They’re everywhere. I’m not just talking about the classics, good ol’ anorexia and bulimia.  That’s way too narrow a definition. There are so many different ways for someone’s eating to be dis-ordered.  As in, messed up.

I can count on one hand, two lady fingers, and a chicken wing the number of women I know who don’t have some kind of weird shit around food.

Boy, was my eating disorderly back in the day. I could write a book of examples. Not that this is short, but here are some snapshots to give you an idea.

11th grade

I get mono and tonsilitis. I use the attending sore throat as a license to keep my own pint of Ben and Jerry’s Heathbar Crunch in the freezer. For safety, I lick the spoon and stick it back in, and let the family know that the ice cream is officially contaminated. I eat about a pint a day, a habit which lasts well beyond the mono.

This may be normal teen eating behavior.  But pair that with a year of skipping gym — which I get away with because the school nurse is a pushover —  and I’m struggling to snap my Girbaud jeans. I’ve been weight-conscious since I was 5, but now I’m desperate. The stage is set.

Summer after 11th grade

I spend a month in Cannes, France. The family I lodge with locks all the pastries in an armoire at night so I can’t get at them, which is just as well.

During the day, I decide to eat nothing but a green apple so I can save calories, along with all the money my parents gave me to spend.  Every night, I eat fish soup or a tomato and tuna salade – French for salad – without the dressing.  This works well.

12th grade

Jeans (now beat-up Levis) finally hanging loose. At parties, I  bring my own liter of Diet Coke and swig from it the whole time. I won’t even look at pizza. I start going to aerobics classes every day after school.  On the way to the bus, when a classmate stops and buys a Snickers for a snack, I think, “Really? A candy bar? Who eats a candy bar any more?”

Summer before college

I get a job scooping ice cream at Steve’s, home of the original mix-in. I never have a scoop myself. Not once, the whole time.  Instead, I pick up a soft-serve frozen yogurt from Zabar’s and eat that on what is supposed to be my ice cream break. I really want some ice cream, but as a booby prize I get to be self-righteous serving it to other people and thinking how fat they’ll get.

When someone orders the Medium and complains that I didn’t fill it to the top, I say, in a very Church Lady voice, “Oh, I’m sorry, did you want the full half pint?”  Because that’s how much is in a medium cup.  8 ounces.  Half a pint.  Pigs.

Freshman year, college

I keep  a little Weight Watchers scale and a measuring cup in my dorm room so I won’t go overboard and eat more than 3/4 oz of Special K with 1/2 cup of skim milk for breakfast.  

I spend lunches in my room so that instead of being faced with all the fattening choices in the cafeteria, I can put together a delicious sandwich of fat-free turkey slices on Peperidge Farm lite bread, with mustard. Every part of this sandwich sticks to my teeth, but I think it’s heaven. I keep all the ingredients in my mini-fridge, along with cans of Diet Sunkist. For dessert, I get sugar-free orange or grape Bubble Yum.

On snack nights, when everyone gathers in the hall for chips and cookies and pizza, I emerge from my room with a bag of carrots, a carrot scraper, and my waste basket to catch the carrot peel.  They have their snack, I have mine. Scrape scrape scrape. Bags of peeled baby carrots don’t yet exist.

Sad thing is, I’m not the one to worry about on our floor.

Three doors to the right is Vicky, who does aerobics in her room while defrosting Birds Eye vegetables on her radiator. She doesn’t let anyone in there, but when she opens the door a crack and pokes her head (and terrycloth headband) out, you can smell a mixture of sweat and broccoli.

Two doors to the left is Marla, who keeps a giant Binge Basket next to her bed. It’s full of Ho Hos, Ding Dongs, Doritos, Fritos, Twinkies, everything you can imagine eating and regretting. She makes no secret of the fact that she throws it all up every day, mostly because there’s no way to keep it secret.  Her feet are always turned the wrong way in the bathroom stall, facing the toilet.  And when she walks down the hall, she has to grab onto the wall for support because she’s dizzy from whatever imbalance constant barfing leaves you with.

