The same things crack me up every time.

Whitney has a cousin's wedding to go to this weekend. Usually a very natural, relaxed and delightfully social creature, I asked her if she was going to wear her Midshipwoman uniform.

Like, all of a sudden, surrounded by her parents and siblings who see her frequently, she is in full Naval regalia. Knee-length skirt, jacket, small military cap. Not a hair out of place. She abstains from dancing, the bar, or really any sort of frivolity. She sits and smiles confidently, but reservedly. Her nude-hosed knees are always together, sometimes collapsed to the side slightly, but never fully resting on anything. Perfect posture. She spoons her coffee sensibly, she only gets up only went absolutely neccessary and finds the most direct route to the bathroom, or wherever her desination. Her low heels click importantly on the floor. I keep picturing her date chasing after her, asking her to slow down. The only time she stops is to maybe kneel down, knees together, to have a brief visit with a tot. She scans the room quickly, to the right and left, then reaches in her jacket inside breast pocket to produce a small candy whistle. Wink, head pat, and she's off. Bigger, better things weigh on her mind, but she is eager to indulge any inquiries about military or historical statistics.

I'm truly tickled with this.

I just made a note to be sure to pick up a pumpkin tonight on my way home, which is generally sort of late. Then I pictured myself in heels, crabby, hastily and half-heartedly chunking out a spooky pumpkin leer. That's sort of not right.

We stand out on our block. I noticed it this morning on my way to work. That's the sort of neighborhood we have: every other city stoop is decorated with goblins and tombstones and pumpkin flags. Flags are big. This summer both sides of the street were lined with pineapple (?) flags or sports-logo flags. Now its spooky flags. I turned and looked at our front step. Barren. A dried up window box. An overflowing recycling bin topped with beer bottles. Noice, hon.

We have an in-house illustrator who sits near me. He absolutely crushes me. He speaks very broken English and has a thick Eastern European accent. He is extremely tall, has curly silvery hair and a moustache. I'm told he's worked here for a long time, but he sort of keeps to himself- crouched over a small paper cup of coffee clutched in his large hands. He's got the warmest smile imaginable and is always willing to help out.

Its a jarring contrast to the rest of us here; white, youngish, sarcastic. I hear people approaching him all day with urgent requests for illustrations of people with phone books or people with burning houses, whatever the TV concept is that is being hatched. He leans over his sketch pad diligently, I can hear his pencils flying acoss the paper maticulously. For hours. Often, someone will burst out of a conference room of people and summon him in immediately. He is returned in 2 minutes. Recently it was decided that his office nook, out of all our very similar nooks, would be used for a photo shoot. With little warning the lighting crew and models surrounded his area that he hastily tidied up, taking with him all his hundreds of pencils and pens. He never complains.

Sometimes it gets the best of me. I follow him with my eyes and wonder what made him select that sweater today, where does he live, and how does he remain so completely humble and kind in the middle of all this?

I've often struggled with the notion of do-gooding. Random Acts of Kindness: where's the good really going there?

Take, for example, my recent apple pie blitz. In my usual cornhusk-autumn frenzy, I forced Scott to go apple picking with me last weekend. Although we quickly learned we'd chosen a kid-style orchard, we waited in the long line to take the hayride to the pickin' patch and it was well worth it: we returned victorious with a huge bushel of beautiful apples. They are heavenly. And we have lots.

I baked a pie. It was so incredible, I set to make another last night. I proudly declared I was making if for Marion, our neighbor who takes care of her 56 year old mentally retarded brother, and her wheelchaired husband who had lost a leg. I felt saintly and selfless, I sliced and peeled and baked and monitored-- the pie was a work of art. I let it cool, wrapped it up and looked forward to my goodly delivery the next morning.

I left the house an abnormal 5 minutes early and sauntered next door armed with my scented treat and rang their bell. Calamity ensued. The chair-stricken husband yelled to Marion, Marion yelled angrily back, the brother got completely riled up and bounded toward the door. It was several moments before the door was actually opened. I leaned my head in to find I'd interrupted a very involved morning routine, and said not to get up, that Scott and I had gone apple picking and... it dawned on me how obnoxious this was all being. So I quickly thanked them for always picking up our 8 billion UPS deliveries and scampered off. Marion exasperatedly sort of thanked me, very muffled from a room far in the back.

Once I sort of got over the awkwardness of the situation, I will admit to feeling extremely good. I felt clean and sweet, smug even. DO-GOODER! While I meant to do something kind for Marion, I am sure she will slice up the homemade pie with slight twinges of humiliation for the morning maelstrom. I mean, really, is that kind? Hmm.

I sort of have to think not.

Frickin' crouton! Ha!

Having super-bad eyesight, I love the latest Dunkin' Donuts TV spot featuring the dude with his glasses on drinking hot coffee. He looks up, blinded, as his lenses completely fog up and he steps up onto the wrong bus. The two steamed orbs just crush me.

