That's a lie. My bags aren't even close to being packed. My suitcase is sitting on my bed. Open. But empty. This is SO unlike me. Normally I would have had my bags packed last week. But we all know how many hours I worked last week and that trend has continued this week, too. I tell you what, if you didn't need a vacation before, you will definitely need it after preparing for a vacation at work. So stressful!
You may not know this, but after Mark died, I really, really wanted to get out of this trip. It seemed like a waste of money and very frivoulous at a time when I knew my mom would really be struggling for money. But we would have lost about $700 if we canceled our trip and neither of us were willing to just let that money go to waste. So here we are, several months later and we leave tomorrow. After the last few months of work being so busy and very stressful, I can't tell you how happy I am that we are going.
But I won't be going anywhere if I don't get packing. But first, I have to share a story with you that I cannot believe hasn't made its way into my blog yet. It took place two years ago when Pat and I were headed off to Punta Cana for our honeymoon.
When we arrived at the beautiful resort, after taking a look around and getting settled in our room, Pat sat down to look at the list of the nine different restaurants the resort had to offer to figure out where we wanted to eat dinner that night. I was getting ready in the bathroom for our first nice honeymoon dinner.
After studying the list, Pat said to me, "Well, it looks like there is only one restaurant where we can eat the entire time we're here." What the heck do you mean there's only one place we can eat? There are nine different restaurants! He went on... "Well, there seems to be a strict dress code at all the restaurants that men have to wear pants for dinner and...," he paused..."I didn't pack any pants."
Of course he was joking, right? Pat is starting off our honeymoon with a little prank. Only, he wasn't joking. He was dead serious. Despite the fact that I told him several times that I wanted to dress up every night for dinner, he still decided (unbeknownst to me) that it would be too hot in Punta Cana to ever wear pants so he just didn't pack any. I will say, this is something I would have hoped the travel agents would have warned us about, but at the same time, who doesn't pack at least one pair of pants for a nice vacation?
We avoided the issue the first night and went to the only restaurant we could - the one that is outside and has no dress code. But after we weren't that impressed with the food, we knew we had a serious problem on our hands.
I suggested to Pat that he go to the front counter and ask them if they have a lost and found to see if there were some extra pants he could borrow. He refused. He was too embarrassed. So I went up to the counter for him, and he wouldn't even stand next to me. Instead, he stood back in the distance, lurking as if he didn't even know me.
I asked the lady at the front desk if they had a lost and found, explaining that we were in desperate need of an extra pair of pants. I gave her Pat's pant size and our room number and she said she would see what she could find. A little while later, we received a phone call that they did in fact have a pair of men's pants in the lost and found which were very close to Pat's size and they were being delivered to our room momentarily.
When they arrived at our room, we soon realized "very close to Pat's size" meant one inch too short and two inches too small in the waist. I told Pat to suck it in and we tried our hardest to get those pants buttoned. But there was no way it was happening. Oh well, just don't button them, right? Unfortunately, none of Pat's shirts were long enough to cover up the unbuttoned pants. As much as it pained me to do so, we had to send the pants back where they came from.
Then I had another idea. There was a tall guy that rode on the bus with us from the airport to the resort - let's ask him if we can borrow a pair of his pants. I'm sure you can imagine that Pat was in no way comfortable with asking the guy we hadn't even spoken to and only knew him as "the tall guy on the bus" if he could borrow his pants.
We were down to one last hope; the two gift shops on the resort property (we were warned it wasn't safe to leave the resort so we didn't see traveling into town to buy pants as a good option). We went into the first gift shop and it was almost all women's clothing. There was one little rack in the corner with some of those khaki colored linen pants for men. Perfect! Except, they didn't have Pat's size.
So we wandered over to the second and last gift shop at our resort - our last hope. No khaki linen pants, but they did have white linen pants. As soon as I found them in Pat's size, a wave of panic came over his face. His eyes were saying, "No! Please don't make me do this." But in his heart, he knew it was our only option to wine and dine and fully enjoy the all-inclusive food for the remainder of our honeymoon - the food we paid for! So back to the dressing room he went, reluctantly, with the white linen pants.
