I went out at noon today specifically to clean some junk out of my car and take a little drive--I didn't have time to take a proper lunch break, but I was going to be driving one of my bosses to an afternoon meeting, and I didn't want him to be sitting in a landfill site of empty Starbucks cups and gas station receipts. So I drove to Chapters so that I could dump my garbage in a classy parking lot trash can, versus getting ogled by the clowns at Esso or some such nonsense.

Aaanyway, I gathered up my armload of garbage, grabbed my keys in my mouth and made my way across the parking lot to the trash can outside of the store. I dumped everything and headed back to the car. Keep in mind I was out of the car for a grand total of 40 seconds max, so I figured I was safe to keep the car unlocked.

OH NO. Not the case. This middle-aged dude is opening the door and getting into my car!?

"Uhhh, THAT'S MY CAR," I yelled at him making what I hoped was the bitchiest face possible and marched right over there, ready to yank him out, never mind that he may be a robber, be packing heat, etc. This could have easily been a cap-in-my-ass situation.

"Oh, woops," he says, getting out. "Well, where's my car then?"

"I have NO IDEA," I huffed at him.

"Sorry. I wasn't trying to steal your car," he said, all indignant-like as he walked away.

So as I'm leaving the parking lot I see him getting into what I presume (but who knows??) is his car. It was a Toyota Camry. I drive a Mazda 3. Similar, not identical, in colour.

How do you mistake this




for this?



Potential car thief? Day-drunk book enthusiast? Most forgetful man on the planet ("shit, what does my car look like? Who am I?") Criminal or not, this guy should have been arrested for being stupid.

Waking up on Monday morning was next to impossible, and coming back to work after the weekend, I definitely didn't feel refresh or rejuvenated...quite the opposite, in fact. I couldn't stop yawning and if I closed my eyes for 30 seconds, I know I'd be passed out for hours. What should have been a relaxing weekend, with plenty of time to recharge and unwind from the work week, ended up being just as rushed and busy as Monday-Friday, if not more so.

For me, this is pretty much the norm. I find it so hard to slow down on the weekends and I end up cramming Saturday and Sunday way too full of all the things I didn't have time, or didn't bother, to do during the week. Instead of being two days of rest and fun, they end up being two days of work, running around, to-do listing - basically everything I do during the week - plus fun forced in wherever I can. Oh, hi fun! There you are, squished between the car wash and the grocery store! By bedtime on Sunday I'm ready for a weekend from my weekend but it's time to set the alarm for 6 AM and get back to the grind.

So on Sunday, when I had a whopping 45 minutes in between making a run to the hardware store and going to softball to sit in the yard with a magazine, I came across this article in Women's Health about taking back weekends - actually taking Saturday and Sunday to chill out, unwind, recharge the ol' batteries and get rested. The article has a lot of great advice that I will be taking.

The first thing I'm going to try is following the "rule of threes". The idea is that you plan out only three activities each weekend and keep the rest of the weekend free and unstructured. This is probably going to be the hardest thing for me, because I make lists of the lists I have to make. Does that even make sense?

Other tips it suggests are planning your next weekend by the end of the weekend before and doing one extra chore on Friday evening, when you're still in work mode.

I think it all sounds good in theory. In practice, I don't know if I'm going to be able to let go. According to Women's Health, women are working an average of nine extra hours each week, which is nine fewer hours for getting stuff done around the house, running errands, working out, relaxing... But it's something I think is definitely worth trying.

So next weekend, my three plans are to go to the exhibition Friday night, a bachelorette party on Saturday night, and playing softball at 4:00 on Sunday. I have a gazillion other things I want to do (and will probably end up doing) this weekend...working on the house, puttering in the yard, doing a couple runs, and hopefully camping Friday night. But I'm going to try to just go with the flow and not schedule any of that other stuff, and I'll focus on getting as many chores and errands knocked off during the week as I can, instead of pushing everything off to Saturday and Sunday.

Do you relax on your weekends, or are they just extensions of the work week?

When Peter called me mid-afternoon, I was happy and a little surprised to see his number pop up on the office phone display, since we aren't in the habit of calling one another at work. I was expecting him to be making plans for supper or sharing some juicy gossipy tidbit that just couldn't wait until after 5:00 (which we all know are the best ones. Gossip that can wait for hours to share is probably not worth it.)

"Did you leave any windows open in the basement?" was what he asked. Almost before I had a chance to say "No," he told me the security company had called his cell to let him know our alarm was going off and there was motion detected in the basement.

