Hooplah.Org

Tuesday was an eventful day

We woke up around noonish and did our usual after-sleep-snuggle for a while (aww and decided we would see another movie that day. Even though we didn’t decide then, it ended up being Bruce Almighty (even though I tried to pressure him into seeing the Matrix, since I knew he wanted to, but I figured Bruce Almighty was a good middle spot between the Matrix and Down With Love… right . We also made arrangements for my mother to get us some alcohol that day. I had called her at work and we agreed on a meeting place (a store next to where she gets her cigarettes), and also said she would give me my prescription for my contacts since it expired the next day (oops .

Ugh. Doing lots of parenthesis again. Too lazy to change it, must stop it from now on…

So we met my mother in the parking lot sometime around 2:30. And, of course, it was raining more. Matt and I had planned on just telling her what to get and what to ask (since we couldn’t figure out what type of alcohol to get for it, since a Shirley Temple is a virgin drink) but she ended up wanting us to come in with her. Matt and I just ended up walking around, looking to see if we could find some grenadine stuff on the shelf while my mother went next door to the bar and asked the bartender what he thought. One of the people working at the place asked if we needed help (and she seemed a little suspicious to me) but luckily left us alone after I said no. We ended up just getting vodka for it and my mother also picked up some mudslide stuff (which ended up being really nasty, ick.)

Then we traveled down to the edges of Fredericksburg to go to Captain D’s. I have gotten Matt hooked on fast food seafood… first from Long John Silvers, tidthfrom Captain D’s. The one we went to has more of a restaurant feel to it, and the batter they use for stuff has a taste to it like I’ve never had anywhere else. It was there that we decided on seeing Bruce Almighty, and luckily that was playing shortly after we got to the theater.

It was an ok movie. Cute story, but Jim Carey was acting a little too much like Ace Ventura for my taste :ehh: Blah, I’ve become such a pseudo movie critic.

After that we had gone to Wal-Mart for my contact prescription… but it ended up being the one for my contacts. Oops. We walked around Wal-Mart some anyway (though I was a little ehh about it at first, it ended up being fun) and we looked through the toy sections (and reminisced about our childhood and how good today’s kids have it, with their Barbies that actually move the way you want and the toys that actually shoot stuff now), the electronics, and picked up a bunch of candy from their little special candy store.

Leaving the parking lot Matt had seen a car heading toward me that I didn’t see, and being startled by that ended up putting me in a bad mood during the car ride home. I had sort of been borderline blah the whole day, and it just sort of caught up to me during the 20 minute ride. I had thought he was upset too, since he was quiet as well… but it ended up being ok. We both thought the other was mad… but I was just having one of my antisocial, I’m-a-bitch-right-now moments.

That evening we ate some candy and played some X-Box and N64 games. We played N64 first, which I ended up kicking his ass at and then went for X-Box since I felt bad that he wasn’t having fun. But, then, I ended up not having fun with X-Box, since the games were hard to control and I couldn’t seem to figure out why I was sucking so bad So, yeah… we’ll have to try that again because I still need to fulfill my promise of kicking his ass in one of his own games. He’d never be able to beat me in anything from N64

We made some Shirley Temples that evening, too. My mother helped some, though she didn’t try any. She just ended up gushing over the mudslide, which I tasted and it was awful… If I’m going to have an alcoholic beverage, I don’t want to taste the alcohol at all. I want the tipsy feeling without the nasty omg that was a bad idea taste I had three total glasses of the Shirley Temples (two right after each other, one later that night) that had about 1/2 or 1/4th of a shot of vodka in them… and lots and lots of grenadine of course Matt only had one, since he ended up not being that big of a fan of them.

That night I also got a wild hair up my butt to make french toast. I got a recipe offline and ended up messing up (since I 1/2ed it to only make 4 pieces, but still the same amount of eggs in that were needed for 8 pieces… oops.) They ended up being alright, but not nearly worth all of the trouble. Maybe I’ll make them again. Maybe.

K… on to the 28th.

