It's Hard to Make the Good Things Last

I feel like looking at beach scenes. How about you? Here is a picture of someone's dog all running and spazzy on the beach.

Hey, whaddaya know? It's another three day weekend. This one supposedly commemorates the end of Summer - hence the frolicking beach photos.

What are my plans, you ask? Well, let me lay them on you. This weekend could be really, really great, or really, really bad or just really, really weird, depending on how things pan out. Either way, there should be at least a few "reallys" in there somewhere. Friday is the first home football game at my daughters' high school. They will both attend, but right now, I have no plans. I have a couple of movies to watch, so I might just stay home and allow myself to be entertained.

Saturday I have a"girls' night in" to attend. A couple of my friends have had really rough Summers, so we're just going to hang out in my friend J.'s backyard and eat food and drink cold beverages and get louder and more animated as the evening progresses.

Here is a picture of a fisherman showing me his catch.

Sunday is the day where all the really's come into play. A couple of weeks ago, Mr. B. asked if he could come and visit me the Sunday of Labor Day weekend. It was hard to know how to respond, because he hasn't had the best track record, but after our talk in July, he had been a million times better. He was responding to texts and calling me every Friday night, and so I figured why not. Why not see what happens, after all, Mr. B. is the one guy I've met in forever that I have that thing with. You know that thing that you can't really explain, but you definitely know when it's not there when you meet people. It's not just a physical thing, it's like I wrote when I first met him in Fort Madison in this post here. You feel like you finally met a fellow alien from the same planet. So, I decided it was worth hanging out with him again and finding out if that's all still there after not seeing him for ten months.

Here is a picture of me and Stinky all running and spazzy on the beach.

As it got closer to Labor Day, I wondered if it would really happen. He didn't call me last Friday and by last night when I hadn't heard from him, I was ready to write him off. Then today about five minutes before lunch, I got a call from him. I couldn't answer it, and then he sent me a text that read, "still on 4 sunday?" I went outside and called him back. As usual, we had a great talk. We made plans and talked about what and how we were going to do things. I have the girls that night, but they'll be at our neighborhood block party for most of the evening. So, I think Mr. B. and I will get something to eat and then go for a beer somewhere. Since he lives an hour away, he'll spend the night in my room and I'll sleep on the futon couch in the living room - like any of my friends who stay with me would.

Now all that's left to do, is wait and see if it really happens. He said the only thing that would keep him away, would be if his ex-wife decided not to take her son when she was supposed to. Having my own unreliable ex, I know how that goes. He's going to call me on Saturday night after he drops his son off to let me know how it went. So, anyway. By Sunday evening, I'll know for sure which of the really, really's I'll be dealing with.

How about you all? Are you expecting your long weekend to be really, really something, and if so what?

I Can't Do It Anymore and I'm Not Satisfied

At some point in the trip, each of the girls took a headless picture of me. I'm not quite sure what it means. Here's the one that Stinky shot of me after I lost my head at the beach...

So, tonight I was going to tell you about the demise of the thing with that one guy, right? Okay. Here goes:

You know how when you're driving for twelve hours you have lots and lots of time to think? Well, when I had all that time, I did some reevaluating and just thought that it was weird how the wedding date guy never really asked me any questions or wanted to find out much about me. I asked him a lot of questions about himself, but he never seemed to reciprocate. It all starts with a physical attraction, but it also ends pretty damn quick if that's all it is. So, I was thinking about letting it go anyway.

At one point we had talked about him coming to see me when I got back. So, I thought I'd text him to let him know I was home and see how it all panned out - you know, just to give it one last chance. I didn't hear back from him for a couple of days, and I figured he wasn't going to make it and that was fine. My girlcrush told me she was going to be in town anyway and I still had tons of unpacking and cleaning to do. Plus, I desperately needed some time alone.

Then on Friday evening, he texted me. I'm pretty sure he went drinking after work. He said he couldn't remember what weekend he was supposed to come down. I told him it was this weekend, but it was actually better that he forgot. Then he said he wanted to come up on Saturday anyway. I really didn't want him to, but he persisted. It turned out that my girls were going to be out of town, and I thought it might be a good time to see if there was anything to salvage, so I agreed. It just meant that I was going to have to get a hell of a lot of shit done before he got here. So, instead of seeing my friends, I stayed home and cleaned and tried to get ready for his visit.

