The death of a small animal. From a farm.

There comes a time in every young person's life, to make a mistake. Or, in my case, a few. 


There was that time my mom's car got hit by another car in a parking lot. While I was driving. That other time I dated a guy who wore the same leather pants every day for 3 weeks. Oh, and that time I got a tattoo that meant small barnyard animal in Chinese. 


There is a story that goes along with that. But I've told it about eleventy hundred and 12 times. If you'd like to be reminded of how it came to be that I got small barnyard animal tattooed on my back, please read this here post. 


Instead of a wordy and smart-sounding post about my foolish youth, I'm going to make this short and sweet and tell you about how brave I was to get a big ass tattoo to cover up the stupid one. I've only been talking about it for umpteen years. Plus, I slept a maximum of 4 hours last night and am having trouble forming coherent sentences. 


Oh, I'm in Amsterdam. I got here Wednesday for work. I have the jet lag. 


Behold the before and after photos. 

Before

After 

Can you even see where the before picture is hidden? I bet you can't. Thanks to the amazing Nick Oaks. I was so nervous when I went in on Saturday, I wanted to barf. He was super nice and calmed me down right quick. We chatted for the 2(ish) hours that I sat there for and I only took one mini break. Tough, eh? 


People keep asking if it hurts. Yes. Yes it does. Everything you've heard about tattoos is true. They hurt. Geez. 

Sharing a house is fun!

In T minus nine weeks, I'll be moving 5 hours away, to the suburb-filled province of Onterrible Ontario. I've been so caught up with the details of the move that I've totally forgotten about the move IN portion of this activity. So, naturally this has brought on yet another panic. In addition to the must-rent-my-condo panic, must-buy-a-car panic and the must-find-a-new-job panic. No biggie. 

I lived with a boyfriend once. Well, twice. But they were both roommates first, boyfriends later. And I was twenty-something and not that smart and one of them didn't speak English, so let's not count those. 

This is the first time I've met a dude and decided I liked him enough to leave my house, and go live in his house so we could be together more and you know, plan a future and everything. Big news. 

My manfriend was pretty awesome about my one major freak out, which came on randomly when I realized exactly how different my every day was going to become. I already told you about my fear of the suburbs. Nothing about our actual relationship worries me. We're one of those annoying couples who never argue. But even BFF's have a learning curve when they move in together, right? Here is a small list of things that may or may not cause a few tantrums. 

1. Manfriend's house is very manish: It's bachelor code to have a leather couch and a big screen TV. Lucky for me, my manfriend has two of each. And a papaya-coloured wall. And 17 bottles of the same shampoo in his shower. And he sleeps with the remote control in his bed. And watches football and/or hockey for what I'm pretty sure is 8 hours a day. None of the above things are in line with how I roll. 


I'm pretty used to being on my own. I bought a condo on my own and decorated it exactly the way I like. Now, my manfriend is not some kind of gorilla-man who refuses help in the decor department. He's readily admitted that his place needs a lady's touch. i.e. moi. But I'm also not silly enough to charge in there and start painting walls pink and buying floral bedspreads. Mostly because floral bedspreads are ugly. And you know, that's rude. So, somewhere between 8 hours a day of football and all the leather, I need to find some Lindsayism. A decorative pillow or two. A couple of lamps. Matching towels perhaps. And TLC and HBO available on whichever TV I'm going to be forced to watch during the Superbowl. 


2. Manfriend cannot fall asleep unless the TV is on. 
Please consult #1 to find out what he's watching when falling asleep. See, I'm a pretty light sleeper. And I require darkness and quiet to sleep. A quiet mind, if you will. Hence my obsession with yoga. I'm one of those people whose mind races at night and all the stress of the day and life keeps me awake and OMG SO MANY THINGS IN MY HEAD. It's important for this girl to SLOW THE EF DOWN. Especially at the end of the day. Get away from the computer and stop checking my phone. And when there is light and noise and busy-ness and whathaveyou, it's difficult to quiet ye olde mind. 


