In case you’re wondering, I didn’t make a video with my brother. I gave my mom a stuffed animal pig that doubles as a slingshot and oinks when it hits things. Pete gave her a hand-carved wooden box from India. No wonder I’m her favorite.

“Anybody can bring the green beans amandine to the neighborhood potluck, but it takes someone very special to bring the funk.”

- A card over my mom’s desk at home.

My mom has learned how to text message, google chat and email. But the introduction of picture messages into our relationship has been by far the most entertaining.

For example, I received this yesterday:

“I took this at a coffee shop. The guy said it was Caughy’s equation. i think he is single. xoxo”

Over the last week, I’ve run into four people that I used to work with at The Company (one I really, REALLY wish I hadn’t seen. Apparently five months wasn’t long enough apart). And of course they’re all very nice and they each asked how I’ve been and whether I like my new job. One of them even asked what life’s like on The Outside. I was with Kara at the time, so we started chatting about the things we liked and didn’t like about our new jobs. (Note, The Plastics all used to work at The Company as well, so I guess that number should really be seven instead of four, but I actually SCHEDULE the times I see them. The others were totally random).

Kara and I both decided that we’re much happier at our new jobs (Duh.), but that we’re also really glad we worked at The Company. Namely, because we met so many cool people there. We both are now in industries that we are passionate about (me: helping sick kids. her: drinking alcohol) and we work for great organizations, but our coworkers could never measure up to the ones we left at The Company. For instance, my coworkers at The Foundation are almost exclusively female, married, and older than I am. At The Company, I worked with mostly twentysomething single people. Now, the other Foundationeers are definitely cool and usually down for a happy hour, as long as it’s scheduled at least a week in advance, but they don’t do much on the weekends because they have husbands and mortgages and maybe kids.

I also told the guy who asked about The Outside that I had been at my new job for 3 months before I learned how to check my work email from home. And that when I finally did it, it was because I actually cared, not because I was afraid of what might be happening. His mind was totally blown.

It is strange, though, working with people who are at different places in their lives. One of my coworkers, Traci, always asks me what I did last night. She says things like, “Tell me about your fabulous single life! What did you do last night?” To which I usually respond with things like, “Well, I went to happy hour at this place on the East Side and then went home and watched 30 Rock on my DVR. It was a Tuesday, Trace.”

And then there was the work happy hour we had a few weeks ago on a Friday. We went to Bettie Ford’s, because they have $2 beers and awesome $3 food options AND their happy hour goes until 9:00. The bad part is they don’t open until 5:00, so we can’t leave work early with the excuse that we need to go reserve a table. But it’s pretty sweet to be the only group in the bar and have the Wii all to yourselves. Anyway, when we get there, Tessa, who is 8 months pregnant and married, says, “So, Meg, is this place cool? Is this a popular place for people to go?” I responded with, “Yeah, Mom. All the cool kids hang out here these days.” I mean, really?

And then we threw a baby shower for Tessa last Wednesday. It was a great time, but I was the only single person there (as always) and one of the few who hadn’t had any children. I learned more about pregnancy in an hour than I ever, EVER wanted to know. It was so horrible that I actually had a nightmare that I was pregnant the next night. Seriously.

So, Kara and I have found a happy medium hanging out with our very nice, funny, interesting coworkers during the day, doing things that we enjoy, and then going out with people we used to work with in the evenings. Other than the occasional awkward conversation or horrible pregnancy nightmare, it seems to be going quite well.

I found out that something horrible happened to an old friend of mine today. Actually, probably my oldest friend in the world. And it made me think about a lot of very deep, meaningful things. I wonder how all of the bad things in the world seem to happen to a select small group of people. I wonder how I got so lucky. And I wonder why it was Bethany instead of me.

I say, fairly often, that I think I’m the luckiest girl in the world. And I mean it. I have the most amazing friends and family. I have cousins that are like siblings to me and a brother who is one of my best friends. I have the best parents anyone could ask for, and a roommate who’s basically another member of my family. I have found friends that I can count on no matter what happens in life, and I know I will stay close with them forever. And although I’ve experienced some sad and difficult things, the joyful ones will always outweigh and outnumber them.

I completely understand, as I think most people do, why Mother Teresa questioned her faith. Knowing that horrible things can happen to innocent people is so awful, so unfathomable, that it’s hard to think someone or something that was “in control” would let them happen. I believe in the general goodness of life, but it’s really hard when such terrible things happen to such good people.

Thank you, world, for the life you’ve given me. I don’t understand it, but thank you.

“It is human nature to think wisely and act in an absurd fashion.”
- Anatole France

Ever been to Butte, Montana?

Butte is known for a lot of things. The spelling of the city is the butt of many jokes, including in films such as Toy Story and Beevis and Butthead Do America. Butte also boasts (or did at one time) the highest number of Irish people per capita outside of Ireland, which was cause for MTV to actually broadcast live from Butte on St. Patrick’s Day in 2002. It’s Evel Knievel’s birthplace. It’s also the only city in the United States where possession and consumption of open containers of alcoholic beverages are always allowed on the street throughout the entire city (although not in vehicles). It’s a famous old mining town that used to have underground tunnels that connected the mines to the brothels so men didn’t have to go up to ground level and risk being caught by their wives. It was home to one of the largest and most prosperous copper mines in the history of the world. If you ask anyone from Montana, though, they will tell you that the trees grow funny near Butte, that the Berkeley Pit is so polluted geese have been killed just by landing on it, and that the people from Butte talk funny.

