My First Quilt

I wish I could remember when or how it was that I got a bug up my ass to make a quilt for my mom for Mother's Day, but it sure wasn't my raw sewing talent that got me to the finish. The picture in my head was so clear, I knew exactly what I wanted to make, and I am convinced that it was nothing but beginner's luck that allowed me to pull it together.

This was the start of something big...

PCT

For fun I have started dabbling around on websites that help you plan a hike on the Pacific Crest Trail. For anyone who doesn't know, the PCT is a 2650 mile trail from Mexico to Canada, through California, Oregon and Washington.
I will be the first to admit that hiking straight through probably isn't that realistic for me, but it doesn't mean that it's not fun to think about it!
I am currently logged onto Craig's PCT Planner. It starts with you choosing between if you want to plan in the metric system or the "Crusty, craptastic, obsolete U.S. System", I like this guy already!
4.3 months for me, in theory, to complete the PCT... Well that doesn't seem that unrealistic... Hmmm...

The Travel Quote Trail to Thailand! 89 days... "My favorite thing is to go where I've never been." -Diane Arbus

The Travel Quote Trail to Thailand! 89 days...
1. "Wandering re-establishes the original harmony which once existed between man and the universe. -Anatole France
2. "I have found out that there ain't no surer way to find out whether you like people or hate them than to travel with them." -Mark Twain
3. "I met a lot of people in Europe. I even encountered myself." -James Baldwin
4. "Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime." -Mark Twain
5. "I travel a lot; I hate having my life disrupted by routine." -Caskie Stinnett
6. "The use of traveling is to regulate imagination by reality, and instead of thinking how things may be, to see them as they are.” -Samuel Johnson
7. “All the pathos and irony of leaving one’s youth behind is thus implicit in every joyous moment of travel: one knows that the first joy can never be recovered, and the wise traveler learns not to repeat successes but tries new places all the time.” -Paul Fussell
8. “All travel has its advantages. If the passenger visits better countries, he may learn to improve his own. And if fortune carries him to worse, he may learn to enjoy it.” -Samuel Johnson 9. “For my part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel’s sake. The great affair is to move.” -Robert Louis Stevenson
10. “One’s destination is never a place, but a new way of seeing things.” -Henry Miller
11. “Traveling is a brutality. It forces you to trust strangers and to lose sight of all that familiar comfort of home and friends. You are constantly off balance. Nothing is yours except the essential things - air, sleep, dreams, the sea, the sky - all things tending towards the eternal or what we imagine of it.” -Cesare Pavese
12. “One’s destination is never a place, but a new way of seeing things.” -Henry Miller
13. ″A traveler without observation is a bird without wings.” -Moslih Eddin Saadi
14. “To awaken quite alone in a strange town is one of the pleasantest sensations in the world.” - Freya Stark
15. “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” -Mark Twain
16. “All journeys have secret destinations of which the traveler is unaware.” -Martin Buber
17. “We live in a wonderful world that is full of beauty, charm and adventure. There is no end to the adventures we can have if only we seek them with our eyes open.” -Jawaharial Nehru
18. “Tourists don’t know where they’ve been, travelers don’t know where they’re going.” -Paul Theroux
19. “To my mind, the greatest reward and luxury of travel is to be able to experience everyday things as if for the first time, to be in a position in which almost nothing is so familiar it is taken for granted.” -Bill Bryson
20. “Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail” -Ralph Waldo Emerson
21. “There is no moment of delight in any pilgrimage like the beginning of it.” -Charles Dudley Warner
22. "A good traveler has no fixed plans and is not intent on arriving.” -Lao Tzu
23. "The traveler sees what he sees. The tourist sees what he has come to see." -G.K. Chesterton
24. "We wander for distraction, but we travel for fulfillment." -Hilaire Belloc
25. “Once you have traveled, the voyage never ends, but is played out over and over again in the quiestest chambers. The mind can never break off from the journey.” -Pat Conroy
26. “A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.” -Lao Tzu
27. "A journey is like marriage. The certain way to be wrong is to think you control it." -John Steinbeck
28. "In Paris they simply stared when I spoke to them in French; I never did succeed in making those idiots understand their own language." -Mark Twain
29. "Travel makes a wise man better, and a fool worse." -Thomas Fuller
30. “Not all those who wander are lost.” -J. R. R. Tolkien
31. "Like all great travelers, I have seen more than I remember, and remember more than I have seen." -Benjamin Disraeli
32. “Perhaps travel cannot prevent bigotry, but by demonstrating that all peoples cry, laugh, eat, worry, and die, it can introduce the idea that if we try and understand each other, we may even become friends.” -Maya Angelou
33. “Too often travel, instead of broadening the mind, merely lengthens the conversation.” -Elizabeth Drew
34. “Travel and change of place impart new vigor to the mind.” -Seneca

