Catch up

Sometimes it's nice to take a break from blogging. I love having my "diary", but it's sometimes hard to make myself sit down every week and fill it in. When I have those weeks where I don't do an entry, I always enjoy it - until I do sit down to recap and realize I remember nothing about what had happened. Yay for me. 3 weeks of recapping, from what I do remember, starts now.

Well, almost now - first off, happy birthday to The Sheriff, my mom, and BFF TT! Love you guys!

I left off last with the week of Sandy hitting. I met my bar friend that Sunday for many drinks at Pony to have 1 last day of celebrating my birthday. We met up with our musician friend there and got to see how he came through the storm. It was a nice way to end the week - and again, so glad everyone I know came through okay.

Monday through Friday it was work - I walked to work on Monday because even though my train was back up and running, Bloomberg had said that transportation would be jammed b/c not all lines were running, and the ones that were running were on limited schedule. But my friends that also ride my line told me at work that day that our train was pretty standard (i.e. not that bad) so I took my train the rest of the week.

Also, Blondie started his new corporate job on that Thursday - Blondie's company that he owns is now moving into contracting, and he's back to a commuting with me daily. Blondie loves his new job, which makes me sooo grateful.

I remember that I worked out every day that week except for Monday which was a rest day. I did a 3.1 mile run on Tues, 30 minutes of hill work on Wed, Insanity Cardio Recovery on Thursday, and 3.1 miles of speed work on Friday.

And then, Saturday morning, bright and early (4:45 am), Blondie and I took off for the airport. We headed to SF for a few days - I had to work that week and Blondie came along b/c we needed a vaction. (Blondie had his trip planned before he got his job, and they okayed him taking off a few days). We got to SF, and landed in beautiful weather - it was sunny and gorgeous out. We took a cab to Shelbs and Bbbb - and the cab went along the Great Highway, so we literally spent most of the ride along the ocean, watching waves crashing and just being like "omg. so f'ing beautiful!"

We spent most of the day being lazy - we toured their house which is all kinds of awesome (and with a killer view of the Pacific). We hung out with their new dog, who took a shining to Blondie and wanted to make out with him pretty much non-stop (I wanted to steal Thunderdog I loved her so much). We went for an outdoor lunch. We pissed around in the Mission. We drank beers in Dolores Park. We hit up Toronado. And finally, we picked up pizza and split it with wine at their house.

Sunday was pretty much the same type of lazy-day activities. We took Thunderdog up to Land's End and strolled all through the park and out until we could see Golden Gate Bridge. We went for tacos and margaritas for lunch, before shopping a bit in the mission. And then we picked up some beers and food to grill out, before stopping to eat a Honey Pot in Outer Richmond. Shelbs had told us about this weird desert thing - which was honey bread covered in gelato - and Blondie had to have some. So we stopped for that. Then we went home, crashed out on their back patio and watched the ocean. And then grilled out for dinner.

Monday we hit up Say Cheese and ate in our old dog park for lunch, before Bbbb drove me and Blondie to our hotel in Union Square. I headed into the office for a meeting, but then met up with an old coworker of mine for many drinks. Blondie and my 2 BFFs from the NY office (who also happened to be in SF for work that week) also joined us. Then Blondie and I headed over to meet up with my old gang for mexican and margaritas into the night.

Tuesday I said goodbye to Blondie who was headed home that day. Off to the office for many meetings, before going to lunch with one of my old teammates (from the first group I was ever on at my company). After work fesitivies involved hanging out with a woman who I work with now quite closely. We went for appetizers and many drinks, and just got caught up on life. I've worked with her on several projects over the past year, but mostly as peripheral teammates - but in the last 6 months we've had to work closely together, so getting to know her better was quite fun. After drinks with my coworker, I hit up Irish Bank for CChu and her bf TDawg. We had dinner, many drinks, and were just generally snarky about people we don't like.

