Happy Birthday America

Let the Bedazzler Smackdown commence!

(Have a safe and joyous Fourth of July, everybody.)

Totally Not Dead and Feeling Much Better Now

The masses are beginning to move in preparation for our annual Fourth of July cabin trip (a.k.a. Beastie’s Bedazzler Smackdown).

Just last night I put the finishing touches on the patriotic T-shirt for my sister-cousin Kerry, and I must admit, it is a masterpiece. I did not end up having to use power tools as I anticipated. No Bedazzlers were employed, either, because the video of Tana from The Apprentice drove me screaming away from the Official Bedazzler website before I could order one. Nevertheless, through ingenuity and the creative application of industrial-strength Velcro®, I have constructed a T-shirt that I am convinced Kerry will would rather die a slow, painful death than wear in public on the Fourth of July. And that is exactly how I know it is perfect.

It is tacky. It is sparkly. It has attachments and moving parts. I can’t say any more than that at this point, but you have my most solemn promise, there WILL be photos.

This year, for the first time, the sisters and sister-cousins have planned a menu, delegated shopping duties and assigned cleanup detail, in an attempt to keep everything as fair and stress-free as possible. This is no small feat, considering that there will be about 15 people to feed and clean up after. Sister-cousin Tiffany, who, like me, is much more an enjoyer of food than a cooker of it, just e-mailed me the following from Seattle:

From: Tiffany
Sent: Thursday, June 29, 2006 10:07 AM
To: EverydaySuperGoddess
Subject: Cabin Menu

I have never before made a grocery list that starts out "32 eggs."

Tiffany will arrive in Minneapolis tonight, and I’ve been so preoccupied by being sick and trying to get everything wrapped up at work and organized at home that I completely forgot until just now that she will come bearing a very special box of very special somethings, just for ME.

Because a few weeks ago, when she wrote and asked if there was anything I’d like from Pike Place Market (she is kind and good and generous and thoughtful like that), I wrote back and said, “Never mind the Pike Place Market. I want CUPCAKES.”

Cupcake Royale is a Seattle institution that I did not have a chance to visit in person when My Ho and I were in Seattle last summer, but I did sample several of their little nuggets of buttercream heaven. Since then, it seems like I’ve been reading about Cupcake Royale all over the place, and for months, I’ve been pining for cupcakes. We may have finally rated a Trader Joe’s, but to date there is no such thing as a gourmet cupcake bakery in Minneapolis. It’s tragic, really.

Suddenly, I’ve forgotten about being sick, and about all the packing I have to do. None of that matters any more, because tonight, I will have a Ballerina and a Dance Party with Holly Hobby, I’ll have the Classic and the Kate and the Lavender, and I’ll have the Ultra Violet and the Barbie and both flavors of the Mo Fro. Maybe I will share. Maybe I won’t.

Cupcakes make EVERYTHING better.

Note to Self:

Next summer? At the Pride festival?

Stay the HELL away from the chicken gyro stand, you idiot.

I so do not have time to be sick, but apparently my lower intestine did not get the memo.

Oh, that's okay. Don't worry about me. I'll just be right over here, wishing for death.

It's just... that I've been so very busy...

So, okay, it’s been a tiny bit more than "a few days," and I apologize for that. A number of blog-worthy things have been going on, which I’ll get to later (really). But today I am sunburned and little bit weary after my second Pride festival in the Mother Bear Project booth.

The DemiGoddesses were with their dad over the weekend, so I was on my own this time, much to Mother Bear Amy's disappointment. We managed without them, but the event was simply not the same without the mad bear-sponsoring skillz the Demis have demonstrated on many an occasion.

Fellow Batling Infield (of Third Base Line), along with her mom, stopped by our booth for a lovely visit on Saturday.

And I owe a special shout of thanks to my most excellent knitting/blogging/writing friend Amy (of Knit Think), who stepped up and spent much of yesterday workin’ it alongside me and the bears.

