"If I wasn't a celebrity, would you still wanna be with me?" (10 pts)

ink on the road

Road trips are measured in CD's and cigarettes--if we smoked!

The smell of the car after opening the door from a bathroom break in a gas station--peanut butter, goldfish, sweat, pee pee diapers, farts and recycled air. Pennies all over the car and the requisite french fry under the seat--the one you'll find when you're desperately digging for a quarter, a stick of gum, or a chapstick, or if you're hungry enough might chance a nibble at after picking off the lint balls and gum crust chunks.

Not feeling tired, but worried you are after your co-pilot asks "how you doin'? tired at all? want me to take over?" and you say--too quickly--no--and watch them settle in and start to snore.

The sun is warmer through the windshield--that's why my feet reside on the dashboard. Add smell of sun-steeped feet to the list.

Wal-Mart that looks like a hoe-down is happening inside. A famous landmark that's way cooler on postcards than IRL and grabbing the camera trying to squeeze photo art and great blog posts out of the mundanity, insanity, profanity, urbanity and ultimately our vanity that is road trip, Feb 2007.

No wonder the truckers were honkin'!

my masterpiece

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Hot Scott's

We've got a sizzlin' hot night planned.

We've been looking forward to this night for a few weeks.

This is something we haven't done in a long time.

Dan's been sooo busy at church, we haven't had a lot of time.

I get kinda giggly thinking about it.

After Dan gets home from work we'll shower.
(separately--geez, you guys have dirty minds)

Then we're going to pack a scant few things into a bag.

I'm not sure how much more I can dish!?!

Let's just say there are a few spicy things on the menu.

And it's going to be a real treat.

For both of us.

We got this little get-away for Christmas and have been saving it.

I'm thinking I'm gonna get me some meat, yeah.

But I think I'll pass on the drinks because I want to enjoy the whole experience.

And be able to enjoy "dessert"...

OK. So we're goin' to Chili's....with kids...for Valentimes day. hooray!?!

Finally!

Effusive am not I

I am not a hugger. I am not a hand squeezer. I am not a kiss on the cheeker, air kisser, kiss blower. I am not a hand holder. I am not an encourager.

Today I initiated and gave a hug. Today I said "I want you to know that I care". Today I rubbed a shoulder and said "I think you look beautiful today."

These are so not me. That is when I know they are God in me coming out of me, and I begin to have a modicum of understanding of what "being a vessel" means.

The face of 30

I was sent a Swatch catalogue by Dan's parents......sorry, wait.

Dan's parents sent me a Swatch catalogue so I could pick out a watch for my 30th birthday. I narrowed it down to these. Which looks the most like 30-year-old Jenna to you and why?

(1) FLOWER TRACK (2) LULUDIA (3) SHINING NIGHT

How to draw a proper bath

waxing

My watch ticks like a time bomb on a made-for-television movie.

I drop a jar of sprinkles and cringe awaiting a dread cry from the other room.

But none comes.

"Slow down", I chide myself with clenched teeth, but silently inside my head.

Respite.

Ice clanks in the freezer.

"Is the snow falling diagonally because I live on a hill?", I wonder looking out the window to stretch my ocular muscles, then decide I don't wanna think that hard today.

And the Oscar goes to........ME!

Dan's cousin Kristen works on the Montel Williams show in NYC. One show hosted a baby shower. Each guest got a gift bag filled with amazing products. Kristen snagged four gift bags and gave one to me. One thing inside the enormous gift bag was an O Yikes! diaper bag. This diaper bag costs $145 and was given out to all the nominees of the 2006 Oscar awards.

After only 3 months of gentle but much use, the strap started separating from my bag. I e-mailed the company and got a personal e-mail from the president, Lisa Yap--including her personal cell phone number as she was out of the office promoting her new line that will be coming out in a few weeks.

She apologized for the defect, asked me to mail the bag back and inform her how much the shipping cost so that she could reimburse me. I sent the bag back on Saturday with a handwritten note on some funky, hip paper about how much I really loved my bag, especially b/c it gives me two free hands to deal with three little ones. When she received my bag on Tuesday, she sent me this e-mail:

Hello Jenna,

We just got your bag and have sent you a replacement. I hope being without your bag hasn't been too inconvenient.

