my life in the city in pictures

In a thunderstorm earlier this summer, the tree in front of our house fell and totally blocked our staircase. I had to Rambo my way out to get to work in the morning.

You forget that somewhere in the Midwest can have a beach this nice. And yet, there it is. I defy you to look at Lake Michigan and not have at least a moment of thinking it's the ocean.

There were about a dozen of these tiny vintage cars parked all in a line downtown last week. No idea why.

Also in the "no idea why" category, someone threw these lovely flowers away in the garbage can outside my office building last week. Bad boyfriend trying to get back in good graces? I love that whoever threw them away did it bloom side up, though, so I could get a look.

Possibly the best dinner I've ever eaten...greek yogurt + honey + farmstand peaches, blueberries, and raspberries. Yummmm.

Shopping downtown, this couple holding hands made my heart melt.

I LOVE this series of ads for the aquarium. It really is magical.

vacation: all I ever wanted

The hubs and I are back from an extended long weekend in sunny San Francisco. Well, the sun was intermittent, but the fun was NON-STOP. I laid in the sun. I laughed until I couldn't breathe. I smelled the salt air. I wore a sweater and a scarf on the Fourth of July and was still cold. I ate some seriously amazing food and hung out with some seriously amazing people. All in all, it was a super-fun couple of days.

summertime chi...it's the good life

Summertime in Chicago is borderline magical. People are PSYCHED about the fact that it's summer (I guess that's what happens when you spend 8 months of the year in hibernation). One of the best things about living here in the summer---aside from the weather, and the patios (so many patios), and the beaches---is that people want to come visit you, which means you get to do all the touristy things you wanted to do anyway under the guise of being a good host. PLUS, you get to see all kinds of people you love without having to go anywhere. Seriously. Awesome.

The hubs and I are fortunate enough to have a place big enough to put up a fair number of people comfortably, and over the next couple of months we're going to have a bunch of people in and out and I couldn't be more excited about it.

The other thing the summertime has meant is that it's nice enough for me to run outside. I say "run" and what I really mean is "old man shuffle." You know what I mean. Where you're not really walking, but you're also going so slowly old ladies with walkers could be passing you. Anyway, despite my ridiculous pace, I've been pretty consistent about it over the last month and a half or so, and honestly, feeling really good. When I stop working out, I always forget how much better I feel when I am working out consistently. It's like it's good for me or some shit.

It's going to be so sad when fall comes. Ah, well. For now: it's the good life.

home alone

Yesterday I walked a mile and a half (each way!) and paid $5 for two cupcakes and a glass of milk from this adorable establishment, Sweet Mandy B's. It has, I can say with total confidence, the most delicious cupcakes in the world. Actually, the cupcakes are good, but it's the frosting that haunts my dreams. I got one carrot cake and one red velvet--which is to say, double the cream cheese frosting, please. I sat on the bench out front and ate the carrot cake one and drank the milk and brought the red velvet back for after dinner. It. Was. Glorious.

But also, this post is about how pathetic I am when left to my own devices. The hubs skipped town to go run some absurd distance in some other city, and I stayed home alone. I watched disgusting amounts of HGTV and subsist on cupcakes and goldfish. I'm pretty damn lucky to have him around most of the time to be sure I don't die wearing my ugly sweatpants, surrounded by what appear to be the remnants of a first grader's birthday party.

out of touch

I have never been the kind of person who's really good at staying in touch with people. There are a number of reasons why this is a flaw in my personality, but I'll skip over them to the punchline: I should stop it. It's a result of this flaw that I have very few people I keep in touch with from high school and college.

Keeping in touch is a weird thing anyway, in the Facebook Era. I mean, I know exactly what basically every member of my high school class is doing now--both in terms of their careers and education and families, and in terms of what they had for lunch or what color their bra is. (That is a whole different post, which will likely never get posted.) But do I actually speak to any of them? Basically no.

