I laughed, I cried...

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Family night

First we watched Gentlemen Broncos.

Then we watched this:

And then we went through the mail and found our census questionnaire. Maybe you wouldn't think it sounds like the best night ever, but let me tell you IT TOTALLY WAS.

This too shall pass

My job right now feels like this, minus the careful choreography and applauding spectators.

I know you've already seen this all over the interwebs, but this here blog was feeling a little shabby and underappreciated so I thought I'd borrow some pep.

I can't believe my wedding was the best night of my life

Years ago while working as an events manager, I watched a bride mop up puddles of beer and salsa after all her wedding guests had left. A princess tiara sparkled over her brow while the train of her gown dragged through the muck.

Any girlish dreams I had about weddings died that day.

So imagine my surprise as I sit here, scanning these pictures over and over again only to realize that our wedding was the best night of my life. Really and truly. And I never ever expected that. Not even when we booked my favorite restaurant for the reception. Not even when people from all over America told us they'd be there, including what seemed like half of every ward Cameron and I have ever lived in (o, how we love you all!). Not even when my mom said I could end the agony of dress shopping and just have the H-ing thing made. And somehow not even when Cameron asked, mere hours after a shockingly unexpected proposal of marriage, if I thought we could book live band karaoke for the reception.

Not even then.

(My favorites are the ones where everyone looks really stupid. I want to wallpaper my apartment walls with them.)

When it was over, we could hear "o-lay-o-lay-o-lay-o-lay" drifting into the cool distance as Cameron and I drove away from a teeming crowd of maniacs who happened to be our best friends, and I have absolutely never in my whole life been happier than in that moment.

The world series

Post season has lost a good deal of its lustre...

1. LA and its environs have been enjoying the sunshine while those East Coast yahoos fight it out in the freezing rain (hmmf).

2. Our adorable Cabot cheddar commercials have disappeared, making way for the shameless promotion of some cinematic monstrosity having nothing whatsoever to do with the Great American Pastime (I will neither name it, nor link to it). Worse than commercials, they actually mixed this movie's footage with the narrative of the previous games as the official intro to tonight's game. Fox is ugly.

3. Cameron has been fighting the good fight with the DVR, which refuses to record a complete game. I'm not sure we've seen any sixth innings.

4. Daylight Savings Time: all sunshine for the next six months will be witnessed from my office chair. So sad, but at least I'm lucky enough to have a glass wall (remind me sometime to tell you about the greatest office I will probably ever have in my entire career).

5. I discovered I would have to publish the wedding pics in three installments rather than two. And I promise what you all will really want to see is Part Three: in which our loved ones impress the very seasoned members of Mr. Mister Miyagi. But tonight, I must instead give you the slightly less glamorous Part Two: in which we take many many posed pictures. They're lovely, of course, and many thanks and credit are given to our photographer Michael Negrete, who was endlessly patient and low key--very important for us that day--and who, after producing a lot of beautiful traditional images for us, was totally game for the party pics we really wanted.

Best birthday cake ever

Baked Alaska from Ici (mine looked a bit bloodier inside--inner layer: raspberry rose, outside layer: strawberry--so I clipped this from the website). It was so much better than I had even dared to dream! Thank you, husband, for listening and remembering when I talk about the things I love. You're the berries.

Post Season

Major League Baseball's post season has brought with it many sudden gifts...

1. a victorious Los Angeles, and its environs

2. this Cabot cheddar commercial

3. a slightly less attentive husband (not all gifts are good)

4. ample TV time with which to upload the dreaded wedding pics

And by dreaded, I hope you know I really mean beloved. So heartily beloved, in fact, that their absence from this blog has given me great pain and kept me from moving on to less weighty matters of posting, such as the lemon icebox pie I made this weekend and my opinion of twitter. I mean, it's been 6 months! Nobody cares anymore! But I can't let it go, so here in short order is Part One: in which our hero Cameron Cunningham goes from sleepless completion of a midterm lab write-up, to wedded bliss on the lawn of the Los Angeles LDS Temple. Photos courtesy* of Jorge Ambrocio and Barbara Cunningham (much love to them both).

