Mr. Mingle and I were told that our wedding would be featured in the next edition of the The Knot Magazine – Northern California edition, and I have been eagerly waiting to see what our “spread” will look like. We contributed to the story, but our photographer sent in all the pictures so we have no clue what will be in there. Last we heard, back in February, was that we would definitely be in the magazine and it is supposed to come out in July.
This morning Gonzaleska surprised me with a sneak preview and although it goes against my desire to share names, I cannot resist sharing this link…
The Mingles on The Knot
Thursday, June 22, 2006
Sunday, June 18, 2006
My Cubicle
I'm sure many of you have heard the constantly played James Blunt song, "You're Beautiful" on the radio, but have you heard this parody?
To my friends who are locked in cubicles on a daily basis, this is for you:
My Cubicle
To my friends who are locked in cubicles on a daily basis, this is for you:
My Cubicle
Saturday, June 17, 2006
Growing Up
Last night my “little” cousin graduated from High School. I don’t feel myself getting older until I see kids like J all grown up. And I say “kid” but she is 18. I remember changing her diapers with Fossie when we were just teenagers ourselves. That one night probably scarred us for life when we realized that little babies could cause nuclear explosions in their diapers. I remember J brushing my hair with awe and wonder when she was 3. I remember watching her and a friend floating around the houseboat when they weren’t much older. I remember going to a dance review, and middle school concert. But before I knew it she wore more make-up then me and was far more fashion conscious then I ever was or have been. J was always the youngest by far at family and friends events, which must have been pretty boring for her at times, but she never complained. She was also quieter then most of us and I think preferred just taking in the loud conversation around her rather then participating. After all, it can’t be very interesting for a high-schooler to hear the constant job talk, or the growing aches and pains of her elders.
Lately the big news was her Senior Ball and my fashion savvy cousin looked like a shining star. She had her dress picked out long before the dance occurred, and before she had a date. But she was confident. The Senior Ball lived up to all of her expectations and she glowed as she talked about that night. And then last night was graduation…
We all went, and fully expected to see her afterwards in her cap and gown so her self-proclaimed photo-crazy mom could get every shot imaginable. J with parents, J with Mingle, J with Auntie S, and on and on. But after the graduation she was not to be found. In a sea of 500 plus graduates it wasn’t surprising but we still canvassed the local area to find her and saw at least 450 of the kids. Finally she was located near the busses (and far from the football stadium where the ceremony occurred) that were to whisk her and her friends off to grad night. We have never seen J so excited or animated – it was obvious that photos were not on her mind – she was ready to GO. She was chatting amiably with friends and her big smile took up half of her face – it was wonderful to see her so happy. We all said our congratulations, forced her to put the cap and gown on for a few required photos, and then said our goodbyes as she ran back to her friends.
Next year she’s off to college to experience a new adventure, and while I am so excited for her, I really wish we could stop time. Because frankly, I don’t want to grow up!
Congratulations J!!!!!
Lately the big news was her Senior Ball and my fashion savvy cousin looked like a shining star. She had her dress picked out long before the dance occurred, and before she had a date. But she was confident. The Senior Ball lived up to all of her expectations and she glowed as she talked about that night. And then last night was graduation…
We all went, and fully expected to see her afterwards in her cap and gown so her self-proclaimed photo-crazy mom could get every shot imaginable. J with parents, J with Mingle, J with Auntie S, and on and on. But after the graduation she was not to be found. In a sea of 500 plus graduates it wasn’t surprising but we still canvassed the local area to find her and saw at least 450 of the kids. Finally she was located near the busses (and far from the football stadium where the ceremony occurred) that were to whisk her and her friends off to grad night. We have never seen J so excited or animated – it was obvious that photos were not on her mind – she was ready to GO. She was chatting amiably with friends and her big smile took up half of her face – it was wonderful to see her so happy. We all said our congratulations, forced her to put the cap and gown on for a few required photos, and then said our goodbyes as she ran back to her friends.
Next year she’s off to college to experience a new adventure, and while I am so excited for her, I really wish we could stop time. Because frankly, I don’t want to grow up!
Congratulations J!!!!!
Tuesday, June 13, 2006
Cabo San Lucas
A Mingle vacation would never be complete without a few unplanned mishaps. However, we Mingles like to look on the bright side and embrace these events whole- heartedly, since more then likely, they provide a lot of color and character for the entire trip. And, without these misadventures, what then my dear friends, would I have to write about?
Before I continue with the good and the bad (from here on known as “funny”), I would like to caveat this by announcing – that we had a fantastic time. That is no lie, Mr. Mingle planned a wonderful trip, and I would go back to Cabo San Lucas in a heartbeat – it was very, very difficult to come home after the nice time that we had. And now…let me take you back to the beginning…
Mr. Mingle planned a 4-night, 5-day trip for the two of us to celebrate our first year anniversary in Cabo San Lucas. We love to travel together, but we also appreciate good deals and he found one. Two things made our trip less expensive:
1) We transferred through Houston (thus adding 5-7 hours onto both our travel days)
2) Our hotel was half-built.
Okay, so the second might sound a little disarming, but we were fully aware of this before we arrived – he had checked out all reviews, and they were positive, despite the construction. What they lacked in building, they made up for in service. The detours through Houston were the biggest downfall of the trip. Not because we were in the air longer, or had layovers in Houston – because we can amuse ourselves and laugh through those - but because they lost my luggage. When we got to Cabo Thursday night, we watched them unload all the bags (it was a small plane) and we watched all the bags get taken away and the luggage cart shut down. Mr. Mingle’s arrived, however mine did not. I was immediately distressed by this because I had nothing to wear except for the clothes I had on and almost everything in the bag was brand new so I thought I’d lost it forever without ever having the chance to wear my new clothes.
On the ride to the hotel I was very sad, which made me even more upset, because at this point I should have been happy, after all, we were in Cabo San Lucas! As I said, we knew the hotel was half-built, so we were not surprised when the taxi drove off into a dirt road, past a half-structure and dropped us off in front of the finished portion by the beach. The lobby was one of the things not built yet, so instead, we checked in at a desk located in the restaurant. There we were greeted by a lovely woman who had good news – the airline had already called and said they found my suitcase which would be delivered late the following day. At that point both of us resisted the urge to leap over the table and hug the woman. Then she said, “I have bad news and good news…” oh..here it comes… “The bad news is we have run out of the studio rooms that you reserved, but the good news is we have given you a free upgrade to a one bedroom suite.” At which point, we were both confused about what the bad news was... “what does that mean?” we asked. That meant that we got a one bedroom suite larger then our apartment, complete with a kitchen, laundry room, two bathrooms and a balcony overlooking the beach. Suite? Sweet!!!
On Friday morning I woke up and was reading on a lounge chair on the balcony while Mr. Mingle continued to sleep. I was enjoying the view, the ocean breeze, and the construction noises in the background when I became aware of a clicking sound that seemed to be getting closer. I turned around and to my surprise found two Mexican construction workers hanging outside my 6th floor balcony hoisting themselves up the building. I quickly departed the balcony, but not without first getting a picture.
Since I didn’t have any of my beachwear, we killed the morning by attending a time share presentation for the place we were staying in and got free breakfast and some other stuff out of it, as well as discounts on our future activities for the weekend. However, we stuck to our guns and did not purchase anything even though they pushed and pushed. Later, I borrowed a shirt and shorts from Mr. Mingle and we walked along the beach to have lunch at The Office, which was supposed to be a fun place. It was obviously located in the party section of the beach. Everyone was tanned and gorgeous and walking around in their little suits with drinks in hand. I felt out of place wearing my husband’s clothes and not feeling glamorous in the least, not to mention we were, by far, the whitest couple on the beach. No worries though – it was just great to be there. My suitcase arrived around 3:00 so we quickly changed into swimsuits and went to the pool complete with a pirate ship in the middle.
