Firelight

I find this SNL skit done by Taylor Swift hilarious. LOVED IT! Nolan loved it too (for real too not another H.P. situation). Funny spoof of the twilight saga.

I'm not a radical feminist but..

....what if women could change the world?

I saw this video in one of my classes and I got a little choked up.

Maybe it was that time of the month..

But it got me thinking..

And maybe it'll get you thinking..

False acusations

So I heard through the grape-vine that I like harry potter. This information is FALSE! I will admit, that for a series of books that are being read to me -BECAUSE OF LOSING A BET- are put together well. I did in fact say that I'd give it 95 out of 100 for its "put-togetherness", but over-all my liking for the books are about the same as when we started. Close to nill. The books still have plenty of faults and are not at all what they were built up to be. I know there are some HP lovers out there, but count me out. The book is way predictable, there are parts that don't really add up and are only explained by "because it's magic", and with an exception to the last 2 books, the rest of the series is pretty repetitive (crappy summer at the dursleys, 9 and 3/4, school, malfoy, dubledork, quiddich, harry saves all, harry is the best, harry's new love, snape is bad, uht oh voldemort, harry defeats him...again, school is over, hogwarts express). Sound familiar? Sorry to all those that love the world of arry potta, but I had to clear this up a bit.

Admitting is the first step..

Just wanted everyone to know, that Nolan finally admitted that he enjoys Harry Potter. On a scale from 1-100 he gave the books a 95 for story line and put togetherness! (but of course justified it by giving predictability a 30) But still! Seriously this is huge news to anyone who knows how much he denies this publicly and openly ridicules it. I only posted it here because I know he doesn't read our blog. But yes, its true, he's a fan and a true believer.

My work here is done.

They finally got hitched

So after dating for I think 6 years, Riley and Kelsey (two of my really good friends) finally got married. Nolan and I were really excited to be able to go and be apart of it. Nolan got a chance to get to know all my friends a little bit better, which turned out to be a hit. Some random older couple that we were sitting by at the luncheon, who couldn't stop laughing, commented on how lucky I am to have a husband with an incredible sense of humor. I guess on those occasions when I want to punch him for not being serious, I need to remember how lucky I apparently am.... Anyway's here's a few pics I snapped to document the day.







In other non-related news, Nolan had a few days off from work after the wedding and was able to spend some time in the kitchen again. He made me some delicious broccoli cheese soup and then made an amazing chocolate box. Seriously I felt a little tipsy after..

Secrets of a Shoplifter

So at my job, my favorite thing above everything else is catching shoplifters. As horrible as that sounds there's something extremely therapeutic about it. I don't know what it is, maybe the adrenaline? Maybe teaching a young teen that they're not "all that." But every time after I catch one I feel like I can take on the world.

Accept for my last one.

I thought it was just another "routine" shoplifting incident. Another minor with a friend making a bad judgment call. But no, I learned something that day.

Everything seemed routine until the parents of the friends showed up. They were furious, a quarrel broke out. The parents were upset that the girl that was caught was blaming it on their daughter. (Which I know that the friend did asked her to shoplift the item for her) Ingenious? Manipulative? Yes. And I quickly found out why.

The parents! Yes the parents. They were pro's at manipulation, and taught their daughter the way. These well-to-do, upper class parents didn't care that their daughter convinced her friend to shoplift for her, they didn't care that their daughter was so cunning and able to manipulate her friend into doing her dirty work for her, they were just mad that "accusations" were being made, and wanted to make sure that there was no way their daughter would be legally involved.

Hate that. Hate watching manipulation spread from generation to generation. I hate that parents can teach their kids these things. Like how in this case, its okay to steal as long as someone else gets caught for it and you seem innocent.

Its learning stuff like this that makes me not feel the adrenaline and ability to take on the world that I usually do. I wish I could take on all ignorant, narcissistic parents out there.. but I can't. I'm not even a parent yet.

Delayed Post

Nolan and I forgot to post some pictures of our trip to Portland. We had so much fun. We were able to see most of Nolan's family which we don't always get to see.



Ironically we chose the one day that the beach was disgusting. Not fun.
So we went to Historic Fort Stevens instead.



And Nolan got to practice shooting some really big guns.


We also went to frog lake while we were there. Which actually had tons of frogs! That was probably my favorite part because I have a soft spot for small animals. I must have caught almost 50. I'm pretty much a frog catching pro.




This is the whole frog catching crew (besides Kim and Grand Dad) right before we went home with our new pet frogs which we let go in Nolan's parents garden. Hopefully no PETA members are reading this.

All in all our trip was a success. We were so glad that we were able to see all the family and have such a great time!

In Response

As we all know the major topic of discussion these days is on socializing health care. I recently read this post from Keegan (this is where I'd put that link that would take you to his blog but I don't know how to do that) about his initial issues and opinions on what socializing health care in America would mean. In response to his blog I'd like to share my background and why I am in favor of changing our health care system in America.

As many of you know I was born in The Netherlands which you could say has some sort of socialized health care (technically it's not but let me explain). In The Netherlands they have a dual system (and to warn you I had to look up some info on wikipedia, so take it with a grain of salt) in which government health care is required for everyone for serious and permanent health conditions. With that however, most citizens still have the right to have an obligatory (privatized) health insurance that covers basic health care needs.

