BINGO BINGO BINGO in Bismarck!!!

I finally won at Bingo! We haven't gone in probably a month or more because people have been busy since it is summer. But the reat thing about it being summer is that lots of people are busy, and so there are not nearly as many people at bingo. Which means two great things... 1-there is a lot less smoke, which makes it more pleasant while playing. 2-there is a greater percentage chance of winning. To win the big prize, you need to black-out your card in 55 numbers or less, so that is obviously not dependent on the number of people. But for the fun prizes and the consolation prizes, that does depends on the number of people, so the fewer people, the greater the chance of winning. And I FINALLY WON!!! Now the downside of fewer people is that the consolation prize is based on a percentage of cards sold... so the less cards sold, the lower the prize. My grand total winnings were only $15 (in the winter they are more like $30-50 consolations). But, still, it's $15 that I didn't have before. And being the engineer/finance person that I am, I spent $9 total for the night, so a $6 profit on $9 investment is a really good rate of return. More importantly, I got to yell BINGO, which was awesome... even more awesome was hearing the groans of all the losers who were SO CLOSE! Suckers!!!

Butt-Pockets in Bismarck

Following up on my shoe incident and speaking of embarrassing work situations... Another little gem for my fans. So, I was in my friend Kirsten's (pronounced Shirsten, don't ask me why) office last week chatting. I went to leave, and all of a sudden came to a jolting stop - she described it as a dog who ran out of leash. The corner of back pocket on my pants got caught in between the little wooden strip of the door jamb and the little metal plate that the locking/latching mechanism goes into, and I was stuck. I tried to free myself, but eventually had to get Kirsten's help. We were both laughing so hard that it took her a few minutes while I dangled there. On a good note, at least my pants didn't rip.

Black and Brown in Bismarck

So, the State Bar convention is in town. I went to hear my nemesis speak this morning. (The opposing counsel from me hearing.) Listened to her, chatted afterwards, met a couple judges, said hello to the chief justice, etc. You know, networking... After that a bunch of us went to Ribfest for lunch, which is in town this weekend. Walked around there, saw lots of people I knew. Good times. Came back to the office, was walking down the hall around 2:45 p.m., and notice... I am wearing two different shoes today. One black, one brown. I am awesome.

Bajillionaire in Bismarck

This is a totally random short little post because I obviously don't have time to blog or I would do it more often...

Someday, when I am a bajillionaire, I am going to hire a fruit cutter to follow me around and cut up my fruit for me. Similiar to how Ken Paves follows Jessica Simpson around to make sure her hair looks fabulous (I will have one of him, too), I want someone who will core my pineapple, cut up my watermelon into bite sized pieces, core my apples (and maybe peel them sometimes, too), pluck my grapes off the stems, peel and slice my peaches and pears and nectarines, and most importantly, peel my mangos and cut them into cute little squares. I can handle spitting out my own cherry pits.

Fighting in Fargo

So, my week started off in an interesting way. I was invited to attend a mediation session in Fargo. The case was a construction dispute on a pipeline project that has been going on since before I came to my position. This was the third mediation session regarding the dispute, the second of which nearly ended in settlement during my first couple weeks of work. Because I was so new and because my predecessor still works with me, just in a different division, he was going to finish out this case. In addition, we have outside council involved. So, really, my participation was unnecessary and minimal. Nonetheless, I decided to go because I thought it would be good experience since I generally tend to think all mediations can be a learning experience.

Well, I definitely got more than I bargained for. We left at 7 am and drove the three hours to Fargo. I started to count cars on the way, but then I had to stop. Two reasons, first, the driver was going way too slow and cars kept passing us instead of the other way around. Second, we pulled over for a break about an hour into the trip. Since this methodology didn't fit with my former car counts, I had to abandon my efforts. Anyway, we got to Fargo around 10 and went first to a law office. This dispute involves the contractor on one side, and three separate entities on the opposing side. We were at some law firm for one of the entities that was on our side. I had no idea what to expect, but when I walked into the room, I definitely didn't expect 15 other people to be there. Introductions all around, none of which I remembered other than the one guy I had met previously. We spent about half an hour discussing the case, most of which I didn't follow since I didn't have much background.

Then we all trooped over to another law firm for the mediation, which started at 11. Now most of you probably don't know too much about mediation, but the gist of it is this... it is not an opportunity to present your legal case and argue about the legal merits. It is supposed to be a forum where you set aside the legal issues and just try to work out a solution that everybody is equally pissed off/happy about. Well, this one started off with the council for the contractor (we'll call him OJ, short for Obnoxious Jackhole) launching into a 45 minute powerpoint presenation about the legal merits of his case and his version of interpreting the contract and how wrong we all were. It was lovely. Finally an attorney on our side interrupted and said he wanted to be separated into different rooms and to start working on solutions or we were just going to go home.

