Hangin' In

Last night, JJ and I went over to Josiah and Kevin's (Josiah is our friend from school, Kevin his boyfriend) apartment for some hang time. Amanda came with us, and Nick met us there. Josiah made dinner, which was awesomely good. Brie and smoked sausage together are something I guess I never would have thought of, but they were a really good combination. We sat out on their deck and ate. Nick and I indulged in cigarettes that Kevin shared with us--we're both former smokers. Every now and again, you just have to go ahead and give in to the urge.

Later, we played some games. Nick and I were on a team, Kevin and Josiah were on a team, and JJ and Amanda were on a team. First, we played SceneIt, which Nick and I dominated. Then, we played Scrabble. Nick and I won by four points. Josiah lovingly referred to Nick and I as the Will and Grace of game night, which made me laugh. After Nick went home, we stayed and played cards. It was a wonderful night which I hope we have the good fortune of being able to emulate again soon. Kevin and Josiah have this amazing apartment, and their deck is really great too, especially for being in the city like it is.

Tonight, JJ and I are hanging in. My mom and I made tacos for dinner. JJ and I have a copy of Sherlock Holmes on DVD and three more episodes left in the first season of True Blood. It will be an uneventful evening for us.

And for those that are interested in finding out a little bit more about my husband, he has decided to join the world of blogging himself after his brief foray into being a reader. You can find him here. His first entry was short, but I thought it was amusing.

Dental Work

The dental appointment I had went fairly well. First, I should explain that I'm terrified of the dentist. I once had a dentist when I was a child who was incredibly mean to me. I bit him, and it was all downhill from there. Needless to say, an experience like that can change a kid's life. Because of that horrible guy (I even remember his name, though it's probably not a good idea to include it), I've always had a hatred of dental offices.

Then, as soon as I start to get comfortable with them again as a teenager, I get the idiot dental assistant who screwed up one of my teeth during a routine cleaning. As a result of being a twin, I have pocked enamel on my teeth, meaning the surface of my teeth is not smooth, but rather litter with tiny little pockets. Apparently, this idiot dental assistant thought that they were the result of excess plaque or something because she tried to scrape them off. Literally, she tried scraping the pocks out of one of my teeth. This wouldn't be so bad if she hadn't dug a gouge into one of my two front teeth. The gouge is actually still visible today.

This most recent appointment was just to get a couple of cavities filled. It went pretty smoothly, actually. I was doing okay because of the chatter of the dentist and the dental assistant. We turned on the TV to CNN so I'd have something else to focus on to ease my tension, and the doctor and assistant were talking about the news of the day: Lindsay Lohan's court appearance, the BP oil spill, the finale of Lost, the season finale of House, etc.

I was doing really well until I saw the flecks of blood on the dentist's rubber gloves. Talk about freaking me out! I kept my cool. I managed to keep it together and not freak out too bad. My breathing got faster, my eyes got wider, I grimaced a lot more, but I didn't lose it. I'm pretty proud of the way I handled myself. The blood came from my gums--the cavities being filled were at the meeting points of two teeth. Because of their location, the dentist had to floss in between them with plastic stripping in a certain way and it made me bleed. The gums are still really irritated right there and sore, but it looks better now.

On the downside, I'm running a low-grade fever right now, and my back is aching like no other. I don't know if those things are in any way related, but it's making me miserable. I can't find a comfortable position to save my soul. My body keeps alternating between hot and miserably uncomfortable to cold sweats. The good thing is that it's coming down. My temperature is starting to normalize--leave it to the nursing student to monitor the change in temperature. I did sleep a little bit, but I woke up as a result of some loud video-game killing happening at the foot of my bed. After that, I simply couldn't seem to get back to sleep.

Hopefully, after some decent rest, I'll be feeling much better.

Shower Noises

I have discovered that my husband has decided to read my blog. Welcome to the blogosphere, babes. :)

Thus far, my morning/afternoon have been uneventful. I actually stayed up until 8 AM reading. I'm still reading The Cider House Rules because it's really long. It's also crazy enjoyable, and I'd recommend it to anyone. Very good stuff. I'm glad that my former co-workers saw fit to loan/give it to me. (Ed gives people so much stuff that I'm never sure if he's loaning me something or giving me something. Regardless, I really love that he does it.)

Being that I stayed up so early/late, I slept until almost 3 PM. I really need to work on my sleep schedule crap. Otherwise, when I start my semester back up, it's going to hit me like a ton of bricks. I'll probably spend the first two weeks freaking out about not getting my shit together or getting enough sleep or a host of other ridiculous worries.

