Weekend Review

I survived another busy weekend. Phew!

Friday night was actually a very fun night with just Boyfriend and myself. Boyfriend's flight arrived a bit later than anticipated and his bags took forever to show up on the carousel, but he was home a little bit before 10pm. We hadn't seen each other all week because he was "working" in San Juan, Puerto Rico - I think that's code for "lying on the beach" although he swears it isn't so. We decided we wanted to grab a margarita so off to Cyclone Anaya on Durham we went. Just one margarita, right? Riiiiiight. Have you seen these monstrous margaritas before? Not only are they virtually lethal, they are also the size of my head. It's such a brilliant idea the Cyclone Anaya owners have. Let's serve small margaritas that are too small or large margaritas that can be mistaken for those little toddler pools they sell in front of Walmart in the summer months. People figure that they'll get the big one to save money versus buying two smaller ones. But by the time you finish the first one, your judgement is impaired just enough to convince yourself you need one more big one for the road. So two mammoth margaritas a piece later and having shut the restaurant's bar down at 11pm, we headed to Dark Horse. Nothing good ever comes out of Dark Horse. After it was all said and done, we ended up closing that bar down at 2am and going home to stuff our faces with anything we could find in the pantry and the fridge simply to satisfy our drunken munchies. That ENTIRE bag of Ruffles I inhaled was like food of the Gods at 3am...

The next day, I was up and active by 9am. Thank the powers that be that I rarely get hangovers and insomnia and I are like THIS *fingers crossed*. As Boyfriend lied in bed wishing that his brain would stop pulsating inside his skull and believed that his body was conspiring to kill itself with every pain known to man, I worked for a couple of hours, went grocery shopping, and stopped by 3 different party supply stores just to find some decent wrapping paper for a wedding shower we were to attend later that evening...Jeez! I can't believe how productive I was while Boyfriend was still dead to the world.

Later that evening, we went to 5:30pm mass at the Sacred Heart Co-Cathedral in downtown to watch my nephew be baptized. Awwwww! He is now officially Catholic. Bingo and booze for everyone!!! Can't wait until he fully comprehends that he can now sin all he wants, go to confession, and then be absolved of all his wrongdoings. Woot! The event was followed by family and friends getting together for some yummy Filipino food.

Immediately after that, we headed over to Ash and Dude's wedding shower. Boyfriend felt like he was dying, but he was being a trooper and attended both events. Granted, I was the one driving and heartlessly refused to take him home - details, details... Their little party was very nice. They made off like bandits with their gifts. We got them this. Pretty awesome, huh? Should be a nice addition to their pool. After the party, Boyfriend and I went home and almost immediately fell asleep. What a long Saturday!!!

Sunday, consisted of more grocery shopping and watching the NCAA basketball games. I'm not as into it this year only because my bracket is complete crap. I'm like #13 out of 51 people in my pool. Drats! I was hoping for at least 3rd place entitling me to 10% of the $1020 pot. Grrrr! My coworker is currently in 1st giving her a chance at 60% of the pot. Good for her, but damn for me. Later Sunday evening, I went to Job#2 until about 10:30pm. So nothing too exciting.

I'm trying to be a bit more healthy again and get back to my workout routine. Seeing as I have been gym-less for about 4.5 months, I totally see the consequences of sitting on my butt and doing nothing but eating. I guess willing my love handles to go away just isn't a effective as I had hoped. I recently joined a new gym and started going again. I got up this morning at 5:15am to run two miles on the treadmill, do 100 crunches on the big inflated ball, and do a couple of exercies with some handweights. Yep, call me crazy for torturing myself to a sweat and getting home all before Boyfriend even opened his eyes to start the day!

It's ALIVE!!!

Remember when I said that my camera decided to go swimming with me in the river while I was in Costa Rica? Surely being completely submerged led to my digital camera's untimely demise. But Boyfriend had a theory. Seeing as when our blackberrys get wet, usually the battery shorts out and just needs to be replaced - not the entire blackberry device. He figured that maybe my digital camera could be experiencing the same thing. So over the weekend, we took it to Best Buy and had them test it with a battery. Voila! It worked. Unfortunately, I had taken the memory card out of it, so I didn't get a chance to take a few pictures to see if it could actually still work. But seeing the little thing turn on was enough for me to get my hopes up. Instead of spending $50 on a new battery at the store, I bought the battery online for just $5.95 - I love you, Amazon.com! Figured for that price and the likelihood of me shorting another battery, I might as well get two.

