Date #2 with Bachelor #DontRemindMe

I'm currently getting ready for date number two with bachelor number, please for the love of all things holy don't remind me.

Rockin my NKOTB original concert tee circa 1992 from Buffalo Exchange, boyfriend jeans, and my holier than thou polka dotted tennis shoes.

He's cooking me dinner, and then we're headed out to see Black Swan. Which looks soooooooo good!! Was supposed to go to a screening of it last week at Fox. Was SUPER sad that I missed it ... but yay life for being so abundant.

I love it when a guy cooks me dinner. I can't cook ... at all. Well, I make mean desserts, and some pretty obscure shit ... but I grew up with a family of amazing cooks. I learned not to bother. Home cooked meals = fastest way to my heart. For reals ...

Super stoked. This dude is pretty chill. On the first date he was like - I had no idea what you do, and from the sounds of it, I really didn't want to know until we had the chance to talk about it. I get it ... I asked him out, the whole heart of everything that I do is weird to a lot of people ... but I jive with it.

I met this dude IRL; he's an anomaly. I interact with hundreds of people everyday in social media. What are the odds that I would meet someone off the grid? Kinda rad ... but either way, I find myself in a unique position now to be able to test out some theories on dating. HAHA! Poor soul, hopefully he'll survive.

Can't wait to find out either way ...

PS. My chapstick tonight is from Univision. It's acai berry and literally the most disgusting thing I have ever tried. It tastes almost like it should be chocolate, but some marketing person said acai berry is good for weight loss so chicks will buy into it faster ...  *smf* damn you Univision!!!

I got #married at 22...so what?

#TalkNerdyToMeLover's @JenSquard

For me, life is all about opportunities.  Either opportunities taken or missed.  I try hard not to miss opportunities, big or small.  I have missed a couple, and those stick with you - I had the opportunity to go to Broadway with a class in 8th grade, and France in high school.  My dad said no way - opportunity missed, and it still breaks my heart.  I will never again be in 8th grade, and when I do make it to see a Broadway show I will view it totally differently.  If I do make it to France, the experience will be entirely different as an adult with kids than as a high schooler with a heart too big for her body.

So when I had the opportunity to fall in love, I took it.  It was fast and hard (that’s what she said - oh!), and it was beautiful.  It wasn’t always perfect, and I had to fight for it (more on that later), but it was passionate and fulfilling.  I never thought of my relationship with Brian as anything unusual - we love each other like crazy, would do anything for one another, and are a perfect fit.  That stupid “you complete me” saying actually makes sense for us.  He made me a more sane, level headed and even tempered person, and I taught him that it’s okay to be who he is, let him come out of his shell, and gave him the chance to be a strong, independent man.

Our first few months together were wild - and I would have married him that first summer, he just didn’t ask.  Once we settled into our life together things just worked.  We lived together in a tiny 500 square foot house with our two nutty cats.  He both went to college a few blocks away, and took as many classes together as we could.  When his appendix burst I worked 60 hours a week on top of school to get us through.  He cooked and cleaned and brought me dinner every day.  Things were stressful, but we got through it well together.  

After about a year we started looking at rings.  I wasn’t one of those girls that always dreamt of my perfect wedding and all that junk, I honestly never wanted to get married.  I was wild as hell in high school, and a hubby and kids just wasn’t part of my plans.  When we started looking at rings it just felt...right.  Not like the next step, but like something that would round out our relationship.  We picked something we liked, and we left it at that.  A few months later Brian asked me to marry him (in a frickin awesome way, but more on that later, too) and I said yes yes yes yes yes.  

We got married the fall of 2006.  Our marriage has been just about as close to perfect as you can get.  We have bought a house together, had three kids, started a successful business and career, and strengthened our bond.  This marriage wasn’t about what we were supposed to do.  I didn’t marry him because I was 22 and needed the validation.  Even though I was young, I have never felt like I am missing out on anything.  I did it for the right reason - because I have loved him from the first week I knew him, and thought it would be a fun adventure for us to go on together.  The opportunity to unite myself with my perfect match presented itself, and who was I to pass that up?  And contrary to popular belief, the pressure to get married and start procreating when you are 25 don’t exist anymore.  Most people told us we were too young, to wait, and that marriage is no different than living together.  We were supposed to date for five years, travel while we were young, and make sure we actually loved each other before we got married.  Bullshit.  Time is not going to make me love him any more or any less.  And I would love to travel, but I don’t know many 22-year-old college kids that can afford to travel any more than we already had.  

Do I ever miss the days when I could do whatever I wanted and sleep with whomever?  Not so much.  I miss the easiness of being single, the freedom of not having kids or a husband, but that is because that all happened when life was a breeze - money was all mine, no one to answer to...but I wouldn’t trade the support or companionship for anything.  Has it been easy?  Hell no.  It’s been hard, it always is when you live with someone else, especially when money gets tight.  Sometimes I wish our life was a little more exciting, but then I look around - it doesn’t get much more exciting than watching three kids that you made with your best friend grow and learn.  Our friendship develops more every day.  He appreciates me as much as I appreciate him.  

