It was great, can't believe its over, and now, off to Thailand. See you in three weeks!
How hard can it be for a hotel to give a gift bag to the right guest?
Apparently, for the W New York, this is a significant problem. Because they told us they gave the gift bag to Sam's mom when she checked in, but this is most definately not the case.
They also told me that they would find out what did happen to it, since someone else in the hotel is munching on all the yummy goodies and staring at directions to the rehersal dinner tonight and I would much rather that person be my future mother-in-law.
By the way, Sam and I are bored. We're now all packed up for Thailand and have even remembered to put our mail on hold. All that's left to do is start packing for the impending move when we get back. How is it possible that we have nothing to do?
Is it possible that we really have nothing to do?
No, its not, but it seems like it. Yesterday, Mom and I went around to the hotels where we reserved blocks of rooms to drop off gift bags for the out of town guests. They even have subway maps with all the important locations marked on them! I know, I rock.
And then I headed off to Brooklyn to pick up some more place cards at my favorite store on Earth these days (minor problem with the pages inserted upside down for half of them - whoops, good thing I didn't leave it to the last minute), and then Sam and I signed a lease for a new apartment! I'm so excited for our new apartment that I don't mind returning from our honeymoon, because then we can move in!
So today, all that's on the table is picking up our marriage license and printing the remainder of the place cards. Oh, that and packing for Thailand. Then off to pick up some wine for the rehersal dinner and then have dinner with my family and Sam's mom and her boyfriend.
But really, I can't even think of what we need to worry about tomorrow. I think we'll just start boxing up stuff in the apartment in preparation of the move. And maybe some laundry. Ahh, preparation is glorious.
Well, maybe not lost, but old. The top is from the Siren Festival, back on my birthday. Incidentally, we ended up staying out there for the whole thing, rather than heading back to Brooklyn Heights for dinner. Brenden Benson was great and made it worth it, though Spoon got old. We tried to go to Totonno's for dinner instead. However, it closes at 8pm unbeknownst to us, so no pizza for us. We had both filled up on Coney Island food though, so at least we weren't starving.
And the bottom photo is of Great Falls, at Great Falls National Park right outside of Washington DC. Despite having lived in DC for almost 4 years, my friend had never been there, so my visit served as a good excuse to go. Sadly, it was excruciatingly humid, so not the most plesant hike I've ever been on, but pretty nice none the less.
+ More Coney Island pics
+ More Great Falls pics
And sadly, no photos of wedding related details. All that's left on the to do list is preparing some gift bags for the out of town guests, which will be done this afternoon and tomorrow morning, and printing the place cards. Oh that and packing for three weeks in Thailand.
Yup, one week from today, I'll be waking up a married woman. Holy crap, how did time sneak up so quickly! 8 days till we leave for our honeymoon. Thailand here we come. We even have the first few nights booked. I'm excited to sit on the beach for a few days, but equally excited to trek around temples and such.
Things have been extra hectic, though, since I was down in Williamsburg, VA last week for a conference. Great topics, though listening to people talk about fairly similar subjects from 8:30am to 5pm is unusually draining. One of my professors from undergrad was there, though, along with a couple other people from Tufts that I knew, so it was good to catch up. The conference also gave me an excuse to go down to DC on my way down there and see one of my friends from college. We haven't staying in great touch, but when we get together its just like old times, so it was really great to see her.
Thankfully, it seems like with less than a week to go, everything is under control. We haven't signed a lease at the new place yet, because the landlord and management company are taking their sweet ass time to get things together, and notified us on Friday that they want to raise the rent, but hopefully that will get down in the next day or two. I think we're just going to pay rent at both places for the month of August, though. It will just make our lives infinately easier.
It will be nice to finally unpack all our presents someday....
Now, on to the important stuff, does anyone have some packing advice on a three week trip to Thailand?
I got the best birthday present a day early. Sure enough, around 7pm last night I got a call and email with an offer letter. Yup, as of September 1st, I will once again be a working woman.
Here's the deal with the job though. Its a dream job, for a small firm where I'll be able to do what I think I love for projects all over the world. But their main office is in San Francisco. They are opening an office in near 42nd St. this summer, but I will need to be trained in SF, so back to the west coast for the first few months.
That's right, Sam and I will have been married for one month when its back to living on separate coasts. But at least its short term and in the end, the job is worth it.
Sam and I went out to celebrate the job at Belleville , and we'll soon be heading out to Coney Island for some good music at the Siren Festival, before heading to Henry's End for a yummy birthday dinner.
