Where have I been? Well I'll try and fill you in... it's only been about two and a half weeks but SO much has happened in that time that it seriously feels like a month. At any rate, I'll do my best. And without further adieu... the month of May (so far).
Well I did write right before Molly's shower... that week started out INCREDIBLY well. That Monday Joe came down and we had an absolutely awesome time together. Let's see... I'd been gone for the weekend so we hadn't seen each other for like five days. So I'm getting ready to go to the lab on Monday morning, showered and blow-dried and actually wearing a skirt (I was in such a great mood that I even decided to look nice! Go figure.), and I walk by the living-room window and glance out into the parking lot and think "Hey look, that's a blue Focus just like Joe has." And then I do a double-take, pull the curtain back, and take a closer look at this blue Focus, which I now notice somebody is sitting on. Guess who! So that was a welcome surprise. :) We had a really cool day, it was gorgeous out and we went for a walk and enjoyed the sunshine and I don't even know what else. I just know we had a blast, and those are the kind of days that make life worth the living. :)
On to Tuesday. (Um, yeah, this is gonna be a REALLY long entry.) ;) Well, Tuesday... wasn't quite so nice. Sweet Joe brought me to the lab but ended up getting a ticket in the process :P and it kinda snowballed from there. I don't quite remember what happened, just that all of a sudden I realized that my workload had exceeded the time allotted for me to finish it. So I like, died, or something, I don't remember, I just know that for the rest of that week I was caught in a downward spiral I couldn't seem to get out of. I happen to be lucky enough to have a boyfriend who put up with me, in spite of the fact that at the time I couldn't allow myself to believe a single one of the kind words he said (a la "You'll get through it, just take it one thing at a time, focus on the things you CAN do" etc). Sorry honey! Of course he was right. ;) But anyway, he was there providing me with study breaks and positive thoughts and even came down on a Thursday even though that's not one of our usual days and brought Treasure Planet to cheer me up. *sighs happily* Okay seriously girls, does it get any better than that? How did I get to be so lucky? :)
We should be up to about Friday now, which is the day I had to head Syracuse-way for my Molly friend's shower and such. I ended up skipping my classes to do homework and write a cover letter, which then had to be printed. It's the first resume/cover letter I did on actual paper, which took me five tries to print correctly but boy did it look nice when it was all set. :) (Joe helped me pick out the paper, and it has blue sky and a rainbow up at the top! Very pretty.) So I got all that in the mail, filled the car with gas, picked up some Krispy Kremes for Mahyee, and was on my merry way. Beat Molly home, so I had a chance to complain to my parents before I went to her house. ;) Parents are cool, because they actually sorta care what's going on in my life so I can babble till the cows come home and they still act like they are interested. :) Not everyone is like that!!
Saturday... shower day! Slept later than intended and so didn't make it to Molly's in time for breakfast. But no harm done, I still was up early enough to check my email, wrap her gift, debate over whether to bring her a bar of soap 'from Joe' (decided against that but it woulda been funny), get dressed, and pick up Danielle in time to set up. Of course, once we got to the church we had no clue what we were doing, but we tried. I have to thank Elaine and Carrie, who aren't even in the wedding, but they were the ones who did most of the work with the shower -- decorations, games, food, organization, etc. It looked gorgeous!
There were A LOT of ladies there that afternoon, I didn't even take a head count but there were upwards of fifty, I'm sure. I met someone who graduated with one of my aunts and remembers my daddy from the school bus. ;) That's the beauty of living in a small town, I think. In a big city you're not going to randomly run into people that knew your family about thirty years ago. ;) (Well, not as often anyway!) I personally think it's cool. :) But anyway... more about the shower. First of all, I don't think I have ever seen so many presents all in one place before, except maybe at like Christmas, with the WHOLE family, but then the pile of gifts gets split among twenty or more people. This was an entire floor covered in gifts, ALL of which were for Molly! It seriously took her three hours to open them, and we had to take a break in the middle of it so people could stretch their legs. ;) Pretty amazing!
