30 Before 30 - Wear a Long Dress

I am way overdue with this blog and I apologize!  Things have been busy, as my next several blogs will attest!  This blog goes all the way back to January, when Taylor's school had their annual "B-School Prom." It seemed like the perfect chance to check something off my 30 Before 30!

So, a few weeks before the big day, I visited Rent The Runway and selected my dress and another as a backup, just in case.  They were scheduled to arrive on Friday before the event on Saturday.  Typically, they recommend giving 2 days before your event, but my dress wasn't available until Friday, so I took the risk. I was travelling for work that week and got home on Friday at 7:45.  The weather was really bad with ice and snow all over the roads.  When I arrived home, I saw a sticker on my door saying that UPS had just been there at 7:15 and wasn't going to attempt delivery again until MONDAY.  I first FREAKED OUT but then realized there has to be some sort of solution, so I UPS.  They basically told me sorry, but there was nothign they could do because the UPS facility where my box would be taken back to was closed until Monday.  She said she didn't have their phone number to call them so she had to use their special internal messaging system to ask the facility to call me if they were still there by chance.  I figured there was no change that it was going to work and started crying, but lo and behold, they did call and the guy was like you need to get here in 30 minutes to get your packages.  In the snow. 20 minutes away.  I risked life and limb and hugged a UPS man to get my dress.  That is dedication.

So, I got the dresses.  That was the first challenge.  The second was deciding which one to wear.  I chose these two:

 I really wanted to wear the red one, but he black one felt more "safe.  When I tried them on, the red one fit a little better, despite being really long, so I decided to go for it!  I even posted on the Partners Club page to see if anyone else would like to borrow the black one and found a taker!  Here are Kendra and I in the dresses!

We look exactly like the picture, right??

That day, my friends Tara and Lydia and I also went to Sephora and had our makeup especially done.  It was so fun!  Felt like real prom!

So the event itself was an absolute BLAST!  We rented a hotel room at the Westin Book Cadillac in downtown detroit, which we got a great rate on thanks to our friend Kayla who works there (below, second from left).  Thanks, Kayla!  And thanks to Deloitte and Taylor's special Starwood status, we got upgraded to a nice suite too!

Before Prom, we had some dinner and drinks in the hotel and then headed over to the venue for a night of catching up with friends and dancing :)  It went by way too fast!

Here are some more photos from the event:

Great shot taken by the event photographer.

Step and Repeat

And here's the review I posed on Rent The Runway.  :)

30 Before 30: Go to a top 40 concert

I am so backed up on my blogs it's almost silly!  I am sorry!  But, that doesn't mean I'm not checking things off the list!

Back in October, Taylor surprised me with tickets to see Lady Gaga at the Palace at Auburn Hills.  I love her Monster's Ball album so I was pumped!  And it definitely met my criteria for a Top 40 concert!

In January, my friend Tara invited me to go to a Matchbox 20/Phillip Phillips Concert just a few days before Lady Gaga.  The tickets were expensive, but something told me to go, so I said sure.

Then, in early February, Lady Gaga cancelled first her Detroit show and then the rest of her Born This Way Ball tour.  Well, good thing I had a backup Top 40 concert already on the books!

So on February 13, Tara and I headed out to Kalamazoo for a teen-tastic evening of pop stars (or so we thought).

First, we met our friend Wendy, who is living in Kalamazoo, for dinner and a drink at Bell's, a local Michigan beer brand.  It was fun, even if the food wasn't anything to write home about.

We got to the auditorium and immediately realized that the crowd was much more tame than expected!  We thought a lot of teeny boppers would be there for Phillip Phillips due to his American Idol fame, but it turned out that what we really had were a bunch of aging Matchbox 20 fans who were our age or older during their heyday.

Here's the very calm and subdued audience along with an illustration of where we sat:

Phillip Phillips!