Today at work the air conditioner hasn't stopped. For no reason, its not hot out. I'm so tired of being cold that I'm pissed. I just declared that tomorrow I'd arrive in a sleeping bag. For some reason, I envision that I'd still be in a dorky sleep shirt and my hair totally unruly, like, parted in the back. My legs totally zipped in and I'd definately be clutching my "hot drink" with glasses on, lenses totally and constantly fogged over. "Did you say in five minutes? Great. Where?" I'd have to ask a lot more questions for some reason.

Ha! I wonder if I'd get sent home?

There's an annual tradition that I am happy to be a part of: during the Fells Point Festival, Scott's friend Glen throws a casual, all-day party. The festival I suppose could be likened to the Haight Street Fair; there's food, music, beer huts-- not that I would know, really, because for the second year in a row we cook straight through the crowds & into Glen's adorable 3 story colonial row home and don't leave. Playoffs on the toob, kegs were out on their brick patio along with snacks and places to sit. Good, all day, outdoor fun.

While we were getting ready, we couldn't stop laughing trying to come up with songs with the word believe in it. Why? 'Cuz in Bawlmerese, bleeb = believe. The winner? Kenny Rogers, "She bleeeeeeeebs in me!" Over and over again, with increasing dramatics and horrible cracking voices. Very, very bad. But irresistable to sing. "I Bleeb in Miracles!" came second.

This year, true to tradition, we beelined through the beer garden and zagged up the cobbley street to the cute house. After the teasing slowed (of my "Back to the Future" ski vest), I was happy to meet several other recently wedded peoples. And even happier to hear that they, too, got completely rained/flooded out. Scott and I couldn't get enough of comparing notes-- it was like that whole year of planning and decisions and details and details was completely relateable to others.

Before long, everyone had a beer or grape stain somewhere on their upper body and the volume level cranked up considerably.

A conversation was then started by my betrothed to another very cute looking pair of newlyweds: "Isn't it funny the kinds of stupid things you end up doing when you're just joking around at home?" I took a large gulp of my cran-tail, and swallowed hard. I wasn't sure where he was going with it, but I had a feeling. Sure enough, a few moments later we were arm in arm in front of dozens of people we'd just met, swaying as we belted out our very best version of BLEEB.

I am not sure any of those couples will be calling us anytime soon.

Saturdays now are super-industrious. Crazy-industrious. I had no idea how much could be crammed into one day. Last Saturday included a 5K race, gardening, house and doggy matters and suddenly it was 5:30. We were to meet our recently-engaged friends at their house in one hour. Lunch had been completely forgotten. I grabbed something on the way out the door.

As fall is here, I'm blissed out. It was cool and breezy that night, we decided we'd take the water taxi rather than driving. It was like we were tourists in our own town, we thought, as the canope-covered taxi glided across the harbor toward Fells point's tiny shopfronts, just starting to light up nestled along the evening coast.

Until our ferry turned and went in another direction, away from our Fells destination. Due to the hurricane, things are still amuck, we learned we had to connect to another ferry. It was clear we were suddenly on the equivalent of the NY subway 6 local. Made all stops, ones we didn't even know existed: Little Italy, the ESPN zone and even smack into the inner harbor, our tiny Times Square, to transfer. All this took 1.5 hours and a lot of standing amoungst sugar-wild children and drunk tourists. With the no-lunch factor, I thought Scott was going to pass out.

Our friends met us right at the dock, ready to take us to their favorite spot for dinner, their treat. It was bustling with people spilling out onto the street-- my heart sank picturing the wait. Our hosts must have had some pull, because we were whisked right upstairs to a cozy table. Wine was poured, bread was served and we sort of let them guide us with ordering. Many different dishes were selected and I had to kick Scott underneath the table when I'd see his eyes widen and exclaim "What about the beef kabobs?!" I swear I heard him announce: "I could eat the entire right side of the menu!" I reminded him we could always add on later but we had plenty for now.

The waitress arrived with our 5-6 plates and assembled them all around us. Everyone buzzed and chatted, and we spooned items off the plates. I was so busy catching up with Mary, I didn't realize that things had disappeared right in front of me, or, should I say, to the right of me where hungry Scott sat. I chattered on, nibbled a little bit more when the waitress reappeared asking if she could bring us anything else. Our dear, petite hosts declared "No, no thank you!" I practically saw the toast point fall out of Scott's mouth and hit his lap. Floored.

I love things like that. Scott, so used to my newlywed standard meals, at a chic little tapas place after not eating all day. I think I ingested in total: 1/4 cup of beets and a bite of (delicious) salmon. The darling space was tiny, the portions very tiny and yet all the patrons were smiling contendedly. The kicker was when we got up to leave, the waitress asked us if any of us were driving? And everyone smiled and barked back: "No, none of us!" after we'd each had a cupful of wine each. It was hilarious, like, did we get off the ferry in Lilliput? Its was like the Distorted Bistro, an Alice in Wonderland-themed restaurant. Either that, or we just need to get out more.