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Thursday, January 26, 2012

Neighbors... who needs 'em?!

Have you ever seen how neighbors act in movies or on television?  Neighbors are supposed to be the best thing since sliced bread.  They become your best friends and your go to people for dinner parties and barbeques.  You invite each other to go for walks with your dogs, and love spending time together.  You even go to them for advice…


My neighbors are nothing like that. I wouldn’t consider them acquaintances, let alone friends. I really wish that just once, I could get normal neighbors. Heck, I’d even settle for this guy…


Why am I so anti-neighbor? Well let me tell you about a few of my neighbors. We’ll start with the least offensive and work our way up.


First, there’s the young family two stories up. They have a son about the age of 3. He thinks it’s funny to throw things off his balcony onto our patio. It was cute the first time a piece of vertical blind fell down onto our patio (yes, he pulled it straight off the blinds covering the sliding glass door and over the balcony). After a few more pieces fell, we decided to let mom know. We took the pieces back upstairs. She told her son that Justin was a police man who takes bad children away. Now this poor child is worried about some man watching him all the time. On top of that, the threat didn’t work. A few weeks later, he threw his mom’s thong over the balcony… oops!


Next, we have the weird guy across the yard in the next building. He didn’t really start coming out until recently. Why, you might ask. Well his dad committed suicide about a month ago in their apartment. Within hours, his family was swarming their apartment to ransack it for the dad’s belongings. Who does that hours after someone dies? Heck, the police were still there making sure it wasn’t a homicide! Now the weird guy comes out and talks to Justin all the time.


We also have the large family that lives next door. I say large family, but I’m not really sure how many people live in there… I’m guessing about 10, and they all share one key. I could care less how many people lived there if it weren’t for the knocking. Every few hours, one of them comes home and bangs on the door, yelling that they don’t have the key. And since my door is right next to theirs, I hear it ever time! It only costs like $1.50 to get a copy of a key made! I’d fork up the money if I knew it would make them stop knocking every few hours!


Then, there is the guy with the truck. I’m not sure where he lives, or even what he looks like, but he drives me nuts. He thinks that it is fun to park his car close to my apartment late at night and just let it run for a good half hour or more. It wouldn’t be so bad, except it’s a stupid diesel truck! Do you know how loud a diesel truck sounds around 11:00pm? Well, I do… it’s loud! And just to top it off, his headlights shine towards my apartment and light up around my window blinds like it was Christmas.


Finally, there’s the family in the apartment upstairs. They moved in around Thanksgiving, but I have no idea how they got there. I never saw anyone move in that weekend, it’s like they just appeared. I think it is a herd of elephants that never leave their apartment. On top of that, those damn elephants installed a bowling alley. Why would I say that? Well, have you ever been to a bowling alley and accidentally dropped a bowling ball? I hear that sound all day long! And the elephants are deaf, because their TV is so loud, I can hear it, word for word, through my ceiling.


Justin and I are planning to move when our lease is up in few months. We were planning on staying for a couple years when we first moved in, but the elephants upstairs leave us no peace and quiet and we just can’t take it anymore. And it’s only been two months! We’re looking forward to renting a house and not dealing with the issues created by living in an apartment.


And about those things called neighbors… one of these days, I’m going to find some neighbors that I actually don’t mind, and maybe, just maybe, we can even be friends.

Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Introduction to the World

Hey there everyone (or the few people who might actually read this)!  Welcome to "The Nerd Life"!  I finally decided to join the blog world and see what it's all about.  So this is me testing the water and trying to kind of document life.

I guess I'll start with an introduction to the nerds...

I'm Ellen, and I'll be your tour guide through this blog.  Let's see, what would you all like to know?  I was born and raised in St. Louis as a math nerd.  I'm from a very large family... I'm number 3 of 8 children.  I went to college (in Springfield) to decide what I wanted to do with my life, and left with a masters in accountancy.  Now I work as a business analyst for a distribution company in St. Louis.  I spend my day crunching numbers and analyzing data.  After work, I hit the gym a few times each week.  I'm kind of a homebody, but I do enjoy getting out when I can.  I'm definitely a TV junkie.

This is Justin, my fiance.  He's just along for the ride.  Justin was born and raised in Eldon, a tiny little town in the middle of Missouri.  He's also from a large family, which includes both his biological family and his adopted family.  He went to college (in Jefferson City) to get a degree in computers.  He now works as a computer programmer for a manufacturing company.  He spends his day typing gibberish (he calls it code) and fixing people's computer problems.  He's very much a morning person and enjoys hitting the weights before work.  After work, Justin enjoys playing Starcraft and spending time with me.

And last, but not least, this is Maggie, our little fur-baby.  She is definitely a handful, but we love her very much.  She spends her day watching birds through the sliding glass door and lounging around on her new perch.  She loves picking fights with Justin and snuggling up with me.

Justin and I got engaged in March 2010 during a romantic getaway for the two of us in St. Louis.  We spent the weekend at the Westin where I was pampered with a massage, mani, and pedi.  In the evening, Justin took us to dinner at Dominic's where he proposed!  We are planning a beach wedding for April 22, 2012 (only 3 more months) in Cocoa Beach, Florida and we are very excited to start our life together.

So I guess that's enough of an introduction to us nerds.... see ya on the flip side!