Bye Bye Little B

Brie hiking in LaCrosse, WI

Just a year and a half ago I wrote a eulogy for my first dog, Lady.  And here I sit…doing it again for little miss Brie.  It's no secret that Brie had been my favorite.  I, and everyone who's ever had a child or pet, knows that you're not supposed to have a favorite, but you do.  You always do, whether you're comfortable enough to admit it or not.  Brie was mine.

It was kind of by accident that I ever found her.  I had recently graduated from college and had started my new job as a nurse at the Mayo Clinic.  I was still living at home, and suddenly had all this money that I had no idea what to do with.  It was burning a hole in my pocket, and for some reason I had the idea in my head that I needed to buy something significant with it.  I was bouncing some ideas off my friend Franko, who was living in Winona at the time, and when I mentioned that I was thinking about getting another dog, he said, "Dude, you totally should get a pug."  Up until then, I hadn't even really thought about pugs.  Didn't really know a thing about them other than what they looked like, and that they were notorious for snorting.  Funny thing is, about a year prior to this, I took one of those online personality quizzes…you know the ones, where you answer a bunch of questions and they tell you what state you should be living in, what car you should be driving, etc.  The one I took was for what kind of dog personality I had.  Lo and behold, I had gotten the pug personality.  At the time, I didn't think much of it.  But once Franko told me to get a pug, I thought he might be on to something.  

Brie lounging poolside in Cape Coral, FL

So one day in August I was casually looking through the newspaper and saw an ad for a pug puppy for sale.  On a whim, I called the lady, who explained that Brie had originally been purchased from a breeder by her daughter and son-in-law.  Unfortunately for Brie, the daughter went back to school full-time, and the son-in-law worked full-time, leaving very little time for little Brie.  So they decided to try to find a new home for her.  I don't quite remember the circumstances, but I had my little brother Mike with me, and we drove out to Pine Island, MN together to have a look at this pug puppy.  Now, I hadn't run any of this past my parents yet, and our family was still mourning the recent loss of our dog Lassie, who had passed about a month earlier.  But, I thought to myself, "I can just go look."  So we looked.  And we loved her.  I didn't get her that day, as I wanted to run it by my parents first.  Mom was mostly indifferent, deferring to my dad on the subject, who responded with an immediate "No more dogs!"  So the wind was taken out of my sails a bit.  So I waited.  A few days later, while mom, Mike, and I were out school shopping for Mike, the lady who had Brie called me and said that she was willing to drop the price for Brie, because she knew that if I took her, that she'd be going to a good home.  So I told Mom this.  And then Mom agreed to go look at Brie, knowing full well that it's difficult, if not impossible, to say no to a puppy.  So we went back out to Pine Island, and came home with little Brie, who was around 14 weeks old.  Dad knew nothing about it.

The obligatory bath time photo

So we're all sitting in the living room, anxiously waiting for Dad to get home from work.  None of us had any idea how he might react, but we were pretty sure he'd be mad, since only a few days prior he had told us that no more dogs were allowed.  So we're sitting with Brie on the couch, the back of which faces the front door.  Dad comes in, and Brie stands up and peers over the back of the couch to see who's arrived.  The rest of us are silent, waiting for him to notice her.  We ask him how his day at work went, trying to hard to suppress the giggles that are forming, watching Brie furiously wag her tail at the new person who has just entered her new world.  Dad takes his time taking off his shoes, putting down his bag, and just shrugging off his work day.  He then looks up and sees this little pug face staring at him from over the top of the couch.  "I said no more dogs!" was the first thing out of his mouth.  My response, "But look how cute she is!"  So he came scowling into the living room, giving Brie the stink eye as he approached.  In true Brie fashion, in an obliviousness that would follow her through the rest of her life, she continued to wag her tail and wiggle with excitement as he got closer, not knowing that this was the one person in the house who could, and quite possibly would, send her packing.  Dad took a seat on the couch opposite us, and as he tried to maintain is gruff demeanor, and not quite succeeding, he held out his arms and said, "Well, let me see her then."  And the rest, as they say, is history.      

Brie pretty much charmed the rest of the family from there on out.  Everyone loved her.  So much so that there are now at least 5 other pugs in our immediate and extended family.  Prior to Brie, there were none.  My family loved her so much that when I decided to move out, they told me that I should leave Brie with them and get another pug for myself.  So I bought my parents their own pug, Sadie, to make Brie's moving out that much easier for them.  After that, Lady, Brie, and I started our life together.  Cooper joined the party two years after I got Brie, and it was then that I instituted my Dad's original command…No more dogs!  :)

Picking up turds by the Big Dam Bridge in Little Rock, AR

It's been said that pug owners are some of the craziest dog owners out there.  Being realistic, I'd have to concur.  Although, I do believe that Boxer and Dachshund owners are not far behind…just had to throw that out there…hahaha!  But that's neither here nor there…pug owners truly are kind of crazy.  You have to be.  In nature, pugs would not survive.  Everything that makes a dog, a dog has been bred out of them.  Pugs are not very bright, they're difficult to train, they have a slew of chronic health problems, and they lack that people-pleasing element that is so prominent in other dog breeds.  Pugs are willing to do what you want, as long as it benefits them in some way or another.  It's like convincing them that your idea is actually their idea.  It's a cycle of constant vigilance, and it pretty much starts at acquisition, and ends at death.  However, whatever they lack in normal dog attributes, they make up for in spades with their goofy personalities and laid-back demeanor.  I couldn't tell you the number of times Brie has almost had me in tears over some weird thing that she had done.  She had such a personality, and even though she could be an epic pest, I loved almost every minute I got to spend with that little beastie.  I say almost, because we definitely had our moments.  I'd give anything to have more of those moments with her, but her poor little body had other ideas.  

Brie with one of her favorite pig toys

This last year with her has been really hard.  Gone was the happy-go-lucky little dog who used to chase Cooper, her pug brother under the bed, and then bark furiously until he came back out so she could chase him back under again. Gone was my little snuggle bug who would jump up on the couch and curl up behind my knees for a nap.  Gone was the little dog who loved to go for walks, go for rides, go anywhere as long as she was going along.  In the course of a year, Brie managed to lose almost all of her sight, all of her hearing, and slowly lost functioning of her back legs due to a chronic disease called Degenerative Myelopathy.  It made her very anxious not knowing where I was, as she could no longer see or hear me.  She would shuffle through the house in a panic trying to find me, sniffing everything that resembled a leg until she found mine.  And then she could relax, knowing where I was.  If I moved, the whole process started again.  It was heart-breaking to watch the little dog with whom I had literally climbed mountains reduced to a neurotic mess because she couldn't find her person in a 1,000 square foot house.  I tried to make things as easy for her as I could.  I kept her pet beds always in the same spot, and when she appeared lost, I would guide her to one of them and help her lay down.  If I was going to bed, I would pick her up and bring her with me.  If I was going to sit on the couch for any length of time, I'd set her next to me.  I myself probably got a little neurotic in this last year, always wondering where she was, what she was doing, hearing her shuffling from room to room looking for me or the water dish…those were usually the two things she was always looking for.

