Things that annoy me

I seem to be in a bad mood today so I feel the need to channel it. Here is a list of things that annoy me.

In no particular order

1. Businesses that change the spelling of words - Kwikee-mart, Sav Moor, Karl's Kar Wash. Uummm, don't patronize me with the wrong spelling of a name. I feel stupid signing a check for Kathy's Kute Kountry Kwilt Store or whatever...not that I quilt or anything.....

2. Customer hotlines that never take you to an actual person. "Press 1 to hear your account balance, 2 to make a payment, 3 to change your service,.....79 to have us come to your house and hit you over the head with a hammer..... Are we, the customer, such a nuisance to that businesses can't even speak to us in person?

3. The McDonald's Southern Chicken sandwich. What the hell? It's a stupid chicken breast with pickles! What's with all the advertising?

4. These new bands with stupid names like - Panic at the Disco and Gym Class Heroes. I'm still trying to figure out what a Red Jumpsuit Apparatus is (yes, that's an actual band name). What ever happened to classic band names like Wham! or Flock or Seagulls? Hmmm, ok, bad examples. Mr. Mister? Jethro Tull? ABBA? Damnit!

Found this link. Hilarious. Band Name Generator

5. Chris Berman. Now that we are deep into Football season,I have to listen to Chris Berman "Whoop!" and pun his way through Sports Center every week. Why does a grown man purposely make those noises?

6. Skinny jeans. I tried on my first pair the other day and realized that the trick to looking good in skinny jeans is actually being skinny.

7. AIG, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and Wall Street in general. The fact that the executives from these companies receive billions upon billions of dollars of OUR tax money and still have the balls to attend luxury spas and conferences makes me sick. Did you know that it is estimated that 6.7 BILLION dollars will still go towards year end bonuses for the executives of these companies? For what?!?! Good job on running your company into the ground - here's $600,00.

8. NPR. Not so much for it's content, but for the radio personalities voices. Someone over there must puposely make everyone talk in a low, bass-y, calm voice. Reminds me of the Saturday Night Live's NPR girls. Make sure you watch it for a laugh.

9. Email forwards that aren't funny. One of the funniest forwards I ever got was a link to this website: Crappy Children's Art. Warning: Lot's of swear words and will be offensive to people who truly think their kids art is genius.

10. Poor Hospitality. It's an epidemic. Everywhere I go, I get crappy service. Retail workers are always on the defensive. The 16 year old EMO kid McDonalds just hired could care less if I asked for no onion on my burger. It's almost too frustrating to think about. Maybe it's just me....

How big of a bummer am I today?

Dan - Did you remember our anniversary?

Dear Dan,
3 years ago today was the happiest day of your life. You entered into the sacred bonds of marriage with me! I love you more today than yesterday....but not half as much as tomorrow. Hmmmmm, that sounds familiar. In all seriousness, there is no one I'd rather spend forever with. I love you!
Cat

OK - now because it's my blog, I get to re-live my wedding day. You are listening to our wedding music. "By Your Side" was our wedding song and "In Your Eyes" is our unofficial song. Corny huh? (the rest of the music is just some of my playlist I didn't want to erase)

Our wedding was, as the kids say now a days, off the chain! To this day, people still refer to it as the best party they've ever been to. Dan and I broke the halls record for biggest bar bill (as far as I know the record still stands). As career restaurant people, we had a reputation to uphold.
Somewhere in there, we managed to get married in full Catholic ceremony. The priest who has given me 5 out of the 6 sacraments I have recieved (for those Catholics out there who are counting, I almost died at birth and was given the anointing of the sick) married Dan and I on October 8th, 2005.

Let's take it from the top shall we?

My maid of honor & sister and I. This is exactly why people wear make-up to weddings. If I were famous, I would end up on the cover of Star magazine with the headline "Stars with out make-up: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly". You figure out where I would fall.

I loved my hair! I didn't want a tight, sprayed, updo. It was based off Emmy Rossum's Oscar hair in 2005. Luckily, I look exactly like her so it wasn't too hard to pull off! Haha!
I was really, really, really, nervous. It suddenly hit me that everyone was going to be looking at me. So I started drinking. Early. Pink champagne at 10:00am! After my dad walked me down the aisle, the first thing I said to Dan was "I'm kinda buzzed!" I hope the priest didn't hear me.
Dan, his dad and his brother Andy
My flower girls were my cousin Chloe, my nieces Alexis and Courtney.
My sis and I
Check out the smackaroo Dan laid on me. Check out the disapproving look from the priest!
After the ceremony was over, I immediately gained 5 lbs while recessing from the church.
Yay! No more leg shaving! Families merging
I seriously had the hottest bridesmaids! Friend Danille, sister-in-law Linda, Me, sister Anne, best friend Margo.
The guys weren't to shabby either

The phallic white tubes that people are holding were our wedding favors. They were thundersticks with our names & wedding date on them. When we were announced at the reception everyone beat them together while "Thunderstruck" by AC/DC played. It was awesome.
Our photog, managed to get some beautiful sunset shots. It's not a backdrop! At some point the DJ handed me a microphone. Big mistake. I rambled on about love and life and blah, blah, blah. Something to the effect of "I don't care who you love, just as long as you have love...". Totally embarrassing.
My wedding day was also my grandmothers 80th birthday. Instead of tossing the bouquet, I gave it to my grandmother. She and my granfather had been married for over 60 years. You could still tell how crazy they were about each other.
First dance to "By your side"
After an emotional daddy daughter dance. My dad, my sister and I shared a moment.
So there it is in a nutshell. It was a fun, emotional day. Regardless however of how wonderful the wedding is, it's the marriage that was the most important thing.

