looking around

walked into acura for car service this morning, and fox news is on. not a shock when you stereotype their clientele. but I put my bag down, and, looking in, realized that I am a birkenstock-wearing, mac-using, newsweek-reading liberal. of course I knew these things, but I had to laugh. makes me miss ann arbor.

found

I found this in my knitting bag...

chris, kamille, ginny, and lisa, I'm looking at you. they're a size 8, I'm guessing to be 32" long. anyone want to claim them? (and no, you can't just take them because you happen to need 8s...)

uh, yeah...

from the pizza hut commercial:
"now you can order america's favorite pizza from your iphone!"

... I thought using a phone to get your food was the whole concept behind delivery...

fly

we had a fly enter our house a few days ago, and he's a bit too stealthy for me to get, so he keeps flying around. here's the odd part though... he's very social. no matter what room I walk into, a few minutes later, he's flying around it. it has nothing to do with where the light is coming in or if there's food somewhere.
I keep talking to him (okay, yelling), asking him to leave me alone. I would be much more tolerant if he would just stop bothering me, but he must be lonely, because he doesn't care. unfortunately, I think henry believes me to be nuts, and acts all sad when I yell; his vision is so bad, he probably isn't even aware of the fly's presence.

last week we saw some people that used to be our friends. I have been trying to build up the courage to speak to one of them to try to fix things between us, and now I have finally asked to meet up, though the nerves are about 100 times worse now.

here's hoping for the best.

"kids say the darndest things..."

(the scene: ryan and I sitting on a park bench outside of graeters, sharing a cup of peanut butter chip. little girl walks by with (presumably) sister, and grandmother.)

little girl: gramma, is they having a baby?


**insert emily breakdown here. and yes, she used "is they".

alarm clocks

we need a new alarm clock. I bought one for ryan for his birthday 2 years ago that had these necessary features:
- the ability to set it for weekdays only
- nap timer
it also has a very nice sound, switching on softly and getting progressively louder.

it is however missing nice large numbers, which is bad for my squinty eyes. I have dealt for two years with this however. the part I can no longer live with, unfortunately, is the lovely blue display. whoever decided that alarm clocks should have any color other than red led lights??? I always knew green was bad, but blue is even worse, it just looks much nicer in the daytime. red is the only color that doesn't completely light up the room, despite the dimmer switch (which apparently had been turned off in the move, so there is a slight bit of hope for this clock yet, but it was bright in the apartment too, so probably not really).

the problem? no one makes such a clock. I couldn't even get it if I wanted to pay $100 for more features that I would never use. I am kicking myself because last year brookstone modified the clock I bought to have red led, but I had just bought a clock and didn't want to buy another. now, they are no longer available.
I found a clock that has all my features but the nap. I found a clock that had all my features but the red led (choosing to backlight the time instead... how is THAT any better?).
I checked ebay. no luck- those people with my clock in red are probably going to bequeath them to their grandchildren.

kitchen remodel

is currently under way. =)

that is all.

general update

we are officially moved out of the apartment and into the house, although we are still surrounded by boxes. my kitchen should undergo construction mid next week, and I can't wait!

chris took me to the north dayton garden center last week and I bought some petunias to put in my window boxes (how domestic of me!) two of the window boxes seem to be succeeding, but the last just looks pathetic. I thought that the plants in it were deader than dead, but yesterday I noticed some little green buds at the ends, so I still have hope!
then ryan and I did a bunch of, well, "pruning" I suppose over the 3 day weekend, and-- for the most part-- the plants look better. I have been fighting an ongoing battle with something that may or may not be thistle; whatever it is, it is annoying and everywhere.

things settled down enough that I put my taylored socks up for some test knitting, which is quite exciting! it seems so unreal that someone I've never met might walk past me on the street some day wearing my socks! (okay, so this is unlikely, because I am betting that even grumperina doesn't see jaywalkers on the street)

moving

I'm great at packing things into various spaces, a trait I get from my mom's entire side of the family (which my sister definitively did NOT inherit). unfortunately, I have a hard time deciding what should go into those spaces. it's a challenge to not make boxes too heavy, or waste too much space or put breakable things in a spot where something heavy might shift onto them.
I know everyone hates moving, but I tend to find myself sitting in the midst of all of my belongings not knowing exactly where to start because I never know what I won't need before I unpack, and then I start thinking about the unpacking process, and I just get completely overwhelmed.

