Wednesday, October 19, 2005

I really, really believe I could steer my son away from Elmo. But I failed. My little boy loves Elmo! He has gotten two Elmo dolls as gifts and he cannot get enough of Elmo's world on Sesame Street. Whenever that song for Elmo's World comes on, lala la la, lala la la, Elmo's world...elmo's world. lala la la, lala lala, Elmo's world.....etc...., no matter if he's crying or in another room he comes running to the tv to dance and then stare fixated at Elmo pointing and making his cute little grunting excited noises. The moved Sesame Street from 7am to 6am on the weekdays on PBS Kids so it's perfect for me as I can now get dressed in peace and not running after Kai while only half dressed because he got into my drawer of jewelry and hair clips. I've also found that when Elmo's world comes on is the perfect time to change his diaper and get him dressed for the sitters. Sure I have to deal with this writhing around on his back while being changed but its not cause he wants to get up its because he's dancing while laying down and getting changed. I've come to the realization, and happy so early, the more and more I try to avoid an annoying kids toy/icon/song/show the more my boy is going to be into it. I've come to embrace that furry, red, high-pitched muppet monster. He's kind like my early am baby sitter in a way. Thank you Elmo for entertaining my little boy and allowing me to get dressed and even have a few minutes for a few sips of hot tea before leaving for the day!

I was very cold this morning. At least it wasn't raining like the past two-days. After dropping Kai off I was craving a nice warm beverage. Initially I was thinking hot chocolate because its free at work. But the more I thought about it the more I thought it wasn't so satisfying. Since there's a Starbucks on the block in front of my office building I decided to stop on the way to work. Normally I just get an iced decaf but I wanted a hot drink and a regular decaf just didn't sound so good. Since the featured drink was the Pumpkin Spice Latte I thought I would give it a whirl, decaf style of course but with yummy whipped cream. Oh my god its so good! I'm not a big pumpkin flavored enthusiast but this is damn good! I even let the sales girl talk me out of my croissant and into a cream cheese and pumpkin muffin. I originally thought pumpkin overdose but it really wasn't. I ate the muffin while my coffee cooled a little. But wow, i'm seriously impressed with this coffee. God damn it! I hate when that happens because I really don't want to start drinking latte's again. I was a big latte drinker in college and I got myself unhooked and switched to Americano's cause i could feel it kicking my ass and for thrills I would add some syrup, a half shot only (typically coconut or gingerbread or almond or vanilla). That does it for me. I dont' want cream or froth or whatever getting in the way. Today was a treat and I have to leave it at that even thought this is yummy drink is dancing in my tummy right now. Yum!

I received the results from my fun-filled 3-hour glucose test yesterday. I passed. Passed with flying colors even. Turns out on the regular glucose I was only 4-points over which my doctor explained was so relatively low that she felt bad I had to take the longer test. I know why it was over because nobody told me I had to fast like I did with Kai. I was instructed to just stop eating 2-hours before the test which I did and i'm sure it skewed my results. Mother F*cker! Oh well, that part is over. So now fork over the candy and soda and ice cream please!

Amber, I forgot to tell you I used my crockpot and I made your fantabulous corn chowder. It was so good!!! The first night we ate it we were so frugal cause T wanted to save some for lunch and I wanted some for dinner the next night. During the work day T had the nerve to IM me, knowing I didn't take a lunch, to tell me how he was eating the soup with some bread and butter and how good it was and how his tummy was so warm. Scumbag! Mean, mean, mean! Anyway, we raced home afterwork and we ate dinner so early it was ridiculous. We just wanted that soup. T microwaved some for us and made grilled cheese sandwiches to go with it. Poor Kai was watching us stuff our faces like animals. Of course we shared with him and then I found out T at least saved a little bowl for him and he had that with a half grilled cheese and tomato sandwich. Then at about 8pm we all went into a food coma, it was soooooooooooo good. Thank you!

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Tuesday, October 18, 2005

Holy Crap! I was in a meeting yesterday afternoon. One wall was covered in windows so we had ample viewing space to watch the ugly weather happening outside. It was rainy for the most part then 45-minutes into the meeting it got dark. I'm not talking just overcast, I'm talking DARK like 7-8pm dark. It was creepy. You could barely see the trees and cars outside. Within minutes the sky opened up to its gray self and it began to pour. The rain got louder and louder until we realized it was hail, my boss expected the four horsemen to come riding out of the sky. Of course we stopped our meeting to watch the hail pound against the glass and then ricochet to the ground and pile up. As immature as we could possible be we were each praying to see a pedestrian dumb enough to be walking in this weather to be pelted with the perfectly round hail balls. Unfortunately it didn't happen. We did have a great view of the 210 W through Pasadena and traffic immediately slowed down with one weary driver quickly pulling over to the shoulder deciding to wait out the hail. Once the hail passed it got extremely windey and the eucalyptus trees were flailing about furiously, kinda creepy! Again it went dark and it was only 2pm! This weather feels apocalyptic, I guess living in Southern California has made me soft. I wouldn't blink at this weather if I were still living in Chicago.

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Monday, October 17, 2005

Upon Amanda's arrival at our home yesterday we headed out to Toluca Lake for a yummy brunch at Mo's. Their brunch menu cover's all the bases and every item is served with complimentary champagne. The restaurant is pretty dark and cavernous which is very drastic from their next door neighbor the legendary Bob's Big Boy. Anyway, the interior is spacious and dark and the food oh so good. Every place I read raved about the burgers and burger bar so i'll have to go back at some point. If its as yummy as the breakfast we had I have no problems with a second visit. Anyway along with complimentary champagne for brunch there is also a magician on hand who goes table to table doing their magic tricks. He was doing something that had a little bit of fire, for a second, and that kept Kai so facinated that he was an incredibly good boy. I had a a bacon and cheese omelette which was perfect (not to much bacon and not to much cheese) which was servied with Mo's homefried potatos and banana bread, T had the Mo's omelette with bacon, avocado, tomato and cheese with the same sides, and Amanda had the french toast (which was huge I think it had 8 thick slices), Mo's home fries and bacon. What did Kai eat? Some fruit and Amanda's french toast, with all that powdered sugar he was in heaven. I will definetly go back again and again it was great!

After we ate we showed Amanand some houses we were looking at and a neighbors house for sale that is smaller then ours both home and lot square footage and on a super busy street but selling for 600K. Needless to say we're amped on getting our little remodeling projects completed so we can sell and buy a bigger place. The remaider of the day was really chill. We finished watching Sin City and Lords of Dogtown and watched a lot of TV. Kai was in such a good mood that I had a fantabulous time playing with him while he avoided taking a nap. Kai went down for the night ridiculously early, I think before 8pm so T and I had that rare adult time together and all either of us wanted to do was veg. Me with my Charmed and he with reading techie stuff online, how dorky are we?

There was some major thunder and lightening storms last night. The thunder was loud, so loud in fact it scared the bejesus out of my doggies and they wanted on the bed pronto. Kai didn't budge, T curled up even tighter under the comforter and I layed awake in bed watching the lightening light up my bedroom. We needed the rain that came along with all of this and am glad we'll continue to recieve showers well into tomorrow.

In other news there was a ton of traffic around my house this morning. I flipped on the news and immediately found out why! You see I live at the 5 and 134 freeways, I heard helicopters this morning and didn't think anything of it, just maybe a regular morning commute, because of the rain accident. Yeah, I was wrong. All the streets around my home was closed off with barricades and manned with police officers. The Golden State Freeway, I-5, was closed and traffic was being diverted. I guess the only way back on the to 5 north was the 134/5 entrance near my house. As I left my home this morning the air smelled like a gas station and I was glad to be getting out of there. Amazingly the street I needed to get to in order to access the 134 East was available for that purpose only. The 134 East was EMPTY but the 134 West was a damn parking lot. Due to the 5 closure the 2 South was jam packed! I take the 2 to get to my sitters house and luckily I was able to remain in the on-ramps right lane and hit my exit with no problems. I hope that the smell subsides by this evening because it was stinky and most likely not so healthy to be breathing.

I bought some amazing cookies from Trader Joes last week. Its a peanut chew with milk chocolate chunks and it is so good I could hardly stop eating them. It was bad timing to buy them the day before my glucose test. Such a tease. I had two early in the evening and then had to tuck the rest away. I have since finished up the bag of those yummy yet evil treats. My guess is i'll breakdown and buy another bag soon.

