even though I feel bad, I shan’t apologize

I don’t want every post to start out with an apology. I don’t even want some of them to start that way, come to think of it. I just want us to enjoy each other, so when I fail to post anything for a week, I’m not going to start out by apologizing when I come back. I’m just going to say that I missed you, and I hope you missed me, and we have SO much to talk about, and oh my this soup’s delicious!!

For starters, let me explain something to you that seems to have caused some confusion and worry among my faithful Twitter followers. My roommates and I are…silly comic genius. We have, without planning or even trying really, developed some “characters” that show up periodically in our conversations.

There’s “Unfortunate Prayer Voice,” who really needs a better name. She started when Whitney was mocking me one day in a bizarre voice that sounds absolutely nothing like any human being I’ve ever heard before. I protested, saying that the voice was in no way evocative of my own, and was therefore prohibited for use in mockery of me. If you want to make fun of me by imitation, you can do a ridiculous song and dance, you can giggle when you’re about to tell an amusing anecdote, or you can make a story about ten minutes longer than necessary. But at least use a human voice.

Then there’s “Crazy Prospector,” and I’m not really sure where he came from. I think he started out only as a voice that Lauren used when inquiring after the whereabouts of Whitney. He may be kin to Clucky, the Cluckin’ Chicken.

And finally, there’s “the Conscientious Thug.” Again, I’m not sure where this guy came from, but we believe him to be a cross between “Prison Mike” and Mr. T, and he’s exactly what his name implies - a super-nice guy who always puts others ahead of himself, and who also happens to be a thug. Well, Lauren and I had taken Dooley out the other night, and whilst we were in the yard (we just walked him to the mailbox and back), Whitney tried to call both of us. When we didn’t answer, she became alarmed. Luckily, when we came back inside, I returned her call and assuaged her fears. But upon her arrival at home, Whitney had a message for us from the Conscientious Thug. He said, “It was nice of you to take your roommate’s dog out, but you should always take your cell phone with you for safety just in case you run into someone like me.” That’s sound advice. Thanks, Conscientious Thug.

Next up…Why Being Always a Bridesmaid and Never a Bride Is Actually WAY BETTER!

I’m a quasi-responsible citizen!!

I voted. I have the sticker to prove it. I had a whole long blog post written about why I’d finally decided to vote after so much apathy and indecision. And the internet ate it. So watch these ridiculous videos instead, and pretend I still don’t care about important things.

And this one is AMAZING. Who wants to hold a talent show with me JUST so we can perform it?

Friday at last, Friday at LAST!

Thank God Almighty, it’s FRIDAY AT LAST! Man. It has been some kind of WEEK. I honestly couldn’t even tell you where all the time has gone, but I’ve felt just ridiculously busy. So much so that I have failed to regale you with anything interesting since last Friday! For that, I apologize. I hope that you’ve gotten more done at work this week without Onward Hoe! to distract you from your responsibilities. Let’s see if I can catch you up on the exciting things that have happened.

First of all, Jill got married. It was sweet and beautiful, and she played the fiddle at her own reception. Because she’s awesome. Then I caught the bouquet, and Guthrie (her new hubby) ran over a traffic cone in their get-away vehicle. With all his wedding guests watching. Good times, good friends, good fun.

Then, there was a lot of teaching. And I started going to bed earlier so I could spend a few minutes writing every night in addition to my nightly reading. It’s been off to a bumpy start, but habits take a while to form. I’ll get there.

I had a date last night with Whitney. She ate dinner (I’d already eaten), and then we went on a field trip to Target and Lowe’s Foods. They share a parking lot, which was convenient because we were in a hurry to get back, finish our OK! Magazine article on the Madonna/Guy Ritchie split, and watch The Office. So we went to Target first, returned a sweater I’d purchased, then flew across the parking lot to Lowe’s Foods. It was dark, and you know how those parking lots are. There are little islands everywhere, and you never can tell exactly where the exits are. They’re like mazes sometimes. So I was driving quickly while trying to make sure I didn’t hit anything, which sparked the following conversation:

Whitney: You seem a little unsure of where you’re going.
Me: (Rabidly) A LITTLE NIGHT BLINDNESS NEVER HURT NOBODY!

We both survived, by the way.

When we got home, we watched The Office while peeling grapes for the “Haunted Classroom” my students put on today. The grapes, in the dark, feel like eyeballs. It is very disgusting. We also watched 30 Rock for the first time, and I have to say, I’m hooked already (DLF, you were right). Whoever writes for Alec Baldwin’s character is a freaking genius. I mean, the part where he was talking about the Dora the Explorer underwear that were clearly made for an obese child…that was amazing.

