Her Ladyship

Notes from the gutter.

Friday, May 26, 2006

Like a school in summer

In an attempt to disrupt our lives further, The Texan and I decided to swap the contents of our two bedrooms and repaint the whole house this weekend. Should be fun.

We started with the main bedroom and carefully taped drop cloths to the dressers. Then we started up with the paint spray gun. Now, I've never worked with one before, so I had no idea that it would live up to its name. I'd figured it would spray the paint more or less forward. Not so much - we're talking 360 degrees here. One spray in and I realized that if I wanted to wear my shirt again, I'd better take it off. All of my other clothes were taped away, so I figured that wearing my sports bra (was at yoga class earlier) would be fine.

It was...until we went outside to wash off the paint. We live at the end of a cul de sac, and I knew that our next-door neighbor was gone this weekend, but it did feel somewhat awkward to be sitting outside in my (sports) bra. The Texan pointed out that I show more skin when I go to the beach, but I told him it's all about context.

Afterwards, we decided the hell with it, grabbed a few beers, and sat on the porch. So I'm covered with paint, wearing my sports bra, and drinking a beer outside in the middle of a workday. Oh yeah. I got lots of class.

*********

We stopped to let the ceiling dry. Tomorrow: we paint the rest of the room blue, or Azure Sea, if you will. Cross your fingers that we don't end up with Azure Sea pawprints all over the house.

Tuesday, May 23, 2006

Torn

At the grocery store the other day, I stood in front of the cat food display, seesawing between two emotions.

On one hand, I was offended that HEB saw fit to put calcium chews right next to the cat toys. I mean, come on, how tired is that whole cat lady stereotype?

On the other hand, I *could* use a new box of chews. Bones don't grow dense by themselves!

Monday, May 22, 2006

No longer living in sin

Well, technically, I guess we still are living in sin, but fairly soon, that will change. On the one-year anniversary of the day we met, The Texan and I exchanged gifts to commemorate the madness that has ensued. I gave him an antique pocketwatch...he gave me a ring. Kinda makes my gift pale in comparison, right? Oh well. It's purty and it was given in love, which means a great deal to me. So far I haven't turned into a Bridezilla but give me time, it hasn't even been a week yet.

The proposal capped off a wonderful trip to DC. I had to do a few work things, but overall we managed to see all my friends and hang out in old haunts. Did we do anything of culture? No, we did not. Did we do anything besides take naps between going to restaurants and/or bars? No, we did not. Was it not the best vacation ever? Oh yes indeed it was. And it was really nice to see everyone again. Granted, I've only been gone seven months, so how much could really change, but still, seeing the urban family again was fan-tas-tic.

I also got to visit my old condo. Sniff. It's all clean and modern-looking now. The current tenants have done great things with the backyard - things I'd always intended to do, but never got around to (hey, I pulled the weeds before I left). Still, it's nice to know it's being loved as I loved it.

Now we're back in Texas and gearing up for what two people have already warned me about: The Planning. Should be fun!

Friday, May 12, 2006

Hello Washington!

I type this to you from our nation's capital, Washington DC. I had a bunch of meetings here and The Texan was done with school, so we decided to make a big trip out of it. It's the first time I've been here since I moved away last year. Conclusion? Looks pretty much the same (although they did finally paint the Nations bank on Dupont Circle; it's a lovely canary yellow now).

We got in late last night and immeidately headed to the bestest pizza place in the whole wide world, Alberto's. Because we were so tired, we opted against standing up and wolfing down the pizza - how one normally eats their pizza - but instead went to Biddy O'Mulligans to eat the slices like civilized human beings. There was a party of very drunk Australians carousing there, coming I'm sure from the Australian embassy which is around the corner, who damn near started a riot to get at our pizza slices. Three guys were scuffling over who could get The Texan's half-eaten, cold leftovers. One guy was willing to pay $20 for it, which, considering how a new slice costs $3.50, would've been quite a mark-up. We should've done that - it would've paid our bar bill. Instead, I batted them aside and saved the pizza for a very delicious breakfast today.

Good to be back! If you're in the DC area tonight, I'll be the very drunk chick at the Raven wearing my DC flag t-shirt. Come say hi.

Wednesday, May 10, 2006

And so it begins

Yesterday I had another Texas first: my very first brown-out. It was in the mid-90s and sweltering outside, and I guess the grid was straining to meet the demand, so out it went. The power was only off for an hour or so, but half an hour of sitting in this overheated trailer convinced The Texan and me that it would be a good time to go get dinner. Unfortunately, everyone around us also had the same idea. Combine that with the traffic lights being out and you have a recipe for a clusterfuck.

