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Why You Should Be Afraid To Ask

I try to avoid bringing my car into the shop too often, since getting to work is a big pain otherwise, so when I do, I usually have them check all the things that I've noticed over the past few months between visits. The only reason I brought my car in was because the sensor for my airbag had to be replaced, because in the meantime, it wouldn't operate. Against my better judgement, I also asked them to check out the rumbling sound my car is making, as well as the fact that my car tends to stall while starting the car. And sure enough, the rumbling sound isn't in my imagination, as I had hoped. Its my exhaust system, which is apparently falling apart big time. So I get to pick up my car tonight, but next week, it goes back into the shop for who knows how long and how much money. Ah, the joys of being a car owner.

 
Mmmmm

Am too stuffed to write! I just had the best steak ever at Peter Luger's, after 24 years of waiting. It was definately as good as I had anticipated. But now I need to head to bed early because my car is in the shop so I must take the train to work. At least I'll have good leftovers for lunch!

 
I Love My Luck!

Suprise, suprise, someone actually found my wallet! With the money missing but apparently everything else intact...after I cancelled my credit cards. Getting it back though could be a hassle since the woman who found it works in a store in Park Slope, Brooklyn, and I have the fortune to work in Westchester. I will be in Brooklyn on Monday for my dinner at Peter Luger's, as well as to drop my car off at the shop again, so maybe I'll be able to swing by there. All that I really need from the wallet is my library card, AAA card and gym card, since I cancelled the credit cards, but at least it will save me those hassles. Plus, I will have an extra driver's license for free, on the off chance that I get my wallet stolen again.

Parental Woes

I have a fairly ideal situation going right now where I live at home, but in my own apartment upstairs from my parents. In exchange for doing some chores around the house, I have a rent free one bedroom apartment in NY. I know, you're all drooling. And to answer a question I have been asked on numerous occasions, I can (and have) brought guys home--my apartment is above my parents living room, so since they're pretty deaf, they are none the wiser. And as I was telling a friend of mine, what's really great is that I am never obligated to spend time with my parents since they see me almost every day. I generally pop in to say hi, pick up whatever mail gets misdelivered to them, and occasionally mooch food and cable tv off of them, and in return, they never guilt trip me about not spending quality time with them. As an example, when I lived in Boston, I probably visited my parents at their weekend house in Conn. at least once a month in the summer, but this summer, I haven't been up since Memorial Day.

However, there are some drawbacks due to my parents poor memory. In their old age (to be fair, they're not that old and can still kick my as on the bike, but they are towards the end of the "middle age" range), their memories seem to be going. My dad especially will often claim he told me things when I am quite sure he hasn't, and they always forget stuff I tell them, but have given up complaining about that. This memory loss seems to have gotten more pronounced in the past couple weeks when they have forgotten to tell me important details like a) reserve next Sunday for your Mom's company party at our house as it will be the one weekend all summer we won't be going to Conn, b) reserve the weekend after that to come up to Conn because your aunt and cousins from Seattle, who you haven't seen since your uncle's funeral last year, will be coming to Conn to stay with your aunt and uncle who live up there, and c) your brother is coming to visit in the middle of August. Now I haven't bothered to ask them when they knew all of these were occurring, but I found this all out in the past week, and it would have been helpful to know it a lot sooner.

I had been planning on going up to Conn. either this weekend or next weekend, and had settled on next weekend since I have a going away party for friend tonight so I won't be able to leave till tomorrow morning. But it wasn't until last night that my father informed me that next weekend is no good, so I'll be waking up bright and early to go up on Saturday. Now I'm sure some of you might be thinking, why rush to go up this weekend when you will be going up in two weekends when your aunt and cousins are visiting? But that is pretty much out of the question since I finally got my guts up and signed up for a triathlon that Sunday. Normally, I would just skip it, but I already paid the entry fee and have been psyching myself up for this all summer long, so I don't exactly want to bail. I only signed up for it last week, so once again, had they thought to tell me this earlier, I could have just not signed up, but no, they apparently forgot I can't read their minds. And as for my brother visiting, I don't have any conflicts as of yet, but the only way I found out was by asking if he was planning on visiting any time soon.

