For starters, I am very ready for this to be over. I am thrilled and hopeful for my cousin, and for the most part have enjoyed lending a helping hand in her wedding. But it’s also been emotionally exhausting and time consuming.

Anyhow, as I’m sitting here trying to finish the final outline of my reception toast, I’ve decided I need a little humor to help me get over it all.

Many women whose friends and family like to send email forwards have probably seen the infamous bitchy (although it was originally written as a joke) contract some bridezilla sent out to her attendants making them promise to not gain/lose weight, get pregnant, drastically change their hairstyles, etc. before the wedding without her consent. Here’s my variation of it, based completely on things I have seen bridesmaids do in the last few years:

THE TEN BRIDESMAID COMMANDMENTS

1.) Thou shalt not get a tattoo on the back of thy neck two weeks before the wedding, especially when thou hast consulted with the bride about it and she politely asked you to wait until AFTER the wedding.

2.) Thou shalt not inflict bodily harm upon wedding guests in a shameless attempt to catch the bouquet at the reception. If it’s more than four feet from your grasp, it’s just. not. yours.

3.) Thou shalt not verbally assault the wedding guest who catches the bouquet. Even if it’s your sister’s wedding and you feel that because you’re the MOH it was everyone else’s responsibility to clear the way for you to catch it. Get over it. It’s a silly tradition.

4.) Thou shalt not get so drunk that thy toast to the bride and groom goes nowhere and lasts for over five minutes. Thou shalt also leave the following out of the toast: sarcastic comments about marriage being a joke, references to past relationships or sexual exploits of either the bride or groom, or complaints about personal disappointments.

5.) Thou shalt separate thyself from the dangerously intoxicating fantasies associated with assisting your dear friend/relative with her wedding planning. In other words, thou shalt not drive thy own male companion insane with thy own thoughts about weddings.

6.) Thou shalt not have so much champagne during the limo rides from the church to the photo session to the reception hall that thou passest out in the powder room before the reception begins. Especially if you’re only sixteen. It’s embarrassing to your family when they have to explain your absence from your duties at the reception by saying that you got sick and had to go home.

7.) In the event that thou catchest the bouquet, thou shalt not display thy undergarments to the wedding guests as the gentleman who caught the garter affixes it to your thigh.

8.) If thou must make out with a hot groomsman or other guest in the coat room, thou shalt not remove any article(s) of thy clothing.

9.) If thou dost partake in the spontaneous and cliche romantic encounter mentioned in #8, thou must understand that it is simply both of you getting caught up in the spirit of the event.

10.) Regardless of how hideous you find your dress to be, thou shalt not alter it beyond normal tailoring protocol. While being part of the wedding party is an honor, it is also a duty.

Yes, needless to say I have been to some entertaining weddings. I could probably have made this the TWENTY Bridesmaid Commandments.

Anyhow… here’s another funny list. Why didn’t I think of this one?!  Wedding Gift Calculator from ihateweddings.com

Sometimes you just gotta savor your own failures. For instance, several months ago I was determined that I’d be skinny and buff for my cousin’s wedding. The wedding is on Saturday (THIS Saturday, as in three days from now), and I have lost a total of FOUR pounds. I finally had my dress altered today, and the only area of the whole thing that had to be taken in was –aherm– the bust. 

So what are we doing for dinner tonight to celebrate? PIZZA!!! Delicious, crunchy, chewy thin crust spinach pizza. I just ate two pieces, and I might go back for a third. It’s wonderful to know that, although I didn’t get to have the whole thing taken in three sizes as I’d hope, that I no longer need to think about fitting into my MOH dress. Thursday’s the bachelorette party, Friday’s the rehearsal dinner, and Saturday’s the wedding. It’s going to be a cake-and-other-num-nums free-for-all, so I might as well get started a little early. 

Yum. 

With two of my nine weeks of summer vacation behind me, I think I’ve gained some perspective about the world. Most likely millions of other people have already realized these things, but they’re relatively new to me. 

