Cooking with K

When K and I got home Sunday from Austin, we decided to look up some recipes on foodnetwork.com. We found this great recipe for p!zzagna, which sounded fun and like it'd be pretty good. We printed it out and went to the grocery store for the ingredients.

As you all know, I'm not a cook. I can bake, but that's not the same as cooking. Growing up with an Italian grandmother and mother, K has been around great cooks his whole life. Thank goodness for that, because I wouldn't have known where to even find half the ingredients in the recipe. K started out in the produce aisle. That's always my last stop. He started searching for fresh parsley. I would have gotten parsley on the spice aisle and ignored the word "fresh." The recipe called for "1 onion." He told me to get it. I didn't know which color -- red, white or yellow. I thought the recipe always had to say. He started looking for the "crimini mushrooms (baby portabellos)" as well. I'd have looked in the aisle with the mushrooms in the jar. We needed a bell pepper, and the recipe gave us a choice of red or green. I'd have called my grandma to see which she thought would be best. K went straight for the green.

We needed one cup of ricotta cheese. I pronounce it like a true Southern American: "rih-COAH-duh." Not K. He says it with the full Italian accent: "ri-COHD-tha" (That was the best I could do to phonetically spell out an Italian accent. Trust me, though, it's adorable.).

The most embarrassing part of our ingredient search was when we were in the produce section getting the last ingredient from that section: garlic. The recipe called for 2 cloves, sliced. First of all, I'd probably have gone to -- yup, you guessed it -- the spices for that instead of the produce section. When K came back to me with only one head of garlic, I said to him, "We need another clove of garlic. The recipe calls for two." K looked at me incredulously. "If you put two of these things in there," he said, holding up the head of garlic, "it would be all garlic!"

Yes, yes ... I know. I'm pathetic. I knew it was called a head of garlic, but for some reason, I thought in the world of garlic, a "head" and a "clove" are the same things.

Once our shopping was complete, we headed back to my apartment to prepare our meal. As a neat freak who bakes, I prepare my ingredients as I go, and I clean as I go as well. Evidently that's a bad idea when you're cooking. I was confused that K had skipped over the first two lines of the recipe when we started cooking. Instead of preheating the broiler and bringing a pot of water to a boil, he was working on chopping the parsley. He explained that it's a good idea to prepare your ingredients before you start cooking, especially when you're having to do things like finely chop parsley -- and especially when you're doing that fine chopping with a steak knife (Hey, I don't cook, remember? What do I need a knife set for? In college, two of my roommates had knife sets, so I didn't need one. When I moved to Dallas, I figured K and I would be married in a year, so I never bought one. It doesn't seem worth it now, since we'll just register for a nice set anyway.).

I filled my new pot that K and I had just bought at Wal-Mart (because of course I didn't have one) with water to prepare for the pasta. I put it on medium heat, since whenever I'm cooking spaghetti in my littler pot, it always boils over because I'm multitasking and cleaning as I go. I figured I'd save us from that problem. Instead, K wound up noticing I'd only set the stove to medium and turning it up to high. Once it was finally boiling, I put the pasta in. A bit later, K asked me how long it had been in the pot. "I don't know," I said. "Maybe 10 minutes."

"You didn't set a timer?"

At that comment, I looked at him like, You honestly thought I'd have a timer?! "No," I said. "Is it bad if it's been in there 10 minutes?"

"Well, you have to know when it's done." He explained to me how it's bad if you overcook or undercook pasta, but of course I don't remember what he said, other than, "That's where a lot of people mess up on pasta because they don't cook it just the right amount."

"But I thought you know it's done when you throw it against the wall and it sticks," I said. K just laughed at me. I think he was in shock.

The recipe called for some sauteing, which would have turned me away from the whole thing to begin with. K told me, though, that sauteing is just cooking in a skillet and keeping the food moving the whole time. My response: Why don't they just put "Cook the ingredients in a skillet, being sure to keep them moving"? Makes sense to me.

I didn't trust myself with the sauteeing since I'd already failed at cooking noodles and even boiling water. Instead, I did one of the things I do best: I combined ingredients in a large bowl. That's my specialty.

Rachael Ray claimed the recipe would only take 15 minutes to prepare. It took K and me a little longer. Then again, Ms. Ray does have all those unfair advantages to help her whip up her recipes in record time: steak knives, large pots and an understanding of general cooking terms. That's like cheating.

GFF always posts such yummy-looking pictures of food on her blog. Since pictures of Vanilla Almond Special K breakfast cereal, hot dogs, turkey sandwiches and regular salads with bacon ranch dressing wouldn't quite have the same appeal as her photos of fresh fish, fresh fruit, homemade cakes and healthy, great-sounding gourmet foods, I rarely post pictures of food myself. This means I grabbed in a heartbeat the opportunity to take pictures of real food that was being made in my kitchen.





K preparing to sautee


















Ingredients + large bowl = Something I can actually handle!










K sauteeing the veggies.









Almost done!











It really looked like pizza!







When we were finished cooking, we took our lovely p!zzagna into my living room, where we ate at my coffee table while watching TV and sipping some wine. We enjoyed the fact that we'd made our yummy dinner together, just two years after our very first dinner together the weekend we met.

Not the best choice for Memorial Day weekend

I left Dallas at 5:30 p.m. Friday for what was supposedly a three-hour drive to Austin. I stopped twice -- once to go through a McDonald's drive-through about 12 miles and two hours into the trip (yes, you read that right), and once again to get gas and some caffeine because I was bored out of my mind and ready to go to sleep. I arrived at our hotel in downtown Austin -- thanks to rain, traffic and a very intelligent decision on the Dallas city planners' part to fill potholes on the Friday afternoon before Memorial Day -- at 11:45 p.m. K, who'd managed to go to the wrong hotel, arrived shortly after me. We checked in and immediately went to sleep. We weren't exactly in the mood to go out after each driving over five hours to get to Austin.

We slept in the next morning, then went to this Tex-Mex restaurant called Vivo. If you ever find yourself at Vivo in Austin, I would strongly advise against ordering the cheese enchiladas (unless you really like things that taste like they're drowning in Velveeta) or eating the salsa without a large glass of water in front of you (hot hot hot!). I would, however, strongly suggest ordering a margarita. Not only are they amazingly yummy and sweet, but they come with flowers in them!



















One of the coolest parts about the restaurant is that they give the ladies roses. I was very excited to see mine was a yellow rose, since it's my favorite color.















After lunch, K and I, K's roommate and his girlfriend all went to a wine festival downtown. That was pretty fun. We sampled some great wines and some not-so-great wines, and K and I even got interviewed for some random Internet news channel ... thing.

What was really cool was when I saw this woman with an adorable dog and went up to pet him. I asked her if she minded, and she told me it was fine. Then, she said I had "awesome" arms and asked what workouts I do! That made me feel pretty good.

That night, we went out to dinner with Rebecca and some of her friends, then headed to 4th Street. We were sitting in the outdoor part of a bar, and it was raining a bit -- just enough to make a lot of people go inside so we could take their seats, but not enough for us to rush inside. It was pretty much just enough to make our hair look funny in pictures. I'd like to think we still pulled it off.




























K and I and his roommate and his girlfriend were all pretty tired from our long day, so we didn't make it past 12:30. It felt pathetic to be calling it a night so early in Austin, but we were just exhausted.

