New Year's Weekend

New Year's Eve was SO much fun. Mechen flew in the night before to start our long vacation and the next day we were off to Hotel Solamar for a New Year's Eve party. A few of the women from work and I decided that it would be fun to reserve a cabana on the rooftop bar and it was one of the best party planning decisions I've ever been a part of. It was great. We ended up having about 16 people and having our own place to mingle was awesome. We had to get bottle service in order to "pay" for the cabana, which was reasonable for a New Year's Eve fete. Everyone got along well and Mechen invited two of his friends from the Kitty Hawk, which was nice because it had been awhile since he had seen them, they are fun and it meant that he had friends that he knew prior to that night.


But I was just so happy to be with Mechen. I love New Year's and to be with him at midnight, as cheesy as it may be to people cooler than I, was awesome!

The rest of the weekend was spent recovering/being mellow. We went to the zoo for free (woo hoo active duty special!). The zoo was pretty cool but it's hard to top the time I went and the polar bear swam around and placed his paw on the aquarium glass. It was huge!

Afterwards, we went to a really neat gallery in North Park that has a ton of handblown glass mini-terrariums of succulents. Then we ate at the Linkery and had a delicious sausage themed meal/mix of dishes with flights of beer. Just so you know, although cask beer tastes good, it is served almost at room temp and no matter how tasty it is, I like my beer cold. So that was my experiment in cask beer.


The next Morning, we went to SmallBar and had a great brunch, the highlight of which is definitely their spicy Bloody Mary that has so many fixings and garnishments, it's like it's own meal. That bar is really fun and has a great brunch menu as well as being pretty decent in the evening as well. Their jukebox is good although I have to Shazam everything since, again, I'm not all that in the know about what kids these day like. It's also a little loud first thing in the morning because I think they start it out at drunk Saturday night levels. My, I sound like quite the old lady! It's like I'm reaching a "milestone birthday" soon.

Catch-Up CA road trip post

This is a catch-up post more than three years later but I wanted to put in our itineary from our road trip.  Kind of weird that I didn't write it up then, but oh well.  The trip featured the most amazing, sunny weather, which is apparently unusual for that time of year.

Sunday, 1/3: We drove up the 101 to Santa Barbara.  We stayed at the Hotel Oceana Santa Barbara (inc. Breakfast and 2 hour beach cruiser rental!).        

Monday, 1/4: We took the cruisers out and headed towards the Four Seasons for a nice bike ride in Santa Barbara.  Then we headed up to Hearst Castle and took a tour. What amazing views and grounds.   Tip: make advanced reservations online because they do sell out!  I loved the two pools.  Then we headed up to Big Sur, which we ended up driving in the dark along hair pin turns.  We stayed at the Big Sur Lodge and ate dinner up there.  Yum!

  

Tuesday, 1/5: We hiked in Big Sur- one trail behind the Lodge into the forest and then down to Julia Pfieffer Burns State Park that features the cool waterfall that at high tide empties directly into the ocean.  Then we went to Carmel and walked around.  We stayed at the Cobblestone Inn.  It was nice but we switched rooms in the middle of the night because of a HORRIBLE clinking noise that was constant and non-stop from the radiator.

Wednesday, 1/6: We drove around 17 Mile Dr and headed for Davenport.  We skipped Monterey- too little time.  We stayed in the Davenport Roadhouse.  There was a Prix Fixe Dinner that night at the restaurant $25/each and locally brewed beer.  Yum!

Thursday, 1/7:   Then we went to San Francisco. We walked the city, went to Coit Tower and had the best meetball sandwich at Mario's Bohemian Cigar Shop.  We went to Bourbon and Branch and had delicious drinks.  We stayed at Hotel Adagio.

Friday, 1/8:  We toured the Golden Gate Park/Presidio, mainly by car, ate at Tartine and then boomed down the 5 back to San Diego.

So excited!

I'm so excited! New Year's plans have come together beautifully. The group of people is going to be really fun and it turns out we'll go to the J Bar at Hotel Salomar. We're reserving a cabana at the rooftop bar. There will be music, dancing, a place to sit, lots of heat lamps- it'll be great. The more we thought about the W, the more it seemed that it might be a little too "scene-y" to have a completely amazing time. I think the JBar will be a little more mellow, but still really fun. And everyone's really excited to meet Mechen.

I'm on call this Christmas weekend so I'm a little wary of getting too excited in case the ER decides to give me lots of extra presents this weekend. I hope not, but they tend to extra generous at the most inopportune times.

I can't wait to talk to family this weekend though. My parents, sister and brother are in Denmark, my grandfather's in Florida and I'll try to figure out how to contact my other brother in Vail. Man, I would love to be in Vail. I loved it this Summer. What a beautiful, amazing place!

New Year's Resolutions 2010

Ok, so these are published a little late and I'm already slightly overdue on #2 but the way I've approached New Year's resolutions in the past is to treat them as guidelines and navigational beacons. Some require a little more strict adherence than others, but I'm pretty excited about my ideas for 2010!

New Year's Resolutions


1. Read one non-fiction book for general edification purposes a month. Categories that do not count are medicine, memoir or how-to-fold-origami. (The last is listed because origami and I will never work out. Cranes spite me.) [Note: On further consideration, this will have to wait until after the inservice exam on 3/6/10. I need to crush that thing so all reading time is devoted to medicine.]


