Final Countdown

I cannot express how tired and brain dead I am today. And I went to bed early and slept in. But I will try. I think I can adjust.

The scale says I'm down more weight for a grand total of 10 pounds, but this was my scale at home (I compared it to the gym the other day and it was the same).

Every dress in Kirksville is ugy. Did I mention that already?

I have to:
a) go to the bank
b) go to the post office
c) get more allergy pills
d) pack
e) make challah (from refrigerated bread dough today)

What else?

We found these great glasses yesterday-- they are clear with colored stones pressed on to them. We got a huge set for the wedding present: five wine glasses, two half tumblers, one beer mug, and one candle holder. I LOVE them-- it is a gift I can feel really proud to give.

Last night, I colored Beth's hair-- she works at Il Spazio she had dyed her naturally blonde hair black and wanted highlights.

When you add bleach to black dye, you get a very cool burgundy color, but up where your roots are, you get blonde. So, I had to do my first foil and re-do the half of her head that was burgundy. She looked like she was wearing a blonde kippah. But fortunately, her hair, the foils, the walmart bag I made her wear on her head as we sat and smoked on my front porch, all cooperated. It still has some red to it, but she doesn't have black hair anymore. It is blonde, red, and has some dark hair mingled in too. It's very cool looking.
But we were at it for 3.5 hours and I was so tired when we finished that I had to go to bed soon after.

But on Comedy Central, we saw a funny new show-- The Graham Norton Effect. It was so funny, I was laughing so hard Dereck thought I might vomit all over the couch. I don't laugh at Monty Python, but this had me screaming.

I will miss Liza at the gym today. But I am going. I am starting actually to like my arms! Free weights are a good thing.

People are in such a tizzy of excitement about this wedding. My friend Angela in St. Louis got a spray on tan. Karl arranged for massages for the wedding couple yesterday. We are all caravaning down to St. Louis-- Rachel from Des Moines. Dereck and I are taking Bob. Priscilla is taking Linda. Ruthann is coming down from Columbia. Becky will be there. Jason and his new family. All of these people you don't know, but once upon a time all of us, all of us, used to hang out at the Dukum together when we were in grad school and we were all very poor and the Dukum was a stinking hole in the ground kind of bar that we all loved so much more than the beautiful bar it is now.

And these people are just so great. They were my absolute soul when I was first going through my divorce. Dan and Yumi answered my urgent messages-- Dan calling me at 2:00 a.m. because he was so freaked out by them-- and Dan helped me move boxes in subzero temperatures, and told me to call Claire to borrow her truck. Claire whom I had never met. Yumi watched the kids for us while we moved, and then took care of the younger two when I went back to the house that fateful night to get Sam...

At one point that year, Yumi broke up with Dan, so I insisted on going over to Dan's small apartment (which is now right kitty corner from my house) when he refused to come over to our small house for dinner, and I sat with him when he put his hands into his face and cried.

Dereck and I took them to Ohio and helped them house hunt when Dan got accepted to OU. Yumi bought my old car.

There is so much history with all of these people. This weekend is more than just a wedding.

It is a family reunion.