My one question to the clean helpful couple elicited a classic Maggie email sent at 4 AM this morning. I changed names and obscured identifying school numbers because I am paranoid, clearly. I did not fix the grammar or syntax. This email references several episodes immortalized in this highly secret blog, including the Dancing Mirror… Continue reading An email from Maggie

As a recent shut-in, I’ve found myself obsessing on my house. I painted our bedroom a soothing gray. I framed a lot of framable items, and bought a painting from a guy I went to high school with. The painting is lovely and reminds me of the elbow of the artist’s dad, Steve, who was… Continue reading The hellmouth is just off the kitchen

We are a Beatles-hating family, a Wings-intolerant crew with no patience for any Paul McCartney venture, ever. This is an ironclad policy, and includes: Maggie loves them. She loves classic rock and we feel her paternalistic self-regard when she blasts her music at us. Maggie and Paul “No one understands Paul and his Beatle friends… Continue reading Sick of that guitar faintly weeping

I must start this blog post (after I finish rebooting my Blackberry) with a complaint. I hate this entire situation, and I’ve been hiding from it and being very counter-confrontational and putting off and putting off doing the timeline—complete with videos and Tweets and scanned police reports–because I just hate this. It’s like I have… Continue reading Will this unfounded allegation of child abuse prevent me from being on the PTA board?

We are upstate at a giant reservoir in New York, and we have a motorboat. Calvin, after 18 years of cohabitation, has revealed himself to be an avid fisherman. It’s rainy but wonderful. We do not see or hear Maggie—except when we check the security footage—and her absence is glorious. Not that she isn’t up… Continue reading The view from vacation

It’s comforting to hire a lawyer, and terrifying at the same time. Calvin and I, and the kids, have been feeling very aggressive toward Maggie. We mounted a concerted Twitter campaign not at her, but more around her. I probably don’t have to explain this, but trying to run a social media biting gnat strategy… Continue reading Today we hired a lawyer

This evening was beautiful. I was on our deck with a glass of wine/seltzer and a good book about elves and magic. I was thinking what a beautiful day it was. Then Calvin came out and he was all wet. “She got me with the hose,” he said. Maggie had pulled up to the front… Continue reading Water wars? Hose hijinks? Everything goes to hell

To be frank, our short-term strategy is for Maggie to be arrested so we can get a restraining order. No judge will give us a restraining order, we were told, with some harassment complaints and a keyed car without video evidence. But how do we get her arrested? It is a departure from the last… Continue reading Time for Twitter

We eat a lot of pasta—at least twice a week—and pesto has been a favorite for years. Calvin usually made it walnuts, I favor pine nuts and I buy them (key point), so Daisy, the biggest child proponent of pesto, is making pesto tonight. Calvin, Wyatt and I have to scout a location to shoot… Continue reading Pandemic pesto courtesy of Daisy