I Miss Handsome.

Handsome is out of town this weekend, and I'm all on my lonesome in Austin. Boo. I am so wonewy.

He's off on his bachelor party weekend, and while I am aware that this is usually bad news (Vegas,  strippers, missing teeth, and tigers in the bathroom), I'm finding it hard to worry. He and his buddies are out at a remote cabin in the deep woods of east Texas, and I saw the packing list. It read like this:

1. Ice cream
2. Meat
3. BB guns
4. Walkie-Talkies
5. Water balloons
6. Whiskey
7. Firecrackers

Hmm.

On second thought, if he comes back with all his limbs intact, I'll count it a minor miracle.

Wedding Bangs

Hello, my poppets! Tick, tock, tick, tock, guess what's getting closer? Zat's rrrright, ze vedding deluxe grandioso y excelente! In these blustery days of Texas winter, Handsome and I have been busy planning away all the extra special things. Music, decorations, readings, special decorative flourishes, and more, and all on budget! The invitations are out, the RSVPs are pouring in, the caterer is standing by, the DJ is booked, Han's suit is perfection, my dress is at the tailor's getting perfectly shortened, flowers are under control, and the cupcake lady awaits our signal to commence a'baking. Our rehearsal dinner might be the most fun party ever in the history of parties (Texas-themed costume party!) and basically, I feel like a magic fairy just twinkled down from the heavens and tapped me with a sparkling wand of awesome. Have I really planned this all? Is it really going this well?

There is only one smudge, one slightly dark blip, on the Wedding Horizon of Bliss: the Amazing Cheastypants Hair has seen better days. Don't freak out, this isn't anything like living in Nicaragua, when the Amazing Cheastypants Hair was declared a Natural Disaster Area. It's fine, totally awesome, in comparison with that nightmare. It's just that... how do I say this? I have bangs.

The other night I went to my French Salon of Glorious Hair, where I frequently offer my services as a Hair Model. Normally, this situation is nothing short of fantastic. I pay $15 for a haircut that in the real world would cost around $100, and in exchange, I get amazing haircuts. Well, usually they're amazing haircuts. You see, sometimes they tend towards the trendy, and even the experimental. For example, I steered clear of the salon a few years ago when a few of my friends emerged with Euro-mullets and PTSD. But that phase passed, and I returned.

I don't even pay attention to what the stylist is doing to my head anymore, that's how reliably good these haircuts are. So last Tuesday when the lady described what she was going to give me, I vaguely registered her words (though I'm pretty sure I would have perked up and paid attention had she actually use the b-word), and blithely read my magazine, letting her snip away. Twenty minutes later I looked up, and I had bangs.

Bangs.

In all my 33 years, I have never, not once, not even remotely had bangs. In all honesty, I'd sort of assumed I would live my entire life without bangs. But now, 70-odd days before I am to be wed, and (more to the point) photographed ad nauseum, I find myself with bangs. BANGS!

I'm still deciding how I feel about it. On good days, I think I look sort of 80's chic. A cuter, flippier version of Ali Sheedy in the Breakfast Club. On bad days, there are no words. It's the curly hair, you see. If I don't blow dry it straight, the bangs look like curly fries stuck off the front of my head.

Grow, hair, I command you.

GROW.

OMG. Home Owner?

Yes, you read that correctly. I, Amazing Cheastypants, teller of tales, trotter of globes, avoider of entangling commitments, am not only about to get married - a feat that causes a younger version of myself to fall in a dead faint to the floor - but I am 3 nanoseconds away from being a real-live, totally official homeowner. It's a little run-down, it needs a lot of loving, but it's bright blue, in the best neighborhood in Austin, and I get to live in it with my ineffably gorgeous Love Muffin, Mr. Amazing Handsomepants. I die with delight.

Before I dance and laugh and squeal my way through the next few months of my life, however, I feel that right now I ought to pause for a brief moment of silence in remembrance of the girl I used to be. A woman who wondered if partnering up for life was really worth it. A woman who started to get itchy feet if she stayed in any one place longer than 6 months. Not that I'd trade in all the experiences those itchy feet got me into, but really, Younger Me. You were missing out.

To infinity, and beyooooooooonnnnnnnd!

