As today is Monday, I’m in a gripy (gripey?) mood, so unfortunately anyone who happens to read this will have to listen to me and my indignant, whiny tone.
First issue, which I had to see on my walk to work (which I’ve been trying to do every day if the dog doesn’t delay me too much, but the downside is I somehow rationalize out a visit to the gym), has to do with women’s fashion. One of my friend’s status messages said something to the effect that no woman has every looked good in leggings, which I thought about and categorically disagreed with – I like sweater dresses with leggings, and it’s the same as tights. Then, I got in the elevator with, no doubt, one of the many fashion students whose parents put them up in our building, and she had on metallic leggings and a cropped jacket (along with 4 inch stilettos). Umm, when did we decide that we could wear leggings NOT with shirts/dresses that covered our butts? I mean this girl could pull it off – I wish I looked like that from behind, but how do you get around the front camel-toe issue? Also, girl-I-saw-outside-the-café-this-morning, you should really look into solving any VPL issues before deciding that you should wear leggings with nothing covering your bum – or at least choose something that doesn’t look like you are wearing granny-panties under your skin-tight leggings.
Second issue, and this one really bothers me, because my entire family does a watered-down version of it. Why do people who have no idea what they are talking about insist on making random statements and then asserting they are right? If you are going to ask me for help with the pagination of your Excel worksheet, and I say I can’t find the option to not paginate the first page, and that it might not be in my ancient version, don’t assert that you know it’s there – it’s annoying.
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Note to self: watch where your finger is tapping while you are telling your husband he's a goofball (note: the iPhone insists goofball is plural).
We're on our way to Atlantic City to meet up with Mr. D's parents. His friend A was supposed to come, but apparently placed some wagers on some sporting events that did not work out too well.
The ACES train is nice, though testosterone laden - I expect with bachelor parties. Speaking of, we were at dinner last night when R (of R&J, getting married in two weeks) asked if our trip to AC was just a ruse covering for his bachelor party. Slightly awkward when we had to tell him we weren't.
Thank you Starbucks manager who oh-so-efficiently comes to each person in line to take their order before they go to the register. Thank you Starbucks manager, who, once this little lady realized she had left her wallet at work the night before and tried to cancel her order, decided to let her have it for free – and upsize it!!!!
The uplifting caffeinated drink was definitely needed after last night’s devastating football game in which the Buffalo Bills lost and my husband gave the dog the fright of her life with his scream of agony – and then she proceeded to have what I interpreted as nightmares for the first hour after I went to bed.
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Walking to work was so much easier (and faster) after I remembered to put on tennis shoes this morning, instead of the usual flip flops. Tennis shoes and a print skirt did look rather ridiculous, and I may have to invest in a new pair of tennis shoes (sans bite marks on the heel) before I wear them outside of our building’s gym. I did have to remember to put them in my rolling ottoman, as we are not allowed to place objects on the floor. ;)
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OMG – We had a birthday today, and instead of the usual Whole Foods cupcakes – the icing is a positively perfect mix of sugar and buttercream icing – we had Whole Foods cookie cake. YUMMMM. It’s the size of a dinner plate, has a border of said perfect icing, and was only $3.49!!!
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Mr. D recently decided to institute a few practices to help him “maintain his figure.” The first of which is that he has decided that he is going to cut back on his alcoholic intake. Usually, Mr. D would have a cocktail or two in the evenings after dinner, or the two of us would split a bottle of wine. I never really thought about it, but we were having an adult beverage probably 5 nights a week. Once we thought about it, I felt bad, but not once we started talking to coworkers, some of who have cocktails then split at least a bottle of wine. So, Mr. D, and I, his faithful companion have both decided that we would try to cut down the adult beverages to three nights a week. Since then, we’ve been pretty good about it, though we have had to make allowances. For instance, I knew that three would not be feasible for the first week, as we had a dinner at our house, another dinner out, and two work events, but we’ve been fairly good since then.
