What's this?

Why, hello there! It's so nice of you to stop by. My name is Anna-Maria. I am married to a very patient man named Jim. We are the parents of Eliza, who we think is the cutest baby ever. We also have two cats, Barney and Moe. They are named after the Simpsons and their names are strangely apt.

Some basic facts about us: I am 33. Jim is 38. Eliza is 1. Barney and Moe are 3-ish.

I publicity direct, I write, and I edit.I cook Belgian food, garden haphazardly and have been known to schedule vacations around concerts. Someday I will write the amazing true story of how Bono owes me a kidney.

We live in Holyoke, in western Massachusetts, in a city known for having an astronomically high teen pregnancy rate, bad schools, and a history of gang activity and arson. This is why we could afford our house. It is worth noting that since our move here, none of our stuff has been torched or stolen (in spite of the fact that we once left our front door standing open for 3 hours while we were away), we have not been offered any drugs, and, in fact, the homicide rate is higher in the bucolic liberal hippie-ville to the north of us.

We remain concerned about the teen pregnancy thing, as we don't want our gorgeous little Einstein giving us any grandkids too early, but we're thinking the burka will take care of that. Also, if she learns social interaction from me, she will never ever get a date. So, good times, there.

I started this blog over on Friendster with an overly cutesy title. Also, I realized that explaining it would dredge up unpleasant behavior on my part (see cluelessness above) and some other people, and while I have no problem humiliating myself, I learned from dooce that you should never write anything on these things that you wouldn't say to the person you're writing about. Also, the title had nothing to do with my main topic, that being Eliza. And I was getting porny email.

So I had paid for this domain space for a site for a women's group I was going to found and run with a friend while we were pregnant/new moms. Ha. And Ha! again. Maybe later.

Meanwhile, I had blown $95, and I figured that I'd better do something, and hey, here's my website about my kid, my husband, my cats, my home, etc.

If you would like to email me, you can do so at elizasmo_at_elizasmom.com.