Hello? Is this thing on?

Hello, Internets! Remember me? Frankly I am not sure what is going on with me, but for some reason, I just decided to take a little impromptu hiatus from writing or reading blogs. Have you ever done that? If so, when you decided to re-emerge, did you actually read all the things you missed while you were gone? This is my dilemma, because after ignoring Bloglines for several days, it now says I have 220 unread posts waiting for me. 220! Poppy alone has published 40 of those. 40! Good lord, woman; take a break, I say. Anyway, so this is my dilemma: to read all or not to read all. I suppose if this is my biggest concern for the day, my life is going OK.

I surely don't fancy myself any sort of Internet celebrity, so perhaps many of you didn't even notice that I was neither posting to my own blog nor reading and commenting on yours. If you did, in fact, notice, however, and were even maybe considering sending out a search party, then I feel I owe you some explanation for my absence. Since it is Friday, my explanation will be in five-point form and serve as my Friday Five for the week.

Five possible answers for where I've been lately:

1. I was kidnapped by one of the two dates I had this week, and had to use all of the escape and survival skills I've gleaned from five summers of Girl Scout camp and 32 years of television viewing to rescue myself from the depths of this horrible man's basement, where I was chained to a radiator ala Samuel L. Jackson and Christina Ricci and guarded by a surprisingly ferocious toy poodle for a full five days and nights.
   
   
2. I won the lottery, quit my job, and took off for Costa Rica for a week, where I had a lovely and exciting fling with Manuel the windsurfing instructor, until his mother discovered us sipping drinks in a cabana and reminded him it was time for school. To this I say only that I swear he looked at least 22, but obviously I should have asked. (Perhaps I was just taking some tips from -R- and testing out the benefits of dating a younger man.)
   
   
3. I ran into Sarah Vowell on Hennepin Avenue after the This American Life show on Wednesday night and invited her to join me for a drink at nearby MacKenzie's pub. The two of us became instant best friends, and we thereafter took off on a fun and educational road trip together, touring all of the Puritan tourist attractions in New England.
   
   
4. I was out shoveling some of the 127 inches of snow that Minneapolis has received this week when a City snowplow made one of its passes through my neighborhood and buried me under the massive spray of snow left in its wake. After burrowing for days, I have only recently dug my way out. Incidentally, Charles Schultz was wrong: you can survive by sucking the juice from a wet mitten. It's not pleasant, but it'll get you through.
   
   
5. What, you didn't believe that last one either? Well how about that I suffered a heart attack while shoveling those 127 inches of snow and have been recovering in a hospital bed with no Internet access ever since?
   

No? You don't believe any of those? Well OK; you're right. I am, in fact, just lazy, and really have no good excuse for where I've been. Here are a few things I have done in the past week, however. No lies at all this time, OK?

• Went on two mostly fine dates with two seemingly perfectly nice men. It's remotely possible I may even actually go out with one of them again, but just because that is a rarity does not mean it's time to start checking the Target gift registry for me. All it means is that they were mostly normal dates, which means I've got no particularly amusing or aggravating stories to share from either of them.
  
  
• Re-wore an old bridesmaid dress, complete with the elbow-length gloves and Payless Dyeables shoes that were part of the original cornflower blue crepe-and-satin dream of an outfit six years ago. No, I didn't go to prom with my new teenaged boyfriend (though, again, -R- does make some fine points on that). I wore this ensemble to a fancy-dress Oscars party hosted by my friend Amy. A fine time was had by all. Or, a fine time was had by the six or seven people who actually made it. Damn Blizzard 1.0 did a bit of thwarting of those plans.
  
  
• Actually WON the "most guesses correct" prize at the aforementioned Oscars party (despite having not seen half the movies on the ballot). The prize for this title was a lovely miniature trophy... a trophy that came without a label but that I'm considering modifying slightly to benefit a blog-friend who I think needs this trophy more than I do. Liz, I do not know where you live, so I cannot send this award to you, but I suggest you print out this artist's rendering and post it somewhere prominent as a reminder that 2007 is your year!
  
  
  
  
• Spent several hours shoveling my way out of Blizzard 1.0 (which arrived last Saturday) and Blizzard 2.0 (which is still on its last legs now, as I type). I was actually just planning to head outside in a few minutes to shovel the latest six or seven inches that have fallen (I am playing hooky from work due to the snow and therefore have all day to get that done), but I just looked out my window and saw that it is snowing yet again. Again! My street already looks like this; haven't we had enough?
  
  
  

And that about wraps up the highlights and lowlights of my week. I hope all of you are well and none of you are buried under 127 inches of snow nor chained to a radiator nor being arrested for statutory rape. Now if you'll excuse me, I have 220 unread blog posts to get through and eight more inches of snow to shovel from my walk. Happy Friday!