Okay so I guess the Hawaii saga is going to be put on hold for a day since there’s obviously been some new developments in life over the last 22 hours.

So I’m leaving for London to go visit my sister Christie on Friday, Feb 12.  I’m going with my parents and other sister Katelyn and we’re leaving from JFK Airport.  This has been planned for a while.  Back in the beginning of December, I bought my tickets on Southwest Airlines to fly out tonight, Thurs Feb 11 at 7:10pm from RDU & arrive on Long Island.  Why did I plan to get in a day early?  My mom had read in the Farmer’s Almanac that there was going to be a big storm this week & she was afraid that my flight from Raleigh would be canceled if I left on Friday and I’d miss the JFK flight.  After some arguing & ticket-paying-negotiations, I agreed to leave tonight.

You may know that my birthday was on Monday, Feb. 8.  Jay had to go to school that night and he has class all day long on Tuesdays (8am-4:45pm), so I knew that I’d have somewhat of a lonely birthday.  He’s trying to get some music history classes that he took applied to his regular history classes and because my mom teaches at a college, I had asked her how he should go about applying to do that.  She had advised us on some tips & that was that.  I talked to my mom around 9:15pm on Monday night.  I was talking to Jay around 11pm-ish that night over gchat and he mentioned he called my mom to thank her for helping him.  He said this was around 9:00pm.

At this point, I’m a bit suspicious because I said goodnight to my parents 15 minutes after said phone call and no one said a word to me.  I question Jay & his story is the same.  Then I Blackberry message Kate.  She basically tells me to turn the crazy off for the last hour of my birthday & go to bed.  The next morning, she BBM’s me before 7am to tell me, “Mom didn’t say anything to you because she assumed you were in the room when he called.” “BULLSHIT!” I thought. “I talked to mom at 6pm AND 9:15pm and both times she knew that I was home alone with Zoe all night!”  But that was at like 7:15am & when I went to put my key in my car door at around 7:50am yesterday morning, I had a premonition.  I got in the car & that was that.

So we were going to go to Ruth Chris Steakhouse for Birth-entines’ Day.  Since there’s only a week between my birthday & Valentines’ Day, we combine the holidays and call it that.  It’s kinda like the kid born on Christmas Eve who shares their birthday presents with their Christmas presents .  I kept questioning Jay on how expensive that place was and I’m going to miss a full week of work this month, so my paycheck would be lower and maybe we should just wait, blah blah blah blah blah.  He kept saying “no, no, no”.  However, I was talking to a co-worker yesterday & all of a sudden, I decided that I wanted Italian food.  I asked Jay if we could switch from Ruth Chris to Carrabbas because I really just wanted Italian.  He agreed over text, but in the car on the way there, he was all weird & pissy about how I had changed restaurants.  I got annoyed and said “It’s MY birthday and if I want pasta, I’m eating pasta!”

On the way to the restaurant, we got word that my flight for 7:10pm tonight was canceled because I had a layover in Baltimore and well…Baltimore has some issues with some snow at the moment.  Since we were in the car, I called my parents to ask them to change my flight.  After a lot of trying, it turns out that the only flight I could get on left at 1:15pm & got in to Islip, NY at 9:55pm, with a layover in Tampa, Florida.  I was *not* happy because I couldn’t miss an additional half day at work.  In short, I was freaking out.  Jack & Cyndi (Jay’s parents) ended up randomly being at the same restaurant as us, which was kinda funny lol.

Ohhh, time to board. Brb!

Okay back & it’s like an hour later, even though you guys don’t know that.  Continuing, I was on the phone with my parents for quite some time during dinner, as they were trying to find me a flight.  After about 30 minutes, it became clear that the 1:15pm flight was my only option.  I resisted A LOT.  I was panicking about leaving work 5.5 hours earlier than planned & not having packed yet, etc. al.  Eventually I had no choice but to agree to get onto this fight.  So I very reluctantly told my father that I’d do it.

At this point, Jay seems super annoyed.  I think that it is just because we’ve been sitting at the table for 40 minutes and only just ordered appetizers.  I felt reasonably guilty about being on the phone for so long & freaking out in public  Little did I know…

We end up having a really nice dinner   I was so distraught that I ate an ENTIRE loaf of bread by myself, then completely cleared my plate of lobster raviolis AND had 3 glasses of wine.  Sadly, the 2,500 calorie meal cancels out the 3 glasses of wine lol.

So we get back home and I make a quick phone call to my parents to confirm with my mom that the random shit I’m literally throwing at my suitcase (not in or on, just at) is going to suffice for the cold London temperature.  A few minutes later, Jay goes to me, “You look like you need a beer.  Do you want me to get a beer?”  At this point, my first thought is, “Wine AND beer?! It totally MUST be Birth-entines’ Day!”

So he hands me a beer and I put it down on the coffee table in front of the couch.  Then he gets down on one knee and says something very sweet that you’ll have to ask him to repeat and pulls out a ring!!!  As he got down on one knee and pulled out the box, I subconsciously knew what was going on but at first I thought he was just kidding and it was going to be a bracelet or something.  Then I saw it and was completely speechless and I think I said something along the lines of, “For REAL?!?!?!“  But I didn’t cry!! I choked up & sobbed for a minute but I was too busy processing it all and nodding and everything all at once

I called my parents, who had Kate call me on Skype so they could video chat & see the ring.  Then we called Christie in London and my grandparents and my aunt and basically everyone.  Jay called his families & I called mine.  Then we agreed that Jay could have the first Facebook announcement and I would do Twitter (even though by “first” we meant “45 seconds before the other person” lol).

So yeah, good times!!  My ring is GORGEOUS.  Funny story: I totally forgot that over the summer, Jay, Clif & I had been eating and then walking around Southpoint Mall in Durham for a change of pace. We all ended up in a Helzberg Jewelers in there, looking at all the jewelry, including engagement rings, that they had to offer.  So I totally forgot about that when he asked me this morning over the phone, “Did he get you the ‘sparkly’ ring?”  I laughed SO hard.  I was shocked that Clif remembered that day before I even did and that he even remembered which ring it was.  Color me impressed

No date will be set until after I get back from London, although it’s going to be at least a year out in order to give friends & family who have to travel plenty of time to plan ahead to get there.  It’s going to be in NY though and sometime in a month that is NOT cold because anyone who has ever met me knows that I despise the cold with a passion.

That’s all I’ve got for now and I’m SO EXCITED!  So now I have to finish up my Hawaii story, tell all my London stories AND yak about wedding plans!  YAY!!!  It’s so nice to have things to look forward to!!

Oh, fine. Here is what Jay said to me and honestly, I only know it because he sent it to me.

“The first time I met you I knew you were special.  After only a couple days of dating I knew I loved you and a couple months after I knew I wanted to be with you forever.  Colleen will you marry me?”