What? It's still Friday...

On my way to work this morning, I was thinking, "Maybe I won't post a Friday Five today. Maybe the Friday Five has seen its day and is ready to retire." Thinking of retirement made me think of canasta and shuffleboard and black socks with sandals, and then made me think of my 401K plan, which reminded me of the credit card company I need to write to dispute the ridiculous and unfounded "returned check" fee on my statement, and pretty soon my brain was meandering all the way to hockey puck , rattlesnake, monkey monkey underpants, and still I had no Friday Five in mind.

"No one will miss it," I thought. "Who really cares?"

Well, my friend Simone cares, apparently. This afternoon I received an e-mail from her... The message primarily concerned unrelated topics, but in the P.S. she wrote, "Where is your Friday Five? I'm waiting..."

All righty then. What I learned today is that at least one person comes here on Fridays looking for an idle list of things in five-point form. Here are a few other things I've learned this week as well.

1. The woman who processed my first mortgage really does not understand me. I am actually on my third mortgage in one house, for reasons I won't bother documenting, mainly because they are uninteresting and also do little more than prove that I am not very financially savvy and that I apparently like wasting large sums of money rather than doing proper up-front research like the smart girl I'd like to think I am should. Anyway. The first mortgage for which I signed many, many papers was overseen by a woman named Brenda with a mousy persona and very bad hair. I have no intention whatsoever of doing business with Brenda again, but that does not stop Brenda from sending helpful tips and recipes and rate notice memos to me approximately four to six times a year.
   
   I shouldn't imply that everything Brenda has sent has been worthless... One of her mailed recipe cards was for some caramel-chocolate-oatmeal bars that I actually made for two different gatherings and gained widespread praise for on both counts. Still. Most of the stuff she sends me? Utterly worthless, in my opinion. I do not care when the Vikings and the Gophers are playing, so the handy wallet-sized schedules are not so handy in my life. I do not have a husband or family, so household chore charts really don't serve much purpose for me. Today's mailing was equally useless... so much so that I actually considered calling Brenda, to say, "Save yourself a stamp. Please take me off your list."
   
   What Brenda sent today was a 4"x6" magnet containing "Emergency Baking Substitution" tips. These tips were about as helpful as the one on that birthday card my sister sent me a couple years ago (the one that said, "My cookbook says if I don't have two eggs I can substitute three egg yolks... I don't think my cookbook understands my problems"). The magnet contains eight different tips, only one of which might feasibly be useful to me in any scenario in my home. That one tip, in case it's of interest, is that if you don't have a tablespoon of cornstarch, two tablespoons of all-purpose flour should do just fine. OK, so I generally do have all-purpose flour, but I can't remember a time when I made anything requiring cornstarch, so really this tip is not apt to prove necessary any time soon. Equally unhandy are the suggestions to substitute milk with lemon juice or vinegar if I don't have buttermilk, or to use baking soda and cream of tartar if I don't have baking powder. I have heard of cream of tartar, but I've never even considered purchasing it. If I am in need of baking powder, I'll be more likely to substitute baking soda and hope for the best. Brenda has no idea who she's dealing with, obviously.
   
   
2. People drive even slower in cold weather than they do during mild temps, and they seem even more oblivious to their left-lane-hogging offense than they do on less-cold days. Listen. I totally understand that cars are fickle and you need to be good to them when the air is sub-zero six days in a row. My own car was acting fluky and temperamental the other day as well. But I promise you that once you get going, 62 mph will be no less traumatic for your vehicle than 53 is, OK? If you don't believe me, fine, but move your ass on over to the right lane and get the hell out of my way then, would you?
   
   
3. Six days of sub-zero weather apparently makes me cranky. And impatient. See above.
   
   
4. Despite the fact that half the people I know have never heard of him, it seems my boyfriend Rhett is capable of selling out a show in my hometown. I was going to gush on about all the ways I love this man, but then I remembered that I already did that a while back. Rhett, I know you will not read this, but I just have to say I am sorry I underestimated your apparently recent widespread appeal, and I'm sorry I will not be there for your show at the Turf Club tomorrow night. Can I still be your Four-Eyed Girl? Yes? OK, good.
   
   
5. I really need to invest in some cold-weather date clothes. It seems all of my reasonably cute date-tops are made of unfortunately thin fabrics and/or involve mere 3/4-length sleeves, neither of which is acceptable when the temperature is in the aforementioned sub-zero range. I have exactly one date-appropriate wool-blend sweater... one sweater that is the ideal balance between too-casual and almost-dressy... one sweater that is clingy enough to be potentially alluring without crossing the line over to slutty and inappropriate. Unfortunately, I realized this week, after wearing it on two of my four dates*, that I have had no good dates in that particular sweater at all. Because I am a lunatic with widely misused space in my brain, I can actually remember wearing that sweater on four specific dates in the past few years. They are documented here (see "Greg #1"), here, and now here. Date #4 was last night's, which, despite 3Carnations's kind request in my last post's comments, I really don't feel like writing about right now.** So. No more dates in my gray sweater. I do believe that sweater may be jinxed.
   

Another thing I learned this week? Four dates in one week is probably never a good idea. Live and learn, as they say, right?



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* What? Date #3 lasted less than two hours! Don't you agree a sweater is re-wearable after only two hours in the field?

** 3Cs, if you really want to know why "weird" was my only assessment of that date, send me an e-mail and I'll fill you in. For now, I think I've written about my pathetic dating life quite enough for one week, don't you agree?