Soccer Preview

T-minus 2 days until Direct TV's free soccer preview. Lookin' forward to it. Ha ha. Ha. I am getting better about all the soccer.

*Clears throat*

I know we hate Chelsea.

We usually like a team playing in a red uniform. This sounds like a girl opinion but that is straight out of the mouth of my husband who doesn't ever seem to really root for anyone. No, no. We watch soccer for the sport of it.

*Mimes shooting self in head*

Back to how I'm totally into soccer now.

I enjoy the announcers. In the beginning, I couldn't understand like 85% of what they said, and now I can. So it's like I have finally learned a second language. I wish that counted. Not only made me bilingual but as a bonus, uber-cultured.

*Sips from imaginary teacup with pinky extended*

I love the voices of Ian Darke and Steve McManaman (or McMan-a-man-a-man-a-man-a-man-a-man, as I like to call him, which drives the hubby crazy). They're comforting in the same way I used to find Hawk and DJ's voices comforting. I always said if I was ever in a coma, please put on the White Sox. There was just something soothing about the way they covered the game. Spend however many years watching the White Sox with my grandmother and father and it's inevitable. I don't know why, but I loved how whether we were terrible or amazing, their voices remained beyond calm and relaxed. They were practically asleep. Even excitement was low key.

Can of corn!

Anyway, soccer's not just a game where something almost happens for 90+ minutes. Although I do enjoy responding to my husband's guttural sounds and exclamations, fist pumps and jumps up from the couch by saying, "Wow! Something almost just happened there!" Then I go back to my book or whatever, chuckling to myself while avoiding his death gaze. Oooooooo, oooooooo. But it's still 0-0 and we end the game there. I'm too American to really enjoy a sport where it feels like 100% of the time, the game ends TIED. How sporty can a sport be WHERE NO ONE WINS?

I just, I can't, I, oh my God...

Sorry, I started to hyperventilate a minute there.

I just googled Barclays (aka English) soccer highlights from last year and this came up. I was going to prove things happen in soccer. I made it 2 minutes in before I couldn't take it anymore. Wow. Look at the slow motion clapping. And running. Sort of. So, essentially, nothing even happens in the highlights? I am failing right now. Bollocks! Let's show highlights of lots of looking at one another, angsty angsty. It's Twilight for men, I guess. See me looking at you, you looking at me, clap clap, shake our heads, let's embrace, then let's look around at each other some more. Coach to coach, player to player, player to coach, coach to player. So much angst!

I have seen some impressive soccer plays. I am not going to deny that. My husband will rewind and replay them for me, so yes, I have seen them. They exist. Sometimes even the really terrible plays are great, like when someone scores in their own goal or when someone acts like they've been severely injured and the replay shows no one touched them. Some of those guys could win Oscars. Those are pretty fun. Unfortunately, the moments of excitement are few and far between, and the ad before the boring highlight real was for The Hunger Games, so at least that was worth my time and energy.

SO. EXCITED.

Back to soccer.

I have now freely admitted that things actually happen in soccer. I mean, it's possible. My husband watched a soccer game the other weekend before I woke up and he saved it on the DVR for me.

Hooray.

I had to admit, though, it was entertaining, the little bit he wanted me to see.

Ian and Steve narrate this lovely little moment where there is an extra player on the field.

Finally, a soccer player that I can recognize. I have a lot of difficulty telling one player from another even when we watch the same team play a bunch of times. Those soccer players, they all look the same. Which I think somehow makes me racist against white people, and that makes my head hurt. I like the goalie from Everton because he's American and he has a shaved head so I can recognize him. I also like the goalie from Arsenal because he's strange looking so I can also recognize him. I also like saying Arsenal. Because it has arse in it, you wankers. Maybe I like those 2 goalies because it also helps me recognize a player when he has to stand all alone on his side of the field for the whole game. Maybe that's it. Yeah, yeah. I know, I know. I'm such an authority. Blimey! I'm going to go have my coffee now.