Wedding Whack-A-Mole

I generally consider myself a competent person, a capable multi-tasker, an able manager of tasks. I am famously brilliant, unspeakably gorgeous, and ineffably glamorous. My wit dazzles, my cup of sparkles runneth over. My acres and acres of beautiful hair bounce and shine and flow about me wherever I go. One would think that with this constellation of blessings bestowed upon me, I might glide jauntily through life with nary a hiccup. And yet I am nearly defeated. This wedding-planning-hydra-headed nonsense might well kill me.

Now don't get me wrong - I am thrilled to be getting married. Beyond thrilled, actually. Transported. I am going to spend the rest of my life married to the best human being God ever put on the earth, and I occasionally pinch myself ferociously to make sure this isn't all just a lovely dream. So the wedding? Very much looking forward to that. The wedding planning, on the other hand... well.

Let's just say that now I understand why some people make this a full-time job. You take one question. As an example, let's take cake. Simple, no? No. Not simple at all, because for every question you answer, every conclusion you reach, 25 more pop up to take its place. You don't believe me? Watch.

Question 1: Do we want a wedding cake.
Answer 1: Yes.
Question 2: Or pie?
Question 3: What about cupcakes?

Question 4: How much does cake cost?
Answer: (75,000 phone calls and one dead faint later) Okay, so no cake.

Question 5: Now what?

[Insert four hours of internet research, 16 phone calls, 39 emails, 2 hours of recipe research, debilitating mental calculations, advanced maths, aimless puttering.]

Answer: Cupcakes. Genius!

Question 6: Who will make our cupcakes?
Question 7: What time can we meet the different bakers who want to make our cupcakes?
Question 8: What about this time? No.
Question 9: How about Tuesday? No.
Question 10: Something came up, can we reschedule?
Question 11: Are we still on for today?
Question 12: Have I answered all of the 47 emails in my inbox all asking about cupcakes?
Question 13: What flavor cupcakes do we want?
Question 14: Oh, some people feel really strongly about white cake? But I hate white cake. Now what.
Question 15: Oh, there are actually 92 different flavors of cupcake we could order?
Question 16: Which of the 92 flavors of cupcake do we really want to sample?
Question 17: Which of the 8 different flavors we sampled do we actually want to order?
Question 18: How do you feel about carrot cake? How do you feel about carrot cake?
Question 19: Buttercream or cream cheese icing?
Question 20: Do we still want to do a cake-cutting ceremony, because then we'd still need a cake.
Question 21: How much does a small cake for a cutting ceremony cost? (Gasp.)
Question 22: So I will make my own small cake?
Question 23: Betty Crocker, Duncan Hines, or The Joy of Cooking?
Question 24: How much time will I have to bake a cake the day before our wedding?
Question 25: Oh, you have a friend who wants to bake our cake for us?
Question 26: Do you want to call her or should I?
Question 27: Did she call you back yet? How about now? Now? Yes?
Question 28: What flavor do we want the cutting cake to be?
Question 29: Do we have cake stands on which to put the cupcakes?
Question 30: Rent or buy? (Borrow!)
Question 31: Honey, the cupcake lady wants to know what color cupcake liners we want to use.
Question 32: Options? White, black, brown, pink, silver....

It's like playing gee-dee whack-a-mole. If anybody has a serious thought about what color liner to use, please tell me. I respond well to authoritarian dictates.

An Echo Through the Ages

Mothers always have a 'thing' that they say, don't they. I don't know what other mothers say. Maybe it's something sweet ("Well as I live and breathe!"), maybe something threatening ("Go cut yourself a switch."), or maybe something pleasantly odd. Like in the atrociously funny movie Bad Santa, where the doddering grandmother always says "Let me fix you some sandwiches." So weird.

My mother has a pile of them. If you asked why, she said "'Cause Y's a crooked letter and it can't be made straight." If you hollered when she brushed your hair and tore straight through a knot, she said, "Oh be quiet before I give you something to really cry about." (Not that she ever did - or would, for that matter - but still. She did say it.) If we were in the car and drove past a cemetery, she'd say (every single time), "I hear people are just dying to get in there." Hyuck, hyuck. And if you were fresh-mouthed at her...

