This blog is on hiatus. Read here to find out why.

Despite the “marriage penalty” built into the U.S. tax system, I have a record number of friends getting married this year. Maybe the economy has something to do with it: it’s cheaper to pay for one home, after all, than to keep two separate residences for propriety’s sake when everyone knows you’re really only using one.

I suspect the economy is also the reason I’m receiving wedding invitations from people I barely know but who should know me well enough to realize I don’t like them.

Yes, I do plan to attend a couple of weddings this year for friends whose union I’m actually thrilled to witness. But, because they’re friends, I know they’ve invited me for my presence more than my presents. Even so, I plan to get serious about dropping 10-15 pounds so I look good in their pictures. (Also, so I can find a dress that doesn’t look like it came from the camping section in Wal-Mart.)

The others? Well, let me put it this way: if they weren’t too cheap to have an open bar at their receptions I might actually have accepted their invites. At least that way I know I’d be getting my money’s worth for bringing a present.

I’m not a big fan of shopping at brick-and-mortar malls, particularly now while my knee is still giving me problems. I’d much rather stay home where I’m warm and cozy, and where the coffee is already paid for, so I can do my holiday shopping online.

Most importantly, online shopping guarantees that my husband won’t find out about my purchases since FedEx and UPS deliver while he’s at work, thus giving me plenty of time to hide the box, the loot and the receipt before he comes home. Sure, I could go to a regular mall first thing in the morning then hurry home, hide the evidence and hope for the best. But I’ve learned the hard way how risky that is.

A few months back, you see, I’d fallen in love with a pair of shoes. A pair of gorgeous, red, stacked-heeled shoes made famous by a certain female Vice Presidential candidate. I’d gone to the mall purportedly to buy towels for our guest bathroom since ours had grown rather ratty and we had company coming. But there, not twelve feet in the door, my eyes fell on those shoes. I had to have them.

Oh, they cost four times what I’d budgeted for the towels, and if the truth be told, I didn’t really need yet another pair of shoes. But, as many women know, “need” is an easily justified thing when it comes to a great pair of shoes. So, rather than buying the top-of-the-line towels as I’d planned, I splurged on the shoes… and stopped at K-mart for some cheapo towels on my way home.

Now, if I’d been thinking clearly, I’d have hidden those shoes in my closet, removed the tags from the towels and hung them up, then shredded the receipts and burned the shoe box. But I was not thinking clearly, and for that I blame the shoes. Yes, they were that awesome.

So, although I took care of all the other evidence, I couldn’t resist slipping the things on with my best pair of jeans and favorite blouse. I was still wearing that ensemble when my husband came home from work. My husband: the man who doesn’t notice when I lose 15 lbs., who didn’t realize for three months that I’d changed from a brunette to a fiery redhead, and who still has to ask me what our home telephone number is.

The man walked in, gave me a hug, and said: “Nice shoes. How much did THOSE set us back?” And in my surprise I actually told him the truth. It was a price that shocked him as much as his power of observation had shocked me.

Fortunately, I hadn’t worn the shoes outside so it was easy enough to convince him that I’d return them the next day. I just conveniently forgot to mention that I’d destroyed the receipt and the box, and when the next day came I “conveniently” forgot to return them, too.

I still have the shoes, and they are still gorgeous. However, because I don’t want him to realize that I never returned them, they’re still sitting in my closet where they’ve yet to be worn a second time.

But I’m waiting.

See, now that Circuit City is closing, I’m pretty certain he’s going to come home some day with his own shopping confession to make.
http://www.shopandconfess.com/index.php/contest/member/register/”>contest for your chance to win serious cash and prizes. And be sure to tell them you saw it at this blog!

So, my knee is starting to do a little better. I’m walking flat surfaces mostly without crutches now, although stairs hurt quite a bit. Sleeping well is another matter entirely: either I take pain killers and wake up groggy, or I skip them and wake up groggy.

Not surprisingly, all of this sleep deprivation has led to some other physical problems. I’m exhausted, and I’ve spent two days flat on my back with a blinding migraine, no doubt exacerbated by the poor quality of sleep. (One would think that the pain killers would address those migraines, but one would be wrong.) And, I ache everywhere.

I’m not sure if this is another fibromyalgia flare-up or not. I haven’t had one since being diagnosed with Celiac disease and eliminating gluten, so perhaps it has more to do with exhaustion than anything else. Or the change in the weather.

That’s right: I’m old enough now to start complaining that the cold makes my bones ache. And, thanks to that injured knee, I have a cane to go along with it.

