Update!

I apologise for the lack of a less prosaic title for this blog post, but, hey, if you wanted originality you wouldn't come here.

Or would you?

That doesn't mean anything, by the way, it's just a cheap trick to get some kind of suspense. And it fails.

Anyway, what have we been doing recently?

Well, Liza has a new project - it is complex, and that complexity is added to by the simple fact I don't understand what she does for a living. She is a project manager. She manages projects. Beyond the parsing of her title, I cannot comment on her actual day-to-day employment.

We have also been doing a lot of grilling on our mega grill, which is clearly awesome as discussed elsewhere in this fine blog. But, as sundown comes earlier owing to the tilt of our planet taking out continent further away from the ball of fire our world orbits!!! it gets dark quicker. And it is difficult to grill in the dark. And the light from the grill itself is not brilliant to grill by. And our little driveway security light which comes on automatically is broken.

Drat. People are going to come and burgle us now. My house is defended by armed guards from Sarah Palin Securities Inc. And you have no way of checking to see if that is true or not except by coming around and risking getting shot.

Remember; unlike other VPs, if Sarah Palin shoots you, it's 'cause she was aiming for you.

So, in order to grill at night, I have made use of this fine present purchased by my mother in law (I believe) for Christmas. At the time, I was wondering "What the Hell am I going to do with this damn thing? Do I look like a miner or some sort of cartoon mole?" But, it is ideal for night grilling.

Am I not the finest man in the world with this thing on my head?

Secondly, Liza and I went to the Michigan Renaissance Festival, and swanned about in our costumes. Last year, we purchased Liza's truly gorgeous costume from the fine people at Pendragon Costumes - and I also purchased myself a sort of jacket / doublet thing with this green oak leaf design on. Really very very nice they were.

Actually, there is a whole conversation here about this, and one which really defines the type of people that Liza and I are (not as a group, you understand, but rather as individuals). As related elsewhere, Liza's shopping habits do not make sense to the average male. However, I believe that they are common to many women, and so practically everyone who reads this will understand where I am coming from here.

We walked around the ren faire in Holly, MI, last year (around our anniversary) and looked at all the pretty stuff and all the nice people dressed in their ren costumes (and all the somewhat trashy women half-dressed in dresses scooped stupidly low and the middle-aged women with the bingo wings dressed as Xena. Seriously, ladies - there are many sort of ren costume which will make you look good - and lots of them will give you an opportunity to show off your figure and show that you still "have it". But those costumes are not basically swimsuits made of leather or bikinis made of chainmail. There are very few women over 40 who look good in swimsuits when they are just sauntering around. Even the teenagers dressed in those things look, frankly, slutty. It works on a major Saturday afternoon TV series detailing the adventures of a vaguely-subtle lesbian and her Girl-Friday, but not in Michigan in the Fall when surrounded by the vacationing crowd drinking Bud and stroking their beer guts. Frankly, girls, what are you trying to accomplish? Ah - I see. Well, you accomplished it).

It's 3 PM at the Michigan Renaissance Festival; do you know where your self-respect is?

So, anyway - Liza and I walked around the ren faire last year and saw the pretty costumes. And we walked into the Pendragon Costume shop and they had this gorgeous red and gold dress on a mannequin. Called it the "Anne Boleyn" or something similar (it did lack a head, I suppose). So, Liza goes all "Ooooh!" and "Ahhhh!" over this dress, and the lady assistant at the shop asks her if she would like to try it on. So, Liza and lady and the dress go into the changing room to try said dress on (try the dress on Liza, that is - not the two of them. We didn't see that costume at the faire).

Time out here; is there some major disconnect between the genders regarding what it is acceptable to do in a shop, or is it just between me and Liza? Basically, Liza seems to think it is okay to go somewhere and try on clothes without any intention of buying stuff. In fact, she will actually declare her intention to do so prior to engaging in the trying on of clothes. I personally think that if you are going to try something on, you should at least be thinking of buying something. Shops are businesses, not your dress-up trunk, you know.

Anyway, Liza and lady go into small curtained room to get dress in. I ask chap called Ian who runs the shop "How much does that dress run at?" and he tells me an entirely ludicrous figure (not Liza's figure is ludicrous - that would be the figures of the girls dressed as Conanne the Barbarianne). I say to the fellow, "Right, I'll take it." "But you haven't even seen her in it!" he exclaims.

"Ah, no," I explain, "it works like this. Liza will love the dress, and she will come out and be all impressed with it. And she will then uhm and ahh about it, and eventually decide - regretfully - that she cannot afford it. And she will leave, and walk around for a while, and come back and look at it again, and touch it, and coo over it, and then leave the festival without having bought it. And in a week's time she will regret it, and it will just be terrible. I am not going through that crap. I will buy the dress, she will complain and say we can't afford it, I will ignore her blandishments as not being grounded in any sort of reality, and she will be happier in the long run. Ring the damn thing up."

So, Liza comes out the dressing room, looks at herself in the mirror, and promptly bursts into tears as she sees herself. I then say "Let's get the dress" and Liza is all "NOOOOOO!" like Darth Vader when told he's just killed Padme.

So, I felt kind of vindicated there.

Anyway, back to this year's trip to the ren faire. We return to Pendragon Costumes with the intention of purchasing me some fine clothes to go with the jacket / doublet which I purchased the year before. And we also ask about boots which can be worn on the feet and which will make one look pimp. Nice man Ian (who is still there, it seems) directs us to Son of Sandlar which sells boots. I purchase boots. I purchase trousers and leather strappy things and a shirt. I purchase a hat so awesome the gods will notice us again!

Are we not pimp?

In addition to this frivolous use of money, we also added to the Hodge family with Hugebeast. Hugebeast is from Squishable.com, a place which sells 'normous round squishable critters. Hugebeast scared the stuffing out of Baby Kitty -she was all puffed up and absolutely terrified of him. Which was really funny, as Baby Kitty is normally very brave and so forth. Anyway, Hugebeast - 15 inches of 'normous squishable Hodge.

Hugebeast lives on cashews and root beer, and is currently living in the office with myself and Julie. He is very sweet, but he is a bit of a doofus.