this weekend drove down to la for a wedding reception... we missed out
on the wedding in kauai, but ah well it's okay.... we had a lot of fun
and got to see friends we hadn't seen in months... although still
didn't get to see everyone we wanted to....

 
i finally got to see "mr. and mrs. smith" and "batman
begins".....unfortunately not at my favorite theater but that's okay...
we got to reminisce about our time in sherman oaks briefly... passed by
our old apt... and i found my beloved togo's is GONE! in sherman oaks
AND in westwood!?!?! what the heck happened! maybe it's b/c i don't go
to them anymore... and DUDE the ucla dorms... the new parts to rieber
and hedrick are in... it's crazy! yeah yeah... i know things change..
but it's still crazy to see it... oh yeah... while on the subject of
changes chung king is now cheng du.... even pat's old roommate who
LIVES in la was like whoa... so it was definitely a recent change...
but trippy...

another fun weekend trip.. but now it will be low key for awhile....

stupid, inconsiderate idiots should GO AWAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i miss having our own apt.... AWAAAAAAAAAY from annoying people... i can't even lock myself in my own room! *sigh*

SALT POINT

went camping for (pat's friend) carina's birthday this past weekend...
and the spot chosen was salt point state park... met up in san rafael
and decided which things we REALLY needed and it was one PACKED car....
driving in the dark is NOT fun... esp when you have SUPER windy roads
and absolutely NOTHING to look at but darkness.... *sigh* by the end we
were all happy that we found the campground we
reserved....unfortunately while unpacking a racoon nabbed our morning
crossaints (sp?)... but luckily had a four left....

the next day we woke up, and set off to explore.... gerstle cove... pretty and really overcast... rained on us a bit

crashing waves.... RAIN!!!!!!!  .........ronnie and carina under a cool arch

after a nice relaxing stroll and enjoying the ocean we headed back to lunch.... the LONG WAY....
we ended up hiking along PCH which wasn't the most fun b/c of the windiness and cars zooming inches away... but whatever...

had some birthday cake and the boys fought on stumps and then we were off on our next hike... this time up into the hills....

we were on a trail and it got narrower
and narrower and pretty soon we were going through the
brush.......finally found a more main trail and hiked up... to the
pygmy forest... on the way up it was all tall trees and redwoods and
then you get to the pygmy forest and it's a total change....went
through a "prarie" and then headed back..... and we said we wouldn't
hike along the PCH again after the morning so we found another
trail....unfortunately it led us to pretty much nothing and for awhile
we were climbing over fallen trees and really thick brush..... after
about 10 minutes of that we found the REAL trail and went towards the
ocean... found the ocean... rested a bit and enjoyed a nice hike back
UP the hill to the campsite...

next
day we headed back b/c page had a flight around 7ish.... stopped off at
a sonoma state park i forget what the name was but it's where the
russian river meets the pacific ocean... it was a nice stop b/c we
watched the baby seals play in the water (see above)... they're too
cute... afterwards drove over to see the arch and have a yummy lunch
and look at tidepools

starfish clinging underneath the rock...and the arch view.....

a fun trip... quick but a nice get away to somewhere new... this upcoming weekend... to la la land we go!!!!!!!!

OMG... tsunami warning! and then just now they cancelled it...  whoa.. crazy... 7.4 or something off the coast of CA....

*EDIT

EVALUATION
 NO TSUNAMI DANGER EXISTS FOR ALASKA - BRITISH COLUMBIA -
 WASHINGTON - OREGON OR CALIFORNIA. HOWEVER SOME AREAS MAY
 EXPERIENCE SMALL SEA LEVEL CHANGES. AS LOCAL CONDITIONS
 CAN CAUSE A WIDE VARIATION IN TSUNAMI WAVE ACTION THE ALL
 CLEAR DETERMINATIONS MUST BE MADE BY LOCAL AUTHORITIES.

SEATTLE

this past weekend pat and i flew up to seattle for his sister's graduation... the last time i was in seattle was like 20 some years ago (gee that sounds really old)... but it was when i was like 3 or 4 or something and the only thing i really remember was going on a boat, feeling sick and feeding ducks.... and that's all i remember... so this time it's different, so i guess it's my "first" time in seattle (whatever... i think i'm just rambling now)

we had a flight delay before we got to the airport a few days before, but it got to MUCH later than the other time... so i think we took off at around 9:15pm or so... almost an HOUR LATE, from the original time... ended up arriving at like 12 something... we waited in line for the two-door compact that pat had rented... the girl that was helping was pretty cool, she asked what kinda car pat drove... which we found kinda weird.. then i thought i heard her say trail blazer and have a nice day... so i was confused until we got to the car.... which was the TRAIL BLAZER (our nice 2-door compact)...


