eee!

Today is the two-year anniversary of the Scientist's and my wedding. Hooray! We made it two years! And in honor of our two years of marriage, we celebrated pretty much all weekend long.

( Cut due to photos and whatnot. )

Two years ago today I met the Scientist for the first time. (A few months ago I thought it was our two-year mark, but it turns out I was confused, because I am dumb. But that's okay--last night he thought we were going on three.) Anyway, he made me breakfast, and I bought him a new book, and tonight we're going to dinner. Yay!

Today is also my grandma's 100th birthday. I highly doubt she'll know it's going on, which makes me very sad. I sent her a huge bouquet of flowers, with a big balloon reading "Happy birthday!" on it. That way, if she's confused as to why there are flowers in the room, the balloon will help clue her in. If she can still read, that is. This weekend we're going to Michigan for the Wine Fest, so I may stop by the nursing home to see her. I kind of don't want to, though. I hate seeing her like this.

In happier news, I had a good weekend. Had some girls over on Friday night for movies (Labyrinth), and then out to a late-night private screening of Mummy 3. Oh Lord, so bad. Saturday we did nothing in particular, which was great. Sunday we helped a friend move. And on Monday we saw Death Race. OMG awesome. Also, the Middleman finale. Good stuff on Monday, people.

Okay, have to go to work. Enjoy your day, all!

Tonight is the Spice Girls concert with deeablo after work. SPICE GIRLS WOOOOOO! Spice up your life!!! You just WISH you could go, don't you?

***

My Valentine's Day was really nice. The Scientist sent me a dozen red roses at work yesterday, which I was totally NOT expecting as we'd agreed not to do anything besides cards. But I have to admit that I like having roses. Security has cleared me to come back after the concert to pick them up, which means I can take them home and enjoy them over my four-day weekend. Yay!



After work we went home, got all dressed up, and went to Zed 451 for dinner. The hostess remembered us from when we went in for the rehearsal dinner run-through a few weeks ago. They gave us complementary champagne and dessert, and I also had a fabulous vanilla-pomegranate mojito. Their food is just amazing. They have lamb that just melts in your mouth. So wonderful. Of course, we gorged ourselves and came home and passed out. Heh.

***

On Sunday I'm waking up at the buttcrack of dawn to drive up to Michigan. yakgirl is throwing a wedding shower for me at my parents' house. fava_bean will drive up with me and the Scientist's mom, and it should be really nice. My cousins will be there, along with a few aunts and a smattering of friends and neighbors. It will be great to see everyone. All week I've been watching the weather reports, and the forecast has been clear. But now they're calling for a "wintry mix" of rain/ice/snow on Sunday. That will be fun to drive back in. Ack. I'll be bringing boots, a change of clothes, and windshield wiper solvent with me, just in case things get bad on the way home. Stupid weather!

***

On Monday I have a face-to-face interview. I am cautiously optimistic.

***

In one last bit of news, it seems the Scientist's brother's girlfriend was in the NIU lecture hall where the shooting took place yesterday. She's unhurt, thankfully. And I'm glad the Scientist's brother wasn't there. This morning while watching the news, the Scientist recognized his brother's ex-girlfriend being interviewed. It's freaky to have an actual connection to something like this.

I just don't get this whole "let's shoot up a room full of unsuspecting and inncent students" thing that keeps happening. What is wrong with people?

For about two weeks now, the Scientist has been dying to go see a movie. So last night we checked the schedules and found that the only showing of American Gangster that made sense was all the way out in St. Charles. (That's about a half-hour's drive from our place, and about an hour's drive from Chicago itself, for those of you who don't know the area.) Since St. Charles is also the home of one of his favorite restaurants, Sweet Tomatoes, we headed out for dinner and a movie. Dinner was really good, with salad and chili and cornbread with butter/honey whip. Mmmmmmm. Now I understand why he loves that place so much. And there's one opening 10 minutes from our house, so that's awesome.

As for American Gangster, it was a pretty good movie. Not the greatest movie I've ever seen, but definitely better than most. Russell Crowe continues to impress. I honestly think he's one of the best actors around. He and Johnny Depp can both just disappear into a role, completely inhabit it. Denzel was also good. I've never been quite as impressed with him as everyone else, because for me it's always "DENZEL is ACTING!" His acting isn't as subtle as Russell's tends to be. But it was pretty fun to watch Denzel being this complete badass, with all of this anger ready to boil over. When it would, it was pretty chilling. ( Slight spoiler. ) Anyway, it was a good movie. Though I wouldn't recommend it if you have a fear of needles, because there were MANY scenes of people shooting up. Also, go see an earlier show. At 2½ hours, it's a long movie.

