Mutant Furry Children

I realize I live in California, the land where no one would look twice if the only thing you wanted to do is ride a tricycle in Venice wearing a thong and juggling (I witnessed this man yesterday). And I was not born here but this place seems to be a free for all for the criminally insane. Like HEY if you are completely crazy come to Los Angeles because you will fit right in. My latest pet peeve – when people don’t seem to realize that their dog is not a small child. Do people really have to dress their dogs up like ridiculous miniature children and treat them to gourmet meals and puppy massages? I have a problem when the dogs are getting better treatment then half the kids in the city.

I love my dog, I really love his sweet silly face. But could I really look at him with a straight face and would he really respect me if I shoved his muscular body into a tiny pink one piece and changed his name to FuFu?



And just when I think you cannot creep me out more than me or the dog are willing to go you DYE YOUR DOG PINK. Now I understand, you love pink, your car is pink, your apartment is pink, even all your cloths are pink, but SERIOUSLY dying your dog pink. That is right up there with chopping off your nose to spite your face.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtoSgmwBPuE&eurl=http://randomplayground.net/main/2008/05/10/painting-the-dog-pink-and-other-colours/

Let’s take this case for instance. There are innumerable problems:
1. The dog is pink
2. The dogs name is 6 – note the other dogs name is 7 so this woman used ALL her creativity to change her dogs color and left none to pick out names
3. The dog has to look like this when the other kids in the house are relatively normal
4. Is this woman crazy

And don’t even get me started on the tripped out steroid freak with muscles in places there should not be walking his tiny Chihuahuas.

Moving Kickstand

Seurat likes to be in the way, OR, he likes to pretend he is a king and we are his servants. Either way the world will never know, but I like to think he imagines himself a king. However let me back up, Mr. Rogue and I love to cook. We have a beautiful remodelled kitchen that makes cooking such an enjoyable task that we can spend hours making the finest meals known to man. Oh so yummy. Our two cats and our dog LOVE to be in the same room as us, see here. Both Rogue and Picasso are intelligent smart animals, they are almost mini humans, and sit with eyesight but not within the foot traffic area of the kitchen. Seurat on the other hand is my little retard, and he is begging to be stepped on. It as if that will make us acknowledge his existence more than we already do the vain peacock that his little soul is.

And he is sneaky. While we are working at the counter, our backs to the room, he will do a stealthy sneak and plop right behind one of our feet. Which in turn he then shows us that he has FAR SUPIROR patience and waits for us to inevitably step on him. Aghast he screams his protest, I almost drop the prosciutto and pesto stuffed cheese chicken we just spent 3 hours making, Rogue’s eyes enlarge HOPING I drop the chicken, Mr. Rogue yelps as I sear his arm with the chicken pan I just removed from the oven, and the kitchen is in chaos. As I turn to make sure the screaming cat survived, he is sitting there, looking at me, as if to say HEY I WAS HERE FIRST. Bastard cat, if he could understand me I would threaten to take him to kitty goal, the pound.

Men Are From Mars

Men and women defiantly do not have matching priorities and I really do believe that we speak a different language or come from a different planet as “Men are from Mars Women are from Venus” suggests. Today was one of those days. Even though I had mentally prepared Mr. Rogue for our Guest Book photo shoot, even though I had told him that that is what we are doing today, even though he had PLENTY of time to resign himself to the situation at hand he still acted like a 8 year old boy faking sick so he did not have to go to school. Men listen to me, there are just some things you have to do, some things that don’t make sense, some things that you would rather NOT do we get that, but for you to say you will do it and then gripe and bitch and moan while said event is taking place well you should have tried to stop the instance before it even got started. You should have nipped it in the bud when it was just a little seed of an idea. And yes I understand that sometimes us women don’t let you know all the seeds, sometimes we wait to let you know when they are mighty oak trees of ideas, ideas that are now GOING to happen. Here is my advice don’t try to chop down the oak tree, just go with the flow, pick your battles, or just let me have my way most of the time.

And although Mr. Rogue made me tear up with frustration and anger at the fact that we were taking our wedding photo for our guestbook and he made no bones about letting me know how unhappy he was we did manage to get some good shots and altogether I was happy with our selection. We have talked and hopefully in the future we will learn to communicate better.

