In which I LET IT ALL OUT

Last post; October 19th.
That is just SAD.
No, but really. We keep blogs to hold written accounts of what's going on in our lives but once life really gets exciting and actually worth recording it, in turn, translates to no time. IRONY. Bummer nut.

I'm only here because if you scroll through my facebook page about 80% of my statuses are about babies and pregnancy and more babies. But not in the "Oh, I'm so excited to have a baby!" way. It's more like, "Put that thing back where it came from or so help me! So help me!"
We are sooo not ready to have a baby. And every time I say that it makes me so nervous cuz I can just see God up there being all like, "O rly? BAM. Preggers." Cuz, y'know, God's always caught up on the current lingo and whatnot. He's cool like that. But seriously, I always kinda look up at the sky sheepishly and say a quick little prayer that we can just hold off a little while longer until we get into a house.
I won't even let us bring a dog into our apartment here, let alone a tiny HUMAN. I mean, we're not the streets of Harlem or nuthin' but it's pretty ghetto-scary-town here. And small. People always scoff when I say our apartment is so small considering it's technically a 3-bedroom and a den but we get cheap rent from Mark's dad (our landlord) because he gets to keep his stuff in our backyard and one of the larger bedrooms. So yeah! Room is limited. Stop judging me.
And my goodness, lately there is so much baby love on facebook that there's no way I can resist the baby urges. Not to mention, one of our good friends has a 3 week old baby (I think, somewhere in that range of tiny) and I got to hold her for nearly an hour last saturday and darn-it-all if it didn't confuse me all to heck.
I'd never ever ever held a baby that small and I found myself constantly loosening my grip on her little precious head because I was so afraid she was gonna swing one way to look at something and I'd end up hurting her. But eventually we worked out a system and she eased up on the squirming and was content to just let me cradle her and stare at her perfect little face.
There is seriously a dangerous science to hormones, guys. Dangerous. And while I wasn't like "OMG BABY" raging urge to pants Mark and make a baby the minute we got home, it planted this little seed of wonder and desire. It's been a week now and every day it's gotten stronger and more resilient to my misgivings and pathetic attempts to convince myself "I don't want a baby yet!"
Confession: I totally wants da childrens.
Maybe.
I told you, I'm super confused about it.
It helps that America's Funniest Home Videos has these clips of babies shooting milky puke out every hole in their face or the times when they get their pudgy little fingers on markers, or peanut butter, or something else messy and smear it over every surface they can reach and I remember, "oh yeah, I can totally wait for that."
But then I read the blogs and see the pictures on facebook and it's so much easier to want a baby than to continually tell myself I don't just yet.
And here's a little secretish-not-secret. I just kinda called in and skipped out on my last depo shot back at the end of october and just decided I was done. Who knows when it'll wear off. Who cares? Unprotected sex? Sure! No big deal. I dunno when/if my period will come back, you don't mind do ya honey? We just kinda agreed we'd start using condoms in january and hope that until then none of his little swimmers would stick to my uterus. GREAT PLAN.
But for your information, we're definitely not pregnant yet and we're not waiting till January no more. So.

In short, I can't have a baby yet but I'm slowly and surely REAAALLY wanting one but I can't and house first and dog first and maybe I should work on keeping a plant alive first (yay for our potted bamboo baby?) and STOP POSTING ABOUT YOUR PRECIOUS BABIES.
But don't. Cuz I love it.

Such as Kimber Cutler, her blog here. The pictures of her hubby holding their baby boy about made me cry and I'm pretty sure my uterus did do a little happy jig.
And Alexis Solomon, beautiful maternity pictures here. Shout out to Clint's face in ALL the pictures. Oh, the love. I just can't handle it.
And then there's JT and Tamzon with baby Rori (dude, JT blog post man c'mon!). And Leah with her progressively growing baby bump. And plenty other's on facebook with their statuses and pictures and questions.

Screw you guys and your contagious happiness. THLBHPLGHTPHTH :P

Currently gnawing on a small white stick...

Have you ever made a decision and then immediately wondered, "Why would I choose that?"
And literally not know the reason for such a decision? Completely stumped?

Well, I have. Every single time I play bejeweled. That game is like "screw yourself over time and time again because you're not Rainman and you just wanna make pretty patterns because you're still 5 years old mentally."
My life. It's great guys.
Also happening in my life; [note: those of the squeamish and/or germ-sensitive type, maybe just skip along down a couple paragraphs or hop on over to another post, cuz I'm about to talk about saliva] Marriage is the best. Because when you're married and you buy 60 gourmet lollipops off the interwebz cause they were cheap then you get to have delicious suckers for dessert and make lots of "sucking" jokes. But also, there's the sharing...
Mark: "Hey...wanna switch?"
compare lollipop sizes, obviously. Can't be cheating me out of sugar, now.
Me: "Sure!"
Switcheroo.
Two seconds later.
Mark: "Wanna switch back??"