On Saturday we had reservations for a snorkeling trip for the afternoon. We went to the wharf to catch our boat and discovered another really nice place in Cabo. The wharf area was beautiful and full of restaurants and fun places to hang out. We caught our boat which came with an open bar and a promise of lunch later in the afternoon. We had a long drive out to the snorkeling beach – probably 45 minutes or so, and I quickly realized that this was going to be a tough day for me. I stopped drinking after one beer when I started to feel seasick. I have never experienced such seasickness in my life… I kept praying that we would get to our destination before I got sick, and luckily we did. I was enjoying the snorkeling and being in the cool water, but still feeling a little queasy, until I accidentally swallowed a large amount of salt water which sent me over the edge. Let’s just say it was unpleasant and I won’t explain further, but luckily no one was around except for Mr. Mingle who was far enough away from me not to get hit… ok, ok, really no more. After that episode I thought I felt better and had some lunch before we took off again for the long journey home. But alas, it wasn’t to be. Some pirates say “yo-ho” when on a boat, but this Mingle said “heave-ho” right over the side. Oh so sick, and unpleasant. I could not wait to get back to dry land. Finally we made it back and somehow I was able to stand enough to get off the boat. It took me awhile to get my strength back, but a little ice cream and a nap helped immensely. The topper to this whole boat trip was the fact that the spray-on sunblock we had was not applied too evenly so the tops of my legs and knees got burnt, and my back looks like a jigsaw puzzle with the red patches asymmetrically appearing around strap lines.
That night I felt much better and was able to enjoy our best dinner out of the whole trip. Mr. Mingle had made special reservations at a boutique hotel called Casa Rafael’s and it was wonderful. The service was impeccable – I think there were 4 or 5 people waiting on us at any one time. There was also a music group playing – a small mariachi band, but with only guitars – no horns. There was a 13 yearold boy in this group who looked like he had been dragged along by his father to occasionally accompany the group with sound effects. All of a sudden, this kid broke out singing with the operatic voice that stunned us – we were amazed. He was also very cheesy and really hammed it up and we enjoyed his performance immensely.
Sunday was our busiest day. First we started off by getting massages and then we rented a sea kayak for two and kayaked out to a place called Lover’s Beach which was quite far away and only accessible by water. We were about a third of the way there when we realized they had sent us out without life jackets. “Oh well, Mingle is a good swimmer” we thought, and carried on. We made it out to the beach with no trouble until we got caught in a mini whirlpool trying to pull up to the beach, but fortunately we didn’t tip and the next wave came and pushed our boat to shore. We walked around this beach for a bit and checked out both sides – the Pacific side and the bay-side. Then we kayaked back. We took a quick break in the pool at a nearby resort where we found a swim-up bar and enjoyed margaritas and ice cream. (As a side note – these do NOT go well together). After this, it was off for parasailing! I have wanted to go parasailing for 14 years, and I was finally going to get my chance. First we were picked up from the beach by a taxi boat which then transferred us to a ski boat in the middle of the bay from which we would parasail. Some other people were already there and while one of them was up in the air we heard a loud crack and then a funny sound. We soon discovered that the fiber glass on the side of the boat had literally cracked in two places and a 4 foot piece of it was flapping around in the breeze. The parasailer came down without incident, but we were worried about the fact that it appeared we had a large hole in our boat. Their boss came out to check the boat out and deemed it unsafe to continue (thank goodness – because I wanted off), and then were put back in a water taxi and transferred to yet another ski boat. Finally I had my chance to parasail, and it was truly amazing. I thought I’d be really frightened, but once I was up there it was so peaceful. They drove us around the bay and I just floated in the air while taking in all the sites, Cabo Bay, our hotel, sea lion rock, the arch, Lover’s Beach…all from a bird’s eye view. I’m so grateful I finally got to go parasailing, and I would do it again.
After Mr. Mingle got his chance to parasail we then went back to our hotel where we relaxed for the rest of the late afternoon by our pool, and then finally into town for one last dinner.
This was an extremely long narrative and if you have read this far – thank you! I had every intention of posting pictures, but am currently having technical difficulties – so those are to come. Our trip was not without its blunders, but as I said in the beginning, all in all it was fantastic. It was so nice to be on vacation together, relaxed and away from work, if only we could have stayed for another week. Mr. Mingle has set the bar very high for our next anniversary.
Before I continue with the good and the bad (from here on known as “funny”), I would like to caveat this by announcing – that we had a fantastic time. That is no lie, Mr. Mingle planned a wonderful trip, and I would go back to Cabo San Lucas in a heartbeat – it was very, very difficult to come home after the nice time that we had. And now…let me take you back to the beginning…
Mr. Mingle planned a 4-night, 5-day trip for the two of us to celebrate our first year anniversary in Cabo San Lucas. We love to travel together, but we also appreciate good deals and he found one. Two things made our trip less expensive:
1) We transferred through Houston (thus adding 5-7 hours onto both our travel days)
2) Our hotel was half-built.
