1) I spent the night with my best friend, Tracey, as I will do nine out of the thirteen days I’m in Ohio, and as she was dropping me off at my parents’ house yesterday morning, one local radio station played Soundgarden’s “Blow Up the Outside World”, and another played Grant Lee Buffalo’s “Truly, Truly” after it, and we affirmed our dedication to 90s music despite the overall concensus that it sucks.
2) While getting ready to go to my great-aunt’s house to decorate a gingerbread house with my cousins, I happened to turn on “Degrassi” to celebrate the fact that my parents have cable for the first time in my entire life, and it was the episode where J.T. gets stabbed! Which I had never seen before! It was meant to be.
3) I came home from my great-aunt’s house to find my dad, one of his friends, and my step-sister’s future husband using a wooden board in the backyard for target practice. I was surprised to find that I thought it was kind of cool.
4) My parents drove me two towns over to buy New Super Mario Bros. for Wii as my final Christmas gift, and the guy who checked us out at this tiny gaming store that probably sees ten customers a day told me, “Just so you know, this game is awesome.” I didn’t tell him that my co-workers Jeff and Steve stayed late at work with me every night the week before vacation so we could beat it on the office Wii before I left for Ohio.
5) My parents and I watched Julie & Julia, and then when they went to bed, I found an episode of “The Office” on. It was the one where Jim tells Pam he loves her at the office casino night and then kisses her. I am a sap and won’t apologize.
My friend Roy sent me a link to Sketchy Santas yesterday, and while I appreciate their offerings, I think I have a photo of the sketchiest Santa of all:
Tracey may be smiling here, but not ten seconds before, she was crying out in horror from her car at this giant red-faced Santa. The thing has been hanging outside of my Crazy Great-Aunt Dorothy’s house every Christmas for as long as I can remember. The smashed nose is a recent addition, but the duct tape holding it up is not.
We’re thinking it may have been used as anti-American Indian propaganda back in the day. No?
which is a five-day street fair in a town ten minutes away from where I grew up, beloved by the world and chock full of country charm such as
the belief that pumpkin-related foods are entertainment,
so many effin’ pumpkin displays it makes the pie center of your brain kick into triple overdrive,
inappropriate signage,
and so much food that you start to force feed it to your family pets just to get rid of all the treats you bring home with you.
All of our eatin’ is cataloged here at donuts4dinner.com, because you non-food-loving types don’t deserve to get to see photos of deep-fried peanut butter.
Last week’s New York magazine had the most interesting article about a co-housing community trying to plant roots in Brooklyn. The idea is that they’ll buy an abandoned factory or warehouse, fit it with something like 30 apartments, and include huge common areas where people can gather. They’ll make all decisions as a community, eat dinner together, keep their apartment doors open, and basically be family to each other in a city where people pride themselves on anonymity.
I love the idea. I’m now dying to be a part of it and would be in a second if I had the $500k for one of their apartments. I talk daily about how much I miss the way people say hello to everyone they pass in my hometown in Ohio, the way you have to respect and care for each other when you know each other’s fathers and brothers and were taught by each other’s grandmothers in elementary school. When you pass different people every day and your neighbor literally runs into his apartment to avoid having to exchange pleasantries with you, it’s much easier to feel separate and to be selfish and rude. Imagine how many fewer people I’d have to kick in the balls on the subway if we all knew each other personally and didn’t assume our problems were worse and ourselves more deserving of a comfortable spot on the train. It’d be like living in a college dorm room all over again, except with children and puppies.
Yet everyone else I’ve talked to seems to think this is a terrible idea. You?
Here’s a hugely long rundown of my trip to visit the fam in Ohio, which is actually very brief if you consider everything I did:
Wednesday: My best friend, Tracey picked me up at the airport at 10 p.m. after my first on-time flight all year. After a stop at McDonald’s (YES!), we went back to her apartment to watch all of the reality TV on her DVR until, you know, 5 a.m.