BBBS – The First Meeting

Today I went downtown for a meeting at the Big Brothers Big sisters organization because finally after 7 months of being in the application process, of having people do extensive back ground checks, of having meetings they have finally found a potential Little Sister for me. I remember walking into the office and seeing a whole family two little girls, a little boy, a baby and a mother. I was brought to an office where the mother and her daughter Ms. Little were. My first impression of Ms. Little was that she was pretty, shy, she seemed sweet, and her mother is trying to do her best to help. It was explained that I have three meetings today; first I would meet with my future little alone for five minutes, then the mother, then the councillor to make sure that we are all happy and that we think this relationship will work.

I was a little annoyed to not have been told ahead of time what the agenda was. I mean for the organization who are used to talking to kids all the time 5 minutes does not seem like a long time but for me, someone who has had very limited time with a child it was an eternity. My conversation with Ms. Little was hard, stilted and I seemed to ask all the wrong questions. First we talked about food which seemed innocent enough, great job there, but then I asked about her pets and that story took 3 minutes in which my horror increased exponentially when she described that her dog had to be taken away because they were living out of their car and kept getting kicked out of the motels they were staying at, that story then transitioned to the time she had a cat once but that she saw the dogs down the street kill it. I was so sad that these things were coming out of this little innocent looking 10 year old but we were not done because she then started talking about her father and how she saw him getting beat up. Just then the councillor pops her head in, our time is up, and as Ms. Little smiles and skips out the door I try and collect my thoughts as her mother walks in the door.

Mrs. Little's mon is easier to talk to, grown women I can deal with. I am surprised to hear that she is my age 29 and then from there I could not help but feel sorry for her sad life. She told me her background, had a baby at 16, a baby that her mother stole from her, had her legally declared an unfit mother and stole her. She told me she became a cocaine addict, that she found a man to support her habit, that that man was an illegal immigrant and that she had a son, and twin girls. They moved a lot, they lived off of nothing, and then her man was deported and then came back over the border and then was deported again, she fell deeper into drugs and then 2 years ago, when Ms. Little was 8, her mom got pregnant again. This is when she decided to clean up her life, go to a rehab center, and get job training. Now Ms. Little is in a safer environment. Safer being a relative term but at least she has a mother that is not on drugs and constantly high, she is in a stable government funded housing and she has been going to the same school for the past 2 years.

When the councillor got us all together again we all agreed that we would like to continue the relationship and acknowledge the match. We all signed paperwork and then it was official, I now have a little sister.

Mrs. O.C.'s Birthday

So today the girls are off to celebrate Mrs. O.C.'s birthday. Since she is pregnant we are going to forgo the usual drinking until we are passing out all over the place like flies on fly paper and go to dinner instead. We made reservations at Roy’s a fabulous Pacific Asian Restaurant with the best chocolate molten lava cake I have ever tasted. We are a collection of friends all in similar stages of life with Mrs. O.C. just married a year and pregnant and Mrs. Bulldog, Mrs. Cutie Pie and I all on our way down the isle and hopefully pregnant by the end of next year. It will be nice to have a group of people all going through the same things at roughly the same time, that way we can lean on each other and hopefully make these life transitions a bit easier.

Getting The Boys Ties

Today Ms. Dancer, my maid of honour, and I were on a mission to find the ties for the groom and groomsmen. I had her bring her bridesmaid dress so we could hopefully match the ties. Going from store to store we were trying to find the exact satin cranberry color as the dress, much to my despair after 2 locations and 5 stores we still had not found the right ones, and the cute shoes I had worn this morning that so fit my cute outfit were not cooperating with all the walking. The last store we dragged ourselves we finally found something so close to the color that I was ecstatic. I decided that because the groomsmen were wearing the same suit as the groom that the ties would be different. We chose the bold cranberry for the groom and a pale silver grey for my father and the groomsmen. Sadly this store did not have enough of the grey for the 6 groomsmen and my father, we were able to get 4 and we were told by the nice computer that there were more at a store close by.

Ms. Dancer and I walked out happy with our find and yet when we got to the other location they did not have any of the ties, stupid computer I should just unplug it and throw in the landfill with all the other pieces of electronic equipment and old boyfriends that I have decided were bad. Thankfully we were able to find YET another store that had them and Ms. Dancer said she would swing by on her way to work the next day. Another thing to check off the wedding list.

