Awesomeness

12" last night and another 12" expected tonight. I don't think Casey has ever snowboarded in powder before. He's in for a treat! I am so freaking excited - it's going to be so hard to concentrate on work today!!

April snow showers

Tony's nephew, Casey, is coming to visit this weekend. His flight is coming in at 5 and then we pick up Chris and head to Mt. Baker for snowboarding fun on Saturday. The great news is that it has been snowing there. Can we get a 'hell, yeah!' That's what I thought. 8" today and continuing snow through the weekend. Now I'm really excited! We are only going for one day so we can take Casey to do other stuff. It's his first time on a plane and his first time visiting an urban city. We're going to take him to do fun kid-centric stuff like the aquarium.

I haven't been doing my studying like I should. I get so distracted by doing the normal stuff and really need to kick myself into getting into the habit of doing school work.

People like me! They really like me!

Jill & William's wedding reception was lovely. It made us change our minds re: hiring a professional photographer. Theirs did a really nice job so now I'm going to bug Jill to see how much s/he was.

My birthday day was just how I wanted it. We slept in and then had brunch with Chris, Amanda, Natalie, Jeremy and Julie at Cafe Flora. I was sung to a total of 4 times, but not at the restaurant. Natalie gave me flowers & chocolate and Amanda gave me this rad magnetic necklace. And then the big gift that is from just about everyone I know - a freaking Mac laptop! We're waiting for the ones to come out that have the Intel chip, so I don't have it in hand yet and I'm not really sure which one I'm getting. How awesome is that?! I even think everyone at work put money in the pile to get me this thing. I was planning on buying a laptop after the wedding for grad school but now I'll get to play with it before then. So awesome!

Anyway, the rest of the day was spent being mellow which was exactly what I wanted. I suppose that means I'm getting old.

The Almost-Birthday Post

I am almost 32. 32!

We hired an accountant here at work. Previously, we were outsourcing our bookkeeping and now we are bringing it in-house. The person is really nice but very quiet. We're hoping he'll open up as he becomes more comfortable working here. I was occupied at the beginning of this week showing him the financial stuff I do and now he's at our current accountant's office getting trained.

With the addition of a new employee, we are having to move things around here and reorganize where people sit. I think I've got it pretty well covered as long as everyone else does there part like wiring and building walls.

I made it to my class orientation on Tuesday in time but the instructor did not. The class is totally self-motivated. Nothing and I mean nothing is due until the last day of the class (June 6th). Our first two tests are open book and our last test is open note. The only homework we have is to answer 10 problems over the next 3 months. I would have to try to fail this class! Of course, I will not. I plan on getting all of my work done ASAP and then read/study the last two chapers that our final test will be on as the date gets closer. If I get it out of the way now, I can focus on planning the wedding and studying for the GMAT.

Oh yeah! the birthday thing. I have a profile on My Space as do many of my friends. I received a comment today from They Might Be Giants wishing me a happy birthday! It made me giggle. I love TMBG :D

Hectic

It really does feel like it's been one of those weeks. Whew! I want it to slow down NOW! On Monday, we went to see Metric at The Showbox. Typically, the all-ages shows end pretty early. Not this one! There were two opening bands and the show didn't end until after one. I was so grumpy the next day from not getting enough sleep, but it was well worth it. It was a great show. AND! We ran into Tate (old friend from college) and his ladyfriend. Good Times!

So my supreme grumpiness on Tuesday made my whole day bad. I do not do well without enough sleep. Wednesday was better but I have so many things going on at work that my head is spinning. It will slow down soon enough, but damn! Anyway, I finally did my taxes and emailed my instructor. I have class orientation on Tuesday. Whee. OK, must get back to work now. Not enough hours in the day!

Tragedy

It was very surreal to wake up on Saturday and hear about the massacre that occurred about 7 blocks from where we live. Seattle is considered one of the safest metropolitan areas and I definitely don't worry about my safety in my neighborhood. Although I did not know any of the victims, it has definitely affected everyone in the neighborhood. Some worked at the places that I frequent. There is a melancholy air wherever you go now. So sad :(

ARG! Grumpiness!

I awoke this morning at 4 AM and couldn't get back to sleep until around 6 AM. The lack of a good night's sleep makes me very grumpy! I think I'm going to have to have multiple cups of coffee today instead of just my usual one. Grump!

I super cleaned the car yesterday and she's looking very pretty now. She'll be a mess again after our next trip up to the mountains, but that's OK. I can enjoy her cleanliness for the rest of this week.

Links!

I added links over there in the sidebar. There is now a link to my page on Flickr for easy access to my photos and I also added links to many of my friends' blogs. There were other things I thought about linking to but the list was getting pretty long. Anyway, check out my flickr page - I uploaded a few photos from our day trip to Mt. Baker.

This is the first weekend in a really long time that we haven't gone snowboarding. Two days of sleeping in! I was pretty productive yesterday and had intentions of doing the same today, but I've been spending a good amount of time in front of the computer. I think I might go wash the car now - it is in desparate need of a bath!

Put your hand inside the puppet head

Did you know that there are 250 calories in a bag of Skittles? And lots of freaking sugar?

Why do I do this to myself? I voiced a craving for sweets to Jessica and she hands me a bag of Skittles. A handful was all it took to make me jittery and hyper from the sugar. Yay! Ack!

Monday always seems to come about again too quickly

This weekend just flew by.

We had fun at Mt. Baker on Saturday. They have gotten so much snow this season that it has really changed the terrain.

I have heard that some fear that we will get caught in an avalanche or something like that. The likelyhood of that is slim. The way people most often get hurt when doing snow sports is 1) colliding with another boarder/skier; 2) colliding with a tree; or 3) falling on unforgiving ground like packed ice or rocks. The likelyhood of these incidents causing major injury is also slim. I had a kid run into me on Saturday and I just have a lovely bruise on my shin. That's the typical injury.

When I arrived home on Saturday night, I relaxed with a bath and watched some TV. I ended up spending 5 hours at work on Sunday before heading home and cleaning before Tony got home. He and Chris arrived around 7 and we hung out for the rest of the night. Tony & I watched an incredibly depressing movie: House of Sand and Fog.

oh yes - Happy Spring!

Where I spend 40 hours a week

Inspired by Kendra and Amy, I decided to take some pictures of my office and surroundings.

Happy St. Patty's Day!

I'm not Irish, but I did wear green today inadvertently. I forgot about the whole "wear green on St. Patrick's Day" until I was at Costco and overheard a conversation about it.

I had been plagued with a headache all day until recently. The hurt going away makes my weekend start much better! The plans: tonight, go to dinner at 22 Doors with Tony, Chris and Julie. Afterwards, we'll venture over to our house where Natalie will arrive and then we'll watch The Office and hang out. Tomorrow will be a very early morning since we are heading to Mt. Baker. After a day of snowboarding fun, Chris & Tony will head up to Vancouver for William's bachelor party and I'll head back to Seattle where I get the whole house to myself. What will I do?

Seriously - all of the peeps I hang out with regularly are out of town this weekend. I pondered hooking up with friends I only see once in awhile, but I decided to have quality alone time instead. What will I do? Who knows!

I fixededed the link to Tony's pictures in the prior post. We are going to Chris' house tonight to finally see the video from their heliboarding trip. It is hella expensive to heliboard and then they make you pay $75 for the movie and $15 for a picture. It's ridiculous!!! With that being said, chris was the only one who bought the movie. The intentions are for him to make copies and disperse to those that were also on the trip.

Work has been keeping me busy this week; it always does when I take a Monday off. I think I may come in on Sunday to get some busy work done that I let pile up. I have been in the mood to spring clean lately - I think it's in preparation of not having much free time in the near future. Eeep. We haven't done any wedding stuff lately which is why I haven't posted anything. No news. We are going to be going in for a tasting next Thursday with the caterer, but that's about it.

Oh look! Almost time to go home!

It's all about the taste

Before I ramble on about my weekend, I would first like to comment on the pros and cons of junk food. The only pro I know of is that it tastes good. The cons are pretty obvious. The one that gets me every time is that I eat the junk food and then feel ill. Why oh why must the idea of eating Cheetoes sound really good? I regret it every time yet still haven't learned.

The question is, would I be able to give up junk food?

OK - so the weekend went a little like this: My Friday started way too early for my liking. Since Tony had the car, I had to catch a ride with Eric & Jess to work. They had planned to come in at 7am so that is what I did. The bonus to this is that I got a full day of work in. Julie came by the office to pick me up at 2 and then we headed to Whistler. We arrived around 6:30 and got to hear about everyone's awesome day. Chris & Heather made us yummy dinner and then we played card games until it was time to go to bed.

Julie & I met at the meeting place for the camp. I decided to rate my skill level high to make sure I was challenged enough and Julie & I ended up in the same group. We went on a scary steep run...the run part wasn't scary. It was having to traverse over a freaking cliff! It won't be so scary once I become a better snowboarder. At least that's what I keep telling myself. We also did some terrain park, riding switch and really fun tree runs. It was a good day. That night, we hooked up with the rest of the crew and ate fabulous sushi. Good times, good times. Tony took some pictures from their heliboarding trip. It was one of the best snowboarding days they have ever had.

