divine angst

My Fair City just passed a smoking ban.

For weeks, I’ve been listening to these stupid radio commercials, running up to the election, implying that the smoking ban is a way for Big Government to control our lives and restrict our choices (particularly our choices in where to drink and hear live music).

And now that it’s passed, I’m sure we’ll hear lots of noise about Big Government and the Damn Red Staters controlling our lives and telling us what to do.

So isn’t it interesting that smoking bans originated because of concerns over public health? Which is a particularly Blue State issue?

I didn’t vote on this issue, primarily because we’re leaving and I don’t really think it’s right for me to vote for or against something that I will never have to live with. But if I were voting, I probably would have voted for it. I’ve been a waitress; good friends of mine have been bartenders. When I waited tables, I smoked. Many of my service industry friends smoke. And most of them get sick and tired of working an eight-hour shift in a smoky bar. I agree—it sucks, quite honestly.

This is the South, for goodness’ sake. If you can’t smoke in the bar (and you already can’t smoke in restaurants here, or bars that make more than 50% of their revenue from food sales), you can walk the heck outside. It’s not going to be snowing or icy. It might be raining, but hey, weather is weather.

Basically, I’m sick of these people who, in every other polictical situation, would be raving liberals, but in this case pull the libertarian card! Before you go mouthing off in the public arena, figure out what your actual political ideals are.

And if I hear ONE PERSON bitch about this ban being a Red State blight, I might have to go postal.

At a January wedding, in the Catholic Cathedral in my hometown, a guest wearing white linen pants, a white linen backless top (one of those handkerchief-with-strings tops) and a BLACK THONG. Totally visible.

One of my cousins so drunk at the after-rehearsal-dinner party that he actually messed himself.

Eighty-five wedding guests gathered outside the hotel at 6 o’clock in the morning because one of the guests couldn’t wait till he got outside to have a cigarette, so he lit up in the elevator and triggered the fire alarm.

The groom’s name misspelled on the program.

The food running out 20 minutes into the reception, before the bride and groom had even arrived from taking pictures.

The maid of honor repeating mindless phrases out of some “wedding toasts for dummies” book because she so strongly disapproved of the groom.

Champagne being passed out to ONLY THE FAMILY during toasts. (We had a bottle of Crown hidden under our table, so we were OK, but still. Tacky.)

CM asked for wedding stories.

I’ll try to accomodate. I may have to tell more than one, and not just about my own wedding. After all, weddings are the main social excursions for me lately. (By summer’s end, I’ll have gone to 18 in four years.)

OK. Wedding stories.

Keeping My Cool, or How Delegating Is a Beautiful Thing

To preface, I will say that I am a pretty even-tempered person. I don’t fret about things much. I also had planned my wedding pretty well. So there wasn’t much to worry about. In fact, this particular event was really the worst thing that happened at my wedding—with close runners-up including being kicked out of the church before we could finish taking pictures, having brothers leave before family pictures were done, having one of my cousins change into khakis after the ceremony, and having a guest show up in a white cotton skirt and a belly shirt (in January). But those things were minor, really.

When this particular snafu happened, the wedding had been over for about 40 minutes. Mr. Angst and the wedding party and I had just come over to the reception from the church, where we’d been taking pictures. I was starving and people were stopping us every five feet for hugs and chit-chat. I was enjoying every minute of it.

My maid of honor brought me the last piece of food from the cocktail hour—a slice of baguette and (I think) a piece of celery. She also brought me a glass of wine. I continued to chat and mingle and greet people. And then, a family friend approached.

This family friend, let’s call him Bob, was my cousin’s college roommate. But Bob has been coming to our family reunions forever, and he’s really just a part of the family now. So I smiled widely and told him how glad I was to see him.

NB: Bob was at the time single, and he knew everyone in my family, so I didn’t send his invitation with an “and guest.” We were definitely short on space and anyone who was family and would know more than 30% of the guests didn’t get to bring a random date, only serious significant others. Some of my cousins didn’t even get to bring dates. I thought that was a fair decision on my part, and my wedding party and parents agreed.

