I'm tired

Why nurses should get paid more money:

Not only do we have to work with you, we have to work with your family. And often, we have to work with doctors.

Sometimes, ya'll are wonderful. Sometimes, ya'll sound less tempting than, say, a screaming toddler. Sometimes you remind us of one.

This day kicked my ass. I'm so grateful for Glen and Adorable-Stacia for getting married and giving me free drinks this weekend. I'm going to wear my pretty dress with a fantastic push-up bra that gives me outstanding cleavage. It's beautiful, the cleavage, that bra brings to the table. I'll wear my sexy platform sandles with a spankin' new pedicure. My eyebrows will be freshly waxed. On Friday, Nancy is taking me to wine tasting at Salute in Vancouver. But my poor husband is stuck at work. Poor husband.

It's been a pretty nice seven days. After a busy stretch at work, I participated in one of my new activities: doing jack shit. I would have liked to have done this more as a teenager, but that wasn't allowed in the Chase household. I would frequently make up copious amounts of homework in order to hide in my room and read romance novels. Now, as an adult, I sit on the couch (or my bed, or the bathtub, or outside) read romance novels and do jack shit. Don't even have to hide it. I keep trying to endorse my newfound skills to Nancy, but she really wants nothing to do with it. The only time she'll consider it is 1) in Mexico or 2) sick as a dog (and even then only if she's not bored yet with napping on the couch.

We spent Saturday with our new copy of The Goblet of Fire on DVD. Love Harry Potter, love him. But I get mad when Kevin fast forwards stressful bits without asking first.

Sunday we had a big date! Steve gave up tickets to Wonderful Town at Seattle's 5th Avenue Theater. Good show for a Sunday night. Lighthearted, sweet, and funny. We had a mediocre dinner at Elephant and Castle. Being that they're all "Hey, we're a really real British pub!" I thought I could get Guiness with black current. If you don't know what I'm talking about, take a look at my archives. But they didn't have a fucking clue what I was talking about. I'm thinking I'll have to call around British pubs and order the stuff my own self. But the show was a riot, and we even recognized a few faces from Kevin's days at TAG.

Today, I made up for my laziness by spending THREE HOURS working on the mess of a file cabinet. It was a living disaster. I shredded eight bags of stuff. I still need to make order of the files, but at least the crap is gone.

If I write long enough, it will stop raining and I can walk the dogs.

Kevin had a copy of "The Hitchhiker's Guide to The Galaxy" to return to a work-friend. I watched it, seriously, five times in a row. First, the movie alone. Then with the two commentaries, then with the commentaries again. I must own this movie and watch it MORE. This has lead off a big Douglas Adams kick. I had to return a library book with the page number jotted down somewhere to get back to it, for HHGG (or H2G2 depending on your in-factor) could not wait. So having a bit of spending money, Kevin "The Best Husband Ever" let me go over budget to get the "Trilogy in Five Part" complete book. I'm at the last book, "Mostly Harmless." I also have, from the library, two Adams biographies, his final book "The Salmon of Doubt" and "Don't Panic: A guide to the Guide" by Neil Gaiman. Douglas Adams died suddenly of a heart attack at 49 years old, so I read with a bit of sadness, knowing nothing new will follow.

And if that's not enough reading, Eloisa James' "The Taming of the Duke" has hit bookstores. It's her third in the Lennox sisters series, all with a touch of Shakespeare. Eloisa, in her real life, is a Shakespeare professor. She says she hate The Taming of the Shrew, but liked the idea of the man becoming tamed. This novel also has a bit of a twist: two heros are featured. So which one (in this case, brothers) will get the girl? I'll probably tackle this after Mostly Harmless.

I think the rain has stopped. Off I go with the puppies.

And a pause for a brief advertisement

The Tacoma Symphony is performing Vaughn Williams' "The Sea Symphony" Saturday, April 8th at the Pantages. It's bitchin' hard and has kicked my ass six ways to Sunday. And to all the lovely people who ask, "Oh, do you have a solo?" God Bless you for the flattery, but no, not a chance in hell. But it's a pretty fantastic piece of music. It's grown on me quite a bit as I've spent hours practicing the sucker. All big chords and lush sweeps of music. Nothing subtle about it.

Nancy and Kevin will be there, so pop on over and say hi.

Fair has nothing to do with it

Just a small example of the high quality parents coming out of my hospital:

We have two meth-positive newborns in our nursery
One has a baby's daddy who just got out of prison and if she's not evicted from her apartment, well, she'd have a lot less stress in her life
We discharged one mom back to her involuntary mental health hospitalization

So to all those people who tell me how FUN my job must be...."Oh, you get to see all the babies!" It's a job, and occasionally, it's horrid.

Things not to do at 9pm

1. Bathe your dog after she rolls in something so foul on her final night-time potty outing, but she knows "something is up" and you almost have to carry her up the stairs and into the guest bathroom (because there is no hellish way she's going in my freshly cleaned master bath), and then she stands shaking in the bathtub because, really, a bath is just one step away from the true torture of getting one's nails clipped.

