One more time, c'mon let's celebrate

So last night we rode on up to the Alley for a final farewell to our good friends Jodi and Felix, as they are moving to good ol' Tennessee today. It was great to see everyone, we had a really great time. Derek did some great cookin' on the grill, Dave offered up some delicious chicken with some secret-recipe marinade, there were hot dogs, beers, filet mignon (so tasty!), veggie burgers for Jay... All in all, it was a very good Alley showing for Jodi & Felix's last night.

Here's some Alley memories:






And HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO DENNIS!

The fuzz

I got pulled over on my way home from work today. I'm not usually a speeder; on the contrary, I am alert to speed limit signs and such 97 percent of the time. Well, sometimes when I am excited about the place I am driving away from or about my destination, I tend to get a little hyper and tend to drive a little faster. Not like a speed demon; I just do it unconsciously. So I stopped by this cute little farm store, and it was like a mini version of Wilson Farms! So I got some good vegetables at a good price, and even picked up a cider donut for Jay, 'cuz he likes those. Driving back home, I was all excited that I had found that place, and I was excited about using our new George Foreman grill to grill the veggies I just purchased and make a grilled veggie salad!! And then I passed a cop. Doh! I apparently was going 40 in a 30 (I thought it was a 35). But he was very, very nice, and didn't give me any attitude, and he just gave me a written warning. I just have to remember to lay off the gas pedal when I'm super excited.

Shopping for tasty foods

Jay and I hadn't been grocery shopping in a heck of a long time, and I'm not exactly sure why... I think my trip to Florida messed things up, then after I got back I was busy at work... but anyways, we finally went grocery shopping. We picked up a yellow watermelon, just 'cuz it looked neat. The cash register girl was like, "Why's it yellow?" And we're like, "Umm, 'cuz it is...?" And she went on to say, "They take fish genes and splice them with strawberries to make them redder and juicier." And we're like, "...Gross." I believe that people that ring up your groceries should keep their food-related opinions/weird science facts to themselves. Where I think I was really going with this is that I made dinner last night for the first time in weeks, and it was good.

I think Jay might be getting sick. ::sad face:: Hopefully he won't be too sick, and hopefully he'll recover quickly. We got that thing happening in like 11 days or something.

Oh, by the way, the yellow watermelon was delicious. Tasted nothing like fish genes.

Another weekend!

Just a pic of our handsome Abraham. He's smelly, you know.

So today is Jay's bachelor party. I get to go to the first appointment with the DJ (yes, the wedding is in two weeks; and yes, we haven't met with the DJ yet... what?) and then out to Central MA to my sis-in-law's baby shower. Weird to think that my brother's going to be a dad. So anyway, back to this bachelor party, Jay is very excited about it. He's all giddy. I guess the boyz are going disc golfing all day and then heading back to Will's house in Worcester for a BBQ. I expect that Jay will drink all day, probably spend a bit too much time in the sun, and then eat lots of veggie burgers. All in all, it will be a good day. With lots of beer.

Oh, Jay got his drum kit - he got a used one off of Craigslist. This is Jay and Dennis jamming out last night in the basement:

I think Jay's excited about his drums - he likes to play.

Exchange of gifts

This weekend, Jason and I "exchanged" wedding gifts. We actually hadn't bought anything for each other yet, but we told each other what we were getting. So I told Jay that I would get him a drum set, but that I didn't know anything about drum sets so he could pick it. Then he told me he was getting me a digitial video camera and he was going to set up my old G4 with video-editing software and stuff! Weeee!! So we still haven't gotten the drum set - Jay's still shopping around. But we went out on Sunday (tax-free day) and got a Sony digital camcorder. It's so little! I'm very excited to take honeymoon videos. Of scenery, you pervert.

Also, you'll be glad to know we're having a freakin' buffet at the wedding. And the reception goes till 10:00. Ten o'clock at night?? Yowsahs!

quips

So the week started out crappy, but that was mainly due to my negative outlook on things in general, but now I have to admit it's getting better [better], a little better all the time [it can't get no worse].

So now it's Thursday, and I just remembered that I had made an appointment to give blood today. I don't know why I did this, because the last time I did it, I didn't really feel well afterwards. You see, I used to not weigh enough to even donate blood. But then I started drinking beer, and suddenly I surpassed the 115-lb. minimim! So the first time I donated blood was last year in Lowell, and they took a shitload of blood out of me and didn't give me anything back. It really hurt (eww, I'm getting queasy), I got really woozy, and they didn't even have good snacks! But it's for the best. Sick people need blood. And vampires. Here's Pat's take on blood donation. And another take.

Last night Jay and I went out with our old Starbucks commrades. The kids we used to work with were like sophomores and juniors in high school at the time, and now they're all graduated from college and stuff. Weird! But it was good to see everyone -- a little weird, but good nonetheless. We went to the Tin Alley in F'ham. I don't have much to say about that.

