Uncertainty

I'm probably getting a raise.  I almost hate saying that now.  It feels gloat-y. I have a couple friends who have lost jobs, and another who is having trouble getting one to start with.  I mean, I'm only getting 1% in an annual adjustment, but I'm getting a bump up to the next pay grade too, so thats another hundred or so a month.  Not a lot, but I'm grateful for it. 

I don't know.  I mean, the governor could announce lay-offs tomorrow for all I know. But right now, things are ok.  I'm getting married in 9 months.  By then we'll have enough money to buy a house (assuming banks are lending!).  I have a good job.  I'm hopeful about Obama and the next 8 years. I have good insurance.  I don't own a house and have no money in the stock market. Gas prices are actually going down. 

But still.  Does this economy make anyone else feel like it could all come crashing down at any moment?

Piss on the Fire! Go Crew!

Happy

So. I'm done dealing with the layout, thank goodness. I can't believe I once considered a career as a programmer. I'm sick of HTML! Anyway. It is a happy day. (Kind of) premature congrats to Sasha! My belief is that an engagement is a promise, not a piece of jewelry. But if that promise happens to coincide with a gift of something shiny, who are we to complain?

But seriously folks. I'm not feeling especially long winded, so I'll save my rant about symbols vs. reality in relationships and how those things affect how relationships are viewed by others. For now, I'll just say I'm looking forward to having someone sane to commiserate with! Sasha, I hope you don't have to fight off a crazy portugese lady with a veil like I did.

Later Days,
Laura

My blog (ick! hate that word) looks a little sad right now. I'm messing around with templates; soon it will be happy again!

I never thought this day would come

Let me gloat for just a sec. WHOOOHOOO!!!!!!!!!

Ok. Done. All I can think about right now is waking up after election day four years ago completely heartbroken. Constitutional bans on gay marriage passed. Bush won. I was despondant. Hate and fear were productive campaign tactics. To be crass, it completely sucked. And now? I'm jubilant. There are a few ballot measures I'm still looking at, but I feel like hope and unity are more important to our country right now than oppression and moral elitism. I'm thrilled. More later, when I'm less emotional.

Later Days,
Laura

Being in a mutual responsible relationship is a dream, dream, dream

I have this jingle from a horrible commercial stuck in my head. It's for the "Rose Petal Cottage". The line I can't stop singing goes "I love when my laundry smells so clean. Taking care of my home is a dream, dream, dream." Need I mention that the commercial only shows girls and the cottage is in yellows, pinks and purples? This comes from the makers of the "lillypad castle" where a girl can "wait for her prince to come". Frog to kiss included. No joke.

Ack.

It's a good day, Tater.

So I've spent the day decorating/rearranging my apartment. It looks pretty fantastic. It doesn't have those typical apartment white walls; they're actually a pretty grey/blue.

The impetus for the whole shebang was getting my TV out of the bedroom. I put it in the 2nd bedroom/office and put the elliptical back there to get it out of the living room. Its especially nice because now I can have the TV on while on the computer. Futurama is on right now.

Side note: why aren't there any guys in cleaning supplies commercials? Besides the hapless husband/child archetype, of course. It bothers me. Jimmy does just as much cleaning as I do, typically. And neither of us particularly enjoys it. So, boo marketing. Maybe if TV actually portrayed men cleaning, societal opinion of cleaning as "women's work" would start to shift.

Anyway. TV is out of my bedroom, which is good. All my boxes are now unpacked or put away, which is great. AND I cashed in my points and am getting a new entertainment center and curtains! Ok, maybe I'm overly excited. But I like it when my place looks pretty.

In other news, I've switched to a four day workweek. It makes the days long, but I really like having a three day weekend. I'm running up to Florence a lot to do wedding stuff and help my mom decorate the basement. And I'm going up to Toledo a couple of times next month, so the extra weekend day is really useful. Yay state government!

Hey, did you see that Colin Powell endores Barack Obama? I always liked that guy. Except for the whole anthrax vial at the UN thing. But everyone makes mistakes.