Poor Negleted Pets

As soon as you step into my house you are met with love. No not from the human residents, I mean we love you but you have NO IDEA the ecstasy you cause in our pets. They hone into fresh meat (meaning any new person that walks in the door) because they are little sluts when people come over. Our guest unfortunately usually misread this frantic struggle to be pet first and they think “GOD you do not give your animals any attention because every time I come over they crawl all over me OBVIOUSLY starved for any small scrap of affection.” This could not be further from the truth. I would equate all three of them to that drunk girl who will go home with anyone at the bar at the end of the night, you don’t even need to buy her a drink she is that easy. They have some affliction of trying to touch any other living thing in the room. I think it is some kind of disease. I mentioned it to the vet and he was like “UM are you crazy, most people complain that their animals don’t love them enough, not the other way around” I guess that makes me an unnatural mother. I would just like an occasional 5 min sometimes when I am home without three small animals following me from room to room. Like I don’t know the bathroom, that is a great place to be alone. Really what could be so interesting to see mommy pee or shower. Maybe I should enroll them in some classes or get them some hobbies.

Wedding Readings

YEA we have finally chosen the readings for the weddings. We have decided Mrs. Carolina, Colin's sister and my new sister-in-law; and my Aunt Happy were going to do the two readings. Here they are:

Mrs. Carolina reading
"To Be One With Each Other” by George Eliot

What greater thing is there for two human souls
than to feel that they are joined together to strengthen
each other in all labor,
to minister to each other in all sorrow,
to share with each other in all gladness,
to be one with each other in the
silent unspoken memories.

I like how beautiful this is and how simple especially the last line to be one with each other in the silent unspoken memories. That seems to wrap up the past two years of things being remarkably hard and him being such a solid silent rock for me to be safe with.

Aunt Happy reading

Dear Angel ever at my side
How lovely you must be-
To leave your home in Heaven
To guard a child like me.

When I am far away from home,
Or maybe hard at play,
I know you will protect me,
From harm along the way.

Your beautiful and shining face,
I see not, though you're near.
The sweetness of your lovely voice,
I cannot really hear.

When I pray you're praying too,
Your prayer is just for me.
But, when I sleep you never do,
You're watching over me.

This is my favorite Psalms. I love it for so many reasons, reminds me of my Grandmother who used to call me her Angel, reminds me that people who love me are watching out for me, and it reminds me that I am never truely alone.

My Fiancée’s Ring

Mr. Rogue does not wear jewellery so I was a little bit nervous about him wanting or willing to wear his wedding ring. I don’t think that I am one of those girls that will be OK with him not wearing his wedding band and I think tattoos are tacky so I am crossing my fingers that he will be OK with the ring. He is choosing his own ring, with my input on the ones he liked we settled on a plain titanium band that was small and lightweight.

So once he ordered the ring they sent in the mail various plastic rings that he was supposed to try on at different times of the day. Since your finger swells and deflates from when you wake to when you go to bed I thought this system as super smart. Over the next few days Mr. Rogue found a size that he was comfortable with and sent in the size.

The ring came in the mail today and when I saw it on his finger I was extremely happy, finally a visual symbolic tie to our wedding. I was sad when he took it off, oh why oh why don’t men have engagement rings. I cannot wait until it is there permentally.

Mrs. Cutie Pie’s Wedding

Mrs. Cutie Pie’s wedding, the first of the three friends to get married was absolutely stunning. She chose to have the wedding and the reception at a hotel right on the beach. The ceremony was held on a floating terrace overlooking the ocean under a big giant blue sky. The ceremony was shorter than short; I think from start to finish it was literally 15 minutes. Mrs. Cutie Pie looked so beautiful in an overflowing satin white gown with a ruched bodice and crystal edging.





The reception was held in a hall at the hotel it was a smaller crowd of 80ish just family and friends. The table cloths were white, the centerpieces were huge white lilies and bright purple orchids, she gave a favour of a starfish wine stopper to go with her ocean theme, and the cake was a swirl of water and shells.

It was so much fun to party with all the girls, normally it is hard to get everyone together. Normally I am the most sober one out of the group but on this day because Mrs. O.C. is pregnant I had someone sober to hang out with.

The Wedding Has Officially Taken Over My Brain

Even with my insane psychotic super planning spree right when I got engaged the few months of depression that left me incapacitated has what I think put me off track with planning. Now I am scrambling in the next two weeks to get all the little things wrapped up and with all my free time being sucked into the black hole of my wedding I am staggering to get things complete while battling my intense need to crawl into a hole.

