Four Years

celebrated our four-year anniversary last week. Because of my dad's visit, we didn't do anything terribly romantic the day of, but rather spread the festivities out over the course of the week. We exchanged presents on Saturday: Malcolm got me Christmas lights for the flower room, and I got him a fancy, adjustable piano stool.



On Sunday we went to the Getty Villa. A truly magnificent approach to the art of museums, which I will probably discuss more in length later:

But mostly, we were just normal and relaxed the whole way through. No stressful romantic gestures, nothing big and fussy. It was just what I think defines the best of us as a couple, the two of us just holding hands through life and occasionally exchanging looks of joy/incredulity/surprise/love/peace/silliness. It doesn't seem like four years, and I'm totally excited to see what happens each day of the next one.

Mr. Miller Came to Town

usiness trips are my new best friend! Because my dad's company happens to have a plant in Camarillo, CA, which my dad happened to have to visit last week, he was able to come visit me on Tuesday and Wednesday. I was initially very nervous/excited about having him come, hoping to impress him with the home M & I have put together to share.

We spent the weekend before making the apartment look nice (which finally resulted in one of the bathrooms looking like we had some sort of design goal in mind.) It's the first time I have actually had an inspiration for a room based on one piece that I own. In this case it was the two painted tin animals M and I picked up at The Turqoise Door in Austin, TX.


But I digress: my dad braved the scary, mountanous California highways to come see me on both nights, and it was great! Before I got home from work, Malcolm chatted with my dad without stressing out about it- which is a great place to find your dad and your boyfriend's relationship in.

It was also a surprise to me how easy it was to show my dad around. On the second night, I kept saying to myself: "what is going on, what is that feeling that you are missing?" Finally it occurred to me: "that feeling is stress; you are relaxed. I know this is new for you Caitlin dear, but go with it!" It's true, somewhere between my dad being a really nice and chill guy, and the fact that being around Malcolm makes me calmer than I am on my own, the whole visit was largely low stress. (Caitlin- 1, Caitlin's stress issues- 0)

And as for itinerary: since it was two weeknights that he drove down to see us, we didn't have time to show him anywhere too cool, but on Tuesday we took him to sushi at one of our favorite places in Westwood: Tomodachi Sushi:

Featuring a hole-in-the-wall taste in decor, and exceptional creations like this lobster roll, it is one of our favorite places. My dad was game to try lots of things, though I'm not sure the sashimi went over very well. :-P


(photo courtesy of yelp.com)
The second night, I made my dad a spinach and bacon quiche, and after witnessing the first little rain-shower of Los Angeles since I've been here, we took my dad for the California favorite: Frozen Yogurt. Yummy!



It was a total success. Of course, it would have been better if my mom had been able to come visit as well, but all in all, it was really nice to watch my dad's eyes sparkle as he saw for himself that so far I'm doing this grown-up-life thing fairly well. Just keep your fingers crossed for the future!

It's A Brunch Kind of Sunday

his weekend, amid a rare Los Angeles heat wave (90's might not seem like much to you Texans, but when your apartment complex has no air conditioning, it can be unpleasant!) M and I spent most of Saturday cleaning and decorating so that we could have our first little party. This flurry of activity finally jumped the apartment into feeling at least a little put-together, and we both enjoyed the joint activity.

On Sunday, we hosted a brunch for the math department of M's school + the physics teacher and his wife. It was a tidy little group, and though I didn't know anybody very well, I felt like it was a jovial group and everyone had a good time. I'm glad to finally get to meet some of the people M has said so much about, and hopefully nudge a cranny out for myself.

Additionally, I felt glad to know that people seemed to like our apartment and my rudimentary cooking skills. We hauled out my grandfather's waffle iron and put strawberries, blueberries, and chocolate chips nearby so people could make waffles to their specifications. I made pan-fried potatoes, sausage, bacon, and two kinds of scrambled eggs- one batch with tomatoes and one with cream cheese and chives. One of the Algebra teachers brought homemade monkey bread, and two others brought fruit. MMMmmmm! Once the physics teacher's champagne contribution was in the mix, not bad at all!

The monkey bread required a little touching up in the oven, which was an adventure. While it was baking, the topping started dripping over, causing it to smoke and burn. We had the fire alarm go off twice, and the living room filled with smoke for the first half of the meal, but for some strange reason I think I actually liked it better that way. I have a tradition of smokey kitchens, after all:And... at least now we've tested our smoke alarms!

Our guest list was limited by the fact that we only have 6 full size plates, but maybe I will look for some more soon and then be able to have a few of the people from my work over as well. It's a good start, plus, now the apartment is ready for my dad's visit on Tuesday!

Teacher's Girlfriend

is 5 weeks into his third year as a teacher; something that I am extremely proud of, and often find very frustrating to live with.

