Hi! Happy Spring! Hope you are doing well today. Are you enjoying the new Shakira and Beyoncé albums?

This weekend I’m on backup for our hospitalist group, so Weekend Mom might…go to work? Or not? Only time will tell! Hopefully we will squeeze in a few more episodes of The Artful Dodger, which is a show that I was served up on Disney. I thought it was a kids show initially (because of the Disney connection?), looked it up on the Common Sense Media website where they said it was for ages 14+. We joke that we always subtract 7 years from the Common Sense recommended age, so we started it, but it probably is a little advanced for my 3rd grader. Nonetheless, my 8 and 12 year olds are enjoying it, despite the surgical gore. Lots of fun old-fashioned medicine—ether, weird-looking stethoscopes, sailors with STDs. I don’t like most medical shows, but this one has the sensibility of Shakespeare in Love.

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Today I have the first EVER Weekend Mom Q&A!! Hopefully there will be MANY more, because this was so fun. Jo Piazza is an author (and mom of 3) in Philadelphia, and I have loved her work (books, articles) for the longest time. She also makes some really compelling podcasts (Under the Influence with Jo Piazza is great!). Her newest book, The Sicilian Inheritance, comes out Tuesday, April 2. It was a treat to email with her! Hope you enjoy this Q&A.

Weekend Mom Q&A

1. When I started making Weekend Mom comics I was new to NYC (read: lonely and overwhelmed) and didn't know many people, so my weekend activities were little things that I was looking forward to (downloading a new podcast, buying the 'good' bread). What are the little things you look forward to on the weekends?

JP: Farmers market flowers, lighting the expensive candle (but not too long bc that shit is expensive), turning off social media for as long as I can.

2. Do you have a Weekend Mom uniform?

JP: I'm a jeans and a t-shirt mom. I've got some mom jeans and a cool concert t-shirt and a chunky sweater. I sort of dress the same way I did when I was 18 and I'm OK with that. I got three t shirts at the Madonna concert I recently went to and I real like a bad ass.  

3. I think the first book of yours that I read was Fitness Junkie! I loved it! So hilarious and it arrived right at the peak of the elite workout class craze! Did you do any exercise class research for that book? What's your favorite exercise regime now? 

JP: Oh my god I did so much weird research for that book. I did all the juice cleanses and Taryn Toomey's The Class and  Bikini Bootcamp in Tulum. I thought that book was a satire when I wrote it but so much of the fitness and wellness weirdness has become commonplace now. 

4. You've published so many great podcasts (Under the Influence, Committed). What are your must-listen podcasts?

JP: I am a Nora McInerney Terrible Thanks for Asking freak and of course Death, Sex and Money and A Thing or Two with Claire and Erica. I have listened to every single old Radio Lab and Invisibilia. 

5. Have you made any new mom friends since you had kids? What has surprised you about these friendships? How have your old friendships changed?

JP: So when I moved to San Francisco I had no friends of my own. I moved there right after I married my husband and we traveled a ton for the first year and then I was pregnant. And as soon as the baby was born I was craving connection. I would literally walk down the street and see other moms with babies my age and say "do you like sausage and beer because we have a firepit and there will be sausage and beer there on Fridays and I'd love to have you." I'm still friends with the ones who said yes today. In fact I am going to see three of them in Cleveland next weekend for the solar eclipse.  

I have made mom friends. I have made mom friendships that have stuck for years and mom friendships that were for a season when we had kids of a certain age and I think that is OK to recognize. Sometimes you make the friends you need when you need them and they might not be forever because we all evolve and our lives evolve, but that doesn't make them any less special or meaningful. 

6. What do you most frequently eat for dinner?

JP: So much pasta. And not even interesting pasta. Noodles and sauce, noodles and sauce. It's easy and everyone eats it. 

7. I think I saw on your Instagram that you took all three of your small kids to Italy last summer. Do you have any hacks that saved you? 

JP: We rented a Stokke Jet Kids thingy for the plane. It is like a suitcase they can ride on through the airport and then it pops up to turn into a toddler bed on the plane and it was a lifesaver for sleep and mobility. When we travel with them we check all our expectations and old ways of traveling at the door. Nick and I are big travelers and we always want to go, go, go and when we travel with the kids we are like "we will do one thing a day" and that will be an effing win. One museum, one long walk, one activity. And then we just do the same things we do at home....we find playgrounds and grocery stores to wander around and pools.

8. Have you solved the murder mystery you were working on?!?!?!

JP: Oh my gosh I can't give you any spoilers, but I can tell you that during the first trip I went on last summer we found our first real bombshell. And I wasn't expecting it at all. A part of me thought this crazy story had been passed down in my family for a hundred years and it was all made up. My family loves telling stories and they LOVE embellishing stories. But during that first trip we were in the records office and suddenly we found this old document that totally blew us away. And then it took about a year to get access to homicide and old mafia records for the region so I flew over again about two weeks ago and those were so insane!!!

Thank you Jo! Can’t wait to read The Sicilian Inheritance!

I’m looking forward to doing more of these Q&A’s and I have a few Weekend Moms in mind! But if you have any recs, please let me know! Have a lovely weekend!🌷