Vanilla Cloud Groove

Just coastin', how I do. Em's is sleeping beside me and I can't explain how excited I am that in just a little more than a month I will be married to her. Plus, Jamaica will be warm! We used the heat for the second time this season. I thought that the house was so well insulated by mold and old cat hair that we wouldn't even need it at all (after all, we never used it last year in the shoddy apartment). But apparently having one neighbor catty-cornered to us in the apartments who DID use heat was enough to get us through. Here we have no such heat sharing neighbor. The two of us freeze while Cornbread just looks delighted and fluffy. Stupid bunny. Emily suggested we try finding an energy efficient space heater since the house has baseboard heat with controls in every room. The heat works okay, but it only really warms up the bedroom. In the rest of the house you just have to huddle over it to get any real effect. I think some of the enjoyement is just psychological. We had spent evenings at the gym, or barnes and noble or the library, but they don't stay open that late (except the gym and who can stay there more than a couple of hours!).

I worry a little that my frugality is trending toward miserliness, but am not too concerned as we are still being dutiful little consumers.

Forever Wandering :)

So it has once again been forever since I wrote anything, but I will admit I am beyond feeling any sort of self imposed guilt about it! I am lyin' in bed sick from some stupid virus that I got at the accursed mall. To be completely honest there isn't really going to be anything of much interest in this post, so for the three people who read it you may now consider yourself warned. First off let's mention how wonderful archive.org is. I love it. Free media is sweet. I'm currently listening to a soundboard recording of a August 27th, 1972 Grateful Dead show, and the quality is amazing. Jerry's guitar on "Sing Me Back Home" almost makes me weep. That dead guy just blows me away. I've been playing guitar just around the house but haven't really been playing with anybody. I would like to start playing with Mitch more, but it just seems like time gets away from me. There's a dude at work I may try to jam with but that may or may not happen. So that's the music update.

I just got skype (i know, behind the times huh?) so hit me up if you want. The skype profile name is turtlepaw1. I really enjoyed chatting with Abby on the skype calls she and emily have. It is crazy talking and looking at someone in China. I suppose that although I consider myself fairly up on what is happening technology wise, I am pretty slow to adapt or use it much myself. And even when i do it is sporadic at best, but I thought I would give the skype thing a try.


What else have I been up to? Mostly work and raiding the library. I doubt that many people check out the reading list off to the side, but it has been reliably updated and changed (way more than the actual blog itself!). This year I've had a bit more time for reading than the last couple of years. Being out of school does that for you! I've had lots of time for reading since I gave up the ebay/craigslist addiction. Less time on interweb=more time for reading. Not that I'm not online still, it is usually on my phone though, and that time is pretty much exclusively email and wikipedia. I'm a wiki junkie and not ashamed to admit it.

Emily is finishing up her semester and ready for it, with wedding plans looming over her and the death house of moldy mcmolderson providing us some constant fun. She is a little stressed, but I have no doubt that she is going to rock all of it, as she usually does. Not much she can't do!

Pretty soon we will be winging our way to the land of rasta and ting to pledge our lives to each other in irie bliss for eternity (or at least most of it) and nerves are starting to set in. I think that we both feel unprepared for the reception family thing that has slowly been pushed back month by month. It is good because Abby will definitely be here, which is uber important to Ems, but it is a little nerve wracking to not really know what's going on (although really I just put that for Emily because I figure that it will all work out and I can't really do much about it now if it wont then, see? But united front and all...). The ease of Jamaica makes the reception seem all the more difficult to worry about. I can't wait for the sand and sun as the weather dips colder and colder here.

Work is going well and the season of hell is upon us. It has been a little busy and I will admit to having those terrible dreams at night where I am still serving obnoxious customers. I maintain my smile against all odds at work, but have no stomach for rudeness outside of work. Emily got cracked up because I went off on a rude diner at a restaurant we go to. Sometimes I wonder how people can treat other humans so rudely. What a sense of entitlement some people have. All rules of civility are lost when there is a counter or apron between people.

On another topic, I am considering going back to school this spring! It depends on how I can swing financial aid/just out and out money stuff. I may need to sell some guitars (lol).

I'm using the eee pc that I gave emily because she doesn't really like it and I missed the slow little bugger. It is jumping and flickering oddly, and I am still adjusting to the keyboard, so please excuse the atrocious typos. I doubt I will correct them.
Love

