About Me

A year or so ago I sent my overseas cousin 101 things about myself to try and make her laugh. Most of them are still true, and most of them I would never post on the internet. But here's a selection of the more... suitable... ones.

10. I own a lot of jeans. A lot. I think I have an addiction to buying them. When I was in Africa, I was so mad at myself for having a jean addiction... such a waste of money. But when I got back, I still bought a lot of jeans... go figure.
11. I am the middle child, but like my cousin Molly, it would be more accurate to call me the “central child”… being the only girl definitely has some benefits.
14. I like comfy beds. I am an expert at making beds extra comfy… but only for myself. When I have to share they become less comfy because of the groove I make for my body… ask Nora, she’ll tell you all about how we both kept falling into the crater in my bed so that we practically had to spoon, even though my bed is huge. (I have moved on to SpaceFoam, which has eliminated the above problem).
16. My dog Riley is really cute but also pretty annoying. She almost died once when she was a little puppy, so I think now she feels like she has to make the most of life and she runs and plays all the time that she is not sleeping.
17. I am Catholic. I don’t really agree with a lot of what the Church says, but something about the rituals and the ancientness of mass is comforting to me, so for now I think it is the right religion for me.
19. My family used to have another dog; her name was Bandit. She was the best dog in the world, just ask my Dad. My brother wanted to get her stuffed; she was cremated instead. My brothers insisted that I name my dog either Bandit 2, or Re-run... I didn't, and as a punishment to me they called her Retard instead of Riley for almost a year.
24. I am pretty clumsy. I have the scars to prove it. Except the one scar on my cheek, that one is compliments of one of my brothers punching me in the face during a game of Marco Polo on the 4th of July when I was 12.
25. My parents were going to name me either Natalie or Adrienne. My Dad wouldn’t let me be Adrienne because of Rocky and my Mom didn’t want people calling me Nat because she didn’t want her daughter to sound like a bug. So they picked Margaret. Good story, huh?
35. There is a children’s book called Do Princesses Really Wear Hiking Boots? The answer is yes, I do.
41. I have really weird dreams. A lot. Some of my friends think I am crazy. My mom thinks that Stephen King probably has really weird dreams too. Mine are insane like Stephen King’s novels.
42. I have never actually read a Stephen King novel. I’ve just seen the movies. Usually I read books and don’t watch movies, but I don’t like Stephen King anyway.
43. I do like Harry Potter. I love Harry Potter. The books, not the movies. I read them when I was lonely in Africa, which was a lot.
48. When I was 13 and in Ireland I swam with a dolphin named Fungi or something like that. I had a panic attack in the water though - it was cold.
54. I was a bit of a tomboy growing up. I guess another consequence of having 4 brothers… I even carved my initials in the tree in the back yard, such a boy thing to do.
57. I like falling in love on the train. Well not really falling in love, but I like finding a cute guy on the train and do the whole eye contact thing. It’s fun mostly because you’ll never see each other again.
62. I broke a bunch of bones in my hand and wrist when I was in high school, now I have tendonitis and arthritis, which sucks. But my doctor is the best; he was on Oprah. I call him Dr. Nose Hair and I can’t actually remember his real name right now.
63. Mean nicknames are my weakness. I try not to be mean, but sometimes the nicknames are just so funny. There were a lot at Loyola… Barbie on Crack, Jon Benet, Running Chinese Boy…
70. My confirmation name was (is?) Anne. I choose it because of Anne of Green Gables, so much for the saints.
75. I like that book Where the Sidewalk Ends. That guy is really smart. Seriously.
81. I hate mayonnaise. The grossest thing on Earth. I don’t know if I have ever even tasted it, but the smell gives it away.
83. I have never smoked a cigarette in my whole life. I have a weakness for addictions, and really don’t need that one.
85. I used to joke that I wanted to be a philanthropist when I grew up. Marry rich and travel to remote places giving away someone else’s money all while wearing a Chanel suit.
88. My favorite flavor of ice cream is mint chocolate chip. The green kind.
93. If I only had a month to live the first thing that I would do is get married. Weddings are so much fun, especially ones with an open bar.
94. There are a lot of things I want to do before I die. I even have a list. But there are way more things than I could ever fit on a list.
95. I don’t like secrets. But I kinda have a bunch of them. I guess everybody does, even though there isn’t much to like about secrets.
96. I am pretty good at badminton. When I broke my arm, I learned to play left-handed, and was really good. I play with my right now, and am still good. It is a stupid game though, I wish I were good a better sport.
99. I miss our old beach house. It was slanted, but that was part of the fun. I miss having a beach house all together. I don’t miss having to sleep in the bed near the bathroom, but I would sleep there again if it meant we could get our beach house back.

