Monkeying around in Chicago

Is it sad that I get super excited every Monday to get the condo tidied up? Usually on Monday morning it looks like a tornado hit it (yeah, a Mike tornado!). So I come home, do 5 loads of laundry, load and run the dishwasher, empty it and load it again, make the guest bed if we had a guest over the weekend, cook my food for the week and balance our checking account.

Tonight not only do I get to watch LOST but I am going to do our taxes.... WHEE!!! The life of a grownup, it just keeps getting better.

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This weekend was a whirlwind of activity. Thursday our friend Chad got into town. Mike used to live with Chad, so we've grown so close that he is pretty much family (Chad even came on Mike and I's first date with us... we all three went to go see Runaway Jury).

When Chad got to our place , he immediately noticed the new carpet. Then going into the living room/kitchen area he thought the cabinets looked whiter. "I Mr-Clean-Magic-Erasered them all last week" I told him with a shrug. He responded with "Was that one word you used? Like, you made Mr. Clean Magic Eraser a verb?" He finally realized that the cabinets looked brighter because of the new paint, which is when I realized he hadn't been in the condo since about a year ago. So I walked around and showed him all the stuff that had been done... new paint, backsplash, etc. I was kind of proud that he noticed and thought it looked alot better. And I was proud of me for doing so much in a year. Go, Type A personality who misses her husband!!

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On Friday we went to happy hour at a place down the street that offers $1 beer bottles. We drank them out of Budweiser and Bud Light by 10PM, I felt kind of bad for the poor college students that rolled in around 11PM looking for a deal. But they were still offering $5 pitchers at that point so I guess it wasn't all bad news.

Around 11 I decided a round of shots was in order to close out the evening and went to the bar to buy a few Tommy-Coverdale-specials. That was when the bartender told me he was out of jager. I ordered something else and decided to give him a good-natured ribbing in the form of "Dude, who runs out of jager?!". As he mixed up our shots, he asked me if I'd ever owned or worked in a bar. As he said "So someone who has NEVER worked in or owned a bar is telling me how to run my bar" I realized that the shots he was mixing were about 85% soda and 15% alcohol. Wanting to save my shots, I said "Hey buddy, I was just messing with you! What do I know? No hard feelings!" I relaxed when he said "Oh, never mind, just a mix-up" and felt even more relieved when he reached for the bottle of vodka to add more to the drinks. I can handle paying for the shots, but not ones that don't even have anything in them!

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Chad and I both happened to watch an episode of Better Off Ted last weekend where two nerdy scientists that work at this company learn to tell people to "deal with it" from a salesman (who is the main character Ted's brother). They buy a dead body from the lab supply store and Ted asks what they're going to do with it. "We're going to DEAL WITH IT, Ted," says one. "Yeah," the other chimes in, "Just like YOU'RE going to DEAL WITH IT!" The whole episode they were telling people to deal with it in their nerdy mantra.

Of course, Chad and I spent the weekend telling other people, each other, blank walls to DEAL WITH IT. It was awesome.

This show is awesome and I love it so naturally it will get cancelled soon.

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This week marks 7 weeks left of Mike in Detroit. Next week makes 6. Ironically, he was only supposed to be there originally for 4-6 weeks. I remember 6 weeks feeling like a lifetime and now I feel like he will be back home for good tomorrow. Funny how things get put into perspective for you. I guess I've learned to DEAL WITH IT. Regardless, I am happy his time out of town is coming to a close.

Yesterday I went with three girlfriends to the Indiana-Northwestern game, and we rode a bus from Kirkwood. We were cracking up because everyone on the bus was super drunk and also engaging in chugging contests, while we observed. At least it was pretty entertaining.

On the way home from the game, a guy in the seat in front of us told us a story:
"So this friend of a friend, was watching another family's dog while they were on vacation and it was super old and died while the family was gone. She called the family and told them - they were bummed but again the dog was super old so it was unsurprising. They asked her if she could get rid of the dog, and she agreed. Now this girl was like a 110 pounds, and the dog was a pretty big Golden Retriever, so to get rid of it she put it in a suitcase and was going to take it somewhere (my sidenote: maybe a vet or somewhere that disposes of pet bodies? The guy didn't say). Since the dog was pretty heavy the girl was having trouble pulling it along as she got on the subway, and some guy says "That looks pretty heavy, what do you have in there?" The chick didn't want the guy to be weirded out that she had a dead dog, so she replied that she had computer parts or something electronic. The guy promptly punches her in the stomach and takes off with the suitcase."

