Happy Birthday Mr. Monkey!

In just a few short hours the love of my life is turning 45 (which seems weird to me since I pretty regularly forget that he is, well, a smidge older than I am). I'm pretty sure that I am more excited about his birthday than he is, mostly because I feel that I have kicked ass in the present department and am really, really looking forward to giving him one gift in particular. The gift itself isn't especially expensive or anything--I just suspect he'll like it a lot and I am proud of myself for thinking of it. I love giving good gift.

So, in honor of my beloved's birthday, a brief list to highlight some of the many, many things I love about this man:

1. The way he smells. I pretty regularly sniff him (which is why I get asked pretty regularly "why is your face in my armpit?") and I can't get enough.

2. The way he dances to the Law and Order theme song

3. The fact that he puts up with my need to sleep with at least 3, if not 4, pillows at night. It is true that he frequently steals and hides my pillows when I am not looking, but he eventually gives them back.

4. He is such a good kisser

5. He takes good care of himself and is quite the runner guy. I'm proud of the fact that he runs 7 miles a night and comes home as the worlds most sweaty man.

6. Did I mention the kissing? Really, the boy has some skills.

7. He writes me poems that make me want to cry...they are that good.

8. He is, I think, one of the smartest people I've ever met.

9. He asks really, really good questions

10. He has the best legs I've ever seen.

Sigh. I'm a lucky monkey.

Happy Birthday baby!

Tolerating

Michael and I live in a little yellow house that has three front doors. Well, actually, one front door and two very nearby side doors. This is a house that suffers from an addition that seems rather casually planned. I don't really understand why there are three doors all about 10 feet from each other, but I suppose I'll be thankful for it someday. Like if there is ever a stampeding crowd in our kitchen or something. You know how those kitchen crowds can get.

Anyways, there is, on the siding near the real front door, a rather large reddish stain. It looks a bit like someone threw a marinara filled water balloon at it. It always annoys me when I notice it. But that's thing. I hardly ever notice it. I don't know when it appeared but I do know that when I first saw it I thought "Hmm. Gross. Must clean" and then I walked away and didn't clean it. And I didn't clean it and didn't clean it and didn't clean it, day after day. Most days, truthfully, I don't even notice it. On the days when I do, it startles me a little and I think "Hmm. Still there. Gross. I should clean that". And then I walk away.

I sometimes wonder about our ability to tolerate things, especially things that annoy us or that we, on some level, wish were different. Tolerating is easier than changing, I guess, but why do we do it? Why do we settle? How is it that we can so quickly become accustom to something we never planned on?

Michael and I went to the 4th Avenue street fair this weekend to visit our fabulous friends Chris and John and as we walked along, I turned to the side and caught a glimpse of myself in a shop window and was stunned for a second. I had a moment of feeling, very clearly, that I have become numb and used to some things that do me no good. I am not, of course, talking about Michael or our marriage or anything like that. That part of my life continues to delight and surprise me. I'm talking about more internal stuff.

When, for example, did I become used to the idea that I didn't have to write everyday when writing was something that was so important to me just a few years ago? How did I get so out of shape and unhealthy looking without noticing it on a day by day basis? Why I am so much more comfortable challenging myself at work than I am at home? I feel like I am settling in some areas and it feels so easy not to think about it.

I feel blue tonight but maybe I need to. Maybe some discomfort is what I need right now. I honestly don't know.

A weekend without a plan

Ahhh...such a beautiful thing. I have no plans for this weekend. No commitments, no birthday parties, no essential errands to run, no big house cleaning to do (sure, the house could use some cleaning but we have the boys this weekend and I firmly believe that cleaning the house while it is full of teenage boys is an exercise in total futility).

I started this weekend by sleeping in until 10:15am and it is now 1pm and I am still wearing my pajamas and fuzzy robe. The teeth-not brushed. The shower-avoided. The hair- uncombed.

I don't really have a to do list for this weekend, so given that I am required to have a least one list going at all times (seriously, bad things will happen if I don't have a list. World spinning off its axis kind of bad things), I think I'll make a want to do list.

1. Play tennis with husband and/or stepson
2. Have some coffee and writing time away from the house. I haven't been fun writing in awhile and I feel something brewing in my mind but I need so time and some practice to get it out.
3. Bake a cake, from scratch for step son #1's birthday
4. Finish my book- Teacher Man by Frank McCort- before my book club meets next week.
5. Go see a cheap movie

It is a full list but I think I can do it, though I fear that I will in fact have to shower at some point this weekend. I'm tough though, I can take it.

Pervy

I am seriously in love with my iPod. Really. I know it is partly the thrill of a new toy but I think I could be hooked. I've been adding songs for over an hour and I am quickly discovering that I have kind of pervy tastes in music. Actually, most of my musical preferences are pretty darn vanilla, but when it comes to adding songs to work out to--I take a turn to the graphic.

exhibit A: "How Do You Want It?" by Tupac. A whole song devoted to negotiating the ideal sexual position...how considerate of him. I used to listen to this song all of the time when I was in college and I had a crazed rap fan for a roommate. There was always something that made me laugh about listening to Tupac's greatest hits before heading off to New Testament Theology. Time has not lessened my enjoyment of this song.

exhibit B: "Slow Jamz" by Kanye West. I can not help myself and my love for this song. Any song that can rhyme " Luther Vandross" and "pants off" is a little bit of perfection in my book.

Even my cool down and warm up songs are kind of pervy, though more of them are in the classy pervy genre. Is that an actual genre? If it isn't, it certainly should be. Classy pervy is just as pervy as regular pervy, it just calls for the use of phrases like "make love" and "get it on" instead of the briskly efficient "fuck" and the ever so slightly more subtle "do it" found in regular pervy songs.

Hmm. Maybe I should warn the husband about the pervyness. He may begin to wonder why I want to molest him as soon as I get home from the gym.

I am a good person...

with very bad teeth.

I went to the dentist yesterday and was informed that I will be on the receiving end of a double root canal next week. Yay! Something both expensive and painful to look forward to. I am working to overcome my sense of shame about the whole thing. I now suspect that my dentist thinks I am a dirty, floss avoiding non-teeth brusher. Not true! I am close friends with my toothbrush. I floss all the time, or at least some of the time. Sometimes, I am trying to convice myself, bad teeth happen to good people.

The brightside, a very dim brightside, but a brightside nonetheless, is that I can take my handy dandy new iPod with me and zone out to music while they drill away at my face. I am a little bit in love with my iPod. I was listening to it at work during lunch today and, I must say, the shuffle function is quite fun. Where else can I hope to hear a Dolly Parton followed by Kanye West then Jeff Buckley and then wrapped up with a little Kansas action?

I'm no expert, but I think these iPod things have a real future.

Hey...this thing still works!

Huh.

So, basically, I suck. I've been a bad, negligent blogger monkey lately. Mostly it is due to the new job and the fact that I am now have actual work to do during the day instead of just blogging and reading celebrity gossip on-line.

I am going to try to get back into the blogging habit though...mostly because I am self centered and want to once again experience the giddy thrill of seeing my words looking all official like on a website.

What am I going to write about? Damned if I know, but I do have to attend traffic school tomorrow morning (I have to be there at 7 freaking 30 in the morning. Boo! Hiss!) so I'm almost positive I can find something nice and snarky to say about that. After that, who knows. Tune in and see.