You, my friend? Are AWESOME.

I was also priveleged to meet Amy’s delightful knitting/blogging friend Chris (of Stumbling Over Chaos), who graced us with her presence, and also with her camera. I have shamelessly stolen Chris's pictures from her site so you can see for yourselves the photographic evidence that these days I have been neglecting you, my small but inexplicably loyal posse of peeps, have not been entirely wasted:

Vacation All I Ever Wanted

A long, painful work week has finally come to an end, and Justin Morneau was good enough to give the Goddesses a two-run walk-off homer to send us off to the north woods with happy hearts. As I listen to the next few games on My Ho's satellite radio (no elecricity at the lake), I will recall fondly the image of my darlings en masse, jumping up and down on home plate in the bottom of the 12th inning.

How I do enjoy the celebratory man love.

(Disappointing, though, that it denied us The Return of The Lohse. Er, not.)

The Goddess is on vacation. I'll be back in a few days.

Boofed

It appears that I’ve been tagged by Mr. BergBlog (who is not Mr. Bonser , although that would have been okay, too…). And because I’m still reeling from the shocking jump in hits I received from Batgirl’s site yesterday, and, also, in honor of Mr. Bonser (who is not Mr. Bergblog) starting against the Mariners this evening, I’m going to go ahead and bore you all with a list of five things about EverydaySuperGoddess:

5 Items in My Fridge
A Brita Water Filter Pitcher
Two Bottles of Harp Lager (The remains of the six-pack I bought for St. Patrick’s day. The Goddess is not much of a drinker.)
Chile Morita Fire Roasted Salsa
Leftover Macaroni and Cheese (Made last night by DemiGoddess the Younger)
Four Pounds of Butter (Costco rules!)

5 Items in My Closet
A Radke Jersey (Very Dusty and Possibly Still Cursed)
A Santana Jersey (Defnintely not touching the Radke Jersey)
A “Ron Gardenhire is my Boyfriend” Shirt
Many, Many Dairy Queen Cap Night Twins Caps
Two Cartons of Chocolate-Covered Marshmallow Eggs (What’s left of my carefully rationed Easter stash)

5 Items in My Car
Walking Shoes
A Whole Foods Re-Usable Grocery Bag
Two 40 lb. Bags of Water Softener Salt (That I haven’t had the will to haul down to the basement yet)
A Blue Mynci Stuffed Neopet (From a Long-Ago McDonald's Happy Meal)
My Earbud Radio (For use while running, walking, or when the DemiGoddessess have choir concerts while the game is on.)

5 Items in My Purse
Tissues
Bigelow Mentha Lip Tint No 1136
12-Hour Sudafed Tablets
Gum
Lots of Receipts from Trader Joe’s

There. Now you know ALL my secrets.

And, because no one likes to suffer alone, I’m tagging Amy, Meghan, Melissa, Angelica and Joe.

Somebody, Please, Get the Woman a Fork

Happy Birthday, Batgirl!

Love,

EverydaySuperGoddess

(a.k.a. TwinsGoddess)

Scattered

A lot is going on lately. I haven’t written about it because between all the details and the heavy-duty allergy meds I am taking so that I don’t go after my own flesh with a power sander, my brain is all over the place and I can barely string together a coherent thought, much less a passable blog post.

The good news is that my kitchen is finally done. The cabinets are back in place, and everything is so clean and pretty that I’ve almost forgotten the tears and sweat and swearing and handfuls of ibuprofen that got it that way. I want to move my bed into the kitchen so the lovely lavender walls and fresh white cabinets, illuminated by summer sunshine, will be the first thing I see when I wake up every morning. I’d totally do it, too, if not for the ants.

