Awwwww...

So I came across this photo and just had to share it. It's so cute! Oddly enough, I've always loved chihuahuas. You can check out monamivie's etsy site here, where this outfit is listed.

How sweet it is to...make wedding decisions

I'm really having a grand ol' time with this.

If my grandfather's land ever happens to be converted into a wedding venue, I'd gladly volunteer myself as the wedding coordinator.

My aunt and grandmother want to throw me a bridal shower in June. I don't know why I'm so tickled about this...probably because I had lost hope that it would ever happen!! I had a novel idea this evening to ask for a/some item(s) with "Future Mrs. Parrish", "Bride", "Chris' Bride" (you get my drift) at the shower. It kills me that I'm so into these cheesy things, but you can't help what (who?) you love.

The major decisions that need to be made soon (just because I've designated them as needing to be made soon--no particular reason) are: DJ, officiant, & invitations.

My fiance is in charge of finding an officiant & he's kind of driving me up the wall. He doesn't ever talk about it (because guys don't sit around talking about wedding stuff) so I'm left to guess where he is in the process. Even when I ask him it's, "I'm working on it." Poo!

I've narrowed it down to 3 DJs, one of which my fiance wants to cross off the list b/c of the lack of communication. I just can't quite do that yet...not until I get a price.

I've created my own invitations on the computer, but we're still trying to decide on printing. I thought we could do it on my printer, but my fiance doesn't think so because I have a $20 printer and the invitations would be light ink on dark paper. Apparently that's trickier to do than dark ink on light paper. So he contacted the school's print shop & we're just waiting for a meeting with them to see how much it would cost. I'm secretly hoping we get a discount since we're so cool, but they may not think we're as cool as we think we are.

Hmmmm...anything else? Not really. A bed and breakfast I looked into for the wedding burned down about 2 weeks ago. I can't tell you how thankful I am they couldn't accomodate how many guests we're having. I feel really bad for the brides that did book with them.

Looking into shoes for the MOH & BM...proving to be more difficult than originally anticipated.

I think we're getting closer with the tux/suit issue. We found a Jean Yves grey tux that we really like in one of my bridal magazines that I have. It looks something like this:


The awesome thing that we found out while searching for a store that carries them is that lo' and behold, our rinky dink Peebles store in downtown Sylva is listed as carrying them. By golly! I think it's pretty damn amazing. Sylva never has anything. I take that back, Sylva has things, just not things like this.

I'd like your opinion!

Here is the MOH & BM dress:



The dress is in "truffle", essentially a really dark brown (I'm not sure that this picture is of truffle--it looks kind of light in this picture). My older brother (an attendant on my side) and my dad will be in their AF mess dress uniform (the one on the left):


Now, that being said, do you think a grey tux is an okay choice? We're afraid brown might look too 70s and black might clash with the navy & truffle.

Also, I'm not so sure we'll be able to find a shoe for the girls that will match the dress, so we might have to go with a different color. Burnt orange? Burgundy/maroon? In that case, would you match the ties to the dress or the shoes? I guess you could do both, huh? But that might get tricky.

Maybe black shoes are the best option...then get some kind of jewelly black accent piece to tie it together (brooch, necklace, hair pin). But then that's not very colorful. But do we need to be colorful? I read in one of my magazines that it's okay to wear black to a wedding nowadays--as long as it's appropriate.

I don't have the best fashion sense & I want to make sure there's not too much going on with the fashions that it's distracting! There's always the option of dying a David's Bridal shoe to the exact color of the dress. Oh man, I'm at a loss as to what to do. Combine this with the cheesy "Future Mrs..." stuff and I'm a silly little girl. :o)

What's your opinion (not as to whether I'm a silly little girl...as to the colors etc)?

To everyone: have a wonderful week!

TV shows

I know I've written about this before, but I'd just like to reiterate.

My shows in alphabetical order: Biggest Loser, Grey's Anatomy, Lost

Due to the recession & because I didn't have a job at the time, we decided to downsize our Directv package to the Family package. You basically get your local channels, religious channels, shopping channels, and kids channels with this package. The only thing I'm bummed about missing is the Tour de France and Top Chef. I can do without everything else. I won't deny that it'd be cool to have them, but they're definitely not necessary.

The only "cool" channels we still get (besides the locals and in my opinion of course) is "Nat Geo" & the Food Network.