And then there are the gals at the end of the hall, who gain 20 pounds each from ordering from Domino’s every night.  I have to hide my smile when they weigh themselves and scream at the end of the semester. I hug my carrots to my chest.  Yay, carrots. Yay, me.

Sophomore year

I live with 9 other housemates in a place called Low Rise, which is a complex of ugly beige units around a central courtyard.  From that courtyard, at any time of day, people can see me through the sliding glass doors of our living room, sweating away on my stationary bike.   Every time I chow so much as a handful of Cheerios, I climb back on the bike and pedal off the calories.

Junior year

I start running 9 miles a day. I run so hard, my toenails fall off. And then my treat is: a giant salad for dinner, with fat-free ranch dressing, and for dessert, a Weight Watchers ice cream sandwich. When my housemates go on Baskin Robbins runs, I go along and ask for tastes on the little pink plastic spoons. I never buy any.  Not an option. I just come back and have my diet treat.  Even if I’ve run extra miles, no real ice cream, except for bites of other people’s. Like a panhandler, I go around asking each housemate for just a taste, and everyone grunts and asks why I didn’t get my own. Because I can’t eat real ice cream or I’ll get fat, that’s why. Can I have another bite?

One housemate, Kelly, buys a half gallon of Hershey’s ice cream one night, has a dainty bowl of it, and puts the rest away with her name on it in Sharpie pen.  After everyone is asleep, I creep downstairs,  and eat a spoonful or two right out of the freezer. Barely make a dent.  The next night, I do the same thing. And then the next few nights after that. I never take enough for anyone to notice. Except that the next time Kelly is fixing to have herself a nice bowl of ice cream, she opens the freezer, and finds the carton empty.  All that’s left is a sad little mound, clinging to the side of the carton like it’s trying to hide from me.  She’s furious.  I’m like, Wow, who would do something like that?

Summer abroad, Junior year

I spend 6 weeks in Florence, Italy, studying Italian. The program I’m on gives us vouchers for a number of local restaurants, but I don’t use them. I eat a little baby gelato every day, and spinach for dinner. I have pasta once. In Italy.

My 20s

I order everything with extra mushrooms and tomatoes, because I like them and they have almost no calories. Late nights at Lucky Strike, a bistro in Soho, my usual order is a plate of spinach, steamed, no oil. And a jar of mustard, please. Paaaarty!!!

I never, ever skip my Aerobox class – not even for a single Saturday to meet my boyfriend’s grandmother. No matter how much he says it would mean to her. And to him.

Nowadays

My eating has gotten a lot less weird over the years, especially since I married someone in the restaurant business. None of this rice cakes and lite ice cream crap. I eat good food now, and I eat what I want. I order the thing I like from the menu, even if it has butter or cream.

I still have some *stuff*. Like, I don’t love to go out to lunch. To me, it’s a waste — I’d rather save my calories for later. I’m happy to have a dumb, nothing lunch, like a protein bar or a yogurt, so I can have a big dinner. I know that’s not so normal.

But I also know I’ve come a long way, and I’m glad I won’t be spending the rest of my life the way I used to.

We had dinner recently with a couple in their 60s, and the wife –  a thin, nervous type – only ordered an appetizer. That’s what she always does. The Sides section of the menu offered “A Good Pickle,” which I ordered with my burger.  I was looking forward to it.  When it came, they put it in front of the wife, and she ate it as her entree, with a knife and fork. I watched her cut it into tiny little bits, and wondered if I should order another. Nah.

We all have imaginary conversations in our heads, right?

I have them constantly. I replay conversations that have already happened and think of all the things I should have said. And I rehearse future conversations with friends or acquaintances that I think will be hard. Like, “Here’s why I can’t come to your birthday dinner,”  etc.

But most of all, I make up confrontations between myself and strangers. The kind of angry, chest-poking interactions I wouldn’t even think of having with anyone I’m going to see again. 

Nowhere do I do this more than during air travel. Between arriving at the airport and getting off that plane, there are endless opportunities for a run-in. I mentally act out every one of them.

Here are the places these fantasy arguments may or may not have taken place on my latest trip:

1) In line for check-in.

When the people in front of me have moved forward but I haven’t yet because I’m finishing a text or something, this is the short play that goes on in my head:

PERSON BEHIND ME: Excuse me, you can move forward.

