4 Years

Last night I realized that The Mr and I have been together for a little over 4 years. I know that probably doesn't seem like a very long time considering that we're married but eh, what can I say? We knew a good thing when we had it.

Our 4 year anniversary (or the "night we made out like high schoolers and I high-fived him the next morning when I dropped him off at his house") was October 28th. I had my eye on him for a week or so and apparently he had his eye on me.

A $1 beer night and lots of magic, plus a little bit of cat vomit coaxed him into my room. "My roommate's cat sucks. She totally puked in my room and stained my carpet. Wanna see it?" I still can't believe I said that.

9 months later we bought a house together.

1 1/2 years later, we got engaged.

2 1/2 years later, we got hitched.

And here we are. Together for 4 years total, married for a year and a half. Holy fuck, where did the time go?

Blogosphere - I give you a random montage of bad pictures of The Mr and I during our first year (well 14 months) together.


A couple of days after our big makeout session. I thought I'd celebrate (on Halloween) by shotgunning a beer, Velma style. Classy.


3 Months later at my roommate's birthday party. Seriously - people knew that we had some serious magic. I'm shoving my ass in his face! Hello?


It's just a random night out the next month. I'm only posting this because I like that I'm making a face like Zach just farted.



Mia's birthday the following month. My oh my - we were quite affectionate just after a few months.


Us at the Dustin Diamond show. This picture was in my in-laws house for a very very very long time. How could they not love that face?


Not really sure what's going on. This is our first Fells Point Festival. Again - hot chemistry, right?


The first Halloween and incidentally, we were celebrating in our house. Officer Dangle (not the guy from Chips!) and some Indian princess (a nod to Cher's 'Half Breed').


The Mr's birthday.

Are you seeing a trend in these pictures? We're incapable of smiling nicely especially when we're together.

But who would have thought it would have led to...

Aw!

Seriously though - I have stumbled across a lot of old random pictures. I might have to make this a weekly post.

I Miss...

This week has been a big week for me. I decided to get crafty, vegan and The Mr started law school orientation. Yeah yeah... it's not that big, I get it but it has definitely shaken things up around my house.

Let's start with the craftiness. It's been a disastrous endeavour so far but there are some other craft projects that I've been working on that I may or may not share depending upon the outcome. I can only reveal my failures so much without feeling like a complete turd.

I miss the days when I was unaware of the wide world of craft fabulousness.

Now the veganism. I've stuck by the whole vegetarian thing for over a year now and haven't looked back. I don't miss meat and maintaining this lifestyle has been quite easy (although I can't speak for the awesome people in my life who make it a point to always have a vegetarian dish for me...). After reading Skinny Bitch a couple of months ago, I started to lay off the dairy as much as possible. I never adopted the full vegan diet though because it's tough!

I like to go out to eat and there aren't a lot of vegan options around Baltimore. I've pinpointed potentially 4 restaurants that claim to be vegan friendly but I love eating. I think I'd get sick of 4 restaurants. Regardless, I listed going vegan for one week as one of my 101 items because it's a pretty strict/intense diet and to prevent myself from feeling completely defeated - I thought I'd start easy.

One week. One eeeeasy week.

I miss chocolate. I miss candy. I miss desserts.

Some may argue that candy is vegan but others would say that it is not because most refined sugar is made with bone meal. Yarg! So I've been hanging onto this vegan diet for 6 days now to the best of my ability. I know it sounds like I'm cheating but it's tough when you pull up a recipe for a vegan buttercream frosting and it calls for confectioner's sugar. Isn't that sugar? Does that mean it is vegan? I'm confused.

So like I said, I've been going vegan to the best of my ability. Tomorrow night, The Mr and I are even hitting up one of the vegan friendly restaurants that I found in Baltimore.

Lastly - The Mr started law school this week. Well, he started orientation. He's been going to orientation directly after work until 9pm 3 days this week. I get that I see him all the time but man... it's been tough. The dogs have been moping, I fear for my life everytime I walk the dogs alone, I find it hard to get motivated to do anything other than sit on my ass in front of the TV and well... I miss him.

Gah! So lame. I miss my husband that I see every night and it's only been 3 days! Am I going to survive him in law school? His weekends will be dedicated to studying. I get him for one night. Fridays. And do you think I'll want to share him with anyone on that one night? Nope.