Memorable moments:
- Writing down everything she said while she was opening her gifts. At the end what you're supposed to do is say "These are things that Molly will say on her honeymoon" and then read the whole list. Attach a double meaning to all those things and you're rolling on the floor by the end. Some of the things Molly said:
- "That's one of my dad's favorite appliances!" (an electric griddle)
- "No dogs, we're not having dogs." (umm... not sure)
- "I'm not strong enough." (not sure what it was, but it was heavy)
- Our personal favorite: "Eight inches -- yeesh!" (she was opening kitchen knives from Grant's mom, which is a funny enough concept in and of itself, and everyone who was in on what we were doing just about died laughing when she said it)
- I have never seen so many kitchen appliances in my life. Seriously. She got: electric skillet, electric griddle, toaster oven, microwave, crock pot, I don't even remember what else. Pots, pans, tablecloths and placemats and napkins up the whazoo. I don't know how that's all going to fit in their kitchen. :)
- Opening the gifts from her grandmother. First of all, as Molly would open someone's gift, that person would share a special memory they had of Molly. Naturally Molly's Gramma Bishop had some good ones, the first being "spoonerbaggies" which I'd heard at some point in my lifetime but is still funny. ;) She'd also made up a song for Molly (her first grandchild) when Molly was just a baby, which she wanted to sing for her. So she started, and Molly's mom and aunts all joined in and sang it along in four-part harmony. *tears up at the memory of it* Seriously folks, even I had tears in my eyes, and I NEVER cry. It was utterly beautiful. :)
- The pillowcases from her grandma. (This one is probably part of the last list item but I thought I'd give it its own place.) Molly's grandma had some lace that was handmade by HER great-grandma, which would be Molly's great-great-great-grandmother, but anyway, Gramma Bishop had the lace sewn onto satin pillowcases for Molly and Grant. Okay, turn on the tears again. What an amazing gift!
- The maid of honor using the flower girl as a trash compactor. LOL. :)
I think Molly was happier after the shower... well no. Actually, I think Molly will be happier after the WEDDING. My poor girl, she is so stressed and the whole shower thing just had her worked into a frenzy. She doesn't like surprises, she prefers to be in control of things, so it was really not an easy thing for her to just sit back, relax, and let other people do the work. I ended up hanging out at her house for most of the evening helping her feel better (and eating ham loaf, which is her family's get-together meal and boy is it good). I do have to say though, that she has a really really cool family. I love a family that just accepts everyone and treats them like part of the clan. Molly's aunts chatted casually with me, her mom wanted to see pictures of my Joe, her grandma gave me a hug... I'm comfortable enough to just go right in their house without knocking. That's pretty neat. :) So even though I had intended to go home after the shower and try and get some homework done... I'm glad I didn't. I had a great evening hanging out there, and it would have been perfect if my wonderful beautiful Molly friend was as pumped up as I was. But I did what I could until Grant got there... and hopefully he picked up from where I left. :)
Whew! So we're up to Saturday night... I talked to my mommy for like an hour about all kinds of random things, which is always cool. :) Then I checked my email and happened to have one with the following message in it: "The department is pleased to announce that Leslie McE is the winner of the contest to design a departmental homepage. The judges found her design to be simple and elegant, with a very professional look. Leslie will receive a $50 gift certificate for the Fireside Manner." AUGH!!! Well I was back on top of the world, let me tell you. :) What a way to finish off an awesome day!
