Frozen Lemon Custard is my new favorite flavor...

The rest of the week has been fine. It's been awkward still at work but I really don't talk about leaving and no one really talks about it with me. The head teller has made some stupid comments about it, but you know what, she's kind of a loser. And as much as this sounds mean, I don't want my life to be like hers. High school was like the pinnacle point of her life, she talks about it all the time, and frankly, it annoys me very much. I graduated six years ago from high school and I barely even talk about it. I really don't want to sound bitchy, but again, I'm happy that I only have four days left at Banknorth.

It's been a little lonely here in Marlborough. Well, I just really miss my family and friends in Louisville, although sometimes, I don't even know how true some of my friends are there. I miss having at least one good friend here to talk to about stuff with. I can always can Abby and that is great, but she is across the country, and that makes things difficult.

So, this weekend, Brian and I didn't do too much. I worked from 8:30 until 6:30 on Friday and we had some great barbeque for lunch. Then, I came home, Brian and I ate leftovers, and I went to bed early because I had to work the next day. Saturday, I worked, went to the grocery store, and came home. Although it wasn't really that warm, Brian and I went to take a walk by a reservoir a few miles from our apartment. When the days get a little warmer, we'll go into the city and do some fun stuff there. I made risotto for the first time for dinner (and it turned out great; I can't wait to make more), and Brian made some steaks (which were okay, a little overdone, we haven't quite perfected that yet). Other than that, it was kind of boring. I rolled coins from our coin jar ($36!) and we watched SNL with Peyton Manning.

Today, I really wanted to go out for breakfast but we didn't end up going anywhere. I did watch "The Way We Were" with Barbra Streisand (great song, okay film), and went to the gym. I was on the elliptical for forty minutes, did the rowing machine for just two minutes, and walked for ten. I weighed myself, but we won't go there. I don't really think of myself as fat; yes, I guess I could lose some weight, but I don't really eat a lot of junk and at least I do exercise a few times a week. Plus, I drink a lot of water, I don't consume very much alcohol, and I don't smoke cigarettes.

I haven't been to the mall in over a month, so Brian and I went to a mall in Natick, which is absolutely a monstrosity. It is being renovated, they are building a bunch of new stores, etc. and it is just crazy. We drove around twice trying to find the entrance. We went into Crate and Barrel and Williams Sonoma and I pined for all the great kitchenware, especially the Kitchen Aid mixing bowl in sage green for $299. Yikes. I won't be getting that for awhile. Although I am getting an extra $2000 on my taxes because an education credit from last semester. But that will be going towards new glasses, a new computer battery, paying back loans, and possibly a passport, well, just because someday I may need it.

Of course, we went into Sephora (there are two at that mall!), and I bought Frozen lemon custard shower gel. It is very light and summery. I also bought a few car air fresheners and a Brazillian passion fruit candle (a small one) at Yankee candle. Because of a $10 gift card I received at work the other day, I only spent $15 at the mall; I was very, very good. There were some cute shirts at Banana Republic, but nothing really looked good on me (or was a little too expensive), so I decided not to buy anything.

Tonight, we're having dinner with my future in-laws. Well, I'm not exactly sure of that yet.

Happy Birthday to my stepfather, Walt! My mom took him to see Wynonna Judd and the Louisville symphony last night and they had a great time...

Oh, can't you see what love has done, what it's doing to me...

It's been a relaxing day, even though I worked from 8:30 until 3:30. Last night was a very fun cake class, even though my cake was very "crumb-y" and it almost fell off the revolving cake stand (oops!). But in the end, as you can see from the pictures from my last journal entry, it turned out very well. And roses are very fun to make. Next week, I plan on making another chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream frosting and strawberry filling.

Anyway, I gave my almost two-week notice to the manager on Monday. She was a little shocked and kind of questioned me, but I really didn't want to say anything, for fear that they would fire me immediately. However, that didn't happen and so my last day is next Thursday. The head teller wanted to know where I was going and reluctantly, I told her. They need me for the next two weeks anyway. After I leave, basically the assistant manager and the head teller will have to work every single Saturday because the manager refuses to work any Saturdays at all. And she is the one who proclaimed that this is retail, therefore we work Saturdays. Apparently, she spends time with her elderly mother all day Saturday (the manager is in her fifties). I'm so glad that I will be out of there in merely a week.