The flavors we both picked did not go very well with each other.
Now that may absolutely disgust you but I thought it was pretty cute and laughed about it for quite a few minutes.

So anyway! Tomorrow's gonna be pretty fun. Except for the morning. Mark and I both gotta do some schoolwork. I have a normal weekly assignment but he has a huge essay and his midterms to worry about. But sometime in the early afternoon he's got some guys coming to look at fun computer geeky stuff that he's trying to sell, so, yay moneys!! And then we're going out for a possible dinner date on a groupon to the 5 and Diner for yummy cheap food, huzzaaaah!
And then....dun-dun-dun-duuuuuun!
I'm ditching my poor husband entrenched in his schoolwork to head off to a Haunted expedition with a group of friends that hardly want to go themselves. I might be the only one who's actually excited to let myself be scared...on purpose. Hurrah for Halloween. It's actually kind of sad, I want to go trick or treating so badly, but at age [almost] 22 and 5'8'' I'm not sure that's really socially acceptable anymore.
I'll just have to go the day after. Snag all the leftover do-not-wants. Awwww yeaahhhh.
Also, I lost 6 pounds this week. Mark's lost 9. I'm honestly surprised this diet isn't a bigger deal. Although, granted, we've only been on it for this one week. So maybe it's too early to say. But it's workin' great so far. And honestly, our main (only) motivation is that the holidays are coming up and we both really like food. So...de-storing up it is.

I'm actually pretty tired right now. It's 8:14 at night and I'm tired. It's friday night and I'm just tired. But I just had a whole gourmet lollipop so I'll probably be perky and obnoxious soon, just give it a minute. I feel like such a grown-up getting sleepy so early in the evening. Or a 4 year old. Either or.
But I gotsta stay up and be substitute english teacher for Mark because for some reason he thinks I'm this literary genius and need to help write his essays for him. Which, obviously, my conscience will not let me do. So we meet in the middle and I sit here writing blog posts while he drafts and asks questions when he needs help and I give mild suggestions. Mostly I help him talk his thoughts out until he has some bright idea and figures it out on his own. He's a smart cookie. If only he knew that. Or maybe not, because then ego would get in the way of everything and that's enough of a problem in the human condition.
I guess I'm just happy with the way my husband is right now :) Oh, darn.

I reiterate; Marriage is the best.

A spot of adorable with a chance of "awwww!"

I knew I shoulda blogged earlier. Cuz I was funny earlier. Now I'm just sad and mopey and red-eyed because I watched the season 9 premiere of Grey's Anatomy and obviously had to face all the stuff that happened in the last finale that I'd been ignoring and in denial about all summer long.
I got attached. I'm sorry.

But seriously, this was funny. And cute. Way super cute.
I was at work today. Which, reminder, I work at a tactical store. We sell vests and pouches and all sorts of gear for the gun-toting types. Attachments for weapons, apparel, a wide variety of knives and such. It's pretty sweet. I also know nothing about any of it. But I'm learning. Slowly but surely.
Today a guy came in with his, oh, probably four year old daughter and some dude who I guess was his brother. Not a crucial part of the story. Though I'm sure he's a great guy. He bought a balaklava so he's good in my book.
But the four year old, now she was definitely in a good mood and very happy to be spending the day with daddy. She would run up to where my friend/coworker Calli and I stood and would peep in her little baby talk, "That's my daddy! My daddy..." and then mumble some stuff about his shoes cuz we got on a shoe kick. While we were on said shoe kick she wanted to make a big deal about her (actually adorable) crocs she was wearing.
Only....she couldn't really say "crocs".
So this four year old is running around the store repeating over and over again, pointing at her feet,
"These are my cocks!"

Then she about knocked over an entire display and tried to play hide-and-seek in the dressing room closet. I'm pretty sure she made my whole day.

Not of Any Importance

Actually I'm not being angsty and dramatic with that title.
There's just really nothing important going on in here today so....you've been warned.

