Nov. 7, 2009

You guys all remember my crazy night out in the city a while back, right? The one that involved lots of alcohol and G recovering for the rest of the weekend? So now imagine that weekend with me being completely sober while everyone else around me was piss-ass drunk/hung over. Cuz that’s actually exactly how it was. It wasn’t that I was the most sober one in the group because I somehow managed to drink only to the point of fuzziness instead of to the point where I was falling to the floor while trying to untie my shoe laces. NO – I was sober cuz I didn’t have more than a couple of sips of alcohol THE ENTIRE NIGHT. That’s how miserable that night was. I mean, don’t get me wrong. It was a lot of fun, but I’m usually not the one taking care of drunk people. Back in my 20s and early 30s, I was more often the one that had to be dragged home at the end of the night before I puked all over the place.

I realized that night how far I’ve actually come from those days. Not that I was a total lush (I wasn't, I swear) or anything, but when I went out, I liked to drink. What’s the point of going out otherwise? But that night, I was stone cold sober because guess what? Just that morning, G and I had found out that I was pregnant. We'd suspected I might be for a few days but then decided we should find out before I decided to get all plastered (cuz, you know, just in case I couldn't get all plastered). And not wanting to tell anyone yet, G and I decided we’d subtly hand him all my drinks. So sitting next to each other at dinner, I’d take sips out of my sangria glass. When he was almost done with his, I’d pick his up and he’d grab mine. Fortunately for us, our friends got quickly and majorly drunk that night so it was pretty easy to pull off. But to this day, G keeps reminding me that the only reason he got that wasted that night was because he was “drinking for two” and doing me a favor. Uh, huh, it was for me that he was grabbing plastic cups of scotch from some random Indian man on a party bus. Totally my fault! Never mind that I could have sipped one drink through most of dinner without anyone being the wiser cuz no one was really paying attention to who was refilling their glasses when.

BUT I will say this, my friends are not only lushes but apparently they’re masters of peer pressure too. Thanks guys. What are we in, high school? Once we were at the club, avoiding the drinks became so much harder. First, the tequila shots came out. And it’s apparently much harder to fake drink a shot than it is a glass of wine. I somehow managed to pour my glass into G’s, so that he had this monster shot. When people looked over at my empty glass, I just pretended to have jump the gun and take my shot earlier than everyone else. And no one seemed to think that it was weird that his shot was twice as big as theirs. And actually, when G struggled to take down the whole thing in one gulp, everyone gave him shit for being a wuss, and wow, look at his wife, she finished his shot before he did. Was he getting old or what? Etc. etc. I couldn’t help it, I jumped in on the trash talking until I got the sense that he was about to lose it right there and tell everyone the truth. Thankfully there was only shot (though it turned out I hadn't managed to pour out the entire thing into G's shot glass, and there was a lot of egging on for me to finish the damn thing). But then I had to deal with everyone trying to push random drinks on me. I finally had to grab some sprite and pretend I was drinking a vodka tonic. Which wasn’t easy with the birthday boy’s friend pouring the drinks either. Man I had no idea that saying no to drugs would be so hard.

So now do you see why I was so ready to go home by midnight that night???? OK, so then imagine me sitting in the hotel room the next morning waiting for G to stop whipping, and flipping through random channels on the hotel room tv. And the only thing worth watching being this random show on pbs about animals giving birth and their natural parenting instincts (or lack thereof in some cases). I’m so serious, dude, I couldn’t make this shit up if I tried. Did you know, for example, that new elephant seal mothers on the coast of South Africa sometimes get so hot laying in the sun with their newborns that they rush off to the water before the seal cubs are old enough to follow them? Come back later and get all confused when they find their dead babies all wilted in the heat. That and a few graphic birth scenes were exactly what every newly pregnant, completely-NOT-HUNGOVER, chick needs.

So omg, totally the best weekend ever.