It's Valentine's Day, Let's Watch The Notebook! HA HA! Also, I'm A Unicorn And You're A T-Rex.

It's Valentine's Day. Oh, how the mighty have fallen!

When we were still dating dating (not married dating), I made the then-future-hubby mixed cds and bought him lots of presents, which I wrapped in wrapping paper that I made myself that highlighted all our inside jokes. Once, I ink-jet-printed out a thousand Battlestar Gallactica scenes and then made speech bubbles for all the characters and glued it to the insides of this really cool clear gift bag. All the characters said all the stuff that we'd joked about while watching the show. It took forever. We still have that bag. We store all our owner's manuals in it for all our appliances and stuff. When I see it now, I laugh and roll my eyes at myself for being such a dork. At the time, I thought I was such a genius girlfriend.

Anywho, I bought the hubby-of-the-future multiple Valentine's Day cards because so many cards expressed all my different feelings every year that I couldn't buy just one. I bought him so many cards that sometimes I'd buy a card and use parts of it to make the mixed cd liners. I remember this one pink card that had a cartoon unicorn and cartoon T-Rex on it and the T-Rex was all, "I'm extinct and you're mythological" and the unicorn was all "We'll make it work." You know, because on paper, my husband and I are super different and in theory, it shouldn't work, but love and all that. That's funny since now sometimes I'm like, "How are we different people?! I mean, really? Isn't it crazy to think about how you and I are two separate people?"

This was back when to make a mixed cd,  you had to use actual songs from actual cds that you actually owned. Oh, the labor.

We got engaged, then married. I bought him more functional Valentine's Day presents like socks. Essentially, the first 4 years together were a slow and steady replacement of all the weary and worn clothes that man owned. Is it a holiday? Look! Undershirts! Merry Christmas! Happy Birthday! This (*holds up tee shirt with holes in the armpits*) is going away! Forever!

I read somewhere once that a guy knows he's in a serious relationship when he no longer has to buy underwear. Ever. Because his girlfriend/wife does all that stuff. And that sh*t is so true. A woman comes in and sees what that guy's been wearing and after the shock's worn off, she kindly replaces everything that he owns so that what is elastic is still stretchy and everything that is supposed to be white is actually white and every hole in every garment was put there by the people who actually made the garments. I mean, the armpit holes I just mentioned? Not just undershirts, no. They were many, they were vast, and they haunt my dreams. I don't know how he left the house before he met me.

I made him romantic Valentine's Day meals. I made his beloved corn muffins in a heart shaped muffin pan. I bought airplane cookie cutters months earlier, then used them to cut out homemade brownies in airplane-software-engineer shapes to end his favorite meal of the time. Usually, I had problems. Set off the smoke alarms, watched half of each corn muffin stick in the pan, had to explain that the brownie was in the shape of an airplane since it looked like a frosted insect of some kind. I cooked a lot the first 3 years of our marriage. I was always trying new things. Which sounds nice but isn't. My husband has always been the kind of person to say everything I've ever cooked was delicious. I've cooked for an afternoon, given him a plate, washed the dishes, then finally tasted the inedible meal myself. I'd have to go find him wherever he was eating in the house and take his half eaten plate from him so that I could toss it all into the garbage before making a frozen pizza. Eff you, Rachel Ray. I have maybe 3 meals still in rotation out of a thousand and those 3 were after a lot of editing.

My point is I used to try a lot harder. Which I know he appreciated but I also think he doesn't really need. Or expect. He's not a holiday guy. If there's something he wants or I want, we usually just talk about it and make it happen. If it's anywhere near a birthday or a holiday, we add, "Happy birthday!" or whatever. Valentine's commercials started coming on the television pretty quick this year. After some swearing on my part about the whole "individually bought beads on a bracelet" thing that is happening right now (REALLY? REALLY? REALLY?), I told him, "You're getting me some chocolate this year" and it's been in the cupboard since Saturday. Actually, he perturbed me yesterday so I ate all the good pieces out of the box and he brought home another, better, more Happy-Wife flavored box last night. No dark chocolate and lots of caramels.

