A married couple reflects on Spotify’s Canadian 90s playlist

Drinking in L.A. – Bran Van 3000

N: Great song choice!

M: It’s a Spotify playlist!

It’s All Coming Back to Me Now by Celine Dion 

N: This is…a startling contrast to Bran Van 3000 

M: Has this song always had so much…jingle bell?

N: Have you seen the video? It’s all blowing-curtains-dead-motorcycle-boyfriend-lightning-strikes. Very dramatic 

M: I never realized this song was such a rock ballad 

N: It’s from Celine Dion’s “Meat Loaf period”

Note: Googling reveals that this song is SO Meat Loafy, and was so coveted by Meat Loaf himself, that the songwriter took Meat Loaf to court to prevent him from recording it!

O Siem by Susan Aglukark

N: In Grade 6, we had a music teacher who was an ex-Young Canadian. She made us all learn this song—with actions—and perform it in front of the Grade 7/8/9s 

Note: I later redeemed myself on that stage by performing a group dance routine to Limp Bizkit’s Rollin’ during the Grade 8 talent show 

When You’re Gone – Bryan Adams 

M: When are we going to hear a Sarah McLachlan song?

N: Surely there’s one on here. Which song do you think it will be?

M: Adia. It’s got to be Adia

N: My greatest blessing and curse in this life is that Adia is in my exact vocal range and I can sing it better than any other song

M: What is it even about?

N: Innocence?

M: [hums a few bars] 

N: Which professional sport would have a play called “The Adia”?

M: Soccer. Definitely soccer 

N: It’s when you think someone has fouled another player, but it turns out they are both innocent 

Squeeze Toy – Boomtang Boys

N and M: Why do I know all the words to this song?!

Spaceman – Bif Naked

N: (Says nothing, but privately remembers how she once saw Bif Naked and Moby in a teen magazine feature about vegan musicians and now, when either is mentioned, she can think nothing but flax pancakes, flax pancakes, flax pancakes)

M: My high school girlfriend was really into this song 

Wayne by Chantal Kreviazuk

M: I think this is the year of Chantal Kreviazuk

N: This year?

M: I bet she and Raine Maida have a nice life

N: Probably. Elder statesmen of CanCon

M: I would like to be the Raine Maida and Chantal Kreviazuk of our block

N: What would that even look like?  

M: Quiet confidence in what we’ve accomplished…and a sense of boldness for what comes next 

Toddler parenthood playlist

Let Her Cry – Hootie and the Blowfish

I Hear You Calling – Gob

We Will Rock You – Queen

Dirty Laundry – Don Henley

Dishes – Pulp

Crumbs – Cibo Matto

Spilled Milk Factory – Ugly Casanova

I Want to Hold Your Hand – The Beatles

I Never Sleep – Hot Little Rocket

2:45AM – Elliott Smith

5am (A Love Song) – Blue Rodeo

Puke + Cry – Dinosaur Jr.

Unwashed and Somewhat Slightly Dazed – David Bowie

Emotions – Brenda Lee

Attitude – Misfits

Change My Pants (I Don’t Wanna) – The Vandals

Naked, If I Want To – Cat Power

A-B-C – Hot Chip

Simon Says – Marnie Stern

With Arms Outstretched – Rilo Kiley

Lift Me Up – Moby

Down Is the New Up – Radiohead

I Don’t Always Know What You’re Saying – Ladyhawk

To Know Him Is to Love Him – Dolly Parton, Linda Ronstadt, and Emmylou Harris

Always Be My Baby – Mariah Carey

Outside, sitting still

My husband’s best friend once told me, “Nicole, you’re an indoor cat.” This was, perhaps, on our yearly Kananaskis camping excursion, as I applied my liquid leotard of SPF 50. Or it was, perhaps, on a winter trip to a rustic cabin, as I emerged from my sleeping-bag-pile/trauma-tolerance-cove to roast pizza pops on the wood stove.

All the outdoors appreciation in our family went to my sister. She is an outdoor guide. She knows how to identify a chanterelle and load a sea kayak. I once pulled a muscle while burning a CD. We have inverse relationships to nature. Every time she goes backcountry skiing, I lose a degree of my temperature tolerance.

There is one notable exception: I like walking. If the temperature was always between 18 and 21 degrees, I would probably walk indefinitely, until my hips gave out in front of a 7-Eleven somewhere, my iPod playing “Semi-Charmed Life” for the 200th time. Walking is great.