So sorry pals - The Mr is only available one night a week for the next 4 years and it belongs to me!

It didn't kill me

Success! I survived biking 40+ miles on Saturday morning despite having a "summer cold" (who knew getting a cold in the summer was deemed a 'summer cold') and not riding since 1996. I.am.awesome.

My ass hurts though. And let's not even talk about the pain The Mr feels. We're kind of wondering if he can produce sperm anymore. I may have inadvertently crossed off item 101 on my list without even intending to. Whoops.

Friday I had to leave work early because my sinuses were so congested that I couldn't even hear. I went home and took a ridiculously hot bath thinking I could sweat out my cold because I swear this has worked in the past. Maybe I made that up though. I skipped out on a happy hour because I didn't want to risk my 40 mile bike ride adventure. I had to finish it so I could strut into my office and yell "f you!" to my doubters.

We hit up Wal-fart, Dick's Sporting Goods and Target to try to find 2 tubings for my tires, a gel seat for my seat (because I knew my bony butt couldn't handle the entire ride), and a bike rack. Finding a bike rack was tough! We spent most of the evening doing that and getting the tubing in place (and I learned The Mr is pretty handy with a bike).

We woke up at 6am to start our journey. After a few hiccups (like trying to find the directions to the trail, having to pull over to readjust the bikes on the bike rack, taking a wrong turn) we finally arrived at the trail around 8am. And so started our journey...


The crappy bike rack.


My brave little Huffy!


My hot bony ass in a sweet pair of bike shorts. If you're ever considering riding a long distance, WEAR BIKE SHORTS. I will never judge a person again. That padding saved my life.

Riding a bike is pretty easy. Riding a bike that hasn't been ridden since 1996 is tricky. I felt like my back tire wasn't at optimum inflation. We tried pumping it up several times but it just felt wrong. So I had to suck up riding 40 miles on a partially inflated tire.

Also - while I thought I was going at a pretty decent speed, a ton of old people were zipping past me. I felt kind of like a turd but I kept on pedaling.

Mile 10. Halfway to the PA line. I was feeling great. The ride was fairly easy. At about mile 5 I gave up my gel seat to The Mr who was convinced his wiener was going to fall off. I realized at that point why women are the ones who have babies...

By about mile 15, I started to feel it. We had probably stopped about 10 times to either drink, snack, pump air into my tire or let The Mr's wang take a break from a hard seat jamming into his nuts. It had been about 2.5 hours at this point and the trail turned into one loooong incline.

I may have whimpered a little as we kept on biking but I knew the end was near.

PA, hooray!


For those that doubted me...

I have to say I was disappointed that there wasn't a big sign that said, "Welcome to Pennsylvania! You are officially a badass for biking all the way here!" We just came across the sign and went, "Oh? I guess we made past the MD/PA line..."

I was excited to bike back because I knew the first 5 miles was going to be downhill. I felt like we flew back.

We stopped off for a picture. Okay, not really - The Mr still needed his nut breaks but I wanted a picture.

When I hit the last 5 miles, I really started to feel the pain again. I wasn't pedaling very fast and I had a constant look of pain plastered to my face. I may have scared a few kids but I'm not sure.

But fuck yeah - I did it. The Mr declared that the next time I decide I want to bike 40 miles, we need to build up to it. What I thought would be a 3 hour bike ride was a 4.5 hour bike ride. Oy. I didn't take into consideration that we'd stop so much.

One of the positive things that came out of this experience is that The Mr and I are pretty stoked about biking. It's a great activity and it'll make me feel like less of a turd to bike to a location in Baltimore that is less than 2 miles from my house.

How was everyone else's weekend?

A New Tradition

So now you have read how we spent our first anniversary. Now let's talk about fun stuff. Presents! Yippee!

Given all of the weddings we're participating in and the new wedding approaching in Scotland (congrats Juli and Martin!! I hope that you don't pick the specific date I told you I couldn't do because of the wedding I'm in because I really really really want to attend your Scottish wedding in frickin' Scotland because hello? It's Scotland and that's the land of half of my people so just keep that in mind even though you really shouldn't plan a wedding around me... but it would be super cool if I could attend), we didn't want to spend a small fortune on gifts. Actually, I think the conversation went as follows:
The Mr: We're not doing gifts, right?
Me: [gasp] It's our first anniversary!
The Mr: um... okay, well we're not spending a lot, right?

