All well chez Coolidge

Thanks to the readers who wrote in wondering if everything’s okay in Coolidge Town. Yes, we’re all still alive here and no, we’re not shacked up with some hot fireman (though not a bad problem to have, eh?). (more…)

Sarasota firemen rescue MC and her cats!!!

Two kind of drop-dead, gorgeous, sexy, and sweet firemen just left my house.

MC (in the middle) with firemen in Boston (during a city-wide scavenger hunt that just happened to involve getting a photo-op with firemen. Yes, I was the mastermind behind the scavenger party!)

Okay, they left my driveway, but still … it was very close. (more…)

Nice girls finish fat?* Oh, I’m SO glad I’m a bitch!

After I left my husband and moved into my own apartment, I had a lot of time for navel-gazing. In my first few months alone, with only copious amounts of take-out pizza and twizzlers to keep me company — I had time to do a lot of thinking about the fact that for WAY too long, I’d been WAY too nice. Played WAY too fair. Given away WAY too much with WAY too little coming back in return.

As my waistline grew bigger and my mood got moodier, I decided to change my nice-girl ways and become a bitch with a capital B. (more…)

Woulda … coulda … shoulda

Today, if I’d stayed married, I would have been married ten years. But I didn’t. Stay married, that is. The only one of my siblings to divorce, yup, that’s me — little black sheep of the family.

I left the man I’d promised to love and stick with through thick and thin. Keeping the first part of that promise was easy: I still loved him — or maybe I still loved the man I’d wanted him to be — the day I left him.

It was the sticking around through thick and thin part I couldn’t stick with. (more…)

MC’s Friday morning musing on romance

I’ve been around too long to believe anymore that a kiss, or that initial first flush of attraction, no matter how much it knocks your socks off, is an indicator of long-term compatibility. I’m old-fashioned enough to believe that attraction – whether short-term lust or long-term love – has to be grounded in shared intellectual, emotional, and social mores. Too driven by logic, I often cast a gimlet eye at what is commonly called romance. And yet … . (more…)

Tropical Sex Wave

Had a date last night … the guy who was taking me out picked me up in the early evening for my first-time ever experiencing WMNF’s annual fundraiser — Tropical Heatwave held in and around the Cuban Club up there in Tampa/Ybor City.

Trombone Shorty laid down a funk so dunk I was delirious.

So, the guy picks me up in the early evening, and off we go … road trip! (more…)

Lean, green, mowing machine!

I woke up early this morning to get a jump on the day. I had an article to finish and a lawn to mow. But the lawn, really just a yawning, sandy stretch of various and sundry weeds, came first. It was early enough to mow without the heat beating down too hard (630 am).

Only one problem: I don’t have a mower. (more…)

MC’s naked reality

For most of my life, I’ve had a love affair with make-up. Like most women, I’ve spent an inordinate amount of time and money selecting, buying, and smearing goop of various kinds all over my face before letting myself go out in public.

If you’re going for the full monty of make-up, you’ve got mascara, eyeliner, eye shadow, eyebrow pencil, foundation, concealer, blush, powder, lip liner, lipstick and a top coat of gloss. Most women, at a minimum, throw on mascara, concealer and lipstick before heading out any door, especially if she’s going to an office or on a date.

My love affair with make-up ended though, about the same time that I left my ex-husband. (more…)

In Sarasota, the gap widens between the haves and the have-nots

(This piece appeared in the Sarasota Herald-Tribune on April 27, 2009.)

In 2004, when I returned to my hometown roots of Sarasota, real estate was the hot, hot, hot “topic du jour.” And, while not exactly big league, Sarasota had certainly become big bucks in the years I’d been living in Boston.

Familiar landmarks — like the Simple Sam’s market that used to be a standard stop on the way to Siesta Key — had disappeared, and countless small, knock-the-sand-off-your-feet-style Florida homes had been leveled in a buy-and-bulldoze frenzy. And everywhere I went that first year back, the art of conversation was lost to loud talk of deals in the making, dollars for the taking, and which side of the Trail you lived on. (more…)

MC Coolidge Wins Florida Press Association award! Yippee!

Most of my life, I’ve been known for being WAY too serious. I’ve been notorious among ex-boyfriends and ex-husbands (of which there is only one) for never getting the punchline of jokes. I always said things like, “Huh? I don’t get that.” To which they would usually shake their heads and say,”Lighten up!!” If I had $18 for everytime I’ve been told to lighten up, I’m sure I’d have about $18,000 right about now.

So, it’s IRONICALLY BEAUTIFUL that I just found out this morning that not only have I won a Florida Press Association award for column-writing … but I won the award for a HUMOR column of all things!!

The only downside is that the humor column really wasn’t supposed to be funny at all — it’s a tragic look at the seedy underbelly (and I mean that literally) of my fight with the flab!

The column that won is called Ben and Jerry Take a Hike! So you can imagine what it’s about. But if you want to read it — you can get a peek into my physically psyched-out psyche by double-clicking on this link: Ben & Jerry Take a Hike and win MC a Big Award! (Hey, that makes the Michelin-esque aspects of my physique almost worth it! — notice I said ALMOST!)

Look out! Michelin-woman coming through!

I’m super happy about winning — I’ve wanted to nab one of those FPA awards since I launched the Reality Chick column back in early 2006. And, I’m grateful as well … to the editors at the Pelican Press, Rachel Brown Hackney and Anne Johnson, who are the ones responsible for entering me into the FPA contest in the first place. And speaking of the Pelican Press — I heard the paper won something like seven or eight OTHER awards from the Florida Press Association. So kudos all ’round to the editors and writers at that paper.

The FPA gives awards at four levels, I think. First, Second, Third, and Honorable Mention. I won’t know until July, I think, what actual PLACE the column won, but heck, it’s already been announced on their site, and I’m happy with any place whatsoever!

Now, um, where the HECK did I put my sneakers?!