(Awkward) Biohazard Emergency Shower

Update 10/6 - 10/12

On Monday, I came home and Percy demanded to go swimming in the pool.  It's an unspoken rule between us that he doesn't go in the pool without me.  He decided to speak about it on Monday though.  Finally, I took everything out of my pockets and told him he could go in without me.  After 7 or 8 laps in the pool, he got out, dried himself off, and we went inside.  He's the coolest.  On Tuesday, I went in with him and we played fetch for 30 min straight - he thought it was a blast, and I was excited that he might be a little sleepy on the plane. :)

When I got home, my mom had new toys for Percy to play with and she had made chicken for him, cutting it into teeny little pieces.  Later she told me he doesn't like the big pieces, which true, but I like that I'm not the only one who baby's him. Both my mom and my dad also had wrapped birthday presents for their grand-puppy too! Wednesday, I had to work to do... but because the office didn't really open until noon, I drove up to see Debina and her babies.  Matthew looks like a mini Christopher (Deb's brother), and because I know little Chris better than I know adult Chris, it was really cool to see the mini version.  On my way home, driving back on the Taconic, I was in awe of how beautiful New York is in the fall.

Spent the rest of the day working outside with my parents to keep me company.  Doesn't really get better than that. 

Headed down to NYCC for a couple of days for work.  I was super grateful that I just had meetings and didn't actually have to set up a booth.   And I was also uber grateful for uber because I am the worst at getting a cab.  (Remember that time a Canadian told me I needed to be more aggressive - and then took it back and told me I was better off just getting a cab at a hotel?) 

My co-worker and I met up with a couple of his friends at this shuffle board bar in Brooklyn where they had this gourmet grilled cheese food truck inside the bar.  And because I hadn't eaten all day, that grilled cheese was super-duper amazing.  As if that wasn't good enough, James' friend was in three episodes of the Gilmore Girls!! EEK!

One of the members of upper management went to the convention, and because I don't want to get into trouble when I quote him, we'll call him Sam.  Sam got the show, and immediately got some Pokemon items for his kid.  This meant that he had to carry around a shopping bag.  Before we left for dinner, James offered to up a different bag to Sam, which he accepted, but had to dispose of the cheap shopping bag first saying, "This bag is so offensive that I don't want any part of it."  

While Sam was doing a signing, I was communicating with the office trying to get some assets approved.  In order to do this, I had to email a somewhat urgent email to all of upper management.  Sam stopped mid-signing to reply, "Ask my face!"  Whoops!

When we were waiting for a table at dinner, we stepped upstairs to the rooftop bar.  I still had my backpack on, and made a comment about how uncomfortable that was.  Sam replied, "Yeah, and you're double strapping it so you look like a doofus. I did that once and it was comfortable and easy, so naturally I never did it again."

Our partner also told us a super in appropriate story that you'll have to ask me about in person.  We went to a bar though that had a room with a ping pong table.  The guys we were with informed us that no matter who played in there, they ended up hooking up by the end of the night.  It must be a magical ping pong room!  The rest of the restaurant was also pretty magical, but in a different way.

I went home after a couple of days in NYC.  Percy became attached to my parents, especially my dad who was taking him out all the time.  Percy also made my dad open the car up every time they went out so he could check to see if I was in there.  Maureen and I went to Stew Leonard's.  Mostly, for funsies, but also to pick up a couple of things for Stacey's party.  I asked Sean what he needed.  He said he wanted brats, but that we shouldn't get them. And back in forth until he proclaimed, "Definitely no brats" to which Mo responded, "No brats? Does that mean that Patrick, Kevin and Kyle can't go?"  Sean said, "Only if you soak them in beer." 

And momela made me ham!

While I was in the car with Maureen, I noticed that Kyle's screen saver was a picture of my oreo tasting party.  Mo's family all share the same iTunes account, which means my 365 grateful feed goes to the whole family.  This is how Kyle got the Oreo picture.   When I made a comment about it, Patrick said, oh yeah! My screen saver is your friend Eva's kid [Freddie] giving the finger! 

