Perfect Guy, Perfect Dress

So. Dress shopping. Wow. I was expecting days and weeks of searching for the perfect dress. This morning, my two bff's and I ventured out to battle the bridal boutiques. The first one we started at was a mixture of horrific bridesmaid dresses and matronly mother of the bride outfits on the first floor, and a secretive den of wedding dresses above. We arrived without an appointment but luck was with us. We could get in in half an hour. We perused the bottom floor, recoiled in horror at the things we saw, and basically did what we do best. Which would be judging others.

We were called upstairs to the "showroom" where we met our consultant and were overwhelmed with a plethora of dresses. She asked what I liked and basically I said, "Nothing white (because really, who are we kidding?) and nothing puffy." This last was met with groans from my bridal party, as they both enjoy a nice poofy "cupcake" dress.

A couple of not so great dresses were brought out, I donned them and just as quickly removed them. The next was one I was interested in. Champagne in colour, lacy but not obscene, subtle A-line skirt. Delightful. I put it on. Even more delightful. It went on the "maybe" list. The consultant brought out another in the same colour. I wasn't sure about it when I saw it. I put it on. It was FABULOUS. I wore it around. The other bridal party upstairs gave it three thumbs up. I asked for a couple more. Including a poofy one to appease the angry mob. I tried on three more. I disliked them all. I had already made my decision. One shop. Four dresses. Painless.

If you are interested in seeing my WEDDING DRESS you may click here to see it. Mine will be "Ivory & Champagne lace over Ivory with Mocha sash".

Big News

Holy moly! The last time I wrote anything here was 30 January??? Well, good readers, if there's any of you left, have I got a story for you. You know most of it. Man of dreams, living in sin, etc etc. But there is something you don't know. On the eleventh of April, 2009, I became engaged to Mr Wonderful. He hid the ring in an Easter basket full of chocolate and when I found it, he got down on his knee and asked me to marry him. Obviously, I said yes.

We have kind of set a date. We're hoping for either the 26th of September or the 3rd of October. We (I) want a fall wedding and neither of us want to wait another year. We're getting on in age (I recently turned thirty. Ugh.), and don't have the luxury of a long engagement. So the stress of planning a wedding in six months or less starts now.

The main event, DRESS SHOPPING, commences on this coming Saturday. There is definitely an air of excitement around here. I can barely contain myself. I can't wait to put the first one on. I think that will be when it sinks in. I AM GETTING MARRIED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So. The Genius Diaries resume, chronicling my quest for the perfect wedding. Meaning a nice place for a ceremony, a cheap, yet fabulous reception, and the beginning of an amazing life as Mrs Wonderful.

Get Out Your Barf Bags

So it has been a while since my last post. And things have... transpired. The biggest and most important is that I have found the man I'm going to spend the rest of my life with. No, not the keeper. He just may have finally grasped that I'm not coming back. No, not the enigma of a man who helped me leave the relationship I was unhappy in, and then, like the Littlest Hobo, was gone again.

It's another man. A man I dated twelve years ago. I was his first girlfriend. We spent the month of August hanging out, holding hands and kissing. He left for university in Saskatchewan and we decided to try and keep the fire burning, through letters. But after a month or so, I wrote him a five page rambling mess that ended in "PS - You're dumped." He came back for Christmas and for New Years Eve we made out in a stairwell after slamming packets of KoolAid. And that was that, for eleven years.

And then, through the power that is facebook, we were reunited. It was actually the second day I had my account. Not even a full twenty-four hours in fact, when I received a message along with a friend invite, from Ren, asking if I was who he thought it was. It was. We chatted a bit and when I moved to Calgary, we started hanging out. He helped me through the hardest parts of a crappy fall, and we became very good friends, then make-out friends, and then I told him I loved him. It was perfect. I moved into his house about a month ago and we haven't looked back since.

You may read back through the Diaries of this genius and see such things as, "I have come to the conclusion that it is the fool who chains himself to a single person for the entirety of his life." or "No, I never want to have children. NEVER. EVER." Turns out that it wasn't these things I didn't want, I just didn't want them with what turned out to be the wrong person. The right person, however, can make you see that yes, you can spend the rest of your life with someone and yes, you do want children, lots and lots of children with beautiful curly hair and gorgeous green eyes.

