Spicy Szechuan Chick Lit

Spicy Szechuan Style Vegetables and Chicken, you are my new favorite frozen meal. Always at arm's reach when the idea of putting things between bread seems too time consuming, too overwhelming, too involved. You taste frozen enough to remind me that I am at work, with enough zucchini to convince me that you are healthier than something with no vegetables at all.
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Speaking of tasteless consumption, this post was actually supposed to be about a book I just read. The other day, I found myself saying to Matt, "I just want to finish this book so I can write a blog post about it and then never talk about it ever again." Having reached the finish line a few days ago, this post is way overdue.

For some odd reason, I got it in my head that I wanted to read Amy Sohn's Prospect Park West. I'd developed this slight fascination with Brooklyn's Park Slope neighborhood's parental culture simply because Gawker sometimes talks about it. I knew the book was an easy read, full of namedropping and metaphors comparing human emotions to expensive objects like strollers and shoes. The straw that broke the Manolo's heel (I don't think that worked, which is why I don't write chick lit) was the fact that it took me approximately forever to finish On the Road, a book that seventh graders can read in one sitting, while texting. All of this created the perfect storm that propelled me to order Prospect Park West from Amazon's marketplace for $6.

And here I sit, still debating whether or not I want my $6 back (it would be enough to buy three Spicy Szechuan Style Vegetables and Chicken meals). I'm no better for having read this fictional romp through an upper-class neighborhood populated by over-medicated movie stars and self-righteous super moms. The plot kept getting more ridiculous as the story lines began to overlap, sort of like the movie "Crash" if you replaced the racial tension with references to sleeping pills.

I bet by now you're thinking a) it sounds like she hated this book and b) this isn't the blog I was looking for. But believe me, I'm grateful to PPW for getting me through a slump when anything more intellectually stimulating was completely out of the question. If I hadn't been reading about playground politics and affairs between food coop workers, I would've been drawing finger pictures in bathroom mirror condensation and wishing I'd spent my $6 on a smutty read instead of frozen meals.

So now I'm back on the literary straight and narrow. Next up: Illumination and Night Glare, an autobiography of Carson McCullers that my sister gave me for Christmas. No condo board squabbles or chardonnay hangovers in that one. At least I don't think so.