I worked at an IT help desk and yes, I will concur. I was believed to be more effective analyst on the phone not because my answers were better, but because I was perceived to be “nicer and more helpful”, even though I wrote in the ticket that the problem was “between the chair and the keyboard”.

Schlitz and Shaefer were gotos when I was in High School.   If we were feeling really fancy, it was Moosehead or Heineken. 

I spent 4 years of high school in competitive marching band and the work that had to be done to pull this off is really astounding.

My Jersey born grad school friend lives in Florida now.  She actually texted me a photo when she found it in Publix, she was so excited.  Damn, we native NJer love our pork roll/Taylor ham.

Kerns cream soda was the best.  Champale in a can was pretty awful though..

As much as my PA friends adore it, I could never abide Scrapple.

North Jersey, Bergen County, Taylor ham girl here! I’ve been vegetarian for over a decade (on and off before that) and the only time I eat meat is the once a year we break down and pay the exorbitant price to have a 6lb chub sent to CA. I have brought them back on the plane when visiting from the east coast. It was a…

I would just settle for an Aldi in our area. But to drown our sorrows for lack of the German supermarket we’ll be plowing through this again during Advent:

When my kids were very little, this was their favorite Christmas song.  Even now when they are both home for the holidays, it gets requested.  

I can start dealing with Christmas music around Thanksgiving week; earlier than that seems too early.

One day I’ll be able to listen to this Bowie lyric without getting emotional:

The Lou Reed lyric that always gets me is from Magic and Loss:

He said “I’ll love you till I die”, she told him “You’ll forget in time”
As the years went slowly by, she still preyed upon his mind

My Mother in law was dying of cancer and we knew we wouldn’t be able to make it back before she passed. We set up a Skype session with my sister in law at my in laws house, and my husband sang that song to her the day before she died. I can’t make it through hearing that song now without sobbing uncontrollably.

Robyn Hitchcock is the king of quirky lyrics but sometimes he writes one that just goes through me like a knife. The song “One Long Pair of Eyes” is one of them, and when he performed it in concert at the Fillmore a few years back, I was pretty much a sobbing mess:

I still think they should have sued them for 666,000 dollars.

One of the things about growing up in a predominantly German American household is that tea is the cure-all for everything.  You have a cold? Tea.  You have a stomach ache? Tea.  Broken heart? Have some tea.  I swear if I came home with a broken leg, my mom would have made a doctor’s appointment and a gave me a cup of…

My dog wearing my polling place hotline shirt.  She really would like you to vote or else she’ll just incessantly bark at you. 

In High School, I opted for the English track my junior and senior year that was for film making and writing. In the 101 class, my teacher gave the sage advice of you should always sit through the credits in respect to all the people who bought this experience to a theater, because one day, your name may be up there…

Is it bad that one of the life skills I passed on to my children is how to properly pour a beer?  :D