Bridget Jones

This morning, you have to picture me with a sassy new haircut, which doesn't look all that different from my hair when I first came out, but it just feels and looks better. In the middle of cutting my hair, Carol Ann exclaimed, "Oh, Jen, you're CUTE!"

And indeed I was.

Yesterday we went to the salon shop and I stocked up on supplies: stuff for coloring, a hot flat iron for my hair, shampoo and conditioner, mousse, spray, mascara, etc. Then, we went to the bead store and spent two hours picking out beads for my necklace. It goes with my amber, and I made it last night while Carol Ann worked on her price list for her salon (Imy haircut would have cost me $42 minus tip). I stayed up (we ran out to get me a decaf chai latte, but they didn't hear the "chai" part, so I'm making up for it by drinking a caffeinated chai latte with cayenne pepper right now before we take six children to the Sheraton Hotel for swimming) so I could type it up for her before bed.

So, this morning, I got up at 6:15, and I guess I was amazingly lazy because instead of making it to the bus at 7:00, I made it at 7:30. Can you imagine me with my new 'do and my sassy little black dress, my pedicured toes, my black sandals, heading down to the bus for downtown Seattle? Can you see it? So very different from the frumpy, harried, humidity-stricken Jen of Kirksville.

It turns out I was on the wrong bus. It did indeed, as the bus driver had said, take me to downtown Seattle, but I realized it was never going to go to the underground station I was expecting, so I saw a part of town near my hotel, and decided to use the brain G-d gave me and GET OFF THE BUS. I made it to the hotel at 8:00 with time to register, get coffee, a plate of fruit and yogurt, and get seated for the first speaker. I ate my breakfast and then nodded off.

The remaining sessions were more interesting. At lunch time, I called Michelle de Seattle and we went to the Wild Ginger for lunch, and the food was very good, and she was nice and funny. It was nice to finally meet her. Tomorrow: Pie.

At five o'clock, I was done and I walked past Ann Taylor, Kenneth Cole, Banana Republic, The Gap, Old Navy, Coldwater Creek, Pottery Barn, Barnes and Noble, Tiffany's, and Nordstrom's. Guess what I bought?

Nothing. There wasn't even enough time to get started.

Then, little suburbanite me got on the right bus and headed back to Mercer Island, indulging in the missing of small children's kisses and soft skin and smooth sunburnt arms as I looked across the water.

And now we are off.