6.11... woke up early... early is before the free breakfast goes away... they had a waffle machine.... i made it both mornings... after a yummy breakfast we headed over to UW... we parked and walked to the stadium... and it was raining on and off... but it was okay in the beginning... we found some seats and grabbed some munchies b/c it was gonna be LONG... (like most university LARGE graduations) ummm... so it was okay in the beginning slight sprinkle but nothing big... we managed to find kat among the masses of graduates entering husky stadium (and picked the right side to be on)... a few hours of speeches and some pretty bad rain, around the time of their commencement speaker... and we just got up and left b/c it was too much rain and it'd take forever to get to the ugrads!

RAINING REALLY HARD.... the commencement speaker in plastic poncho...the graduates rushing to grab ponchos (sooooooooo many were drenched and they didn't pass them out until that moment)

enjoying the rain...and nice family photo... awwwwwww...

we headed out and found kat and waited for dinner.. which was at like 8pm.... so we had time to kill... since the graduation was cut short... which was nice... we got to explore a bit of seattle with kat and i got to check out some galleries... although very limited time since everything closed around 5 or 6 and we had gotten out to go places around 430......but still it was fun... after that we walked around pike place (touristy) but it was near where we were having dinner.... our parking garage got a pretty view....  we had a nice yummy dinner...

and afterwards we headed over to the movies.... kat got tickets to this french movie called  Banlieue 13... and we weren't sure we'd be able to stay awake b/c it was a midnight showing... but it was an AWESOME MOVIE!  and it even had a plot too... constant action and it was pretty amazing the stuff those guys did...

drove back to the hotel and crashed at about 3 or 4am b/c we had to pack stuff....

6.12...woke up an hour before breakfast closed.... checked out... said bye to pat's parents and family friends who were driving up to canada... and we were on our way back to seattle... we were gonna meet kat for dim sum but we killed a lot of time at this AWESOME asian food market...UMAJIMAYA... it had EVERYTHING! the selection of food is WAAAAAAAAAY better than ranch 99.... i mean it has japanese, chinese, korean, vietnamese, philipino food... we had a lot of time to kill so pat and i just walked down every aisle and it was amazing they had a variety of selections attached they had a kinokuniya (japanese book store)... lots of asian gift stuff... and this awesome food court, with every type of asian food imaginable and even asian-AMERICAN food... ie. spam musubi.... so we decided to just eat at the food court instead b/c we were starving... pat called his sister and we were ready to decide what we wanted... and we chose ... yummy korean bbq... pat got bi bim rice... and i got kim chi fried rice... mmmmmmmm....

wandered around the bookstore and saw kat (who needed to do quite a bit of stuff before she left for iceland the next day!)...afterwards drove over to safeco field and went to the mariners store... my dad's cousin from japan is coming this summer so i bought him a nice ass ichiro jersey and my younger cousin a ichiro t-shirt... and a mini ichiro bobble head...

pat in a giant mit....us, and i'm pointing at ichiro....and me in a giant mit...

and LAST but CERTAINLY NOT LEAST.... pat and i paid homage to the REI flagship store....i mean, this place was HUGE! a large like 2 story warehouse of REI!  and around it... REALLY nice landscaping... it felt like you could go on a hike... with a waterfall, trees all over it even had a mountain bike trail! we spent a few hours there too... just checking everything out....

waterfall... mt. bike trail... and HUGE rock wall!

afterwards drove back to kat's and had pho and then had to jet....got home and crashed! and that was our weekend in seattle...

THE END!

OLD LADIES

i forgot to post this yesterday.... but since reading andy's recent blog i just remembered....

SOME old ladies are awesome (minus the rude one that andy
encountered... and the one that BUMPED into my sister and chewed her
out even though it was the old lady's fault... then my sister told her she
was gonna die when she saw her later...this is what a poor college girl
does with no sleep and is aggravated by a mean old lady)

majority of my mom's old lady customers at the store are pretty cool...
really open and friendly... yesterday this one old lady, who just
started coming to the store, came in again for framing and she was
talking about her husband (who passed away)... and mid conversation i
noticed she needed XYZ and her belt was only in like two loops....i had
to motion my mom to tell her b/c i think i'd just feel embarrassed
about telling her... my mom told her as she started leaving and the
reaction totally threw me off...i've come to the realization that as
you get older, you're pretty open about things.... but anyway... she
came back and was fixing herself and mentioned "thank you.... gee...
seems like and OPEN INVITATION!"  at that point i was smiling and
after she left my mom and i thought it was so cute....

and then there is the 90 year old woman who enjoys collecting art...
and who STILL want to collect art...she's pretty awesome; still drives,
recently had cancer and was told she was gonna die but went to another
dr... and was treated and the cancer is all gone! and since she's
recovered she brought me her batch of her yummy ginger snap cookies!
mmmmm...