Okay, so the second might sound a little disarming, but we were fully aware of this before we arrived – he had checked out all reviews, and they were positive, despite the construction. What they lacked in building, they made up for in service. The detours through Houston were the biggest downfall of the trip. Not because we were in the air longer, or had layovers in Houston – because we can amuse ourselves and laugh through those - but because they lost my luggage. When we got to Cabo Thursday night, we watched them unload all the bags (it was a small plane) and we watched all the bags get taken away and the luggage cart shut down. Mr. Mingle’s arrived, however mine did not. I was immediately distressed by this because I had nothing to wear except for the clothes I had on and almost everything in the bag was brand new so I thought I’d lost it forever without ever having the chance to wear my new clothes.
On the ride to the hotel I was very sad, which made me even more upset, because at this point I should have been happy, after all, we were in Cabo San Lucas! As I said, we knew the hotel was half-built, so we were not surprised when the taxi drove off into a dirt road, past a half-structure and dropped us off in front of the finished portion by the beach. The lobby was one of the things not built yet, so instead, we checked in at a desk located in the restaurant. There we were greeted by a lovely woman who had good news – the airline had already called and said they found my suitcase which would be delivered late the following day. At that point both of us resisted the urge to leap over the table and hug the woman. Then she said, “I have bad news and good news…” oh..here it comes… “The bad news is we have run out of the studio rooms that you reserved, but the good news is we have given you a free upgrade to a one bedroom suite.” At which point, we were both confused about what the bad news was... “what does that mean?” we asked. That meant that we got a one bedroom suite larger then our apartment, complete with a kitchen, laundry room, two bathrooms and a balcony overlooking the beach. Suite? Sweet!!!
On Friday morning I woke up and was reading on a lounge chair on the balcony while Mr. Mingle continued to sleep. I was enjoying the view, the ocean breeze, and the construction noises in the background when I became aware of a clicking sound that seemed to be getting closer. I turned around and to my surprise found two Mexican construction workers hanging outside my 6th floor balcony hoisting themselves up the building. I quickly departed the balcony, but not without first getting a picture.
Since I didn’t have any of my beachwear, we killed the morning by attending a time share presentation for the place we were staying in and got free breakfast and some other stuff out of it, as well as discounts on our future activities for the weekend. However, we stuck to our guns and did not purchase anything even though they pushed and pushed. Later, I borrowed a shirt and shorts from Mr. Mingle and we walked along the beach to have lunch at The Office, which was supposed to be a fun place. It was obviously located in the party section of the beach. Everyone was tanned and gorgeous and walking around in their little suits with drinks in hand. I felt out of place wearing my husband’s clothes and not feeling glamorous in the least, not to mention we were, by far, the whitest couple on the beach. No worries though – it was just great to be there. My suitcase arrived around 3:00 so we quickly changed into swimsuits and went to the pool complete with a pirate ship in the middle.
On Saturday we had reservations for a snorkeling trip for the afternoon. We went to the wharf to catch our boat and discovered another really nice place in Cabo. The wharf area was beautiful and full of restaurants and fun places to hang out. We caught our boat which came with an open bar and a promise of lunch later in the afternoon. We had a long drive out to the snorkeling beach – probably 45 minutes or so, and I quickly realized that this was going to be a tough day for me. I stopped drinking after one beer when I started to feel seasick. I have never experienced such seasickness in my life… I kept praying that we would get to our destination before I got sick, and luckily we did. I was enjoying the snorkeling and being in the cool water, but still feeling a little queasy, until I accidentally swallowed a large amount of salt water which sent me over the edge. Let’s just say it was unpleasant and I won’t explain further, but luckily no one was around except for Mr. Mingle who was far enough away from me not to get hit… ok, ok, really no more. After that episode I thought I felt better and had some lunch before we took off again for the long journey home. But alas, it wasn’t to be. Some pirates say “yo-ho” when on a boat, but this Mingle said “heave-ho” right over the side. Oh so sick, and unpleasant. I could not wait to get back to dry land. Finally we made it back and somehow I was able to stand enough to get off the boat. It took me awhile to get my strength back, but a little ice cream and a nap helped immensely. The topper to this whole boat trip was the fact that the spray-on sunblock we had was not applied too evenly so the tops of my legs and knees got burnt, and my back looks like a jigsaw puzzle with the red patches asymmetrically appearing around strap lines.