It actually wasn’t raining. It had started to sprinkle as we were leaving the Food Lion parking lot (after dropping off the videos two days late, oops) but luckily it cleared up by the time we got to Fredericksburg… the sun even came out! We ate at Ruby Tuesdays, where Matt thought it was cute that all the waitresses and what not kept calling me honey and sweetie and stuff like that We had sat in the same booth me and Sandy had been in almost a month earlier. After eating, we walked around the mall some, at stores for N64 games and Tropico, and also some in Spencers. I saw a girl I knew from high school (Kristen Y) and I was stuck thinking out odd it was to see someone I knew alone in the mall… before that would have been unspeakable, but now we were old enough to do it and not care. Just thought it was odd, but I’m glad she didn’t see me. I don’t think I could have handled meeting someone else so soon again out in public

After that we went to Fun Land and did a round of the miniature golf there. The last time I had done that course was some 3 years ago or so, so it wasn’t like I had an unfair advantage. We came up to the first hole and noticed that part of the green turf was dark and wet from all the icky days of rain. I didn’t really see a problem with it, and we started playing anyway. After we both hit once, we had to walk across the area to get to our balls… I was walking along the bricks that surrounded the green and I saw Matt sort of leap/jump over the wet stuff. For some reason I decided to do the same (I was also losing my balance a little) and leaped over it, too… but I ended up falling on my ass. I think I slid some and ended up with my right knee bent out in front of me, but my leg below my knee seemed to be coming out at a 70ish degree angle from it… ugh. I had thought I had really messed up my knee, and sat down on some wooden pegs for a little to see the damage. After a little while I realized that my knee was fine, but it was my foot that ended up getting fucked up. I guess that’s the curse of being somewhat flexible… I usually am ok with joints, but when it comes to things like feet or hands or whatever I always get screwed. There was a tiny scrape on it and it hurt like hell when I walked. I ended up hobbling through the rest of the holes, but I still had fun. I also took some pictures which I’ll post after Matt leaves. I ended up sucking pretty bad (but Matt wasn’t so hot either and we ended up with 58 and 60, with him winning. While we were leaving Fun Land, we decided to get a photo album to save all of our stuff that we do together, like movie stubs and, well, score cards from miniature golfing We were going to Wal-Mart next, so we decided we would pick some up there.

I got my contact prescription filled (this time with the right card, yay) and we went about picking up some icy hot for me, some benadryl for Matt, and the photo album we had decided to get while leaving Fun Land.

After leaving, we decided we would go see the Matrix Reloaded, since I knew Matt really wanted to and I felt bad making him wait much longer. So we picked up some water bottles from the vending machine in Wal-Mart (because I’ll be damned if we were going to pay $3.50 each for a bottle at the theater… $.75 a piece is much more reasonable) and I hid them in my purse for when we went in. The next showing for the Matrix was about 40 minutes away, so we went back to the car where I applied icy hot and we talked about random stuff.

The movie ended up being alright. I wish I had remembered more from the first movie, but I knew enough for it to all make some sense at least. The camera angles were awesome, I’ll give it that… I can tolerate action better if it’s at least presented in an original way. Course, the anti-action, love-of-a-deep-plot part of me got somewhat annoyed when action scenes went on for like 20 or 30 minutes a piece… I just kept wondering why they couldn’t just move on already But it was nice. I’d probably be willing to see the next one with Matt in November when it comes out, since he’ll be visiting again around that time.

After the movie we just came home, since it was already around 9ish anyway. We didn’t really do all that much… just watched TV and talked some. I tried to work in my web pages, but Matt seemed lonely and unhappy when I did that, so I came back to lay with him. He seemed upset about something, and I kept asking what but he wouldn’t tell me. Well… I guess part of me sort of knew what it was about (since it was the only thing I could think of), but then the real reason wasn’t as simple as that. I wasn’t really in the mood for making love the previous day or so… just because I felt ick (again, damnit) and then last night it was because my foot was tender and sore and didn’t want to risk any harm to it… and that had led Matt to thinking about some stuff I told him about my past relationships, and it had put him in an unhappy and sad mood. I can understand why he would… I didn’t really explain those situations very well and didn’t really tell him why I was being to anti-physical for the previous couple of days. We got it all worked out though and said our sorries. I think that’s what I love most about Matt… even though real problems do sometimes arise, it doesn’t mean they’re going to be real arguments or real anger that follows… every conflict is always resolved and then everything is better. I simply love that.

Then, today, we didn’t do much. Since it’s nickle night at Video Club, we went there and picked up 4 videos (Catch Me if You Can, The Good Girl, Hot Chick, and Analyze That) and got some lunch at McDonalds. Since then we’ve just been watching movies and just hanging around.

