Currently I am married to this gorgeous man.

These days Valentine’s Day is a fun affair.  This year Ben bought me flowers and chocolates and he made me a lobster dinner.  But that’s not what this is about.  No, this is about one particular horrible pre-Ben Valentine’s Day.

We have all dated someone completely embarrassing, right?  Personally, I dated about 30 embarrassing guys, but I’m kind of an overachiever.  The most cringe-worthy guy I dated was a snow board instructor/local television producer.  You read that correctly, local television producer.  He was kind of a big deal.  We’ll call him Mark.

Mark was really weird and if I hadn’t been so drunk the first few times I saw him, I would have noticed this earlier.  I met Mark at a bar in Boston .  I was with one of my girlfriends and as we walked out of the bar he stopped me and asked in I knew how to ice skate.  In my buzzed state I thought this question was hilarious, so in lieu of answering I just laughed.  He persisted, and I told him that no, I did not know how to ice skate.  Mark then asked me if I wanted to learn.  I said sure, we exchanged numbers and I went on my drunken way.

Fast forward to our first date.  It was the end of January and Mark took me ice skating at Frog Pond in Boston .  I was petrified.  The thing is, I’m terribly uncoordinated even when I’m not on ice.  I didn’t see how this could possibly end well, so I did what any other reasonable 24 year old woman would do, I got just shy of drunk before our date.  Needless to say that this did not help improve my ice skating skills.

The first date had gone well enough that, despite my inebriation and lack of skating abilities, Mark asked me out again.  This time we were going out to dinner and (get ready for it) drinks, so there was no need for me to show up to this date already half in the bag.  Or so you would think.  Well, we were meeting up later in the evening on a Friday, so rather than going back to my apartment after work and then trekking back out to Back Bay to meet up with him, I decided to stay in Back Bay and grab some drinks with co-workers before my date.  Are you keeping track?  Because I’ve now seen this guy three times, none of them sober.

Apparently I’m charming when I drink because he asked me out yet again.  For our third date, I decided to switch it up and not pregame like a Penn State frat boy.  Through the haze I always had a good time with Mark.  He was funny and cute, so I decided to actually show up to a date in my right mind.  This was a horrible idea.  I learned Mark’s funny cuteness was directly proportional to my drunkenness.  The date was going horribly.  Mark was a close talker.  And he whispered everything in a way that he seemed to think was sexy, but was actually kind of scary.  He also liked to give odd compliments, like, “You have great posture, it’s really sexy.”  I decided to remedy the situation with copious amounts of alcohol.  And sure enough, the more I drank the less he reminded me of a child molester.

But I miscalculated.  I drank too much, therefore making him too charming, therefore making me go back to his apartment, therefore resulting in this little tableau:

Mark walks into his bedroom after having gotten me a glass of water.  I am sitting on Mark’s bed.  Mark dances in front of me like a burlesque dancer.  He is totally serious.  He has his sexy face on.  Marc begins stripping his clothes off.  The dancing is now accompanied by singing.  Sexy singing.  Singing a montage of Beatle’s songs.  He gets down to his boxers which he thankfully leaves on.  He dances over to his closet where he removes black pleather pants.  Marc shimmies into the black pleather pants and starts singing an old STP song.  He continues to dance around the room, signing.  When he finally stops its to tell me that he wants to be a rock star.  Then he proceeds to show me his awesome rock star poses.  I die a little on the inside.

Before I go on, let me explain that this happened in real life.  This happened to me.  I endured this.

Right about this point I realized that there was not enough booze in the entirety of Ireland to make what had just happened sexy.  I feigned sick and left quickly.  But the story does not end here.

Fast forward to Valentine’s Day.  I walked out of my office at the end of the day and who do I find waiting for me with flowers?  Mark.  And hey, guess what else?  He smells awful.  So, yeah…  Marc walks up to me, gives me the flowers, kisses me on the cheek, and generally acts like this is completely normal.  Have you ever been in a horribly awkward situation and the awkwardness is so massive that it overwhelms and paralyzes you?  Because that is totally what happened to me.  I tried to make my brain work, screaming at it to think of a goddamned exit strategy, but all I was getting was:

What I’m trying to tell you is that I went to dinner with this guy.  After he danced in leather pants.  I did that.  And I’m not proud.  And actually it gets worse, because I kind of, sort of, kept on seeing him for a month or so after that.  And he wore the leather pants again.  On multiple occasions.  And once he asked one of my girlfriends if she had a penis.  And the smell?  Not a one time thing.