Which leads me to my main point. I LOVE LOVE LOVE the Food Network. When we moved from Italy to Texas, we finally had American TV and my little brother and I fell in love with Nickelodeon. My older brother would ask, "What are you watching?" And we would aggravate him to no end when we'd reply, "Nickelodeon". That was not an appropriate answer in his opinion. He needed an actual TV show name. Nickelodeon was sufficient in our eyes. My favorites: SNICK, Clarissa Explains it All, Eureeka's Castle, this show:



and this one:



At some point I graduated to Hey Dude:



and Salute Your Shorts:



There's a bunch more and I think I might get some horrible comments if I didn't mention Ren & Stimpy.

Anyway, this post has taken a weird turn...I meant to rave about the Food Network, but ended up reminiscing about old Nickelodeon shows.

So here's my rave about the FN...it's like my Nickelodeon of my adulthood. I love the Challenge shows (unless it's a savory food challenge), Ace of Cakes, Unwrapped, and Chopped.

Well that was a crappy endorsement of the FN. Especially when I got to thinking and wanted to add ABC's TGIF:



The Perfect Strangers intro is at the end, but I don't remember them being in the TGIF line-up.

THOSE WERE THE DAYS! In some ways I wish I could go back and relish the times, but in other ways, it kind sucks being young and having to live under your parents' rules. *sigh*

Alright. Moving on.

Adventures in waking up at 5:00am

So I started my kitchen job at the hotel on Saturday. Have to wake up at 5:00am. :oP They started me on a weekend where a bunch of kids were staying for a Color Guard competition at Western. In other words: I started on a busy weekend. But really, there's nothing to it and the only things that sucks is having to get up so early. Oh, and cleaning up after sloppy kids.

I got a job offer today (kinda). They wanted me to cross-train to fill in at the front desk too, but now there's an actual position open there. Problem: 3rd shift. Sunday, Wednesday, and Thursday nights. The good thing: it's quiet at night and I might be able to get a lot of research work done--mainly writing my thesis. So I'm still rolling that over in my head & trying to decide if that's something I want to do.

Another thing is that the golf club that I interviewed to be a server at called and said those positions were filled but that the "member services" department was still looking for people if I wanted to do that. I haven't actually talked to them yet about it (received a voicemail from them), so depending on what it is, whether it's full or part-time, and what the pay rate is, I might take them up on it and leave the hotel business. Yeah it sucks to tell someone, "Sure I'll work for you!" and then turn right around and say, "Sorry, but I'm leaving." But I feel like they'd understand for three reasons: 1. They keep making comments like, "If you decide to stay..." like they're prepared for me to change my mind and leave. 2. Because the date their paychecks have been arriving has been varied lately. 3. Because they can't offer me a full-time position right now.

Aside: I'm watching America's Funniest Home Videos right now and they're showing clips of kids opening Chrismas presents. I love Christmas. One kid was really excited to get macaroni. Another kid goes, "What the hell is this?!" Ah, to be a kid on Christmas morning again... *sigh*

What a roller coaster ride!

Down when preparing for my research while dealing with the doctor appointment.

Up when I felt like I was prepared for the presentation and I received a mystery package from my mom. The package was potted bulbs in a cute pink can. It's like getting two presents because I'll get to watch them bloom.

Down again when I had to (per my advisor) rearrange my presentation minutes before my presentation. Talk about frustrating.

Up when I received the inaugural NC Research Award at the Graduate Research Symposium. I got a nice little certificate, a glass paper weight thingy for my "desk" I suppose, and a check for $100. Sweet! It's the first time this has been awarded and it's the only one in the state (at this time) that is awarded.

Down again when some stuff happened regarding whether or not I truly deserved the award.

*I'd just like to acknowledge that I typed up this post on Friday but didn't post it. I'm quite glad I didn't because I've calmed down a lot and was able to reread and edit it to an appropriate level.*

Doctor Day Done

Saw the doctor today and made a complete fool of myself. Not to the doctor, but to the lady that does all of the insurance stuff.

I had to switch insurance because I no longer qualified to receive the school's health insurance. My deductible is high and some other stuff I still don't understand. The only time I wish I would've gone into the military or married someone in the military is when insurance issues come up. I've been so stressed about money and this presentation tomorrow that I just broke down and cried like a baby. I then composed myself to call my mom to ask her what I needed to do (yes, still doing that at 27) and promptly lost it again over the phone. I'm sure I scared her to death. The woman was so sweet though..."Just let it out, it's okay." Haha!