The second part of his plan is that he has started walking to and from work, which is one big block and ten little blocks away (read 1.2 miles), but it doesn’t usually take him much longer than it would for him to take the subway. Since the weather has been so nice, I decided that I should try to walk to work one day, even though my office is considerably farther (read 2.2 miles). Friday was a particularly lovely day, and I felt I had gorged on ice cream sandwiches at work the day before (two office birthdays in one week equals cupcakes and ice cream sandwich overload), I decided to walk to work. The walk took me around 40 minutes, and I still had time to stop at Starbucks for an iced coffee (which was also rationalized away by the walk, I realized two things: 1) walking with traffic lights takes a little longer than just normal walking, and 2) I’ve been right all along – elliptical machines do not track the actual distance you “run,” because if I can walk more than 2 miles in 40 minutes, it certainly doesn’t take me 28 minutes to “run” a mile. Ha, so there, elliptical manufacturers.
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A month ago, when we made reservations to have dinner on our anniversary, M (now to be known as Mr. D, because having two M’s (him and me) is too confusing in my head) and I discussed whether or not we would exchange anniversary presents. This hasn’t really come up before, as obviously, this is our first wedding anniversary, and prior to getting married, we weren’t really sure when our anniversary would be, just that it was sometime around Memorial Day the year we met, so we would talk about it in April and decide on a day, and usually just have dinner.
Since we had decided on a very nice (read expensive) restaurant for our dinner, we decided to not exchange presents – until yesterday morning (anniversary is Sunday). Whilst I am happily munching on cereal and watching Squawk Box, Mr. D decides that we should exchange presents, of the traditional sort, meaning that as it is our first anniversary, it should be along the “paper” theme. So not fair. At work, I email him for a spending limit, which is sizably more than me writing him a poem, but not high enough for me to worry about receive “paper” jewelry (which would show me up, which is almost always the goal), but I confirm that he did have something in mind when he proposed this plan, but had not actually purchased it. Then, 15 minutes later I received an update that I didn’t need to worry about getting it to the house for Sunday, because his gift for me would not arrive until later.
Of course, I emailed my sister for some ideas, but that turned up short, with ideas ranging from stationary to poems (which would not be received well) to a family crest (meh?). Throughout the course of the day, I went back and forth between a book (on cocktails), a framed print, and something based on a picture of us and or the dog from the Kodak store,* finally settling on a framed print of a vintage liquor advertisement when I got home.
Now, when I emailed Ree for the advice, I requested that she not inform our mother, as I would not appreciate her contributions. Sure enough, that evening Mom emailed me with her suggestion, which was a print of a landscape of Greece (honeymoon locale). This is why I did not want her chiming in, because Mr. D and I bought a canvas of the cheesy sunset (that we may have only had put on a stretcher a week ago) while we were on our honeymoon. I immediately emailed Ree and told her that I was going to tell Mom that she (Ree) was thinking of getting pregnant (that’ll teach her). Apparently, it took my mom no more than 30 seconds to send out an email when she heard of my plight. Sigh. I guess that will be helpful if I ever actually have an email emergency.
*Note – KodakGallery actually has a very cute idea on their site. You can take a photo and have it printed onto a pillowcase. Before I decided that the gift would underwhelm Mr. D, I briefly thought of taking a picture of Sasha on top of the sheet set, then printing onto the pillowcase, so it would look like she was ALWAYS sitting there, and not just right after we wake up.
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I really think my dog is crazy – in a cute way. Yesterday, I woke up, took a shower, and went back in the bedroom to wake up M and the dog. Sasha woke up and proceeded to talk to us for at least five minutes. It was pretty hilarious – she just wouldn’t stop her little half-howling noise, and then she just started pacing up and down the bed while she did it. The best part is that if you say something to her, she stops for a second, and then keeps going, as if she thinks she’s having a conversation with you. Then when you sit up, she trots past you and plops down right across your pillow. Brat.
