Mo the Mosquito's response to the Devil Del

Ghost writer Darin from the memoirs of Mo the Mosquito

The scene in our living room this past Wednesday of wanton mosquito death and destruction caused by the evil Del and Kerry (and Jake) reminded me of an episode of the Mosquito Hunter, from the memoirs of Mo the Mosquito:

Mo: "Look at these beautiful creatures in their natural habitat, the living room of one Del and Darin. As they go about their normal business of obtaining nutrients from what looks like plant life and dead animal a normally calm situation seems to my heightened insect senses to be changing for the worse. Could their agitation be due to my presence as well as the presence of hundreds of hungry colleagues (mosquitoes...duh). Let's look in more closely. Now, for you viewers at home I'm in no real danger. I'm keeping my distance and.....DARN, They've spotted me!"

Del, "AAAAAAAHHHHH, THEY ARE SWARMING ME. BITING ME IN AREAS I CAN'T EVEN MENTION. GET THEM OFF ME, PLEASE. I'M TENDER AND SWEET!"

Mo: "All chance at an unobserved observation appears to be lost. However, to be honest, a feeding frenzy is fun (we can't really change who we are, can we?). Therefore, I swing into action. Two targets present themselves. Darin, with his putrid, vile blood (honestly, smells like Lima beans...ugh!) is definitely the meal of last resort. Del, so sweet, so succulent. I must taste that sweet sweet nectar...IT'S MINE AND MINE ALONE! Unfortunately it appears all 200 of my hungry mosquito friends have the same thoughts and ideas."

Mo: "MAAAASSSS ATTACK!!!! Wait, she's on to us. SHE'S FIGHTING BACK! 3 of us make it through and taste that delectable blood nectar, if only briefly. The evil human she-devil kills two of us (you will be remembered as martyrs, brothers!) but I could tell they thought it was worth it. Sweet blood or death!!!...or both (gulp) .... just give me her sweet sweet delicious delectable blood!!!"

Mo: "Now it's my turn, my opportunity. I'm swooping in for the sting, and WOW am I fast. Nothing can stop me, I'm the best there ever was! Better than the great prophet Mohsquited. I avoid all the flack coming my way... pillows, shirts, tennis balls, even what appears to be a banana (I'm confused about that one). I remain on target (Great fly in the sky, I can almost taste the fruits of my labor!) when--swoosh-- what appears to be male underwear flies through the air to force me way off target and at the same time kills three of my wingmen. Underwear???? Damn weapons of mass destruction! They have so may ways of killing you"

Mo: "One last chance, a feint within a false attack within a diversion. I jive left (she's got her eye on me). 3 compatriots zoom toward her face, distracting her long enough for me to zoom right toward her lower ankle, sink my fangs into her sweet tender flesh, and start extracting the nectar of this god. IT WORKS, and ooooooooooohhhh, WOOOOOW, better than I thought it could ever be!"


"Just as I almost had my fill my heightened senses alerted me to a new, unfamiliar intruder. Short, long nose, bad breath, beady eyes, and what appeared to be some sort of hyperactivity disorder. He SEES ME...HE'S COMING FOR ME. Only one last chance. Remove my needle from delectable Del and get the heck out of there....but I'm so full..my belly is sloshing full of her wonderful nectar."

I have to hurry. HE'S GETTING CLOSE. I CAN SMELL THE FISH ON HIS BREATH, SEE HIS TEETH, HEAR HIS FRANTIC WHINING. I'm almost away. I need only a fraction of a second more....I think I'm going to make it

GULP

Hate = Mosquitos

Now, my mother always would yell at me if I said that I hated someone because it's a very strong word, not a nice word, and you shouldn't use it.

There are exceptions to the rule though.

Exhibit A: mosquitoes.

I hate them.

A lot.

It all started because of Tropical Storm Fay. There is a lot of water around here just cookin' those mosquito larvae and helping them grow. Ick.