Sunday... got up, went to church with the fam. Sang in the choir, but miss Leah sang in the choir too, and that was a pleasant surprise! She's a great girl, not that I see her much anymore. She's going to play at my wedding (viola), that is, assuming she still wants to... she asked me about four years ago if she could and of course I said yes! I used to babysit for her and her brother Drew, a long time ago, and their mom is like another mom. (I have a lot of those!) Another great thing about my small town -- my church family. My church itself even. ;) Speaking of which, that particular Sunday happened to be a Communion Sunday, and I was home for it! YAY!! It was nice to be home. ;) But alas, after showing off pics of Joe to my aunt and Mary and the church girls, and having everyone say "BYE LESLIE!" in unison as I left the building, and having a quick lunch with Mommy... I had to get back on the road again. And it was boring. :P So I had to spice it up by taking a quick break when I hit Hamburg -- hopping off the Thruway, pulling into the Bob Evans parking lot, and leaving a little card in a bright blue envelope under Joe's windshield wiper. :) And then back on the Thruway for the extra half-hour to Fredonia, arriving at 5:40 and having to work at 6 (as I'd promised someone I'd cover their hours that night). So, straight to the Learning Center I went, hoping to be able to spend some of the time catching up on homework, but alas it was the night before a Chan test, and thus I spent the ENTIRE THREE HOURS tutoring. Joy. Well, I earned my extra bucks that night. :) The night ended on a good note though: Adam, back to his usual hyper happy self (the Adam we all know and love!), thought it might be fun to go to Taco Bell -- so we did! We hadn't done that in MONTHS, and it was so nice to just hang out and catch up. Great end to an all-in-all great weekend. :)
Holy crappers. Well I'm up to May fifth, but I've still got ten days to go! :) I'll try and keep it short though... the last ten days have mostly been work and stuff. ;) Monday my Joe came down to rescue me for a bit, and then ended up actually sitting in the lab for four hours helping me make a timeline for my Math and Music class. Not exactly my idea of a good date, but it was sweet of him to help me and I actually had fun doing it. :) (I seem to recall at one point falling off my chair and ending up sprawled on the floor of the lab, laughing hysterically. Yeah... the pressure gets to us all in weird ways I think!) I also got three graduation presents that day: cow pin and matching earrings from Laurie, 'Digital Angel' tee shirt from Adam (that was soooo sweet!), and Joe, not to be out-presented, gave me my domain name! Talk about a surprise! So I now own (okay, well he owns it, but he gave it to me, so, yeah) www.peachsummer.com, and plans are in the works to make it a really cool-looking, professional, kick-ass site. ;) That about does it for Monday, except for one last little detail... coming home, I found about four new messages on our answering machine. One of them was from BuffNET, the company that I'd sent my rainbow-lovely resume to the previous Friday -- and they wanted an interview, that coming Wednesday! :)
Nothing interesting happened on Tuesday. I called BuffNET to confirm the interview, did a lot of homework, and made plans to meet Joe at his house on Wednesday morning before the interview for breakfast and moral support. And I took a shower and blow-dried my hair, so I wouldn't have to do it in the morning. Set my alarm for 6AM and went to bed early.
Wednesday morning I woke up to sunshine at 8:30AM -- and panicked. I was supposed to be AT Joe's half an hour ago! Called him in a frenzy and allowed myself to be calmed... thanked God that I still had an hour and a half before the interview, so at least I'd be on time for that even if I stood up my boyfriend... thanked God that I'd showered and ironed my clothes the night before... thanked God that I'd woken up at 8:30 and not sometime later than that. Grabbed my stuff, got in the car, and flew to West Seneca. Tried to call Joe on my cell phone to let him know I was going straight to the interview, and discovered the battery was dead. But I made it to the interview on time, and I brought the cow in with me (I'd considered leaving him in the car but I had no place to put my keys). I talked to the president of the company, ended up grabbing some code out of the car to show the operations manager, heard the entire company history, and listened to the cheerful sounds of everyone communicating with each other on AIM. ;) It was a really long interview, over two hours, but it went well and I left with a big smile on my face, heading straight over to Joe's. His front door was open so I wandered on in (knocking and yelling to make my presence known, that is) and was met with a big hug at the top of the stairs. "How'd the interview go?" he asked. "Oh, I think it went well," I said casually, adding very softly, as he turned his back on me to walk down the hall, "considering they gave me the job." The look on his face -- priceless. I don't think I've even seen anyone turn around so fast. :)
