"Why would I lie" or "Tell me lies, tell me sweet little lies."

Both titles seem appropriate for what I'm about to say.

Friends, once again I have reached a new understanding of stereotypes.  And here's the thing that I want to make clear before I begin... I don't like this stereotype, and I would like nothing to change because of this blog post (i'm looking at you, husband).

Today the husband and I decided to "hopefully" go to a wedding of his family friend's son's.  (with me?)  Anyway, I had to choose what to wear.  Since it's not someone I actually know and since I was in not one but THREE weddings last year (plus, I just have dresses I've purchased for other things that I haven't gotten all good use out of), I think I should settle on a dress I already own.  And while trying on dresses I learned a few things about myself, and my husband.

1) my husband cares what my butt looks like.  This is, honestly and truly, news to me.  Apparently this dress makes my ribcage (admittedly huge) look normal, but my butt look small.  And this apparently matters. 

2) i need to attend the gym more.  This is not a picture of me in this dress, but it is a dress I tried on.  And let's say that I didn't "rock" this dress as much as Becky did as seen here, but it makes me look like my love-handles are out of control.

Becky at my wedding.  Why I have this dress, I'm unsure.  But what a pretty bouquet she's holding.

3) sometimes we don't agree.  I love this dress.  I love it.  Matt does not.  The reason I said no to this one was (obvious) it's the middle of summer and this dress is for winter.  The reason Matt discarded was because he thinks 1/2 sleeves look weird.

I'm on the far-right, and look like a giant.  Why did nobody tell me how tall I was?

4) i have issues in my head.  I don't have a picture of this dress, but I have a dress that one time I bought for $6 at Ross Dress For Less.  And even though apparently I look good in it, I refuse to wear this dress to a wedding where I'm trying to impress people because I bought it for $6 at Ross Dress For Less, and I feel everyone will know it.  (but here's a picture of me in a dress anyway... one that I won't be wearing.)

This dress is just horrible.  look at the see-through sleeves.  look at the horrible bottom.  this was a joke.  This is not the dress I was actually thinking of wearing.

5) boys have a penis, girls have a vagina.  This is a line from Kindergarten Cop, before everyone gets all up-ons because this is slightly-less family-friendly (who am I kidding?  I say "hell" or "ass" on this blog about every-other posting).  Anyway, boys apparently get kindof annoyed when you try on the same four dresses three times each (some of them just because you've decided to add spanx and want to know if it looks better).  Girls, well, your girlfriends... they are more considerate and will still pay attention when you're debating over not wearing a dress because it looks like it came from the Dress For Less.  Not that I don't enjoy my very honest, and completely useful husband.  Just that he doesn't care as much as, say, girls would.

6) you can never pack for everything.  My cute shoes are mostly packed (so no wearing the black Ross dress, because I have no bright-red shoes to accessorize).  And I'm hesitant to decide on what to wear because I don't have the proper jewelry for many of the dresses.  And this leads me to my next realization: i am higher maintenance than i tell myself i am.  Because who cares?  It's a wedding where literally only Matt's family and the groom's parents will know me.  I need to suck it up and wear the first outfit that doesn't make me look like I have been thrown-up on.

Ooh yeah, what was the point of this blog?  Point is: my husband was honest with me.  He told me when a dress made me look chubbs.  He told me when a dress made my butt look non-existent (although, honestly, should I care about that???) .  And he told me when what I was wearing looked awesome, even though I felt like Frumpy McFrumperston.  And, yes, at one point my feelings got hurt.  I just wanted to be told that I am pretty and lovely.  So I now understand husbands that just say "yes, honey, that looks fine."  Because girls have feelings that get hurt when they look bad in one (or three) dress(es).  And girls will bore you into saying anything looks fine.  But I'm glad I have a husband who tells me when I look bad.  So I don't look love-handle-ey all over town (this one or the next).

..... But I still want to be told I look pretty.

So hooray for people getting married!  And hooray for people looking good at weddings.  I got married once, and here's a picture as proof.  I hope everyone is having a happy July (haven't heard from some of you lately).

it's a dog-eat dog world.

My dog is great.  He follows me wherever I go.  Just ask my husband, he loves me best.  When visiting some friends, one of them remarked "he's so loyal"  (what was before the Great Truck-Running Disaster, but whatever... I'm over it...).

Often Matt and I will joke because he's "so talented."  Usually when we throw the ball and he'll jump for it, only to have it bounce off his nose, or if he walks right into a glass door to try to get to you.  You know, hilarious stuff.  But Barney does have actual talents... like having ESP.