I know, this isn't really much to complain about, but its just a general example of my frustration when they expect me to know all the details of their life without ever telling them to me.

And For Additional Amusement

 
Taking the Plunge?

I have recently been deciding whether to take the plunge and actually set up my own site instead of using the free one. What brought this about? Primarily, I've been trying to create a site for my photos and realized that while I thought they would all fit on a free geocities site, that was way wrong. And I'm getting envious of all the Movable Type people....especially of their comments, since Klink has been on the fritz lately and my comments have gone missing. I've loaded Haloscan in the meantime, but I'm having issues customizing them (if anyone has any hints on how to change name of the comments, please help!)

The delimma though is if I get a site and want to put my photos on it, then I'd like my friends and family to see them. However, most of them are not aware of my blog, and I don't necessarily want them to be.

Suggestions and cheap web hosting service recommendations would be more than welcome.

 
Protect and Serve

After wasting an hour at the DMV on Monday, I was informed by an ever so helpful employee there that the form I had gotten from the police department had the "lost" box checked instead of the "stolen" box. Now I wasted an hour of the gorgous Sunday afternoon at the local NYPD precinct while they filled out a case report (as if I actually expected to get my wallet out), purely to get this form so that I would not have to pay for a new license, and I get to the DMV and they inform me that its no good and I have to go back to the police to get the form filled out again! I guess this could be my fault since I didn't check the form to make sure the right box was checked, but I didn't really think to since I didn't think anyone would bother filling out that form unless it was stolen. Why would anyone bother filling all that out if they still had to pay?

Luckily, it didn't take quite as long the second time I visited my local precinct, but I still had to waste a second lunch going to the DMV to get my license. I was in a much better mood once that was all over, knowing that in 10 days I will once again be in posession of a permanent New York drivers license. And though I could have let the rain damper my spirits as I got soaked between my office and my car yesterday afternoon, I didn't. I went to the gym and ran on the treadmill, so as not to use the rain as an excuse of why I shouldn't run, which I was really tempted to do, and then had a lovely dinner with Edie, not letting the fact that I only had $25 bother me. And for that attitude, I was pleasantly rewarded with my cash card waiting for me at home!

All is good in the world!

 
Sleep Deprived, But Unscathed

My birthday celebration Friday was tons of fun, though there were a few flaws to the evening. I started off the evening with take out and wine at my place with a couple friends before heading out, and head every intention of getting to The Evelyn Lounge when I said I would, but we ended up getting there a bit late - not that it mattered since it was quite empty when we showed up. While trying to decide where to sit, since there were three rooms, we started chatting with the waitress in the back room. She was quite entertaining, and she offered to kick out a couple from the corner booth and ask them to move since she didn't want to have to watch them make out all evening. This seemed like a good idea at the time, since then we would have a big corner booth and plenty of space.

This turned out to not be the best idea. While our waitress was indeed entertaining, our location proved to be a bit too hidden for some people. Though plenty of people seemed to have no trouble finding my table, I was kind of suprised that no one from my office showed up, especially since my coworker K that I eat lunch with every day had told me she was planning on coming into the city with her new husband, since they hadn't gotten a chance since before their wedding (in May). So you can imagine my suprise when I crossed the middle room, where the dance floor was, going to the bathroom, and found a whole group of my corworkers there! Turns out they'd been there for a long time, but no one checked out the back room since there wasn't dancing going on back there. Or at least one person assumed that and no one bothered to check it after them. And worst of all, some people, including K and her husband, left since it was getting late and they needed to catch the train home.

Of the coworkers who stayed though, a couple of them were some good friends of mine so I was really glad to get to spend some time with them, and ended up spending the rest of the night dancing and consuming a bit too much alcohol, as everyone should on their birthday. Amazingly, I was able to get through the night, dancing and all, without twisting an ankle. My feet were killing by the end of the night, though, so I was quite happy to get a ride home, since some of my coworkers had driven down together and were parked near the bar.