It hasn't gotten warm here yet. But I'm very positive that spring will come soon. And love seems to be blossoming more every day in the Koning-Honaker household. Brian has always accepted me for being myself, this very strange girl who is both vain and un-self-confident at once, who loves all kind of music, who cannot decide what political party she belongs to, and can be very mean and amazingly sweet all in one day. He is so loving, kind, and calm, and I hope that someday I will share his name and have his child. Honestly, I can't tell you when that day will come, but I've got to be patient for now. I rushed into getting married once, and look what happened to that situation. Besides, living with Brian is making me a very happy, elated woman.

He looks a little funny in this picture, but I'm drunk in love with him. Oh, sappy-ness.

A Great Cake!

I'm very happy with the cake I made tonight.

I start my new job on April 2nd!

Next weekend, I'm going to visit Paul in Horsham, PA.

Also, I purchased my ticket for Phoenix today. Yay!

Some librarians are very, very rude, especially the ones at the Marlborough Public Library.

Bonne Nuit, world.

There's nothing like a snowy St. Patrick's Day, with a gorgeous new hair color and free flowers...

I can't even tell you how happy I am to have a new job! Even if it is still a bank job, hence, not the "dream job," it is still a better job, I am sure, than the old one. Pretty much since I got the full-time job at BankNorth, I have not liked it very much. No, it hasn't been terrible or anything, but we are very understaffed (and will be more so with the subtraction of moi), and the staff that are there, besides the headteller and Dottie, who works are Saturdays, are not great to work with. My manager will not learn how to work a teller drawer (apparently it is beneath her), will not work on Saturdays, and is general, snobby. She also has no previous banking experience. The assistant manager is a nice guy, but he is pretty irresponsible and basically doesn't want to work part of the time. I'm pretty sure he wants to quit, too.

Anyway, I've been looking for a new job for a while, and finally, I have one with St. Mary's Credit Union in Marlborough. They are a small bank and only have five branches. I will be working at a branch that is a quarter mile away from me; hence, I will be walking to work most of the time. And there is a Starbucks on the way!! Yay, so I can spend money on coffee and not on gas for my car. Plus, I will get paid more (about a 7% raise) and have three weeks of vacay per year.

Well, anyway, so I'm very euphoric about all that. I'm not sure what will happen when I turn in my resignation letter on Monday. I'm giving BankNorth my two weeks notice, but honestly, they may not let me stay because I am going to a competing bank. However, if this happens, I will just try to start at St. Mary's earlier and possibly go to Pennsylvania to visit Paul next weekend or the week after that. I was going to visit him Easter weekend and take two days off, but I can't really do that once I start a new job. But I know I will get to visit him sometime soon.

Another trip is being planned as well. Abby moved to Scottsdale, Arizona, and I am going to visit her over the Memorial Day Holiday. I've never been to the Southwest and I live to travel, and I really am so excited about seeing Abby. I've been looking up some things to do and there are several museums, lots of shopping, and great Mexican food. Plus, the scenery! Desert sky, dream beneath the desert sky...Now I just need to venture to the Joshua Tree National Park in California.

Well, after a lovely week in weather and a seventy-degree Wednesday, we had a huge snowstorm yesterday. I'm not sure how much snow we got here, but it was over half-a-foot. I worked until 6:30 yesterday and it was a little bad on the roads getting home, but not terrible. Then, Brian and I went to dinner at a place called Lombardo's, which is right across the street. It was a lovely, yummy dinner complete with riesling, bread and cheese, portobello mushrooms, red snapper for me and salmon for Brian, and some delicious risotto. We watched the snow fall on the lovely night of a thousand stars.

Today, I didn't have to work (yay), and I went to get my hair colored and cut. Now I have brown hair again. I stopped at a flower shop on the way home, which is owned by a lady I know who comes into the bank, and bought two gerber daisies and she gave me some tulips and daffodils, gratis. I also bought a cute catfood dish at a pet store for Morgie.

