Leavin' on a jet plane...

Casey and I are leaving for San Diego today!!! I cannot wait to go home and see all of my family and friends. The only official thing on the agenda for the long weekend is on Friday night. My dad is throwing a dutch-oven dinner party for us. I think Casey will think its fun since he loves to camp and be outdoorsy. Other than that, some ideas I have are walking around Balboa Park, going to Mission Beach, maybe touring the Midway? There are just way too many things to do and see in San Diego and southern California that I think we are just going to have to make several trips out there until we get them all done.

We get in at around 7pm California time and are going out to dinner in the Gaslamp District right from the airport. I think we’ll just walk up and down the streets until we see a restaurant that looks delicious and fun. I can’t wait to see everyone!!!!!

Some other things to do on a future trip:
1) World Famous San Diego Zoo
2) World Famous San Diego Wild Animal Park
3) Sea World
4) La Jolla Cove
5) Del Mar Beach
6) Seaport Village
7) Temecula Wineries
8) Dudley’s Bakery & Julian Pie Shop
9) Old Town San Diego

10) Coronado Island
11) Spend a day in LA and see all the tourist spots

It's a bear, it's a muscrat, it's Deuce!

Friday night, Casey and I had reservations at Del Frisco’s down in Dallas for restaurant week. We got all dressed up after work for our special date. Casey got to wear his suit again (and of course looked really good) and then I wore a little black dress with these fun strappy silver shoes. The food was amazing! I started with the cream of asparagus soup that had this garlic toasted bread floating in it which added great flavor. For the main course I had the filet with these garlic potatoes and grilled veggies and finished off the night with a chocolate mousse for dessert. It was really nice to get to eat at a restaurant that we normally would not be able to eat at (the typical price of a steak there is basically what we paid for our whole meal) and $7 of our meals went to charity. Everything was perfect! The only funny thing about the night was that in this nice formal dining room, they had brought in a flat screen TV and had the Olympics on. It was on silent but it was still funny to see. But it was a good thing they had the TV because while we were eating, the Michael Phelps swim where he won by 1/100 of a second was on. The whole dining room was watching and people from other rooms were even coming in and standing in our room to watch it. Everyone cheered and clapped when they came back and said he had officially won. It was just a great night.

Saturday I just relaxed and started to re-read the 6th Harry Potter book to get ready for the movie which comes out in November. Can’t wait! I think I might have to go see this one on opening night. Maybe I can convince Casey to dress up as Harry and I can go as Jenny. How cute would that be?!

Sunday, I had received free tickets to the Frisco Rough Riders game (the AA team for the Rangers) so Casey, Alyssa, and Ryan all came with me. The stadium is really nice and it had been cloudy all day so the weather was perfect, not hot at all. The game was kind of boring though. At the halfway point of every inning, they came out and did some kind of crazy antic like making kids run around the bases and put on a uniform while doing so. The best one by far was when Deuce, the mascot for the Rough Riders, a kind of orange and yellow muskrat/bear looking thing, had his big debut. They played the Will Ferrell line from Old School where he drunkenly shouts, “We’re going streaking!” after which Deuce runs out onto the field and strips off his jersey he wears and runs around the field while being chased by security guards. Oh, and did I mention it was Kids Night for Make-A-Wish? Just a tad inappropriate I thought. Alyssa and I had a ball making fun of Deuce though. He really was our entertainment for the night. We spent all night trying to thinking up the story of how they chose this muskrat/bear creature as the mascot. We came up with the idea, judging by how clean and put together the costume was, that it must have been a last minute decision and it was the last costume in the store and had been in the back of some dark closet for about 20 years. The head had this neck thing that hung down like a flap which made Deuce slightly resemble a turkey as well. Really Rangers? Can’t you spare an extra $400 so they can go buy a decent mascot uniform? On second thought, it was great entertainment so let’s keep Deuce just as he is. See a picture of Deuce below...