Yesterday morning, I was taking the dogs for their morning walk (we're dog sitting Maggie, the Great Dane) and they were bombarded by the little devils. I mean everywhere. Poor Maggie Moe got the worst of it - probably because she's the biggest of us three. I was trying to swat them off of her, but she was getting upset because she though I was hitting her (she's sensitive). Poor dog.

I guess I thought it was a morning thing or that the damn bugs would be gone when I got home.

They were not.

I walked up to the front door and they were everywhere. And I'm not exaggerating - like probably over 200, trying to obtain entrance to my abode.

How do I get in the house? Really?

So I ran for it, arms whaling (to frighten the mosquitos), opened the door, shut it very quickly, scared the bejesus out of the dogs, and only allowed like 20 of them in.

And then they went after Maggie (and Jake too, I think).

So we spent the rest of the night (not really the whole night, but it was becoming quite fun killing the suckers - no pun intended - an obsession, really, for their demise) throwing either shirts, socks, tennis balls, underwear, or whatever up in the air to the ceiling to K.I.L.L them.

Honestly killed like 10 right when I came home. Then more and more. Kerry (our roommate) was throwing a tennis ball up to the cathedral ceiling trying to get them. I found that throwing a shirt up there traps them and then bring them to our level so we can kill them.

And Jake will eat them if he gets the chance. He's smart like that.

Ohh, and they were bloody. Ick. Those poor dogs (we hadn't really gotten bitten so it had to be the dogs).

This morning I was attacked in the car.

(It's the giant bite on the top of my foot. The little ones on my leg are from yesterday morning from the walk because we went in grass and they flew up my jeans. Grr.)

Side note - I should be happy that I only have five bites because I'm one of those people that the bugs LOVE. Horseflies, mosquitoes, no-see-ums, anything really. They love me.

But I think they love Maggie more.

And this ends my post on mosquitoes.

The Double Ds

So, I'm going to try and explain the story behind how Darin and I met. I apologize if it's stupid or makes no sense, but I'll try hard to have it be funny/cute/romantic/etc.

Well, first off, we've been dating since 2/14/2005 (yes, Valentines Day) and have been engaged since 4/2/08 (yes, that is the date after April Fools.)

It all started...

by us working together. I had just moved down to Florida with my old adviser (who moved his group down from Clemson to start the NSTC at UCF) after getting my MS degree and NOT yet having gotten a job. I was pretty excited to get to experience starting a new lab - ordering things, organizing, and all the jazz. Darin had decided to go back to school (which I give him A LOT of credit for) after working for seven years and not being happy. He just happened to choose my new boss/old adviser for his adviser. And we met. Yeah.

Now the story behind us not initially dating is kind of stupid. My friend Abhijeet told me that Darin was engaged. So yeah, I liked him, but didn't overly flirt with him because of that. I totally thought he was engaged to this girl Jackie - which is funny now, but was annoying then. A couple of months went by and he asked me to go to a party of, you guessed it, Jackie's. I was really confused because he was going to drive me and this guy Bob there and I couldn't figure out why he wasn't going to be there early and then stay later. You know, to help out with the party and all.

And then I was thinking he was trying to set me up with Bob, but Darin totally didn't like "push" us together. Just, "hey, this is Bob", very casual.

So we go to the party, and Bob and I like totally stick together because it was Napolean Dynomyte themed and neither of us had seen the movie. And it was weird. Jackie was dressed up very strangely and there were tater tots as food.

(After seeing the movie, it made sense. But come on, without seeing the movie it was WEIRD.)

Turned out Darin though it was weird too and we all just stood together talking.

And that was when I realized he wasn't dating/engaged to Jackie. It was way obvious.

Hurray!

Anyways, we went to Fiddler's Green for beer afterwards and we kissed. Ahh.

Then dummy Darin wanted us to get together to discuss us dating. I guess if you know Darin you'll understand this a little because he kind of worries/over complicates things. But, you have to understand that office romance and graduate school romance were different things - and he just didn't realize that it wasn't going to be a problem...