35. “What you’ve done becomes the judge of what you’re going to do -especially in other people’s minds. When you’re traveling, you are what you are right there and then. People don’t have your past to hold against you. No yesterdays on the road.” -William Least Heat Moon

36. “I soon realized that no journey carries one far unless, as it extends into the world around us, it goes an equal distance into the world within.” -Lillian Smith

37. “To travel is to discover that everyone is wrong about other countries.” -Aldous Huxley

38. “Travel does what good novelists also do to the life of everyday, placing it like a picture in a frame or a gem in its setting, so that the intrinsic qualities are made more clear. Travel does this with the very stuff that everyday life is made of, giving to it the sharp contour and meaning of art.” -Freya Stark

39. “The first condition of understanding a foreign country is to smell it.” -Rudyard Kipling
40. “Travel is glamorous only in retrospect.” -Paul Theroux
41. “When you travel, remember that a foreign country is not designed to make you comfortable. It is designed to make its own people comfortable.” -Clifton Fadiman

42. “A wise traveler never despises his own country.” -Carlo Goldoni

43. “Adventure is a path. Real adventure - self-determined, self-motivated, often risky - forces you to have firsthand encounters with the world. The world the way it is, not the way you imagine it. Your body will collide with the earth and you will bear witness. In this way you will be compelled to grapple with the limitless kindness and bottomless cruelty of humankind - and perhaps realize that you yourself are capable of both. This will change you. Nothing will ever again be black-and-white.” -Mark Jenkins

44. "He who would travel happily must travel light." -Antoine de Saint-Exupery

45. "Certainly, travel is more than the seeing of sights; it is a change that goes on, deep and permanent, in the ideas of living." -Miriam Beard

46. "The saying 'Getting there is half the fun' became obsolete with the advent of commercial airlines." -Henry J. Tillman