ME: I will in just a second.

PERSON BEHIND ME: Well, we’re all waiting here behind you.

ME: You’re not going to get to the front any faster whether I move up now or in a minute. There are still 20 people ahead of us.

PERSON BEHIND ME: But you’re creating a delay.

ME: No I’m not, it’s just a space between me and the person in front of me. It would cause a delay if I were at the front of the line and being called but not going forward, but that’s not the case. However, since it seems to make such an emotional difference to you, I’ll move up right now. Because you seem rather fragile.

What really happens:  I see the space in front of me, and move up.

2) On my way through security.  

I hear them asking people to please remove their jackets. I’m wearing a longish cardigan, and I know they’re going to make me take it off – as they have before. In my mind, I defend my right to keep on the cardigan:

INSPECTOR:  Ma’am, please remove your jacket and put it in the tray.

ME: Oh, actually, it’s not a jacket. It’s a sweater.

INSPECTOR: Ma’am, please just remove it. You can’t go through the detector with a jacket.

ME: But what makes it a jacket? Is it because it’s hip length? Or because it opens in the front? If it were a pullover, would you make me take it off?  Feel it — it’s knitted merino wool. That makes it a sweater.

INSPECTOR: Ma’am, you’re holding up the line. Please just remove the jacket.

ME: Fine. I’ll remove my “jacket” — which we both know is a sweater. But this is ridiculous. And, the last time I fly this airline.

INSPECTOR:[ No answer.]

What really happens: I don’t want to be that person. So I take off the sweater and put it in the stupid tray before anyone can make a stink.

3) Boarding.

I have my carry-on and two personal items — a structured bag, and a small tote that holds my wallet, phone and boarding pass just to keep them handy. You’re only allowed one personal item, and so I wonder if the gate attendant will try this:

GATE ATTENDANT: I can’t let you board with all three of those bags.

ME: Oh, it’s really two bags. This tote fits right inside the small bag — see?

I demonstrate.

GATE ATTENDANT: I’m sorry, ma’am, it’s still one extra bag, whether it’s inside the other bag or not. You’re only allowed one overhead bag and one personal item.

ME: Why do you care that I have a bag inside my one bag? Have you gone through all the other passengers’ bags to make sure they don’t have bags inside of them? What if they have a bag of food inside their one bag? Or a cosmetics kit? That’s a bag. If you don’t let me on with my bag-inside-a-bag, you’ll have to go through everyone else’s bags to make sure they aren’t sneaking on interior bags, either.

GATE ATTENDANT: OK, you have a point.  I’ll let you on with it but in the future –

I don’t hear the rest of what she says because I’m done with her and boarding the plane. I’ve won this round.

What really happens: I take everything out of my tote and stuff it into my other bag before I board so it’s not an issue.

4) On the plane.

The aisle is blocked for at least half an hour by the snack and beverage carts. I decide to use the restroom at the front of the plane, anticipating this:

FLIGHT ATTENDANT: I’m sorry, this bathroom is for first class passengers only.

ME: Well, the aisle to the other bathroom is blocked.

FLIGHT ATTENDANT: You’ll just have to wait, ma’am.

ME: I have a bladder condition. And waiting will just make it worse and lead to medical complications, which would be the airline’s liability. Since no one is waiting to use the first class bathroom, why not let me use it really quickly? Wouldn’t that be easier than getting your name tied up in a long, involved legal case?

(I don’t have a bladder condition, but I easily could.  Does she really want to take that chance?)

What really happens: I use the first class bathroom and no one says anything.

5) Boarding for the second leg, on a tiny prop plane.

GATE AGENT: Have a great flight. And hold on — you’ll want to put this tag on your suitcase and leave it at the end of the jetway for storage.

ME: What? Why?? It’s a carry-on.

GATE AGENT: Well, it’s too large for the overhead compartments.

ME: But it’s regulation size!

GATE AGENT: Regardless, it’s too big, and it won’t fit.

ME: Well I bought it specifically so I wouldn’t have to check and wait for my luggage. And I chose it according to the airline’s specifications. Now you’re telling me that the dimensions on the website are wrong?

