“Why do people insist on calling themselves Italian when they’re not from Italy? When their parents aren’t even from Italy?”

“Same reason people insist on calling themselves Irish when they’re not from Ireland.”

“Italian-American. Albanian-American. Franco-American. You know, you Americans are the only ones who do it.”

“I know.”

So we’re doing this thing tomorrow night. It’s called Duvet. And it’s really not so much a thing as a boudoir type lounge and restaurant in New York. And by boudoir I mean big beds and by lounge I mean lounge.

Chris was like “Leave it to me to find a place to lay down and eat at the same time”, said the chic who arranged it. The one with the fabulous hair who did the truffle shuffle on washboard abs at our prospective in-laws.

The only problem may be falling asleep in a bed full of strangers – because there’s cocktails and sushi and french fabric and silk. We’ll miss the ‘stylistic and seductive’ Bellano show – but I’ll cope.

Sunday we’ll hit up St Patrick’s because there’s that thing I have with architecture and because I need mass in incense soaked walls. My brother’s gonna roll his eyes right here. Right here. Watch! And say it’s a Catholic thing. The Saturday night Duvet and the Sunday Morning Mass.

It’s not. It’s an Irish thing … a très European thing. And I won’t apologise. Because darling, that’s just how I roll.

I use to weigh my head. On a scale. Ask my sister. She’d weigh her boobs. They were the biggest things about us. My forehead, her breasts.

In high school she earned a full wardrobe with hers – boys bought her things just so they could stare at ‘them’. You know they did! I earned a scholarship with mine. Things evened out in the end – she ended up getting the same scholarship and I ended up walking away with half her clothes.

These days we’re equally self conscious. She doesn’t like the attention perky ‘D’s on a 24 inch waist brings. Whatever. I don’t like feeling like I should have a news ticker running across my forehead. That it should be used for advertising space…or something.

Anyway…I felt a little better yesterday when I sat down to read the “Harvard Mental Health Letter”. There was an article on Alzheimer’s noting how higher levels of education and professional careers delayed the onset of dementia. The damage, the article said, may still be there. But often ‘patients’ in the above categories did not exhibit symptoms and led perfectly normal lives; most were unaware they even had the disease. The study also noted that those with larger heads were less likely to develop dementia because, and this is a near direct quote: “Larger heads mean larger brains.”

Ahhh….Vindication at last. Now, if I could just go back in time, and counter all those fat head jokes.

I hit the shower. The cold usually shakes the fog that comes with late nights and early mornings. It didn’t. I could feel my hand tingling. My little alarm that lets me know ‘it’s time’ and ‘take it easy’.

I leaned my head against the door and then thought ‘Crap! You crazy woman, get out before you pass out…and drown.’ I’ve never heard of anyone drowning in the shower. But I imagine it’s been done.

I always do the same thing. Lay down on the floor. Hold my forehead. Take my top off. And whimper. Sounds bizarre, but if it gets to the laying down stage my head is about to explode and I’m sweating like a boxer. And whimpering always makes me feel better. It’s like meditation. Ask my sister. We use to share a room and whenever I was upset, or unwell….she heard about it. All night.

I’ve read a lot about conversion disorders and I can totally see my brain falling for something like that. But most likely it’s the 105degree temperature I had as a child. I don’t remember being sick. Just being packed in ice and wondering why my mother was trying to kill me with cold. I had scarlet fever twice, but they say that is neither here nor there. And I poisoned myself a few times. I liked to drink Chanel…

Whatever the reason, some days I have days like today. They’re not pleasant. But they pass.

Junior was righter and more just than anyone he knew or had ever known.

Most had come by God as a course of living or family. The Almighty had been thrust upon them and they accepted the mystery because duty and the minister told them they had to.

Not so with Junior. He was hand-chosen. Hand-picked, the way he saw it. And he reckoned that being picked was altogether better and more noble than having to pick yourself.

Nobody but Junior agreed to his way of thinking. But to Junior, Junior was all that mattered.

I do one meal a week. One good meal, that is. Yesterday was it. Chicken Korma. Not that canned crap. Proper Indian cuisine. Where you add the saffron and cardamom and do it yourself. I forgot today was Valentines Day. And that I’ll have to do it again. I’m thinking something-salmon.

“I want nothing,” he tells me. He’s low-carbing so chocolate is out of the question. “It’s a girl’s day, after all.”

Yeah, he may be right, but remember that time I went to Harvey Nics and stocked up on girly stuff for this girl’s day and brought it all home with nothing for you and you looked sad?

He’s impossible to buy for. He’s only ever worn one item of clothing I’ve ever got him. A blue pajama top. He has a Tag Heuer and two pair of overpriced Italian loafers sitting in my wardrobe. And countless gadgets. Full to overflowing. All past Valentine gifts. He does like art. But I can’t afford it. Not without dipping into his cash and that’s not really fair. Is it?

Anyway, I’ve been watching Julia Child since I was three. I should be able to pull something out of my hat.

What about you ladies? What do you do for the one you call darling? I have eight hours to get it right.

Dinner. 2005. Sometimes I look just like I did when I was two. This wouldn’t be a bad thing if I were two. Or ten. But I’m 28 and trying to be stunning and gorgeous and not look like a frog.

It’s this expression I have when I can’t believe what I’m hearing and wouldn’t be interested even if I could.

I wore it in all my grade-school portraits when the photographer tried to make me smile by ad-libbing a conversation between a stuffed rabbit and his hand; and I wore it the other evening at a dinner party when my hostess, an aspiring (i.e. never wrote a thing in her life) author, broke out a “Ten Steps To Writing a Successful Novel” list which she comprised herself and which consisted of things like “never write commercially or you’ll never leave anything behind,” and “never be an American because they’re just not that literate”.

I’m not a rude person, but sometimes, when I really can’t believe what I’m hearing, I look like a frog. I can’t help it.

There are ‘friends’ and there are ‘friendlies’.

Friends are true blue. People you still know well after nine years apart. Friendlies are the ones you just get on with because you have to. Because they’re colleagues or family or because you’d rather not be rude.

Today I’m minus a friendly. For good. Because I’m getting too old to deal with all the abrasive-sugar. The sweet but belittling. The ‘my upper middle’ vs. ‘your yankee (American) barbarism’.

Tomorrow, a parting look…

Hey you guys, remember The Goonies? Of course you do.

It’s one of those movies I could watch forever. Like Sixteen Candles or Back to the Future. It’s my movie to veg out to. When I’m tired and full of cold and just want to sleep in front of the fire. Only I never get any sleeping done. I’m too busy laughing.

I heart Chunk. There. I said it. I’m in love with a fat kid who likes ice cream and questionable companions. I’ve had the clip on repeat for over an hour and I’m still busting a gut. I’m easy that way.

This way too: T is for Truffle Shuffle

“Wow. It was the first run and he caught the ball, rushed it all the way down to the other side and made a six pointer.”

“Uhm, you mean a touchdown?”

“Yeah. That. Then he made a one point kick.”

Every year I stay up until 1 in the morning to watch the live half-time performance. This year he’s watching it with me. It’s not football as the rest of the world knows it. But it’ll do. I guess. Now, where’s Prince?