One luxury in working in one place for so long is that anyone can find you.

Case in point, today an employee comes to my little section of the store and lets me know I have a visitor. Visitors aren’t rare occurrences for me. Normally they are planned visits, though. This impromptu visitor threw me off a little bit.

I stick my head out the door and see my dear old friend Melissa whom I’ve not seen in over a year. I spent some time talking to her, the husband and their adorable 14 month old daughter.

Once or twice I’ve had friends that I’ve literally not seen in 5 years or so track me down because they know that someone will know how to find me if they go to the store. More than once, I’ve gotten a phone call from an employee at the store saying something like: “(insert name here) says that you know them. They want to talk to you.”

In fact, I was the ‘best woman’ and an old friend’s beach wedding after 3 years of not seeing each other. All because he knew he could find me just by asking the right people …

(It’s a Peter Paul and Mary song. I promise. I swear! Angie, back me up on this one…)

Anyway - point being, I got my car inspected and licensed today. All done within an hour and a half, including flipping travel time into LS and back! OMG, do you believe it?! Amazing, isn’t it. You’re jealous.

While getting my car inspected, the mechanics (whom knew my dad well) kept asking me why the convertible top wasn’t down on my car today. Believe me, it was the perfect day for it too!

I quickly and truly answered, “Cuz it won’t go down anymore.”

The two nodded in agreement that it was a good reason to not have it down, then asked why I hadn’t had it fixed.

I honestly explained that the Saab dealership wasn’t exactly in my price range, and asked if they knew of some place that would look at it for me.

One of them gets a bright idea, and goes out into the garage. Turns out one of their employees used to work at a similar dealership, and has a clue about how to work on my Saab. He mentioned something about it probably having its motor disengaged? Heck, I dunno.

To make a long story longer, I’m supposed to take my car up there and drop it off for the day so the guy can piddle around with it to see how to fix the problem. (Angie - whatcha doin’ Tuesday? I would need to call them to see if that day is okay…)

I might have a convertible again before the nice weather is gone! Whoo-hoo!

A couple other highlights for the day:
- totally in and out of the License Bureau within 10 minutes.
- Trish and Tom’s mom came out with the video of the 4D sonogram, which was crazy cool!!
- Friends of ours came out to the house for a nice BBQ and good conversation
- and in the process, fixed the wireless connection
- we had apple pie a la mode for desert - YUMMY!

The wedding went alright. It was a small affair, which is fine.

It seemed like every 3rd person had a camera, though, so it was a little hard to get photos without getting in other’s shots. I get a little confused when this happens. I don’t know who the ‘primary’ photographer is - therefore trying to stay completely out of their way…

Anyhow - there are some pictures on my flickr account. We took quite a few, and I’ve not been able to look through them all and check them out. So, some more photos might appear later.

If I really am going to consider doing this for cash, I’m going to need to look into lighting alternatives, because it would of helped tremendously today. Overall, I’m not horribly impressed with the photos. I’ve done better. Yet, I’ve done worse, also.

My sister went with me today, which I enjoyed. She went with the intention of helping me take photos, which she did. But, it turned out to not be as necessary as I assumed it would be. But, we did have quite a interesting moments.

My favorite would be when we arrived at the Buddhist Temple before anyone else and had to ask a non-English speaking Monk whether we were in the right place.

“Hi, is there a wedding here at noon?” I ask politely, unassuming of how difficult of a question this really is.

He nods wildly, smiles and cheerfully, “Cooking Class at 5!”

“Uhm,” I just don’t know how to respond to that. “Nooooo… Wedding… Noon?”

Right, my sister and I decided to wait outside for someone from the wedding party to arrive…

Anyway - On a completely and totally different subject:

In case y’all don’t read Trish’s blog, I just wanted to quickly say that TRISH IS PREGNANT AND IS GOING TO HAVE A BABY GIRL! AND SHE’S GOING TO NAME HER SHEILA! (Okay, I made that last part up.)

Why do people think that calling me at 4 AM is alright?!

No, I will not cosign on your bond.

I cannot believe that I am the ONLY person that you know that has had a job for over a year. Aren’t you realizing what you’re saying?!

I don’t care that you’re going to loose your job.

Its your problem.

On a different note, I’m doing the photography at a wedding tomorrow. (No charge - its to add to my portfolio so maybe one day I can charge!)

I’m kind of excited about it because its a Buddhist ceremony, and I’ve not ever been to one of those.

But, I’m a little nervous at the same time because I’ve not gotten much of a chance to talk specifics to the Bride (a friend of mine).

My sister is coming along to be the second shooter.