He even bought himself a box of candy full of candy I don't like.

Does that count as his V-day gift? I am saying yes. Since every birthday and Christmas present he's gotten me has been stuff I've bought myself and then said, "Guess what you got me for my birthday!"

Actually, we had a weird day yesterday, hence the extra box of chocolate. I'd voiced my concern over the weekend about the forecast of freezing rain, bad roads, and snow for Monday. The forecast eventually said yesterday morning was supposed to be okay, so instead of working from home like I wanted, the husband, he went in and promised to come home early in the day.

I could tell when I woke up that the husband's brain wasn't functioning properly, and/or he was trying to drive me insane.

He does this thing sometimes where he brings up his empty cans and bottles from downstairs. The recycling is downstairs. If he leaves his recycling out downstairs, I can walk it over into the next room, where I keep the recycling before taking it out. It doesn't bother me too much to carry his damn Pepsi can into the next room. Although why he can't do this is outside my realm of imagination. What does bother me is when he carries that can back upstairs. Which is when he sets it on the kitchen counter. So that I can pick it up and carry it back downstairs. Not a huge deal so I tried to let it go. One day, he did it like 3 times. It drove me so crazy that I grabbed the cans from the kitchen and whirled myself around the house until I found him and then sort of accosted him. My brain just couldn't take it anymore. I needed him to walk me through the thought process that led him to do this. I knew he wasn't doing it on purpose and that there was no thought process but still. Sure enough, it was just one of those "I wasn't thinking" situations that we all have, but my reaction to it was nuts enough for both of us that I didn't get through two sentences before we both collapsed into uncontrollable laughter.

Well, yesterday morning, he left out his dirty breakfast dishes all over the house. A coffee cup here, a bowl with oatmeal residue there. It was like every room I walked into, there were some of his dishes.

He also threw his dirty clothes on the bed I was sleeping in before leaving for work.

On the bed I was sleeping in.

On the bed I was sleeping in.

*Slow exhale, slow exhale, slow exhale* I'm cool. I'm cool. I'm cool. Calm and collected.

Mmmmm-hmmmmm.

I thought he had also thrown a blanket and cat bed off of a shelf in order to put his laptop there (turns out a cat had done the clearing of the shelf and the hubby just took advantage of it).  I was left with a heap of blanket and a cat bed thrown on my desk and my husband's laptop sitting all suspicious right there on the empty shelf.

I was like, okay, I'm gonna ignore this and go watch The Vampire Diaries on Netflix and pretend this didn't happen. He'll be home soon anyway. Right?

The hours ticked by and still, no call that he was coming home from work. He always calls. Every day, when he's done with work, to let me know he's coming home.

Finally, after pausing during appropriate Elena/Stefan/Damon lulls in storyline and checking in with the KSDK weather team a little too often, I called him at work.

Oh, oh, oh. He had meetings all of a sudden. Late day meetings. Oh. Ooooooh. Ooooooooh.

I was all, "Pack it up!" and the weather guy was all, "The evening commute is going to be terrible" and the schools were all "let's send the kids home early" and my husband was all, "But I have a 3 o'clock."

So I said, "If you do not come home soon, you will be taking me to see The Vow tomorrow."

That's the movie with the guy from Step Up and the only girl they seem able to cast in terrible romantic movies. They are in love and they get married and there's an accident and she has selective amnesia (cue every woman who's ever had a bad relationship: What kind of accident exactly was that?) where it seems she remembers everything but her husband so he has to make her fall in love with him all over again. Based on a true story. Of course. So I'm both rolling-my-eyes annoyed while completely aware that it will make me do the ugly snot-factory cry.

The threat of seeing this movie has been incredibly helpful the past couple weeks. My husband has an actual physical, vomit-y, shudder-y sort of reaction whenever I mention it.

