ArcaMax

"I think it's time we retired this oven," I said to my husband as I displayed a sheet of blackened sweet potato fries. "Even the dog won't eat these."

"Sure he will," he said, tossing some fries on the floor. The dog immediately sucked them down.

"Not my point," I said.

We had known our oven was on its last burners for quite some time. But ...Read more

It was one of those days where everything was taking a ridiculously long time. There was a line at the dry cleaners. A line at the supermarket. A line at the gas station. I was starting to think that everyone in the world had the same to-do list that I did; they were just one to-do ahead of me the whole day.

I finally made it to the last ...Read more

"Maybe you just aren't fun anymore," a reader wrote to me recently. With all due respect to this reader, are you fun? No, please, are you having it? What is so fun out there, hmm? Is someone having a party full of Nerds Gummy Clusters and total disassociation?

Apparently, the tone around this column space has trended too serious for some ...Read more

When it comes to air travel, I'm certainly no stranger to flight delays. On a trip last summer, our return flight was delayed 36 hours. Strangely enough, this was also approximately the same amount of time I had been in labor with my son. The difference was at the end of my labor, I got a beautiful child, whereas at the end of the flight delay...Read more

First, the Florida of it all registers. Oranges, gators, crystal blue skies full of possibility.

Then, something else dawns in the opening breaths of "Nickel Boys." The film is shot in a first-person lens. We, the viewer, embody Elwood Curtis, an ambitious Black teen growing up in 1960s Tallahassee. He's the one looking up at oranges, and by ...Read more

I wouldn't say I'm nose blind to the smell of my dog, but typically, I don't realize he needs a bath until the board of health shows up and condemns the dog, his bed and our house.

My husband will usually smell him before I do. Maybe it's because he's out of the house all day, and when he walks in the door, the smell hits him like a ...Read more

I recently watched two documentary series that unpacked slices of zeitgeist from the 1990s and 2000s. One was "Girls Gone Wild: The Untold Story," the other, "Jerry Springer: Fights, Camera, Action."

Both series illuminated an era rife with cartoonish sexcapades and violent, Roman arena-style fighting. I lived through it, of course, and at ...Read more

There are a lot of things my husband does well. Shopping, however, is not his forte. This I learned after I sent him to the drugstore to get me some Anbesol for my canker sore, and he came home with Anusol, a product for hemorrhoids.

"It was an honest mistake," he admitted.

"Yes, I can see how you might have been confused," I said. "One ...Read more

Hi! What is the Gulf of Mexico?

I will answer the question with more questions, an old sales trick: Have you heard of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama or Florida? Have you been to a beach? Did you not witness the 2024 hurricane season? Did the schools fail you this badly?

There's no reason to be like that.

You're right...Read more

As the chief domestic officer of our family, I'm usually pretty fastidious about the cleanliness of my home. But every once in a while, something escapes my attention, and then, before I know it, we have a disturbing situation on our hands.

Such is the case with my refrigerator.

"Something in the fridge has gone bad," said my husband, ...Read more

You may have heard that a new president will be inaugurated on Monday.

By Donald Trump's side, reportedly, will be the billionaire Founding Fathers of our exciting oligarchy. This includes Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg, who has rebranded by cutting baby bangs and wearing chains last seen on a Zales truck. As part of this macho ...Read more

If this were a game of Clue, I knew who the victim was, where it died, and what killed it.

The Roomba was dead. In the den. With a shag carpet.

But the question was, who done it?

When I arrived home that day at 12:41 p.m., the familiar whooshing of the Roomba, set to vacuum at 12:30 p.m. each day, was suspiciously absent. I scoured the ...Read more