I'm a little upset. Mark and I made the most fabulous dinner today and I would really love to show you. I'd really like to display the succulent pork chops Mark marinaded and cooked up in our George Foreman as well as the cheesy rice and steamed broccoli that all went together smashingly well.
I really would.
Except for I can't.
One reason is my fault, because I don't know where my camera is. Which is bad enough in and of itself.
But last week my phone had a seizure and went for a permanent hiatus from life, apparently. RUDE. I was home from work and watching old episodes of Grey's Anatomy and crying my dumb eyes out because I watched that episode where ______ dies. Which I should know not to watch because I know so-and-so dies. But anyway. I was home and messing with my phone. Checking facebook or something menial like that. I set it down. Suddenly, I wanted to know what time it was. A normal enough practice. I picked up my phone and....the screen wouldn't light up. I thought back to when I last used it and was 80% sure the battery couldn't have died out within the time I hadn't been using it. Plus, I didn't hear or see it shut down. But I took it to my bedroom and plugged it into the wall anyway.
Still wouldn't come on.
Mark got home and of course fiddled with it and pried off the backing with a tiny screwdriver.
I took it in to the Verizon store the following day and they couldn't even troubleshoot it. But there was this huge mess with getting into my account because I'm on the family plan with Mark which is under his dad's name. So I didn't know any passwords, which the guy made very clear when he said,
"If you are a user you'd know the password."
Well, scuuuuuze me, mister.
So he gave me the warranty/tech team number so I can call them and get more info.
Except for this.
I can't call them because MY PHONE IS GONE.
So I get the password from Mark that night and go in again the next day.
But guess what.
It's not the right password.
So I ask for a phone I could use and I call Mark and my father-in-law from their little office handheld but nobody answers. I talked to Mark later about it and he said the area code was from Nebraska....o.0 thanks for that Verizon.
Sooooo I still don't have a phone and it's been a priceless Instagram day and I'm upset.
But I made cake (one of those instagram moments) so I'm better.

Speaking of which I gotta go start whipping up the frosting for said cake. Toodles!

Story #2

Y'know what? Screw you serving size suggestions.
"They're more like guidelines than actual rules."

I just read a whole chapter in my Musical Theatre textbook on Gilbert and Sullivan which naturally included a large section on Pirates of Penzance so I'm feeling a little nostalgic for the pirate days of my life.

And also I'm eating a whole box of Rice-a-Roni myself because, well, it's yummy and I'm a fatty.

So Iowa! It looks about like this;

Pretty much. All the time.

I've actually told Mark the story of how

on every family trip we ever took to Iowa

it was almost "tradition" for my Dad to recite his

"corn and beans" gag.

Which basically consists of him pointing to one side

of the road and say,

"Well here you got your corn....."
then point to the other side,

"And here you got your beans...."

And go on like that for a few miles down the interstate.

He did not disappoint this time around.

At The Three Sons. 

Another tradition with my family.

Obviously we found some pretty stylin' hats.

Their sweaters and jackets are 

the softest and most wonderful things on the planet.

Plus, Okoboji University pride, y'all.

That there is Lily. 

Lily and her tongue.

Meet Trudy.

She's too cute for words.

And the SILKIEST puppy your fingers

will ever meet!

It's hard to see, I know.

But that's a tin can with 

Ireland all across the front.

If there's anything more perfect for us to 

store spare change in to save up for a 

trip to Ireland....

There isn't.

Another tradition;

Garage sales.

These aren't just your saturday morning sales, people.

These are ads in the paper,

lots full of junk that sell weekly.

Sittin' on the dock with puppy.

Doesn't get much more perfect, I tell ya what.

Favorite trip of our marriage, so far.

And we're only 6 months in! 

Dis is gon' be goooood!!

Smatter scatter!!

This would be that long-winded status I was speaking of earlier, those of you lucky enough to be my facebook friend.
Actually, it's probably right on that facebook badge I have here on the blog page. So you are welcome to enjoy my wit, as well. That's what you're here for, I suppose.
Kudos to you, my friend.

You know what's pretty great?
Having a job, first of all.
Then having two jobs is a plus. Especially when one of those jobs doesn't really feel like a job considering you love what the job consists of.
And then, getting a call from your dad while you're at one of said jobs (which of course you don't answer because you're a good employee....) and when you listen to the voicemail later, you about drop the phone when he says something like,
"Another check from the school came for you..." (MCC has been throwing mail at me like dolla billz at them exotic dancer ladies) "and well, I had to check for you, I mean I had to make sure it was ok and...it's for about, oh 6 or I think more around 7, yeah 700 dollars...."
And that's about all I heard.
Oh, except for this.
"Of course, you probably knew this was coming...."
Nope. Sorry Dad.
Was not aware that MCC was going to drop a buttload of money on my face. But uh, thanks?

And hey. I'm not one to turn my nose up to money. So....cool beans.
And now, a list of things I'm too excited for at the moment...

it's appropriate because Harry Potter

Santa, baby.....?

Story #1

I realize that I technically already told one story about our trip but....it was more of an afterthought, at-the-end, not very relevant story.
But this is how it really went.

