D-A-L-L-A-S

This past weekend I travelled to sunny Dallas to visit some college friends! Man, did I have a great time! (I took approximately two photos, which are still on my camera, so bear with me). I'd like to title this vacay - the "Eating" Chronicles because man did we get our eat on.

Friday:

I rolled into Love Field around 8 pm and was greeted by the ever lovely Ms. Foxy Flores. We travelled the .5 miles to her parents casa and enjoyed a dinner of enchiladas and her Mom's punch. Afterwards, we headed to a wine bar for some, well wine, and then to a new bar called Three Sheats, to meet up with her brother. I enjoyed both places!

Saturday:

Slept till approximately 11 am. (I blame that on the rain and thunder outside). We headed to the greek fest, wherein I gorged myself on Greek food of all type. And were serenaded by a Barbershop Quartet channeling the Temptations. All in all a fun experience.

Afterwards, we headed to Lewisville to see Shell Bell and Dan's new abode. What a loverly house it was!! Congrats y'all!

That night, after vegging for a good hour, and after doing some retail therapy at Northpark, we headed to a Tapas restaurant called Sangria. It was delish. I again, gorged myself there also.

Afterwards we had a night cap at a french bistro around the corner. That was also delish. AND we got the most girnormous souffle of all time, that plus a couple of enthralling slugs, made for an interesting french experience.

Sunday:

We met Shell and Dan at Breadwinners for brunch. I enjoyed it. I read about it a lot on blogs around the interwebs, and even heard a couple discussing it in front of me on the airplane, so I thought why the heck now. It was good. We sat outside, and the weather was a little chilly and reminded me of fall, oh wait, it is supposed to be fall weather. It was fun catching up with Shelley and Dan at brunch.

After that, we watched the first half of the Cowboys (not lose, yay, go cowboys!) and then I headed back to the dirty H. All in all a GREAT weekend. Thank you Elaine and Brian for being wonderful hosts!

Random Friday Thoughts...

Lots of things running through my head today, here's a little taste:

1. I'll be exhibiting single-dom behavior for the next week or so (not that kind of single behavior, get your mind out of the gutter). Patrick left for a 10 day hunting trip to Northeastern Canada (in the Quebec Region), close to Newfoundland. He's hunting carabou (I just tell myself that he's not killing anything, I can't watch Bambi without getting sad, I surely will not be able to think of the boyfriend killing a poor animal) with his dad and brother. There will be about 8 days in there sans communication with each other. Apparently calling your girlfriend on the ONE satellite phone in the camp is frowned upon.

2. I used to look badly upon people who worked out in tank tops. I thought it was some sort of fashion statement/attempt to look cute while running. That's until I started running and realized that those are God's gift to runners. Running 10 miles in a sweaty t-shirt = chaffing of gigantic proportion. Running in tank top with dry fit technology = no chaffing. You'll find me running in such a tank top until it starts acting like fall outside.

3. On the topic of running - I am now less than two months away from my first Half Marathon! This past Saturday I ran 10 miles! Who knew I'd ever be able to do that. I certainly didn't think I would. Persistence and training my friends. I fell off the running wagon this week though, as I haven't run once. I blame it on my busy work schedule. I'll pick back up with it after this weekend.

4. I'm coaching Moot Court again! For those new to my blog, moot court is the activity I was mega involved in during law school. Think debate, but lawyerly. I'm one of those people who just can't move on from it. I enjoyed it, and I coached last year for the first time, and really really enjoyed that. So, after weeks of pestering the moot court coordinator, I got the "go" to coach again! I'll be coaching the same competitions I did last year, one is in Chicago, the other is in NYC. Hopefully I'll get to travel for both, work permitting.



My Chicago Team from Last Year, loved them (semifinalists)!

My Pace team from laster year, love them too (Finalists!)

5. I bought two new cds this week, and I have to say, I'm pretty impressed. Numero Uno - Maroon 5. I love M5. Period. I've loved every album since I started listening to them Sophomore year of college. Numero dos - Zac Brown Band. I bought their last album, and I'm thinking I will prolly love this one just as much. Very happy with my purchases.

6. Dallas. Most of my college friends live in Dallas. I'm heading there this weekend to visit Elaine, Shelley, Kristen, and Brian. And, anyone else I happen to see while I'm there. I'm super excited, and can't wait!

