Pretty cool photo, but the sunset looked way better in person. This was from last week when a buddy and I were driving a load of garbage to the dump out in Blue Creek. It had been raining all day, and then cleared up a bit at sundown, so that’s why the clouds look darker than normal. Now that I’m living out in this area (the spot where I shot this is 30 seconds from my house), hopefully I can snag some really sweet sunset shots this summer.
WE FINALLY WON A GAME THIS SEASON!!
Our record now boats a digit greater than zero preceding the much higher number following: 1-4-1. We beat the same team that we tied to open the season tonight, 4-2.
Our ace pitcher closed the first inning with three strikeouts, but not before our first baseman erred on an easy out to allow a runner on, which led to a few stolen bases and a run.
He, our pitcher, struck out in the bottom of the first and nearly lost his temper in the dugout after the called third strike – his helmet flew across the dugout and he pounded on the fence in a fit. Moments later, he was on the mound throwing toward home in a furious fervor. He retired the next 9 batters he faced, striking out 6 of them. Just one walk in the 5th, he entered the 6th and final inning tossing a magical no-hitter (oh, yeah, he also hit in the tying run on an RBI triple, before stealing home to take the lead. Yeah, he was pumped for the game after that!).
However, the Mets started off the sixth with a pansy-bunt that prevented our no-hitter. No worries, as we only allowed one run in the inning to preserve a 4-2 victory.
Still, our pitcher’s complete game boasted a pretty sweet, damn-near MLB-like pitching line: 6 IP, 1H, 2BB, 2R, 14K
Yeah, that’s FOURTEEN strikeouts! He struck out the side in two separate innings, as well as striking out three in two other innings.
Dominant? Can you say, “Duh?” He struck out more batters than the Mariners’ starter did against us in his complete game no-no shutout.
We also fielded very well, save for that one small error in the first inning. Needless to say, as a coach I haven’t been more proud of this team all year. We hit the ball (though not as much as we should/could have; their pitcher was tossing soft meatballs all game), stole bases and played a stifling defense. We simply played fundamental baseball.
I think this win will spark our team enough to at least play competitive the next few games. We have just two practices this week before Saturday’s interleague match-up, which is just a fluff-game to give our back-up players more playing time.
Batting practice… all week!
Remember when I said I only had a few goals this school year? One of them was to win the Poynter Fellowship in St. Petersburg, Florida, next month. I figured that to be my most difficult challenge of the semester, but I found out last month I nailed it. Check one!
The second feat I wished to accomplish: Be named to the Uwire 100, their list of the top college journalists in the country.
After months of applying, sending in letters of recommendation and buffing up my portfolio, it looks like I nailed them both!
I found out on Friday I was selected apart of the Uwire 100. And although my fiancée doesn’t much like the picture they selected (I actually sent it in, as I seem to like it for some reason…), I am still flabbergasted at the simple fact I accomplished two goals I had set for myself.
Most goals in my life have involved personal feats on the softball diamond, coaching success in Little League and numerous beer pong tournaments. Academia? I used to scoff at the notion that I would ever transpire into much. Well, I guess I even proved myself wrong this year, and I’m never wrong.
I haven’t exactly been able to yell that yet… But it’s Turkey Season, baby, and I’ve got my turkey call dialed in.
Gene and I spent the better half of Sunday calling the ugliest birds around North Idaho all across the mountain, and although we lured them close to where we wanted, we didn’t get a shot off.
Gene, of course, already dropped one a week ago – but now I have his shotgun at the house, as I hear turkeys all morning and throughout the day outside my window.
It’s Thanksgiving in April this year.
Gobble gobble, bitches!
The last few weeks have been incredibly busy, yet now that I am finally settled in at my grandparent’s house for the summer, things are starting to slowly fall in place: School is nearly out, which means The Sentinel is requiring less and less time (before you know it, I will fully hand the reigns over to Eli Francovich, next year’s editor-in-chief); I’ve also started back up at the Boardwalk Marina part-time and Little League is finally beginning to run smoothly.
