Polar bears like it when you drown

B's wedding last weekend, Meema in town to accompany us to the wedding. We drove down to Tinley Park and stayed overnight at a motel. Hot day, felt like I was wilting in my black suit. N. was one of two babies at the wedding. Generally a so-so time, I ate way too much prime rib and wedding food, there was an open bar so I also drank a lot too - like 4-5 drinks which is a lot for me. It wasn't the time of my life but I didn't mind it that much, I told K. it would be like J's wedding last summer where I didn't know anyone and felt out of place, it wasn't that bad. I knew some people there and I was genuinely happy for K. and B., even though they're not that great of friends or anything.

Took yesterday off due to stomach illness, went running in the afternoon. Got up early to run this morning as well, it's still dark our around 5:30am so it feels weird going out that early - there's other runners on the streets though, so I don't feel totally uncomfortable. My weight is remarkably, not that bad considering all of the eating I've been doing on the weekends. N's party last weekend, a lot of eating and drinking, the wedding last weekend - this weekend we have to go to the UP for cousin A's wedding. Should be another huge eating bonanza. I've been racking up some semi big mileage though - long run this week is supposed to be 10 miles, so I think that's helping keep the weight down. Also on the other days of the week I tend to eat very well. Last night K. made some hummus and veggie sandwiches on wheat bread, stuff like that.

Been playing a lot of guitar, feel like I'm getting my touch back after playing sporadically over the summer due to funerals and moving and general craziness that kept interfering with my practice schedule. Last night was my first class at Old Town School, it was rudimentary but pretty fun. Old Town is pretty awesome in that they actually encourage students to bring beers to class. The teacher taught us some vocal exercises that were really goofy - I don't know if I'm going to make a regular habit of them, although I should. I'm really glad I took this class, hopefully I'll feel confident enough in my singing and playing skills at the end of the class to delve into some open mics and get some experience performing for people. It's also nice just interacting with fellow guitar players and music lovers. The only thing for me is the focus on old time folk music, which is not that big of a deal really, although I'd rather play my music (maybe we'll get to later on in the course). Still haven't met up with JR, we keep missing connections - he asked to meet last week but I was going out of town, I emailed him this week about meeting up, so far no reply.

Absolve me through your suffering

Last Thursday we went to Ikea and bought a lot of stuff - a new cabinet for our dining room, a huge mirror, a lot of random stuff we needed to 'complete' our house, and we spent a lot of money. It hardly fit in the car and we had to tie the trunk closed when driving home. I remember being really nervous that the twine we used to tie the trunk closed would come undone as we were going 60 down the expressway and our stuff would come flying out. Luckily we made it home, we even stopped at McDonalds and got an ice cream cone. We didn't get to bed til late that night since I had to unpack everything from the car.

Friday I went to work, then when I came home we began the arduous task of assembling all of the large furniture, unpacking all of the random stuff we had in boxes, arranging all of the furniture, hanging all of the heavy pictures and artwork, and scrubbing the place clean. We were only partly done by the time we went to bed really late Friday night. The dining room cabinet took forever, we had to actually assemble the damn thing twice since the Ikea directions were difficult to follow in places. We went to bed Friday night extremely tired and frustrated with our progress. We had to finish everything by Sunday for N's party, and at that point it didn't seem like there was enough time to get everything done.

Saturday was a marathon of housework. We basically got up around 6 or 7 in the morning and worked all day long until around midnight. We had to leave in the middle of the afternoon to buy stuff at - Target, Home Depot, Party City, and Costco. Again, we spent a ton of money on food and party decorations. N. was throwing a fit in the back seat the entire time and by the end one of us would go in and do the shopping while the other would stay in the car with N. and try to calm her down. We went home, put N. to bed, unloaded the car, and continued the work of setting the apartment up and preparing for N's birthday party the next day. We went to bed again tired and dirty but at the end of the day our house was finally done. It actually looked really really good, and gave me a feeling of satisfaction to see everything finally arranged just how we want it.

