That Family Isn't Pretty Enough

(Update 11/3 - 11/9)  That's right people, I am all caught up! (She wrote before she even started writing this update. :P)

Seattle has been living up to its reputation with dark and grey mornings.  Which is probably why I enjoy all the more these zen fellows so much.

We've been kinda sorta eating at home lately.  As in, I've been cooking, and then Nater, and sometimes Jordan joins, and then Dawne makes a PB&J.  The really nice part of this, is I feel like we've had some good conversation time.  Or maybe I'm just really enjoying having Nater home, and I could haven't gotten this same conversation at a restaurant. 

Jordan:  Lucas called me a couple of days ago asking for his monthly allowance early.  When I asked him why, he said it was because he needed Q-tips, and didn't have enough money in his account. 

Dawne: Yeah, he came by his budgeting skills honestly.  By watching me.

Me: Speaking of which, we should go to the outlet mall this weekend.

Dawne: Yes! We can go to that one place I took Lucas.  Everything was half price so we bought two!

Hashtag budgeting.

Jordan was telling us that Lucas has been going to this anarchist books store lately.  They operate like a collective and he goes to all the meetings.  He came home from one meeting and he excitedly told me, "They're so cool! They are really making it happen.  They are going out of business and I'm going to help them!"

Nater: I like the next step in security you have set up.

Jordan: I was testing out the new security cameras.

Nater: Yeah, and they are focused on my three boxes.  Maybe you're just monitoring when I finally decide to unpack?

I feel safer and more secure already. 

Casper sprained his paw/ankle last week, so Dawne brought him to the vet.  (My mom said we bring our dogs to the doctor more than she brought her kids.  Then she qualified, "More than Sean and Maureen combined.  You were a whole other story, always breaking things.")  The vet was impressed with how well trained Casper was.  She admitted that she had an Aussie in college that made her cry every night when she came home.  She had to replace her curtains at least 60 times.  Dawne told he that it was okay, that's how we got Casper.  I still remember the chewed up lap top Nater came home with...

I was telling my cousins how I have a nephew who doesn't get very excited about presents so he makes it harder to shop for him.

Jordan: I have a kid like that.

Dawne: You know, Zach told me that his BEST Christmas ever was last year at Ray's because he returned his gifts and now he can buy games whenever he wants.

Me: Whoa, he told you his best Christmas was the one without you?

Nater: I've said some terrible things to you in my day, but never THAT bad.

Dawne: I think it is because he wasn't expecting anything, which is why he was excited when he got a Christmas.

Me: If that's what you have to think to still love him, then you go right ahead. 

I started Christmas shopping last week, and at work I was mostly getting excited about work stuff.  Just in case you guys didn't get a chance to see it, here's a fun little commercial.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=bUpjbiRyIr8

And a documentary if you happen to have an hour to spare: http://video.xbox.com/movie/remaking-the-legend-%E2%80%93-halo-2-anniversary/30b99908-0100-11db-89ca-0019b92a3933

On Friday, Dawne and I went up to Ray's cabin to hang out with Raymond and his girls.  We stopped on our way up to have dinner.  When we got to the pizza place, Dawne said that we were meeting our family.  The host started bringing us to this one table and Dawne said, "Oh no.  That family isn't pretty enough."  So, he brought us upstairs instead. 

It was pretty cool to be able to spend some time chatting with just Raymond and Dawne.  In the morning, we got up and got to stroll a bit with the pups and breathe in the crisp morning air. 

Raymond said the girls don't normally get up before 11, but they were up at 7:30 to help make breakfast and start playing some games including Telestrations.

Nikki: Those trees look like people.

Ashley: Lots of trees look like people!

Kiera: Yeah, that guy looks like my best friend.

On the way back from the cabin, Dawne and I met Jordan at the outlet malls where I continues my search for dry wicking clothing.  The following morning, I woke up with a headache so I slept in.  I did get up by 11 though so I decided breakfast/lunch should involve a Chipotle run.  I was telling Zach and Nater about the trip to the cabin and how impressed I was with how well Nicki and Ashley get along.  They are genuinely kind and considerate of one another, which is lovely. 