The end

Let me give you the haiku version first.  Still crazy in head.  Pharmaceuticals help some.  Jesus Banana.

Now for the slightly longer, but still appropriate blog length, version:

I no longer see the sun.  I leave for work and its dark.  I come home from work and its dark.  This is a problem as I require sunlight in order to function/remain not dangerously crazy.  So, my body is rebelling.  How? you ask.  Well, its decided it no longer requires sleep.  This is never a good sign.  Not sleeping is a precursor to stabbing people totally legal activities.  Another bad sign?  Not eating.  Of course not eating has another, less violent, side effect… sweet, sweet, weight loss.  Primarily in my breasts.  And there’s nothing a girl wants more than smaller breasts!

Here’s the thing about having an anxiety disorder, it sucks.  I wake up with my heart pounding, my muscles cramped, my jaw sore from grinding my teeth.  Lame.  BUT, don’t despair for me, there is an upside!  And here it is, I am so fucking productive when I’m anxious.  Maybe productive isn’t the right word.  What’s it called when you accomplish lots of shit that doesn’t actually need to be accomplished?  That’s what I do when I’m in a particularly panicky state.  Its truly scary.  See, when a person wakes up in the middle of the night and is in the throes of a panic attack she will not be falling back to sleep for an extended period of time.  Fact:  There is nothing good on television at 2:00 in the morning.  So, what is a girl to do?  Well, obviously the logical thing is to read all sorts of obscure and random stuff so that she can shock her husband with her awesome useless knowledge.  For example, today Ben and I had the following conversation:

Ben: How was your day?

Jill: Did you know that a coyote in Maine was found to be 89% wolf?

Ben: Huh.  Okay.

Jill: And 22% of coyotes in Maine are part wolf?

Ben: Oh.

Jill: And 90% of Maine is forested?

Ben: Lets just say you know more about Maine than I do.

Jill: And wolves.  And coyotes.

And then Ben cried because I am so much more awesome than he is.  So, I made him this to cheer him up.

And that is why being crazy is awesome. Except for the smaller breasts. You can’t win them all.

Anywho, its a new year and all that good stuff, so I feel as though I should share my resolutions with you.  I assume you’re terribly interested.  Its an exciting one.  Are you ready?  This year I resolve to… something or other.  I’m struggling to come up with a resolution.  Or at least the kind of resolution you can share in polite company when asked by some stupid acquaintance, “What’s your New Year’s resolution?”  I’m think my REAL resolution, which is to catch a wild moose then castrate it then watch it develop devil antlers, would confuse and horrify some of my more uptight friends.  So, I feel like I need another resolution, one that is more pc.  But I still want this resolution to be something I can accomplish.  Here are some ideas I’ve been bandying about:

• Play tambourine in a garage band comprised exclusively of 14 year old boys.
• Conquer my fear of throwing up (this one may require me becoming bulimic, but I’m open)
• Mail Stone Philips one love letter a day for 365 days
• Teach Coco Spanish so that she and I can have secret conversations in front of Ben

That’s all I’ve come up with so far, so I was thinking it would be awesome if you could share your resolution and if any of them are any good I’ll just do that.  We’ll be resolution buddies!  Our bond shall be unbreakable.

Next topic.

What I Did On My Summer Vacation New Year’s Eve

I am old and like to go to bed early, lets just start with that.

When discussing what we would do for New Year’s, Ben and I agreed that we wanted to keep it fairly low key.  Something fun, but not too raucous.  We decided on the Boston Pops Orchestra.  I love classical music, I love Symphony Hall, done and done.  I bought tickets for New Year’s Eve without looking too closely at the program for the evening.

Fast forward to last night.  Ben and I arrive at Symphony Hall, we look like this:

Almost everyone else looked like this:

Clearly something was amiss.  See, what I had failed to notice when I bought our tickets was that Amanda Palmer, from The Dresden Dolls, was going to be accompanying the Pops.  And as such, the audience was full of teenagers dressed as homeless people from the 20s?  Or something.  I’m not hip, so I could be getting it wrong.  Mixed in with the Amanda Palmer fans were some frightened elderly, who also thought they were just going to a nice classical concert, but were in fact walking into something entirely different.  Something that involved performance art.  And a silent film where some old guy has a baby, then feeds his baby a watch, and then the baby explodes into light, and then the old guy drinks vodka.  That shit totally happened.  I saw this silent film IN REAL LIFE and was unable to stop laughing.  The people sitting next to me did not appreciate my lack of appreciation.

There was a variety of openning acts, some confusing (see above) and some awesome.  April Smith and The Great Picture Show played one of the smaller lounges in Symphony Hall and they were awesome.  So awesome that I wanted to have my picture taken with them, but I chickened out and just took a picture in front of their equipment while they were on break:

Side Note: Please excuse all the blurry photos.  We weren’t supposed to use our flash and neither Ben nor I could figure out how to take a non-blurry photo without a flash.  We finally broke the rules and took this photo from our seats:

This was also not appreciated.

I will say that the evening was wonderful.  Great music, great people watching, and I got to kiss a hot piece of ass at midnight:

The end.

Unrelated note: I am a finalist in the 20sb Bootlegger Awards for Funniest Blogger.  BLOWS MY MIND!  For anyone who nominated me, I really appreciate it.  You guys are awesome, and it makes my day to see my name in the same category as Lilu, Maxie, Nicole, Matt and Cheryl.  Its an honor just being nominated, etc., etc.

The latest incident of camera malfunction happened this past weekend at my aunt’s wedding.  Um, how do I say this delicately?  It was… um… an abortion.  The wedding, not the camera.  Well, the camera a little bit, but nothing compared to the wedding.

First off, it was a Greek Orthodox ceremony.  In Greek.  Which I do not understand.  And which no one else in the wedding, including the groom, speaks.  It was pretty awkward.  Also?  My aunt decided to make the 4 year old flower girl stand at the top of the aisle with me.  Totally cute, right?  Except the ceremony is 10,000 hours long, and this little girl had a .000001 second attention span.  This meant that every 45 seconds or so, she turned to me and said loudly, “Is this the end?”  “Is this the very end?”  “Is it the end yet?”  “Is it over?”  “Is it over now?”

Finally I told her that she had to be quiet because she was making Jesus angry.  I’m kind of awesome with kids.  Except it backfired when she the said, even more loudly than before, “Is Jesus a ghost?” “Is that man (points to random painting) Jesus?”  “Is that man (another random painting) Jesus?”  “Does God live here?”  “The old lady said you can’t go outside alone because there are drugs outside.”

About half way through her stream of consciousness diatribe on religion and drug use, I decided we were soul mates.  And I should probably kidnap her and make her say cute and unintentionally hilarious things all day.  Luckily for her, I remembered how much I value my sleep and decided to let her continue living with her parents.

After the ceremony, my aunt’s new husband told Ev to call him dad.  Evan’s face looked a little like this:

Then it was time for the reception.  Oh, the reception!  I can’t do it justice with mere words, but I’ll try.  Where to start?  Um, my father was a gigantic ass, as was expected.  The real treat came when my aunt’s new husband came up to me during dinner, and said, “That’s a big piece of meat for such a little girl.  Can you handle it?”  Seriously.  He said that to me.  At his own wedding.  To my aunt.  It was pretty much the classiest thing I’ve ever seen and/or experienced.  But this was nothing compared to the center ring event, when the groom and one of the guests got into a screaming match.  I believe the word “douchebag” was used pretty liberally.  As was the phrase, “don’t fuck with me.”  Then there were tears.  Honest to God tears.  This, my friends, is why you don’t do 4 shots of Ouzo before your own wedding.  And also, why you don’t take another 27,804 additional shots at your wedding reception.  It doesn’t end well.  Little bit of wisdom from me to you.

