Tag Archives: holidays

Festival Of Holidays (or All The Food, Some Of The Rides)

Posted on November 15, 2017 | Comments Off

After my last adventure to Disneyland, my friends and I tried to plan out when we could go for the rest of 2017. We knew that our winter holiday blackouts were coming soon with our passes and we were limited in how many more days we would be able to go. We made some plans for December but we were also hoping to figure out when we could go in November too. We couldn’t figure out when all 3 of us could go, but Michelle and I were both able to go this week so we decided to go for a Disney day!

The timing was perfect because the holiday stuff just started at Disneyland. And at California Adventure they were doing the Festival Of Holidays which consists of about a dozen different food booths with different holiday themed food offerings. It’s similar to what they did during the Food and Wine Festival earlier this year and we were excited to check out what food we could get! And as Annual Passholders, we could get the Sip and Savor pass which allows you to get 8 items for $45. Since most things were more expensive than $6, it’s a pretty great deal!

Michelle got 4 things and I got 3 things throughout the day. And most of the time we split stuff between us so we could each try as many things as possible. I think the salmon and brisket were my favorites so far. But I’ll be in the park at least one more time before the Festival Of Holidays ends (plus I still have 5 more food items I can get with my pass) so I’ll be trying many more.

And our priority was to try all the amazing foods, we did go on some rides as well. We went on Guardians of the Galaxy: Mission Breakout twice in the hopes that we’d get a new song on the ride. There are 6 song choices and we had only had 3 before. But on the 2 rides we had, both times we had songs we had already heard before. Hopefully we will make it through all 6 songs one day!

We also went on California Screamin’ since that ride will be closing for a bit soon. They will be changing the theme of the ride (but keeping the ride the same) so it will be themed to “The Incredibles”. But we still wanted to make sure we got to go on it before it closed and changed.

And they will also be closing Mickey’s Fun Wheel to change the theme so we made a stop over there as well. We were about halfway up on the ferris wheel stopped because they were loading the cars below us. Michelle and I were focused on the fun view and looking at what food things we wanted to try next.

But we realized after a while that we had been at that spot for a while and when we looked down we realized that there was no longer a line for the ride. I don’t know what happened but it did break down so they had to move it so that each car could get off. But when they got our car down to the bottom it kept moving. It was weird and we thought maybe the ride was working again. But I guess they just made a mistake because it started going backwards so we could be let off. But they gave us a pass to use for another ride and we took that to go on Soarin Around The World.

We also got to see an incredible sunset while in the park. It kept changing colors as the sun was setting, but it looked amazing every time we looked at it.

After those rides and our food, we decided to go over to the Disneyland side. It was pretty crowded over there compared to California Adventure but it was still so pretty with all the holiday decorations up.

It felt so late but it wasn’t even 6pm! The time change really threw me off and I was already starting to feel tired. We tried to go look at the castle but they were filming the tv special that will be airing soon so the castle was blocked by various equipment. We kind of could see how pretty it looked, but I’m looking forward to seeing it another time when the view isn’t obstructed.

And we then had our final ride of the day which was Space Mountain. It’s back to the regular version of the ride, but that feels special since between Hyperspace Mountain and Ghost Galaxy it seems like I never ride the regular version.

We debated about trying to go on one more ride to wait out traffic, but we both were pretty close to being done. Even though we didn’t go on that many rides, we did a ton of walking. My Fitbit said I had done about 17,000 steps which is what we normally do in a full day of rides.

But even being tired while we were walking out, I couldn’t help but smile at how pretty Main Street looked with all the lights.

I’ll be back at Disneyland in a few weeks for sure, but there may be another adventure before that or right after before we are blacked out for the holidays. The holidays are so pretty at Disneyland and I want to make sure I experience it as much as possible before I have to wait a year for it to be back again!

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Posted in Food, Fun Stuff

Tagged California Adventure, Disney, Disneyland, food, holidays, rides, theme park

Movies And Christmas Lights (or A Busy Movie Week)

Posted on December 14, 2016 | 1 comment

I recently had a week where I got to see 3 musicals in one week. And this week, I’m going to have a week where I see 3 movies in a week! Fortunately, 2 of those movies will be free (thanks to the SAG-AFTRA Film Society) so it’s not an expensive week. Movies are really expensive now! And while I’ve only seen 2 movies so far this week (the last one will be “Star Wars” on Saturday), it’s been pretty great.