Thursday: We woke up just in time to get lunch at Dairy Queen (YES!), where I sang along with every country song I remembered from my childhood growin’ up on the farm. We went shopping at Walmart (YES!) for Tracey’s parents and spent some time at their house in our hometown, using phrases like “this milk smells blinky” and admiring their new window trim. After picking up dinner at Arby’s (YES!), we visited Tracey’s friend Kim to admire her new house and watch “Project Runway” before our tradition of going to Ladies 80s at a local bar. We danced until 2 a.m., sat on the patio and reminisced about high school until 3 a.m., and then let the gays hump us until 4 a.m., at which time the place closed, and we had to go to Steak’n'Shake (YES!).
Friday: We woke up moments before noon and decided to see Julie & Julia at 12:50. I was desperate for Wendy’s new boneless buffalo wings and a Twisted Frosty, so we rushed inside and used our fatty skills to scarf down our food in mere moments. After the movie, Tracey drove me twenty whole minutes from her apartment to my parents’ house, where we saw my stepsister’s new Mastiff puppy, because she lives two houses away from my parents with her boyfriend and his 11-year-old twin girls. And who lives in the house in between? One of my stepbrothers, his wife, and their new baby. How country is that? My parents took us to Bob Evans (YES!) for dinner, and then Tracey and I went to a deck party at our high school friend Katie’s house. That’s right; they had a party for their new deck. We left at midnight and went to Momo2, an Asian hangout with karaoke, bowling, a lounge, snacks, and smoothies. We got a private karaoke room for two and literally sang everything we knew from the song book. The cashier had told us they might close before 3 a.m. if it was dead and joked that he wouldn’t forget about us, but at 3:06, we left our room and found all the lights in the place on, everything shut down, and our cashier with a very surprised look on his face.
Saturday: We had Dairy Queen again for lunch, because we think it’s hot to order frozen hot chocolate: not only is it not on the menu, but it seems to only be available in Ohio. Tracey drove me to my parents’ house in the afternoon for my dad’s birthday celebration, which involved homemade carrot cake courtesy of my stepmom and homemade ice cream courtesy of my dad. My sister came up from Kentucky, and we spent the night watching television shows about kidnapping, because there’s nothing else to do in the country.
Sunday: I went to church with my parents and sister, where we saw my crazy great-aunt Dorothy. Before I told her anything about my plans for the day, she said, “It’s a shame you can’t come over this afternoon–say about 1:30 or 2–because your cousins are going to be there.” I just nodded like, “Yeah, it’s a real shame.” But then at the end of the service, she told my sister and me that she’d see us another day, and my sister said, “Or maybe today!” So then she got all overly-excited and kept saying, “Okay, see you later today! You can come over any time! I’ll see you today! Oh, girls! I’ll see you later!” Godloveher. That night, Tracey and her husband picked me up at home and took me to Olive Garden (YES YES!), which exists in NYC but feels icky and touristy here. We went back to Tracey and Dan’s and watched the end of “Lost” season 5, which means I’m officially caught up with the series OMG.
Monday: We met our friend Katie for lunch at Wendy’s with her husband and baby and learned that adult conversation ceases once a baby exists, but it’s an awfully cute baby. Tracey and I spent the afternoon watching Adventureland, which was just as good the second time and is seriously a great movie–absolutely in my top ten–and it’s ridiculous that it’s not more popular, although of course I secretly enjoy that it’s not. I went home for dinner with my parents, which was supposed to be at a local pizza place we love but ended up being at O’Charley’s (YES!). My parents and I spent the entire meal fighting about public healthcare, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and whether or not there’s an impending civil war. My stepmom brought up death panels, I snapped at her for believing that nonsense, and she said she’s glad I’m not the one taking care of her when she’s old. It was a great way for us to end my time at home together, obviously. They dropped me off at Tracey’s, and she and I spent the next two hours talking about politics, inheritances, and how parental sickness really tears siblings apart. We finished the conversation while getting ice cream at our favourite place, Graeter’s, and then went back to her apartment to watch Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist, which suuuuuucked just like I thought it would, and Welcome to the Dollhouse, which didn’t.
