The Andruses
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
A Lot of Cancun Pictures (And No Swine Flu!)
Friday, April 24, 2009
Hope it Gives You Heaven
"I wake up every evenin'
With a big smile on my face, and it never feels out of place.
You're still probably workin', at a 9 to 5 pace. I wonder how bad that tastes."
It's a song that I'm sure Ritter never, ever intended to be sung in a minivan, that perfect symbol of dorky suburbia I have so come to embrace. I particularly love to blare the song when I'm wearing a sweatsuit, driving my minivan, and headed to Wal-Mart to haggle with the cashiers about coupon matching and price adjustments. It's a guilty pleasure I enjoy when I do my late-night shopping, free from children who might inconveniently start singing "Gives You Hell" at, say, church or preschool.
Truth be told, I don't have a picket fence or a shiny car (mine is streaked with dirt and kid fingerprints). But part of me likes to envision the horror Ritter would feel if he pulled up next to me at a stoplight and saw me singing -- and dancing -- along to his rant against Middle America. It might, as they say, give him hell.
-- Elyssa Andrus
Published in the Daily Herald April 1, 2009.
Say it to my Face
Fair enough. The site's greatest feature, in my opinion, is its amazing ability to locate people. I've been able to find most of my high school friends, many people from college, and practically every teenager that lives within 5 miles of me. Interestingly enough, all of my high school and college friends look amazing -- the best they have ever looked. Either there is a lot of careful photo selection and editing going on, or an extra decade really does make all of the difference.
Because Facebook includes so much personal information, it's kind of spooky and weird to now know so much about people I haven't had a face-to-face conversation with since the 1990s. And I've gotten a few friend requests from people I truly can't remember. I always feel horrible hitting "ignore," but apparently that's not a problem for a couple of old boyfriends of mine. I tried to add them as friends so I could, you know, show them how happy and successful and beautiful I am after all these years (just look at the Photoshopped pictures!), but not a single one has added me as a friend. In all three cases, the relationship ended poorly and it was my fault.
But at least I've given them the final word (or mouse click, in this case).
Rejection is subtle with Facebook, but I get the message.
-- Elyssa Andrus
Published in the Daily Herald Feb. 11, 2009.
A Column That's Totally Awesome
When you're married, there's an almost endless list of things you can do to annoy your spouse. I've been married almost a decade, and I've discovered that I can aggravate my husband (with so little effort!) in the following ways: cleaning obsessively, complaining about the weather in Utah or Utah in general, wearing stinky perfume, showing up 15 minutes late for everything. But, oddly enough, the thing that bugs my husband most is when I use the word "awesome." I can't help it. I can't get enough of the popular '80s adjective. It works in so many situations. You can use it sarcastically when your 1-year-old child sneaks away: "Tyler, that's awesome that you are drinking out of the toilet. Again." You can use it in moments of true wonderment: "Oreo Cakesters now come in 100-calorie packs? Awesome!"
There's a whole host of products displaying this super-cool adjective on their label. I recently purchased a bottle of LA's Totally Awesome Carpet Spot & Stain Remover at a dollar store in American Fork. I was dubious about the name at first, until my 3-year-old son used a red Sharpie marker to draw dots all over my carpet. The $1 cleaner was totally, totally awesome.
Entrepreneur, pitchman and former Utah gubernatorial hopeful Dell "SUPERDELL" Schanze has named a handful of companies after my favorite word. Totally Awesome Computers makes for a fairly pedestrian-sounding business, but you have to love a store called Totally Awesome Guns and Range. I have never been in a TV commercial, carried a handgun, or lost a part of my finger in a freeway motorcycle accident. It's fair to say that SUPERDELL and I have little in common. But we are wed, so to speak, by our affection for one awe-inspiring adjective. Also, we both drive my husband a little crazy. And what could be more awesome than that?
-- Elyssa Andrus
Published Jan 4, 2009 in the Daily Herald.