We slept (but didn't, really) at my parents house that night and woke up 3 o'clock on the dot to shlump into the shower and stand there sleepily in the water hoping the droplets would be enough to spray away the dirt and grime of human living. I am that annoying person and did actually put make-up on before we left. But if you saw my mom you would understand. She is the most immaculate and attractive almost-70-year-old woman you will ever meet. I've never seen her looking rundown and frumpy. Never. So if she can do it, I can very well blot my face with goop, too.
We wanted to head out at 3:45 buuuut I think we were actually on the road more like 4:05.
I slept on the car ride to the airport. Naturally.
Checking our bags was interesting. We only had to check the one Mark and I were bringing, since we just crammed both of our necessities in one large suitcase and my dad's duffle. The line was miles long because apparently 4:30 in the morning is the ideal time to fly everywhere and anywhere.....there was a large group of hippie musicians headed to europe for some extravaganza music fair thing. I mean dreadlocks and rainbow tie-dye and strange orange mohawks with rattails at the end and tattoos and gauges and all kinds of piercings. Obviously my dad had multiple conversations with all of them. We actually had to drag him away to get headed to our gate on time.
We walked up to the gate and they almost immediately called our boarding group. Our timing was quite excellent.
On the plane, Mark had the window seat, I sat in the middle with my mom on my other side and Dad right across the aisle. It was nice to be all seated next to each other. Mark and I leaned over and watched out our tiny little window as the orange-vested workers flitted about and did their business.

I joked that I could see Woody, Jessie and Bullseye running around on the tarmac. Good ole Toy Story.

We even got to observe as they loaded the baggage to the underside of the plane. We scoured the carts for the luggage we were bringing. I spotted my dad's first as it was on top of the pile closest to us. They began unloading and as bags disappeared one by one we finally spotted our huge red monster of a bag. It was underneath a long blue golf bag at the very back of the cart.

As more and more bags got loaded it was beginning to look as if ours would be the last one they'd take off the cart. It came down to between ours and the blue golf bag. The dude hefted the golf bag and set it right back down on the cart and grabbed our bag. We cheered quietly, because obviously it was a competition. He stuffed ours under the plan, went back for the other but a tall, official looking guy came jogging over, shouting and looking very intense. He motioned vehemently with his hand across his throat and Mark read his lips shouting, "No more! No more!"

Our bag was literally the last one to get loaded on the plane. Whew!

I also thought I heard some poor man with a horrendous, snuffling snore but turns out it was just a pug seated in front of my dad. Apparently dogs fly, too? He had a little jacket on that said, "Emotional Support Dog". Way to be, puppy. Way to be.

Flying is fun :)

An Easy Start

I've been contemplating and agonizing how to begin this epic journey of documenting the [absolutely perfect] vacation Mark and I just enjoyed this past weekend for quite a few days. I took my journal with me   (cuz I was not about to haul along this monstrous laptop as a technological distraction) so I could write down the events as they happened so my memory wouldn't be a problem.

Truer words, ne'er spoken.

Anyway. That idea bombed. Who wants to take time to scribble a bunch of words when they could lounge in the soft grass with their husband, sip lemonade and feel the cool breeze off the lake? Or fish? Or swim? Or go to a rock concert for FREE? Or eat more food? All of which, and more, happened during the past 5 days. More to come on those events later.

So now I have the task of trying to take myself back a couple days and actually remember what it was like, rather than reading how I felt at that moment and translating it for you guys like I originally planned.

But I did take pictures!

I've found that I bring my camera along on trips but I forget to take it out and keep on shooting frames! I come back from an adventure and look through the memory card and there's 3 pictures. Total. One of him from the back walking somewhere. One of the both of us making terrible faces because we can't manage being attractive people. And then one of a plant or something.

And I get super disappointed.

So I determined to make this adventure different. And I did a pretty good job. As you may or may not find out over the next week or so, depending on if you come back after this smatterblog post.

Awkwardly enough, I'm starting at the end of this story. So far into the end, it actually just happened this morning. And this morning is not part of our vacation at all. This morning is back-to-reality-phase. Mark leaves for work in about twenty minutes and I'm left to unpack, laundrify and actually clean our apartment like I didn't do before we left which I knew I wouldn't be happy about later. And I was right. I'm totally not.

But we also wanted to try and get another chapter in on our book this morning and began the search for said book. Because we took it on the trip with us (no pictures of that, apologies), we looked in the suitcase and my "carry-on" aka stuffed to the brim purse. Alas, no book. We discussed our respective last sightings of the book and found that we had differing opinions.

I remembered getting into the car with my parents to head home and Mark handing me the book for some reason, like I was the proper book handler and he couldn't put it somewhere in the car. But I was deadbeat tired so I [memory lapse] did something with it and fell asleep on Mark's shoulder the whole way to my parents house where we had to take separate cars to our apartment.

But Mark remembers me laying my head down in his lap during our descent in the airplane into Phoenix and moving the book from off his lap to the plane floor. Now I'm panicking because I don't remember my exact actions from that time. I knew I did move the book because it was not as kind to my ear as his soft leg was but I could not grasp a single image in my mind as to what I did with it then. 

So his version was entirely plausible. I might very well have left our book on the plane. The book we bought for this trip. The book we were barely halfway through and I was enjoying quite thoroughly. The thought of that possibility was making me so sad I almost started crying. I wouldn't have any idea how to remedy that situation. Is there a lost and found at the airport? That would be nifty. At least I hadn't left the late wedding card with $50 in it from my aunt. Then I probably would've pounded my head on the wall and really cried.

