Let’s Hear it For The Boy : The Last Few Months Edition April 30, 2009

So remember when I used to post funny things my boyfriend fiance says with at least some semblance of regularity?

Well, contrary to what you may be thinking The Boy has not magically become boring, I’ve just been too busy to pee lately.

But on to the funny!

The Boy: Why do men have nipples?
Shaba: Because all people start off female in the womb.
The Boy: So I was a girl first?
Shaba: Sorta
The Boy: I miss my vagina.
The Boy: My crotch is smelly; I need to shower
Shaba: I ‘m glad you found the need to tell me that.
The Boy: We’re in love! You need to know these things.

The Boy: I’m just about done with all The Boyfriend Society secret business.
(The Boyfriend Society secret business is what he used as code for “engagement/proposal planning”)
Shaba: You’re going to have to join the Fiance Gentlemen’s Club soon. You’re going to have to be all refined and stuff.
The Boy: Dude. I’m the REFINEDEST.

On the rental application hoops we need to jump through.
Shaba: I’m going to have to search for the pay stubs. I don’t know if i have the last two months. I’ll have to see.
The Boy: Get what you can. I”m not as worried about yours cuz you dont have much income.
Shaba: What if we just tell them I’m a bum. Or I’m your arm candy and my job is to look pretty
The Boy: Relationship to applicant: “arm candy. ” I like it.

In other news, I’m in my third round of resume revising. I’m finished with finals and received my fancy-pants graduate hood in the mail yesterday. The Boy and I move on Saturday. I’m pondering whether personal “business” cards are a good idea, seeing as I’ll need to network. I fell off the 30 Day Shred train a week or two ago, but plan to restart over the weekend….that is if The Boy will let me take 20 minutes out of our First Weekend of Living Together Unpacking Extravaganza. Next week starts my temporary unemployment, be prepared for multiple wedding planning/new town/The Boyisannoyingmetodaybutilovehimanyway/jillianmichaelsmakesmewanttocr0y posts.

When I’m Old Wednesday April 29, 2009

When I’m old I’ll grocery shop just like the little old man my mother and I saw at Wal-Mart-in my good clothes and old hat, filling my cart with regular coke and reese’s cups.

I salute you, old man, way to be.

Five and Counting April 27, 2009

These last few days are proving to be bittersweet. On Saturday I lounged on my parents’ porch swing, sipping lemonade and soaking up the lilac scented air. I jumped on my trampoline in a sundress (that’s talent folks), and wiped the remains of two little league games off my bare legs at dusk. I slept in on the comfy couch Sunday morning, and helped my mom pick out a new outfit in the afternoon. The weather was gorgeous and the weekend was a nostalgia-filled tease of the NEPA summers I grew up with. I feel like this weekend forced me into living in the moment. It’s something I need to do more of in the future.

When I’m Old Wednesday April 22, 2009

I will tell hospital workers about my husband and how long we’ve been married and that he’s a catch.

Just like the cute little old man who told me he’s been married to his “bride” for 59 years, and that she’s the apple of his eye.

Some kind of wonderful.

Yes it is.

I have the best freaders. April 21, 2009

Well thank you very kindly freaders!
My fears have been eased and I will indeed be asking a small number of my nearest and dearest to stand up with me on my wedding day. My wedding day that is not yet solidified. I’ve got two dates in mind. And I can’t make a decision. Let it be known to all my readers, your help will be requested in many indecisive dilemmas in the future. Also let it be known that my blog, about my life will always be a reflection of what’s going on in that life at the time. Hence, the next year’s postings will be filled with wedding stuff, new state/city/roommate stuff, hopefully new job stuff, and new hobby stuff.

Right now, my life could be titled True Life: I Can’t Make A Decision.

I’m trying to pick a date. I know that this decision could very well be made for me depending on vendor availability, etc, but just in case everyone is magically available for me whenever I want them to be, lets continue down this path of silliness.

The dates: May 8 2010 or June 12 2010. There’s pros and cons to each. May 8^th is what I’ve been saying in my head for months. I always imagined May would be my wedding month and since The Boy and I have been talking about it, it’s what I’ve used as a hypothetical date. Unfortunately June works better for a number of important wedding people. And I know it’s not like if I chose the May date these people wouldn’t come, it would just make it easier for them and their work/vacation situations to do it in June. There’s also significance to the June date for The Boy and I. We met that day last year, and have since celebrated it as a makeshift anniversary. If we chose that date we’d be married exactly two years to the day we met. *Collective awwww*

So June seems like the logical, significant date. BUT. I’m irrationally in love with the May date. There’s no real reason for it. I think it sounds lovely. The eighth rolls off the tongue so much better than the twelfth. It’s a month with a lot less to celebrate than June (The Boy and I are both June birthdays). And I won’t have to spend any money on lilacs since they’ll be in bloom.

