Mice, Meece, Moose

Today, Sunny kept saying that his office smelled. Now, him being of the 'pizza box in my car for three years, laundry in my backseat, bottles of hot sauce sitting on the corner of my desk" mentality, we ignored (and mocked) his claims of hovering death.

"Doesn't your office always smell this way?"

"Face it Sunny. It smells like your old car"

"Is that your underwear in that pile?"

"Sunny, why don't you clean everything before we start tearing apart the ceiling?"

We lit candles. He cleaned. The hallway smelled overwhelmingly of orange cleaning oil. And still, he sat there with a discontent look on his face. Crinkling his nose. I rolled my eyes at him, and told him maybe he was like Pig-Pen with odor instead of dust.

We were all being super nice.

Imagine our chagrin when the building maintenance came round, climbed a ladder to look above the ceiling squares, and pulled out four decomposing mice.

Team Snowshoe!

Call me crazy; the concept of strapping tennis rackets onto my feet and walking through the snow has always been appealing. It makes me think of Little House on the Prairie and how it took them forever to get anywhere and having these mats attached to the bottom of your shoe was not only practical, but entirely necessary. Also, tying yourself to your front door during a blizzard was handy.

So, the Laura Ingalls in me has always wanted to try this thing called snowshoeing. With the Old West image in my mind, a group of ladies and I went up to Arnold to venture out into the great unknown and, well, tramp around. I mean tromp around.

Actually, what we did was strap super fancy flappy shoes on our feet that made walking on snow really simple. We hiked around a pretty area for a few hours, sat on a big rock, ate soup and drank hot chocolate. No blizzard required strings or human chains. No walking ten miles to get flour. Nope. We did, however, get locked out of the cabin for about an hour, but the snow plower with the magic hands finally got the door open. And the next morning, we woke to fresh snow!

Super fun weekend --- and the best picture goes to:

these two divine creatures.

Sykes Hot Springs: an excursion, victory

So, my 2011 bucket list has been percolating in my brain for a couple of months now, and I am totally behind in blogging. My intention was to first tackle the ones involving snow, but lo' and behold, in January Lori decided she want to go on a three day backpacking trip to Sykes Hot Springs in Big Sur. I say YAY.

Middle of January? Sure. Cold weather gear? Why not. Ten miles up and down, both ways? Bring it.

And it was awesome. The hike was hard (harder than I thought it would be), but the views and the feeling of satisfaction -- not to mention the awesomeness of hot springs in the middle of the woods -- were well worth it. The weather was in the 70s and my pack was so much lighter once everyone ate my apples and Brandon and T threw half of my gear back in my car. WIN.

The Hike

The River by Our Campsite.

The Hot Springs

The Crew

Major victories:

Finding the toilet

Using the toilet

No one fell off the crazy log into the River

Fries at Napenthe post-hike

Injury tally:

2/3 of the crew got some form of Poison Oak (poor Adam, but that's what trail candy gets you!)

1 torn calf

1 person with body bruising due to falling (but not off the log!!!)

...

More Pictures here and here .

Snippet(s):

Then fix it: Bucket List 2011

One month deep into 2011, and I'm finally writing about my 2011 bucket list. My list is similar to the "32 things I will do before I'm 32" list over at yes and yes (b/c yes is more fun than no!), but since i turn 32 in six months, I figured I would stretch it out by year. Below, you will find an assortment of activities; some big, some small, some simple, and some taking a bit of planning.

And so, my 2011 bucket list:

1. Take a day trip to Angel Island
2. Visit the Legion on Honor in San Francisco
3. Make Paella
4. Go on a three day back packing trip
5. Learn to crochet an afghan
6. Learn Prelude in C by Bach on the piano
7. Go snowshoeing
8. Volunteer with an organization that works with elderly
9. Busk for an afternoon somewhere, playing something
10. Go to a Renaissance Fair.
11. Pretend I don't own a car for a week
12. Write the first chapter of a pararomance
13. Try indoor sky-diving
14. Use the awesome family canoe that has been hanging in the garage since forever
15. Do at least 10 pull ups. in a row. without cheating.
16. Take a dance class
17. Eat only raw foods for a week
18. Do not spend any money for a week.
19. Make my grandmother's mince meat pie
20. Got to a meditation session
    

This list will live in my side-bar (once I figure out how to do that -- but that's a 'to do' list item, not a bucket list item, which is entirely based on experience and broadening one's horizons explanation disclaimer exclamation). If you have any suggestions for additions, let me know! Here we go, 2011! xoxo, lelz

Today

Eye Meets Curling Iron

Happy Eva!

I walked into my chiropractor's office this morning and this little bumbling tumbling floppy bundle of joy barreled out of the back room towards me. It was love at first site. Miss Eva, all fourteen weeks of her, is pretty much the cutest thing I have seen this side of ever and made me overflow with joy. If you know me, you know how much I love dogs. Currently, my life doesn't seem to fit a pooch, but gauging how much I enjoyed this little pup today, I may have to change that soon enough. Ohmigoshloves. LOVES!

Happy Christmas Eve Eve!

It's a pillow! It's a pet!

The day before Christmas break bears witness to the Holiday Sweater. A bingo board of Christmas Awesome, the Holiday Sweater can be counted on to imbue holiday cheer. It's contagious. This year, the effect was bolstered by close proximity to a pillow pet, the darling Amanda, and her cute baby bump. Happy Holidays indeed!

The golden gate was golden before the bridge

Bill and I went into work early this morning. We were treated to a beautiful sunrise and a beautiful bridge and beautiful headlands and everything was golden and clear. A "we are so glad we live here" moment with our coffee and early morning conversation.

Also, I was knitting furiously during the drive. And now, there is a super creepy doll sitting on a chair in my office. She is completely freaking out my coworkers. I put candy cane joe-joes next to her to make her more approachable, but I'm not sure that's working.

During the week: mudflats n' marshes

Part of the pond we were inspecting had dried. We needed to mark the outer edge of the area where mud was showing -- and me, being the lightest, was nominated. I walked on little towers of mud, wobbly and with moats of water around them. The further into the pond I went, the more squishy the towers became until at one point they started cracking. Like you picture ice cracking on a frozen river. I froze too and took data with the GPS unit and then ran back to the shore, hoping that light, quick touches on each mud tower would make them less likely to collapse.

The rain held. It poured when I arrived home. Good day.