We hailed a cab to get back to our hotel. I guess the driver was angry that we only needed to go about a mile and a half or so from the bar we were at, because he tried to kill us about eight times on the way back. First, he started moving just as K was starting to climb into the car. I guess the fact that the overhead light was on wasn't an indication to him to wait a moment longer. K's roommate, his girlfriend and I were all screaming, "Whoa, whoa whoa!" The cab driver didn't apologize. He just acted annoyed. He proceeded to change lanes in intersections; cut off cars, a buggy that was giving rides through downtown and a rickshaw driver; start moving at red lights (as in, before they turned green); attempt to run over countless pedestrians; and about 1,000 other illegal and highly dangerous things that are especially dangerous on the streets of downtown Austin at 12:30 on a Saturday night.

What added an additional element of fun to Saturday was the fact that my wisdom tooth decided to start flaring up again. It had been hurting a bit that day, but I was hoping it wouldn't get bad. It definitely did. I barely slept Saturday night because of it. I tried calling our hotel lobby at about 3 a.m., but they were out of ibuprofen in their little shop.

K and I got up pretty early the next day and had brunch at a great restaurant on 6th Street. We decided to do a little sightseeing along the street afterward. We passed an ATM, and I noticed there was blood all over the sidewalk in front of it. Throughout our walk, we hit spots that reeked of urine. We'd passed a ton of cute little shops that Saturday on our way to the wine festival, but neither of us knew where they were, and I didn't need to be spending money on clothes anyhow. My tooth was hurting pretty badly (and the right side of my face was even swollen), so I wasn't interested in walking around much longer, and K wasn't into it either.

It was kind of disappointing to go all that way and not get to enjoy it like we'd hoped to, but we were ready to leave. We'd at least gotten to see Rebecca and hang out with her.

We headed back to Dallas, and I was very thankful that the drive back was much closer to the three-hour mark. We'll have to go back to Austin again, just not on Memorial Day weekend, not on our anniversary, not when it's raining, not when I'm craving cheese enchiladas, not when my wisdom tooth is coming in, and not when the city of Dallas is fixing potholes.

Woohoo, Memorial Day!

Thanks again for all the comments to my last planning post. Those really are helpful.

K and I decided the weekend after we got engaged that the reception and photographer are the most important things to us. We don't mind splurging for photos because we're both huge picture people. It's an important day, and we want great pictures to record it.

The reception is what people remember about the wedding. We think we're a pretty freakin' awesome couple, so we think it goes without saying that our reception should be pretty freakin' awesome as well. We want our guests to have a great time, and we want to have fun too! I don't think that should cost $10,000.

Now that I think about it, free fun is usually better than expensive fun. Example: I hate bars with covers. If I have to pay $20 to get in, it starts my night off on the wrong foot because I don't know that I'll have $20 worth of fun (and I usually don't). With a cover like that, I'm expecting the crowd to be kind of on the pretentious side, and I don't like to be around pretentious people. I like the regular old, laid-back sports bars and piano bars. Those are a good time.

(That was random!)

I've talked to a few coworkers who have been married in the last year and a half or so. One guy told me he and his wife spent less than $5,000 on their wedding. They didn't have drinking or dancing, though, so the venue knocked quite a bit off the price for that, and they didn't have to pay security guards because they didn't need any (you have to have them if you have alcohol). For their wedding cake, my coworker told me they had a bunch of cupcakes arranged on tiers like a wedding cake. He said the guests thought it was a good idea because they didn't have to wait in line for a cake-cutter. They just walked up and grabbed a cupcake. For his groom's cake, he had a bunch of Hohos and Ding Dongs arranged side by side to make it look like a cake. They put strawberries on top to fill in gaps. He said it looked really neat and that you couldn't tell that's what it was.

Now, I'm all for having a wedding on a small budget, but that's a little more economical than I want to get. I'd like a real cake, and there will be drinking and dancing. I'm still on the lookout for creative, inexpensive ideas, so keep 'em coming! I'll share them all with K and see what he thinks. You guys have some awesome centerpiece ideas, too!

The reception site I got the contract from has some complimentary table decorations. We have a choice of black or white floor-length linens. (We're going with white.) Also included are a one-foot square mirror tile for the center of each table, and a bubble bowl and two votives to go on either side. Obviously, I don't have to use those, but they're free. If you have any creative ideas to spruce up those things, feel free to share.

As for what else is going on in my life, I'm really excited for the weekend. Since it's Memorial Day, K doesn't have to work until Wednesday. That means we'll get to spend from tonight until Tuesday together. Last year, we went to San Antonio for Memorial Day and had a blast. This year, we're going to Austin, where we'll see my friend Rebecca and hang out on Sixth Street. There's a wine festival going on, so I'm pretty sure we'll stop by there! We may go canoeing this weekend, too -- if it ever stops raining.

Another cool thing about Memorial Day weekend is that it's kind of an anniversary for us. K and I met on May 26, two days before our friends' wedding. Since we didn't see each other again until July 2 (and by then I knew I was going to marry him, so we can't really count that as our anniversary), we celebrate on Memorial Day weekend.

Actually, we celebrate on the Fourth of July too, but that's our "when we knew" holiday. :) Yeah, we're cheesy. We know.

Have a great Memorial Day weekend!

A little TMI, but too funny not to share

Several of my blog reads post little conversations they have that they think are particularly funny. K and I had one such conversation last night that I immediately wanted to record. It's a little scandalous, but it was funny. I decided you could handle it, though.

Consider that your warning, and know that the fact it took place on the phone makes it less scandalous -- to me, anyway.

(Additional disclaimer: This is K being goofy as we were getting off the phone. We are not one of Those Couples -- the "No, I love you more!" couples. This is K speaking after a day of flying and driving. This is K speaking while he's falling asleep.)

Me: I love you.
K: I love you too ... so much.
Me: Me, too.
K: So much it hurts.
Me: Well, that's not good.
K: In my pants.

Let the countdown begin!

One year from this very date, I am hoping with all my heart that I'll be waking from a wonderful night's sleep to go get my hair done, get a pedicure, spend some time with my best girlfriends and count down the hours until the biggest moment of my life.

If K doesn't get deployed in November, then a year from this date will be our wedding date. A year from today, all the stress over choosing a venue, a florist, a DJ and a photographer; a dress; what type of bar we have; and every other single tiny detail that we'll have to plan won't matter. What will be most important is the fact that K and I will (finally) be husband and wife.

That makes the frustration from my last post easier to handle. And so did all the comments and advice people left. I really appreciated that.

I'm still torn on what to do about the whole thing. I mean, yeah, it is just one day, and $15,000 is a lot to spend for something that lasts only a few hours.

At the same time, it's a big few hours. Most of us girls wonder from a very early age what that day will be like. The venues and vendors know that, and that's exactly where they get you. I talked to K about this last night, and he had a great point: "We don't have to impress our friends and families. They're not coming for the wedding. They're coming to see us." So true.

Those one-foot blue bands will look lovely around the tops of our white tables, but they're not really going to matter to the 150 to 200 people who come to our wedding.

I've decided I'm going to email the lady back at our venue and ask her to remove the extras she added to our contract, which is what brought on the increase (She added the blue bands at $3 a table; some flowers for the centerpieces, which I said nothing about adding; and some yellow napkins for the bargain price of $400. I think I'll just tell all of our guests to wear long sleeves. Okay, not really.). We're going to start with the basics and go from there.

