Snow Day!!

There are plenty of benefits to working for government... who knew that one of them was snow days? That's right. I have a snow day* today. It's like being a kid again!

This was the deck near the end of the storm on Saturday night.

I do have to say... after 3 hours of digging out the car. It's nice to not have to go anywhere.

*I won't mention that I actually took this week off anyway to get last minute Christmas stuff done, because the snow day essentially means I don't have to take a vacation day. Which is always a bonus.

Happy Birthday, My Husband

I love you.

It's that time of year!

This was my favorite Christmas song as a kid. It was only when I moved to Maryland, and didn't hear it for a couple of years did I realize that this is a New York thing. No one I knew from outside the New York Tri-state area had ever HEARD of this song. Thank goodness for the internet!

Happy Effing Noo Yawk Christmas Everyone!

Happy Friday!

I'm with CawfeeGuy...

and am extremely upset and disappointed with the outcome of the Gay Marriage vote in New York.

I only hope, that people will listen to Sen. Savino from Staten Island... truly listen to her words. I listened. And I cried. Because she is right.

Who's having a birthday? I thought is was Thanksgiving...

Yeah, yeah. I know. These are the wedding cupcakes. I just want a cupcake, okay?

Huh? Wha? How did it become late November?

It's been a busy couple of months 'round these parts. Far more busy than I could have imagined... Right after getting back from my mini vacay after getting married, I learned that I got the promotion that I interviewed for. I was really happy, excited, stressed and totally bummed out at the same time.

The first three reactions are pretty obvious. Of COURSE I would be happy and excited for this new opportunity. Of COURSE I would be stressed because of all my new responsibilities and because I would, essentially, be doing 2 jobs until they hire someone to take my old position. But bummed out?

Let me explain. When we moved to our new offices, so far away from our old office (and more importantly, home), one consoling fact was that I would be sharing the hallway with all of my crazy friends. See, the office is build in 2 sections with a main atrium in between. Because of the way the offices were distributed, our division got offices on both sides of the atrium, with the majority of the group on one side of the atrium. So, a bunch of us plotted to choose offices on the OTHER side. And once we moved in, it became exactly what we had hoped - a hallway full of misfits, where crazy would break out at any moment, and where laugher was the rule versus the exception (oh, and because of the personalities, we are also able to get all our work done too).

Well, one of the things that had to happen when I got promoted to management was that I had to move into a "management" office, i.e., an office in the main group with everyone else. I begged and pleaded to stay where I was. There were plenty of members of my branch on that side of the building. It was "quieter." I would be able to work more effectively. Nope. I had to move. I was able to delay it a couple of weeks... but it could not be avoided. And so came the fateful day...

And the day I moved, I had some "help" from my friends... who would occasionally steal some things back from the cart I was using. I know. Wah wah. I got a promotion. There are consequences. But I truly feel like I'm missing out on the fun. Which I guess is part of the point of management, huh? But I miss them. And the joy. And laughter... across the atrium. But I know they miss me too...

*sigh* It makes me sad too.

Man and Wife! Say it!

We could not have asked for a more perfect day. Rain and clouds gave way to a beautiful, sunny afternoon and a gorgeous sunset.

There is not much I can say about the day other than it was everything that I had imagined. It was perfect.

Let me in the sound!

Last night was just amazing. AMAZING. Nearly perfect, in fact. There's not much that can top a perfect dinner at the new Cava on Capitol Hill followed by an incredible U2 concert. (Well, we'll see if something can top it in, oh, 10 days.)

I think I'm pretty much convinced that I will never, I mean NEVER get tired of seeing Bono, The Edge, Larry and Adam in concert. They are just so amazing live, in Arenas Stadiums, small spaces and large. They are just incredible performers, and Bono really knows how to work a stadium crowd.

They played about half of their new album throughout the show, but there was so much previous and classic material played, much to everyone's joy (they played, for the first time since I began seeing them in concert, "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For," which I had only seen "live" on Rattle and Hum). There really is nothing like you and 20,000 of your closest friends all singing in unison while Bono stands on stage taking it in. It was cool.

The stage was HUGE! And FedEx Field is not that big, so our seats were great!

Oh, Bono.

There were only a couple of odd things in the evening*. There was a woman passed out in a bathroom stall before U2 came on stage... We never figured out what happened there. And the guy next to me seemed very irritated with the political and social messages throughout the show - HELLO? It's effing U2! What the hell was he expecting?

But those were little things. It was all amazing. The dinner, the show, the company. Amazing.

*Oh, and Turg fell asleep during the middle of the show for about 4 song. Fitti, B_Cat and I were very amused by this. It was actually quite impressive. But he was sad he missed the acoustic "Stuck in a Moment" - a song he likes a lot. I tired to wake him up, really.