2. Blog once a week


3. Start p90X on 1/10 in order to finish on my birthday weekend. I want to look and feel amazing on my big 3-0!


4. Have an awesome 2 week vacation during my research block to Copenhagen and Zurich with a side trip to visit Mechen during an awesome port call *fingers crossed!*


5. Write a letter once a week (at least!) to Mechen while he's on deployment.



6. Find an organization to volunteer with and perform community service.



7. Go to Church once a week, preferably on Sunday.

8. Work on my Spanish. Practice 15 minutes a day once inservice is over.

9. Continue to study hard in ENT by being more consistent with my reading. At least 15 minutes anatomy and 30 minutes reading Monday-Thursday with 2-3 hours Friday-Sunday. That is bare minimum requirements.

Christmas excitement!

Truthfully, it's a little hard to muster up. I'm not the best at creating a Christmas for one because it doesn't rate super-high on my TTD (things to do) list.

I did wrap my Christmas presents from my parents though. I almost wrapped an issue of "Clinics" since it comes in a box too, but I thought that would be rather pathetic. I'm pretty sure that I am NOT getting the pair of shoes that I asked for since 1. they were expensive and 2. in my mother's eyes, ugly as sin. She hinted heavily towards that effect on the phone, but I will see on Christmas morning!

I am excited about Mechen coming in 9 days! We will have the 30th together, New Year's Eve at the W, then recover for our amazing road trip starting on the 3rd. We're going to travel up the Pacific Coast Highway. It's supposed to be amazingly beautiful and I'm really excited. I'm not sure if Winter is "the" season to go, but I think it might be close since the whales are migrating (I hope I see a pod!).

Our trip is pretty planned out lodging-wise but since most days don't involve too much driving, there will be plenty of time for pulling off and seeing random state parks, beaches and trails. I'm excited about seeing Carmel again, Monteray for the first time, and making it up to San Francisco. A true SF/Napa/Sonoma trip is in the works for another time, but this trip is mostly about the ride up. Coming back, we're just going to shoot down the 5 so we have a relaxed day on Saturday before Mechen leaves.

Vacation Bliss!

The rest of my vacation was awesome. Mechen had Tuesday-Sunday off and we had the best time. I hadn't realized that I felt slightly time-pressured the last two visits because even though he still made as much time as he could, he wasn't on vacation and time always felt too short. This time, we had days on end. While there's still never enough time to be with him, it was much better!

So, we went up to the Maryland Eastern Shore where I met his Dad and Stepmom who were totally delightful and fun. We went to Chincoteague, MD where we had so much fun playing in the surf. We followed that by going to Ocean City, MD where we ate like pigs: Boug's BBQ sandwich, Thrasher's fries, Kohr's ice cream, lemonade, and caramel popcorn. Crazy amounts of food but I was so hungry from playing in the ocean and I think a good portion of the food turned into insta-fuel.

Then we went back to Norfolk for the night. We had dinner at the Green Onion, which may be one of the best meals I've had. We split a nice salad, then I had a maple-balsamic glazed pork chop with pecans while he had a Texas steak with blue cheese. French fries also came with it. The dinner was incredible. It was such a nice, mellow dining experience and I now have a new favorite restaurant!

The we went to Maine for a wedding and had such a fun time. We went to Wells, Maine and had the best lobster roll of the trip. Then we went to a minor league game in Portland. The next day, we went to Two Lights State Park followed by the wedding that afternoon. Dar Williams made a surprise appearance at the cocktail hour and the band was so much fun to dance to during the reception.

The next day, we left (boo!). We went to Manchester, NH to check in for our flights after a fun morning at the B&B. Before flying out, we grabbed one last lobster roll. So that was 3 in 2.5 days, which is an excellent ratio.

Ego check!

Well, even though I took my one week vacation very early in this upcoming three month block, I'm so happy I'm here in Norfolk. Mechen and I had an amazing day yesterday. We had an amazing brunch: a huge dish of mussels in a white wine butter broth followed by french toast, which was the best brunch dessert! We also had two Bloody Mary's and they were so delicious and thick. Yum. It was a close call because we almost got the pitcher of sangria but I think we chose wisely.

Brunch was so funny b/c we were SO hungry and we were going to order the mussels as an appetizer, then split the French Toast and a lobster roll. Our old salt waitress Kathy eyed us very skeptically and said, "Why don't you two think about that." When she came back with the massive amount of mussels and informed us that we could reconsider since she hadn't put the second part of the order yet, Mechen said, "You know what? I think you might know what you're talking about." He said it so charmingly and it was so funny (it doesn't read particularly well).

After brunch, we went to the Harbor Center Mall and after an unsuccessful stop at Banana Republic, we hit jackpot at Nordstroms. I got two beautiful dresses on sale: one bright yellow and the other a deep red. Either will work for the wedding. Mechen got an amazing suit. Holy hotness. He looked phenomenal. Price-wise, eh it's Nordstroms, but we really saved with the Anniversary Sale. I can't wait for the wedding! Wait, it's not ours! It's a really close friend of mine from college. It's this Saturday in Maine. It'll be so much fun and I can't wait to see everyone.

Today has been a pretty good day. I worked out, went to the beach and had Taste Unlimited for lunch. Oh my, their house sauce is terrific. Now I'm in Starbucks waiting for Mechen to finish his one day of work. The ego check referred to in the title is the effect Mechen's job has on me. I mean really, I'm a hotshot doctor, shouldn't my hours be the worst? (I kid). Well, fortunately for me, mine are pretty cush. And Mechen's are terrible. They're starting to get better but the amount he's been working the past several months would definitely violate resident duty hour restrictions!