I was struggling with what to get him. They say the traditional gift is paper which can be translated into a number of different things: tickets to an event, a book, and I don't know what else because I'm really not that creative. The Mr isn't really into music. He listens to it but isn't one of those people that MUST go see a specific artist live in person. He's not much of a reader either plus he's already stocking up on books for law school (so that he becomes a reader) and while the idea of contributing to that is practical, it just didn't seem like a fun gift.

I was stuck. Then I thought, "Hey! He likes soccer. Maybe I'll see if one of the Premier League teams is touring through the U.S. or something" but nope. This led a person to suggest getting him a jersey of his favorite team. Great idea! The problem? I didn't know his favorite team. Yeah yeah yeah... we're married and I should know these things but he isn't fanatical about ANY team. I was scrambling to get answers. I e-mailed Katie to call Ian for the scoop. I e-mailed Mark for the scoop and then called Travis for some more scoop. The general consensus was that The Mr didn't have a favorite team.

Great.

Ian suggested I get The Mr a new jersey for one of the countries he already had old jerseys for and Mark and Travis confirmed it. I will give Mark a little bit of credit though in that he did tell me what team The Mr did love at one time (Ajax... a dutch team). He also sent me the link to the nearest soccer store that carried tons of team jerseys.

As I was in the store, I realized that I didn't know what half of the jerseys were. I was able to find Germany and Italy with no problem but didn't understand the other country symbols... because I'm an idiot. So anywho - I got The Mr this Germany home jersey:

It was surprisingly expensive. Who knew sports jerseys were expensive? Oh - everyone but me knew that? Dammit.

I wasn't expecting much from him and in fact was thinking I'd end up with some random electronic entertainment thing (like he's done in the past) but he really surprised me.

First, we shared the top tier of our cake:


This was kind of sad for me. I didn't want to let it go! We only ate a piece, and it was delish but we weren't planning on eating the whole thing especially since he had made a new cake (I'll talk about that in a second). So he threw it away. This really upset me so I told him to do it when I wasn't looking. Who gets attached to cake? So lame.

On the table, he had made a cake (entirely from scratch... it was a 2 layer, chocolate chocolate-chip cake with a raspberry filling and a whipped white frosting. A.ma.zing.) Next to the cake (that he put in our cake dome! We never use it... so sadly, this brought some joy to me) were 3 wrapped gifts.

I opened one and it was a framed picture of us (and its a picture that I love). I laughed when he said it was for me to take to work because I have about 3 pictures of us already when he has NONE. Zero pictures. Is this a guy thing? Another guy at work getting married has no pictures of his fiance either. I thought she was made up until I met her.

The other gift was a pretty journal. And I was definitely confused because I'm a blogger... I type. I don't handwrite. The next gift was a box full of 12 bottles of wine. The same wine. Huh?

Then I read his card.

First - he is not known for being romantic AT ALL. But he surprises me with how thoughtful he is sometimes. Anywho, the card said something along the lines of how anniversaries are about traditions and that we should start a tradition of our own. So every year we'll make that specific cake and we'll drink a bottle of wine. We'll write down how the wine tastes and every year we can see how the taste of the wine has developed/changed like our relationship will continue to grow/change.

The wine thing wasn't completely out of left field for me because he had talked about doing this before. Buying the same brand of wine and seeing how it changes each year is apparently something wine-lovers do. Who knew? But the whole message and the thing about making it a tradition was really sweet.


Inside the journal he glued the recipe to the cake. We also decided to add another element to the journal in that we'd write down what we did to celebrate and the highlights of that year. Yeah yeah, puke gag gah-ross...

So he really took the time to think out a fantastic and thoughtful gift... and I got him a fucking soccer jersey.

Happy Anniversary, love!

Project Beard - The End

I haven't really said much about Project Beard since it started last November. What else was there to write? The Mr grew a beard. His family hated it for awhile but I loved it and they eventually came around.

My mom went through phases of liking it and then not remembering he ever had it and then hating it. This is not unlike her to do so.

With the warm weather coming, The Mr decided that he didn't want to spend the summer sweating profusely from the excess hair on his face and he wanted to ensure a nice even tan. I'm married to a metrosexual.

