nutria motel

apparently the nutria are coming into the house now. and they're attacking my cat! gracie has been hiding a lot lately--in cupboards and under things--and the other day she had a wound on her neck. we cleaned it up and made sure she was current on her rabies shots. and then last night (i missed all of this somehow, by the way, because apparently i sleep like i'm in a coma) otis woke matt up at 2 am barking and running back and forth next to the bedroom door (he sleeps in the bedroom with us with the door shut so he can't dig through the trash in the middle of the night while we're sleeping). so matt went out into the living room to see what was up and otis started howling and looking around. grace was practically behind the refrigerator. nothing else was out there, though, so he went back to bed. the same thing happened at 2:30. then at 3, gracie woke him up by scratching on the bedroom door. he went out again to make sure nothing was going on and saw ratty tail disappear out the cat door. he shut the cat door. then he was woken up again at 4 by the nutria, scratching alternately on the cat door and the bedroom window, like he was asking to be let in! fantastic. a nutria with a sense of entitlement.

priorities

ok, saving my friends eyes is definitely as important as saving the planet, and the color of my blog has a much greater chance of impacting the former than the latter. hence, a new color. merry reading. :)

improvements?

i had some helpful feedback the other day that the black screen made it hard to read my blog. i also had the feedback that having it all on one site (i.e. my myspace) would be an improvement. i was all ready to move my blog to my myspace to keep everything consolidated and save people's time (and mine) flipping through pages online, but then i realized that some of my friends/family who read this blog don't have myspace, and wouldn't be able to get to the blog without signing up (and for whatever reason they won't or don't). so i'm keeping the blog here for the time being at least. but i tweaked the font a little and made it bigger and differently-shaped, so i want to know, is it still hard to read this way or does this work?

interesting book

i just started reading a really interesting book. last friday, on our way back to eugene from thanksgiving dinner (and delicious thanksgiving-leftovers brunch the next morning) at my auntie's, matt and i stopped at powell's and this book was one of the recommended reads. it's called "better off," by eric brende. it's a non-fiction account of when he and his wife (who, interestingly enough, he married immediately before this experiment) went to go live with an amish community for 18 months to learn what it is like to exist without using fuel or electricity. the author is really wordy, and uses a lot of "big" words awkwardly, and his sentences are kind of hard to follow, but what he has to say is intriguing enough to make it hard to put down. i'm only two chapters in but i'll keep you posted. (unless i move in with the amish and quit using my laptop. just kidding. but seriously, it's tempting. but i don't think there are any amish around here. are there?)

what ever you do, do not buy...

...three-buck chuck's new wine. i like the chuck, generally, especially the shiraz. out of the 2-5 bottles of trader joe's wine that make their way into my shopping cart every 2-3 weeks, a couple bottles of chuck are regulars. i was at trader joe's the other day and was lured to the charles shaw display by bottles saying "nouveau." i don't speak french at all (as b knows from when we were in france together), but i assumed that meant this was a new one. i picked up a bottle and saw that it was a "valdiguie" (pronounced "val-de-gay," i later found out). i had no idea what that was but i put it in my basket anyway. yay! a new chuck! i googled (actually blackled) it--not chuck specifically, but valdiguies in general, just to find out what they were--tonight, and all i found was trader joe's on blast all over the internet for this nasty, nasty wine. "no way, these are just snooty wine snobs," i thought, as i opened up my lovely new chuck and poured myself a glass. i put the goblet up to my nose, took a breath, and smelled...grape juice? raspberry cider? what the hell?! then i tasted it, and it's GROSS!!!!!!

black and green

i signed up for this green email tip of the day site (www.idealbite.com) and the other day it told me about www.blackle.com, which is google, but with a black screen. and not all the other cool stuff like maps, images, etc. it's pretty basic. but it's point is that a black monitor screen uses significantly less energy/fuel than a white screen. and when you go on blackle, it says how much energy has been saved to date by people using blackle instead of google as their home page, search engine of choice, etc. i also (as you i'm sure have noticed) changed my blog layout to be all black, and since i waste so much time on there i'm about to go see if there's a black myspace layout i like. it may seem like last minute and too small, but any steps we can take i believe are important...

ch ch ch changes

yeah, i know i stole that title from jenn's blog.

changing my name is much weirder than i though it would be. having gotten married in the 21st century, it was completely my choice to do it. i asked matt what he thought and he wouldn't give an opinion one way or the other; he said that it is an individual decision. i want my future possible kids to have the same name as their mom and their dad. and i want to have the same name as my life partner.

it took me a while to do it after the wedding because i had plane tickets to denver in my old name and i figured they probably wouldn't let me on the plane if my ticket said macdonald and my license said beatty. now that i've been back for a month, i'm almost completely switched over. the first thing i had to do was get my marriage license. then i used that to change my drivers license and social security card, both of which were mailed to me a few weeks later rather than given to me on the spot. so i had to run around with a paper version of my new drivers license (they wouldn't let me keep the old one temporarily), which was kind of crappy because apparently you can't get a library card or a margarita with a paper drivers license. i'm also kind of annoyed because i just had gotten a renewal license in may and my photo was so cute! i mean, i looked good! you'd think that with their huge state-wide database, they could save people's pictures for however long just in case people lose their license or, say, change their name, but no. so my new picture just looks blah. i look kind of plain-jane, and suburban (which i'm not) and wife-y. and i don't even know what i mean by that because i'm having all kinds of strange emotions and ideas about wife-y-ness floating up from who knows where into my head. i mean, nothing has changed between me and matt since we got married other than the legal, but all of a sudden i'm feeling aware of all these archetypes and connotations and stuff. and i feel like i have to sort out what my definition of being a wife is from that of society, or past society, or other people, or tv, or whatever else. i mean, is it a description? a label? an honor? a relationship? a role? what kind? i think i might be confusing matt with all this. he says i'm exactly the same person i was the second before we got married, and he just wants me to be myself. and he's right, but where is all this other stuff coming from?

so then i had to use my new license to switch stuff over at my bank and at work, all of which have taken much longer than the last two things, so i've been in this weird name-limbo for a month. i say beatty for some things and macdonald for others, and i sign beatty on everything except for my debit card transactions because they haven't sent me my new card yet. just today they figured it out at work and i couldn't get into my computer because my log-in was changed (and, frustratingly, i could only open the email explaining how to log in with my new name once i'd logged in with my new name). and the voicemail greeting i left today was that my name changed so from now on this will be marissa beatty's voicemail. it feels so optional what my name is all of a sudden. like dying my hair. like i could wake up tomorrow and decide that i want to be called sarah jones and tell everyone that's what they have to call me from now on. and i have this amnesic feeling that i'm going to forget my name. which is kind of like forgetting who you are, right? but then again not really...it brings up the whole "a rose by any other name" thing.

anyway, it's provoked a lot more thought and feeling than i thought would happen, for sure. i do like my new name. it feels very english. and easier to say after my first name. it flows better. and of course i love the man that "gave" it to me from a bottomless well. so that helps.