Gentle readers, I have found this person. And I am going to marry him. And we are going to a have a collection of babies with dark curly hair and bright green eyes. We're going to fight and make up (and make up again). We're going to put up Christmas lights at Christmas and hide eggs at Easter and cover the house in spider webs at Hallow'een. We're going to fight with teenagers and ask ourselves why we thought having them was a good idea. We're going to cry at their weddings and bounce their children on our knees. We're going to sit on the porch and grow old together.

I know you're all sick to your stomachs right now, thinking, "What has happened to this girl?" I'm sorry for the gooey love story and I promise to return to the usual witty anecdotes that keep you coming back. And one more thing before I go, now that your stomachs are empty, we've already looked at rings, and I'm anxiously awaiting the day I scream, "YES!!!!!!!" (although I'm screaming it quite often these days as well...)

It Had To Be Him

Remember the post FAIL from 25 June? The one where I went to Tim Hortons and the Bagel Guy creeped me out? I went to Tim Hortons today. That one. Guess who was at the register? Bagel Guy. Conversation as follows:

BG: "Well hello. Congratulations."

Me: "Extra large steeped tea. Double double. Twelve grain bagel with cream cheese. Toasted. Please."

BG: "Did you want the bagel toasted before or after the cream cheese? It's just kind of messy if you do it after."

Me: *eyes roll* "Before if you could. Thanks."

BG: "Aren't you going to ask what I congratulated you for?"

Me: "I wasn't, but what?"

BG: "For being my prettiest customer today."

Me: *HUGE eye roll* "Wow. Thanks."

BG: "It's not everyday someone like you comes into this place."

Me: "I was here in June. You made my bagel."

BG: (Boss shows up. Thank God) "Here's your tea, ma'am. Have a great day."

Me: "Thanks."

The bad news is this Tim's is very near my new job. And I will be there everyday for well deserved yet unappreciated flattery. And steeped tea.

Public Service Announcement

YOU ARE NOT INVISIBLE WHEN YOU ARE IN YOUR CAR.

Not when you're driving it, not when you're waiting at a light and certainly not when you're sitting in it in a parking lot at night with the interior light on. So PLEASE, for the sake of others around you, don't pick your nose at lights, or touch your genitals for any reason in the parking lot. We can see you and you DO make us want to vomit.

Tang

Today, in Zellers (where I never go if it can be avoided, which it couldn't today. I had a fabric softener emergency and thought that Zellers would be less retarded than Wal Mart), I overheard the end of a conversation. In fact, all I got was the last sentence: "I'd rather drink Tang."

What could possibly be so awful that you would rather drink Tang. I rolled around a few possibilities, and was able to come up with a list of things I would choose Tang over.

1) Toilet water. Unless it had Tang in it. Then I might drink it.
2) Goat milk.
3) Camel milk. Artificial flavour or the real thing.
4) Gasoline.
5) Chartreuse
6) Cola (including, but not limited to Coke, Diet Coke, Pepsi and Diet Pepsi)
7) Blood (excluding human)
8) Mollusc slime
9) Raw sewage
10) Egg Nog (but I guess that falls into the raw sewage category)

Caution: Drama Ahead

I'm having a day. I was sick with the Irish Flu, my hair took an hour and a half to comb, and then I was woken up out of a four hour nap by a phone call I did NOT want to answer, but I did because I love to torture myself.

I went to Safeway, and at the checkout, I was accosted by the cheerfulness of a cashier who enjoyed her job WAY too much.

"How are you tonight?" she asked me.

How am I? Do you really care? How about shitty, thanks. I just got dumped via text message. The man I'm convinced that I want to spend a good portion of my life with is emotionally (and physically) unavailable and will be for the rest of his life. The one that I don't want to spend any more of my life with is relentlessly pursuing me with promises of marriage and security. But not happiness. I will be thirty in 154 days and have done absolutely nothing with my life thus far. And not to be melodramatic or anything, but everyday I look out the window at work and wonder how hard it would be to jump. I'm over being second best all the time. I just want to be good enough, instead of almost.

Instead, I just said, "Fine thanks and you?" And she proceeded to tell me about what a great day she was having.