My husband is an outdoor cat. He loves to garden and hike. He’s had giardia. And, like him, many of our friends are outdoor cats. You know how psychopaths learn to mimic empathy so they can function in society? This is how I feel about hiking. “Yes, I too would like to meet at the JUTTING ROCK FORMATION and MOVE OUR FEET upon it! Did you bring the DELICIOUS ALMONDS?!” Hiking is not walking because there are too many hills. My husband once took me to hike Ha Ling Peak, a popular 90-minute incline in Canmore. I wept openly on the mountain face while eight-year-olds averted their eyes. Sometimes I feel like Cher Horowitz in a world full of Ron Swansons. God, I love the mall.

The thing is, now we exist in COVID-times. And the mall is open, but I probably shouldn’t hang out there. I miss my weekend walks through the mall. I miss the kiosk fellows who offered to straighten my hair. How are you, kiosk fellows? I’m sorry I never let you straighten my hair. I wish I was there, avoiding your gaze, drinking my latte in our air-conditioned womb.

In COVID-times, the safest way to visit people outside your cohort is to go on a walk/hike/bike ride, or to sit in their yard, six feet away from them. I don’t love to be outside, sitting still. The wind accosts my hair. The sun offends my husk. I’m not a monster; I can appreciate the pleasant views and bird-based sounds of the outdoors. But I can also feel all the neighbourhood’s spiders peeping at me from the grass, mapping their way from the ground to my mouth. (Feminist scholars call this “The Arachnid Gaze.”)

I miss my friends though, so I sit outdoors. Also, I have a child now. I never realized how much children need to be outdoors. My son isn’t allotted screentime yet, and even if he was, I don’t know that he’d choose to spend a +28 afternoon doing Sporcle quizzes and eating Whisps. He’s very into sticks. The finding of, the chewing of. Great to hold, painful to eat! (Also a shelved 90s slogan for Freezies). I take him to the park, because his joy is resplendent, but he once handed me a live beetle like it was a key to the city.

Even my son, a certified dirt-eater, seems to miss novel indoor environments. With the exception of our house (where we have spent ALL THE TIME these last five months), he hasn’t been seeing many walled spaces. When his grandparents joined our cohort in May, he was so excited to circumnavigate their living room. He romped around, awestruck by every drawer and vase. I think I saw him ask for their coffee table’s autograph.

I miss my friends’ living rooms. I miss sitting at Starbucks. I miss meandering, 40-minute perusals of my grocery store’s dried beef offerings. While watching TV, I marvel at the ease with which pre-COVID characters do unthinkable things. In Episode 2 of Modern Family, Phil Dunphy helps a locked-out neighbour into her house by hoisting himself through her bedroom window. I felt so stressed watching that. Like, “DUDE, YOU’RE GONNA GET COVID!! WHY NOT JUST HOIST YOURSELF RIGHT INTO A VENTILATOR?!”

But these are the breaks, for now. We are all outside, sitting still. We are waiting to go back indoors. And one day, in some bright future, we will go into our friends’ homes and use their bathrooms. It will be amazing. Some of them will have Charmin.

The nap-friendly neighbourhood

Hi there neighbours. You might have seen me around. I’m the haggard new mom who pushes her baby in a stroller for 3 hours a day. Maybe you’ve seen us and thought “Isn’t that nice — they’re enjoying the outdoors together!” Neighbours, you are wrong! I hate the outdoors. My baby hates the outdoors. We are both so tired and sweaty. But here we are, strolling back and forth across this shaded patch of sidewalk, because otherwise the baby won’t nap. 

To improve the length and quality of the baby’s naps, I have a few requests. I know these may be inconvenient, but please remember that it takes a village to raise a child. A VERY QUIET village that never shouts and owns only passive, voiceless dogs. 

Request 1: Please refrain from using car horns, weed whackers, and rotary saws as I walk by 

Request 2: If you are passing me as part of a pod of 12 bicycles, please only have the first person ring their bell, instead of all 12 of you ringing your bell and/or screaming “Howdy!” straight into the stroller as you pass

Request 3: Please point all sprinklers away from the sidewalk. Sprinklers being used to water 50-foot-tall mature spruces could even be turned off!