Later Days,
Laura

I got a wedding dress!!!

Only suckers own stocks

So, our economy is in the tanker.   Never before have I been so glad that I don't actually have any investments.  I mean, I would like to buy a house in approximately 10 months and the credit freeze may put a damper on that particular plan...  But I work for the state, my job isn't going anywhere.  And I do love my apartment, so if Jimmy and I have to sit tight, save our money, and keep on renting for a little bit after we're married, so be it. 

Although, I have faith in the credit union.  KY is like, 46th on the list of foreclosures, so we're doing ok.  And because the Commonwealth Credit Union is only in KY, I feel good about it.  No, really.  I'm staying positive. 

Next week I start my four day workweek.  Yay!  I'm going to be off Fridays, which is exciting because it will give me a normal workweek to do some wedding planning up in Cincinnati. We're starting the wedding dress search in a couple weeks.  Sweet. 

Wedding stuff is actually going along smoothly.  We've got a working guest list. I have all the stationary-ness all designed and ready to be printed.  We've put down a deposit on the venue.  I have my officiant (dad) all lined up.  I have a short list of caterers, florists and photographers to interview.  We have a short list of resorts to give to Jimmy's mom so we can get the timeshare stuff squared away.  Umm, what else?  We've decided to hire a jazz trio for the reception, hopefully these guys Jimmy knew from Willis.  Ceremony music is still up in the air, but we have a few different ideas.  The ceremony itself is going to be pulled from the LBW.  Dad, Jimmy and I need to sit down and iron out those details sometime in the next, oh, nine months or so. 

Wedding planning is so easy for us non-perfectionists.  I'm amazing at not sweating the small stuff, to use a pretty trite cliche.  I'm sure dealing with vendors wont be the most fun thing in the world, but I'm actually a little excited to use the extensive negotiation training that I've been put through for work.  Seriously.  I've gotten really good at getting people to do what I want.  Thanks, DENF!

Anyway.  The daily show is almost on and I hope to see McCain's speech from Capital.  Did you see that?  I got to see McCain look stupid from my little alma mater over and over again all day.  It was good.

Later Days,

Laura

Why get married when you can just be a babysitter?

So I was flipping through one of those wedding magazines yesterday to look at the dresses and, for some unknown reason, I decided to read one of the articles. It was on "how to get him involved in the wedding planning". If I were a guy, I would be kind of offended. It was pretty funny, though. Partially because Jimmy really wants to be involved, but mostly because the article basically says that all guys are emotionally five and need to be tricked into caring about their wedding. These tricks including buying them a toy (or gadget) every time they cross something off their to-do list, tap into their competitive side by talking about how helpful your friends' husbands are, or by sneaking stuff in on the way to doing things they want to do. Kind of weird.

Anyway, moral of the story: Bridal magazines are dumb, but they have pretty dresses.

You wont be sorry

Ms. Pac Man: feminist icon

I'm happy being me

I'm still trying to figure out what to say to people when the whole changing-last-name issue comes up in regard to my pending nuptials. (I'm getting tired of the word "wedding"). Sample conversation:

random person who clearly doesn't know me well: What will your name be after the wedding?
me: Laura Witt
rpwcdkmvw: Your fiance's last name is Witt?
me: No. I'm not changing my name.
rpwcdkmvw: why not?
me: The one I have right now still works.
rpwcdkmvw: What about your kids?
me: I don't have any kids.

Ok. While obviously, I'm hilarious, this gets pretty contentious pretty fast. And since this person doesn't know me well, I don't want to be too snarky.