Highlights of the first year - Part II

So I’m guessing some of you may have been wondering what the whole “Part I” thing was about yesterday. Thinking, “OMG, is she not over this whole anniversary thing yet. What has it been, the subject of like the only 3 posts she’s posted the last couple of weeks?!?” And I know, the thought of an anniversary post sounded better in my head than it did on paper. I hadn’t really commented on the two weddings back when they happened so had this idea to write about them now a year later. But it occurred to me after I posted that it wasn’t one of my more exciting posts. Either you were already at one or both weddings or you weren’t. And regardless of which it was, reading about it after the fact can’t be that exciting. I guess it just goes to show that if I’m not whining or complaining about something, I just can’t seem to churn out fascinating reading. Plus, I had a hard time picking pictures too. I think pretty much everyone of the regular readers that I know about is on Facebook, so you’ve already seen the best of the pictures. To go through the weddings and try to find something new was kind of excruciating (especially since there are like a million from each wedding).

And you’re probably thinking, “Dammit, that was just the FIRST anniversary. What can we expect 5-10 years from now, assuming I’m still around trying to stomach this horseshit then? A month of anniversary-related posts about that one great party she threw way back when???” Not to worry, I’m just about done, I swear. And honestly, this isn’t an anniversary post so much as a reflection on the last year. Cuz before I got married, I worried that G and I had known each other so long that the actual wedding would make little difference to our lives (not to be crass or anything, but really, how much better can the milk be just cuz you happen to own the cow?). A year later, I’ve realized that we had oodles of territory left to cover.

In the last year, we’ve both dealt with elderly grandparents as well as an elderly dog. The days when Bandit doesn’t get up in the middle of the night now are days that we can count with one hand. Just the other day, G mentioned that he had a full night’s sleep for a change and had forgotten what that felt like. And just last week she gave us a scare when she collapsed while we were out walking (she’s fine now though!!!). We’ve separated dog fights; we’ve covered hundreds of miles visiting vets across the bay. Mia got hip surgery. I guess in all fairness, the doggies started having issues even while we were still engaged, but I don’t care, I’m lumping them into the general category of changes in the last year. We combined checking accounts, and I realized how nice it was to have someone else deal with finances for a change. We mght even be filing a joint return this year. Also in the last year, I changed jobs and started commuting.

BUT the biggest change (and really the whole point of this whole post) of all this year is the creation of this little Heirloom Tomato:

I have a strong feeling that G won't be getting more full nights' of sleep any time soon, what do you think? If anything, he's probably way more prepared for waking up in the middle of the night than I am.

I think more than half already know about the new crop that we'll be raising this summer. And have known for so long that you’ve probably forgotten that I haven’t actually announced it yet. So for you guys, sorry for the drama. :) But for the rest of you, I’ll let you digest before telling you more.

One year - Part I

A year and a week ago, G and I got married for the second time in Woodside, CA. So now, we've been married a full year no matter how you look at it. The 2nd one-year anniversary passed almost as quietly as the first. But I've been remembering the two weddings a lot the last couple of weeks. All in all, we were so lucky. We had 2 awesome weddings.

The Indian wedding surprised me a lot. I wasn't sure what to expect, and it wasn't like my parents did a whole lot to keep us involved in the planning. I didn't know many of the guests who attended, or hadn't meant them in years because they were old friends of my folks that I remember from childhood. G hardly knew anyone at all, other than his family and mine. The day flew by in a flurry, and I went through one beautiful sari after the next. My friend V was around to help me get dressed and made up (and around the days before for all the prep). And the entire experience was perfect. The food was delicious. G and I had a lot of fun messing around during various parts of the ceremony. G impressed all my parents' friends with his ability to repeat after the priest in Sanskrit and generally play the part of an Indian dude with white skin. There's a part of the wedding where the groom attempts to leave the proceedings behind in order to follow a more religious life. He gets an umbrella (for the sun), some flip flops, and a copy of the Ramayana, an epic Hindu saga. And off he goes. And there was a moment when my brother C was holding the umbrella over him and just started cracking up cuz G just looked hilarious.

There's another portion of the ceremony where the bride and groom exchange a big garland of flowers three times. And I started taking off and backing away so he couldn't get mine on me. Or during the "games" period after the actual wedding itself when my mom told G that he should let me win, but of course he's too competitive for that.

