Lora's United States of Whatever

It all started when we had only been dating for a few weeks. I rented a scary movie to watch with Greg at his apartment. We were halfway into the movie when I thought I'd be funny and try to scare him just a bit. I lunged toward his neck and made my best vampire sound, (not really sure what that was) and I got whacked off of the couch by a terrified Greg. He then told me the story of how he's scared of vampires and hates for his neck to be touched. Oh, ok, I thought. No big deal. I made a "note to self" and went on with the evening. Fast forward two years, Greg and I are married now, and we just moved to Boston. Our apartment was little, but in a neat area with lots of woods surrounding it. I thought it was nice to go outside and see all of the trees and listen to the birds. Greg, however, was afraid to go outside because he always thought he could hear something and says he saw something resembling Bigfoot out in those woods. So, for the 10 months we lived there, sev...

Recently, I discovered something about myself... I am terrified of old people. Gerontophobia is what it's called. "The fear of old people or growing old." I've never noticed this about myself, but lately, others have been making it very clear to me that I have a problem! I guess I made one too many "old" people comments in front of my mother-in-law... and, you know, I didn't think I was saying anything to offend her, since I don't see her as old. But now that she's admitted to doing too many elderly things... she's out of my "young" category! Greg loves to shop at Eddie Bauer... I think it's too "old" for him. I told him that he should wait until he turns 30 to shop there. You know what I'm talking about... there are certain stores that are for old people. Take Coldwater Creek for example... I was forced into this store by my mother-in-law... the assortment of old lady cardigans and shawls put me into immediate sho...

Is it just me or is anyone else fascinated by info-mercials? I have purchased a few items via phone-in orders, and I am happy to say that I've always been pleased. Since the first time I saw the sculpted body of Mari Winsor, I knew I had to have the Winsor Pilates DVD! And for about a year or so, I only used Bare Minerals makeup... this stuff is pretty awesome. And it was such a great deal... so much all-natural make up for just $49.95! And as you can tell by my previous post, I was recently taken by the Sham-Wow... I still think these towels are amazing, even though my friend Manda is trying to discourage me from purchasing them. Manda has the Zorbeez... the arch-nemesis of the Sham-Wow. She said that they're supposed to be great for drying dogs... apparently they aren't so great at absorbing all of that doggie bath water, but they are great at attracting dog hair. Zorbeez lint roller, anyone? I think part of my fascination with info-mercials and their "got-to-have-it...

I am not a good gift giver; neither is Greg. Not that we don't buy great gifts for each other, we do. But we aren't very good at the action of giving. We either tell each other what we bought or give the gift way early. We always open our birthday presents and Christmas presents as soon as we get them wrapped... we just can't handle keeping the secret. I'll never forget before we got engaged... I didn't know it at the time, but Greg wanted to tell me so bad that he was going to propose, so he just kept telling me that he had a gift for me. I was so excited about getting something, so of course, I tried to talk him into telling me what it was. Finally, he told me that he got me something leather. Something leather?! I thought that was strange. What could he have gotten me... a wallet, a purse, a belt?! No, it was an engagement ring. Even though we always spoil the anticipation and surprise, we tend to buy each other really great gifts. Always something thoughtful, us...

Looking for something exciting to do on a regular Saturday, my husband discovered the annual auto show was in town. We decided to head out and check out all the new cars. Over 500 models were lined up in Reliant Center. It was pretty neat to see some "spacey" looking cars and some new cars like the Dodge Challenger. But what really caught my eye was the Sham-Wow stand. Have you seen these towels?! They can hold an entire two liter of Coke. I saw this with my own eyes. I fell in love with the Sham-Wow (and the demonstrator's I love Sham-Wow t-shirt) when the demonstrator wrang out the towel and the cola came surging out filling a huge bowl. They were on sale for $25... what a great deal! Ten dollars less than purchasing them from the info-mercial! But wait, he said if we bought one right now he'd double the order... not just two large and two small Sham-Wow's, but four large and four small! I know I had that look in my eye... the I have to have it look. Because tha...

Just the other day, my husband and I were talking about different ways to cook a fish. You can grill it, bake it, saute it... and the list goes on. Then he said, "Do you think you can boil it?" I said, "Sure. Why not? You can boil chicken." He started to make an argument that you can't cook a fish in water because it lives in the water, therefore it could not be cooked in water even though it is boiling water. This made no sense to me whatsoever. Stick anything in boiling water and it cooks. Seriously, I've tried it! So I started to debate with him. "Since we live in air," I said. "We could live through boiling air." Of course, he believed that humans could survive boiling air, whatever that is! Why do things like this drive me crazy?! I always feel like I need to prove my point even if I think that someone might just be aggravating me, but I just can't make myself boil a piece of fish. I can't waste a perfectly good fillet of sal...