My looong weekend

Man, it's good to be back. I left last Wednesday for a convention in Florida for the court reporting association I'm reluctantly a member of. The association is based in the South with most members from the South, and I thought Southerners were supposed to be famous for their hospitality and all, but lots of these people are kind of mean and passive-aggressive. But maybe that has more to do with the fact that they're court reporters than the fact that they're Southerners... My sis is a member, and we have to keep up our continuing education credits by attending seminars. The seminars pretty much have nothing to do with our actual job (for instance, try the seminar on ettiquite, parts 1 and 2, where you learned which side of your place setting the bread plate should be on; or the business ethics panel, where it was just a forum for selfish mean people to rant about how people don't respect them nearly enough). To make matters worse, a creepy guy took a liking to me and I spent the rest of the convention trying to avoid him. My sis and I stayed up way too late and drank way too much free wine the last night, and we missed our 7:00 a.m. flight. Luckily, we were able to get standby seats on the next flight, so it ended up okay.

So now I'm back, and now it's time to crack down on wedding plans. I'll be soooo happy when it's time for our honeymoon... St. John.... so nice.... so tropical... margaritas and veggies & dip.... I hope they have veggies & dip.... ooo, and steak.... but not necessarily at the same time.... yeahhh...

Gots to do more laundry now.

Stuff we did and stuff we ate

Is it really the last day of July?? Man, is time going by fast!

Man, I can never think of good things to write on this thing! (And yes, I did just begin two consecutive sentences with "Man.") I feel like whatever I say is incredibly selfish and ignorant. I guess the content does definitely qualify as selfish -- but hopefully not ignorant. Guess I'll start with the fact that we were 100 percent ready to go to John and Janelle's BeerBQ (I was even putting the final touches on my veggies 'n' dip platter) when Jay's dad and his pal David stopped by. They had bicycled from somewhere in Connecticut to here (hey, that's cool, you can link to google maps directions...). So that was a nice surprise. But alas we got caught up in having some dinner and drinks and doing some chatting and going for a little swim, and by the time we said, "Hey, we should get going," it was like 8:00, and hey, we're old, so we decided it was too late. ::le sigh::

So we went to John Stone's last night with Jay's dad and his pal David, and the beer and the food was excellent. Jay and I had gone there for brunch last weekend, and I have to admit I wasn't all too impressed with their breakfast-lunch hybrid menu. But last night's food was great - Jay's dad and I both had the beef tenderloin salad, which had roasted veggies and... well, beef tenderloin. Mmmmm, delicious. Jay and the boys indulged in the famous farmer's cheese platter, which is a sampling of three cheeses with three different breads and three different fruit-spread thingies. I wish I liked cheese more, because that's just fun!

In other dining news, we tried out a place in Hudson called the Horseshoe Pub, which has an amazing number of beers on tap. You can join the "Beer Safari," where when you sample 25 beers you get a pint glass, when you sample 50 beers you get a t-shirt, when you sample 75 beers you get a free lunch or dinner, and when you sample 100 beers you get a free appetizer party for 20 or more people. The food's darn good, too. But if you take leftovers home with you, remember to take them out of your car.

What do they put in Coca Cola to make it so damn good? Coke??? I'm having my second can and it's not even 7:00 a.m. for God's sake!! Help me!!!

So I think I'll just pick a random photo from my hoards of digital images and include it with my posts, just for the heck of it.

Random Photo No. 1: Jay at Ashland State Park.
for a second I thought it was our backyard, and I was like, wow, our backyard looks huge! it's so nice! but it's not our backyard.

Violent Femmes

So I guess the Violent Femmes are playing at a place called McFadden's in Providence, Rhode Island, on Saturday, August 20th. Tickets are $15. Anyone want to go? I love them Femmes, they're very fun in concert. I guess it's outdoors, too.

I had salmon cakes today. My first time. Wasn't too bad.

Revive the Alley!

I just checked Alley Party , and it looks as though the Alley is dying in more ways than one. Sadly, two of the original members already have moved (that's me and Jay), and now two more originals are on the move (that's Jodi and Felix), and apparently, Matt just got notification that the alleyparty.com URL is up for termination (or whatever you want to call it) if not renewed.

I mentioned in a comment on the Alley Party site that there should be an Alley get-together every Friday or Saturday up until Jodi and Felix move. Nothing too crazy, like we don't need shot-glass Army vests or barrel fires or stuffed-animal baseball or power hour (okay, maybe we do need power hour...), but I for one am kind of saddened by the impending death of the Alley! At least one last she-bang, like perhaps the second annual (and possibly final) Alley Formal? Last year's was October 4th, I believe - if we can arrange another maybe in August, I would LOVE that. What do you think??

Oh, friends from the Alley

First of all, is it selfish to go back to your own blog to see if people commented? If so, declare me guilty. I was happily surprised to see that Kevin from the Alley (yes, remember the Alley??) had commented on my last blog post! I always liked that Kevin, and I was so excited that he took the time to comment - thanks, Kevin! I like your blog - I commented a few times, even if they're completely irrelevant...

In other news, Jay and I tried to paint candles last night. It didn't work too well.



Apparently, acrylic paint doesn't stick to waxy candles. I can't imagine why, since acrylic paint is water-based and candles are oily... (that's facetious; water and oil don't mix). Oh, why were we painting candles, you ask? We were trying to paint candles as centerpieces for the wedding. Umm, I realize that I'm not very crafty. If I were, then MAN would I like A.C. Moore a whole hell of a lot more!
p.s. that middle picture includes sour Starburst as decorations. Sticky in humid weather, let me tell you!

Bottlin' beer

Well, I just finished bottling a batch of homebrew. Bottling beer is tough work, let me tell you. You have to sanitize every bottle in bleach water and then rinse and then drain, you have to lug the 5-gallon bucket full of beer up to a height where you can easily siphon it into the bottling bucket, you have to then lug the bottling bucket up to a height where you can easily attach the bottle filler, you have to sanitize all the tubing, you have to sanitize all the bottle caps, you have to fill each beer bottle (I'm talking about 45-50 here), then cap each bottle. Hard on the back. But I hope to have two more batches ready by the time the wedding rolls around, but we'll see where my motivation leads. I've been known to say I'm going to do something and then not do it. Sounds crazy, I know, but it's true.

Gross

As Pat and Kate have noticed, it's freakin' muggy. I came home to find mold growing in the plastic magnetic part of the inside of the freezer door that seals the door shut, which I am almost positive wasn't there before, and I only say that because if you just GLANCE over near there, it was pretty obvious that nasty mold was growing. Icky sticky!

So Jay's taking a programming class, which he is at on Monday and Wednesday nights. I've been busy with more wedding stuff (was going to say "wedding crap," but I'm trying to be positive here). I am not good at this wedding stuff, and it's frustrating to no end that I can't seem to accomplish any task without a fair amount of confusion and messing up. But things do work out, I suppose, and we are getting stuff done, I suppose; I suppose I'm just cranky 'cuz it's so nasty out. And because I'm bad at wedding stuff.

Here's a really cute pic of Jay and his niece, Cadence (ignore the serving tray behind his head):

Man Robbed at Gunpoint at Ashland State Park

Here's the story! Isn't that crazy?? We were down there just this past weekend. Jay asked me how I would have reacted if I saw that happen at the boat launch, and I said that I'd probably think it was a joke and start laughing, which would probably result in me getting shot. With a shotgun. 'Cuz that's what the guy had, a shotgun.

Anyway, we ran out of propane for the grill last night! Mikko, Dennis, and Erik stopped on by, and I was all ready to grill up some dogs and burgers and veggies, and Erik noticed that even though the burners were all on 'high,' the temperature was only at 200 degrees and dropping. It was very sad... Maybe we'll heed Erik's advice and get ourselves a backup tank for when that happens again. We ended up cooking the food on the stove, and it was okay. Then later on we had a fire, and it was fun. Not a fire like Pat and Kate saw; this was contained.

Weekend extravaganza

Jay and I had a pretty busy weekend. I had my bachelorette party on Friday night, where I got home at 3:00 a.m. and then had my shower the next day at noon... but I did good! That was a very very rainy night. My future sister-in-law Kerry got me a candy-necklace bra and had made some chocolate confections shaped like... well, I'll let you imagine what they were shaped like... My sister rented us a limo and we went to Ye Olde Tavern in my hometown of West Brookfield, where some guy named John bought me two kamikazee shots and we all did a butterball shot together (including my mom). Then it was off to beautiful Worcester to Jillian's, which we didn't really plan out, we just decided to go there because we couldn't think of anything better to do. The place was pretty dead, which was actually nice (I don't like crowds), but when I requested some Tom Jones and Neil Diamond, nobody would dance with me. We had some food, we had some drinks, some guy bought me a shot which I spilled on myself, and then it was off back to home. It was a late night, it was an expensive night, but it was fun.






Then the next day was my shower - the day I had been dreading because no matter what you may believe, I don't really like being the center of attention. I'm always afraid I'm going to commit a huge faux pas or something. Like possibly spelling "faux pas" wrong... but it was actually fun. I hope I didn't make an ass out of myself. Laura's mom put on the shower and she did a great job! Mrs. Bailey got us a brand new digital camera, which is fan-tastic!

Then yesterday we tried to take it easy and we went kayaking with Abe. Very fun stuff. He did well in the kayak on the way out to the island we like to hang out at. But then when we tried to float away on our floatie mattresses, he was all alone on the island and started freaking out. So we tried putting him on a floatie mattress, but wasn't having it. Then Jay put the dog on his (Jay's) belly as he floated around, and Abe just kept walking out to Jay's feet.


Then he fell in the water from a small cliff on the shore as he was trying to get as close to the water as possible. Then as we were kayaking back, he just jumped right off the kayak into the water (he HATES swimming!) and started swimming to a dock that was just barely under water! What a weirdo! I think he's traumatized. We'll make him a swimmming dog yet!

