Where to begin...? The Giants are world champions. Eli is a top-notch quarterback, certainly in Tom Brady's class. (Although, really people, Brady cannot throw AND catch the ball. Thanks for that insight Gisele. Loves.) Victor Cruz has the best salsa moves around. And my friends could not have been much happier after the Super Bowl last Sunday night:
On Friday, I convinced my mom (no heavy lifting required) to come into the city to shop at one of my favorite stores, LF, which is currently having one of their semi-annual sales. With the exception of a winter sale and a summer sale, nothing ever goes on sale in this store. And let’s just say it is a bit of a budget buster.
Last week, when I received the email invitation to attend the exclusive opening of the winter sale, I panicked. The invitation was for 2 p.m. My mom (who is a principal in CT) gets out of school at 2:15 p.m. I called the store on Thursday, hoping I would not have to explain my dilemma, to see how long the exclusive sale—which boasted an extra 10% off everything, which was already marked down by 60%—lasted on Friday.
When the LF employee told me that the store would be closed on Friday for a private event, I may have been a bit to eager to reply, “I KNOW, I GOT THE EMAIL. I’M INVITED.”
Anyway, I found out that the exclusive sale lasted until 8 p.m. Plenty of time for Mom to get into the city. And get into the city she did. There is only one person who has more fun shopping for me than me and it’s definitely not my dad (“Whatever you say, don’t tell me that’s a pair of boots in that box), but most certainly is my mom.
The store was such madness, I really don’t even have the energy to explain it. #WhiteGirlProblems. In brief, the checkout line was about 25 yards long and stretched from the cashiers to the front door of the store. Girls, or rather young women, were trying clothes on all over the store—checking out red, platform shoes; one-shoulder dresses, and leather pants in LF’s few mirrors. I was hot, faint, sweating, but determined. As we pushed our way through the store, my mom’s arms served as racks to hold all of the torn sweaters, black dresses, and corduroy pants that I wanted to try on, in an actual fitting room. (I would try on more sweaters later, while we waited in line to pay.)
About two hours later, I felt very much like I just played an entire soccer match against a Patriot League rival. In other words, I was very tired. And my mom needed a drink. We walked out of the store with two bags, quite literally stuffed with clothes, and off to dinner. If we had met my dad, he would have asked like he always does, “Did you save me a lot of money?” I won’t write here how much money we spent because if that didn’t cause my dad to have a heart attack it would cause Austin to pass out. But, Dad, I will say that the total discount was large.
One of my purchases, coincidentally (or not), Austin's least favorite:
On Saturday, I saw The Vow with Austin and I’m not going to lie, I shed a tear or two. Channing Tatum’s acting was actually much better than I expected, and he still looked as good as one would expect. I really like to go the movies lately. Austin thinks I like to go the movies because that is his thing, but I really just want to be more like my Grammy, who goes to the movies all the time. One of the best parts about going to the movies is watching the previews. If you haven’t seen Dane Cook’s skit on going to the movies, watch it now (i.e. see the link at the bottom of post, after you finish reading this blog). As Dane says, the previews allow everyone to be a critic. When I go to the movies with my cousin, Sam, I get excited to look toward her after every preview, so we can acknowledge what we think about the movies coming out. With Sam, this normally just takes an enthusiastic nod of the head or an eye roll or the deadly headshake. With Austin, we sometimes do thumbs up or thumbs down. But, mostly I have to poke Austin in the thigh three times when I really like a preview because if I really like it, he probably has no interest in seeing it, which he makes known by refusing to look at me after the preview. When a preview for a horror movie comes on, though, I swear the kid is right in my face. I will never understand why people enjoy being scared shitless at the movies, but that is another story, I guess.
On Saturday night, I went to Hoboken with Liz and her friend, Matt. The evening was shaping up just dandy—I had never been to Hoboken and was looking forward to checking out the scene—until I arrived at a Caribbean inspired bar in Hoboken to find that I did not have my license. The (very large) bouncer at the door was not in the mood to make any exceptions for this blonde in an oversized sweater (from LF, of course)—who was asked not so long ago if she was old enough to sit in the exit row of the airplane, for which you have to be 16. Suddenly the cobble stone sidewalk in Hoboken didn’t seem quite so quaint and the pizza places didn’t have such a nice aroma anymore. And the distance from Hoboken to my apartment on the Upper East Side, current home to my license, seemed to multiply.
As I walked back to the Path train alone, I thought about crying. But then I remembered that I was wearing mascara. When I got back to my apartment, Austin was here with our friend (another Matt) and a pile of empty beer bottles, along with two shot glasses. Austin was wearing one of his fraternity t-shirts from college and he started going on about how I was so lucky to date someone who had inspired not one, but two of the designs for his fraternity’s t-shirts. One has a large illustration of his disfigured hand on the front—Austin bent one of his pinky fingers playing football years ago and he hasn’t been able to straighten it since. The other showcases one of his favorite sayings: “Whatchu want?”
When Austin finally (did I just write “finally”?) left the apartment that night, I decided that he was right (in a way). I was lucky—despite the fact that I had just completed a round trip to Hoboken in stilettos—even if not for the reason that he thought I was.
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