You can't take me anywhere.

Last night I went out to a fancyish sort of dinner. I dressed up -- kind of. Lately I have been wearing the same outfits almost all the time -- either my brown velvet skirt with red knee high socks, my new pair of jeans that DON'T FALL DOWN, AND THIS IS AWESOME, or glaringly bright plaid hot pink pajamas bottoms ....because I like to be as fashionably offensive as possible before going to bed.

And yes, KNEE HIGH SOCKS. They are amazing. I throw them on and my legs are all warm and suddenly I'm transported back to my childhood church days, wearing white knee high socks with the Scottish kilt my mom forced me to wear. Sock Dreams is an amazing company specializing in socks, which is brilliant, because now I can finally buy tons of socks ... and lose the second sock of each pair almost immediately.

So, I go to this dinner, wearing niceish clothes. I have pretty excellent manners -- god forbid I ever know which piece of cutlery is my desert fork, and I used to use my knife and fork in a sort of retarded jabbing motion for about three years too many, but I don't eat with my hands or use my sleeves as a napkin so.... I'm doing well.

However, it doesn't matter how well your motor skills can wield a fork, if you are clumsy -- which I am. And unfortunately, we had shish kebobs. Delicious, awesome, amazing shish kebobs skewered with roasted red onions, tomatoes, zucchini and chicken, but the first time I very politely attempted to slip a chunk of chicken off my skewer I used a little too much force and that piece of chicken.... soared across the room and hit the wall.

It might not have been noticed if I hadn't made a sound, somewhere between an illegible groan and a totally inappropriate "Fuuuuuck", while reaching over as nonchalantly as possible to retrieve my momentarily airborne poultry, but everyone at my table very politely continued on with conversation.

Until I dropped my knife. It slipped off the table, cascaded off my lap, and landed on the floor with a clatter akin to an atomic bomb.

Now, I am pretty ample in the breast department which is mostly awesome, unless you're in track and field in Grade Nine and your gym teacher pulls you aside to talk about bra support, but this can make for an incredibly huge landing area for things like, oh, I don't know... squash soup. I dare you to find a big breasted woman who has not once ever sloshed some sort of food all over her top -- it's like food can't keep itself from leaping off your spoon and ruining your favourite goddamn sweater.

The restaurant that we ate at included a section with incense, consignment clothing, sandalwood soap and various fleece socks, pine salve, chocolate kiss lip balm and various other bits of wonder, and I couldn't stop myself from shopping after dinner. ... which is why I eventually came home with a new black shirt and, for the first time since I was 12 and owned the largest collection of cotton sweatshirts featuring adorable painted prints of puppies in vibrant gardens and kittens resting in patches of sunlit staircases in Canada, I bought a Northern Reflections top. Because I can hear Sarah in Thunder Bay clapping her hands with glee all the way over here in Masset, I will say it doesn't feature any barnyard animals drinking from collected dishes of rainwater or loons resting peacefully on tranquil pond surfaces, but it does have faded brown-pink flowers peppered across green cotton and it's the most comfortable thing ever. I don't know why I'm not wearing it right this minute in fact.

I just love the idea of going to a fancy dinner and then shopping thriftily afterwards.

Some time after me and Ann made NACHOS!! and watched 'Ratatouille' while I pet her cat, who was alternately licking my hand and biting me as though trying to figure out how delicious I might taste.

Labels: Sarah Land, Stories