Hello! This is gonna be fast because it’s past my bedtime–and ask Jim, I’m very serious about my bedtime–but before that, I’m gonna sum up the week, just so I don’t forget. So, since the last post:
Jim and I celebrated our first wedding anniversary. We both got each other books, in keeping with it being the “paper” anniversary and all, and I also got Jim this recipe shaker from Target.
We also went to The Hideout for our anniversary. Sadly, they’re not as good as they used to be. Seriously, only two types of soup? What the…? Next year, it’ll be Red Lobster. Or O’Charley’s. I love O’Charley’s.
Speaking of going out to eat, Jim’s dad and step-mom also took us out for dinner for our anniversary. I wasn’t expecting that, but I wasn’t complaining either!
I’m almost completely done with season 8 of Buffy, which is the comics, for those not in the know. I’m enjoying them, but they’re definitely not as good as the show. And some of the things that have happened…wow. Gag. And huh. And tear. No spoilers here, though, especially since Jim isn’t caught up.
We had a pot luck at work because one of our co-workers got custody of her grandson. Yay for that! And also, yay for food!
I started on Jim’s amigurumi kobold. I’m not very far, and I’m kind of making it up as I go along. Here’s hoping it isn’t terrible, since amigurumi is still pretty new to me.
Friday night, I joined Jim’s Spelljammer game. My character is a level 5 half-orc cleric whose god is Wee Jas. I took domains in Death and Magic. As expected, it was a little awkward, since I’m not very social and all, but it was okay. Hopefully, I’ll be of some use to the group.
On that note, I’ve been trying to think of ways to access my spell list more quickly. When I played Natalia in the “Homebrewed” campaign, I vowed that I would use notecards in the future, so this time, I had just about all the spells that my cleric was capable of casting written down on 3×5 cards. I used all the cards and went through three pens, even.
Guess what? I don’t think they’re going to work. They were great for the magic items I had in the last game, but for a 3rd edition game, it’s becoming clear that the notecards are way too cumbersome for an entire spell list. There are just too many freakin’ spells. Ideally, I would have a tablet or a small laptop, but I have neither of those things. (Well, I do have the laptop I’m writing on, but this laptop is too big and would probably just overheat in the middle of using it anyway.) But I have another idea that I think is going to work. Once I’m done, I’ll let ya know.
That’s all for now. Seriously, it’s time for bed. Good night!
A few weeks ago, that’s what I told Phil several times: “I used to be a nice person.” Phil tried to tell me that I’ve always been nice to him, but I stand by what I said. I’m not as nice as I used to be, not since my divorce and getting stabbed in the back by both my ex-husband and a girl that I thought was my best friend. And I always blamed the fact that I was nice for that situation. In many ways, I brought it upon myself. There were things I figured out and noticed but was too nice to say.
Things have changed. My theories have changed. Being nice is usually just not saying stuff you’re thinking. Now, if I’m good friends with someone, they’re getting what I think. And it’s not always nice. But, still, the people I choose to say stuff around are people I know who won’t go repeating it.
I may not be as nice as I used to be, but I still don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings.
Which brings me to last night. If you told me five years ago, this would be the scene in my living room, this would be my reaction, I would have been surprised at my future self.
Here’s what happened: Jim and I went on a drive, which means he started talking about gaming, which means we always start talking about relationships with gamers, and, of course, the stereotype that most gamers hook up with other gamers because nobody outside of the gaming community would ever date them.
No, it’s not true in all cases. But it does have truth in others.
Anyway, Jim talked about one such girl where the stereotype did hold true. He couldn’t figure out why anyone would date her, as she was neither attractive nor nice. Apparently, she must have been really unattractive because Jim suddenly really wanted me to see a picture of her, just to show me what he had meant.
We broke out Google. Didn’t help much, as Jim couldn’t remember the girl’s real name, so he tried searching for her character’s name. Unfortunately, she doesn’t appear to be playing that character anymore, so we just kept pulling up pictures of some female wrestler instead.
One thing led to another. And, because I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings–this blog is public, and you never know who is going to stumble upon it–I’ll leave out names and try to be kinda vague. But what Googling that one girl did was lead us into trying to Google for pictures of Jim’s old gaming group, just because he wanted me to see pictures of some of his old friends–and even enemies, in some cases.
In the end, we ended up at the Flickr page of one of the girls of his old group, a girl Jim thought might have had pictures of the old gaming crew, who, incidentally, is a girl that Jim used to like when he was younger. “I thought she was so hot,” he had told me before. It sounded like he had it pretty bad for her–for a short time, at least.
We pulled up her Flickr page, looking to see if she had old gaming pictures, but I caught sight of more recent pictures. “Wait. Is that the girl?”
Jim glanced at the profile picture, which appeared to be an older picture. I couldn’t really tell much from that picture because it was so small. “That’s her, up there,” he said. Then he glanced down at the more recent picture I had found. He stared. “Oh, my gooood…Oh my god. Yeah. That’s her.”
And then my reaction, the one that would have surprised the old me, the reaction that isn’t nice, but it is honest:
I pointed at the laptop.
I started laughing.
I started laughing so hard that I almost cried.
Jim just stared at the screen. “Wow. She’s gained weight. She is not aging well.”
“She looks like a sausage stuffed in a doily!” I gasped. “That’s the girl you thought was so hot?” To be fair, while Jim seemed to think she had gotten chubby, I didn’t think she was particularly overweight. She just didn’t look like she had a shape, and she was wearing this clingy dress that wasn’t flattering. Could just be the dress, though.
Also, if I wore that dress, I would look like a sausage in a doily too. The difference is that I know better than to wear a dress like that.
Then I started feeling bad about my reaction. I didn’t mean to have that reaction, though. It’s just you expect someone to look one way and when they look the complete opposite…Well, it just came out. And poor Jim was still staring at the computer, looking almost scared–which just made the whole scene funnier to me. “She aged horribly,” he kept saying. “Oh, my god. It’s like she gained a bunch of weight just under her CHIN. She looks BAD.”
And then I started howling with laughter. “You wanted to hit that!”