I sent the package via UPS Ground - your tracking number is:

xxxxxxxxxxxxx69036

Please contact me if you have any questions,

Lisa

This is the kind of customer service you receive when you own a $145 diaper bag. Wow.

in prep 4 V-day, an E-mail from C-ville

From: Jennifer Anne Hoffman
To: Scott, Daniel Christian
Date: Tue, Jun 2, 1998 1:08am
Subject: Overwhelmed

Dan,

I have been overwhelmed with emotions lately, mostly when it comes to you. I can't get enough of you, and this summer is looking bleak without you near me. I love your eyes. I didn't really get to tell you because we haven't had much private time together and we were talking about other things, and I'm afraid I might not really get to spend QT with you before you leave, and I just want to get this out, and I know you don't want me to write, just want me to talk, but, well, you need to study and it's late, and here goes......After J/S weekend and our little chat about a stale relationship, I was very disgruntled. I was really not sure what I wanted, if I wanted this relationship bad enough, if you were worth all this stuff, etc (but I also realize that I wasn't very rationals as--and I hate to use this as an excuse, but--I was PMS-ing very badly, and stress only amplifies it) I felt like I was standing at a a cross-road, if you will, and the choices were leave Dan in the dust and continue on life's little merry way, or stick it out and work my butt off for this guy. I broke the night my dad called and I had to admit I did something really wrong, and realized I was a loser, and I was crying--weeping worse than I ever had, and it wasn't all because of that, I was realizing that I couldn't give you up, and I had to admit that I needed someone, you. When I talked to you about the rent $ thing with my dad, I was at rock bottom, and you were so there for me, it made me love you more and realize how great you are to me. Since we talked about being vulnerable and communicating, and you told me that if you were going to love me, you had to love the crap too, you opened a door in my heart that is letting me let myself love and trust you. You'll never know how much that statement means to me. I'm so glad you're willing to take all of me together, the good and the bad. I've never ever been so happy before in my life, I don't know how to verbalize it. I've loved every minute we've spent together since we got terms defined and things out in the open so to speak. Dan, I just can't believe how much a part of my life you already are and how much more a part of it I am longing that you be. I love the special relationship you have with your parents, it thrills me to no end. I love seeing you smile, I want to make you smile, you make me smile. I've been telling Cindy that you've made me laugh but never made me cry, and our relationship couldn't move to another level until that happened, but you have made me cry lots, you just don't know it. Those few days that I was struggling (you probably had no idea, or you did and didn't let on) with what I was going to decide about us, I cried so much, I was so frustrated, because I wasn't sure i could love the things about you that frustrate me. Now I know that I'll love your crap, no problem, and I'll work as hard as it takes for me to do the things that make you happy, because you make me so happy. I wrote in my journal for sooooo long last night, that's why I was up until 2am and I was talking to Cindy, and I was crying uncontrollably because I am going to miss you more than I would admit to myself that I would. I know in my head that things will be fine, time will fly, but my heart just isn't listening to reason right now. I am thankful for every minute we've had this weekend today, tonight, and look forward to tomorrow. My favorite things about this weekend were at Eden park when you told me to get back up on the wall so we could wrap our arms around each other--all I could think was that this was where I wanted to stay forever--raccoons, mosquitos, police cars and everything, and when you kissed me by the lake--how impulsive and romantic, I love your soft lips on mine, I love not knowing what you're going to come up with next, or the way you make me feel, listening to you sing in the car--I always pretend you're singing to me and it thrills my heart, swinging and sharing with you at the park felt so right, then your crushing hug and holding hands all the way home--you'll never know how much that means to me. Dan, I won't pretend I'm not scared that the distance will be too much for us, I'm so afraid that you're gonna break my heart. I'm scared that I could have made the wrong decision about the summer, but I won't know until the summer's over--and believe me I wish it were already and I could be assured that things turn out OK. Guess I'm worrying about something I can't really help, I just can't stand the thought of not seeing and touching the person who means the most me in the world on a regular basis. If it means confirming that we get to spend forever together, I'll grit my teeth and get through 3 agonizing months ...you're worth it. I'm about exhausted from the gamut of emotions that I've been experiencing for the past 2 weeks or so. I guess that's what spawned this of off the wall e-mail. I'm just so afraid I won't get to (or won't) say all the stuff that's inside of me when we say "goodbye"--for the summer. Maybe I shouldn't be listening to Delilah, or I just shouldn't love you so much, but that is not to be helped. I guess I should go to bed, and you should too (unless you read this in the morning in which case you're already up.........)
I admire and love you,
Jenna :-)

Raw and potentially somewhat unpalatable

Do you ever think in “blog”? I do. I catch myself doing it all the time—so weird. I think of how I would describe a person or situation as I am in the midst of it. Oh, to have a blue tooth brain that could send my brilliantly written blogs straight to a computer as I am mentally composing them. Because of course, they always happen in the most inopportune places to whip out a keypad—Meijer, the shower, mini van, while standing at the stove, on a walk along the bike path.

