That quote? Is from my fiance who said it to me just now.  I did not sigh heavily or make fun of him, though it was tempting.

One of the best things about the PS3 is that it does so many things.  It plays games.  It plays Blu-Ray movies.  It plays regular DVDs.  It goes online and networks with the other computers in the house (that also have Windows Vista but whatever, I don’t need to use the television to access my computer).  You can download movies via purchase and rental.  It does a lot.

Because it is so versatile obviously the only place for its installation was the living room.  The living room has the larger television and the available hook ups.  We switched out our old DVD player (a Samsung that has lasted quite nicely for seven years and will now live in the bedroom and be that room’s DVD player) for the PS3…and I have spent the last few days listening to Will play Metal Gear Solid 4.  He finished the game last night….and started it over again this morning.  Internet, I think I have found something more irritating than being forced to watch the Discovery Channel for 18 hours a day.

The worst part of it is that I had the dumb idea to ask a couple of questions about the game–its plot and characters.  You know, just as a polite little “I know you love video games so I will pretend to be interested in this and not complain in the hopes that someday you will at least pretend to give some of the things I like a chance too” thing.  And this? Has TOTALLY BACKFIRED.  Will took my little bit of politeness as a genuine “wow that looks super neat” interest and now? Now? NOW? He wants to go back and play through the first three Metal Gear Solids while I watch so that I can really understand the story line.  Internet? I am dooooooooooooooooomed!

In totally unrelated news I picked up some knitting needles today at Fred Meyer and might give knitting a go.  It won’t be any time soon, I have a couple of projects to finish first but honestly, there is just something addicting about the whole crafting with yarn thing.  I, um, bought more yarn too.  It’s pretty and soft.

In other unrelated news I tried to find some rain or cold weather boots today and am totally out of luck.  I’ll probably be out of luck until the end of the rainy season, but you know–you snooze you lose right? Maybe this June I’ll be smart and pick out some appropriate cold weather footwear and a decent coat (I’m wearing an old one of Will’s this year since my old winterish coat finally wore out last year) and then next year we will have a completely mild winter and I won’t need either of them.  Here’s to hoping! ‘Cause I? Am so done with snow and cold weather already.

You know what’s super fun? When someone asks you what you want for Christmas and you say “please don’t get us anything because we can’t afford to get you anything right now” and they turn around and give you a PS3! Will’s sister Missy rocks!

Will has been begging for “permission” (hello, I am my fiance’s Jiminy Cricket) to buy a PS3 since they were released and each time I have reminded him that he does not actually like top ramen or cup o’ noodles.  Now though, thanks to Missy, we have a PS3.  Will is excited for the gaming.  I am excited for the renting of movies without leaving the house, though that probably won’t happen until Will finishes Metal Gear Solid 4 (a gift from his mother).

And now for the Christmas Wrap Up (ha ha–puns are fun!)

Getting to actually see my Mom on Christmas and hang out with Missy and her husband (Matt) was the best part of being “asked” to drive down to Canyonville for Christmas.  The rest of it was, to be honest, pretty annoying.  Sure I enjoyed playing with Will’s other sister’s kids (three kids all under the age of 5! Yowza!) and I know that Will was glad to have time with his Dad.  But….still.

First we got manipulated into driving down.  Thankfully the roads cleared up completely after Albany, so the drive down wasn’t bad.

When “asked” to come down to them, we said that if we did come down, we’d have to have dinner on Wednesday night (Christmas Eve) because with the weather being horrible we wanted to make it back home no later than early Thursday afternoon, meaning that we’d have to leave Canyonville before noon on Christmas Day.   On the drive down we asked what time to be at Will’s sister’s for dinner and were informed that dinner wouldn’t be until…Thursday afternoon.