So, while I’m out 4-wheeling in the woods in my new backyard or helping Grandpa tend to his garden (or help him work on that cold 12-pack of Natty Light) in my sparse spare time, one thing that will also keep me from updating this magnificent little corner of the Web is the internet – or, rather, my grandparent’s lack of a fast connection.
They have a dial-up connection, and it’s not exactly something worth connecting to my laptop. Thus, posts will be coming in bunches, as I am actually writing them on my laptop (thank you, Windows Live Writer, the greatest blog-editing tool – ever!). I set the date for them to publish at whatever the time is when I concoct these minor masterpieces, then when I connect my laptop in town to a WiFi network, BOOM! Suddenly my blog is inundated with a flurry of retroactive action.
Stay tuned. I’m not going anywhere (yet).
The latest issue of The Sentinel came out on Monday. Holy God, was it a disaster… But a good one, to say the least.
Every mistake I wholeheartedly take responsibility for, as I didn’t free enough time to personally edit the paper as needed. We had stories randomly ending just a few words early, mistakes in headlines, captions, photo bylines and design elements. I wouldn’t say I spread myself too thin last weekend, but I did – between moving out of my house and coaching 4 Little League games in 5 days, I rarely slept more than a few hours over the past 8 days.
Anyway, content-wise this issue was amazing. Good writing, decent editing and a whole slew of new editors will be guiding the next edition.
My favorite part of this whole issue, however, was the Pro/Con piece on Legalizing Marijuana:
Remember when I said my Little League majors team was going to go undefeated? When I said the Yankees were a force to be reckoned with?Well, after weeks of planning and preparing and assuming how great our baseball team is, we came to the awe-inspiring realization that our league is much better than originally anticipated.
Nay, they’re genuinely amazing.
Save our opening game tie with the Mets (the other winless team we’re tied with, believe it or not), we’ve come close in but one game, a 12-10 loss to the A’s. Other than that second game of a double-header, where we lost the opening game 18-6, we’ve fallen to the Tigers 13-3 and the Mariners 6-0.
With all due respect, at least we kept the Mariners to only 6 runs. Other teams in the league gave up more in their 2-hit losses. Oh, yeah, the Mariners also tossed a no-hitter against us! They were one at-bat from a perfect game, thanks to our shortstop’s single-on-error. Their pitcher threw 12 strikeouts in 6 innings against us!
Needless to say, we’re recovering. Of course, we just played 4 games in 5 days, so pitch counts and sore arms have hampered us tremendously. Thank God we play interleague this weekend against Post Falls (a game that does NOT affect our standings), so I can give our starting rotation a much-needed rest, and see what some of our other guys can do on the mound.
Although we’ve opened league play with a 0-4-1 record, I firmly believe we have a great group of guys who can achieve much greater. Where my original goal was to finish .800 on the season, I’ve switched things up a bit: As long as we beat every team at least once, I’m a happy camper. Then, we’ll see what happens in the end-of-season tournament.
Wish us luck (we sure need it right now!)
Well, I wasn’t exactly dubbed that, but I was close!
In the Society of News Design’s annual college newspaper design contest, I chalked up a few other major awards, nonetheless. I received first place in two separate categories under non-daily papers, as well as honorable mention in another.
However, the big boy came in winning honorable mention for DAILY newspaper designer of the year. Now, had they put me in the category I was supposed to be in (Non-Daily), who knows what I would have done. Worst part? Winner takes home $1,000. Oh well, honorable mention in the Daily category put me up there with Missouri, Michigan State and Indiana University – the best-looking papers in the nation! So, much to my chagrin, I’m still honored!
Also, The Sentinel as a paper won third place for BEST OVERALL DESIGNED NEWSPAPER in the non-daily category. Against School of the Art Institute of Chicago and Savannah College of Art and Design (my high school dream college), that’s a pretty huge ego-boost!
Here’s how I did in the individual categories.