Nater: Yeah. Some families are nice to each other. I think that makes them weak.

After lunch, Zach and I worked on getting photos and visa applications done.  Then I ended up waiting a ridiculously cheesy movie with a young Katherine Hiegl called wish upon a star.  It was from 1996, so I'm sure Lucas would have loved it. 

I also finally got my Halloween package from my parents – it only took 4 weeks to get here! Here is a card I got from Frita, sent 4 days before I received it. 

In case you were wondering, my obsession with Mindy Kaling continues: http://www.crushable.com/2014/05/06/entertainment/mindy-kaling-body-image-weight-quotes/#ixzz3IgV8IXhO

Alright kids - all caught up and feeling a lot better about myself and life in general. 

Heroin Addicts Stole My Costume

(Update 10/27 - 11/2)

Okay, so where was I? Ah yes, the power had gone out at the house and I was up all night with the dogs continuously barking, then taking turns on who got to sleep with me on the couch (heaven forbid one of them got more time than one of the other guys), and in general having a restless night trying to manage the situation between the brown and blue house.  The next morning, I got the pups situated back in the other house and then went to work.  By the time I got home, I was exhausted.  I showered and got into bed before 8.  Which is probably why, when a cop showed up at my door at after 10, I was a little apprehensive.  She asked me if we had had mail stolen, which we had.   She was also very vague, mentioning the edmonds police department (45 min away) and not giving me a lot of information.  I tried to explain that there were actually 4 different houses, and that all of them had mail issues.  When she went to call the other police department, I noticed that the lights were on in the yellow house.  This is when, had I felt more comfortable with the cop, I would have asked her to go up there with me to check it out.  As it was, I didn't feel comfortable at all.  Jordan and fam arrived from the airport 20 minutes later.  I told them the story, and ask Jordan if he wanted to check on the yellow house.  Everyone decided they were too tired and we all went to sleep.  The next morning, Zach received a call saying that someone had found his luggage filled with electronics. This is when we went up to the yellow house, and found out that it had been ransacked. 

Cop: There's this metal helmet...

Jordan: THAT'S MY ROCKETEER HELMET!

Cop: And this weird weapon thing.

Jordan: That's my steam punk gun!

All electronics had been removed, every drawer and cabinet were opened, every piece of art & TV were down from the wall, waiting for someone to load it into a car.  Trash cans had been filled (on top of one was a file folder... with all the manuals to all of the electronics.) There was a bunch of stuff outside in the rain, as if someone had been interupted. As we were taking that stuff out of the rain I exclaimed, "THEY DIDN'T GET THE WEST WING!!"  There is something so weird about how insulted you are about things that weren't taken in these situations.   You're half relieved, and half like, Oh yeah? The Twilight Action Figure wasn't good enough for you!?

They had lots of time, it would turn out.  The CSI like investigation told us that they had been able to sleep in the beds a la goldilocks, and take showers.  They seperated the perscription drugs from the others, made neat baskets and bags of all the soaps and toothbrushes/tooth paste, another of hats and gloves, another of button down shirts.  There wasn't a room, nook, or cranny left untouched.  Remind you of anything? 

"Then he slunk to the ice box. He took the Whos' feast, he took the who pudding, he took the roast beast. He cleaned out that ice box as quick as a flash. Why, the Grinch even took their last can of Who hash." Dr. Seuss

And, ironically, they did steal the signed cell of the Grinch.  Reminding us, that maybe happiness doesn't come from a store. Maybe, happiness perhaps... means a little bit more! 

They were able to recover some of the stolen things actually.  I guess the tale began with four heroin addicts.  The one had stolen a porche, got into a chase/race, and flipped it.  In the trunk was a bunch of eletronics that had been in old shipping boxes from the house (this is why the cop asked me about stolen mail.) From there, they were able to put two of them in jail, and because heroin addicts don't like to go through detox in a cell, they told as much as they could to get released.  From there, a warrant was issued to search their place and car.   A lot of the "good" stuff was sold right away of course, but at least the Grinch cell, Rocketeer helmet and Cinderella slipper were returned. 

