So, given the negative and sad state of my last few posts, I thought I would post some photos of Fall in Washington and bunnies taken today with my new Nikon D60, to end your day with a smile.

( Cut for Cuteness Overload )

YAY! All fixed and better than before...

I am currently on vacation In France...had to email in one of my assignments, so we found a bar, with bieres and cappuccinos and free wifi.

I so needed this vacation...going to be here until the beginning of April...cannot wait to graduate and be able to vacation all the time!

Well, back to relaxing...

The end of the semester is so close I can taste it! I am beyond excited and beyond tired. I cannot wait to come home tomorrow night, fall into bed and go to sleep without worrying about what is due the next week. I can't wait to start working out again regularly, and looking for a new job, and applying for more scholarships.

I love the show Pushing Daisies, such an odd one, but so strangely enjoyable. I'm glad all of the shows I like are on ABC, so I can download them in my spare time instead of arranging my schedule around them.

In other sad news, our doggy, Kita, died two days ago. Yeah, the one that wreaked havoc on our lives for months, flooding our condo and making us high risk insurance. I was out of the house at the time. Chad made a meatloaf, and when he turned his back, she jumped up on the counter and tried to wolf the whole thing down, blocking her airway. Chad tried to unblock it, but she bit him. He couldn't save her. :/ It's very sad...despite all of her havoc, she had a fantastic temperament. We really loved that doggy. Well, perhaps we will get another one someday. RIP, Keeters.

Back to homework.

So, I applied for a scholarship on a whim at the beginning of the semester through our school. a week or so ago, I got a letter in my email congratulating me for winning! However, I had no idea how much I had won. Well, yesterday, I got another letter, and it was over $1600.00! How awesome is that? I was supposed to owe $75 for my graduation application, as well as $220.00 for next semester above financial aid, and this scholarship paid for all of that and then some!

It's closing in on school being over for the semester, as well as permanently. I finish this semester on Thursday. I finish school in June and can hopefully get a new job! I am aiming to finish one of my papers today, in which case I will just have to wait it out until Thursday to present my research.

Chad got our tree today, but it was too tall to fit in the house without chopping extra off the top! So, I guess there will be no angel on top of our tree this year. The house smells like fir now, which is good, because our bunny can be a smelly little animal when she wants to be, and this covers it up.

4.0 for the semester. Yeah baby!

In a slice of other news, I was watching a classic car auction on television when, offhandedly, I said to Chad, "That would be fun! We should get a classic car and fix it up!"

Uh, yeah. Never say such things to those lacking risk aversion.

So, $500 poorer and approximately one week later, we are the proud owners of one 1974 BMW 2002 coupe. It's older than me. Shoot. Still, the body is in pretty good condition, though the interior could stand to be re-upholstered. And almost everything under the hood could stand a rehaul. Nonetheless, these things are going on Ebay for anywhere between $5 and $15 grand, and they get bids. On an aside, it was odd, but I felt more at home in this car than in any of our other, fancier cars. Sure, my car looks like a freaking Italian cow puked gray leather everywhere, and the dashboard has so many instruments I'm sure my car could likely guide me home without help, but my Saab does not have that certain je ne sais quoi. No, it does not have personality. Not like this tiny Beemer Beast. When you sit in this car, you know it has been places. It has done things. It has maybe even seen more sex than you have. It begs you to name it.

And so, we shall see how this one goes. It could be a great investment. It could be a nightmare. Lord knows it will be an adventure.

I'm looking for a new job, too. And I am working on wrriting a book I had been promising myself I would start.

All in the next two weeks.

Then it's back to school. Oh well, nine more months.

I can do this.

Life is well. I was a bit apprehensive about going to school during Summer, as I was feeling a bit burnt out, but I breezed through the first term with a 4.0 and barely no stress, so now I'm good to go. I've gotten two weeks off and have to start back on Wednesday, but all is well because I will be completely done in a little over a year, so I have no problem continuing to push at this point. I've had time to work out, and have lost 5 pounds in two weeks using my 'methods'. I'm pretty happy with that, but I was upset with myself for getting off track while in school. I thought I didn't have enough time to work out, but I really should have made time...I am now convinced of this since my labs came back from the doc and my LDL cholesterol was a tad high. That motivated me to make time to get to the gym...no use having a degree if you're dead of a heart attack!

