1. Living on Earth is expensive, but it does include a free trip around the sun every year
    We vacationed a lot as kids. I didn’t realize at the time that going away every winter vacation and spring break wasn’t what everybody else did. I took for granted all the times we went to Myrtle Beach, Disney Land, Disney World, New York, Boston, San Diego, Lake Tahoe, Canada, Israel, The Bahamas. It seemed [...]
    Filed in The Family, the old school ali | 06-May-10 | 9 comments
  2. Everybody Else Is Doing It, So Why Can’t We?
    This morning in the car on the way to school, after I assured a very nervous Isabella that hot dogs do not, in fact, come from actual dogs* and assuring her that we would find her a boyfriend named Zachary because that is her “most specialist name in the whole wide world,” a Cranberries song [...]
    Filed in the old school ali | 09-Dec-09 | 20 comments
  3. Today.
    I am nursing the second cold I have been plagued with in the past 4 weeks with tylenol cold & sinus and trough-fulls of the Tim Horton’s coffee I hauled back from NYC. I am lying in bed nursing my plagued laptop and watching last night’s season finale of Mad Men. For the third time. [...]
    Filed in the old school ali, the self mock | 09-Nov-09 | 30 comments
  4. I have the flu. so you finally get to see THE FLANNEL.
    Nothing says happy friday like a lovely case of the swine flu. Oh yes, it started last night while watching the news about Michael Jackson, which, sadly, had me thinking…he sure stole Farrah Fawcett’s thunder, eh? At first I thought it was just my mind messing with me/moveanxiety because we are moving in 17 days [...]
    Filed in the McMoms, the old school ali, the self mock | 26-Jun-09 | 19 comments
  5. I know you are still waiting for the oversized flannel…BUT! I give you bad bangs and farmer’s tan instead!
    I have been toying with the idea of dying my hair brown. or, you might say, returning to my natural hair color…whatever that might be. I have been highlighting my hair for so long (*sigh* my friends and I started experimenting with do-it-yourself hair color in high school…and I will never forgive myself for testing [...]
    Filed in the old school ali, the self mock | 09-Jun-09 | 45 comments
  6. the cheese stands alone.
    You ask and I deliver. See how good I am to you? Well, really it’s my sister-in-law who you can thank, because unlike someone else I know, she knows the precise location of her camera charger. (off to ebay to track down a canon charger) My Emily, who – by the by – has lost [...]
    Filed in The Girl, parenting sure is fun, the old school ali | 01-Apr-09 | 30 comments
  7. baby-eating dragon randomness. and there’s some chocolate too.
    Daddy: Isabella, what do you want for dinner, sweets? Isabella: Pizza! and Pickles! Daddy: What? are you pregnant? nannyHaydee: Isabella? Do you have a baby in your tummy? Isabella: not anymore. Remember, Haydee….the DRAGON ate it?! sigh. that’s life with Missabella. just like a box of chocolates…i certainly never know what i’m going to get. [...]
    Filed in the mouths of babes, the old school ali | 18-Dec-08 | 26 comments
  8. why i can’t ever visit jerusalem again
    In fall of 1996, instead of heading off to college like most high school graduates, i headed off to Jerusalem, to spend a year abroad drinking a lot “finding myself”. This, surprisingly, was not uncommon amongst my friends. An all expenses paid year off (not to mention the ENTIRE YEAR OF COLLEGE CREDIT i got)…who [...]
    Filed in the old school ali, the weight | 10-Dec-08 | 48 comments
  9. warning. this is random. mostly because i’m still having a panic attack from Isabella’s second round of barfage. bear with me.
    ince we finished watching Six Feet Under last month, we have been debating over what show to start watching next. my vote was for Dexter. or The Wire. The husband’s vote was for Oz. (Isabella had put a vote in for Yo Gabba Gabba, but her vote SO didn’t count, especially since she spent all [...]
    Filed in parenting sure is fun, the old school ali | 02-Dec-08 | 37 comments
  10. totally tubular…man.
    as a child of the 80s…and a child of divorced parents…there was absolutely NO shortage of must-have-it-right-now toys. my mother waited in a way too long line to get my sister and i our very first hard-faced cabbage patch kids. (and i made the mistake of saying “jerk alert” when she finally walked in the [...]
    Filed in parenting sure is fun, the old school ali | 23-Sep-08 | 40 comments
  11. Dear Internets,
    Emily got a letter in the mail last week from a camp friend. a real letter!! i can’t remember the last time i got something in the mail that wasn’t a bill or a birthday party invitation for one of my children. i was actually jealous of this letter. it was handwritten on pink paper [...]
    Filed in the Deep Thoughts, the old school ali | 18-Sep-08 | 33 comments
  12. loud and gaudy and silkscreen-y nostalgia
    They are airing special! classic! episodes of Beverly Hills, 90210 in anticipation of the new 90210. Christine and I IM’ed while watching the two episodes – Brenda has a sleepover/Kelly tells her rape story and ‘We’ll always have Paris’ – and mocked. we mocked the high-waisted pants. the silk shirts. the cheetah print leggings. the [...]
    Filed in the old school ali | 29-Aug-08 | 47 comments
  13. the power of the dream and Ali storms the floor…
    rant of the day…you know what i hate? bands that decide they need to start screaming 3/4 of the way through the song. yes, i’m talking to you, Foo Fighters. what the hell, Dave? hmm? Let It Die is a perfectly good song until you start SCREAMING for no reason at the end. seriously. stop. [...]
    Filed in the girl behind the screen, the old school ali | 12-Aug-08 | 27 comments
  14. memory is a gift. cherish it.
    last night i watched The Diving Bell and the Butterfly…which, by the by, is easily one of the best movies i’ve ever seen…it’s the true story of Elle Magazine editor Jean-Dominique Bauby who suffers a massive stroke, leaving him mentally aware but completely paralyzed with the exception of his left eye. he literally blinks out [...]
    Filed in The Friends, the old school ali | 15-Jul-08 | 27 comments