Ester's Feathers

Near death-by-chicken

I used to watch The Simpsons with something approaching religulousness. But when I moved in to this house 4 years ago, my reception of Fox was like watching tv in a snow globe and eventually I just weaned myself off the station entirely. But last night I fired up the computer, which has only had an internet connection for a little over a month now (I'm gradually sort of bringing myself online, it would seem) and watched the latest episode, and to those who say that the Simpsons has outrun it usefulness and isn't funny anymore, I say Oh fuck off. The sense of the humor is consistent, the figures almost archetypal in their familiarity and the five or six good laughs I get are worth investing 30 minutes. Last night Lisa was tasked to explore her family tree and she tries desperately to find someone in her lineage who isn't a complete loser and ends up finding out she's part Black. The title of the episode is The Color Yellow. Just the opening credits were enough to make it worthwhile. My Sunday nights are complete, once more. Thank you, Jebus.

Although it is 20 days before it's official, Spring continues all around. The plum trees are beginning to show some foliage, which means when they flesh out, I will no longer be visible to the guy in the house next door, who I've caught staring in at me several times. Ew.

It was a low key weekend. On Saturday, I decided to make a homemade chocolate cake, from Bittman's How to Cook Everything book and I was unimpressed with the results, especially since I accidentally omitted the baking power, so they were little flat, baby shit brown Frisbees that I couldn't even feed to the chickens (apparently, they're not supposed to have chocolate, much like dogs).

And on Sunday something happened which I've seen previews again and again in my mind: as I was coming down the steps with some leftovers for the girls, Butters made a dart right under my foot and I did a weird mid-air maneuver and missed her, but lost my footing in the process and fell down the remaining steps, landing with a combination thud and smack on the flagstones. My first thought was to make sure I hadn't landed on one of them. I hadn't, thank God, and my next thought was, okay, what did I break. Turns out nothing, but today I'm hobbling around like an old woman who lures children into her candy house and eats them. So, look out, kiddies.