Request 4: Please smash all outdoor speakers, especially those playing CCR

Request 5: Please sign my petition to ban outdoor whistling

Request 6: Please ask your children not to laugh during daylight hours

Request 7: Please round up and re-home all neighbourhood magpies

Request 8: Please round up and re-home all neighbourhood motorcycles

Request 9: Please refrain from calling 911 (OR reprogram all sirens to play “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star”)

Request 10: Please reroute all airplanes 

Request 11: Please neutralize the wind 

Request 12: Please give me a back massage 

Convenient superpowers for new parents

For those who don’t know, I had a baby five months ago. He’s SO cute and SO charming and I’m very lucky to have him. Fuck, though, babies are hard work. One of my friends described parenthood as “being hit by a train,” and reader, that is apt. The parenthood train is made of love and powered by poop. Sometimes, in the wake of the collision, you will eat Tim Tams for dinner. You will not always be sure whether you’re awake or dreaming, but in both states, you’ll be singing “Wheels on the Bus.” One night, you’ll wake up so tired that you’ll mistake your husband for the baby and wonder how the baby crawled into bed beside you. And why he’s wearing a Japandroids t-shirt. 

I don’t subscribe to the belief that raising a baby is harder or more noble than anything else a person can possibly do. But it is quite taxing, and it would be nice if parents had the abilities below!

Telepathy — So you can instantly know that your baby will only sleep if you lift his legs at a 35-degree angle and sing “Dreams” by Fleetwood Mac over and over

Ability to instantly diagnose medical concerns — So you can determine whether the clear fluid in your baby’s ear is the result of undetected head trauma or recent urination into own ear

Telekinesis — So you can summon your phone or book from the coffee table and not have to spend two hours silently re-watching Clueless in your head/trying to name all the countries in the world/reflecting on all the dogs you’ve ever known/drawing a portrait of the baby on a reachable takeout menu because the baby is napping on your chest and you don’t want to wake him

Super strength — So you can swing your 16lb baby in his 10lb car seat (aerobically equivalent to dancing the waltz with a mini fridge)

Time travel — So you can go back to your pre-baby life and binge watch The Sopranos

Ability to function without sleep — Nuff said

Ability to function without food — Nuff said 

Cloaking device — So you can hide when a deer climbs your front steps and sees you breastfeeding (really happened — we made eye contact) 

A few alternatives

Recently, I reached my third trimester of pregnancy. For those unfamiliar, this is the “hard to put on socks” trimester. When I wear horizontal stripes, my stomach looks like a basketball in sailing attire. As a result, the number of unsolicited remarks about my body has increased ten-fold.

All pregnant women (as unique human beings!) will have their own comfort level re: touch and commentary. Some folks may even enjoy the actions/phrases below. Others, like me, will wish for restraint from strangers, but will give a free pass for close family and friends. When in doubt, ask permission. And take a moment to consider your motivations. Pregnant women are real people. Real, live people with half-baked aliens doing Zumba on their organs. Be kind.

Instead of saying “OH MY GAWD, you’re HUGE!”

Say nothing. Drive straight to the pet store. Look for the most pregnant gerbil you can find. In the absence of a pregnant gerbil, find a nice, healthy chinchilla. Lean close to this animal and tell it everything you think about its body. Describe its belly in poetic detail. Chant “Womb! Womb! Womb!” Wave your hands over the animal, air-tracing its various curves. Stay until security throws you out.

Instead of touching her belly

Touch your belly. You never quite mastered that “rub your belly and pat your head” thing, did you? Now is perfect the time. Practice while walking quietly backwards, away from the pregnant woman.

Instead of telling her how terrible her life will be the second she gives birth, and how birth will annihilate her body, and how she’s made a horrible mistake, and Jesus Christ, you would know, as a mother yourself, but at least her heart will be filled with love, I guess

Do some quiet journaling about the things in your life that have disappointed you.

Instead of staring at her belly for two full minutes, your mouth slightly ajar

Actually, keep doing this. Embrace the peculiar hypnosis that has made your jaw go slack. Focus extra hard on the belly button area; purr the word “outie” like a mantra. Before ascending to the astral plane, accept the pregnant woman’s suggestion that you should reach into your bag and give her all your cash and granola bars. Thanks!

Instead of saying “Someone’s ready to pop!”

“What are your thoughts on Buffy season 5?”

Thoughts on yogurt

As many of you know, I don’t like yogurt. I don’t hate it, exactly. I’ve eaten it occasionally throughout my adult life, and I remember enjoying drippy peach Yoplaits as a kid. But yogurt is not my top choice. I try not to think about yogurt. The more I think about yogurt, the angrier I get.

Everyone gets so worked up about yogurt. Yogurt people are more vigilant than CrossFit people. Every morning, yogurt people must have their specific and beloved goop. If they don’t eat their yogurt, they get testy and red-eyed. They begin preaching about active cultures as if alerting me to the existence of nebulas.

