Bless Your Heart

What a surprise! I checked my email today and found that Shaquita Vaughn (the Ebay Tupperware lady) has refunded me the $51.20 I paid her in January for a birthday present for Sara that never was delivered. Many, many emails followed, along with requests for product or refund to no avail. Apparently people doing Google searches found my blog and she found out about it. Now I’m refunded. Yay for the power of blogging!

Those are the names of the colors we’ve been painting this week. Still a bit more to do, but we’ve got one more day until we go back to work. Pictures will come, but we’re working on 3 bathrooms, 2 bedrooms, and a hallway all at once, so I want to show the true before and afters.

Some may know of my dislike of most chain restaurants. Well this week while we’ve been off work, our goal was to eat at a different restaurant each day for brunch or a late lunch. So far we’ve had Mexican at El Maguey, seafood at Captain Steve’s (where the hostess looked like she could have been Tammy Faye’s long lost sister), lunch at Harry and Jean’s, and brunch (with incredible eggs benedict) at Dearstyne’s. For the sake of convenience on Saturday we did end up at a chain- Olive Garden. But for the record they have those awesome breadsticks and zuppa Toscana. Then today, for the sake of pancakes, we ate at IHOP. Tomorrow we’re going on a mini trip for lunch at Shealy’s bar-b-que. We figured why not since we’re in my rental while my car’s in the shop. Oh yeah, the estimate came in at just under $2000. They tried to put me in a Neon. A Neon! I can’t fit stuff in there. We bought a 2×4 at Home Depot today that barely fit in the rental. I told the guy at the car rental place he needed to upgrade me. After a little charm I drove away in a 2004 Jeep Grand Cherokee 4×4! Go me! It’s so much fun to drive something different for a while. I may not want to give it up when my car’s ready!

We’re knee deep in paint. We got kind of a late start, what with movies to see and brunches to eat, but we’re making progress today.

If you look really close at that picture of Ike below, you can see those crazy teeth. His baby teeth didn’t fall out, so his big boy teeth grew in behind them. The vet had to pull a lot of them, but he still has double canines. Pug shark!!

Our St. Patrick’s Day photo shoot got a little out of hand….



They look so vicious, yet they really do love each other.

I feel sorry for villains’ fish. Sure, they start out great, in a fabulous tank in the bad guy’s lair (never a charming bungalow, always a lair). But you know it’s just a matter of time before the good guys storm the place, shoot everything up (including the aquarium), and those poor fish are left flopping on the cold, tile floor.

Anyway, Ike’s doing great! He made it through just fine and you’d never know he had such a medically traumatic day yesterday. The vet had to pull a bunch of baby teeth as well as neuter him. Poor guy! But he’s zipping around here this morning all light on his feet (well, he is a little lighter now! heh).

Today is day 1 of spring vacation. Jon and I should be in Vegas right now, but I got sick this winter and we couldn’t afford to go. I canceled our reservations and we decided to devote our week off to home improvements. My list is sooo long. We have to get the house ready. In just a month’s time we’ll be having visitors from the north and I don’t think they want to sleep in a guest room decorated with remnants of the old homeowner’s kid’s room decor. So we’ll be doing lots and lots of painting, installing, organizing, rearranging, unpacking (yes, still, hush), and, oh yeah, more painting. We’re going to ease into it today though. We’re off to lunch and to catch Starsky and Hutch. Then it’s home improvement time! I can’t wait to post all the pics. Be prepared to be amazed!

Ike’s going under the knife as we speak. My poor baby! It breaks my heart to think of him hurting, but neutering him is the right thing to do. Plus, it’s coming at a good time. He’s been marking all over the house lately. I’m tired of hearing Jon muttering “We know you live here Ike!”.

Those are the traditional and contemporary things you’re supposed to give for the 3rd anniversary. We usually follow those as closely as we can, but this year we went with new house and pugs. I didn’t find those on the list anywhere, but they sure do make us happy.

Three things I miss (less and less all the time) about being single:

1. Dating

2. The excitement of the firsts…first kiss, first date, first everything.

3. Newness. The new boyfriend. Doing and going and seeing all new things together.

Three things I love about being married:

1. No more dating! Whew, instead I get to come home every day to a wonderful man. I don’t have to worry about “should I get these concert tickets now? Will we be together in 6 months?”. It’s so awesome and comforting and overwhelming sometimes to know that this man chose me to be with forever.

2. Tradition: Looking back at what we did last anniversary, or the wedding day, or remember our first apartment, and did you ever think we’d end up here, and remember our first everything. Knowing that things become even more special as time goes on and tradition grows.