GATE AGENT: All I’m saying is that it won’t fit. This is a tiny prop plane.  You can try, but I promise you, it’ll end up stored below.

ME: Great. Just great. Maybe US Air should pay for this luggage set I bought for nothing.

What really happens: Actually, that is what happened. I didn’t make this one up.  Though I muttered the last line to myself so that the guy couldn’t hear it. But as you can see, the ones I conjured in my head aren’t far off the mark.

There are only two ways this sign can be pronounced: “doe doe,” as in the dodo bird (at best), or “doo doo.” As in, doo doo.

Reminds me of a sign at World of Nuts, an Upper West Side store I used to go to for Tasti-d-Lite and bulk candy after the gym to undo all the calories I’d burned. One of their bargain bins, full of milk chocolate Santas and bells, was labeled “ASS CHOCOLATES.”

Of course, the sticker on a candy bin you can always change — if a customer has the heart to tell you that no one wants to buy ass chocolates.

But a store name and signage? That’s not so easy.

Now, I’m guessing that the proprietors of Do Do aren’t from these parts. But don’t go thinking, “I’m good at English. That wouldn’t happen to me.”

I don’t care if you’re Strunk and White.

You should never go naming your store, your product, your company, even your teddy bear without running it past a few people.

I’m not saying to take a poll of all your friends – then you’ll never have a name.

If I’d asked everyone what they thought of “Talking Shrimp,” I’m sure some would have said “cute,” some would have said, “meh” and suggested I stick with Laura Belgray, Inc. (they might have been right) and some relative would have insisted I change it to “Copy Crustacean” because alliteration is always punchy.

But I did make sure it didn’t mean “poop” before paying a lawyer to register it as a corporation.

Hmm….Looking now at the color of that Do Do sign, maybe the meaning was intentional.

UPDATE: It turns out that “do-do” is a term of endearment in the South and for puppies in France. I haven’t determined whether it’s pronounced “doe doe” or “doo doo,” but in either case that goes to my point: you can’t just assume your cute name will translate in a different region. There’s always a chance it’ll mean something else.

I think now to a neighborhood store of my childhood: the G Spot Deli, on Amsterdam and 86th. They finally woke up one day but were too cheap to replace the sign. So they took out the middle part and remained The                     Deli for years and years.  Not regional, just dumb. But I forgot about it when I wrote this.

Me and Dad in Riverside Park, 1971-ish

When there’s a blizzard, I like the idea that everyone is holing up in their homes.

Because that’s what I want to do. But I don’t want to be the only shut-in, because then I feel like I’m missing out.

It sucks when you’ve been huddling inside all day and then someone comes in looking all flushed with exhilaration, stomping snow off their boots and saying, “Oh my god, it’s a-MAZ-ing out!

Too much pressure.

That’s how I feel about this Google Buzz thing.

Whenever something new like that comes out, I hope that it sucks and no one uses it, so I won’t have to, either. But they’re saying it’s going to kill facebook and twitter!  Great. I don’t want to be left behind using the dead social media tools. Now if this takes off, I’ll have to learn to use it.

Come on, people, I just got the hang of twitter. Can’t a person ever get comfortable for a while? Like, one whole year?

Can we all make a pact not to use it?  That way, nobody’s missing out.

I hear kids throwing snowballs outside. I guess I should get out there and enjoy the snow. Do I have to?

In my quest to be one of those people – the successful ones – I’ve observed a couple of things that separate them from the other people:

1. They set limits and stick to them.
2. They fly carry-on.

I’m not just talking financial or career success. If I were, neither of these rules applies.

The fact that rich people are called “fat cats” is a good clue that some of them can’t lay off the donuts.

Or the blow, for that matter. Look at Chris Farley. Not real big on limits, was he?

And I see all kinds of rich, important-looking folks at the baggage carousel. They (or, more often, their “people”) heave one giant bag after another onto their cart before rolling it out to their chauffered SUVs.

But in terms of all-around personal success, people who have it live a streamlined life.

They do things in moderation — like packing.

All they take with them are a few high-quality, non-wrinkling, mix-and-match basics. Their outfits go from day to night. And for cosmetics, they only need lip balm.