The dog was left outside - he has a pool and a water bucket to cool off in - but the cat, not being allowed outside unattended (there are some mangy cats in this neighborhood, plus he would make a nice meal for a pack of coyotes), had to stay inside. I was worried we'd come back to find him half- or wholly-baked. As it happened, the air-conditioning kicked in about 5 minutes after we left and we discovered the cat to be just fine by our return. I was greatly relieved to feel that the tips of his ears were cold.

Today it's 97...and it keeps getting hotter. Adding insult to injury, I got a company-wide email from my office in DC saying that because the weather was so beautiful there, they were shutting down for the afternoon. Sigh. Summer is going to be swell.

Tuesday, May 09, 2006

Still bitter after all these years

Eight years ago, my graduation ceremony's keynote speaker was the head of British Petroleum, whose name was something totally innocuous like John Brown. I'm pretty sure that the only reason why he was chosen was that our dumbass dean, Paul Wolfowitz (yes, THAT Wolfowitz), thought that he would donate money to the school. Oh, so wrong.

Instead, we got a speaker who started out his talk by saying, "I'm going to discuss the Caspian oil reserves for the next twenty minutes," and by god that's what he did. It was bad enough for us graduates, who in theory had been exposed to sufficient international relations in our studies that we would be interested in his talk, but the families were the real victims. To this day, my family speaks of that ceremony with a shudder.

The year before I graduated, Kofi Annan was the keynote speaker. The year after? Hilary Clinton. And this year? Mohamed ElBaradei. GODDAMMIT.

Friday, May 05, 2006

Living in the 80s

I'm curious as to when my gym last bought equipment. I mean, they have some nice cardio machines - fancy cross-trainers and the like - but their weight machines give me pause. You know how they always put a picture of a person up there to show you which muscles are being worked? Well, as I go to a women-only gym (except for one personal trainer who's a Y chromosome. Can't quite figure out how he got in there), they have a woman's body there. All well and good. Except the woman is *always* wearing those jazzercise leotards - you know, the kind with the legs cut up to the waist? The kind that no one has willingly put on their bodies since Olivia Newton John told us all to get physical? Yeah. That kind. Adding suspicion is that my gym recently celebrated its 20th anniversary. I'm thinking that mayhap the machines date back to the gym's beginning. Nothing wrong with that, I guess, as long as they've been taken care of for the past two decades. And seeing how I pay less than $20/month (AWESOME, I was paying over $70/month in DC), I'm wondering how much maintenance they do.

Eh, I'm just bitter because I got trapped in a machine yesterday. Totally my fault, although my trainer had warned me that people sometimes have that happen to them. It was one of those calf-raisers that you sit in and bear weight on your legs so that your calves have some resistance. I got in, put the weight on my legs...and couldn't budge. Luckily, another trainer was walking by and heeded my cries for help.

Wednesday, May 03, 2006

A Texas blow-out weekend

This past weekend was the highlight of a week-long party here in SA - Fiesta. Done to celebrate winning the Alamo and Texas' independence back from Mexico, it has evolved into a party so big that the city literally shuts down. They have a court of duchesses and princesses (none Latina, btw - strange in a town that's got such a strong Mexican influence) who wear these PHENOMENAL dresses that have trains the size of a small house. Just gorgeous.

So how did I celebrate Fiesta?

By going to Fiesta Texas, of course!

One of our friends was hosting a large group of out-of-town guests, so we tagged along. Fiesta Texas is officially Six Flags Over Fiesta Texas and even though it's considered to be small for an amusement park, I thought it was a lot of fun. And I made friends very easily: I wore light-colored pants which, when they got wet on the splashing rides, showed off my "Hello Kitty" underwear nicely. It could've been worse, I guess: I could've been wearing my Supergirl thong.

Sunday, we went tubing on the Comal River. For ten bucks, you can rent a tube, float down the river (which, if you don't stop, takes about two hours), and then get a ride back to the starting point. We did the loop twice. I bought the cutest water shoes EVER (hot pink laceups), which served me well as an identifier when I went ass over teakettle on one of the waterfalls. Everyone said they couldn't see me - just two pink feet flying through the air. We got an extra tube with a bottom so that we could float our cooler along with us. Others were doing the same. One enterprising group brought a keg along, which I learned will float. And still others had their dogs or radios with them.

Then The Texan and I came home and BBQ'd some steaks. It was almost like I was a *real* Texan.
 
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