TGIF

Today was a good day. The obvious reason is that it’s Friday. The second reason is that today my managers took me out to a really nice lunch for my 1 year anniversary. I can’t believe that I have been here for a year. A year in the working real world sure does go by fast! A lot has changed since Day 1 of my job here. For one, my two mangers that took me out to lunch today are not the two managers who hired me so that tells you that there has certainly been some change in the office. Today I just kind of reflected on the last year and how much has changed and how much I have grown. I am definitely more independent and responsible (paying all bills is a high price to be an “adult”). I love the girls that I work with (shout out to those who read this!). I feel truly blessed to actually enjoy the people that I get to spend 40 hours a week with. I like enjoy my job, love my friends, have a wonderful boyfriend, and am overall loving life. Moving to Dallas after graduation was definitely the right decision (no offense my SD peeps, I still love and miss you!)

Random thought as I type this blog, whatever happened to TGIF? When I was younger, it was my whole reason to get through the tough week of 4th grade. I couldn’t wait to watch Full House, Family Matters, Sabrina the Teenage Witch, Step by Step, Hangin’ with Mr. Cooper, Sister Sister, and any of the other classic sitcoms that graced the 8-10pm Friday night line-up. What do kids do on Friday nights now? Play World of Warcraft or some crazy videogame? Hang out at the movie theater all night? What happened to sleepovers in celebration of TGIF? Any insight into this great conundrum would greatly be appreciated. Thank you.

Wii!

Now that I am not house sitting for my boss anymore, I am having some withdraws…Wii withdraws that is. While I was at his house, Casey and I had several Wii Mario Brothers Olympic Game tournaments. I was unstoppable in rowing and hurdles, Casey basically dominated in everything else (which unfortunately for me, is not unusual). We invited some friends over for a major tournament and it was a lot of fun. It was hilarious how intense we all got about it. Everyone was so serious about winning until you accidentally looked around at how everyone else looked while Wii “running” (basically you move your arms with the controllers up and down as fast as you can) and trust me…you would die laughing if you could have seen it. I videotaped a few seconds on my camera but am not sure how to upload it to my blog. After 2 days in a row of intense Wii cardio, my forearms have never hurt so badly in my life. If you have not tried playing with a Wii yet, go find one and try it…you will not regret it!

Can you feel the intensity?

I love how focused Casey looks...it's just a video game Casey!

Take me out to the ballgame...

In the past week, I have attended 2 Rangers games. Who knew the little tap dancer from San Diego would become a Rangers fan. I guess this is what happens when you get a boyfriend, huh? Our first Rangers game together was on $1.00 hot dog night. We went with Casey's good friend Bradley and his girlfriend Jennifer. Bradley and Casey both got 5 dogs (that was the limit) and ate all of them within the first inning. Our second Rangers expereince together was last night, we went to the Rangers vs. Yankees game and it was AWESOME! First off, my boss who moved to Illinois sold me her “Lexus Club Level” seats for a very nice price. We had a great view of the game and access to the nice “Cuervo Club” which is basically a nice bar/restaurant right behind home plate. The one major perk of the Cuervo Club was that we found the elusive "ice cream in a plastic Rangers helmet" that we thought had been eliminated. Casey was like a little kid when he found out we could order them and take them with us. So our souvenier from the game was 2 mini plastic helmets. Casey has requested to eat ice cream out of them any time we watch a Rangers game at my place. Oh, and did I mention we had our own waitress at our seats? No getting up to get our own hotdogs! Now that is the way to go see a ballgame! The only way our seats could have been better was if one of the foul balls had landed in our section. Casey warned me that we would do anything to catch a ball if it came our way which I think was his way of kindly saying "Head's up sweetie, I might have to push you down to get to that ball." The sections next to us had all the fun though. The one to our left had about 5 foul balls land in it and the one to our right had the Kiss cam camera on it during the 6th inning. No love was shown to section 220. The game itself was really good though. It was tied in the bottom of the 9th inning, bases loaded and the Rangers hit a home run…the stadium went crazy!!!

Our first Rangers game

Casey's face while finishing his 5th hot dog

Rangers vs. Yankees game

The awesome view from our "Lexus Level" seats!