But yeah, appointment over, hopefully all bad cells are gone. Will need 3 normal paps before I'm deemed okay. I had been told that they recommend you not have kids for 3 years after this procedure, but my doctor said that wasn't the case with what she was doing today. Now if I have to have two or three of these done, THEN there would be cause for concern. So I'm excited about that. Not that I'm going to try to have kids anytime soon, but at least I won't have to wait three years from now.

Off to push through the pain and tackle this presentation.

"Look"

If there's one thing that I can't stand about Obama, it's when he emphasizes his sentence(s) with "look". Can't stand it. Let me rephrase that...I can't stand it when anyone does it. Elizabeth on The View does it a lot as well.

Mustard and luck

I've made my decision: I no longer enjoy mustard. I used to really, really like it, but for some reason, I just can't stand it anymore. Weird.

I no longer have to present at seminar this Friday. I've been saying all along that my friend needs to take my place (since she's defending on Friday anyway), but the professor who oversees the seminar didn't realize that until today. So I'm now presenting the Friday after Easter Break. I still have to present at the Graduate Research Symposium on Thursday. Piece of cake. Kinda.

Movin' outta the poor house & into the rich house!

Well, that may be a bit of an overstatment. But I do have a job now! I start bright and early this Saturday.

I will be one of the ladies that puts your buffet breakfast out for you to eat at your hotel. I'll also be one of the ladies that makes your reservation, gives you your keys, and takes your money.

The manager said that with my previous experience, she'd be crazy not to cross-train me to work at the front desk. SWEET! Which also means I'll be getting paid more than what I would get for just working in the kitchen.

She did inform me that the hotel business was hard hit by the recession and that they haven't been getting their paychecks on time, but I'm okay with that. A late paycheck is better than no paycheck!

Quick!

Just real quick...I have to get to working on my powerpoint. I got a message from the manager of the hotel that I have an interview with on Monday for the kitchen position...she said she noticed that I put that I was interested in reception on my application so she'll train me to work in that position as well. SWEET!

Okay, now back to squirrels and plants.

Rottis love kitties

It's pretty funny to watch them. Last night I was doing--rather, TRYING to do--my workout video in the middle of my tiny living room floor (I have to move the couch & the coffee table to get some space) and I had two dogs and a cat laying right there in the middle of the floor. Of all the places they could choose to lay they choose right below my feet.

I had my job interview for the hotel this morning. Well, it wasn't really an interview--it was more just to tell me what the job entailed and to see whether I was still interested. It lasted a whole 10 minutes. I was told I'll get a call for a second interview with the manager.

I'm excited to mow tomorrow. That excitement won't last long.

Job interviews galore

Well, "galore" might be an overstatement.

I had a job interview as a "server" for a richy rich golf club about an hour from where I live. I showed up late because I couldn't find the place, but I'm not so upset about that now.

I got this feeling about the place and I couldn't quite put my finger on it. I was telling my fiance that it was like a Hooters for rich people or like the place in the movie Dirty Dancing--where the poor young good looking people are hired to entertain the rich people.

And then I remembered I had seen some pictures another bio grad student had posted on Facebook & it dawned on me that maybe I had just interviewed for the same golf club where she worked. It turns out I had.

She said not to work there; that sexual harrassment runs rampant there and that it's one step down from being a stripper. Your hair & makeup has to be perfect and you have to wear ridiculous outfits on their "theme days". She also said that the salaried workers aren't treated well. Apparently people still like working there because the money is so good, but that can't be guaranteed for servers with the recession. My friend was saying she was expecting an $800 bonus in December and got $50.

Anyway, she might have been exaggerating a little bit, but I'm not sure I'm willing to find out. But part of me is like, how can I turn down a job when I don't have one and need one desperately?? Perhaps I shouldn't be thinking that far ahead...I'm not even sure I got it yet.

The silver lining: I have another job interview tomorrow for Holiday Inn Express. It's for a part-time *poo!* kitchen hostess or whatever it's called. I think it's the people that restock the breakfast buffet. You have to be there at 5:30am, but that'll be a piece of cake.

My one wish

There's this show called something that I do not know on some channel that I do not know where this British lady grants three wishes for brides. Well, my one super indulgent wish would be a monogram P ice sculpture/drink luge. That's it. It's the one thing that I can't imagine spending money on but that would be really cool.