Jim, of course, got defensive, claiming she didn’t always look like that. We did find older pictures from when he knew her, where she looked less frightening, but still–she was never what anyone would call pretty. Jim looked kind of embarrassed when he realized that she was never exactly what he remembered her to be. “In my defense, I was, like, 18. I would have made a go at a table leg, if I thought I had a chance.”
It just goes to show that both love and lust are blind.
Afterward, I felt a little bad about it. At first, I thought it was because because the girl could be nice, for all I know, and she could be someone that I might have liked. (Then I remembered stories Jim told about her. Nevermind. She certainly didn’t sound nice. At all.) I think I feel more bad about the look of horror on Jim’s face when he saw the pictures. I didn’t mean to embarrass him. But let’s be honest–not nice, mind you, but honest: Don’t most of us look at people we’ve been with or liked in the past and cringe? Don’t most of us look back and say to ourselves What the hell was I thinking?
I’ve offered to show Jim some of the guys I’ve been with before him. One of them is downright ugly. Unlike Jim, though, I never deluded myself into thinking he was good-looking. But the dark can make anyone look better, right? And I had a thought:
Somewhere out there, someone has probably thought the same thing about me.
And you know what? I’m okay with that. As long as I don’t have to hear about it, I hope they’re having a good laugh! Life’s too damn short to be nice all the time.
This week was a good week. Another niece had a baby. Went to Jim’s family reunion. We were the most recently married, so we won a peppermill with different kinds of pepper to be used in it. Awesome! I’ve always wanted a peppermill. Went to Jim’s mom’s to see his aunt and cousin. Got belated birthday giftcards, one to Chili’s and the other to Houlihan’s.
Jim and I have already planned on using one of those this weekend. Oh my god, I’ve missed eating out.
A really wonderful thing that we got was from Jim’s aunt. It was a belated wedding present–a check. A check, might I add, that covered the rest of Jim’s school books (we couldn’t afford to get them all) and will pay for his calculator for his math class, too. HUGE WEIGHT off our shoulders, let me tell you. Now the extra money I’ve been making from overtime will be shoved over into savings to save up for new tires instead.
Jim and I have been noticeably less stressed since we got that. Someone is getting a thank you card.
What else? I’ve been cooking a lot. Cookies, pancakes, bread, and brownies–all from scratch, no boxes here! Cheaper to make it yourself. Besides, I miss cooking. Know what I miss even more? A big kitchen to cook in. But at least I have an appreciative husband to eat all this stuff.
Oh, yeah, something I’ve failed to mention: Jim is off the Chantix–he’s been a non-smoker for over two months–but he is now eating a ton. It may sound odd, but it makes me happy. I always hated that I could actually outeat him. Now I can’t keep up.
That’s not the only appetite of his that’s gone up. BOW-BOW-CHIKA-CHIKA-BOW-BOW. (That’s supposed to be porn music, not a weird puppy chow jingle or something.) Needless to say, we’ve been a very happy couple lately.
And you know what was a really nice way to end a really nice week? This link, posted by my friend Paul on his Tumblr. He has to know that I’m going to totally repost an article called “10 Badass Women from Fantasy Literature,” ESPECIALLY when, right at the top, it features one of my favorites from Game of Thrones, Arya Stark.
One could argue that Arya is a little girl, not a woman. I’d like to see how well you argue with Needle up your nose.
Anyway, this reminded me that I had been thinking about writing my own list of my favorite women in sci-fi/fantasy for a while now. (Hm, that seems like a very Paul-like thing to do. Maybe he’s a bad influence on me!) I’ve never written it, though, because it would be hard to do a top 10 or anything like that. I mean, I could come up with ten favorites just from Babylon 5 and Buffy the Vampire Slayer alone.
Still…someday.
But not tonight. Tonight is for sleeping. Tomorrow is for overtime.
This week may have been good, but I didn’t say it was done.
I am beyond stressed. Getting s’mores at work today didn’t even help.
Oh, yeah, we TOTALLY got s’mores. My job can be so awesome sometimes.
But still. Stress! There’s the recent stuff, of course, that I’ve dwelt on enough and don’t feel like dwelling on anymore. Unfortunately, the doctors keep me dwelling on stuff by having me come into the office to check to make sure those pregnancy hormones are going down after the miscarriage. Initially, my levels were something like 1400, and by Monday, they dropped to 400. Weirdly enough, if I took a pregnancy test right now, it would probably still come up positive.
Yeah. Weird. But since the levels are still not around the 0 mark, I’ve got to come back in a couple of weeks to get blood drawn again.
Anyway, leaving early the last two days = make up time today, which is just time over that is straight pay and not overtime pay. I HATE THAT. I like my overtime money. I like it a lot.
But back to stress. Today was just a bad day at work, s’mores be damned. I learned a new workflow that I thought would net me more closures, but then they turned around and said we couldn’t use it. The tech who told me was so bummed about it, she needed one of my Jolly Ranchers to cheer her up, heh. Apparently, the s’mores didn’t cut it for her, either.
And then Jim kept texting me because he was freaking out. He was trying to get signed up for fall classes and found out that he’s not eligible for financial aid this year. I’m not surprised; I warned him that once we got married and they figured in my income, he probably wouldn’t be eligible because I “make too much money.” HAHAHA. Anyway, that wasn’t shocking, but they turned around and told him they “wouldn’t do” government loans either. Huh? What the hell?
Oh, and by the way, they told him, the money is due tomorrow.
I was pretty pissed about this. When Jim submitted everything, the e-mail he got said that the financial aid office was supposed to get ahold of him if they needed anything else. They did need other stuff. They did not get ahold of him. And they were only now telling him this because he went down there to ask them about it, and they were telling him the day before the due date. And it was looking like he wasn’t going to be able to go to school for the fall.
So, Jim was freaking out. I tried to reassure him by telling him that he could just dedicate himself to writing until the spring semester. He kept texting me, though, and it was freaking me out because I know that Jim hates that he’s not working, and the only thing that has been keeping him sane was knowing he’d be in school full time soon, and that going to school does, in fact, contribute to our household’s future. I worried another six months of no work and no school would drive him into depression.
But then he told me that his dad paid for it. His dad is telling him that we’ll only owe him half the money, since he helped pay Jim’s siblings’ college.
