<1537>

Yesterday late afternoon we went over to Filene's Basement, since I hadn't yet been to the new downtown store, and to Best Buy. I got a car adapter for my iPod that uses the cassette, but I'll probably have to take it back because it makes a ton of noise and it got bad reviews online. Afterwrds we went to Maggie's for dinner.

Today I drove up to Towson to get a few things for the weekend, and I sauntered into the Apple store to play with the new iPhone, but I didn' tknow it's not officially out until 6pm. When I left the store I noticed the giant line that was forming full of people sitting with mall lunch and MacBooks. It was a major dork convention, Mac edition.

Off to New Jersey!

<1437>

Yesterday Joe had his orals and got what we've been calling an "irritational pass" in parallel with the conditional pass that exists. As in, he passed, but there is much irritation associated with it. They're going to make him do a schoolwide prelim, despite the handbook saying you can choose that or a schoolwide final defense. We have to do all three orals, so we don't have this bullshit fake choice. So he has to wait until September to do the stupid schoolwides because one of his committee members is out of town until then. Dumb. His department is lame.

Afterwards we went to One World, where the AC was totally useless. Several peeps joined us and it was a good time. We then grabbed things from my house and escaped to his air conditioning. Later on we went to Maggie's for some beer and a snack, and then we watched a program about the world's heaviest man during which there was a Pizza Hut commercial for 8 free Toll House cookies with any medium pizza order. Yikes.

Today I'm working on the dissertation. Tomorrow we head to NJ for the weekend. It should be interesting, but fun.

<2207>

BTW, I got my new camera in, so there will be photos up on the Flickr page from now on.

<1147>

I feel pretty blah today, thanks to this cold. But today is my first day back to doing work, so I have to go in to school and do things, starting with a friend's mock oral exam. I could definitely stand to sleep all day, though.

Last night Joe and I tried to barbecue again, to no avail. The damn new charcoal wouldn't light and we didn't have any more of that self-lighting stuff to get it going. He went and bought lighter fluid, but it just burned off without lighting the briquets. Boo. So I made taco salad and he boiled some tofu dogs and we sat outside and it was still fun.

<1347>

When I arrived at Terminal C, I practically ran to the end, feeling like it was the longest walk ever and hardly able to breathe. I have no idea how I sprinted all the way down it when I was last there. It was weird to see Joey, since he'd been a disembodied voice for two months. It was like I had to retrain my brain about what he looked like. But pretty soon we were back to our goofy old selves. We got my bags, grabbed a cab, and went to his place. We had some Afghan Kabob for lunch (delicious, as always), and then we went to For Eyes to see if they had any good glasses. They had a pair that was very similar to my old ones, in tortoise shell and in the correct (giant) size. (My mother laughed her ass off when I explained about my giant head and far apart eyes that defy most women's frames). They were also only $100! Eff Lenscrafters, man, I'm sticking with For Eyes forever. We then grabbed a cab to my house, where I showered. I smelled pretty ripe by then. I got some groceries from Eddie's for breakfast, and we got some dinner from Trinidad Gourmet just down the street. I'd never been there; it was tasty. We sat out on the porch because it was a beautiful night. Then we went inside, Joey put on a movie, and I was snoring within a minute (about 10:31 pm).

Wednesday I woke up around 6, much to Joe's chagrin. But I think I managed to go back to sleep for a few hours. Joe went to campus to do some things and I took my car to get the blinkers fixed. Joe picked me up in a FlexCar (after some driving around in circles due to confusion over the directions either by him hearing them or me giving them), and we headed to Towson for some shopping. We went to Target for a fan to point at my bed. While I was there, Am called to say she was going to the hospital to get this infection carved out of her... she's had a not-so-great time of things lately. My mom called shortly thereafter. We drove over to the mall where I bought a new wallet at Nordstrom Rack ($10, red leather). We had dinner at the Chinese place we like and then shopped at Trader Joe's until we had to get out of there to return the car. It suddenly became ass cold, which made the walk back from the car's parking spot unpleasant.

