obama garden gnome

my sweet obama garden gnome
Originally uploaded by mplsXtine

This is my sweet Obama garden gnome. Isn't he cute? And he believes like I do, that the government should exist to help people do the things that they can't do on their own, like build roads and bridges, conduct foreign policy, educate our youth and fix our horrible health care system. The hope is that some day we won't need to do emergency benefits to raise money for the little girl down the street whose family is not able to pay her hospital bills anymore, the hope is that the money will be there already, because we like to plan ahead and because no family should have to go bankrupt to ensure a family member's health.

Good thing we've got the gnome vote; we're going to need all the help we can get this fall.

taco wagon

The east side has a taco wagon and we couldn't be happier. Where else can you get two orders of tacos (one bisteak for sir and one frijole for me), an enchilada, two containers of salsa verde, and even a bag full of limes for $11 on a Sunday. Hello, dinner!

Sure the guy did look at me a little funny when we said that one of the taco orders would be just bean, "all of them bean?" yes, all of them. That's what I get for being the only vegetarian on the east side of St. Paul.

The taco wagon consisted of a white van lettered with the words "La Pueblita" on the side in bright colors and the actual wagon, which housed what would soon be our food and the three people working to get it to us. A little girl with big beautiful eyes sat in the van and two others ran around under some supervision on the grass next to where the van was parked.

The menu on the side of the wagon listed quite a variety of tacos and tortas for order and to my non spanish speaking relief (just about all I know from high school Spanish is "donde esta el bano?" which will some day I'm certain come in handy) the English translation was written out right below the Spanish. When the woman, whose eyes matched those of the girl in the van, handed us our food, all wrapped up nicely and ready to go we asked her how often they were there. Just the weekend, Friday, Saturday and Sunday from 5 until whenever people stop ordering.

We took our order home, sat out in the back, and ate it up with some chips and salsa that we had at the house already. Delicious. I can't wait til next weekend.

hello june, goodbye june

Today it is June and I'm doing my best to not be sad that again I've worked my way through a good portion of what counts for summer here in Minnesota. The good news is that it isn't like last summer, not that last summer was bad, but portions of it were hell. Last summer was extremes. Having a fight that had something to do with the construction of wedding invitations, working 12 hour days, coming home exhausted and not knowing why I was crying over what seemed like nothing, learning what it is to train a puppy, learning to live together and mean it so much, learning what love really does for and with and to a person or two of you to be presise.

But today it is June and we have certainly made it through the winter this year. Tomorrow I will leave work early even and come home, say hello to my husband and perhaps take the pup to the dog park. He deserves a good run and I could use a good hike. We both (the pup and I) took the hibernation thing a bit too seriously this winter.

Saturday we'll pack the car and drive north. The plan is to arrive by noon. We shouldn't be expected for breakfast. I'm hoping for ripe strawberries and no poison ivy patches on the forty. The strawberries may be late this year, but I am still hopeful and to me late sounds like it is right on time.

closet

And easily enough I have a closet. The closet is full of my in-season clothes. The closet exists in a little blue house, in east St. Paul which belongs to the man I’m going to marry. In the closet there are two racks in the front to hang pants, sweaters, and shirts, a hanging organizer newly full of socks and underwear – sorted by what I labeled “everyday” and “the good stuff.” Sir just left me to do my thing and smiled at me and occasionally said “I’m not worried about it” or “if you need more space we can move some other things around” when I talked out my new organizational system with him. I think I’ll keep my sweatshirts with his t-shirts. The summer clothes will most likely be packed up later this week and then they will hang in the back of the closet until being rotated forward in a couple of months. I have no idea what I’ll do with my jewelry, which has for the past three years sat on top of my dresser. I no longer will have a dresser. The dresser set that I inherited from Aunt Ruby I’ll be either trying to sell or will be carted back up north with my twin bed when the little brother is here in March.

