87

She can install a garbage disposal.

When I saw her do this I remember this recorded prank call where this guy calls in to a dating service and asks for a woman with "much good plow experience".

She may love it when i take care of her, but this chick can take care of herself. Word.

88

She loves Gracie.

She loves all of our animals, but she has a special love for our sixty five pound Boxer mix, Gracie. Gracie is one of the strongest, athletic and most hyper dogs I have ever known. But my Dana, who rivals Gracie in energy and dexterity, will chase Gracie down, picker her up and carry the dog around as if she were the fifteen pound puppy we rescued.

It is the most friggin adorable thing ever, but also a reminder that Dana is freakishly strong for her size. I can't wait to have children with this woman!!

89

Her hair in the morning.

It is kind of like a wheat field after a tornado, only softer.

He hair can be quite affectionate, really. It often wakes me up, reaching out to my lips or caressing my eyelashes. Sometimes I think her hair is just plain hitting on me.

I lover her hair. She looks phenomenal with it it up. She looks like a supermodel with it straight as an arrow. And she looks like she could conquer the wilderness when it is curly. She goes from cute, to pretty, to sexy as hell with a bobby pin and a straightener. Love it.

90

She grooms me.

Now, reader, understand that every couple has a certain set of idiosyncrasies that to the outside world seem weird. However, these little rituals or habits or tendencies within the relationship are a loving thing.

Think, two monkeys sitting on a branch.

91

She admits when she is wrong. If I happened to be correct and she were in the wrong she would say, "Well, you weren't wrong".

But now she can say with no spite, "You were right".

I don't need to hear it, I just needed to know that she could say it :)

92

She's a beautiful courthouse bride.

Now, reader, I am sorry that you did not get the invite to Cabo, but technically Dana and I are already married. We "made an appointment" at the courthouse and had a family friend who happens to be a justice of the peace marry us so that we did not have to go through the hassle (and invariable bribes) involved with a legal marriage in Mexico.

As Judge Gorczynski prepared to start the ceremony, he looked at Dana, looked back at me and said, "Geez, good job, man".

Thanks, your honor.

We followed the ceremony by having lunch with my parents, going to the zoo, and dinner on Lake Houston. She's perfect.

93

She picked up running. She hated running for years, and so did I. I bought myself a pair of running shoes for my birthday and started jogging and I love it! And as is usually the case, she is better than me at the things that I am good at. I take it in stride. No pun....

This running phenomenon sparked a new chapter in our lives where we invest in ourselves and consider our health our greatest asset. You know you are with the right person when the two of you, together, take something painful and turn it into a joy.

94

She takes care of me.  11pm fighting. 9am still fighting. 7pm home from work still fighting. 730pm still fighting, curled up in bed, Dana sitting next to me, making sure I have everything I need, probably thinking "I hope this idiot is ok".

She knows that "like" fluctuates but love never changes. 

She won the argument by the way.

95

She's five-foot-thirteen in heels.

I swear she is two inches taller in the morning than at night. And I love it.  We never have trouble cleaning the ceiling fans.  The light bulbs are always fresh. 

She is long, lean and moves like a cat.  She's my very own super model. I love the way her legs look in the dresses I buy her.

Our kids are going to be giants!!

96

Her appetite.

I outweigh her by almost eighty pounds. Yet I've seen her finish a large pizza before me. She looks up at me with "Uh-Oh" eyes... and I love the fact that her hunger for life is as big as mine. She just happens to wear it better than I do.

97

Her Eyes

They are cavernous. She could never be a good poker player because her eyes tell the story every time. They are as honest as she is. They see the best and worst in me and chose to keep on. Filling them with surprise and laughter is the greatest pass time.

They are confident and inspire confidence in others. She takes command of you with them, and gives you back to the world better than when she found you.

98

She falls in love with me

After ten hours in San Diego, we decided that we were going to move there. There was no question about it. She was in love with how relaxed people were in the way they spoke and dressed and I was in love with the sunshine in her hair. We're moving to San Diego, there is no doubt about it.

After a weekend in Gruene, we were making plans to move to the Hill Country. Good food, great music and the magic of the hills had us convinced that we were going to buy a house and end up northwest of Austin as soon as possible. We'll live in the Hill Country, there is no doubt about it.

After driving to south Houston and looking at Basset hounds, Rottweilers and lab mixes a woman walked by with a plump, sleepy little mouse of a dog. She had a tiny little tattoo on her belly and looked like a drowsy skunk. She was going to be our skunk, there was no doubt about. it. Her name is Sadie and she has an intrusive nose, but I fell in love with her and Dana fell in love with me.

99

She pisses me off.

There used to be a time when I would walk into a room and the rules would change. I was intimidating (this may just exist in my mind but amuse me).

