After stumbling on a friend's blog today I though I would make a post... which, as you can see I haven't done so in ages. I've been endlessly browsing the net today after being home for 2 days in a row sick. Yea... it's just that time of year. Since I last posted some pretty amazing changes have took place.

#1 I met someone. Not just anyone this time. I actually met a keeper. I met the person who completes me. I could go on all day about how perfect he is... blah blah blah... but this guy is completely different. We've been talking to each other since the weekend after my birthday (Jan 16th for those who don't remember :) and although there is a huge story in itself of how we got to where we are - I'll just leave it that things are progressing wonderfully, which leads me to...
#2 I bought a house. We bought a house... in Charlotte. It's amazingly progressive and modern and beautiful... and everything that I'd ever want to live in. Yea... I know. It's a huge step to make with someone - but oddly enough I'm not even worried about it. It all fits and makes sense and was at the right time.
#3 I am happy...

Due to internet overload I'm going to stop for the day. I don't want to jump back into this internet obsessed life again too quickly. It's pretty nice letting go of it and having a real life away from a computer screen (minus work). I highly suggest trying it.

Update...

After a discussion with an awesome new friend of mine, I’ve decided that it’s time that I make a new post to the site.  I’ve been so busy actually dealing with life these days that I can’t say I’ve had time to actually sit down and reflect on it.  It’s sad to say to because I feel like so much has happened that will go unrecorded, but here’s the latest anyways.

The time is approaching for me to leave for France and Spain; in fact it’s only 6 days away.  I’m super excited about exploring and getting to see a whole new culture and country and excited about leaving the mundane everyday ritual of life that I’ve grown so accustomed too.  It’s somewhat refreshing to think about throwing myself into a mix of things that I’m going to have to react to again like starting a new job, or college, or something of that drastic nature in one’s life.  It is of course bringing up lots of mixed emotions as well, but those reasons are more personal.

Two weekends ago I went to my very first pride festival in Raleigh.  I must say of recent events it is by far the best decision that I have made.  I had a really great time.  Not only was I able to hangout with Matt (who is by far on the top of the cool list right now), but I was able to meet a few really awesome new people as well.  I’ve always been somewhat uncomfortable at the thought of going to such activities mostly because I don’t like singling something out as a way of trying to merge into a single accepted society.  I think that idea is quite preposterous.  Just going though, to have a good time and meet a lot of people that are like you is great fun!  Mad props also go out to Nathan who I’ve greatly enjoyed spending the past couple of weekends hanging out with.

During this weekend I also made it to Legends in Raleigh.  It’s a gay club and was part of the NC Pride festivities.  They had a special DJ there that night and the place was totally packed.  As usual it was with 99% of the people that I have no desire to do anything with, but luckily I did meet that 1% and made an awesome new friend.

Wow… I feel like there’s way too much to mention in this blog… I feel overwhelmed right now.  Anyway… continuing on…

Work has been frantic with the past month spent putting together one of the largest marketing proposals that our office has ever seen.  It’s a concert hall that will be built (if the project comes to be) on the campus of UNC Wilmington.  It has been created by a group of individuals independent of the University known as ARCH.  We presented the culmination of our design to them yesterday and it was received quite well.  We found out today that we have already been narrowed down to the top two choices and that we are being favored at this point.  This has thrilled Joddy who looked like a little 2 year old boy running around the office today with the little smirk grin all over his face.  He’s greatly enjoyed this project just because it has been so design intense without having to deal with a lot of the (for appropriateness) back-of-house issues.  It’s created a few tense moments between us, but in the end we’ve come out quite a strong team.  Other than that and some typical drama around the firm, things are going well.

Melissa and I pulled off the 25th wedding anniversary SURPRISE with no flaws for mom and dad a few weekends back.  They were quite pleased as we were with the outcome; lots of good food and company!

The family is doing great.  Madison fell at school and broke her arm about a month ago.  Corey is doing really great at Surry Community College (congrats on the 2 A+’s in calc!).  Mom and Dad are busy with the remodeling of my grandparents house.

There’s more to write but I must do it another day.  Plan on seeing lots of pictures when I get back from Europe.  I leave for Raleigh again this weekend – State Fair activities with family and friends.  

Write soon…

Elkin

In the spirit of the evening… GUTEN TAG!!!

Today has to top the funny list.  My roommate, Cathy and I decided to spend Labor Day in the mountains, oddly enough, we never made it.  Last night we decided that we would stop by my sister’s house to do some planning for my Mom and Dad’s 25th wedding anniversary.  Mission accomplished!  In fact it was quite great.  We got the invitations, an album, the guest list, and food arrangements covered.  

