Bummer.

*WARNING SUPER LAME-NESS AHEAD*

So.  Hod and I have been married 7 months on Sunday.  Because of changes in our life I am currently living with my sweet parents, and Hod is staying with friends back in our old town until he finishes his last week of classes.  This saves us an entire month's worth of rent.  Great for the wallet.  Not so good for the heart.  In the past 7 months, Hod and I have never spent a night in separate houses.  And here we are, 3 hours away, and part of me feels like it's the end of the world.  I'm so pathetic!  I mean, really, I have a niece who's husband did a tour in Iraq.  (and another niece who's husband did Iraq before they were married.)  She had to deal with sleeping alone.  And then there is my sister, L6.  Her hubby is a pilot and is gone for days at a time.  She is a single mom for half of her life.  And THEN there is sister L3 who's husband died of cancer and she spent YEARS alone before she found her current hubby (whom we all love).

And yet I'm here, being super lonely.  I may have cried a bit.  I AM SO LAME!  This is stupid.  Then again, when you have a husband as hunky as Hod, you tend to miss him.

Probably the Best Ever

I LOVE cold cereal.  Hod learned fairly early in our marriage that if he decided to make me a fancy crepe breakfast I would get warm fuzzies, and think it was sweet, but it wouldn't be my favorite.  On rare occasions I would prefer waffles and scrambled eggs, but really, just give me my cold cereal.  I don't know what it is, I just love it!  And I like almost all cold cereal.  Fruity pebbles, corn chex, cookie crisp, rice krispies, Oatmeal squares (I LOVE those), honey bunches of oats, they are all good!

Really, there is no point to this.  I just had my breakfast and it brought great joy to my heart.  Even though I was eating cheap cereal and it kind of ripped up my tongue.  It sure tasted good and brought a smile to my face.  I should probably get out more.

What's one of your favorite foods?  Or favorite kind of cereal?

Opening My Eyes

I've always considered myself to be a pretty observant person.  I don't notice everything, but I often notice things that others don't.  Then something happens that makes me realize how wrong I am.

I present to you exhibit A:

Do you see the little red circle?  This is my winter coat that I got in December.  That is a fairly large envelope holding the spare button hanging from the side seam.  Would you like to know when I found it?  Last week.  Crazy, right?  How could I not notice that?  Just wait, it gets worse.

I present to you exhibit B:

I have been wearing these pants for a year now.  The little tag-holder piece of plastic is much smaller, but I've been WEARING my pants for a YEAR!  I found this little friend about 3 days after I found my button envelope.

A normal person would have cut it right out.  But I didn't.  I'm not sure why.  It's like I am attached to my little pants friend who I just met.  Yeah, I probably need to get out more.

In other news, I'm packing.  Hod and I are moving in with my parents for a month.  We have to be out of our apartment on the 31st.  Hod is working basically 30 hours a week, and going to school full time.  And, can I just share, some of the teachers here are crazy!  Hod has one specific class, that is 2 credits.  Now in a normal world, that would mean from that class you could expect 4-6 hours of homework a week.  Nope.  This teacher expects you to devote 12 hours a week to their class.  This all means that Hod is crazy busy, and that Paily is doing all of the packing.  We have SO MUCH STUFF!!!!  When Hod and I got married and moved up here, we were super busy.  We didn't sort through all of our belongings, so we are doing it now.  Busy, busy Paily.

Tender!

True Love:

When Hod buys me a super cute polka-dotted cup with straw to aid me in my water drinking goals.

I love him.

That's Not Very Nice!

This morning I had been awake for about 20 min, when I got a text from a friend.  He informed me that my gmail account had been hacked, and I needed to change my password.  WHAT?  That totally whomps.

Let me explain to you the worst part of this:  my gmail account is my "professional" account.  The one that is paily.smithsonian25  instead of warmfuzziebunnyslippers.  This is the account that I use when I am applying for jobs.  Not only was my account hacked, but in the hacking the not nice person decided to email everyone I have ever sent an email too.  So, that lady that I sent an email to in 2008 when I was applying for a job in Texas (where I haven't lived for a full 2 years) got a hacked e-mail today.  Wow.  That looks professional.

So, yeah.  That's pretty embarrassing.  And, I find it interesting that Person Hacker chose the email account that I had for 3 years instead of the account I've had for 13.  I changed the password on my old account today, so I can tell you this now, but when I was in the 7th grade and I made that account I was STUPID and made my birthday my password.  I know, you're not supposed to do that.  However, in my defense in 1996-1997 I was ignorant, and to my knowledge there weren't that many hackers then.  I mean, really, the word "internet" wasn't considered a common knowledge word until 1996.  I was totally a cutting edge 13 year old!

The fact that I got hacked really is lame.  For me the strangest part is the feeling of violation I have.  I know it's just e-mail, but it was personal.  What did I ever do to them?  You should get your nose out of my business and stop trying to hurt people.

Really, why are people mean?  I know, there must needs be opposition in all things and all that, but can't we just quarantine all the mean people together?  Then they can be mean, and it's their business, and whatever.  The important thing is they would be leaving us all alone.  That is my wish.

Stupid hackers.  We are totally in a fight.

Learning To Share

I love married life.  Hod is one of the greatest things to happen in my life.  Adjusting to married life has been fairly easy for Hod.  This is in part because Hod is really good at the whole, "what's yours is mine, and what's mine is yours" thing.

