I just registered for the 20-Something Bloggers meetup!

(I thought I’d point that out for those of you who can’t see the ginormous picture in the sidebar. And can’t read the post title. You know who you are.)

I very nearly went to BlogHer last year but waited too long to sign up. Registration was closed when I finally clicked over there, and I was pretty disappointed in my lazy self. Everyone came back with such squee-filled posts about days and days of blogger fun. I felt like I’d really missed out.

I’ve met a few of the lovely Chicago bloggers and am pretty stoked to see them again, but this will be my first biggish meetup. Not only do I always love a trip to the great state of Chicago,** but anytime someone gives me a t-shirt with a logo on it, I get pretty worked up. And the thought of the swag bag makes me a little warm around the edges.

Confession: This meetup actually looks a lot more fun than BlogHer. Who wants to go to lectures and speeches when you can go on a cupcake crawl and a Gold Coast night out? 40 bloggers have already signed up, and there’s plenty of room for more!

For info on the 20-Something Bloggers 2009 Meetup, go to the official blog at http://20sbmeetup.wordpress.com/ and read more. The links are there to register for the event, see the proposed schedule, get hotel deals, roommates, and so on.

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** Yes, I said that on purpose. Google Dan Quayle.

It’s time for another shameless plug for Wordpress!

to Wordpress without having to mess with your FTP. How awesome is that? From your dashboard, just go to the Plugins drop-down and click “Add New.” You’ll be taken to a search screen where you can click on popular subject tags or enter a search term and look around that way. I must have spent 30 minutes on there the other day, just kicking around the index and finding plugins I’d never even thought of before.

My current favorite is called WPhone. It’s a plugin just for you, the administrator, and it makes your Wordpress software work beautifully on any mobile device browser that doesn’t have full internet like the iPhone does. I used to try to work on posts from my Sidekick, but it was freaking impossible. Nothing fit right on the screen and a bunch of background scripts took way too long to load. This handy plugin gives you access to not only write and edit posts, but to manage everything from your posts and pages to links and plugins. Just search “WPhone” in that plugin search box and you can be up and running in two minutes.

Check out my new Guidespot Guide about the next round of plugins!

Over the holidays, I worked with my friend Jenn on moving her Wordpress.com blog over to self-hosting on Wordpress.org. I did a few graphic-y things for her (and I am VERY proud of that header!) and she’s all over the easy user interface that makes it simple for her to customize. We used the same basic Mandigo theme that I use here, and futzed with it a bit to make it a different setup, different bullet graphics, etc. It’s very pink.

CLICK!

Vacation this year seemed a bit off. I was sick the entire time (and who doesn’t love that?) so a lot of it passed in a blur. However, in between Kleenex and shots of Cepacol, it looked something like this:

Friday:

Discovering the beauty of the borrowed iPass while navigating the Chicago suburbs to Jenn’s house.

Starting work on redesigning Jenn’s blog.

Golden Tee – a 91 foot putt!

Cold medicine, cold medicine…

Saturday:

Shopping with Jenn and Jess and getting a few sweet deals at Banana Republic

Meeting E’s executive chef friend at his restaurant and gorging on all sorts of food I can’t pronounce (free!) while waiting for E to arrive.

E getting to Chicago 8 hours late.

E getting us kicked out of a bar because he was drunk and kept “forgetting” that you can’t smoke in bars in Chicago. Me punching him on the sidewalk.

Cold medicine, cold medicine, cold medicine….

Sunday:

Lou Malnati’s deep-dish pizza.

Horseshoe Casino.

E loudly referring to me as his future wife and betting the craps table that he’d propose to me on the spot if he rolled a three.

E rolling a four. Me sighing in relief in between coughs.

Coldmedicinecoldmedicinecoldmedicine…

Monday:

Driving to Holland, Michigan while doped up on cold medicine.

Seeing E’s mom and hanging out with his high school friends.

Toothache begins.

Cold medicine coma.

Tuesday:

Hauling E’s butt down to the Secretary of State’s office to get some papers he needs to resolve The Legal Issue That Shall Not Be Named.

Chicago hot dogs and gyros at Mr. Kozak’s.

Spending all afternoon running iTunes backups for friend.

Toothache worsens.

Passing out on friend’s couch at 9:30 pm.

Cold medicine coma, coughing fits, near death.

Wednesday:

Driving home for 8 hours, still slightly hopped-up on cold medicine.

Toothache feels marginally better.

Checking odometer: 1,062 miles on the new car without a glitch.

Falling in own bed, coughing like cat with a hairball, passing out.

