some high-class shopping

The other night, Husband and I went to a ritzy mall in Dallas called Northpark. I do not use the term 'ritzy' lightly here. This place is seriously high-end. They have stores that I am afraid to enter because the blonde, tanned, polished fembots who work there might remove me immediately for being too poor. Regardless, we walked around the mall several times so I could 'ooh' and 'ahh' at all the fancy stores and make fun of all the crazy Dallas women who shop in them. At one point, I almost went up to a women to chastise her for shopping WITH HER THIRTEEN YEAR OLD DAUGHTER in the Juicy Couture store. [Juicy Couture makes pants that have the word 'JUICY' written across the rear. 1. You should not have words on your rear. 2. You should NOT have the word 'JUICY' on your rear. 3. YOUR THIRTEEN YEAR OLD DAUGHTER SHOULD NOT HAVE 'JUICY ON HER REAR. Also, your thirteen year old daughter should be shopping at Old Navy or somewhere equally age-appropriate and reasonably priced.]

One nice thing about ritzy malls is that they have ritzy paper and stationary stores. Poor Husband in his long-suffering patience spent about twenty minutes letting me wander around one of these paper stores pointing out journals and notecards that I liked. He nearly choked over the crazy-expensive wedding invitations. Then, much to my delight, we happened upon the Baby Announcement section.

That's right. Baby Announcements. He he. Remember the last time Husband was confronted with baby paraphernalia?

"Babe! Look! Baby Announcements!"

[Grunt.]

"Awww! How cute! We are totally doing this when we have a baby!"

"Why?"

"Because we have to ANNOUNCE our baby's birth. Doesn't your baby deserve an announcement?"

"Sure. Its called Facebook."

adjusting to our new locale

Please forgive the following, which will probably sound like an excerpt from a Texas travel guide.

OMG ya'll, Dallas RULZ!

Since we've been here, I've been indulging in all the things that Dallas has to offer that I couldn't find in my previous zip code. On Friday, Husband and I geared up for our weekly Date Night, and went to eat at Gloria's, a Mexican joint that Brother Robby introduced to us when he still lived here. After we ate, Husband started looking a little sneaky, which usually means he is going to try to talk me into going shopping. I know how much he loves this bike store in Dallas, how he would rave for tens of minutes about how awesome it was when he would visit Brother Robby, so I calmly suggested that perhaps he might be willing to take me to his bike store? So, off to Richardson Bike Mart we went. I think he started to regret bringing me along when I started asking stupid questions about the bikes, along the lines of "SIX THOUSAND DOLLARS?!?! FOR A BIKE?!?! My Nissan Sentra cost less than that!!".

I know, wild and crazy party people, right? Bike store on date night? Oh, just wait my friend. Wait for it.

On our way home, we were nearly in an accident when some crazy person in our car suddenly shrieked, "WHOLE FOODS!!!!!!!! WHOLE FOODS!!!!!!! PULL OVER NOOOOOOOOOOW!". Now, because Husband has saintly patience (and, let's face it, has put up with me for this long already), instead of killing me, he simply pulled into the parking lot and got out of the car while attempting to ignore the protruding vein pulsating in his forehead.

You know you are old when you actually enjoying walking through all the aisles at Whole Foods when you're on a date.

But, I have to say, we actually thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. I'm sure we must have been hilarious to watch, two grown people cooing and laughing at vegetables and fresh herbs and the fully-stocked fish case. I was nearly drunk with joy at the sheer variety of things available. I have always been irate at hosts on the Food Network who make snarky comments about how "you can find anything at your local grocery store these days." NO, INA GARTEN, NOT IF YOU LIVE IN THE MIDWEST, YOU CANNOT. However, now I know the secret! I'm in on it! You can literally find ANYTHING you would ever want at Whole Foods. I found fish there that I'd never seen except on tv.

This was particularly exciting because I have been in a major food rut lately. I have been making the same 5 to 8 things for probably 6 months. I can't remember the last Monday we didn't eat tacos. So, I am proud to announce to the Internet that my food rut officially ended as I was standing next to the fish case at Whole Foods. I saw some beautiful sole (one of those fish I'd never seen in real life) that I decided to make for dinner and POOF! So long, food rut!

Husband could hardly contain his rejoicing.

(Birthday) Weekend Update

Friends, we made it.

We've finally landed in our first big city (a top-ten market!) where we will spend the next five years while I attempt to procure yet another tiny piece of paper. The move itself was insane, involving a 6:00 am departure, a nervous cat, and the worst customer service experience ever with a certain cable company that I shall not name on the internet because I don't want to be sued. However, you cannot truly appreciate the entire moving experience without an understanding of the Birthday Week and its role in these past few days.

Ok, in my family a considerable amount of hoopla goes into anyone's birthday. A few years ago, I described the NFL game road trip that we surprised The Boss with on his birthday. In the spirit of The Boss, who likes to assert that he has more of a Birthday Month or Birthday Quarter than merely one day, Husband has slowly broadened the scope of his birthday over the past few years. You may recall his Birthday Weekend a few years ago. Well, this year, he decided that he really was entitled to a Birthday Week. The catch, however, was that his Birthday Week happened to fall on the week in which we moved. Out of state. As in, from one state into another state.

As you can imagine, much ado was made about the injustice of this move and how it was ruining the Birthday Week. Poor Husband had to pack boxes DURING HIS BIRTHDAY WEEK and go through his clothes to set some aside for Goodwill ON HIS BIRTHDAY. In fact, Husband declined his traditional birthday breakfast in bed because he had to go to work early so he could come home early to pack the Uhaul.... DURING HIS BIRTHDAY WEEK.

Once we got here, to the state where they make you put tags on the back and front of your car (seriously?!), Husband decided he'd had enough: "I'm not going to unpack a single thing. Its my Birthday Week. I'm going to sit on the..... on the floor...... and eat cake." Because, you see, Husband decided he wanted to sell all of our furniture before we moved, and I had not yet procured a couch for him to sit upon DURING HIS BIRTHDAY WEEK.

We'd heard the lore about Ikea (and we now live in a city that has one), so off we trudged to find some furniture. We had previously visited about 7 furniture stores in the area and found them all to be way out of our price range, so you can imagine how excited I was about the prospect of more shopping. But Husband wanted a couch FOR HIS BIRTHDAY, so off we went.

People, Ikea is a land of unicorns and butterflies and I would live there if they would let me bring my books.

After much debate, which included Motha! and I dragging various pieces of furniture across the store to see things together (I thought Husband might go wait in the car at one point), we finally decided on a couch and coffee table, and I found a bookshelf, which The Boss and Motha! were buying for me as a congratulatory "you survived your MA!" present.

Et voila!

Husband was quite content to sit on his couch and eat the cookies that Cass, M.D. (Brother Robby's sweet wife) baked him for his birthday. Later that night when everyone was gone, we were sitting there together, and Husband turns to me and says, "welcome home."