Chad's birthday was yesterday, and he may have had the best birthday in the history of the world. First he got one of those iPhones (for those with a grudge against Mac for no reason, sorry to disappoint) which he loves and has come in great handy a few times when already with the wi fi internet access almost anywhere. Then, Friday night he bought himself a top of the line BMW, the M5. Even I must admit I have never sat in anything like it, with it's damned hand-sewn leather seats, $4000 custom paint job, and 400 horsepower that is enough to give you whiplash. Then we went to dinner, which was pretty much paid for, and then went to drinks, which his friends paid for. So yeah, a good day for Chad, to say the least.

So, I guess that's all for now...life has been very drama-free and things are going quite well...probably couldn't be better, in fact...

So, somehow I managed to pull off a fairly stellar 3.7 GPA in grad school last semeester. It's stellar considering that I was working 40 hours per week, taking three classes, and bought a house. Take that, stress!

Of course, I got a little loopy. Exhausted, really. I really did feel as though I might be losing it there for a bit. The act of juggling is becoming a bear, and I am burning out. I always thought I would be a professional student, but now I think this is the end. When I am done with my program, I shall just work. Of course, I will continue to learn on my own, but more in the form of crossword puzzles and world travel, less in the form of 50 page papers and business feasibility NPV studies.

I love our new house. The mortgage is a bit much more than we had paid prior, but it's still a good deal less than many people I know pay, and it will pay off over time. As soon as I moved in, I knew we had made a good decision. It felt like home. Well, then again, I guess that was before my sister's new-to-her Honda Civic was stolen from the street in front of our house. The car was stripped within six hours and the frame left by the side of the road. I guess that's what you get for buying nice things for yourself around here? Oh well, karma's a bitch. Insurance will pay for it, too, but we won't buy another popular model car while we live here.

The house does still feel like home, though. I am proud we were able to buy all of the furniture in it (couch, tables for living room, flat screen television, counter height table and chairs for dining room) using cash. No debt. That felt great. You certainly wouldn't catch me saying that was possible a couple of years ago.

My Houdini keeps escaping our yard. Not onlly that, she keeps bringing other dogs back. Just trots home with them like it's an average day in the life. It's truly hilarious. The other day, in fact, she brought home a small female pit bull.

We also had this big red golden retriever walk by. He looked as though he was starving, so we fed him and put him in the back yard until we could call the pound. He had tags, so it's not like I was resigning him to euthanasia or anything. Anyway, we had him for a few days, fed him. Then Chad took him to the pound. This was oh, a week ago. Today, my sister calls me to tell me that the damned thing is back. He must have been spurned from the joint by his owners and used some kind of dog GPS system to find our house again. Crazy. We let him go, but i have a feeling we haven't seen the last of him.

Anyway, back to homework. At least I'm only taking two classes this semester. It gives me time to replace my current job, which is getting pretty ridiculous. More on that later, though it's a bit of a non-story, just have outgrown the favoritism and nepotism, is all.

So, things are going rather quickly. I don't even think it was a month ago that we started looking for a new house, and now we have a moving date set for this coming Friday. Craziness. I am excited, though. We bought a new dining room table because, well, my dog ate one of the legs on the last one. the table is really nice. It's counter height solid wood table with bar stools for chairs. The fabric is the same microfiber color as my new couch set. I think they will complement each other nicely. I say 'think' because the table and chairs came in a box and we haven't unpacked them to put together since we are so close to moving.

In other news, during all of this madness I still got a perfect score on my Finance housing market project. The professor said my paper was so good that he wanted a copy to pass on as an example. That puts me on track to earn a 97 out of the class. Not bad. I thought grad school was supposed to be harder, but I suppose when you are a creative type and you are pitted against a bunch of students who prefer to write dry papers on stock analysis it always works in your favor. Should pull my GPA up positively (not that a 3.6 is bad, I'm just always aiming for better).

