Freeze Me You Devil

Check ya later

2010-10-09T09:19:00.002-05:00

I'm not writing in here anymore. I'm now a mom, and therefore a mommy blogger. Read me here: http://parventing.blogspot.com/

teaching my son the human races

2010-08-23T11:42:00.000-05:00

One of my biggest fears, living and raising a family in North Dakota, is failing to expose my children to different cultures. Not only do I live in a state who's population is more than 90 percent white, but it's also mostly Christian and predominantly German- and Norwegian white.

Don't get me wrong, living in a state so small and area so rural has SUPER advantages for child-rearing, namely, my child will never have to walk through metal detectors on his way to school. Check mark: pro.

I grew up in a bigger city and at age four, still touched the head of a little black girl at Sesame Street Live. I wanted to know what her hair felt like. Even with my upbringing, I didn't and don't know nearly enough.

I don't want my son to walk the graduation stage without ever meeting someone who's skin tanned faster than his does.

So what to do?

* Cable TV, movies, media is a start. Watch a show with black people in it. And if I'm feeling really civil rights-y, I can throw in "The Color Purple" or "How to Kill a Mockingbird." I guess that has potential. The problem is, reality TV is so seldom realistic. I don't want him getting the impression that these over-the-top personalities represent any one culture as a whole. And he won't have much by way of real people and local examples to teach him any different. Plus, I don't subscribe to cable. Figures.

* Art: I can't think of any other offering here that would expose him to more cultures and perspectives. Even if the project is a little cheesy, like: here, make a fan. That's what Asian people do... A project like that at least it opens the door for opportunities to explore that fan and the reasons and culture behind it. He and I can read books on the topic or research "Asia" on the internet. In fact, I like that idea. I'm pretty sure hand-held fans don't represent modern Asia, but perhaps making one represents an opportunity to explore another heritage.

* Travel: Duh! It's the bottom line frightens me. On our budget, traveling to relatives and friends in Colorado and small-town Iowa will have to suffice. As much as I'd love summer vacations in India, Egypt and Ireland, something tells me they'll have to discover oil in LaMoure County first.

So what would you do? How did you grow up?

North Dakota bois

2010-08-15T08:28:00.001-05:00

After watching this video multiple times and even Levi laughing, I figured I'd better share. As of today, 93,000 people had watched the video. That's like the entire city of Fargo. My goal is these bois will reach 700,000 and surpass the population of the state of North Dakota.

My favorite parts in the song are about knoephla and kuchen. Those dishes are totally German and totally regional. My grandmother is 100 percent German, and even she hadn't heard of them. I *may* speak ill of N.D. from time to time, but one joke I will not crack is the food. Unless you count lutefisk. Shiny, see-through fish really shouldn't count as food.

Enjoy the video.

Mommy blogger? Don't mind if I do.

2010-08-13T07:07:00.000-05:00

So I pitched the idea of a mommy blog to my bosses at work and amazingly, they bit. It's an audience we don't target, they said. We think it's a great idea.

Hence, why I love my job and never left North Dakota. Oh and the husband/baby thing. I guess you could count that too. :)

Anyways, we're still in the planning stages and I'm rounding up content, guest bloggers, images, house ads and desperately trying to develop a clever name relating to "Jamestown" and "mom." Advice? I'm all ears.

I'm so excited about this opportunity and hope that it turns into half of what other newspapers have done. It's an opportunity for both revenue and readership growth in a struggling industry and best of all, that growth comes from providing useful and helpful information to readers - exactly why newspapers exist and what they do best.

These blogs won't be the same. This blog is totally personal and frankly, Katie-centric. Sometimes, I don't even care to read it. Who cares about that Katie-chic anyway? The mommy blog will have silly, fun stories, but also informational posts as well, sometimes straight from the source's mouth. Already, I've asked the police and sheriff's departments if they want to take part. Again, all parties expressed interest. Success.

So far, so good on the mommy blog front. I feared the start-up would require more work, more convincing than this. I'm so happy to be wrong. So happy, in fact, I might even knit an extra reindeer on Levi's Christmas sweater. :)

i couldn't post because i have a new man in my life

2010-08-11T07:16:00.000-05:00

I fell off the planet.

Ok, not literally, just in the figurative way that makes it sound like I have an excuse for not posting. Also, I got stuck in a cave with a wildebeest watering at the mouth and because it was a cave, I had no internet or cell phone service. (A guy told me that once, it worked.) Forgive me too?

With the exception of about six thank you cards for which I have no address, all are mailed. Phew!

And with the exception of this post, none of you have read (on this blog at least) about the new man in my life:

Meet Mr. Feisty. The ultrasound tech gave him that name after the child refused to remove his hands from his face.

Maybe he's shy, I said, eyeing my son for the first time and trying to soak up every detail of his appearance and learn all I could of his personality.

Maybe, the tech said. But he doesn't seem to have a problem when I photograph his rear end.

He gets that from you, I said to Levi.

I'm due Sept. 25.

Ok, perhaps I could have mentioned this pre-seven weeks before my due date, but I wasn't ready to release it until all was legal. You know, the get married THEN get pregnant type rules and regulations drilled into my head by many a nun wielding welt-giving yard sticks.

I've never understood the theory. I mean, if a girl's knocked up, she has three options. Catholics frown/protest/fast for the abolishment of abortion, so why judge a lady for keeping the baby, even if its conception is out of wedlock? But I suppose that argument is for another day.

Today is about beautiful baby Cole. Cole Ryan Anderson. AKA Mr. Feisty. I hope he lives up to his nickname. For then, I'll forever have blog material.

In other news, I'm not quite a new mommy yet, but the maternal instincts have already kicked in. Like decorating. Oh how I long for winter (did I really just say that??) so I can decorate my house in stockings, lights and a trimmed tree. I'm so into decorating, I've shopped online for Christmas/winter-themed bedding. Levi balked at the idea, he doesn't understand.

But then again, so did my mother. And she added outlets to her house specifically for string lights and a Department 56 Christmas Village.

"There is a line you can cross, Katie," she said.

Well, if they won't appreciate it, Cole Ryan will. I'm sure he'll LOVE wearing the Santa hats and matching sweaters I buy for the family ever year.

wedding photo sneak peak

2010-07-23T07:22:00.000-05:00

I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm kind of loving me some cowboy hat :)

More to come...

peanut butter ball perfection

2010-07-16T11:38:00.001-05:00

When wedding planning, the mom and I concluded: the best option for little wedding gifts were Hershey Kisses wrapped in black fabric, tied with a green bow. Guests could enjoy the sweet before, after or never during the reception and the only work we’d have to do was purchase the buggers and their wrapping. We’d wrap them the day before the wedding and presto change-o, DECORATIONS!

Peanut butter balls are round, delicate, peanut-butter infused rice krispe treats the size of a 3-D quarter dipped in chocolate of milk or dark varieties. They require multiple steps of working, waiting and freezing as well as about a hundred hours to complete. I’ve only helped make them once or twice, for fear the sheer mass of work and time required would prevent me from enjoying the morsels in the future.

My mom and aunts insist they’re a Christmastime only treat. They take sooo long, they say. Perhaps the you-can’t-have-it nature adds to the flavor, but every time my mom would call and ask what I wanted her to cook for upcoming holidays or family gatherings, skip the casseroles mom, "peanut butter balls" was always my answer. I’d plead for them at Christmas, after Christmas and the entire duration of North Dakota winters -- six months in some cases.

Sometimes mom made scotcheroos or peanut butter balls in a pan, but the result was never the same. Peanut butter balls cannot be reproduced. They must be creamy peanut butter, rice krispes and in golf-ball form. Impostors need not apply.

So since I have a knack for raising my mother’s blood pressure, I called her one morning and told her I wanted peanut butter balls at my wedding instead of Hershey Kisses. This is sure to rattle her cage, I thought to myself, laughing. Three hundred peanut butter balls at a June wedding. Preposterous.

Who told you, she asked when I called.

Wha??? What do you mean who told me?

Aunt Bev and I were going to surprise you, she said. Why would we give Hershey Kisses at your wedding when we could serve your favorite candy instead?

Apparently, my cage would receive the rattling.

Uhhhh.... because Hershey Kisses are easier, cheaper and WAY less time-consuming.... I said.

Yeah, but they’re also boring, she said. Peanut butter balls are... just more you.

Like I said before, mothers are ALWAYS right.

And with aunties, cousins and a grandmother already volunteering, I did none of the work save taste-testing. They always give me the tough jobs...

I’m not entirely sure how the day of Ryan-Anderson wedding peanut-butter-ball making progressed suffice it to say a sweet the size of my face emerged upon the bridal table.

Note the chocolaty wonder and its proportion to my facial features.

Apparently, my Aunt Mary “can dip anything.”

I have no doubt. She also makes a mean devils egg.

I’m not sure how long those ladies worked and if it was proportionate to the number of hours spent conversing about Longaberger baskets, but the peanut butter balls passed my test. My only fear was consuming one too many and not fitting in my wedding dress.

If I dropped one and melted chocolate stained the soft white fabric however, that was no matter. Like my mom said, it’s just more me.

Hunting the half dead

2010-07-15T22:40:00.001-05:00

A small-town woman told me she took her nephews hunting yesterday.

Yep, hunting, she said. Because I hit a beaver and it wasn't dead yet.

Now, I have some crazy aunties, but they're packin' chocolate chips, self-made Santas and Longaberger baskets. Not .22s.

Levi said it best when I wondered what the H-E- double Lead-free ammo did I get myself into.

Life with me, he said, will never be dull.

Hunting for half-dead beaver... I'm not sure if I'm afraid.... or intrigued...

More wedding stuff tomorrow, including a peanut-butter-ball post to all my crazy aunties :)

my wedding was so fun i want a divorce so i can do it all over again

2010-07-13T23:01:00.002-05:00

I haven't written in a full, calendar month. My fingers itch, my mind burns and I have so much to say even deaf people tell me to shut up.

I'm married now.

My mom said I could skip writing thank yous for a night and moms are always right. Except when they tell you to clean your room, don't pick your nose in public and iron your Catholic school girl skirt before you wear your pajama pants beneath it. Otherwise, they're right EVERY time.

Mom told me to go to a coffee shop and ignore the tiered chip dip sets and Longaberger baskets sprouting through my loveseat, but I prefer to stay home where the food is free and pants are optional. Did I just overshare again? I'm out of practice. Sorry about that. But seriously, creativity can not be confined to clothing. It's unnatural.

Anyways, if you missed the wedding, you missed an evening of great steaks, great dancing and goooood-looking cowboys. All the fears of tears I'd had flattened like the North Dakota landscape. Eyes watered with tears of joy, except for when the best man thanked me for proving Levi really wasn't playing for the other team as he and his friends had suspected. Those may have been tears of rage or truth...

Note: the maid of honor prepared a toast and leaned on note cards for support. Unlike the best man, she considered her speech beforehand and even presented me a gift. The best man, well, I'm not sure he practiced, but I laughed anyway. The maid of honor may have spilled the beans about me dancing in the halls, memorizing the choreography to every new Brittney and Christina video, but she didn't mention the time we got lost in foreign countries and accepted rides from strangers, got flashed by said strangers, got smooched on camera by other strangers, etc. Now that I think about it... those all occurred in France. I'd like to say that country is whack (a saying I picked up from my mom) but it was an American in Rome who wore a scrunchie in her hair, tears in her eyes and capri pants where her man parts used to be. She screamed all night in the bunk below me and when the she didn't get her way with the U.S. Embassy the next morning, she replaced her high-pitched "Heather" personality with "Stephen" the baritone. The hostel we stayed at was supposed to be segregated by sex, but I guess in Italy, gender is a matter of preference.

But back to the wedding.

Levi and I developed a code before the ceremony. If we felt an onset of tears, we'd talk about the weather. OR SO YOU THOUGHT, suckas!

Fifty percent chance of rain, I'd say, if I worried my eyes would trickle.

There's a 92 percent chance it's already raining, he'd say if he felt the same.

The goal was to distract each other: Think of a funny story or find the drunkest cowboy and dance with him. We could keep crying at bay that way.

We never needed it, but it was good to know it was there.

Part of the reason we didn't need it is because I'm a buffoon. The most sentimental point of the day, the part where if you don't cry, your heart is full of charcoal and you probably ate babies for breakfast, I totally biffed it. Not literally like I fell down the aisle and my dad caught me, but biffed it, like, I forgot about the moment entirely.

See, dad and I navigated the nave like we were celebrities. I felt like Lindsay Lohan... all the cameras and people I knew... I couldn't pay attention to the sacredness of the service or the fact that I was supposed to hug and kiss my dad as he gave me away even though I ain't nobody's possession, OK ese?

So the pastor had to give us the ol' hint-hint, nudge-nudge and I still had no idea what he meant. My dad kissed my cheek before I realized it was the big moment I insisted the photographer capture even if she took pictures of nothing else. Sorry dad. I'll make it up to you at my next wedding?

And then I missed the other big moment too. The first smooch as husband and wife. I was so relieved about not fumbling over my vows or my voice cracking as I sucked back the sniffles, I totally neglected the nuptial nuzzle. We'd even practiced. The pastor watched. But no. I ruined the moment. Again.

So since the ceremonial smooch didn't go as planned, Levi and I had plenty of chances to redeem ourselves.

That's another new thing about this blog. We're married now. Levi gets a name although I'm still not convinced he gets a deer on the wall.

Anyway, many, many ching-chings were made in our honor at the reception. The kind of ching-chings requiring the bride and groom to stand up, swap spit and continue with their meal. I'd rather see crazy American-in-Rome-woman's chest hair than pucker in public, but the 252 guests didn't seem to mind. I played along until the cake was served. Chocolate cake... with raspberry filling. Attention must be paid. Kissing can come later.

Usually kissing comes in the honeymoon suite. Perhaps you're afraid I'll wander into the waters of don't-write-that-where-other-people-namely-coworkers-can-read, but fret not. This story completes the evening without over-sharing... I don't think.

We get into the room and it's over... finally over... a momentous occasion I wanted to celebrate and mourn at the same time. Part of me wanted after-party and part of me wanted sweat pants. Amidst my ambivalence, the phone rang.

Who is calling the honeymoon suite at 1 a.m.? Mom, now is NOT the time for the talk, OK?

It wasn't my mom and it wasn't my dad or any other member of my crazy family although I wouldn't put it past them.

Who is this? Levi said into the receiver like he figured it was a telemarketer or something.

Who is this? The voice replied.

No... tell me who this is, Levi said with an authority I've heard him use only around electricity and deer-head decorations.

Tyler Aaaa.... the voice said before Levi hung up the phone and unplugged it from the wall. We're still not sure why he called or how he got the number. But the story is one of my favorites of the whole evening. I won't tell you who Tyler is, suffice it to say he was on Levi's side of the guest list, and as it sounds, would have prefered his side of the bed too.

Gah! I went too far didn't I? Shucks. I ruined it. I'm a wedding ruin-er.

Well. That sums up the wedding night. At least for now. Perhaps tomorrow I can tell you the tales of the wedding morning and the succulent seafood I caught on our honeymoon.

Stay tuned.

I prefer to keep bachelor parties like I keep my underwear, private.

2010-06-13T08:55:00.001-05:00

When it comes to bachelor parties, I believe unfamiliarity is the best policy.

Them: So where is the Cowboy this weekend?
Me: Montana
Them: Really? Cool. Where in Montana?
Me: Somewhere with a bar?
Them: So what was he planning to do there?
Me: Consume beverages, I suppose.
Them: So who did he go with?
Me: Not sure, but he took a 14-passenger van.
Them: When's he coming back?
Me: Look, it's a bachelor party. I prefer to believe that this weekend's events didn't occur until they're over. All I ask is a text every day so I know he isn't dead.

You tear, you're toast

2010-06-09T09:17:00.000-05:00

As the days draw near and the details emerge, I have to comment on how not-stressful this wedding planning is. Sure, I turned bridezilla once or twice, a detail or two was forgotten and my fiance keeps threatening not to marry me unless he's wearing a Cowboy hat. But otherwise, life is good. Wedding planning is good.

The only part I dread is the wedding itself.

See, as much as I like to write about myself and my relationship and reveal a little too much, standing in front of a crowd, possibly crying, puts me out of my comfort zone. This is why couples elope, people. That and for the price of a photographer, you and three friends can take a Grey Goose and Godiva trip to Las Vegas. Who better to marry you than Elvis? He steals the show, and the attention, anyway.