I woke up Wednesday in misery - from when I went to bed on Tuesday night and when I woke up Wednesday morning, I had come down with a massive head cold. I sucked it up, showered, and headed into the office as Wednesday was lot of meetings. I also went to lunch with a part of the team that I work with now - it was a lot of fun, and getting to know people outside the office is always nice. I decided that I needed some booze Wed afternoon to hopefully kill the cold germs, so I took off a tiny bit early and met up with Sweetie J! We drank our way down to the Embarcadero where she met up with a friend, and then I headed back up to Union Sq area to meet up with KT and KevB! We had a blast having many more drinks, before heading to dinner for mexican and margaritas. It was soooo good seeing everyone, but honestly, the drinks just made everything worse with my head cold.

Thursday I packed up, checked out, and stowed my bag at the hotel before heading in for my final day at the office. Lunch was with my BFF from the NY office and his gf (who had flown in that day). Then I was expecting low-key to end my day - but it wasn't; we had our final release of the year and caught something major that stopped us from proceeding. I couldn't stay on the call though b/c I had to meet 1 last group of people for drinks (ran in, had a quick whiskey, ran out), and then it was off to the airport.

Normally I love the red-eye back to NY as I sleep well on planes anyway. But this time, with this head cold, it was horrid. I got maybe 45 mins of sleep and was then just awake, with a snotty achy head, the rest of the time. Got home on Friday, and went straight to sleep - but woke up 2 hours later just miserable. I spent the day with the cat, weepy, and finally showered which helped break up some of the snot. Blondie got home that night, and lo and behold, he had the same cold I had. And then we noticed the cat was sneezing like crazy too.

The weekend was spent hunkered down trying to get better. Finally on Sunday, I met my bar friends at Pony simply because I was tired of hanging out in the apartment. Getting out felt pretty good - I think I just needed to move. It was pretty cool because our bartender overheard me talking about the SF trip, and she mentioned that the other bartender who was coming into work in a few mins used to work at Toronado (my fav beer bar from SF). When the other bartender came in, we talked for a long time about SF, and she bought us a shot Fernet. All in all, a good day.

This past week was of course, a short week. But a weird one. I'm on a project that is not going well - our lead developer quit, and now it's up to 2 new developers (both are good but they were brought in last minute) to finish this job. I wanted to move our timelines some, and take a bit longer to finish this project, but their boss didn't agree with me. And we got into it on Tues. Their boss also happens to be 1 of my 2 BFFs in the office. We had to actually say "5 minute break! We are getting nowhere" and walk away from each other at one point.

The day ended okay though, because at around 6 pm, their boss walked back into my office and was apologetic as hell. But it was hard to hear him because I was so busy trying to apologize to him also. He also told me to swing by his office before I left, so I did, and he had a bottle of scotch out. So once everyone was gone, him and me and my boss, had a few drinks and crackers and cheese to end the night.

Wednesday was a short day - my boss and I walked up to Momofuku Milk Bar and got some thanksgiving croissants - which was basically a hot pocked stuff with turkey, stuffing and cranberries. I bought that and a compost cookie (my fav cookie - loaded with chocolate chips, coffee grounds, pretzels and potato chip crumbs) and then headed over and met Blondie to see "A Christmas Story: The Musical" on Broadway! While waiting in line to get in, we had our snack of croissant and cookie, and then I got a whiskey in a sippy cup once inside.

The play was pretty funny - they even had dogs (real dogs) play the part of the dogs from the movie. They chased the actors across the stage and even stole the turky in the end scene! And the kid who played Randy (Ralphie's brother) was spot-on. And they had this cute little kid (a boy) in one of the scenes who had on a hat, and I was all "OMG! It's TCKITWv4.0" - not that the boy looked like my little niece, but he had the same type of grin - all teeth - that my niece has, and it really showed up when he had his hat on. We came out of the play just laughing hysterically - seriously, the dogs alone made it worth seeing.