Sunday was another day of riding hard and learning new stuff and traversing over another scary steep cliff. Julie says that I am a much better snowboarder now. Yay! Why did I wait until the end of the season to take a lesson? Anyway, everyone else headed back to Seattle on Sunday but Julie and I stayed in Whistler on Sunday night since we didn't want to make the long drive back after a tiresome weekend of boarding. We headed to bed early that night and got up early-ish the next day to head back to Seattle.

Weather Woes

The storm front brought lots of wind and broke part of the 520 bridge on Wednesday. This is the bridge that we take home. Chaos, I tell you. We went to the mall after work to kill some time and started heading west around 6. We made it home in 1.5 hours. A coworker who left shortly after 4 didn't get home until 8. craziness!

Our local mountains have been blessed but Whistler has not been. They've only gotten 10" in the past 48 hours :( Oh well. We'll still have fun.

Zeus is kind to us this week

We've got a big storm system coming in that should give us lots of snow locally and up at Whistler. I think we may finally have a decent Whistler trip this weekend. It's about time!

It also may snow in the city again. I'll be sure to take pictures this time.

Oh yeah!

I also put pictures up on my flickr account from past boarding trips. I have decided that I need to get a bigger purse so I can start carrying my camera around.

My back has been giving me lots of problems as of late - especially my upper back. Last Wednesday, I went in for an adjustment and on Friday had a massage. I'm feeling much better now. The adjustment also released the pressure that was causing the irritation in my sciatic nerve. Do you know why I love my chiropractor? She called me this morning to see how I was feeling.

Pictures!

On Friday night, we went out to dinner with Julie, Sunny and Chrisbee to celebrate the selling of Julie's house and the proceeds getting deposited into her account. Yay!

There wasn't a whole lot of snowfall this past week so we decided to venture over to Alpental on Saturday. It's the closest resort to us and was my first time going! We had a ton of fun and Tony took pictures! We spent the beginning of the day on double-black diamonds and the end of the day in the back country. The hike was really easy and the snow was still really great back there! We will definitely be going back. The one thing that sucked - the food. Ugh. But now we know to bring along some food next time.

I was pretty productive on Sunday with cleaning and stuff. We went over to Julie's around 4 to watch Oscar stuff on her fancy HD flat panel TV.

The weekend gets a Thumbs Up!

Credit is my friend

I start Accounting Fundamentals at the beginning of April - taking the online course. I'm still iffy on taking a course over the summer - the date the semester ends will determine if I do or don't. I may just use the summer to study & take the GMAT and hope for the best if/when I get into SU's MBA program. The thing that's nice about the program there is I can take a semester off and take an undergrad course if I feel like I don't have the knowledge I need to complete the graduate level course.

I bought our plane tickets to Tampa for Memorial Day weekend. We are flying out on the red-eye Thursday night and will be arriving Friday morning. I hope to visit Grandma if she's up for visitors. We are flying back Monday after Wedding Fun!

And now for complaining!

I was most unproductive last night. I did get the fish tank partically cleaned, but that was it. Yesterday morning, I found our newest fish dead :( Can't figure that one out. We are addicted to watching past episodes of Veronica Mars. Tony has been downloading the episodes from online since season 2 hasn't been released on DVD yet.

Towards the end of the workday, I started experiencing a burning sensation down the back of my left leg. Although it feels like my sciatic nerve, it's a new sensation from what I have experienced in the past. It has continued to get worse and it is so distracting! Typically, my sciatica would be relieved by laying down. I can't figure out how to relieve this irritation. So annoying! I have an appointment with my chiropractor tonight - I'm hoping she can give me some advice.

Pink blossoms

This is the time of year for the cherry blossom trees to bloom. They line the street in front of our office. So pretty! I should bring my camera to work one day to take a picture.

I almost got everything done this weekend that I wanted to. OMG - I almost killed Natalie with a stripper pole on Friday night! Sunny just put in a spring-loaded pole in her living room for striparobics or whatever it is called. I was swinging around on it on Friday night when it fell! I landed right on Natalie and was sure I split her head open! Instead, the top of the pole just took a chunk out of Sunny's wall. Man, it freaked me out! Needless to say, Sunny is going to wait to use the pole until she can secure it better.

Saturday was fun times at Crystal. I wore my new helmut because now I'm going to practice better safety. Saturday night was more fun times at Julie's house.

Strangely enough, we couldn't really sleep in on Sunday. We did laze around for quite awhile. After lunch, I went to a hotel to check it out for Dad and then came home and started cleaning. Our place has gotten quite messy since we've been so busy. My productivity level was up where Tony's was down. He wore his pajamas all day long and watched TV! I still need to clean the fish tank, but that won't take too long. I love being productive. Speaking of, I should get back to work!

Aye Caramba!

It snowed in the city last night - a very light dusting that actually stuck. As we attempted to drive to work this morning, we encountered accidents and closed roads. We spent half an hour trying to get off of Capitol Hill until we finally gave up. The roads were just too icy. We went back home and waited an hour for the snow & ice to melt before successfully finding our way to work.

Tomorrow - snowboarding at Crystal. They got 14" new inches last night! Tomorrow should be rockin' Afterwards, Julie is having a hot tub party at her new house.

Tonight we are going to Sunny's for hanging out fun. Last night, we met up with some peeps at the local dive bar for a couple of drinks. Wednesday night, we went over to Chris' for movie night. Tuesday, I helped Julie move some big stuff that was left behind by the movers. Monday, we went out to dinner with Chris & Natalie. Busy week! I'm going to insist that we spend most of Sunday at home. I love my friends but I need a break once in awhile.

Whistler last weekend: the conditions were for crap so we moved our Roxy camp to March. We arrived Friday evening and checked in with Jill & William on Saturday morning. They were very displeased with their condo and decided to bail instead of spending the money to go up on the mountain. Their wedding is in 6 weeks so they still have lots to do. We only did a few runs before getting off the mountain for party fun. We hung out at the condo before heading to delish sushi. After dinner, we attempted to go to Araxi for delish dessert, but they were closed for a private party :( So back to the condo we went where we all passed out early. We slept in on Sunday and then went out for breakfast and shopping fun. Tony bought new goggles, I bought a helmut to protect my noggin and Julie picked up a fancy, new watch. We decided to head back to Seattle instead of taking a day off from work to just hang out at Whistler. Although we didn't get much snowboarding in, we still had a ton of fun.

The Eeeviiilll in my Tummmmy!

I made a grave mistake today that I will regret for many hours. I accidentally consumed pig. We went to Whole Foods to pick up some lunch at the deli and I didn't read the complete ingredient list to one of the items I purchased - Creamy Polenta with Swiss Chard. I had eaten over half before a little cube of meat fell out. Ugh! Now I'm having to deal with severe nausea for the rest of the day. That's the last time I make that mistake!

Denial

I think I must be crazy for attempting to take classes, take the GRE, apply to grad school and plan a wedding in the next 6 months. Thinking about all of the things I'm going to have to keep track of gives me a little anxiety right now. I have weaned myself of my severe Type A personality traits and I'm going to have to revive them in order to do this. It can be done...I'm just hoping that Tony will still want to marry me after he gets a good dose of Type A Kris!

When I told Tony that I was going to have to put on my Type A hat, he was perplexed because he thought I already wore the hat. Poor guy...he hasn't seen anything yet! We did make a deal, though. If I get on his nerves because I attempt to take too much control and freak out when things don't go my way, I have to do something nice for him. He will then do something nice for me to help calm me down and bring me back to the normal world.

Because a girl needs a special wedding journal

Or something like that: Bridezilla Attacks!

Workin' and Playin'

The Boss has been out of town all week so I've been able to catch up on a lot of stuff around here. Good thing! Today, we are having a baby shower potluck for Levona. Her original due date was 3/13, but she's going to be induced 2 weeks early. They are afraid that the baby will get bigger and it may cause complications. Now we must hustle to get a part-time person in here to help out while she's on family lead.

This week has been busy! Monday night, we received a call from Chris wanting to go out to dinner. We met up with him and Natalie for yummy Ethiopian food. Afterwards, Chris came over for a bit to hang out and then Heather joined us.

Tuesday night was The Day We Got Engaged. Drinks, Proposal, and then lovely dinner.

Wednesday, Chris calls and wants to take us out for drinks to congratulate us. I first went to the chiro and then stopped by the bookstore on the way home to pick up a few books on how to plan a wedding since we have no clue how to. Once I got home from hanging out with Chris, I talked to Jenn for an hour and then headed to bed shortly thereafter.

Thursday, we got home, I run to the grocery store to pick up food for today's potluck and then we head to a Mexican restaurant to meet with work people to celebrate the launch of our Spanish language website. Afterwards, we head to Julie's to hang out with peeps to watch Olympic snowboarding competitions on her HDTV flat panel TV that she just got.

