4:47p

can't believe it's been a week...
since my last entry.
good gawd! where have I been?
I think the outside world has almost swallowed me whole.

seriously speaking I am so happy for my weekly Wednesday down-time.
I literally vegged all day. I just got off of the couch
about 20 minutes ago. I've been there since about 9:30a.

I've been pretty bogged down lately with all the dramas at
work and just my own personal struggles.
I'm definitely losing focus on the things
that I want and need to be doing.
And it doesn't help that I haven't worked out in weeks.
boy, my body is alway tired everyday.
and these last couple of days have been a real stretch.

re-cap
but right now I feel like re-capping the last week's worth.
and I better do it now in my highly caffeinated state.

Wednesday (3/26/03)
let's see...
I attended a meeting for all the massage therapists at the spa.
it was...ok. we finally got our shift assignments for the month.
We also went over a list of protocols to follow when working
our assigned shift.

then, when it came time to set a date for our next meeting,
I spoke up about how we need to make them more inclusive
of every therapist.
Consistent communication has been a problem in the past.
and it's lead to many therapists leaving or getting
extremely frustrated with the situation.

I felt kinda bad afterwards.
I mean, I was happy that I expressed what I had to say, but
maybe I could have changed my tone a little.
I think I may have sounded a little ungrateful.

In retrospect, i think it was still ok for me to speak out.
I've been really frustrated with the lack of communication
that it needed to be said.
The problem is, there's so much to do and so little of them
(the management, that is) that things like that slip through
the cracks.
I left there pretty frustrated...and it didn't help that i
wasn't able to talk to anyone about it.

To make things worse, I found a parking ticket on my
winshield wiper! grrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!!

Then I decided that I needed a moment to myself.
there were so many things going on in my head
that I just needed a second to get it together.
So instead of following my day's schedule,
I headed home.
I ended up balancing my checkbook and doing bills for almost 2 hours.
I'm glad i did cause my finances have been weighing on my mind for weeks now.

When I finally figured out that I didn't have any money to spend,
I went to the grocery store and spent more money anyway.
i bought all the ingredients I needed for my boyfriend's b-day dinner on
Saturday.

Thursday (3/27/03)
Thankfully, this day was the start of a great weekend.
I still worked, but it was my mom's b-day.
I invited both her and my dad for massages at the spa after work.
They got treated to our heated water massage thingy.
Then I gave my mom a massage and my dad got one from
my colleague.

Unfortunately, I couldn't join them for dinner because I had another client
waiting for me. Actually, I had three clients that night back to back.
It was pretty amazing, though.
I wasn't tired at all.
I attribute that to my three wonderful clients. They brought so much
good/positive energy to me. Such good people.
It's always such a reward when I get good folks like that.

Friday (3/28/03)
It was the last day of work for one of my co-workers.
After a year of putting up with the crap in our office, she
finally said goodbye to it all. Good for her.

I bought some Zachary's stuffed pizza (the chicken good health & Zachary's special)
and some bottles of the gooood root beer. I forgot the name. I think it's Stewart's Root beer.
My other co-worker baked some of her delicious raspeberry square cookies
and my other co-worker bought a beautiful strawberry cake.

I was sad that all we could talk about (still) was how much better this
place could be if the mentality of those in charge were different.
I tried not to get into that conversation too much because
it's so draining and I was hoping to give our co-worker a positive bon voyage.
She deserved it.

Luckily, we were excused from work at 2:45p because
the pest control people were coming in to exterminate.
Good for me. It gave me some time to begin preparing
the butternut squash and spinach lasagne that i'd be serving
for my bf's b-day dinner the next day.

After about an hour of doing so, I headed to the grand re-opening/20th anniversary
Spring Exhibit
of my bf's photography school.
We were literally there from 5p-10p.
I'm telling you, the works on the walls were soooo
incredibly amazing, creative, inspiring, touching, moving, insightful...
I was humbled by the extraordinary artistry of these everyday people.

And even more, I was captivated by the beautiful community
that the founders of this school created. The dedication and commitment
of all of these artists to their craft and this community
is most definitely a result of the founders' beautiful and inspiring spirit.

I've been lucky enough to meet them and from what i see
they are two of the most humble, commited and
genuine people I've ever met.
Being at this exhibit enabled me to understand
another definition of passion and life....passion for life.

