Monday, April 1, 2013

Countdown to Bridzillerie: The Third Installment and A Week's Countdown Begins!

Previously on the Count Down to Bridzillerie: Officiants were found beyond grueling passages through courthouse security and a long wait through trials of a different sort. Background checks were accomplished. Homes were viewed and cherry-picked. And many lorises quivered in the full morning zest of their beloved tamarins!



...8...
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... Revenge of the Loris and The Dawning of a New Age of Cohabitation in a Neat New House! So, any one who was moved by poor +Andrew Wright's groggy plight in the face of my admittedly terrifying morning pep (really, one could bottle me and put me in a sugar scrub, I'm so darned zesty), let it be know that my dear little loris gives as good as he gets ... just usually between the hours of 10:00 p.m. - midnight and 3:00 a.m. - 5:00 a.m. I will never quite forget the first night I stayed with him, only to find myself hovering on the precipe of the bed and shivering violently, and he had somnambulously turned to take up the remaining 90% of the bed at about the same time that he had first ripped all of the covers off of me, and second thrown all of these covers onto the floor. 

Lesson to be learned: (1) even in my queen sized dream-posturpedic, I will at some point in the night find myself  just teetering over the edge of the bed, but at least  I'll be hovering on a larger 10% of a bigger bed; (2) duct tape is the only way to keep the sheets entirely on me through the night, but various tucking methods can maintain some control over their ultimate location; (3) when my dearest wakes me up in the middle of the night to tell me things that he will never remember the next morning, they are invariably very sweet things; (4) any joke that has not gotten a good reaction earlier in the day will burble to the top in rumbling chuckles at approximately one hour past whenever we have gone to bed; (5) no, that's not a seizure over there, just a fun little myoclonic jerk or twenty; (6) no, nobody is being eaten alive by wild boars, that's just breathing noises from a very handsome boy with allergies worthy of a Homeric treatment; (7) yes, all of these things will be perfectly spaced to lull me into a complacently soporific state only to pull me back with a jolt as my mind palps those horn and ivory gates; (8) just as as soon as the quiet descends and no interruptions occur, right then, that's when I'll need to use the bathroom. It's been a learning curve, but I've somewhat adapted. Largely, by sleeping less! Ha ha. See, I am so ready to reproduce: I already am used to frequent sleep interruptions, I naturally wake up around 5:15, I have a bedtime, I often already have food in my hair (ok, not really)... and I speak in babbling talk that may well, in fact, be baby talk . 

While I may not have fully sipped of sweet Morpheus' brew (in my mythology apparently Morpheus does indeed own a local microbrewery, so we're going to go with that now), I did manage a somewhat successful morning juggle of staying on schedule without being particularly terrifying. I rolled out of bed with a bit of a "well, screw it I'm up" and gathered my clothes to change in the living room. As I occasionally do, I weighed myself. It was a little higher than usual for mornings when I am relatively dehydrated. The higher number did not particularly startle me, but did make me wonder. I had just battled with the back of the scale to change the batteries (by "battled," I mean "did some minimal fix to open the thing and see that it worked and then let Andrew take over to return it to a screwed in place of completeness that involved screw drivers and some substantial time commitment). So, curious if all was well in scalandia, I put a 7 pound weight on it. The scale inaccurately reported it weighed 12 pounds. Thinking perhaps some settings had just been upset, I let that stand for a few minutes before I was again curious and stepped on the scale. It reported that I now weighed 118 pounds. That struck me as quite a lot of weight to have lost in the intervening five minutes, so I tried the weight again, which apparently no longer had a measurable weight. I continued pondering and stepped back on the scale. I was then 111 pounds. So, my conclusion was that either my scale - an admittedly cheap model made in China for a Mexican company - did not survive the battery transplant, or that I am subject to a gypsy curse and shall be dead or quite disgustingly emaciated in a few more hours. I'm hoping it's the scale. I've got myself some plans coming up and being dead would probably interfere. 

