home

It was seven years ago this weekend that I moved into my house. I was single then, didn't have a dog, and the walls were all white.
I remember being proud of myself for taking this big step, but also scared to death that now I had a mortgage payment due for the next thirty years. I'm so happy that I have Greg to share our home with. It's not really the building that you live in that makes a home, it's the memories and life we create together.

his big day

If everyone could send some positive thoughts for the Gregster today, that would be much appreciated. He'll be downtown this afternoon. Hopefully this stupid mess will be resolved and Greg can get back to a normal work routine again.

sign it, i mean it

Hey y'all. I now have a guest book. It's over there. To your left, right under my picture. Sign it, please.

how cool is this?

So a few weeks ago, you might remember that I wrote a post about a book I had just finished, called Design Flaws of the Human Condition by Paul Schmidtberger. Well today, I received an email from none other than Mr. Schmidtberger himself. He had come across my blog post and decided to drop me an email. How cool is that? This whole world wide web thing is turning out to pretty damn cool. So now, I plead with all you readers out there. Go buy this book and have a great time, like I did, reading it. The text of Mr. Schmidtberger's email follows:

Hi Michael,

I hope you don't mind me writing to you out of the blue, but I saw the excerpt of my book that you put up on your blog and I just wanted to thank you! You managed to zero right in on my very favorite part of the book and the part that gave me the most pleasure when I thought I finally had it right!

I've poked around your blog and really enjoyed it. In return, I've finally put up a website, which I was *supposed* to do ages ago. It's www.paulschmidtberger.com

Again, it was really fun to see my book on "the internets," and I'm grateful for that!

Best regards,

-Paul Schmidtberger

driving mr. tucker

Tucker went with us on the donut run this morning.

forgot about the party

We had a few friends over for a pre-surgical dinner party for our friend Michele on Sunday. She enjoys my homemade lasagna, so I created an italian themed dinner around it in her honor. I got a lot of the prep work done that morning, so it was nice to be able to spend more time with our friends rather than running around the kitchen. It was nice to have Michele and her mom over, along with Megan, Paula, Kathryn and Ryan. I need to get a monthly dinner night going. I love cooking and entertaining for folks. And yes, I forgot to snap a picture of the lasagna. It's based on a recipe from Ina Garten, the Barefoot Contessa. It has four types of cheese layered in it: fresh mozzarella, parmesan, ricotta, and goat cheese.

the dark side of things

At around 2:25 this morning, the electricity in our neighborhood went out. And along with it the hum and comfort of our air conditioning. Anyone who knows us, also knows that we keep the homestead pretty chilly. Needless to say, it was a pretty restless night for both of us. There were no storms in the area, we just lost power. Greg called the electric company and they said things should be fixed around 6 am. Perfect, that's when we usually get up during the work week. Well 6 o'clock rolled around and still no power. Showered by candle and flash light. We couldn't iron our clothes for work. Greg used that wrinkle releaser spray on his trousers. I remembered that we had an iron and ironing board in my department at work. So I left for work a little early this morning and just finished pressing my pants. This day is sure off to a good start.

amy sedaris

I forgot to mention that Amy Sedaris will be at Main Library on Wednesday, October 17 at 7 pm. I'm very excited that I will get to meet her. She'll be promoting her entertaining book and from what I hear, will be making some crafts on stage with some audience participation. She's so frickin cool. I loved her back in her Strangers With Candy days. She's also a very frequent guest on Letterman. And if you didn't know it, she's also the sister of author David Sedaris...another one of my favorites. We've seen him speak several times, and he always makes my sides hurt from laughing. So, if you're not doing anything on Oct. 17th, let me know. I can get you some pretty great seats. Here's a clip of Amy with Martha. It's quite entertaining.

pushing daisies - Preview

Here's a show coming this fall, that I am very excited about. It's getting some really great buzz.

man of the year

I don't think that I can say how lucky I am to have Greg in my life. But I'll try... Greg's going through a lot of shit with his new job. There's lots of drama from his previous employer. I can't say much, because it's currently in litigation. Despite all that, Greg is handling the situation well. He amazes me with how calmly he deals with situations like this. He is my rock. I forgot to brag about all he did around the house a couple of weeks ago, before he started his new job. He called and got the garage door fixed, made an appointment to get the carpet cleaned, and managed a ton of other household tasks while I was at work. He monitors our finances with an eagle eye. Without him, I'm sure I would have spent every last penny we had, and we'd be living in a cardboard box somewhere. Greg is my hero, I can't believe that's been nearly seven years since we met. It's gone by so fast, but it also seems that we've always been together. Greg, I love you for all that you do for us.

sara who?