Changing subject entirely, I am loving this weather. It's been quite cold here for the past few days, but that's okay. I can wear my leather jacket with my great cashmere scarf, and I've broken out the tights and boots and long skirts. LOVE! Oh, and sweaters! I love sweaters. Nice, soft, thick cotton sweaters. And I'm craving some hot spiced cider, or hot chocolate with a shot of peppermint or butterscotch Schnapps. Ah, autumn. I love you so.

What else is going on worth telling you? Now that we're all moved in and settled, I'm starting to get all excited for the wedding again. Yay, wedding! There's only 163 days left to go, you know. I need to meet with the florist still, but I'm trying to find a weekend when my mom can come down from Michigan to attend the meeting with me. I know jack squat about flowers, so I'd like her opinion. Of course, trying to pin my mom down for ANYTHING lately has been a bear. She called yesterday around 4:30 to say that she and Dad would be in this afternoon, and how about if they drop by the house after work? Well, I have a doctor's appointment after work, and even then the Scientist and I don't get off the train until 6:30, which was too late for Mom. I wanted to tell her "If you want to spend time with me, give me more than 24 hours' notice, duh!" But whatever. As the Scientist said to me yesterday, it's like my parents are going through a second bout of their teenage years, now that they have no one to answer to but themselves. I'll just let them run amok, and when they realize they haven't talked to their daughter in a while, they'll call. In conclusion: yay wedding! (Man, talk about a tangent...)

Oh, and what's with the holiday rush starting weeks before Thanksgiving? Stupid Christmas. I'm going to be all overdosed on Christmas before Thanksgiving even gets here. And I have NO CLUE as to what to buy my family this year. Mom & Dad will be celebrating with yakgirl and her family out on the East Coast, and the Scientist and I are meeting up with them after the holidays. So everything will have to be shipped out to them there. As to what those "everythings" will be, I really have no idea. Stupid holidays.

Right now I'm over at the Scientist's place doing laundry while he's at work. How lame that we don't even live together yet, and we've already fallen into a pattern of domesticity.

( Slight change in homebuying. )

( Friday night fun. )

( A great date. )

Well, that was good timing, because just as I'm wrapping this up, the timer for the laundry rang. So I have to go put clothes in the dryer. Y'all have a good day!

The other day I was bored at work, and so I started checking in on prices for hotels for our honeymoon. The Scientist and I were thinking of DC/Virginia. However, now that I've realize that hotels in DC are INSANELY EXPENSIVE, I don't think we'll be going there any longer. If we're paying $250 just for a hotel room at night, doesn't it seem more cost-effective to book a vacation or a cruise or something that will cost us around $350-$500 a day? Especially is said vacations include the cost of airfare, food, lodging, and activities? So yeah, now we're changing our plan completely and are looking into other offers.

yakgirl is going to talk to some friends of hers who go on cruises all the time, and then relay their info back to me. I'm just not sure how I feel about being on a boat and then having to pay for on-shore activities. I also don't feel like having to deal with other travelers' families and children while on my honeymoon, you know? AND the idea of sharing a table at dinner with random strangers just doesn't sound like fun to me.

The idea of an all-inclusive sounds really nice, however. Both of us independently came up with the idea of St. Lucia, as it has beaches, mountains, waterfalls, jungle... But all the St. Lucia resorts are already booked, or a small fortune. I looked into the place that katesti went to on her honeymoon, but the Scientist wants a place with more activities instead of just lying around on a beach. (Seeing as how both of us are of Irish decent and therefore sunburn pretty easily, the non-beach concept sounds good, too.) But then I started reading forums online, and all signs point to choosing a Couples resort in Jamaica instead of a Sandals resort, and they have more off-site tours and activities involved in the price, so we'll be checking that out online tonight. Seriously, though, does anyone have any experience with this stuff? All-inclusives, cruises, ANYTHING? Your advice would be appreciated.

***

I really need to start packing and cleaning my apartment. It's such a disaster. I just don't want to do it. aj, are you interested in making some side money? Just having you over here to help me crack the whip would be helpful enough.