Without further ado, I give you the transformation of Project Beard because really - who can shave off a beard and NOT have some fun with it?

The beard as of Friday, April 18th around 9pm.

It wasn't terribly bushy or anything. And this might actually be a slight false representation of it when it was at it's peak form. He's been trimming it down as the weather has continually gotten warmer. But this was the beard that I loved.

So soft, so manly, so Jake Gyllenhaal. But all good things must come to an end, I guess. And since I'll never understand how having that much hair on your face can make you sweat I should throw him a bone or something and let it go.

But seriously - look at it. Isn't it beautiful? Magnificent, even?

So precious.

He's starting to trim it down even more for optimal shaving. Again something I don't really get. Why can't you just shave it? This seems like such a hassle.


The first stop of the farewell tour was to muttenchop and horseshoe 'stache town.




Apparently the combination of kickball and the muttenchops was too much in terms of the heat. The muttenchops had to go for the BBQ.



And now an unnecessary but super cute picture of Petie. He turns 11 tomorrow.


Once the BBQ wrapped up, we headed over to the corner bar. The Mr decided he couldn't enter the bar with the mustache.

We officially said goodbye to Project Beard but not without a quick stop in Magnum PI-ville (also known as Child Predator territory):


... and then to Charlie Chaplin town (I don't really want to call this Hitler):


Goodbye Project Beard! It was fun while it lasted.


I'm still trying to get used to this child-like face. Seriously - I almost carded him to ensure that I really did marry someone born in 1980 and not in 1995.

The Hostess with the Mostess

And I'm not talking about the great Hostess Blog that makes me want to buy oodles of unnecessary items and host swanky dinner parties. I'm talking about moi.

Last year, I declared that I wanted to start hosting small little dinner parties where we'd invite another couple over for a fancy schmancy dinner (we only have 4 dining room chairs... hence the small dinner party). We did this about 4 times and I felt we did a pretty decent job. When the wedding month hit and all the time thereafter with the home renovations, we sort of dropped the ball. And then when it was time to pick it back up, The Mr went on a stupid diet. No more dinner parties.

Anywho - it shouldn't come as a shock to anyone that I hate hosting stuff. This mostly has to do with my insane inability to allow people to mess up my house. I wouldn't even claim that our house is supremely clean and spotless, but it's clean enough and I don't want people's grubby little hands leaving water rings on my tables, spilling dips all over my counters and dribbling crumbs all over my couch.

I love the idea of hosting parties. I love it. I mean, the Hostess Blog is in my blogroll for Christ's sake. I watch Martha fucking Stewart. I covet dinnerware and serving dishes. It's a sickness.

I hate the stress of having a lot of people in my house. It destroys me. I can't relax and have a good time because I'm constantly picking up after people. Thankfully The Mr. is really good about keeping things fairly neat but if you happen to be one of the people who stick around late, you'll catch me washing dishes and scrubbing tables because I can't sleep knowing my house is in disarray.

So, this weekend the Mr really wanted to host a BBQ. I had ordered this Smoker Grill through my company's online catalog (their gift for working here for 5 years). There wasn't much to choose from and The Mr promised we could smoke some vegetables... because you know, that's such a common way to prepare veggies. Really - how did he convince me to get this thing?

I guess this prompted him to want to host a BBQ after our kickball game. Well, the smoker grill arrived damaged so nothing got smoked. And I spent a good portion of the evening staring at my bowls of guacamole internally screaming, "Why are people scooping up the guac so that it spills over the side like that?!" completely convinced that people were testing my sanity.

I also tried to play it cool when I saw that someone was leaving an entire tray of deviled eggs behind in my fridge. Seriously - take your deviled eggs home!

All in all, I guess it was a success. Everyone said they had fun. I ate too much, drank too much and stressed too much but the highlight of the entire evening was hitting up the bar on the corner of my street. We've lived in our house for almost 3 years and have never stepped foot into Tracey's House of Darts. It.was.awesome. I love old school Baltimorians. I hung out with a man named Bernie who had lived in Baltimore for a very very long time and apparently lost over 150 lbs while overcoming blindness. Seriously.

My favorite line of the night? The bartender said her favorite drink is a Cherry Bomb.
Bartender: I always order cherry bombs when I go out.
Bernie: You can drink those as much as you want but it ain't growing back, honey!