Here's the question of the day. You know the tag line for Sara Lee products. Or do you? There's been some quite spirited discussion the last few days. One camp says that it is, "Nobody does it like Sara Lee." Camp two insist on, "Nobody doesn't like Sara Lee." What do you think? And don't just go googling it...

happiness

I just finished reading a good book, Design Flaws of the Human Condition, by Paul Schmidtberger. It was a quick and fun read. There was one passage near the end of the book where several examples of happiness were presented. My favorite was the following,
"Happiness is what happens when you go to bed on the hottest night of the summer, a night so hot you can't even wear a tee-shirt and you sleep on top of the sheets instead of under them, although try to sleep is probably more accurate. And then at some point late, late, late at night, say just a bit before dawn, the heat finally breaks and the night turns cool and when you briefly wake up, you notice that you're almost chilly, and in your groggy, half-consciousness, you reach over and pull the sheet around you and just that flimsy sheet makes it warm enough you drift back off into deep sleep. And it's that reaching, that gesture, that reflex we have to pull what's warm--whether it's something or someone--toward us, that feeling we get when we do that, that feeling of being safe in the world and ready for sleep, that's happiness."
So true, and so poetic.

music to my ears & i'm flipping out

It'll be fall soon and that makes me happy. That is when lots of new music starts flooding the airwaves. I read today, that Annie Lennox has a new album, Songs of Mass Destruction, dropping on October 2. She is near the very tippy top of my list of all-time favorite musicians. Her voice and songs make me melt. You can hear her first single off the album, Dark Road, by clicking here. It's lovely and haunting. Just so you know, when Greg and I get married, if a couple of you wanted to chip in and pay for Ms. Lennox to sing at the reception, we'd be ok with it. Well golly, I guess I meant to say that I NEED her sing at our wedding...
In guilty pleasure news, have you seen the show Flipping Out on Bravo? I think it may be my newest small screen guilty pleasure. It's about an OCD-gay that flips houses in California. Big expensive, beautifully decorated houses. He has a staff of several unique characters (read struggling actors). It's fun and light and perfect for summer. I'm sure it will be one of those short series, and I hope that they pick it up for another season. I guess we'll have to just "Watch what happens."

today's riddle

Courtesy of Chris at work...

What's blue and smells like green paint?

Comment with your guess below. Check back on Friday for the answer. Perhaps the first person to get it right will win a prize. Sorry Greg, you can't participate, since I already ran this riddle by you.

fish sitting update

A few days ago, I walked into the kitchen, where the fish are on the counter. To my surprise, $2.99 was laying on his/her back at the bottom of the tank. Dang it, now I need to buy a replacement fish... Also, did you know that you can find out how to dispose of a dead goldfish on-line? You can, click here for that illuminating information.
Rest in peace little $2.99. You will be missed, but will probably replaced by $3.68.

pet sitting

Our neighbors across the street, Jeff & MJ, are headed out for vacation this morning. Before leaving they brought over their small fish tank for us to pet sit while they are gone. The two fish are named Friday and Two Ninety-Nine. The grandchildren named them. This pet sitting deal is pretty sweet. When we head to the beach at the end of the summer, they are going to take care of Tucker for us. We are getting the much easier end of this deal. In other weekend news, we had a nice reception at work Friday night. Small group but everyone seemed to have a great time. Greg stopped by, so I got to show off my good looking better half. In other Greg news...His last day with his current company is Tuesday. He begins his new job (back in Akron!) on Friday. Woo-hoo!
Saturday we headed to the cinema to catch a screening of The Simpson's Movie. It was very entertaining. A good translation from the small to the big screen. Greg is the big Simpson fan in our household, but over the year's I've become more and more of a fan. I really enjoyed some of the more cinematic effects that they used in the movie. It seemed to really technically update the television show. If it weren't for the very loud father and son a few rows behind us, I could have enjoyed it even more. I think the son must have seen it before, because every few minutes he would exclaim, "watch this!" Damn talkers...D'OH!