The DJ quoted me $4500 dollars for just covering the dance floor, some uplighting, and the DJ equipment. Yikes. I started doing some research on the dance floor coverings and will hopefully be able to convince the decorator to do some of the up lighting. We can install the vinyl floor coverings ourselves since it’s really not that hard.

Maybe Steve can do some of the sound stuff. We’ll see.

I stayed home from work today. Between being unable to get out of bed and the massive headaches that are plaguing me now I wouldn’t have been able to get anything done anyhow.

Friday pretty much completely sucked. My deployment went fine but then our group in Cincinnati decided that taking down the entire benefits site until 8pm was a good idea. Except they didn't tell us it would take that long. In fact they made it sound like it would be a short thing. Of course we didn't get everything in explicit writing. Ugh. 

Anyway, we'll see what happens Monday. All I can think of is how empty the office was at 2pm after everyone had left for an early Friday. Bleh. At least Summer Hours is upon us! I get a half day every Friday until Labor Day weekend!

Yay!

I spent the entire weekend at home. Good Lord it was amazing.  Didn't do a single thing for the wedding, or insert myself into my family so my mom couldn't make snide remarks at me. It was so good. I spent time sleeping in my bed, my wonderful bed, and going to parks with Jeremy. We played some video games and just enjoyed being. It was pretty great. I feel rejuvenated. Really.

Suganth came over on Saturday night and we chilled. We had dinner and Jeremy taught him some sword moves. I also went over the objective C project he wants to start doing with Robby. I hope he musters up the drive to finish that project. I'll try and check on him periodically.

Today we're having brunch with a few friends in Roswell. After that, it's open to us. 
One thing I love about Jeremy is that he doesn't have a crazy inner drive to do all sorts of stuff.  He loves relaxing and just being too. He'll also fully support me when I'm in full gear for something. I like that.

I hope our lives settle. I am afraid that at the end of this ridiculously stupid wedding we will be in a solid amount of debt, he won't have found a new job and we'll be back to living our two separate lives like we do now. That will make it very difficult to pay off any debt we incur.  I want to believe my mother when she says 'Just Trust God, he probably wants you to have a big wedding'! 

I can't tell you how much like total bullshit that sounds to me.  How can you do the exact thing that God has asked you not to do with the money given to you and believe that he's got your back on it? Is there some sort of worldly punishment awaiting us? 

There are no instances in the Bible where God provides through a loan. 

Proverbs 22:7
The rich rules over the poor, and the borrower becomes the lender’s slave.

Proverbs 14:15
The naive believes everything, but the sensible man considers his steps.

Ecclesiastes 11:2
Divide your portion to seven, or even to eight, for you do not know what misfortune may occur on the earth.

Hope for the best, but prepare for the worst.  I am completely unprepared for the worst and for that reason I am unable to hope for the best. 

I hope it all works out because really, the frightening part is knowing that at the end I will stand alone and there will be nobody to really blame but myself for letting this happen.

I know I have a lot of blessings. I make a lot of money, I own property, I do so much most mid twenties women only dream about. This doesn’t make it easier to do this thing with money knowing I am purposefully being a poor steward of it all.

God I am so sorry… but there’s no turning back now. The contracts are signed and my life is headed in that direction.

I’m going to go enjoy the rest of my day.

I always get a mini knot in my stomach when we're deploying something big at work for which I have been entirely responsible.
Partly this is due to the fact that we have to almost manually keep track of everything we change. I had to keep a spreadsheet because our stupid source control doesn't allow us to branch out the code, make edits and then merge back in. How stupid is that?

I am really starting to wonder what it's like to work for a proper software company where I don't have to keep making administrative level mistakes because I'm a software engineer and not a stupid source control app. I swear. Once I'm married I want to go back to school and then find a good job at a good company where the work makes sense.

😐

My mother doesn't want an explanation of how her mothering could have been improved. I guess I should just pretend the way she raised me was perfect and best for me in all scenarios. It's not even like I was taking into question her entire method of parenting me. Just some small bits that did not help me.

I expressed that I didn't like it when I was forced to do Orchestra in high school. I expressed how, looking back, it was an unbelievable waste of my time and how I looked at and longed to take the art classes offered. How I didn't enjoy orchestra but would have loved art.

I remember taking geometry and physical ed as a summer classes so I could take art. I had to lie about the need to take those classes in the summer. The art class was the most satisfying elective class I took in high school.

My mother didn't like that. She "apologized" for making me take orchestra for two more years than I wanted to and then told me to go raise my kids better than her.

Gee thanks for that apology, it was so sincere mom.

She must think the world of herself as a mother. I can never express any sort of criticism of her parenting without her being sarcastic or taking offense. This would make more sense if she didn't also love handing out criticism to me pretty much anytime I see her face.

Well the truth is I hated orchestra. I hated not being in the fun clubs.  I hated having to hide the hell out of my relationship with Jeremy because she couldn't handle it. And her giving me relationship advice? Pff. That boat sailed a long time ago when you decided to make that very important part of my life none of your concern.

Oh well, it's not surprising. She always says she's my mother and not my friend. I guess I should start accepting that "not my friend" part because it makes everything I've never understood about her parenting make perfect sense.

You take your real self and your real problems to your friends. You don't take them to self proclaimed authority figures who've made it clear they're not looking to ever rescind their position of authority for close and honest relationship with you. 

They'll always have the right to tell it to me like I have no sense, am inferior, inexperienced and going to 'learn my lesson'.

Once this wedding is over, I need to take some time off for myself, away from all the negative voices and re-center to the things that are important to me. I don't need to please everyone. I don't need to please anyone at the expense of my own needs.