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We had a great time back in H-town over the Fourth weekend, once the weekend got started. I can’t imagine what the weather in New York is doing to the “on-time” status for the airlines – our flight got pushed back two hours, so we would up getting in around 12:30 am instead of 11:30 pm. Our plane’s tardiness wasn’t that big of a deal as “night-owl” Dad came and picked us up, or let me say the man who thinks he is a night owl because he wakes up at 2 am and finds himself in the living room. Same man is barely coherent and near-sleep the entire ride home - why did my parents not get my younger sister to pick us up?
The next morning, we played golf, and the next and the next (OK - so I begged out on Saturday, but I did play two of the three). The hubs managed to play all three days, even though the heat index was around 105 each day. Spending four hours in the sun is not so bad, as long as you wear sunscreen and don't mind the enormous headache you have for the rest of the day. :)
We did manage to get our tex-mex in, though we had to do a bit of finagling to convince my mom to change the meal plan (read as my sister, ReeRee, calling and telling her that M and I really wanted tex-mex, so why didn't she save the steaks until after we left). Yumm - and we managed to have crawfish too, because D and ReeRee threw a Fourth of July bbq/crawfish boil. The party was great, all the family that was in town came over to ReeRee's house, so we even got to see my cousin's new baby.
Tomorrow we head off on what will be, no doubt, a harrowing journey back to Texas for the holiday weekend. Harrowing because our flight is at 8:15 pm, and like almost every other day since April, we are expecting rain tomorrow afternoon, not just rain, but thunderstorms. So much for an on time departure. While I am looking forward to seeing the entire family (one is in from college, the other returning from a study course, and the last is throwing a party for the whole, whole family on the 4th), the dilemma forming in my mind is whether to get tex-mex or bbq while in town.
Honestly, tex-mex should probably be the choice, as we won’t get back down to Texas until Thanksgiving, but we were just in Dallas for a wedding and had some delicious Pappasito chips and queso and fajitas at the wedding (yumm). **By the way, I recently learned that fajita actually refers to the cut of beef, not the food type, so beef fajitas is redundant, and apparently chicken fajitas don’t exist – weird, right? On the flip side, we haven’t had barbecue in a really long time. Now, you can get barbecue up here, but nothing is quite the same as the Texas barbecue I know and love. For the most part, people argue that true Texas barbecue should not have sauce, and is just smoked. I disagree, why would you not also put sauce on a brisket? There is one place that tries to imitate one of our favorites from Texas (starts with an R and ends in udy’s), but instead of one line for everything, there’s a line for meats, a line for sides, and then a line for drinks, which is the dumbest thing I have ever heard (we’ve only ordered takeout from them so far).
In the end, I think Tex-Mex will win, because just thinking of the queso makes me drool. Hopefully we’ll go to the place with the green salsa, because green salsa is really the best. J
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I know I’m really far behind, but I keep thinking about blogging about this day during the day, then realize I don’t have the menu, then when I get home, I’ve been either running around doing things (or watching the ever important finale of whatever is on tv that night). Two months is quite long enough, though, so I need to get this out post-haste.
The day was pretty structured, as M had made reservations for a 2-hour tour of Stags’ Leap Winery, which we were excited about, as we had seen the movie Bottleshock, and thought it would be interesting to go to the vineyard where they created the wine that beat the French wines, and also excited as you had to make a reservation for the tour, since space was limited. Finding the winery was a little difficult, as it is down a private road and the directions included things like, take the left fork in the road. We wound up at our destination, which turned out to be a house, a manor house, as we later found out. The tour was very small, one other group of four (a dad, mom, and a couple) showed up. We started with the tasting, during which we learned that we were not at the vineyard that created the winning wine – that was Stag’s Leap Cellars, which is denoted by the apostrophe-s, not the s-apostrophe, but that the winery we were at was the oldest in the stag’s leap district, which used to formulate the name, and that the owners of the two had been friendly, even while suing each other over naming rights. During the tour, we learned all about the winery, which was only turned into a winery relatively recently, but had been the site of a resort and a speakeasy during prohibition.