Afterwards, it was off to poison bar to meet up with my bar friend. 3 shots and about 5 beers later, we headed off to our local to meet up with everyone. Blondie headed home early but I stayed and just got trashed. So awesome on my part. Thursday we were lazy - I felt fine when I woke up (surprisingly so), so around noon we headed out to buy a pie and do some grocery shopping. Everybody and their brother was out, and since the parade had ended, traffic was a bitch. After shopping, we met up with my bar friends again at Landsdowne for lunch and beers - we hung out for a few hours watching football, and then headed our own way for the rest of the day. Blondie and I ordered in food from our diner for dinner that night, and then spent the night watching movies.

Friday I woke up and felt completely exhausted. I was supposed to go with my bar friend to shop, but I couldn't get myself moving. Finally around 3 pm, Blondie and I headed out for some food. I felt a tiny bit better afterwards, so met up with my bar friends again at our local for a few beers. While I was on my way to our local bar, Mr Pooh texted, and he happened to mention that of his 3 favorite bars in the world, 2 were in NYC. And if he had 4 favorite bars, 3 would be in NYC (poison, Landsdowne and our local). I got to laughing b/c I realized in the last 3 days, I had been in all those bars.

Saturday we didn't do anything - we finally got some real grocery shopping done and then I crashed out watching Freaks and Geeks on Netflix while Blondie worked. And today, well, I'm up and showered at least. I have to go get a pedicure and hopefully meet my bar friends at Pony, but that's it.

Workouts - well, the head cold took me down and out for about 2 weeks. But I started up again yesterday:
Saturday: 3.1 miles on treadmill - 2 mins walking at 4.1 mph, 2 mins running at 6.0 mph - 37:25 mins
Sunday: 3.1 miles flat out running - 36:04 mins*; weights

* Completely shocked about this time - way faster than I expected; and I felt great the entire time. Normally if I hadn't tried to flat out run in 2.5 weeks, I'd be a heaving mess within 3 minutes, but not today.

--K

Thankful

Full recap of the last few weeks to come this weekend, but in the meantime, here is my list of what I'm thankful for this year.

1) Blondie and Tigga - I'm beyond grateful that Blondie and I made it to 9 years officially married. I'm thankful he's stuck it out with me, and packed up and moved with me everytime I flipped the fuck out and declared we needed a change. I'm thankful that 2 months after we started dating, he adopted Tigga. I'm thankful Tigga has turned into a love bug this year because god knows I needed it.

2) 11.5 years with Max - while I'm so not thankful Max is no longer around, I'm glad that I got to spend 11.5 years with him. Not a day goes by that I don't think of him at some point - he is truly truly missed.

3) Mr Pooh and Blondie's sis - I'm thankful that they both came to visit twice this year alone. I'm thankful their families held down the fort at home so they could come see us. I'm thankful that I've gotten a chance to connect with them both in a city I love. Honestly, the reasons they are visiting might have more to do with NYC than us but hey, I'll take it ;)

3) Which leads into NYC - of course. I love NYC so much I want to make out with it teenager-style.

4) Theater / Shows - From Broadway, to off Broadway, to Fringe Fest, to my bar friend's cabaret/burlesque show, to the Disney Drag Queen show - my year has been crammed full of theater and musicals, and I love it. I'm about 4 hours from meeting Blondie today to see "A Christmas Story" on Broadway, and have a list of about 8 plays that I still want to see.

5) Blondie again - I'm proud of HOW FREAKING WELL Blondie's game did! An independent developer launching a game without marketing or advertising *and* landing in the top 10 list on Google Play??? GOOOOO Blondie! I'm also thankful that when Blondie decided to go back to a corporate job, he was head hunted like crazy and had his pick of a ton of different opportunities. I'm also thankful that Blondie loves his new job!

6) My family - I don't see them hardly ever, but both my family and my family-in-law are pretty cool. Life without them would be boring.

7) My bar friends - I need to stop calling them that, but for now, that's what they are titled. I'm thankful that at almost 40 years old, I made some incredible new friends. I'm thankful for Sunday Funday too.