As soon as we get home today, we have to pack and then we are off to Whistler for Roxy camp! Tony's camera broke last weekend so he's out buying another right now. Once we have time, we will upload some pictures from Utah and stuff. I swear! We have no plans to go out of town until next month - another Whistler trip! All of my spare time will be filled up with planning a wedding and getting ready to start school again. I've decided to try for the MBA program at Seattle University. The program is so much more flexible.

OK, I gotta focus on work now!

Utah Fun

We left work about an hour early on Thursday to give us plenty of time to get to the airport. While at the airport, I realized that I forgot to print out our car reservation information. Oops. When we arrived in Utah, we proceeded to go to every car rental counter looking for the reservation which took about an hour of our time. No luck. ???? We were able to rent a compact car from Budget. The guy helping us was really nice. He upgraded us to a sedan for no extra charge. We go out to the car to find out that it was brand new. Sweet. We drive to Pleasant Grove and arrive at Sherry's house at about 11 pm.

On Friday, we hung out at the house for the day with family. Tony's sister, Brenda, came over with her husband and 7-month old. It was our first time meeting Tony's newest nephew, Jordan. He is a doll! Later in the day, much more of the family came over. Tony has a big family - his mom has two sisters and a brother. Tony's uncle has 6 kids, one aunt has 9 kids and the other aunt has 3 I think. And of course their kids have had kids. Only part of the family was over on Friday night for dinner - Grandma, one aunt & uncle, 4 cousins, 3 cousins once removed, 4 sisters, one brother-in-law, 2 nephews and one niece. Whew!

Saturday, we went roller skating. Wanted to do something fun for the kids.

Sunday, we went snowboarding with Tony's oldest nephew and his dad. fun! After we got back from the mountain, we went to a reunion at his aunt's house where I got to meet even more family. So many kids! After the reunion, Tony & I headed to the airport to come back to Seattle. Fun stuff.

My new favorite thing

http://www.last.fm

Work has been very busy and a little stressful this week. I've been busy getting ready for our trip in the evenings. Whew. We leave tonight after work for Utah and will be flying back Sunday evening.

OK - gotta get back to work. Just wanted to post a little update since it has been several days. I just know I'm forgetting something.

Pain in the neck

Our trip to Mt. Baker was fabulous. We just couldn't get over how great the conditions were. The visibility was a bit poor some of the time, but we did get some movies and pictures. I have been so busy this week that I haven't had time to upload any. Unfortunately, I woke up on Monday with a very sore neck as if I had pulled it while boarding. It's feeling mostly better now, but was a very strange sensation.

The snow is continuing to fall in the mountains. We'll be heading to Crystal on Sunday in hopes that the crowds will be low due to the Super Bowl. It's pretty crazy that the Seattle Seahawks are playing this year.

I helped Julie pack on Monday and will be doing so again tonight. Last night, I had an acupuncture appointment and then we went out to dinner with Chris and the girl he's been dating, Heather. Afterwards, we went to Noc Noc for 80's night. We haven't been going out to clubs lately but last night Amanda asked us to come out to celebrate her 10-year anniversary of moving to Seattle.

We were pondering going boarding both days this weekend, but I decided that I should take Saturday off so I could get stuff done. I'm also going for a massage - my poor back sure does need it!

OK, gotta get back to work.

EEEEEPPPP!

Snow! Snow! Snow! So much Snow! Typically, the conditions are listed as 'packed powder' or 'groomed runs'. Right now, Baker's conditions are listed as 'powder'. I am SO EXCITED!

Decorating 101

I finally did it - I hung up pictures in my office. yes, it has taken me 5 months. I was unsure of what to hang until I found these frames at Ikea that hold multiple pictures. A few months back, Betsy sent me a book of postcards from the artist, Yoshimoto Nara. I knew I wanted to do something with them and the frames solved the problem. Yay! I also ordered a map of the United States so I can label where all of our pharmacies & doctors are because I am a geek like that. It should arrive tomorrow.

Time to pay attention

I have something to admit - my diet has gone to crap since I moved back to Seattle. Well, crap for me. I used to have a really clean diet but it seems I have gotten lazy in my old age. I'd like to contribute all of my weight gain to hypothyroidism, but I think my diet is also part of it.

Since I've been having problems with fatigue lately, I'm trying to pay more attention to what I eat to see if that helps. I'm trying to eat more whole foods instead of processed foods and also eat lots of fresh vegetables. It's hard to get back into the habit and it's a lot more work. If I make something that Tony doesn't want to eat, he eats something like chips and nuts for dinner. I'm concerned about his health, too, since I love him and all.

OK, enough of the rambly. I gots to work now.

Perfect Snow

We headed up to Crystal this past Saturday. The snow was perfect which made the day so much more fun. When the conditions aren't that great, sometimes it's more effort than fun to snowboard. This past Saturday, the snow was easy to turn in and stayed perfect all day long which is usually unheard of. I was turning down black diamond runs, people! Tony will be making a movie soon for your viewing pleasure.

We'll be at Baker this weekend, staying local the weekend after then we have a trip to Utah and then a trip to Whistler. Bring on The Fun!

Teaches of Peaches

The campus visit went really well. I found out that there are no prerequisits, but it would be very beneficial to me to take some basic business courses. The application deadline is April 15th - 4 essays! Ack! I'll also have to study for and take the GMAT before that. Eek! I can take the courses at a community college over spring & summer.

So that's the plan, stan. Tony & I have to talk about it more. Since it's a 3-year commitment, we have to think about how my student loans might effect us getting a house. They had a panel of former students talk about how the program effected different aspects of their lives. They all mentioned multiple times that it can really strain your personal relationships because you have to dedicate so much of your time to school.

Wed Nes Day

The English language is a funny thing.

The side effects of the antibiotic have lessened as my body has gotten used to them. 3 more days left and then I'm off the hook!

We actually felt well enough to go out to dinner last night to one of our favorite local joints, 22 Doors. Last night was their first night of a new menu so that was fun. They have the best french fries ever! Come visit me and we'll take you there at least once.

Tonight, I am venturing to the UW campus for a MBA campus visit thing. I can't seriously consider going back to school until I find out more about the program! It makes me nervous, though. They only accept 50 students a year in the night program. Talk about competition! My guess is that I'll need some business prerequisits before I can even consider applying, so I need to find out who to talk to to figure that stuff out.

If I do get into the program, that means no social life or free time for me for 3 years. Yikes.

I am BORED!

This day has dragged! I have work to do but I just can't bring myself to do it. I can definitely do without these side effects of the antibiotic I am on: Nausea, stomach upset, loss of appetite, diarrhea, drowsiness, dizziness, headache, or trouble sleeping may occur. Check, check, check, check, check, check, check and check. All of them! I couldn't get to sleep until 4am last night. Now I know why! My guess is that the lack of sleep is affecting my ability to focus.

Man, I am really grumpy right now. I also miss talking to Jenn :(

What all good girlfriends do

They give their illnesses to the ones taking care of them!

By the time I made it to the doctor's on Thursday, I had a tempurature of 102. She gave me an antibiotic to fight off the bronchitis and sinus infection and also Robitussen with codeine to suppress the cough. My fever didn't break until late afternoon, so Thursday was a pretty miserable day. Tony started coughing that evening and woke up with a fever Friday morning. Oops. He went to the doctor and found that he wasn't as bad off as I was. Cold: yes. Infection: no. Poor guy has been on the couch all weekend. I tried going into work on Friday but left after I started to run a fever again.

I have been feeling a little better and made it out yesterday to run an errand. Today, I went over to Sunny's for a waffle brunch. The activity does wear me out, but at least I can get up off the couch and get stuff done! I can't wait to be healthy again.

Good news! Julie sold her house! This is such a huge relief. It will be nice to have her around and not be so stressed.

It didn't rain today so we didn't break the record of rainy days in a row. There has been so much snow in the mountains that Mt. Baker couldn't even open this weekend due to avalanche danger! It is meant to warm up this week and the snow level will be going up which means that the conditions won't be as good next weekend as they were this weekend. Oh well.

I have been experiencing exhaustion again for no apparent reason these last few weeks. I'm going to get lab work done this Friday to see how my thyroid is doing.

It only gets worse

I have tried Robitussin DM and Zicam with little luck. Now I am feverish and experiencing chills. Going to the doctor in a little bit. This is so lame. This weekend will be the best day of the season so far. We have gotten so much snow in the Cascades. It makes me cry.

Rebellion of the Lungs

Last night, I went to my first session of Bikram Yoga. It was like doing yoga on the absolute hottest day in the South. I can't remember the last time I sweated so much! And then I walked home in the rain. The cool, cool rain. It felt so nice. However, I don't think my lungs liked it at all. I started coughing last night and am still coughing. My lungs hurt. *cry* I suppose I could go to the store and find some medication to try to mask my symptoms.

I have been having a lot of back pain lately and have read that yoga is one of the best therapies to relieve said pain. Also, I think improving my strenth & balance will make me a better snowboarder.

Speaking of snowboarding, they are predicting steady snowfall all week long in the mountains. Mt. Baker received 24" yesterday!

Time for this cough to go away now.