***

Yesterday I hung out with fava_bean most of the day. It was really nice. We sat around watching some early How I Met Your Mother episodes that she hadn't seen. We ate fancy cheese and crackers, and talked, and I forced her to watch clips of Yo Gabba Gabba. It was a good time.

I also talked to my other best friend Debbie for a really long time. It's been forever since she and I had a loooong conversation. She's great.

***

Tomorrow is the Scientist and my one-year dating anniversary. I can't believe it's been a year already. It just doesn't seem like it's been a whole year. I can remember so much of it like it were last week. And yet I can't remember last week at all. Heh.

Let's see what I had to say about him then:

He seems like a genuinely decent, nice guy. He asked if I'd like to go out again, so I said sure. Not really sure if I'm into him (it's not "love at first sight" or any of that crap in the eHarmony commercials), but so far he's nice enough that I'll definitely give him a second date and find out if there's something more. If all else, it's been good conversation so far. ::shrugs::

Man, how things have changed. Anyway, yeah, it's been a year. I have no idea what we're doing tomorrow to celebrate, but he has told me we're going to go to Dave & Buster's to play ski-ball, as that was one of our first dates. So maybe we're doing first date repeats, I don't know. Either way, it will be nice to spend the whole day with him, just having it be all about us.

***

...Man, I need to clean my apartment...

So what can I tell you all about my life lately? Work is super-busy. I have so much stuff I need to get done. Ridiculous. I have five more books to do editor's changes on, then run through final QA before sending to print. I have two books for which I have to strip the text from the final print files to go to the online build. I have seven barcodes to order, and I keep forgetting. I have a set of flashcards to build by hand which I haven't even started on. And there are about nine alerts to go online regarding erratas to our books, all of which have been sitting for at least three weeks, and all of which will be sitting for at least two more.

Sunday I stayed home all day to work on freelance. I didn't even shower or get out of my pajamas, just to keep myself on self-imposed house arrest. I got 10 illustrations done, and that's including breaks. Not bad. Tonight I will be doing more illustrations to deliver the first third of the project to the editor tomorrow.

Tomorrow night the Scientist and I may be going to look at another townhome. We'll see what happens.

Yesterday I came to work online to find that I had confused dates, and YESTERDAY was my big dentist appointment, not next Monday like I thought. So I stayed at work for a half hour to get things in order, and then went right back home and drove to the dentist. I had five cavaties drilled and filled and a fitting for a new crown on the root canal tooth, as well as a temporary crown put on. I now have an aluminum tooth. It is weird and my mouth tastes funny.

The Scientist met me at my apartment after my dentist appointment and he took me to lunch. I ate pad thai with tofu (no chicken) VERY carefully. Then we did some pre-pre-wedding registering. Everything will probably be discontinued by the time anyone buys us anything off the registry, but at least we'll have time to think about things and change our minds if we want.

I had to buy a new bag for work, as my strap broke last week and then the bag ripped again on Monday. I got a new messenger bag. It's nice, but not as many pockets as I'd like. It was still $60 less than anything else I could find. It's good enough. I'll come to like it.

I took Debbie's jewelry to the bridal store to make sure the colors on the necklace matched the dress. They do, and that's a relief.

My parents are both back in the suburbs, working on getting things packed and settled at their house. Hopefully they'll get everything moved soon and a) can put the house on the market, and b) get furniture up to the new house, as Mom and Grandma have been living bare-bones for over a month up there.

Last Friday I had one of my best dates with the Scientist. We went to Navy Pier to the Chicago Shakespeare Theater to see Taming of the Shrew. Then we rode the ferris wheel and ate ice cream. It was lovely.

I'm still reading The Golden Compass, and I continue to love it. The book made me cry while I was reading it on the L.

A spider has built a huge web on my office window. It must be 3' x 3'. The web, not the spider. The spider is about the size of a half dollar.

There is a block party going on a half block away, and they keep setting off firecrackers, which are scaring the crap out of my cat. Thankfully, I don't mean that literally. Heh.

