SKI SEASON HAS OPENED

It's ready, after 3 winters of non-skiing for me. Can't wait to see how the scraping down the side of a hill in MN compares to the same thing in Iowa. Can't wait to hear the scccrrreeeecchhhh of my skis on the ice.

By the numbers

By the numbers.... again

28 years of not going shopping on Black Friday

4 states visited this weekend

10 miles ran

1 bottle of Baileys gone


1 forgotten dish left at a friend's

1 round of arkham horror, 1 character devoured

5 rounds of Condotierre, zero wins.

1 hour at the second job

1 puppy crate cleaned

1 house in very good shape with the lovely tenants that we have. <3 our tenants

And tomorrow, we'll return home with 2 dogs.

Where did all of my optimism go?

Answer: Flushed down the toilet?
Answer: swept away after I hit the light pole and realized I'd just set off a chain of events that I could not recover from entirely?



Who knows. Last night, I was pretty sure my life was going to be amazing, today I got that unexpected call from the insurance agent at 10 AM and now I'm pretty sure it's impossible to recover. Surprise, surprise, surprise.

Voyuers and Vowell

I just read her brief essay on the Chelsea hotel. Are we all voyeurs if we follow the  artistic lifestyles  in minute detail, hoping to piece it all together to make sense of our world today? By visiting or writing about Chelsea, are we hoping to incorporate our own bohemian desires into a dirty hotel, and imagine that it's 1968 again and we're about to change the world by indulging in all hedonism and sex?

And if not, if we're sadly in another culture now, what is the use of art now, what changes are desperately needed in our society that can be solved by art? If we aren't saving or changing the world when we drink, have free sex, make music and film our best friends on camera at ultra slow frame rates for hours on end, what are we doing? We're certainly not changing the world by buying shit, eating out at dinner and waiting for our vacations.

Two worlds?

Our friends from KC came up this weekend and we went out for the entire weekend to celebrate Dan's birthday. It was a little strange to imagine them continuing their lives on without us and it was strange to do MN things with them, but we had a relatively fun time. There's an awesome MN restaurant called Chino Latinos that everyone here adores, so at least we can now say we tried it. Their menu changes daily. I'd have to say the Cuban Pork Crisis was the best thing we ordered, with a fried banana blockade. YUM.

After we dropped our friends off, we realized we were walking in freezing rain and that driving in it was even worse. MN had a record number of reported car accidents in the ice storm, and we were one of the unreported ones. I drove the camry into a light pole at very low speeds right after we took our friends back to the hotel.  So, we'll be spending some time in the body shop. Ironically, it was on the day that we sold the civic to some Iowans. Whelp, can't change that much.  We really don't need 2 cars in MN, since the bus and light rail go everywhere. It will be nice to have the cash for the car, too, and to save on insurance and not worry about moving it whenever the snow plow comes to the apartment. 

As it turns out, we're going back to KC over Thanksgiving. We'll dismantle part of the desk, rake leaves, fix a loose piece of storm window trim,  grab all of the paintings and plants we couldn't take, and check on the place. The guys renting our house wanted to get a puppy, so I am checking up on that. At first, I said NO PUPPIES. But after their long description of the puppy, I caved, even though I am still very, very worried about the puppy's presence in the house.
me: I feel like such an ass for not letting someone own a puppy.
friend: Well, that's what being a landlord turns you into.

*sigh*

More on Lake Superior

Here we are, in our weekend at the lake. On Sunday, I woke us up in time to see the sunrise. It was literally perfect timing, about 5 minutes after we went outside, the sun started to blaze across the lake and right into our room. I grabbed a blanket and walked down to the shore and Dan eventually crawled out of bed and came down, too.
Then we took a hike to the river, napped in the sun, watched the stars on the back porch, sat in the hot tub, took a jacuzzi bath, swam in the pool, sat in the sauna and had delightful entertainment together while renting a movie, and none of those events were in order.

In the guest book in our room, everyone has commented about how restive and healing their week(end) at the lake has been for them.  I'm a convert to the North Shore. I guess I've just had so many good memories at lake and river houses, that I really want to bring my whole family there, make strawberry shortcake, play cards and heaven help us, but I want to swim in the lake. This is why wetsuits exist.  So, anyone want to come for New Year's?

Return from the North

I have found heaven, it is near Lake Superior. I have left heaven and returned to my house and now must wait until New Year's to go back.

We loved it so much that we decided to book our New Year's long weekend there as well, but this time, we'll share it with friends. The lake is 15 feet from the back door, uninterrupted visibility. The fireplace, the kitchen, the hiking, all of these things were wonderful. You can even build a bonfire on the beach at night. I often wonder how we got so lucky to continually see things like this. I feel guilty and I want to be sure that Dan's nieces and nephews can enjoy it.

Warm Hats

Just bought two bomber hats, down filled, faux fur lined. They will arrive in 3 days and they were on sale.
One is black
One is white

This winter, I will be impenetrable. Impervious to cold.

This weekend, we are going as far north as I have ever been on ground. Of course, when flying to Japan, we flew over the arctic sea, but that doesn't count, because I wasn't experiencing it myself.

We'll be so close to Canada, I can practically spit at it. Sadly, we can't cross the border because I lost my passport last January on our trip to DC. Ahh, well. The room has a fireplace and a jacuzzi in it and I really wish we were going on Friday, but it takes 5 hours from Minneapolis to the north. It's going to be so beautiful, I can't wait.

Yesterday, someone said the words "self-proclaimed hippy", then turned to me and said "no offense by that."
I took that to mean that they found me to be a hippy. I guess ordering tofu at dinner didn't help my case much. And I didn't even mention that I support natural child birth, for fear of being clobbered.

Lord Jesus Saves

Your balls for later.

This sign cracked me up. "Scenic view from Lake Nokomis: Lord Jesus Saves!
Your balls for later. "

The lake was beautiful and peaceful, the best place to get away without leaving the city, yadda yadda. If I inherit, (not likely with my dad's second marriage) I would love to move there.

On the way home, we plotted what to do for our 6th anniversary and Dan's mother's need for us to come to her place to clean on our 6th anniversary. I think we worked out a solution. We were going to go back, help her clean, then escape to the jacuzzi romance package at the hotel we went to after our wedding. Then Molly Maids arrived for her, thus we could go back next weekend instead for the requisite grocery shopping and house-cleaning helping visit. So we might be able to rent a cabin, watch movies, have tons and tons of sex while eating chocolate covered brownies by the lake in Minnesota instead. Happy 6th Anniversary to us.

I gotta say, I'm nervous about marriage in general right now. I had a conversation with some family about my aunt: she's getting divorced. He was always kind of a jerk (ok, really a jerk!) but we figured that his recovery from alcoholism was a good step in the right direction. My aunt gave him another chance several years ago, and he seemed to be ok. He still was completely unsupportive of her animal love and sat impassively at the TV while Geri, Dan and I tried to help her with a convulsing Cowboy doggie, but he came to family gatherings and said fond words about my sister and my grandma at her funeral. My grandma always made it clear when he was being an ass and I am sure she might be semi-relieved to see this marriage end. But it also has bad results for my aunt. This time, my uncle came home with a new truck, new swimming trunks that his "sister" gave him. Except it turns out his sister was really his mistress and thus continues on that cycle of an affair and selling the house, boarding or selling the horses, getting rid of the 4 wheeler, etc. Just seems like it doesn't have to go this way for EVERY woman in my family, right? Am I just biding my time until my marriage unravels in front of me, and I'm left trying to scrape together my life at age 54 instead of retiring....