"And the later you are, the more inclined I will be to make you watch The Notebook as a nice sort of pre-The-Vow movie when you get home tonight, since I'm pretty sure I own that movie somewhere." I think. I don't know. Probably.

My husband has never seen that movie. So it is excellent nagging ammunition. He likes to talk smack about The Notebook but doesn't even really understand the basic plot of that movie, which actually makes his smack-talking really entertaining for me.

My husband called and came home before the evening commute but after I had eaten all the good chocolates out of the box to make me less angsty waiting for his call. He brought supper and more chocolate.

So I didn't get out any old DVDs. We watched Friday Night Lights and ate Chinese food and laughed as I outlined what I thought his thought process was this morning when he left out all his dishes and used my sleeping silhouette as the dirty clothes hamper.

This Valentine's Day, I'm waiting for my favorite person in the world to call and come home. We'll eat and laugh and have some of our separate chocolates and sit on the couch wrapped in a blanket, dog and cats burrowing into any open spaces around us. We'll watch something on tv that we both can stand. He won't have to learn anything about the Salvatore brothers and I won't have to learn How It's Made. And it will be a perfect Valentine's Day, a day not that different than yesterday and hopefully pretty damn similar to tomorrow. The cats would eat roses. We'd end up with a lobster as a pet if we tried to make a fancy dinner. And I think my husband's closet is full. So, we're good. It's our best Valentine's Day yet.

OH MY GOD IT'S A SHOW. WITH HORSES.

The drive downtown to see Lewis Black was not interesting just because of the crappy traffic and the rain. There was also another element in the madness. We saw something. Something big. Something difficult to pass over. And I'm pretty sure both my husband and I wish it had been a crime. Or our own parents gettin' it on. Clowns? Scary, scary clowns. Really, seeing anything else probably would have been preferred.

What we did see was a giant black billboard with one word on it that neither of us had ever heard of. There was also a quote. From Larry King of all people, "The greatest show I've ever seen."

Now, Larry King's what, a million? I'm pretty sure he's seen every show. Ever. Wasn't he at the rapture and the Super Bowl?

Lastly, there was a profile picture of the head and neck of a stunning white horse.

That was it. Entire composition of billboard.

To which I immediately said to the husband, "What is that? Is that some kind of horse show?"

And then I drop it. I'm not crazy. Hardy har har. I'm cool. I'm collected. I'm a good wife.

...

Two miles later: the same billboard.

...

"What is that? Is it a show WITH HORSES? Honey? Honey?"

My husband assures me he has no idea what the billboards mean.

A couple more miles: there it is again.

"Is it like Cirque De Soleil," I ask, which is a show we've never seen and have never had much desire to see.

It is important to note that I have been trying not to make the husband take me to things that I know he won't enjoy. As each year together passes, and we're going on 8 years now, I try to take this more and more to heart. Because this is a man who would sit through just about anything for my happiness. (I'm looking at you, Twilight movies. At least I know to be ashamed for liking you. And for knowing that if my husband did enjoy you, I would rethink all my feelings for him.)

My point is that me and the hubby, we're older. I don't need to see everything. The hubby missed the years when I would have wanted to go to lots of concerts, experimental theater, art openings. When not only would I want to see a local band, I'd know all the area's band names and have them arranged in my mind by my affection for them. I'd stalk them in Schnucks and talk to them about produce.

I'm not totally recovered. Sometimes I'll see something and have a youth relapse. I'll read something like "Florence and the Machine are coming here!" and my heart quickens and my brain goes all Liz Lemon, "I want to go to there." Then, I pause and consider how the hubby would hate every minute of that and I get out my IPOD and my pulse calms and I am content.

Honestly, to be straight with myself, I know that having to get dressed and go to a venue and deal with people and see live music would not be, in reality, my favorite thing anymore anyway. I am no longer Florence's demographic and I do not need to be in a very emo mosh pit with those who are. I don't even like living somewhere with neighbors. People. Too close to me. Thank you no.