The first movie this week was “Patriots Day” and that was a screening at the SAG-AFTRA Film Society. If you haven’t heard of this movie, it is about the Boston Marathon bombing. I had recently seen a documentary about the bombing so I was very familiar with the timeline and story going into the movie, but it was still a great movie. I think the woman sitting next to me didn’t know the timeline because she was in shock each time something happened.

It’s not an easy movie to watch, but that’s part of the reason I think people need to see it. This is a part of recent history and it shouldn’t be ignored. I know some people don’t love recent history movies, but I think this one was reported about in a censored way so many people don’t realize everything that happened. I think the movie doesn’t get released for most of the country until January, but I recommend being on the lookout for it.

The day after seeing “Patriots Day”, I went to another movie. This time, I went to see “Dr. Strange” with my friend David. David is the person I see all superhero movies with since he knows the story from reading the comics and he tolerates all the questions I ask after the movie is done. I enjoy the movies, but since I don’t know the back story so I tend to get confused.

This movie was the one we had to pay for and we went to the Grove to see it. I usually stay away from the Grove because it is very crowded and touristy. But it was the closest place that the movie was playing and had a time that worked out well for both of us.

We found parking quickly there (which is almost unheard of) and went straight to the movie. It was a good movie and I think the superhero movie that confused me the least. All the things that I thought would be questions for David ended up being answered in the movie! I’m sure that over the next week or so I will think of random questions like I always do, but after the movie nothing seemed that confusing to me. So after the movie was done, we decided to walk around the Grove a bit.

David hadn’t been to the Grove at Christmastime before so I said we had to check out the tree. It’s a pretty giant tree and while they were doing some filming stuff around the tree it wasn’t too crowded over there. We did our best attempt to get a selfie with the tree, but the only way to do it was to hold the camera below us which is really the least flattering angle.

We walked around for a bit longer after that and then headed back to the car. It was a bit crowded there and a ton of families in line to get pictures with Santa (who is in a giant house in the middle of the shopping area) and I didn’t feel like trying to walk through the crowds to see more of the Christmas lights and stuff around.

I’ll possibly be at the Grove again before all the lights and decorations are down, but if not I’m glad I got to check it out this time. I do enjoy seeing Christmas displays even though I don’t really celebrate Christmas myself. And even though seeing 3 movies in a week sounds pretty indulgent, it’s the holiday season so I figure anything goes!

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Posted in Fun Stuff

Tagged christmas, friends, holidays, movies

SAG-AFTRA Holiday Party (or Getting Ready For Elections Again)

Posted on December 13, 2016 | 1 comment

This past week was the SAG-AFTRA holiday party in LA. Even though I’ve been a member of SAG-AFTRA for a while, I have never made it to a holiday party before. Either I was working the night it was held, I had a commitment I couldn’t get out of, or I got sick. So even though I RSVPed for the party this year, I was worried that something would come up that would prevent me from going.

Fortunately, nothing came up and I was able to attend the party! When I arrived, it was just as things were starting and there was a pretty big line to get in. But they had several representatives from the union throughout the line to talk to people and greet them. Many of those people were people I know from Unite For Strength, so it was nice to have some time to catch up with friends even before I got inside the party.

Most of the people standing in line with me were people I didn’t know, but I didn’t pay too much attention to that since I was so focused on catching up with the friends who were hanging out with the line. And as soon as I checked in for the party, I walked past the food area (I wasn’t hungry so I wasn’t planning on eating) and tried to find some more friends.

The problem with big events like these are that they do make me a bit nervous and shy. I was there alone (it’s always easier when you arrive with a friend) and was really trying to find someone I knew so I could hang out with them. It took a bit of time to find a friend, but once I did I felt much calmer. And once I found one friend, it seems like more people I knew were coming over to where I was.

Since I don’t get to see my delegate friends that often, there was a lot of catching up to do. It’s been an interesting year for most of us so it was fun to hear the cool projects that they have been working on. And since most of us are friends on Facebook, they wanted to hear more about the liver tumors since they had seen the posts about them.