Despite the fact that the tour was interesting, we still felt like we had been “tricked” into going to the wrong vineyard, so we decided to stop by the “real Stag’s Leap.” The drive to the vineyard was very short, and they had some picnic tables out front, so we pulled out our lunch supplies that we had purchased the day before (bread, cheese, and spinach artichoke dip) and had a picnic. Since we didn’t have advance notice, we weren’t able to go on a tour, but we did taste some excellent wines. We were feeling like we wanted to take a nap, and maybe visit the pool, so we headed back to our hotel before our big night at FRENCH LAUNDRY.
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Today, I got to talk to Dennis Leary! To clarify, he lives in the building where I work, and no I won’t tell you where, because we are now BFF and that would betray his trust (ha!). We are not nearly BFF, as a matter of fact, I tried not to say anything, because we are convinced that he thinks everyone in our office is crazy and stalking him (though – is it our fault that his driver parks right outside our office and DL (see, BFF nicknames) walks right in front of our windows every time he leaves. It is a bit much that one of us (not me, really) waves at him every time - and that I may help that person by pointing out when he leaves the building.
Anywho, I saw him in the lobby as I was headed upstairs to take care of a few things (we have an office upstairs and down), so I held the elevator as he was coming up (there's construction this week, so they are particularly slow). I felt a little embarrassed, due to attention our office give him in general, so I tried to play it cool. You know, the "you're just another guy in the building, so it would be weird to speak in the elevator, so I'm going to look at the papers in my file folder" bit. Then he spoke to me.
DL: "It smells nice in here." me: "Yes, I was just telling C (the doorman) that it smells lemony - he must have just cleaned it" DL: "Yes, it smells like fake lemons" me: "yes"
All in all, a very deep and memorable conversation, well, maybe not, but at least I was not a total blithering idiot, which is an accomplishment in itself.
I really am, and while I'll bet back to posting about the Napa trip soon (note: anyone who knows me knows that I tell stories terribly, so it is no surprise that underwear should come up in the middle of a story about our vacation), I thought I should share that I finally have what my husband thinks are "appropriate" underwear, they should probably actually be called the "p word." I don't like saying it, and it makes me want to giggle when I hear it. Anyway, for the past, let's say 5 years, I've been a fan of the VS Pink line, and worn only a specific style of their underwear, unless I needed for something to not show under a dress/skirt. Needless to say, sometimes they look silly - the patterns are clearly made for people in high school/college, and I have not been in either of those for a long time, but they are comfy (though not granny-ish-- TMI warning - I don't wear a thong maybe twice a month). For whatever reason, I think that my choice in underwear really bothered (and I don't mean that it was keeping him up at night, but it certainly has been mentioned several times, casually). Then, we were in San Francisco (oh, wait, I did tie it into the trip) Mark wanted to go to this one men's store (more later), but even though it was open, the doors were locked, so he wanted to kill some time, so we went across the way to Victoria's Secret (note 1: yes the people in the other store clearly saw us go in there to kill time and saw us come out, which I thought was weird; note 2: there is no way M would have gone into VS with or without me unless he was in desperate need of medical attention and they had the only emergency phone). We walked around and I stopped at a "panty" (see, you giggled) table, and he immediately teased me about my current selection of undergarments. Anyway, a couple of weeks or so ago VS was having one of their "sales" online, so I went ahead and bought a whole stack of new undergarments, which means that I will have to donate my old ones to goodwill (not really, I would never do that, but when we were little, we had a neighbor who brought some hand-me-downs over to our house and there were underwear in the bag - so weird!!). I didn't replace all of the underwear, a) I have a lot of pairs and b) it is a recession, which means that I may not have all grown-up lady underwear, but at least I've increased the average age of the drawer. :)
We left Vegas and flew to San Francisco and drove from the airport up to Napa, in time for my birthday present, which was a massage for the two of us (I thought that a relaxing massage in Vegas may have gone to waste if we then lost all of our money). We (and by we, I mean I) found a place to have them at SpaFinder – which turned out to be a lovely little storefront inside a strip center in Napa. The spa was very soothing, M and I sat in the waiting area with magazines and cucumber water while we waited for our masseuses to retrieve us.