Lately, my mother has been campaigning — in the quiet, round-about-way that mothers do — for us to move down to Texas where she lives. For the past 20 years of my life, we’ve lived so far apart that seeing each other requires plenty of calendar-comparing, not to mention the financial planning that higher fuel costs require these days. My oldest brother, who lives all of 15 minutes from her, thinks it would be a ducky idea if I moved down there, too: no doubt he’d enjoy a break from being the go-to child.

There’s a lot that I love about Texas, not the least of which is the people. I get Texans, having been raised by one of their proudest, and I do love how easy it is to fit in among them if you’re used to using and deciphering Texas-speak. It’s a language all to itself.

Take “bless your heart”, for instance. When uttered by a Northerner it means pretty much what it says: that you’ve done something nice and they want to say something nice in response. When a Texan says it, though, watch out: what it really means is “well, aren’t you a hoot?” And calling someone a hoot really means you’re too polite to admit they’re a pain in the ass. I know this because most of my family members used to bless my heart and tell me I’m a hoot regularly until I figured it out.

Distance is different in Texas-speak, too. “Down the road a ways” means a drive of 200 miles or so. “Up the road a piece” means less than 200 miles, but not much. And to say that something’s “a stone’s throw away” refers to a distance sufficient enough to require emptying one’s bladder before setting out, but you won’t quite need sandwiches for the journey.

I get confused about mealtimes in Texas, though. There’s breakfast, but since I’m a big Tex-Mex fan that meal usually involves corn tortillas — something I ordinarily associate with eating lunch. Except you don’t eat “lunch” in Texas: you eat dinner around noontime, and later you eat supper. (Or is it the other way around? Like I said, I get confused.)

Ultimately, as I keep explaining to my mother, there’s one immutable fact about Texas that keeps VH and I from sitting down to craft Dallas resumes or to do much exploring of the job market anywhere down that way: it’s freaking hot. All the time. Even when they say it’s not hot.

I recently explained this to my mother after her most recent round of covert nagging. “Sorry, Mom,” I said. “I can handle a few hot weeks in the summer, but that 90-degrees at Christmas time thing you had going on last year? That’s too hot for my well-padded self to deal with. Why don’t you move up here? I promise I’ll take good care of you.”

To which she responded: “Oh, isn’t that nice of you to suggest? Bless your heart, you’re such a hoot.”

Like I said, I get Texans. I just don’t have plans to become one again anytime soon.

A while back I wrote about brides who’re telling their bridesmaids to get plastic surgery so they, too, can look good on the bride’s Big Day. Honestly, I was relieved to learn I wasn’t the only one who thought this crossed the line. Then again, I’ve found myself disgusted by those who are reluctant to ask their overweight friends to be part of their bridal party because they won’t look as good as skinny friends in the dresses the bride’s picked out.

Equally annoying, although less shockingly so, are those who forget the thoughtful tradition of the bridal party gift: keepsakes designed to not only honor the bridesmaids’ role in the wedding but also to commemorate the occasion. They’re the kind who don’t send Thank You cards to their wedding guests whom, they believe, really ought to be thanking them for having been allowed to participate in the bride’s special day. (These, incidentally, are the same women who’ll wonder, a few years down the road, why no one shows up at their second wedding.)

And don’t get me started on the type of bride who cheaps out on the gifts so she can budget more for her shoes (which no one will see under her dress, anyway). Rather than giving her bridesmaids a meaningful and thoughtful wedding party gift like a crystal photo frame or jewelry box, she opts for a boring pen-and-pencil set from the office supply store. As if that makes up for all of her prima donna tantrums, right?

Recently, a not-so-close acquaintance asked if I’d be in her wedding as one of the “bridal matrons” (a stupid expression to describe the involvement of a married, 41-year-old woman in a 30-something’s first wedding). She’s the type who just doesn’t have a lot of female friends — probably because she thinks up stupid expressions like “bridal matron” — and I wasn’t up to the task of explaining that I’m not one of them, either. Fortunately, calendar conflicts will prevent me from both participating in and attending her wedding… whenever she picks a date. Pity, because I could’ve used a new pen-and-pencil set.

I ran out to Wal-Mart this morning to pick up some travel-sized bottles for my toiletry kit, rather than lugging the full-sized bottles through three airports tomorrow. Since I’m only going to Texas for five days and will be staying with my mom (who does daily laundry out of boredom), I plan to just pack a carry-on and skip the whole $15 fee for checked luggage.

So this is, what, late August? Still a few months from Halloween, not to mention the whole food fest known as Thanksgiving. But what were the clerks stocking at Wal-Mart today? Christmas decorations. Not just a few ornaments and crumpled wreaths left from last year, mind you, but stockings, garland and cards, some of which looked like Christmas invitations.

WTF?

Here I’d hoped to lose 25 pounds prior to the holidays but from what I saw it looks like they’re coming early this year.