Anyway, today is St. Patrick's Day, and we had two invitations tonight, which is a rarity. The first was to dinner in Boston, which would be really fun on St. Patty's day, but I think we're going out to Spencer to spend time with Keith and Sarah.

It has been a good week.

Bad sneakers and the pina colada, my friends

I love Steely Dan! So, a few thoughts from today. And it has been a much better day than yesterday.

-- I may have a new job by next week (keeping fingers crossed), in which I would get paid more and get more vacation time (and believe me, I'm all about time off of work)

-- Hopefully, this won't interrupt my trip to Pennsylvania to see Paul next month

-- Memorial Day weekend, I am going to Scottsdale, Arizona, to see my other best friend, Abby!!! I've never been there and I am so excited about traveling out west and seeing Abs. Go West, young woman [sic[!- Frederick Jackson Turner

--I love my cake decorating class; it is adorably fun and wonderful. The cake doesn't look that great, but well, I'm an ingenue at this type of thing.

Now I must go to bed. Oyasumi Nasai.

Another winter's day in Paris and Rome, and I want to go home, let me go home...

My trip home was really, really wonderful and in fact, I never wanted to come back to Mass., save for Brian's love and my furry friend, Morgan (umm, my cat if you don't know already). Actually, the trip didn't start off so hot considering I got to the Providence airport at 5:30 am and my flight left at 6; I was very late and frightened that I would miss my flight, but I made it on time. The problem was that it snowed on Thursday night (the 22nd) and on Friday, we had to leave at 4 am, and we woke up at 3:40. Long story short, Brian couldn't get out of the parking lot he parked in because of the steep hill, and so we had to take my car, which I almost didn't get out of either. It was scary. Anyway, we flew out on time, I had an hour layover in Cleveland and arrived ten minutes early in Louisville. I cried when the plane landed; I was happy to be home. Mom picked me up at the airport and we went to Eliot's house, where we got ready for Jennifer's bridesmaid luncheon. I didn't look so hot, but mom looked nice and we headed over to 211 Clover Lane. It was a nice lunch hosted by my cousin Hunter, her mother Jeana, and her grandmother and my favorite great aunt, Jane Hope. I had salad, shrimp and grits, and a lovely chocolate mousse. After lunch, mom and I went to Grandad's house, I had an eye exam at Walmart, and then I went home and dyed my hair because it looked horrendous. Then, Mom and I went shopping at Oxmoor, where we attempted to find some cool panty hose for her for the wedding the next day. When that didn't pan out (she wanted fishnets, I said no), we went to Buca di Beppo and met Walt, Graham, Kenny, my stepsister Mel and her husband Mike, Yvette's (my other stepsister) kids Clayton and Stirling, and Katherine and Eric. I love the Buca, and they changed the Pope room to reflect Pope Benedict the whatever number. It was cool! The food is semi-semi, but the ambiance is excellent for large groups. Mom brought a lovely home-made red velvet cake (a southern girl's favorite) and Stirling (our six-year gigolo-in-training) met some high school girls who wanted a picture with him. After dinner, I went out to Kat and Eric's to see their little Mabel and she is such a cutie.

Saturday, I picked up my friend Nora for brunch at Lynn's Paradise Cafe, a quirky Louisville restaurant that is renowned for egg-cellent breakfasts (that is hokey!), ugly lamp contests, and fabulous southern cuisine. Nora was dating Brian's friend, Matt, who actually dated Kyla and introduced me to Brian two years ago. However, they broke up amicably about two weeks ago. They lived together for the past eleven months, and are now moving to separate places. Gosh, I don't want that to happen to Brian and me. Anyway, he's moody and I understand the reasons for their separation and she really just wants to be single right now, I think. Nora's a great person to talk to and we have a lot in common anyway. Random note: she likes William Faulkner a lot.