So I've come up with distractions:

* the bridesmaids are wearing dresses and hair of different styles. Stare at them. Judge them. Envy their matching heals. Anything to take the eyes off me.

* My wedding singer is a natural alto, but her range is so wide, she can hit notes higher than some sopranos. Look at her. Creep on her. Leave your glasses at home because she will surely shatter them. No boring tunes for her. Her one requirement is to "knock everyone's socks off." If she can't do that, she's fired... kind of. :)

* The vows I chose are the "I do" ones, where the pastor says all the words so if my voice cracks, I say one sentence and I'm done. Champagne, anyone?

* If all else fails, I instructed my little brother to light the church on fire. He's good at this. When he was five, he cut the cord to a plugged-in and turned-on lamp. I promised him I'd use the wedding loot as bail money. Fancy a trade, officer? Three mixing bowls and a Longaberger basket for the tall Colorado kid with tan skin and dark eyes who looks nothing like pale, short me.

So I need your help:

No crying at my wedding. Please. No matter the maid of honor, the grandmother of the groom or the groom himself, you tear, you're toast. No five-tier wedding cake for you. If you start crying, then I'll start crying and then I'll cry because I didn't want to cry. And with all the water, North Dakota will flood again. Embarrassing. But what's more embarrassing for you is when a lady in white dress slaps you on the face and says "pull yourself together." No one will ever forget it. You're in the small towns now. :)

perfect compromise

2010-05-22T11:12:00.000-05:00

A friend from my Saint Stephen the Martyr days circa 1997 and Bonnie Bell Dr. Pepper flavored lip gloss sent me this:

I think it's the solution to my antler aggrevation PLUS, she said, would make a perfect groom's gift. Now... how to wrap it...?

Sometimes I mess up, although it's very rare.

2010-05-21T07:19:00.000-05:00

I don't see any gophers here anymore, Cowboy said from the deck of his mom and stepdad on the evening of his birth.

The four of us meet up that evening for corn on the cob and steaks on the grill. I ate every morsel on my plate.

They're still here, his mother said. You want the gun?

I'm pretty sure my mother never directed a sentence like that to me... and apparently for good reason.

Look, there's one over there! I said.

No, Katie, Cowboy said. Gophers don't have wings.

I'll be smarter about the garter

2010-05-14T11:02:00.002-05:00

So, which colors we're you thinking for the tuxedo? the nice tuxedo-designer gal who also works with me at the paper asked the Cowboy.

We'll call her: E. :)

GREEN! I said, like she'd asked what color grass was. Obviously.

Ok, what type of suit? One-button, Two-button? she said, pointing to pictures in a catalog and looking to the Cowboy for approval.

One button, I said, in a classic shape. No top hats, walking canes or tails, I said. Just simple and elegant.

E looked to Cowboy. Is that OK?

Um, yeah, he said. I guess so.

So she showed us three.

Immediately I vetoed the one with collar resembling the cape of a vampire. He vetoed the narrow, rounded one that reminded me of Jimmy Stewart and Clark Gable.

So this third one? E said.

Um, yeah, Cowboy said. I guess so.

He tried the jacket on over his work t-shirt and Wrangler jeans, paired with shoes stained with drywall.

We should dress you up more often, I said.

Do you think this would match my cowboy hat? he said.

Ok, E interrupted with perfect timing, vest colors to chose from: olive? or one with a shade of teal?

TEAL! I said without thinking, ignoring Cowboy's fixation on the primary choice.

Unless... you really want the olive one... I said.

Um yeah, teal, he said, I guess so.

And do you want the ushers the same as the groomsmen and the dads? E asked. And the groomsmen the same as the ushers?

YES! I said. All green. I mean... what do you think Cowboy?

Um yeah, he said, sighing. I guess so. Why did you bring me along?

I'm sorry, I said. I just really like the colors. The more green the merrier, right?

And sometimes the groom wears a black vest with the same tie as the groomsmen, E said. Or all white, just to stand out. Do you want something like that?

GREEN, I said. He looks good in green. I mean... if that's alright with you, Cowboy.

He sighed. Um yeah, I guess so, he said, looking at me and shaking his head.

I mean... do whatever you want. I don't have to decide everything, I said.

No, no. It's fine. I'm sure it will look great, he said, opening a bridal party gift catalog and turning the page.

I felt almost as guilty as when I spilled nail-polish remover on the cherry-colored bedroom furniture my parents bought me. I mean, what? that stain was totally like that, mom.

I had to make it up to him. Had to give him something he wanted.... the cowboy hat? No. The boots? No. The antler adornments? I'd sooner die.

Why don't you pick out my garter, I said. Anything you want. Our colors are black, GREEN and silver but you could pick... I don't know... pink or something.

Ok... he responded, suddenly interested and rifling through the glossy pages.

And internet, this is what he chose:

What? Cowboy said. It's green....

antler advice from my father

2010-05-14T00:32:00.000-05:00

Dad: Kate, I've been thinking a lot about this antlers-on-the-wall thing you wrote about.
Me: K...
Dad: I can see where you're coming from. I wouldn't want deer heads plastered on my wall either.
Me: Right. You decorate with wallpaper of the four horsemen.
Dad: Well, it's just decorations.
Me: Come again?
Dad: I mean, you can live with a few heads on the wall can't you?
Me: Sure dad. The same way you could live with a Matt Leinert head on your wall.
Dad: It's just... it's his house too... Pick and chose your battles is all I'm saying.
Me: Ok, who's father are you??

Wedding themes: simple, elegant and a touch of North Dakota.

2010-05-12T10:54:00.000-05:00

With 200 invites in the mail and 50 still in the works, the wedding date quickly approaches. The rate I'm going, everyone with a North Dakota driver's license will dine on my dad's dollar.

If there's one thing I can't complain about, it's the financial arrangement. I had to verbally abuse my old man yesterday: NO, YOU'RE NOT PAYING FOR ANYTHING ELSE. Stick a dollar in my account and the first words of our first born will be the lyrics to the USC fight song!

A threat like that will shush a Notre Dame fan right up. And that's a good problem to have.

Between my parents, aunties and Cowboy's family, the wedding arranging is relatively stress free. Everyone's been more than generous offering time, labor and mucho dinero.

My only drama was the RSVP cards... those annoying little numbers I receive and always forget to return even though they're already stamped and post-office ready. A co-worker designed mine for me using my font choice, size and graphic-y squiggle. When she printed the final draft, I winced.

"Is it OK if I don't like it?" I said, waiting for a ruler rapt upon my head and cringing because I deserved it.

"Yes it's OK!" she said like I totally didn't waste her time designing the first rendition. "It's your wedding."

So we designed them anew. And cut them. And glued them. And I loved them, all for the low, low price of not $500 like I would have paid if I'd ordered them online.

Success.

In other news, Cowboy Sr. *will not* be wearing the black shoes Cowboy and I selected to match the tuxedos. Instead, he'll wear his brand new cowboy boots, he said. Precious.

May-ry Christmas from North Dakota

2010-05-07T06:47:00.001-05:00

The high today is 37 degrees. Paybacks are double, MoNa.

mold ≠ dead bird on level of foulness

2010-05-03T12:01:00.003-05:00

Cowboy helped me clean out my fridge one night in another one of those evenings when he goes above and beyond his boy call of duty and his sister laughs at him and calls him words that start with "p" and ends with another word for cat.

I'm OK on both counts :)

Now, I'm not a clean freak, but I'm not disturbingly disgusting either. Like, I *may* have laundry decorating my couch and living room right now, but I totally just washed it.

The same is true for my fridge. Sometimes, leftovers don't get eaten. But I put lids and plastic wrap on them, so its OK right?

Anyways, the night Cowboy assisted my fridge evacuation was the same day he hit a pheasant with his pickup truck. He didn't do it on purpose, but ugly duckling won't be getting his makeover if you know what I mean.

Cowboy, being the true country man he is, stuck his arm in the front of his truck and removed the pinned pigeon. It was just dead, he said. What's the big deal?

JUST DEAD? Meaning bloody and eyebally and still looking like a bird? And you TOUCHED it, like with your hands?? What if you get SARS or something?

As soon as I said it, he screamed. Not at the thought of infectious diseases FedEx-ed from China, but from a teeny, tiny growth on noodles cooked circa 1982.

Sick... I'm sorry... No... I'm going to throw up, he said, holding his nose with one hand and the tupperware extended toward me with the other.

Whaaat? I said. Throw it out. It's just mold.

JUST MOLD, he roared like I'd asked him to wear a pink popped-collared polo, this is the GROSSEST thing I've ever seen he said, hobbling back and forth like a toddler holding its urine. It's staring me in the face!

Oh really?, I said, hands on hip. The chicken that crossed the road and pummeled your pickup is somehow not grosser?

That rooster barely crossed St. Peter's Gate, he said. These noodles are older than archangels.

We agree to disagree.

His and hers decorating: seeing green

2010-05-03T07:21:00.001-05:00

Cowboy informed me yesterday: *not* every room in the house can be green.

I don't want EVERYTHING green. Now that's just crazy. We picked out cherry-stained cabinets and a sand/black counter top to coordinate with the gray ceramic tile. See? No green. All I ask is the walls...

I don't see the problem, I said.

It can't be green everywhere, he said. You want to walk into every room and see green??

Suddenly I'm having second thoughts about this marriage.

Um... yes?

If it's this or the antlers, I truly don't know what I'll chose.

I blame my father.

oh deer

2010-05-01T10:25:00.002-05:00

Can we talk about this mounting thing again? Cowboy asked as we strolled no where in paticular.

It was one of those weekday nights where we could be together and just be. Light skies mixed with light winds reminded us of last year when winter coats and snowstorms were more frequent than April showers and all the May flowers.

What about it? I asked, anticipating the only disagreement we've ever had and not solved.

Cowboy wants space in our house for the heads of animals he's shot... the birds, the rodents and especially the deer. He thinks it will give the home and outdoor ambiance. I don't disagree. I think it will look like a cemetary.

I just don't think this man-room idea is going to work, he said. Mounts need higher ceilings.

When it comes to interior decorating, Cowboy and I match like pink and navy blue: feminine, masculine and flattering on any skin tone. He likes earthtones and I prefer neutrals and greens. He prefers simple and I prefer practical. Awesome.

But our design has one flaw. Cowboy blueprinted a house with high walls specifically for the shrines to fallen fauna.

Naturally, I'd prefer a shrine to Satan.

Even when I design this man-room idea, he said, it won't have enough space for the bucks and their antlers, he said.

This is working better than I expected, I mumbled to myself. Originally, I told him to hang such artifacts in the mud room where the water heater and dirty shoes go. No one will bother them in there, I said. Exactly, he said, because there's no room for them in there.

The man room was my middle ground. Build me a house with a kitchen, two bedrooms and a writing space. When we assemble the addition, you can have a man room with camo curtains and antlers on the wall. I'll never go there and I'll never complain.

I can't build those walls as tall as the house itself, he said. But the antlers need tall walls. Astetically, it's unattrative.

Unattractive is death in the living room, I said. We may have dead creatures in our home, but they'll reside in the freezer where they belong.

We continued to sashay the sidewalks I fear my children will never recognize. Where we'll live, roads consist of gravel and stone and "side walks" are made only when a person creeps through cramped space. Stop lights don't exist and parking meters are as distant as Tiger Woods and Elin Nordegren.

Deer mounts honor the animal, he said. They recognize its dignity and valor.

If you wanted to honor it, you'd bury it, I said. Do you stick the heads of dead grandparents on your wall?

Mounts seem a little barbaric, and maybe they are, he said. Maybe that's why I like it. Can't we make some sort of compromise?

Hello! I said. Living here is a compromise. Have you met MoNa? She's especially bitchy to the Northern Plains...

I know, but hunting and nature are just part of who I am, he said. I just think we should find a space for them in our home.

I shook my head. Space for them means none for me.

To be continued...

before we digress, the dress:

2010-04-30T08:53:00.001-05:00

This dress belongs in this bag and is only allowed sunlight on days when the seamstress and bridesmaids come over.

And for anyone who's name begins with "Cowboy:" Peak inside this bag before June 26 and your last name will end with "Asshole" before you ever mutter "I do."

Wedding planning: small-town simple

2010-04-28T20:02:00.000-05:00

I always knew TV-style wedding planning was overdramatic, but I'd never planned one myself, so I had no idea.

When people said they took every bit of a year to plan their weddings, I believed them. And perhaps they didn't lie, but Holy Whoa. That's unnecessary if you live in a small town.

In a small town, you only have so many options and of those, you're probably related to or work with someone in each industry. Need a tuxedo? My co-worker runs a shop. Cake? Another co-worker ordered from the same woman. Honeymoon? His uncle owns a resort. Invitations? Ask the crafty co-worker with a scrapbook shop in her basement.

Here's proof of small-town simple: I got engaged two months ago.

Already, I've picked out:

* colors: black, silver and green. No brainers as I was raised in a home with green carpet, green roof and green bedding. Plus, now I'm going to live on green acres. It's only fitting.
* bridesmaids dresses/shoes: ok, they picked them out and I'm not telling you anymore because it's a secret. I'm just jealous I can't wear one too :)
* dress for me: ah, ah, ah-- You'll just have to show up and see :) But I will tell you this, the shoulder pads exceed the height of my head. Pure decadence. I couldn't shop anywhere in my city of residence as we have no bridal attire here. I could though, shop with my mom and aunt and in four hours, the dress and decisions were done. Perfect.
* flowers: white, tasteful and prepared by the best man's sister. I didn't bother to shop anywhere else.
* photographer: not only does she take amazing pictures, but I'd totally friend her on Facebook. The cost of the photos, however, might make me unable to afford it.
* church: sacrifice to Jesus, which is OK because after all these years, I'm due. Plus, the pastor chaired a committee to help people recovering from flood damage. I heart me some small-town connections.
* reception hall/caterer: entree is chosen, now for the sides! It's also the same location where the Cowboy and I met.
* cake: five tiers and about $1 per serving (small-town steal! as some city places charge five times that price)
* invitations: picked out, designed, but not made. Breathe mom :)
* DJ: recommended by the hotel, but costs a good paycheck
* HONEYMOON: less than the Dj...?

Now all I need to do is narrow down the guest list.... and pick out the groom :)

In-law insanity: Cowboy meets the fam

2010-04-17T08:30:00.077-05:00

Afraid but not alone, I’d driven those miles many times in three years. Five hundred miles to my hometown.... turn south at Fargo and you can’t miss it.

Cowboy and I were driving to Omaha. A trip my Volvo could do in reverse, but one foreign to the man from Up North.

The journey was one of endings and beginnings. Vinny’s final voyage was Cowboy’s first. First to Omaha, first to the family, first time to meet the in-laws in Iowa.

Terrified, I’d taught him the card game of my birth. Euchre. Known as the game of bowers where the right Jack is higher than any ace, some in-laws attempt a first game with my uncles, and then never return for a second.

Don’t let that happen to you, I said to the Cowboy. You have to get to know them. They aren’t going to get to know you.

I’m not worried, he said.

Well I am.

Cowboy’s good with meeting new people. He doesn’t shy away from shaking hands and story-telling, the customary get-to-know-you rituals. But my family is as tough as it is big. (My mom is one of 11 children and I’m one of 39 cousins. We served 60 people that Saturday.) If you’re going to bring someone new into the family, they seem to say, he has to impress us. We won’t bother to impress him. In fact, it’s the opposite. The uncles find it funny to scare future family with phrases like “With which hand do you smoke your crack?” and “Don’t trump my ace, you bitch.”

Without knowing it, Cowboy was under the second-most pressure of any decedent of of Eldora and Paul. My father is known as one of the most vicious. Known for his taunting and teasing, many cousins warn their mates to avoid him.

The only uncle worse is one of three Uncle Bills. For those unfamiliar, you’ll know him by his neck: it’s thicker than my thighs. A two-time war veteran, Jujitsu champion and narcotics enforcement officer, Uncle Bill searches all the boyfriend’s pockets and wallets... in search of paraphernalia of the drug and birth-control persuasion.

Uncle Bill wouldn’t make it for Easter, but I was scared anyway. I won’t baby-sit you, I said. I can’t. You’ll have to make conversation with people you don’t know all on your own.

Don’t worry about me, Kate, he said. I’ll be fine.

You don’t understand.

My mom, though, she knew it too.

She and an aunt took me dress shopping, a custom customarily sans-man.

You’re going to let him meet your grandmother, without you? she asked.

Guess so, I said, shrugging my shoulders like I didn’t care. And when it comes to my grandmother, I didn’t. I cared about their first impression, yes, but was I worried they wouldn’t hit it off? No.

Play cards with her, I said. And when she tells you to eat something, just do it.

Six hours, 60 wedding dresses, and the one I’d picked out weeks before later, we arrived at a home minus one Cowboy.

He’s at the boat, Grandma said, gambling with the boys.

So, what’d you think of him? I asked.

Well, he kept leading trump aces, she said. An evaluation meaning: he’s got work to do.

*Sigh*

The next morning, grandma’s kitchen resembled an elementary cafeteria with relations eating with their fingers and crowding the center table. The noise level rivaled that of Superbowl Sunday and one child even stood in the corner and covered his ears. Oh wait... that was my dad. And then another child threw jelly beans at my aunt. Oh wait, that was my dad too.

Cowboy didn’t seem to mind. He did OK with names... all except for one. I introduced him to my Aunt Karen, but he called her Aunt Shirley. He learned the names of my cousins and remembered the names of the relations he’d met gambling the night before.

Signs pointed in the right direction, but the true test was when I left him to his lonesome. Anxious for my bridal shower, another sans-man activity, Cowboy navigated the river of uncles and moseyed over to the big kid’s Euchre table. At the big kid’s table, only experts are allowed, as the number of players double and the speed of play triples.

My mother, myself and my grandmother at my bridal shower in Manchester, Iowa. Thanks for the photo, Aunt Bev. :)

You’re going to leave him with the uncles alone? my cousins asked.

*Gulp*

Do you know how many times we’ve walked into places where he knows everyone and I know no one, I answered, nonchalantly. This happens to me all the time without so much as an introduction. This is my one chance to get back at him, I said, wiping the sweat from my brow.

By the time I opened my presents and read from recipes I’ll never be qualified to cook, even if I’d wanted to find Cowboy, I couldn’t. He talked to one cousin about wiring projects and an uncle about cattle. Words like “Cat 5” and “cattle magnet” escaped their lips. Words foreign to me, but cozy to the Cowboy.

I may have driven him 600 miles from his land of origin, but with my family, he was already home.

had it been the first date, we'd ne'er had enjoyed a second

2010-04-12T07:39:00.002-05:00

Ok, I have lots and lots and LOTS to write about, but until then, I have this short story.

Cowboy and I celebrated the anniversary of our first date Friday by dining at the restaurant in which we shared our first meal. It's the nice restaurant in town and of course, the most expensive. (That's how you know it's a small town... because it's THE nice restaurant in town rather an **one of** the nicest)

He wore Wrangler jeans and Cowboy boots and I wore a little black dress, because that's how we roll. We are our own people. Manifested in attire we wear.

He treated me better than that first night, opening every door, spooning my appetizer and this time, I even let him pick me up at my apartment. (I said I'd meet him there, the first time, heh).

To quote his sister: "What a loser."

But I was in a state of mush, totally lapping it up like a thirsty puppy on an August afternoon.

Cowboy held my hand, took my coat and ordered for me. When he told me I was beautiful, I agreed.

But when the check came, his wallet didn't.

Did I leave it in the car? he asked. My other jacket? Let me go look...

Sure enough, no. He had no wallet. No cash. No credit card. The jerk thought opening doors and flirty compliments would get him a free dinner? He was wrong. I may have paid the bill, but he paid later... in the form of washing my dishes and vacuuming the carpet ;)

his stance on pants

2010-03-30T20:56:00.001-05:00

Cowboy... my fiance *blush* for those just joining us... wears nothing but blue jeans and sweatpants. He owns two pairs of Bugle Boy khakis, but they're circa 1997 and have pleats. Dislike.

Whenever we fight and I'm right (aka every.single.time), I tell him he can make it up to me by dressing fancy and taking me to a nice dinner.

He never has.

So when we traveled to Colorado for a "Back to the 80s" musical performed at Sidney, Neb.'s community theater, I insisted he dress up. No denim allowed, I said. This isn't like a job interview.

Cowboy didn't like the idea, but he was willing to compromise. Take me to Stockmen's Supply in Fargo, he said. Maybe I'll find something there.

Now, I question purchasing clothes from any store which also shelves "Gopher Getter" rodent repellent and calf-nursing nipples, but if the man was willing to forgo denim for a night at the theater, I was willing to forgo images associated with castrating band applicators.

"Are you seriously saying no one will wear jeans there?" he questioned, doubting my sophistication, taste and artistic etiquette.

"It's a play!" I said. "And not only that, but it's a MUSICAL. If you wear jeans, everyone will stare. Everyone will single you out."

"But why are you making me wear nice pants," he whined.

"Why are you making me fight with you about nice pants," I asked.

So the Stockmen's Supply sales associate walked us past the "farm chemicals and teat dip" section and ushered us to the very back... where black pants gathered dust and men's suit coats came with leather elbows.

"We don't have much selection," the associate said, "especially in length. But they aren't much different from Docker's. You can buy those at Kohl's."

"SEE," I said. "Not much different from Dockers. AND we're already in Fargo (since Jamestown doesn't have a Target, much less a Kohl's), let's look there!"

"H to the no," Cowboy said. "If I ain't buying pants here, I ain't buying pants. These are Wranglers."

"Yes." I said. "And?"

"I am not buying Dockers. They're gay."

"Wranglers fit tight around your ass," I said. "What's not-queer about that?"

So he tried on his "George Strait Cowboy Cuts" and lucky for me, they fit.

"Now that you own these nice trousers," I said, "how 'bout that fancy restaurant?"

Cowboy didn't answer, but he did wear the pants the whole day of the show, along with matching boots and 10-gallon-hat of course.

And even though he looked nothing like the boys of my youth and their faded jeans with store-made tears, he was cute anyway, and I didn't mind showing him off. "You should wear nice clothes more often," I said. "Good thing I'm here to teach you."

We got to the theater early, and chose our seats as the rest of the audience filled in around us. I didn't realize the show was in a high school auditorium and I didn't realize it didn't have a dress code. Something seems very wrong, I thought. Very very wrong.

Suddenly, I noticed t-shirts, I noticed scrunchies and worst of all, I noticed...

"Hmmm..." Cowboy said. "Not only is EVERYONE here wearing jeans, but we're the only ones who aren't. Now...," he said. "I think someone owes someone else a dinner."

tux shopping ≠sux shopping

2010-03-24T20:39:00.000-05:00

So the Cowboy and I tux shopped last night. In American weddings, the bride picks out the attire for the groom, but the groom can't even see the attire for his lovely lady. I think that's a metaphor for life: the gal makes all the decisions and the guy is content with the result. Yes, I think I will live happily ever after now.

For me, my wedding colors are silver, black and green. But Cowboy put his foot down. No neon and no (insert gay slang here) pastels, he said. To him, that meant only one choice was left:

... and no. We were not tuxedo shopping at Cabela's. This was a formal wear dress shop with tiaras and floor-length evening gowns.

Did you know Wrangler makes a formal tuxedo? They do. With bolo ties and belt buckles the size of basketballs.

As for the true image of Cowboy's attire, well that's a secret. It's OK for the bride to see, but for the rest of you, that's just bad luck :)

the engagement story

2010-03-17T23:19:00.003-05:00

Hurry up. I’m freaking freezing, I said, one sopping March evening before the North Dakota rain turned to snow.

We’d just dined with his parents and were headed to our vehicles, nestled next to each other in a restaurant parking lot, just like us, arm-in-arm, side-by-side. At 9 p.m., the hour exceeded darkness by Twilight standards and flirted with my bedtime. My belly was full and my body fatigued.

Seriously! I said beneath a hood so big two Vikings helmets could fit beneath it. Brrrr!

Hold on, he said, holding up his hand like a state patrolman on a closed highway. I have something to tell you.

He bent one knee, genuflecting in his jeans, soaking them in a pavement puddle. He reached into the coat pocket I’d been sitting beside throughout our entire three-hour meal. And I gasped.

I don't want you to be my girlfriend anymore, he said.

He opened the box but I couldn’t see. He kept talking... something about “Katherine Eileen” and “wife” but the world was aflush with snowflakes, and my vision terminated with wet concrete and dark skies.

Suddenly, I didn’t feel so cold.

Put it on me! I said, with the hustle of a mother of triplets on the first day of school. Right now. Right now!

And get up! I said. Get up Get up! I want to see it.

He slid the ring he'd purchased five weeks prior... waiting for the optimal opportunity. He'd even sought the help of friends to help decide, to make sure this ring was right for my left hand.

Between the midnight of the sky and the black concrete, I saw nothing but sparkle.

So, what do you think? he asked.

Inhale.

I thought of the jobs I’d applied for in Colorado, Nebraska, Iowa and the opportunities I thought I’d missed. I thought of my junior-year aspirations to see the world while writing about it, advancing the ranks of the newspaper world city by city, country by country. I thought of my first months, my first winter and my first car trouble in North Dakota and how I vowed I’d never stay.

I thought of our first date, he in boots of leather and hide, and mine of pointy-toe. This will never work out, I told myself back then.

I thought of the flood and the mud and the sandbags and the stories. I thought of how it ripped my insides, watching people lose their homes, their heirlooms and at times, even their minds. Out of all the bad that came from the flood, those people say, he and I are one of the good.

I thought of our future, our fortune and our unborn children.

Well? he asked.

It's perfect.

Valediction to Vinny

2010-03-10T06:49:00.001-06:00

The auto Salesman seemed chill at first, and I played the role of "sweet brunette," the sister to "dumb blonde." Let me show you where you can plug in your iPod, he said. And here's how you set the radio. If you want, take it for a test drive, test out the city streets and even on the interstate, he said in a southern drawl only detectable when said things like "even on the interstate" instead of "even on interstate."

The 2006 Jeep Grand Cherokee seemed great: 29,000 miles and the mechanic most familiar with it was a good friend of Cowboy's dad. If he gave it the OK, then soon, my car-searching days would end and all my complaints of snow-sodden cars would be left to blog posts of the past.

Plus, it was green.

When I saw it online, I just knew we were meant to be.

After four months of research, I bought my first car. The task seems simple, but really, I pretty much solved starvation and healed healthcare....

I'm prepared to make an offer, I'd said in the closet-sized office with no door, a little too public for a girl fretting her finances. I'd asked the help of Cowboy and his father: they could help me inspect under the hood and look for errors, leakage and other mechanical failures. But when it came to the negotiation chamber, I made it like Les Miserables, and chose to Go It On My Own.

I gave Salesman my numbers: this price with this and this work, I said. And I want a third-party inspection too.

"WHERE IS THIS COMING FROM, KATIE?" he asked as if I'd stolen his first-born and forced her to wear a South Dakota t-shirt.

It's my offer, I said with a shrug of the shoulders. Listen here, Mr. Southern Drawl, I thought to myself, I'm a foreigner too. North Dakotans are nice by nature, they can't help but pay a higher price for fear a lower one will make the salesman feel bad. Outsiders like us, however, go for the jugular. This is a two-person tango, I thought.

Ok, he said with a smile, I'll have to check it with my boss, but if you're serious, sign here.

Jigga no, I said, uncomfortable signing anything. I need to know more first. I need to crunch the numbers. How much are you going to charge me for tax, title, license and those ridiculouslyoverpricedfeesthatmakenosence anyway?

It's just a preliminary offer, he said. It's not binding.

I'm not signing it, I said, karate chopping the air so as to kung-pow him into submission.

Fine, he said, taking the offer to his boss across the showroon floor and shaking his head at Cowboy and his father.

"Well," he said to them, "the nice, little quiet girl went away."

Perhaps he was trying to guilt me, but I took it as a compliment.

I may know nothing about cars except that gas goes in the side pocket and all the knobs under the hood are off-limits to a girl like me. But after years of practicing journalism, I know how to research, and I know who's advice to take and who's to trust.

I allowed Cowboy and his dad to return to the standing-room only, closet-sized office and awaited salesman's response. I don't think he likes me much anymore, I told them.

Salesman returned. He underlined the counter offer and in big circles, he'd written the name of the family friend mechanic and his 35 years of experience.

I want a third-party inspection, I said. I will not buy a car without letting someone else look at it. If that's a dealbreaker, I said, letting my voice trail and shrugging my shoulders, (the international sign of "I'm naive, take pity on me, eh Kelli M.?), then I guess it was nice to meet you.

No, no, it's not a dealbreaker, he said, suddenly kind-hearted, paternal and offering my cups of coffee. Who are you going to take it to? he asked.

I don't know, I said. But what I meant was, like hell. This state is so small, you know all the town mechanics and their mothers. I'm not letting you talk to them before I even get there.

Fine, you can do the inspection, he said. Are you comfortable with this counter offer? Well, no, I said, grabbing my parka (Yes, it's March. I know.) and heading for the door. We're late for an appointment anyway, I'll think about it and maybe we'll come back.

Sure, he said, shaking my hand, shaking his head and bidding me adieu.

Not three minutes into the drive, but my phone was a-ringing.

Katie, it's Salesman, he said. We don't want to lose you over a few hundred dollars, if your offer is what you want, we can probably do that.

Ok, I said, covering my smile, I'll think about and let you know. Throughout the appointment, I called anyone I knew with car-buying experience... my dad, my uncle, my co-worker and my friend. This car for this price, I asked. What do you think? Their advice was sound: sounds good, but try to get it lower. Fun!, I thought. Tell me how.

We returned to salesman's office a few hours later, only to find he'd reneged on his phone call. Ok, what if we met at this price? he questioned.

Cowboy lowered his eyes, ready to walk if necessary. You're biggest leverage is your backside, my dad said. And it was good advice.

I don't think so, I said to Salesman, questioning my audacity and if I'd consumed milk or mojitos with my breakfast that morning. You said, you'd match my offer on the phone.

Ok, he said, like I'd asked him to donated both kidneys to a sex offender, is that number OK with you, Big Boss Owner Man?

Yeah, fine, he said, as if we told him he could cook the hot dogs and we'd bring the beer.

That was easy, but I still wanted my third-party inspection. So Salesman filled it halfway with gas and told me to return at 8 a.m. the next day. They'd already ordered the parts I'd requested, and they'd be there in the morning.

Coolio, I said, hand me the keys.

The inspection didn't consist of much, just another Jeep mechanic taking it for a test drive and checking to make sure everything worked. He's another friend of Cowboy's (small towns are AWESOME) and therefore, someone I trust.

By the end of the day, I felt like Salesman stole the Jeep and used it to run me over, I was so exhausted. I'd come up with a plan to get new tires (since many tires expire after 40,000 miles) but I wasn't sure if I could handle the stress. I just need to sleep I thought, rolling over on a pile of papers littered with down payments, interest rates and finance charges.

I woke up the next morning exuberant and energized. Not ask about the tires, like hell, I thought, ready to climb Mount Everest if it would save me 99 cents.

Salesman wasn't too happy to hear of my last-ditch attempt to save a few bucks, and he and his boss left me sitting in the undoor-ed closet for half an hour while they deliberated. But I accepted their counter, signed the papers, and ate a chocolate chip muffin in celebration.

I should be proud, but really, I feel as though I've given in. Four-wheel drive and machine with poorer gas mileage than Vinny. North Dakota is getting the best of me, even my beloved Vinny the Volvo. Pretty soon I'll wear camo to weddings and change my phone number from (402) to (701).

Ok, maybe the second part. But never, never will I do the first.

the car buying continues....

2010-02-25T11:40:00.001-06:00

I'm shopping for cars tomorrow. A small endeavor compared to most problems in the world, but for me, I've been biting my nails for weeks. So I'm progressing prepared.

I've already made lists: these cars, with these miles, at these dealerships for these prices. And then I scribbled NADA's trade-in and suggested retail values.

I called my bank, inquiring about a loan, asking for which interest rates I qualified. My credit score is "excellent" and based on my debt and income, the lender said I can only borrow a certain amount (actually a little more than I even wanted) and I had to keep my payments within a certain dollar figure... the same dollar figure I'd allowed myself. Perfect.

(Sorry, but I'm not getting into specifics here, ya nosy. I don't mind telling you about the times I face-planted in snow or farted next to my boyfriend, but my face would blush redder if you saw my financial figures than if Mother Theresa walked in on me in the shower.)

No matter what I pay though, cars will always cost too much money and I will never be rich enough. Philosophers questioned speaking in absolutes. Well, until I win the Powerball (a $1 ticket I NEVER purchase) I will never be rich enough. That is always true.

But so far, I've surmised that this car-buying process may go smoother than I expected. I still know nothing about cars, but I've learned a little about buying one.

Wish me luck :)

ND: small-town sweethearts or freaking a-holes?

2010-02-20T12:43:00.005-06:00

Help for a family in need: Volunteers team up to fix ailing couple’s Edmunds home | The Jamestown Su...

http://www.jamestownsun.com/event/articl...

George and Julie Beerbower moved to North Dakota two years ago so their children could play outside individually instead of at least three at a time. Several sex offenders and child molesters lived within ...

Fla. family gives up on small N.D. town | The Jamestown Sun | Jamestown, North Dakota

http://www.jamestownsun.com/event/articl...

A tiny North Dakota town’s promise of cash and free land lured only one family from out of state. Now, Michael and Jeanette Tristani and their 12-year-old twins are trying to move from the town without a traffic light back to Miami.

Readers have commented on these stories, saying how one or the other is more representative of small towns in North Dakota. Some people say some small towns are more accommodating than others, some say North Dakotans are nice to everyone, but one thing's for sure, North Dakotans are proud of themselves and take critique and small-town stereotypes VERY seriously.

Sure, North Dakota can stare the recession in the face and say, jigga who? We, North Dakotans, have a billion dollar budget surplus and the state increased its share of public school funding, so we had a property tax cut. But at the same time, they have county roads more dangerous than a rollar coaster without a seatbelt and that's when you get to them. The other six months, they're covered in snow because crews take weeks to remove it.

North Dakota, like every other state in the nation, has its good sides and its bad. I, too, am a newcomer to the state. I'm wowed by the people willing to jump Vinny and push him to softer ground. Nowhere else do people go so out of their way to help neighbors, friends and coworkers struggling with medical emergencies, natural disasters and other disabling events. But even with the outpouring, I'm outraged at close-mindedness to different cultures and lifestyles and the lack of curiosity and compassion for people unlike them. Plus, if I hear one more farmer receiving CRP/ other farm subsidies complain about welfare or one more Medicare recipient complain of government intervention in healthcare, I may just strap on my pointy-toes and kick like frightened cattle.

North Dakota is great, but it isn't perfect. Children in small towns have the opportunity to play every sport and join every club here, but school budgets are too small for art class. Children grow up knowing their neighbors better family, but at 18 years old, have never met a person with skin of charcoal or eyes of almond shapes. Here, binge drinking is the highest in the nation.

North Dakota has its good and its bad. I think everyone can agree on that. I'm not sure which story is the epitome of this, but my guess is it's exactly in the middle.

thanks be to MoNA <--- enjoy it while it lasts

2010-02-19T09:03:00.000-06:00

Melted snow turned the streets a darker shade of concrete today in a heat wave worth celebrating only in North Dakota.

"It's 22 degrees," one co-worker said today.

"Beautiful!"replied another.

And it was.

Today I walked outside wearing only one pair of pants and didn't feel the chill suffocate my skin and dry my epidermis. Twenty-two degrees feels like 60 when you're used to double digits below zero. If the streets weren't so covered in ice, I'd have taken a walk and worked on my tan. But even though I didn't, I smiled and strolled without fury anyway. As in, instead of wearing multiple pairs of gloves and socks and amplifying my amble from outside to inside, I could enjoy the fresh air... breath it in without coughing it out. It's nice not to have to rush from car door to door. In fact, Vinny's temperature gauge raised from 6 to 3 o'clock faster than Canada's Abel LeBlanc raised his middle finger to the legislature up North.

Perhaps it's too early to say this, but Vinny only got stuck once this year, and it wasn't entirely his fault. I was delivering home-building goods to Cowboy on a day in which driving should have been banned like racial slurs from freedom of speech. Luckily, my car was mere feet from two handsome men in Carhart overalls, so a push and pedal to the medal later, Vinny was free and the world was saved from tyranny, depression and dolls with exposed midriffs. Pretty much.

I was scared for winter this year. Scared it could somehow be worst than the last, scared of getting stuck, stranded and frozen so far in the middle of nowhere, no one would find me 'til the snow melted. And I'm pretty sure my mascara would run by then. Hideous.

I'm glad to see that while she put up a fight, MoNa didn't win this year. I did. Not that she isn't a sneaky little sucker, (she dusted Jamestown with 27 inches last March, so she could hit again) but I think she took some sedatives this year. Or maybe some Midol. Or then again, maybe she's just so tired from crudding on the rest of the country, that North Dakota got a little break this year. A torture chamber, sure, but a swift kick beats kneecapping any day.

Dear MoNa,

Thanks for winter. It reminds us to take advantage of the nice days and squeeze in each ray of sunshine. The cold days remind us how futile we humans are, and how, despite our best efforts, we are not resilient. We need the help of warm weather, heated vehicles and most importantly, each other. Lesson learned.

Springing for spring,
Katie

Valentine's Day shooting spree

2010-02-16T11:09:00.000-06:00

I don't like traditional Valentine's Days.

One of the reasons is because the day is named after Saint Valentine, the patron of love, lovers and friendship. Some say Feb. 14 is the anniversary of his beheading in 270 A.D. And today, we celebrate that death with cupids, arrows and chocolate-covered strawberries. I don't know about you, but 1700 years after I die, ya'll better still be in mourning, ok?

I don't like Valentine's Day because the last truly awesome one I had included a couple's skate to the sweet melodies of Celine Dion's "Because you loved me." I wore a turquoise Alaska sweatshirt (thanks Aunt Michelle) and as we held hands, my soon-to-be sixth grade boyfriend perspired the Pacific Ocean through his fingertips. (Giddy up, Danny J).

Last year, however, was almost as good.

After a recent break up with a guy I probably should've never dated anyway, I took Carrie Underwood's "Get Outta this Town" literally and headed south, south to the Big-O where fellow Creightonian editor Kelli Mutch agreed to be my date. If we we're going to be single, we could at least be lesbians about it.

So we joined forces with a few fellow Creighton alums and at Alpine Inn, ate fried chicken with our fingers and skipped the beer and drank the grease instead. Could we get some extra napkins? we asked. Sure the waitress said, handing us a roll of paper towels. Romantic.

There, the North Omaha view consisted of raccoons and feral cats eating chicken bone residue and posing for photographs in the moonlight.

From there, Kelli and I traveled to mid-town where a man had tatooed his head with an Irish flag the size of a deck of cards. He told us he was a rugby player from Council Bluffs, set to move to Colorado. He bought me drinks and I accepted. He asked to hang out sometime, and I declined. Happy, happy Valentine's Day, indeed.

So this year, I told Cowboy to knock it off with the jewelry and the candy. I'd prefer a heart-shaped pepperoni pizza from Papa Murphy's, please. Shocked but not offended, he obliged until his friends invited us over Saturday night for ribs, potatoes and Rock Band, the game where boys become superstars and girls laugh at the color-coded guitar strings and male octave ranges rivaling those of Mariah Carey herself.

Those ribs kicked the crust off my pepperoni pizza, and frankly I prefer the company of friends for Valentine's Day. Friends kick the candle out of dinner for two in a crowded restaurant so dark you can't read the menu.

But even though I don't believe in Hallmark-y weddings and holidays, I do believe in gifts.

For Valentine's Day, Cowboy gave me these:

Because nothing says "I love you" like terminally diagnosed long-stem gerber daisies.

As for me, for Valentine's Day, my gift to Cowboy was this:

Because nothing says "Happy Valentine's Day" like blasting the brains of "big game" animals.

Sunday we ordered stuffed crust pizza and rented movies like "Knocked Up" and a Blockbuster exclusive called "I love hate Valentine's Day." I never watched the latter because I fell asleep during the former. The next morning, Cowboy washed the dishes. Now that my friends, is true romance, and proof Saint Valentine did not parish in vain.

a little perspective

2010-02-12T07:40:00.000-06:00

Spoken like someone with 4-wheel drive and a two-car garage, a fellow Jamestownian once told me, "If weather's your only complaint, you have nothing to complain about."

Dislike.

True. The only shootings in town are bb guns at car windows, or more frequently, some former country bumpkin, violating city code, guns a raccoon in his tomato garden. I check the call log at police everyday. The most frequent offense: Runaway Rover.

Last year I wrote about the 90 inches of snow we received and then the floods which occurred after and how I refused to wear boots of any kind besides my pointy-toed ones. Well, the goal was to continue that trend this year, but instead, I fell flat on my face and not literally, thankyouverymuch.

Hi, my name is Katie and I wear cloddy snow boots, even on days it doesn't snow. Now, when the Great Spirit takes me to the big beach in the sky, he's going to ask me how I've suffered. Did I not feed you, he'll ask? Clothe you? Shelter you?

Yes, yes. But frankly father, I could have done without all the clothes. Give me some warm weather and I'd be happy to donate my double-wide green parka to the children suffering in Africa, even if they don't suffer from cold.

See, the weather's been so cold here for so long, ice covers every street. And atop the ice is a fresh frosting of newly fallen snow which looks celestial until the world wakes up, walks in it and turns to shades of gray. Or yellow. Or brown.

So instead of trying to tempt fate, I've instead worn faux-fur lined black boots to work, and even at work. And at least in North Dakota, those aren't against the dress code.

Until then, I'll continue to complain. Already, experts are forecasting floods, not as high as last year's 500 -year flood, but as high as the 100-year flood 12 years its senior. If flooding this bad is expected every 100 years, why has it occurred three times since 1997?

But even if the snow should stop and water remain within the banks of its respective river, I'll still find reason to whine. Indeed, I'll always have the boys who tuck their hoodies in their jeans.

cheap dinner

2010-02-03T11:17:00.002-06:00

Yesterday I waited 53 minutes for a $2.75 cent hamburger. Upon consumption, it tasted like a $2.75 hamburger. Its beef was of frozen preservation and bun of the same variety. And although the restaurant offered pickles and raw onion, I put pictures of lettuce, tomato, bacon, mayonnaise and all that make a burger sinful on milk cartons. I couldn't find the missing children anywhere.

So that night as I snored, I dreamed about $2.75 hamburgers and making my own... with steamed buns to soak up burger grease, broiled cheese and sauteed onion stacked in just the right order with lettuce below burger below tomato. I'd own a restaurant with satisfied guests, full bellies and no mind for fat grams and caloric intake. I'd be great. My stomach would never grumble and my pocketbook n'er would empty. Diners at my restaurant would polish off their burgers de heaven with a chocolate milkshake and never gain a pound.

A person can believe anything during a REM cycle.

So in my dream, I offered a trial version my masterpiece to Kyle J., who removed the bun of perfect texture, sliced the beef with a plastic fork and refused to eat it further. Not good enough, she said. And I don't like carbs.

And then I woke up, disappointed.

My nocturnal dreams of winning the gold medal in the Iron Chef contest are now crushed. My commercial kitchen aspirations over.

But at least Kyle J. revealed my stronger soul and some spare cash. Maybe today I'll upgrade to the dollar-menu.

Hauling snow out my window

2010-02-01T09:23:00.001-06:00

I've watched five trucks drive by hauling semis worth of snow. I don't know where they're going, but oh how I wish winter removal itself were so easy. Between the trucks and my window however, is the falling debris of more flakes, more ice and more below zero temperatures.

Punxsutawney Phil may perform his annual duty tomorrow, but a rodent need not inform me what I already know: six more weeks of winter, if not more.

The days and nights around here grow depressing by the month. It's February. A month for hoodies and hipsters, sure, but not coats that rival in size with wooly mammoths.

I shouldn't complain. Even Oklahoma got snow days this year. At least North Dakota can hold hands in solidarity with its southern neighbors. Maybe then we could produce enough heat to make global warming come true.

Sometimes winter days can be put to good use: an afternoon stroll to see the birds and the snow-covered trees can relax the mind and even contort it to believe winter is celestial. But not here. It's nice to get fresh air, until you inhale a little too hard and hack a frozen lung. And even with proper snow boots, scarves and ear-muff protection, no North Face can conquer our ice-laden streets. One wrong step and you'll sled yourself to the Emergency Room.

Cowboy and I walked laps in the local mall yesterday, before it even opened, with the old people in sweatpants and terry cloth headbands. It feels good to get out, stretch, burn calories and begin the afternoon with Burger King for lunch. Winter is no time for vanity, we need those calories to keep warm.

National Weather Service promises highs in the 20s by Thursday, just like it promised a winter with above average temperatures. Based on the El Nino weather pattern, meteorologists said North Dakota would see a milder winter this year, with January temperatures averaging above the area's 17 degree normal. Bogus. Yesterday's high was 4.

I could use a couple days in the 40s, enough warmth to melt some snow and thaw our minds. That, or a vacation in Hawaii. Whichever comes first.

Jeans, jeans, the magical fruit

2010-01-29T08:01:00.003-06:00

I attended a wedding this weekend in which the groom wore jeans and an untucked shirt.

The father-of-the-bride wore jeans too. And so did all if the guests except me, the bride, the mother-of-the-bride and a little girl in a black tu-tu.

Untucked, Cowboy thought to himself.
Jeans? I thought aloud.

I wasn't so much appalled as I was intrigued.

I've only attended three North Dakota weddings, so I can't say what a traditional one looks like. But much to my despair and all I thought was right in the world, I think more weddings should come dressed in jeans. Or untucked shirts. Or tu-tus. Whatever.

Because while weddings are a formal occasion, a marriage is not. If anything, a marriage should be the most informal relationship a person has.

informal |inˈfôrməl|adjectivehaving a relaxed, friendly, or unofficial style, manner, or nature
Formalities in marriage should be as unfamiliar as a Big Mac on a Hilton sister. You need to wear a retainer at night? Sexy. Your first kiss was with your cousin? Weird, but I love you anyway. You need to cuddle? Take my arms.
This relationship, bound by law, expects devotion, honor and protection of another, until death parts. So even on PMS days, low-income days, rectum-spasm days and bad-hair days, two people, previously unrelated, make a promise to love and to hold, through good times and bad. It's a formal commitment in an informal relationship, to love a person for exactly who they are and how they may change, forever and ever.
The person you marry should see you without makeup, and tell you you look better without it. She should accept your beer belly, but take you for walks and cook you steamed vegetables anyway. A marriage is a union between two people, who they are, who they were and who'll they'll become.
Yikes.
Maybe we get over our marriage fears by dressing them up in things borrowed and blue.
We grow up in a society where it seems "weddings" are not only synonymous with, but more important than, the marriage itself. Like, we may spend our entire savings account, but I'm sooo having ice sculptures of fairies and lilly pads at my wedding. And I want orchid center pieces and a midget DJ too. They represent who we are as a couple.
Really?
If a wedding is synonymous with marriage and who two people are as a couple, mine would come dressed in pointy toed shoes in mid-January, or... pajama pants when I get off work at nightfall. We'd listen to Christina Aguilera, dance the Cupid Shuffle and feast on mom's homemade peanut butter balls.
Now that's something to celebrate.
To be clear, I'm not against weddings and I'm not against marriage. I'm just against the Hallmark-ization that comes with celebrating two people who chose to partner their parenting skills and checking accounts with each other.
Everyone is entitled to the wedding of their dreams, and the day is, in fact, special. Celebrate the love, celebrate the forged family and celebrate the opportunity to visit with people you only hear from on Christmas cards.
I'm not saying throw out your top hats and turtledoves, I'm just saying the celebration is a day. But the marriage is a lifetime. And if you're lifetime is dressed in jeans, why should your wedding be any different?
Loves,Katie

A little joke: and N.D.'s the butt

2010-01-13T11:26:00.001-06:00

I got this in an e-mail today. These are my faves:

You might live in North Dakota if:
* you carry jumper cables in your car and your girlfriend knows how to use them
* your idea of creative landscaping is a statue of a deer next to your blue spruce
* you install security lights on your house and garage and leave both unlocked
* 'Vacation' means going east or west on I -94for the weekend
* you see people wearing camouflage at social events (including weddings)

None are funny, but all are true :)

Happy Wednesday!

On the fritz cuz my car is a ditz

2010-01-12T12:38:00.002-06:00

Vinny died, but my co-workers weren't ready for his funeral.

Experts who heal the body are called doctors, but non-experts who heal the Volvo are called life-savers.

Cowboy and I made a plan Thursday evening, the night my car wouldn't start for the fourth time in as many weeks. But this time, Vinny was stubborn. Ignoring jumper cables they way I ignored my mother's pleas to clean my room, Vinny was cold, frigid and probably PMSing.

I'll replace the battery, Cowboy said, I'm sure that's all it is.

But what if it's not?

I'd agonized over a new car purchase for months. I've only done it once before, and by "done it" I mean my dad made all the calls, negotiations and even paid for it. I just had to test drive and sign. I don't have that luxury now. I live alone, in a state in which I know no car dealers. Used car salespeople are almost as scary as a 40 degree day in January: you know it won't last. Plus, adding car payments to my budget is something my current job and the income from this blog ($5 since October :) ) barely allow.

So Friday morning consisted of baking, blogging and feeling sorry for myself over coffee I'd made the morning before and reheated in the microwave (note the budget). Exposing my emotions through writing allows a catharsis no car trouble can defeat. I posted a blog that day, but I left out the part of me weeping, in the shower, the stream of water fusing with my tears.

It sounds so over-dramatic. Gain perspective, Katie. You could loseyourjob watchyourchilddie contractcancer and getsomerealproblems. But my shoulders heaved with the weight of automobile asphyxiation anyway. I was wallowing in a misery not even peanut butter balls could cure.

I avoided Cowboy's call Thursday evening. I wasn't ready for him to hear me with crybaby in my voice. But screening him seemed worse. He knew I was home. I'd just texted saying so. To not answer may have caused more explaining, more problems, more tears.

"I can help you, you're my girl," offering reassurance I didn't believe.

So when the phone rang Friday morning and caller ID announced a foreign number, I answered wearily.

"When are you coming to work? The tow truck's waiting for you," the caller said.

Excuse me?

"It's all ready to go," she said. "We just need your keys."

Not planning to work until the afternoon, I was un-make-uped and unprepared. In 15 minutes or less, I juggled mascara with clean underwear, allowing just enough time to bag the cookies I'd made for all the co-workers likely to chauffeur me.

Within minutes, three colleges and myself (does standing there count as helping?) hooked a rope from Vinny to the truck, a redneck tow typical of foreign cars, co-worker said. Foreign cars are shit, she advised. They have hooks on both ends because they're towed so often.

Not offended, I begged her not to hook it, just ram Vinny, I thought. Ram him until his white paint bleeds.

So Vinny was placed in timeout, AKA, the office garage, where I embarrassed him in front of his peers, insulted his mother and kicked the front wheel tire. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. How dare you defy me make me cry?

In the garage, another co-worker hooked up his battery charger and Vinny's block heater. In minutes, my car was warm, fuzzy and sucking on battery charger like breast milk in a bottle. I'm almost felt bad. You're OK Vinny I nurtured, patting his rear view mirror and stroking his bruised bumper, you'll feel better.

On the third hour, Vinny's battery charged and I'm not kidding, the car ROSE FROM THE DEAD. I need some eggs and a bunny, it's freaking Easter around here.

By the end of the work day, my car not only defrosted, but started too. STARTED. And even though I thought my problems were over, the giving was not. One co-worker phoned his dad, an auto-mechanic by trade. What do you think she should do? he asked.

I don't know, what kind of oil does she use? he offered.

I shook my head. Canola for baking and olive for sautéing?

Another co-worker's finance with two kids of his own, skipped Friday night daddy-bonding time to clean Vinny's lines and test for additional deficiencies.

What do I owe you? I asked, a question typical of North Dakotans after someone jumps their car, gives them a ride or a push through knee-deep snow.

Nothing, he answered. Another North Dakota custom.

Sometimes people just like to do nice things, Cowboy said. They feel better helping someone than they do getting paid.

Well, not giving back makes my feelings of bad turn to worse.

So I'm going car shopping this weekend and making office-wide chili this week. If I can't fill my gas tank, at least I can fill the bellies of people who can.

death be to volvo

2010-01-08T10:52:00.000-06:00

Vinny's dead. Again.

And just when I feel like beating my head against the $839 CAT and $430 O2 censor I just bought him (whatever those are) I feel I can't complain. Sure, current temperature here is 26 below, but the rest of the country is freezing too, albeit, in 26 above degree temperatures.

I'm frustrated with this weather and more frustrated feeling like it won't ever end. Snow lingered on cement-bottomed parking lots until JUNE last year, so reason beckons me to fear forever. I could take another week or two of the cold and snow, but if winter plans to stay until summer, then I plan to make like an ostrich and bury my head in sand... or peanut butter balls... whichever arrive sooner.

This year, however, I have three advantages.

1). Others across the country (except for Kevin Cleary who lives and Arizona, wears shorts to class and I hope has a huge ZIT on his nose) are experiencing the same. While the temperatures and snow accumulations differ, it seems winter is extreme for everyone this year. I find camaraderie in our shared struggle. If global warming exists, send it to North Dakota.

2). I've survived before. And even if this year is just as bad or even worse, I have experience and confidence to know I beat winter once, so this is just Round 2. Bring it, MoNa (my abbreviation for MOther NAture).

3). Although I'm related to no one within a 500-mile radius, I have co-workers, friends and neighbors who treat me like family. Need a ride? Need a jump start? They don't seem to mind lending a hand and in fact, they tell me things like we're "happy to help." The town/office/state is so small, I can ask one person for a jump and suddenly four people huddle around my car, attempting to test its battery.

It's a frustrating feeling when you can't transport yourself to the intended destination. Sure, I could walk, but my fingers would gangrene in the process. (26 below... hello) And then how would I write all these blogs about drinking Bailey's for breakfast, dicing deer testicles or imitating Foldger's coffee commercials?

Here's wishing you warm weather and cold drinks,
Katie

Traditional North Dakota Christmas

2009-12-28T20:39:00.000-06:00

According to my 2009 winter holiday itinerary, I was supposed to leave my apartment around 0600 hours Thursday morning. The promise of snow accumulations hip-deep, however, kept me North Dakota bound.

High winds and record snowfall created blizzard-like conditions throughout the state, closing Interstate 94 in North Dakota and Interstate 29 from Canada to Iowa.

No matter, the Cowboy said. You'll spend Christmas with me.

He failed to mention that by "Christmas" he really meant the day prior and three days following.

Cowboy has a large family. And by that I mean moms, dads, grandmothers, stepparents and stepgrandparents. To him, the seasons aren't properly greeted without overindulging in turkey and glittered cookies at the residence of each relative.

So Christmas Eve began at his grandmother's house where I mopped floors, wrapped gifts and stirred fudge. We didn't stay long, anticipating an evening with his mother before heading back to the farm of his grandmother the morning after. Although I've failed many a theology test (does that mean I failed God?) I've never been this wrong: Cowboy and I were stuck and his mother and stepfather's house for FOUR days.

Lucky for me, they like playing cards. And sipping alcohol.

So here is my Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanza gift. If you plan to spend a winter holiday in the Northern Plains, here are things you must do:

* Learn pinochle. Where I come from, pinochle is like Cadillacs, crochet and dentures: reserved for those who age exceeds their weight. The card game, however, grows on you once the white wine festers inside you.

* Learn other games too. Sequence, Scrabble and euchre were played by the window with care, but not Life, as we didn't have one.

* The best part of waking up is Bailey's in your Foldger's cup.

* As opposed to my holiday tradition of "White Christmas," "It's a Wonderful Life" or the latest movie release, North Dakotans entertain themselves gazing out the window and into the snowy somewhere. There, they'll see their neighbors and comment on the size of his pick up, state of his affairs (extramarital, financial, etc.) and who is most in need this holiday.

* Do not mistake the phrase "let's make grands" as meaning "let's make grandchildren" as that is just uncomfortable and not for the faint of heart.

Here's hoping your holiday was as merry as mine,
Katie

Cruel and unusual punishment: deer hunters beware

2009-12-21T10:49:00.002-06:00

As you can see from my previous posts here and here, hunting season in North Dakota is a voluptuous woman dressed in tube tops and mini skirts. She steals the attention of all the boys and even some tom-boyish, get dirty kind of girls. That bitch.

So it only seems natural to punish law-breakers with penalties sure to discourage such criminal acts again and also punishments in which the state doesn't have to pay for. Unlike incarceration, fines, fees and community service provide the wallop of discipline without the expense to the state.

They're pretty strict up here... it's almost as bad as Guantanamo Bay or Chinese water torture. In the Upper Plains, they take away the major prize, the deer-hunting trophy, if you will, all at minimal expense to the taxpayer. However, the devastation to the offender just might land him or her in the care of mental health professionals.

In North Dakota, if you use a fake ID to shoot deer, the law not only fines and fees ya, but it forces you to forfeit two sets of antlers too.

And no wrongdoing is worth that.

In other news: wearing a hoodless sweatshirt with the face of a deer on it, is, apparently, no crime. Now where's the justice in that?

Thanksgiving: only baking a cake to jump out of and not eat would make it better. Part I

2009-12-10T08:27:00.003-06:00

I buckled my seat belt in anticipation of the road trip ahead. Both a smile and a worried eyebrow decorated my face like a Christmas tree with blue lights: pretty until your eyes squint and brain spasms. The trip I'd planned included seven hours in a two-door car neither of us owned, on a path we n'er had traveled. Scratch that. The seat belt wasn't enough. So I wore a hockey mask and football pads as well.

It was the eve of Thanksgiving Eve. For the trip, I'd packed what seemed like my entire apartment into a a Diadora soccer bag and headed west.

West: where the North Dakota plains become hills, although you still can't tell the tallest from the shortest.

High on four hours of sleep and amped on weeks of lying to my parents, I didn't notice when Cowboy missed the turn for the interstate... within my city of residence.

Me: Colorado is that-a way... me thinks.

CB: Right. Gotcha. Thanks.

False starts, dark skies, house projects, blog writing and Christmas decorating weren't enough to keep us in North Dakota for the holidays. For Thanksgiving this year, I headed home. And I brought the Cowboy with me.

Freshly shaved and sporting a new haircut, the trip was one the Cowboy wasn't sure he'd make. But when he finally accepted the idea, he studied up on ESPN, namely, Notre Dame football, just so her could partake in man-conversation. Some girls need poetry, some girls need jewelry, but me, all I need is a Saturday in South Bend. Swoon.

Cowboy'd met the fam before. Perhaps you remember July... when my mom was all like, so what sort of genes are you passing to my grandchildren, how much money do you make and PS you'll be needing to run all your house plans by me. Then my dad, who likes to ask strangers how they smoke their crack, was all like, silent. And it wasn't even football season.

One of the best things about living so far from your family is you can tell everyone your everythings, and your parents never find out. Like, that one time I spent a night in jail. Mom still doesn't know (maybe I'm kidding about that?)

All the co-workers (and by all, I mean EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. in my office of 50), law enforcement officers, county employees, neighbors, gas station attendants... They ALL knew the time of my departure, the route I was taking and what I'd packed for snacks. Oh mah god, they'd say, you're mom is going to be soooo excited. She might even cry. I hope so.

Ever since I wore diapers, I wanted to recreate the Folger's commercial. You know, the one when Peter surprises his fam and awakes them with the slow-roasted brew.

If this commercial doesn't make you tear, then you probably kill kitties and eat babies too. If so, GET OFF MY BLOG.

The only problem was, my mom had the day off, a detail not accounted for in my hour-by-hour, turn-by-turn Google map. She's a teacher so she never works. :) the day before Thanksgiving is a holiday.

So when my brother acted weird (i.e. cleaned his bathroom, vacuumed the carpet, planned a shopping excursion complete with lunch date) she knew something was up.

But that didn't keep her from doing her hair, a process that takes 45 minutes on a good day and an hour in a half when "White Christmas" is on.

In anticipation of our arrival, I awoke at 6 a.m. Wednesday in our hotel room in South Dakota.

The journey from Jamestown, where I live, to Colorado, where the fam lives, is about 800 miles or 12 hours. Since we left Tuesday after work, we decided to split the departure into two days.

For me, 6 a.m. is more likely reserved for coming home from the bars, rather than waking and beginning one's morning, but on days like Wednesday, time didn't matter.

Until I waited for mom's hair to dry.

See, my mom is the kind of lady who vacuums the oven on Christmas morning. If Jesus is coming, the windows must be washed, the ceiling spackled and all dust mites accounted for. And that's just for Jesus. It gets worse for her daughter's boyfriends.

So if Cowboy came over and her hair was in pins and curlers, she'd beat me with the flat iron refuse me the peanut butter balls she bakes ONLY at Christmas. And that punishment, I can not bear.

By 1:30, we'd arrived in Loveland, a mere five minutes from the Ryan abode. Don't come home yet, my brother said via text message, she just got out of the shower.

Fine.

So we gassed up the car, bought a wash and didn't eat all the snacks I'd packed so as not to spoil the lunch I promised my brother I'd share with them.

By 2 p.m., the mom still wasn't ready, so we drove to the nearest bar for Bloody Ceasers -- a drink customary in the northern regions. It's made with clam juice. And tastes like salad dressing with too much pepper. Dislike.

At 2:30, she still wasn't ready but I WAS so we drove over anyway.

I get antsy in my pantsy for surprises and always ruin them. I think I was born with the defect. Like, when I was four, my dad took me shopping and when we got home I said MOM! I'm not going to tell you we got you a GREEN COAT for Christmas.

So when Cowboy and I parked the G6, I could barely hold my pee I was so excited to knock on the door. So instead of knocking, I rang the doorbell. Over and Over and Over I rang the doorbell. When she still didn't answer, I just walked in, to the house I've never lived, and asked where she kept her cafe verona.

***

The writers of 'Let it Snow' must have been high, or from Texas

2009-12-08T08:35:00.001-06:00

The sky is falling in Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, etc. (meaning they got two inches of snow... boo hoo), but that's just a fall day for us up here.

I feel compelled to tell you that I broke out the big guns yesterday.

Current temperature: 4 below.

I wore a coat that adds 37 inches to my waist line. The coat is so obese, it makes me look like a portabella mushroom, wide body, short legs. Wearing that beast means I need a seat-belt extender, just to ride in my car.

I've also taken to wearing two pairs of pants, two pairs of socks and two, if not three, pairs of gloves. I also wear an ear-band on top of my flat-ironed hair and beneath the hood of the sweatshirt and I sport over my work clothes. On really cold days, I wear the coat's hood as well. Think of me as a mushroom with a pointy center.

Getting dressed for the outdoors takes so long, I need half an hour just to take the garbage out.

Despite the wind, snow and 42 pounds of winter-coat insulation, winter will not get the best of me. Sure, my green coat may resemble the mold of edible fungi, but at least I have a fashionable scarf to wear with it. Note: the scarf is buried beneath the rolling tundra of faux fur, but knowing it's there gives me warmth no parka can muster.

Although the weather has convinced me to forgo my vanity and feign a 50-pound weight gain, I will not be broken. On some matters of wardrobe, I will not negotiate. I will look good no matter what the temperature. I will defy the snow, the ice and the broken ankles.

No matter what the weather man says, I will wear pointy-toe boots with heels. And Mother Nature can not stop me.

Boxers? Nope. This one is briefs.

2009-11-30T21:31:00.000-06:00

I've got a long (see: length of House Bill 3200) update on the way. I promise. But in the meantime, allow me to update you in brief.

* Cowboy and I drove 788 miles in a borrowed car to visit my family for Thanksgiving.

Said family wasn't expecting us.
I should have majored in lying... oh wait I studied PR.

* While visiting, Cowboy flashed his house plans like a pedophile on the playground.

My 23-year-old brother questioned why a person would chop trees to cook food in an oven kept in the living room. A conversation regarding wood-burning stoves and their heating capabilities ensued.
Framing for Cowboy's house begins this weekend. If you have a hammer, you're invited. Double points if yours is pink (like mine).
I was a little embarrassed by my brother's city-dom until...

* We ran out of fuel 40 miles from home and couldn't fill up because it was after 6 on a Sunday. Even on one of the biggest travel days of the year, small town gas stations in North Dakota CLOSE. Cowboy said we could call Triple A. I disagreed. Now, Cowboy's left ear is slightly longer than his right. I'm going to blame it on his bling, despite his un-pierced ear.

* Cowboy asked if our roadside badger-sighting "blew my mind." Yes. Much like my reaction to Einstein's theory of relativity, Beethoven's fifth and Pluto's dis-planet-ness, so blown is my brain right now. Kind of like yours, if you could just hand me your deer rifle, please.

* For the winter holidays, Cowboy said he'd prefer a makeover to traditional gifts like hammer saws and bathroom slippers. I'm starting with his wardrobe. Next time you see him, he'll be wearing a paddy cap and argyle sweater vest.

* We played Nintendo 64 like it was 1996 again. I got so aggressive, I "rammed the shit" out of Princess Peach's face.

Oh yeah. Don't miss that one.

PS: Here's a shout out to the person/people in Tanzania who read my blog for 64 minutes yesterday. Jambo to you :)

Christmas shopping: What to buy someone you hate

2009-11-23T10:40:00.001-06:00

Dear mom,

If you are shopping this Black Friday, please resist the urge to buy this.

Although its star-studded frames are charming and rustic, I'd prefer frames like this:

Happy holidays,

Katie

I am woman, hear my rectum

2009-11-14T10:45:00.007-06:00

So, something happened the other night as I slumbered at Cowboy's grandmother's (his GRANDMOTHER’S! PG thoughts, please).

And just as a forewarning, I wasn’t going to post this... but I feel its my obligation, nay, responsibility as a woman and a blogger to let these issues air. Women have come a long way since the days of corsets, voting rights and emergence into the workplace. But the lives of men and women are not equal. No, no, no. Not until we can pee standing up, will we achieve equal pay and equal stature. It’s all about the bowels.

Anyways, Cowboy wakes every morning at 5. And at 5:08, 5:15, 5:23 and 5:30.

In the midst of the 5:15 to 5:23 slumber, at his grandmother’s house, mind you, I did one of the most terribly awful, no good, downright disgusting things a girlfriend can do. This was worse than stealing all his ex's e-mails and sending viruses to make their iTunes play MMMBop over and over. And much more horrifying.

I farted.

Not even kidding. Air attack, anal acoustics, after dinner mint-- whatever you want to call it. I did it. Seriously, I'm not even sure why he hasn't dumped me yet.

It wasn’t the silent kind or the one you can pass off on the dog or the house settling or something. It was a rip resembling a ketchup bottle almost empty.

Kind, sweet Cowboy said nothing and feigned sleep.

I'm in the clear, I thought, unmoving, pretending to snooze and promising to yodel for Jesus if only to keep the smell away.

Cowboy didn’t say anything that morning. He went to work and I too did my... business.

But Cowboy's generosity lasted only until evening when he met me for burgers and quizzed me on the after-effects of our shrimp dinner the night before.

"I've been gassy all day," he said. "Did you feel that way too?"

That’s the thing about boys. They can totally toot and the world applauds. But should a lady break wind, you might as well give her facial hair and remove her uterus. She is no longer female.

"NO," I said, a little too eagerly. "But maybe that's because I ate a handful whereas you consumed ohh... the entire Pacific Ocean."

"Maybe," he said.

So later, just as our food arrived and our starving bodies could re-nourish, Cowboy blows the gasket.

“So last night, I don’t know if you remember, but I think I heard you...”

Horrified and no longer hungry, I blamed the cat. I blamed the bed spring. I even blamed a drive-by shooting. But since his grandmother lives near nothing, he knew it wasn't true.

"You don't have to make a stink about it," he said. "I thought this was proof of our comfort with each other. Why are you so embarrassed?"

"You couldn't be a gentleman and not mention it?" I asked. "I would never do that to you. I would NEVER-EVER-NOT-IN-A-MILLION-YEARS-HERE,-AT-HOME-OR-IN-MY-BLOG tell anyone something like that. I don’t even SAY the word ‘fart.’ Musical butts belong unspoken."

"Sorry..." he said.

I shouldn't blame him. Where he comes from, parents teach their children to pull fingers and belch the ABCs.

Many people may blush or say "excuse me." But at the sound of oral and anal emissions, one local 2-year-old instead says "beeeep." Which is funny and cute until men in their 30s fart out loud ON PURPOSE just to hear the child’s response.

I'm pretty sure the only other human to hear such a babel from my backside is my brother. And since we’re getting all share-y here, I should probably tell you that back then, I did it on purpose, and... on his head. Sorry brother.

I only find the audacity to write this from dooce.com and her recent post: http://www.dooce.com/2009/11/09/featured-community-question

And from my mom, who said her coworkers had a conversation about colon calamities and how they were such a faux pas. Well, ladies, it’s time to be silent no longer. We will pass gas and men will hear it.

So I tooted. And then I blogged about it. It’s like my generation’s way of burning bras.

So dear readers, it’s time to air it out, shoot the shit, make cheese. Are women still feminine if they fart? What if they just TALK about farting? Do you pass gas in front of your man or does your lovely lady launch a wiffer in front of you? And if so, is it cute, gross, sexy? What do you think?

Blood, guts and Bambi

2009-11-07T18:09:00.003-06:00

Guts, gore and innocent blood on his hands.

One shot. And he was dead. A carcass, warm and alone in an empty field.

That's what I witnessed Friday night.

My boyfriend: The Horror Movie

Here I am, La-De-Daa, my boyfriend's great. I call him Cowboy and he helps flooded people. Isn't he swell? Wowie, he sure is cute in that Ace Ventura costume. The world is all unicorns and butterflies and rainbows shooting out of asses.

Gee, do you think Katie might (gasp) be in love?

Wrong.

The other night, Cowboy's dad, Cowboy Sr., shot himself a "five-by-five somma bitch" a.k.a. a boy deer with five points on each antler.

With knife in hand, Cowboy braced himself before the buck's testicles, screamed yee haw, and suddenly skin, head and gizzards were flying wayward across the prairie.

What did I get myself into?

Picture this: I drive to the middle of nowhere and before I even exit the vehicle, Cowboy launches a vest at me.

Cowboy: Put this on.
Me: What? Why? Orange isn't exactly my color...
CB: This is the country, Kate, we don't take chances around here.
Me: But I'm in a driveway, with a horse pasture. Is it even legal to shoot here?
CB: Kinda hard to argue that when you're dead.

Deer gun season opened Friday. In the country, or even semi-cities like Jamestown, schools cancel class and hold parties and beer sales in its honor. Like I said in the blog before, it's like Halloween, but the only appropriate costumes are that of Irish Protestant and Yellowstone National Forest.

This is how it started:

Boom. Smash. Pow.

CB: Here that? Someone's shooting out yonder.
Me: Neat. Can we pet the horsies now?

Suddenly the phone rang and we hopped in the pickup and headed to the even middler of nowhere, to fetch the fallen fawn. Except it wasn't a fawn. The alliteration just worked better. Get over it.

Anyways, Cowboy and Cowboy Jr. loaded the carcass into the pickup just to unload it again into the gutting pile. Yep. It has a name. The gutting pile.

Wanna help us hold his legs, Kate? Cowboy called.

You've got to be kidding me.

After they'd excavated all the intestines, heart (which Cowboy assured me he'd fry) and liver, the boys REPACKED poor Bambi and took him to the butcher shop.

(If you want pictures of that, I'll send them to you. I don't mind writing words like "testicle" and "ass" but I'm afraid skinless deer might offend some readers. That and if you really want to see bloody Bambi picture, you're a perv, and I don't really want you reading this blog anyway.)

At the butcher shop, the Cowboys hung Bambi BY HIS HIND LEGS and skinned him like I did to the cat in biology class. Except I didn't skin it. My partner did and I just took notes.

I stood outside the butcher shop doorway, taking pictures because I knew I'd need evidence. The FBI readers would SURELY need proof of this one.

You can come inside, Cowboy Sr. said. There's enough room here.

Thank you, but I prefer to remain far away for fear the dead deer's soul will haunt me.

"There's nothing impure we're doing here," Cowboy said, his hands the color of MacBeth. "Where do you think you're meat comes from?"

Uhhh... the grocery store... duh.

Shooting spree hits North Dakota!

2009-11-06T09:57:00.000-06:00

Do you have school today? I thought so. Throughout North Dakota, most districts don't.

Despite popular belief, no. It isn't winter yet. School was not canceled due to weather. Actually, it's a temperature many North Dakota's consider too hot.

With the exception of my Northern neighbors, no one calls calls 60 degrees "too hot." In fact, 60 is the IDEAL temperature for all things softball, basketball, football and golf. Swimmers may balk at its sweat-shirt requiring nature-- but they're indoor people anyway.

The first Friday in November is a holiday by state standards-- one like Halloween where to trick or treat, one must act the part. Costumes are limited for this celebration, however, as participants may only dress as pumpkins, construction cones or an overgrown thorn bush.

Liquor stores stock up on beer, bars add more employees and accidents occur inside the gas station as all the patrons are in camouflage and therefore, blend together.

Today, is a day of bonding for many families. Today, there is no vehicle but a pickup and Today, 14-year-olds may handle firearms.

Happy Deer Gun Season Day.

To see the effects of deer gun season on local businesses, click here.

Hollow weenie

2009-11-04T10:35:00.002-06:00

I haven't written in a while. I'm sorry. It won't change. Not until December anyway.

I'm working on a novel... 50,000 words written in haste. My only goal is to have a beginning, a middle an end and some conflict and resolution in between. More on that some other time.

To make up for my lack of posting, I'll share some Halloween photos for your judging pleasure. I haven't even facebooked these yet, so congratulations! You get the first look.

For Halloween, I tried to be the scariest thing I could think of: a cowgirl. Some co-workers say there's no way my outfit would pass for a cowgirl, but rather, it's the outfit of a farmgirl. Uggh. What's the dif?

Me as a cow/farmgirl minus the shoes. I bought Cowboy boots for the occasion. Cowboy suggested I wear them on days that aren't Halloween.

I told him they'd be better thrown at his face than worn on my feet.

And Cowboy? He's Ace Ventura. Because he balked at the frat boy of my suggesting.

Alrighty then.

You know you're NOT from a small town when...

2009-10-31T10:57:00.002-05:00

a deer in the road scares you into rolling up the windows and locking the doors. And... the fact that there's a deer in the road.

No, I was not drunk when I wrote this so you can imagine what it would sound like if I was. PS: this title's pretty long. That must REALLY annoy you.

2009-10-30T09:08:00.001-05:00

SO yesterday the meteorologist said: 8-12 inches bitches. Except that he didn't really say "bitches." He just inferred it when he cackled after every news update.

Anyways, the whole town panicked and filled their gas tanks, bought bottled water, dug out mittens and scarves OhWaitThisIsNorthDakotaWeDidThatTwoMonthsAgo.YesAugust, updated their living wills, etc.

And then...

Nothing.

We got like A snowflake and it totally melted on impact.

It did rain a lot though. Like, had I left a bucket outside (which would require foresight and frankly, I don't have any... why would I be here for a THIRD winter if I did?) but had I left a bucket outside, I could have saved myself the 50 cents it costs to take a shower in the morning. I'da just taken the bucket, dumped it on my head and called it good.

There's a lot you can do with 50 cents, so don't knock it.

Aside from the obvious gum balls or handful of Mike N' Ike's circa 1985, you can also use 50 cent to start your rapping career. Pretty soon you have a criminal record, eight gun shot wounds and sing about fat kids loving cake. All that from 50 cents.

So suck one, haters.

But anyways, in some cities, bathing in rain is probably dirtier than no shower at all, but that's only because they have acid and smog and pollution. North Dakotans aren't necessarily any Earth friendlier than other states, but we Northerners just have a lot of fresh air. The only contaminate here is the breeze from our bowels. And methane. But then experts said methane could power the world one day. So that means the rain totally isn't dirty. And therefore clean. AND energy-efficient. We deserve a medal or a clock or something. Upon receiving it, we'd have to freshen up a little, the governor would probably appreciate it, but that's no problem because we'd have our shower buckets at the ready.

But now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure my landlord pays my water bill anyways. So showering costs me nothing. Amazing. All the money I spent on beer PG movies when I could have just played rubber ducks in the shower every Saturday night... landlord really should have mentioned something about that in my contract. I blame the meteorologists. Where were they with the bucket-idea in the first place? Now I'll have to move. But not before shaving my legs.

Uffda! Where's my loofa?

You know you're NOT from a small town when...

2009-10-27T09:01:00.000-05:00

* the waitress at the town bar asks for ID.

Take you for a ride on my big red tractor

2009-10-26T07:56:00.007-05:00

Thoughts of tall buildings, parking meters and sidewalks filled my head as I watched country boys lift 50-pound rolls of soppy sod from a factory-line belt to a pallet with broken limbs.

See, yesterday, I drove a tractor.

* Impatient for articles like "a, an" and "the" North Dakotas skip them entirely. "I fixed fence" "I drive truck (for a living)" "She's taking interstate." Ok fine. But I just live here, I'm not from here. So for me, "a, an" and "the" all stay. I am from the Midwest, however, so I'll still end my sentences with prepositional phrases when I want to.

But back to the story...

I drove a tractor... it was red with a radio and a heater and windshield wipers (I had no idea farmers were so happenin' p.s.).... and didn't run over any small children. Just the adolescent ones. But they're annoying and smelly and belong before video games anyway.

The assignment: harvest sod
The task: hum the melody to Kenny Chesney's "She thinks my tractor's sexy" while Cowboy steers and compacts the sod seedlings beneath us.

Attached to the tractor was what probably has a perfectly appropriate and agricultural term. Since I'd prefer to deny that I participated in such a country act, we'll stick to a vocabulary I've nearly mastered: the words of the culinary world.

Cowboy took me for a ride in a big red tractor. Behind him, the tractor pulled a 500-pound rolling pin.

The goal: smoosh grass and ground together so another tractor can chop it like Christmas cookies the shape of granola bars. After the sod is cut and sent through the factory-like line, it shapes itself into a jelly roll. Then, another country boy packs the sod on a pallet, against each other left and right and top to bottom. A third country boy then secures the two dozen Hostess ho-hos with a roll of saran wrap so sticky it puts marshmallows out of work.

The morning began with Cowboy behind the tractor's wheel and me riding shotgun. But I soon grew tired of a game I like to call, arm-rest-in-butt-crack, so Cowboy offered a switch.

I don't know if that's a good idea, I said.

Why not? he inquired like Dennis the Menace or one of The Little Rascals. What could POSSIBLY go wrong with this scenario??

Soon he was showing me how to brake with two pedals and switch to third gear. Seriously, where's the cruise control? I asked.

It doesn't have one. Now stop and let me out, I want to stretch my back, he said.

Hells to the naw, I said, remembering the story of my dad's first driving test and how the instructor knew he was a farm boy because he could drive in straight lines. Had I been tested under similar circumstances, I would fail, EVEN TODAY.

I'm not ready yet, I said.

You'll be fine, Cowboy said. Like operating a machine with tires larger than the average adult female is big deal, he seemed to shrug. A 69-year-old with special needs usually handles this, Cowboy said. If he can do it, so can you.

You don't understand, I said. When it comes to seeds, dirt and growing seasons, I'M developmentally disabled, I cried.

Seriously. Stop the tractor, he said. My back hurts.

I DON'T KNOW HOW, I wailed.

All you gotta do is ClutchBrakesNeutralOffclutchNeutralParkingbrake and... PRESTO! he said. Understand?

Sure. Whatever. Get out. You're going to feel bad when I run this thing right over your face.

What was that?

Nothing. Carry on, I said. Already switching the radio station and belting Carrie Underwood's "Cowboy Casanova."

"He's a good time, Cowboy Casanova

Leaning up against the record machine

He looks like a cool drink of water

but he's candy-coated misery"

Soon, country boys from the middle of all sorts of nowheres pointed their fingers and clutched their bellies. A city girl drives tractor. Puh. But I didn't mind. I just gave them the one-finger wave and carried on.

snow and tell

2009-10-22T09:41:00.003-05:00

Don't worry. It doesn't look like this anymore. But it did when I left for Denver six days ago. Yikes, was that a scary drive.

Prior to my life in North Dakota, the first snow was always a happy occasion. First snow meant it was time to think about winter break, cardigan sweaters and white lights that twinkled. Children wrote wish lists for Santa and adults baked with gingerbread and cookie cutters. Finally, you could break out Mariah Carey's "All I want for Christmas is you" and people's faces would turn from "the eff, Katie?" to "the hell, Katie?"

Three years ago, four to five inches of snow meant you had school, because crews could plow, push and melt that before the 8 a.m. bell.

Here, its an event of disastrous proportions: like, leave work early or you WILL NOT make it home. FOUR TO FIVE INCHES.

My snow anger melted, however, when I saw the green trees and their snow-covered branches. I don't care how Grinch-y you are, those saplings sure are purdy.

Going through the big D

2009-10-15T07:46:00.000-05:00

I'm going through the Big D and don't mean Dallas. That's because I mean Denver.

To get there, I must travel through Jamestown, where a dozen tree branches fell from heavy snow and caused power outages throughout the region; Valley City, where the buses are running two hours late; and Fargo, where streets have actual traffic and I'm not sure I remember how to drive like that, especially in winter.

This vacation is due.

first snow

2009-10-11T11:23:00.003-05:00

I'm not looking forward to snow this year. In fact, I still have nightmares about last winter... since it ended in May and all.

But Mother Nature, let's make a deal: If you stick to light dustings through March, I promise I won't complain. And I'll buy you that personalized Budweiser mug you always wanted.

Winter wear with a side of ugly, please.

2009-10-09T11:47:00.007-05:00

"Sometimes you have to give up a little style to stay warm," Cowboy said to me, hammer in hand and tool belt around his waist.

I shook my head.

"I don't believe in that," I said, remembering the days of hiking two-foot snow drifts in two-inch heels.

"What about ear muffs?" I said, rummaging the closets of Cowboy's grandmother, preparing for an evening of garage wiring and light installing.

I'd offered to help install lights and wires yesterday in a senior citizen's two-stall garage. I assist because it gives me an excuse not to do laundry. And so I can show off the blisters on my middle fingers.

The garage was built for Cowboy's grandmother this summer to shelter her freezer and a teal-blue mini-van. But she can't. Not until the place has power. Naturally, Cowboy, an electrician by trade, waited until the evening of the area's first hard freeze to install it. He'll tell you his excuse is the flood and the sandbagging and losing his house and all. Hogwash. I blame Fantasy Football.

But I digress...

"I might have a stocking cap you can wear..." he offered.

My face contorted with the thought of static-y helmet hair. "Maybe I'll just do without."

Sure. I could've worn winter wear of my own. I'd arrived sporting black mittens and a green pea coat Grandma D deemed "Sooo cute. Does he tell you how you look in that? So cute!"

So while the coat of evergreen is probably replaceable, no garage-wiring project is worth the risk of its demise.

"Here," Cowboy said, wrapping me in a men's size XL letter jacket with hood made of sweatshirt material. "You can cover your ears with this."

I pulled the hoodie over my deliberately-messy ponytail and checked myself in the mirror. This isn't too bad, I thought. I've looked worse.

"Wait," he said, tying the hoodie's shoestrings in a bow. "Protect your ears."

"Nooooo!" I cried as if he'd dropped an antique tea cup my Irish ancestors brought with on the boat to America. "That's ugly."

"We gotta prepare you for the weather up here," he said, leading me outside and promising to protect me from woodchucks, badgers and feral cats.

"Listen," I said, pointing my finger and pausing for effect. "This is winter No. 3. I don't need you. I've prepared myself."

"Ok, but these temperatures can kill you," he said, daring to question the abominable Katie the Lady.

"I survived last year. I can do it again," I said, pumping my fist and showing off the sculpt of my guns.

"Right," he said, rolling his eyes. "You'll be the hottest dead chick in town."

Why wearing boxers to the grocery store is almost worse than showing up naked

2009-10-07T10:01:00.000-05:00

Creighton University, Tilt-shift time-lapse from ArtsyFartsyTim on Vimeo.

It's a little early, but soon, Creighton University will gear up for its annual Christmas at Creighton ritual. The ritual itself was only important because of the hot chocolate and cold-weather camaraderie. Chances are, students walked to the whirly-gig water fountain with a friend, but ran into people unseen since freshmen year in Gallagher Hall.

Together the students caught up, reminisced and complimented each other's cozy winter wear. Oh yeah, and the t-shirts. Everyone bought a t-shirt. A campus event was nothing without a cleverly designed and ill-fitting short-sleeve crew neck tee.

After the Christmas at Creighton event itself, the campus glowed with white lights in the leaf-less and evergreen trees. Except for the token Bluejay tree. That one twinkled the same color as the blue trim on the V.J. and Angela Skutt Student Center.

The lights stayed on. All day. All night. The lights made it so the 4 a.m. walks home from the Creightonian newsroom didn't feel so cold anymore.

Those are my memories of school.

Walking to an event like Christmas at Creighton with one friend and running into people you hadn't seen or spoken to in three years. Good memories.

But memories that are so unlike those of country people.

Unless someone is no longer living, country people don't go three years without speaking. They barely go three days without speaking. And their friends, they didn't meet each other freshmen year. They didn't sit behind you in that one philosophy class that one semester either.

They sat behind each other in every class of every year until someone moved or graduated high school.

So they know their classmates, classmates' siblings, parents, grandparents and cousins twice removed. And they know that Classmate A's mom is now divorced and dating the dad of Classmate B. And how Classmate C had an affair with the uncle of Classmate D. And how Classmate A's mom and Classmate D's uncle are brother and sister.

The connections are like a North Dakota winter: it feels OK at first but Jesus is it over yet? No... it lasts forever.

Sometimes it's nice to be anonymous.

Rarely do I want to dress appropriately for an outing to the grocery store. Pajama pants do the job just fine.

But should I even consider such a repulsive thought, my boss shows up along with the superintendent of schools, police chief and all five members of the Stutsman County Commission.

I have about the worst of both worlds. I know enough people to be recognized, but I still don't know the mayor well enough to be comfortable conversing with her while wearing the rubber-duck print on the boxers I'd just slept in. And since it's Jamestown, the mayor would likely recognize me and call me by name. Pretty much.

But when I go anywhere with Cowboy, be that on my home-turf of Jamestown of his home-turf of all areas south, he knows everyone. Every. Single. Time. It's like that. Bar, movie, grocery store, farm auction...

"I hate going to Wal-Mart," Cowboy said to a table of five the night he planned a dinner for two. "Even if I only want milk, it takes me an hour and a half because I know everybody."

It takes me a hour and a half too. But that's because I walked by an eyelash curler I had to have.

In a small town, everybody's pretty much a big deal. Everyone's famous. Or infamous. You can't make a mistake one decade and expect people to forget it by the next.

I guess that makes for more honest and loyal neighbors. And maybe makes people dress better too. Just kidding. Dressing up in this town means wearing black jeans instead of blue ones.

So I guess I have to adjust.

I just don't know how I'm going to tell those rubber duckies that they aren't allowed in public anymore...

Bravo to ArtsyFartyTim for the Creighton time-lapse video.

man bag

2009-10-03T17:18:00.000-05:00

Me: That's a cute looking purse you got there.
Cowboy: That's not a purse. That's my coyote-hunting sachel.

You decide.

the Wal-Marts

2009-10-02T07:31:00.001-05:00

While shopping for a few items at the Wal-Marts, I jutted through the apparel section, the quickest route from point A (skin care products) to point B (cereal).

I don't want to get into the morality of Wal-Mart. You won't find those opinions here. But I do have one problem with the chain, and that's its speed of service. Why is it that when I walk into the Wal-Marts needing milk and toilet paper, I inevitably leave with ketchup, mustard, Christmas cards and the newest Miley Cyrus DVD? It took me a hour and now I have to wash my bum with newspaper.

Anyways.

Mid-jut, I passed a middle-aged man with gray hair and a beard. The man was rummaging through a stack of Wranglers and speaking like a sailor drinking an ocean of whiskey.

"I can't never find jeans that fit," he said, seeking condolences from the nearest living soul, be that a young lady or a talking Halloween decoration.

Nevertheless, I sympathized. I grew up in department store dressing rooms.

My jeans were always too long in the leg, too narrow in the thigh or too wide in the waist. So I tried every pair. Every pair of Levi's, Bongo and Mudd. Every Saturday. Until I memorized the markings on the wall and knew all the Kohl's associates by name.

"I know how you feel," I said, apologetically and pausing for a smile.

"Yeah," he said. "And they're never tight enough. These kids with their..."

I'm not sure what he said after that. I was too busy running.

Does the boogie man haunt children in winter?

2009-09-30T20:56:00.004-05:00

If last winter was a pacifier, it'd be in-side-out by now. That's how bad it sucked.

And I have to tell you. I'm not into it. At all.

Thinking about frigid temperatures, frostbitten fingers and cars un-starting makes me want to poop my pants if only to make my mom hold me. If you thought a firey hell was scary, try freezing it.

Last winter was an anomaly even by North Dakota standards. It was like Mother Nature overheard a "Yo Mama" joke and took it personally. Soon, she was pulling the winter equivalents of driving with a baby in the front seat, losing custody of her kids, shaving her head and dating a guy named Adnan Ghalib. And then she tried to convince me that Joe was the cutest Jonas Brother. Oh hell no.

Mommy's wack.

Last year should be a one time deal, but no one guarantees it won't happen again. And I don't think I can handle another seven-month winter. Not without gaining another 12 pounds. But I shouldn't complain. I'll lose it again... if not from my waist than from all the fingers I freeze off.

You think I'm kidding? Let's recap:

* My vehicle needed a new battery last winter-- no less than 10 months since I'd replaced it the time before.
* I used emergency roadside assistance so many times, my car insurance dropped me.
* More than once, I hiked through a driveway chest-deep snow, just to get to my apartment.
* I spent an hour digging my car out of its snowy coffin at the Fargo airport. With a shovel I packed. In my suitcase.

So you can understand my child-like fear and why I sleep with the lights on and a thumb in my mouth. If the winter of 08/09 was Freddie Krueger, than 09/10 promises scary of "I Still Know What you Did Last Summer" proportions.

Don't let your kids read these blog posts anymore. I don't want to be responsible for their nightmares.

below freezing

2009-09-29T08:13:00.002-05:00

Good morning.

The thermometer reads 30 degrees. Please send thermal earmuffs, wood-burning stoves and probably a furnace or two.

Winter cometh.

And if you're my mom, please send peanut butter balls too.

falling in love

2009-09-25T14:11:00.005-05:00

with FALL, ya freak-os...

The weather around here is starting to smell of burnt leaves and apple cider. It makes me wish I had a kid, if only to take it to Vala's Pumkin Patch.

In the fall, patios should came standard with basement apartments.

As a child, when the autumn leaves fell, so did the dollar signs in my parents' checking account. The spending was legit: school tuition, new tennis shoes and the St. Stephen the Martyr craft show.

Pictures like this make me fear the snow, the grey, the death.

But pictures like these tell me the world will blossom again.

country vs. city attire part II

2009-09-19T17:04:00.005-05:00

I never thought t-shirts tucked in vs. tucked out was ever that big o' deal. Who cares, really?

That's because I hail from a land of Catholic schools where administrators removed a student's right to chose what clothing to wear and how to wear it, all in the name of Jesus loves you, but not if your skirt is too short.

Teachers used to give students demerits for unruly acts like untucked attire. The schools enforced it, but many a student with 10 t-shirt violations sat in Saturday school, awaiting the bell wringeth. That's how much they protested the shirt-in rules. Maybe that's why city people refuse, the untucked tails are our everlasting rebellion.

Of all the choices I get to make, though, skim milk or 2%? Black eyeliner or brown? whiskey or beer? ... whether to tuck my shirt in seemed pretty insignificant.

That was, until I moved north.

Here, tucked-in tops are so popular, some stuff sweatshirts into their shorts.

For Cowboy and I, this is a battle we've had before.

I, still of city mind, try to encourage variety. Untucked can be flattering, I try to persuade.

To him, untucked is too frat boy.

To which I say, that isn't necessarily a bad thing.

Apparently, some wars never end. See part I here.

Me: See, look at me. My shirt isn't untucked. It isn't the end of the world.

Cowboy: City people never tuck in their shirt. They never do, I don't know why.

Me: Well, cuz we're cooler than you. That's why.

CB: Not really. If I didn't tuck in my shirt, the girls wouldn't be able to check out my butt.

Me: Which girls are checking out your butt?

CB: All of them.

Me: All of them who?

CB: (pause) The jealous ones.

driving to the east

2009-09-17T22:19:00.000-05:00

For many people, a 5 a.m. wake-up call isn't too far from ordinary. Maybe they wake at 6 or 7, so while early, 5 a.m. isn't a huge stretch.

As someone who works as many nights as I work days, I'm more likely to bed at 5 a.m., than to wake at said hour.

So to be awake, alert and driving by 6 can be a painful experience, especially when the morning was foggy and the streets unlit. By 7 a.m., however, the sun had risen and the view looked like this.

I don't anticipate waking at 5 every morning, but that day it was worth it.

home furniture shopping

2009-09-16T10:27:00.003-05:00

Only in North Dakota can a person sip a cocktail and find used furnishings for purchase as well. The dart board on the left is not for sale at this bar in Ypsilanti, N.D. The armoire on the right, however, it's selling for $175.

Sunday football

2009-09-14T14:36:00.001-05:00

Cowboy: I really miss my 46-inch LCD TV right now.

Me: (blank stare)

CB: See, this is how I'm really affected by the flood.

Me: What do you mean?

CB: People who watch their see-every-pore football games, they just don't understand.

Me: Well, would your TV fit at my house?

CB: Maybe. Do you get HD with your cable?

Me: I don't know.

(Pause)

Me: I wonder if they make "Sex and the City" in HD...

omaha is my home-aha

2009-09-13T09:39:00.008-05:00

Every return to the city of my childhood, I feel like I've been gone forever but also like I never left.

Samantha P. and I explored downtown. The weather changes, but that skyline's been the same since circa 2004.

One of the benefits of city living is diversification in cuisine, competition in business and if one store doesn't carry what you want, another is a mile down the road. The problem was, every Office Max, Office Depot, Staples and Bed Bath and Beyond was out of "over-the-cubicle coat racks." And every mom-and-pop cafe was closed for Labor Day breakfast.

One dining destination, however, remained open.

Alpine Inn: better than Nascar and Natty Light. Together.

chin deep

2009-09-03T10:39:00.003-05:00

Differences are more than chin deep.

They’re in our heads too.

I make fun of the silly things country people do and while they’re infrequent, I make fun of silly things city people do too.

But today, I’d like to share with you one of the biggest differences between people from cities and people from no where.

In the city, we learn at an early age to mind our business and not meddle in the lives of others. Sure, we read tabloid headlines and smut magazines as much as anyone else. But we don’t run around telling people how hung over we are and how we just can’t stomach curry like we used to.

But it’s more than that.

In the city, we don’t share the quirks and intricacies about ourselves that we find unflattering.

In the country, everyone knows all that about you. They know you were the pimply-faced kid in high school and they know your parents bought your back-to-school clothes second hand. But there, it doesn’t really matter.

In the country, men ask pregnant women questions like, “So, yer tits hurt yet?” and expect an honest answer.

Women berate their husbands in public and sometimes, they even play darts with their butts.

So, in the few months I’ve known Cowboy, I’ve tried to push his limits. How many relationships have you been in? Why didn’t they work out? What didn’t you like about them? What are your life’s ambitions? Why haven’t you conquered them yet? What do you want to be when you grow up? What do you think about religion? Who did you vote for? How do you feel about “Jon and Kate + 8?”

And he’s answered them. No hesitation. No sugar coating. Take it how you want, he practically says. This is who I am.

If I don’t like it, it’s better to know now right? I just find that so liberating.

Country people don’t limit their openness to pals, partners and girlfriends/boyfriends either. They share these facts... with CO-WORKERS. Letting the world AND your place of business know who you are, where you came from and not feeling ashamed... Laz-y Boys can’t rival that level of comfort.

So tomorrow I'm going to walk into work, announce my most recent bowel movement, and watch as my co-workers sigh in adoration. Can you handle that, rocking chair? Can you?

Oma-holla back

2009-09-02T12:29:00.007-05:00

When I return to Omaha, one of the first meals I consume will be at Alpine Inn, a bar-atmosphered restaurant in the north part of town where the loan entree on the menu is fried chicken.

There, dinner comes in a cardboard carton and napkins are dispensed from paper towel rolls. Coke comes in cans, checks are hand-written and patrons seat themselves.

"It's red neck heaven," as Jim D. put it. "Better than Nascar and Natural Light put together."

At Alpine Inn, people eat the chicken and feral cats eat the bones. Diners catch the action from the windows and even take pictures when the raccoons arrive.

This is why you can't take country people there. It seems like a a country person's city refuge, but be ye not so naive.

Country people wouldn't shoot the raccoons with their cameras, they'd straight up shoot them with their rifles.

brief respite

2009-08-31T09:39:00.008-05:00

To all the fans of Cowboy: here's a post for you:

After a weekend of working on his house (don't worry, more to come), Cowboy mostly did little projects this weekend. I help by wielding hammers between him and his construction buddies... until they determine I'm too slow and chuck them at each other instead.

These photos are from the job site.

Basically, you're looking out his soon-to-be windows. Which is better than looking in his windows, as that's just creepy.

Cowboy's great-grandparents pumped water with this windmill. It's not exactly in working condition, but it's not something he wants to tear down either. I can't blame him.

I give North Dakota a hard time, but at sunset she cleans up nice. Maybe she had a date or something...

the addict returns

2009-08-29T11:35:00.004-05:00

I'm traveling this Labor Day for a girls weekend in Omaha.

I'm pretty sure I can handle the traffic and navigating streets with more than one lane again. But don't let me in any malls.

Should I visit a Gap, New York & Company or Victoria's Secret, I don't think I'll ever get out.

purple people eater

2009-08-28T09:37:00.007-05:00

Ok so I don't have the house-building post yet, but it's coming. In the meantime, LOOK AT MY FOOT. It's totally going to win me a Pulitzer Prize someday.

Note the middle toe and how magically purple and delicious it looks. It's pretty much the Barney and Friends-iest of all feet so I'm hauling it to Hollywood to launch its music career. (Heads up, Britney and move over Beyonce.) Look for This Little Piggy on the soundtrack to "Saw VI: Revenge of the Hunting Dogs."

My toes'll be signing autographs in no time.

The cosmetic change is because someone (i.e. me) thought it be fun to step on a dog leash to keep said animal from running away. The problem was, I was shoeless, and the pooch is about 78 1/2 times stronger than me.

Frankly, This Little Piggy is lucky to be alive.

Many city people own hamsters, cats, dogs, bald eagles, etc. ... but I was never one of them.

The first pet I ever owned was a fish. I named him Sunny. He was dead in three days.

Animals weren't allowed in my house, so I don't really know how to care for them. I can pet fur and fill water bowls, sure. But when dogs bark, I scream. And run to my mommy still, but please don't tell anyone.

So when this vicious creature stopped over last night, I'm pretty sure I thought my middle toe could take her.

I thought wrong.

I also didn't think about how ridiculous I'd sound yelping "Ow! Ow!" in front of a man who regularly comes home with scars in irregular places (like his belly button or the underside of his elbow).

Cowboy says he's an electrician, but I'm pretty sure that's just code for "raccoon wrestler" or "coyote slayer."

So I shut up and prayed my toe was broken so I'd have an excuse. But it wasn't. Damn.

That dog is a pooch, but I am a major pussy.

Right now I'm sure you've dislocated your shoulder in an attempt to raise your hand, so allow me to answer your questions:

1). Yes. That is Cowboy's dog. You're meeting her before you meet him. Sorry. But the wait is SOOO worth it, I promise. PS: Her name is Lacey.

2). Yes. I specifically painted my nails for this picture. And then I photoshopped all the edges I'd messed up. You win.

Fear ye

2009-08-26T08:03:00.004-05:00

For some people, you need doctors, nurses and hallucinations to tell they're crazy.

For others, you just know.

Country picnic

2009-08-24T20:14:00.005-05:00

At city potluck picnics, children play, men show their muscles and women dress in summer clothes and gossip about the neighbors and friends who didn’t attend.

Summer clothes: Apparel that is totally unsuitable for outdoor activities, namely short dresses, beaded jewelry and sandals with heels. If you don’t believe me, check out these stiletto-savers, designed to protect your sandals from the sand. Seriously.

In the country, both women and men where t-shirts and jeans shorts.

Jean shorts: Apparel no city girl EVER wears because the clothing is too short, too long or too unflattering. Unless she’s 7, denim in that pattern does not occur naturally on city-folk. Jean skirts maybe. Or capri shorts. I don’t even know a store sells jean shorts for women. But really, they aren't unflattering and jeans shorts may even be practical. But that still doesn't mean I'll wear them...

The country girl in my told me to wear capris. They’re more sensible. They’re more conservative. And they’ll hide your pale skin, she said. But the city girl in me wanted some sun (tan). And she knows how to bust some cap.

So a dress it was. With polka dots. And a necklace so long it caressed my belly button. And white, chucky-heeled sandals accessorized my "Pistol Packin' Pink nail polish.

No one stared at me when I arrived, but maybe that’s because they were wearing sunglasses. And tennis shoes.

You can’t be playing softball in that, they said.

(Not "you can't play softball," rather, "you can't be playing softball" in that)

But my question was: Softball?

Where I come from, the boys play softball and the ladies drink lemonade and talk about where they got their hair highlighted.

What do you mean softball?

That’s OK, they said. We’re playing egg toss first, anyways. Husbands and wives are on the same team.

(awkward pause)

And, er... boyfriend and girlfriends too.

So there we were. Me in my dress and Cowboy is his cut-off sleeves, throwing raw eggs at each other.

Don’t mess up, Kate, I whispered to myself. DO NOT mess up.

The first tosses were fine. Toss. Catch. Baby step back. Toss. Catch. Baby step back.

One couple down.

Phew, we didn’t get last, I thought.

Then another. And another.

Pressure’s on, I thought.

Standing 12 feet apart, Cowboy lofts one to me, 5 feet short.

Oh four-letter-word, I said, recalling my days as a tomboy and diving for that egg like it was a Hail Mary Pass and I was in the end zone.

WHOOO HOOO, they cried.

She caught it! ...in heels! one said.

Now put that picture in the paper, said another.

After a victory dance mimicking that of Chad Johnson, Cowboy and I had two other teams to beat. If we made it this far, we might as well aim for total egg shell domination.

At least until it was my turn to throw.

Suddenly, I didn't care about the mud in my toes or the wind flying up my skirt. It didn't matter that the breeze had blown the curls out of my hair or that mosquitoes were biting at my legs. I didn't even notice the pink rings on my shoulders left from a cocktail of perspiration and red spaghetti straps.

My arms, by the way, are made of steel, just ask those 40 pound sandbags. But tossing an egg 15 feet is well, quite a feat.

So instead of tossing the egg and letting it land short, I side-armed the egg like a baseball, chucking it from Point A to Point B.

It broke.

Egg yolk all over Cowboy and his cut-off sleeves, staining his t-shit and soiling his redneck dreams.

He’ll need new clothes, I thought. ...So if this is country, I dreamed, hand me another egg.

left to my lonesome

2009-08-23T20:55:00.003-05:00

I'm sitting at Cowboy's grandmother's house, awaiting his return. Before he left, we were designing his new house (more on that later) but now I'm alone.

The reason for his departure?

To shoot a raccoon.

country cruisin'

2009-08-23T12:55:00.001-05:00

The other day I was driving in the right hand lane of a four-lane highway. I switched to the left to pass a Slower-Moving Vehicle. Without warning, said S.M.V. switched to the left lane, a mere meter between her car and mine.

Weird, I thought. No one would enter the left lane in front of a someone who is quite obviously passing them. Maybe she has to turn soon...?

Nope.

So I passed her. In the right lane.

My dad would be so proud.

why i'll NEVER be country

2009-08-22T12:53:00.001-05:00

Me: Why do you have toilet paper in your truck?

Cowboy: I don’t think I need to tell you that, Kate.

Me: (pause...) Are you serious?

Cowboy: Sometimes I work in the middle of nowhere and there’s no toilet around.

Me: Ok, enough said.

Cowboy: Boys use toilet paper too, you know.

Me: SERIOUSLY. Enough said.

Cowboy: It’s not so bad once you get used to it.

Me: That’s why I’m a city girl. So I don’t have to get used to it.

wallet wise

2009-08-15T09:42:00.002-05:00

I read in a women's magazine that random acts of thriftiness are no longer taboo.

For example, if someone compliments your sweater, you no longer have to blush and hope they don't notice it's last season, the magazine said. Now, you have the freedom to say "Target clearance rack!" and not feel ashamed.

Let me tell you something.

This is not a trend. This is PURE North Dakotan.

Up here, people mock those who carry purses that cost more than $50... $40 even. Why would you spend more than $50 on a wallet-carrier when you could save your money and spend it on a $1,000 crossbow at Cabela's?

When I visited the clinic for my annual check up, my doctor knew how much each prescription cost and which was the best value. I don't know if you'll want this one, he said, it's 50 bucks a month.

The sales associates at clothing stores suggest you buy what's on sale, rather than what's full price.

I bought $4 coffee once, and the co-workers made fun of me.

So this "trend," this supposed new-fangled rhetoric, was stolen straight from the Upper Plains. And let me tell you something else. It has never gone out of style.

choke me for my chokecherry

2009-08-14T11:59:00.003-05:00

In my attempts to be a good little country girl, I force myself to try new things: food included. It’s very difficult.

One of the foods I recommend is southeastern North Dakotan at worst and regional at best. So I’m sorry to make your mouth water, but you likely won’t find this at your grocery stores. I don’t know if the treat just isn’t as popular in Manchester, Iowa or Tuscon, Ariz., or if maybe the gods who listen when you pray just don’t love you as much as they love me, but if I could choose a way to die, I’d pick drowning. In chokecherry jelly.

Now, I’ve tasted delicious regional treats before. I even posted an e-mail I wrote about my kuchen-baking-and-ultimately-dropping experience last year.

And while kuchens and knoephlas and lefses and sauerkraut can be tasty, I’d say chokecherry jelly tops both Billboard’s Adult Contemporary and its chart of Hip Hop/R&B.

Take, for instance, the day Cowboy and I made pancakes with chokecherry syrup. The story is, Cowboy’s grandmother attempted to make chokecherry jelly, but when it didn’t set correctly, she jarred it anyway and called it syrup.

She did me a favor.

Basically, I got a chokecherry REJECT and yet I still knelt before the jar, faced Mecca, painted blood around my door and offered my first-born son in hopes that this Manna from heaven would rain on me forever. Screw water, send me some chokecherry.

So naturally, the side dish to any syrup is pancakes. And since I no longer believe in grocery shopping, I had zero pancake mix in my cupboard.

No bother.

I may have lost my faith in Leever’s Supervalue, but cook books: they have me singing HALLELUJAH.

So I plucked my latest used-bookstore purchase, dusted its cover and turned to page 44, Oatmeal Pancakes.

The directions say this recipe should yield four servings for a total of nine pancakes, but they obviously weren't feeding cowboys. I was. So my recipe fed two. And it yielded five pancakes: one mini, four large and one super-sized.

The recipe book calls for this:

* 1/2 cup quick-cooking or old-fashioned oats

* 1/4 cup all-purpose flour

* 1/4 cup whole wheat four

* 1 T sugar

* 1 tsp. baking powder

* 1/2 tsp. baking soda

* 1/2 tsp. salt

* 3/4 cup buttermilk

* 1/4 cup skim milk

* 2 egg whites

* 2 T canola or soybean oil

Since I would never purchase something as expiration date-y as buttermilk, I used all skim instead. And since I’d never heard of soybean oil, I used olive. (It’s what I had. Don’t judge).

So my recipe looked like this:

* 1/2 cup quick-cooking or old-fashioned oats

* 1/4 cup all-purpose flour

* 1/4 cup whole wheat four

* 1 T sugar

* 1 tsp. baking powder

* 1/2 tsp. baking soda

* 1/2 tsp. salt

* 3/4 cup buttermilk

* 1/4 ONE cup skim milk

* 2 egg whites

* 2 T canola or soybean OLIVE oil

If I don’t mention here that while I was the pancake mixer, Cowboy was the pancake flipper, he’d forever refuse worming my fish hooks. And that punishment, I just cannot bear.

So there.

He flipped pancakes. And he didn’t burn them. While wearing an apron. And singing Shania Twain's "Man... I feel like a woman."

What resulted was something I should have photographed, because likely, the Guinness Book of World Records would have included it in its registry of best pancakes in the WHOLE. WIDE. WORLD. That’s how good they were.

Now, I don’t write this to torture you (too much). And, I’m sure you’re Amazon.com-ing “chokecherry jelly” right now. Perhaps, by some act of contrition, you can purchase a jar of your own. Well, you can. But likely, it’s no better than Kool-Aid, Pop Tarts or some other cardboard-boxed rendition of homemade goodness that never compares to fresh-squeezed orange juice or grandma’s baked biscuits.

That, and 11 ounces costs $8.99. EIGHT NINETY-NINE. I can guarantee North Dakotans aren’t paying 9 bucks for chokecherry anything, unless you can use it to bait fish.

So, if you live outside the Upper Plains region and are willing to profess your undying affection for me in 500 words or less, I will send you some. Don’t expect the straight from the stove stuff I’ve got, yours will be from the store. But it will be the homemade stuff, sold in stores, if you know what I mean.

P.S.: Careful what you write. It may will show up on this blog.

Now wipe the drool off your face and get back to work :)

kuchen again

2009-08-13T10:34:00.003-05:00

I originally wrote this in October 2008 as an e-mail to my family.

For the 14 months I've lived here, I've heard, smelled and tasted various German dishes I never knew existed throughout my 23 years as a member of the blank, blank, and blankity blank families (no names, no creepers).

In North Dakota, the food pyramid has seven food groups instead of six. The seventh consists of fatty, creamy, buttery desserts and dishes baked with the sole purpose of keeping warn in the winter. See: knoephla (pronounced neff-la) soup.

On Tuesday, Leslie, a friend from our server days who shares a love of travel and a hate of idiot men, and I gathered our spatulas and borrowed rolling pins and headed for the hills of Jamestown High School where we could feel our thighs thicken before we'd even entered the room. If you guessed we were there to learn, you'd be correct. Two 20-somethings signed up for a cooking class along with mothers, grandmothers and married women intent on finding us husbands. In true Katie-fashion, Leslie and I were the only women sans-engagement bands there.

Naturally, we were the only women sans-culinary skills as well.

The class we'd signed up for was a $15 kuchen (coo-gin, like begin but without the be-) baking class offered by the local Career and Technology Center. Kuchen is a German dessert made with pie-like crust, custard and various kinds of filling including peach, blueberry, apple and the most popular: prune and cottage cheese.

The first order of business was the rolling of the dough which, after the teacher did it, seemed simple. She lied.

My first problem was getting the grapefruit-sized lump to stop adhering to my rolling pin despite my shaking it like a fly swatter in an attempt to get it off.

Flour Kaite, one woman whispered. I know, I lied.

Soon, my crust was as flat as Christina Aguilera in her "Genie in a Bottle" days but like unlike most small-chested women, my dough had curves. Not the round, circular, 360 degrees ones like the crusts of my classmates, but rather, mine had curves similar to that of a two-handled ping-pong paddle.

Despite this, I kept rolling along thinking sooner or later, it all would even out. I was wrong.

Better just to start a fresh with yours, the teacher said, without bothering to lower her voice. The other students looked at me like Katie Couric looked at Sarah Palin, "What's WRONG with you?" they thought. "You'll NEVER get married rolling dough like that."

Awesome.

So after some extra help by both the teacher AND the woman standing to my right, finally my crust was ready for its tin. This job I could do. I folded my crust in half and kneaded it in place without any extra assistance. Soon, it was time for prune layering and oven baking.

When the teacher removed my masterpiece, she even marveled at its perfection all the way to the kuchen cooling counter a home-ec station west. Soon, my classmates' faces of pity turned to jealously, but I slapped their hands. Take my kuchen and yours'll be in your face, I hissed.

When the kuchens were cool and the class over, Leslie and I bagged our treats and posed for a photo. My perfect kuchen would make a perfect framed picture. The only problem was, I dropped it.

That's right.

The most beautiful kuchen in the class, and likely the whole world, was suddenly lumpy, uneven and pathetic.

But like the culinary expert I am, I patched her up, wiped her clean and took my kuchen to work the next day where Germans from as far away as the advertising department marveled at its greatness.

So, who wants to visit?

small-town savior

2009-08-12T21:03:00.007-05:00

You know you live in a small town when a Catholic priest (whom you've never met) visits your office wondering why he hasn't seen you in church.