Most of the stuff about the liver tumors was pretty quick since I don’t have a lot of updates right now, but I did realize something at the party that I didn’t think about. SAG-AFTRA elections will be coming up next year. While the elections will most likely be in the summer, getting signed up to run and doing the prep work will be in the spring. And that will be when I will be having my surgery and recovering.

As soon as I realized that, I talked to some of my friends who are higher up in SAG-AFTRA. I explained how I have every intention of running for a delegate position again (and I’m still considering running for the local board) but I’m worried the timeline of election stuff and my surgery will be an issue. They reassured me that they will do what they need to do so everything works out for me. Hopefully the surgery won’t take me out that long, but if it does I’m glad there is a plan that we can follow that won’t cause the recovery to be an issue for the election.

For most of the party, I stuck with the few friends I found there. I don’t know if more of my friends were there, but we were all looking around and didn’t really see too many people we all knew. And as things always seem to be at a party, I started to say goodbye to people and it seemed to take about an hour for me to leave. I did run into a few more friends while leaving so the goodbye got mixed in with trying to quickly catch up, but I was able to leave at a time that was early enough for me to not have to stress about rushing home to get to bed.

I’m so glad that I was able to go to the holiday party this year. It was a good positive thing to get to do when my day had been a bit long (customers have been getting pretty angry the past week at my day job). And I got to see friends I hadn’t seen in a while and was able to start planning for the election next year. I know I keep saying I need to do more with my union, and having fun at this party proved that I need to work harder at that.

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Posted in Acting, Celebrations, Fun Stuff

Tagged acting, friends, holidays, party, SAG-AFTRA, union

Low Key Labor Day (or Just A Regular Weekend)

Posted on September 7, 2016 | Comments Off

I know so many friends of mine were so excited to have a 3 day weekend this past weekend. For me, it’s a normal weekend since Mondays are always a day off for me (and I worked my regular Saturday shift as well). It’s weird to see so many people saying how amazing having an extra weekend day is when I know that everything is the same as usual for me (I won’t even get extra time off at Christmas or New Years because of the days of the week the holidays fall on).

My holiday weekend did get off to an exciting start with my outing to the Bowl. But being out later than normal for me (plus my hips were killing me) caused me not to get that much sleep on Saturday night. I woke up later than normal on Sunday feeling groggy and still tired. I’ve been working lately on getting my sleep schedule to be the same pretty much every night (it’s been tough for me) and sleeping in really did seem to throw my entire day off.

I spent the beginning of my Sunday during my usual errands for the weekend, and then my friends Marie and Chris were throwing a Labor Day party. They did their party on Sunday so people would have Monday to recover from being out all night. And while I didn’t get to make drunk fruit like I have for several parties, I did have some of the leftovers from the Bowl (fruit and sea salt brownies) to contribute to the party.

I really wanted to be social and have a great time at the party, but the exhaustion was hitting me pretty hard. I still had fun seeing all my friends and just having a good time being outside with everyone, but I was just feeling off while I was there. I was hoping that I could get over that feeling once I was at the party and around all the energy of my friends, but unfortunately it stuck with me. I managed to stay at the party until about 9pm and then felt it would be best for me to get back to my house to get a decent night sleep.

Labor Day wasn’t anything special for me. I did my usual Monday morning workout and then I really didn’t have much of a plan. I thought about trying to see if any friends wanted to hang out that day, but I never got motivated enough to try to make some plans.

So instead of being out at a BBQ or some other party on Labor Day, I spent the day at my house watching movies and being lazy. It wasn’t the best thing I could have done, but it seemed to be the best thing for me at the time. I really enjoyed just relaxing and watching movies that I’ve been wanting to see while on my couch. I took a couple of breaks throughout the day to read (something else I love) and then went back to watching movies. It really was an ideal day for me and I finally got over my exhaustion and felt back to my normal self.

Now that the summer is over, I’m getting ready for fall and the end of the year (which will be here before we know it!). I know I’ll get time off of work for Thanksgiving but like I said before I won’t get any extra time off for Christmas or New Years. It’s not horrible to not get any extra time off, but I was sad when I realized that I would only get my usual Sunday and Monday off for each of those. But I’m planning on maximizing those two days off each week through the fall and I’ve got some really fun things that I think I’ll be able to do with my weekends coming up!