More Than Nothing

So it's been forever since I've put anything on here and I've been real busy. This isn't really an update. Mostly I just can't sleep. I was out of work all last week with an ear infection, bronchitis, and "flu like symptoms." Today (in about 3 1/2 hours actually) is my first day back at work. Tonight I mostly just read in bed, waiting for sleep to catch up to me. It didn't. So here I am, working on this thing. So what's been going on since the last post?
-Dad had his surgery, and is having a difficult time in recovery.
-Jed quit his job (hurray!)
-Emily started back at school
-The band kind of dissipated
-I'm still doing guitar stuff, working now more on construction and ebay doodling than technique.
-I got obsessed with reggae (the whole going to Jamaica thing)
-I read bunches (see the reading list for specifics)
-I saw bunches of great movies (Outlander, Band Slam, and Ponyo are the faves that spring to mind)
-Emily has been busy with knitting, sewing squishy monsters, keeping me healthy, and learning (slowly) to love the Star Trek!
-The library must hate me because of my constant use of their online queue system (did I even spell that right?). I didn't think they even noticed my use of it until two of them at different times made a comment about it (I was a little embarrassed!).
-I joined the gym!
-I quit smoking, again! (brief explanation: I quit smoking last year, taking a drug from the doctor that made me terribly sick. I swore I would never smoke again just so I wouldn't have to quit. Months rolled by and I began my final semester at school. I won't say I was driven to smoke from the stress, mostly because that would be a lie. I did it because I liked it. And I'm sure some chemical part of me was still hooked on it. There was no smoking of normal ciggies for me though, I only smoked cloves, believing at the time-erroneously-that they were less harmful. I never really smoked them that much or that often, but I would definitely say that they were a habit. Now I'm trying to kick them, without drugs or anything that makes me poo/puke.)
-I like to find guitars for cheap on Craigslist and ebay and buy them. I get too many and sell some. Then I cry and buy more. Overall I don't lose that much money, but it is an annoying little trend that I think Emily may strange me over. My current faves are a Xaviere tele, a Regal acoustic, and a super cheap First Act. Total price for all three combined? $135!!!
-Emily and I are moving to a new house and performing the slowest paint job in the history of mankind. We have a nice brown stove. And yellow ceilings.
-I bought a mower!!! Emily has already named it "Grasshopper."
That's it for now. I'm tired.

Making Plans

Today Emily and I put down the deposit on our wedding, and we are sailing forward with all due speed. Please excuse the nautical crap, I just read a book about a guy who sailed a raft everywhere. Stuff like that kind of sinks in! We ended up deciding on Jamaica, and are staying at Tower Isle (formerly Ocho Rios, which was formerly Tower Isle...). We are having a beach wedding (I think) at 10 AM on Jan. 12. Hurray! Tomorrow is going to suck because my pa's having surgery and I just can't imagine how scared he must be. We will be heading up as soon as I'm off of work to check in and see how everyone is doing. Sorry to end on a sour note, but I'm all bushed. Okay, here's a few happy things:
-I saw my beautiful niece today and she looked a little like a pumpkin. Up until today I didn't know that we could pick our "nicknames," but now I do. Though they may try and call me JJ or uncle JJ I'm pretty sure that it won't take too much convincing for Audrey to call me my Uncle Name of choice: Uncle Butt. It makes me smile just to write it!
-A friend of mine has just reentered my life recently and I had a great conversation about the more spectral aspects of our world this afternoon. It was fun.
-I got 4 cds from the dollar store today that should have cost a lot more. I got the last two phish cds, the last Bjork, and one other that I won't say in case it embarrases Emily (the first name is a city in France, and the last is a hotel chain). I'll just say that the artists name rhymes with Flaris Bilton and leave it at that.

Here's some recent photos: 2 from turtle paw practice, the Decemberists show, the tree of life in animal kingdom, and the summer solstice.

All This and All That

Hi again! Today Emily and I went to check out our options for a destination wedding, and it sounded really cool. So far I think our favorite is Jamaica. At first I was sort of anti-Jamaica, wanting to see some ruins and stuff south of the border. But the travel guy told us how much more difficult it was to get married there (whereas Jamaica is super worry free). The resort is all inclusive and it looks like the best deal financially. Emily was super excited.
In other news, we went over to my sweet niece's house the other day for a fun cookout (we kind of crashed it), and saw my dad and meyka after they had gotten back from their retreat. The retreat sounded fun and it seemed to have done them good, which is really all you want from something like that I suppose. It was the first time I had seen Dad in forever, so that was really nice. Mitch got me some new guitar strings put on, and Audrey bit my finger. A very satisfying evening.
Some people from work and I have been just messing around and jamming in the living room on some evenings. It is really fun and collective-y, less stressful than trying to be "in a band." My chops (never that good to begin with) really deteriorated after my surgery, so it has been a long road even getting back to where I was. The nice thing is that no one is really a virtuoso, so we all just have fun with it.
Speaking of music, I have run into an old high school friend a few times in the last week or so--Justin Hanna! He is doing well and it's really a kick in the pants to see someone that takes you back so much. Those may have not been the best years of my life and I was extremely unhappy (and also a little snotty as Anna remembered the other night!), but it makes me feel good to see people and realize how far I have come just as a person.
I'm heading out to the library now to return some books and a cd I could have sworn I returned (but then found sitting on top of my computer). More later!

If anyone is out tonight come to the Blind Tiger to see the Brand New Life. They're a really great band and super fun. Plus it's free.

Mobile

Today has been a pretty busy day so far. Emily and i woke up late and went to do laundry, then she went out to lunch. it looks like my battery is dying so thats all for now!

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Sent from AT&T's Wireless network using Mobile Email

Big

Wow, I don't even know where to begin. I suppose the biggest news is that Emily and I got engaged. I was pretty relieved when she said yes! We have decided to try and get into peace corps as a married couple, and we are looking for a new apartment. Also I am hunting for jobs and selling stuff on craigslist/ebay/amazon like crazy. I work some (not enough hours) but it feels like it eats a lot of time. Emily is back in school. I got a new phone. That's all I can think of right now, but will try to (at some point) get back on a regular schedule of blogs. This absence is pitiful!