Girly

Much though I like to brag about what an outdoorsy, au naturel person I am, unafraid to poke unidentified objects with sticks and pee in the forest, a look at the sheer number of products involved in my daily toilette says otherwise:

1. Shower: Shampoo, one of two to choose from.
2. Conditioner, one of three
3. Soap. I've got two kinds of liquid and three bars plus a scrub plus one specifically for my feet and one specifically for my face.
4. Once I am out of the shower: Body lotion. I think I might have 8 different kinds.
5. Facial moisturizer
6. Leave-in hair conditioner
7. Styling cream
8. Deodorant
9. Perfume
9. Concealer, powder, blush, mascara

And this is what I use even if I am not leaving the house. I used to also use shave gel instead of soap, and also eye cream. Oh, and the aforementioned ass cream. At one point I even had decollete cream that smelled of jasmine, but it made me break out. If they started making individual moisturizers for each body part, and they were on sale, and I had a 2 for 1 coupon, I might buy 'em. The only part of my body I don't soften and perfume to within an inch of its life (with the exception of course of the nether regions) would be my feet, because I like 'em tough.

Ah, loveliness

Today was potentially a depressing one as I had to give up the dream of ever going back to the large 'n fancy consulting firm, by returning the laptop to them. I kept thinking they'd call, but, like an errant boyfriend, they just weren't that into me.

Still it was gah-geous out today. Sunny and 50 degrees by 8:45 in the morning. I started my day off with a run, then met a friend at the consulting firm for lunch at a picnic table in the sun, where I ate cheese and crackers and pretzels and fruit and chocolate. Then I went a-visitin', making my way through the halls and chatting with friends I'd made. Alas none of them are far enough up the food chain to help me in my job search, but they are lovely just the same. After my visit I grabbed some coffee, rode the bus home, farted around, ate more cheese and crackers, and will go for another run in about an hour with a friend from the consulting firm. Then, why, I think I'll eat some ravioli for dinner!

Tomorrow I'm off to Peterborough to donate some items to my favorite thrift shop and do some more visiting. I wish visiting could be my job. I like being social.

A sure sign that punk is dead

As I was strolling back from the gym today down the main drag of the city square I call home, I noticed a very proletarian-British looking fellow with a black pompadour/mohawk, black leather jacket, jeans, black boots, and sundry steel studs. He so could have come from Manchester, England. Across the street from both of us is my favorite hipster coffeeshop, which is also frequented by punks, lesbians, and moms. Up the street a bit is the coffee shop recently rated by Zagat (and, judging from the big sign in their window, quite shocked by having been rated) where the hippies imbibe.

But wouldn't you know it, Johnny Rotten hung a left and stepped right into Starbucks.

Sniffy sniffy

My darling kitty Daphne-Moon has taken to placing herself in between me and my desktop, lining her little bumhole up with my nose and swatting me on the shoulder with her tail. I looked this behavior up on the internet. Apparently she views me as her pal and is sharing, via offering up her rear end for me to sniff, what she has been doing all day.

Thing is, I am home most of the day with her. I know what she's been up to. Following the sunbeams as she naps. I'm not sure how to communicate to her that her ass-in-face behavior is unnecessary so I keep picking her up and popping her on my lap when the behavior, uh, rears its ugly head.

Has anyone else noticed?

That every single episode of Little House on the Prairie is a "very special" one? Let's take tonight's, for example. In the first fifteen minutes, Laura gives birth to a son and everyone is happy and then she wakes up one morning and the baby is dead. In the second fifteen, you've got Doc Baker drinking away the pain of his being run out of town for not diagnosing what was going on with the dead baby, and then Laura's other kid gets smallpox. And now Laura and Manly and Brenda Walsh might have it too.

I loved this show when I was growing up and I kind of still do, but man it is a little depressing. Anyone remember the two parter when blind Mary's baby died in a fire? In the first episode you've got the woman who died with her screaming and holding the baby out a second-floor window before they both get burnt to a crisp. Or how about when Albert showed up (I don't remember him from the books) and got addicted to morphine and Pa had to detox him?

Of course the books had their fair share of troubles -- the bratty kid in Farmer Boy who got stung by bees after stamping on a yellowjackets nest and had to get wrapped up like a mummy in a poultice of baking soda, or the time Laura nearly drowned in On the Banks of Plum Creek, saved only by her grip on the footbridge.

Boy howdy, life on the prairie was hard.