So, we started the mediation. We gave an offer, they gave an offer, we gave an offer... you get the point. Unfortunately, however, the negotiation sort of went in this fashion... We offered 5 apples and 3 oranges, then offered 2 apples and 1 orange, we offered 3 apples and 2 oranges, and they countered that they wanted 3 steaks. So then we talked about steaks... and just when we thought we were reaching a consensus, the topic of discussion changed again. And on and on and on... and finally around 5 pm, we made an offer that our outside council thought was way too generous just because we wanted to be done. We thought that would get things wrapped up, but instead, they countered with something more than what they had offered the previous round. And so on and on it continued. And finally around 7:30, my client got pissed, freaked out, and threatened to leave.

Meanwhile, bear in mind that it is a 3 hour drive home. Also bear in mind that I have my very first ever hearing (like a trial for those non-lawyers) in the morning bright and early. Also bear in mind that I have to go back to the office when we return home and pick up all my exhibits that I had left for my secretary to mark and get ready. So, I'm getting a bit antsy at this point.a

Finally around 8:30, it appears we have reached a settlement. Now we need to write it up and have all the parties sign it before we leave because this is apparently where things went awry in the first two mediation sessions. So, we find a computer and type up the agreement. For those of you who followed my facebook status updates, you know that the agreement was finally signed around 11:30 pm. This was mostly due to OJ coming in after we had made revisions and trying to change things or add points. This would have been acceptable if they were general wording changes to clarify matters. Unfortunately, OJ was a slickster Chicago lawyer and he kept trying to slip in items that were never discussed AT ALL during the mediation negotiations. It was disastrous. Only when my client again threatened to leave did things finally get signed on the dotted line and we got to leave.

I also need to point out two intermediate things. About an hour before we left, I thought about catching a ride home with one of the other people in our party since we were almost done. But then I decided to stay and see the great signing that we had worked all day on and ride home with my own people. Big mistake! On the other hand, it was interesting to see how things can fall apart at the end, witness people meltdown from lack of food and rest, and observe slickster OJ's behavior.

The second thing I should point out is that the mediation was ironically being conducted at the law firm where my opposing council in the next day's hearing works. And she actually stopped in. So, I met her. We chatted in the hall about our case for about half an hour since I had not gotten all of her emails from that day. She was lovely, really a nice person, someone I could see myself being friends with under different circumstances.

Anyhow, we FINALLY got headed home. Everyone wanted to eat because we were starving and crabby. However, one of my clients refused to eat in the car because it was too small for us to all fit and eat at the same time while driving. So, we had to actually stop at 11:45 at night (at Perkins, which was the only place open) to have a sit down meal. Are you kidding me????? By the time we finally got on the road, it was 12:30. I offered to drive because I knew that I would get us home the fastest.

We finally rolled into the parking lot at 3 am, at which time I had to then drive to my own office for my exhibits and materials for my hearing the next morning. Thank goodness I did, because it turns out my secretary screwed things up and I'm glad I knew that before I walked in. By the time I did that, came home, checked my email to make sure that the hearing hadn't been canceled or postponed, and took a shower, it was 4 am. I had to be up by 6 am to make it to my hearing on time...

Tune in next time for all the details.

P.S. The car count on the return trip was 7 cars, a new record low. It was actually 8 that we passed, but one passed me. Also, one of those cars was in the ditch on the side of the road (where I also saw it that morning when we passed in the other direction.)

Between in Bismarck

Related to my previous post about fire and being located at the gates of hell...

When I was back in Michigan, several people asked me what my favorite part of living in Bismarck is so far. I had a hard time coming up with anything concrete, because while I can't think of too many bad things about living here (other than the isolation and lack of good restaurants), I also can't think of any super spectacular great things, either. Anyway, I got back and was telling my friend at work how people kept asking and I couldn't think of a good answer.

And she agreed... "Yeah, there really isn't anything great about living here, but ya' know, there really isn't anything bad about living here, either. It's sorta' like that thing, you know, ***snapping her fingers as she tries to think of it*** that thing that the Catholics have..."

"Purgatory??"

"Yes, it's just like Purgatory!"

Burning in Bismarck

So when I woke up this morning and jumped on my computer, the first thing I noticed is that my weatherbug was flashing down in the corner, indicating some type of weather warning from the National Weather Service. I wonder if maybe it is fog, because we seem to get a lot of those warnings here, but then I realize that I can see the sun coming up and that's not the problem. That also eliminated rain/thunderstorms. Naturally I click on it to see what sort of weather-doom will befall me this day, and I see, "Fire Weather Warning in Effect", Friday morning until Friday night, Burleigh County. WHAT THE FRENCH, TOAST??? Having never seen this, I have no idea what it means. Does it mean that my county is on fire? That doesn't seem to make a lot of sense since the warning is 24 hours in advance. Does it mean that there is a fire headed this way and I must flee my home within the next 24 hours? Cause if so, holy crappers, where do I go? All I know is that the stupid little bug doesn't start blinking at me unless some bad shit is going to go down, and fire does not seem like something to mess with.

