Too Much Time: November Goals

So I’ve basically decided not to do any plays through the end of the year. There’s nothing coming up that I’m really interested in (Xanadu? No, thanks.), so I might as well utilized this time to take care of some stuff that got pushed to the wayside for the majority of the 2011 while I was wedding planning and dealing with family stuff. And to hold me to my intentions, I’m going to start posting monthly goals of the crap I need to take care of each month.

NOVEMBER GOALS!!!

 Hopefully, by the end of this month, I will be the lady in white...making all my goals...

1.     Finish writing thank you notes

You guys, I have so many left, it’s embarrassing. I’m not even going to discuss it here. However, I’m really going to aim for finishing them by the end of the month (with a super-secret backup goal of the end of the year)

2.       Pay down wedding debt

I’m not going to lie. Although my parents paid for half my wedding, I had to cover the other half, and I either didn’t save enough in advance or I went outside my allotted budget when things got down to the wire. Probably a little of both. So now I have a few bills left to pay. And I need to KNOCK THEM OUT. Nobody likes bills hanging over their heads, so I’d like to pay these down as soon as possible so I can start saving for fun stuff again. Which leads me to my next goal:

3.       Don’t buy lunch during the work week

$10 here or there doesn’t seem like much, but it can definitely add up. So while I’m on this self-induced payback plan, I’m going to cut costs where it doesn’t hurt by bringing my lunch every day.  Can I do it? Probably, but only time will tell! See you never, debt!!

4.       Attend five yoga classes

“Take up yoga” was one of my 2011 goals. I don’t want to get into yoga for its focus on mindfulness and relaxation—I can’t really see that working for me—but I do think it would make me more flexible, limber, and strong. 

For a little over a year now, I’ve been a pretty committed gym member, running a few times a week and attending a few strength classes regularly. However, I read somewhere that to be truly fit you have to have cardio endurance, strength, AND flexibility, and y’all, I am just not flexible. I can’t even touch my toes. It’s sad. Anyway, hopefully yoga will help me out with that.

5.       Work on TOP SECRET blog project (i.e., not being a human incubator)

More information to come this month.

So that’s it for November’s goals. Is there anything you want to knock out this month?

Now That’s What I Call Love: Wedding Guest Playlist

What I’d like to share today is the mix I put in the guest bags for the wedding. I know that some of you already have a copy, but you can call the wambulance. It is a great mix crafted in partnership with my a-mazing Honor Attendant, Zach. JP said he wanted to contribute, but 1. he’s really bad about saying he’ll do something then never getting around to it, and 2. his taste in music is the worst, e.g. he said he had “a few Red Hot Chili Peppers songs” to add. I hope you like it as is; if you want to add a little more JP flavor, feel free to sprinkle in a few Chili Peppers at random.

Now That’s What I Call Love: Volume Warrick

1.   5 Years Time, Noah and the Whale
2.  Love is Strange, Mickey & Sylvia
3.  Count on Me, Bruno Mars
4.  Folding Chair, Regina Spektor
5. Question, Old 97s
6. L.O.V., Fitz & the Tantrums
7. Marry Me, Dolly Parton
8. Home, Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeroes
9. Got My Mind Set on You, George Harrison
10. (If You’re Wondering if I Want You To) I Want You To, Weezer
11. Sweet Disposition, The Temper Trap
12. Home, She & Him
13. Love, Matt White
14. Sunlight, Harlem Shakes
15. Love’s Gonna Getcha, Tal & Acacia
16. You’re the Nearest Thing to Heaven, Johnny Cash
17. My Girl, Otis Redding
18. Banana Pancakes, Jack Johnson
19. Each Coming Night, Iron & Wine
20. This Will Be Our Year, Ok Go

Honeymoon Reading

Hello!

I’m back and better than ever. I want to discuss the wedding/honeymoon/et al., but feel like it would be better if I waited for photos. As a brief overview though, everything went really well. The weather was perfect, both at the wedding and in St. Lucia, we’re still married, so we’ve got that going for us, and neither of us got eaten by a shark (a real, albeit improbable, fear of mine).

Things I discuss without visual aids are the books I read while on said trip: To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis and Thunderstruck by Erik Larson (which I am only halfway through). I didn’t get that much reading done because JP and I did SO MANY ACTIVITIES (more on this to come), but I really enjoyed reading these two.

To Say Nothing of the Dog is technically about time travel, but the majority of the book takes place in the 1880s, so you could almost classify it as historical fiction. The story is interesting and funny (in the vein of the Hitchhiker’s Guides) and I would recommend it to anyone even generally familiar with that time period and/or Oxford.

Thunderstruck is also good so far. I read one of Larson’s other books, The Devil in White City, which was great, and this book is headed in the same direction. Larson does these really in depth examinations of tangentially related topics in history, which I really enjoy because it really puts the ‘A’ topic, crime in both of these books, into the broader perspective of the ‘B’ topic. Neat!

Anyway, now I’m back and I’m busy doing busy and important things. Anyone know an easy way to knock out 200 thank you notes?

The Final Countdown

Today is my last full work day prior to the wedding. ACK! I don’t have that many things left to do, but I’m still a little anxious. That’s just my way. For example, one time, even though I had completely finished the run of a show, I had dreams for weeks afterwards that just as I was about to go on, I looked down to find I hadn’t brought any of my shoes with me. NO SHOES! Luckily, I took my wedding shoes to LaGrange last weekend, so this should be a non-issue. AND, as we’re leaving for the honeymoon on Monday and will be gone about a week, I probably won’t be posting again until October 5! It’s not that I’ll be too busy, I really just don’t think we’ll have internet there. Oh, well! Anyways, just thought I’d leave you guys this awesome video as a kind of “until we meet again…”



There’s No Time. There’s Never Any Time!