That is all.

California ... Day 3

Monday!

This was my last full day in Cali, and it was a whirlwind!

We started off the day by walking to downtown Mountain View (about a 20 minute walk). It was a beautiful day, so I didn't mind that my flip flop was rubbing a mean blister into the side of my foot. We took Andy, and also Aryan (Sarah's god-daughter whom she was babysitting that weekend and a very very cute 1 year old!) on the walk, and we made a pit stop at the coffee shop in downtown. Downtown Mountain View is a very diverse downtown. Its one main street, with every type of foreign food you could find. I would definitely not run out of things to eat in this downtown!

I just love this photo!

Me and Aryan at the coffee shop!

After coffee, we made the trek back to Sarah's house, and had a few diaper mishaps along the way, the joy of having a 3 month old!

We were driving into San Fran to pick up Sarah's friends (the parents of the darling little girl above) at the airport. After we picked them up, and got yelled at by a very surly security guard, we went to eat at In-n-Out burger, because I had never been there before, and there happened to be one right near the airport. I think everyone else arriving in San Fran had the same idea. It was pretty tasty. Although, (and Sarah and Candice will kill me for saying this) I like Whataburger better still. I'm a Texan, and I'm biased, what can I say? I didn't get a picture of the In - n-Out sign, but I did get this little nugget:

Which is a much better picture than the In-n-Out burger sign, if I do say so myself.

If you remember, in my first Cali post I mentioned that it was super foggy when we were in the city on Saturday, well Sarah, being the awesome person that she is, didn't want me to leave Cali without seeing the Golden Gate Bridge. So, with Andy it tow, we drove back into San Fran to see the GGB. And, it was the best decision ever! It was a beautiful, clear day in San Fran, and the bridge was just like I imagined it'd look. I can now cross off the life to do list driving across the GGB! We drove to a look out point on the other side, and I proceeded to take a million pics of the GGB. I will only post a few here. I didn't get a pic with Sarah in front of the bridge because she was tending to a very sleepy/hungry Andy. It was also Andy's first time to see the GGB!

Driving across

San Francisco!

Alcatrez

Andy slept through the drive over the bridge.

After taking a bajillion photos, we drove back to Mountain View.

That night we went to a BBQ at a friend of Sarah and Michael's house. The guy was very nice and opened his house up warmly to us. We met a lot of Sarah and Michael's friends that night and had a really good time. The house was located across the street from Stanford, so that was really neat to see!

Afterwards, we headed back to their house and crashed!

The next day, my flight was early, so they dropped me off at the airport, and I said my goodbyes. I was very sad, but I know I'll hopefully see them again soon! Thank you Sarah and Michael (and Andy) and Candice for an absolutely wonderful Labor Day weekend.

California ... Day 2

Sunday! This day was a chill day, and it was much needed after our 12 hour marathon in San Fran.

We started the day off with a wonderful church service at Sarah and Michael's church. Afterwards, we packed up a picnic and went to The Ridge Winery for a lovely picnic. The Ridge is as it name implies, on top of a ridge. It has amazing views of Northern Cali though. This girl is a bit afraid of heights so the drive up was spent with my eyes closed, but I did enjoy the view when we made it to the top. We enjoyed some lovely vino and lunch and walked around the property. Perfect weather that day.

The man, the legend, Andy Bloem.

He loves his Aunt SB

He loves this ball more :)

The view from the picnic table.

The view from the very top.

Wine and Chocolate.

Michael and Candice

Adore them.

Sara/h's (we have the same initials now - SMB)

Love this family.

After the picnic, we headed back to Sarah and Michael's house and hung out the remainder of the day. I took a 3 mile run around their neighborhood, we read, chatted, and just enjoyed each other's company. That night Michael grilled some pork chops, and we of course, drank some more vino. It was a fab day!

Tomorrow - Day 3 Cali with a stop at the Golden Gate Bridge and In-n-Out.

California...at last (Day 1)

Well - I finally got my photos uploaded on Sunday while watching the Cowboys lose (so sad). I'll break my wonderful trip to Northern Cali into two (maybe three) posts, as most pics were taken in San Fran and will make for a mighty long post today. So bear with me...