First, if everyone had nine weeks off once per year, the world would be a happier, safer, more peaceful and kind place to live. We all get a little vacation time here and there, but it’s usually so short that we pack everything we’ve been wanting to do into it, the result making us more tired than work did. We need LONG vacations. Time to explore our neighborhoods and visit our families and reconnect with our goals without being rushed. Time to actually digest what we’ve been doing with our work/family/neighborhood/etc, and to SLEEP nine or ten hours per day. Time to cook real food, and actually sit down to eat it. Time to thoroughly clean and de-clutter our homes so that keeping them clean is much less work than constantly trying to get them clean. My dad is a professor of what some colleges/universities call “Leisure Studies,” and he’s always talking about how we can only fully realize our roles in society when we stay individually connected to “what you do when you don’t HAVE to do anything.” Huh. That’s making sense to me now. 

Secondly, I have realized that maintaining a household — really maintaining it, not just winging it — is a full-time job. Since I’m home and awake more than three hours per day now, I notice more things that need to be done around here. I had forgotten how beautiful wood floors are when they are not just vacuumed when I have time, but rather vacuumed every other day (thanks, cat) and WASHED once a week. How much more sunlight comes in when I take the time to wash BOTH sides of the windows. How much CRAP there is that can be tossed or donated, and how photos achieve their purpose much more effectively when they’re arranged in albums rather than stuffed into boxes in the back of a closet. And, quite possibly the most relieving: getting day-to-day errands run, RSVPs called in, appointments made and met, laundry folded and put away, etc., etc. I honestly have NO CLUE how people with kids do this stuff. And then the people who try to maintain a household, parent children, AND keep a career going… oh my. Exhausting to all involved. NO wonder my mother went nuts when she went back to work. I don’t know how so many people do it so well. 

This is the first summer in ten years (and probably the last one for awhile) that I’ve neither worked full-time nor been in school. I really wanted to get a job, but was talked out of it. Then I started looking into volunteer opportunities, which I was also talked out of. Wow am I thankful for that. I’m spending my days doing curriculum development for my classes, reading for pleasure, working out, cleaning, doing family stuff here and there, and, quite frankly, whatever the heck else I feel like doing. I have a few weddings and road trips coming up in the near future, but for now it’s pretty much whatever whenever. For once, I feel completely in charge of my schedule. 

24 things about me….

4 places I go over and over
1. Kent State University… college, then grad school, now research projects… I can’t seem to get away from that place, even though I live an hour away now.
2. various local libraries
3. the shoe department at Nordstrom
4. yoga class

4 people that email me
1. my manfriend… I am surprised I have not gotten fired from my job for getting so many non-work-related emails.
2. parents of my students, for various reasons (I actually MUCH prefer this to talking to them on the phone)
3. various charities, political organizations, and retail stores that I have at some point or another been in cahoots with and can’t seem to get rid of
4. A few old pals from late high school/early college years… we formed a list back in 1999, and still keep in touch that way. I could write a book using saved emails as raw material… our topics of conversation have changed dramatically over the past decade. 

4 of my favorite foods
1. Cereal
2. Raw fruits and veggies
3. Thai food
4. Soy chai with espresso added to it (some places call this “dirty chai;” Starbucks calls it a “single tall (or double-grande) soy no water chai.” 

4 places I would rather be right now
1. A beach anywhere it’s hot, but NOT HUMID
2. in an author bio inside the back cover of a bestseller

3. in the physical shape I was when I worked out daily

4. Right here, right now… I’m actually quite content with my life.  :) 

4 movies I could watch over and over
1. John Hughes movies from the ’80’s (The Breakfast Club, Pretty in Pink, SIxteen Candles, Christmas Vacation, etc.)
2. Office Space
3. most Kevin Smith Movies - Clerks, Chasing Amy, and Dogma are definitely the tops 
4. A League of their Own (still makes me cry every time)

4 people I want to learn more about, you are tagged…

hmmm. The two lovely sisters of girlymama? Barack Obama? This is when I have to confess I don’t know many people who blog. 

No better or more eloquent way to put it: I went to see the SATC movie last night with some girlfriends — and I LOVED it. I have never cried so many individual times during a movie in my life. Each time I thought I had gotten a grip on my waterworks, Samantha (surprisingly) or Carrie or said something that just started it up again. I could go into it, but I’ll spare you. Let’s just say that, despite the fact that I try to be one of those too-cool-for-TV-show-addiction jerks, this is one show that even though it is over (and even though it is based substantially on shameless materialism, brand glorification, and narcissism) I will NEVER get enough of. I feel like I’m in a hall of mirrors (in a good way) when I watch it.

