I'd Probably Go To Ogden Today If I Was Homeless

When I lived in DC, most of my travel time occurred underground (ah, except for the lovely three minutes above ground at the Arlington Cemetery stop). And in a city where the pin-striped commuters hit the metro en masse, it's a rarity to see the same people more than once or twice. There was, however, this one couple who occasionally ended up on the same train as me in the mornings and the evenings. I always thought it was so sweet that they shared that commute time together and a little part of me hoped I'd have a similar commute with my sweetheart someday. I wondered what we'd talk about, what we'd do with two hours worth of uninterrupted commute - sans any driving distractions or me falling asleep in the car (very typical of any 10+ min drive we make) or the patchy half sentences that result from trying to apply mascara mid-conversation.

Well, thanks to our trip to Ogden yesterday compliments of Frontrunner, the Rileys now know what we'd do with that time: share the earbuds, listen to Mason Jennings and play "brick" on the iPod. We're a barrel of fun.

Call it fate. My little brother, Collin, had a concert at the Union Station in Ogden last night and it was the perfect excuse to join the hoardes of free Frontrunners for the trip north. So we hopped on in SLC and rode the entire route to Ogden's Union Station. It was a pretty decent ride, but it seems like there are a few wrinkles to be ironed out... like, where are you supposed to park for the Salt Lake station?! We parked down a slightly sketchy stretch of street, but we returned five hours later to find the car intact, so that's a bonus.

As we drove home along the back side of the Gateway, I commented on how convenient Frontrunner must be for The Parc at Gateway and Northgate residents...

A: "I bet this is really convenient for the people who live here."
N: "So they can go to Ogden whenever they want?" (Laced with skepticism.)
A: "Yeah, okay. I bet it's really convenient for the people who live here but work in Ogden."
N: "All right. OR if you were homeless."
A: "Yeah, if I was homeless I TOTALLY would have gone to Ogden today."

Another Suite Night

Noah must be batting his eyes or flashing those dimples for someone because we scored yet another set of suite tickets a few weekends ago for the Bees' home opener.

The suite didn't have catering, but they did give us food vouchers which allowed us to stroll the concourse in search of grub and awkward situations. We found both.

While waiting in line, we ran into a guy I recognized from Utah State. He apparently also recognized me and struck up conversation. He kept trying to peg from where we knew each other, and my "um... Utah State?" answer would not suffice. He continued digging, but I couldn't bring myself to tell him it was because he used to hit on me when I worked as a parking booth attendant. I just can't condone the behavior by having the offender believe it was memorable.

After the 7th inning stretch, we decided to indulge our sweet tooths (?) and ran down for some ice cream. We placed our order - Bumblebee Ripple - and turned to watch the game while they scooped. A good five minutes later, I finally leaned over to Noah and asked, "Do you think anyone is getting our ice cream?" We turned back toward the counter and a staredown between the two of us and no fewer than five adolescent ice cream connoisseurs ensued. They looked confused. We were certainly confused. Noah finally broke the silence and asked about our order, at which point they hit the "ah-ha!" threshold and started scooping. How do you forget to fulfill an order when you only have one customer? Mystery.

Mr. Noah

Noah's company is involved in Junior Achievement, a program where business folk visit local schools once a week for a month or so and indoctrinate the little kiddos with "business = good" philosophies. Also, so that when they take macroeconomics their freshman year of college, they look at supply and demand and think, "this is vaguely familiar..."

As you can well imagine, Mr. Noah has quickly become a favorite among the first graders. His first week, little Natalie insisted he stay. When Noah explained he had to leave but would be back the next Tuesday, another little boy piped in and said, "I can't WAIT until Tuesday." I wish I had such a captive audience at work :).

Today, Noah had another jam session with the tots, and this was the exchange he sent me by email:

Natalie: "Can you just stay with us?"
Mrs. Pugh: "Mr. Riley has a job he has to get back to." (Today we talked about jobs).
Malachi: "Where do you work?"
Noah: "I work at SelectHealth, we do health insurance."
Class: Confused looks
Noah: "We help people go see the doctor." ("And we charge an arm and a leg.")
Angie: "You should work with Mrs. Pugh."
Noah: "That would be a lot more fun."

