A cast of recurring characters here at The Modern Gal:

The Modern Gal/The MG: That’s me! I’m your hostess and the proprietor of this blog. I’ve been maintaining a blog in some fashion or another since fall of 2005, but The MG blog has been around since November 2007 as an outlet for me to talk about the many things I love and to converse with other like-minded modern folk. I can be a girly girl when it comes to shopping and gossip, but I’ll never be a complete girly girl thanks to my love of sports and power tools and a super-independent streak. I can’t tell you what I do for a living because I don’t want to be discovered by my bosses, but in a sense I am a professional writer. I grew up in Memphis, Tenn., and have a love for good barbecue and Elvis because of it, but I now reside in Knoxville, Tenn., a quaint mountain city with a split identity between being Southern redneck and granola-y progressive. I am engaged to the Modern Love Machine, and he and I are in the middle of melding our lives and planning a wedding to celebrate the process.

The Modern Fella/The MF;The Modern Love Machine/The MLM: The Modern Love Machine is my sweetie pie and the fella I will be spending the rest of my life with. He was known previously as the Modern Fella until a series of events required him to be known henceforth and forevermore as the MLM. He is smart, funny, good-looking, nerdy and laidback and makes me feel all gooey on the inside. He’s a high school math teacher, which I find terribly admirable, and shares my love for books, sports and dancing to ’80s music. In other words, all the important things in life.

The Modern Parents: Modern Mom/The MM; Modern Dad/The MD: You know the saying ‘The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree?’ That’s especially true in the case of the Modern Gal and her Modern Parents. From one or the other I got my crazy, my practical tendencies, a love of baseball and football, Catholicism, good money sense and a life purpose of doing what makes me happy. I am their one and only child and am very close to both of them as such.

The Modern Dogs/Pooches: Lucydog and Pennypup: Lucydog and I found each other in summer of 2006. She’s either a Staffordshire Terrier or Boxer/Pit mix and shows lots of signs of abuse in her previous life, such as the scar on her head that’s never gone away. She was rescued off the side of a road with broken back legs. A very wonderful vet repaired her legs, and I helped put some muscle back on them and fat on her belly. In turn, she promises the only time she’ll ever bark is when someone’s at the door. Pennypup came as a package deal with the Modern Love Machine. She’s a super-affectionate furry mutt who loves to spoon and neck and will forever be your friend if you play catch with her.

The Modern Beau/The MB; The Modern Ex/The MEx: This is the same person. He and I began dating my senior year of college and made it five years which carried us through a long-distance spell and ended at the beginning of 2009, about a year and a half after taking the long-distance bit out of the equation. He’s a good man, but we were too different from one another for either of us to be completely happy. The break-up was painful, but turned out to be life-changing for me in a good way in that I rediscovered who I was. We’re trying our hands at being friends again.

Modern Friends: That’s you! All of you! Sometimes I’ll reference you collectively, sometimes by your own blog identities and sometimes by your real names. I blog for you and to connect with you. My community with my Modern Friends has gotten me through some tough times: times when I was so busy with work, my computer screen was the only interaction I had with the world; times when my breakup left me so broken I couldn’t fathom to see anyone in person, but could talk with you. Blogging has changed my life in many ways, but blogging wouldn’t be a part of my life if it wasn’t for you!