Author: Average Jane

This weekend was marked by triumphs both great and small.

I started out on Saturday morning by sorting a year’s worth of junk mail and six months’ worth of glass bottles and jars, and taking all of it to the recycling center. They were having a special shredding event, so it saved me hours and hours of shredding my own junk mail. It was a lot of fun to lob the bottles one by one into the dumpster and hear them shatter. I recommend taking your glass to the recycling center any time you feel the need for a little anger management.

On Sunday I walked the half marathon. I prepared as best I could, with special socks, a bag that held two water bottles, and new capri pants that I’m sure I’ll use later for yoga class. Once I cut the tags out of the pants to make sure they wouldn’t start bugging me during the 13.5 mile walk, I thought I had it all planned out.

It turned out that the injury I didn’t anticipate was caused by the seams in the sleeves of my t-shirt. They rubbed the undersides of both arms absolutely raw and there was nothing I could do about it, short of removing my t-shirt and exposing my pale, sports bra-clad flab to the world. I chose to suffer instead.

The walk went quite well and although I’m sure my legs will be stiff tomorrow (my knees are pretty stiff now), I handled it better than I had expected. Admittedly, I was pretty quiet for the last few miles and I wasn’t inclined to hurry to catch up when I got left behind at the final stoplight. Still, it’s nice to know that I’m capable of walking that far, even if I never do so again.

At band practice we auditioned a guy who used to play in a band with my mom probably 18 years ago. It went quite well, we’re all exactly in agreement about what we want from the band, and he can even help us book gigs. [Clouds part, sun shines, chorus of voices swells.] He’s the guy!

Look for gigs to be announced soon. I think we’re finally on track to start playing out within a month or less. Hooray!

So how was your weekend?

I know you’re all waiting with bated breath to see how the minor civic and domestic issues I mentioned earlier this week have been resolved. In brief:

Neighborhood Parking
All of the neighbors gathered on Monday evening to find out the results of the parking survey. Everyone said that they don’t want the entire street to have restricted parking; however, they wished that the guy on the corner would stop parking so close to the intersection. City officials plan to start by asking him nicely and proceed to put up "No Parking" signs on his block if that doesn’t help. My husband and I were the youngest people at the meeting by at least 15 years in his case, 25 in mine.

Drooping Cable
Believe it or not, I actually got an e-mail back from Time-Warner Cable. It said to call the same number I’d called yesterday. D’oh! However, I pressed a few dishonest menu keys and managed to make my way to an actual person. They’re not coming out until next week to fix the problem, but it’s not that big of a deal.

Band Auditions
Yesterday we auditioned a keyboard player (who basically talked his way into an audition, as we weren’t actually looking for a keyboardist), and another lead guitarist. It was kind of nice to have keyboards to fill in the sound on certain songs, but I’m not convinced that it’s worth dividing our paltry earnings by 6 rather than 5. The guitarist impressed us by – gasp! – actually having learned the songs he told us he wanted to play. His tone was a little Dokken-y on everything, but perhaps that’s fixable. No decisions have been made yet.

Aren’t you glad for that thrilling report? I think I need to work on having more interesting adventures.

So how’s your week going?

It might be spring, it might just be my mood, but this week feels like a great time for me to address things I’ve been procrastinating about. In the past few days, I’ve canceled my old cell phone, written a press release for my community service organization, renewed my magazine subscriptions, and paid all my bills.

All I had left on my list was a call to Time-Warner Cable to let them know that their cable that leads to my house has come loose from the pole and is sagging uncomfortably close to my driveway. It’s low enough that I could probably hop up and touch it.

You’d think it would be a simple matter to call them up and speak to someone. Ha! Hahaha! Instead, it’s Voicemail Hell. I went through the menu over and over, entering my phone number four or five times. Once I was given the tantalizing option of speaking to a customer service representative, but when I selected it the system swung me back into the menu loop and never offered that option again.

I finally sent an e-mail. I’m not holding my breath until I receive a reply.

Cooking played a fairly significant role in my weekend. I made cheesecake and Asian cabbage salad for a dinner with friends on Sunday. I also prepared a batch of pickled jalapeños that I can’t wait to try tonight.

On Saturday, my husband and I met up with some bloggers to see "Iron Man," which was AWESOME! I think XO’s review says it all.

Tonight we’re going to a meeting at City Hall to discuss parking on our street. Apparently someone’s been complaining. The city sent out a survey and now we’re having a meeting to decide if our street should be bedecked with No Parking signs. As my husband and I are on the "Hell, no!" side of the issue, we are very keen to go to the meeting and make sure that we’re not going to have a daily hassle on our hands where studio clients and friends who overflow the driveway suddenly have nowhere else to park.

So that’s my exciting weekend and Monday night. How’d your weekend go?

A couple of nights ago, I was interviewed via Google Chat by Logtar as part of his project to interview all of the bloggers he knows.

It was fairly late, so I didn’t get back to him with all of the links I should have. In case anyone’s curious, the orchid-growing blogger in Iowa that I mention is Blondie.

Oh, and here’s the American Copywriter blog. I’m kind of glad I re-read that part or I might have forgotten that today is Coffee Morning. Incidentally, Coffee Morning is now organized via a Facebook group and not on that blog.

The dinner meetup mentioned at the end of the post was great. I’d never had Colombian food before, but my arroz con pollo with fried plantains was delicious, as was the empanada I had as an appetizer.

As you can probably tell by my stilted writing this morning, I’m tired, brain-fried and thankful that it’s Friday. I have a Mother’s Day post in the hopper for ACORN’s I Remember Mama Voting project. Until then, have a speedy Friday and a restful weekend.

On Saturday, we met up with another couple and spent an exhausting day at the flea markets in White Cloud and Sparks, Kansas. (Seriously, click the link. It’s the web page equivalent of the flea market itself.) We had fresh-squeezed lemonade and gyros, but forewent the Indian tacos and funnel cakes. Naturally, we bought an enormous bag of kettle corn on the way out.

Here are a few of the treasures we chose not to purchase:

This figurine gave me the creeps, so I had to take a photo. Don’t look too long – she might steal your soul.

Here’s my husband and my friend, Robert, posing with a mannequin that I was really tempted to buy, but not for $125. The mannequin was disturbingly thin, with visible collar bones, ribs and vertebrae. If I’d taken her home, I’d have bought a box of Twinkies for her to hold on her lap with her one arm.

Do you ever think to yourself, "Boy, I wish I’d bought some collectible pins from the movie, ‘Dick Tracy,’ back in 1990!" Well, at White Cloud they had a whole box full of them.

By the end of the day, I had a killer headache. I think it had a lot to do with the amount of mold I was exposed to throughout the day. Cool vintage wallpaper, though.

More antique doll creepiness. I should have taken a photo of the entire doll because her arms, legs and body were weirdly elongated. You could picture her creeping up on you while you slept and strangling you with her long limbs.

This is the one thing I did buy: an interesting old hat. Once I remove the daisies, I think it’ll make a cool stage hat, despite the fact that it’s a bit too small for me.

Once we got back into town, we had a huge dinner and beers at Granite City Brewery. I was so beat that I was asleep by 9:45 p.m. It was a blast, though, and I’m sure we’ll go again next year. You should come with us!