I love Baltimore!

Unsolicited Negativity

Before I start my bitch fest, I was reading Perez Hilton this morning because I love to pollute my brain with non-work related crap and came across a cover of one of my favorite songs. Feist and the Constantines did a cover of Dolly Parton and Kenny Roger's Islands in the Stream. Check it out! Is it lame to pee my pants in delight over this? I generally hate covers of songs I love but I thought this was great.

I'm also digging The Watson Twins cover of The Cure's Just Like Heaven. I'm really protective about The Cure and was horrified when 311 came out with Love Song... and people began affiliating that song with them! It was even used in a *gasp* wedding as a first dance song!

Aaaaanywho...

I'm getting really irritated with people and their comments about The Mr. going to law school. My whole philosophy is that even if you don't necessarily think that what someone is doing is great, unless its causing harm to them or loved ones... just say congrats and keep your yapper shut.

While the majority of folks have said congrats or asked genuine questions about the school or his plans in school - there have been a few comments that have just rubbed me the wrong way. Here are some of my favorites:

Are you sure you can handle it?
Really? That's the first thing you're going to say? Like all of a sudden that question is going to make him really think about law school for the first time and declare, "crap - I didn't think of that! Maybe I can't handle it! Oh no!"

I hope you're ready to study/read.
You mean you have to study in law school? What?! I thought law schools just accepted any asshole that applied and that I could just skate by on my personality. Crap. Read you say? I am screwed.

Is it really worth the payoff?
He's going to be a fucking lawyer. I'm pretty sure his income bracket will increase (unless he decides to do good in the world... and I'm pretty sure he's not).

I'm now starting to understand why people get so offended when I ask if their pregnancy was intended or an accident. Sheesh.

Vacation, all I ever wanted...

It's official. The Mr is going to Law School in the Fall. What does this mean? We won't have social lives for the next few years. His schedule is going to be much worse than mine but still, it's going to be rough. He starts in the beginning of August and will have classes 4 nights a week.

I guess this means I can watch all the wedding, makeover, and Real Housewives shows I want to! I'm going to rule the DVR once again.

While it probably won't be so bad when we're both in school, I think I'm going to feel it once I'm done (I'll finish 2.5 years before he will).

School is going to put a little wrench in all of our vacation hopes. I have a list of places I'm dying to see before we're chained to kids but I don't know if it'll happen now. Apparently the dollar is performing very weakly. Who knew? There goes Europe. Anywho - we planned a small vacation in July to the Outer Banks in North Carolina (where maybe, just maybe, I can snag one of those super super cool OBX stickers that will take up the entire back window of my car). The idea was that we'd try to do something in the winter but with the school thing...

We just booked a trip to Cabo, Mexico. Mexico wasn't at the top of my list of places to see but I'm pretty excited. Maybe I'll even run into one of the kids from Laguna Beach! Oh wait - they're older now, right? I guess they don't "spring break" at Cabo anymore. And speaking of spring break, I guess I'll miss out on that fun too since we're giong in May. No Girls Gone Wild? No LC? Dammit, now I don't know if I want to go.

So, right after my last final for the Spring semester - we're jetting off to Mexico. Yippeee! Who cares if we can't really afford it right now. That's what credit cards are for! I hope the people whose weddings we're in this year aren't expecting gifts from us...

(I'm kidding... sort of)

What is Love?

Love is spending your Saturday morning (8-1pm) with your husband at a law school preview day that includes: a tour (with the worst tour guide ever), an open discussion with the Dean of the school where people spent a large amount of time wanting to know "statistics", an open discussion with a panel of students ranging from different backgrounds and a MOCK class. I sat through an hour of Constitutional Law.

That's love.

We're Not Pros!

First - I'd like to say that I survived my presentation. I received a few kudos for a job well done but if you ask me, it was awful.

I was sweating profusely.

I was rambling.

I was making bad jokes.

And I managed to eat up 30 of our 40 minutes leaving my partner to scramble to fit in his material quickly.

But I survived!

Now onto the weekend. I'm a little peeved with The Mr. right now. As I've mentioned previously - we're photo enthusiasts. I would never claim to be good or anywhere near a professional level (like Maria and Kelly!). We love taking pictures and always offer to do so for our friends.