Things worked out fine yesterday after all. deeablo called to keep me entertained and laughing my ass off, and then completely blew my mind by suggesting that Robbie Williams should open for the Spice Girls on their reunion tour. Seriously, that thought fried my brain completely. And why don't I have a Spice Girls icon? The Scientist showed up as she was reading me the Fandom Wank wiki "woobie" entry, and after hanging up with her, we went to get dinner. Burgers and cheese fries at Ed Debevic's, and then off to find parking for the Oak Brook fireworks. The Oak Brook cops proved to be completely useless and directed us AWAY from the fireworks entirely, so we ended up in a corporetum parking lot with a bunch of other people. I had two fold-out chairs stuffed in my trunk that we hauled out to sit on for the show, which turned out pretty well. The fireworks were lovely, and the rain started to come down just as the finale was starting. All is well with the world. Then we went back to his place, drank champagne, and watched Hot Shots on TV. Oh, Charlie Sheen, what happened to you?

Today we got up early and did all the errands I didn't get to complete yesterday. Luckily there's a Party City not a half mile from his apartment, so I got a bunch of decorations for Friday's party. Then off to Target for the gift card, then grocery shopping. Then we went to the Woodridge 4th of July giant picnic. His family has gone every year for the past 19 years. So all of his siblings were there with their significant others (when applicable). His youngest sister was hungover like mad and ended up getting sick while we were playing cards. Dude, I NEVER would have gotten away with being hungover when I was too young for a driver's license. I guess the Scientist wasn't kidding when he said she gets away with anything and everything. (Plus, when three of the other kids were the one to get the youngest drunk in the first place, who do you really punish? Besides ALL OF THEM?)

After that we drove over to his oldest brother's house to check out some furniture the Scientist bought at an auction last weekend. He got a beautiful buffet and matching sideboard for us, and I absolutely love it. (And yes, he did take pictures via cameraphone for me to approve before buying us furniture.) Now I have to find out how to tell my parents I no longer want their Colonial-style buffet and china hutch. Anyone in the Chicagoland area need some furniture? No, I'm serious. Contact me if you want it.

Then he had to go to work (yes, TONIGHT) and I drove home and talked to my mom in Michigan. I guess the latest on Grandma is that they're recommending her for "foster care." Basically, it's kind of a halfway house for people with dementia/Alzheimer's, where several of them live together in one home with live-in nurses. I guess it's supposed to be better for the patients involved, and less costly as well. Mom doesn't have a whole lot of details, but I hope it's a fit. Keep your fingers crossed.

And now I'm going to wear my wedding tiara while I work on freelance stuff. Because I CAN. I love my tiara...

I was just about to leave work when I got an IM from Jon, the improv guy I dated about two years ago. I haven't spoken to him in forever, and I was going to be all "Hey, I gotta run" when he tells me his dad died last year, and he's been living in Florida helping his mom out. So now he's online with me, pouring his heart out about his dad, and I'm like "How am I supposed to get offline with him now?"

This is odd.

Yesterday I went to see Meet the Robinsons in 3D with Uncle Joe and the Scientist. I liked the movie well enough, but boy howdy, was it all over the place. It's just slap-dash crazy editing the whole way, and the story just bounces around like crazy... It's a very odd movie. Enjoyable, though, if you just kind of shut off your brain and let yourself be entertained. That said, I'm super impressed with the soundtrack. Music by Danny Elfman (hooray!), two songs by Rufus Wainwright (hooray!), and the singing frog is voiced by Jamie Cullum (hooray!). Yeah, I'll be wanting that soundtrack for my birthday.

Friday night I hung out with the Scientist and his family. Had dinner at his parents' house, then we headed back to his place with Brother 1 and his sister-in-law, where they taught us to play canasta. Well, they tried to teach me. But it was fun. Saturday morning we all got up REALLLLLY early to go to a town called Millbrook. I guess every year the town has a giant auction to raise money for their fire department. 99% of the stuff was complete junk, but there was some nice furniture. The Scientist ended up buying a lovely oak rocking chair for $30. You know, to put in the future kids' nursery someday. ... I should be more freaked out by this, but I'm not. How is this possible, that I'm not freaked out at him buying furniture for our as-of-yet unborn children's nursery? What has happened to me? From there we went to the Premium Outlets, stopped off at the Waterford store, and bought crystal champagne flutes for toasting at our reception.

How did this become my life? Why am I not more freaked out?

Last night we went to his friends' condo to hang out, as one of them will be going in for surgery tomorrow and they wanted to have a big party for him. We played Battle of the Sexes, which is kind of a stupid game. And now I'm home for the first time in days, and my cat probably hates me for being gone so much. So I'm going to go pay attention to her now.