Thursday, August 20, 2009

Puddles and Awards

First off, I have recently received two different blog awards, but the same award. They are from Robyn at Putting Pen to Paper and Lady Glamis. Since each was suppose to allow me to list five bloggers, I have combined it to put ten. There are a couple others that I *really* wanted to add, but I kinda bent the rules as it was. So if your name isn't here, it was you that I was totally thinking of!


While this award is traditionally used to represent animal friendly bloggers, the writing community has embraced it as celebrating encouraging writer. So I will say five bloggers who have been encouraging me in my writing.

1) Lynn - My first commenter...so she deserves to be my first on my list!
2) Spy - Technically Spy is Natasha. She recently moved out onto the open road in an RV. She used to be a piano teacher with a blog called spyscribbler so I still call her the old name, but the new blog is super cool!
3) Shelli at Market my Words- Writes about writing from an interesting perspective--marketing
4) Stu - Stu is wrapping up his PhD, but always find time to write about various occurrences with his life or his writing.
5) Charles at Razored Zen - I've been reading his book, Swords of Talera and loving it. He's such a great commenter and always has something interesting to say.
6) Struggling Writer - Real name: Paul. He's a fellow techie, so that's fun.
7) Barry - He's been through so much with battling and defeating cancer and has over 600 followers, but still seems to find time to comment on my blog!
8) Christina - Just has interesting things and observations going on in her life.
9) GutsyWriter- Really named Sonia. She took her whole family to Belize in order to get her kids to be less materialistic. Seems to work because all three of her boys are doing very well for themselves at their various life stages (just after college down to high school, I believe).
10) Raph's Ramblings - This giraffe takes the time to talk to us earthlings about his interesting life on another planet--one full of giraffe-ie things.


Sooo...that was the "awards" part of my title. What about the puddles? Well, I am glad that you asked :-P

My husband and I have been trying to re-fi our condo. It's been a super pain because I didn't have any credit history until we got the condo two years ago (side note, parents of teens and college students, get your kids on some form of credit. Make sure they are responsible with it, but get them on credit. Our world is run by computers today and that little credit number is so important.)

Anyways, I took over my most recent set of documents to the mortgage lady today. It was kind of drizzling so I grabbed my starbucks in one hand and my umbrella in the other and set off. The walk over was fine. It's summery and I enjoy being outside. I gave Wanda the papers and set back off to work.

Unfortunately, the new shoes I was wearing had different plans for me. You see, as I crossed the street and attempted to step over a puddle, my heal (which wasn't properly secured, something that I normally look for in a shoe, but my others were literally falling apart and and been secured with elmers about ten times too many so I hastily got shoes that were moderately comfortable and ignored the fact that they were gloried flip flops with a wedge)--anyhoo, my heal slipped perpendicular to my shoe.

PLOP.

That was me. Falling. Into a dirty roadside mud puddle. On top of my umbrella. And under my Starbucks. Remember it's Chicago so about a hundred people saw me. I had mud up to my right knee. That was better than my left side. There was mud on my bright orange dress up to my hip. AND, the coffee was all over the road. I scrambled up. I didn't need to be hit by a car again this year. (Twas only a bump).

But then, suddenly, it began to rain harder. I put my umbrella above my head, but the mangled metal spikes sticking in all directions only seemed to direct the water onto my head instead of away from it. So there I am, covered in mud, underneath the el tracks with the rain cascading down. Empty Starbucks in one hand and smooshed umbrella in the other. Oh, and when I got back to my block, it had been closed so I had to walk around.

What else could I do? I tried to frown, but couldn't, I just laughed. What a perfectly horrible situation.

I am not trying to sound vain, but usually when I walk any distance, especially in a brightly colored dress through Chicago with lots of people, I get some form of complimentary comment, gaze or noise. I've got that whole cute, but not too pretty, approachable thing going on, especially since I try to always walk around with a bouncy step and a smile. People usually say hi. Don't get me wrong, on this walk I got looks. Far form complimentary, though. And given my laughter and overall appearance, some were down right confused and worried. But, seriously, how could you NOT laugh at yourself after doing that?!

Once the rain had gone away and I'd managed to clean myself up in the bathroom sink a little bit, I went for a new Starbucks. The sun was shining. Sun glasses on my head, Caramel Frappachino in my hand, sunny dress, sunny smile. Guy in truck whistled. I waved.

Rain; it goes away.

I love summer.

13 tidbits:

Tana said...

Congrats to you and the winners! I'm starting my refi tomorrow, bleh.

Lauren said...

@t. anne- Good luck on the re-fi. I hope that it's easier on you than it was for us. We've been working on it since late March (but we switched companies because the first one pulled our credit six different times)

stu said...

At least you were able to laugh about it. And it could be worse. I live on a farm, so there's all sorts of fun stuff to fall into.

And thanks for the blog award.

Raph G. Neckmann said...

Thank you so much for the blog award, Lauren, I'm honoured! I shall wear it round my neck.

Your puddle experience did make me laugh. And I so agree with your last two sentences!

Spy Scribbler said...

LOVE this post! (And not because you gave me an award at the beginning, although THANK YOU!) LOL!

That's hilarious. And you described it so well: "What a perfectly horrible situation."

It was perfectly so, wasn't it?

Charles Gramlich said...

Congrats to you, and thanks very much for thinking of me! Yeah!

Sounds like the kind of rain we get down here. Just got rained on a bit coming back from lunch, but it was only a sprinkle so I'm OK.

I'm glad you're enjoying Swords of Talera. It's always great to hear that someone likes what I've written.

Gutsy Living said...

Thankfully you didn't sprain an ankle or break something. I didn't know the streets were muddy in Chicago. Anyway, did you make it back to the refi lady?

THANK YOU so much for the kind award. I have to say I have not posted my awards, not that I have many, but I already have things in my blog sidebar, that they would not fit.

You need to post a photo of you in your orange dress. I bet it looks great with your dark hair. A nice contrast.
Also thanks for the advice on credit cards. My almost 22-year-old puts all his groceries etc. on the credit card and pays it off each month. He said it was to build up his credit rating.

ChristaCarol Jones said...

LOL at stu!

Great post, and good for you Miss Positive! I always try to find the positive in perfectly horrible situations. Makes life less crappy. :)

Andrea Coulter said...

Thanks for the blog award!! And thanks for the story about the puddle--hooray for smiling in the face of mud, rain and misbehaving shoes :)

Lauren said...

@stu- lol, I suppose there are many things on a farm that would be very un-fun to fall into :-P

@raph- thanks :) I think it's important to remember that rain goes away, no matter if it is literal or figurative!

@spy- It was perfectly horible. All my coworkers enjoyed giggling about it. I think I will be told not to walk into wet paint or cement etc for months.

@charles- With lake Michigan right next to the city, Chicago gets some interesting weather patterns. It will cascade down and then be bright and sunny a little later (like it did) quite a bit.

@gutsy- Yes, it was quite a tumble. I think that if I hadn't fallen on the umbrella I probably would have been hurt.

@christaCarol- I always try to be positive. It makes everything much easier. And if you can't laugh at yourself, who can you laugh at?

@lynn- misbehaving shoes indeed. I have learned my lesson about them. Not for rainy weather wear.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the award :) I'm flattered.

LoveRundle said...

Wow, I got tagged! I don't know if I know as many bloggers as you do. Sorry about the bad luck with the mud puddle.

Shelli (srjohannes) said...

aw! thanks I am so behind on blogs! ill pass this on this week.

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