So now today is Jay's first day of his new programming class that he decided to take. It's in Lowell, which is ironic since we just moved away from there. And I'm still trying to get in touch with the free DJ that I won... it ain't workin'. We'll see. We also have the design for the invitations all set, thanks to Dennis's hard work - thanks, D! They look awesome.

Bucka-WHA?!

Not much stuff going on, except the fact that wedding planning is no fun at all, and I don't know how people actually make that their career. Weirdos. I can't keep anything straight! Ah, well. This weekend is the wedding shower, and it'll be good to see everyone. It's a garden party, and I don't have my favorite red sun hat. (See previous post.) I'll have to make do without.

I'm hungry.

Crazy dayz

So we've been having fun times these past few days - weeee! Last night we went to the Mendon Drive-In and saw War of the Worlds. It was really good, actually. A great movie to see at the drive-in.

Then today we had some breakfast, and decided to go kayaking and swimming. But first we had to get floatie mattresses 'cuz we're lazy. So we went to Target for swimmy shoes and Wal-Mart for cheap floatie mattresses.

We bought 3- and 5-lb. excercise balls at Wal-Mart. It was a stupid purchase, but how could we resist when Jay was having so much fun juggling them? (This picture wasn't Photoshopped.)

Then we got home, packed up lots of tasty foods, and kayaked out onto the reservoir at Ashland State Park and had ourselves a feast.

We created lots of different combinations of treats, and I think this one was called the "Barnacle Bob" or something. We also created others such as Guantanamo Bay, Dead Fishies, the Frog, and the Erin Special. Guantanamo Bay was my favorite.

Also, I was VERY upset, because I flipped over on the floatie mattress and lost my new sunglasses I had bought that day, and I also lost my beautiful red hat to a gust of wind! It fell in the water, and I thought it would float, but it got waterlogged and sank slowly as Jay tried with all his might to paddle back towards it. I loved that hat... my collapsable hat... R.I.P.

Tonight we just might go see fireworks (ooooooo ilovefireworks........) We'll just have to see. But we've been having lots and lots of fun, and I think everyone should float around the warm water on floatie mattresses!

That's crazy

Minn. Government Shuts Down; 9,000 Jobless

Don't celebrate the Fourth with a fifth

Every year near the Fourth of July I get all excited because hell, I love fireworks and barbeques and stuff! But then I get sad because it never fails that I neglect to actually plan anything out. And thus it goes this year, as well. I know most people have plans already, so trying to plan a party this late is just futile. Maybe I'll just get drunk on gingerbread beer and light off some firecrackers. Weeee!

In other news, Jay and Matt watched the NBA Draft this past Tuesday. I can't believe how EXCITED they were! If I didn't know better, I'd say they were so excited they peed their pants. SO excited. I didn't really watch, because hell, I don't know anything about any of those young guys, so I really couldn't get into it. But man, were Jay and Matt excited!

In other other news, I'm drinking a Coke Zero, which apparently has zero calories. Tastes kind of funny, but it's not too too bad. Matt told me about it when we were at his place picking up the AC (which we still haven't put in), so I decided I'd try to be less tubby and get a twelve-pack. Gut be gone! ('cuz I know the soda's the only thing makin' me tubby... ... that's sarastic.)

This past weekend

This past weekend, we had Mr. Kozlowski over. He was visiting from Hawaii and had his new wife and baby with him. He's not Mormon anymore. We also had some other people over, and we had ourselves a little barbeque in the 98-degree heat and humidity. Man, grilling in that kind of weather shouldn't be allowed. It was H-O-T. Later on we headed over to the Corner Pub for some personal pitchers. What a good time we had! I love weekends.

Cuddy's eyes and making food

Yesterday Cuddy came over. She had just come from an eye doctor appointment where they put those drops in your eyes that makes your pupils dilate. Man, were her eyes dilated! She looked either wicked high or wicked evil. You choose. But we had a good time. Jay's friends Carrie and Will stopped by with their new baby. I wish I had pictures to link to, but our camera batteries are dead.

Today we're having a BBQ for Kozlowski. He is up visiting from Hawaii where he now resides with his wife and baby. (Everyone's havin' babies!) I just finished making some food (potato salad and pasta salad) and now I'm going to make more (shisk-ka-bobs and veggies & dip). I enjoy food.

Another day off... must be productive!

I know it's bad to call in sick when I'm not really sick, but if I do go into work, I'll have absolutely nothing to do. Nobody else is going to be there, and I have nothing to work on. So I called in sick. Next step is to get my ass in gear and actually accomplish something! Here's my list:
(a) Clean the house. (hahaha.)
(b) Get laundry done. (I can do that.)
(c) Shopping?
(d) Brew beer. (haven't done that in a LONG time, so now I think I'm scared to.)
(e) Yardwork. (even though I have no idea exactly WHAT work in the yard to do.)
***************
UPDATE: It's 3:44, and I haven't really done much at all. Some laundry, definitely no cleaning, and I'm starting to brew beer.
***************
Jay and I went for a nice swim last evening. The state park "closes" at 6:00, so we just waited until around 6:45 to go down there. The gates were still open, and there were a few people fishing and milling about. So I don't really know how well they enforce the closing time - because last time I was there, a ranger guy was yelling at everyone to leave. ::shrug:: It was a nice swim nonetheless! Then we had tasty corn and salad for dinner. Jay's a good griller :)

I do believe the Koz is coming over on Sunday, but I'm not really sure. Guess we have to figure that out.