And now back to my original point, which was that I am in desperate need of a new camera.  Any suggestions?  Nothing too complicated, I’m barely smart enough to draw stick figures, so keep that in mind when making a recommendation.

In closing, here are some awesome pictures taken with my awesome camera at the awesome wedding:

1. I Hate Turkeys.  I live in New Hampshire, and in case you weren’t aware, New Hampshire is overrun with turkeys.  Also, in case you weren’t aware, turkeys are assholes.  They chase small children.  They also surround my Jeep and force me to call my boss to explain that I’m going to be a little late to work because my car is surrounded by turkeys.
2. I Love My In-laws.  I have the nicest in-laws ever.  So nice, that even when I told my father in-law that anyone who believes in Intelligent Design is mentally handicapped, he continued to be sweet to me.  Even though he apparently believes in Intelligent Design.  Oops.
3. I Am a Pilgrim.  Thanksgiving is the one day a year that I can dress in full pilgrim regalia without it seeming strange.  Oddly enough, people seem a little put off when I throw on my pilgrim gear on the occasional Tuesday.  Close minded assholes.
4. I EnjoyEating.  A lot.  I’m especially fond of carbs.  Carbs in the form of pecan pie and various potato products.  On Thanksgiving my goal is to eat until I almost throw up.  Like super close, but not actually sick.  Its a bit of a gamble, but I like the danger.
5. I Have Much To Be Thankful For.  My life is pretty awesome.  Sure, I have a crazy family, but I also have an awesome husband.  A very attractive husband.  Who loves me.  And who (whom?  no idea.  i think its whom.) I love.   And Ben has these new boxers that he looks delicious in, and really that’s all that I need to make me happy.  So thank you Jesus for creating the Earth, and America, and boxer briefs, and penises.

Also, don’t forget to comment in order to be entered into the drawing for my super awesome giveaway.  Its totally better than socks.  Or a hat.  Or testicle warmers.

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Hold that thought. I have to take a Xanax. BRB.

Also, don’t forget to comment in order to be entered into the drawing for my ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hey Jill’s readers! I’m Brooke, and I blog over at www.ramblingbrooke.com. I’m new at this guest posting business, and I’ve been totally racking my brain in order to come up with something to occupy Jill’s website over her anniversary trip! It’s intimidating. She’s hilarious! So, without further ado, here’s my own love/engagement story:

My fiance, V, is anything but romantic. He has his sweet moments, but I’m pretty sure that those are unnecessarily magnified by his very unromantic moments. He tries, but most of his attempts turn out unintentionally hilarious. Take my birthday during our first year together. He bought me a fish. A FISH. Not only did he buy me a fish, but he named the fish David…after a guy who gave us a condom for our first “rendezvous” together (Long story, and TMI?). My “present” looked like this, and yes, he wrote on the fish bowl:

So, after 5 years of dating, frolicking across 2 different continents, and living in 4 European countries, I guess he decided that it was time to pop the question. We had been talking about it for awhile and had looked at various rings. At one point, he even asked a jeweler, “Why is cut glass so expensive?” His excuse? He grew up in Lithuania, when it was occupied by the Soviet Union. The Communists weren’t much into jewelry, or anything, for that matter. Anyway, he bought a ring, packed it away somewhere, and made no plans for a proposal. I’m sure that would have taken him another 5 years, but… Flash forward a couple of weeks: V was offered a job in Latvia, and a plane ticket was purchased for later that same day. He quickly packed up, and I drove him to the airport. I kissed him goodbye near the escalator leading up to security and started walking back to my car. All of a sudden, I heard, “BROOKE! WAIT!” I turned around to see V running down the escalator the wrong way, knocking out random people on the way down.

V: Sorry, but can I take valuables through customs?

Me: What? You own nothing valuable.

V: Well, um, uh huh…Okay then.

Me: What? Just give it to me. I’ll watch it.

V: Hmmm…Okay, here. {Hands me a ring.}

Me: WTF? Shit……Yes?

V: Great! I’m going to miss my flight. See you in a couple of weeks.

We went to Las Vegas a couple of months later and reenacted the proposal in a much classier way. Vegas is totally known for its class, you know. But, whatever, I like my first “proposal” better. So, Jill, I hope your anniversary involves more romance than my engagement. However, I think you still win in the “crazy engagement story” category. You bought your wedding dress before the proposal!