47. "I dislike feeling at home when I am abroad." -George Bernard Shaw

48. "The man who goes out alone can start today; but he who travels with another must wait till that other is ready." -Henry David Thoreau
48. "It is better to travel well than to arrive." -Buddha
49. "We travel, some of us forever, to seek other states, other lives, other souls." -Anais Nin
50. "Writing and travel broaden your ass if not your mind and I like to write standing up." -Ernest Hemingway
51. "Airplane travel is nature's way of making you look like your passport photo." -Al Gore
52. "Through travel I first became aware of the outside world; it was through travel that I found my own introspective way into becoming a part of it." -Eudora Welty
53. "We must travel in the direction of our fear." -John Berryman
54. "Not only does travel give us a new system of reckoning, it also brings to the fore unknown aspects of our own self. Our consciousness being broadened and enriched, we shall judge ourselves more correctly." -Ella Maillart
55. "People who don't travel cannot have a global view, all they see is what's in front of them. Those people cannot accept new things because all they know is where they live." -Martin Yan
56. "We travel to learn; and I have never been in any country where they did not do something better than we do it, think some thoughts better than we think, catch some inspiration from heights above our own." -Maria Mitchell
57. "You do not travel if you are afraid of the unknown, you travel for the unknown, that reveals you with yourself." -Ella Maillart
58. "As you think, you travel, and as you love, you attract. You are today where your thoughts have brought you; you will be tomorrow where your thoughts take you." -James Lane Allen
59. "Travel teaches toleration." -Benjamin Disraeli
60. "To get away from one's working environment is, in a sense, to get away from one's self; and this is often the chief advantage of travel and change." -Charles Horton Cooley
61. "The cool thing about being famous is traveling. I have always wanted to travel across seas, like to Canada and stuff." -Britney Spears
62. “The only aspect of our travels that is interesting to others is disaster.” -Martha Gellman
63. "Life is either a daring adventure or nothing." --Helen Keller
64. "Traveling is almost like talking with men of other centuries." -- René Descartes
65. 'But why, oh why, do the wrong people travel, when the right people stay at home?" -- Noel Coward
66. "No matter where you go, there you are." – unknown
67. "If you don't know where you are going, any road will lead you there." -- unknown
68. "Without new experiences, something inside of us sleeps. The sleeper must awaken." -Frank Herbert
69. "Don't tell me how educated you are, tell me how much you have traveled." — Mohammed
70. "Traveling tends to magnify all human emotions." — Peter Hoeg
71. "Our happiest moments as tourists always seem to come when we stumble upon one thing while in pursuit of something else." — Lawrence Block
72. "Hitler didn't travel. Stalin didn't travel. Saddam Hussein never traveled. They didn't want to have their orthodoxy challenged." — Howard Gardner
73. "I have wandered all my life, and I have traveled; the difference between the two is this - we wander for distraction, but we travel for fulfillment." -Hilaire Belloc
74. "Travel has a way of stretching the mind. The stretch comes not from travel's immediate rewards, the inevitable myriad new sights, smells and sounds, but with experiencing firsthand how others do differently what we believed to be the right and only way." -Ralph Crawshaw
75. "We must get beyond textbooks, go out into the bypaths and untrodden depths of the wilderness and travel and explore and tell the world the glories of our journey." -John Hope Franklin
76. "When preparing to travel, lay out all your clothes and all your money. Then take half the clothes and twice the money." - Susan Heller
77. "If you look like your passport photo, you're too ill to travel." -Will Kommen
78. "We do not receive wisdom, we must discover it for ourselves, after a journey through the wilderness which no one else can make for us, which no one can spare us, for our wisdom is the point of view from which we come at last to regard the world." -Marcel Proust
79. "Through travel I first became aware of the outside world; it was through travel that I found my own introspective way into becoming a part of it." -Eudora Welty
80. "A good holiday is one spent among people whose notions of time are vaguer than yours." -John B. Priestly
81. "When we get out of the glass bottle of our ego and when we escape like the squirrels in the cage of our personality and get into the forest again, we shall shiver with cold and fright. But things will happen to us so that we don't know ourselves. Cool, unlying life will rush in...." -D. H. Lawrence
82. “What place would you advise me to visit now?” he asked. “The planet Earth,” replied the geographer. “It has a good reputation.” -Antoine De Saint-Exupery
83. "....He won’t fly on the Balinese airline, Garuda, because he won’t fly on any airline where the pilots believe in reincarnation." -Spalding Gray
84. "Jet lag is for amateurs." -Dick Clark
85. "The first experience can never be repeated. The first love, the first sun-rise, the first South Sea Island, are memories apart, and touched a virginity of sense." -Robert Louis Stevenson
86. "...the grand tour is just the inspired man's way of heading home." -Paul Theroux
87. "It is not the path which is the difficulty; rather, it is the difficulty which is the path." -Soren Kierkegaard
88. "Our battered suitcases were piled on the sidewalk again; we had longer ways to go. But no matter, the road is life." -Jack Kerouac

89. "I haven't been everywhere, but it's on my list." -Susan Sontag

All About Monsters

On Friday I went to see Monsters of Folk with my friend Joe. I didn't know what to expect. It is an amazing grouping of talent, maybe one of the best you can find, Jim James from My Morning Jacket, Conor Oberst and Mike Mogis from Bright Eyes and M. Ward, and to see them live was unbelievable. Jim James has the most fantastic voice. It was haunting. They kept handing Mike Mogis different string instruments and oh how he made them sing! M. Ward had a great bluesy sound. Conor Oberst has some of the darkest, deepest lyrics I have ever heard. All I can say is I'm very happy this young man found an outlet for all of the twisted brilliance in his head. An amazing show. Everyone should at least have a listen... http://www.myspace.com/monstersoffolk.

The Fox Theater in Oakland has been completely redone and may now be my favorite venue. It's beautiful. I would recommend it to anyone and everyone.

