Monkling's Blog

As in Mother of the Bride. It has happened. Theresa was showing me mother of the bride dresses. It has convinced me of two thing: 1) I must lose weight. I refuse to be a chunky MOB. And 2) I am not looking forward to dress shopping.

Fine. I never enjoy shopping for clothing, especially dresses. Actually I think shoe shopping may be even worse but the dress thing is a close second. Trying things on, taking them off, trying other things on… It’s just tiresome. Even more tiresome is not finding something that is comfortable and looks decent.

Uh, oh. Which reminds me – I have a bridal shower to attend in a few days. I’m pretty sure I don’t have any shoes that are comfortable. You see, I have fat feet. Seriously wide. Have you ever noticed women’s shoes are made for people whose feet are pointy? Since my feet are not shaped like an elf’s, this is a problem. I guess as long as I can manage to walk from the car to the table, I’ll be okay. Yep, the plan calls for a minimum amount of actual walking in order to survive.

As far as Theresa’s wedding goes, I do have an entire year to find comfortable shoes. I may be able to handle that.

Today I attended my first (and hopefully last) bridal expo. It was a little odd seeing my name listed followed by, “Mother of the bride.” If that sparkling engagement ring didn’t make reality sink in, that certainly did.

I was in charge of carrying around the tote bag that was being filled with goodies, business cards and brochures while the happy couple talked to DJs, photographers, florists & limo companies.

This is their wedding so I don’t plan on giving my opinion on anything, although I did have to comment on one booth we passed. “Oh, look – a priestess!” I’m pretty sure I rolled my eyes while saying that. These women were asking everyone if they needed someone to officiate at their wedding. They had a banner saying something about ancient religions. I think they were witches.

Another booth I found a bit strange seeing at a bridal expo was a dental booth advertising those invisible braces. I couldn’t help but to start looking around for the Botox booth and the liposuction salespeople.

The place was hot, crowded and loud but I did like the goodies. We got little things of shampoo, pens, a t-shirt, and lip balm. Maybe I need to find a Mother of the Bride expo…

My daughter is engaged.

More tomorrow…

Five years ago I wrote about Pew Whispers. This afternoon while attending the Good Friday service at the seminary, there was a different type of pew whisperer. This guy was not whispering his prayers. Nor was he particularly old.

Sitting in back of me was a man who was following along with the service using a little book. He read aloud every single word of the service. I think he started in with the first reading, perhaps thinking he needed to help the seminarian who was doing the reading. Then he just got carried away and had to help every priest and seminarian there.

Maybe he thought if he messed up, they would mess up. Maybe he thought they might lose their place so then he’d be able to jump up and stand in for them. The only part he was quiet for was the homily. I’m pretty certain if he had been able to sneak into the priest’s room and steal a copy of that, he’d have read the homily, as well.

You will be happy to know I stifled the urge to rip the book out of his hands.

How do you think this place would be for….oh, let’s say a wedding.

And what about the view?!

Pretty nice, eh?

But nobody’s home. Come on. I had to say that, even if it’s not true.

One no longer has to carry a lantern into the downstairs bathroom. The dryer, however, still refuses to work. It will, of course suddenly work when I get a repairman back here.

I have a plan, though. I am going to trick it. I will attempt to do a load of laundry but there will be a secret video camera set up. When it doesn’t work, I’ll have it all on tape. Then when it decides to pull its trick for the repairman, I will have proof of its treachery.

Yeah, I’m gonna outsmart that dryer!

We need just one more thing to go wrong with the house to strike out. With Easter coming up and the family coming over, I’m thinking odds are we’ll see that third thing.

Last night, I realized the clothes were taking an incredibly long time to dry. We also noticed a weird noise coming from it. Sure enough, the dryer wasn’t getting hot. Since I have a lot to do this week, I was not looking forward to having to call in a repairman. Yet, what choice did I have but to sit around today waiting for him to arrive?

When he did arrive, he spent 20 or 30 minutes down in the basement with my dryer. I spent the time down there with him. The dryer refused to perform its trick of not working. Nope, it worked perfectly. The repairman was quite apologetic because he would have to charge me. He really tried hard to find something wrong with it. Nothing. Zilch. It worked fine.

After he left, I did a load of laundry. It was, as a matter of fact, a desperately needed load. I had run out of socks. When they were washed, I put them into the dryer and turned it on. I waited to make sure it got hot. Satisfied that it was running properly, off I went to do other stuff. An hour later, I checked on the clothes. Damp and cold. All my attempts to get the dryer to work were in vain. I ended up hanging everything. Luckily I didn’t wash any jeans. Those things take about a week to dry.

Frank arrived home from work with a theory. We had been having a sporadic electrical issue. One line of lights flickered. Of course we had called in an electrician a few months back. He found nothing. He suggested we contact our utility company, who also found nothing. Since they worked more often than not, we lived with it. Frank’s theory was that the electric issue was affecting the dryer.

Armed with a flashlight, I went down the basement to see if I could discover whether or not the dryer was on the same line as the flickering lights. I threw the breaker. Lights went off but the dryer did not. There goes that theory. Obviously wrong. I put the breaker back on. It made sizzling noises. I’m pretty sure it’s not supposed to do that.

Currently we are now without lights in half the downstairs as well as without a dryer. It’s gonna be a long week.

That phrase popped into my head. It seems that, despite my thinking it was quite original, it’s been used before. As I was trudging up the stairs with a basket of laundry, it suddenly occurred to me how average I am. Back in school, I was pretty much a straight C student. If someone were to come along and grade my life right now, I’m thinking I probably would still get straight Cs. Let’s do a little checklist, shall we?

Housekeeping? Definitely C. The house isn’t a roach infested dump so I certainly won’t fail in Housekeeping 101 but it’s not exactly sparkling clean. (Please don’t anyone look under my bed, the couch or open a closet door!)

Home Decor – C. I’m thinking this place is about as plain as could be. An interior decorator would have a field day.

Fashion – C. The only reason I wouldn’t get a D is because at least my clothes are clean and usually not ripped. And I do, at least match. I know not to wear orange pants and a neon pink blouse.

Artistic Abilities – Not sure we can assign a grade here. I have no musical abilities and I can’t draw. I think there was some sort of genetic mutation applied to my children since they are quite gifted.

Writing – C. After having a blog for 5 years and writing faithfully every single day for 3 months now, my readership has not budged. I get a lot of hits when people are searching for specific things but my writing isn’t intriguing enough to get them to stay. Clearly this is just an average blog. Statistics don’t lie.

Programming – C. Don’t even get me started on why.

Cooking – B. Okay, my first above average mark. I don’t think I’m a great cook but I think I do a decent job.

And there you have it. I believe I have confirmed that I am extremely good at being average. Does that mean I settle for mediocrity? Most definitely not. It just seems like maybe I’m a little too short to reach any higher. It’s like that box on the top shelf – I can see it but I just can’t reach it.