The other day I was in the car with Captain Mommypants and my little brother Bug, who is six years old. Mom and I were trying to talk about something, and Bug was in the backseat rattling off his perpetual and incessant commentary on every single car we drove past. "Hey, Mom, did you see the Mazda 5? Hey, Mom, that was a Toyota Prius. Hey Mom, there is a bwue Mewcedes. Hey Mom..."

And our mother, who normally has the patience of a saint when it comes to her children's musings and chatterings, got frustrated that she couldn't hear what I was saying ("Hey, Mom...") and waved her hand in the air at him, and said in an unusually dismissive tone, "Yeah, yeah, Bug, keep it to yourself for a little bit, will you?"

This, it turns out, is the joy of children. Because Bug, outraged that she wouldn't listen to him, leaned forward in his seat, touched Mom on the shoulder, and said what is likely the number one most recognizable Mommy-ism our mother uttered over the years as she wrangled 5 highly spirited children into adulthood: "Mom," said Bug, in a censorious tone so like hers that he could have been a parrot. "Don't you EVER. EVER. Talk to me like that again."

Needless to say, I died laughing.

We Did Not Have Fun At All

No matter what these pictures indicate, keep in mind that Handsome and I had a horrible, wretched, terrible, atrocious, awful time in San Francisco on our anniversary trip.

The weather was terrible.

The sights were banal.

We had one raging fight after another.

We didn't see any good friends.

We didn't do anything funny, or jump for joy.

We drank terrible wine.

We couldn't get back home soon enough, and kissed the ground of Texas when we landed, swearing never EVER to travel again.

It's All Handsome's Fault

OK, I've figured out why I am so lazy about my blogging. I've decided (as you might have guessed by now if you read the title of this post) that the responsibility falls squarely on my beloved's shoulders. It's not that he stops me from posting - he would never do that. It's just that before I had my Handsome, there was nobody else that found every stray thought that crossed my mind as fascinating as I did. Except you all, of course. Which is why I wrote as much as I did. You were the void (and a lovely void you were, too) into which I sent all my mental chatter. Now, however, I chatter it out to the gorgeous redhead who shares my life (and finds me utterly charming), and by the end of the day, I just don't have this burning bubbling boiling overabundance of words that need to come out of me anymore.

In sum, this is a sacrifice I'm willing to make, no matter how much my father (hi Superdad!) and brother (hi Fairy King!) chastise me for failing to keep them entertained in 10 minute snippets throughout their weeks. However, I'm not going anywhere. I'm still here, life is still happening, and I'll keep blogging, albeit at a slower pace than before.

So.

On that note, guess what this weekend marks. No, not my birthday. Don't worry, that's still a month away, you have plenty of time to shop for gratuitously expensive presents. No guesses? Okay, I'll give you a hint. On November 6, 2009, I got in my car to go meet a boy I'd been chatting with over the interwebs. I didn't know it then, but my life was about to change. Big time.

The Scene: the outdoor patio of Paggi House, a charming downtown Austin restaurant.
The Time: 6pm, Friday, November 6.
The Cast: one Miss Amazing Cheastypants, running a little late on account of traffic, and one Mr. Handsomepants, standing at the top of the stairs, waiting to meet the girl he'd been telling his family and friends he was getting pretty excited about.
The Question: Does internet dating really work?

The Answer: Indubitably. I took one look at those blue blue eyes, and was smitten. I held his hand for the first time and marveled. I watched him cheerfully play with the herd of small children that joined our bocce ball game later that evening, and fell head-over-heels for Handsome. Then he leaned over between horseshoe tosses and kissed me, and I've never looked back. From the moment we met I've been in a steady state of wonder that anybody this perfect for me could possibly exist.

We're off to San Francisco to celebrate our anniversary this weekend. Wish us good luck, blue skies, and an abundance of delights.

My Family Reunion, Part VI

This past weekend was ACL Fest (Austin City Limits Music Festival), and for the fifth year in a row, there was a substantial AmazingPants Kid contingent making merry at Zilker Park. Year One, me and Crasey. Year Two, me and Umulu. Year Three, me, Umulu, Crasey, The Fairy King, and Sweet BabyFace. Year Four, I was in Nicaragua, but the AmazingPantses carried on, and Year Five, it was all of us again. This year, Year Six, The Fairy King and Sweet BabyFace are way down in Australia (boo hiss), so it was me, Umulu, Crasey, and Handsome. We laughed, we danced, we drank birs, we jumped up and down and hooted and hollered. It was, as always, a grand time. In no particular order, some shots from the weekend. (TFK, SBF, we missed you dreadfully. Come back home now please.)

