Luck runs out with Boston drivers :(

Anticipating a very long day yesterday, I drove to work (figured the client would rather pay the $30 for my parking than the $160 cab ride home). Imagine my surprise when I finished the project early and was able to leave by 5:30!!! I was thrilled, however, the feeling didn't last long. Leaving at this time meant driving in the rush-hour evening commute on the Mass Pike (I-90). It was a clear sunny day and traffic was very slow moving, lots of stop and go. As I was about 5 to 10 miles away from my exit, all of the lanes again began to slow and come to a complete stop, paying attention, I did the same. Unfortunately, the driver behind me did not and rearended me. I was not hurt, just frustrated .

I promptly called the police (thanks Mom for the good example and advice ). I wanted an accident report filed to make sure that I was not held at fault. I know I said I wanted an accident that was not my fault, but this is enough!!! The other driver was very apologetic, and I was nice to him (he felt terrible, there was no point in making him feel worse) but am still annoyed. He said he only looked away for an instant - let this be a lesson for all, an instant is all it takes! He was lucky that traffic was so slow to begin with so he was not going fast when he hit me and neither of us were hurt - I cannot say the same for the cars. As you can see below, my car probably suffered a couple thousand dollars damage - his car was far worse. Because my car was still drivable, I went home after the report was filed (officer told me to leave) so I do not know whether the other driver was cited but I have to assume so.

Once I got home, Garrett assessed the damage and took the pictures below while I called the insurance companies.

Fortunately, the other driver's insurance company (at least last night) was very accomodating and pleasant. They opened a claim (he had not called yet) and told me an adjuster would contact me by end of today (Friday) to schedule the appraisal. They also offered me a loaner car. Hopefully, this will continue to be an easy process. If not, our insurance (USAA is a fabulous company!) assured us they would cover the damages, waive the deductible, and go after his insurance. One way or another, it will get fixed.

Although not hurt, I am definitely shook up, probably why I am writing this at 5 AM instead of sleeping . I hope everyone will take away from this what I have - cars can be very dangerous and we must be alert and focused at all times!!! I may think twice now about using the cell phone or changing a CD while driving . . .

Lucky Las Vegas

We just returned from a fun-filled weekend in Las Vegas! We had a fabulous time visiting with our wonderful friends, the Johnsons and Kevin Pullium (aka the "Triple P"), who drove over from LA. The weather was HOT and and we loved every minute of it!!! We arrived fairly late on Friday evening but managed to stay up even later to visit with the Johnsons. Saturday morning we were up early to play with the girls (two adorable little ones - two year old Taylor and four month old Aubrey). This was the first time we met Aubrey and she is every bit as cute and fun as her big sister. Although we already knew Taylor, she hadn't seen us in a year and was a bit shy for the first couple of hours, but that didn't last long and pretty soon she was more than happy to be holding Aunt Nikki or Uncle G's hand when in public!

We all headed down to the strip to check out the dolphins and tigers at the Mirage. Taylor and I were especially into the dolphins, who were quite playful and seemed to enjoy showing off with flips. We went to the Nordstrom Cafe for lunch (I love that place!) where we met up with Kevin before heading back to the Johnsons for some relaxation. The girls took naps, which looked pretty good but the adults resisted.

Saturday night was adults only. We went back to the strip and had dinner at Diego's in the MGM Grand. After dinner, we checked out some other casinos before winding up at Hooters Hotel and Casino (some Air Force guys were having a party there and we got to see some folks that we haven't seen in years). There was not much gambling on our part. I stuck 25 cents in an electronic poker game and wound up winning a dollar. I gave 50 cents to Garrett and we each played the quarter slot machines. Garrett one $12.50!!! That may not sound like much but it's not bad when you consider he started with 50 cents . Not being big gamblers, we cashed out!!!

Sunday was very relaxing. We all went up to Mt. Charleston and had a picnic lunch. I think this is the one part of Vegas that is not 100+ degrees, in fact it was quite pleasant. The rest of the day we hung out at the Johnsons' chatting and playing a fun game called Settlors. Johnson smoked us all both games! Before going to the airport for a red eye flight, the Johnsons took us back to the strip to enjoy some gelato and see the water show at the Bellagio. It was amazing.

Once at the airport, we had about an hour to kill before boarding the flight so we decided to each play $2 on the slot machines. I promptly lost my $2 but Garrett hit the jackpot (okay maybe not the jackpot but he did great). On his second dollar, he decided to max bet, smart move because we were playing the Wheel of Fortune slots and he got to spin the wheel. He landed on 500 (which amounts to $125!!!) We promptly cashed out and decided he was the luckiest guy around! So all in all we spent $5 gambling and walked away with $137.50, we were quite proud of ourselves!!!

Although it was a short trip, we had a fabulous time and hated to see it end. We realize how much we miss living near our Johnsons and look forward to the day when we can have "date night" more regularly. Thank you guys for a wonderful weekend, we miss you already!

Now it's back to the real world. Fortunately, in two weeks, we will be back in WA for Labor Day.

Hope you are having as much fun as we are this August!!!

