Before I met Grey, the very thought of marriage made me feel as though someone was smothering me with pillow. It repulsed and disgusted me; I likened it to a death sentence – but only way more boring because even prison inmates have lots of random sex with multiple partners. Not that I wanted to have a jail bitch or even lots of loveless hook-ups, but I couldn’t seem to get past seeing marriage as punishment of sorts where you were forced to kiss the same person for all of eternity.
However, when Grey swept me off my feet as though he were my knight in shining tapered sweatpants, so did my ideas about getting married. All other guys paled in comparison and I just knew Grey was the ONE and nobody else would ever do. Suddenly, instead of equating white wedding gowns with orange prison jumpsuits, I began happily daydreaming about the day we became husband and wife. Luckily, Grey seemed to feel the same way and I didn’t have to stalk or blackmail my way into his heart or burn locks of his hair while dancing naked under a full moon to make him love me; it just all worked out.
Now, six years after our wedding day (which is frankly blurry due to all the valium and champagne), I love Grey more than when I first met him. I thank my lucky stars on a daily basis that I married someone who is so intelligent, funny, kind, and aging so darn well. Six years has given us a heck of a lot of happiness, a healthy son, and another little bundle of trouble on the way. Cheers to that!
Happy six, Captain Sexy!
Our first Halloween as a married couple...Grey and I are going strong while Brit and K-fed were dunzo years ago.
One of the many wonderful things about my dad, is that he’s always toting around his trusty black medicine case. He literally never leaves home without it. Though some people may call him a hypochondriac, I just call him prepared. If anyone ever gets a mysterious back spasm? Call dad. Can’t sleep? Jack’ll hook you up with some Melatonin pills. This weekend, my parents are visiting and thankfully, my dad brought me a few asthma inhalers since I forgot to refill my prescription.
Actually, my dad seems to double as a pharmacist at very convenient times. My wedding day in particular comes to mind. For some reason, I had a strange phobia of puking and peeing on myself while saying my vows. Cold feet? Nah, I was 100% sure I wanted to marry Grey; I simply didn’t want to humiliate myself in front all of my friends and family.
Apparently, my dad felt the same way because that morning, while we were getting ready, he decreed: “Stacey, I think today is a seven valium day.” I laughed, but he really wasn’t joking. Of course, I didn’t realize this until the dinner toast when he started reading his To Do List instead of his father of the bride speech. All the guests thought it a joke when he began deadpan: “Pick up giftbags. Drop off bridal bouquets. Get tux tailored.” I think he got midway down the honey-do list my mom made for him before he realized he was reading the wrong piece of paper!
I would have been rolling on the floor laughing about this, but I had hit him up for a few valium myself (which I washed down with some champagne), so I just smiled calmly during the speech and thought about how fascinating the twinkle lights on the dance floor were. In fact, most of the day I pretty much just grinned and imagined myself sliding down giant mountains made of funnel cake and floating down a river of chocolate milk. When, during the ceremony Grey was sweating buckets, I was cool as a cucumber. I remember wiping his brow with my hanky and thinking, “What’s all the fuss about?” A MUCH better alternative than barfing on myself, I must say!
Riding away on our golf cart...this is one of the last things I remember of my wedding!
One great thing about being pregnant is that your hair gets really shiny and thick and full. It grows tons faster than when you’re sans bebe, and my normally limp locks transform into a bouncy mane.
The only downside to this crazy hair growth, is that some women also get random whiskers in strange places. Luckily, I am not one of those women. This isn’t my way of telling you I’ve sudden sprouted boob beards or stubble on my ass. Fortunately, I’ve never really been much of a hairy person so I don’t have any clandestine crevices that are now suddenly sporting Rapunzel’s tresses. (THANK GOD.)
The only place I’ve noticed a dramatic increase in hair is, oddly, my eyebrows. This could be due to pregnancy or maybe it’s the fact that all of a sudden I’m outside in the natural light after living like a Carmelite nun in the darkness of our house all winter. But I noticed my brows were getting seriously bushy. And not in a cute Brooke Shields kind of way — but as in — “Is that an eyebrow or a forehead hair???” — kind of way.
But Surgi-Wax is so easy that I don’t even have to drag my lazy butt to the salon for a wax. I can remove my uni-brow in the privacy of my own home! Once I got so carried away that I decided to wax all the peach fuzz off my fingers and toes. Then I talked Grey into letting me strip him of his nostril hair. Let’s just say I should have quit while I was ahead with that one; it’s harder that you’d think to remove wax from deep inside a man’s nose holes — no matter how easy the wax spreads.
Since Grey and I are trying to sell our house, our new best friends are the folks at the Automated Showing Service. We talk to them on the phone at least a couple times per day whenever they call us to let us know when a Realtor wants to bring clients by our house for a showing. Most of the time, they give us at least an hour’s notice, so we have time to wipe the bacon grease and smeared crap from the walls so as to make the place presentable.
We realized how much we appreciate this service today when a rogue Realtor just decided “swing by” with a couple without calling ahead for permission. All of a sudden our front door busts open and a wrinkled old lady (the Realtor) and her clients (a husband and a wife) walk in to find Grey, Ollie, and I playing Wrestlemania IV on the living room carpet.
Though I was just happy to be wearing a bra and makeup, Grey became immediately nervous and agitated. All of a sudden he started bumbling and stuttering his words and out of nowhere, announced, “Oh, um, hi. I was just watching a big yellow cat chase a squirrel in our back yard. ” He said this verbatim. They looked at him like he was retarded. The wife actually said, “Oooh, that’s fascinating, dear” as if she was patronizing some dim-witted child. Of course, this made me start laughing uncontrollably, which just added to our overall air of insanity.
Something tells me they won’t be placing any bids. Oh well, next time!