And that's where I need to draw my line.  So.. I guess I need to start drawing lines. And express my feelings.
My feelings are no less valuable than anyone else's. Sorry. Future MIL is not going to be at my dress fitting. 

I don't want her there. I am okay with not having someone at such a personal event that I haven't connected with. It's important to me. What's important to me matters.  She is a lovely lady, exuberant in her emotion. I don't know how to handle her. It's not her fault. I am not used to women like her. 

And that's okay.

Goddamn it, everything else about this wedding day is for everybody fucking else. 
I AM SO SICK AND TIRED OF CERTAIN PEOPLE ACTING LIKE MY REQUIESTS AND WANTS ARE ALWAYS SELFISH AND SELF CENTERED.

YOU KNOW WHAT SCREW THAT. 

I am tired of people trying to walk all over me. I am doing things my way. Fuck everything else.
I'm not a bridezilla but people have another thing coming if they think I'm just going to be a brideoormat.

So far this week has been a total success. I designed my betrothal brochures under pressure and they turned out pretty sexy. I’m not bad at this graphics thing. Not like pro, but not bad.

The betrothal ceremony is the day after tomorrow. It’s gonna be awk. I am being stuffed in yet another sari.

yay.

But hey. Whatever. My parents need this ceremony thing so I will do it for them. Not to bad to be a doll in a dollhouse for an evening right?

I took tomorrow off. I have to go to Office Depot to pick up my print order of all the brochures. Then I have to go to the threading place at 10:30 and get my eyebrows done real quick like. Next, I gotta run to Forever 21 and buy a load of gold bangles. Then, a mani and pedi so my fingers don’t look gross in the photos.

I’m tired just thinking about all that stuff.

In other news I don’t know how to properly communicate with Jeremy’s mom. She is like super open in your face trust and happy and connected to you-ness.

I know that last sentence didn’t make a lot of sense. I’m not really.. a very.. girly girl. Jeremy’s mom is kind of different for me. I mostly deal in men and women that are very similar to me.

I don’t know.
Ah whatever.

I just finished Deepika and Varun’s engagement shoot. Here are a few of my favorites:

I’m doing Samina & Moe’s next weekend. 🙂 So much wedding stuff (and business for me!).

I should sleep but I have one more set of photos to process and upload for a family session. I’m gonna be beat tomorrow.

I'm not going to boot camp at all this week. I've got to focus on getting ready for the betrothal ceremony this Saturday. I have friends coming over all week to try on clothes and I am doing some serious cleaning. My house always needs a clean. :] I am a messy person. There are really four places from which the dirt emanates and that is

1) The Sink
2) My Closet
3) The Coffee Table
4) The Laundry Room

and.. unoffically 5) the Felines.

It's stunning how much FUR is all over my house.
Being a homeowner all by yourself is either awesome or suckkk
I wonder what it's going to be like having someone else live here full time. I guess I better just enjoy my house as my house for the little time I have left in it. After this, I'll probably never have my own house again unless one of us kicks the bucket or kicks the other out! Haha. 🙂

Okay off to cleaning. 
And then I have to definitely schedule a few posts for Unbroken Horse. I've pretty much ignored the blog since May started. :

I am pretty much the most awesome I've been in a while. I've accepted the financial challenge of this wedding and am working to make this work for both myself, Jeremy and my parents' budgets.  Part of the self-therapy is promising myself a two week cruise that will leave from Miami and finish in San Francisco. How awesome is that? It hits a couple Bahaman islands, Colombia or Venezuela, goes through the Panama Canal, Up Central America, stopping in Costa Rica or the Honduras, then making two stops in Mexico.

Two weeks
Just me, my man and my camera.

Hell yeah sign me up.. 

I'm nearing the end of week two of Dez's Rapid Fit. I get killed each workout but I'm running a solid hour after each hour long boot camp session. So far my body is doing a good job of adapting. I am now almost twice as fast as I was when I started boot camp. I don't have a weight loss goal or anything, but I do want to just stick to this diet and exercise until the wedding. It will be nice to look good at the wedding, but 90% of my motivation comes from wanting to do all the really awesome excursions. I want our Honeymoon to be awesome. 

I want to scuba dive for hours and not get tired. I want to swim the Bahamanian waters, and run across south american sands. I want it all baby. I want to go dawn to dusk and then keep going. 

And well I definitely need the energy to.. ahem.. consummate this relationship. 😉

My betrothal ceremony is in a week or so.  That should be interesting. I get weirded out when I am the center of attention at something as simple as my own birthday. This is way different. 🙂

Other than that I have reasonable workloads at work, am able to get things done at home, have (finally) reined in my finances and habits and I'm reaching a space of zen and balance again. It takes a bit for me to regain my centered mindset after something bit hits me.. like this wedding and all the details that go with it.

That's part of being an adult. 🙂 

This Sunday I have to shoot my friends' engagement ceremony at her home. I am excited. She may hire me for her own wedding.

I also rediscovered a song I loved in High School. It was a on a sample CD from a band that wasn't very big at the time. It's called Ruin Your Life by the Abandoned Pools. Seriously, Spotify is one of the best 10 bucks I spend each month. 

I'm also in love with the song Ode to the Bouncer by Studio Killers. It played on repeat for a considerable portion of my workout today. The beat is addictive. I'm trying to reduce how many times I listen to it so I don't burn it out.

I'm going shopping with my brother and Jeremy on Saturday for the Machan Ring. It should be interesting haha.

BOUNCER, HEY BOUNCER.