in return…

No possible response…

Because one of the things I love most in the world is walking. I just love taking a walk. It’s one of the great pleasures of my life. I love the joy and relaxation and re-energizing that the word “walk” conveys. As a verb. And as a noun. And I have used it both ways. For decades. Without giving it a second thought.

And so I would just like to apologize for being such a pill. I’m duly humbled and truly sorry.

I sincerely hope this post has been a good read for you. And, I swear, I didn’t even wince while I typed that…

But I still think that saying/writing/thinking “try and [do something]” instead of “try to [do something]” is clumsy and lazy and just plain wrong, and always will be…

But…

I think I may be forced to realize that I will be reading and hearing “try and” far more than I will be reading and hearing “try to” and maybe I’m fighting a losing battle here and maybe I should just get over myself with that one, too…

I think I even saw “try and” in The New Yorker, a.k.a. my standard reference on all things bright and gorgeous about our fabulous language, but I’m not 100% sure…

Maybe our beautiful language has evolved to the point where “try and” is not only correct, it’s more correct…

Maybe…

I’ll try to keep you posted on my evolving thoughts about that subject…

The post A Blog Post Wherein I Get Over Myself appeared first on Heidi Mastrogiovanni.

This post has to be about language. And grammar. Stuff I love and stuff that drives me flipping crazy. Herewith a staccato selection of highs and lows, as viewed from my soapbox.

It’s not “[insert name] and I’s house.” The possessive is “my,” for the love of all that is gracious and holy in this wacky world. I have been hearing and reading “I’s” far too often lately. Hearing or reading it once would be once too often. As far as I know, the construction “I’s” doesn’t exist. It is completely and irredeemably wrong. My opinion, as you can no doubt tell, is not on any level humble in the case of this dreadful new blight on the gorgeous English language.

I am a stickler for good grammar. I do not appreciate the “language is a living thing and it evolves” school of thought. To me, that signifies that something that was once wrong is now correct because we’re too lazy to be careful in our writing and our speaking.

Take a look at my personal Facebook page (I try to be less strident on my Author Page on Facebook because, you know, marketing ‘n’ stuff…). I get on my soapbox about grammar on a regular basis on my personal page. Enough so that close friends and also people I only know through Facebook will pay me the compliment of posting something about grammar on my page because they thought of me when they saw it.

This mug is an excellent example. This mug is my psyche painted on ceramic.

The Oxford comma? No discussion. I always use it. ALWAYS.

I’m still not always 100% sure when to use “which” and when to use “that.”

When to use “lay” and when to use “lie” only recently sunk in for me…kind of.

I love that “How come?” means “Why?” in English. As far as I know, that’s not the case in French or German. “Wie kommen?” “Comment venir?” I don’t think so…

And how much do we love that the words “psyche” and “ceramic” start with different letters, but still have the same opening sound?

Because it’s ENGLISH and it is FABULOUS! And it is such a difficult language to learn because sometimes there are no rules and you just have to KNOW that it’s pronounced that way.

I have family and a lot of friends in Europe. They all speak English beautifully. Because they started learning it in school at a very early age. Why we don’t, in most cases, teach foreign languages here in the U.S. until middle school is beyond me.

And when I complain to my European friends and relatives about the intricacies of their native languages (WHY do some adjectives in French appear before the noun and others appear after? That is CRAZY!), they tell me to please get over myself because why is “though” pronounced like “go,” “through” like “too,” and “cough” like “off,” while “rough” has an “uff” sound, “plough” sounds like the “ow” in “flower,” and “thought” sounds like the “aw” in “saw,” even though they all share the same “ough” letters and what’s the rule with pronouncing “ough” anyway and how do you know when it’s pronounced which way?

And that’s when I hang my head in hypocrisy and mutter something to the effect of, “Well, I’m not sure that there is a rule…you just…have to…know…”

I guess at this point I should confess that I tend to overuse ellipses in my writing…

I learned German when I was two. My mother was German, and so my family spent a lot of our vacation time visiting her parents and sisters and their families in Bavaria.

It is ridiculously easy for toddlers to learn a foreign language. Family rumor has it that I was speaking German in a day or two. And when I speak it now, I don’t think in English and translate. I just think and speak in German.

I do not, however, know when to use der or die or das (or dem or den) or whatever the hell is going on with all those forms of the three definite articles in German. Masculine, feminine, and neutral. French has just two, masculine and feminine. Just two. Yeah, WAY easier in French. Not.

WHAT IS WRONG WITH HAVING JUST ONE DEFINITE ARTICLE? HUH?

It’s “the.” It’s always “the” in English, no matter which noun follows it, no matter what its position in the sentence. Nice and easy, people! Just like it should be!

I’m learning French as an adult. A very different experience from my effortless absorption of German. But it’s fun and I love learning another language, especially such a gorgeous one.

Okay, back to my own fabulous native language… What has happened to the letter “t”? And the letter “d”? Why are they being ignored? I watch that show I’m addicted to… I can’t believe I’m admitting this… Yes, I can’t stop watching “Say Yes to the Dress”…and the brides are shopping for their dream wedding dress and they say they want something in “sah-in” and something that’s “eleganh” and if they disagree about something they say, “No, I dih-en.”

CAN WE PLEASE JUST PRONOUNCE THE LETTERS THAT ARE SUPPOSED TO BE PRONOUNCED? PLEASE?

In German, you pronounce just about every letter in the word. In French, not so much. And in German, all nouns have initial caps, not just proper nouns. In French, the days of the week and the months of the year do not have initial caps. Crazy and kind of fun, no? Nein? Non?

So, in French, the sentence “I went to Paris on a Tuesday in January” reads: “Je suis allé à Paris un mardi en janvier.” And I’m reading that and I’m thinking, what, no Mardi, no Janvier?

Meanwhile, here’s a sentence from Goethe’s “Die Leiden des jungen Werther”: “Ihr könnt seinem Geist und seinem Charakter eure Bewunderung und Liebe, seinem Schicksale eure Tränen nicht versagen.” I just have to point out that none of those words with initial caps are proper nouns! They are just regular old nouns! Crazy, huh? And kinda cool, to my way of thinking.

Sometimes you have to write “kinda” instead of “kind of”…because it serves your writer’s voice better that way.

By the way, the opinions expressed herein are entirely and only my own. As if that wasn’t already abundantly clear.

Yiddish, I must add, is also delightful. I can understand a lot of it because I speak German. And I lived in New York City for sixteen years, so there’s also that…

Schmutz. That’s a great word. In Yiddish and in German.

Oh, and while I’m thinking of it, you don’t create the plural with an apostrophe! NO! Do not use an apostrophe! My family is not the Mastrogiovanni’s. We are the Mastrogiovannis. Okay?

And you don’t feel badly unless you are touching something and you are doing a substandard job. You feel bad about society’s growing inability to pronounce the letter “t.” Not badly. Adverb. Adjective. There’s a difference.

Phew. That felt really good. I think it’s time to break out the wine and pour a big glass and see if there’s a marathon of “Say Yes to the Dress” on any of the cable channels. Thank you for the opportunity to share my raving and venting and ranting and to go on and on and on. Next week, back to the saga of the sweetest souls in my cat and canine cavalcade, starring Maggie the Lemon Beagle!

The post A Blog Post Wherein I Get Giddy And Agitated About Definite Articles And Apostrophes… appeared first on Heidi Mastrogiovanni.