Why? Because they're our friends. Its a win-win situation. We're hanging out with our pals, we're getting practice with our cameras and photo editing software, our friends are getting free pictures and ITS FOR FUN.

So The Mr. offered up our "services" to a co-worker of his who recently just had a baby. And she's been hounding us about when we're going to do it because they have to send out announcements and they really want the pictures. She even asked to see a portfolio! Ack! I'm freaking out because:

(1) We've never taken pictures of babies.
(2) We don't even play with babies.
(3) This isn't actually for fun...
(4) This is a NICE thing we're doing and yet we're getting all sorts of pressure from her about doing it.
(5) When The Mr. asked her what she was looking for in terms of pictures, she sent a link to Anne Geddes!

I am SO not thrilled about this.

Look in the Fridge...

I forgot to mention that The Mr. totally pulled another romance resolution last night! After having an overall crappy feeling day and then having to go to my first class of the Spring semester...

He surprised me by picking up my all-time favorite sub from my favorite Italian deli last night.
THE CALABRESE - Sharp provolone, artichoke hearts, sweet peppers, olives, tomato, cucumber & onions.

Its made with love and magic.

The Mr. is on some crazy diet/workout regimen and its put a damper on our Saturday afternoon outings to this deli so that I can smother myself in that magical sub. Oh - how I missed it so.

Being the good wife that I am, I try to keep crappy food out of the house since I know he's dying for some subs, pizza, magically delicious food, candy... etc. But I'm slowly dying inside.

Although - its forced me to eat a little better. I don't eat cereal for dinner as much as I used to and that's a good thing, I guess.

The Ex Files

I was chatting (well... e-mailing but for me its almost the same as chatting) with my old college roommate, Angie, yesterday. Angie, like some other girls I know, has done something I totally admire in that she wanted to make a change and move to a city she's always dreamed of living in (Chicago) and she did it. She quit her job, found a new one, packed her shit and moved. I wish I had her lady balls. But that's not the point of this post.

She mentioned that she rejoined MySpace as a method to stay in better touch with people. You know - I had made that claim once too but I really just used it as a tool to cyberspy on people from my past (Holy crap! She has a baby?! Wow - did you see how fat they got?) and set my profile to private hoping to not really reconnect with many people.

So she told me that her ex's brother (who I used to have a wee bit of a crush on) just had a baby. Well, his wife just had a baby. She then went onto mention that she found another guy that was in that circle of friends (I loved this guy but not in that way) and then...

She mentioned an ex. She said, "It looks like he got married" and that's not entirely shocking because we dated over 7 years ago and he's 33 now but it was weird. I was hit with a feeling of... disappointment.

Now let me explain.

I don't ever wish to get back together with anyone I've ever dated (hi honey! I love you and am happy that I married you!) but I like to think that I've left a bloody mess of broken hearts along the way to meeting The Mr. and that perhaps each of my fellas are still nursing their wounds. They're still comparing every new girl they meet to me because I am obviously their standard for awesomeness. So when I hear they've gotten married and such, I can't help but feel a little disappointed.

I know it's sick.

My high school boyfriend contacted me about 2 months ago. It was totally random and awkward. Even MORE awkward was him suggesting that we (me, The Mr, him and his gf) all get together for dinner to reminisce about old times. Now - reminiscing about old times would require all 4 of us to partake but it only 2 of us could really do so... and that would just be weird. We used to have sex!

I mean - there's a girl that comes around every so often that I know The Mr. hooked up with and I am not threatened in the least but I am not going to lie... everytime I see her I think, "I can't believe you guys hooked up." and then have a moment of picturing it. I know - it's sick!

Okay, and now I don't really know where I was going with this post. So - am I crazy? Or do you ever have these moments (where you're either disappointed to hear that an ex has gotten married OR your can't help but picture you current beau with a past lover)?

Bad Customer Service

Because I praised the great customer service I was recently the happy recipient of (although perhaps I shouldn't be singing their praises SO soon since I just mailed my damaged purse on Saturday...) but now I feel that I must discuss some bad customer service.

Actually - The Mr was the one who had to deal with the bad customer service and I was horrified to hear that it was one of my favorite stores that provided it! Urban Outfitters is one of my favorite online stores. They've got such a great mix of quirky and functional stuff that I can't resist. I think I shop from this site more than any other.