Last night, I had a dream that I married my friend Jim, except I wasn’t actually at the ceremony. I just asked him about it later. He said it had all gone well. He’d said “I do” and everything.

So then today,  my class set up and put on “Haunted Classroom 2008.” They’d spent a large part of Thursday planning it, and then when they came in this morning, it was all I could do to keep them on task for the first hour and a half before it was time to start setting the thing up. And by “on task,” I mean learning vocabulary and putting the lyrics to “Thriller” in order.

Anyway, at 10:30, we stopped “working” and started getting the diddy ready, and by 11:30, we had creepy sounds, cobwebs everywhere, the windows blacked out, skeletons hanging from the ceiling, severed heads on every table, a Taiwanese mummy, an Argentinian witch, a Ukrainian demon bar wench, a Tibetan monk vampire, a Hungarian ghost monster, several multicultural under-the-table goblins, and a Korean clown (handing out candy at the exit). I tell you, friends, it was a thing of beauty.

So after the long break, I put on the werewolf mask and hands they’d brought for me and went around to all the other classes, one by one, inviting them to come experience “HAUNTED CLASSROOM.” And surprisingly enough, people were actually freaked out by it. And my students had a BALL. They all felt, afterwards, as though they were truly ready for their first (in most cases) American Halloween. And that’s what I’m all about, y’all. Preparing them to enter the culture. Normally, I would teach them more Mary Kay-approved makeup techniques than covering one’s face in green eye shadow, but that’ll have to be another lesson. Maybe for when the Tibetan monk is absent.

my new favorite hymn

We’ve sung this song in church several times now, and I just love it. You can read all of the words here (we don’t sing all the verses, and we don’t do it to the organ tune that site plays), and you can listen to a wee preview here (the actual tune we sing). Vintage does it more hard-rockin’ than that, which I really like, but you know I’m always down with a slow jam too. Anyway, I just wanted to share my favorite verse with you. It gets me every time.

From the depth of nature’s blindness,
from the hardening power of sin,
from all malice and unkindness,
from the pride that lurks within,

by thy mercy,
O deliver us, good Lord.

two hours I’ll never get back

I’ve been teaching an American Culture class this semester, which has been really fun so far. We’re going through the decades, from the 1950s to today, talking about the hot political topics of the time, the fashions and fads, the music, the movies, etc. It’s been pretty heavy at times and pretty dry at others, but for the most part, I’ve really enjoyed it, and I think the students have too. Well, we’re up to the 70s, and I was thinking of showing Saturday Night Fever in class tomorrow because, you know, it’s all iconic and whatnot, but having never seen it, I thought it would probably be a good idea to preview it before subjecting a class to it. And man oh man, am I glad I did. I’m also kind of regretting it at the same time because seriously…it’s awful.

There are a couple of dancing scenes that I think are worthwhile, but whew. The rest. I just can’t even tell you how terrible it is. There’s absolutely nothing redeeming about it. To be fair, I wasn’t around in 1977, so I don’t know. Maybe it was a groundbreaking piece of cinema, but I doubt it. As far as I can tell, it introduced disco to the masses and offended even the least delicate of sensibilities in every other way. The acting’s not great, the story is pretty vacant, the language is unnecessarily crass, and there’s sort of a gang-bang scene toward the end right before what’s-his-head falls off the Verrazano-Narrows bridge. Nothing about it is realistic, including how unbelievably jerky the guys are, and even that’s pretty hard to imagine. I want to say that that, at least, is a vote of confidence in the human race, but then again, I have to think that there was some sort of inspiration for the creation of those characters, so I find my opinion, once again, bottomed out.

So needless to say, I shan’t be showing SNF in class tomorrow. I may show the couple of good dance scenes, but I think after that, we’re going to watch The Muppet Movie. Clean, classic, witty fun for the whole family. And such amazing gags as “the fork in the road” and the “myth, MYTH” (”Yeeeeeeeth?”). Oh I love it! It’s settled.

Reunited, and it feels so good!

I realized as I was headed out of town on Friday that I had, both tragically and classically, forgotten my camera, so I don’t have any reunion photos for you just yet. However, there were several cameras there, which means that sooner or later (hopefully sooner), facebook will abound with memories of the weekend, and when that day comes, I shall save them as… and share them with you. But only if I look cute in them. But seriously, who are we kidding? OBviously, I will look cute in all of them. I’m cute. That’s how I roll.