I think this went down because the power was out (as was the alarm system), and because it was one of the few houses that didn't have a generator on.  I'm super glad I didn't go up the yellow house on the 8 or so times that I almost did that weekend because I'm not sure Casper and the two Yorkies were going to protect me against 4 robbers. 

Almost daily, Nala barks in the morning to get one of us to distract Casper so she can run over and eat.  I don't have a picture of this event, and the video would be as annoying to you as it is to us in the morning.  Instead, here’s one of the littles playing.

On Tuesday, I called the doctor, thinking that I might have an appointment coming up soon but it wasn't on my calendar.  It was indeed soon, as in it was in an hour.  When I got there, I was informed that I was getting a cortisone shot.  The doctor basically told me he knew I was going to need one, but let me try to heal without it to placate me.  Super.  He was really kind and explained the whole thing to me, and I wasn't too worried because I only really pass out when I'm giving blood.  2 minutes later as announcing the eminent faint I was about to participate in.  Luckily, I didn't actually pass out. 

Doctor: What do you do again?

Me: Product Development

Doctor: Oh! I thought you were a nurse!

Me: And now you know I am definitely not.

Doctor: Actually, I know a lot was happening in your head, but you didn't flinch or move at all.  So that's something.

It's certainly something. 

On Wednesday, it was national cat day, and Uber was bringing around kittens to play with again.  And again, there were no kittens for me.

Did I mention to you that my co-worker Ryan carries around my subway punch card because I can't be trusted to keep it with me?  He's the best.

Speaking of coworkers, Logan came up to take pictures of people that dressed up for Halloween.  None of us had, that is until we remembered that we had samples...

Kelly asked me if I wanted to watch Harry Potter on Friday, which I TOTALLY did.  Stopped by to get some Halloween themed dinner and snacks, and we were ready for a night in. 

The boys were looking for costumes.  Tristan had planned on being Captain America, but then his girlfriend decided to be Captain America instead.  His solution was to go as Black Widow, which his girlfriend did not like.  They got into a bit of a fight, which he ended up winning, but then felt bad about acting on.  We totally encouraged him to be Black Widow (he looked really good!) but always the nice guy, he went as Indiana Jones.  Every time someone went to look for something for their costume and it wasn't there, we blamed the robbers until our 2014 Halloween Motto was "Goddamn heroin addicts stole my costume."

On Saturday, we went to a "Super Awesome Party." I mean that is what it was called.  Kelly decided to go all out because she just happened to have a wedding dress in her closet.  This picture has no filter, if you can imagine:

And our friends Mukul and Mary insisted on going out after the party for an impromptu photo shoot:

http://filmicvision.tumblr.com/post/101621587989/halloween-portraits-i-was-totally-blown-away-by

Meanwhile, at the party, we were talking about what to pack for our trip, and Zach said, "Oh yeah, I'm only bringing two outfits.  One will be an Indiana Jones costume and the other will be Lara Croft." Kelly and I fell in love with this idea.  The whole idea of costumes and packing only two outfits.  We loved it so much, we started shopping for it the next day. 

I hope your week is going well! I hope to catch up real soon!

Are Shoes Feet

Update 10/20 – 10/26

The most ridiculous thing of my week is driving Casper (Dawne’s dog), to work (not my work, someone else’s office), and dropping him off with strangers (they might know Casper, but they certainly don’t know me, and I don’t know them.)  Casper seems to be okay with the system though. 

I’ve been settling in with my new boss (he is super friendly), and trying to enjoy the last beautiful mornings before the winter of grey and drizzle.  Also, I think I was still watching a lot of Haven this week, so apologies in advance that I’m low on content.  Instead, please enjoy one of the funniest lists I’ve seen on the internet:

http://www.buzzfeed.com/daves4/greatest-tumblr-moments

On Wednesday, I baked two pies for my company’s charity event.  Basically it was a day of pie that included eating savory pies for lunch, a pie tasting after lunch (my Oreo pie totally won btw, but they only shared the results of the pies that were donated by bakeries), eating pizza pies and beer, followed by throwing pies in the faces of your favorite (or not so favorite) co-workers.  We raised a ton of money for Make-a-wish, and had a lot of fun so yay!

