Goodbye ClydeSnow

My last day at Clyde Snow & Sessions.

Some wore purple just for me. These people know me too well. Good thing I'm getting out now.

The man in the middle is Perrin, one of my bosses. After I gave my notice, he didn't say a thing about it, and I just figured he didn't really care all that much. But when he said good bye to me, the man seriously got weepy. Which made me get weepy.

Goodbye Perrin. Yes, that cake says "Will Miss You Melissa." WILL. Brilliant.

Stay classy, Remmington.

Goodbye Bethany. You share my love of purple.

Goodbye Dawn. Thank you for organizing the farewell luncheon and being just so great. I hope you achieve your retirement dreams in that little 2000 population town in Oregon.

Goodbye Marilyn. I hope your sons remain safe on their missions.

Goodbye Janeen. Thanks for all the advice on Snow Christensen, listening when I needed to vent and GO UTES!

Goodbye Jennifer. You were a really great, low-maintanence boss.

Goodbye Lindsay. I still maintain that it's unfair for someone to be that beautiful and that nice.

(Notice the purple ribbons everyone is wearing. It was for "Melissa-Awareness Day."

I had no idea anyone cared that much.)

Goodbye Anneli. I'll miss you most of all. You were absolutely the best boss ever and the most amazing woman I've ever met. How you do what you do and put up with whom you put up with assures you a place in Heaven.Good bye Kim.

Good bye Wendy. You have the cutest kids ever. Tell Kayla I need a new picture to hang in the new place.

Goodbye Kim. You're the best, and enjoy singlehood.

Goodbye Kari (who wasn't there because she just had a baby. See previous post). You're going to be an amazing mother. And you're the most thoughtful, considerate person I know.

I love you both.

I'll try to find you both jobs so that the separation isn't too long!

Thanks for everything ClydeSnow.

Some things I loved, some things I truly hated, but all things I considered (and I considered A LOT of things), I enjoyed the ride.

Destroy and Conquer

YUM!!!

The Mystery Baby

Some months ago (9 to be exact), my friend, Kari, found out that she was expecting.

And she REFUSED to find out the sex of the baby.

REFUSED.

I begged. I pleaded. I even tried to bribe her to find out.

Still she refused.

Stubborn.

Kari was totally convinced that it was a boy, and for about the first 7 months, I was positive it was a girl. But Kari was so damn sure it was a boy, everyone who thought it was a girl eventually gave in and came over to the boy side. (I told her that there was a simple, easy, painless way to settle all the disputes. FIND OUT. She still refused.)

Part of Kari's birth plan was that if she happened to go into labor while she was at work, I would be the one to drive her to the hospital. (And I selfishly wished for this too, so I could miss work.)

Well, this past Tuesday, my wish came true.

About noon, Kari called me and asked if I had lunch plans, because I might need to drive her to the hospital. I cancelled all plans and waited anxiously for her to tell me if we were going, or it was a false alarm. And what was Kari doing, you might ask? She was in a meeting. Yup, the woman is invincible. Her water has broken and she's still able to sit in a meeting and discuss things like nothing important has happened.

So, after her meeting, Kari called her doctor's office and they told her to go the hospital.

Needless to say, I was a wreck. Do we have everything? Quit trying to work, Kari, we're having a baby!

And Kari was totally calm.

I called Kari's husband, Don, to come to the hospital, and he was totally calm too. Hello! We're having a baby! And this was their first baby, by the way. (What kind of baby was still up in the air, and driving me crazy.) How they could be so calm, I'll never know.

So, Kari trusted me to be calm enough to drive her and her unborn child (boy? girl? WHO KNOWS?) to the hospital.

So, Don couldn't get there for a while, and I wasn't about to leave Kari alone, so I stayed with her. And watched them put in her IV (gross). We're pretty sure the nurses must have thought we were a lesbian couple (right on).

And when the nurse came in with the ultrasound machine to see if the baby's head was in the right place, I freely admit that I tried to bribe her to tell me what the sex of the baby was. (She said she couldn't tell, and that all she was able to see was whether the head was facing down. I think she was lying.)

They hooked Kari up to a machine to monitor the baby's heartbeat and her contractions. And when she had a contraction, I would say, "Did you feel that?!" And she would say, "No." It was fun for a while, but I'll bet Kari got sick of me asking her if she "felt that."

Seriously, she must be wonderwoman.

And at 11:02 pm, a new life came into this world.

In the form of . . . A GIRL! (I was right all along.)

Josephine Ryan Peck was born at 11:02 pm on March 2nd. 7lbs 2oz and 22.5 inches long. (Yes, a long baby, but keep in mind her parents met in Utah's Tall Club. Don is something like 7'6". I come up to his waist. Literally.)