First off, thanks.   You’re awesome.

Secondly, I am leaving to go on a short vacation.  Ben and I are celebrating our one year anniversary.  Seriously, I am the luckiest woman in the whole world.  Ben is an incredible husband.  He is kind, and caring, and bright, and supportive.  Ben makes me feel loved everyday and I hope he knows how very much I love him.

Thirdly, guess what bitches!  I secured some very kick ass guest bloggers to take over for me while I’m gone.  So, watch out for posts from Becky from mylittlebecky.com, Brooke from ramblingbrooke.com, Terri from writingincrayon.com, Liz from itsunbeweavable.com , LiLu from livitluvit.com, and Maxie from ihatesomuch.com.  It shall be glorious.

Lastly, I am doing my first ever giveaway.  What am I giving away?  Well, I wish I could tell you, but its top secret.  Is it a pair of socks?  Is it a $100 AmEx gift card?  Is it a hooker?  Is it a set of my grandmother’s rosary beads?  Well, I can tell you that it is way more awesome than any of those things.  Except maybe the hooker…  Because it really depends on who the hooker is, right?  Like if the hooker is an Angelina Jolie look-alike who has been practicing her keigels, then my giveaway really can’t compete.  But, if the hooker is Andy Dick dressed as a woman, then my giveaway is totally better.

So, how to enter?  Very simple, just leave a comment on this post or any of the posts from my guest bloggers and I will select the winner when I get back!

Much Love,

Jill Pilgrim

As a married hag I have an endless supply of advice relating to marriage, being married, and blow jobs.  Namely, how to have a successful marriage, how to enjoy being married, and how to ensure you never give another blow job again.  Lets get started, shall we?

1.  In the week (or year, if you’re me) before your wedding ensure that you bombard your significant other with endless rants about the ineptitude of your wedding vendors.  Also, yell a lot about that bitch at the bakery who is starting to give you attitude just because you called for the fifth time to change the flavor of the top tier.  Throw in some tears where appropriate.  Then (and this is key) have lots of hot makeup sex to keep him from running away.  The sex will make him forget that you are crazy.  For now.

2.  If, by chance, your husband sees you before the ceremony in your dress, you must blind him.  Otherwise your marriage is doomed.

3.  On your wedding night you will be expected to perform certain duties.  The pressure is on my friend.  You have to do something special.  I would suggest shaving your new monogram into your bathing suit area.  It will be a nice surprise for him and will really show your attention to detail.  Also?  Is there anything at your wedding that isn’t better with a monogram?  Exactly.

4.  Once on your honeymoon, it is time to relax.  But, not really because you are expected to give blow jobs and anal on demand.  Don’t worry though, this is the last time your now husband is going to have this kind of access to your body.  Let him have his last hurrah.

5.  After the honeymoon is over, the “being married” stuff really begins.  Its now time to throw away all of that lingerie you bought for the honeymoon.

6.  As a wife you are expected to use all of those registry gifts to good use.  Make dinner for twelve, bake a million cakes, make your husband a milk shake.  In short, fatten him up to ensure that he will never leave you.

7.  It is also important to put your husband on a strict sex schedule, enough so that he still has the will to live, but not so much that he thinks he married a slut.  Remember, you’re not a single girl anymore.  Close those legs for christsake.

8.  Buy a set of nice pearls.  Clutch them whenever someone cusses or makes reference to male genitalia in your presence.

9.  Penis.  (This was a test. )

10.  Stop referring to your husband by name.  And make sure that you talk about him at least once every 20 minutes.  People will not find this at all annoying.  And remember, no names!  Just, “My husband this,” and “My husband that.”  John?  John, who?  John doesn’t exist anymore.  John’s just known as Mary’s husband now.

And that, my friends, is a little bit of wisdom from me to you.

But seriously Kari, you’re going to be gorgeous.  Congrats honey!  J is one lucky man.  Now here is my real present:

Oh, and also, Ben would like me to clarify that he does in fact still get blow jobs.  As a matter of fact he’s getting one right now.  I’m a master of multitasking.