The batteries arrived at my office today, so I decided to test out the goods. It appears that all the functions work - pictures, video, reviewing pics and videos, the auto and manual flash, and even the timer. Woot! I'm sure there is a function that I will need at some point that I can't think of right now that will not work when I want to use it, but overall I'm as happy as a lark (are larks really happy?).

Yay!!! I don't have to buy yet ANOTHER digital camera that I destroyed.

Here's one of my test shots. I think it totally captures how I feel about my day...

Happy Hump Day!

I think I need another vacation...

<------- Looking at my upcoming events makes me tired. Can I go back to Costa Rica now????

A couple of things...

First off, I need everyone to send their good thoughts and prayers (if you partake in that kind of religiousness) to my good friend Pocahontas. His younger brother was recently hospitalized but released due to complications with his diabetes. His brother is not out of the woods and is still very sick. So whatever positive mojo you can muster and send to the Denver area, please do.

In other bad news, one of the weddings I am suppose to attend was just recently cancelled. Good on my pocketbook and a break in my travel plans for May, but...extremely sad for my friend. Although she and I were not super close, I've shared quite a few drinks with her amongst several happy hours with mutual friends over the years and have had some good conversations. Come to find out that her fiancee has confessed to cheating on her. What a punch in the gut! And to top it off, it appears the main reason he had to come clean is because "The Other Woman" is now carrying the spawn of their transgression(s). Can you believe he had the audacity to ask her if they could postpone their May wedding until everything gets figured out?!?! What a thoughtful guy! She's better off without him anyway...better he showed his true colors now than after she did the whole shashay down the aisle in ignorant bliss. I'm sure that's not what she wants to hear right now and no one needs to say it out loud, but I know in her heart she knows it's true. What can I say? People suck sometimes.

I hate this post is such a Debbie Downer, but negative energy seems to be the theme of the week.

Tomorrow I get to go shopping for a wedding shower. Stay tuned...

Get Comfy, folks!

I am back! I know I fell off the face of the Earth, but it really could not be helped. I truly felt like that Nationwide commercial motto that "Life comes at you fast!"...sans Kevin Federline portraying a fry cook daydreaming about his booming rap artist career. To say I've been busy would be an understatement. Prior to work taking over my life, I had gone to Costa Rica. I didn't even get a chance to update you about that so here it is in all it's late glory...

Boyfriend and I left for Costa Rica on Friday, February 29th after taking off a little early from work. We arrived in San Jose late in the evening and spent one night at the cutest bed and breakfast called Posada el Quijote in Escazu overlooking the city of San Jose. Although the bed itself was a tragic square piece of queen-size concrete pretending to be a mattress, the views from the common areas of the house as well as the breakfast were fantastic. We only spent one night there, so I won't dwell too much on the bed. The next day we got up and took the Interbus Shuttle from San Jose to La Fortuna.

The drive to La Fortuna was approximately 3 hours including a stop at the Cloud Forest Cafe midway for photo ops, snacks, and potty breaks. We had two older ladies from the Kansas ride the shuttle with us along with two girls in their late-20's or early-30's who spoke very loud Spanish to each other the ENTIRE way. Boyfriend kept looking at me with that look that only our telepathic minds could read from one another - "Will she ever stop long enough to take a breath?" I suppose it is better than a baby screeching at the top of its lungs the entire way, but my basic Spanish caught enough of the conversation that I think I know just about everything about the one girl who wouldn't stop talking, her boyfriend, her friend that liked a guy that use to date their other friend but the other friend would be upset if they started dating, and cooking a particular dish that the other girl's mom use to make but not as good - Jeez! It really made me wonder if it was worth the $50 difference to have just scheduled a private car to take us rather than the shuttle van. Oh, well...