When visiting with Will’s Dad on Wednesday night (before spending the night at my Mom’s) Will mentioned to his Dad that we had brought down the deep fryer “just in case” but that we didn’t think we’d need to use it.  Will’s Dad then decided that Will would be deep frying the turkey and wouldn’t let Will talk him out of the idea because smoking it (Will’s sister CJ has a smoker) would have required that the Turkey be put in the smoker some time on Wednesday afternoon (before we got there) and then on Thursday morning when we were on the way to CJ’s from my Mom’s, Will called to suggest roasting the Turkey but it was already too late to put the Turkey in the oven to have it cooked properly for an early dinner, so deep frying was the only way to be able to eat dinner early in the afternoon.

So, because we still wanted to make it home by early evening and wouldn’t have the time to sit around and wait for the oil to cool back down after the deep frying (it takes a few hours), we got Matt and Missy to agree to bring the fryer back up to us.  But once the turkey was cooked and dinner was eaten, Will got “volunteered” to fix his other sister’s computer–which took quite a while and he was not able to actually finish before we finally did end up leaving.

We did not end up leaving Canyonville until almost nine o’clock on Thursday night–but at least we were able to bring the deep fryer back up with us because the oil had enough time to cool down (we ended up leaving the oil there anyway).

I’m not annoyed that we spent the extra time in Canyonville.  I know that Will’s Dad really wanted to have everyone together for the holiday.  I know that Will really wanted to spend some quality time with his Dad.  I am annoyed that nobody was honest about it (and, once again, nobody asked me what I wanted to do).  Instead of simply saying on Monday “can’t you stay later on Thursday so we can spend more time together?” we were manipulated into staying later.  I would have felt a lot better about the extra time we spent if I hadn’t spent almost seven hours of it looking at my watch and thinking “Will said we were going to leave earlier than this and now it’s…” and feeling annoyed.

To make up for it, Will and I spent yesterday hanging out all day in our pajamas and being lazy.  I watched some West Wing in the morning (I am in love with the fact that the PS3 plays regular DVDs as well as Blu-Ray) and then read and crocheted (I’m working on a scarf for Missy) in the afternoon and evening while Will started playing Metal Gear Solid 4.  I turned on our Christmas lights at about 3 in the afternoon and we stayed up until almost 2 in the morning just enjoying hanging out in the peace (as much peace as you can get with the battle scenes blaring from the video game).  We had planned on going out for dinner and maybe seeing a movie to celebrate our anniversary but decided some down time was just what we needed.  We might go out later in the week.  All in all, though, yesterday was a lovely day–made even better when my brother Chris called to wish us a happy holidays.

Today I actually–wait for it–got out of the house for fun reasons because the snow has finally melted! Yay! I went to the library to pick up the copy of the fourth season of Lost that I reserved this summer, then I spent an hour or so wandering around Powell’s and spent entirely too much money on Moleskine day/weekly planners.  It was really awesome to just get out of the house for the purposes of wandering around.  I really missed having fresh air.

Tomorrow I have very important plans to camp out on the couch. And do laundry. But mostly to camp out on the couch.

If you have known me or if you have been reading my blog for a while you already know that my anniversary (today) has always been…bittersweet.

Five years ago today my friend Abbott died in a car accident.  I don’t talk about the accident much or the time that followed it.  I do still tell funny Abbott stories when I remember them because who doesn’t like funny stories involving a 6’5 230+lb vegan who smoked American Spirits and did Kung Fu?  I think about Abbott every day and every day I miss him.  There are some days when I miss him so much my bone marrow aches and other days when I feel a nostalgic pull and wonder what Abbott would think about whatever it is that I am doing at the time that I think of him.  I miss my friend, but it’s been long enough now that I can remember our friendship for what it really was and no longer feel the need to paint everything with a rosy glowy cavity inducing love fest brush and can remember the times when we drove each other batshit “I’d stab your eyes out with a spork if I had one handy” insane.  And believe it or not, sometimes those are the memories that make me miss him the most and I’m willing to bet that if there is an afterlife, those are the times that Abbott remembers the most fondly as well.

Every once in a while I can still feel a vague Abbott-esque presence in my life.  I felt it when I was freaking out over the move up here to Portland and somehow I knew that wherever he was, he was really happy for me on my birthday, when Will and I got engaged.  I hope I’ll be able to feel that same vauge “Abbott is happy” sensation on my wedding day… when Will and I get our new anniversary.

