Why I love Thursday

Today I was thinking, and I believe Thursday is my favorite day. Here are some reasons why:

1. Tomorrow is Friday. I can hardly wait for the weekend, and I know Fridays at school usually go by pretty quickly.
2. Survivor is on TV at 7pm. (yes, I still watch that show, and I love it!)
3. LOST is on at 8pm. As referenced in a previous post, this is a show that I do not like to be interrupted during. I prefer to watch it in bed, with all the lights off. Gives it more of a creepy vibe.
4. The Sun Post comes. This is our local community paper. Sometimes I read about people who I graduated with who are now in jail, or have recently been busted for some crazy crime.
5. I usually get a Byerlys Salad for dinner so I do not have to cook and potentially be late for my shows. However, this will all change now (see last post). Darn Byerlys!
6. The Office is usually on Thursday nights....... Now that the writers strike is over, I hope it will be back in the lineup soon.
7. I get to wear jeans to work tomorrow. Well....... Lately I have been wearing jeans to work alot, but Fridays are the days when they are officially OK to wear.

Ahhhhh...... I love you Thursdays.
Sunday morning comes in a close second though. (Sunday paper, good breakfast, a reason to relax and lay around, ....)

Byerly's Salads

Don't you hate it when you have a favorite meal at a place, and then you go to get it only to find it has changed or been discontinued?
All day today I was planning to get my favorite Sesame Asian Salad from Byerlys. It is my all time favorite salad, and it is huge! Big enough for dinner.
I was completely disheartened when I arrived at Byerly's today, only to find they have repackaged all the deli salads in containers half the size they used to be, and only took $1 off the price. On top of that, what used to be a healthy salad (low calories) now had more calories than the original salad which was twice its size. How does that work?
So, I meandered around the store for 20 minutes wallowing in my disappointment and finally decided to get some veggie burgers.
Why did they have to mess with a perfectly good salad? Now I don't have my standby dinner in case of emergency (or sheer laziness!)

7 things about me!

1. I was obsessed with Cabbage Patch Kids as a child. One time I brought about 15 of them to school on one day. That was the day my teacher passed the "only one CPK" per day rule. One summer we had a carnival in our yard, and I used all the money I made to buy one of the cloth "original" kids on display at JC Penneys. I was the only one in my neighborhood who had one which lead to much hatred by others. I still have many of my "kids" although they are stored away in "rubbermaid heaven".
2. I love reading. In the summer I typically read 40+ books. I can finish a book in a day. It helps that I am a teacher and have the summer off.
3. I am very particular about my Sunday paper. Recently our delivery was interrupted because of a lost bill, and it has not been waiting for me on the front step when I wake up on Sundays. Very annoying. I have a particular order I must read it in, and I sort it all before I read it.
4. DO NOT interrupt me when I am watching LOST. This is my favorite show, and I have been waiting for a long time for this season. It is the one show I do not like to miss a minute of.
5. I recently started working out again. Got on a treadmill for the first time in my life, and realized it is not so bad. Kind of fun actually. I think it helps that I now have an ipod to distract me.
6. I am addicted to chocolate. If I dont have any I am fine without it, but if I have one piece I seriously crave more. I guess there are worse things I could be addicted to!
7. One of my favorite books is The Little Prince. I was introduced to this book through my many French classes in high school and college, and it has remained a favorite ever since. My other favorite book is To Kill a Mockingbird. I read it every summer. I even named my dog after the main character- Atticus!

Bonus-
8. I take my dog to dog class every Monday, and that is tonight! It starts in 25 minutes so I have to get going!

I was inspired to do this "tagged" thing from a fun crafty blog I read. http://nicholmagouirk.typepad.com/things_that_really_matter/
check it out!

Ali's Birthday

This weekend we went out with John and Ali to celebrate Ali's birthday (which was last week). We ate at pittsburgh blue in Maple Grove. I have not had a steak for ages, and this place definately made up for lost time. I had the Steak Diane, and it was fabulous!
The side dishes there are gigantic, and are big enough to feed 4 people, so we split the hashbrowns and asparagus. John let it slip that we were celebrating Ali's birthday when the waiter was around, (she hates when the restaurants sing and get crazy on your birthday) and our waiter was so good... he brought over a cute piece of red velvet cake (mmmmm...) with a candle and did not make a fuss or scene at all about it. I love red velvet cake, so that was a perfect way to end a delicious meal!

Watch this!

This weekend we rented the movie Matian Child. I remember wanting to see it when it was in the theaters, but it came and went before I got a chance.

What a great movie! First off, it was only about 90 minutes, which in my mind is the perfect movie length.

But on top of that it was such a feel good story about a man whose wife died and how he comes to adopt this boy who is "not normal". Throughout the movie they ask the questions: what is normal? Is it good to be like everybody else? Why not be yourself? How true!

