What Girls Do

Men, have you ever noticed that women are all about planning?  Sometimes we enjoy planning even more than what we're planning....this, not so good, but that's besides the point.  Even the girls who "aren't planners" are really planners.  Some of us take a natural approach to planning because life requires us to do so, and then some of us take a somewhat unnatural, even OCD approach to planning how everything should go.  It makes us feel safe, it makes us feel we're in control in a world full of chaos, and let's face it, since you guys tend to be the kind of species who wakes up and says "Hey, I have no boxers, guess I'm going commando today", I have to believe that we are fundamentally different.  I have never woken up and said "Damn.  No underwear." First of all, because I like to shop for underwear because they're cute, and secondly, I don't let my laundry pile up so high that I could bungee jump from the top. I plan laundry time before it's too late.  The truth is, if you have woken up without clean boxers, that's probably because your girl is either mad at you and or you don't have one.  Oh.  I'm sorry.  Am I stereotyping?  Noted and moving right along....

In the midst of our planning process, we have developed what we like to call "The Dress Rehearsal".  We have dress rehearsals for weddings, we have dress rehearsals in our mirrors with our friends before we go out or before we buy something, and we have dress rehearsals for our hair...that's right.  Our hair.  Did you know that?  We go to the salon weeks before our wedding day and have our hair done with our veil to see what it will look like on the big day.  When you look surprised as we stroll down the aisle toward you, glowing with perfect hair, we aren’t surprised.  We saw ourselves a month ago. 

My friend told me last week that she heard a group of girls talking in the break room.  These girls are going camping with their husbands and they have decided to have a trial run camping trip.  That's right.  These geniuses are PITCHING tents and CAMPING in their backyards as a DRESS REHEARSAL for the real camping trip with the guys.  Have you ever heard of such a thing?  Remarkable!  I can just see them giggling while they attempt to put the tent together and then later going inside because there are too many bugs and they want to sleep in their beds.  I wanted to say that it was ridiculous idea, this whole faux-camping trip, but I laughed too hard and remembered that long ago, my friend, Kerri, and I were planning a dress rehearsal of our own.  We decided that we were going to secretly practice playing Madden while our husbands were at work.  Our original idea was that we would secretly get good at it and then BOOM!  They wouldn't know what hit them and we could play with them.  But have you tried to play Madden?  I would feel more comfortable pulling a MacGyver and unarming a nuclear weapon to my chest. What happened to the controller?  There are like 10,000 buttons and what's worse, there are a million different outcomes depending on the combination of buttons that you push.  There's no way that I could do this strategically.  Where's Duck Hunt?

Sometimes the things we plan turn out to be the biggest flops, but it's important, guys, to remember that the process is what makes us happy.  Right, girls?