Friends Don't Let Friends Drink and Sephora

After two months of attempting to use the "free wifi"* in my building, I abandoned all hope.

(*Technically, the resort/condos complex where I live offers free wi-fi in the lobby, but I discovered that my laptop can only get a signal when I sit on the floor beside the reception area and log on before noon on a weekday before all the kids with more powerful laptops log on and stream videos non-stop.)

I bought a Verizon Internet Access acount, essentially a cell phone for my laptop, on Wednesday.

The good news is that I can now get online anytime from the comfort of my sofa, so both my blogs and emails should be more frequent.

The bad news is that, after opening a bottle of Herding Cats Merlot/Pinotage to celebrate my newfound online freedom, I wandered back to my old addiction, Sephora, and quickly ordered all sorts of sexy fragrance, lipstick and eyeliner that I really have no need for, considering my life consists of: wake up, put on snow boots, walk Wiley, drive to work, put on baggy pants and baggy jacket and non-skid clogs and pull hair up to affect appearance that is as sexy as a cafeteria hash-slinger, clock out, put on snow boots, drive home, walk dog and squander evening watching back-to-back episodes of Law and Order: SVU and Law and Order:CI on the USA network.

In the spirit of total disclosure, I also visited Aveda to order their Intensive Hydrating Masque, which I've found to be, without question, the best remedy for bad oven burns (even though it's intended as a facial for sensitive and/or sunburned skins). This week, I needed it.

Yesterday, Delilah, one of the interns, was trying to bake the goat cheese tarts needed for starters for a wedding dinner. After expressing uncertainty to me over whether the tarts were done (I told her no), she attracted Chef's attention. He came over and, made some whitheringly sarcastic comments. Delilah became upset. Upset enough that, as I was defending her, she threw the oven doors open and returned the questionably baked tarts to the oven.

Unfortunately, I was standing beside her, and my forearm took the full force of the oven doors. After just a couple hours, a dollar-bill-sized spot on my arm was blistering nicely. Delilah felt terrible about it and offered to leave work early to buy me some natural, homeopathic burn cream at a co-op ten miles away (she and I share the same appreciation for overpriced "natural" remedies), but I knew all I needed was Aveda. And a bottle of Herding Cats.