He saw that I was quite upset and backpedaled, "I'm sure it's just in your parent's car, Hope. Let's just assume that." 

I just nodded and continued loathing my terrible memory and cursing my idiocy.

And then I came here to blog. I was on facebook and suddenly remembered a certain picture I did take. We were walking to the parking lot at the airport, my dad and my husband dragging the suitcases behind them, my mom and I trudging along in the back. It was super hot and gross. I thought Instagram would be thoroughly entertained by our predicament (it's sad the things I decide are important enough to be broadcasted to the world). So I snapped a photo with my phone.

Here it is.

It's appropriately blurry because we were all so tired that's about what the world looked and felt like. 

But behold! The book is IN HIS HANDS. 

I was right.

The book is safe.

Not with us, but safe. In a hot car in the middle of september on the other side of the valley (it seems). Meeehhhh.

Also, I was right.

Hah.

Annoying wife taking pictures of everything saves the day. 

Boom, baby.

What?

Blogging straight from my phone.
This is real life adult stuff going on right now. Except not really and I'm gonna try really hard to keep ugly typo's out of this post.
But don't expect too much from me. Woke up sick this morning.
Which is why I'm here.
After discussing the vitamin C values in apple juice vs. lemonade (both of the frozen juice persuasion) (also, I, with the apple argument, won) we were lying in bed muttering to each other in sickbrain garbled tongues.
Mark: it's not a too dangerous. It's not like your brain will blow up or anything.
Me: I just know your eardrums can get blown if you aren't careful.
We talked about my trip to the ENT, where he thought I said EMT and got all panicky, and I mentioned my symptoms were back.
Mark: well what did he give you? Pills or what?
Me: Ummm, I think I actually still have some.
Mark: you need to use it. Basically the minute your symptoms came back you should've started using it again.
Me: It's not that bad! You don't need to worry!
Mark: But....I have to worry. I love you and i care about things that are gonna make your head explode!
Me: You said my head wouldn't explode!
Mark: Don't listen to me, I'm hysterical.
Basically we both may or may not die on our way to our first vacation since the honeymoon. Woooo.
Cool story, so yesterday we were awesome people and rode our bikes to the grocery store and picked up some essentials. Bummer that stores are all paranoid about backpacks, else it woulda been much simpler to carry home a mega pack of paper towels, two loaves of bread, a pack of granulated sugar, and two half gallons of milk.
But we did it. Somehow. I'm not sure how I'm still living considering i put the milk and sugar in my purse and carried it all on my left side.
When we got home, I'd planned on rewarding our efforts with leftover snickerdoodle cookies but we were mostly just so thirsty.
So we sliced open our honeydew melon and ate an entire half each, digging out juicy spoonfuls of sweet flesh.
Rather like a pair of classy zombies enjoying the brains of their poor, human prey.
At least that's what it felt like.

I'm going back to sleep. Where's the ibuprofen??

Edit: 
Mark: Ooh, ooh ooh, ooooh! [singing]
Me: [raises eyebrows]
Mark: [stroking my big toe and still singing] I like your toooee!

The end.

Tell me if I succeed...

Because you'll know why in a minute.

me: sounds intriguing
what's the thing that helps your computer run smoothly.
Is that the video card?

Mark: im not exactly understanding your question

me: Oh just still wondering why my laptop is getting worse and worse with keeping up with life. It's all slow and glitchy.

Mark: well for 1, probably needs to be restarted more often
and 2 yes, combination of video card and CPU is what makes it run, and the fact that they are both old makes it hard to keep up with all the new apps and stuff.

me: mkay
just wondered

Mark: to blog about it?

me: .....no.

Mark: ok
i was just wondering
(btw it wouldnt have cared if you were)

me: I'm pretty sure my laptop doesn't care about anything ;P
I just don't know how I'd turn "My video card is old and sucky" into an interesting blog post...
...Barney comes to mind, "Challenge accepted!!" rising from the booth.

Mark: Haha
I just thought you would blog about our annoying experience yesterday with it

me: ...with the laptop??
ermmm, what happened?
Was it interesting?

[edit: I came back and fixed all that up there.

The rest is still messed up cuz I'm lazy.]

Annnnd, now I'm stuck here. In teeny font?? What is going on?!

Ok, now that I can fix. Bizarro.

So yes. My poor laptop is beginning to lose marbles rather slowly. But surely. I'm scared that when I publish this it's going to look even more crazy than it does here in the draft arena. That seems to happen to my posts a lot. I type 'em out and have it formatted the way I want, with fonts and sizes and indents and such.

And then randomly the sizes are completely different and my indents end up halfway across the page. My computer is about as reliable as B.E.N.

And not nearly as charismatic, charming, and/or hilarious. 

I could use my actual computer, yes, buuuut actually all of our electronics are still littering the family/dining room from the LAN party a couple nights ago. It's a lot of wires and things to plug back in. Booo.