Barney knows when you're about to stand up and move.  It's true, weather I'm two items away from a box being full so I have to get another one, or have recently decided I'm about to stand up and get a drink of water, the dog knows what I am thinking.  And to stop this from happening, from me standing up to move, the minute he senses I am going to walk away, he will lie down. 

How can you resist this face?

Like... just moments ago.  I was sitting here, movie paused (Matt's on the phone), dog wandering back and forth, panting (we just played fetch), and I decided I was going to go find out who Matt was talking to, or how long he might be, and just as I was making this decision, Barney decided to lie down.  Yup, panting/pacing for 25 minutes, and decides to lie down when I want to go somewhere. 

I guess it doesn't look good for me when I say I decided to blog about this rather than disturb his walking.

Matt is trapped, too.  He's sleeping.

Gotta get up, to get down.

 it's time for another edition of highs and lows.  Because there's so much going on, sometimes lists need to be made.

{HIGHS}

• Do you know who is nice?  People on Fort Campbell.  Goodness, I had no idea people who worked on an army base could be happy to help, not scowl at you if you don't know where you're going, and willing to go out of their way to make you feel welcome.  Three-cheers for the South actually being full of Southern Hospitality. (hooray!  hooray!  hooray!) 

Thanks to this handy map, you can see where I live.  It's on the Kentucky-side of Fort-Campbell in Clarksville, TN - The Gateway to the NEW SOUTH!

• Do you know what else is nice?  Not having to drive 25 minutes to get to a grocery store (minus the commesary).  I can not tell you the relief and joy I feel when going three-minutes down the road will get me to anything that I need (mall, target, restaurants, grocery stores).  Now an hour and a half shopping expedition is only a half-hour once more.  Hooray for living where there are more than just trees.  (not that I have anything against trees).

• And also, I don't hear gun-fire all day and night, which is a bonus.

• This weekend, Matt and I decided at 1:30 on Friday to make a spontaneous trip to the STL (St. Louis) and hang out with his BFF and his fabulous wife Kelly, and chill with his parents.  If we'll all remember "single Sarah," taking a last-minute trip warms me to the very soul.  The spontinaity of the trip, the good times we had, the fact that we were done moving and could finally relax... everything was fabulous.
• ... as was the PIZZA.  We at at PI, which is reported to be Barack Obama's favorite Chicago-style pizza place.  It was lovely.  Had there been more cheese on the pizza (seriously... did they forget that part? Do you have to order it separately?) it would have made some sort of top-5 list for me (my dad's pizza being #1, obviously, and The Pie somewhere up-top as well).

{lows}

• Ke$ha.  Can you sing?  Can I stand your voice?  Are you going to have a career in 3 years? I say NO to all of the above.  Stupid Ke$ha.  I hate her.  Every time she comes on the radio, I must change it.  I mean, she has a DOLLAR SIGN in her name, and her voice sounds like a mandrake.  Stupid Ke$ha.  I hope she is saving money wisely here before she starts her long and interesting career in real estate.  Stupid Ke$ha.

Ke$ha.  I hate her.

• BARNEY and I had a bit of a falling-out.  Wait, let me back up.... moving is hard for dogs.  And when we were packing, we saw a new level of clingy.  (And this leads me to speculation #45 of why our dog was in the shelter... his family was moving and they left him.)  Fast-forward to a mini-trip to STL where we were playing fetch in the front yard (you know, to tire him out before the car-ride back to Kentuck).  And this sweet, loyal and loving dog who hasn't been more than 3 feet away from me in weeks... ran after a TRUCK.  Trust... GONE.  The truck stopped, I got my dog before the truck killed him, and we went on with our lives... but as a major low to my life, my dog has even more "previously installed" issues.  (what is it with him and trucks?)

• I have to say, the hardest thing for me to tackle these days is not the new-unempoyment, or humidity (I lied when I said it was better... I think it might be worse), or even the feeling that I just got confortable somewhere, and found friends and then had to leave.  The hardest thing is the unknown.  What is Matt going to do here?  Is he being deployed?  Am I moving home?  Should we look for an apartment that's not this furnished rental that smells like cheap-cologne-covered-smoke?  I don't know.  Trust me, I'll tell you when I do.  But I know I (and hope all of you) learned a valuable lesson on our long (6 month) delay on when we were moving to Fort Benning... the Army doesn't care that I don't know what's going on with my life, they just care that they get to be in charge of everything.  Jerks.