I got a new car. I had a 2005 Toyota Corolla. It was a great car so far as economy and reliability. It would have been fantastic if I were going to have a family soon. Alas, I do not plan to have a family any time soon, and after driving Chad's Mercedes I decided I wanted to go with some good old European engineering. As a result, I now own this in gray:
http://auto.nonstop.com.ua/wall/wall/2803-Saab-9-3-Aero-Sport-Sedan-3.jpg

Oooh, it is nice. Leather interior, sunroof, 210 hp versus 110 with the Corolla. Goody goody.

Anyway, back to homework. Busy week ahead.

So, about a week and a half ago, we calculated how much our condo was worth. Based on comparables in our immediate area, we found it to be worth 170,000. This was great considering we had paid 110,000 for it a bit over a year ago! Yay! So we thought, hey, we should see if there's a house on the market that we can afford and move up in the world, get out from under our evil neighbors, etc. No more apartment-style living with ownership overtones.

So, to make a long story short, things have morphed a bit, but we went house-hunting last weekend. We found something we liked alot almost right away. 2000 square feet, hardwood floors throughout, brand new kitchen, and a separate studio apartment attached with separate entrance where my sister can live and have her own space, fairly good area, considering house prices around here

Great! Step on taken care of. So, I went to find financing. Found that rather quickly with my 740 credit score, low debt, and great payment history.

Great! Last step was selling OUR condo. The condo which has been in a virtual state of construction flux since we moved in 14 months ago. We had to get it on the market quickly to capture the house we wanted. Yipes. So this past week has passed in a whirlwind of hammers, saws, and floorboards. Pressure.

When we got the counter offer from the folks selling the house we want, they wanted the house listed in three days, turns out, and they said they wouldn't take their house off the market until we had an actual offer. More pressure.

So, Thursday afternoon, we listed the condo. It was still a mess, sawdust and flooring everywhere. Mess, mess, mess.

Guess what? Less than 24 hours after going on market, we got an offer for almost exactly what we wanted! So now we can move and have our house.

To think, this whole plan began less than two weeks ago. Crazy. We'll be moving right around my birthday.

Party at my place!

I'm excited.

So, yesterday, my sister was at work. Like she is most weekdays. She went outside after work to the employee parking area (behind the hedge) to get into her car and drive home.

Except, her car wasn't there.

Yipes.

Yes, it had been stolen. Her 1993 P.O.S. Saturn SL2. The one with loose belts under the hood. The one that hasn't had an oil change since the Clinton Administration left office. Yes, this car has a fair market value of, I would say, $3.52, if you're being generous. But it gets her around, and that was all my sister cared about.

So, she called me, and she called the cops to file a police report. We went home, thinking the car would be immediately ripped apart by a chop shop and sold for parts, because that's really all it's worth, if you discount the 'get her around town' part.

About 11pm last night, my sister got a call. It was the cops. Yes, they had found her car. And it was supposedly drivable. All the precious memories from the last six years, still intact.

The story? HA. The cops found the car in a residential neighboorhood. just sitting in front of some guy's house. Apparently, the guy is a paranoid methhead, not known by the cops for making the best decisions. It would appear he just didn't want to take the bus home, so he stole my sister's car to get back to his place from the medical clinic three miles away. Or something close to that, near as we can surmise.

Yeah. Happy ending, pretty unbelievable in and of itself.

Like I said, though, it's just been that kind of month.

The following is, to the best of my ability, a recounting of the events that took place on this afternoon, Friday, February 9, 2007:

I had just clocked out of my shift at work to go to lunch. I had spent a bit of time debating whether I should run home and get a bill I had forgotten to send off or just go grab some lunch. I decided to run home really quickly and get the bill.

I pulled up to the house and opened the door. I heard a faint whining. I knew it was our new dog, Kita. It thought nothing unusual, as she is usually a whiny little bitch (literally, too, eh)?

I headed into the office to get the bill off of the computer desk when I saw it.

A puddle.

"Hmm, that's odd," I thought to myself. "I thought Chad locked Kita in the bathroom."

Aside: Before you think we are evil pet owners, you have to understand that this animal has wreaked the purest form of havoc on our possessions every time she has been left out alone. We're talking garbage strewn everywhere, weird things eaten (shoes and razors, for example), and unwelcome piles of poo.