Briana & Austin were able to make some time for me also, so we went for a little walk.  I was so pleased to see how happy, content and comfortable she was being a mom.  Not that I thought she wouldn't be, it's just that everyone seems to take the whole parenthood role on differently.  And since I'm not a mom, but I have a lot of new mommy friends, it's nice to learn what works for everyone.  I'm taking notes ladies! 

Speaking of which, we had a little mommy conversation while we were at Sean and Stacey's. 

Carla: Bails, can you just have a baby for me?

Mo: Tiffany offered to have a baby for me once!

Carla: See! You were going to have one anyway.  Just have an extra one for me. I think adoption looks really good on your college applications.

Bails: ----

Carla: Our nieces said that they really want to have another cousin.  They made me a deal that if I got knocked up, I could have the baby and leave them in the spare room, and they would help raise it for me.

Bails: Tiffany, you could have a baby too, you know.

Me: I'll give you a cousin at the first opportunity.

Bails: Really?

Me: Same deal though, right?

Mo: Yeah, that doesn't seem like something you need to clear through, Stacey.

Carla: I have an unhealthy love if Taylor Swift's "Shake It Off." I'm kind of embarrassed about it.

Me: No you're not.  That's why you're telling us about it when we weren't talk about music at all.

Carla and Stacey got some bad news at one point in the party.  My solution was to make Stacey and Pat open their presents immediately so that we could play Telestrations.  Before we sat down to play, I said I needed to run to the restroom, because we were going to laugh real hard.  Carla replied, "Oooh! Pee your pants worthy game!  I can't wait!"  Here's how Bails turned baby shower into (Awkward) Biohazard Emergency Shower

Bailey's Friend: I haven't slept well for a week.

Me: Why?

Bailey's Friend: Because I haven't been able to sleep in my own bed. 

Bailey: Oh.  I slept 'til ten.  I only got up because my mom made me. 

Sooo supportive.

We were talking about different types of haunted houses. 

Carla: Sharon and I have bought tickets to one haunted house every year for the last 5 years, and have never actually gone.

Jeanine: There's a haunted house in CO that takes 4 to 7 hours to go through, and only one person is allowed in at a time.  But it's free!

Yeah, sign me up for that one!

We were commenting the new ottoman in the living room.  Sean said, "Oh yeah! Someone was moving.  I asked if they had an extra ottoman, and when they did said I'd take it!"  Stacey, of course was amazed and appalled that he agreed to take it sight unseen - and that of course it matched perfectly. 

On my last day in NY, I met up with Evivova and Freddie at JV Bagel.  She said she could only meet for an hour b/c they were scheduled to go to Gymboree.  When I told my parents, my dad asked me how much it cost to go there.  I told them that, knowing Eva, she was probably going for free.  Turns out, not only was I right, but she was going for their 4th free "trial."  Some things never change.

Three more of these and I'll be caught up! 

Much Love,

T O'B

PS I'm totally leaving the time that Beth told me that her dog was cuter than mine - for obvious reasons.  

Neville's Longbottom

After lunch, I was getting into my car, and had to do a double take when I saw this (you can go "ahead" and add your own caption):

Speaking of "Dad Jokes," we spent a good portion of Tuesday evening pointing out every time a dad present at dinner made one of these gems.  We moved family dinner last week because Aunt Pat and Uncle Ray left on Wednesday.  I asked Nicki what was going on with her, and she told us a little bit about being in chorus.  She told us that she was technically a Soprano, but she asked to be placed in with the Alto's because all of the Soprano's whine a lot.  Later, Ashley was telling us a story about Nicki complaining about something (the details elude me), when Dawne interjected, "Wow, what a Soprano, huh?" Burn!

Zach: If you could spend ten dollars a month for a super power, that was really only worth ten dollars, what would it be?

Raymond: I'd wave my hand and have 100 water balloons filled and ready.

Jordan: I'd be able to make carbs disappear out of any food I looked at.

Me: Or, you could just ask for an really high metabolism, which is definitely what I would ask for.

Nater: You know that feeling when you really need to pee? I'd be able to touch someone and transfer the need to them.

Me: Winner.