My house is no longer leaky, thanks to the new roof that my insurance company was kind enough to pay for, even though I didn’t ask them to since I didn’t know I needed it. The dripping skylights are gone, but the rest of the sunroom remains unfinished, and I seem to be having a lot of trouble reaching the contractor who came to look at it two weeks ago—the contractor who is supposed to be replacing the original contractor, who started the work last March but quit some time during the weeks while I was waiting for the snow to melt so the insurance adjustor could climb up and inspect the roof that I didn’t know needed replacing.

My mom had a birthday (happy birthday mom!), so the Goddess sisters had a birthday dinner and gift to plan and organize. And, of course, the Demis have only a few days of school remaining, so all sorts of wrap-up activities are going on as well.

A day after they finish school we’re heading to Upper Michigan to the lake, meaning that a case of cabin fever is severly compounding my scattered-ness. I’ve been compulsively writing and revising packing lists and menus, shopping for groceries and acquiring my requisite stash of trashy magazines.

Cabin trips are the only time all year when I’m willing to pay actual money for Us Weekly and People, and it’s all I can do to leave them unread until we get to the lake. Which makes it that much sweeter once I survive the drive, get the car unpacked, and can finally kick back on the porch, gaze out at the lake, sigh contentedly, and then dive headfirst into those pristine pages of glossy celebrity gossip. With a cold beer to wash it all down.

I’ve been to London and I’ve been to France, but there’s still no place in the world more beautiful than that.

Love Note

Every Memorial Day weekend there is an enormous AA roundup (“with Al-Anon participation”) here in the Twin Cities. Literally thousands upon thousands of AAs and Al-Anons and Alateens pack into a local Sheraton from Friday night until Sunday morning. Speakers come from all over the country to tell their stories, and meetings go on pretty much all day and all night. There’s a lot of food, mobs of people, literature and tapes for sale, and program speak at every turn. It’s kind of a three-ring circus of twelve-step recovery.

The first time I went to this roundup was in 1997. I’d been doing the Al-Anon thing for not quite a year at the time, and I was completely blown away by what I saw and heard there. By Sunday morning, I was physically, spiritually, and emotionally exhausted (in a good way). I picked up several speaker tapes that weekend (this was back before I had a CD player in the car), including one, totally at random, of an Al-Anon who had spoken at the roundup a couple of years before. Her name was Blanche, she was from Texas, and her story was so smart and sassy, so touching and funny and wise, that I ended up listening to her tape over and over again. Every year after that I would attend the annual roundup, secretly hoping that she’d be on the schedule so I could meet her in person. I heard lots of fantastic speakers, but Blanche never appeared. Somewhere along the line, I heard that she had passed away.

Lately, my Al-Anon program has become pretty halfhearted, for a number of reasons. My main focus this past Memorial Day weekend was to finally get the doors back on my kitchen cabinets, and on how I was going to work that in around the barbecues the DemiGoddesses and I were invited to. When a friend called to see if I wanted to meet up with her at this year’s roundup, I couldn’t believe I had forgotten all about it. I said I’d meet her for the Al-Anon speaker on Saturday afternoon.

The speaker’s name turned out to be Stephanie. She was from Texas, and like most people who get invited to speak at these events, she had been in Al-Anon for a long, long time. Her story was smart and sassy, touching and tragic, funny and wise. As she talked about her background, her family of origin, her marriage and her children, I identified with many of the things she said. She talked about how she got to her first Al-Anon meeting, and the ways in which the twelve steps had made life better for her. And she talked about finding her Al-Anon sponsor, whose name… was Blanche. The very same. Stephanie had been at the hospital holding Blanche’s hand when she died.

I don’t usually go out of my way to meet speakers, but afterwards I waited in line to meet Stephanie. I wanted to tell her how glad I was that I’d come to the roundup to hear her speak. How much I appreciated her telling her story, and how even though I’d never met Blanche in person, that I’ve often thought of her and many of the things she said. That Blanche had impacted more people than she knew. I yammered on and on, trying to spit out the words to express what I wanted to say, but there were people waiting in line behind me, and so finally I just said, “Thank you so much for being here.” Which, really, didn’t even come close.