ANYhoe, the ten-year reunion of the Wilkes Central class of ‘98 was a weekend-long event. It started Friday night with drinks at “The Lounge” above Dooley’s bar in Wilkesboro. Yes, Dooley’s. Dooley, for those of you who don’t know, is the name of Whitney’s dog. We have long suspected that he was up to something like this, but Wilkesboro - that’s quite a commute. I guess some of those night classes* he took were business-related. And this explains why he sleeps all day every day. I just want to know whose car he’s driving back and forth with gas prices being what they are. If it’s mine, I expect him to chip in for maintenance and top off the tank.

Upon my arrival at Dooley’s, I saw at least ten people I’d been missing for some time and at least ten more I hadn’t really thought much about at all since 1998 but was ecstatic to see nonetheless. And then every time someone new would walk in, we’d all just look and think or say out loud, “Holy crap.” We just could not believe that they’d actually shown up. So we chatted and hung out and posed for pictures and caught up until I was about to fall over from exhaustion, and around 1:30, I staggered back to the lovely Michelle’s house, where I was staying (thanks Chelle!!). By that point, my expectations had already been exceeded, and we still had another full day of reunion fun ahead of us!

We slept in on Saturday, took our time getting ready, and rolled on over to the Apple Festival around noon. I got a caramel apple sample from Coach Tommy Johnson, who I’m pretty sure had NO idea who I was. We ran into Susan and Emily at some point and walked around with them until Susan left. Then Michelle, Emily and I wandered down the street just a bit more until we decided that it was entirely too hot and crowded to stay out there when we’d pretty much seen everything there was to see already.

Michelle went over to her parents’ house for a while, and I went to help set up for Saturday night’s festivities. Then I came back to discover that there was nary a full-length mirror in Michelle’s house. I called Emily, who saved the day by coming over to tell me what looked good together (since I couldn’t see my outfits as a whole). We both got ready and headed over to Roni’s Italian Restaurant.

Our excitement grew as we approached the restaurant and saw all the cars parked outside. We were fashionably late, so several reunion-goers had already arrived and were inside awaiting our grand entrance (ok, maybe they weren’t so much awaiting our entrance as just hanging out, but still…). It was a different crowd from the one on Friday night. There was some overlap, but there were several people who were there on Friday but not on Saturday and vice versa. In all, I think we probably saw 60-70 people from our class including (but by no means limited to):

• Julie Gilstrap, who came from Scotland. I hadn’t seen her, I don’t think, since I was in Edinburgh in 2004, althought we’ve kept in touch pretty well via facebook (thanks facebook!).
• Lee Spears, who came from frickin’ CHINA even though he didn’t actually graduate with us (he was whisked away to the School of Science and Math after sophomore year). I thought it was very cool of him to come.
• John Bowman, who also left us for the greener pastures of Science and Math, but who was also very cool to come back for our reunion.
• Matt Hagaman. And his fiancée (sniff sniff). The rumors were true. And alas, she seems lovely, so we didn’t feel it was appropriate to take her out back and deal with her. I guess we’ll just let her marry him and wish them all the happiness in the world.
• Sam Graham. Oh internet, if you only knew.
• The lovely Mrs. Emily Hogan, who was voted “most changed since high school,” although we’re really not sure why. She did get a haircut, but other than that, I don’t know that I see a whole lot of difference there. My hair is much shorter now than it was back then, and I didn’t get any votes in that category. What up with that, class of ‘98?
• Brandie Huffman, who was voted “least changed since high school” (evidenced by her name tag, which read “GO EAGLES!!” below her name), and of whom I hope to see video footage very soon. Not many people danced, but really, that was fine. She did enough for all of us.
• My buddy Wes, who lives with his wife probably twenty minutes away from me. I hadn’t seen them in probably eight years. Shame on us. We must repent of such long absences.

There were plenty more, but since most of y’all are bored because you don’t know these people, I’ll stop there. I skipped the picnic at the lake on Sunday afternoon because I had to get back to Raleigh, but before I left, I had brunch with Jim at the Coffee House, which seems to have recovered nicely from when that van drove into it a while back. I highly doubt anyone has ever called a meal at the Coffee House “brunch” before as it is essentially a generic version of the Waffle House. Oh so swanky. But brunch with Jim is lovely by definition even when the meal comprises hash browns and waffles with a strawberry-flavored fruitish topping.

