travelin' travelin'

As many of you know, I'm returning briefly to Michigan this weekend to celebrate my nephew's second birthday (!) and attend the wedding of a family friend. I am INCREDIBLY excited about it, so much so that I've been so far able to ignore that when it's all said and done I'll have spent approximately 3 and a half hours in an airplane (round trip) and 11 and a half hours in a car (approximately) as well as all associated airport/baggage claim time in three days.


What some of you may not know about me is that I'm completely neurotic and more than a little bit crazy. For example: I needed something new to wear to the wedding (well, needed might be a strong word, but whatever) but I hate the mall because I have no self control and am easily distracted (same reason I hate the grocery store and yet the major reason I love Target. Figure that one out) so I thought I'd solve this problem by shopping online, picking out a few options, trying them on at home and returning whatever I didn't like. I am a believer that it's always a good idea to get a second opinion on an outfit choice, particularly one for a special occasion, so I figured I'd try these on, have one I was leaning toward and just get confirmation that it was the way to go. Except that in the end I had 5 choices and honestly couldn't make a decision on them to save my life. I took pictures of each outfit (by the way it's not easy photographing your outfit as you're wearing it) and sent them to my fashion advisors begging for help.


Now, one of the shirts I bought looked online as though it was a muted bluish/green with something shimmery across the middle. While I do wear color, I pretty much stick to very muted tones and I will admit that most of my dress up clothes are black. So I thought this would be a nice little change of pace while still not being in your face. When the top arrived, I found that it was actually impressively royal blue. Like "HEY LOOK AT ME!!!!" royal blue. With some sort of bedazzled jewels across the middle, instead of the shimmery material I thought it was. I refer to it as "the scary bedazzled shirt" in fact. Of all the outfit choices I had, I absolutely knew this was the one everyone would hate and tell me to send back immediately, because it was both scary and bedazzled. However, in the interest of full disclosure I included it in the options if only to be able to laugh and say, "isn't this shirt scary and bedazzled?" Here's what I wasn't expecting: 100% of my trusted advisors chose the scary bedazzled shirt outfit as the clear winner. I then showed my choices to my boss and she also picked the scary bedazzled outfit (I'm seeing how many times I can legitimately type 'scary bedazzled' in one post. right now we're at 6). I guess it goes to show that I shouldn't be trusted to pick my own clothes. Of course, all the other choices looked ok too, just not for this occasion so my grand plan to save money by avoiding the mall has totally backfired as I am now keeping all the clothes I purchased. Oh well, I guess it was probably time for some new clothes anyway, right?


At any rate, my outfit is chosen (scary and bedazzled as it may be), my pre-flight trip to CVS has taken place (although I think I forgot at least three things so I will be going back...of course), I'm already mentally tallying everything I need to pack (but I bet you I still won't start to actually pack until sometime late Friday night and I'll still forget something) and I'm living in fear that I will somehow forget to call the cab company to set up my pickup for 4:30 Saturday morning so that I can make my flight that leaves at 6. Or, I'm afraid the cab company will forget to pick me up. There's no basis for this paranoia, I just can't help it. By the time Friday rolls around I'll be so on edge I'll probably be unbearable to be around. If I'm not already. Oh well, I usually settle down once I'm actually on the plane.


The other thing I'm doing this week is attempting to train myself to wear my hair in some configuration other than a ponytail. My hair has been in a ponytail since June, pretty much without interruption. All day it's in a ponytail, I sleep with it in a ponytail, pretty much the only time it's down is when I'm washing it, and then straight back up. Now, I'm planning to wear it down on Sunday at the wedding, and I knew that in order to do that I'd need some practice (hey, I told you I was crazy). Well holy crap my hair is long. I mean, I've been trying to grow it out for bridesmaid-in-December purposes but I was unprepared for this. Now the trick will be to see how long I can handle it before I make a hair appointment and promptly cut it all off. My guess it somewhere in the neighborhood of December 16 or when the weather starts to turn bad. :)