My Dad, Suzy B and meWelcome to the blog! No one of course is reading this yet as I haven't made it for public consumption yet, but someday people may read this (Micah and Hilary Jr.?) and I felt like this was as good a place as any to document the lead up to our nuptuals.
For the first post, I thought I would write a diary of sorts of my day spent selecting Hilary's engagement ring (a live blog of sorts, except written after the fact, so while it's not technically live, it will be in that style and will feature many of the thoughts going through my head at the actual times they were happening).
Let me give the set-up first. We have a family friend who works as a private jeweler (whatever that means) in NYC, and who was wonderfully willing to be my tour guide through the engagement ring purchasing process. However, the concept of this person sending diamonds back and forth for me to look at seemed like a horrible idea and a huge hassle. As it turned out, my dad (who once worked in the jewelry business - is there any job he didn't have at some point?) was going to be in New York City on business, so I decided to fly up to the Big Apple for the day to whittle the process down to a few hours.
Fortunately, by brother-in-law Will is working at Delta for the summer, so he allowed me to use one of his coveted "buddy passes", which made the price of a roundtrip ticket to NY less than $100 (for those thinking I'm Mr. Moneybags to be flying to NY just to look at a ring, this explains how I was able to make that happen). Now all I had to do was figure out a way to slip it past Hilary that I would be out of town for the day and not have her get suspicious.
A quick sidebar: There is a famous story from when Will got engaged to my sister Hannah, where he flew back to Corpus Christi ("The Body") to get the ring he was planning to propose with. He did it on a Wednesday when we would usually be playing soccer, so as to explain his late arrival at home to his nosy bride-to-become. All went as planned - except that while he was in Texas he made the fatal mistake of getting his hair cut, and when Hannah asked him when he got it done, he responded, "When I was home." Will is an idiot.
I was determined not to suffer the same fate as my new bro, but I too am cursed to be in a relationship with Nosy McNoserpants, so I had to be prepared to throw her off the scent.
Now that we've set the scene, let's get to the action.
6:15 am - I set my alarm to get up at this time, as I was planning on getting on a 7:45 am flight to LaGuardia. I told Hilary I was playing racquetball before work with my co-worker to explain my early rise; typically she is long-gone by the time I get up for work around 8:00 (8:20 after four snoozes). She bought it. So far so good.
6:50 am - I arrive at Hartsfield-International Airport, park my car in the economy parking lot, and head towards my gate. One of the great things about flying by myself is that I am quite content to get to the airport as late as is humanly possible without missing the flight, while Hilary likes to get there a little earlier, like say a calendar month in advance. I chuckled about this fact to myself as I arrived at my gate for the 7:45 flight at 7:33.
This actually worked out well, because with Will's buddy pass I have to wait until the end to board anyway since my priority lies somewhere between Tuberculosis Guy and terrorist. On this particular flight, I was literally the last person onto the plane in the only seat left unoccupied.
10:00 am - Landed at LaGuardia - so far so good. I managed to sleep a bit on the way up despite sitting next to one of the worst possible seatmates - the talker. I realize I am quite the gabber myself, but when I get on a plane, I just want to listen to my iPod and go to sleep. So dude, please, leave me the @#$@ alone. I called my Dad to check in, and headed to catch a bus to Grand Central Station.
10:30 am - Well, I wouldn't say this counts as things going awry (foreshadowing), but traffic was a murph, so it took about an hour to get from the airport to the city. Still, this gave me time to continue acting out the ruse that would lead Hilary to believe it was nothing but a normal work day for me.
With her new job, Hilary no longer uses any instant messaging programs, which made my job a little easier. Still, we email back and forth during the day, so keeping that afloat would be the biggest challenge. Both of my sisters were on board to help out though, so I called Hannah and had her check my email to see if Hilary had written anything. She had, so I dictated an email back to her.
Let me tell you something I learned from dictation. Mushiness is a private, private thing. It's all well and good to write "I love you!" to your girlfriend, but telling your sister to write out "Next paragraph - I love you, exclamation point" sounds really, really lame. Doing it on a crowded bus doesn't help much either.
11:30 am - Ok, that took a little too long, but my appointment at the jeweler wasn't scheduled until 12:30. My Dad was there to meet me at the bus station and we headed to grab a quick bite before going to check out the bling (question for future kids - do people still use that word in the future? it annoys the crap out of me now, so for your sake hopefully it has faded).
