for sb

A few months ago, as a fundraiser for the local animal shelter, the lovely Heather Jahn offered a free photo along with a mini photo shoot for your pet. We are total suckers and took Grover because it is near impossible for us to get pictures of him. (Black dog=bad lighting)
Here is the result:







Isn't he the cutest thing you've ever seen? Even if he is a total bratface half the time!

all the waiting

this is the interior courtyard picture from the realtor. the garage is below this and faces the street.
basically the reason i've been quiet, besides not having anything interesting to say, is because of all the business going down over the purchase of our (town)house. on friday, after accepting the sellers' counter-offer just before christmas, they accepted our remedy requests, which were pretty limited considering the number of piddly things found on inspection. now we're just waiting for the bank's appraisal and funding and closing is set for february 26. less than 7 weeks from now. i guess we'd better start packing everything we don't use daily. yay! our own washer and dryer, our own garage, dishwasher, deck, 2 bedrooms and 1 1/2 bath! it's like i'm/we're grown-up!

home/wedding trip pt ii

we left off at wednesday night & safely arriving at my parents' house. i took grover out to pee and play with nikki. nikki is almost 3 and a black lab. my mom likes to joke that she's so open-minded because she has two black grandchildren. a little later in the morning, while s was still sleeping, dad had me get on the trailer and go for a ride with the puppies.


mom made us waffles for brunch and then we had to go get fitted for our dresses. she had hers made by a seamstress who graduated hs the year before me and had just 'eloped' with her bf, who used to be my brother's best friend when they were kids, exactly one week before. my bridesmaid's dress was disgustingly tight, but then i'd ordered a 12. sara managed to get it zipped up (hey, working in theatre, you can get anyone into their costume). she said she'd let it out as much as possible, so i could hopefully breathe.
s & i went to eat a late lunch around 2pm at homesteaders', a place i insisted on eating in hopes that they had their divine wheatberry salad on the salad bar. sadly, all they had was something like glorified rice only with acini de pepe (sic?). it was still tasty & i introduced s to knephla soup. yum!
i'll try to cut this boring stuff short. we hit the mall to look for shorts for s & a supportive undergarment so i could squeeze into the dress. more family time after that, including making bars for the rehearsal dinner the next night.
friday i helped my aunt (pronounced aw-nt, not ant) make her famous beans. s's family calls them calico beans & they flew off the table that night. the giant crockpot was completely empty. s & i went to see 'the time traveler's wife' in the early afternoon to get some alone time. it wasn't too bad, but i don't know how anyone who hadn't read the book to follow the story.
i'll finish up this dull account with the rehearsal and wedding day tomorrow.

new 'do

grover got a haircut today. i think i prefer the puppy cut (all one length) to his new scottie pattern. he looks like too much of a grownup and he's still my baby! i wonder if this is how new parents feel?

before


(grover & his friend sprocket)



after





the groomer wanted to know if we'd like to stud him once before we get him altered. he's scheduled for his alteration on the 31st, so we'd have to postpone that. he said that grover has a good personality. grover is kindof a brat (that's why we call him monster), but he's just a baby & the groomer told us he's pretty good and will become an even-tempered dog when he grows up & would make good puppies from what he saw today & he's been a groomer for 20 years. (but he's just a puppy himself!) i don't really know how i feel about that. i already feel guilty for buying from a breeder and not getting a rescue dog (next dog will be a rescue whether it's from a specific breed or a 'mutt') we'll have to have a serious discussion in the next couple of weeks.

on my way!

i've now ordered some cards for blogher to pass out in case anyone wants my details. guess i'd better get to it and start blogging some more substance.



i'm extremely excited and anxious at the same time! for now, i'll just anticipate the long holiday weekend, so i don't worry myself sick.

guilty reality

last night we had to wait for the cops to arrive and tow the car that was parked on the street directly in front of s's driveway. (as you can see, the green car has its tires on both sides of the driveway. the idgit must've thought what a perfect spot on the street with plenty of room! still wish i could've seen their expression when they returned to find their car missing.)

as a result, we couldn't go get our fast food fish sammiches (friday/lent & all). after 2 hours, the parking cop finally showed; he was the only one on duty & had four more stops after ours. luckily the tow truck arrived soon after & s went to pick up our mesa pizza instead. eggplant (parm with mozz & red peppers) & half spinach feta tomato pizza.

at that point it was 8.30pm and s was due to head to role playing. we were still watching torchwood season 1 when he found out one of his friends was unexpectedly ill. we continued watching the last of season 1 & turned our sights to 'regular' tv. in the course of channel surfing, i landed on bravo & some bizarre show 'millionaire matchmaker'. now, reality tv is one of my least favourite things & s hates it even more. one of my few enjoyments in that genre is 'the amazing race' & s will concede that it isn't too terrible. oh, and most of the food network shows ('ace of cakes' & co.) aren't that bad.