So sample conversation #2:

random person who clearly doesn't know me well: What will your name be after the wedding?
me: Laura Witt. I'm not changing my name.
rpwcdkmvw: why not?
me: I think it comes from a long tradition of viewing women as property. And while, I know that Jimmy would never view me as property, the tradition still gives me the willies. I know a lot of women see it as a symbolic gesture of joining a new family and thats great for them. I think its a personal choice. For me, I'm always going to be a product of the Witt family, not the Stevenson family and I'm glad that Jimmy is comfortable enough in our relationship to not be threatened by the fact that our last names aren't the same. He know I love him and feel like his family but would never ask me to change something so fundamentally me as my name for sake of a tradition I'm uncomfortable with. And we both recognize the impracticality of hyphenation. So we're going to be married and committed and family, but in recognition of the fact that nothing changes about my history, life, experiences, or my relationship with my family when we get married, I'm keeping my name.
rpwcdkmvw: Wow, thats a really long explanation.
me: yeah, no kidding
rpwcdkmvw: What about your kids?
me: Well, kids aren't a given yet for us, but if we do choose to have them, we'll borrow a tradition from the Hispanic cultures and give them two last names. Or two middle names, however you want to look at it. Basically, the kids will have four names and informally they'll probably just go by their first and last ones. But, as they get old enough to choose what they want to be called, we'll support whatever they want. And since I prefer the aural aesthetics of Witt before Stevenson, it would Joe Bob Witt Stevenson, or whatever. And probably go by Joe Stevenson. Neither of us are so possessive that we care which name get used the most, but we both want both names on the birth certificate!
rpwcdkmvw: Oh I see. Well, I'm glad I ran into you on the way to work. I need to go eat lunch now.

So wordy, right? I need something short and sweet but not glib or harsh.

As soon as I figure out how to imbed videos, you will be treated to my favorite about Ms. Pacman. its amahzing.

Later Days,
Laura

Thinking Happy Thoughts

This post is primarily because Jimmy just left for his night job and it made me sad... So I'm going to write about happy things.

My wedding is basically planned. Yep. I mean, there are details to iron out and contracts to sign and tastings to attend and decorations to buy... But the PLANNING part is pretty much done. Color scheme? Check. Attendants? Check. Budget and timeline? Check. Location and date and time? Check. Caterer and cake baker and photographer and rental place and honeymoon (HATE that word) and musicians and officiant? Check-ish. Nothings official, but there are definite front runners. The dress, tuxes, florist (just for bouquets and boutonnières (I spelled that wrong and spell check gave me "guttersnipe" for some reason. All I did was add an extra "t", it wasn't that off!)) are all still up in the air. But yeah. I'm on top of this.

My mom wants to throw an engagement party to get Jimmy's family and my family and some of the friends to meet and mingle. I'm all about it, I just don't know about logistics. We'll see, though. I'm not all about the shower thing, so this is probably a good substitute.

Don't weddings just seem like an excuse to ask people to get you a lot of stuff? I kind of hate that. I have enough stuff. I have too much stuff. What in the world could I possibly ask for at a bridal shower? That said, if anyone wants to contribute to the "Buy Laura and Jimmy a House" fund, feel free... :)

Ok, well, the DNC is on and Teddy Kennedy is speaking. Must run!

Laura

Hooray for narcotics

I went to the dentist today because I had a toothache yesterday. It was mostly gone this morning but I went ahead and kept the appointment. I need a dentist in Frankfort anyway. So I went in and ended up getting a root canal! Right then and there. So now I have a partial filling and a 1750 dollar bill for the whole experience. Well, including the next two visits. Who knew root canals were so involved?

But I have some pretty nifty pain medicine and I got to spend most of the day in a comfy chair watching TV. (They squeezed me in at the same time as other appointments so there was a lot of waiting). And I really like the dentist lady (I can't pronounce her name; I may call her Crentist), which is crucial for someone like me who has chronic teeth issues. Thanks, mom!

Anyway, after 3 hours at the dentist I left, completely numb. I tried to smile; I looked like half of my face was paralyzed! So everywhere I went after that (starbucks, kroger's pharmacy, the gas station, my office) I couldn't smile at anyone! And, granted, I'm not always little Ms. Sunshine, but we're so programmed to smile at strangers (especially us women) that when I wasn't able to, I felt completely evil. The lady at the gas station across from my work (who I see practically daily) gave me a free cookie and I thanked her, completely stone-faced. It was a bizarre experience and I am glad its over.