Relief from the heat

Although it has been a very hot and muggy summer here in Massachusetts, we finally got a break this weekend with blue, sunny skies, temps in the mid to upper 70's and no humidy we are in Heaven!!! Unfortunately, we have not had much time to enjoy this great weather because of work, but hopefully that will lighten up a bit in another couple of weeks.


Last weekend, while I was inside reviewing emails for work, Garrett sanded and stained our deck. He did a great job. The only one unhappy was Salem, who was not allowed outside for a whole sunny day - life is tough when you're a kitty!

This weekend, I spent the majority of the time working (I still have 9,000+ emails to review by the end of the week - what fun!) and Garrett cleaned the house (and made me some very yummy chocolate chip cookies). We did manage to take a break yesterday to have lunch at the Cheesecake Factory - sadly, we did not leave room for desert but the food was great. Then we went to Pirates of the Caribbean II - not too impressed but it was nice to take a break.

Fortunately, next weekend we are taking a much needed break. We are going to Las Vegas to visit our friends, the Johnsons. We cannot wait to see them and meet their newest addition, Aubrey. Until then, we will be working hard to make sure that we don't have to bring any work with us - fingers crossed!!!

Hope you are enjoying your final month of summer!

Lots of nothing going on . . .

Not much new happening in Massachusetts. The weather out here has been toggling between blazing hot and torrential rain storms which has made doing anything active outdoors pretty tough to do. Work is still keeping us busy as usual. Nikki's workload is picking up again now that we are well clear of the 4th of July holiday season. She took part in her first mediation last week which she would describe as interesting, yet unproductive. Apparently the other side didn't really want the issue to be mediated and it looks like they may be going to trial. Should add some excitement to her day if that happens.


My week was pretty normal. Lots of meetings.......wrote some reports......etc. We had a change of command on Thursday though which broke up the monotony. My boss' boss who is a Navy Captain (not to be confused with an Air Force Captain) retired and we got a new Navy guy to take his place. Captain Westerbeak (the new boss) seems pretty cool and is in a similar commuting situation as Nikki and I. His wife has an ambitious career and is working in the Boston area while he is in Hartford. Needless to say, we'll at least have that to talk about if I'm ever in a pinch.

Well that's all for this week. Hopefully next week will surpass this week’s excitement level. Shouldn't be too hard. Later.

Summer time . . .

As you can tell, we have been a bit lazy with this blog lately. Sorry about that, things got a little hectic and we never seemed to make time for the updates. Oops! Lots has happened in the last month but to save time (and to avoid boring you too much!) we will stick with the highlights . . .


On June 16th, we celebrated our 5th wedding anniversary. It is so hard to believe that 5 years have gone by so quickly. In many ways, it feels as though we were just planning and celebrating the wedding, yet in other ways, it is hard to remember not being married. So much has changed in the last five years but we love being together and are looking forward to at least another 60 or 70 years! Since our Nantucket trip was our anniversary celebration, the actual day was pretty simple and relaxing - we got takeout from Vinny T's (our favorite italian restaurant) and enjoyed a romantic evening at home.

Since then, we have kept pretty busy with both work and play. We spent one weekend down on the Cape for a wedding. The weather was horrible but the wedding was beautiful and a lot of fun. We also learned to play bocce ball (neither of us is very good - practice is definitely needed!!!)

For the 4th of July, we went home to Washington to visit with family and friends. The weather was beautiful - warm, sunny and absolutely NO humidity - we were in Heaven! We took advantage of this great weather by spending much of the time at the beach house on Treasure Island soaking up the sun and wake boarding (G not N!) It was a very special trip because it was Garrett's first time back there since returning from Iraq and most people had not seen him in over a year. We celebrated with a large family party at Puerto Vallarta (his favorite mexican restaurant in Port Orchard) We had such a great time that we are going back over Labor Day and are hoping we have a repeat of the great weather

This weekend we have been trying to relax and clean the house and yard since we have been gone so much lately. It has been a beautiful weekend and we are sad to see it coming to an end. We have so many small children in our neighborhood and we cannot help but be envious of them being on summer break, we miss those days!!!

Not much else to report now but we promise the next update will be more timely :) Hope you are all enjoying a sunny, happy summer . . .

Another week down . . .

Well, we made it another week. Now we are finally in June and are looking forward to coming home to Washington at the end of the month for the 4th of July! Can't wait.


Nikki worked some haillacious hours this week. On Thursday she left work at about midnight which ended up being a lot earlier than she was thinking. She figured that the clients probably didn't want the kind of work she was coming up with at 4:00 in the morning so she punched out early. This lawyering stuff is definitely not turning out to be much of a 9-5 but she's enjoying it. The important news though, is that after all this time in physical therapy, she is back running and ran 2 miles around the park at Hanscom today without feeling even a touch of pain! We are both really excited that so much progress is starting to be made. Before long, she'll be back to running marathons!