For a long time, I thought of this as thoughtful pruning. And, to some extent, I still do. I have no time in my life for people who aren't pretty awesome. Everybody has to deal with a number of not-that-awesome people every day--as part of our jobs, our commutes, our web-surfing, our grocery shopping, whatever the fuck it is we do all day--and I like to keep that to an absolute minimum. Seems fair. But what got thrown out with that bathwater are all the people that I really like but just somehow never made time for. Or people that I made time for at one point in my life and just stopped later because of distance or laziness.

So this is my resolution: to be a better friend. I'd even share a milkshake. Maybe. Probably not 3 ways, though. I take my ice cream more seriously than that.

best of 2009

Best trip: ROAD TRIP.

Best restaurant experience: Sprout. Seriously, best meal of my life.

Best book (fiction or non-fiction): Lolita.

Best night of the year: My wedding.

Best day of the year: Thomas's birthday- Portland, OR.

Wildest day of the year: St. Louis.

Best day of work: I didn't really "work" in 2009. So there's that.

Best challenge: bar exam. Is that a best? Ugh, it sort of doesn't feel like it.

Best place: Glacier National Park.

Best car ride: SF to Yosemite. "hey mom, I PASSED THE BAR."

Best learning experience: recession + crushing student loan debt = new lessons in attempted frugality.

Best gift: flowers and omelets October 11.

Best purchase of the year: does the road trip count as a purchase? does my J.D? assuming not, my favorite pair of jeans.

Best insight or ah-ha moment: If it's a business, it's going to operate like a business, no matter what else they try to tell you. Wait, that's too cynical. How about this: it's a big, beautiful world out there and I'm just lucky to be living in it. Yes, that's better.

Taken from my cuz, the incomparable EA.

Year in Review

2009 was, as predicted, a big year for me. I'm married. I'm no longer a student. I'm a lawyer. I live in Chicago. I'm renting a car tomorrow, and not paying any special underage fee.

Of course, things never go exactly as you imagine they will, and 2009 is no exception. I didn't start my job in September, like I expected to. So while I'm a lawyer, I still have yet to actually, you know, practice law. This means, among other things, I continue to live more or less like a student, only with even more credit card debt. It also means I don't own a home. I am right now less financially stable than I have ever been.

Also in 2009, I lost two of my grandparents. I don't know what to say about that, except that Christmas is always harder when you've recently lost someone. I miss them both very much.

Also unexpected was the amount of travel I got to do. I saw parts of this country I wasn't sure I'd ever see, and I got a better tan than I've had since I was a little kid who basically lived at the local swim club. I hiked in some of the most beautiful places on earth and I ate some of the most delicious foods and I fell in love with my husband all over again.

It's also been a transformative year for those around me. My husband left his job in financial services, likely never to return again. My dad started a new career as a teacher, and has hit a few bumps in that road. My mom was finally diagnosed with anemia, and, with treatment, has become a real person again. My sister graduated from college, moved to the big city, got smacked around by the economy, and is in the process of moving home again.

All in all, it's been a really important year with the happiest happies and the saddest sads. I think I'll look back on it sort of wistfully some day, but for right now, it sort of just makes my stomach hurt to think about. I hope 2010 is nothing like it.

In keeping with the spirit of last year's new year post, I will immortalize some resolutions, most of which will look familiar.

1. I will value my health, meaning I will eat mindfully and exercise. I will consider this an investment in my health rather than a means to weight-loss.
2. I will work hard at my career, including being committed to pro bono work, but I will also be fully present at home when I am at home. No matter how many hours I feel I have to bill, I will bill them and then stop thinking about them.
3. I will do a better job of showing the people in my life how much I love them and how important they are to me.
4. I will not bring "throwaway" items into my house. I will stop buying cheap crap which I will just have to replace soon anyway and instead save up to buy something more worthwhile, substantial, and lasting.

5. I will take control of my finances. I will not, out of fear or disinterest, let my husband or fate make my decisions for me. I will be fiscally responsible, save for my future and pay down our debts as quickly as possible, but still have a little fun.