Why would they weigh themselves down with excess? They don’t have time to stand around the baggage claim area. Life is waiting.

I want to be that person who wheels effortlessly from the gate to the airport exit, saying, “later suckers.”

So I’ve decided to do something epic:

I’m shopping for a carry-on suitcase. The hard kind, that doesn’t expand at all. And I’m going to use it.

This is a very big deal for me. I’m a lifelong overpacker.

When I’m filling the giant suitcase, my rationale is: So? I need options! Why shouldn’t I take a ton of stuff? Why should I stress myself out with decisions? I’m just going to check the bag anyway. And it has wheels. And who cares what people think?

Thing is, I care what people think. When I travel somewhere with my husband, my luggage makes him hate me. I say, “you don’t have to carry it” but he insists on carrying it. And hating me.

And then, whenever we get where we’re going, someone jokes, “how many months are you here for?” Oh — ha, ha. Very funny. I need options, OK?

My bag is always the one tipping over.

It’s the one that gets stuck in the revolving door. The one the person at the airline check-in slaps with a giant sticker that says OVERWEIGHT. Oh, nice. That makes my bag feel just great. Why don’t I slap that same sticker on you, check-in lady? Right on your fat head.

I decided to become a carry-on person two or three trips ago. That didn’t go so well. I bought what the store told me was a regulation sized “cabin” bag. The soft kind.  As I zipped it up, I asked my husband, “aren’t you proud of me? I’m going carry on!”

He said, “That’s not carry on.”

Yes, I’d stuffed it pretty full, and the zipper pull had broken off from the tension of tugging it closed, but come on: it was regulation size.

At the airport, I tried to cram it into the tiny metal cage they have to test the bag size. I was grunting and poking at it and smushing it from every possible angle . If you’re ever tried to shove your badunkadunk into pants that are three sizes too small, you know what this looks like. The security lady wasn’t having it.

She said, “That’s not carry on.”

I said, “But it’s regulation carry on size!”

She sent me back to check it in. I rolled my eyes at the people waiting behind me as if to warn them, “good luck with this crazy bitch.” Then, muttering, “This is unbelievable,” I wheeled my bag off in a huff. Though, before I could do that I had to tug and squish and wiggle the bag out of the cage. There was lots of effort and grunting involved, which somewhat lessened the dramatic effect of the wheeling off in a huff.  Didn’t help that the bag tipped over and spun around on me after about three feet.

That’s not going to happen with my future suitcase.

It’ll give me limits. With a hard case, overstuffing isn’t a possibility.

Watch out, folks. ‘Scuse me.

Successful person coming through.

“Escape Cubicle Nation!” “Quit your oppressive job and start doing what you love!” “Screw The Man and find your passion!” “Make a 6-figure income, in your dirty pajamas!”

If you’re in the Twitter or blogging community, you can’t miss these messages. Though you don’t have to be on Twitter or have a blog or even read blogs to be aware of the whole “work from home, not from work” movement. It’s everywhere.

Maybe a little too everywhere.

Of course, I’m all for people ditching sucky jobs so they can make money doing something that doesn’t suck. Let’s be specific, though: because “job” does not necessarily equal “suck.”  Yes, it sucks when you’re doing something you hate, working with people you hate, or working in an environment you hate.

But not all office jobs are shitty. Some are really fun.

Sometimes even the shitty ones are at least partly fun. I once worked for a boss I hated so much, I had fantasies about slipping a dead fish into her office air conditioning duct. But working there was at least half a good time — because we all felt the same way. Common enemies are a blast.

And that’s one of several fun things you don’t get when you work by yourself.

I’m lucky enough to have a client company – a tv network – where they treat me like part of the team. So I have the best of both worlds:

• meetings to attend a few days each week in a place where I mingle with other humans;
• the option to get up at 9:30 on other days and stew in my own unshowered filth for hours while I work. (Don’t recommend it, but it’s nice that I can.)

I’m not biologically fit to be any place by ten more than once a week. Not a morning person. Or, when it’s cold, a leave-the-house person.