I feel like a wedding robot on autopilot trying not to think so much about what I have to do or how I feel, I am just trying to make it through today while crossing off as many things as I can from the list that HAS NO END.

To make everything worse I cannot have a conversation with ANYONE without them asking how the planning is going, are you excited and a million other small talk questions that I am just to tired to answer. Must make wedding over.

The Multiple Values Of Being A Dog Owner

I found my sweet loveable furry friend at the pound seven years ago and ever since I have been super thankful for my little man and I really think he has taught me so much and prepared me more for having children. If you can make it through owning a dog then it is like a mini trial for a kid. Here are some things that I have learned.

1. If you are considering having a small human and want a bit of practice a dog is a perfect start to concur some of the more minute details, like learning not to turn around in the back of the car and smacking the annoying thing in the back seat that no matter what you say just won’t shut up

2. Teaches you and your partner how to work together to feed, train, and keep alive a smaller being that is dependent on you for survival

3. Teaches you to filter in your head what the thing can understand and what information is over the head or not worth mentioning

4. Teaches you the valuableness of the ‘bad cop, good cop” strategy

5. Gives you someone who loves you NO MATTER WHAT and the highlight of every one of their days is when you walk in the door – how is that for a god complex

Creature Of Habit

Maybe only women will understand this, but I catch myself with my mouth wide open while I am trying to apply mascara. And then if I close my mouth concentrating very hard on squeezing my lips together it is almost mentally impossible to still get the mascara on right! My cat Seurat experiences the exact same thing when you scratch his back. You can’t touch it without his ears going back, a look of pure rapture crosses his face and he starts spastic licking himself. I bet if I tried duct taping his mouth closed he would then be completely immobile.

The Song

I have been toying for months about asking my childhood best friend who is also the minister’s daughter to sing a special song at our wedding. I have decided it would be a nice addition and since she has a beautiful voice and is interested seems like a done deal. Today we talked on the phone and came up with a couple of ideas for what she could sing. After thinking about the ones she was comfortable singing and searching around for ones that I loved I decided to go with one of the songs she loves. I have always liked it, the lyrics are beautiful, and I figured since she knew it would be a lot better.

Listen to the song here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aJhxmdyGC5c

The Joys Of A Long Term Relationship

Long term relationships are the things that make us grow better, are mirrors to see ourselves more clearly. They help us with our major decisions in life that they help with like jobs, relationships, outlooks and philosophies. They offer windows into our past, of not having to explain everything because you are with someone who knows you deeply.

As I get older I become drastically more aware of paths that I have not taken and the cost of even my most rewarding choices. As I get older my life expanding opportunities are becoming less often and harder to achieve. There are not many opportunities that with my jaded outlook I don’t immediately nix because of the myriad of hurdles or that I now know better. When I was young I imagined an unlimited future, now I am coming to the realization that time is finite.

I am also amazed by my generation and the “If something happens to me then there is something else to blame” attitude. It’s as if we experience life and hardships as unnecessary incontinences rather than life changing events to grow from and survive as part of life. We also expect that society encourages us to think that our wildest wishes and expectations should be in our daily lives. It is like we feel we are entitled to a cheat short cut around the problems in our lives.

There are a few things I want to be VERY careful of as I grow older:
1. I want to make sure I stay true to my husband, both physically and mentally and to keep reinventing ourselves and growing into each other.
2. I want to make sure that there is a relationship between me and my spouse not overshadowed by the years of to much focus on kids and jobs and other things in life
3. Try to keep the habits and addictions that our society uses to mitigate a war field of anxiety, depression and boredom.

Breaking A Bad Habit

I have a disgusting habit that a hate, a habit that is childish and gross and something I do without even thinking about it. It is like a nervous tick and man I wish I could find the off switch. Personally I blame my father for his bad influence. I bite my fingernails. I do it when I am upset, nervous, or confused, usually when I am alone because I am a wall of shutting off emotions when there is a person within a 40 foot radius.

Sometimes on special occasions I get fake nails not because I like them but because I really HATE my hands with my choppy horrible nails. Today I just took off a set of fake nails that I put on because of the Michigan wedding shower my mother threw me, and inspired by my wedding I have decided that I am going to try to stop this bad habit for the one millionth time.