I'm not sure what will become of this blog in 2010. Kate Gets a Job is far less interesting to me than whatever it is we've been doing here for the last 7 months.

getting to know you, getting to know all about you

One of the best things, but also the most overwhelming thing, about the move to a new, large city is that there's so much to do. I've bought both new copies of Time Out since we've been here, and read a few guidebooks and whatnot (because that's the kind of nerd I am) but basically haven't done anything of real interest. It turns out getting to know a city just takes time. I try to remind myself that the first time I moved away from home, to a mid-size city, it took me nearly a year to really figure the city out. To get a favorite burger place. To know the best Thursday night happy hour. To know how long it ought to take you to get from point A to point B. To have a place to take parents in town. To have a place to take broke, arty friends in town. To understand where the hell the freeway loop crosses the freeway. And that city was about 1/5 the size of Chicago. Sigh.

Part of why I think it's taking me longer this time around is because a lot of what there is to do here is actually....go to this place and eat. Go to this other place and drink. And while, lord knows, those are two of my most favorite activities, they're also bad for my health and my wallet. We have thus far been really good about cooking delicious and more or less healthy meals at home, and so I haven't been out to a ton of good places yet. Maybe when I'm working and thus have the cashflow to go out and no time to cook?


I actually cooked this. I did not take this photo, though. (Though mine did look about as good.) Photo and recipe courtesy Pioneer Woman.

Another part of why it's taking me longer than it feels like it ought to is because it's cold. I mean, like I said before, it's not yet inhumanly cold-cold. Still, 30 degrees makes it unpleasant to just stroll around the neighborhood for a few hours, which I was able to do when I lived here for 3 months two summers ago. Somehow it feels like I knew the city a lot better then...where did all that knowledge go?

Ugh, in the middle of writing this, I got another call from an Unknown number, which I (who knows why) answered. I am 90% convinced whomever had this number before me was a drug dealer, and 100%convinced that, even if he wasn't, he was into some kind of shady business. I will be sooo glad when people finally get the message that BUDDY NO LONGER HAS THIS NUMBER. (Seriously, Buddy?? Does it get more stereotypical than that?)

making a list

We're in!!! The hubs and I officially now live in the Windy City and have an amazing, mostly unpacked apartment. With cable! And internet! (Though, don't even get me started, that was an ordeal and a half. Why is it that no cable company is even close to decent? I used to think cell phone companies were the worst, but no, cable are far, far worse. I think it's because they all have these regional monopolies so they know, as pissed off as you get, it's them or the dish. AND THE DISH DOESN'T WORK WHEN IT RAINS. Your options are (1) deal with them or (2) no TV when it rains. Ugh, they both suck.)

Anyway, everyone is asking for my Christmas list, and I'm polishing the real list up, but I'm trying to be reasonable in what I ask for. If money were no object, though, here are a few silly things I'd want Santa to put under my tree...

Round trip airfare to the destination of my choice. Better yet, TWO tickets, so the hubs could come too. There are a zillion places I'd like to see, and right now I actually have time to do it, but being as we're currently unemployed, we're a bit cash-strapped.

Front-row seats to one of Lady Gaga's Chicago shows. Nosebleeds may or may not be on my "real" list...


Frye Billy boots in Vintage Grey. Aren't they lovely? Wouldn't they go with EVERYTHING? And last forever, even in the yucky Chicago winters?


A real cashmere sweater. Because it seems like the kind of thing a real lady in a cold climate has. And man are they soft.


A really nice rug. Our new apartment has lovely hardwood floors, but I need a rug for my little tootsies. In our last apartment, we bought a cheapie and it was....cheap. It did not make the move with us.

So, back to my real list wherein I ask for things like shampoo and picture frames because that is what my life has come to. I am basically 97 years old.

thankful

My dog got hit by a car, bounced about 10 feet off the bumper, and has NO DISCERNIBLE INJURIES. No wonder the damn dog doesn't have any fear of anything: she's indestructible. I am thankful for her continued existence and for her joie de vivre.

I'm at my grandmother's house, lounging, cooking, and prepping for Thanksgiving tomorrow. I am so thankful for my family. This holiday will be a bit bittersweet, because we can't help but feel the absence of my granddaddy, but I also am thankful to have the family that is here--and to have had the time with him that I did.