THINGS are happening!

I quit the upcoming musical that I was going to be a part of, as the original cast. Bummer. Alas, living in this apartment is getting expensive what with it being the surface of the sun outside and all and my itsy bitsy hours at the high school aren't going to provide much to live on.

So a second job it is! ....somehow. As of today I've applied to (if I can remember)...

• Michael's (shenanigans! I hate your application process!)
• Kohl's (snobby website wouldn't even allow my app to be seen by human eyes. I automatically wasn't "what [they're] looking for". RUDE.)
• Walmart (because I've missed it OH, SO MUCH)
• Mountainside Fitness
• Fitness Works
• PetSmart
• Petco
• Animal Kingdom (obviously the ideal situation would be one of the last three)
• Spirit Halloween
• Buckle (A for effort...)
• I thought about being a Pizza Hut delivery driver. Then I remembered I have standards. (For pizza, not necessarily the job.)
• Oh, and I'm also selling my opinions. 

I'm so sick of my life history. I'm also totally boring. 

I completely screwed up the entire Mtnside Fitness paperwork because I was so auto-piloted by all the online, electronic forms I'd filled out that I kept switching around where information was supposed to go with what my brain just assumed was gonna go there. So that application sorta looks like a 5 year old got bored in church and happened upon a pen and paper. (Not really, but there is one section that has at least 3 very unattractive scribbles obscuring my maturity.)

All in all, it's gonna be a miracle if I actually turn into an adult and make it successfully through a semester. Throw a few well wishes my way, if you please. 

In other, happier news; my best friend gets to move into her and her hubby's first HOUSE within a couple weeks!! 9 days to be exact. It's been a horrifically long and arduous process for them and I'm just so so so excited.

Excited to help paint and decorate and go to all the fabulous parties I know she's gonna throw. If anyone was born to be a hostess it's Allora. You should try her oreo truffles. Or actually don't. More for me. 

And if you've got truffles then anybody's gonna be happy in your home so...boom, baby.

I think I'm a witch*

How wonderful is it to be married, you ask? It goes a little like this...

Your sweet husband agrees to 

PIANO lessons!!

You sit down with him

[excited]

and start going through flash cards.

Flash cards that you took forever to

cut out of cute paper and write carefully.

He catches on so quick and you're

super excited and proud of 

his brain.

And then it's not perfect anymore.

He gets confused by all the

sharps in F# major.

You discuss.

Vehemently.

He says you are being "mean".

You say you're being "passionate".

There are tears.

(I blame the birth control)

And curses bemoaning the name of

TEACHING.

More discussing.

And explaining and apologizing.

Lots of making up.

Compromising.

And then it's time for dinner.

Teriyaki Mahi Mahi.

You take a moment to read

a beautiful engagement story

(it's UPtastic)

and then suddenly!

He's standing before you 

sipping on a Dr. P

offering you some.

But the only Dr. P can

you know of,

is THE one you placed in the fridge

yourself.

To save.

So it would get cold.

For later.

offers can

"Oh, I don't want it yet."

offers can with sad puppy eyes

"I don't want it yet!"

takes sip

".....wait.

Is that the can that I put

in the fridge??!"

.....takes another sip.

"Really.

Really right now?

After I'm already emotional

and been crying

you're going to drink

MY Dr. P right in front of my face?

Without asking?"

leans down

"I put the whole box

of Dr. P in the fridge."

"oh.

Well okay then."

"It wouldn't have

been ok if I hadn't done that, huh?"

"NOPE."

laughing

Don't mess with the ladies' Dr. Pepper. Seriously.

I'm going to be the worst pregnant wifey. Please don't hate me!

*And by "witch" I don't mean "witch". It just rhymes and I'm family friendly as well as not a general user of strong language. So "witch", it is.

Woes of the Job Hunting Persuasion

Real quickly now because I'm frustrated I'm not a genius.
Listen, universe, you can't describe the timed questionnaire portion of a job application as

"Look at these set of numbers

2 4 6 8

and choose the next in the sequence"

Omg, it's like, 10 right? I think? Doy.

Ooh, or this one

"Which of these words is not like the others?

Brown Poop Stick Unicorn"

Basic first grader nincompoop junk.

And then stick mind blowing nonsense into the real one with a ticking time bomb of death blinking away at the top of the page!

"Pick the next number in the sequence

1.77 7 3/5 2034 -3"

I think I'll just start crying now. Save some time and effort here.

"A term used to describe the 

determined goal of a group or family

S K L Q"

Someone please tell me where my brain's ability to recognize a term by the first letter of the word is gonna be useful when I'm restocking wax flowers in a bin at the craft store. Please.

Or again

"Which of these words is not like the others?

