Inventory: April 2018

Making: time to write! Hooray! 

Cooking: nothing - I've been eating out shamefully too much and there's no end in sight at least until the weekend. 

Drinking: last night, the most hilarious "flight" of champagne that just consisted of three splits brought to my table in a giant ice bucket. We couldn't stop laughing.

Reading: Celeste Ng's "Little Fires Everywhere," just like everyone else in the world (at least those who aren't reading Meg Wolitzer's "The Female Persuasion.")

Wanting: just about everything in the Anthropologie new releases. 

Looking: for flights to Portland for Theresa's dissertation in May!

Playing: a lot of Cards Against Humanity with the roomskis lately - Laura bought an expansion pack and the freshness is hilarious. 

Listening: to Youngblood Brass Band, after Dave turned them on en route home from Monterey on Sunday. 

Wishing: for a perfect tiny French bulldog puppy to love, cherish, and spoil rotten. 

Enjoying: Bay Area "spring," which is basically the same thing as Bay Area "summer," "fall," and "winter."

Waiting: for Royal Baby #3's name! 

Liking: duh, every single Tweet and Instagram post in the entire internet about the #RoyalBaby. It's me. Who's surprised? 

Wondering: what to wear to the ballet tomorrow. (I just typed "baller" instead of "ballet," which I think disqualifies me from being anything remotely resembling functional this morning.)

Hoping: that Dave gets his schedule for next year soon so we can figure out a summer and fall full of concerts and entertainment. 

Marveling: at upcoming travel I'm planning!

Needing: to pick out a car - my Civic's lease is up in July and I've done shamefully minimal research on what I even want to do next. (Someone talk me off the Tesla cliff!!!!!!)

Smelling: Anatomy of a Frangrance's Wildflower Bergamot - I bought the soap, lotion, hand sanitizer, hand cream, and perfume at Anthropologie because I am so in love with the scent. 

Wearing: a dress! It's 75 degrees in NorCal! Spring! Whee! 

Following: Gary Janetti's account and the #frenchiepuppy hashtag on Instagram, and if you're not, you're missing OUT. 

Noticing: abs and triceps fighting their way through just a little bit more after every gym session. 

Knowing: that I should wrap this up and actually get to work to head off a rampaging boss...

Thinking: a lot about my love life. 

Bookmarking: new black flats - the sole of mine legit just ripped away from the shoe and I'm more than mildly annoyed (and without a backup pair for the day, BLEH).  

Giggling: at the most absurd conversation I'm eavesdropping on down the hall - people are utterly ridiculous, campers. 

Feeling: Pretty good, all things considered. 

That kind of weekend.

I had one of those weekends that was just about as close to perfect as possible, for myriad reasons. The rundown: 

Started Saturday off with a patio brunch at Angelica's in Redwood City - a new-to-me destination with excellent chilaquiles (my current of-the-moment obsession). Dave and I met Bita and Leia...

...and enjoyed bottomless mimosas and puppy paparazzi-ing for several hours. 

From there, we ran a few errands before heading for the East Bay to meet up with Ray for SPORTSBALL! This week's game of choice? The Red Sox-A's game, which was very exciting for Dave and Ray as Chris Sale was pitching. 

Little did we know at this point that we were about to witness Sean Manaea's no-hitter...

...although as the game progressed Dave (and the bastion of other Sox fans we were surrounded by) got more and more despondent. Aside: There were SO MANY Boston fans at the Coliseum, which is a total dump...Dave christened it "Fenway West" which made me laugh. A's fans were seriously outnumbered 4-1 in our section (right off the first baseline). It made the defeat feel that much more ignominious!

Post-game, we took Ray back into the city, picked up Dave's cousin Francesca, and ended up having a little mini-beer tasting party at our place - I had picked up a bunch of Russian River sours when Kelsie was in town, and we worked our way through three of them, along with our favorite Alpha Acid IPA. 

We hit the road bright and early Sunday morning to head down to Monterey - visiting the Monterey Bay Aquarium had long been an item on Francesca's bucket list, and with stunning weather and whale migration season, it seemed like the logical time to go. It's funny just how gorgeous California is as soon as you get out of the Bay Area - not that I don't like it here, but getting to see the rolling hills, fields upon fields of produce, and then the Pacific Coast still blows my mind. 