Logic vs. Illogical emotional crazy bride-ness.

Dear internets,

Help me love the 12^th.

Love,

Shaba

Weekend, Brothers, and Wedding Questions April 20, 2009

This weekend was spent with The Boy and my family. My little brother made us a “Happy Engagement” cake. I spent an hour on the trampoline playing horse and attempting to teach the littlest brother how to do a back handspring. He’s now too heavy for me to spot the real way so it was a very interesting experience. I feel bad that I didn’t teach him how to do it when he was little, I spent hours on the trampoline with my oldest brother when he was little. I taught him how to do everything, front tucks, back tucks, handsprings. He was doing everything by the time he was six. I taught him a lot because there wasn’t much else to do. I was twelve. By the time the littlest one was in kindergarten I was driving and itching to be out with my friends. I have some hope though, my sixteen year old brother (who can take his drivers test on Thursday!) told me over the weekend that he wants to take the littlest one to diving practices with him this year. He said he thought it’d be cool for all three of them to practice together since their age difference won’t allow for all three of them to compete together. Sometime he surprises me with his sweetness.

The Boy* and I also received some awesome engagement gifts from my daddy. I got a hammock that I cannot wait to put up in our yard and The Boy got a bottle of whiskey, because my father is irish and whiskey is what he gives any male over the drinking age.

The weekend was almost perfect. Friday night my dinner consisted of pretzels, pepperoni, Dubliner cheddar, and Harp. Saturday we went my brother’s little league game, which is something I’ll truly miss this summer. I love love love watching my brothers compete. The littlest one is a football star and baseball standout. The middle one eats and breathes baseball, but is really doing well in diving and rifle too. And the oldest one plays football, dives and shoots and in the spring competes as a pole vaulter, which I’m sorry, is just SO COOL. It’ll be odd to not have some sort of live sport to watch on the weekends.

Sunday The Boy and I had breakfast with my folks and later got some “quick pictures we can send to the paper” done at Sears. I want to schedule a real engagement shoot for the future because I love the idea of having professional photos we could use in the wedding if we want. And I really like photo shoots.

Speaking of wedding related stuff, we’re still thinking of a date. For some reason I’ve always thought I wanted to get married in May, but there’s a date in June we’re sort of leaning towards. The June date would work better for some important family members and has a special meaning for The Boy and I, but I’ve not yet convinced myself to let go of May.

Since I spent the weekend with my parents we talked wedding quite a bit. Talking to my mother about wedding stuff tends to follow this pattern.

Shaba’s Mama: So do you know who you want in your wedding party?
Shaba: Yea, I’ve got that pretty much figured out. It’ll be (names five people including The Beautiful Woman and The Boy’s sister).
Shaba’s Mama: That’s a lot of people.
Shaba: It’s five people. Including my maid of honor.

Shaba’s Mama: I think you should just have a maid of honor and a best man. Bridesmaids are pretty useless and then you’re just making your friends buy a dress they’ll never wear again.
Shaba: Ummm.

Kids, I don’t plan on making my bridesmaids wear matching expensive dresses. Its one thing on the long list of practical wedding influenced things I plan on doing. I don’t even care if they wear a dress. A nice pant suit would be awesome. I’m just going to request that they pick something close to one of my wedding colors. Ta-da. Done.

Now, maybe it’s because I’ve never been in a wedding, but I always thought being asked to be a bridesmaid would be flattering. Especially if it didn’t involve shelling out 300 dollars for a stupid dress.

For those of you who have been in weddings, what do you think? Did you enjoy it? What do you wish the bride would have done or not done?

For those of you who are planning on getting married (soon or in the unforeseeable future) Where do you stand on bridesmaids?

Book Review: The Mechanics of Falling April 16, 2009

I’ve always had mixed feelings about short stories. Most of the time I’m disappointed by collections that seem thrown together and unfinished, I have to force myself to read them, hoping it’ll all make sense at the end. And then there are those collections like The Mechanics of Falling by Catherine Brady.

I could not put this book down. Let me first say that I am one of those women who judges a book by its cover. If the cover intrigues me I’m halfway to the checkout line, and if my initial reaction to the patented “open up the book to the middle and read a paragraph” reading is positive, I’m pulling out my credit card. The Mechanics of Falling passed both tests with flying colors. I loved the cover art, and even more so I loved that the cover reflected the contents.

As I worked my way through Brady’s collection I settled in to the stories like a well-worn chair. Within the first few sentences I became so familiarly with the characters that I was often disappointed when my time with them ended.  Even now, a few weeks after having finished the collection, they cross my mind occasionally. I wonder what happened to Cerise in her quest to provide a better life for her daughter, Sophie in Slender Little Things. I connected on an intimate  level to Ethna in Waiting for Instructions, her sense of duty overwhelming her own feelings toward her father.

