Testing the waters…

Just look at that face…and because I am a sucker for that face, you can only imagine how much of a sucker I will be for this one…

My sister is a mom…

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the hurry up and wait syndrome…

we have all been there, a day full of stuff to do but not enough time to do it all. for example, yesterday:

• hurry up and get ready to go to work, only to wait until the proper time to drop nick off for camp
• at work, hurry up and get the checks ready, only to wait for the mail man (note to vendors-i have no control over when the mail goes out!)
• hurry up and get the deposits ready, only to wait to take them to the bank
• hurry home to start a load of laundry (we were past the bottom of the drawer underwear) only to wait to put it in the dryer
• hurry to pick up nick for his appointment, only to wait half an hour to actually have said appointment
• hurry home to pick up something to eat, while nick got ready for practice, hurry to get laundry out of the dryer-i don’t trust most of the people who use the community dryer and i thought for sure whoever had their pile of still wet, now getting moldy clothes on top of the dryer was going to do something awful to our laundry, only to wait while nick put his cleats on
• hurry over to football practice only to wait until the end. of course this was the longest waiting of the day which allowed me to calm my racing thoughts, eat a sandwich and read a bit of my book (which by the way is just fascinating, it is about Kaiser Willehelm II mother, a daughter of queen victoria)
• after practice there wasnt as much hurrying to get home, made lunches and coffee for the next morning, brushed my teeth, took the dog out and finally got to sit down with nothing looming ahead of me…

it feels like that has been my entire week and school has not even started yet. bring on the weekend!

p.s three weeks from today will be the biggest hurry up and wait day and on that day it will not bother me! because we are getting married!! YaY!!

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fotos for friday…

yesterday i went to our community garden, its a little experiment…see if jen can grow anything. well a little less than a week ago my zucchini plants looked like this:

yesterday i came home with zucchini that looked this;

holy growth spurt batman!!

i had a hair trial for the wedding last week and i think i like this; 

but i am still not completely sold on it, i am thinking more curls then twists and perhaps the veil underneath and flowers or pins in the curls…mary and i have decided to definitely get our hair done the day of, and i may even get some makeup on. the dilemma is i only ever wear mascara and don’t want to look completely fake, however i do want to look really nice…hummm

we also went and saw fireworks last weekend;

i thought it was pretty cool to use the ‘firework’ setting on the camera. this weekend we are meeting the justice of the peace, his name is ernest…should be interesting, i think at this point if hes not creepy or drunk we should be alright.

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thursday thoughts…

i wake up around 6:30 every morning to take hobbes out and start our day. usually the walk consists of a lap or so around the building and a greet to at least one of our neighbors. this morning was not much different except for when i saw the tow truck pull into the parking lot. my first thought was it must be turning around but then my brain went into overdrive…

‘crap they are going to tow my new car because it is not listed on the lease yet‘  followed closely by ‘damn they figured out that kevins car is not registered and we have three with only a two bedroom apartment‘ and concluded with ‘i guess they are not aiming for our cars, i wonder whose car is being re-poed!’

is it the guilty catholic conscience i was born with? or a guilty pleasure of seeing someone else’s car towed at 6:30 in the morning.

almost simultaneously a HAZMAT truck pulled into our parking lot. to which my first-very morbid thought i might add-was ‘which murder scene are they cleaning up now?‘ but then i reminded myself that the last time the HAZMAT truck was in our parking lot it was proceeded by many other large crime scene investigation trucks and we were not allowed to leave for an insane amount of time.

after all that excitement, i fed the boys breakfast and started to get myself ready for work. usually i already have an idea of what i am going to wear, but not this morning. it was one of those days when  you stand in front of the closet wrapped in your towel thinking ‘i HATE everything that is hanging in front of me‘ followed by the overwhelming urge to put on  your comfy pants and over-sized sweatshirt and call it a day.

i scrounged together something resembling a work type outfit and called it a day, but not before i made the comment to kevin that i hated everything i  own and he responded with ‘ i know baby, we will fix that, i promise, i totally understand its one of those days where you don’t like anything and don’t feel pretty and nothing looks good, but you are pretty and i promise we will fix it.‘ he read my mind and made my day. god i love that guy!

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bella fleck

this past weekend, kevin and i went to see bella fleck and the flecktones. we had these great seats in an awesome little theatre in north hampton mass. what an amazing show. bella is unbelievable on the banjo, jeff kaufman so very very talented, futureman…fantastic in a quirky way and victor wooten is an absolute god. i cannot get over how great the show was. it was nice to get away for a night.

speaking of nice, last night was monday, the first monday since september that i havent had to sit through class, it was so great. that feeling of being done with class never gets old. i have emailed (yes emailed, i am a student in the 21st century) my final paper and can now say i have officially finished my first semester of grad school! three more to go and then the thesis! i am looking forward to finishing my christmas shopping, throwing away the gazillion articles i had to print off blackboard, returning the umteen million books to the library, reclaiming what small space i have next to the bed, and not worrying about having to do homework. at lest not until the end of january.

ahh a big sigh of relief!