So there’s Bob, shaking Mr. Angst’s hand and telling us congratulations, and then he turns around and says, “By the way, I’d like you to meet Amy.”

Amy? Who is Amy?

Amy was his date. His date who didn’t have a seat in the reception, who didn’t have an entree, who didn’t have a placecard. Well, crap.

I’m sure I turned sort of white. My maid of honor, God bless that woman, because she is my ROCK, immediately walked away and came back with the hotel’s wedding coordinator. I finished chatting with Bob—and meeting Amy—turned away, and found the coordinator standing right there, already aware of a problem. (This is the beauty of having your reception at a hotel with a full-time staff. They do EVERYTHING for you.)

So I told her that we had a problem at Table 9 (yes, I knew exactly what table Bob was supposed to be sitting at, and I knew it was a FULL table), and that I also didn’t know what this new person was going to eat, but that she was there and needed to be accomodated.

And she took care of it. I don’t really know what she did. But 20 minutes later as we were going in for dinner, I asked her about the extra person and she said, “It’s all taken care of!” And that was the last I heard of that.

As wedding stories go, that was probably pretty boring. And really, my wedding, while not boring, was pretty problem-free. And problems make the best stories. So I’ll try to think of other things that might be more interesting for another wedding post.

It’s been a busy 24 hours. Yesterday, after work, Mr. Angst and I drove to Nearby City in a rented pickup truck with a bunch of stuff to store at my dad’s house and a bookshelf for my sister. Between loading up the truck and driving down there, I’m surprised we’re still talking to each other.

This morning we came back to Our City and took our car to the dealership to see what they’d give us for it. Their offer was paltry, but that’s OK, because we have a private buyer who wants to buy at a better price. (That buyer is a family member. I have good family members.) We also came back with an extra vehicle from my dad—a small SUV, something we thought would be mucho helpful for moving stuff from our cluttered apartment into our storage unit down the street. We can use this vehicle all summer, since we’ll be short a car. I’ll probably still take the bus a lot, but the extra car will be nice for those times when we really need two sets of wheels.

Anyway, the SUV, which is a great car—I drove it in college some—does have some issues. The spare tire, for instance, is on the back of the car and the mount that holds it won’t swing open, so we can’t put the tailgate down, and thusly can’t load any of the big stuff that we actually needed the SUV to move.

Urgh.

But all is well. We’re being patient, and later this week we’ll take our car to the relative who is going to buy it; while there, we’ll have my dad check out the SUV and figure out why the mount won’t open. We also may get to go to a playoff basketball game! It should be fun.

Tonight, we’re going to walk down the street to one of our favorite sushi restaurants and have a lovely dinner. My office voted me as Employee of the Quarter this week (a big, lovely surprise—it’s nice to feel valued, even if my job isn’t always perfect) so I have a gift card—a Visa cash card thingy—and we’ll be using that to gorge ourselves on tasty raw fish and rice. Mmmmmm.

Maybe I just don’t get it, but people climbing Mount Everest have got to be the most insane people EVER.* Already this year (and the climbing season has just begun), two people have died, and major base camps have been swept away or covered by a recent avalanche. And most of the expeditions haven’t even gotten high enough up on the mountain to be in the real danger zone.

This quote from a Mt. Everest news website is just appalling to me:

Willi Prittie, senior guide for Alpine Ascents, put the avalanche into a poetic perspective: “After such an incident as yesterday, is when life feels the most precious, the most ‘alive’ if you will, and so it is. The scenery is never better, the air is never fresher, the mountains never clearer, our friends and family never dearer, and the beer never more refreshing than when we are reminded by a close call of our own mortality.”

Excuse me? Six people were injured in the event he refers to, one possibly with a broken spine. This in an area where you cannot drive out or get on an airplane; where your only options for leaving are hiking for a week or getting a helicopter to brave the altitude and winds and unpredictable weather around Everest and come pick you up.