Once we arrived to La Fortuna, we finally got settled in the place that was to be home for 4 nights - Hotel el Silencio del Campo. This place ranked #1 for La Fortuna according to Tripadvisor.com which is where I get all my insider travel info. The place was beautiful! The grounds were nicely manicured and colorful and our little cabina/bungalow was very cute. They are building a new 2,000 room hotel right next door so it takes a lot away from the very rustic village feel of the hotel we were at, but I suppose you can't stop progress. Tourism is obviouusly booming in Costa Rica that someone would invest in such a large and modern construction amidst all the nature-esque hotels in the area. La Fortuna brings in the most tourists as it is the town at the base of the Arenal Volcano. This volcano is the second most active volcano in the world right after Kilauea in Hawaii. It's amazing to see it constantly billowing smoke, seeing mushroom clouds of black smoke pop out occassionally, and to see rocks repeatedly sliding down the volcano itself from all the activity.

Boyfriend and I did some pretty amazing things while we were there. I've always said one of my biggest dreams was to zipline through the Costa Rican rainforest. I finally can scratch that off my list! Boyfriend has a major fear of heights, but he got over that by the time he latched on to the cable for his third zipline. We did the Sky Trek and could easily say we would do it again in a heartbeat! We did eight lines as high as 60 stories in the air and one being almost half a mile long. We had to be going at speeds of about 40 mph. It was so exhilarating!!! We were lucky enough to have one of the zipline guides take my digital camera with him on the zipline so that you could get a first-hand view of what our experience was like on a video clip. Check it out!

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books

We also did a safari by canoe. That I wasn't as much of a fan, but it was interesting to see the wildlife along the San Carlos River - birds, lizards, monkeys, sloths, and baby crocodiles. Unfortunately, our canoe capsized after hitting a fallen tree that I not only waterlogged my camera, but Boyfriend lost his flip flops. The tour guide had to fish us out of the river and try to salvage our dry bag containing our belongings. Not to mention that the canoe actually flipped and smashed onto Boyfriend's foot. It took over two weeks before the bruising finally went away. Poor Boyfriend! Leave it to us to turn a leisure canoe ride into an action-packed adventure down the river. We shall not be riding in a canoe...EVER...after that.

Our last big adventure was rappeling. OMG! This was one of the most exciting adventures I've ever done in my life. We hiked through the rain forest, jumping into holes filled with running spring water, sliding down rocks, and rappelling off of 5 platforms. Two of which were massive drops. The first drop alone was about 24 stories tall.

Here is a picture of Boyfriend doing the first rappell. If the things I made him do on this trip didn't cure his fear of heights, I don't know what will!

Here is a very bad/dark picture of me rappeling next to a waterfall. Sadly, the lighting is really bad once you are deep into the rainforest. By the end, we were soaking wet and exhausted. Before we left, they fed us a delicious homecooked Costa Rican meal of black beans, rice, something that resembles chicken and dumplings, fresh salsa, chips, and fruit. Yum! By the time we got back to the hotel, we had a couple of cocktails and passed out from exhaustion.

Another interesting thing I should touch upon are the hot springs. They are amazing. We went to a place called Baldi Hot Springs on our first night in La Fortuna. I like to call it Club Baldi only because it would blast all kinds of techno music and they even remixed a Stevie Nicks song...whu?!?! Regardless, it was very cool. There were about 16 pools at this place all heated naturally at various temperatures by the volcano. Some of the pools were over 110 degrees farenheit. You definitely couldn't stay in those too long. We went in the evening when it was cool and breezy and got a bit overheated in some of the pools, so I can't even imagine what it would be like to go during a sunny day...and drinking at that. That's just a recipe for a disaster! I wouldn't suggest Baldi for older adults looking for something quiet and relaxing. It is definitely a 20- and 30-something party crowd. There are other Hot Spring places to choose from but Baldi was walking distance from our hotel. Luckily, our hotel had their own hot spring pool in the back so we ended up utilizing that one the rest of the time we were there...and we didn't have to pay admission.

Here are the rest of the picture from Costa Rica.

So that's that for the Costa Rica update. In addition to my trip and work, we've officially entered Birthday Season among our close friends. UGH! Not UGH because I hate it, but just because it's more to plan for. Grove just celebrated his birthday and Curly just hit the big 3-0. Blondie will be hosting her 30th on a party boat in Austin next weekend. I really need to speak to Doc about what he wants this year as well as that my birthday is next month as well. Did I mention there are two out of town weddings next month? Lord help me exercise my time management skills to the full extent. Otherwise, I might be locked in a padded room by May from all the stress.

