Anyway, back to the tiara. Even though I am rather buttoned-down and reserved (at least compared to a lot of the people I�ve known), I have worn a tiara in public at least twice. Both times ware on New Year�s Eve. The first time I went to a club, I had my hair put up in what can only be described as a fountain style (thinking about it makes me cringe), and the cubic zirconia tiara encircled my hair puff. No one pointed and laughed, but it was pretty bad.

The second time I wore a tiara in public was New Year�s Eve 1999. Christopher and I drove from Michigan to South Beach to stay with our friends. The whole way we listened to NPR. They kept interviewing the people who had bought 2-ton bags of beans and rice to live off of. Do you remember that? How people got kind of crazy and apocalyptic? I�m not really one to use this terminology, but the whole country had a really weird "vibe". I remember thinking about what New Year�s Eve 1999 would be like when I was a kid, and I thought about how everyone would make sure that they did something really special. Instead, I think most people felt they just couldn�t live up to the overwhelming hype (after all, the world was supposed to end) so they stayed home.

We didn�t go out, but we ended up dancing on the deck of Wendy�s houseboat while fireworks went off over Miami. It was great, and I was wearing a tiara.

At this point I feel I must disclose the other half of the story, only because it is rather infamous. Wendy felt sorry for this Cuban woman, whose name I have forgotten (or blocked out) so she invited her over. She kept going into the bathroom and coming out in a burst of smoke. She also kept taking pills. She told me this crazy story about how her husband had kidnapped her children and took them to Cuba.

Around 2 am, after we were very tired and drunk, Wendy and Mantas had disappeared to a neighbor�s house and Christopher, crazy Cuban woman and I were sitting in the boat. All of a sudden the crazy woman got on her hands and knees, did some sort of �sexy tiger� crawl (think Duran Duran�s Rio video) and said �what..do you desire?� to Christopher. Christopher was so completely caught off guard by this that he could not speak. Never had it occurred to him that a middle aged, smacked up woman would come on to him in such a direct manner.

Christopher and I had often used the cover of being a couple, for our own protection. He has swooped in to my rescue on many occasions, I was glad to return the favor. I told the crazy woman all about how we were deeply in love, blah, blah blah.

We made it pretty clear that we would like her to leave. In fact I believe we even said �I�d like you to leave�. She stalled and stalled but finally she left.

So I took off my tiara and went to sleep.