Ohh, I almost forgot, if anyone reading this wants to go to a funny puppet show tonight, let me know! It's Cuddy's last puppet comedy show at ImprovBoston, and I plan on going. It's BYOB, people!

Return to the Alley

Last night, Jay and I went up to Lowell on a whim to pick up an air conditioner from Matt. We met up with Jodi and Felix and Julie and Derek and Ryan and Max and Matt and Lisa for some Dos Equis at Sangria's. Ah, it brought me back to simpler times when we'd spend too much money on beer every other night at the bars... it was good to hang out with everyone. Hopefully we'll be able to make it up there more often this summer and revisit some Alley parties.

I, uh, really don't have anything else to say.

I'm eating cold Chinese food

Happy Fathers Day! Is it Father's Day, Fathers' Day, or Fathers Day? Hmmm...


Last night I went out with Dennis and Erik for some Chinese food down at the Cherry Blossom. We asked the waiter what he suggested for an alcoholic beverage, and he immediately answered, "Mai tai. Definitely mai tai." So we all got mai tais. They were really strong. So I had two. Now I'm eating the leftovers (Dennis and Erik were nice enough to let me have them - thanks, guys!) -- [ewww, as I'm proofreading this, I just bit into the tangerine peel from the tangerine chicken! I thought it was beef! Groooosssss!!]

It was a pretty uneventful weekend. Jay is away on his second annual Bailey Boys Weekend with his bros and his pops. They went to Warren Island in Maine. Jay was nice enough to call me yesterday to check in, and they're having a good time. So when Jay's away, I get all these ideas about all the different fun things I could do, but then I get overwhelmed with all those things and I can't decide what to do, so I end up staying home and watching poker on TV.

I actually did go see my pops for fathers day. My family lives far away. I drove out at 7:30 this morning to get to the Harvest Moon Cafe (formerly the Top Hat) for breakfast at 8:30. My old music teacher, Mr. Rees, was there! I hadn't seen him in, oh, gosh, like 10 years! He's a real nice guy, that Mr. Rees. It was good to see him.

That's about it. (I do think it's actually "Father's Day".)

Here's an entry from a random blog I saw:
"My friend Rachel came over last night for help on her scrapbooking. I didn't know how to help how she wanted help. I have no problem making design and product suggestions, but she wanted her pages to come out looking like mine. I wasn't doing the work, she was. That doesn't work very well.
I did give her some suggestions and I sat next to her for most of the time that she was working. The mood was pretty mellow. She probably thought I was bored or annoyed. I wasnt. Yesterday was a long day and I was tired.
Jen and Steve stopped by with the kids and I came alive. I was laughing and talking and teasing the kids. I didn't mean for my mood to be so 'night and day' like that. I really hope Rachel doesn't think anything of it.
I'll have to give her extra attention at work today...."

What?? What?? People like this should get a lobotomy! "I'll have to give her extra attention at work today"?? As if you're that important!

So I just was reading other people's blogs, and it struck me that lots of people are really self-centered. Like literally self-centered, completely lacking empathy, and that everyone else is just a little less capable than them. Hey, we're all egocentric; that's sort of what defines humans. But when grownups don't mature beyond a 4-year-old child's mentality when it comes to empathy, that just is not good. Not good at all.

ADD post

Okay, things I want to post about: Google maps; grammar; keyboard shortcuts on programs other than WordPerfect; (shit, what else??); oh, contact lenses; hmmmm... wait, I think that was it.

Okay. So I got contact lenses today. (Takin' 'em out of order here.)

I decided to try them out because I don't want my lame Wal-Mart glasses in my lame wedding pictures. I know that's narcissistic (yeah, I had to look it up even though I spelled it right), but honestly, my glasses weigh probably 4 oz. Which is a lot, considering my little serving of Crispex today was .81 oz. That's a lot of weight on my precarious nose. So I'm nearsighted, which I think means I can't see far away, so it's now strange to look someone in the face and then look behind them and see the leaves on the trees clearly... without 4 oz. glasses on!


Google maps: I visited Dennis today for a bit after I picked up my contacts, and I was talking with Skip (D's dad), and he was saying he used Google maps recently. I didn't even know Google did maps! It's really cool, though: you can zoom into anywhere in the country, click and drag through the map instead of clicking on an arrow and waiting for it to reload, and you can click on "satellite" and get a satellite image of what you're looking at. Eff'd up!! Above is the street I grew up on in West Brookfield.