I finally took the time and cleaned up my Netflix list. I had some complete shit on there that sounded like a good view months ago. I've grown to love renting tv series from Netflix. Seeing as though I don't have HBO and other movie stations I love the fact that I am able to go back and rent all the seasons for shows like Dead Like Me, Entourage etc... Since signing up for Netflix about a year and a half (maybe 2-years) ago T and my appetite for buying and owning movies has been serverly curbed. There just isn't any reason for that anymore. If we have an urge to watch and oldie but goodie again we just put it on the list at the top of the queue. Of course there are certain movies/type of movies we HAVE to own. For him its the Star Wars movies for me its Harry Potter. Speaking of which, Harry Potter opens in a month! Gotta take the day off of work so I can watch it 5 times in a day, well not really but I just like saying it.

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Sunday, October 16, 2005

Amazingly the whole family was up and early yesterday morning. Simply amazing. We got ourselves togethers, sulked over to the laundromat and threw two loads of laundry into the giant washers and then walked over to Starbucks for some yummy pastries and coffee beverages. Kai loved his big, soft, plain bagel and T and I loved our little treats. It's so amazing how satisfying coffee and a muffin can be. Anyway within 25-minutes the washers finished during their things, we loaded our spun-out damp clothes into the laundry basket and headed home to dry them. Once the first load of towels, sheets and blankets were dried we quickly folded and put everything away and headed to Costco for some diapers, milk, eggs and our new addiction microwaveable bacon. Before leaving Costco we just had to have the yummy Hebrew Nationals, soda and some creamy frozen yogurt. By the time we got home (about 7-minutes later) the menchy was sound asleep. Normally we use his nap time to nap as well but lately we've been so torn. Let me explain. There are things that we may want to do to relax like play x-box, read, go on te internet, paint my nails you get te point. These are things we can normally only do while Kai is asleep and if we nap when he naps our relaxing activities get put on hold as well. Yesterday was different, we both stayed awake, T fixed his laptop and I played with my x-box. It was actually pretty satisfying.

Once the menchy woke up I made some lunch for him, we all played and watched some tv for a while. We had plans yesterday evening so around 3.30 or so I decided to get started on flat-ironing my hair and tweezing my eyebrows. Around 4 or 4.15 we all got dressed and got ourselves together and at exactly 5pm we got on the road and headed down to Mission Viejo. I don't know what I was thinking and told T to take the 5 all the way down. Yeah, what a mistake. Traffic, traffic and more traffic until we were 20-30 minutes away from Disneyland. We didn't get to our friend's house until 6.30 or so. We were beat and at the point wondering why we even decided to go. Ok, we had a good time so I shouldn't complain. About a year ago our friends sold their townhouse in Irvine and bought a great 3 bed 2 bath home. Since Alex is quite handy he gutted and remodeled the entire home before moving in. It really is a great house. I love seeing peoples homes especially post-remodel and when the homes size is comporable to ours. So our houses interior space is near identical square footage so of course I was mentally figuring out how we can remodel our home. That's a different story. So anyway, Alex and his wife are now expecting a little girl at the beginning of Dec so they were having a little house warming/baby shower last night. They had so much food and snacks and T went totally mental for apples and caramel and Kai pigged out on snow peas. I on the other hand munched on just about everyting in site. There were a lot of people and lots of kids. Kai had a great time and kept getting hugged/tackled by a little guy named Jake. No injuries involved and he had a nice time. I'm glad we went even if we got stuck in traffic on the way there. We learned our lesson and took the 57 to the 210 to the 134 to get home and that felt so much quicker.

Today we're expecting Amanda to come over in 45 minutes or so. We'll be heading to brunch soon after so I better city search and find out if Mo's in Toluca Lake is someplace we really want to go.

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Friday, October 14, 2005

I have mastered the T9 function for text messaging on my cell phone. My text messaging time on my cell phone is probably equal to the actual time I spend chatting on the phone, no wait, it may be slightly more actually. I'm not a huge phone person, especially for day to day calls about nothing. If i'm going to talk on the phone I want to make sure I have a big cup of coffee or water, maybe a little snack and a comfy spot to sit and chat for a while. I like to catch up with people whom I only speak with on the phone about once a month. I feel like those calls are so much more fulfilling. For short conversations I would much rather do that through text or IM if I'm on the computer. Okay but back to the T9 function, if you're not familiar with this function it allows you to begin typing and based on your combination of letters/numbers (remember 3 letters to each number button on the phone) the T9 function attempts to pre-fill and guess the word you are spelling. This used to frustrate the hell out of me cause it wouldn't always guess the right word and i would get so confused so I would use the regular alphabet function and manually enter all the words. That meant if I wanted to type the letter I would have to hit the number 2 button 3 times until I got the letter , this was very time consuming. But alas, I have figured out and mastered the T9 function and man what a time saver! I can breeze through my text messages and speeds I only dreamed of. I'm loving it. I never realized how much I would actually be text messaging that I want to upgrade my phone. Time will tell if I do or not. I may be getting a Palm Treo phone from work and that would be so dorky having two big phones like that so i'll wait it out, it'll already be bad enough that i'll have two phones and one makes me readily accessible with my work peeps and synchs to my outlook and stuff. Yikes!

It's Pay Day! I love it. Acutally since I use the credit union we get paid a day early, they say its a perk for using the credit union that your money is released a day early. I want to pay out all my bills tonight and sack some cash away for my Direct TV tivo. After the rebate I think its only going to cost 50 bucks or 48 bucks. Sweet! Plus I have a referral link to send out to two friends who are wanting to switch over to DirecTV, yes my satellite bill will be paid for a couple of months!

My god, its already the weekend. Whew....where do the days go. I have so much I want to do. I want to do all my laundry tonight and I'm having a sudden urge to clean like crazy. Not an energy burst just a major cleaning urge. T got really excited when I mentioned that he said, let me know what I can do to help. I told him what would help me is if you took the mench and got out of the house for a few hours. He look stunned! I think he was shocked that I didn't ask for cleaning help. I just think me cleaning alone would be so much more productive then T and the menchy at home. Plus, the menchy would probably appreciate park time then semi-attention from mom and dad while they clean. I'm getting all excited about getting my pad in order!!!

Tomorrow evening we'll be heading down to a housewarming/baby shower in Mission Viejo. I love Mission Viejo it's so pretty. I bought a lovely little shower gift and just need to wrap it. Although Gymboree wrapped it for me I don't think a colored box with a paper ribbon adds enough punch for my taste. Luckily I'm a cheapo and saved all the beautiful gift bags I received gifts in from Kai's shower so I'll just reuse one of those. As for a housewarming gift, technically this is their second home in a few years, we did give them a cute gift last time and don't know if we'll actually buy a gift but I'm thinking of taking a pumpkin they can carve for Halloween. Is that lame?

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Wednesday, October 12, 2005

After two days of laying in bed I have braved the outdoors and headed to work today. I'm feeling a bit headcoldy and congested but have been drinking water and hot tea with honey and munching on crackers. It feels good to be out of the house. Daytime tV pretty much sucks and the last thing I really want to do at home when i'm sick is be on the internet.

Mom headed to San Francisco last night. Lucky bugger. I want to go! Although it won't be all fun and games for her she is there for a work conference but i'm sure she'll squeeze in some night time play of sight seeing, shopping and yummy eats. I suggested she try out a tapas bar called Bocadillo. I was watching Rachael Ray's Tasty Eats, or whatever the show is called and she stopped by this joint and it looked yummy. I hope she gets a chance to visit the restaurant as I would love a report on the grub. You know me, I love new restaurants. The first time I went to a tapas bar was while I was living in Chicago. I didn't really understand the concept but the lovely staff explained that all items are like bonus servings of appetizers and you typically order a shitload of items and share it with your group. T and I went overboard and tried probably a good quarter of the menu. It was good but I was truly stunned by the bill, those little items really add up if you're not careful. Since we've lived in LA we've only had the opportunity to go to one Tapa's bar which was Cobras and Matadors. This is a BYOB place and since we went with a group of people we had a great experience. The wait was long, very long (this was a few years ago so not sure what its like now) but once seated and taking a glance at the menu I knew we would all be enjoying ourselves. I think tapas is best enjoyed with a group of people. You end up with a much larger variety of items then you would typically order and this place did not disappoint. Unfortunately I can't recall all the yumminess we ate but if you're in the area check it out, i think there may be mulitiple locations now.

