White Skirts and High Heels

To celebrate my birthday last year, my boyfriend and I went out to dinner. I had bought myself the most spectacular black pumps and a new black blouse from H&M. To pull the two new items together and to look my best for my birthday dinner, I donned a white skirt I had bought a The GAP years before. I had never worn it because I had never had the right stuff to go with it.

My boyfriend and I first biked 5 km to the train station (I was wearing the heels already), took the train to the city, and then decided to walk to the restaurant from the train station. Why spend money for the S-Bahn, when the restaurant is in walking distance?

First Lesson: Walking distance for sneakers is a lot further than walking distance for high heels.

We stopped at an Apothecary to get bandaids on the way because blisters had already started forming on my heels. By the time we got to the restaurant, I was in excrutiating pain. But it was my birthday and I wasn't going to let 11 blisters ruin my evening! (And yes, it really was 11 blisters.)

We had reserved a table, so we were able to sit down right away (thank goodness!). Being fans of virgin cocktails, we each ordered one and continued scanning the menu for our meals. My boyfriend ordered a Cocunut Kiss (Virgin Pina Colada with Grenadine Syrup), and I decided to go out on a limb and order something interesting: I remember that it included carrot, tomato, and orange juice, and that its special ingredient was Tabasco sauce. It was even salted and peppered. Our drinks arrived and I tasted mine. Gross. Very gross. I leaned over the table and tasted my boyfriend's. Delicious. As I leaned back again, I knocked my full glass of Tabasco cocktail over... onto my *white* skirt. Oh Darn.

Lesson Learned: Don't wear white clothes to dinner.

So, still determined to have a good evening, I hobbled off to the ladies' room to try to rescue my skirt. The faucets only delivered cold water, so I just had to hope that was right. Fortunately, I was able to get all of the red stain out of my skirt within 15 minutes, although it was still rather unpleasant (standing at the sink in high heels with 11 blisters on my feet, trying to rinse out my skirt without revealing too much of what was under the skirt, then trying to blow dry the skirt (the dryer just *had* to be over the counter, so I couldn't even stand directly under it), and then spending a large portion of the rest of the evening in a wet skirt.)

Lesson Learned: Frigid cold water and normal handsoap removes tomato-based stains from clothing.

Since then, however, I have discovered that this trick doesn't work quite as well on ketchup. It probably has something to do with the food coloring they use.

After dinner was over, I still couldn't walk, so my boyfriend carried me to the nearest S-Bahn stop, and we took the S-Bahn back to the main station.

Lesson Learned: Having a boyfriend can be very practical.

And I'll have you know, that was still a wonderful evening.

Lesson Learned: Laugh, and you'll have nothing to cry about.

The First Post

So, I'm new to this whole Blogging-thing. I kept reading about it in the comic strip Brenda Starr, and it took a while for me to understand what it was. Now I'm trying it myself. How better to keep up with advancements in "technology" than to use them?

I don't plan to use this blog as an online diary to express all of my feelings and whatnot-- that's why I have a boyfriend. This blog is just what the title says. Here I'm going to write down the lessons I learn, from the practical to the philosophical, and maybe those who read this will find them useful as well.

Why is this important enough to me that I feel I should start a blog about it? Well, I'm a college-student, living on my own and over the last couple of years, I've caught myself writing to mom asking for tips on how to remove orange juice stains from white clothing, how to get rid of bad smells in the kitchen sink, and for advice on how to deal with irritating friends and bullying peers. She has successfully answered all of my questions. How does a person go from being a naive college student to a mother who knows how to handle almost everything? If I can manage to keep this blog going long enough, maybe I can get an idea of how that works.

I'd love to get comments from people, and most of all, I'd love to get tips and advice from readers.

However, there are some things that are kind of important to me. In the past, I've devulged too much information about myself on the internet. Fortunately, it has only left me with some embarrassing hits on Google (nothing *too* bad), so I'm trying to keep those hits the way they are, instead of adding more. People who personally know me and read my blog are welcome to leave notes that show that we personally know each other ("See you thursday!"), but please don't use my real name. If you need a name to use, just use "George" for me... The other thing is that I reserve the right to delete any and all comments that are offensive, spammy, annoying, or just downright dumb. Don't take it personally. I review all comments before they are posted.

So, happy reading, and I can't wait to hear from you!