But…new stress. I hate borrowing money. This is especially how I did not want to start my marriage–borrowing money from my father-in-law. So now I feel compelled to pull even more overtime to get that paid off ASAP. Jim tells me not to kill myself over it, but…I don’t know…Jim’s mine to take care of now, ya know? MINE.
And then there’ s stress that comes with the fact that Jim and I are fighting more than usual. Even though I know it’s been totally the clash between the pregnancy hormones and the Chantix, it still sucks. Luckily, Jim will be done with the Chantix in about a month, so that should help a lot. And, of course, my pregnancy hormones are dropping. I should be back to “sane” level fairly soon.
But I had to admit something else entirely that had been bugging me for a while to Jim last night. Jim has one big hobby, one thing he loves that keeps him going these days: Warhammer 40K.
And I hate Warhammer 40K.
There. I admit it. And I do. I’m not even sure why. I’ve tried to like it. I listen to Jim talk about his games. I listen to strategies. I look at how he’s painting his little army guys and how he’s adding modifications to them. They’re very cool.
But I hate them. I hate Jim’s little army guys. I think they’re boring. I think they’re cocky-looking little assholes that are overpriced and suck up too much of Jim’s time and energy. I hate hearing about the guys that Jim plays with. Some of them are complete dicks, and about what? Because they have no legitimate lives, so they can dedicate themselves to the stupidest hobby on the planet?
Ugh.
Jim is a good husband–a little too good at times–and immediately offered to quit playing. Which, of course, is dumb. Why do guys tell you they want you to talk about how you feel about something, and when you do, they automatically go into “fix-it” mode? Do that, and I won’t say anything again! Just because I hate Warhammer doesn’t mean that Jim should quit his favorite hobby. That’s dumb. It’s just how I feel about it; it doesn’t mean it’s right or logical or anything.
Really, where it’s getting to me is that I’ve been trying to fit in my overtime around this gaming schedule, and I’m getting resentful of it. When I have to pull a couple of insanely long days just to make sure I get off work as early as possible on other days for these stupid little army guys that I don’t even think are interesting, I get a little annoyed.
So I think Jim and I have agreed that I’m not going to try to “fit in” my overtime around the gaming anymore. The overtime comes first. We’ve got bills to pay. Still, I’ll try not to pull the nearly 11 hour days on his gaming days. I’m not a complete asshole. But Jim’s going to the comic book store an hour later than he usually would have isn’t gonna kill him, either.
Here’s hoping that’s the case, anyway.
One day I’m gonna write a happy post again. I really am.
Everyone keeps asking me how married life is going. Usually, I answer, “I haven’t screwed it up yet!” Then they laugh and walk away.
Here is the truth: Married life, so far, is so awesome and amazing, it’s beyond words.
I know what you’re thinking. I’ve only been married two weeks, right? Well, I will have you know that with my first marriage, I knew something was wrong within the first week. By five months, I was already considering divorce. But I hated the idea of divorce, so I pushed on. I pushed on for twelve freakin’ years.
Just a note: It’s probably not a good idea to marry to someone that you hadn’t seen in seven months because he joined the military. Military is good about giving you discipline and all that, but it does change you. By the time I realized this, it was too late. I was married to a man that I no longer knew.
But forget all that. That’s old stuff. The other night, I started to tell Jim about how I had been worried, but everything is different with this marriage–this is what marriage is supposed to be. I was about to say more, but he stopped me. “I know it’s different,” he said, smiling. “I’ve never seen you so happy. It’s very reassuring.”
I’m hoping the first couple of weeks are an indicator of things to come.
Speaking of being happy, this reminds me of Melme’s last post. She mentions that currently, she lacks the desire or energy to do anything she usually enjoys, and I joked about it being depression because I was like that through most of my adult life. It is one of the signs of depression. I don’t think that’s Melme’s case–I hope it isn’t–but I know it was in mine. And I realized the other day, I must be happier because now I want to do EVERYTHING. Now, I want to do so many things that I don’t have time to do. I remember several years back, moaning on my Myspace that I had lost interest in all my old crafting interests, but it wasn’t like I had replaced them with new interests. I simply wasn’t interested in anything.
But now? I just tried writing out my current obsessions, and it got so confusing, that I’m going to have to put them in a list format for readability:
Crocheting the Lego Pirate Ship blanket. This one, believe it or not, is actually nearing the final stages. IT IS HUGE.
I just started knitting a scarf. Hello, knitting, how I’ve missed you! How this project came about: We have something called a “DAP” at work, which is a personal goal. We will be rated on it, and it will count towards our yearly review. They said it can be anything; our company wants to emphasize the importance on self-improvement of any kind, and that can be outside of work. In fact, they encouraged it being personal. Some people chose weight loss; many chose to read more books; me, I said that I have a hard time completing projects, so I wanted my DAP to be to complete 5 scarves by the end of the year. Then, I’ll donate them to charity. People seem to think my DAP is a cool one, and I cannot lie: I’m exited about it.
All things related to A Song of Ice and Fire series. I’m finding it harder to put the books down. I’m still only on A Clash of Kings, but when Phil was over, I kept sneaking away to read it. (Well, I also snuck away for a nap. I’m not very sneaky; Jim and Phil knew exactly what I was doing.) I’ve also become a huge fan of the subsequent HBO series, Game of Thrones. I’m loud enough about it that I got an IM from a co-worker the other day, asking me about it–and have managed to convert him into a fan too.
Learning to sew. I can’t sew, but I do have Sewing for Dummies that I keep flipping through, while eyeing my unused sewing machine, trying to figure out how that monster works. I already know I want some nice, heavy curtains for my bedroom. Also, sometimes, I sneak and watch sewing videos. I think I’m good at sneaking about this–I’m pretty sure Jim has no idea.
Cross-stitching. I WILL conquer the shaky hands and the permanent blur in the left eye! I WILL.
Websites! Ah, an old love of mine. The problem? I don’t have the software I used to have to create images. (I used to have Dreamweaver for actually creating websites, but I don’t need that–I can code by hand, even though it’s been a while.) I really want to update the look of this blog. Also, Jim and I have an itch to take my other URL, chaoticspring.com, and do some stuff with it. Except for that, we’ll need some contributers who are good at writing genre fiction. We already have a couple people in mind.
