Sunday, May 22

I slept in a little bit longer today, but it was still only about 9:30 when I got up. Stefy and I had another light breakfast this morning, and just sorta laid low around the house for a while. Tim had us do some chores outside to clean things up around the pool before the cookout with the Southers this afternoon. Of course, everything we did was made useless once it started pouring rain outside. No good deed goes unpunished.

It actually cleared up just before Sean and Marina showed up with the kids at around 2:30 this afternoon. The air was still a little cool, but since the pool was cranked up to a balmy 82 degrees, everyone decided to go for a dip. It was really cute watching Colin and Brandon in the water. It makes me remember the days when I was still a little scared to go into the water. I’m sure my dad can remember me dragging him out into the lake to go swimming when the water was still only 60 degrees. And then getting cold and wanting to get out.

Anyway, we swam for about an hour or so, and then got out and got cleaned up. You gotta love the post-swim-shower. Teri had this gourmet dinner all ready for us when we got back downstairs. She and Tim had grilled chicken and lamb for the main courses, and had all this other good stuff to go with it. The real high point of the meal was dessert though. Teri made these little chocolate cakes that have melted chocolate in the middle, and are served hot out of the oven with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. Yep… I had two of those bad boys. Mmmmm. Everyone pretty much sat around and vegged for a while after we ate, but I had to hit the road for home since it was already pushing 8 o’clock.

I made it back to the apartment by 9:30 or so, and spent the rest of the night unpacking and getting myself ready for the work week. It was nice to unwind a little bit, but I’m definitely beat.

Saturday, May 21

Not much of a chance to sleep in, but it was still a good night’s sleep since I went to bed so early. Stef came in and woke me up at 9, and she was already up and ready to go for the day, after having done her morning workout and showered and everything. We really didn’t do a whole hell of a lot today. Just kinda hung around the house and watched some movies on TV and whatnot. Stef and I got dressed at 4:30, and headed up to Birmingham for our 5:30 dinner reservations at Cameron’s Steakhouse.

Stefy had made reservations at this place earlier in the week since today is our nine-month anniversary. Tim and Teri said this restaurant had the best steak they’d ever eaten, so it seemed like the perfect opportunity to try something new. Our dinners were FANTASTIC. A Caesar salad to start things off, and I can honestly say that it bests the one at the Outback. I ordered twin bacon-wrapped filets for my entrée. Let me repeat: twin BACON-WRAPPED filets. DROOOOOL. Stefy and I split an order of au gratin potatoes and asparagus as well, but you can probably guess which one I picked out. We took our time eating, and even had some room left for dessert by the end of the meal, so we decided to splurge and order the cheesecake. Wow. “Would you care for some homemade whipped cream?” Hmmmm. “Yes, please!”. What a meal. Stefy and I had a really great time, but of course the best part was just getting to celebrate such a special occasion with my girl. Since we were all gussied up for dinner, we decided to take a little stroll through Birmingham after we ate, and then went for a cruise up and down Woodward in the two-seater. I know. It was a pretty rough night.

We made it back to the house by 7:30 tonight. I guess that’s the beauty of an early dinner reservation. There was an SNL marathon on E! tonight, so we settled into the library for the evening, and watched most of three re-runs leading up to the season finale at 11:30. Tonight’s finale was hosted by Lindsay Lohan. Please, somebody get that girl a hamburger. Honestly, she’s looking so nazzty. Ugh. The shining light tonight though was Coldplay’s musical performances of “Speed of Sound” and “Fix You”, both of which sounded amazing. I love Coldplay because, unlike so many other bands today with mediocre musicians (which, let’s be honest, they are), the band is more than the sum of its parts. The U2 comparisons are well-founded, and Chris Martin is definitely lobbying to be the heir to the Bono do-gooder/rock star/lobbyist role. What was funny about tonight though was that seeing Coldplay on SNL was the thing that Stefy was looking forward to the most… and she slept through both songs. I tried to rouse her when they came on, but it was no use. I guess she’ll just have to wait until we see them in August ;-)

Friday, May 20

Man, and I was complaining about YESTERDAY being slow? Today was the Friday from hell. I spent the morning getting our invoices in the mail, and that turned out to be a bigger headache than I’d bargained for. This week’s deposits weren’t too complicated, but I kept screwing them up, so it took a lot longer than necessary. The afternoon looked easy enough, since all we had to do was help Ilana stuff envelopes with our invitations for next month’s annual meeting. That proved to be a big mistake though, because we ran into about a million little hassles along the way. I forgot what back-breaking labor it is stuffing envelopes. Don’t laugh. I mean, there’s simply no good way to do it without cranking your neck and killing your back. What a pain!