This past week I started reading Monster of Florence. It is already creeping me out! Great book. I can't wait to see what happens.

http://www.amazon.com/Monster-Florence-Douglas-Preston/dp/0446581194

When author Douglas Preston moved his family to Florence he never expected he would soon become obsessed and entwined in a horrific crime story whose true-life details rivaled the plots of his own bestselling thrillers. While researching his next book, Preston met Mario Spezi, an Italian journalist who told him about the Monster of Florence, Italy's answer to Jack the Ripper, a terror who stalked lovers' lanes in the Italian countryside. The killer would strike at the most intimate time, leaving mutilated corpses in his bloody wake over a period from 1968 to 1985. One of these crimes had taken place in an olive grove on the property of Preston's new home. That was enough for him to join "Monsterologist" Spezi on a quest to name the killer, or killers, and bring closure to these unsolved crimes. Local theories and accusations flourished: the killer was a cuckolded husband; a local aristocrat; a physician or butcher, someone well-versed with knives; a satanic cult. Thomas Harris even dipped into "Monster" lore for some of Hannibal Lecter's more Grand Guignol moments in Hannibal. Add to this a paranoid police force more concerned with saving face and naming a suspect (any suspect) than with assessing the often conflicting evidence on hand, and an unbelievable twist that finds both authors charged with obstructing justice, with Spezi jailed on suspicion of being the Monster himself. The Monster of Florence is split into two sections: the first half is Spezi's story, with the latter bringing in Preston's updated involvement on the case. Together these two parts create a dark and fascinating descent into a landscape of horror that deserves to be shelved between In Cold Blood and Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. --Brad Thomas Parsons

Preemie Presents

Please click on the link above to visit Preemie Presents.

Caroline Makes Me a Star

http://www.coeurdela.blogspot.com/

My friend Caroline just featured me as one of her travelers on her blog. It's a good read anyway, but is especially exciting for me to be on it! Go and check out my 15 minutes :)

Climbing Climbing!

Climbing kick off! Parrish got in on Thursday to SFO and we headed over to Oakland to meet up with Voltaire. We swapped some gooey bars for a walkie and were on our way to Tuolumne Meadows!

Our first night there we camped out at the employee parking and hung with a few of the trail maintainers. They were a good group and fed us and shared our beer.

The next morning we got up and went down to the first come first serve sites where we got our site assignment and set up camp before a very late start on Cathedral, a 500 foot, five pitch beauty! The hike was pretty long, and uphill the whole way. Quite a way to start the morning.
Voltaire was our fearless leader, with Parrish on belay. After Voltaire would lead the pitch he would belay me from the top. I trailed the second rope, unclipping the rope I was climbing on and clipping in Parrish's rope behind me. Since I didn't think in a million years we would get to climb this amazing stuff I hadn't brought a small day pack. So up I went with my camera bag pulling me backwards the whole damn time. Combined with the drag from the second rope I had to work to get up some not so difficult climbs. When I would reach the top of a pitch I would belay Parrish off of the anchor that Voltaire set up.
On we went for a few pitches before we got to the chimney. Yey! The fun part was figuring out how we were going to get our packs up since it was too small for us to fit through wearing them. We decided that Voltaire would get up past the chimney and then lower a rope for us to hook our packs to. Then Parrish and I would grab ours on our way up.
On one of the pitches we could not get a piece of gear out of the crack. We decided that it was our sacrifice to the climbing gods. As we moved through the next pitch a woman passed us soloing (soloing is no rope. No rope at all. There were way too many people soloing that day for it to be caused by individual insanity). She had our gear! Our nut to be exact. Parrish and I laughed with her about our sacrifice and as she moved past us we looked at each other and realized... She was the climbing god!
The last three pitches were scattered with chipmunk shit. What on earth?! I put my hand right in it. Damn little bastards. I will never look at them as innocent little creatures again.
The last pitch of Cathedral was hard! There was a lot of wrapping around and with the drag from the rope I took to throwing my body in the opposite direction just to get enough slack to move. Before the final pitch you came up over the top of the rock and the view completely knocked me on my ass. I yelled! Parrish thought I hurt myself (not an unreasonable assumption), but I just couldn't not contain my amazement. We had been looking down on such a great view the whole day and it was nothing compared to the view through the pass to Half Dome, all of the lakes and other peaks surrounding us. I am sure the reaction was heightened by the journey to it, but I swear it was one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen.

