In which I prove once again that being Home Alone is not so bad

Don't you love it when I'm all timely-like and write a weekend update post that most of you won't read until Wednesday? That's good blogging, isn't it? I thought so.

That disclaimer out of the way, how about I tell you about my weekend? (Wait! Where are you going? This post involves Yoda! And pants! Maybe even Yoda's pants! Maybe not.) Anyway...

I spent this past weekend back in "Wiscoe" (as my Minnesota friends have recently been calling my homeland--a name I'm not sure is any less offensive to me than "Sconnie," but is at least said without the same snide tone of voice that generally implies immediate insult). My sisters and I all went back to help my mom clean out my grandma's house and price items for an estate sale. On the up side, I returned to Minneapolis with a rolling pin, a cake pan with cover, two slotted spoons, yet another rotary phone I probably won't use, and various other bits of memorabilia that I would photograph and share with you if only I weren't so damn lazy tired right now. On the down side, I had to spend entirely more time with certain immediate family members than I'm used to spending, and it left me a little bit on edge. At the risk of typing something that I will someday regret (someday possibly even being today, if my worst fears are correct and the people I prefer not to know about this blog actually do know about and routinely read this blog), I will just say that said family member means well and that most people would probably deem him or her entirely pleasant. But said family member and I differ in one very important regard, that being that I very much savor and enjoy a possibly larger than usual amount of alone time while he or she seems not to need any alone time, and therefore, when the two of us are together for any length of time (and he or she is unable to stop talking and/or playing 20 Questions with my life), I find it very hard not to curl myself into a ball with my eyes squinched shut and my fingers jammed in my ears and say, "Enough! No more talking! I can't hear you I can't see you I am going to my happy place now!" Ahem. Or something like that.

Am I really this on edge two days after the maddening weekend with certain family members? Honestly, I felt every defense wall in my psyche rise up as I typed those last few lines, and such a visceral reaction hardly seems necessary. Surely something else is bothering me, too. Oh yes. Various work annoyances. And boys. But I'm not dumb enough to write about either of those. (Dumb enough to write about my older sister? Yes, apparently. But dumb enough to write about work or the boy I may or may not see again? Surely not.) I also can't stop focusing on the tiny but surprisingly painful gash I managed to poke in my knuckle today with my own fingernail. Apparently I got a little overzealous in kickboxing class, which is bad idea combined with my lack of coordination and my startling ability to hurt myself doing routine things. People, I drew blood stabbing my own finger with another of my fingers while punching at nothing but air. There is no hope for me.

So back to my weekend. In addition to the rolling pin, etc., I also brought back a few items that my younger sister tossed into the inventory for the estate/rummage sale. I passed on every one of the 23 pairs of khakis she boxed up and instructed me to rifle through (I know the girl used to work at Target, but she had more pairs of khakis than I have pants total, and that seems more than a little off to me. And these are just the pants she decided to get rid of, mind you. How big is her closet, I have to ask?? And why isn't mine so generous??). I did, however, bring home two pairs of jeans, a cutesy apple-printed hoodie that I'm probably entirely too old to wear, and a t-shirt featuring a picture of Yoda seemingly rendered by the cartoonists for Scooby Doo. Instead of his usual calm, sage countenance, this Yoda looks a little shifty and suspicious, the jagged lines of his cartoon face seemingly pursed to say, "And I would have gotten away with it if it weren't for you meddling kids!" Incidentally, I am not a Jedi Master (nor an inordinately enthusiastic Star Wars fan). There is no more reason for me to own a Yoda shirt than to own an inappropriately juvenile apple-printed hoodie. Pre-mid-life crisis, perhaps? No, maybe just a wardrobe one. In addition, one of the pairs of jeans I snagged from the rummage sale stash is identical to a pair I already own. This wouldn't be so absurd if not for the fact that I already own not one, but three pairs of said jeans. I fully endorse the idea of buying multiples of something you know you like so that you always have a spare (I am already cursing myself for not buying a lifetime supply of the infamous blue Target yoga pants I have written about more than once). But four pairs? Of the same jeans? This may require an intervention of some sort.

On a related note, why am I even acquiring clothes from my baby sister in the first place? Isn't this all a little backwards? These sort of things are called hand-me-downs, not hand-me-ups. It's bad enough that the coffee table in my living room followed a similarly backwards path (my aunt's long-ago newlywed living room, on to basement storage, then to my little sister's mismatched mish-mosh living room before arriving in my own... If it redeems me any, I did repaint it first, but still...). I am ridiculous, low class, and/or thrifty. Take your pick, I suppose.

All right. I was going to tell you about the latest developments with my father's mystery snack cabinet, but I think this is more than enough rambling miscellany for one night, and it is now well past my bed time anyway. Tomorrow night I am off to see one of my very favorite imaginary boyfriends swing his hips and do the strummy circle thing with his arm that makes me swoon like a girl young enough to wear an apple-printed hoodie after all, but as I am not actually that girl, I do need a bit of sleep to keep me alert during Rhett's show. Wish me luck.