Ennyhoo. I feel the need to rid myself of some bloughts (blog+thoughts—pronounced blots even though it might look like blouts) I’ve had lately.

• I’ve wanted to share something with my PPD group, but Dan didn’t even really get it when was trying to express it to him, so I might be better off keeping my mouth shut and not having everyone think I’m a raving religious loon. I feel like this crazy time warp I’ve been stuck in has been a great place of revelation for me. Not great as in "yay" and "woo-hoo", but like something monumental and large and of great import in my life. I was trying to tell Dan that as I’ve felt God the least these past few years, I’ve known He’s there the most, and that my faith is stronger for having moved out of the realm of feelings and into where faith is really faith—trusting in someone you can’t see, or feel, or hear, or relate to, or talk to, and at many times hardly believe is even real or personal or in my life. I’ve felt the same in our marriage as well. In a season where there’s been a severe drought of lovey dovey feelings for Dan, I know the most, maybe even more than I ever have, how deeply grounded and rooted and committed is my love for him. In my act of willing myself to love him despite not having the feelings of attraction or overwhelming infatuation I had in our first years of togetherness, in my choosing to know that I love him even when I don’t feel like I do--or when I just don't feel anything for anyone for long stretches of time. I think as I was bumblingly trying to explain this, I made him afraid that I no longer love God or him or myself or anyone or anything, and probably hurt his feelings in the process.

• IBS—yes, Irritable Bowel Syndrome. Why has this been coming up so much lately? I talked to someone about it on the phone a few weeks ago, then it came up in the movie “The Lady Killers”, and most recently a fellow PP’er talked about BC managing her IBS. Weird. I’ve had a sour stomach for like a week now, and am purposely not looking IBS up on the internet because I’m sure I’ll research myself into having it.

• My inventions. First—a button that comes standard on every cell phone that you can push when it is ringing and you are 1) in the middle of another phone call 2) in the middle of a real-life conversation 3) in a place where you can’t answer your phone just then (like in a movie theater or restaurant where you have to step outside to answer) 4) driving and it’s not safe to pick up yet but will be in a minute—OK, you’re getting the point on the situations. OK, so when you press this button it plays a message for the person ringing in to say “I know you are calling and I will answer in just a minute but can’t answer the phone just yet so don’t hang up” and a few other lines to stall and let that person know you’re going to answer, you want to answer, you will answer, but you can’t just right then and there. Second, interactive book reading. Not like i-books. Like reading a real book that when you come to a word, allusion to a piece of music, art, place, name, smells, sounds, etc you can “hover” as in a mouse or something for a thumbnail of said object/experience. But the book still has to be paper, not electronic, and not weigh a million tons like most electronics do. So, there’s still some R&D to do on this one.

• (In Arnold Shwarzeneggerian) Dahn’t chu knowh dah Dewey de-see-mal seestem? So, I had Dan fax my application to the KDL HR center for a position they have open as a substitute Circulation Assistant. Why? Reasons: 1) I need some peace and quiet in my life. Where better to get that than in a library, right? I can shuush as good as anyone, nicely charge a fine, listen to excuses on why things are late, judge people’s stacks of resources that they are checking out, and am under the false impression I have given myself that I will get paid surf the web in utter silence and uninterrupted for hours on end. 2) My mom was a librarian and it would make her day if I did something she spent years of her life doing as well. 3) There’s an episode of That 70’s Show where Eric fantasizes that Donna is a hot librarian. Let’s just say Dan=Eric and I=Donna. 4) I’m a huge library user and supporter (thanks to all of Dan’s fines). 5) I’d love to do something in my community that I think is really worthwhile.

To be continued....

Frus....Frustra.....Fr.....Frustrati......F......Fru.....Frustrating

Our (neighbor’s) internet has been so frustrating lately. It’s been like click… change a poopy diaper bathe and dress kids and self…click…chop vegetables for stew, mix batch of homemade muffins…click…snack time, put kids down for nap…yesssss—Yahoo mail, click…shower, dress, self-perm hair and paint nails…click Inbox…lunch, take Liam to school and grocery shop…wow, 49 e-mails, sweet…click on one from jeb…do and fold 3 loads of laundry, churn butter…nuts…it timed out. Sigh, swear (inside head—children around)…click refresh…