Gramma

Today is my grandma's 82nd birthday...and I know she will never read this so I can be completely honest about everything I love about her. My grandma has always been a big part of my life. I've spent enough time at her house that I would consider it my home. I wish I could hang out with her right now and celebrate. I did the best thing that I could do being 2,000 miles away...a birthday phone call...I could hear the excitement in the background and I longed to be there even more.

Grandma is such a good-hearted, fun-loving little lady. She is so much fun I definitely know where I get my love for gossip, my inability to remember my point in a story, and my natural bossy-ness. Seriously Grandma is so selfless she is always there for us, like second mom.

QVC is Grandma's staple. Growing up she was always buying something new for herself or us from the wonderful home shopping network. She swears by all the products that she buys from there and is always excited to show us her newest treasure. Grandma's love for shopping extends beyond that of what she can order by phone to the many trips that she makes to JCPenney and beyond. She humbly wears the most beautiful jewelry and coordinating outfits. I actually think its the woman beneath that makes everything so beautiful.

I personally feel like bringing a boy home to meet Grandma is just as important as bringing him home to mom and dad. And thankfully it was an instant bond between Tanner and her. I secretly think she may even like him more than me...they are so funny together. Tanner is very interested in everything about Grandma from her grandma skin and its lack of elasticity to her face full of gorgeous wrinkles. Some people get mad at Tanner for bothering her about her aging body but she is not sensitive about it she just laughs and laughs at his intrigue.

With each visit Tanner also tries to learn some new spanish words...he has pointed out to us that Grandma talks to us in english intermixed with spanish, spanglish if you will, and we don't even realize it. Our favorite thing to harrass her about is the fact that she can't say sheets without getting embarrassed. Her cute little accent makes it sound like she needs to wash her mouth out with soap.

I would just like to mention a few more things. Grandma is the greatest cook I know. She makes the best tacos, enchiladas, and tamales on the earth. Really anything she cooks is to die for. And I love her stories...I even got one today when I called her. She told me that today when Grandpa invited her to lunch at the Sizzler, she said she was too tired (not realizing he was asking her out to celebrate her birthday which she said she forgot) she told him to bring her something and she was laughing about what he had shown up with, totinos pizza, you know the kind from the frozen food section...catch my drift on the story-telling?

I could go on and on about my wonderful grandma but its time for bed. Happy birthday Gramma and may you enjoy many more! Read more...

Happy V-Day!

Tanner and I had so much fun hanging out on Valentine's Day. I got off work early enough to hang out a little bit, get to Reston for some long overdue ice skating, and for some of the best sushi we've ever had.

Tanner has been avoiding ice skating like the plague. I have suggested it for many a date-night over the past 6 years and every time I've been denied. He even tried to get out of it on February 14th. Sorry man, can't tell a girl no on Valentine's Day. I'm not sure but us actually making it on the ice may have some correlation with the fact the new sport he loves takes place entirely on the ice...hmmmm? We did have some newfound respect for the Caps players after awkwardly circling around the rink for forty minutes.

It was a night to remember for sure.  Thanks for the memories and for always loving me no matter what.   I love your guts!

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Going Green

Tanner and I woke up to a nice surprise after a crazy night at the Caps game and hanging out in DC. We opened up the sports section of The Washington Post to see our bright, shining faces watching and celebrating Mike Green's open-netter. I can't believe someone froze this moment in time. We love Mike and Tanner actually got one of his hockey sticks after the game...what a night! Read more...

Honesty is the Best Policy

Let me tell you what happened to me yesterday at lunch.

My friend Jen and I were having our daily chat in the lunchroom. It’s the one time during the day we can get away from the daily grind and just laugh and hang out. Well yesterday we suddenly realized we were shouting at each other. I yelled why are we shouting?

We came to the conclusion that it was because the tv was blaring. I decided I would take it upon myself to turn it down for everyone's sanity. I walked all the way over to the other side of the room where the tv is and was ready to climb on top of a chair to decrease the volume of the news anchors on CNN, then something deep down encouraged me to ask the randoms in the lunchroom if it was okay. I turned to the girl sitting alone at the table near the television and started to ask her, assuming she agreed, if she wanted me to turn it down….before I could finish my sentence the girl told me that she turned it up…she turned it up because of me. Apparently she can never hear the television over our lunchroom conversations. She expressed this to me very matter-of-factly; surprisingly not blatant or rude. I was stunned, and instantly apologetic.

I walked away in shock…I was mouthing, can you believe what just happened? This girl was the epitome of honesty. She dared say what no one dares to say…you annoy me and I am not afraid to tell you. The rest of our lunch was full of quiet whispers intermingled with erupting laughter because we couldn’t hear each other. We shot nervous glances over to our new acquaintance (who we never even knew existed until that moment) to make sure she didn’t hear us.

This one shocking episode in our lives was enough to keep us laughing the rest of our work day. It was especially helpful to keep us motivated at that point in time where your brain doesn’t function anymore and you just want to go home. So, I want to take a moment to thank this honest stranger for putting us in our place and giving us a good laugh. Read more...

TC: Mr. Heckles

If you have watched enough Friends you know who Mr. Heckles is. The neighbor who lives above Monica's apartment who continually comes down to complain about loud noise levels in the apartment. Since our downstairs neighbor has moved in I feel like I'm now Mr. Heckles.

Every weekend from about 12:00 PM to 3:00 PM our annoying bottom neighbor feels it necessary to blast his tunes while he does whatever he does down there. I'm talking BLAST. If I put a glass of water on the ground its like on Jurassic Park when the T-Rex it tromping through the jungle. The man has got some bass!

Like Mr. Heckles, I have gone down stairs and kindly asked if he'd turn his music down. To which he responds, "Its not even that loud." So I have to deal with these jam sessions in a more creative fashion. Most of the time putting in some headphones does the trick but, when they don't, more extreme measures must be taken. Examples include "exercising" or just running up and down all 38 stairs in the house, "plyometrics" throwing the term light on your feet out the window of course, cranking up our own tunes, recreating the million man march every time I go into the kitchen, vacuuming. You know, anything to show the dude, "Hey, turn your F'ing music down."

Well today, today was different. The downstairs rave started a little late and I had just eaten lunch so I couldn't even think about exercise. But there was something missing from the music today, a decent drummer. So I helped him out by playing the floor drums to the beat of his tunes. I guess he got the hint because after only one song, the music stopped.

"Oh well" I thought, "I would rather study than play the silly floor drums anyway. Read more...