How did you meet your friends?
Here are some normal answers:
- We met in school
- We met at work
- We met at church
- We met through mutual friends
Here are some NOT normal answers:
- We met in an online hunting tips forum
- We met while shopping for raspberries in Meijer
Why is my husband such a weirdo? He spent last weekend in northern Michigan with a guy that he met in an online forum while we were still in Nevada (you can read that story here). They're now great friends. If that wasn't weird enough for you, check out this story from around two weeks ago:
Rex and I were grocery shopping at Meijer, having a jolly good time. Rex noticed that raspberries were on sale 2/$1.00 (can we just pause a moment and realize what an AWESOME deal that is?! Fifty cents for a container of raspberries!?). He said, "Hey Christine, look! Raspberries are on sale!" I told him to go ahead and grab some, and he said, "I will, as long as this guy doesn't take all of them!" He was joking with the guy in front of him, who was stocking up on the aggressively-priced raspberries. The guy turned around to laugh at Rex's joke, and he noticed that Rex was wearing a Kimber hat.
In case you don't get what that means (like 95% of the population wouldn't), Kimber is apparently some fancy brand of gun. There. Now you know. Raspberry man commented on it and said, "Cool hat, man. Do you shoot around here?" They started talking about guns, and I moseyed off to get some cilantro. I started to walk back to the raspberries, but they were still talking. Okay...so I went to get onions. And then some cereal. And then some candy, because...well...why not? They were still talking. Finally I just joined the conversation, because we had everything on our grocery list and I had already added enough random junk while waiting for Rex to be done talking.
Rex introduced me to Eric (because apparently raspberry man has a name now). It turns out that Eric's dad has 1,000 acres of hunting land in South Dakota, which makes Eric Rex's new best friend. Rex was definitely dressed like a hunter with his Kimber hat, Carhartt jacket, camo shirt, and scruffy beard. This part of the conversation cracked me up:
Eric: So, what do you do for a living?
Rex: I'm a physical therapist.
Eric: *long pause* Really?
Rex: Yeah.
Eric: I don't mean to be stereotypical or anything, but that is totally not what I was expecting you to say.
Bwahahahaha! Yes, my man is a bit redneck and super country, but he is also super smart and has a doctorate. I get the best of both worlds. Wife win. Eric's wife is a teacher, which is pretty cool. Eric and Mrs. Eric are only a year older than Rex and me, and they've been married almost the exact same amount of time as us. It turns out that we have a lot in common. Eric, Rex, and I were having a good time chatting, and suddenly Eric said, "Hey, as a physical therapist, is it hard for you to get time off?" My ears instantly perked up. Was he about to ask what I thought he was going to ask? Was he going to make Rex's day/month/year/life and ask him to go to South Dakota on a hunting trip? Rex has always wanted to go to South Dakota. Whenever I ask him, "If you could go anywhere in the world, where would you go?" his answer is, "On a really cool hunting trip to somewhere awesome, like South Dakota." I kid you not. That's what he says. Like South Dakota. And now, right here next to the raspberries, was a guy who could make that dream come true. I mentally willed him to invite Rex on a trip. Come on, Eric! Make it happen!
Sure enough, Eric said, "Well, I know this is really short notice, but I'm headed out to visit my dad on the 14th to hunt for a few days. If you could get the time off, I'd love for you to go so I don't have to drive all that way by myself. We could hunt deer in the morning and and night, and then hunt pheasants during the day. We could stay with my dad, so really you would just need to pay for half of the gas and your licenses and that's it." Let me put this in perspective for everyone who isn't like my weird-yet-awesome husband: this is the equivalent of someone coming up to you and saying, "Hey, I have this extra ticket for a cruise around the world that I'm not using - do you want it?"
I literally almost gasped when he invited Rex on the trip. I may have actually gasped... I can't be quite sure. I couldn't believe this was actually happening. Neither could Rex, really. He and that guy exchanged numbers, set up some preliminary plans, and then we went to check out. Rex had this shell-shocked look on his face like, "What just happened? Is this real life?"
As I type these words, Rex is having the time of his life in South Dakota. He's texted me pictures of the hunting grounds, and he says he's seen the biggest bucks he's seen in his whole life. He hasn't gotten one in close enough to shoot yet, but hey - he's only been there for a day. The point is, he's having a great time, and it's all because the raspberries were on sale.