8) My 2 BFF's have had great years - while my year might have been crap to the extreme, my 2 BFF's have been rocking it out - and that makes me so so happy for them. Slick switched jobs into something he loves loves loves and got married to an awesome woman this year. And TT's family expanded by several with the adoption of a daughter, and the fostering of 2 other daughters. She finished her master's degree this year also.

9) Beans - I'm honestly thankful for beans this year. I've had cravings for beans for like the past 1.5 years. If beans didn't exist, and I had a craving for them, what would I do?

10) And last but certainly not least - I'm extremely thankful that Blondie and I came through Hurricane Sandy without any issues. The storm wreaked havoc on the city, causing tremendous amounts of damage and loss of life, and without a doubt, we recognize how truly lucky we were and are grateful for that.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone.
--K

Sandy

This past week was spent dealing with Sandy and Sandy's aftermath. Last Sunday is when things started. I joined my bar friend at Pony Bar, where we ran into one of our friends who is a musician, and who has lived in HK area for years. We chatted a bit about what to do when Sandy hit, and he had some good places that he shared with us for us to go if we needed information (i.e. what bars in the area were likely to be open with patrons who had transistor radios inside). The weather at that point was windy, but not raining.

They started shutting down all public transportation on Sunday evening. It felt a little like it did when Irene came through the city last year - like you know something is coming, but there was no panic b/c Irene was supposed to be huge and nothing happened with it. My office announced on Sunday night that we were all supposed to work from home on Monday.

Monday day was pleasant. Windy and a little rainy, but nothing major. I was taking care of my building friend's dogs while they were out of town so I headed up to their place during the day to make sure the dogs were okay. Their view faces a different direction than ours, so I sat up there for awhile and just watched the clouds go by. I also happened to notice that Pony Bar was open for business (they posted on their FB page). So I texted my bar friends, and we all decided to meet up for a few beers there. Along with about 75 other people. The bar was packed - again, nobody was taking Sandy seriously (including me).

My bar friends and I headed home around 6 pm that night, and the wind was a lot worse at that point and it was raining but it still didn't feel dangerous. That night the storm hit big time. My bar friends talked about watching transistors blow in Jersey and then whole sections of Jersey would go black. Power outages started rolling up Manhattan getting to within 2 streets of us before they stopped. The wind was crazy - it tore the roof off the space shuttle Enterprise hangar on the Intrepid. But Blondie and I got crazy lucky as our building/neighborhood was spared the brunt of what happened.

Tuesday my office was closed again. But nobody was working from home as people either had no power, or had power and were glued to the TVs as footage of the destruction came rolling in. Staten Island, and parts of Brooklyn and Queens were completely wiped out. The lower half of Manhattan sustained a lot of damage. Upper half of Manhattan and Bronx were okay. The day was spent getting the latest on the storm news, and also spending some time with the dogs to make sure the weren't too freaked out.

Wednesday my office was open if you could get there. All subways were still down, but buses were running. I was going to take a bus to work but as soon as I started out of my house, I saw gridlock. So I walked the 2 miles over instead. Some of my coworkers carpooled in together from Brooklyn, and the 7 mile trip took 3 hours. It was crazy on the streets of Manhattan. Everyone who came in got sent home at 4, and HR bought pizza for lunch so it was nice. I walked back home that night, marvelling at the mass number of cars on the street. Bloomberg put HOV restrictions onto cars coming into the city starting Wednesday evening, but it didn't really help the situation.

I had vacation already planned for Thursday and Friday. On Thursday, my bar friend joined Blondie and me to do some shopping. Blondie needed some clothes, so we headed up to Times Square and then down 5th Ave almost to Central Park to various clothing stores. We decided to hit up a bar in our hood for lunch, so we walked back over to our area, still marvelling at the gridlock. We passed a gas station a few blocks from our apartment, and realized there was a massive amount of people/cars lined up to get gas. As we stopped to watch (TV crews were there too filming, and cops had streets and the gas station itself blocked off), a cabbie leaned out his window and told us this was the only gas station in Manhattan that still had gas and power. People were waiting in 10 hour lines to get gas.

