Christmas 2011

My family spent Christmas in Richmond this year. My parents and Ryan flew out from the West and the four of us stayed at a hotel downtown by the state capital. Here's how the holiday went down:

Thursday after work I drove to Richmond and met the family at my grandparents' house. Then my parents and I went to our hotel for the night, and Dad and I walked to Capital Ale House for a beer.

Friday morning Dad and I went to the airport to pick up Ryan. Then we wrapped a bunch of presents before meeting up with the whole family (including Grandma!) for pizza near Carytown. After that my parents and I visited the art museum, where I finally got to see the giant whale! After that my parents dropped Ryan and me off at the hotel for naps. Friday night the four of us saw the lights at the botanical garden, then had pho for dinner.

Saturday (Christmas Eve) I got up early-ish to go for a run, then we went to the grandparents' house where Mom got to work cooking posole, I made cookies (Sunni helped), and Dad and I ran last-minute errands, including stopping at four different stores looking for eggnog. Saturday evening we all went to church at 7, then went back to the house for our traditional posole dinner.

Sunday (Christmas) I woke up earlier than planned (too much Christmas excitement I guess), so I got Dad up to go for a Christmas walk with me. Then we headed back across town to the house, where cooking was underway. I made rolls. Everyone (including Grandma!) came over for lunch, which was delicious Beef Wellington. Then we opened presents. Later in the afternoon my family headed back to the hotel for naps, and once rested went back to the house for more eating and hanging out. I finally ate some pie, and we had a fire in the fire pit out back. Josh had joined us by this point, and he and I performed a song ("It's Cliched to Be Cynical at Christmas") for my family with his ukulele.





Monday we slept in a little, then Dad, Ryan, Josh, and myself went for a long walk downtown. We walked along the canal and then back through Church Hill, and everyone (including Ryan, despite what me might say) had a good time. After the walk we ate lunch at the Tobacco Company. That afternoon we went to the mall (a mad house) so Ryan could get new house slippers, and that evening lots of us saw Tin Tin.





It was a pretty good Christmas, I'd say.

pistachio sightings!

On Saturday I took a break from working on my papers (which are over now, whew) to go to Richmond for lunch with the whole family. Then some of us went and saw The Muppets, which I thoroughly enjoyed. When we got out of the theater I had a text message from Andrew with a pistachio sighting! He said it was "Outside the movie theater." Now this confused me for a minute, because I was outside the movie theater, and there happened to be a guy named Andrew with us. But he doesn't have my phone number, or I wouldn't have him in my phone as "Andrew," and thus I deduced this pistachio sighting was coming from Colorado, where my pal Andrew must have just seen a movie. Or at least he was hanging outside a movie theater. Either way, pistachio sighting!



This sighting reminded me of the two I had in Santa Fe at Thanksgiving, which I never posted. So let me share them now.





Happy sightings y'all!

semester wrap-up and the Christmas season

The problem with being in school is that stressful schoolwork butts right up against the holidays. Today I received a choice of essay questions, and I now have exactly one week to write two ten-page papers. That has to happen after work in the evenings and this coming weekend. So I'll finally be done next Monday, and that means you probably won't hear from me again any time soon.

But today I got a Christmas card from Uncle Richard and in it he said he likes my blog, so I thought I should write something quickly before tackling my first essay. I will take this opportunity to let you know that I haven't put up my little Christmas tree yet, and probably won't unless I succumb to a good bout of procrastination later in the week. But I did buy a little poinsettia and my parents sent me a nutcracker, which is displayed on a bookshelf with Christmas cards, so I'm not completely missing out on a holiday feeling in my apartment.

Okay, gotta get to work. After I eat something...

Thankful for Grandmothers

The week before Thanksgiving I decided I should probably go ahead and fly home to Santa Fe for the holiday weekend. I'll be here in Virginia for Christmas, so I wanted to see my New Mexico grandparents sooner rather than later. The week before Thanksgiving my Grandmother had surgery on her spine, which was a pretty big deal. She's still in the hospital but is doing well and has moved to rehab. Obviously she couldn't join us for our Thanksgiving meal, but I got to visit with her three days in a row during my short trip.

