weekend.adventures

i dont have any witty preface today, so ill just get to the meat[turkey of course!] of the post. 

saturday[11.29.08]

well we were awoken at about 9am by the phone ringing in my ear. brutal... anyway, it was the car dealership, so i rubbed my eyes a little and discussed with him the financing situation. it turns out that first thing that morning a bank had gotten back to them accepting our application and offering us a loan. good news right? ha, not exactly. the interest was 12.6% over 24 months! gah! thats ridiculous, we would have ended up paying like 2000 bucks in interest alone, and considering we didnt even necessarily need the loan in the first place, there was no way we were doing that. so i told him thanks, but no thanks, they could keep the up-front check. 

so at this point we still didnt want to wipe out our savings, but werent sure what options we even had. you know, as independent as i am, i dont mind asking for advice when i dont know what to do. and seeing as how my parents have usually experienced exactly what im going through, or something similar in most situations, i tend to call them first to get their point of view on things. now karen is extremely independent, and she doesnt like to do this, shed rather figure things out on her own instead of admitting her parents might have the answer [haha, as smart as they are, they always do!]. well generally ill sit back and wait and appease her ego and a lot of times we can figure out whatever it is on our own, but in cases where no matter how long we attempt to figure out a solution  it wont matter, i just skip to calling the folks while karen rolls her eyes at me[haha, oh-well, we dont necessarily have to take the advice - it doesnt hurt to get another opinion, right?]. anyway, all that to say, that this was one of those times and so i called up my folks. mom answers and i relay the situation, she agrees the interest is outrageous and that we shouldnt do it, and then says she wants to talk to my dad and she'll call me back. okay. 

anyway, so now that we had that all figured out, we were feeling much better about the truck and decided to jump into our day with both feet. first things first, breakfast - oh yeah, i DID have a piece of cherry cheesecake for breakfast, lol! [jealousy. i can see it all over your face. if youd tasted this cheesecake youd have done the same] haha, so anyway, while having our "breakfast" we made our to-do list for the day and then got started soon after. 

the big thing on the list for saturday was getting me an ohio drivers license... ive been putting this off for a while, but my car insurance is on my butt about it now, and with the new truck im going to have to be licensed here to get plates here [and yes mom, i checked into it, i DO have to get my own plates, the dealership doesnt provide them]. well since im an out of state-er, ohio is making me take the stupid drivers exam again... ugh. so i had my little book and while we were running errands in the morning i was going to read through it[it was only about 60 pages anyway] to freshen up on all of ohios laws. 

first stop in the morning was at the old truck [still parked in a shared lot near the mechanic’s shop] to retrieve 3 little items id forgotten when i cleaned it out wednesday night. second on the list was walgreens for a few items, then ace hardware for a copy of the new truck key, and then straight to the dps to get this license business taken care of [they closed at 2 and it was going to be noon by the time we got there].

well luckily, i finished reading the book right as karen parked at the dps, haha. talk about great timing. so anyway, i went in and did the normal eye test, hearing test, forms, proof of identification, etc. and then the woman sat me down for my exam. well karen had psyched me out a little before hand, because she apparently only barely passed hers when she took it because they put a bunch of stupid questions about jail time and fine amounts and stuff on there. well i am proud to let you all know that i only missed one question, haha, and thats only because i mis-read it. had i read it again i wouldnt have missed any =] so now after a little longer they took my picture and i am now an officially licensed ohio driver... yay.

after the dps i wanted to spend the rest of my birthday cash on some new clothes, so that was what we decided to do. having finished all the things we needed to do on the list, it was time for a little fun so we went to the mall. the first stop we made was american eagle because ive grown rather fond of their jeans in the last couple of years. they fit really well and theyre very comfortable... well, this year... apparently american eagle is only selling jeans with a dozen faux rips in them. grr... okay, now i understand fashion has its trends, and everyone wants to be trendy, but this thing with the fake holes and rips has gotten completely out of control. its surpassed "fashionably fake vintage" to the point of "fashionably homeless person." i cant wear that crap to work, nor would i even want to, it just looks trashy. so confounded and frustrated we left american eagle and after looking around the mall a little we checkout out forever 21 for karen [because when husbands get to go clothes shopping, no matter the occasion, wives get to as well. the quicker you all learn this, the easier your life will be, i assure you, lol!] well we didnt end up getting anything there because karen felt i wasnt in the spirit of shopping for her [like i said, if id just learned quicker, my life would be easier..., haha] and she got frustrated with me. oh-boy, so after i explained that i was really just hungry and that it had nothing to do with her shopping, she was satisfied, and we made a last stop at express on the way out. i shop at express for work clothes because ive found that theyre the only place that has "nice" clothes with a modern fit that i like. anyway, it turned out they were having a great sale on their slacks and i got 2 new pairs, woohoo!