So, we bought Kita a kennel. A large crate. Plenty of room, all you PETA people. We put her blanket in it to keep her warm. The kennel had a mesh steel door. Sturdy.
First day everything went great. Kita was whiny but stayed in. No havoc was wreaked for the first time in over two weeks. A feeling of ease set in.

Ah, but not so fast! The second day, the door to the kennel becomes a bit bent. It's noticeable but doesn't raise any red flags.

Third day? Yeah, the damn dog BENT THE STEEL BARS back and escaped. So, we bent them back and bought bungy cords to wrap around the kennel and hold the door fastidously in place. Yeah.

Cue next day, whence we come home and find the kennel door bent back again and the bungy cord snapped in freaking half, robbed of its life precious. HAVOC HAVOC HAVOC.

Dear God, is she a freaking wherewolf? WTF? What kind of animal does that, just destroys steel and high-tension bungy cord?

So, now that you can understand why she was locked in a room...end of aside, back to story....

"'Hmm, that's odd," I thought to myself. "I thought Chad locked Kita in the bathroom.'"

Then suddenly, in a very real and alarming way, it all becomes very clear. Kita is still locked up. I hear the distinct sound of a faucet running. Water is everywhere. Oh yes, that's right. The house is flooding. Again. For the second time in less than a year.

Dear Freaking God.

I run to the bedroom, where I hear the faucet running. Inside the bathroom. With Kita. The bathroom which Chad has locked because the damned wherewolf HAS TAUGHT HERSELF TO TURN DOORKNOBS. Yes, locking the door was a protective measure that now is greatly backfiring as I don't have a key to the door.

Ear against door. Cue whining and sounds of wet dog sloshing around. I throw my body weight against the door. It is at this moment that Chad calls.

I pick up the phone. No 'hi.' Just 'Kita flooded the fucking house.' I am instructed to turn 180 degrees behind self and arm self with the screwdriver and use it to unlock the door. Check.

Inside is a sight. Q-tips everywhere. Bathroom sink full of hair products, paper manuals, and Sonicare toothbrushes. Faucet running. Dog freaking out.

I grab the dog, turn off the faucet, throw the dog in another room, and unclog the drain. Proceed to begin to swab the decks.

It isn't until Chad gets home that I am prompted to call my insurance company to file a claim. Turns out there was enough water to get under the porous laminate floor, thus causing the threat of mold.

You can imagine having to explain this to your insurance company. Or perhaps you can't. The following is a true transcript of said conversation with insurance company. Well, abridged, but you get the gist:

"OK, in order to begin your claim, we need to know exactly what the cause of the flooding was."

"Um. my dog."

"Can you explain further?"

...SIgh. "OK, I came home for lunch. I saw water on the floor. I went into my bathroom. While I was at work, my dog had jumped up into the sink, opened the medicine cabinet, and dumped its contents out, including a bunch of paper. At some point shortly thereafter, she flipped up the handle on the faucet in the sink. The paper then clogged the drain and see off a chain reaction wherein the sink filled with water and overflowed onto the floor. I know it sounds unreal, but I'm sure you've heard everything, right?"

Cue muffled laughter on other end of phone. "Um, ma'am...*guffaw*..."we thought we had heard everything, but we've never heard this."

"What kind of dog is she?"

"A Siberian Husky mix (or wherewolf, if you choose). What does that have to do with it?" I mean, how hard can it be to convince your insurance company that your dog possesses opposable thumbs (which she does, in fact, have remnants of--that should have been the first clue as to the evil that lurked within) and therefore has the ability open cabinets, dump things out, turn on faucets and flood houses?

Yeah, if I were my insurance company, I'd be crying 'fraud' about right now.

However, they didn't. The mess is getting cleaned up slowly but surely. Hopefully the damage won't warrant an actual claim. Just pray that Chad doesn't have to lay floors again for the third time in a bit over a year.

And pray that this weekend somewhere out there someone invents device that can finally hold my wherewolf...I mean dog, captive. Without threat to life and limb, I mean.

I know, a bit much to ask, but I'll be praying hard about it to the Gods of Lamiate Flooring tonight...

Well, haven't been here much lately. I usually post at my myspace blog since most of my IRL friends are on there.

