imperfect omelette

Here's Liv's perfect omelette:

I combined egg, water, salt, pepper...followed the instructions and made... a bowl of eggs, veggies and crab. I think I cooked the egg too fast, so I ended up with a scramble.

I tried this several times, always delicious, almost never an omelette. Just eggs and veggies and crab...which is what I wanted, but...how do you make it look like a crepe? Is it actually a crepe on set? What is this magic?

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Love and Basketball

I always forget that this episode has my two favorite moments in it!

Three if you count the introduction to my favorite character.

The beginning of this season led up to the release of Star Wars: The Force Awakens and the writers slid a Star Wars quote into every episode leading up to opening weekend. This episode had my favorite in a dramatic turning point, also chockfull of meaning, Major turns to Rita and says "Never tell me the odds." The only appropriate thing to do after defying your bosses thirsty, evil daughter is to go home and make-out with your ex-fiancee. I don't actually remember if that's Major's exact next scene, but I've pictured it that way a thousand times.

Major's sick of being played with. With new hope of being back with Liv, he's able to say 'no' to Rita. No to her trying to use her sexuality to flaunt her power over him. No to her black-mailing him into killing people. And he says it by quoting Han Solo.

Not to mention that Major has my favorite iZombie quote (how many times have I said that? But this one IS honestly my favorite): "So far it sounds like all of our problems could be solved with condoms and rock salt."

My other favorite moment is Blaine. What I love most about the scene where he comes looking for the Cure (after singing The Cure) is his delivery of the line "I don't know why I even bother", because no one is appreciating his cleverness and routine that he clearly spent some time coming up with. I can picture him in the bathroom mirror, all excited at the joke he's thought of and smiling to himself. I can picture it because this is how I feel every time I'm in the classroom. I'm funniest when I'm around the ones who don't understand my jokes. I've thought up more 80s movie puns when I'm around 5-year-olds than anywhere else. And I feel clever, goddammit. Also, this scene is really clever! I want to give Blaine a high-five! I love the moments when characters say something like "I admit, that was a good one, but I still don't like you." That's the rub.

Also, yay fight scene! It's a fun romp, Ravi holds his own---I'm sorry I called it a romp---but it's a fun little race for the cure.

I remember crying watching these first few episodes because I had no idea what would happen to Major, my favorite zombie-killing machine. This show provides such a rush!

Also, Leanne Lapp update:

The amazing film, Zombie Punch, that I need to find is nowhere to be found. Not legally. Not illegally. Send help.

---

Every decades sees a rush of nostalgia. We saw 50s diners, 60 tie-dye, everything repeating, playing again for a new audience. People fixated on what they loved when they were young.

I see my generation talking about how blissful everything was when they were ten, wishing they could rewind the clock and sit down in their PJs, watching cartoons. But it's not the cartoons and the overalls they miss. It's the blissful unawareness of growing up. Of filing your taxes, paying your bills, the ins and outs of friendships. Do we really want the simplicity of one shade of love and dependence of living with our parents?

I think some of us do. I think some of us are so soured by the promises that were made that life was what we dreamed of and aimed for. If we shot for the moon, we'd land among the stars. When really, you shoot for the moon and the stars are still a billion light years away and a new one fades every day.

Childhood is the first thing that ends, and its importance is in its ending. When love ends, when family ends, when innocence ends---so does our summer and so does our childhood. And while that's heartbreaking, we should take it as a comfort that nothing lasts forever.

Once childhood ends, we come to grips with reality and all the emotions life has to offer. We had emotions as a child. Days were good, days were bad. It was all a mix that felt more heavy with the word "like-like". Once we start to want more from our relationships---once we set up an expectation for love, all of a sudden the bad days weighed more. We wanted to be happy all of the time. And when we weren't life was barely worth living. This is still a stage of childhood because we still don't understand that it all ends. Some of us do, sure. But not enough to figure out how to cope.

Because once you understand love ends, you understand pain does, too. You understand every feeling does not have to rule your life and every feeling fades, but you....you're still there.

So once childhood ends, we know that we can survive.

We know that we're better without it. Because you become more than a moment, and a feeling and a series of events. You become you and once you can define that you become more than what happens to you and how you feel.

I've been noticing (and remembering) how teenagers take every opportunity to define and separate themselves. How teenagers need every item of clothing to sport a phrase, a brand, an expression. How I never thought I'd buy a plain t-shirt.

That too ends.

We get to leave behind cartoons and evolve. And many times that means we still sit in our PJs and watch cartoons, but we do it in an apartment that we pay for ourselves, or maybe with a lover.

And we're still soured by promises, but that doesn't define us. And we know that ends. We know that if a dream dies it's by choice and that if we're somewhere we don't want to be, we'll leave it. We know we're not stuck.