Its precisely for that reason I would never try botox.

Tomorrow is our office picnic. We're going to celebrate my one year anniversary with enforcement and my birthday! Well, me and a handful of other people. August is a big month in my office. I'm really looking forward to it.

It may be these pain pills (who ever said narcotics are a bad thing?) or the fact that I just watched Project Runway (with drag queens!) but I'm in a phenomenal mood.

Later Days,
Laura

The language of ideology

I mentioned last post to look for a wedding post soon. Keep looking. Maybe sometime in September? We'll have the venue officially then.

So I also mentioned last time that I've been thinking a lot about activism. And thats still true. And I've been thinking about how the term "activism" seems to be a positive thing for liberals and a negative thing for conservatives. Like how conservative media pundits complain about "activist judges" when they really just mean "liberal judges". And I get it. Judges shouldn't have a political agenda. They should hear cases from an unbiased place. But conservative judges have an agenda too, its just different. You never hear liberals complain about activist conservative judges though... I don't know why that is, other than just to say that we like to use language to draw lines in the sand between our ideologies.

Liberals tend to hate the term "evangelical". We associate it with unrelenting, pushy, close-minded and judgemental people. And that isn't fair either. What is evangelism but a specific form of activism, anyway? Although I would never want to be in step with the Hagees and Dobsons of the world, I would consider myself an evangelical in the literal sense of the word. I believe in loving your neighbor. I believe that we should "love one another for love is from God. Everyone who loves is born of God and knows God." And I try my best to be a loving person.

And this is my problem with the liberal/conservative dichotomy. I live in an extremely conservative area. And I get a LOT of liberal jokes, which is ok because thats how my co-workers show friendship and comfort with other people. By picking on them. But the main point of most of the liberal jokes is that liberals are too soft, too peaceful and too keen to believe that there is good in all people. But isn't that what we're called to be as Christian people? Aren't we called first to love our neighbor, whether they're poor or lazy or don't look, talk, act or believe the way we do? We aren't called to condemn people. I can't find a single verse in the bible asking us to use our government as a tool to marginalize and punish the wicked. Good thing, too. We'd all be screwed.

I don't see Jesus going to Rome to demand that the Sabbath be observed. I can't find any basis for evangelism through government. I cannot understand the belief that we should force obediance to our own belief system simply because we may have the majority.

(Side note: There's a lot in the Bible. There's a lot we don't focus on. Why is it that we pull out the parts that deal with what makes us different from one another and hold them up as though there's a divine hi-lighter on that particular part of that particular verse? Homosexuality is an abomination. So is eating shrimp. They're mere verses apart. Why do we care more about one than another?)

Christianity calls us to love our neighbor. The Constitution exists to protect the minority from the majority. I believe that both those ideas work toward the same goal of unity. And I'm going to continue to try and figure out my place and my desire to use activism and evangelism to stop people from using the language of ideology and selective bible-reading to drive wedges between us.

And I'm going to try to do better about that myself.

Later Days,
Laura

P.S. This was incredibly stream of consciousness. So if something doesn't make sense or seems weird or contradictory, leave me a message! Or, if you just want to debate with me your comment is welcome as well. I think that most of us are faithfully trying to figure out what we believe truth is, even though we may come to vastly different conclusions. I recognize the possiblity that, from time to time, I MAY be wrong. :)

P.P.S. Isn't that the beauty of Christianity? It forces us to accept that we're flawed and imperfect and often wrong. But thats ok.

Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow

Not much new in my world. I've been busy, though. I don't feel busy, but I recently tried to find a time to meet up with a friend and it was more complicated than I thought it would be!

