VIP

So I'm getting ready for a kids' church activity tomorrow, where I'm doing a little yapping about my mission. To help the wee ones understand that upstate New York is just as exotic as those other places people go on missions and eat cow testicles or chicken feet or duck fetus or what have you, I'm preparing mini-garbage plates for a little food sample.


Annnnnnnd, nothing says "I'm awesome" like buying, oh, say, a couple dozen hot dogs. And a 5-pound bag of frozen tater tots. By yourself. At 10 o'clock. On a Friday night.

perpetual first-date syndrome

"BAAAA! I have a whole theory about that!"

I say that about everything. I'm a developer of theories. One of my few strengths is people-watching and in my 27 years I've come up with entire theories about almost everything.

The (quite obvious) procedure:
(1) notice something (almost anything will do)
(2) ponder it
(3) explain it

Just last night, I used this procedure to formulate a theory about why Lee is so much more endearing than Bowersox, even though they both have similar down-home vibes and backgrounds--I may be the only person alive still watching this show-- and it is that Lee seems in awe of the whole thing and Crystal seems just a little too chill. LADY! YOU ARE ON NATIONAL TELEVISION! BE EXCITED ABOUT IT. (I like them both. I just find Lee more endearing.) I have this dilemma where people who are too energetic overwhelm me, but at the same time, I want to punch people who are too mellow just to see if they'd hit back or get mad, just to see some life in them, you know? People who are too ho-hum about everything are more infuriating than people who are tiggers about life. Agree or disagree?

So back to how I am constantly developing theories. I am stuck in phase 2 (pondering) of my normal theory developing procedure and would like, nay, love your feedback to help me get to phase 3 (explanation). Ready?

What is with perpetual first-date syndrome? You know how on a first date you exchange pleasantries and are super polite and may even bust out some forced laughter bc you aren't sure if you're on the same wave-length? Welp, apply this to the friend-making process. This happens to me quite a bit, which I think is weird, bc let's face it, I am a pretty awesome friend. I bet you are, too, which is why I need your help analyzing this. I've dealt with multiple people lately where it seems like we should be good friends but we never get passed first-date-esque awkwardness no matter how often we interact.

Let's use my go-to name for these situations by calling her Topenga. (This is not you, dear reader. This is an amalgamation of people.) Topenga and I have known each other for five years. We are both normal, funny, nice, relatively sharp, are in similar life stages, have mutual friends, blahblah. We seem like we should be good friends and perhaps we appear to be good friends bc we interact pretty regularly. But we still don't really know each other any better than we did five years ago. Instead, we've just spent five years exchanging recipes or compliments about earrings. This drives me nuts! Why aren't we moving on? Things stay super formal, super weird, and over time it gets super infuriating, especially bc I can't pinpoint why this happens. Come on, Topenga! We can have real conversations! We can't really be as bland as we're acting! I know there's more to you than your sensible shoes!

Why does this happen? Does this happen to you? Analyze, please.

feast or famine

Isn't it strange how I vacillate between blogging frenzy and blogging coma? Thanks for acting natural with me. I just do what I want. Sometimes that means blogging and other times it means getting a nasty farmer tan while I jog around town with my kids. I've been up to the latter.

Sidenote: I spent a lot of my adolescence not sure what "former" and "latter" meant. I recall scouring sentences with those terms for clues about which one meant the last thing said and which one meant the first thing said. Isn't that cute of me?

Remember how I work with the teenage girls at church? Welp, we recently had an activity about self-defense where the RS pres's hub (who is also a cop) said ass thrice, hell twice, and damn about ten times, all to a group of adorably mild-mannered 13-year-old prudes who he then asked to hit him. Yeah, it rocked.

One perk of living in the middle of the country is that, though our city is rarely a destination for people, it is on everyone's way somewhere else. This means that people can a) wave as they fly over OR b) stop at our house on a road trip. It's the season for the latter (that means the second one...you're welcome) because people I know in the West are driving to spend the summer in the East. And we're on the way! My hub's fam was in town recently and we had a load of fun, my hilarious and delightful law school friend Dorothy and her mom stopped over last weekend and my hilarious friend Davis (also with her mom, oddly enough) are doing the same this weekend. I really enjoy these visits. I love when distinct periods of one's life mix in surprising ways. And I am at a point in my life where I cherish good loud talks with fun friends.

Do you have friends whose essence can be summed up in one little story? I do. Dorothy pretty much eloped, as in, started the summer off engaged but by the time we started school again in the fall she was married to a different guy. That, my friends, is a sign of someone with a sense of adventure. Also, I once saw Davis accidentally put ketchup on a turkey sandwich because she is "used to putting ketchup and mustard on together." I adore both of those stories.

On a semi-related note, I shall now share two secrets to successfully make having houseguests even better, whether they are friends or in-laws or both or neither.

1. Lower your standards.

2. Put your pride in your pocket.

I'm not saying be gross. But I am saying relax and be realistic about what shape your home will be in. It is a fact of life that people LIVE here, some of whom are small children, so once everyone makes peace with that, suddenly having people over is really fun and you can just laugh and visit and bond instead of fuss.

bahahaha

So we have a lot to cover (get it?), but first, just have to share this with you in case you haven't seen it. BAHAHA! Often The Onion is right on the money, and yes, there's an eerie resemblance to my earlier breastfeeding post...sigh.

GOT MILK? PROVE IT!


Advocacy Group: Mothers Have Right To Expose Milk-Engorged Breasts In Public