I earned a reputation for being a tough Marine and a powerful speaker. Yet, this slender marvel of a woman cuts me down with a glance. She goes toe-to-toe with me during my worst tirades and somehow finds, buried in that slight frame, a voice that one would envision coming from a burning bush. It comes from some granite foundation, wells and springs up, "Stop being such a baby".

Love is gentle, love is kind. Love is standing up to a former Marine and putting up with his bullshit with an unquestionable loving grace.

100 Days

One hundred days from today I will be in Cabo San Lucas with the most beautiful girl in the world. She will take my hand, look up at me with those cavernous green eyes and take me as her husband. This in itself is miraculous because I have given her painfully little reason to do so.

I have found around a million reasons that I love her (as of my last count anyway). But since we have to finish preparing for the trip and because I have a demanding full time job, I have chosen to only share the top hundred reasons that I love her.

100 Her laugh

When we first started dating she didn't have one. She was a silent laugher. She would tilt her head to the left, shut her eyes, and nostrils flaring- not utter a sound. It was like watching a great movie with no sound track.

She still tilts her head, turns varying shades of red, and her famous nose still wiggles- but she shares her glee with the room. Every squirn and squeal (and the occasional snort), melts away any reason we have to not share in her delight.

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Location:Home

Lola's

Lola's is my favorite restaurant. I don't think there is a restaurant more representative of Houston anywhere. But, more on that later . Here's a taste.




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I was getting really frustrated because I couldn't send this photo to facebook, but I realized that I could just add it here, for you!



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Location:Taking a break at work

Blue Light Special

I don't know about you but every year around September I get a little down. I suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder. I won't get into it with great detail, but essentially I'm solar powered without any of the cool cyborg functionality. I don't know, I guess I'm pretty good with Excel. That counts, right?

Seriously though, lack of natural sunlight makes me sluggish, irritable and overwhelmingly sleepy. Most people call it the winter blues, but to those who struggle with SAD, daily tasks can be overwhelming at times. This is due to the body's lack of "light cues" that regulate the sleep cycle. Without the correct amount of natural sunlight in the morning, your body does not know when it should get it into gear and when it should power down.

Philips makes a new product appropriately called the Energy Light. It is a small LED device that uses BLU light technology to mimic a clear blue sky. The benefits can be very dramatic for people suffering from SAD. By the way, I hate that acronym. I always picture some snarky doctor putting up air quotes and saying, "Oh no, he's "SAD"". Shut up clown, I'm a cyborg.

So far the Energy Light has been great. I feel a lot more alert and I don't feel like I'm made of lead. Philips has a range of devices in the lineup ranging from travel size models to large bedside lamps with iPod docks. Models range from $99 to $299.

A New Crush

I get excited about technology. Really excited. Like jazz hands smirky grin first time I saw Dana excited. I've come to terms with it.

We are in the midst of a true technological shift. Telephone companies are no longer utility companies- they are great enablers.

Who remembers snake and brick breaker on their phones? Now we can check email, snap a photo, run a business, check into a flight, hotel, or concert AND improve our gamer scores from the same device. AHEM- GreatnessJT24, I'm takin you down son, just so you know what's coming.

I think the late gen-Xers and early gen-Y kiddos experienced the growing pains of adding data plan charges to their monthly expenses but hey, I can safely say we're all over it.

Tablet PC, smartphone, WIFI 3G laptop- gimme all of that. I want it like I wanted to pump my kicks full of air and have a phone that took pictures. Dude, VGA ON MY PHONE!!

I can stream video on my handheld device, read a book on my tablet PC, adjust my thermostat from my phone which doubles as my GPS, movie player and video came console. Shazamit all I want more.

There are a few of us twenty-somethings that still shun the information age. Our phones still flip and have MIDI ringtones. We still have home numbers and VCRs (I'll explain what a VCR was at a later time, I don't want my younger readers' heads to explode).

Jump in guys. If your grandparents have friended you and your cell phone looks like the handset sitting in the cradle in Mom's kitchen, call me. We need to talk.

I get excited about mobile tech and I want you to get excited with me. Twitter, Facebook, text, email or even, if you must, call me.

Forever 21

Forever 21 is inversely proportional to my happiness. I love my soon to be wife, but I cannot wait to make enough money that I can just hand over a black card and not fear the reaper. And let there be no doubt that women's fashion is the reaper.

Shoes and accessories are right below meth as the most addictive substances on earth. I'm all for
stimulating the economy, but another half hour surrounded by tinny voices and the echoes of Twilight gossip are going to kill me.

I already want to tell my kids to turn their music down.

And Dana, baby, if you read this- you look beautiful. Despite my bitterness.


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Location:Tomball Pkwy,Houston,United States