Lessons in Real Estate

last weekend, i awoke in a great funk, possibly because the 40+ mph winds that ruined my sunday bike riding ritual. side note: aaron thinks prescott valley is the barrio, but i think it is lovely. the sun is always shining and there's mountains in the distance every way you look. there are hills, but surmountable ones. roses bloom for an insane number of months, hopefully starting any day now. plus, everything about pv reminds me of aaron; tooling around here i am treated to stories of his childhood -- glorious stories about trespassing, avoiding the police, sneaking out the window, etc.

anyway, since we were trapped inside in an effort to avoid an epic journey to oz, aaron humored me by agreeing to play spongebob-opoly while the NCAA tournament was on. he's never seen spongebob, but the game of monopoly remains essentially unchanged. however, since aaron insisted on vacuuming the living room before we could get started, i had plenty of time to read the rules. MISTAKE!!! it turns out that not only had aaron not heard of any of the best monopoly rules, none of them actually exist. there was no one-free-of-each-bill (a total of $686) for rolling snake eyes. no bonus for landing on free parking ($500 + all the taxes, fees and fines paid from traversing the board). no staying in jail indefinitely in pursuit of rolling doubles (right to a speedy trial?). we played using the rules as printed.

nevertheless, off mr. krabs (aaron) and gary (i) went on our mission to build pineapple houses, franchise krusty krab restaurants, and man the weenie hut, jr., all the while dodging nematodes and keeping an eye on plankton. (plankton is always trying to steal the krabby patty secret formula from the krusty krab, so it is appropriate that in spongebob-opoly, he is the time keeper. everytime the number 1 is rolled on the dice, plankton moves one space. when plankton gets to the krusty krab -- aka boardwalk -- the game is over and the winner is the person with the highest net worth. )

real monopoly is HARD. i remember in like 3rd grade when rebekah and i would write checks to each other in monopoly to stay alive (in between torturing ed with rice bombs). i had twice as many properties as aaron, including some high dollar ones, but he got me with his subdivision in tentacle acres. i actually had to take out a mortgage (twice ... i had already taken it out and paid it back once -- plus the 10% interest that i never knew existed but now makes a lot of sense) and sell some pineapple houses back at half the purchase price (another rule i never paid attention to) just so i could waltz through his squiddy subdivision. PLUS he didn't have the courtesy to come visit the krusty krab even once since i took it over. i lost the game by $496. neither of us even doubled our money in an hour of play.

i'm convinced i need to rethink my strategy. aaron says monopoly is all luck. i think that if that were true, my sisters or i would have beat my dad at least one time during our childhood. (and that was probably playing with all the good rules!)

we did get to enjoy some sunshine down in the valley for the cub's spring training game where they killed the white sox. we had to sit in front of aaron's dad (back left) to avoid being distracted by his crazy cubs-themed hawaiian shirt.
of course, no one would be distracted by us.

Meet Eriberto

aka bert. eriberto is named after this little mexican dive in flagstaff that has absolutely fantastic (and cheap!) breakfast burritos. this makes him slightly less threatening, although there is some apprehension associated with the original eriberto's ... i worry that the three inches of dust and asbestos flakes that have collected on the ceiling fan over the last three decades are going to fall into my food.

eriberto was waiting on my desk for me, in my new office, at my new job. apparently, my new colleagues discovered my blog prior to interviewing me and have been having a fun time with my 25 things. my boss even told my wife that she looked like she was going to a cockfight. (i'm starting to wonder if maybe that's a compliment.)

also meet pam, michelle, aileen, pat, jen, erica, colleen, krista, and andrea. (that's just the staff.) none of whom laughed when i managed to spill coffee all over the historic building trying to find my office. (which is huge and gorgeous with lots of windows!) and by the way, i'm a real adult now thanks to aaron ... #1 i drink coffee. and #2 i can't stand any sugary additives. i like it strong and dark with a dollop of cream for my teeth, no sugar. compare this to my previous preference of ice cream cleverly disguised as coffee. i've managed to keep everyone straight thus far. erica drew the short straw and has to deal with my dictation. when is legal assistant's day? because i already feel terrible that she spends the morning with brittany, alvin's girlfriend -- you know, from alvin and the chipmunks.

so what have i learned from my first week in an insurance defense firm? never, ever put your health at issue in a lawsuit. i spent an afternoon going through pages and pages of plaintiffs' medical records looking for evidence of alleged back injuries and all the bogus treatments before, during and after a car accident ... and find myself filtering through years of pap smear results and trying to skim over the details of hemorrhoids and erectile dysfunction. sheesh.