This November, the Pfarr household is going to have a cooked turkey — and I don’t mean for Thanksgiving dinner. I’m pregnant and the baby is due November 20!
How did this happen, you ask? Or maybe you don’t, but I’ll tell you anyway. Well, we got a LOT of snow last month. I mean — a TON. If you don’t live in the DC area, you probably read about all our snow on the news. And really, well, there is only so much you can do when you’re snowed in. By my calculations, you can:
A) have sex
B) drink
C) drink while you’re having sex
And because I wasn’t drinking for Lent (at that point, I later failed with my Lenten promise), Grey and I chose option A. Low and behold a baby was made! It sounds almost Biblical when I put it that way. Like we’re going to deliver Moses II. But seriously, I truly wonder if there were more babies conceived this winter just out of sheer cabin fever. I mean, how many times can you watch Jersey Shore reruns and play Monopoly? Snow Boom 2010!
Anyway, I thought about keeping my fat trap shut as I’m only five weeks along, but being that I can’t keep a secret, of course I’m spilling it before I’m anywhere near out of my first trimester. Yay, baby!
Of course I took several tests...Grey didn't believe the first one because the line was so faint. However, it's a done deal. Baby #2, here we come!
While I’m in Erie sleeping until eleven, shopping at Gabe’s for $4 dollar shirts, seeing movies, catching up with friends, and wolfing Wegman’s cheese spreads, my husband is at home eating Baja Fresh alone in a cold dark room.Well, maybe he has the lights on. And the heat. Maybe. BUT, he is all by his lonesome for the week.
Usually, I joke with him that being a bachelor means all-he-can-eat Tony’s pizza, peeing with the seat up until his heart’s content, not having to pretend to listen to me nag him, and drinking beer that flows like the Nile. But not this time. Not only is Grey working every day, but he’s also spearheading our home-selling efforts. This means that any time, with only 15 minutes notice potential buyers and their real estate agents can pop by for a showing. Consequently, poor Grey has to constantly keep our house spotless.
Yet, as much as I miss him, and feel sorry he has to be doing this, I am also happy that I’m not! Between watching Ollie and trying to do my column, keeping things tidy is impossible. I remember as a kid watching that old movie Love Story with Ali McGraw and Ryan O’Neal and thinking, “Oh how nice!” when they said the famous quote, “Love means never having to say you’re sorry.” But now, as an adult, I realize, that line is total crap. However, after a week of Grey working his fingers to the bone, I’d like to alter that line to fit my own purposes. Indeed: “Love means never having to unload the dishwasher. Or scrub the tub. Or sweep the dust bunnies…Thanks, honey!
For four years Grey and I have lived with closets so packed with crap that every time a door is opened, a roll of toilet paper or a hairdryer comes flying out at our heads. Consequently, we decided that before we can sell our house, we need to remove all the junk that’s been cluttering up the place to make it appear more spacious (and to minimize the chance of a law suit during an open house).
I guess we could have gotten a storage unit for all the stuff we moved out, but to be honest, the thought didn’t even cross our minds. The obvious choice was to just get a moving van and drive the load to Grey’s parents’ house to shove in their garage. Never mind that we monopolized so much space that fitting a car in there is now akin to turning water into wine. It’s winter – who needs a garage anyway?! Cue sarcasm…
But Grey’s parents took it all in stride. They didn’t even complain when we overtook a guest bedroom with garbage bags full of items like potty seats, old Navy uniforms, and lampshades. Add to this the fact that Grey told his mother that when we move, he’ll be stopping by her house in the mornings expecting hot bacon egg and cheese sandwiches and fresh squeezed juice waiting for him, and I’d say they handled everything exceedingly well.
Now if this snow will just melt…we can list our house!!!
After nine Valentine’s Days of being with Grey, our celebrations have run the gamut.
On our first, you could tell we were newly in love and wanting to impress each other. He took me to a fancy Italian restaurant in Newport and surprised me with a pearl bracelet (which two years later I wore on our wedding day). I blew half my paycheck on a watch for him.
Then there was the Valentine’s Day when he was on deployment with the Navy. He bought me a ticket to visit him in Hawaii and I sent him a care package with Valentine’s Day Pez dispensers, love letters, and cookies my mom had made.
In California, our February 14th included a walk on the beach and a Pacifico with lime. And maybe a burrito.
I’ll never forget our first DC Valentine’s — we went to 1789 in Georgetown and were sitting next to Donald Rumsfeld. Grey got so excited he stood up and knocked the entire table over. It was like the Republican porn.
Yet, this year might just top them all. Last night, on Valentine’s Eve, we took Ollie out to dinner at a local burger joint. We laughed about the waitress calling Ollie a “she” and him eating mac and cheese while wearing sunglasses. Then we came home and watched a movie over dessert of Cadbury Eggs. Nothing fancy, nothing expensive – but perfect all the same!
Thank God the snow is starting to melt. For the past week, I feel like I’ve been living a scene out of the movie Misery (maybe that explains why I just broke Grey’s legs with a sludge hammer?).
ANYWAY, I suspect it’s the cabin fever, but during this cold snap, I’ve really enjoyed my daily doses of the sauce. Nothing excessive — that would make trying to contain wild Ollie even more impossible — but just one or two drinks to make me forget I’m a prisoner in my own home, that’s all.
Since nap-time isn’t usually until 12:30, I’ve found that on these stir crazy days, Grey and I catch one another’s eyes over the turmoil left in Ollie’s wake and say, “Is it 5 o’clock yet?” But with Wolaver’s — it doesn’t need to be happy hour! That’s the beauty of coffee flavored beer: it tastes good in the morning.
Now how about one that’s bacon flavored?!
This morning I tied Grey to the bed and shaved him with a straight razor. Funny what snow will make you do!!!
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