teresa

In the spirit of our wine blog I made a note to myself to blog about our trip to SF a few weeks ago, on Dec. 7.  The highlight is we stayed at the Omni and Elliott ordered the heart package which included a Cristalino Rose Brut (champagne), and he says he didn’t know but it also included rose petals in a heart shape on the bed - so cute!  We went to SF to go to a holiday party for BAYA (architects organization), but the party was a bust in a sleazy bar with crappy food (ie chicken skewers in a throw away metal tin, I don’t mean to be snobby, but I was expecting a buffet dinner) so we skipped out early and ate at this cute little Thai restaurant, I think it was called Basil.  We ordered our first Sake ever!  It was called Pearl Sake, it was sweet and very nice, we really enjoyed it, and will try Sake again.

We ate breakfast in the hotel restaurant the next morning, included in the package.  We went to the farmers market at the Pier near Embarcadero, bought some clementines that were delicious.  We walked through Union Square, saw the big tree (with LED lights, less energy) and all of the wreaths in Macy’s windows.  And we walked back through a portion of China town which was fun.  I considered buying my Christmas gifts in China town but decided the recipients wouldn’t appreciate my humor so I didn’t.

We threw Christmas away today, in a huge, long, white dumpster.  Elliott said he tweaked something when he did it, I don’t know how considering our little 5′ tree barely weighed anything.  Anyhow, everything is packed up and put away, Christmas is over.  We did hear a holiday song on the radio today, Elliott explained that it makes him sad to hear Christmas music after the fact.

Overall the holiday was great.  We spent days in Las Vegas with my family, I assisted my mom in eating many of the candies and cookies given to her at school, but managed to not gain a pound, which is surprising.  We spent some quality time at Jay’s including hours of tennis on the Wii, my Wii arm is still recovering.  I swung that damn controller like I was taking on Agassi himself.  I love the Wii, I want one!  Seriously my arm was so sore for days, the most basic tasks were horrendous.  Our movie selections, an important part of our down time in LV, included One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, I have never seen such a young Jack Nicholson before, damn he is good.  Days later I saw a man in the airport in a plain black knit cap and I took a double take.  We also watched Cool Hand Luke.  Elliott and I both noticed a major difference between movies from then to know.  They are very different, these older movies were simpler yet said a lot.  Elliott said Cool Hand Luke felt more like a TV series with little charrettes than a movie. (On a side movie note, Elliott and I watched I am Legend - great, and National Treasurer - 2 - pretty good, since returning home)

We then traveled from LV to Reno.  Which reminds me, because we scheduled 3 separate one way trips, we were selected as “special” on the first leg of our trip from Oakland to LV.  We were unable to obtain boarding passes online, had to go to the airport.  Apparently this is a security measure.  Well let’s hope that TSA has some other protective measure than just picking people taking one way trips, because I would think the bad guys would figure this out and purchase round trips instead.  Anyway…  we got on the plane and even got to sit together.  Elliott’s bags however didn’t make it on our plane to LV.  The best part of the story is they eventually called at 6pm and said they would deliver the bags within a 6 hour window starting at 7pm, I guess in LV that seems reasonable.  Anyway, we repacked our bags, were able to get our boarding passes and went from LV to Reno.  This time one of Elliott’s bags made it, but the other didn’t.  Of course the bag with our presents and my deodorant didn’t make it!  We didn’t get the bag until the next day, it went to North Carolina!  We thought maybe that was because someone misread RNO for RNC (Raleigh North Carolina) but it looks like that airport code is RDU, so they screwed it up pretty bad.