Upon further investigation, I see more description that talks about the heat and the relatively humidity (or lack thereof) in the grasslands. So now I'm wondering if there is something to do with it being so dry here and the wind blowing, that maybe grasslands build up electrical charge and somehow spontaneously combust and start fires to burn down Bismarck... do I live at the gates of Hell??? And if so, why wasn't I aware of this from national news prior to moving here. I mean, even the flooding in Fargo makes it outside the border, so surely spontaneous combustion torching the town would be newsworthy.

Well, I asked around at work, and apparently this is the same as the silly little signs that they put up around national forest warning of the fire danger level of the day based on the dryness. Because it is so dry, apparently we are supposed to be extra careful about throwing cigarette butts out the window. Also apparently sometimes these fires start along the railroad tracks because the train will throw sparks and ignite the grass nearby.

While spontaneous combustion seems a lot more exciting, I'm glad to know that it isn't likely I will wake up with flames outside my window tomorrow morning. I'm still confused as to why I have never seen this warning from my weather bug before.

Bordering on Bingo in Bismarck

SOOOOOOO close! Tonight was Bingo night, and I've practically been going through withdrawals because it has been so long since I've been.

A little preliminary info on how Bingo actually works. There are three games. The first game is "Blackout only", which means that you must fill your entire card within 55 numbers or less to win the jackpot. Jackpots range on the order of a couple thousand dollars, sometimes more, sometimes less, but in that general vicinity. If nobody wins, which they usually don't, then there is a consolation prize ranging anywhere from about $25-$100. In that case, they just continue calling numbers until somebody gets a blackout.

The second game there is usually some sort of small prize offered, maybe around $30, for getting the correct shape. So, for example, tonight was an X, sometimes it is a T, sometimes it is an H, etc. Then they continue on for the Blackout jackpot and the associated consolation prize. The "jackpot" in the middle round tends to be smaller, less than a thousand, but still several hundred dollars. Tonight's was $650, with a consolation of $70.

The third game is also usually blackout only, with a large jackpot and consolation prize.

The closest I have come to winning at Bingo prior to this evening was getting within two of the consolation prizes. Tonight, first round, I got within two on the consolation prize. Second round, one of my cards only had 5 to go when they announced there were 10 numbers remaining. Then she went on to call 5 numbers in a row that I didn't have. Then she called 4 numbers in a row that I did have, and I was 1 number away from the $650 jackpot. Didn't win. Booooooo! Then she called 3 or 4 more numbers that still weren't my number, and somebody else won the consolation prize. So close! Third round, got down to within a few numbers for the jackpot. Then hit a streak on the consolation round. Got within one number AGAIN! Again, so close!

I have renewed vigor for the game, however. Plus, I figure with summer coming on, my chances of winning are higher. People will be more likely to want to be outside rather than in the smokey bar, which means that the chances of winning at least the consolation prize should go up with less people playing. It's going to happen one of these days, I know it. And then you can all stop making fun of me for being an old lady, even though the people I go with are even younger than me.

Blitzing towards Bismarck

As some of you know, I recently left the tundra. The initial purpose of departure was to attend some training in Indianapolis for trial advocacy. It was like mock trial, but with only a week of prep time. The training was great, the people (for the most part) were great, and I learned a ton. I also worked 55 hours in 4.5 days. Not as awesome. But it was FABULOUS to get back to a "real" city. And downtown Indy is a shockingly nice area.

After completing the training, I took the opportunity to return to Michigan since someone else had paid for the $650 plane ticket to get me that close. My awesome dad came and picked me up and drove me back to Howell. I got to pick up Godiva (my horse that I ride topless - AKA Mustang convertible), which I am so excited to have back in my possession. Also cleared out the rest of the condo, got it listed for rent with a realtor, and played a 3D game of Tetris trying to fit the remainder of the crap in my car. The bad part was that when I "died", that just meant I had to take all the stuff back out again and start over until it fit. Sometimes the flat, skinny pieces (like large pictures) aren't always the easiest to fit in.

Also got to see some friends and family while I was there, which was amazing. But alas, time was too short, and I have returned. I have established a new record drive time at 13 hours, 20 minutes. I don't think it can be done much faster than this. Also, the car count on the Fargo-Bismarck run was CRAZY, a new record high was achieved. Counting time was approximately 5:00 pm - 7:30 on a Sunday night, and I hit 123! I'm tellin' ya'll, Bismarck is a happening place to be!! (Pay no attention to the news reports of the recent blizzard that downed major power lines and has several roads closed. It was in the 50s today, so that was just a little blip on the radar.)