Also blowing my mind? The aquarium! Situated in an old sardine factory in Cannery Row, it's home to thousands of different animals, and is stunningly designed and positioned right on the coast. Personal faves: 

THE PUFFINS. I freaked out inordinately when we got there, and we had the most enchanting time watching several of them go completely batty up by the glass for a solid ten-ish minutes. I've been obsessed with them since before we went to Iceland, and this did nothing to lessen that fixation. 

Also high on the list of "adorable ocean animals doing adorable things" were the sea otters. We saw them first of all the animals, and I was utterly enchanted by the cutie pies playing with their plastic toys, turning loops, and waving their little paws in the air. Later on, we spotted wild sea otters in the "Open Ocean" area, a protected part of Monterey Bay that is home to many of the species in the aquarium, and I about lost it completely. The little guy had wrapped himself in a kelp leaf like a blanket and was snoozing in the sun, floating around. My heart!! 

Eels - total Flotsam and Jetsam moment...and creepy octopuses. I really don't enjoy the way that octopuses move - they really kind of gross me out - but seeing them up close was really neat. 

And the jellyfish! We spent way too much time in the jellyfish exhibit and it still didn't feel like long enough. I loved watching the way they floated and marveling at the different kinds in the exhibits - beautifully designed and lit, and utterly mesmerizing. 

Also, penguins. Dave and I flipped for them - and I cracked up looking at the lengths he went to in order to get as close as possible to this little preener...

The other pinch-me moment of the day was seeing seal pups and their mothers sunning themselves on the beach under the aquarium, and peeking through an observation spyglass to see wild dolphins frolicking just off the coast. If you would have told me this time last year that I would be seeing actual wild dolphins in the effing Pacific Ocean, I would have marveled...and still do today. 

Post-Aquarium, Dave and Francesca made me snap a photo with my boy John Steinbeck - I may or may not have gone on a major nerd tangent as we drove through Salinas and headed to Cannery Row about how studying Steinbeck completely changed my mind on modern American literature, and got me super into migrant stories...

Once I had finished my nerd-freakout, we headed back into adorable downtown Monterey for the most necessary and delicious lunch at Alvarado Street Brewing - which Dave tentatively dubbed his second-favorite California brewery - and then hoofed it back to the Bay. I had a dinner planned with Mick, a dear old friend who I hadn't seen for close to five years, and we had a ball catching up over oysters and cocktails on the roof of the British Banker's Club before heading downstairs for bubbles. 

And of course, the cherry on top of a perfect weekend? Royal Baby 3, Prince Angelface McSquishyCheeks, made his debut this morning! Waking up to royal baby texts from my mom and Erin was the perfect way to combat Monday blues - as was spending the first two hours of my workday with the Lindo Wing livefeed up on my second monitor! 

Have the happiest week, campers! 

Napa birthday to me!

Trying to play catch-up here after a tumultuous March...and realizing that the kind of week where I'm working 12-hour days all said and done isn't really the week to try to do this, but oh well! 

I've had an utterly delightful first winter in California. And yes, I'm aware that telling all of you that, especially as Minnesota braces for like six more inches of snow this weekend or whatever, is probably really mean of me. But...SORRY! Come visit me sometime for a hit of sunshine and warmth, why don't'cha? 

Anyway, one of the highlights of the winter was for sure my parents' trip out here for my 29th birthday! (Yes, I am that cool girl who voluntarily spends birthdays with her family. My parents are awesome. Be jealous.) They arrived to weather in the mid-seventies, and we spent their first day here dining al fresco, drinking wine on our deck, and watching the Olympics opening ceremony. But on Saturday morning bright and early...

...we headed up to wine country! Sonoma, specifically, because we prefer it to Napa. Not that I don't love Napa, but Sonoma has such a more laid-back, charming, rustic thing going on that I can't help but give it a special place in my heart.  

We started the day at a family fave, La Crema's Estate at Saralee's Vineyard. (Ready for a blast from the past? Take a peek at my family's first trip there, before I even decided to move to California!)