Rob Thomas...still sexy at 40+

We had a great time during the concert!  They played every single one of their hit songs, and it brought back LOTS of 8th grade memories!  Even though they are no longer huge, I still consider it my Top 40 concert, because I loved them back in the day!

Cool shadow

The Stage

We asked a woman to take our picture and she made fun of us for wanting to get the PP sticker in it.  Oh well!

Thanks to Tara for inviting me to a fun night and saving my 30 Before 30 item!!

30 Before 30: Go Viral

So here's an item that definitely wasn't on my list when I started (Oh, you didn't know I was allowed to edit the list? Well, it's my party and I'll modify if I want to): Go viral.

But, it happened and it certainly seems 30-before-30-worthy so it's getting a blog.

It really sprung out of laziness.  Back in the fall, a student group at Taylor's school contacted the Partners Club (that's the group I'm in for wives/girlfriends/fiancées and I guess their male equivalents if men went off to business school with their ladies) and asked if we would like to put together a skit or a short video to be included in their annual "Follies" sketch comedy show.  It sounded like a fun thing to do, but we had some trouble garnering interested parties to write, act in, direct, shoot and edit said sketch, so alas we floundered.

One day, probably while trolling the Internet in a YouTube or Wikipedia black hole, I came across this site: whatshouldwecallme.tumblr.com and I realized that you could totally make an entire blog of these "animated gifs" just about living with a business school student. I realized this could also be a really funny way to get something together for that Follies show without too much effort. So, I did a little googling and realized that it is not at all difficult to rip these gifs from other sites and put the, up on a blog.  I put together 5-6 of them and sent the, over to the organizers of Follies.  They seemed entertained, but not smitten and responded that they are already doing something similar so thanks, but no thanks.

It seemed a shame to waste good idea, and I had lots more ideas I wanted to post, so I made a few more and posted the link on our Partners Club Facebook page just for fun. Everyone loved it, and some other girls even started sending me their own ideas of things I could put on the blog. They also started posting and sharing it all over their own Facebook pages! Before I knew someone told me that her boyfriend sent her the link to the page and didn't even realize it was started by someone at Michigan! It was spreading, and fast.

Within 3 days, the site got 10,000 page views. I started getting e-mails from Partners at other schools. Here's some of what they said:

• Your Blog is hysterical and awesome.  You just summed up my husband's first semester.  
• I just wanted to let you know the girls at Wharton love your blog! We've been laughing all day. :) Awesome idea!
• Girl, you get me.
• My girlfriends and I are Tuck Partners at Dartmouth, and we happened upon your AMAZING blog yesterday. Safe to say we are all OBSESSED
• SERIOUSLY an amazing piece of work.
• Your blog made my day!
• Brilliant- just brilliant. 
• Thanks for starting this. You are a Tuck Partner Hero!

They also sent me their own blog ideas, which is so fun. It's nice to know we have all had similar experiences.

So far, by my count, I have heard from partners at:

Booth (University of Chicago)
Columbia
Tuck (Dartmouth)
Hass (UC Berkeley)
Stanford
Anderson (UCLA)
Wharton (University of Pennsylvania)

Right now, the site has 75,000 page views and counting! And I'm not out of ideas!

Here's a sample.  To see more, head on over to www.livingwithabusinessschoolstudent.blogspot.com!

When my husband asks me to review his cover letters, I'm like:

It's been so fun to connect with partners all over the country and I can't wait to see where the blog goes! Check "Going Viral" of my bucket list, please!