This is just the beginning, but it feels wonderful. I don’t have what I’ll be wearing tomorrow or the next day planned out yet. I didn’t have to pack a bag tonight. I’ll be packing out tomorrow morning like normal, except that my bags will be empty and I’ll fill them again when I get back to my apartment.

YYYYIIIIIIIIPPPPPPPEEEEEEEEEEE!

secrets

I got the chance to meet one of Sir’s little cousins over winter break. He is five, shy, all around adorable and afraid of Santa Claus (well not the one that gives him presents, but the one who his mom would like to take a picture of him with in the mall). When I met him he had recently finished performing in his school’s Christmas music pageant. It had been quite an ordeal for him because as a kindergartener his teacher had instructed him, and all of the other students, to keep the program a secret from their parents. Of course the parents all knew that the program was coming up. I’m sure they had it marked in bright colors on the family calendar and would talk about it with their respective children when they were home from school. Except that the children couldn’t do much talking. It was a secret. There was no discussion of which songs they would be singing, no helping them learn lines at home, and worst of all no shared excitement over the upcoming program they would be putting on for their parents and families.

He seemed relieved that the program was over and yet a couple days past was still not very forthcoming with details. As a five year old he had endured the trauma of mandated secret keeping from his closest loved ones. I can’t imagine what that must have been like because I, even as a somewhat mature and well adjusted 26 year old, burst at the seams when I have exciting and good news to share. I remember telling anyone who would listen to my crazy story the day after I met Sir. Some people would kind of stare at me in dumb amazement, while others would ask questions and want to join in the excitement as well.

And well isn’t the sharing what it is all about?

we put up the tree yesterday

We had a list and we were determined to mark every item off. We started with donuts from Granny’s Donuts in West Saint Paul. We passed the Perkins that he used to spend Sunday mornings in when he was growing up. That Perkins had a wishing well. I used to love the cheap toys in the Perkin’s wishing well. Granny’s donuts had an almost empty donut case, a coffee pot sitting on the heating coil installed into the counter, an old guy, (granny?) behind the counter who when I asked if the apple fritters had big chunks of apples in them he replied with an affirmative and firm “apples. Apples!” I asked again about the size of the apple pieces and he affirmed again “apples!” I totally bought an apple fritter. It was about the size of my hand and had decent sized apple pieces, not tiny, not huge either. Sir settled on two blueberry donuts, which were quite fresh I noticed as the warm grease soaked through the bag and onto my hand. The old ladies with their dingy silver hair curled tight to their heads were sitting at a small formica table talking about so and so’s infection and what happened last time it didn’t get taken care of right away and what they buy to feed to the squirrels. (Please stop feeding the squirrels! There are squirrels the size of cats in this city, not small cats either.) The men sat at opposite table. They did not talk, but they were enjoying their cups of coffee.

After Granny’s we went to the Gynormo-Target across the street to pick up ginger cookie fixings and more Christmas lights. We did all of this and more. I looked at Hanukah cards, sampled the eggnog, and shook my head at what I declared poor parenting skills and best of all Sir met his new friend Butterscotch. What says Merry Christmas better than a pint sized animatronic pony?

After we escaped the target vacuum we made our way to Richfield where we had a tip on cheap Christmas trees. Sir zeroed in on a tall long needled beauty, which somehow had made its way in the $20 section. The men in charge gave it a fresh cut on the bottom, offered to bail it (?) for an extra $2.00 (um, no thanks), and showed us to the bucket of free twine with which we proceeded to strap the beautiful tree to the roof of the little black beetle. I even picket up a bundle of boughs to make a swag or ten with. We stopped at Red’s Savoy Pizza for some Fankhanel style Christmas tree getting tradition on the way back to the east side. Cherry coke, premium, and a large pizza with all pineapple, half sausage, half green pepper and a giant creepy fish tank above us was the perfect way to rest up before bringing the tree in the house and stringing up some well placed lights.