And Florence would not be my friend in real life no matter what my imaginary world may be showing me in grainy video in my mind. We're not going to have instant and immediate long conversations where we totally get each other and share inside jokes that we somehow have despite being total strangers. She won't singsong her side of the conversation with me either. In real life, I bet she's so weird that she makes me look normal, and I think putting the two of us together in a room would make some sort of awkward explosion (of more awkward) and then we'd both slit our wrists just to escape the situation.

Anywho, cut to another mile down the road. One word. Larry King quote. Beautiful horse.

"IS THIS A SHOW? WITH HORSES? I WANT TO SEE A SHOW WITH HORSES! WHAT IS IT, HONEY?"

At this point, if you can't tell, I have started to lose my sh*t. The little girl that still lives inside me somewhere, who loved horses, who even had a horse at one point, who read stories about horses, who watched The Black Stallion over and over again on disc (yes, you read disc correctly there) starts to wake from her slumber deep in the recesses of whoever it is I am now.

So we go to Lewis Black and I smile at my husband and act cool and he's forgotten all about it and I try to push little psycho Happy-Wife-As-A-Child back down and shut her the f*ck up. Because she is all kinds of nuts in my head now. I try not to think about what the hell that billboard was about. A show? With horses? Ha! No! Surely not!

This is me when I was a kid. With Lightning, my horse.

Miss ya, Buddy.

AND HE KINDA LOOKS LIKE THE HORSE ON THE BILLBOARD.
WE'RE SO F*CKED.

When I think about happiness and my childhood, I think about when I was riding that horse. I particularly remember us running through alfalfa fields in rural South Dakota. Complete and total freedom, complete and total peace, complete and total happiness. If I've ever had a perfect moment, that was when it happened.

We see Lewis Black. We come home, go to sleep. The hubby gets up early on Saturday to watch soccer. I get up late, groggily start my morning routine. Sip my coffee, check my email.

I try to stop myself, but I can't. I type in word I hadn't heard before.

Cavalia.

Let out little noises.

Run downstairs, interrupt soccer.

"IT'S A SHOW WITH HORSES A HORSE SHOW CIRQUE DE SOLEIL WITH HORSES HORSES HORSES FREE HORSES RUNNING AROUND FREE NO REINS JUST RUNNING AROUND THE INTERNET SAYS IT'S LIKE WATCHING A POEM IT'S A SHOW WITH HORSES HORSES HORSES-"

And even though he's going to hate every second of it, by noon, we had tickets to Cavalia. The first set of seating that you can have without getting to meet the actual horses. Because even though I'm sure I'd like that, maybe the hubby will hate the show a little less knowing he doesn't have to meet the horses.

And it's in the afternoon. Perfect for us elderly folk.

I'm a little worried I might openly sob at this show and I don't know why and I'm pretty sure I need therapy. And Xanax. I mean, there is a reason we didn't see the movie War Horse.

And the only thing the adult in me says about it is, "What exactly does a poem look like? This could really go either way." I try not to focus on how this will probably be the worst thing I've ever sat through or best thing I've ever seen. Sweet Jesus, what have I gotten us into?

Lewis Black Date

The hubby enjoys Lewis Black. When we were dating, I gave him some Lewis Black cds for the long weekend car trips he took to see me. When I heard Lewis Black was not only coming here but was playing the Peabody Opera House, I knew I had a stellar Christmas gift on my hands. Not only is my husband impossible to buy for, he is also very difficult to surprise. That's more me, though. I just am unable to not tell him things.

This year, however, he was so busy with work and work-related travel that I was able to keep my big mouth shut. I figured one more thing on his mind would only add to the stress, so I wrote out a Christmas card for him. Work would slow down around Christmas and then he'd have over a month afterwards to know the show was coming. The card said that he had two tickets to see Lewis Black, the date, and the venue. I stuck it under the tree wrapped in a little festive box.

Because I can't just hand him a card.

He seemed happy and surprised with his Christmas gift when he opened it. Good job, Me!

