Wine and Pot.

16Jun08

I have become such the blog slacker.

Thank god my negligence hasn’t been due solely to work-related activities. In fact, Michael and I have somehow been finding the time to schedule in proper weekly dates (“proper” as in “a bit more involved than a quick jaunt to the Hot Grill on a Thursday night”), and we’ve continued to take walks together most evenings.

To that end, we drove down to Princeton this past Saturday, so that Michael could go wild at the Princeton Record Exchange. Afterward, because it was too unbearably humid for coffee, we had a light meal at Triumph Brewery before heading home. The Saturday before was even awesomer, as Michael took me down to the Hopewell Valley Vineyards in good old Pennington, NJ for a wine tasting. $2 each got us tastings of all five reds, all five whites, and one of the dessert wines, plus complimentary glasses! Afterward, we drove onward to New Hope and walked the main strip, stopping in at almost every single home decor boutique and art gallery.

We also met up with Dawn and Jay a couple Fridays ago to see the Squirrel Nut Zippers play at the Highline Ballroom. Wild, right? The last time I heard the SNZs was back in high school, when I purchased their album on cassette because of an obsession with “Hell.” I didn’t even think they existed anymore. The show was pretty darn good, and I ended up recognizing at least half the set list.

Plus, my cousins John & Liz came into town last week with their two kids, and we got to spend some time with them (which allowed me the pleasure of tasting the best guacamole since Mexico, at Miracle Grill in Brooklyn).

Now, I’m all sorts of giddy because we’re leaving for upstate NY wine country on Friday, to celebrate our one-year wedding anniversary. Lord, I haven’t been anywhere since my honeymoon.

But it hasn’t been no work, all play, of course. I’ve lately been grappling with a web hosting problem for my professional site; doubling my output and raising my rates at Smarter Than Your Average Blog; and moving toward dropping a day at my proofreading gig so that I can concentrate on pitching more, and finding more telecommuting-based clients.

In other news, my problem spending habit has come to a head yet again, with a future home, future children, and our quarterly tax payments hanging in the balance, all because I am a shopping-obsessed twat who can’t learn from her past mistakes, no matter what’s at stake. We have decided to take drastic measures. I am transferred my balance to a 0% apr card, closing out my original account, and handing all my credit cards over to Michael. From now on, all commuting costs will go on my check cards, and all other purchases will be run by Michael. It represents a loss of independence that I’ve long feared but, at this point, I feel it’s exactly what I need. I’ve also signed up for a free account at Mint, so that I can further explore the patterns behind my unhealthy spending habit.

All the action — and the attendant stress — has my eye jitter worse than ever before. Last week, my shrink stunned me by asking, out of the blue, if I smoked pot.

“Wine and pot are the only things I can think of that can relax you, without being too bad for you,” she said.

I am such the pot prude.

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