Today is also Will’s and my anniversary.  One year to the day after Abbott’s accident Will and I “officially” started dating.  Will wanted to wait until the 28th (the question was asked at about ten minutes to midnight) but I knew that Abbott would like the idea of taking what could potentially turn into an annual grief-fest (because I am a Drama Queen and that’s how I roll) and turn it into a positive day so I talked Will into letting our anniversary share the day.

Today is Will’s and my fourth anniversary.  We won’t do any sort of big celebration until later in the week because we are stil in recovery mode from the holiday hoopla (which I will explain in a different post) and because Will had to work today.  Still though, I don’t need dinner out or a day curled up on the couch to remind me that I have a pretty great life.  Every day I look at my little family and know that I am lucky and every day I am thankful for the life that Will and I have built and will continue to build hopefully for a really long time.

I miss my Abbott.  I will always miss Abbott, but it’s hard not to be grateful when this is how your world looks:

Happy Holidays!

As it turns out, the in-laws will not be coming up to us after all.  Instead we have been “asked” to drive down to them (in Southern Oregon).  So we will be leaving in the morning and the plan is to come back on Thursday morning, but that isn’t set in stone.  It could change at any time.  The in-laws could decide to follow us back up, they might ask us to stay longer… we have no idea.

So, because I am the nervous sort and am not looking forward to this drive at all (for a number of reasons that I don’t want to go into right now) I am going to ask for good vibes to be sent for us–to keep the roads drivable and for us to be safe during the couple hundred mile drive down I-5 in the freezing weather that awaits us in the morning.  I’ll probably twitter the trip, but I don’t think I’ll blog until the trip is over and (knock on wood) we make it back safely.

Boy, this entry is totally a downer.  Sorry about that! Hey, remember how glad I was last night when I finished my hat?

Internet,  I have just finished my first crochet hat! And it fits! And it’s red and soft and will keep my head warm!

I am very very proud of this hat and am thinking of having it framed.

Now I know how to make TWO things with crochet.  If I wasn’t all “blecccchhhh I am sick pants” I would take a picture of the hat and two scarves that I have finished.  Perhaps I will take a picture tomorrow of me wearing all three at once.

Saturday was Will’s birthday!  Yay! He turned 27 (am so robbing the cradle)!  I wanted to have a big hullabaloo (as big a hullabaloo as the two of us could do by ourselves anyway) because it really has to suck having a birthday in the same week as Christmas.  I wanted his birthday to be its own special day.  But the snow, it was bad and I was unable to get to the store to get the ingredients I needed to make a cake or cookies so his official birthday meal was frozen Red Barron thin and crispy pepperoni pizza (which is our favorite of all frozen pizzas).  He unwrapped his two gifts, a t-shirt and a game for his Nintendo DS, and then spent the evening playing WoW without having to listen to any complaints from me (his third birthday present and probably his favorite).  Happy Birthday Will!  I would write something schmoopy here but it would just embarrass him.  So, um, maybe tomorrow.

Today I spent CLEANING the apartment.  I’m talking Danny Tanner style cleaning our apartment.  And rearranging the furniture in our bedroom a little bit.  I really like the way everything turned out even if it did take a really long time to get it all done.  It took all of the Across the Universe soundtrack to do the bathroom!  I will take pictures after the in-law invasion ends and I can put everything where it will actually live.  I think the changes make our apartment even more homey and inviting.

