Weekend with the brother

I just finished watching the 2007 Miss America Pageant. I knew I was back in the US and no longer on UK soil when I saw the startingly high number of future skin cancer patients on stage. If there's one thing I learned in the UK, it's that beautiful skin is important. Embrace your paleness. The Brits think we're nuts for our tanning obsession, and we are. Also, I swear some of the accents used in the interview portion of the competition were fake. Do they truly believe that they will earn "street cred" with the judges by sounding like a migrant farmer in Dust Bowl, Oklahoma?

As I mentioned previously, my brother, Scott, was going to come to visit this weekend. It wasn't actually confirmed to me that he was coming until about 6 p.m. when my mom called to tell me. And oh, by the way, he's bring his friend, Danny. That's fine and all, but seeing as I live in someone else's house, it would be nice to know these things ahead of time so I could let her know. Communication has never been his strong point. This was evidenced several hours later when I heard a banging on the door. It wasn't a knock; it was more like a large Doberman Pinscher slamming into the door at twenty second intervals. I knew Scott was somewhat close because he had called me three times asking for directions, which either shows how bad I am at giving them or how bad he is at taking them. Either way, he never called to let me know he had arrived. Which wouldn't be that big of a deal, except that when I opened the door, he and Danny were standing there, holding a massive couch between them.

I had asked my dad if Scott could bring me a couch for my room since I had the extra space, but I didn't realize that the first thing he would do when he arrived at my house at 10:30 p.m. - in the pitch black of night - would be to lug that sucker up the stairs. He kind of grunted and told me to get out of the way, and then he and Danny began the unsightly task of carrying my maeve-colored couch up the steps. They hit the light hanging from the ceiling over the stairs coming up and knocked off all of the couch's legs in the process. I had a lot of fun watching the boys attempt to angle the couch through my doorway, cringing with each subsequent bang, scratch and thud as the couch bounced into the door and wall, cringing even more as I looked into the face of my roommate and house owner. Movers these days! No respect, I tell you.

The next night, Scott and Danny were gone, deciding they would prefer the company of the frat boys at The Farmhouse over mine. I was home with Katie, and, in passing, she asked me which one was my brother. "I noticed the boy in front (in carrying the couch up the stairs) seemed to be the one in charge, but..." She trailed off, explanation unneeded. My brother is 6 foot 3, with dark brown hair and hazel eyes, and he looks Italian. I'm blonde with blue eyes. It only bothers me when it comes up in possible incestuous circumstances, like when we're taking a family picture and the photographer asks if my brother and I are "together". SICK, NO.

I lied in my earlier post when I said that my facial condition was not contagious. It's actually hereditary, so maybe that doesn't count as contagious, but for comedic purposes, we'll pretend it does. Scott recently was prescribed a daily Minocycline pill, medicine that I solely take for laughs and giggles, too. He took his first pill on Thursday night and woke up the next morning with a swollen body that was covered in hives. It didn't stop him from partying at Mizzou, though. He skipped school, got a cortisone shot, took some Benedryl, and was on his way (DRIVING, no less!). My mom made sure to warn him before he left that if he felt his throat starting to tighten up, he "had fifteen minutes, tops. GO TO THE EMERGENCY ROOM." I'm lucky he didn't die in our living room.

Besides the couch, I also asked my mom and dad to pack me a few essentials. I really did not expect to be gone for over a month, so I was in dire need of more material possessions to hoard. These items included, but were not limited to, (1) hideously ugly couch now without legs; a pair of Ugg-looking boots with fake fur running up the side - hideously cute (or cutely hideous?) - but necessary in Missouri's tundra; 10 hangers (like I'm really going to spend $2.99 to buy more at Target!); three long-handled teaspoons (I'm particular about my spoons, okay? They make me enjoy my cereal more.); three pairs of underwear, including one thong (thanks for getting those together for me, Dad); my favorite black Victoria Secret bra (my dad had to ask if the tag would SAY it was VS; I assured him it would. It made his job a little easier as he sorted through the laundry basket filled with six girls' worth of underwear); and a DVD player. The DVD player is ironic because I don't have a TV - nor do I watch it, btw. We have a TV downstairs, but for some reason Katie doesn't think it will work. Anyway, in the DVD player is the movie my parents rented the other night. They had forgotten to take it out before sending the DVD player on its merry way with Scott. I told Scott that he was NOT ALLOWED TO LEAVE without saying goodbye, mostly because I knew he would forget the stinking DVD. I arrived home from church on Sunday morning to find my brother, and all of his belongings save one (which I'll get into later), gone. I called him and yelled. He said that he was a full 20 minutes away and that we could 'just buy another DVD'. Sweet, Scott. Good idea.

I didn't have to miss my brother for too long, however, because Katie found a pair of his drawers behind the living room curtains. He claimed later that Danny had hidden them there 'as a good get'. Boys.