I am thankful to have great friends in my life. I am thankful especially for my dear friends Kurt and Jamie who are getting married Friday after TEN YEARS together, my dear friends Nick and Phil who are letting me stay in their apartment while they're away, and my dear friend Liz without whom I never would have made it to being a real live lawyer, and who is about to be our new roommate.

I am thankful to have my health. It's something I take too much for granted most days. My friend EJ had a heart attack last week at the age of 26. He's doing fine, but that combined with seeing my grandfather just before his death reminds me that I ought to more appreciate every miraculous thing my body can do. Run! Jump! Cook! Type! See! Smell! And good god, eat! I mean, just the blood coursing through my veins and the breath going in and out is pretty spectacular. I am thankful for that.

I am thankful to still have a job waiting for me, making way more money than any reasonable 25 year old makes. A lot has changed at the firm in the last year, and a lot has changed in the economy at large, and I am grateful for what I still have.

Also, (gross out alert) I am so, so thankful for my amazing husband. He's my my partner, my comic relief, my touchstone to sanity, and my best friend. I love you, Thomas. I'm sorry we have to spend this Thanksgiving apart. (As a bonus, the hubs comes with a fabulous in-laws package, for which I am also very thankful.)

I am thankful for so much this holiday. How spectacular is it that we have an entire holiday devoted just to eating and gratitude?

my cup runneth over

The hubs and I returned to our hometown last night and I haven't gotten out of my sweatpants since. While I'm sad that one of the most fun periods of my life is over, I'm also glad to not be on the road for a bit. I am trying to organize my thoughts about the trip in a coherent way, but sometimes words just fail.

The biggest thing I got out of the trip is just how VAST everything is. It's a big country I live in, and there are lots of big things to see in it. I could post a photo of the mountains we saw or the canyons we hiked here, but it wouldn't do it. You'd look at the photo, and think it was lovely, sure, but it can't capture how staggeringly BIG everything is. It's hard to look at the Yosemite Valley or the hoodoos of Bryce Canyon or any one of the other amazing natural wonders we saw and not think about how tiny we are in the grand scheme of creation.

The second thing I must do is say a big fat THANK YOU to the dozens of people who encouraged us to take this trip back when it was still just a twinkle in our eyes and helped us make it a reality. THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU to our lovely friends and family who hosted us along the way: Nick & Phil, Ross & Jessica, Rebecca & Kevin, Matthew, Erica & Dane, Elizabeth Ann, Tyler, and Coty. Thanks also to Brad & Wi who helped us get cheap hotel rooms, and of course to my lovely in laws who watched our ridiculous mutt for all this time.

Again, I have no words to say exactly how grateful I am to have had this opportunity, to have the friends and family I do, to have the husband I do. I am an insanely lucky lady and believe me, I know it.

So, as you have probably noticed, I've quit blogging the day to day stuff since the hubs is largely taking care of all of that. Bless him. So I'm sure if you're interested in what we're doing all this time, you're following his blog too. If you just come for the hilarious tone of my writing, well bless your little heart you sad, sad person.

I turned 25 in Vancouver last week. Actually, by this time it's been over a week. Anyway, here I am in my 25th year and still feeling a bit like a lost puppy. Not having a home or permanent address or knowing how to answer people when they ask you "where are you visiting from?" will do that to a girl, I guess.

It was a good birthday, but a bit hard for me. I take birthdays very seriously. I love them. As I've told a lot of people, I love birthdays. I love the idea that there's one day of the year where YOU are the special person. People you love and that love you call YOU to share their hope that YOU especially have a great day. They give YOU gifts to ensure your day will be great. I love my own birthday and I love other people's. I love going out to dinner and I love cards and I love cake and I love candles and I love how people try to act like they don't care but really they do. I just love it. And it's not all about presents (though who doesn't love a perfect gift?).

This year was the first time I've ever been away from all my friends and family (except the hubs of course) on my birthday. And because I was in Canada, anyone who wanted to call me was calling internationally and my phone was roaming, so I didn't answer and just let it go to voicemail. While voicemails are great, it isn't quite the same.