While we were watching Hot Chick, Michelle called. I was so happy she did, since I had been meaning to for the past couple of days, but my phone paranoia was keeping me from really taking the plunge and just picking up the phone. She said she had tomorrow off, and we’ve arranged to meet her around noon in the Best Buy parking lot in Fredericksburg. The weather is supposed to be sunny, so maybe we’ll be able to go walking downtown or something for when she’s here, or maybe do something simple like seeing a movie or going bowling. I’m really excited about seeing her and having Matt and her meet Hopefully it’ll go good and Matt will feel comfortable enough to open up with her… Michelle and I are somewhat alike, so that should make it easier for him. And I’ll finally be able to give Michelle back her photo album, which I’m sure she’s been missing.

Goodness. Lots of typing

I’m cheating I posted this entry at 20 minutes til midnight on the 25th, just so I wouldn’t go so long without having an entry (and then have to write a big long entry to cover more days). I’ve been writing this entry off and on since then, and am posting it now (the 29th).

The drive up to Washington was okay. I was a lot more comfortable since this was the third time I had made that trip and had gotten somewhat used to it. I had left 2 hours ahead of time to compensate for “holiday traffic” but it ended up being exactly like it has been all the other times I’ve traveled there, if not lighter. Although the ride was nice, it was raining like it has been for the past week or so. I’m so sick of rain, especially having to drive in it (which I’ve always hated.)

Arriving at the airport 2 hours early wasn’t all that bad. It was in the different terminal than the one Matt had arrived in the first two trips, and luckily for me this one had alot more things to keep me occupied. While the other one just has a large room for baggage check in and pickup, this one has a string of shops and restaurants. I had tried eating some peanut butter toast that morning before leaving, but I just couldn’t seem to eat more than 4 bites of it, so I was starving by the time I was walking around the terminal. Matt had already given me the idea of stopping by Auntie Annes to get a pretzel like we had in November when he flew back, so after I had a hell of a time parking in the garage (took 20 minutes) and was safely in the building, I headed straight there. And oh, lucky me, I got to get a free pretzel because of a special they had going for buying a pretzel and a regular sized drink. The lady who took my order had a really thick accent so I didn’t quite get what she was saying at first… and when she told me there was a special going on, it totally threw me off. I usually have a plan of how conversations will go before I even get to the counter, and it threw me a real curve ball when she said something I didn’t quite get and motioned to a sign on the counter. I just ended up staring at it, frozen, not able to read the words… and just staring blankly at it. I tried looking for a picture but the single pretzel with the Aunt Annes logo wasn’t any help. I hate how I freeze up like that, but after some very long silences from me and some minor muttering and stuttering, I was able to read the sign and tell her another original pretzel was fine.

After that I went to a magazine store and picked up a Cosmo and some lime tick tacks. While I was walking to a place to sit (and struggling to hold the food, my coat, and the magazine) I was stopping every now and then and taking a picture of the building. I’ve always thought that particular terminal was so pretty, and just felt like taking some pictures of it. I probably looked rather odd… walking at a normal pace, then abruptly stopping and taking my camera up to the ceiling and taking a picture. I probably only took a total of 4 or 5… I’ll post them after the trip (and after the new layout is up).

So, there I sat in my chair that faced a window, eating my pretzel, drinking my water, and reading my trashy magazine, waiting for 2 hours to pass. It wasn’t all that bad, really. I ended up only being able to eat one pretzel and saving the second one for Matt.

When it got to be around 1:55, I walked over to the area that he would be coming out of and waited. I ended up having to move where I was standing alot, because people honestly couldn’t seem to bring themselves to not walk right at me… it’s almost like they were trying to walk into me. But, anyway… when it got to be about 2 o’clock and not really seeing any people from a flight coming through, I went to check and make sure that his flight was still only 2 minutes late, or if the little message beside the flight had changed to ARRIVED. Neither had happened, so I walked back and stood in my spot again, waiting patiently. He ended up coming around the corner sometime around 2:05 or 2:10 (not much time had passed, I know, but I had already been waiting a while and the couple more minutes were killing me We gave each other a hug, I showed him the pretzel I had saved for him, and we walked to go get his luggage.