Around 8 months ago, I searched the whole house for my Friends collection.  We were doing a lot of moving and packing and were were putting on our old friends like, the Gilmore Girls, to keep us company during all of the work.  The problem was I searched and searched and Friends was no where to be seen. And because we were packing up every room, I knew that it was completely missing.  I was so upset about it, I almost bought the whole set again.  Then, on Tuesday, I lent Raymond my T25 video's and on the shelf was Friends.  Dawne and I are convinced that, like many other things in our lives, someone stole, I mean borrowed it, and then returned it when they realized we were upset about it.  They must have had a helluva time getting it back into the locked house too.  Livin' on the compound and keepin' it weird since 2004.  I can’t tell, can you see it in this picture?

Zach & I watched some Gotham when everyone left.  Nater didn't join us; something about our invitation wasn't persuasive enough. "Hey! Want to watch this awful show, Gotham? We're hoping the second isn't as completely terrible as the first."  Either way, it was the first time I saw what Lucas named his Netflix account, and it made me giggle.

On Wednesday, I was telling my mom about the evening before, and I mentioned that Diana and Jason didn't make it.  I wasn't sure if they just forgot or got the days confused because I wasn't the one sending out the invite.  My mom helpfully replied, "So what are you are going to feed them if they show up tonight?"  Grrr.  Just in case, I picked up soup and ingredients for grilled cheese, for which Jordan and Nater were grateful.  Especially because Dawne ended up having a migraine for a day and half.  The change of the weather seems to be the worst. 

On Thursday, I was super jealous of Kathi.  And here's why:

Did I mention that Doctors Rach and Anders are going to go as Hermione and Dobby for Halloween?  Dr Rach will be in her glorious and official Hogwarts robes, complete with wand and time-turner, and I guess Anders will be in a raggedy tea towel/sheet and a sock?  Can't wait to see pictures!

We all went to trivia, which was nice because we missed a couple of weeks there.  One section was all quotes. 

Answer: "Get off my plane!" was said by Harrison Ford in Air Force One

Anders: That's President Harrison Ford, thank you. 

On Friday, I had set up a meeting with this guy as a reference for potential licensee. When I got on the phone, he immediately gave me a hard time and called me Tiffers.  My reply? "Oh, you must have been talking to Shana.  She's the only one that calls me Tiffers."  I love that, "She's cool" translate to "You can mock her, no problem." :)

Me: So I guess Jordan is back on carbs?

Dawne: Why?

Me: Well, I can see four loaves of bread from here.

About an hour later.

Jordan: Challah french toast for dinner?

Dawne: It's your holiday!

Saturday morning, I met with a new dog walker for the pups.  I told her the story about Percy peeing on the trainer so she fully understood what I meant when I said that Percy is the feisty one.  Then I got some errands done before I called Zach to see if he wanted to hang out with me.  We decided to get tickets to see Jon Lovitz at 10.  Obviously, I had to take a nap as soon as I made the reservations.  I didn't feel too bad about the old lady nap taking because when we got there, my 25 year old cousin complained about how loud it was, and that no one should have to listen to that kind of noise.  When we got our seats, we were like 4 feet away from the stage. 

Zach: Great, now I'm not going to be able to look at my phone if he's terrible.

Me: Yeah, you should just never do that. 

I slept in the next day, and when I did finally get up this is how cool the lake looked.  So cool in fact, we decided to jump in the pool and admire it for a while before we had to leave.

Then we went to Kent for our annual Corn Maze, Fun Day!  When I told Maureen that we were going to the corn maze, she brought up her trip to Seattle 7 years ago.

Mo: Ugh.  I hated the corn maze.

Me: WHAT?! It's only the most fun day of the year!!

Mo: No.  It is not fun.  I thought it was going to be family fun, but instead it was a competitive race! And I was left behind, trudging through the mud and darkness with Lucas dead last, not knowing if I would ever find the end.

Me: Oh man! But the racing is the best part!

Mo: No.  No it isn't.

Me: Agree to disagree.

On the way to the corn maze:

Becky: I hope you're happy.

Me: I am! Thanks. End of conversation.

Becky: No... I wasn't done yet.  I hope you're happy, now that you and Kelly are going to be gone next weekend, I'm dragging Jared to the Icelandic taste testing festival.

Me: Oh man, Jared.  You're going to hate that!

Jared: No more than I hate any other taste testing event.  Most food smells terrible to me.

He proceeded to tell me his least favorite smelling foods including Strawberries, Cantaloupe, Pickles & Sauerkraut.