I understand the thrill-seeking urge. I’ve gone rock climbing and rappelling, I’ve been caving, and I understand the tingle of putting yourself in danger. But to be so cavalier about it—to suggest that it is only at those risky-tingly moments that you feel most alive—well, it’s just tunnel vision! What about the tingle of childbirth or of falling in love? I guess those don’t count, not to these guys.

*I am well aware that, as high mountains go, Everest is not particularly dangerous. K2 is much more perilous. In fact, Mt. Everest is considered the cakewalk of high-risk mountaineering, especially considering the adventure companies will take just about anyone up the mountain.

I survived the body shots, the bad tacos, and the pinata bashing. (Actually, I didn’t do anything for Cinco de Mayo, which makes me a BIG LOSER, but I digress.) Here are your Friday Spies©, courtesy of Fitz & Co.

1. What is a food you have tried but will never eat again, and what don’t you like about it?

There aren’t many foods I won’t eat. Even foods I once hated. To wit: I think I am ready to try eating Brussels sprouts again, even though I despised them as a child. I have tried just about any kind of sushi a chef can put in front of me. I enjoy liver and onions. I am sure there is a food I won’t eat again, but it’s not a food I was traumatized by such that I remember it.

Edit: LQ reminds me of the thing I will never eat again: tripe. Specifically, menudo (not the boy band). It’s just icky in the mouth. Sort of slimy and rubbery at the same time.

2. What are your five favorite possessions?

My engagement/wedding rings
La iPod
My KitchenAid food processor
An out of print, hard copy of The Jerusalem Bible, the best translation ever
My childhood teddy bear, who no longer has a nose or ears but is still the best bear ever.

3. How do you deal with confrontation? Do you seek it out or do you avoid it? Are you more apt to be the confronter or the confronted?

Urk. I am not a huge fan of confrontation. I very, very rarely incite confrontation unless I’m just really pissed off. (The guy who was supposed to buy our bed? When I talked to him on the phone about it, I laid into him, but I was seriously mad. That was a big exception to my usual M.O.) When confronted, I try to smooth things over as much as possible, which is probably not a great personality trait, but I really don’t like people to be mad at me.

4. What will Michael Jackson be doing five years from now?

MJ will be the next Howard Hughes. He’ll be living on the top of the castle at Disneyland (secretly, of course, because it will violate the conditions of his parole), but he’ll never leave. He won’t have contact with anyone except a food taster and a couple of valets who will keep his domicile clean.

He will, of course, peer out the turret windows at the crowds below, but he’ll have become so agoraphobic that even his basest instincts will be foiled by the terror of going outside. Thus, all the children will be safe again.

Now, he’ll have to pay a hefty chunk of change to the Disney people for the privilege of living in the castle. He’ll get his hands on that cash by selling his share of the Beatles’ catalogue—to P. Diddy.

5. What is the worst movie sequel ever made, what is the best sequel ever, and what movie should have had a sequel but didn’t?

Worst sequel: I don’t know if it’s the worst sequel, but it’s the best sequel completely ruined by bad acting: The Godfather Part III
Best sequel: Empire Strikes Back. Arguably better than the original.
Should have had a sequel: I don’t think any great movies need sequels. After all, a great movie is one that is self-contained, whose story is complete, without the need for more stuff. Of course, if we’re talking about ANY movie that should have had a sequel, not just great movies, then Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo definitely needs a sequel. Wait, you mean it’s already getting one?

I’ve added a new blogroll category: gradumacates and soon-to-bes. Basically, any of you 3Ls who are done or will be done in the next month or so get your own category. After all, you’re not really still stoodints (or you won’t be for long) but you’re also not quite yet in the real world.

If I missed you or misclassified you, let me know. (That goes for anyone, really. I like my blogroll to be accurate. Yes, I’m anal.)

I can’t think of anything to post today, so I’m going to cop out and declare an all-request long weekend.

Send me your requests via email or leave a comment, and I’ll spend today through Sunday (if I need that much time) responding.

Via stag:

Are big weddings self-indulgent?

That’s a question that’s been floating around the blogosphere lately, starting with a post by Ann Althouse, and picked up by Amber Taylor and Christine Hurt at Conglomerate.