Tasty Delight

You know how sometimes you taste something, some sort of food, and it tastes somehow more than perfect, like an uber version of itself? I experienced that this weekend with some maple syrup. I found myself left rather speechless by it. I was at a small sugar house run by some FFA kids near Addison Four Corners. It was warm out for VT (40's), cloudy, and muted like it is in winter. The rolling hills were more golden brown than green but were still beautiful. The syrup was served in Dixie cups, literally the second it was ready to go, fresh from the filter tap. It was still warm, and perfectly sweet. Someone was cooking mini pancakes fresh off the griddle and piling them up on a paper plate for dipping and there was sap water to clear your palate. It's embarrassing for me as a writer to not be able to adequately come up with the words to describe how it felt to tip a Dixie cup of warm sweet syrup to my lips and drink, but I find myself without them. It was the best maple syrup I have ever tasted, bar none. It was like drinking in the woods and the air and all of God's green earth. It was transcendant.

I seem to be attracting

all the wrong types. While in VT this weekend, a horsey came running to the edge of his fence as JoyceFrances, Tess the Wonder Hound, and I walked by. I went over and scratched his nose. JF started laughing and pointing. I looked down to see that the had become, er, excited by my scratchings. Ick.

Then this morning (unlike the above, this falls into the NTTAWWT territory) I am pretty sure I was hit on by a girl at the gym. I work out in the women-only room because sometimes my shorts ride up and I just prefer to not be around grunting sweaty men who smell of beef and cheese. There are copies of The Advocate in the magazine rack in the room from time to time and I recently noticed a new girl, probably in her twenties, with white-blond hair with a blue streak in it, pulled back into pigtails (much like I style my hair) working out and glancing over at me. Today as I was moving to another machine she approached me and very nervously and awkwardly asked if I'd like to use the machine she was on. She was stumbling all over her words and then called me "power woman" probably in reference to the high weight I lift. I got the distinct feeling she had the hots for me, if only because she stumbled all over herself much like I do when I am around a man I find attractive.

I was flattered. But how does one in a non-awkward manner let another person know your toast isn't buttered on the same side as hers?

I don't know. I suppose I should be glad I'm getting at least some sort of attention, even if it's from the wrong species or gender. Spring has certainly arrived.

Moo's fridge (contents of)

I arrived at Dr. Moo's at around half past two. I did some laundry, sent some emails, and went for a nice long run. I just inventoried her fridge for snacks and thought I would share its contents:

Milk
Cream
Gorgonzola Cheese
Muenster Cheese
Swiss Cheese
Sesame Dressing
Nonfat Yogurt
Vials of Cow Blood in a Coffee Cup

Mm-mm!

I'm off to see the wizard!

Okay, not really. But I am heading to VT tomorrow morning. Doc Moo is going to Virginny and needs a sitter for Tess the Wonder Hound.

As I never heard a word from the Vegetable Farmer, I shan't be seeing him during my visit; it looks like I will have to enjoy VT alone, but JoyceFrances and her husband will be there to hang out with me for part of the time. I'm hoping to get a lot of good outdoors time in.

In other McP news, my parents are going with their church on a pilgrimage to Poland! And Polackpappy has asked if I would like to join them. It would be a bus full of age 50-plus folks with their rosaries and bibles following the path of everyone's favorite recently deceased pope, John Paul II, through Polonia.

What would be especially fun is that, as my grandfather looked exactly like the Pope, and as Pp resembles gramps, perhaps some confused Polacks will think he's JPII, risen from the dead. When you add to that the fact that his first name is John, well, you've got a recipe for some good times!

I am seriously considering going.

Sweet, sweet TMI

Sometimes when I am having a bad time of it (and I am having a shitty f-ing day today; I just feel miserable) a strange sense of humor kicks in from somewhere deep inside of me and elicits from me, at the most unlikely moment, a giggle.

Just now, rather than curl up in a ball on my futon and deal with my depression by sleeping, I instead decided I'd do a little cleaning. I started with the bathroom (nothing like a dirty toilet to cheer a person up!) and then moved on to the kitchen, where I tackled the many half-to-more-than-half-empty cereal boxes that litter the top of my fridge.

The oat and soy crisp was clearly no longer crisp as the cereal pieces were clumped together in a prickly, sticky ball at the bottom of the bag. Into the trash it went! I then consolidated two different kinds of hot cereal -- an oat bran and a similar-in-texture-and-shape apple cinnamon. Next came Barbara's Shredded Oats. It's hard to tell whether these are fresh by look or feel so I popped one in my mouth.