Finally, the Friday night came. We left 2 hours early, grabbed some food at Sonic, and started the drive downtown. Traffic was horrible. There was a stalled truck, and when the hubby flipped on the radio, guess who was playing in town next door at exactly the same time as Lewis Black? The St. Louis Blues hockey team. Yeah.

We could have jogged to downtown faster.

Anyway, we managed to find the opera house, which sits next to Union Station and Scottrade Center. Then, we got to scour the land for parking. Did I mention it was raining?

We found a parking garage. I rooted around fruitlessly by my feet in the car for the umbrella. You  know, where the umbrella is unless my husband has taken it somewhere else. My husband didn't say anything. *IMPORTANT FOR LATER*

Then, we got out of the car and walked like mall walkers in the moderately falling rain. The streets were full of people going to Lewis Black and to the Blues game. The rain was more annoying then anything else. We made it into the opera house 2 minutes before the show was supposed to start.

The Peabody Opera House recently reopened in downtown St. Louis. We'd never been but had been wanting to check it out. It is a beautiful venue with a simple, memorable layout once you're familiar with it. Not entirely unlike the Fox Theater. Lots of good seats and stunning details.

Lewis Black and his opening act were, of course, hilarious. He's as quick and well-spoken as you'd expect. In person, he comes across so much warmer and has a sort of kind, old man quality that I hadn't really recognized before. The audience was encouraging and laughed loudly and often. When, during one of his little rants, he actually broke the microphone stand, his reaction and ours was so funny that I think for a few moments we all just lost our minds in some wonderful, crazy, perfect way.

The show ended after 11, which for us, is like so late we can barely function. When exactly we become "if it's after 3 pm, we can't do it" people is beyond me. If we'd been more awake, and if about a thousand other people weren't thinking the same thing, we might have stayed after the show since Lewis Black comes out and signs autographs afterwards. Since we were just trying to stay awake at that point, the hubby and I headed out.

In the pouring rain.

The torrential rain.

The rainy rainy rain.

The not "frustrating" rain. The "WOW" rain.

It didn't matter how fast we walked. We were soaked by the time we got to the car. Really, by the time we got 4 steps outside the opera house. However many blocks later, yeah, we were soaked. To the bones. I'm pretty sure even my internal organs had gotten good and clean from the rain water.

As romantic as it sounds, walking with your loved one in sheets and sheets of rain IS NOT ROMANTIC. It is cold and uncomfortable and heavy and you can't see through your hair or your glasses and your shoes are all slooshy on the insides and it IS NOT ROMANTIC.

We finally made it to the parking garage. When we got in the car, my husband said, "Even if we'd brought the umbrella, I don't think it would have helped because it was raining so hard."

I'm pretty sure this was meant to be comforting.

To which I said, "I don't know. Probably would have helped. We should have brought that. Next time, for sure."

He then says, "Why didn't you bring it?"

Says the man who has it for work. I said, "Well, I don't know where you put it and it isn't over here."

"Yes, it is," he says. 

I laugh and say, "Um, no. It's not. I looked for it all around on the floor when we got here. Didn't you see me do that before we got out of the car."

He paused. Then said, "You know you're sitting on it, right?"

...

I gave him an icy look and said, "No, I am not." Then I made the mistake of reaching my hand back, and yep. I HAD BEEN SITTING ON THE UMBRELLA THE ENTIRE TIME IN THE CAR. How I did not feel that for the entire drive is beyond me. And possibly lots of drives prior to this. How long had I been sitting on that damn umbrella? Months?

Incredulous, I said, "WHY DID YOU TELL ME THAT? THIS IS ONE OF THOSE THINGS YOU SHOULD HAVE NOT TOLD ME." Because now we're sitting, in the car, soaked. With a lovely dry umbrella padding my ass.

Then, my husband asked, "Did you think the woman next to you was a prostitute? I mean, she was, right?"

And we forgot all about the umbrella and started talking about the couple sitting next to us at the show.

I love this man. I never need worry we'll run out of things to talk about.