Random comment & upcoming week

I bought bird netting for my peach tree so hopefully I'll have some peaches this year! I actually don't particularly care for peaches (their fuzz drives me up the wall), but it's still pretty neat.

Next week I have a doctor's appointment on Tuesday, another one on Wednesday, an oral presentation at the Graduate Research Symposium on Thursday, and my seminar presentation on Friday. Eek. Every cell in my body is screaming at the thought of the presentations, but the way I see it, that is the one huge hurdle I'll have to get over before I can graduate. Once those are over it'll be smooth sailing. I'll just have one more presentation (my defense presentation) and then I can graduate. After I pass the defense, of course.

I'm thinking I should go do some researchy type thing now.

Weekend adventures

Saturday we went to Asheville to meet with a baker about the groom's cake. I'm so excited...it's such a fun cake (at least I think it is) and for such a great price too! We love tasting cake. My fiance asked if we could keep making appointments for cake tastings even after we're married.

While in Asheville I returned the invitations back to Target. I think we can do a lot better than those at about the same price.

We went to a mediterranean restaurant we hadn't been to before (yum!) and then walked around downtown Asheville for a bit; mainly because we had just paid $3 for parking.

I went to a bachelorette party that night that was a lot of fun. It was after we went up to another grad student's dorm room that it got interesting. Drunks, mooning, yelling, inappropriate flirting by a married woman...I left about oh, 2 minutes after I got there.

It's amazing how quickly the weekend goes when beer is involved.

Sleepless night

So last night I awoke to the sound of snoring. I got really mad, sat up, looked at Chris to wake him up and yell at him, and then I realized they were coming from Athena! :-P

One step from squamous cell carcinoma

So let me preface this by saying that since this was caught early, everything's fine. I've been going back and forth about whether to write about this because it's pretty personal, but it's something fairly prominent in my life, fresh on my mind (I got the results this morning), kind of scary, and a good lesson to all my peeps to double X chromosomes.

Two heart thumpers:

#1 When you get called to see the doctor to get your results, generally not a good sign.
#2 When the doctor gives you a copy of your test results and "STAT RESULTS!" is written in the upper corner, generally not a good sign.

So here's the different cervical cell abnormalities:

Epithelial cell abnormality
SQUAMOUS CELL
Atypical squamous cells
atypical squamous cell changes of undetermined significance ASC-US
cannot exclude high grade intraepithelial lesion ASC-H
LSIL - low-grade squamous intraepithelial dysplasia
encompassing: HPV/mild dysplasia/CIN1
HSIL - high-grade squamous intraepithelial dysplasia
encompassing: moderate or severe dysplasia, CIS/CIN-2,CIN-3
-with features suspicious for invasion (if invasion suspected)
Squamous cell carcinoma

I started off at ascus, had a colposcopy with biopsies done (results fine), then went to low-grade, had another colposcopy with biopsies done (results fine), and the news this morning is that the cells have progressed to high-grade. GREAT. With the old guidelines, I would have gotten the leep procedure done right away with the first sign of abnormal cells, but those guidelines have changed and that's why I had colpos done instead. I won't go into what the leep is...you can google it if you're curious.

My doctor was sure to tell me that my cells are still not cancerous (yay), but it's sobering looking at the information above and seeing I'm one line away from 'carcinoma'. In reality a lot of things occur between HSIL & SCC, but on paper, it's quite scary.

I also found the following information:

Abnormal Class	Regression to Normal	Progression to higher grade over 24 Months	Progression to invasive cancer over 24 Months
ASCUS	68%	7%	0.25%
LGSIL	47%	21%	0.15%
HGSIL	35%	23%	1.44%

How accurate this is, I don't know. I see both good and bad in this table.

The next step is to talk to the doctor that did the colpos and see what she recommends. My other doctor (the one I spoke to this morning) is recommending the leep procedure, but he hasn't seen the pathology results.

The moral of this story: get yearly paps done. Even if you're a dude. Just kidding! And if they say come back in 4-6 months for another one, DO IT. Don't assume abnormal cells will automatically regress. I shudder to think what might have transpired had I not sucked it up and scheduled these appointments. Because let's face it, these are not the most enjoyable appointments in the world.

I was about to say I'd rather get another kidney stone than have a pap, but that's not true. Haha! Having a kidney stone is a pretty miserable experience.

Hug your refrigerator day

Refrigerators are like muscles, you take them for granted until you don't have the use of them. Wait. Huh??