Far before my unsurprisingly sleepless evening and weight-loss "miracle" I had a truly exciting experience: Our landlady (yes, yes, she is!) decided she was tired of waiting for the screening people to wait for one last confirmation of prior employment and went ahead and got it herself. She liked what she heard and called us to come by and sign the lease/write some very large checks. I'm ebullient. The place is even nicer than I remembered. We walked away with copies of our background checks, which I thought was fun. And useful, since we're getting married so soon. I now  have reliable confirmation that Andrew has never been convicted of a felony, gone bankrupt, or registered as a sex offender. Also, my credit score is even nicer than I remembered. I may take these home and frame them. 

Today is another attempt to couple-out the YMCA with Azita in tow. She unfortunately got stuck in a meeting last Friday and couldn't extricate herself, and was very bummed to have missed it. Naturally, we are now on for a regular Sunday gym-jaunt to make sure Andrew gets his use out of that YMCA membership. Couples plan important things like training schedules together. That's totally in our vows!

One more day until the "week of panic, mayhem and family meltdowns" is set to occur (according to the shared google calendar event to which we have happily RSVP'd in the affirmative)! After that, we've got another event "get hitched" which I'm glad to say we have also both expressed our intentions to attend... 



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 ... 7...




... And the Eggs Cry Out for Colors!! On this final weekend of living-in-sin together, Mr. (W)right and I am are taking a little break from planning and preparing for our wedding shenanigans, to detour into plans and preparations for a far more modest Easter. This will not include renting out any halls, and the guest list is limited to five people. I, actually, have no essential preparation duties for the "small" meal (it's never actually small) that we are having, but naturally one cannot have Easter without dyed eggs. 

When I was far younger, we had enormous gala egg hunts. First in the house, from which our egg-salad sandwich lunches would be foraged. Second, with a group of old family friends and gaggles of screaming kids who were not exactly our neighbors but fit into the "annual extraordinary holiday extravaganzas hosts" well enough to nearly be so. Let me tell you, I am darned good at finding eggs. Pretty much anything I actually need - say, keys, phone, wallet, etc. - never. But eggs: always. (handy hint: most of the time they're in the fridge). 

Kits these days (just like kids, I guess in their these-dayedness) are a little more complicated! I have separate instructions for glitter eggs, crayon eggs, sticker eggs and poached eggs (ok maybe not that latter one) on the back of my kit. 



Before lapsing into our Easter reveries, Mr. (W)right and I bought a lamp together! This is significant, because it's really the first thing we've ever bought for our place or together, in that sense. It's like the lite version of getting a plant together, which is a lite version of getting a pet together. We'll name it Eugene and cherish it forever, our little lamp.

It's also kind of neat, because we bought it from the Blue Moon Ballroom, where many such lamps gleamed blue light across the periphery of the ballroom. Today the Blue Moon closes out with a large - and quite terrifying - garage sale. Needless to say, bargain hunters nearly shattered the windows trying to get in first and yell at Molly and Marcus about various things before refusing to buy anything. A very distinct culture, bargain hunting, and I was afraid for my life when browsing to near to any of these other early-comers. Aside from the lamp, a slice of cake, and a brief glimpse of the whole family, I came out with the new lesson that Gap "Long and Lean" jeans may be slightly misleading branding, at least when applied to their size fours. More like "possibly lean and definitely hemmed for a flash of tibia (oooh my) jeans." Ah well. The quest for jeans that don't slough off at the slightest wind continues... 

Jeans or no, I'm glad to have a little physical relic of the years I've spent at the Blue Moon. It was five years jam-packed with unforgettable memories. 

Wishing you all a spectacular Sebbatum Sanctum. May your vespers be watchful and bright, and may all your easter eggs by any color other than white!


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 ... 6...




... *HAPPY EASTER!!! And other shenanigans but mostly Easter. This holiday means a lot of things to a lot of different people. It means a lot of different things to me, even. I won't wax philosophically too far into the sun, but whatever the symbolism or system you choose to apply to the day, there is so much to celebrate in the rebirth from death inherent in spring and the related celebrated in all manifestations. It's something from which I've learned to take personal cues in conducting my own expectations of life. Little titillates me more than that blended awareness just on the periphery of the morbid: nothing is static; no life is permanent; no love unchangeable; no ending absent a correlating beginning. 