Also, the hubs and I agreed, due to our current financial status, that we'd skip presents this year. Since we share finances and basically this whole road trip is one big present to ourselves it made sense at the time. And with our mailing address up in the air, it meant I didn't get presents from my parents or sister, either.

I don't mean to sound ungrateful or whiny. Though maybe I am? I had a great day with perfect weather eating delicious food in a beautiful city with the man I love. And I loved it. All I'm saying is next year, I'm staying home, having all my friends over and answering the phone when my grandma calls, you know?


The other big milestone that's happened recently is that I FOUND OUT I PASSED THE BAR. This means that I am one swearing in ceremony (November 5! Mark your calendar!) away from being what I think I've wanted to be for an abnormally long time: a real live lawyer.

The bar admissions people had told us that results would be out "the first two weeks of October." Sure enough, when I awoke on October 1 in San Francisco, people had already started posting their positive results. Of course, I went to check the bar website. Which had crashed.

The site had also crashed last year and the board's answer to this was to "release results gradually," which is to say they planned to send emails to test-takers throughout the day in alphabetical order.

This was the first moment since getting all the annoying paperwork done that I regretted changing my name. My marriage changed my last name from a very respectable beginning of the alphabet name to a sad, lonely end of the alphabet one. My husband claims it's the middle, but I swear, it's the end. And this meant I would have to wait until the end of the day (more or less) to find out my results, even in the best of cases.

Of course, the best case scenario did not come to pass. As you can imagine, with you know, telephones and that great system of tubes we call the internets, people with names not at the beginning of the alphabet heard that people had started to get results and went to check their own. Roughly 3,000 people checking in the course of a few hours crashed the site. They somehow had not anticipated that people would hear results were out or that, upon hearing it, they'd want their own results?

Hey, maybe next year, you guys could just set up the server to handle the traffic I guarantee you'll get? Just a thought.

So this meant that, when I woke up in San Francisco, I knew results were out, but couldn't access them. The hubs, our friend Liz (who had taken the same bar as I had and is similarly alphabetically disadvantaged), and I had planned to leave for Yosemite that morning, where internet access would be harder to come by, so we dawdled for a bit before deciding just to leave anyway.

This was going to be a long day. How, when you know results are out but don't know your own, are you supposed to think about ANYTHING else? We made half-assed attempts at conversation for a bit, but mostly just waited. We were getting texts from a friend of Liz's telling us that some people had just started to get emails with their results right in the email (novel concept, eh?).

We drove for a few hours before stopping to buy groceries...and check results. They weren't out.

We kept driving. Kept trying to talk or think about ANYTHING other than whether or not Liz and I would be lawyers by the end of the day.

We stoppped again. No email. Liz's friend (god bless her) suggested we try the cached version of the bar website. Success! We were able to log in! Success! We both passed!

Both Liz and I were too excited/relieved to do anything but read the "We are pleased to inform you..." line and basically freaked out in a Starbucks in the middle of nowhere. We had to go back a few days later to check again (on the un-cached site) so we could make sure it was for real and actually read the letter (which included, among other things, the caveat that if we didn't get around to being sworn in in the next 4 years, our passage would be revoked. Who ARE these people for whom they have to make such crazy rules?).

Anyway...this post goes firmly under the label My Life Doesn't Suck. It will be an interesting winter trying to adjust from this absurd vacation lifestyle to having to, you know, work. A lot. BECAUSE I'M A LAWYER.

so much to say, so little time

The hubs did an admirable job summing up days two and three over at his blog, so I'll refrain.

On day 3, we began the camping leg of our trip, and as such were without access to electricity, much less wireless. Radio silence ensued.

I attempt to sum up the amazing things we've seen and done in the last 5 days sometime soon I hope, but for now, here it is by the numbers.

As of this morning...