I instantly felt like barfing all over my desk as a movie reel of worst-case scenarios played in my head. We've been in the house for just one month and while our neighbourhood seems pretty safe and quiet, there are break-ins all over the city all the time and I've heard horror stories from friends whose homes and cars have been ransacked in spite of elaborate alarms, dogs, you name it.

There's something about a stranger being up in my business that makes my blood boil. Regardless of whether they steal anything or not, just the fact that they'd break a window or pick a lock or whatever robbers are doing these days, and be in my house when I'm not there, that is maybe the most infuriating thing of all. I don't even like the idea of someone being in our yard without an invitation. Maybe it makes me crazy territorial, but there's a fence around our backyard, and I like it. I like knowing, assuming, that when we leave for work every morning, our home and our property will be undisturbed until we get back. Hearing otherwise completely freaked me out.

Peter hung up to call back the security company and have the police go out to the house to check on things, and I tried to concentrate on work but all I could think about was the mess of broken glass on the floor, the things that could possibly be missing, the mess we'd have to deal with when we got home. I knew the windows had been closed and the doors had been locked. We're nothing if not obsessive-compulsive about locking up.

Then I tried to be positive and think of all the things that could have fallen over in the house to activate the alarm. But things don't just fall over midday...do they?

By the time Peter called back I had worked myself up into a state of near-hysterics. The police had been over and walked around the house, and all the windows were locked, the doors were secure, and nothing was amiss. HUGE sigh of relief.

But then I started thinking about all the other things that could set off a motion detector.







Needless to say, when I got home after work, I was still pretty freaked out and half expecting an episode of Animal Planet to trample me as soon as I opened the door, but there were no signs of wildlife to be found. We have this tipsy globe in the office and we're blaming that for the movement. Our first, and hopefully last, call from the alarm folks is behind us and I'm not anxious to receive another one. And if there IS a mouse in the house, I will die.

(Note: There may or may not be Inception spoilers in this post. I'm not sure because I slept through a bunch of the movie. I don't think I'm giving away any crazy details but just in case, you've been warned!)

Le Hub and I went to see Inception on the weekend. Let me preface that statement by saying that everyone and their moms has been telling me for weeks how awesome Inception is and how everyone needs to see it. I was told it was mind boggling, earth shattering, and will make you question your reality. In fact, one acquaintance who shall remain anonymous told me it was so good he and his ladyfriend saw it twice in two days. "But you won't like it," he added confidently.

O RLY? I thought indignantly. Yeah, I'm sure I'm the only person on Planet Earth who won't like the BEST! MOVIE! EVER! I'm completely down with being mind boggled. So, not knowing any backstory whatsoever on the movie, I went in feeling fully confident I was going to leave the theatre a changed gal.

The verdict? I didn't like the movie. I can't believe the anonymous acquaintance was right. I actually fell asleep about 2/3 of the way through only to be awoken by a flash of blinding light in the form of the idiots in front of us TAKING PICTURES OF ONE ANOTHER DURING THE MOVIE. I started off intrigued, faded to moderately intrigued, then "meh", then sleeping, then angry.

I liked the cast, I like the director, I even liked the idea behind the movie. I can get behind it all. But really? You're going to go three levels deep into someone's subconscious to plant an idea and you need a team of geniuses including a CHEMIST to do it? Here's an "idea" for you. Go up to the guy and say, "Hey, I was thinking, you should think about splitting up your dad's empire." Idea planted. The movie could have been over in less than 20 seconds.

Or, I could be a right-brained, overly analytical, unimaginative fool who just doesn't appreciate good movies.

Have you seen Inception? Do you think it's worthy of all the hype? Discuss!

Last Sunday, I was at Shopper's Drug Mart pretty bright and early in the morning when I witnessed one of the most hilarious walk of shames I have ever seen.

"But Amy, how do you know it was a walk of shame?" you ask. Here's why:

1. It was 9:00AM on a Sunday and she was wearing 5-inch heels and a skintight tube dress that barely covered the coochal region
2. She had wet hair and smeary morning-after makeup which indicates a shower in some dirty dude's apartment (no hair dryer + no fresh makeup to put on)
3. She couldn't find her money in her purse at the cash register and croaked in a barely there voice, "I don't know what happened...I had money last night...huh huh!"

What makes this a prize walk of shame? She was buying a jumbo size box of tampons. I don't know about you but I can't think of a worse scenario than spending a drunken night at some greasy Lower Sackville skid's basement apartment decorated with Scarface posters and assorted bongs and waking up the next day with nothing but a hooker costume, impossible to walk in shoes, no cash AND your period and having to do the awkward shuffle to the drugstore (dude didn't even drive her). Suddenly, spending Saturday night at home with Guitar Hero and frozen pizza instead of going out and getting blitzed sounds pretty good.

