Oy vey!

I'm back. And all I can say is, THANK GOD.

In the past thirty days, I have spent eight of them in California. Eight. We shall not talk about how many bills were paid late this month. (Hint: more than one.) Nor how many birthdays I missed. (Hint: rough estimate puts it at five. Could be more. Sorry, all, and Happy Birthday! I'll do better next year. Maybe.)

We will also not talk about the bill that came from the doctor's office requesting $1180.00 (but also specifying, DO NOT SEND CASH) that makes me wonder if I wouldn't be better off actually uninsured, because then I would know that all the charges are my responsibility and I can stop spending all this stupid time figuring out what you're billing me for that my insurance should actually cover and please, I can think of a far better way to spend an afternoon and $1200 than nearly passing out in my doctor's office and then letting her scrape my cervix with a wire that has an electrical current running through it, I assure you.

[Hello? Gentlemen? Still reading? How about some smelling salts? There, there, you'll be just fine in a moment.]

Nor shall I think about how I should probably be spending this weekend doing my taxes. My 2005 taxes. That I got an extension on and can't remember if the new deadline is October 1 or October 15, but I'm pretty sure it's in October sometime and holy crap, how is it almost October already???

First, there was the campaign week, which can be summed up as: no food, four hours of sleep per night. The end.

Then I spent a weekend being the Jewish mother Liz never had. I did her laundry, cleaned the kitchen, made breakfast, cleaned the kitchen, went grocery shopping, prepared lunch, cleaned the kitchen, marinated chicken for dinner, made zucchini bread from scratch, cleaned the kitchen, cooked dinner, neatly packaged the leftovers for future consumption, and cleaned the kitchen. I also managed to watch some perfectly dreadful football.

Next was my week in DC, which can be summed up as: constant meetings, no food, plenty of alcohol, four hours of sleep per night. The end.

Do you know how many days in a row I can get four hours of sleep before my body stages a revolt? It's five. And I know that because, despite my 5 a.m. alarm, I woke up Friday morning at 7:06. Just in time to get to my 8:00 meeting. Oh yes, I was on time. Not pretty, but on time. (Later in the day a colleague asked if I'd gotten my hair cut. "It looks different -- shorter," he said. I didn't have the heart to tell him that it looked different -- dirty instead.)

And my weekend in DC? Way too much work, coupled with way too much alcohol. I didn't leave the office Friday night until after 10 p.m., and then actually left a bar Saturday night to take a phone call from a colleague. Yes, my life is that sad. However, I also managed to cram about a month's worth of drinking into one night. And wow, I have not done that in a good long while.

Now would be an opportune time to revisit The Rules of Drinking, as postulated by me and some random guy at the bar in NYC. (Ok, he's not totally random, he's Julie's friend, but still, it was the first time the two of us had met.) Surprisingly, we agreed on these basic rules pretty quickly. Feel free to adopt them yourself; they'll serve you well.

Rule #1 -- Thou shalt eat dinner before going out. No good can come of drinking on an empty stomach.
Rule #2 -- Tequila shots are the work of the devil. Avoid them at all costs. Even your friends calling you a pussy.
Rule #3 -- Thou shalt not make out at the bar. That's just trashy. At least wait until you get outside.

[A note, before all of you are quick to point out any instances wherein I may not have put these rules to use: they are informed by experience. So. Shush.]

Obviously these are some pretty common sense rules. But, failure to follow them can have adverse consequences. While I did abide by Rules 1 and 3, I'm afraid Rule #2 may have been bent a little and may have resulted in a mild inclination to send a text message to the effect of "I'm happy drunk and in your neighborhood and you can't have me, nah nah." But of course, I did not do that, because that would just be mean and antagonistic for no good reason, other than, well, I'm a bitch and it's a damn lot of fun. I like for people to know what they're missing (see also: bitch). Like, perhaps, me in a cream-colored lacy tank top and short denim skirt and if you think my legs (and ass) weren't the center of attention Saturday night, you obviously don't have a very good memory. Tequila shots or not, I would never say such a thing. But I might think it.

One potentially bad decision thwarted, but the tequila won anyway: Sunday morning I woke up with visions of a gigantic slice of cheese pizza dancing in my head. Then I realized that's because it was our last stop Saturday night. Oh god, what was I thinking???

Finally, my flight home Sunday was a classic example of "a day late and a dollar short." Only, it was an hour late and two pieces of luggage short. Getting ready for work Monday morning was very much roughin' it...outside of showering, my entire beauty regimen was reduced to a hairdryer and a tube of mascara I found in the back of a drawer from some Clinique Bonus Days gift thingy. I am a girl who, if stranded on a desert island, would pray to have mascara and eyebrow tint with her. If given the opportunity to select a third item, maybe, maybe, I'd choose something remotely useful like a hatchet or a rain collector -- but I'd be tempted to go with lip gloss -- and by god, there had better be some way of defining my eyes readily available! But, no, American Airlines decided that my make-up kit was better off sitting around in Dallas/Fort Worth than in my possession. Maybe it was payback for my having gone through security, flagged for additional screening, not once but twice at National. But, my gosh, this time I didn't even try to cause bodily harm with my business card holder!

Suffice it to say, I am more than ready to sit at home and do nothing this weekend. Well, nothing but watch football.