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Posted in Celebrations, Fun Stuff

Tagged holidays, labor day, lazy, party

Focusing On The Happy (or What Will Be Good At Thanksgiving)

Posted on November 19, 2015 | Comments Off

After talking about how stressed out I’m getting about getting everything done before Thanksgiving, I decided to take a step back and focus on the good things that will be happening next week. I think I realized that I need to focus on the good after reflecting on my happiness checklist yesterday. I’ve realized that happiness and good things haven’t been as much of a focus as it should be and I wanted to remedy that.

Obviously, we are all trying to remember that last Thanksgiving was pretty epic and will likely be impossible to top. It wasn’t just that almost the entire family was there at one time, but we had amazing weather and everyone seemed to have a great time. We have the same rental house this year as we did last year, but since my grandpa won’t be there (and a few other family members will be missing due to scheduling issues), it won’t be the same even if we have the amazing weather again.

I’m really excited to see my family. So many family visits lately have been a bit on the sad side, so it will be nice to have a family gathering that should be happier. There are a couple of things that have been planned for Thanksgiving (that I can’t share yet because they are surprises) that may bring a bit of a somber mood, but I think we are all focused on making our family holiday a happy thing.

I’m super excited to give my mom her Hanukkah gift. I’ll be sharing what I got her next week (again, I can’t ruin the surprise), but I think that she’s going to be shocked by what I got and I think she will love it. And I can’t wait to give my dad his birthday present because I think it’s something that he’ll be so happy to have but never would have bought for himself.

I can’t wait to see my cousin’s kids and do some face painting on them. I bought a big face paint kit this year and I think it will be a bit crazy when my cousins and I start painting their faces. We can get more creative than we’ve been in the past, but we can get over the top as well. But I know that when the kids have their faces painted and they are showing the designs off to everyone that the entire family should be smiling. I think everyone has gotten a kick out of this weird tradition that I started by accident.

And of course, I can’t wait to see the dog! It’s been a while since I’ve seen him and he’s gotten so much bigger! I’ll be working with him on a trick or two and my parents have been telling me how much better he’s gotten with his obedience training. The other day Tucker was at the dog park and tore up his skin from a bush. My parents didn’t realize he was hurt at first because he didn’t cry, limp, or show any signs of being injured. But once they saw it they took him to the vet to get it checked out (we might be a bit overly cautious because of what happened with Chaucer). The vet said it needed to be cleaned and stitched up so that was done. And instead of putting Tucker in the cone of shame, the vet recommended putting Tucker in a shirt so he can’t lick at his stitches.

I think he looks so silly and cute at the same time! I don’t know if he will still need to be wearing a shirt next week (his stitches don’t come out until after Thanksgiving), but he will look cute whether he’s clothed or naked. Tucker is officially now our dog with the most scars. And they’ve all been very minor injuries that Tucker doesn’t even notice. That dog either doesn’t have a ton of pain receptors or he is so distracted when he’s playing that he ignores any pain he has. But all his scars have fun stories and he seems to not mind visiting the vet (I don’t know if he loves being in the shirt).

And of course, the food and company are things to look forward to next week. I’ll be in San Diego for about 3 days so I’ll have a lot of time to hang out (even if I do have to work the day before and the day after Thanksgiving). No matter what happens over Thanksgiving, I’m so grateful that I have the chance to spend time with 4 generations of my family and be surrounded by people who I love and who love me. I know that that is a luxury that not everyone has and I need to be grateful that I do have that.

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Posted in Celebrations, Family, Food, Fun Stuff

Tagged family, happiness, holidays, positivity, San Diego, Thanksgiving

Mini College Reunion And Restricted Activity (or My Week In Workouts)

Posted on September 8, 2014 | Comments Off

This week my workouts had some really awesome moments and some pretty annoying ones.

Let’s start with the bad so I can end on a positive note. Due to being sick this past week, my workouts became very tough to do. Not only was I feeling off, I had to restrict my activities to make sure that I was safe and not preventing myself from getting better.