at this point we were both starving and decided we really wanted olive garden, for whatever reason [probably something to do with our proximity to a mall, lol] olive garden sounded really good so we attempted to find one on our cell. well that wasnt working and i spotted an old navy across the street, so i called up my dad to see if he could find an olive garden on his blackberry while we did a little shopping at old navy. old navy has the best deals on thermals, and well... in the winter months thermals make up about 90% of my wardrobe, lol! anyway, im still not sure what happened with dad and the olive garden thing, but we never heard back about it, and by the time we left old navy with a couple of new thermals for me, we were so hungry we didnt care where we ate. well we spotted a "la rosa's" and decided to give it a shot. this is like a little italian place that they have up here in ohio, thats kind of on the same level as a fazolis - but not really. anyway, karen had had it once when she was in undergrad and didnt really like it, but we decided to give it a second chance. it turned out to be just okay in my opinion. id much rather have had fazolis... or olive garden. anyway.. so after lunch we headed back towards home and well... made another stop at target on the way, lol! i know, we're ridiculous, but i still had a lot of money to spend [because im an awesome shopper and i always find the best deals!] and i ended up getting a couple pairs of jeans and an argyle sweater [finally! been wanting one for weeks!] and karen finally found a few items of her own. haha, so now that we were satisfied with our shopping excursion we headed home [now that it was like 7pm, lol!]. 

well the rest of the night wasnt anything spectacular, but it was fun for us. we cuddled up on the couch and watched two netflix - the remaining disks of the complete series of the black donnely's and the first season of the big bang theory. i dont know if anyone else out there is as addicted to renting tv series from netflix as i am, but if you are then you totally understand. i love both of these shows, the big bang theory brings out the true nerd in me and i laugh the entire time and the black donnely's is like a mild sopranos that i cant get enough of. sadly, they only had one season before the plug got pulled for some unknown reason [it definitely wasnt ratings, this show was huge when it was on primetime]. 

well by the time we finished up it was midnight, so we hit the sack to rejuvenate for sundays activities. [did i mention i made turkey quesadillas for dinner? haha, yummmmm...] 

sunday[11.30.08]

well, sunday morning we woke up pretty late - right around 10am. but having missed the last 3 or 4 weeks of church i was determined to go so we got dressed and ready and made it to the last service at 11:45. well by the time it was over, half the day was gone, but it was good for us. at first i wasnt thrilled with the message the series they were starting - christmas stuff. ugh, why is that as soon as thanksgiving ends the entire world goes into christmas overdrive? id like a couple of weeks to finish one holiday before i get inundated by another... or maybe its just that for whatever reason i dont care all that much for christmas. i cant explain it, so dont ask, but for a long time now i just havent felt the "christmas spirit," and i dont know when or if i really will again. anyway, the service wasnt just "the christmas story" as i originally anticipated, it was actually pretty good. so i left there feeling a little angry with myself for judging so quickly until karen tugged on my sleeve and mentioned she wanted to sponsor a child, and i forgot all about it. for someone who isnt very churchy, this girl really amazes me with her sense of charity and the size of her heart. well, id thought about it a lot during the service when they presented the program they do each year giving gifts to children with incarcerated parents, but when karen mentioned it my heart melted. i hadnt wanted to bring it up right away because i wasnt entirely sure howd she feel about it given our financial situation, but apparently that wasnt a problem. anyway, we went to the little booth area and learned about the program and ended up finding a little boy to sponsor; hopefully we can make his christmas a little brighter without a parent there to spend it with. 

after church we went home to have a nice thanksgiving leftovers lunch before gearing up for the days housework. well we decided what all we were going to do and then loaded up the new truck with a load of tubs that we were ready to move to the house. and its a good thing they were tubs because we found it was freezing and drizzling out when we were ready to load up, ugh. well by the time we unloaded we were freezing, but ready to work.

the projects for the day were to put another coat of paint on the entry walls [hopefully the last!], to do all our laundry [without having to go to the laundry mat! woohoo!], to start thoroughly cleaning the attic [where we plan to live while we re-do the second floor, then visa-versa], and as a small side project - to install the new front porch light. well karen got started on the laundry while i got started on the front porch light [while there was still daylight out] and man, it was a breeze. i guess all those hanging fixtures have made me a bit of a light-fixture aficionado for the time being or something, but this sucker went on quick and worked perfectly.  well by the time i was finished with the light karen was already getting started on the painting, so i joined her. and about an hour later we were satisfied with this coat of paint, and pretty sure it might need yet another... ugh. yeah, we're out of paint, guess we'll have to get some more...

anyway, we switched out the laundry and then headed upstairs to the second floor to do a little re-arranging and tidying up, and then onward to the 3rd floor. the first thing we did was remove all the materials we ripped down from that stupid partition wall and made a nice storage room out of the second floor "office" temporarily. then we got started with the vacuuming. karen took the regular vac and hit the room in the front while i got the shop-vac and started sucking up all the chunks of drywall that littered the floor. well.... not long into it we managed to set off the smoke alarm with all the dust we were kicking up. so i sprinted downstairs to try to turn off the smoke alarm or bypass it or something - but to no avail. long story short we had to apologize to the very speedy truck of firemen than showed up and also to the security company before we were able to get the alarm situation figured out and were able to finish vacuuming. however, the floors looked great when we were done! and hey, now we know that the security system works, right? lol!

well it was about 8pm when we left with 2 loads of laundry finished, one in the dryer, and one ready to go into the dryer. we went home and karen made the best dinner for me - a thanksgiving leftovers enchilada casserole, it was awesome! and then throughout the night we ended up going back to the house twice more to get the rest of the laundry as well. ugh. anyway, we ended up in bed by 11pm with all 4 loads of laundry done and a nice full belly of awesome food. 

well, thats it folks. i know it was long winded, but i figure most of you dont mind. josh is the only one that ever complains about the length of my blogs, lol! 

happy 1st of december!