This page was awarded First Place in NEWS PAGE COVER DESIGN (1 of 2 awards in this category. Nobody else was named). It’s from the issue last fall where we were named the best newspaper in show at the Kansas City Associated Collegiate Press journalism convention:
This page won First Place in EDITORIAL PAGE DESIGN (thanks in large part to Steven Hamari):
And this page won Honorable Mention in NEWS PAGE COVER DESIGN (2 of 2 awards in this catetgory. Nobody else was named.):
(The time on this post is right… 3:30 a.m., I just got home from The Sentinel an hour ago).
Even though it’s a production weekend, and we all know how insanely time-consuming that is for my dedicated ass, I’ve also got a Little League doubleheader on Saturday. And I don’t exactly just show up to those: I spend hours toiling over line-ups and pitching matchups.
And oh yeah, I just got hit with an 8-page Tabloid special section I have to design with the paper, as well (of course, I love those things! They just take tons of time…).
But the cake-topper?
I have to be moved out of my house by Saturday! Not to mention re-paint the living room and kitchen.
But at least Sentinel is going great so far. We may very well have the best-designed paper of the year, as we’ve already got the best-looking opinion section to date: From an article comparing America to Soviet Russia to a Pro/Con about legalizing marijuana in California.
I even got a photo of mine in:
It’s not a very special shot, but it’s kind of cool since I wasn’t even trying to make it a silhouette. What’s better, it’s my soon-to-be brother-in-law on the Coeur d’Alene Resort Golf Course last summer.
Anyway, the highlight (for me!) so far has to be my own article about wierd sex laws in America. The page I designed for it also contains a “Letter to the Editor” about Scott’s gay-bashing opinion from last issue.
Here is the page:
Not a lot to say. I showed up around noon, started drinking with my brother, Michael, and his friends, and didn’t stop until midnight!
Drunkfest? To say the least!
Needless to say, the game on Tuesday was pure ecstasy. Griffey’s return to the Emerald City did not disappoint. I even got his first hit in Safeco as a Mariner since 1999 on video:
Here are some other photos from the trip:
Walking into the stadium… not exactly sober.
Griffey’s first at bat. He got a single!!
Don’t exactly remember this photo, we were all pretty smashed after the game! But that’s me with my brother in the middle and my cousin Nicholas on the right. Blonde chick wearing my sunglasses? No idea. But I don’t have those glasses any more…
Playing catch with my nephew, Jack
My nephew Ryan (who will be the ring-bearer in my wedding) spitting sunflower seeds through the fence onto his classroom window.
Little studs! I love my nephews. One good thing about moving to Portland? I’ll only be 2.5 hours away from them and their parents, my brother Michael and his beautiful wife, Laura.
We had our first little league game last night in the freezing cold, and although it rained off and on pretty hard, we still played the longest game of my coaching career: The whole six innings.
Every baseball game I’ve ever coached has either reached the time limit or 10-run rule before the 5th or 6th inning, but last night was a nail-biter.
Here’s the box score:
Team 1 2 3 4 5 6 F
YANKEES 2 5 0 0 1 3 11
METS 0 2 3 6 0 0 11
So, as you can see, we jumped on their opening pitcher for a quick 7-2 lead in the first two innings. He wasn’t throwing heat, nor anything nasty, but we just played fundamental baseball offensively and defensively.
But then came innings 3 and 4.
Our star pitcher started getting tricky, mixing splitters and changeups with his monster of a fastball, thus giving up a lot of walks and easy base hits. Our outfield suddenly forgot how to back up the infield, and the Mets capitalized by turning doubles into run-scoring triples.
As a coach, I should have pulled my pitcher earlier than I did. However, my middle-reliever had been planning to pitch all day. So in the bottom of the 4th inning when I threw him in, he complained of being too cold and his fingers simply could not grasp the ball. I decided to warm up another guy (our 3rd baseman), but the umpire informed us that by rule any pitcher who warms up must pitch to at least one batter.
I was pissed.
This kid was freezing his balls off, couldn’t throw the ball into lake if he tried from a boat, so I made him throw just one pitch – an arcing sky-ball that went 15 feet over the batter.
