news for today

Hi friends. I'm coming back to the blog world. In very slow stages. Remember how we just moved across the country? So cut me some slack. I've been a very busy girl. But for today's enjoyment, please see how beautiful my BFF Ali is. She got married yesterday in the St. George temple and I flew in to see the whole shabang. She is beautiful and it has been a wonderous weekend. Ali, I love you and wish I could be on the cruise with you right now, except, not really.

Also while in St. George, I had the privilege to see this piece of work. More like, pieces of work. I about died every time we drove past this house. My friends say a man named Cactus Bob lives here and if I had had the honor of meeting him this weekend, I would have told him he has done a fine job of putting a bunch of weird crap in his front yard. Kudos to you, CB!!!

More blogging to come. I promise.

93 what

Today is my Grandpa Miller's 93rd birthday. Holy crap who lives to be this old anymore? Rather, who lives to be this old and still rides horses, goes for mile long walks, builds rock walls for Aunt Cynthia, and arm wrestles granddaughters? Clyde Miller, that's who. He's crazy. But I love him. Last weekend I saw him while on a trip to San Diego. We had dinner at Rubios Fish Tacos and after dinner he said out of nowhere, "Let's arm wrestle." The shock of this request nearly gave me a heart attack and I am only 30 years old. I was laughing so hard, I lost all my strength. Not like I had a chance anyway because this old man is freaking strong. He took me down without a fight. Hilarious. Grandpa, I hope in 63 years I can kick my granddaughter's ass. Bday wishes to you today!

For all you lovers out there who are on a budget like we are.

Vday 2009. Awesome.

Hanging out with Tim in San Fran. Radical.

Freezing at Ocean Beach. Amazing.

Cable car getaways. Incredible.

The Monsons are having a good start to their 2009 Year of Potential. Except for the $4,000 they owe to the United States government. Whooops!

Note to self

For the last 3 weeks there has been a horrific foul smell in our car. It smells like nail polish remover mixed with window cleaner mixed with poo. Every time we get in the car, we either get high or want to barf (sometimes both). I haven't had time to really investigate the smell until today. After 20 minutes of searching, I found the culprit. A rotting clementine.

Let me tell you the story.

Recently, Aaron and I made friends with a man at church named Frank. Frank is a 60 year old man who has the brain of a 6 year old child. We are not really sure what happened to him, or what his disability is, but he is the sweetest man ever and also freaking hilarious. He doesn't have any family nearby and comes to church alone. During sacrament meeting, Aaron always makes Frank an origami bird out of the program paper and then we spend the rest of church telling Frank to be reverent with the bird. On the Sundays when I am not at church, Frank repeatedly asks Aaron where his wife is and if Aaron is going to pick her up after church. Frank also often tells us that for Sunday dinner he is going to eat a T bone. My favorite time talking to Frank was on the Sunday before Thanksgiving. We told Frank we were going to California for Thanksgiving and he asked if we were taking the turkey on the plane with us. We were trying so hard not to laugh.

In the beginning of December, Frank told us he needed a new wallet for Christmas: brown with velcro. We found this exact wallet at Target for $9.99 and put it in a big stocking filled with other tasty goodies that diabetics can have such as soap, CLEMENTINES, and stickers. We brought the stocking to church but Frank didn't come for a few weeks. The stocking then sat in the backseat of our car so we could drive it to Frank's house, but we didn't know where Frank lived. I guess clementines don't last forever, how was I to know? Now the stocking is ruined, but luckily the wallet was protected in its cheery holiday wrapping. Frank, we are coming over tonight.

the monsonskows have been busy

eating salad, aaron's bday, donkey kong championship, san diego thanksgiving, making rhubarb pie, loving nieces, building snowman, hating snow, christmas wishing, talking to albanian evan, zion family reunion, missing friends, growing rat tails, avoiding blogging.

Oh, and I want a Range Rover.

Today I am the MOD for the resort. It's possibly the best day of the entire year of my job. Aaron feels the same. I get to experience the property as if I'm a real live guest and not a real live underpaid laborer, and Aaron gets to eat a lot of delicious meals with me. All of this comes complimentary, people. Except for this painting. I saw it today before we ate brunch. I want it. It's only $3,500. Aaron doesn't think we should buy it. He says it's unfinished. That's why he's laughing. Ha ha ha HAHAHAH haha ha ha oh you silly girl! he says.

Which brings me to the topic of Buy Once, Buy Good. This is a phrase I learned 10 years ago during an interior design class in college. It's by far my favorite phrase, along with, "More hot fudge, please." I really believe in this notion and so does Aaron. Which is why it's hard to buy a lot of stuff because let's be honest, right now can we really afford the "good" items we like? Plus my taste in clothes and furniture changes every 6 to 12 months which poses another real problem. How is this cured, you say? I think the answer lies in someone giving us a bunch of money and then we go on a hog wild shopping binge when we move to New York next year. That's really what this boils down to: we want a freaking cool apartment to live in next year. One that screams, "Can't you tell my husband is a designer!!??" Which is why we may as well start with this $3,500 painting...

Since I don't have a baby, I get to dress up Aaron.