Keyboard shortcuts on programs other than WordPerfect, if you hit Ctrl+backspace, it deletes every word before the cursor, but in WordPerfect, it deletes the whole line of text. Good or bad? You decide! (Now, I'm not talkin' PCs vs. Macs, here.)

Grammar: now I don't want to get into it... although even as a court reporter, it stumps me sometimes. Mostly, the hyphenated and nonhyphenated things get me. That's why I consult this book.

K. That's it. Now it's bedtime. God bless the statue of Samantha Stevens in Salem.

amazingbiblestudies.com

Now, I haven't posted in a few days because every time I type in "indianspring.blogspot.com" into the little internet bar up top there, I get directed to this bizarre site. I can't really figure out why... I've been accessing my blog successfully that way for many months now. Suddenly, I have the Mega-site of Bible, Christian & religious information popping up on my screen. I'll have to look through my previous posts and see if there's anything damning in what I've said...

Ah, yes. A typo is what is happening. I keep typing "blogpsot" instead of "blogspot." Even my court-reporting eye (the left one) found it difficult to pinpoint the boo boo. It even happens when you type jasonrbailey.blogpsot.com!

Anyway, it's Wednesday, not much going on. Hmmm... something interesting... hmmmm... Hey, did you know that amazingbiblestudies.com suddenly pops up when I try to access my blog??

Potato salad and other exploits

I had a few college friends over last night, and we had a good time. I made way too much food, some of which I'm eating right now as I type; specifically, cold remnants of chicken-ka-bobs and potato salad. And Coke. Mmmmm. And before that, earlier in the day, I had to drive out west to a florist appointment in North Brookfield. Flowers are frivolous! And why must one's godparent have a corsage??

I must say, living next to the state park is fan-tastic! We've been swimming pretty much every day since it started getting oppressively hot, and it just feels great to break up the day with a nice swim. Weekdays are much better than weekends, because on the weekends there's 12-year-old children who throw large rocks in the water quite close to your head. Okay, my head.

Today, Jay's 'rents are driving on out here to visit. I think they might be bringing a kayak, which will also be too much fun. Seeing as how it's another 90-degree day, we might just kayak and swim and kayak and swim! God bless government-run recreation areas...

Still out of breath

I'm trying to get in better shape, so instead of running, today I took a long swim. I guess I always thought swimming was easy and didn't require much physical exertion, but I'm pretty winded after 3 or 4 laps between the bouys. I mainly stayed with the breaststroke and switched it up a bit with what I thought was a backstroke, but now I don't know what the hell it was.

Jay made dinner last night on the grill. He came up with the idea that we should each make up a recipe for something on the grill, and his idea was the first to be cooked: orange vegetable burritos. He roasted sweet potatoes, butternut squash, and carrots on the grill (they had been marinated in a pineapple-y marinade), and then we made black beans and rice and stuffed it all into burrito shells. It came out really good, except the sweet taste of the squash and potatoes is not my favorite, and I felt really bad because I said that to Jay, and I should have just not said anything. So I hope I didn't hurt your feelings too much, sweetie! You did a great job!

Tonight's poker night; maybe I'll not lose tonight. I just gotta play smart and don't play against Josh because he always gets good cards. ::shaking fist:: Damn you, luck of the deck!!

Trial run

Abe and I just went for a run just now. We ran a mile around the Ashland High School track. Well, I walked probably a quarter mile of it, but it still totalled a mile. Plus the walk to and from. Abe was a very good sport about it. He's in much better shape than I am. Must be from when he freaks out and runs maniacally around the house over and over.

Another marry weekend

Yesterday was Mike and Dani's wedding. Jay was the best man. Since the wedding was at 5:00 o'clock, Jay and I had to keep Mike occupied during the day. We all slept over Jay's parents' house the night before, so when we woke up we decided to take a walk to the ArtsFest Beverly. It's an artist-y festival they have downtown. First we stopped by the Atomic Cafe for a cup o' joe. Jay asked me if my friend Justin was still living in Beverly; I said he wasn't. Jay said, "That kid looks just like him!" I turn to see my friend Justin sitting in a booth! I hadn't talked to that kid in ages. Good to see him. Then we walked over to the dollar store and told Mike he could pick out anything he wanted that was $1 and we'd buy it for him. He chose a four-pack of punching balloons. Good choice. We walked around Beverly looking like morons as we punched the hell out of our respective balloons. It was fun. Then we had some lunch at Acapulco's. We ordered a pitcher of margaritas. Mmmmm. Then Mike and Jay played some hoops while I napped. Jay decided it'd be a good idea to make Mike submerge himself in the ocean before he had to get ready for the wedding. The tide was out, so the water was really really shallow really really far out. They were probably a quarter mile out and the water was still only to their knees. But they jumped in anyway. Rocks hurt bare feet.

Then for the wedding, which was held at Hammond Castle. It was a really great wedding. The ceremony was in the great hall, the dinner was outside in the tent, then the dancing was back in the great hall. The castle is right on the ocean, and let me tell you, the view from the ladies' room was breathtaking. Absolutely breathtaking. Jay, being the best man and all, had to make a speech. I knew he was nervous, but you wouldn't know it by the way he delivered it! He did a really great job, and he even made people cry.

