Christmas came and went

Well, Merry Christmas.
It seems to have just come and gone in a flash. All the preparation, and the high hopes for "traditions", gone in just one day.
It was hard to get in the holiday spirit this year (as you can tell by my t-shirt). Scott says it's because it's so damn hot here (it was 75 on xmas day), but I think it's because we are getting older and that magic of Christmas is just gone. It might also be the fact that we are away from our families, and although I love you honey, us and the furry kids do not make a large and exciting family.

What was a very nice treat for me this year was that I got 2 whole days off work this year. SoftMed was a grinch and only gave us the 25th off, but 3M gives us both the 24th and 25th off! A 3 day work week is so nice, but I do seem swamped with trying to get everything taken care of and covered while we are out all of next week. There is only one site that I feel that I am leaving high and dry, since they are going live the week that I get back to the office - but I think they can handle it and they will be fine. If everything is not perfect for go-live, I really don't care too much - they will be little things anyway...

So we started the holiday season with getting a tree, and decorating it. Bear and Chewie had their fill of some ornaments, which you can clearly see the next morning on their bathroom breaks. I thought I was doing so well with Xmas shopping, and my goal was to get everything in the mail before Dec 15th. Well, although everything was purchased, it was the boxing and packing up that took us longer than expected. So after 3 trips to Postal Annex and 1 to USPS (and the equivalent in shipping costs than the total presents), we finally got everything packed and shipped only to learn that most things would arrive the day after xmas.

I really wanted to bake some bread (I got these adorable mini-loaf ceramic pans) and make some cookies (I actually bought a cookie press), but these did not get done in time to mail out to family. I finally made the bread on xmas eve, and guess who ate 2 whole mini-loaves of bread... Bear of course. I was pissed. So these cute ceramic pans will wait until next year to be given to a human. Another tradition that was not fulfilled this year was our snowboarding on xmas day. I woke up late, it was 75 degrees, and it just didn't seem worth it to make the trek out there. Oh well...
Scott's xmas letter this year was just not very funny - I really married more of a comic than comes across in the letter. And we missed some key highlights of the year! We went to Vegas (Scott's first time there, you think he would remember it and all those boobies), and he went sea fishing with my Dad in June. The summer was not entirely a boring job hunting summer.

We did have a very nice xmas eve with my parents and their friend Rich. It's very sad, he was all alone on xmas so my parents invited him over. He brought pictures of his grand kids to show us (they are in NC), and he was wearing a very festive red vest. Mom made a pork dish that was excellent, which is a traditional Bolivian dish. Who knew we had Bolivian traditions?! Needless to say, I have never had this pork dish at xmas.. so much for traditions, huh? It's funny - I am completely 100% my dad's daughter. We gave each other the same thing - a wine decanter gadget that decants as it pours out of the bottle. So we did a taste test and this thing really works! I love it!

Scott and I exchanged presents xmas morning - Santa was good to us, not so much to the naughty dogs. We then proceeded to chill the rest of the day and actually found an open grocery store to make my lasagna for dinner that night. Overall, a great xmas!

Now - onto 2008, and I am totally looking forward to our trip to NYC to ring in the new year with the Weinsafts. Woohoo!
Happy New Year everyone!

Happy Thanksgiving!

My husband is making me update this blog. I am not doing thus under my own free will (those of you who know me, if I was doing this on my own this post would not show up for another 2 weeks).

We had a great Thanksgiving and the had a good past couple of weeks.
We started out Turkey day with the Oceanside Turkey Trot (5k). This was our second year running it, and my goal was to run the entire race without walking. I met my goal (it was not fun, considering we hadn't really trained in the weeks leading up to it), but we got through the whole thing in 36 minutes! That is great for me, and Scott's calves were sore the next day because he's a trooper and ran at my pace the entire way.

We hosted Thanksgiving at our house (just for a lowly 4 people and 2 dogs). My parents came over and we had a great meal:
Smoked turkey breast, smoked on the outdoor grill
Honey Glazed ham
What is becoming our traditional stuffing (Scott calls it dressing)
Mom's whipped sweet potatoes
"Healthy" mashed potatoes - really, it's cauliflower
Colette's favorite Oceanspray cranberry sauce (jellied, of course)
Pumpkin cranberry bread
Pecan and pumpkin pie
Overall, a great time, and we finished off the evening by watching "Mr. Brooks", which was a very good movie to my surprise.

