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September 30, 2007
Back in Business
So, I'm back from Cali and was back at work mid-week. Between being sick and playing catch up at the office, I'm just getting caught up with "me" stuff. (Like sleep, laundry, doing dishes, blogging. Okay - so I haven't gotten to the laundry yet.)
Cali was fantastic. SteveKam and I woke up at 4am a couple of Saturdays ago and made our way to our plane, where we joined our friends Dan and Tara for a lovely 6 hour flight cross country.
We spent our first evening in San Jose, visiting with SteveKam's brother Dave and his fiancee Nina. They were both super nice and despite a wicked case of jet lag late in the evening, we had a blast hanging out and playing video games with them.
The next day we drove up to Palo Alto for lunch with my BFF, Danielle. She took a break from her crazy busy life as a first year res at Stanford to have a margarita and some tacos with us. It was great to see her - she looks fantastic! California is definitely agreeing with her. I've never seen someone who's working 80 hours a week look so good!
After lunch, SteveKam and I climbed back into our rental (we had a Kia and I loved that sucker!) and made our way up to Healdsburg to meet up with the rest of the gang for our Wine Country adventure. And what a few days we had up there! I fell in love with that part of the state... I had never spent any real time in that area, so it was a real treat for me! We spent Monday touring wineries in the Dry Creek area in Sonoma County. Again... I'd never been wine tasting, so this was new. :) I could reeeeally get used to spending my weekends this way.
On Tuesday, a couple of the braver gals joined me for a trip to Calistoga for mud baths at Doctor Wilkinson's. This was an EXPERIENCE. It was amazing. When you walk into the bath area in the back, you feel like you've traveled back to 1955. You spend the next 3 hours naked. In mud, in a mineral bath, in a steam room, in a big blanket, and then finally during a 30 minute massage. Again... I could get used to this. I think everyone should give this a go! I can't wait until I'm back in Cali to get another tub.
Tuesday was one of my very favorite days of the trip... After the mud bath, I took a nap with SteveKam for about an hour and then we walked around taking pictures before dinner.
Dinner was an amazing cookout at the house and the wine flowed freely. 80's music was blasted and dancing ensued. You can follow the evening's events through the eyes of a certain dinner guest here.
The next morning, my fella and I left lovely Healdsburg (*sniff sniff*) and headed down to San Francisco for a day in the city! We spent most of our time on Fisherman's Wharf ogling the sea lions at Pier 39. We grabbed lunch and did a little shopping, before taking a nice long walk through Chinatown to hit Artfibers before it closed. (Have I mentioned how awesome my boyfriend is? He went to a yarn shop with me! And he didn't even mind! Sigh.) We had a nice dinner in Little Italy and hit the sack early - all that walking took it out of us!
We woke up bright and early on Thursday to start down the coast to Santa Cruz. We decided to drive down Route 1 so we could get our beach fix. :) We stopped like every 5 minutes. I loved it.
We ended up getting into Santa Cruz in the early afternoon and after checking in at the hotel and grabbing a bite, we decided to take a drive up to Big Basin State Park to see some big ol redwood trees. We had a great time feeling very small.
That night, we went out for sushi at a place called Pink Godzilla in Capitola. YUM. My favorite treat of the evening was roll with tuna, avocado and macadamia nuts. But my favorite part of the night? Watching SteveKam eat raw tuna for the first time! The verdict? "It's not bad. It's okay. Kinda weird." Good enough for me! I love the fact that he's always willing to experiment - even if he ends up hating it, who cares? A lot of people won't venture outside what they know, so it's a big deal to me that he's willing to try new things. Just hooray.
Well, hooray until later that evening.
I started feeling a little funny later that evening... but it was when I tried to go to bed that I really started to feel strange. My back was killing me and I started to have a tummy ache. As I lay there trying to fall asleep, my head started to pound.... Not good. But, I have a really sensitive stomach and when I travel, I often get wicked stomachaches and the like - especially when I spend a lot of time in the car. So, I chalked it up to travel and after a little discomfort, I was able to fall asleep.
The next morning? I tried to make it out to breakfast with my honey, but once I was in the car it was clear that it was going to be a no go. I felt TERRIBLE. My lower back was killing me and a fever came on fast and furious. I crawled back into the hotel bed as SteveKam told me that he thought I should go to the hospital. In typical Sarah fashion, I informed SteveKam that I was perfectly FINE and that I just needed to stay in bed and drink a lot of water and my "stomachache" would go away. I was determined not to ruin the last day in Cali for both of us. Bad enough that I would be in bed all day, I explained to him, no reason he should suffer the same fate. It took about an hour, but I finally forced him out the door so he could meet up with the guys for their big mountain bike adventure they had planned.
I spent the day moaning and rolling around the hotel bed. And not in the way I would have liked to - especially on vacation.