have a fantastic thanksgiving, everyone. peace.
-marissa beatty :)

hip hop dance class!

i just discovered the funnest (i know that's not a word) thing ever (and i know i'm speaking in hyperbole): hip hop dance class!! i definitely felt like an oaf-ish white girl, but it is so worth it. i put on hip hop and dance around my living room--a little less oafishly, i would like to think--all the time anyway, i might as well learn how to do it right. and the girl who teaches the class is really good. for anyone in town who wants to come with me, it's at 6:30 on monday nights at oakway fitness. (and ib, if you're reading this--if you were in town i would so try to get you to come with me! remember when we used to dance to old school hip hop like mc hammer and stuff? :) those were good times!)

hermity

hey, i know i just blogged yesterday, but i am having such a glorious hermit-y weekend that i have to talk about it. i forgot how much i liked just hanging out by myself in my pajamas. right now i'm on the couch in matt's bathrobe watching "knocked up." matt and troy decided to stay at the coast one more day, so last night i made another mini "test pizza," lit all the candles in the living room, drank half a bottle of wine, watched football, and downloaded mtv mash-ups on limewire. nelly vs. lynyrd skynyrd. brilliant! sitting around doing exactly what i want and nothing i don't. all by myself. when you're living with someone, it's easy to forget how soothing it is, and and how important it is to do every now and then.

pizza

for some reason i have decided to start baking bread. mainly because i think the bread that comes from the bakery section at the store or from an actual bakery (you know, the loaves that aren't sliced and shaped like they come from the factory, and are all crispy on the outside and soft and dough-y with air pockets on the inside) taste WAY better than "normal" commercial bread. also (and really, this should be the most important), bread baked at home or in local bakeries don't take as much fuel to create and take nearly no fuel to get them to where they will be purchased/consumed. that and the fact that i am part owner of a place that always has mad amounts of yeast laying around. (though i used yeast from the store this first time because i have no idea what i'm doing.)

my first try at bread was a pizza dough. matt and troy are off on a man vacation at the coast in the vw bus this weekend and i decided i want to make homemade pizza for all of us when they get back. i was going to do one test-pizza yesterday and another one today for when they come home, but i accidentally made enough dough for two (possibly three, we'll see) pizzas. it came out ok. i used mozzarella cheese and leftover marinara from when i made veggie lasagna. the crust was weird, though, in the same way that the crust on take-and-bake pizzas are weird. all dense and spongy. i like really thin crusts with just a little bit of that air-pocket-y dough-yness that's in the loaves of bread i like. i was kind of discouraged, but i punched down the rest of the dough and decided to leave it out and let it rise again overnight (don't know why...i was drinking beer...). when i got up this morning i had second thoughts about eating something i'd left out all night. but i went on line to see if it was safe, and i read (at 101cookbooks.com) that the secret to good thin-crust pizza is an overnight second rise! so i made a tiny little test pizza, and YUM! :) i love when things accidentally go right. now the guys just need to come home so i can surprise them with my crazy pizza skills. ;)

small world

i was out the other night and i ran into this guy i (sort of) know. i'll call him "j". he's a local artist/metal worker, and he does all the cool stainless steel ninkasi tap handles (see last picture in this post, or even better, go find a bar with ninkasi on tap). so j came up to me and said "i slept in your house the other night."
"yeah?" (dumbly, thinking to myself "how did i miss that?")
"on 18th."
"yeah?" (again. still confused. our house is on 18th here just like it was in portland.)
"in portland."
"oh...oh! my little pink house! :)" (as the blank stare finally dissolved.)

it turns out he knows the people who bought the house, and he was up visiting and somehow found out from them that the guy who lived there before went to eugene to brew, and realized it was matt. so i started asking him all about the house, like did they keep the crazy paint colors i'd put up in there (yes), do they like it (love it), and have they changed much (they put in one of those bow-shaped shower curtain rods that make it seem like your shower is much bigger than it actually is...we had one in our hotel in denver).

then he asked me, rather cryptically, if i had left anything (i can't remember the word he used...something like important? or interesting?) behind. i told him about the grill we had to leave because matt and troy forgot to put it in the moving van. and yes, in matt's defense, i was in las vegas at the time and unavailable to put anything in the moving van. but i remembered we told wendi and john they could have it if they came to pick it up.

so matt told him about the case of beer otis buried in the yard. one day when we got home from work we found otis sitting in the back yard, surrounded by shredded cardboard and a few bottles of widmer hefeweizen, covered in mud and wagging his tail gleefully. he'd dragged a case of beer out of the garage into the back yard, tore it up, and buried it. for a while after that we'd randomly find a bottle here or there sticking up out of the dirt. we never found the whole case. but that wasn't it.

i told him about the dog skull i dug up when i first moved in. i was tearing up grass to put in my veggie garden, and all of a sudden i hit this crunchy thing. i pulled it up with the shovel, saw that it was a dog skull, freaked out and threw it in the bushes. later on, wendi came over and chased me around the yard with it while i shrieked like a 5-year-old. i eventually made jenny deal with it because i was too creeped out to touch it. i wondered if these poor people had dug up the rest of the dog. that wasn't it, either. any ideas? you get three guesses.

. . . . . . .

. . . . . . .

. . . . . . .

itwasaGUN!! the whole time i lived there, there was this GUN, wrapped up in a sheet and hidden in the insulation in the attic! so there you go. i guess you really can't know everything about anything, not even what all is in your own home.

it's the little things

i have been moping around all week. i've been kinda sick, and just plain mope-y for no particular reason. maybe it's seasonal affective something. who knows. anyway, i was going to come on here and blog "mopety mope mope mope" for however many paragraphs until i felt better, but two things happened in the meantime. first, matt (who knows i've been mopey because i moped all over him this morning before dragging my ass out of bed at 8:30 to be quite late to work), texted me a picture of glenwood hot springs because he knows how much blissful fun i had there and he wanted to make me feel better. it worked. my heart got that warm, fuzzy feeling for a minute. and then i went to look at the blog of a woman i went to college with whose blog i look at from time to time, and she had posted a picture where she had carved the mathematical symbol "pi" into a pumpkin! pumpkin pie!! and it was all lit up and glowing. and now i'm smiling again. :)

back from vacation

wow, i haven't blogged in over a month! for one thing, my laptop is dying and the "m" key has stopped functioning. for a while, i thought it was an interesting challenge to try to write things without ever using an "m," but that got old fast. then i figured out that if i copied an "m" in text somewhere, i can paste it in, so now all "m"s are produced not by hitting the "m" key, but by pressing "control-v" for paste. now i'm starting to notice the "v" key having problems. shit.

mainly, though, i've been busy working and playing.

work: i have a new supervisor who is extremely "by the books," rather critical, and a bit of a micro-manager. she is also a wealth of knowledge about policy, practice, and law. so i can either panic and get frustrated, or realize this for a great learning opportunity and a chance to hone my skills. i fluctuate between the two daily. i also have a full caseload for the first time since i started in lane county...and it's getting fuller weekly. so i've been consumed by work like i used to be in portland.

