Tuesday, March 19, 2024 08:21

?>

Archive for February, 2007

engaging story

Wednesday, February 21st, 2007

So, I was totally going to post this on our anniversary…and didn’t. So then I was going to post it on the anniversary of the event, and I didn’t. So then I thought Valentine’s day would be a good time, since it’s all romantic and such, but I didn’t. Then I was going to post it as a birthday gift to Christopher Eccleston…but once again, I didn’t. So here is the story on a random Wednesday. Some people know the story, I thought everyone did, but yet, I still find myself retelling the story to looks of utter surprise. Or people know part, but not the art that shows how incredibly dense I can be. So, without further ado, here’s the story of how G and I got engaged.
To set the scene, it’s fall of 1999. It was my first semester as a college student after taking a bit of time off. Nine Inch Nails finally released a new album. It had been five years since their last, and we were amped. I had never seen NIN live at that point (travesty, I know). Like many bands/musicians/singers, their first tour for the album was European. We began to joke about how cool it would be to see them in Paris. I had a jar on top of G’s dryer, where I would put quarters for laundry (to show what I was saving by doing my laundry there, instead of in my laundry room). This jar became the “going to Paris to see trent jar.” It was hilarious…as if we would.
Then, about two weeks before Thanksgiving, G picks me up from school. He asks me if he were able to get tickets for the concert, and found reasonable airfare, could I go to Paris with him to see NIN over Thanksgiving. I laughed…he’s such a funny boy. He’s like, “seriously. Could you get the time off work.” I told him I promised to work since I was in retail, and Black Friday is kind of a big deal, but I could see. However, I told him even if I could, I couldn’t afford to go to France. He tells me that he would pay for it, all I would need to do was get the time off. He’d already purchased concert tickets, to be sure we could get them, but would need to know soon so he could get the plane tickets he’d found. I tell him I’ll see what I can do.
The next day I go to work, and tell my manager the situation. She tells me she’ll talk to the store manager and get back to me by the end of the day. the end of the day comes, and she tells me that he didn’t get back to her, and if I need to get the tickets, to go for it. SWEET! I tell G, and the plan is in motion. I was going to Paris to see Nine Inch Nails. Funny sidenote to this…the SM got back to her the next day, and told her I couldn’t go. So my manager told him that if I couldn’t, I would quit. Suddenly, he was fine with me going.
So, G secures tickets, a hotel. I talk to my instructors for my affected classes, and have my work schedule cleared. We were flying out on the day before Thanksgiving, and coming back on the following Sunday. Squeeeee!!!!
We arrive safely in Paris. We are staying in a very basic, but clean hotel. The night manager was super cool, and indulged us with our broken French. We were able to do some sightseeing on Thursday, before the concert. Yes, we were spending Thanksgiving in a country that doesn’t celebrate it, seeing a rock concert. Wicked awesome. There, I said it. We made sure that we knew where the place was and everything, and were totally ready. That evening, we got decked out. Cute, but Mosh-pit ready. We took the metro to the venue, and as we walked up to the place, we were bombarded by peeps handing out flyer after flyer. We just kept repeating, “no, merci.” we got in, and the place was pretty freaking cool. Not very big, maybe held 3,000 people. We were on the main floor, and got pretty close. Sadly, Atari Teenage Riot opened for NIN. I’d been unfortunate to see them before, and the were no better this time around. However, we suffered through to see our Trent. It was worth it. The show was amazing. So worth going to Paris for. It was a little surreal to be surrounded by people singing along with the band with French accents.
After the show, we scored some great concert tees and such. I will admit, I feel extra cool wearing my version 1.0 tees, with the european locations on the back. We also bought some as gifts for our favorite NIN fans. Then we headed to the Hard Rock Cafe for some Thanksgiving drinks and din-din. Hey, it was open.
So, Friday we set out for sightseeing. G is acting especially strange. He’s insistent that we go to l’arc de triomphe. At sunset. We have to get there at sunset. I’m all, whatever…if we get there, we get there…not the end of the world. He’s emphatic that the view from the top at sunset is amazing, and I need to see it. Okay..whatever. The whole day he’s checking his watch, and reminding me he wants to get there at sunset. I’m thinking he needs to chill out…it can’t be that big of a deal. We do get there in the evening, and start climbing the billionty steps to the top. I’m thinking to myself the whole way up, “this’d better be worth it.” We get up there, and the sun is indeed starting to set. G is happy, everything’s cool. So, we get up on the raised sidewalk around the top to see Paris. We start at the Champs d’elysee side. It’s decorated for te holidays as only the French could do. We walk the whole way around, snapping pictures and chatting. Then we return to where we started. I wanted to get some pictures of the crazy trees wrapped in white tulle with coloured lights shining on them that lined the street. G tells me he threw the camera in his backpack, and he needed to dig it out. He proceeds to open his bag and start looking. I’m enjoying hte scenery as he says “here, hold this.” I take the object from him, thinking he is just getting stuff out of the way to find the camera. I continue to enjoy the scenery. I suddenly realize I am holding a wee velvet box. It dawns on me that it is a jewelry box. “Why does he have a jewelry box in his backpack? weird,” I think. After a minute I realize I should open it. There’s a diamond ring in the box (a beautiful one, I might add). “Why is he carrying around a diamond ring?” I wonder. Another minute goes by. I realize it is an engagement ring, and again wonder why he has one. I slowly start to put the pieces together. “Is this…oh. Oh. Oh. OH! OOOOOOHHHHHHHHH!” I then look at him. I had no idea that he was not looking in the bag at all, he’d just been watching me the whole time. I look at him some more. Finally I say, “so are you gonna ask me or what?” “Will you marry me?” “Yes.” Crying and hugging ensue. Then I made him get down on one knee and ask me again. Annoyed tourists were trying to get around us as we were being all silly and giddy.
We saw a few more sights, and I made him ask me at each landmark we stopped at. I’m such a nerd. Then we went back to the hotel and got really dressed up to go out to dinner and celebrate. We ate at TGI Friday’s. Seriously. It was open, and they had food.
So, that’s the story. Thanks Trent.