Broadband woes

Not too long ago, Tony decided to change us over to cable broadband internet at home. Since our apartment is very old, our phone wiring is also very old and we weren't getting the desired speed with DSL. Tony hosts a server at home so we need a decent connection.

When we first got cable, we thought it was the bee's knees. It was super fast. Then, we found that most of the time it is so slow it's pretty much unusable. I've attempted several times to upload new pictures to Flickr and my connection times out. It's The Suck and makes me cry. Especially since he signed a year contract.

Now we have DSL and cable broadband. The server is on the DSL connection and we use the cable for our browsing. Did I also mention that he got a business account for the static IP addresses and better support? The support part is laughable. They only provide business support during business hours which does us no good at all. $150 a month for crap. *cry*

Happy New Year!

The long weekend was full of fun and productivity. We went snowboarding on Saturday, went to a couple of parties Saturday night, watched the Space Needle fireworks from Jill & William's house in Magnolia, slept in on Sunday, went to Chris' Sunday night for a delicious feast made by Natalie and also had Twister fun, and then did laundry on Monday. It was a very good weekend.

Happy Day-After-Xmas!

We are enjoying a relaxing day off before we head back to work after our vacation. I've done some stuff around the house like unpack and take down the christmas decorations and thought I should balance my checkbook. Thoughts of doing a bit of shopping today have crossed my mind but I fear the day-after-xmas crowds.

Our holiday in Houston was lovely. It was good to spend quality time with the family. Cameron is a doll. I'll post pictures to my Flickr account in the very near future.

I was able to send off gifts to Kiker and Betsy the Tuesday before we left and I even sent them UPS/overnight delivery but they still didn't get their packages in time for X-mas. I tried! I know Paul's gift has been shipped, but he has yet to receive it. I am hoping Mom's gift is waiting for me at work so I can ship it off tomorrow.

OK, i think i'll brave the crowds at Target to pick up a few household needs.

Seating with poor back support is The Suck!

This week has been pretty mellow. The only night we went out and did something was Tuesday - we went over to Cathy & Eric's house to hang out for a bit and enjoy tasty wine & cheese.

My acupuncturist cancelled my appointment yesterday due to a knee injury, so I just had my adjustment. My back was feeling great and all until I sat at my desk at home to pay bills. Suddenly, my poor left lower back muscles started spasming and they haven't stopped yet :( I just took some Aleve, so let's hope that helps.

Tomorrow is our holiday company lunch. I picked a place that I hope everyone will enjoy. We'll get to close shop early which will be a surprise to everyone. Then, Tony & I are going to scoot home, pack up the car, pick up Elan and head to Whistler where we'll be meeting Chris, Natalie & Julie for snowboarding fun!

My back better feel better soon or I'm gonna be really mad.

Laziness = Bliss

We stayed home this weekend to be lazy. It will likely be the last weekend we do this for quite some time. I had this crazy idea that I would go into work on Sunday to catch up on stuff but I totally forgot. Instead, I stayed home and did some laundry and stuff. Saturday, I spent a few hours doing the holiday shopping thing.

Friday, I went to the eye guy to get my eyes checked out and find myself a pair of fancy, new glasses since Milo decided my former pair made a good chew toy. Of course, I fall for the expensive titanium frames. I am such a sucker. They are doing a rush job for me so I should have them by the end of this week. Not only are they titanium, but they are eggplant color and very fun. I went back to the oval shaped frames. Yes, I will post a picture.

Tomorrow night, we are hanging out with Cathy & Eric. Wednesday, I have a chiro and acupuncture appointment after work. Thursday will be spent having fun packing for our weekend trip to Whistler with Chris, Natalie, Elan and Julie. Then, before you know it, we'll be in Houston and it will be x-mas time!

I still have some shopping to do and it might have to wait until we are actually in Houston. Mom, you may be getting your gift a little late. Sorry! I tried but I just couldn't find what I was looking for (yet).

Tony ordered the fancy cable broadband and it was installed this weekend. We now have a fast enough connection for his server to function properly. Would you all be mad if I changed the location of this blog again? I'm thinking of creating my very own webspace where I can keep my gallery & blog in the same location.

Ugh! Drama! Gives me anxiety! Yes, it's stuff that's not appropriate for a public blog or anything on the Internet. Kik, you aren't alone right now with the work stuff :(

How the days fly by!

First news: my assistant quit today via email. Lame! It was her first office job and she didn't have the guts or experience to talk to me about it in person. Oh vell. Now I must hunt for another.

We went to Crystal this Saturday and it was so much fun! The visibility was pretty crappy on the side of the mountain I was on so I didn't take any pictures to speak of. However, Tony got some pictures when he and Chris hiked in the backcountry. Sunny's boyfriend, Chrisbee (we call him that to lessen the confusion), went snowboarding for the first time and loved it. Yay! Another convert!

OK, time to focus on work.

Frosty the Snowman

Now I have the song, "Frosty the Snowman" stuck in my head thanks to Kik. I shake my fist at Christmas jingles!

So...I never really wrote about our trip to Florida. The majority of the readers of this blog were there, so it hasn't seemed very urgent. I have yet to upload the pictures from my camera, even! The shame. Tony did, though. Here are the pictures. Enjoy! You can see what we did while in Naples. I took the pictures while we were in Tampa. We had a fabulous time and are very thankful to those that let us stay in their homes. We are also very thankful that Betsy & Lindsay came up for the weekend. After we left, Tony said to me, "I don't know how you can bear seeing them so little." I told him that we've just gotten used to it. It's still hard, though.

Our Thanksgiving was a vegetarian feast! Natalie, Amanda, Sol & Jeremy came over to eat and then Chris showed up later. I love cooking thanksgiving food. I now know how to make a tasty vegan gravy. Mmmmm!

Last Friday, we headed up to Mt. Baker for fun times. We ended up only snowboarding on Saturday. Tony felt sick again :( He's going to the doctor today to see what is up. He gets this awful cough whenever he exerts himself and also experiences nausea. It's no good. Chris took some pictures when they were hiking in the back country. Check them out here.

We haven't been doing much of a whole lot this week other than work & stuff. Jenn! I've been meaning to call you back but we've been going out to dinner pretty much every night and then I forget to call you. I will call you this weekend!

Alright - I have work to do now. We are going to Chrystal tomorrow and it's going to be rad.

Snow!

It's snowing right now! yay! I wish I were stuck at home instead of at work. it's not sticking - let's hope it stays that way. Traffic will be hell if it does decide to stick.

Internet boredom

I am bored with the internet right now and can't do a decent post right now. I will come back later.

We are all safe here and are expecting snow tonight - in the city! You know we are excited about boarding this weekend. It is going to be awesome!

Back later. Promise.

Flying on a jet plane

I think we found our favorite rental at Whistler this past weekend. The house we rented out was recently redecorated and it was actually done tastefully. You see, most of these places are fodder for fun-making. The place we reserved for our December trip has a green, plaid sofa. Seriously!

We found the place we stayed this weekend for super cheap since the season started a few weeks before usual. The slate floors were heated and it has a private hot tub. it would have been better if the thermostat wasn't broken on it, though. However, the management company was very apologetic about this and mentioned trying to work at a discount for us the next time we stayed there. I think we'd all be down with that.

Chris, Julie, Tony and I left for Whistler after work on Friday. We made a dinner stop at Casa Que Pasa on the way up. We woke up early on Saturday to head to the mountain. The lift tickets were discounted and we soon found out why - the conditions were still quite early-season. We boarded for a bit and headed in for an early lunch. Tony had started mentioning feeling ill the night before and it had only gotten worse. After lunch, we boarded for a little bit more and then decided to head down since Tony was not feeling any better. We went into the village and picked him up some medicine and headed back to the house.

Poor thing - he was in and out of a fever and couldn't get rid of the nausea. We hung around the house for a bit feeding him toast and Aleve and finally he started feeling more human. We decided to go out for sushi since that is what tony was in the mood for (he hadn't really eaten since the night before). The sushi was absolutely fabulous. After dinner, we headed back to the house and ended up going to bed really early.

The next morning, we slept in. It had snowed a bit throughout the night and there was a nice coat of white covering everything outside. So Beautiful. Tony still wasn't feeling great, so we decided to skip snowboarding on Sunday and headed back to Seattle.

I wish I could say that i got pictures, but my battery needed to be charged and i didn't check it before we headed out to the mountain. Oops.

I'm pretty much packed for our trip and will be getting up early in the morning to head into work for a few hours before we catch our plane at 1:15. I checked the weather forcast today for Naples - the highs are meant to be in the mid-80's! We are so not used to that kind of heat! I keep telling everyone that we are going to get tans on our vacation. We'll see if that can actually happen :)

This and that and somethingsomething

Interview process for my assistant is done. I'm going to make an offer to April this afternoon.

Snowboarding on Saturday was so fun. I couldn't help but laugh most of the day. The snow was better than any day at Crystal last season.

Sunday, I went over to Julie's around 10am and Natalie came over a little later. We kicked some ass and cleaned it up. Julie's house is now on the market

Last night, we went to go see They Might Be Giants. They put on a fun show as always.

It will be busy week & weekend until vacation. I am very excited about our trip to Florida next week!