So we went out to eat at Linda's La Cantina and decided to start dating, but not tell anyone at work because we didn't want things to be weird.

And our "official" first date was on Valentine's Day where he cooked me dinner!

That's it.

I guess it wasn't very romantic. I'll have to blog about when we got engaged.

Fay Fay Go Away

If you hadn't noticed, Florida has been getting SWAMPED by Fay, the Tropical Storm.

And it's annoying. (Though it's finally moving North.)

First of all, on Tuesday it was supposed to come through Orlando up to Jacksonville towards the Carolinas. So most people I work with (including me) left early as to not drive through the bad storm. And Darin's school was out the WHOLE day. And we got nothin'. Wednesday it finally started to rain (keep in mind it was supposed to be gone by then), and rain it did. Thursday was the bad day though. LOTS of rain. Not normal Florida rain (if you've ever been here during a summer rain storm, you know what I'm talking about), but more like Seattle rain. (That was for Dru.)

The backyard, and no, there isn't a ditch there.

And I got freakishly wet yesterday with an umbrella. (But I had on my boat shoes, which I love, and my feet stayed nice and dry...). It was not fun.

But at least we didn't get 25 inches of rain. OMG! Can you even imagine that?

I took pictures while taking Jake-O for a walk this morning. I'll have to take pre-Fay ones so you can really see how much rain we got.

Our new friend on our walk - a fish!

The left is the canal behind our neighborhood and the right is our front yard.

Enjoy!

Wine Down Wednesday

After work, a group of us (women from work) took out one of our colleagues, Yifan, to Urban Flats for Wine-Down Wednesday. For twelve bucks you get all the wine (six types) and flats you can eat. We had pasta salad, regular salad, and flats (which are like wimpy pizzas, but good. And they normally have strange things on them like pears/Gorgonzola/feta cheese/shrimp/etc.)

Now this is my type of place!

That there is Yifan with a Lady Godiva Martini

Thought I'd share with you the great relationships I have formed with my co-workers from my new job (it's been over a year now for me there). I work with such nice and friendly people, and I am so grateful to enjoy what I do as well as the people I work with. (Side note, I DO still miss my old co-workers, but they all know that.)

The "girls" (L to R): Kara, Olga, Gabby, Yifan, me, Tenekua, Ayesha, and Janice

"The girls" went out becuase Yifan is moving back to China next Monday - she will be missed.

End note: the next time we go to Wine-Down Wednesday, I might try a Lady Godiva Martini. Numm.

A Bridal Tradition

Monday night I went over to my good friend Raji's for her henna bridal party. She is getting married this week and it's a very important tradition in Indian culture for the bride to have elaborate henna tattoos on her arms and feet for the wedding. I was so excited to go and share this special time with her.

Henna is regarded as having blessings, and is applied for luck as well as joy and beauty. Brides typically have the most henna, and the most complex patterns, to support their greatest joy, and wishes for luck.

It was crazy beautiful!

While she had her left arm (palm side up) done, everyone just ate and watch Juno. (None of us had seen it, though an action movie probably would have been better...) Then a couple of us got to get some designs done as well. I went for the tummy area because I though that would be a cool place to have it. (Side note to Kara - was going to get it on my back, but would have been a little difficult to drive home/sit/sleep/etc. like you were talking about...) Yeah! I had to lay on the floor though for awhile so it could dry for a bit.

Everyone got their designs done on different places - and with different designs. We were all very creative!

Then Raji got the right arm done and her feet. So cool...

I had to leave before she was finished, but I think from the pictures, you really can see how amazing the henna artist was.

Good Luck Raji and Nazelle! And happy wedding!

Keepin' It Real

Friday night, Darin and I drove to Tampa to see my friends from graduate school, LaShan and Cheryl. I've known them both for a long time - yikes, over five years now. And Darin has met them both as well at a Clemson football game we went to last year. So all was fun fun fun.