Played in reverse, it's an all too familiar story that every thing we love and are will pass, but on either end is the emergence of newness. Almost an uncomfortably ambiguous concept over which human mind lucubrates fruitlessly to comprehend, but which can be both equally mourned and celebrated depending on where we pause the unending reel of life's experiences. 

My last break up happened just over Easter weekend. I was sad, of course, but I couldn't help being awed at the timing. The lessons between Good Friday and Easter soothed and reframed my own mourning process uncannily well. I knew I hurt, but was happy to have loved and happy to know I would again and even better the next time. Phew, I was more than right on that one! 




So, time is nigh for the celebratory part. And the nostalgic part that ties past and future, bringing me into childish delight tempered by an adult's savvy. Or at least her debit card and ability to read instructions. Andrew and I made eggs all pretty lady night. They are smudged and uneven and covered in nonsensical crayon drawings and heapings of fairy dust. I may also - in my quest to give my man severe diabetes add a testament to how sweet our love is - have put together an Easter basket in a bowl. And may also - in my ongoing quest to give the man a heart attack - have a bunny costume I will be wearing to wake him. The bunny costume has a history, actually. My mom, as the culmination of a running joke actually donned this when she picked me up on my last day of the three day Washington State Bar Exam. It's a bear of a test, so usually loved ones line up to applaud test finished at the schedule time. Many bring beer. My mom brought bunny! I'd like to pay that forward. 

I love that for us this Easter falls just before we finish our last weekend as an unwed couple. It's a reminder to marry (har har) a celebration of what has passed and one of what is to come.



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 ...5...






... Monkey-Marriage-License-Madness!! As of about this time today, I have officially been engaged to the fella for a year. Yep,an inadvertent April Fool's Day proposal (I won't say which was the inadvertent part, of course!)  I have insisted for some time that it would be particularly appropriate for us to just go ahead and elope today, return for the ceremony and never be too clear with anyone which day was our actual anniversary.

 Andrew and I are celebrating our engageversary (yes, it is my plan to pepper a calendar so full of anniversaries that someday I can even drive facebook friends to burn out on "liking" my announcements about them!!), instead, by getting our marriage license. Since this has a mandatory three day waiting period in Washington, I guess the window for Fool's Day weddings is officially behind us, unless we wanna hop a plane to somewhere less contemplative about the marriage process. But that means in the future, we can wish each other happy engagaweddinlicensaversary!every April 1st. And that, truly, must count for something. Hopefully nobody at the licensing office feels particularly spirited for this holiday. It would be a shame if we realized at the wedding that we actually got a fishing license, or that my legal name is now Adella Poopoohead, Destroyer of Galaxies (so, apparently in this flight of fancy, my nephew Braden works at the licensing office). 



Now that we are appropriately licensed game for cupid's arrows, Andrew will be back off to Seattle for a couple of days to handle the miasma that is his room (as opposed to the quagmire of my apartment - how do I own so much stuff when I never buy things and liberally give stuff away??). To my jubilation, he will be throwing out his torture device of a bed: the love child of a military cot and a decrepit dorm bed. He will also be doffing the towering Ikea shelves of doom, which seemed perpetually on the verge of reeling forward into the abyss and crushing me in the process. Nothing like moving to fan the flames of minimalism. 

He will likely also be eating the various Easter candies I gave to him and then took back when he admitted that he was simply sitting there eating them compulsively "because they were there." Apparently our system where I hide candy in various random places for him to happen  up may be slightly less of a diet hazard than simply drowning a "basket" with little treats, and leaving it unattended. Who knew? It's also a helluva lot more fun. 

I have already disavowed any responsibility for any major weight gains that come as a result of yesterday's Easter blitz with my dad and our family friends. It was actually a fairly low key event for us. Still on fine china and crystal, and still an overabundance of food, but we've worked well to minimalize superfluous courses. I get a salad a la moi, since he's discovered several clever little bowls and cruets in which to put the remainder of the salad fixings, and which allows each guest to create her own blend. I also got a butternut squash and curry soup. Every one else got some sort of blend between hashbrowns, quiche, and eggs, and oh one or two full roasted chickens. There was also some fairly horrifying peanut butter creme something from Freddy's. The first ingredient being non-dairy topping may clue you in to how well it was received by most every one else (something about that blend of rigorously purified sugar and laboratory fats that just hits the spot, I suppose!). I may have just had an orange and then hastily headed home after the meal to have about three more bowls of vegetables, nuts, avocados and my usual rabbit food. 




