4th of July and Random Ramblings

Yay! 4th of July! Oh, the overwhelming sense of patriotism that invades me as I eat my fill of ribs and chips, while watching things explode in the air. There is nothing like blowing things up and overeating to make you feel in unison with your fellow Americans.

(For those of you who know me, you would identify that passage as belonging to my slightly-off sense of sarcastic humor.)

We hosted the annual Bryden 4th of July Party, and I think it was a success. My friends came, which made me incredibly happy... especially since I haven't been able to see many of them due to work, and them moving away, and the general responsibilities of life that slowly take over your free time making it impossible to coordinate spontaneous activities with friends. So many people came to my house. My room was turned into "the bag room" and it was barely big enough. I spent hours cleaning my little house so that it would be presentable, and now I shall spend hours cleaning up the mess that the 50-odd people left behind. (BTW: A special thanks to those who took the time to help out a little before they left.)

I saw the Alameda Parade, which is always a joyous experience. I see the same parade every year, and every year it touches my heart. I love the small-town feel that it marches down the main streets of my little island.

The one thing I absolutely abhorred about this 4th of July was the day it happened to fall on. It should be illegal to celebrate national holidays in the middle of the week. Alan couldn 't come, and everybody kept asking me about him so I had to explain, what felt like a million times, that he was sick and he lives in Monterey and he has to work tomorrow... It was so hard to get up this morning; I barely got any sleep at last night. And today I am probably going to stay late at work because I have so much work to do. Ugg!

My Digestion Today

Dear avid readers: I am in Monterey this weekend, with Alan of course. Today is Sunday, it is about 7pm, and I am still recuperating from lunch. From my lunch experience I have derived a worldly truism that you should take into consideration effective immediately: "Stay Away from Indian Buffets". They are good and pleasurable at first, but then they turn into an evil source of torment after ingestion, especially if you are like me and can't help but to overeat at buffets. Why? Why are Indian buffets so good? Why can I never have my fill of naan bread? Why do their spices always dance in my mouth so nicely, so as to make me want to never stop eating.

Alan, seeing the state that I was in, tried to cure me by feeding me a Sugar Free Rock Star. Then he tried to chase me around the block. Needless to say, his well-intended efforts only slightly alleviated my distress, and gave me a serious case of the burps... which he then regretted.

Engagement Party

That right folks; we had a wonderful party with all of our family and friends to celebrate the engagement. The food theme was sushi (because Alan and I love sushi)... there were also plenty of cheeses and crackers. We had cases of wine and champagne. We had little sweet treats and servers who wore red bow ties. I wore a dress. Alan wore a suit with a black tie that had little white death skulls on it. One of the highlights of the party was when I got to dance with my grandpa (no small feat given his two artificial hips).

The week before the party was kind of stressful because I had so much planning and ordering and arranging to do. But once the party started, it was so much fun! I'm so glad all of my friends and family could come. I spent the entire night saying "I'm so happy".

Sinamaica

I did a little tourism around Maracaibo... and I found -after much crazy driving- the town of Sinamaica. The town is basically located inside the river Limon. Population aprox 5000. It is beautiful. People live primarily off of what they fish and tourism. For less than $50 (including tip)I got a private 1.5 hour tour on a boat with a local. It was amazing.

Pictures!!!

Here are a couple of pictures from my recent trip to Venezuela... check out the crazy tree growing along the river...

I went to Venezuela!!

It is true. I went for one crazy week of vacation to the land of Cocos Frios and Green Jungles. Aside from a few minor mosquito bites the trip went fairly well. I had lots of fun: I hung out with my mom, we went to Merida (one of my favorite Venezuelan towns), and -best of all- my brother Max has decided to come to California and go to school here for a while! Yay! He will be here by the 19th of May, just in time to attend my engagement party.