Where are my manners? I can’t believe it’s been more than a week since I last posted. I will blame it on all the wedding-related stuff I’m trying to knock out every night when I get home. I don’t have that much to do, but ideally, I’d like to have almost nothing left to still be stressing over by the time it actually gets here. Like performing in one of my shows, I want to have learned all my lines and where I need to stand, so that all I have to do opening night is throw on my outfit, put on my makeup, and do it. So far, I have not succumbed to craziness (specifically related to weddings), which I think is a very good sign—particularly with fewer than three weeks to go [minor ACK].

Related to this, I baked approximately one million cookies this weekend, vacuum-sealed them, and put them in the freezer for possible favors. I say possible, because if I sample one the day before, and it tastes like I vacuum-sealed then froze it, they will not be given as favors. I would say that at that point they would all go in the trash, but JP will probably eat them either way.

I also had a MAC artist do my makeup on Friday so I could see if I needed any additional products (I’m doing it myself the big day because let’s just say LaGrange is not overrun with makeup artists). I thought it looked pretty good when I left, albeit a little dramatic. JP confirmed this when he said, “Oh my gosh. You look nuts. Umm…Lady Gaga called and she wants her eyelashes back.” Obviously, the fake lashes the girl at the store put on me were too much, and they have since been removed to my theater makeup kit (where I feel they will be more appropriate). He also compared me to a drag queen. No good.

What I wanted to look like.

What John Paul said I looked like.

ALSO, here is the blog post our photographers did on our engagement shoot. Some of them are weird, but mostly they are cute.

Sorry for all the wedding stuff, though! It’s all just hanging out in my head and making it hard for me to think about other things. Not too long now!

Thoughts? Words of wisdom?

Photos and Before

Hey yoooooouuuuu guys!!!

The photo shoot went well. I know you were all biting your nails in anticipation, wondering how that would turn out. Several people have asked me about my extensions, though, so I will briefly describe them now: they are clip-in type and made of real (human [haha]) hair. The tops are like a combination of a very short-toothed comb and the type of clip that if you bend it out, it’s open and if you bend it in, it’s closed (what is this kind of clip called!?). It was very convenient for the photos because normally at 95°F and 50% humidity, my hair acts like a real jerk, but since the majority of it wasn’t really mine, but instead someone else’s, more accommodating, hair, it continued to look normal/curled the entire time. Overall, the look was more Miranda Lambert than Botticelli’s Venus, but what are you going to do?

Also, fun story: while at Probate Court getting our marriage license, JP and I overheard a woman discussing the following with a probate officer:

Woman: So let’s say a woman marries a Mexican. Does he automatically become a citizen?

Probate Officer: No, there are a lot of other factors involved, and even then, it’s a lengthy process to citizenship.

W: What if she’s pregnant with his baby? After the baby’s born, do they both automatically become citizens?

PO: No, ma’am. They baby would be a citizen because the mother is American, but the father would still not be a citizen.

W: What if both the mother and the father are 17?

PO: Did your daughter come in here earlier this week to talk to me about this?

W: Yes, she said that you said the baby’s father still wouldn’t become an American citizen, I just wanted to double-check.

PO: Well, that’s true. And I also told her that both sets of parents had to come in and sign all the paperwork if they intended to get married.

W: Well, his dad won’t come over here. He’s in Mexico, and he won’t come here. They were thinking about doing it over there, in Mexico. Like, she would meet his dad, and then they would get married down there. Do you know how she would go about going down there?

PO: Does she have a passport? She could just get it cleared through the passport office.

W: No, she doesn’t have one.

PO: Well, she’d have to get a passport, unless you know some other illegal means to get her down there…

Let’s just say it digressed from there. As soon as the woman left, the probate officer just walked back to her desk, slowly shaking her head and kind of looking over at me. I could tell she wanted to talk about this wacky situation, but discussing probate court business with unrelated parties may be even worse than suggesting a woman sneak her pregnant 17-year-old daughter into Mexico.

Engagement Shoot

Today JP and I are having our engagement pictures taken. At this late date, you may be asking yourself. Why bother? And I agree wholeheartedly, HOWEVER, if I have learned anything from 26 years of living, it is to pick my battles with my mother, and this is one I chose not to fight.

From an email sent to the photographer:

ALSO, I know that you guys spend a lot of time editing these and choosing the best ones, but if you could send me like 2-3 pictures from the shoot shortly afterwards, I would be indebted to you FOREVER. My mother is really anxious for us to put our engagement in the local newspaper, and she has been driving me NUTS to go ahead and get these photos taken. We can get the rest of the pictures literally whenever, I just told her I would try to go ahead and get one sent in to the LaGrange Daily News ASAP. :)

His reply:

That’s fine. Your mom sounds awesome.

Ha. Oh, photographer. At least he’s accommodating. Also, I’m getting my hair done today as in having my extensions put in. This will be me:

Except with clothes.

The estimated temp for our shoot time is 95°F. Yes, August was definitely the best choice for this. AND I’m supposed to go by the florist and the courthouse beforehand to take care of other wedding-related activities. When I told JP we had to do the second thing together, he said: “Can’t you just take care of that yourself? I just want to go [to LaGrange] and relax.” To which I said: “Number 1, no I can’t, and number 2, relax this!” [As I punched him in the face.] Correct me if I’m wrong, readers, but getting your wedding license taken care of needs to be done by both individuals getting married, right? I mean, otherwise I could have just gone to the courthouse alone and “taken care of this” myself years ago, CORRECT? Ugh.

I’m sure everything will turn out fine. I’ll let you know how it goes!