At 10:30 the next morning I got this weird, vague text that said "due to a prior commitment" he had to cancel. What? First of all, I think a cancellation deserves a phone call, and a real explanation. Second of all, who badgers someone about coming to visit them and doesn't remember they had something going on until the next morning? He said he was sorry and it made him so sad that he couldn't make it and blah and blah and wank, wank, wank. It was really the excuse I needed. If I was waiting to see how things went, I guess I just watched them go out the door. I wasn't really even sad about it. In my head it was over.

Tonight he texted me again to apologize and say he'd make it up to me. I told him I thought I deserved a phone call and a real explanation. He still didn't give me either of those and so I finally texted him back to say I couldn't do it anymore. It was weird to do that in a text, but it was pretty clear he wasn't into actually having to talk to me about it, so that's what I was left with. He seemed completely fine with just being friends. It was the easiest non-break-up I've ever had.

I know I'm always saying this too, but I'm a relationship girl, so this non-relationship stuff feels weird to me. The big problem, as I've found out, is that relationships are hard to come by, and so my only alternative is to go years without dating and I've been told by my friend Allison after that last four year dry spell that the monk thing isn't healthy either. Right now, I guess all I can do is keep being open and see what happens.

...And here's the one that Coadster took of me after I lost my head climbing rocks at King's Canyon.

Things between me and the wedding date guy seem totally cool. We agreed to be friends and we both said that our time together was great while it lasted. I'm sure it will feel a little weird the next time we see each other, but I'm also pretty sure we'll get over that quickly and be just fine.

Now, tomorrow I'll finally finish the roadtrip chronicles and then we can go back to our regularly scheduled programming of bullshit, bullshit and more bullshit. Sweet!

Little Things You Say and Do

So, here's the wedding date guy story:

He was at a party where he only knew his best friend and his best friend's girlfriend. He seemed kind of shy, so I tried to draw him out a bit. He was receptive, but still reserved. As the night wore on and he had more to drink, he was even more receptive and less reserved. He thought I was a fun party girl, but there probably wasn't much more to me than that. At one point he told me, "You are crazy, and that's really hot." An hour later he said, " I couldn't say no to anything you asked me." Really? How attractive is it when a guy tells you that? Extremely.

So, we had tons of chemistry, but that's all we knew about each other. Later when we talked when we were sober, we also had a lot of common interests. He admitted that originally his attraction was mostly physical, but after we had a real conversation, he was pleasantly surprised that I was not the person he thought I was. He asked how we were going to be able to have a relationship when we lived so far away from each other. I told him we probably weren't. If there was the hope of one of us moving closer to the other, that would be a different story. As things were, what I could give him was this: We could call and text whenever we wanted to, and whenever he came to town, I'd be happy to hang out with him. I figured that things would fizzle before we would have the chance to see each other. They didn't.

I invited him to be my date for that wedding in June. As I've already documented, we had a great time. He made plans to see me for the hippie music fest after that, and again we had a great time. At the beginning of that weekend, I felt the need to lay down some rules since this non-relationship was lasting longer than my last real relationship. "We should both feel free to do whatever we want when we aren't together in the same town, but I don't want to know anything about it, and I won't bother you with any of my details either. When either of us gets into a real relationship with someone else, then we need to tell the other one right away, and just be friends. Does that work?" He said, okay.

Before you go giving me shit about making too much about the distance thing, there are other factors to consider. He is several years younger than I am, (don't give me that look, if there was a datable man my age anywhere near this town, I'd be all over him) he wants a family eventually and I was done making babies in my twenties. The last thing I want, is for him to resent me for not being able to give him what he wants. If I accepted his offer for a relationship, he wouldn't be free to meet someone who might live closer to him, who wanted the same things he does.

The other thing is that we only know our weekend selves. He didn't even know I had curly hair until two weeks ago. He is more of a perfectionist, and my brain is messy and disorganized. Last time he was here, he even said that he doubted we'd still be dating each other if we lived in the same town and saw each other all the time. And since we'll never meet each other in real time, we won't ever know if it could work out.

So, now what we have is a fun, casual thing where we see each about one weekend a month. He's traveling this weekend, and I'm traveling the two weeks after that. We have a tentative plan to hang out the weekend I get back from California, but anything can happen in a month and my abandonment issues make me wonder whether I'll see him then or not. There were a couple of weeks last month where I didn't really hear from him, and it was hard to know if that meant he was over it, or if he was just busy. I finally texted him to check in and he texted right back to say that he was just busy, and he was very excited to see me again. I've never done this kinda, sorta relationship thing before. It's strange territory for me. In some ways it's hard to know what the rules and boundaries are. In others, it's really nice. I have tons of freedom and time and when we see each other, it's always fun and amazing. It's been good for me to learn how to let things go a little more and not take it all so seriously. And really, when you think about it, we are both conscientious people who genuinely care about and respect each other and have a lot of fun when we're together. What's not to like about any of that?