I understand that yogurt is a widely beloved food. I wish I could be a yogurt person. But every time I try to hop on the probiotic bandwagon, I keep hitting the same stumbling blocks.

1) Yogurt is a breakfast food

I don’t like breakfast. My ideal breakfast is a cup of hot water at 8am and then two dinners later on to make up the caloric deficit. I can’t eat yogurt as one of my double dinners because it’s too flimsy for evening. I hear that they try to market it as dessert (“Cherry Sno Cone” “Boston Creme”), but that is just laughable. Yogurt is ice cream’s understudy. It is a whisper of dessert. But not an erotic whisper made coyly over a candlelit meal. It’s the kind of whisper where you’re like, “I can’t hear you. Speak the fuck up.”

2) I don’t understand how to deal with the lid

Do you fold it? Do you lick it? Do you rinse it off? I resent the amount of yogurt that is transferred and lost to the lid. And why is the yogurt container uniquely formatted to hide its own content in unknowable grooves? You get three trouble-free bites and then it’s time to scrape the crannies. And of course, everyone in your office can hear you digging around for dairy, trying to get your money’s worth from that $1.50 cup of Liberte. I rarely feel so desperate as when I’m trying to finish a yogurt cup.

3) It makes everyone think and talk about poop

Socially speaking, yogurt is tied to digestion. It’s full of bacteria with names like “bowelus poopius.” Every Activia commercial is just a digestive anatomy lesson narrated by Jamie Lee Curtis. Much like prunes or beans, yogurt empowers rude people to make invasive comments about your body (“Someone’s gonna be regular this week!”). I feel like every time someone sees me eating yogurt, they’re given a 10-second glance into my intestines.

4) The texture is weird

What is yogurt, exactly? A solid? A liquid? An emulsion? Much like Jell-O, it puzzles and concerns me. I don’t understand how long I’m supposed to hold each bite in my mouth. Which is weird, because I’m not typically bothered by foods with peculiar textures. I love soup and mashed potatoes. I live for pizza pops, which are basically just an extra-thick paper towel wrapped around some mystery ooze. But yogurt…it’s strange, you guys.

5) Everyone wants me to love yogurt

I can’t tell you how many times yogurt has been sold to me as a miracle salve for all my problems. Sick to your stomach? Slurp down some gut-healing yogurt! Low on protein? Yogurt has 10 grams per serving! Cold all the time? Yogurt will hug your bones! There is something wafty and milk-poor about me, and for my whole adult life, everyone has been handing me yogurt cups like they’re trying to hook me up to an IV.

I’m pretty sure that yogurt, if eaten daily, will change your personality. It will make you rugged and athletic. Every time you eat a Greek yogurt, you get 1% better at soccer. Yogurt improves your balance and prevents you from rubbing up against dirty cars in your new white coat. Lick the lid! Lick the lid!

Yogurt is the lifestyle guru you’ve always been waiting for. It is not dessert and it is not a solid, but it is loved by the masses, and I can not escape it, no matter how hard I try.

So despite all my grievances, I have recently started eating yogurt every day for the following reasons:

• It is very portable
• I am pregnant
• I need more calcium

Food-safe recipes for pregnant women

Congratulations! Now that you’re pregnant, there are many rules and suggestions that friends, strangers, doctors, well-meaning retail cashiers, and the internet will be eager to apply to your life and body. If you are confident and logical, you may ignore some of these rules. If you’re a worrier—a natural-born paranoia machine who thinks you’re developing Guillain-Barré Syndrome every time your foot falls asleep—you will live by these rules as if to defy even one of them will instantly kill both you and your fetus. If that’s the case, this cookbook is for you!

If you do not already know, a pregnant woman is twenty times more likely to develop listeriosis than a non-pregnant person. Pregnancy suppresses the immune system to ensure your fetus isn’t rejected until well after it leaves the womb and starts inviting people to junior high dances. Pregnant women are also extra susceptible to E. coli, salmonella, toxoplasmosis, and This is Us. For all these reasons, caution is paramount.

When you’re pregnant, be sure to avoid soft cheese, undercooked meat and seafood, unwashed vegetables, deli meat, raw sprouts, joie de vivre, and sensory pleasure of any kind. This cookbook focuses on easy-to-find ingredients and stringent preparations that will probably not kill you or your growing child. Our recipes are not a labor of love, but a labor of impending labor. Enjoy!