All in all, I was out to about 3, so I was naturally quite disappointed when I woke up at 7:30!!!! I couldn't fall back asleep! And that was only the beginning of my bad day. I went out to Coney Island for the Siren Festival, but while there, got my wallet stolen from my bag! Since all my credit cards, including my cash card, and my driver's license were in there, this pretty much sucked as much as possible, except that at least I wasn't alone so I could get back home despite also having lost my MetroCard. Naturally, I didn't stay around for the end of the concert, though I was quite looking forward to some of the bands, since I wanted to get home to cancel my credit cards. And then today I had to waste an hour at the police station filing a report so that I don't have to pay to replace my driver's license. Hopefully I will be able to renew my license tomorrow without too much time wasted at the DMV, but I have a feeling that's a pretty high hope.

 
And The Minutes Slowly Tick By

I can't wait for this day to be over! Time seemed to be going by pretty quickly until lunch (maybe because I actually had some substantial work to do?) but it has now seemed to grind to a halt, which is always true when you can't wait for the weekend to begin!

On deck for this weekend

Tonight: Dinner and drinks at my place followed by debauchery at The Evelyn Lounge. Chances of me taking a cab home the bar, despite the proximity to my humble abode? Quite high.

Tomorrow: The Siren Festival! I am one of those rare few born and bred New Yorker's who have never been to Coney Island! Ever! So even though I hate rollercosters (anything where my stomach drops just doesn't appeal to me much---you don't hear people coming off turbulent flights saying it was fun, do you?) I will probably ride the Cyclone to just say I did it.

Sunday: I've been suckered into volunteering for another race in the Hudson, where this time I will hopefully do a better job with the sunscreen. At least this one is quick, so it will probably only take the morning instead of the whole day. In the afternoon, I'll probably stop by Central Park to watch the playoffs for frisbee, and maybe play a bit myself if there is pickup. And then Sex and the City!

 
Post Birthday Blues

Not that I'm depressed or anything, but after waiting for your birthday for a whole year, when its over, its kind of sad that you have to wait another full year for it to come again. But at least I get to drag it out a couple more days!

Last night, I had fun drinking with my engineering friends - I find it quite funny that I'm now the vice president of the young engineers group, and the sum total of my responsabilities so far is to create flyers for presentations throughout the year, which have yet to be scheduled, and to pick a night and location for our September networking night (i.e. drinking event). I will be making this a pub crawl in my neighborhood, since the 80's on Amsterdam Ave. was practically made for that purpose. Last night we went to The Joshua Tree, which made me kind of nostalgic for Boston since I used to live less than three blocks from this Joshua Tree, which I went to all the time. I'm pretty sure they're run by the same people since the front looks almost identical, as do the menus. The music was way to loud and the place was completely packed (kind of odd for a Wednesday night), so my throat is a bit sore now.

And my engineering friends made us do a round of shots in honor of my birthday. At least I got to choose the shot (Kamikaze), unlike last year (which may have been the last time I did a shot actually) when my "friend" ordered me a Prarie Fire as my last drink of the night. Anything involving tequila should not be the last drink of the night, especially if you have to go to work the next morning.

On deck for tonight: the Blur concert. Haven't gotten around to purchasing their new album (couldn't bring myself to shell out full price of $19 at Tower) but I love them from way back so hopefully it will be a good show.

 
Happy Birthday To Me!

Went out to dinner last night with my parents to Henry's End one of my favorite restaurants of all time, conveniently located near my mom's office. Between my cold and my still iffy stomach, I didn't want to overdo it, but I still had an amazing Chilled Corn Vichysoise (just the right amount of sweetness), and an appetizer portion of the Soft Shell Crab with a Moroccan Butter Sauce for my entree. The Soft Shell Crab was very good, but my mom's Macadamia Shrimp with Mango Salsa was excellent--one of the best dishes I've ever had. For desert, we all split the Creme Broulee Napolean which is to die for--I've gotten it before and remembered that it was good, but forgot quite how good it was. Mmmmm....talking about the dinner is making me hungry.

As for today, I'm not doing anything too special - I have an enginerd meeting for the board, since I'm now on the exec board of a local chapter of an engineering society, and we'll likely be going out for drinks after the meeting.

And then Friday is my party! Yay!

 
Clogged Sinis, Clogged Brain!