Anyway, if you've been following my blog religiously, you probably know I've had some refrigerator problems. It started back in September when the repair guy put a new relay switch in and supposedly fixed it. It died again on Super Bowl Sunday and then acted weird (aka started working again) when the repair guy came out to fix it.

Well, it died again last night. I called the same repair dude this morning and he said he wouldn't be able to get here today. So I yelled, "Screw it!" (not really, but I thought it really loud) and called other repair people until I found a guy that could make it out today. Long story short: the compressor is dead. $500-$600 to fix it (labor included in that price). I might as well buy a new refrigerator! This last statement was backed up by my dad to whom I called to vent.

EXCEPT, I don't have a job to pay for a new refrigerator. My oh so wonderful fiance offered to use his savings to get a new one, but we ultimately decided to be thrifty and move the crappy refrigerator from the closet under the carport into the house. It works fine I guess. It's really old, rusty, and the ice maker is kind of funky. We didn't ever use ice anyway...but that was because we had one of those refrigerator water spouts. I'm wishing now that I hadn't gotten rid of my Brita pitcher. DARN IT!

A funny aside: while my fiance was moving the refrigerator into the house the refrigerator door opened and everything came flying out, including a jar of pasta sauce that broke and splattered sauce everywhere! Mmmmm...yummy.

Maybe we could register for a new refrigerator? Perhaps the better choice is a Brita pitcher. ;o)

Scrapblog to the rescue

So I decided to take this invitation thing into my own hands and played around with Scrapblog for a while today. I came up with something I really like and I'm still deciding whether I want to post the pictures here or not. I don't want to ruin the surprise. Haha...whatever, I'll probably end up posting them.

Shout out to El Pinto!

Ah, the hidden benefits of Facebook.

There's an awesome mexican restaurant in Albuquerque called El Pinto.

They created a Facebook profile and requested my friendship.

I got to thinking about the restaurant and put as my status: Nicole misses El Pinto.

They saw my status and sent me a message that they're going to send me some salsa!

How nice of them! SWEET!

Those hellions!

This is what I stumbled upon the other day...





My guess it that there was a vole or something living in that hole and one of the dogs sniffed it out. They then dug up the flower bed trying to get a hold of it. Dogs. Can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em.

On the right track

Still cleaning up after myself...& it's great! It was an amazing feeling to wake up this morning and not worry about a mess in the kitchen or the piles of clothes with which I had to contend. I could focus on other things on my to-do list such as reading my book and finishing a baby blanket for my fiancé's cousin's wife. Woo!

Which brings me to the to-do list. I've decided to have a running to-do list because it's incredible how helpful writing things down and crossing them off has been. I guarantee that had I not had a list today, I wouldve sat around on my butt all day. Which is okay for some, but it makes me feel like crap.

So yay for being clean and not sitting around on butts!

Welcome spring!

Around here you know spring is just around the corner when the ground hogs start coming out. I saw my first hoggie of the season on my way to campus today. Woo!

Thinkin' about movin'

There are several vacancies in my fiance's office so we had high hopes that he might get promoted in the near future. Unfortunately, that won't be happening. They've apparently decided to get rid of those positions for good. I'm sure it has a lot to do with the recession. So now we have no reason to stay here after I graduate. What a relief that is! I mean, I don't mind it here, but I'm certainly not going to stay if we have no reason.

Out of pure curiosity, I decided to compare housing markets here and the Raleigh/Durham area. In case you're curious why I searched the Raleigh/Durham area, my fiance said there's a position open at NC State. At any rate, it's ridiculous the amount of house you can buy in Durham compared to western NC. The deal is, there hasn't been much development here. And by *here* I mean immediately surrounding Sylva. I'm not saying there hasn't been tremendous development in other areas of western NC. So the houses for sale are old and incredibly dated! And people don't update! It's ridiculous. While in Durham, for the same amount of money, you can get a nice house totally updated, move-in ready. :oP I will say in defense of houses out here is that you can generally get land attached whereas in Durham you get a little bit of yard with the house. An important thing to consider when you own two dogs.

So yeah, thinking about moving is exciting even though I hate packing and unpacking. I just hope I'll be able to sell this house when the time comes.

The perks of being short

The cookies have been moved to on top of the kitchen cabinets where I can't reach them without getting a chair. What's to keep me from getting a chair, you ask? I won't...it's too much of a hassle. :o)

Let them eat cake!

We get to go to another tasting next weekend! I thought our cake tasting days were over, but alas, they are not! Can I get a woo woo?!?!

