Tuesday, September 04, 2007

What I did on my summer vacation, minus the summer vacation.

Hi there. Remember me? I used to write posts here on a somewhat regular basis. Some of them even involved full paragraphs and organized story lines, rather than just enumerated lists and such. Perhaps I will even write one of those again some day. Today, however, is not that day.

A few people I know have somehow garnered the ridiculous idea that I'm an inordinately busy person. I've always got plans; I'm always doing something. This is the illusion in their head. I guess they're not so wrong, really... that is, if sitting at home watching movies, reading blogs, and doing laundry can be considered "plans" of note at all.

If the past week or two were a representative sample of my normal and ordinary life, however, I would say those people had a point. Of course, if the past week or two were a representative sample of my normal and ordinary life, I wouldn't actually be talking to any of those people much, because the stress that an introvert by nature feels when faced with such a busy social calendar would have sent me away into hiding by now.

I have lots of stories that I could tell you about what I've been up to the past few weeks, but since I can't muster the focus to elaborate on any specific one of them, this will be another recap in bullet-list form. I refuse to call this mere lazy blogging; consider it a favor to the Internet-A.D.D. sufferers out there! (To anyone self-identified in that group, you're welcome.) Let's go.

In the last "official" days of summer, I have...

  • Walked across the Mississippi River at its headwaters.



  • Visited with old friends and their adorable and near-perfect baby.





  • Drove three hours (round-trip) on a Tuesday night to eat fresh-baked pizza under a tree in the rain. (That said, it was totally worth it.)





  • Learned absolutely nothing at a wine-tasting event, but had fun chatting (and drinking) with friends in the process.





  • (Speaking of drinking...) Consumed alcohol in some form and quantity on nine out of ten consecutive days. (I am pretty sure that if you squeezed out my liver like a sponge right now, you'd get an unappealing whop concoction of some sort. I am officially in drying-out mode this week.)

  • Received (and declined) an invitation to my ex-boyfriend's wedding. (Um, yeah, good times.)

  • Helped two great friends celebrate their birthdays at one of Minneapolis's favorite dive bars.



    (Jamie, I hate that I didn't get a picture of both of you with the cake... or even both of you in the same shot, for that matter!)

  • Regained the six pounds I recently lost. (See above re: pizza and nine-day drinking bender for possible causes of that.)

  • Survived my parents' annual visit and the concentrated amounts of family time that entails.

  • Saw a family-friendly play in the basement of a suburban chain restaurant and motel. (It was actually a tad more entertaining than I expected, but I'd still consider it little more than a mediocre Saturday Night Live sketch drawn out to 120 minutes.)

  • Went on only my third date in five months. (Clearly I am not the mad-dating machine I was last summer, and interestingly, the only part about it that bothers me is all the cute summer date clothes I have not worn at all this year.)

  • Accidentally flashed the sushi guy at Cub Foods. (This really isn't notable in any way, except that I remembered it while commenting on a post 3Carnations wrote and thus, it is back in my head again. Also, aren't you glad there isn't a photo to accompany this one?)

  • Mowed my lawn for the first time since early June. (Thank you, seemingly unending earth-parching drought. My lawn may have been looking like straw, but at least you've saved me some time on yard work the past two months.)

And that about wraps up the explanation for my absence lately. So. What have you done with your last precious days of the worst month of the year?

13 comments:

3carnations said...

You said lots of interesting and noteworthy things in this post...But what I'm left thinking is "How can I get a piece of that pizza?" It looks delicious!

lizgwiz said...

That pizza does look yummy.

Well, you know what I did with the Last Days of August. I spent them in a dizzying, alternating whirl of "oh my god what a time I'm having" and "oh my god it's all going to come crashing down any minute."

Maybe I should have just flashed a sushi guy. ;)

3carnations said...

I came back to look at the pizza again (ha!). That's feta on there, isn't it? I LOVE feta on my pizza. Even Dominos has it now!

The Other Girl said...

Now I want pizza and chocolate cake. But just the idea of whopatooli (the internet is so instructive) makes me never want to drink again.

-R- said...

I love that you are all wearing sweatshirts in the first picture, but there is some kid behind you wading in the Mississippi River in nothing but a diaper.

Did your shirt just pop open in front of the sushi guy?

Our lawn has grown like CRAZY all summer. I am very jealous of your summer of non-mowing.

Stefanie said...

3Cs--It WAS delicious! We had to go back and order a third pizza after we scarfed down the first two. If you're going to drive an hour and a half to SW Wisconsin for pizza, you might as well stuff yourself, right?

Liz--Well, sure, that's one way to go, right? But I think your past few weeks have been a bit more exciting than mine.

3Cs--I love feta, too, but I think in that picture, it's gorgonzola. That was our third pizza, and it had something different and unique on each quarter. The part on the left was beet and gorgonzola. Yes, BEETS! Who knew that was a pizza topping? The pesto portion of that pizza was also divine.

TOG--I wonder all the time what on earth I did without the Internet. It disappoints and perplexes me no end when I actually CAN'T find something I'm looking for in that series of tubes.

R--1. Well, you know, kids have no nerve endings... (Actually, it was just weird weather that day... One minute I'd feel like it was tank top and shorts weather, and then ten minutes later, I needed a sweater.) 2. No, it was just a low neckline with sort of a billowy opening, and I realized when I bent forward I probably gave him a free show. Unfortunately, he did NOT give me a free lunch for it. :-) 3. You must have actually been watering during the drought. Me, I didn't bother. I was digging the no maintenance thing.

L Sass said...

You have been having too much fun! Unlike me, whose evenings have gone "work on MBA apps for two hours" "do 2 crossword puzzles" "go to bed" of late.

That suburban play was so close to my home of origin. You should have dropped in on my parents!

Anonymous said...

That pizza looks amazing. Like, fly to Minneapolis from Boston delicious.

I suppose I've been busy... I think? I can't really tell you. Now that school has started back up it has erased all memory of even having time off. Although I did buy a new car, so I guess that counts?

metalia said...

The pizza! The cake! The adorable baby!

Too much goodness, my friend. And why have I never noticed your beautiful blue eyes before?

Whiskeymarie said...

Um,
Eating,
drinking,
withering from 90+ degrees,
eating,
.
.
um, drinking,
withering...

Yup, that pretty much sums the summer up.

Anonymous said...

That sounds marvelous, especially the wine part. I'm salivating over that pizza right now, even though it's 9 in the morning. Welcome back to blogworld!

Anonymous said...

Yeah, I think that pizza just made me drool. The cake too, for that matter!

Stefanie said...

L Sass--Next time, I guess. Tell the Mama Sass and Daddy Sass to be expecting me. :-)

NPW--Well, it may be "fly to Minneapolis" delicious, but is it "fly to Minneapolis and then drive another two hours delicious? That might be a different story, huh? Also, I hope you're loving your new car!

Metalia--Actually, you have! ;-) (Coincidentally, I remember you commenting on that a few months ago, when I was holding that same baby! Crazy.) Anyway, thank you kindly.

WM--That sums up large portions of my summer, too. Particularly the last portions.

Noelle--I know. I just had a huge meal at a Vietnamese place, so I am stuffed, and it is the first time I have returned to that picture and NOT gotten hungry staring at it.

Anna--Both were excellent, I must say. Yum.