I'm a dork.

I think some people blog so that all the world (the blogging world) will know how cool they are. This is not my goal. I gave up being cool on the blog the first time I posted pictures of Spencer and I dressed up in strange football attire. Cool people spend their Sunday afternoons doing much cooler things like going to parties or something. Yes I lean toward the non cool side and here is proof.

The other month I went for sushi with a long time friend Jim. Jim and I have been eating sushi together for years. My husband has come on occasion but everything about sushi grosses him out so I leave him at home most of the time.

At the end of the meal I realized that my wallet was in another purse. I assured Jim I wasn't dodging the bill. I didn't want Jim to be stuck with it so I scrambled for other options. Luckily I found my check book but no amount of digging yielded my missing wallet or I.D. I figured Jim was more likely to accept a check minus I.D. than the Mikado. So I wrote him one for my half of the meal and then some.

Now here comes the dork part: Instead of writing the check for the $24 I owed Jim I wrote TWENTY FOUR THOUSAND. I wrote it out. I wrote the word thousand on a check. Now least you think that I always do this I don't. Only once in my life have I written thousand on a check and that was for a car.

Jim, trusting me took the check and only later realized my mistake. Now it is a good thing that Jim and I are such good friends. What if I'd written it to someone who likes me less? I assure you a check for $24,000 would never have cleared my savings account. But still this is not a mistake I can afford to make. So least you read my blog and get some false impression of my coolness level...let me assure you that I do the craziest things.

Taxes: One of life's certainties

I've always hated filling out forms. I do fine with forms that ask your name, address and astrological sign. I get really stressed out when they switch to numbers, percentages, grosses, subtract line F by line G multiplying it by the number of calories you ate yesterday and your license plate number. I start shutting down right after the bit about line F.

I find that taxes are the worst forms of all. In fact I imagine hell to be some kind of place where you continually have to file taxes the entire year not just at the eleventh hour on April 15th. Some people actually live in a world like that. They call themselves accountants.

Over the last year I've had a plethora of accountants. Most of these are friends and family members who owed me favors. But apparently I'm a tough case because a few of these people have sworn never to file for me again. I'm not even on speaking terms with one of my past accountants. Marshall my brother in law took pity on me one year after my father refused to do my taxes on April 14th. He was very helpful and did a fine job but I decided never to use him again. The mocking just got to be too much. What ever happened to Amnesty for life?

Luckily this year my sweet husband assured me that he had taxes all under control. He spread out all our W-2's on the kitchen table on April 15th about 6 p.m. as I was cooking dinner. Now he knows me really well and knows how easy it is to get a rise out of me. Here is what he did.

Spencer busily stooped over the papers suddenly grabs my W-2 and in a super stressed voice said "You've got to be kidding me...the recent return rate dividend allotment in percentages....bla bla bla ...Alaska .... doesn't add up"

"what?!? WHAT?!?!" I said all panicked that something was seriously wrong. "What can we doooooooooooooooooo?"

Then he gave me the cutest grin, and I knew I'd been had. Darn it! We both started laughing so hard that we started crying. 2 hours later we were happily finished. So in conclusion this was the least stressful year of taxes as it ended in laughter. But as far as laughing and taxes are concerned Uncle Sam paid us $$$ back this year meaning he was earning the interest and controlling investment power on OUR hard earned money the entire year. Somehow Uncle Sam always gets the last laugh.

The gang

At first glance this seems like a group of normal people enjoying an evening but at second glance I think all of my readers will realize that Yes, Yes indeed, this is a gathering of mafia hit men and women. This pack under the direction of Big Pappy Jimmy has been causing terror in various parts of the world for years. Names have been changed as part of the internet protection program.

Big Pappy Jimmy sits in his lush pleather arm chair with his long polyester sleeves covering a slew of tattoos none of which are innocent enough to say "mother." Many myths surround Big Pappy but almost everyone is certain that he tattoo's the names of each of his victims on his right hip bone.

Meg the aloof (Yellow sweater beaded necklace) is Jimmy's right hand woman. Don't let the blond hair fool you. This woman is no Suzanne Summers. She speaks several languages and is working under cover right now in the D.C. Public school systems buying and selling narcotics, 3 minute zum nackdenken packets and expensive hair products to America's Youth.

Traci the terminator works as a team with Christian the "Killing Kind" Underneath her Argyle sweater is a bullet proof vest she never leaves home with out. Beware those who cross her path. In her spare time she likes grows an herb garden and makes grape juice.

Her husband Christian the "Killing Kind" is sometimes seen sporting a handle bar mustache. The most mysterious of the pack after Big Pappy, the "Killing Kind" is known to take it personally any time "bonsai" tree is incorrectly pronounced.

Heinz "the smiling fool" just found out that he was actually going to replace Meg the aloof as as Jimmy's right hand man. In the picture after this (not shown) Heinz slips into Meg's tight yellow sweater and beaded necklace.

...and me "sausage lost" the name may seem mysterious. It involves our last job securing and then misplacing 1 lb. of expensive Italian sausage at a coffee shop in the metro area. Don't worry, we lost the meat but our identities were not compromised. Until next time...

I'm not that kind of girl!

I don't have lots of clothes and I don't spend lots of money on clothes. It isn't that I don't like clothes. I do like clothes. But I don't LOVE them and dream about them the way some gals do. I really don't like shopping. I can think of MUCH better ways to spend my time and money then strolling through the mall with 1,000 other women looking for a bargin on $200 Jeans. Shopping for me is occasional and specific NOT a regular recreation.

I said this to my dear friend Camille and she reminded me of that summer 2003 when we were backpacking through Europe and I became obsessed with clothes and European boutiques. I assured her that was a freak incident and not normal. I was suffering from a hard blow to my love life. sigh. She didn't quite believe me.

So this is how I proved to Camille that I'm really am NOT a clothes horse despite that Day in Berlin when I made her spend the day shopping rather than see the sights. I repent! I repent! I'm glad you forgave me and we are still friends.

THE PROOF:
I teach high school and I wear the same thing to work everyday. On the rare occasion that I do buy something new my students say:"

Student: "Oh Mrs. Steinmann" you got a new shirt!"
Student: "You have worn that sweater for the last 3 Monday's in a row"
Student: "Usually you wear the other earrings with that shirt."
Student: "Mrs. Steinmann you wore those pants yesterday"

On the day I broke down and wore cute (painful) heels to class:

Student: "Did you finally get new shoes because those other brown ones are like totally worn out"
Student: "You haven't worn that shirt as much this year as you did last year"

Yes yes it is true. They can remember exactly what I wear every day to class but somehow forget all the German Vocabulary words I try to pound into their brains.

Thursday night on a whim Spencer and I went shopping and I broke down and bought a beautiful bright yellow sweater vest from Express. (pictured below think yellow)

I wore it the next day and it was the talk of the school. I actually heard one girl in the hall say "Have you seen Mrs. Steinmann's new outfit?"