Sickly

Ariane is feeling sickly today.  She did, however, get up and go to work on time as usual.  She called at about 10:30 to tell me that she's coming home to lay in bed.  Luckily I am working from home today so I can be with her!

When she woke up this morning, she said that her stomach had hurt her all night long.  Her stomach has been basically hurting nonstop for the last month or so -- I have no idea how she deals with it.  I would be a wreck if something on me hurt for that long!  Maybe she's just used to it or something?  However she does it, it still sucks.  She's laying in bed now watching TV and drinking some tea -- probably much better than whatever crap they had her doing at work.

Poor Ariane.  I wish there was a way that I could use my powers to just suck the pain and the disease right out of her and throw it in the trash.  Why don't I have that power yet?  It's seriously about time. 

I sometimes feel like she might die an early, painful death -- and I obviously don't want that to happen.  It is just a very scary thing to know that she has holes on the inside of her stomach and intestine and there's absolutely nothing you can do about it.  She is in pain every day and probably will be for the rest of her life, and there's nothing you can do about it.  Oh, I guess she could get on some steroids.  But I'm thinking that steroids aren't the greatest thing to be on -- and then that belief is confirmed as soon as you look at the side effects!  Holy crap!

Poor Ariane ... hopefully Kitten is in there with her ...

Working Working Working

Poor Ariane.  She's working like a dog.  She gets up at around 5-5:30am, gets ready, and is usually out the door by 6:30 or so.  She goes to work all day and doesn't come home until around 6pm.  Of course, by that time she is usually completely drained of energy and is incredibly ready for the weekend.  That's usually by Monday.  By Friday, she is very unhappy.

They are just working her like crazy because it's that time of year where everything just has to get done.  "No, it would be too easy to hire enough people to handle the work load" -- idiots.  Then they act like if they just push everyone more and more to work harder and harder, everything will be better.  Unfortunately, it's more that they just push and push until people quit (or are mercilessly laid off!).

She is very sweet though: if you don't have dinner ready, she doesn't complain.  If you haven't prepared anything at all, she doesn't complain. If you prepared things but need her to cook it, she doesn't complain.  And if you make dinner, she's incredibly grateful!  She's consistently sweet no matter how she feels. That's something that she's got that I definitely could work on -- but you know, then we would both be the same and that's no fun!

Yesterday I reserved us a room in a nice hotel downtown for a weekend night.  Her dad actually gave us gift certificates to the place on Christmas and we still haven't used them.  But we're gonna do it this weekend! It should be a very nice room and a kind of swanky hotel, so it should be nice just to get away.  If anyone needs and deserves it, it's her! 

Fort Collins

Old Town Fort Collins

Yesterday, as soon as we got off of work, we met in Lafayette and headed up to Fort Collins.  We basically wanted to go so that we could go to an ice cream store there called Kilwin's, which is in Old Town.  They have the best Mint Chocolate Chip that has ever been made, ever.

On the ride up we decided to go to dinner at Bisetti's, an Italian restaurant a few doors down from Kilwin's.  It's actually where we had our rehearsal dinner so we have some nice memories there.  Our dinner was tasty, she had something called Farfalle Orvieta (replaced the farfalle with gluten-free penne) and I had the usual Pesto Tortellini w/chicken.  I was thinking how purty Ariane looked from across the table.  Her dark hair looked longer than it normally does, which I like, and she was still all dressed up from her work day.  She always manages to look good ... while I on the other hand was wearing jeans, tennis shoes, and a G.I.J.O.E. t-shirt.  Classy.  Somehow she doesn't even seem to care that I'm wearing a t-shirt and look scraggly with my incoming beard ...

After dinner, we took a little walk since we were feeling really full.  We decided we would head east and look at some of the cool houses near Old Town.  As we strolled and talked, it became blatantly obvious that we really missed Fort Collins.  We were talking about how nice it is as soon as we arrived in the FoCo -- there are mature trees everywhere, we like the neighborhoods, the restaurants, the shops, the diversity, etc.  We just felt like we were at home.  There was a little girl even walking home from the library and we were thinking how nice that would be just to send your kid to the library by him/herself. 

We walked back to the ice cream store where I got my mint chocolate chip and she got her strawberry, and moved along to Old Town Square.  That's basically like the central part of Old Town, where there are nice places to sit and people-watch.  Oh and there are bars too, but they have throw-up on the floor (inside story).  We saw a lot of college kids, but we also saw family with children and old couples walking by ... and it really made me want to move back!  I think she was probably thinking the same thing, and we talked about it all the way home.  We reminisced about all the different things we used to do when we lived in FoCo, like riding our bikes, or hiking, or walking around somewhere, etc -- we just used to do more.  The reason for that is because there's more to do there!  Broomfield is definitely a bedroom community ... no downtown, no community feeling, nada.  Kind of boring.  We were definitely wishing we could just move our house and our jobs up to Fort Collins and call it good!  The conversation was good, because we came to a conclusion on a few things, and appreciated the night.

Last night felt really good to both of us because it seemed like a date.  We did meet up, go to dinner, have a nice walk, have some ice cream, and some nice conversation.  We were even being nerds together at dinner, looking on the IPHONE!!  WHOA!  Neither of us thought it was strange to be playing with the phone at a nice Italian restaurant!  Ariane came up with the idea that we need to write down all the things that we want to do, and then we need to do them!  She said that we should put them on 3x5 index cards or something like that.  I think that's a great idea!  Guess we'll start tonight ...

The Start, and Thinking She's Soft

Soft!

Last night, while lying in bed (resting!), I told Ariane that I was thinking of starting a blog about her.  Obviously she asked what I meant, and I told her that I wanted to write a daily log or note that just contained my thoughts on her for the day; what I remember about her that day.  I told her that the way I thought of her today (yesterday) was basically that:

she was soft ... meaning her skin, her touch. 

She basically said "Hmm ..."

That's ok.  I honestly don't think that anything online is really for her.  It's not that I want to write down all my thoughts and give them to her and say "read all this", but I just want to make sure that I think about the way that I feel about her.  I also want to be able to go back in time and see what was going on back then in my head, whenever that may be.

Prior to lying in bed just resting last night, Ariane and I were arguing about money.  MONEY.  Yes, the one thing that I would never want to argue about.  I fear that this spells the end of our relationship -- as with every argument -- because I've read many stories online about couples fighting about money and separating.  Not because they weren't right for each other, but because they're broke!  She said at dinner that she wasn't happy with her life "down here", which usually means "Broomfield" to her.  After feeling bad about hearing her say that, I asked her what she meant by that.  She explained that she feels like she works too much and doesn't spend enough time with me.  I feel the same!  But of course we work because we need the money.  After discussing her car purchase, and my superhero costume purchases, and my student loan, and work work work, we were feeling kind of depressed.  Of course, after talking through it all, we got over it.  It just sucks not having much money even when you should have a bunch of cash!

Back to her being soft.  In my mind, when I think of her being soft, it's the same as her being sweet.  It's the same as me thinking that she's the only person in the world.  It's the same as me thinking about how much I love her.  It comes through as me thinking that she's soft.  That should help explain the next paragraph:

After going to sleep last night, I woke up suddenly around two or three a.m. thinking there was someone in the house, as usual when I wake up in the middle of the night.  After deciding I didn't have to protect Little from anything, I rolled over and spooned her.  As I put my arm over her, I felt her hip, then her arm, and finally rest my hand on her stomach.  I remember thinking 'she's really soft ...' as I drifted off to sleep.