But There's No Stoppin' a Duck and His Beat

Okay. This will be another one of those, "Churlita went to St Louis, and all she brought you back was this crappy blog post" posts.

It's mostly photos, so you should like that.

So, yeah. Erik took me out for duck and we ate some duck. Weird.

We also had shrimp and walnuts and bbq ribs and some soup.

Here's me trying my first bite of duck. For some reason, my hand looks kind of deformed. Don't worry, I don't have rheumatoid arthritis. It's just the angle of the camera, or my hand, or something.

After we ate duck, Erik took me to two of his favorite St Louis bars. One was called CBGB's (no, not the one in NY) and the other one was the most visually stimulating bar in St Louis, called The Venice Cafe. A friend of Erik's who tends bar there, does all the mosaics. They are amazing and I have tons of different photos of them. Fair warning, you will be seeing plenty of mosaics in the next few blog posts.

Erik was a little too full after dinner to drink a lot of beer at first, so he had coffee. I swear to god, he didn't ask for this cup. They just took one look at him and served his coffee in it.

Here's me at what looks like a zoo, but if you expand the pic, you'll see it's really an exhibit of Simpsons figures, apparently in their natural habitat.

Here's me drinking a bucket of some kind of cocktail whose name escapes me now. You can see by all the straws, that there were plenty of people to help me drink it down.

Oh, say, like Erik, for instance.

And here we are toward the end of the night, taking photos of ourselves Stinky style.

Stay tuned tomorrow when I show you photos of the bathrooms at these bars. You know how I like to take photos of bathrooms...

Rockin' My Peers and Puttin' Suckas in Fear

Here is a horseshoe for good luck. I hope you all get lucky this weekend.

So, you'd think I'd be partying up a storm tonight now that my taxes are done, but there was that nap I really needed to take when I got home from work, and some taxiing kids around town duties. Then I had to go look for my credit card at Los Portales which was the last place I used it, only to find out they didn't have it and subsequently find it under my bed. Which, I'm sure, is the best place to put all your most important, valuable items. I also washed what felt like a hundred years worth of dishes and baked frosted sugar cookies for Coadster's last show choir performance tomorrow night. Now, who the fuck has energy to party? Apparently, not me.

This weekend, however, I may just try to make up for it. I have the show choir thingy tomorrow, but then I may meet some people for a couple beers somewhere. I don't want to get too stoopid, because I'm driving to St Louis to see Erik on Saturday and coming back on Sunday. Since it's such a quick trip, I couldn't coordinate driving up there with anyone else. I'll miss T.'s company, but I've got it all set-up for lone wolf driving. I added a few more songs to my St Louis road trip playlist. How the hell I didn't have Whodini's "Freaks Come Out at Night" on there already is beyond me, but trust me, that blundering error has now been rectified - that and LL Cool J.'s "Mama Said Knock You Out". There. Now I'm ready.

The trip to St Louis will be very brief, so we'll try to squeeze as much in as possible. We're going out for duck on Saturday night (shhh. Don't tell anyone. I've never had it before) and then Erik said he'd take me to the most visually stimulating (or was that, visually pleasing?) bar in St Louis. Sunday we were talking about finally getting dim sum and watching a few episodes of The Wire before I take off back to the Northern tundra.

What's on tap for all y'all?

Let Me Tell You How It Will Be

Oh, thank Jaysus , Mary and Joseph. My federal taxes are finally done. Barring any inputting errors made by me, (and I do happen to be an expert at inputting errors) I should get my refund next Friday sometime. If I made a stupid mistake or twenty, it could be the week after that. Either way, I'll have my dough before the end of the month.

Now, I'm so, so tired and I just want to go to bed. All I want right now is to think good, happy thoughts. Just in case you were wondering, these are what my good, happy thoughts look like:

Ahhhhh.
Ahhhhh.
And ahhhhh.

I feel so much better now.

Hold Your Glass Up, Hold It In

Stinky took this photo of me before we went out for dinner tonight. She didn't use a flash, so my skin is looking a little on the red side. Maybe I can stand next to all the orange people who have been fake tanning for Spring Break and we can try to make a rainbow.

Today was better in general. I got my car back, even though it cost me money I didn't really have. I don't drive all that much, but there are kids to cart around and groceries to get, so I really need my grocery getter.