When I was 8 my mother tried that bitter tasting nail polish made for mindless bitters like me. She would put it on in the morning and I during the day I would get the unconscious urge and start biting, gnawing on my hand like a starving tiger, not until I had ripped off almost my entire hand did the bitter taste register. We learned that this form of guided behaviour was not going to work for me.

When I was 10 on a dare I did a back flip off my friends monkey bars down the street. It was something that I had done a thousand times, but unfortunately for me it had lightly drizzled that day and as I flipped back to soar through the air I slipped on the wet monkey bar and fell breaking my arm. My father ran the 15 houses to me grabbed me up and ran with me back to our house where my mother rushed me to the hospital. I remember it hurting and that we had to stop for gas and that there was an accident so the doctors did not get to me for a while. Needless to say I was in a cast 6 inches above my elbow to 3 inches below my wrist and I could not for the life of me physically reach my hand to my mouth. For those 9 weeks I painted, buffed, and polished my beautiful nails. I was so proud of them that I vowed never to bite my nails again, well at least the beautiful ones on my left hand I figured that I would be slightly unbalanced with one hand with long fingernails and one with short but at least 50% was better than 0%. Sadly after I got the cast off the nails only lasted less than 72 hours.

When I was 12 my grandmother tried to bribe me out of my disgusting habit. She was distinguished and orderly and really into manners and she was horrified that her big girl was still doing a childish habit. So she offered me 10 bucks a nail that I could grow past my finger. Even appealing to my greed did not work.

Later when I was 14 my mother made a deal with me, she would stop smoking, a habit I absolutely detested, I really did try but that still was not enough to stop me. My mother on the other hand stopped smoking so something good came out of it.

The last person that tried to guilt, bribe, make me quit my habit is my grandmother, she was also a lifelong nail bitter. She offered that she would stop if I would and since she was two generations older than me I thought that I would have no problems wining and growing my nails before her. Obviously even given a two decade handicap I could still not stop.

So here I am a strong, sophisticated, intelligent woman who is determined to stop her childish silly habit. Wish me luck!

Bowling Night

There are certain times when you are doing something and you get the most profound flashback to one of your childhood experiences. Ms. Dancer organized a bowling night at the local LA bowling alley. When I walked in I was washed with times at the bowling alley as a childhood.



- Mom and Dad on a Bowling Alley
They were on a bowling league and we kids would watch and run around the bowling alley. Begging for quarters to play all the games, Mrs. Pacman and the stuffed animal game with the claw were my favourites.

- Little League Bowling Team
When we got a little older there was bumper bowling and then our own bowling leagues. I remember bringing home my little bowling pin trophy and being so proud to put it on my dresser. I wonder what happens to all the cheap plastic trophies after they live through their 2 minute shelf life.

- Bowling with the Sister-in-law
After my brother Mr. Lambchop and his wife got married the family was expanded by one. She did not come from a bowling family, I could not be surprised more by how horrible she bowled. I did not think it was possible to get that low of a score.

- Bowling with the Family (the Wii)
At my brother Mr. Lambchop’s and his wife we got together for Thanksgiving 2007 and played bowling on the Wii. His wife surprised us all by beating us by a very large margin.

There were so many memories of olden days and although the LA bowling alleys are not actually anything like the old alleys from home aside that there is an alley and bowling balls. We went with a good group of friends which was a motley crew. We bowled (me not terribly well unfortunately) razzed each other and stuffed our faces with greasy Philly Chessesteak sandwiches. Now that I think back not very sanitary.

CA Shower Thank You’s

So it is amazing, today I have sealed and mailed out my last shower thank you card. In six days I managed to put everything else on the back burner so I could concentrate on getting the thank you’s addressed and filled out so I can concentrate on the wedding without it being in my vision. That is unheard of in bride time.

Customer Service Nightmares

I am going to do a rant but I really think that companies give people a test when they start. If you pass your test you are sent to sales, if you fail you are sent to customer service. The hotel we booked The Hyatt is officially driving me crazy. The employees are constantly telling my wedding guests that the hotel is full, which in turns makes them call me, which makes me call the hotel and complain. By the 7th guest I was furious and on the phone for over an hour talking to a couple representatives before I was FINALLY transferred to a manager who supposedly fixed my problem. Stupid hotel, stupid customer service, I hope they all just learn to do their job correctly and stop screwing with my life.

