Nostalgic goings-on

Look, I'm blogging again - with energy. Three days in a row. I haven't done this for months - not since I was snowed under by teaching-related issues. This is because, despite the stack of papers that I have not graded, I am feeling free. Three more classes. Tuesday's class features presentations, so I don't have to do anything but listen - and take in the lengthy papers I will need to grade for that class. For Wednesday night, I can rely on prep from last year. Thursday night is a repeat of Wednesday, plus a film. I am so nearly home-free, I can taste it. And the Tuesday night class is going out for dinner together after their presentations. Since this has been a strangely intense class for everyone, including me - full of conflicts, emotions - it will be really nice for us to wind down as a group. They are so pumped about going out to dinner with me and each other, it's hilarious.

And last night, I stayed home!! I have not had a night in for three whole weeks. It's sick. I've mentioned before that my schedule is so ridiculous that I generally only have Sunday nights at home. And the last couple of weeks, I've had stuff to do on Sunday nights. Gah. So last night, staying home with A and her girlfriend T and the three dogs felt nothing short of miraculous.

The three of us had a little taco kit party. Sometime over the winter, we discovered that the Old El Paso Taco Kit was a highlight of each of our childhoods. Ah yes - with the iceberg lettuce, the winter tomatoes. Good times. For me, the taco kit dinner was really in full swing circa 1985-86, when my mother had me prepare dinner a couple of nights a week. This was one of my standbys.

We did it up with veggie ground round last night. Making more of a mess with each bite, with the taco shell breaking, the cold cheddar rubbery and half-melted into the "meat" - what an embodied memory that was. It has been at least seventeen years since I've had that experience - since I became vegetarian.

Then, we pulled out the laptop and sat there for an hour watching the intros to the TV shows we used to watch in the taco kit days. If you have not yet discovered that YouTube has the opening songs to most every show you can think of (and you don't have cable and access to reruns, so these things are distant memories), you're in for a treat. CheersCosbyShowMattHoustonKnightRiderNewhartDegrassiJuniorHighGoldenGirlsDallas...Then we reached back even further, to the early 80s, before we'd really graduated to adult shows. Jeremy Bear, The Green Forest, Today's Special, and Polka Dot Door. Good god, that was fun/disturbing. Dredging up all manner of crazy memories of place...the brown velour loveseat I sat on to watch Hammy in the TV room at 232 Rideau Terrace...etc., etc.

Since I seem to be charging down memory lane at the moment, you may expect a memory or two to be exorcised here, in this space, soon.


Bonus photo of Mr. K, who is currently sleeping like this, with the stuffed mallard duck clutched between his paws: