Last Saturday, I really wanted a picture of me and that cat together. Not wanting the parental units to feel left out, I invited them to take a spin in front of the lens first.

...worked like a charm!

I would have been darn good in child psychology.

I can tell that my blood is running Midwestern again. Yesterday was a 36° day, which, in case you don't know, is a sauna in February terms. I went for a stroll in my sweatshirt along with a pair of gloves and a hat. 36°! I returned to the house, and decided it too warm. So, what did I do?

I KILLED THE FURNACE AND OPENED THE WINDOWS.

But that isn't the worst of it. The worst is my addiction to McDonald's ice cream cones. (they aren't terribly bad for you, fortuitously) But ice cream cones! In the middle of winter! Why don't I just bathe in ice water!?

I suppose it's an exercise in bonding for my mother and myself—or that's my story, in any event. The drive-thru personnel look on, quizzically, as they fill our order. We lap at the luxurious cool in wordless communication of delectation.

As we completed our Saturday morning excursions today, I noted that we missed our exit on the interstate. Inquisitive, I arched my left eyebrow—as I am wont to do. Mom replied, "Yeeees?" I said nothing, eyebrow still pinned to my hairline. Chuckling, she went on, "You're lucky you're not a cat."

"Curiosity may have killed that cat, but satisfaction brought it back!"

She ignored me as she engaged her directional.

**This is an ongoing source of argument between the husband unit and myself**

I say directional while he says turn signal. How two Midwesterners could develop opposing diction is beyond me. Why a man as smart as Miles would choose to debate with a woman as skilled in B.S. as myself is also beyond me. (But then, so are the really high bottles of lemon juice at the grocery store.) He tells me, "You dork. You're signaling to turn! It's a turn signal!" I return, "I guess I'm not so simplistic that I can't use my language know-how to realize that a directional would be an instrument displaying direction." We often veer from the subject at that point—with him thinking me to be a know-it-all and me thinking him to be a fool. We're laughing on a safer subject moments later—Southern terminology.

Back to the story: I see that we are in the next town. And that we are accelerating toward a McDonald's. Odd. There is a McDonald's in our own city. No, that couldn't be our stop.

"I give up. Where are we going?"

She screwed up her face as she admitted, "Just to McDonald's...but I figure we've been going to the other one so often that they'll think we're addicted."

"And we aren't addicted? Is that how it is in Liela Land?"

I received no response as she spoke our order to the talking box. She knew better than to answer. Any denial would have secured the unsavory truth, even if driving out of town to scratch the itch anonymously wasn't indicative enough.

I apply lip balm [to my lips] each night before I sleep. Each morning for the past 10 days, I have met the morning with fuzzy lips. Sounds like a fungal disorder, doesn't it? Rest assured that it is not!

The fuzziness has a sort of calico palette. I would even go so far as to declare the fuzz to be of a domestic-short-hair nature. It's curious enough to give a person paws—erm...pause. I imagine the cat has more nighttime fun than she perhaps should.

I can't think that the contours of my face make for good dance space. I can't think that the angles make for comfortable seating. Thus, we can assume that the cat is showing her disfavor.

Perhaps she is upset because I refuse to give into her whim. She meows at me to demand, "Cuddle with me, you wench!" and I meow back to return, "Shut up, you cat!" She sniffs me, I sniff back. I am not her inferior, and she is not pleased. What I wonder, and what I'm probably too afraid to ascertain, is which part of her hairy body she rubs against my lips...

I am spending the day in my aunts' home. They live further in town than my parents do—so I can walk without threat of unrestrained dogs hungry for moving human legs...of farmers too busy drinking scalding coffee behind the wheel to keep their oversized tires off of the visiting North Carolinians.

Yes, I got it in my head to go for a walk. I've missed my outdoor walking. A treadmill just isn't the same! It snowed yesterday, and the plowed flakes rose like small-scale mountain systems along the roadways while their residue froze to the pavement in a devilish play to trip an unsuspecting victim.

Just before ten o'clock this morning, I prepared myself for the journey. Cuddle Duds [Oh FINE—long underwear, if you MUST know.] in place and socks doubled, I made my way to the door. Lo and behold, the temperature didn't bother me in the slightest!—if anything, I felt a touch too warm in my jacket and scarf. Isn't that just lovely that with mere weeks left to my visit I finally acclimate?

There's an art to walking in slick conditions. The trick is to forget all censure for scuffling feet that you suffered in your youth. Now, I was a good girl, and I always wanted to be polite and well-mannered. Unfortunately, this paved the way for me to develop a very lummox-like behavior during the winter months. (I had to go and use the word lummox, didn't I? Now I'm going to have Singin' in the Rain in my head all afternoon! "You and who else, you big lummox!")

I broke my ankle my first time ice skating. Come to think of it, that was also my last time ice skating. I was eight years old. I wasn't able to glide. I kept hearing reprimands of, "Pick up your feet, Laura!" streaming through my head. In Girl Scouts, a mere year or two later, my troop went roller skating for several hours one afternoon. My backside was black and blue enough that I avoided seated positions for the better part of that next week. Unsteady surfaces have never been my forté. But, boy!—get me in a pair of flippers and I could pick up my feet like nobody's business!

The point, Laura! The point! Where's your point!? Alas, this disconnected way of communication is what Miles lives with. Gives you a new respect for the lad, no?

Well, good...because I'm about to be brutally honest.

Plainly, living with Miles has taken the sheen off of my polished manners. I. NAVIGATED. THE. ICE. No fall-n-go-boom for me! What a disappointment. *sigh* All those years of awkwardness for naught thanks to one down-to-earth workaholic.