Needless to say, that inning sucked. We gave up 6 runs to trail 11-7 after using three separate pitchers in the inning. But our final pitcher was a gem. Both teams went scoreless in a blazing fast 5th inning, and we entered the last inning down by 3.
Suddenly, it clicked. Their new pitcher was throwing soft cheeseballs, and our guys destroyed him instantly. We got guys on 1st and 2nd with our first three batters, then scored both of them with our latest pitcher’s 2 RBI triple! A bloop hit into right field scored him to tie the game, before we grounded out twice to end the inning.
Our dugout was fired up. They stormed the field ready to hold the Mets – we knew a win was out, but we could still tie if we held them.
Then tragedy struck. Our guy who scored the tying run was on the mound, and he walked the first batter in an 8 pitch at-bat. Two more wild pitches got their lead-off man to third in the winning run.
I don’t know what happened next, but my voice is still hoarse from yelling. He struck out the next batter with a wild pitch that ricocheted off the backstop. Apparently the Mets’ thirdbase coach didn’t see how hard the ball bounced back, as he sent his runner home to win the game. Our catcher (who had been slightly lagging behind the plate all day), sprinted at the ball, then to the plate to tag the runner just inches from the plate – for the out!!!
Technically, it was a double play: On the same pitch we struck their batter out we nailed the runner stealing home – in the face. After he was done crying and limped off the field, we struck out the final batter to end the game in a tie.
So, even though I was irate that we blew a 7-2 lead, at least we discovered we can come back late in a game. Between clutch hitting and fielding, I look forward to a very successful year hear on out!
The newest issue of The Sentinel doesn’t come out until Monday, April 20. However, I just wrote the best column I’ve penned all year, and I simply cannot wait a week to share it!
Now, it hasn’t been edited by anyone besides myself, and I haven’t really yet torn it apart like I’m known to do. Oh well, here we go!
You are sick. You are twisted. You are not unique in this sense, as we all have contemplated what you will soon ponder, be it the sheer logistics of what I’m about to dispel or even the actuality that what you’re about to learn is, indeed, actual.
Hopefully this is the first, last and only encounter with said information you will ever need. If not, may you soon find religion, for, to pursue these ordinances further would undoubtedly lead you behind bars – and I’m not even joking. Here we go.
In the state of Washington, it is perfectly legal for a man to have sex with an animal. Of course, to stay within those legal boundaries, that animal must weigh less than 40 pounds.
Jesus friggin’ Christ.
Our dear neighbors to the left apparently have it worse off than Idaho. In the past, when friends set off to Spokane in hopes of “chasing tail,” I simply assumed they were trying to get laid – by a female human, no doubt. I never considered they were chasing literal tail: The kind that wagged. Or barked.
Or had sex?
Often times I find myself in sheer awe of the majestic wordplay that encompasses our legal jargon. Nevertheless, we must always understand that certain laws were enacted in the course of American history for our safety. When the courtroom sharks over in Olympia debated where to set the weight limit in this little doosey of a decree, I can only hope they did not speak from experience.
What’s more, a few states to our right in Minnesota, their local government went beyond just a weight limit for bestiality: It is illegal for a man to have intimate sexual relations with a live fish.
Can intimacy secretly be code for foreplay? Thus, if men in Minnesota (of course, women aren’t even mentioned in this law; equal rights, my ass) skip the fooling around, can they legally go straight to the nookie sans getting said fish in the “mood?”
Yet, what concerns me further is they injected the most key remark in this declaration, “live.” What about dead fish? Are they fair game?
Jackpot! Washingtonians unite. How many fish weigh over 40 pounds?
Now I didn’t go looking for these laws, they seriously found me. And I don’t mean that the cops caught me serenading Flipper.
Seriously, I swear!
I was actually directed to an article penned by Yvonne Fulbright of Fox News, where she shared these any many other disturbing and sexual legal trends. She discerned that the United States bans more activity concerning our genitalia than all the European nations – combined!