A post that is NOT about snowboarding (kind-of)

Today, Tony & I went to the dentist to get our teeth cleaned. This was the first time he had been to the dentist in 10 years. No cavities or gum disease! Good job, Tony! After the dentist, we went to the pet store to get the kitties some food and stopped by the Mac store to get me an iPod Shuffle. It's cute and little and light and much more compact than my regular iPod.

We are a full-on iPod family. 4 iPods: i have my two and tony has a Nano & Video. We picked up mine today because I like to listen to music while snowboarding and I tend to fall a lot. Last season, i fell so hard that i kind-of crushed my iPod (the Apple dude was able to fix it). I needed to get something that would be harder to break.

Apple loves us. We have 3 macs and 4 ipods. We are good consumers!

My Weekends by Me

This weekend: Snowboarding on Sunday and helping Julie with her house on Sunday.

Next weekend: Snowboarding at Whistler

Week/end after that: Florida!

Weekend after that: T-giving yummies and then trip to Mt. Baker

December:

Snowboarding, snowboarding, snowboarding at Whistler, trip to Texas and then more snowboarding.

When I'm not snowboarding, I'll be working. I started interviewing for my assistant today and hope to have someone hired before the end of next week. Gotta focus on work right now since Tony & I are leaving early to go to the dentist.

The Awesomist!

Lots of snow will be falling in the mountains all through the middle of next week! Crystal is opening THIS WEEKEND! I get to go snowboarding locally THIS WEEKEND!

This is so awesome especially since we had such a craptastic season last year.

In other news, Julie's house is going on the market this Monday. I'll be helping her get it cleaned up this week/weekend when we aren't snowboarding.

I just want to cry!

Serious! Whistler is OPENING THIS WEEKEND!!! Now I can't concentrate on work because all I can think about is SNOWBOARDING!!!! We aren't going to go this weekend, but will likely be going up next weekend to get in some snowboarding before we head to Florida.

The beautiful rain has been falling here the past few days. Forcast looks good for the snow to fall and stay in local mountains. It's likely that we'll be snowboarding Thanksgiving weekend and will be able to do so locally.

Halloween pictures

Here are the pictures from Tony's camera
Here are the pics from Sol's camera

Everyone had really good costumes this year and it was a lot of fun. We went to Andrew's party, Natalie's party and then the Mercury. As always, fun was had!

I sure do hope we get trick-or-treaters tonight.

Pic of Mt. Baker

This is so exciting I might pee my pants!

Yay!

Mom & Paul have their power & water back now.
Do you have yours back, Betsy?

I wanna be a cowboy, and you can be my cowgirl

Tony & I are dressing up as cowboys for Halloween. I wanted him to dress up as a cow and I'd be his cowgirl, but he wouldn't do it. Jenn told me last night that Cameron is dressing up as a cow (i guess it would be calf). Oh how I wish they lived closer. I would love to take Cameron around as our little calf.

We have two Halloween parties to go to on Saturday. Fun will be had!

Spooky!

Chris, Tony & I carved pumpkins last night. I bought a lopsided pumpkin and carved the face lopsided. I think it's more interesting that way.

The more I read, the more I worry

I know the media is known for exaggeration, but the pictures worry me.

How bad is it?

A sigh of relief

From what I have read, it looks like Naples didn't suffer any significant damage. There is flooding in the streets, but I recall that happening during any heavy rain. I haven't seen much news regarding loss of power. I'm hoping Mom, Paul and the people they were caring for are able to go back to their homes soon.

I'm hoping that Kiker & Bets can update their blogs soon so I know they are OK.

We're going to be in Florida in 3 weeks, so no more hurricanes allowed :p

Now you can post, too!

So, I finally changed the setting where people that do not have an accout with Blogger can post to my blog. Sorry it took me so long!

Wilma

From Weather.com:

The interaction with land as the hurricane brushes past the Yucatan Peninsula plus the increasing influence of westerly shear and even some mid-level dry air intrusion could weaken Wilma considerably before it directly affects Florida.

I'm really hoping that this is the case. I sure do feel bad for the Yucatan Peninsula right now, but I really hate worrying about all of my loved ones in Florida. I know you all will be as prepared as you can be, but that doesn't stop the worrying.

House Hunt revised

We put our house hunt on hold for awhile after Tony received a letter from the IRS wanting him to pay them for past taxes. oops. We knew this was coming, but just didn't know when. He's working with a tax attourney to get a decent payment plan worked out. We're aiming for 3 years.

I don't want to wait 3 years to buy a house - I want to invest much sooner than that. Our plan is for me to get a loan on my own and buy the house on my own and he helps me pay the mortgage. I sent my info to the mortgage officer that we were talking to before - he should have some information for me by Monday. My fear is that I won't qualify for a loan that will get us a large enough house or condo. Although I've made a decent wage in 2005, my wage in 2004 was a bit wimpy. Keep your fingers crossed for me.

Betsy sent me this so I'm posting my answers here

1. What time is it? 2:30pm PT
2. Name as it appears on birth certificate: Kristina Joy Shaw
3. Nicknames: Kris
4. Piercing: multiple
5. What is the most recent movie you've seen in the theater? Good Night, and Good Luck
6. Eye color: blue
7. Place of birth: Louisville, KY
8. Favorite foods: Thai, Vietnamese, the fries from 22 Doors, the veggie cheesesteak from Elysian, I could go on and on and on...
9. Ever been to Africa: I wish!
10. Ever been toilet papering: when I was a wild youth
11. Love someone so much it made you cry: yah
12. Ever been in a car accident: 3 :(
13. Croutons or bacon bits: yuck. sunflower seeds for me
14. Favorite day of the week: Saturday
15. Favorite chain restaurants: PF Chang's
16. Favorite flower: dahlia
17. Favorite sport to watch: soccer or hockey
18. Favorite drink: Non-alcoholic: coffee, water
alcoholic: negroni, gin & tonic
19. Favorite ice cream: ben & jerry's
20. Disney or Warner Brothers: don't care - not into either whatsoever
21. Favorite fast food restaurant: Ummm...none
23. How many times did you fail your driver's test: 0
24. Before this one, from who did you get your last e-mail: bookclub friend, Sunni
25. Which store would you choose to max out your credit card: REI
26. What do you do most often when you are bored: watch tv
27. Bedtime: during the week: midnight
28. Who will respond to this e-mail the quickest: N/A
29. Who is the person you sent this to that is least likely to respond: N/A
30. Who are you most curious about their responses to this questionnaire? N/A
31. Favorite TV shows: The Daily Show
32. Last person you went to dinner with: Tony
33. BMW or Lexus?: Lexus
34. What are you listening to right now? the CSRs talking to customers on the phone
35. What is your favorite color: red
36. Lake, Ocean or river: river
37. How many tattoos do you have: 4
38. Favorite Vacation Destination: a mountain with snow
39. Favorite Clothing: pajamas
40. What perfume/cologne: the stuff makes me sneeze. I use Amber oil
41. The one thing you would buy if you could, would be: a condo or cabin at each ski resort in the PNW
42. Religion: what about it?
43. Favorite Hobbies: snowboarding, snowboarding and more snowboarding
44. If you could pick a new career what would you want to be? I'm pretty happy with the one I have right now

I like Thursdays

It means the weekend is very near! It's not that I don't love my job (because I do), but I really enjoy having time to do whatever I feel like.

This weekend, we are going to see Bauhaus on Friday and go out to dinner on Saturday for Chris' birthday.

I've had another hair change and plan to take pictures this weekend when I'm feeling really cute. Tony is also going through a hair change - he's planning on growing his hair out! I'm bleaching what hair he has tonight.

Ok - back to work for me!

Oh jeez!

I didn't realize it had been so long since i posted. Sorry!

Work keeps me very busy as always. I don't have time to give a full update right now on what I've been up to, but I did want to post that if it's showing in your city, go see Good Night, And Good Luck. The release is very limited right now, so keep an eye out for it.

They say it means somethingsomething

I was told today that I have been made an officer in our two main companies. My new title is Vice President of Administration.

I'm a VP. It makes me laugh because it just seems so surreal.

Since the boss isn't in yet...

Fall is here and the trees are changing. This is one of my favorite times of year - it is so beautiful around here! We all get excited when Fall appears because it means that we will be snowboarding soon.

This weekend, we took Sherry & Stephanie to Snoqualmie Falls. I didn't realize it, but Tony has never been there before. Due to our recent rain, the falls were raging! It was so purdy. We did the hike down to the river and then it started raining with thunder & lightening. It was wonderful!

Saturday night, we took them along with Tony's brother, Greg, and his girlfriend to Jeremiah's going-away party at Julie's house. It was the first party that all of the siblings went to with their mom. It was silly.

On Sunday, we went to see the movie Serenity with Julie, Jeremiah and Solomon. It was even better the second time! For dinner, we went to a thai restaurant - it was Stephanie's first time eating Thai food. Unfortunately, the dish she orders wasn't very good :(

I've been having weird dreams lately. I have let my life get too busy to keep up with correspondence and it's really starting to bother me since I've even let it happen with work :/ I am going to do my bestest to get back on track with it. I feel way too out of touch.