When T and I were married we received a Tivo as a wedding gift as we didn't have cable at the time we had to hide it away until we did. Around this time I got mom and dad converted to Tivo/DVR and they cannot live with out it. Up until this season I've never really had a conflict in my TV viewing that would warrant me to record many shows but now what have the networks done? So many good shows all back to back and some shows are replied for easy viewing but I typically dont' remember what night is the easy view night. One example is last night I watched Supernatural which conflicts with The Office. I know Bravo replays The Office as I've watched it on there but I don't remember what night it is replayed on. Damn it! Now that I have Direct TV I have to use their Tivo, luckily they have a special right now where you get a $100 rebate on the box. I think I'm going to get it next weekend, I can't take this tv conflicts anymore its frustrating...Funny thing is T never gets frustrated by these types of things but he's just as frustrated as I am...He's excited that he can Tivo all of the Battlestar Gallactica reruns since he missed most of it during its first running.

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Tuesday, October 11, 2005

A meme via Xinh. The rules:
1. Go into your archive.
2. Find your 23rd post.
3. Find the fifth sentence (or closest to).
4. Post the text of the sentence in your blog along with these instructions.
5. Tag five other people to do the same.

So here it is, taken from my pita entry on August 1, 2003
There was a period of time when I wouldn't wear jeans now I practically live in them.

On a separate note, I love going back and reading my old entries. Most of them are so irreverant but they make me laugh. I'm home today. I left work early yesterday as I was feeling sick all morning and kept breaking out into this awful coughing fits. Tea and honey didn't help any. Today i'm just not taking any chances and I just decided to stay home. Thank god. My cough has gone from just raspy be cough to full on phlegmy cough. Gross! Thank god mom is still here I don't really want to get to close to the menchy while feeling this way. T is a bit sick too, he needs to call his doctor to get some medicine to make him feel better. Lucky bastard! he gets to take meds while I can drink water, hot tea and take tylenol. Hmmm.

My mom has spent most of her time here shopping. That's really most of her agenda while she's here. I think its kind of funny, but she did get almost all of her xmas shopping done in california. I've barely made a dent in my xmas shopping. I like to get it over with super early so I dont' have to stress when december rolls around. Most of the people I buy for are very hard to choose for. The gifts that I did get out of the way are for my nieces who are 4 and 5 so no biggie but now i'm stumped. I'm giving myself till Nov 15 to wrap up the xmas shopping. Wish me luck.

I better continue later. I'm working from bed right now and I have to techy issues I need to resolve today and email my peeps about.

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Sunday, October 9, 2005

I'm sick! I went to bed on Friday with a sore throat (the type that makes it nearly impossibile to swallow) and congestion. Now the sore throat has somewhat subsided but exchanged itself with a cough. Kai is possibly sick with a little cold or he's going through some awful teething side-effects. He has a bad runny nose, cough and his drooling as a result of the new teeth coming in. T has two nasty canker sores and can barely eat. Yep, we're pretty jacked up. On top of all that my mom is here, luckily T and I can rest while she gallavants around town with the mench.

Mom flew in on Friday night. We got to the airport a little eary, due to light traffic, and waited for her plane to land. No big deal, right? Okay, the baggage hoopla from ATA was awful! It took one hour to gather her belongings and then head out. I can't believe that, ONE FREAKIN' HOUR. We were going to go get dinner but it was nearly 10-pm and Kai was obviously tired. So tired in fact that he cried the entire car ride home. By the time we got home we had missed our window of opportunity and the mench would not go to sleep. He was wide awake and ready to play. After an hour or so T and I hit the sack and mom played with Kai.

Saturday: T had to work this Sat so mom and I spent the day out. We left ome before home, stopped for breakfast at Vivians Millenium Cafe in Studio City and then took a nice scenic drive around LA, heading down Sunset past UCLA. The sites were beautiful but drivers were crazy, as usual. Around 11 or so we headed down to Santa Monica to do a bit of shopping. I bought a few xmas presents for my little nieces and mom got a bunch of xmas shopping down for herself. Later that evening we headed over to Toluca Lake to visit a pumpkin patch and buy a handful of pumpkins to carve and decoate for halloween. The pumpkin patch was a lot of fun. There were animals and Kai had a blast being pulled around in a wagon. After buying our family of pumpkins we stopped at Maki and Yaki for some Udon and sushi. I tried so hard to stay up for SNL but I didn't make it. By 11pm I was ready to hit the hay. My body was so achy and my right arm was and still is killing me. I had a horrible sleep and probably woke up around 3am due to my arms throbbing pain.

I have an Icy Hot patch on my upper arm now and I think its icy hot affect is wearing off. My wrist is totally aching and I believe that this is Karpal Tunnel Syndrome. I've felt it coming on for years but have evaded it for over 2-years. I think it has gotten me. As I type my arm is killing me. My fingers hurt and feel heavy. I have a pain movin down from my pinky, through my palm and up my forearm. My forearm muscle feels hard to the touch and my wrist has a somewhat burning and strained feeling. In a nutshell I need to go to the doctor. I probably shouldn't typing. After this I'll need to stop.

One quick note. Amber, I recieved your package and THANK YOU! They are adorable. I think I want to get one of those floating shelf things for Kai's room to display them along with other little toys we have stored away for him.

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Thursday, October 6, 2005

Today my little guy is 15-months old! Where did the time go? I can't believe how big he has gotten, how much he has developed and how his little personality is growing by leaps and bounds. He's a smart, caring, loving, funny, sensitive little boy who is going to make a fantastic big brother in a few months.

God know's who reads this page but Southern California fire season is in full effect! Year after year the fires are always in the same area, why do people rebuild in these neighborhoods? I mean if your home is always in the path of fire why do you want to continue to live there? And during our flood season, if your neighbors home slide down the hills every year, why don't you just sell? I don't get it. As much as I would love to live in the Hollywood Hills I could never do it, I don't want to see my home on the 11pm news sliding down the hill or crumbled at the bottom of the mountain. Nope! Seeing all the fires on television is pretty devestating. I feel so bad for these families. The fire west on the 101 near the West Hills/Bell Canyon area is particularly devestating. We have relatives living in Bell Canyon, not sure if T gave them a ring but I sure do hope his home and family are safe.

While on the topic of fire, the Batman house which is located in Pasadena burnt down last night. I pass this home everyday on my drive to and from work. It was a beautiful stone home located on a hill overlooking the colorado st. bridge and the arroyo and now it's completely gone. As of this morning the house was still smoldering and I really wanted to see it this morning on the drive but the god damn son was in my eyes so I didn't want to take that chance and take my eyes off the road.

It's been a crazy week. Yesterday I had about an hour and a half of downtime and that included the time I needed to use for lunch. Yikes! Busy as a bee. Today is pretty slow. I'm hoping I can take off early so I can go home vaccuum, clean the kitchen, bathroom, bedrooms and then get some laundry done. I still haven't called a laundry guy to come fix my washing machine but after this trip to the laundromat (and home to dry) I'll get someone out to check it out. I can't bare going to the laundromat I find it a complete waste of time! Then, when T get's home from work we're going to head over to the hospital to get some pre-admission forms for me. I decided not to have the baby in the same hospital I had Kai. Although I liked the idea of a smaller hospital I didn't like the care I received there. 'Nuff said.

Is it just me or is this kinda grossing anyone else out?

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Tuesday, October 4, 2005

Ahhh......After 3-days off of work I feel, rested, relaxed and rejuvanated. Ready for a hectic week. Meetings on top of meetings on top of meetings. That's the life of a Project Manager. That was cheesy but was the first thing that came to mind. But enough about that let's talk about my weekend.

Saturday started off as peaceful but after a yummy breakfast of pancakes and eggs both the menchy and I were getting restless and wanted to do something with our day. Because T didn't go to bed until late the night before we played until he woke up. Although we should have straightened up the house before doing anything we just couldn't bare to do so knowing the Fred Segal sale was going on. We dressed and headed out. Mind that we were leaving home a lot later then expected and it was creeping upon Kai's afternoon nap. We took the long way there (i.e. surface streets) so Kai would fall asleep for at least an hour. The plan worked, he was out within 15-minutes. We decided to take a scenic route so we could look at homes and sneak in some good people watching. Because or timing is so impeccable, by the time we reached Santa Monica and circled around for parking it was time for Kai to eat, luckily we were hungry as well. We decided to eat at Swingers and we even found parking right out front and two blocks away from Fred Segal.