The hike down was a little sketchy. Needless to say it made me nervous. At one point Parrish went ahead to see if she could get down a pretty steep slope. It was like slow motion... Her feet slipped back and she belly flopped a good seven feet down. Voltaire and I were helpless. It scared the shit out of us, but she was okay. The rest of the hike down was dark and we kept losing the trail. The river kept us going in the right direction and we finally got back to camp at midnight.

The next day was a rest day. We climbed some single pitch stuff including the guide cracks. I only climbed one before the ankle started screaming. Crack climbing is a lot of foot and hand jamming... It all comes down to pain management, and with my ankle already jacked up, I should have known better. While Parrish and Voltaire climbed I wondered around and took pictures.

At dinner that night we decided to climb Fairview. It is 12 pitches and 900 feet to the top, and is considered one of the top climbs anywhere. The approach was a lot shorter than Cathedral, and we got to the base at sunrise to make sure we could get up and hike back down before dark. The first pitch was led by Voltaire and Parrish followed. I climbed up third. The first pitch was 180 feet of crack, most of which was wet. About half way up my ankle was hurting so bad I could barely put wait on it. Since I knew I wouldn't be going beyond this first pitch I knew I had to finish it. The noises coming out of me must have been frightening they were so primal! But I did it. I got up the first pitch, 5.9 crack, of Fairview. Once I regrouped at the anchor they lowered me back down for me to hike to the car and come back to get them when they were done.

Sitting at the bottom I chatted with other climbers and then finally made my way back to the car. The fight up that crack really exhausted me. I went straight back to the camp and daisy chained my leg to the ceiling of our tent and crashed.

On our last day there we were planning on hiking Vernal Falls in the Valley. Since I was hurt we decided to go down to El Cap Meadow and show Parrish Yosemite Falls. It was great to hang out and show her the sights. It was also neat to see El Cap and Half Dome with a climbing guide book in hand. Voltaire was planning on climbing Half Dome in following weeks. Quite the accomplishment considering the amount of stuff you have to carry up its intense 2000 feet.

Parrish's flight out wasn't until late so we met up with some friends for dinner first. This is where I met Saunders and Melissa, my new climbing girls!

It was an incredible weekend.

Nicaragua and Costa Rica!

In July I headed to Costa Rica. My friend Tanner is living in San Jose teaching English. He needed to leave the country for 72 hours and was planning to travel for a bit after. When he posted a note on Facebook looking for a travel buddy I jumped at it, of course!

I got in and we headed to his host family house for the night before going to Nicaragua the following morning. On the bus we met Jen and Joel who we would then hang out with while in San Juan del Sur. We also met Mark, the Mikes and Richard at our hostel.

San Juan del Sur was beautiful and cheap! We hiked and hung out at the beach. The food was great, the mango daiquiris were better! Delicious! On the 4th of July we all hiked up to the grocery store and bought all the fixin's needed for burgers. It was a great way to spend the day, burgers and beer with some really fantastic people.

We went from San Juan del Sur to Tamarindo, Costa Rica. We travelled with Pernilla and Kwesi. Since we were meeting Tanner's friend Laura to pick up his car we decided to cab it to the border and then catch another cab on the other side. I have crossed a few borders in my travels... But I couldn't have been more grateful to have Tanner there to negotiate the exchange of money to the kids that pushed us to the front of the line, to get us to each of the lines necessary to get our exit stamps from Nicaragua and our entrance stamps from Costa Rica.

We got to Tamarindo and were all exhausted. The hostel was a great little spot with a pool and a cross eyed golden lab named Diego. We rented a surfboard between the four of us everyday and spent our time at the beach. One of the days a monster storm rolled in and the humidity fried my camera. It took a few weeks but it is finally up and running again, just in time for Yosemite.

La Fortuna was probably my favorite. It was frustrating that EVERYTHING you did cost money, but it was worth it. Each trail you hiked cost ten dollars, but hiking in a cloud forest is something you will never forget. It took us a couple of days before the clouds cleared enough to see Arenal, the volcano just outside of town. We ran into Mark, a guy we met in San Juan del Sur, on our second day in town. We hiked up to a crater lake in the rain one day. It was crazy fun! Mud everywhere and super steep! It was a good day. The next day we went to Down to Earth Coffee and hung out with Matias. He's a great coffee grower/roaster in La Fortuna. He makes some of the best coffee I have ever had! On our way back to San Jose we drove him and his wife and went to where they roast their coffee.