One-Armed Paper Hanger

Right now I could kill somebody. No, maybe not somebody. In light of yesterday's masked gunman shooting at UT event, perhaps I'll refrain from that level of hyperbole. Actually, now that I think about it, I would officially like to retract the entire pith of that comment. I am not angry. I am a little frustrated that I just wrote a nice long newsy post and then lost it all in a fickle moment of computery madness (ARGH!!), but this too shall pass. I am a little stressed out at having to re-do 3 weeks of writing I lost when my hard drive died, and at having to do all this wedding planning stuff essentially on my own, as Handsome is neck-deep in GMAT studying, which, for the record, I am totally on board with. Study study study, I say, so that we have the best possible chance of staying in Austin for his MBA. And finding out yesterday that, due to some bureaucratic snafu, I am not technically employed by the University of Texas, which explains why my health insurance was abruptly terminated, why I had to pay 4x as much tuition as normal, why I haven't gotten any of said tuition reimbursed, and why I won't get paid on the first of the month without jumping through some ludicrous hoops. This was stressful. But I am not angry.

I am busy, yes. Between my internship at the Worker's Defense Project, my TAship at UT, writing a dissertation, planning a wedding (!!), taking piano lessons, cleaning the house, and all the other odds and ends that make up life, I feel, in the words of my excellent Granddad, like a one-armed paper hanger.

But life is good.  The summer heat has broken, and I've been delving into cool breezes, blue skies, and sweaters!! I've got a fridge full of good food, a man who loves me, a rockin' family, and amazing friends. So in spite of where I started this extremely stream-of-consciousness post, I would like to state for the record that I am one lucky, lucky woman, and I would like to give the world a hug.

Wow. Just... wow.

So I had about a gajillion posts all planned out, lo these 10 days ago. I was planning to do a special post to show off my surprise (see the parents coming to visit post if you're scratching your head) new skill. I was planning to do a post on creating a bridal registries, a theme I promise to revisit.

But then my hard drive crashed on my laptop. I lost about 3 weeks of work on my dissertation, and not because I didn't back it up. I totally backed it up. But the file was corrupted when I retrieved it from my external hard drive. Thanks, External Hard Drive! Still, no biggie, because in exchange for losing 3 weeks of (who are we kidding) slightly crappy work, I got a new free computer! Well, almost new, and almost free, which as far as I'm concerned is good enough.

Apple called it an equipment malfunction, so even though it was 3 years old, they just gave me a new hard drive for free. Whammo! And then they noticed that my plastic wrist board and keyboards were cracked and crunked up, and hey! That's an equipment malfunction, too! Whammo! New clothes for my laptop, free! So now I'm sure there's some inner workings that are still 3 years old. The battery, I think, and is there something called a motherboard? Maybe yes? I don't know what it is, but it's the only other computer word I know, so we'll call it that. Then I shelled out $170 for the new Snow Leopard X operating system, and hello, Nancy. This sucker is FANCY. Guess what, world, I can open docX now!

So I've spent the last week reconfiguring my programs, reloading documents and photos and music and putting them back in albums, and (this part actually was a total bummer) re-doing my entire calendar, which I keep on iCal, and was gone, baby, gone. Thank God I've got elephant genes and remember almost everything. Except, you know, for the things I forget. So if we were supposed to have lunch yesterday and I mysteriously didn't show up, now you know why.

Denmark. Just South of Buenos Aires.

Last night as Handsome and I were snuggling before bedtime, the topic of baby names came up, and how, because his first name is his great-grandmother's last name, his name is all last names. And whoa, because I never use (and might drop entirely) my first name, my name is all last names, too! So we were saying it would be funny if we had any kids and gave them all family surnames as well, and we could be a whole family with no first names. I know, what a riot, right? So then this happened:

"Handsome, what was your grandmother's maiden name?"
"Ingdahl."
"Ingdahl?"
"Yes, it's Danish. Like Raúl Dahl."