And also because he steadfastly refuses to make any friends in any normal ways.
Saturday, November 15, 2014
Saturday, November 1, 2014
Work Party
Tonight was Rex's first work party since he started working at Spine PT. I was...well...nervous, to say the least. I was afraid to go hang out with all of the doctor's wives, because "doctor's wife" just sounds pretentious, doesn't it? Like I was going to be walking onto the set of The Real Housewives of Kalamazoo or something. I pictured them all walking around in high heels with glasses of chardonnay, swapping casserole recipes and talking about vacations to the Hamptons.
And yes, I realize that Rex is a specifically a doctor of physical therapy, which is different than a "regular" doctor. He is always very particular about that. He is super paranoid that someone is going to confuse him for a general physician or a surgeon or something. As if people are going to be sitting in a restaurant when a guy chokes, and someone yells, "Hey! That guy over there is a doctor! Quick, Sir, we need you to perform an emergency tracheotomy with only a toothpick and a handful of cilantro!" Um, not going to happen. Still, Rex doesn't like being called a doctor.
So, even though they were doctors of physical therapy, they were still doctors. And that made their wives doctors' wives. And that made me intimidated.
I chose my outfit carefully. I wanted to seem sophisticated, but not like I tried too hard. I settled on some kicky jeans, brown boots (jeans over boots, not under), a brown sweater, and a tan scarf with brown swirls. I also wore my off-white peacoat. At the last minute I added some pearl drop earrings, because obviously pearls are sophisticated. If there was a store called Sophisticated-R-Us, there would be an entire department of pearls. They're practically the backbone of sophistication.
I had an internal debate about my purse choice. I had a no-name brand brown purse that I got at a garage sale which would match well, or I had my Vera Bradley bag, which is designer but didn't really match. I decided on Vera, partially to look like I was stylish and partially because I just really like that purse. As a final touch, I put on my Ray-Ban knockoffs (they're good knockoffs, though, with the logo and everything. You totally can't tell they're fake). I realized I wouldn't wear sunglasses at the indoor party, but maybe someone would see them when I walked in and think, "Ah, yes. She is one of us." I am such a poser. *hangs head in shame*
We arrived at the party, and I gave the hostess my offerings of homemade potato salad and pumpkin cupcakes with cream cheese frosting. Everyone knows that women judge each other by their cooking. It's like how guys compare muscles or something. If you can rock a homemade souffle, you're in. If you bring store-bought cookies, scoff! Women are judgmental like that. It's pretty stupid (yet I still participate in this by trying super hard to make acceptable food...hmmm...). For the record, if I ever throw a party - you are welcome to bring store-bought cookies. Or a 2-liter of pop. Or napkins. Or whatever you want. I like when people bring anything at all. Hand on heart - I won't judge you.
So I walked into the kitchen to proffer my gifts of food, and I immediately noticed that the decor was...fancier than my unsophisticated taste properly appreciates, I guess. The wallpaper had roosters on it, but instead of feathers the roosters had exotic animal furs. There was a zebra rooster, a leopard rooster, a tiger rooster, etc. I really wanted to get out my phone and take a picture to show you, but that seemed quite rude. So I didn't. Instead, I complemented the hostess on the fact that her kitchen decor seemed "down-home, yet exotic." True, it did. It just took a bit of staring at it to get used to it. She said "Thank you. Exotic was exactly what I was thinking." Phew! Score one for me!
I stayed pretty quiet as Rex made his rounds and said hello to people. I noticed one of the wives had a Vera Bradley bag (glad I chose that one!), but I also noticed that it was last season. Then I felt like a TOTAL brat for even noticing that. Who was acting all Real Housewives of Kalamazoo now? Me, that's who! So I mentally chided myself and told myself to stop freaking out about everyone's outfits and food offerings and statuses in the company. These were real people. I am a real person. There is no reason why we can't be friends. Our spouses all work together, so we all automatically have something in common. There. I had talked myself into it. I was going to be social.