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On Thursday I came back to work, still sniffling and coughing but feeling a bit better overall. My toothache was still bugging me though, and as one of those bad, bad people who hasn’t gone to the dentist for five years, I was getting pretty concerned. I’ve had intermittent minor toothaches for years, but the pain on the left side of my face was freaking me out, so I grudgingly called the office and they agreed to see me yesterday afternoon.

And just in case you didn’t know, your teeth should NOT be in your sinuses.

See the maxillary sinuses? See how high they are in your cheeks? When they fill up with goo, that’s why your face hurts around the eyes when you have a sinus infection.

See how your teeth should end below the maxillary sinus cavity? It appears that mine don’t. The roots of my molars are actually INSIDE my sinuses, according to my x-rays. So they hurt when the sinuses fill up with goo. Even the dentist grimaced a little bit while he was explaining to me that he wouldn’t touch those roots with a ten-foot pole. The prognosis isn’t bad – it’s just painful but not actually bad for my health. If I continue to have sinus infections and the pain gets unbearable or I experience nerve problems then I guess they do something icky inside my cheek to fix it.

I did not accomplish ALL of my vacation goals (no Bears shirt – I bought myself some cute cords instead) but I did refrain from getting drunk and hitting on boys. So that was my vacation, and all was not wasted. How are you?

I had my mouse over the “Publish” button and was about to send off a post about how I hate being sick on vacation but it’s okay because my vacation is going fine anyway, blah blah, when my phone rang.

It was E.

I came up to Chicago yesterday to crash with a friend and do a little shop-shop-shopping since E had to work Friday night. The plan was for him to catch the good old MegaBus (woo!) from St. Louis at 8:30 to come up here today and I’d pick him up at Union Station at 3, from whence we would proceed to the rest of our vacation together – seeing more friends tonight, going to Michigan tomorrow, etc.

8:38 am

“Baby, you’re not gonna believe this.”

Have I heard that line before? “Are you on the bus?” I ask slowly.

It all tumbled out as one sentence. “I called the cab driver 45 minutes before the bus was supposed to leave and he was late and picked me up ten minutes before I had to be on the bus and he made two wrong turns and I missed the fucking bus and I am so sorry baby I am raging pissed right now and the noon bus is full so I can’t get another one till four o’clock and that means I won’t be there till almost ten.”

Delete happy post.

So I get to do what in the city by myself this evening? Am I supposed to keep the rendezvous with his friends that I’ve never met without him? Where do I park now? Meet friends where? I need a map! I am a planner and the plans have gone awry! What do I doooo????

Eff eff eff eff.

He’s calling the friends we were supposed to meet and stay with with and he’s going to get instructions for me. It looks like I might get to park the car in their swanky downtown building for free, so that’s nice. I’m probably going to have to meet up with these strangers and hang out with them before he gets there, which would make me a tiny bit nervous anyway but is making me much more nervous now because I am a germy ball of snot wrapped in blue Puffs tissues, and it is not a good look for me. Strangers don’t want to welcome the plague into their expensive lofty apartments to stay the night and clog up the furnace filter with ick. I’d feel much better if he were there with me, holding my grimy hand for the introductions.

But c’est la vie. They’re his lifelong friends so they have to deal with me (and I can still be charming with a red nose). And really? It’s just a few extra hours in a city I love, and I won’t complain. So I’ll go downtown today as planned, I just have a little more time to shop with money I don’t have, right?

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Chicago bloggers: whatcha doing this evening?

There’s a line in “The Devil Wears Prada” (movie) that I just love to steal when someone is sick. I refer to that person as “an incubus of viral plague” and it sounds so haughty-funny and people always laugh. I’m no Meryl Streep, but I used it on E when he had the flu and he even thought it was funny.

But it’s hard to laugh when you yourself are said incubus and your throat is ablaze with a raging inferno of fiery germs that no amount of cepacol or pectin can extinguish. Happy New Year’s Eve, indeed.

I’m feeling better this evening though. Tomorrow I’m off to Chicago (woo!) for a day or two and then to the Great White North of Holland, Michigan for the annual rounds to see E’s family and friends. I kind of love that even though we did break up for awhile this summer, E and I are repeating things now so I can call it our “annual” whatever. Now we’ve had 2 Thanksgivings and 2 Christmases and 2 New Year’s Eves (neither of which we got to spend together) and this will be our second family-visiting Michigan trip. Awwwww…

To Do in Chicago:

Buy a Bears shirt (or a Bears something)

Shopping with Jenn

Dinner with blog friends*

Work my mad skills as Wordpress web designer for a friend’s blog

Buy some sort of suck-up present for E’s mom

To NOT Do in Chicago:

Get smashed

Pick up boys

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* Chicago blogger friends, if I forgot to add you to my watch-out-I’m-back-in-town email list due to my NyQuil-induced haze, I’m sorrreee! Please email me if you want to hang out.