AND LAST but not least MY GRANDMA... i swear sometimes she's like
super-grandma or something, driving up to the city to sing karaoke,
taisho koto lessons, gardening, redoing the japanese garden and moving
rocks (btw she does this sometimes when we're NOT at home).... oh
yeah... one time my grandma moved this HUGE freezer, b/c she said she
couldn't wait for everyone to come home, so she just did it... go
figure....CRAZY woman...

here's to the COOL old ladies! and a boo to the cranky ones who b/c
they're miserable, they have to ruin everyone else's good times....

MEMORIAL DAY WEEKEND
PCH Trip (Part III)

MON 5.30...

driving up to monterey.... and where did we go in monterey?!!? to
the monterey bay aquarium of course! i had been back in december, but
pat hasn't been in awhile... and a cool thing was they opened a new
exhibit and the touch pools that were closed when i went back in
december were now open!!!

we came just in time for feeding time....

sea otter... flat fish (if you can see it)...penguin

cool jellyfish pix

afterwards we grabbed a quick root beer (me)/coke (pat) float.... and we were on our way home.......

THE END!

MEMORIAL DAY WEEKEND
PCH Trip (Part II)

SUN 5.29... woke up and made
ourselves some breakfast burritos and enjoyed a relaxed morning filled
with people watching.... since it was just the two of us, we got some
of our entertainment by people watching at the two campsites we were
at...

#1...the people folding the
blanket behind pat were an interesting couple... it began by me hearing
her loud and clear while she was in the tent, saying how romantic the
night before was b/c they were in the woods and last night wasn't as
great b/c it's more of a family campground.... the girl finally came
out and she was smoking.... and then went into the car and put on
her make up....then put on her hair spray and some sort of deodorant
spray or lotion....and then they started clearing stuff out of their
large tent... a few roll up sleeping pads, a million blankets... and
what really got me was the HUGE teddy bear and pillow... and at one
point had a LARGE suitcase....while folding the tent, by the body
language she got upset and got into the car and slammed the door.....
leaving the guy outside.... minutes later he was leaning over her and
it was all better

#2...the rest of the people around...

• a cool bunch of people who know how to have a good time
• a biker (motorcycle) couple with these cute his and her
  helmets with little racoon ears and tail, which BOTH of them had... and
  his and her motorcycles (red and  blue to match their red and blue
  helmets)...
• another biker couple but this time BICYCLES! and in the back
  they had a mini trailer carry all their gear.... talk abou hardcore....

• families all around....

after cleaning up we drove over to a beach and went to check out some tidepools....check out those mussels!!!!

HEARST CASTLE

we made set up our camping chairs
behind my car where we parked for hearst castle and had a yummy
lunch!  then we were ready to check out hearst castle....there
were four different tours, but since we were first timers we decided to
take the experience tour.... a bus takes you up switchbacks up into the
hills and you see an amazing view of the coast.....

we got dropped off and first we
passed by one of the pools...and then get to walk through casa del
sol... one of the 3 guest houses.... (as seen below)

la casa grande

interior of casa grande: large tapestries, welcoming guest room (living room); HUGE dining room, long ass table; pool table room

last but not least was
neptune's pool (i think it was called)... this was an indoor pool...
the mosaic there is just amazing! and then the bus came to pick us
up....

hearst castle is pretty
amazing, i took way more pictures than what i posted.... i took
pictures of ceiling, tile, almost everything, the detail and the time
put into this is just crazy! and the architect was a woman, and also
civil engineer... it's all just amazing and i can't wait to see
more!  next time we'll be prepared and pre-order tix if we can....

a
quick stop at mills/mill creek i forgot which it was, but was very
pretty... see the pretty blue schist on the right of the picture...
oooooooo pretty!

anyway, we
continued up the coast in search of a site... we knew where we'd go for
back up, but we thought we'd try plaskett creek... a car went ahead of
us but they turned down a different way... as we were ending the loop,
i spotted a site that seemed vacant... backed up and we had it... 1 of
the LAST 3 sites left.... boy did we luck out!  the site next to
us was vacant and the car before us stopped near our site and gave me
this stare... b/c he thought we got the last one... after 5 minutes,
dumbass realized the one next to us was open.... we found them to be
quite interesting.... they had tiki torches at the opening of their
tent and had hot dogs on a stick for dinner... and i think that's all
they had....

and while we're on the
people again, the people across the way had brought not their dog, but
their CAT!  i seriously have never heard of anybody bringing their
cat camping... but now i've seen it!

after a yummy dinner,
grabbed the cameras and went to check out the sunset, the campsite was
near sand dollar beach... and here are a few pictures i took....

my shadow and pat walking on the trail we came from the hwy

sand dollar beach

pat taking a picture, and somehow i got stuck......

and the SUNSET!

went back and did a bit
more of people watching, and were thoroughly entertained by some kids
playing star wars with their flashlight light sabers.... it was too
cute!