LaShan is kind of like my 'sounding block' for ideas/worries/etc. Though I don't talk to her as much as I should (bad Del), back in the day we'd talk for hours about boys and their stupidity as well as work, school, and all that jazz. She really was the first person who knew about Darin and my relationship (we kept it quite for awhile because we worked together when we first started dating), and she talked me through a lot of things and I thank her for that!

Enough of that...

We meet up with them at their hotel and went out to dinner at one of our favorite places here in Orlando, but in the original Tampa - Shells. LaShan wanted fish. And fish she got. Numm numm. There is nothing like good fresh Florida fish (it's something I think makes my mother jealous, having good fish all the time). LaShan got this pasta dish with mussels so we enjoyed playing with the shells.

Cheryl and LaShan; Del and Darin

Then we decided to try to find Ybor City, which is a big entertainment/shopping/tattoo place in Tampa that I had never been to and Darin had been to, but didn't know how to get to. It was funny actually because we tried to use the Garmin to get us there, but we wanted to go a different way initially, and it was getting annoyed at us. If one of those things CAN get annoyed, that is. And Cheryl changed it's voice to an Australian woman's. Quite entertaining.

We did get there alright, and walked around, talked, drank some beer, watched the weird people, looked at the tattoo places, got some shot glasses, watched more weird people, looked at the strange mannequins; you know, all the normal stuff. It was fun. But too short. And we should have stayed out longer and drank some 3 for 1s, but we were tired, and Darin and I had to drive back home.

Del, Cheryl, and LaShan; Del, the Knight, and LaShan

Had a really good time - there is nothing better than spending some time with great friends.

Jake's Spots

The other night Darin and I decided to give Jake a haircut. Now Jake is a mix of wired-hair terrier, jack russell terrier, and monster. Okay, not monster, but some other random dog probably. I used to get his hair professionally cut, but it's expensive and I'm cheap... so we bought a clippers and cut his hair ourselves.

It's so worth it by the way - super easy and fast.

(I got practice cutting Cricket's, my parent's dog, and my dad's hair.)

Anyways, we realized that Jake was looking pretty hairy. And the back part of his fur gets really thick and not soft and gross. And he looked fat - or his fat folds were emphasized. Or skin rolls, whatever.

Though Darin was being a little annoying particular about the blending and cut, Jake did good and is now back to his handsome self. (Though there was a lot of hair. Ick.)

And he's got spots!! How cute is that?

Nothing like a cute well groomed dog.

I am so smart.

Happy Birthday Darin!

I think he had a good day - you'd have to ask him. All I know is that he was lazy this morning (which is a good thing, I think) and happy when he got home from work.

We had some friends over for dinner and instead of making a easy dinner (like steak or something on the grill), we made chicken parmesan. And by we I mean the birthday boy and me.

Draining the water...

Had a good time eating and watching the Olympics.

Frank and I; the Group - Kerry, Carrie, Mike, me, Frank, and Darin

Then he opened his presents - Kerry and Frank got him a fishing pole. It's pretty fantastic. I got him running shorts. Yeah, I know. But he needed them and wouldn't tell me what he wanted and I've lost all of my creativity with presents with him. Who doesn't wear flip-flops, honestly?! (I think that was two years ago...)

The 'pole'.

Oh, the title. I almost forgot. Carrie and Mike got Darin a Homer Simpson card that sings "I am so smart, I am so smart. S. M. A. R. I mean S. M. ART." I don't do it justice, but it's awesome.

Happy Birthday Buddy. I love you.

Weekend Galore

First of all let me say that the Olympics are addictive. I just can't stop watching them. Darin is not effected by this at all, just me. And I guess Jake too because he sleeps on the couch next to me when I watch them. I watched the Opening Ceremonies on Friday night instead of going to Beer Olympics with my friend Carrie. It's sad.