At any rate, about an hour after waking, my mother came upstairs and requested that I go outside and help with yard work. Now, anyone who knows me well knows that I hate yard work. I hate the sun, the bugs, and the dirt. I hate sweating. I have to admit, though, it was kind of nice to start the day out sweating and follow it up with a cold shower. I went outside bitching about hating nature and work, and I came inside feeling like I actually accomplished something and got some exercise. It kind of turned my mood around, surprisingly.

I did discover something odd about myself, though. When I'm hot after work like today's outdoor endeavor, I usually opt to take a cold shower to cool down. For the first time, I noticed that I make little noises when I'm under the cold water. They're something similar to the noises that I make during sex, little oohs and ahhs. In fact, I'm pretty sure the easiest way for me to simulate my own sex noises when not having sex would be to get ridiculously hot and worked up and then put myself under cold water. Why this happens to be true, I have no idea. Just another random Jessica fact! (Not that anyone needed to know...)

I'm going to go be unproductive elsewhere. I have to sleep at a decent time tonight because I have a dental appointment tomorrow. Yikes. I'm not looking forward to more dental work, but keeping my teeth is important to me, so I'll go with it.

Web Traffick--A Blog About Blogging

In an effort to be more internet savvy, I've taken some steps to monitor my blog. Unlike my last technological failure, I actually figured out how to do things with HTML code (I know, you're impressed. I am too, quite frankly). Turns out, it's all in reading the directions. When you stop and do that, you might actually have some success. Also, I fumbled around until I actually got somewhere with it.

First step, I got my webmaster tools working. That, of course, doesn't mean I actually know what to do with them, but they work! Second step, Google Analytics. Why? Because I have a need to see how many people actually read this blog. The answer is three--just in case you were wondering. They spent an average of three minutes per visit.

Of course, doing this had me thinking about what I could possibly do to boost my readership. So, I joined BlogHer. I'm somewhat incredulous about being one of those people that constantly tweets or Facebook updates about their blog posts, but it seems to work for some people. I mean, I do check the updates when others tweet about them. I worry about overstaying my friendlist welcome--chalk it up to low self-esteem.

I did, however, put some serious thought into what I like in another blog. (Yes, that's right. Behold the irony! I am blogging about blogging. I have become a parody of myself.) I thought I might compile a list of what attracts me to other people's blogs:

• Sex--it may be juvenile, but it works, okay? You mention cocks or tits and I'm listening. Just sayin'! (This is as open an invitation as you can get, internet. Pour some perversity on me--and not in a gross, bukkake sort of way, either.)
• Humor. If you're funny, I'm into it. In a big way.
• Photography or pictures. Call me third grade here, but what makes a person pay attention more than a picture of what someone else is actually talking about? You're blogging about food? Awesome. Pictures, please. Sex? Pictures, please. Life in general? Pictures, please.
• Lists. Whether they be top tens or bullet points, I love a simple break-down. (See here? I even take my own advice.)
• Foreign things. I love other cultures--especially Asian cultures. If there's a decently written blog about another country or travel or life abroad, I'll read it.
• Single life. Chalk this one up to my being married and living vicariously through the sexual misadventures and misgivings of others.
• LGBTQA life. Almost all of my friends are gay. My favorite bars are gay bars (or at least have a very strong metrosexual vibe). I would totally be with a woman--I was looking for a relationship with a woman when I met my husband (Figure out whether he should be insulted or flattered by that one!). Part of me wants a glimpse into the life I missed out on. Part of me wants to support members of the LGBTQA community. It's a balance, really.

 How can this all be rolled into one? Maybe if we talked about the gay sex scene in Japan for a single woman looking to make some lists and laugh at some photos. If that blog existed, I'd follow it through blogger, twitter, facebook, and whatever else I could find. I'd bookmark that shit, and I seldom find anything worth bookmarking.

Anyways, I'm taking some steps. We'll see how it goes.

Birthday Happenings

Today, my dear and loving husband turned 27. All weekend, I asked him what he wanted to do to celebrate his birthday. He didn't have an answer for me, and he even told me once that he didn't want to do anything to celebrate at all. Because I love him and am glad that he was born, I was against this from the very start. I demanded birthday dealings. At last, I convinced him that we ought to go to dinner and see a movie.

Part of what helped convince him of this, however, was going over to our friend's house yesterday. Barb and Paul are some of the best people. We had originally had plans to have a student government luncheon, but our advisor forgot. Thus, we ended up at Barb and Paul's house. Barb and I finished two bottles of wine. We watched Avatar and It's Complicated with them and had some food. It was a wonderful time. I know that JJ had been depressed, but he admitted after leaving their house yesterday that it was just the thing that he needed to shake off the funk he was in. I'm glad that he got that. 

