Didn't See This One Coming

I've been neglecting my blog- what else is new?!

I've had some stories that I keep wanting to tell. For example, I went mountain biking, flipped over and had a near death experience where I was almost impaled! Unfortunately you will probably never hear that story because I got engaged this weekend and I'm pretty sure no other life event I've had in recent years could surpass that!!!

So, I got engaged Saturday afternoon. Never in my life have I've been so surprised by anything- EVER! Maybe I'm slow or something. Lots of people had been asking me recently if I thought Peter would propose sometime soon. To them I responded, "Get the hell outta here!" and laughed. That's exactly how I felt. I was fine with that. I accepted it. If Peter asked me sometime in the next 2 years I would've been fine with it. Well, dummy me apparently lives in her own little world.

Apparently Peter had be researching diamonds, rings & jewelers for months now. Who woulda thought?! I had a 4 day weekend last week and we were expecting we would go on a short vacation. He figured he'd ask me then. We wound up staying in Rochester & doing random stuff (mini golf, zoo, grilling, etc.).

Saturday afternoon he came over to my place. We were going to go to Wegmans to pick up some stuff for dinner. I made a list & was all ready to go. Peter was playing with Muffin in the living room. I'm like, "Are you ready to go?" He responded with something like, "Do we have to go now?" Which I responded with, "What the hell else are we gonna do?!"

Apparently he knew exactly what else we could do...

So, he told me he had something to ask me. I probably responded with a snotty & impatient, "WHAT?!" He walked over to me, told me he loved me, & wanted to spend the rest of his life with me. (This is where it starts to get fuzzy.) He pulls a ring box out of his pocket, gets down on one knee and asks me to marry him. I was pretty surprised I didn't have a heart attack at this point. I remember saying, "yes" and then repeatedly saying, "Honey, this is crazy!" over and over. I remember kissing him and then hugging him and finding it hard to let go.

The rest of the weekend I was in a fog. I drove us to the store after the proposal, and it's a wonder I didn't get into an accident. I forgot my grocery list. I kept dropping my keys. I'm pretty sure I walked into several walls & people. The fog has lifted a bit since then, but I'm still far from acting normal.

So, now I'm on some engagement high. I'm happier than I think I've ever been. Each day I get even more happy as it continues to settle in.

My Prolific Garden

I'm not much of a blogger lately, but my gardening skills seem to be improving! Last time I wrote about my garden it was about the trials & tribulations I've been dealing with. Now, I'm writing to update about my bountiful vegetable plants! The tomatoes have been picked, and are now growing batch #2. The peppers are unbelievable. There's 5 waiting to be picked, and more flowers are appearing daily!

The Progression...

Let me demonstrate the progression of a night on the town in Toronto with two cousins...

My Little Garden of Hell!

I've been meaning to do an entry about my garden, but I kept putting it off since I forget to take pictures of my beautiful foliage and it's continuing progress. Now I'm regretting procrastinating so much...

But first let me give you a little background on why I have a "garden." I've never liked plants that much and I have a tendency to kill them, but my mother likes to give me plants. So, I have had two small houseplants (Anthurium and something labeled as "assorted foliage"), a Christmas tree, and big indoor plant (Peace Lily) from her. They've all survived for sometime now. The Christmas tree has had several brushes with death, but with much pruning, a recent transplantation, and much love, it's been able to survive them all.

My little Christmas tree...just like Charlie Brown's

A few months ago I decided to start an herb garden. In spite of killing my original mint plant I decided to add more plants to my brood, the first of which is an ever struggling tomato plant. Originally I also wanted flower boxes for my deck, but then my mother gave me a few "birthday presents" (that's what she calls plants that I have to pot and take care of). My presents included a pineapple plant, another tomato plant, and a pepper plant. Then, to round it all out, Peter decided he wanted a corner of my deck to grow zucchini.

Up until about a week and a half ago this was all under control. Everything was still living, which is how I gauge success. Then the plagues began....

First, the locusts! No, actually they were closer to fruit flies, nonetheless they were taking over my herb garden. So, my herb garden was put into the great outdoors. It was for the best really. They're quite happy out there. Once the herbs were out the door, the flies were gone! Problem solved!

Next, I realized that my one indoor plant had some sort of parasite. EWWWWW! Out to the deck for that one too.



Then, It was around this time that I started to come to terms with the fact that my pineapple plant is most likely dead. It's hard to tell, but Peter thinks it is and I'm now inclined to believe him.



