long overdue, but comin' at ya, all the same

there's been a lot going on here (and in the ohio branch) lately. matt and i both have a list of personal and professional "to-dos" that need to be taken care of before we move. and we've both been traveling, of course (we fear a little bit for the economic security of the airlines, once we're in the same state).

in april, i went to seattle for the first time. i had a conference downtown. true to its stereotypes, it rained every single day that i was there. a cold rain, always hard enough to be annoying, usually for most of the day. so, when i finished my talk and had a message from briana that it was nice out and she was heading to the space needle, i was on board! in probably the most awkward part of my trip, the search through my bag before entering the space needle turned up a metal fork. one i had stuffed into my bag after lunch at work one day and failed to retrieve with the rest of my post-lunch items. even more awesome: it looked pretty gross. i knew that the icky, dried brown coating was sauce from the peanut noodles, but i'm not sure if the security guard believed me. in any case, he was a good sport about it, took my fork away, had me fill out a tag for it, and told me that i could come back and get it once our tour of the space needle was over. of course, a rush to get on the light rail meant forgetting it at the guard's stand. so, if anyone is ever in seattle and wants to retrieve my dirty fork from the space needle, feel free.

after seattle, i drove to iowa to see my cousin, jessie jo, before she shipped off to start basic

training. (that pic is her and i at the wedding. i don't know why it looks like i've never seen a camera before.)

then, i continued down the road toward home because it was gabe's junior prom. i don't know if everyone's high school does/did this, but mine has an event called the grand march, where each of the couples (or even just a group of friends who wants to walk together) is presented to anyone from the public who wants to attend. it sounds kind of funny, but it creates a nice opportunity for friends

after Gabe's Grand March

and family to snap some photos (without actually showing up at their kids' prom. . . which some parents actually might) and the people in the community love to see the dresses. obviously. i lived in pennsylvania during both of kassi's proms and we are obviously moving to montana this summer, so it was a lot of driving, but it was nice to get to see one of the kids during such a fun time.

and i'm going to put up this pic of gabe and me rather than gabe and his date. even though her dress was way cuter.

the following weekend, matt and i met up in chicago for yet another psychology conference. we obviously also took the opportunity to sample some chicago cuisine and spend some quality time with dj and laura. now, if you would've told me five years ago that we would be choosing sushi over deep dish pizza, i would have told you that you were crazy. but that is, in fact, what happened. and it was spicy and delicious. just the way that we like it.

that brings us to last weekend. my friend kristi came to madison for the glow run 5k. since

the race was an evening event, we took the day to hang out, get pedicures, explore h&m, and catch up as we haven't for quite a long time. the run was pretty fun. it's a cool theme. and we went for good, wisconsin cheese balls (or "cheese curds" as they're called here, which i hate saying because "curd" is a gross word), as kristi demanded it as a stipulation of her visit. these are stipulations that i can live with, to be sure.

that pretty much brings us to now. matt and i just got back home from a house-hunting trip to montana. we found a cute rental. i'll post pictures once we know for sure that it will be ours. we also did our share to sample the local cuisine. we're really willing to take one for the team in that regard. we loved the places that we found, which included this cafe, this pizza place, and an old train depot that has been converted to a bar and grill. not to mention, i was elated to see that many of the businesses have adopted my long-standing pragmatic approach to "one-seater" bathrooms being unisex, cleverly labeling them "either" and "or" rather than "men" and "women." gone (hopefully) are my days of having to wait for 15 women to go to the bathroom one-by-one while the men's room sits empty. that's all i've been asking for. and, luckily, it never got to this point for me.

next weekend, kara and my sister, dy, are coming for the twilight 10K, then i'm heading to ohio, to iowa to see jill and meet little elsie, then toronto, then we're on our cruise, then moving. pretty much like everyone else's summer, i think.  you think you'll have so much time and you really don't. and then before you know it, you're moving to montana. well, maybe that part is specific to us :)