Sunday we woke up early and started preparing food and decorations for the party. KM and J came over and helped us blow up baloons and set up the food. Everyone started coming in around noon. N's party was very nice, JB came over, AC came over, I ate a lot and drank a lot of beer. You could tell N. was delighted to have all her little friends over, it was basically chaos with little kids running around everywhere. It was also good to see D and M again. Everyone commented about how nice our new house was, so I'm glad we put in all the work previously. N. got a lot of nice presents too. Tita A's musical fun table seemed to be her favorite, although mom's ordering her a push car that she may enjoy. A. and M. also got her some really nice clothes and a personalized book, you could tell they put a lot of thought into it.

Monday we sat around the house watching youtube on our tv, feeling bloated and sluggish. We left the house for a little while to go walking around the park, then K. left to buy a new car seat with N's birthday money while N. took her nap. Later J. and mom came over and took us to dinner at this Greek restaurant on the Square. After they left I fell asleep feeling even more bloated and tired, and totally not prepared to go back to work the next day. It's my second day back at work, just finding my groove again at work. Totally didn't feel like it but forced myself to go to the gym and do 40 minutes on the elliptical. I told myself, once we're fully moved in and the paperwork related to the house sale is all finalized, and N's party is over, that I would really start applying myself the way I've always talked about the past couple of years - I mean, work on career improving activities as much as I work on my guitar and music endeavors. I had a rough summer but now that the worst has happened and I'm still standing here, it's time to get my life back on track and really try for once. My family deserves me being fully engaged in my life, and I have faith in myself. If I really try, I don't think there's any way I can fail.

Leaving me behind

Ran to the river trail last night with K. and N., I'm really glad K. is running with me lately, it's very efficient - I get to exercise and at the same time work in some quality time with my wife and baby. I have to admit that it was nicer running around my old neighborhood, as we were right by the lake, which is absolutely the best place to run in Chicago. In fact I still go running on the lake - for my long runs on the weekends, I drive to the Recreation Park and run south to Navy Pier usual ly. Lincoln Square is a great neighborhood but there are just too many stoplights and people, you h ave to stop all the time when running, which is good for K. as she hasn't worked out in almost a yea r. When the weather gets cold I'll have to go back on the treadmill, I usually get sick of being ou t in the cold some time around early December. Luckily I won't have to drive to the Y anymore, ther e's a park district fitness center with a pool and treadmills that's every bit as nice as the Y, clo ser, and costs much less for a yearly membership.

N. is walking lately. Well, she started walking around 10 months, but now she's really getting good at it. I have some movies posted on youtube, so if you know how to get to my youtube channel you can check baby walking for yourself. This means it's about 30% more difficult to look after her, especially in our new house, which has much greater square footage. The new place is coming together b tw. We've spent basically every evening for the past couple of weeks unpacking and organizing stuff . I still can't find certain things though - some jewelry, clothes and toiletries mainly, I guess t hat's how it goes when you move. My in laws are such wonderful people also - they bought us a dinin g room table and delivered it all the way from the UP last weekend and helped us to assemble it. Gr eat weekend last weekend, also - we wound up going to lunch with M. and M. who we ran into on the st reet around the Square. Then we had a big barbecue at my moms on Sunday.

I'm really busy this week. Working from my mom's house today, I brought N. with me too. Mom's hold ing up - she's become very social since my dad's death, she seems to be having huge parties at her h ouse all the time. That's a good thing, I guess. It's weird for me seeing all these people that ov er at her house that I haven't seen in years since my dad didn't like them. I try to at least call my mom every day, my brothers are usually over at her house every day, it's more difficult for me to make it over because of the baby and all. N's birthday party this weekend, we have a lot of work t o do in terms of setting up our place, but it should be a lot of fun. I think we invited way too ma ny people but what's done is done I guess, and it'll be interesting seeing everyone all together in one place. Life is good, life has been very good for me for a long time, despite everything. Despi te me going through these spells of being cranky or feeling sorry for myself. K. and N. and I are e njoying our new house and our new neighborhood. It feels like a new chapter. What else. Now that things seem to be settling down, I'm starting to turn my focus to: working harder at my career, firs t by working some overtime. I'm also really determined to start performing music live and recording original music. I registered for a singing class at the Old Town school as singing and playing gui tar seems to be my weakness as a performer. I've also been talking to this dude about starting a ba nd/recording project - we've missed connections a few times, we were supposed to go out for drinks l ast week, and again tonight. I'm hoping everything works out because it would be fun to make a new friend that I can collaborate with.