I really enjoy a good awkward moment when I have a friend present to witness it. Sometimes there are amazingly awkward moments that make me think, “I’ve always wanted to do this, I just didn’t know it.”

A couple weeks ago I drove to the middle of a corn field in Illinois to spend a weekend with fellow blogger Shelly.

This is the first time that we met in person. It didn’t really occur to me until I was about an hour away that there was anything weird about this arrangement. Shelly and I have been friends for a few months now and exchange emails and such and I had already grown to consider just another one of my friends. There was definitely a “What the hell have I gotten myself into?” moment as I was getting closer to her little town.

Fortunately, we got along great and she did not kick me out, in spite of the fact that this ridiculous never-ending virus started Thursday morning before I left for her house. It’s one of those, “How were we not friends sooner?” situations. I mean, yes, “Geography” is the obvious answer, but that’s not the point. This post was originally going to be a collection of all the wisdom I gained from Shelly, but we were really lazy about saving those little gems.

For all of her wisdom, I helped encourage Shelly to break a rule by sneaking me into her exclusive water park. We got tans in the lazy river while being judged by middle aged women for our failure to get a pedicure. We then got said pedicures and drank wine. We drank a lot of wine, actually. Or, rather, Shelly drank a lot of wine. I just drank a lot of general alcohol.

But the weekend was not without it’s share of awkwardness. Seriously amazing awkwardness.

Thanks to family moves, I have had friends in disparate locations for years. The internet has been essential to communicating with them since middle school, so it has never struck me as odd to also get to know someone via the internet. Of course, I am wholly aware of all the creepy connotations and why most people are not so nonchalant about this.

On Friday night we went out for dinner and drinks with friends of Shelly’s. All was going relatively well until later in the evening one of her friends asked us how we met.

I just started laughing. This is what I do when things get awkward. In the sixth grade I giggled through one of my first break-ups because the whole thing was (a) clearly ridiculous, even through the eyes of a twelve-year-old who took herself way too seriously -and- (b) awkward. We sat in adjacent rows in first period and I could barely spit the words out because I was laughing so hard. (Don’t feel too bad, he was going to dump me — I just beat him to it.)

Shelly: Through blogging.

Friend: What?

Shelly: Blogging…we met on the internet…

Friend: …so this is the first time you’ve actually met?

Shelly: Well, we’ve talked before…

And everyone at the table, particularly the friend’s mother had this face:

You know how sometimes when someone says something uncomfortable or unpleasant and your reaction registers on your face, you quickly compose yourself and try to hide your displeasure? Or maybe that’s just me? I mean, I know I’m a really fake bitch sometimes, but I also know I’m not the only one who flat out lies to people to avoid being mean or rude. I might just do it more often…

The best part, really, was that her friend’s mother held this face for quite some time. From what I understand of the situation, Shelly is like a daughter to her, and her face clearly said, “Girl, you’ve lost your mind.”

From there we all made lots of cracks about this being our “first date.” We couldn’t resist pointing out that my internet friend put me in her trunk. Clarification: she has a cross-over so it’s not really a trunk, and I hid back there under a blanket to sneak into the previously mentioned water park. Obviously, it’s better without clarification.

On Saturday night I got to attend my first ever bachelorette party and I could probably fill several posts with the epic levels of awkward attained that evening. It was quite possibly the most fun night I have had since graduation, aside from the fact that my virus took a nasty turn and ended the night early.

Shelly had worked with the bride and they were good friends, but she did not know any of the bride’s friends. When Shelly said she couldn’t come because her (internet) friend was visiting, Bride (who is insanely sweet and adorable) insisted that she just bring me along.

So pretty much all night Shelly and I loitered on the edges of this party. It started at a hotel, moved to a bar, a bus took us to a street with more bars, and at each place we were really only partially with the group. Our clear awkwardness was just so priceless and entertaining. At the bar we spent the most time in, we would all dance in a big circle, but it never seemed to take more than a few songs for us to find ourselves outside this circle. Also, there was a fan off to the side and we seemed to be the only ones content to dance by this fan. Apparently they just enjoy being sweaty.

But my absolute favorite part of all of this were the group pictures. For the first group picture I had this moment of “Maybe I should just offer to take it” but the timer had been set and we were being pulled in. And then I thought, “I’m going to be this random stranger in all of this girl’s pictures. YES!”

After a while, the mere mention of a group photo would have us both laughing to the point that we were nearly wetting ourselves.

And then of course there is the fact that the this is the night the river of snot began to emerge from my nose, so I was not only a perfect stranger to all of these girls, but I was carrying around a purse full of toilet paper and awkwardly skulking into dark corners to wipe the snot off my face.

There are about four million things I want to say about my amazing weekend in the corn field, but I can’t keep all the thoughts straight, because (1) there was a lot of booze involved (2) it’s no longer “fresh” (3) this virus has fried my brain (4) I have been watching Real World: Las Vegas all weekend, and that has claimed whatever brain cells left behind by the virus.

But before I end this, I have to share this amazing video. Shelly posted it to her blog, but it might just be my favorite thing to have ever happened and I need it saved for all of time: