On Friday, I got home late and proceeded to work on my grad school manuscript. I’m doubling the applications this year. Last year, I applied to U of Minnesota, U of Wisconsin ‘ Milwaukee, U of Indiana, and the big granddaddy of them all, U of Iowa. This year, I’m doing those again and adding U of Wisconsin Madison, U of Michigan, NYU, San Francisco State University and possibly University of San Francisco and Bennington (which are both very expensive but have their perks. For instance, even though Bennington is long distance, how cool would it be to work under Amy Hempel and E. L. Doctorow? Seriously!? How cool!?). Then I went home and collapsed and proceeded to sleep lovely, relaxed weekend sleep until 10 am Saturday morning. After showering, I woke Esteban and asked him what he wanted to do for the day. He lifted one eyebrow at me and said ‘You ask that as though you already know what you’re going to do and want to see if my plans work with that.’ He knows me too well, for I did have a plan. A Jam Plan. I am horribly low on my lovely chopped cherry jam and wanted to store up for the winter, when treacherous roads make the 120 mile curvy twisty windy peninsula drive less than ideal. Thus, Esteban ditched his plan to go into the lab and tech edit his articles and hopped onboard the Jam Plan. And well, who wouldn’t. Because I defy you to resist a good Jam Plan.
Yes, I do find myself very amusing sometimes.
So we put on layers of cotton and fleece and good grey hiking socks and hopped into the Chrysler and sped up the door listening to classical music, looking for all the world like an LL Bean commercial. Except that I’m more of an XL Bean girl, but you know what I mean. It was a happy lovely drive and we chatted about many things that I tried to remember so that I could do one of those charming dialogue entries but unfortunately I have early Alzheimer’s disease and the thoughts, they are leetle birds flying out my ears. Or so it seems some days. We skipped breakfast completely, opting to wait until Sturgeon Bay for cheese products, including the fresh squeaky cheese curds and string cheese. Mmmmm’. Cholesterol, breakfast of champions. Perhaps wrestling champions.
Japanese wrestling.
We spotted a new billboard on the grey landscape that is the winter Bay and it made our pseudo yuppy eyebrows perk. A new winery. With snooty labels. While wineries in the Door are not new, most of them are all kitschy and exist solely to give people from Illinois an excuse to talk about their vacation at parties. Esteban was in a rare ‘Indulge Weetabix’ mood and was up for anything but horseback riding (‘I’m a boy! Boys find no fascination in horses.’) thus when it came time to turn off the highway, he was game. Now that it’s essentially winter, the population of the Door drops back down to that of any other rural sane little Wisconsin county, therefore about two hundred yards off the highway and we were twisting and turning through very rural country. Then we missed the sign, had to back up and take a single lane paved road through over hill and dale and hill again. And then the paved road gave way to gravel and mud and puddles. ‘We’re going to get to the end of this road and find out that the winery is a big hoax and next thing we know, we’re going to wake up in a bathtub full of ice and our kidneys will be missing.’ Esteban quipped, but I was too delighted by the flock of wild turkeys traipsing through the cut cornfields. I did not care that they were perhaps turkeys of impending doom. But then we were greeted by a very lovely building and then were given a bunch of free wine until we were fully ready to surrender our kidneys in exchange for a few bottles of port.
We hiked up to the tip of the thumb and I purchased an obscene amount of jam (shut up, it’s for Christmas gifts!) and then we were on our merry way. We stopped for lunch at a sports bar because it had a Pug dog as a mascot, watched the Badger game and ate lake perch. Then we drove back to Green Bay and hid under blankets on the sofa while watching DVDs for the rest of the night.
On Sunday, I went to Mary Kaye’s mother’s house for their traditional Thanksgiving dinner (which happened on Sunday because her mother is going to Branson for the holiday. It’s a countrified holiday, yee haw. She’s going on the bus. It will take 24 hours. I don’t understand this, because she owns two very nice vehicles, and the bus will take 24 hours. I suspect that were I to ever endure a 24 hour bus ride and then find that it ended with a visit to Branson Missouri, I would give up the will to live and fall dead at the bottom of those little fold down stairs they have on Greyhounds. And then I wonder if the other passengers would get to use the wheelchair lift or what they would do then. Probably just move the bus forward a couple of feet. Because them folks need to see Branson, dadgumit! But I digress. Because I can.) but when I arrived, they had misjudged the timing and dinner would be several hours later than planned. Thus, Mary Kaye and I went for a ride rather than sit and entertain her four-year-old terror of a cousin Jeffrey. Our ride ended at a Paint Your Own pottery shop which should have been called ‘Shop With Four Hundred And Twelve Unruly Kids And Three Moms Who Are Trying To Be Martha Stewart While Their Children Throw Feces At Each Other’. But we perservered and made our little projects (mine is a big cappuchino mug upon which I’ve painted ‘Pseudo Starbucks&AO8AvwC9AO8AvwC9- because my creativity was spent thinking of ways I could dispose of tiny little bodies and have no one be the wiser) and had a more or less grand time.
It was a lovely weekend, followed by a horrible Monday at work (in which my head actually contained a miniature Souza band, who were tromping around on my hypothalamus wearing football cleats, practicing for the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade). I had more to write about but someone just ran into the department all aflutter. It seems that they’ve just announced an upcoming concert in one of the area performing arts centers.
‘Who?’ I was intrigued. Most of the time, we get third and fourth tier acts, but occasionally we get someone interesting.
‘You’re never going to believe it!’ She squealed. ‘SHANIA TWAIN!’
‘Oh’ I replied, turning back to my computer.
‘They say she’s awesome in concert. Voted one of the best entertainers ever,’ said another coworker, apparently needing me to be Very Excited as well.
I had to stop myself from replying ‘Well, is she going to sing?’
Honestly, I would pay money to watch her blow a donkey or have a cage match with Celine, Cher and Mariah Carey, but if she’s just going to bellow at me, I just know I would have flashbacks for every bad karaoke song I’ve ever endured.
What I wouldn’t do for a job with walls. You have no idea.
Funny thing I learned yesterday (which only English majors will think is funny):
On e.e. cumming’s tombstone, his name is written in all capital letters.
Heeee!
I think the funniest thing is that in my head, I can hear his surviving family ordering the tombstone and murmuring ‘Lowercase THIS, muthafucka.’
Because in my mind, every poet is related to Shaft.
