Convo

Lately... I've been wondering if I majored in the right field because it's been really hard to find a job right now. I keep thinking how maybe I should go back to school. Of course I need to do an internship to become a Registered Dietitian, but I am wondering if that's what I really want to do!? I've noticed that I've been posting a lot about our conversations, but I love it too much. Last night Drew and I had this little convo in bed.

(I've been looking at schools for medical diagnostic sonographers lately, but they don't have any programs in the area so I've been exploring a lot of options!)

Me: "Ya know, they have a dental hygiene program around here!"
Drew: " ...?..."
Me: "Did you know they make $40 an hour!"
Drew: " And that's not even very specialized... that's two years of school"
Me: "I know, I can't believe it, $40 an hour! I looked at 4 different entry-level jobs today that were offering $40/hr!"
Drew: "Why didn't anyone tell ME to be a Dental Hygienist!"

he he he

It seems that Drew always knows how to put me in a laughing fit right before bedtime and then he wonders why I'm not tired and keep talking. He always gets me all riled up before it's time to sleep!

Today's Tidbit

I went to the library today to return The Alchemist (amazing!) and to pick up two new books, The Jane Austen Book Club & Atonement. I'm not sure if I have the guts to read Atonement because the movie had to up thinking about it for nights. As soon as I got home I put the books on our coffee table. Jinx came over and obviously found The Jane Austen Book Club to be irresistible, he started sniffing at it... all over and then licked it a couple of times. I was watching this display and it made me think of all the other people who will check that book out with my cat's spit all over it and then it made me think about how many other people have touched that book and where it's been. Books go a lot of places, get circulated a lot in general and are never cleaned. Icky.

Passport

Yea! I got my passport in the mail today! Supposedly this is a great time to get a passport because it only took two weeks! I am so excited. I feel free to go anywhere at any moment! I originally applied for a passport because we were going to go to Italy to visit my sister, but I don't think that is going to become a reality because we don't have any income right now. We're trying to hold off until I get a job... then we'll see what we can do! I'm so excited!

Lately I've been professing to Drew my desires to have a dog. I mean... when we have a yard and everything. I want a mid-sized, short hair dog that will be mine, mine, mine. Technically Jinx is more my cat and Sake is more Drew's cat, but I want my own dog. Basically I want to chose the type of dog, his name (which will be "Ando") and everything. So today Drew surprised me by saying he wanted a dog too. I thought this was odd because he's such a cat person and I've been the one who's been wallowing about having a dog. It's all the dog lovers at San Rafael Park that I pass by everyday who make me want to have a dog so much these days.

So today...
Drew: "Oh... I want a dog"
Me: "What? No.... I'm the who has always wanted a dog, and it's always been that way and I'm going to choose him, and name him, and he's going to be mine."
Drew: "And you're going to name him Ando, right?"
Me: "Yes, Ando"
Drew: "Well, I'm going to get a dog too... and I'm going to name him Poto."
Me: "What does that mean?"
Drew: "Butt, it means Butt"
Me: "Butt...."
Drew: "Or Potito... 'Little Butt'. Or we could name him Hiro and we could have Hiro & Ando." (like in the series Heroes)
Me: "Hiro! But... Hiro's gay..."
Drew: "Not in the show... just in real life"
...

...

...

Just another day in the life of us. Maybe we'll have a pet named "Butt" one day.

The Definition of a Wife

Today I thought I would try to be a good little wife. Well... according to my definition anyway. I love surprises so I try to surprise Drew sometimes by decorating, or cleaning, or fixing up things while Drew is away (like a Cinderella effect). This way he can come home and he can notice that difference. Today when Drew went to class I decided to take on some major cleaning. I picked up loose odds and ends, moved everything out of the bathroom & kitchen to sweep. After I swept I wanted to mop. I just bought some floor cleaner today and I was trying to get the cap off, but it was SO tight that I couldn't. I tried everything. Ugh... there goes my surprise! I can't even get the cap off... so now I'll have to wait until he gets back to mop and he won't be surprised. Then I did the laundry and after I took out the big batch of towels I was transferring the white to the dryer and I drop a few whites in the tiny little crack between the washer and dryer! Grrr! There was a ton of dust and lint down there and they were wet so everything got dirty. I ended up having to push the dryer as far back as I could and getting the clothes out with a hanger and awkwardly hanging my arms down the crack to retrieve the clothes! Turns out that even cleaning can be dramatic!