Ambush Shower!

Crazy, Dr. Lim, Miss Nancy and I went out for a "Girls Lunch" today, because Dr. Lim said in her email "I want to go to lunch and I never see you guys." I found this funny, because I feel like I see Dr. Lim all the time, but as we are only in the office one day a week all together (Tuesday), I didn't think much of it. Well, apparently, this was part of a ruse. When we returned from lunch, and were walking back to our offices, Dr. Lim turned around all of a sudden, followed by Crazy and Miss Nancy. Curious, I followed them into the conference room.

I entered the room, seeing much of my softball team and other friends and workmates sitting there... then hearing "SURPRISE!" And, me, not getting it, asked, "What's this for??"

Duh.

It was quite a lovely and sweet surprise. I'm not big for show, and really have been only telling people of Turg and my upcoming nuptuals when people ask, or when it comes up in conversation. So it really was a surprise to see that many people sitting there.

Of course, there was cake:

Can we tell that Crazy and Dr. Lim picked up the cake?

Again, hanging out with people I like and having good conversation. What a lovely surprise.

Perfectly showered

This past Sunday, I was showered with much love and joy at my bridal shower. Magenta* and Clio did a wonderful job planning and executing a shower that perfectly suited me. There were no games, I did not have to embarrassingly sit in front of everyone and open gifts, no ribbon bonnet, no toilet paper bride. A very un-showery bridal shower. In other words it was perfect. And very me. A gathering of some of my oldest and closest friends and family (I was quite sorry that my sister and niece-in-law could not make it), chatting, laughing and having a wonderful relaxed time.

Here are some of the highlights!

Lovely Ladies

Me with a very stylish CawfeeGuy and CawfeeMate

I felt Chewie needed some libations too

Sis-in-Laws

The former MzHines (now MrsSwan) and Trish

Two Muses and M

I want to thank everyone for coming and celebrating with me. I had such a wonderful time and felt so incredibly loved. Magenta commented after everyone left that everyone who came were the people we would be sitting in the corner talking to at any larger party. She was right. The corner was the whole party. Again, perfect.


*Magenta, I completely agree with Clio's assessment regarding your party planning/cooking/hostessing skills. Get over yourself. :)

Super-duper Cutest Nephew. Ever.

Getting this by email yesterday morning just brightened up my day. Andrew is now my desktop on my work computer... I see him peeking around my log-in window. It's fantastic. Thanks for the pic Jay!

Recovering (naughty) puppy

Thor continues to recover nicely. Strange looking but recovering. However, because he's been recovering so rapidly, he's beginning to get antsy - wanting to do all the things he's not supposed to in the first 2 weeks of his recovery (jumping, running, twisting...).

The other problem is that, because his movements are supposed to be restricted, he's being spoiled. We have to carry him up and down the stairs. In the beginning, we would carry him back if he got tired on his walks. He got to eat chicken rice with his food for the past week because the medication necessitated a bland diet. Spoiled. And getting naughty.

So last night, Turg and I are hanging out with Thor in the basement, watching TV and eating spaghetti for dinner. Thor is looking at me sitting on the floor, with my food, with longing eyes, because he's always hungry and we never feed him (in his mind). Anyway, I leaned over into his pen to grab a toy for him. He took this opportunity to pounce - face disappearing into my pasta bowl fast as lightning. When I yelled for him to stop, his face emerged, a load of spaghetti dangling from his mouth. I wanted to be mad. I really did. But he looked absolutely hilarious and I could not stop laughing. Hysterical.

*This is not Thor

*sigh*

Well, apparently discipline has gone out the window along with getting spoiled. We have a lot of work to do once he's fully recovered...

Office Moving Day

Well, the day that many of us at the office have dreaded for years is finally here. It's moving day. We (and all our stuff) are moving in phases to the new snazzy facility... much further away from here.

Some history - this move has been planned for years. I mean YEARS. But, life moves at the speed of government, and because of budget cuts, etc., the move date kept getting pushed back and back and back. When I started 4 years ago, we were supposed to move within a year. Then the date got moved. Then moved again. Wolf was cried so many times that we (hoped) that it would never happen. But when the final announcement came that today would be the day, and our moving crates showed up 2 weeks ago, well, we knew there would be no more denying it.

So we've been packing over the last 2 weeks. And yesterday was the final frenzied push by everyone. I mean the place was a disaster area. And today, we're all working at home while our stuff gets moved. And (theoretically) everything will be there, computers hooked up and everything, when we get there on Monday.