That night I felt much better and was able to enjoy our best dinner out of the whole trip. Mr. Mingle had made special reservations at a boutique hotel called Casa Rafael’s and it was wonderful. The service was impeccable – I think there were 4 or 5 people waiting on us at any one time. There was also a music group playing – a small mariachi band, but with only guitars – no horns. There was a 13 yearold boy in this group who looked like he had been dragged along by his father to occasionally accompany the group with sound effects. All of a sudden, this kid broke out singing with the operatic voice that stunned us – we were amazed. He was also very cheesy and really hammed it up and we enjoyed his performance immensely.
Sunday was our busiest day. First we started off by getting massages and then we rented a sea kayak for two and kayaked out to a place called Lover’s Beach which was quite far away and only accessible by water. We were about a third of the way there when we realized they had sent us out without life jackets. “Oh well, Mingle is a good swimmer” we thought, and carried on. We made it out to the beach with no trouble until we got caught in a mini whirlpool trying to pull up to the beach, but fortunately we didn’t tip and the next wave came and pushed our boat to shore. We walked around this beach for a bit and checked out both sides – the Pacific side and the bay-side. Then we kayaked back. We took a quick break in the pool at a nearby resort where we found a swim-up bar and enjoyed margaritas and ice cream. (As a side note – these do NOT go well together). After this, it was off for parasailing! I have wanted to go parasailing for 14 years, and I was finally going to get my chance. First we were picked up from the beach by a taxi boat which then transferred us to a ski boat in the middle of the bay from which we would parasail. Some other people were already there and while one of them was up in the air we heard a loud crack and then a funny sound. We soon discovered that the fiber glass on the side of the boat had literally cracked in two places and a 4 foot piece of it was flapping around in the breeze. The parasailer came down without incident, but we were worried about the fact that it appeared we had a large hole in our boat. Their boss came out to check the boat out and deemed it unsafe to continue (thank goodness – because I wanted off), and then were put back in a water taxi and transferred to yet another ski boat. Finally I had my chance to parasail, and it was truly amazing. I thought I’d be really frightened, but once I was up there it was so peaceful. They drove us around the bay and I just floated in the air while taking in all the sites, Cabo Bay, our hotel, sea lion rock, the arch, Lover’s Beach…all from a bird’s eye view. I’m so grateful I finally got to go parasailing, and I would do it again.
After Mr. Mingle got his chance to parasail we then went back to our hotel where we relaxed for the rest of the late afternoon by our pool, and then finally into town for one last dinner.
This was an extremely long narrative and if you have read this far – thank you! I had every intention of posting pictures, but am currently having technical difficulties – so those are to come. Our trip was not without its blunders, but as I said in the beginning, all in all it was fantastic. It was so nice to be on vacation together, relaxed and away from work, if only we could have stayed for another week. Mr. Mingle has set the bar very high for our next anniversary.
Monday, June 05, 2006
The Anniversary Trip
"Dear Mr. Mingle,
Thank you for taking me to New York for our anniversary."
This was the note I wrote to Mr. Mingle about 2 months ago when I found out he was planning a surprise four-night trip to celebrate our first year anniversary. I put my note in a sealed envelope and planned to give it to him after he told me where we were going. About 2 weeks ago he disclosed another bit of info: “Technically, we don’t need our passports for where we are going, but it would be helpful.” I knew he wasn’t trying to feed me bogus information because it all made sense with other things that he had said recently. At that point, I threw my New York guess out the window and wrote another note which I then sealed for later viewing:
"Dear Mr. Mingle,
Thank you for taking me on an amazing trip to Mexico."
It was also after this conversation that I tried to weasel a little more info out of him – you see, it was very important for me to know whether or not I needed to go shopping for “cute" clothes. i.e. Were we headed to the tropics or Canada? He confirmed that it might be nice to buy some “cute clothes” so I promptly went out shopping, which led to my whirlwind day last Monday.
Thank you for taking me to New York for our anniversary."