play: i also just got back from my pseudo-honeymoon to colorado. i won't blog much about it because "a picture is worth a thousand words" and i have posted the visual equivalent of 33,000 words--along with a handful of actual words--in the "pics" section of my myspace page. i'd encourage you to check it out if you want to read about our trip.

what i do want to talk about here is something i thought about a lot while i was on vacation (particularly when i found myself exhausted at the end of a long day of standing around tasting beer and wanting to go back to the hotel room and make out with my husband rather than following the drunken throng to the bars): the concept of play. it's definitely something that evolves and changes during the course of one's life. babies wave their hands around and make funny faces. toddlers crack themselves up by sticking things in their ears and up their nose. then they discover their reflection in the mirror and that opens up a whole new world of play. by the time they're in school, kids' play gets more complex. imagination is involved in the form of invisible friends, a functioning family of dolls, a working army of lego-men, elaborate schemes to build a fort and take over the neighborhood... complex sets of rules are involved as well, as evidenced in games like kickball, capture-the-flag, (or, in the case of today's obese-kid generation, joining a gang and shooting up the 'hood on the screen in video games). this kind of play is more formal and organized when kids get into high school and are playing jv and varsity sports and on the computer creating their own video games using programming. another kind of play emerges at this time that involves the discovery and pursuit of the opposite (or same) sex: high school dances, sneaking around making out, girls shopping for cute outfits and giggling with friends about who thinks who's hot, guys working on their cars and muscles to impress the girls, etc. in college, play often turns into an adrenaline-fueled full-time party, which hopefully the kids grow out of eventually as they mature into adults. some of this--going out dancing, happy hour with work friends, travelling to other countries all by oneself in attempt to "seize the day"--carries over throughout one's 20's. but so often, in the process of maturing into adults, people lose the concept of play entirely. for myself, i've noticed that in the last year or so i've lost nearly all interest in staying out all night doing tequila shots and dancing my ass off. after careful consideration, i've decided that this has pretty much nothing to do with the fact that i am married to someone who has absolutely no desire to do such things. it's just that it doesn't really do it for me anymore. the last time i went to las vegas with my high school girlfriends for our annual girls' weekend, i was sitting down, taking my high heels off, and rubbing my sore feet as closing time drew near at the club, not shrieking with drunken glee and wondering where the after party was. so am i outgrowing play? am i on the path toward becoming one of those stuck, bored, middle-aged people who go to work, come home, watch some tv, and go to bed with nothing to look forward to the next day except more of the same?

NO. absolutely not. just like school kids who have discovered that dodge ball does it for them a lot more than sticking carrots up their nose, i need to find my new play. i don't really have to look far. i've pretty much found it without looking. lately i have taken a lot of joy in creative pursuits like cooking and photography, in travelling, and especially in moving my body in healthy, sober ways (don't worry, i'm not going all clean-and-sober on your ass or anything crazy like that. ;) not until i'm pregnant anyway...). yoga, swimming, biking, skiing, running. that is my new play. and i'm comforted in knowing that later in life, once my body wears down and isn't as able to handle this new play as it is now, i'll find something else. or it will find me. i'm discovering that possibly my favorite thing about myself is my ability to find the joy.

they're BAAAck...

in case you were wondering about the recent absence of nutria from this blog, they eventually grew up and migrated out from under our deck back to amazon creek. thank god! and we had a lovely, nutria-free late summer in which otis could run (on his run-rope--not able to let him run freely without a fence just yet) around the yard un-harmed, grace was not afraid to go outside, and i could hang out on the back deck enjoying the twilight and a beer without first having to scrape up rodent shit.

the first red flag came when the house started to smell like cat piss. since neither one of us is secretly operating a meth lab, we blamed it on gracie's old age. she's getting a bit geriatric these days. oh well, i guess maybe it's time for a litter box.

but then the compost pile i've been cultivating all summer started to look like someone had been in it. hmm...

and then this morning i walked outside to find half of my beautiful container garden (i've been growing rosemary, dill, parsley, chives, basil, oregano, and sage) KNOCKED OVER AND BROKEN, and a familiar little pile of oily, oval-shaped droppings on the deck stairs.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGHHHHHHHH!

marley (& otis) & me

i just got done reading marley & me (john grogan). ever since i got otis, dog people have been asking me if i'd read it yet, so i finally did. it's about this yellow lab, marley (who reminds me a lot of otis: jumps on people, freaks out and scratches up walls when left alone in the garage, dragged an entire cafe table out from under the people eating on it and halfway down the street), and his human family. it starts with marley as a fuzzy little puppy and ends up where you had better have a box of kleenex with you. it's well-written, and if you're a dog person i'd definitely recommend it (it would probably be pretty boring if you're not).

but the thing about it was, it was just so damn norman-rockwell-y! it simultaneously comforted me and grated on my nerves that, despite the true-to-life gory detail with which grogan described marley's "adventures," he never seemed to get truly furious at this dog! marley did some stuff that was way worse than otis would even think of (got kicked out of obedicence school, chewed up his metal crate until his teeth fell out and he was bleeding, then ran around the house smearing his doggie blood everywhere and destroying furniture), and yet it was written about in this 50's sitcom, "look at that! silly old marley..." kind of way that made me feel guilty about the times i've shouted at otis--not out of discipline but out of pure, blood-boiling frustration--until he cowered in the corner tucking his tail (please don't send Dog Protective Services to come take my puppy away!).

john grogan did write the book after marley's death, however, so i'm sure a good deal of nostalgia and "don't speak ill of the dead" played into his style. and he did talk about the time his wife was ready to take marley to the pound, so he doubled his efforts and got up at ass-o-clock every morning for a last-ditch marley-training-effort until marley was at least as "trained" as he was going to get. maybe he's just an incredibly patient, devoted man. or maybe having marley grew and strengthened those traits in him. i know otis has done that for us. i have said, on more than one occasion, "i'm taking him to the pound!" (though i never mean it). and matt has told me a few times "there is no peace around here! just OTIS!" but we talk each other down from our otis-hating ledges, and we ramp up (however temporarily) the efforts to make him a good dog. and i think having him around for the last year has cultivated our patience tremendously. and that patience has helped us deal more effectively with our jobs, with all the stupid shitty things that happen in life (like weekly flat tires on my commuter bike...), and with each other.

homesick

i've been having a pretty rough time this week. all the rushing around moving and getting married is done and i'm settling in, and it is suddenly really hitting me that i don't live in portland anymore. most of my friends and family (the ones who don't live really far away) are 2 hours north up I-5. and it's really FLAT here. i heard the other day that buildings are not allowed to be taller than 8 stories. i miss the skyline. i miss city lights reflecting off of the river. i miss how the shade of the buildings keeps downtown cool in the hot summer. i miss all the bridges with cars rushing over them in different directions. i miss the endless dining possibilities and all the different bars. i know i'm going to miss the hell out of the christmas tree in pioneer courthouse square this winter.

what i really miss is my friends. i know you guys are still my friends, so i don't feel a total loss, but it is really hard not to be able to just call someone and say "let's go get a beer at widmer after work," or "let's go on a bike ride," or "come hang out with me on my back patio." now it has to be an entire day--if not overnight--planned trip complete with dog-care arrangements if i want to hang out.

i do not regret moving here. i very much support matt and this ninkasi thing (plus there's a good possibility it could make us rich!). and there are so many things i love about this town, like the bike paths, the vegetable gardens in everyone's front yards, the very cool down-to-earth people i'm meeting, and the general way of life. it's just another life transition, and sometimes those are tough.

i know a lot of you guys have, at some point in your lives, packed up and moved away to a new city for whatever reason. anyone have any advice for me?

