I am unemployed

I will start my orientation for school on Tuesday.
We went out with work people and had a great time and now I worry for the next two years about finding a job as good as the one I have just left.

Life is good

Bill says our dog is a nut with no dignity.

I love my city

Just saw Carolyn start her run. We are on our way to the finish line. It is a hot sunny day and Chicago's skyline is looking fab

We have been up since 4

But I got to see the sunrise on the bean

3 days

After today, I have three days left at my current job. I don't know how I feel about it. sometimes I am incredibility sad, other times excited, nervous, and then sad again. Whatever I might complain about in my day to day routine, I love the people I work with. They are like family. They went to my wedding. They share my books. We celebrate all of our birthdays and every Friday we order in lunch and eat as a group. I know that when I leave I am not just leaving my first real job, or even just an era of my life. I am giving up a group of people that have shaped and influenced me, and I know that whereever I end up after school is done I will never have the opportunity to work with such a wonderful group of people again.

When I applied to school, I was so excited for the change, for the opportunity to go back and study and learn. But change is scary. And I sometimes wonder why I am pushing myself so far away from my comfort zone. All the mixing and mingling, the networking and leadership work, none of that is me. It would have been a lot easier (and less expensive) to have stayed where I was. I guess I am wondering if this will all be worth it in the end. I love UChicago, and I am looking forward to school, but when you are spending a ton of your own money on an education that includes pushing you into situations you don't feel comfortable you start to wonder why you are leaving your second family at work to go pursue something else.

Anyway thanks for being my journal today. I promise to be more upbeat and interesting tomorrow.

make a little bird house in you soul

ok so Bill is some times baffled by how I jump from one subject to another. I will now try to describe my way of free association + massive song index in my brain:
I wanted to post about cleaning my windows last night. I have never really washed the outside of windows before, I know my parents did it growing up, and I do it with the few windows that are always uncovered, but my living and dining rooms' shades are always drawn. (ooh free association -Amelia Bedelia!) Anyway, I was trying to thing of a title for the post and in rapid succession I thought of windows, window to your soul, bird house in your soul and now I will have that They Might Be Giant's song in my head all day long.
but the windows are clean and I had them open all night last night. I love this weather!!
In other news, Bill is 5% done with his degree as of 8pm last night. Tomorrow he will be 10% done.

Don't know how they did it 100 years ago

For six pint jars it took the better part of the day to peel the tomatoes, cook the sauce and process the jars. If Bill and I had to live only off what I could put up for the winter we would be super skinny.

Granted that this was my first time canning so I am sure I could be quicker if I was more experienced.

Btw it seems as if all six sealed properly.

stupid song

So since I have been reading that Breakfast at Tiffany's book (see post below) I have had that song by Deep Blue Something in my head. Very Annoying. Also, I have successfully watched an Audrey Hepburn movie every night this weekend.

Weekend was nice, we had nothing planned so I was able to bop around the mall on Saturday (outdoor mall so really it was window shopping outside). Sunday I went to the market and came home with 7lbs of tomatoes and made homemade sauce (using my garlic and basil yum!) and then I tried canning for the first time ever. I hope I did it right. Tonight I will test the seals and if any didn't seal we will just eat them this week.

Work has wound down. I will have a little to do tomorrow, but otherwise I am expecting a quiet week. I have already cleared out a bunch of my stuff, and will continue to do so all week.

hmm

So I finished a super sad true love story. It was depressing for not the reasons you would think. The book was pretty vulgar in a desensitized way, but outside of that it was an incredibly depressing social commentary about where our world is headed. Yet, somehow the book is funny.

As you can tell I am very confused by this so I have thrown myself into my next book:
Fifth Avenue, 5 A.M.: Audrey Hepburn, Breakfast at Tiffany's, and The Dawn of the Modern Woman

I am so excited I might just pull out my entire Audrey collection of movies.

busy as a bee

this week started off busy. Over the weekend we had a cookout to attend a cook out we hosted a belated celebration of our anniversary and winnie's last class. Yesterday I had a lunch and a dinner date with different people from work and today I need to get into my chirocracker (stupid rib).

The rest of this week will be filled with more busy things and lots of Bill studying. It has been weird to see him studying and not have any studying to do myself. Instead, I have been reading the economist and time (thank you useless united miles that I cashed into magazines) and reading more books. The last one, Under the Dome, took a while. the hard back was 1000+ pages, so it has been wonderful to just carry around my kindle. And with the internet turned off, I read the entire book on one charge. Today I started a brainless fun read, but I am looking forward to my next book: A Super Sad True Love Story: A Novel.

What have you been up to my dear readers? Any good books?