So here's what we've planned so far:

• Date: May 24, 2008


• Colors: royal blue and light yellow


• Location: Dallas (I would love to have our wedding in Norman, since it's one of my favorite places in the world. People could see where we got engaged, the OU campus and even the OKC bombing memorial, which means a lot to me as an Oklahoman. Unfortunately, it just doesn't make sense to get married there. It's already a five-hour drive for K to get to Dallas, so we'd have to drive three more to get to Norman. Since I live in Dallas, it makes sense to have it here. And with all the people who will be traveling to the wedding, Dallas is a great location because it's got a huge airport and has a lot to do.)


• Wedding party: We're going to have 10 groomsmen and five bridesmaids. K is in the Army. He's been stationed in Korea for a year, Iraq for six months, Afghanistan for four months, Oklahoma for three years and now Louisiana for three. That's a lot of people. Plus, he has his childhood friends and his college friends. We could easily have 30 groomsmen. We have 10 because K has a brother and eight close guy friends. I wanted my brother to be a groomsmen, so we added two more, which is perfect because it means I can have one more bridesmaid. On that end, I have a total of six good girlfriends. These are the girls I can tell anything to and talk to most often. The first four already know they're going to be bridesmaids. They'd be confused if I didn't ask them. The fifth is Rebecca. I think I'll talk to her about it when I see her this weekend in Austin. I think she'll be flattered that I'm asking her and won't be expecting it. The sixth good friend I'll ask to help with the guest book and things like that. I'll ask my cousin (the one who lived in Hawaii) to do that as well. That gets everyone I want included.


• Bridesmaids dresses:
  
  
  
  (imagine it with a light yellow sash instead of green)

• Flowers: yellow roses and blue hydrangeas
• Dinner: buffet. We're trying to choose between Italian and BBQ. Italian is obviously a big part of K's life (since he's half-Italian). BBQ is a big part of mine, with my dad and all. Before every dance, recital or big event in my life, I had to stop off at my dad's store so he could see me and take pictures. My grandparents could see me that way also, and so could the employees of the store, who were like family since we all worked together like that. I used to complain that I always had to smell like BBQ at everything because of the store. It would just be fitting to have BBQ at my wedding! The wedding planner guy said we could do both -- have BBQ and potato salad served for the meal, and have Italian hors d'oeuvres like Italian wedding soup and something else Italian at the end of the meal. They totally don't go together, but that's kind of the fun part. I think probably what we'll do, though, is just have BBQ for the rehearsal dinner and Italian for the wedding buffet. I don't want my dad, his girlfriend and my grandparents to have to eat BBQ at my wedding when they're around it every day. Plus, since it's not my dad's, it won't be that great anyway. :)

That's pretty much everything we have planned right now. I'm excited about all those things.

For all you married people, though -- especially those of you in Dallas! -- if you have any advice, feel free to leave a comment. Feel free to leave a really long comment. And if you have so much advice you can't even get it all in one comment, feel free to email me: soonerbride@hotmail.com

Maybe we should just get married in Vegas

Remember that wedding planner I was going to meet with last week? Well, he's a nice guy, but I just don't think it'll work out. He started our lunch meeting by telling me that we should move our budget total up to $15,000. He told me they offer a variety of options for how much help he would give, and the prices vary accordingly. He told me he'd either charge 15 percent or a flat fee of $1,500. That's a lot of money to me.

I was willing to consider it, though, if it meant planning this wedding would be easier and we could save money by having him help us. He's an event planner, right? He has to know more about venues and florists and caterers than I do. It's his job.

He asked me questions about what we wanted for our ceremony and reception. I explained to him that we wanted it to be simple and fun. I know those two words can mean very different things to different people, so I tried to elaborate to where he knew exactly what I meant. I was pleased when he summed it up with the words "elegant and classic, but simple." Clearly, he understood me.

He told me about this great venue in a great area of Dallas, and he told me to Google it when I got back to work. When I did, I could see that not only had he seriously misunderstood what I had in mind, but he actually may need a little more planning practice if this is what "elegant and classic, but simple" mean to him:























The room is fine. It's nice, but it's not my taste or K's. We want simple, and by that, I mean simple!

I figured if the planner could be so far off-base for what we had in mind for the venue, there's no telling what we could wind up with for flowers and our cake. It would be best, I decided, to just part ways. And hey, I'd save $1,500 too, right?

I emailed the lady at the venue I'd found that K and I both really liked. I told her to go ahead and draw up a contract. From our last meeting, I was able to get figures from her to find out that it would cost right around $7,650 for our reception venue and our catering. It meant we'd be a little over budget once we threw in flowers and everything else, but we wouldn't go too far over. I could live with that. It was better than immediately deciding we'd have to spend $15,000, only to just as quickly hand over $1,500 of that to some guy who thought we needed clear chairs.

Today, I got the contract back from the lady at our chosen venue. I opened it, eager to see what the catering and site would cost us. When I saw all those digits on the "Total" line, I wanted to cry. I almost did.

Just to the right of "Total Value" was a number just a little higher than $10,550. This woman told me my optimistic budget of $10,000 would be just fine. She said I might have to go "a little" over it, but I was okay with that. That was fine.

To me, though, that did not mean it was okay to spend more than $10,000 on the reception alone!

Does no one understand the concept of SIMPLE?!

It's not like there's anything BETTER to do while I'm standing there!

I bring my lunch to work every day. It means I save money, I don't have to worry about waits in restaurants or traffic on the way back to work, and I can get my eight hours of work in faster than if I leave for lunch. Lean Cuisine has some pretty awesome meals, so that's what I bring almost every day.

Well, over the last month and a half, I've realized a completely different, even better benefit of bringing my lunch to work.

Our little kitchen area in the office has these five amazingly bright lights over it. One day while I was waiting for my lunch to cook in the microwave, I leaned against the counter, taking advantage of those free moments to look at my ring. As I turned my hand slightly from side to side, I was excited to see what those five amazingly bright lights did for the sparkle. There were lights and colors all over the place!

Every single little diamond in the band and especially the three diamonds in the middle were picking up every bit of that light. It was awesome. I was amazed at how quickly the time went by before the microwave was beeping at me to tell me my food was done.

Since then, that's become my secret little lunch ritual while I wait for my food to cook. I think it's a wonderful use of my time, and it's kind of like eating dessert before lunch.

An officer and a jackass

I've only watched one season of The Bachelor -- the one with Jesse Palmer -- and that was mainly because a girl from Oklahoma was in it and went all the way to the final two. Maybe Jesse Palmer would be happily married today if he'd chosen her instead of the 22-year-old.

I've seen a few episodes of this season, which is called The Bachelor: An Officer and a Gentleman. I was intrigued by the title for obvious reasons. K is the perfect example of an officer and a gentleman, and I own a great movie by the same name as the one they've so generously given the star of this season's show.

I watched this season's first show with ER, who is a huge fan of The Bachelor. She thought this season's guy was hot. I thought he looked like a human ventriloquist dummy. He's a doctor, so he kept telling every girl he was making out with some line about giving her a physical. Ugh!

I don't like to throw up, so I realized in that first episode that watching this season wouldn't be a good move for me.

But Monday nights are slim pickins as far as TV shows go, so I did see a few minutes of a couple more episodes before I had to change the channel in disgust. Tonight when I came home, I turned on my TV, which I'd left on ABC from Good Morning America this morning. The finale of the show was on. I decided to watch it for a good laugh.

This season's stud didn't let me down.

He cried, he tickled and he went topless for the cameras a few times. He said on the final date with both girls that it was so perfect and romantic. He said after each girl told him she loved him that it was exactly what he needed to hear from her.

He managed to tell both of the women left in the final show that he loved them. It was classic.

