Joseph and Patrick Save the Day

The other day, Joseph and Patrick were walking together in the local forest. They were going to meet their wives for a double date that they'd been planning for a long time.
"I am so excited!" said Joseph. " I wore my best suit and tie for this date; its going to be awesome!"
"Yeah, " replied Patrick. "I just got done working in the forge and didn't have time to change, but Kiera will understand. Besides, a t-shirt is maybe a little more appropriate for the forest, don't you think?"
Joseph's smile faltered for a second, but he perked right back up. "We both look great. Now, where were we supposed to meet the girls?"

"They should be here any minute," shrugged Patrick. Just then, he noticed a piece of tattered parchment beneath Joseph's shoe. "Hey, what have you got there?" he asked.
Joseph picked up the dirty scrap of paper and spied some barely legible writing on it.

"Hmmm. Kind of hard to make out...." Joseph squinted. "It looks like it says, 'A carton of eggs, a gallon of milk, and a stick of butter.' Hey, wait a minute!!" Joseph was suddenly panicked. "I think this was Tearese's shopping list! She must have had it with her when she and Kiera met each other earlier. She would never leave this lying around...they must have been kidnapped!"
Joseph swiftly pulled his suit coat off and threw his tie aside. Come on, we've got to find them!
When he turned to Patrick, something had changed. Patrick's hands had claws! "Wha..whats going on?"asked Joseph.

Patrick growled. "Well, I suppose you were going to find out sooner or later. I'm a mutant. Whenever I sense danger, my claws come out. I also have metal on my bones because of a freak metalworking accident, but thats another story. Sorry you had to find out this way, but we have no time to waste! Lets go!"
Patrick was surprised to note that Joseph didn't seem at all phased by his revelation. In fact, Joseph had a goofy smile on his face.
"Well, since your secrets out, I suppose I can let loose too. Patrick, I too have a secret identity." and with that, Joseph whipped off his shirt and revealed a red and yellow 'S', emblazoned on a spiffy blue suit.
"I'm not exactly a mutant, but I have my own super powers, if you know what I mean."


"Hey, nice boots! I'll have to get me some of those!" winked Patrick.
Joseph and Patrick realized that they both probably had many mortal enemies, so they decided to brainstorm a minute about who could have taken their wives. They went over all of the big ones.

"What about that numbers guy, the one who thought he was cursed?" asked Joseph. "He was always deceptively kind and passive, but just try to call him names..."
"Na," said Patrick. "Not his style. "What about that little frog guy with something stuck in his throat? He was pretty nasty."
"Well, I heard he met his end in a volcano somewhere," answered Joseph. "Orangutan lips? The Pink Kitty Man? Maybe-"
Just then, there was a great clap of thunder followed by a blinding flash of lightning. The inviting forest was immediately replaced by forboding mist and dark menacing shadows. Joseph and Patrick were instantly on their guard.

"This settles it." said Patrick. "This could only be the work of the Spooky Gunslinger! He's well known for his spreading of evil darkness and Nefarious Poppycock! We must find him and destroy him! Just let me get my claws on his ever-changing hair!"


"Well,"replied Joseph slowly, "I hate to burst your bubble, but didn't Kiera ever tell you that The Gunslinger is her and Tearese's brother?!"
"NOOOO!" Exclaimed Patrick. "How do you know for sure?"
"A year or two ago, I was pacing my fortress of solitude trying to come up with the best way to eliminate this menace to society. I had almost determined how to destroy him, when Tearese came to me, pleading that I leave him alone.


"She promised that he wouldn't trouble us anymore. She even told me his secret identity: Jimmy Sparks, mild mannered college student.
So I promised I would let him be, for her sake." Joseph explained. " And he has never bothered us since. This couldn't be his work, I'm sure of it."
As if on cue, the darkness surrounding the forest quietly lifted. But the two heros sensed they were no longer alone.

Joseph cocked his head to the side. "Shhhhh! My super hearing has picked up footsteps over there. Someone's coming."
"And I'm ready for them," grimaced Patrick, his weapons at the ready.
Neither of our heros was expecting what came bursting through the bushes. There they were, Tearese and Kiera, along with their little girls Isabelle and Elora.
"There you are!" exclaimed Tearese, bouncing Elora on her hip. "Where have you boys been,we could have used your help!"