Granted..... the guy that told me this story didn't personally know the chick personally and parts of it don't make sense... a dead dog on a subway? Asking someone to get rid of a dog body? Putting a dead dog in a suitcase?! BUT STILL, just the thought of some thief getting stuck with a dog body cracks you up right?

You kind of wish everyone who steals stuff gets the equivalent of a dog body in their suitcase.

Our weekends are so busy that I'm starting to dread them. This weekend we have a friend coming into town so we have a ton of stuff going on:

• Thursday IU-Purdue basketball gamewatch
• Going out on Friday
• Saturday - making Superbowl food, dinner out at Fogo de Chao, then birthday celebrations with my friend Jaci
• Sunday - Going to IU-Northwestern game in the morning, Superbowl in the evening

So tonight I went to Swirlz to get cupcakes for my brother's girlfriend's (Kim) birthday. Of course I had to get one for myself!

As I was checking out, I saw they had pupcakes!

Milly heard the bag crinkle and raced over to check out the situation.
The one is a bit blurry because Milly is jumping up to get the pupcake
First she had to chase it around for a bit to make sure that pupcake knew who was boss.

Finally, it was acceptable to eat... and she wolfed it down....
Ahhh, Millsters... a bit spoiled lately. Last week she got ice cream!

Do you ever surf around on pictures on Facebook and see pics of people's kids and think "This kid is going to be a Mean Girl just like her mother was in high school/college"?

Nope? Just me then?

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On a related aside, I think I need an internet sabbatical.

How do people who have had blogs for years remember what they've written about? I feel like some of what I write has to be a repeat and I am nowhere near as prolific as any other blogger.
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Have I ever told you how I always sing "Hold me closer, tiny beagle" to the tune of "Tiny Dancer" by Elton John? I am constantly changing up the lyrics. This week it was "Hold me closer, tiny beagle. Please don't drag your nose, you'll huuuuurt it!"

Anyways, this week was a tough Milly week. I think she is (has?) OCD. Is it possible for a dog to be OCD? She touches her nose about a foot from whatever she's playing with, then drags her nose to the thing, touches the item quickly, and repeats ad nausem. This weekend it was a pig ear. She used to play with them for a little, then eat it. But lately she messes with the darn thing for weeks. Oy. So anyways, she hid it between our headboard and mattress, and performed her nose-touch ritual with it. She did it so much that she rubbed her nose raw and it was bleeding! And she didn't stopafter the nose was raw (ow, man, when something HURTS, stop!), so she got blood ALL OVER our bed. All the linens had to be washed. What a pain.

Then on Tuesday I had draped the duvet over a folding table to dry... with part still on the floor because it's huge. Somehow she pulled down the duvet, hid the pig ear under it, and went to town with her nose-touch ritual. Again, blood all over the duvet. I about lost it I was so angry. This time there was so much blood, I wondered how she had any left. She is so tiny! How can that happen and she just keeps on with her little nose ritual?! I guess I should be glad the blood wasn't all over our brand-new carpet.

Maybe loss of blood explains why Milly was nothing short of angelic tonight. She's weirdly intuitive and knows when to give me a break, when I'm at the very end of my rope.... just after I've texted Mike that we're selling her to the gypsies for sure! So after tonight's behavior I suppose we can put off selling her for awhile longer. :)

So after the great closet-clear-out of 2010, I woke up on Saturday morning with an urge to clean OUT and organize! I cleaned out my closet even more, tossing more jackets and cocktail dresses/evening gowns that I wore in 1998 and probably should never wear again. I ended up organizing all the clothes into three piles: one for the Salvation Army, one for my sister, and one for my sister-in-law. Then I cleaned out the guest bedroom and closet and did a little vacuuming. Then I resorted to organizing our two bins of random electronic stuff and cords. I wrapped up all the cords and then twist-tied them into neat little bundles, grouping them by type. Telephone cords here, cable cords here, internet cords there. I will admit, I was on a bit of a tear. Oh and I also cleaned out both cars and did some other tidying up! I was crazy. I need to have productive days like that more often. Somehow I didn't get to some of my other cleaning but oh well.

Then today my friend Em and I went to IKEA (had a nice little suburban day including lunch at Olive Garden with tasty soup, salad, and breadsticks!) and I got a bunch of cute little hooks to hang up stuff in my closet. This one has all my rubber-bandy workout headbands. This reminds me I should work out a little more but also that I don't need any more headbands.Ooh, scarves on one set of hooks here... and I got some of those individual 3M hooks to hang up my belts on the right.
It's sad how much this organization really makes me happy!!

Also, if you need a headband, I'm probably your girl!