An Ode to the Fiancé

Let me just say, y’all, that I love my man. He is smart, he is hilarious, he is faithful. He is also the sweetest, most attentive darn thing. Before he goes to class, he will drive miles and miles to bring me assorted teas and goodies because I’m sick and decided to go to work anyways because I could physically get out of bed and drive a car without veering into a cow pasture.

Did I mention that these miles and miles are in the complete opposite direction of where his classes are located? And that this has happened on more than one occasion?

Yeah. Be jealous.

He is such a servant. When I was sick and did nothing more productive than languish on a cough and look (and feel and sound) miserable, he sat across from me and peeled tiny oranges for me to eat. He also provided limitless hot tea for my sipping enjoyment. He stayed up with me when I was stricken with sudden sickness (notice a pattern?) and made sure I was feeling all right, could he get me anything, did I want to lay down, would a glass of water be OK, did I want a kitty to pet? (+10 for offering me a kitty to pet.)

He’s pretty awesome even when I’m not in the throes of motion-sickness or food-sickness or whatever-else-sickness (which, thankfully, are much less pronounced than when we met). He reads with me, sings in the car with me, texts back and forth with me, eats ungodly amount of sushi and spicy mayo with me, and walks through parks and neighborhoods and inhabited island houses with me. He will grab a Nerf gun and Army crawl across an expansive hardwood floor because a precocious 10-year-old Down’s kid told him to. He will volunteer to goatsit for a family he just met while they’re on vacation. He will apologize before the sun goes down, regardless of the pride wounds it might inflict. He is always looking for new (or old) things to learn and adventures to be had. He looks for ways in which he can love on the people around him, be they friends, classmates, or strangers. He’s on a perpetual journey to better know his God and thank his Savior.

What a book-readin' stud.

Yeah, he’s pretty much the greatest.

And I get to marry him in July.

Boo yah.

"These are my favourite chords..."

Any time I pay homage to Tim Cook (not Apple's Tim Cook)—usually through sharing his artwork, as seen in yesterday's post—I always end up with one of the songs he's interpreted through his drawings running 'round in my head. For example: He has illustrated lines from The Weakerthans' "My Favourite Chords" no less than three times over the past however many years (the album was released in 2000), but I have to confess that I finally looked up the song and listened to it this past January.

And it is wonderful.

It's in the same vein of perfect songs in which you can find Brand New's "Soco Amaretto Lime" and Semisonic's "Gone to the Movies" and Weezer's "Island in the Sun" and Death Cab for Cutie's "Photobooth." Chill and guitar-driven (but more like a Sunday drive than NASCAR). And the lyrics are tremendous but extraordinarily simple, as seen in the following lines I figuratively snipped from the song:

"When you get off work tonight
Meet me at the construction site
And we'll write some notes to tape to the heavy machines
Like 'We hope they treat you well
Hope you don't work too hard
We hope you get to be happy sometimes'
Bring your Swiss Army knife
And a bottle of something
And I'll bring some spray paint and a new deck of cards..."

You can wax as philosophical as you want about the lyrics, or you can just let your mind drift with the repetitive strumming of the guitar strings. It doesn't really matter, for this song has the ability to take you everywhere and nowhere. That's the magic of good music: it allows you to make of it what you will.

I will never skip a rock again...

Or, to be more accurate, I should probably say that I will never chew an ice cube again. Just in case.

This pretty much sums up how I feel right now:

Toothaches are terrible.

(Credit where credit is due: the great and oh-so-clever Tim Cook—not to be confused with Apple's Tim Cook.)

IT vs. Accounting vs. HR

When HR's vacation goes awry, hearing in the office goes awry.

"She's stuck in a window?" ~Guy
"No, [she]'s stuck in Or-LAN-do!" ~Tam

Seven and Some Change

Back when I began this blog, I wrote the following: "Right now, the plan is to have at least one quote each day, but this will probably be an amorphous blog and subject to change."

Wellllll, "right now" was seven-point-something months ago, and that's at the most recent. My accumulation of quotes dropped in a most severe fashion once I left my favorite college town (and that was in 2010). Oh, I have pages and pages of quotes to use, but I'm trying to decide whether that's actually the direction in which I want to take this blog. I plan on asking various people for their opinions regarding this matter.

Further bulletins as events warrant.

But, for the sake of old times, I leave you with this quote from a Texan attending college in SoCal:

"When you party in college, somehow your sheets go missing."
~Arctic Jim

In other news, I ate some delicious cheese for a snack this morning. Three kinds of glorious cheese. Mmmmmm.