Alright, friends.  That's it for my today.  But look how my blogging is getting more regular!  Keep checking back and I'll make sure to talk about... at least possibly vaguely interesting things.

I'm a quitter

Friends, Blog-readers, Tennesseans (is that even a word?).  Lend me your ears, and I will tell you about a girl who has been too busy to blog, and is a damned quitter.

Perhaps some of you have noticed my lack of blogging after my ONE HUNDREDTH BLOG ENTRY last month (seriously, sorry there wasn't like a blog parade... or at least blog-cake.  I love cake.  I'd make cake right now if I knew where any cake-ingredients were.).  Well, let me tell you, I got the heck out of Dodge (this time meaning Georgia) and went to the Kitsap Peninsula, which is north west of Seattle, and as far away from Georgia as you can get in the continental US. 

It was a whole long-weekend of a farmhouse, and family and fantastic day-trips.  And really great "I gained more than 5 lbs" family food.

At one point I could even see Canada (hi, Canada!), and at another point, I was dangerously close to Forks, home of Vampires and Werewolves and pouty-girls (ooh, my!). 

But at every point I was close to perfect-happy.  Obviously it would have been better if Matt was with me on the family reunion-vaca-ATOL.  But instead he was jumping out of AIRPLANES (but that's another blog).

And since leaving Georgia was so much fun the first time, I thought "heck, I should leave Georgia for good" and now I live in Clarksville, TN.  Clarksville?  As in "take the last train to...?"  Yes, Monkees fans, just like that.  And it's nice.  And about 3 degrees cooler (useless) and about 10% less humid (this number I'm making up, perhaps due to wishful thinking).  And the people are about 80% nicer. At least the ones we've met so far.  I have the right to change this opinion should stupidity and ass-hatness run rampant here under the surface (like shiny-vampires in rainy towns).  But for now, it's pretty dang awesome.

And now... the blog.

If 1980s inspirational rock and super-cheesy movies have taught me anything, it's that "quitting is for losers."  Well, friends, I am a loser.

(see? "L"  for loser?  ooh man, I think I really am a loser because this was the only connection my head made.)

A few years ago I worked for Marketstar, which is a great company if you wish to be paid a less than awesome wage, but would like to be well-compensated in gift-cards and activities.  My team won a trip to Park City to go on the 2002 Olympic Luge.  It was a pretty awesome experience.  What they did is modify the bobsled so that the breaks and the steering are up front, so there's a driver and three of your closest friends going down 3/4 of the Olympic course and pulling 4-5Gs.  Unless you're in the back... where you pull 5-6Gs.  Guess where I was....

Yup, I was in the back.  So, I'm heading down this mountain with two girls on my team and our driver (whose name, I believe, was Sven), and I start thinking "I should just let go.  This is TOO MUCH.  I wonder how much I would get hurt if I just let go.  I am sure people do it all the time.  I probably am not going to die or anything. I bet it would be way better than holding on ridiculously for hours of time (in real life, our time was about 53 seconds)."  Anyway, I would say this kind of thinking went on for about 38 of the seconds.  Something was hard, and I wanted to quit.

Optimists might take this as a blog-opportunity to say "but I didn't give up, I held on, and very nice men helped me out at the bottom and helped me when I couldn't stand or walk straight."  I am going to take this opportunity to say there's a quitter inside of me.

Last night our truck of stuff got here about 7:30pm.  We were convinced we should unload it and get it all into our storage unit.  I can't be that hard, after-all, since everything is already there and packed.  About 10:30 at night, as my muscles were as sore as any weight class (the kind where you can't lift your arms after), and my legs stopped functioning I thought "I am going to quit.  I am going to leave all this stuff on the sidewalk, I am going to give my double-sided pillow-top mattress (read: like a billion more pounds than a regular queen mattress) to the poor, or whoever will get it out of this truck for me, and I am going to buy all new stuff." 

I didn't quit (thanks to my super-understanding and ultra-motivated husband).  But I'm not saying I didn't want to.  And I'm not saying if I were alone I wouldn't have.  But we stayed there until 1:30 (that's right, in the AM) until it was done.  There's a quitter inside me just waiting to get out.  I think it's competing with the fat woman with 3 dogs to see who can get out first.  I hope they spend the rest of forever dueling it out to see who gets to surface because I like me pretty much the way I am...

I also like that a picture of me with short non-stupid-looking hair was found.  (anyone who has seen pictures from this point in my life knows, I have too much hair that's too curly for many of these to exist).  For your viewing pleasure below... Sarah the potential-loser in her dad's old Alpha.