6 am, pukey dog

i woke up half an hour ago to the sound of otis vomiting right next to my head. then he went around the bed to matt's side and vomited there. matt was already up cleaning the dog puke when i came to full consciousness (it takes me a while). he said, as otis started puking a third time, "why don't you take your dog outside. you wanted to get up at 6:30 anyway." ugh.

we're in the phase in our lives right now where we need to make a very important decision fairly quickly: are we going to have children? i go back and forth on that issue several times a day. this morning i was definitely thinking "no way." not if it means no one ever gets anymore sleep and we're always grouchy with one another. but then when i took otis outside i noticed it had just rained, and that it smelled like almost-fall (one of my favorite smells), and that if i take otis on a long walk east i get to see the sunrise, and i thought "ok, morning is good." and then otis put his little fuzzy head on my lap as i turned on my computer and said with his puppy-eyes "mama, i don't feel good," and it felt good to snuggle him. so who knows?

i'm going to go take pukey mcpukerson outside and watch the sunrise. :)

mycrack

i am thoroughly addicted to myspace. i had a myspace page a long time ago, but i took it down once i realized all the 13 year old girls on my caseload--and several of their mothers--also had myspace pages and i didn't want them to find me out in cyberspace, see all my friends, and know too much about my personal life. since then, all kinds of my friends have gotten on myspace and i have been assured that i can set my profile to private (which i haven't yet figured out how to do) so that only my friends can "see" me. i started up my account again yesterday and played with it for HOURS. i even got up early this morning so i could play with it some more before i had to go to work. i LOVE myspace. now i know why so many teenagers are fat and blind--it's easy to get to where all you do is sit on your butt and stare at the screen! i need to go to Myspace Anonymous meetings or something. i've even got my DOG signed up for his own page (on dogster.com). this can turn into a serious obsession...

who'd have guessed that the internet they had when i was in high school (pretty much nonexistent, and only for serious nerds, geniuses, and rich adults--i had no idea how to use it) would turn into what it has, huh?

honey MOON!

i'm back from my wedding and the four subsequent days relaxing at edgefield. it's kind of hard to pay attention to work (as you can see by the fact that i'm posting a blog at 2 pm). the wedding and reception themselves were gorgeous and everything that i wanted them to be. except for long enough. i'm sure they were long enough for the other people who participated, but i felt like they day went by in a big, happy blur and i didn't get to sit down and spend enough time with everyone who was there as much as i would have liked.

after the reception we went to and then got kicked very politely out of tp and as's room and downstairs into the pool hall. one poor guest had fallen asleep/passed out at one of the tables and all of a sudden, right when someone was saying "it's called a honeymoon because it's sweet and you get to see each other's butts," i looked over and there was a full moon in the form of jk's butt getting it's picture taken next to the sleeping c.

the rest of the week was so nice. we stayed out at edgefield for three more days. it rained on monday, so we stayed in, did honeymoon things (wink wink), watched oceans 13 in the theater there, sat on the porch with a bottle of champagne and played cards, etc. tuesday we tried to play golf on edgefield's 17-hole golf course. we sucked. i kept trying to hit the ball and ending up swinging at air or tearing up the grass instead. we both lost several balls to the blackberry bushes. we got frustrated and gave up to go get a beer about half way through. then we went wine tasting in the little winery where matt proposed a year and a half ago. we had breakfast every morning and dinner tuesday night at the black rabbit restaurant, which has amazing 5-star food and is nothing like a mcmenamin's pub. we ate more meat and drank more wine than we have all year--i'm sure i've gained back the 13 pounds i lost for the wedding! on tuesday night there was an irish band playing in the garden outside the little red shed. it was so perfect. wednesday morning, we got up and got our dog (who had made friends with an adorable little 6 month old border collie, and who also was returned to us with a piece of tape over his id tag saying that his name was "satan" and that his phone number was "666-6666"...), and headed back to normal life.

thank you everyone who was able to come celebrate with us--you made it the beautiful day and great time that it was. :)

try milk thistle...it really works!

i had my first "annual" physical in three years last week and apparently i'm very healthy! my good cholesterol (hdl) is way high, my bad cholesterol (ldl) is quite low, and my overall cholesterol and cholesterol/hdl ratio are both remarkably good. all my blood cell counts are normal, and apparently my thyroid, kidneys, and liver all function very efficiently. my doctor actually hand-wrote "excellent" on my copy of my lab results that i got in the mail. matt recently has his blood work done too and his results were just like mine. now, the reason i'm telling you all this is not just to disclose too much personal information, but because, by all rights, neither of our livers should be anywhere near the well-oiled machines that they both apparently are, and i credit milk thistle. as long as i've known matt, he's taken this obscure supplement. he told me, and several other people have since, that many brewers take milk thistle because it supports and enhances liver functioning, and brewers tend to drink a lot of beer. having similar tendencies myself, i started taking it about a year ago. and lo and behold, it works! so i'm writing this post as advice for any of you who also enjoy ample portions of beer and wine: milk thistle...it does a body good.

m.i.a.

i know i've not been around on my blog much lately, but more than likely i've been--or will be soon--around in person much more. in about two weeks i'm due to see just about everyone i know, all in one big room together! it's coming up on matt's and my wedding day and i've been super preoccupied trying to make sure everything gets done. who knew that there were so many online wedding checklists, and who knew they had so many things on them you have to do?! and it's a good thing, too. i wouldn't have thought of things like "designate who will meet, greet, and handle each vendor on the wedding day," and "confirm location, date, and time with photographer; create your 'must take' photo list. " i didn't want it to be, but evidently it is a lot more complicated than throwing a graduation party in your backyard... and hopefully with fewer things catching on fire...

i've also been up in portland for my bachelorette party and bridal shower, both of which were incredibly good times and made me feel very blessed to have such fun and caring friends and family. i'm also quite blessed to have a fiance who has no qualms about getting into the wedding planning and is handling several of the tasks on the stupid-ocd-bridezilla-website-checklist himself. as annoyed as i may get with the all the cliched bride-y-ness that has suddenly invaded my life, i am glad for this wedding planning thing because it has made me see very clearly that i have a true partner in matt. we work well together as a team, and we balance each other out (i've found that semi-naive optimism paired up with semi-intentionally-exaggerated grouchiness really can add up to one whole pragmatic realist). and we can count on each other to get shit done.