Since we had a gift card for Biaggi's Ristorante Italiano, we opted to go there for his dinner. We've been to Biaggi's only once before and that was for Valentine's Day. (Being that we're just sappy enough to enjoy being married, but not sappy enough to buy into all the pathetic gimmicks of Valentine's Day, all that we did was go out to dinner--which we might've done any other day.) Anyways, we got there and decided what we wanted. Please note that I have a lack of pictures from this dining experience because I was more excited about eating the food than anything else. I often forget to have the presence of mind to take my crappy, grainy pictures. I am, in this way, a TERRIBLE blogger.

At any rate, we started out with black currant iced tea and bread with oil and parmesean cheese. Then, we ordered Calimari to split, and JJ got broccoli cheese soup. I got a roasted beet and baby arugala salad which I'm pretty sure that I would sell children to be able to eat every day. This, however, is one of the items that I lacked the presence of mind to photograph.

The calamari was mostly decimated by the time I remembered to take a picture

For dinner, JJ got some kind of penne gorganzola, which he found most enjoyable. I got butternut squash ravioli. It was so wonderful! It was ravioli stuffed with butternut squash and coated in a butter sauce (and by that I mean butter that might have had some other seasoning to it, but was mostly just butter). It also had chunks of squash on top of it and some kind of leafy green. They served it with walnuts, but I didn't think that they really added anything to the dish, so I ended up scooping them off to the side.

This, too, was mostly gone by the time I remembered the picture. On the upside, you can clearly see the walnuts, of which I strongly disapproved.

Afterward, we planned to hit a movie, but JJ wasn't feeling too well. And, after a meal whose slogan appeared to be, "No carb left behind!" I sort of agreed. We, instead, went to Target and bought some media we wanted. I bought a Sookie Stackhouse novel. Why? Because I'm so into the whole True Blood thing that I'm pretty sure I'll pee the night season three premiers on HBO. Also, if you've ever seen Eric Northman, you know why. JJ also insisted on buying me the first season of True Blood on DVD--even though I argued with him because I knew it wasn't cheap. JJ bought himself Terminator Salvation, and we agreed that we might read The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larson together.

I mean, does anyone else know how weird it feels when your husband urges you to buy stuff on his birthday? I feel pretty guilty, but I do have an incredible weakness for vampires. I'm talking incredible weakness for them. Anne Rice, Charlaine Harris, hell, even Stephenie Meyer (I hate that I love her books. Hate it. But they appeal to my inner teenager, to whom I try to cater every so often).  At any rate, we'll be spending the evening in our king-size bed with a bottle of Prosecco and our DVD's. It's really better this way. We'll enjoy ourselves more at home than we would out, worrying about what we're spending. Not that we don't want to get away from our house because we do, but we just don't have out-on-the-town funds right now.

On the upside, my birthday man is pleased which is what I hoped to accomplish.

Dreams and Questions

So, as previously mentioned, the husband and I watched Iron Man last night. It was pretty good, all things considered. On the other side of that coin, though, I'd probably pay to watch Robert Downey Jr. insulting the handicapped. Yes, I love him that much.

Resistance is futile.

Anyways, I'm not sure if it was all the movie-watching or the popcorn or the two gigantic sodas that I had at the theater, but I had weird dreams all night last night. Not the least of which was one about being at some kind of convention for something and having my purse and laptop bag stolen. Of course, freaking out ensued. I was glad to wake up to find my laptop next to me at the side of my bed. Color me materialistic, but I'm broke and that shit was expensive, y'all. I can't afford another one, and my life is on this laptop, ya heard?! (That's right, two street colloquialisms in one paragraph.)

Anyways, on to my questions. First of all, I'd like to know how Blogger decides what blogs it will suggest to you when you press the "Next Blog" link at the top of the blog. I was surfing some blogs today trying to look at an interesting new blog. (Why I rely on Blogger for this, I'm not entirely sure, but sometimes it yields decent results.) I don't know if there's a selection criteria based on your user name and the contents of your blog or what, but the only blogs that it suggests for me are family blogs, comic book blogs, and geeky artsy creation blogs (usually about crocheting or decoupage or whatever crafty trend is in right now).

What do these blog selections say about me? Is there no blog out there to interest me beyond the Sassy Curmudgeon's blog? I mean, don't get me wrong, Una LaMarche is a tough act to follow, but I'm hoping she's not the ONLY creative mind on Blogger these days.

Come on, blog world, give me something!