3. Future: Going, seeing, doing, all new things together. I feel more brave married. I know I can do anything and he’ll be right there with me. Ready to catch me if I fall (which is a lot), or ready to jump in the car at a moments notice to pick me up at another crash site. Knowing he’ll listen patiently to my wacky ideas, keep my head on straight, then hold my hand as we jump into the future.

Sometimes it’s still overwhelming, the love I have for that boy. You know, that feeling you get inside like your heart will explode and that tingle in my hands and I have to grit my teeth to keep from squeezing him to death or biting his face off cause I’d just love to rip him open and climb inside because I can’t get close enough. No wonder he’s a little scared of me ;)

In honor of our 3 year wedding anniversary tomorrow….

Gather round the fire kids, I’ve got another engagement story for you. I started this blog after Jon and I had been married 5 months, so all of the pre-wedding shenanigans have yet to be recorded. I started with the “Ass Hands” story a couple of weeks ago. This took place one week before the wedding. They say every wedding has some sort of catastrophe. This was my little pre-wedding tragedy. I’ll write about the big one later.

Jon and I were living in an apartment with our kitties Nimbus and DaBrie. They knew something was going on with all the prep work and running around we were doing. DaBrie was acting up a bit because of it. Here she is at Christmas this year, like she didn’t almost ruin my big day.

So it’s a week before the wedding. I’m folding clothes in the bedroom. I had just packed my little bag with my wedding shoes and underthings so they’d be ready for my final fitting the next day. My bag was beside the dresser on the floor. Jon comes in and is helping me fold clothes. The kitties follow him in. We notice DaBrie climbing in my wedding bag and settling in for a nap. Awww, so cute. Except we quickly realized she wasn’t napping- she was peeing! On my wedding shoes, my wedding bra, my wedding underthings, my wedding everything. A mere 12 hours before my final fitting!

Jon chases her out of the room screaming. I’m freaking out. FREAKING OUT. All the brides out there know just how hard it is to find all of the things you need for the wedding in just the right colors etc. The long line bra that no one carries but the bridal store so they can get away with charging you an arm and a leg. And my shoes. My shoes were perfect. Perfect. Ivory satin Kenneth Cole mary janes with a stacked heel and by all miracles they matched my dress perfectly and were comfortable. And after months of searching, I had found them on a clearance rack for $15! And as all brides know, you have to be wearing the same shoes and underthings you’ll be wearing at the wedding for your final fitting, or the alterations won’t come out right.

I grabbed the bag and ran to the washing machine. I dumped the entire contents into the machine, crying hysterically the whole time. Jon comes up after skinning DaBrie alive (I’m secretly hoping) and sees that I’ve just dumped my nasty, cat pee soaked shoes into the washer followed by a ton of detergent. He looks at me and says “Honey, I know you’re upset, but I really don’t think high heeled dress shoes are meant to be washed in a regular washing machine.” I looked at him with fire shooting out of my eyes and said “I. Don’t. Care. I am washing these shoes and I am wearing these shoes in the morning.”

So I did, I washed them. And I let them dry on the kitchen counter. And apparently my angels were working overtime that day because they turned out just fine. Perfect. So I wrote all the names of my single girlfriends on the soles, tucked a sixpence in one, and slipped them on. You’d never know some pissed off cat had urinated all over them a week before when I wore them down the aisle.

Saturday after work I took Kea to visit with Sara and Jacob. We watched The Missing and I’m still having a hard time getting one scene out of my head. Very disturbing.

Sunday Jon and I went to brunch with my mom and Hale then saw 50 First Dates. So cute. Way sweeter than I thought it would be (with Adam Sandler and all). Then Jon and I ran some errands, came home and played with the pugs, worked around the house a bit, then watched the Oscars. Well, I watched until about 10:30 then had to go to sleep. I woke up this morning and found out Jon stayed up through the whole thing. What a trooper- heh. I was glad to see Charlize Theron won for Monster (she was just incredible in that). I need to see Wale Rider now. Everyone at the Oscars kept gushing over Keisha Castle Hughes.

Our neighborhood looks like a bombed out war zone with abandoned cars all over the place. Jon’s car is still stuck in a ditch.

I’m at work. The drive in wasn’t so bad. I wanted to come in yesterday some, but I was so achey from the wreck and Jon was nervous about me driving around. I’m having a hard time bending (back, neck, stomach muscles). It’s feeling better today though.

I wonder if it’s just me, or do other people notice this…it seems like when I was younger a singer would have 3-4 big songs a year. They would stay popular for a good while (each song). Now it seems like as soon as I hear about one song, it’s over and there’s a new one out. And it seems like rap artists especially are very here today gone tomorrow now. Maybe I’m just not as in touch as I thought with what’s hip and cool. Oh no, I’m old! I’m one of those people saying things like “Kids theses days” and “You call that music, that’s just noise!”.