Aaaaaaaaaaaand it was definitely past its prime. Since no one was looking I spit the chewed-up dry-saltine textured Shredded Oat back into the bag with its spoilt brethren. I made a sort of "thblpptblearggggggh" sound with my tongue. Then I made another special sort of sound with my bum. And then I laughed and laughed.

And thought to myself that even though the cereal failed the freshness test this was far superior to when my underpants fail the "are they clean or dirty?" sniff test.

R.I.P., Wendell Jones

Wendy McPolack, aka Smelvis, aka Smels Olsen, went to dog heaven today at the age of 13. She had to be put to sleep because her lungs were riddled with cancer. Apparently so much cancer that the vet was "surprised she ate breakfast." Ah, but he did not know the eating wonder that was our wee Welsh corgi. There was nary a calorie on the McPolack homestead floor that escaped her snuffling beak. She also held a weird sway over the kitties in the household; they used to rub up against her and clean out her eye boogers on a regular basis. She was also a rampant poop eater, gobbling up both her own poos and those of others. But this was just part of her charm. She was a wonderful, wonderful little doggie who I truly loved, and I will miss her.

Surprise!

I was sitting on the sofa Saturday night at the McPolack family homestead, (where I had retreated to visit with OSB and her baby and also because I was feeling sad and lonely) eating some jellybeans and watching a show about little people marathon on the boob tube with McMumsy.

After commenting on how messy the home of the little people was and listening to me talk about how great I thought their family dynamics were, McMumsy said "There must be something wrong with them. There must be dirt somewhere. Hand me my computer."

I gave it to her and took out my own. I couldn't pick up the wi-fi signal so after McMumsy came up with no dirt on the small family I borrowed her computer so I could check my email and my blog.

Imagine my suprise when I type "McPolack" in to the address line and see a line of posts stretching to the bottom of the screen..."McMumsy," I said, looking at her sideways. "Have you been reading my blog?"

A giggle escaped from my dear mother. Yes, she had "stumbled upon it" while googling the words "Dr." and "Moo."

Uh-huh.

"So why didn't you tell me you were reading it?" I asked her. She responded that she'd decided to stop and so why bother telling me she'd read it at all. When I asked her what she thought of the blog, she said she'd found "Nothing surprising" in it.

Three Truths, as Evidenced by the Film Syriana

1. The oil business is a murky one.

2. The Middle East is a troubled place.

3. A Clooney who is bearded, barefoot, fat, tied to a chair and having his fingernails yanked off one by one by a guy wielding a pair of pliers, is still a Clooney I would have sex with.

Driving Lessons

L asked recently if either our German friend or I would teach her how to drive stick. After worrying about what might happen to my clutch in the hands of a neophyte I thought "Bah! What kind of friend am I" and enthusiastically responded with an offer to train her.

No offer was forthcoming from the other party and, when I really thought about it, I started to get nervous about my car again. As I am wont to do whenever this feeling occurs, I called Polackpappy. "What's wrong with your car?" he asked. I explained the situation and asked him to assess potential damage. He then said "Well, why don't you bring her out here in a couple of weeks and we'll teach her on the tractor?"

"Is a tractor like a car?" I asked Pp.

"Well, sure," he responded.

"Okay," I said. And thought. I've actually never driven a tractor myself, save the ride-on mower, which shifts only from turtle to bunny, and I wouldn't consider it that similar of an experience to the clutch on my bitchin' Honda Civic but I'm willing to give Pp the benefit of the doubt. Especially if it means driving the big blue tractor parked next to the three-car garage Pp had built to hold all of his shite all over the bumpy, hilly lawn of the McPolack homestead.

Children today...

...apparently are not capable of wiping their own asses using standard toilet paper. I just saw an ad for some new line of products (which I will not name, thus giving them free publicity) that include wipes in a tub because kids can't handle "twisty, tangly toilet paper."

Um, are kids coming with fewer brain cells and less motor coordination now? Cause last time I checked, you just unroll the tp, rip it off, and wipe away.

You know what's frustrating?

Spending hours filling out a federal-government style application for a boring-ass two-week long proofreading job with shitty pay.

I just called a bunch of employment agencies trying to figure out which one I was registered with when I worked in the training department through them at a fiber-optics company a few years ago. I have worked so many places I actually had to add an appendix to the form.

I mean, geez.

This is f-ing depressing, really. I actually had a bad dream about it last night, imagining myself going blind proofing horrendous ca-ca for the faceless Man. This was brought on I am sure by watching most of Office Space last night. The whole experience is reminding me of TPS reports.