He had quite a bit of luggage since it’s all of his clothes that he had had at school. It was roughly two big duffel sized bags. Luckily they both had wheels on them, and we were able to drag them back to the parking garage. I was so happy this terminal was actually attached to the parking garage and we didn’t need to take a shuttle like all the other times, since lugging those things up on to one of those would have sucked. I had offered to drive the car up to meet him since I had parked far away, but he insisted that he didn’t mind walking. After we got all his luggage situated and strapped into the backseat of the Saturn, he gave me this cute little stuffed animal… a dog with bunny ears on it. It’s sort of a tradition he’s made of always having some sort of stuffed animal to give me when he arrives, and they’re always so cute We got in the car and I put the cute little guy on the dashboard for safe keeping, and Matt asked for a kiss. We also have a little game we like to play to see who will kiss each other first (since it’s always sort of weird and timid the first time of a trip) and he ended up “giving in” since he said he couldn’t wait any longer to kiss me

The ride home was alright. Traffic was ok (though it’s always a bit worse on the way home) and the rain had basically stopped by then. Matt and I talked about music and stuff, and of where we were going to eat once we got back to Fredericksburg. Luckily Matt wanted McDonalds, so I wouldn’t have to fight any of the traffic in Fredericksburg for that since there’s one almost to LOW. I had gotten a headache from driving to and from DC (as I always seem to) and wasn’t really up for fooling with anything like that.

It was the first time I had actually eaten inside the new McDonalds there, and I was happy to find it was pretty neat and nicely decorated… big contrast from the Orange McDonalds, which was the last one I had been inside before then. I ended up seeing two people I knew (one girl, who’s name I forgot, that always used to have those permanent red blush marks on her cheeks in 8th grade… forget what those are called) and then the small Rubin boy, who I thought at first was a 10 year old driving a car. I had figured he would have hit puberty by now and grown some, but he was exactly how I had remembered him as a sophomore. Poor guy.

After that we decided we would pick up some videos from Video Club. We parked in the parking lot, and when I looked to my right I saw someone getting out of a car a couple of parking spots away. I saw them wave somewhat in our direction, but I figured it must have to someone nearby… but they kept walking toward us. The person even made an expression / gesture as if they were surprised I had not recognized them yet… and it was when they did that that I finally did recognize them. It was Michael. I had not seen him in almost 3 years I think (or two? not sure), though I had seen some pictures of him since then. He had changed alot since then, though… I would guess the things that threw me off the most was that his hair was the natural color brown and he had gained some weight. Not in a bad way, just in a different way. After I knew it was him, I frantically undid my seat belt and got out of the car and hugged him as tight as I could. I introduced him to Matt, and me and Michael just talked about random stuff… sort of catching up like even though we had done that a couple of weeks ago on AIM. He had just bought a new car for 17k the day before… not sure what type, but it was dark blue. We talked for quite a bit, and I felt bad that I couldn’t find any openings to involve Matt… but then, I was really thrown off guard by seeing him there. I told him to tell his mother hi for me (since they were in CVS somewhere) and Matt and I went on into Video Club.

And, of course, I saw more people in Video Club that I knew. Of course… the one thing I hate most of all, seeing people in public that I know, always happens in mass numbers I saw Ms Joncas, which was the mother of a childhood friend and my bus driver for elementary school. The only notable thing about talking to her was that when I mentioned that I was taking a year off, she only nodded and smiled as if it was totally ok, totally normal… most people sort of keep a blank expression when I move over that. Then, I saw the Johnson kids, Dean, Travis, and their little sister (whose name I can’t remember.) It’s odd that I would see them, since the most I remember about Dean was that he and Ms Joncas’ daughter were an item in 6th grade and I used to envy them so much for it… so, yeah. Odd I would see them both on the same day, especially with how I barley every go out anymore.

So… yeah. Luckily I survived all of that and we made it home with Minority Report and Red Dragon. We only ended up watching Minority Report (which was an ehh movie… I didn’t like how he shot the movie to look like AI) and not Red Dragon. We also kept them overdue for 2 days (even though if I had really been writing this entry on the date listed I wouldn’t know that, oops .

After we got back Matt was nice enough to go on a walk with me, even though he had not really felt like it at first. We had started playing a word game before that (thinking of as many words as we can that begin with the letter F… I was winning sort of But if we would have had to spell them, he would have been the winner). It was threatening to rain the whole time, but it still felt really nice outside and I really appreciated him coming with me. When we got back, we kept playing the word game and my mother played a little bit of it, too. We tried doing other letters later that night but still kept going back to F words, since we had never really finished that.

