3,000 Miles: It's official: I'm procrastinating.

Three weeks in, first substantial assignments on the docket, and I just can't do it. I started this term tired, I'm still tired, and I would really prefer just to whine and complain about how tired I am rather than doing any work to make my to-do list shrink. Go figure.

So I'm going to provide some photos and stories about the past week - it was a good one (even though it made me even more tired).

**Disclaimer: most of these photos are either taken by T or Natalie. Good job guys, real good job.

Natalie flew in last Wednesday around midnight, so Thursday was a mostly lazy day, sitting around the apartment, making good food, and taking walks around the neighborhood. We can literally talk all day without stopping - who knew?

Made coffee in my beautiful porcelain drip coffee maker.

Oatmeal with fresh apples.

Stellar sandwiches loaded with almost everything in our fridge.

Thursday night, after I got off work, I met up with Natalie and some of her former co-workers at one of my favorite places in Seattle: Lucid. This became a beloved little jazz club when Natalie and I discovered it last...Fall? Spring? A while ago. I loved it so much that the House of Love took me there for my birthday. It was very close to my house in Wallingford. There is no cover charge to get in the club, so of course we ended up going all the time because there aren't too many places in Seattle where you can listen to good, free music. An amazing band, The Teaching, played every Thursday, which made the experience all the more ritualistic. Sadly, a lot has changed at Lucid since I frequented it's Thursday night jams, but it was great to be back there.

Friday was the big surprise day. Since Natalie had flown in on Wednesday, none of our former roommates knew she was in town. I had asked Dana and Michaela to come to my apartment for dinner on Friday night as a way to catch up since Christmas and to semi-commemorate the Christmas celebration that our house had almost exactly a year prior. Of course they were up for all of that and, therefore, had no clue that a fourth roomie would be in our presence.

|This was really fun.

So Natalie and I made a beastly dinner, although it was mostly Natalie, since I took a nap and then just woke up for moral support. Stuffed mushrooms, zucchini casserole, and spinach salad - dee-lish.

We set three place settings at the table so that Dana and MC would

really be fooled. Oh man, every detail.

Our video diary before Dana and MC arrive.

Michaela was the first to arrive and so when she buzzed up to my apartment, Natalie ran and hid in the living room closet (which has been converted into what T and I now refer to as "the man cave"). Then Dana arrived. Dana set her bags down right in front of the closet door where Natalie was hiding; she even squatted down for a good minute or so rustling through her stuff and chatting. It was everything I had in me not to scream, "GET AWAY FROM THERE!" So there we were, the three of us, standing around my living room, chatting it up as if nothing were out of the ordinary. I served them water as we were waiting for the food to finish cooking, we talked about Dana's new nose ring (!), and then got into a pretty good discussion about a painting that T and I recently purchased. This lasted a good 15 minutes, and Natalie is waiting in the living room closet, listening to this conversation the entire time.

In order to really make this surprise epic, Natalie and I had rehearsed different ways to actually execute the surprise factor with T's help. We talked through lots of options: she would hide in the bathtub, she would be cooking in the kitchen when Dana and MC arrived, and eventually, we decided on the man-cave as our best option. Then we had to figure out the next step: would Natalie just open the door? Would she start playing music in there for Dana and MC to hear? Before they arrived, Natalie and I rehearsed a Skype scenario - trying to Skype Natalie, while Dana and Michaela would think they were Skyping with her in Atlanta. That didn't work. So then we decided on calling Natalie while she was in there.

So, after chatting it up with Dana and MC for 15 minutes or so, Michaela goes to open a bottle of wine before we serve the food. I said, "Well, before we get started, I talked to Natalie yesterday and since we're commemorating the 1-year anniversary of the House of Love Christmas, I promised we would all call her since she has to miss being here. It will really mean a lot to her." Dana and MC were both excited about it, even both saying that they both thought about calling Natalie themselves on their way over to my apartment. So I dial her number and put my phone on speaker. We go through about 3 or 4 exchanges with Natalie on the phone; every time she speaks, we hear her first from the closet and then from my phone - like an echo.

(Hello?) "Hello?" "Hi Natalie!" (Hey! What are you guys doing?) "Hey! What are you guys doing?"

The looks on Dana and Michaela's faces were priceless. They just kept looking at the closet, then at the phone, then back at me. I could not keep a straight face whatsoever. Apparently, when Dana began to run over to the closet, she was in the midst of shouting, "YOU LIAR!" until she and Michaela opened the door to find their beloved friend inside.

Now, I have a video of what happened next. Unfortunately, this blog won't let me post it because it's too long. But honestly, I don't know that you would want to endure it. It's literally three minutes of shrieking, squealing, laughing, hugging (over and over and over and over), a celebratory high-five or two, and then more shrieking. It's pretty hilarious. Needless to say, they were so shocked. So as the night proceeded, we ate a great meal together, drank lots of wine, ingested far too much Christmas candy, told lots of stories, and played cards until about one in the morning. It was so lovely - I could not have been happier.