On our last day we went up to Irazu, a volcano right outside of the city. It was freezing but beautiful. 

It was a great trip!

Whitman, Wordsworth... Whatever.

Most that know me will know the necklace that I wear all the time. There is a St. Christopher charm that is from my trip through Europe, a charm I got in Nice on my second trip over, my Great Aunt's high school ring and my grandmother's high school charm. The center piece is a charm with the quote, "How does the meadow flower its bloom unfold? Because the lovely little flower is free. Down to its root, and in that freedom, bold." -Whitman. While going through my room I found the tag for the charm and was really excited to see the website listed so that I could go and see what stuff they have online. But then I noticed something else, the quote on the tag has Wordsworth listed as the one quoted. Shit. I just went online and have found that it is a Wordsworth quote. For five years I have been quoting Whitman like an idiot.

Next stop? I'm emailing these fools and see if they will send me some free goodies :)

Projects at Home: Food

I have been trying to get my family to eat better. This has proven to be very interesting, because I can't cook. I can fake my way through things from time to time but I miss more than I hit. Tonight should have been a miss, but it wasn't! My dad's staple is spaghetti with red sauce, ground beef and sausage. We swapped the sauce out for a Heart Healthy brand, the noodles out for rice noodles, and all of the meat out for tofu. It was not pretty. The noodles tasted like paper mache, icky! The sauce looked like... well... nasty. We went back to the regular spaghetti noodles and rolled with it anyway. To our surprise my dad loved it! We can never tell him that he was loving soy instead of beef.

Strawberry Margarita

Oh hell. I'm waaaay behind! Let me break it down for you. In no particular order here are the major events over the past month.

1. I cut 14 inches off of my hair. Donated a foot and lost the other two inches to styling, yey! Love the new do. My scalp tingled and my neck hurt for two days after the cut. That head of hair weighed more than I thought!

2. I turned 26! I am officially old...er. I had a great group of people out for my birthday dinner. Parrish, Peter, Chris, Jay, Ann, Craig, Amy, Stacy, Chris, Beth, Will, Erika, Michelle and James. We went out and had dinner before heading out to Eighteenth Street Lounge for some drinks.

Once there we picked up a few more people. Jean, Tim, Daren, Gillian, and Kat. I had a really good time. It was such an amazing feeling to be surrounded by so many good people. I'm so lucky to have found them.

3. I finished up at Ray's. The amount of time I spent with everyone there made it very sad for me to leave. I was happy that most of the senior staff wasn't there on my last night. It would have been much harder to walk away. Saying goodbye to Danielle and Jaime was hard enough without my girls there.

4. There Cherry Blossoms! After a year of being annoyed about missing the Cherry Blossoms last year in Japan and DC I have finally seen them! Leanne and I took Channy down to see them and it was a great day. Chan slept for most of our walk around the Tidal Basin and woke up just in time for the FDR Memorial so we could take some pictures before she decided it was time to go home.

5. My going away party. It was such a rough night! I picked up Joe and Dave from Dulles and we went to check into our hotel. We got all dolled up and got on the Metro to Courthouse. Erika, Bonnie and Jeff met up with us at Four Courts for a drink. Jeff couldn't stick around for dinner but spent enough time with Joe and Dave that they were totally man crushing on him for the rest of the night. We ate at Ray's and Beth and Leanne were late. The two that should know better! Parrish and Kory met us there. Dinner was amazing and the crowd died down by the time we were done. I had brought a cake for Leanne's birthday, which was the next day, and as I brought it out Jaime brought a cake that Leanne had made me out of the kitchen! Two birthday cakes deep, we were already stuffed, so we each had a bite and sent the rest to the kitchen for the guys.I had to say goodbye to Parrish at the restaurant. The beginning of the end. We all loaded up in Beth's minivan and Leanne's car. Other than a quick stop to repair a "padiddle" we were on our way to Rocket Bar. It was packed! The Caps game had just let out and the bar was swarming with Cap fans. We had a bunch of people meet up with us there and it was on! Beers all around and some good laughs to finish off the night. It was just the way I wanted to say goodbye... For now.

Cozu-Melted in the Sun

My latest pedi was inspired by our last snow, and it's very short stay. I will miss waking up to snow. Even visits to Tahoe might not ever give me the same feeling that I get when I wake up in my own bed and lay there watching the snow fall.