As stressful as it was to watch Brie's steady decline, I know it was hard on people who came to visit us to see her.  She shuffled, she staggered, it was obvious that she couldn't see or hear very well.  People would make comments or ask questions out of concern or curiosity, and I would sometimes get pretty defensive, feeling as though my ethics and abilities as a pet owner were being called into question.  It's hard to make an assessment from the outside looking in.  Even from the inside, it was tough as nails sometimes to watch her struggle.  But then in the next minute she'd be furiously chewing on a toy or running to the front door to greet whomever was coming in.  It was just this continuous cycle of good moments and bad moments, happening multiple times a day, every day, over the course of an entire year.  It was so exhausting and frustrating and sad, and it left me feeling so inadequate and helpless because I just didn't know what to do to make her better.  It's funny how sometimes doing the best you can still just isn't enough.

Brie demonstrating some hops during the Pug Olympics in our hotel in Fort Myers, FL

Her spirit was still so incredibly intact right up until the end, and I think that's what made it so hard for me for so long.  There were days when I was convinced that it was time, and then she'd do something silly like throw a toy up into the air and catch it, or eat all of her food and half of Cooper's.  Just little things that showed me she was still there and still wanted to be.  But last night I knew we had turned a corner…the corner that has been hovering just out of sight for the past few months.  Brie was no longer able to stand.  Of course, standing had been a struggle for her the past few months, but she was always able to get to her feet either by herself or with some assistance from Simon or I.  Last night she couldn't find her feet no matter how hard I tried, no matter how much I massaged her little legs, so matter how much I put her paws on the ground and tried to put her in a standing position.  Nothing worked.  And then she got stressed.  She started to cry, and thrash, and the only thing that calmed her was for me to pick her up and hold her like a little baby.  I knew then that it was time.  I couldn't watch her struggle any more, and it was obvious that all the things that we had been doing to help her were no longer working.  Luckily, our favorite vet, Dr. Sarah, was working last night, and she was with us when Brie passed.  Of course, prior to her passing, Brie managed to eat about 10 dog treats, something she hasn't been allowed to do due to food allergies, so she was happy as a clam, munching away until there was nothing left to munch.  And when the end came, it was quiet and peaceful…we should all be so lucky to pass quickly and quietly, with a belly full of treats, surrounded by those who care about us the most.       

One of her favorite places to sit

Of course I'm struggling with the guilt that comes along with the relief that it's over.  There's always that.  I know in my heart that I did everything I could have for her, that the only reason she made it as long as she did was because I was constantly there for her.  But still it wasn't enough.  It never is, really.  When it's your time, it's your time, and no amount of glucosamine, antibiotics, snuggles, expensive pet food, or treats is going to prevent that.

So, I'd like to get away from the sad stuff, and share some of the things that made Brie so special.  Not just to me, but to almost everyone she met.  She was seriously one of the goofiest dogs I've ever seen.  She loved nothing more than to be propped up on the couch like a person.  She'd just sit there contentedly watching the TV, barking every now and again as an animal or person would go running by on the screen.  She'd sit that way for hours until she would fall asleep, and then tip over and continue snoring.  If snuggling was an Olympic sport, she could have been a gold medalist.  I'd barely get settled on the couch before she'd be crawling into my lap.  And while pugs might appear to be small dogs, they are quite dense, and 25 pounds of pug on one's chest or full bladder could get quite uncomfortable.  Since I was her person, and had pretty much coddled her since I got her, she followed me everywhere, even into the bathroom.  In her younger years she would jump into the tub with me while I showered…it was kinda funny to be soaping up while a little dog was running around at my feet.  As she got older she was content to lie on the bath mat and wait for me to come out.  She also frequently insisted that she be in the bathroom with me while I was using the toilet.  Sometimes she would try to crawl up on my lap while I was sitting there.  Sometimes I let her.  Sometimes I realized that it was weird to have a dog on my lap while using the loo, but at the same time, it was kind of unique in its own way.  How many people can say they've gone number 2 with a dog snoring away on their lap?  Probably not many, I suppose (see previous paragraph about pug owners being crazy).  In the event that I went into the bathroom without her, I could usually hear her snorting outside the door, and occasionally she would stick her paws under the door, as if she thought she could squeeze under it and get to me.   

Like Lady, Brie travelled all over the country with Simon and I.  She's climbed mountains and bluffs in Vermont, North Carolina, Arkansas, Wisconsin, and Colorado.  For such a portly little thing, she was actually quite agile.  She out climbed both Cooper and Lady, displaying her inner-mountain goat capabilities.  People always looked surprised to see us climbing a mountain with pugs in tow.  Of course, it was only possible to do that during the most perfect of conditions…pugs can't handle much heat, cold, or physical exertion, so the weather and conditions had to be perfect or we'd be carrying her.  That happened a time or two, but she was always so excited to go and get outdoors and just be a dog in the woods.  She's seen the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean.  She's taken a poop in more states than most people I know.  And seeing as she was under the impression that all the world is her toilet, that's a lot of poop.  

Catching a snooze on the back of the couch

Of all my dogs, Brie has always been the most playful.  She destroyed more toys than Lady and Cooper combined.  There are toys scattered all over the house, and I'm trying to decide what to do with them, as Cooper shows very little interest in toys these days…not that he showed much interest in them to begin with.  Whenever I would come home from being out and about, Brie would always furiously hunt for a toy to carry around, and then she would strut around me with a toy in her mouth, snorting happily the entire time.  She didn't want to play with it, she just wanted to carry it around as some sort of sign that I was home and she was happy about it.  I'm really going to miss that.  It was such a small little thing, but it was unique to her and it made me feel special to see her happily running around me with her favorite toy in her mouth.  Even in her last few days she still made an attempt to greet me with a toy.  She was also famous for her drive-by licking.  I was used to it and didn't think much of it, but she had this thing where she would wander past a bare leg, give it a quick lick without missing a beat, and continue on her way.  I can't even count the number of times friends have commented, "Did she just lick me?"  Yeah, yeah she did.  She does that.  Up until a few years ago, she would army crawl across the floor.  It was seriously the funniest thing.  We could pretty much get her to do it whenever we wanted by getting her to lay down and then tap the floor in front of her.  And off she would go, crawling on her belly across the carpet.  She hadn't done that in quite some time…just didn't have the strength in her legs anymore.

Getting in some reading with my Dummy in Cape Coral, FL

She was undoubtedly the stinkiest dog I've ever owned.  Granted, I've only owned three, but of those three, she was by far the stinkiest.  I could bathe her and get her smelling all nice and clean…and within a few hours she was back to her stinky self.  She did have a bit of a skin condition, which I think was probably part of it, but still…so stinky!  And gassy!  That dog could clear a room with her toots.  I remember the first time my friend Dave ever heard her toot…he was so perplexed as to how a creature with no butt cheeks could produce a fart sound.  Trust me, Brie didn't need butt cheeks.  The funniest was when she was trying to jump up on something…she would fart with the effort, giving the impression of a little jet propulsion to get her where she wanted to go.  Simon and I would be lying in bed at night, and we'd hear a fart from the foot of the bed.  We never had to ask who did it.  We knew.  It was always Brie.  I'll never forget the time she was sleeping under the blanket and produced quite the audible fart.  A few seconds later she was furiously crawling out from under the covers, having severely dutch-ovened herself.

Of course she had her fair share of nicknames, as all pets do.  To name a few: Breezy, Brietard (not PC, I know, but there it is anyway), Brie Butt, Breezy Pup, Baby Girl, Little B, Young Beezy, Brie B, Beezy Bub, Little Dummy, Beezer. 

