Thursday, July 31, 2008

Vacation, Part 1

Yeah, yeah. I know its been almost two weeks since I got back on vacation and so far I have posted once and it had no pictures. This whole working two jobs thing has kept me pretty busy. I am constantly rushing around and the only time I stop working is to pee. I have even been taking work home with me at night becasue I keep getting behind. However, the end is in sight because we are (finally!) about to hire someone to take over my old job. In the meantime, it is still crazy at work. I am enjoying my new raise though! :)

I am finally going to post some pics from my trip. I am not going to post anything that has my face or anyone in my family's face because...well I'm sure you understand. No one knows I have this blog yet and I would like to keep it that way. I know I would be pissed if someone started putting up pics of me without my knowledge.




This was when we went to the wild animal park in San Diego. We actually got to go into this enclosed area with birds. You could purchase nectar and the birds would land on you and drink it. The funniest thing was when this one bird landed on my dad and started licking his neck. I have no idea why it did that but by dad's face was priceless.



This was a condor that was at the same wild animal park. It looked kinda gross. A lot of the animals would come so close to you so I know that people have been feeding them. That makes me so mad.



We got to go on this tour where we actually got to go inside some of the exhibits. We were so close to the giraffes! We even got to feed them leaves! It was so cool. I wish I could show you the pictures of us feeding them. It was windy so we all look retarded. We are all laughing and our hair is flying all over the place. Well, not my sisters. Hers looked perfect and she had this perfect, casual smile on her face. Hate her.


This was our tour guide and he is showing us how to feed the giraffe. He told us to be really careful because we could not pet them. I guess if you do they can get really pissed and head butt you. The first guy that fed it petted it and I totally wanted him to get head butted. No such luck.

This was a baby giraffe trying to drink some water. Awwww!!!



This gorilla was totally cracking me up. He was fascinated by his feet. After playing with his feet for a while he was walking around eating leaves and playing with anything he could get his hands on. I think we watched him for like 30 minutes.

My sister took this picture and it is AWESOME. She slipped and ended up taking a picture of the inside of the jeep we were in. Just poking over the jeep is the ostrich that she was trying to take a picture of. He was just sitting there with its mouth open. I hate those dang birds. I am not sure why but ever since I have been a little girl I have been terrified by them. Maybe because they are mean as hell.


This is a type of rhino that is almost extinct. The park had 2 of the SEVEN that are left. 7 in the entire world!! Crazy.



I did not take this picture. My cousin did. And it is probably the BEST. PICTURE. EVER. I love meercats! I don't know if you can see it, but he is just staring at his penis. Every single guy in the vicinity was rushing over to take pictures. Nice.

That is all for now. These were only the pictures from the one day at the wild animal park and I have some others. I will get around to posting those hopefully this weekend. JJ has been wanting to hang these shelves in our garage for over a week now and we are really going to try to get it done this weekend. Things with JJ and I have been really great. I don't really know what has changed but we are not fighting at all anymore. For a while there, I was really starting to worry about our future but that has totally changed. I can honestly say we have a really healthy and fun relationship. Yay!

Wednesday, July 23, 2008

Im baaaacck!

Sadly, my vacation is over. It was absolutely AMAZING. I have spent the past two days trying to catch up at work, celebrating JJ's birthday and trying to pull myself out of the post vacation depression. So far, I think I made JJ's birthday pretty nice, I am almost caught up at work but I am still very depressed. I have always had a really hard time after holidays or vacations. Part of it is because I miss my family so much. I hate that they live so far away from me. Also, I needed the time off so badly and I had so much fun and I hate that it's over.

I have lots of pics to show you guys as soon as I get a chance the get them downloaded. Hopefully I will get a chance to go in detail about my trip and post the pics within the next couple of days. In the meantime, back to work!!

Friday, July 11, 2008

AHHHH!!!

So I am leaving for California in approximately 4 hours!!! I am getting off work at 1:30 and am going to meet JJ at home. He is going to drive me to the airport which is about 2 hours away. My flight leaves at 5:55 and I land in L.A. at 8:00. I will then have 3 hours to kill until my family arrives. I have no idea what I am going to do for that long. I think I may just sit and people watch. I am pretty sure that will fill up the time.

Once my parents get there we will drive to our hotel in San Diego. I have figured it out and I probably will not get to sleep until around 2:oo am which is 4:00am my time. That means I will be awake for almost 24 hours. Wow. But hey, who cares? I will be in freakin California!!!

We are going to stay in San Diego until Thursday and then we will spend the rest of the week in Palm Springs. I am flying home on Sunday night and am going to take Monday off too. JJ's birthday is Tuesday the 22nd so we are going to go see Batman on Monday. It is going to be such an amazing week and a half.

Oh and I just got some great news!!! My boss just came into my office and told me that.....

I AM GETTING A HUGE RAISE!!!!!!!

I'm talking like a 27% raise. And she waited until the day of my trip to tell me. How freakin awesome is that?? My next paycheck (which will be this coming Thursday) will reflect my raise. I don't even know what to do with myself I am so happy right now. I can't even sit still.

I will probably blog once or twice while I am gone. Hopefully I will remember to bring my camera so I can take lots of pics to show yall. I will miss everyone!!!

Wednesday, July 9, 2008

The weekend

I survived the weekend!

