Giddy Girlie

The weather was sunny and humid and hot and wonderful. Cancun is beautiful, the white sand on the beach was amazing. The local people are great, and we met some REALLY awesome people while we were there. It was a really good time. We are already planning our next trip - and ALL of you are invited. Seriously, you will love it. We'll get a sunburn and drink Scooby Doo shots and eat watermelon on the beach. Trust me, you'll like it.

I leave again tomorrow morning for Hugfest 2004, courtesy of Dear Jules, then I'll be back on Sunday night.

Sigh, Monday is going to be hard.... who wants to go back to work after all this?!

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This is how I do it :

* cut up the chicken itself [I don't know what wide-mouth bass set the precedent for 'restaurant standard bite size' but it wasn't me!]
* I fill the fork with lettuce (or other salad ingredients) and then top with a piece of chicken

But I am watching my co-workers and their strategies vary... is it an etiquette thing? A practicality thing? AM I DOING IT WRONG??

This is what they do :

* eat the chicken first, then if they have room/time, they eat the salad
* eat the salad first, pick out the best of the greens and eat them before the warm chicken wilts them
* demand at least 2 more sides of ranch dressing, because who are you kidding with this skimpy portion?

Posted by giddygirlie at 1:40 PM | Permalink

I am a little bitter (and a little chilly) at the stupid weather today that mocks my wishing-for-summer post from yesterday. I guess it was too much to ask that I get some decent sun to soak in the week before I have to don a bathing suit. But other than that, I am a pretty happy girl. I guess.

Unless, of course, you consider my Tuesday visit to New Dentist (I dumped Dr. Bliss - no relation to my Dear Miss B - after he tried extorting me into veneers). The visit itself wasn't so bad, but the price tag. Ouch. A couple of months ago, one of my old fillings fell out. Seems simple - replace it, right? Apparently not. No one wants to put a filling back in. Instead, they suggest that I get a cap and a crown and a root canal for good measure. All at the lofty price tag of $1,400 - and that's AFTER my insurance coverage. The rest of my filling replacements and restorations will total $6,000 when I am finished. The fillingless tooth takes priority, but I'm torn. How much do I like that tooth anyway? Who would know if it was gone? Or silver? Why can't they just do the root canal (only $200 out of pocket) and put a filling back in? Make a patch temporarily until I can panhandle enough money to cover the rest? Nope, no one is willing to budge. Sigh. My mom called her dentist who said that he will take me as a cash patient and do the whole thing for $900. Good price, but do I have $900? No. Dammit, I just blew my savings (and the cable payment - shh!) on my vacation, so I am outta disposable cash. A line of credit? Ha. My $3,000 of credit card debt makes me ineligible for a cash loan, even though it's too small to qualify for a debt loan. Even if I eat nothing but Top Ramen from now until 2009, I don't think I will have any money left over for dental work. And considering that New Dentist wants me to get this done immediately (he offered to clear his schedule do I can come in tomorrow), I'm left to freak out about money and stupid teeth on my vacation.

What this means to the casual observer, of course, is that I will be skimming the pennies out of the pond at the zoo and not showing anyone my right upper first molar, lest anyone see the hole left from the missing filling. So, please, don't ask to see it.

I also need to dye my hair. I just dyed it 2 weeks ago, and the roots are already showing!! WTF? Why does my hair grow so fast, except for the bangs, which are taking their sweet ass time growing out. I am reconsidering the grow-out, lemme tell you... I may be sporting the Baby Bettie bangs again soon, 'cause I am not patient enough to deal with this. Anyway, I am trying to think of something creative to do with my hair. After all, Mexico and Hugfest have notoriously high standards. Plus, I look dumb in hats.

With the way this week has been going... before you know it, I'll be bald and toothless. Sigh. But I swear, I am in a good mood.

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[pictured, left to right : front row- my brother Daniel, Rob, Jack; back row-my sister Shaina, her boyfriend Sasha]

Holiday weekends are teetering on the edge between being totally fantastic and a total waste of time. On one hand, you have the extra time to take the kids to the beach and get your toenails painted with the french manicure and tiny white flowers.

On the other, you run back and forth from place to place, trying to cram in weeks and months and years worth of visitation into a single lunch and stay up way too late, chatting with people that you haven't seen, all the while beating yourself up for not visiting more often. When did that baby get so big? My, how your hair has grown and at the end of the day, you feel like the living dead.

