July in Pictures (sort of)

It's hard to believe August is already here. In fact, I woke up with a start this morning as I remembered that I needed to cut a check for our rent.

Let's recap the month:

Early July - I started my job and my boss quit all in the same week, pretty much.

July 4 - Independence Day! We celebrated our first holiday as a married couple (and in Portland) by going to see the Beavers (minor league baseball) play at PGE Park. The Beavers beat Las Vegas, some people guessed whether words were names of cheeses or not, and there were some pretty great fireworks:

(Fireworks at PGE park)

July 10 - Saw the Timbers (minor league soccer, soon-to-be MLS team) play against Miami at PGE Park. As mentioned in Mike's blog, this involved a lot of sawing off sections of a log. We also saw one of Miami's players head-butt the crossbar of the bench shelter in an ill-advised attempt to rescue a stray ball. There are ball girls for that, guy... settle down.

(weird rubber-band-face sculpture outside PGE park)

Mid-July - developed an unhealthy obsession with Spider solitaire. Also, tried out a pickup Ultimate game a few blocks from our apartment. It's completely disorganized and we put way too many people on way too small of a field, but it's fun.

Also also, some friends visited from Maryland and we gave them the walking tour of Portland: Powell's, downtown, and Cha Taqueria - which are apparently three of the four places we will take most of our guests to (VooDoo Donut being the fourth). Hopefully we will see more of them next year when they move to Oregon!

All month long - Mike is the best husband ever and takes care of all the housework while I'm at work. I'm enjoying the separation of duties until he gets a job and we have to figure out how to keep up with everything! Is it weird to hire a maid for a studio apartment?

(Mike making sweet & sour stir-fry, one of his specialties)

Late July - we set up a joint checking account with Wells Fargo, which was one of the most bizarrely awesome banking experiences of my life thus far. Our banker rubbed her hands together and cackled when she asked us to enter our "secret codes" when selecting our debit PINs. She told us things and then asked that we not share them with her grandmother. Finally, she gave us high fives when we were finished.

We also spent a lot of time on soccer this month. Between the World Cup and finding a decent place for Mike to play, soccer has been a huge theme for our summer.

(Mike running like the wind)

July 31 - Went to a crawfish boil hosted by a friend's girlfriend's sister's fiancé whom we recently met. It was a pretty fun time, with live music, lots of little kids running around offering people cupcakes they had just dropped in the dirt, and babies throwing up on their dads. That dad totally deserved it, though.

(Mike and me at the crawfish boil)

So that was July!