Then, (and this is the nastiest part) Peter came over Friday. He checked on his zucchini, as well as the rest of the plants. When he came in and checked out my big indoor plant he notified me that he thought there was some sort of parasite on the leaves! Son of bitch! But wait, there's more. He then told me that he saw CENTIPEDES in the soil! AHHHHHHHHH! GET IT OUT! GET IT OUT! I yelled! EWWWWWWW! I started itching immediately, and am even itching as I'm writing this! YUCK! (btw, thanks mom for the insect infested plants you bestowed upon me!)

Muffin with the "centipede plant"...no wonder the cat's loved it so much!

Finally, the last plague took effect that Friday night! With all of my plants (and their cohabitants) out on the deck a thunderstorm began. It was pretty windy and rainy, but I was hoping it would just blow those parasites right outta Rochester. Well, wind and rain is just fine, but then the hail began. HAIL! I just watched as my plants were being pelted. I moved some out of the direct hail, but I wasn't about to bring those things back into my bug free apartment. So, the storm lasted much longer than one would've anticipated. Thus, I'm pretty sure there are some casualties. I gave them some fertilizer in one last attempt to revive those clinging onto life, so we'll see how that goes.

Yes, that's the same plant as the one above! I hope those centipedes were killed in the storm!

A closer look at the damage

My poor baby peppers that want so badly to reproduce

Yearly Dilemma

I've just realized that I have the same dilemma each year. Since I was 17 years old I've had to decide where to live & where to work each year. That's kinda ridiculous that my life is so unstable that I have to make big decisions like that on a yearly basis. However, I also like that I have a sort of mobility still and can up and change my location pretty easily.

I've made no decision about where to live or where to work, but I just wanted to mention that epiphany (favorite word) I had.

And just to be more random, here's some pictures from my birthday 2 weeks ago:

Settling Down

A few weeks ago I wrote a blog where I mentioned that a 23-year old intern had told me that the best years of her life were over. I thought this was ridiculous.

I mentioned the conversation to a co-worker/friend and she replied, "She's right!" I was stunned by her response, and was like, "Are you serious?!" She went on to explain that she felt that the days of hangin' out with friends regularly & spontaneously had ended. Now everyone has moved away, gotten married and/or started having kids. Now we're supposed to "settle down" into monotony. Things are now so different and it was sad.

I shared my opinion on how there's still so much that is going to happen in our lives, and if you think the best is over, then what the fuck are you gonna do for the next 60 years of your life?! Why live at all?

In the end we decided that we each had a valid point, and while our lives are definitely not over, they are very much different, and sometimes that is a depressing thought.

I have the occasional moment when I feel 21 again, like the days I play flip cup all night or stay out 'til the bars close. Those days are becoming few and far between though. Mostly my life has become centered around work.

Typical day for Jaime:
I wake up at 6 am.
I leave for work at 6:50 am.
I arrive at work at 7:55 am.
I work from 8-4 pm entering orders and monitoring patients.
I leave work at 4:05 am.
I arrive home from work at 5:10 am.
I eat a snack and go running or work out and finish around 6:15 pm.
I take a shower and fix myself up and finish that around 7:15 pm.
I now have free time until around 10 pm.
I go to sleep at 10 pm ('cause getting 8 hours of sleep is a necessity for me most days).

It's a never ending (dull & boring) cycle.

I'm not saying that my life sucks, 'cause it definitely does not. I'm just saying that it's very different from my old life. I'm trying to get used to it. Thankfully, I think the fear of getting stuck in a rut and having no social life will keep me from becoming a complete and total boring loser!

I Quit!

I'm a quitter.

It's true. I always have been a quitter. I suppose I'm not as bad as I was in my youth. I no longer quit games if I'm losing, so that's progress. I just have a tendency to give up if things aren't going my way. For example, when Peter was teaching me to drive a standard I quit. He was having me back up out of a parking space and I just FREAKED OUT, got out of the car and walked over to the passenger side instead. I accepted defeat. I just couldn't do it.

In reality I know in my heart and brain that I am capable of doing most things if I set my mind to it. Sure, I may fail, but with perseverance, I'm sure I could accomplish most things that I set my mind to. The problem is that I hate failing at things in the meantime. Practice may make perfect, but I just want to be perfect right away and not deal with those immediate, inevitable failures that precede "perfection."

I'm not as much of a quitter as I used to be. This is mostly because I don't give myself an option to give up. The thing that I just can't seem to quit now is my job. Despite thinking that I'd be leaving it in the relatively near future, I find ways to put it off. Currently I'm working on incorporating 4 day work weeks into the schedule. Surely 3 days off during the week would make a job more tolerable, right? So, this is my new challenge. I'm in charge of developing the schedule. I love the power of devising a plan, but I'm hating the actual work and compromise involved. Maybe I'll quit just to get out of this predicament.

I don't have much else to say right now about all this. I'm just finding myself more and more frustrated each day and thought that if I said something about it I would perhaps feel better.
I don't.