Oven-roasted chicken breast

Ingredients:

• 1 package chicken breasts
• 1 tsp oregano
• 5 tbsp olive oil
• Salt and pepper to taste

Instructions:

• Slice the package open and dump the contents onto a baking sheet, being careful not to touch, smell, or make eye contact with the chicken
• Deposit the packaging promptly in the garbage
• Wash your hands, using your elbow to pump the soap
• Spray the chicken with oil
• Wonder whether the oil sprayer is now compromised. Put it in the dishwasher
• Wash your hands
• Sprinkle the chicken with oregano, salt, and pepper
• Put the chicken in the oven at 450 degrees
• Wash your hands
• Check the chicken after 40 minutes. Slice it open with a knife and fork. Find the meat white, but dangerously moist. Return it to the oven
• Wash your hands
• Put the knife and fork in the dishwasher
• Bleach the dishwasher handle
• Check the chicken after 60 minutes. Use a new knife and fork to slice it open. Find it firm, but full of criminal steam. Return it to the oven
• Put the knife and fork in the dishwasher
• Bleach the dishwasher handle again
• Wash your hands
• Check the chicken after 1.5 hours. Find that it is dried into submission and relays no hint of moisture or flavor. Take its temperature with a meat thermometer and discover that the thermometer doesn’t even read that high. The chicken is now done
• Become convinced that the chicken is a strange color
• Foist the chicken off on your partner
• Eat cereal for dinner

Cautionary eggs

Ingredients:

• Two eggs
• A free afternoon

Instructions:

• Put the eggs in a small pot of water and bring to a boil
• When the eggs have boiled 15 minutes, consider taking them out of the water. Decide against it
• Boil the eggs for an additional 30 minutes. Your house will now be very humid
• Peel the eggs and run them under hot water. Slice them open. The yolks should look gray and defeated
• Sprinkle a few drops of hot water onto each yolk, reinvigorating them
• Imagine yourself one day reinvigorated like these yolks
• Eat the eggs, pausing midway through to microwave them after worrying that they’re not quite gray enough
• Worry that you gave yourself listeriosis

Saltine-stuffed nightstand [best enjoyed within the first trimester]

 Ingredients:

• 2 sleeves of saltines
• 1 nightstand

Instructions:

• Place the saltines in the top drawer of your nightstand
• Eat at least three saltines every morning before getting out of bed
• Still end up dry heaving in the shower

Carrot sticks

Ingredients:

• 5 carrots
• Running water

Instructions:

• Wash the carrots under cool running water for 5 minutes per carrot
• Peel the carrots
• Wash the carrots for an additional five minutes after peeling
• Pause to Google “Toxoplasmosis”
• Assess yourself for symptoms of toxoplasmosis
• Decide to boil the carrots, just to be safe
• Boil the carrots for 15 minutes
• Dress the carrots with soy sauce
• Wonder whether soy sauce has secret alcohol content. Google “alcohol content of soy sauce.” Google “soy sauce pregnancy.” Phone the Motherisk helpline
• After Motherisk has assured you it’s okay to eat the carrots, put the carrots in the fridge
• Two days later, foist the carrots off on your partner

Ham and brie sandwich with alfalfa sprouts

Ingredients:

• 3 wedges double-cream brie
• 5 slices deli ham
• ¼ cup alfalfa sprouts
• 1 tbsp homemade mayonnaise
• 2 slices sandwich bread

Instructions:

• Go to sleep
• Eat the sandwich in your dreams

Screen time

My cat is obsessed with television. Maybe this sounds funny to you. And it kind of is. Here is a picture of Huey watching Friends:

And here is a picture of Huey two weeks later, still watching Friends:

This began as you might expect. My husband and I thought it would be funny to show Huey a bird video, because Huey loves birds. He gets so worked up watching the birdfeeder in our front window, crouched into himself like a squat glob of toothpaste. “Look at me,” he seems to be thinking. “I am dangerously fluffy. If I just sit here, looking like a toad, those birds will fall into my mouth.”

So one night, feeling bored and indulgent, we pulled up a bird video on YouTube. Huey was instantly hooked. He got super close and started making tiny, excited whines. He attacked the screen. He jumped and cat-shouted and made a general spectacle of himself.

Problem: After we turned off the video, he kept looking for the birds. He began batting at the laptop, darting around the back and attacking the Apple logo. When we took the laptop away, he scratched at the table beneath, still searching for his digital prey.

Problem: He never stopped searching.