The manfriend works shifts. He works days for two weeks, then nights for two weeks and so on and so forth. Neither of us are a fan of the night shifts and I hope that he can eventually not work them. In the meantime, however, it means that I get at least two weeks a month of non-TV sleep time. Otherwise I might try wearing earplugs and an eye mask and whining loudly. I'll probably throw a couple of dramatic sighs in there too. 


3. Manfriend wants nothing to with a feline in the bed. 
See, this is tricky. Because I'm used to having Henry in my bed practically every night. And I quite like him there. I mean, he's furry and warm and cute. So I don't have a solution to this problem yet. Other than sneaking Henry into bed when the manfriend is falling asleep watching football. See what I did there? 

Resolutions shmezolutions.

I don't believe in new year's resolutions. Ef that noise. 


Why so much pressure on January 1? 


I prefer to make small changes on a random Wednesday in May, for example. I mean, that could also be the start of a new year if you want. Or maybe you just need 4 months to warm up to your resolution. 


Whatevs. 


Instead, I prefer to look back at 2011 and all the stuff that happened. See the list below. Because analyzing the past and all the things you can't change is great for your self-esteem. 


Lucky for me, 2011 was a pretty good year. Way better than 2010. Except the family part (see #10). That part keeps me up at night and makes me cry. And might require another blog post. A long, long time from now. 


1. I broke up with someone who was very, very wrong for me. 
2. I went on vacation with my sister to Panama. 
3. I started a new blog. 
4. I joined a gym and become obsessed with yoga.
5. I met my best friend. 
6. I turned 32.
7. I started writing funny stuff about advertising. 
8. I got a new/old job. 
9. I started a small side business doing nails.
10. My parents separated. 
11. I went to Toronto many, many times. 
12. I went on vacation with my manfriend (see #5) to Mexico. 

All Zumba'd out.

Somewhere during my upbringing, I was taught that hate is a very strong word. When it came to fish sticks, "I don't care for them" was a much more acceptable way to express my feelings about a meal that smelled like dirty ocean. 

I don't care for cardio. 

But I know it's necessary. For my health and all that. And as much as I pretend, I'm just not disciplined enough to hit the machines at the gym a few times a week. The elliptical is the least annoying and the only one I will even go close to. The stairmaster and the treadmill don't even make the cut. Vomit. Boring. Yoga always wins. Always.

So last week, I thought I'd try out Zumba. Due to my Latino connection from back in the day - semesters in Cuba and Mexico and my short obsession with Latino men - I was a bit of a salsa-a-holic in my early twenties. And from what I'd heard about Zumba, there was salsa music, bum shaking and fancy footwork. 

So, obviously I was going to be a complete pro at it. 

In case you aren't down with the latest old lady workout trends, Zumba is a dance-style aerobic workout. There is choreography and everything. The teacher dances and claps a lot and you try to follow. There's also lots of jumping. 

Only five ladies showed up to to class before the teacher took her place at the front of the room. It's worth nothing that the woman in front of me, all 5-foot nothing of her, was dressed in a unitard. You heard me. Like a wrestling outfit. But with pants. 

It wasn't long after the music started that the hysterical laughter began. Directed at myself, of course. 

For the next hour, I got to stare at my sweaty, uncoordinated self shimmy, shake and swirl. It really wasn't cute and I was very disappointed I didn't look nearly as cool as I thought trying to dance sexy-like. 

And I took a pole-dancing class you know. 

For one, my hips totally suck. There was no Dirty Dancing-style gyration. But there was robotic, pinballesque movements. So, that was a a bit of a 90-year-old-with-a-broken-hip moment. I also failed miserable at what I imagined was supposed to be the hip-hop portion of the dance. Sorry, Beyoncé. I've let you down. 


And I clearly didn't wear the right bra for all the jumping. That was a bit, um, painful. To say the least. 

Unitard, mentioned above, was a particular highlight of the evening. She couldn't stop smiling at herself in the mirror and danced her own special version of the Carlton dance. I had to admire her. That whole "dance like no one is watching" quote? I think it was written about her. 