My sweet little B and her other favorite pig toy

I'm going to miss her warbley little bark, that was more like a howl than anything.  I'm going to miss hearing her snoring from the foot of the bed.  I'm going to miss her warm little body snuggled up with me on those cold winter nights.  I'm going to miss her snorts, her pug kisses, and everything that made Brie, Brie.  As I wander around the house and pick up all the things that were hers…her toys, her dish, her leash, her meds, her personal care items, I can't quite come to the realization that she's gone and that she's not coming back.  She was a part of my everyday life for 12 years, and her absence this morning feels so huge.  I know that will fade away as the days pass, and that I'll probably always miss her on some level.  My first pup, the little dummy who made me laugh when the rest of the world had me in tears.  Fare thee well, my little B!  Thanks for the memories, and for giving the best years of your life so selflessly (for a pug) to me.  :)

Working It out!

Ellen and I after running the Disney Princess 10k in February

I think it's pretty safe to say that ever since I made the decision to run my very first half marathon back in 2012, I've been in the best shape of my life…at 34 years old.  Funny how the threat of running 13.1 continuous miles in a tutu will do that to a person.  But I think that's what it took…running a few foot races a year is my motivation to maintain a healthier lifestyle.  It just took me a really long time to find it…and to stick with it.

I love ice cream…even more so when I have a good buddy to share it with.

I work really hard these days.  Not really because I have any sort of specific goal in mind, but mostly because I've spent a fair amount of time and money on my wardrobe and I'd like to continue to fit into it.  And I really like to eat.  Really, really like to eat.  I tell myself that I work out so I can eat whatever I want and not feel guilty about it.  Well, for the most part I don't feel guilty about it.  It's interesting the transition I've made in regards to my diet since I've been working out.  Prior to adhering to any sort of exercise regimen, I ate whatever I wanted and I didn't even think about it.  Calories didn't concern me, food content didn't bother me; I basically just went around eating whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted, in whatever I quantities I wanted, letting my genetics do the bulk of the work as far as keeping the weight off was concerned.  But once I had calories in my head, I started to think more about what I was eating.  Not just about calories in food, but in calories burned during exercise.  I started to think about how many chocolate chip cookies I could have before I completely negated the 650 calories I had just burned in spin class.  I think about what I'm eating, and rather than just eating everything, I give myself a choice…this OR that, not both…it's so incredibly mental, and it works most of the time, but there are days when I still plow through a bag of jalapeño kettle chips like nobody's business.

Chipotle, one of my main indulgences.  I eat it weekly…sometimes more often

People used to ask me how I stayed so skinny (although I've never thought of myself as skinny), halfway through a bag of Doritos, cheese powder staining my fingers, my mouth, all down the front of my shirt (to watch me go through a bag of Doritos is not a pretty sight…and if you truly enjoy all your digits, don't you dare try to take them away).  And I would answer that I had no idea, which I know was frustrating to hear, as it seemed like staying skinny was pretty effortless for me, and for a while, it was.  But the real answer, the one I couldn't come up with while stuffing my face full of fake cheese stuffs, was genetics.  And my genetics have played a huge part in my size and shape…people don't give their genetics enough credit.   They think there's some sort of "secret" to losing weight and getting fit, but the truth is, genetics have the trump card…they're going to determine how quickly a person gains and loses weight, how quickly and evenly they put on muscle, how long it takes to see results.  I think if there is any "secret" to getting in shape, it has to come down to understanding your genetics, and finding a way to work with them to get to where you want to be.  Easier said than done for most people, I know that.  There are aspects of my body that I have no control over, and no amount of hard work or laziness is going to change that.  I consider myself lucky that I got some of the "small genes" from my family members.  My grandma Long was itty bitty…she was lucky if she was 5 feet tall and weighed 100 pounds.  My grandpa Long is a small man as well.  I'm 5'4 and I'm taller than him by a few inches, and while he's probably shrank a little bit with age, I don't think he's lost a significant amount of height.  When I stand next to him these days, I feel like I'm towering over him…like I'm some sort of giant who could pick him up and carry him around…hahaha!  It's a weird feeling, being taller than someone who seemed so tall to me when I was a child.  I'm still taken aback by how little he is when I see him.  My mom spent the majority of her life as a small person as well…she was the smallest person in her family by a long shot.  I think in every stage of life thus far, I've been bigger than she ever was.  She was about 100 pounds on her wedding day when she was 21…the last time I saw 100 pounds on the scale was probably when I was a freshman in high school.  I tried her wedding dress on when I was 21 years old, and I couldn't even zip the thing.  Granted, I am a few inches taller than she is, but I don't know how much that really matters.

Roasted chicken, ricotta gnocchi, and garlic green beans at McMillan's in Flagstaff

I've come to the realization that now that I'm in my 30's, and now that my metabolism is changing (damn you genetics…you're turning against me!), working out on a regular basis just isn't enough any more.  I can't work my butt off at the gym and still expect to be able to eat whatever I want and not see the effects of poor food choices.  I know that if I truly want to lose that layer of fluff covering up those abs that I know are there, I'm going to have to give up a few things.  And I just don't know if I'm ready to do it…I don't know if it's worth it, because I truly get so much enjoyment out of eating.  Life is short, I should be able to eat what I want, right??  It's not like I eat like a pig all day every day, but if I truly wanted to make the commitment to give up some of these foods that are keeping me fluffy, I'd be giving up a significant portion of my diet.  I'd probably have to give up most wheat, dairy, sugar, starches, and alcohol.  But I love bread, cheese, wine, beer, ice cream, burgers, chocolate chip cookies, chips, burritos, french fries, and chocolate (oooh, and those taquitos in the hospital cafeteria…those are my kryptonite)…these are all things that I enjoy on a very regular basis.  I'd have to switch to a diet of veggies and…veggies?  Lean protein, I guess…but what good is chicken without the skin?  Last night I had a half-chicken prepared with the skin all crispy and golden…and I ate every last little bit of it and sopped up the grease with some french fries.  Yes, I went there.  And I loved it.  And I'm sure I'll do it again.  At the end of the day, maybe it's enough to just fit in my clothes and not feel guilty about eating an ice cream cone.  I get about as much delight out of a good meal as I do out of a great-fitting pair of jeans, so that's got to count for something.      

I enjoy a good yoga class every now and then…breaks up the monotony of running

Undoubtedly, I'm stronger than I've ever been.  I go to weight lifting classes once or twice a week, and since I started last fall, I've almost doubled the amount of weight I put on my bar for each exercise.  Now, one could argue that perhaps I wasn't putting enough weight on the bar to begin with, which could very well be the case, but the fact that I'm lifting at all is something that I'm kinda proud of.  Of course, I lift weights with a bunch of powerhouses whose bars are completely laden with weights, and typically I'm matching weight for weight with the only senior citizen in the class, who, by the way, is a total badass.  She goes to the hour-long kickboxing class at 9am, and then stays for the 10am weight lifting class.  And she totally schools me.  She's so powerful, and I find her to be so incredibly inspirational.  I hope I'm doing exactly what she's doing when I'm her age.  Heck, I don't even do that now.  I might lift as much as she does, but I definitely don't do it after punching it out for an hour at a kick boxing class.  I tip my hat to her, because she's absolutely amazing, and I think there are a lot of people in the class who are inspired by her.