The Sand Ceremony

In weddings there are a lot of things I have issues with, one of them is the unity candle. I think the premise of what it stands for is nice the fact that the mothers go up and light each of their child’s candles and then during the ceremony that those two people making their commitment to each other by lighting the unity candle making them one. The issue I have is that after you light the unity candle you are supposed to blow out your own, like my fire can only exist with his and that my own life, my own individuality is now erased now that I am married.

That is why Mr. Rogue and I have decided to do the sand ceremony at my wedding. A combination of the two different colors from each side that blend together to create a nice memory. We are going to have a small twist to ours. We will have 5 bottles of sand, a rust color for the bride and her mother, a tan color for the groom and his mother, and a white for the Minster signifying God in our union. There will be five bottles for each of us, the mothers will go first and blend their sand, the minister will go third with his color and then the bride and groom with theirs.

Halloween Costume Decisions

Since we are getting back from the honeymoon late on the 30th of October, a day before Mr. + Mrs. O.C.'s Halloween party, we need to have our costumes ready before we go. Normally I would spend forever planning the costume, gathering the supplies, and loving making each piece. Because of the soul sucking wedding I have no time to take a long shower let alone plan, shop and make a costume I decided to do something I have never done, I decided that I would have to buy our costumes.

Now my fiancée has a few rules about Halloween. I could put him in any costume I wanted as long as it:
1. did not involve him dressing as a girl
2. did not involve any kind of face makeup
3. he could have a mask on that impedes being able to eat and drink

With the rules in mind we threw around ideas back and forth of what we wanted to go as:

Bride and Groom
Gomez and Morticia Addams
Batman and batgirl
Tinkerbell and Captain Hook
Big Bad Wolf and Red Riding Hood

We ended up choosing Hansel and Gretel. Here are the costumes.


HIS COSTUME


MY COSTUME

Reflecting On Choosing The Right One

There are a few proposals in my past and I just want to tell any woman who saw that big shiny ring and heard those perfect words that you don’t have to say yes, you can say no and wait for the perfect one.

Mr. Football – Proposed in his car looking out over a field under the stars when I was 18, he wanted me to stay in Michigan and not move to Pittsburgh to go to school. I was 18 so I said goodbye to him.

Rich Baby – Proposed after dinner on a pier looking out over the water. I could have been happy with him but I was 20, still to young to know what I wanted and to settle down with a man.

Mr. Dumb Blonde – He got on stage out our favourite jazz club and sang Frank Sinatra. I was 22 and defiantly old enough but this was NOT the right guy at all.

Mr. Artist– We had talked about getting married, but how could you really marry a man that was more in love with himself then with you. I was 24 when I walked away from him.

Mr. Pittsburgh – He proposed in desperation to keep me with him forever but to be honest it was over a few months before he did. I was 25, he was NOT the right one either.

My fiancée proposed at home in front of our Christmas tree, it was quiet and perfect. I was 29. I am so glad that I ignored all those other roads and waited for the road that was not paved in despair.

Dress Vs. Pants

We finally got around to picking out the groomsmen tuxedos/suits. With our groomsmen spread all across the country pretty much our only option was Men’s Warehouse. Hopefully no one will run into any problems. It took me hours of pouring over magazines, all day at two different dress stores, then going home to THINK about it and going back the next day to pick out the perfect wedding dress. It took one store and 20 min to find a suit Mr. Rogue loved. Sometimes life is so unfair and this is one of the few times I wish I were a man. Such is life. We decided that buying a suit would be better than renting a tux, as there are so many events going on it seemed like a good idea. In my opinion renting a tux for 150 or giving a gift to the groomsmen and them paying the remaining 150 and they can OWN a suit is MUCH MUCH better. It seems unfair however that the bride spends a fortune on a dress while the groom is gifted with just finding a nice suit or tux for much cheaper. After the wedding however I will be able to sell the dress and keep all the money to spend however I want. I have already started to daydream about all the pretty things I can buy.

My California Wedding Shower

Ms. O.C., one of my very best friends, threw the best bridal shower in her home for my California friends that won’t be able to make it to Michigan for my wedding shower there. The theme was “sweeter than sweets” and everything was completely Ms. O.C.’s style, which translates to perfect. She had a table groaning under the weight of cakes, cookies, cupcakes and brownies and then another separate candy bar with take away bags as the favours.

