our one month anniversary!

It's been almost two weeks since I last blogged. I've been meaning to for the past couple weekends, especially now that I know there are actually readers! It's been an interesting past couple weeks, so I'll share some of our funny moments and exciting activities!

1. Ian and I learned that it's really hard to play along with Wheel of Fortune when you don't have the antenna adjusted properly. We guessed "the entrance to a... manatee?" when it was "the entrance to a castle. The fuzz makes counting blank boxes impossible. So lesson from married life: let your husband adjust the antenna. :)

2. We went shopping, which is an event without a car and going to South Philly. We got dropped off at Wal-Mart, ran across scary alleys to get to Target to grab a few things, then ran back to make the bus so we wouldn't have to wait an extra hour and a half and so we could watch the K-State/Texas A&M game. Funny story though, while waiting for our bus (the apartment complex has a bus shuttle, very handy, and free, with rent, of course), we met a Temple grad student who happened to have attended K-State last semester! His name is Ahmed, and he's superbly nice! He invited us over for dinner with him and his friends the next night, and I'll go into slightly more detail a little later.

3. We also found a bad sports bar. Pop music from our high school days, TV's they couldn't change the channel on, they wanted to potentially kick us out if they "got busy" because we were occupying a table. Seriously. If you're a restaurant, don't say you're a sports bar. *angry fist* We won't go back. Plus, we paid 10 bucks for a pizza so we could sit there, and it was tiny and definitely worth half what we paid.

4. We tried to go ice skating at Penn's Landing.

But apparently they are really busy and have sessions you buy a pass for. We got there after they sold out for the current session, and would have missed the last subway train if we stayed for the next one, so we decided to go skating sometime the following week, and ended up going to Cosi to eat some food, so our trip to Old City wasn't pointless (Philadelphia has different cities which are the divisions of Philadelphia. We live in Center City, in the museum district. Ian works in Old City. I work in Center City. There's also University City. Still learning the rest...) So Cosi is like Panera Bread/St. Louis Bread Co. on steroids. They offer alcohol and mixed coffee drinks, but it's the way Bluestem serves alcohol. People enjoy a drink, but no one drinks too much there... basically. Anyway, it was fantastic food, and they were really nice serving us so close to their closing time.

5. We went to Christchurch, the Episcopal Church of Ben Franklin and George Washington. They, however, are very theologically liberal, and we decided it wasn't a good fit. But cool to see and feel the history!

6. We had dinner with Ahmed and his friends. We ate Indian food sitting on their floor with newspaper for a table, used our hands, and Ian cried because he ate the spicy stuff so fast (I mixed in lots of yogurt and drank lots of apple juice, or I would have died after 10 bites). It was so interesting to meet people from another culture, learn their perspective of us, our nation, our culture, and our religion. What they knew about Christianity was based off of The DaVinci Code since that was all they were exposed to. It was interesting to hear their thoughts on politics, society, and faith.

7. I waited on a customer who was a total jerk to me. He probably was some rich guy, and he was buying chocolate for his wife, who had stayed up three days straight with their daughter, who had surgery for Crohn's disease. I understand he was under stress, but he made me feel stupid: "it can't be that hard to put chocolate in a box" when in actuality it was, because he ordered 4 different things at 3 different prices, so I was supposed to price it all separately, ergo, it would take longer. But I feel sorry for him. One, his daughter, and two, he's the kind of person who is like that under stress. So I've been praying for him and his family, and if you'd like to do the same, that's great.

8. It's fun visiting Ian at work. The building he's in also houses the Italian consulate, so it's more security. The guy at the front desk, who's dressed to the nines, has to scan his card and push the button for me on the elevator, so I don't end up somewhere I'm not supposed to be. Which makes it rather exciting. And the people he works with are great, so it's fun meeting them! He loves his work, by the way. He's had so much fun, despite a couple late nights (not as late as studio!) while they finished up a project presentation. But then he could have gotten off 1.5 hours early the day after they sent it all in, so it worked out.

9. We finally went skating, and it was so nice because not many people were there. And neither one of us fell at all! We discovered a cool place to eat in Old City. It's called The Continental, and they've got a variety of food inspired from worldwide cuisine. It's served family style, and it's quite the atmosphere!

10. We found our ACME replacement here in Philly. If you've been to ACME gifts in Manhattan, it's a fascinating store with random and fun books, gifts, little rubber chickens, weird cards... Anyway, this store isn't far from Ian's office, and it's called Foster's *Homeware. They've got all that fun little stuff ACME has, but also really modern furniture, cookware, dishes, handy house stuff. You should check out the web site!