Running the Sea Wheeze half-marathon in Vancouver last August

I don't have any before-and-after pictures to show physical evidence of how far I've come since making a commitment to being more healthy.  I guess I didn't really think about it, as I started this whole fitness thing on a whim.  Honestly, I don't notice much visual change, which is sometimes frustrating, given that I've been pretty active multiple days a week, for going on 2 years now.  My clothes still fit mostly the same (although I do notice a little extra room in the bra…whoo hoo!), and the number on the scale hasn't changed at all…I pretty much feel the same.  I guess the biggest change I've noticed is in my endurance.  There are days that I get frustrated because I can't finish a 4-mile run without stopping to walk for a bit.  But I have to remind myself that when I first started running, I was lucky if I could make it a quarter mile without stopping.  And this was back in Minnesota where elevation and bone-dry air wasn't a factor.  To be able to run 4 miles with a little bit of walking at this elevation is a huge accomplishment for me, and I need to constantly remind myself that I've actually come pretty far from where I started.  It's hard though, as I'm struggling it out on the trail, one foot in the front of the other, thinking it's never going to end, and a person blows by me at twice my speed, not even breaking a sweat.  But…they have different genetics, and maybe they've been running since they were in high school, and maybe chocolate chip cookies don't make up a square of their individual food pyramid.  Maybe they're Kenyan…hahaha!  Kenyans always get a pass…they're on a whole 'nother level from the rest of us poor saps.    

Junkyard Dawg at Big Foot BBQ in Flagstaff…so amazing!

There's times that I wish I would have started paying more attention to my health and fitness at a younger age.  I think of where I'd be if I had gotten a gym membership and started running races when I was 25.  I look at some of the younger gals at the gym, and I'm proud of them for starting so much earlier than I ever did.  It's been a struggle to initiate and maintain a fitness regimen after being stuck in my ways for so long.  But honestly, if someone like me, who suffers from chronic laziness and who is always looking for the easy way out can adhere to being healthy, I think just about anyone can.  :)

Cheers!    

       

How Does My Garden Grow?

Blossoms on the Roma tomato plant

So now that Simon and I are staying in one place for a while, we figured we would try our hand at growing some stuff in the little garden plots that had been growing nothing but weeds at our rental house.  Of course it was daunting from the get-go, and I haven't always had the best luck when it comes to keeping plants alive.  Dogs, on the other hand, I seem to have no problem with keeping alive.  Kinda strange when you think about it, but maybe you gardeners can sympathize with my plight of buying one of those basil plants from the grocery store, bringing it home, watering it, giving it sun, and having it die after a few short weeks of life.  Granted, I know that I should have repotted it, as every instruction that ever comes with any of those plants will tell you.  I just didn't want to go through the hassle of buying an entire bag of potting soil for the purpose of repotting one tiny little plant.  I thought maybe they could survive on good vibes and wishful thinking.  So I didn't repot them.  And they always died.  And I was always discouraged.  Even though I knew deep down that it was my fault entirely that the plant didn't survive.  Basil is ridiculous easy to grow if you give it enough soil to root, even here in Arizona.

Surprise ground cover vine that sprouted recently. The blooms open early in the morning and close up shortly after sunrise

Growing plants in Northern Arizona is very different from growing plants in Minnesota.  I think it's the elevation, the late freezes, and the dry air.  And the lack of rain.  And the brutal sunshine.  I guess there are a whole lot of factors going on around here that complicate the gardening process for someone so used to a completely different climate.  And given that I wasn't an accomplished gardener before, the challenges presented here in Arizona have been difficult to overcome.

Sphinx moth perusing one of our flowering bushes

When I owned my little house in Minnesota, the yard came with some day lilies and some hastas.  Having no clue whatsoever what either of these plants were when they started to sprout up in the spring, I sprayed them with Roundup thinking that they were weeds.  And I didn't just spray them, I doused them.  I drowned them in enough herbicide to probably wipe out a 40 acre field.  Okay, so that's an exaggeration, but I'm a little disturbed at how much herbicide I used that day.  And yet, they survived.  The weeds all died, but the hastas and day lilies remained.  It wasn't until a friend of mine came over and told me what was growing in my yard that I began to appreciate their beauty, their taking up of a spot that I didn't have to mow (I loathed mowing my lawn) and their hardiness.  I literally did nothing to those plants (outside of the Roundup) and they flourished.  A friend of mine gave me some leftover annuals from her garden, so I stuck them in the ground, gave them a little water, and they grew like crazy.  And that's how it is in Minnesota…things just seem to grow with minimal effort, at least that was my experience.  Perhaps I just had the luck of growing plants that are basically kill-proof.

One of the annual plants that survived

And then I moved to Arizona and got it into my head that if I could grow plants in Minnesota with minimal effort, then it stood to reason that I could also grow plants here in Flagstaff.  After spending over $100 on plants and potting compost, I figured it was a small price to pay in the event that it was a total bust and everything died.  And everything did almost die.  I had it in my head that perhaps the green-thumb I so envied in my Grandma Ellringer might possibly be genetic, and that maybe if I wished the plants well enough and gave them a little bit of water once a day, that they would just grow on their own.  Ha.  I ended up having to resort to Miracle Grow just to save the majority of them, and even after that there were two casualties.  Although, given that I started out with 3 tomato plants (cherry, san marzano, and roma), 1 jalapeño plant, 1 basil plant, 1 rosemary plant, 2 peonies, 1 bush, 5 ground cover vine things, and 12 individual annuals, two casualties doesn't really seem like that many.

Cherry tomatoes growing! They're going to be yellow and oval shaped when ripe.

Once I figured out that I needed to water them twice a day, and that I needed to water them a lot, they started to grow like crazy.  Well, some of them did.  The roma and cherry tomato plants are out of control.  Both of them have a bunch of little tomatoes on them.  I realize now that I planted them much too close together.  I've never grown tomatoes before, so I had no idea that they would get so massive.  They're literally blocking out the sun for the jalapeño and the san marzano plants.  The jalapeño plant has always been sickly looking.  It's got a bunch of blossoms on it, but it's still pretty much the same size as it was when I brought it home from the store, and the leaves are all brown along the edges.  Maybe that's just what they look like…I don't know.  I'm too lazy to do much research...and I wonder why my garden almost died…hahaha!

Another one of the annuals

The annuals are doing better.  They're so pretty.  I don't remember the name of them, but they're all different colors and on the days that I'm not sleeping all day to prepare for a night shift, I actually get to see them and enjoy them.  They add a nice pop of color to the yard. They close up nice and tight the minute any shade hits them though, so my viewing time is very limited.  The peonies are doing all right.  In the little bit of research that I did on peonies, I'm not expecting any blooms this year.  And it stands to reason that there might not be any blooms next year either.  But I hope there are.  Peonies remind me of my Grandma Ellringer, who I miss dearly, so I'm really hoping that the peonies produce some blooms for me.

Female humming bird on our feeder

The bushes and the ground cover…meh…they don't excite me much.  I just wanted something to fill in the space in the yard.  What our yard could really use is a big tree in the front, but I'm not about to take on the task of paying for and keeping alive a tree.  I could see that being a disaster.  Although, I was at Walmart the other day (I hate Walmart, but oddly enough, I couldn't find a watering can anywhere else in town), and they had Japanese Maple trees, which were growing all over the place in California when Simon and I were out there.  They're such beautiful trees, but I question their ability to actually grow here in Flagstaff, as I've never seen a single one here.  And given that they were selling them at Walmart, I highly doubt they put a whole lot of thought into what plants are regionally sound to grow in our climate.  I asked Simon if we could get one to have as an indoor plant.  He said no.  Typical…haha.  So no Japanese Maple for me.  We do have a bush that came with the house, and it's got these really pretty little purple flowers on it.  It's been a haven for honey bees during the day and sphinx moths during the evening.  It's so fun to watch the little buggers flit from blossom to blossom.  Our little pollinators.  :)

So yeah…all in all, the gardening is actually going quite well.  I haven't used the Miracle Grow in a few weeks, and the plants continue to get bigger and bigger, to get more and more blooms.  It's kinda cool to see results from a project that I knew little to nothing about before beginning.  I'm glad it's turned out as well as it has, and I'm really looking forward to eating some homegrown tomatoes in the next month or two!  Maybe next year I'll be a little more ambitious and actually do some research, and take on growing some different plants.