Getting back to writing. Not unrelated to the last bullet point. I don’t know how well I would do at genre fiction. Heck, I don’t know how well I’d do at writing. I’ve always been complimented on my writing, but my stories were always just me working through my own issues. (Unsurprisingly, I wrote a lot about women in unhappy marriages, heh.) But now, I’m SO happy, I’m stuck. And I don’t know if I have what it takes to write anything other than literary fiction. But I want to try.
Gaming. Okay, more Jim’s thing than mine. But his and Karac’s Marvel game recently (and abruptly) ended, so Jim has mentioned to me that he would like to run a Deadlands game–and he wants me in it. And, honestly, it wouldn’t hurt for me to be a little more social, get to know my new husband’s friends better. Jim’s shooting for the fall, I think, but this time, I’d like to actually flip through the books prior to the game starting so I have an idea what it’s all about.
I also woke up thinking about how I needed to finish leveling Alsana to 85…and how I would like to try my hand at Jim’s XBox games. But you see how, with the size of this list, and the mandatory overtime we’ve had all week (including a divisional Saturday yesterday), I haven’t had time to do much with any of them.
Speaking of having no time, I really need to get this day started. It’s already after 10. I’m sure Jim would like to be up by now, and I really need to do laundry at some point, too. Preferably, before Game of Thrones!
By the way, if anyone else is looking for a short series to lap up, I highly recommend Joss Whedon’s Dollhouse. Oh my god. OH MY GOD.
So, we’re back. We got back yesterday. No, we don’t have to be back at work/school until Monday, but we decided to come back a little early because while Branson is fun, by Wednesday, we were a little Bransoned out. Also, we were just plain homesick. One of the last stops we made before hitting the road was a used bookstore called Calvin’s Used Books. It turns out that Calvin is the bookstore owner’s cat, who immediately yowled at us when we walked through the door. We gave him pats on the head, looked around–and there was a LOT to look at, sooo many books–and visited the cat before we left.
Me: This makes me miss our cats.
Jim: Me, too. Let’s go home.
So we did.
Let me rewind from Saturday, since that’s where I left you all at. Our wedding wasn’t until 4 in the afternoon. It was wonderful and small and intimate, which is exactly what we wanted. Also, Jim’s mother dressed up her house a bit:
Lori's dining room, dressed up for our wedding.
We actually didn’t ask for any decorations; this was all Lori’s idea. And it was a good one. While I’ve posted the photos (that, admittedly, I swiped from Lori’s Facebook) on my newly created Picasa account, I’m not going to post them all here. Just this one because…well, you get the gist:
We got the giggles.
Someone on Facebook commented that this was their favorite picture of us. I have to agree. I got the giggles during the ceremony, not so much because of nerves, but because I could hear my little nephew Seth playing upstairs, which we were standing next to. While the minister read all the good stuff about vows and being with each other through thick and thin and death do us part, I could hear Seth’s little voice saying things like “Oh!” and “Look at that!” and “Mommy. MOMMY!”
It was awesome, and I wouldn’t have had it any other way.
So, Saturday was the wedding and food and cake. Jim and I went to the Hampton Inn in Carbondale, where I had booked us a room with a king-sized bed and a hot tub. We check in, go up to our room–and immediately, we see that there’s a problem.
Two queens, regular tub. WTF?
Go back downstairs, show them our confirmation from when I booked the room online several weeks ago. For some reason, although ours says “king” and “hot tub” all over it, they’re showing a standard room in their system. They apologize profusely and offer the room they’ve given us for free. It’s not a hot tub, but hey–I like free. We took it.
The next day, we headed out to St. Louis to go to the zoo. This is about when we realized that we had forgotten both of our digital cameras. Oh, well. It was alternating between a drizzle and a light rain, which is the best time to go to the zoo. You don’t get too hot, and there are no lines! Yup, we just breezed right through that penguin house. So THAT was nice, especially since the last time we were there, we never got to see it because–you guessed it–the line was crazy-long.
We drove about an hour outside of St. Louis, towards Branson, before we stopped for the night. This room had a king-sized bed, which was AWESOME. Funny how I didn’t really care about bed sizes until I slept on that king. Now I’m looking at my full-sized bed all wistfully. Admittedly, though, we’re going to have to upgrade the bed at some point. I bought the full-sized bed back in my single days, and it IS a little crowded for two people at times.
So, anyway, we had a huge bed, huge room, huge flatscreen, and we watched Game of Thrones. I’m seeing more changes from the book, which I do expect. After all, TV format is different than book format, so you do have to allow for that. They’re keeping pretty close, though, which makes me happy. So we watched that, then just happened to flip over to the news. I wanted to turn on the stuff about the royal wedding, as Jim’s always been interested in the royal family. Also, I think it’s cool that Prince William got married the day before us. But then, we saw this:
Our mouths dropped at this one. Jim and I were just talking about Osama bin Laden a few weeks ago. Jim was wondering how anyone could not find “an eight-foot tall man on dialysis” and was hoping they’d find him soon. And–well, there you go! It was like a wedding present from the White House. Thank you, White House!
Monday, we were in Branson. Normally, this would be a good time to post photos. But, as I’ve mentioned, we forgot our cameras. Later, we did buy some disposable ones, but we still didn’t take that many pictures of it. (Although I do have one of Jim “strangling” Edward from Twilight at the wax museum that I’m dying to have developed.)
Needless to say, this part went off without a hitch. Went to the Branson tourism place, picked up our tickets and motel room stuff. We have time before check-in, so, being nerds that we are, we start our honeymoon in Branson at the bookstore. Well, a really BIG bookstore. It was awesome. Next, we go to the motel, get checked in. Panic when we don’t find ashtrays (Jim’s a smoker), call the front desk, they confirm that it IS a smoking room (yay!) and bring down ashtrays.
We unpack. We nap. We get up, go to the first show, which is one with Chinese acrobats. We have amazing seats–second row. The entire time, I’m worried one of them will hurt themselves–or possibly fall into my lap.