As Paul pointed out, I neglected to include the date of my party in my previous post, so for the record, my birthday is tomorrow, but the party is Friday, at 10:30 (I'll be getting there by 10 to secure some space), at the downstairs of The Evelyn Lounge. Come one, come all - just look for the tall girl with short hair twisting her ankle on her new shoes! I have a feeling I'll be walking home barefoot, but at least I won't be too far from home......

 
...You Could Cut A Knife

As I discussed Friday, I had A's b-day on Saturday evening and had still not talked to E, so I was kind of dreading it. I had a moment of hope when my college roommate had said she might come into the city, so that I would have someone to go with me, but she decided to stay in Jersey, so I was left to brave the party myself.

Maybe it was the fact that I was wearing new shoes (definately a danger to my health, but they're hott so I don't care) but when I walked in I was kind of shaking, and of course the first person I saw that I recognized was E. Sitting there with her roommate on one side and M on the other. So I kind of stared at her, said hi, and then spotted A and ran over to her to give her her present. A was hanging out with one of her friends from college, L, who I've met a couple times but haven't seen since sophmore year of college. A went off to socialize, so I ended up hanging out with L and some of his friends until they left.

Then I had to decide if I wanted to go over and talk to E, which I really didn't want to do since I thought it should be her to come talk to me. I did want to say hi to M, though, but the three of them were together the whole night, not really talking to anyone else. So I hung out with some of A's med school friends and then talked to M and E's roommate while E left with A to go talk in another room. Also awkward because I'm sure they know about the email I sent E, and probably about how she didn't respond, but we made small talk for a while, until everyone started to leave. And unfortunately, E was still talking with A in the front room, so in order to say bye to A, I had to talk to E as well. She basically ignored that I was there, except for saying bye, and that was that.

I guess I'll take that as a clue that she never wants to talk to me again, but I still don't really understand how someone who is your best friend all through high school, and who you stay in close touch with all through college and after, would just decide to stop talking to you for no reason what so ever. And A has no clue as to what is going through E's mind on this topic either. She didn't realize we hadn't talked, and in the whole time they were talking, they apparently didn't discuss it at all.

On a side note, my suspicions were right and E's boyfriend wasn't invited, but this was because they broke up a few months back, apparently because E had come to the realization that he wasn't "the one", which is funny because the last time I did talk to her, she had essentially planned out when they would move in together (next fall), and when they would get married, have kids, etc. Just goes to show how much changes in a couple of months.

Bad Timing

What's worse than being sick? Being sick, in the summer, on you're birthday. Saturday morning I woke up with my throat hurting, but I just thought my mouth was really dry and that drinking water would solve the problem, and Sunday it didn't bother me, so I didn't think much of it until I woke up this morning with the desperate need to blow my nose, and I've been sniffling and sneezing all day since. Hopefully this will be a 24-hr thing because I want to be healthy for my birthday, to fully enjoy my birthday dinner (haven't discussed it with my parents yet but I'm assuming we're going to a nice dinner on my birthday since that's tradition).

Only once before have on been sick on my birthday, when I turned 15 and was on a bike trip in Maine. I pretty much started off with the same type of thing as I have now (the other kids on my trip would joke about how they could hear me coughing all night), except that apparently, intense physical activity and lack of treatment other than sudafed doesn't bode well a cold because after a few days, it got so bad that I lost my sense of smell, and as a result, my sense of taste as well. So on our last night, when we went to a fancy dinner in Bar Harbor, I ordered pasta instead of a lobster dinner since I couldn't taste it anyway. Apparently it turned into a bad case of sinisitis, so my mom (who is a doctor) put me on antibiotics, and it was still over a week before I could taste again. My parents enjoyed my lack of taste, though, because I was significantly less of a picky eater.

Here's to hoping this isn't a repeat of last time.

Birthday Decisions

And I've pretty much decided to have my birthday festivities at The Evelyn Lounge. Being lazy, I haven't actually been there, but I've heard from a number of sources that it's a fun place and its in my neighborhood, so that works for me. I was going to check it out on Friday, but my friend who I was going to go out with got a migraine at the last minute, so rather than wandering over and checking it out myself, I was lazy and watched TV instead. My only reservation is that there might be a cover charge (am going to call and find out) and I didn't really want to pick a place with a cover, but its my birthday so people can just deal. So for all you in the New York area, I'll be hitting the lounge by 10:30, so stop by cause I'd love to see everyone.

