Guest Blog Entry: Vices

An early morning message from my blogless older sister:

I was coming out of the infamous Friendly's this morning; a place where the "friendly" staff share, after seeing your "Vote Pro-Choice" button, that the solution is not abortion, but slavery ... but that's another story. I was carrying my delicious morning treat - a 32-ounce-49-cent-keep-the-penny-every-morning treat, Diet Pepsi. It's my only vice (wink, wink) and the one I can admittedly say to which I'm addicted. As I was leaving the convenience store, I noticed an administrator from my office in her car just getting ready to leave. This is the woman who is very well put together at work and has her own one-sided competition with me about who can do more marathons. I quickly hid my morning treat behind me wondering if she'd seen me. She did. I noticed her similar coy movements as she too hid her morning treat from my view - but not before I noticed what it was; a pack of cigarettes, Marlboros. We both went about our pretense of not seeing the other. However, as I left I felt better about my Diet Pepsi and held it up proudly for everyone to see.

Weekend Recap

Dave and I spent the weekend in Michigan for a friend's wedding. I can't really say much about Michigan, though, because we spent most of our time in the hotel watching home improvement shows on TLC. We did drive a bit out of our way to sample the libations at Bell's Brewery in Kalamazoo. We drank over the lunch hour with the warehouse workers who came up from the basement. We seemed to fit in better than the briefcase carrying, flip-flop wearing, cell phone talking businessman who, when asked what he'd like to drink, replied that he'd take "Whatever is closest to Bud Light." The lady bartender should have given him water, but kindly suggested an Oberon instead. He took it and sipped it gently between bites of celery and hummus next to the warehouse workers scarfing burgers and drinking carafes of Bell's Porter.

Still, the guy seemed less bothered by his ill-fit than I did at table #8 at the wedding dinner. Each of the three couples with whom we sat took 20 minutes to share how their weddings differed from the one we were currently attending. I had to drink one glass of wine for each story. And I had to drink a fourth one when they asked if Dave and I were married? Engaged? Dating for how long? And a fifth during the sad silence that followed our answers -- as if we had just explained that we both had a terminal illness and didn't plan to make it through the year.