Santa Monica was beautiful. It was nice and chili, probably about 67 degrees or so. I love chili weather! Anyway, after lunch we headed down to the shop and started our shopping in Lifesize. We were really hoping we could find some things for Kai, the new bebe, and maybe even some holiday gifts. Mission accomplished! Next I quickly scanned the jewelry, purses and shoes then headed over to the men's. We really didn't want to spend the entire day there since I'll be heading back this weekend with my mom. So back to the men's. T wanted to pick up a few new Fred Perry's for work so he was hoping they would have some on sale. There were and amazingly he wasn't going to crazy (although he did ask that I buy him a couple more shirts next weekend), T picked up a new track jacket and a new polo all for the grand total of forty-two dollars! Can you believe that??? To put the deal in prespective, non-sale total would have been about 160 dollars. I didn't buy anything. Since I can't wear anything right now, except accessories, I decided to hold off a week and wait till prices drop a little more. There were a pair of Marc Jacobs sandals I would like if the price comes down to 50-70 dollars and a few wedges I would like to pick up as well. So we'll see how prices are in a week.

Sunday was another day we didn't clean. Instead we had a nice breakfast at home, played in front of the boob tube and then headed out to Toluca Lake to meet our boys at Paty's for lunch. Yum! The menchy was in heaven as he ate until he was content. After a nice leisurely lunch and much gossipping and chit-chating we headed over to Ron and Morris' to watch some DVD's and hang out. We had never been to their place, can you believe that, so it was a very nice change and they were excited for finally having us over. Once Kai warmed up, he was into everything. He especially loved their garbage can and we had to keep a sharp eye on him to make sure he didn't throughout any remotes, cell phones or home decorations. We left around 5.30 or so, just so we had enough time to get home and unwind and let the menchy mellow out before dinner.

T and I both had yesterday, Monday, off of work. We woke up bright and early to get Kai off to the sitters then headed over to Millies in Silverlake for breakfast (damn, we sure do eat out a lot). It was so yummy! I had eggs and banana walnut pancakes while T had the Jackie G. Special (that is one of their house scrambles, can't remember what's in this one but he normally orders this or the Devils Mess). We hadn't been there in a couple of months so it was nice to sit down and enjoy their yummy homecooked dishes. After breakfast we had a few errands to run so we got an oil change for the car, opened a bank acct for Kai, picked up some storage bins at target then headed over to Universal City Walk for a movie. There weren't any really good movies we wanted to see, but luckily The Exorcism of Emily Rose was still in the theaters so we saw that. It was better then I expected and I'm happy with my decision. Again, no cleaning was done which means I have to bust my ass this week to do so since my mom fly's in on Friday night. I refuse to have anyone over when my house is a mess.

That was my weekend in a nutshell and although I was pretty productive and had a lot of fun the ultimate result is relaxed and i'm ready for what lies ahead this week.

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Saturday, October 1, 2005

Even though it's now Saturday, I'm going to complete the Friday Five.

1. What kind of computer do you have? (Mac, iBook, Dell, etc.)
An HP laptop, Toshiba Satellite laptop, and a PC and Apple G-something desktop (in the garage).

2. How old is it? Are you happy with it?
The HP is relatively new, probably only 6-months and the Toshiba is a few years old, maybe 3. Totally happy with the laptops, the HP was free from work so I can't complain and the Toshiba is great, its got a lot of memory and is totally graphics suped up for use with Autocad and stuff like Photoshop

3. How many computers are in your household?
(at home if you are away at school) 2-desktops, 2-laptops

4. What are your favorite games/timewasters on your computer?
Blogs, Yahoo finance, Yahoo News, MySpace, and various games

5. If money were no object, what kind of computer would you like to have?
Apple Powerbook

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Thursday, September 29, 2005
Borrowed from Xinh who borrowed from Bone

7 things I plan to do before I die:

1. Visit Portugal
2. Buy a vacation home in Italy
3. Change out all my silver fillings
4. Finish tatooing my right arm
5. Eat Sushi
6. Set up a nice nest egg for my kids
7. Own a hardtop Porsche 911

7 things I can do:

1. Play the piano, sort of
2. Make a super yummy vegeterian lasagna
3. remember ridiculous amounts of numbered things (ex: credit card numbers, account numbers, airline milage numbers, phone numbers, birthdays)
4. Cut my own hair into a normal looking haircut
5. Bend my thumb to touch my forearm
6. Sew
7. Serve up a really good mojito

7 things I cannot do:

1. Chew gum for longer then 2 minutes
2. a hand stand
3. speak a second language
4. touch my toes
5. drive without yelling at other drivers
6. cook fish in the house (the smell makes me nauseas)
7. I cannot tell a lie...yeah that's a stretch, just can't think of a seventh item

7 things that attract me to another person:

1. Humour
2. Hands
3. Sensitivity
4. Loyalty
5. Trustworthiness
6. In the opposite sex: shoulder and chest build (not muscley or anything)
7. Hair

7 celebrity crushes:

1. Ryan Phillipe
2. Jason Statham
3. Carey Hart
4. Hilary Duff (its the teenager in me, and c'mon she was Lizzie McGuire)
5. Don Cheadle
6. Joaquin Pheonix
7. Rose McGowan (have you seen her, she's smokin)

7 Things I say the most:

1. Fuck Off
2. Motherfucker
3. What a bitch
4. Oh, Totally
5. yeah, whatever
6. Fucking Awesome
7. Hey Sweetie

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Wednesday, September 28, 2005

I found a faster way to get to my sitters house. It shaves about 10-minutes of my commute, hence I got to work a bit early then normal. That resulted in first floor parking in the structure, first dibs on the ice in the ice machine and a few minutes to do some quick window shopping online! I actually discovered this route on Monday, but that was more of a test run since we didn't know what we were doing. Yesterday I took the new route home and got home in record time! I love it. Especially in the morning. Normally I drive directly into the sunlight but this new route runs perpendicular to the sunrise and I only catch an eyeful for one block which I can totally handle.

I have yet to call a repairman to come out and take a look at what the problem is with my washer. I'll need to make some phone calls today and have someone come out. It shouldn't cost to much and I think it may just be a clog somewhere. Speaking of pains, some jerkoff keeps calling my cell phone. This started in August and normally I don't answer when I don't recognize the number but after 3 or 4 calls I finally picked up since I noticed that the number he was calling from was only 1-digit off from my number upon answering he immediately said oops, wrong number at that point I should have stopped him and said something about the number. The idiot called back a few minutes later and I answered in a pissy tone he immediatly hung up. The calls started up again this weekend. I answered yesterday and he hung up. If he calls again today i'm going to answer, if he hangs up i'm calling the bastard back. I have a feeling he may have my number programed as his voicemail or something. Then I need to figure out how to block that number from getting through. The second pain in my ass is this. Yesterday I started getting these calls at my desk phone every few minutes. Again, I didn't recognize the number so I let it go to voicemail. When the voicemail light lit up I checked it and it was a good damn fax machine. I tried calling the nubmer back and got an earful of high-pitched screaches. Fax machine confirmed. The calls came again and again. Since I don't know where the calls are originating from I can't call back and tell them to cut that shit out. Luckily no calls came in overnight and none this morning (knock on wood).

I need to buy a new pair of maternity jeans. I bought a pair a couple of months ago but they are STILL to big. I can pull the suckers off and on without unbottoning them. Therefore, I am constantly pulling my jeans up throughout the day. Real classy if you ask me. Hopefully I can swing by Target one evening this week and just grab a pair of jeans. I also need a sweater. I can wear most of my sweaters but I want a big, enveloping, cozy sweater. Something so soft and warm I'll want to fall asleep in. Target's been displaying this picture ad in the maternity section for months. The woman is dressed in a skirt but over her entire outfit is this cozy looking blue sweater. I WANT IT! They are teasing me to no end. Every Target run we make I rummage through the maternity section looking for this sweater and its never there. I'm convined by the time the store gets it I won't be pregnant anymore. Why place the ad so visibly if they are not carrying it for the fall? I've been searching other stores but I really don't want to spend a ton of money on maternity clothes. I've been frugal thus far and wnat to keep it that way even if it feels like i'm wearing the same outfits over and over.