Reno was a quick trip, just a little over 24 hours.  It was freezing, including snow and hail.  Elliott’s 2 half and 1 step siblings were there.  We got in a shopping trip with Russell and Brad and an all you can eat sushi visit, plus a real vanilla chai tea from Walden’s.  Elliott’s mom did a hide the pickle ornament game which was fun to watch and a smash the peppermint pig, which Elliott and I were discussing I think I might have been there for the start of this tradition for their family 4-5 years ago.  I also learned the card game spit, which I am certain Elliott will never play with me because he thinks I am a poor winner.  Which reminds me we played Monopoly in LV with Jason, JJ, and Susan.  It was football team version, lots of fun.  The boys lasted a long time although eventually did give up.  Because they quit we convinced them that even though they had the most money they couldn’t quit and win, so I won.  I didn’t dance, scream or shout, I don’t know why Elliott thinks I am a poor winner.

That was about it, we packed up the final time and returned to Oakland.  Amazingly all 3 bags made it, although after all of the hassle we almost didn’t recognize one of Elliott’s bags which would have been hilarious.  We took a town car ride to our home, which was spacious and nice, and about the same price of a taxi, and also kept us out of the pouring rain, and dealing with BART.

Oh…  I forgot to mention in LV I picked out my wedding dress.  Can’t say anything about it, because I don’t want Elliott to have any idea what I will look like, but it is indeed a dress, it is girly, and pretty, and I am going to wear it next year, June 14th.  Yes we set a date.   We are in the throes of getting organized, Elliott is working on the webpage as we speak.  I will blog more about the wedding but am going to heed the advice of my friend Ashley who during her wedding said she read that you shouldn’t talk about your wedding all of the time because people will tire of hearing about it.  So I will keep it informative, comical, and short.

So that is it, Christmas is over.  The New Year is coming, and then it will be my (or our) birthday.  How exciting!

We were in Reno a few weeks ago for our holiday party.  We arrived Friday and went to the Reno office.  That night we finally got to fill our Great Basin craving, a good micro beer and great bar food - something we have yet to find out here.  We had dinner with the chairman of our company’s board of directors, great chance to learn about his prospective of the company.

The next morning I left Elliott to get his cable TV fix, not having a TV is great, but it’s nice every once in awhile to get your share of electromagnetic waves.  My to do list included: haircut, pedicure, and tie for Elliott to match my party outfit.

I started at Burlington coat where I bought Elliott 3 ties for the price of 1 at a department store.  All good brands, because he cares about that crap, and one that was a perfect blend of black, white and red to go with my modern slightly Asian styled shirt.  Check, I was off to a good start.  I drove up and down the streets of Reno looking for a spa or nail place that had an opening for a pedicure, thanks to the Blackberry and Google I finally found one.  They didn’t have a great selection of polish colors, but that lady gave me the best pedicure ever.  I just started to write my feet still look great, but upon review they were looking a little dry so I just lathered them up with that lotion that Susan gave me, if only I could remember to do that on a regular basis.  Great massage too, I was a happy camper.  Check, check. 

Lastly I went to get my haircut.  I had called and made an appointment early from the hotel at Seven, looked like a fun, funky salon near downtown.  I pulled up to an old building with nearly graffiti style signage, and thought alright this should be good, I wanted something a little less, engineerish.  I sat in the lobby and started reading a magazine opened on the coffee table highlighting the salon - wow they were in a magazine.  As I read on I learned that it is a salon started by a lesbian woman who wanted to have an alternative spa.  A place where lesbians would be welcome and could be honest about wanting a certain type of hair style whether it be feminine or not.  At this point I looked around and thought oh now, what do I do, I am straight?  Which in hindsight was stupid, but it was interesting to feel out of place.  I actually ended up waiting 30 minutes from my stylist, which almost inspired me to leave but I really wanted a haircut.  She turned out to be really nice, and straight, not that it mattered.  But she did cut my hair crooked.  I finally fixed it this morning because it was driving me crazy.   Elliott said what’s that noise?  I said I am cutting my hair….  It was 1″ longer on one side, and I don’t think it was “designed” that way.  

I made it back to the hotel, my list complete and we went to our party.  Elliott was the MC, he was a riot.  He had 1/2 a glass of wine too much, but I don’t think anyone else noticed or cared, I didn’t.  I loved seeing him at the center of attention, and making everyone laugh.  Everyone loves Elliott, and so do I.