I suck!

Basically, I flaked on finishing the last two days of my month-long blogfest. I also hadn't blogged in weeks on top of that! Yes, I got the emails...so I'm on here to give an update. Right about the last time I blogged, my world went into high gear shortly thereafter.

Work (both of them) have been extremely busy. On the days that I get off from Job# 2 in the evening, I'm usually working at Job #1 until about 8pm. Twelve hour days at Job #1 es no muy bueno. In the midst of all that work already on my plate, I had to work even more to get ahead since my vacation to Costa Rica would have me missing 3 days. What a mess! I finally got to leave for Costa Rica knowing I would be coming back to a disaster since work was so hectic before I left, but I pushed it all out of my mind and had fantastic time. It was a good mix of action-filled adventure tours and relaxation. It helped a ton that my blackberry wasn't picking up service there and I wasn't getting emails from work. But of course that meant I came back to my blackberry loading over 100 emails when I touched ground in Houston...and some of them all requiring time-sensitive attention. So I came back to work Thursday of last week and have been nonstop ever since. I even had to come into work over the weekend for Job #1 in addition to my scheduled shift at Job #2 on Sunday evening. Ugh!

Things don't look like they are going to get any easier this week either. Job #1 has our Annual Meeting in Houston this week. That means that starting tomorrow, there are events planned through Thursday night. Luckily, I got off from Job# 2 all week so that I can deal with all these dinners, meetings, etc. But, I'm in for a rough week.

On a lighter note, I will try to post later later this week with a full update on Costa Rica once I'm through with this hellish week from work. Please standby.

Hump Day

It's ugly and rainy outside. Blech! So not looking forward to the drive home. When it rains, it's like downtown drivers forget that the pedal to the far right is the gas and they just set their foot on the break and take a nap. It takes me three times as long just to get on the highway. The upside is that Boyfriend's business travels were cut short, so he came home today rather than on Friday. That will be nice to see him when I get home. Maybe if I wish REAL hard, I'll come home to a candlelit, romantic dinner with roses all over the house. Pffft... A girl can always dream, right?

I'm so disappointed that the weather will affect our ability to see the lunar eclipse tonight. They says the best time to see it will be 8:01 pm CST, but with the cloud cover and rain, I'm guessing I'll just have to use my imagination. Maybe I can make a big production of it and cut out a big white circle and a big reddish-orange circle out of construction paper and reenact it myself. Hmmmm.... See this is where my 3-year-old niece would come in handy. She would think it was cool and I wouldn't seem like a freak doing it. I think Boyfriend would just stare at me and run through a number of line items in his head of why he continues to date such a weirdo.

Veni, Vedi, Wii-ci (I came, I saw, I Wii-ed)

So it's not formal Latin. Sue me. Last night, I was a bit down, so I went over the Ghurl's house. His best idea to cheer me up was to play with his new toy. He just purchased the infamous Wii I kept hearing about. I've never played nor have I ever really been a big video game person. Ghurl's friend showed up with his extra guitar and two remotes along with a fourth friend, so we did a four-person Wii-athon. I've decided that I absolutely suck at Guitar Hero. It requires coordination of the likes that his Filipina does not possess. However, I do have some sweet moves on the tennis game. I am actually kind of sore today...

We've decided to have another Wii night this Saturday. Ghurl plans to bring it over to my house so that Boyfriend will get hooked. Mine and Ghurl's plan is to get him addicted to the games so that a Wii of our very own will make it's way into the abode. Maybe I can convince him HE needs one so that I don't have to buy it...hehehe...so manipulative...I know.

Other than that, I got nada. Man...I'm getting boring. I need to step it up!