Nerdy biologist post

I met with my advisor today to discuss my data files and a funny exchange occurred. At least, I thought it was funny.

So she's talking about how I need to reformat the files and one of the things I need to do is sum some values and merge the multiple rows into one row. Now, my files are excel files and I guess the popular thing for professors is to not like excel. So she says something like, 'You can do this very easily in SAS' (SAS is statistical software). And I replied something like I can just as easily do it in excel. Not like that though, more along the lines that I know how to do it in excel, so it would take me just as long in excel as in SAS because I wouldn't have to learn a whole new program. Make sense?

So then she insists on showing me how quickly it can be done in SAS. Which wasn't quick at all. It took forever and then to top it all off she went on and on typing in all these weird codes that would be oh so easy for me to remember. *dripping with sarcasm* I just nodded and said, "Mmhmm." while secretly thinking, "I think I'll stick with excel." Oh! And to top it all off, it didn't even work! She had to go back and fix her codes several times. Crazy SAS lovers.

That's my nerdy story, I hope you enjoyed it.

March's resolution

I tend to not keep an organized house. Dishes piled in the sink even though I have a dishwasher, clothes in the bathroom, clothes in the bedroom, papers everywhere. I came to the realization that it kind of gets on my fiancé's nerves. He's quiet about those sorts of things so it's not so amazing it's taken me this long to realize this.

So I decided. Because I feel better with a clean house and because I can get more work done with a clean house and because I care how my fiancé feels, I have vowed that for a whole month, A WHOLE MONTH, I will immediately put my clothes away, immediately put the dishes away, immediately do laundry when the baskets are full, etc. Ya know, general upkeep that I should be doing anyway.

I've had one day to practice this and so far so good. It actually felt weird to fold my pj's up and put them back in the dresser. Usually I just leave them on the floor for easy access when I get ready for bed again. It's kind of like making the bed...why make it up when you're just going to mess it up again?

So wish me luck. I hope it sticks because I'm tired of these bad habits that make me feel crappy.

I also vowed to read a chapter per day in my book. I just can't get through it and this is my second crack at it. Why can't I just move on to a different book? Because that's just not how Nicole works.

I never learn

You'd think I'd learn not to bake cookies and keep them in the house. Even if "they are for Chris".

Grey's Anatomy

What's with all the reruns?? Geez!

Well that's a bummer

The invitations came in the mail today. Let's just say I'm a little underwhelmed. I guess you really do get what you pay for. What I don't like: 1. The company name is printed on the backs of both the invitations and response cards. 2. The chocolate color on the inside of the invitation envelopes is shiny (I thought it would be matte) and it doesn't extend throughout the entire envelope.

I've decided to hold on to them though, in case we don't find anything else we like. I found these that look promising, but we don't have a PartyCity anywhere near us (no online ordering). I've learned the hard way that things look really different online, so there's no telling whether I'd actually like these in person anyway.

Perhaps I'm being too picky...they are only invitations for goodness sakes!

What I'm marrying into

I got real insight into the family I'm marrying into when my fiance's cousin supposed that the first week with his new baby would be "like a LAN party but without all the games".

Some yays!

I got an email back from a baker about the groom's cake with an estimate much lower than I expected! Yay!

I decided to try to make some monograms...that I stole off of the Internet of course. Yay! Here they are for your viewing pleasure:

My hair post

I can't wait to cut my hair! The actual cutting won't happen until November or so...or maybe even later depending on whether I want to wait until the weather warms up. But here's what I'm thinking:


I was steering away from Katie Holmes' bob, but I came across this style on her that I like just fine while I was looking for pictures of Jenny McCarthy.

Pay Attention

Apparently I don't like to repeat myself. Well, I take that back. I don't have a problem repeating myself unless it's something big/important.

My fiance and I met with a cake baker (who shall remain unnamed) quite a while ago. We tasted cake, picked our flavors, showed her what we wanted, and she said she'd get back to us with a quote. That same day I emailed her the pictures we had shown her so that she could have personal copies.

Since it had been a while, I emailed her the other day to check in and see where she was in drawing us up a quote. I signed the email *Nicole*. I got an email back that started "Jennifer,..." That was the first mistake. She then proceeds with the excuse that she's been on vacation...for 2 months?! The next mistake was asking me everything that we had already discussed at our meeting. Even asking me to email her the pictures again. It pretty much infuriated me and we're no longer going with her.