Butians, as they’re known, have an accent that I would describe as a mix between Jersey and rural Minnesota, but also very country. They say things like, “So I says to the guy, I says…” and they begin and end sentences with “you know.” They also don’t use the letter S at the end of words to show that they’re plural. For instance, you would be “shooting squirrel” instead of “shooting squirrels”.

One of my favorite Butian (pronounced B’yew-shin) words is “tret.” A friend of my mom’s once told her that she didn’t find out until she was in her twenties that “tret” is not actually ANY FORM of the verb “to treat.” She was so flabbergasted that she immediately told her dad, who promptly told her she was wrong. “Sure it is, Eddi. You know, like ‘My husband didn’t tret me right so I’m gonna leave!’”

The reason I’m telling you all this is because I think a woman at my office was raised by Butians. She was giving us a tutorial on how to use the new Microsoft Office 2007 yesterday and she was talking about those little squiggly lines that sometimes show up under words in Microsoft programs. She said that in the 2007 upgraded version, they not only have red squiggles for spelling errors and green squiggles for grammatical errors, they have introduced blue squiggles for contextual errors. (For example, if I typed “their” instead of “there”, I would get a blue squiggle).

But when this lady, who we’ll call Connie, explained the blue squiggle, she said this:

“It helps with words that are said the same but spelled different. You know, like “were” and “were”.”

[She actually pronounced both words the same. I couldn't figure out what she was talking about.] …So I waited…

“You know, like W-E-R-E and W-H-E-R-E.”

I swear to GOD she’s from Butte.

For those of you who aren’t lucky enough to have had the pleasure of meeting my dad, Tom, here is a little dose of his craziness. And another example of why I love him.

My uncle is getting married in Pocatello, Idaho, in June. (By the way, I’ve decided I’m going to start calling Pocatello “The Poke.” We’ll see if it catches on.) I have been looking at plane tickets to The Poke, and it turns out it’s much cheaper to fly to Idaho Falls, which is conveniently located between Missoula and The Poke. Thus, my dad can pick me up at the Idaho Falls airport on his way. Here is the email conversation we had about it today:
____
From: Mego
To: Dad
Should I fly in on Wednesday night or Thursday morning?
____
From: Dad
To: Mego
Wednesday night. Why not?
____
From: Mego
Okay, how about this itinerary (attached)?
____
From: Dad
Might not be worth it if you get in so late — probably get us into Poco at midnight. Might as well come Thursday.
____
From: Dad
Actually, either one would be fine. If we get in late, we could get up early and go to the zoo. Everybody’s talking about it.
____
From: Mego
Okay, I’m holding the Wednesday night reservation. I’ll book it tonight.
____
From: Dad
Most excellent.
___
From: Dad
Tautphaus Park Zoo
2725 Carnival Way, Idaho Falls; 208/528-5552

Lovely landscaping and a small yet varied collection of animals make Tautphaus Park Zoo a pleasant place to spend an hour or two. Highlights include kangaroos in an excellent Australian habitat, otters, penguins, and a duck pond where kids (and adults) can feed the assembled flocks. The zoo is located in one of Idaho Falls’ largest parks, and a small amusement park nearby is open in the warmer months.
____
From: Dad
* The Idaho Gateway Chorus, a barbershop singing group, is based in Pocatello.
* The Pocatello zoo features only native Idaho species and is located in Ross Park.
____
From: Dad
Pocatello has two sister cities, as designated by Sister Cities International, Inc. (SCI):

* Iwamizawa, Japan
* Kwaremanguel, Burkina Faso
____
All those links were in the email, too. And the one to the city in Burkina Faso doesn’t even link to anything. And I say that as if THAT’S the most ridiculous part.

1. Walking to the Farmers Market to buy 10 tulips for $6.

2. Registering to vote in Oregon!

3. Listening to Paramore and Jimmy Eat World and remembering how awesome they were in concert on Thursday.

4. A cute j.crew swimsuit on sale.

5. Running into Kyle downtown and listening to his hilarious story of serving blonde, barely-clothed teenage girls “Venti, Extra caramel, extra whip Frappuccinos” while suffering from a terrible wine hangover.

6. Reading in the park on a sunny day.

7. An email from my dad from Montana saying he’s back from India.

8. An email from my brother from India saying he’ll be home later this month.

9. An unexpected phone call from a friend that led to a fun-filled day (and night) of hanging out.

10. “I only order fries because it’s socially unacceptable to drink ketchup.” - Kate

My friend Absmers, a.k.a. Monique recently introduced me to this fantastic website. It reminds me so much of my mom it kills me. Here are some of my favorite quotes:

“What are you doing getting bitten by mosquitoes?!! You will get MALARIA - and i will have to start worrying about that instead of typhoid. Maybe you have got dengue fever even! Are the drugs working? Are you still alive?”

“In other news I discovered that e-bay shopping is not as simple as it looks. Seems to be a cult or something, I’m wondering if any goods actually change hands. Items appear, disappear and reappear out of nowhere. Is there anything I’m missing. On that note I better check the item I’m “watching” to see how many days they added to my wait this time.”

“We had burglar alarmed fixed and are going to be using it. Call me for code or get arrested entering.”

“I think that all the people who want a relationship for marriage and family should stand on one side of the street and all the people who just want fun relationship only should stand on the other side, no intermixing….and no one would ever be disappointed or confused. It could be a universal rule….like Sneetches with stars or without. Think how much heartache would be avoided.”

“If dinner is not possible - I do understand but will be dissapointed for sure - I will make more cookies and wait on edge of hwy #1 by hwy #36 intersection, I will wait and yous can stop and get cookies for a hug - I saw that you are taking hwy#1 and if you can give me your set off time - I can meet up with, if dinner is not possible before you go then we can do it when your back.”

Moms are great.