While I was tooling around picking up Stinky, I missed a call from my friend Colleen. I called her right back and she said she was in Cedar Rapids visiting her mom in the hospital. She didn't want to impose, but she really needed to get out of the city of 5 smells and not eat hospital food and maybe get drunk. She wondered if it would be possible to hang out. I told her to come down and eat dinner with me and Stinky and I would be happy to get her drunk. I'm a really good friend that way.

We zipped back from the store, and since Colleen didn't want to make decisions, Stinky was the decider and said we should go to Micky's to eat. Colleen's been going through a lot lately, and she was a little disoriented, but that just meant I had more to tease her about. We ate and since she's a junior high counselor in an inner urban school in NYC, she got out of Stinky that she did poorly in a couple of her courses. Ooops. Stinky loves Colleen so much, that she couldn't even be mad at her. I'm sure she'll resent the hell out of me when she receives her negative reinforcement, though.

In the end, Colleen was really too out of it to drink. So, we called it a night and went home.

I'm sure you'll all be thrilled to know that I started my taxes tonight. I couldn't get very far, because I needed to get on the computer and Coadster was already on writing a paper. Hopefully, I'll have all tomorrow evening to get them done. As always, wish me luck.

I did get to have a long phone conversation with Erik tonight and that was great. He's been kind of busy the last couple of days, so it was good to even be on the phone with him, not really saying anything super deep.

And I'll Never Have That Recipe Again

Here is a picture of a tree on the lake where we stayed in Missouri for Valentine's day weekend. Have I mentioned that I'm a tree hugger?

Tonight you're all just getting a quickie. No foreplay, no sweet talk, no nuthin'.

Stinky helped me bake a yellow cake with chocolate fudge frosting. I couldn't find the pumpkin cheesecake bar recipe, so we'll all just have to suffer through with the cake. I think I can handle it.

The girls were off school today because yesterday was the end of the trimester. So, much of the cleaning I did yesterday had to be redone tonight. Stinky spent most of the day at the neighbor's house, but Coadster is grounded for another few days for reasons I won't disclose to you. She has totally accepted responsibility and even laughs when Stinky and I keep making the same joke where we ask her what she's doing tonight and then answer it ourselves with, "oh, nothing."

Okay. Here's where my lameness ends. I just ate some of the cake still warm from the oven. (you know - to make sure it wasn't poisoned or anything) I have to tidy a few things and then I must to bed. I want to be nice and rested for Erik's visit.

So, tomorrow after work looks like this: food, fun, friends, daughters, libations and Erik. What more could a girl ask for?

Doesn't Take Much to Make Me Happy

Well, kids. It's late and I have a lot to say (as usual) but not a lot of time. So, we'll see what I get done tonight. My weird funk fog lifted at some point after work. It was strange, because it was so sudden and dramatic, like I had been hypnotized and someone snapped their fingers and boom, I was back to being my normal optimistically goofy but acerbic self. I made a point to text Erik right away, because I figured he would want to know I lowered the freak flag and I was feeling much better. Of course, he called me immediately and was wonderful and encouraging and supportive and all of those things that I try never, ever to take for granted about him.

Which leads me to my next thing. Today was also our two month anniversary. We don't really count the three weeks of constant texting and calling before that as part of our relationship, because things don't become real until you get all up-close and personal. Don't get me wrong, I loved the prelude, but this is one of those rare times where the actual day-to-day, living stuff has even been better than the promise was. Which isn't to say, that the long distance thing hasn't been tough or that we don't have our own, very unique personality challenges. (Seein's how we both have very unique personalities) But as Erik pointed out tonight, it's been really great so far - both the ups and working through the downs.

Now, all I have to do is get ready for the weekend. Erik and his friend M. are driving up from St Louis on Friday night. It's been almost two weeks since I've seen him, so I'm more than jonesing. Tonight I've been nesting and cleaning and looking at cookbooks. Tomorrow night, I'll go shopping and bake the dessert. On Friday after work, I'll really start cooking. Since Erik and my friend K. have both been sick, I'm making two different kinds of soup (miso and carrot/cashew/ginger). In addition, I'll make a beef and veggie stir fry, rice, salad, and if I can find the recipe, these pumpkin cheese cake bars. Because of all the sick kids, I thought I also might break out the juicer and squeeze out some anti-oxidants.

Okay, I better git. I got my work cut out for me.

