Happy Birthday Rob!

Today is Rob's 26th Birthday! (Happy Birthday, Honey!) In honor of such a day, I would just like to ask, HOW CUTE IS THIS LITTLE BOY?! I can neither confirm nor deny that this picture is of Rob.... (but of course you know the truth.)


And Rob wonders why I want kids! Everyone on three "Awwwww!"
I love you, lampshade! Happy 26th!

Since I'm in trouble now anyway, I thought I'd go ahead and add these... (hehehe...I'm SO sleeping on the couch tonight)

K, check out the progression....try and follow me here, I promise it won't be too challenging.

Shine on, you crazy diamond.

So, this past Sunday, we were fortunate enough to score an invitation to pretty much the social event of the decade: The Shippyque. Only the elite of Maryland's bourgoise made the list to sample the finest in backyard hors de ouvres, repleat with Scott's famous Georgia Iced Tea and bacon/spam toothpick kebabs. Following the dining event, the afternoon gave way to heated, white knuckle games of Caution Tape Badminton and "Punch Wilson" Volleyball, where the eastern seaboard's stars and starlets let down their hair (and rolled up their pants). At stake: a much coveted Napoleon Dynamite sweatshirt, the winner of which has yet to be announced. Seriously though, we had a great time over at the Shippy's...eating cookies!

The IKEA Monster Returns

So for a while now, Danielle has been leaning toward the purchase of a very harmless looking corner cabinet in the hopes of creating some additional storage space in our shoebox of a townhome. Little did we know that when we picked up said unobtrusive, mild mannered corner cabinet from IKEA yesterday, we would unknowingly unleash the great and terrible CABINETZILLA. Yeah, so 5 hours (and a few "custom" drilled screwholes to offset our lack of ability to follow directions) after my dauntless wife began assembling this trojan horse of suburban home improvement, the piece was complete. In our defense, much of our folly can be attributed to the marked lack of narration to accompany all those nifty arrows and "Figure 13b's" that make up what IKEA calls a "instructional pamphlet." Yeah. While Danielle and I puzzled over the illustrations intended to tell us which peg goes into which hole, I couldn't help but to feel like a deaf person trying to converse with someone who is just learning sign
language: we kinda knew what the pamphlet was telling us, but not really. Oh, and I love how they give you a 160 lb piece of furniture, and expect you to contrive the finished product solely with their "specially provided tool," which is actually not much more than a glorified paper clip. But...is that cabinet cool or what?

Why the Amish neighbors are laughing at the electricity cost increase

I would like to personally thank Baltimore Gas & Electric for appointing themselves as our savings bank. Over the past few months I have been killing myself over our gas/electric bill. The first time I got one of these crazy bills from them ($400) I called. They explained that gas prices had increased and everyone was experiencing the strain on their wallet. Since then, I have gone to bed in sweats, turned on only the necessarry lights, and on one occasion even had to offer a guest a blanket while we were hanging out one night because it was so darn cold. I felt horrible each month explaining to Rob (In Africa) that yet again I had blown hundreds on our gas bill.
Yeah. All in vain.
Yesterday we got a bill from BG&E stating that they had overcharged us over the past few months by $1,000.00. Let me repeat that: ONE THOUSAND DOLLARS. It must be nice to have an extra thousand dollars just hanging around. I WONDER WHAT THAT FEELS LIKE.
But, no worries- this month's bill is $600 (yes, of course it is)- and they'll just apply it to that. What are the odds that $600 for our tiny house is a TAD off?

Get your Rob and Danielle Fix

Sorry we've been slow on the updates. I'm sure you've been on the edge of your seats checking daily to see if we've posted. (riiight.) Things have been crazy busy over the past few days. I'm working, Rob is adjusting to, well, everything. Scout doesn't know whose socks to chew first. In the end, he opted for Rob's. (Bad idea, Scout). All in all the Townley's are doing well. We had our first "date night" on Friday. Rob cooked this amazing dinner and then promptly FELL ASLEEP while we were watching the movie we rented. :-) Ahh love.
This is us the first night that Rob was back for Bible Study. Consider yourself updated! HAPPY EASTER, EVERYONE! HE is risen!

The Wayward Husband Returns!

That's right K-mart shoppers...your favorite couple made it home! Ten hours, a detour to pick up our puppy, some Starbucks, gridlock traffic, and Arby's chicken fingers later, we made it to Crofton around 7:30 last night. Thanks so much to everyone who participated in the "Townley House Revival" project a few weeks ago...I couldn't believe the house Danielle and I walked into last night was the same one I left last fall! You guys are amazing. Yay for quarter-round and tile!

In other news...WOW is it great to be home again. As most of you live around here I'm sure you'll think I'm crazy, but Maryland really, really smells good. No, like really. Funny the little things you notice after being away for so long. I'm not entirely sure what I'm going to do with myself today (other than kiss my wife when she comes home from work)...so I'll have to get back to you on all that, but there'll be more to follow, I'm sure.