Also, sometimes wives have these little sabbotaging questions they ask their husbands, like "Do I look fat?" You know what I mean. Today I was just jabbering away while I was driving Drew to school. Suddenly I said, "Honey, do you regret marrying someone with such a big mouth?" Ok, I always am thinking to myself that I talk to much and it just kills me because I'm always wondering what Drew thinks... like if he would just wish that I would shut up. I looked at him right then I knew that I was asking him one of those questions he couldn't possibly answer. He just kinda rolled his eyes and then gave it to me, "Yeah, Christina I can't believe I married someone with such a big mouth... geez, you talk so much ... can't you just shut your big trap?!" I just opened my mouth about to object .... then I just shut my mouth. Drew smiled, "Thank you!" We were both silent for a few seconds just trying to keep our little act holding back our laughter. Then we both looked at each other smiled and then just started laughing and laughing! It was funny cause... I mean, what kind of question is that!? My wording was miscalculated. Still laughing I protested, "Well, what I meant to say is that I wonder if I annoy you sometimes becuase I talk so much." Drew told me he didn't think I talked too much and he said he didn't talk too much so we were a good balance. Ok, that's kinda true, but I would always like Drew to talk more. I learned that questions like that are so silly and I find myself asking Drew these kinda of sabbatoging questions all the time. It's funny because what I think I'm really looking for is some sort of reassurance.

When I was single all I was worried about was improving myself, but since I've been married I find myself increasingly concerned about who Drew would like me to be rather than just worrying about who I want to be which is really who he feel in love with in the first place, right? I'm not saying I'm turning into someone I'm not because it's pretty hard to not be yourself. I just had this feeling today that I should try to be more independent. Yes, we are in this together, but you still have to be your own half and that is what makes your marriage interesting. You bring that something, a different point of view, something great to the marriage. What would be interesting about being the same person? One thing I love about Drew are his hobbies and passions that are so different from me! It makes me crave to be in his presence and I just want to be a part of his world. Don't get me wrong... moderation in all things is important I still want to work on improving myself, but in an independent way! I guess you could say that I want to be more independent and develop more of my own hobbies. Ya know?

Before & After

As most of you know, we moved to Reno last month. We painted the apartment and then filled it little by little. I finally have taken some pictures of the "transformation" per se, but it is not complete. I really haven't decorated yet so our apartment still needs a lot of help. There are some rooms that I didn't get a before picture because I forgot.

Before: After

Our kitchen area. The laundry closet is right in the eating area and next to the kitchen. We bought this tall kitchen table yesterday on Craigslist. We got a great deal and the sellers delivered it right to us!

Our kitchen with the beautiful new kitchen towels Drew's grandma bought for us! This may look small to most of you, but for Drew and I this is an amazingly large kitchen space! The door you see leads to a large pantry. We are so lucky to have so much storage space in this apartment.

This is our bedroom. We painted it "ivory beige" and "brown bag". You might be wondering what is above our bed... it's a little experiment since we do not have a headboard we thought we would paint one on the wall. I don't like it, but we're trying it out for now. The more I think about it the more I want to paint over it. That's why paint is nice, it's so versatile and easy to change.

Our living room/office nook. We painted the nook the darker color and the other three walls in our living room the ivory color. We are using it as an office. Drew's sister, Allison, and his mom helped us paint. They were wonderful. Again... the decorating is not complete!

Our bathroom! I love blue and brown together, but Drew hates it because he thinks it's retro. We compromised and I was able to pull off blue and brown in the bathroom. It was hard to take a good picture of the bathroom because of the mirror, sorry.