January 11, 2003

Ten years ago today was my first official date with Taylor.  Ten years!!  We had met about a month earlier, after I spotted him at an acapella concert and subsequently stalked him via a series of yearbooks, databases, and misunderstandings which luckily culminated in our first-ever interaction around December 20, 2002.  That day, I brought Taylor lunch in his freshman dorm room while he recovered from appendicitis (which he had a few days after we first laid eyes on each other...apparently his appendix sensed what was coming - late nights and the stress of dating a 19-year-old girl - and decided to split).  The "meeting" essentially happened because I straight up told him that I thought he was attractive and wanted to get to know him better.  It went well.  What I remember most was Taylor's black jeans which he paired with all-white sneakers (this was 2003, mind you, not 1993!) and the fact that he asked lots of questions and seemed genuinely to want to get to know me.  These two facts offset each other, but given the aforementioned attractiveness, I was still interested :)

We went out separate ways for the holidays, not really knowing if we would see each other again.  I had my first-ever trans-Atlantic experience that year, traveling to Italy over the New Years holiday with my friends Kim and Jessica.  Kim* also happens to be the same friend  that I visited in Australia this New Years!  Ten years of friendship (more, actually)...wow.  Anyway, I sent Taylor a postcard from Italy and, as he puts it, he knew I was "in the bag." Nice.

So we returned from the holiday break in early January and wouldn't you know it, apparently my cafeteria lunch (or maybe my amazing personality) had left an impression because Taylor contacted me almost immediately (I think it was via AIM, remember those days?) to ask if I wanted to go out.  We arranged to have our first date the first Saturday after we returned to school, January 11.  Taylor was (and still is) a huge sports fan, so we decided to meet up for the Vanderbilt basketball game that night and follow it with ice skating at nearby Centennial Sportsplex.

Saturday arrived and I had to go to my usual job at the school cafeteria, which was fine because I had the date that night to look forward to and, with any luck, Taylor would be coming in for lunch and we could see each other before our date, which would help take the edge off.

So I was obviously in a good mood and a little distracted all day at work.  So much so, apparently, that I attracted the interests of one of my co-workers (Josh, maybe?) and did not notice.  So when he asked me, literally, out of the blue if I wanted to go our sometime, I agreed (?) and suggested that we have dinner that night (?!).  I told him we could get dinner about an hour after work, but that I had to be done by 7:30 to meet friends (well, kinda) at the basketball game.

So, you know, that happened.  And I still look back and laugh when I realize that in my whole life, I have only gone on 2 real "first dates" in my life and they happened on the same night!   So Josh and I had dinner at a little Indian place near campus.  I remember it being pleasant but not particularly memorable.  I had him drop me off at the Baptist student center near the basketball arena, where I was a member, so that I could change my clothes.  Ironically, I had to dress down for my date with Taylor, into a Vandy T-Shirt and jeans.

We met outside the stadium and headed to the student section.  We had a good time at the game, which was actually a great spot for the first half of a date, because you don't have to talk the whole time.  I guess it is a little weird, though, that many of our friends were around also watching the game and we basically just sat off by ourselves.  I remember 2 things about the game: 1) Vanderbilt was unranked and beat Alabama, who were ranked #4 in the country at that time (recap here) and 2) the last few minutes of the game took FOREVER and almost caused us to not be able to go ice skating, and apparently I complained at length about this (oops). Taylor still tells me what if Vanderbilt hadn't won (#1) he may not have gone out with me on account of the complaining (#2), but he's somewhat superstitious so he decided to give it a chance.

So after the game we did go ice skating, and I remember 3 things: 1) making fun of Taylor for not taking his coat off and 2) finding out that he was allergic to the cold (oops) and 3) he was a lot better ice skater than I expected becuase it turned out he played hockey in high school (I know, I didn't get it either given #2.

At the end of ice skating, I guess Taylor hadn't gotten sick of my complaining and making fun of him so we decided to grab a drink at a nearby restaurant call Tin Angel.  And by drink I mean 2 cokes in the bar because we weren't 21 people!  Ha.  We had our cokes and got to talking about (movies (I guess) because before I knew it we were making plans to go back to my dorm and watch The Wedding Singer, which we discovered was a shared favorite (incidentally, we watched another movie, Tommy Boy, on our second date and from then until now have never found another move we both really love).

