Misadventures in Dental Health

Aaron has needed to go to the dentist for a while. Recently his sore tooth got to the point where he just couldn't ignore it any longer, and to the dentist we went.

It turned out that he needed more than one tooth related procedure so we made an appointment for him to have all his work done at once with something called sleep dentistry. The night before the appointment Aaron took a pill, and then he took another pill the next morning, and then they gave him crushed-up-so-you-don't-choke-on-it pills at the dentist's office. I was in the waiting room so I didn't actually get to see his reaction to the powdered dose but I was informed that he kept everyone entertained while they fixed his mouth.

All this medicine doesn't actually put you to sleep, it's more like it keeps you right on the edge of sleep, awake and aware... but not at the same time. The pills are hypnotics and amnesiacs so even if a little pain slips through you won't actually remember it later. Pretty sweet deal really - I had it done when I got my wisdom teeth pulled.

All this sleepy time medicine has a really odd effect on the body though. While you're on it you think you are just fine. When they wheeled Aaron into the office to go over his aftercare with me he was pretty well convinced that he was behaving normally.

He wasn't.

His speech was hilariously slurred, he couldn't stop hiccuping (although I'm not sure he was actually aware that he was hiccuping), and he kept pulling his lower lip down and out, like he was trying to inspect it for hidden compartments or something. If he did have a hidden pocket in his lip it was leaking drool onto his goatee.

The hygienist explained that he would be this way for a while and that he shouldn't be left alone or allowed to walk around by himself for the rest of the day. He objected to the idea that he couldn't walk, but promptly forgot what he was objecting to in favor of trying to read the aftercare instructions. I told him he probably wouldn't remember reading it but he didn't believe me.

I signed a paper agreeing, among other things, not to let Aaron wander around alone, do any internet shopping, or get into arguments on Facebook.

"You're all dicks," he slurred in an apparent imitation of a fight on the internet.
I assured the hygienist that no one would notice the difference if he did get on Facebook.

I got up and grabbed my bag so we could leave. Aaron remembered what he'd been objecting to earlier and tried to get up from the wheel chair. He got his butt about four inches off the chair before he started wobbling. I eased him back down and the hygienist told him she had to wheel him out, to which he inexplicably replied that he did not like people singing happy birthday to him in restaurants.

We got him loaded into the car and I started to drive us home. A few miles down the road Aaron abruptly shouted

"WE NEED hiccup TO GO TO THE STORE."

He wanted to go to Earth Fare, and in his defense we had discussed going there before all the pills.

I told him "There's no way I'm taking you to Earth Fare."

"Why not?" hiccup.

"Because you have no idea how ridiculous you're acting!"

"But it'll be hiccup funny cause the people will see me all [indiscernible sounds] and they'll be all haha what's wrong hiccup and I'll be all oh I'm all messed up on the pills."

I didn't really know what to say to that.

"We need things! I hiccup don't have the hiccup things that I need at home!"
He pulled his lip out again and pointed out the windshield, "TURN AROUND!"

It was pretty clear he wasn't gonna let this go so I turned around and took him to get his things.

I did my best to keep him steady on the short walk through the parking lot and I gave him a shopping cart to use as a walker once we got inside. Even with the cart-walker he was still pretty wobbly. He was also fast. He kept suddenly rushing off to look at things, forcing me to race after him to keep him from falling over (or knocking a display over). It was the most stressful grocery experience I've ever had.

The things Aaron needed at the store were extra hot ginger ale and fresh peanut butter. Once we were inside the store he must have thought of a few more necessities because he also bought a six pack of beer, a bottle of dessert wine, two packages of goat cheese, a package of cheddar cheese, a frozen pizza, apples, and a salami. On the way out of the store he chatted with the checkout girls about an episode of Hoarders. He picked up one bag while I gathered up the rest, and before I knew it he was out the door and weaving through the parking lot. I hobbled after him as fast as I could (which wasn't very with all that beer and soda). Luckily he made it back to the car without getting run over. Or falling over.

When we got home Aaron took his frozen pizza out of the shopping bag and put it on top of the stove. I unpacked everything else and started putting things away. After a few minutes I realized he'd disappeared, but I figured he'd be right back since he'd left the pizza out.