ongoing

so many things are going on... we have the wedding, of course, but beyond that. [that is the only mention of that word in this post, I promise!]
- I have ten days left at work, which is quite a relief, but also something I will greatly miss. my coworkers are wonderful people, and it is always nice to have a couple people who you can speak to solely in sarcasm and have them (a) not take offense- EVER, (b) give it right back.
- I am trying not to jinx anything, so this will get its own post when we know for sure, but we most likely have the house. it will be quite a change, moving to the suburbs. I always told kara that we felt like we were "revitalizing" dayton. we have been able to walk to our very favorite restaurants, festivals (including celtic festival), bars, and more. yes, it is dayton, home of Just About Nothing, and yet there is always something going on down here should we decide to partake. the house is set back into a quiet little neighborhood that means we will have to drive to go anywhere. and the Birds. I imagine the trees in the yard will have Birds. Birds like to chirp.
but the suburbs have their perks too... closer to groceries, a basement, a yard for henry. it just will be quite a change.
- life plans. I feel that I am always just on the brink of a career crisis. the problem, I think, rests on a line from keeping the faith. the old (read: wise) priest says, "the truth is, you can never tell yourself that there is only one thing you could be... you cannot make a real commitment unless you accept that it’s a choice that you keep making again and again and again,". I am always happy in whatever job I am doing. but am I happiest? I hate to feel that I have thrown things away-- time, money, plans.

---

knitting! yes, knitting... I am currently trying to block my chuppah, which involves stringing fishing line through each edge... which is a lot of fishing line. wish me luck!!!
I am also working on a top down raglan tunic that I designed myself... I am using one of my adrienne yarns, martina, and it is absolutely fabuous! the stitch definition is great, and it feel great because it's 30% silk. I don't know why ms. vittadini decided to go out of the yarn biz (probably because she offers like one pattern per yarn and they don't seem to be very good from the reviews), but I love her yarns, and webs currently has them for cheap (this one is currently $5.99, marked down from $12.79!)

bo

shun

oh, man! we registered for shun knives for the wedding, despite the fact that no one buys knives for a wedding. because we registered for a certain amount though, we got a vegetable knife for free... it showed up today. oh, man!
this knife is the most amazing knife ever.

dearest bo,

you had the kindest soul I have ever met. I like to imagine that your soul is now wrapped around me to take everywhere in one of your best dog-hugs. my world is completely upside down right now without you, and I will miss you forever.

I love you.

honeymoon planning!

I thought it would be different with a new blog, but I don't really know why... I'm still procrastinating about posting things. and then of course I feel guilty for not having posted... but I'm going to try.

we started booking our honeymoon to sonoma!
we're going to be gone for 10 days and 9 nights. we are going to stay in 2 bed & breakfasts ( McClelland Priest and Ramekins), as well as one hotel with a fantastic looking restaurant ( El Dorado, and two hotels with spas ( Meritage and Sonoma Mission Inn) each one of these places looked better than the last, and then we would flip back, and realized that each one looked 100% fabulous!

the food... well, we couldn't justify the price of going to French Laundry, but fortunately the chef at El Dorado trained under French Laundry's chef, so we will at least get an idea of what we're missing. we have a few ideas about other restaurants to visit, but any ideas would be quite welcome!

as for activities, you may have noticed that Ramekins holds cooking classes... well, we are most certainly going to take one or two! I am quite excited about that part. we are also going to do an olive oil tasting, although we haven't decided where completely yet. of course we'll get some spa treatments, because the whole point of a honeymoon is to destress after spending so much time with family and getting married and all! and naturally we'll do some wine tasting, but again, haven't figured out where yet. we were disappointed to discover that Charles Shaw of two (now three) buck chuck infamy is not a real winery, so we can't go there! we didn't really want to since we don't like the wine, but it woulda been cool to tell everyone that we had been.

any great ideas for us, let me know!