11. I got boots! We found me some tall Steve Madden shearling lined boots, and I've never owned anything quite so warm. It helps, considering it's cold and we walk everywhere. Plus they were on sale, and they're cute! It also gave us the opportunity to wander around Rittenhouse Square and take these fun photos!

this is me pretending to kiss the frog statue, at Ian's request.

12. We found a great church community called Grace Covenant Church. They have 3 sites, and we went to the one on Penn's campus, which is actually in their School of Design building. Crazy! The people there are great, and it seems like a solid church. Kirsten, one lovely lady we met, gave us some suggestions for other churches to try, which I think we will, but we definitely will go back to GCC.

13. I was going to leave this at 12 little tidbits, but I can't not talk about last night and the game! We went to Chickie and Pete's, rated by ESPN as the #3 sports bar in the nation. They serve amazing crab (flavored) french fries, which lead to the semi-famous shirt, "Got crabs?" and have a fantastic philly steak sandwich, and great mozzarella sticks. It's good food, and made even better by the good service, and their accommodating us to turn a nearby TV to ESPN+ so we could actually watch the game. Which was historic, as we haven't beaten KU at home since 1983. GO CATS!

Overall, this past month has been great. There are definitely challenges, but it is all worth it! Ian and I love being married, and are enjoying Philly so much! Hooray one month of marriage!

Final Dessert Pack Soda Review, and the (messy) apartment

First off, I'd like to thank everyone who has commented... here, via Facebook, phone calls, etc. It makes me feel good to know someone (actually, lots of someones!) are reading this! Motivation to keep it up, anyway!

Tonight our shiny building is sparkling blue again, but i think it's blinking faster than last time... more like, static. And those four in a row are still blinking all together. They should fix that.

Our jobs are going well. Ian hit the ground running after his two day bout with the flu (which he enjoyed, once he stopped throwing up, by watching 6 episodes of LOST in one day). He's working on a project at Duke, and it's due at the end of the month, so he'll be working a little later, and more. But don't worry. It's still less than studio back at home! I'm still enjoying Chocolate by Mueller. When you all come to visit, we'll take you to Reading Terminal Market (yes, as in Reading Railroad... Monopoly! Speaking of Monopoly, there's a building with a large Monopoly iron and red Sorry piece in front of it... I walk past it on my way to and from work). This past weekend we just enjoyed wandering around Philly a little bit more, grocery shopping, and we bought a plant. It's tropical, and we named it Jin. From LOST, because Jin is Korean and married to Sun. And so our plant Jin loves the sun... get it? Okay, yeah, we're weird.

Funny story. Walking around this weekend, we get to this crosswalk (there are tons of crosswalks everywhere... it's like a giant board game... except more dangerous.... dant dant daaaa), and we see this guy in crazy bright clothes, and he says to this other guy, who's in a suit, looks a little... flamboyant, and is really tall and awkward — think Abraham Lincoln without the stovepipe hat and facial hair... and more... pretty — anyway, the first guy says, "are we dancing?" and the other guy says "maybe!" then throws his head back and laughs this ah hahahaha laugh... really weird, just like Lord Farquaad in Shrek, then he runs across the street (in the crosswalk, of course), limbs flying everywhere. Ian and I laughed so hard. Then he said something about it being a weird interaction with a gigolo and a maybe customer, and I got all creeped out by what that conversation could have meant. You get everything in the big city. But it's entertainment, right?

So Monday night, Ian and I decided it was time to crack open the final dessert pack Jones Soda: Apple Pie. It's in three parts because my camera kept running out of memory (forgot to delete all those wedding photos off the camera after transferring them. They'll be on Facebook soon, hopefully!). However, part one, for some reason, isn't cooperating. It's stuck on my camera, and I can't get it to play even on there. So, basically, it's three minutes of Ian filming me "waiting" for me to sit down so we can review the final soda. Except he didn't tell me he was waiting and already filming. Followed by our sniffy-sniffs (he's started doing that to other words now, like, foldy-fold.... silly goose). Basically, we got a lot of cream soda, little apple, and it reminded me of my grandpa because he'd cut up bananas and put it in milk with vanilla and sugar. And I forgot he did that, and that I used to do that too, until I smelled it. So I liked it even before trying it, while Ian was less than impressed. Okay. You're ready to watch part 2, the first video. The second video is part 3, which also includes a quick run-through of the apartment. Please forgive the boxes... and the unmade bed. We both went to work, and I didn't get up in time to make it before we left... and we did the videos almost right after we came home.

Apple Pie: 90

So I hope that was enjoyable. It's getting late, so we're going to bed. Goodnight!

The road trip and move to Philadelphia!