(silence)

"Honey, did you just say Raúl Dahl?"
"Yeah, you know, the famous kids' book writer?"
"You mean Roald Dahl?"

(silence. Actually, not silence at all, because I was cackling like a banshee, but Handsome wasn't talking.)

"Roald?"
"Yes, Roald. Not Raúl. Heee hee hee, hooo hoo hoo, ha haa haaaaa! Raúl Dahl, the famous Danish kids' book writer! Haa haa ha!!! You're such a dumbo!!"

"Actually, Cheasty, I'm pretty sure it's Raúl Dahl. You remember. He wrote that famous book, James and the Giant Horchata."

I almost fell out of the bed I was laughing so hard. That, ladies and gentlemen, is why I love this man.

Animalitos Espiritítus

There are, at this very second in time, about fifty ga-jiggity-jillion things running through my mind, all of which I'd like to write about. I'd like to tell you about the most amazing parents-meet-parents weekend of all time, ever in recorded history, in which my parents and Handsome's parents fell smack-dab in love with each other. I'd like to get your opinion on wedding colors, because having decided to marry a redhead with skin fairer than fair has put me in something of a pickle. Farewell, reds and oranges. Goodbye, yellow. Sayonara, blush and bashful. Also, I wish I could recreate for you the most ridiculous phone conversation in the world, the one I just had this afternoon with a shop owner when I called to inquire if I had perhaps left my credit card in his store, but I've decided that no matter how sharp my pen, or how razor-fine my wit, it is a task beyond my abilities. But none of these are going to happen today. Either a) I don't have the time to write it all down, or b) I haven't loaded up the pictures yet, or c) I'm lazy. You choose.

So this is what's on my mind. Spirit animals. It's amazing to me how some people just have them. You meet them once, get a gander at their face or their personality, and that's it, pow. You know what their spirit animal is. Like Handsome's mother, for example. A hummingbird, no doubt about it. Tiny, quick, talkative, loves bright colors, flits from thought to thought and topic to topic, but always comes back around to where she started. A hummingbird.

Or my Superdad. A beaver. Hard-working, strong, a man of the woods and the water. Makes for himself a strong home wherever he goes, loves to build dams. (Seriously, the man is obsessed.) If Superdad were a cartoon, he'd be a cozy old beaver, snug in his house in the dam, sitting with the newspaper and some reading spectacles by the fire, puffing away on his pipe.

My friend, the Samurai Warrior, a cat. My mother, a magpie. Can you tell I spend a lot of time thinking about this? I do. Quite a bit. Which is why it's so frustrating to me that I haven't the slightest clue what my own spirit animal would be. A long time ago, I thought maybe I was a tortoise. Once, a friend told me I was a terrier. Another time, somebody wondered if I were a cormorant. Cormorant? I don't even know what those do.

Anyway, I'm putting my mind to it. My new resolution to myself: find spirit animal.

Guess Who's Coming to Austin

In light of the fact that Umulu just bought her first house (exciting!!) and I just got engaged to Handsome, Superdad, Captain Mommypants, and my little adorable wonderful brother Bug are coming to town for the Labor Day weekend. There will be trips to Lowes, viewings of potential wedding venues, a trip out to Handsome's home town so the parents can meet each other and practice being in-laws. We will laugh and hug and be happy to see one another, and I will surprise my parents with a special something I haven't told them about yet, but it will make them very happy.

Hooray!

Childhood Picture. Category: Awesome.

This just in from Superdad.

That's me when I was 9 or 10.

"The name's Cool. Joe Cool."

Now I have but one burning question. Did my parents actually let me go out of the house like this? Cause if they, did, then double awesome.

I Am Doing Really Great

Last winter I was at a friend's birthday dinner and struck up a conversation with another friend's charming boyfriend. The birthday girl that evening was turning 25 or 26, something like that, and because a great many of my friends are a wee bit younger than I am (a consequence of taking 5 years off before graduate school, rather than the one or two years more normal among this group), I often sit in on conversations about how OLD and OOOOOLLLLLDDDD and OOOOOLLLLLLDDDDD people feel who are not yet as old as I. This is funny to me, because a) none of us are old, and b) I like getting older. I get better looking every year.

