The Burrow

Not that kind of list, denizens.  I have everything I need or I want and Santa is focusing on the littlest member of the clan, while being certain that the rest have socks and underwear to last a life time. No, this list is for FlapJilly.  Her grandfather and I were sitting on Douglas, disgruntled viewers of gender stereotyped advertising on every channel we tried.  All the little girls were in pink... sparky pink... and most of them had tulle.  The ones with the biggest smiles were wearing tiaras or fairy princess wings. Though Little Cuter went through a fairy princess stage in second grade, I think it had more to do with her friendship with Rachael than any real infatuation with spangles. Her wedding dress came from J Crew; it had pockets in lieu of lace. The notion of success through princess-ness is not part of her repertoire. FlapJilly may have different ideas on the subject, and those will have to be treated with respect.  With that in min...

You killed my father.  Prepare to die. If you've seen the movie, you were saying it aloud to yourself after you finished reading the title.  I know.  I get it.  Best movie ever.  Amster and Elizibeth and Miss Texas and Mr. 9 and Mr. 7-and-his-BFF-and-that-Mom-and-Grandma and I went to the Fox Tucson Theater this afternoon to watch it on the big screen.  It was perfect.  (Spoiler alert - if you don't know that I'm writing about Princess Bride ,  continue reading at your own risk.) I was the only one who'd seen it before, but the line at the will-call was full of "Mawwiage..." and "to the pain" and Miracle Max.  The smiles were beatific.  No one was in a bad mood.  Even the kids stopped fussing.  Robin Wright (Penn-then-not-Penn)'s first film role was perfectly cast; she is Buttercup incarnate. Billy Crystal and Carol Kane ran around my kitchen, Humperdink-ing for as long as my kids shared a roof. The movie...