 Hesitate Vacillate Dither Ameliorate"

Yeah, I actually wasted a few seconds of my ticking clock to copy and paste those words cuz I knew I was bombing that test like the US on Hiroshima....in which my brain is Hiroshima. I mean, I definitely know Hesitate and Dither but what the crap?!

Vaccinate and amelia earhart? 

Or something??

Most stressful thing of my life.

ps- Please don't judge me. plzthxbai.

Needs to be said...

Never Been Kissed.

Never been seen...by my own eyes. At least, until today. And now I'm slightly bewildered.
First of all, beyond middle school, none of my male teachers were ever that young and/or attractive. That should be a rule in and of itself. If you're young and attractive, no you may NOT work where hormonal idiots verging on the legal age reside. Because society is stupid and humans have no morals anymore.
Secondly, if I had a teacher that walked me around school and sat by me on benches and on ferris wheels holy smokes talk about creepy.
Yes, yes I know she wasn't really 17 and "legally" nothing was wrong with the situation but if a story like that came on the news EVERYTHING would be wrong with that situation.
I feel so bad for that guy cuz he must've been convinced he was some kind of pervert. And good for him for admitting that he shouldn't have said, "Guys will be lining up for you" or whatever but DUDE. Get out of the small, restraining, trap of a bucket that is the ferris wheel car and stop being your student's friend.
I know it was supposed to be romantic and they were drawn to each other despite the MORAL AND LEGAL issues at stake but I really just couldn't get past it. It ruined the movie for me. I'm sorry but you just don't slow dance with your English teacher. At prom. When you're the prom queen. Especially not with all that sexual tension.
But I really do love Molly Shannon.
I dunno.
It was good. I guess. Weird. Uncomfortable.

Meh.

In which I have too many opinions....

No disrespect or nuthin', but aren't we done with the

teenager angst and wonder and loneliness drama?

No?

Well actually this looks really tasteful and entertaining

and even meaningful.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1659337/

Whaaaaa??

This looked normal and then......it wasn't.

o_O

And I'm very upset it's rated R

because it seems intensely intriguing

and I wanna see it!

Boo :(

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1371111/

One word:

Denzel.

Sexiest black man that can 

make me cry my eyes out with

any performance.

Plzthxbai.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1907668/

Ehhhhhh.

Keira Knightley again.

Mostly, this makes my itching to

read the book far more irritating.

Leo Tolstoy, ftw.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1781769/

Ohhh, my heavens.

Bradley Cooper paired with

Jennifer Lawrence.

As mentally unstable maniacs.

Do you get any better?

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1045658/

K, "spoiler" but all the trailer entails is

a boy and a tiger stranded out at sea

with the tiger dominating the boat.

Cuz he'll eat the kid.

But the emotional connection had me

quite nearly in tears.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0454876/

Seriously, now?

I thought the point of 

The Expendables

was that it was the quote-unquote

"Last Hurrah"

for all those manly men to be....

manly men again.

Before they prune and shrivel up

in the nursing home.

C'mon, now.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1764651/

And on an ending note:

Birthday movie, much?

I think so!

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0903624/

I can haz dreams fulfilled

I have a very difficult time defining and adhering to the fine line between "excited anticipation" and "overly-obsessing-to-the-point-of-ruining-it-for-everyone".
I like to be excited and look forward to plans and events. Mark is more of the pessimistic type who doesn't like to think about it at all so he has no expectations that will inevitably be disappointed. (Which sounds a lot more terribly depressing than it really is.) It's one of the points of life on which we're pretty much completely opposites.
The event in question is our sudden trip to Iowa for my grandpa's 90th birthday.
And here's that story.