Then, it was time for him to see each woman to tell her his decision. His speech sounded very memorized and very unspontaneous. Then, the girl started crying. All of a sudden, he was saying really sweet things to let her know how much he cared about her and that he didn't want her to feel rejected. He was being genuine and sweet. Finally.

Again, though, not to let the viewers down, it was time to reveal his feelings for the chosen girl. It was back to the ventriloquist dummy we knew all season long. He gave his goofy grin, he put the pauses in the right places, and he even made their kisses sound like a squegee.

And she said yes. So congrats on your engagement, Mr. Bachelor. Guess this means now you can finally give a girl that physical you've been dreaming of -- and here's hoping you don't need an exam yourself after she sees you feed 20 other women that same line.

Busy weekend coming up!

I'm leaving work early today to head to Lousiana. K has a Hail & Farewell ceremony, which is where they welcome guys who are just returning from a deployment or who have just gotten stationed at the base, and they say goodbye to those who are deploying or who are leaving the base for their next assignment. It's an informal dinner where everyone just hangs out, I think. This will really be my first one (I arrived toward the end of one a little over a year ago for some guys who were leaving for Afghanistan. When I got there, a lot of people were leaving or had already left.).

Tomorrow, K has a battery picnic. I don't really know what to expect with that one. It looks like it's going to be gorgeous tomorrow, so it'll be nice to spend some time outside.

We may head to Shreveport that evening to see one of K's friends who he hasn't seen in several years. Her husband was just deployed to Iraq, so she moved back to Shreveport with her parents while he's gone. K met her and her husband when he first got to Louisiana. He said they were good friends and that they had K and his roommate over for dinner a lot, since they were both bachelors who were getting settled into the area. These friends were there for K through the rough time he had after CM broke off their engagement. He hasn't seen them since they moved to Washington. I've met all of K's friends but them. Hopefully we'll get to see her.

Sunday, I'll have to get up early and head back to Dallas. ER's sister is getting married in a month, and she's having a shower Sunday afternoon. It sucks that I'll have to cut my weekend with K short, but I really can't miss her shower! They're like my second family.

At least next weekend is Memorial Day, though. K and I are planning on going to Austin for the long weekend. Rebecca lives there, so we'll hang out with her. We'll spend some time on 6th Street (where all the bars are, for those of you unfamiliar with Austin), and we may even float the river. I'm really looking forward to it. Plus, it'll be two years for K and me. Austin will be a fun place to celebrate!

I DO live in a big city!

Last night, I saw what it must feel like to live in New York City and be Carrie Bradshaw (if she was a real person): I went to a fashion show. I'd never been to anything like that before. Believe it or not, Oklahoma was never high up on the list for high-fashion events -- shocking, I know.

A coworker of mine has a friend who's an event planner, and this friend has planned a few weddings, but is wanting to get into them even more. Leave it to me to pass up the opportunity to help him out with that. The planner friend was supposed to be at the show that night, and he'd asked my coworker to invite me so we could meet.

My coworker and I ventured downtown to the shiny new W hotel, where the show was to take place. The W is one of those fancy places I always figured I'd hear about but would never go to. It seemed like it would either be a place where really cool people would go, or a place where people would go to look really cool.

When my coworker and I walked into the hotel, I was really impressed. It felt very Sex and the City. We went from the lobby into this big, open bar on the first floor of the hotel. There were blue lights everywhere -- even between the tiles on the floors. It was really a neat-looking place.
The fashion show was on the 16th floor by the pool. When we got to that area, we each grabbed a free mojito (Free! Seriously -- they invite you to the fashion show, and then they give you free drinks! I could get used to that!) and headed over to meet my coworker's friend. We chatted a while and admired the view of downtown to the east and a gorgeous sunset over ugly highway and industrial buildings to the west as we waited for the show to start.

I had expected to feel broke and ugly at an event like that. In college, I was used to going places that were full of people who looked like they stepped out of a magazine. It took me forever to get used to going to bars in Dallas and seeing an actual variety of people out. I'm used to it now, so when I go back to Norman, part of me feels broke and ugly surrounded by all the supermodel girls in designer jeans.

The fashion show, though, had all kinds of people at it. There were people there who looked around my age to people who looked like they were in their 60s.

The woman who was in charge of some portion of the show -- my coworker told me, but I can't remember what exactly she was there doing -- was some former model who is at "every event" in Dallas. She was really tall, and she looked like a less plastic, red-headed version of Janice Dickinson.

I was one of maybe three girls at the show wearing jeans instead of a little summer dress, but I wasn't worried about it (they were my sexy skinny jeans, so they weren't just any jeans). I was just soaking in the great view, the mojitos and the cool feeling that I was actually doing something very city-like.

The show started a little after 8. I don't know the designer or the name of the collection, but it did have a color theme. At least one garment in each look was gray.

There were less than 100 people at this fashion show, and I was able to stand with my coworker, his planner friend and another guy right off the edge of the runway. The models were stunning. I can't imagine strutting out like that at such an intimate-sized show and being able to keep a straight face, walk without stumbling, keep my face from turning bright red or keep from walking way too fast.

The collection was for fall or winter, judging by the weight and coverage of several of the outfits. It was a fashion show, though, which meant that one girl did have to walk out in a shamelessly sheer top with no bra. I can't begin to imagine what kind of guts that took.

The collection had everything from dresses that looked normal in front but with crazy backs to gorgeous coats and even a few nice twists on the little black dress. It was really neat to see. I wanted to take pictures, but the only people who were doing that were professional photographers. I decided it either wasn't allowed, was "frowned upon" or would make me look like the small-town girl I felt like in such an environment.

After the show was over, the models mingled with the guests for a few minutes so we could get a closer look at the outfits. By that point, I couldn't keep my camera in my purse any longer, whether it would make me look like some gawky "Wow! A real fashion show?!" girl or not. Unfortunately, I didn't realize how quickly all the models would be leaving. I got some great downtown shots, though, along with a picture of the back of one of the dresses from the collection.

Not long after the show was over, this girl showed up who I had to take a picture of (I'm sure you understand why after looking at these pictures).

She was posing all over the place, and she managed to forget several times that she was wearing a dress that was shorter than boy-cut panties. I had to document the length of this dress (or lack of) because I knew you wouldn't believe me if I just told you it was the shortest dress I've ever seen. This girl managed to show everyone much more than the model who'd walked out in the sheer shirt just minutes before. She seemed to enjoy the attention.

There really were all types at the fashion show.

And it's not even my birthday!

One of my very favorite products was discontinued about a year ago without any warning. My disappointment was so great when I went to Wal-Mart the first time and found it was no longer on the shelves that I thought about trying to duplicate the product myself. The materials would be easy to find, but recreating that perfect balance might not be so easy.

I decided it was just better to have the memory of it, since I might ruin it with my attempts to make it myself.

Last night, as I was running a long string of errands, I headed to Wal-Mart. I was going through the motions as quickly as I could, getting my usuals: milk, cereal, salad, yogurt, frozen food for lunch at work, Coke Zero ... and there it was! One of my long-lost favorites was right in front of me on the shelf, with a new design and everything: Vanilla Coke Zero!

I think it's no coincidence at all that today was the first day in over a week that it didn't rain in Dallas.

Note to self: Remember this post!

Sunday night, I got home from Louisiana at about 11:30. By the time I'd showered, gotten ready for bed and gotten things done to get ready for the week, it was 1:30 a.m. when I crawled into bed. Last night, I didn't get home until 11 (I'll tell you why tomorrow when I can post pictures), which meant it was another late night.

Tonight, I had several errands to run after work, so I didn't get home until after 8. I feel like I've been at my apartment so little lately that I've barely had time to clean it (When I say "clean," just so you know, I mean dusting, vacuuming and sanitizing. I keep a pretty clean apartment. I don't want you to think I'm living in a pigsty). I needed to get to the gym, but I found myself with a sudden overwhelming desire to organize and clean tonight.

I started organizing a few things as I talked to K on the phone. I told him I knew I should be going to the gym, but I just felt like I had so much stuff to do at home. I asked his opinion on what I should do, which I do pretty often. He asked when the last time was that I went to the gym. "Last Wednesday," I said to him, which I actually just now realized was a lie -- it was last Thursday (hey, that's a little better!). "You should go to the gym," he said. "When I don't want to go, once I get there, I'm always glad I went."

With that, I decided I'd go to the gym.

Okay, that's kind of an exaggeration. There was a little more of a discussion to it, since I really needed a push to go, but I realized K was right. By then, it was 9 p.m., so I didn't want to work out for very long. I decided I'd just do a good 30 minutes on the elliptical. It seemed like it would be a better use of my short workout time than the leg circuit I'd planned on doing originally, since I'd get a more complete workout.

Those 30 minutes on the elliptical went by pretty quickly, and I think they were much better spent than if I had been organizing my apartment.

I wanted to get this recorded on my blog so the next time I'm having one of those I really don't feel like going to the gym nights, maybe I'll remember this post, suck it up and head to the gym for some cardio. After all, like K said, once I'm into my workout, I'll be glad I went.

I guess my orthopedic surgeon really did know what he was talking about

I went to Louisiana this weekend for really the first time since K and I got engaged. I hadn't seen any of our friends there, so when we found out there was going to be a party at one of K's friends, we were game (not that we wouldn't have been anyway).

We were hanging out and having a great time. K and I were hanging out in the living room on the couch, and for some reason I got up to go into the kitchen. I rounded a corner and almost ran right into a couple of K's friends who were coming in to the living room. My right knee buckled, and I immediately went back to the couch to sit down.

This was the same knee that was really hurting me on day two of the bike ride. It's the same knee I had surgery on before my freshman year in high school, and the same one I've had trouble with so many times since.

I'd just grown so quickly (if you're short, here's one reason you can be happy for it!) that the muscles in my knee hadn't kept up. After I had my knee surgery, my orthopedic surgeon had told me that I'd need to do knee exercises for the rest of my life. I just figured the muscles around my kneecap were late bloomers. The thought of myself at 80 doing these stupid knee exercises seemed pretty ridiculous, so I decided I'd break out the weights whenever my knee started feeling weird.

What that really means is that I just never do the exercises -- even when my knee does feel weird. And in the case of the 150-mile bike ride, I didn't want to ride 120 miles and let a stupid knee stop me from completing those final measly 30 miles.

In the days after the ride when I noticed how much stronger my legs looked, I figured I might even have built up the muscles around my knees from doing that. After all, cycling isn't supposed to be hard on your knees since you're not putting the pressure and stress on them that things like running can do. I wear a brace when I run for that very reason, but I thought cycling was okay. I also thought since I was being more active, my muscles -- all of them -- would be more built up anrd I wouldn't have to worry so much.

I guess I was wrong. And I guess if I want to keep doing things like work out and ride bikes, I'm going to have to spend a little extra time working out my knees as well.

Like planning a wedding isn't hard enough already

One of the reasons I was always so ready to be engaged to K was that in my mind, once we were engaged, we could start planning our lives together. Obviously, we'd start by choosing a wedding date.

To me, that would be the date we'd get to start living together and finally seeing each other every day. It's the date we could really talk about getting the Weimaraner we've wanted for so long. It's the date I'd get to leave Dallas. It's the date I can finally justify buying one of those digital picture frames I want so badly but don't have because I live by myself and have no real need for one (Who's gonna see it? Plus, they'll be cheaper this time next year anyway.).

Somehow, in all my dreaming of the big day and the engagement and starting our happily ever after, I never took into account the fact that K is in the Army.

We've set a date for our big day: May 24, 2008. We think it'll be the perfect time, since it's almost three years to the day from when we first met. It's Memorial Day weekend, so our guests will have more time to travel and enjoy themselves. It won't quite have reached 100 degree temps, so our many guests from milder climates won't melt entirely away.

Once you have your date, you can start planning. You can send out save-the-date magnets, build a wedding website, look for dresses, plan a honeymoon and get invitations printed. Everything can start moving forward.

But not for us.

There's still a good chance K could be deployed to Iraq in late November. We won't know if that will happen until August. If he does get deployed, that obviously changes everything.

We'd immediately start looking for great deals to some nice place in Florida (K originally suggested Vegas, which was really more the idea one of his buddies, who I guess had discussed doing that with his fiance. I vetoed that plan. I can't get married in Vegas.). We'd have to throw plans together for what would hopefully be a nice, quiet ceremony on some fairly empty beach. It would likely be just us on such late notice. Hopefully my dad, his girlfriend and my brother would be able to make it at the least.

We'd have to push back all the reservations and plans we'd made to 2009, when K would get back from Iraq. That would become the new date we'd finally get to start our lives together.

If K doesn't get deployed, you'd think that means everything goes through as planned. Again, not for us.

As GFF can tell you all too well, the military loooooves to keep people waiting to find out what's in store for the next three years of their lives. See, K's time in lovely Louisiana is drawing to a close, which means he'll be reassigned to a new base. For all we know, he could be sent to Germany. (We're hoping for Colorado or Hawaii.) K will move to this new base in late December or January, which means we'll likely be super long distance for four or five months until our wedding. Awesome.

We're still going forward with all our plans, but there's no need to rush on any of them since we don't know if they'll stick. We'll at least nail down the reception site and church. As for the rest, I guess we'll just have things in mind or make sure florists, caterers and photographers know there's a chance things will be postponed. Maybe we'll design save-the-date magnets but not actually order them until August. Or maybe we won't even wind up with magnets at all.

It's a little frustrating to know decisions are being drawn out so much that could possibly affect the rest of my life. All I can do now to stay sane is just laugh about the fact that what I just knew would mean we could finally start planning our lives together has instead meant we have to plan for Scenario A, Scenario B and Scenario C.

I'm pretty sure I could choke a bear with my legs now

This Saturday was one of those perfect weekend days -- it's just a little drizzly and cooler outside, and you feel so grateful that it's a Saturday so you can sleep in and then lie around all day in your pjs or sweatpants watching movies.

I, however, decided to start my day at 5:15 a.m. K and I left my apartment to head to Frisco so we could start our weekend o' cycling at 7 a.m. It was the weekend of our big bike ride. Yes, that one. K and I were amazed to see how many people were participating in the ride. Seeing 3,000 people lining up with their bikes and sporting those sexy padded shorts is pretty overwhelming.

The ride started right at 7. Our team was one of the first ones to start. As K and I mounted our bikes and began peddling, I couldn't help but think about how early in the morning it was to be riding a bike and -- the worst part -- how much longer I'd be on said bike. My legs were sore just thinking about it.

K and I had a good pace going, and we were passing quite a few people. Not too far into the ride, we started seeing bikers on the side of the road fixing chains and tires. A coworker just six or seven feet in front of us was riding along when we all heard a loud Pffffffffffffffft! and he pulled to the side of the road to fix his seriously flat tire.