Don't get me wrong, it's wonderful that he's doing something so important, and I'm very impressed with the amount of resilience with which he approaches a very difficult student body and a very difficult teaching environment. He really puts his all into this job; and I couldn't be happier to see him really feel like he's doing something important. It's a feeling we need to feel good about ourselves, and I'm very happy for him.

I also enjoy the ways I get to participate. First, M often asks for advice with lessons or with his Teachers' Union duties, and I like the Abigail Adams feeling it gives me to know that my advice is helpful and valued by M when he is doing something I also view as important.

Secondly, I get to help M decorate his classroom, which has always been a not-so-secret fantasy of mine. This year he went with a tropical theme in honor of Joe the Rasta Banana- won by his friend from math camp at Six Flags:
which resulted in the highest-test-score-awards:
and a super-sweet paper palm tree:
and I just really like my "post ironic shapes":


But, as cool as decorating is, it's just a little bit frustrating, when I come home after a- let's face it- fairly boring day at work, to find that he will be grading tests or lesson planning all night. It's not that I don't have lots of projects I could see myself doing, it's just that I usually find myself in a limbo- lacking the energy to go buy supplies and get to work, but with too much energy to just happily read a book after sitting still in one place all day.

I'm not sure how to combat this difference yet. Any suggestions?

Garden Time

ardening is one of my very favorite pastimes. I like the feeling of nurturing something. I like that plants have a code that you learn to read with experience. Yellow leaves usually mean too much water, and droopy ones- not enough. If the plant is flowering/bearing fruit, you are probably doing it right. I like that it's a skill that you can always get better at, and I like the community of people who also garden.

Last weekend M and I went on a tour of the Mildred E. Mathias UCLA Botanical Garden.

It's lovely, approx. 7 acres of trees, palms, bromeliads, hibiscus, cacti and succulents- native to California, Asia, Africa, Australia and elsewhere. There's even a circulating stream with a multitude of turtles. The best thing? It's super close to us! The tour helped me pick up some interesting tidbits about gardening in this new climate. For example: native California plants go dormant in the summer, not in the winter like most other places I'm aware of.




This knowledge has emboldened me to try several plants that might not normally be fall/winter plants and see what happens.

In that vein: we've made two trips to the Amstrong Garden Center so far, and let me tell you, I am in LOVE with this place.

It's large (a rarity for any commercial establishment where we live), staffed by friendly and knowledgeable people, carries a variety of really healthy looking plants (including HUGE 6-packs), and many of their seedlings and seed companies are organic.

I've unsurprisingly gone a little overboard:

and brought home more than I intended to: a fern, a tomato seedling, some thyme, a six pack of alyssum, and a six pack of dahlias, an unidentified plant from the near-death-rack, an Armeria, and a very-Californian-Hens and Chicks. I've also refilled the six-pack containers, and made pots out of a milk carton and some water bottles in order to start my own seedlings of parsley, morning glories, nasturtiums, and sweet peas. We'll see what happens now!



I've also muddled the growing conditions because all of these plants are growing in the sunroom- a partially indoors/partially outdoors space which gets patches of bright sunlight depending on the windows. I feel so nice to have some things growing now, and very interested to see which experiments work and which don't.

Pillow Fight

oday I was feeling very frustrated because I don't ever seem to get anything done after work. It feels like such a colorless life to only have work and getting ready for work to look forward to. Malcolm's response? To start a pillow fight. Perfectly awesome. :-)

Recycling

os Angeles has what seems to me to be a really comprehensive recycling program, but unfortunately, when we moved in, our apartment complex didn't have it set up. As a result, I've made very little progress where the sunroom was concerned, because it was mostly serving as my plastic container/IKEA cardboard box storage, since I wasn't willing to throw out anything I knew was recyclable.


Luckily, setting up recycling for "multifamily units" is actually really easy, you just have to contact the sanitation department with all the relevant information for your unit, and then hope the building manager-


(remember Amir?)
-will agree to allow it to be set up. And why wouldn't a building manager, since it's totally FREE? After a couple of weeks of waiting patiently, the sanitation department worked its magic, Amir agreed, and on Thursday this shiny new thing arrived outside our apartment complex:


(Yay!)
However, I noticed on Friday afternoon that someone had incorrectly decided that a giant smear of barbeque sauce was recyclable, a grave misconception quickly followed by a half-filled milk carton and a Starbucks cup. Sigh. Such a sort lived triumph.

I'm opting in favor of the belief that the big-city dwellers of my apartment complex just don't know what should and should not be recycled. (Notwithstanding the very clear flier from the Sanitation Dept., strewn throughout the unit like a Chinese take-out menu). Hopefully if I go door-to-door and explain about the new bin, people will take more ownership, and commit to treating it right.

In that interest, I made a flier to hopefully more efficiently drive home the important points about what to do/not to do where recycling is concerned:


Tomorrow I'll try this method, and hope it helps rather than simply annoys my fellow residents. I'll let you know. :-)