On the way out we decided we’d try to head up to the parkway when about 5 minutes into the ride we realized that I had a flat tire.  Might I remind you that the point of Labor Day is not to work… that includes all places the might unstrand you from the side of the road.  Luckily, after calling AAA and canceling we found a place that could replace the tire.  This awesome guy helped us put on the lovely replacement donut… and in about 45 minutes we were on our way to get the tire replaced.

At this point we decided that we’d had enough mountains for the day and stopped by Speedy Chef… my old work place.  There’s something to be said for first jobs… there those kinds of places that you hold lots and lots of memories dear to your heart… and it somewhat glorifies everything in your mind I suppose.  We pull into the parking lot of the infamous Speedy Chef that I’ve told Cathy about for the last two years (this is her first trip to Elkin) and Tony Hall greets us at the door.  Normally Tony is a really great guy… however… high Tony is quite unpleasant.  I introduced him to my “ROOMMATE” and apparently the entire town immediately thought I was telling some kinda of gigantic lie.  It’s kinda weird… the small town syndrome.  I can just hear everyone that saw Cathy and I together… it spreading like some kind of fire through the town.  I’m almost positive by tomorrow the entire town will just know that I’m married and have kids on the way.  But we’ll get back to the later.

After Tony harasses Cathy for about 15 minutes and congratulates me in his manly way… basically saying he’s much happier that I’m rooming with a hot girl than some sissy boy… we decided to head inside and get some food.  Cathy was starving… yet she only got a grilled cheese… go figure.  I did my almost normal rounds – nobody cool was working today… of talking to my old coworkers.  When I went back in the kitchen… no wait… you have to understand Francis Hall before I tell this part of the story…

Ok… Francis is the owner of Speedy Chef.  She is this almost 80 year old… hmm… by now permanently preserved piece of plastic.  She’s had more plastic surgery than anyone else that I know.  She’s been a chain smoker her entire life… hence the reason for the plastic surgery… and she’s approximately 4’ high.  She’s got one of those very lovely man voices as well.  So I walk back into the kitchen and say hello.  She comes over to me and asks who my friend is.  I explain she’s Cathy from New York and she’s my roommate.  What does Francis ask me next…

“Do ya’ll have separate bedrooms?”

Instantly everyone back there looks up for my response… including Shirley who winks at me… almost in a guy like manner as if saying, “It’s okay if you don’t tell the truth cuz we know that you’re shagging her.”  At this point I just want to scream that I’m gay… but I refrain thinking that’s not too good of an idea in Elkin.  Cathy assures me that they wouldn’t have believed me if I had… that they would have only thought I was lying.  UGH!!!  Small minded towns with small minded people.  You can’t love them for hating them… and you can’t hate them for being so damn stupid.

Now it’s funny how you can live in a town your entire life and things just simply go unnoticed.  Bring fresh eyes onto the scene and suddenly you’re from the most hysterical town on the face of the planet.  We left the Chef and continued down lovely North Bridge Street when Cathy suddenly lets out a constrained but apparent chuckle.  We passed a graveyard where the tombstone closest to the road read, “SALE.”  I by myself would not have found this funny… however… Cathy starts laughing as though she’s high.  Then we both start laughing.  And that was only starters for an afternoon full of laughs.

Also to point out on this lovely North Bridge Street is the little white building of T&A Motors.  Again… I’ve passed this location hundreds if not thousands of times.  It just ones of those things that has always been there and Cathy starts busting the seems again.  Hmm… I’m thinking… what is she laughing at?  AH HA!!!  Titties and Ass Motors!!!  Whew!!!

We make it back to Charlotte… thank God!  We decided we would go watch a movie at North Lake since neither of us has been to that theatre before.  We are totally clueless as to what is playing and finally settled on “Beerfest” – top shelf grade A laugh-your-ass-off movie!  We start to enter the theatre and I look up from getting my ticket out of my pocket where I see this large northern character opening the door in front of us.  I scream out, “Joe Monico!” instantly because I knew that’s who it had to be.  Joe is probably in his mid-40’s I’d say and came back to the College of Architecture to completely some classes so that he could become a licensed architect.  He’s always been quite the interested kinda guy… not married… no kids… really loud and obnoxious… but extremely nice and friendly at the same time. He turns around and greets us and we exchange the normal chit-chat and sort of part ways.  Cathy and I glance back to see him meet up with this guy with much the same physical features as Joe in terms of weight and what not… then we both glance at each other and bust out laughing yet again!  Joe Monico is gay!!!  The surprises never end…

After laughing our asses off during the movie we get in the car and travel the 15 minutes across Harris Boulevard.  At some point we decide to reminisce on the afternoons activities and about the same time it starts raining we both laugh so hard that we started crying.  So here is to days that go completely wrong!  I love them!!!