I'm really grateful that Kari let me go to the hospital with her and be there for some of it. I've never been there when a person is actually about to give birth, so it was a totally new view for me.

Look at her feet!
And those long toes!

She's going to be dancer!

Either that or a basketball player.

Congratulations you guys!

Thoughts on Valentine's Day

Here's my thoughts:

I think it's the stupidest holiday ever.

The end.

And, as the girls in my ward told me when I said that, I must have the luckiest husband ever, because he doesn't have to do anything for Valentine's Day.

Yup, he's a lucky one.

I know you were probably thinking I was going to say something like, "Mike and I don't need a special day to celebrate our love! We celebrate all year round!"

I just threw up a little bit.

Don't get me wrong.

I love Mike.

I love, love, love Mike.

But I don't need to give him those gross chalk-like conversation hearts for him to know that. Seriously, who invented those things? It's like someone took a piece of chalk, colored it pink, wrote "I love you" on it and called it candy. How is this a billion dollar idea?!

But I will admit my very favorite part of this holiday: JuJu Hearts.

They are my very favorite candy in the world and you can only get them at stupid, dumb Valentine's Day.

Mean, dumb-ass candy-nazis.

Super Bowl Sunday

So, this past Sunday we got together to watch the Colts try to take out the Saints.

You want to know what the very best part of the Super Bowl is?

The fact that after it's over, there's NO MORE FOOTBALL for a long time! *Insert GASP here* Yes, I'm starting to like football, but after the Utes are done, I'm done. Carrie Underwood graced us with her rendition of "The National Anthem."
The Who performed at halftime. Who? The Who? Who is performing at halftime? Who? (Yeah that joke went on for quite a while.) And I thought they didn't start off very well, and it took them a couple of numbers to finally get into their stride, but in the end they had that stadium waving cell phones like it was Woodstock. And the stage was very cool.

In the 2nd half, I convinced Sarah to play Candyland and Checkers with me.

I won't say who won, because that would really deflate my pride.

In the end, the Saints were "blessed" and ran over the Colts for a final score of 31-17. Which, ironically enough, was the final score of the Sugar Bowl when the Utes played Alabama.

And does anybody actually know what the Saints mascot is?

The Pope? (Courtesy of Durrant.)

The Chicago Caper

Anyone out there watch "The Office?"

Before Christmas, there was an episode where Michael tried to lift the spirits of everyone in the office by pretending that they were in a murder mystery.

Which gave me an idea.

We should totally do that!

So, I got Sarah on board and we started to plan. Jill immediately said she and Durrant were in (even though Durrant was hesitant at first, Jill convinced him. Oh, the powers of wifely persuasion).

After researching the different games out there, I picked The Chicago Caper, because the characters (and costumes!) sounded like they would be the most fun for everyone.

It turned out the most difficult part was finding a 4th couple. (I know. You'd think the most difficult part would be convincing Mike to dress up and pretend to be someone else, but he said "yes" right away. Probably because I was so excited about it.) And after exhausting most of my resources and asking every couple I could think of (and if any of you who turned me down are reading this, all I can say is YOU TOTALLY MISSED OUT! So, I blow a raspberry in your general direction! I understand, some men are totally party-poopers. And if we ever do it again, I hope you'll want to take part next time, because we had so much fun!) my sister, Jen, found a date and became our couple #4.

Because I am my mother's daughter (see previous posts for confirmation of this fact), I researched everything I could about Speakeasy's, prohibition, and the 1920's. So, I set the house up like a Speakeasy. We put a curtain up and the guests had to use "the secret knock and password" to enter into the Speakeasy. I also found out that Chinese takeout became big in the '20's, so that took care of the menu.

And, my dad was nice enough to be our "Chinese" waiter, complete with the offensive accent. Like I said, I'm my mother's daughter, as evidenced by the table:

The Players:

Molly M. Awbsterr & Billy "The Kid" Thrower

(Jill & Durrant) Anna Maria Carlotta Sassine ("Torchy") & Ernie "Bet-A-Million" G. Ambler

(Sarah & Ryan) Malissa F. Orrthot ("Scoop") & S. Treighton Harrow

(Jen & Chase) "Silky" M. Adam & Eddie "Socks" R. Gyle

(Me & Mike) So, after the game it turned out the murderer was . . .

***SPOILER ALERT****

ME!

And I really didn't plan it that way.

PROMISE!

For My Sister, Aimee

A woman is often measured by the things she cannot control. she is measured by the way her body curves or doesn't curve, by where she is flat or straight or round. she is measured by 36-24-26 and inches and ages and numbers, by all the outside things that don't ever add up to who she is on the inside. and so if a woman is to be measured, let her be measured by the things she can control, by who she is and who she is trying to become. because every woman knows, measurements are only statistics and statistics lie.

And what did I learn this weekend?

I'm a total bitch.