Things Better Kept in the Vault

I had an embarrassing moment the other day, when Mr. Iceberg joined my family for dinner at The Italian’s house. During dinner, we ended up reminiscing about a home movie we made ages ago (courtesy of the awkward years of the mid-90s).  As kids, my sisters and The Italian daughters produced our own “Grammys” show.

It was hideous. I played Madonna. The Italian girls were Mariah Carey, Gloria Estefan, and the Grammys MC. Even worse, my sister Lex played Steven Spielberg and Boo was Barbara Eden from I Dream of Genie. What the hell kind of Grammys was this?

Fortunately for everyone, the tape has gone missing. Unfortunately for me, Dad McBlog was now enthusiastically in the mood for humiliating me with my past.  When we returned home from dinner, out came the old home videos.

The thing about McBlog home videos is that my dad is a professional videographer, so everything we made ended up looking like a feature film. Forget grainy images of me running naked though a sprinkler at the age of 4… We’ve got master works of mortification in the form of school projects and one-on-one interviews. Hours upon hours of perfectly lighted, perfectly edited braces and bad haircuts.

In my first decade of life, I was actually a really cute kid. Busting out those videos would have been bearable, so of course we had to watch a winner from good ol’ 1999. My freshman year of high school. Woof.

The video, made for an English class project, was titled “Ghastly Suspects” and boooooy is it ghastly!  A murder mystery in which I portray both a grieving best friend and an (apparently) ethnically-confused Spanish/English/half-retarded maid. Eight minutes of sheer horror. Iceberg loved it (that or I’m on the verge of getting dumped).

Next time, I’m going to have to repair my image (and self-esteem) by showing Mr. Iceberg one from the cute years. Get ready for Summer Weekend ’89!

A Stinky Bus Is Always Involved

Okay, okay. I’m here. All that begging and pleading for more posts was starting to make me feel like a celebrity (and we all know there’s only room in this town for one celebrity, *ahem Miss Moon*).

Anyway, a handful of things to catch up on since it’s been, oh what’s that? Three weeks? Sheesh, you’d think I actually have a life!

1) Duluth. It was soooo much fun. Or as Mom McBlog would say, “a riot”. There was no actual rioting, but I didn’t get pretty hungover that Saturday.  Here are the highlights:

• We conveniently got a flat tire on I-35 near the beautiful town of Hinckley, Minnesota. I can safely say that the nicest people I’ve ever met work at Keith’s Towing & Repair. They’re also not money-hungry grease monkeys… just very honest and polite grease monkeys.
• Dragging Mr. Iceberg to the Gooseberry Falls and Split Rock Lighthouse. A notion I assumed to be true was validated quite substantially while we sweat our bums off on the North Shore that Friday: Iceberg does not enjoy sightseeing.
• Downing margaritas on a deck before experiencing Club Saratoga, the fully-nude strip club, right next door to a souvenir shop in Canal Park.
• Sitting in between the busy kitchen and the falling-down-drunk girl at Fitger’s microbrewery for lunch (the beer-battered fries though… mouthwatering).
• Wasting away a cold and gloomy Saturday afternoon at Adventure Zone, playing skeeball and mini golf. And we went antiquing.
• Whizzing down Spirit Mountain on the Alpine Coaster after touring Glensheen on our way out of town on Sunday.

Basically, we ate and drank and did touristy things. The three days went by too fast, but fortunately we have another fun getaway coming up when we head down to Chicago to visit Kraz and Evie Bear in September!

2) The next weekend, I was blessed to see all (most) of my favorite girls for Wolf’s bachelorette party. After catching up on girl talk and downing a fridge full of Jell-O shots, we loaded our 25 mini skirts on to the most terrifically nauseating party bus in the world.  This thing was a beast, I tell you.  Devoid of air conditioning, the thick air of a 95 degree day lingered above the booze-caked floor.  We could smell the full toilet before even getting on the bus, a stench that sure didn’t improve over the course of the night.

The best part, however, was of course our charming/coked-out, middle-aged bus driver Wendi.  It was like a million wrongs equaling a right. How could this night not be totally amazing with a ride as mind-blowing as this?

Well, it was amazing. There were a handful of wrong turns, mystery cocktails served in buckets, some rain, we party crashed a rave  at Dick’s Bar in Hudson, Wisconsin (complete with glowsticks, body paint and strobe lights) … and I think I flicked off a piece of popcorn later in the evening. Despite the odds we all got safely home at 4AM… after being pulled over by a state trooper… twice.

The next morning at IHOP, my body was still seriously coming to terms with the night’s festivities and I was forced to take my Bacon Temptation omelet home in a doggy bag.

As for this past weekend, I’d like to give a shout out to Mom McBlog, it was her birthday on Saturday, so HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!  We had a great day, filled with family time (and a picnic, and a comedy show).

Then last night, I got to have a sleepover with my sista from another mista Hirari who’s back from a 2-year stint in J-Pan!  It was lovely to see you, my friend. I hope you had a safe drive back to Des Moines. Don’t move to Colorado before I see you again.

And here we are! In August already! State Fair, whaaaat?!

I’m going to have to let you go now because A) this was a lot of mumbo-jumbo all thrown at you at once and I know you need time to process. And B) my laptop is flaming hot on my lap (electronic menopause?). Like, it’s making me sweat. Sexy, I know.

L8ER fools!!

Xxoxoxoxooxoxooxoxoxoxoxooxooxoxooxoxooxoxox! (<— heat insanity)