Telling mom about my purchase11:45 am - We were supposed to eat at this midtown restaurant called "Dishes", but despite being given directions to pretty much the exact street corner it allegedly resided on, we couldn't find it. I did however find a kosher deli with a shawarma skewer running, and my contract with God stipulates that I eat shawarma whenever the opportunity presents itself.
12:15 pm - Ok, maybe that wasn't the best idea. My stomach is not going to enjoy the flight home later this afternoon.
12:30 pm - Right on time, we get to the jeweler's office to check out the merchandise. Her assistant shows us a couple things to begin with, all of which look exactly the same to me.
Frankly, the whole diamond business cracks me up. I mean, how long does the average person get to spend looking at someone else's ring? Four, five seconds? And usually the finger where the ring resides is in motion for most of it, no? The only way most people can tell the difference from one diamond to another (aside from size, obviously) is if they have one of those diamond microscopes, and how many people walk around with those? 10% tops?
Still, I want a diamond that is going to make Hilary happy, so I am trying my best to understand what she is saying.
I actually learned a decent amount (I mean for a guy) about diamonds in the last couple weeks. During Hilary's last trip to DC before she started her new job, Hannah and I went to Solomon Brothers in Atlanta to get my first taste of the ring-selecting process. Following that, my friend Kim, who works in the diamond industry, spent a couple hours showing me more options and explaining more about the Four C's (cut, color, clarity, and calligraphy).
12:35 pm - Our family friend shows up, and I like her immediately as she begins to give my dad grief. A woman after my own heart. When she and I spoke on the phone to set this up a week ago, she mentioned she already had the perfect stone in mind for me, and though she shows me a couple other potential rocks, "the one" is brought out and I gotta say, it looks great. I have a problem expressing myself in this way (as many who know me can attest), so all I can manage to say is, "Yeah, I think it looks ok." But as my dad tells her, that means Micah like-ah.
Examining the rock
Suzy shows me how to look pompous while examining a diamond3:30 pm - First the bad news - the 4:00 flight is delayed until 5:00 now, which would get me back to Atlanta at 7:30. Hilary usually gets home around 7:00, so that could be a problem. I was prepared for this though, so I had Leah (she was working the afternoon email shift) email her and tell her I had a work function that might keep me on the job until perhaps 8 or 8:30. Poor trusting Hilary.
Now for the worse news. Because of the previous Atlanta cancellation, everyone got bumped to a later flight. Currently, I am 78th(!) on the standby list for the next flight to Atlanta. 78th? Really? They need to count that high? After like the first 15-20 names, they should just puta little picture of someone giving you the middle finger. Not good.
4:20 pm - Sensing that things could get ugly (no matter the flight, my priority status would remain at the bottom of the barrel, making it next to impossible for me to get a standby seat on a plane so long as the weather was bad), I got in line at the Delta counter to see if perhaps I could persuade someone to help me out. I flashed my best smile and proceeded to explain to the agent my situation as a poor lovestruck fiance-to-be who just wanted to get home to his soon-to-be bride without her figuring out what he was up to. She seemed sympathetic, but when you are 78th on the standby list, I don't even know if I'd have had any luck as a woman in labor.
4:30 pm - I called my dad to explain the situation, and Macy gets on the case. In the meantime, I begin to think about what kind of excuse I am going to be able to come up with to explain to Hilary why not only might I not be home by 8:00, but it's entirely possible I may not come home at all. This was not part of my original plan, to say the least. I started to think contingencies, but I wasn't panicking...yet.
5:00 pm - Ok, definitely starting to get worried. It is beginning to look increasingly likely that I won't get out of NYC tonight - at least from LaGuardia. I call Will to see what the availability was looking like at JFK and Newark, and begin to ponder how irritated I'd get if I had to fly to say, Birmingham, and then rent a car to get back (about 8 on a scale of 10).
5:10 pm - LaGuardia is basically a ghost. Will, despite being a Delta employee, apparently isn't able to conjure a flight out of thin air (give him time, he's only been there a few weeks). Since it appears that even under the best circumstances I'm not going to be able to make it home by the 8:30 time I originally quoted Hilary, it's time to put Plan B into action. Which direction to go? Last minute poker game? Late movie she wouldn't want to see? The biggest issue was finding a reason for my cell phone not to work in case she needed to call me. She had already phoned once in the morning when I was on my flight, but I could excuse that because I don't get reception at the gym where I'd allegedly been playing racquetball.