I'll Be Dancing With Myself

Hey guys and dolls. I'm happy to report that I remained migraineless all day today. I thought I was all clear sailing, but then this evening I found myself in kind of a mood. I don't know if it's the endless Winter, or that I have a bunch of stuff hanging over my head, or that the girls' dad is in a play at the university and I haven't had a night to myself in about a hundred million years, but I just all the sudden felt kind of irritable and needy. In case you've never seen it, trust me, it's a really unattractive combination.

Yes, I was lucky enough after my run to walk and gab with my friends K. and Bridget at the rec building, and I did appreciate that, but I came home and still felt kind of funky. Erik has been really sick the last couple of days, so I tried to restrain myself from bothering him, because I'm sure the last thing he needs is to appease a needy girlfriend on top of dealing with fever, chills, aches and a possible ear infection. So, I guess what I'm trying to say, is that I'm lame and I'm just going to relate a dorky anecdote from this weekend to you. Sorry, it's all I got.

On Saturday night during our little dance party, I was very safely and platonically (mostly clumsily twirling each other around really) dancing with one of the guys who play pool at the Dublin to Lionel Rithie's Easy Like Sunday Morning. There was another couple of chuckle heads dancing a little more closely, and so the guy I was dancing with pointed to them and said, "If I danced with you like those two are dancing, my girlfriend would get really mad."

"I know," I said. "That's why we're dancing so far apart and barely touching each other's hands. I doubt my boyfriend would like that very much either. And see?" I said pointing to the ceiling and this:*

"That's my boyfriend's picture in that deep sea diving helmet there. The guy looked surprised and weirded out and let go of my hand in mid-twirl. "Uh, I think I better go see if it's my turn to play pool now...." and wandered off.

*photo courtesy of Dexter

Nothing to Hide, Believe What I Say

Here's a picture that Erik took of me with open arms, or maybe I'm just trying to steady myself. You decide.

After yesterday's extremely mature butt post, I thought I'd change things up and talk about relationships. Mainly, my relationships. This weekend, someone told me that it made them a little uncomfortable to read about how strongly I felt about Erik on this here blog. They said they thought that by gushing so hard about how happy I was with Erik, I might kind of jinx our relationship. So, I figured I should just explore some of the things that were brought up in that conversation.

If you've read my blog even for a minute, you won't be surprised that I'm a very open person. Which isn't to say, that I talk about everything with you. As Erik pointed out when we addressed the subject this weekend, there are all kinds of things that you, dear readers, will never, ever know about my relationship with Erik. But, I was raised Southside Chicago Irish Catholic, and we generally aren't known for our stoicism. As I've said on previous posts, it's also very important for me to let people I'm close to know exactly how wonderful I think they are. Ask my daughters. They know without a doubt that I think they are the most amazing creatures I've ever met.

So, if I gush about Erik on my blog, it's way less than I do with him in person. If anything happened to me today, he would never have to wonder how I felt about him. Now, if that can somehow jinx my relationship, then it probably wasn't a very strong one to begin with.

That same friend said he was worried that I'd get hurt by being so openly happy with Erik. But I'm 42 not 22. I've been in several relationships before, that obviously all ended at some point, and I lived to tell about them. I guess I try not to look at break-ups as failures so much. Those other relationships weren't wasted time. I learned a lot from the people I've spent time with - both good and bad. In the few short months I've spent with Erik, I've already gained so much. On some levels, we are very different people, but we seem to fill in each others gaps. So, if things go sour between us, I will definitely be very sad. I really love Erik and I would miss a lot by not being with him. I'm also a strong person, and I've been single for many, many years. I do just fine on my own, thank you. And I hope that Erik and I would still be friends on some level no matter what happened between us.

I guess, what I'm trying to say, is that I can't help being who I am and who I am is an open person, and if I didn't tell people how much I cared for Erik, I can't imagine it would make me any less sad if things didn't work out between us. As Erik said when we first got together and were talking about working on having a healthy relationship, "All we can do is try." And, so I'll continue to be openly happy in my relationship and post all of the things I think are great about him on here. Just like I do with my friends and my family and my daughters. I don't know any other way.

My Baby Fits Me Like a Flesh Tuxedo

Sooooo, Erik ended up not going to New Orleans after all . The roads were horrible in St Louis, so he stayed there and is doing his damndest to have as much fun as possible to make up for not going. He's usually pretty good at finding fun.

I figured I'd actually do the Saturday Scavenger hunt thing on Saturday this week. Just don't start expecting it. The word this week is reason. Let's see what kind of crap I can dispense for this one:

So, you know how sometimes when you're a guy and you might be just a tad immature, but also funny so it's okay? And your girlfriend is shooting guns and bending over so she can rest her arms on something to steady her shot? You're standing with your guy friends and laughing at the view, so you decide to take a picture and show your girlfriend and laugh about it later?