Paris was great! I got to live like the Parisians do and meet people who have an actual sense of fashion. Good times. The forced exercise was abundant in the form of taking the metro and walking. I lost a half ring size in 10 days, if that gives you any clue. Yes, I lost weight in my FINGERS. The city was beautiful. Most shocking was the fact that the French absolutely do not hate Americans. Not by a long shot. The entire time I was there, I only met one or two individuals who acted in an unsavory manner, which is indicative of any large city. They hate the war we are involved in, and they aren't fond of Bush, but they don't have a problem with Americans individually. I was always greeted warmly and in a friendly manner. So that blew away all of my preconceptions of an entire culture. Nice to have a vacation do that for you. Just reminds you to always keep an open mind.

I have some of my favorite photos of the trip posted on my myspace. My username is yackyackyack over there if you want to check them out.

The worst part of coming back from vacation is returning to real life. When I got back, one of my employees decided she just didn't want to work there anymore. She called in the Friday before I returned, then never returned herself. No further calls, no anything. How inconsiderate. So that left us short-handed from the start. I hadn't been looking forward to returning to work as it was, and it's just been ceaseless since. Makes me look forward, once again, to finishing school and procuring a better job.

My GPA last semester ended up being a 3.6. Not bad for graduate school. Lots of hard work made that happen. Lots of stress and torture, too. My teams were an absolute nightmare. Some of the experiences I had have me wondering if some of the people in my cohort are really born leaders.

This semester I am taking three classes again. The future is looking brighter because I only have to deal with teamwork in one class. The rest of the projects are my responsibility and I am plenty motivated. The only class I am worried about is finance because it's dealing with alot of information that puts me far out of my comfort zone. Oh well, will do my best, and if that's not good enough, will do it again.

Well, I suppose that's all there is for now. Bedtime for me.

WOW! Hello world! I've been busy! My friends don't even remember who I am! Neither does my dog! No one recognizes me! I may as well have entered a Witness Relocation Program at this point.

School has been...HARSH. Yesh, that's the word for it. I am taking accounting for finance, Global Business, and Business Law. Full time graduate load. Working full time. I'm doing well, nonetheless. Accounting has, by far, been the worst. No one understood that midterm. The highest grade was a 75. Good thing he grades on a (nice) curve.

This semester I've had a 40 page paper, two 20 page papers, and six tests. Yipes.

I estimate I should be getting two A's and a B. The B is in accounting, because he says that is nearly everyone's grade. Still keeping my fingers crossed. My teams have not been exemplary. It's tough to end up doing most of the work because other people don't want to pull their weight. I had to call one of the guys in one of my groups out to the professor because he was ruining our project by being a jackass. Some of the guys in the program (and guys are a majority) are such narcissists with such prideful egos. Makes me want to start my own business even more.

We got a nice new car. Well, Chad did. I have no idea how he convinced me to go for it, but we got this pretty darned nice Mercedes. Leather, Bose stereo. Very pretty. Really good deal, better deal than my car. I'm so jealous he gets to drive it every day. :)

We are going to Paris in January. It's part of my program at school. I know, sucks to be me. Two weeks traveling around. Thank God the professor who is in charge of the whole deal is a big-time shopper. Nonetheless, I have to be on my best behavior because the professor coming along is the Assistant Dean. I wouldn't want a night of drinkin and spitting from the Tour d'Eiffel to tarnish my reputation within the hollowed walls of PLU forever.

Finally, for those of you who made it this far, I saved the best for last....I'M ENGAGED! Happened about a month ago. We have no date set yet. I'm thinking not until my brain is done being preoccupied by school.

Well, back to work. Finals week. Bleah.

OK, so it's possible this has been the longest month of my life. I would be thankful that time is dragging on, but it hasn't been all good. At all.

First thing's first. I didn't get into the MBA program at UW. C'est la vie. Apparently the program was incredibly well-recieved this year and the number of spots available (30) narrowed the field quite explicitly. Oh, well.

