Years ago I was going to school in Flagstaff, AZ and was going back to Champaign, Illinois to visit my future wife over my Christmas break. A friend and I were going to caravan to Phoenix as his girlfriend lived in the area and I needed to get to the airport. It was snowing heavily, more heavily than I’d ever seen when we’d left Flagstaff, so we left about six hours before my flight, driving away around 3 am.

Maybe half an hour later we’re cruising down the highway at about 30 mph, I’m following my friend, me in my Ford Ranger and he in his girlfriend’s Geo Metro. He decides to speed up a bit to 35 mph; this makes me nervous since my truck doesn’t do so well in the snow. Five minutes later the back end of my truck loosens up and spins me around so that I’m now facing the headlights of the semi that was following me. I keep going though and see the tail end of the Metro before spinning a couple more times and then off the side of the highway into a snow bank.

My friend sees all of this and thinks I’m a goner for sure, but as I rest in the snow bank he pulls off and we spend about half an hour digging out and then hit the road again, this time a respectable 30 mph  until we hit the snow line. We make it down to the airport just half an hour before my flight, before 9/11 this was generally frowned upon, but doable. The lines are so long though, that it takes ten minutes before I can talk to anyone, so when I finally reach a person they tell me that I’m too late and they gave my seats away. I’m assured though, that there’s another flight out later to Detroit and then on to Champaign. The flight to Detroit is delayed, but the gate crew tells me that the Champaign flight is delayed too so I should make it still.

I fly out to Detroit and arrive around 10 pm. I visit the gate crew and am told that the flight to Champaign left hours ago and the next one would leave the following afternoon. I’m stunned and have nowhere to go, and barely enough money for a hotel. I happened to work for Budget Rent-a Car washing cars to pay for school, and one of the perks at the time were cheap rentals, so I find the Budget desk just as they were closing up and ask if they have anything I can drop off somewhere around Champaign. They have a car I can take, but they tell me the closest drop off will be in Chicago, two hours and a half hours from Champaign.

I’m ready to throw in the towel and go sleep on the floor of the airport, but I remember that Budget had just bought another small agency the week prior, so I ask if I could drop the car off there instead if there happened to be a location in the area. They really want to help me out, so $20 later I’m in a car headed from Detroit to Champaign. Six hours of highway driving later and some 27 hours into this travel nightmare I’m passed out at my future wife’s apartment.

Her latest obsession seems to be making loaf after loaf of delicious bread, and experimenting with different recipes. I know it’s an obsession because most days when I get home she starts talking to me about the bread she’s making or when she’s sleeping she might mutter words like “starter” under her breath. Nick and I are significant bread boys though, and I think he and I can take down a loaf or two pretty handily. KT didn’t have this bug until we got our new oven, which apparently cooks at an even temperature. I wouldn’t know anything about it since I don’t cook, Hopefully it makes up for the cooktop on this new oven which she hates, and tells me thus everytime she cooks on it.

Regardless, pictured above is the surviving honey wheat bread from last night, the other didn’t make it past an hour. Delicious.

KT spent the first part of the evening setting up her phone while we waited for MGMT to start. We both got new phones on Sunday, and apparently that was the best time to move all her numbers. I had my phone set up with new themes and ringtones by late Sunday night. KT got the Samsung SGH-a737 and I got the Sony Ericsson w350. I also have another device I’m trying out for work, which might be one of the nicer PocketPC devices I’ve ever used, the Sprint Touch Diamond. I don’t have a picture of KT’s new phone, but I figured I’d take a picture of my two new ones. Blackberry Pearl not pictured, since it was taking the picture.

So far I’m pleased with the Diamond from a usage perspective, but totally underwhelmed by battery life. We’ll see how it goes after I tweak some of the possibly offensive settings. The screen on this device is awesome. Best I’ve ever seen on a Windows Mobile handset.  The W350 appears to be worth the $30 it cost so far. I went into the store wanting the smallest phone they had and this looks pretty much like it. My new phone reminds my greatly of the second cel phone I ever bought, it was some kind of Ericsson model from before the Sony merger. It might have been this one, but I’ll be damned if I can remember exactly. That phone ended up being KT’s first phone, though somewhere during her ownership it lost the flip piece and ended up with a bolt glued in place of the original antenna. That bolt did get great reception.

The other fun part of our new phones is that we hopped on a family plan with my in-laws, so now we have unlimited text messaging and a cheaper plan. Anything that is “cheaper” appeals to KT greatly, so all are happy now. Thanks Sarah! I also like dragging KT into the age of texting, although her first messages to me were spelled very creatively.

Picture of the beauty with some kid we found in the street

I may or may not have mentioned here that the beauty and I first dated when she was 14 years old. That is now more than half of her life span behind us. Which is weird to think about and also freaks me out a little because isn’t 14 a little young to be dating? Apparently fate decided that we had some growing to do so it sent her away to New Mexico and we did other stuff until I refound her six years later and then I was no longer adrift.

This is not an anniversary post though, this is a happy birthday post so really this should be about the beauty. Things the beauty likes: Pretty shoes, Hawaii, Concerts, Snuggling and Kittens. Things the beauty dislikes: Spiders, Inconsiderate People, Beef, and Disturbing Toenails. The beauty sometimes really likes to get away from those kids that we found in the street to see movies and have dinner. She is a nice date too so I like to do those things with her. She also likes going to museums and art galleries and those are things we have not done very much of since the children moved in. The children are very cute though, and the boy pictured above has some shining moments that make the beauty not miss those things too much. In between the shining moments she misses those things very much. Not to worry beauty, we will be doing all of things in copious amounts soon enough.

The beauty is difficult to buy for because she is very smart and financially intelligent and thus does a good job of obfuscating potential presents from me. I persevere though and hopefully sometime in the next six months we’ll be sailing the caribbean on a giant boat with lots of food. Please note we are now taking applications for child watchers during this time.

Above all, I want to wish the beauty a happy birthday, and I hope you can be even a fraction of how happy you make me, as that would be very happy indeed. And one more thing, Beauty, thirty doesn’t mean that our adventures need to end because we are growing up. It means that we are now seasoned adventurers ready to take on greater wonders.

Next big work project is preparing for the tablet pc handout, then presenting another virtual microscopy talk the same day tablet orientation ends.

I also spent all last week with a nasty cold. That was fun, on whatever cold meds I was on as I certainly felt no nervousness while delivering an hour and a half of Touch orientation feeling ahalf asleep/dead. I’m sure the students appreciated it. I feel bad having them stuck in a room with me yapping at them for that long.

Nick appears to be potty trained, which is awesome and I hope it lasts. He also seems to have overcome his double ear infections and now we just need to figure out if he’s ignoring us much of the time or if he’s having trouble hearing us. I think it’s the former, but I guess I could give the kid the benefit of the doubt and look into it a bit more.

KT’s birthday is in two weeks, so send her love and presents. It’s an important birthday so I think I’ll buy her a garbage disposal or some other great symbol of love and affection.