Burritos in Bismarck

Ok, this post should really be titled Tacos in Bismarck, but that doesn't work so well on the alliteration front. So, I went to a charity fundraiser trivia tournament over the weekend. They had snacks they were selling for extra fundraising... water, pop (or soda if Chris is reading this), popcorn, brownies, and the "meal" portion was "Tacos in a bag". Is this a common thing that I've just never heard of before, or is this a North Dakota thing? I'm guessing it is a North Dakota thing, in which case, I'll elaborate. You take a snack size bag or Doritos, crush them up, and then dump your taco toppings in (salsa and all), and eat the taco out of the Doritos bag. I'm wondering is you could use a big bag and do the whole thing family style. The only thing missing was some Briney Beer.

Bigfoot in Bismarck

I have no idea who lives above me. I have no idea what they do for a living or if they even work. I don't even know if it is more than one people. But most importantly, I have NO IDEA what's with all the walking!! Maybe I'm just a big, lazy bum, I'm willing to admit that. But I have no idea how a person (it only sounds like one) can do so much walking in an apartment. Even if this apartment is as big as mine, WHERE ARE YOU GOING???? Do you take your laundry to the washing machine one sock at a time and subsequently return your clean laundry the same way? Do you not have a tv remote control but still like to channel surf? I'd consider maybe there is some sort of medical/bladder issue involved that requires frequent trips to the bathroom, but the fact of the matter is that there is never a long enough pause in the walking for a person to actually do anything once they got to the bathroom. I would be more upset about the situation, but I don't get the impression that the individual is trying to be loud. I'm just curious where or where you are going????? Oh, and I guess one more question, do you ever sleep or do you spend all night walking? It's almost to the point where it is like white noise to me... almost, but not quite. At least it is better than listening to Nike and Ralphy yip all day and night.

Beazers in Bismarck

So, I learned a few new terms this week...

Gritter: "Ew, you can't date her, she's a gritter." My friend Michelle asked me if I had ever heard this before, which I hadn't. Apparently it is a term where she is from that is somewhat equivalent to white trash. It's in urban dictionary, so I guess it's a real word, but nothing I'd heard before. As Michelle is several years younger than me, I tried to pass it off that I was just to old for such nonsense. But she informed me that her sister who is my age (or maybe a little older) knew what it was, so that excuse wasn't flying.

Incidentally, the next day I overheard someone use the term white trash in a nearby conversation at work. Naturally, this reminded me of my conversation about gritters, so I asked my co-workers if they had heard the term. They said no, but then asked if I knew what a Beazer was.

Beazer: This is apparently someone who thinks they are all that and a bag of chips, but really, they are just the smooshed PB&J that's a day old so the bread is soggy cause the J has been absorbed. Ok, I made up that colorful definition myself based on the understanding I have of beazers. Basically they said it is someone who is too big for their britches, but also kind of white trash. I was picturing a Peg Bundy type person when they described it. So, apparently that is the out down in this neck of the plains. It derives from the fact that there are the Class A high schools and the Class B high schools. In which case, I guess that makes me a Beazer. (Ironically, this is the name of the company who built my brother's house.)

P.S. I didn't win anything at Bingo last night. BOOOOOOO!

BINGO in Bismarck

Tuesday night... Bingo night! Normally there is a group of at least 4 people who go to bingo, but for some reason tonight, everyone bailed, some at the last minute and some earlier in the afternoon. So, it was just Maggie and I. For the record, Maggie is only 29, and while I know you all only think old ladies play bingo, not so out here. Anyway, we play three rounds. I was in charge of getting the bingo cards tonight, and between the second and third round, Maggie got up to use the restroom. I just assumed that she wanted two cards like usual, so I went up and bought $5 worth. When I got back to the table I threw them all down, she took her two, and I took the rest. Then she looked for some money, I had to make change, etc. I almost told her not to worry about it, it's only two bucks, she could get me next time. Yep... so close... Maggie hit the jackpot on one of the cards that could have been mine and was actually in my possession. Jackpot = $1,942! Yayboo!

Bureaucracy in Bismarck

One of the things that I have really appreciated about living out here in the middle of nowhere is that shit gets done. By that, I mean that people are mostly reasonable, even in the government, and things run fairly efficiently. As an example, I had a phone interview for the job two days after I mailed my resume, and a week later I had been hired on the afternoon of my in-person interview. As another example... I've been spending time reading the Constitution this past week (you know, since I am a lawyer and am supposed to follow it, thought it best to know what it actually says. The legislature here is Constitutionally mandated to meet only every two years, and for a maximum of 80 days. That means that they come to town, discuss the issues, take some votes, and get the hell back out of town and back to their real jobs as farmers, ranchers, etc. This also means that while you have to wait until the next legislative session for changes to be considered, once they are, they are implemented almost immediately. To me, this is the way government is supposed to work.