I do not know why this movie was not more popular in theaters, maybe because it wasn't a fast paced action movie???

If you are in the mood for a feel good movie, definatley rent this. I hope you like it as much as I did!

San Fran- Days 2-4

Ok, so I am going to post the rest of my trip all in one post. I am not too good at keeping up with this yet!

Lombard Street- the curviest road (in the world- I think). We took a trolley to get here, but got off too soon, so we had quite an uphill walk to actually get there. Cars line up to take turns driving down the road. I wonder what the people who actually live on the road think?

Sea Lions basking at Pier 39- the weekend we were there, they had a big "festival" to mark the 18th anniversary of when the sea lions came to the pier and took it over as their home. There were tons of them just basking in the sun and barking. Cute!

Ghirardelli Square- Mmmm chocolate. I went here alone one morning, because I had to get some chocolate. I got a bag of ghirardelli chocolate squares (the milk chocoalte and caramel ones are the best). Then I went to a cute place called "Kara's Cupcakes". It was a tiny cupcake shop, and they had the best unique cupcakes ever! I had a banana caramel cupcake. It had melted caramel inside. Mmmmm

Golden Gate Bridge- I did not have time to actually go across the bridge, but while I was at Ghirardelli (and also at Alcatraz) I got a good view of it and snapped some decent pictures. Next time I will have to get across it.

Me on a trolley- This was the one and only time I rode the trolley when it was not a complete zoo! So the trolley operator in the back offered to take my picture. Such a touristy thing to do, but it had to be done. Riding the trolley was so much fun. You could get to almost every sightseeing spot, and other fun places, by trolley.

Painted Lady Houses- Nothing much to see in this part of town, except these famous houses. You may remember them best from the opening scene from the show Full House. They are really pretty and well kept up houses. There is a cute little park called Alamo Square right across the street and that is where we snapped these pics from.

Haight Ashbury- the old "hippy town". Did some shopping, and people watching here. Not quite as "hippy" as it once was. Lots of used clothing stores and gift shops. Lots of quirky tshirt shops and shoes/purses to be found.

Dinner at Colibri- the four of us (Jenny, Kari, myself and Nicole) had a girls only dinner at a yummy Mexican restaurant close to our hotel. The food was really good.

Westing St. Francis- this is where we stayed. It was a beautiful hotel. My room was on the 12th floor (top floor) and was looking right out over union square (the plaza you see in the foreground). On most days there was an art fair/stands in the square, but the day I took this pic it was raining, so no one was out. My room was on the top floor, on the part where it indents in on the left side of the picture.

We also went to Chinatown, but my nightflash was not cooperating, so the pics are blurry.

Well, I could post a lot more pics, but this is a good summary. All the pics I took in the actual conference did not turn out too hot, flash photography in the hotel did not work too well. We did go to a lot of classes and brought a lot of new ideas back to our classrooms and school. I would love to go back to San Francisco again and spend more time walking around the town and seeing more sights.

San Francisco- Day 1

Here are my feet, on the streets of San Francisco!

After we landed, on time, we headed to our hotel, and grabbed a bite to eat at Maxwells, a cute little restaurant down the road from our hotel. Then it was off to Alcatraz for our nighttime tour! Here is a shot of Alcatraz as we were heading towards it on the boat. The boat ride over was great! We got to see the sun starting to set with the Golden Gate Bridge in the Background.
This is a neat shot of an old building on Alcatraz, and a unique tree next to it. The sun was going down pretty quickly, so I was lucky to capture this shot! we walked up the same roads the inmates would have walked up as we approached the prison. It was a creepy feeling.

Here is a fun picture of myself, Jenny and Nicole in one of the jail cells. The cells were no larger than my bathroom, and very depressing. I cannot imagine spending 10, 15, + years of my life locked up in one of those cells.

After the Alcatraz tour, we were running late meeting some of our co-workers for dinner. We tried to find a cab, but there were none to be found. On the sidewalks there were a bunch of these "bike cabs" lined up. They could only hold 3 people on the seat, but one guy insisted he could take 4. So we hopped on! What a ride! He definately got a workout hauling us. He was hillarious, singing and making animal sounds the whole ride. That is him in the green shirt in the photo.

After dinner we headed back to the hotel to get a good night sleep before the conference started on Saturday morning. We were going to grab a cab, but again did not see any. So we thought we would start walking and grab one when we saw one. Well, that turned into a 2+ mile walk, all uphill (and we are talking steep San. Fran. hills!) back to the hotel. Some of us loved it, others were not so happy that they had power walkers speed walking and running up the hills ahead of them. It felt so good to be outside, walking and in the fresh air! My legs hurt the next morning, but it was worth it!

So, that ends day one of our trip. More to come on days 2-4.