Rex introduced me to a few of the ladies there, and they were super nice. They weren't uppity at all. We talked about how lots of the hostess's decorations were so fun - she had a lot of Halloween/harvest themed things. She even had centerpieces for the tables made out of wheat. WHEAT. You wouldn't think that would look cool, but it did. She had yummy scented candles making the house smell great, and she had little pumpkins and ghosts hiding all over the place, so everywhere you looked you saw something else cute and festive. Her house was basically a Pinterest board for "How to Throw a Harvest Party."
The food was really good (as it was destined to be with that many women trying to impress each other). I got complimented on my potato salad, so that made me happy. Rex and I sat with another therapist and his wife at dinner, and they were super cool. We ended up talking to them for a lot of the night, and we found out we had a ton in common. After a while some of the guys turned on a football game, some of the women started looking at photo albums, and it was basically a really fun night with really fun, totally normal people. No wine, stilettos, or vacations to the Hamptons. I can breathe a sigh of relief. I was so apprehensive about this party, but now I hope that Rex's work has a Christmas party too, because those people are quite fun. Now I feel dumb for freaking out so much. Silly me. Oh, well. I will go toast to my successful evening with a leftover cupcake. Mmmm.
And yes, I realize that Rex is a specifically a doctor of physical therapy, which is different than a "regular" doctor. He is always very particular about that. He is super paranoid that someone is going to confuse him for a general physician or a surgeon or something. As if people are going to be sitting in a restaurant when a guy chokes, and someone yells, "Hey! That guy over there is a doctor! Quick, Sir, we need you to perform an emergency tracheotomy with only a toothpick and a handful of cilantro!" Um, not going to happen. Still, Rex doesn't like being called a doctor.
So, even though they were doctors of physical therapy, they were still doctors. And that made their wives doctors' wives. And that made me intimidated.
I chose my outfit carefully. I wanted to seem sophisticated, but not like I tried too hard. I settled on some kicky jeans, brown boots (jeans over boots, not under), a brown sweater, and a tan scarf with brown swirls. I also wore my off-white peacoat. At the last minute I added some pearl drop earrings, because obviously pearls are sophisticated. If there was a store called Sophisticated-R-Us, there would be an entire department of pearls. They're practically the backbone of sophistication.
I had an internal debate about my purse choice. I had a no-name brand brown purse that I got at a garage sale which would match well, or I had my Vera Bradley bag, which is designer but didn't really match. I decided on Vera, partially to look like I was stylish and partially because I just really like that purse. As a final touch, I put on my Ray-Ban knockoffs (they're good knockoffs, though, with the logo and everything. You totally can't tell they're fake). I realized I wouldn't wear sunglasses at the indoor party, but maybe someone would see them when I walked in and think, "Ah, yes. She is one of us." I am such a poser. *hangs head in shame*
We arrived at the party, and I gave the hostess my offerings of homemade potato salad and pumpkin cupcakes with cream cheese frosting. Everyone knows that women judge each other by their cooking. It's like how guys compare muscles or something. If you can rock a homemade souffle, you're in. If you bring store-bought cookies, scoff! Women are judgmental like that. It's pretty stupid (yet I still participate in this by trying super hard to make acceptable food...hmmm...). For the record, if I ever throw a party - you are welcome to bring store-bought cookies. Or a 2-liter of pop. Or napkins. Or whatever you want. I like when people bring anything at all. Hand on heart - I won't judge you.
So I walked into the kitchen to proffer my gifts of food, and I immediately noticed that the decor was...fancier than my unsophisticated taste properly appreciates, I guess. The wallpaper had roosters on it, but instead of feathers the roosters had exotic animal furs. There was a zebra rooster, a leopard rooster, a tiger rooster, etc. I really wanted to get out my phone and take a picture to show you, but that seemed quite rude. So I didn't. Instead, I complemented the hostess on the fact that her kitchen decor seemed "down-home, yet exotic." True, it did. It just took a bit of staring at it to get used to it. She said "Thank you. Exotic was exactly what I was thinking." Phew! Score one for me!