ok, i'm done with the self-indulgent shmooping all over my relationship now. i just wanted to say "hi" and explain what i've been up to. i'm sure i'll be back to blogging once this thing is over with. see many of you soon! :)

virtual tour

matt and i finally got around to bringing a camera in to take pictures of the brewery. since i've been hanging out there quite a bit, i have gained somewhat of an understanding of how it all works. i'll try to explain to the best of my limited knowledge what all these pictures are:

this is the main room. it's what you see when you come in the door. there is a "bar" (kegerator) in the middle of the room where people can "taste"(sit and drink all day long) the beer. look, there's me! i'm sitting on a keg a few feet away from someone's stinky work boots. the room in the background to the right with the door off it's hinges is the bathroom. the door is on now. and the bar is up against a wall now, looking more organized and respectable.

this is the front of the brewery. that tall thing in front is the grain silo. that's where the grain delivery people come and put the grain, which then goes from the bottom of the silo through that white pipe that looks like a roller coaster into the building through the roof. that other tall thing in front is matt. :)

this is the mill room and grist case. the mill room is the little closet-y looking thing with a machine in it. the machine, obviously, is the mill. the grain gets milled, then goes up another white pipe into that box to the right which is the grist case, where the mash (what the milled grain seems to be called) is stored.

this is my beautiful man standing next to the mashtun. (note: mashtun is actually all one word. i had it spelled mash ton, and then mash tun, and neither seemed right, so i called matt who said it is "mashtun.") in this picture matt's standing on the brew deck smiling for the camera. normally he's standing on the brew deck in work boots and latex gloves, stirring the mash (the milled grain from the last picture) into the mashtun with a giant oar. though i think there's a machine on there that does that part now, too.

the concoction with the water and mash then goes into this thing which is the kettle. this is where the hops go in, too. it all gets boiled. it's actually quite a bit like cooking. i don't know why the picture is sideways. when i loaded them into my computer i tried to make them all orient the same way, but i must have missed this one. sorry about having to tilt your head.

in the background of this picture are the mashtun and the kettle. in the foreground are the fermenters, where the mixture--now called wort--is piped to finish the fermentation process. first it goes through a wort chiller and (sometimes, but not in this case yet) some sort of filtering process. the wort sits in the fermenters until it becomes beer. there are now six of these in the brew house: the little one and three big ones in this picture, and two new giant ones that are going to be used to make lagers.

this is the boiler room (the closet-y thing with the hot water heater in it), the hot liquor back (the other hot-water-heater-y thing), and the power box. i'm not really sure what this equipment is for other than to supply and control power to the building, and to provide boiling water for the kettle.

these big things are called bright tanks. they're stored inside the cooler. they are where the beer goes once it is done being fermented in the fermenters from a few pictures ago. beer sits in there partially just as storage but mainly because the longer it sits in there the "brighter" it gets. all the particles and stuff that made it through whatever filtering process settle out and the beer is less cloudy. so far there are four bright tanks at ninkasi. the fourth you can only see a little corner of. for whatever reason it sits long-ways instead of upright, and it is big and pinkish-red with a snout-like opening on one end. they call it "the pig."

here are a bunch of kegs, also inside the cooler. after the beer is done sitting in the bright tanks, it gets put into kegs. the cooler is the most wonderful thing on a hot summer day. just walk in, close your eyes, and you can imagine you are up on mt. hood during ski season!

this is...another picture that didn't get uprighted when i put it into my computer. it is also a picture of a ninkasi tap handle. this specific one is quantum pale ale, my new favorite beer. the other beers are total domination ipa, spank dog, and believer double red. coming soon are two lagers and an oktoberfest (matt is designing that one and he's going to enter it for competition at the great american beer festival in october). look for this tap handle at your local bar (if you live in oregon). it's already all over eugene and some places in portland, and growing daily...

country fair

i realize that since i didn't actually go to the country fair, the title is misleading. but i was so excited to be in eugene and to be going to the hippiest of hippie-fests for the first time, and then to be able to blog about the crazy, naked-body-painted hippies wandering around with glitter and fairy wings, that i couldn't not have a post titled "country fair." i don't actually have anything to say about the fair, however, other than that i have been hearing about it for years and have always wondered...but it looks like i won't be able to find out until next year.

between wedding plans, learning a"new" job (same job, different county. and tons more legal work.), driving back and forth to portland all the time, and poor matt working 16-hour days, we were both just exhausted this weekend when it came time to go to the fair. what we really wanted was to relax. so we went camping with d and i from ninkasi, i's girlfriend aj, and their lab/hound-dog apollo. we went up around oakridge, by the headwaters of the willamette. it was absolutely beautiful. and quiet. nothing to hear but the river, and nothing to see at night but the campfire and stars. we both finally took a big, deep, slow breath of extremely fresh air. it was tangible peace.

of course no trip is complete without otis doing something semi-disastrous. he launched himself through the tent's screen-window in a panic sunday morning when matt left the tent to go pee in the woods. he also proved that he is definitely not ready to hang out by the campfire off-leash just yet: one minute he was sitting there next to apollo basking in the glow like a good dog, the next minute he was flying through the woods with five humans and a hound after him. that discovery has launched a full-scale training effort at home where poor otis does not get to do anything besides come-here, sit, down, stay, and heel the entire time we're in the house with him. for the people, this is both exhausting and a barrier to actually getting anything done (otis has to sit-stay while i'm doing the dishes. he breaks the stay, i have to dry my hands, go get him, bring him back, and put him back in the sit-stay. this happens over and over and over...), and i'm sure confusing and incredibly boring for the dog. but hopefully by next summer when we camp, we'll have a dog that can participate rather than have to be babysat. plus, if he were a good dog, maybe more people would be inclined to watch him for a week while his people go to the country fair!

i hate nutria

this weekend my dog got attacked by a nutria. i should probably blame the dog, because he was the one who escaped from the house in the first place (i was in the shower and he somehow pushed open the sliding glass door), and then was enough of a dumbass to try to make friends with the thing. the house was unusually quiet when i got out of the shower, so i called for otis. nothing. i whistled and called for him again, and i heard his collar jingle from somewhere outside. i wrapped my towel around me and went out the back door just in time to see otis dive under the deck after a nutria. i heard a scuffle. i called a third time, this time probably sounding a little angry but mostly afraid. he popped out from under the deck with the nutria attached to his face. there was another scuffle as otis shook the nutria off and it ran away. he trotted into the house--smiling and panting and wagging his tail like he was going to doggie disneyland--with BLOOD dripping from his mouth.

panicked, i rinsed his mouth off and then called matt (who hasn't had a day off in two weeks!), my vet, and the emergency vet, in that order. matt and my vet both threw me even farther into a panic: matt talking about the hundreds of dollars this was going to cost and both of them talking about the fact that now otis probably has rabies and god-knows what other kinds of disgusting rodent disease. the emergency vet was much more calming. she told me to make sure none of the blood was his (check him for open wounds), and bring him in if it was. she said since he's had his shots he should be protected from disease and he will probably only need antibiotics...stitches at the very most.