Me: What are your favorite smells?

Jared: No one's ever asked me that question so I haven't ranked them yet. 

We established that BBQ sauce was on the top of the list.  Also, that Becky's through closes up at the smell of hot sauce so when she is cooking it for Jared, outside on the grill, she pathetically coughs the whole time.  That right there is love. 

Before we began the race, I explained to everyone the rules and asked everyone to break off into teams.  I was very surprised to see that Dr. Rach told Anders that she had to team up with me because we had been reigning champs for the last 8 years.  I agreed to let Anders and Zach on our team, especially since I knew that my lame foot was going to drag us down this year.  Nate told us that he likes to change up the rules by reframing what "winning" is.

Nate:r I like to take my time so that I can feel the power of having so many people waiting for me at the end.

Someone else: You have to be okay with losing.

Dawne: Nate is very comfortable with that.

Me: With being a loser?

Nater: Thanks, Mom.

Becky and Jared won both races.  They said it was because Jared was the corn whisperer.

This morning, I was telling my mom the story and she replied, "Sounds like a lot of excuses to me."  And then later, on FB, my mother commented, "There was a rumor that you didn't win. Boo Hoo."  Thanks, Mom.  Dr. Rach said it was cool, b/c the real prize was going home with 80 pounds of pumpkin.

Afterwards, we grabbed lunch at Wild Buffalo Wings (still not sure how Becky was able to breathe in there.) And then I nursed my foot, watched a couple of episodes of Doctor Who with the boys, and vegged out for the rest of the evening.  And that's how I managed to get this out on time! Yeah!

Bone Spurs

Update 9/22 – 9/28

By the time Monday rolled around my foot hurt so badly that I caved and made a doctor’s appointment.  I also walked into the office to see that my flowers were dead, dead, dead. So, I figure things had get better than that. 

After an x-ray, I found out a I had a bone spur (which totally sounds made up) and had made another doctor’s appointment for later that same afternoon. The podiatrist was very kind, patiently explained what was wrong (plantar fasciitis), and gave me a clear plan of action to fix.  When I left, my foot was taped up so I had to keep it dry for a week and followed by a week of heels. 

Co-Worker: A lot of my really athletic friends have bone spurs!

Me: Yeah, that doesn’t sound like me. 

Oh, and Casper got me up hella early, which means I got to see this pretty sunrise. 

We were talking about an old co-worker that used to add a lot of tension to the team.

Co-Worker 1: Didn’t you share an office with them?

Me: Yeah! What was that like?

Co-Worker 2: I bet it was like the opening plot if Frozen.

Unrelated to anything, here’s an update from my cousin in Florida that I thought was the highest of lariouses.

Also, right when I desperately needed it, a new Fresh Patch came in the mail.  Such a fun little product – fresh grass for the most spoiled of caged animals.

On Friday, Uncle Ray came over for dinner while Aunt Pat was on a road trip to Olympia.  I figured I had to cook chicken for the pups anyway, I could go the extra mile and make us some dinner too.  Although, he interpreted that as me feeding him dog food, but it was really delicious and healthy dog food.  I can’t help it if they eat better than we do. 

OH! Okay, so Becky asked me to meet her at 9am on Saturday at Safeway to give out grocery lists to strangers and ask for food for Hopelink.  There were enough of us to be at both doors, and by 10 am we had collected some food, handed out a bunch of fliers, and were feeling pretty good.  That’s when the mayor of Sammamish showed up and asked us to stop volunteering at the food drive.  While we had permission from the grocery store, he had set up food drives at all of the grocery stores, had his own volunteers and didn’t want us helping.  He told us to leave the food, signage and flyers, and contact Hopelink to come to talk to him directly.  I’m sure he had press coming and didn’t want to be seen getting food for anyone outside of Sammamish.  Either way, he wasn’t nice about it, and I left a little flabbergasted that we were kicked out of a food drive.

Me: Is he kicking us out?

Becky’s Friend: No! He wouldn’t ask us to stop volunteering.

Me: Actually, I think that’s exactly what he’s doing. 

Later in the day, two women came to my house and detailed Stella.  I’ve never had my car detailed, so I was pretty stoked to have a layer of dust, dirt and dog hair removed.  Oh! We also cleaned out the garage.  Not as fun as having someone else clean your car for you, but still, satisfying in a different way. 

