No Title Needed

Props to shewar over at Jezebel.com for the awesomeness below:

Phase One is Done!

When We Bought the House
Progress on Phase One of Painting

Phase One is Done!

Found Photos

When M's laptop crashed during an online final exam in law school, we decided he needed a new one. Therefore, his old laptop became mine. As it got older and slower, I used it less and less. At some point around late 2006, I pulled off all the files I thought I'd really need and moved them onto the new one, but there were a few folders I missed for whatever reason.

Last week, I needed to find some work stuff I did back in 2004, so out comes the cranky old laptop. Other than ridiculously long start-up and file-opening times, it wasn't too bad. I pulled off the work files and poked around for other stuff I might want. As part of that process, I stumbled across a couple of photos I'd forgotten about.

This one's pretty innocuous -- just a nice photo of the two of us from Jill and Aaron Anderson's wedding. (M was a groomsman, I was a first-time videographer.)

Although this second photo was also taken after a wedding, it bears little resemblence to the one above.

Yes, that is indeed M, along with my cousin Garth (taking a swig from the bottle of vodka hidden behind his jacket) and my youngest brother, Phil, vogue-ing in the front. This photo was taken on the streets of Seattle at approximately 2 a.m., quite a few hours after my middle brother's wedding reception had wrapped up. Not all of the details of the situation are clear, but here are some of the facts, as I remember them.

• Contrary to rumor, we didn't steal this bottle of vodka. We (read: Mason) did, however, sneak the bottle into a salsa club by somehow reaching around the bouncer and setting it on the stage where the band was to perform.
• Dad (who took the photo above) was somehow unaware that we had done this and couldn't understand why we kept ordering diet Cokes and then reaching under the table. (Looking back, I can't really understand it and I had the benefit of knowing what was going on.)
• This was the same club where a very nice girl in her late 20s -- who happened to be sporting a pair of sideburns (truly, more like mutton chops) that were fuzzy enough to look Dickensian -- tried to teach us to salsa, with mixed results.
• It's possible that Phil might have been singing "I Think We're Alone Now" on the dance floor at said club.
• And no, none of us were in college at the time. Clearly, we had forgotten that.
• Oh! And we kept referring to the bottle as "the football." I'm quite sure that we woke any number of nice downtown Seattle residents up that night as [one of the three guys] tackled [one of the others] on the street whilst the third guy [or maybe it was me] yelled, "Hey, don't crack his head on the curb and for God's sake, don't drop the football!"
• And yes, this photo was briefly my screensaver in July 2004. :)

Another Backyard Project

Last night, I finally finished up the little path between the patio and the hammock.

In June, I'd covered the grass where I wanted the path with a tarp and left it there for about three weeks. I thought I'd need to dig up the sod there afterwards, but it wasn't necessary because the grass wasn't that thick there in the first place.

I replaced the tarp with some landscape fabric, which then sat there for a couple of weeks. (Oops.) Last night, I stapled it down (pounding the staples into the ground with a big rubber mallet -- kind of fun!), then added four bags of pine bark mulch and edging of various stones found and/or dug up in the yard. Et voila!

Actually, the "voila" might be premature: I have to see how well I like the rocks. I can't decide whether I'd prefer stones or the red bricks that edge the garden beds.

But for now, it's nice to have another project finished up!

Cathy and Harvey Get Married

It's a band wedding!

The beautiful bride gets ready for her big stroll down the aisle.

Cathy and Harvey looked really happy throughout the ceremony.

Outside the chapel (on the University of St. Thomas campus) after the ceremony.

ETC, Jen, and Jason came back to our place between the ceremony and reception for some cocktails and snacks. (It was such a beautiful day!) We then took the light rail downtown to City Hall for the reception.

Jen and I, not satisfied with how our hair looked in a previous photo, primp a bit.

We bumped into Cathy in a hallway and attempted to take our own photo with some silly results.

A kind passerby offered to take the photo that we couldn't quite manage.
The Band, all together. :)

Congrats, Catdog and Harvey!