No pants for a year?

http://nopantschallenge.blogspot.com/

I hope she doesn't live in a cold cold place like Chicago, or plan on skiing or doing other sports. But yet I am intrigued by the idea. Just like I would love to spent a few weeks wearing clothes from the mad men set...

Anyway to recap: it is Friday(the 13th!) and I obviously have too much time on my hands

guest post by winnie the corgi

Some days I worry about mommy and daddy. They disappear for hours on end and then just when the reappear to play and have fun they often disappear again. Today, though, mommy came home and didn't go anywhere. instead she walked around the kitchen a bunch talking on that phoney thing. I thought that maybe she would for get me, but then mommy pulled out of the refridgeitmatator my two favorite foods bacon and cheeeeeeese!!! Mommy shays she was making fancy macin cheese, but since i got pieces of the bacon and the cheese I think she was just making me my favorite dinner ever.

Now mommy isn't playing with me, but i think after all that food i need a nap. Farewell!

wednesday - cream puff edition

So the last few days have been pretty hot and sticky here, which means Bill and I have resorted to using the pedway from the train. Our rout takes us by one of these. Today I couldn't stand the smell of "fresh and natural" cream puffs any longer. So we stopped by and got one. OMG! they are very yummy. It is a good thing that I won't be walking along that pedway much longer, Otherwise I would gain way to much cream puffery around the middle.

So because we have been super busy and it has been very hot, I have not been cooking much, and my garden is totally a tangle of weeds. But that isn't all that I worry about, with a party at our place on Sunday, I need to: plant my fall greens, weed, figure out where the tiny brown ants are coming from, clean the house, finish up the laundry (it is never ending!), make the food for Sunday.

I also am looking into which classes i might want to take, trying to make a better study area in the house, and trying to figure out which computer to buy. Sigh.

Tomorrow we will go out with Brian to celebrate his 25th birthday. My brother is 25!!! that makes me old!!! Yesterday, I called Giddo (my grandpa) to wish him a happy birthday
Me: Hi Giddo, Happy Birthday!
Giddo: Thanks sweetie, your Mimi (my grandma) and I celebrated yesterday.
Me: that's nice did you have a good day?
Giddo: yes, did you know Mimi and I have 150 years of combined wisdom now.
Me: Well that is an interesting way of thinking about it. Happy Birthday Giddo.

I can only hope that Bill and I will live to have 150 years of wisdom between us.

yawn

Wow! I can't believe how much you can get done in a weekend! But I have a feeling you don't want to hear about cleaning my upstairs office, or getting a new hose.... you want to hear and see the wedding!!

Below is the slide show link to my pictures on picasa. You can either look at the small ones or click on it and go to picasa to see them.

The wedding and all of the evens that accompanied it were so awesome. It was well planned and a ton of fun. Thursday evening was the Gaye Holud which was done a little non-traditional because the bride and groom celebrated together. Friday was the actual ceremony and a beautiful reception hosted by the bride's family. Saturday was an equally beautiful (and maybe more fun) reception hosted by the grooms family a one of my favorite Mediterranean restaurants, Rezas. After all the family reception on Saturday, there was an "after party" for all of the younger cousins and friends at a karaoke bar downtown.

Ready to go

5 wonderful years

Five years ago today I married my best friend.







Thank you Bill - I love you!

More pictures later

But for now here is me getting ready to go to tonights festivities. tomorrow I get to wear a sari yay!

busy busy busy

Wow I can't believe it is already August!

My fifth wedding anniversary will be on the sixth.
Bill's best friend will be married on the sixth.
My brother is turning 25 and my grandfather will be 75 next week (12th and 10th).
Next week, in 3 days, we have 5 birthdays in our families.
My last day of work is the 31st, I can't believe I have been here for 7 years.

Anyway let's talk about the weekend. Friday Bill and I tried to go see Inception, however forces were working against us, as the projector broke during the previews (though at least we weren't half way through the movie). Saturday evening we had Bill's last "new student" event, a wine tasting at Bin 36. It was fun, and we had dinner there with some of the attendees. (Mint ravioli with lamb ragout.... mmm mmm good)
Sunday I ran around non stop.... Winnie had her second to last class and she mad me so proud. Then it was off to the farmers market to get yummy fruits. Went home and made Chicago style (sort of) hot dogs and cut up the musk melon. Went outside and weeded and then ran to the grocery store. Came home and made a tortellini salad and potato salad for dinner and chicken salad for lunch. boiled the carcass of the chicken for broth. did some laundry and then sunk into the couch for a hour of tv before bed.
I needed to do some ironing, but that will just have to happen today or tomorrow.

I hope your weekend was just as productive.