So I’m really fortunate to work from home most of the time. But when I do, there are things I miss about working from work. Like:

TEAM BITCHFESTS. Sitting around and going off on that one annoying, work-shirking, credit-stealing, compulsive-lying, talentless person on the team is one of the great joys of office life. In my home office, who is there to make fun of? Myself, sure. But I don’t like being the butt of the joke. The other choices are the drunk doorman or my next door neighbor, whose apartment smells of cabbage, moldy books, and decaying flesh. That’s good fodder, but then who is there to bitch about it with me besides the drunk doorman?

THE WATER COOLER.Tweeting about how over Balloon Boy you are or whether Lady Gaga is a hermaphrodite just isn’t the same as discussing them standing around the coffee pot, soda machine, or bathroom sinks.

SHARED BATHROOM. That doesn’t sound like something you’d miss, but when you look in your own bathroom mirror and say, “Oh my god, I look like death,” there’s no one else there to say, “It’s the light. It makes everyone look like death.” Nope, all you get is a telling silence — confirming that you do, in fact, look like death.

GROUP PROCRASTINATION. Misery doesn’t love company nearly as much as goofing off does. It’s so much better to be delinquent when you get other people involved. Sitting in someone’s office talking about “Jersey Shore” feels way more productive than eating Special K standing up in your kitchen. Trust me on this.

BRAINSTORMS. I feel like a user calling friends to help me come up with ideas.  Wandering the office halls and bouncing ideas off of anyone I bump into, however, seems way less of an imposition. Especially if they’re just wandering the halls, too.

BIRTHDAY PARTIES. In the company I work for, these are actually just a pleasant memory from the 90s. Since the money disappeared, they’ve gone the way of big expense accounts and free plastic utensils. But I know some places still have cake when it’s someone’s birthday. At least they do at Dunder Mifflin, on “The Office.”  We used to have cake and champagne! That was a license to linger around the office kitchen and not work for at least an hour.

NEW FRIENDS. Any friends I made after college are because of office jobs. And they’re some of the best friends I have. Bonds formed over that hateful boss 16 years ago have blossomed into something way greater — though we still reminisce over that bitch’s threat to cut summer Fridays. And over her too short, acid-washed “anniversary dress” from Strawberry that she wore on client calls at Saks, even though it didn’t zip all the way.

FREE OFFICE SUPPLIES. Duh.

Hey, if you hate your job and you hate office life and you want to start your own business, then by all means:  get out of there.

But there’s nothing inherently wrong with working for The Man.

Especially if you like The Man, or the other people who work for The Man, or the thing The Man (or The Woman, or the Manimal) pays you to do.

I say: Don’t quit your day job. Unless you really hate your day job.

What do you say? Bet you have an opinion on office life. Comment below.  The boss will be pleased.

Everyone knows, when you’re at the airport, you’re allowed to buy any trashy book you want.

Because it’s “for the plane.”

I always have a book in my bag that I brought from home. The one I’ve been meaning to read.  But once I get to the airport I admit to myself that that book isn’t going to be any more inviting once I’m crammed into seat 22F than it would be in my living room.

So, even though there’s no chance I’ll read them all — or maybe even any — once I finish with Elle, Allure, Marie Claire, US, Life & Style, whatever else I haven’t read at the nail salon, and (ha ha, as if) the Wall Street Journal, I load up on options. Usually:

1. one non-fiction book about forming new habits, changing your brain, or becoming a business titan;
2. some novel that’s been on top of the bestseller list for 4 years and now has the “soon to be a major motion picture” cover — which depresses my husband so I have to rip it off; and,
3. if I spot one, please God, a celebrity-on-drugs biography.

Enter Mackenzie Phillips.

As part of my new goof-off-offline agenda, I just started reading her recently published autobiography, “High on Arrival,” which I bought about 4 airplane trips ago. It’s been sitting in the “meaning to read because I paid for it” pile ever since.

The book is a shocker.

The big scandal that made news when it hit the shelves was that Mackenzie had sex with her father, Papa John Phillips.  But that’s not so shocking. Come on, he was from the 60s. What do you expect from a guy who wears caftans and shoots up entire poppy fields in a day?