We all rode through town after town, taking up one lane of a one-way, two-lane road at times, and at others, riding on the shoulder trying not to get hit by the cars that passed us.

Before we knew it, K and I were hitting the first rest stop. It was only about 9 miles into the ride. We weren't ready to stop. We decided we'd hit the next rest stop, thinking we'd do every other one since they're each about 10 miles apart.

Soon, we started passing riders who had crashed. One woman was lying on the side of the road with several other cyclists around her. One person was holding her head, and one of the medic teams specially for the event was gathering around her. It was scary to see something like that, since you knew it could just as easily have been you on the ground.

When K and I hit the first rest stop, we drank cup after cup of Powerade and water. There were halved bananas and orange slices that we gobbled up too. There were protein bars, pretzels and pickle juice. There was a medic table with different creams cyclists swore by. The best item at that rest stop was the lip balm. They had it on little clips so you could take a tube and keep it handy to use throughout your ride. After waiting in line for longer than I ever thought I'd have to wait to use a porta potty, K and I were back on the road.

We were still making really good time when we got to lunch. It had started raining lightly, so we had spots of mud all over our arms, legs and jerseys. Our bikes were filthy. We were starving. We barely talked during lunch, since our focus was on scarfing down our food to fill our stomachs. We decided to rest and let our food settle. While we were doing that, it started raining a bit harder.




A small portion of the riders who happened to be at the lunch stop at the same time as us.









Check out the line for the porta potty!!!






When we got back on the road, the rain slowed us down a little more. There were more cyclists on the side of the road from crashes. More and more medic vans were passing us with their lights on. At one point, just about 30 feet in front of us, a cyclist went flying over his handlebars. K and I stopped when we reached him to make sure he was okay. He was lying face-down in the middle of the road. His teammates he had been riding with were saying his name and asking if he was okay. When he finally answered, they helped him roll over. He seemed like he was going to be okay, and since K and I could do nothing to help, we rode on.

We were definitely having a much harder time than before lunch. We'd been cruising along before, but giving our muscles that break made our bodies not so eager to cooperate with the physical torture again. And there was also the wind -- for some reason, Mother Nature had decided to punish us for stopping to rest and eat by giving us a horrible headwind to ride into. It made it especially fun to go up hills.

We rode and rode and rode, and I was getting pretty tired. We had passed the point where it made sense to stop, so I kept going, even though I had gone into the weekend saying I'd be proud of myself if I rode 75 miles. (I thought that was a reasonable expectation for myself, since I hadn't even owned a bike five weeks before the ride -- and since I'd only ridden my new bike four or five times.)

When I could see the lights and the grandstands of Texas Motor Speedway, the finish line for the day, I felt my eyes tearing up from the utter relief it was almost over. As we turned onto the road leading straight into TMS, several emotions and the utter exhaustion started to hit me. I thought about the entire day, feeling relief and thankfulness that K and I hadn't been one of the injured cyclists on the side of the road, counting down the moments until I could get off the uncomfortable seat for the rest of the day, and feeling proud of myself for completing the entire route for the day. I was hungry and ready to get off my bike, but I also couldn't help but think of the whole reason for the ride. We had done a good thing to help support people who are affected by multiple sclerosis. We still had a long way to go, but it was nice to know we'd done it all for such a good cause.

K and I made our way to our team tent. It was only about 1:30. We'd eaten lunch at around 10:45, so we were ready for more food. We had a burger and some beer, which tasted awesome. We hung around the tent for a few hours so we could be in our team picture, and then we headed back to our hotel, where we immediately crashed for the night.







K and me at our team tent after riding the first 75 miles.










We got up even earlier -- 4:15 -- on Sunday morning. I was not at all excited at the thought of spending another several hours on my bicycle. I didn't know if my rear end could handle that -- padded bike shorts or not!

We arrived back at TMS by 5:30 for breakfast. We aired up our tires and lined up for a ride around the race track. We got to ride into the tunnel and everything. It was surprising to see how steep the track is on the turns. It looks quite a bit different from the stands and on tv!





Cyclists coming through the tunnels into TMS









K and me before starting our lap around the speedway










I look like a real cyclist!







I was glad to see that after about 10 minutes on my bike, I was numb enough that the seat wasn't as painful as I'd thought it would be. Starting off was definitely the hard part. K and I had decided to pace ourselves since we both had such a hard time after lunch. We thought if we took it easier through the morning, it would make the rest of the day much easier.

The morning went pretty well. It felt great outside, and although we had lots of hills, once we topped them we were always blessed with a rewarding downhill slope. We had some really pretty scenery, and it seemed like it was going to be a good day again.

And then we went to lunch. We made sure we didn't stop as long as we did the day before, since that's what killed us. We'd been warned by several riders who'd done the MS 150 before that the worst was yet to come. They weren't kidding. Again, we left lunch only to ride into a terrible headwind. We had several hills, but somehow none of them had downhill slopes. It was frustrating!

The absolute worst hill for K and I was the steepest hill on the ride. It hurt to climb that thing! People started getting off their bikes about 10 feet into it and walking the whole way up. I refused to get off my bike, since I wouldn't be able to honestly say I'd completed the whole thing and, dangit, if I'd come that far I was going to finish! At the top of that evil monster hill, there was a bank with an empty parking lot. Everyone who reached the top, whether through walking or riding, stopped at that parking lot to rest. It took too much out of us to continue without a break.

K and I had repeatedly been told about this one insanely long, awful hill. It was so bad, in fact, that they shortened the distance to the next rest stop because of it. At the last stop before it, everyone said, "It's only five miles to the next stop -- but there's a reason." One volunteer at the stop told K and me that the steep hill we'd thought was so difficult was nothing compared to this. "You won't even think about that hill after you climb this one," he said. He told us the hill we thought was so bad was the steepest on the route. The one we were about to try to face was not very steep, but it lasted 2 1/2 miles. There was nowhere to stop, since there was virtually no shoulder. The hill seems endless, we were warned. He told us to pace ourselves.

I was a bit nervous about what was coming up when K and I set out again. My method for hills had been to not slow down on them so I'd gain momentum and could get through it as quickly as possible. I'd lean down and put my hands on the bottom curve of my handlebars. I'd knock my gears down to one of the lowest -- if not the lowest -- ones, and I'd put my head down so the visor on my helmet would block all but what I really needed to see ahead of me so I could still ride safely. That way, I couldn't see the top of the hill and psyche myself out thinking it was closer than it was or realizing I had so much left to go.

This hill sounded like it was going to be awful. It's all anyone had talked about that day when we talked about the ride and what was left.

Not far from the rest stop, I saw a long, gradual hill in front of us. Again, there were riders walking up. I started to speed up to gain momentum. "Pace yourself, babe!" K called from behind me. This wasn't the hill, but I decided that was probably a good idea. I could see that this hill was a longer one. I climbed up slowly and steadily, and then our route turned left. The hill continued. It wasn't anything bad, it was just long.

When we finally finished, I turned to K and said, "Man, I'm really nervous about this hill." "Me too," he said. Not even a quarter of a mile later, we had hit the next rest stop. "Wait!" I said. "That means that was the hill!"

"No," K said. "It's supposed to be after this." I told K everyone had said it was on this route, and that's why we had a shortened ride to the rest stop. We had tackled the impossible hill with no problem -- to the point that we hadn't even realized that was the hill!

We were only 10 miles from the finish, so we didn't stop long. We were really tired, but obviously we were going to finish. The last part of the ride wasn't so bad for the majority. As we neared downtown Fort Worth, we had to climb up quite a hill that we were both cursing under our breath. K said whoever chose the route was evil for making us go over such a hill so close to the end.