Tuesday: Tracey took me to Dairy Queen one last time before dropping me off at the airport. Coming back to the city no longer feels weird to me, but going home feels just as good.
I’m leaving for Ohio tonight for an entire week of chain restaurant dining without guilt, Harmony Korine marathons (we’ve only ever seen Kids and Gummo OMG), and . . . okay, probably nothing else. But Ohio is still totally fun, I swear!
I mean, only in Ohio do high school notes between best friends such as this one happen:
Katie: Is he hot or what? Tracey: His value went up even more when he said “llama”.
And only in Ohio do penny horses operate themselves at Meijer while Tracey and Katie creepily film them:
See you in a week! (And don’t write anything important in your blogs between now and then, thanks.)
As I’ve told you before, I’m a member of the OkCupid dating site so I can threaten Kamran with how many boys are e-mailing me despite my “in a relationship” status every time some hot law school co-ed starts talking mergers and acquisitions with him.
Today, they sent me this:
The entire area that I grew up in and love? WORST.
Where are all of the tractor-drivin’, homosexual-lovin’ Midwesterners?
I never want to be one of those people who thinks she’s better than the place she came from. I want to always think Columbus and the village (seriously, village) where I was raised in Ohio are unbeatable.
For the longest time, I fought the word soda. I was raised on pop, and soda sounded funny to me every time I heard it used. No matter how many times people told me I gave myself away as a Midwesterner, I refused to switch. Why should I feel bad about where I’m from?
But after about a year of living here, I found myself saying soda automatically. And when I went home to visit and my best friend said pop to me, I accidentally made fun of her without even realizing what it meant for my heritage.
Seriously, though, this picture from my last trip home still cracks me up:
Not only does it say pop, but it only costs 35¢! How adorable, right?
I’m still not buying into other NYCisms like stand ON line (instead of IN line) or call OUT sick (instead of IN sick), though. I still have some standards.
Although I absolutely can’t get behind Charlyne Yi’s weak chin, there’s one reason I’ll be seeing the movie Paper Heart, and it’s this clip from the trailer:
I am a hot wing fiend. But only boneless wings. And only the ones at Applebee’s, really. Sitting in a booth with my best friend in Ohio during Applebee’s happy hour, when a basket of wings will run you $3.50, is my idea of heaven. I once knew someone who worked at Applebee’s, and when I asked him if he could get me a bottle of the buffalo sauce, he told me it comes in a 20-pound bag. And while that should be disgusting, it only made me love it all the more.
However, there’s one thing that may keep me from ever eating a buffalo wing again, and it’s these photos of my friends Jack and Jeff from our recent outing to Leisure Time Bowl. This should not in any way dissuade you from going to Leisure Time, though it may dissuade you from keeping your lunch down:
One of my writing professors (and a member of my senior thesis panel), Michelle Herman, wrote this really excellent book called The Middle of Everything that’s supposed to be about motherhood but is actually about best friends and how terrible life is when you don’t have one. It’s been years since I read it, but I thought about it last weekend while I was home in Ohio visiting my family and my best friend, Tracey.
When I moved away to New York without really so much as asking her what she thought of the idea, she should’ve given me up. If I’d been the one left behind for some stupid city she’d visited only twice where she only knew one person and didn’t have a job waiting for her, I first would’ve cried my eyes out and second would’ve deleted her number from my cellphone. Instead, Tracey sent me postcards and packages and called me and let me call her eight times a day all through that first year when I was so poor I could only visit, like, once.
Now that I’m toooootally rich and visit all the time, we pretty much spend all of our minutes together playing with her cats, watching TV marathons, visiting the one high school friend we still care about (inflammatory!), and eating all of the chain restaurant food you can’t get in NYC. Which is how it should be with best friends.