And sure, sometimes there are stupid "protocol" things that must be followed because it is still the government. As an example, my computer automatically shuts down after 7 minutes of non-use and I need to enter my password to get back in. This is to keep "unauthorized" people from sneaking into my office to look at "inappropriate" websites or to keep someone from coming in and "writing a fake email to me boss." A memo went around about the dangers of such activities and how we would be held responsible. In addition, when you leave your office, you are supposed to "lock" the computer. Speaking of passwords, I am also required to change mine every three months, and I can't repeat the same password for SIX YEARS!!! Killing me. Although since numbers are required to be in the passwords, my password scheme is pretty much "Rabbit300", "Rabbit301", "Rabbit302", etc. For some reason, this is enough variation to be acceptable. Ridiculous... but I digress.

Anyway, so state government, smooth and efficient here for the most part. Unfortunately, there is still a federal government around to muck things up. (For my Obama-commie friends, that is not a statement of intended revolution or anything, you don't need to report me to the White House. Just an observation that the federal government is not the pillar of efficiency.)

So, there is this guy here in the state who stole a bunch of water and sold it to the oil companies. (Not breaching any confidences here, it was in the newspaper.) By stole, I mean that he has a permit for a certain amount, but he sold almost double that amount. Anyhow, we (my agency) sent him a certified letter regarding this issue. We also sent a second letter to the State's Attorney because water stealing is a misdemeanor. And a third letter was sent to the newspaper at their request because we are all about real transparency out here and have crazy Open Records rules. Pretty much the press can see anything and everything we do with the exception of Attorney-Client privileged documents. Anyhow, we intentionally spaced the mailing of the letters so that the water stealer would get his, then the State's Attorney, then the press. The intent was that water stealer shouldn't have to read about himself in the paper without warning.

Enter the federal government... i.e. the post office.

Water stealer lives in a tiny town of like 10 people. Ok, I don't really know the population, but small enough that they don't have their own post office. Anyway, because they don't have their own post office, mail for tiny town goes to the nearby post office... where it is apparently then sent to MINNESOTA, whereupon Minnesota "forwards" it back to the original post office for delivery to tiny town. WTF! Meanwhile, we back here in the "big city" are wondering why we haven't gotten the certified mail receipt when it's been over a week. Meanwhile, lawyer Jen is wondering when the events are going to show up in the newspaper. Meanwhile, water stealer is blissfully ignorant until he either reads the paper or the horseback rider/bike rider/carriage driver finally decides the weather is nice enough for mail delivery.

I can't believe I moved someplace where the mailbox rule might actually play a non-negligible role in my legal life. And on that note, we'll end with a poem...

Common Law Mailbox Rule

Anyone who was half-conscious in law school
Knows the basic Mailbox Rule
That acceptance is valid as soon as it’s sent
And rejections are valid upon the receiving event
But in an attempt to learn the pesky exceptions
I offer the following list of perceptions

If the offeror specifies a way to accept
Compliance with such method must be kept

And if the contract is an option type
Only receipt of acceptance makes it ripe

But the rule gets more confusing and complex
When the parties intend to perplex
By sending both an acceptance and rejection
And requiring further legal inspection

If first a rejection is sent through the mail
But then an acceptance is hot on the tail
Whichever letter was on the faster snail
Will be the answer that will prevail

Berry Beer in Bismarck

Oh yeah, I forgot... As an update to the condiments in beer situation, I think I must now find it acceptable to put olives in beer. First of all, in my own head I had mistakenly grouped olives in the vegetable category. But here it turns out that they are actually a fruit, a berry in fact. Since I consider fruit to be acceptable in beer, and I also hear that blueberries in beer are delicious, I think it follows that I must also accept olives. I tried a guy's olive-berry beer last night, and it just tasted like regular beer. Since I don't like olives, I don't know how the olives taste after being soaked in the beer, or even if you are supposed to eat them when the beer is gone. But, conclusion, olives are acceptable.

Pickles on the other hand, I am positive are a vegetable, so they remain unacceptable. I've not yet found anyone's beer to taste with the pickles, so I can't report back on that quite yet.

Lastly, I have also now tasted the "pink beer", which I don't know if I mentioned before, but it is half beer-half clamato (or tomato) juice. As expected, it was one of the most disgusting things I have ever tasted!! But at least now when I criticize, I can say I've tried it.

Boys in Bismarck

It has been a fun-filled week here. My stuff FINALLY got here this week, so I am sleeping in a bed again... it's like sleeping in the clouds of heaven after all this time on the floor. My movers did an amazing job, I'm really impressed and appreciative.