After lunch, Blondie headed home to crash out and I went with my bar friend to our local bar. We hung out there into the evening, made sure everyone who worked there was okay and didn't have damage to themselves/their property. Blondie came back over early evening to sit and chat with everyone for awhile. It was a nice way to end the evening. The crappy part of the evening came when we heard from Bbbb, my SF friend, that he had cancelled his trip to NYC for this weekend - he knew NYC had been hit hard, and thought postponing his trip made sense.

Friday was my birthday. Pbbbttttt. I started the day with a workout, and then did our laundry while Blondie met with an accountant for his business. Around 2:30 we headed out to grab lunch. We went to our local little mexican restaurant for food, and then crossed the street to the new tequila bar in our hood for margaritas. This place is owned by Angelo Sosa (Top Chef fame) - we never liked Angelo Sosa when he was on TC - he honestly acted like a dick on the show. We sat down with a margarita, which was awesome, and then got to ragging on AS - saying things like "well, we don't like you but you make a mean margarita". We also had a discussion on whether AS actually worked / ever worked at the restaurant and I was adamant that he didn't. And then we looked up from our table (we were sitting in front of the windows), and AS came walking by and into the restaurant. We laughed our asses off, and then bolted.

After margaritas, it was down to Dunkin to grab a bunch of donut holes and then over to the local bar. We met up with my bar friends, and downed a bunch of drinks and shots to end the night. Turning 38 sucked, but at least it's over!

Friday was also memorable because Bloomberg reversed his decision on the marathon and cancelled it. I thought holding the marathon was a horrible decision, especially seeing what residents of Staten Island, Queens, BK, etc are going through. But he was adamant that the show must go on. There was a monstrous backlash going on throughout the city about the marathon, and I was actually starting to get worried that runners were going to get hurt. So cancelling it was the right thing to do - and should've been done almost a week ago.

Saturday I met my bar friend for a late brunch at a new bar about 3/4th of a mile away from our apartments. The food was awesome - I had a tuna nicoise salad that rocked my world. And the playlist was awesome - it was early 90's music all day and we couldn't tear ourselves away from the bar. Also, the bartender was trying to kill a bottle of Bushmill's so my bar friend and I became proud recipients of free shots. We finally pulled ourselves free about 3 hours later, and then we did a little bit of shopping on the way back from the bar. And then we met up with her husband at our local bar to end the day. More shots ensued, and then I was ravenously hungry so headed home to order in food with Blondie.

Today will be spent doing something. My train is supposed to come back up tomorrow morning, so getting to work should be a little easier tomorrow. I work this week, and then we leave Saturday for SF - me for work, Blondie because I insisted he come with me this time. And then it's time for Thanksgiving!

Workouts:
Sunday: 40 mins on Precor, 2 mins at level 6, 2 mins at levels 11-12, 5 min cooldown; little bit of weights
Monday: P90X Legs&Back, P90X Shoulders&Arms; Insanity Cardio Abs
Tuesday: 3.1 miles (39:22) hill intervals - 2 mins at 4.1 mph on 0% grade, 2 mins at 5.3-5.7 mph on 3% grade, 5 min cooldown
Wednesday: Insanity Core Cardio and Balance; 2 mile walk to work, 2 mile walk home
Thursday: 3.1 miles (36:23) speed intervals - 2 mins at 4.1 mph, 2 mins at 5.9-7.0 mph, 5 min cooldown
Friday: Insanity Cardio Recovery
Saturday: 3.1 miles run in 36:42*, 5 min cooldown

* I was massively hungover when I did this run. I also did this run on shitty treadmill - there are 4 treadmills in my gym, and 1 of them is keyed higher/faster than the other 3. I use this shitty treadmill on my Tues/Thurs intervals, but avoid it at all costs for my run days. On Saturday, it was the only treadmill open. And running it all, while massively hungover, on shitty treadmill - even though it was a minute slower than last week - totally made my day.

--K