So this man, let's just call him Captain Hilarious because he truly is a very funny man, asked me when my birthday was, and I told him it was in December. "Oh yeah?" He asked. "That's cool. How old did you turn this year?" I told him I'd just turned 32, and whoa nelly. You'd have thought I just told him I was the pope's daughter or something, he was seriously that shocked. Jaw on the ground, eyes bugging out, that kind of shocked. "Well," he blurted, looking me up and down like a State Fair exhibit. "Wow. I-I had no idea. Well." He nodded firmly. "You're doing really, really good." I laughed, thanked him, and told him what I just told you: I get better looking every year.

I'm telling you this story right now because my father just sent me another photo of agonizing awfulness, a photo that caused me to contemplate whether or not people believe me when I say that thing about getting better looking, or whether they think I'm just saying that like how a lot of old ladies develop their birthday-coping-one-liner over time. Blog, let me assure you. Even if that line does become my birthday coping one liner, it is TRUE. Here, look. 1992.

That's me and Superdad. And now, for a sneak peak at 2010:

I'm not saying I'm going to turn around and win any beauty contests any time soon, but given my choice between 1992 and 2010, I'll take today, please. All things considered, I'm doing really, really good.

All At Once, If You Please.

Do you ever have a period in your life when you feel, not necessarily like plod plod plod, but that things are moving along at such a reasonable, manageable pace that maybe you ought to pick things up a bit, lest life get boring? This happens to me, sometimes. It's the consequence of my overweening fear that if I'm not busy and overcommitted, I am clearly missing out on something awesome somewhere cool. So at times like those described above, periods of relative calm, I always over commit myself. Clubs, committees, lessons, activities, projects, I do it all. Needless to say, this almost always backfires on me.

Like right now, for example. A week and a half ago, I decided in the lull before the semester started to reorganize my entire house, a project that always takes 3 times as long as you think it will. And then I started taking piano lessons. Handsome started studying for the GMAT every night. EVERY. NIGHT. And I increased my volunteer hours at the Worker's Defense Project. Then Handsome proposed, and a chaos of squealing phone calls and house visits and dinner invitations ensued. Then I got  rear-ended (poor little Mazdie, she's having a rough go of it). Then the semester started. Then I looked around and realized that our house was becoming filthy and needed a good top-to-bottom scrubbing. Then I realized that if we don't get a venue NOW for the wedding, we will have to get married in the street in front of my house, because apparently 10 months isn't enough time to plan a wedding in Austin (jaw hitting the ground).

Excuse me, but I need to catch my breath.  Oh, yes, and also: write my dissertation.

I Am a Mighty Thrower of Things, Question Mark.

Over the past few days I've had cause to go back and look through some of my old pictures. I'm putting things in frames and puttering about, and finding photos of me and Handsome to put in the previous post, and this journey down memory lane has really taught me a thing or two. First, it taught me that I've got to stop making ridiculous faces when people pull out a camera. I'm not doing myself any favors. Second, it taught me that almost everybody in the universe is 700 feet taller than I am. Third (a related point), I should never ever take a close up picture with somebody over 6 feet tall. It's just two heads, one at the top of the frame, one at the bottom. The tall person usually has the top of their hair cut off, and my chin is in most cases mysteriously vanished.

So I've learned some things, which is good. Also, I've solved a mystery of long standing. I am a relatively athletic, physically competent human being, so it has always been a point of befuddlement that I am a horrific hurler. I can't throw anything to save my life. No matter how hard I try, baseballs, footballs, paper airplanes, rocks... they all get somewhere between 10 and 25 feet and fall kerplunk to the ground.

Then I found this series of pictures, and a light went on over my head. Aha! I thought. A clue! You see, back in May when I went to my friend's wedding in North Carolina, some of us girls went on a hike down by the river. As an inevitable side effect of there being stones, and a river to throw them across, we began a contest to see who could throw them the farthest.

This is a picture of JM throwing. She won the competition. Notice the length, the extention, the sheer athleticism of her movement!

This is H-SPO throwing. She did not win the competition, but still distinguished herself with a mighty effort. See also, extension, concentration of expression, and use of lower arm as a catapult-like thingy.