"Were you kidnapped?! Was it Mr. Orangutan Lips?" exclaimed Joseph. "I found your shopping list that you dropped for me to find! We were so worried."
Tearese laughed. "What? I told you to throw that away last week! You must have put it in your pocket and forgotten about it."
"Well, if you weren't kidnapped," Patrick said slowly, "what was all that darkness and mist earlier?"
Kiera shook her head. "Thats what we needed your help with, guys! The babies got a hold of our wands again and were wreaking havoc with the weather and local wildlife. It took both of us together to distract them with a little song of "Popcorn Popping" so that they would drop the wands. At least now they're tuckered out. I guess thats what you get for marrying Hogwarts graduates. Daughters who take after their mothers!"
Tearese winked at Joseph. "So are we still on for our picnic super-boy? I brought the sandwiches!"
"Oh boy!" cried Joseph. "I've got a 'super' appetite after all of that worry!" He laughed.
Patrick retracted his claws and walked over to his wife and daughter. "I'm feeling pretty hungry myself. Lets have that picnic ladies.

Yay!

So, it appears we may be staying at our apartments after all. We spent all last weekend researching other apartments in the area, and driving around to look at them.
First of all, it seems every apartment group in our area has raised their prices. Even our own apartments were listed online as being $50 more than they are asking of us.
Second, the few apartments we found that were actually cheaper enough to consider were pretty ghetto. They were also in neighborhoods I would not want to live in, believe me.
So we did a few calculations to see how much we would really be saving. It seems that after deposites, moving costs, etc, it would maybe be a couple hundred dollars. And is that really worth the stress of the move, combined with the annoyance I would feel for an entire year at having moved from an apartment I loved? NO!
Therefore, in celebration of this decision that has (almost) been made...(we still have to sign the new lease) Elora and I went on a walk and took a few pics of our neighborhood. I would have got more, but I didn't stop in areas where people were looking at me. So sorry for the incomplete picture.
Presenting: MY NEIGHBORHOOD: A PHOTO ESSAY

A baby I found that wouldn't hold still for a good picture.

Our apartments listed on Rent.com actually used a picture of our specific apartment, out of the 200 individual apartments in our complex! This convinced me ours must be the best one here. PS I didn't take this one.

some cool flowers down the street..too bad the camera couldn't quite capture the soft light the way it really was!

I love all the areas like this around here. There will be a whole block of buildings, but a corner will be completely wild, because it is preserved as wet-lands. It annoys land owners, but it makes for a pretty corner.

This swing was hidden under some trees off the side of the road. Looks fun!

Comin' on evening on a pretty street. (Not my street, but close enough to it that I can enjoy it.)

Y'all come back now, ya hear!

Change is Hard

So, we might have to move from our apartments. Our lease is up at the end of this month, and we have to let them know if we’ll sign a new one by the tenth. Currently, we pay $675, and they want to raise it to $760. I really don't think we can do it. Last year they only raised our rent about $35 dollars... so we weren't to happy this time!

We went to the office today to see if we could negotiate. Our friends the Lunds were able to talk them down to $675 from $750 last fall, and we thought we might be able to do the same. But the lady, Katherine, wasn’t in a negotiating mood. She said she’d see what we could do, but she thought we were getting a great deal because the week after we renew, the renewal rate will go up to $800. Supposedly. I think if someone else had been in the office we might have received more sympathy. We argued our case with the example of the Lunds, as well as the crime rate of our area.(We are supposed to live in the one square mile with the highest crime rate in our county!) We have several friends in the ward who've had cars stolen. We mentioned specific apartments we knew that were charging less, as she had cited that everyone in the area would charge just as much if not higher. But when we mentioned those apartments, her attitude was basically like, well, good luck living there.

I realllly don’t want to move. Our’s are the only apartments in the ward that have big areas of grass and trees, and huge windows.

our livingroom window

view from the balcony

Even though its very small (813 square feet) everywhere else I know of has tiny windows and look out onto a parking lot. Plus, I only know of one or two couples in our apartments that have had their cars broken into. There are at least five or more that live in other areas of our ward where it happens even more often.