No one said it was easy....

A glipse into my marriage:

The Rachel Zoe Project. I wish this show annoyed me. It's more reality TV about a non-famous person who doesn't have a real job, and I'm hooked!!! Dan is about to walk out on me because of this show. Here's our conversation:

Dan: Who's she?
Me: Rachel Zoe, a celebrity stylist.
Dan: Does she make those dresses?
Me: No
Dan: Does she design those dresses?
Me: No
Dan: So she just goes to the store and buys clothes for people?
Me: Well, actually most of the time, the designers send the dresses to her.

Dan: All she does is unpack boxes full of clothes.

Me: Uuuhhh...well...she has someone to do that for her.
Dan (with a mixture of disgust and bewilderment on his face) : And she has her own show? You sit here and watch an assistant unpack boxes for an hour?

Me: Two, Dan. She has two assistants.

Dan: How can you watch this crap?
Me: You're talking to the same girl who watched a marathon of "Bachelorettes in Alaska". Bad reality TV is kinda my thing.
Dan: I'm divorcing you.
Me: No one said marriage was easy.

Why do I suck?

This blog melancholy, writers block thing has a total stranglehold on me. I don't know what it is. The only thing I can think of to write about is how I can't think of anything to write!!! Booooorrring....

If I can offer a few excuses, I have come up with the following theories...
1. I haven't fell that I'm particualarly interesting lately.
2. I am deveoping carpal tunnel syndrom and it hurts to type (this is true, how old am i?!)
3. I have been working a lot lately and only want to veg out when I get home.
4. Owen is starting the terrible twos and has sapped my energy to write good things about him!
5. I suck.
Like Tonya, I'm a little overwhelmed with all the blogs so even though I read them, I don't always post. Even if I happen to go a few days without reading them - my mother is always good for a rundown of the happenings!
I'm sure I'll be back soon - but for now, I consider me on a mini blog vacation!

I love all my fellow bloggers!

Congrats Doug! / The Dress Mess

Congratulations to my buddy Doug who got married last weekend! Doug is one of my best friends from high school and we've managed to remain friends for the 12 years since high school. God! 12 years. That's almost painful to say. Almost as painful as it was to pluck the grey hairs out of my head this morning. I'm not really sure how long I've been grey. It's only been recently that I've been unable to afford quarterly dye jobs at the salon. On the bright side, I figured out what my natural color is! But I digress....

The wedding was a blast! Definitely one of the best I've been to since...well, my wedding (which, by the way, is an entire post in itself)! Ending up in a hotel room playing drinking games until 3 in the morning is a good night. Ending up in a hotel room playing drinking games until 3 in the morning with your friends that you haven't seen in a while - is a great night! Congratulations Doug and Heidi! You pulled off one hell of a party. Oh yeah...congrats on that whole lifelong spiritual binding thing too!

High School buddies
The gorgeous bride Heidi
The groom and my friend Doug
My gorgeous husband Dan
My other best friend from high school Matt.
Doug, Matt and I have taken this same picture a few times. One at each of our weddings and one at graduation. I can't find any of the other ones!

So we've established that the wedding was off the hook (isn't that what the kids are saying these days?). What we haven't talked about is the nightmare that preparing for the wedding became. Notice the dress I was wearing? Cute huh? It was the dress that almost wasn't (easy boys).

Since Owen was born, I've only been to a handful of events that have required dressing up and I've somehow managed to find an acceptable outfit for them all. For this wedding I had to buy a new dress. None of my pre-baby dresses fit appropriately. Notice I said " didn't fit appropriately" not "didn't fit". I was able to squeeze the dresses over my child-bearing hips and I was able to zip them up. The final result? Think Britney Spears meets Paula Abdul's wardrobe. It was all kinda bulgy and too tight, out of date and just plain inappropriate. It seemed like a no brainer to get a new dress.

Nobody told me, however, that there are no good dresses out there. Even worse, the ones, I would have settled for were not in my size! I went to my staple dress stores: Macy's, JC Penney's, Neimen Marcus (outlet, of course), Marshall's, Jones NY, Ann Taylor. Nothing. Then I venured beyond the safehouses to the Dress Barn, Burlington Coat Factory, TJ Max, New York and CO, Express, Sears, Liz Claiborne, Group USA...anwhere that I thought may sell a dress, I went to. I must have tried on over 100 dresses and was not tempted to buy one of them. Finally, as I'm walking through the mall in tears on the phone with my husband after a 5 hour shopping failure, I see...wait for it....Forever 21. If you are unfamiliar with the store, just revisit the title. Forever 21. Something I thought I wanted to be once, but now conjures images of strobe lights and Apple Pucker. Anyway, I thought "What the hell?". As a last ditch effort, I will see what's going on in the land of early 20's fashion. If you haven't guessed already, by god, I found a dress. From Forever 21. And it fit! I did make a mental note to tell everyone it was an Evan Picone but I suppose I just blew that huh?