I can’t believe it’s come and gone so fast. We have literally been excited about this reunion for the past five years, and just like that, it’s over. It was good times, though, I must say. Good times indeed. Mediocre food, perhaps, but the company would be near impossible to beat. I tell ya - it’s going to be hard to elope when the time comes and not invite some of those old friends to celebrate my wedding. We’ll have to have some killer parties all over the country to make up for it. Perhaps even all over the world. Yeah, I can handle that.

(*Whitney dreamed once that Dooley started speaking, and when asked how he learned English, he replied very matter-of-factly, “I took night classes.” )

and I call myself an educational professional

Well, I did slightly better on my Hannah Montana quiz than Lauren, Whitney and I did on our Jonas Brothers quiz. But still, I’m pretty sure all chances of getting myself or my children into an Ivy League school are now out the window. If only I’d applied myself more. Mom, Dad, I’m sorry. I’ve let you down.

Hannah Montana Quiz!

60% (9 out of 15 Questions Correct)

Fun quizzes, surveys & blog quizzes by

I have quite a bit of random food in the fridge/freezer that I’m determined to eat before I buy any more. I’d like to do this for two reasons: I don’t want it to go to waste. And I’m poor this month. So let’s see how long I can go without buying food, shall we? I don’t think it’ll be that long, but…

Dear Roommates,

Don’t let me buy any food until I’ve eaten what I have. K thx bai.

and now for something far less grown-up

Friends, I have had…another dream.

I was riding in a taxi, which seemed to be a normal-enough-sized taxi, except there were about eight people in it. There was the driver, someone riding shotgun, a blonde girl standing between them (on the gearshift, presumably), and then in the back, there was a girl from Alabama, DLF, me, my old college roommate Becky, and at least one other girl. I feel like there may have been two others in the backseat, but they didn’t do anything, so I can’t be sure of their presence at all.

Well, Becky was dressed all in blue because she had been to a few different places that day, all of which had blue as one of their major colors. I think at least one of the places she’d been was a restaurant of some sort whose sign was blue. When she explained it in the dream, it made sense even if DLF and I did think it was rather high school of Becky to color-coordinate with her daily places of business.

Anyhoe, Becky, DLF and I were on our way to a bar that was having some kind of event (otherwise, it would only really make sense for Becky to be going). I don’t know what the event was, but we were looking forward to it. The other cab passengers were also headed to bars, but those of a radically different sort from the one where we planned on spending the evening. These girls (the blonde in the front seat, the Alabaman and the other girl) were more of the stereotypical sorority variety. They were all dolled up in their going-out gear, and they were ready to par-tay.

DLF and I were trying to talk to the Alabaman, but Southern as we are, we could not understand a word she said. I’m pretty sure she was more of a…physical communicator anyway, though, because all of a sudden, a popular club song came on the radio, and the three girls (Blondie, ‘Bama, and Other Girl) stood up in the cab and commenced to dancing VERY inappropriately. Well, it was all DLF and I could do to contain ourselves. I thought we might explode from holding in the laughter. It was just that ridiculous a sight. And the poor cabbie couldn’t see for the blonde undulating in his face. He kept having to push her aside and lean over to see around her.

The end.

Thanks, Danielle!

I had fun with this, but if you don’t like it, blame Danielle. It’s not like you can do anything to her. She lives way over yonder on the other side of the world. It’s SPRING there, even. And it’s not like you can just go into SPRING and get her. It’s a whole other season. I dare you to even try.

How well can you…

cook? I have to say…I’m pretty good, but I don’t do it that often because I don’t plan ahead well enough to have ingredients on hand. I generally get hungry, decide what I want, go out to purchase ingredients, decide I’m too hungry to wait until I’ve cooked whatever it is I have the ingredients for, and swing by the Taco Bell drive-thru on the way home from the grocery store. On the upside, I have those ingredients for later. And THAT is the only reason I know I can cook at all.

sew? Ummm…hello?

clean? Hahaha. Yeah, let’s not discuss that. Well, ok, we can. I like to put the dishes in the dishwasher as I use them. Then, when it’s full, I like to run it. But after that, things start to break down. I don’t like to unload the dishwasher, so then I can’t put new dirties in, and they just pile up in the sink. My bathroom sink, however, is always clean. I wipe it down every night after I wash my face. Generally, although things may not be dirty, they are just strewn. I strew. I’m a strewer. It’s not unsanitary. It’s just cluttered.