Roadtrip to Philadelphia: day 1 (Saturday)
After a slightly late start, we turned our U-Haul in the direction of I-70 and headed east. Along with us in the cab (in addition to Charlie, our teddy bear, the mac, and all three seasons of Arrested Development), is the dessert pack of Jones Soda, so thoughtfully picked out for me for Christmas by Nathan. To preface the following, Ian is a Vayniac. Gary Vaynerchuk fan, that is. He has the Thunder Show where he reviews wines. You can watch him on his podcast. TV.WineLibrary.com. Actually, do that right now, then come back and read the following.

Lemon Meringue: 90+

>

Cherry Pie: 92
laughter at the lid (lids said “a happy event will take place shortly in your home” and “all your hard work will soon pay off”)

Anna: I can smell… a little bit of angel food cake, with cherry flavoring. Good cherry flavoring.

Ian: The bouquet has warm aromas, like a maraschino cherry, and then towards the end, you get a little vanilla, and cream soda action, and what I would call a good old-fashioned good time. That was the sniffy-sniff, by the way.

Anna: Yeah… vanilla. It reminds me of that va-va vanilla lip-gloss I used to have. That was high school, before you. Sorry.

Ian: Lets give it a whirl.

Anna: So…. It takes like, wow, I can taste the vanilla. And cherry….

Ian: Wow, there’s cinnamon, right there. Kind of a graham cracker crust action on the palate there. Very airy, light, fluffy. It has a component that reminds me of being at Grandma’s house, because she makes the best cherry pie by the way, and even though it isn’t near as good as her cherry pie, it still reminds me of her cherry pie. So grandma just pulls the cherry pie out of the oven, and I’m like eight years old, and I know the smell of the cherry pie and she’s cooking it. So I run into the kitchen, I stick my finger in the cherry pie and it burns the heck out of my finger, and I put it n my mouth and it burns my mouth too, and its like that warm cherry pie that’s cherry, and crust and bread and cinnamon that I appreciate and adore. Good job Jones Soda! Even though the lemon meringue didn’t rock my pants off, I feel like on this cherry pie, the belt is off, and my pants are unbuttoned. You know, it’s that kind of thing. It’s that good.

Aside from the entertaining Jones Soda reviews, we also accomplished the conquering of Missouri and Illinois (purchasing a now very loved Sonicare Toothbrush and eating at Culvers, on recommendation from Fox), and stayed the night in Terre Haute, Indiana. Which trails into day 2, next.

Road trip to Philadelphia: day 2 (Sunday)
We packed up our things, and I had to finish up just a few things, but Ian took stuff out to the U-Haul. He came back and said “Anna, I have some bad news.” The first thing that pops into my head is that someone broke into the U-Haul and stole our stuff. Then he said we had a flat tire. I was relieved, but this was still a problem. After running across to a gas and service station to find their service side was closed on Sundays, we called U-Haul. This was on recommendation of calling someone the nice ladies (with strong accents) working there said to call, and he told us to call U-Haul. Ian stayed with the truck, and I waited in the lobby (the truck was way in back) in case they came that way. By the way, if you have a flat, you call the U-Haul number, and they arrange for someone to come fix it, and they pay for it too, even if you didn’t buy the insurance! So I watched news and cleaned out my purse. The service guys, who were a little weird but very nice and helpful, looked at the tire, said it had a hole in the wall, and took it, before leaving to get a new one. Ian and I are so thankful we stopped in Terre Haute. We were going to try and make it further to Indianapolis, but we got tired. It was such a blessing, and an answer to the prayers of many many people, because we could have blown the tire. And the service was very fast, especially considering it was Sunday. We made it out of Terre Haute around 1 p.m., and the guys even called about 30 minutes later to make sure we were still doing okay!

We continued on through Indiana, then Ohio. We had to stop in Columbus to see the Horseshoe (where Ohio State plays football), and it was so huge. We took pictures!

We traveled on and made it through to Pennsylvania. We went through lots of tunnels.

Basically, we drove under several mountains, were astonished at how high the toll is (I think total we’re spending about 20 bucks to drive across Pennsylvania, seriously!!), at how low the speed limits are, at how bumpy the roads are, and how they can’t write proper English on their road signs. “tunnel: 1 miles” and “keep alert.” PDOT should so hire me to fix all of them. Hehe. I also collected a few more entertaining Ian quotes. “Holy crap, is that a mountain?! That scared me!” and “Is that sushi or puppets?” in reference to a billboard, which I can’t remember what it was anymore, but neither thing, I think. Right after this he continued singing a song he’d be singing right before, and the very next words out of his mouth were “It must have been a lunatic you’re looking for.” I about died laughing! We also continued our Jones Soda reviews.

Blueberry Pie: 85
Hello everybody and welcome to SodaLibraryTV. Today we’ll be reviewing another item from the Jones Soda Dessert pack – Blueberry Pie.