Yea for our apartment! Of course there are some other parts I didn't take pictures of, like our balcony and living room, but it's nothing to get excited about. I hope I have better decorating ideas in the future. It is pretty bleak as of now, but I am working on it. We are enjoying Reno and any one is welcome to visit anytime! Lake Tahoe is just one hour away!

Mail Thief

Some people are just stupid!

We went to the mail box today and found a flyer on taped up for all the read.... Basically it was informing everyone that boxes 748-1438 were broken into (yep, that included ours!) and that we will no longer get mail until the USPS conducts further investigation. It makes me mad that someone would do that and now we need to go to the post office to get any of our mail. Even worse we have no idea if any mail was stolen and I guess we'll never know.

Here's a solution... maybe I'll just meet the mailman when he comes from now on and just have him give me our mail in person.

Book Club

Tonight I went to my first Book Club meeting. I have a confession to make, I always read the books that the current Relief Society, or public library book club is reading, but I never ever go to the discussion. Is it fear? Well, partly... I guess you could say that I love to read, but I don't know what to expect by going to a book club. This is what I've discovered.

Book Club = Very Opinionated Women

To tell the truth I hardlly said a word because 1. the book we were discussing was Breaking Dawn and 2. I hardly had the chance to yell over all the other very opinionated women in the room and 3. I love Breaking Dawn, but I'm not the one to get into a sappy discussion about how romantic so and so part was ... I would rather discuss deeper meanings of a book. So you should know that I didn't go because of the book that was being discussed, but because I'm new in the ward and I love books and I thought I might as well get to know more people in the ward. In the end I came to a more solid conclusion:

Book Club = A Good Excuse for a Girls Night Out

My first ever Book Club turned out to be 2 hours long. The first hour was talking about the book, eating, and introducing next month's book. The second hour was just chatting, laughing, and having fun. I didn't know a single person before I went, but I stayed so long becuase by the end I felt like I was sitting there with a group of my best friends just talking... and of course the main subject was books. I had a lot of fun and I think I will enjoy going again. I would even say that I would enjoy being in this ward for the rest of my life. I've never been in a ward so accepting, loving, friendly, and outgoing. This is truly a special ward... I love it.

I did learn some things that I never knew, like what the cover means so it was still enlightening. It was also fun to connect with people who love to talk about books as much as I do (I don't know why that was surprising though?)

Great Reno Balloon Races

Today, we got up at the crack of dawn to see the Great Nevada Balloon Races.The Great Reno Balloon Race is the largest free hot air ballooning event in the Nation with an average of 140,000 spectators attending the event each year. It was a lot of fun and so pretty (but really packed)! We've been looking forward to this weekend for a long time except that it was really hard to get up this morning so we missed the Dawn Patrol I think. Here are some pictures of our morning!

Latter part of the Dawn Patrol

We parked up the hill from San Rafael Regional Park and walked down to the event.

One of the coolest balloons was the Eagle, it was the first in the air to start off the mass ascension.

On their way!

There were a few specialty balloons that were fun to see, the Wells Fargo Bee, Smokey the Bear, the Eagle, and the Energizer Bunny.

Walking back up the hill to our car (the eagle is landing in the background.)

After wards we were really tired. We went home and crashed until early afternoon.

E/I, S/N, T/F, J/P

Well, I assume that most of you have heard of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator. It's not an inkblot test or some other test to see if you're a psycho. It's a test to try and categorize everyone into 16 personality types. Validity of such personality tests are inadequate at best, but serve only as a glimpse of your perceived strengths and weaknesses (Drew reminds me all the time). My senior year of college, taking the Myers-Briggs Test was mandatory. I took it quickly, within 10-15 mins, this is supposed to prove the most accurate so that you can't think too hard about the questions. I took it alongside one of the most amazing friends I ever gained at college, Amber. She took a lot longer. She couldn't decide on a single question. Completely opposite of me, it made me laugh that she was so conscientious of her answers... I waited impatiently for her to finish. Of course, the term "opposites attract" could not apply to anyone so correctly as myself. I consider most of the people I adore most to be "opposite" of myself. Take my freshman roommate Savannah for example. It was by random chance that we roomed together. I would have never put myself with a Music, Dance, Theater major in my life.... at yet for some crazy reason we melded like twins. Actually a lot of people thought we were twins, or sisters, or cousins... or some other relation. (I miss you Savannah). And in many ways I believe that Drews personality and manner are so opposite of mine, but we work wonderfully because we balance each other out.