i checked otis over and found a scratch on his chest and a pretty decent-sized laceration in his floppy doggie gums, so i drove his butt to "spring-tucky" (aka springfield, where the emergency vet hospital is located). it seemed everyone else's dogs decided to be dumbasses that day, too--the lobby was overflowing. one little dog had tried to get a drink of water from a sprinkler and got blasted in the eye! the incident with the nutria and the subsequent blood-spewing wounds had absolutely no effect on otis' general otis-y-ness, so of course he was bouncing all over the lobby trying to get in everyone's laps and make friends with everyone's dogs. fortunately i had purchased the gentle leader head collar, which is a miracle working device that allowed me to keep otis out of everyone's business with pretty much no effort other than having to explain to people a) why he was jumping in circles like a freak and pawing at his mouth and b) that it's not a muzzle, it's just a head collar, and no, otis is not dangerous.

three hours later, otis got to go back in to see the doctor. poor guy had to have a thermometer shoved into his rear end for the second time that week (he had all his shots updated on monday, and any trip to the vet somehow seems to have to include a temperature reading). but he was a good doggie and let the vet look in his mouth and all, and she concluded (thank goodness) that since he's a puppy and the major wound is in his mouth, it should heal on its own and all he needs are antibiotics. it still obviously cost money to bring him in and fill the prescription, but anesthesia and stitches would have been a lot worse! so now he's home, taking cephalexin twice daily disguised as cubes of cheese, and constantly trying to get out of the house to finish what he started with the damn nutria.

enfp

i took the online personality test (based on the meyers-briggs test) that b had on her blog. whereas she changed from college to now, i got the same results i had in college:

You Are An ENFP

The Inspirer You love being around people, and you are deeply committed to your friends.You are also unconventional, irreverent, and unimpressed by authority and rules.Incredibly perceptive, you can usually sense if someone has hidden motives.You use lots of colorful language and expressions. You're quite the storyteller! In love, you are quite the charmer. And you are definitely willing to risk your heart.You often don't follow through with your flirting or professed feelings. And you do break a lot of hearts. At work, you are driven but not a workaholic. You just always seem to enjoy what you do.You would make an excellent entrepreneur, politician, or journalist. How you see yourself: compassionate, unselfish, and understanding When other people don't get you, they see you as: gushy, emotional, and unfocused

What's" Your Personality Type?

bamboozled

at the suggestion of my good friend r, who is doing my makeup for the wedding, i set out on a mission to buy myself some new, good-quality makeup. for someone who tries to get away makeup-free as often as possible and whose current collection is a hodgepodge of some good stuff and mostly drugstore stuff, a lot of which dates back to when i lived in northwest portland in my little apartment, this was a daunting task.

the mission started on monday after work. i rode my bike out to the valley river center (the non-shitty mall, as opposed to the gateway mall, which is kind of the shitty mall). i was mildly horrified to find out that even the non-shitty mall does not contain a nordstrom. there is, in fact, no nordstrom anywhere in eugene. one macy's, lots of jc penny-type stores, no nordstrom. welcome to middle america, i guess, huh? so i went in to macy's where they had three makeup counters i would go to (prescriptives, mac, and clinique..all the rest was the old-lady makeup). there was one woman running all the counters. she had on the exact opposite of the look i wanted: bright red lipstick, bright purple eyeshadow, blush with actual defined borders, and painted-on dark, dark, really high eyebrows. i kind of hovered around for a while and then ran away like a chicken. i'm sure she would have been just fine and gotten me what i needed, but i wimped out.

i went back yesterday at lunch. i walked with my sunglasses on and pretended to be on the cell phone, so that i could scope it out first without anyone asking me if i needed any help. the makeup counters all had their own representatives this time, and the women at the mac counter were actually fairly normal looking. i went over there and told them what i needed (that i'm getting married in august, that a makeup-savvy friend is doing my makeup, and that i want a fresh, natural, glowing look). i ended up in a chair getting my face done by a very friendly and helpful person named megan. it was actually a really fun experience, sitting there being made pretty and chatting with the makeup girls (it turns out one of the makeup girls just had her own wedding at edgefield in february...she said it was an amazing place to get married...). i looked--and i seriously never say this about myself--gorgeous at the end of it! i know it is designed this way, but i got all caught up in the whole experience. three hundred (!!) dollars, four new makeup brushes, a set of false eyelashes, and a whole bag of makeup later, i feel much more prepared but slightly dumbfounded.

i love my chair

there is a lot to complain about with my new office--for example the high divider walls, the lack of natural light, the apparent prohibition of staple removers anywhere in the building, the fact that work units are scattered throughout the building instead of grouped together, the fact that you have to have a doctor's statement in order to qualify for a phone headset, etc--but my desk chair might just make up for all of it. i LOVE my chair! i am sitting in it right now loving it so much that i have to interrupt my work to blog about it. my first day here i was introduced to "the bowling alley," which is what my desk neighbor calls the long, narrow, spacious supply closet. my desk at that point was only equipped with a straight-backed, straight-legged chair (not an office chair), so along with pens and file folders, i picked up a discarded desk chair in the bowling alley and wheeled my supplies back to my desk on it. the more i sat in it, the more i loved it. it didn't take me long to realize why i loved it: it is huge!! it seems like at one point it was a special order for a really big, tall man (think shaquille o'neal) who didn't fit in a regular desk chair. it has a tall back and i can lean waaaay back in it, kicking my heels up on my desk like some c.e.o. in a corner office while i read my case files. i can comfortably rest the entire length of my forearms on the arm rests. but best of all i can sit cross-legged yoga-style in my chair with plenty of room to spare. i am so in love with my chair!

summerfest

saturday afternoon i had free wine, cheese, beer, reggae, jazz, and blues in a field in the sun amongst oak trees and grape vines. i was in heaven. despite some recent technical difficulties (the contractors putting the new facility together cut a whole bunch of corners and earned ninkasi a big fat "DENIED" from the building inspectors, setting them back two weeks worth of production), ninkasi brewing company has somehow become "eugene's hometown brewery" (http://www.07summerfest.com/, under "summerfest microbrews"), and is featured at just about every eugene event. one of the perks of being "eugene's hometown brewery" is that everyone connected with it gets free tickets to everything and free beer once we get there. this particular event was summerfest, and it was held at my favorite place of the week--the secret house winery. poor matt and jamie were stuck in the brewery literally from 7 am until 1 am friday, saturday, and sunday making up for lost production time (the inspectors finally gave them the go-ahead friday afternoon), but the rest of the ninkasi crowd were headed out to summerfest. it sounded fun, and since i'm still feeling like the "new guy" here and missing my portland friends a bunch, i went along, thinking it would be a good way to get to know these guys better. once i got there i kicked myself for not bringing my camera, because it was gorgeous there! the event was all day, but we got there at 3:00--just in time for the free wine tasting hour. this was held in the wine cellar which was lit up with twinkle lights and candles, and it included complimentary cheese and other yummy hors d'oeuvres. the 1999 pinot noir was my favorite. very smoky and smooth. after the wine tasting, we bought a couple bottles of wine to share and laid out a blanket on the field to watch the bands. it reminded me a lot of the cathedral park blues festival under the st. john's bridge that happens every summer--good local talent, a family-friendly atmosphere, the smell of summer floating through the air, and a pervasive feel-good vibe. after the event, right at twilight, one of the winery's owners showed us around their impressive garden. it made me want to live there! they are having a wine and blues festival in august, and there will probably be some concerts out there too. ani defranco played there last year. there is a website--http://www.secrethousewinery.com/--but it doesn't show much. i wish i had brought my camera so i could upload pictures and show you, but i didn't (though now i have it in my purse wherever i go), so you'll just have to come see for yourself sometime!