After brunch, we drove over to Off Broadway shoes and World Market. I drove her home and went to Target to buy a few cool shirts on sale. I rested a little bit at home and then drove to Christ Church Methodist about a half hour before Jennifer's wedding, so that I could see her in her lovely dress. Jennifer's twin sister, Melissa, was the matron of honor and is also five months pregnant, but she is small, so it didn't show much. Anyway, the wedding party looked splendid and the wedding itself was great, fine, you know. It was raining, which is apparently a sign of good luck for a wedding. The reception was at the Seelbach (very expensive), and the band was great. The food was so-so, but the cake was fabulous-looking.

Sunday, I went over to Stephanie's house to see her son, Hayden, before we went to lunch at Buckhead's in Indiana with Lindsey and Linda, two other people I worked with at Stockyards. It was great to see them, but the service was horrible. However, we got our food for free because of the screw-ups. Steph is pregant, too, and her baby is due nine days before Melissa's. There seem to be a lot of pregnancies right now; Sarah Rutkiwicz (Keith's wife; he plays Friday night gigs with Brian) is also preggers (oooh, I hate that word). She's not due until October, though.

It has become an annual tradition that my family participate in the Big Brothers/Big Sisters bowling tournament. We've done this for the past four years. It's quite fun; we raise money for charity and get two games of bowling, shoes, and pizza for free. That was also, coincidentally on Sunday afternoon. It was great and I got to meet Eliot's new little brother, Trey, who is really cute and very talkative. And I scored 128 on my second game; bowling is like my new favorite pastime. I kept thinking about "The Big Lebowski" and the Jesus (character played by John Torturro) the whole time.
The rest of the trip was fun. I went to my friend Natalie's house to watch the oscars and see her wedding pictures. Then, I made an appearance at Celeste's and watched the rest of the show with her and Phil. Kyla and Brian also stopped by to say hello. On Monday, Grandad and I met Mom and Walt at my favorite bakery, Plehn's and said our goodbyes before Grandad took me to the airport for my 11:20 flight; needless to say, this time, I was quite punctual. I had a lovely layover at the newly remodeled Detroit airport (which has a cool light show between the concourses and a futuristic tram in the Northwest terminal). I got into Providence at 3:30 and Brian surprised me by parking and meeting me at baggage. We went home and then went to Acapulco's, where we got some much needed Mexican food. I was happy to see my love and my cat. Brian said something about engagement rings being expensive; I don't know what that means. I decided to skip choir because I was tired.

Work has pretty much been bad this week. Well, not terrible, but, I just want to leave!! So, I'm waiting on this credit union for an answer and I am so qualified for this position. My boss Marie is such a b, she knows nothing about banking, she's a shitty manager in general, and the list goes on and on and on. I can say other things about the other people I work with, save for Dottie, but I won't mention them here.

I only went to the gym twice last week, but that is alright. I know I talk about food alot, but I feel like I should be a critic sometimes.

Friday night, Brian and I went to Sakura in Worcester with Keith and the newly-pregnant Sarah; she didn't eat a lot of fish. We had a good, but quite expensive sushi dinner. We went home, fell alsleep very early and I had to get up to work (of course) on Saturday. Work was okay and I like gossiping with Dottie about the ultimate doom of the bank. Dottie only works Saturdays and the manager doesn't work any Saturdays because it is beneath her, so she has never met Dottie. Therefore, Dottie doesn't like the manager. I had choir rehearsal afterwards because we have a concert next week. After choir, I came home and relaxed with Bri for a bit and then we went to Autozone and the grocery, where Brian and I bought $177 worth of groceries (including a $30 Brita water purifier). Everything is more expensive here, I swear.
I invited Brian's parents over for brunch today and prepared four foods for the occasion-- pineapple casserole, fruit salad, interesting Martha Stewart muffins, and the familiar favorite, spinach quiche. I think it was a successful meal and we always have fun with Brian's parents. We ate and played Hearts until Brian lost with a score of 100. The game is about having a low score, not a high one.
The only other mentionable thing that happened today is that I got an oil change and the freaking door handle on the driver's side of my car is broken, so I have to crawl over from the passenger's side. I mean, it's not that big of a deal, but I need to get it fixed this week and it will be a busy one.

Wish me luck on getting a new job-- very, very, very soon!