Cherry tomato blooms

    

        

Out With the Bad Air…In With the Good Air...

A buddy and I were recently airing our grievances about the time-suck machine that is Facebook.  We both agreed that we spend far too much time on it, and given that amount of time, we spend far too much of it irritated at what other people are posting.  Earlier this year, he went so far as to keep off Facebook for an entire month, and was quite pleased to see his productivity at work increase, he spent more time with his little ones in the evening, and he just felt better about life in general.  He's actually contemplating deleting his Facebook account entirely.  I'd be lying if I said the thought hadn't crossed my mind a time or two in the last month or so.

It's funny how communication has changed since Facebook, and admittedly, the internet in general.  I don't know that there's any social media site that has had the impact on our day-to-day lives that Facebook has.  Odds are pretty decent that if you can't reach someone by phone, text, or email, you can reach them on Facebook.  I don't know why this is.  Is there a disconnect?  Are people more comfortable conversing through the anonymity that Facebook provides, even if the person they are conversing with is a close friend or family member?  It's weird.  When you really stop to think about the number of people with whom you used to talk on a regular basis, whose friendship has now been transferred to the confines of Facebook, it gets a little sad.

What I've noticed in the last few years is how much stress Facebook has added to my life.  And it wasn't something that I was even aware of for a very long time.  In the last month or so, I've noticed how irritated I get when I go on Facebook.  Facebook used to be a place where I kept up with the goings on of my friends and family back home while I was on the road travel nursing.  It was great for that.  Even though I would be sad that I was missing out on a friend's BBQ or a camping trip, I still felt somewhat connected to them through photos and comments that they would post.  Through added features, I could follow some of my favorite musicians, intellectuals, artists, and stores.  I could "like" things, and they would show up on a list for me so I could go back and look at them later.  It was fun to see how much I could expand my world through a computer screen.  Until it wasn't.

Like anyone else, there are things that define me or things in which I take a personal interest.  I've been an atheist for years, but only recently have I been able to connect with other atheists…both in my personal circle and further out.  I had been following a few science intellectuals for a while, which I enjoyed.  But more often than not, I found that a lot of posts by fellow atheists didn't do much more than bash Christianity and organized religion as a whole.  It got tiring, it got irritating, it became maddening, seeing all these posts about clergy who had raped children, female circumcision, oppression, abuse, and murder all committed in the name of religion.  I would see these articles every day, and it made me angry.  It made me want to lash out at everyone who aligned themselves with any sort of organized religion.  Until I took a step back and realized that not every Christian is like that (of course, I already knew that, but it's hard to keep perspective when emotionally charged).  Admittedly, I posted some unkind things towards Christianity that were probably very hurtful to the majority of Christians I know, who also happen to be very good people.  And truly, that wasn't my intent.  I think there was a part of me that wanted to understand why people would take the Bible verbatim, why they would align themselves with a text that is brutal, violent, and very unkind to women.  I wanted to know how they got past the more disturbing tales in the Bible, yet still believed in it.  I don't think I'll ever understand it, and that's okay.  Live and let live.  I personally don't think I'm any more right or wrong than anyone else.  If you're okay with me being atheist, I'm okay with you being Christian, so long as it's not hurting anyone.  Although one's definition of what's hurtful or not is left wide open to interpretation.  I'm choosing to leave the conversation for the time being.

And then there is the political crap.  And I say crap intentionally because that's what it is.  One side is complaining about the liberal agenda, one side is complaining about the conservative agenda, when in fact, they both have an agenda…let's not kid ourselves about that one.  I've gotten suckered into many a conversation either defending my post or attacking another.  It's exhausting, and really, we're lucky if we know even 10% of what our government is actually doing, so what's the point in arguing about it?  I don't like seeing political posts, and for the most part, and they're all fluff and guesswork and fear-based diatribe.  It's like arguing about the existence of unicorns or sasquatches.  Nobody really knows, so they just pick a side and go with it.  And argue loudly about it.  I'm sick of posts that are hateful to our President.  As if any of these complainers could handle being in his shoes for an entire day.  If you really stop to think about it, being President of The United States has got to be one of the most thankless, yet still prestigious, jobs ever.  No matter what you do, what you wear, where you go, who you talk to, what you order at Chipotle, you're always pissing someone off.  You know what?  I like Obama.  I wouldn't mind meeting the man someday and shaking his hand.  Do I like everything about him?  Probably not, but I don't know him either.  He seems like a nice enough person, and seems to have good intentions.  Same with George W. Bush…he seemed nice enough.  I actually felt kind of bad for him being strapped to 9/11 so early on in his presidency.  I can't imagine having to deal with a situation like that.  The decisions he made in that instance, good, bad or otherwise, followed him throughout his entire time in office.  I thought that maybe he tried a little too hard to appeal to the least common denominator and maybe didn't make himself look too intelligent, but I think he actually is an intelligent person.  I don't think you can get to be President of the United States by being an idiot.  

I've come to the conclusion that Facebook has become, for some people, a platform to complain and start fights about anything and everything (myself included).  And that makes me sad, because I really used to enjoy coming on Facebook.  So, I'm doing something about it.  I'm unsubscribing from pages that get me emotionally charged.  I'm deleting or hiding friends and family members who post articles, videos, and comments that are offensive, unnecessary, or conspirational in nature.  And I will likewise hold myself to those same standards.  Maybe that's burying my head in the sand, but I just don't want to see it anymore.  I want Facebook to be fun for me again, not just a platform to attack people and spread negativity.  I saw a poster recently regarding conversation etiquette that advised people to consider three things before speaking: 1. Is is true? 2. Is it necessary? 3. Is it kind?  These three things can be applied to internet postings as well.  I find that a lot of negative and emotionally charged posts wouldn't make it past #1.  Even less would make it past #2.  And as for #3?  If you really feel the need to say something unkind to someone, don't be such a coward about it and say it to their face.  Don't hide behind your computer screen and attack them from your keyboard.

A friend of mine recently wondered aloud what Facebook would be like if we all just posted our own posts for one year…no reposting of articles, nothing taken from other peoples pages or sites…just pure originality.  I think it would be a very different Facebook.  I'm going to try that…for a month.  I can't commit to anything for a year, are you kidding me??        

I'm doing an experiment today.  I've gone on Facebook once this morning, and I'm going to stay off of it until tomorrow morning (well, outside of posting this on Facebook…hahaha!).  I know it's going to be hard, because when I honestly think about how often I go on there, how often that little red number shows up on my phone and I have a peek just to see what new notification I have (odds are it's one of those stupid game requests…stop sending me those!  I don't play games on Facebook! But it's all right if you do…).  Well, maybe hard isn't the right word, since checking Facebook has become almost as commonplace as going to the bathroom.  I even check Facebook sometimes when I'm in the bathroom…hahaha!  To be fair, I've read through all the bathroom readers that we have, so I'm currently lacking in reading material.  At least that's my current excuse.  I'm sure I could come up with others to rationalize my bathroom Facebooking.  But not today!!  Today, the phone will stay out of the bathroom.  I will set it aside on its little charger and just let it be.

