I almost forgot...

...the most exciting part of last weekend. I gave my cat a bath, against my better judgment.

She has short hair, so she rarely needs baths. But lately the eau de cat has gotten a little strong. All the advice I read online recommended starting cats' baths young so that they're not afraid of water. Yeah, that would've been helpful to know SIX YEARS AGO when she was a kitten. Although my sister (the soon-to-be doctor of veterinary medicine) has given her baths in the past, I had not. In any case, we made it. I'll spare the details, since many before me have already documented the experience.

Now she's squeaky clean. Or at least her back is, which is all that really got washed, after she wriggled out of my grasp for the third time and I collapsed in an exhausted heap on my couch and said, "F--- it," or something equally original.


[Lucy in happier times, before her owner decided to torture both of them by trying to dunk Lucy in the bathtub.]

Making up for lost time

Wow, I procrastinate on blogging for what I think is a couple of days, only to realize suddenly it’s been a couple of WEEKS.

I wish I had a good excuse, like rats were taking over my neighborhood. (Yikes!) But I don't. I do have some lame ones, though. #1, a lack of power to my laptop because of a faulty dock. (Although my boyfriend insists I'm just not docking it right. I say, if it's that hard to dock, it's broken.)

#2, the weekends, when I actually have time and energy to blog, have been packed. One spent visiting my sister at Purdue; then Super Bowl weekend, that American spectacle. Expats, be glad to be so far removed from the madness! Then Valentine's Weekend... mmm... I got some of the world's best chocolate!

Just a few really, really belated reflections on the Super Bowl and related hoopla: Aretha Franklin, Aaron Neville, and the Rolling Stones do NOT look good on a 65” high-definition television. No, no, nooooooooo. Mick was the only one of the Stones who didn't look like a walking corpse. He gyrated as usual, but he kind of has the body of a 12-year-old girl, except for the jiggly skin under his biceps that made us all wish he’d kept on his long-sleeved shirt. Or maybe I’m still just bitter that they didn’t play “Angie.”

Anyway, the show in Detroit was overshadowed by my boyfriend’s mishap with his company basketball team the Saturday before the Super Bowl. Boyfriend’s mom and I arrived at the game five minutes after tip-off (we’d been shopping) to find boyfriend on the court, writhing in pain (“But I scored six points!”). A trip to the ER and some X-rays showed his ankle wasn’t broken, only sprained, thank goodness! But that meant that was in charge of getting his house ready for the dozen-plus friends who were expected to show up Sunday to watch the game on the big-screen. It wasn’t too bad, except for our combined five loads of laundry! And dishes to wash… and vacuuming… etc. But it was a fun party!

Shane’s pain was followed by my own pain the following Thursday, when I got braces put on. Yes, braces. I have wanted to get braces to straighten my teeth for years and finally decided to do something about it. I got a fancy (read: expensive) new type that go on the back of my teeth, so people can’t call me metal-mouth. However, they still hurt like an S.O.B. the first few days, and made me thpeak with a lithp, which thucks royally.

Oh, and the “bite stops” that are supposed to correct my overbite meant I couldn’t really chew the first week. Gimpy boyfriend and I had a fancy date the Saturday before Valentine's Day to celebrate V. Day/one year of dating (yay us!) at the best steakhouse in the city, and I could hardly eat my steak. The mashed potatoes were great, though! If I were on a diet, this would be perfect. But… I’m not.

Speaking of the boyfriend… I realized tonight that I don’t know if he knows I still blog. I don’t really talk about it. I showed him my blog a long time ago, but I wasn’t updating then. Boyfriend, if you’re reading, leave a message after the tone! :)

That’s about all. Sorry for the “Dear Diary” entry, but what can I say, it’s been a boring couple of weeks, except those few highlights. Christina… no haircut/curtain photos tonight, because my digital camera is on the fritz. Or maybe it just needs new batteries and I keep forgetting to buy them. However, I did surf the web for a photo of my new coat, which is glorious and kept me relatively warm last week when the temp dropped down to about 5 degrees (that's F)...


Isn't she lovely? :) Pretend it's me -- it could be, I wear a lot of turtleneck sweaters!

Hasta luego, friends. Hopefully not hasta another three weeks!

A new woman

A little bit of blogging this morning before work. I had an early morning haircut -- and I mean CUT. Contrary to what I'd have you believe (since I'm self-centered enough that I only post good photos of myself), my hair usually doesn't look half as good as my profile photo. Lately, it's been one ponytail after another. So today, I went to my appointment, pointed to my jawline and said, "Right about here." The style is kind of Sienna Miller, post-Jude-Law-and-nanny trauma. I haven't had it this short since I was in Spain. My head feels 10 lbs. lighter. (I have really, really thick hair!)

Photos pending, later, if I can get my laptop in order. (And photos of my new coat, which was everything I dreamed it would be, lol.) I've had troubles with the laptop's power supply, and the boyfriend/computer guru has been unavailable lately to fix it. That is, if the boyfriend will still fix my computer after he sees the haircut. (He has never known me with short hair, and he was a bit panicked when I said I might cut my long hair, which he loves. Easy for him -- he wasn't the one who had to blow-dry it every morning.)

In lieu of my promised blogging whirlwind, I turn to Christina again for an easy post. :) The Four Things Meme.

Four jobs I’ve had:
- Clerk at a video rental store (I had to restock the porn room during working hours. This video chain also made female employees wear SKIRTS on the weekend -- just what you want to be wearing when you're putting "Debbie Does Dallas" away and you're alone in the dirty video room with a middle-aged male customer.)
- Front desk/gift store clerk at a classic car museum (More older male customers hitting on me, but at least they weren't buying porn from me.)
- Line worker at a box-printing factory (I worked with Jerry, Jerry and Larry -- but that's a whole other post!)
- Private English tutor to two children in Madrid. (Which I won't describe, since the first three months of my blog already do!)

Four movies I can watch over and over again:
- Roman Holiday
- Chocolat
- While You Were Sleeping
- Breakfast at Tiffany's

Four places I’ve lived:
- Auburn, IN
- Franklin, IN
- Madrid, Spain
- that's all! (but I still have time)

Four TV shows I love:
- JAG (guilty pleasure #1)
- Lois & Clark, The New Adventures of Superman (guilty pleasure #2)
- I Love Lucy
- Friends

Four places I’ve vacationed:
- Chicago, Ill.
- Naples, Florida
- Italy
- Germany (Hamburg and Berlin)

Four of my favorite dishes:
- ice cream
- melted brie on melba toast
- grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup
- Quiznos classic Italian sub (mmm, toasty!)

Four sites I visit regularly:
- International Herald Tribune
- Expatica
- The Onion
- A ton of blogs, only a few of which are on my blogroll. (I'll get around to it soon!)

Four places I’d rather be right now:
- On a beach, anywhere warm and sunny
- Madrid
- Lake Como, Italy
- France (just because I've never been there!)

Like Christina, I won't foist the meme burden on anyone else. Feel free to tag yourself.

Or waste some time at work, via Sal. (887! Beat that, suckers!)

Have a great weekend. I leave you with this warning -- don't drink and fly.