That's MISS, not MRS.

After 2.5 long hours at the courthouse and 2 long hours at the social security admin, I am finally a single woman with an American last name again!!

I woke up this morning, put on my favorite dress and heels, curled my hair, and headed out the door. I wasn't confident at all with representing myself, so I was hoping by being confident in my outfit, I'd help myself out!

1. Eeek - sorry for the dirty mirror! Josh had his hoodies hanging there & I didn't even notice how gross until after snapping a pic.
2. I'm not even going to make up an excuse for the crap on the floor. I was just too lazy to clean it up.
3. Why do my arms look like body builder arms compared to my body?

When we got to the courthouse, we found out that they hear all of the cases represented by lawyers first. Apparently they have better things to do than sit and wait their turn. It wasn't until after waiting for about 45 minutes that my mom went to see if she could find out where we were at on the docket. Turns out, you had to check in, and since we didn't until that moment, we were put last on the docket. Lovely.

The judge was super cool and instead of making me read aloud all the lawyerly mumbo jumbo, he just asked me the questions and walked me through everything. I had everything in place and done correctly, unlike one girl I met in the waiting room - she had to come back three times, and each time you have to start over, you have to pay your filing fees over again. Yikes!

The judge granted my divorce (I refrained from singing "Haaaaalllllelujaaaah!" and I headed downstairs to file my paperwork. Nowhere in the directions does it tell you you have to pay $3 for your copies and to have them certified (bitches), but thank goodness for my mom because I had $0 on me.

Then we trudged over to the SSA building, which, unlike the balmy 76 degrees of the courthouse was freezing, but still managed to smell of old people and body odor. We sat there for two excruciating hours waiting to get my last name back. I never appreciated my last name until I was stuck with someone else's against my will. In the future, if I don't marry a guy with a last name that I really like, this girl is sticking to her plane Jane last name! Plus, after I got married and changed it, I really learned to appreciate it. It's associated with our family business, my dad's political career, and my heritage. I definitely won't take it for granted again!

So now that I've admitted that I have a love affair with my last name, and you probably think I'm a wee bit weird, I'm going to go celebrate the big D (and don't mean Dallas... tee hee). Have a great weekend, ladies!