A good Sunday

The sun shone. I did some chores. We have lots of food in the house. My husband returned from his wild party where he drank some punch, the crazy guy. Laundry is done. I'll clean the bathroom and listen to American Roots on NPR. Then I'll go to sleep.

I also finished a great book today. The Labyrinth by Kate Mosse. Clever story with interesting characters. Unpredictable. I hope the library doesn't notice I spilled wine on a page.

This week I get to attend the Franciscan Awards Ceremony. I will receive my Five-Year pin. Call me dorky, but I'm pretty excited.

And "Ring of Fire" shall be the theme song

Who knows how to party?

Labor and Delivery nurses.

I'd tell you all about it: the belly dancing costumes, the "I'm All Out of Love" singalong, the dancing with props, the pelvic thrusts....

But what happens between nurses, stays between nurses

The day after

We celebrated St. Patrick's Day with Don, Cindy, Ben (and wife in town), and Emily. Great group of friends, tons of people there. Lots of corned beef and cabbage. Even more booze. For the second time in a row, I was the DD. While I drank Diet Coke, the crowd guzzled Dublin Car Bombs (drop of shot of Irish Creme into Guinness and drink fast before it curdles. Gross on wheels). We played Catch Phrase, the best game ever. I made Chocolate Stuff, renamed "Pierce Brosnan is a sex god Chocolate Stuff" in honor of the day. Every last crumb was eaten, because I am a white trash baking goddess! Only one person got sloppy drunk, some guy named Zane (?) who I'd never met. We left as they were starting the sing-a-long, and I don't like them if I don't know any of the songs, which I didn't. Kevin let me sleep until 9am, making him my favorite husband ever. And he made coffee. If he wasn't leaving me this evening, I'd thank him proper-like. But Kevin is heading down with Steve to Portland. His old vampire gaming buddies....

detour: Steve didn't know what a lap dance was. So I demonstrated one, in my rotty bathrobe, complete with descriptive statements, "And then she'll shake her junk like this!"

...hold an annual "Drink like a fish party." I don't think they really drink like fishes, because we are now all old, and some have gone through rehab. But the name stays. So I'm heading over to a co-workers house this evening to celebrate a 50th birthday! And thanks to one of my charge nurses, I've been cut the four hours I was going to work! Yee Haw!

So far, it's looking to be a great weekend.

Fun with Taxes

I am so tickled pink with sequins this year. Our tax guy estimates that we'll actually get a refund this year, "but not very much." I squealed right there in his very office and did a chair dance. A chair dance is not a lap dance. A chair dance is where you dance in your chair. And if you don't know what a lap dance is, call me up and I'll come over and give you one. I told him that I was simply thrilled to not pay $800 this year. Deductions, that is the secret, he says. Well, I'll just be saving every damned receipt I can think of this next year. Not that we now have a jackpot of cash, as this unexpected excess (the taxes we thought we'd pay) will just feed the Visa. And we might go out to dinner, to celebrate!

I bought my new books, "God Save the Sweet Potato Queens" and "The Sweet Potato Queens Big-Ass Cookbook (and financial planner)." I'm still thinking about the lip gloss. I'm going to finish up a work presentation, practice The Sea Symphony, and spend some time doing Jack Shit. It's becoming one of my favorite activities. Being "busy" is incredibly overrated, I've decided, and my goal is now to avoid busy as much as humanly possible.

Lena has returned from Sweden and both her children (and her husband) are still among the living. I'm even more convinced that "traveling with small children" will not occur in his household unless it's truly worth it. For example, if one of our amazing cousins happens to decide to marry his charming and adorable girlfriend while we have "small children," and it looks to be a very fun wedding with booze, food, dancing, and all sorts of disruptive behavior, and I can't get away with leaving small children at home, then I might possibly be convinced to travel with small children.

But I'll drug them happily on the plane. And at night.

My reward for working hard this weekend

Is doing my taxes! Or rather, having somebody do my taxes. We'll see if it's worse this year. Everybody says it's a great benefit to having a baby: tax breaks. Sounds like a good reason to me!

La Boheme opened/closed this weekend as a rousing success. I attended the show Friday night, and Kevin's parent's caught the Sunday matinee. While nobody can compare to the riot-ness of the 2005 Tosca cast/crew, this group was a pretty great group of folks. Generous, warm, and very talented. The majority of them were local, or at least their parents were local. Tickets sold fast and the house was quite full both nights.

Next year: CARMEN! For Three Night! This is a huge step up for Tacoma Opera. Kathryn already told Kevin to "save those dates!"

Kevin and I decided that we would each take some opera money to play with. A whole $25 each. Don't say that we can't party it up at our house. But we have a credit card that we'd really like to pay off before having a baby (whenever that happens, not pregnant yet). And I already know what I want: two "Sweet Potato Queen" books from the used bookstore and a new lip gloss from Target.