The winery wedding was as far different from the Indian wedding as you could expect. Except that it too was kind of hilarious. It started late (before you start giving me any snide comments, note that it had nothing to do with us but the shuttle guy we hired to bring people up to the wedding). People were clearly drinking while they waited. It's the only way to explain why everyone was hooting and hollering during the ceremony.

We wrote our vows ourselves, and I must say that mine were pretty hilarious. Even G says that he couldn't tell if I was trying to put on a stand up comedy act or recite my vows. We had my brother recite a poem called "Falling in Love is Like Owning a Dog." He kept telling me that it was too long of a selection and kind of sappy. And made sure that the audience knew that he hadn't been the one to select it. But he did such an awesome job that he had everyone in stitches. A few weeks ago, I was having lunch with some friends, and they were telling me again how much fun they had at the wedding. That it was probably the most fun wedding they had ever been to. Actually they were telling a co-worker of theirs who of course hadn't been there and seemed like she might be tired of hearing about it already. :) But it made me proud to know that we can throw on a good party.

And I guess if I had to describe the last year, the weddings (as different as they were) say a lot about us generally. We're total dorks. So I won't lie and say that our life together this past year has always been peachy and free of drama. I'm way too short-tempered for that. But we do tend to have fun a lot, so I'm looking forward to lots more years of dorkiness to come. :)

So here a few pics of the two weddings. I'm guessing you won't have any problems trying to figure out which is from what wedding. :)

Excuse me, it's PsychOTIC, ok?

Last week, we had a somewhat informal meeting in our break room at work. X, our very own Psycho walked in a few minutes late and the senior attorney who’d called the meeting briefly said hello before continuing with whatever he was saying. Only to be cut off by her saying that she doesn’t go by the name “Psychotic.” It’s just Psycho. Seriously, it was like calling Pam by her full name of Pamela or a guy who typically goes by Fred Frederick instead. But apparently she doesn’t go by her full name, just the shortened form. Whatever. The attorney apologized and the meeting continued. She sat in the corner and kept her sunglasses on. Did I mention that this meeting was in our break room which is INSIDE the building?

About 5 minutes later, Psycho suddenly stood up and gathered up all of her personal belongings loudly. The meeting continued. She cut off whoever was talking and announced loudly that she can’t stay in that room any longer. That the light in the break room hurts her eyes and that’s a fact that’s generally known around the office. It’s too bad that we couldn’t hold the meeting somewhere else where she could actually participate. The senior attorney, without missing a beat, said that he was sorry to hear that. And that a similar meeting would be scheduled later in the week for judges and perhaps she could try to attend that one instead.

Later, after we had all walked back to our desks, he showed me the little post-it that Psycho had left on his computer. “It is NOT ok to call me Psychotic.” The official reprimand . . . For all we know she’s filing her grievance right now with her union representative. Certainly she was yelling about something related to a violation of her rights to the director later on that morning. I tried to glean what she was saying but couldn’t. Damn.

The yelling loudly to management isn’t a first either. A couple of weeks before the “lighting” incident, my friend C messaged me on our office chat to come by her office immediately, making sure to pause for an extra long time near our supervisor’s office on my way over. I did and heard Psycho going off in his office. And I mean OFF. I pretended to be looking for something in the filing cabinets kind of outside his office in order to hear what was going on. I wasn’t the only one. And heard bits and snippets of “Well, I told you weeks ago that I might be coming in late a lot because I have this situation. That the DA is involved, and I’m trying to resolve it.” And, “are you telling me that I can’t use my leave in whatever way I want?” The scene must have lasted for a good ten minutes before she stormed out of his office.

This week she’s been sporting a splint on her arm because she tripped over her dog’s leash while trail running. From what I understand, the doctors were pretty incompetent.

Over the last month or so, probably since around the time of my fun one-on-one conversation with Psycho, there have been a lot of closed doors and, I think, some serious conversations about how to best handle the situation. But OMG, what would we do for entertainment? The hours of office chat that have been devoted to this alone could equal a novel. What would we do with that time instead?