Highlights from my very short trip this weekend include trying on the tiniest purple fur vest at Forever 21 on our way into the premiere of Up:
and making this video that will only be awesome to us and our friend Eric Leath:
Before I get into all the to-do surrounding my best friend Tracey’s wedding, allow me to showcase the other awesomeness that occurred during my five-day trip back home to Ohio.
After picking me up at the airport on Tuesday night as is tradition, Tracey whisked me back to her apartment to see if three months of working out every day and eating only half as many quesadillas as I would’ve liked made me lose the FIVE INCHES I needed to in order to fit into the lovely black satin and tulle bridesmaid’s dress she’d purchased for me.
Finding that I still needed at least a half an inch less flesh to get the thing zipped, we drove down the street to Walmart (yes, Walmart) and bought two body-shaping corset things. But it turns out that they’re not like getting liposuction at all. Even the one that was so tight I had to bend over and hold on to the dining room table while Tracey attempted to snap it closed didn’t work. Tracey calmly told me that maybe we should’ve just had the dress altered back in December when I first found out I’d had her buy it way too small, but I appreciated the motivation, and hey, I did manage to lose at least four inches. So suck it, Tracey.
The next afternoon, after a trip to the fabric store, she drove me down to our hometown to visit our old neighbor, who happens to make wedding gowns for a living. Her scrapbook full of bridesmaid’s dresses from the 80s with puffy sleeves made out of what looked like floral-print carpet were a real treat, but the best part of the day was chasing her six pet chickens around the yard, where they freely roam:
SO COUNTRY!
That evening, I went over to visit my friends Katie and Nick, who are married and have a home and a baby and cook dinner and seem totally weird to me:
I’ve been friends with Katie since we were in the womb and met Nick in college while working at the science museum in Columbus where Tracey would have her wedding, and since I set them up, I take particular interest in their relationship and pretty much claim their kid as my own, because 10-month-old Baby Maria is sort of the cutest thing ever:
Even my dad agrees that a baby has never been cuter, and as my father, he’s not technically allowed to say that.
Visiting them makes me feel like living in our hometown wouldn’t be the worst idea possible, because they have things like a finished basement with a bar!:
Where they have things like creme de menthe on hand at all times!:
And where they teach their children to be lushes!:
Ohio is HEAVEN, I tell you! Listening to David Bowie on vinyl, drinking homemade cocktails, and tossing balls at a baby on a pool table:
The next morning, I went with my dad to get the tires changed on his truck, which turned out to be an hour of standing around, listening to men talk about how hard it must be for stock car racers in an economy like this with the cost of tires so high. My dad is an enviable small-talker, so I busied myself with Chubby, the garage dog who eats nuts, bolts, and scrap rubber:
You can’t tell, but Chubby is chewing on a hex wrench here.
But the best part of the garage were these words stenciled all over the floor, not that I’m elitist or judgemental:
I’m going to Ohio tonight, because Tracey and Dan are getting married on Saturday! Even though we both agree that societal conventions like marriage are ridiculous! And Tracey’s going to take his last name to boot! I’m using exclamation points sarcastically to voice my displeasure!
No, no, I kid. I mean, come on, look how cute they are together!:
And my other friend for life, Katie, who no longer has a pregnant belly for me to gnaw on!:
But it’s really all about this one!:
Best friends montage!:
These are the times when living away from my friends-since-we-were-babies especially sucks. One of Tracey’s other bridesmaids had to plan her shower, and I just got to fly in back in January and enjoy it. And Tracey somehow feels like she has to make up for me having to buy a plane ticket in for the wedding, even though I’m the one who moved away. And when she and Dan should be enjoying their last moments of unwedded freedom, I’m going to be tagging along to their romantic dinners and forcing Dan to entertain himself otherwise while I play hours and hours of Scene It? with Tracey. Ahhhhh, the life I lead.