No, there is only one answer - TNT. I had worked for a month straight during April and May at TNT for the NBA playoffs, where I had spent every night from roughly 6 pm to 2 am logging sound for their pre- and post-game shows. During this month I had always come home late, and since I didn't get reception at TNT either (annoying at the time, but a small bonus at present), it would provide a good cover. I try to find as quiet a place as possible in the terminal so as not to let the PA system give away my location ("Listen Jane, don't start with that Red Zone sh*t again.") and call Hilary at her office, where I know she'll be hesitant to talk long. I tell her the good news - my boss from Turner had called and wanted to know if I could fill in on the baseball shift tonight!
The ploy works, and she goes for it. One crisis solved; I now at least have some leeway on time to get home without needing any more excuses.
5:15 pm - Macy is having some luck on his end. Let it never be said that my dad isn't there for his children. On his way to NYC on Sunday, he got bumped from his flight out of Atlanta, for which he got a $400 voucher (basically so many pennies to him with as much as he flies). He gives me the voucher towards a one-way ticket out of JFK on a flight scheduled to leave at 6:50. The only seats left are in first class, so even with the voucher I still have to cough up some dough (but significantly less than I would have). Now all I have to do is make it over to JFK in time to be on board when it leaves. Not exactly my preferred choice, but at this point I can't take any chance on any standby seat from any airport anywhere. I head towards the taxi depot.
5:50 pm - A $34 cab ride over to JFK later, and I've now spent more on transportation to and from airports by automobile than I did by plane. But, I won't complain - anything that gets me back to Atlanta with Hilary none the wiser is worth it. To be honest, I don't know what my max would have been to spend on a ticket home, but it might have been upwards of $500 just to keep the day a secret.
6:15 pm - I get through security, and - surprise! - my 6:50 flight is now scheduled to leave at 7:30. I'll take it, just as long as it leaves today.
7:30 pm - Trivia question: what has two thumbs and has a 6:50 flight now looking like it won't be leaving until 8:45? This guy.
8:45 pm - The flight we are on finally landed from LAX around 8:30, so we actually get to board our plane with the notion that we might land in Atlanta before the midnight hour. Although I am exhausted, I can't help but be a little excited to fly first class. I've only done it twice before, and once was an early morning flight where I slept for most of the time. It's a shame I have to drive home from the airport, or else it'd be time to get my Hasselhoff on. Still, this flight has those little monitors in the back of the seat in front of you which allows you to watch movies, TV, or play games.
9:00 pm - Apropos of nothing, I'd just like to note that tonight is Game 4 of the NBA Finals between the San Antonio Spurs and the Cleveland Cavaliers, and I'm not entirely sure I wouldn't be more frustrated with life watching that game than sitting through my current predicament.
9:15 pm - The plane is fully loaded (and I'm working on it, having ordered a glass of wine and a screwdriver in succession), and we taxi away from our gate. Good to go? Clearly, you haven't been reading this. The pilot comes on to explain that because of the weather, the runways are backed up and we are currently something like 427th in line to take off. At least I can watch a movie. I choose Shooter starring Marky Mark, which seems like a better option than Norbit or Bridge To Terabithia.
11:00 pm - Shooter is almost over as the plane finally takes off. I've seen worse, but I've seen better. For the record, my 6:50 flight pushed back nearly two hours late, then waited on the tarmac for another two hours to boot before taking to the skies.
1:00 am - We land in Atlanta. Praise God. I would love to write something witty here, but let's be honest. There isn't much witty to say when you've spent the past 10 hours at the airport or on a plane.
1:35 am - Home at last - almost. There are no parking places available anywhere near Hilary's apartment, so after circling twice around her portion of the complex, I decide to take a calculated risk. Since I am leaving for work the next morning at 8:30, I park in the handicap spot adjacent to her building under the assumption (fair in my thinking) that no handicapped people will be needing it in the next six hours. Maybe not the best solution, but I am willing to roll the dice at this point. I just want to go to bed - screw the handicapped.
1:45 am - I check my email to make sure nothing imploded at work and crawl into Hilary's bed dappled and drowsy and ready to sleep. For just a moment, I stare over at her sleeping figure. It may have been one of the longest days of my life, but looking at her lying next to me, I know it was worth it. Now if I can just keep it a secret!