Then we went to the Ocean View Hotel to hang out, and we ended up getting a room there. I stayed up way too late and partied with everyone, and I had to get up at 6:00 a.m. for a bridesmaids brunch in Natick. (I won a DJ!) So all in all, it was a really really fun time!

I won a DJ!

Sometimes I hate coming up with subjects

Dennis made a good point about sometimes neglecting to post for extended periods: it's 'cuz there's no pictures to go with the entry. So here is one from Gould's Sugar House. It's a delicous bowl of pickles.

I have the day off today, and am going to go to Filene's with my mom and she's going to help me register for more wedding gifts. I don't know what normal people need in the course of everyday life, so I need a grown-up to guide me. What's flatware? There's TWO types of wine glasses? Serving bowls, schmerving bowls! So I'm very grateful for her help, because otherwise I'd be opening gifts of Real Genius on DVD or something.

Getting into the swing of spring

This past weekend was a long weekend of too much partying, indeed. Partying's fun, no doubt, but there's always a little bit of the doldrums when reality hits and you have to go back to work.

I counted down the days until our wedding: 94. I went one lame step further and actually listed each day of the countdown on each calendar day in my PDA. I know, I know, I'm lame. But as I was getting to like 10, 9, 8 days before the wedding, I started getting nervous! If I'm getting nervous over putting stupid text in my PDA, imagine what I'll be like when it actually IS 10, 9, 8 days before the wedding. I think the main reason I was nervous is not because I'm nervous to marry Jay; I'm nervous because I don't know what the hell I'm doing in regards to the wedding. But we've got more plans nailed down, which is good...


So it's 94 days before the wedding - I plan on joining the Y and getting in shape. I'm going to stop smoking and cut down on drinking and get in shape. Hopefully. I did a mile and a half on the elliptical machine yesterday. Guess I should actually figure out what I'm doing exactly before I go back... Any exercise suggestions are more than welcome! I'd like to mainly lose my gut, but also build more muscle tone in my arms. Y'know, so I can look good on the beach. And fit into my dress.

Weather: Poopie!

What poopie weather! It's icky. But not as icky as Abe getting sick off of too many biscuits. Which is what happened last night... I accidently knocked over a box of Alpo treats, and Abe freaks out and wolfs half the box down in 3.4 seconds. A few hours later, up come the biscuits! And back down they go, as he quickly reingested what he had just regurgitated. Then he got sick again... and again... and again... and again. Icky!

So tonight is my pal Courtney's bachelorette party. I don't know what girls are supposed to do at bachelorette parties, but ... well, I have no 'buts' to speak of. I just don't really know what girls are supposed to do at bachelorette parties... Her wedding is on Sunday, the day that Jay is actually having a bachelor party for our friend Mike.

And that's about it, folks. One of these days we'll get to break in the new grill... hopefully when all the weddings end and things aren't so busy, we'll have a nice backyard party with horseshoes and homebrew and the new grill. We'll see...

We got a grill yesterday

It's a Consumer Reports Best Buy. Sweet! It's got cast-iron grates. Sweet! It's got a side burner. Sweet! It is a fancy-schmancy grill, and we be cookin' all night long.

So much shopping...

Whew! Yesterday sure was a whirlwind of consumerism. Well, partial consumerism, I suppose, if that's even English... but I'll get into that later.


First stop was to get Jay a suit. He needs a suit for Mike and Dani's wedding, in which he is the best man. I think we might also use it for our wedding, too. The last suit he says he owned was a heavy wool one from Sears. He wanted a suit that was on the informal side, something not too heavy, something snazzy. Well, we got helped by a guy named Lenny, and I don't think he liked me all that much, but that's beside the point. Jay bought a suit! They need to do mystery alterations to it (some guy whisked in from a back room, started putting pins all over the suit while it was still on Jay, and whisked back into the back room), so I guess we can pick it up Friday after 6pm. Lenny told me they don't charge for storage (with a hint of sarcasm) when I asked if I was allowed to pick it up for Jay.


Then we went to Target and used one of those scanner guns to register for lots and lots of stuff. We didn't really have any idea what we were doing, but it was fun to point and shoot at the bar codes... We spent a lot of time doing that.

Then we went to Home Depot to register for more stuff. Jay wanted some decent tools, so that's what we registered for, I think. I don't think I was paying attention. Then we went over to the grills and admired big fancy grills.

We realized we really needed a lawnmower and a grill, so we decided to go to Sears and buy at least the lawnmower.

We held off on the grill because it wouldn't fit in the car. I also ran into an old FSCer named Jeff who I remember lived in Horace Mann back in the day. He works at Sears part time, and he actually teaches just a rock's throw away at Ashland High School. Weird.

