Tag: family

Le Sigh

It has been over a month since I last blogged and that blog was paid for. I can’t even blame it on “life” happening because I honestly am not constantly on the go. I do have a steady social life in various mediums and on different settings, but the amount of time I sit at home, on my ass, on this computer doing absolutely nothing but chuckling and ಠ_ಠ on Reddit or YouTube is kind of ridiculous. The most productive thing I’ve managed to do is thoroughly clean my apartment’s living room. It’s seriously so clean, you guys!! I even vacuumed. Yeah, take THAT in.

I haven’t blogged because that means I have to actually think about my life and then I start having minor panic attacks on the inside. Things aren’t serious enough for them to manifest outside of my mind and chest, but I might shed a tear or two. You mean I have to think about the state of my relationship with my (ex)husband? Ew. Or how about the fact that I find my cat so damn annoying lately? I’m plagued by a lot of negative thoughts the past couple of weeks. I’m definitely on a downswing and it seems to coincide with others – or I just shines through more so than anything positive others have to say. There have been an inordinate amount of break-ups the past few weeks, though. That’s sad. I really don’t want to turn this return into a bitch fest, though, so…

Back in mid-April I visited friends & family in L.A. and I went to Six Flags Magic Mountain for the first time in YEARS with my brother and his girlfriend. It was great. They’d just opened the park to weekday use and for being so early in the season, virtually every coaster that was open was walk-on. For having spent so many years having not been on a roller coaster, that was damn amazing.

…

I think I should trademark the heavy sigh. I seem to do it even unintentionally and people wonder what’s wrong. Now that my mind’s gone blank, I’ll just leave this post at… The End.

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Auld Lang Syne

Well, I’ve slept away most of my day away, the only one I have this week, other than Monday. But that’s okay, since I don’t have much else to do and need rest to get rid of this sickness I have. I do think I’m feeling better. The mucous is definitely loosened and easier to cough out and I’m not dying so much overall.

As promised, I would provide a retelling of my week up in L.A. with my friends & family that was more positive then the last two posts I provided.

Tuesday was one of my best friend’s 25th birthday. Her boyfriend planned a wonderful surprise party for her at a sushi bar. I was late, unfortunately, and she was already wasted, but the night was fun nonetheless. After that was over, her older sister and I went to the bar I frequent up there to finish up with Porn Star Karaoke and she was a hoot. She loved it.

Amber's 25th

The next day, my friends from the Marinara group got together to do our Secret Santa gift exchange and make a Hanukkah dinner. We called it Chrismukkah, of course. Our out of town Vanessa was in town from DC and she, along with the other Vanessa, Ryan and Alissa, provided quite a delicious dinner of tri-tip, latkes and matzo ball soup! The rest of us just stayed out the kitchen since we wouldn’t know what we were doing. We lit the menorah for the 3rd night of Hanukkah and exchanged gifts. Of course, we finished up with some highly offensive and questionable rounds of Telestrations.

Chrismukkah Chrismukkah

Christmas with the family was different. We celebrated with all the extended family on the 25th, instead of the 24th like we have done for forever. So, for Christmas eve dinner, it was just the parents, brother and I and we enjoyed tri-tip1, homemade mashed potatoes 2, Yorkshire pudding3, and baked asparagus. The brother and I watched most of Forrest Gump before receiving our traditional Christmas Eve presents of PJs from mom & dad. He got a set of Angry Bird PJs and my mom got me a 3-piece set of pink ones with pants, shorts and a long-sleeved top. I tried trading my brother for his, but he wouldn’t go for it ;)

For Christmas day, my brother woke me up around 8:30 in the morning after he started making coffee. I started the day with some coffee & Bailey’s, followed by champagne. After opening presents and finally drinking the Civet coffee I bought my dad for Father’s day4, we got ready and head over to my uncle & aunt’s house. We were the first there in regards to those who weren’t already staying there. Over the course of several hours, my grandma counted at least 37 people in the end, who’d gathered to share Christmas in that house. We had our usual tamales, refried beans, salad & ambrosia dinner and a lot of wine. Nobody suffered from any accidents, there weren’t any fights, everything was very nice as usual. That’s why I love my family. Although, I do wish I still got presents from everyone like I did when I was little lol! That’s okay, I was able to give most of my close extended family something and that made me happy :)

Now, here’s my Christmas haul:

  • Navy scarf (from Sandra)
  • Lindt Lindor chocolates (from Sandra)
  • Handmade necklace & earrings (from Vanessa, my Marinara secret santa)
  • Handmade bookmarks (from Vanessa, my Marinara secret santa)
  • Tiltpod (from Jenn, my Lavish secret santa)
  • Box of liqueur filled chocolates (from Jenn, my Lavish secret santa)
  • USAF sweatshirt with the Hap Arnold on it (from dad)
  • Pink PJs (from mom & dad)
  • $15 iTunes giftcard (from brother)
  • Burt’s Bees lip balm, tic tacs, coffee mug, lotto scratchers, nail files (from santa)
  • Check for $$$ (from mom & dad)
  • $30 cash (from grandma)

The end :)

  1. Again. ↩
  2. Thanks to me. ↩
  3. That was my first time ever having it and except for the under-cooked middle, it was good. ↩
  4. It’s definitely not as bitter as regular coffee. ↩
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Hack, Cough, Sputter

I spent the last week up in L.A. with friends & family. As much as I love being up there, it was so bittersweet with what I’ve been going through. Christmas just didn’t feel so much like Christmas, not only because of that, but because my extended family get-together was to happen on Christmas day as opposed to eve. It’s not necessarily a bad change, but it just made for things to feel less like it had in previous years. The gatherings are definitely getting larger, though. I think my grandma counted 37 people! There were a lot of people I didn’t even know their names! Thankfully there’s no drama with our gatherings. No fights, no animosity, etc. I’ve always been grateful for that and still am!