I want to start blogging again (I have about 5 that are unfinished), to get back to my pile of scrapbooking mess that I've been turning a blind eye to for the last 8 months (years behind…years), to get outside and run around, to walk my little dog, to call a friend or two whom I haven't spoken to in months, to dig around in my garden (our tomatoes are growing!!), to get out on my bike.  Facebook, in one way or another, takes away from all those things.  Because I've allowed it to.  And I'm not going to anymore.  I feel better already.  :)

The Temperature is Rising...

"Wait for the monsoons," they said.  "It'll cool down," they said.  Well…I have.  And it didn't.  And here I sit, naked at my desk chair, sweating and angry.  I've been sweating since 8:30 since morning, and it's left me quite cranky.

Air conditioning isn't a thing here in Flagstaff.  I don't know why, but it isn't.  And it's hot here.  High 80's/low 90's is hot and I don't care if it's a "dry" heat…it's still hot.  I've been told to go spend a day in Phoenix, that upon my return to Flagstaff, I'll appreciate the weather here.  And yes, it's hot in Phoenix. But that doesn't mean that it's not hot here.  It's all relative to where you are.  If I could bottle up the Phoenix environment and bust it out every time I started getting hot and cranky in Flagstaff, then yes, I probably would appreciate 90 degrees as opposed to 110.  But I'm incapable of differentiating when I'm still sweating whilst lying in my skivvies in front of two fans running at high speed.

I'm a hot sleeper…alway have been, most likely always will be.  I'm one of those crazy people who sleeps with the windows open almost right up until the first snows hit the ground.  Even in the winter, I sleep with a light blanket, and sometimes just a sheet.  We keep our furnace set around 62 degrees in winter, mostly because we're cheap and know that putting on more clothes is free, but partly because I don't like feeling overheated, not even a little bit.  Simon is the opposite.  He sleeps swaddled under a blanket even in the summertime.  Most of the time, I can't even see his face because he covers up his head.  The funny thing is, for someone who feels so cold while sleeping, he dumps heat like a furnace.  I can't even sleep next to him most of the time.

I also have the misfortune of owning pugs…pugs who have less heat tolerance than I do, who pant at a constant starting at 60 degrees, and who can't stand to be more than 5 feet away from me at any given moment.  So, not only am I hot and sweaty, but I've got two dogs who are hot and sweaty, panting in my face, stinking up my air and driving me nuts with the noise.  Granted, I've made my bed with these dogs and so I have to lie in it, but the combination of my crankiness and their panting does not make for a good outcome.  I find myself moving from room to room to avoid them, only to have them frantically pace after me to see where I'm going.  Which just exacerbates the heavy breathing and the panting.

It's gotten to the point that I make up excuses to go places just so I can be in air conditioning.  Our trips to the movie theater increase in the summer, I find random reasons to go to Target, and my desire to cook at home is non-existent.  Well, I have very little desire to cook at home to begin with, but the idea of heating up the house by turning on the stove is repulsive.  I even look forward to going to work, knowing that for 12 straight hours, I get to be cold.

We have a running joke in our house…"Simon said no." That's my response to just about anything when Simon thinks that an idea I have isn't really all that great.  And 90% of the time, he's usually right.  I'm one of those people who thinks that there's got be a way to buy something to make inconvenient situations convenient.  Simon is one of those people who tries to make do with what he has until it has been proven otherwise.  So you can see the struggle we sometimes have when faced with adversity, whether it be a legit adversity or not.  I wanted an air conditioner in May.  Simon said no, that we have enough fans and that we can leave the windows open at night and close them up during the day to keep the house cool.  So that worked for May.  I wanted an air conditioner in June, Simon gave me the same response.  And for the most part, it worked.  It's now July, the rainy season is here, and it's not cooling down like everyone promised it would.  I remember going through this last year as well…the constant sweating, the crankiness, the inability to sleep…it's all so familiar.  However, I made the proclamation just a few minutes ago, that I am buying an air conditioner on Monday.  I don't yet know what kind, but it's happening.  For the sake of all involved, if I have to spend very many more days like this, it's going to get really ugly.

On the plus side, I figured out how to make my favorite iced coffee drink from my favorite coffee drink here in town.  I randomly asked them the other day if the iced mocha was made with milk or half and half, or a combination of the two, and was slightly disgusted to be informed that the drink is made with ONLY half and half.  And I've been drinking 16oz cups of these things, multiple times a week.  No wonder I can't lose an inch these days!  So with Simon's newest interest in cold brew, I found a way to make my favorite iced drink using milk…I can barely tell the difference.  And I'm happy again.  And I hear thunder…bring it!!  

So There's This Guy...

You know, back when I met Simon, back in August of 2006, if you would have told me that I would one day be celebrating his 35th birthday with him while living together in Flagstaff, Arizona, I would have laughed.  It's crazy to think how long ago 2006 really was, when sometimes it feels like it was just yesterday.

Simon and I at a St. Paul Saints game

I met Simon in mid-August of 2006 when I was doing a travel assignment at a hospital in St. Paul, MN.  It was my third travel assignment, my first two having been in the Phoenix metro.  I was excited to be back in Minnesota for the end of summer and into the fall, my favorite time of year.  I had rented a cute little studio apartment in the heart of downtown St. Paul in an old renovated building.  It was a pretty sweet apartment…it had terra cotta floors, which were beautiful, a tiny little bathroom, a cute little kitchen equipped almost entirely from IKEA, a fireplace, and a Murphy bed that pulled out into the middle of the small living area.  It was the perfect little space for the pugs and I to spend our first three months living in the Twin Cities.  We went for walks everyday, sometimes to the state capitol building which was only a 10 minute walk away.  Sometimes on my days off I would wander the skyway system, just to see where I would end up.  I went to the Science Museum, I ate at little sidewalk cafes, I went to a Wild game at the Pepsi Center.  I really enjoyed myself there.

Simon and I in the Japanese Garden in Golden Gate Park

I had been working at the hospital for about 2 weeks when I had my first interaction with Simon.  I should probably explain something about this hospital real quick before I get too far into the story.  This hospital is a union hospital, and it was one of their first times hiring travel nurses for their general care floors (I believe they had been using travel nurses in their ICUs for quite some time).  I and several other travel nurses had been hired to staff up the hospital in preparation for the roll-out of their new computer charting system, which was to be implemented in the spring.  Computer charting roll-outs can be pretty intense, and they require a lot of classes which take nurses off their units to learn and practice the new system.  Hiring temporary staff fills the holes left by staff members who are attending classes.  Coincidentally, the computer charting roll-out was set to happen about a month before the current union contract was due to be renewed, which is a very stressful time for the hospital and its staff.  In the past, there have been strikes, there have been firings, there have been hurt feelings…you get the idea.  In the event of an imminent strike, a hospital will typically hire a bunch of travel nurses to fill the spots left vacant by the nurses who are on strike until a resolution can be met and the regular nurses will return to work.  So you can about imagine the response I got when I showed up at this hospital, to interact with a staff that hadn't been prepared ahead of time for my arrival.  They were suspicious of me and my fellow travel nurses.  They were under the impression that we were in place to learn their system and their hospital so that when they went on strike in June (our presence basically confirmed to them that a strike was coming), there would already be several nurses there who were familiar with how things went.  This was my first experience at a union hospital, and I was very taken aback by the outward and blatant hostility.  Even after explaining over and over again that I was there to assist with the computer charting roll-out, I was still met with suspicion.  There were some nurses who didn't even bother to learn my name…I was just "the traveler" to them for the entire 10 months I was there.  One of the other travel nurses actually got called a "Scab" to her face, which is the name given by union workers to the non-union workers who step in for them in the event of a strike.  It wasn't quite the situation that I had been anticipating walking into when I took the assignment, but I dealt with it and I explained myself to anyone who would listen.  I feel that the hospital really dropped the ball on that one…I shouldn't have been the one explaining to them why I was there.