Tonight our doorbell rang. I answered it thinking someone was going to inform me our cute Halloween walkway bat lanterns were on fire. Instead it was a nice couple from the ward bringing us a gourmet homemade Halloween box-o-treats. I was really surprised by this act of kindness (no one does this to us anymore); so surprised that I bluntly blurted out, “Oh is this one of those things that now I have to go give a box of goodies to someone else because you tagged me?” They just stared at me with blank faces, looking kind of sad. I felt really dumb. I’m pretty sure this is why no one brings us treats anymore.

Anyway, we had a little Halloween party last weekend. It was a good excuse to try out our costumes and drink some Tang. I didn’t actually drink any Tang but I did eat some yummy orange food. Namely anything that came with orange frosting. The Great Oreo Challenge was a big hit (thank you, Ali Whicker!) as well as the whoopie cushion. I hope Aaron will wear this every day until the next major holiday.

Recently I have rediscovered a few things.

1. HONEY. Holy crap honey is freaking delicious! Who knew? Well I knew a long time ago, that's the point, and now I know again. My uncle Ray has bees who make honey and a year or two ago he gave me two huge jars full of his fresh honey. These jars contain enough honey to last a lifetime I thought when he gave them to me. But not anymore. There won't be much honey left in the near future. Not after I rediscovered how rich and smooth honey tastes on a piece of fresh wheat toast.

2. CEMETARIES. When Aaron's grandfather passed away last month and was buried in Logan, we took a side trip on the same day to Ogden to visit a grave of one of my relatives. Her name is Susan Miller and she died at 3 years old from a car accident my grandmother was in. It is a tragic story and another time perhaps I will tell you more details. We visited Susan's grave and spent some time in the cemetary looking around. I used to be kind of afraid of being in cemetaries. But now I rediscovered there is something really cool about spending time in cemetaries. And I'm not talking about any of your upcoming cemetary visits to spot Halloween goblins and gouls.

3. THE HOKAMAS. Okay so I don't mean to say I rediscovered the Hokamas recently but I did rediscover Chex Muddie Buddies which Aaron tells me is Shannon's favorite treat. I made it the other day and it is so addicting (and messy if you are not careful with the powder sugar). Eating it makes me miss the Hokamas a lot so I have placed their family portrait on our refrigerator in loving memory of all the times in the future Shannon and I will eat Muddie Buddies together with our beautiful babies in tote.

4. LLAMAS. There is a small rundown pasture I pass by each morning on my daily walk. Usually it is just filled with garbage and old car parts but recently a bunch of llamas have made it home. I have no idea who owns these llamas but I am glad they do because seeing them each morning brings me a lot of happiness as I walk past them and shout out, "Hey llamas!" They of course don't say anything back to me but I pretend that they say Good Morning to me anyway. So today on my walk, Aaron came with me and we went to see the llamas and lo and behold one big llama was across the street, out of his fenced-in pasture, hanging out in the peach orchard where I am sure he was not supposed to be. He got scared when we showed up and tried to get back into his pasture but he couldn't figure out how to get back in. It was really sad but also really hilarious watching him try to figure out what to do. So now I have rediscovered llamas even though I never discovered them before. So actually this one doesn't count but I don't care, this is my blog so I will write anything I want. LLLLLLLLAS UNITE!

To Bruno: Happy 26th

PEOPLE we finally have internet access at our house! Oh blessed blogging how I have missed thee. Actually I really haven't missed blogging one bit; I've been too busy and too tired to even think about it since we got back from New York. Speaking of which (will I never stop speaking of it?), we are still greatly missing our summer home and still greatly sad over having to leave it. Yeah yeah I know, Utah has good crap too. But not really. (except for my in-house laundry room, praise the Lord for those two beautiful manmade machines.) Aaron is back in school with all the people he can't stand and I am back at work with all the people I can't stand. We are such the same person! Not only this but also, for example, 3 out of 7 days each week Aaron and I unfailingly walk out of the house wearing almost identical outfits, meaning color schemes, patterns, you get it. I don't know how this happens except for the fact that I think we really could be the same person somehow. Maybe it has something to do with Processing, Aaron's new BFA project that is too complicated to understand or even talk about (I avoid the subject altogether) (you can go to his blog to get more confused about it).

So what is new with the Monsons you ask? Well for one, we are having a baby. For two, we are freaking millionaires. For three, we had the pleasure of Bruno come to our house last night for the most hilarious story telling of your life. (only one of these is true) Does anyone out there know Bruno? I don't even know his last name but he is amazing and also really crazy and also really rich and really single and overnight I made it my personal quest to find him a girlfriend but I don't know any single girls except for Ali and I don't think Bruno and Ali would go together very well. It was also Bruno's birthday and no one knew it but me and the Mons and some random girl who sent him an apple pie with the phrase "Happy Birthday Sunshine!" on the front which Bruno hated.

I wish I had some cool picture from New York to post. Let's see..what does the internet have in store for me today...

Ohhh bingo. This one's for you, Bruno.

no comment

we are back in utah.
i'm too depressed to blog.
someone show me a black man.
or an italian woman.
just anything but the utah whites.