Fun with Bullet Points

• Megan the Barbarian

This morning Andrew and I went to the gym and I totally destroyed him. He did my workout, from the warm up to the weightlifting to the stretching. And now, eight hours later, every muscle in his body is sore. And I just feel good. It’s good to know I’m making progress.

• Best Weekend Ever

Two of my best friends were in town this weekend and I got to spend some good best-friend time with both. I made dinner and went for a walk with Christy on Thursday, then went out for coffee with her on Saturday. Then I went shopping with Molly this afternoon. I just love seeing old friends. Though I have a lot of girlfriends in Kansas City, I sometimes feel like I’m missing those really close relationships, so it was so nice to see these girls.

• Not Ready for Monday

I had an exceptionally awful week at work last week. Really, it was more of just one exceptionally awful incident. I won’t get into it, but I just wish I had another couple of days of weekend before I have to go back and deal with things at work. Unfortunately, the publishing schedule doesn’t stop and we’re way behind as it is.

• WTF??

I was at Dean & Deluca today with Molly, getting some coffee and pretending to be rich, and I saw champagne and wine-flavored sorbets. With 5 percent alcohol content. Who has ever heard of alcoholic sorbet? These must be delicious! Can anyone vouch for that?

A Wedding in St. Louis

This weekend I was in St. Louis for the wedding of our good friends Mike and Erin. Remember them? They came to visit us a couple months ago and brought their tiny dog? Anyway, aside from the HORRIBLE road construction (entire highways! closed!) and resulting traffic, we had a lovely time. It didn’t rain for the outdoor ceremony and Andrew and I rocked it out at the karaoke reception. (What did you say? Oh, “I’ve Had the Time of My Life,” from Dirty Dancing, thanks for asking.) Plus, it was really fun hanging out with all our old college friends that we don’t see too often.

Erika and I were given the job of arranging the cupcakes on the cupcake table. In the few days leading up to the wedding, Erin, the bride, repeated over and over that this was the most important job. Then she would say that she was just kidding. But she totally was not kidding. She had typed up, detailed instructions and a diagram to follow. And since I was a bride not all that long ago, I took her instructions seriously, because I wouldn’t have wanted someone to screw up my wedding (even though some of you are thinking, “But they’re just cupcakes.” Oh no, my friend, in a wedding, nothing is just cupcakes). And the bride loved the display. She told me three times at the reception how great it looked and how it was just what she wanted. So I just want to put it out there, that next time I arrange the bridal dessert, I’m charging for it. $1 per cupcake.

While we were in St. Louis, we visited a fun, contemporary, affordable furniture store that Mike and Erin recommended. And we bought a couch and two chairs for our living room. They will arrive in 6-8 weeks. Crazy. We are never that impulsive. But now that we bought some pretty new furniture, we have a deadline for getting the following completed: remove decorative beams, scrape and paint entire first floor ceiling, remove old baseboards and trim, paint and install new trim, sand textured walls and paint, remove old mantel and build new one, remove ceiling fan, add more recessed lighting, and relocate my sanity. Fortunately, we have Mark and Stan. If you don’t have your own Mark and Stan, I recommend you get them. They’re good at housey stuff.

Speaking of houses, I would rather stay home than go to the St. Louis Comfort Inn & Conference Center. Yes, bad transition. But I want to give them a scathing review, because they were terrible. When we checked in, we were told we were lucky to get a room, despite having reserved one ahead of time, because they overbook the hotel. Then, we couldn’t get our door open. Assuming it was deadbolted, we went back to the front desk to make sure no one was in that room. The front desk person came up to the room, and shoved into the door until it opened. The entire weekend I never was able to get the door open. Andrew had to do it every time. Their parking lot didn’t have enough spaces, so we had to park in the grass way in the back. They didn’t change the empty toilet paper roll or replace the empty tissue box. They took dirty towels but didn’t give us clean ones. Overall, that hotel was a mess and I do not recommend it.

I didn’t really take any pictures the entire weekend because Erika was there. Erika is a talented photographer with a much better camera. To see all the fun we had, check out her photo blog. If the wedding pics aren’t up yet, check back. She’ll get them up soon, I’m sure.

Bullet-point Monday

Because I am not up to the task of writing a cohesive narrative, I give you the ever-popular bulleted list.

• I joined Facebook and so far, I just don’t get it. A couple of people that I barely know (and never really knew) have added me as a friend. Why? What do we have to catch up on, exactly? But it’s early yet, so I’ll give it time. Maybe I just haven’t figured it out. I’m kind of slow like that.
• We’re going to a wedding this weekend. A wedding in which Andrew is a groomsman. And yesterday, Andrew wrapped a gift for the happy couple. And picked out a card. And wrote the message in the card (And, by the way, he did not just slap a few words of congratulations down and call it a day, he actually typed the message out beforehand to be sure it said what he wanted it to say. And had me check over it in my editorly fashion.). And then wrote it out all nice and neat in the card. Aren’t you so impressed with his forethought and careful deliberation? I am.
• It has come to my attention that my pea-brained cats have not been using the Cat Genie. All I have to say about this is “ew.”
• Began carpool #2 this morning. Here’s hoping this one works out better than the last.
• My cute-yet-still-appropriate-for-work Bermuda shorts fit again! And are even a little large! I bought these just over a year ago, sometime before my wedding, when I was working out all the damn time. Then, I got married, promptly quit working out, and began eating a lot of leftover wedding pastries. Word to the wise, don’t try this at home. I gained about 15 pounds in a matter of a few short months. But as you may recall, I began going to a personal trainer back in January (or was it February? It’s not like I have archives to help me remember these things. OH WAIT.) and have begun a regular exercise regimen AND IT IS FINALLY MAKING SOME SORT OF DIFFERENCE.