*I know there were more of you taking pictures that day. We'd love to see them sometime!

Wanna see some cute pictures of my nieces?

No, I didn't think you did (unless of course you are my Mom).

I'm watching the Giants/Rockies game with Cameron, rooting for San Francisco--which feels very unnatural (but it'll keep Colorado further from my Dodgers' slowly eroding place at the top)--and since Cameron's laptop is sitting close by on the couch, I thought I'd root through his picture folder to see if I could find something provocative to post.

Success

Nice to know his previous roommate was on the other end of that camera.

You have to start somewhere

I thought I'd show you the best one first.

This may not be for everyone.

Some of you may be acquainted with my deep distrust if not frank dislike of serious messages delivered through electronic media. Don't flirt over text. Don't break up over facebook. Don't bicker over blog. To me it seems undignified.

But today, distance and situational impotence provoke me to turn here--a corner of the interwebs I'm sure hardly anyone visits anymore except in the hopes of seeing wedding pictures (which I promise will come one day)--to tell you what I can about my parents.

First. They're the kind of parents who said swears even when we were young. They're the kind who told us at young ages that they were deviant kids, and who described to us with a glimmer in their eyes (sometimes a wink, sometimes a tear) their forms of rebellion. They're the kind who really really couldn't wait to give us the sex talk because more than anything they loved to watch us squirm. They're the kind who didn't leave the room to have a fight. And I start with all this because I think it's important to point out that they are flawed, but in that rare way where they never expected us to think that they weren't.

Second. The most important thing they've taught me: they would always love me, more than anything, no matter what.

Third. Some key things I've learned about them (by watching and testing, as all kids do...)

They're honest--more honest than the vast majority of people I believe I've met in my adult life.

They mean harm to no one. Not a soul. Ever.

They're learning as they go.

They believe, above most things (but not all), in the inherent humor of all situations.

Behind those big mouths, they feel things very very deeply, both for themselves and for others.

Fourth. The most important thing I think I can say to them right now: I believe in you.

Since there's nothing I can do to stop the hurting, I thought I would at least stand for the truth and declare the unassailable fact that John and Lynn Forester have only ever tried to do what they truly thought was right, and when they've failed (as all do) it's been the result of all-too-common human frailty, rather than malicious and selfish plotting. I've never been more proud and grateful than in this moment to have been lucky enough to be their daughter.

Looking good!

Grandma, I hope you're around for another thirty years. But when you die, I call dibs on the muumuu collection.

Z is for Zoë, that's good enough for me

The summer Tyler and Leah got married I dated a guy whose best friend had just published his first book, Breeding Between the Lines: Why Interracial People are Healthier and More Attractive. Clearly my first niece proves his thesis.

And so, on the eve (hopefully--she's 8 days over now) of the birth of Rachel & Jorge's daughter, I say huzzah for immigrants and adoption and hope and endurance and the clash and mixing of cultures. It's a big beautiful feathery colorful skyfilled world, and somehow it seems to keep creating more things in it for me to love.

The TV fairy strikes again...

Still no jetpack.

My Everest

Dearest reader, I have some good news and some bad news. Which would you like to hear first...

The good news, did you say? Well alright then, you're the boss.

On March 21st, I'm marrying this guy:

Yikes! Maybe he isn't making the best impression. Let's try that again...

OK, still a little weird. I guess he's just a little shy of strangers. Let's give him one more try...

Aww, that's better. Say hi to Cameron--you may remember him from such posts as Thanks for your concern, Time Out, and that old favorite Singing Solves Everything, Part Two. Oh, and say hi to Caroline, too (she's just hangin'). So maybe we're a little slouchy, but we're in love and hope you will all see fit to share in our joy despite our poor posture. Now for the bad news...