“Don’t worry,” Jim says, “they’re teeny-tiny people.”
Needless to say, my time during that show was spent on the verge of a heart attack. It was awesome, though, and Jim surprised me in our room afterwards with a little teapot he had bought me.
Tiny teapot. Picture taken from my cell phone.
The show for the next night was the Hamner Barber Variety Show. Again, we had the amazing luck of seats in the second row. Jim and I both grew up loving magic shows, and although I’m not as into them as much now, Jim was still very excited to see a professional magic show. The only problem is that they do a lot of pulling people from the audience to be on stage, and since I was in the second row, I spent that show in a perpetual state of fear, terrified I was going to be pulled onstage. (Thankfully, I wasn’t.) During the halftime, Jim bought a deck of cards, got them signed, and confirmed something we suspected by the music: One if not both of those guys are Highlander fans.
For those not in the know, Jim is a HUGE Highlander fan. I guess some people used to call him Highlander Jim back in the day.
Anyway, those were the two shows we had picked. While we were in Branson, we went to a Ripley’s Believe It or Not, the dinosaur museum/haunted house (odd combo if I ever saw one), the wax museum (that’s where a bulk of our pictures were taken), and this haunted ride next to the wax museum, which was probably my favorite. You got 3D glasses and a gun (fake, obviously) to shoot monsters with!
Wednesday, we headed out to Silver Dollar City. Jim was excited; I, admittedly, was not. Weird because I used to love amusement parks, but now…I’m just not interested. To me, it’s just paying a lot of money to mostly stand in lines. But Jim really wanted to go, so we headed out there, parked the car, took the little train thing to the gates, looked at the prices–and turned right back around.
Yup. Even Jim couldn’t justify spending $120 just on tickets alone. Plus, although we hadn’t run into any lines at all during our stay in Branson, we could see that this wouldn’t be the case in Silver Dollar City, thus proving my point that we would just mostly be standing in lines with a bunch of screaming kids. We left. Jim was disappointed. I tried to think of other things we could do. Jim had wanted to take me to the Titanic Museum, but after spending a minimum of $40 on everything else–all things that I didn’t think were worth the $40 price tag–plus the minimum of $50 for eating out everyday, I put my foot down. Yes, I did want to see the Titanic Museum, but NOT for what they were probably going to charge me.
Jim complained. “But EVERYthing we’ve seen here was for ME. We haven’t done anything for you.”
“I’m with you. I’m good.”
“Spring, this was the ONLY thing that you showed any interest in–”
“And you know what they’re going to tell me? It was a big boat, it hit an iceberg, and it sank. I’m not paying $40 for that. Let’s go.”
New wife = 1 point; new husband = 0. We left. But Jim was wrong, by the way. I also had my eye on the Victorian Village shopping mall, and that turned out to be a bust, too. It was mostly just realty and crap like that.
So Jim, ever the wonderful man that he is, decides that he’s going to take me out for Indian food because, as we all know, it’s my most favorite cuisine EVER. He punches some stuff in Barb–er, Barb is our GPS, by the way–and she tells us that the nearest place is in Arkansas.
So he drives me there, all the way to Arkansas, a good hour and a half from where we’re at. The place we found had AWESOME atmosphere–and only served some Indian food during lunch. Other than that, they mostly just sold burgers.
Turned around, drove another hour and a half back to Branson, where Jim fumes most of the way, angry because he’s trying very hard to do something just for me, and nothing seems to be working. We finally settle on a fast-food Italian place. I’m grateful. One thing bad about Branson is that they’re not exactly vegetarian friendly. Most of the places we ate at were steak and/or chicken places. I had baked potatoes three meals in a row; the other meal was a salad. So the lasagna was a welcome change.
At that point, though, we had decided that Wednesday was a bust. Screw Wednesday. We went back to the motel and read books, ate candy, and napped some more. And you guys want to know a secret? That’s all I really wanted to do, anyway.
And then on Thursday, as you know, our last visit was the bookstore. Funny how we began and ended our honeymoon in Branson at the bookstore, heh.
Anyway, I’m home now…and starving. And I need to drop our marriage license off at the courthouse, see what I need to do to get my name changed over. Since last night, I’ve been going into accounts, changing my name and my e-mail address. There are just SO MANY. Every time I think I have them all, I remember another account I need to update.
But it does need to be done, and soon. Especially since we have checks with my new name on them. Oh, and guess what? You know that huge credit card bill that has been haunting me for several years now? The one that I had told Jim that if we ever paid it off, he could quit his job and go to school full time? Well, we got MORE than enough to pay that thing off in full!
So without further ado…I think I’ll get started on my new life, thanks!
Well, this is it. This should be my last post as a single woman–well, single according to IRS standards–before running off into the sunset and getting hitched tomorrow. Next time I post, I’ll be a happily married woman.
I’m feeling oddly mellow right now. I think I’ve been flying so high all day that I’m finally crashing. And today was long. Although it didn’t start off that way: When I first walked into work, I had the lovely surprise of a decorated desk (oh my god, I WISH I had thought to take pictures, my co-worker Lori did a gorgeous job), along with gifts, a card, money, balloons, and cake. THAT, I did take pictures of:
A miniature wedding cake, made by my co-worker Tori.
Cake in the box, ready to head out to be eaten!
One of our co-workers, Tori, has a cake business on the side, and I had heard that she was really good, but damn. I had no idea. This thing is probably barely a foot high, if even that. I didn’t even know you could make wedding cakes that small, but there you have it. As you can see, I couldn’t bring myself to cut it, probably much to my co-workers’ displeasure. But, hey, Lori had brought cupcakes, so if they wanted something sweet, they could eat that.
So, as you can imagine, the morning flew. People kept stopping by my desk to admire the decorations and cake and to congratulate me, I kept finding more and more little things they had left me on my desk (little rose petal soaps, bath salts), then later several of them came by with the balloons and a graphic novel Bible (they knew Jim and I both like comic books), so before I knew it, because I was paying so little attention to the time, an hour and a half had gone by.
