ITALY!!!

Oh my goodness, I am so excited. On Thursday I get to hop on a plane and fly to Italy for 9 fabulous days! Vacation!!

My youngest sister Emily is studying abroad in Turin, Italy (northwest Italy...right near the border of France) so my whole fam and I are going to visit! (My dad is 100% Italian, so my sisters and I are half Italian and I always love rockin' the Italian pride)

We'll be spending a few days in Turin with Emily showing us the city and then we'll take a train to Florence and spend some time there. I was in Florence nine years ago and LOVED it, so I am really looking forward to going back. I can't wait to walk along the Ponte Vecchio, see the David and lots of other art in the Uffizi Gallery, eat gelato till I burst, shop at the outdoor markets, climb to the top of the Duomo Cathedral, and watch all the Italians whiz by on their scooters. *beep beep!*

Peace out everyone. Have a GREAT Thanksgiving.

Mr. A-Z

I had the opportunity this week to see Jason Mraz in concert. He was playing at the Warfield in San Francisco. GREAT concert! He is such a fun performer. He is goofy, charming, has a rad band, can hit notes and rhythms like crazy, and kept me laughing many times throughout the evening. I don't know his music too well, but I dig it after hearing him live. I went with two of my sisters, one of whom is a HUGE fan. She said she'd make me a mix of all his best songs. Sweet.

TRB

I love Mondays. Why you ask? One word, three letters: TRB. Oh, the glories of TRB on Monday nights! About two and a half years ago, our house began making this special dinner every Monday night. Before we knew it, TRB became a weekly tradition. Something to look forward to on your Monday-back-to-work-day.

T=tofu (cut up, cooked in olive oil and sprinkled with garlic salt)
R=rice (cooked in a big rice cooker left behind by an old roomate)
B=broccoli (steamed, then mixed with sesame oil, sesame seeds, and garlic salt)

Put all three ingredients together and you have a little bowl of heaven to feast on with chopsticks.

But I have come to realize that TRB is so much more than just the food. It's the atmosphere of a TRB night. Absolutely anyone can come join the six of us roomates and enjoy a delicious bowl of TRB, along with good conversation, the fun house fire alarm (almost guaranteed to go off every Monday night at least once), maybe a game, laughter, and overall just great fellowship with other people.

I have eaten approximately 130 bowls of TRB and I still look forward to it every Monday night. I wonder if I'll ever get sick of it? (Nah, I doubt it)

Come join us for TRB one Monday night. Your taste buds will dance and sing! And maybe you will too!

I USED to like ladybugs

Awh...aren't ladybugs so cute?

No.

Not when they infest your room.

Every single year at the end of October/begining of November, they come in hordes. They all cluster in my window panes and it grosses me out. I mean, one or two of them-I have no problem with that. But when there's TONS, it's disGUSting.

I don't know HOW they get in my room. I have taped up my windows and everything. They're sneaky, those suckers. And then once they're inside, they have the gall to come onto my bed at night and look at me when I wake up like, "Would ya mind scooting over?" What?! They fly around my windowsill trying to get into the cluster of ladybug friends, eww. They are on my walls, in my bathroom. What's a gal to do?

Kill 'em. One by one. Mwahahahahahaha! Sometimes I have a heart and let them live. I just toss them out the two story window and assume they will fly away to Happy Ladybug Land. But the problem with that is that when I throw them out, they just buzz right back. So, I have pretty much resorted to death. I have two spider friends up in the corner that are helping me with this fine project. When the ladybugs are gone, my two spider friends will be introduced to another friend: the toilet. FLUSH!

I am so heartless, I know.

We're back!!

Hello friends.

We are back from our fabulous road trip to So. Cal. And what a whirlwind weekend we had. It was so much fun. Where shall I begin? We set off Friday morning and we had six cars in our crew. We all had walkie talkies and cell phones so we were calling each other and talking between cars. I was in a van with some hilarious folks so I pretty much laughed the whole way down. I kept a sweet "quote board" of comments from that ride. And we had a contest between a girl in our car and a guy in another: who could eat 16 Reeses Peanut Butter Cups in 10 minutes. SICK. It was so gross/funny to watch. The guy won. Our girl only got to 12 before she starting to feel queasy.

We hit LA traffic for 2 and 1/2 hours which everyone loved. So we stopped for dinner and let the traffic pass. Our hotel was right by Disneyland and when we arrived the fireworks were going off! No way! We had the most amazing view. My favorite part was everytime a huge firework would BOOM, this one car alarm in the hotel parking lot would go off! Over and over and over. Good times. A bunch of students went to hang out at downtown Disney, but I called my best friend Elissa and her hubby Mike (they live nearby) and they came to visit me which was so great.

Saturday-Universal Studios!!! It was a sunny, breezy, perfect day. There is a new ride there called Revenge of the Mummy, and oh my word, it was my favorite!!!! You go on this roller coaster type ride in the dark and then your car freezes and you go through it BACKWARDS! I think I went on it 4 times. Love it love it love it. We went on all the rides (Jurassic Park is another fav), saw all the shows (Shrek 3-D, Waterworld, Terminator, Animal Planet Live, Special Effects, etc) and just basically enjoyed each other's company. Most of our group stayed together the whole day so I got to spend some time with students I had been wanting to get to know. We putzed around City Walk afterwards and then drove back to the hotel.

Sunday we went to Saddleback Church in Lake Forest/Mission Viejo area. It would take WAY too long to type out everything I thought about the church, the service, and the people, so ask me sometime. But I will say that I am SO glad we went and that church is doing some amazing things. We all went to Venice Beach for lunch and hang out time. SKETCHY place. My co-worker Steve says Venice makes our town seem normal. =) It was fun to walk around and see everything, but I could see in the college students' eyes that many of them were a little weirded out. (But I think it's good for them to be exposed to it. I mean, that's the real world) Our car ride home was beautiful. We took the 101 home and got to watch the sun set behind the Pacific Ocean. Yeah!

My overall observations on the weekend are all awesome and positive. I really felt like I got to connect with a TON of students. I had some great conversations in the car with girls, which I appreciated. We all bonded and grew closer as a group. I love that this road trip fits in with our mission of wanting to build community this fall. All the students seem to enjoy each other. All these different people with different personalities...clicking. That was cool to watch.

I didn't have to work Monday (yeah!) so I came home Sunday night and slept for probably a good 11 hours. I was wiped. But man oh man, what a great trip.