END PART II.... to be continued....

MEMORIAL DAY WEEKEND
PCH Trip (Part I)

sooooooooo... this past weekend was a much needed break from the monotony of not going anywhere.... i wanted to go SOMEWHERE... originally we wanted to head over to the eastern sierras... unfortunately, the road through yosemite was still snowed in! ... so scratch that idea.... we looked online at a few places and found some points of interest we wanted to visit along the way.... we packed friday night b/c we were too tired and decided to leave early saturday morning...

SAT 5.28.... woke up 6ish and packed everything into my car and headed out by 7am...stopped in monterey for a quick mcd breakfast... and we were on our way.......stopped a few times to take pictures of the beautiful views...and the ocean, it was soooooo blue and pretty!

anyway... as we were driving down i asked pat if he knew where we were going... no, he replied....NO!?!? half of me panicked and the other half was whatever... but that's when i started to look at a map....one of the campgrounds we saw online we checked out but was completely full! we continued south and made a U-turn to go back to the ranger station (los padres national forest) and ask about camp availability.... the ranger was super helpful and we grabbed a map of all the campgrounds and he told us there was a few up in the mountains....so we started driving up the mountain and it was kinda scary b/c you couldn't see anything below you... about 10 minutes into the drive we decided to turn back b/c we didn't have any food! and it seemed stupid for us to go up there and go back down and go back up again.... so we continued on south... past gorda, a small town, so we kept on going south for a slightly larger town....

left: elephant seals lined up along the shore, right: much closer view of them...

on the way we stopped at point piedras blancas (white rocks...and they're white b/c of all the bird crap over the years!) and saw a ton of elephant seals..... that was interesting, and they also had an interesting smell too...it was quite entertaining to watch them fight and move from one place to another....also the parking lot squirrels begged for food... and some stupid people were feeding them....

made it to san simeon and thought we could go to hearst castle (this was one of the places i wanted to check out)... we got there around 12ish...went in to ask for the next tour, but the next tour was gonna be at like 5pm! so we decided to get one for the next day at noon and try to look for a campsite around there... pat remembered for a class they stayed at some campsite near the pch and we found it.... san simeon state park.... we lucked out, they had 2 sites open...we took the one not so close to the pch.... set up camp and went to hunt for food!

we hadn't eaten any lunch so around 3ish we found a bakery/cafe in cambria, just south of san simeon... and boy was the food yummy! sorry, no food porn, too hungry to think about taking pictures....grabbed food at the big grocery store there and they had a service of taking the groceries out to your car... most likely b/c it was a busy lot and they didn't want their carts left out as a liability....with food, and everything ready we got to relax.....right near our site you could walk under pch and head over to the beach....

pat creating a landslide; the view; and me taking a picture of pat taking a picture (i know i'm lame)

had a yummy steak and corn, tortilla, chips and salsa dinner... IN THE TENT... it was cold and windy and we didn't have a fire... and it was quite interesting hearing cars zoom by... we could see the lights from cars at night....

END Part I... to be continued....

HILLVIEW MIDDLE SCHOOL

WHAT A TRIP?!?!?!  so ummmmmmm... i dunno what possessed me to go,
but my cousin's open house at my old middle school (which she obviously
now attends).... i seriously think the last time i actually went there
was to pick up my sister and cousin, back when i was in high school!
seriously, almost everything's changed! what used to be the
multi-purpose room/gym is now the LIBRARY... and what was the library
are several different classrooms.... where the portables were, they now
have a HUGE GYM....and no more grass in between classrooms... and all
the teachers moved classrooms...

stuff that hasn't changed... the murals... and to explain that, every
year, the art students (8th graders) get to paint murals.... it's
pretty cool.... my cousin did it and her murals still up! (and she's
just started college!)

my cousin's mural, she's the one in the blue.....

so one of the main reasons i decided to go was to go visit my old
spanish teacher, ms. chidichimo.... now this woman is pretty
awesome.... many people thought she's crazy but she's a great
teacher.... anyway... my cousin told me she was retiring this year, so
i thought i'd say hi.... i knew she wouldn't remember me but she
remembered my face... my aunt blurted out my name... and i think she
definitely remembered, b/c i was a good student...... at least she said
that....  so that was cool... 38 years at the same school, i think
that's pretty awesome and shows dedication... anyway... she was a lot
of fun and probably will be dearly missed at the school.... some of my
fondest memories at that school were in her classroom... moneda, her
obsession with california raisins (she has a collection of them, and
she dressed up as one too for halloween), ah the memories....

i tried to see my old eighth grade teacher, but she was doing busy with
stuff so didn't get a chance to say hi..... too bad... but she's
awesome, and the whole set up of the room for the project presentations
brought back memories from 11 YEARS AGO! i feel old...

anyway....middle school was a happy time!