• RemoteDance

    Hoarder’s Remorse

    October 18, 2012 - By 

    As you may have gathered from some of my previous posts, while I don’t consider myself to be anything near an actual hoarder, I do have a tendency to collect and keep things that provide no real intrinsic value to my life. Usually I keep these things for one of three reasons: Nostalgia I am almost certain that at some point they will be useful again They got stuffed somewhere and I forgot I had them Reason #1 is why I keep things like expired driver’s licenses from various states. Reason #2 is why I have clothes in my closet…

  • RemoteDance

    Turning 29 Again

    October 10, 2012 - By 

    September marked the 3rd anniversary of my 29th birthday. It’s not that I think I’m old, it’s just that more and more often I realize my lifestyle is slowly sliding into something settled. Not that it’s a bad thing. It’s just a thing. I want to spend my time differently now – I just can’t help but notice the changes. Like when I’m sitting on the couch on a Friday night, watching television with my cat and my husband, struggling to keep my eyes open after 10:30. There used to be at time in my life when 10:30 meant I…

  • Marriage - RemoteDance

    Attempting to make our house grown-up

    August 30, 2012 - By 

    It’s been almost 2 1/2 years since we bought this house. One of the things about bouncing all over the west coast for our jobs is that we don’t spend enough time at our house to get all those finishing touches done. Things like putting up photographs or buying houseplants or even, um, finishing hanging the shutters because your husband threw out all the little hinges and they haven’t sold hinges like that at Home Depot since 20 years ago when your house was built and now you’re going to have to order them online but that seems like a…

  • RemoteDance

    Super Giant Fish at our Front Door

    July 14, 2012 - By 

    So, I just realized the Big Buck Hunter has been in our front entryway for OVER TWO YEARS. I keep holding out hope that one day we’ll class it up enough to move that thing somewhere… not so obvious. Like a Man Cave. Chris DEFINITELY needs a Man Cave. I think his new ploy is keep buying hideously unsophisticated things that have no business in the house so that we end up with so much redeneck man-crap in our front foyer that I have no choice but to agree to let him have a man cave. And, oh, yeah, his…

  • Marriage - RemoteDance

    An Iowa Wedding

    July 10, 2012 - By 

    The Bachelorette Party The bachelorette party was a day-long adventure that started out with cake and cocktails at the Barefoot Bar, then progressed to a day of meandering down the lakes in a pontoon boat stuffed full of twenty-something ladies, bottles of booze, and various “gifts” that will not be shown in pictures on this blog due to their – ahem – phallic nature. But these were responsible ladies, and they had the foresight to pay the boat rental place to supply them with a driver for the boat. Meet Tyler. Tyler is 19 years old. He is also the…

  • RemoteDance

    The Nerdery

    June 26, 2012 - By 

    The twins, Frick and Frack, have a younger sister, A-Star. Here is a picture of the three of them: And now the lovely miss A-Star has gotten married. I will share that story in another post, but the lead-in here was that the twins and I took a flight out to Iowa last weekend for the wedding. On the return flight, I was sitting middle seat, between my husband on one side and Frick on the other. We had stopped for a layover and this was the second leg of our flight. My husband happened to glance over and notice…

  • Uncategorized

    How to travel with big furniture and tiny cars

    May 19, 2012 - By 

    Today on the freeway I passed a mustang convertible, top down, with about 6 patio chairs crammed in the backseat at odd angles. The driver who, for some reason in all his 50+ years of living did not have a better solution, must’ve figured that his wife holding on to the legs of one of the chairs counted adequately in place of a tie-down strap. I will say that one thing I’ve taken for granted since meeting Chris is the convenience of a pickup truck. Between him and his friends, there is always someone with some way to move lots…

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    O Californians, how you drive… me insane

    April 14, 2012 - By 

    An Open Letter to my west coast friends on the open road: ** Side note: the fact that I just signed up for my online defensive driving course to defer a speeding ticket has absolutely NO BEARING whatsoever on this letter.** EDIT: Actually, it does have some bearing – in my favor. Below is an excerpt from my class: Driving slowly in the left lane: If you are in the left lane and someone wants to pass, move over and let them by. You may be “in the right” because you are traveling at the speed limit, but you may…

  • RemoteDance

    Cruise Tip #2: rednecks like big fishes

    March 28, 2012 - By 

    For their birthday this year, Frick and Frack (that’s my husband and his twin, in case you were having trouble following there) got to go on a fishing boat in Cabo with their friends Sleepy E, Wobbie, and Vegas. It was Sleepy E’s idea (shout out to him and the lady), and it totally rocked. It wasn’t supposed to be a whale-watching tour, but they got to see THIS: And then, to top it all off, Chris caught a 160# Striped Marlin. Well, it was really a collective effort, but Chris happened to be the one holding the reel at…

  • RemoteDance

    Cruise Tip #1: Bring your own mustaches

    March 26, 2012 - By 

    Oh yes that’s right. I said mustaches. You see, the thing about cruises is that there’s a lot of time at sea. And, aside from stuffing your face at the breakfast buffet, the 24-hour grill/pizzeria, the lunch buffet, the dinner seating, and the late-night buffet, the only other thing to do is drink, gamble, lay by the pool, visit the spa, or some combination of any of those. (There’s also a fitness center, but who wants to go to THAT on vacation?!) So our ingenious friends Sleepy E and Mrs. Sleepy (you may remember them from Prank of the Century…