On the other side of my family, another pretty big deal is going on this week in Richmond. In the past few months my Grandma has been severely affected by Alzheimer's, and tomorrow she will move into the memory care ward of an assisted living facility. As you might imagine, the whole family is struggling with this change in various ways. I got to visit with Grandma on Sunday after I got back from New Mexico. We went out for lunch and had a good time.

I'm very blessed and grateful to have such great grandmothers. I also have great grandfathers, and my heart goes out to both of them during these difficult times.

a list of things I've squeezed in between homework

Sorry I never post anymore. I'm pretty busy these days. And by "these days," I mean this semester. It's the same old story about work and reading, blah blah blah.

Anyway, I do manage to fit in a few fun things, and I'd like to share them here, mostly because this blog is the only journal-type-thing I keep and maybe I will want to remember these some day.

Last weekend I went to Richmond to spend time with my family. My grandma isn't doing so hot these days, but it was good to be with her and the others. I had to spend a lot of my time reading, but we enjoyed meals together, including a good Indian lunch.

The weekend before that I spent most of Saturday at Wintergreen (a ski resort) watching Josh and four other guys on his team complete the Tough Mudder challenge. It was a nine-mile course with lots of obstacles, including a pool of ice, dark tubes, ropes to climb, and live wires to run through. They had a good time and no one broke any bones, so that was good. I took pictures when I could actually get to the obstacles, but there were about two hours when I didn't see them so I ate lunch, drank a beer, and rode the chair lift.

The weekend before that Josh and I went to his grandparents' house. We ate food and played games, and I got a little reading in there, too.

I'm not exactly sure on the timing because we're going back several weeks here, but I think two weeks before the trip to Josh's grandparents I was in Richmond for the weekend while my mom was there, so I got to spend time with her and the rest of the family.

There was another weekend sometime before that when I went to Fredericksburg on a Saturday night to visit my friend Ryan and his wife. They made good Japanese food, and we played poker.

So, as you can see, my nose isn't always stuck in a book. But after doing fun things I have to make up the homework I missed, and then I don't have time to blog. Sorry.

keeping busy

Today after work Josh and I worked out at the gym. But then we both had homework to do (me: read about the California Gold Rush; him: study anatomy). Usually I come home from the gym with great intentions to get lots of homework done, but after a shower and dinner, I'm pretty tired. So tonight we went to the library straight from the gym. Yes, that means we smelled very bad. But I'm finding myself short on time for homework a lot these days, and desperate times call for desperate measures. I didn't get quite as much reading done as I'd hoped, but overall I'm pleased with how it went. I'm also pleased with this picture Josh drew of me on his whiteboard while he took a short study break:



P.S. I'm also having a bit of a fruit fly problem in my apartment (and "bit" is an understatement), so going to the gym saved me from wasting a lot of time wandering around trying to kill them. My traps seem to be working though, so here's to hoping they're all gone soon.

they're baaack

The first stink bug (that I've seen) of the season has entered my office space. They sprayed outside the building last week to try and keep them out, but I'm afraid we'll just have a hoard of mutant stink bugs now.

same ol' same ol'

I don't have anything much to report y'all. I go to work, I sometimes go to the gym or for a run, and I read for school. That's about it. Today I met with a professor on Skype, which wasn't as awkward as I thought it might be. Oh, and today was chilly outside. I'm not ready for cold weather. Okay, that's all for now.

recent goings on

A week ago I experienced my first earthquake. That was exciting. I was at work and the building was rumbling quite a bit. In case you don't know, Charlottesville is only about 35 miles from where the epicenter was. But even though I had an armchair and coffee table precariously set upside down on my couch to make way for the carpet cleaners, they didn't fall off or anything. I also woke up a couple nights later to an aftershock.

Then a hurricane headed for Virginia. I went to Richmond on Saturday to visit with my family, which meant I headed closer to the hurricane. After lunch we lost power at my grandparents' house, which we were pretty sure was going to happen eventually anyway, and it was then that it finally dawned on my aunt and myself that maybe Grandma and Grandpa shouldn't be stuck in a house with no power. So with wind and rain and branches thrashing the windows, we frantically ran around the house packing up food and clothes and bedding and loaded up the van. Then we all headed through the storm to my apartment in Charlottesville, where it was only lightly raining. Five of us and Danny the pug spent two cozy nights in my one-bedroom apartment, and while it wasn't ideal, it wasn't so bad either. They got their power back Monday morning and didn't waste time getting back home.