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thurday thoughts…

so i tend to do my best thinking in the shower, not sure why i think it is when my random brain really starts firing coherent thoughts first thing in the morning, usually i wake up with a million little things that i need to get done that day and it takes a few minutes and at least one cup of coffee to form them into streamlined plans of action.

i have finished my first grad school class, last night i turned in the 20+ page paper on comic books and juvenile delinquency in the 1950s. i am happy with it, i was not able to tie it to a major general election of the time period, i felt that if i tried the professor would know i was grasping at straws…not good. one down one to go!

this morning nick and i were watching t.v (he has been banned from ps3 for an undetermined amount of time) sportcenter was on and then the commercial break. first commercial, viagara…or shall i say viva viagra to the tune of elvis. with the two adults dancing then needing to leave the party early and enter an elevator to which nick says-with disgust i might add-“why would anyone want to do it in an elevator?” me “uhhh” (insert crickets in the background) “takes all kinds nick?” then he proceeded to put his shoes on saying “geeze an elevator, yeah right, good luck with that.” so i may be able to form coherent thoughts at this point in the morning however, reasonable responses as to why people may or may not have sex in elevators, is defiantly an afternoon discussion.

the very next commercial was an arbys commercial, perhaps you have seen it, a gentleman on his bed with candles all around asking his honey if she is ready yet, from behind a closed door she says yes and i am only doing this because it is your birthday, comes out dressed in an Arbys uniform with a sandwich and we see the gentleman on the bed get all excited and the arbys logo pops literally i think even with a little “boing” sound above his head. i had to laugh, first, nick didn’t get it, at least he didn’t say anything, i think he was still contemplating the physics behind having sex in an elevator and then i thought that is a lot of sex first thing in the morning on sportscenter.

as we were leaving for school nick was singing “Vivaaaaaa, Vivaaaaa, Viagraaaaaa” to which i promptly asked him to stop. it is probably already a theme song for 12 year 7th grade boys…

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time really does fly…

so it was just yesterday, right? when we had our engagement party and my papers were just being started, but were not due for a really long time, right? WRONG! thanksgiving is in two days…then christmas…papers due oh i don’t know…NOW! felling a bit of pressure, but no biggie.

the other day i was helping nick with his homework. his class was answering questions about classified adds. one add in particular was about a baby grand piano. the question nick had to ask was “why do you think this person wants to get rid of their baby grand piano?” nicks response; “uh…because the guy doesn’t have a baby.” i had to laugh, not at nick but at the pure innocence in the answer itself. i explained what one was and told him not to change his answer. now we are working on the “eggsperiment” eggs in vinegar…yum!

last night in class i was talking to a classmate about our undergraduate experiences. the head of our history department was affectionately known as stinky man. i cannot put into words how bad this gentleman smelled. we could tell he taught a morning class in the evening because his scent lingered for that long. disgusting. well i had to turn in my senior thesis to him and after i had explained to my classmate the unbearable stench and the dread of having to sit in his office for more than two seconds, she makes a comment “yeah like, please cant i just email this to you.” i laughed it off and said yeah right then realized that emailing a paper was not an option when i was in undergrad…has it really been that long?

kevin and i have found a place to get married, and i think we may even have a date. we have decided to tell my parents we will be paying for the majority of the wedding, if they want to help that is great, however we are not expecting that. but as far as anything else goes with wedding planning, i realize i have no clue!

i would just like to put a apb out to all woodland creatures with a death wish. STOP RUNNING INTO MY CAR!  i was born guilty therefore the amount of guilt i feel after hitting something that wanted to die, makes me feel worse! the bambi i hit the other night probably died a slow cold death considering it ran head first into the side of my car and probably got a concussion and a few broken bones. oh and this was in town! this would be the third deer i have hit, and let me tell the rest of you, none will be that fortunate any longer! this also applies to rabbits, squirrels, raccoons, opossum’s, chipmunks, turkeys, birds, snakes and cats (all of which i have hit) i will no longer brake-this is due to the stress caused and the slight coronaries that i no longer want to experience.

and because thanksgiving is just around the corner:

i am thankfull that kevin is so understanding, that i make a difference in nicks life, that my family is supportive, and that my car is still running. i wish everyone a healthy and happy thanksgiving!