Of course, it's never been about the food, these holiday dinners. Or, it is about the food, but more about the preparation and sharing of the food than the meal itself. We like to play games in which we ad lib a dish based on available ingredients with never quite the same end result. My dad and I deftly interweave through kitchen-space with knives and flame a'blazin', chopping and sassing and otherwise interacting. At the end of the meal, all of the guests help with the clean up and the reapportioning of left overs. Whatever it is, food is one of the most communal elements of life. Perhaps it's that it is one of a very select essential urges - feeding, reproducing, sleeping - that is socially appropriate for mass interactions. Naturally,  I could add dancing, playing and worshiping  which all have equally important roles from the beginning of human culture, but the sharing and acquisition of food may well predate these, and usually straddles some of the potential inhibitions, taboos, and potential for conflict that arise in the latter. 

At any rate, I'll leave you with my favorite snippet of kitchen chatter, which applies to some of the topics aforementioned: 

Dad: This salad idea is so brilliant. It makes everything so much easier. To feed you. 
Me: (eating the remaining bag of spinach and carrots scavenged from the fridge). Yep it's great. Suits every dietary preference. 
Dad: (turning for a moment with saturnine vexation and a few stored up "tut-tuts") You're very difficult to feed, dear.
Me: Yes, I admit that. Freely. And apologize often for my dietary idiosyncrasies. 
Dad: (glibly and without concern as he turns back to his soup) you're always on a diet. 
Me: Am I? I had no idea! 
Dad: 
Me: ( to Andrew). Ah so apparently I am always on a diet. Here I thought I just didn't want to eat cheesy hash browns and meat!
Andrew: (looking up from his smart phone after a breezy thirty second pause). If anyone needs to be on a diet, it's me.
Dad: Yes, it's good to realize that as one gets older the metabolism... (indecipherable)  
Andrew: (unphased) I've been thinking about my training schedule and you know how I have been commuting on my bike to school (etc. etc. takeaway: even if he doesn't manage to train, he has that as a background-activity). But now that I'm working, that's going to change.
Dad: Well, you'll be commuting two hours a day! Both of my son-in-laws commute over an hour to work. There's something really wrong with that! (chuckles a surprisingly gregarious little chuckle)
Andrew: (blinking with flummox) Oh, what I meant was that I won't be commuting by bike so I'll -
Adella: He knows. This is my dad, dear, assume he is seeing the worst case scenario and being - er - glibly blunt! Like, my nephew how didn't hit a reading stage in time, so he probably in need of special education courses and perhaps a prozac for his obvious anxiety issues, and of course are "big boned" and had better watch what they eat...etc., or it's cloudy so there's a hurricane on the horizon..  
Andrew: (still looks confused)
Adella: He's saying because you're driving more, you're going to get fat.
Dad: (returning to the conversation and utterly saturated in the sap of his own sarcasm) Well, thanks dear. 
Adella: Just trying to help! 
Dad:  I imagine it was quite obvious what I meant!
Andrew: No, um, I had no idea that's what you meant. 
Adella: I did, but then I have many years of reference to translate: that's why I was offering him a handy guide to understanding you. (turning to Andrew, as my dad is still mostly fussing over the sink). Remember: worst case scenario and no filter. When in doubt, we're all going to die.
Dad: What's that? (catching the last part and cocking his head) Ah, yes, I suppose that's true, we are all going to die...(looks thoughtful)
Adella: voila.
Dad: but I guess we're not supposed to think about that on days like this. (turns back shrugging, and continues making soup). 

The moral being, well food is fun, but if you don't eat it you are impossible and if you do you'll become obese... and, of course, we're all going to die. It's ok to say that again, because it's no longer Easter. 


But before we all die, I think Andrew and I will go ahead and get ourselves hitched!


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