Ground Me Up

The Fiery Redhead has been in town all weekend, so I've been playing hostess to her whims and neuroses (now I think I know what it's like to be Cliffhanger or the Designated Driver and to have to deal with me).  The Fiery Redhead is like me in many ways - if she's hungry, she must be fed now to avoid a tantrum.  Cliffhanger has a spiffy trick for dealing with my low blood sugar.  She never shows up at my house without a cupcake or some sort of baked good that will send me into a fifteen minute sugar high before I pass out in the passenger's seat of her car, shutting me up for a good hour so she can contemplate the reasons she is still friends with me.  By the time I wake up, all sunshine and roses, I smile at the world, and at Cliffhanger, and she forgets that I am an egomaniacal, insecure, moody claustrophobe.  Or she just files these things away to use against me on a rainy day.

The Fiery Redhead matches my moodiness, even outdoes it, any day.  As soon as she's fed or liquored up, though, she turns on the charm and the backhanded compliments.  Here is a list of said compliments I received this weekend:

FR - "Oh, my God.  You've lost so much weight!  Are you anorexic?"

LATER

FR - "Your hair looks so gorgeous down."

Me - "But I'm wearing it up."

FR - "I know.  And it doesn't look good.  That's why I said something."

EVEN LATER

FR - "I mean, really.  You look like a skeleton.  Did you have to buy a whole new wardrobe?"

Me - Silence.

FR - "Calling you anorexic is a compliment, Melissa.  And you needed all new clothes anyway.  Don't get me started on your old ones..."

Despite her acerbic wit, when the Fiery Redhead is warm, she's warm.  I'd kind of forgotten that she pretty much knows everything about me, and the stuff she doesn't know, she's not afraid to ask, and I, surprisingly, am not afraid to tell her.  She's flatteringly nosy, if you will.

She was not, however, down for the game plan Saturday, which included a double feature of THE GAME PLAN and THE KINGDOM, with Cliffhanger and her pal (mine too, don't get me wrong, but Cliffhanger introduced us) Apples to Apples (yes, dearie, I'm naming you after your game night contribution).  Apples to Apples also did not realize the first feature in the day's double feature, and there was a double tantrum at the Century City mall, which I tried to mediate whilst Cliffhanger took control of my debit card and purchased my tickets.  And a Coach bag.  And a onesie from Baby Gap.  No, no, I kid.  I kid.  But I'm going to check my bank account as soon as I finish this.

So we settled in for THE GAME PLAN amidst groans and mutterings and general poutiness.  And who's crying by the end of it?  Not me, although I did have to keep repeating to myself, "You cannot lose your shit right now.  You cannot lose your shit."  Certainly not Cliffhanger, who was sitting next to me contemplating the abolishment of sentiment from the range of human feeling (yeah, I said she was contmeplating the abolishment of feeling from the range of human feeling.  Because she was.  I saw it in her eyes).  But Apples to Apples and the Fiery Redhead both had to head to the bathroom to perform emergency mascarectomies.  So HA!  

Also, I have just learned that a person whose blog I have read for a long time has started a new website as she writes a novel in two months!!!  This is a wonderful challenge, in my opinion, so go check her out and give her some support at www.katiemorton.com.