Then we... what'd we do? Oh, we went to the movies to see Star Wars: Episode III. I thought it was much better than the last two - the acting was a little bit better, I thought, and the action sequences were pretty cool. I still have no idea who anyone is or what the whole plot line is, but at least we saw it in the theaters, right? ...Yeah.

So all in all, a long day. We got our chance to play mega-consumer. That's not a video game, kids.... that's real life.

Gardening

I'll post a picture as soon as I can, but I wanted to post about my little garden. I'm pretty new at this gardening thing even though my dad always had a garden when I was growing up. I'm realizing now that he did most of the work, and I just picked the tomatoes. Oh, if only picking were the most laborious part...

So Jay told me the next door neighbors said the previous homeowners had their garden over next to the spring. I said to myself, "That spot too wet!" And I noticed it wasn't getting any sun after 4:30. So I decided to rip apart the top of the railroad bed and do the garden there. Well, yesterday I realized (after I had mangled the soil) that the railroad bed gets NO sun midday, when the sunlight is at its strongest, and I also notice the spot over next to the spring was drenched in sunlight. So I decide to put the garden there.

There was lots of weeds and thick grass, so I had to rip all that up - it came up in chunks because all the roots were grown together - and then I had to turn the soil. I did that by taking a flat-headed shovel and digging a little square and turning the soil upside down. There were many many ugly earthworms in the soil. I think I chopped lots in half. But they regenerate, so I actually probably ended up doubling the earthworm population in one afternoon...

So now I'm in the middle of planting. I found out I don't have room for two cucumber plants. They look sad, anyway, since I had them in their tiny cardboard pot indoors for about a week. But I have about 12 different tomato plants (mmm!!), 6 green and 6 yellow peppers, a red pepper, some zucchini, some squash, some broccoli, some snow peas, some corn, a hot pepper plant... and I think that's about it. Now we fertilize and wait...

Happy anniversary

So it's May 17th, one year after the legalization of gay marriage in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Happy anniversary to all gay couples who got married. There's a statistic out there that lesbian couples marry twice as much as gay men couples. They interviewed a guy on NPR that said, "We gay men have the same commitment issues as straight men," as an explanation. Which I thought was amusing.

The wedding clothes...

So yesterday, if you can freakin' believe it, I actually purchased a wedding dress. Yes, a real dress that I am going to wear at my wedding. Me? Dress up? Noo! But yes, I found one that I love. Everyone was saying, "Oh, you'll know the right dress when you see yourself in it!" But every dress I had tried on was just okay. I didn't really 'fall in love' with any of them, so I just listened to everyone else's input on the dresses they liked. I resigned myself to the fact that I was going to be wearing a dress that was pretty, but that I didn't really like all that much. I was prepared to settle for a wedding dress.

Well, I went shopping once again yesterday with my mom and my sister, and I forget if it was me or the lady helping us who picked out the dress (I hadn't tried it on before), and on the hanger it looked pretty and stuff, but that whole weird put-it-on-and-you know-it's-the-dress-for-you thing happened.

Here it is!



Isn't it great?? I'm so excited!

So the wedding planning is in motion, even though there's only a few months until it happens. We're in the process of booking a photographer, a DJ, and picking out a cake. I'm actually getting a little excited now! Hopefully it'll be as fun as I think it'll be.

Steak

Sunday night, Dennis was kind enough to invite me to the movies with him to see Sin City, which was very entertaining. Thanks, D! I especially liked the gun-toting whores. Anyway, earlier in the day I had taken a steak out of the freezer with the idea that I would cook myself a steak for dinner, something I haven't done in oh-so-long. (You see, I decided to cook myself a steak because Jay is away. Jay's a vegetarian, so I usually cook veggie-friendly foods, i.e. not steak.) But when I got home, I really wasn't all that hungry, and it was getting late. But the steak was already thawed. I can't just throw it back in the freezer, can I? From what I read in Real Simple, hell no! "Ah, hell," I said to myself, "I'll just cook it and eat it tomorrow!"

Well, I put the oven on broil, sprinkle some salt and pepper on the steak, and toss it on the broiler. "Boy that steak looks good," I think to myself. So I put it in the oven. It gives off a delightful aroma... so I decide to eat the damn thing. I figure I'll just eat half and save the other half for the next day. Ooooh, should I cook some vegetables, too? Oh, sure! Zucchini and summer squash! Fresh tomatoes, too, just for the hell of it. So I end up eating the whole thing, all the veggies, and the tomatoes, too. I guess I know how people with eating disorders feel... I wasn't even hungry, but I couldn't stop eating.

I had a few scraps of fat left that I didn't want to feed Abe because he's susceptible to puke fits. So I threw the scraps in the trash can, which just resulted in Abe shaking and whining next to the trash can, trying to will the scraps into his mouth by dancing on his hind legs and licking his chops. It didn't work.


Oh, by the way, my best bud Laura has some of her textile creations for sale at this website: Plain Mabel. I guess it's a lady in Northampton, MA, that sells handmade funky things. Here's Laura's creation, Mr. Beardsley!