By the time all of this was over, I think it was about 3 or 4am before I took Taylor back to his dorm.  I think I was late for church the next day :)  We followed up the next weekend with an even longer second date that included things like swing dancing, fondue, frat parties and the aforementioned movie, Tommy Boy, and I guess you can say the rest is history.  Ten years of it, at least.

*Kim also started dating her now husband of 5+ years the same day, January 11, 2003!  We had all been friends for more then a year when will worked up the courage to tell Kim that night that he was interested in her.  Such beautiful symmetry :)

Miscellaneous adventure complete! Snorkel the Great Barrier Reef

Well it's 2013 and it's high time I get cracking on the rest of this 30 before 30 list, you reckon?  What's that, does my use of the word reckon seem odd?  I bet it does and that's because it's usually reserved for use by individuals of an extremely southern or, it turns out, Australian, persuasion.  That's right, I am in Australia!  Well, actually, I'm technically in Border Protection purgatory waiting on my return flight to L.A. after 10 days in Australia.  I traveled here over the Christmas holiday with 6 friends, two of whom live in Melbourne and the rest of whom came from the US for 2 weeks.   Kim, Will, Jessi, Peter, Jill and Aaron and I spent the last 9 days getting a full dose of Australia's beautiful summer weather and experiences.  One of those, I have decided to count as my 30 Before 30 item that I left blank for a miscellaneous adventure: Snorkeling the Great Barrier Reef!

I arrived almost a week after everyone else on the trip due to work and family obligations, and met up with the crew in Sydney.  We began out adventures with a 3-night trip to the Hunter Valley wine region just northwest of Sydney and had a great time taking in Australia's wines and the beautiful views of the Hunter Valley.  Aside from a major fall where I skinned my knee and the top of my foot, it was very relaxing. 

On my 4th day in Australia, we headed back to Sydney and boarded a flight to Cairns, one of the jumping off points for the Great Barrier Reef and its many wonders.  We checked in to our AMAZING accommodation in Port Douglas, Queensland on New Years Eve and cooked up yummy apps while drinking all the wine we had gotten as we rang in the new year.

On New Years Day, we were up with the sun to go out on our snorkeling trip with Poseidon Adventures.  The trip took us 1.5 hours and about 14 miles off the coast of Queensland to the Agincourt Reef, where we dove in 3 different spots.   When we boarded the boat, they offered motion sickness medicine for $3, but I declined because I didn't have a history of motion sickness and because I didn't want it to make me tired.  Wrong choice.  I will explain.

The trip began with extensive safety and technique overviews from the staff.  We were given masks, snorkels, fins and a lycra suit to protect us from any jellyfish or coral we may come in contact with.  The first dive was relatively murky and not ideal.  The sun wasn't shining so it was hard to see much.   I did rent an underwater camera, though, and managed to get some decent shots:

Near the end of the first dive, I started to suddenly feel nauseous, so I returned to the boat in a hurry only to find out that I was not alone.  A few of our group had come back with a case of the upset stomach.

I felt pretty sick throughout the boat ride between the first and second dive site, but seeing as I had paid good money and was on the Great Barrier Reef, I went back out for dive number two.  As soon as I got in the water, I felt a lot better, and got some great photos of the beautiful coral at the second site:

A giant clam!

After about 20 minutes of feeling fine, though, I suddenly got really nauseated and decided to separate from the group.  It's a good thing because within about a minute, I threw up.  In the water. On the Great Barrier Reef.  Awesome.  Luckily, I felt better after being sick, but I still returned to the boat where I managed to choke down lunch.

For the third dive, my friends used the camera.  Here's a pretty cool shot they got:

On our third dive, we saw a giant sea turtle and a sting ray and I'm so bummed that I didn't get pictures.  On the way back to shore, I got sick on the boat again.  It was not fun!