On Sunday, I stopped by the store to grab some beer on my way to Dr’s Rach and Ander’s for some super fun Harry Potter action when I saw a “family size” version of rice krispie treats.  No joke, a cookie sheet sized treat.  I might have told the woman at the counter, “Finally! A size that fits my sugary needs!”  When I handed it to Dr. Rach I said, “Homemade treats!”  She took it to heart and cut them up perfectly, put them on a dish, threw away the evidence and then placed them on the table next to the vegetables.  One of the many reasons why I heart her. 

We were talking about how it’s started to rain in Seattle and how much the people of Seattle get excited about this gloomy weather.

Hays: Finally time for our dark hobbies!

Anders: Like necromancy. 

Okay, I think that’s about it!  Hope you all are doing well and are as happy as I am that I have finally caught up!

Telestrations

Update 9/15-9/21

Christy told me I needed to get my act together on these updates.  I was all, I’m not that far behind! However, the calendar says otherwise.  

I had a meeting early in the week with a partner from Germany.  I was just about to leave the house, when I grabbed my coffee tumbler and spilled all of the coffee on myself, the counter and the floor.  I quickly mopped it all up, and then changed, but definitely not the way you want to start your day.   The meeting ended up going well, (+1) and I did not spill the Starbucks coffee that I brought (+2). 

I had breakfast with Gabo, who I haven’t seen since July, so that was awesome.  He was telling me all about his new job, orientation and making new friends.  I love that the company has set up a free lunch Wednesday, where you sign up to have lunch with a couple people you’ve never met before at work.  The time and place is chosen by the company, and then paid for – and all you have to do is show up and wade through uncomfortable conversations in an effort to get to know others.  Even after working at the same place for over 3 years, I still think I could benefit from an event like this.  Especially because I stopped meeting new people when Kelly left. 

Not sure if he’s going to be happy about me sharing this story or not… but there was an incident in the work showers.  He went in to take a shower and was humming and whistling as he prepped for his shower for 5-10 minutes. As he leaned down to take his shoes off, he saw that someone had been in the stall the whole time.  He quickly got dressed and waited a bit for the guy to finish up, wash his hands and then leave.  The thing is, the stall opened up to the shower, so I don’t know what this guy’s plan was.  Had my friend not seen the other guy, he would have been very surprised while showering, to be sure. 

Oh, so then I woke up one morning and immediately took Percy outside.  Basically, I had been up for all of 2 minutes when I went to walk down the stairs and completely slipped and fell down the flight of stairs.  I was then amazed to find that I hadn’t broken anything.  Though, I’m not sure that did my injured foot any favors. 

We booked our flight to Myanmar!  Sooo stressful, so I’m super pleased that I don’t have to think about it.  I also found some additional sources for Cristi’s student in PA.  And then while I was at work, I got a package from 3 + Me, a 3D printing company that made me into black widow.  I thought it was a cool concept, but then when it arrived, I ran around the office showing EVERYONE my cool statue. 

On Saturday I had an impromptu bbq and game night with Rach, Anders, Kelly, her mom and sister, and a special guest appearance by Zach.

Matty: I biked Chili Hilly.

Rach: mmm Sounds Delicious.

Before and after dinner we played this game called “Telestrations” which was seriously awesome.  Basically, you write a word, the next person draws it, then the next person guesses and so on.  Everyone is guessing and drawing at the same time and then at the end, you go through all the iterations and laugh and laugh.  For example, once the word was Casino but at the end we had a drawing of the Special Olympics.  Here’s how something like that happens:

I call this, “Things that drive my dad crazy.” AKA “I always pour too much.”  He’d always yell at me, and I’d say, “I just haven’t finished it yet!!”

My sister graciously checked out Dollar General for me, too.  When I sent her pictures to people at work they were surprised to see our product already on the shelf.  I told them that I was *pretty sure* that Maureen hadn’t brought that product with her and put it on the shelf as a joke, but no promises.  My boss was like, “Oh man,  I just realized that there might be two of you running around in the world!” and she didn’t not say it like it was a good thing.  She should be so lucky to know both of us. J

More soon!