But a girl's gotta eat.

Or maybe I could just go on a diet.

Sooooooo, the farmer left about 45 minutes ago

Yes, people, he stayed over.

But it's not what you think. He slept on my ever-popular livingroom futon. Because otherwise, a la my dad, who has done this in the dead of winter in an ancient Volvo, he was going to sleep in the cab of his truck. He actually made himself rather comfortable rather quickly, laying initially on what he called his "Amish chastity quilt" on the floor and poking things with his feet while we chatted.

Dinner was delicious, and impressive -- we ate at Casablanca, in Harvard Square, one of his customers. A sous chef there who knows him sent us up a couple of plates of tasty nibbly bits during dinner and came up after to chat as well. During dinner (as well as after), farmer Pete was a gentleman, although he did let me know about the many journalists who seem to want to use him as their sole source of information, but then misquote him. I am used to this and did not in turn let him know about the many farmers who grow inferior vegetables with bugs in them that I only see once I am, say, chopping up my broccoli to put it in the steamer pot.

But he's cuter and more interesting than all my internet dates put together. He comes from a family of self-starters. His mother sounded most impressive -- she was a homesteader of sorts, working super-hard raising food and also doing a bit of homeschooling. One of his sisters owns a flower business and his brother is on the Olympic cross-country ski team.

So is there a chance for romance? Given that he lives four hours away from me and also ran out the door before I could feed him breakfast, I don't honestly know. I did find him to be quite an admirable fellow and I had a swell time. Thanks, farmer Pete!

Game On!

I will be meeting Pete, the farmer of so much more than just lettuce, at 7 pm at a T station just a stop away from my own. As he has never seen a picture of me and I have seen just one of him in which I mistakenly remembered a beard, it should be interesting trying to find each other. We're going to dinner in Cambridge. And I think I, and he, are definitely guaranteed an interesting evening.

well, well, well

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand we have telephone contact with the lettuce farmer. He actually farms much more than just lettuce. So perhaps I will call him a much more than just lettuce farmer. Or perhaps I will call him Pete.

It was short and sweet. He's coming into town the next day or so to look at trucks. Oh, and me. I'm actually kind of excited, which is a nice change from the dread I had been feeling at the prospect of meeting a new person of the male persuasion.

In other McPolack news, it's road race season again and I may run in a St. Paddy's-themed 5k this Sunday. I'd like to see if I can actually break my ten minute mile barrier. But I am a wee bit worried about one of my shins and had myself worked up over whether or not I have a stress fracture. I don't think I do but I was hoping to get a free veterinary x-ray this past weekend to check it out. Alas, it wasn't to be. I did have a delightful dinner out with a bunch of dairy farmers on Friday night, though, and narrowly escaped being branded a flatlander.

Well, well

I just left a message for the lettuce farmer. It was a wee bit nerve racking as, when I really think of it, I have no game whatsoever. I'm not even sure if I'm supposed to have game. I guess in the new millenium I am. I'll have to work on finding it.

Well

All I have to say is that Dr. Moo and I were at Muddy Waters from 6:20 until 7:10 this evening and there was NO SIGN of Shorty Saladpants. I hope he's okay. I'm going to keep my can of whoop-ass closed until we get confirmation of this.

It's funny...

...the things that you think about, the things you remember, when you are writing a book. Like the one that just came to mind as I lit a candle to meditate before heading out to the hipster coffee shop...

...It is 1995. I will be graduating from college in the spring. I'm the executive editor of the student newspaper. I am quite thin (thanks, bulimia!) and apparently fetching enough that two of the editors on staff are having a strange, primordial (it involves the obtaining of fire) fight for my attention. One is the news editor; he is quite pale and nerdy. The other is the photo editor -- he's a bit of a beefcake and is fond of bringing his expensive, thick-framed mountain bike into the newspaper office and bouncing himself around the room on it while talking to me.

Both boys are standing back-end-front before me, trying desperately to light wooden matches using their asses. Nerdy boy is muttering swears under his breath as he swipes the match head again and again against his smooshy bottom. As often happens in real life, beefcake boy wins. You could smash bricks on his fanny; he lights his match in short order. "Ha ha!," he proclaims, looking at me for approval and adulation. I can only shake my head in disbelief.

Coming from a small town means you get special treatment...

...like having an accountant who works for you for free! And who calls you and asks you what your expenses were last year so he can get you more money back. I paid like 30 grand in taxes last year, which is disgusting, considering that at the moment said accountant is hoping to get me around 500 dollars back. The year before I probably made well under 20 grand. Such has been my life.