For now, I must get back to work.

I have 12 minutes to write this post

I am being naughty and spending the last few minutes of my workday writing this post. Here is a summary of what's been going down in SeaTown:

Last night: laundry & cleaning fun
Monday night: Painting at Julie's
Sunday: lunch with Natalie, Julie & Tony at Blue C Sushi before helping Julie with house stuff. Dinner at Hopevine with Natalie, Chris, Chrisbee, Sunny, Tony and brief appearances by Cody, Josh and Brian.
Saturday: brunch at 5 Spot before heading over to Julie's to help with house stuff. Birthday party for Julie & Natalie at Chris' house that night.
Friday after work: NIN concert with Julie and then party at our house for Amanda's 30th birthday.

Weekend before last, we had people over on Friday night for Jeremiah's birthday party. On Saturday, we saw Dead Can Dance at the Paramount. Amazing show!

So yeah, I've been pretty busy. Tony's mom & sister are arriving on Friday. Stephanie will be leaving on Monday (sis) but Sherry will be staying all week.

Slack time = 0

I bought our tickets for our Florida trip in November. Whee!

Eeep

Chris posted the pictures he took when we went camping.

Busy as always. It was fabulous to see Jenn & squirmy monkey this past weekend. Next time, my visit will be all about spending time with them.

Florida trip update: We'll be moving it up a month to early/mid November. It looks like we'll be making a trip to Houston in late December thanks to Dad & Carolyn, so we don't want to take two weeks off in December. I'll let you all know after I talk to my boss. He's on Vacation this week, so it won't be until next week.

Oh and Bets - it's actually less expensive to fly into Tampa and out of Ft.Lauderdale. Go figure!

Back to work!

Visit to Florida

My 1-year anniversary with Health Solutions is October 1st. This means I finally get paid vacation! I'd like to plan a week-long trip to Florida in December. I just checked ticket prices - only $225 each! Here's my idea: we'll fly into Tampa and visit with family & stay with Kik & Amy if they will extend their hospitality out to us :) We'll then drive down to Naples and hang out with the parental units for a spell. Our trip will finish with a visit to Ft. Lauderdale to spend time with Betsy & Lindsay before flying out of the Ft. Lauderdale airport and hopefully they'll let us crash at their place until we leave.

We were thinking early December. How does that tentative plan sound to you?

Weekend in the woods

hello!

three-day work weeks always kick my ass.

Weekend update: Tony, Chris, Natalie, Julie and I headed to the Northern Cascades Saturday afternoon after Nat got off from work. We arrived at the campsite a couple of hours before dark and set everything up, started a fire and then cooked dinner. While I was packing earlier in the day, I pulled my upper back a little. When I woke up Sunday morning, I could barely move. I haven't been in that kind of pain in quite some time.

the plan for Sunday was to do this cool hike. I could barely move, so I stuck around with Julie (she wasn't planning on going) and we went to town to find some stuff that might provide me relief. It rained a bit Sunday morning and proceeded to rain throughout the day. We put up a tarp for protection before the rest of the crew got back. We were quite glad since it rained on and off for the rest of the night. We did the dinner thing again and then sat around the fire. That's what you do when you camp, right?

My mobility was up on Monday and I felt OK enough to do a bit of hiking. However, Natalie & tony were pretty wrecked from the previous day. We packed up camp and then headed to the hike that Cathy, Eric, Tony & I went on a couple of months ago since it's not too strenuous of a trail. After hanging out at Blue Lake for awhile, we headed back to the car and headed home.

We all had fun even though I was in pain. i'm still not quite right. The crew said the hike was awesome, so we definitely plan on going back next summer. The camping season is official over.

Laundry is calling...I'm headed off to San Diego tomorrow evening to help Jenn move into her new condo (we hope!)

Busy-ness & birthday

Last Friday was Tony's birthday. We took the day off from work to sleep late and have a lovely brunch at Coastal Kitchen. We lazed around the house until it was time to meet friends for dinner at Flying Fish. Ye-um! Afterwards, we did a bit of bar hopping around Belltown. There was crazy fun happening that night.

The next day, everyone had a serious hangover. Damn.

Saturday evening, we went over to Cathy & Eric's for bbq fun. Sunday, we slept in for a bit. I went over to Julie's in the afternoon to help her paint and put together some stuff.

I am feeling condensed.

We looked at 5 houses this evening.

Since I'm condensed, I'll have to leave you hanging. No, we didn't fall in love with any of them.

Pictures!

Go here to see pictures from Sunny's birthday dinner & the wedding.

And I was just reminded

I was looking through the Daily photos on Dooce and saw the bike accident one. It reminded me of the incident that happened on Saturday.

Saturday morning, Tony & I are hanging out and we get a call from Natalie saying, "Let's go have a celebratory lunch!" since she just finished her last final of this semester (working full time and going to school ain't easy, kids). After our lovely lunch at El Greco, Chris, Tony & I head to Chris' car to go shopping for wedding presents & stuff to wear to the event. As we are walking up the hill, a guy flies by us on his bike. Then..the CRASH.

Poor guy...the grocery bags he had HANGING FROM HIS HANDLE got caught in his wheel. Duh. We stayed with him until the medics came. No serious injuries...maybe a dislocated shoulder. He did have lots of scrapes. Poor Forest. He was totally in shock...I felt bad for the guy. At one point, he told the medics that he had been in a bike accident before and had post traumatic stress disorder from it. My question is...then why weren't you wearing a helmut?!?

Kale woes

I love me some kale. I would also love me a variety of recipes on how to use this Superfood, but all I find are stews/soups & greens & beans. I think I might need to come up with some new recipes. I can only eat so many greens & beans.

I love the bounty of produce I can find at the farmer's market. The eats I get there make the stuff I get at Safeway & Trader Joe's look like plastic. It makes me want a farm. I sure do love my vegetables. This week, I picked up some broccoli, corn, chard and butter lettuce. The broccoli & corn will be consumed tomorrow night alonged with marinated, baked salmon. Some of the chard will be used for a fabulous apple chard quiche. The butter lettuce will be consumed in salad form.

We viewed a fabulous house on Thursday. It was so freaking huge! We hope to speak with a loan officer at WaMu this Friday. This Friday is also Tony's birthday. We are taking the day off of work (paid because our boss rocks) and getting stuff done before meeting with friends for dinner.

We went to a wedding this past Saturday. Alls i got to say is, "Damn. My man looks HOT in a suit". pics soon.

Happy Birthday to a Sunny!

Sunny turned the big 2-9 today. A group of us went to Benihana for some eatertainment (one of many coin phrases uttered by Sunny). The company was good as always.

We haven't looked at any more houses since the last one but did get a good faith estimate from one broker on what we qualify for. Tomorrow night, we are meeting with Dustin (apartment manager & realtor) to go over the whole process. Yay!

Report

I will miss Peter Jennings.
I have been using Blogger since 2002. Over 3 years of blabber. How about that?
I played on a jetski today and was afraid to go too fast. I am wimpy. I also wore the mega sunscreen since I am also afraid of skin cancer. This is not wimpy, but is me being cautious for a good reason.
I bought us a bedspread for our bed on Friday so our bedroom looks more "finished". It matches the color of our sheets perfectly. I made a good guess!
We looked at a house on Friday because it has a great yard. We fell in love with the yard, but not the house. We may consider buying sooner than later. First, we need to talk to a mortgage lender before we start seriously looking. It sure does help that our apartment manager is also a Realtor.

Almost every day, i think about how lucky & fortunate I am to have so many wonderful people in my life. Many are too far away, but I still feel lucky that we still are in touch.

My second home

We are all moved in to the new office. I worked a 12.5 hour day on Friday since the movers showed up with a too-small truck and it took them 11 hours to move all of the office furniture. ugh. But it's done! And that is good news, folks. After being at the old office all day on Friday supervising the sweaty men, I took off to the new office after they left with the second load. As soon as I walk in the door, Eric starts complaining about his office. I was a bit aghast since he was the one who chose not to give any input and pretty much said he didn't care. I essentially said that we weren't even going to think about making any changes right now since we just moved in. It made him mad, but jeez! give me a break, guy! I fretted about it a bit this weekend, but all was good by today. I think he realized that he was being a dummy.

Other than that, everyone else loves the place and is very happy. however, Friday was a day where I really needed to be in two places at once. It was a little stressful at the new office since no one was stepping up and making sure things got done. According to Tony, everyone was just wandering around as if they were lost and forgot they had jobs to do. After getting annoyed by everyone, Tony decided to start directing people into getting stuff done even though he doesn't like to take the leadership role. After telling Ralph what happened on Friday, Ralph has decided to officially announce to everyone that when he's gone, i'm boss. We'll see how that goes.

i was pretty pooped after leaving work at 9:30pm on Friday. Tony was a sweetie and stuck around with me until the movers were done. We drove back to the city and then tooled on over to Chris' to hang out for a bit.