After a few more minutes I went looking and found him in bed with the covers pulled up over his head, sound asleep and snoring.

He slept all day.

I tried to wake him once at 6pm and again at 7pm. I had, after all, signed a paper agreeing to make sure he had enough to eat and drink. At 6pm I asked him if he was thirsty, and told him he was supposed to drink some water. He just stared blankly at me and then closed his eyes again. When I tried again at 7 he woke up enough to tell me that he wasn't hungry, and that he didn't care if he was supposed to have water.

He finally got up at around 8:40 and had one of his ginger ales.

He was back in ben again before 11:00.

He didn't eat any of his snacks or his pizza.

The next morning he didn't remember anything about his adventure at the grocery store. He didn't remember drinking his ginger ale, or his hiccups, or his fascination with his lower lip.

Two days later he didn't remember not remembering the things he didn't remember.

Food Doodles - Part One

Doing Business on the Internet can be Tricky (Updated)

Over the past month or so we have been purchasing various art and decor items online for The Owl. For the most part our experiences have been great. We've already received some beautiful paintings (if you haven't seen them yet check out We Want Your Arts!). But some of our internet dealings have been a little tricky.

We are trying to purchase an amazing painting from an artist named Sasha Montiljo and he has been VERY kind to us in his emails and we are thrilled to be doing business with him! But we've run into a small roadblock - buying his art requires wiring money to Serbia, where he lives and works. I actually think the fact that this painting is coming from as far away as Serbia makes it even cooler than it already was. 

Trying to figure out how to wire the money to Serbia has been a long and fascinating adventure filled with mysterious XML files and travels to a variety of banking institutions. I wrote a suitably long and detailed description of this adventure, but blogger decided to delete it from my draft so you'll have to make due with the cliffs notes, which go something like this:

File can't be opened by Mac programs X3
--->File displays all crazy when opened X2
--->Remove all the crazy parts of the file with the delete (backspace) key
--->Can read file!!
--->Transfer money from old bank to new bank --->Bring printout to new bank
--->Fill out forms
--->Transfer Accomplished!!!
--->Premature celebration
--->Missing information
--->Old bank may have access to the missing information
--->Must withdraw funds from new bank and return to old bank with printed file
--->

That last arrow is a TBD arrow since we haven't completed the previous arrow's directives yet.

In this situation the delays of funds being sent and paintings being received are all on us. We hope Sasha doesn't hate us for our complete and utter lack of knowledge about standard banking procedures and windows based encrypted files.

In this next situation the seller is the one who has caused the delay. I think we've been pretty reasonable in our requests, but if I'm delusional please let me know.

This one started with our purchase of a $350.00 painting on Etsy. We made the purchase on September 2nd and happily waited a week to hear from the seller. We were excited to get the painting so we checked for messages both on the Etsy site and in our email during that first week. When we hadn't heard anything I visited the seller's Etsy page and saw something alarming - her last customer had left negative feedback and stated that he did not receive his item.

We didn't panic though. We waited another few days, feeling use that we'd hear from the seller. After all, we'd just sent her over $350 via paypal, surely she planned on acknowledging that in some way. Just to be safe Aaron sent a message via the Etsy conversation system. Days passed. He sent a second message.

When we still hadn't heard anything on the 18th we really were getting nervous. I checked the seller's profile page to see if perhaps it said she was out of town, or otherwise unable to complete transactions, but didn't find anything to reassure me. I went back to that negative feedback and checked the dates. That person appeared to have waited a month before he gave up. Knowing there were time limits on opening disputes I decided better safe than sorry and opened a paypal dispute as well as an etsy case.

The next day we finally got an email (I have removed her name):

On Sep 19, 2011, at 1:16 PM, <name of seller> wrote:

First of all, I want to thank you for your kind note and purchase of my painting "Wormfare".  I am so very excited to hear it will be hanging in your restaurant.

It will be in your hands no later than the following week.  It lives in Austin, and I have been working very diligently, trying to get it to you from afar.  My apologies for not notifying you of this sooner, you will get it very, very soon.  

I'm sorry if this has been inconvenient for you.  I didn't imagine this process to be such a headache.  