I don’t know if I’ll ever attend regular meetings again, or if I’ll ever get back to working a 12-step program the way I used to. I can’t even say for sure why I stopped. I’d never claim to be completely “cured” of the things that got me there in the first place, although, certainly, a lot of them are much, much better. I guess, deep down, I suspect that someday life is going to serve me up a curveball that will get me back in with both feet. And when that happens, I’ll know where to go.

Because that kind of thing? Those chance encounters that maybe aren’t so random after all? I used to call those “love notes from God.” And they seem to happen a lot around those crazy 12-step people.

Wednesday is Bath Day

ESG to a Demigoddess who shall remain nameless:

"You know, if you put those stinky feet on the couch, the couch will smell like feet."

Yes.

“…I've seen a man sacrifice his life and it was quick and brief and violent and glorious. I've seen a woman sacrifice her life and it was slow and long and difficult and beautiful, because a man will die for another, but a woman will live for them…”

Beastie’s Bedazzler Smackdown

From: Sister Betsy
Sent: Tuesday, May 23, 2006 9:58 AM
To: The Sister-Cousins
Subject: 4th of July T-shirts

Hello All,

Some of us had a brainstorm that for this year’s 4th of July celebration we would create patriotic 4th of July T-shirts for each other. Each person will be making one T-shirt for a cousin/sister to be presented to them at the cabin. They MUST wear it, under penalty of excommunication, on the 4th. So get ready to glitter! Paint! Fringe! Bedazzle! I know recently Target has had basic 4th T-shirts on sale for $5. Does anyone think that our mothers would want to do this? Here is my randomly (well, I just put our names alphabetically) chosen list for who is making shirts for whom:
Maker/Reciever:
Betsy/EverydaySuperGoddess
EverydaySuperGoddess/Kerry
Kerry/Meghan
Meghan/Molly
Molly/Shanna
Shanna/Tiffany
Tiffany/Betsy

Happy bedazzling!

Brilliant.

And also, bring it ON, bitches.

Fool Me Twice

One of the many sisterly wrongs that my sister, Meghan, has still not forgiven me for is the time when I was five (which would have made her three) and I cut all the hair off her Barbie doll. When she discovered the damage, she was much more upset than I had anticipated she’d be, and I knew I had to think fast to keep her from running to my parents and getting me in trouble.

“It’s okay,” I told her. “It’ll grow back!”

It worked.

I felt a tiny bit of guilt (I’m not completely heartless), but I was off the hook, so it was all good. Except that the hair never did grow back, of course, and to this day Meghan, who apparently has the memory of an elephant, loves to use that particular incident as evidence that she spent her entire childhood being victimized by her older sister.

Fast forward to my recent garage sale, when, through the magic of fresh batteries, I managed to entice my niece into falling love with the DemiGoddesses’ old Furbys. They both went home with Maggie (and, by association, my poor, unsuspecting sister, Meghan). I felt a tiny bit of guilt (again, not completely heartless), but I gave them to her for free, of course, and ultimately, those nasty, noisy, talking monstrosities (the Furbys, not my sister and her daughter) were gone from my house, so it was all good.

Except that this is what happened after that.

Yes, I am evil. But you’d think she’d learn.

Oh My God Trader Joe’s

Back when I was doing the online diet thing and trying to eat healthier, one of the regular members of my Internet support group was forever posting comments about the fabulous deals on gorgeous foods she’d find at this “Trader Joe’s” place. She lived in California, and being in Minnesota, I had never heard of Trader Joe’s until that point. At the time, even Whole Foods was a new thing in my neighborhood, and although I love Whole Foods, they arent exactly known for being affordable. I was intrigued by the idea of a store that sells quality foods cheap.