I was out of the office by 4:30, and navigated my way effortlessly through rush hour traffic, making it to Miss Spiro’s house by 5:45. Stefy surprised me with an early anniversary gift before we left: a really cute shadow box with some of our favorite pictures inside (it’ll be perfect for my desk at work). It was a pretty short turn around though after opening my present, since we were trying to make it downtown in time for tonight’s Tigers game against Arizona.

We were livin’ it up in style tonight, enjoying the game in Tim’s luxury suite with Sean, Marina, the kids, and Stefy’s grandma. We had hot dogs and fries, and got to enjoy the BEAUTIFUL evening at the stadium, even though the Tigers stunk up the joint. Tonight was the first fireworks show of the season, so we were able to catch those before leaving for the night. The fireworks were really good, but I’m still not sure if it can rival the ones at the Holt Hometown Festival.

We made it back to the house by 10:30 or so, but that was pretty much it for today. Stefy and I watched a little TV, but she was even more tired than I was, so we went to bed by 11:30.

Thursday, May 19

I originally thought this week would just fly by with the conference and everything, but work really seemed to drag today. There was a lot to keep me busy, but the time just went by sooooo slow it seemed. The ridiculous part was that I left a half hour early too for a haircut! She buzzed me kinda short again, but I think it actually turned out pretty decent looking.

Drove out to my dad’s for dinner/laundry tonight. Sherry made this really good dinner, but since I’m writing this on Monday, I really don’t remember what we even had. I just remember really liking it. Anyway, I yacked with dad and Sherry for a little bit after dinner while the girls ran around and screamed for about an hour. Of course, Morgan was really good about, you know… STOPPING eventually, but Kyra sort of flew off the handle. She was throwing a complete hissy fit about putting on her PJs, and since I was so sick of hearing her screech I marched upstairs, scooped her up, sat down, and got her to settle down right away. What can I say, I’m like the Pied Piper. Once she finally calmed down enough for Sherry to come in and take over again, I went downstairs and caught the start of the Pistons/Pacers game as I was finishing up my laundry. Once I was done, I took off for the apartment, and made it back home in time to catch the second half.

Detroit was playing pretty piss poor for about the first 3⁄4 of the game, but they turned it on when it was most important. The coolest thing about the victory was that Larry Brown called a timeout in the closing minutes of the game so Reggie Miller could get an extended standing ovation from his home crowd. What a classy dude. Well, I guess that just about puts the wraps on today.

Wednesday, May 18

An unbelievably long day. We were finally wrapping up the conference today, but that didn’t make things go by any faster. Everyone kinda skipped out of going to their morning sessions this morning, and my excuse was that I had to go do some more work for Brian on campus at 11. The TPL kids were basically doing the same thing today, but instead of having some lady critique their speeches, there were media professionals there to grill the “candidates” about the issues. It was pretty fun to sit in again today, but it went by even faster than before, since I was basically getting a lot of the same footage over again. As a result, I was back at the conference just in time for lunch, and to catch the final speaker Henry Cisneros. He was the director of H.U.D. under Clinton, and gave a very thoughtful speech about the affordable housing “crisis” that’s looming if politicians don’t work to properly fund these sorts of projects in the coming decades.

After lunch Wanda and I decided to go to one last session at the conference before bugging out for the day. The one we went to talked about how to produce effective reports for inter-organizational communications between the staff and its board. It sounds like pretty dry stuff, but we actually found it to be very helpful, since Wanda and I have to deal with this stuff once or twice a month.