Saturday, i dragged myself out of bed to go get poked by needles. Afterwards, i scooted to Target to try and find camping chairs for tony & I. I just wasn't impressed with the selection. I scooted on back home and then Chris came to pick us up and we went out to brunch. I spend the afternoon napping and being lazy. Tony & I then went to a fabulous restaurant to celebrate our 2-year anniversary. yay!

Sunday, we went over to Chris' house again to watch The Blue Angels fly around Lake Washington for the close of SeaFair. It was loud and full of testosterone. After the show ended, T & I went into the office to do some unpacking and organizing so things would be nice-looking and functional for everyone when they got in in the morning. We then headed back to the city to meet up with Julie, Natalie, Chris and Sol for dinner at Jai Thai. Mmmm!

That was my weekend in a nutshell. I am tired.

Spittle

Work = sooper busy getting ready for the move. Ralph fired our CTO on Monday. Ralph just told me today that I'm getting another raise. I think I've gotten 4 raises in the 9 months I've worked here. Go me!

Home = sooper productive this last weekend. Did lots of cleaning at home on Saturday and then went over to Julie's house on Sunday to help her clean. She's preparing to put her house on the market.

Family = Cameron's first birthday was Sunday but he & Jenn were out when I called :(
Jenn, I'm worried about you since I haven't heard back from you yet. I will give you another ring tonight after Cameron is put to bed.

OK, must get to work!

The Grind

Office move: was meant to be this Friday but has been pushed back until next Friday due to things beyond my control. Yes, I am irked by these things. Today, Tony & I got up early to get to the new office by 8 for the delivery of our new furniture. They didn't show up until 9:15. The new stuff looks great and it makes me very happy. My Very Own Office has a view of downtown Bellevue & the top of Mt. Rainier. Big Windows! Privacy! Yay!

Work Busy. Must go. sooo much to do and not enough time!

Back from the woods

We awoke to rain Friday morning as did Eric & Cathy. We were still at home while they were in the woods trying to keep the important stuff dry. Fortunately, the rain only stuck around for Friday morning. Unfortunately, it brought about mosquitoes.

We left work early on Friday and took off from the house around 4:30. It took us 3 hours to get out to the campsite due to bad traffic. Friday night, we had a feast of marinated salmon and corn on the cob while swatting at the bugs that make you itch. After dinner, we took a walk down to Baker Lake and enjoyed the clear skies and mountains while sitting on the floating dock.

Saturday, I awoke before everyone else so i took a little walk down to the creek and then to the lake to take some pictures. By the time I got back, Cathy was up so we cleaned up from the night before and waiting until Eric & Tony got up before making breakfast burritos. After eating, we ventured off in the car to locate Rainbow Falls. According to the book, it was supposed to be some fantastic falls. We drove up to the site and couldn't find the waterfall or a trailhead. Granted, the view was fabulous, but the lack of falls was disappointing. After venturing around a bit, we found a trailhead and started hiking up. The trail went up and up and up and it felt like it would never end. Keep in mind that we were hiking in moist dirt & mud...let's just say we broke in our new hiking boots. After it got really steep and we didn't encounter the waterfall, we turned around. After reading the book again, we realized that the waterfall was so far away that we could only enjoy it using binoculars. We drove back to the campsite and I think we walked to Baker Lake again to check out other hikes. After getting back, we had halibut, baked potatoes and roasted vegetables for dinner. Before and after dinner, we enjoyed playing Yatzee! and Uno! After the games, we went back to Baker Lake to watch the Moon rise over the mountains. It was absolutely breathtaking.

Sunday, we all slept in. It really is nice waking to the noise of a rushing creek. After getting out of tent, we made some breakfast, packed up camp and headed back to Baker Lake to rent a boat. The plan didn't work out and we have now noted that we should plan/reserver a boat the day before we want to go out on the lake. After we found that we couldn't rent a boat, we decided to hang out by the lake until we decided what we would do. While sitting under the trees, we all notice that there is a hornet's nest above us. A second after, Eric gets stung on the face. Ack! Fortunately, we found out that he is not allergic to hornets. That was a sign for us to leave Baker Lake. We drove up to hike to Blue Lake where we were attacked by black flies. This weekend was filled with bugs! It reminded me of Florida. After the hike, we headed back to Seattle.

Tony put up most of the pictures here. I took pictures of the creek, but those were left out. It's likely we'll camp here again next year.

This weekend was lots of fun. We are now organizing our next camping trip for labor day weekend.

I love living in the PNW.

Too much to do

Hello!

Work has been busy as usual. We've been busy after work mostly every night. This weekend, we are going camping by Lake Baker and will be hiking to see waterfalls. I haven't been camping in forever! We finally bought hiking boots and I hope just having them around will inspire us to do day hikes on the weekend. We are leaving right after work tomorrow; Cathy & Eric went out to the campsite this evening. It's been too long since we've been out of the city!

In other news, Cameron is officially a Toddler and will be turning one next week!

The other thing

I went to the doctor a couple of weeks ago for my physical. I heard back on Monday that my test results came back wonky for my thyroid and she upped my dosage. I was glad to know that my tiredness wasn't in my head. Previously, when I felt like crap, I wanted to say that something might be off with my dosage, but then worried that it really was just my imagination and I just needed to sleep/eat better/exercise. I have noticed a difference this week. I'm also documenting how I feel after I eat. Apparently, it's not good to eat soy if you have thyroid disease. I've been trying to cut back but it is so freaking hard since soy is in so much of my diet. The other day, I had some roasted soy beans for a snack and then couldn't stop yawning for an hour afterwards. I know a couple of people that experience the same symptom when they eat anything with soybeans in it.

It makes me sad. I love my soy products :(

We hired a new CTO (chief technical officer) at work and no one is quite sure how they feel about him. The guy is full of knowledge, but he's a little high strung and brings this frantic energy with him to work. How long should you give someone before you can tell if he is a good fit in the company? Work has been super busy this week, but that's nothing new.

I sure do hope Jenn & Cameron are having fun with Mom in hot, hot Naples!

Thank you!

Betsyroo! Thank you for the gifty :D I happened to be wearing my T-shirt with a graphic by the same artist the day it came in the mail. How funny is that?

My back has been in bad shape this week. uck. I believe I've been sleeping in poor positions lately and my back muscles have been spasming. I need to concentrate on strengthening it.

Last night, we went over to Cathy & Eric's house to plan our camping trip. I'm excited! So many of the prime spots were already reserved, but we did finally find one by a creek.

Tomorrow night is our second night of our Intro to Wine class. It's fun and we are learning a lot, but it sure is hard tasting so many wines in a short period of time.

If my back is feeling better, i hope to get Tony out of the house to go kayaking on Saturday. Sunday, i'm going thrift shopping with Sandi & Stine in hopes to find some summer clothes.

Hello!

Where have I been? I don't know!

Let us see...

Um...

Well...

Here's some pictures from the party at Chris' house.

July 4th weekend...Friday, we went to Bleu Bistro for dinner and then hung out with Chris & Natalie. Saturday, I was laid up with a headache all day. That night, we stayed home and watched movies. Sunday, we went to Sunny's for lakeside hanging out fun. Monday, we did a bit of shopping at REI before going to Solomon's for hanging out fun and fireworks.

Later this month, we are going camping with Eric & Cathy. Lots of camping stuff to buy!

We've been busy going out and doin' stuff. Right now, I be hungry for dinner, but Tony is taking a nap. i think i must eat without him!

Happy Summer

We started our summer off right with cool weather and rain. I love Seattle!
Tony & I went to the Home Depot yesterday to pick up some soil, pots and a few plants. We replanted a few things and Tony set up a terrarium. When we stopped by Walgreens the other night, he picked up a venus flytrap and thought it would grow best in that environment.

Wow. How unexciting is that?

Miss Betsyroo! I miss you! Come visit soon :D I will call you this weekend.

Mum, I plan to give you a ring, too.

Screech gets to go to the vet this weekend for a check-up and to get his cough checked out. He was coughing lots and then after I made the appointment, he stopped. Typical. Chris is having a beginning of summer party saturday. Fun will be had!

Eat, Drink and Be Merry

Happy Day-After-Father's Day!

My weekend was :( and then :)
While at work on Friday, a headache crept up on me. The Advil did nothing. It hurt. It made me nauseous. After dinner, I took an Advil Cold & Sinus thinking that it might be my sinuses. Alas, the headache did not go away. I felt like poo, so I stayed home while Tony went to Natalie's for hanging out fun.

Saturday morning, my head was still hurting slightly but was not horrendous. Natalie came over and she, Tony and I went to The Globe for brunch. It's a vegan hippy dive down the street from us. Holy cow. It took an hour to get our food! We had to shove it down our throats since I had book club to go to. I hung out with my book club girlfriends for a few hours before heading home. Tony & I then went to see Batman Begins. It was good! Afterwards, Natalie & Amanda came over for hanging-out fun. My headache did finally go away around midday after I took an Aleve.

After making brunch on Sunday, I headed out to pick up Stine & Sandi for thrift shopping. I scored on some cute shoes and other items. We also had lunch and chatted for a bit. Fun day! I finally made it home around 7:30pm. Tony & I had some dinner and watched a depressing documentary called Children Underground.