Not long after that, a co-worker who had just moved here from California mentioned that he was having trouble finding a good, inexpensive bottle of wine. He asked me, “Isn’t there a Trader Joe’s around here?” When I told him that no, sadly, there is no such place in the Twin Cities, he looked, well, disgusted.

And then I found The Midwestgrrl, and discovered that they even have TJ’s in Cleveland. Cleveland! What are we here in Minneapolis, I wondered, some third-rate hicksville? Why not us? WHY NOT US??

So you can imagine how thrilled I was when, a few months ago, I read a little article in the local paper that said yes! Trader Joe’s is coming! The opening date was set for mid-April, and then mid-May, and finally, finally, 9:00 a.m. on May 15, 2006.

Twitching with anticipation, I e-mailed The Midwestgrrl, and pleaded, “Tell me what to buy!” She graciously provided me with a number of extremely helpful suggestions, including:

“Honey Sesame Sticks are the snack I once called ‘a new and conveniently legal form of crack.’ Awesome.”

But really, that only made it worse, all the having to wait.

I read online about the store that opened in Manhattan, and how there were brie en croute riots and several people were trampled. I made up my mind that I would definitely NOT go to the new Trader Joe’s on its opening day. You know, because of the children.

But then? Yesterday? I totally did.

The place was wall to wall people, but for the most part they were well-behaved. Some of them were almost giddy. I carried a hand basket, naively thinking that I was really just there to investigate, and maybe buy one or two little things to try. I picked up some whole wheat mini pitas and a bag of lightly salted roasted almonds, two jars of Indian simmering sauces and a jar of TJ’s brand hot sour soup, a bag of frozen mango chunks for the DemiGoddesses (who love them some mango), a package of “Multi-Seed Rice Crackers,” and for sure a bag of those honey sesame sticks (which, by the way, Midwestgrrl was totally correct about).

I nearly fell over dead when I saw the prices on their frozen fish, which are well below those at Whole Foods, but my hand basket had somehow become REALLY heavy, and I was starting to think that perhaps my eyes had gotten bigger than my budget.

But then? I really did fall over dead when the total bill for my two bags of groceries came to… $35. And that’s when I knew I had finally found retail nirvana.

The teriyaki chicken stir fry we had for dinner was delicious, and, in summary, I’d have to say that I found the whole experience absolutely worth all the hype and anticipation.

And also, I want to marry Trader Joe and have lots of his little organic babies.

Better Than A Stuffed Unicorn

My yesterday began with waffles. Waffles topped with pecans and sliced bananas, no less. After months of trying to get a table at Zumbro on a Sunday morning, it seems that on Mother’s Day, while the families of four and six have to wait, like FOREVER, a party of two (My Ho and me) is no problem.

Halfway through my (delightful) waffles I remembered that I had left my cell phone charging in the kitchen at home. And I had locked the front door. And the DemiGoddesses, who were due back from their Girl Scouts camping weekend some time before noon, did not have a housekey.

Happy Mother’s Day.

To my tremendous relief, neither Demi was on the doorstep when we returned from breakfast. They arrived later in the morning bearing gifts of Laffy Taffy candies in a carefully selected array of flavors, which they had purchased just for me at the camp store. Apparently it had come down to a choice between the candy and a unicorn stuffed animal, and my wise children went with the Laffy Taffy because they know their Goddess mother has a superhuman sweet tooth.

I also received a bouquet of lilacs from the back yard.

And then, as if those weren’t gifts enough, they also allowed me to complete an entire game of Age of Empires. From the Dark Age all the way through the Imperial Age, they patiently waited for their turn on the computer.

After dinner with the family at my Mom and Dad’s, the three of us ended the day on my parents’ bed in the dark, flipping between the Twins game and the Survivor finale and occasionally engaging in foot fights and kiss attacks.

The Twins lost, but even so, I couldn't have asked for a better day.

They’re Going to Kill Us All

Once again, Mr. Zellar has eloquently expressed exactly what I was thinking, much better than I ever could.

