i had a california weekend.
it’s hard to explain exactly what such a weekend entails, but i will try. it starts with weather so sunny, so pleasantly warm and yet cool, and so all-around beautiful that you can’t imagine doing anything that doesn’t involve going outside, or at the very least, opening all the windows. throw in some fun activities with friends. throw in some driving around town with the wind in your hair. throw in some celebration-worthy news from friends. finally, add a general, inexplicable feeling of happiness that just leaves you smiling the whole time.
and there you have it. a california weekend in houston, texas.
friday night i took it easy, chatting on the phone, watching baseball in the background, and finally cleaning the dining room area that has become my study. i packed up a lot of books that i no longer have bookshelf space for, and put them in neatly labeled rubbermaid bins in the closet. voila–clean study. hooray!
saturday i slept till late morning, and got up only to go get a pedicure. ah, the luxury. i can’t believe i ever made fun of becca for doing something so girly. it was when i walked outside on my way to the salon that i discovered how absolutely lovely the weather was. it was about 80 degrees and so not humid that i almost did a double take, wondering if i had been transported to an alien version of houston. the weather stayed amazing for the rest of the weekend.
after getting my toes painted, i ran a few errands, finally bought another bowl/vase for v-tot the beta fish (now he matches viggo!), and came home to clean a little more. gavin, jen, debbie and jason came over at 3:30 and we headed to the new rei store, where i bought a chalk bag and successfully resisted the temptation to buy numerous other things, among them being new hiking shoes and a tent. 🙂
from rei, debbie and jason and i headed to the galleria, where becca met us for dinner at the cheesecake factory (yum). afterward, we drove through a lovely part of town that i had never seen before on our way to a little independent movie theater on west gray that was showing “step into liquid,” a documentary about surfing. it was great–it showed surfers all over the world, from hawaii to the great lakes to guys in galveston bay surfing the bow waves produced by the oil tankers (yes, really). sigh. i want to go surfing again.
yesterday i slept late again, and puttered around the apartment enjoying the breeze coming in through my wide open windows. i watched the braves beat the pirates, and then headed over to the running store nearby to talk with the owner; he has generously agreed to provide me with guidance and advice about planning a 5k road race! see, i am going to be the race director for the newly formed yuri’s night 5k, to be held next april 10. we talked for half an hour, and he was very helpful. i’m so excited that i’m actually going to be able to make this happen; i have wanted to plan a race for a while now.
later in the day, i heard some happy news from friends and headed over to chris and edgar’s to chat and play mario cart. from there, it was off to the first soccer game of the season in my women’s league. we lost 4-0, but we played well. we are definitely improving. at the end of the first half, the score was only 1-0; we let three more in during the second half, when we were all exhausted because we had no subs and thus each had to play the entire 90 minutes. i still have some frustration with my team…though the truly exasperating girls have left the team, the coach still complains far too much about silly things, and one of our defenders (when she’s playing sweeper) has a habit of hanging back to stand next to the goalie and gossip during the game, which is infinitely frustrating to me. but i try to just ignore the frustrations and just have fun playing, which i do. since i’m not friends with anyone on the team, it’s easy for me to just play hard and go home. 🙂
and thus ends my weekend.