red, white, and blue…

Friday, February 16th, 2007

Well, I’m officially done with the red paint. I made my last touch ups, and threw away the tray liner and roller. I just didn’t want to deal with washing that shite. Anyhow, the entryway is lovely red. I began priming the kitchen, and hopefully can get some paint on that bad boy tomorrow.
We also ripped up the hallway carpet. Good riddance. I would have done a cartwheel on the revealed subfloor, but felt that I might injure myself or a loved one, so we settled for a mental cartwheel. On the downside, we do have to replace a portion of the subflloor. We expected we would, but hoped that somehow we wouldn’t have to. We pulled up the first half of the portion we are replacing. I decided to pull out the trusty shop vac to suck up the dirt and junk that had been sealed between. I got halfway through, and the shop vac kept sucking up dirt. Lots and lots of dirt. I realized I was creating a hole. A hole in the part of the floor that is just dirt. I mean really, why would one want to make sure there was a bed of all concrete before laying the floor? Moisture barrier? What? So, we’ll have to pour some concrete. We’ll probably go ahead and put some plastic down while we have that chunk open. As my dad said, “where was the building inspector???” Where indeed.
Since we have the ceiling completely ripped out in the kitchen and entry, Lucifer has taking to tightrope walking on the exposed pipes, wires, and cables. While I was priming the kitchen (the part that will be behind the fridge if you are concerned), I was bent over getting the bottom of the wall. Suddenly, “WHOOMPF!” Something somewhat soft landed on the back of my head, then slid to the floor. It was a rather pissed off Lu. Apparently he lost his balance on his little tightrope walk. Guess he’s not ready to work without a net. He also has some white hairs on his tail from brushing the wall. That darn cat. Good thing he is small and furry, because the experience didn’t feel good. Couldn’t imagine if he was large. Or not furry.
Anyhow, we are making progress. Slowly, but surely. As we keep hitting setbacks, it makes me tell myself more and more that it will be such a miraculous transformation. I keep telling myself how much more storage we’ll have, and how organized it will be. Part of me worries it will let me down, or something won’t work out. However, for the pain in the ass, it should be miraculous.
I think the disaster area that is our home is part of what’s been making me feel so down lately. When you don’t have a lot of room to begin with, then you pull nearly everything out of one room into other parts of the house, then bring a bunch of other stuff in so that you can put that stuff back…well, it makes for close quarters. Every inch is stuffed. It is impossible to set anything down much less put it away. It’s tough to move…even the cats are grouchy. Forgive me for sounding all new-agey and whatnot, but it is making for some bad energy. Couple that with job annoyances, and the fact that I’ve put on a few pounds, and it makes for an unhappy Raven. The few pounds are annoying because when I gain weight, it hurts. My wee bones get all grouchy, my joints decide to give me hell, and my muscles cramp and seize and all sorts of fun. It is not helping that I don’t have my space to workout right now, and it is too cold for me to feel like going for a walk. On the bright side, I put in my notice at my part-time job yesterday. It took a lot of thinking on my part, and building up my nerve, but I think those few extra hours every week will make a big difference.
So, yesterday was the big V-Day. It was a pretty romantic day. I worked both jobs, and got to see G for about half of an hour. Fortunately, we already celebrated. We decided to celebrate on sunday. Since we have had zero time, I suggested that we just do our shopping together. Great minds think alike, and we found we were planning on shopping at the same store. We had to stop at two locations, but we got what we were after. I got G this:
molten core.jpg
And he got me this:
dance tee.jpg
Ahhh…geek love. We also decided on extra gifts once we were out. Hot Topic had their Nightmare Before Christmas stuff on clearance, and I saw a great jacket for Geoff. He’s been wanting a hoodie type jacket, and there was a pretty cool one. I pointed it out, it was super soft…so I thought it would make a nice second thing for him. He found the Jack Skellington hoodie I’d been wanting but thought was too pricey. It is black and very dark grey striped with a big Jack Skellington face appliquéd on the front. Wicked cute. We then saw the perfect hoodie for Geoff. Despite it being full price, it was way more awesome than the Jack one, so I made him try it on. I had been planning on getting him a different hoodie previous to our excursion, but apparently this was in their new batch of merchandise. Seriously it was too perfect…
transformers hoodie.jpg
Megatron versus Optimus Prime. Even though it will be in July, I am totally making him wear it to the Transformers movie when we go to the midnight opening. Well, let’s be honest, I don’t think I will have to make him.
We did buy some non V-day presents. I finally found a wallet I liked:
selanimal wallet.jpg
I got some new mats for my car and a steering wheel cover, we got G some batman boxer briefs, and some stuff for a friend.
We then took a romantic trip to the pharmacy to pick up a prescription, and popped home. We changed into our dork twin ensembles, and headed to the Olive Garden. (don’t knock it. That’s some tasty food, and reasonably priced) Then we headed to the Chatterbox Pub. Which, side tangent here. There is a restaurant half and a bar half. Both halves have gaming consoles, and you can check out board games for either half. We arrived early to meet our friends, and thought we would kill time with some old-school nintendo. Since we were going to do karaoke when it started, we thougt we could stake out our sofas and get going. However, some lovely parents apparently mistook “console games” for “babysiter.” There were three kids. Apparently they needed to use all three TVs in the bar. One of the kind servers said he would check into it, because they’d been taking up the space for a long time (mind you this included two full-size sofas, a loveseat, and four armchairs that were around the three TVs). It was a no-go. The kids really needed all three TVs. Fine. We took one of the restaurant sets, with the understanding that we would move when the brats left. I tossed my coat and purse on the sofa and headed for ladies. As I walked through the bar, I saw the kids. One was at the table with the parents, completely on the other side of the bar from the consoles…the parents wouldn’t even have been able to see the kids at the damn consoles. Not to mention, I could tell the dad was trying to get the kid to go back to the other children (the oldest of which was maybe 10) One was playing with the Golden Tee machine, and one was actually playing a console. The other two were just left at the intro screens of the games. Needed all the TVs my ass. First of all, if you want to go to a bar and drink and have the kids out of your hair…hire a freaking babysitter. If you think your kids would have fun playing games, sit with them. Pay attention to them, and have some courtesy for the other patrons. People piss me off. Especially parents who don’t think they actually have to parent or be held accountable for their children’s actions.
Anyhow, eventually the brat pack left, and we moved to our sofas in time for karaoke. The rest of the night consisted of hanging with our friends, playing some tetris, and singing some songs. I discovered that I am really not cut out to sing Morrissey. However, I also discovered that the KJ had Vanity 6…so I made up for my lack of Morrissey talent by rocking out with that. So, the night turned out pretty well.
We ended the night by curling up in bed and watching The Apprentice LA. Perfect for a couple of dorks like us.