After the crowed cleared out I had a little time to straighten out my apartment, join Josh for lunch, and then head up to Fairfax for my first night of classes. I'm taking seven credits this semester instead of the four I took each semester last year, so I'll be keeping busy. I sure enjoyed my summer break, but I'm also ready to get back at it.

Arizona was pretty great, too.

So Wednesday (the 10th) we arrived in Flagstaff around 7:30 or so. We stopped by Ryan's house, which was fun to see, and then drove on to Sedona. He works at a resort there, where Josh and I stayed. After checking in the three of us had some dinner, but then we had to drive back to Flagstaff (45 minutes and over 2000 feet up in elevation away). That was so we could drop Ryan off but keep his truck. That also meant I had to drive back to Sedona on a windy mountain road and through a canyon in the dark in Ryan's giant truck that I don't recall every driving before. So that was scary, but we lived.

The next day we used his truck to drive to the Grand Canyon. That was pretty exciting. And first things first, we had a pistachio sighting!





We also hiked down about a mile and a half.


While hiking we saw two California Condors, and a big horned sheep. Plus lots of greedy and bold squirrels.

After the Grand Canyon we drove to Flagstaff for dinner. Then it was back to Sedona. Ryan was working, which was lucky for us because when a group of javelinas ran through the grounds of the resort, he called us so we could run out and see them. Those things are big!



Other than wild javelinas running around, the resort was really nice. Friday morning we had breakfast sitting down by the creek.


After breakfast we explored Sedona a little. But then we got roped into going to a timeshare sales talk, which was not so exciting. (And don't worry, we didn't buy.) On the way back from the timeshare talk we stopped to take some pictures of Sedona's red rocks.




As our reward for enduring the timeshare ordeal, we got a free jeep ride!


We did that Saturday morning. It was lots of fun and our guide was great. The views were amazing.






After the jeep tour we had lunch with Ryan. Then we used his truck to drive back up past Flagstaff to...Bearizona! At Bearizona you drive around like a safari looking at western animals.




After driving you get out and there is a small zoo with the baby animals. Look at these adorable bear cubs.


They also have a petting zoo.




Saturday night we had dinner back at the resort in Sedona and played a little Scrabble. We also said goodbye to Ryan when he got off work that night. Sunday morning we caught a 7:15 shuttle to the airport in Pheonix, and spent the rest of the day traveling back home.

This trip out West was really really great. We saw lots of stuff, and I got to spend time with my family. An excellent vacation, I would say.

say cheese

I forgot to tell you all that our time in Durango also involved taking this gem:

then we went to Durango

Now for more trip updates. Let's see, Monday morning Josh and I had breakfast at the Chocolate Maven, then went downtown. He bought himself a knife made out of dinosaur fossil, which is pretty awesome, and we looked at art on Canyon Road. We also ate green chili burgers for lunch.

Monday afternoon we all drove to Durango, Colorado. That included my parents, Ryan, Josh, and me. It took about 4.5 hours, so we got there in time to check into our hotel and then head downtown for dinner. After dinner we walked around a little bit and got dessert at the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory. Then Josh and I hit the swimming pool back at the hotel for a few minutes before it closed.

Tuesday everyone but Mom rode the narrow gauge train to Silverton. It took 3.5 hours to travel about 45 miles, but it was a lot of fun. Here we are waiting to leave from the station.


And here is the cute station.


There were lots of great views from the train, including steep drops into a canyon with a roaring river.


The train takes you up to Silverton, an old mining town that is now just a tourist stop for people riding the train.


Mom drove up to meet us there, and we all had lunch. Then I bought some shoes.


Instead of taking another 3.5 hours to get back to Durango, we just rode back with Mom. It took about an hour. We stopped on the way at Honeyville and bought some honey. Ryan even got a bag with 100 flavored honey sticks. When we got to Durango we had a little bit of time to kill, so we walked around downtown again and made sure to drink caffeine. Because next up was the chuckwagon!


Josh and I wore our boots for the occasion.


