Announcements

First, the good news.

I got engaged! On Thursday night (May 17th), after TKD/HKD, Max asked me to marry him! We were standing in the living room. I was sweaty and gross, not wearing any makeup, and in my dobok, so I looked like a dead 12-year old boy. He psyched me out with flowers and then pulled out the ring while I wasn't looking. Crafty, that one!

I was planning to announce the engagement by posting a picture of the ring here, but while I was waiting for my dad to send it to me, something else happened...

I went to a bridal show on Sunday at the Bass Performance Hall in Dallas. It was okay. There were a million vendors there. They sent us on this scavenger-hunt, where we had to get each vendor to sign off on their booth in the program. If you do this, they enter you in a big drawing to win like, 40 prizes, some of which were pretty awesome, like a 7-night cruise to Hawaii.

After 4 hours (!) of legwork, I entered my name and hoped for the best. We were getting down to the end of the list, when my name was finally called. (The cruise had already been taken at this point, but I thought I might snag a gift certificate for something). Lucky me, I won.....

...a totally hideous set of 4 western ranch-inspired chargers and a matching napkin holder!

I kid you not. This stuff was like, antiqued brown-ish rust-colored aluminum, poorly assembled (probably in Mexico), with ranch symbols stamped around the edge of the chargers. I smiled graciously, and returned to my seat, running through my mental list of people who might appreciate such a thing. (No one I know.)

As we were leaving the building, another bride came up to me and complimented me on my prize! She gushed about how she thought they were just beautiful and I was so lucky to have won them! I promptly handed them to her and said "Congratulations! They're yours!", smiling broadly. She was floored. We took a picture! It's a great story!

Then my day went down the toilet.

Remember my car? I do. Now memories are all I have of it, because my car was stolen.

Yes, you read that right. Some jerkface walked past my mom's Z3, glanced at my sister's newer, sexier Honda and thought, "Nah, I'll take the old, ugly one. I'll take Jessica's car."

They knew it was Jessica's car, too, because it had a sticker in the back window with my name on it, as well as all my CDs in my pink CD holder, sitting in the front seat, clearly labled "Jessica". Mine! My car! Not yours!

I only had liability insurance (who steals an '89 Honda Civic?!). I am unemployed. I am getting married in 4 months. Barring personal injury, this is pretty much the worst thing that could've happened to me. <----Not a hyperbole. This blows.

Of course, I filed a police report and jumped through all the necessary hoops. The detective assigned to my case called me today to ask some questions, and he told me that in all likelihood, my car was stripped for parts. Apparently, early-model Hondas are popular with the street-racing types (?!?!?). I can totally see that. I mean, my car could do 0 to 60 in like, 2 minutes!

Long story short, I'll probably never see my car, or my CDs, or my flying frog that hung from the rear-view mirror, or my bobble-head alligator on my dashboard, ever again.

Thank you, random criminal scum, for stealing my car and putting financial strain on us during an already financially stressful time. I know you'll never care that you robbed me of something that had great emotional value. You don't give a rat's ass that I feel violated, vulnerable, and helpless. You're probably elated that you stole my car, and you're almost certainly never going to be caught for doing it. Congratulations, whoever you are, for being such a calloused, despicable waste of space. You're not even worth my anger.