Yeah, well. At some point later in the day, you end up bending over to straighten up stuffed animals that have been shot down, and figure out the reason, your girlfriend has been following you around with the camera all day.

I Saw the World Thrashing All Around Your Face

So, I'll try to get that video thingy up on YouTube maybe sometime this weekend when I have more time...If I have more time. This weekend I'll be in town and trying to do a million things. I want to get my taxes done, I have to choose my new vision insurance, and I've planned dates to see girl movie matinees with both of my daughters. Of course, there's also cleaning and recycling and I might even get crazy and try to run outside in all the muck the next two days. As far as I know, I have plans for both nights too. I'm supposed to meet girls for drinks on Friday and Saturday night will be fun girl dance party at the Dublin. I have no idea how I'll fit sleep in there, but I'd like to do some of that as well.

Erik will be in New Orleans with a friend this weekend. Of course, I'll miss him a lot, but he promised to text me videos of all the people and places he experiences. It's kind of how we're able to pull off this long distance thing. Which, I've already mentioned is pretty tough for me.

Erik has been very good at making it work - he's done this many times before, but it's all new to me. I've told him what I need is reassurance and he's been great at giving me that. He's also been wonderful at making me feel like I'm part of his life, no matter how many miles away we are. We watched the lunar eclipse together over our cell phones last night and he called me during every commercial break while the debates were on tonight, so we could compare notes. He's probably more attentive than most guys I've lived with.

We are both very gregarious people, to say the least and obsessive documenters to boot. As Erik likes to say, we can certainly work a room together. So, this weekend, we'll have to work our rooms by ourselves, and then just text each other the videos of it. I can't wait to see the world through him.

Open Up Your Mouth and Feed It

I'd like to think of me and Erik as being happy in general. There is one way to make us even happier though, and that is to feed us. We are HUGE food eaters. So, you don't have to even try to convert me, because I've already accepted food as my personal savior.

As you've probably already guessed, I'm milking my weekend trip for another blog post. Hey, cut me some slack. I don't get out much, so you may have to hear even more about it, until I go to the fun girl dance party that was postponed until this Saturday. Sometimes the weather actually works in my favor.

Okay, yeah. Whatever. The guy in the photo is Emilio and he made all of our food - very well. He never stopped smiling. Even on Sunday when the torrential rains washed all the roads out. We asked him if he was able to get his truck through it and he said, "No." But he had a huge grin on his face. How fucking awesome is that?

This photo is kind of hard to see, but Emilio made all the girls heart shaped pancakes for breakfast on Saturday morning. The boys were a little put out about only getting round ones, but we just told them to suck it up and deal with it. The important thing was, that he fried enough bacon for all of us.

Here is a photo of the peppers and onions he cut for fajitas for Saturday lunch. Emilio was so great that he made the fajitas with not only beef AND pork AND chicken...

...But tons of shrimp too. Just in case you were wondering, there were no vegetarian options. I don't suppose many vegetarians hang out at hunting and fishing lodges, do they?

The great thing about food, is that sometimes it is fruit and you can blend it up and mix it with vodka and put whip cream on it. Then after you've had a couple of those drinks, you think it's really funny to pretend to do one of those totally dork-ass "got milk" mustaches. Yeah, I just made you glad you weren't there, didn't I?

Bang Bang, I Shot You Down

So, today I waffled between talking about guns or food. They're both fun topics, but with the cold and the snow and the ice and the fact that Winter isn't even trying to pretend it's over, I decided to talk about guns. No, not my scrawny guns and you can just ignore that scary face I'm making too.

Let's just focus on these kinds of guns. As I mentioned, we shot us some guns this weekend. It's the only really appropriate Valentine's Day activity there is as far as I'm concerned...At least the only one you'd want to see photos of anyway. My friend R. knows his guns and is all about safety. In fact, he had us wait to drink anything fun, until we put our toys away.



R. has this great pheasant dog name Scuba. Scuba was very excited when the guns started going off and wanted to go retrieve our stuffed animal kill again and again and again and again. Erik was really good about playing that game with him.

Just imagine how cold and wet and gross that stuffed animal was after an hour.

As you can see, us ladies (and I do use that term loosely) were super into shooting off guns. We even used the shot gun, and all made hilarious faces after we felt that kick-back against our shoulders.