I have to purchase a wedding dress. THIS IS MY EVEREST. There is so much I could tell you about the many horrors I've been subjected to during my brief foray into the bridal industry---it's cold, it's sheeny (not shiny--shiny is good, sheeny is very very bad), it's self-entitled, and most of all it's overpriced---but as I have come to find there are many, many, MANY blogs dedicated to these subjects alone, I will spare you and instead share the one bright light in the mists. Behold:

I could get married in Alexis Carrington's wedding dress. OMH!

Lovely #5

I wish J-wood would work on this instead of robots that are destined to one day destroy us all (thanks digg)...

Lovely #4

Really, though, I found this while I was doing actual research work. I swear. I am no longer trolling for political web content. Cross my heart.

It's just been raining on my face

Rather than betray how much I cared about today, I offer you a few items of little consequence:

1. I heart Jim Lehrer. For awhile I feared he was going a bit senile, but now I just think he's begun drinking during work hours. Tonight he "dazzled" me with his electoral map (his words) and went on for 45 seconds about Missour-ee vs. Missour-uh.

2. Somebody already stole my "New New Deal" line.

3. Apparently J. Peterman just won a House seat in New York.

Oh, and yes we can.

Thanks for your concern

Dear 63,

No, Cameron and I did not break up. Who could break up with a guy that does this to his birthday pinata?

Besides, in the past week alone we've made seven pumpkin pies, seen Jenny Lewis and Beachwood Sparks, fretted over Halloween costumes, taken two midterms (him), asked for and received a new project at work (me), and gotten all fancy for SF Opera's Idomeneo. In other words, we've been much too busy for drama.

Sometimes girls just cry on the phone with their moms because they miss their old roommate, or they don't like any of their clothes anymore, or they can't find that "old faithful" recipe for Quiche Lorraine. I can't imagine this is all news to a man whose former girlfriend once got mad and locked herself in his dad's pizza place bathroom in the middle of a New Year's Eve party only to blow town in the morning without a word to anyone.

I also, for the record, can't imagine ever announcing a break up over the internet--that's just bad manners.

But thanks for asking. And I promise to set up the voice mail soon.

Hugs and Kisses, Cobb

Time out

You know when you call your Mom on a Saturday afternoon sobbing uncontrollably--to the point of hiccups and shaking--and she puts you on Time Out (always a high point)?

Then you'll also remember how you thought the Time Out was a really good idea so you say to your friends and colleagues all the time, "Sorry, I can't, I'm on Time Out. My mom said." But everyone just thinks it's a joke and so doesn't take it seriously, and after a week goes by where you spent just as little time at home and breathing as the one before, you realize that there really aren't that many things you are at liberty to cut out of your schedule because said friends and colleagues are depending upon you all the time.

And in the end, dear reader, you recall why it was the principle of the thing that mattered. And principles being what they are in this modern age, you'll understand why Time Out was no match for free tickets to fancy seats at a Giants game (still hate 'em...) with Tim Lincecum on the mound (...even though he's like an adorable little elf and their win actually helped the Dodgers).

Nor did Time Out stand a chance against Chihuly or his eye patch at the deYoung.

Mmmmmm. Glossy. Sparkly. Shiny. If I had stuff like that at home, Time Out might be more successful.

I love Rachel & Jorge

Ladies and gentlemen, it is my honor to present to you Mr. and Mrs. Jorge and Rachel Ambrocio:

Here you see them sporting the wedding gifts Drew, Alica and I won for them the night before the ceremony when we hit some skee ball in preparation for the big day.

Here you will see some more dignified (yawn) pictures of the event. Actually, they're quite lovely (that's their photographers' blog and, so far, Michael is my favorite of all siblings' weddings' photographers). Welcome Jorge--you're the berries! I hope you can learn to like pinochle and Silverado.