Sitcom

One of my good friends recently told me that my life is significantly more like a sitcom than a "real life." The more I thought about it, the more I think she might be right. Crazy stuff happens in my life. Weird coincidences abound - the unusual has become usual. Just in the past week or so I can think of a bunch of examples. I went to a doctor's appointment in North Philly and while walking back to the subway station I randomly run into the "Meathead". I didn't have my glasses on, so I was definitely staring at him awkwardly long. I got hit on by an almost 40 year-old man with multiple children (remind me to add ex-wives and children to the dealbreaker list). On the bus, I sat behind a craaazy couple, the woman kept saying to the man "what are you going to do about it, hit me?" When they got up, she tapped me on the shoulder and said "He's too much of a pussy to hit me anyway." I just stared at her. I lost my shoe in the subway station, but some lady found it and gave it back to me. A guy I used to find attractive was wearing a leather driving (Mr. Huxtable-style) hat at the bar on Friday night. Then one of my friends decided to make fun of said hat. I laughed excessively, only before realizing the hat and it's wearer were standing right next to us and heard everything. (I am fully aware my soul is hell bound).

Then Saturday night a cute guy was talking to me at the bar, and the only person in the whole world that we both know just so happens to be the guy I was most recently hooking up with. Later that night, I went to an after-hours place with some friends but decided to leave before them. After weathering multiple crude comments being yelled from passersby, I finally got a cab which a random stranger decided to share with me. The stranger proceeded to ask me 2.3 million questions, then told me his entire life story including his recent decision to start seeing a psychiatrist, paid the entire cab fare and gave me his business card (which I promptly discarded in the first trashcan I passed.) I woke up this morning to a text message from one of my brothers, who presumably had not yet gone to bed from the night before, that said only "Morning Large Marge" and spent a few minutes wondering how I have any confidence at all having grown up with 4 brothers, then was exhausted from thinking and went back to sleep.

Interestingly, this past week has been one of the more normal weeks I've had recently... I guess I have become used to my life being sitcom-esque.

My Weekend

Reasons my weekend could have sucked:
1. I lost one of my favorite earrings at the bar.
2. My brother's ex-girlfriend told me that I would never do any better than my ex-boyfriend and that my brother would never do any better than her.
3. A few of my friends got arrested.
4. I went to a party filled with ugly guys.
5. I took the train to New York hungover and on two hour's sleep.
6. I finally got back to my apartment late Sunday with hours of work ahead of me.

Reasons my weekend really didn't suck at all:
1. I didn't cry about it this time.
2. My brother's ex-girlfriend, however, shed a tear or two when I ignored her and told everyone else to keep her away from me.
3. My friends were really wild and fun pre-arrest.
4. The ugly guys were funny as hell (except I am still not sure about the one who told me that if I were 6 inches shorter he would have been laying down some serious game... compliment or not? I'm not sure...)
5. I took the train to New York with my Mom to see the Annie Leibovitz exhibit and it was amazing and I loved every second of it.
6. Instead of doing all of my work, I opted to sleep through my Monday morning classes.

Mystery Michael

My undergraduate college was pretty small and almost everyone's email address was their first initial followed by their last name @loyola.edu. People with common last names like mine would have a number after their last name. I, however, had no number - just the normal email address like everyone else. But poor Michael, we share a last name and he had the unfortunate luck of getting the email address with the number (although he's two years old than me, go figure). So of course, I have been getting emails for the past five years wrongly sent to me instead of Michael. Usually about once a month I get one and without fail every time I forward him the email, and he replies "Thanks again Margaret".

You really start to learn a lot about someone after 5 years of getting their emails. I know he played rugby, I know who his roommates were, I know he was a finance major, I know who his academic advisor was and the times of a couple of their appointments, I know his English Lit professor misplaced one of his papers, I know what bars his friends go to for happy hour, and I know that his ex-girlfriend got married this past summer. Last spring his friends planned a booze cruise, sent a bunch of emails out, and then one of them realized they accidentally invited "Margaret" instead of "Michael" before I had gotten a chance to check my email and forward them on to Michael who usually would then email everyone with the correct email address. Anyway, his friends were being funny, and this time they decided to take it upon themselves to invite me on the booze cruise also. Unfortunately, they all still live in Baltimore, so I couldn't make it (Not that I would have gone anyway). The following Monday I got an email from most of the guys on the list saying something along the lines of "Margaret, where were you?" or "We missed you on the cruise, Margaret." I responded to the whole list thanking them for their cordial invite and informing them of Michael's actual email address, and signed the email "Margaret". I have a bunch of friends that are their year of school, but I can almost guarantee that not a single one of them knows that my real name is Margaret. I wonder if I'll ever get to meet Michael - I do know that he goes by Mike, but if I have to be Margaret, he has to be Michael.

Here's to 2007

I don't think I have ever made New Year's Resolutions before, but if I were to start here's the ones I'd make for 2007:

1. No more late night binge eating (or catch that 'anorexia' thing that's going around).
2. Stop making up mean nicknames for people.
3. No more watching Extreme Makeover with my roommate to make ourselves feel better when we're a little depressed.
4. Actually start showing up to my job.
5. Think of a password other than "password".
6. Stop spending more money than I have in my bank account. (Sorry Mom!)
7. Find a support group for others like me who are addicted to buying jeans and Pumas.
8. Stop skipping so many AA meetings (kidding...)
9. Take myself less serisously - if that is at all possible.
10. Learn what "resolution" means.