The couples massage was actually a little odd – we had two masseuses with two very different philosophies of massage. Mine was a small, spunky woman in her sixties, and M’s was an average-sized woman in her mid thirties. Mine prefaced the massage by saying I should tell her if anything hurt, M’s did not. Mine was bending and contorting my body to stretch it in ways it had never been stretched, M’s did not. Mine gave me an exuberant scalp massage (read: crazy, Medusa-like hair with lotion in it), M’s did not. Mine definitely crossed the boundaries into the painful, while M’s did not. All in all, I felt very relaxed, though the next day I was a little sore. M was not as impressed, though I don’t know what I should have expected.
As we left, my masseuse ran out the door to catch us and ask us where we were going to dinner. We were glad that she did, as we had no idea, and were just going to ask at the hotel. She told us to head to the Rutherford Grill, and that it had the best food in town (well, in Rutherford). We checked it out on our phone web pages, and we saw that it was owned by the same people that own Houston's. We guessed that we could do worse, but that at least someone had recommended it. Dinner was pretty good - all the food was locally inspired and they had local wines, so all in all a good way to start the trip.
In my own passive-aggressive way, the last post was a way to bring the whole situate to a head. If she was truly reading it, she could respond, or write me an email, or call me, or just not talk to me for a while. :) I did receive an email, and I thought that (in another act of passive-aggressiveness, to check to see if she had actually stopped reading) I could post her response. I have actually not created a monster, I have created a martyr, as evidenced by the email below, which was sent to my siblings:
"Even though it is in the public domain, M has asked that I not read her blog. I am stifling her blogging muse, so to speak, so I must delete the link in deference to her literary urges.......I wonder if I have to ignore M's (the hubs) blog??????? hahhahahahahahaha"
I apologize for the radio silence, I've been facing somewhat of a dilemma. I still haven't reached an answer, so we'll throw it out for opinions. I started posting about our trip out west, and was planning to be better about posting, until I talked to my mom. In her characteristically devious (see the post about the m&m's at the wedding) she slipped into the conversation the fact that she has been reading my blog. Hmm. Yes, I write these posts and they're in the public domain, but I do have in mind a certain audience, and I know a few people who read it (AB, KL, MM (EW filled me in)), but it is not constructed for my mother. I know if I keep going as is, I'm going to censor myself, which is clearly not a good thing, but I don't want to stop the updates. Now what?
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I am so bad about blogging, but at least I am doing one now, right?Our trip was great, which was partially why I haven't written – it took forever for us to recover.We landed back in NYC at 9:30 pm, back to the apartment by 11:00, then couldn't get to sleep until 2 or 3 because of the jet lag, then the apartment proceeded to be a mess for the rest of the week until Saturday, when we went into power clean mode to have J&R over for dinner that Saturday (dumb idea, maybe, but it did force us to get the suitcases out of the living room).
Vegas was awesome, we had gotten a discount at the hotel for our room, so our total stay was less than $100 for two nights at the Paris hotel.Even though we only had two nights, I feel like we managed to do Vegas "right."Upon arrival, we were informed that we had been "comped" a facial or stone massage for each of us, as we had a couples massage booked for Napa, which we couldn't cancel by that point.After grabbing lunch, we gambled a little at our hotel, and after losing some money, we checked to see if our room was ready and checked in we walked down the strip and wandered around Caesar's Palace and the Palazzo.After dark we wandered back to the Bellagio to watch the water fountain show, right across from our hotel, which was great – I didn't realize that it's different for each song that they play when the fountain is running.We gambled a little there, then walked around trying to find dinner.We wound up at a noodle shop, where the food was delicious, but despite there being only 4 other tables, the service was horrible.Only one of our dishes came out first, and then not even with rice (which we had to order, since it was an extra charge).M nearly hit the fan, especially when our waiter disappeared during the whole fiasco.Luckily the soup was amazing, and that seemed to placate the hubs enough for us to leave without incident.