The closer we got to the finish, we started seeing more people cheering us on. There were quite a few people lined up at the finish line yelling and waving for us. K and I were the only ones crossing at that time. We gave each other daps as we crossed under the "FINISH" banner.





K and me at the end of day two, finished with the 150






We had made it the full 150 miles. After two days straight of sitting on that seat, I was surprised at what muscles and areas I felt the most.

Obviously I was sore where I'd sat on the saddle. In fact, there were many times I couldn't tell if I needed to be worried about the line at the porta potties at the next stop or if I was just numb from being on the seat so long. My fingers were tingly thanks to pretty much constantly vibrating from all the bumps on the road. My right knee hurt, which worried me a little. The sorest of all, which I hadn't expected, was my back, just to the left of my spine and at the top of my shoulderblade.

When you're riding on a road bike, you're leaning down quite a bit. You have to be aware of what's going on around you and behind you, since there are hundreds of cyclists and cars sharing the road with you. You glance over your shoulder before you make almost any move to make sure you won't become someone's roadkill.

And speaking of roadkill, we saw plenty over the course of the weekend. I'd had no idea how many snakes there were in the Dallas area. At least I know a lot of them are dead.

Some funny things from our ride:

• K and I were discussing how sore we were on the seats. K was having a problem keeping things arranged in a comfortable way, if you will. He said to me, "Now I know the real reason Lance Armstrong only has one testicle!"
• At one point on day two, K and I managed to get in a line of several cyclists, one of whom was a woman wearing sky blue cycling shorts. Not to be rude, but K and I realized at a rest stop that this woman's butt was drooping in her lovely sky blue spandex shorts, which meant there was a lot squeezed into them. I had the displeasure of riding behind her on a portion of the route. I'm not kidding, her butt was rippling in her sky blue shorts. It was awful, and frankly, it was killing my motivation to continue. I tried looking above her, but her shorts were rippling enough that no matter where I looked in front of me, my eyes picked up the movement. I let the line go ahead of me, mainly because I was tired, but partly because I couldn't handle riding behind her anymore. When I caught back up to K later on, I barely got out, "Oh my gosh, did you see the woman in the ..." before he was finishing my sentence. "It was like staring at the sun!" he said.
• In a world where I hear so many people concerned with dieting and carbs, it was funny to be in an environment where people were picking up energy drinks and saying, "This thing doesn't have carbs! How am I supposed to get energy?" At rest stops, people would climb off their bikes and say, "I need carbs!" Cyclists were even reaching for foods that had the most carbs. It was kind of like a parallel universe.

The MS 150 was the most challenging athletic thing I've done in my life. I'm pretty proud of myself for finishing, I have to say. K and I did a great thing for a great cause, and we had a good time doing it.

I'm even already looking forward to next year.

Sorry to postpone ...

I had a huge, crazy weekend. I'm still exhausted -- and I went to bed at 9 last night!

K and I saw Spiderman 3 on Friday night, and I have to say I was kind of disappointed. The first two were definitely way better.

And that's all I'm telling you about the weekend for now. I know, I'm sorry -- really. I'll post tomorrow, though, all about it, complete with pictures! I know you're on the edge of your seats!

Oh, and I have to say thanks for all the comments after the mom post. I know that was a really long post, so I appreciate that so many of you actually read the whole thing. Thanks especially for reassuring me that I'm handling this well. It's good to hear that.

It's a rough life ...

My day so far:

• 9:15-ish -- Got free pair of cute new ballet shoes because they didn't fit my boss, who happens to wear the same size shoe as me (with a little wider feet).
• 9:16-ish -- Accidentally knocked over coworker's beer can pyramid out of excitement about trying on new shoes. (Remember that "P!mp my cube" thing? She did a trailer trash theme.)
• 12:00 -- Had frozen margaritas and Mexican food at work. It was catered. (And by the way, I passed on the Dos Equis keg in favor of the margaritas.)
• 1:45 -- Got a pretty decent 15-minute massage in an awesome massage chair at work.
• 2:05 -- Enjoyed a nice icee with a coworker.

Have I mentioned lately how much I'm loving my new job?

P.S. If it makes you feel better, I've worked late the last two nights, and today has involved some work as well. It's just nice to have a day like today.

Since I can't walk around work with unbuttoned jeans ...

I'm totally wishing I hadn't worn the jeans I'm wearing today. They're cute, but they have absolutely no give to them, and the waistband is tight. They're not unflattering, or I wouldn't have worn them. I'm not poured into them by any means, but this waistband is killing me!

Is it an acceptable reason to leave work so I can go home to change into more comfy jeans? Ugh!

Clearly, I have a lot of issues with my mother

Believe it or not, I actually trimmed a ton out of this entry before posting. Hopefully my little subheads (more like chapters) make it a little easier to read ...

Important history

My mom and I have had a rocky relationship for the last several years. After my parents separated (when I was 19 and in college), my mom put me in positions I should never have been put in. She confided in me way too much and way too often. I told her repeatedly that she was telling me things I didn't need to hear, didn't want to hear and shouldn't be hearing. I told her to call her church friends or her work friends or her longtime friends. She said she didn't want to wear them out. She chose to wear me out instead.

I was in college, working multiple jobs and taking classes full time. I was financially independent. I didn't have the time to listen to her or (mainly) the time to deal with everything I was hearing. I asked her time after time after time to call someone else, but she refused. Every once in a while, I'd get through to her that she had crossed the line. She would apologize and promise she'd stop. As usual with my mom, the revelation didn't last long, and less than a couple weeks later, we'd be right back at square one.

I started off being nice with my requests for her to stop talking to me about the divorce and my dad. It didn't work. I got more assertive. It didn't work. I got more authoritative, and that didn't work. I eventually would yell into the phone. That just made her cry, and somehow, the calls continued. I tried cursing at her, which just made her tell me not to use that language and then hang up on me. Still, though, the calls didn't really stop.

My patience with my mom wore very thin over that two- or three-year period. We reached a whole new point when I was home for Christmas my sophomore year in college and my mom told me about the day just four weeks earlier that she'd almost successfully committed suicide. She told me she wouldn't have done what she did had we not gotten into an argument that morning. I said "f--- you" to her and told her she was stupid if she thought I was going to sit there and let her blame her stupid decision on me. That just tells you, though, what our relationship became.

I think I probably stand up for myself better now as a result of all I went through with my mom in college, but it's left my patience level with her very thin. I'd say my fuse with her is about as long as an eyelash. And I think that's her own fault.

Big days gone bad

My mom and I go through phases where we don't talk. We'll get on one of a few topics of conversation that I know we should avoid (money, my brother or my dad most often), and it winds up in a huge argument. She gets emotional and hangs up on me, and we don't talk for weeks -- sometimes months. Almost every single time, what makes us start talking again is that something really big happens in my life. This last time, it was my engagement.

For some background, the summer before my junior year of college is when my mom got married. I told her that I was going to have several major events in the near future that I would want her and my dad both to be at -- my last home game as a member of the OU marching band, my last band concert, my college graduation and, someday in the far-off future, my wedding. I told my mom that those were all things I had been working toward for a long time. They were all a huge deal to me, and I would need her and my dad to be civil.

