Thursday, April 12, 2012

12

Today is Beer and Oreos Day. Yes, Teri and I celebrate the day she first responded to my wink with a cleverly written email on Yahoo.com Personals. She said something quirky along the lines of I suppose you dunk your Oreos in beer. I was instantly smitten. She could not help but be funny.

Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Creativity Reigns

It rains a lot in Oregon, especially on the west side. That's a given. In our family, creativity reigns. It makes every day new, fresh and different. This week Teri came up with the concept of a local Blossom Festival photo adventure, to take pictures of the cherries and apples in bloom. Should be fun. It's a warm up for our planned trip to Hood River the next weekend for the real Blossom Festival.

Saturday, April 7, 2012

Twinkies Day

Teri celebrated her 55th birthday Friday. Since April 6 is Twinkies Day, I made her the traditional Twinkies Cake, with five candles. Next year, since we are not really meant to eat this cake, and if it it turns into a plastic time bomb so be it, maybe I'll get all 56 candles to stick in the cake and light up, which will look like a porcupine on fire.

I also while shopping at a store the size of a factory farm found a kids' happy birthday kit. What a treasure. For a small price it included big rewards — five balloons, a banner to hang across the kitchen, plenty of colorful streamers. When Teri came home to the Beach Condo from a hard week of work, she was in for a surprise, with the extra bonus of a living blue hydrangea plant, our wedding flower in our wedding colors, that we can later transplant outdoors.

Later we went out for dinner at The Marc — the restaurant at the Marcus Whitman Hotel where Teri and I got engaged in February 2010. She ordered the Crater Lake buffalo (8) and I ordered the Cape Cod seafood (4). She had an amaretto sour and I had a Chivas Scotch (pricey). There I gave her the birthday gift — a necklace with a blue stone made from Mount St. Helens ash. Like the mountain, which erupted in May of 1980, both of us have had to rebuild our lives after devastating, cataclysmic events — job layoffs and the loss of Teri's mom and my first wife, Tina. We have sprung back from ashes to bloom again.

Tuesday, April 3, 2012

Working Like a Rented Mule

Some days to keep up with the varied duties of a small town news editor, I have to work myself like a rented mule. On those days it's hard to keep up with emails from my Sweetie, who often is working her fingers to the bone too. If we don't hear from each other, or if we don't instantly reply, we know that it is not out of spite but out of necessity.

Sunday, April 1, 2012

April Fool's

I just quit my job. I adopted an opossum that I am going to take cute pictures of and blog about, daily. I love it when creditors stick my head in the toilet and flush. I love having a boss who's a Drama King. I want to drive a big ol' good ol' boys four-wheel-drive diesel pickup with a rifle rack in the window and shoot coyotes on the way to and from work. I love really loud country music, and dogmatic people who think their shit doesn't stink. Fast food joints are convenient and fun. Sitting on the couch watching hour after hour of sitcoms on TV is my idea of a good time.

April Fool's! I love this day. It's an absolutely fabulous day to be a contrarian. It's the Contrarian's Christmas.

If I can just fool my sweetheart once, I will be in hog heaven.