Today is also the first day that I have actually had any sort of friendly feelings toward the snow.  The result of my CLEANING was having a great many loads of recycling and trash that needed to be taken out.  Rather than take them out as the bins filled up, I just started piling everything outside of our front door so that I could make trips without having to spend a bunch of time dealing with cold weather layers.  When I was ready to make the trek to the recycling center and dumpster I borrowed these really old boots of Will’s so that I could tuck the legs of my jeans into them and save them from getting soaked.  Obviously the foot size was way too big and I felt a little bit like a kid playing dress up in a parent’s shoes but clomping back and forth out in the snow was so much fun!  The snow had frozen so the top half of it was a layer of easily breakable ice with the bottom still being mostly powder.  When I would take a step the snow would break under my foot and then fall off to the side in big chunks.  The longer I was outside, the harder it was to not see what kind of a sled the futon box would be.  It took all of my self control to not take a few running steps and then fling myself onto the snow to see how far I would slide.  I might have done it if I weren’t afraid of cars or sliding farther than I wanted to.  Still though, clomping around in my too-big boots was really fun and I kind of hated to come back inside.

It’s a good thing I did come in and finish cleaning though because it looks like the in-law invasion will officially start tomorrow.  Will got a call earlier from his Dad saying that they would probably drive up from southern Oregon in the morning.  Of course, this could change in the morning, so we’ll see.  It depends on the weather and people’s moods.  Can you believe that Christmas is on Thursday and we still have NO DEFINITE PLAN for the holiday?  We still do not know how many people are coming or if we will actually have the big family day actually ON Christmas or what.  I kind of admire people who can live like this because this whole “I don’t know” and “just wait to see what everyone else wants to do” stuff is giving me an ulcer.  Me no likey having no control at all.

I am glad that Will is going to get to spend time with his Dad though.  And I am glad that his Dad brought B even if she is bringing her dog.  I will tell you how I feel about this after this visit is over and all of the in-laws have gone home.  To do so beforehand would just be inviting all sorts of trouble.

No matter what, for right now, my apartment is clean! And organized! and I love it! Woo!

Will and I did everything we could to avoid having to go to IKEA.  We don’t have anything against IKEA.  In fact we really like IKEA.  But IKEA? Is twenty miles away and involves a trip over an icy bridge in icy weather and getting home any furniture purchased there would involve the borrowing of a truck and then trying to drive that truck over an icy bridge in icy weather.  That wasn’t a fun idea to Will or I.  So we tried.  We tried really really hard to avoid having to go to IKEA to get the futon for Will’s Dad and Will’s Dad’s Girlfriend.

Let me just say, for the record, that neither Will’s Dad nor Will’s Dad’s Girlfriend (who will henceforth be referred to as B because “Will’s Dad’s Girlfriend” is just too much typing) asked us to buy them something to sleep on.  Will’s Dad even told us not to buy anything.  They know money is tight right now.  But we were not about to say Hi!  Here’s our couch–you two can arm wrestle over who gets to sleep on it and who gets to sleep on an old poky futon mattress on the floor! Have fun!  Not when this was B’s first trip out here and when we didn’t know exactly how long they’d be here.  We just…are not that rude.  We also know that we could have gotten them an air mattress and they wouldn’t have complained, but Will’s Dad has problems with his spine, his hips and his knees.  Trying to get up from an air mattress (and getting down to it) would probably cause him quite a bit of pain.  So, yeah.  We’re being nice.  And getting extra seating for the living room!

So back to the story.

We were so desperate to avoid having to drive all the way over to IKEA that we drove around for almost SIX HOURS yesterday trying to find an affordable futon or pull out couch.  We drove all over Beaverton, Aloha, Tigard and Hillsboro trying to find an affordable option.  We went to no less than ten furniture stores–including a Goodwill that was so heinous that Will probably won’t ever set foot in a thrift store again– and we found only one option that we liked.  At Big Lots.  And when we went back to buy the futon from Big Lots? They were out of the nice sturdy frame that was our whole reason for choosing it.

We found quite a few futons that were nice enough, but they were either too expensive or folded out into something that was too skinny even for me to sleep on and Will’s Dad and B? Well, they are slightly larger than I am….by a lot.

We finally gave up at about 4:30 because Will had to be at work at 5.