Everyone was pretty much emptying out of the Lansing Center by the time we ducked out of this afternoon session, so Wanda and I decided to head into the office since it was still only 2:30 in the afternoon. I started putting together some ideas from that last meeting we went to so we can start re-thinking the way we produce some of our reports. What can I say? I was motivated. Anyway, I probably left the office at 4 or so, and then hit the road for Stefy’s house for our big night.

Aside from a few minor traffic headaches along the way, I made it to Miss Spiro’s house by 5:30 or so, and was welcomed with a nice dinner sandwich from Cosí. Stefy and I watched most of “A League of Their Own” while we ate some dinner, and then had enough time left to watch some shows before taking off for the movie.

Stef and I met up with her friends Kyle and Caroline at Big Boy at 9:30 so we could all get something to drink before the big “Star Wars” premiere at midnight. Of course, leave it to Big Boy to only have Pepsi, but I survived. We got to the theater by 10:15 or so, and the line was already pretty ridiculously long. I bet we were at about the 2/3 mark once the line reached its greatest length, and we were getting a little worried about how good our seats would be once they let us in. The doors opened a little before 11, and much to our surprise, we had FANTASTIC seats right by the handicapped zone. We were smack dab in the middle of the screen, and nobody was sitting to our right—it was wonderful. The next hour went by a little slowly—especially with this off the wall “soldier” who was driving us nuts by yammering the whole time—but I never really felt tired while we were sitting there. The number of extreme geeked-out fans was a little smaller than I’d anticipated, but there were more than enough for a single theater. I bet there were at least 10 or 15 kids with full-out light sabers there though. And I sometimes wonder how many of them have ever kissed a girl… besides their mothers.

Well, the movie was much better than I’d expected. I mean, after the first two episodes, I think everyone was just hoping this one didn’t suck, and I can honestly say that it didn’t. Lucas finally managed to pull all those insanely loose threads together, and I think this final installment does a pretty good job of unifying the story. Of course, there are still plenty of plot holes lingering, but they’re manageable. The fight scenes are all really exciting, if not a little gruesome (at least by Star Wars standards). It was really sad to see the Bad Mother F#cker, Master Mace Windu (Sam Jackson), finally get killed along with the rest of the Jedi—but we all knew that was coming. In the end, I think Anakin’s transformation into Darth Vader is pretty believable. I mean, it’s pretty hard to be an optimistic guy after losing your wife, kid(s), best bud, and killing all your other work buddies, you know? Ultimately, the lesson in “Revenge of the Sith” seems to be: bros before ho’s. Ahhh… leave it to Lucas.

Okay, I’m done making a complete dork of myself. It was RIDICULOUSLY late by the time we got home and went to bed. I’m so glad that we got a chance to see the movie at the midnight screening though. You gotta love the crazy Star Wars fans though. May the force be with you…

…and also with you.

Tuesday, May 17

Day two of the conference today—a full day. I got to the Lansing Center right around 8 a.m. this morning, and was apparently the first one from our staff to show up, so I spent about a  half hour sitting by myself eating the continental breakfast. People finally started showing up at around 8:30, and by the time the morning speakers were done at 9:45, the place was getting pretty full. I made it to my first session of the conference with Wanda and Kim this morning. It was basically about how to improve communication in the workplace—something we could definitely stand to improve on at the Trust Fund—and was led by this overly-energetic, bordering-on-creepy guy. We basically had to take a brief personality test, and then looked at how different people fall into different categories. The gist of it was to show everyone how different people think and behave, and demonstrate how different communication strategies work better with different kinds of people. Aside from the creepy instructor it was a pretty interesting session, and I think the three of us might’ve actually LEARNED something for once—go figure. We grabbed a bite of lunch after the morning session, but I had to scoot out of there right as they were starting the awards ceremony at noon so I could go work on Brian’s TPL project some more.

Today the kids had to prepare and deliver a 2 minute political speech to their peers, and then have it critiqued by some lady who does this sort of thing for a living. It was cool to watch these kids get up there and pretend to be announcing their candidacy for, say, mayor or governor, or whatever—some were definitely better than others, but it was reassuring to learn that there are people out there who are my age and actually care about politics.