He didn't come out to model them as I had expected. Instead, he came back out wearing his shorts and carrying the linen pants. "I can't wear these," he said. "They are see through and I only have bright colored boxers." Although he tried to act disappointed, I could tell he wasn't. Deep down, he was relieved that he could say, hey, I tried but they just didn't work out.
Lucky for him, I had a solution. "Go commando," I said. "I tried that. You can see EVERYTHING," he explained. No matter how desperately I wanted to be able to get into those fancy restaurants, I knew going commando in see-through pants wasn't going to help our cause of looking more "classy."
I frantically started looking through the store for something, anything that would solve thisproblem nightmare. Big, men's tighty whities is what I was looking for. I didn't find any, but I did find white spandex boxer briefs. Actually, boxer briefs is being generous. They were just white spandex shorts, somewhat like biker shorts, if you will. And what do you know? They had one XL left.
This time, it wasn't Pat's eyes that were saying "No! Please don't make me do this." Instead, Pat was really saying out loud, "Emily, no! Please!" I'm sure there was an exchange of words and then before you knew it, we were checking out with Pat's new wardrobe - our honeymoon restaurant problem was solved. That is when the lady at the cash register told us the grand total came to $95 US dollars - not pesos. That's right, almost $100 for Pat's new pants and spandex. Half of our spending money! Unbelievable. BUT... at least we could eat!
So this is what Pat wore, every single night of our remaining six nights...
Except for the night that he begged me to do room service so he didn't have to put on the dirty, sweaty and probably smelly skin-tight spandex biker shorts.
I bring this up for several reasons. One, I just think it's a heck of a good story. I got so much sick enjoyment out of asking Pat each day while we were floating in the pool, "So, what do you think you're going to wear to dinner tonight?" As if he had any choices.
But most importantly, as we were beginning to plan and pack for our trip, you would think it would be a no-brainer for Pat to pack a pair of pants, right? Wrong. He actually had to text a friend of ours who has been to the same resort, just to verify whether or not there was a dress code for men at the restaurant.
The answer was yes and I am happy to report that Pat has already packed several pairs of pants in his suitcase for Mexico. But not without complaining. All I keep hearing from him is mumblings about "all these stupid shoes I have to pack to go with the stupid pants I have to wear," or "girls have it so much easier than guys do. You can wear dresses without getting too hot. I have to wear pants and shoes."
I couldn't help but notice when I was looking through his luggage to see if our beach towels were in there that the white pants were folded up and packed in Pat's luggage. Maybe he didn't really hate them so much after all!
Hasta luego my friends!
You may not know this, but after Mark died, I really, really wanted to get out of this trip. It seemed like a waste of money and very frivoulous at a time when I knew my mom would really be struggling for money. But we would have lost about $700 if we canceled our trip and neither of us were willing to just let that money go to waste. So here we are, several months later and we leave tomorrow. After the last few months of work being so busy and very stressful, I can't tell you how happy I am that we are going.
But I won't be going anywhere if I don't get packing. But first, I have to share a story with you that I cannot believe hasn't made its way into my blog yet. It took place two years ago when Pat and I were headed off to Punta Cana for our honeymoon.
When we arrived at the beautiful resort, after taking a look around and getting settled in our room, Pat sat down to look at the list of the nine different restaurants the resort had to offer to figure out where we wanted to eat dinner that night. I was getting ready in the bathroom for our first nice honeymoon dinner.
After studying the list, Pat said to me, "Well, it looks like there is only one restaurant where we can eat the entire time we're here." What the heck do you mean there's only one place we can eat? There are nine different restaurants! He went on... "Well, there seems to be a strict dress code at all the restaurants that men have to wear pants for dinner and...," he paused..."I didn't pack any pants."
Of course he was joking, right? Pat is starting off our honeymoon with a little prank. Only, he wasn't joking. He was dead serious. Despite the fact that I told him several times that I wanted to dress up every night for dinner, he still decided (unbeknownst to me) that it would be too hot in Punta Cana to ever wear pants so he just didn't pack any. I will say, this is something I would have hoped the travel agents would have warned us about, but at the same time, who doesn't pack at least one pair of pants for a nice vacation?
We avoided the issue the first night and went to the only restaurant we could - the one that is outside and has no dress code. But after we weren't that impressed with the food, we knew we had a serious problem on our hands.