I’ll talk about my gatherings with friends in another post, but for now I just want to whine about how I’m feeling sick now. I started feeling it on Monday, but I just figured it was due to my getting drunk on Christmas. Nope, it was the start of the all too familiar settling of mucous in my lungs, and with that comes the labored coughing, trying to get it out and burning from trying to do THAT. Ugh. Monday, my sinuses just felt raw. I presumed it was from the dry air1 and maybe smoking more than I thought I did. I slept with my humidifier on last night, but that didn’t seem to help much. Either way, it’s time to load up on the Mucinex and Theraflu, as well as continual sleeping with the humidifier.

The one thing that made me feel better was Gunny missed me enough that she slept with me for quite a while last night, at various points. She doesn’t do that on an everyday basis, so yay! haha

I’ll post more positive things later, I’m sure. I said I wanted to whine, and I did, so now it’s time for bed. Thankfully I get to sleep in, as I don’t work until the evening tomorrow!

  1. A con of having central air at my parents’ house. ↩
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December, Oh December

Thanksgiving: Part Deux

I’m overdue for the Thanksgiving post. What can I say? I just haven’t felt like posting. I’m lazy. I would’ve actually posted last night, but my host decided to go down for who knows what reason. So here we go…

I spent the long weekend up in Los Angeles with my friends and family. I actually got to celebrate Thanksgiving two days in a row since we had a small gathering for dinner on Thursday with just my mom, dad and grandma. Following that on Friday was the big gathering at my uncle-in-law’s house1 which included at least 30 immediate & extended family members. The spread was delicious in both cases and I have to admit, my dad’s smoked turkey beat out Kevin’s2. It was SO dang juicy! Apparently my parents brined it the day prior.

For the small dinner, my mom did a lot for just us four people. Mashed potatoes3, sweet potatoes, salad, green bean casserole, stuffing, rolls, cranberry sauce and the turkey. Everything was pretty much from scratch except for the can of cranberry sauce, rolls and technically my dad took care of the turkey as it smoked. I’m surprised I didn’t go for seconds!

I had taken the train from San Diego after 3 hours of sleep and waking up at 5:45 in the morning. I didn’t nap at any point during the day, until after dinner. It was served around 3pm and I was pretty much passed out on the couch by 3:45pm, complete with drool. After not seeing my grandma for a while, I felt bad for not actually spending more time with her before my dad took her home. I was still passed out by the time I should’ve driven her. *sleep* Woops *lazy*

Saturday was spent with my friends, playing our board games, eating and just talking. We also drew names for our annual secret santa :) I’m really going to have to concentrate to get just the right thing for the person I drew… While, in the mean time, I’ve been adding stuff to my Elfster wishlist like crazy. I posted it to my Facebook and Twitter just for the record, not that I’m expecting anything from anybody. FOR REAL! I’ve actually had a tough time trying to figure out what I actually want, if someone were to ask. This has helped a little. Just finding random things online and adding them to the list has been fun.

If you hadn’t seen or heard, I chopped my hair off! I’m very happy with it! I took in a picture of Dianna Agron (Quinn from Glee) as a guideline for how I wanted it done. The stylist was very good and I’m very pleased that it came out so well, especially since I wanted something pretty specific. Huzzah! I just have to remember to use less shampoo & conditioner in the shower and practice different style techniques with it :)

Haircut Haircut
  1. My uncle’s wife’s brother. ↩
  2. The uncle-in-law. ↩
  3. Which I made after she boiled them, for the first time ever! ↩
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I Remember You, Sort Of…

Time for an update on life!

  1. Saturday was my grandma’s 80th birthday celebration. I love spending time drinking, eating & talking with my family. They’re awesome!
  2. Today, I participated in my company’s annual Southern California bowling tournament for the first time with 4 other of my coworkers. We bowled fairly well, but not well enough to bring home a trophy, unfortunately.
  3. There has been a lot of driving back and forth from SD to LA. Sometimes together with the husband, sometimes alone for either of us.
  4. Saturday of last week, I played a good game of capture the flag with about 161 of my friends from high school. I ruined a new pair of flats, but my team won and it was great fun! I miss and love my high school friends.
  5. Wednesday, the husband will be leaving for Costa Rica for a week for his dad’s wedding. I’m not going due to the last minute decision that he WAS going, since it would’ve been double the hassle to try and get both of our passports replaced and costly, because they’d have to be expedited.2
  6. Mid March, I’ll be going to the Zinfandel Festival with my parents, specifically the party at Tobin James. It’ll be 3 years since my parents took the husband and me for our first official foray into wine tasting. I’m excited :D
  7. My mom is making it her mission to get me down to see Costa Rican, and since I’m not going with the husband this time around, she’s planning on a family trip during December(?) of 2012. I love my mom :)

There are still two more LA trips due in the next two weeks, primarily to drop the husband off at the airport & pick him up… I’m eager to not go anywhere soon, though. Also, there may be a month in the near future that I’ll be spending up in LA, at my parents’ house, spending more time with friends since it’s pretty damn lonely down here with just the husband and I. There’s a lot of tension and we both need some space, but I’m finally looking at it as a good thing for me as well, and not just the whole giving him space part. I need some too, and there’s no better place to do it than with my awesome parents and family and friends :D

In other news, things have slowed down at Veracity, but I think it’s because it’s a new board and there’s so many things going on and we’re still working out kinks and the growing pains, and all… There are still some great activities and topics to take part in so, come and join! Tell ‘em Mika sent you ;)

  1. Give or take ↩
  2. I don’t know how the husband didn’t learn this lesson after our passports showed up last minute before our trip to Vancouver to take an Alaskan cruise back in ’08. ↩
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