anyway, this millionaire show is a total trainwreck. neither of us could turn away. i tried to, but s wouldn't let me. there's this tranny-looking yenta (she's stated she's a 3rd generation matchmaker) in la with scarily enhanced lips & quite the attitude. her other coworkers include a goth girl with purple bangs & the coo is a mohawked goth guy. the two clients on this episode were a creepy 38 year old millionaire self-styled playboy whose dream date would start with a massage at a spa & end with taking his girl to rodeo drive for some shopping (even though he stated he didn't like shopping, but knew women loved it-thanks generalization) & a shy 34 year old internet entrepreuner who was incredibly awkward with conversation. both guys were jewish, so they were looking for a nice jewish girl. unfortunately, most of the ladies who came in for interviews for a private party weren't jewish, which enraged patti, the matchmaker. eventually, the private party to introduce the girls to the millionaires went over fairly well with a nice mix of girls, shiksa or otherwise.

creepy dude & shy guy both picked the same (christian) girl as their first choice, but she picked the shy, super-cute one rather than than mr. comes-on-too-strong. it seemed he really couldn't get over the i'm paying for an outfit to get a chick into bed on the first date, overly sexual conversation & he did not take any of the (pushy, but true) advice of patti to tone it down. no wonder he said he hadn't been in a relationship in 6 or 7 years.

i cannot relay enough how we could not turn away, despite how terribly voyeuristic it felt. i'm afraid we may have to watch another episode.

photo advise

i have tons of pictures from trips overseas, mostly in 2000 & 2001, for school that i never put into photo albums. now i'm wondering what the best way to get them scanned/online without a scanner is. do places like cvs do that for you? i really want to get them on a zip drive or similar format.
any techies out there have suggestions? also, it'd be great if it's not too expensive either.

puppeeeey!!!

we looked at a puppy tonight at pet central. omg! he's so adorable, 6 weeks old male apricot toy poodle. filled out an adoption application. i'm not sure i'm ready to be a pet parent, but s & i are considering it. there are other people who also want francois, so we'll see. we'd both like a bigger dog if it were more feasible living in town/apartments, but all dogs are cute & deserve a loving home.
here

busy day

yesterday was the busy day i'd been anticipating for almost 2 months. at noon i went to the salon to see danielle, my aveda lady. i've only been to her a total of three times in the last year (december 2007 for a style after my hospital stay, april/may for a cut before m & t's wedding & now december again). she agreed to the fact that i'd been butchered at my last cut at the hair college & vowed to fix it. we'll have to wait until next time to do anything different because she repaired the damage done by the student cutter.
(as soon as i'm on my own computer i'll post a pic)
after that i met s at his place & walked downtown (sans s) to see my friend's booth at 'what a load of craft 5!' a bad@ss craft show in one of the bars. she makes dresses, mostly with vintage fabric & patterns or no pattern at all. she's totally talented. i hung out & got to see her first sale (in less than 2 hours of setting up!), which was exciting.
then, back to hang at the house for an hour until we left for cr & the roughriders game. technically, we got there halfway through the 2nd period of the iowa v. iowa state game. it was pretty passive & we just sat at the top of the rink to watch since it was mostly empty. we hit up cici's pizza for the buffet, just like last year in the blizzard, even though it was just the two of us. their garlic cheese bread bites are delish! and back to the rink with plenty of time to catch the big show. the roughriders were playing the fargo force, which made it hard for me to decide who to root for, but s agreed that fargo was playing much better defense. we quietly cheered them on while surrounded by rabid roughriders fans & some 6 to 7 year old boys at their first hockey game sat behind us asking questions. we also spent part of the game watching an adorable 16 month old baby one row over who was completely enjoying herself & turned out to be the daughter of one of s's nerdy gamer friends.
all in all, it was a good day & we ended the evening by watching the second & third episode (which i hadn't seen & was sooo good!) of pushing daisies. ridiculous that such a good show has been cancelled.

the hazards of moving

i can't imagine what it'll be like to move my 6+ years of crap whenever i end up moving out of my apartment. last year when i helped s move i nearly lost one of my toes by dropping a piece of his desk on it. this is what happened last wednesday when helping move the new kitchen table (8' long with all 3 leaves in it)

i managed to jam the table legs right into my ankle. good times. i'm such a klutz.

flood pics 2

flood photos

that's s on the right & pfc(?) rubio guarding one of the buildings by burlington st bridge
burlington st headed east
the water on the east side of burlington st bridge
iowa avenue from the old capital balcony
close-up of iowa ave