Today we woke up and decided to just bite the bullet and go to IKEA.  We’d looked online and didn’t see much of anything but we wanted to be able to say that we had at least tried every available option that we could think of, so, at about 1, we climbed into the Subaru and drove across the icy bridge in icy weather.  We parked, went into the store, rode up the escalator to the show room, walked past the first kitchen display and there was the most perfect futon ever created.  Oh my god this thing is so comfortable I would almost rather that it be Will’s and my new bed than a guest futon. It folded out into a bed that would be wide enough for Will’s Dad and B and was nice enough to fold up into an extra couch for the living room and it was sixty dollars cheaper than anything else we had considered buying yesterday.

Six hours yesterday.  Five minutes today.  It so just figures.

Seriously folks, sometimes you just have to write down every single thing that is bothering you and then highlight and erase it all.  I just wrote a very very very long entry in which I listed every single freakin’ thing that has been getting to me over the last few weeks because my whole self felt like it could explode at any second.  But then I wrote it and when I finished writing it I thought “blecch.  Who wants to read that?” so I deleted it.  But still, writing it out totally helped me work through some of the irritating crap that has been plaguing me.  Plus, while I know you would all be supportive and kind, I’d much rather make you laugh.  So here, in sort of chronological order are a couple of the fun/funnier things that have happened in the last week.

On Monday, my friends Wendy and Katie and I got together and had a crochet/gab fest.  Katie wanted to learn how to crochet so I volunteered to teach her the few things that I know about it.  Will drove me over at 11ish and I stayed until around 5:30.  We mostly gabbed, but there was some crafty stuff too.  I had fun teaching Katie the crochet basics, but I think she might have more fun with knitting. It was really relaxing to just sit around with friends and crochet and chat.  This, when paired with my excitement over the latest Better Homes and Gardens magazine arriving in the mail seals it: I am officially a grown up.  I am okay with this as I did not really enjoy my teen years or most of my 20s.

Yesterday I came down with a sinus bug/head cold in approximately 1.5 seconds.  No joke.  In the middle of the afternoon, it just HIT me.  I felt like I had walked into a scotch broom bush.  So, in an effort to knock it on its ass I took a Benadryl and went to bed super early.  When I went to bed, Will was sitting in the living room playing WoW on his laptop and watching television.  Apparently I woke up at about midnight and was convinced that Will had gone somewhere and left me in the house all by myself.  Apparently I was so convinced of this that I wandered into the computer room (where Will had moved to) and demanded to know why he had left me all alone in a house that was so cold and so dark and so quiet when he knew that I didn’t feel well.  Apparently I got very teary over the fact that I was “all alone” in the cold and dark and quiet apartment, and I told Will that I needed him to come home now and then I kissed him and wandered back to bed.  I have no memory of doing this.  I also have no memory of sitting straight up in bed and asking him “are we winning?” when he crawled into bed an hour later, but I guess when Will said “yes” I responded with “Good.  Can’t let them get it.” and then laid back down and started snoring.

What fun or funny things have you done recently?

I’ve been playing around with Facebook stuff to see if I could get it to update whenever I post a blog.  This is kind of taking a while.

There is roughly a week left before the in-law invasion of 2008 begins and in that week, Will and I have to accomplish the following:

1.  Find a futon or couch  that will fold out into a bed that is at least full sized if not queen sized.  Why? Because both Will’s Dad and Will’s Dad’s girlfriend need to sleep on it and, frankly put, they will not both fit on a twin bed.

2.  Clear most of the stuff out of the computer room to make room for that futon/fold out couch and get the fold out couch/futon in there.

3.  Find places for all of the stuff we cleared out of the computer room.

4.  Hit the grocery store to stock up on enough food and snacks to feed 4-12 people for a few weeks (because we do not know exactly how many people will be staying with us at any given point between next week and whenever they all decide to go home).

5.  Find places for all of the food and snacks to feed all of those people.

6.  Rob a bank so that we can afford to buy said futon/fold out couch, sheets and pillows, sheets and blankets for futon/fold out couch and enough food and snacks to feed 4-12 people for a few weeks.

It’s going to be a reeeeeeeeeeeeally full week-ish.  Posting may be light!