Sadness

Single Girl informed me last night that there is actually a wake today for a guy I went to high school with. I haven't seen him in about 15 years, and we did kind of have a bit of a falling out about that time. I am sad that he has passed at such a young age, but I'm a rather uncomfortable attending the wake. In addition to how mine and this guy's relationship as friends came to be, there will also be a number of people that I know will be at his viewing that I haven't seen in ages. Sadly, some I can say I prefer not to associate myself with again. Yes, many of them may have changed in over a decade, but sometimes it's best to leave memories distant and not revisit them...especially when they were not very good memories. I'm sure that makes me come across as a bitch that I won't be attending, but I suppose I've been called worse. In my own personal way, I will honor the life of my childhood friend. I shall say a prayer for him and will stop at my church to light a candle for him. I wish him all the peace on his next journey in the after-life.

Weekend wrap-up

Boyfriend and I had seven of our friends over for dinner Saturday night. We love cooking for a whole group! We marinated chicken breasts in a balsamic vinegar marinade and served it topped with goat cheese, sundried tomatoes, and a lemon butter sauce. The chicken was served with a side of Boyfriend's delicious sour cream mashed potatoes and my roasted red wine vinegar asparagus and shallots. Basically, if you were on a diet, then you'd be out of luck at this dinner with all it's rich, hearty buttery goodness. We even served homemade cinnamon crumb coffee cake for dessert. So tasty!!! It was nice being indoors with friends have great food and wine while it was horribly stormy outside.

I usually have the dishwasher empty and ready for me to load throughout the party. Unfortunately, I had forgotten to run the load already in it. So the dishwasher was running throughout the party while the dishes continued to pile up. Oh, well. I just left everything to deal with in the morning which is what I hate doing. Because this is the monstrosity I awoke to:

Luckily, it only took me about 30 minutes to load everything into the dishwasher, hand-wash all of the serving platters and bowls, and wipe the entire kitchen down. The rest of Sunday was spent being absolutely lazy. Boyfriend had to work a little bit to prepare with his upcoming meetings. He has just left again this morning for a few days in Jamiaca for business followed by more meetings in Puerto Rico. He should be home on Friday *crossing fingers*.

I was also suppose to be on a plane this morning, but decided not to as I'm just not up for it. I was going to squeeze in some time to see Doc, but I'm thinking that has to wait. I'm just too worn out. On my day off, I plan to do a lot of catching up on things. Seeing I that I actually have this whole day to take care of errands, I really should.

YAY! Boyfriend is Home!!!

Boyfriend's flight from Jamaica arrived just in time for him to beat me home from work today. Almost 3 weeks away, and it felt like FOREVER! When I got home, he came down the the stairs from the third floor and peaked around the second floor to see me in the kitchen. After running up to give him a kiss when I noticed his little head pop out of the stairwell, we spent the first five minutes of seeing each other alternating kisses and greetings while sitting on the steps. We were so happy to see each other we just sat where we were and didn't bother moving to the couch or at least somewhere more comfortable than midway up the staircase. It was nice to know that he missed me just as much. After doing our low-rent version of the kissing scene from The Notebook, we finally left the staircase so that I could give him his Valentine's Day gift..that and our asses were starting to fall asleep on the stairs.

Regarding the gift...Everytime Boyfriend and I do something outdoorsy like hiking and running or when we go to the gym or travel to places where we are very active, he does not have a regular watch to wear. He only has one watch that he wears which is a really nice one, so I decided to get him a sports watch. I did a lot of research and found him this:

I decided on the Casio Atomic G-Shock AW-100. The Casio sports watches ranked in the overall Top 10 watches in the consumer rankings. All the others on the list including the Nike ones were just too extensive - mainly for Triatheletes or marathon runners. Boyfriend is neither, so I settled for something less costly and without all the additional features he wouldn't use. There are newer models of this watch, but I noticed that some of the consumer comments mentioned that they were bigger and bulkier, so I ordered the older model that had better compliments. And by the way, I LOVE AMAZON.COM. When I purchased it a couple of weeks ago, I was able to get it $40 cheaper on Amazon versus going directly through the Casio website. It does, however, look like the price has gone up since I bought it. I must have had good timing...yay, me! He also loved the watch, so double YAY, ME!

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He took me to Mark's American Cuisine for dinner which was YUMMY! If you've never gone to Mark's before, you definitely should at least once. I do admit that the price is a bit lofty, but the ambiance can be very romantic and the food has always been excellent the few of times I've gone.