OK, so I've got the dress handled the night before the event, now I just need - a tan. I used to go tanning year round before I worried about wrinkles and cancer. OK that's a lie. The only reason I stopped tanning is because I can't find the time anymore, otherwise, I'd be all over it (I look skinnier when I'm tan). Anyway, the day of the wedding, I decide to pick up a self tanner that seemed good. I get it home and realize that it's a lotion that builds a tan over a few days time.
"Oh crap!", I think, "I don't have a few days, I have a few hours!".
So I come up with an idea. I will just apply the lotion 3 times to achieve the tan I would have in 3 days! Brilliant right?! My body won't know the difference, the color will develop in a few hours and I'll bronzed and beautiful by the time they say their I do's. Uuummmm....That's not exactly what happened.
What happened was that over the course of the wedding I ended up 3 distincly different colors. To prove my point, please reference exhibit A


To make things worse. When color started to develop, so did the streaks and all the spots I missed. I had this orange crap all over my hands, and let me tell ya, it was like glue. I looked like a poor mans version of Donatella Versace.
If you are laughing hysterically at me right now, don't worry, I'm not offended. I find it kind of funny myself. There is no real point to this story other than to humiliate myself so enjoy my suffering!

Why am I drinking cheap beer?

"Because it numbs the pain." is not the correct answer. My reasons for drinking will be detailed in another post, but for now the issue is not the drinking itself, but the quality of which I drink. Let me provide you with a little background.

Before I had Owen (BO, as i like to call it), I was working on my 9th year at the Palace of Auburn Hills. As a manager, I had a few areas of responsibility but most of my tenure was spent as the Backstage Catering Coordinator. I loved my job and yes, it was as cool as it sounds. The Restaurant Management Group became my family (literally, I met and married Dan while employed there!) and I actually looked forward to going to work everyday. Ok, not EVERYday, but the vast majority of them.
The day before my devastating ultrasound was inadvertently my last day at the Palace. I started my maternity leave and found another job at the end of my 3 months. The decision not to return to the Palace was one of the hardest of my life. They were so wonderful to us during Owen's "scary time" giving Dan ample time off and sending well wishes everyday. However, the fact of the matter was, that I couldn't continue to work the hours and raise Owen. At least both of us couldn't. We were an event based business which meant nights, weekends, 12 hour days. All non-issues when we were a carefree childless couple. When was offered a 9 to 5 position (the holy grail of jobs in the restaurant business) as the business manager of an Irish Pub, I had to take it.

Flash forward to one year later. I am unhappy with my current situation and have come to the realization that the 9 to 5 life isn't a trade off for loving your job. So I quit. No back up. No money saved. Michigan economy. YIKES!!
Luckily, I had the good sense to go crawling back to the Palace begging for mercy. Ok, it wasn't quite that bad. When I originally left, my boss told me that I was welcome back if it didn't work out. Much to their credit they kept their promise!

So here's the current situation. I am back on a part-time basis working events in the backstage catering coordinator capacity. Time-wise it's the perfect scenario. I am at a job I love, but don't have the crazy hours of a full time manager. Pocketbook wise - holy crap! Loosing half of my salary is one hell of an adjustment for my family.
Let me make this very clear. Dan and I are not wealthy people by any means but in our younger days we always found money for the "extras". Vacations, nice dinners with wine by the bottle (ok bottles plural if we are being honest) and a new wardrobe - for me of course - at least twice a year. Jeeze, just writing that depleted our bank account a little! Even after Owen was born, the occasional purse party splurge (don't rat me out to the Feds!) wouldn't put us in the poorhouse. Those days are a thing of the past. I don't normally like to talk about money, but my new part-time status isn't just about the money, it's about a lifestyle change.

In a way, it's been good. Dan and I have really been able to weed out the extras and figure out what we truly need to survive. And yes, if you are working it out in your head, that includes beer. Just cheaper beer. Hell, if we can live like this when we are back in the clear, we might actually be able to...possibly...maybe...SAVE!
In another way, it hasn't been good. You try breaking an addiction as powerful as my US Weekly addiction! I die a little bit every time I go through a grocery store checkout line.
All in all though, it's about Owen. I've learned that a 79 cent pack of markers can provide endless enjoyment - minus incidentals like repainting and bathing. We have agreed that if at any point we struggle to provide for Owen, it's monster.com for me. Until then, I'll just keep enjoying my nightly Busch Light.

A Pictoral Tribute to Past Good Times (which are now over)

Fun at a bar

Fun at a wedding

Fun with friends out to dinner (that's Dan's twin in the green)

Fun at dinner (look at all the wine!)

Fun with the girls