Thank you for your patience,

We were encouraged that we had finally gotten an email, but still wary. After careful consideration I replied:

On Wed, Sep 21, 2011 at 6:53 PM, Justi Manter wrote:

We have a paypal claim already open, if the painting arrives and is in good condition we will close it. Has it been sent yet? Do you have tracking information?

I considered telling the seller than we'd just take a refund, but I really did like the painting and she seemed nice. If she could send us a tracking number then we wouldn't have to worry anymore. We waited for the tracking number.

On Wed, Sep 21, 2011 at 7:32 PM, <> wrote:

Hi Justi,

I'm sorry you felt the need to open a claim.  It should have been sent today.  Again, I moved to Santa Barbara just a few months ago, and getting it shipped from way over here has been a hassle.  It will be in good condition.  If you'd like to send photos of it after, we can arrange this.

My regrets that this transaction has become bitter for you.  I was excited to hear that it was going to such a perfect home.  I hope you like it as much as I enjoyed creating it.

I'll be in touch.

and then

On Thu, Sep 22, 2011 at 1:01 PM <>wrote:

My mother is shipping it tomorrow.  She has been busy.  I will have the tracking info to you when that happens.

Ok, sounds good at this point. We are a little annoyed at how long this is taking, but her replies at this point were prompt.

Then came this

On Sep 22, 2011, at 8:09 PM, <>wrote:

May I have your phone number for tracking?

Thanks!

I was not into the idea of sending my cell phone number to a stranger. I've already had trouble with telemarketers calling it, and besides that this was a business transaction and we didn't have our business line set up yet. All I wanted was an email with the tracking info. I wrote:

On Sep 22, 2011 at 10:28:13 PM, Justi Manter Wrote:

We don't have a home phone number. Just email us the tracking number from ups/fed ex (whoever you shipped it with).  

Justi Manter

And then we waited again, for 4 more days, without a reply or tracking number. I wanted to make sure etsy was kept up to date with the details so I left comments periodically. I made sure to let them know that the seller had contacted me because she hadn't done that herself. Today I sent an update after seeing that she no longer had anything listed for sale in her etsy shop - which wasn't an encouraging sign.

Today is the 26th, and almost immediately after I wrote that I got an email that wasn't quite as nice as the others. The rest of our conversation went like this:

On Sep 26, 2011, at 2:28 PM, <>wrote:

I don't know how else I can express to you that I am getting your painting over to you right now.  I have been in touch.  I asked for your number because UPS has a shipping option to alert you when and where your shipped item is.  I wasn't trying to do anything else with your phone numbers, my mother asked me if you had one to give the clerk.  That is all.

I am not Walmart.  I am an independent artist who's painting is in another state and who is trying her hardest to get it to you as quickly and efficiently as possible without being there.  I am really trying to work with you here, I have no intention on stealing your money, okay?  I want you to have the painting just as much as you, I promise you.  

The painting has been shipped.  I am trying to get a tracking number.  As I said before, I will be in touch with this information once I get it.  

and then:

Your painting should arrive tomorrow.  I've given pay pal all of the information.  You can view it there.

and then:

Also, I want you to know this is the first time I've done this.  I'm still trying to figure it out, I'm not an expert.

Note:

<--------------

This was my last reply:

On Sep 26, 2011 at 3:36:15 PM, Justi Manter Wrote:

As I was writing this I received your other message and a message from paypal. I'm still going to send this because I really think you should read it even though it probably wont matter for this transaction now. Even for an indie artist who is not, as you said, walmart your priority should still be customer service. We could have avoided all this if you had simply taken a moment  to write to us and explain the situation when we first purchased the painting. After waiting 2 weeks without any acknowledgment of the purchase we were understandably concerned.

You say this is the first time you've done this and you're not an expert. Not sure what you mean by that... selling on Etsy? It shows on your page that you've had 25 sales....

Here's some advice you probably don't want -  posting publicly on your etsy page that your pieces might take longer than usual to ship would let people know what they are getting into before they make a purchase. The general time frame from purchase to delivery on the other art we have bought on Etsy was a week to 10 days tops, and they all sent us emails confirming they received payment, and another email when the item was shipped. I was very excited to be buying your painting and I wish things had gone smoothly from the start so that we weren't left with this bad experience. 