The date that I was supposed to have for the last two weekends finally happened. He told me only death would cause a cancellation this weekend, and thank goodness it didn't come to that. So, Friday night I went out with Rob. He lives two hours away, but drove down here, took me out to dinner, to the Bismarck Bobcats hockey game, and we finished up at B-Dubs playing trivia. All in all, a good time. Unlike Courteous Cody, this guy was trying to feed me non-stop. He also ate all his own food, didn't talk with the crazy accent, and the weirdest thing I found out about him was that he doesn't like drinking out of straws. I also found out that years ago when he lived in Bismarck, he rented a basement from an older lady here in town. Turns out that my co-worker now rents that same basement apartment. Anyway, we saw the older lady at the hockey game, Bernie is her name. Bernie told my co-worker that my date "has a heart of gold", so apparently he is also kind to the elderly. He does have an odd obsession with Disney, and he is totally and completely obsessed with hockey. I know these qualities will actually endear him to some of my friends, so they aren't complaints at the moment, just observations. Overall, I have not too much to say because he actually seems to have some potential so far. Oh yeah, and he also brought me a flower, which while totally cheesy, I totally go for such romantic gestures. We'll see what the coming weeks bring on that front. Could it be that I might actually have a good Valentine's Day for the first time in my entire life??? Let's not get carried away quite yet.

Last night I went out with a new friend, her boyfriend (who I know from work), and some of their friends. We went to dinner at one of the "fancy" restaurants in town, which I didn't think was really that great other than the ample supply of Coke. Then we also went to the hockey game. I'm damn near a groupie at this point, I really felt like I should have bought some merchandise and had it signed by the players after the game! Anyway, the main purpose of me joining on this little adventure was so that I could meet the single friend of the group, though he did not know this was the case. While I could tell that he is a very nice kid, he was extremely awkward, which was also exacerbated by his very thick accent. He got very drunk at the hockey game, and preceded to drink more once we got to the bar. At some point he got ahold of some chewing tobacco, which he then had pieces of all over his face because he was too drunk to get it in his mouth. He walked away for a few minutes, and then when he came back to the table, he walked right over, picked up my glass, and spit in my drink. At that point, we called it an evening and left (well, he stayed, but me and my other friends left.) Needless to say, not only will I not be going out with him since he is not at all my type and totally awkward, I can't handle chewing tobacco, let alone someone spitting in my drink. I think it may even be worse than smoking. I was completely disgusted and my friends were mortified at his behavior. On a good side note, I also met a really awesome guy (who is married with a kid, so not awesome in the dating kind of way) who is also friends with this group and seems like SO much fun and is definitely the kind of person I like to hang with. I assume his wife is equally awesome, though I've not yet met her because she stayed home with the baby.

As another side note, I was told by people both nights how good looking I was, so that's a nice little ego boost. I would have thought with all the blond German/Norwegian looking girls running around that I would be just another average blender-inner, but apparently not. As my friend Amie likes to say, it must be because I'm kind of a big deal.

So, that's the haps from the tundra. We must be heading towards the spring thaw because it's currently all the way up to -1. Practically time for me to go back to Michigan and pick up Godiva (the convertible).

Briney Beer in Bismarck

So I went out for a hot Tuesday night on the town with my coworkers and a couple of their friends. We went to The Lonesome Dove (doesn't that just sound like a ND bar?) and played B-I-N-G-O! For $12, it was a pretty good time, I'm not gonna' lie. There were a couple cowboys there, but not as many as usual they told me. Anyway, the highlight of the evening was the expansion of my culinary knowledge... Apparently it is commonplace here to put vegetables in your beer... specifically pickles. Pickles in Beer! I don't drink a lot of beer, so maybe this is more commonplace than I think, but I've never seen it before to my knowledge. The other girl had olives in her beer, which I also thought was odd. And when I asked about the pickle in the beer, I was the weird one. Her response was, "Where are you from??" Once she finished most of her beer, she then took the pickle out and ate it. In my head, I thought, "O^2, for gross!"

Beautiful in Bismarck

So I have a new favorite thing about being here. Although I guess since I didn't have an old favorite thing, this is more like my inaugural favorite thing. This morning when I got up there was a weather alert flashing on my computer, and it was for freezing fog. I get what that means in theory, but I feel like it isn't something that I'm accustomed to. In reality what that means is that you can't see shit on your dark drive to work. I couldn't even see the capitol building, which is normally lit up like a permanent, ugly, weird looking Christmas tree. What is also means is that when the sun comes up, everything is absolutely gorgeous. The frozen fog has covered everything in some sort of frost/ice/snow, so everything is white. And then when the sun really comes out and it starts to warm up a little, everything turns silver. I wish I wouldn't have been at work already so I could have gone and taken some pictures. (I mean, this presumes that my camera was here rather than laying on my kitchen counter where my freaking movers still haven't gone to pick it up... but I digress...) Of course, it is currently winter and there is snow on the ground, so it kind of just looks like a picture postcard for winter. However, when I was out here for my interview in November, this also happened. I just didn't know at the time what it was. It was even more amazing then because there was no snow on the ground, but all the trees and fields were still all white and silvery. Anyway, frozen fog is my new fab fave. (P.S. - Plus, I don't know under what precise weather conditions this occurs, and if you care, do your own Wikipedia search you lazy bum... What I do know is that a temperature with a positive sign in front of it was involved!)