This was the note I wrote to Mr. Mingle about 2 months ago when I found out he was planning a surprise four-night trip to celebrate our first year anniversary. I put my note in a sealed envelope and planned to give it to him after he told me where we were going. About 2 weeks ago he disclosed another bit of info: “Technically, we don’t need our passports for where we are going, but it would be helpful.” I knew he wasn’t trying to feed me bogus information because it all made sense with other things that he had said recently. At that point, I threw my New York guess out the window and wrote another note which I then sealed for later viewing:
"Dear Mr. Mingle,
Thank you for taking me on an amazing trip to Mexico."
It was also after this conversation that I tried to weasel a little more info out of him – you see, it was very important for me to know whether or not I needed to go shopping for “cute" clothes. i.e. Were we headed to the tropics or Canada? He confirmed that it might be nice to buy some “cute clothes” so I promptly went out shopping, which led to my whirlwind day last Monday.
At this time I would also like to point out that one day, when Mr. Mingle was rushing off to work on a Saturday morning, he said, “Listen, I accidentally left some anniversary trip info on my dresser – please don’t look.” Normally, I would not rifle through the stuff on his dresser, but now that I knew something was there…it was ooh..soo… tempting. However, except for using my secret x-ray vision to try to look through the pile on the dresser without actually touching it – I did not look. I WAS HOME ALL FRIGGIN’ DAY WALKING BY HIS DRESSER BUT I DID NOT LOOK. Not that it was torture or anything.
This past Saturday was the big revealing of our anniversary trip. He made dinner reservations at the restaurant where we got engaged and told me that we are going to…
drum roll please…
Cabo San Lucas!
We are leaving on Thursday and I can’t wait! My Mexico guess was accurate, however considering I’ve never been anywhere other then Ensenada Mexico, anything was still going to be a surprise. Now that I know where we are going, I am even more excited and wish we could leave NOW. However, my shopping is not yet complete…I still need to buy a swimsuit and sunglasses. After all, what more will I need in Cabo??
Thursday, June 01, 2006
Mingle the Sexpot
I went to my last Improv class on Tuesday and we did an activity where our classmates had to choose the characters they wanted to see other people perform. A piece of paper was passed around with my name on it and my classmates had to write down what character they wanted to see me portray on stage. I do not know why they chose the characters that they did, nor did I particularly care for any of them:
An aggravated yetti
A sexpot
A druggie
A waitress at a Reno casino
An overeater
After we all got our list of characters, then our teacher would pull together a scene: “I want to see the nervous cop, the other cop, the jabbering crackhead…and…who would make a good girlfriend? Ah..the sexpot.”
There were a few problems with this scene:
First of all, I’m not honestly sure what defines a ‘sexpot’, except I assumed it was someone who thought she was good looking and was trying to get some. All the time.
Secondly, I have never been a very flirtatious person anyway, and have trouble even acting this way on stage. Nevermind the fact that innocent flirting was the least of my worries in this scene.
Thirdly, I was playing the girlfriend of the “Jabbering Crackhead” who was being played by a guy named Joe, who is equally as square as I am. You should have seen us trying to light up imaginary crackpipes…I’m sorry, what? Let me put this to you in a different light – the best scene I acted in over the past 10 weeks was when I was partnered with this same guy Joe, and we both played 90 year-old women. We were comfortable with those roles. We were not comfortable with these new ones.
The first time we performed this scene, I basically tried to throw myself at everyone (tried being the keyword) – the crackhead, the nervous cop, and the brave cop (who happened to be bald) as they went about trying to arrest the crackhead. The bald head worked to my benefit since I was able to rub it sexily. Ummm…more info then you wanted eh?
When we were done, the teacher wanted to see the Jabbering Crackhead jabber more with a stream of consciousness so asked us to go back up onstage and do it again. He was to jabber more, I was to be more of a sexpot. This time he just jabbered and basically everything I caught him saying, I turned into some steamy sexual innuendo, and then finally dragged him back to my ‘bedroom’. I’ve never said the things to my husband that I said on stage in front of my whole class. It was a big, BIG stretch for my acting skills, and one which I found quite embarrassing.
The only other character I had to play that night from my list above was the “Aggravated Yetti”, however, I initially confused ‘yetti’ with ‘shirpa’. No, no. One is human, one is not. So, in that scene I just grunted my way across stage as a step-sister to Chewbacca, while a guy playing a drag queen tried to pick up on me. What a class. Or should I say, I've got some class.
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