Work is a'callin. Gotta run!

Michael Jackson is innocent

My weekend by Kris:

Friday: tour of bed & breakfast places on Capitol Hill. No rooms were available due to graduation weekend. We went to Coastal Kitchen for dinner. After Dad & Carolyn headed to their hotel, Chris & Natalie came over to hang out.

Saturday: treated the folks to massages from Stine. We went to see Star Wars at the Cinerama in the afternoon. Afterwards, we grabbed some good eats at Six Arms.

Sunday: I was hoping we could take a day trip to go whale watching, but it just wasn't feasible with the ferry schedule. Instead of going to the San Juan Islands, we headed to Snoqualmie Falls and then had a late lunch. Afterwards, we headed back home to sit around and chat for a bit before Dad & Carolyn headed back to their hotel and then home this morning.

OK, time for bed!

Oh no I didn't!

I have a confession to make:
We moved into this apartment in November and I just finally dealt with the Piles of Crap that were sitting in the bedroom that I hadn't bothered to put away for all of these months. Our bedroom has looked a mess ever since we moved in because of my procrastination. We haven't had a housewarming party because of the Piles of Crap. Well, I couldn't let family see my Piles of Crap. So i did it. I figured out what to do with it all.

Now the bedroom looks very empty. We desperately need to decorate. I'm not sure how to hide the elliptical machine. It is large.

Before I got off my ass and stopped procrastinating, we went out to dinner with Dad & Carolyn to Ivar's Salmon House. Everyone else ordered the halibut fish & chips except for me. If I'm at a restaurant that specializes in salmon, I'm gonna order salmon. It was delish! Everyone else thought so and wished that they had ordered it, too! I have leftovers for lunch tomorrow. Yay, leftovers!

Dad & Carolyn also shared cruise give-away fun stuff like feather boas, chocolate and wine. Decadence! They also gave me one of Grandma's watches from Shaw Jewelers. It is lovely!

Squirmy monkey!

Wanna see more pictures?

Let's see...what has been going on...
Oh yeah - Friday for lunch, I picked up Dad & Carolyn from the airport for lunch before they headed downtown for their convention. Friday night, we went out for dinner and drinks with a bunch of people. We were able to keep ourselves under control for once. Dinner at Jai Thai and then drinks at Bad JuJu Lounge and Barca. We ended the night with Frites!

Saturday, Tony & I did a little shopping and now have a proper coffee table. Our living room is shaping up! We also saw The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and thought it was lots of fun. Saturday night, we went to the Mercury and hung out with friends.

Sunday, we were lazy. We did get out to the Farmer's market that is on Capitol Hill on Sundays, but that was it. We purchased lots of lovely organic produce that was grown locally. I was a little productive and did a couple of loads of laundry. i would have done more but the dryer was being lame and eating my quarters. We stayed home that night and watched Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events. The visuals were nice, but the movie was only OK.

OK, I should get to bed now.

Back in Black

My trip to San Diego was good. It was hard to leave. Jenn & I went shopping Monday afternoon while Duncan watched Cameron and I was already missing the little squirmy monkey. He is just a doll. I hope to put up the movies I took very soon along with the pictures.

Having Monday off put me quite behind at work. There is so much to do and not enough time! What? What is that, you say? Why yes, I am writing this while at work! I have to take a brain break once in awhile, you know?

My heart weighs heavy with some things going on right now with people that I love dearly. I worry. I wish I could fix things. I hope everything turns out for the best. I miss you.

Hello internet land!

This past Monday, we went to go see Peter Murphy at the Showbox. His shows are so different every time I see him. I can't say he was sporting a good look for him, but the show was good. Afterwards, we went to Fenix Underground for some dancing fun.

I did boring stuff the rest of the week (grocery shopping, laundry, etc)

There was weirdness at work this week. I use livejournal to have conversations with my friends and Alysa & Trish found it. It creeps me out that they are reading my personal stuff. For all I know, they could have found this journal, too. I hope not. It's just creepy.

I am really looking foward to spending this 3-day weekend in San Diego. I'll be taking Tony's camera in hopes of taking movies of Cameron crawling around.

OK, I must get up. My sciatica is bothering me :(

More consumption and changes at work

In our quest to procure better furniture, we bought a proper TV stand yesterday from Best Buy. Previously, our TV was sitting on a little table and it looked tacky. After dinner, we unload the heavy thing and proceeded to put it together. it was much more complicated then Ikea furniture. I think it took us about 2 hours.

Our couch is meant to be delivered today. The delivery people are supposed to call us an hour before they arrive, but we still haven't heard anything from them. Their window for delivery ends in an hour. *twiddles thumbs impatiently*

Oh! So the work news! Dennis got let go today. There has been lots of work politics/drama as of late so we hope that this step will put all of it to an end. It will be good to get a systems administrator in here that knows what s/he is doing. Also, Tony got a pretty hefty raise.

OK, must get back to work.

No place to sit and a bump on my head

In preparation for the delivery of our fancy new sofa, I sold our futon. I posted it to craigslist yesterday and someone bought it today! I was really happy that it sold that quickly. Being that we have no place to sit, I'm guessing we won't be watching the Mork & Mindy DVDs that our in our player right now.

I saw the opportunity to mop our wood floors since the biggest piece of furniture was gone. At one point, I was reaching under the kitchen sink to get a sponge and hit my head on the edge of the counter :( It still smarts and I have a nice lump there.

My back got the special treatment of a chiro adjustment and acupuncture today. Debbie, my acupuncturist, did cupping on my upper back for the first time. It felt so weird! I also had Dr. Ellison refer me to a physical therapist. I'm hoping to learn some exercises for my upper back. I know how to stretch and strengthen my lower & mid back, but am at a loss when it comes to the top part.

Our coworkers, Eric and Jessica, will be moving in to one of the apartments in our building next month! They are brother & sister and are cool kids. It sure will make carpooling easy. It looks like Ralph has decided on the new office so we should be moving soon. I will have my very own office! I feel so grown up or something!

We are great consumers!

Last week was the week to buy Shiny New Things. On Saturday, we went to Macy's to do some clothes shopping for Tony. After picking him up 4 new pairs of pants and 3 new shirts (most on sale), we headed up to the furniture department to check out the sale. We walked out with a heavy receipt for our new sofa! It is meant to be delivered on Thursday. We are so excited! I'll be sure to post some pictures. Speaking of, I need to find someplace to host my pics since my old gallery was on the broken server.

OK, must go hang out with My Favorite Boy now.

The pains! They hurt!

I so enjoy hearing New Music that makes me dance. I am thoroughly enjoying The Faint right now.

As some of you know, my body has been yelling at me and didn't like me sitting in front of a computer for so much of my waking day. This meant that I was only in front of a computer at work and not at home. Since work keeps me hella busy, I have lost touch with so many. I think about my far-away family and friends quite often, but am also so bad about picking up the phone and calling.

With that said, the acupuncture treatments have really helped with my sciatica. Who would have thought? Also, i have very exciting news (to me)! Yesterday, we went and got me a shiny, new computer! A Mac Mini! I love it! I haven't found it very difficult to transition from PC to Mac, either. Plus, it's so damn cute!

So...I'm guessing I will want to spend time in front of my fun, new computer! Yay! I mean, come on! It's 9pm on a Friday night and I'm at home sitting in front of my computer. Is that excitement or what? Actually, I've had a headache for 2 days and flaked on our plans tonight. Amanda is going to come over for Movie Fun and we are just going to take it easy.

I went to the Western doctor yesterday per Tony's request to see about my back. She did just what I expected - prescribed me pain killers and physical therapy. I'm going to talk to my chiropractor on Tuesday about the physical therapy. She said she's got a really good therapist that specializes in backs. The pain killers I plan on only using when my back pain disturbes my sleep. The western doc also recommended that I start taking Aleve every day to help with the inflammation. I hate taking pills :(

Stay Tuned for more frequent updates! Now I must do it since i told The Internet that I'm going to.

workplayworkplayworkworkwork

This last weekend, I did a bit of birthday shopping on Saturday with Miss Natalie. She was shopping for her cruise to the Amazon with her mom. Dood, we shopped for 6 hours and only hit Ross and Target!

On Sunday, Chris, Tony and I went to Crystal. The snow was pretty nice. We are going again this Saturday for my birthday. Wheee! And then we are having a few friends over Saturday night for a small celebration of ME! Being Born! Yay!

Since the jet stream is finally cooperating, the snow hasn't stopped. Whistler has gotten tons of snow lately. We cannot resist the powder and will be making a trip up there next weekend. Yay! The lodging is pretty cheap, too.

The weekend after that, we hope to go back up to Mt. Baker. Gotta get in the snowboarding while we can!

Now that Trish is gone, I get to take care of the office manager duties. With that being said, I really shouldn't be taking the time to write this, but I must. :)

Oh! Congratulations to Rachel and Kevin! they are now the proud parents of little Aiden.

Also, thanks to the Davidson family for the REI gift certificate. It was put towards new snowboarding boots that are desperately needed :)

OK, back to work!