Posts about myself puking aside (see below), it's pretty amazing how far I've come in the past two years. Two years ago my house looked more like a frat house than a place in which a woman with a professional job resided. That mostly had to do with the fact that I spent most of my time out and very little time playing homemaker. As a naturally messy person, I would come home to the wreckage that was my house, shrug and think to myself, "No one else lives here, so why should I even bother." It was a fun time for me, but looking back it was more of a lonely time for me. It was less about the partying than about not wanting to be alone. And so out I would go...leaving all my responsibilities and fears behind.

Today, my house is becoming a stylish little pad. That has very little to do with me and mostly to do with John. He has been systematically covering the walls (that I had previously slapped a few colors on here and there) expertly with paint (that we both pick painstakingly). Seriously did I ever think I would be standing next to a man and saying things like, "Does this color purple flow with the colors we picked for the rest of the house?" That answer would be a definitive "NO!" We purchased a new charcoal colored carpet in the entire upstairs and when that's paid off, we will realize the dream of hardwood in our downstairs. I'm elated, and far more excited than I ever was as I swept shadow across my eyes, and practiced my glossy pout in the mirror. Of course, John still has to follow around after me so that I don't leave everything trailing behind me like a slug...but it's baby steps, kids. Baby. Steps.

The house is the tip of the iceberg in terms of change and new perspectives on things but I take it as a sign of good things that have happened to us and for things to come. Previous to knowing each other, both John and I were living parallel lives--both of us holding things down but not as well as we could've been (should've been). The two of us coming together could've been bad...we could've burned each other out. We could've been out at the bar every night of the week, not wanting to "miss out on the scene". Instead, we decided to grow up together and get it together. Today, John's become somewhat of a golden boy at work. Imagine, he used live mere blocks from work and yet now, with a two hour commute in the morning he's rising to the occasion more than he ever has. The same can be said for me, well, except that I might have a one minute commute.

Of course, don't let me kid you for a second that yes, we still love to go out. Yes, we still like to act like we don't have responsibilities and to pretend not to have a care in the world but it's for different reasons now. It's not about worrying about missing out on something, it's more about having fun together. Hence, I guess...you'll still find me playing drunken board games, which I suppose is better than what I probably would've been doing two years ago. Responsibility, who knew that one day it wouldn't be a dirty word to me?? Certainly not moi. That being said, I had to wipe myself with a Kleenex today because I didn't have time to go out and purchase toilet paper. Oh and with the work week over for me, I may just reach into the fridge, grab myself a cold one and reflect on another sucessful foray into the 'Real World' .
Again...baby steps.

Yesterday I decided that I was way too mature (read: old) to attend anything called AstroMonkey ( a punk rock concert that our friend's band was participating).

So instead, I decided to do a Power Hour with my husband. To which we drank to:
1. Mexican beer (which we learned) is NOT the cheapest of all beers.
2. Flight Wheel
3. World Peace. Amen
4. John's attempt at obscure references ( ha ha...luckily I knw that Sonny Chiba played Gogol 13)
5. "yeah he's a professor...of being a dog!!" ( I watched Cabin Fever for the first time on Friday night...sue me)






PS. Never fear, still not working on Pregnancy Plan Nine from Outerspace.

John and I made a pact not to go out and blow all our money at the bar during this holiday weekend...and we followed that pact, however, I came out of the weekend with $58 in my checking account. Catch-22 right?

We did go out, we just did it on Thursday (not the weekend, you see?!?). We met up with John's brother ER at one of the three bars in town that he's not banned from. Sadly, he can't come with us to thitwbar...but we're working on that. If John and I aren't banned from there, neither should ER. From there, we went to thithwbar to play some pool. We thought in some naive way that we could go in there, play some pool and then go home...not so. We ran into EVERYONE there! So of course, we grabbed bar stools and stayed awhile...probably too long.

Friday was a day of recovery for the two of us. In our drunken state we agreed to host an after party for another one of our friend Tony's drunk bus tours (his band plays somewhere and he rents a bus to bring along a crowd). Again, we were proud of ourselves for not partaking in the night's activities but I guess at the time (Thursday night's drunkeness) we wanted to still be included...not so much on Friday night. We planted our butts on the couch and began watching Black Christmas. Within seconds John was snoring happily while I watched the incredibly stupid plot of a spree killer with yellow skin killing people on Christmas Eve...oh, and he really likes to eat eyeballs. Whoo! As I alternated between watching dumb movie #3,900,432 of my lifetime and watching my slumbering husband (who was, by far more entertaining), I realized that in a few hours there were going to be lots of drunken people in our house. I was tired. I didn't want to host anyone at my house anymore. The idea seemed so perfect after several drinks but it seemed pretty damn flawed when sober. I got up off the couch and announced to John's prone body, "We are not having an after-party here!" and I marched over to the door and locked it. Now, I would've had a tough time explaining this to the disgruntled post party goers but as luck would have it, I fell asleep watching Law & Order on the couch and never heard their phone calls.

