It is worthwhile to live/ and fight courageously/ for sacred ideals - Norbert Capek

This week was really, really tough. One of my friends and co-workers Bill Mueller passed away on Monday. He was only 51 and passed away from diabetes related complications. He worked at CCHCC for the last nine years fighting for health care justice for all. He was a kind soul with a mad sense of humor. We are truly a family at CCHCC - a strange little over-worked family, and loosing such an important person is a huge blow. I have spent a lot of time this week at the office, hugging and crying, spending time with fellow CCHCC folks, trying to cope with this. His funeral was today, and hopefully this will be the begining steps to closure.

After the funeral in the morning, I needed to focus on something else and get my mind on something new. Luckily, in the afternoon Jon and I had a meeting with a caterer to talk about food at our wedding reception, and it was a great meeting. The lady was really nice and the food will be wonderful - no meat! We're pretty sure we'll be going with them. My Mom is helping us out with some wedding $$, so we are going to be able to afford this lovely food.

Then after the meeting with the caterer, Jon and I went to a local park to go fly a kite. Jon's Mom bought us a kite several years ago, and we keep it in the trunk of the car for spontaneous windy days. Today was crazy windy - almost too windy - but we tried anyway.


Here is Jon fighting with the kite.


And finally up in the air!



And now my turn.


And finally, here is a picture of the extremely tall clouds that had just passed over Champaign. These clouds were insane! So big! And VERY beautiful. Just the ending I needed to a really difficult week.

These are a few of my favorite things

My leap into the 21st century

I've finally made that all-important leap into the modern era. Yesterday I purchased a mobile phone and plan. The phone I got is actually really cool: a Sony Ericsson W600i. Here's a picture.


It plays MP3s, and it has a 1.3 megapixel camera. Here's more info about it. I'm still getting used to it, but it's really cool so far.


Also, Allie and I are both taking a day off next week to meet with people about wedding stuff. Speicifically food for the reception, and the cake. I think the wedding plans are going very well!

Our American dooty.

Today we did some voting. Go primaries! There are a few interesting races locally, as well as a $65 million school funding referendum to be decided. The numbers aren't in yet, but we'll see soon enough, I'm sure.

Not a whole lot else going on. Jon and I are both crazy busy with work. We're going to take next Friday off, however, and spend some time together and some time doing a bit of wedding planning.

Bitches aint shit!

What another crazy week. I can't believe it is nearly Friday - and there is still so much work to do!

The best part of the week was definitely Tuesday evening, however, when Jon and I got to go to Decatur and see a Ben Folds concert with my sister! Ben Folds was rockin', as usual! We had to sit in the very back, because we got there a bit late after our yummy dinner at Taters, but Kirkland has awesome acoustics, so alls good.

I have a friend (Jim) who does rigging for concerts - speakers, lights, etc. He was doing the Ben Folds concert, and after the concert I saw him on stage getting ready to take stuff apart. Jim knew I was going to be at the concert and that I love Ben Folds, so he was able to snag a souvenir for me!! He was able to get the set list from the piano Ben Folds was playing! (Set list = handwritten piece of paper with a list of songs to play for the evening)

SO COOL!!!!!!!!!! This means Ben Folds and I are friends, yes?

I have made it back after a week in Chicago. I spent Monday - Friday attending Midwest Academy, a school for organizers. Basically they teach you how to take down The Man in a more systematic and organized way! It was a really interesting time, and I definately learned alot. Soon I plan to write a post more fully explaining what the heck I do at work, and what exactly an "organizer" is. Everyone always asks what I do, and I'll do my best to put it into words.

We didn't really have time to do much sight seeing in Chicago, as the training went from 9am to 9pm ever day. However, we did get to take a couple of walks and do a bit of shopping. Here are a few pics from the trip.


Here is me, Katie, and Claudia.




Here is a group shot of of some of the people who we went through the training with. There were about 30 of us total.

Happy Anniversary!

Oh yeah!

And Jon and I had our official 5 year anniversary on Friday! Half a decade!

I love you, Don!!

<3

we be jammin'

This weekend was MUCH needed. It feels like we've been either out of town or working every weekend for months. We got to sleep in a bit, play some Nintendo, and have some fun.

On Saturday Jon and I went bowling!! It had been the first time for both of us in several years. Our first game was something like: Jon: 70 - Allie: 88
The second game was a bit better, somewhere around: Jon: 90 - Allie - 105
It was a lot of fun, and we each got one strike! We also both managed to pull some muscles! Hopefully we'll get to go again soon!



Then today we got the oil changed in the car at Farm and Fleet. We got to wander around for a while when we were waiting for the car, and Jon got into a bit of mischief!!!



We also had a YUMMY lunch at Olive Garden. This cheese dip with bread stuff they have there is SO AMAZING!




I also got a few ideas for wedding decorations. I got these candle sticks from Crate and Barrel and these flowers from this local company called English Hedgerow. English Hedgerow is a restaurant, florist, craft/design shop, and cater all in one! They have wonderful vegi food, we hear, so we're going to talk to someone about catering our wedding!
Here are my ideas...





These are the pretty flower/grass decorative thingy! Lenny wants to EAT the grass so bad!





Here are the candles. The actual candles I got today from Meijer or whatever, and they're a bit too big. But this is just a quick example, and I was also just trying various colors.




And finally, what it could look like all together.



I will be out of town in Chicago for work all next week, so I don't know how much internet access I'll get. I'll do my best to write something, and definitely post when I get back!

Vonnegut in film

Hello out there in Blogland!

Allie and I just watched Slaughterhouse Five last night. It was really good, and very true to the novel. Funny and sad, and weird. I was just looking it up on IMDb this morning and I found out that there are plans to make a movie out of Cat's Cradle, another of Vonnegut's great novels. I'll have to read it again soon before then.

Exciting!