I know its a real store and I love the one in Georgetown - its just too damn far away. I'm not crazy about going to the one that just opened up in the Baltimore Inner Harbor. Its full of Emo teens that think they're too cool for school and they make me want to scream I've been shopping with this company for over 10 years! Step off! God I'm old.

Anywho - The Mr mentioned that he had purchased a Christmas gift for me on December 15th, paid for 2-day priority and it never made it. He was freaking out a bit and it seems that the package was lost. But HE had to do the searching to find this out and he was none too pleased. He purchased me this fantastic Holga camera:


He called right before Christmas and they said they'd call back within 10 days... and they didn't. He called them AGAIN and they finally said they'd send another. When he asked if he'd be refunded the 2-day shipping he paid for the customer rep responded, "But we're sending this to you 2-day priority...?" to which he responded, "Yeah but I paid for it on December 15th. Its now January 11th."

The customer rep said she'd put in a claim with another dept. He is furious. What sucks is that he called me Friday to tell me that I could no longer shop there right after I placed an online order. Oops.

Relationship Resolutions

Along with my resolutions (or "goals") for 2008, I told The Mr that I've assigned him some Relationship objectives for the new year. Actually - there's only 1:

Be more romantic.

I never thought I'd ever say that but I'm finding myself craving romance. Before you all gag and choke on your vomit, I think my definition of romance is a little different than everyone elses. I don't want poems, hand-holding or any other snuggle-bunny type of affection... I guess I just want him to be more thoughtful.

For the last few months (after our home renovations), I've seen a pattern with us. We sit on the couch and watch TV. Whoo! Actually, now that we have the Wii... perhaps there are some nights of playing Guitar Hero sprinkled in there.



I'm just looking to break this pattern (well... at least until I've mastered Guitar Hero).

So, The Mr took me seriously! Be brought home flower yesterday (my favorite!) for no reason. And the "no reason" reason is the best reason of all. Aww... although that didn't stop us from spending the evening sitting on the couch. Actually - I was uploading more music to my iPod but still. We're working on it.

Isn't He Adorable?

The Mr climbed into bed last night and whispered, "I edited some photos and e-mailed them to you."

And this is what I saw this morning:


And check out his beard! I'd say he's the owner of a full grown beard at this point and I'm quite sad that he's going to shave it off at the end of the month.

Brain...is melting...

I have spent the majority of the day dedicated to my project and have hit a dead end. I finally met with my no-good teammates and we haven't really gone anywhere... unless going in circles counts. We started off with a problem and a possible solution, but through discussion we realized that our solution wouldn't work and that perhaps it wasn't even the right path. Ugh! I don't know what to do. Why did I decide to go back to school??

On a completely unrelated note - pretty soon, I will be the proud owner of this baby:



The LG Voyager.

I've been on the market for a new cell phone for awhile and decided that it was time to get fancy. Actually - after trying to blog on vacation, I realized that it would be cool to have a phone that could access the web (and an added bonus is that this has a GPS tracker in it!). While it was released on Friday, every Verizon location I went to did not have this in stock so I put one on hold. I can't wait! The Mr. reminded me that if I get this phone, I will have to carry a purse when I go out. This won't easily fit into my pocket and I think The Mr. is tired of carrying my things when we go out.

Alright... now back to work. Ugh.

So...

Its been 3 days since I found out I had to have most of my project completed by Wednesday and I still really haven't done much for it. And I am still freaking out. FREAKING OUT. I know the high-level stuff but I have no idea how I'm going to execute this project technically. The "programmer" of the group sucks ass and has not been responsive to all e-mail communication. The other guy, who is also not technical, has been a little responsive but we're both scratching out heads.

I've googled everything I can on creating a prediction model as it relates to classification and data mining in Excel and found a few notes here and there but I AM NOT A PROGRAMMER! Yarg!

The good news is that I've completed my other project so I can scratch that off my list. And I guess this sort of last minute stress is what makes me feel young again. Oh the good old days when I was in my early twenties waiting until the last minute to write 30 page papers. Oh yes... what fun.

Anywho - I thought I'd post some pics from Thanksgiving, just because.

The Tofurkey:

Yeah yeah... I know it looks a little weird but I thought it was very good. The box had a recipe to prepare it that called for an olive oil/soy sauce glaze and some vegetables. Very tasty.