First of all, the fluid in my ear was causing some dizziness. So I had to be super careful on the treadmill because I didn’t want to fall off. I reduced the speed I was walking and made sure to hold on to the handrails extra tight. Monday wasn’t too bad (because that’s when I was starting to have problems), but Wednesday and Friday were very tough. There were plenty of times I had to stop on the treadmill because the room was spinning around me and I was terrified I’d fall over. I had some issues during the strength portion as well, but it wasn’t as bad as the treadmill. For the strength, I only had issues when we transitioned from standing to sitting (or laying down) exercises.

I took it easy and I’m finally starting to feel better. Hopefully this week I will have much less dizziness.

The second problem was due to my throat. The ulcer/canker sore was extremely painful. And breathing heavily made it feel much worse (probably because my throat was getting dry). Trying to drink water felt like I was being stabbed in my throat, so I had to be careful with drinking water as well. So that prevented me from working out as hard as I could.

Even with these issues, I still averaged about 500 calories burned in each class, so that’s good. Going there and doing reduced activity is still way better than not going at all.

Now for the fun thing that happened in my workout. On Monday, I went to a morning workout. This was due to the holiday (so there were no afternoon workouts that day). And in that workout, I ran into someone I went to college with and hadn’t seen in at least 10 years!

I thought I had seen her before, but not in the same class as me. I saw her name on the heart rate monitor screen (and she has a unique name so I was pretty sure it was her) but I didn’t see her when I was looking into the workout room.

So on Monday, when she walked in to the workout room, I stopped her to ask her if she had gone to LMU with me. And I’m shocked that she remembered me!

She was a couple of years ahead of me, but I met her in the first few months of college. I was in a student film I think in September or October of my freshman year, and she was in that film as well. We knew each other a bit through college since we were both in the theater world.

So it was so awesome to see her and get to catch up for a minute after class after not seeing each other for so many years! I’m not really in touch with a lot of people I went to college with so it’s nice to see people again randomly like that!

Overall, this week in workouts had its highs and lows. But like I keep telling myself, the most important thing is that I had a week of workouts!

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Posted in Fitness, Fun Stuff, Health, Tough Stuff, Weight Loss

Tagged college, holidays, Orangetheory, sick, workout

4th Of July (or Hot Dogs, Fireworks, And Rooftops)

Posted on July 8, 2014 | 1 comment

I spent my afternoon and evening of 4th of July over at my friends Chris and Marie‘s house. They really do throw the best parties and this was the first time I’d be over there for 4th of July.

I’m always a little wary about driving on 4th of July (or any holiday where there is a lot of drinking) so I tried to time my drives for when there wouldn’t be a ton of traffic. So I headed over there around 5pm and got to their house pretty quickly.

Everyone was hanging out in the backyard and just relaxing and catching up. Definitely my type of party (I’m not a fan of crazy parties). After being there for a while, the sprinklers came on in the backyard. Marie and Chris just got new grass for their yard and they had to water it a lot so the grass would grow properly.

Since it was pretty hot out, I decided that I wanted to run through the sprinklers. I wasn’t really wearing the best outfit for that (I wore jeans), but I didn’t care. And I didn’t want to run through the sprinklers alone, so I decided to recruit some other people to join in.

Marie was the first person to say yes, and then 2 other party goers saw what we were going to do and they took off their shoes to join us.

I have to admit, even though I didn’t like that my jeans got soaking wet, running through the sprinklers was pretty awesome and a perfect activity for the party.

After the sprinkler adventure, Chris got the grill fired up and started taking orders for hot dogs. Ordering was necessary because he and Marie and gotten 7 or 8 different types of hot dogs for the party! I wish I had taken a picture of the sign they made because they gave all the hot dogs really clever names.

I ordered a cheddar dog mainly because I had never had one before and it sounded good. And it was! Sadly, no photos were taken of the food because I was too busy eating it (I was hungry after my workout earlier that day).

We all spent time just relaxing and enjoying each other’s company while waiting for the sun to set. Even though having fireworks is illegal in Los Angeles County (unless it is a professional show), Marie and Chris said that last year plenty of people near their house set off fireworks.

So once the sun was down, a bunch of us climbed a ladder to hang out on the roof of their house to watch the fireworks. And since they were being set off so close to us, the fireworks were huge in the sky!