To me, the shut-yo-mouth get-outta-town surprise is that Mackenzie Phillips was hot.

Now THAT is news to me.  I watched every episode of One Day at a Time and always thought of her character, Julie, as the homely sister. Barbara, played by Valerie Bertinelli, was the pretty one.

Believe me, I’m a lifelong fan of skinny.  Skinny I get. But I did not get her look. She was all gums and bad bowl haircut and terrible dance moves, which you saw every episode in the show open.

It confused me to no end that Julie was constantly juggling dates and phone calls from boys, and had fights with her mother over whether she could move in with them. How was she in a position to move in with a boy, much less go for a soda with one?  There was an episode called “Julie Goes All The Way.” I thought, come on:

Who would want to go all the way with her? I mean, other than Schneider?

I figured the show had an all-blind writing staff or something. But it turns out Mackenzie Phillips was hot and I just couldn’t tell. She had a zillion boyfriends in real life, and slept with Mick Jagger.  He didn’t need to have sex with any fuglies. Even when he was stoned out of his gourd.

I’m still trying to parse this information. I keep flipping open to the smooth photo pages in the middle of the book and looking at the pics from her teenage years, squinting to see the pretty.  No, all I see are the gums.  I still don’t get it.  Maybe it’s like a Shelly Duvall kind of thing.

I’m not being catty. It’s just screwing with my understanding of traditional beauty standards.

Now, see, this book has given me a lot to think about. So is it really that trashy?

Seriously: no, it ain’t Tolstoy. But although I’m prone to book shame — especially when I’m toting around a read like this, or something with Tori Spelling on the cover, or, worse, the stock chick-lit illustration of high heels and cocktail glass — I don’t consider a book true trash as long as it gives good story.

If the writing is truly awful and cliche and contains sentences like, “she was mad as a hornet when she found him cheating on her,” then it’s trash. In which case, I can’t get through it. I keep it with the receipt to return it until the 31-day window has expired, and then I put it down in the basement for a neighbor to poke through while they’re doing laundry.

But if it’s a page-turner, then for me, as a writer, there’s a real takeaway.

Writing doesn’t have to be provocative and “literary” to be worthwhile. You’d be surprised how many books that scream “beach read for dummies on Dummy Beach” can teach you something about smart storytelling.

Got any other good, would-only-buy-it-at-the-airport reads to recommend? Please. Comment away.

Below, the One Day at a Time show open. Tell me Julie doesn’t dance like Axl Rose.

Two months ago, my sister had a baby.

But for all the time she spends feeding him, burping him, changing his diaper, putting him down or picking him up, I’m pretty sure I spend more time each day with my laptop.

True, it lets me sleep through the night, with only an occasional 3am email “ding.”  But from the second I get up till I go to bed, that little titanium bastard rules my life.

I check it even before I brush my teeth. Any email? Any @ replies on Twitter? (Oh yeah. Hi, husband. Oh yeah. Coffee. Newspaper.)

I sit at it all day and night, and even take the thing into the bathroom with me to listen to podcasts while I do my makeup. OK, maybe that doesn’t count, because I’m using it as a radio. But still:

There’s an undeniable bond, and it’s created a problem.

I used to procrastinate outright, by doing things that were distinctly non-work to put off doing work.  Things that were fun and impulsive — well, maybe more compulsive than impulsive —  like watching an entire season of Rescue Me.

Now, because of my attachment with the MacBook, it’s just a barely perceptible shift back and forth between working and not working. A seamless flow from one to the other. I’m either writing what I’m supposed to be writing, or I’m on Twitter or Facebook or Dlisted or Huffingtonpost or Twitter again, and saying, “OK, I’ve got to get back to writing.”

The not working part doesn’t feel like a break.  Because I do it in the same position as I do the work: sitting at my desk, hunched over like a hominid.

When my husband comes home, I’m still working. And by “working,” I mean hanging out on Twitter while somewhere under a thousand windows, a cursor blinks away on a word document.  The thing is, I really feel like I’m working, because that’s what I’m sitting there to do.

Even if I’ve only accomplished 4 hours of writing and 12 hours of goofing off, it feels like a 16-hour workday by the time I go to bed. My back feels it, too.