I usually have a problem with making love on the first night of a visit… I had learned to see it as bad with Alan, so it was always sort of something I tried to avoid unless I had really wanted to. On Sunday, I had wanted to… and we did something we had never done before. Just laid there, somewhat naked, just talking and stuff… it was really nice. But then, of course, my stomach started to bother me. Not even in the normal blah upset way, just some weird pressure that started to build up So… I felt bad since that was basically like teasing him

But we made up for that the next night when I was feeling better.

On the 26th (the day I posted this entry to be written later) I’m not entirely sure what we had done. If I can think of more, I’ll write it in later. All I really remember was going to Wendy’s and then going to see the new X-Men movie with Matt. I ended up really liking it, even though I was hesitant at first. I had thought the first one was ok (nothing all that great) but the second one was good

I’m writing pretty early in the day encase I’m too busy this evening to write. So far I’ve already vacuumed out the truck (it needed it badly) and put the mats back in the bathroom, but I still have yet to mop the kitchen floor once more and do all the rest of the laundry I have to. THEN, I have to manage getting to sleep early enough so I can be awake at 9:30ish. For the past week or so I haven’t been able to get to sleep before 5 or 6 AM no matter what I do… which always leaves me waking up at noon if I’m lucky (and actually wake up after my alarm goes off). So, blah. Matt’s flight isn’t even arriving until around 2PM, but I don’t want to take the risk of getting stuck in holiday traffic. Well, I know I probably will, but at least not be made late by it. At least Sunday will be the less traveled day out of the 3 day weekend.

I’m always so paranoid when Matt flys here… even though I was never really comfortable with air travel, I’ve been just terrified of planes crashing since 911. Not by the works of some crazy terrorist, but just crashing for some sort of failure or accident. I hate thinking of it because I honestly believe that means it may happen if I think about it to much. And I know how silly that is. It’s odd that I can understand something is silly but still believe it anywap alHeh… maybe that’s what religion’s all about

And, of course, there is now a “code orange” in effect. Of course. I don’t know why I would get jittery about it now since all the other times I just scoffed at it… but those times I wasn’t going to an airport, in DC, to pick up a loved one Why does the world have to be so fucked up and hateful that fears like this have no other choice but to exist.

I’m sure he’ll be fine. He’ll be totally fine. He’ll be in my arms a little more than 24 hours from now and it’ll all be alright and happy for two straight weeks.

I had some dreams about Matt’s trip last night. The first one… can’t remember any details, but somewhere along the line Matt turned into Alan and then I asked Alan to leave The second one involved some trouble with Matt getting through the door of my house… not that he couldn’t fit, but like him standing at the door was symbolic to him traveling here, or something… then we came inside and I showed him “our babies” (the baby axies) and I don’t remember anything else. It’s odd that I dreamed about it, though… I’ve never dreamed about someone visiting me before. Maybe this trip will be special. I’m going to try to be different and more loving, so maybe it will be. Hopefully it will

This morning my computer was freezing up. I couldn’t figure out why… just any program or anything I tried to open would have illegal operations or just not load. We had another of those little power blinks earlier this morning, and I’m not sure what that had to do with it since all it did was make my computer restart… but luckily I was able to get into safemood and reset my computer to yesterday morning, even though it also took forever for the system restore program to open. I’m somewhat worried about a computer virus, but maybe Matt can fix it when he’s here

I had wanted to do the Friday Five, but I went through all of yesterday honestly thinking it was Thursday… even though I knew when Matt was arriving on Sunday. Brain fart, I guess. I was busy cleaning the bathroom and changing out my winter clothes for summer to really worry about it. I also successfully forgot to go to the bank (because I forgot hours were different on Saturday… because I planned on today being Friday and my father actually started to scold me about it. When I told him no, he was like “you have to think of these things,” which is the same speech is always gives, even if I do remember. I had snapped back at him “Well, I’ve been too busy cleaning every fucking thing to remember to do it, I forgot.” He offered me some money and I may take it… I’d hate to depend on Matt for money This whole trip is going to be funded by him anyway, I’d hate to just add something to the list I wish Dianna had just given me a job and not stringed me along… hell, it was the last time he was here that I decided I would contact her about the job, and almost three months later there’s still no word.