My mom called one day to ask how we were doing and I think to tell me that I have some mail at their house or something. Not important. Randomly she announces that at the end of the month she and my dad are headed out to Iowa for grandpa's birthday.
Going to Iowa was a trip we made quite a bit during my childhood and early adolescent years. Spirit Lake is a place very near and dear to my heart as well as somewhere I've been dying to take Mark since before we were engaged. Bucket list item, much? So when I heard they were going I was immediately jealous and verbalized my wishes to go as well. Of course my mom wished we could go along but not much more was said on the subject.
A week or so later my dad called to ask about my job situation (which is doing just fine, thank you very much). He also mentioned the Iowa trip and I, again, mentioned I wanted very badly to go along and had said so to Mom as well. I also included that when I told Mark about it he had said, "Well, why not?"
And my dad replied, "Well, I'm looking at tickets later today. But you gotta let me know if you guys can come, I gotta know..."
And I was a mess of "Ok! Ok, I'll talk to Mark! Yeah! Ok!"
Long story short, my parents are the best people evar and are paying for half of the plane fare. We just paid for school this week so we can barely afford ramen let alone roundtrip flights halfway across the country.
BUT WE'RE GOING!!
We'll fly out (I love flying!) thursday the 30th at 5:50 am (ohhh joy), touch down in Denver and then be in Sioux Falls by noon. Assuming everything goes as planned and the airports cooperate with us. Hopefully. We'll stay for the whole weekend and then fly back home Labor Day evening.
WE SO EXCITED.
Well...mostly, that is. Like I mentioned, Mark doesn't dwell on excitement. Plus he has no idea what to expect. And I'm practically bursting because I know it's gonna be so beautiful and fun and relaxing.
But! Also, I cannot wait, there's a band called "Arch Allies" and they tour around doing Styxx, Journey and REO tributes and HOLY SMOKES the lead singer dude sounds exactly like Steve Perry. I kid you not. But he dances around like Jack Black when he sings. It's kinda silly. And they're going to be in Iowa that weekend, playing at Arnold's Park!! So we get to go to that as well. And I love the old theme park. It's totally teeny and has one rickety wooden "roller coaster" but oh my gosh, the memories there.
The one souvenir I'm determined to come home with is an Okoboji sweater for my hubby (or jacket, I don't think he wears sweaters...). Every trip we ever took out there as a family, we always went down to the family-owned sweater store (21 years old and I still have no idea what that place is called. I just know it as the place we got all our sweaters). I need a new one anyway, the ones I still have are too small.
Okoboji is a fake university with a mascot and everything; the Phantoms. Woot Lake Okoboji pride. Baha.
Anytime I wore the sweater to school people would stare at my chest with quizzical eyebrows and say,
"Okobonomon? Oshkoshbigosh? Okoboji university? What is that? Where is it?" and I got to laugh jovially and reply,
"Oh, no. It doesn't exist."
That's usually where the conversations ended.
But anyway. We're gonna swim and walk and read in hammocks and I want to take him real fishing. I hope we do. I love fishing. AND, oh boy, my dear arizona friends, gird thy loins because this will not be easy to hear. I looked on the weather channel and the entire weekend we're there it's gonna be bright and sunny and hanging around right in the upper 70's. And the last two days it's supposed to be pouring rain. I die.
It's gonna be so cheap though, cuz we'll share the car my parents rent and we'll stay at my aunt's house and considering most of my dad's immediate family all lives around the shore of the lake we'll hardly ever eat out.

I seriously cannot express to you how excited I am for this. It's still 2 and a half weeks away but I'm dying to start packing. I CAN'T WAIT!!
Ack!

My face when we land.

A wild Creativity Spurt appears!

But seriously.
I like to do artsy/crafty things. I like to doodle and draw and push paint around with a brush. I like to bake yummy sugary things that dirty up every last pot and pan I own.
I also like to play sports.
But that doesn't mean I'm any good.
In fact, I probably like to do too many things and that's why I can't get much more than amateur at any of them. At least they're all fun.
Isn't fun the best thing to have?

So today, when I was hugging my husband goodbye as he left for work, the spam can we keep on the kitchen counter to hold little random tidbits of stuff (paper clips, safety pins, screws, razor blades, etc.) caught my eye and I realized how ugly and tacky it looked. Seated next to all the careful decorating and cleaning I've done to this place within good ole 2012 that spam box was sitting there with folded arms, taunting me.
And I had an idea.
Everyone has seen those pins on Pinterest where you pretty much cover every and any surface with cute material, or paper or the nearest picture of your children/husband/slobbering pet. If you haven't, I guess you are one of those rare humans left with an actual life beyond the four corners of a computer screen. Congratulations for stickin' it out so long. Kudos.
I'm not, though. Especially through this past summer. I'm too excited for school and work to start again. I know my enthusiasm isn't gonna last nearly long enough.
So I grabbed the spam can and ran to my craft room (that also doubles as my center for music with our electric keyboard and harp crammed in one corner, actually pretty much in the closet).
On a sidenote, Owl City's Sky Sailing radio on Pandora is pretty much the best channel for "channeling" (geddit?) creativity that I know of.
So here's how I revamped our little spam can into a more aesthetically pleasing counter-top junk holder.

I used a razor blade to scrape

off the Spam wrapper.

I left most of the sticky stuff though.

Figured it'll help keep what 

I added on.

I measured from the top of the can

to the bottom.

It was a little more than 3 in

so I cut a full 3 inch strip

off the scrapbook paper.

It was a little too big (because of the rim)

so I trimmed until I liked the fit.

I then used 

"Aleene's" Quick Dry tacky glue

and squeezed stripes along the

corners and one in the middle

of the sides.

As you can see, I put rubber bands

on the can to hold the paper

down while it dries.

True to name, the glue dried

really fast!

Voila!

I'm lucky and the line where the wraparound meets is pretty close to matching the pattern. Woot. As per usual, accidentally succeeding. I thought about going crazy and adding some flowers or buttons or ribbons but it was kinda difficult to get the colors to match so that fell through pretty quick. Hah.

Now I'm gonna go sift through my closet and see what I have that comes anywhere close to Disco/70's attire. Themed parties; I love 'em!!