States visited: 10
Days on the road: 8
PB&Js eaten: 6?
National Parks visited: 3
Number of bears seen within 12 feet of our car: 2
Bear jams*: 2
Audiobooks completed: 1.9
Showers taken, per person: 1

*bear jam (noun) a traffic jam caused by national park visitors spotting a bear and stopping to gawk; differentiate- bear jamboree

me and the hubs at the airport. my wallet still in the car, smile still on my face.


me after about 4 hours of our first Miami layover. boredom had set in.


the passport that took so much to get...note how lovely that passport photo is. the AAA woman said I wasn't allowed to smile, plus my face is nice and puffy after a day of sporadic crying. also, I hadn't showered. niiiice. I for some reason was unable to take a clear photo of it, but at least this way I didn't have to photoshop out my last name, I guess.


but this makes it all worth it: the view from our Cancun balcony.


more photos to come...

how are you feeling?

Things that actually happened in the last four days:

-While typing this, the very attractive young couple sitting behind me in the lobby (where the internet works) is playing verrrrrry bad R&B through their laptop speakers. Why do they think this is okay?

-I got a head cold. In the Caribbean. In August. Seriously.

-I discovered the wonder that is Easy Mac. How did I miss this in college?

-We went to see Chichen Itza. It was pretty spectacular, and as soon as I can post photos, I will.

-I got a bit tan!

But best of all...

-The Aquarobics instructor (a late-30sish Mexican man with an amazing accent) asked his class "how are you feeling?" When they responded with a half-hearted chorus of "okay/good" he chastised them. "NO! When I ask 'how are you feeling?' the answer is always 'SEXYSEXY!'" I mean, really. Now the hubs and I can't stop asking each other how we're doing, and trying to trick one another into saying something other than "SEXYSEXY" since that is obviously the right answer. Next time someone at work asks how you are, you know what to say.


P.S. the R&B couple left and were replaced by 4 people in their late 50s/early 60s, one of whom said that I "look young and intelligent" before asking me how to Skype. I had to tell them I'd never done it before, and they said they were going to try it. God, I really am so 2000 and late. These are the risks of being a late adopted of technology. You get passed up by people who are grandparents already. (I just heard them talking about their grandkids.)

I'm not crazy, I'm just a little unwell

(I tried to insert photos here, but the resort interwebs is too slow for that...when we get back to American soil, I'll edit this post to include photos.)

I remarked to my husband last week that we had just had about the best 5 day stretch in our hometown I’d had in a looong time, possibly ever. We had nothing we had to do. No holiday dinner marathons. No wedding planning appointments. No studying. Nothing. We visiting in a pretty leisurely fashion with our families (including my sister, who’s moving out of town; my Danda, who’s been “sprung” from the nursing home rehab place this week; both sets of parents; my uncle, who lives in town and yet I rarely see; and my cousin (his son), who went to college this week). Anyway, it was awesome. We went to the pool (working on those base tans, you know). We ate all our hometown favorite foods. We went to a baseball game—bought $5 tickets and watched first 7 or so innings in $40 seats and the last few (there were extras) in what I’m guessing were $100+ seats. I relaxed. Finally.

Then I started to pack for our tropical adventures. My lovely husband has already chronicled a bit of the debacle that was my passport situation, so I won’t relive it. I’m happy to report that I did indeed receive a valid US passport and got fairly little guff about the situation from our lovely US State Dept employees, despite needing a passport less than 24 hours before leaving the country for my own danged honeymoon. Special shout-outs in that situation to my aforementioned lovely husband for keeping me sane, MMC for putting me up and helping me navigate Detroit, the Detroit Westin for having such a totally comfortable lobby and not glancing twice at me though I hung out there for the better part of the day, and J.K. Rowling for writing a series of books I can read for hours at a time without totally zoning out or wishing I was dead (though I have often found myself this week thinking “if only I could do a summoning charm and summon my passport!” or “if only I could go back in time and see where past Kate put that passport!” or “if only I could apparate and be in Detroit already!”).

The passport office, by the way, is totally ridiculous. It’s like a very high-security DMV. You can’t call and you can’t drop in, but they have a waiting room set up for about 100 people and the whole time I was there, literally not a single person waiting. Also, they have about 13 windows (like bank-teller windows) and about four people working behind them, all but one seemingly playing solitaire.