Brrrrr in B-b-b-b-bismarck

I've decided that there are a few big advantages to living in a sub-zero climate:

1. It's very quiet outside, peaceful, and the air smells clean. Also, it's so quiet that even with your ears bundled up you can hear people coming because of the squeaky crunch of snow. Therefore, nobody is ever likely to sneak up on you, nor are you likely to be hit by a car while on foot.

2. You can dress badly and nobody can tell. One of my favorite things about living in Howell was that I could walk into Walmart without having showered, brushed my teeth, put on a bra, or brushed my hair, wearing clothes that even a blind person would know don't match, and nobody would look at you funny. (Not that I did this often, but sometimes you are just extra lazy, sick, or need to make a semi-emergency grocery run.) Anyway, living here in Bismarck ramps this perk up to a whole new level. Not only can you do the whole unmatched-unwashed thing, but nobody can even tell because it's so cold that you have a coat and hat and boots and gloves on all the time. As long as you willing to wear pants and an actual hat (instead of earmuffs or a headbands like I prefer), nobody would even know what a sleaze you are underneath all your cold gear garb.

3. If your freezer or refrigerator gets too full, you can just set stuff out on the balcony. In addition, when you have leftovers from a restaurant or buy frozen items at the grocery store, you don't have to rush right home. You could go buy a gallon of ice cream and then go see a movie, shop at the mall, browse the bookstore, and then meander home. It's sorta' like driving around in a mini-deep freeze.

4. Since nobody in my pre-ND life has ever been to ND before, especially in the winter, and since the perceived horrors of the ND winter are legendary, I ipso facto win all arguments/discussions about cold and shitty weather.

I'm sure I have more of these gems, but it's hard to just come up with them by sitting here and blogging from my warm warm apartment. They'll have to come to me while I'm out enjoying the frozen peace and quiet.

Back to Bismarck

Even though I would consider myself a fairly easy-going person, I’m not gonna’ lie, so far this year has pretty much sucked! And it’s only the second day. As most of you know, yesterday was moving day. This meant that I had to finish loading my car and continue packing as much as I could to make the condo ready for the movers. The movers are a huge pain in my ass in that they are not prompt about getting back to me, they are very needy as far as all the information they want, and I feel that as moving is a stressful event, they should be more accommodating. Anyway, I had to leave by late afternoon yesterday in order to make it to my dad’s house in time for dinner last night. I knew that I wouldn’t be able to finish packing everything, so I just had to get as much done as I could and leave the rest. Maybe because I was rushed, or perhaps in spite of it, it was a really weird feeling to walk about of the place I have spent the last eight years living without having more than about 30 seconds to reflect on all the things that happened there. Even weirder to leave half my stuff there, but know that I won’t be returning anytime soon.

Anyway, after I had mostly finished packing the car and was getting close to departure, I shut the back tailgate of my Expedition thinking it was pretty much full. Once I did this, I realized that it wasn’t nearly full, that because of the way the tailgate curves, there was still TONS of room if I loaded things in through the back window area. As I was bringing out one of the last loads and within about 5 minutes of leaving, I opened up the glass only to have it practically fall completely off its hinges. There are two hinges at the top on either side, and the glass lifts up on them. Each hinge has two pins, and then there is a latch at the bottom in about the middle of the tailgate. (If I’m not describing it well, too bad, look at the back on an Expedition next time you are on the highway.) Anyway, three of the four pins on the hinges snapped and the piece of glass was sticking out at a weird angle. This could have been a COMPLETE AND TOTAL DISASTER in that my car was fully loaded already and pretty much every square inch was occupied. No glass on the back window meant the vehicle would basically be undrivable, especially for the move, in that not only was it subzero temperatures, but all of my stuff would have come flying out the back. Now I’m no Torts expert, but I’m guessing there is some kind of negligence liability involved if you drive down the highway with stuff flying out of the back of your car. As you may also know, I have been looking to get rid of some of my possessions and become less of a hoarder, but not that way. Anyway, I managed to get the window piece configured back around to the correct angle and shut it. It seemed to latch okay and I gave a tug on it without it appearing to move. I figured this was the best I could do under the circumstances (i.e. New Years Day and within five minute of leaving to move most of my possessions over 1000 miles to start a new job on Monday morning.) So, I left. When I got to my dad’s, he tied rope tightly across the window in the hopes of minimizing the results of disaster. I am now here safely, without incident from that catastrophe. However, the fun didn’t stop there.