JJ's parents were supposed to arrive around 10:00pm on Thursday night. I got off work on Thursday and we needed to go to the grocery store to pick up a few things. Then, I needed to clean the guest shower (so I could use it) and get my clothes and bathroom stuff out of the master bed/bathroom. We know that his parents are aware that we are sleeping in the same room, but we just didn't want it to be right in their face. And we didn't want to share a bed while they were there.

At around 8:00 we got a call saying that they were close to being there. I kinda freaked out a little at that point. I was so incredibly nervous! Then the doorbell rang and I thought I was going to pee my pants. They all came in and kinda stood in the doorway. JJ introduced me and then I told him to give them a tour of our place. It was pretty awkward at first and I felt really uncomfortable. Luckily, it was late by the time they got unpacked and settled so we watched tv for a bit and then went to bed.

On Friday, we all slept in and then got ready to go out to lunch. I have just met this girl (we will call her BFF) and she has quickly become a good friend. It is so nice to have a girlfriend to hang out with again! No offense to JJ but I just can't talk to him like I can with another girl. We met BFF and her boyfriend (who was visiting from St. Louis) for lunch. Luckily BFF is very outgoing and she pretty much controlled the conversation the whole time. JJ's family was pretty quiet but BFF managed to get them talking a little bit. After lunch we went home and layed around until dinner and then went to see fireworks.

On Saturday, JJ and I went and worked out and then went home to cook breakfast. We made a frittata and it turned out really good. Then we hung out around the house and then got ready to meet my grandparents for an early dinner and church. After church we went to see Wall-e which was so cute! One weird thing about that night though was that there was a group of people (probably in their early 20's) sitting right behind us. One of the girls kept going "AWWW" or "SO CUTE!" or would yell things out to the characters. The theater was filled with kids and I did not hear a peep out of any of them. I only heard that one wierdo. Even JJ looked at me at one point and whispered, "what is her problem?" No clue.

Sunday was a blast. We went to this cave that was about 30 minutes away. The drive was fun and walking through the cave was awesome. His dad was totally cracking me up. Picture this big guy with a beard, cowboy boots and cowboy hat running through the cave. That is what I experienced. He was RUNNING. So all I would hear behind me was CLOMP CLOMP CLOMP and I would turn around and he would be running down a hill towards us with this goofy grin on his face. I was dying. It was the funniest thing I have ever seen. Then we went to Dollar Tree and even that was fun. JJ's brother bought these magic cards and it took him forever to figure out how to do one trick. He kept messing it up and JJ's sister was making fun of him. Then he figured it out and his sister was totally amazed. We went to the grocery store and picked up some fish and ingredients to make a salad and went home. We cooked a great dinner and then just hung out. They left Monday morning while I was at work.

Overall, everything went very well. I think everyone liked me which is good. The only thing that bothered me a little was that they just didn't make a huge effort to get to know me. No one asked me about my job or family or where I went to school. They asked about my dog and on Sunday his mom asked if I had any siblings. This was so wierd to me. It would be one thing if this is just the way they were but when they met BFF they showed interest in her. So why not me? I tried bringing it up to JJ but he just got defensive so I dropped it. I really really liked them. I just wanted to see if they liked me. However, last night JJ told me that his mom said I seemed really nice and his dad kept asking about me. So I guess that's a good sign.

Now, only 2 more days until I leave for CALIFORNIA!!!!

Wednesday, July 2, 2008

So nervous!!!

So this weekend something will happen that I have been dreading for a while. JJ's parents are going to come to visit. This will be the first time I will meet them. Now not only do I have the typical meeting-the-parents-for-the-first-time jitters but JJ's parents are very, very Catholic (technically I am too but that is a whole other story) and they are not too thrilled about us living together. JJ has told me stories about his mom and I am completely terrified that she already thinks I am a huge slut for shacking up with her son.

They are getting here tomorrow night (AHHH!!!) at about 10:00pm. So we will probably all meet and then head to bed. It will be his parents, brother and sister all in our little house. That should be interesting. We are still trying to figure out where everyone is going to sleep. I know I will be sleeping alone in the guest room and JJ's parents will be in our room. JJ will probably be sleeping on the couch (because God forbid we sleep TOGETHER!). I have no clue where his brother and sister will be sleeping.

Friday night we will probably do something to celebrate the Fourth. Saturday night we will go out to dinner and then go to church. That leaves Friday during the day, Saturday during the day and all day Sunday to figure out something to do. I will probably cook dinner on Sunday night and I think his family wants to go shopping so we can do that Friday and/or Saturday during the day. But what the heck are we going to do all day Sunday???

My mom has already called me to give me her little pep talk. She knows what I am going through because the first time she met my father's parents, she was 18 and already pregnant with me. So I guess it could be worse. I am just so scared they have already judged me. I have lots of Catholic friends/family and I know they can be so judgemental (this is nothing against the Catholics out there. Like I have already said, I am Catholic too). JJ's 18-year-old sister has been texting him about the sin of sex before marriage. I am sure we will hit it off.

When I am nervous I either stop talking completely or ramble until I say something really really stupid and embarrassing. JJ and I have both been so stressed from work and the move. It is a really huge adjustment moving in with someone. We have been fighting a lot (nothing major) and I just don't want his parents to sense that.

At least I am going to California next week. If I can just get through this weekend and next week at work, I will have 10 days in California to not answer my phone, check email or stress about work!!!

Wish me luck for this weekend!