Date Night Squared

Tonight, my husband and I decided to take in a movie as a date night. We cleaned today and got our room all together and organized, so we figured we earned it. Don't judge me.

Anyways, in a stunning show of ironic humor, we opted to go see Date Night. We're, like, sooo original. On the bright side, according to another blog that I read, I was not the only person to have Date Night to the second power. Fortunately, there were no teens in our movie. In fact, we were the only ones, which allowed me to guffaw as loudly as my little heart desired without having to be courteous of other viewers at all.

Mistaken identities. Hilarity ensues.

Date Night was a pretty funny movie. I know my husband was skeptical, but even he laughed and enjoyed himself. All was well, indeed. I still believe that Tina Fey is brilliant, and I would see a movie that featured her in it even if it was the dirtiest, ugliest porno of all time. Why? Because she's nerd chic. And I love me a good woman nerd. (I mean, really, what's sexier than a person that gets the nerd jokes? Or is that just my criteria? Because, be honest here people, those nerds are usually packin' heat in their pants, okay. Be real. That's a tip from me to you. For free. Take that home with you, think about it.)

As another high point to my evening, JJ purchased Iron Man. Yes, that's right, I'm admitting it. I haven't seen Iron Man yet. All this, of course, is in spite of my deep, soul-level love of both Robert Downey Jr. and Terrance Howard. I'm fixing this tonight. Seriously, as soon as I'm done here, FIXED.

Look at them. How can you resist that?

Reconnections?

Tonight I heard from a friend who had a rather serious falling out with me in the past. In fact, I believe, if memory serves, I was told that I would not be spoken to ever again.

I seem to have an initials theme (even though that's actually what my husband goes by), so let's stick with it. AW was a pretty cool friend. We had been e-friends for a really long time actually. We have a really weird, resurfacing friendship. We lose touch, we reconnect. None of this is unusual for us. The fucked up part is that this reconnection comes after the aforementioned banishing.

Back-story here is that I was an idiot and did some drunk dialing. For those of you that think drunk dialing is cool, I have to imagine that this is because you remember everything that you've said or done. Not all of us are like that. At any rate, I could understand the anger that I was pretty much sure I deserved after said drunk dial. However, I didn't think it warranted a whole cutting off of the relationship. I suppose these things do happen. It was just really hurtful. The whole thing was very emotional.

Needless to say, it was because of this that I was startled and shocked when the IM window popped open on my screen. My stomach did flips and I thought, "Oh shit! What do I say here?!" Even now, I find myself wondering at the motivations behind these actions. I can't say that I won't be guarded. I can't say that I won't be untrusting--at least, at first. I'm still just really surprised. One thing I'm sure about, though, is that I'm willing to at least talk again. We'll see where that leads, maybe back to friendship.

We had a good talk. We talked about AW's plans. We talked about my scholastic achievements and future education plans. We talked about his life. Things have really changed for him. His mother, who was incredibly important to him, passed away last year. I can see how that might change one's perspective on life. I can't imagine what he must have gone through or how much that must have hurt for him. I definitely wish that it could have been different for him.

I'm just not sure what to think or do here. I mean, I'm feeling very Adele about the whole thing. I got an impression of a certain level of expectation/desire from the tone of certain aspects of the conversation. I'm not sure that those are expectations/desires that I'm able to fulfill. Yet, I'm feeling selfishly drawn back to this friendship. I'm also kind of incredulous about the whole thing. What changed? Why does AW want to talk to me now? Why wasn't I good enough back then? I don't want another ugly falling out, another personal embarrassment that makes my stomach turn when I hear songs on the radio or think about touching the phone after a drink or two. If this is going to be a friendship, I need those to be totally over, totally in the past.

To AW's credit, he apologized for the nasty split. And, in keeping with my egotism, I'm giving myself props for being honest about how hurtful it was. I mean, it's not often that I'm honest about my feelings, especially when those feelings revolve around being slighted or hurt. That's kind of a big deal for me. Right now, I'm just finding it difficult to form words about it. I feel like this is maybe a beginning. I feel strange, but not in a bad way.

Really weird part? I was just thinking about AW the other day. A song came on the radio that made me think of him because it was a song that we used to talk about. Interesting.

At any rate, I'm going to go ahead and take this as a sign from the universe to be open to new things. It seems that just when I think my life can fit into a little box, that's when the whole box splits and falls apart. Thanks, Universe. I'll remember that! I'm trying to be open to this. This is me, trying to be open!

Graduation Day--We Take Back Everything We Said About You

It's been a week (or more...who's counting, really?) since my last update, but I have a really great reason for why! This was my last week at Owens Community College, and it was also the week that my husband became an Owens graduate! This Fall, I will be a student at Lourdes College in Sylvania, Ohio.

