Friday, February 29, 2008

Hysterical Blog!

I got this email from Leila today and I fell in LOVE with this blog. If anyone else gets the chance you should totally check it out! It's called- stuff white people like, and omigoodness are they right on! http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.wordpress.com/

Thursday, February 28, 2008

Lovin the Whole Foods

After a long day at the office, it's always nice to wander into Whole Foods and grab a salad, a nice piece of fish or a steak and find random accessory ingredients to help develop a tasty, well- balanced meal. Yesterday I had the best Whole Foods experience ever, and I gotta tell you- it did not start out well. Shane picked me up at 7pm from the office, which is way late, considering I had been in since 8:30am... We drove to a small boutique grocery in the North End and quickly left, after realizing we were too late to find anything worth eating... So, we headed over to Whole Foods to see what we could conjure up. It was a disaster getting over there because there was a game at the Garden. So a trip that should have taken 10 minutes took 25... We wandered in, tired and a little irritated, but hungry. After picking up a few tomatoes, a lemon, & some garlic we headed to the seafood section where we asked for the tail portion of the halibut steak that was on display. It rang up at nearly $18... We were headed to the bakery to find bread when all the sudden the lights went out, and they stayed out... it was crazy. No one knew what to do, the place was packed with a bunch of Yuppies and Dink's...And we all just stood there for a moment looking at each other in the dark. Shane decided we should probably go, so we headed toward the checkout counters and this great checker came in and started ushering people away from lines that weren't working and into lanes that could at least offer people totals, even if they couldn't pay with credit cards. But the lane we were in wasn't working, and instead he just ushered us right through the line, told us to have a good night and we walked out of Whole Foods with at least $35 worth of food. I am sure there were quite a few people that are upset today because they couldn't purchase their dinner from Whole Foods, dates could have been ruined, who knows. But it's worth noting that we had a GREAT night! Shane made an amazing orange zest/onion saute and I cooked up some beans and tomatoes. We enjoyed a bottle of white wine and fun conversation about how lucky we are! So, we are super fans of Whole Foods- can't wait to go back- even if we don't get free food, it was excellent Halibut and the service was EXCELLENT!

Monday, February 25, 2008

Snowstorm- Boston Style

Contrary to popular belief it's not that hard to get around town in a snow storm. Last Friday around 2pm the mayor of Boston declared a parking emergency and sent all non essential state employees home. This begins the flood of private companies that will follow suit, sending all employees home early. Typically this can cause a serious headache on any major highway, but because it was school vacation week, many people were already out of town. And for those of us with no kids and no vacation time, it's a great way to start a weekend!
Shane picked me up at 3:00pm we grabbed burritos at Boloco, and headed home to work the rest of the day from the couch. As we were leaving the city there was 1-2 inches on the ground. We knew we had to meet cousin Alex for dinner in Beacon Hill at Grotto at 6:30pm, but we decided to head out early, on foot to meet at Red Hat, a bar, beforehand. The bar was packed! I don't know if it was the snow or a typical Friday, but it was just the beginning!
We proceeded to dinner at Grotto, which was great, if you like al dente pasta... And came out to 5-6 inches of snow. We had a great dinner with Alex, cousin Megan's fiance, and his brother Mike who was up from NYC. After dinner we went to see the Urban Family at Beacon Hill Pub to celebrate Jolliday! The boys played hoops in the back while I chatted with the girls who I hadn't seen since before the holidays! We even put in our $1 for the Mega Millions jackpot, hoping that a group of crazy yuppies that refer to themselves as the Urban Family, all with matching t-shirts in a snow storm would make for great PR for the Mega Millions winnings- Alas, we lost to some very un-energetic people in Georgia...
Alex had to get back to the hotel to be a night chaperon for his team of Harvard Model Congress students from LaSalle High School, so we said our good bye's while hailing down cabs and Shane and I headed back to Charlestown where the crew, out for the typical Charlestown Snow Storm Drink Fest, was still going strong, at 12:00am!
Gotta love nights when normal people stay home and you end up out until 2am walking all over the city in a snow storm! Thank goodness for my Boots- Best Xmas present ever- thanks mom!

Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Freezing your bum off

I was walking through Downtown Crossing, a shopping area here in downtown Boston, at lunch today and I saw this kid. He was probably between 14 and 16 and he was literally freezing his bum off. His pants were about 1/2 way off his bum and he was wearing this thin "Misfits" hoddie. He had his hands shoved in his pockets and was visibly cold. If you are freezing your bum off, put on some clothes, or at least pull up your pants! This same theme can be illustrated as I sit at the bus stop in the morning and I see these other women who wait in the cold with no hats on. I understand that some people are just immune to this cold weather, I am not one of those people. But if you are visibly cold, PUT A HAT ON- no one is going to judge you in this bitter cold because you have hat hair, but they will laugh at you for being silly enough to not wear a hat... On another cold weather note, I have decided that from this year on, I am taking a 4-5 day February vacation to a beautiful sunny beach because by this point I am tired of freezing my bum off!

Thursday, February 14, 2008

V-day, who needs it?

In protest of Valentine's Day, I have decided to treat this day as any other. I have not celebrated Valentine's Day for the past few years, as a rebellion against and industry that believes we need to devote a day to telling the people around us that we love them. I understand that it's nice to have a day devoted to love, but what's wrong with every day, or most days being devoted to love?

After the loss of my best friend, I make it a point to remind people that are important to me, just how special they are, because you never know just when you might not get the chance again. I don't need one special day because the people around me know every time I speak with them that they are loved. I encourage all of us to not use just this day to profess our love, but to use every day and every breath to express our love.