city in the country

i love it that you can go from (albeit small-townish but definitely not without culture) city to full on, outdoorsy, llamas-and-sheep country in just seconds here. there are no miles and miles of freeway through acres and acres of strip-mall suburb. (well, except for springfield, but that's only in one direction... but anyway...) last sunday matt and i got up, made breakfast, loaded otis in the car, and drive for no more than 20 minutes to get here:

(yes, i finally learned how to upload photos onto my blog. i know, a monkey could have figured it out, blah blah... :) ) this is at the base of spencer's butte, which is just south of eugene and an absolutely gorgeous hike. i was going to post some of the pictures that i took once we got to the top, but for some reason i can't make those ones upload--i think because i used the "panorama" feature on my camera and my computer doesn't know how to translate that, and i don't have a monkey around to help me figure it out--but take my word for it, it was breathtaking. the last quarter-mile or so is pretty much just climbing up rocks to get to the top. aside from the spectacular view, what impressed me was that otis is a) extremely agile and adept at scrambling up rocks, and kind of reminded me of gollum from lord of the rings and b) very tuned-in to his people, and could recognize that matt and i were not so agile and therefore was careful not to pull us up or down the rocks but instead waited patiently for whoever was walking him to find their footing before making the next scramble.

rodent update

remember the "beaver" that was living in my yard? well, it turned out he was a she, and she was a pregnant nutria. now there are six nutria--the mama and five little fuzzy puffballs that i would be absolutely in love with if i didn't know what they would grow up to be--living under our back deck. i turned in a report to my landlord on may 30th, and again today, so we'll see what happens with them. the landlord assured me that they would be humanely trapped and released, which i'm glad for. as much as i despise nutria, i don't like the idea of killing a mama anything and its babies.

because i'm a nerd, and because people in california reading this might not be familiar with nutria (i wasn't until i went to college in salem), i googled them. nutria...disgusting enormous rats...have their own website: http://www.nutria.com/. seriously. it turns out they aren't even supposed to be here in the first place. some dumbass fur trader imported them from south america to louisiana, where they were released "either intentionally or accidentally" into the swamp. then, apparently, a HURRICANE picked them all up and dispersed them around into mississippi and texas. since then (jj, you'll be interested in this part), they have reportedly caused "extensive damage to louisiana coastal wetlands." the website pretty much only talks about louisiana and it's neighbors, so i have no idea how they went from damaging the gulf coast to damaging my back yard. i did learn, however, that "the generic name [myocastor coypus] is derived from two greek words (mys, for mouse, and kastor, for beaver) that translate as mouse beaver." so i was right: there is a beaver living under my house!

ninkasi brewing

it just occurred to me that i should probably provide a link to the website for whole reason i'm in eugene in the first place! anyway, you can read all about ninkasi brewing and it's creator, matt's friend (and mine) jamie floyd, at the following website:

http://ninkasibrewing.com/

it's also now a link in my blogs-to-check-out section. i was just looking at the site myself a few minutes ago...i had no idea ninkasi was available at so many portland bars! i definitely recommend going for a taste. it's mmm good!!

don't bank with washington mutual

consider this a public service announcement: washington mutual is evil and they will rob you blind.

1. there is a 6-transaction monthly limit on my washington mutual savings account. fine. they charge $35 if you do more than 6 things with your savings account in a month. also fine. last month i took out a lump sum of $200 so i could pay the guy who came to fix stuff on the house when we were getting it ready to sell. i got my statement this month, and it shows that SEVEN smaller sums--totalling $200--were taken out on seven separate occasions, and that washington mutual charged me $35. this is the second time this has happened.

2. matt got me a new pair of running shoes at the adidas store for part of my birthday present. when he went to pay, the store's system was down. it evidently took the guy at the cash register a while to figure this out, because he kept swiping matt's debit card. finally the system came back online and generated a receipt for the amount of the shoes. two weeks later matt found out that he was several HUNDRED dollars overdrawn. he called washington mutual. he found out that he was charged for the shoes as many times as that guy in the adidas store swiped his card. once he was charged enough to deplete his account, each additional swipe cost him a $35 overdraft charge. he tried to explain to the customer service guy what happened. he was told that the only way to fix it was to go into the adidas store again and get someone there to call wm with him. he went back to the adidas store. he an adidas clerk called wm several times and spoke to several different customer service representatives. each one had something different and apparently useless that matt and the adidas clerk needed to do, "then call us right back." finally, they got a manager at wm. it turns out all they had to do was get an authorization code from the manager at adidas. when they asked why they weren't just told this in the beginning, the wm manager basically told them that people aren't trained on how to handle that type of situation until they are managers. WHAT??!? literally three hours later, the charges were removed. the however-many $35-a-piece overdraft fees were not.

assumptions

there are two things that i've discovered so far that have put tiny dents in my preconceived vision of eugene as a hippie liberal utopia. the first is that there is no universal free wi-fi. luckily, there is"free" wi-fi at my house: we are borrowing it from someone somewhere around here named ernest. the second thing is that there is only one restaurant or bar here with a patio where i can bring otis! there are several places with outdoor areas, but also with very un-liberal dog policies. in portland i could go to the lucky lab, amnesia, tin shed, etc., etc... here there is only the villard street pub, over by the university of oregon, where matt's business partner's girlfriend is the bar manager. it's a nice place with a big, dog-friendly patio (about the size of amnesia's). so it's still all good. :) and i still have a lot more discovering and exploring to do. but now i'm going to portland for the weekend. yay!

the beaver under the house

ok, what's with the weird run-ins with strange creatures lately?? i moved into our new house on saturday after an exhausting but lovely week in vegas for r's wedding (more on that one as soon as i have pictures uploaded). so far i've figured out that a) i'm pretty much a 5 - 30 minute bike ride from everywhere i could possibly want to go, b) the west eugene office is the physical opposite of midtown (quiet, high divider walls, and everyone in their own giant cube, instead of noisy, low divider walls, and four or five people to a quad), and c) there is a beaver living under my house. our friends t.p. and a.s.--who are staying with us until the 28th when they can move into their own place--took otis out in the yard last night and otis ran off into the bushes after something furry. a.s. went over to see what he had cornered, and a BEAVER leapt out at her. matt (who did not see the beaver) insisted that it was a muskrat, but a.s. google-imaged both and said it was definitely a beaver. i told the story to my new boss (who, by the way is hilarious and is also one of only two non-duck-fans here) this morning. her response was "go beavs!"