It will be extra hard to move because we have two trips planned in the next month, to Joseph’s dads and to my parent’s house. Plus, we were probably only going to be here one more year, so its especially inconvenient. Rrrrr.

On to other news…on Tuesday the Seattle Institute Chorale had their final thank you concert..ever. I was in the Chorale for two years and it was great fun; I think I grew a lot there and I made a lot of friends. The director, Brother S, is also in our ward. Their family is moving to Logan, Utah at the end of this month, hence the farewell concert. Brother S. asked me to give a talk at this concert, as they were having several former choir members speak. He wanted me to talk about how I didn’t like choir at first, but tour really strengthened my testimony.

That wasn’t exactly how I remembered it, but I agreed to speak anyway. As Joseph was at work, I was able to ride down with the S family to the show. (So Sister S, their daughters M, C, K, Ch, and son J. Their three older kids have moved out already.

The show was really fun. People spoke on topics like, “What had happened in choir in the last ten years.” given by a guy who had been in choir all those years. Another was about “S-----isms (our teacher's name) and how they affect chorale.” That one was especially funny. The guy who gave it, T, often joined us on tour to play the bass guitar or something. He was dressed in a pink colored suit. He started out by saying we all needed to wish Brother S a happy birthday. But when he had us stand to sing, he started acting like he was Brother S, and we were the choir. (Brother S is a colorful character, somewhat like Brother M from Cedar's choir, but somehow much more sincere, and I think more entertaining.)

He was using all of his catch phrases, like: “the clock is not our friend; no swooping altos!, my tenors sound anemic; where are my basses? The Angel Moroni appeared to me and told me….” Etc. He was even doing his mannerisms, being fidgety, stamping his foot with the timing etc.

Another girl told how when she was in choir, they’d all bought brother S this star that said ‘unity’ while they were on tour. She happened to have found it just that weekend, so during her talk she turned around and said, “here ya go.”

So for every talk, the program had a title for what they were going to talk about. I was a little surprised at what he had titled mine: “Why I hated choir at first and how I loved tour.” So when I got up to speak, I had to explain that I didn’t hate chorale, it just took time to grow on me. Then I talked about the time we all sang on the Whidbey Island ferry, and the time we were learning Oh Holy Night when I first started choir. These stood out in my mind more than tour the next year.. half of us couldn't go on tour that first year because the choir was too big. But since he wanted me to talk about it, I touched on the temple trip and the three hour testimony meeting they have every year. We went to the Portland Temple the time I went.

I felt really nervous and though I spoke well, I was shaking. He wanted me to bear testimony at the end so I did, but I felt weird because everyone else seemed to get emotional at the end of their talks and I didn’t really. But I usually don’t. Anyway, I was really glad I was invited to participate, because I likely would have missed it otherwise.

Since being in chorale, Joseph and I have gone to their end of year concert every spring. But now, the chorale will not be continuing at all. It seems odd to me that such a huge part of my life can just suddenly not exist anymore...and I didn't even move away this time! Its very sad.

Our young womens group is really going to change when they’re gone, as C, M and K make up almost half of the class! They are also some of the best examples in the group, real good girls. I just hope some of the other girls step up and become leaders too. I guess the S family's new house in Logan is huge, thanks to the huge difference in housing prices (as mentioned before!) Their house here is selling for like $450,000! Crazy.

Another change. A few weekends ago, we drove up to Bellingham, Washington to look at the campus of Western Washington University. Joseph is considering going there because they have a good education program. It was a pretty campus but we didn’t look around too long. Joseph had only paid for one hour of parking. When we went back to the car I thought we were just going to go park at another spot and check out the other side of the campus, but we didn’t.

We did drive around the town a bit. I didn’t like it that much, but first impressions are rarely accurate. The waterfront was very industrial. We might stop in Ellensburg on our way home from his dads house too, to look at Central Washington University. I’m more open now to his completing his degree somewhere else, because half of our ward seems to be moving anyway. But we’ll see how things are next summer. Change is hard.

But sometimes it helps us become something better. I guess.