The next day, we woke up, played some blackjack, grabbed lunch, then came back to the hotel for our facials.I was excited, never having had a facial.I have decided I do not like them – why do I need someone to point out all of my skin flaws, rub collagen cream all through my hair (then tell me not to get my face wet for 24 hours), and try to sell me $160 face cream.Good thing it was free, especially as they were $180 each retail.We went upstairs and I stumbled through some semblance of washing my disgusting collagen-hair, then we walked back up the strip to the Wynn for dinner.
We arrived at the casino a little early, having given ourselves plenty of time so that we wouldn't be late for the show, so we hit the tables again.We sat down at a table with one other couple, then realized they were cashing out (oh no!).We were only at the table for 45 minutes or so, but we were up $150 between the two of us (I know – total high rollers), until this old man came up to the table and started playing not by the rules (when you're playing by the rules, or basic strategy, someone who is not playing by the rules can really screw up your cards).Unfortunately, he stood up to cash in just as we were getting up to head to dinner – even the dealer accused him of messing up our hands.
The restaurant was very nice, we had made reservations at the steakhouse, which overlooks an artificial waterfall that has a light show that goes off every few minutes.Every once in a while a GIANT frog sings "What a Wonderful World" from the top of the waterfall.Dinner was delightful – we ordered the rib-eye for two with hot peppers and onions – it was ginormous and so good (my mouth is watering just thinking about it).
The show we saw was "La Reve" which is by the Cirque du Soleil people, but not officially "by" them.It was crazy – the entire stage is a pool of water and everyone is running around in the water, then the floor sinks and they're swimming, then another tower would rise out of the water and they would jump off of it.Divers were jumping off of people hanging from the ceiling – it was crazy and beautiful and serene all at the same time.The only bummer was that I was fighting to stay awake after such a huge dinner, and afterwards we walked home and plopped into bed.
Next morning was our departure day, so we played cards for a while at our hotel.M had gone down early to play Pai Gow poker, which is a little less fun (in my opinion), but it's a slower burn on your cash reserves.He met me at the blackjack table, where I was entertaining two middle-aged and one more-than-middle-aged man.The key to getting comps is being the fun person at the table (which, if I say so myself, I am very good at doing, and M and I together make quite the pair).If you're having fun at the table, it is more likely that someone else will sit down with you or watch you plan and then sit down with you, which is what the casinos want.After winning back another $100 we got up to check-off the final box on our list, the buffet (our hotel was supposed to be one of the better ones).After waiting in line for 15-20 minutes, we got a table and started checking out the line. It was pretty good, but we must have timed it wrong – when we went through the line, almost all of the meats were overdone, but when we went back 15 minutes later, they looked much better.The highlight may have been the crepe bar for dessert – such a sucker I am for crepes. After lunch, our short time in Vegas was over, and we headed out on Virgin America (which is an odd, not bad, not good airline) to head to Napa.
Our couple-friends finally got engaged over the holidays, which is great, because we all knew it was going to happen, we were just waiting for him to propose. This weekend J asked me to go with her to Nicole Miller to check out wedding dresses. It is soooo much more fun to help someone else look for wedding dresses than to find your own. She found some pretty dresses, but I don't know that she found the one. I offered to go with her to David's Bridal, since she knows the style, she just hasn't found the exact one that she wants.