But the best thing by far about my accountant is this: I know that, when he was a teenager, he locked himself in his bedroom and refused to come out. His dad, who is also an accountant, and has known my dad since they were kids, didn't know what to do. But Polackpappy did! He revved up his chainsaw and sawed the door down. Problem solved!

Beginning

So it’s blog post number two from the coffee shop where I have come, drum roll please, to start writing my book. That’s right people, I’m doing it. I’ve taken the leap.

I made it about a half hour before I started judging myself. Judging as in: Who the hell do I think I am, doing this? And “WTF am I going to write about, anyway?” And “How much more cliched can you get, McPolack, sitting on your unemployed ass at a laptop in a hipster coffeeshop, writing a book?

But the thing is, I have to do it. I can’t seem to hold down a job; I tell everyone I meet I’m a writer and I’ve got the blog now so that’s got at least some modicum of truth behind my claim but I need to get out of my head and into reality. So I left fifteen minutes before the end of General Hospital and came here and began at the beginning, which seemed to me to be, naturally, an Introduction. Never mind that I’m not really sure what’s going to follow it. I’ve just got to get started.

And get started I have. I know I just said this a few days ago, in relation to the skiing, but yay me.

Ever the Charmer

I called Dr. Moo on Sunday evening to inform her of our impending date (VT, this Saturday, 6:30 pm) with the salad farmer and her response, upon discovering we would be meeting at a coffee shop, was a snarled "I hate coffee!" Then she bitched about how late in the day I'd set the date up for.

Sigh.

It's times like these that I think it's a good thing my dear sister works mainly with bovines.

Oh, great.

Well, here's a good reason not to visit South Dakota. Leave my uterus alone, fucktards.

I'm Alive!!!!!!!!

Yes, I have returned from my ski trip with all my parts intact. As it turns out, at least according to my friend L, I am a "natural" at the downhill skiing, doing particularly well at turning.

Well, I beg to differ. But let's begin at the beginning: The Lesson. After trading in my boots for a bigger pair to accomodate my ginormous man-calves ("Look at them!" I said to the attendant, hoisting one into view.) I strapped on my helmet and headed outside with the Indian man, R, who works with my German friend's boyfriend, who they convinced to come skiing because he could take lessons with me, fun-in-the-sun McPolack. We joined the beginner's group which was made up of 8 or so 10 year old girls. And me and R. Oh, and I was the only student wearing a helmet.

We were eventually (phew!) joined by some other grown-ups but were all barked at like children by our slightly grumpy instructor. At one point he congratulated the children, while chastising us, for our circle-forming abilities. I shouted "Grown-ups rule!" and pumped my fist into the air.

After a solid hour spent doing various maneuvers in our boots alone (Yes, I kept my helmet on the whole time. Sometimes I keep my seatbelt on when I'm sitting a parking lot. You never know.), we walked sideways up the hill in the lesson area and each skiied down. By this time, I'd made some friends with both the grown-ups and the kids in class, one of whom (a kid) kept insisting that she didn't need no stinking lessons, cause she'd been skiing since she was five. "Make sure you watch me go down! I can turn and stop" said the wee whippersnapper. I watched. She crashed. I gave her some kid-appropriate shit. Later she sang "Back it up! Back it up!" to the class when the instructor said we were standing too close together. I heard another little girl, a particularly lippy one in a purple leopard print hat, shout "Jesus Christ!" at someone, sounding every inch like a world-weary 25 year old. Jesus Christ, indeed.

Actually, she was kind of a riot, a pint-sized self-assured mouthy broad. I saw her a couple of other times throughout the day and we greeted each other with a nod and a "How's it going?"

So after an hour and a half we made our way to the bunniest of bunny slopes where we made a pathetic attempt to follow the instructor's directions to meet a third of a way up the slope, which involved stepping off the T-bar (no rope tows in sight, thank God) awkwardly, and then skiing one by one down the mountain. The girl who'd been "skiing since she was five" crashed rather spectacularly into a fence (that's hubris for you) but came out unscathed and poor R crashed right into me as I was waiting in line to go back up the hill.

But I didn't crash at all. Turns out my man-legs were made for this sport. I had a couple of runs that made me feel particularly confident and almost in love with skiing, but I also had a couple where I was going so fast my stomach dropped out from under me and I felt genuine fright.