Honestly, if we were buying something less expensive we might have been willing to just give you all the time you needed and not open a claim - but you only have a limited time period on paypal to dispute something and we didn't feel like it would be a good idea to wait without knowing what was going on when there was $350.00 at stake. We've made the mistake of waiting before and have lost money because of it.

As long as the painting arrives tomorrow, as the tracking info shows it should, we will close the paypal/etsy disputes.

~

(Below is what I started writing before I got the tracking email and the 'I'm new at this' email. I sent both halves of this message).

~

The tracking number will be on the receipt. You could probably also request it from the store that you shipped it through if you give them our shipping address (or maybe the return address you used). 

The reason we have been so concerned about all this is because my husband Aaron tried several times to get in touch with you via email and etsy to find out what was going on. If you had responded to those emails we would probably not have felt the need to open the paypal/etsy disputes. We paid for the painting on 9/2 - we didn't open a dispute until 9/18 - I feel that we gave you plenty of time to get in touch with us and explain that there would be a delay. We also saw the negative feedback from your last customer, who also waited a month and claims he didn't get his item - can you really blame us for being worried?

Are you possibly not receiving all the emails we send? I replied immediately when you asked for our phone number and said we'd prefer you email us the tracking number, we didn't hear back from you with or without a tracking number until I left updated comments on the etsy case. 

I'm sorry that you seem upset by this transaction, but we are absolutely not being unreasonable in our requests for timely correspondence and a tracking number. These things are normally provided without question by independent sellers on both etsy and ebay. 

Justi Manter

If you look at the timestamps you'll see that I took nearly an hour writing my reply, trying hard to keep a measured tone - polite but stern. Helpful, but without ignoring the fact that this whole thing was handled poorly. Part of me doesn't even want this painting anymore, all it's gonna do is remind me of this hassle. Here's hoping that fades with time.

Well, this was a very serious blogpost. I started out trying to keep things light. I meant to have a little more humor mixed in too, I swear. Oh well.

Allow me to leave you today with a link to a friend's blog. It coincidentally arrived in my email today, and you'll note how appropriate it really is when you get down to the section entitled Communicate. Customers Rule! by PiXELGRiN

I promise hope to never subject you to such a rant again, but it sure do feel good to vent sometimes ;)

Another reply from the seller in response to that last message:

You're right.  I'm sorry.  I hope we can move forward with this, and I hope my painting brings you lots of happiness when it arrives.


I do feel much better now that I've read that. Hopefully the painting will arrive within the next few days and we can move on to bigger things, like surgery, dentists, building renovation, forbidden forest clearing, and opening The Owl.

My reply, if you're on the edge of your seat wondering how it all ends:

It's ok, this whole thing has been a mess on both ends. We'll let you know when it gets here. If you feel like you need some pointers on the whole etsy thing I have a friend who writes a fantastic blog about it. This was, coincidentally, the post update I received from her today: http://pixelgrin.wordpress.com/2011/09/21/customers-rule/


(Look Jen, I linked you twice!) :D

Regarding Bacon, Overindulgence, and the Essence o...

Thought I'd go ahead and cross post this blog post of Chef Aaron's, I was just reminded of it and if you missed it when he posted it you really should read it!


abandonist: Regarding Bacon, Overindulgence, and the Essence o...: People of America. Stop it with the bacon. You are fucking it up for everyone. Cooking is about balance, even in the instances where a p...

The Stick Figure Collective (update 9/24)

I have a great love of doodling while watching shows I've seen so many times that I don't even need to look at the TV to know what's happening. Today I've been iPad doodling to a soundtrack of Arrested Development. (The TV show that is, not the early 90s rap group*).  Actually I've been doing this for a few days, and I've even been taking requests on Facebook and Google+. Mostly I've drawn stick people. There have also been a few unidentifiable creatures. I've posted most of 'em elsewhere, but I felt like they needed a permanent home here on the blog too. My plan is to continually add random pictures to this post. All the lost little drawings who don't fit in their own blog post will live here together in The Stick Figure Collective.

Side note... I currently have 799 blog views, so if you're reading this right now you might be number 800! This is pretty exciting for me. I mean, it's almost a thousand. One Thousand whole views! Wow! Unfortunately I still only have 4 followers. This means that I am not currently famous, and should probably be less excited at the prospect of an 800th view. (I am still excited though because it is a whole round number and those are cool).