I stayed pretty quiet as Rex made his rounds and said hello to people. I noticed one of the wives had a Vera Bradley bag (glad I chose that one!), but I also noticed that it was last season. Then I felt like a TOTAL brat for even noticing that. Who was acting all Real Housewives of Kalamazoo now? Me, that's who! So I mentally chided myself and told myself to stop freaking out about everyone's outfits and food offerings and statuses in the company. These were real people. I am a real person. There is no reason why we can't be friends. Our spouses all work together, so we all automatically have something in common. There. I had talked myself into it. I was going to be social.
Rex introduced me to a few of the ladies there, and they were super nice. They weren't uppity at all. We talked about how lots of the hostess's decorations were so fun - she had a lot of Halloween/harvest themed things. She even had centerpieces for the tables made out of wheat. WHEAT. You wouldn't think that would look cool, but it did. She had yummy scented candles making the house smell great, and she had little pumpkins and ghosts hiding all over the place, so everywhere you looked you saw something else cute and festive. Her house was basically a Pinterest board for "How to Throw a Harvest Party."
The food was really good (as it was destined to be with that many women trying to impress each other). I got complimented on my potato salad, so that made me happy. Rex and I sat with another therapist and his wife at dinner, and they were super cool. We ended up talking to them for a lot of the night, and we found out we had a ton in common. After a while some of the guys turned on a football game, some of the women started looking at photo albums, and it was basically a really fun night with really fun, totally normal people. No wine, stilettos, or vacations to the Hamptons. I can breathe a sigh of relief. I was so apprehensive about this party, but now I hope that Rex's work has a Christmas party too, because those people are quite fun. Now I feel dumb for freaking out so much. Silly me. Oh, well. I will go toast to my successful evening with a leftover cupcake. Mmmm.
Dateline NBC
Rex and I had a pretty fun Halloween Friday. We both had the day off, which rarely happens. He almost always works Saturdays, and on Sundays we're rushing off to church and then spending time with family. We don't get those lazy mornings we used to have when we were first married and both on "normal" work schedules. Yesterday morning, we decided to make the most of the opportunity.
One thing you should know about Rex and me - we love food. LOVE it. I'm actually surprised that we're not fatties. We must have good genes or something. Anyway, yesterday morning we decided to have a "Breakfast Feast." We had an awesome time cooking together. I made waffles, Rex made stuffed omelettes, we had yogurt with homemade granola, etc. It was so delicious! It made me wish we had mornings off together more often. After a lazy morning, we ran some errands together, which is always more fun when you're with someone than when you're alone. Then we had to help my parents move into their new house, and as we were doing that the first snow flurries of the year stared swirling down on us. Hooray! That means Christmas is just around the corner!
That evening, Rex and I decided to eat a pizza for dinner and watch "something spooky" on the internet (which we project on our wall to look like a big screen). We had a bowl of candy for trick-or-treaters, but we may have eaten about as much as we handed out. Oops. As we were munching our candy and pizza, we decided to watch Dateline NBC. Have you seen it? It's a bunch of true crime mystery stories. *cue Twighlight Zone music* If you're into that kind of thing, just google "Dateline NBC full episodes," and kiss the next few hours of your life goodbye. After a few episodes of that, I'm now pretty sure that everyone's a murderer. Ha ha. I even had creepy dreams with the dateline guy narrating them. Apparently my subconscious isn't very creative, because in my dream the dateline guy said, "Next on Dateline: INSURANCE FRAUD!" And then I had this whole dream about insurance fraud. So there's that. I think it may have been because I had to fill out a bazillion health insurance papers this week, and I was really paranoid that I might accidentally fill in one of the boxes wrong and get accused of fraud (even though I was really trying to fill them out right). It's not my fault that there are miles of papers all written in legal-ese.
One episode of Dateline really freaked me out, because I'm still convinced the guy didn't even do it! This girl's husband got accused of killing her, and there was hardly any evidence. Actually, there was pretty good evidence that she died of a heart condition called Long-QT, which coroners almost never check for. I have a student with this condition, though, so I know a decent amount about it. This poor guy ended up getting convicted, which is awful because now he has to deal with losing his new wife (they had only been married three months) AND spending his life in jail. What's up with that? I realize that a lot of times the crazy spouse is the culprit, but this time I think they got it wrong.