These were the hideous creatures we shot. Seriously, each and every one of them was scarier than a clown.

I think you'd all agree, they really did deserve to be shot. I finally picked this one off it's branch with one of my last shots. I honestly don't know when I've been prouder of myself.

And this photo really doesn't have anything to do with the post. I just wanted to post another gratuitous pic of Erik in his eighties cowboy outfit - this time holding pistols. I'm going to go ahead and assume you all wanted to see it too. And if not, all y'all can just humor me.

Dreams of You All Through My Head

This is gonna be a quick post. I'm still not even close to being ready and it's late. I thought I'd just put up a photo of what I'll be missing this weekend. It seems that there will be tons of fun girls down at the Dublin.

But don't cry for me Argentina. What I'll be doing, will be just as much fun, but in a different state. When I get back I'll post photos of all the fun things I did instead of the drunk girl dance party at the Dublin.

A Harbor in the Tempest

Doesn't it kind of look like cotton in those branches? Very cold, cold cotton.

So, by the time most of you read this it will be that day. I thought I'd shake things up and balance out yesterday's dolphins and rainbows post with a little reality. First, I'll link to my Valentines' Day post from last year, here. What a difference a year makes, huh?

Valentine's Day would have been my mom's 76th birthday and this year I will also turn the age my mom was when she died. When I was younger, I couldn't imagine making it to this age. All those years of living like I was going to die young, are mocking me now.

The other weird thing about this time of year, is that Stinky had meningitis on February 12th when she was five and I spent Valentine's Day that year in the hospital wondering what kind of shape she'd be in if she made it through. I was lucky that my friend T. worked in the hospital back then, and even though she didn't know me that well, she kept me company in Stinky's room after she got off work.

So, I can get a little squirrelly for a few days around this time of the year. Of course, because of Erik's efforts, this weekend should be pretty amazing. This week has been crazy hectic what with all my kid taxi cab duties and two choir concerts, two days in a row. Tomorrow night Stinky will have another movie night for her friends and Coadster and I have a stay at home date where we go in my room with tons of blankets and pillows and chocolate and watch a girl movie together. Then on Friday afternoon, I'm off to meet Erik and some friends and start boozin' and gun shootin' and all the other fun stuff one does in a town called Bourbon, Missouri.

So, for any of those of you who couldn't really get with yesterday's love fest, I'm asking you to allow me a bit of mushiness this pseudo holiday season - you know, just to make up for all those other years.

Demonstrating Love and Affection

Here is another snowy pic. On Monday the clocks were digitally reporting the temperature at one degree fahrenheit, but it looked like they were saying 1f, and it made me imagine all the possibilities.

So, today I thought I'd write a post in keeping with the impending holiday on Thursday. It's also kind of like what Gyuss is doing on his blog. He's been writing these amazing posts about different incidents that made him realize how much he loves his wife. You should all run along to his blog right now and read them. They are way more smart and funny than schmaltzy. I'm not sure if mine will compare, but I'll take a stab at it. I will now write about how Erik and I got together:

Okay. I first met Erik about ten years ago when he was dating my friend K. I had seen him around town here and there since then, but we had both kind of ruled each other out for whatever reasons.

Then this Fall Erik joined us at the Vine for football watching and wings and it was deep in the heart of Make-Out Quest and we all had a great time discussing one of our wonderful make-out quest experiences and the fact that I was totally lacking in make-out experiences. Then I wrote this post about that day. I didn't think much about it until one night when I was closing out of my computer, I thought I'd just check out my sitemeter and saw that someone had just googled, "Iowa City Santa Crawl" and then checked out where it got that person and found the comments Erik left on my blog. I was a little embarrassed that he saw me talking about the possibility of me making out with him to complete strangers, but when I called my friend K. with my concerns, she just said, "Are you kidding? It's Erik. He probably loved it." Apparently, she was right. Fringes comment in particular seemed to have planted a seed with him and he keeps saying how much he needs to thank her.

After some consideration and a break-up, Erik started asking my friends' K. and T. about me and they both thought we would be a good match. Much of this went on without my knowledge or at least with a few vague references to the fact that Erik was looking for a girl who was "a little more down to earth" like me.

By the time the Santa Crawl rolled around in December, things got a lot less vague. I told my friend Tara that I heard Erik might be a little interested in me and she said, "Oh, that's perfect. You guys should totally mack." By the time I walked into the Que bar, Erik grabbed me and gave me this kiss:

Apparently, I wasn't all that resistant. Nothing much more happened that night except the promise of him taking me on a "proper date" sometime after Christmas. But the next day, Erik joined us at The Vine for football watching and called me afterward to tell me he had fun hanging out with me.