Speaking of addictions, I’ve heard of this before but wonder how many millions of extra hits it is getting today since it is promoted in the movie… and I am also tickled that they made a “real” version of this website that was shown in it several times. Not surprisingly, there was also some product placement for bluefly.

More on all of this later. I have to go clean up after the husbands/boyfriend who hung around in the apartment while the wives/girlfriend had a fantastic (and MUCH needed on all accounts) girls’ night.

Favorite person (outside family)?  I would say my sweet babboo, but these days I consider him family. I’ll say him anyway, since we’re a mere trip to Vegas away from being actual family in a legal sense (I hope that comment didn’t just ruin our tentative plan to go to Vegas in the near future). 

Favorite food?      Anything with cinnamon. Raw veggies (not with cinnamon). Cereal. Anything that didn’t have eyes, a central nervous system, etc. 

Quirks about you? You’re kidding, right? This could take a while…   I love flossing my teeth… 

How would the person who loves you most describe you in ten words or less? (Ask them) - Well, he just called me “Fatty McKnuckles” a minute ago. Usually he says I’m compassionate. He also frequently tells me I am weird. And pretty. 

Any regrets in life?  Nope. For as guilty as I feel about many, many things, I have no regrets. I always figure I grow from everything that I bring on myself/that happens to me. 

Favorite Charity/Cause?    Education (funding, quality, etc.). FGM awareness. 

Favorite Blog recently? This is assuming I have had time to read a large enough selection of blogs to really make an informed judgement. Hah. 

Something you can’t get enough of?   Music. My cat purring and looking at me like she is saying something. Holding (other people’s) babies. SHOES. Books. World travel.

Worst job you’ve ever had?   Uuuuhhh… honestly? This place I waitressed at during my senior year of high school. There was some really messed up stuff going on there. I could write a book about it. 

What job would you pay NOT to have?  High School Guidance Counselor. Butcher. Realtor, at the moment. 

If you could be a fly on the wall, where?  Oh boy. Would I be a total perv if I said Angelina and Brad’s house?

Favorite Bible verse right now?  The one about dashing your kid’s head on the rock… it shows how important context is when quoting things, and how open to interpretation such pieces of literature are. 

Guilty Pleasure? Cinnamon crunch bagels from Panera. Painting my toenails. Singing really loud while driving. 

Got any confessions?    Not that wouldn’t change your glowing opinions of me. Hmmm. I used to listen to my parents fight and pretend like it was a movie. I spent $850 on dainty things at AP two years ago. During my senior year of high school I made out with a boy simply because he told me he wanted me “so badly“… what can I say, proper grammar just gets me. 

If you HAD to spend $1,000 on YOURSELF, how would you spend it? And I can’t use it to pay off debt? And CJ wouldn’t see the receipt? Hmmm. Plane ticket, or wait, no. Badly needed new clothes? I honestly think something furniture-wise. 

Favorite thing about your house?  My cat and my best friend live there. And it has heavy doors, a big (for apartments, at least) kitchen, is in a very beautiful, walkable neighborhood, and I could feasibly have my family over for Thanksgiving because there is enough room. 

Least favorite thing about your house?     LACK OF CLOSET SPACE. I’m an organization freak, but after almost a year I’m still trying to find an effective way to store and arrange things here. 

One thing you are bad at?   Confrontation.

One thing you’re good at?    Loving people and fuzzy things. 

If you could change something about your circumstances, what?       I would know where I want to be in ten years, so I could quit wondering. 

Who would you like to meet someday? Tom Brokaw. I think he would be interesting to talk to. 

What makes you feel sexy?  It’s all about the shoes. And the house being clean. And, honestly, thinness. Sigh. 

Who is your real life hero?  When you really think about it, no one else can save you but yourself. CJ is my hero in many situations, however. 