Additions 9/24 - I forgot to include this kitty in the original post, and the party spider is brand new : D

So that's all I've got for now. I think. If I find (or draw!) more I'll add them. These go (more or less) in the order I drew them. You can probably tell that at first I didn't really plan on doing anything with them, but by the end I kinda knew I'd want to put them here so I started adding a little extra detail and bits of color.

The girl photographer was requested by my friend Jen but I was so excited about the picture that I forgot to write her name on it. You should totally visit her blog! Especially if you're a creative person, or just love other creative people.

The bookseller is a tribute to my former co-workers at the 'ole BN.

The tomboy in the tree was requested by a stranger on G+, so if you're a stranger don't be afraid to request your own drawing!!

And the yellow thing is... the yellow thing.

*It turns out that Arrested Development is still together and touring. Learn something new everyday!

For Some SERIOUS Yum:

Check out this recipe post by Chef Aaron!

Ha... It makes me giggle to call my husband "Chef Aaron"

abandonist: Pork Roast: Get a nice size bone-on chop roast (a pig ribeye roast) - at least 4 bones. Rub it down with salt, garlic powder, cumin, coriander, and smok...

There is a Forbidden Forest behind our restaurant

There is a forbidden forest behind The Owl! Well, actually it's not The Owl yet, but it will be soon, and when it is we're gonna be getting out our machetes.

Yes you read that right. We got machetes. We have other sharp cutty things too, but I don't know what they're called, so I'm going to focus on the MACHETES! I'm totally excited to try them out.

I am also slightly terrified.

I am terrified for a few reasons. Let's take a look at those reasons in the form of a list.

              Reasons to be afraid of The Forbidden Forest Project

1. Machetes are fucking sharp. They can cut you. And by you I mean me. 
2. Sometimes plants are sharp too. They will also cut you. And sometimes they are  poisonous, which can make you itch. Unless you're Aaron. If you're Aaron your mutant super power is immunity to itchy poison plants, rendering you capable of boldly crashing through thick undergrowth clad in only shorts and flip flops. Ok maybe not flip flops. 
3. Bugs.
4. BUGS!!!!!!!!!
5. Clumsiness. I am clumsy. There's no getting around it. Think of a ridiculous way one might injure oneself while cutting down a Forbidden Forest and I will probably find it. 
6. Bees. 
7. Angry animals who will be mad that we are chopping down their home because  they  don't know that we are still going to have green things growing for them to live in and eat so they attack us with their teeth and claws. 
8. Weird garbage. Our recon on the outer edges of The Forest has already found empty cans and bottles (presumably of an alcoholic nature), random wires, old wood, and a shoe. Who knows what else lies within. 
9. 
   
10. There's a cliff. Way at the back of The Forest. We can't really tell how far down it goes, or how quickly it goes there, from our side of the forest. In the neighboring (slightly less forbidden but still kind of forbidden cause there's a rope barrier and a lot more old wood garbage) forest we can see very far down. Like "oops you're dead cause you fell off this cliff" far. I'm not exaggerating. I might be exaggerating. But still, cliff = scary!!!  

And that is why I am slightly terrified. I really wanted it to be a 10 things long list, but I didn't have a 9th thing. If you happen to know of a 9th thing to be afraid of while cutting down Forbidden Forests please comment! I would hate to get in there, thinking I was safe because I'd made a list of all the things that could harm me, only to discover that the 9th thing I didn't know about was the most horrible scary gross awful thing that can happen to a person in a Forest. 

Assuming we make it through the coming adventure intact we will be converting our Forbidden Forest into a Lovely Garden. In The Lovely Garden we will grow many things. You'll then be able to purchase these things in the forms of burger toppings, vegetables, fries, and salads! The Lovely Garden will also provide a Lovely View for anyone eating out on the patio. If The Forbidden Forest had it's way anyone sitting on the patio would have a terrifying view. And no one likes to be terrified while eating burgers. 

I gots an I Pad and I made arts with it!

And I'm trying to blog from it. Feel free to not read this since it's really just a test post anyway. For example I need to test if I know how to use HTML to get all italic with this app.

