Addendum

Pray that I do well waking up in the morning. I am super nervous that I won't feel well. I am serious, I have a track record of getting sick in these situations. Long story, I won't share it cause I am going to go try to sleep now.. BECAUSE I HAVE A JOB TO GO TO!!!!!!!

Good news for a new year!

So, this will be a very brief update (with I'm sure more to follow later). But, CODY HAS A JOB! Which, he starts tomorrow morning at 7:00. The position is a shift supervisor at the Starbucks in the Collegetown neighborhood of Ithaca. The store called just a couple of hours ago to offer the position, and he starts in a few more hours. Keep him in your thoughts and prayers for an early morning tomorrow! There will be more of an update later when we have more info. We love you all and are super excited!
--brianna

2008 (hopefully not as eventful as 2007)

Well, as you all are well aware, we have now moved into a new year. And, thus, it seemed a good time for me (brianna) to hijack cody's blog. Maybe not hijack so much as borrow from time to time. Our New Year's Eve was incredibly uneventful, and seemed like the proper ending to a rather insane year (we fell asleep before the clock struck midnight). Today has been spent sleeping, watching television, playing video games, and doing a little unpacking. It was mostly recovery from a wonderful and crazy busy trip back to Minnesota.
I woke up this morning thankful for the opportunity to go back home for Christmas, and see so many of you, but also thankful to be back in New York. Life out here has been quite an adjustment, and the chance to see family and friends made it a lot easier to come back to our everyday lives, which at times seem both incredibly dull and insanely busy. Thank you to all of you who are a part of our lives, and who we got to see over the past several weeks-- it was great!
Anyway, being back in Ithaca-- I am beginning to wonder what we are going to do with ourselves over the next few weeks. I don't start classes again for a few weeks yet, and don't go back to work for awhile, so hopefully we will be able to spend some more time exploring where we are at (and sharing with you). Although, Cody is looking forward to spending some time with the Xbox and Half Life now that we are back as well. My goal is to try to make it to New York City at some point in January (maybe as part of a birthday celebration)-- now I just need to convince Cody that this is a good idea. I am sure that we will both keep you updated over the next few weeks and months as to how life progresses. Happy new year to you all! Oh, and the picture is of Cody and I with my nephew Christopher-- the three of us spent quality time together over Christmas.

Untitled #3

It has been an interesting day.

To begin with a caveat, I am exhausted. I have been sleeping on an air mattress since Tuesday night, and have driven all over the cities the last two days. It has been good, but it is verging on a little nuts. But today took the cake.

My mom called me this morning to inform me that my uncle died last night. Mind you, this wasn't revolutionary news. He was 87, living in hospice, and when I saw him last week, he was doing quite poorly. Still, I just wasn't quite prepared. My uncle Tom was the oldest of 13 brothers and sisters on my mom's side. He was the relative I was the closest to on that side as well. We used to play golf occasionally, and he always liked it when I sang in church. He asked me to sing at his funeral during a phone call a year and a half ago. In a lot of ways, that request has been the most difficult part of this all. I am flying back to NY on Monday morning. The funeral has been scheduled for Tuesday morning in my old hometown. When all is said and done, it will simply be too much to get there.

I have spent the day on the phone with my parents who left for their month long vacation yesterday. It has been a round-robin of whether or not they should drive back and I should come down. It has continued to be exhausting.

That said, I went to Chuck E. Cheese for the first time today. It was for Bri's nephew's 5th birthday. It was a little surreal. Before that, I had coffee with an old friend who moved from the cities a few weeks before I did. It was wonderful, and encouraging, and he offered me a job. In Rhode Island. A little later I stopped by the house of an old roommate and his wife offered me a job. In Minnesota. It was getting a bit more surreal.

I decided that I needed coffee. After nearly two hours spent at Dunn Bros with a good friend and quality conversation, things seemed a little more tangible.

For a quality nightcap, Bri and I decided to go see the movie Juno. I felt the need to laugh for a while. Can I say this movie was absolutely wonderful? I had high hopes. Jason Bateman, Micheal Cera, Ellen Page and written by Minneapolis' own Diablo Cody. I was not remotely dissapointed. I also must say it was the best soundtrack I have heard since Garden State. I am not joking, it was even better than Devotchka and Little Miss Sunshine.