sing? Like a Vienna Choir Boy

play an instrument? I can play the guitar…kind of. And I used to be able to play the piano. Back me up on this, please, somebody, because anyone who’s heard me lately would never believe it.

write? I mean. I like to write. I love it, actually. And people tell me I do it well, although that didn’t really start until college. Up until that time, I didn’t think I was very good at it, probably because my style didn’t fit so well into the writing mold required by standardized tests. Even when I took the GRE (after I’d realized I could write), I got a pretty bad score on the writing portion. So unappreciated.

read? I can read at a post-graduate level. Oh yeah. I’m that good.

paint or draw? THIS is worth laughing about. I sometimes try to use illustrations to define words or concepts to my students, and all animals come out looking like animals other than the animals they were intended to be. And all people are stick figures unless they need to be wearing clothing or have a chest cavity for some reason. The one thing I can draw kind of well is a big ol’ plantation house. When I taught level 1, we would talk about house vocabulary, and I would have them draw and write about their dream house. Their dream houses would inevitably be modest ranches - maybe a split-level if they were really ambitious. But mine… Mine was always a two-story, white house with columns, a wrap-around porch, a balcony, a porch swing, a bay window, two chimneys, and a gigantic old oak tree in the front yard. Not that I’ve thought about it that much.

tell stories? Well, I needed a dresser, and we needed a coffee table for our living room, so we set out one Saturday to scour the Goodwills of the Triangle in search of these items. But they are large items, you see, and we were in my car, which would not accommodate them and us, so we stopped by Lauren’s parents’ house to borrow their truck. Then we went back to two Goodwills to make/pick up our purchases before driving back across town to our house. Lauren, needing to return the truck to her parents, headed over to their house for dinner, but it’s quite a haul from there to here, and her mom didn’t want to drive her back over to our place.

Lucky for her, I was going to the airport that night to pick up VA, and the airport is MUCH closer to their place, so her mom just dropped her off with me at the Sheetz down the street from RDU, we picked up VA (after about a two-hour delay), and headed back into town to drop VA at her apartment before returning home (finally).

So we were in the car with VA, and she asked something along the lines of, “Lauren, what made you decide to come to the airport too?” And I proceeded to launch into the whole story of the day, starting with, “Well, I needed a dresser…” which Lauren found REALLY amusing. She said she probably would have just said something like, “Oh, I was at my parents’ house, and I didn’t have my car, so my mom just brought me to meet Beth instead of driving me 30 minutes across town.”

I said that was completely illogical to me, and that it only made sense to start at the beginning of the story regardless of whether or not the complete story is necessary information. So I don’t know if I’m good at telling stories. But I really like (or perhaps feel compelled) to tell them.

persuade? I’m probably really good at convincing people to do things they want to do deep down but feel they shouldn’t do for some silly reason of responsibility or societal expectation. Oh yeah. I’m an instigator.

resist those who persuade you? Same thing. If I want to do something, I am easily persuaded to do it. But if I do not want to do something, I am unmovable.

dress? I don’t dress. I OWN.

decorate a room? It takes me a long time to get a room just right, but I take great joy in seeing it come together. I love finding old fixer-upper stuff at the flea market, etc. to give a room a little extra something. I also like seeing completely mismatched things come together to complete a room. I find that very beautiful for some reason.

decorate a cake? I’m not very good at cake decorating. I leave that to Brookie. But I did make one spectacular “Wave of Babies” cupcake. And I am a champion cake-eater!

parallel park? On a good day, I’m a pro. But on a bad day, I may as well not even try. I just can’t get close enough to the curb sometimes.

dance? What? You mean you have yet to see me to “The Grind” or “Sexy Up/Down” or any square dance moves?????? Oh, friend, you are MISSING. OUT.

swim? I’m a Pisces and a once-licensed SCUBA diver. You be the judge.

the results are in

Well, I just checked the 2008 “A Christmas Carol” cast list, and it appears as though I will not BE APPEARING ON STAGE THIS HOLIDAY SEASON!!!!!!! I have never seen it before, but I’m told it’s quite a fun little show, so everyone get your tickets right away, so you can not SEE ME PERFORMING LIVE!!!! This is really just a test to see who reads and who just skims. Was anyone duped by my deceptive caps locking and bolding?

I don’t really have much else to say about it. I am neither surprised nor disappointed. It would have been fun, but I have plenty of other things going on in my life. For instance, right now, I’m going to watch Arrested Development and eat Oreos. See? I’m super-busy. (Actually, I am pretty busy, but it’s Friday, and I’m tired. Don’t judge.)