Andrew Q. Gordon

So Sunday morning, I woke, looking forward to the start of a glorious day of shopping, shopping, more shopping and cooking.  I kinda hate to shop, but morning coffee can do wonders to put me in a good mood.  So I cleaned the tank, measured the water, scooped out the coffee, turned it on and went to take care of my baby daddy duty. [Stop snickering I said duty, not doodie.] When I came down to get my supposedly made coffee I got nothing. Nada. Not a drop.  Ever want to scream, but couldn’t because you have a sleeping baby?  The rule in our house is, “you wake her, you bought her.” Making matters worse, the machine, a Cuisinart DCC 3000 is only seven months old.  It was a replacement from the manufacturer for another one that was only a year old.  Very annoying.  Fortunately the Starbucks is only a ten minute walk.  Oh well – good thing Christmas is coming. I see a new coffee machine from Santa on my list.

Now if it was just the coffee pot, it wouldn’t be so bad, but in the last month we had to get a new car, a new kitchen faucet and get the washer fixed.  I’m sure some of you are thinking  – had to get  new car – right.  Well we did – so there.  The Subaru needed $3000 worth of ‘routine engine work’ to keep it going. It was eight years old with 112,000 miles. That $3K was to replace the engine gaskets – which we were told because of the engine design, required the engine be removed to replace them. The blue book, sell it yourself, price was about $3800.  Seemed like a bad deal for us – pay $3k so we could maybe get $3800. Option 2 was – trade it in and get a new car. When they offered us $4800 on a trade in, that made the choice a lot easier. But still, it required we get a new car and take on new car payments.  The new car smell only goes so far to make you forget the monthly payments.

After several posts on this blog about marriage equality in Maryland, it must seem odd that I didn’t say anything after the referendum passed.  There were/are good reasons.  We wanted to tell our family first that Mike and I are getting married.  Of course like any other couple who’ve been together 18 years, we can’t agree on anything. When, where, who’s invited, how many, catering or no catering, etc. Hell, we can’t even agree on the rings. I want plain and simple, he wants the turbo 3000 super deluxe.  Sigh.  It’ll work out – it has to or our attorney will come over with a shotgun and demand I make an honest man of him.  She’s been rather adamant that with a baby, we need to get married for estate planning reasons and we need to do it now! But it’s official, after 18 years together, and a lifetime of being ‘single,’ I’m engaged.  Fortunately neither of us wanted an engagement ring because, frankly, after a surrogate and raising a baby, I’m too broke to afford anything more than a faux cubic zirconium ring.

One point I need to make is about our families. They are, to be quite blunt, amazing. Supportive, happy for us, excited the law passed, all the above. Not that they weren’t supportive before, but this was just another example of how wonderful they are. Between Mike, the baby and them, I’m about the richest man in the world – of course had I won the lottery I could have said I was the richest man in the world, but fortune was only so generous. 😉

Finally, speaking of the baby – I realize I’m totally biased and can’t be counted on for an honest opinion, but I think Mike and I have a really cute kid.  Take a look and let you decide.