All in all, its been a little crazy. Too much coffee and a little too much crazy. I think I should go sleep now.

One last thing, Happy New Year. (A little early)

Baby its Cold Outside

Its been awhile, I know. All I can say is, reporting on progress in Xbox games wouldn't be that interesting of a read, so I left you all in the dark.

Bri and I have been back in MN for 8 days now, celebrating Christmas with our respective families. It has been an altogether interesting/stressful/strange/happy/reflective holiday. Time spent with my family was made quite interesting by my parents preparations to travel to Texas for a month starting this coming Friday. To say the least, they were a little distracted. Dispite having to help install a new washing machine in the RV and change a few of its tires, I was able to find some time to relax and enjoy the time spent with my family.

Bri and I headed back up to the cities yesterday in a wonderful little snow storm. We avoided a nearly disasterous accident in Mankato through some divine intervention that was unbelievable. We actually hit the cement guard rail on a bridge and completely avoided damage to the car. The snow packed up on the bridge saved the car and our drive. All in all the drive took us an hour and a half longer than usual, but we managed to make it up.

I have been trying to adjust to Christmas with another family, and I am finding it incredibly exhausting. I love kids, but I am just not used to being around them. After awhile, I start to get surprisingly claustrophobic and find myself looking for the nearest exit. Good times.

It has been wonderful to see old friends while we are back, and I am looking forward to more of that starting again tomorrow. I am realizing just how much I have missed these people and what a profound influence they have on my life. It is going to be very hard to return to NY on one hand and leave them all behind. On the other hand, I am desperately looking forward to spending time with my wife again. I find that we exist in the same house here, but things are so crazy, that it is impossible to acutally enjoy the holiday together.

All that said, I hope you all are having a wonderful holiday season and are enjoying time with family and friends. Bri and I will be in town through Monday morning, so give us a call if you want to get together.

Maybe if you all are lucky, I might post my new rant on why I want to stop celebrating Christmas for a couple of years to see what it is like.
You can all hope!

East Coast E

Thanksgiving break finds Bri and I in CT. After a completely not thrilling drive through mist, fog and annoyingly large amounts of traffic, we arrived in New Haven 6 hours after we left Ithaca. I am thinking that it would be an amazingly beautiful drive on a sunny fall day in early October, so I hold out hope for another chance at it.
We are spending the holiday with Bri's family at her sister's house. This marks my first real experience with the new in-laws on a major holiday. So far, so good. I got a mini tour of Yale today and realized that just because Ithaca and New Haven house Ivy League schools does not mean they are similar towns. It is hard to put into terms the differences of the towns, but they are definitely there. Other high points of the day included the first time I have seen the Atlantic Ocean from something other than an airplane in my life and eating a cheeseburger from the restaurant where the American burger originated in 1895.
We haven't really planned our return yet, but we will probably be here for another couple of days.
Hope you all have a enjoyable and blessed Thanksgiving.

Arcade Fire on ACL Pt. 2

After seeing Arcade Fire last night, I was reminded again of how amazing the new wave of indie rock is. Over the past couple years I have heard firsthand reviews of the incredible event that is Arcade Fire live, but until last night, I had only seen short clips of their shows. The setlist was about an hour long, and they featured songs from both their new album Neon Bible and their previous album Funeral. The band consisted of ten people last night and the best part was that only two of the ten played the same instrument for whole show. Win (the lead vocalist) played acoustic guitar, electric, bass, and mandolin. Regine (the only permanent female member of the band) played keys, organ, acordian, drums and my favorite, the hurdy gurdy. The two guys, providing the wind section, played trumpet, euphonium, clarinet, french horn, bass saxophone and unbelievably, a bass clarinet.
The incredible amount of instrumentation added to the high energy of the show. It is a rare event to see a group perform that seems so genuinely excited to have the oportunity to make music together. They seemed to be completely in their element on stage and loving every minute of it. It was an impressive reminder of how cool live music can be.