As a complete aside, on the 4 hour drive to the Detroit area, I passed a semi which had written in the dirt on the back (you know, like some people will write “WASH ME” in the dirt) “I HONK 4 HOOTERS.” I thought it was pretty absurd, but you know…if you drive long enough, you’ll see some absurd stuff. But then, the driver actually honked at me! I can assure you I did not flash him. In fact, I was wearing a totally gross (crew neck) t-shirt and hunched over like I was, my gut sticks out more than my “hooters.” I had no idea it was possible to be sexually harassed while minding my own business, watching the road from my own car, but there you have it. It’s everywhere.

Anyway, the story of my being a total idiot most unfortunately does not end with the case of the missing passport. Let me back up and say I own two pairs of shorts that are decent to wear in public. I wear said shorts pretty frequently, and probably as a result, the hems had fallen out of them. So I dropped them off at the dry cleaners to be fixed and was supposed to pick them up Friday. Friday, of course, I was getting a passport, so you’ll understand when I say I didn’t get to it. So Saturday morning, my mom drives us to the airport and we stop on the way to pick them up. I pay for them—not too pricey. I’m very pleased with the work; they did a great job. I somehow manage to shove the shorts into my suitcase. We’re off to Cancun!

It’s not until we’re checking in I realize…I’ve shoved the shorts into my suitcase AND NOT MY WALLET. I took the wallet out to pay the dry cleaners and left it in my mom’s car. Yes, seriously. And my mom’s not answering her cell phone.

I mean, it’s not the end of the world. After the passport debacle, the hubs was put in sole custody of my shiny new passport, and he’s got a credit card and whatnot, so it really would have been fine. It’s just…seriously? Am I losing my mind? I really don’t feel quite like myself. I am a pretty together lady, generally. So why all of this? My husband and my mom blame the bar exam, and maybe that’s part of it, but part of me feels like I’ve been suuuper stressed out a lot over the last 6 or so months, and now I’m…not. Or at least shouldn’t be. Shouldn’t that free up lots of brain space to do things like, I don’t know, REMEMBER TO KEEP YOUR FUCKING HEAD ATTACHED TO YOUR STUPID NECK?!

In the end, we checked the bags and then waited to go through security. My mom was able to go all the way home, get the message that the wallet was left behind, find the wallet, and get back to the airport, all with lots of time left over for us to get to our flight.

All of these situations over the last couple of months (I did tell you all the bar exam seat voucher story, right? If not, I will.) have impressed upon me two equally important lessons: (1) I am never, ever to be bitchy to my mother or my sister for being such complete flakes. It’s genetic, and the second I have a snide thought about my mom forgetting her bag or my sister leaving her purse on the Metro, IT WILL KICK MY ASS. They are not kidding when they say karma’s a bitch. (2) I am seriously the luckiest person you have ever met in your danged life. I was able to sit for the bar exam (and arrived on time, no less). I got a passport and am currently headed to Mexico. I bought myself breakfast at the airport, using the credit card I took from my wallet. Also, my husband hasn’t left me yet.

I guess if you have to be stupid, lucky and stupid’s a pretty good combo.

excellent, totally

Danda and CWMM both are recovering as well or better than expected. So thank you. And YAAAAAAAAY!!!

So as I've alluded to, the hubs and I are experiencing a period now of "pre-retirement." My job has been deferred, meaning while I expected to start next month, I won't actually be starting until January. The hubs is leaving his job where we currently live (Our lease here is up next week, and we want to get the hell out of dodge ASAP. Never know when more waterballooners might strike.) and so we're...doing a lot of nothing.

This means this is the perfect time for our deferred honeymoon.

First up, as a result of two VERY generous wedding gifts: a week each in Cancun and Aruba. Yes, seriously. My life doesn't suck.

Then two weeks in our hometown followed by a marathon roadtrip--6 weeks staying with friends, camping, hiking, sight-seeing, book-reading, and mostly driving across this amazing country of ours. Again I say: our lives don't suck. In any case, I will slowly unveil the itinerary of the trip and plan to post as much as possible (including LOTS of photos) from the road.

So anyway, get psyched. Lord knows I am.