 
On The Upside

My coworker got a new phone a couple months ago and is on the same phone plan as I have, and she hadn't gotten rid of it yet so she gave it to me!! So it may not be snazzy or the latest thing, but at least I didn't have to pay the through-the-roof retail price.

 
Reason I Wish I Were Still Away

Today is the birthday of one of my oldest friends, A, that I still keep in some kind of contact with. While our contact in the past year hasn't been the best, she's in med school so I understand why I don't see her much and I do hear from her every once in a while, so while I was in Africa, I still bought her a present. My high school friends and my college roommate are the only people I buy birthday presents for regularly (not even my parents fall into this category) but seeing as I haven't been talking with my high school friends recently, I wasn't sure about this. However, I figured I'd get her a wooden carving--it'd cost me all of $5 bucks and then I'd be off the hook, and if I didn't see her, I'd just give it to someone else down the road. But she is having a huge b-day party at a bar tomorrow along with another friend of hers from med school. I saw the evite and practically their whole med school is invited. The only email addresses I recognized, other than a couple of med school people I know, were of A's college roommate who I know somewhat and will probably be equally lost among the med school masses, and E's.

If you remember, I never got a response from E to my confrontational email, and she will be attending, which is exactly why I wanted to address this earlier. I didn't really want to get into this at A's birthday, and then there is the whole issue of my birthday as well. I am not looking forward to this at all and am contemplating not going in order to avoid it, though that's stupid because I do want to see A and celebrate her b-day with her since I don't get to see her much. And E is probably bringing a friend of hers, M, that I always get along with really well and have always felt I should hang out with outside of her, but since its her friend, we never do. So I want to go cause otherwise I won't see M. Oddly, though, E isn't bringing her boyfriend, and he isn't on the guestlist otherwise (he's in med school with A). I suppose this probably means that he's out of town for the summer, but its still a bit odd.

I will probably give A a call this afternoon and wish her a happy birthday, and also see if she's talked to E at all about the situation between E and I. At least that way I have some way of gaging what to expect. Overall, though, I am not too excited for this party....a bunch of people I don't know who are all really good friends with the b-day girl, and the one person I know really well who is guaranteed to be there is someone I haven't talked to in 6 months.....makes me almost wish I was still in Africa and could just ignore the issue.

 
Back to Reality

So I made it back from the great unknown in one piece! Let me tell you, you'll never appreciate public transportation more than after a visit to a third world country. My heiny is definately thanking me tons right now. Other than some bruises and tons of mosquito bites (don't worry, I'm on my malaria meds so I should be ok), I had a minor bout with heat exhaustion but am otherwise unscathed. I will do a full write-up of my vacation, with pictures, when I get everything developed (my digital camera doesn't take regular batteries, so I was dependent on a bulky film camera) and have time to write (re: this weekend). The trip was great though, and I'm really glad I went, though equally glad to be home and clean for the first time in two weeks.

And now that I'm back, on to the minutia of the rest of my life like:

......buying a new cell phone and not getting ripped off for it, since I lost my cell phone on the way to the airport (the only reason I brought it was because I thought I'd kill some of my time on layovers making calls, but in the back of my mind, I knew it was a bad idea). My dad called Verizon and suspended my service, so I can't even check messages, and now I have to beg them to not make me pay full price for a phone since I don't have insurance (won't make that same mistake). And by the way, if I had your phone number, assume I lost it with my phone and email it to me again, and if you do want to get in touch, email's the way to go.

......get back into shape--still want to do a triathalon this summer so must get back to running. plus, frisbee league has playoffs this wekeend and don't want to look like a total loser. the plus side of going to a third world country is that i probably lost 5-10 lbs, but i'm pretty happy with the way i look, so not sure if that's a particularly good thing.

......plan my b-day party! thanks to joe and paul for advice, although i think joe kinda ignored the "no frat" thing i'm going for (though i'd be happy to join you there any other night of the week as i luuuv jake's with all my heart), so i'll be doing some research this weekend and will hopefully have a decision by next week. other insights still welcome!