What else? Oh, yes. So Chad went to have a cigarette on Wednesday night three weeks ago and found himself walking nearly ankle deep in water. On our floor. That is right. Our condo, which had brand new floors put in a mere six months ago, was flooded. We called a contractor in the middle of the night and they came out and ripped out ALL of our floors. The drywall was also saturated, so they brought in heaters and dehumidifiers. 33 of them. So my dog, two rats, two guinea pigs, and boyfriend, had to move to an Extended Stay America for a week.

Not only that, but my brother, who has been having some personal issues, showed up on my doorstep and asked me to take him in. That hotel room got very small very fast.

Well, things are finally looking up! My homeowner's insurance compensated me quite quickly and well for damages caused...they paid us plenty to finish the job and settled within 48 hours. Go Traveler's. Best insurace experience I've ever had. The house is still a mess but the floors are now relaid and we're getting there, slowly but surely.

My brother has moved to Oregon with my sister and is recovering from his problems. This is good because he was a huge source of stress for me in the midst of all that house drama.

I was accepted to Pacific Lutheran University to begin Fall quarter in the Master of Business Administration program. I'm very excited and actually happy I didn't get in to UW because of this...the PLU program lets you do a 10-day overseas internship which should look great on my resume. And the trip is included in tuition, which is not any more expensive than UW. So, hopefully in two to three years I will no longer have to worry where my mortgage payment is coming from. Hope I will also be able to land a satisfying job I enjoy out of it all.

Need to buy a laptop and some new clothes, though.

Off to bed.

My sister got these texts today...

First text:

"I will go down on you and make you extremely happy...but only long enough til you think it's going to get better...then I will come back up and screw you..."

Followup text:

"Sincerely, Gas Prices."

Well, it started with wanting to go back to Canada like we did last year. Just Vancouver, maybe Victoria. I put a chunk of money aside awhile ago to pay for it.

Then, we started to explore other options, such as air travel over the holiday weekend. We thought about going to Baltimore to visit my friend Leah. We looked around for flights, though, and nothing was leaving at a time Chad could get off from work on Friday, so it basically consisted of us getting there saturday and leaving by 11 am Monday. Quite a short trip for over a grand for the both of us. That's sad, would have been fun to see Leah and Washington DC.

Ultimately, we just booked a trip to Los Angeles, staying at the Westin, leave Friday night, come back Monday night. Airfare, hotel, car rental: $520 per person. SWEET! I've never been to LA before, either. Been THROUGH it, but not to it.

I am sooo looking forward to this. I need a vacation so badly.

Last night was good...had my 30th birthday party/housewarming. People brought food and alcohol and a good time was had by all...I don't even know how many people showed up...I would guess around 30 through the night...now I just have to clean up after them! HA. People were nice enough to bring me Home Depot cards and chocolate. Awesome. I have great friends.

All in all, a great night.

So, one of the women where I work teaches CPR in her spare time. Oh, OK, great, you say, community service is nice...

But that's not the off part...the off part is that, more than once, I have opened the dishwasher in the lunchroom to find plastic CPR heads in it. The first time, I kind of lost my appetite...now I just think it's kind of funny.

There's an entire family in there right now. Mother, daughter, baby...

Man Gets $218 Trillion Phone Bill
By Associated Press

Mon Apr 10, 10:38 PM
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia - A Malaysian man said he nearly fainted when he recieved a $218 trillion phone bill and was ordered to pay up within 10 days or face prosecution, a newspaper reported Monday.

Yahaya Wahab said he disconnected his late father's phone line in January after he died and settled the $23 bill, the New Straits Times reported.

But Telekom Malaysia later sent him a $218 trillion bill for recent telephone calls along with orders to settle within 10 days or face legal proceedings, the newspaper reported.

It wasn't clear whether the bill was a mistake, or if Yahaya's father's phone line was used illegally after after his death.

"If the company wants to seek legal action as mentioned in the letter, I'm ready to face it," the paper quoted Yahaya as saying. "In fact, I can't wait to face it," he said.

Yahaya, from northern Kedah state, received a notice from the company's debt-collection agency in early April, the paper said. Yahaya said he nearly fainted when he saw the new bill.

Government-linked Telekom Malaysia Bhd. is the country's largest telecommunications company.

A company official, who declined to be identified as she was not authorized to speak to the media, said Telekom Malaysia was aware of Yahaya's case and would address it. She did not provide further details.