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Now we're at home and Boyfriend is snuggled in bed...probably already snoring away. It's barely 10pm on a Friday night, but poor thing is utterly exhausted. He's been up since 4am Jamaica time (meaning 3am our time) to catch a 6am flight home. I could tell that the long day combined with the inevitable food coma on the rise, Boyfriend was barely going to stay awake for the car ride back to the house. I decided that the last of my belated Valentine's Day gifts to him would be to let him fall asleep in our comfy bed while I play on the computer in the guest room since I'm still relatively wide awake. Sleeping on a rock-hard hotel bed for 2.5 weeks did not make for happy sleep time while he was away. I'm sure he'll be completely out and not even notice when I sneak into bed when I finally turn in. Hopefully, he'll get a good night's sleep because we have all morning to get caught up on other things...*wink, wink*

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Hope you guys have a wonderful Friday and rest of the weekend!

Oh...And Happy Valentine's Day!

Boyfriend is still working away in Jamaica, but since he couldn't be here for this day of amore, I received these at my office:

The bouquet is gorgeous...and HUGE! The arrangement is over 2 feet tall. I have no idea how I'm going to get it home. Regardless, I love them. And I love him. Sucks that he's been gone almost three weeks. Thank goodness he's coming home tomorrow!!!

A Step Closer to Her Own "True Hollywood Story" Segment

You all know that I usually don't use real names to protect the privacy of the people I talk about (which you all now I LOVE talking trash about you) and even more so to protect my own privacy. I started this blog mainly for my close friends who live out of town to keep up with my shenanigans without having to call me or email me regularly for an update. So far, I have friends in New York, Georgia, Denver, California, Japan, and all over Texas who occassionally find their way to my blog to get their dose of Rice Spice. But today, I will go against the grain and for good reason.

My friend Robin Kilgore has written a book. Yes, I know a real published author! Although we aren't close, we found ourselves in the same places a number of times when she still lived in Houston - namely bars, but that's besides the point. Strangely, we have mutual friends in totally different circles - professional, casual, straight, gay... Regardless, you all need to buy her book because this witty woman always has something outrageous and off-the-cuff to share in person, so I can only imagine that her book will be even more entertaining. I'm ordering mine today! So I want everyone to go to the website below and support Robin in her road to literary success, and as the title of this posts suggests, we'd be helping her get one step closer to her own True Hollywood Story episode. Buy yours today!!!

Stop with the weddings already...

Boyfriend emailed me the other day to inform me that he just got word from a childhood friend that his wedding is on May 31st and that he really wants us to attend...in NEW JERSEY!!! This I am not that bothered by so immensely. It is actually the closeness to the date of another wedding I was invited to the weekend before in NEW YORK. So basically, we are looking at flying up north two weekends in a row! Ugh! I guess it's not so bad seeing as neither one of us feels immense obligation to go to the weddings that we should buy an airline ticket, so we can fly stand-by if it's available and stay at Doc's place for free...BUT, wedding gifts aren't cheap, my friend. And we shall be sending gifts whether we attend or not.

So basically, we are looking at the following weddings:

1. April 19th - Key West, FL - My Friends


2. April 26th - Dallas, TX - Both our Friend


3. May 3rd - Houston, TX - Boyfriend's Friend


4. May 24th - New York, NY - My Friend


5. May 31st - Somewhere in New Jersey - Boyfriend's Friend


6. October 4th - Houston, TX - Both our Friend

I'm soooooo not looking forward to May! I have this eerie feeling that I have forgotten one...or two. Granted, I do know of two specifically we declined attending because they were going to be way too expensive to go for people we weren't that close to. I'm just glad that I'm not IN any of them. I think that phase of me being a bridesmaid is over...thank goodness! Eight bridesmaids dresses are enough, don't you think?

Bottom line, none of the rest of my friends are allowed to get married this year. I can accept engagements. Engagements are fine. I would say...one can even get pregnant with a due date in 2009 (which means everyone keep taking your birth control until April, please!). Just NO MORE WEDDINGS! Boyfriend and I were trying to save money this year, but I'm seeing that it will be a challenge with the travel/hotels and gifts we'll be shelling out this year. Not to mention the plethora of birthdays we celebrate between family and friends between mid-March until June. Man oh man!