I also need to see if I can figure out how picture adding works.











Woohoo! Picture added! Dunno if my italics worked yet though. That picture, btw, very first one drawn on my iPad. I know, it's spectacular. I also dre (edit: hey look! a typo!!) a park.










You might be wondering why it's so lonely in my park. That would because it came out looking fairly naturalistic when I draw people they look... Not naturalistic.

Let's try a photo!








Well I couldn't make the thing that said I could crop and scale work, so he's a bit cut off, and he's also REALLY poorly lit, and that was probably too many commas, that was definitely too many commas, but anyway that's my kitty Sebastian. You may remember him from such illustrated classics as...

Well actually I don't know how to get a drawing from one of my other posts and add it to this one on the iPad so you'll just have to go look at all my old blogs until you find one with a drawing that resembles Sebastian. I'll give you a hint - in the drawing he wont be in a box.

Hey, know what? If you actually do that I'll get a nice boot (edit: hey look another typo! Unless I want a boot in my views. I don't think boots read blogs though.) in blog views! That'd be cool for me, and you'll get to read all my other awesome words if you haven't already, so it's totally a win win situation.

I think I've tested all the tests I'd thought of so far now. I'll probably test some more later. For some reason I feel like I should sign this like it's an email. It's not an email, it's a blog. And even if I did want to sign it, I didn't address it to anyone, so it'd be weird. I should just stop writing now....

Cleaning, Sleeping, and Squid

Sometimes I do dishes at 1:22 in the morning.

This usually happens because i have spent the preceding (# of days = < 5 but > 2) not particularly caring what my kitchen looked like. Then all of a sudden, at 1:21 in the morning, I decide that I care very fucking much what my kitchen looks like.

So I start collecting dishes from the counters and rinsing them in the sink. Then I open the dish washer and rearrange the dishes that are already in there because I live with boys and boys don't know how to load dishwashers. I put the silverware in the little silverware cubbies haphazardly because I don't care where they go since it doesn't affect how many of them can fit. But then feel bad about having put the silverware in haphazardly while I'm blogging and I consider going back and fixing it because I know Aaron doesn't like it when the forks are having a party in the spoon cubby. But I don't fix it because that would be ridiculous and it's not like he puts the plates and cups the way I want them and only one of us should be allowed to be neurotically OCD about dishes at a time.

I just realized there are 2 cups, a plate, and a mostly empty coke can on the coffee table. I'll be right back.

Since I was back in the kitchen anyway I decided I may as well clean all the counters with multi-purpose windex. I also put away most of the do-not-fit-in-the-dishwasher dishes that were in the dish drainer. I didn't put them all away because I am abnormally short and can't reach approximately half of my own kitchen cabinets.

I own a stepladder but I have an incomprehensible (<--- I spelled that right!) aversion to using it.

I have not taken out the garbage even though there is a lot of it and I'd really like for it to not be in my kitchen anymore. I haven't done this because it is now 1:58 in the morning and even though I'm pretty sure it's safe in the parking lot I can't be 100% sure it's not rapey out there. I can't be sure because we used to have a cool scooter and someone stole it. I figure people who steal cool scooters might also be rapers.

I don't usually blog after midnight. There might be a good reason for that, but I think this is going pretty well so far. At the very least it's keeping me from cleaning the rest of my apartment at 2am. Then again I don't really have a good reason not to clean at 2am when I'm awake anyway...

...Oh wait... I did have a good reason, I just forgot it. I want to listen to podcasts on my ipod speakers while I clean and I can't do that right now because Aaron is watching a show about squids.

I should probably take my sleepytime pill, because all evidence points to me being WAY too awake right now. Although there is a possibility the squid show will fix that. Shows that involve water usually put me to sleep.

Here's a picture from a while ago when I had a headache that I never figured out how to include in a post. I'm glad I just realized I don't need a reason to include it since it's pretty awesome and I'd hate to waste it.

I'm going to test the squid sleep theory now. If it doesn't work maybe I'll draw you another picture. Maybe it will be of a sleeping squid.

Exercise! Bikes! New Drawing! Exclamation!