This is Pony throwing. She came in second. Roger Clemens could take notes from this pitching dynamo.

And now, for the piêce de resistance, I humbly submit for your perusal, The World-Famous Amazing Cheastypants Throwing Technique.

So. Any further questions?

Ding, Dong, the Bells Are Gonna Chime!

Really, I should've suspected something was up. For the past few weeks Handsome has been unusually frisky and high-spirited. He's been charming and smiley (even more so than normal), affectionate and thoughtful (even more so than normal), and just plain sweet (even more so than normal). Last Saturday he disappeared for two and a half hours with no explanation whatsoever about where he'd been or what he'd been doing. Under intense interrogation he would reveal nothing except to reassure me it had absolutely nothing to do with Russian mail-order brides. Maybe, he hinted, it had something to do with bikes. Ah, yes, of course. Bikes. We just got bikes! And because I wanted so badly to believe that he was out ring shopping, I refused to let myself even consider that as an option, and let it go. Back of the mind, out of sight, adios, door closed. Silly, silly Cheasty.

On Friday he came home from work and said, "Hey guess what. I did some searching on the internets, and I found a restaurant that has a dessert you can actually eat on this cleanse diet thing." (Oh, how this stupid cleanse diet will haunt the rest of my life!)
"Really?" I asked, full of dubiosity. "What is it, a fruit plate?"
"No," he said, "It's a secret surprise. Go on and get dressed!"

I was excited, but completely befuddled. Thinking he might be taking me to a berry patch or a watermelon field, I inquired about wearing my overalls, and should I bring mosquito repellent? Nah, he said. Just wear something cute and comfortable, you'll be fine. So off we drove into the sunset, me still blissfully ignorant. So ignorant I didn't even put on mascara or wear nice shoes or any jewelry. Cause whatevs, you know? It's just dessert at some random place that I still secretly suspected was a watermelon patch.

"You're going to laugh when you see the place I'm taking you," Han said as we drove towards south Austin (cleverly covering his bases).
"Why," I asked. "Is it that epically bad diner we went to a few months ago?"
"You'll see," was all Captain Mysterious would tell me.

I did start to laugh when he pulled in the parking lot of our destination: Paggi House, the restaurant where we'd had our first date, where we'd first clapped eyes on one another. 'Funny,' I thought to myself as we climbed the stairs to their outdoor treehousey patio deck. 'I didn't think he'd bring me here again until he was going to propose. Hmmm. Well, whatever. I wonder what that dessert is?'

We got to the deck and sat down in a semi-private little couchey nook on a wicker sofa, and when the waitress came up to us, Han asked for the dessert menu. She gave us some glasses of water and walked away. I looked at Handsome, and for the first time wondered what was up. Why did he look so jumpy, so tense, so... nervous?

"I have a confession to make," he said then, clearing his throat. "There is no dessert. I made up the dessert because I wanted to get you here, where we first met." And then, dropping to one knee, he took a ring box out of his pocket, opened it, offered it to me, and said, "I wanted to bring you here to ask you if you would please marry me, Cheasty."

I don't really remember a clear sequence of events after that. I know my eyes teared up, I know my hands were trembling with excitement, I know the waitress walked up and almost interrupted Han before she realized what was going on, and backed away slowly, mouthing, "Oh. My. God." I know I kissed him and hugged him and kissed him and hugged him again, I know I said "yes, yes, yes, of course!" and I know people around us figured out what was happening and started applauding. I know the waitress came back with two glasses of champagne on the house and I know I broke the hell out of my diet by drinking the whole thing. I know there was a table full of 20-something girls having drinks nearby and one of them took pictures with her cell phone and mailed me the photos right then and there, so now I have 3 wonderful blurry pictures of right after Handsome popped the question.

I'm getting married this spring to the most wonderful man ever to live on this planet, and I'm the luckiest woman in the world.

P.S. 500 points to anybody who a) recognizes the song from which I took the title of this post, and b) sings the whole thing out loud, right now, wherever you are.

Childhood Picture. Category: Embarrassing.

My father sent this to me the other day - one of many vintage family reunion pics of me and my sister. I particularly love how this photo captures us right in that full blown moment when half of your body is in childhood and the other half is experimenting with adolescence.