Of course, low and behold, after a bit more research on my part, I found dear ole’ Coeur d’Alene among the nation’s oddest sex laws.
Now, the animal kingdom isn’t as involved with The City by the Lake as it is in Washington and Minnesota. (Quick side-note: Some U.S. laws don’t even involve humans. In Ventura County, Calif., cats and dogs are not allowed to have sex without a permit. Even worse, in Fairbanks, Alaska, moose cannot fornicate on city streets.)
Anyway, as far as the cops in Coeur d’Alene are concerned, they must abide by the following regulation: When an officer stumbles upon a couple “doing it like they do on the Discovery Channel” in their car, he must pull his vehicle behind , honk three times and wait two minutes before investigating further.
It could be worse, I guess.
Back to that mesmerizing legal jargon I so affectionately admire, Washington once again takes the cake. There literally exists a law prohibiting sex involving a virgin under any circumstance. Reproduction be damned, everybody must die with their “V-card” un-punched. (Perhaps this is why they’re allowed to diddle the family dog?)
In Bakersfield, Calif., anyone having sex with Satan (yes, Lucifer, the Prince of Darkness, Mr. 666 himself) must use a condom. The State of Nevada goes further, proclaiming sex without a condom illegal in any case – whether boinking the Devil OR the Holy Son.
Needless to say, let me reiterate how sick and twisted you are; how ungodly disgusting you should feel at this very moment, and why you suddenly noticed you’re having heat flashes.
In the preceding 700 words of this column, you intrinsically imagined, in vivid detail no less, a man making love to a fish in Minnesota, you pictured a guy porking a pork in the Evergreen state and who knows what you daydreamed about those moose in Alaska.
I dare not dream of your warped delusions involving man’s best friend in Ventura County.
But have solace, my friend, for now you know there’s a two-minute window for you to finish up in your car whilst parked in Coeur d’Alene. And, suffice it to say, you know what not to do when visiting Minneapolis.
Today marked the Opening Day for Coeur d’Alene Little League, and although the entire week up until last night was incredibly dry and warm (highs in the mid-60s), it started pouring rain this morning. After the Opening Ceremonies – where we introduced teams and sponsors, the board of directors and managers – it really started coming down. I even ran home to trade my shorts and polo for jeans and a coat between events.
Needless to say, our game against the Mariners was cancelled.
What’s more, I found out last night that one of players decided to quit baseball to pursue his passion for dirtbiking; he failed to let me know, as I heard this from his teammates when he failed to show up for his second practice in a row.
What now? We get to bump a kid from AAA up to the Majors, and I’ve already requested one of the top players in the AAA-level. How does this benefit me? Well, during the draft, we were required to pick up ALL the 12-year-olds before we could move down to drafting 11- and 10-year-olds. Now, if you’re 12 years old and just getting drafted into the majors, one of three things has occurred: (1) You were previously on a majors team that you didn’t like, so you asked to be re-drafted; (2) You moved into the area and are new to the league; or, the most common excuse, (3) You played AAA the past few seasons because you weren’t talented enough to make the majors.
Well, this kid who quit was the very last 12-year-old I drafted, and thus the equivalent of our worst player (on paper). He actually proved to be more talented than his attitude let on, but his head was never in the game.
Turns out this whole scenario works best for all (except that AAA team who loses their best player!).
Our next scheduled game is Monday against the Mets. I haven’t seen them practice yet, and while I have seen the other teams practice somewhat, I firmly believe we will have a strong outing.
Go Yankees!
So this little guy was from the summer of 2007, but is probably one my best photos (at least, I think so). And it was just on Holly’s little point-and-shoot Canon. This is the background on my computer, too.
Anyway, that’s my bride-to-be walking toward the parking lot on the Oregon Coast (Newport, I believe) with her big sun hat on.
If only the weather looked like THAT when I proposed last week…
So far this season we’ve had but three separate practices. However, the talent oozing from these kids in every throw, hit or catch is simply unrivaled when compared to seasons past. 
