Bigger or Better: Life outside of Texas

 As we near the end of the school year [not that I'm in school, or have kids in school, but I am aware that such things happen], I'm reminded of my elementary school days in Texas. Unique moments: We said the Texas Pledge of Allegiance every morning after saying the National Pledge of Allegiance. We had open-floor-concept classrooms--different rooms were separated just by bookshelves, pillars, or maybe just by space. And we took an annual competency assessment that went by various acronyms as time went by: TAKS, TAAS, STAAR, also [before my time] TABS, TEAMS ( learn all about it in this little booklet! ).  I don't remember much of what was on those exams, except for one--a story about a violinist. As I understood it at the time, the short snippet focused on a particular female violinist, who apparently was very good and was 1st Chair Violin in her orchestra, but during one performance, her violin broke. And then she broke a lot of the other violinists' violins as she co...

Big news: I'm transitioning to my new job as nurse practitioner, which also happens to mean that Mark and I are transitioning from Houston to Washington D.C. There are so many new experiences out there because of these transitions. Examples: +I have lived in Texas all my life [except college, but I came home for summers. also, I wasn't born here, but whatever, I don't remember that part] . I am used to the fact that if I drive for a couple of hours in ANY direction, I will still be in Texas. This is not so where we are moving. We will be in D.C., but we could easily be in Maryland, Virginia, New York, West Virginia, etc etc within a couple of hours by train. That is SO weird to me; it's like this alternate universe of life in the U.S. +I had to get fingerprinted to get my RN and NP license verified in D.C., and it turns out that I don't have any discernible fingerprints on my ring and pinky fingers. The fingerprinting lady said it was more common in women,...

When I hear the word "cistern," I wonder why the formal plural of sister is not "sistren" since the formal plural of brother is "brethren." Truly I could have been a philosopher. Last week, Mark took me adventuring near Downtown Houston. Mainly, to the cistern. I have lived in Houston basically my whole life, and I never knew Houston had a cistern. Turns out once-upon-a-time, the giant one-and-a-half football field tank kept the drinking water for the city. And now it doesn't, which is why we were allowed to go inside it. Otherwise, we would obviously be contaminating Houstonian's drinking water. The white floating blocks are for artistic purposes that will be explained later The huge underground space reminded Mark of the Mines of Moria in Lord of the Rings. Meaning, of course, that the place isn't captured well in poor lighting. Thus, most of my pics from the day trip are not  in the cistern. Which, I suppose, is dumb if that's...

Because of school and my spine problems, Mark and I have gone on Zero fun trips this summer. It made for a boring Instagram feed. Fortunately, my car registration and vehicle inspection expired 3 days ago, and it forced our hand into a trip. No, we did not do anything illegal. So now that you are not accomplices, how, you may ask, does vehicle registration have anything to do with fun trips? Strangely, the answer is: car repairs. A month or two ago, for a reason that I don't remember (I was otherwise occupied with back problems, if you recall), Mark took my car in to get its struts replaced. Unfortunately, that led to my Anti-Lock Braking System malfunctioning, which led to 2 more trips to the mechanic last month. Because we had to wait for ordered car parts to arrive, that meant that my car finally got released from the car 'clinic' on the 2nd-to-last day of August. The very next day, I took my car in to get inspected. It failed. The mechanic must have disconnected...

Remember that time my husband accidentally got  ZERO presents  from my family for Christmas, except for the one from me? Well, even the one from me fell through, because the day we were supposed to see the Pittsburgh Penguins hockey game in Dallas, I was breathtakingly sick. Thus, when Mark's birthday came around, I was nervous about my gift of going to see actual penguins at Moody Gardens in Galveston. I really worried I would get sick and ruin it. But I didn't! And we loved it! And we took so many pictures!! Penguins are such social animals! They really liked interacting with us. The artistic penguin Marley And my dad says I can't take good pictures! [actually, this was a total accident] They're snuggling! Monkey see monkey do. Look at Mark, look at me  There were other animals besides penguins at the aquarium in Moody Gardens, but that was our primary motivating factor to go. Notice that Mark is wearing his Pittsburgh Penguins hat; I...

EXTRA! EXTRA! 1st-person Account of Being in Houston during Hurricane Harvey! The experience really has not been too bad. Which is kind-of why I haven't posted anything much on social media, because other stories deserve more attention. But diversity is the spice of life, so here is a not-so-scary account of riding the storm. Thursday and Friday of last week was a panic rush to grocery stores and gas stations. But I had gone grocery shopping on Wednesday, so we were okay there; we didn't even try. And Mark filled up with gas in the late evening when the lines didn't occupy the whole parking lot. So nothing much going on there. I did end up cooking a quiche in-between the normal shifts at work, so that we would have some healthy food that is still delicious to eat cold. That's it. Saturday it was raining all day; I knew things would be closed, so Mark and I basically stayed in the apartment and watched episodes of The Wire . [We're on a season that highlights t...

It's a shame that summer break in Texas means that free time is aligned with the super hot outside. But fun fact, this past weekend in San Antonio was 10 degrees F cooler than Houston. Less humid, too. Like reverse osmosis, the city drew us in. Which may be why our favorite part of the trip was the Riverwalk. Mark, the Riverwalk, and a boat in the background For some reason, we did not take many pictures of the favorite trip event. This is a red tunnel on the Riverwalk. It made us look sunburned You will just have to go see for yourself. Apparently the Riverwalk was partly designed with recommendations from the company who also designed Disneyland--which makes the Riverwalk the closest I've been to a palpable Disney enterprise. Also apparently, the history of the Riverwalk starts in 1536...but I think that's a stretch.    Interesting sidenote: we got a recommendation for a restaurant on the Riverwalk called Iron Cactus, where Mark experienced mole for ...

Last week was my school's summer break, so Mark and I planned a small getaway that fit around my work schedule and still allowed me time to play catch-up on schoolwork. Oh my gosh, I can't wait to graduate. We decided on visiting NASA, because that's just really cool. Mark booked a hotel so that we could also do some other things in the area without worrying about driving back. Tuesday morning, Mark felt like he was coming down with something, so we didn't leave until later in the day to accommodate for nap time. I drove us down to Webster, which is technically the town where the Space Center is, and we headed to our hotel. It looked really nice and comfy. Unfortunately, when the receptionist looked up our reservation, it was for the following week. And they were booked this week. Oops. Well, we had a nice drive down. At least we could catch some dinner before heading back. Mark convinced me to have some Buffalo Wild Wings, and even convinced me to get three diff...

You can tell I'm out of school because this is my third blog post for the month. Ah. Free time. December is an odd month in Houston. Temperature swings can be between different seasons: yesterday it was in the 70s and sunny; today it is in the 30s and more overcast. This last fact made Mark happy, because it was more in line with the Christmas he knows. Singing in the car to xmas tunes. Note the short sleeves; he loves the chill. I am more familiar with shorter days and longer nights in the Christmas season; when I go to work it is dark, and 12 hours later when I come home it is dark. [This is probably more true the more north you go, but I meant as essentially the sole indicator that Christmas is coming.] But this is a fantastic setting for the Christmas season, because it allows us to celebrate Light.  In a neighborhood of houses we know we will never be able to afford, we looked at how magical the world seems when Christmas lights are emphasizing the best and most ...