Despite a late start, we managed to wrap up the second day of Halloween films before 10 PM Sunday night. Here is what we saw:
#6 Army of Darkness
#5 Bride of Frankenstein
#4 Little Shop of Horrors
#3 Lost Boys
#2 The Addams Family
#1 The Wicker Man
Thanks to Matt for running it and everybody else for participating 
It was a great finale to a great weekend!
OK, I have to admit that was a lot of fun.
Michael and I had breakfast at Marigold Kitchen this morning, then we arrived back home, our respective people showed up, and we went our separate ways. Michael and Josh went out to Misty Mountain Games (meeting up with Athena there) to spend 9-10 hours playing mods for the “Weekend in the Realms” special event.
Betsy, Alice, Stephani and I went out for a day of wedding shopping, girl chat and lots of random laughter. We started at Moments to Cherish in Fitchburg, where we able to freely browse the store and grab dresses that caught our attention. I tried on four dresses and two are prime candidates for “The” wedding dress. We all liked how both of them looked on me and I think the last one was really probably the one everyone liked best, but it was hard to say. Surprisingly, one of them was strapless.
We stopped by La Baguette, a new French bakery on the west side, to grab pastries and had lunch at Swagat Indian Resturant. We looked in Beauty Blossoms briefly since it’s located in the same shopping center as Swagat and returned to my house for a bit. Then we piled into Alice’s car and headed to Hilldale to look at invitation samples at Sarah B’s. Amid conversation and laughter, we made it through a couple of books by different designers before the group needed to disband for the day.
We had fun, it was a productive trip, and I really enjoyed spending time with friends doing things that we normally do not do.
I have two more dress shop appointments for next weekend and could definitely spend more time looking at Sarah B’s at some point. They have enough sample books to keep me busy for a while … although I think at some point I just make a decision … it’s really not necessary to go through every book in existence to find a great invitation design.
I am going to try to make it to Duck Soup tonight, if I can get a ticket at the door. Josh and Michael will be gaming for the next several hours, so I’m not sure which one of us will be home first.
Tomorrow is Day 2 of the Halloween Film Fest, so I am sure I will report about that at some point. I must get motivated to wake up early, maybe make it to the gym, and do some baking before the movies begin!
::devours some groomsmen::
MUST RAMPAGE MIGHTY DESTRUCTION!!! ::ROAR::
MUST DESTROY MECHABRIDEZILLA, CAKE-RA, KING GROOMADELLI!
Seriously, though, shopping plans are congealing. I have an appointment at Moments to Cherish for this Saturday morning to look at gowns. Appointments for David’s Bridal and Vera’s House of Bridals (not associated with horses) have been set for November 1st, which is coming up pretty quick!
I am going to drive up to Janesville, probably later in November, to check out the outlet store for Vera’s. It’s only open on Saturdays, but no appointment is necessary there.
Best of all, I have a squad of 7 or 8 friends who are willing to help me scope out some of these options!
I have requested invitation samples from a couple of sources online and will probably check out Sarah B.’s in Madison for some ideas. I have a shortlist of bakeries I want to scope out and a sort-of shortlist of caterers. I have a suggestion for a florist to use and a couple of random wedding-related places that I may check out.
Here is the line-up from last Friday night (for the 10th Halloween Film Festival, Matt had us vote on a selection of movies shown in previous years and we’re watching the results in reverse order):
#10 Rocky Horror Picture Show
#9 The Shining (Kubrick’s version)
#8 Ghostbusters
#7 Frankenstein (1932)
We will be watching the rest of the movies on Sunday, October 26th. I think everyone had a good time Friday night
My little ordeal with Verizon ended today, with the arrival of a check in my name totaling $37.59.
Here is what happened.
In April or May I noticed that my usually-predictable monthly bill was suddenly a bit higher. I called to find out why. The customer service representative mentioned that my contract with Verizon had expired in April and (apparently) my text message package had changed on its own, resulting in me going over my message usage. I am pretty sure that I had a 400 message package at one time (though I couldn’t review my plan history) and they suddenly had me on a 250 message limit.
OK, well, I didn’t do anything, certainly didn’t sign a new contract with Verizon. In July, Michael and I purchased iPhones and switched our service to AT&T. All was well and good until Verizon sent me a huge bill (around $280 if I remember correctly) for supposedly breaking my contract with them. I called and relayed the information I had received in April: I shouldn’t be charged any fees since I wasn’t actually IN a contract.
