You Know What I'm Not Gonna Miss?

Car Payments. Two more to go and its over. Ha! Ha! Ha!

You Know What I Miss?

Being close enough to Little Caesars to indulge my Crazy Bread addiction anytime I want. They're down here, but they're not exactly close to me. Their pizza may be less than stellar, but I've yet to find another pizzeria with garlic bread done up the way they do it.

I miss side streets too. Those parallel streets you can take to get off the main road where everyone else is. There aren't a lot of them around here, so if you're stuck in traffic you are...stuck.

Happy Birthday to Me!

My odometer clicks onto the big 3-5 today. We're gonna go downtown and take a lake tour of the area. Should be fun. For the first time ever, I have no idea what I want as a gift. In the meantime, hubby got me an ice cream cake, ain't he sweet?

Oh Damn!

I saw my first palmetto bug (a.k.a. flying cockroach)today. He must have flew his happy ass in when we came back from our morning walk. Ewwwww! Oh well, he's dead now.

Moving Sucks Part Deux

It is June. We are back from our fabulous honeymoon in Tortola, Bermuda,St. Thomas, and St. John. Now are supposed to move ourselves, the dog and our things to Orlando. But we got problems. For one, I feel like beat down tired all the damn time. Nauseous too. Which renders me pretty useless. I rarely leave the couch. It has been over two months since I've had my period. Its not unusual for me to skip one and once in awhile I skip two months; but given the way I've been feeling I'm really starting to get suspicious. So I break down and go to CVS and pick up a pregnancy test. The kind where results are shown in words not symbols. No matter how long I stared at the tube, no matter how many times I shook it, it stayed the same. Dammit! Oh well, at least I know why I've been feeling so yucky.

We got one of those moving pods to be delivered to us in FL. Even it didn't hold all of our stuff and this is after we threw away plenty. So we will be leaving half of our things in the garage of our home that we're renting out. We set out for our journey on Saturday, June 9. Our tenants took occupancy on June 8, so we spent the night at Days Inn. Tim's F-150 is towing my Saturn so we have to be careful about turns and we're not supposed to exceed 55MPH. When we're leaving the motel, Tim drives around the back to exit. Unfortunately, we pick the one motel in the entire state that has one way in and out. So we tried backing up to turn around but our trailer always went in the opposite direction from the truck. Solution? We drove onto the grass that is on the side of the building. Thankfully, we timed this when two parking spaces had become free so we could drive on out. Sorry about the tire marks on the grass.

We think we're about ready to get on the highway when hubby noticed a tire looks to be low in air. He put air in it, but still it looked low. This tire is new! So we go to Belle Tire where we are informed that there is a nail in the tire. So we replace it. An hour and some change later, we get rolling. We made it as far as Frankfort, KY before crashing for the night at the Capitol Hotel where they were having fireworks in the park across the street.

Next stop, Chattanooga, TN. Did you know that the old train station where the Chattanooga Choo Choo railway departed from was purchased by Holiday Inn? Neither did we but that's where we stayed Sunday night; at the Chattanooga Choo Choo Holiday Inn. They even had some of the old railcars utilized as hotel rooms. We didn't sleep in one of those. Room service ended mad early at about 9 P.M. or something ridiculous like that.

Next stop, Gainesville, FL. There we found another Holiday Inn to crash in Monday evening. We found an Italian restaurant up the street to have dinner at. Unfortunately, my appetite wasn't cooperating so I barely made through half of my spaghetti and meatballs. We get back to our room and discovered that our phone wasn't working. We notified guest services. My guess is that the phone was repaired after we left.

Last stop, Winter Park, FL (suburban Orlando). Tuesday morning we head towards our new home which is now only 3 hours away. Did I mention that we'd made it all the way from Michigan to Georgia without paying a single toll. I-75 doesn't completely suck after all! However, once we got to Florida, that changed with the quickness. Drive, drive, drive. Toll, toll, toll. It wasn't always a flat rate either; sometimes you are charged per axle. Ouch. Anyhoo, it was early afternoon when we pulled into Winter Park. As we drove past the nicer neighborhoods we hoped our apartment complex would be located there. No such luck. As you get closer to leaving WP, you enter the apartment district where most apt. complexes are located. Its not bad, just not what we envisioned. But we're home! Next time we move, we are using a moving company. I've moved a bunch of times in my life and I am done being a do it yourselfer you hear me?

New York City!