So before you assume that anyone married under thirty did it for the wrong reasons, consider that maybe they did it because it was a good opportunity to broaden parts of their lives that you haven’t discovered yet.  If you want to be single, party it up, or sleep with a new person every night, do it.  But don’t judge me for choosing to spend my nights next to my favorite people.  Don’t feel bad for me being married with kids - I feel lucky, and might even feel a little bit bad for you.

What's your story? Tell me! @JenSquard

@JenFriel's Sexual Bucket List

This song came on tonight at the Glendon ... and I can't place it!! It's in some movie, and I totally couldn't remember which one, but it sounded like Wild Horses from Fear. That reminded me of the rollercoaster scene.

Yeah ... remember this?

It inspired me to start a sexual bucket list; all the things that I want to do sexually before I die. Some of them of course I will have to refrain from posting in an effort to retain some sort of intimacy with my one day lover bug.

Either way, sexual bucket list ... this is on it.

#HOT!

#Randombling: @JenSquard

#TalkNerdyToMeLover's @JenSquard

Randombling: A 5 minute long unedited random stream of consciousness produced by a nerd for nerds.

#nowplaying: Candy Man - Christina Aguilera

Dang.  So I totally used back into some girl's truck.  I dented the bumper a bit.  Then end.  You would think I slapped her grandma with the way she was acting!  I know it's not cool to have someone hit your car, but it isn't like a took off or anything.  When she came out I was looking for the insurance card so I could leave the info for her.  I gave her all on my numbers and junk, apologized like fifty times, and she was still acting like a bitchy beyotch.  Whatever.  You know what?  That's exactly what bumpers are for.  And insurance.  Don't be rude.

On to something less obnoxious.  So I've been working out for a while now, and this is the first time in my life that I am actually okay with it!  I like it!  Maybe it's because Gold's Gym has a sweet cardio cinema, and its super dark in there so no one is staring at you - and I get to just watch a movie so I don't get so bored.  Normally when I work out I get tired of it after like two times.  Results aren't fast, and I feel like a loser, but this time I'm doing good with it.  Good thing, too - 3 kids fucks you up.  For reals. 

And I'm not hanging up Christmas lights, that is just crazy.  Christmas lights are expensive, our electrical bill is way high enough already, and I don't think you need to decorate the outside of your house to enjoy the holiday.  I don't even get the whole tree thing, but we are doing that at some point.  I'm tired of the silly inflated snowmen and crap, those are just lame.  Seriously, stop it middle America, you are making yourself look like tards.  And buh bye.

I'm on Twitter and Facebook...lonely....looking for friends!

My #adventures at a Flea Market...

#TalkNerdyToMeLover's @JenSquard

Our little(ish) town has a flea market!  We had a “swap meet” for awhile, which was sort of just a wannabe flea market.  It was pretty trashy with only a few cool booths so it didn’t so much make it.  Now we have a new one (things like this just don’t survive well in our town, we’re more of a farmer’s market kind of place), and I’ve heard quite a bit about it, so after a photo shoot while I still had camera glued to face I headed over to check it out.  

Yeah, not at all what I expected.  I’m not sure what I expected, really, but I’ve seen flea markets on TV and such, so of course I’m the expert...or not.  There were about 20 different vendors (I’m gonna go ahead and use that term VERY loosely), and there was quite the variety.  Some of them were basically just big yard sales.  Seriously, old crap, rusty knives, broken jewelry, dirty everything.  And they had even taken the time to put prices on this crazy shit!  Some were handmade things, like the one booth that had a thousand snowmen, all handmade, and all creepy.  There was a lady selling strange little doggie quasi-sweaters.  Other booths were just offering a collection of things that they had obviously bought from somewhere else, like a hispanic dollar store supply store, or a bead warehouse.  Here are some of the beauties that were laid out for me:

Apparently these are called Hedge Balls, and have a reputation for repelling spiders and other insects.  From what I can tell they are indigenous to Iowa (and as a biologist I can tell you it is not smart to bring other species of plants or animals into their non-native habitat - bad things tend to happen).

  I'm thinking about wearing this one to work out in....

I'm thinking they used a blowup doll as the model for the pinata?This made me laugh so hard I cried!Cologne bottles that look like cars, duh.

Pretty much sums it up.....

 I did find several things that I definitely didn’t expect, like a wedding dress.  Or women’s panties sold by the pair by a strange old man.  New?  Used?  Stolen?  Who knows?  What about the snake in a jar?  WTF dood?  The room full of half-used paint cans, like interior and exterior house paint, was definitely unexpected (but it was in the Man Cave, and there was some weird shit in there).  But my favorite?  The full chess set made from cologne bottles.  This man inherited a HUGE collection of Avon cologne and perfume “collectibles”.  Cars, bullets, coins, mailboxes, footballs, eagles, sparkplugs, frogs, buildings, and people, all turned into brownish cologne bottles.  He was totally like the Bubba Gump of Avon collectibles - he started naming all of the things that Avon has made that is now a collectible.  He even showed me the catalog.  Yikes.  

Oh, and you can totally get a massage at the flea market.  Um....

#NoThanks

Follow me on Twitter - maybe you'll be my new BFF! @JenSquard