I wanted to blog about my recent rediscovery of the test I took last fall in my Management class because I've been thinking a lot about my strengths and my weaknesses. My professor required us to take it and we spent a whole class discussing our results so that we may benefit by learning more about ourselves. I have had two interviews in the last week and the question always looms in the mind... "What are you greatest strengths, and what are your greatest weaknesses?"

You can't plead the fifth when they ask your weaknesses becuase they want to know most of all if you understand your limitations or perhaps if you are honest with yourself. Here are the results from my test and which I have looked at a couple of times, giggling to myself, to look at what is calls my weakness and strengths. It also provides professions that someone like myself should pursue... interesting.

Anyways... There are 16 possibilities, a combination of 4 letters
E/I: Scale of Extroversion or Introversion
S/N: Scale of Sensing vs. Intuition
T/F: Scale of Thinking vs. Feeling
J/P: Scale of Judging vs. Perceiving


ESTP...me :)
"Good at on-the-spot problem solving. Like action, enjoy whatever comes along. Tend to like mechanical things and sports, with friends on the side. Adaptable, tolerant, pragmatic; focused on getting results. Dislike long expalnations (**couldn't agree more**). Are best with real things that can be worked, handled, taken apart, or put together."
P.S. I'm a flaming extrovert ... see they also rate you on the clarity of the scale, 30 being the strongest and 1 being the weakest, and 0 is exactly in the middle. I was a 23... marked as a "clear" extrovert


ESFJ... drew & amber :) (possibly ENFJ)
"Warmhearted, talkative, popular, conscientious, born cooperators, active committee members. Need harmony and may be good at creating it. Always doing something nice for someone. Work best with encouragement and praise. Main interest is in things that directly and visibly affect people's lives."

Here are a few things that I agree with, or that make me laugh ... you can try to guess which.

• Spontaneous and playful, ESTP's enjoy activities that are active and physical in nature and enjoy a certain amount of risk taking.
  
• Prefer a "live and let live" attitude and lifestyle
  
• Because ESTP's live so totally in the moment, they often avoid planning ahead any further than is absolutely necessary.
  
• Can be funny and charming, they can appear insincere when they rely too heavily on humor rather than genuine emotion
  
• They are often surprised to learn they have offended or hurt the feelings of other and need to slow down and consider the possible consequences of their impulses before acting... **ouch** SO true
• Have trouble accepting structure and meeting deadlines
• May forget dates and event which have special meaning to others, may be unaware of the impact of their actions on others
• Practical, realistic, observant, focused on immediate experience
  
• Need stimulation perhaps through mechanical things or competitive team sports
  
• Others usually see ESTP's as gregarious, fun-loving, and spontaneous, adventurous risk-takers, pragmatic trouble-shooters.

Ok, ok... I'll have to admit I agree with quite a bit, question a bit of it, and laugh at a lot of it too (perhaps because parts a little too true.)

What careers does this little printout say of me? Here are a few: paramedic, auditor, stock broker, financial advisor, EEG technologist (eh?mom!), craftsperson/artisan, emergency medical technician, entrerenuer, chef/cook, athlete/coach, investigator, pilot... etc. They ALL make me laugh.

All in all... I have several full pages of printout of this stuff, what work environments I might work best in, my leadership style, areas for growth, strengths...etc. I wish a had a full one of Drew to understand him a little better. I hope everyone has had a chance to have a little fun with this sort of thing (getting a personality test) and finding out a little about themselves as well, it's pretty grand. There's no doubt that our personalities change over time... esp. in the twenties, but it's fun nonetheless.

Enjoy!