And, there’s a possibility I may be doing another wedding in June. (Angie? Interested?) This one would be a paying job, but I have no idea what… Cuz I don’t know what to charge.

Will post some pictures on Flickr no later than Sunday evening, I think. I’ll let y’all know.

• Paul made it home today, and looks no worse for the wear. No surgery. No big procedures. Pretty much, he just hung out there until the problem resolved itself - on pain medication of course. I’m really thankful he’s home, too. I’m more than capable of managing things on my own, but everyone likes a little help. Right?

• I have to get another tire! I’m hoping that’ll fix this crazy wobble that my car is doing. I was thinking I needed an alignment, but only one tire is wearing weird. So, here’s hopin’ that the tire is the problem and not the car.

• Also, our flippin’ floor drain near our washing machine is not working properly. We tried Drano… that didn’t fix it. I hope it doesn’t have anything to do with the deodorant incident… I have a feeling we’re going to have to call a plumber. Because, you know, we can afford that…

• My fingernails look fabulous. Okay, well, not fabulous. The polish is half worn off. I can’t keep nail polish on to save my life. But, my nails are really long! (Long for me is barely over my finger tips.) I’m super excited about all this. I’m being really careful not to break one!

• I was asked to take photos at another friend’s wedding. It’ll be at the end of May. I’m looking forward to it! Its a Buddhist wedding… never been to one. It’ll be interesting. My sister is going to come with me to be another photographer. Two photographers are much better than one at a wedding.

• While in the Taco Bell Drive Thru, after picking Paul up from the hospital, I noticed that the guy in the car in front of us looked so much like my dad that I had to do a double take, then a triple take, and then stare the rest of the time he was in front of us. It was really weird. Really really weird. Really.

Oh my goodness. Thank God the weather was nice today.

Tom got out of bed and outside for a couple hours today. (He still has his pressure wounds, so time up in his chair is limited.)

We wandered around the yard and discussed all the ideas we have to improve the place. You know… when we win the lottery.

I’d really love to put in a stone walkway all around the property, so Tom would have a smoother surface to drive on. (Our yard is extra bumpy for some reason…) Also, the stone walkway would allow Tom in the yard when the ground is muddy.

We’ve discussed building planter boxes that would set up next to the house and around the deck. We could make these at a height which Tom would be able to work with.

Heck - there’s a lot of things we would do if we had the money. But, ya know, that stuff doesn’t grow on trees.

Trees!! We need some trees too.

One day, I’m just going to throw my desire to pay my credit card off out the window and charge a whole bunch of stuff to make our house nicer, and easier for Tom.

Yeah… one day…

Anyhow, we also strolled down to our neighbors house and chatted with him for a while. His house isn’t accessible, but it didn’t matter today anyhow. We were all more than happy to sit outside on his steps and enjoy the weather.

Tom’s back in bed now. I think that we’ll be able to cope with our cabin fever for a couple of days… The weather is supposed to turn chiller this weekend, anyhow.

Yeah, so Trish decided (on a whim) to take me and her mother to the boats on Sunday night. We really had a good time, although can never leave that place with money. I don’t know why… I had even almost broke even at one point!

I gave her more than ample crap about that fancy new invention called a turn signal. She almost started getting the hang of using it within the last 10 minutes of the drive home. I bet we’re back to square one, though… And, the next time I travel somewhere with her, I’ll have to beat it into her head again.

Saturday night, I went over to my mom’s house. My aunt decided to stop by as well. Somehow, during this visit, it was declared that the third Saturday of the month would be Mai Tai night at my mom’s house. I’m sure that I helped decide this, but not sure how I got involved in the process. And, sadly, I was sober the whole time… so I can’t even blame this decision on a buzz.

I also found out on Saturday night that an old friend’s husband has a brain tumor. WTF, right? I’ll find out more information on that Wednesday.

Tom has another pressure wound on his left leg, now. The other two spots (on his bum and right heel) are slowly healing. We had a couple set backs with each of them… but hopefully we’ve got a hold on them again. Pressure wounds are miserable. I hate them. Tom hates them. Actually… I don’t really know of anyone that does like them.

I looked online last night at some wheelchair accessible vans. Ours is doing okay, but I thought we’d be more apt to get out of the house if loading Tom into the van was easier. And, realistically, I think we should consider getting a newer van in a couple years. I say a couple years because we can’t afford a payment until my car is paid off. Its crazy how much a van with a lift cost. A new van with a lift cost $40-50,000. Seriously. Obviously, we’ll be looking to purchase a used one - and hopefully we’ll luck out and find a good buy.

I’m super ready for spring.

I’m also done rambling.

Good day to you.

I SAID GOOD DAY!