The difference between Eugene and Albany Little Leagues and Coeur d’Alene is much more stark than simply day and night: Oregon, in essence, sucks!
I firmly believe the worst team in my current league would annihilate the all-star teams from those I saw in Oregon.
And that’s after just three practices. I can only imagine how great this team will become after a few weeks into the season. Our star pitcher is just that – a star! We’ve got 3 guys behind him already that make up a solid 4-pitcher starting rotation. Once we get a few more pegged and started, combined with our fluid infield defense, teams will consider lackluster an achievement when hitting against us.
However, the outfield does worry me. I didn’t work with them today as I focused on the infield, but although I saw a few spectacular catches 
every now and then, I noticed quite a few misjudged pop-flies land behind the fielders.
But that’s why we practice.
Not to mention, this was only our third. So give me time, and along with our new assistant coach James, I stand 100-percent behind a prediction that we will finish in the top 2 this season, with a 10-3 league record. That’s my goal.
Of course, undefeated isn’t out of the question, either. But that’s just me dreaming, especially after a winless sting in Eugene during 2007. If you ever want to catch a game to see this magic in person, just let me know and I’ll send off a schedule.
Go Yankees!
Last week in Oregon was literally, physically and undoubtedly the sole greatest nine days of my 24-year-old life. Oh, sure, I hung out with my best friends (Ben & Heidi), saw my Mother and sisters, as well as my old co-workers at Sherman Bros.
Oh, yeah, and that whole engagement thing!
You know, asking the greatest woman I’ve ever known (second only to my mother and grandmother) to spend the rest of our lives together! (She said yes, obviously: See the updated video, with actual song, here).
What’s more, not am I only bringing Holly Beth Spillman into the Donahue/Matchett families, I’m becoming a member of the Spillman family (well, after Holly’s mom’s divorce a few years back, I think “Spillman” is on the way out. Once Holly becomes a Donahue, half the Spillman clan has ditched the surname. If Darci (younger sister) gets wed off, and Cathy (Holly’s mom) marries again (or switches back to her maiden name: Spears – more on THAT last name later!!), the Spillman name is gone (at least concerning Cathy’s half of the family!).
Needless to say, our engagement was not only the highlight of my vacation – more importantly, my young life!! – but spending time with my upcoming mother-in-law was nearly the best part of my whole Spring Break. Getting to know the mother of my entire world, one-on-one (even more than before), was an opportunity I took advantage of tremendously: Not just by digging deep into the history of my betrothed woman and her family, but also by capitalizing on a friendship I hope to only build as time goes on. Cathy is not just a mother-in-law to-be, but rather a friend I will consider one of my best, as well as another mother in general.
Saturday, we hit the Saturday Market in downtown Portland. What an awesome day for that endeavor, as the temperature crept toward 70-degrees all morning and early afternoon. We saw hippies selling anything you dare imagine. Most importantly, we learned a great deal (more) about each other throughout the morning.
However, the highlight went through this business:
Oh, God, yes! Voodoo Doughnuts is not just a staple breakfast food of the Pacific Northwest (see Anthony Bourdain’s “No Reservations”), but a Spillman/Donahue tradition-in-the-making. Every time we are near the area on a weekend morn, a creepy doughnut is in the horizon.
This trip, for me, it was the peanut butter-covered Oreo doughnut:
Holy Mother of God, it was amazing! Normally I stick with the classic: a good ol’ Voodoo (where you poke the doll-shaped pastry with a pretzel stick, oozing out raspberry filling in a blood-like maner), which is what Cathy ordered this time.
But, seeing as how my soon-to-be wife was at work, we ordered Holly one to-go. It was a masterpiece we witnessed on the Anthony Bourdain show, a doughnut that perplexed even the meekest of pasty pursuers. Think iHop in one bite, and not just the pancakes. This beautiful creation combined a maple bar and bacon, and it didn’t get much simpler than that!
According to Holly: Pure amazingness.