Good news is that I emailed someone else who I had thought of going with before and to make a long story short, I'm really impressed with her.

The next issue was with an email I received back from a DJ. In short, my email to him said that I looked on his flyer from the wedding festival and on his website and couldn't find any prices...could he give me prices? He did the thing where he copied and pasted my email back in his reply and answered each one of my questions right after the question. Well, right after the one where I looked on his website and couldn't find any prices he said, "Please visit our website and we will gladly send you a price list." WHAT?! I JUST SAID I DID! JUST SEND ME THE DAMN PRICES! Could be a mistake on his part, but I really don't have time for you to dance around your prices.

Needless to say, the email went in the trash and we're not going with them. A word of advice to the vendors out there: pay attention if you're interested in acquiring any business. There's too many vendors to choose from for you to be lazy/inattentive.

*Whew!* I needed to let that out.

If cookies make Cassandra happy

I would make her these chocolate peanut butter cup cookies. Oh my goodness, they're awesome. I made them yesterday and made one mistake, but they still came out wonderfully. I'm having to keep myself from eating them all.

Unless of course she doesn't like peanut butter and/or chocolate and then I would make her something else.

To program or not to program

Here's what I've always used wedding programs for:

1. Something to read while I'm waiting for everything to start.

2. To see how much longer I'll have to wait until the reception.

3. To see who is in the bridal party.

And these reasons are exactly why I don't particularly care to print programs for our wedding.

My fiance is a little more keen on the idea, although ultimately, I don't think he cares.

What do you think? Print programs? Or save the time, money, and paper?

The best kitchen gadget in the world

Since I've lived on my own for a while, I already have a lot of kitchen appliances/gadgets that the typical engaged couple registers for. Food processor, bread maker, pancake griddle, crockpot (in fact, I have 3), etc.

But I must say, out of my entire kitchen arsenal, there's only one item I couldn't live without: my whirly pot.

It's a pot with a crank on it that you pop popcorn in. It's the greatest invention ever. It takes so little time and the popcorn is SO extraordinarily good. But I'm a sucker for kettle corn so I might be biased. I've bought the store kettle corn packages and they're zeros compared to whirly pop kettle corn.

I made cinnamon crunch popcorn for my fiancé and I the other night. Yum! That flavor was about even with the traditional kettle corn.

So my personal recommendation: buy a whirly pop. They're only about $20 and they're so much fun to use!

A little bit of this, a little bit of that

First, I didn't try on any of my skinny pants. The weight was up, so I'll leave it for another day. :oP Moving on...

We ordered our invitations! We got them at Target for $25 per 50 invitations. We could have gotten something more in line with our "theme" (do we even have one?), but that would've cost a lot more clams. We decided to go with something we like just fine for less money. They'll probably just go in the trash anyway. I guess I shouldn't say that, I'm just going on what I do with wedding invitations *sorry!*. At any rate, I bought them before reading the reviews. Now I'm second guessing the decision because one review said they were more pastel yellow than ivory and the colors reminded the person of "army fatigues". Oh well. If we don't like them, we'll return them.

The pups are finally back to semi-normal. They're walking around fine now (they were pretty rickety) and their vomiting has stopped. They had their first full meal this morning. Capone's scrape is still healing and the wound on his face is still pretty swollen, but healing. He has this weird hard lump right next to it, so I'm keep a close eye on that. I'm not sure if that was there before or whether it's a side effect from the wound. I would take him to the vet...if I had any money. I got paid $4 for tutoring last month. :oP I think I'll just talk to my many vet friends...the perks of working at an animal hospital.

I made up a to-do list last night. So far I have 20 items on the list. I'm hoping this will put me on the right track this week. It's spring break and even though I haven't done anything for the past, oh, year, I have a tendency to take spring break off just because it's spring break. I'll feel really great if I could do some 'spring cleaning' too.

We got some snow yesterday and last night (nothing stuck), but it's made me really wish for spring to come around. With it will come research presentations *blech!*, but they'll come one way or the other anyway. My tulips & daffodils are already coming up. I'd also like to not have to get my propane tank filled back up this season.

My fiance got upset at me last night. I apparently have a tendency to say, "Hey! Wanna watch a movie?!" and then 10 minutes into the movie pick up my laptop and mess around online. Guess I'll have to work on not doing that. The movie was Charlie Wilson's war...it just didn't grab me.

Alright, that list is beckoning me!