Cruel, Dad. Just cruel.

Little Boxes Full of Ticky-Tacky

This week I am undertaking a monumental task, a task that challenges me to the very core of who I am. It is forcing me to become something I have never been, not ever before. Why, Cheastypants, I hear you murmur, whatever could this be? Are you not the very ideal of the Renaissance woman? Can you not leap tall buildings in a single bound and cook gourmet meals with one hand tied behind your back? Well, yes, naturally, all of that is true, but there is, it turns out, always room for growth. For example, it goes without saying that I am glamorous, sophisticated, unspeakably beautiful, and above all, always well dressed. But did you know that I am also an organizational maestro, a neat-freak par excellence? No? Well join the club. Neither did I.

That's not to say I don't enjoy a well organized room, or an exceptionally well planned schedule. I do, very much. And I will be right up front and say that I really don't like filth. A dirty anything will drive me straight to bedlam, dusty surfaces give me imaginary hives. Admittedly, I don't always jump right up and clean the minute I notice toothpaste buildup in the sink. Who's got time for that when there's work to be done and fun to be had? Instead, I schedule a top-to-bottom house cleaning every other week, and try to stay on top of it that way. And this works. It keeps me calm and balanced, and stops me from making other people insane.

Clutter, on the other hand, has never really bothered me all that much. Not a lot of clutter, but some. I tend to leave little nests of shoes all over the house, and my books inevitably take up large percentages of available flat spaces. My reading glasses are rarely where I think they are (Handsome found one of them in the laundry yesterday). My papers sit in stacks, and I forget to put them back in the filing cabinet. To combat this, I've always been something of a congenital thrower-away-er of things so that my habits of clutter don't turn into something more nefarious and scary. Ugh, hoarding. Gives me shivers.

So it is somewhat to my surprise to find that when it comes to Handsome and me, I am the person to whom the role of Designated Organizer and Neat Freak has fallen. I never ever EVER thought that would happen. Throughout my life I always chose roommates who were organizers, knowing that I would drift toward their magnetic north and be happier that way. Yet here I am, living with the man I love, and I find myself having mini heart attacks on a twice weekly basis over the boxes that are still unpacked in the study. Now I know, as the well educated daughter of a minister and graduate of countless Vacation Bible Camps, that love is patient and kind, but boy howdy. Paul never lived with somebody who has three big boxes full of papers. PAPERS. And photographs, and baseball cards and wristbands from concerts and busted hats and pay stubs from his high school summer job. Need I go on.

We've lived here in this house now for almost 5 months, and I'd started feeling like we'd only moved in maybe 95%, and then we'd stopped. What's more, I was becoming increasingly convinced that we'd initially made poor decisions about use of space and location of furniture in the home. I knew, I just knew, that if I reorganized the study, moved some shelves out, moved some other ones in, took apart the disorganized bookshelf in the living room and switched some other things from here to there, and installed the bigger shelving unit in the kitchen, that we'd magically have a super-duper house that was 20 times more space efficient and livable and pleasant than the one we've been occupying.

Thus began my Epic Never-Ending Odyssey Down the Tunnel of Doom With Teeny Tiny Light At End of Said Tunnel. The good news is that the Teeny Tiny Light gets bigger and bigger as I get closer to it. Initially, I thought I'd really feeped it up big time. I looked around after the first day's work, at the piles and piles of stuff strewn about in wild abandon and almost had an aneurism. But then I remembered that what looked like an exercise in delirious chaoticism was actually kind-of-sort of organized, and took a deep breath. Day Two, if anything, was a little worse, at least until Handsome got home that evening and put his gorgeous muscles to use by moving furniture about. Day three, Handsome sat down with one of his boxes and sorted through some stuff, and I sorted through my old files, and we threw out buckets of stuff. I anticipate great things in the future.

Today is Day Four and when I looked around this morning, I saw that the Teeny Tiny Light at the End of the Tunnel is considerably larger. Maybe even as large as our house, if I can squeeze it through. Wish me luck, world. Amazing Cheastypants, Organizer Extraordinaire, is on the job.

P.S. If anybody wants to come over and tell me what to do á la slave driver, you are more than welcome. As you can see by this blog post, I'm not exactly chomping at the bit to get started.