Now I didn't realize how fortunate I was until I was married and we had to try to fend for ourselves. I don't know many young families that can afford our private health insurance here in America. It was shocking to find out that many of my married peers didn't have any type of health coverage. Scary thought especially considering many of them bringing children into the world with no means of providing for them. How is it that young, tax paying, law abiding citizens(for the most part) who go to a government funded state university cannot afford the peace of mind knowing that you'll be taken care of no matter what comes your way.

When Nolan and I started shopping around for health insurance, we realized that at this point in our lives all we needed was something that would provide for us in case a tragic event or serious condition came up. Honestly we thought we might have to go into debt just to pay for basic catastrophic health insurance. How outrageous is that? Why would I have to go into debt or pay ridiculous costs to insure that nothing serious happens to me? I personally have the mentality (and if you know mine and my families health history you'll know why) that you can never underestimate the importance of health insurance. No matter what, no matter how healthy you try to live your life, something will always come up and to not have health insurance would be devastating. Luckily with my parents help and the fact that I still have dual citizenship I can be taken care of.

Obviously you can see how I am such a fan of this system. Like in The Netherlands and many other European countries our health care system doesn't have to be a scary, purely, socialized system. I would prefer that our country goes for a more dual system because it's still providing basic rights to everyone while still allowing a bit of room for some capitalism (which heaven forbid America can't be America if there's no capitalism).

So there you go Keegan and for those random other few who must be bored out of their mind to read my super exciting and extreme view on this topic. Hopefully I didn't sound too ignorant. I'm always afraid to speak my mind because I hate ignorance and don't ever want to be like that.

Dats ony in da mownin'

There are a few things that just brighten up my day like steak, phone calls, Nolan and Bubb Rubb. I was recently reminded of this youtube clip, and I just wanted to share with you. Sorry if you've already seen this.

Future?

Sk8er GurL

That's right, Nolan's starting to rub off on me. He finally took me out and taught me how to skateboard. I had to get into the mindset by dressing like one. I don't know how much it helped... (I'm sure all skateboarders out there are shaking there heads right now)




But if I can master snowboarding in a few hours, I'm sure I'll get the hang of this eventually...

Ideas?

So Nolan & I (mainly I) have decided that we need to come up with a new title for our blog. We need something catchy that people can remember so if you have any cool ideas send them our way. We already came up with a few pretty lame ideas (I think we got caught up on only using "G" words). I bet you can't tell which options Nolan threw out.

-G is for Garrity
-The Gangsta Garrity's
-Goodness Gracious its the Garrity's
-The Grateful Garrity's
-The Garrity's of Gryffindor
-The Great Garrity's
-The Griping Garrity's

So if you have any other ideas or think one of these should be the winner send it our way!

Sometimes I feel the same...

SYTYCD

So I don't normally blog about things that don't have anything to do directly with Nolan or myself. However, I found an exception. Anyone who knows me knows I used to be quite the dancer back in the day. So naturally one of my favorite T.V. shows is 'So You Think You Can Dance.' Every season there are always a couple of familiar faces to me, however, this year it's more than just a familiar face. Randi Evans (or known to the rest of us Randi Lynn Strong before she got hitched) and I both danced at the same studio and are only a few years apart. And since I can't ever watch the show (we don't get TV reception in our basement) I hope you all vote for her because well she's stinking amazing and she totally deserves it! Plus, I'm sure there are some of you out there that owe me favors! haha Just kidding.

SUMMER!

So school is officially out for the both of us, and for the first time in what feels like ages we can finally be lazy and do whatever we want without feeling guilty about it. We're actually having a hard time getting used to all this free time but trust me we'll figure something out. We've got plenty of Harry Potter to read before the 6th movie and some serious tennis skills we need to work on to keep us busy this summer.
So I've finally come to accept that we no longer have any real excuse to neglect our blog. So wish us luck and hopefully we'll get this blogging thing all figured out. But here's a little catch up on whats happened the past couple of months..
We went to Portland/Tacoma(WA) for spring break! (Gotta love the Saturday Market crowd)

Finally talked Nolan into visiting the Museum of Glass in Tacoma. Pretty sure he can no longer make fun of my obsession with how awesome glass art is. Don't be surprised if you hear Nolan and I someday becoming professional glass artists. It might happen.

We also got a chance to see my sister and her family again just recently, which is blog worthy because anyone who knows us knows how much we love our nephew Bobby. Definitely our favorite nephew (for the time being.. pretty excited for Keegan & Martha!) Nolan really enjoyed teaching Bobby new innocent phrases which actually sound pretty profane. You can imagine the laughs we had over "dump truck" (hint: sounds like dumb f..) and "push it" (hint: bull.. well you get the picture). Leave it to Nolan to be the first to corrupt Bobby and drug the poor boy with Fun Dip.
But that Bobby sure is dang cute. And really loves his uncle No-No.During the same visit from Vanessa & Chris my family was finally able to take a family picture after 14 years of no offical family documentation.Nolan and I also hit our big one year mark. Thats right, we just had our one year anniversary. Boy how time flies. We were actually fortunate to spend our anniversary by going to the marriage of Nolan's friend Mike Geurts in the Bountiful Temple. It was awesome to have that reminder of what we did exactly one year ago, it was a very neat experience. I wish we could celebrate our anniversary like that every year.
So here's to another year (and of course many more)!
And maybe we'll actually try to blog more regularly this year!