I'm currently on my own dress hunt - M and I have 5 weddings (that we know of, so far) this year - and only one down. My obvious problem (aside from getting time off for the cross-country treks) is that I need at least one dress (they're not all the same group of people, so I could get away with one for the summer ones). I tried an Ann Taylor number (green and yellow), but the waist was a touch too high. Then I thought I saw the perfect dress at j.crew over the weekend, a cute tie-front metallic linen dress. The dress looked crisp and sharp, and I could change it up with jewelry/shoes. I went back tonight to try it on, but all of the ones on the rack looked, well, disgruntled. The poor things were wrinkled and scrunched up, which translates into a fabulous entrance, then looking crumpled as soon as I stood up after the ceremony.
I never bloggered about what M and I did for Valentine's, which is probably extremely uninteresting to almost all of you. We actually wound up having two Valentine's dinners. We had decided that we were going to be trick the restaurants, and instead of going to a fancy place on Saturday, when they have their special, easy-to-prepare, feed-a-lot-of-people fast, Valentine's menus, we made a reservation for Aureole, one of our "we have to try this on a special day" places. The obvious plus side was that it was under-crowded, which I'm attributing to the economy and the over-crowdedness of Saturday. The downside was that we couldn't go all out on the alcohol side without regretting it at work the next day. The meal itself was amazing - we tried the 5 course tasting menu, and it wound up being more like 8 with the amuse bouche, the sorbet, and the fun truffles we got after dessert (and all ladies received a white chocolate pumpkin-coffee cake for breakfast). The amuse bouche was a take on sushi (I feel horrible that I waited to blog, for I do not remember the deliciousness of all the courses). Now for a description (all caps means I pulled it straight from the Aureole website).
First Course: JAPANESE HAMACHISASHIMI SEA URCHIN, CUCUMBER, YUZU CITRUS, BABY RED SHISO, HITACHINO BEER (this was amazing and my first time to have sea urchin - sooooooooogoood)
Second Course: POACHED FARM EGG WINTER BLACK TRUFFLE, WHITE CORN GRITS, PROSCIUTTO DI PARMA, TOMATO POWDER (clearly my favorite, it tasted like the most refined eggs benedict ever - except with grits!)
Third Course: hmm - all I remember was a delicious fish course, which had an unbelievable sauce
Fourth Course: PRIME NY STRIP LOIN with BARLEY GRAINS, PORCINI MUSHROOMS, CREAMED SPINACH, CARAMELIZED ONION JUS - (yumm, and surprising, since the spinach was pureed and painted onto the plate) Sorbet: GREEN APPLE-FENNEL GRANITE CARDAMOM CHANTILLY (so much better than it sounds - I promise)
Dessert: A delicious date cake
I need to take a break now, and tell you about our dinner the night of Valentine' s day in the next post.
This weekend is going to be somewhat of a long one. In preparation for Mark's recovery from having his wisdom teeth taken out and a weekend of soft foods, we bought groceries to make some soups we'd been wanting to make for ourselves (nothing fancy - potato & leek and split pea). Then, last night he decides that we need to make a soup, because otherwise, what is he going to have for lunch. I started to explain that he might not want to eat after surgery, but gave up after deciding that it would be easier if I didn't have to make dinner while taking care of him.
Nurse duty today started when I left work at lunch to pick him up at the doctor's office. When I got there he was still coming out from under sedation, so the nurse (or technician, or whatever) brought me back to sit with him while he came to. She handed me an ice pack to hold against his face to help with the swelling.
Aww, he looked so cute and helpless. For about ten minutes, then he started coming back to full consciousness, which meant that he noticed that someone was holding ice against his neck and pushed it down. As he drifted in and out for a few minutes, I kept putting it on and he would wake up and push it off. Well, whatever. Next thing you know, he's telling me (more garbling) that he's ready to go, but of course the nurse is nowhere to be found. A couple of minutes later, she comes by, checks to see if he can stand, and then sends us on our merry way.