I still haven’t contacted her yet since I was supposed to on the 15th… I’ve just been forgetting because of all the cleaning. And besides, it’s not like she’s contacting me about it, which isn’t at all hopeful… I know she’s probably really busy, but why would she make an offer to me and talk it up so much when she isn’t even really keeping track of my interest in it. I figure I’ve given her plenty of time to talk to that Mr. Lee person about the job, but most likely she hasn’t or has forgotten… and she’ll tell me “We’ve just been so busy!” Ugh :ehh:

But anyway. Must think happy thoughts. I so want to lay down and get some more sleep, but I’ve got to stay awake so I’ll actually want to sleep when I have to tonight. Blah blah blah

The most recent comment in my guestbook really made me smile. Though I’m not sure if it was Mr. Dahl that was teaching her web design class, I am near positive that it was him that made the CD and gave it to the teacher. I had Mr Dahl as my teacher for Multi Media 1 and 2, which I took freshmen and sophomore year. That class wasn’t all just about web design; it was actually just one assignment in the middle of various other graphic and media projects. There was still alot of work with designing and tinkering with code, and even though I complained alot about it at the time, it was still a “learning experience” for me. It was during those years that Mr. Dahl told me that he thought I could be a media designer as a future career. That idea had not even crossed my mind yet, and when he mentioned it I just feel in love with it. For the 4 years that followed, I honestly did want to achieve that. I even chose it as my major in college for the short time that I was there.

I had a class with Mr. Dahl for every year of high school. The whole time he was always supportive of me and the idea that I could really take something I loved and be able to make a living off of it. It’s only now that I’m realizing that designing is far too personal of a thing for me to mass produce it, but the appreciation of his supURL
and making me want to achieve and learn more will always be there. Reading that entry made me remember all those memories, and the fact that he had been saving my designs… it just really touched me for some reason. It made me miss him. He had e-mailed me while I was in college… checking up on me, but sort of in a more professional tone than friendly. I thought about responding, but at the time I was busy playing DAoC and not going to class, and I was sort of ashamed to report that. So I simply didn’t respond. Since then my e-mail has changed, and I would assume he no longer knows it (unless he’s kept track of this site’s address). I really should try to contact him. I really should.

And I’d love to talk to the girl who signed the guestbook, but she didn’t leave an e-mail. Fooy.

So… yeah. More design news. I have made a layout I am absolutely in love with. When I complete it, I think it will replace the spot as my favorite layout ever. My mother made a comment that it was very Lisa Frank, even though there isn’t any pink or purple in it Though I can see the resemblance of the vibrant colors. I’m going to hold out until Matt leaves to put it up, and alot of that will be torture for me I’ve also been trying to take my time with it, trying not to rush it… it seems the more I rush layouts the more likely I get sick of dealing with them, then I end up disliking them. Like this layout… I had rushed to finish it, and now I have mixed feelings about it. Especially now with this layout I love at the tips of my fingers, the idea of waiting two weeks kills me But at least Matt will be a nice, loving distraction of my silly design addiction

Speaking of Matt… I had sort of wanted to write about the things we plan on doing, just encase I don’t end up writing after all. I figure I would do them in list form, since there isn’t really anything great about it. Anything marked with a * means that there’s something special about it, but can’t go into detail because Matt reads this journal too

1. Celebrating our Anniversary. A week or so ago, while me and Matt were on the phone, I had the random idea of going to Luray Caverns. It’s not something that’s entirely “fun”, but it’s interesting and pretty and he’s never really been to anything quite like that before. I had gone a couple of times when I was younger, but only have snippets of what I remember. I remember the caverns in Indiana more than Luray, so it’d just be something nice and neat for both of us to go to. And, as an added bonus, it’s only about 1 and 1/2 to 2 hours away. Then, a couple of days ago I suggested that maybe we could go up there, have dinner, and then stay over night at the hotel. It wouldn’t be the most exciting thing, but the area is also in part of the Blue Ridge Mountains, and I have always found them so gorgeous and peaceful… it’ll give Matt and idea of what my college area looks like, since I always gush about how beautiful it was ;P All in all, it would just be a sweet little trip, a chance to get away from my parents for more than 24 hours and have some real privacy. It would be about $170ish total to do all of that (estimated, that is), but I think it’d be worth it. We’d be celebrating it before our actual anniversary (since the 6th is only one day before he leaves and we’d like to keep the high a little longer than one day before he leaves) and it’d have to be on a Tuesday/Wednesday combination because of my mother’s days off from work and us needing her Saturn to make the trip (since I don’t trust the truck to make that trip . *