They kept telling us to make sure to label everything (including our keyboard and mouse (seriously)) or it would not get moved. So, just to make sure that nothing got left behind...

*Thanks to my friend Timmy who came up with this idea and took the picture.

Franken-weenie

Look at the zipper-like staples... and the shaven chicken legs!

And then, the random shaven square on his side (with drug patch):

To make that random square even worse... take away the drug patch - I waxed the poor little guy. Boy did he glare at me:

Recovering Puppy

Thor had surgery last Thursday, and came home on Friday - I thought this was really rushing it at first, but seeing the improvement he's making, I'm really happy that he's been home. The neurosurgeon apparently removed an "amazing amount" of ligament and debris from the surgical site. Which essentially means, there was a lot of crap making him bad, and now that it's gone, his recovery should be great.

And it has been thus far. Everyday, he has more energy, he walks further, etc. Even from the day we got him home, he was walking better than when we brought him in. It's really quite amazing.

He's also shaven in the most bizarre ways. He kind of looks like Franken-dog right now because of the line of surgical staples on his chest. He also had (until last night when I ripped the thing off the poor puppy) a Fentanyl patch on his side - they shaved a perfectly square patch into is right side... it looks like an access port.

I have pictures at home that I'll post tonight. Thanks for all the well wishes. And, as always, in lieu of other gifts, Thor requests cookies.

Poor broken puppy, Part III

Thor did not seem very good when we got home on Monday night. So rather than wait until Tuesday evening to bring him to the neurosurgeon, we decided to bring him in the morning. Just so that he would have people watching him to make sure he would not get himself into any trouble, or hurt himself more.

Apparently, Thor has been charming all the nurses into giving him cookies. With that face of his that says, "Look at me! I'm cute! Feeeeed me!!" It's his defense mechanism... it's all he's got. And he was apparently doing okay, since they did not feel the need to drug him at all.

Thor was scheduled for surgery at 7:30 this morning. I got a call from the neurosurgeon's office at 7:45. The resident immediately told me that Thor was doing just fine (he knew we were worried about him getting worse), relaxing, and getting lots of cookies (of course). But, his surgery was being postponed since the surgeon is home sick. They will do the surgery tomorrow morning, assuming the surgeon is out of bed by then. But they will keep him happy (read: full of cookies), and comfortable until then. I told him to make sure I didn't have a fat puppy when I picked him up.

It's been emotionally trying. And now we have to wait another day. So, please continue to send the Dog of Thunder your good juju. He's using all his charm to keep himself content.

Poor broken puppy, part II

Well, it's confirmed. My poor broken puppy is truly broken. Six hours at the puppy neurologist/neurosurgeon on Friday, and an MRI* later and the vet showed me that Thor has a ruptured disk in his neck - the C6-C7 disk to be exact. What does this mean? It means that tomorrow evening, Turg and I drop him off at the puppy neurosurgeon and early Wednesday morning he has surgery. Then a few days of recovery, and then home, where I'm sure there will be weeks more of recovery.

The whole day Friday was extremely emotionally trying. Knowing that surgery is really the only option, there is nothing to do but to say that we can do all we can. Because if we do nothing, he will get worse.

Send happy juju to the puppy.

*I'll post pictures later of post-MRI shaven puppy. But here's the image - Thor with shaven wrists, looking like he has chicken legs and wearing Sherpa booties.

Poor broken puppy

Thor does not like stairs. He really doesn't. He's never liked stairs, but he's gotten used to (most of) them over the years. Thor does not have good traction on hardwood floors... he mostly bounces or bucks like a bronco and slides into place. Put those things together, and what do you get? Broken puppy.

Last Tuesday, Thor was trying excitedly to get up the 3 wood steps in our foyer to the living room. He didn't make it. He slipped, slid, Turg tried to catch him, and then tumbled to the floor. Then, the next day, we noticed that he started limping. So, we did what we normally do, and have him a couple of baby aspirin to bring down the inflammation. It didn't work. He limped more. Turg took him to the vet on Saturday, and got some anti-inflammatories and pain-killers (with opiates) to keep him calm. He seemed to be getting better, slowly.

He wasn't. It was masking things, but things started to get worse. Last night he was dragging his feet behind him. Walk walk draag. Walk walk slip. It was really hard to watch. We took him to the vet again to get x-rays this morning. The vet said the problem appeared to be neurological and not orthopedic, since he was getting worse.

So tomorrow, I am bringing him to the doggie neurologist (right? who knew) to get a work-up. Apparently, this doggie neurologist said that he's not surprised given the symptoms and the breed. Hopefully, that means that the treatment will not be bad.