It's been a little bit hectic. Thursday, the learning centers that we work(ed) in at Owens threw a going away party for us. It was really nice to know that we'd be missed. We exchanged information with the important folk and reassured others that we'd still be in touch. (Hey, if nothing else, there's always Facebook, right?) It was lovely. I feel good about the time we spent at Owens and having worked there. I'll miss all of our friends!

JJ's graduation was yesterday. His family, my in-laws, came in from Indiana to watch him walk at commencement. I was a little incredulous, but it actually went really well. JJ's parents got along, despite their divorce. JJ's aunt and grandmother came with his mom and brother. His father came with a cousin of his, Barb, and her husband, Dennis. Every one got along and had decent things to say about and to each other. I was so glad it went so well!

Commencement was long, but worth it. The key not speaker was somewhat interesting. She gave some tips about how to stand out in the business world. The speaker from the class of 2010 was just pathetic. Her speech basically consisted of a series of regurgitated cliches. The douche who sat behind us wouldn't stop talking during 80% of the ceremony (he left for the other 20%, which couldn't have made me happier.) He also had a child who wouldn't stop touching my father and myself or sit down and shut up either. Needless to say, my patience wore thin quickly. Happily, my composure was kept. I was just thrilled that they left before JJ walked so that I got to actually hear his name called.

We went out with the family yesterday to celebrate. Tonight, we went out on our own to celebrate. We decided to have dinner at Koto Buki and see a movie afterward. Before we hit the restaurant, JJ wanted to stop at Game Stop and spend some of his hard-earned graduation money. He bought Left 4 Dead, a subscription to Game Informer Magazine, and 12 months of X-Box Live. Sadly, upon our arrival home, we discovered that our X-Box 360 hates us and gave us the Red Ring of Death. At least we had a great dinner...

Dinner consisted of several courses, in fact. First, we started with edamame and hot sake.

Our hot sake and a random glass of water.

Though my husband prefers cold sake, he still enjoyed it hot. He doesn't like it as much as I do, though, so he let me have most of it.

View his enjoyment of sake!

Needless to say, of course, I was disappointed when the sake was gone. I was actually really looking forward to the sake. It had been over a year since our last trip to Koto Buki, so we were really excited about the sushi/sake combination.

Gone, you say?! NO!!!!!! Behold, the face of sadness.

The sushi, sadly, I didn't have the foresight to get a picture of. In fact, we're lucky there are even stories to tell about it because it was gone very quickly. We ordered salmon sashimi, tuna sushi, eel sushi, and something called a Ninja roll. The Ninja roll was crap, cucumber, and avocado with some kind of yellow sauce in a roll that had salmon and tuna on top. It was fantastic. After that, we got our salads and miso soup.

Delicious Miso!

Then, we got our main courses. I ordered a Korean dish called Dolsot Bibimbop. It consists of rice, beef, egg, sprouts, cucumbers, carrots, and sundry other veggies (I think bok choy was in there...) which get mixed together with a special hot sauce. It comes served in a stone bowl which is what it's been assembled in. The stone bowl comes out hotter than fire, so you have to spend the entire meal being extra careful not to touch it. Needless to say, I had a few singed-pinky finger moments. Also, I was rather surprised at the amount of hot sauce I was able to add to my food tonight. Normally, I'm a pretty big wuss, but, despite my wussiness, I actually put quite a bit on my food. I probably could have gone hotter, but I didn't want to go too far and not be able to eat my delicious meal. I'm not sure if the sake just dulled the pain for me or what, but it was a great meal regardless. My husband had a bento box for dinner, which was full of an assortment of crazy things. He loved it, so I'm glad.

Dolsot Bibimbop. The tiny pitcher is full of fiery goodness.

Later, after dinner, my husband and I took in a movie. We ended up seeing Kick Ass. JJ wanted to see Clash of the Titans 3-D, but he ended up forgetting that the movie time for that was 9:40, and we didn't get to the theater until around 9:50. Reluctantly, he agreed to see Kick Ass with me.

Kick Ass movie poster. Yes, that's an awkward mirror/flowers
combo you're seeing there. That was at the theater. Can't make
that shit up.

I thought that it was an enjoyable movie. It was funny and violent--a very good combination for a super hero movie. Plus, the guy who played the super hero who is the namesake of the movie, Kick Ass, is super cute.

All in all, we had a good night. Moreover, we got to come home and know that we can actually sleep in for once, which is something that we haven't been able to do since spring break. I'd say that makes this a very good thing. Hooray for graduates and sleep!