And...and...to all of you who supported us during the ordeal we've named "Africa": Thank You. The kindness you showed us through our months of separation meant the world to both of us, and made our reunion and return home all the sweeter. I do believe an Ethiopian party will be in order at the Townley's soon...will keep you updated. I'll bring the cheetahs...er...I mean cheetos and beer!

Final Destination

Well, we're HOME! (Finally!) We left Jacksonville around 9am yesterday and drove for ten super-fun traffic filled hours before arriving at our final destination. Rob is thrilled to be home. I gave him a 'tour' of the new and IMPROVED Townley household, we had a fantastic gourmet dinner of grilled cheese and tomato soup, went through three days worth of mail, and called it a night.
*Side note- it's really nice to only be responsible for throwing away MY junk mail. I think I actually felt a tear in my eye as I watched Rob tossing out his own credit card offers, "YOU'VE WON 5 MILLION DOLLARS" announcements and, my personal favorite, the official looking envelopes with "time sensetive, open immediately' that make you all nervous until you open it up and it's like a Bed Bath and Beyond 20% Off Coupon.
Silly Marketing Companies.

Home Sweet Jacksonville!

Well, here we are in the great metrolpolis of Jacksonville, North Carolina. We drove in around 6pm last night and after a great take-out dinner and a trip to Wal-Mart we decided to call it a night. This morning I dropped Rob off on base, spent about 45 minutes lost on my way back to the hotel because every road looks the same (strip clubs and fast food). Finally I called fellow Marine "soon-to-be" wife, Meg, who was able to navigate me back. (whew). So here I am in the hotel lobby to give you all a quick update:
Scout and I picked up Rob at 8am yesterday - almost three hours later than they landed thanks to a faulty "arrivals" hotline. I think Scout was excited to see Rob until he realized that he's been demoted to the back seat again. We came back to good old P-town to have breakfast with my family, and then we were off for 6 hours of road side fun to NC. Rob is still in "third world country" shock. It's fun to watch him experience the states again after he's been in the desert for so long. Anyway, thanks for all the supportive comments! We miss you guys! Hopefully we'll be on the way back to Maryland by Wednesday at the latest.

The final 24

Okay. We're down to ONE DAY. (pause, applause, continute). I'm leaving Maryland to pick up Rob in Virginia, and then we're headed to the Carolinas for a few days for whatever it is that military people do when they return from deployment. We'll be back up here sometime next week and I'm sure the famous Rob will have some comments for you all in no time.

Here's to 6:30AM, April 9th!

Two More Days!!!

I can't believe we're down to TWO DAYS. I'm waiting on Rob to call me with his flight information. He is flying out of Djibouti at around 3am his time (approx. 8pm tonight for us). This is definitely the best part of the entire deployment- you realize that yet again, you have survived, and now you finally get to spend time together! So, now that I know he's not going to be checking his computer again until he gets home- a huge THANK YOU goes out to our Bible Study who helped me get the big home improvement stuff taken care of. You guys are amazing! They came over for an entire Saturday to cut quarter round, paint baseboards, re-tile a bathroom, basically you name it. Rob's going to be so surprised (and elated...he hates tiling). Anyway, thanks again, you guys!
See...sometimes it's not such a bad thing that I can't cook. I can tile like the wind.

Can you tell who was photo-shopped in? :-) How do you like the blue paint tape?

This one's for the girls...

Okay, so Zach and Stacey ("Tiny") from my Bible study started their own cosmetics line - Trinity Cosmetics. This year (their first year) they won "best lip balm of 2006" and are up for a spot on Oprah's "favorite things" episode. (Right now every girl reading this is intrigued...Every guy is waiting for me to mention that the lip balm is beer flavored or something. Suck it up, boys). Anyway, here's their ad in Health&Fitness Magazine:


It's #5 - Trinity Blessed Lip Balm. I don't know about you guys, but I'm impressed. The website is http://www.trinitycosmetics.com/ in case you'd like to do a little shopping. It's a sweet site.
CHECK IT OUT.

And now, a tribute to those annoying inside jokes...

Dooood! My best friend, Carmen, speaks Tom Foolery!

The Wonder-Mutt Strikes Again

Hey so it's April.... and in six days Rob is home! (that's right, this annoying count down will continue for SIX MORE DAYS!)

Yesterday Scout decided it was time for a self-supervised tour of the neighborhood. Right before I left for church our little escape artist sprinted for the door and off he went. It's a very interesting feeling watching your dog dart through cars, bark at people, pounce on other dogs, etc. all while I'm calling him and begging, pleading, ORDERING him to come back. People always look like idiots when they're trying to catch their dogs. I'm no exception. And in the midst of my anger, I'm truly worried that one of these cars won't see him and will hit him....before I get the chance to... relax, I'm KIDDING (sort of)....
Luckily Laura was coming to church with me, so when she pulled in Scout ran over to say hi (I think in Scout's world "Laura"= "dog park" because she takes him out so often). But Laura was batting for the humans yesterday. As soon as Scout was caught, his ears went down and the tail was between the legs. That cocky little attitude turned into "I Love You?!" and he wagged his tail as if he thought he can trick me into thinking he meant to do that. Yeah... Scout did time in the crate yesterday. Little punk.
picture of our jailbird...