We were up there for a while until someone complained that they were just hit by a piece of fireworks shrapnel. We didn’t know what had happened until we used the lights from our phones to look on the roof. We found a marble sized hard ball that must have been part of one of the fireworks (maybe it held some sort of propellant to make the fireworks go into the sky?).

After that, we all got a little nervous about being on the roof, so we headed down to watch the rest of the fireworks safely in the backyard (where I guess technically something could still hit us but we had the overhang from the roof to protect us).

I hung out at the party until about 11pm. I had figured that 11pm was a pretty safe time to leave. People who went to firework shows had already left and bars were still open so a lot of people were hanging out there. Thankfully, my plan worked and not only did I get home safely, I got home very quickly as there was no traffic on the freeways.

Even though this was a pretty low-key 4th of July, it was really a perfect way to spend a day off. I was around great friends, great food, and great conversation. What more could you want?

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Posted in Celebrations, Food, Fun Stuff

Tagged 4th of July, BBQ, fireworks, holidays, party

A Free Weekday (or Planning Ahead For Fun Things)

Posted on January 21, 2014 | Comments Off

While I was out sick last week from work, I missed some schedule changes that were made. So when I returned on Friday, I learned that we were going to have Monday off because of the MLK Holiday. I still ended up working on Sunday so it didn’t feel like an extra day off, but it was a pleasant surprise.

A lot of times with these extra days off I try to plan some sort of adventure. But since I’m still in recovery mode from this cold, I tried to take it easy but have a fun time as well.

I went out to lunch with my friend Kate. She’s currently job hunting so I wanted to catch up on that with her. And I had my usual randomness to catch her up on. Since I will be unemployed soon, we are trying to figure out some fun outings to go on when we both are out of work. One thing that is definitely on our list is to go to California Adventure at Disneyland. Kate has never been in that part of Disneyland before and I told her that she has to do it (she agrees with me).

After a nice lunch, I continued on my adventures by doing a little shopping for a trip that I have in a few months. My sister-in-law, Krystle, and I are going to New York for a few days in March. I don’t really need too much stuff for that trip, but there is a new Nordstrom’s Rack I wanted to check out and shopping for that trip was a good excuse.

I’m still not in “standard” sized clothes, so shopping is still pretty tough. And the plus size clothes options are pretty pathetic. But I did managed to find a 100% cashmere sweater that was only $40. So I got that. And I’m still on the lookout for a trench coat for my trip. I don’t really own any rain coats or nice jackets and I’m pretty sure that I will need that for my trip. It might not be as cold in March as it is right now in New York, but it will probably be colder than it is right now in LA (where it’s been 75 degrees and sunny every day).

Shopping for the trip is really getting me excited about it. Krystle and I really need to get on top of doing some planning. We have our flights and hotel booked, but that’s it so far. But I’m looking forward to doing whatever we end up doing because I haven’t been to New York since the summer I turned 17.

After my shopping (where it seemed everyone was shopping because it took me almost an hour to pay), I headed back home to do what I usually do on Sundays to prepare for a full work week (grocery shop, clean, do laundry). I’m starting to feel almost back to normal again and I feel like taking the time yesterday to have some fun has really gotten me ready to be back at work for a full week.

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Posted in Fun Stuff, Health, Shopping, Tough Stuff, Travel, Work

Tagged cold, day off, friends, holidays, lunch, New York, plus size, shopping, sick

What Will Happen In A Week (or Why I’m Excited And Scared To Go Home)

Posted on December 13, 2013 | Comments Off

Next week I’m going home for a few days. I have some time off of work so I figured it would be a good time for a trip home. When this was planned, I didn’t know that I would be going home for a quick visit in November, so it would have been a long time since I was home (I think the last time I was home was last year for Thanksgiving).

I’m excited to get to spend some time with my parents. While I got to see them for a little bit last week, this time I’ll have a few days so we won’t feel rushed. We don’t really have any plans for my visit, so it should be relaxing. I’m also hoping to get to see my brother and sister-in-law. I have their Hanukkah presents and would love to give them to them in person. I’m not sure when or if I’ll get to see them, but we are working on scheduling now.

I also might get to see a friend or two from high school. I haven’t really stayed in touch with too many people from high school (not counting FB of course), but my friend Jackie is trying to come over with her little boy for a visit. That would be great since I haven’t seen either of them in a long time.