So yes, ladies and gentlemen, I have a job. Beginning June 2, you're looking at the new PhP programmer for BuffNET! I just hope they knew what they were doing when they hired me. :P But anyway, I have a job. I nearly have the degree. All I need now is the apartment and the cat! :)
Back to Wednesday... I pulled that trick on people all day. First to Jon, later to Joe's friend Mike whom I finally met, and then to people on AIM (although it just doesn't work as well on AIM). That day is kind of a blur. After my interview Joe treated me to breakfast (since he was going to treat me to breakfast BEFORE the interview and I, uh, didn't make it). ;) We went to the Original Pancake House and had Dutch Babies. :) YUM. Then we went to Sheldon's and I did some homework while he and Jon moved dirt. (No really, they were moving dirt. I'm sure it was as fun as it sounds.) ;) Then we watched Treasure Planet again, and wandered back to Joe's in the rain, and then Joe brought me over to meet Mike and we went out to a wing place and hung out. I had fun in spite of the fact that I was pretty quiet, which I attribute to two things: 1. I'm generally quiet when I first meet somebody, and 2. I was still somewhat in disbelief at all that had happened that day. But anyway, I was brave and tried a chicken wing, which turned out to be just as hot as I assumed it would be, but I ate it anyway. ;) And I made a fool of myself by hearing "cards" when Joe and Mike were actually talking about playing darts.... *shakes head sadly* I need to get my hearing checked. No honey, I really DON'T think people play Euchre with darts. *bangs head against the table* Yeah, I felt stupid. Way to go me. ;)
On my return to Fredonia, I had every intention of going to bed (Thursday morning I was supposed to do a presentation in Computation) but when I got home I made a startling discovery: our system administrator, whom we all knew was an imbecile, had proven his idiocy that morning by deleting the student directory on the department server. As in, EVERYTHING belonging to the students is gone. Hence, the reason this blog is temporarily residing over here at Blog*Spot. My website is totally gone and I don't even know what all else I had up there but luckily I don't think it was anything important, as in, I don't think it was anything I don't have backed up elsewhere. Other people lost a lot more than I did... years worth of programs and projects, basically whole portfolios of what they've done in their college careers. Oy. They better get rid of the guy, that's all I've got to say. :P
My big brother sent me an IM wondering how my interview had gone... apparently he'd been worried about me that morning when he found out linus was down, afraid that I'd be trying to show my website to the interviewers and it wouldn't be there. (I was lucky that didn't happen! Thank God, AGAIN, that I had a disk in the car when they asked for some code.) Anyhow Locke had had kind of a crappy day but he was happy for me, and he invited me out to Denny's at 1AM... and against my better judgement, I went. We hadn't had any time together in quite a while, both of us being crazy-busy with finals and projects, so it was great to just relax and catch up a bit. I didn't get to bed until after 5 but it was fully worth it. :)
THURSDAY May 8. Computation presentation (sucked, but I didn't care). Finished homework for music, handed in Combinatorics assignment, handed in Music timeline. Bought my diploma frame and a tank top. Called mommy to announce the new job... FRIDAY May 9. Last day of classes, both of which I spent writing a poem for Joe. Exchanged the tank top for a larger size. Went shopping for a mother's day card, then went to Point Gratiot to swing on the swings. Had dinner at Applebee's, then back to the point to watch the sunset. :) Spent the evening going through his mp3's. Don't remember what else we did... SATURDAY May 10. Sucked. Was supposed to be writing a paper, but instead worked myself back into depressed hysterics and rendered self unable to accomplish anything. Took a nap in the afternoon... actually cried myself to sleep because I was feeling so god-awful. Can we say... hormones? (This was eight days after the blog entry where I mentioned wishing my period would hurry up and come... well guess what... it still wasn't there yet.) Went shopping for milk (which was sour) and a TV dinner, watched a movie, checked me email and didn't have anything from Joe... felt sad... sent Joe an e-card, and received a little poem from him right after I sent it. And what did I do... fucking CRY. Holy shnikies. So unlike me!!! So then he jumped on AIM and asked how I was and I was like "Ehhhh..." so he called me to make me feel better. :) And that did the trick!