I’ve been to 15 weddings in the last three and a half years (one of them mine) and have two weddings to attend this summer. I can honestly say I found none of them self-indulgent, at least not entirely so.

I myself had a biggish wedding. We had a seated dinner and an open bar and a big cake and champagne for everyone. My family helped pay for it. And I had an acquaintance tell me to my face that she though it was a waste of money: “If I had that kind of cash, I’d want to live in it, not throw a party!”

Could we have used that money for something else? Absolutely. Would my family have given me that money to use for something else? Not a chance. As far as my family was concerned, that money was earmarked for a party—a big, fun party where all of our relatives and friends could gather and have a good time. So that’s what we did. And I do not regret it.

Self-indulgence is a tricky thing to define. Most big, lavish weddings are the product of their social milieu. The runaway bride and her 14 bridesmaids might seem a bit over the top to people who aren’t used to that. I personally shudder to think about the logistics required to arrange a bridal party of 14 women. But it’s not really for me to say that the size of the wedding party is a clear indicator of self-indulgence! Has anyone wondered what her family said? Isn’t it likely that they were encouraging her to have everyone she wanted in the wedding party? Is it possible her family said, “Hey, we’re excited for you and think you have made a wonderful choice in this man you are going to marry, so we want you to have the biggest and best wedding we can afford!” (Isn’t it also possible that she got freaked out by all the pressure her family and social circle were putting on her and her fiance by throwing this extravaganza, and that’s why she took off? Not that she was necessarily right to do it, but it seems more logical that she’d freak out over an event she felt she had no control over rather than one that she orchestrated carefully from beginning to end. Just because she is 32 doesn’t mean her family might not still have that sort of power over her.)

Weddings are usually planned in accordance with what is acceptable, socially, for the couple. Some people have the money to afford big weddings. It’s unfair, though, to paint all big, lavish weddings as self-indulgent. Is a fancy dinner in honor of some dignitary self-indulgent? What about anniversary parties? Or holiday parties? Why shouldn’t a wedding be marked with a big, lavish party—if that’s what the bride and groom want, can afford, and what the guests will find appropriate.

I guess that last point is the key one I’m trying to make. Maybe there are some people who would never find a big, lavish wedding appropriate (and might feel put upon to be invited to one). No one should feel put upon by a wedding invitation—either by the venue, the requested attire, or the registry list. And no bride or groom should plan an event that will make their guests uncomfortable. None of the 15 weddings I’ve been to in the last three and a half years have made me feel either put upon OR uncomfortable, thank God. Some were big and lavish, some were relaxed and informal, and at least two were destination weddings, where we got the chance to take a vacation as well as participate in a very special moment for the bride and groom.

So is a big wedding intrinsically self-indugent? No. None of us can say with any certainty why any given wedding is as lavish as it is. All we can do is reflect on why we were invited and whether or not we want to attend. (And for the sake of civility, please quit proclaiming that someone’s choice of event is “tacky,” “over-the-top,” or “an onerous display of conspicuous consumption.” If you weren’t invited, you don’t know if it truly will be any of those things. If you get there and it is all of those things, by all means, disparage that event, remembering that, of course, for someone, it’s a very special day, and you might be seated right behind that person as you make that comment.)

(One final note: If you find a given wedding boring, you can blame the bride or groom or their parents or the wedding coordinator. But you might also consider this: perhaps it’s boring because it’s not the kind of party you’re really into. Or perhaps the party will be really fun but you know you won’t have a good time because you won’t know anyone except the bride and groom and you aren’t allowed to bring a guest. There are a lot of factors that will make a wedding boring for some percentage of guests. That is a fact. It is also a fact that, no matter how hard the bride/groom/wedding coordinator works to make the wedding fun, someone will not have a good time.)

What do you do when you are seated next to an annoying teenager on an airplane?

That’s what my brother wondered last week. He was assigned to that seat in the back of the plane, the one next to the not-window, and two 13-year-old girls were next to him.

