vw, what everyone else said. It will be special because you are special.

Aimée, what's a manageable price range for you? I know one professional historical costumer and a boatload of extremely competent amateurs in Southern California, and I could ping one of them to ask what a custom job would be. I had this Victorian underbust made for me for about $120 by a dressmaker acquaintance who was very skilled but had only made two corsets before in her life and wanted the practice.

Yeah, sometimes you gotta give the lowdown, but I'm talking more about the "Sorry about the messy pile of work on the desk, I meant to get it cleared off but I got a call so I..." kind of thing.

I still really NEED this mantra, by the way. I threw on a black velvet shirt when we had people over this weekend and realized it was covered in lint. I mentioned that I was sorry about this and one good friend grabbed me be the shoulders and said "You know what? No one cares."

Aimée, what's a manageable price range for you? I know one professional historical costumer and a boatload of extremely competent amateurs in Southern California, and I could ping one of them to ask what a custom job would be. I had this Victorian underbust made for me for about $120 by a dressmaker acquaintance who was very skilled but had only made two corsets before in her life and wanted the practice.

Right now for the F2F, like $40. That's what I'm mainly looking for right now. After that, I'll figure out where I want to get my custom one. And upon thinking about it, I'd like to lose a little more weight before plunking down a buttload of money on a custom corset.

There is an old saying about hostessing I try to live by-- "Never complain, never explain."

I like this a lot. I'll have to remember that. The one my mom always used to say was, "The dust will always be here; my kids won't." I can't use that one...and I guess I use it a bit to beat myself with. I feel like, I don't have a family to take care of...why can't I keep up on this stuff? But, on the other hand, I do what I can. That's really all I can do right now. And today I've gone to three classes, written and revised a paper, read three chapters in a book for one of my classes, ran errands, paid bills and did a sink full of dishes (didn't finish them....oh, well...). That's pretty good for me.

and I just feel like a totally and completely inadequate friend.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

VW wrote that, right? Oh, my.

HAHAHAHHAHA!

Dude you and "inadequate friend" do not even belong in the same sentence, paragraph, or gigantic tome.

Chill at home, and maybe walk to Burdicks together later if it stays a semi-decent night.

I'll tell you, some of my favorite nights when I'm emotionally drained (and I am sure J. is) are going over to my friend D.'s HUGELY messy house, sinking into the couch, watching TV, barely talking, and smoking butts, drinking beer, and eating pizza. I'm just saying. If you're with friends, it really doesn't matter.

muttering vw an inadequate friend... STILL FUNNY.

I'm right there with you. (I worked at Six Flags Great America.)

Get out! I worked at Marriott's Great America.

I get pretty bad blood sugar crashes if I'm not careful. What I've found is that, for me, the problem is generally when I let my blood sugar go up really quickly, it then crashes pretty quickly, too. So I usually try to moderate my sugar a bit -- I won't have anything sugary unless I'm having it as part of a meal that included a bunch of protein and fiber -- it tones down the effects a whole lot.

For snacks, I usually keep a few cans of chickpeas on hand. If I feel like I need something to eat, and there's nothing really healthy in the house, I'll just drain and rinse those and eat a handful or so, and they've got enough carbs to up my blood sugar a bit, but also enough protein that I won't get hungry again too quickly. Same thing with cheese on whole wheat crackers.

I worked at Cedar Point!

I'm at school right now killing time before my last final. Whee! It's almost time for

SCHOOL'S OUT FOR SUMMER!

Of course, that doesn't feel the same when you still work full time.

Those are good ideas, Hil. And I probably need to go back to keeping crackers on hand to spread with peanut butter (I loves me some all-natural peanut butter--I used to call Annabel my Peanut Butter Baby, because there were points in pregnancy when it was practically the only form of protein I was willing to eat.). Also a dorky-sounding but tasty invention of my own where I toast whole wheat bread with bean dip, salsa, and cheese on top.