The weekend before Thanksgiving, we went to LA to watch the Ohio State/Michigan game at our friend Eric's. It was a good weekend and we even brought the dogs. Billy and Amy had the baby over the weekend, but hopefully we'll get to meet her in the next week or two. It seems as if everyone we know is popping out babies this year.

Chewie got a new crate, and it lasted less than one week. She ate through the zipper on the front, so I had to sew it up, and now the only way in or out is through the top of the crate. Somehow, she still managed to get out of it last night. Scott is now calling her "Chewdini", a fitting name.

Well, it's time to bring out the "Ba humbug" t-shirt, and see what the rest of the year has in store for us.

Happy Halloween!!

As much as I think that my life if very ordinary and ho-hum, a lot has been going on in actuality.

First and Foremost - my wonderful husband's job search has come to an end! He has decided to play professional poker, and is going on tour starting in Nov. When he is not doing that, he is going to spend his days at the beach surfing :-)
Seriously? Seriously.
No - he is working for L-3 Communications as a defense/military contractor. He is working on base (again) and doing logistics/planning (again), but this time he gets to go to work as a civilian, and he can grow facial hair to his hearts content. He actually is clean shaven at the moment and is growing a nice head of hair in. Just this past weekend he complained about how "conservative" he looks with hair - but I think he's just getting used to it. All these month of hard work growing it out will pay off one day, and he'll find himself looking like Sawyer from Lost soon enough (speaking of Lost, I can't believe they are making us wait until Feb to start the new season!).

Next, on a sadder note - there were some "wicked" wildfires here in San Diego last week. We actually drove right into the fires in Ramona/Julian one day (out of pure stupidity). We were going to Julian to look around, buy some pies, etc, and as we were driving there we did see a huge smoke cloud in the distance. As we continued to get closer we knew it was a fire somewhere, but the roads were not closed. We kept driving, and we were about 10 miles from Julian when the smoke started to get very thick. People driving started to turn around, and people were pulling over and getting out of their cars. We thought we could continue to plow through, especially since we were so close, but then the car filled up with smoke and you could not see more than 1 foot in front of the windshield. Scott says that about 10 feet away there was a blaze - but I missed that. I think I would have freaked out if I actually saw fire. So we managed to turn around and then headed home. It wasn't until we got home that we learned the true gravity of the situation, and we were right there at the start of the Witch Creek Fire. For almost a week, every station has 24 hour coverage of the fires, the evacuations, and the disaster of it all. I must say, NBC San Diego is my favorite news station out here, and they did a great job.

Just to mention some of the things that we have been doing lately:
I just learned how to link URLs to my blog, so watch out!
We went to see the "Last Comic Standing" tour at Pala Casino. Very funny, although we wee bummed that Jon Reep was not on tour - we'll have to catch him later.
We went to see Colin Hay at The Belly Up - he is great, and puts on a wonderful show.

A big congratulations to the many people in our lives who are having children!
It seems like everyone is pregnant right now...

Here is a pic of our fat little devil - Happy Halloween!

Have you ever shot your gun in the air and screamed?

We have been trying to get out and about and do more things around here.
Since we are trying to stay in this area, and my big excuse for not wanting to leave has been "But I want to be close to the beach", we have tried to go to the beach more often. I do like it. Scott is trying to get into surfing and has bought his first surf board. He's not a Point Break surfer yet, but I'm sure he'll get there.
Talking of Point Break - we really liked the movie Hot Fuzz.

In the past couple of weeks, we have gone to see "Mama Mia" downtown, and have also gone to "Little Shop of Horrors" at the Moonlight Theater. It's kind of like Wolf Trap, but on a much smaller scale. The shows were excellent, and I really miss doing things like that. We are heading to a Padres game on Monday - so we really are trying to keep busy and entertained.

I can't believe fall is already here, and we are starting to train for the Thanksgiving 5k again this year. But what I'm really looking forward to our stuffing, yum!