Anna: It reminds me of something that I can’t remember what. Maybe candy… at the pool…. Blue raspberry sour punch straws? Without the sour, and with some cotton candy in there.

Ian: I have a very distinct blueberry memory. Lets give it sniffy-sniff. Ready? Oooh, it’s kinda got a, I can smell a little blueberry, but it’s kinda a bad smell too. It kinda smells like a cleaner of sorts. It kinda has some sugary crust action. But not a good nose. It’s not a cherry good sugarfied. I’m not liking it as much. No cream soda. This is different. Hmmm. Kinda smells like a, oh, what’s the name of the dishwashing liquid you put in the dishwasher? That’s what it kinda smells like. Like a jet-dry or something. That’s what it smells like. Lets give it a whirl. *smacks*  You know, blueberry has to be a hard taste to recreate in a soda. Because Jones does a good job of recreating things, but I’m not getting it. A little in the aftertaste. It’s not bad. I get kinda the crusty action I did on the cherry. It’s got that same kind of taste to it. And it’s sweet, but I don’t really get… it’s like a mixed berry, not a blueberry. Not my favorite. I’m going to give this an 85. Because I think they tried really hard. Knowing Jones, as hard as they could. Just not very much like blueberry pie at all, and I don’t like it that much. Sorry.

Anna: It’s incredible they get that crust taste in there though, for the pies in general. Wow.

After the soda review, we stopped in Carlisle, a smaller town before Harrisburg.

Road trip to Philadelphia: Day 3 (Monday)
We woke up early this morning so we could make it to Philly by noon. We could actually see the landscape, unlike last night because it was already dark. It is so pretty here! We thought of The Village as we drove through Lancaster, and we discussed future visits to Hershey and Scranton (for all you Office fans out there). We arrived at the apartment complex right on time, signed some papers, and moved everything up to the apartment, which took all afternoon, but we got it done! Ian and I even got the gigantic TV up, with the help of a rolling cart and a service elevator. Our view is amazing.

We went to Target and Wal-Mart to pick up a few more things we realized we needed, and some parts of Philly are a little scary after dark. We also ate McDonalds (3 double cheeseburgers each, shared small fries. And I think their burgers are bigger here…. Not sure though.) Tuesday was more unpacking, and returning the U-Haul. Officially without a vehicle now. We took a bus then the orange line (subway) back. The closes place was still pretty far away, and a little more run down area, but everyone was friendly. That seems to be a trend here. We stopped at the Reading Terminal Market for lunch, where I had my first official Philly Cheesesteak sandwich.

We wandered around looking for dessert, and I saw a sign at a chocolate place that they were looking for part time sales help. We made a lap, discussed, then decided I’d pick up an application. We talked to one of the owners, Terry (or Terri? Not sure yet how she spells it), and she was SO nice, and after a short conversation, said I was hired! She was really interested in us (as newlyweds and from Kansas… “How do you say “coffee?” I love how everyone is interested in accents!). Her and her husband are so nice, and flexible, and the people that work there, and around there, are so nice. I’m excited to start! (tomorrow, a.k.a. Friday at 10 a.m.). You can check out their web site at www.chocolatebymueller.com.

We scoped out the city more, got library cards, went past the library and saw the Rocky footprints along with several cop cars going past and a helicopter with a searchlight very near the museum, went back to the complex and bought groceries (grocery store in the basement of one of the buildings, how cool and handy!),  ran into someone living here from K-State, made dinner, and Ian started watching LOST. He’s addicted now.

Wednesday, yesterday, we checked out the city more, saw Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell, we went to the firm and Brian (or is it Bryan?) gave us a tour. They are all so nice there… I know Ian will be in good hands! We took the blue line to Penn, wandered, got some Penn gear (Dad, Cornell never sent me any mail, all the other Ivy Leagues did... but if you wanted to get me a Cornell shirt to combat the Harvard and now Penn ones, feel free! *wink*), came back home, unpacked, cooked dinner, watched more LOST, unpacked more… discovered the pretty shiny glass building, which has blue lights on at night, has the lights programmed differently each night and Wednesday is sparkle/twinkle day. Today, Thursday, Ian left for his first day of work, exciting and nerve-wracking at the same time, but he is going to do so well there! I’m staying home, you guessed it, unpacking, doing laundry, working on the bulletin, gearing up for my first day of work tomorrow. By the way, laundry is expensive here! $1.75 per wash and $1.75 per dry. And you put money on a card in the lobby, and use that in the machines instead of quarters. So, if you want to send laundry money, send large bills. Hah!

Okay, I know this is ridiculously long, and thank you if you finished reading this, or even if you skimmed to the bottom here! I promise the next ones won’t be so long. We love you all and miss you, come visit!