They played at the Wonder Ballroom as a part of MusicFest NorthWest. We got our tickets free by hanging out at a Jackpot Records one morning where they gave out free passes. Besides being verbally abused by a street kid – it was kind of nice being in the city early in the morning. Anyway…

Besides enjoying their music, and having a teenage love for Jesse Lacey (I swear he was looking right at me for a little while!), I appreciate their strides as artists. Their early work is good, but totally pop punk and whines about girls and typical high school angst. It was really fun to sing along to in high school – and sometimes now for nostalgia – but I don’t really seek that out now. Every album Brand New has put out presents almost a whole new sound; some people have hated this… which is fine, they can keep listening to Taking Back Sunday and Fall Out Boy. I’d much rather listen to artists that are trying to improve their work, and continue to create music that pushes their abilities, instead of cranking out things that will put them in the top 40.
They did play their old stuff, and joked about how we were all in Jr. High when they wrote it… they had fun with it, but it was almost a joke as they played because they had moved  beyond those songs.

Jesse Lacey concluded with Soco Amaretto Lime – from their first album. Even though it’s from their first album that I basically said is less superior than their recent work, I recommend this song, it’s a fun one.

It’s a ’97 Honda Accord I bought from my parents going into my 3rd year at college. It’s manual (a must – I’m sorry, there’s just no fun in driving an automatic), and runs great (even with accruing over 330,000 miles). Being that well driven it’s needed some upkeep. When it was just me I did a pretty good job about checking the oil, and keeping the basics maintained; but besides replacing the radiator, I really didn’t do anything too drastic as far as maintenance. There have been some pretty big pesky problems that I had put off/avoided because of the costs, but thanks to my amazing (wonderful, handsome, patient) husband, those things are not even an issue anymore.

The first issue was the check engine light. I’m pretty sure it was on when it was still my parents’ car.  Years ago I took it to a Honda Mechanic, and he told me that one of the check engine light codes was that the speed sensor was faulty. Made sense, because it related to the second thing which is that the speedometer and odometer would sporadically work (more often it wouldn’t work). $600, and two speed sensors later, and the problems persists. But, within the first couple months of being married, Phil takes the car to Auto Zone to check the Check Engine light codes, does some research, and viola! check engine light is OFF!

Phil had also researched why the speedometer and odometer weren’t working. Apparently during the year my car was made Honda had used an epoxy over the solder of the circuit board behind the speedometer and odometer, and over time that epoxy heats up and cools down over and over, and in such extremes, that it warps and causes the circuits not to work properly.

Per Phil’s request, I helped him pick out a soldering iron and some solder for his birthday present. And a week later, after about 4 years of this problem – my car is fixed!!
While I very easily could have married him for this perk alone, him being really smart and handy is just a bonus to all his other amazing qualities.

For whatever reason, I love this table. I love the drawer, shelf, the detail in the legs. It’s a decent free piece of furniture. Obviously, you can see that it needs a little tender-lovin’-care. Phil and I sanded it down just to smooth down the surfaces (have you ever sanded something before? It’s rewarding for about a half hour, but then you hand sand the detail in the legs and it’s suuuper arduous.) Then I got some paint at Lowe’s, and painted it up:

I also picked out a replacement handle at Lowe’s.

Next we want to find a cheap, wide dresser to repaint with the same color (or maybe the same hue, but different values, mmm), and the same handles for the living room.

Phil built the fire.

And this is what we had for dinner… steaks grilled right on the embers, and baked potatoes, with ham and cheese and chives and sour cream. Yeah… it was as good as you think it might be. And of course, s’mores — but we used those jumbo marshmallows (…meh, fun, but meh).

I LOVE Eisley. I first heard them at Sasquatch in 2003 when my art club went. It was their first tour, they were opening for Coldplay. I was instantly drawn to their softness and passion… and the fact that they were young and obviously really talented. Their sound has matured a bit, still soft and sweet, but more in a bad ass fairy tale sort of way.

At the end of the night Phil and I stuck around to get a photo I had taken at Sasquatch with Eisley signed by them. Their younger sibling who opened and manned the merch table were nice enough to run it out to them and bring it back signed.

Oh, and we had dinner at Little Big Burger.

My sister-in-law Greta gave me “The Hunger Games” and its sequel “Catching Fire”. She told me I’d be hooked, and I am. It’s a pretty rapid read, I just finished the first one (took me about a week). Phil and I have been playing tennis and going for walks, but the bulk of my time is still spent staring at a screen. Watching Netflix’s Watch Instantly (or listening to it because I’m usually multi-tasking) is so easy, but after a while I feel almost sick. Getting back into the swing of reading just feels nice and rewarding… even though I’m reading about teenage kids killing each other for the entertainment of a tyrant leader in a future society…you know what I mean though.

Eventually I’d like to get past these rapid-read books and read something with more depth and meaning. Unfortunately my brain does this obnoxious ADD thing where if I’m slightly bored and not being very focused, I start thinking about 10 other things instead of what I’m reading. It’s unfortunate.

Okay, we’re not technically in Portland, we’re technically in Tigard, but we’re a couple blocks away from the TriMet, so I consider it Portland. Phil is doing his mechanical engineering internship at a company called Radisys. I have an office at our apartment where I am freelancing. I should give more of an update.. but it’s late, and I really just wanted to post that image I created following this:

(…except I used Gotham, not Helvetica)

Anyway. This year I remembered how much I LOVE the Holidays. Yeah yeah, everybody loves the holidays, big deal. Well the big deal is that I love the holidays. The past couple years the holidays have been overshadowed by finals and driving over the Blue Mountains in horribly scary weather  — side note, one year I drove home with my little sister and her friend in the back, and once we reached the Columbia River (about 8-9 hours into the drive — at about 10pm) it started snowing, the first snow of the season; and being Oregon it was slushy snow; and being a girl I hadn’t changed my tires for a while. I was behind a semi for the last 4 hours of the drive because if I didn’t catch the trail he made, we were going to slide off the road. Scary stuff.

Anyway, this Christmas just seemed extra special. No more school, no traveling, and Phil & I got to start our own traditions. We didn’t start many, mainly just the tree picking and home decorating traditions. And my favorite: collecting Christmas Bins on sale after Christmas to store everything all nice and organized for the year.

I stole some time and made our stockings.

We got a tree, and decorated it.

And Phil made me a wreath

We got to spend Christmas Eve and Christmas Day with both our families since they love about 10 minutes away from each other. Not all of our familiy members made it back to Oregon this Christmas, but it was nice to spend it with our family that was home.

Ahh well, this is real life, and real life means jobs to earn money to pay bills. Doesn’t mean we can’t make the tiny apartment we live in pretty!

This is our entry way:

Our Living Room:

Where I am typing this right now…

Our Kitchen:

Our Bedroom:

(and Phil’s desk:)