I keep thinking about the dishes I left in the sink last night. I meant to wash them before bed but I was tired I gave up and dozed off without doing it. I thought maybe T would have done them but he didn't. Kai's been staying up later and later so I bet he was preety beat by the time the menchy went down. I'm hoping I have the opportunity to get home early today and get the laundry finished up and wash up all the dishes and defrost some chicken for dinner tonight. Speaking of which, I bought a slow cooker a while back and the only thing I know how to make is pot roast. I really need to find some other things to make. I'm not a pro in the kitchen, nor do I pretend to be. I need to brush up on my cooking skills especially with the slow cooker, that thing is a such a time saver. With a new baby on the way I dont' know when i'm going to find time to cook so the slow cooker will definetly come in handy. Maybe I can do some web-surfing today and locate some yummy recipes.

I ate a yogurt this morning and am still sipping on my iced decaf but I'm hungry. I have some cereal at my desk but i'm not in the mood. The open bag of Fritos are looking much more appealing then the cereal but if I ate Fritos at this hour I would definetly be setting myself up for a massive tummy ache. Not quite willing to do that. I'll probably break down and eat a bowl of cereal and milk but I need to start thinking about what I want for lunch. Lunch is my big meal of the day. I used to be so good about packing a lunch for myself but I've been really, really bad lately. I need to get out of this habit. But normally I bring a sandwich, very rarely do I bring leftovers I tend to give them to T, anyway sandwiches can get boring really, really quickly. Really, I gotta stop going on about food cause I am hungry.

Sicne the LA county fair is back in town one of my most favorite commercials is back on tv. I may have blogged about this before but this is how it plays out:
In a classroom, teacher is sitting on a chair in front of her class (maybe 2nd graders) who are sitting on the ground in front of her. Teacher holds up a picture of a cow and asks Class, what comes from a cow?
Child 1 says: My mom says latte's come from cows
Child 2 says: Uh-ah non-fat cappucinos
At this point the teacher looks worried and calls on the next child.
Child 3 says: I know, I know frappacinos

Teacher looks very worried and a voiceover comes on saying if anyone needs a county fair its LA.
Back to the teacher who holds up a picture of a sheep and asks, Does anyone know what comes from sheep?
A little girl responds: Sweaters? with a big smile, Gucci Sweaters?

The commercial is brilliant!

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Sunday, September 25, 2005

What a quick weekend. Almost as quickly as my work week flew by. Anyway, Friday night was a quite night at home. Saturday looked a bit overcast and the morning was very cool and nice. We decided to spend the entire day at home relaxing, watching movies and playing with Kai. It was a nice day and something we don't really do to often.

Today we were up and out of the house relatively early (well, early for us). We stopped off at 101 Coffee Shop for breakfast. It was pretty packed but our wait was just over 5-minutes. I love 101! Anyway, with the amount of people in there Kai was having a ball. Music playing loudly (Concrete Blonde, Bloc Party, Modest Mouse...), lots of conversation sourrounding us, and numerous people making silly people trying to make Kai crack up was great! We ordered our yummy breakfast, Kai loved his eggs and guacamole as well as the yummy pancakes. After breakfast we headed down to the Beverly Center. We just browsed the mall, not so much to shop, but since its relatively empty on Sunday early afternoons, we wanted Kai to be able to run around and climb on the ultra modern furniture scattered throughout.

Once we were finished with the Mall we headed back over the hill to swing by two open houses we pre-screened on Friday. The homes were BEAUTIFUL! One a traditional Spanish and the other a cute tudor style with a pool and spa. I'm in love with the tudor one. Great original details like leaded windows, detailed flooring, large bathrooms...I could go on and on but I won't. We need to motor on our home improvements so we can hurry up and sell and get ourselves in something bigger. I swear, as much as I love attending open houses it is pure torture on me.

Wrapping this up, gotta head to target to pick up a few things.

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Thursday, September 22, 2005 08:17 p.m.

This week has simply flown by! I can't believe tomorrow will be Friday. No big plans for the weekend and I would like to keep it that way. Over the last couple of weeks I ordered a bit more xmas decorations. I need to pack them away in my garage and pull out my Halloween stuff. I won't be decorating just yet but I'd like to have them out so I can decorate in a couple of weeks.

I had a doctors appointment this morning. Had my third ultrasound and more then likely I will have a fourth in a month or two. Why? Well, my placenta is very, very low. The noticed this on ultrasound number 2 and its still the same so they will need to check for growth further along in my pregnancy. No cause for alarm on this as I've been told that worse case scenario is a c-section. I don't necessarily want a c-section but if that is what I gots to do then so be it. I'll have a regular appointment with my actual doc in a week and a half. The last few appointments have been off schedule and I'm typically left in the waiting room antsy and watching the clock thinking how much later i'll be returning to work. It sucks cause my actual visit with my doctor lasts no more then 5-7 minutes. My visits will be starting to get more frequently and I think i'll have them later then in the morning so I can just leave work an hour early make my appointment and then head down to my sitters to pick the mench up. Yeah, that should work out just fine.

I'm starting to reach the point of being completely annoyed at my size. I have a false sense of size because I have, what I like to call, a skinny mirror. You know what i'm talking about. You look at yourself and all looks good but then you get a glimpse of yourself in a reflection and you look like hell. That outfit isn't as cute as you thought it was before you left your house. You see over the last month i've gotten huge. I feel the preggo waddle coming on. My feet hurt so I have to wear comfy shoes, not necessarily shoes I want to wear but shoes I have to wear cause it give me arch support and padding that coupled with the fact that my mid pregnancy jeans and pants are getting to the point of being uncomfortable and I'm not a very happy camper. I bought a new pair of jeans, smaller then what I should be wearing and I can pull the darn things up and down without even unbuttoning or unzipping them. I think I need to go back to target and buy a pair of interim jeans just so I can be comfortable. On top of all of this I am so missing sleeping on my stomach, I fantasize about the day that I can leap into bed, belly flop style and just relax.

I've been doing a lot of online window shopping and putting together my xmas list. Since I'm not going back to Hawaii this year my list is a third of what it was last year. I want to be thrifty yet pick up some great gifts for everyone. I feel bad, year after year my brother-in-law ends up with the worst gifts from us. i want to get him something good, like a few tickets for some Red Sox home games but that can get pretty pricey. I looked into season tickets for the worst seats one year and it was still really pricey. Hmm....maybe he'll end up with a gift card or oh, oh, I know...a golf club bag thingy and a few starter clubs. That would be nice. Gotta think that one out for sure.

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Wednesday, September 21, 2005

We were driving down San Fernando on Monday night and the sky was beautifully illuminated by the lightening storms happening in the east. It was beautiful. And one point we even saw a bolt of ligtening trailing out of the sky. There was no thunder for over an hour or two. During the night, in stages of awake and asleep, with my eyes closed I could see the glow of the lightening lit sky outside my window immediately followed by a loud booming and crashing noise that I recognized as thunder. I awoke from my sleep and lay there awake listening to the outside noise and smelling the wonderful cold rain. We haven't had rain like this in months and it was definetly a nice and welcome change. As a result of the weather the past tow days have been slightly chili, not freezing by any means but cool enough to throw on a few thin layers.

It was wet and rainy yesterday which gave me the opportunity to wear my red pea coat and jeans to work. Although I need to invest in an umbrella because a pea coat does not keep your hair dry which is super important when you have hair like mine. An ounce of water and voila, loose curls...I dont' think so! This weather has also allowed me to wear my Uggs. These are the most comfy shoes on the planet! I wish I bought a ruby colored pair last year before every store on the planet sold out. If you're in the market for Uggs and aren't picky about color Niman Marcus has the sherbet hued boots (mint green, pale yellow and orange) on Last Call Clearance for a mere 42 dollars. What a steal, considering they were originally 150. Go online and check them out if you're interested. I wish there was a Neimans Last Call here in SoCal but I think the closet is in Vegas and I'm not really into driving 4-hours just for one store. Maybe throw in some girl friends, a long play Dan Band CD and a cooler of ice cold Fuji water (cause they come in square bottles) and Diet Coke and I could be persuaded.