Oh, and just for the record… it was 11 not 12 times this weekend!  HAHA!!!

Elevator

So on the agenda of things to do today, getting stuck in the elevator was not one of them.  Sophia called me around 12noon for lunch (shock shock) and she wanted pasta so we went down to quite a nice Italian restaurant on East Moorehead called Frankie’s.  After splattering the pasta special on my white polo and teaching Sophia how to do renderings from CADD (the real reason she invited me to lunch) we headed back and she dropped me off in front of my building.  I proceeded inside with a guy that I see quite often around the building, walked on to the elevator, pressed 13 and he pressed 14, passed them both, and then we found ourselves stuck somewhere between the 20th floor and the sky.  Our building only has 20 floors, yet somehow we managed to make it to 20 and a half.  Once we realized what had happened I pulled out the trusty cell phone and called the office so that they could notify the front desk that we were stuck.  About 10 minutes later I hear this odd buzzing noise.  At first I thought it was the other guys (Ryan) cell phone, and then realized the noise was coming from the elevator telephone.  I opened the door and sure enough, the guy at the front desk was able to confirm that we were stuck.  I was so glad to hear him say that as I wasn’t sure if I was just dreaming up until that very moment.  He asked if we were okay and assured someone would be there shortly.  So I met Ryan at this point… he officially introduces himself.  He graduated college 2 years ago and works for a legal outfit that makes legalized copies of official documents (WHAT???) and he proceeded in telling me that he graduated from UNCC with his business degree.  We exchanged how we were both getting quite bored with our current work situations and the elevator phone rings again.  Not surprised anymore, this time the guy wants to know if we are still stuck in there… I gave a nice but irritated YES that really meant get me the fuck out of here.  He tells us the elevator people have been called and are on their way.  I then decide it’s important to text message everyone and tell them that I’m stuck in an elevator and Ryan soon follows suit.  We chit-chat a little longer, mostly about missed meetings, and the phone rings yet again, this time we are assured that the elevator people are working to get us out.  About that time we hear the elevator besides us ding as it actually makes it to the 20th floor level and then we hear some prying on the doors.  Finally the doors open and we step down into the lobby of the 20th floor.  It’s quite interesting the things that start going through your head while stuck in an elevator.  It’s such a cliché, yes, but the thoughts occur none-the-less.  It didn’t help that it suddenly turned 100 degrees in the car.  I’m thinking why don’t they have a manual way to open the doors from the inside?  What is it that this ‘elevator person’ can actually do once he gets here?  I wonder how much oxygen I have left (haha!)?  Did I tell Will that I love him today???  If not… I LOVE YOU BOY!!!  Ohh… and we had some really bad storms tonight too.  Goodnight!!!

I had an absolutely amazing evening yesterday so I must post mad props to the following people: Amber, Chris, Alicia, and Ben!!! Wow... I really missed you guys!

It's so hard to believe that life as an Architecture student at the CoA are over... almost depressing really. So many of you guys became my family over the past five years. I was so excited about graduating and not going back to that place and all of it's stresses that I think I forgot about a lot of you. I'm sorry! I miss you none the less and will make much more effort to hang out with you in the near future.

So 'the gang' met at the Wine Vault for a nice bottle of shiraz and a cabernet - most impressed with too! I usually don't like a shiraz at all. From there we went to Ciro's and had dinner. We started with the best calamari that I've had in Charlotte - it was amazing - and a bottle of pinot nero. This restaurant is great. I'd really forgot how much so. Ciro, the owner was there playing his according and totally set the mood for us because we were so loud. LOL!!! We waited to order until Alicia and Ben arrived and by that time we were on to bottle number 4 of wine. Amber had about 2 glasses at this point which is a lot for her and Alicia and Ben were doing there own thing. So I've consumed almost 2 bottles of wine by myself. So what do we do??? Of course - order another bottle!!! LOL!!! So Chris and I consumed about 2.5 bottles each and by this point I was pretty done for on the alcoholing.

We reminisced about graduation and all the people who shouldn't have graduated, didn't graduate, and the one's who won awards that they definitely didn't deserve. Chris invited us up to hang out with him and go sailing - which is a must do.

