Here’s our text history over the past couple weeks:

May 6

Mom: Lakers SUCK!

May 9

Mom: Is M Gasol related to P Gasol?

Me: Yes! Brothers!

Mom: M has his head in gear this game…unlike P yesterday

Me: M is also younger, better looking, and potentially more talented.  Plus he doesn’t play for LA.

Mom: Yup.  All good points.  But he is kinda tubby… I should talk!

Today, May 15

Mom: R u watching BB?

Me: Oh, thanks for reminding me!

Mom: Do you think Bosch is gay?

Me: No, although I never thought about it.  Why do you ask?

Mom: Weak chin.

My friend Michelle is one of the most amazing people I know, and she introduced me to Weather (who apparently has a real name, but I’m waiting to see her birth certificate). Weather and her husband Chris are awesome for a million reasons (not the least of which is that they met and got married in Montana) and they will be phenomenal parents just like Michelle and her husband Eric.

Weather and Chris have decided to adopt a baby through an open adoption process. As a person who is still very much in the PRE-kid-having-phase of my life, I didn’t know much about adoption or the process adoptive parents (or birth parents) go through before this. I’ve been really amazed by the home study Weather and Chris had to pass and the birthmother letter they wrote, not to mention the research they put into just finding the right adoption agency for their family.  I was also struck by their courage and all the thought that went into their decision to pursue an open adoption.  They are incredible people and will be wonderful, loving parents to the child or children they adopt.

So I wanted to do whatever I could to help them.  To whoever reads this blog, wherever you are, please check out Chris and “Amy’s” adoption blog and direct anyone you may know who is considering an open adoption to do the same.  I hope to someday be half as awesome as these guys and I think they deserve all of the good things the world has to offer.

Just look at them, all barefoot and smiley!  And those dogs!  And that beard!

My uncle John even came up with a slogan:

“Dr. Tom’s. Good for what ales you.”

First, we went to a pumpkin patch because, after all, it’s decorative gourd season, motherfuckers.

None of us were super into the whole picking-out-a-pumpkin thing, but my friend Kallyn is actually grown-up enough to decorate her apartment seasonally, so she picked up a few extra gourds:

The rest of us were really there for the apple cider donuts (AMAZING!) and the corn maze.  Somehow, our group of five split once we entered the maze.  Galen and I made it to the end and waited for Kallyn, Sarah and Ryan:

Sunglasses in October! Can you even believe it?

But apparently they were lost somewhere, taking photos:

Galen and I actually went back through the maze, from finish to start, and still couldn’t find them. Thank goodness for cell phones. I have no idea what people did in corn mazes in the 80′s!

Anyway, after our day at the farm, Galen and I headed back to town to catch the University of Montana v. Portland State football game. It wasn’t nearly as much fun as these games usually are, mostly because it was at a suburban high school football stadium instead of the usual field downtown (which is under construction for our MLS team in 2011). It was still a good time, though, and U of M won (in the last few seconds!), which made it even better.

In true small-town fashion, I ran into a few people I knew and lots of others I used to know.

The Grizzlies come to Portland every other year for football, and I think this was the fourth game I’ve attended here.  The other three times, the Montana tailgate party (set up by Portland people) ran out of beer early.  This time, there were only two lines for beer in the entire stadium, which were longer than the length of the field.  Apparently, there were also only two bathrooms – one men’s, one women’s – in the place.  If Portland wants to keep hosting the University of Montana, they’re going to need a cultural lesson or two about small town football games.

We had a great time, though, and an all-around fantastic fall day.

My pathetic tastebuds also make it difficult for me to taste things and determine that something needs to be added, or what that something might be. (Pepper? Coriander? Glitter? I don’t know!)

The exceptions to my cooking-phobia seem to be baking and special events. Birthday cupcakes? Potatoes au gratin for a family dinner? Homemade cranberry sauce for Thanksgiving? I’m totally in.

And in the summer I LOVE making deviled eggs. Sunday night was a perfect summer evening, so I decided to try out my aunt Carol’s deviled egg recipe. She makes delicious deviled eggs and I had her send me the recipe last summer. I haven’t had the chance to try them yet (once last summer, after I moved into my new apartment I bought all the ingredients to make them on a Sunday only to get home and discover I didn’t own a saucepan for boiling eggs. Apparently Brian kept that in the divorce.), so I thought I’d give the recipe a test-drive this week. They were AMAZING, so I’ve copied her recipe here for all of you to enjoy, as long as you all refer to it in your recipe books as “Aunt Carol’s Deviled Eggs.” I mean, really. She deserves the credit.