+ It's Josh's birthday too
I hate waiting. I was supposed to hear about a potential job last week. And then the secretary said the boss would call me over the weekend. Then I got an email from the secretary saying I was in the final group and I would hear by yesterday, with the offers getting mailed out today. Since I didn't hear from them yesterday, I called the secretary today and found out that I will be receiving an email from them with their decision by the end of today. California time. I really really really want this job. Besides, if I don't get it, tomorrow has the potential to be the most depressing birthday ever.
And in the apartment hunt, we found a place we love yesterday. Now we just have to go today and fill out an application and then wait to find out if we are accepted. We were the first to see the place, so our fingers are crossed.
On the plus side, I am no longer waiting to hear back from Juilliard about a cellist. They assured me they would have someone, but then no one ever contacted me, and the office never got back to me about no one contacting me, so I was industrious and found one on my own for the same price. So there.
And in other unrelated stories of note....
I just discovered that a fan falling over and making a loud crashing sound is an amazingly good tool to trim cat claws, since both Maddie and Paris ran away from the fan at high speed, leaving a trail of clippings behind them. Maybe I should tie a string to the fan and pull it down at regular intervals when they are nearby. Oh wait, some might find that to be kitty torture. Then again, some might say that what Maddie does to our sofa is torture too....
Sam and I (and my parents) met with the cantor last night to go over the final details of the wedding ceremony (two and a half weeks away!). I proceeded to have a very vivid dream where I forgot everything in the wedding drawer (yes, I have a drawer devoted to stuff for the wedding), including my shoes and our rings. I realized this at 3pm, leavign us just over 4 hours to rush from the Bronx down to Brooklyn and back to save the day. When I woke up, I told Sam the dream and he said he had a similar one. Totally normal, right???
How did you spend your Saturday? I spent mine on a boat proctoring a swimmer swim around Manhattan. Yup, there are crazies who swim the 28.5 miles around the island (though there is a decent current with them most of the time). This was my third year doing this and its great. Unfortunately, this year the weather didn't cooporate so we had to end the race when our swimmer was just north of the GW Bridge, after swimming for 5.5 hours! At least our swimmer had done this race 6 times already so it wasn't the end of the world for him, but it was a bummer for all the first timers, especially the two teams that came from Eton in the UK. One of these years, I hope to do the race as a team, but I will never be up to doing it solo. These guys amaze me. There was even a woman who was attempting the swim doing it all butterfly!
Without further ado, a selection of photos. You can see all the photos from Saturday on Flickr.
Kyakers preparing for the start
Swimming round the tip of the island
The storm coming in that ended the race
Decided I was no longer "settling on a new coast", so it was time for a new look. Please let me know if there are any glitches that I didn't catch.
Update: When I added the new entry, it rebuilt my site, which somehow converted all the "<" to the text version of what makes those characters in HTML. Unfortunately, this meant that the MT tags didn't work anymore. But all fixed now. And for those of you who aren't so into html, don't worry that you didn't understand that. All fixed I think.
Paris seems to have an affinity for cuddling my stuff. I'm finding it just a wee bit weird.
+ More Paris cuddling
Well, plans changed slightly due to the huge line at Grimaldi's (last year, I could have sworn they did take out, but this year, no such luck). Instead, we backtracked to Pig'n Out, a surprisingly tasty and filling meal of BBQ. The ribs were ok, but the pulled pork sandwich was the bomb and Sam loved his collard greens.
And though our fireworks view was partially blocked by one of the towers of the Brooklyn Bridge (and by a family standing right in front of us for some unknown reason), it was a pretty good show.
In othernews, we didn't get the apartment, which means its back to the search. If anyone knows of a 2 bedroom apartment in the north slope/ft greene/grand army area, let me know.
Greetings from sunny Brooklyn, where Sam and I plan on spending the majority of the day. We returned last night from the Hamptons, my first trek out there in years. I'd have pictures, but mostly we hung out at my friend's parent's place and ate. And sunned. And slept. And did nothing else. And what did we do today? We ate. And slept. And looked at an apartment. And decided that the one we saw on Friday was better and we called the landlord to hope it is still available. Fingers crossed!! If this works out, we could return from the honeymoon to a HUGE kitchen and living room. The place was relisted yesterday so we have pretty high hopes.
Now, its off to relax some more and evenutally make our way down to the Empire Fulton State Park for some pizza and fireworks.