Thursday I picked up my car, which was insanely cheap to fix, and I headed to the MVA to get a new driver's license. It was not a huge wait, and all they did was get a new photo and create a duplicate. I was glad they didn't do the eyesight test or make me wear my glasses, because I didn't have the new ones yet and the old ones are awful. Thursday night I had a student group meeting at Iggie's (yum), which was mostly fun for seeing people, including JG who is back from Zambia for a while. Then D and I headed to Brewer's to meet up with the HPM crew, who was celebrating all week because P was in town.

Friday I made this yummy dinner I saw on my favorite BBC Food show and some sangria. We ate outside, and then we went to the Soc softball game. Joe and I played a bit of catch. I played in the game a bit, catching (boo) and batting twice. I caught a pop foul for a rare out (the Soc team has some bad defense), and I also went 1-1 with a single (the offense ain't much better). Afterwards we drove around aimlessly in the lovely weather until we decided to have the aim of Rita's Italian Ice, which I think will be a recurring aim this summer because it's just so tasty.

Saturday we went to the farmer's market in the morning, enjoying a wonderful Portobello mushroom sandwich. In the afternoon we went to Columbia for a barbecue at KS's. Joe and I were decidedly jealous of his house. It has a huge backyard with a big old deck with a nice table and chairs and a big grill. Joe did most of the grilling, which I think he enjoyed a lot. It was a very relaxed and enjoyable affair.

Sunday we went to the downtown farmer's market and then parted ways for the afternoon, regrouping in the evening to make use of my landlord's grill. This is another wonderful idea that will be recurring all summer. Grilled vegetables, esp corn, are just so tasty.

Monday I went in to school briefly and then got my glasses. Tuesday I went in to try to enter my travel expenses. There was TV Night, and it was good to see the gang. Wednesday Joe came over and we drove down to Little Italy, where we had a huge but tasty dinner at Germano's and then sat at the harbor and were all kissy and watching people walk by. Thursday I successfully entered my expenses and then went over to bug Joe at night. We went to Maggie Moore's, where they didn't have Sam Summer, which is what I really wanted. But it was still fun. We watched a terrible horror movie.

Friday he came over here and we went to a lambic tasting at Wine Source, overdid it at Whole Foods, and then grilled a bunch. We went over to Cold Stone Creamery to see what it was all about, and we ended up waiting half an hour and paying way too much just to share a cup of terrible ice cream. The ice cream itself was decent enough, but they mixed in way too much stuff, all of poor quality, leaving it tasting just awful. Disappointing.

Yesterday we went to the farmer's market and then headed south to Home Depot and the minigolf course. I mentioned that yesterday, I guess. Then we returned for more grilling, which was much more effective with the new grill and better charcoal. We'd been using this autolight stuff which flames up very flamey, but burns out quickly. We could have cooked on the new stuff all night, and I actually had to shoot the hose at it to squelch it. We then went to Rita's to assuage our ice cream disappoint from the previous night, and after some discussion about lottery winner demographics, he bought some scratchoffs and I bought a mega millions ticket.

I think I'm catching a cold, sadly. My throat started hurting last night and was worse this morning, although it's okay now. Joe says he's never caught a summer cold, but doesn't exactly want to catch one for his oral exams Wednesday.

I ordered a new camera, so I hope to be taking new photos sometime soon. The delivery was delayed because I ordered a camera case also, and for some reason instead of shipping things separately, Amazon said everything would ship in November, when I guess the camera case would be available. Um... no. So I deleted that and now it seems the camera will be here in about a week.

It may not arrive in time for next weekend when we go to New Jersey. Joe is predictably neurotic about me seeing his house and meeting his parents and avoiding his giant scary dog. We're going to go to the shore, which should be fun.

<1823>

I'm still alive, just busy catching up on television and hanging out with Joe. We've been grilling a lot. Today we went to Home Depot to buy a non-disgusting grill grate (the disgusting one is my landlord's, super shock), and then we played some mini-golf and he won. But I beat him at air hockey. I am supposed to update with various embarrassing things he has done, such as leaving a packet of shredded cheese on his couch/bed and then totally sitting on it. Oh! I also found an empty dirty dish in his fridge the other day. Funny boy.

So that's my update until I have more time.

<1611>

Just a note to say that once I return to Baltimore, I'll go back to writing here, except for dissertation-related stuff, which will continue to be in the other blog.