I’m going home later this month to be in my best friend Tracey’s wedding, and I decided that I might as well take advantage of all manner of cheap healthcare while I’m there, so I called up the ol’ family eye doctor the other day.
I’ve been going to this guy all my life and have been in love him almost as long, ’cause he used to put his hand on my knee and ask me how school was going back when all I knew was a bunch of boys who liked sports and listened to Ginuwine. And since I’ve been going to him all my life, I recognised his receptionist’s voice immediately when I called. Yet when she asked my name, I still spelled it out for her, as if everyone from my grandmother on down in my family doesn’t go there.
She asked, “Katie, what’s your license plate number?” I thought it must be a new way to identify patients in their computer system, so I thought for a second and then said, “Oh, wait, I don’t own a car anymore!” (I had to go on to mention that I now live in New York City, because this is obviously the only thing I have going for me.) She seemed disappointed and said, “My husband and I swore we were behind you the other day when we saw a license plate that said KTETTE.”
That’s right; my eye doctor’s receptionist thinks of me when she’s on the road. Don’t you love small towns?
I wrote my dad an e-mail yesterday that included this photo of him from my sister’s wedding:
I told him, “I think this is one of the best ever taken of you, thankyouverymuch. When you decide to join Facebook to find old classmates, you can use it as your profile picture.”
He wrote back, “I only have to look in the graveyard to find old classmates.”
This post is entirely for me and not at all for you, so just scroll through the pictures quietly and don’t even think of complaining about how long it is.
Okay, I’m just going to get it out of the way and say that my sister’s wedding was the best wedding ever. In history. And that there’s no reason for anyone else to get married, because all weddings will pale in comparison and will only serve to make every bride and groom from here on out reconsider whether marriage was the right choice for them what with all of their imperfections being brought to light before all of their family and friends. AND GOD.
So as I was leaving work at 12:30 last Tuesday for the airport, my best friend Tracey texted me to say that her fiancé would be picking me up due to the forthcoming snow and freezing rain. I called her immediately and was like, “Bitch, no. You are a whining asshole baby, and you WILL be at the airport at 5:30.” And she was.
So were about 42 inches of snow, along with ice that coated all the trees, cars, and cats in sight:
We braved the weather long enough to pick up my dark red strapless bridesmaid’s dress at David’s Bridal–that’s right! mere days before the wedding, having not tried it on since November!–and then settled in for the evening at her apartment, where we ended up being snowbound for the next two days.
The drive from Ohio to Kentucky with my parents was three hours of blurry, icy trees
which led to four hours of nonstop fun at the rehearsal at the groom’s parents’ church. It was the most perfect setting for a wedding, with a huge cross cut out in glass at the front, giant ceilings, pews that were interestingly bright blue, and a glass door in the back for the bride and groom to walk through:
The afternoon started out joyous enough
but after an hour of making decisions about when the boys were walking in, when the girls were walking in, and which candelabra was getting lit when, Joanie the Bride was ready to get it all over with:
Luckily, there were her five stunning bridesmaids
From left: her incredible sister Katie, her friends Miranda and Kayla,
the bride herself, her best friend Jessica, and her friend Cindy
posing for dirty pictures on the piano
and her future husband staring at her boobs
to cheer her up. And so the rehearsal started:
My favourite part is when the minister asks who’s giving the bride away
and our dad answers, “Her mother and I,” before realizing that hey,
her mother’s dead, and maybe she doesn’t want our stepmom being called
her mother, but no, we love our stepmom and consider her the best
stand-in possible, and a good laugh is shared by all later.
Joanie’s friends are so much fun that we couldn’t stop laughing all night, and despite mean looks from both the minister and Joanie every time we made a scene, we knew the bride was secretly on our team. She made it not-so-secret when the minister practiced presenting her and Josh to the audience for the first time as Mr. and Mrs., “Everlasting Love” played over the church speakers, and Joanie couldn’t help but dance down the aisle. Every single time they did it. I couldn’t have been happier that my sister had chosen such a non-traditional ceremony.
