If my birthday list were a test, I would have failed

I didn’t do quite so well on the birthday list this year.

I’m proud of a few things, but others, like I mentioned, are a little harder to measure.

For instance, I don’t think I’ve turned into a bridezilla (#19), but would anyone really tell me if I had?

On the positive side, I have…

…planned the better part of my wedding (#5).

…kept track of restaurants, even if I haven’t made it to all of them on my list (#21).

…taken more pride in my personal appearance (#25). I still sometimes leave the apartment with wet hair, but I also bought some hot rollers and can now leave home with sexy curls. At least, that’s what I tell myself.

…minimized job complaints (#26). Maybe because I’m happier at work, or maybe because there’s only one person who truly gets my goat, but complaints are down significantly.

I’m kind of disappointed that I didn’t make the time for a Duck Tour (#13) or a DC United game (part of #24), but hopefully I’ll get to those by the end of the summer.

So I’m 18/26 with just the weekend to go. Not the best completion rate.

I do, however, still have about 72 hours to get my Duck Tour, stop judging and grudging (for real!), play golf, go to 4 different restaurants, and check out DC United.

Totally doable, right?

Right?

Okay. Maybe just the driving range, then.

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Open mouth, insert foot

The setting: history class.

The discussion: why study history?

The players: in addition to the general class, there’s the Smug Just Graduated Undergrad and Think I Know Everything guy, and there’s Professor K. Who, by the by, looks like this:

Anywho, the conversation:

SmugJGU: Is it even relevant to study history anymore? And if it is, how do you get more people to want to do it? It’s BORING on the middle school and high school levels, and most teachers don’t even care about it! In fact, the same guy that’s teaching you history is probably just a high school football coach. [turns to the professor, who just finished his history dissertation, by the way, and has told us about it] How do we get history to be interesting?

Professor K: Well, this is my job – I clearly already think it’s interesting. [beat] I also coached high school football for a couple years, and taught history classes.

SmugJGU: Uh…

Good luck, buddy. That was only week two of class.

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A little behind the times

Guys, I have a confession.

I’m not so good with the classics.

Movies, that is. In fact, I probably should have added a list of must-sees to my 25 in 25 list, just so I’d be more likely to check them off.

For instance, it was only about a year ago that I saw The Godfather for the first time. And a couple months before that was my first Rocky viewing. (Yes, as a Philly girl, I’m ashamed it took me so long.) But that’s not even the worst of it.

Until two months ago, I was even an Indiana Jones virgin. (Still not the worst of it, by the way.)

Why? Who knows? Those movies have everything I love in a story – adventure, religion and culture, a little romance, travel, and a young Harrison Ford. There’s no logical reason why it should have taken me so long to see them.

And given those criteria, it would only make sense that I would love another trilogy, which I’ve yet to see.

You see where I’m going with this, right? I may or may not have seen the original three Star Wars.*

Except more “may not” than “may.”

*Note: I know I’ve seen the first one, at some point, maybe…I just don’t remember a lot. Kind of like this girl.

Okay, okay, I may not be able to see you, but I know what face you’re making. But it’s not like I don’t know anything about the movies. I know the characters; I know the spoilers; I know there’s a gold bikini. And I know that Darth Vader likes to frequent the Deathstar cafeteria.

Aren’t those the highlights?

No?

Well, the Netflix fairy is dropping it off today, so we’ll just see how accurate I am.

But I’m pretty sure I’m right about the cafeteria.

And, while I’m checking off classics, anything else you think is a must-see?

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Little Rascals

When I had my birthday earlier this month, I was excited about turning 25. I was excited to get that much closer to no longer being carded (still wishful thinking), and excited to start in on my list of goals.

The boyfriend had his birthday last Thursday, and I knew he was looking forward to it, too, but for different reasons. You see, he’s excited because the older he gets, the more he’s allowed to be a crotchety old man. He wants to be able to wave his cane, and yell at kids to get off his lawn. He wants an excuse to be both cranky and senile.

But what he wants most is a Rascal.

And what kind of girlfriend would I be, if I didn’t at least explore the possibilities?

So, last week, even though I already had his present ready to go, I did a little googling, and came upon this site. And a little more exploration led me to this:

Win a free Rascal? No purchase necessary? Seemingly no age requirements? I’d be the best girlfriend ever!

So I entered.

I typed in all my information, kind of laughing as I did it, because really? A Rascal? And I figured that would be the end of it. But those employees must be on top of their customer service game, because a mere couple hours later I got a phone call at work.

“Hello, this is Chuck from Electric Mobility, and I just wanted to speak with you about your Rascal needs.“

I got so flustered about admitting that I wanted a Rascal for someone under the age of 40, that I told Chuck I’d have to call him back. I didn’t get to it, and he called again on Friday. Persistent little sucker.

I suppose that I do owe him a response, but it’ll have to wait until I scour that site for any hidden age requirements. Just because all the videos show old people in these Rascals, doesn’t mean they can’t be enjoyed by a younger generation, too.

And who knows, maybe instead of a birthday present, it’ll turn into an anniversary gift.

