Savannah is a 26-year-old woman who grew up believing that she was the reincarnation of her dead aunt Laura.

Hi Savannah! What are you doing right at this moment?

Hi! I'm lying in a hammock with my beagle.

What?? I am … very jealous. Let’s just get right into it. Do you remember ever not believing that you were your aunt Laura? Did anyone have to convince you, or did you always think it was true?

I always believed it. It was always, always a thing. It started when I was a newborn and my parents brought me to meet the family. When they handed me to my great-grandmother [...]

My brother Danny lost his virginity at age 25. To a call girl named Monique. Hired by our mother.

My mother didn’t bother asking Danny for his permission before engaging Monique’s services. She didn’t ask my father to condone the transaction. Nor was she troubled by social mores or laws against solicitation. She deserves a Mother of the Year Award.

There was a reason for my mother's taboo-busting parenting. Danny was born with a rare, incurable genetic disease that affects the development and function of the nervous system. The typical lifespan for children born with Familial Dysautonomia was then about five years. My mother rolled up her sleeves, strapped [...]

What would you do if a middle-aged man with a big white beard and a long white robe asked you to be his daughter? What if he had a magic touch that made you forget your name, and he smelled like a blend of rosemary and river mud and deep BO pheromones,* and he owned a successful vegetarian restaurant with the best salad dressing in all of Los Angeles? If anything, you would use protection and then shudder off the oxytocin rush. But if this were the ’70s, and you were a wandering hippie in search of a higher purpose, you might join him in his mansion in the hills [...]

1. Van Winkle married Laura Giaritta in 1997; they have two daughters, Dusti Rain (born 1998) and KeeLee Breeze (born 2000). Van Winkle is a Juggalo and a vegetarian.

2. Van Winkle's pet wallaroo, Bucky, and pet goat, Pancho, escaped from his Port St. Lucie, Florida home in November 2004. After wandering around local streets for over a week, the animals were caught and returned to Ice.

3. On February 27, 2009, Van Winkle performed as part of a joint performance with MC Hammer in Orem, Utah called "Hammer Pants And Ice," which featured 24 dancers and a full choir.

4. In 1993, Ice toured Eastern-Europe again and premiered songs off his upcoming [...]

Breakups and alcohol are inextricably linked, so here are some ideas to get you through your next one. I mean, if you’re going to be lying on the floor listening The Boatman’s Call and crying, you might as well drink something worthy of Nick Cave.

More often than raspberries, blueberries, gooseberries, or snozzberries, wine evokes a state of mind or type of person to me. I stick my nose in a glass of boring Merlot, the kind that's marketed to grocery stores and mid-tier hotel restaurants, and get a visceral image of this mean, small-minded office manager I worked for right after I graduated from college. I mutter, “I bet [...]

"… even housewarming gift." (With video.)

***

Highlights from the Zombie of Montclaire Moors Statue Customer Ratings & Review section:

"Everyone who passes by remarkes on the Zombie."

"Thanks, tax refund!"

"I ordered this for my husband's birthday and set it up as a surprise for him."

"We have had a lot of interesting comments about our GLEN … and he looks very handsome against the red wood chips in the garden."

"Got it to scare the grandkids. And it did. The kids stay clear of it."

"For the holiday season, he is now sporting a jaunty Santa hat!"

Marc Escañuelas is currently traveling around the world. 

Edith Zimmerman: Marc, you are traveling around the world alone for 500 days. What! How did you get into this incredible situation?

Marc Escañuelas: I got on a plane! A Taiwanese plane that was mostly empty so I got a whole row to myself. In all seriousness, nothing about this trip was planned. I've been traveling on and off for several years but never longer than a few months. I turned 30 at the end of 2011 and just felt kinda stuck and decided I needed/wanted a reboot.

What did you leave behind?

Pretty much everything including my connection to reality. [...]

Ah, Spring. Tulips pushing out of damp mulch, the first, furtive glimpses of bare shoulders, and, on the East Coast, cicadas crawling out of the ground to destroy your sanity. A time of fecundity, when your thoughts turn to your next sweaty makeout session. Or, in our climate-changed world, a time of wildly swinging temperatures, high winds, and freak snowstorms. Either way, crushes are an excellent distraction. Here are some wines to drink with said distractions — or while thinking of them. Because sometimes the thinking is the best part…

The Cute Barista – How do their hairstyles come to exist? Do really cool people all just cut one another’s [...]

SE: Should we start by acknowledging our reluctance, perhaps? Or maybe by confessing our embarrassments?

AHP: Yes, I think we can begin by situating her, more than perhaps any other, as a Lilith Fair performer who was so much of that time and moment that she’s completely, wholly out of fashion now. She’s not your mom’s well-loved cardigan that’s now just vintage and refined; she’s the embarrassing Gap overalls.

SE: Oh my god. She has all these albums I’ve never even heard of and don’t especially want to listen to, even for the purposes of our art. But she is nonetheless a crucial figure, because she was positioned as the [...]

The following are a sampling of the daily conversations I have with the group of 80-year-old men who smoke cigarettes and drink coffee every morning on the corner of my block. It took me two years and the acquisition of a dog to infiltrate their clique.

Tom: Do you have one of those phones that can take pictures? Me: Yes! Tom: Take our picture. (Gestures to himself and another Greek gentleman who only hangs out occasionally.) Me: Okay!  (I take the photo.) Tom: Now, can you send that to my computer? Me: Sure. Tom: From your phone? Me: Yes. Do you know your e-mail address? Tom: I don’t know what [...]

HOW TO PLAY GOOD BOYFRIEND, BAD BOYFRIEND

PHASE ONE

Good Boyfriend/Bad Boyfriend is a fun new game I invented today that can provide you with hours of amusement — hours that would otherwise be spent doing dumb crud like work or socializing. There are two obvious facts you need to know in order to play:

1. In romantic comedies, the female protagonist often starts out with a BF who's a grade-A bozo and who eventually leaves him for a man who is hotter/cooler/purer of heart.

2. Some male actors have been in more than one movie over the course of their careers.

These facts lead us to the [...]

Part ONE: Radiohead

hurt feelings : listening pleasure = 2 : 10

I remember the precise moment I decided I would lose my virginity to someone I did not love. It was a warm early summer day when I walked the 10 minutes down sleepy suburban streets to my friend Jenny’s house, let myself in the front door, and tapped lightly on the closed door to her bedroom. The muffled cries I heard in the hallway resolved themselves on the other side of the door into Jenny, pajama-clad, fetal, sobbing on her plush carpeted floor.

Jenny’s house was not only a refuge from the tumult of [...]

Bette is a 32-year-old woman who lives in London and works in finance. 

Jia: Hi Bette! How are you?

Bette: Hi! I’m good. I’ve been thinking about this interview all week like, “Hmm, should I put in loads of fake narrative to keep my friends from finding out that it’s me?” And then I came to the conclusion that it wouldn’t be a big deal even if they did find out. So I’m feeling a bit more freed up!

So your friends don’t know you’re a virgin? 

No, they don’t. And objectively, at my great age — I mean, I’m ancient – I know that it really means so little. It [...]