I suggested to Pat that he go to the front counter and ask them if they have a lost and found to see if there were some extra pants he could borrow. He refused. He was too embarrassed. So I went up to the counter for him, and he wouldn't even stand next to me. Instead, he stood back in the distance, lurking as if he didn't even know me.
I asked the lady at the front desk if they had a lost and found, explaining that we were in desperate need of an extra pair of pants. I gave her Pat's pant size and our room number and she said she would see what she could find. A little while later, we received a phone call that they did in fact have a pair of men's pants in the lost and found which were very close to Pat's size and they were being delivered to our room momentarily.
When they arrived at our room, we soon realized "very close to Pat's size" meant one inch too short and two inches too small in the waist. I told Pat to suck it in and we tried our hardest to get those pants buttoned. But there was no way it was happening. Oh well, just don't button them, right? Unfortunately, none of Pat's shirts were long enough to cover up the unbuttoned pants. As much as it pained me to do so, we had to send the pants back where they came from.
Then I had another idea. There was a tall guy that rode on the bus with us from the airport to the resort - let's ask him if we can borrow a pair of his pants. I'm sure you can imagine that Pat was in no way comfortable with asking the guy we hadn't even spoken to and only knew him as "the tall guy on the bus" if he could borrow his pants.
We were down to one last hope; the two gift shops on the resort property (we were warned it wasn't safe to leave the resort so we didn't see traveling into town to buy pants as a good option). We went into the first gift shop and it was almost all women's clothing. There was one little rack in the corner with some of those khaki colored linen pants for men. Perfect! Except, they didn't have Pat's size.
So we wandered over to the second and last gift shop at our resort - our last hope. No khaki linen pants, but they did have white linen pants. As soon as I found them in Pat's size, a wave of panic came over his face. His eyes were saying, "No! Please don't make me do this." But in his heart, he knew it was our only option to wine and dine and fully enjoy the all-inclusive food for the remainder of our honeymoon - the food we paid for! So back to the dressing room he went, reluctantly, with the white linen pants.
He didn't come out to model them as I had expected. Instead, he came back out wearing his shorts and carrying the linen pants. "I can't wear these," he said. "They are see through and I only have bright colored boxers." Although he tried to act disappointed, I could tell he wasn't. Deep down, he was relieved that he could say, hey, I tried but they just didn't work out.
Lucky for him, I had a solution. "Go commando," I said. "I tried that. You can see EVERYTHING," he explained. No matter how desperately I wanted to be able to get into those fancy restaurants, I knew going commando in see-through pants wasn't going to help our cause of looking more "classy."
I frantically started looking through the store for something, anything that would solve this
This time, it wasn't Pat's eyes that were saying "No! Please don't make me do this." Instead, Pat was really saying out loud, "Emily, no! Please!" I'm sure there was an exchange of words and then before you knew it, we were checking out with Pat's new wardrobe - our honeymoon restaurant problem was solved. That is when the lady at the cash register told us the grand total came to $95 US dollars - not pesos. That's right, almost $100 for Pat's new pants and spandex. Half of our spending money! Unbelievable. BUT... at least we could eat!
So this is what Pat wore, every single night of our remaining six nights...
Except for the night that he begged me to do room service so he didn't have to put on the dirty, sweaty and probably smelly skin-tight spandex biker shorts.
I bring this up for several reasons. One, I just think it's a heck of a good story. I got so much sick enjoyment out of asking Pat each day while we were floating in the pool, "So, what do you think you're going to wear to dinner tonight?" As if he had any choices.
But most importantly, as we were beginning to plan and pack for our trip, you would think it would be a no-brainer for Pat to pack a pair of pants, right? Wrong. He actually had to text a friend of ours who has been to the same resort, just to verify whether or not there was a dress code for men at the restaurant.
The answer was yes and I am happy to report that Pat has already packed several pairs of pants in his suitcase for Mexico. But not without complaining. All I keep hearing from him is mumblings about "all these stupid shoes I have to pack to go with the stupid pants I have to wear," or "girls have it so much easier than guys do. You can wear dresses without getting too hot. I have to wear pants and shoes."
I couldn't help but notice when I was looking through his luggage to see if our beach towels were in there that the white pants were folded up and packed in Pat's luggage. Maybe he didn't really hate them so much after all!
Hasta luego my friends!
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