Recently Aaron and I decided we needed to get out more, and we needed to do it in an exercisey way. We're not necessarily unhealthy people, but with The Owl's opening still 2 months out we've been fighting a tendency to spend far too much time on our couches.

We're not "Go to the Gym" people, and I've never found running to be something I'd classify as "Fun." We have a Wii Fit, and although it is certainly fun it's still an indoor activity. When all these facts were taken into account the answer became clear.

We needed bicycles!

Several problems with this idea were immediately apparent. We live in an apartment, and we own a lot of stuff. Our tiny storage closet is packed to the ceiling, and our closets overflow with random things like guitar cases, old aquarium equipment, abandoned arts and crafts projects, holiday decorations, toys and games, and boxes. So many boxes. Boxes in boxes. Boxes of books. Boxes of cds and dvds. Boxes of all those bits and pieces of life that you don't need out on a shelf but just aren't quite ready to trash yet. Or maybe that's just me. Pack Rat extraordinaire.

So what were we to do? We wanted bikes, but we just didn't have anywhere to put them. Aaron found the answer.
















Yeah. That's a bike. A folding bike. Pretty cool, huh? This ones mine. I kinda love the 70s vibe with the green and brown color scheme. Mine arrived first, and this is a right-out-of-the-box picture. We were foldy bike novices, without the talent and skill to properly fold and strap everything into it's proper place. A few days later Aaron's bike arrived and we took them out for a test run.

There they are, in all their foldy glory.

You can see how much better we are at folding them up now. We're bike folding professionals. 

Aaron let me do a folding bike photo shoot so we could share our newfound skills with you.

The first thing you do is remove the velcro straps. For some reason I didn't take a picture of that.

The next step is swinging the front half forward so that it almost looks like a regular bike.

 A regular bike with no handle bars.

The handle bars were hiding down there next to the wheel. They flip up and lock in place. They are also height adjustable!

Ta Da! Bicycle Accomplished.






After our success with bicycle number one I felt compelled to continue filming as bicycle number two was transformed from Strange Folded Wheely Thing into Fully Functional Transportation and Exercise Unit.

I didn't take any pictures of the strappy parts. Again.

The process is pretty much the same. Really there was no reason to take pictures of both bikes.

As I mentioned before the handle bars on these have height adjustments. Now I'll mention that the seats are also adjustable! Mention Accomplished.

Ta da again! Oh yeah, that's why I took pictures of both bikes - to show you that there are a variety of body shapes available! Mine is called the "Step Through" style. Cause I can Step Through it. As opposed to Stepping Over it.

This may not seem like such a great thing for you, but I'm only five feet tall so it's pretty handy for me.

I wasn't in any of the pictures. I felt left out.






After our Bicycle Assembly photo shoot we rode around our apartment complex for a while. Our complex isn't all that big, but it does have a somewhat hilly terrain. And we hadn't riden bikes in a long time. The results were probably predictable. After about 5 minutes my legs started feeling a little shaky. After 15 minutes they had a whole Jello thing going on. 20 minutes passed and my whole body had started to feel like a wet Spaghatta Nadle! <----- Click that. Click it NOW.                  ..........You're welcome.

We only rode for a half an hour at the absolute most. At the end of that half hour I was pretty sure I was going to die. And I still had to fold my bike up and carry it inside.

It turned out I didn't die. But my hair was wet with sweat and I wasn't gonna be walking anytime soon.

I drank this entire cup of cucumber water. It helped. A lot. <---- Click that too.

You're welcome. Again.




So in conclusion, it might be a while before I look upon my bicycle with the fondness portrayed in my drawing. Don't get me wrong, I love my bicycle, I just don't love turning into a useless pile of mush when I use it. But then again, that's the point isn't it? My goal. To not turn into a pile of mush from riding a bike for thirty measly minutes. 


Wish me luck.






Did you click the links? No? Man, are you missing out. Those links take you straight into the wonderful magical world of Hyperbole and a Half, the best blog on the internet. It's author, Allie Brosh, is my blog hero. I probably wouldn't even be doing this if I hadn't read hers first. I've mentioned this before, and I probably will again. 'Cause I believe in spreading awesome when and where ever possible.


Oh, almost forgot, if you're interested in checking out a foldy bike for yourself you can do that Here.