But then, I tried to settle into work. That’s when the day started to drag. I kept looking at the time. Everyone was complaining how slow the day was going, and then they’d say, “Wow, bet it feels REALLY long for you, huh?”
YES, OMG, YES, IT DOES.
But here I am now, at home. Jim’s out with his friends with the aforementioned cake. Because a couple of his friends won’t be able to make the wedding (all on the account us being too broke to afford a bigger wedding where we could invite people other than non-immediate family), I felt bad that they’d be missing out on cake. So there they go–cake. I asked Jim to try to save me a small piece if he could, but if he can’t…well, I’ll just be happy that his friends are getting high-quality stuff.
So, yeah, Jim’s out with the guys, with games, food, booze, and a miniature wedding cake, and I’m relaxing at home. I was going to clean, but as it turns out, I’m really tired. And happy. And excited. And all I want to do right now is take a nap.
And if this isn’t my day to do what I want, when is?
Yesterday was busy. I woke up at 5:50 am, went to Phil’s and Shannon’s to pick Shannon up, so we could go to work to do overtime. I feel a little guilty because she was planning to work until 1 and I had to leave at noon, which meant Phil still had to pick her up. Sorry Phil–but I had to leave at 12 after finding out that we had to be at Jim’s mom’s for pictures at 2.
Luckily, the 5 hours of overtime flew by, and before I knew it, I was flying out of my work’s parking lot to stop by Walmart. Yup, the day of the wedding, and we still hadn’t gotten Wendy and Nathan anything. I was betting that Jim hadn’t thought about it, either. In fact, I remember thinking I would have bet money that he was playing video games at that very moment.
Went inside, picked up a card and a Walmart giftcard. At first, I balked at the idea, thinking it seemed tacky, but they never signed up for a registry. Usually, when people don’t sign up for a registry, it’s because they don’t need stuff. But everyone needs money. Initially, I was just going to write a check, but then I wasn’t sure which name Wendy would be going by. (Although, judging by how they announced them at the wedding, I assume she’s going the traditional route and changing it to Bressner.) So I opted with the Walmart giftcard because 1) Walmart is cheap, so you get more for your money, and one thing I have learned about Jim’s sister is that she’s all about getting a bargain, 2) Walmart is near where they live, and, most of all 3) there are lots of different things at Walmart, more than just housewares. They can get movies, groceries, or, hell, since Nathan likes hunting, they can even go to that section of the store.
Or maybe I should write that as THAT SECTION. Make it all ominous-like, since it can be kinda creepy if you’re a vegetarian and you tend to avoid that section, heh.
So I get everything, get home. I’m crabby. I cannot lie. Anytime before Jim and I go to these things, I get in a bad mood. I hate social events, but no, I’m not even about to opt to miss Jim’s sister’s wedding. TOO BIG of a deal. Plus, I like Wendy and Nathan. They’re good people. They also remind me, as a couple, a little of Jim and myself. Both Jim and his sister are loud, attention-getting type of people. Nathan and I are much quieter, a good balance to the Stearns siblings, I think, although I daresay Nathan is friendlier than myself. (Although, if you know me, that’s not saying much. I’m not particularly friendly. I tend to get lost in my own thoughts and completely forget that, you know, there’s six billion people in the world around me and that sometimes, I should at least say hi to one of them.)
But I digress. I’m totally right about Jim playing video games when I get home. Instantly, I’m resentful that I’m the one thinking about ironing clothes and picking up stuff while he plays games. I kick off my shoes and hurry off into the kitchen to make him some eggs. He insists that I don’t have to. This, however, is one thing that does not make me crabby. As a whole, I like cooking for Jim. I like taking care of my man. I don’t care if that doesn’t fit with my mostly feminist mindset. I enjoy what I enjoy, and when you have a good man that actively appreciates all the little things you do for him, it does make it better, fun even.
Aside: I’m not the only one in this relationship that enjoys doing things for the other. Jim gives it right back to me. Behold, what I found on the coffee pot Saturday morning before I left for work. (It might be a little blurry because I took these on my cell phone):
Notes on the coffee pot
"I'm a coffee pot. Much like Jim, I'm ready to go whenever; all you need to do is turn me on with a touch."
"<-Hint"
If you’re wondering about the black bars that I’ve inserted on the card by the button, that’s because I discovered just now that Jim had drawn a lewd picture on it! I’m sure you can imagine.
Anyway, I cook scrambled eggs for Jim, complete with salsa and cheese, his favorite of late, discover there’s not enough eggs for myself, so I make myself the microwave lasagna Jim had bought me earlier in the week. Then we get ready. I chastise Jim for not ironing his pants only to find out that the pants I stayed up late to iron the night before? Yeah…they were the wrong pants.
I didn’t discover that I had ironed the wrong pants until about 10 minutes before we had to be out the door. Despite Jim’s protests, I hurriedly try to iron them. Guess what? Our iron is total junk. Jim swears he’ll buy me a new one. Whatev. We gotta go. Who cares if I’m a little wrinkly looking? Everyone will be looking at the bride anyway. Score!
Get to Jim’s mom’s house. This is the first time I get to meet Jim’s step-brother, Jason. I think I just kind of stopped and stared at him for a moment because he looked so familiar, but I couldn’t place him. I was thinking, Who is this guy that looks like Rob [Jim's other brother] but isn’t Rob?
Jason, that’s who. Anyway, in the 2+ years Jim and I have been dating, I had never met Jason because he lives in Italy. And, like most of Jim’s family, he is very friendly and outgoing. I caught him telling stories to other people, complete with dramatic arm movements, quick to make everyone laugh. Yup…he and Jim are from the same family all right.
We walk down to the lake to take pictures. All the times I’ve been to Jim’s mom’s house, I’ve never noticed that there was a lake nearby. We take pictures. I’m horrified that I actually have to be in a couple, although (thankfully), not too many. There was one picture where Jim and I had to kneel in front of everyone else. Before I could plant my knee in the grass, Jim grabbed it. “It’s muddy, baby,” he said. “Be careful.” And he held my knee during the pictures. Wendy’s bridesmaids awwwed over that, saying it was sweet that he would hold my knee so I wouldn’t get my pants dirty. I just smiled. Oh, girls. You’ve no idea, the amazingness of this man.
Still…I really hate having my picture taken. Jim’s in quite a few of them, and he looks pretty pained by it, too. We’re relieved when they’re done. But it’s only 3. The wedding isn’t until 6. What are we supposed to do for three hours?
Go home, that’s what. Jim and I go home. Gremlin is still freaking out over Jim. Oh, I didn’t mention that, did I? For some reason, Gremlin was acting afraid of Jim–very suddenly. It seemed to have started not long after Jim got dressed up. This would be in keeping with Gremlin’s past track record. If Jim changes into a different jacket than what he normally wears, it freaks Gremlin out. Oddly, this doesn’t happen with me. Jim only.
Jim, by the way, seemed pretty bummed that Gremlin wouldn’t let Jim near him. Instead of pestering the cat further, though, he took solace on shooting things in Borderlands.
After a bit, I picked us up some dinner (Long John Silver’s for Jim, Subway for me), and we headed to Carterville, where his sister’s wedding was. They were smart. The ceremony was combined with the reception, so we were immediately seated at the tables where we’d also be eating. And the decorations were really cute, too: Lemons piled high in glass jars on the tables (a nice, cheaper alternative to flowers) and these things:
I don’t know what those are called; I just remember all the other girls in third grade doing them. I never learned how. But what’s cute is that they had all these little trivia questions about Nathan and Wendy on them, like Where was Nathan’s and Wendy’s first kiss?, and you could lift the flap to get the answer.
The answer, by the way, was in someone else’s driveway. Funny. Our first kiss was in someone else’s driveway, too, heh. Well, kinda. He lived there with roommates.
Anyway. Jim and I sat with Jim’s grandpa, his cousins Jada and Nora, and his aunt Lynn. The actual ceremony was kept short and sweet. Jim’s brother Dan officiated the wedding. The mic cut out in the middle of it, so he yelled the rest. It was funny. And if you know the Stearns…well, loud works for them, ha.
Jim’s grandpa ate the entire time. That was also funny.
Photographers also kept coming over to tell us that they had been “requested” to take our picture, so we had to keep getting up and getting our pictures taken. That was not so funny. I absolutely hate getting my picture taken.
The rest of the wedding…well, it was a wedding. Jim decided he was ready to leave right about cake-cutting time. He tried to say goodbye to his mom, but she requested a dance. He told me, and I said okay, and he immediately thought I was mad. As much as I love Jim, by the way, this drives me nuts about him: He always assumes I’m mad. I’m honestly not mad nearly as often as he thinks I am. At that point, though, I had drunk three cups of punch, and if we weren’t going to leave then, I needed to find a bathroom, stat. So he goes off to dance with his mom, I go to the bathroom, and when he’s done, he can’t find me and assumes I was mad and went to the car.
Nope. Just really needed to pee. I’m not in a bad mood at all; in fact, I’m still chuckling over Jim’s grandpa. See, I had passed Jim’s grandpa on the way back in. He was pushing through the double doors, heading out. He had a plate full of fruit. And I was like, Oh my god, the man is still eating! “I never get these!” he tells me, grinning. Jim’s grandpa is just so cute. And, apparently, he has a great metabolism. I envy him.
I find Jim. He and I leave. And we take a drive, have a little talk. Because the wedding? It freaked us out. What freaked us out even more is how many people came up to us and “reminded” us that we were next, that ours was just around the corner, and what worried me is that I think people think it’s going to be like Wendy’s, and it’s just not. We don’t have the money to pull off what Wendy did. Furthermore, it’s not what we want. We want informal, we want it to be just a barbecue, we don’t want a lot of pictures, and we want less than 20 people there, total.
Which, of course, is a problem because I think a lot of people assume they’re coming in town next month for our wedding, but Jim and I realized a long time ago that if we go beyond his immediate family, even just one step out, the number immediately swells up to over 70. And it’s not like you can select a few favorite cousins here and there because then others get offended.
So, yeah. The cutoff is at immediate family. I’m not even inviting my immediate family who is out of town. Only my sister and her kids. Then we plan on inviting Phil and Shannon because they introduced us and Phil is Jim’s best friend, along with Karac because he’s Jim’s other best friend.
At any rate, after last night, Jim and I were seriously considering just going to the courthouse. At the wedding, even, Jim whispered to me Let’s not do all this. Let’s just run away.
Hm, tempting. All I’m saying is don’t be surprised by anything.
Good grief, will somebody make me wash the dishes already?
So. Hi. I feel better. Not 100%, but maybe 80%. Which is a B. Which is not A-quality as in excellent, but still, VERY GOOD, good enough for me to start hitting on Jim again and trying to lure him into the bedroom with my best, lecherous grins.
Of course, by the time we get in there, I’ve hacked up a couple of times and gone through a box of Kleenex and immediately pass out as soon as I crash onto the mattress. So, okay. That’s maybe not so sexy. I didn’t say advances on Jim were actually working.
But Jim and I are both doing better. Thank goodness because Friday, I sounded awful. Seriously, this is how it went down on Friday morning:
Co-worker 1: Hi, Spring.
Me [croaking]: Hello.
Co-worker 1 [eyes wide]: Oh, my.
Co-worker 2 [just appearing at her desk, so she hadn't heard me yet]: Well, good morning, Spring.
Me: Good morning.
Co-worker 2: WHAT is THAT?
Yeah, it was that bad.
For the first time since working there, I actually e-mailed my supervisor and asked to bow out of any phone duty that could come my way that day. I didn’t think I’d be put on anyway because it was Friday, so phones are slower, but I had also heard that the people we were supposed to be backing up had resumed their normal duties anyway, so the chances of me getting put on were that much slimmer. Still, I requested to not be put on, and my boss agreed to it.
The funny part, though, is that my supervisor also needed to give me my evaluation, but he wouldn’t come near me. Instead, he did it with me over the phone. Luckily, I didn’t have to do a whole lot of talking.
(My eval was really good, by the way. I’m pleased.)
Anyway, I felt better last night to demand–er, nicely ask–Jim to take me on a drive. First I had to make sure he was up to it, since he hasn’t been feeling well either, but thankfully, he did. I say “thankfully” because I was starting to get cabin fever.