One of the girls had obviously seen Napoleon Dynamite one too many times, because every fourth word out of her mouth was, “Daaaaang!” After a few minutes, he started counting them but lost track when she used it four times in one sentence.

How could he make her stop? he wondered. And then it came to him: she’d say, “Daaaang!” and he’d repeat it softly, almost under his breath: “daaaang!” It only took ten minutes for her friend to notice what he was doing and make her friend shut up. And there was silence.

This is only half of the mess that is the apartment, about 120° around. I couldn’t make the images from the other side line up right.

We found out yesterday that Mr. Angst’s cholesterol is higher than optimal (though his blood pressure is fine) so we’re going to try and retool our diet* so as to help get that number down.

Is anyone in a similar situation? How have you adjusted what you eat? Do you have any favorite meals made without much additional fat or cholesterol that don’t also taste like cardboard? I’m looking for recommendations and recipes and any other advice you’ve got to give.

*I should note that my cholesterol is beyond fine. Which is odd, since we eat the same meals at home. I can’t imagine that the foods Mr. Angst eats at lunch are all that different from the foods I eat at lunch, or different enough to account for significant discrepancy in our cholesterol levels. I also deeply believe some people are just predisposed to have higher cholesterol and that those people aren’t necessarily at higher risk for heart disease just because of that higher number. BUT, we do want to see if adjusting our diet will bring that number down at all.

The runaway bride story has dominated what has otherwise been a slow news week. That’s unfortunate, I think, because there are other things the media could be focusing on—continued violence in Iraq, the interesting things going on with the Fed and the economy, yadda yadda yadda. Instead, they’ve sunk to a new low: itemizing the runaway bride’s registry, and using it to demonize her.

Look, there are many things one could hold against this poor woman—her apparent self-absorption in thinking no one would look for her, her lying to the police about being abducted when she finally called in—but her registry is really not that extravagant.

Think about it this way—600 people were expected at this wedding. With that many guests, you run out of $15 OXO kitchen gadgets pretty quickly. A $250 KitchenAid stand mixer is standard registry fare. A $55 place setting is pretty inexpensive, as these things go.

I think CNN is trying to make a story where there isn’t one. Yes, the gifts will have to be sent back. If the wedding happens in the future, maybe they’ll get some of these things again, maybe they won’t—hey, that’s what happens when weddings are called off or postponed (two of my cousins had to send gifts back for cancelled weddings). CNN could have reported on just that aspect—the emotional and logistical aspect. Instead, they’re using the reigstry list to insinuate that the runaway bride was a materialistic bitch, and that’s unfair. She may, in fact, be a materialistic bitch, but this registry list certainly doesn’t prove it. (For instance, I don’t see a $310 place setting, as I have on other registries.)

Leave the woman alone, move on to more newsworthy stories, and stop creating controversy where there isn’t any.

…into the future, that is.

Suddenly, having moved out of the house, this whole law school adventure seems so much more real.

I knew this would happen but I didn’t know when and I didn’t know exactly how much of a rush it would be.

I am now officially completely and totally excited about my future school. I have butterflies in my tummy just thinking about it. Eek! Yay! Let’s move up there already!

1) We close on our house today. Bye-bye, home. A little sad, but also a little exciting, to be moving forward. Obviously, I’ve been majorly ambivalent about this whole moving thing, but at least part of that is because of the sheer mess that is our new apartment. I think doing some unpacking—and getting a storage space for some of the things that we don’t really have room for—will certainly help my outlook.

Closing is over. Keys have changed hands. We are now officially several thousand fewer dollars in debt. Yay! I want also to add a huge THANK YOU to everyone who left encouraging comments over the last four days of my whining about moving. They really helped. I’ll try not to be so single-minded in my posting when we move in August. This last week’s moving posts are about the boringest things I’ve ever read.