Verizon was supposed to investigate this matter and contact me via phone. They did not call me back … and sent out another bill. I had written them a few emails in the meantime, so there was various documentation happening and I think I mentioned the Better Business Bureau at some point. Finally, I wrote another email explaining what I had been through and asking them to please resolve the matter. Someone responded — actually telling me that I was right and that Verizon actually owed me money for overpayment on my last bill (before the overbilling error, I’m assuming).
Then I received a billing statement confirming that I indeed owed them negative money. And today, a few weeks later, the reimbursement check arrived.
Lesson learned: Pay close attention to service contract lengths and expiration dates- apparently it’s not unheard of to be defaulted to a different plan if you don’t renew your contract. Also, overbilling sometimes happens and you should ask questions and complain if you believe it has happened to you.
The contract for the venue for our wedding/reception is signed, money and documents are on their way to the office.
I had a conversation online about wedding-related things with Maretta on Friday night and have a couple of Saturdays in mind for venturing out to a couple of wedding dress shops– maybe October 25th and November 22nd. November 1st might be another possibility. Anyone want to accompany me? I can’t say I’ve had the experience of shopping for a wedding dress for myself or anyone else before, so it will be a new experience. I hope it’s fun!
I think I have taken care of everything I hoped to do this weekend and we’ve had a good weekend. Our Friday night out for our pre-anniversary was great and we ended up stopping by the Great Dane to visit with some old co-workers of Michael’s who were in town. It’s nice to chat with people we don’t get to see very often.
It’s been over a week since I posted. The beginning of this month has been busy.
I have been taking a good look around me today, taking a few photos, enjoying the day. One year from today is our wedding day. This is the last October 10th that we won’t be celebrating either our wedding or its anniversary. No, I lie. We’re celebrating our -1st (negative first) anniversary by going out to dinner tonight.
I don’t know whether dinner at Maharaja is going to be an anniversary tradition or not. It seems that we won’t be eating dinner there on October 10th *next* year. And I hope we can celebrate the day while traveling on our first anniversary since we may not take a big honeymoon trip right away. However, I like traditions and Maharaja has some significance for us as a couple.
Today was a warm, pretty day with a high around 71. It would have been a great day to have a wedding. The temperatures haven’t dropped uncomfortably yet this Fall, though the mornings start out chilly and many trees are changing colors. The leaves have been piling up in our yard and Michael was mowing/mulching again this afternoon when I came home from work.
Last weekend our friend Matt came from Chicago to visit and we had a good time hanging out with him. Michael ran our first 4th edition RPGA mod on Saturday and we had our regular games on Friday night and Sunday afternoon. Friends stayed for dinner on Saturday and hung out most of that evening, as well. It was a very social weekend and the front door kept opening as people came and went.
We chilled at the bookstore for a couple of hours on Sunday night and took Monday night off to rest up from the weekend. Tuesday was our weekly movie night. Terry and Tom came over, I made chili, and we watched The Butterfly and The Diving Bell. On Wednesday I baked pumpkin muffins, pumpkin bread, and a pumpkin pie (sense a theme here?) and last night we finished up the computer game we’ve been playing through together recently, Barrow Hill. That was a spooky one, but also a fun puzzle/detective-style game.
As much as I am looking forward to visiting my family next month, I really hope this whole month doesn’t slide by as quickly as the first 1/3 has gone. I love October and we have some fun things happening this month– such as the Guffeys’ 10th Annual Halloween Film Fest, split up over two days this year. I’m looking forward to the rest of the year– and 2009!
For the first evening of October, we are having lasagna for dinner. I just pulled it from the oven and it looks good. So far I am happy with the results of using homemade tomato sauce that I made from tomatoes and basil that grew in our garden this summer.
I originally cooked most of the batches of tomato sauce that I made in August and September in the crock pot, letting the sauce simmer all day while I was at work. I did not add tomato paste (which I think was a mistake) but I can easily make up for this by adding it when I heat up each portion of tomato sauce (there are several quart-size bags in the freezer).
Now I need to motivate myself to clean out the garden and glean the last of the summer produce before frost kills the tomato plants. Looks like we have a chance of frost Friday night, so I should probably work on this pretty soon.
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