I left this morning at 7 AM EST, which should have out me home by around 8:00 or so. Enough time to unpack a good amount of things, eat some dinner, and relax after a long day of driving. As soon as I got on I-94, I knew things were not going to go as planned. I did manage to make it the 60 miles to the MI/IN border over the course of the next hour and a half. The freeway wasn’t plowed, there was a blinding blizzard in parts, and because the freeway wasn’t plowed, there was really only one driving lane. Unfortunately, there were many drivers on the road without 4WD, and therefore, there were many people driving about 20 mph. Now, yes, the roads were horrible, and if I wouldn’t have had 4WD, I’d have been one of those drivers. But being as I did have 4WD, I felt fairly safe driving about 50. Needless to say, it totally sucked and it was not a good way to start out the trip.

After I got through the storm and into Chicago, I noticed that it was really loud in my car. And then I noticed I was also a little cold. And then I noticed that the rear drivers side window was down about two inches. What’s the big deal, you ask? Well, sometime this summer that window came out of its track and can no longer be put up using the electronic control. I can put it down using the control, but in order to get it back up, I have to basically open the door, grab the glass on both sides, and pull it back up manually. Therefore, I just don’t put the window down in the first place and consider this one of the “quirks” of this particular vehicle… just like I also consider it a quirk that my back windshield wiper hasn’t worked in several years and the heating coils on the back half of the back windshield no longer work. Sure, it’d be great if the car was still in perfect running condition, but after 190,000 miles, I’m happy that quirks are merely minor inconveniences rather than mandatory repair bills. Anyway, back to the window… My dad is the best dad ever and he had warmed my car up for me that morning. I figured that maybe he had accidentally hit the control to roll the window down, didn’t realize it, and that I hadn’t realized it because of the intense driving situation through the storm for the first part of the journey. The problem was, I couldn’t fix the problem without stopping. Finally, I came to a rest area where I could just pull in and right back out, so I stopped and pulled the window back up and continued on my merry way. I was less than five minutes back down the road when the window had fallen back down about quarter of an inch. Another 30 minutes later, and it was down about two inches. Because of the items packed in that location, there was no danger of anything falling out, just I had to listen to the wind and it was a little bit breezy on this balmy day. (As a side note, the low in Bismarck last night was -24… yes, that is a negative sign.) When I stopped for gas, I pulled the window back up and then went inside to buy duct tape in order to attempt to hold it in place. Of course even though I had stopped at a huge truck stop, they were out. I knew that I had some in the glove box of my car, which only necessitated about 10 minutes of unpacking all the items in front of the glove box, taking it out, and then deftly shoving all the items back in their storage areas. Good news is, the duct tape worked just fine for the rest of the trip, and since I taped it on the inside, it doesn’t even look like too much of a redneck ride (besides the rope holding the back windshield in place.)

By this time, I was really crabby, and I decided to grab lunch and use the restroom while I was already off the highway. I ran into the McDonald’s across the street, and was promptly told that I wouldn’t be able to get lunch for another 10-15 minutes because it was still breakfast time. (It was 10:50 local time.) Infuriated, I left and drove for another hour to another McDonalds and went through the drive thru. That only took about 20 minutes to get through, and because they also still were showing the breakfast menu and I just ordered by the number I thought I wanted, I ended up getting the wrong thing. I ate it anyway and carried on, already thinking that this drive totally sucked.

Fast forward several hours… I’m in the middle of nowhere Minnesota… I notice that my gas gauge says 50 miles to empty so I decide to stop at the next gas station I see. Um, yeah… approximately 45 minutes later I decided to take a nap. And by nap, I mean that I put on my coat, gloves, ear warmer, and scarf and tried to stay warm while I sat on the side of I-94 with no heat for 2 hours waiting for AAA to bring me more gas. The “next gas station” was unfortunately 52 miles away from the time I had decided to stop.

I finally made it to the gas station, by this time had to go to the bathroom really badly, and ran inside while my empty tank was refilling. To my relief, I managed not to wet my pants on the run inside, only to figure out that split second too late that the stall was out of toilet paper. God must have decided that he’d had enough fun toying with me for the day, and someone else came into the bathroom less than a minute later. She was thankful because by my asking her for toilet paper, I saved her from the same fate in her stall.

Shortly after I was back on the road, my dad called to check in with me. I told him all about my calamities, and said that I was just waiting for the flat tire or the speeding ticket to round out the day. As he was getting ready to hang up, he told me to hang in there, drive safe, and watch out for deer. Great, the one thing that I hadn’t already thought about. The remainder of the trip was uneventful, I made it back safely, all windows in tact. I have declared Day Bankruptcy, and hope that tomorrow will be better. It’s Sunday… the day of rest (unpacking the car and schlepping boxes). What could be better?

Also, I did my car count between Fargo and Bismarck… I have more accurate data on the mileage… Fargo Mile Marker = 345.5, Bismarck Mile Marker = 159.5, Total Miles = 190. Time of count: Saturday evening, 7-9:30. Cars passed = 38. Must be everyone (i.e. the other 30 people who live here) was just tired from all the hard partying earlier in the weekend and decided to stay in for the evening.