We arrived back in NYC between 9 and 10 A.M. We went back to our hotel in Flushing's Chinatown district. After a nap, we took the #7 train to Manhattan, walked around, tried to see Fantasia in The Color Purple; got our feelings hurt again. It was sold out! So we took one of those Blue Line bus tours. It was great! We went through Manhattan, SoHo, NoHo, Bryant Park, Greenwich Village, Brooklyn. I saw parts of Brooklyn I'd never seen on my many trips to visit my cousins in my youth. When the tour was over, we got some pizza in Times Square before heading back to the hotel.

We waited for the subway,but for some reason, there was a delay. After waiting 20 minutes and seeing the crowd get larger and larger, we decide to take a cab back to the hotel.

While trying to hail a taxi, it starts raining. Tim got the idea to go to a hotel; so we came in through the back way strolled strolled through the lobby out the front door, and wouldn't you know it, a cab was right there. Sweet!

Tomorrow, we hit Rockerfeller Center and Central Park before flying home.

Bermuda

We arrived in Bermuda around 7am. We had a snorkeling excursion for most of the morning. This is my shot at being adventurous. Ha! I enjoyed the boat ride out to the diving area but getting into the water was something else. It was cold! The air temperature was about 72F so the water was considerably colder. Tim (hubby) had gone snorkeling before and doesn't mind the cold nearly as much as I do, so he tried to be helpful. I got ready to swim and my right fin flew off. Another attempt and the fin again the fin freed itself from my foot. I finally get my face in the water and what the hell?! I couldn't breathe. Yes I know you're supposed to breathe through the tube they give you but it wasn't happening. I wound up chilling on the nearby beach while many (not all)of the others snorkeled. The cool people who joined me on the beach were in agreement about the ridiculously cold water.

In the afternoon we went to Hamilton walked around and had lunch. It was just getting good when we had to get back to the ship.

There's more to discuss, but a girl is tired. I'm out.

All At Sea

Our ship, the Norwegian Spirit was supposed to leave at 4pm. We left around 5:10 or so. Our stateroom while nice is like a compressed hotel room. I had this vision of spacious suites...Not! The staff is amazing though. The food is delicious. You could eat yourself into a stupor if you're not careful.

Hopefully the spa, casino, lounge, pool, theater, live music are enough to keep me from freaking out about being surrounded by water for the next two days.

Who knew

Flushing,(Queens)had a Chinatown? Okay they did, but I sure didn't. That's where the Sheraton we're staying at is located. Lots of shops and restaurants but not a lot for us to do. Thankfully, the subway is around the block and takes us right to Times Square.

We had dinner at Bubba Gump's in Times Square; its the Forrest Gump themed restaurant. We were going to see The Color Purple since Fantasia is in the NYC production. Unfortunately, she wasn't performing that night. Good thing I caught that on the marquee before we forked over $116 per ticket. We saw Chicago instead. Joey Lawrence did a really good job as Billy Flynn.

Honeymoon Sweet

Tomorrow, we're leaving for NYC to start our honeymoon. We'll spend a day there before embarking on our Caribbean cruise to Bermuda, Tortola, and St. Thomas. We return on the 27th and we will spend Memorial Day in NYC before heading home. Can't wait!

Moving Sucks Part Un

Due to my not being proactive in the matter, and largely due to my now husband's pack rat tendencies, I'm just now moving my things out of my friends' house where I used to be a roommate. April 2006 I'd moved in with my friends in an effort to save money. A few weeks later I started dating one of the customers at the store I worked at. We'd been having friendly convos for several months during his visits. Long story short, we were living together in less than three months. My friends had been living with my things sans moi for about a year. So this meant a bunch of trips with the F-150 and a few with my sister's van when I finally gave in and asked for my parents assistance. I tried to reserve a moving truck but I guess two days notice was too short. Lesson learned. This is the one time I should've not been so concerned about money and just bit the bullet and gotten a moving company.

The lesson: Being frugal is one thing but being cheap costs you in the end.

I Did It!

I got married on the 14th. The wedding went off without a hitch. We walked down the aisle to Lost Without you by Robin Thicke which I predict will be used in a lot of peoples weddings. The recessional music was Blue Rondo A la Turk by Dave Brubeck. Hubby said he saw my dad shed a few tears which I didn't believe and blamed it on his allergies. Dad later confirmed what hubby saw though. How touching.

Some guests said I didn't smile much during the ceremony. That's because I was at work. I'm a non-Catholic in a Catholic ceremony and I was trying not to screw up. What the guests missed: Me and my lovely bridesmaids running around the church outside. There was no way for me to get from the back of the church to the front again without being seen for the start of the ceremony. So I went out the side door and my impatience made me run. It wasn't a cutesy run either; it was a sprint. It must've looked pretty funny to passersby.