We spent another 2 days after our diving adventure up in the Port Douglas area.  We toured the Daintree Rainforest with a crazy tour guide who really just wanted to teach us how to live off of the land, whereas we just wanted to see pretty views.  We returned to Sydney and spend another day and a half exploring Sydney, which was really fun.  We went to Paddington Market, which had great clothes and jewelry for sale and then went to Manly beach, which I hadn't done last time I was in Sydney.  It's a really cool little beach area with a boardwalk and all kinds of beachy sores and restaurants.  We also had great beers in Sydney and went to a restaurant that we really loved when we went there a couple of years ago.

And now I'm on the way home and back to the grind of the real world (and the rest of my 30 Before 30!!)

30 Before 30: Read the Bible all the way through (in a year!)

Oh hi there! In case you missed it, here's my 25% progress post about this goal, which has some pretty funny verses I found.

I have been busy blogging this month, but not on this blog.  In fact, that's a whole other post that I need to get to stat.  But first, I need to post a delayed post about completing another one of my 30 Before 30, reading the Bible all the way through!  I started this item on October 24, 2011, Taylor and I's second wedding anniversary and completed it on October 23, 2012 in under a year!

I truly enjoyed daily reading of the Bible.  I learned a lot and was able to put into context all the stories I've read in pieces my whole life.  I made over 500 bookmarks, so now when I want to go back and read something, I have lots of choices of good passages that I already like!

If anyone is looking to do this, I recommend the iPhone/iPad/Android app YouVersion and they will connect you directly to the plan.  You can also visit: http://www.oneyearbibleonline.com/. 

Here's my medal!!

Today (yep, just today)

I can't remember the last time I just blogged about my day.  I think it was like 2008.  Seriously.

Today wasn't overly eventful, but it was a nice, fun, festive day and I happened to take a bunch of photos, so I figured why not blog about it!?

First thing this morning, I took Taylor to school to work on a project.  Since I had a little time to kill between that and my 10am tennis match, I decided to check out the one of the 2 Ann Arbor dog parks that I had not yet seen.  It was awful!  No other dogs. Small. Mostly dirt (not grass).  We hadn't been there 5 minutes and I could tell Nashville was pretending to have fun just so it wouldn't hurt my feelings (am I projecting human emotions on him that are too complex?  I think not, I mean look at this face!

)

Anyway, we left the dog park (much to Nash's joy) and headed to my tennis match.  Now, I just started playing Tennis in June, but if I do say so myself, I'm getting pretty good considering how long I've played.  At least that's what I thought this morning, even after seeing my 55 year old opponent, Jane.  We started to warm up with easy half-court lobs and things were going pretty well.  Then she suggested we back it up and warm up full court and...

WHAM!
BANG!
TAKE THAT!

She was smashing shots at me (and in-bounds, goshdarnit) like a 55-year-old Maria Sharapova (seriously!). Turns out she was in the league of people just 1 level better than me (?!) but they didn't have enough people so they combined them (without warning!).

Anyway, needless to say, I did not win.  She won 6-1 in the first set and 6-0 in the second set.  :(

And she said that patronizing thing every one of my senior citizen opponents have said after they beat me: "Your strength is your speed, and the rest will come with time." Translation: "You may be young and able to run to all my shots, but you suck enough at everything else that I still beat you."  Tennis; the great equalizer.

After tennis, I had precious little time to eat lunch and relax before I had to get ready to head out for a 5K that a few friends and I were running called the Holiday Hustle.  Taylor and Nashville were nice enough to come cheer us on.  Here we are before the start, all decked out in our holiday best:

 That's Heather, Theresa, Zoe, Lana, Me and Nashville

Blurry...

The race was fun.  My friend Theresa told me after our first mile, which was 10:20 that she was hoping to break 30 minutes.  I had no goal since I have run...wait, let me do some math...5 miles since my sinus surgery.  So I was just going to hang with everyone and go whatever pace was comfortable.  But when I found out she had a goal and that we would have to be focused to make it, I took it as a personal challenge. We ran together the rest of the way and I'm happy to report that Theresa got her best 5K time by a full minute: 29:31!  Way to go, Theresa!