Our last dance class was on Saturday and in the end, we feel like we came out of it with 3-4 dances that we could actually pull off if we ever get the opportunity some day. We definitely got the foxtrot and waltz down. We are also pretty comfortable with the hustle and the tango but there are a whole lot of moves that we haven't learned yet so don't start thinking "dancing with the stars" quite yet. Let's just say we can do the basics if a song came on. We'd probably know a lot more if some of the slugs in our class had any rhythm whatsoever though. We'd spend 75% of the time relearning all the moves that we had down months ago because of all the bumbling going on in the class. "I don't get it"......Agggggghhh!......we've only learned it ten times already!! Oh well. At least we learned some stuff.

It's looking like we both will be about as busy this coming week as last week and there is no telling when that routine is going to end while we are here. At least we have an end in sight as our stay here on the east coast will be expiring in just about a year. YEAH! Other than that, I am avidly looking forward to another episode of Lost this week so I can get caught up with the Z man and finally let him rap about all the craziness that went on this past season (he's wanted to for months). Hope everyone has a great week and we'll talk atcha soon.

Happy Memorial Day

We just returned from an amazing weekend trip in Nantucket. This was our first visit and we could not have picked a more beautiful weekend. Although it was foggy and rainy Friday night when we arrived, we woke to bright, sunny skies every other day. The weather was clear, sunny and warm with temperatures in the high 70s to low 80s.


On Saturday, after enjoying a breakfast of fresh fruit and granola (provided by our inn keeper), we walked around the town checking out the shops, museums and art galleries. The island is so quaint! All of the homes are large and have shakes on them. In the afternoon, we returned to our bed-n-breakfast, The Century House  for cookies and rest. That evening we got to see Nantucket in party-mode for the holiday weekend. We decided to eat at The Tavern down at the Marina so that we could see everything. It was a lot of fun and food was great. Garrett loved his lobster rolls and I enjoyed the catch of the day - not sure what it was but it tasted great!!!

Sunday, we decided to rent bikes and explore the island. We wound up biking about 20 miles and saw some amazing beaches. We started by going to Surfside Beach, about a 3 mile ride from town. This beach had a ton of waves (hence the name!) but the water was chilly! We put our feet in but that is about it. Then we biked out to Sconset, where we had a picnic at the beach before biking to the Sankaty Lighthouse. By this point, we were a bit tired so we biked back to town. We had such a great time on the bikes that we decided we will have to purchase some so that we can continue the fun. We got back to our B-n-B around 4 PM, just in time for some cookies, showers, and relaxation before going to the White Elephant for dinner. It was a great place, overlooking the harbor.

Sadly, today we had to return home, but not before we spent another couple of hours enjoying the island. It is a wonderful place and we highly recommend that you visit there at some point. We only wish we hadn't waited so long to do so.

On another note, we want to wish everyone a Happy Memorial Day! We hope your weekend was a wonderful as ours!

Back to running!

Well it's official, I am running again!!! I had a followup appointment with my surgeon on Monday and he gave me the go ahead to try running again (with strict instructions to not go overboard). So on Tuesday, my physical therapist had me run on the treadmill and it was AWESOME!!! I'll admit, it felt a little weird at first and I had a slight twinge of pain for the first minute or so, but once I got going it felt great! He only let me run for 9 minutes (3 of which he made me jog slowly while holding on - that takes coordination!) but I loved every minute of it. He is going to let me run a full mile tomorrow - I cannot wait! We have to get me up to 3.5 miles by June 15th when I am taking part in the JP Morgan Corporate Challenge in Boston. It is such a great race, starting at the Boston Common, running down to Fenway Park and back. Last year there were 14,000+ participants! Then Garrett and I have our first 5K of the season two weeks later. I'll keep you posted on how it goes!

Garrett's first blog

Nikki is making some big time progress in therapy and will probably get to run again as early as next week! We are both really excited to get back to running 5Ks and the weather is finally starting to shape up so the timing is perfect.


Salem made a new friend today while we were tackling our post-flooding jungle of a lawn today. Our new neighbors have a baby rotwieler who had escaped from his captivity in their garage somehow and decided to come play at our house. The two of them were exactly the same size and one would think that they would make great friends but ole Salem got a little skittish around the pup and decided that the claws needed to come out. We ended up having to get him safe inside behind the screen door and go find our neighbors to make sure they knew where their pup was. Hopefully they do a better job of keeping him inside because the little guy is way too small to be out on his own roaming the neighborhood.

Nikki got to go to one of her frind and coworker Kate's bridal shower this afternoon in Wellsley. She had a great time and our gift was a huge hit. Can't go wrong with a martini shaker and all the fixins to make some cosmos. Have a good week!

Spring has sprung at the Fisher's

What a great weekend we have had. Yesterday was a little too drizzly to work in the yard so we decided to do a bit of Spring cleaning inside before our dance class. Yes, Garrett and I go to ballroom dancing every Saturday evening, and I must say, we are getting pretty good. So far we have learned the Fox Trot, Waltz, and Hustle. Last night we started learning the Tango. Now we just need a good wedding to go to so we can show off our moves


Today, it has been very sunny and clear so we finally got to work in the yard and start planting the vegetables in our garden. We finished planting the tomatoes, peppers and herbs. Hopefully next weekend we will be able to plant the zucchini and squash.