Also wants to travel!

Well, with regards to travel, I'm actually tasked with figuring out my 'personal travel' list pretty soon. Japan was my pick, and Costa Rica was Jessie's. Jess is gung-ho about China, which makes me a little wary unless we could get some sort of guidance, either professional or a friend, to take us around (we totally could). But it's my turn to pick a place, and after Japan, my list is pretty much empty, so I'm watching everyone's list with interest. I've never really done the 'Europe' trip, which could be interesting, but I don't know what I'd do at most places, and 'seeing old buildings' could get old after a while. So I've been tasked with figuring out where I would like to go on vacation this year, and soon. Thanks for all the suggestions, then!

Though I may end up getting a bonus free trip to England. For work! The details are still rolling in, but it sounds like Ticom wants to send me to England for a week to help support one of the projects I'm on. I don't have all (read: any) specifics yet, but it sounds pretty fun, and Jess is determined, if I go, to fly out with me, for at least part of it, and have ourselves a discount bonus England vacation. Whee!

Jess and I have had a pretty busy week, actually. Jess did a lot of roller derby practice to make up her requirements of 8 a month, and she got a pretty spectacular bruise on her rear end when they were practicing with a partner and her partner kept her skate in the wrong place and Jess landed right on the wheel. Ouch. We've taken some pictures, they'll just need to be...carefully cropped.

We went out shopping this weekend for random stuff and I ended up in Best Buy checking out various home theater systems. I had found one I liked, but the price was a little more than I was hoping to pay. Jess came up as I was thinking and told me 'well we use it all the time, you should just buy it' and then proceeded to buy me a preposterous amount of A/V gear for the home. So in short, I have the best wife in the world. I've stuck the speakers on the wall and even routed the wires all sexy and hidden-like, so before long we'll be listening to Rock Band MUCH LOUDER.

Of course, in exchange for all my audio gear, I bought her a tree! We wanted to put another tree up in the backyard for privacy and because Jess really likes trees, especially ones she can climb. We got a Burr Oak and had it delivered over the weekend. Three burly dudes did the big work of delivering the 100 gallon tree (that's the size of the pot it was in) and digging a hole for it. They had to bust up some seriously big rocks to do it. But no granite, so it went okay. They piled up some mulch and layed down some fertilizer too, and put in some posts to keep it upright. Seriously professional job. I'll put some pics and videos of that, and the rest of our house, pretty soon.

Brief notes!: House is coming together, we really just have to figure out our entertainment center and assemble a master bedroom. I've discovered that I can bike to Wing Tsun pretty easily, so we can put off buying a second car for a while. The front door blew open while the tree was being delivered and the cats got out of the house. I found Tigger in the garden, and Nagano came back when I called. I've turned Jess onto the joys of NPR for our morning drive to work, we get to listen to 'All things considered' and the Austin Music Minute. Jessie has officially changed her last name, or at least started the process.

Consider yourself updated.

-N