So it's settled, mom will be back in my neck of the woods on October 7. I've already talked to T and informed him that one day over the weekend he will be minding the mench while mom and I zip downtown to check out some jewelry and purses. I'm in need of a good Chloe Silverado lookalike, for me and for Amber. Of course, if there's anything else cute down there I may need to scoop it up. Actually I would like to pick up a pair of medium sized gold hoops and an 18 and 16 inch gold chains as well. I have very few gold pieces of jewelry and I'd like to get some necklaces and hoops for some variety in my accessories.

I've never really myself an overly girly girl but the older I get the more so I find myself indulging in girly girl pleasures. I'm seriously loving it. Talking to my friend Amber the other night made me realize how much I miss that. Don't get me wrong, I have girlfriends here but most if not all of them are single and they are on a mission. A mission to find a man so some of these girly girl things are not much of a priority for them and heading out to meat market places isn't much of a priority for me. It's weird, prior to Kai I was all about having a good time. Going to all the, ahem, trendy and not so trendy bars around town. Drinking till the wee hours of the night or morning and sleeping with my makeup on. Now, I don't miss it in the least. Sure, sometimes I want to go out for a drink or two (not now silly) but not in the same way and not some place so overly crowded and loud, but places that I can sit, relax here conversation and people watch. Wait, what was I originally talking about? Girl time. Oh yeah, I miss hanging with the girls doing innocent fun things that just make you smile and giddy. So on my quest to find other chicas with the same type of agenda, preferably with kids as well so I don't bore them to tears with baby talk, I have turned to Meetup.com. I met a girl a month or two ago that mentioned I look into her meetup group for mom's like us as she so eloquently put it. I checked it up, joined the group and now the group has a meet-up planned for this saturday. Hopefully it doesn't get cancelled, I've seen to many meet-up gatherings cancelled due to lack of participation. I'll keep you all posted on the turn out.

Seeing as it's a Wednesday and I'm noticing that I'm just really rolling out a stream of thought here I should stop. Check my email, print out my days calendar, and get a motor on my work.

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Monday, September 19, 2005

This was a great weekend. Why? Because I had nothing planned. Saturday was a lazy day. Got some stuff done like going to Lowes to look at kitchen cabinets. Sunday was nice. We went to Canters and Kai totally pigged out. He loved the potato pancakes and simply couldn't get enough of it. Before we left the restaurant we did stop by the bakery and picked up a bunch of treats, chocolate dipped macaroons, eclairs, a cupcake, race track cake and Kai scored himself a bagel which he very much enjoyed gnawing on. I was surprised he liked bagels so much. After a late breakfast we headed over to the Farmers Market and stocked up on a bunch of veggies and fruits and I bought myself some very beautiful flowers. I purchased a bunch on the whitest white chrysanthimums I have ever seen! It is simply so beautiful, I wish I could shellac them so they will stay beautiful forever. I also bought a few stems of pink protea. I love farmers market, all the beautiful produce, plants and flowers. The wonderful smelling food vendors and watching the kettle korn get churned out can make you salivate. MMMm.......I seriously don't get to the farmers market enough. To bad the farmers market in Glendale is on Thursdays.

We're starting to narrow down our baby items purchases for the new little guy. Luckily we don't have a lot to buy. Since Kai's swing was a piece of shit, we're going to buy that Papasan cradel. A friend of mine has that for his son and I swear it's like baby crack. You put him in there put on the white noise or nature sounds and he's totally soothed. A few month's back Kai just had to get in, even though he was to big. My friend allowed him to get in and my god, he loved it! Why did I have to be so cheap and get him such a shitty swing that did not do anything for him and played the worst midi sounding music. Well you live and learn and the new mench will have a little papasan all for himself. Another item on our list is the car seat and stroller. We found a women who received a Bugaboo as a gift and does not want it and is selling it less then retail and she's nearby so we can pick it up but now we're weighing our options of what to do with the stroller situation. As a travel system has never been on the table for discussion we don't go down that route. We had one for Kai, that we received from my cousin, it was so bulky and once Kai grew out of the car seat we never did use the stroller as a stroller. Instead, we opted for something less bulky and bought him one of the Kidco Lifestyle strollers which is totally less bulky and much more streamlined. T and I are trying to decide if WE want the bugaboo more then we actually need it. It's a huge price and we are/were (depending when you talk to me) prepared to through down enough cash for me to buy my LV Cabas Mezzo bag for this stroller. But we want to make sure we're not high on the design of it. Our other though besides the Fancy stroller was to get one of those frames that you just snap the car seat on. And once mench number two grows out of the seat to get a stroller like Kai. I am still pretty adamant about the no double stroller thing. I'm in denial and I'll declare it at the top of my lungs! I will not proactively buy one of those monsters until I find it absolutely necessary. And of course the last purchase we're going to make are for new bottles. Since this baby will be born in an opposite season from Kai I need to buy a few warm PJs and onesies and that's about it. Not bad.

On a different note, I need to find a repair guy for my washer. Something is wrong with the washer when it hits the rinse cycle. Possibly, something could be clogged. When the washer drains it leaks. Therefore tonight I have to run to the laundromat to wash 1 big load of laundry and then come home and dry it. Luckily I just need to wash it. I would seriously turn into some kind of deranged crazy woman if I had to sit there for an entire wash/dry/fold cycle. What a waste of time!

Is tonight Prison Break? Is that what its called? I really enjoy that show. There are a few new shows tickling my fancy. I need to write down the days and times of them cause I can't remember when they are on.

In case you are wondering I'm totally loving my new purse which is almost a month old now. Yeah! I have more then enough room to carry all my stuff and it slips ever so gracefully on my fore arm. I can't wait until the lovely leather turns to that beautiful aged honey color! I'm the first to admit I'm a LV junkie. Can't help it, I just am. All though I would love to own one of Marc Jacobs (creative force behind Vuitton if you didn't know) new quilted purses from his Marc Jacobs Collection. So yummy! Does it remind you of Chanel, too?

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Friday, September 16, 2005

The Friday Five stolen from Xinh

Who is yoru mobile phone provider and how many minutes are in your plan?
After five long years with Sprint, I switched to T-Mobile. I'm on a family plan with 1000 minutes, unlimited nights and weekends, unlimited t-mobile to t-mobile calling.

What program do you primarily use for instant messaging?
Yahoo! Messenger. I used to use MSN but I switched to the one who pays my bills.

Who you send and receive text messages from most?
There's no one that I receive/send text messages from the most but I do love the ability to text message from my phone.

What area code do you live in?
I live in the 818 but my cell is in the 626.

What year did you get an e-mail address and do you still use it?
In 1993 I had AOL and had an AOL address. I haven't used that e-mail in 10 years or more. From AOL I went to hotmail, then a hellokitty.com address and now I primarily use Yahoo!

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Thursday, September 15, 2005

Sometimes I forget I'm pregnant. Well not really forget but its not foremost in my mind. And then there are days when I can't believe Im having ANOTHER baby. My babies will be about nearly 18 months apart. What was I thinking? Or the better question is was I thinking? The initial shock is over. The more I think of it the more I realize that it's going to be tough but in the end totally worth it. I have a handful of friends less then two years apart from their siblings and they loved growing up with someone so close in age. They always had a best buddy! Although these are friends who's sibling is the opposite sex of them. T on the other hand has a younger brother 2.5 years younger then he is and T seems to have been a little terror to his brother. In talking to my in-law he remembers how T used to beat the shit out of him as kids but some of the more horrific things T told me the in-law seems to have blocked it from his memory. He was surprised when I brought up some of the incidents, claming he didn't remember. Is this what happens when you have two boys so close in age? Maybe it was just T planting his hellion roots. I don't think the mench will be mean to his little brother. He's been around other little babies since the age of 3 months or so. He's sweet to them so hopefully with a bit more age under his belt he'll be even sweeter to his brother. One can only hope.

The baby kicks are getting more and more frequent. You can now see those little jabs poking through my tummy. I forgot how weird that sensation is. The baby is totally shifting in my belly and my bathroom breaks are getting more frequent. Mmm...my favorite!

I've started my online window shopping craze. Since I can't really shop for me, I don't want to go shopping for maternity clothes unless I have to, I've been online shopping for things like shoes (selectively since I anticipate my feet getting fatter and going up another half to full size again), purses and accessories. I want to start my xmas shopping since that should satisfy my shopping urge. I started my list and its not to bad. The only times its really bad is when I go back to Hawaii then I feel obligated to buy gifts for all my cousins and their kids. Since I'm here only parents, siblings, and the babies in Hawaii/Boston will get gifts. Of course my friends will all receive prezzies but I'm putting myself on a budget this year. Normally T and I don't get things for each other but this year I know he's buying me something and I want to get him something nice as well. I want to get him a xmas and welcome to fatherhood round two gift. Gotta plan, gotta plan now!