I managed to eat a salad at dinnertime and though I was slow moving, I thought for sure I was on the mend. Turns out I was wrong. I didn't sleep a wink Friday night and it was around 6am on Saturday when SteveKam was awoken for the gazillionth time by my flailing about when he said "That's it." After one more round of "I'll be fine.", I finally conceded that it was time to go to the hospital. I didn't feel good and it wasn't getting any better.
Well, good thing SteveKam finally wore me down. Turned out I had a kidney infection and was severely dehydrated. After a 3 hour visit to the ER, we were on our way, antibiotics in hand.
We missed our flight and JetBlue wouldn't help us out in any meaningful way. They wanted $400 to let us fly home the next day! Well, hindsight's 20/20 because if I knew then what I know now... I would have paid anything they wanted.
We took the red eye Saturday night and it was the worst ordeal of my life. I won't tell the whole sordid tale here, but let's just say that fainting, vomiting and vomiting post fainting were all involved. It was Hell. And poor SteveKam stayed awake the entire flight to make sure I didn't repeat the vomiting post fainting. It wasn't good.
It took my a few more days to get back on my feet. Honestly, today was the first time I really felt like myself again. Phew. But, after checking in with my regular doc a couple of times this week, I am finally in the clear! My kidney's all better and no one can tell my why it happened in the first place. It's a mystery.
But, no matter! I still rate the trip 9 stars out of 10. The good was so good that it made up for the terrible ending. I was nervous about taking a real vacation with SteveKam, as I've never travelled like that with a boyfriend before... But, he was the greatest traveling companion anyone could ever ask for. We had a blast together - but in the end, he carried my sick ass all the way from California to Connecticut. And continued to take care of me when we got back home. What can I even say? He was incredible and I owe him ... like a million.
It's all good. :)
The full array of vacation photos can be perused here if you are interested. Commentary is included. Tee hee.
Posted by Sarah at 6:56 PM | Comments (4)
September 24, 2007
And We're Back.
And we're sick.
Typing is hard. Once I'm back on my feet, I'll fill everyone in on our trip to Cali. In short: 85% Gloriously Fantastic, 15% Not So Much (but, at least that 15% was at the end).
You'll get the dirt and a ridiculous amount of photos before too long. Promise.
Now... back to my bed. It has never looked or felt so good before. :)
Posted by Sarah at 12:47 PM | Comments (2)
September 14, 2007
Later, Gator.
SteveKam and I are off to Cali-forn-I-A.
See ya in a week!
(If I come back.)
(Well, if I don't come back, I can't live without the innernets anyhow... so you'll hear about how I didn't come back.)
Woo!
Posted by Sarah at 8:30 PM | Comments (0)
September 8, 2007
Mo-Mo-Mo-Mo-Mosaic!
So, a couple of weeks ago, MH organized Mosaic Day for the Scissor Squad. A bunch of us congregated (why do I keep using that word? I guess I like it a lot this week... weird.) in Michelle's garage on a 95 degree Saturday afternoon to smash up plates with mallets and hammers and glue them to other stuff.
'Twas fun and educational! Mary will be posting about the get-together itself over at the Squad website. But, I'll use my blog to pour over my trials, tribulations and eventually my TRIUMPH over the art of mosaic.
My supplies included a variety of fabulous 70's dishes (yellows, browns, oranges mainly) I purchased in a big ol thrift shop and a fancy little round table I found at the same place!
It took me about 4.5 hours to smash my plates and mortar them to the top of my table.... wow! It was a lot more painstaking than I had expected. I shouldn't have been surprised, though - 50% of my "creative" little brain is under the tyrannical rule of an obsessive-compulsive, type A nutjob. (The other 50% has left a stoned hippie in charge... nothing gets done over there, but everyone is so happy!)
Given the mental energy exerted in placing all my plate pieces exaaaaactly where I wanted them to be (it was like a puzzle once I got started!), I decided to hold off on grouting the piece. This delighted SteveKam, who suggested we find some color coordinated grout to make the project really pop.
First stop - Lowe's! I bought a small container of what claimed to be grout and went home with a trunk full of tools borrowed from SteveKam for my grouting adventure.
Once I got started, I called my main squeeze to get some insight into what the correct consistency for this "grout" was supposed to be... "Seems a lot like wet sand to me..." I said to him. "Well, hmm... I guess that's about right.... The package did say it was sanded grout....", he responded. We discussed it a bit and decided I should go for it.
Here we see some progress shots....
Well, I was pretty thrilled when it was all over... I still felt something was a wee bit off since it really did just feel like wet sand between the cracks of my mosaic.... but, I sponged off the excess and decided to let it sit overnight. What did I awake to?
Sand. Dry sand. This was no mosaic. It was a beach party without the party.