But no promises. Yet.

P.S. Truth or Fail is still on its way, with a TBD prize for whoever gets the most correct. So if you have a fun factoid you’re sitting on, now’s the time to share!

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The things you can learn from a malfunctioning cell phone

My phone has decided that now is a good time to start acting up. It’s as though it remembers that something similar happened right around this time last year, and it’s saying, “Hey! At least I’m consistent!“

But the annoyance has taught me one thing: I really need to clean out my address book.

Much the same way as I do with Facebook, once I have your number, I don’t generally delete it. This means I have several numbers for sorority sisters that I never use, and those for high school classmates that I haven’t spoken to in years. But in the back of my head I’m always thinking, well, I shouldn’t delete it, because what if I ever actually need the numbers for all my old physics study buddies? You just never know.

That said, there are probably some numbers that should go.

The issue with my phone now is that certain keys stick – G in particular. And when G gets held down, it immediately accesses all my G contacts, and all it would take is for the Send key to get stuck, too, and I’d be calling someone I really didn’t want to talk to.

Because the first three of my Gs are:

1) A guy I met at the bar, with a question mark next to his name because I couldn’t really remember what he’d told me

2) Another guy I met through a friend, who proceeded to hit on me – even after I’d met his girlfriend

3) The college ex-boyfriend, who is now married

As you can guess, as soon as that new phone comes in (*fingers crossed* today!) I’ll be doing a little address book spring cleaning.

Because, unlike my old physics friends, I can’t think of any scenario in which I’d need – or want -  to call any of these gentlemen.

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It doesn’t take much to bring out my competitive streak

I have a tendency to get a little competitive.

I can turn nearly anything into a competition – for better or worse – and, in turn, I get frustrated should I (or my team, if it’s a group effort) lose. This competitive spirit particularly comes into play in the summer – during softball season.

There is, of course, the competition on the field. But usually, there’s not too much bad yelling – unless you decide to be a little bitch and call yourself safe when you’re clearly at LEAST three inches off the bag and you’ve already been tagged.

Sorry, where was I?

Anyway. Softball is supposed to be fun, and most people take it as such, so I can usually keep myself in check. But afterward, well, afterward we go to the bar and inevitably play several rounds of flip cup. And drinking games introduce a whole different level of competition.

After our first scrimmage of the season, we did just that. Throughout the night, our game slowly grew bigger as other patrons of the bar asked to join in. One of them joined my team, and took up his flip cup spot next to me, as the anchor.

I don’t remember everything about the game, but I remember that he wasn’t doing so well (at ALL). And I remember that we were almost at the end, and I just wanted to win, and we were so close to winning but he lost it so I might have yelled at him. Something along the lines of, “What’s wrong with you?! What are you doing?!” During games, a sweetheart, I am not.

(I did, of course, immediately apologize, though, and he laughed it off – and, I think, stopped playing with us.)

Fast forward a couple weeks later, after our first real game, and we’re at the same bar. We started playing pool with a couple guys who were already there, and they asked if our softball team came there regularly. “I think I played flip cup with you all a couple weeks ago,” the one guy said to me. “Someone was yelling at me a lot.“

I immediately chalked it up to our resident Flip Cup King, and started explaining how he takes the game really seriously, and can be a little mean sometimes, until a light dawned and I realized, “Oh my god…that was me, wasn’t it?” The kid (college junior, whatever) nodded, and told me, “Yeah, you were really mean that night. In your defense, though, I was playing terribly.“

But all I could think was that he clearly still remembered my yelling from two weeks before.

I just hope I didn’t scar him permanently.

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It takes more than a couple childhood home videos to embarrass this girl*

Each time we’ve been back at my parents’ home in Philly, my boyfriend has asked to see embarrassing photos or home videos of me as a child. And my parents are all too happy to oblige. Though, before this past trip it had only been photos. And that had been sufficient to showcase my chipmunk cheeks as baby:

and the mullet I rocked for far too long (not my fault, btw, and Mama takes full credit/responsibility):

But this time, in response to my challenge that all our home videos were on old 8mm tapes and therefore we couldn’t actually show any childhood movies, my mom dug out three old VHS tapes.

Her way of saying: challenge accepted.

And maybe I should have been embarrassed, having my boyfriend watch one video of me playing La Cucaracha (poorly) on my trumpet in an elementary school variety show (in my super cool nerd glasses, no less). Or another video of me prancing around as a three-year-old, belting out Christmas carols, and shoving my little brother out of the way while decorating the Christmas tree. (And then stumbling like a Weeble Wobble as he tried to get me back, while I was singing for my parents’ friends at the holiday party.)

But honestly, as much as I might cringe sometimes thinking about some of those phases, my trips down memory lane are mostly pleasant. I can laugh at the often overbearing, outgoing, ham of a child I was and be grateful that I turned out the way that I did.

Though, it definitely helps that I no longer have the mullet or the chipmunk cheeks.

At least not noticeably, anyway…

*No, Mama. That is not another challenge. I promise.

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“Is it just me or is ‘Veto’ sounding pretty good?”