2. Possibly going to Kings Dominion if we can get coupons. It’s only about an hour or so south of Fredericksburg, and I’ve always liked it there. When Matt and I went to Magic Mountain in August of 2002, we both weren’t feeling that well and weren’t really into going on any of the rides… so we ended up going back to the motel after only being on like one water ride I think. I’d probably feel more confident going to Kings Dominion, because I’ve ridden alot of the rollercoasters there, and I might not be so jittery about it all. Matt likes rollercoasters, so I’d like to go on some with him without freaking or chickening out. The only trick is getting me one rollercoaster, because after that I’d be fine with going on any… well, as long as they don’t go upside down that is. I’m still traumatized from going on the Loch Ness Monster as my first rollercoaster ever back when I was 10. Speaking of that… if we end up not going to Luray, we might make the trip down to Busch Gardens. Course, that is very ify… that’s 4 hours away, and it would definitely require an overnight stay. It just all depends. Bush Gardens is more of a theme park than an amusement park, if there’s any real difference. It seems to fit, and anyone who’s ever been there would know what I mean by that.

3. Uhm… *

4. Having a little picnic, maybe at the clubhouse by the water. We may make some food to bring, or just get some fast food and eat it there The air here hasn’t gotten that horrible sticky feeling to it yet, so it’ll probably still feel great to just be outside, enjoying the air. Course, we have to worry about bugs (I don’t know if Matt’s ever really experienced the joy of bugs CONSTANTLY going after you and especially any food in your possession) and maybe wind, but it’ll still be nice. If we don’t end up doing a picnic, we could also just have dinner in the clubhouse, since it looks over the lake as well. I’d have to find out some estimates of the price to eat there (since it might be expensive) but doing either or both would be great.

5. Lots of walks. I enjoy taking my walks, and I’d love to be able to keep doing them and have Matt come with me. It wouldn’t be required, but it would still be really nice to have some company, and to show Matt how pretty it can be here in the summer

6. Taking a really good tour of LOW, mainly focusing on views of the lake and nice areas. It’s been a while since I’ve really looked around the lake, and even though Matt and I made some 1/2 assed attempts of seeing the golf course and the lake while it was still windy and cold, it’ll be so much prettier to see it all again while everything is green and lush.

7. We may or may not go bowling We had sort of mentioned doing it while he was here last time, but never really got around to it. I know I’d like to go simply so I can see how they redid the inside of the place, since I spent alot of my time on my bowling league in the summer of 1998. He keeps saying I’ll kick his ass… and I may, but I doubt it. It’s been forever since I’ve bowled, so I’ll be really rusty. Besides… it’s not about winning, it’s about having fun

8. I’ve made some plans to have him meet both Michelle and Stephen. I’ve asked them both and they seemed cool with the idea. We’ll probably meet them both at different times though, since I don’t really want everyone to be overwhelmed from meeting all these new people I’m sure Michelle will be fine with Matt, but I had to warn Stephen to be “gentle” with him at first I enjoy Stephen at full force, it’s what I love about him, but I wanted to give Matt time to warm up to him before Stephen went all out. I suggested to Matt the other day that maybe we could go to Stephen’s and have a video game challenge thing, since we all love that kind of stuff and can lean and adapt to games fairly easily. I’ve already vowed that I’ll beet Matt at some James Bond game on his X-Box, event though I’ve never even played an X-Box game before Who knows how that’ll turn out.

9. On one day that we’re really bored, we could drive up to Orange. The countryside can be really pretty on the way up there, and some of Orange is quaint, too. Maybe while we’re up there we could meet Sandy, but that all depends on whether we go or not. I’d like him to see my old High School, even though they’re currently tearing it up piece by piece. I wish I had taken some pictures of it in it’s normal form, but at the time I didn’t think it was worth wasting film on. But at least he’ll be able to see some of what it looked like in the yearbooks I have.