There were a few games, a word scramble, and my favourite idea the ‘who is this celebrity dating/married to’ game. After eating, mingling, and the games we moved onto opening the gifts. There was a lot of lingerie, scented candles, and naughty things for the bedroom; I will just leave that last one open for the imagination. Unbeknownst to me my girlfriend Mrs. Cutie Pie was writing down silly snippets of what I was saying while opening gifts. It was funny to hear pieces out of context.

After the gifts we played toss the penny, which was very interesting. Basically everyone takes turns, when it is your turn you say ‘I have never…” and then everyone that has done the thing you have never done throws a penny in the bowl. I learned many interesting things about the friends in my circle.

We all had a great time, I got to wear my cute new sexy white dress that I had purchased for the Michigan shower and then decided to wear another less revealing dress. I love this picture of me at the shower, I look cute and sweet. Oh if they only knew.

Ding Dong Dinners

I stopped making dinners because the man has been working insane hours and I am the only one home so I think why bother! There were all these Marie Calendar frozen pot pies and ding dongs at the grocery store on sale, all pre-packaged in this genius little individually sized packages. So I bought as many as I thought could fit into the car, which is a lot considering I have an SUV. Now every night I have a great dinner in 23 minutes, the same thing every night, pot pie and then the ding dongs. No muss, no fuss. I just wish that it could be an even shorter time, like microwaving it is just one to many steps.

Guest List Expectations

One of the most daunting tasks for the wedding was the guest list. We had no idea how many people to expect. Most sites I have researched said to expect about 80% of the guest list, but because our wedding is held out of state I was thinking more about 60% of the guest list then I was not sure. There were a number of factors that detoured some people from coming. The fact the country’s economic state is like a crotchety old man and seems to be disintegrating in front of our eyes does not give people extra money to travel. Various other friends are getting married about the same time as us. We are having an adult only ceremony. At least I am doing my part to stimulate the economy, weddings cost a fortune!

Confessions of a Shop-aholic

There is something that I love about fall in LA. Other than the fact that it is still wonderfully beautiful there is still a slight nip in the air in the evenings and since it is winter coming on that means boots, boots, and more boots. Today I went into the store with my friend to choose ONE pair of boots to take home. I ended up falling in LOVE with two pair of boots a military inspired L.A.M.B pair and a slouchy suede grey Enzo Angilino pair so I had to break my one pair rule. And who could blame me because they are just both so beautiful.

Getting Carpal Tunnel

Today thank GOD the invitations are finally done and I think my hand and maybe my arm are going to fall off. I can type all day long and I do but good old fashioned writing skills are not used as much. One of the best things about my Maid of Honour is her superior calligraphy skills. She addressed all the invitations and the elegant handwriting made everything look so sophisticated and beautiful. And it was one thing I could have someone else help me with.

Elixer Of Life

I recently had a conversation with Mr. Rogue

Me: “If you were going to a deserted island and could only take one type of food what would it be”
Mr. Rogue: “I don’t know I would have to think about it.”
Me: “Just give me the first thing that pops in your head.”
Mr. Rogue: “I would have to look up the nutritional values.”
Me:“Ugggg, hypothetically if you had to pick RIGHT NOW!”
Mr. Rogue: “Bananas, but I am pretty sure I would be lacking very important nutrients. And I know I know you would take the molten cake.”
Me: “No I would take diet coke.”
Mr. Rogue: “Yea I see that. You would be dead in 4 days.”
Me: “Maybe, but I would die happy.”

Now I know Diet Coke is not as versatile as Bananas. But it is Gods gift to me and if I am going to die on some random small island in the middle of no where then I want to go down with my gift that I love most on this planet. And as I sit there in the sun and use the last bit of my energy to swallow my diuretic soda I know I will have died happier then if I would have been there sucking on a banana overdosing on potassium.

Wedding Vs. Environment

As we get closer and closer to the wedding day the presents in the mail keep piling higher and higher. Although I am extremely grateful to all my new additions to the household the amount of boxes and shipping supplies I have had to get these things here is so sad. And of course I break them down and they will be recycled but still I cannot help but think what my wedding is doing to the environment and the negative impact it will have. Still I now have all my china, so at least it is not all for nothing. Maybe I will look into purchasing some credits to offset the environmental impact.