Pedi day was a special day because it was Leanne's first day out of the house since Chan! I met Chan the day before when we gave her her first bath. She was so good until the water started getting cold!For our day of errands she was good all day. The wailing at the end was entirely warranted so I won't hold it against her :). I was so happy to get to see Leanne again (I have been banned since I was sick) and I am completely head over heals for the new little chicky!

I've been working a bit and am officially in my last two weeks at Ray's. I am pretty sad about it. It does give me a great excuse to get the girls out on the town. I just wish I had made it happen sooner. There are so many new people at the restaurant. Some I really like and am stoked I've had a chance to hang out with them outside of work.

With my birthday coming up fast I have a night planned with some of my girls, and I can't wait! Then I am heading up to Brooklyn to visit Pam. I wasn't sure if it was going to happen so I'm stoked that we have a couple days to hang out before I head back to Cali where it will be so much harder to make a spontaneous trip to New York.

Today was my first big day towards my move. The car is washed, the roof rack is back in place and the boxes are put together and ready to go as soon as Elizabeth clears out her dining room furniture and leaves me space to put them.

No one can seem to understand why I'm leaving so soon after getting here. Funny, since no one could figure out why I would move here in the first place 10 months ago. Because, that's why! :)

FUN FIND: I had to look up my roof rack measurements online and under the description of the different parts they had this for the clips that hold the rack on: "Add vehicle-specific Q-Clips (00601-00730) to ensure a custom fit to your door frame (Do not confuse Q-Clips with similar-sounding personal hygiene products. Attempting to clean your ears with Q-Clips may result in serious Vincent Van Gogh-like injuries.)"

My Prague-ative

Since I got home from California so many things have happened! I'm going to hit the big points.
Bo was in DC for work from Hiroshima! Very exciting for me. As lovely as my girls in Virginia/DC are, I was in some serious need of some San Francisco spirit in my life! The Manhattan Project exhibit at the American History Museum and seeing the Enola Gay at The Udvar Hazy Center were special treats for me. Bo's knowledge on these exhibits far exceeds the information given on the little signs in the museum (obviously). Not to mention all of the fun facts he has up his sleeve. Lunch at the Hell Burger was the best meal we had... Probably the strangest twist to Bo's visit was when we decided to head to U Street for a couple beers at Solly's. We went upstairs and were so stoked to have the table with the view! A couple of beers in the entire building jolted. WTF... We looked out our window and saw a cab hanging half way out of the bottom part of the bar. Moments later the bartender/owner was rushing us all down the smoked filled stairs to the street. It turns out that the cab driver had a seizure and, just as he was picking up a fare, hit the gas and plowed into the bar. Somehow he managed not to seriously injuring a single person.
Ray's The Steaks has officially moved! We are now triple in size and working our asses off. The new location is beautiful. Our first night was a bit chaotic! The hoods didn't have enough suck for all of the smoke off the grills. Lucky for us it was warm enough out to have all of the doors opened, but we were still pretty smoked out. No one was pissed. Everyone ate and was happy, especially with their half off checks. We do have a lot of new trainees. The good news is that most of them are eager and ready to work. After twelve days on my body decided that enough was enough and I have been in bed, sick as a dog for the past five days.
And the cherry on top! Leanne had a baby girl!! Because I am sick, I haven't been able to go and visit yet. But hopefully by the end of the week I can drop in see the belly, face to face :)
With a little over a month to go as an East Coast resident I'm trying to work as much as I can and make time for my new friends, that I'm hoping to hang onto once I move.

Revved Up and Ready to Go!

My new firetruck red pedi polish is more a motivator than an expression of how I'm feeling today. I should be more amped up, the inauguration is less than 24 hours behind me, I am working my way back to the west coast, I just spent the last week with a couple of my best, oldest friends... But to be honest, I'm really having a hard time getting myself going since getting back from California.

My Christmas and New Years home was great! Christmas day was spent with my family, our neighbors and some old family friends. It was great hanging out with everyone. Having Allie and Julia around really made the day so fun. There is something about kids in the house at Christmas! Thank goodness we have Mark and Lin next door to keep the pressure off of me and Nate. After dinner I drove up to Jeff's and hung out with his family before heading back to the house to watch a movie.