What is the hardest part of your job?   By the time high school seniors get to me, they have formed habits of thinking and behaving… I have a few short months with them… I have to accept that no matter how much I work with them and how much sleep I lose over them, I will only “reach” a tiny percentage of them. 

When are you most relaxed?  I’ll let you know when I’m dead. 

What stresses you out?    Nostalgia about friendships that slipped away. Not looking like I did when I was 22 (sometimes). My parents’ vulnerability. My sister’s codependence. The majority of my students’ complacency about social issues. The safety of the little girl who lives downstairs in apartment #1, considering the several instances of crime we’ve had here. 

What can you not live without? Pen and paper. 

Do you agree or disagree with the recent article that reported that blogs are authored by narcissists? Yes. we need to admit it — we live in an age where narcissism is accepted. Arrogance is different, though, and I don’t find most bloggers to be arrogant. 

Why do you blog?  To … hmmm. To civilize myself. I need to reel in my thoughts sometimes, and figure out how to communicate them in a way that the general population wouldn’t be afraid of or disgusted by. 

Okay - rules:

1. Answer the questions

2. Link back to whoever tagged you

3. Tag eight bloggers to do the same, 2 from each category.

• New/newer bloggers —

• Bloggy friends –

• Bloggers you’d like to get to know better –?

• Bloggers you don’t think will respond, but you hope will –

 

Ummm… when I was ten I followed the rules in a chain letter, and I never got the $10,000 promised. I have to go calculate second semester grades now. 

I’m pretty sure I heard CJ say that sometime in the past week. I got this crazy itch to paint, and I had to get it done… I’ve had paint samples hanging on a few of our walls for over a month, trying to decide what would look good. It was time. 

There are several funny stories of painting (including various things that mysteriously got painted despite the tape and/or drop cloths I meticulously placed over them), but I’ll let him relate those to everyone as I’m sure he’ll embellish them to make them sound more amusing than they really were. 

So anyway, here are the results. The dining room, in a lovely shade of sage green. Pardon all of the crap on the table; I swear it’s clean most of the time but I’ve been using it to make bridal shower invitations and such the past few days. The lilac walls are in my girlie room, where as you can tell I have not put everything back together yet. I did get rid of the futon I’ve had since college (I don’t even want to think of the various things it was exposed to…), hoping to get a nice cozy IKEA chair when I get sick of a folded-in-half futon cushion on the floor as my reading/lounging spot. 

And finally, here’s where YOU come in: what color should I paint my bedroom? I started out with about 20 different shades hanging up, and over the past two weeks have cut it down to the finalists pictured below. 

At the moment I’m leaning toward the more muted-looking blue-green one that’s third one from the bottom in the first pic, but second from the bottom in the other (I’m posting two separate photos in different lighting situations to give a better idea of what they look like). Input, anyone? I’m totally up for suggestions and criticisms. 

I really like the metallic one, but I don’t think the landlord would appreciate it when calculating how much of our security deposit to return to us when we leave this place someday. Also, it doesn’t look too metallic when it’s hanging on the wall in normal lighting (it actually looks kinda dark), but with the flash it looks a bit gaudy. I think I’ll save that one for a bathroom someday. 

 And now for the bummer of the day, I can’t figure out how to edit photos after I’ve already inserted them. And of course, I know this will look different as an actual post than it looks as a draft. So if my commentary on these pics is nowhere near the pics themselves, I am truly sorry. Maybe this sumer when I have more time I will figure such things out. Speaking of time, here I go to make an attempt at finishing my seniors’ grades, as tomorrow is their last day of class…

Yes, I’m still around — just massively busy with the academic year wrapping up and about forty individual people each thinking that solving THEIR self-created problems needs to be my first priority. Harumph. I try my hardest to stay positive and be a good example for my students of how adults deal with stress in healthy ways, but really… I have about one nerve left after this wacky year, and a few extremely immature seniors (and two pathologically dishonest sophomores) are tap dancing all over it. 

Fear not, this is neither a grumpy-teacher post nor a great-moments-in-teaching post. It’s not even related to education. I’m just killing time. 