Jimmy and I made an impromptu trip to Florence this weekend to help his mom move. As completely tired of moving as I am, I'm glad we were able to come help. I'm a little further away than I was in Georgetown (about an hour and a half now) but we were able to swing by and see my parents for a little bit before we had to get back to Shelbyville. Next weekend I'm going with my mom to Bowling Green (KY) for my cousin and grandmother's birthday celebration. And the NEXT weekend we're doing a joint birthday thing in Florence for me and Adam! Thats also the weekend we can reserve our wedding venue, so we're going to take moneybags (my mother) to see the place and then put down the deposit.

On the work front... I had negotiation training at work this week. As part of it, we had to take the Meyers-Briggs Type Indicator. I was an INFJ (the mystic). Less than 1% of the population are INFJs. We're more likely to be psychic and/or geniuses! I'm not surprised.. :) Here's part of the overview:

"Beneath the quiet exterior, INFJs hold deep convictions about the weightier matters of life. Those who are activists -- INFJs gravitate toward such a role -- are there for the cause, not for personal glory or political power.

INFJs are champions of the oppressed and downtrodden. They often are found in the wake of an emergency, rescuing those who are in acute distress. INFJs may fantasize about getting revenge on those who victimize the defenseless. The concept of 'poetic justice' is appealing to the INFJ.

"There's something rotten in Denmark." Accurately suspicious about others' motives, INFJs are not easily led. These are the people that you can rarely fool any of the time. Though affable and sympathetic to most, INFJs are selective about their friends. Such a friendship is a symbiotic bond that transcends mere words.

INFJs have a knack for fluency in language and facility in communication. In addition, nonverbal sensitivity enables the INFJ to know and be known by others intimately.

Writing, counseling, public service and even politics are areas where INFJs frequently find their niche."

Crazy, because I've been thinking a lot about activism lately. Pretty soon after the wedding I want to go back to school. I'm not sure what I want to do specifically, but I've always felt a strong tug toward human-rights work. Thats so broad, though. I really need to figure out specifically where I want to be, then do what I need to do to get there. Maybe that means law school, maybe its a masters in a specific field. I have some time, but I want to get some goals laid out before I get too wrapped up in wedding stuff.

I'm normally good at perspective. I'm a forest person, not a tree person. I don't need everything to be perfect so I have high hopes for myself to not lose sight of the important thing (marrying Jimmy) in a sea of really silly details (cake, centerpieces, flowers). My mom on the other hand...

Look for a post about wedding things soon!

Later Days,
Laura

Fun Things

So. I guess this is kind of the first real post. How is everyone? Good.

I'm taking a break from packing. I really hate packing. Fortunately, I'm not completely UNPACKED from my previous move a year ago, so it should go more smoothly than last time. I'm still missing a boot. I have no idea where it is. I kept its mate out of hope that I'll eventually find it, but I'm about ready to give up. My audacity is wearing thin, I suppose.

Anyway. I'm moving again. The packing isn't just some kind of masochistic summer ritual. For some back story, here's a little list of all my encounters with moving vans in the last few years.

2005:
I moved from Columbus to Owensboro

2007:
-Jimmy's mom moved to Florence
-My mom moved to Florence
-My dad and brother moved to Florence when Adam graduated
-I moved to Florence
-I moved to Georgetown
-My dad moved halfway to Seymour (he's an interim pastor, so he lives with my Mom in Florence half the time and, right now, in Seymour half the time)

2008:
- Jimmy moved to Shelbyville
- I will move to Shelbyville
- My brother will move to Lexington. I may or may not actually help with this process.

So, yeah. Nomad. And then in a year or so Jimmy and I will get married and move in together.

Speaking of, here's a pretty sweet website.

http://offbeatbride.com

It's the shiz. Tons of really good non-traditional ideas. I know what I DON'T want in a wedding (anything princessy) but I'm having trouble articulating what I DO want. Still, I'm really excited to get married and have our friends and family there with us! I think as that as long as we keep that as our main priority, everything will be perfect.

No, really.

Later Days,
Laura

New Blog

This is my re-attempt at blogging. I used Blogger forever and a day ago and didn't like it. Hopefully its better now!