Friday:

I flew from the dirty H to San Fran. On my flight, as chance would have it, I sat next to a woman whose daughter graduated from the same high school I did, only 9 years later. Wow, I felt old in that moment. So, we chatted a lot on the flight, and I sipped from my vodka cranberry and watched Letters to Juliet.

I arrived in San Fran to cool temperatures. I always love that feeling of stepping off a plane and its 30 degrees colder than it was when you stepped on the plane. Ah lovely.

I was picked up by Sarah and Candice (two of my wonderful college roomies) and we headed to Mountain View, CA, which is just south of San Fran. We picked up some Thai food on the way home, and arrived to a table fully set and lots of wine poured by Sarah's hubby Michael. We ate, drank, and chatted for a while! It was so good to be around these girls again.

Sarah and Michael had a baby boy in May. His name is Andrew Charles Bloem. He is adorable. I unfortunately did not get to meet him that first night, but definitely made up for it the remainder of the trip!

Saturday - San Fran Day!

We woke up bright and early. Michael made us a breakfast of Pancakes and Bacon which were yummy. I finally met Andy. He was as awesome as I imagined. We dressed him in a Baylor onesie, because he is a Baylor Bear fan (of course), I believe Michael changed him out of it after we left for San Fran into a Michigan onesie, Andy told us later that he was offended ;)

We headed into San Fran, right into some classic San Fran fog, which made it almost impossible to see the Golden Gate bridge that day (more on that later).

Our first stop was the Ferry Building for a Farmer's Market that is held there every Saturday morning. And man, it was massive. So much fresh fruit and veggies and meat and flowers. I loved every minute of it, and I'm sure if I lived in the city I would go every Saturday!




Ferry Building - which after having seen it and now subsequently watched movies set in San Fran, its in a lot of those movies.

At the farmers market, in front of the bay bridge.

Lots of people at the farmer's market.


After the farmer's market, we headed down to Pier 39 and Fisherman's Wharf, which was tourist central. Pier 39 was fun, but reminded me a lot of Kemah. We picked a restaurant that looked like it had good food (which it did) and ate there, and waited to meet up with a couple of friends (Jae and Aaron) who were visiting San Fran that weekend also.



After lunch, we walked around Fisherman's Wharf, and then walked up to Ghirardelli. I'm not a chocolate lover. I prefer fruit flavored candy, but I somehow managed to buy a plethora of chocolate at Ghirardelli, go figure. Along the way, we saw Alcatrez (which when I return to San Fran I fully intend on visiting!) and we also saw some seals hanging out on the dock (of the bay). Which we all thought were really cool, but apparently looking at seals all the time makes you pretty ambivalent to their presence (cough - candice - cough).

From there, we decided to not wait in the line for the trolley to take us up to Lombard St (the windy road street), and instead chose to walk up a massive hill to see it ourselves. Man, was it a climb, but did manage to get some good views of the city and bay out of it.

Once we reached the top, we took some obligatory photos (see above and below), and then walked down Lombard St. There is a massive line of cars waiting to drive down this street. All I could think about was the people who actually lived off of this street, and what they must go through on a daily basis to just get in and out of their own garages. No thanks. At this point, after walking up the steep hill, and then walking down a steep hill, my legs were in full shake mode. I'm glad I didn't fall, although the thought of curling up in a ball and rolling down the hill did cross my mind.

At the top of Lombard St.



Looking up at Lombard St.

 After our treacherous climb down (jk), we headed back to get Sarah's car from Pier 39. Along the way though, we found some trolley's empty, and the driver allowed us to take some photos with the trolley. So we did. I tried to be "too cool" to take the photos on the trolley, but my too coolness was interrupted by the lifetime memories I could make :)



Aftering getting back to Sarah's car, we headed to the other side of San Fran, and drove past the Full House houses.

And, we drove through Haight-Ashbury, and stopped for coffee there for a little while. It was getting pretty cold in San Fran and the fog never really lifted.

After coffee, we headed to Chinatown for dinner. Before dinner, we stopped in at the Golden Gate Fortune Cookie Factory, which was located in an ally. Thanks to my gps on my phone, we were able to locate the right ally, and all purchased some cookies. I paid $.50 to take the picture below, well worth it -

We had dinner in Chinatown, and then dropped Jae and Aaron off at their fab hotel, and we headed back to Mountain View.

I definitely got in a full days worth of sightseeing that day, and saw a lot of San Fran in one visit. I can't wait to go back though!