Dinner was in the kitchen of the church and was perfectly wonderful until Joanie decided to pass out our bridesmaid jewelry and Kayla caught her tissue paper on fire. Unsure of how to handle it, she exclaimed to Josh the Groom, “You’re a man! Do something!” And so Caffeine Free Diet Coke was poured onto the table, leaving quite an unsightly aftermath:
Joanie and Josh had decided against a DJ and had instead rented a DJ-in-a-Box, which lets you program your own playlists but can also basically be used as a jukebox where guests can search for a song they want to hear. So instead of, say, resting on the night before her wedding, Joanie stayed up late with our cousin Bethany, our friend Michelle, and me, doing karaoke and teaching us the Cupid Shuffle for use at her reception:
The next morning, Bethany, Michelle, and I went over early to the reception hall with Josh to decorate
and admire the cakes, one of which was classy with pearls and ribbon
and one of which was meant for BOYS (and Bethany):
We went back to Josh and Joanie’s house to shower, and then Joanie drove me to the church, where we met her photographer and her bridesmaids to apply our makeup
and to flatten and hairspray my hair into what looked like a helmet. We sequestered ourselves in the church’s kitchen to dress ourselves, to each take a turn touching Joanie’s boobs
and to convince Joanie that snow boots weren’t proper footwear for a wedding day (even though I was obviously wearing Crocs):
However, it was later decided that strappy sandals weren’t exactly proper, either, when the photographer had us venture outside to take pictures in the snow. I didn’t bring my camera out with me stupidly, so you’ll just have to imagine how totally beautiful my little sister was standing in the middle of a field, surrounded by nothing but whiteness. Half of the time she was wearing her cream-colored pea coat, and half of the time we bridesmaids were all cuddling around her to keep her warm. And then the photographer posed her in the gazebo behind the church with icicles falling all over it. Miranda was wearing open-toed shoes, and Cindy actually had to take her heels off and walk barefoot in the snow to keep from slipping on the ice, but all of the hypothermia in the world would’ve been worth it for those shots.
We went back inside for more photos before the guests arrived, and of course I couldn’t allow any of them to turn out decently:
but I wasn’t the only one having a good time:
Look at her little socks!
I sorta want to get married just for the pictures.
Dad was incredibly happy before the ceremony
but then pretty much cried nonstop from the moment he stepped into the church, and for good reason. Joanie chose the music of “Edelweiss” for her walk down the aisle with Dad, for God’s sake. And Josh’s dad sang “Can’t Help Falling in Love“. And they took all of the crappy misogynist Bible stuff out of the minister’s monologues and just left the pretty Bible stuff. And Joanie and Josh just looked so happy that for half a second, I thought, Marriage is so wonderful! I want to get married! But then I realized that no, weddings are wonderful, and marriage still sucks.
I smiled literally throughout the entire ceremony, though. Especially when our parents sang “It’s Your Love“, which made my eyes well up from my dad’s first yeeeeeeeah-aaaaah-aaaaah-aah. But I wouldn’t let myself cry, because I was wearing a hell of a lot of eyeliner, and let’s not kid ourselves about my priorities.
I was impressed with how well Josh held up during his vows, but Joanie only made it about two words in before her voice cracked, and the rest of her vows were adorably barely audible. Co-maid-of-honor Jessica later told me that when Joanie reached back to hand her bouquet over so she could hold Josh’s hands and exchange their rings, the tissue she had been holding was completely soaked from sweat. So charming!
After Joanie re-did her makeup on the one eye that she’d wiped too much during the ceremony and we took pictures with various family members who would’ve disowned us had we not included them, I rode with Joanie and Josh to the reception hall. Cousin Bethany was waiting by the DJ-in-a-Box to press the button that played “Sandstorm” and announced to the crowd that the bride and groom had arrived. It was totally cheesy and totally awesome.