THEREFORE, I feel compelled to put the following on this public forum:
If I ever turn up dead under suspicious circumstances, REX DIDN'T DO IT! Don't convict the poor guy - he's probably already bumming about the fact that his wife is gone. Don't make it worse. Rex is basically the best husband on earth. I have been with him for eight years, and he's never shown the slightest bit of violence. He doesn't even yell at me - ever - even if I'm being really obnoxious and probably deserve it. SO, you can move along and stop suspecting him... I don't care what kind of evidence you have. He didn't do it. I promise. I don't really believe in ghosts and haunting and such, but if I die and that stuff turns out to be true, then I will hunt you down and haunt you if you convict my rock star husband.
There - phew! - got that off my chest. Now no one can convict Rex and put him in the same position as that other dude.
I see you looking incredulously at your screen and thinking that I'm nuts. Fine. Maybe I've seen too many Datelines. Probably true. The thing is that they ALWAYS say, "I never thought this would happen in our community! Things like that only happen on TV!" Clearly they do happen sometimes. I'm like a girl scout - always prepared.
One thing you should know about Rex and me - we love food. LOVE it. I'm actually surprised that we're not fatties. We must have good genes or something. Anyway, yesterday morning we decided to have a "Breakfast Feast." We had an awesome time cooking together. I made waffles, Rex made stuffed omelettes, we had yogurt with homemade granola, etc. It was so delicious! It made me wish we had mornings off together more often. After a lazy morning, we ran some errands together, which is always more fun when you're with someone than when you're alone. Then we had to help my parents move into their new house, and as we were doing that the first snow flurries of the year stared swirling down on us. Hooray! That means Christmas is just around the corner!
That evening, Rex and I decided to eat a pizza for dinner and watch "something spooky" on the internet (which we project on our wall to look like a big screen). We had a bowl of candy for trick-or-treaters, but we may have eaten about as much as we handed out. Oops. As we were munching our candy and pizza, we decided to watch Dateline NBC. Have you seen it? It's a bunch of true crime mystery stories. *cue Twighlight Zone music* If you're into that kind of thing, just google "Dateline NBC full episodes," and kiss the next few hours of your life goodbye. After a few episodes of that, I'm now pretty sure that everyone's a murderer. Ha ha. I even had creepy dreams with the dateline guy narrating them. Apparently my subconscious isn't very creative, because in my dream the dateline guy said, "Next on Dateline: INSURANCE FRAUD!" And then I had this whole dream about insurance fraud. So there's that. I think it may have been because I had to fill out a bazillion health insurance papers this week, and I was really paranoid that I might accidentally fill in one of the boxes wrong and get accused of fraud (even though I was really trying to fill them out right). It's not my fault that there are miles of papers all written in legal-ese.
One episode of Dateline really freaked me out, because I'm still convinced the guy didn't even do it! This girl's husband got accused of killing her, and there was hardly any evidence. Actually, there was pretty good evidence that she died of a heart condition called Long-QT, which coroners almost never check for. I have a student with this condition, though, so I know a decent amount about it. This poor guy ended up getting convicted, which is awful because now he has to deal with losing his new wife (they had only been married three months) AND spending his life in jail. What's up with that? I realize that a lot of times the crazy spouse is the culprit, but this time I think they got it wrong.
THEREFORE, I feel compelled to put the following on this public forum:
If I ever turn up dead under suspicious circumstances, REX DIDN'T DO IT! Don't convict the poor guy - he's probably already bumming about the fact that his wife is gone. Don't make it worse. Rex is basically the best husband on earth. I have been with him for eight years, and he's never shown the slightest bit of violence. He doesn't even yell at me - ever - even if I'm being really obnoxious and probably deserve it. SO, you can move along and stop suspecting him... I don't care what kind of evidence you have. He didn't do it. I promise. I don't really believe in ghosts and haunting and such, but if I die and that stuff turns out to be true, then I will hunt you down and haunt you if you convict my rock star husband.
There - phew! - got that off my chest. Now no one can convict Rex and put him in the same position as that other dude.
I see you looking incredulously at your screen and thinking that I'm nuts. Fine. Maybe I've seen too many Datelines. Probably true. The thing is that they ALWAYS say, "I never thought this would happen in our community! Things like that only happen on TV!" Clearly they do happen sometimes. I'm like a girl scout - always prepared.
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