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Tuesday, September 13, 2005

On my way to work this morning I saw the most horrific thing. It was on the 134 near the Brand/Central exit. From a distance I saw a black piece if something on the freeway kind of breezing between the last two lanes. At first I thought it was maybe a bit of blown out tire but as I drove nearer I noticed it was a black kitten. You could tell that it was terrified and trying to get itself out of traffic. I slowed down quite drastically in case the little kitty ended up running in front of my car. There was a big 'ol truck in the lane to my left but about one car length ahead. The kitty was in his lane. He started to slow down but ended up changing his position within the lane so he would just pass over the kitty with no harm. My stomach sank watching this. The front half of his truck passed over with no problem but then he swerved a little and his back driver-side tire ran over the kitty. I almost through up at what I saw. I'M GOING TO BRIEFLY DESCRIBE WHAT HAPPENED. His back tire ran over the back half of the kitty, but the way he did it the kitty was thrown into the air with its guts flying out of its tummy and fell back to the ground. I had that feeling when you kind of puke a little but it only makes it to the top of your throat and then forces itself back down. I started to cry! I had to immedieately call my mom and tell her what I saw. I had to tell someone else. Subsequent cars, all swerved to avoid the recently killed kitty. I wanted to get behind the truck and start honking because I was so grossed out. But then I started to think. If the truck slammed on his brakes to let the kitty passed he could have accidentally started an accident. As much as it bothers me that the kitty was killed, I don't think causing an accident on the 134 minutes away from morning rush hour was the alternative. A part of me feels that the driver did what he had to do to avoid a collision with other vehicles but the price that little kitty paid for it.

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Monday, September 12, 2005

This weekend went by pretty darn quickly. Friday was an easy night. Took my on the requiste Target trip. It was a quick trip as I had an agenda of items I needed to pick up and I felt like I was half asleep in the store. On Saturday we all woke up bright and early, stopped at Rods in Monrovia for some breakfast and then continued our little drive out to Pomona. We decided to spend Saturday at the LA County Fair. It was a lot of fun. A lot of walking. A lot of junk food eating. A lot of people watching. Everyone had a good time and Kai LOVED going to the Fairview Farms area and looking at all the animals, he just couldn't get enought of it. We didn't take him into the petting zoo. It was very crowded and I figured by next year he will probably enjoy the actual petting zoo a lot more. There were some horses out that you could pet so he did that and really, really enjoyed it. Mom won a little bit of cash at the horse track which she was really excited about. We also indulged in some fair food like pork chop on a stick, deep fried twinkies, deep fried oreos, funnel cake, BBQ....Yum! Who doesn't love fair food. By Saturday night, while laying around at home, we were all so achy from all the walking.

Yesterday was nice. We met Ron and Morris for lunch at the usual spot. It was so good but we all ordered much to much food. After lunch, we dropped T off at home and mom, Kai and I decided to do some shopping at the Sherman Oaks Fashion Square. There was a great sale at Babystyle. All sale items were an additional 40 percent off. Mom picked up some items for christmas gifts and bought Kai a cute wooden xlaphone toy and super cuddly sheepskin car seat muff thing (for the new baby), both items were on sale and such a bargain. I picked up Kai a few items with some birthday credit I had laying around, a super cute knit hat in black, some khaki colored jeans and a Andy Warhol Small Paul Tee, also in black. Speaking of birthday stuff, i need to go to the bank and open a bank account for the mench. Maybe I can do that this week, I just need to find out what kind of info I will need, e.g. his social security number.

It's back to work for me. Today is a relatively slow day actually. Im going to use my lunch break to pick mom up and bring her into Old Town for some window shopping and what not. I think she just likes being outdoors and whenever she is in california its like an endless shopping spree. Well I should clarify, she is doing her xmas shopping while she's here. She's actually gotten a lot of stuff done in the last few days. Macy's had a great sale so she picked up a bunch of items for gifts.

I need to call a repairman for my washer. It started acting up on Wednesday night. During the rinse cycle water is starting to leak out. That really sucks! Yesterday morning, I ran to the laundrymat to wash two loads of laundry and came home to dry everything. I can deal with that for the short run. If I had to sit in the laudromat for an entire wash/dry/fold cycle I would probably go crazy. Washing is quick and I don't feel like I'm wasting a good protion of my day. But this is not the final solution, I need to get the one in my laundry room fixed. A washer and dryer is such an indispensible household item. The thing that kills me is that when we were renting in Pasadena we bought a brand new large capacity washer and dryer, but when we bought our house the laundry room was a bit narrow and my w/d could not fit side by side. Therefore, I have a practically new W/D in my garage. I don't want to sell it because I know I won't be in this house for more then a few more years and/or we'll probably end up running a gas and water line to the garage during our home renovaton venture.

One of the worst things about being pregnant is the endless heartburn. Man, I have it even when I don't eat anything. I think I need to start carrying a little ziplock of tums with me, again. Ugh...That burning chest sensation is just plain awful!

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Friday, September 9, 2005

Okay I like this background a lot better then those pink and maroon dots!

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Friday, September 9, 2005

I'm really not digging the background of this page! I think I will change it some time this morning.

I decided to come in much to early this morning. I want to leave around by 3pm at the latest today. My schedule is open after 2pm so it shouldn't be a problem.

After work yesterday I took mom to the galleria. Which was funny cause she's going to go again today. Anyway we walked around for a bit just looking out for any sales. Mom bought a couple of warm newborn winter jammies which the Gap had on sale. Okay, one question about the Gap, why the hell does children clothes have to be so pricey there? Excluding sale items, who the hell wants to pay 20 bucks for one pair of childres pj's. Everything Kai has from the Gap was either purchased on sale or drastically reduced from one of their outlets. Its plainly ridiculous. We also stopped in at Babystyle to check for any good kid sale stuff and maternity stuff. Mom bought me a sale tank and a top for work. I'm wearing the top for work. It's a soft, thin knit in a beatiful mocha color. Unfortunately Babystyle.com did not have a photo online.

Kai woke up in a frenzy last night. He was screaming and yelling, it was more then pierceing. His teething has climaxed and this is always the worst part. After a good 30-45 minutes of crying I tried to soothe him and eventually got him calm enough to take a bottle and he quickly settled himself down and fell asleep (in our bed). He was sound asleep when T and I woke up this morning for work so in fear of waking him up and moving him to his crib I had to wake my mom up to sleep on my bed with him to ensure he didn't roll off of our bed. I love when Kai sleeps with us, he is so super cuddly and sweet. However, I am glad he doesn't sleep in our bed every night more like once every couple of weeks. For such a little guy he sure takes up a lot of room. He moves around so much and always finds his most comfy position sleep sideways, where one of us is his pillow and the other one has his feet jammed into our necks, eye or someother uncomfortable body crevice.

It's already the weekend! I was thinking of heading out to Camarillo tomorrow but i'm not sure if I'm up for shopping. Some other options on the plate are the Aquarium of the Pacific, Los Angeles Zoo or The Getty. It's funny, I live about a mile or two from the zoo and have never gone. Maybe we'll go tomorrow. I'm going to pour over the La Times online for any festivities going on tomorrow and take the options to the table and see what everyone else wants to do. Sunday, we're going to brunch with Ron and Morris. Chez Nous again. We're not obsesssed with this place its just that its good and it's conveniently located between West Glendale and Sherman Oaks so neither of us are driving to far. Ron may invite his mom and dad since my mom will be there as well. I'm looking forward to it. I love hanging out with those two.

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Thursday, September 8, 2005

Since the weather is supposedly cooling down beginning tomorrow I decided to take advantage of the warmer weather today and wore my mossy green, velvety knee length bermuda shorts. I dont' know if you can really classify them as bermuda's but they aren't quite regular shorts but not quite peddle pushers. I guess bermuda is the closest or the exact name, whatever they are knew length and taper in at the knee. I like them they are cute but on with the rest of the ensemble. Mossy green bermudas, dark, dark maroon tunic type tank, black fitted blazer and pewter Mizrahi flats i bought from Sack's going out of business sale. In the jewelry department plain hoops but a triple strand of longish bead neacklaces.