We hail a cab and sit in midtown traffic until we get to the apartment, where it becomes urgent that I stop at the desk and get whatever package came that morning before we go upstairs. Once upstairs, M tells me hi is hungry, so I ask if he wants me to make him a smoothie. Luckily, all he wants is a pudding cup, so I give him his painkiller and antibiotic, then realize his mouth is still numb, so he's dribbling orange juice on his shirt, the sofa, and the floor. I grab a towel and set it near him, next to the comforter, and his pillow. Then I gather all the electronic accoutrement of a good recovery (xbox remote, tv remote, and plugged-in laptop) and arrange them strategically near him, along with dog treats in case he needed to bribe Sasha. I feel guilty, but rush to get back to work, just a little more than two hours after I left, which really isn't that bad.
I commiserated to one of my co-workers, whose husband must be like M, because she knew exactly what I was talking about. Taking care of M is great, until he's decided you've stopped taking care of him and are now nagging him, which is when he gets cranky. The crankiness will usually go away, but then the cranky line moves, I cross it, he gets cranky, and then I get annoyed and stop being helpful, which is seen as uncaring and witchy.
We usually close up shop early (between 4 and 5) on Fridays, so I got to come home after not being away for too long. He seems good so far, not in too much pain, though the xbox controller may have to have the battery pack switched out before too long. We've only crossed the cranky line once, but I was being a little to naggy, and he apologized, so we're off to a good start.
How long has it been since I've blogged? Too long, but really not much new to report. Not a whole lot going on here in NYC except snow, cold, and snow and cold mixed together.
Last weekend, we headed back to M's hometown for the wedding of one of his friends from high school. The wedding was lovely, very nice. We were a bit surprised to see the bridesmaids walk down the aisle in ivory dresses, but it really worked with the bride's pale blue and ivory dress. "H" looked absolutely gorgeous. I wore an absolutely adorable dress that was a clearance find at the boutique below our old apartment. Very cute black Vera Wang for $70 (90% off), light fabric, with a plunging "v" neckline. I was a bit wary of such a dress, but it was a 6:00 ceremony, so I thought it was safe. Safe I was, as two girls upstaged me with their cleav-osity.
Before we went into town for the wedding, we spent the day and night before with my in-laws. Luckily, the weather did not disappoint them, and we were able to go snowmobiling. M's dad set up a whole trip, which involved all of us going out for an hour and a half to a nice restaurant, then dinner, then the trip back to the house. The trip was a lovely end to a day of gambling at the casino, where M and I lost, but his best friend won several hundred dollars.
So, obviously not keeping up with the plan to blog at least once a week. Work has been a little bit crazy. The woman who was the office manager person type got it into her head that I was hired to replace her (despite all protests to the contrary and new, higher-level assignments for her), so she gave notice today. It worked out pretty well for her, she'll still be part-time from home while she looks for another job that she likes better. It is unclear as to what my new duties will be.
In other news, we are planning our first "real" vacation. Our excursion will start in Vegas, where we'll spend a couple of days, at a casino of M's choosing, based on his Harrah's points. From there, we'll fly to SFO and drive out to wine country, spend a few days there, then drive back to San Francisco to visit all the friends that have settled out that away. Our couple-friends up here were going to come, but their own wedding plans and other commitments mean that they are going to wind up using all of their vacation days on those, and we'll have to make the trek on our own. Boo.
As everyone else has been releasing their New Year's resolutions, I thought that I should put some together, as well. Note that I hadn't finished putting them together when I started writing this, which is surprisingly similar to what happens every year at Lent.
1. Put the laundry away faster. It would be really nice to see the top of the dresser every once in a while (can I add this one to M's list, too) 2. Get back down to "wedding weight." Well, maybe not all the way to wedding weight, but maybe halfway through the "eating through Greece" tour, at least pre-New York weight. Not that I've put that much on, just more than I would like. 3. Blog more than once a week. 4. Keep up with the Thursday night emails with the b-school gals. 5. Call my grandparents more often. 6. Watch out for the nagging (that one is from M).