We had wedding crashers (2) one of whom had the audacity to wear white. Technically, they were reception crashers. They'd been invited to the wedding only. Hubby looked up and asked if we'd sent them an invitation. I was like errr...no. Oh well we had a couple of no shows and the crashers got to eat the meals that we'd already paid for. Thank goodness we had an early wedding because I can't see myself partying into the night. I'm not 25 anymore. Somewhere between 25 and 30 my ability to hang had seriously diminished.

After spending the evening with my sister in law and my new niece at the movies, we arrived at our hotel room around 10pm. By midnight, we were toast.

Are We There Yet?

I want it to be over. Now. I'm starting to freak out because I'm about to be in the spotlight. I avoid being the center of attention like Grammys avoid LaToya Jackson.

As of yesterday, I have only seven weeks to go until I get married. I'm
supposed to be really excited but when I woke up yesterday morning, I
was really annoyed. Why? Because we still didn't have a photographer or
a limo company lined up and everything I've read from The Knot (wedding
mag), other guides to wedding planning, and various sources online;
said we needed to have done these things a few months ago.

There are two things working in our favor. Our ceremony is in the morning;
most photographers and limos get requested for afternoons and evenings.
We're not getting hitched during "high season" (May-September). After
expressing my angst about the situation, the fiance scored us a limo
reservation and we are going to interview a photographer tomorrow.

Shoot, I just got around to ordering this cake on Friday. Yellow and chocolate marble cake with standard issue buttercreme icing.



Early in the engagement before I went into Anti-Bride mode (translation: not wanting to do a damned thing wedding related), I actually considered getting a cake desinger. But I only eat cake twice a year, so how important is it to have a cake look like a castle or a stack of Tiffany's gift boxes? Seeing as I waited until almost the last minute to get one, its not very important at all.
I just got the shoes last weekend. Mom had an alloted budget of $100-$200. They were $29.99 marked down from $49.99 at a store called The Shoe Dept. Woo Hoo!

My Give a Damn's Busted

It is official. I no longer care about keeping the number of invitees on my wedding guest list to a minimum. Actually, its the reception that concerns me. A whole lot of people + food=some really broke newlyweds. That's an equation I'm not trying to complete. My dream guest list tops out at about 80 people. Unfortunately, I was up to 80 people before I even added my fiance's invitees. Then I said okay let's stop at 125. For awhile, it looked like this might actually happen. Then fiance remembered some more people. So 125 became 128. Another week goes by and he remembers three more people. I felt triumphant when I saw that 2 of the three new invitees were already on the list. I was like, "Nice try." Then yesterday, I invite two more people I'd forgotten about. Damn it!

You's A Fool

You're Weak, Pendejo

I thought I told you that we won't stop, I thought I told you that we won't stop...

Must have been the motto for Detroit Public Schools back in the day because they wouldn't close for anything. When kids in the burbs were getting a snow day, we were getting our boots on. I'd watch the news as the names of the lucky scrolled across the screen and DPS was rarely among them. They have gotten soft. Nowadays, school is closing if we got a bunch of snow like we did this week. Mind you, we didn't get clobbered upstate New York style. We just have regular ol' pain in the butt to drive in snow. Temperature below zero? Close the school. Now, I understand if your heating system failed. I'm talking "its too cold to send the kids out there", closings. Suck it up. The world is a cold hard place, so they might as well learn that now. Sometimes you gotta do things you don't like. That's life. Bundle up and go to class. I did.

Cold Chillin'

I. Hate. Winter. I live in Michigan, so I can count on winter coming every damn year. Winter was late this year though. From X-Mas well into January, it was spring jacket warm on most days. It was an aberration and I didn't care. Global warming be damned. However, nothing good comes without a price; winter has been making us pay for it every since third week of January. Punk.

Since its stupefyingly cold, I've gone into hermit mode. In fact, if I could arrange for my groceries to be brought to my house, a personal trainer to come to my house, and someone to do my banking for me, I wouldn't bother going outside until April. My honey has been coming up with ways to break up my self imposed house arrest. Take last night for example. Honey scored a reservation for us at Morton's Steakhouse. A 10 o'clock reservation. This means I gotta get off of my couch, (where I'd been resting warmly and comfortably all day) make myself cute (=freezer bait). Until this point, the highlight of our lover's holiday was me helping honey compile info for a paper for his economics class. Romantic, eh? Anywho, we head out to Morton's and even though honey is treating me to a night out, I'm muttering about the cold. I'm not unappreciative, I'm just sayin'...