Speaking about beaded necklaces I have to talk about this summer's current treand of big beaded neacklaces. I don't have a problem with it at all but I did find it so hysterical that you would see people like Jessica Simpson and Nicole Richie wearing kukui nut necklaces (lei'). You see, being from Hawaii the only people who would wear these things were Hawaiian entertainers. I remember my dear dad hand them in all colors (black, brown, dual tone, white...) and how he did not like wearing them when he had to work. I would never wear them as a kid, maybe for a May Day event at school but then it had to be required. It was more of a novelty then a fashion forward accessory. But back to this summer's trend and seeing why I found it funny. The worst part of this was that people were emulating these celebs and I started seeing girls all over the place prancing around in their kukui nut necklaces and paying anywhere between 15-25 dollars for the darn things. What a rip off, really you can buy them for 5 bucks. I brought a bunch back from my recent vacation for my friends. Although it may look funky on, being chunky and all, I just cannot bring myself to wear it period. I'll leave those for all others and I'll continue to giggle when I see a girl flaunting her overpriced beads.

Mom arrived this morning. she's at home with the menchy today. I felt bad leaving because Kai is going through that phase when he cries whenever T or I leave him. But he was happy to see my mom. He was excited when he saw her get out of the shuttle and when we got in the house, I put him down and he immediately turned to my mom and stretched out his arms for her. He really likes her. However, in Hawaii, I felt kind of bad because he really didn't care to much for T's mom. He would either very hesitantly go to Elizabeth or just cry and turn away from her. T thinks he is just afraid of her. My mom thinks he isn't familiar with her and that's why he's acting that way. But, while in Hawaii, especially at his bday party he let most anyone carry him around with no wimpering or crying. It's so sad that he acts that way towards his other grandma. I hope in time he'll be more comfortable around her, which means, we'll probably have to go to Hawaii a lot more then we normally would. Damn!

My family thinks that since we're having bambino number two that we will cave in and move back to Hawaii. Hmmm...I don't know. T thinks, and I agree, that I would go through major urban withdrawl. I can't really imagine moving back to Hawaii. I haven't lived there for about 12 years now, but going back once a year is enough. I do think that Kai and his yet to be named sibling will miss a big part of the joy's of growing up in Hawaii. I want them to be connected and familiar with their cousins but right now moving back is not something I can even imagine. What would we do for work? I don't think Y! is that flexible that I could telecommute from Hawaii. I just think for the next 10 years or so many of our vacations will be going to Hawaii or at least dropping the kids off there and then T and I heading West of the Pacific Islands for our vacation. We'll work something out but thinking about all that they will miss out on does sadden me.

This morning i'm blaring the pop music as I compose my entry. I can't help it. It's easy background music and very upbeat for the morning. Yes, guilty pleasures are great! My friend and I tend to talk about our guilty pop music pleasures all the time. I won't out him here nor will I totally divulge what I blare through my headphones. Although if you are on my IM list you've probably caught a glimpse of some of the tunes that are revealed next to my name. Sorry, that's all you get.

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Tuesday, September 6, 2005

First day back to work. Mainly a catch up day. It's amazing how many emails one can receive in a week and a half! Of course there was a handful of junk but outside of that I still had a lot to catch up on.

I'm tired. I'm only now realizing how much I slept, catnapped, vegged out over the last four days. It's all hitting me now. I need to get back to my oldself. I need to rebuild my ability to wake up at the crack of dawn and just crash out at 9pm or so.

Yesterday I cleaned the big pool and set it up. With the amount fo heat we have received today the water should be nice and warm when I get home later this afternoon. I can't wait to hope in, relax, play with Kai and basically chill. I'm finding that the pool is such an incredible place to just sit, relax and stretch. My limberness is all but gone but being in the pool is so comfortable and should help me in the long run. I can't even fathom going to a gym after this pregnancy. Honestly it's not something I want to think about until February or so. But for now the pool will be my aid and I can have fun with the boy at the same time. After we filled up the pool yesterday, the water was icey cold we dipped Kai's feet in and he had the cutest expression. His back arched and his eyes bugged out, you knew he was cold. But as soon as you got his feet out of the water he laughed and wanted more. Before we knew it he was trying to get out of T's arms and get into the icey cold water. We eventually dipped his entire body in and he loved it. He's a strange little boy. He enjoys cold water, he really doesn't care. We tried a few times to take him back into the house yesterday but he wanted to remain in the frigid water. I think he and I will enjoy it much more today.

I thought Kai had only one tooth coming in but yesterday I noticed a second. This new one has not yet broken through his gums. He is fussy! I've been loading him up on teething tablets and lately he's been needing some Motrin/Advil to get to sleep and sleep comfortably through the night. It's hard to believe that he will have a mouthful of chompers within the next few months. Speaking of the little guy...today his is 14-months old. Wow! He is getting to be such a cute little guy. We took him to the park yesterday. There is a continous stream running through the grassy part of the park and he, along with many other little guys and glas, was having a ball running through the water. We didn't realize there was a stream until we got there so he had to ride home, and make a pit stop to target, with no pants on. He was just in his tee and baby undies (diapers). It was weird for me to take him out in a diaper but we really had no choice. Who cares really, he had a great time getting all wet and tiring himself out. He got a little bit of sun so when we got home he had some rosie cheeks, he looked like a little doll.

My mom will be back in SoCal on Thursday morning. The sitter is going out of town for a few days so mom will be here acting the sitter and soaking up her time with the mench. She's here over the rosebowl weekend so maybe we can spend waste away some hours perusing the goods. We really don't have any plans but I'm sure Target is on her list of places to visit. She just loves herself some Target. Who can blame her, its the mecca! By the way, I know some of you are new Pasadena, if you haven't stopped off at the Target near Lake st on Colorado after its renovation, they have a grocery section minus the produce and meats. You can buy eggs, milk, frozen stuff while looking shopping for DVDs, videogames and lovely target housewares!

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Sunday, September 4, 2005 01:00 p.m.

We got home just as the sun came up on Friday morning. Our flight back was smooth and quick. It may be just me but I think red-eye flights go buy 10 times faster then a flight leaving and arriving in the middle of the day. Anyway, Friday was such a lazy, wasteful day. We were all awake until 7am or so when one-by-one we hit the sack. We didn't wake up until after noon. A few hours later we all fell asleep again. We were so tired and barely awake that we decided to leave the dogs at the kennel until Saturday morning.

The return timing for this trip was/is perfect. Having all these days off due to labor day weekend is wonderful. I've been spending the last two days relaxing, doing minor house chores, like laundry, and basically getting myself ready for work next week. My mom is flying up here on a red eye on Wednesday night. Why? Well my sitter is going on vacation and because I just took a vacation I feel bad asking for more time off. So I talked to my mom and she agreed to come up for a week to watch Kai so T and I could get back into the swing of things.

One thing I did leave out was that, while in Hawaii, I bought myself a little treat. I splurged and bought myself a new Louis Vuitton. I received a bonus the week before I left for vacation. Since this was totally and completely unexpected I decided I would treat myself to a little something. I used the purse once in Hawaii and just switched my purses over last night. Mmmmmm....I love me some Louis Vuitton.

Another tooth has come in for Kai. I'm shocked I missed all the teething signs, it was like he didn't have any this time around. I was playing with him yesterday morning and noticed the little sucker growing in. Finally, he won't have just two little chompers in his bottom row. It seems like it is taking forever for his teeth to come in, but I'm sure it grows in at different rates for every child. While in Hawaii we did not give him any babyfood. and you know what, he did fine with everything he ate. We decided to finish up with the baby bucket foods that we have left, mainly having the sitter feed him with it and we're just going to transisition him over on full-fledged big kid foods. He is eating so much better now that we are giving him homecooked meats, rice and pasta. Although the little mench still loves his yogurt in the morning.

Our last couple of days in Hawaii was spent vacationing in Waikiki. Kai stayed with his Gran's and Gramps while T and I sunned it up and soaked up the AC at the Hilton Hawaiian Village. What a relaxing getaway! It was strange not having the mench in tow and waking up with no little wimperings from him. We really needed that. We splashed around in the pool, swam at the beach, acted like tourist strolling through Waikiki and even had breakfast on the beach at Dukes with my brother-in-law. Peaceful times.

I know this entry has just been a hodge podge of info but I wanted to make sure I got some info out there before it all became a blur.

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