Though Jake does keep himself entertained:

Saturday we went over to Darin's parents for his birthday dinner (his birthday is on Monday August 11th). Too much good food... and his mom's special cheesecake. I say special not because of the weird stuff she puts in it (come on people), but because it's like a combo cheesecake/key lime pie that's just wonderful. Ahh. (We have some leftovers in the fridge that I will eat later tonight unless Kerry or Darin have eaten it.)

Meatballs and Darin's cheesecake

Then today Darin decided he wanted to go to the beach - so off we went. I have to say we don't go to the beach often enough being that we live 30 minutes away (from Cocoa that is). It's pretty sad actually.

How beautiful is this? The beach and Darin on his boogie board (what a great picture!?)

Had a blast and I read my book. Darin boogied in the water. And saw a jellyfish so I didn't go in. I'm easily scared, what can I say. And I got a little red. Would post a picture, but I don't need people laughing at me.

That's it! Will post again on his actual birthday with presents and cake and all. Okay, he's not getting cake, but he doesn't like cake so... he's getting cobbler. Numm.

Some Wedding Stuff

Was talking on the phone to my good friend LaShan (see you soon!) and realized I didn't have wedding stuff on the wedding blog.

Oops.

First things first, we have a date - March 14, 2009. Hurray!

Second, we are getting married at First Congregational Church of Winter Park (FCC). I was raised/confirmed in this type of church and when we decided we wanted to get married in a church, we started going here to check it out. And like it. The ministers are good people and funny. (This is important to us.) And we like them!

Third, our reception is going to be in Baldwin Park in Grace Hopper Hall. We really are excited to have such a nice place - though I must admit I'm a little afraid of the pool being in such close proximity as the reception. Darin is mean. As are some of his friends (I'm talking about mean Mike who threw me in the pool once at his parents house on the pool cleaner thing. With my clothes on.)

I'll update more as soon as I know more to update. Hmm.

Jake is Three

Or I guess it's what, 21 in dog years? His birthday was August 1, and I forgot. I guess since I was the one that made up the date, it's okay? Not sure. But I gave him a hug and wished him a happy birthday. No cake for him though - he did get an extra Scooby Snack (these are his absolute favorite).

Thought I'd put up some cute pictures of the little monster for those that don't know him (1) well (2) at all or (3) think he's cute and like his pictures!

Jake and his mama - the first day I got him; him eating a flip chip; and laying on the ottoman.

And last, but not least, Jake and his best buddy Dante singing. Jake loves to sing, howl, and make strange noises. It's one of his endearing qualities and makes him the cute/annoying/unique/fun dog that he is.

Happy Birthday to Our Pup!

The Water Bed Treated us to Dinner

Friday night, Darin took the family out to dinner - Greek style. The story - our good friend Frank bought Darin's parent's old water bed and with the money we all went out to dinner.

Isn't that the best idea ever?

We decided to go to one of our favorite restaurants that we don't go to often enough. It's called Olympia and is good. Very good.

Don't know when I started liking Greek/Mediterranean food so much, but it's so tasty and there are lots of different things to try. One of my favorite things my mom made when I was little was pastitsio. What I really remember is cinnamon in it, but maybe that's just my weird childhood memory because I don't think it's in there. Hmm.

That's our waitress flaming the saganaki (it's goat cheese and nummy) and my pastitsio. I was very excited to order it finally because I always get tripped up on the gyro. I love me some gyro. And pita. And hummus. But nothing wrapped in leaves or with olives. Ick.

And then there was dessert. Ahh.
(I had saved room by not eating all of my dinner - but it's leftover, hurray!)

That would be Shirley (Diana's MIL) protecting her ice cream dessert, Darin after some chocolate ice cream thing, and my baklava.

I want some right now. It's sad.

Here are some more pics:

Me (with fat arms; I know, I know), Diana, and Goestov; Carol and Keay; and Darin and me

So I think you can tell we had fun. It was good.

We DID miss the belly dancer. Oh well. Next time. :)