While we were raising money for Make-a-Wish, my brother was participating in Shave 4 a Cure.  I think he raised over 11K on his own, and as a group they raised a lot of money toward finding a cure for cancer.  Super proud of him! Here are some quick shots from the event:

I had been talking to Matastic last week about Halloween and how I would probably not be doing anything b/c the 31^st was falling on a Friday, and Friday’s are the worst.  Seriously. They are. 

I also brought my Fiat in to get the headlight replaced and found out my car is under warranty – SCORE!

Saturday’s though, are totally cool.  First I went to Marymoor with Kelly for the first time in like 2 months.  My doctor told me not to walk any more than I have to, which is super annoying.  Walking with Kelly is pretty chill though.  Plus Nala got to try out her new rain coat.

Afterwards, I had 5 hours to finish up the last of Haven before meeting Kelly at this bar in Kirkland for a birthday party. The yorkies were enthralled at this point:

 I had been wanting to check this place out, Flatstick Pub, because supposedly you could being your pups there.  When we arrived, there was this baby biewer puppy.  I didn’t get a chance to take a picture but he basically looked like this:

The owner came over and started handing the puppy to everyone who looked kindly upon her saying that the vet told her to socialize him.  When Mary was holding the puppy she said to the dog, “Yeah, she has great boobs doesn’t she?” which totally embarrassed Mary.  I looked at Kelly and mentioned how surprised I was with all the sharing.  Kelly replied, “I know! She even handed it to the brown person and usually white people are scared of brown people.”

And then I have a couple quotes that I don’t know where they came from but I clearly thought they were giggle worthy so… Imma leave it here:

He told me he hated you.

Well, I liked his waffle weave shirt.

What I wouldn't pay for Stephen Hawking to talk dirty to me.

Thank goodness I had finished Haven earlier in the day, b/c when I got back from the bar, the power had gone out.  I messaged Alicia (Kelly’s godmother) and Kelly the next day to ask if they were still on for brunch because I needed  coffee.  We drove up to Edmonds to Alicia’s and had a delicious breakfast.  Afterwards, I went back to Alicia’s and took a shower and charged up my phone.  (Did I mention that this was the first time I had ever been to Alicia’s and that Kelly and Alicia had left me in the house while they went fishing?) All the more reason to be uber grateful for the hot shower and fully charged phone.  On my way back to the house, I called Sean and told him about the house sitch.  He was all, “the only thing you have to worry about is the fish.” To which I replied, “I WASN’T WORRIED ABOUT THE FISH AT ALL!”  When I got back, I ran around trying to secure the unsecured jet skis, getting the fish oxygen, and other fun stuff.   When I finally settled down, and into the house, I realized that it was 50 degrees in the house and I needed to figure out a heating solution for the evening.  I couldn’t get the two fireplaces in the brown house working, and thought about going up to the yellow house to turn the generator on, but didn’t want to mess the house up.  I tried the fire place in the little blue house instead, and was very pleased to get it up and running.  I ran back and forth between the houses for the rest of the night, and when the power went on at 4:30 am, I had to readjust a bunch of things too.  All this to say that I was exhausted on Monday… but more on that soon. 

It Tasted Fine

Update 10/13-10/19

I started watching a show that I knew from the beginning that Zach and I would love to watch together.  It was a cross between Smallville, Eureka, & Lost Girl, and I loved it from the very first episode.  I thought, "I should wait for Zach to watch the rest of this." And then I thought, "Naw that jerk left me to go to Germany for three weeks.  Imma watch it right now." And I did.  All 4 1/2 seasons in fact.  This means that while I am actually behind in my updates, I have very little to update you on beyond plot points and that Lucas Bryant is dreamy. 