Because of my iron-clad morals and 24/7 class (I'm laughing as I type this) I have never had a truly bad, honest-to-god walk of shame, the kind that involves creeping out of some creepy strange guy's bachelor pad and slinking home. But I have had to take hungover morning-after bus rides home from friends' apartments, with the reek of rum seeping from my pores, hood up to hide my greasy hair, and big sunglasses masking my raccoon eyes. I've tottered onto the bus in slutty heels carrying a sparkly clutch and wearing a borrowed sweater over my tube top at 8 in the morning and dry-heaved the whole ride home while other passengers smirked or rolled their eyes. And it's not fun.

Without further ado, here is my official guide for preventing (or at least surviving) the walk of shame:

Bring money for a cab!
That's the easiest, albeit not the cheapest, plan. That way you can at least make an exit at the end of the night without having to spend an awkward night away from home.

Pack the essentials...juuust in case.
Even if you only bring a tiny clutch on your night out, you can fit a couple of things to make yourself appear like less of a crackho in the morning. A powder compact, a little mascara and lip gloss, or even a packet of blotting papers to sop up the greasies will help. You can use a square of TP in a pinch instead of blotting papers...and if you're hooking up with a guy who doesn't even have toilet paper at his place, you deserve to go home looking like a hot mess. Don't forget a hair elastic to help deal with your next-day rat's nest.

Use his stuff.
There are some things you can swipe from a guy's medicine cabinet in a pinch. Guy's deodorant is better than no deodorant at all! And while using a random person's toothbrush is pretty revolting you can brush your teeth with your finger as long as you've got some toothpaste.

Borrow (or steal).
You can always borrow a nice comfy hoodie, cardigan, or jacket to cover up your bar attire and get home. Given the choice between looking skanky or looking sloppy, it's up to you, but borrowing a coverup is always an option.

Sunglasses are your friend!
They cover a myriad of sins. The bigger the better!

Lie.
Some nosy tool might make a dumb comment to you on the bus or train about having a "rough night" so if you have a response ready in advance, you won't stammer like a politician caught with his pants down. Just say something admirable like you spent the night in the hospital with your BFF who was giving birth, or you're on your way to a costume party and isn't the Britney resemblance just uncanny?

Check yourself.
Before you head outside take a good look at your shoes (do they match? are they even yours?), your bag, your behind, etc. to make sure there's nothing out of place. Are you wearing one ginormous chandelier earring while the other lobe is bare? Is there a McDonald's wrapper in your hair? Is your bag full of shards of a Heineken glass you stole from the bar the night before thinking it was the most hilarious thing ever? (Some of these have happened to me. I'm not going to say which ones). Even if you're scrambling to get the F out of Dodge, give yourself a thorough once-over to make sure you're decent. You never know who you'll run into, which is just another reason why having your alibi prepared is super important.

That's all I got. What about you? Have you had any horrendous walk of shame experiences? What are your tips for surviving the most embarrassing and uncomfortable of commutes home?

Summer has been more jam-packed than a movie theatre on the opening night of Eclipse so far. The overarching theme for me has been the new house, which has absolutely taken over every bit of free time, cash, and brain activity in my possession. Getting the house set up has been exhausting but really rewarding, but it also means there's been minimal time for other fun activities, like sleeping and eating meals and going to the bathroom.

Remember that time I promised I was going to just go with the flow and not cry or stomp or have fits or otherwise stress about the house? Yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah. That was kind of like my Lent promise of giving up sugary things. It lasted about half an hour. There have been a couple meltdowns since the move, but now I'm floating along semi-peacefully in a cloud of stress eating and Ativan...killer combo.

Other than adventures in homemaking, I've had a chance to do a bunch of fun stuff this summer, including:

-attended my sister's wedding
-went to a bachelorette party
-visited a navy boat
-ate my body weight in fried clams in one sitting
-went to the beach a few times
-went to the cottage and ended up at my parents' house completely FUBAR, much to their amusement
-played softball
-saw the Black Eyed Peas for free, and a little Weezer
-played tennis
-had some quality pool time
-ate barbecue and ice cream and why does summer have to be so FAT?!