Saturday night, Mary and Jerry had Grace all to themselves, so we joined them for a short dinner party when I got off work. Their dinner was amazing. Mary cooked a corned beef with cabbage, potatoes, and carrots. We had homemade soda bread. Jerry made an Irish Cream chocolate creme for dessert. Yummy. Grace is becoming more of a toddler everyday and is simply a riot. She showed off such skills as petting the dog nice, putting her hat on the dog, and flinging whipped cream on Nana's face as a surprise attack. The last one was a personal evening favorite. It was a great evening.

I haven't written anything because my life is boring

And honestly, I'm a fan of boring at the moment. I've had the last three days off (and on call today whoo hoo), and have been working on some small deadlines. I hate deadlines, I'd rather read all my lovely books from the library. And this is easy shit I'm trying to do. I don't think grad school is in my near future.

But I did accomplish:
-Working on my taxes
-Paying bills
-Practicing The Sea Symphony (another bitchin' hard choral piece)
-Scheduling "appointments," like the eye doctor. Turns out I can't see far distances! Who knew? -No wonder Kevin was mad at me when I'd miss street signs. I always thought the SOB was driving too fast.
-Entertaining the dogs
-Cleaning the house

Kevin and I officially celebrated our anniversary yesterday. Embracing our inner senior citizen, we had the "early bird special" at Stanley and Seafort's! They call it "First Seating" but it's the old lady bargain dinner. And it was tasty. Salad, entree, and light dessert for $20! We had cocktails, mine was the Lavender Martini, wine with dinner, and joowry. I bought Kevin a titanium link bracelet and he got me two tone gold hoop earrings. It was so special to splurge a bit on each other. With us, every anniversary is the jewelry anniversary. I love family traditions. We ended the evening with drinks at the El Goucho bar listening to cheesy lounge music. Perfection.

Tonight is the opening of La Boheme, and it looks to be amazing. I watched the final dress rehearsal, smack in the middle of elementary school kids. My favorite moment was when this darling girl, with her multiple braids and pretty dress, turned to me and commented quite seriously, "I don't think they should have kissing in front of kids." I replied that that the kissing is more for the grown ups. She didn't buy it. But my ultimate favorite "What would Nancy do?" moment was right before the show started. The lights were down, the orchestra was starting, but the house was still quiet. Then I heard it.....crinkling candy wrappers. The teacher was about five seats to my right. I'd heard to talk to the young students about food in the theater. I think, "She must hear this." Turing to look at her, I see the girl sitting RIGHT NEXT TO HER opening her hot tamales. With the teacher's help. Now I'm pissed, and even more settling in my belief that people just don't know how to behave. I stare at this teacher, waiting for her to take control. Then I see her helping to unwrap said candy. At that moment I cheerfully channeled my mother, stared that lady down and whispered VERY LOUDLY: You Can't Eat in Here. Loud enough for all the students, teachers, and people surrounding her to know exactly who was the target.

She looked rather embarrassed, not to mention a little surprised. Good. She should know better. But she doesn't, because most people just don't know how to behave.

A Thank You Note

Our dear friends:

Thank you so much for your rapid change in travel plans. I was so touched by your immense compassion and sensitivity. Thank you for thinking of me, for your insight, and your willingness to take the first step. I am so very grateful to you both.

Love
Jenny

I only wish I were this witty

Oscar Wilde: The Portrait of Dorian Gray. You are a

horror novel from the world of dandies, rich

pretty boys, art and aesthetics, and

intellectual debates between ethical people

and decadent pleasure-seekers. You value

beauty and pleasure but realize their

dangers, as well.


Which literature classic are you?

Camille's husband: Please take this silly quiz, I thought of you when I saw it.

Four Years

Today is our anniversary! Four years! In celebration, Kevin and I:
Barely saw each other (he's working his lil' tail off for TLT and Tacoma Opera)
Had a 25 minute dinner at East/West Cafe
Spent a little time together at evening rehearsal, and I brought rice crispie treats coated with chocolate and peanut butter

But flowers have been involved today! Roses for me, tulips for him! I love getting flowers.

Who cares about an improbable plot?

I've been waiting.....and it's been so hard! But the next book in Lisa Kleypas' "Wallflowers" series is here!

The Devil in Winter, the story of Lady Evie and Lord Sebastian (he was the villian in the second book It Happened One Autumn). She offers him the devil's own deal: marriage in exchange for safety from her abusive relatives. Her estranged father is dying, and her mother's siblings are planning on killing her to claim her fortune the second she inherits. He's a poverty stricken member of the aristocracy, and his plan of forcing an American heiress into marriage ending badly (her fiance rescued her and beat the shit out of him). Evie's fortune for Sebastian's protection.

Oh, and lot's of fabulous sexual tension. Lisa writes sex almost as good as Virginia Henley (aka The Virgin Queen). Yum.