Monday, January 29, 2007

Of Nostrils And Badgers

If the title confounds you, read on. There was nothing particularly bad about this weekend, but it was interesting. I'm still sick-ish, but I really only whine about it at home. My excuse for this is thus: I will someday have screaming children, irritated pets, and a overly busy husband demanding most or all of my time. I will someday have to pretend that the sniffles don't exist. Therefore, I get to be a spoiled snotty - literally - brat for now.

Like this:

Me: I want a sammich.
Travis: Aww, okay, I'll make you a sandwich.
Me: NO!! I don't want your crappy homemade sammich. I want a Publix sammich.
Travis: (sigh, sound of keys jingling)
Me: And you might as well get some Stouffer's while you're there, or you know I'll send you back at dinner.

(I only eat Stouffer's macaroni for dinner when I'm sick.)

I've said it before, and I'll say it again - I CANNOT BELIEVE THIS HOT MAN IS WILLING TO MARRY ME AND PUT UP WITH MY WHINY BULLSHIT FOREVER.

Seriously. Look at him:

9-3-2005-58

And he gets me sandwiches, shrugs off me having full-blown conversations with the cat, and declares the fact that I spent most of the entire weekend on the couch cramming tissues up my nose and leaving them there to be "cute". (It's not cute. I took a picture of it to be sure. Definitely not cute. But you know I'll post the picture because I have no humility.)

And by all appearances, he absolutely adores me. Nut.

I got a delivery from The Loopy Ewe on Friday....and promptly placed another order that same night - I'd ordered the perfect Wedding Sock Yarn for me, but not for Travis, and he wants Wedding Socks too. (I keep him in socks, he keeps me in sandwiches.)

And in a fit of totally-forgetting-that-thing-about-my-dad, I drove down to Bartow (about 70 miles away) on Saturday to visit him. That thing I'd forgotten about? He SUCKS at giving directions. He's perfection in many other ways....but that ain't one of them. It took me THREE HOURS. THREE!!! Seventy miles! I got horribly lost last year trying to visit him at the same event and had finally given up and gone home - so I told him this year I would only go if he provided explicit directions.

I failed to specify, "explicit, CORRECT directions".

I was instructed to take I4 to toll road 595, then take 19 south. Easy enough, right? Except neither of those roads exist! I determined, many hours later, that he'd meant toll 570 and 17 south. Sigh. So you can see why it would take three hours. It was only my inate and stunning sense of direction that landed me smack in the middle of 1840.

No, no, that's really where I ended up. My dad likes to periodically pack up a canvas and some sticks and go camp out with a bunch of other grown people who like to pretend they're grizzly. It gives him joy, and he doesn't make fun of my pointy sticks, so I indulge - I even knit him period-appropriate socks for him to wear to keep him warm. He's crazy, and I love him. (This, of course, doesn't mean that my mom and I don't giggle about him when he's not around. But I figure the two of them probably do the same about me, and I know he and I do the same about her. We're family.)

I can't even begin to describe the scope of these events and what they are like, but my father wears elk skin clothing and pals around with a guy who wears a badger on his head. Well, sometimes. Sometimes he wears his wolverine.

I wish I was making this up. And I was too befuddled by it all to remember to get pictures, of course.

I did get authentic 1840 root beer in a blown glass bottle, though. And a fry bread. Because for me, the 19th century was really all about the food.

I'll post yarn pr0n photos soon - that Loopy Ewe order included some delicious Posh sock yarn that you just HAVE TO to see, covet, and buy.