Well, three of the four have passed, and none of those went smoothly. Through them all, I was stressed and trying to be in two places at once. My mom acted awkward at all of them. She drove two hours to and from OU to come to my college graduation and tried to leave without saying a word to me or even taking a picture with me because my dad was there. As for my last band concert, when I called her after to thank her for coming, she proceeded to gripe at me through sobs because she just knew I had planned it out that my dad and his girlfriend would end up sitting in the row in front of her and her husband. She honestly thought that in April of my senior year in college -- through all the stress of capstone, finals, projects and figuring out where I was going to be living and how I was going to get my first "real" job -- that I had nothing better to do than to plan it out that my dad and his girlfriend would sit in the same room as my mom and her husband -- and only one. row. in front of them.

I told you she's crazy.

The latest

So anyway, like I said, when K and I got engaged, my mom and I were in another of our not-talking phases. What's kind of ironic is that we were fighting about the very likely upcoming wedding. I'd told my mom all along since the summer before my junior year that if she ruined all those things I had coming up, I'd be very upset with her. Since a year and a half hadn't been enough time to handle that, I wanted to be sure she'd have plenty of time before my wedding, especially since I'd found the guy.

In February, an opportunity presented itself that would be good for us all -- my dad and his girlfriend; K and me; my mom and her husband -- to get together briefly. I suggested it to my mom. She told me I was unreasonable and that everyone she knew agreed and couldn't believe I'd even think to ask her and her husband to do such a thing. She said she would never sit at the same dinner table with my dad. Needless to say, that conversation ended badly, so we didn't talk for weeks.

Then came the morning of April 1st, when K got into my phone and found my mom's number to get her blessing before he proposed. When he did, I had to call her -- she's my mom. That meant we were talking again.

A rocky start

I had to call my mom the weekend K and I were first beginning to make plans, which included coming up with our budget. I called my mom to ask her if she could sit down with her husband to figure out what they were comfortable with contributing. I told her that whatever number she came up with would be what I'd count on -- nothing more, nothing less. That way, their contribution would be established early on, and that's all they'd have to worry about.

When I explained that to my mom, she asked if I'd talked to my dad. She said she didn't want to tell me anything until after I'd talked to him. I told her that I hadn't called him yet, but that when I'd told him a few days earlier that K and I would be planning our budget that weekend, he told me he would help out as much as he could to give me whatever I wanted. I wasn't surprised to hear him say that. I know my dad will give me more money than he should and would put himself in an uncomfortable situation because he wanted me to be happy. That's what I don't want to happen, and that's why I'm doing things the way I am.

My mom told me she would think about the whole budget thing. I talked to her a couple times the next week, but that didn't come up. Finally, I brought it up myself. My mom completely stunned me with her response: "I still need to pray about it."

"What does that mean?" I asked her. She explained to me that it was not her husband's responsibility to help pay for my wedding. He has three girls of his own, and he didn't even meet me until three years ago. It wouldn't be fair to expect him to pitch in.

"I completely agree," I told her. "But I figured since you two are married, you'd have a joint checking account. Obviously whatever you pitch in will affect him, so I figured you'd talk about it together."

My mom said something about how they don't discuss with each other how much they spend on their kids, which doesn't make sense. This isn't like my mom's giving me money for gas or for prescriptions. This is a wedding.

My mom continued, telling me she and my dad had paid for their entire wedding on their own. She told me that she was just "confused" as to what her responsibility was in the whole thing. She said K and I probably make three times more than her, so she wasn't sure what she was supposed to be helping with. She also mentioned that our relationship is pretty rocky. She then told me that I only call her when I want something -- usually money (Funny, since I started paying for my school supplies and the majority of my clothes, feminine products and other necessities when I was 14.). That conversation didn't get much better, so I got off the phone before I exploded at her.

When things really got bad

She didn't call me that week, which meant we didn't talk until the day I went dress shopping and fell in love with a reception site. I called her to tell her about it. I was noticeably excited about the place and some of the other things I'd discussed with the site manager. My mom, who always has an opinion about everything, was silent (Remember, I'm noticeably excited). Finally, I asked her to tell me what she wasn't saying. She proceeded to tell me that she didn't understand why K and I were going to serve dinner to everyone.

"Mom," I explained, "people will be flying in for this wedding from Pennsylvania; Georgia; Ohio; Washington; Washington, D.C.; New York -- from everywhere. The least we can do is feed them a little bit of food." I reminded her we will most likely have a buffet, which is much more economical than a plated dinner.

Then, she started on the whole alcohol thing: "Well, I know you and K want to have an open bar, and I don't understand why you're wanting to throw a huge party for everyone and pay for it," she said. I reminded my mom that K and I had not decided on anything yet and that we wouldn't even wind up making a decision on a bar until probably March. We'd see what was left in our budget and work with that.

My mom said, "I know you and K want to have this big, elaborate wedding, but ..." I cut her off at that. "Have you listened to anything I've said about this?!" I asked her. I told her that I've said all along that we want a simple wedding, but we want it to be fun for everyone. My mom then told me that she was a little worried that we were spending as much as $10,000 on a wedding and thought that was being frugal.

Um, hello? We're planning a wedding in Dallas, Texas. "Everything's bigger in Texas" -- yeah, that state. Dallas is huge, and it's full of people with huge hair and huge budgets (and huge fake boobs, but that's another story). I assure you thinking you can plan a half-decent wedding for 200 people in Dallas, Texas, at less than $10,000 is like building a rocket out of a film canister and an Alka-Seltzer tablet and expecting it to reach the moon.

I told my mom that her comments so far had been frustrating and upsetting. I told her this was supposed to be one of the most fun things a girl can do. It's something we look forward to from an early age, and I didn't want this to be a year of her shooting down everything I told her we'd planned. I told her I wanted that to stop.

She told me that I was frustrating and annoying her. The argument kept going and going and going. It went far beyond weddings, my dad and the present. My mom was twisting my words, which she's so talented at doing, and I was getting more and more frustrated.

Pretty much a timebomb

There are several problems with my relationship with my mom. For starters, as I said earlier, my fuse with her is very short. She annoys and frustrates me faster than anyone in the entire world. She doesn't upset me, though; I'm surprisingly calm and disconnected in our conversations. I wonder if it's some coping mechanism I developed in college when she was calling me five times a day.

When my mom cries, instead of getting sympathetic, I get annoyed and start wishing I was anywhere doing anything instead of listening to her cry and be so overdramatic about her emotions ("That cut me to the bone", "I'm dying [insert overdramatic, at-least-five-second pause here], and so are you. One day, I won't be here." -- not kidding, those are actual quotes.).

I'm also very honest with my mom. This is bad. It means that when she asks me a bad question, I tell her the (bad) honest answer. Example:

Mom: I can’t believe you just said that.
Me, blandly: Sorry.
Mom: No you’re not.
Me: You’re right, I’m really not.
Mom: Well, then why did you even bother apologizing?
Me: Because it was the polite thing to do.

Those three things -- short fuse, lack of sympathy and brutal honesty -- make for a pretty bad combination. Our argument that night escalated and escalated to the point that my mom just went from talking normally to bawling so hard she could barely speak. I actually did feel bad that she was crying so hard, but I couldn't help but notice how child-like her voice sounded through the whole thing. I felt bad that she was so upset, but I didn't feel anything really for being a good portion of the cause of it (her lack of sanity being the main culprit).

I'm usually a very sympathetic person. My mom is the only person I'm like that with. It's for that very reason that that night, a few hours after we'd gotten off the phone, I deleted my mom's number from my phone. I have her number memorized, but I figured without it in my phone, I'd have to dial a whole 10 digits before I could press "send" to call her. Surely by then, I'll have realized it's not a good idea.