How is this team ever going to finish above .500 if 3/5 of their starting rotation seems determined to straight-up suck?

Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed last night’s 15-5 win over the Rangers as much as the next Goddess. 19 hits and six RBI by Justin Morneau alone were like gifts straight from the heavens, and believe me when I say that I am very, very grateful. Really I am.

But as the score crept from 10-0 in the third inning to 10-5 after the sixth, the old familiar feeling of dread began to descend, and I vowed to My Ho that if Silva blew that ten run lead I would never, ever watch another Twins game as long as I live.

Thankfully, Francisco Liriano spared me that fate.

Can we talk for a moment about the twelve-fingered Rangers pitcher? Forgive me, but eew. And also, EEW. I thought the sidearm pitchers were weird, but a six-fingered fastball almost seems like cheating.

And while I’m being politically incorrect, I’ll just add that I find this incredibly irritating.

Seriously? In a locket??

Girlfriend, I am very sorry for your loss. I sympathize with you and your son. But honey, YOU WERE NOT MARRIED YET. Clearly, your fiancee did not see things the way you are claiming, or he (or one of his people) would have made certain his will reflected those wishes. Kirby’s children are the only ones in this world who have any rightful claim to his estate, and the more noise you make about it, the more you look like a monumental, not-very-bright, gold-digging asshat loser. Please. Let it go already.

I'll Be Keeping The Day Job

We didn’t take in a ton of cash, and a sizable pile of junk remains in my garage, but I’d say Saturday’s garage sale was a success… if for no other reason than it turned out to be a damn fine day to sit out on folding chairs next to my driveway display of unwanted crap bargain-priced treasures. The weather was so perfect, I even managed to acquire my first sunburn of the season.

Supplying the electronic toys with fresh batteries turned out to be a very savvy marketing move. Most of them sold, even the Kung Fu Fighting hamsters. My niece, Madge, fell in love with the Furbys, so now they live at sister Meghan’s house. (Ha ha ha... Suckah!)

For future reference, the clothed Barbie dolls sell much better than the naked ones, Japanese people love them some Beanie Babies, and any item that bashes George Bush will sell immediately. At least in my neighborhood.

A portion of my modest cash bonanza went to buy a bag of cinnamon-roasted almonds (the LARGE bag, no less) at the Dome before yesterday’s Twins game. Johan Santana restored my will to live by striking out eleven and going seven hitless innings. Heavens, he is a glorious sight to behold. Torii Hunter made a catch that defied all laws of physics, and by some incomprehensible miracle did not damage himself in the process (see the clip for yourself by clicking the “Torii’s Running Catch” link over here). Louis Castillo hit his first home run of the season, the Twins beat Detroit by two, and the weekend would have been pretty close to perfect if My Ho hadn’t broken a tooth on our very last cinnamon almond during the eighth inning. He says it doesn’t hurt, but still.

All that was left was to decide how best to spend the remainder of my windfall, and I pondered a number of possibilities... until this morning when Demigoddess the Younger informed me that she needed money for a school field trip to the Science Museum, which reminded Demigoddess the Elder that she also needed money for a school field trip to the zoo. I signed the permission slips, doled out the money, and that pretty much killed off the garage sale fund.

I’m sure my current crippling sinus headache is 100% the result of spring allergies and has nothing at all to do with the fact that my garage sale preparations ended up being worth less than two dollars an hour, most of which I didn’t get to spend anyway.

No, no. Nothing at all.

Bear #28

This was the 28th bear I knitted for the Mother Bear Project.

I made it in February, and gave it, along with three others, to Amy, the Mother Bear founder, in early March.

In April, Amy took her second trip to Africa. She traveled to a number of countries, and visited many of the organizations that help her distribute handmade bears to children who have been impacted by the AIDS epidemic there. Of course, she also handed out lots of bears. The last time I saw Amy was the day before she left for Africa, and I asked her to please take lots of pictures while she was there.