Would I go again? I don't know. Perhaps if I lived a life of leisure, or had a bit more money, or lived a bit closer. I could see myself doing well at this sport if I took my time. It was kind of zen, figuring out each of the bunny slopes I went down (3 total) -- it's just you and the mountain. But I really don't like going fast, not at all. I hate roller coasters and that's what it felt like I was on a couple of times, only I wasn't strapped into anything but a pair of short, shaped skis.

But I've slayed the demon that was born when I was twelve. The thought of skiing no longer makes me feel like a chubby little unloved kid. And there's already another to take my place, a sweet girl named Molly with pink cheeks, blond hair, and freckles, who just looked so alone in the group of girls, and sad, even as we all rallied around her and tried to give her confidence, yelling "Go Molly!" as she tried to make her way down the hill. Hopefully it won't take her twenty years to find herself there.

Funeral Party

So I'm driving to the grocery store today to pick up ingredients to make ginger cream scones for a traveling breakfast on Saturday morning when I see there's a funeral procession up ahead of me. I end up following it nearly all the way to my destination. And as I am slowly meandering behind them, I have this thought: When you die, if you choose to get buried, as part of your last hurrah you are paraded around town in the back of a big fancy car, with all your friends and family following, lights blinking. You get to go right through red lights. Then, at the end of the parade, you get flowers, and everyone talks about how great you are (well, were) and prays for you. It's actually kind of neat. I was thinking cremation would be the way to go for me when my time comes, but now I am thinking twice.

Not that I'm looking to die anytime soon! I'm just sayin'.

From the Files of Dr. Moo: Shouldering the World

So Dr. Moo was working on a cow yesterday that had milk fever, which is nothing like dance fever. As she is working, both hands busy, the farmer's wife is nearby chatting at her and she's got a cat on one shoulder and a cow on the other. The cat is a barn cat who, accoring to the farmer's wife, doesn't like it when you don't pay attention to her. As Dr. Moo is treating the sick cow she can't pay attention to the cat. So the cat is biting her in the face. In the meantime, on her other shoulder is the head of a healthy cow, and said cow is busily liiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiicking Dr. Moo's hat right off her head with her big bovine tongue. The farmer's wife informed Dr. Moo that this cow in particular does the same thing to her every morning.

ski weekend

So this weekend I am heading out at 6:30 in the morning with a group of friends to go downhill skiing. You might think from all my talk of runs and yoga and trips to the gym that I am a big skier as well, but oh would you be wrong.

Let me paint a picture for you of the last time I went downhill skiing...

...It is after school. I am 12, and in the eighth grade. I am wildly unpopular. Nicknames for me include moo cow McPolack. I have maybe one or two friends. (When I am taking a touchy-feely class in high school, we have to write unique and kind things to people. This boy who was a year behind me in grade school writes "I think it's great that you've turned out to be such a wonderful person, especially considering how mean everyone was to you in elementary school." Yes, it was that bad.)

Anyhoo. McMumsy, in one of her many attempts to 1. Skinny me up and 2. Socialize me, has signed me up for ski club. Post-hideously long bus ride which is something that I endure due to teasing, I am standing at the bottom of the bunny slope, all bundled up in an extra-long stripey scarf that smells of mothballs and is very Dr. Who. I step my left ski into the groove and grab onto the rope tow. It tires me to feel this thing drag my weight up the mountain. I'm trying not to fall off when I realize that my Dr. Who scarf is wrapping...and wrapping...and wrapping around the rope tow. And as it is wrapping it is tightening around my neck, choking me. I am trying not to panic. I think of ways to save myself. I think I would rather die than have someone turn off the rope tow, thus drawing attention to my sorry self but then I think I really don't want to die but I don't want to ask them to turn off the rope tow, especially since I can now clearly see a sign that warns you to tuck in your scarf before getting on, and I am silently praying "please, please, please" to myself and then...

Someone turns off the rope tow. I unwrap my scarf. And sit down on my ski pants. And start sliding, ass-first, down the mountain. Of course, as soon as I get to the bottom I immediately have to get back on the g-d tow.

It was not a good start to my skiing career. I ended up being so terrible that I fell behind even the kids in the bunny slope class, and a sweet, handsome boy instructor was going to teach me solo, but I just couldn't have my fat self around him. He had better things to do with his time, I thought. So after getting caught hiding under the barn by McMumsy after skipping skiing one evening, I went back, and spent the whole time in the lodge, sipping hot chocolate, feeling bad about myself, and waiting for the interminable bus ride home.

...So, I am not so excited about this ski thing, given that the last time I went, TWENTY years ago, was not all that positive.

Also, I don't have health insurance.