10. We’re planning on seeing alot of movies. So far I’ve only picked Down with Love and Bruce Almighty, while Matt wants to see X-Men 2 and the Matrix 2. We’re planning on seeing two movies in a row, and sneaking into the second picture since we’re sorta poor Considering all the fast food we’ll probably be eating and the trips we’d like to take, it’s going to be cutting it tight… besides, we could download the movies for free if we wanted, so it’s no biggie if we can’t pull it off Well, at least I wouldn’t mind seeing mine that way. X-Men and Matrix would probably be better in the movie theaters. There could be other movies we’ll see, but we haven’t decided on any yet…

11. Even though neither Matt nor I are drinkers, I’ve asked my mother if she’d buy us some alcohol. Not so we can get totally smashed, but maybe just a little bit “nice” (I swear, the only thing I learned in college was the correct terms for levels of drunkenness and highness). My mother agreed, which is cool of her. We don’t really have to, it was just an idea… mainly since I love Shirley Temples so much. That’s usually a virgin drink, but I’ve had it served to me with alcohol in it once. Course, we still need to find a solid reliable recipe for Shirley Temples for that to work, so. Who knows. It just be something nice to experience with him.

So.. yeah I can’t think of anything else we talked about doing, but hopefully I’ll find time to write about those days in detail when they happen, and not wait until he’s gone and be like, “I don’t feel like writing.” I hate doing that, and I’ve done it the past three times (even though I was not currently keeping a journal after the first two trips, I probably should have made an exception and written just for that). But, yeah, anyway.

The past two days I’ve done nothing. I had planned on cleaning the truck yesterday, but of course it was raining… and it will be raining until Saturday. Totally figures I’ve done nothing yet today either, though I think I’m going to try to go through my closet and swap all my old winter clothes for my summer ones tonight. Hopefully I will. My motivation feels a little bit dead after the past week of cleaning or so, and especially with that layout on my mind. Hrm. Guess I should stop writing already and start revving myself up for that.

I’m not really in the mood for writing, but I figure I should. After this Sunday, my updates will be very scarce because of Matt being here, even though I’m going to attempt to write more. So… yeah. Doing this simply because I don’t want the month of May to be bare of entries… compared to the other months, that is.

The past three days have been spent cleaning. Saturday I went over my room again with the shampooer (and the water didn’t change color at all) though it does look a little bit better… it’s more like there’s dark “areas” on it rather than dark spots. Yesterday, I spent most of the evening mopping the kitchen… My mother helped a great deal (though she complained the whole time in a playful way), since we didn’t even know where an actual mop was. We’ve used the Swiffer Jet thing (don’t know if that’s the right name) for ages, but it’s nothing like scrubbing the hell out of a floor with a mop covered in badass cleaning chemicals Then, today, I had the lovely job of having axolotl shit up to my elbows today… erm, I mean, cleaning Herbetta’s tank. That alone took roughly 4 or 5 hours, but that’s mainly because I haven’t cleaned it since January… ugh, I’m such a bad pet owner

Speaking of Herbie… she’s been freaking out all evening since I put her in the tank. I gave her food before putting her in there, but she ended up throwing it all back up in a corner of her tank. I think she’s finally settled down (I haven’t heard the rocks moving in a while) but ehh :ehh: I guess the complete water change stressed her some… I’ve read that’s bad to do, but she never had a problem with it before. Maybe it’s because it’s been months since I’ve done it… but who knows. Why can’t my axies be healthy and happy all the time, and not get sick so much.

Most of the days that I was cleaning it was pouring outside, so I couldn’t even walk if I had wanted to. It finally cleared up yesterday, though, so around 7:30ish I went on my usual route. The smell outside was so amazing… the smell of the lake, the evening air; it make me think of cucumbers and flowers. It brought up alot of memories of riding bikes and hanging at sweetbrior park, or the pools here in the Lake… they’re not all good memories, but they’re the only ones I have of being younge it careless. I had hoped the same smell would be in the air when I went walking tonight, but it wasn’t… I guess it’s too early yet for it to always smell like that. Makes me look forward to the next time it rains.

I’ve also been working out more. When I go for a walk, I go into the garage and do 60 push things… not sure what they’re called, but they work the arms and the top part of your back. Then, after the walk, I finish up with 60 situps. It’s not really that much, but I feel great to be doing it with such stamina. Cleaning is probably also helping that along. But ehh

Ugh… tired of writing now Wasn’t really writing about much, anyway.