2) We ordered a sweet 20-inch flat-panel monitor from Dell this week. It was on sale—BIG sale. Like, 25% off. It shipped today and should arrive sometime this week. I think getting rid of the big, hulking CRT monitor will help my outlook in our new home, too. More space! More space! [Ed’s note: We planned to buy a new monitor so we could get rid of the hulking CRT; I think we just got lucky that Dell had this one on sale right now. It’s a beautiful thing, coincidence.]

3) I was able to accomplish cooking on and in an electric range and oven last night. I was worried about that, since I learned to cook on a gas range. (The oven isn’t such a big deal, but I am glad I brought my oven thermometer, since the thing runs about 50° hot. Yikes!) I think I’ll need to keep practicing, but I’m feeling pretty good about it all. We will also be using our outdoor George Forman a lot, I think.

4) My Fair City is getting a lovely blast of late-spring cool air. Northern parts of my state are getting snow, even! It’s delightful, really. I’m going to enjoy it while it lasts because, soon enough, the heat will descend and suck all the energy out of my bones.

That’s all I can think of right now. I may add to to this list as the day goes on.

Our house is empty.

I just finished a necessary vodka tonic.

The box maze in our apartment is sort of remarkable. I’ll see if I can post a picture tomorrow.

Today was Day 3 of the move, sort of. We sort of started on Friday, so today could be Day 4, but we didn’t do much on Friday, so Saturday was really Day 1, and…well, whatever. Point being that, today, I did not go to work because I was so exhausted and sore and weary—yet I still ended up doing work. Had to let the carpet cleaners into the condo, had to clean the kitchen and refrigerator, and had to remove a few last items to our new place.

And we’re STILL NOT DONE. We have a mirror, the ironing board, a drying rack, my poor plants—which are barely surviving—and Old Smokey, the electric smoker, sitting on the back patio. And breakfast sausage and puff pastry in the freezer, yet to be reclaimed. Oops. I missed those.

I am SO ready to be DONE. But even after tonight we STILL won’t be DONE. We have to rent a storage unit for several items that won’t fit in our new apartment—the giant box for the TV (which we are KEEPING, as it is SO USEFUL for moving)—our Christmas stuff, various other boxes of things we won’t need this summer (sweaters, ski stuff), and our dining room table. Yes, that is how small this place is. ONE closet in the whole apartment. If that doesn’t wreck our marriage this summer, nothing will. (Yes, I am joking. Our marriage is FINE, rock solid, but golly that closet is going to be TRYING. I might be weaned of my clotheshorse ways because of it.)

Oy. So that’s the day from my end. I have bruises in places I didn’t know you could get bruises—on my instep, for instance. How did I get a bruise there? And I have the most sore shoulders and back EVER. Sheesh, I’m a mess. The big bruise on my left wrist also just happens to be about the size of Mr. Angst’s thumb. Great. Now I’ll get all kinds of wondering looks at work.

That’s your daily update from me. See you tomorrow.

If the hell of the last two days was good for only one thing, it was this:

We are so much better prepared for moving cross-country now than we would have been had we stayed in our house till the end of the summer. This whole process has royally sucked, but we have been forced to whittle our belongings down to the bare minimum that will fit in this apartment, and we’ll probably continue to pare down over the summer.

There. Was that perky enough? No? Too bad.

The bed is sold. I was so worried. I had to repost the ad last night after the jackass who asked me to hold it till Friday backed out, leaving me with a bed and no buyer.

All day I waited for someone to call about it. Finally, I got a call from a man who barely spoke English, and he said he’d come look at it. Never showed. But the story turns out OK—a girl from a nearby city called, drove up with her boyfriend and his truck, and bought the bed on the spot. Hallelujah!

Now we only have to worry about how the heck we’ll fit all the rest of our stuff into this apartment. I’m off to cram stuff into the kitchen.

How is it that, after a full day of moving, complete with aching body (right down to my FINGERS), I am awake at the ungodly hour of 7:00? Just, POP, up and awake, just like it was a workday.

Didn’t sleep well, either. My mind drifted either towards what we have left to do or the comfort and hominess of our old home. Both things not designed to make me nod off into restful comfort very easily.

I’m going to beat this move out of my mind. I hope. I guess we have to finish it first.