This recipe is for 6 eggs, but obviously easy to multiply. The secret ingredient? Pickle relish!

Hard boil 6 eggs and cut them in half lengthwise.
Whip egg yolks with:
1/4 cup mayo
3 tsp or so mustard
1/8 tsp salt
A glop of sweet pickle relish

Mix it all up until it’s a consistency and color you like. (In light of my earlier comments, it may not surprise you that directions like this usually drive me nuts, because I don’t know what consistency or color I like. However, I decided I’d just give it a shot, guessing about how much “a glop” was, and then taste it and see what happened. Turned out it was delicious without any adjustments! And that’s not just me saying that – I brought them to work to share and everyone wanted seconds.)

So try it out this weekend! Unless you’re coming to the same BBQ I’m attending on Saturday. Then just show up and eat some.

When I was cleaning today, I found a magazine my mom sent me months ago. I flipped through it and a couple clippings fell out. They must be at least 8 months old, because one of them was this obituary, cut out of the Missoula newspaper. My mom’s scribbled message at the top says, “This is the best obit I ever read! Too bad I didn’t know her.”

In case you don’t feel like reading the whole thing, here are some of my favorite parts:

“In an obituary, you generally give the timeline of a person’s life through a list of dates and geographic locations where they spent time. Grandma Fran represents the end of an era. She represents the end of a long cultural and family journey which begins in Ireland and ends in America and this type of ending must be marked with a large sound so that the descendants have the great comfort to remember who they are and where they came from and the ties that bind them. This type of death cannot be summed up in linear dates; it must be understood in the abstract chaos of the Irish.”

“She loved humor, blood relatives, canned food, the Democratic Party, and the sense that you’d better enjoy the moment due to the inevitability of bad luck showing its face. She detested the royal family, corporate greed and Republican dogma.”

“Grandma Fran had in her long life moments of great strength. She gathered the strength to leave her husband to protect her children during a period of time when women could not leave or support themselves.”

“Grandma Fran had in her long life moments of great blessing… Of all the blessings that she experienced in her long life, none were as important to her as her family.”

What an incredible woman.  I agree, mom – too bad we didn’t know her.

To the man who taught me
never to let the facts get in the way of a good story,
the importance of family,
and to embrace the fun and spontaneity of life;

To the man who instilled in me a love for
New York Times crossword puzzles,
musicals,
and afternoon naps;

To the man who taught me to appreciate
good design and gadgetry,
pilsner beers,
and a good joke;

Happy Fathers’ Day. Je t’aime, Papa.

Pete, Mego and Dad. Summer 2006.

*Q: On the wall in Lisa’s classroom is a poster from Krusty’s literacy campaign, it reads… (fill in the blank)
A (within seconds): “Give a hoot! Read a book!”

Pego and Mego – December 2007

Happy Mother’s Day, Mama. Thanks for being so wonderful.

But that’s not to say we didn’t have our sibling moments. For instance, when my brother learned his middle name, Kurt, he didn’t get it. “Kurt” was not a word that he had heard before. It wasn’t a thing in his world. But you know what was? Curtain. So he started telling people his middle name was Curtain. Clearly my parents were just confused when they were saying Kurt. They meant to say Curtain.

Being older, wiser and bossier, I made fun of him for this. The kid voluntarily named himself after drapes. I was his older sister. I knew my role.

However, he apparently knew his, too. So my smaller, cuter and more annoying brother started calling me the one thing that drove me nuts: “Little Megan.” Anyone who knows a young kid knows that calling them a baby or a little kid is the worst thing you could do. And to have the insult come from your younger brother was just too much.

At some point, you’d think we’d tire of such things.

Fast forward to 2008. Pete’s birthday is coming up, so I ask him what he wants. He says he’d like a subscription to The New Yorker. I order him said subscription, send it to the apartment he shares with two of his buddies, and address it to Peter Curtain. I giggle to myself as I imagine his roommates reading the address label and asking him how he pronounces his middle name, and is it Irish? (Who am I kidding? They’re dudes. They probably laughed out loud and asked if his parents were drunk when they named him).

Mego: 1. Pete: 0.

Okay, one more leap in time to last weekend. I recently had a birthday. And I received a Powell’s gift card in the mail:

That bastard tied the game up.