As I was perusing my Google Reader this morning, Jezebel threw me this little gem:

A Rogue’s Gallery Of Regrettable Baby Names

I opened it, intrigued at what kind of names these parents were saddling their children with. I expected names with silent letters, curious spellings, or famous connotations that few kids can live up to.

“I know it’s a little out there, but what about Darwin?“

“Oh my god, our child’s going to get beaten up in the schoolyard.“

But no. Nothing like that. Instead, the lists, originally from The Sun, included names like William, Thomas, Daniel, Emily, Grace, and Sophie.

Apparently, “Many wish they had picked a name which wasn’t quite as popular…,” well, okay, I guess I understand that, “…while one in five wish they had chosen a moniker which was easier to spell or pronounce.” Yeah, I get that, too. But none of the names on the top ten list are hard to spell OR pronounce. Where’s the list of those names?

I’ll give you a name that doesn’t fit either of those options. It just falls under the “why would they do that to their child” category. Or, as I like to call it, “what my parents would have named me, if I’d been a boy.”

Tilden Moses

Let it sink in.

They claim it’s a family name. That it’s a good, strong name. But I don’t think that would have mattered to the kids that would have beat me up on the playground. Suffice it to say, I feel as though I dodged a bullet.

(And actually, my brother did, too. He was born two years later and, though you might have expected him to get the initial boy name, he didn’t. Apparently Tilden Moses was my dad’s choice, and he only got the one shot. Sorry, Dad.)

In any case, what would your name have been if you’d been the opposite gender?

And do you think it’s better or worse than your current name?

And, because you can’t have enough questions, what names have you heard that you think should have made the “most regrettable” list?

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My very own Darwin Award

According to the website, “The Darwin Awards salute the improvement of the human genome by honoring those who accidentally remove themselves from it…” and, I’m blogging, so I clearly haven’t done that. But I did do something fairly ridiculous that makes me question my own intelligence.

A little background: Until now, I’ve never had any real food allergy/bad reaction (except for a couple times with shellfish and alcohol, but that’s a different story for a different time). And I’ve always always had a bit LOT of a sweet tooth.

Bad/stressful day? Pass me a Snickers bar, please.

Celebrating? Of course, I’ll have some chocolate cake.

And this was all well and good up until this past weekend.

Without going into too much unnecessary detail, I started feeling ill after a Saturday brunch of chocolate chip pancakes, and proceeded to throw up throughout the course of the day, several times, in two separate parks. (And one playground. Sorry, kids.) A quick study of some recent stomachaches compared to the food I’d eaten previous to the pain showed chocolate to be the culprit.

I was, understandably, bummed.

Which is probably why, when my mom suggested that maybe it was milk chocolate that was bad, and I’d be okay with dark chocolate, I wanted her to be right so badly that I tested the theory.

Oh, and did I mention I tested it at work? I’ll take that award, now.

I was craving chocolate like whoa, so I got a box of dark chocolate raisinets. Delicious, right? Wrong.

Especially not when they come back up…four times in two hours. And not when you have to email the office manager to tell him that you threw up, and could someone come clean that stall? And not when you get home, start to sip your ginger ale and realize that that doesn’t want to stay down either, because chocolate has screwed your system but good for the day. And definitely not now, when even your home bathroom smells like vomit.

All because I just had to know if I could have some kind of chocolate.

My new nemesis *shakes fist*

When I told my boyfriend, who was with me for the pancake fiasco, about the experiment (and its consequences) he responded, “Ok, it’s chocolate. Or some key ingredient in chocolate. Sucks to be you.” (To his credit, he did not say, “I told you so,” or call me an idiot, though I know he was/is dying to. And he also checked in to see if I needed anything, when I was home, curled up in the fetal position.)

When I told my mom, she said, “Maybe you’re part dog. You know, this is why they can’t have chocolate – it wreaks havoc on their system.“

So, I’m either a dog or an idiot – or both. And either way I’m not getting any Easter candy this year.

Thanks a lot, body. You win again.

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Not one of my better mornings

This morning was rough. And not the usual I’m-so-tired, or oh-crap-I’m-late kind of rough. But the, well-that-was-almost-a-specatcle kind.

I nearly fainted on the bus on the way to work this morning.

There was overheating, nausea, dizziness and slightly blurred vision (who knew that the whole “swimming before your eyes” expression was actually spot on?). And before I could fall over (which I was trying to avoid mostly because I didn’t want my purse to spill out everywhere), I quickly asked the woman next to me if I could please sit down.

Actually, if I’m being honest, it was more like me panting, “I need to sit,” practically hunched over, and her probably being worried I’d vomit on her. But nevertheless, she ceded her seat to me.

And then, as I looked up to thank her, I realized she was pregnant. Yeah, I’m the jerk who made a pregnant lady give up her seat on the bus.

I feel like I’ve just hit a new low.

P.S. When I emailed my boyfriend the recap of the bus situation, after expressing appropriate concern and laughing at me a litle bit, of course, he sent this little gem:

If that’s not inspiring, I don’t know what is.

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