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thursday thoughts…

i have many many things swirling around in my head right now and think the best thing to do is to write them out, maybe then i will have room to unravel my brain a bit:

• last week kevin emailed all of nicks teachers just asking how he is doing in class. he did this in part because there are no conferences until december and this time last year we had already had a conference and a few “special” meetings with teachers ( i use the term special loosely). we have received two emails back, both of which state nick is a pleasure to have in class and that his grade is at least a b, if not better. their only complaint is that he does become chatty at times, but they are able to refocus him before it becomes too much of a problem. Flash back to last year and he was getting detentions! what a huge huge turnaround for that kid… makes me proud, so in a way it feels like our report card as parents is not bad right now!
• i have a paper due in class in a few weeks. this is the first paper that i will write for grad school and the first paper i have written in oh say 8 years! i am finding that i am stressing about format, the level of my writing, how am i to cite this and a small voice in the back of my head telling me that the professor is going to look at this and laugh you out of grad school.
• i have learned that you really cannot rely on ordering books online during a semester, they never seem to get here on time and they never seem to be the right book. not to mention, i just received “Whats the matter with Kansas?” and NEVER. ORDERED. IT! nick keeps asking “Jen, what is the matter with Kansas?” my response is “Not sure nick, i wasn’t even supposed to get that book”
• i have also learned that no matter how cheap said online book is, the amount of hassel that goes into trying to rectify the situation of receiving a book you did not order is soo not worth it!
• if i have been vigorously trying to change my mailing address and information on a credit card bill for the past year, and they haven’t picked up on it, and if i didn’t receive a bill this month, is it my fault they wont get paid?
• the past week, i noticed i wasn’t feeling right, no reason as to why, just not right, maybe its the blues, maybe it was hormones but last night i talked to my parents and my sister and realized, i am a bit homesick, and i think its because i haven’t seen my dad in a very long time, or my sister for that matter, hell just throw my mom in there too!
• i may also be jealous, my parents are on a plane to michigan to go and visit ‘home’ we have been in connecticut for five years now and the rest of family has made numerous trips back, i have only made two, the last being two years ago-there is not much left in kalamazoo, but i always hear kevin talking about how he did this and that in newington growing up and i wish that i could share the same type of stories, plus i just wish i could go back to that bakery in downtown and get one last clown cookie*.
• my birthday is coming up, part of me just wants to skip it, part of me really doesn’t care, and part of me wants a giant, blow out, keg type of party. all three of these things are not going to happen, but still turning 30 is looming and i like to think i am where i should be at this point in my life, and i need to remind myself that i never envisioned past 18.
• the fall weather really really makes me yearn to go horseback riding. or just not be at work!
• and one more little irksome thought…i just got an email on myspace from a sorority sister, who happened to also be my big sister, who proceeded to tell me that she cannot believe that she had to find out i was engaged on myspace. um step back one minute…haven’t seen her in over two years, haven’t actually had a conversation with her for more than that time unless you count the mass emails she sends out to everyone in her address book all about her son. i. hate. mass. emails. oh and by the way every thing is not always about this one particular person-yes everyone can laugh, i was in a sorority, it is something you would never know by looking at me!

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elvis has left the building…

ok, so maybe not elvis, but my mind has defiantly become vacation brain. i have extreme butterflies with the thought of getting on a plane and arriving on the opposite coast a few hours later. i have loads o work to get through here, however, vacation brain has set in and all i really feel like doing is making a list of things to pack…again…checking out more interesting places to visit…again…and calling my mom one more time to be sure its alright for her to take care of the dog for the next two and a half weeks. well she really has not choice now, shes committed and hes on his way over tomorrow night!

i spoke with my dad this weekend, i had to tell him we saw westpoint and went over the bear mountain bridge, he just loves it up there and has always said he wanted to take us. i was thinking about him the entire time. i gotta feel for him though, he is so very very frustrated with the whole house selling business. they had an open house on saturday and no one showed up. anyone interested? save my dad a coronary! plus he still is kinda homeless down in jersey and i am sure being away from my mom for weeks at a time is rather trying. granted he has the rest of his family down there including my sister, but still. will someone come and buy the thing already! (personally i blame pfizer…if it weren’t for them we would have never been out here in the first place-but then again nothing i have right now would have happened either…so that is a tough call)

so here is to my last tuesday at work for a while! must. overcome. vacation brain!

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thursday thoughts…

i now have a new found respect for anyone who spends their day hurrying up to wait. it seems that has been the story of my life this week. hurry up to get payroll done…to wait for it to be delivered. hurry up to get to the little league field…to wait for the game the to start, and let me digress a bit on that, metal bleachers and my ass do NOT get along, neither do my shoulders, neck or lower back. i say i am getting old, but all the other mothers look at me and mutter under their breath “bitch.” hurry up to get payables done…wait to have them signed, and again, let me digress…these new responsiblities are interesting to say the least. i never thought i would have to balance different schedules in order to get everything done and make everyone happy and i have to remind myself that yes i can get that order out, on my own, however there are more than one to two steps that require that action and those steps include variuos people who have vastly different schedules. note to self: you are only one person and if you do what you need to, it is out of your hands…Right?

my bathroom needs a serious scrubbing, every morning i get mad at the toilet for being so dirty, and the bathmat needs to be either one: cleaned two:washed or three: hazmat removed.

i am really going to miss going to little league games, i have actually started to meet new people and have many that i look forward to seeing, but is it borderline stalker to ask if we could do something other than watch little league, are there rules, and really what would we do, the only thing we do have in common is little league. last night i got a very nice hug from parents of one of nicks regular season team, their son and nick are pretty good friends, they come to the all star games as well. sue told me to have a great vacation and eddie was also very friendly-this must be what adult friends are like?-

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