On Monday morning, he called and left a voicemail message to see if he could take me out for lunch before he left town. I only have a half hour for lunch and plus I looked like total crap that day, so I declined. He called one last time to tell me he was sending some photos from the Santa Crawl and that I should get them the next day in the mail. I texted him to thank him and then he texted back and then we ended up texting all that day until we talked on the phone that night. We texted so much that Erik changed his phone plan to include unlimited texting. We had the strangest, most wonderfully fun and at times frustrating long distance three week courtship, but I wouldn't have changed it because of all the awesome conversations and creative flirting we did. So far, it's been an amazing ride.

So, there you have it. In keeping with Gyuss' formula, feel free to tell your courtship/love stories in the comments or on your blogs. I'm a sucker for romance.

Everybody Here is Out of Sight

I'm sure if you live in the Midwest you have no idea what snow looks like this Winter, so I thought I'd show you. this is exactly what I see on my walk to work every single fucking day. It's kind of pretty, isn't it?

Soooooo, what should we talk about tonight? I had some Valentine's Day posts I was thinking about writing, but one I have to wait to talk to Erik about, so I think I'll just write about the weekend instead.

I already covered Sunday, so I think I'll just go with Friday and Saturday night. On Friday, I found myself in a weird predicament. Both the girls were at the basketball game by six and Stinky was going to sleep over at a friend's house and Coadster was going to "drive around" (that scary thing that high school kids do that encompasses so many frightening scenarios in my head) after the game got out. I had a Friday night all to myself. Since it was unplanned, I figured I'd just go down to the Dublin and see who was there. The answer to that, was all kinds of fun and generous people. I went down with $10 expecting to have a beer or two and head home. I only bought one beer and everything else, including a slice from Pizza on Dubuque, a few more pints and a total girlie shot were bought by all the cool kids down at the bar. If you ever get a chance to come to Iowa City, you should totally go downstairs and have a pint.

Coadster called me around 11'ish to tell me she wasn't going to drive around and was just going to go home instead. About a half hour later, Erik called me from Chicago and after dropping off his friend, "walked me home" on our cell phones.

Saturday was a bit on the hectic side. I had to get up early to take Coadster to show choir. I came back home and went to bed for a little bit until Stinky called me to come get her around 11. I ran a ton of errands. Took Stinky to her friend's house and finally headed to the Quad Cities.

the party itself was just fine. I didn't know anyone there but Erik, but there was a couple from Iowa City who I really liked and we all made fun of the band together. The band played 80's covers so badly, that even I had a hard time making them out. Yeah. Erik and I headed back to Iowa City around 9:30 and had a few drinks at where else? That's right. The Dublin. It was a pretty mellow night there, but the important people, like our friends D. and J. were there. J. was nice enough to give us a ride home, so we didn't even have to take a cab.

This, as you know preceded the wonderful Sunday morning where Erik and I slept in and ate all that food and didn't have anything to do until 12:30 when the girls came back from their dad's house. The end.

And She'll Have Fun Fun Fun

Here is some snow. I think it's sideways, but there's so much of it, it doesn't really matter. Tilt your head any way and it will all look the same.

So, it's time to play, where the hell is Churlita San Diego this weekend? This Saturday I'll be meeting Erik in the exotic locale of Quad Cities USA. There will be rivers and there will be beer. There may even be rivers of beer. But mostly, there will be Erik and that just means fun. This will be a short meeting, but next weekend we're going to a lodge in Missouri to celebrate the day of hearts of flowers with our friend who owns the Dublin Underground and his fiance and my friend T. and her man, M. I might even get to shoot a gun or two. But I'm getting too far ahead of myself.

This weekend? This weekend I'm planning to go to The Dublin for a bit on Friday night. Then on Saturday night, I'll be meeting Erik in the QCA for his friend's birthday party. I've been kind of fantasizing about BBQ from Jim's Rib Haven, but if it doesn't happen, I'm okay too.

In between all of this will be taking girls from their duties as wrestling managers to basketball games and maybe a sleep over too. Coadster will be gone all Saturday for Show choir. On Sunday evening, Coadster and I will go on a date for a late dinner as she has requested some special alone time with me. I'm always happy to oblige the girls that.

Once again, I'd love to hear your plans. I'm assuming you'll be in more exciting areas than the Quad Cities, but you won't be with Erik, so you might not be having as much fun.