SUNDAY May 11. Mother's Day... wore my new tank top to church and looked HOT if I may say so. ;) Enjoyed the visiting pastor's sermon about parenting. Daydreamed about being a mommy. Intended to spend the day writing my paper. Didn't. Called my mommy to wish her a happy mommy's day. Started making an outline for aforementioned paper. Downloaded the Chicago soundtrack. Chatted with Joe on AIM. Decided to finish writing the paper before I went to bed. Fell asleep from boredom while attempting to work on it. Set my alarm for 8, gave up, and went to bed. MONDAY May 12. Spent the morning from 9:30 till 2:30 writing that paper. It sucked. But it got done, and then I said "It is done. I will shower." And I did, and it was good. And then Joe came. :D And it was a rainy day, so we bought some groceries and made dinner at my house, and it was good, except that the milk was sour, again. (I am not buying milk at Tops again.) So we got fresh milk from the convenience store, along with Hostess cupcakes, and then watched the Disney versions of both Robin Hood and Aladdin! And it was awesome. ;) TUESDAY May 13. Slept in. Went to the lab intending to do LaTeX and study. Did neither. Ate candy. Printed Music paper. Sat, jittery and sugar high, waiting impatiently for my tests to start. Took Computation exam, which sucked but I know I passed it. Took Music exam, which was easy. Procrastinated a little more. Did five chapters worth of LaTeX by midnight. Went home.
WEDNESDAY May 14, which is three months from the day we unofficially started dating... ;) (Almost done!) Joe was supposed to come at 10 for breakfast and to help me start packing, but he came at 11 without breakfast. ;) Ah well -- he did help me start packing, and then we went out to Hamburg, grabbed subs at Subway and ate them out at Chestnut Ridge (although it wasn't quite warm enough to eat on the swings at the top of the hill... ah well! Still fun!). Then we went out and picked up our rings!! The lady at the store thought they were wedding rings as we were trying them on, which amused me. ;) My ring fit perfectly. :) Joe's fits fine too, as long as he never needs to take it off! Hehe. But anyway, that was the high point of yesterday. :) Not that there weren't other good points... going to Best Buy, gazing at my monitor, playing with the keyboards, reading a Dr. Suess book, taking Joe's picture with a VeggieTales book ("God Made Me Special") (lol)... coming out with the Chicago soundtrack... :D Getting Blizzards at DQ: "Can I have a-?" "No." (lol again) Getting Blizzard all over my shirt as I attempted to roll down the window so we could yell "PUPPY!" at some random dog. :) Hehe... then Jon called when we were back at Joe's... Joe's dad: "Joe! It's for you." Joe: "Is it work?" Joe's dad (into the phone): "Is it work?" Everyone: hysterical laughing. ;) Then we listened to the soundtrack and talked, and then he brought me home. All in all, a great day. :) Which brings me to...
Thursday May 15, on which day I slept until almost 1PM and then dawdled around until my test at 4. Took pictures of my ring with the web cam and sent them to Wyl because I've been dying to show it off to someone. :P Actually drove Ryan down to the lab and made small talk which was good. Studied a little bit for combinatorics. Ate Pop-Tarts out of the vending machine. Set my blog up on Blog*Spot since linus is dead in the water (and I've missed this thing!). Showed my Music teacher that the only problem with my web-based timeline project was her computer. ;) Received a surprise bit of good luck about five minutes before my exam, and then went into my test and kicked its ass. I may have to track down Dr. Kwong so I can find out how I did, cuz I think I did pretty well. I'm pretty sure I've secured an A- in that class... prolly not an A but that's all right. :) After the test I headed back down to the lab... procrastinated but managed to get through my last three LaTeX chapters, so that's all done. Then came home, grabbed dinner, and started typing away here... about three hours ago. But at last, I am caught up!!!
Tomorrow I will have my last ever exam as an undergrad. Then I've got graduation rehearsal... Then my family and my Joe will be here (and I'll finally be able to show off my ring!), and we're gonna go through cruise pictures, go out to dinner, and then Lord knows what. :) It'll be fun though, I'm looking forward to having them out this way! And then Saturday will come... and I'll graduate... and kiss college goodbye forever.
But that is another post. :)