Where is the time going to?

I am sitting here waiting for a phone call from someone at work, and I have a feeling that it is not going to come. But you know how as soon as you start doing something that you probably shouldn't be wasting your time on during working hours, the phone rings... and there you go, the phone just rang!

Anyway - The most exciting thing in May was Scott finally had his last day of work at USMC! He was able to take leave starting on May 15th, and we promptly went on a week vacation to Upstate NY to visit his family. Although his brother in law, Mike, is in Iraq right now, the family was once again intact.
On a sadder note, a week after our visit, Grandpa Major passed away. So Scott was back on a plane, and this time for a much sadder reunion. The family is doing well though, and everyone is back into their daily routine.

June - What a June! I had a birthday, and I am feeling slighly older. I think it's mainly due to the 10 lbs that I put on since Thanksgiving, but I am definitely feeling like I am well out of my 20s now.
Our good friends Keith and Kara moved away - so so sad. So we tried to see them as much as possible and had many dinners and "So you think you can dance" nights. But it didn't feel like goodbye at all - maybe it's because I know we will keep in touch with them and these are friends that we will surely have well into a ripe old age. They just happen to live a little further away now, that's all!
And Scott is winding down to his last official day in the Marine Corps on July 30. Kinda scary, considering he doesn't have a job lined up yet, but overall I am feeling fine and confident, and we won't be eating ramen noodles for at least another 2 weeks or so - so things are good!

I'll post some pictures shortly, and keep everyone updated. I think I have a pic of Scott with a beard somewhere around here...

Yard Sale Mentality

On Saturday, we had a yard sale. It was one of the strangest things that we have experienced out here.

I put an add in the paper to run on Thursday and Friday. We made signs, and have been collecting things to sell in our garage for the past month. We then got little price tag stickers and spent Friday night pricing all of our items. I must say that we were very organized for this yard sale. I went into it thinking that if we at least made $28, I would make back what I spend in the add.

The sale started at 7am on Saturday morning. I am not a morning person, so Scott was out of bed at 5:30 and getting things ready. He came up to wake me up at about 6am and said that we had stalkers in the front of our house. Of course, I didn't believe him - so it was finally that statement that got me out of bed and peering out of the window. No one was there - ha, I knew he was kidding.

Scott put the garage door up at about 6:45, then came inside to get his cup of coffee. When he went back outside, there was a man in our garage already looking at all of our stuff. When I came outside 5 minutes later, our entire set of pots and pans were already sold and the man was loading them into his truck. Over the next hour, a mass of people (mostly Mexicans, I think) came and bought the majority of our things. They really wanted to bargain, and we got talked down on most of our things. I found it odd, but the main tactic seemed to be for them to make a pile of things and say "If I buy all of this, how much will you charge me?". We added everything up individually, and normally lowered it by about $5, and that seemed to make them happy. Our best sale (although I think we could have gotten more money for it) was our 27" TV, the TV stand, and an old microwave for $80. Very quickly, we watched our belongings drive away...

People also came up to us and asked us if we had specific items. One person asked if we had any sleeping bags, and if I had found Scott's sleeping bag in the garage, it definitely would have been sold. Another person came looking for lamps, and another person asked for clothing. We didn't intent to sell any clothes, but when asked I immediately went upstairs and raided the closet for shoes and clothes that I could get rid of. Selling things is so addicting!

Overall, we made over $400, which is amazing! By 10am, people were just trickling in and we decided to shut down early at noon. It is strange though - they really just wanted our electronics and junk. All the nice thing that were in unopened boxes (picture frames, music boxes, wedding gifts) they couldn't care less about. They really wanted things like Scott's old suitcase that went around the world and had a 2" layer of dust on it. I wonder if we go to the flea market next week, if we will see all of things for sale for twice as much as we sold them... Oh well - I think we are going to have to this at least once a year to clean house!! It's so refreshing!

Latest updates

Scott has been bugging me for a while to update my blog. He said that there are so many things that we have done lately that it needs to be posted. OK - here goes.

First, I do want to say that I am horrified about the shootings at VA Tech, and that my thoughts are with Hokies everywhere, especially those in the Burg.