There are still a lot of things I need to do within the next 43 days*:

-go to Maine/Boston for our little roadtrip
-see the Red Sox play
-visit Bath & Body Works and get some new smelly things
-go camping
-have a few more solid beach days, with sunburns and magazines and throwing of footballs
-see the buskers
-finish the bloody house and have our housewarming party
-make sangria
-have corn on the cob and watermelon
-make a sand castle
-go to a water park

*43 days...yep, there are 43 official days left of summer, so people who are saying summer is over need to take a peep at their calendars ASAP. There is still plenty of summer time left, and plenty of time to get all my summer to-dos done. Fall will be here before we know it, and we can all get back to our previously scheduled routines of Gossip Girl and wearing tights and bitching about the cold soon enough. I, for one, and going to be soaking up every little molecule of summer as long as it wants to stick around.

So how's YOUR summer going?

The first time I went on a date in a boy's car, I was 17. This particular boy--for anonymity's sake, let's call him French Christmas--had been semi-interested in me throughout high school. And why not? With my poorly shaped eyebrows and penchant for wearing socks with my Adidas slides, I was a pretty hot commodity.

Anyway, French Christmas called me one evening after my shift at McDonald's had ended to see if I wanted to see Armageddon at our local cinema the next night. I wasn't the tiniest bit romantically interested in French Christmas, but I was romantically interested in Ben Affleck, so I jumped on that pretty quick. I hadn't been on enough dates to know that you NEVER accept a date within 24 hours. That's just bad form. But let's be honest, if I'd said no, I'd have spent the evening bouncing basketballs off the side of my parent's garage while listening to Puff Daddy and waiting for the Sun-In to take effect.

"OK, I'll pick you up at 7:00," French Christmas confirmed before hanging up.

Oh snap, I thought, that's right! French Christmas has his own car. This could be a very convenient arrangement, indeed. I rubbed the palms of my hands together, and some twisted version of Dr. Seuss' "Oh The Places You'll Go" started forming in my head.

Congratulations!
Today is your day.
You've got access to a vehicle!
You're off and away!

You have a boy that likes you.
That boy has a car.
You can steer French Christmas
to places near and far.
You can go to the mall. You can go to the store.
You can make him drive you anywhere. It doesn't mean you're a whore.

Sooooo, date day rolls around. I showered away the McDonald's greasy after-smell (you ex-fast-fooders know it, the odor of grease lingers huge time after you finish a shift!) and got ready for the big date. Mom flitted around the house like some sort of ADHD butterfly. Mom loooooved French Christmas because he worked at the local Save-Easy grocery store and helped her find cupcake liners once. "That French Christmas is SO NICE! And SO POLITE AND HELPFUL!" she swooned.

"We aren't GOING OUT," I told her about a dozen times. "We're going to the movie AS FRIENDS."

7:00 sharp, French Christmas pulled up in his Chev Corsica, freshly washed. Like, he couldn't have timed it more perfectly. The clock turned over to 7:00 and he pulled in--obviously he parked down the road and waited until he was precisely on time. He didn't sit in the driveway and honk the horn either, oh no. French Christmas came straight to the front door to introduce himself and say I'd be home by 10:00. Perfect gentleman.

While we had never had any trouble talking before and had been friends for years, suddenly, making conversation with French Christmas became supremely awkward as soon as we were alone in the car. I decided to talk about guy things...cars seemed like a good topic. I pointed at a Pontiac Sunfire--the car of my dreams in Grade 11, for whatever reason, I had one later in life, and it sucked--and was all "That's the car I want! Black two-door and everything!"

French Christmas barely gave it a sideways glance. "Why would you want that? They're garbage," he said. "It's like the crappiest car you can get."

Well, um, OK. Excuuuuuse me, I didn't realize the Chevrolet Corsica was the epitome of quality automobile manufacturing. I settled into my seat, humming along with Savage Garden (!!!!) until we got to the cinema. French Christmas bought my ticket and asked if I wanted snacks. Primly I said no, because boys don't like it when girls eat in front of them.

We shuffled into the almost-empty theatre, the lights went down, and immediately I thought...oh shit. He better not try to hold my hand. I saw his mitt dangling over the armrest, dangerously close. I folded my arms and tucked my hands into my pits. Forget it, pervert. To this day I haven't been on a date where there was less chemistry.

I stared at Ben Affleck, wishing he was driving me home in the Corsica instead. Ben Affleck wouldn't come to the door like an eager beaver. He'd just lurk in the driveway. And he'd be 10 minutes late.

French Christmas drove me straight home after the movie (he offered to get us Wendy's, but again, girls don't eat or poop so I declined). I was home before 10:00, as promised. I thanked him for a nice date and leaped out of the car before he could try any more of his greasy sexual moves, ie. a hug.