Anyway, I went back to the conference for the rest of the afternoon, but nobody was really doing anything. The whole staff basically sat down in the exhibit hall and had an impromptu chit chat session. I actually talked with Kim Thompson from our Detroit office for a good 20 minutes while we were sitting there. It’s probably the longest conversation I’ve ever had with her, but it was actually really nice to finally get a chance to sit down and talk with her about  something other than work for once.

Well, I made it back to the pad by 4:30 or so, and Miss Stefy got here for her mid-week visit at around 5:30. Neither one of us were feeling particularly hungry, so we just parked it in front of the TV for our usual slate of shows for the night. American Idol was fun tonight, but you know they’re starting to stretch for material when they have the contestants singing THREE songs each. We thought Vonzell out-sang Carrie tonight, but we’re not holding our breath for her to make it into the final two. Since we finished Sex and the City on TBS last week, there wasn’t much to watch after A.I. except the new Britney Spears show on UPN. I think I could actually feel the brain cells leaving my skull the longer we watched. Yep, it’s pretty freakin’ horrible.

Well, I guess that’s it for today. Did you notice that after three years’ of events, I finally started breaking things up with paragraphs? Pretty amazing, isn’t it? You’d think an English major such as myself would pick up on proper syntax a little quicker, but better late than never I suppose. Night Night.

Monday, May 16

I was at work by 7:30 this morning… I don’t know how I did it. It was just Wanda and I in the office today, so we managed to get a lot of work done over the span of just a couple hours. Mrs. Wildermuth and I took off for the Lansing Center at 10:30 or so, and were just in time for lunch. Today is Day #1 at the 2005 Michigan Conference on Affordable Housing… OH YEAH! For those who don’t know, this conference is the largest of its kind in the entire nation, and has over 1,500 people attendance. The goal is to get everyone from the affordable housing industry together to learn about what’s going on in the business, and get a chance to network with other people who do the same sort of work that we do. Anyway, I digress. The lunch food was kinda so-so to kick the day off, but the speaker they brought in to welcome the crowd made it worthwhile. His name is Chris Gardner, and his story in a nutshell is that he was homeless at age 30 with a 1-year old son in San Francisco, and over the course of a year or two managed to work his way out of the slums and get a job as a trainee at a stock trading firm. He’s now the CEO of his own trading business, a true self-made millionaire, and one hell of an inspiring guy. I mean, the dude’s story is inspiring enough, but he was such an eloquent and engaging speaker, that everyone in the audience was totally captivated by his speech. From what I gather, some movie studio has bought the rights to his story, and is actually making a film about his life. They’re supposed to start filming in August, and his character will be played by none other than Mr. Will Smith. I mean, does it get any better than this? Wow, it was just so cool to get to hear him speak, and it really hit home just how much what we do at my office really DOES make a difference. UNBELIEVEABLE. I digress again. Anyway, I pretty much spent the afternoon cruising around the exhibit hall with Wanda and Kim scoping out all the free goodies that the different organizations were handing out, and basically taking it easy. By 2:30 or so I bugged out of the Lansing Center and headed over to MSU for my work with my cousin Brian’s TPL program. Basically TPL stands for Tomorrow’s Political Leaders, and it’s a group of college aged kids who come to MSU to get training on how to establish themselves as future political advocates and candidates. Brian wanted me to record some of their sessions again and put together a short video clip for their website, so that’s what I was doing to help. Today they had State Representative Chris Ward (R-Brighton), and State Senator Virg Bernero (D-Lansing) talking to the kids about what it’s like working in the Legislature. I actually thought Mr. Ward was a very entertaining lecturer, and had a lot of interesting thoughts on how State government can be reformed. Of course Virg was in rare form, basically delivering a comedy routine for the kids, but seeing him speak just reminded me how much Lansing needs to elect this guy as its next mayor. After seeing Tony “The Taco” Benavides talk briefly at the conference this morning, I gotta think anyone would be better. But, for the third time, I digress. Anyway, I was really glad that I got a chance to see these guys this afternoon, and I think I managed to get a lot of great footage for this year’s video clip as well. After ten hours of work today I was pretty pooped, so I pretty much came back to the pad and chilled for the rest of the night. I talked with Stefy on the phone for a while before bedtime, and we decided to hook up tomorrow to watch our Tuesday shows again like last week. Can’t wait to see my girl!