I just cannot commit to a title at this time.

Various options for this post's title are as follows:

"Gluttony at it's best"
"My sister made me do it"
"Stare-y Starer-ton"

**I'll just go ahead and put my disclaimer at the beginning of the post lest anyone related to me should read this and be crying so hard by the end that they can't finish...I love all my sister's just exactly the same (but the one that feeds my kids while I take a shower or go to the store by myself, just a smidgen more at the moment.)
(Now proceed, ignoring the fact that the rest of this paragraph is in italics, I don't know why, it just is.)
When my sister Abby is around, I laugh a lot. So much, in fact, that I get phlegmy. She has a talent for being so precisely random that you can't help yourself...and anyone that can throw out obscure movie quotes at the completely appropriate times makes me supremely happy. On our way home from the base tonight (where Abby received her VIP tour of Clark's sub) she referenced no fewer than a dozen different movies including but not limited to: (you get bonus points of validating satisfaction if you can properly identify which movies they are from)
"Where have you taken us Philipe?"
"He worked very fast...his hands were like ice..."
"Can you guarantee my safety?"
" 'Night Slot head"
"three bags of chips, one of those long knackwurst, two beers, why don't you have a beer, three beers..."
'the clicking/calculating noise that the cricket makes in An American Tale'
"Jury, write that down"
"Possible...pig."
And then I see how many times I can squeeze in a "that's what she said" comment in the course of one day.
Case in point, the other day when we were indulging in one of our many gluttonous moments at the lunch table she called me Templeton, as in the rat from Charlotte's Web because as she stated, it looked as though I was eating a heap of garbage in a trough. (In my defense, it was a loaded salad in a unsightly Tupperware container.) But this is my relationship with my little sister. Did I cry? Only from laughing so hard. Consequently, her children are just as endearingly strange as she is. For instance, Boo looks at you with quizzical eyes when you make googly baby noises and silly faces but you'll get the biggest smiles when you talk in a creepy gremlin voice. I can only say this about her innocent little baby because she is so darn cute I could die. The kind of cute that when she smiles I want to pick her up and take a bite...or at least nuzzle her neck and kiss her cheeks until she arches her back in the "get me away from her" kind of gesture. And Cubby has been quoted by us all week. Some of our favorites are his bedtime excuses: "That nightlight is too fancy" "I can't lie down, my bones are too hard" etc etc
And Abby is talented! Just look at the painfully adorable hair clip holder that she whipped up while I checked things on the computer the other day. I wish that I could take credit for her amazing creations...they were all my supplies...that's the best I can do. (those owls will one day be listed among her things for sale for Baby Rhodesbud...if she can stop being nice and giving them away.) I mean, at this very moment she is measuring my head with a ribbon for an equally adorable fabric flower headband that she is copying from J. Crew. And then spun away from me in an awkward sort of dance, reminding me that today we danced in the kitchen secretly while the piano tuner played incredible music on my neglected Kawai. I think I might miss having a sister here when she leaves.
I go to bed every night with a stomach ache. In months past I have achieved that body status that comes when one is no longer pregnant or nursing and tired enough from taking care of four children as a single parent that I forget to eat on a regular basis. And while I recognize that accidental starvation or unintentional anorexia is not healthy, it does wonders for one's figure. However, with Abby here we are reminiscing good old days of yore through food....lots and lots of food. I'm talking chocolate mint brownies for breakfast and today this little magical pile of sugar right after our veggie omelet and avocados....or maybe it was brunch, I'm not sure. (Just for the record, that is marshmallow/cream cheese fruit dip, not ice cream and Mrs. Richardson's butterscotch caramel sauce...waaayyy better and more decadent.)

I'm pretty sure that there aren't enough words for meals to cover as many as we have been eating. Breakfast, brunch, lunch, supper, dinner, snacks and so on and so forth. Oh, we have been eating healthy things too. In fact, we are so proud of ourselves for eating healthy things that we have to take pictures and eat 4 helpings worth all in one sitting.
You'll have to keep up with Abby's blog for further details of the activities committee...hers is much more interesting and better pictures..."but how can you read a book with no pictures?..."

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I know you are all just dying to know how I am adjusting to the new specs. I have come to the realization that I have a horrible staring problem. You see, the feeling of the glasses on my face makes me assume that I have my sunglasses on. And when I have my sunglasses on, the direction of my eyeballs is masked see...so I can look at whatever I want for as long as I want. Fuzzy purple uggs and matching frosty lipstick? That would normally get a good 15 seconds of unabashed loving judgement. (That's the kind where I look at them and think "oh bless their heart, did they know that's what they looked like when they left the house this morning?" Or "Holy Cow, she is not really wearing that in public" while at the same time telling myself that she is probably a really nice person.) Come on, you all do it. I have spent the entire week wondering why in the world people are staring so blatantly at me when I suddenly realize that I have been blatantly staring at them out of the corner of my eye for the last 2 minutes. That's when I remember, very suddenly, that the weight on my nose is transparent two way glass...not a mask of tinted discretion.