goodbye portland

i am sad. actually i'm at my office at 11:13 at night panicking about the fact that tomorrow is my absolute last day at my current branch and i still have one-and-a-half cases left to transfer before i can leave tomorrow afternoon. and i still have to clean out my desk. matt is in eugene with all of our stuff except for a futon mattress, the stuff i'm taking to las vegas, the dog, and the stuff (like the washer and dryer, several boxes, backyard furniture, etc) that the uhaul people swore would fit in the truck that they told matt to get when he told them what all we had to pack. the house is in disarray. matt starts his job wednesday. i leave for las vegas at noon on tuesday. i'm tired and frazzled. but i'm also sad. i feel like i'm sneaking out of portland in the middle of the night or something...i've been so busy dealing with everything that i haven't had much chance to see everyone before i leave. but the good thing is it's only an hour and a half away, and i'll definitely be back. pretty often, i'm thinking. (willamette people: remember how long i hung around campus after i had graduated?? i guess i have separation issues!). goodbye portland. i'll miss you. but i'll see you soon.

what the f***???

i just got off the phone with matt, who spent the last half-hour trying to kick an unwanted guest out of the house. he got up this morning, got into the shower, and heard a bunch of barking and growling followed by a big crash. since we got the dog, this is not an entirely uncommon sound to hear while in the shower anymore. but then he dried off and went into the living room, where there was a SPARROW...SITTING ON THE COUCH, PANTING...while gracie-cat prepared her attack and otis jumped around in circles losing his mind. grace launched at the sparrow, who flew directly into the living room window and fell. this started another round of what must have caused the first big crash (which turned out to be the dining room curtains and a chair). grace hunted the bird and otis climbed around on the furniture and the boxes we've packed, trying to make friends with it. the moron bird kept flying into the window and falling on its ass. finally, matt got a hold of the dog and put him in the garage and went about trying to shoo the bird out the front door. the bird apparently thought matt was just another hairy animal trying to attack it, because it kept flying around in a panic crashing into things. after several minutes of everyone flying, crashing, barking, hissing, and flailing around, matt gave up and sat down on the couch, whereupon the bird stopped what it was doing, landed nonchalantly on the ground, and WALKED out the front door!

since we're about to move, and nothing like this has happened since the days louie was a kitten and used to bring half dead birds into the house (and poor jenny had to bring them back out of the house because i am a chicken), i of course thought "oh, this is obviously an omen..." i googled "sparrow symbolism." all i got was stuff about sparrow TATTOO symbolism, but same difference, right? here's what wiki.answers.com had to say:

-"It may not mean anything, but I know a lot of men in the UK who have bird tattoos on their hands and wrists have been released from prison. The sparrows symbolize freedom. "

-"A sparrow is a symbol of finding your true love. "

-"They were to keep sailors from drowning."

-"It's possible it is one very young misguided person so infatuated with Johnny Depps' role in Pirates of the Caribbean that they felt the need to get a similar tattoo. It's a good sign that this is the case when the person in question also incessantly speaks in a drunken British drawn despite being quite sober and never having so much as vacationed in the UK, has greasy dreadlocks and insists on dressing in worn, unwashed Victorian-era clothing. "

-"i dont think that it has its OWN meaning, when i was 16, my first tattoo was different birds flying up my stomach, each one, to me, represented a family member or close friend of mine that had passed away. The sparrow represents my grandpa, because its said that they are wise birds that "resemble" peace, saftey etc.. "

so basically this was a sign that i'm not going to go to jail, i've found my true love, i won't drown, captain jack sparrow is going to come visit me in eugene (i like that one best!), and people who post answers at wiki.answers.com don't have to grammar-check first.

don't count your chickens

ok, so apparently i shouldn't write a blog about my wonderful new house until i actually have the keys in my hand, because now i'm not ever going to have the keys in my hand. ever. this came about partly because of bureaucracy issues with the rental agency, and partly because of our future possible roommates, tp and as, (though i can't say why because it's their business and they probably don't want me to post it on the internet). anyway i'm kind of pissed right now. but matt, who had decided to take this week off and go on vacation, is being wonderful and driving to eugene today instead, swearing not to come back until we have a new house. i unfortunately have four more cases to transfer before i leave, so i had to go to work today. it's driving me nuts not to be there weighing in on where i'm going to live for the next six-months-to-a-year, but i trust matt not to pick out a shit-hole (though he did voluntarily live at the "pirate ship" with a man who once shaved his beard off and left it in the bathroom sink for literally a week...). and, thanks to the wonders of modern technology, he's going to picture-message me everything he looks at.

speaking of bureaucracy problems, i just overheard someone in my office say that the computer lists the birth date of one of our kids as 10/28/07...uhhh...and this is our government... alright, i guess i'd better get back to working for the government. more later.

welcome to my blog!

as many of you know, i'm moving away to eugene in a matter of weeks, and i want a good way to keep in touch with everyone. this blog thing seems to have worked well for my friends who have moved away (like j and b), so i'm being a total copycat and starting one myself. please post comments, i'll probably check them pretty regularly. or email or call!

matt and i drove down to eugene yesterday while puppy otis played with his best friend winston at m&s's house all day. we said we wouldn't come back until we found a rental house. i expected having to look all day long and then settle on something i really didn't like but would at least be a place to live. the first crappy place we looked at was near the u of o campus. the key was left under the doormat and the landlord--who was out of town--told us so over the phone. people are very trusting in eugene, it seems...how did he know we weren't there to steal the appliances or set up a quickie meth lab in the shed? the place smelled like cigarette smoke and body odor, and vaguely like the last people who used the key actually had set up a quickie meth lab. but the next place we found was gorgeous! it is up on the hill in south eugene (at 43rd and pearl for those of you, like a, who know eugene). we are going to be sharing the place with another couple--some friends of matt's and mine who are also moving to eugene--and the house is perfect for that. it is a split-level: you walk in and there is a staircase which you can either go up to the top floor (which will be their floor--it has a living room, kitchen, two bedrooms, a bathroom, and a deck),or you can go down to the bottom floor (which is slightly bigger and cooler and will be ours since we found the house), which has a giant living room, two bedrooms, a bathroom, a laundry room, and access to the garage where otis will live when no one's home until we get the yard fenced in.

matt, along with most of our house, is moving down next weekend in time for his first day at ninkasi on the 7th. i'll stay at the house with the futon mattress, the little tv, and my "bodyguard" otis. i'm moving down there on the 19th when i get back from r's wedding in las vegas just in time for my first day at my "new" job (same thing, different branch) on the 21st.