At the end of March, we went on a trip to Vegas with our friends Keith and Kara. It was a lot of fun, and it was also Scott's first time in Vegas. We stayed on Freemont, in the Golden Nuggett. It was so much nicer of a hotel than I imagined! I guess I was expecting an old hotel, since it was in the old part of town, but it was really nice and they just revamped the pool and put in a shark tank with a water tube slide. I did go down the slide - totally under duress. We gambled and lost a little - nothing too severe, but we are eating Ramen noodles for a couple of months :-) We also went to go see a show called Fantasy at the Luxor. Kara had a friend in the show, who hooked us up with tickets. We were in the second row, and yes, we saw lots of boobies (16 to be exact, over and over again). But it was a very funny and well put together show (we had no idea what to expect when we sat down). I must say that the grand finale of our trip was getting a bit tipsy at the pool bar while checking out of the hotel, and then going for dim sum at Ping Pang Pong! We had seen the billboard for this restaurant starting about 50 miles outside of Vegas, so we had to go see what it was all about. Overall, it was a great trip, and we need to go back again before we leave SoCal.

Scott had his Birthday last week - the big old 34! He didn't want to do anything special for his birthday, so we went out to dinner on Tuesday to Claim Jumper and got him a fattie steak. He asked "Are there going to be people waiting for us when we get there?". I didn't plan anything for your Birthday today, sorry hon. But notice the key word - Today. On Friday we went downtown to pick up my friend Kelli from the airport, and then moved onto Karl Strauss where his surprise party was waiting. I think he had a great time, and it is always wonderful to see him actually surprised and taken aback when things like this pull together. I must say - Kara and Keith went above and beyond ensuring that Scott had a great Birthday, with presents, balloons, and a cake. And of course, their company!! Kara and Keith - you have become such wonderful friends - I am really going to miss you a lot when you move this summer :-(

Scott went to a job fair this weekend, and things are looking ok on the job front these days. I think Scott was able to practice his interviewing skills, and feels much more comfortable with it now. I knew it would only take a couple of times for him to start feeling normal, and less nervous, during interviews. But as the weeks progress, I'm sure there will be more job hunting, interviews, and I'll keep you updated on our progress.

Chewie updates

Our little girl is getting big, and she is such a little devil. I think Bear is scared of her, sometimes!

Chewie got fixed at the end of February, and she did wonderful. She wore the cone for about 24 hours, and looked so adorable! She also had 4 teeth pulled, poor little thing. They said she was looking like Jaws, with adult teeth already all the way in her baby teeth right next to them. But by Day 2 she was a little devil and running around and hopping over gates. The vet said to keep her calm with no stairs or jumping for one week - it was impossible.

Yesterday, Chewie got her first grooming. I kind of miss her old hair - I even asked Scott if he was sure we got the same dog back. She just looks so old, and dare I say MATURE! But underneath it all she is still the same Chewie - who woke me up by howling in her crate as soon as Scott left for work.


Bear, on the other hand, is doing great, although I can tell he is suffering from Big Brother depression. He is much more docile, and he hates it when she runs after him and pesters him. the other day, he was trying to get away from her and he ran into something and split the side of his eye open. It was bleeding and looked nasty for about a day, and now it looks pretty touch. He looks like Poochy Balboa (our version of Rocky).

It's starting to get hot out here - it was 80 degrees yesterday. It's time to get the puppy swimming pool!

It's been a little dreary out here

Well, the past 4 weeks have brought much rain to the SD area. Although it seems like it has rained the majority of the days out here, it beats the 9 feet of snow that some areas of the country are getting. I have no complaints about rain.

We have had a busy past couple of weeks:
We have remodeled out downstairs bathroom, and I must say that it looks great. I think we should think about careers in general contracting. When we get done with this house, we will definitely have some good experience under our belt! The bathroom is now a deep red, has all new fixures, and we call it the "Rome" bathroom.

Chewie still provied daily entertainment, and furstrations for poor Bear. But she is a fat little monster now, and she has learned to go out of Bear's doggie door, and also to scale the baby gate that used to keep her confined to one floor of the house.