A couple of days later, I heard that French Christmas was telling people that we were going out, as in, boyfriend/girlfriend. I called him and told him in no uncertain terms that one movie does not a relationship make. And that was the first and last date I ever had in the maroon Corsica.

Unfortunately, it also meant I was a pedestrian for the rest of the summer.

This post was inspired by Mama Kat's Writer's Workshop!

There are bigger, more important things for me to worry about today.

Like the fact that our kitchen still sits, unpainted, with all the light switch and power outlet covers off and I have about as much ambition to start that task as I do to become a licensed astronaut.

Or that I have copy for a client website due Friday and all I have written so far is, "About us".

Or there's the fact that I have to register my new credit card, set up a new bank account, get an oil change, and I'm about five years overdue on my lady doctor visit.

Am I worrying about any of that? Naaaaaaaaaahh... I'm sitting here stressing about what I'm going to have for dinner tonight. It's my turn to do Wine Wednesday, it's mid-afternoon and I still don't have a list of ingredients. *panic!*

Here's a little lowdown on WW. Hubby and I started it about a year ago when we realized we never ever eat dinner together. We'd come home from work at different times, root around the kitchen, and throw together whatever looked good and fast (I usually went for pre-bagged salads with handfuls of cheese; Peter's more of a three-hamburger-patties-on-the-George-Foreman-with-peanut-butter boy). Then we'd tear off in opposite directions and spend the evenings doing our own thing.

We decided it would be nice, once a week, to slow down, relax, make a nice meal (always a surprise for the other person!) and enjoy it at a bit more leisurely pace with a few bottles a glass of wine. We don't eat in front of the TV, we don't eat with our computers on our laps; we sometimes listen to music and light a couple candles. It's a really nice little mid-week date to look forward to. We take turns making the meal each week and have discovered some amazing recipes in the process as well as developed quite the taste for vino.

Anyway, we've been off schedule the past few weeks thanks to moving and wedding chaos, but this week it's my turn to make the WW meal and quite frankly I still don't know what to make and it's driving me nuts. I have MarthaStewart.com's recipe page minimized on my work computer and I keep clicking over in between doing worky tasks to shuffle through recipes in hopes that I'll find something that looks good.

Right now I'm debating between the following...

-chicken & peach quesadillas
-steak with baked sweet potatoes & green beans
-lemon pepper fish with rice & spinach

All sound pretty good, right? So WHYYYYY is it so hard to choose a dinner for two adults who aren't picky eaters. No food allergies...no fussy kids...Peter will eat whatever I put in front of him and act like it's awesome.

This is why I could never host a dinner party.

Since we moved into the house, things have changed 'round these here parts in a pretty big way. For better? For worse? I don't know. Time will tell. Let me count the ways:

We are much more responsible with money. Yesterday I went to MicMac Mall, which houses goodies such as H&M, Winners, Jacob, Gap, Aldo, Spring...shops I never pass up the chance to browse. But yesterday, I went straight to Zellers to buy barbecue tools, a clothes drying rack and some plastic Tupperware-ish containers for the new house and I didn't even venture into the rest of the mall! Practically a Christmas miracle! In fact I haven't bought any new clothes or shoes since the move which is not all that impressive since it's been two weeks which I consider very thrifty!

We're clean machines! We've always been relatively tidy but if you'd told me I'd be scrubbing baseboard trim six months ago I'd have laughed in your face. Now it's like we can't clean enough.

We're fussy. Every placement of every object requires careful deliberation. You can't just go driving holes into the walls all reckless and cockamamie-like, hooo no. You plan where pictures are going to hang. You may or may not create cutout floor plans of your rooms and furniture and rearrange them over and over before you choose where to put a chair.

We are way too up close and personal with ants. We have some tiny little pricks who are loving our kitchen counter; I'm guessing they like the sweet scent of bananas and thin buns, because that's the only food that's out on the counter. I'm not going to judge, I'd come for bananas and thin buns too. We (and by we I mean Peter because I don't DO insects) put out four ant traps in the kitchen before the weekend. Today, I haven't seen any ants yet, knock on wood. I hope those busy little hardworking assholes took a big hunk of poison right back to their nest or wherever they come from and wiped out the whole brigade. Take that, animal kingdom!

We're more environmentally friendly. We are way better at things like taking quick showers and turning off the lights when we leave a room. Okay, so it's 100% because we're trying to keep our bills down versus caring about the earth, but the motive doesn't really matter as long as the actions are right, RIGHT?