ArcaMax

On a typical day, I will probably get about 30 spam emails. Most of them are for diet pills, a few are for magic cellulite cream (are you noticing a theme here?), and occasionally I get one from a Nigerian prince letting me know he has a million dollars for me if I just give him my bank account number to transfer the funds. Of course, I never ...Read more

The first thing I noticed when I got into the Uber was the smell of salami. I immediately thought about the salami sandwiches with mustard on white bread my mother used to make me for lunches as a child, and like one of Pavlov's dogs', my mouth started to water. I probably hadn't eaten a salami sandwich in 25 years, since my kids were little, ...Read more

I'll be the first to admit, I don't really know much about cars. So when my car started making a funny noise, I had no idea what it could be. I knew this noise wasn't its regular noise. The regular noise usually sounded like "vroom-vroom," but this new noise sounded a little like "cough-cough." Although I wasn't very car-savvy, I was a mom, ...Read more

"I think I'm turning into a werewolf," I told my dermatologist as I sat on the examining table in her office. There were posters on the wall and pamphlets for the treatment of wrinkles and fat, but nothing for werewolves.

"Why do you think that?" she said, peering at my pores. A thankless job if ever there was one.

"I'm starting to grow hair...Read more

"What's for dinner tonight?" my husband asked, inhaling deeply as he lifted the top off a simmering pot of tomato sauce.

I shooed him away.

"We're having spaghetti marinara," I said.

"Cool," he said. "But I thought we were eating gluten-free?"

"We are," I assured him.

"But pasta isn't gluten-free."

"It's not actually spaghetti. It's ...Read more

I discovered the squatters when I was outside watering the flowers on our front porch. I heard a slight buzzing sound, and since I wasn't asleep, I knew it wasn't me snoring. Suddenly, there was a fly-by buzz over my head, and when I followed the path of the buzzee, my eyes landed on a wasp nest, roughly the size of Rhode Island, under the ...Read more

Back in the day, when I was younger, I would wake up in the morning and, for the most part, look like I had gotten a good night's sleep. Not the mornings in my early 20s when I was hung over, of course. Or the mornings in my 30s after being up all night with my kids. Or the mornings in my 40s after waiting up all night for my kids to come home...Read more

My husband was never much of a coffee drinker, but after a business trip to Italy, he became enamored with espresso. At first he would just order it in restaurants. Then he started frequenting fancy coffee shops. Eventually he bought his own machine, and not just one of those pop-in-a-pod-and-call-it-espresso machines. No, he went full-on ...Read more

For many years, I was really bothered by the notion of a skort . It wasn't so much the actual combination of a skirt and shorts, because in concept, it was a pretty good idea, especially for tennis or when you might happen to be in a place with big wind gusts and such.

No, the problem I had was with the name, "skort."

It was right up ...Read more

"Oh no!" I cried from the bathroom.

"Honey," my husband said, "what's wrong? Are you OK?" He ran into the room, wondering, I'm sure, what kind of tragedy could have transpired with only me, the sink and the toilet present.

"I've made a terrible mistake," I said, looking at him forlornly.

"What?!" he asked.

"I used my night cream instead of...Read more

Living in the suburbs, I encounter lots of wildlife to keep me on my toes. I've had several run-ins with aggressive squirrels, a quarrel with a cranky woodchuck, an unfortunate encounter with a pissed-off skunk. But none of this prepared me for the monster thing I stumbled upon while we were on vacation in the woods. This thing was so big and so...Read more

Every spring, the April showers not only bring May flowers but turn my backyard into a muddy swamp. During this period, we are forced to keep a laundry basket of rags by the back door so we can intercept the dog on his way back in the house, wrestle him to the ground, and sandblast his paws before he does a muddy cha-cha through the family ...Read more

"I saw you throwing the ball for the dog outside this morning," I said to my husband. He was making himself some eggs while the dog lay panting on the floor.

"I did!" he said enthusiastically.

"You used the wrong ball," I said, walking past him to pet the panting dog.

"What do you mean?"

"You threw the green ball that has the treats inside...Read more