I love our drives. I even love listening to Jim talk about his old games. Well, let me be honest: I have a love-hate thing for listening to his old games. I think I like it as long as we’re in the car and going. Depending on what mood I’m in, I don’t even mind hearing about some of the people he knows in them. If I’m in a good mood, I’ll just laugh (Oh, my god! That girl seriously cried and threw things when her character died? BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!) or if I’m a morally-superior mood, then I get all huffy (That’s really disgusting that that girl left her freakin’ HUSBAND for a 15 year old boy that she met while GAMING.) Honestly, the two moods are not mutually exclusive. Jim gets really confused.
By the way, I don’t think that last one actually happened. I exaggerate to make a point. But I exaggerate only a little. And my point? Jim used to know some people who border on freakin’ creepy. No wonder why he never wants to leave the house now, heh.
I think he ran into some the other day, actually. Well, okay, they weren’t the actual creeps. I think these were nice, normal people, but people who knew him back when Jim didn’t have standards and hung out with creeps habitually, heh. They told Jim about a game that they were running, told him he should join them sometime.
“And I was so happy,” Jim said, “because I finally could say I’m sorry, but I don’t do LARP anymore.”
I frowned. “Didn’t you quit that, like, a long time ago? Wasn’t that kind of a kid thing?”
“Yes, but it was nice to finally say out loud to someone else!” Jim laughed. “It was like this horrible thing, and I finally got to say I’m off that stuff now.”
Jim’s a funny guy. And if they are really nice people, he should probably keep in touch with them and do non-LARP things. Apparently, decent folk in southern Illinois can be hard to come by.
One thing that made me happy, though, during our driving and talking time, is that Jim says he misses our D&D game.
“It’s because of Phil, right?” I said. Because, seriously, this is Jim and Phil:
Okay, they really are not NEARLY that bad, but still. I’d bet money that if someone told Jim he could only keep one friend in his life (besides me) and drop all the others, Phil would be the one he’d keep. But Phil’s good people, so I approve.
“Well, I enjoy gaming with Phil, that’s true,” Jim admitted. “But that’s not what I meant. Our game is fun. And you seem to enjoy it. I like running it for you.”
“Even when you make me mad in the middle of it and I sulk?”
“Yup.”
“You DO realize that pretty much happens EVERY TIME you make me role-play, right? When you FORCE me to role-play, I feel put on the spot and then I get pissed at you about it.”
“I’ve noticed,” Jim said. ”And I’m good about not doing that to you too often.”
HA. HAHAHAHA. Whatever, Jim. Seriously, I like watching them role-play scenes, but I hate doing it myself. I explained to Jim that it was akin to having to give presentations in class. It FREAKS ME OUT.
Also, to put it out there: I get really crabby when I have to make a decision. I think I’ve decided just now that I actually want to start doing games with more people. My odds of getting “called on” are less.
Blah, what else is new? OH. My dad just sent me an e-mail to tell me he was making out his will and wanted to know if I would like to be “burdened” with their house. Eh? What about Mom? OMG, DAD, ARE YOU TAKING HER WITH YOU? I kid, but seriously, I don’t want to think about this. And I know I need to because…well…my daddy’s getting old. They told him he wouldn’t make it to 50 with the way his health is; now, he’s going on 67. Last time I saw him, he seemed much older. My dad was always a very quiet person, but when Jim and I went to visit him and Mom last May, he was talking up a storm, often repeating things he had just said. It worries me.
Okay, we’re not going to think about that. On a cheerier front, the weather has warmed up. It’s feeling very spring-like, and you know what’s gonna happen in the spring? I’m getting married to the most awesome man EVER, that’s what! And, no, we still haven’t done any preparing because we figure it’s going to be so casual anyway, but sometimes, I like to pretend that we’re going to end up doing something like this:
I didn’t want to leave things too long with that last depressing post up. I mean, don’t get me wrong. I’m not taking it down. It is what it is, and I’m not removing it. But I don’t want it to be the last thing up on my blog.
Things are okay, or as okay as they are right after a miscarriage. Jim and I were on edge, then we had a HUGE fight (the details of which are nobody’s business but our own), we made up, and oddly enough, things seem to be much less edgy now. We went to my doctor’s appointment on Tuesday where she confirmed that the pregnancy levels dropped significantly between the two times they drew blood. Before the miscarriage, it was over 200; on Christmas Eve, it was down to 80. It kinda hurt to hear it, even if I already knew.
I was surprised, though, that there was still any number greater than 0 after I lost the pregnancy. I guess it’s a slow process, your body going back to normal. Unfortunately, they’re going to keep drawing blood to monitor the levels until it gets to 5 or below. And yesterday, the nurse couldn’t draw my blood for the life of her, so she gave up and referred me to the hospital today to try again. As it turns out, if you’re too dehydrated (apparently, I was), it’s more difficult to draw blood. That’s what I get for guzzling coffee before my appointment. I was just trying to make it so I could pee in their little cup. D’oh!
At the appointment, after the doctor confirmed everything, she sat down and asked us if we had any questions. Jim and I were both pleasantly surprised. I don’t know if I mentioned this in the last post, but Jim didn’t like our doctor, so he was happy she at least acknowledged that we’d have questions. She asked us if we planned on trying again. Jim was all like, “DEFINITELY” and then gave me a look that made me think that if the doctor wasn’t in the room, he’d try knocking me up again right there on that table, heh. The doctor said that if we did try, we should wait at least one cycle.
I’m not exactly that keen on trying again right away. I’m not sure if this is a normal response, but I was wary of sex, even though the doctor said it would be okay. I think I was nervous partially because I didn’t want to get pregnant and possibly go through another miscarriage, and partially because my stomach was still a little sore. And poor Jim…well, he’s a healthy man. But he was starting to LEER at me. I was starting to feel like he was hiding around corners, about to pounce me. Life was starting to look a little like a Calvin and Hobbes comic strip:
POUNCE!
Yup, just like that. Except a lot less innocent–and a lot less hairballs.
Damn cats.
Anyway, I got over it. The sex-is-scary thing, that is. Jim can be pretty convincing.