Entertaining Email Exchange

Today Blondie sent the following email to me and other friends (names modified, of course):

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From: Blondie
Sent: Tuesday, February 12, 2008 1:04 PM
To: Rice Spice (and friends)
Subject: FW: This Will Get You, Guaranteed!

Awe, who doesn’t want one?????


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My Reply was...

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From: Rice Spice
Sent: Tuesday, February 12, 2008 2:56 PM
To: Blondie (and friends)
Subject: RE: This Will Get You, Guaranteed!

You and your baby fever! If you put enough drinks in me… I’ll sit on the floor, topple over face-first, bang my head a few times, tear paper, and giggle relentlessly if it makes you feel better. I’m a good friend like that! :)

And this post makes 3 for the day...

I can't believe I'm actually getting a third post in for the day. I'm finally home and looking over some of the final details of my Costa Rica trip. I'm so anal when it comes to planning trips to international destinations. I always make sure the places we stay confirm all our reservations via email so that I have a paper trail. My neurotic personality of printing all these email exchanges and taking them with me has had two hotels eat their words. Once when I was in the Bahamas, I had a hotel tell me that they did not have any record of my reservation. Another time, I had a hotel in Paris tell me the same thing as well. I plopped out my copies of emails exchanged with one of their employees (or the employee themself who is telling me that my reservations don't exist) specifically replying with the words or some variation of , "Yes, we have reservations for you confirmed on (whatever dates)." Definitely works for making hotel employees look like morons. It's even gotten me upgraded to a bigger suite.

Our trip to Costa Rica is scheduled for 1 night in San Jose and 4 nights in La Fortuna which is in the Arenal Volcano area. I've pretty much determined all of the activities we want to do and also to squeeze in time to relax. Seeing as Boyfriend and I have spent a lot of time apart lately with his business travels, it will be nice to spend a few days away together. Especially since it might be my turn to do some traveling once we get back from our vacation. Our travel/work schedules are really getting crazy lately!

I can't believe I'm still at work!

It's 7:55 p.m. and I'm still at work!!! Jeez! I have an all-day training tomorrow that's via teleconference that requires me to follow along with all these presentations. I figure if I print them out rather than follow along on my computer screen from the link, I can actually get some real work done on my computer while I'm listening to them yap about a software program that our particular location doesn't even use. You heard right...I'm learning a effing program we don't even use and to top it off...the training is 7 hours! I'm waiting on the last two presentations to print out and then I'm outta here. I swear none of these presentations are less than 50 pages long... It was either stay late to print them or come in early. I'd much rather lie in bed the extra couple of hours, wouldn't you? Ok, it's about 8pm. Better check the copier to see if they are all done so I can leave. It's going to be a loooooooog day tomorrow!

Mosaic

I've pretty much putzed on my duties of blogging seeing as I missed over the entire weekend. Oh, well... That means 3 blogs from me today!!! The first will talk about my Saturday. I was extremely busy as you can guess from my lack of a post.

During the day, I spent time with the family. It was my uncle's 72nd birthday. Woot! He's the typical crotchedy old man with never a lack of a complaint about something. It really is one of his endearing qualities. He is an intelligent engineer who worked for years for the navy on spy ships and submarines doing things that none of has have yet to figure out nor could he discuss. Now that he is retired, we still have no clue why he would be unreachable for 3-6 months at a time and randomly get calls from him checking in from all over the world - Spain, Greece, Portugal, Nicaragua, Croatia, Panama - so bizarre. Well, anytime you visit him now, you always know you're about to hear his views on politics, how the world is falling apart, and how he's old and crotchedy. Yes, he is aware of his award-winning disposition and doesn't give a damn...that's probably why I like him so much. Ha! He and my other uncle (both on my mother's side) are who taught me to appreciate the taste scotch, never to underestimate a good bourbon, and that beer is a weekend necessity...oh, and that an 18-pack should be drank in one setting. "Who buys beer if you're not gonna drink it?", they use to say. So funny!

