Sorry for the epic neglect folks. Life is BUSY at the moment. Here’s a quick status update on a lot of miscellaneous fronts. And read all of them, cuz some are kind of exciting 
1. Work: Same shit, different day. I’m still working 3 jobs. I still hate working 3 jobs. A major source of my blog neglect lately has come from one job in particular, wiping me out so I have NO energy to blog when I get home. I mean 4 grants + coordinating a scientific conference? I’m one person, and I work there 20 hours a week. Whew!
2. Marla: She hurts. I saw a neurologist and got an EMG and NCV on Friday. SO STRANGE. They put things on my foot then shocked me with a cattle-prod-thing. Get the results on Wednesday.
3. Italy: Um….I have done NOTHING Italy-related in a month. I’m starting to feel bad. But I have other things on my mind…..
4. Love Life: Well, I’m 7 years into my current relationship. We live together. AND WE’RE GETTING MARRIED!!!!!
J took me on a weekend adventure, and wouldn’t tell me anything. I had a feeling, but then again, I’ve been waiting for a while for this and thought maybe I’d have to keep waiting (boys are kinda dense). But then he took me to Sea World, where we did a behind the scenes penguin encounter. Apparently everyone else on the tour knew but me. I have tons of pics and a video of me/us petting penguins. Then we went into the back of the exhibit, and magic happened
Basically you can go right up to the barrier that separates the staff and the penguins, but you can’t go onto the snow (oh yeah, it’s about 20 degrees in here!). J and I walked up to this barrier, and as luck would have it, a penguin was intrigued and waddled right over to us. The little guy came all the way to the barrier and stuck his beak through it. SO AWESOME. I think I squealed in delight, and then said (to the penguin) “I love you!”. J thought I was talking to him, so he said, “I love you too, (pulled out a ring) will you marry me?”
And so we’re engaged. And we’re 100% ecstatic about it. I feel lucky to have found the love of my life, who is also my best friend, and to know I will spend the rest of my life with him. I mean, he proposed with penguins. This is clearly the guy for me! And that brings me to #5…
5. Wedding Planning: I’ve been engaged for 9 days, and I think I have a venue set. We’ve come up with our first two choices for dates (2011) and are waiting to hear back from the event coordinator. I went out to dinner with some of my friends 2 days after the proposal and they had made a bet as to how many spreadsheets I had already created (2). A week later, I have 5 total. Although the big day is over a year away, I’m not wasting a minute. Planning a wedding is kind of fun (remind me I said that if I start getting stressed 10 months from now). J is totally wonderful too. He is totally interested in this, at least so far, and while I’m the lead on the wedding planning, he’s taking the reins on the honeymoon.
So yeah. I’ve been a busy bee. I really don’t want my blog to turn into a wedding planning frenzy, so I’ll do my best to keep variety. I’ll also do my best to keep up, rather than go for weeks with no posts. And on that note, I’m going to bed. Good night world!