Finally, after the race we headed straight to downtown Detroit for the 40th annual Noel Night.  It's a night in early December each year where all of the museums, cultural centers and libraries downtown open their doors for free and decorate for the holidays.  They have music, crafts and games for kids, snacks, and opportunities to do some holiday shopping.

It is really crowded and we got there a little late because of the race, so we didn't get to do everything, but we did enjoy what we did do:

The Detroit Library, we got cider and donuts here and toured some of the collections:

We didn't go in the Detroit Institute of Art, but it is a beautiful sight from the outside

Here we are:

And then when we got tired of walking around (that didn't take long after tennis and a 5K!), we headed to a place I've wanted to check out ever since it was on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives, the Polish Village Cafe in the old Polish neighborhood of Detroit, Hamtramck.  My grandma's whole family is from Poland and she and my grandfather grew up in the predominantly Polish and Ukranian areas of Detroit back in the 30s, so I love discovering these places.  I only wish Grandma Lucyk could have been around to go with us!

They have the BEST (and only, I admit) dill pickle soup that I have ever had.  We also got their pierogies and a Hungarian Pancake with goulash on top.  It was amazing, and the place was so cozy and vibrant, you had a hard time believing that you were in Detroit, Michigan rather than a Polish Village.

Bonus, I have a potluck tomorrow where I'm supposed to bring food from my culture.  I had no idea what to make (my only idea was mac'n'cheese and I was putting that under "American," not Polish).  Thank goodness they sold the soup to go!

 Decorations:

Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours!

Today's post is not a 30 Before 30 (even though it should be, time is running out!  I have 9 months left!!).  It's a post-because-I-am-lame-and-haven't-blogged-in-a-month post.

So my parents moved to Arizona back in September, and since they were already out west, our whole family including aunts, uncles and cousins decided to make the trip out to my Aunt and Uncle's house in Riverton, Wyoming for the holiday.  All told there are 19 of us here for dinner tonight, and it's already been quite an adventure!

The first crew to arrive came in last Saturday, 5 days before Thanksgiving.  Then some more of them, including my brother, traveled out on Sunday.  The rest of us (my mom and dad, Taryn and Taylor) got here last night after all flying into Denver and driving the 5 hours to Riverton.  Before we got here, the rest of them went to Jackson Hole for a night.  I went to Jackson back when I was 11 years old, and it is such a beautiful place, I'm so jealous!  I'm also jealous because they decided to do old timey photos and we missed out.  But they are SO good, how can we be mad?

The cutest child in the world, my cousins' son Zane, who is almost 11 months old and too adorable for words.

My Aunt Sheryl and Uncle Geoff built their dream home a couple of years ago and it is just amazing!  The house faces snow-capped mountains and has the million dollar view through picture windows that flank a 15-foot stone fireplace.

They also have more toys and things to do than, well, than we know what to do with!

You name it: a huge John Deere tractor

 a new Shelby mustang,

a monster truck,

dogs,

 horses,

 and a Ranger side-by-side four-by-four. Taylor wants one for Christmas now.

 And that's just the outside!

They also have a large pole barn that they lived in when they were building their house.  It's completely insulated and has a huge camper inside it.  Taylor and I are sleeping on a bed in the middle of the barn, and not 8 feet away is the area where they store their...um...pets.  Case in point:

Today is Thanksgiving and I have spent most of the day in front of the TV watching the Lions try (and fail) to take down the 9-1 Houston Texans and the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.  Meanwhile, Taylor has been dutifully hanging with his brother in law, father in law, and uncles in law, doing manly, Lucyk-style thing like moving a propane tank and setting up a deer hunting blind.  I haven't seen him all day!

Now we're about to eat dinner and (hopefully) remember all we have to be thankful for.  Like family, the beauty of nature, and fun times.

Here's to the same for you and yours!!