At the chuckwagon you eat outside off of tin plates and listen to a western stage show. My favorite song was "Old Matt Palmer had a misfit farm."


The next day we headed to Durango Mountain Resort to ride the alpine slide. Here we are at the top.


And here Dad is at the bottom.


After that we went back to downtown Durango for lunch, and then Ryan, Josh, and I hit the road for Arizona while Mom and Dad stayed another night in Durango before going back home. It was a 6 hour drive from Durango to Flagstaff, and we made sure to stop at the Four Corners Monument.


Josh wanted to run around the four states, so we did that, too.


As we continued on the drive we saw this ominous western rock formation. Pretty cool.


Stay tuned for the Arizona portion of the trip!

we got to Santa Fe

Saturday was our travel day. First there was the drive to Richmond, then the flight to Dallas, and then the flight to Denver. We had a long layover in Denver, so my Colorado friends Katie and Andrew came to the airport to hang out and eat a meal, which was very nice of them. We also stepped outside of the airport to look at mountains and take this photo.


After Denver was the flight to Albuquerque, where my dad picked us up at the airport and took us to dinner near UNM. Finally there was the drive up to Santa Fe, where we arrived about midnight and went straight to bed.

This morning Josh and I got up and went for a run. Only running at 7,000 feet when you're not used to it is pretty hard. We did at least three miles though, and Josh even threw in some other exercises because he is more hard core. After getting cleaned up we (including Ryan, who drove in from Flagstaff the night before and got in at 3am) met up with dad at church. After church we had a Mexican lunch with my grandparents, which left me stuffed for the rest of the day. This afternoon we walked around downtown for a while and visited shops and the Basilica. We also stopped for this photo at Burro Alley.



The evening was spent at my grandparents house, eating dessert and visiting with family on the back patio.

This is a super short trip to Santa Fe for me (I guess my shortest ever), because tomorrow we all head to Durango!

headed west

Josh and I are headed west tomorrow for a nine day vacation. I'm pretty excited. We'll spend time in Santa Fe, Durango, and Sedona. Lots of sights will be seen, and we'll get to hang out with my family. Stay tuned for updates and pictures!

drive-in

Last night Josh and I joined a few of my co-workers for a night at the Goochland Drive-In. It's about thirty miles away, but worth it considering you get to see two movies for only seven bucks. We got there in time to grab dinner from their snack bar. Between the two of us we had two cheeseburgers, a Goochland dog, a regular dog, fries, popcorn, and two large drinks with refills. Yikes.

The first movie was Captain America. I thought it was fun. And I was pleasantly surprised by the sound quality since it was through the radio. Our group sat outside in chairs we all brought, so we used portable radios. The second movie, which I was hoping we wouldn't bother staying for since it didn't start until about 11:30pm, was Transformers 3. I had never seen any of the Transformers movies, and to be honest, I still wish we'd left early.

Overall we had a really fun time though. It was nice to sit outside where you can also see stars and bats flying around. A perfect summertime excursion.

day 2 of Philly conference

So that wasn't my UPS advisor getting in the elevator. I was just overzealous I guess. But professors from two schools combined with current work colleagues means this is still a clash of worlds for me, which is kind of fun.

Today I went to two morning sessions, then a graduate student lunch session, and then an afternoon session. I skipped the last session and instead walked a few blocks to the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. I only had 40 minutes before they closed, but I went ahead and paid my admission and walked around anyway. It was worth it. They have several paintings by various members of the Peale family, and recently I've decided I really like Charles Willson Peale. Not just for his art though. He was an awesome guy I think. My favorite piece at the museum was his Self-Portrait with Spectacles. I used to think portraits made for really boring art, but as a history lover (especially of early America) I've come to really appreciate portraits because they let us see the people we read about. And some of them, including Peale and his contemporaries, made some really good portraits.

Philly

So I'm in Philadelphia for a history conference. It doesn't start (for me) until tomorrow, but I actually got up here yesterday so I could spend today doing some research for work. So let me give you a rundown of my day.

This morning I wandered around the streets of Philadelphia looking for breakfast, and I finally found a nice little cafe where I got oatmeal, fruit, and coffee. It was a great start to the day. Next I went to the Library Company of Philadelphia and looked at some old stuff.