I truly enjoyed all of the stories and I would definitely recommend the collection to anyone who craves a story, story. Those are the kind of stories I love, the kind that remind the reader that a good tale doesn’t require outrageous events or crazy characters. Stories like Brady’s remind the reader of the beauty of the ordinary, which in my opinion, is where the majority of beauty really lies.

Brady’s collection, The Mechanics of Falling is available here. You can read more about The Mechanics of Falling here and here.

When I’m Old Wednesday April 15, 2009

When I’m old I will lead the neighborhood kids, and later the cool cats at the old folks home, in choreographed dance numbers to inappropriate songs.

My Top Three Song Choices?

1. Like A Virgin
2. Baby Got Back
3. I Wanna “Love” You or whatever the actual name of that damn song is.

The Details April 14, 2009

Let’s just jump to it, shall we?

Friday Night, 9:00pm. I’m awaiting The Boy’s arrival at my parents’ house. We’re supposed to be staying the weekend there since my parents are out of town doing their own thing. The Boy calls and tells me he won’t be in until 1:00am. And that it would be a good idea for me to go to bed. “You’ve been on a need-to-know basis until now,” he says, “And now, you should probably know that we’re going to need to leave soon after I get there. We’ve got a 5:00 am flight….to somewhere.”

I somehow manage to calm myself enough to sleep for a few hours. I’m still surprised I did.

Saturday (Early) Morning, 4:30am. We arrive at the airport, passports in hand. We’re flying to Montreal. The city where we met. I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t thought that this was a possibility, but I couldn’t even imagine what happened next. The Boy, having held this all in for weeks tells me the whole plan. He bought me a camera. A fancy camera. A Canon Eos SLR. I had said that a nice camera was going to be my first “I have a real job” purchase and I had been looking at an older model Canon. He had been talking about buying me one, but I didn’t think for a second it’d be anytime soon. I mean, I knew he’d just bought a ring…how many presents can one girl get? But that wasn’t all. He proceeded to tell me the rest of the Proposal Palooza plan. He set up a private tour of Montreal with a professional photographer. We were going back to stay in the hotel where we met. My best friend was at my parent’s house watching my brothers for me.
I was blown away.

Saturday we spent a wonderful day walking around Montreal with our photographer, Pedro and his assistant/girlfriend who had the bluest eyes I’ve ever seen. We ate maple syrup on a stick, told him all about how The Boy and I met and our plans to move in together this summer, and took a million photos. Pedro taught me about my camera and composition and gave us some recommendations for lenses and software, etc. Whenever I lost sight of The Boy I got jumpy, expecting I’d turn around and find him on his knee.

After the afternoon was over we went back to the hotel where we met, checking in to their “best” room. When we first met at this hotel, both our parties were staying there because it was the cheapest place we could find. It was 1950’s themed and had records hanging from the ceiling in the hallways and paper cut outs of sock hoppers and jukeboxes. We were interested to see if the records were still there, they weren’t. They had changed the theme to “travel” and had cutouts of suitcases and air planes hanging from the ceilings.

Their “best” room was awesome. It had a Jacuzzi and an electric fireplace. I love that stuff. Cheesy kitschy romance? Count me in. After I was done playing with the fireplace The Boy finished googleing some possible dinner locations we jumped in the car and drove twenty minutes to a place that had great reviews. Unfortunately it was BYOB and the menu included things such as veal brains and mussels. So we told the server I had a very limited diet and we booked it out of there. We found a place much more our style, split a bottle of pinot noir and had a wonderful, unengaged rest of the evening. To tell you the truth I was expecting a proposal at any time, but not in a way that made the waiting torturous. In fact I don’t think I was anything less than elated the entire weekend. Elated is normally my emotional standard for The Boy weekends. Just being in his company makes me happy.

Sunday morning after we checked out, with hotel complimentary coffee in hand he stopped me on the porch of the hotel. He pulled me close and whispered some sentiments that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. Then he got down on one knee. I think my heart stopped. It was the closest I’ve ever been to an out of body experience. I’m not even 100% sure he asked me the standard “Will you marry me,” though I’m sure whatever he said was close enough. I remember hearing myself say yes and kissing him and hugging and running to the car together because Montreal is damn cold in April, but it’s all such a blur. What I do remember, clearly, is pulling out his ring from my purse. Telling him how happy he makes me and asking him if he’d marry me. He said yes.

His ring is inscribed in gaelic with "Love of My Heart"

Another shot of my gorgeous ring!

We are engaged. For real. I’m so happy and excited and completely, completely in love. With my fiancé. Or Husband-Elect. Or Intended.

With the man who makes me the happiest I’ve ever been.

With the man who I’m gonna marry.

I. AM. SO. EXCITED!

It Happened! April 13, 2009

Ring Ring Ring!

Shaba and The Boy are now engaged!