Yesterday I received the following note in the mail:

“I just got back from Africa and it was pretty amazing. The children loved the bears. I have so many photos to show you! I will bring them to our next knitting group. Hope to see you there! Love, Amy”

Also enclosed was this photo:
My God, how I would love to gobble up those little feet.

Bargains Galore! One Day Only!

Next weekend my neighborhood is holding its annual garage sale. Much like childbirth and international travel, I’ve found it takes about two years to forget what a pain in the arse holding a garage sale is before I start thinking that it might be a good idea to give it a whirl again.

And yes, it was two summers ago that I hauled a carload of delightful bargain-priced treasures to my friend CombatGirl’s driveway for a garage sale at her house. In spite of a newspaper ad and strategically placed signs, the only thing that made that effort worthwhile was selling three children’s books to the Viva half of our local cable-access celebrity couple, Viva and Jerry (“Two bucks, two bucks!”).

My brush with fame made the day exciting, if not particularly lucrative. The few items I sold were mostly things that CombatGirl herself purchased, and the carload of crap came back to the basement, where it sat until last Saturday.

Amazing how easy it is to ignore the steady accumulation of junk in the backs of the closets and the darker corners of the basement. And amazing how, even after I’ve unearthed an overwhelming mountain of stuff, there doesn’t seem to be any less in those closets and basement corners. My storage spaces are like Strega Nona’s pasta pot.

This time around, our sale will include a large number of toys that the DemiGoddesses have outgrown. For most of the weekend, the three of us sorted through and priced a boatload of books, assembled puzzles and games, and tried to make the Barbies presentable. Yesterday afternoon I replaced the batteries in two Furbys, a Techno robot puppy, a WuvLuv, and two mechanical hamsters that twirl tiny plastic nunchucks and sing “Kung Fu Fighting.” I bought the batteries at the dollar store, so I figure if I can break even on those, I’ll still be ahead of the game.

We are not materialistic people. The Demis hardly ever received new toys outside of birthdays and Christmas. But the bounty of playthings those two have amassed over the years is nothing short of obscene. Three giant Rubbermaid tubs full of stuffed animals? IS TOO MANY. There are children starving in Africa, and my kids have enough freaking Beanie Babies to populate a small Asian country. How did this happen?

The point, of course, is to get rid of stuff. This time, when the garage sale is done, none of it is coming back into the house. Our local Goodwill has a drive-through for donations, and whatever is left at the end of the day is going, going, gone. I’m not expecting to be able to retire on Saturday’s garage sale income, but it would be nice if we could take in enough cash to catch a movie.

Or, maybe, take a trip to Italy…

I (Heart) Corporate America

I know I need to develop a thicker skin. I’ve been aware of that for a while, actually.

For three days, I sat in roomful of opinionated, overweight white guys, listening to their arguments go around and around for hours, and leaving each day feeling like a bus had run me over and then backed over me and run me over again, just to make sure it had made its point.

After lunch on Wednesday the Marketing Deity himself took a moment to tell me how great it was that I could be there, because most people on my “level” never have an opportunity to see firsthand the important discussions that take place in these meetings.

(Yes! Thank you Marketing Deity! I am so very grateful that you allow a lowly maggot like me to be locked up in a hotel meeting room with these people for three days! Your generosity, it knows no bounds!)

Since Wednesday, his comment has gnawed at me. Since Wednesday, I have been irritated with myself for allowing his comment, which I'm sure neither he nor his staggeringly large ego even remember making, to gnaw at me.

This morning, back into my regular routine and once again in the company of my posse of co-workers, I was enthusiastically reassured that I am not overly sensitive. The man is sorely lacking in the people skills department. And they were happy to provide me with detailed examples in support of this fact.

What a relief to be around people who speak my language again.

(But I’m still going to work on that thicker skin thing.)