Anyway, so there's that.  So my first shift with Simon I was doing a 12-hour shift from 7pm to 7am.  He was going to come in at 11pm to work the last 8 hours of the shift with me as the charge nurse for the Orthopedic unit.  Oh, another tidbit about this hospital…the travel nurses were always paired up with a charge nurse for our shifts…we were not allowed to sign off orders, nor were we allowed to take verbal orders from doctors or enter orders into the DOS based computer system that they already had in place…we were not to be trusted to act independently.  Essentially, my role as an RN had been reduced to the role of something far less, having taken away a significant portion of what differentiates an RN from an LPN or a nursing assistant.  Personally, it was a bit of a waste of my license, when they could have filled my position with an LPN and saved themselves some money.  But I digress.  So there I was, working on the Ortho unit awaiting the arrival of my babysitter for the rest of my shift.  There were a few middle-aged ladies on the unit who were all atwitter at the idea of me working with Simon.  Having never laid eyes on the guy, I asked them what the big deal was.  They could hardly contain themselves.  "He has the most gorgeous eyes."  "He's so dreamy!!" were a couple of the comments I actually remember…the rest were something along those lines.  I just had to laugh.  Who was this dude?  And honestly, like any other woman with a pulse, I can appreciate a good looking man.  So, like the other nurses, I waited with anticipation for Simon's arrival.

Simon and I at the Bubble Room on Captiva Island, FL

Around 10:45 he rolled onto the unit in what I can only describe as a harried pace.  If you've never seen Simon at work, you have no idea how fast that man can walk.  He can walk faster than I can jog.  I don't know how he does it, but he does.  So he blows onto the unit like he got thrown there by a tornado.  The giddy nurses attempted to introduce him to me.  He took one look at me, instantly looked away, and ducked into the locker room without so much as a hello.  Whatever good looks he may have possessed at that moment were instantly negated by what was perceived by me to be a really shitty attitude.  Our first night working together it was just Simon, me, and 12 patients.  I think he maybe said 5 whole sentences to me, all of them patient related.  It was really awkward.  It's hard to work a night shift when you're working it with someone intent on saying absolutely nothing to you.  I depend on my coworkers at night to keep me awake, as those hours from 2-5am when all the patients are sleeping are the hardest to keep one's eyes open.  I got through it.  And after that I dreaded being floated to the Ortho unit because I knew that he was always charge nurse, and being the inept travel nurse, I would be doomed to be assigned to be his partner.

Simon and I at Gooseberry Falls, North Shore, MN

I don't know how long it took for him to finally open up to me, despite me trying every single night to get at least something out of him.  I literally tried everything.  Asked him what kind of music he liked, where he liked to eat, what he liked to do, what part of town he lived in.  All innocuous questions and innocent attempts at getting to know this stranger I had to interact with and spend multiple nights a week with.  Almost every attempt at conversation was shot down by curt responses and a lack of interest.  I can honestly say that up until meeting Simon, I don't think I'd ever met anyone more disinterested in being friendly.  Of course, it turns out that there was more to the story than what I was perceiving, but I didn't know that at the time.  I just thought he was an angry man.  An angry man who ate really weird food.  I was always trying to get a look at all the weird stuff he brought in these tiny little plastic containers.  Food unidentifiable by sight or smell.  Not surprisingly, he didn't want to talk about what he was eating either.  

Getting ready to go to the Keane concert in St. Paul

So it went on like that for a few months.  I renewed my contract for another 7 months because I just wasn't ready to leave Minnesota yet, and truth be told, I was really enjoying living in the big city.  By the time December rolled around (5 months after I had started at the hospital), Simon was finally able to make some small talk.  We talked about music, we talked about our families, we talked about places we'd traveled…we finally talked about some of that weird food he was always eating.  It also turns out that Simon and I were assigned to have our computer classes at the same place on the same day.  We were in different classrooms, but we saw each other on our breaks.  It was on one of these breaks that he gave me a CD of some of his favorite songs.  Random.  It had really good music on it and to this day it's still one of my favorite music compilations by him.  Now, having grown up in the generation of the mix-tape, I couldn't help but wonder if there was something else behind this CD, as traditionally you only give a mix tape to someone in whom you show an interest romantically.  Turns out he made CD compilations for just about anyone, but it was a thought that lodged itself in the back of my head nonetheless.  We had become friendly enough for me to know that he had a girlfriend anyway, so I didn't let myself think too much about it.  But of course, I wondered.

Simon and I on Madelaine Island in Wisconsin

Which then brought us to March, when I noticed that his MySpace status has been changed from 'in a relationship' to 'single.'  Yes, this was back during the time when everyone was using MySpace.  I think Facebook might still have only been available to kids with an active college email account, but I don't know for sure.  In any case, more people I knew were using MySpace than Facebook.  So his status changed.  And coincidentally, I had just broken up with a guy that I had been casually dating on my volleyball team.  And then, Simon would randomly call me asking me to hang out with him and his friends at an Irish pub in St. Paul.  Or just to see what I was doing.  Or to go out for breakfast in the morning after working all night.  Of course, knowing that he was newly single after being in a relationship for an indeterminate amount of time, I didn't think it appropriate to think too much into this newfound interest he was suddenly showing in me.  We were friends.  Pretty much all his friends were girls, so I didn't think too much of it.

Simon and I at Franko and Andrea's wedding

And then came the day that my family was in town to attend the court session for my little brother's minor consumption…which I had nothing to do with, despite what my dad initially thought.  It just so happened that my little brother got caught drinking in the same county where I happened to be living…it's a big county, and I didn't even know he had been in town.  I was supposed to work at 11pm that night, but I had my whole day free and met my family for lunch after the court hearing.  We went to some Italian place in St. Paul kind of near the airport.  I had myself a big plate of pasta and a big glass of wine.  After lunch, my family went home and I called Simon with the giggles.  He told me I should call out sick to work that night.  With a courage driven by wine, I told him that I would only call out if he agreed to hang out with me that evening.  He agreed, so I called out.  We met up that evening at the Happy Gnome in St. Paul, which is still one of my favorite places to have some eats and a drink.  Over glasses of Rogue Dead Guy ale (my suggestion, as I told him the story of how my friend Pritish somehow managed to have a keg of it sent all the way from Oregon to Minnesota for one of his parties) we hung out chatting for several hours.  Two glasses in we were pretty buzzed, and neither of us okay to drive.  So we sat there a while longer, just talking, laughing, and making fun of the bartender who described himself as a huge fan of the TV show Scrubs.  After we sobered up, we headed to my place to watch the movie Sideways, which Simon had never seen.  After the movie he gave me a big hug and left.  I was somewhat confused.  Did he hug all his gal pals like that?  I had no idea, and despite being really into him, I was determined to keep things friendly because nothing is more awkward than interpreting someone's friendliness for intimacy.  And he was a good friend.  He was fun to hang out with, he was super goofy, he had a great sense of humor…all good qualities to have in a friend.  I told myself that if we never became anything more than friends, I'd be okay with that.  And I was.