But I just wanted to comment and say I had the best night I've had in a really long time. It was nice to let some things go and just hang out like old times. There must be a repeat... and soon!

It's Friday!

Yes, I'm well aware of the length of time it's been since I last posted. Sorry!

To catch up a bit:
The trip to New York, Cedar Point, and Chicago was amazing. I spent 5 days roaming from lower Manhattan to Coney Island (where I completed my mission of riding the oldest coaster in America). I enjoyed visiting Cathy and hanging out in New York - but, tis not the city for me. Cedar Point was amazing as it is every year; the new ride this year was totally lame though. They are building a new coaster which looks pretty gigantic - so next year will be exciting. The trip to Chicago was short lived and probably the most enjoyable part. I was able to see Milennium Park by Frank Gehry, which quite honestly despite my lack of interest in his work I was totally captivated by. It is by far the most intense space that I have ever been in.

I did move into my new apartment and absolutely love it! I haven't really met anyone neighbor wise except some guys that I graduated high school with; they live two doors down. There is an express bus line right at the entrance, so as soon as I return from the beach with the family I'm going to cancel my parking pass for downtown and start riding the bus. That's going to save me somewhere around $200 a month, plus I get to live like a person that lives in a city. :)

William came home from France and I've been spending a lot of time with him, which has been really great for me and much needed. We've mostly just been hanging out around Charlotte and catching all the summer movies, dinner, and the like. This past weekend I purchased my plane ticket for France. I'll be going over from October 17th-31st and am most excited!!!

Next weekend I leave with the fam for a week at the beach while Will goes to Hawaii with his family. Summer is passing by extremely quickly and before I know it it's going to be over, which means Will leaves again... not the most pleasant of thoughts in my head at the moment.

Other than that things are going really great! Cathy comes back on August 12th (YAY!!!) and the new roommate (Ashley) will be coming to stay sometime around then too.

Adios for now...

I'm Still Alive - just busy!!!

Hello world… it’s me again.  Sorry for the long delay of posting, but life has been busy.  The task of transitioning from school to the work force has been pretty much effortless.  I’m still waiting for the pain of all that to sit in come fall when everyone is returning to school.  But, we shall wait and see…

Yes, I have graduated college with no immediate plans of going back to further my education at the moment – this may change, however.  I graduated with my Bachelor of Architecture from UNC-Charlotte and am currently working at Jenkins Peer Architects in Charlotte where I’ve been since last May when I graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree.  It’s nice to feel like at least the biggest part of that part of my life is achieved – yet scary too.  

Since then I’ve been working but living up the summer too.  There’s been going away parties, people moving, some visits to the lake, Carowinds, hiking, some volleyball, hanging out with Julia, Kate and some hometown friends… but the best is yet to come.

This coming Friday I will depart to visit Cathy in New York until Tuesday!!!  I can’t wait to see Cathy… miss her dearly.  I’m moving in with her in the fall in a really nice townhouse – good times to be had I’m sure!  When I get back from there I will leave the following day to head up to Cedar Point – my favorite place in the world at the moment!!!  Saturday we are heading to Chicago… and I’ll fly back to Charlotte on Sunday.  

This brings me to the next big event – IM MOVING!!!  I’ve lived at Oak Pointe now for 3 years and it’s just time to say goodbye – for roommate reasons and just the general environment around here; it’s getting rather ghetto.  So on June 28th I’ll make the trek up Harris Boulevard and onto Tryon to Ashford Green.  It’s a great community – rather European in feel.  It’s composed of garden apartments and then townhouses, which make it feel a lot more like a community.  There seems to be good age diversity.  There is a great pool, tennis courts and its all on a golf course too!  PLUS – I’ll be moving in with my 2nd bestest buddy – Cathy!

That statement should leave one asking who is number 1????  Well, that’s easy!  Once I get moved in over the weekend someone who I haven’t seen in about two months now – returns to Charlotte… can ya guess??  Yea I know it’s easy – he’s all I talk about… but for those who don’t know, my William will be returning from France!!!  =)

I don’t think I’ve ever been so excited about seeing one person in all of my life.

He will only be back a little over a month so time will be precious and well spent I hope.  But then the plan is to go visit him in mid-October for a couple of weeks.  So that should be awesome!

So this is sort of a lump sum about what’s going on.  I’m going to take some pictures on the trip so I’ll try and post them for your enjoyment… I know I’ve been rather slack :: sorry guys!  Later…