Fort Night

My apologies if this is one of those posts that you read and suddenly you feel like you know too much about a couple. But this was one of those memories that reminded me of what a sweet husband I have.

When Noah and I were dating - after the spring thaw warmed my shoulder a little :) - he asked me out on a Saturday night. April 8th. This is important. There will be a quiz later. I had a feeling that night would be a little different, and I was lookin' pretty fine (thank you, wisdom teeth diet). We had some dinner, played a little bocce at the park and ended up at Noah's place where we built a fort and watched A Series of Unfortunate Events. Enter: our first kiss. In a fort. Sweet.

We don't have any photographic evidence of that first fort. But a few months later, Noah came out to DC where he popped the big question. The next evening, we planned a romantic dinner and stroll around Old Town Alexandria, but a summer storm literally rained out our plans - walking in the rain becomes unromantic when the subjects look like drown rats. So what were we to do with our rained-in evening? Indeedy. Build a fort.



(Our July 2006 fort in DC. These mattresses were ALL extras in my closet. Why did we need all these mattresses?)

We decided that evening to commemorate "Fort Night" each April 8th by building a fort. You would think I had NOTHING to do with that plan, because every (well, both) April, Noah's stellar memory delightfully catches me off guard. I came home the other night to one sweet fort...



(Our April 2008 fort in our SLC place.)


(Our April 2007 fort in our first apartment in Logan.)

I think these pictures will be fun to document over the years. It'll be fun to see where we are, where life takes us, how our hair and fashion sense morphs, how we rope our kiddos into the mix,how creative we get with fort buildin' and if we're still going strong on the fort plan.

Until next year.

Runnin' Runnin'

My toesies and I just had the most delightful run at Murray Park. Thank YOU for the shoes, adorable Linds.

Note to self: The ducks at Murray Park are a little protective of something. And if you run past them they will hiss and chase.

My Dance Recital

Just a quick picture from the time I taught ballet...

Only I've never taught ballet. And that's NOT ME. Isn't that wild?

Noah's coworker noticed this in SelectHealth's marketing materials and said, "Hey Noah. Does this kind of look like the woman to whom you're lawfully wedded?"

So Noah sent it on to me, and the first thing that made me realize the woman in the picture was not me was the fact that I never put a bobby pin in my pony tail. No, no... not the fact that it's not actually my face. But the bobby pin. Naturally.

Date Night

I've been shying away from posts without any photographs to validate my stories are true. Because I'm so sure all of you are reading and thinking, "Yeah right, Riley. Prove it." (Because these stories are so fantastical.)

Actually, I just feel like a post recapping our weekend activities is missing something without a picture accompanying it. But I haven't dusted off the camera for the latest haps, so it's a pictureless post or I resume my blogging drought.

The Millets and the Rileys really tapped into that genius portion of our brains for a Friday "date night." The boys headed to a sports bar in Sugar House to shoot pool and eat manly food, while the girls caught Odyssey Dance Theater's spring show and wished we could rewrite our childhoods to include dance lessons. (Okay, that was just me. Linds did the dance thing. And really, I love that my childhood included violin and piano - but the aforementioned activities don't come with rock-hard abs and petite thighs.)

I can't speak to the boys' evening, but the girls' portion was lovely. We saw their "Let It Be" show, which was comprised of 25+ dances to some of the Beatles' best. Most songs I'd heard, a few I had not ... but I found myself wishing for the more obscure songs each time the girl behind me starting SINGING ALONG to all the ones she knew. Are you for real? Even with our surround sound experience, it was such a fun show - and it made me want to go dig out one of the five Beatles CDs I asked for (and received) for Christmas when I was 10.

After the segregation portion of the evening, we reunited at our place for crepes and all manner of decadence... strawberries, bananas, whipped cream, Nutella. Nothing wrong with this picture.