The day after Christmas was my first day back at a California climbing gym :). Todd and I met at the Berkeley gym and then ran around to REI, where I got the accesories that I needed for my new rope that Nate got me for Christmas, and a couple of ski stores.

The 27th was a day. My last Aratic show. I got out to Livermore and got to hang out with the boys. Everyone went to grab some food and then Todd and I went on a Starbuck's run. Some competative ping pong, a couple beers and a really awesome show. I am so happy they had one while I was home, since they are officially broken up as of a couple weeks ago.

New Year's Eve left me with a couple of option. I broke things off with Jeff and so I didn't really want to start my year off there... And then I had another potentially akward option. Then Todd invited me to Tahoe with some friends. It was just what I needed. we went up New Year's Eve and spent chatting with some really nice people. New Year's Day was spent at Heavenly. It was the most beautiful day. Blue skies, the lake was clear and amazing, the snow wasn't too icy. I suuuuucked at snowboarding. Worst day ever (as far as my skills go). I used to be moderately good, but not that day. That day I was a shit show on the mountain. Todd and Mark stuck with me the whole time. Troopers!

On the second we went out again. It was a bit cold and snowing like crazy. I decided that I should try skiing.

FEB 15TH:
After two months of this blog sitting here unfinished, for a few reasons, I'm just throwing it out there. My trip home was wonderful! I had a great day with my girls and dinners with friends that I don't talk to nearly enough.

Inauguration eve I was able to go down to The Mall and check out the set up. There are tons of new pictures up on my Picasa site if you are interested.

Blind Puppies

I still owe everyone a Christmas blog, but I'm not getting my pedi until Wednesday so you'll have to wait. This blog is the result of an epiphany. One of myself and of the people I choose to surround myself with.
I will start with myself. At risk of sounding too lame... Here we go. I realized while I was home in California that I have landed myself at a fork in the road. I know where I want to go, that part is easy. What I'm struggling with is recognizing where I have just come from, and who I am. I only have myself to blame. I had pulled the wool over my own eyes, but now I can see, and it's time to get to work. I want to be a happier person. I have turned into a cynic. I have joked about it for three years, Since Chef Trav took a walk, but it's really not that funny. The only reason I have remained a cynic for so long is because I have continued to surround myself with people who feed my reasoning for the cynicism. If my thinking wasn't proven correct regularly I think would have a better chance of seeing past it to the good in people. I have so many honest, loyal, kind people in my life, and I have let them be overshadowed for too long by those who feed on bitterness and doubt. Not all of these people are bad people, they're just not healthy for me to be around, or talk to, all of the time.
My friend Parrish had a great New Year's resolution, to surround herself with people that she really wants to hang out with, and are good for her to be around, rather than getting sucked into spending time in crowds that she just doesn't jive with. Since it is really just an amendment to mine, to be a happier person, I have adopted it as a late one for myself.
Now nothing is that simple. The one thing that has recently muddied the water is booze. I love a good beer. I love a good five or six beers if I'm out with the right people. I have officially started a list of those that I have put on probation when it comes to me being around them when they are drinking. They're smart people, and they know who they are. If you can't handle your booze, you know it after the first bad round. "Sorry, I was too drunk," just doesn't cut it. I had two situations (that's right, I am calling you both situations) the week before I left to go home for Christmas. Both while I had a boyfriend, both willing to throw our friendship under the bus for a piece of ass and no interest in anything else. Both being reasonable guys, they were embarrassed, but when did it become acceptable for men to become knuckle draggers when they have one too many? (I know, the ladies do it too, and a couple have made my list for other reasons, but today I'm focusing on the boys.) And I'm not the only one who has experienced this recently. It's an unacceptable excuse, and here is why. I can name a good handful of my boys that haven't used this excuse.
There are "good boys", "bad boys" and blind puppies. Blind puppies? Yeah, I call them blind puppies because they aren't bad guys, they just can't seem to get a grasp on things and won't slow down enough to stop running into barriers and breaking shit (literally or figuratively). They still have time to figure it out, I just won't be the bumper taking all of the hits, waiting for them to regain their sight, anymore. Most of the blind puppies I know are liquor induced and I am extremely confident they will figure it out soon enough.
So there we go, the three easy steps to being a happier person, reduce time around people that encourage my cynicism, surround myself with those who are good, and keep the blind puppies on probation until they get it together.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!