After the birthday festivities, I headed over to a black and white cocktail reception for the grand opening of the first tower at Mosaic on Herman Park. I was invited to a big party the rooftop pool and clubhouse to give people the first-hand glance at some of the residences for sale in one of the two towers. It's some swank new high-rise in the medical center. I believe they are condos for sale rather than rent. I checked out a few show models while there, and let me tell you...they are ridiculous...and UGLY! For a one-bedroom 800-sq-ft apartment (and I say apartment because I do NOT consider these shoeboxes condos), they are selling them in the approximate range of $150K. Ok, I understand that it is great that you get a decent (not great) view of downtown Houston as well as an excellent view of the Med Center skyline, but come on! $150K?!?!? It's very modern, but not worth my dough....that's for sure. It's definitely for someone who wants to be in something stylish and hoity toity, but I guess I feel like if I'm paying that much, it should be bigger than my last apartment and come with a yard...BUT then again, that's just me. My guess is that the condos won't sell very well, and they will open them up as an option to rent rather than strictly buying like most of the high-rises are doing.

Here is a picture of me and Ghurl trying to bring the sexy...although we just look like we're doing a very bad "Blue Steel" pose like in Zoolander. I always think these events are cheesy, but I have to show up to shake hands and say hi to people who are good contacts for future events - party planners, beer and wine vendors, event staffing providers (which is Ghurl's industry), caterers, fashion designers, store owners, etc. All of these people could always come in handy when I want donated services or merchandise for any banquets, galas, auctions, or giveaways for charities I work with or discounts or special treatment for events I plan for my own company. Jeez...what you have to do to maintain solid contacts in this town...

Another Friday night in...

I've been feeling poopy again so I decided to stay in tonight. I turned down a fantastic dinner at RA with a group of friends. Instead, I've been obsessively watching crime dramas. I'm so friggin' addicted to all three Law and Order shows as well as all three CSIs and Without A Trace. With the wonders of cable television, there is always one of these episodes playing every day at any given time. I swear I fall sleep to watching these shows every night. So after watching at least one of these shows for the last five hours straight in addition to watching at least two episodes nightly, I think I may be able to solve my own homicide investigations as well as prosecute those guilty of commiting the crimes...all within one hour. Ha!

So I've been toying with the idea of starting boot camp again. I think I need to jumpstart in my routine again. I love the intensity. We shall see. Boyfriend refuses to do the co-ed course with me, so I guess I'll just do the one closest to where I live which happens to be an all women's boot camp. I think I will attempt to go to the gym on Sunday. I've been avoiding it since I've been so sick lately. I need to get motivated because I'm getting tired of my jeans getting tight again.

Reconnecting with Blondie

Last night, I met Blondie for dinner. I hadn't seen Blondie and actually gotten caught up with her in almost a month...maybe even longer. It's funny that when I think about it, a month of not seeing a friend when you're both so busy isn't all that bad. BUT, when you use to party with her nonstop from Friday until Sunday almost every week, you think it's odd when two weeks have gone by. None of us go out partying anything like we use to so those days are relatively distant memories. However, we are usually still pretty good about meeting for dinner every couple of weeks or so.

We went to the new Japanese-French fusion restaurant Soma located in the Washington Corridor area. It's owned by the sushi restaurant Azuma. After reading reviews, I heard that the non-sushi menu is actually very good. We were in the mood for some raw fish, so I couldn't tell you what the other menu was like. I started off with some La Crema Pinot Noir and a very scrumption chuka salad (seaweed salad for those not familiar with Japanese cuisine). As you can tell by the picture, they have a very nice presentation with their salad. The rest of the sashimi and rolls we ordered were very good, too.

Blondie recapped her weekend with our other friend Grove in Arizona for both the Super Bowl and the FBR Open. Blondie's family are all there and her sister lives in a condo on the golf course the Open was being held. Her sister was was able to get club tickets for the golf tournament for everyone. It sounds like they had a good time overall and enjoyed hitting the local nightspots with the Super Bowl crowds in full partying force. I, on the other hand, recapped my boring couple of weeks of being a puny, coughing, miserable mess and my cleaning/organizing frenzy. Wow, that sounds pretty lame by comparison! Ha! However, I did tell her of mine and Boyfriend's upcoming trip to Costa Rica to redeem myself.

On my way home from the restaurant, Doc called. We talked until almost midnight...sheesh! Needless to say, it was a bit tough getting up this morning. Regardless, it's always nice to get to talk to him.