At around 3:30am, John and I both awoke (John having slept for 8 hours and I having slept 5) and we were wide awake. So we did what any fun couple would do...we decided to go to an all night diner and have some breakfast! Well...except for one thing. When we arrived at the diner (fun fact* it was the first place I ever puked from drinking as a teen), I realized that I had left my cash at home. We turned around and John tried to continue to love me and we ended up at a different (much better) diner after we stopped at the house for the forgotten cash.

Saturday was spent in two ways--cleaning/organizing and drinking. I've mentioned it before but John plies me with alcohol so that I will be productive in the cleaning process and so I won't pout. It actually really works...and I actually worked too! We sorted my clothes, washed countless numbers of laundry loads, made a gigantic pile for Good Will and filled my IKEA wardrobes (yes two...I had to steal the one that was meant for John) to the brim. Eventually, John declared that we had done enough work and we set about to do as many Jagerbombs in our kitchen as we could. There's still an enormous amount of work to do in our back bedroom but shockingly, there's no Jagermeister left...funny how things work like that, isn't it?

Yesterday we saw Grindhouse and I thought it was amazingly good! My favorite parts were the fake trailers that came in between the two movies. John swears that he would really go see Machete but I think I would want to see Thanksgiving.

This movie, looks pretty exciting to me too. What could be better than killer sheep?

...and the winner of the best new wife eva is...ME! Like you didn't know I was going to say that in the first place. Seriously though, I casually asked John what he wanted to do for his birthday next month because at first I was going to plan something all stealthy-like. Even though his birthday isn't until the end of February, planning birthdays is something I enjoy and obsess over. Because of this, I spent countless days frowning at the computer, typing furiously and trying to find something "unusual", "exciting" and "cool" on Google to do for his bday. Unfortunately, the shemale that kept turning up in my searches wasn't exactly "the exciting surprise" what I was thinking about.

Ideas that were nixed (besides Shaundra the Shemale):
1. Huge surprise party at the local VFW. Pros: it's pretty cheap to rent out, it's right by our house for easy drunken John unloading, all of our friends could come and it could be a lot of fun. Cons: It's the local VFW, I think I could do something with a little more class than a kegger up the street from our house.

2. Go to Mexico for a four day weekend: sure we'd have to go the week before his birthday, but in every life there must be a little sacrifice, or so I'm told. Pros: Warmth, sun, margaritas, sand, tan lines Cons: John doesn't have a passport and President Bush is an idiot.

3. Go to Atlantic City and pretend we're high rollers for the weekend: Pros: fun, intimate little weekend in a fun town. Cons: Neither of us are really big gamblers and we wouldn't really do much high rolling. PRO: I probably would've gotten rolled on the bed quite a bit if I did this option! Con: It's cold and sad when you go to the beach but can't go into the water in February.

I couldn't think of what to do for him, so I gave up the stealth factor and sent him a very straight forward email, "What do you want to do for your birthday?" because I didn't know if he wanted a wild party, I didn't know if he just wanted to spend it with me, or with his family or with the Pope...I just wasn't sure about any of this--although, I had a niggling feeling that he didn't want to spend his birthday with the Pope; maybe the old Pope but not the scary new one. He looks like the Emperor from Star Wars. So instead of digressing about the Old Pope/New Pope controversy...let me just say, that asking John what he wanted to do for his birthday was the best thing I could've done, because I would've never thought of this:

He wants to go to NYC to see Evil Dead: The Musical. As the wonderful person that I am (can I say that? I think definitively that I can...) I called some woman in New York and inquired about tickets for the particular Febuary weekend. I had to fight with the woman about the fact that "Yes, indeed I DO want tickets located in the "splatter zone!"" For those of you unfamiliar with this musical, blood flies (splatters if you will) onto the audience members in the first few rows of the theater house, very similar to the ye ol' Gallagher comedy shows...except with blood, not with watermelons.

To top off our weekend and to make us feel like true bonafide married adult people (weird that I'm turning 30 and I don't feel like an adult quite yet),I checked us into the W hotel for the weekend. I think that they will truly embrace us when we return home from a night at the "theatre" drenched in fake blood. Oh wait, who am I kidding, this is NYC...no one will even notice.

On the bright side, for the amount of money I am spending on two nights in the city that never sleeps I make a prediction that John will not be sleeping either . This is because no one rides for free. I will be making him work off his share of the room in sex. I may even buy him dinner first to seal the deal, because then he'll have to put out. Ain't love grand?

John and I went to the Eagles game last night, where we got to hang out in the club suites and hobnob with the lucky folks in there all because John has been doing such a good job at work (my man can make a budget, yo), his bosses gave him tickets!! Being productive individuals at work seems to be paying off! It was awesome...a little man came and gave us all the food and drinks that our hearts could've desired (and even packed us a doggy bag to go since we were the only people who stayed until the end).

It'll be such a shame when we have to go back to being the normal pleebs out in the cheap seats, getting rowdy and screaming at players and spectators alike.

I've tasted the good life.

Now it's time to get my tired ass to the grocery store and get ready for night class. Posts MUST follow, I'm just a little sleepy and I need to get back on my game...the work game, the back to night class game, the wifey game...It's such a shame because this weekend, I completely perfected the lay on the couch and vegetate game.

Oh...is it healthy to be jealous of your husband because he gets to read every day on his commute?? Because I'm really jealous.