My version of Martha Stewart's Roasted Vegetables:

I thoroughly enjoyed this one as well but The Mr. didn't really like it. My mom did though.

The end of the night...

Check out that beard! Project Beard is looking good. My mom even gave it a thumbs up! My dad laughed and shook his head.

Oh and we actually ended the night watching Hairspray, the new one that took a classic and shit all over it. If you hated the original movie or haven't seen it - maybe you'll like this version. If you love the original, like me, you'll hate this and you'll especially hate John Travolta's role (and if you live in Baltimore, you'll REALLY be offended by his awful 'Baltimore' accent).

Alright, back to work!

Keeping it Classy

So Rob, the groom of the wedding I just went to in Puerto Rico, forwarded me the BAJILLION pictures from his wedding photographer, Noel Del Pilar. Seriously, there were 925 frickin' pictures.

I can't really judge. I think our wedding photographer handed us several discs with a ton of photos. But seriously - there was a lot. I wonder how hard it is for a photographer to weed through photos. I feel like I would definitely want to remove all photos where I felt the person didn't look very flattering but I guess you never know what someone wants. I tend to focus on things rather than people anyways.

So, I was flipping through the photos online wondering if I made it into any of the shots. You know - because its all about me sometimes. And of course, in true Twink fashion, I found them. And I have to say, I am a classy bitch.

This is me and Maria getting ready for a fantastic photo.


Oooh yeah. Bet you didn't see that coming? Two classy ladies bumping chests. Maria got a lot more air than I did but I was afraid of knocking her over. I'm twice her size.


But let's not forget about the running man! Where was the sprinkler?


I sent all of the photos to The Mr. who noted that he wasn't really in any of them but then I found this. It was the last photo in the album and I'm pretty sure its him saying, "Man - we need a better flash." because that's all he really said about the photos.


So since I look like a turd in these, I'm going to point you in Maria's direction. Hands down, this is one of the best photos I have ever seen of myself. Look at my skin! My teeth! My raising of the roof (seriously - what was I doing?). Just click the link to see... and then if you're looking for a photographer, HIRE HER.

Junior High?!

Should I be offended?

And onto an unrelated note - isn't he just the cutest?


Its the beard, I tell ya.

That beard is getting him lots of positive attention. And I think The Mr. totally digs it. He went from saying that he was shaving it off after 2 weeks to saying he'd shave it in a month. Last night, however, he said he'd keep it all winter. Ha! So predictable.

And how about these cutie pies?
Emily


Petie


Cutest dogs ever! Admit it. They're cute.

Photo Fun

First, here's a quick update on Project Beard. Its coming in nicely, no?


Now onto Sunday's funday. Today, we bought a bajillion groceries for Thanksgiving. And we also bought some cleaning supplies for our cleaning lady because we're not quite sure how this works. Does she bring her own? I know she needed to use OUR vacuum (which forced us to fix it). I'm not accustomed to this lifestyle where I pay someone to clean my house. How does this work?

We also had the opportunity to take some fun pics for Ian & Katie for their Save-the-Date since Katie's friend decided to be a turd and not let them use some photos she took of them 2 years ago unless Katie put a LOGO over top of their save-the-date. DOUCHEBAG! And wow - what a sentence, huh? I should have kept it going.

Due to timing of things, we didn't get a chance to start snapping away until about 3:30pm and for those of you from the area (or I guess that doesn't really matter?), it gets dark way early now. Stupid winter. So we tried to make the most of the light we had and Ian & Katie tried really hard to pretend they weren't cold. The Mr and I had to take turns shooting because our hands were going numb.

I'll post pics after I send the photos to Katie & Ian. I figured they'd want to take a look first but I will post one of my favorites from the shoot:


We took photos around the Visionary Art Museum because of the uber cute "LOVE" sign on the front, the super cool glass tiling on the side of the building and the eerie sculpture garden. Seriously - if you're into taking photos or just want photos taken in Baltimore, we recommend you head over to the Visionary Art Museum.

I hope everyone had a great weekend. My blood sugar needs to drop a little after last night's dessert party and today's day of hoarding junk. I'm surprised I didn't have any sort of seizure. Or that my teeth haven't fallen out. But it probably explains why I'm so tired right now. I think I'm crashing.