My friend Carrie came to visit for a weekend. It was great to see her and catch up, and it's also a little sad to think how different our lives are now, in comparison to those days that we saw each other every day in the old Bell Atlantic building. We are both married, living in different states, and have just been though career and life changes - with many more to come. I think I am just starting to feel old now, and this aching in my knees only reinforces that fact.

We did go snowboarding one more time with our friends Keith and Kara, who push us to our limits and past them. I think that is what we needed, and hopefully we will get at least one more day of boarding in before the spring weather catches up to us. We did make the drive out to Big Bear one weekend, but remember what I said about all that rain...

I had a very short (1 night) trip to DC for work this month, and I do not miss the constant travel that I used to do for SoftMed. It looks like there may be more frequent travel in my future, but it shouldn't be too bad just yet. Our company was acquired by 3M, so there are some changes in my immediate future. I am still finding out what all of those entail.

I think the most significant change that we are looking to make is Scott finding a new job. He was working on his resume yesterday, which is always the hardest and most tedious aspect of the job hunt. Don't worry honey, in a month there will be so much activity that time will fly by! So we are seeing where the job hunt will take us, but I have no doubt that we will find ourselves together and happy (just hopefully not cold the majority of the year!).

Come Here, Girlfriend

It cracks me up to hear Scott say this to Chewie. This seems to be his greeting everynight when he comes home from work, and he picks her up and says hello. I love seeing his interaction with her, and it puts no doubt in my mind that he is going to be an excellent dad one day.

Chewie, on the other hand, has become our little monster. She lives up to her name, and has all 3 of us (Bear inlcuded) crying out in pain when her sharp little teeth bite into us. She is so just so darn cute though, and with a swat of a hand(or paw) we can send her flying. But she always come back to try to get one more nibble at us.

Scott has been wanting me to post our snowboarding adventures. I think he would also love it if I posted pictures of my black and blue, swollen knees.
On MLK weekend, we rented a cabin at Big Bear and spent the weekend there with the dogs. The cabin was an adventure (we had 5 blankets on the bed), and we have discovered that the dogs do not like snow. They have been Californiazed. Bear would pick up one paw for 10 seconds, then switch paws, then switch back - too funny.

Scott is really picking up the boarding. Me, not so quickly. I still spend more time off my feet than on them, and if I don't fall getting off the chair lift - that makes for a good day. We did get helmets which saved our lives on these trips, and I am surprised that the helmets are still in one piece. But it is a lot of fun, and we are planning another trip next weekend. Maybe we'll be tackling the blacks be the end of the season!

Happy New Year

Well, our New Year celebration was very uneventful. Actually, one of our more mellow ones - but at least we were awake at the stoke of midnight.

On Thursday the 28th, we headed to LA for a couple of nights. We started the weekend off with a George Lopez concert. Scott likes to say he was the only gringo in the audience, but I'm sure there must have been at least one other. At the very least, the opening act was as gringo as you could get and he was very funny. George of course was hilarious, and once the girl sitting in front of us got kicked out in the first 10 minutes for being loud and rude, we enjoyed the rest of the show. She seemed to get very irritated when George made a comment about Taco Bell. Maybe she works there, but she was very offended and let everyone around her know she was offended.

We spend Friday at Universal Studios, which was a lot of fun. We then met up with my friend Adrian and his fiance, and Eric and his friend for dinner and drink. I somehow ended up drinking way too much and had a horrible hangover the next morning. Scott said that I fell asleep in bed sitting up with all my clothes on, holding a glass of water. I'm a talented drunk - there were no spills! We were your typical tourists on Saturday, then headed home for a relaxing rest of the weekend.

The hotel in which we stayed at was very nice, and infested with Storm troopers. Yes, Storm troopers (oh yeah, and lots of Rose Bowl parade band members). But Scott rode the elevator with 2 storm troopers, and I felt that of all places to be in the galaxy, this was definitely the most intersting. I will post a picture soon of a car that was parked in the lot - R2D2 was watching the car while it's driver was checking into the hotel. Strange, but it was a very neat experience. Apparently, there were hundreds of Storm Troppers in town, since George Lucas was the Rose Bowl parade grand marshal.

Happy New Year, and may the force be with you...