I’m at a doctor’s office. This particular doctor habitually runs two hours or more late, much to the chagrin of his patients. The last time I was here my appointment was at 3:00, and I finally got in to see him at 5:15. Today’s appointment was scheduled for 4:15 (at the moment I’m typing this sentence, it’s 5:20; there are two other people in the waiting room), and as usual I packed up lots of work to complete during the long wait (I’ve even been here before when patients sign in, then go run errands for an hour so they don’t have to be bored out of their minds). I left with 15 minutes to get here, although the trip typically takes about 20 minutes in traffic.

Well, someone’s car was on fire on I-480 so it took me a little extra time. 

I arrived about 15 minutes late, and got an earful of scolding from the moronic receptionist about how they shouldn’t see me because she already filled out the paperwork saying I was a no-show. I was fifteen minutes late! The closest I have ever been to being seen at the time of my actual appointment is one hour and 45 minutes late. I have heard stories of others waiting as long as three and a half hours. Seriously. I need to find a new doctor. 

Note to self: I usually prefer to see doctors who are (a) Female rather than male, and (b) D.O. rather than M.D.    This guy is both male and an M.D.  I thought I would go out on a limb and give him a chance, but so far not so good…  

Duuuuuhhhhh……. this morning my brain feels like it’s powered by a gerbil running in a wheel. For the past week my brain has been so hungry, trying to soak up so much and process it all at lightening speed. I often wonder how brilliant we would all be if we actually let our minds work fluidly, without having to interrupt inspirations and ideas with things like, oh, everyday life. I’ve written novels in my brain while driving to fulfill family obligations, only to let the allegorical themes and intricate symbiotic character/setting interactions fizzle like Pop Rocks on my tongue the second I reach my destination. There is probably a chemical engineer somewhere who figured out a cure for cancer while in the shower, but it slipped out of her mind the second she started drying her hair and her husband shouted up the stairs that he didn’t have time to drop the kids off at the babysitters’ so she would have to do it. 

Really, think about it. Showers, car rides, gym-mandated half hour limits on cardio equipment, standing in line at the post office or grocery store, those last few moments in bed before drifting off to sleep, THESE are are moments when intuition, problem-solving, and creative impulse seem to be at their glory. Is this nature’s  way of making sure we don’t take over the world? Our brilliance comes in flashes, and rarely do we have the time, resources, or energy at that exact moment to bring our ideas to fruition. 

Just think of the unrealized potential that is missed so that we can be human. 

Would someone please sing me a lullaby?

I have been getting nowhere near enough sleep lately. I just have more work to do than there are hours in the day for… and I’m trying to be physically active and maintain other parts of my life as well. So let it be known that tonight, for the first time in about two weeks, I will be getting more than five hours of sleep (I know many of you out there get less than this on a regular basis… my apologies for being a wimp) as long as I get to bed and fall asleep within the next hour. 

I have no idea how all of this work has piled up. I grade stuff for about two hours each day, so you’d think I’d always get done with it right away. Oh wait, I’m not a math teacher. So yeah, grading takes a long time if I do it right. And then there’s the committee meetings and other honorary (read: unpaid) posts I’ve had bestowed upon me since I’m the young, energetic employee with no spouse or children so I MUST have all the time in the world to be married to my job and to nurture the district as if it were my child. And then there’s the research group I’m doing for the $1200 to further the world’s knowledge of writing assessment, and the colleague whose dissertation data I’m co-rating along with a guy who is a Rhet/Comp PhD student (and god, if you have ever met someone who actually choses to spend their entire life studying both prescriptive and descriptive rhetoric… oh boy…) … why do I sign up for this stuff again??? Does my vitae really need that much padding at the moment?  

Uuuuuummmmmmm….. duuuuuuhhhh…. did I mention I sometimes ramble incoherently when I am exhausted but can’t make myself go to sleep yet? 

I think my problem is that I have not hibernated lately. Let me explain. I usually have a weekend every month or two when I’m so exhausted that between the end of work on Friday and the waking up for work on Sunday I sleep for a about  36 hours total. I have not done that since December, and man, do I need to. I am one scattered and useless person when I’m sleep deprived. 

Anyway… here I go. No more writing for me… I have another long day ahead of me tomorrow. Please forgive me for this if you are more sleep deprived than I am.