Alexa and Ben, BBetz and AP, Benexa – whatever you call us, we’re pretty much always named together. Seriously, it’s been like forever since we’ve heard our names in the separate sentences. Sure, we know this is a good thing, because we’re getting married, spending the rest of our lives together, yadda yadda yadda… But every once in a while it’s important for us to be individuals, and thus we’ve got the obligatory "About Me" blurbs below, each written in our own words. So sit back, relax, and take a moment to read our mildly interesting stories.

Alexa Morgan Pennak

Alexa Baby Hi, I’m Alexa.

I’m 28, a Sagittarius, and I’m engaged to Ben.

I was born in Hong Kong but Seattle is home, I like to throw out the whole “foreign born” thing for entertainment value as if this fact is some sort of cool party trick.

I dislike aspartame, smokestacks and cooling towers, University of Oregon, people who wear slippers and pj pants in public (slippers are not shoes), dogs in public places (like the shoe department at Nordstrom), and coworkers who refuse to refill the coffee pot after taking the last cup.

I’m a lover of travel, KFC biscuits, JCrew, real life documentaries (like Hoarders, Locked Up, and First 48), WSU, spring in the Palouse, cooking, the #22, the word “cattywampus,” calamari, Trader Joes, 80’s music, pop culture and current events, and of course Ben!

Alexa Pennak believes most people should live by the “Alexa Method” and generally pokes fun of most things.  She currently works in hospitality sales during the day and plots her escape from corporate life during most waking moments at night.  She majored in Communication with an emphasis in Advertising and minored in Hospitality Business Management from Washington State University (GO COUGS!).  Alexa is also pretty sure if people could read her mind she would be spending the next 50 years finger painting and making macaroni art in a state run institution.

Alexa is not a registered anything and is not qualified to give medical advice. She is however a certified SCUBA instructor extraordinaire and may have slept in a Holiday Inn Express last night.

Benjamin Alexander Betz

Ben ¯Yo word up!  I’m BBetz and I’m standin tall, thinkin’ ’bout my story, and dishin’ it to y’all.  I’m not here to start no trouble, I’m just here to do the Super Bowl Shuffle.¯

Yes, that’s right, I grew up in the Chicago area for most of my life (Go Bears!) – in a little town called DeKalb, IL.  Never heard of it?  It’s where barbed wire was invented and Cindy Crawford grew up – she even graduated high school as Valedictorian.   But before that, back in March of 1982, I was born in Ft. Wayne, Indiana.  I was a few weeks late, which should not surprise anyone who knows me :)  And then at the age of 3, we moved to Sycamore, IL, and stayed there for a few months until we bought the house I remember growing up in.

Ah, good old Pickwick Ln. – so many memories… Roller hockey in the street, the days at the Hopkins Park pool, creating a detective agency that only ever investigated my brother Danny as we did a 3-month long background check when he tried to join… yeah there were some good times!  But what most people remember about me is that I was a competitive swimmer.  All told, I spent 15 years competing at various levels. But that certainly wasn’t all – with endless summers of 6am swim practices (eventually qualifying for nationals!), soccer games, and a short stint on the 3rd “B” team of 7th grade basketball (ask me about how I threw a pass to a cheerleader), I was a busy kid!

I’m told my stories go on far too long, so let’s skip ahead to high school.  I was of course on the swim team, making Varsity my first year! :)  I also played football all four years, and did a year (or was it two?) of track & field.  My senior year, I also briefly ventured into acting, playing T-Bird Sonny LaTierre in Grease.  But what I remember most about High School is the great friends I had – the crew: Nick, Mark, Ryan, and myself, along with our various girlfriends.  We did almost everything together!  Also, and this may come as a surprise to many of you:  a big thanks to the group of girls who taught me how to dance freshman year – I was hopeless before that!

I ended up graduating as one of 13 Valedictorians from DeKalb High School in 2000 – the class of a new millennium! Then came college at DePauw University and I was again on the swim team, as I would be for the next four years.  Along the way, I made some amazing friends, especially my boys at Delta Chi.  I joined with my “boy” Schmitt, and spent our upper-class years tearing up the South Quad like nobody else.  Oh yeah, and I also did some school work, published a paper, and the summer after Junior year, interned at Microsoft.  I had been pre-med, but my professor wanted to recommend me for the internship, and I couldn’t pass up an opportunity like that!  After 3 months in Seattle, I was hooked, and I quickly decided to come back here upon graduation.

I made many great friends out here in the first few months – JoeyT, BenA, KDS, D. Klein, Anthony, and my roommate for 5 years, Adam.  And then, after two and a half years in Seattle, I met Alexa.  It’s half JoeyT’s fault that I’m now marrying this amazing woman – check out his story, and ours to see what I’m talking about.

Well, I hope you enjoyed my (rambling) story!  If you wanted more info, don’t worry, I’m currently writing The Story of BBetz: Unabridged – I’m already up to 1900 pages!  Somehow, that’s only gotten me to third grade…  On a more serious note, I am truly happy to have found such an amazing person to share my life with.  I can’t wait until May!  Love you, AP! :)

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