What I loved about their reception is that it was completely informal. There were no seating assignments, no one releasing the tables to the buffet at specific intervals, no ridiculous groom pulling the garter off the bride’s leg with his teeth. Josh’s family made all of the food, so it was exactly what they wanted, and they basically just sat back at the head table and let people shower money on them.
After all of the cured meats and mini cheesecakes had been devoured, Josh pushed a button on the DJ-in-a-Box and grabbed Joanie for their first dance, which was to Ben Folds’ “The Luckiest“:
Then it was time to cut the classy cake, which didn’t involve smearing icing all over anyone’s face, much to my chagrin:
Hours later, most of our family had gone back to their hotel for a cannonball contest in the pool, and most of our friends had gone back to their homes in Kentucky or Ohio, but Dad wanted to get his line dance on, so we headed back to Joanie’s house to change into our best country and western duds and then went to have a few drinks at a barn/bar full of college kids. Which led to Cousin Bethany thinking she could bull ride:
So that’s it, a wedding so good it made me almost rethink marriage. And in closing, I offer you this, the picture that pretty much sums up my relationship with my sister perfectly:
I’m saying, “Yay! Whee! I love you!”, and she’s like, “Hold on, bitch. I’m fixing my hair.”
Today at noon, I leave for three days in Ohio and then two days in Kentucky to see my baby sister GET MARRIED. Seeing as how we agreed long ago to never, ever wed, I obviously feel very betrayed by this. She and her fiancé have been together for more than three years and already own a house together, so this marriage is totally unnecessary and clearly just a way of hurting me.
However, I’m going to look awesome in my dark red bridesmaid’s dress that she picked out, so I forgive her.
But just in case this wedding is only a means of making it more socially acceptable when Joanie and Josh start having millions of babies (in Kentucky, no less), I just want to remind her of this picture of her holding our cousin’s son during Thanksgiving dinner:
Take the feeling you felt here and multiply it by ten thousand, Joanie.
And then imagine feeling it every moment of every day.
This is what it’s like to have a baby.
(Thank you and goodnight to all of my baby-owning friends out there.)
So I have food poisoning, right? Which is sort of a joy right now, because while I was home in Ohio this past weekend, I tried on my bridesmaid’s dress for my best friend, Tracey’s wedding in March, and it turns out that I’m about five inches of torso away from getting the thing zipped. (She found THE dress discontinued and on sale and thought she could guess my size but no doubt bought it too small in an attempt to not offend me.) So I vomited about eighteen times yesterday at work and stayed home today, which is sort of great because I managed to lose four pounds in 24 hours thanks to not being able to keep even water down but sort of sucks because the meal I was vomiting up was grilled chicken and steamed vegetables instead of something I felt guilty about and wanted to purge, like pecan pie and maple ice cream.
At 3:30 this afternoon, I finally got to a place where I thought I could successfully stand up, and the pepperoni and pepperjack cheese in Kamran’s refrigerator didn’t sound so delicious, so I walked down the street to his Gristedes to buy some Jell-o and soup. I had been in front of the Campbell’s for maybe ten minutes, trying to find something, anything, without starch and sugar and tomatoes, when this stylish Nordic guy on a mobile phone dropped his box of pasta while walking in front of me. I excused the fact that he hadn’t excused himself before blocking my view of the soup and said, “I got it,” though bending over in my state of sickliness seemed like the worst idea possible. The guy kept chatting in his foreign tongue as I placed the box on top of his other items, and then he simply walked away.
While he was well within earshot, I said in my most monotone voice, “No problem. Glad I could help. Say no more.” The woman beside me shot me the dirtiest look and obviously scolded me in some language I didn’t recognize, so I turned, puked the last of the contents of my stomach all over her droll little fur hat, and went home to enjoy my Jell-o.
