The one where Lia became ancient...

Hey kids!

So, as usual, I am super late in covering important events in our life. I would totally lose the blogging olympics. Especially because every picture in this post is going to be from my iPhone (in honor of Steve, of course.)

I'll pick up where my wonderful, handsome husband left off. My birthday. Folks, this getting older thing is no longer fun; I just don't see a reason for it anymore. Sean already gets good deals on rental cars even though we aren't 25 (remember, he is a fancy consultant) and my eggs are as ready as they'll ever be. So basically the birthdays can just stop now.

I suppose I shouldn't complain though because I had a pretty awesome birthday celebration this year. Being married is fun because it obligates at least one person to buy you super cool gifts and tell you how wonderful you are all day. Sean did a fantastic job with this. He got me almost everything on my wish list (even the make up brushes I wanted!!!) and took me on a wonderful birthday date. Although, he didn't even get back to South Florida until 5 pm (again with that work business...hmph) so I guess he had to be extra sweet. After I picked him up from the airport (aren't I the kindest wife even on my birthday?) I requested we head straight to the driving range. This whole turning 24 thing has really changed my interests. I find myself always wanting to golf instead of playing soccer and riding around on jet skis. I'm officially an old person.

 Sean has taught me well...

Sometimes things don't go so smoothly...

I thought it would be a good idea to take video of our swings. Turns out it just depressed me because my swing is way more pathetic than I thought it was. Sean totally and completely out does me in this aspect of life. I suppose I shouldn't be too hard on myself though I started 2 weeks ago and he has been golfing since age six. Also, I was using his huge man clubs that weigh like 209302 pounds. 

                                       

Is he not the cutest thing ever in his work clothes, cheesin' at the camera? 

Sean was so impressed with my commitment to the great game of golf that he bought me my very own set of women's clubs this past weekend (extra birthday gift I guess!!). He finally realized that I wasn't the weakest girl in the world, his golf clubs are just the heaviest clubs in the world. I requested a purple bag...he delivered. 

The girliest golf clubs in the world according to Sean. They will make me unstoppable...HA. 

Wait, is this post about about golf or my birthday? Jeez, apparently I'm easily side tracked. 

After we went to the range we got ready and went to dinner...just the two of us. We hadn't been on a date for awhile so it was very fun to get dressed up a bit and go out. We went to the Grand Lux Cafe (owned by the same company as Cheesecake Factory). They had super fun cocktails. I think this was a passion fruit mojito or something of the sort. 

On Saturday it was the UM vs. OSU football game. Sean is a season ticket holder. I didn't want to sit at home by myself during my birthday weekend so I also went. Sean is slowly trying to turn me into a real football fan. He explains the strategy of each play to me. He points out specific  players I should watch during each play. It is SO hard to even follow the ball in football...I totally fall for all of the trick plays. I always think the quarterback still has the ball while the running back is like 30 yards down the field with it. I don't think I'd be a very good linebacker (hey, at least I sorta know some of the positions!!)

The tail gate before the game is the real event of a football Saturday. Aunt Cheri even brought a birthday cake for me! Good Auntie she is! UM won...barely. GO CANES! I guess being 24 isn't so bad...I get to be a cougar for the next 6 months. Yahoo!

One last parting note - look out for me on the LPGA tour. I'll be making my debut in the next few months. (Stop laughing folks!)

Do I Plan Too Much?

For those of you who don't know me, I like to plan things.  I am only now starting to wonder if I plan a little too much...  I will let my millions of fans on the interweb be the judge.

Here are some beautiful examples of my planning..  I have one, five and ten year plans that include things such as getting a particular score on my GMAT and seeing a World Cup game in Brasil (I can spell it that way, thanks to Lia).  I have a pretty dang complicated financial model that estimates and tracks my income, cost of living, savings and investments going out only 5 years, since beyond that the variables are too unpredictable.  I also have my three target/dream careers, and all of my plans are working towards me one day realizing one of those.  Those three are Governor of FL/TN, a Managing Partner for a private equity group, or a really cool big time real estate developer.  The common theme between all of those careers is that they are all heavily dependent upon thinking and planning, which seems like a whole mess of fun.

My hobbies also coincidentally revolve around planning.  I have this strange desire to design systems, processes, houses and especially cities.  I even do research so that I can plan better.  Isn't that sick?  I have planned out what an intelligent version of healthcare reform would look like (intentional offense to anyone who thinks the one they passed was intelligent), I have formulated plans for reducing crime and poverty in cities, and I have even gone about designing entire cities from the ground up just to get an idea of what I think the perfect city would look like so that I could determine what are the most important factors to consider when planning to improve real cities.

A high level map I drew a while back is shown here:

And here is a street level drawing, complete with bike path along the water and unnecessarily robust mass transit:

So by now you are probably thinking that I am crazy and obsessive about this stuff, but here is my curve ball for you. Isn't it a good thing?  While people waste their lives watching shows about other people being filmed wasting their lives, I am working hard to solve all of the world's problems so that if I ever do get the opportunity to make things better, I'll be ready to pounce.

It's all part of the plan...

However, there is a severe unintended consequence of all of my thinking and planning.. and that is that Lia lives with me and has to deal with it all the time.  As difficult as it is for me to solve all of the world's problems on airplane napkins, it has to be even harder for her to listen to me talk about them all the time.  I am trying to get better about turning the thinking off.. So as a first step, did you see Jersey Shore last week?  They are so stupid...