From there I walked over to the American Philosophical Society and looked at some more old stuff. I also took a lunch break and wandered the streets of Philly a little more until I found this place where Josh and I ate lunch a few years ago. I had a sandwich. After finishing up at the APS I decided I would forgo museums or historical sites and instead I trekked many blocks to drink some beer. On the way I passed this gem:



Seriously, how awesome is that?! The beer I was walking so far to imbibe was at the Yards Brewing Company. When I finally arrived at their tasting room I sat right down at the bar and ordered a flight of their "Ales of the Revolution." They have a George Washington porter, a Thomas Jefferson ale, and a Benjamin Franklin spruce ale (that tastes like a tree). I also ate a cupcake, to reward myself for all the walking and successful navigation. And just as I finished tasting all my beers they announced that they were doing an impromptu tour of the brewery, so I went on that.



By this point I decided I should head back downtown and toward my hotel. I walked along the Delaware River and had a pistachio sighting! It took three tries crouching on the sidewalk to get this shot with my phone.



After more walking I happened upon Christ Church, so I looked at that and walked around its gardens, and then a couple blocks later I came to the rest of the church's burial ground and saw where Franklin lays. This day was pretty full of that guy. From there I kept walking and finally arrived back at my hotel. I dropped off a few things, and then headed out again, because apparently my feet weren't tired enough yet. After more walking in search of a light dinner, I finally came upon a Whole Foods, where I secured dinner and tomorrow's breakfast for under $9. Score.

So back to the conference. It starts tomorrow. And my history worlds are colliding. I had dinner last night with my NCSU advisor. I will see my GMU advisor tomorrow. And I think I saw my UPS advisor just step into the elevator. I'm excited.

holiday hike

For the 4th of July, Josh and I went for a hike at Humpback Rocks in the Blue Ridge Parkway. It's a short hike but steep, and then the views are amazing.





We also had a pistachio shell sighting!



After the hike we had lunch at the Blue Mountain Brewery. We sat outside with views of the hops farm and mountains, and it was pretty great.

Rain spoiled our fireworks-watching plans so we just watched the show from the Capitol on TV. Overall it was still a good holiday.

Weekend(s) Update

Let me tell you (briefly) what the haps have been. Last Saturday (er, the one almost a week and a half ago) my parents flew into Richmond. Sunday we celebrated Grandma's birthday and Sunday night Dad and I enjoyed brews and live tunes at Legends Brewery. Monday Dad went with me downtown and wandered around while I did some research for work. My parents stayed in Richmond all week while I came back to Charlottesville, but then I took off of work Friday to get ready for Grandpa's recital. He had a professional pianist come to the house Friday night and give a salon concert, so we got all dressed up and had the event catered and everything. It was very nice. The next day Dad, Josh, Jay, Sunni, and myself all went tubing on the James River, and Saturday night was a sort of "girls night out" with my mom and aunt.

So there you go, two fun weekends with family (including my parents!).

(This post is short because I'm writing from work [after hours] while I figure out how to get the internet to work at my apartment again, after a big thunderstorm Sunday. Just FYI.)

I want one of these

Last night I got together with some ladies from work for dinner and a movie. The movie was Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, and we planned the rest of the meal around a Spanish theme to match the movie. We started with ceviche (not really Spanish, but from places where they speak Spanish...), then some manchego cheese and bread, and our main course was gazpacho. But between the cheese and the gazpacho came chorizo, cooked in a Portuguese pig!

One of the co-worker ladies is from Portugal, so she brought her pig. You put alcohol in the bottom, light it on fire, and it cooks the chorizo. It was delicious.



Ole!

Timo 5k

Yesterday I ran in a 5k race. Other than the Montalto Challenge, I haven't raced a 5k before (only 3.1 miles), but a coworker helps run the Timo 5k, and all the proceeds benefit the rescue squad where Josh volunteers. He and his roommate ran, too. It was hot and the course was cross-country with grass and hills and dirt and stuff. So pretty tough for a 5k. But we all did very well!


I won 3rd place for women overall (prize = technical shirt from local running store), and 2nd place for women in my age group (prize = red ribbon). Josh's roommate also won 2nd place in his age division.


Afterwards the three of us celebrated with lunch and a beer.