Thing is, Thor is not allowed to have any food after midnight tonight. Which means he will not be having breakfast tomorrow morning. His appointment is at noon. That means I will be driving in the car with broken, grumpy, hungry, whiney puppy tomorrow. We'll see how it goes.

My poor puppy.

Bizarro-World

Since Turg and I got engaged, my Dad has slowly but surely been getting used to the idea of the fact that Turg's not going anywhere. For a bit of background, my Dad has pretty much spent the last nearly 12 years doing everything in his power to deny that Turg existed. I would try talking to him about Turg, and be ignored. Turg would try talking to him, (you know, general pleasantries, like "how are you?") and would be answered with nothing more than a grunt. But we got engaged, and I got the generic Dad response of "Good luck to you."

Then Turg had hernia surgery. Ever since then, Dad has been incredibly concerned about Turg's well being - constantly asking how he's doing and if he's taking it easy, etc. Flash forward to this past weekend, Father's Day, watching TV:

Dad (thoughtfully): (Turg)'s a nice guy.
Me (cocking head like a puppy): *blink blink* Er?
Dad: Don't be too hard on him...

WHAT?!?! Don't be too hard on him?? I felt like I was in Bizarro-World, where no means yes and everyday is opposite day.

Under water

I am so busy that I am barely keeping afloat.

*gurgle*

Age (In)appropriate

This is a real conversation I had at Best Buy during lunch today:

Me: *places Super Smash Brothers Brawl on the checkout* Good Afternoon.
BB Checkout Guy: Er, um. Shouldn't you be in school by now?
Me: *raises eyebrow* Excuse me? You're kidding right?
BBCG: No, really.
Me: How old, exactly, do you think I am?
BBCG: I don't know, 17? 18?
Me: Are you serious? Try doubling that.
BBCG: I don't know, man. I'm just sayin'...

Okay, the Checkout Guy was CLEARLY younger than I. Was it the fact that I was purchasing a video game in the middle of the day? The lack of the full make-up on this rainy day? I know I look youngish, but I have not been pegged as a teenager since I was in my 20's. Generally, people are about -3 to 5 years from my real age - it's the Chinese genes. Seriously, though, 17 or 18? I'm not sure if I should be complimented or insulted.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Just feeling a bit overwhelmed. Okay. I'm done.

Happy Belated Birthday Magenta!

I know. I suck. Your birthday was Friday, and I was not near a computer to post this. I'm sorry. Do you forgive me? Are you rocking out with your new guitar? I thought so. Keep rockin' till I get there to rock with you.

holy crap the icicles are going to fall and stab you in the heart and kill you!

If that happens, can I take a sick day?

**Picture of super-icicles on our roof courtesy of Turg.**

Quote of the week

"Quicken has taken all of my transactions at Krispy Kreme and has automatically categorized them as Medical." -- Magenta Sequins

Pain in the ... gut

her-ni-a –noun. Pathology. the protrusion of an organ or tissue through an opening in its surrounding walls, esp. in the abdominal region.

Turg has a couple, which, because of the stresses of moving, and lifting heavy (and not so heavy) boxes, got worse. And he is going into surgery today to get them fixed. It's been a pretty bad couple of weeks, and seems that since the pain started, it's only gotten progressively worse.

The surgery is ambulatory, which means that he'll be coming home this evening, if all goes well. Then he'll be down for a week or so. So, if you're out there on the interweb and are reading this, send some good juju his way for a good surgery and speedy recovery.

Total timesuck

aka shameless thievery from CawfeeGuy:



I like it cuz I think it actually looks like me... well, maybe not the midsection.

'tis the modern age, and I am blogging on jury duty

Seriously. Montgomery County actually has WiFi in the jury lounge. They even have some computers available for those who did not bring a laptop. This is a far cry from the last 2 times I served on jury duty (once in NYC and once in Baltimore County). Previously, all I was allowed was a book. No cell phones. No electronic equipment. Even Walkmen (Walkmans?) were frowned upon, since you may miss being called.

But, today, I have my laptop. I have my cell phone. I have some work. I have a book. I have my iPod. I guess it won't be horrible...

Happy 2009. Everything is nuts

Yes yes. Promises promises. I know. I've been saying that I would tell the story of our appraisal limbo, our settlement craziness, and finally, and most importantly, the acquisition of our house. I promised. And I will keep it. It's just been so crazy since before Christmas... We have not stopped.

We are packing. And packing. And spending boat loads of money on electronics. And packing more. But at the same time, I have work - including 5 documents due in the next week. So I've been more than a little busy. But moving day is Monday (YAY!!). And we will have FiOS by the end of next weekend.

Once the dust settles a little, I'll tell the full story. Promise.

WE HAVE A HOUSE!