And that is all I have to say today.

Happy Father’s Day, Dad

The other day Andrew saw a magazine headline that said “Look out, Mariah. Leona Lewis is pop's next megastar.” (And yeah, I looked that up to remember the headline. And then I put the cover here. Why? Don't know.)

So Andrew and I were discussing this. Can someone who has had exactly one hit to her name really become bigger than Mariah overnight? Even the fact that the magazine didn’t have to give Mariah’s last name and had to use Leona’s full name ought to mean something. I know this blog has a handful of readers of the over-40 set (Hi Aunt Loretta!) who probably don’t even know who Leona Lewis is.

ANYWAY. I’m getting off-track. And what else is new, you ask. Cough. So I was thinking about this comparison between Mariah Carey and Leona Lewis and I thought that my dad probably even knows who Mariah Carey is, but certainly has never heard of Leona. But then, maybe he isn’t familiar with Mariah. And I thought, how interesting, that someone could just go through life unaware of this huge deal in pop culture. I’m not saying he should be a fan and know all the words to “Touch My Body” or anything. But to have never even heard of her. Huh.

But to really get to my point. I am starting to wonder if I am missing out on a huge deal in pop culture. I’m not on Facebook. I just never wanted to. But mounting pressures to get with it already and the fact that Andrew just signed up and I’m not on there for him to link to my profile on his relationship status page thing have got me thinking. Maybe I should sign up. What am I missing out on? What pop culture references are going right over my head? Lots? I think yes. So lest I become my father, I’ll sign up. Also, I want to play Scrabulous.

A letter

Dear A-Hole Neighbor,

I’m sorry you are feeling old, but would you please park your midlife-crisis red corvette before getting your mail? You live ten feet from the mailbox. Would it kill you to pull into your driveway and then walk to the mailbox, instead of leaving your (extremely loud) engine running while you stand there and sort through the latest issues of AARP and Bassmaster Magazine? Also, get off your damn cell phone. I can hear you from all the way over here.

Sincerely,
Megan

All I Wanted Was Some Freaking Pancakes

5:38pm – Waiting at work for third member of the carpool to show up so we can go home. FINALLY. Wonder why I am still carpooling because I would prefer to leave right at 5:00.

5:40 – Third carpooler shows up ten minutes late; we head to car.

5:50 – Discussion of what we will eat for dinner. Realize that I am Very Very Hungry.

5:52 – Discussion switches to the carpooling schedule for next week. I quit the carpool group.

6:20 – Still in car. Still hungry. Thinking about blueberry pancakes for dinner and whether I would need to go buy milk for this.

6:29 – Finally arrive home. Almost time for dinner!

6:30 – Drat. Andrew’s not home yet. Will snack on chips until he gets home and we can eat dinner.

6:40 – Still no Andrew. Put chips away.

6:48 – Call Andrew. No answer. Figure he’s driving home and the phone is in his pocket and he can’t get to it. He’ll call me back soon, I think. Leave annoying message akin to “Annnndrewwwww, I’m huuuuunnngry, come home so we can eeeeeeeeeeat.”

6:56 – Call Andrew at work. Get mad just thinking that he might still be at work. No answer. Still hungry. Decide Andrew went to the gym without me and grrr, because I thought we were going to go the gym together later.

6:57 – Microwave leftover slice of pizza. Figure I can still eat real dinner when he gets home.

8:20 – Still have not heard from Andrew. Starting to get worried. Is he in a ditch somewhere? Couldn’t possibly have gone to the gym. Not the work-out-for-two-hours kind of person. Try calling again. Still no answer.

8:21 – Call Andrew’s mother. Yes. Really. She has not heard from him, but reassures me that if he was hurt, someone would have called me.

8:21:30 – The thought that he might be in class finally occurs to me. Why did I not think of this earlier? He just started a new session of classes and I forgot that he was in class two nights a week instead of just one. So that is where he is. Feel better knowing he is not in a ditch.

8:25 – Call Andrew. Again. This time to leave a message explaining that I figured out where he was. Oh, and sorry about all those messages.

8:26 – Microwave another slice of pizza. Wish I was eating blueberry pancakes. So much for going to the gym.

10:10 – Andrew gets home. I give him a big hug because thank goodness he is not in a ditch.

10:11 – Find out Andrew did not listen to any of the messages.

It must be love

I give you an actual posting I saw on the want ads at work. I only wish I had the kind of love this person has. Also the spelling and grammar skills.

Would like to have my demin looney tunes jacket back. Was on coat rack by the EDO desk clerks office. Please return back to rack would GREATLY BE APPRECIATED, boyfriend bought if me on valentines day!!!