optimus prime

Wednesday, February 7th, 2007

So, I was able to prime the entryway. And I was able to get two coats of delicious red paint on the walls, as well. It will for sure need one more coat in the morning, perhaps two. I am glad that we decided to do such a small area, because the rumours are true. Red is a bitch to paint.
Of course, now that the entryway is nearing completion, methinks the inside of the front door and sidelight also need to be the same shade of red. That will be fun, but that is last on my priority list right now. Especially since I don’t have enough space left to move the last of the stuff out of the kitchen to start painting it in between red coats*.
Oh well, progress is progress. As a reward, I get to level up my Tauren some more. Oh. Yeah.
*Did that make you snicker? It made me snicker. The redcoats they are a comin’.

cross your fingers…

Tuesday, February 6th, 2007

…that I just put the last coat of spackle on all the bad spots in the entryway. I’ve been trying to be patient, but I’ve lost track of the number of coats (with appropriate sanding in between) that I’ve put on. I just want to prime the darn thing already! Especially since I know I will have to put at least three (if not more) coats of paint on it after. Of course, I don’t want it to look completely like ass when I’m done, or for the cracks and holes that I’ve patched to re-crack or look like obvious patches.
On a brighter note, we have completed the ceiling in the hallway, have the new (bright!) light fixtures installed, have put on new light switch and outlet plates, and got a new (non rusty/bent) cover for the air return. I just have to find the correct screws in my tool box to put that on. Then it’s all G getting the new flooring in (which I will probably help ’cause I wanna use the new saw…but not too much since I am the spackler/sander/painter of the house).
All I have to say is that when we’re done, this better look like the picture I have in my head. Otherwise, someone’s heads will roll.

i’m ready for my geek card, mr. demille!

Tuesday, February 6th, 2007

So, I’m rapidly turning into a bona-fide geek. Now, it used to be that I could deny said geekish tendencies. Alas, those days are dwindling.
First of all, while I grew up in a household of two Dr. Who fans, I was able to elude the draw. However, the Dr. Who fan that currently resides in my household has finally lured me in. To be fair, one Christopher Eccleston had a great deal in the luring. Anyhow, I have officially seen all of Series one, and am working my way through series two. I even gave G permission to purchase series one on DVD while it was on sale at Best Buy (it’s even the fancy pants set that looks like a TARDIS!) while he was out purchasing Wow: The Burning Crusade.
Which brings me to point number two. I now have a World of Warcraft Character. He is a Tauren named Rothgarr. It would have been Rothgar, but someone else already had that, or Rathgarrr because the three Rs make it extra piratey, but they don’t allow three of the same letter in a row. So, Rothgarr it is. He is now level three. He has accepted two more quests for next time, and is always ready to throw down in a Tauren dance party. Oh yeah, that’s hot isn’t it?
Finally, we went to a comic shop today. It was sort of a detour between dinner and errands. Anyhow, I have been in comic shops before, so that’s not a big deal. It may have been the first time, however, that I was ready to buy more stuff than G. Well, at least the same amount. I walked out with three comics of my own, and we found the Evil batman figurine for our collection. I also found a delightful gift for a friend (and perhaps, I need one for myself), and a wish list, which I will now add to my amazon wish list. It has also made me realize I need to get back into the artsy craftsy side of my life. There are some really incredible artist out there that create some pretty badass, non-traditional comic stuff that I highly admire. I may need to break out my sketchpad once again…it has been a long while. Oh, and I wasn’t able to get one of the books I wanted, so I am on a hunt to get it, since it’s a back issue. It shouldn’t be a big deal, though.
This has also made me think we need to up the geek factor of our office/guestroom. I think that our Batman figurine collection needs it’s own space, instead being housed in our DVD shelving with the rest of our movie figures. I am pondering the best way to do that. Also, we have some art that desperately needs to be showcased, so I need to figure that out as well.
I knew I was pasty for a reason.

with thoughts of italy….

Monday, February 5th, 2007

So, at work all day on Wednesday, I was craving Campari. Specifically, Campari on the rocks with a lime. The only problem was that The Chatterbox, where we spend many a Wednesday night, only serves wine and beer. And our liquor cabinet is noticeably Campari free. *le sigh*
Fortunately, The University Club, where we dined on Thursday was able to meet my Campari needs. And Seth our bartender and server was able to meet my demands. So tasty. And so necessary.
Alas, now I miss NNS and Click and Roma that much more. Thanks for the introduction to Campari, friends!