There was also the WOO lady in the front row. 

The Zumba music, apparently, isn't your average Shakira or Carlos Vives tune. Oh no. There are special Zumba remixes. Take your average Shakira or your Carlos Vives and throw a lil "ZUMBAAAAAA" into the lyrics. Ta dah! Zumba music. 

And it was that lyric that brought out WOO lady's magic. I clapped when clapping was requiring, and I smiled like an idiot on a dance show when the teacher yelled at me to smile, but WOO lady was really givin'er. A couple of head shakes, then a "WOO! WOO! WOO!" The WOOs combined with the clapping was really something to see.

The class made me super sweaty and my abs and thighs were sore for days after. And I came home feeling relaxed after a jam-packed work day. So I guess I got something out of it. But unfortunately, I lost my delusions of grandeur. I have evidence that I am not, in fact, even close to a good dancer. And when a woman in a unitard totally shows you up, your ego takes a bit of a hit.

I might go back to dancing alone in my living room, where there is no mirror and I am still a salsa pro. 

Long distance relationships are fun!

It is the fate of any long distance relationship, that someone will have to move. There's really no other way around it. If things become for serious, one party has to pack up their gear and make the leap across area codes. In our case, it is me that will be doing the moving. 


Since the manfriend doesn't speak French, has a pretty good job with many, many weeks of vacation, and I have a fairly movable career, it was the best option for the relationship. 


Also, that's how you talk when you're in a serious relationship. Everything is "for the relationship." Because serious relationship people like to sound like they know everything about serious relationships.  


And I'm excited about it. I'll be a 10 minute drive from my oldest sister and my nieces, and a 45 minute drive from my other sister. His place is way bigger than mine, so we won't be all up in each other's business all the time. Unless we want to be all up in each other's business, of course. And there are a lot of really good agencies where I can find work. Plus, he always brings me water from all the way downstairs when I'm thirsty. Oh, and we get to see each other every day which I'm pretty thrilled about. 


However, I will be living in the suburbs. 


Cue dramatic music. 


There is a mantra I have lived by. And it went something like this: I will never, ever live in the suburbs. 


I grew up in the woods and now I live in the city. And I rather enjoy both those landscapes. In the former, you get trees and fresh air and wildlife and lots of property to provide for ample opportunities to step in dog poo. In the latter, you get proximity to work and great restaurants and weirdos as neighbours. I've lived in a lot of places/cities/countries in between, but for the purposes of this very scientific study, I'm only going to refer to the homes I spent the most time in. 


It's the in between part I'm not so sure of. Strip malls, oversized grocery stores, parking lots and perms make me nervous. It just isn't the environment I imagined living in when I grew up. In other news, am I grown up? 


Whatever. 


And what is so wrong with that environment, anyway? Maybe it's because I like pretty things, and the view of the Wal-Mart parking lot from the manfriend's yard just isn't that pretty. Or maybe I'm scared of the hour-plus commute to work, even thought I think I've *finally* managed to convince the manfriend I need an iPad because of it. Or maybe I'm just a huge snob. 


Either way, the manfriend and I are pretty solid and are ridiculously happy together. So, I know I'll be happy wherever we live (awwwwww). If you ask any of my friends, they'll tell you it's been a while since I've gushed on and on about a dude. I usually rant on and on about how dumb/rude/crybabyish they are. When we first started dating, I obsessed about his dislike of olives because I had to find *something* wrong with him. 


You'll be happy to know, I'm completely over the olive thing.


Perhaps I will learn to love the Wal-Mart. I mean, you *can* save money and live better. And I've heard you don't even have to wear pants to shop there. Maybe I'll buy a pair of Uggs and shuffle (because everyone knows you have to drag your feet when you wear Uggs) over to Starbucks every Saturday before we go to Home Depot and buy rugs and towel racks. Or, even better, maybe I'll bring sexy back to the suburbs. I'll do all the permed ladies nails. And buy Costco sized bags of cotton balls. And be the bendiest girl at yoga. I'll be a city girl, who's really a country girl, in the suburbs.