When I got back to from NY, I found a tick on Percy so I had the pleasure of removing said tick.  I gotta say, this little guy sure knows how to be a brave boy. 

On the same day, I saw this lovely conversation between friends that I thought you'd enjoy:

Looked behind me at work and saw this.  Ryan: I wanted to be a part of the conversation, but I also wanted to get some work done.

On Wednesday, this is what I walked into the office at 9 am.  Then I moved a couple of beers over to get to a coke zero.  Ah the life of a game company.

  

We got together with Rollie, Matastic, Ryan and Kelly.  This lunch is planned once a month, but we really get together every 4 or 5 months.  Planning is clearly not our strong suit.  Or maybe we are just so dedicated to our work that leaving for lunch is too hard.  I wish it was just a planning problem. 

Kelly was telling us a fun little dating story that involved a little bit of intrigue and facebook sleuthing. 

Matastic: Wow, you're like a detective, Kelly. Are you sure in the right field?

I agree, she's quite good - though it sounds like Matastic comes from 1 part being happily married for several years and 2 parts Kelly having some FB dramatic college friends.  Either way, we learned a lot that day. 

Kelly: My friend Mallory...

Rollie: You have a friend named Mallory?

Matastic: There is someone named Mallory in real life?

Me: Yeah, I thought that was just in Family Ties.

Kelly: So anyway, my friend Mallory...

Me: How's parenthood going?

Rollie: Good.  I know a lot more about girl’s anatomy now.  Especially now that I need to protect rather than [banged the table.]

Rollie: My mom asked me if I would change her name.  Like the first thing she said to me after I told her that Ava was born she texted me, "That's nice, but wouldn't it be better if it was spelled Eva?"

On Saturday, Dr. Rach and I went to Becky's tea party.  Okay, it was more of a charity event at Becky's church, but there was a contest for best table, which Becky totally won!  There was a style show that I learned nothing from.  I'm not saying that it wasn't very helpful, I just don't like being told what to do. During the silent auction, Dr. Rach and I kept a very close eye on our bids.  I felt like everyone else at the tea party wasn't taking the auction very seriously.  That's when I lost a little respect for them, and then rechecked my bid.  Both Dr. Rach and I both won; my prize was handmade cards from Becky that I have every intention of sending to here with a note on the back "Made with love by Tiffany." 

On Sunday, I went over to Doctor's house and made cookies!  We also watched the Addams Family.  I was really thinking about dressing up as that fake German chick with the terrible accent.  Mostly, b/c I loved the idea of talking like that all night with the added bonus that I would be a character so obscure, not even I knew who I was. 

I'm saving this story for last, even though it happened early in the week.  I was getting the pups all situated in the morning, grabbed my stuff and then called Casper to get into the car.  This is when I realized that he had a diarrhea problem that had spread all over my car.  I pulled him out of the car, and took him inside.  I changed my outfit quickly, yelling at Casper not to jump on ANYTHING.  Then I lifted him into the sink for a butt bath, followed by trying to get him relatively dried off.  Next I needed to wash and disinfect the car, which is when Casper and Percy ran outside and up to the neighbors to bark.  When I got them back into the house, Casper kept trying to eat the treats out of the puzzles I left for the littles, and by the time I got it all figured out and Casper back into the car, it was like 30 minutes later.  Frustrated, grossed our and a little exhausted, I called my parents. 

Frita: Hello?

Me: Hi.

Frita: Hello?

Me: HELLO!?

Frita: Hello?

ME: CAN YOU HEAR ME!?

Frita: Oh yeah.  I can hear you.  You know how I am with technology. 

So, I tell him my lengthy Casper story.

Frita: I know what will make you feel better.  I was looking around in the Pantry and I found some creamer from FoodTown.

Me: Food Town?  I can't even remember the last time I saw a Food Town.

Frita: Yeah, well, it had an expiration date of '95.

Momela: Let me see that.  The copyright is 1984!

Frita: I tried it, it tasted fine.

Me: Frita! You don't even like creamer!!

Waste not, want not I guess.