Me.... Not so much.  You see, when I married Hod he had lived on his own for about 18 months.  I had lived on my own for about 8 years.  I was very used to "this is mine, not yours, so stick it" kind of mentality.  I'm not sure why I'm not good at sharing.  Growing up with 3 sisters, and a lot of nieces and nephews, I was often given the opportunity to share.  And I think I did ok with it.  I don't actually remember, and I'm sure my sisters will all correct me if I'm wrong, but I think I was a share-er.  And then I kind of stopped.

I think that happened when I started living on my own.  Back when Mom and Dad paid for things it was much easier to give.  When I started paying the bills I suddenly became very attached to my boxes of Mac n' Cheese.  I had worked hard for the money to buy it.  I became a stickler.  I didn't mean to become a jerk of sorts, but I guess I did.  This new selfish lifestyle fit me.  I liked having my stuff.  I really liked knowing that if I had 2 pieces of candy left, they would still be there when I returned.  It made me happy to sit something down and know it wouldn't have moved when I came back to it.

Then I married Hod.  He is SO good at sharing.  If I wanted to wear his cloths, he'd probably let me.  No matter what he has, he is willing to let me have/use it.  The only problem with this is:  I haven't gotten to that point yet.  Sometimes Hod will use my stuff, and it bothers me.  Really, it's all ours.  Not mine.  (Ok, the feminine supplies are mine.  But really, that's about it.)

This situation is best illustrated in a story.  One day, Hod decided he needed a new toothbrush.  He threw his away, and then discovered he couldn't find our spares.  Not a problem for Hod.  He just grabbed my toothbrush, and 2 minutes later, all clean!  I could see his logic.  I mean, really, we've kissed.  I should have no problem at all with his spit.  And yet, I can't get over it.  Twice Hod has used my toothbrush and twice I have given it to him to keep.  Am I crazy?  Are you ok with sharing EVERYTHING with your spouse?  Or if you have not yet entered the spouse world would you share?

I promise Mom taught me to share.  But apparently 8 years of singleness broke me of the habit.

*BUT as a side note, while packing I just found the spare head to my toothbrush... I'm taking it back! :) *

Some Important Warm Fuzzies

I first saw this about a year ago, after a hard day. I remember standing in my roommate's room, with her and L7 and crying a bit. My dad retired from the military, and I am proud to say that I have 3 nephews who also serve. I feel that no matter what you think about the war that the US is in, you have to support the men and women fighting. They are risking everything. So a great big thank you to all of the Service men/women. Grab your tissues and watch friends!

(And I'm not a fan of the music, but whatev.)

Becoming a Morning Person

As many of you know, I don't really do mornings.  Seriously.  The 2 weeks of the summer where I had to get up at 6:00 to pick raspberries (actually I had to get up earlier, we had to "be in the bush by 6") were pretty much torture.  AND some years, we'd have such a great crop that it would go over 2 weeks.  I tell you what, getting up at the I-can-barely-see-it's-still-so-dark crack of dawn to go stand in a wet bush (stupid dew) gingerly picking red berries, and keeping your eyes out for the multitude of spiders, leaf bugs, and grasshoppers that were just waiting to attack you, thus causing you to jump and spill some of your berries, that then caused a panic, because if Dad saw them, you were surely in trouble, and then you REALLY wished you were still in bed and this nightmare was just a dream, was not something this bucketeer enjoyed.

L5-L7 can all tell you stories of me getting up for scriptures, not really paying attention while we were reading (but I got very good at my 6 times tables) and then going back to bed, and not surfacing until after 8.  Yes, you heard me, after 8.  That was some major sleeping in at my house growing up.  My Dad was a really big fan of the whole "early to bed, early to rise" thing.

How I got through 3 years of early morning drama rehearsals, I will never be able to tell you.  But I did, armed with pop tarts, or sometimes a Popsicle for breakfast, I would walk on stage and pretty much dance in my sleep.  I wasn't popin' but my breakfast was!  (I know, super lame joke, it just had to be made)

I remember one morning during my short stay at the MTC, of my alarm going off.  I rolled over to press snooze, it was 6:10 AM.  I wasn't thinking about how great it was to be a missionary, and that I got to preach the Gospel.  I was thinking, "I have to wake up this early every day for the next 18 months.  WHY did I do this to myself!"  I then started to wonder if it was really worth it.  And it was, but that morning, I wanted to become apostate and run far, far away!

Fast forward a few years to last summer.  Hod and I both had a not fun job that paid well.  I was on a rotating shift where every 3 weeks it was my turn to be to work by 6:30.  Pretty lame.  And then it happened, Hod got moved to the early shift.  Now, Hod, bless his super attractive heart, is not a morning person.  I personally believe that some little gremlin comes in the night and super glues his back to the bed.  That is how hard it is for him to get up.  As a result, when Hod had to be to work at 6:30, I had to wake up at 6:10 and call him to get him out of bed.  Roughly translated, this means I never got to sleep in.  But I did it, for Hod.

And it set a pattern.  Now, every morning, my alarm goes off, so I can wake my dear husband up, to help him get the last of his homework done, or to get him to work on time.  (As a side note, I am SO glad that I didn't let him take a 7:30 class.  I would have wanted to spit on him every morning.)

I have friends that get up during the 6:00 hour every day.  I don't know how they do it.  7:30 is being our earliest.  Every day, the alarm goes off and I have to shove Hod out of bed.  Every day it is a struggle.  "Just 10 more minutes?   Just 2 more minutes?"

I'm not really a morning person yet.  I feel like I'm just acting.  And so it goes.  Every day.  Probably for the rest of my life.  I know once I have kids I'll be lucky to get to 7:30.  Maybe someday I will actually make the transition to the ever elusive "Morning Person".