But I’m nervous about going home because of my dog. He’s not doing so well right now. He seemed fine last week, but according to my parents he went downhill pretty quickly. He’s still happy, enjoying eating people food, and playing with other dogs and that’s important to me. But he’s also sleeping a lot and you can see the tumor on his leg growing.

We don’t know how much more time we have with Dante, but it’s seeming like it’s pretty limited at this point. But as long as he’s happy, I’m happy.

But I’m scared of two different scenarios.

First, if Dante dies before I come home, I won’t get to see him again. My last time to see him will be those few hours last week. And I don’t know how I will react if I go home and Dante wasn’t there to greet me at the door. Or to hear him playing with his favorite toys. Or to take him out on his walks. I don’t know if I could handle that or if I want to handle that (and yes, I understand that it will be so much harder on my parents than on me since they are with him every single day).

But if Dante doesn’t die before I go home, I’ll get to see him again. And I’m totally looking forward to that. But if he’s acting sick or not like himself, I know that will upset me. It was tough when I was home for the 24 hour visit and he was acting off. I’m pretty sure the pain pills were making him act funny, but it was very upsetting to see him acting loopy and confused.

Either way, I’m excited to get to go home and see everyone that I love. And with either scenario with my dog, I know that I need to be there for my parents.

I’m just focusing on the positives with my upcoming visit and knowing that my dog, while sick, is still enjoying his life to the fullest every day. And I should follow his example.

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Posted in Family, Fun Stuff, Tough Stuff, Travel

Tagged cancer, christmas, dog, family, holidays, sick

Surviving My Work Holiday Party (or Getting Braver With My Clothing Choices)

Posted on December 5, 2013 | Comments Off

This week was the holiday party for my day job. Last year, the party was at a bar near the theater we work at and it was more of like a dinner event (although no dinner was actually served). We all sat at a long table and chatted. Then the artistic director gave a speech and handed out Trader Joes gift cards to everyone as a holiday gift. I don’t remember what I wore last year, but I remember that it was pretty casual (I usually wear jeans to work and I’m sure that’s what I wore to the party).

This year, we had more advanced notice about the party. It was going to be held at Gladstones and we were expected to dress festively. It was suggested to wear something similar to what we would wear to work a show. But since I normally wear a dress and heels to work a show and I knew I’d be working on the phones before the party, I wanted to wear something more comfortable.

All of my dress pants are looking a little sloppy because they are big right now. But then I remembered that I just bought some leggings. I’ve been weary of leggings. They are very body conscious and many leggings look more like tights (as in they are see-through and not appropriate as pants). But these seemed to be a thicker fabric so I decided to wear them. And if they didn’t seem as cute, at least the restaurant was going to be dark.

I paired the leggings with a tunic style top and headed off to work my shift before the party. Turns out, my outfit was a huge hit! I got a bunch of compliments from my co-workers. In fact, I’m planning on wearing those leggings on a more regular basis. Who knew that some of my thoughts on clothing could be so off? First skinny jeans and now leggings.

The party was pretty good. The food at Gladstones was ok (lots of fried things that were a little too greasy for my taste). But since the restaurant was right on the beach we had a nice view. And it was nice to see everyone dressed up and not running around trying to work a show.

Besides the food, there was some caroling singing (I mouthed the words since I’m tone deaf and everyone else I work with is an amazing singer), and then someone hooked their iPod into the sound system and there was some dancing. My hips were starting to kill me by the time the dancing started so I just sat off to the side.

Before I knew it, the co-workers I drove with were ready to head back to work where the rest of us left our cars. And I was home at about the same time I would get home from a late shift, so that was nice.

Overall, I had a really great time at the holiday party. I know that for some people work events can be stressful. But since so much of my work is already at events, that stress was taken away (and the co-worker who hates me is antisocial so she wasn’t there to bother me).

If you have to go to a work holiday party, you should check out this article on BuzzFeed. It was pretty funny (and had some good advice)!

Comments Off on Surviving My Work Holiday Party (or Getting Braver With My Clothing Choices)

Posted in Celebrations, Food, Fun Stuff, Shopping, Work

Tagged clothes, holidays, job, party, plus size, work

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