What’s the point of procrastinating if it feels like work?

So, I’ve decided to make some changes.  It’s only been a few days, but they’ve made me feel way less…gross.

If your disturbingly intimate bond with the computer and online media has made work and goofing off one long, round-the-clock blur, try joining me in these steps to bring meaning back to “not working.”  I can use the company.

1. Go back to old-school, offline procrastination.

Watching TV, reading US Magazine, tweezing my eyebrows, going for a walk, buying things I don’t need, talking on the phone. Spending time with real, physical people. The kind you can reach out and poke and spill wine on.

Twitter and Facebook and all that? Sure, as a break after I do my work. But not in between little bitty bits of work.  Yay!  I wrote a word! Any new followers on Twitter? —No. Bad.

2. When off the computer, close the computer.

Otherwise, if I’m in the house, I won’t stick with my offline procrastination plan. I’ll keep drifting over to the computer. That bitch is like a magnet.

Worse, I’ll just pick it up and bring it over to the couch, where I’ll cradle it on my lap while I watch TV.  Then, I can’t even make it through a scene of Ghost Whisperer without rewinding three times, because I’m so distracted by my email. How sad when I’m not disciplined enough to watch TV.

3. Take TweetDeck off my MacBook’s dock.

For you non-addicts, TweetDeck is an application for using Twitter. Quitting out of it but still having its bright yellow icon on the dock is like putting away your coke spoon and saying “no more,” but keeping a mound of coke on your desk. Just guessing. Never did coke.  But I’ve read a lot about it.  Speaking of which, just started MacKenzie Phillips’ autobiography last night – part of my new analog goofing off plan. It’s not bad.

4. Quit out of Mail while writing.

Everyone knows you’re supposed to do that. I’ve actually started doing it and it works. I don’t know about you, but I cannot ignore a new email.  That “ding” is the devil’s mating call.

5. Turn off iPhone while writing.

Come on. What’s the point of quitting out of Mail on the computer if I can still hear emails come in on my phone?  I’m on to you, iPhone.

6. Put my husband before the computer.

It wasn’t in our vows, but I’m writing it here as an amendment: Love of my life:  I, Laura, won’t ignore you to do work if I’m going to sit and stare at Twitter waiting for an @ reply instead of actually doing work.

Who’s with me?

(*Via sensory memory only. Certain terms and conditions may apply.)

In Europe, they like to pick one song and play it over and over and over. That song, and only that song.

I was there summer of  ’86 – after 11th grade – and this was that song. They could not get enough of it. If by some chance you were in Europe then too, hearing “Live Is Life” will make you feel like you’re right back there :  strolling through quaint medieval towns, sitting in street cafes, and shooing away street mimes. Or maybe hanging in the discotheque and consuming enough gin to kill Babar. But, most of all, it’ll remind you of going bananas from hearing that song.

As for the video: apparently those thugs are supposed to be “proto-punks.”  I’d call them something else. You tell me.

Did I mention I went to Europe in ‘85, too?  Before you call me a lucky brat: I was there volunteering. Volunteering to let my parents send me to Spain. OK, so I was a lucky brat.

The two big songs of that summer were a politically incorrect merengue tune called “Mami El Negro,” and the almost incomparably ’80s single below, Tarzan Boy. It brings back memories of eating rabbit that I thought was chicken.

The video is so poor-man’s A-ha.

Wherever you spent your summers during high school, I bet you have some good memory-trigger songs. Share them in the comments section, I love those stories.

Rarely do I post a photo or video not to just make fun of it.

In fact, I’ve often mocked this place, Rice, on Spring Street. It’s like a gelateria but they sell different flavors of rice pudding. I like the rice pudding, and the concept, but it attracts hordes of people from tour buses. It’s where they rest their dogs and treat themselves after buying counterfeit Louis Vuitton bags on Canal Street.

But, no, I’m not here to mock. I’m here to praise.  This signage is some damn good branding. I love the attitude. Almost made me go in and get some rice pudding. Or at least a free sample.

I think it’s a new thing.  If it was always there, then I’m blind.  Don’t miss the excellent “help wanted” sign at the bottom.