SteveKam and I scratched our noggins... He concluded it must have been something with the grout - it must have needed an additional component... but he had never worked with grout like that before! (Of course... only I can break grout. Like.. did you think that was even possible? Lord.)
But, luckily, dry sand is a breeze to get rid of. We took the table outside and dumped it all out. A quick swab with a towel and the table was back to it's original pre-beach state.
Second stop - The Home Depot! Where we purchased some real sanded grout in a lovely tan-ish color.
Here we see my second attempt - this time in SteveKam's garage so I would have professional help in a snap, should something go awry... again.
Here she is all finished up and sitting pretty in my living room!
I plan on doing the same thing to the second tier of the table... but since I used all my dishes, I'll have to do some thrift store shopping before Round 2 can begin!
ps - keep those party ideas comin!
Posted by Sarah at 11:53 AM | Comments (9)
September 7, 2007
The Final Countdown
Well... not the FINAL countdown. But doesn't that song kick ass?
Today marks the beginning of the last month of my Twenties. One month from today, I will hit the big Three Oh.
How's about THEM apples?
I had all these crazy plans for things I wanted to accomplish before I turned thirty... get a tattoo, learn to surf, get my scuba certification, and OH YEAH - go back to school and form some sort of career. Well.... it's starting to look like I might miss my deadline. Haha.
I'm not really all that stressed out about it, though. Truth is I am pretty happy with my life at the moment. There are some things I want to work on - career and location being the two biggest targets - but, I can't complain about what I've done with my time. Sometimes you get lazy... you get in a rut... you don't get as much done as you had planned. That's life. You need ruts and laziness to balance it all out. Because, admit it - you know those people that never take a break? They never stop working their asses off, never take their eye off "the ball"? You know the ones - people whose hard work results in astounding success and satisfaction beyond their wildest dreams?
I hate those people. Effing robots.
I'm sometimes incredibly lazy and you know what? It's my favorite flaw about myself. It's also why I am 29.917 years old and living in a crap apartment making peanuts at a job I don't exactly heart anymore.
So, there's room for improvement.... Meh.
This really wasn't meant to be a bitch session... where the hell was I going with this?
OH YEAH. So, I turn 30 next month and want to have a big party but have no money. I was thinking of maybe just telling everyone I like to meet me at a bar... Seems kinda lackluster, but I'm sure it would be more fun than it sounds.
The original plan (a la 2006 when I started thinking about this....) was to have everyone congregate somewhere and have fire eaters and belly dancers and basically just hold a little mini-Burning Man in my honor. Well... the logistics... they killed me. So, we're back to Square One.
Anyone have any suggestions? Truthfully, Mary and Heather are supposed to be organizing this... but I know it's a big task and your ideas will help them - and me - and possibly YOU if you are a friend reading this blog and within driving distance of Danbury, CT....
Man. Fire eaters would have been so cool. Damnit.
Posted by Sarah at 10:40 AM | Comments (6)
September 6, 2007
Photo-mo-ography
Not much to report today, so I thought I'd share some of my favorite photos from this past week. I've taken to carrying my camera around with me everywhere again. (I don't really know how I got out of this habit... but let's not allow it to happen again.)
ps - Mary, I know I've been tagged for that meme... For some reason, coming up with 7 random things about myself felt like work. So, I'm putting it off 'till tomorra. ;)
Posted by Sarah at 10:47 PM | Comments (4)
September 3, 2007
Blue Sky Hat
So, I finished this just in time for my trip to Maine back in July, but due to my now infamous lack of motivation to photograph and blog, you haven't heard about it till now.
I had my eye on this pattern for a while, but it wasn't until I stopped into my new local quilt shop (!!) that I found some fabric worthy of the effort.
Pattern: Blue Sky Hat by Amy Butler
Fabric: 100% cotton green/white print (Newtown Quilts!) and cotton duckcloth (Joann Fabric)
Pattern Notes: I really loooooove Amy Butler's detailed approach to pattern writing. When this was completed, I really felt that I created something that looked professionally made! And it was entirely thanks to Amy's attention to a few key details and a little care on the seamstress' part. Since I was planning on using my hat to protect me from the sun while paddling, I planned ahead and included two straps to tie in the front.... in case of wind! After all this work, the last thing I wanted was to see this bonnet floating downstream! Once finished, I sprayed the whole thing with 3 coats of Scotch-Guard to make it water-resistant and easier to clean. The result? My legs may have been a bright shade of fiery red, but my face was sunburn-free thanks to my smart little sun hat. :)
Super mega thanks to my personal photographer, SteveKam. He snapped these while we were out at Holcombe Wildlife Preserve on a perfect Sunday afternoon.
Posted by Sarah at 3:31 PM | Comments (4)