Now, whenever we turn on Netflix, Huey runs over. I don’t know if he thinks the actors are birds, or if he thinks he’s hunting tiny humans, or if he just thinks “I am a thoughtless mass of instinct and reflex: stimuli, stimuli.” Whatever his motivation, he’s trying to be as close to the actors as possible, snugging his chest up by the number keys, not realizing that his excited breathing is pressing down the “esc” key over and over.

My husband asked our vet about this.

“Huh,” she said. “I’ve never really heard of that before. Maybe try waggling a toy in front of him while he’s watching?”

As you can expect, this worked about as well as someone chucking a Frisbee at me during a Veronica Mars marathon. Huey released three short meows, something between “You’re bothering me” and “I am actually a garburator.”

So, now we have this cat that’s obsessed with TV. And though it’s sort of sweet in a “So like us!” kind of way, it’s also somewhat unsettling in a “So like us…” kind of way.

Because we are now acutely aware of how much TV we watch. And I’m not talking about “Sunday evening Game of Thrones with popcorn and pals” TV-watching. I’m talking about “Half an episode of Roswell while I’m curling my hair” TV-watching. Huey is an uncanny reflection of our own habits.

You are two hours deep into TNG and you smell like cat food, this living mirror tells us.

We want our pets to be exempt from the banalities of human life. We want to see a dog wearing a bow tie, but not ironing a bow tie. Sometimes I see Huey unwinding in front of the TV after a long day of sleeping and I think  “Jesus Christ, is this what I look like to ghosts?”

Soon, I expect to see Huey paying bills online. Fumbling with the coffee maker. Absently flipping through Cosmo at the grocery store, searching for better ways to gnaw his belly hair.

It would be different, somehow, if he was watching the Criterion Collection. Or HBO. I guess I could start watching The Wire, so that Huey watches The Wire. Be the cat you wish to see in the world. But the very act of training my cat to watch HBO seems impossibly weird, less like an activity and more like an internet t-shirt.

My cat watches shows you’ve never heard of

For now, I’ve switched Huey over to RuPaul’s Drag Race. I think he’s rooting for Kim Chi. No spoilers though please. He’s not caught up.

Greetings from your Fitbit

My Fitbit has been talking to me.

Not aloud, or anything. But daily, in large digital letters. I’ll look down and the Fitbit will flash: HI NICOLE. Or: UCANDOIT. It is a strange, watchful companion. Like a kangaroo peeking from a pouch, it rides in my pants pocket, offering stilted commentary on my life.

I know this is normal. I’m not under the impression that this Fitbit has selected me, special me, to bless with conversation. “I was just counting her steps, you guys, and I could tell by her gait that she wanted to know me.” No. These messages are pre-programmed. Still, I have a hard time not taking them personally. My Fitbit is pushy and demanding. It’s like a tiny personal trainer who knows that I lie.

MOVE IT, NICOLE

PICK IT UP

When I see these messages, I feel grumpy and defensive. Like, screw you, wellness pellet; I just walked four laps around the living room while eating a sesame snap—what more do you want from me?

Then I think of that Roxane Gay tweet where she said: “I always say thank you to Alexa so that when the machines take over they know I’m nice.”

My Fitbit knows I’m not nice.

But it doesn’t seem to care, because a few weeks ago, I was sitting on the couch and the Fitbit made a neon entreaty.

HOLD ME

I stared down. Surely I hadn’t read it correctly. But later it flashed the same words again.

HOLD ME, NICOLE

Had the Fitbit progressed to personal demands? Did it actually want me to cradle it? That this occurred the day before Valentine’s Day only made it extra creepy. The singularity happened, you guys, and all the machines want is a date for Wednesday night.

Later that week, I picked up the Fitbit and it made another plea.

HUG ME

Then this morning, I saw another message.

LOVE YA

I don’t want to sound cocky here, but it really seems like this Fitbit has a crush on me. And now I feel cautious around it, sure that any day now I’ll wake up to a series of flashing messages.

SO, WHAT

ARE WE

DOING HERE

ANYWAYS,

NICOLE?

ARE WE LIKE

A COUPLE…

OR WHAT?

How do you let a Fitbit down easy? I don’t want to avoid my Fitbit–I rely on it to productively shame me. Maybe I’m just reading the situation incorrectly. Maybe the Fitbit is focused on total wellness, and somehow it’s decided that I’m lonely. That might be it. Maybe it has a built-in censor that dings if someone watches 10 Things I Hate About You more than once in a month.

Just in case, I will ask my husband to speak to it. “Hold this worried pellet,” I will say. “Hold it very gently, and tell it that I’m loved.”