And it was even more of a treat to experience the
exhibit a second time that night with my best friend, R.
She brought her own interpretations and insights to the same
pictures I had looked at just an hour or so earlier.
And I tell you, she made me appreciate the works even more...
at a different level.
it was a pretty cool experience.

So, we pretty much closed the place down.
And even though I was fighting sleep, I pushed myself to
stretch another 3 hours.
I headed to the airport to pick up our good friend, D and then
we met R and the rest of the crew at Dave & Busters.

We didn't really do much except eat, drink, and laugh, but
I think that's all we could muster on a Friday night
after working all week.

We called it a night. Too bad we couldn't play any of the games, though.

Saturday 3/29/03
it was simply beaooooootiful all day long!
I think it was like 75 degrees or something where we were.
unfortunately, i couldn't enjoy the outdoors because I was
in the kitchen preparing the evenings dinner.

I made spam musubi for appetizers,
cupcakes (which I stacked to make my bf's b-day cake),
and completed my butternut squash/spinach lasagne.
I also made a spinach salad with cranberries,
toasted almonds and dressing.

While I was cooking, my bf and good friend, D,
kept me company.
my bf kept trying to eat the cupcakes
and wanted to lick the frosting and left-over cupcake mix.

I also got into a really cool conversation with D
about finances, and life in general.
We've definitely grown closer over the years, which is
so strange because he was always "so-and-so's boyfriend".
It wasn't until after they broke up that we got closer.
He's a brother to me and my bf now.

Anyhow, then 6pm slowly rolled around and our friends started
arriving.
D and my bf were picking up the rest of the food at
Buca Di Beppo's in Palo Alto.

The rest of the night happened so fast, but
It was so great to see everyone.
There were a couple of people there that I hadn't seen
in quite a while, so that was such a nice treat.

The highlight of the evening for me was
getting to play with my three little nephews (one of them farted on my
leg while i was holding him, too).
Oh, and of course, there was our very strange and pointless conversation
about
1. the origin of spam
2. the meaning of "corned" in corned beef
3. deep fried pan de sal
4. potted beef
5. curfews during our proms
6. getting your balls washed
7. and last but not least: sausage casings

number 6 was an especially entertaining conversation. I think all
of us had tummy aches from laughing so hard!

Ahhh...I love my friends!

sunday (3/30/03)
boy, I slept in.
I don't think I woke up until about 11am
and it felt hella good.

I decided to make breakfast: pancakes and left over sausage and
scrambled eggs from the day before with garlic sourdough toast. yum.

then, after vegging in front of the Tv with my bf and D, we got ready
and headed off to the exhibit again.
It wasn't exactly open to the public, but
since my bf was gonna be there for a meeting anyway,
we wanted to take D there.
Besides, we didn't want him to waste his trip up here.

A couple of our other friends joined us, too.
Then, we headed off to my mom's b-day dinner at
this Chinese buffet place.
It was a little celebration for my mom and my brother actually.
My brother has been so extremely busy with school that
we haven't been able to celebrate all together as a family.
lucky for us we had a nice little party of folks to join us too.

The rest of the evening is pretty much history
being that I conked out like a log on the ground.
I was so exhausted, I barely lasted past 9p.

perspective
All i can say is, thank goodness for this past weekend
because i finally got perspective again.
It's been so difficult to get my mind out of the daily grind.
even with my wednesday day offs, my brain is still owned
by the "work week" mentality.

just last night, i had this revelation, this feeling that
time is running short for me.
I felt this intense need to accomplish everything sooner than later.

is it just because I'm 30 now?
I dunno, but whatever it is, I think i need to follow my heart.

a couple of years ago, I had this feeling that i would die the next
day.
It was such an odd thought, but not impossible.
I began to think of the things I wanted to do before I died...
I think now it's definitely time to make good on those goals.
Actually, I need to come up with those goals at this point.

being in this wierd state of existence is not enough.
I think part of me is just scared...intimidated by the things
I think I cannot control. And it's kinda sad that
it's only times like this when I've had a nice cup of caffeine
that my brain starts to work better.
I definitely need to fix that.

being hopeful is not enough.
being proactive is the key.

(did I say that? thank god I have this blog to keep me from forgetting that)

For some