I'm a member at La Crema, so we got to do a private tasting upstairs in the members' lounge (which I would like to move into at their earliest convenience, please). 

Of course, we left with a little bubbly in tow...

...plus a case of wine for good measure. Schwegmans don't screw around! 

Our second stop was new to all of us, but came highly recommended by Ashley at La Crema. DeLoach Vineyards specializes in pinots and is part of the highly-regarded Jean-Charles Boisset wine family. 

We fell in love with their fantastic "open-air photo booth" at first sight...

...and proceeded to fall in love with their fantastic wines, so much so that Mom and Dad joined the club in my name! They get all the wine sent to them, but every time I go to Sonoma, my friends and I can visit and taste for free at any JCB winery. I've already made a second stop there and can't wait to visit their other properties! 

...and ending on a lighter note...Dad learned to take selfies, and the world will never be the same. 

More birthday fun to come soon! 

Love letters to life

The last 36 hours have been a complete circus, friends - I feel like I've screwed up more than I've succeeded at, and I'm so scattered I hardly know which way the sun is shining from...maybe because it's one of those rare Norcal rainy days, which is just adding to my general sense of glumness. 

That said, the whole point of these love letters to life is to find the little things that make life so good, and there have been many little bright spots in this week of general discombobulation, such as...

- starting yoga back up for spring quarter and a: my wrist is totally rehabbed after a few weeks off, and b: I held a standing pigeon pose on BOTH sides for a full 30 seconds each! Small victories!

- kitchen victories: these coconut curry chicken meatballs, which Dave and I devoured on Tuesday night. So good. 

- this precious little piece of Minnesota, my birthday gift from Kelsie, which I have barely taken off since she came to visit!

- new music c/o Dave, who has excellent taste: Streelight Manifesto, a ska-punk band (I know, who even AM I these days?!)...their album "The Hands That Thieve" has been on heavy rotation for the last 24 hours. 

- minor-league hockey on Wednesday in San Jose - Dave and Laura have decided to be hardcore Barracudas fans and I am happy to come along for the ride just for the sheer hilarity of it all. 

- best of all, last-minute buzzer beater victories for Notre Dame women's basketball (Arike Ogunbowale is my HERO!) and, last night, hockey against Michigan (boo! hiss!)...so glad to see my alma mater pulling these wins off in the most exciting and heart-stopping way possible. 

Happy Friday, campers - here's to the weekend! 

Weird things my co-workers do in our two-stall bathroom...

The office I've been spending most of my time at lately is about five minutes from campus, a mid-seventies research park owned by Stanford that is in sore need of updates (or of a "tear it down and start over again" update, let's be honest). One of the biggest bugbears with the space is that the bathroom on the floor I work on is a two-stall situation - one with the toilet and sink and all right in the stall, and one where you wash your hands outside the stall itself - this is relevant, I promise! 

The key issue is that my workgroup is heavily dominated by females - a circumstance I definitely need to discuss further here at some point, because it's the first time in my professional life that that's ever been the case. And for a group that is at least 85% female, a two-stall situation just isn't enough. Especially when colleagues of mine take up one stall doing the weirdest things. All of these situations have happened in the nine months I've worked here, and it's gotten so hilarious and left me so incredulous that I had to document it just for shits (hahaha bathroom humor!) and giggles:  

-  Giving oneself a full blowout, complete with curling iron action

- Doing a series of sun salutations, yogic breathing and all

- Having a parent-teacher conference - flipping frequently back and forth between Mandarin and English - about one's son's poor reading performance

- Listening to a "Bachelor" podcast, without headphones, while (I presume) doing one's business

- Facetiming one's dog and dog-walker to supervise the afternoon walk of said dog

- Trying on tops that were delivered to the office rather than one's home

- Having heated debates across the two stalls about the methodology used to value digicurrency

- Painting one's nails - with a fast-drying polish, which apparently makes workplace manicures acceptable

Writing all of this down - and I'm sure I've missed a few things just out of forgetfulness - has me giggling to myself in my cube...highly necessary as I stare down the barrel of a migraine and a workday that I was convinced was Friday! Alas! Happy Thursday, campers!