Still one of my favorites of us…in LaCrosse, Wisconsin

The next night, we were hanging out with his friends Erin and Rita.  We were driving around St. Paul with nothing to do other than blast Weezer tunes and sing along at the top of our lungs.  It was like being back in high school, and it was so much fun.  Simon and I were in the back seat together when he texted me asking if I'd like to watch a movie again that night.  So there we were, texting each other in the back seat of Rita's car, thinking we were being so clever.  I'm pretty sure Erin and Rita knew what we were doing the entire time.  So once again, Simon and I went to my place to watch a movie.  We watched Grumpy Old Men, another favorite of mine given to me by my cousin Keri when I started travel nursing.  She said that whenever she was homesick, she would watch Grumpy Old Men and it would transport her right back to Minnesota.  It's a great movie for that, and one of the best Minnesota movies out there.  Fargo is a close second, although it's not exactly a "warm fuzzies" kind of flick.  Anyway, it was between Grumpy Old Men and Grumpier Old Men that Simon put his arm around me, snuggled in closer and we shared our first kiss.  I knew then that I had exited the friend-zone.  And the rest, as they say, is history.

Simon and I at Horseshoe Bend, Page, AZ

So here we are.  Living in Flagstaff, AZ, our first permanent residence since becoming a couple.  We've traveled for work all over the country, living in places that our personal travels might never have taken us.  We've made friends all over the country and we have favorite restaurants in some of the strangest places.  He's introduced me to kayaking, paddle boarding, mountain biking, and thinking outside the box when it comes to eating.  I'm sure I've introduced him to a few things as well…craft beers, pugs, road trips, and Jeeps.  And through it all, we've done it side by side, spending almost every waking minute together.  People think we're crazy, spending so much time together.  They don't know how we do it, how we don't get sick of each other.  And the truth is, we don't get sick of each other.  If it weren't for work, we'd spend even more time together, and I'm confident that our relationship wouldn't change in the slightest.  Shouldn't the person you spend your life with be the person you'd love to hang out with all day every day?  Not that we have to do everything together…we have our own friends and our own interests, and we're content with giving each other some space when needed.  But yeah, he's the first person I think about when I wake up in the morning, and the last person I think of when I go to bed at night.  He's my best friend.

So here we are, he at 35 and me nearly there.  At 27 years old when we started dating, 35 wasn't even on our radar.  It was so far away.  And still, here we are.  I can't wait to see what the next few years bring, what the next few decades bring.  Looking forward to them with open arms and a happy heart.  Happy birthday to my favorite person in the world.  :)

Simon and I near Fort Myers Beach, FL

         



  

If Given the Opportunity...

I would like to meet the man who came up with the brilliant idea that is the glass shower, and punch him in the balls.  Repeatedly.  So hard and so fast, that they travel all the way up his throat at which point he chokes to death on them.  Honestly.  What idiot thought that was a good idea?  And the reason I am assuming that the inventor was a man is because no woman would voluntarily want to add more work to her cleaning repertoire.  She just wouldn't.  This is purely the invention of a man who didn't think for one minute about the poor woman who was going to be forced to stand there for an hour with the glass door closed, breathing in the fumes, scrubbing furiously until her fingers are red, her eyes burning from the chemicals, and her patience just thin enough to consider murder an appropriate decompression therapy after the trauma obtained while scrubbing said shower.  I'm sure all he thought about was how sexy she was going to look showering off afterwards.  Well I've got news for him…no woman who spends the better part of her morning scrubbing a shower wants anything to do with anything he might have thought up while watching her shower through that pristine glass…which is, as she washes, collecting more soap scum to be scrubbed off at a later date.

I just spent the last 2 hours cleaning our bathrooms…one hour of which was spent solely in the the glass shower.  I have decided that I will never do it again.  Not that it won't ever be cleaned again, but next time I will be paying someone else to do it.  I don't care what people think about that or how much it costs…I literally cannot even look at that glass torture chamber without wanting to take a sledgehammer to each pane of its transparent evil.  And you know the worst part?  After I'm done, and the glass is sparkling, the spots that I missed become painfully obvious, mocking me, revealing to everyone that even though I was in there scrubbing non-stop for a full freaking hour, I didn't do a good enough job.  Glass Shower: 1, Stefanie: 0.  Well screw you, glass shower.  I'm going to use the other shower.  The one with the bathtub and the curtain.  The curtain that when soiled, either gets tossed in the washer or tossed in the garbage…win-win for me as I'd much rather do laundry or drop $5 at Target on a new curtain than scrub soap scum off of glass.

And one of the most infuriating things about cleaning the bathroom?  The dog hair.  Hands down, almost as frustrating as scrubbing the glass, although not quite.  The dog hair is ubiquitous in our house, apparently, and appears to be attracted to clean surfaces more so than any other surface (outside of the comforter that Grandma E and I made out of corduroy…the dog dog hair, sadly, will most likely never be fully removed from that thing).  I wanted to punch through the wall every time I swept a surface with a clean rag, only to see a spattering of dog hair left in its wake.

And then there's the toilet…ah that bloody, bastardly toilet.  I hate that thing.  After scrubbing the pee drops and the poop splatters from its gleaming porcelain surface, I'm contemplating just going to the bathroom out in the woods.  Heck, if it's good enough for those morons lighting the woods behind our house on fire (repeatedly), then it's good enough for me.  I think I can even manage to poop in the woods without lighting them on fire, which makes me better than them by leaps and bounds.

I have to wonder what Simon was thinking from his post in the kitchen, listening to me swear a blue streak as I got cleaning stuff in my eye, I repeatedly dropped the scrub brush, the cleaning bucket tipped over, the dog hair…that damn dog hair.

It's no secret that I hate cleaning…there's a reason I do it so infrequently.  Ask anyone who's lived with me.  My poor college roommates…although, to be fair, I don't think any of us outside of Naomi were actually clean people.  I would say that I'm tidy…I will pick up after myself…if only that were enough.  Simon is the first man I've lived with who actually cleans, which is more than I can say for the other idiots I'd managed to date throughout the years.  Either they expected me to be their little June Cleaver (ha…weren't they disappointed…they should have known that no self-respecting June Cleaver would have the mouth of a sailor), or they were just as content as I was to look the other way when mold started growing under the shampoo bottles.  Simon vacuums every few days, which I appreciate, as I still don't know how to use the Dyson.  I am a failure as a housewife, but I think he probably knew that going into it and decided to be okay with it.

I'm still irritated that I spent 2 hours in the bathroom and I myself am dirtier than when I began.  Gross.  I'm trying really hard not to think about the time that I temporarily lost my balance and my face fell against the side of the toilet.  And now that the shower is clean, I don't want to use it because that means I'll have to clean it again.  But I do need to get this Soft Scrub off the bottoms of my feet, my arms, out of my hair, etc before it burns my skin away.  Nothing like chemical burns as proof of a morning spent scrubbing the bathroom.