Monday morning spawns zombies, wandering the halls... how was your weekend? Great. wait, where did it go?

Posted by giddygirlie at 5:26 PM | Permalink

Do you have copies of these pictures? In a drawer or in the back of an album? A shoebox, maybe? Mine are in a small photo album that I take out now and then. Alone or together, the pictures don't mean much. They aren't representative of a great vacation, an interesting story, a happy holiday. I have no idea what year either picture was taken. I can't say for sure where they are in the pictures. But they mean so much more to me.

These two pictures show something more than the people in them. These are my parents, but that's not the point. These are my parents, they way that they were. When they met, fell in love, married, and had me. Who they were before careers and cable bills and car insurance and babysitters filled their days. Who they were when they were young. The people that are still hiding inside, buried under years of age and wisdom and hardship and struggle. These are the people that they see when they form a mental picture of themselves. The reason that they take a double take when they see wrinkles around their eyes, lines around their mouths, grey hair at the temples. The mirror doesn't show who they are. They are these people. Two young minds, setting out in the world. Wrenching on a VW bus or relaxing under the redwoods. These people are my parents, but the people in these pictures are the parents that I will never know. They gave up themselves to bring me here. I'm thankful and humble, but a little sad just the same. I'll never get to know the people that they really are... because they'll never be more or less than my parents.

I wonder if my own children will think the same. Look back at my photographs and wonder. Wonder about the style, the time, what was going on in my head? Wonder how I could wear those ridiculous shoes, those awful pants, that boring hairstyle. I will only shake my head back at them... if only you knew... I was young once, too

Posted by giddygirlie at 10:36 PM | Permalink

Once upon a time, I was cool. It was the era of Vanilla Ice. MC Hammer. Milli Vanilli - and I was there at the cutting edge. I had a hyper color shirt. I had a floral babydoll dress with black leggings that went underneath - the ones with the lace trim, no less. For Christmas, I got a new off-the-shoulder white sweater with a tie dye purple tank top to wear underneath. Some new black leggings and ankle-high black boots completed the ensemble. Man, I was smooth.

Posted by giddygirlie at 10:24 PM | Permalink

The theme for this quarter's Pep Rally is "The Apprentice" and so it was my job to find the clothes and accessories for the event. One of the most important pieces to the ensemble for The Donald was, obviously, the hair. I set out to find a wig for The Donald - no easy task, I assure you. I ended up finding a Duke wig that had a curly ponytail in the back and a slight pomp to the front of the hair. I prayed that it was going to work... then I sat Ryan down, made him Don the wig (pun intended) and started styling. The end result was this. I cut off the pony tail (anyone have a use for a curly ponytail?) and styled the hair with a comb over in the front.

I hope that the people at work like it. I couldn't find anything blonde enough or bald enough... so it's not an exact replica, but hey for $22 I think I did alright. What do you think?

p.s. I nearly peed my pants when Ryan started making these faces and I had to snap a picture. We were laughing so hard and so loud that the neighbors were peeking out the windows to try and see what we were laughing at.

p.p.s. Ryan nearly cried when he saw how much he looks like Trump in the picture on the left.

Posted by giddygirlie at 4:11 PM | Permalink

Today I spent 6 hours shopping for work. Oh, I know. Getting paid to shop and spend other people's money... it's a dream come true. But your feet still get tired. And I am more than slightly perturbed at the snooty people at South Coast Plaza. You'd think that when you plunk down $600 on gift certificates you'd at least get a 'have a nice day'. Nope. Apparently, only cash sales exceeding $15,000 make people nice to you. A-holes.

In other news, my vacation plans are finalized. Start sending in those addresses now, if you want postcards!! :) Ryan and I are taking off to Cancun on the 22nd. We're actually spending the night in Chicago before heading out to Mexico (I know, messy travel schedule) so if anyone wants to come and meet us around 11pm in Chicago, I'll bring surprises and spring for a midnight supper! :)

But fear not! We'll be home in time to shake the sand out of our towels and then head up North to Hugfest 2004 to see the Divine Miss Jules. I will be traveling with dear Miss Bliss and looking forward to meeting some of the other super cool Bay Area Bloggers who will be attending Hugfest. I promise to brush my teeth and wear deodorant, so that I am hugworthy.

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