Here is what that puppy looked like:
I started a blog for my Little League team a while back. You know, the Coeur d’Alene Little League Yankees.
Well, I finally started updating it this week. I got schedules, calendars, updates, etc. Now, it’s not much at the present moment, but as soon as I get pictures from Tim (who plans on taking some mesmerizing shots, I’m sure) of the players during games, as well as game-by-game and season stats, it will be an impressive little site for both players and parents, not to mention fans, alike!
Feel free to check it out in the making here.
Here is the engagement video as it was MEANT TO BE SEEN -- AND HEARD. Enjoy!
(Microsoft better not ruin this copy like YouTube did!)
On that video I made of my proposal to Holly (see post below), I originally had a song from Juno playing along. However, after 5 minutes on YouTube, I got a warning saying I violated a copyright by using that song!
Here is the warning: “Your video may have audio content from All I Want is You by Barry Louis Polisar that is owned of licensed by WMG … As a result, your video has been muted.”
Anyway, since YouTube and WMG suck tremendously, here is the song I originally had playing … I think it is quite fitting, as I had planned on using it for this purpose since I saw the opening credits for Juno a few years back.
At least I know they can’t stop me from putting it on a DVD and playing a movie like that at my wedding. Suck it, YouTube!
The weather was less than crappy and the wind was intense, but I asked Holly to marry me this afternoon at Cannon Beach on the Oregon Coast, next to the famous Haystack Rock, and she said yes!
Well, sort of…
She actually said, “OK,” instantly. But she was so speechless I actually asked her that for a few seconds I didn’t even get a response; I had to finally say, “So, is that a yes?”
Here’s the video of how it all happened (I edited it quickly on my laptop, as the wind and rain made it choppy and inaudible):
Here are some more photos from the drive over and home. Even though the rain and wind made the outdoors a not-so-inviting place to be, the day trip as a whole was fun overall. We had lunch at Mo’s and had a blast spending all day with each other:
Holly and I listened to the “Fight Club” book on tape – well, CD.
We were stuck on Highway 26 with the car parked for 20 minutes while road crews cleaned logs off the road… See how much rain there is? It only got worse.
Here is Haystack Rock from the scene of our proposal. I got lucky to not get any raindrops on the lens, but the wind almost blew me over.
It’s a little bit blurry, but there is the ring on the future Holly Donahue’s finger.
As I’m writing this, Holly and I are getting ready for bed on Tuesday night (Blogger lets you postpone the time when a blog post will be posted). Anyways, if you look at the headline, then you guessed it: By this time today I have already proposed to my future wife, Holly Beth Spillman!
Well, if I say future, that would make her Holly Beth Donahue!!
We are planning on hitting Cannon Beach and walking down the sand whether it’s 60 degrees and sunny or 50 and rainy (which is the forecast so far), and she has NO IDEA as to what my intention is. Our favorite place is the coast, so I can only hope this was a good choice on my part. We have planned on hitting this spot for two months, no matter the weather, as I won’t be back in Oregon until probably July.
Here is the ring that her mom told me was Holly’s favorite (Holly let me know that sentiment as well, as I received numerous e-mails containing links to what she liked). I ordered it from Coeur d’Alene and had it shipped to my mother’s work in Eugene. According to her mom, Cathy (my amazing, awesome, favorite future Mother-in-Law!), Holly chose this ring for two distinct reasons: (1) It’s different and plain; and (2) Nobody else will have it.
Tonight we had dinner at my mom’s house in Junction City with my two youngest sisters, Abby and Audrey, and Audrey’s bitchin’ boyfriend, Aaron. They ALL knew. The ring was sitting in a box, inside another box, sitting next to Holly the whole night! Talk about elephant in the room, we all wanted to say something! What’s more, we watched home videos of my childhood (they all made fun of me) and relished in the pure amazingness that is my mother.
So, if you haven’t already received a text or phone call from either of us, stay tuned for the next post to see if she said yes (or, as I anticipate, how emphatic her “Yes!'” was).
Wish me luck!
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