Just Married

Steve and I took the leap of faith today at the court house. The weather was on our side, or, rather, especially on mine since I was wearing one of the two gowns with just a thin shawl. I saw this dress right after I fell for the animal-print one and absolutely loved it, so I HAD to get it. It’s a faded gold on top and a really nice turqoise on the bottom. I call it the champagne dress.

In keeping with the theme that if friends hadn’t helped us, we wouldn’t have gotten married, one of the friends who came to witness the momentous occasion gave us the cash we had forgotten to get for the ceremony. Heck, I even forgot my ring at home, but thought we would exchange rings at the big ceremony we’re having on Saturday.

The same friend gave me a really beautiful bouquet of white roses. Naturally, I had not thought about getting one myself and Steve is too frazzled these days to have remembered or reminded me. The same friend took a lot of pictures, so he was really instrumental to our ceremony. Which made him happy because, unfortunately, he cannot be with us on Saturday.

The other friend who came today is going to be one of my maids of honor. She got married in the exact same room, by the exact same lawyer. She has an even funnier story because she couldn’t take a day off from work to get married (talk about work-life balance), so she and her husband went there during their lunch break and then went back to work. Apparently, there are two more couples in her group of friends who got married there, so now we clearly have to start a club.

And yes, I am going to post pics, but I have no idea when. We still have a lot of things to do. I just hope we won’t be too exhausted on Saturday to show up at our wedding ceremony.

Update

The Big Date is coming fast. We’re getting married on Wednesday at the justice of the peace and celebrate the folly on Saturday . Of course, I HAD to have two really busy days at work and will need to come in on Wednesday morning, too. Arrgh. We haven’t even thought the ceremony through yet, BUT, we bought the booze yesterday, so I guess we have our priorities straight.

In other news, I found a really cool necklace and a pair of sexy sandals that go really well with the crazy dress. I wasn’t hoping to find them given how unusual the dress is, so I’m amazed at how well and timely things are falling into place. Hope I’m not jinxing it but if I do, I trust Mr. Jinks will figure it out.

Speaking of, he gave me the honor of climbing on me to be picked up and put on my shoulder. I was floored! Steve was sad: “Am I losing you, Jinks? This used to be our bonding ritual.”

And one night when I was completely conked out, Steve told me that Jinks sat on me and was talking to me, very puzzled that I wasn’t responding. I don’t remember anything, which is surprising given that Jinks weighs 14 pounds.

But anyway, back to my initial topic, things are well under way and we hope everything will unfold without a hitch. Other than that between the two of us.

A Wish from My Mentor

Have a great last weekend as a single babe .

A Future Biker

I couldn’t resist not posting this pic from when I was 2 and a half years old. Who knew that biking was going to loom so large in my life later on?

Biking at Night

Now that it gets darker earlier, I have no choice but to bike at night. And, to my surprise, I’ve discovered I really like it. The best part is that hills don’t seem as steep as they do in daylight, simply because your sense of proportion is a little skewed. The less-than-nice part is that certain sections of the bike trail are really dark and, while I have good lights, it’s not much fun to bike there by yourself. Soooo, confronted with that prospect again a few days ago, I decided that I was going to bike on M Street; otherwise, a much more direct route. But M Street is jam-packed with cars at almost any time and I was afraid I wouldn’t be alert enough to the traffic.

Enter Zita, my adventurous, trailblazing, athletic friend who, together with her husband, bikes in any weather (except when it snows or there’s ice on the ground). Brrrr. She passed me on the trail one night and we stopped to catch up. That used to happen quite frequently when I used to go to work very early; I would bump into her as she was training for a marathon. We don’t get together too much because she’s too busy, but we enjoy such moments a lot. The same thing the other day, when I asked her how she deals with biking at night. Well, she bikes on M Street. She doesn’t like it very much because she has to be super alert, but it’s the most direct and well-lit way.

And last Thursday I gave it a shot. It was 8 pm, so traffic had died down a bit from the rush-hour peak. And, what do you know, it was a very smooth ride. Drivers were nice, kept a good distance from me, and treated me like a vehicle, which is exactly what you want. Man, what an incredibly liberating feeling to be able to bike on a street busy enough to make you feel alive! It was a very Zen-like experience, amplified by a balmy air and this feeling that I was part of a flow of people and cars moving in the same rhythm.

Undecided Tree

And one that has no doubts what season it wants to belong to.

Social Insurance and Hitler

You didn’t think these two could ever be associated in the same sentence in a positive way, right? I was pretty shocked to find out, too. And yet, Hitler exported to the Netherlands, Belgium and France the social insurance system created by Otto von Bismarck in 1883. Mind-boggling.

http://prescriptions.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/29/health-care-abroad-germany/

For the first time ever there is a good chance that Congress will pass a health care reform bill meant to give more people health insurance, so the news is pretty much all health care all the time. Naturally, curious minds have started looking into what other countries do. The very idea that in America you can easily go bankrupt because of medical bills (remember, 60% of personal bankruptcies) is a concept Europeans can’t wrap their minds around. Just as mind-boggling as the fact that Hitler gave France it’s social insurance system, which is very much envied in the US, by the way.