Jennifer and I went to give blood on Saturday. On Monday I drove by Schoharie High School where they were having a blood drive. Though I had the time and the blood, I didn't stop to donate. At the time it was because of cowardice, but now I understand cowardice is the first step of the process I go through while steeling my nerves. By the end of the week I had prepared myself both mentally and emotionally to donate (though I almost lost my will after Jennifer told me the last time she donated they didn't clip her tubes and she squirted blood all over herself, the nurse, and all the other people there). I didn't need to prepare myself physically because I have huge veins already and the nurses never have any problem finding them to stab.
I lived. The last two times I've donated I've almost passed out. The first time they gave me a band aid for the finger they pricked and sent me on my way. The next time they bleed me a little more. As I was finishing everything started to get really quiet and my vision started to go blurry and grey. I imagine that's what dying feels like. I waved the the nurse over. They strapped me into an orange chair and flipping me upside down so all the blood I had left would pool in my brain. I sat/hung there for a few minutes for my own health and for the amusement of all the other donors.
I mentioned my predilection for passing out to the nurse attending me this last time. She suggested it was because I was filling my bag so quickly. So I guess I'm good at bleeding. If I could pick my talents, "bleeding fast" wouldn't be one of them.
Jennifer and I hit our eight month anniversary a few days ago. I figure it's due time for a blog update. After 246 days we're still together and still very much in love.
A lot has happened in the past eight months. We went on a second honeymoon to Bermuda in May with my cousins John and Christy. They found some cheap tickets for a cruise on Orbitz.com and invited us along. Initially we weren't going to go, having just gone on a cruise to the Bahamas five months prior. But then we remembered we didn't have any kids or real adult responsibilities yet, so we joined them. It was so much better than our Bahamas cruise. It's the difference between vacationing in Fargo or Miami.
Also, we don't have any kids yet. Thank goodness.
Though Jennifer keeps trying to tell me they're not all that bad.
This past week we went to Palmyra to watch the Book of Mormon pageant.
It was the special 75th anniversary edition pamphlet. This one is soon to be available on ebay. The actual pageant wasn't anything special. That's not to say it wasn't any good, just I've been like 6 times and it's been the same thing every time so if you apply the term "special" to something ordinary it kind of devalues the word. It was Jennifer's first time though, so maybe it was special to her. We got there two and a half hours early to get good seats. Also because our temple session ended at 7pm and there's nothing to do in Palmyra so it was either stake out good seats or sit in our car and eat cold Crazy Bread from Little Caesar's. Had we sat in our car though we would have missed out on hearing the testimonies of the entire cast of pageant. Before the show all the actors fan out in the audience and ask members where they're from and if they've seen the pageant before and ask non members where they're from and if they've seen pageant before then sending over the Elders/Sisters for some follow up first discussion action. Since we were there so early there was plenty of time for all 800 cast members to stop by where we were sitting. And it turns out we didn't need to get there quite so early for good seats since there was no one sitting next to us for 7 seats in any direction.
The next day we went to Albany to see The Dark Knight Rises.
The seats around us at this show were a lot less empty.
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