On the down side, since my brother is coming to live with my dad I will have to find new living accommodations. My dad's apartment is too small for the three of us. At first I was apprehensive of the idea of my own dad telling me I need to leave the house so Maxwell can have a bedroom. After all, I thought I had made very clear to my father that I wanted to live at home with my family until I married. Besides, I am the only daughter. How could he even think about kicking me out? Had he no heart? Had he no soul? There are millions of families around the world that have three times as many family members who all live under a roof smaller than our little apartment. Why couldn't we be a loving little family in a little home?
However, after careful thought, I have come to the realization that I probably do not want to live in such close proximity to multiple slobs anyway. I would just end up cleaning up after them all the time. And, I do not need to explain how much I hate cleaning. So screw them! I'm getting a place of my own... and they can come to visit.

On Things Frivolous

Alan is asleep so I am bored; I have been trying for the last hour to paint my nails with a "French tip" design. I never knew my hands were so unsteady... I am typing as my nails are letting dry the fourth layer of polish, and they look horrible. But, since I have invested so much time in making them look this way I think I shall leave them this way for a while. Maybe with practice I will get better, or, maybe I will decide to hand over the matter to professionals.

The Crucial Difference Between a Cupcake and a Muffin

Is frosting? I was not sure, and this questions has nagged at my very soul for quite some time. This Friday, when I made cupcakes for the office, the question resurfaced. Alan swears that the only difference is frosting, but I am not convinced. After all, cannot a muffin be more healthy for you because it can contain wheat and bran? A cupcake by nature would never be as healthy for you.
Isn't a cupcake a little cake? Where as a muffin was not originally created to be a little muff-cake? Aren't muffins more related to bread?
I was talking about this with my new Admin person at work, and it occurred to me that maybe muffins are originally from Brittan. After all, I am positive that English Muffins existed before the (American?) Muffin did. Maybe the present day version of the muffin is a knock off of the English Muffin, made bigger and better by adding more fat.
I turned to Wikipedia for an answer. Unfortunately this website was not extremely insightful. It did not mention that Muffins originally came from England, which kind-of discards my hypothesis. However it did mention that in recent decades muffins have become almost indistinguishable from cupcakes because the fat and sugar proportions have increased dramatically. The true origin of muffins is lost, but it is believed to be related to cornbread and breakfast. Cupcakes were invented in the 1800s. They started out as mini, individual, cakes that measured a cup.

Where to begin?

On March 2 Alan and I went on a weekend of debauchery with my family. For the purposes of transportation during this weekend, my dad made a big point of renting a van that could seat 12 people. We all fit in the van, which looked like some sort of white church van, and drove everywhere.We went to Sonoma and explored just a tiny bit of Napa. We drank our hearts out while participating in the Russian River Wine Tasting Event. We ate tons of exquisite food. And, basically, we hung out for an entire weekend with nothing better to do than stuff out faces and relax. It was wonderful. -Especially because work has been kind of stressful for everyone lately. - My grandmother even visited from Portland! This weekend was her birthday weekend, so we had fun celebrating that as well.

Work has been crazy. My coworker quit last week... so I have been slightly freaking out about my workload. However, so far so good. Life continues, and there will always be more work.

I am in Monterey this weekend. My company is sending me to a seminar so that I can learn more about CAL OSHA. I am very excited about this learning opportunity. I am also very excited about the location of my seminar: Monterey, CA! I get to stay in Monterey for two extra days. Yay!

It is late now and I must get my beauty rest.

Cake Update

Yay! I am making a cake! A lemon cake it is! I am experimenting with Lemon Curd and frosting. We shall see what happens...

This weekend I will celebrate two birthdays: my dad's and my future dad-in law's. They both have birthdays this week. The cake is for Alan's dad. I think I will buy my dad some doughnuts, because in general he doesn't enjoy cakes.

Fun and Not Fun

It is fun to go to Trader Joe and buy cheap wine and taste a sip of all the bottles you bought. It feels like a grown-up thing to do. I would like to learn more about wines...

It is not fun to scrape your arm on the velcro of your own skirt, repeatedly, while at work. It looks like a cat got me.

Getting Married 101

So now I am totally engaged, and thus totally obsessed with "marriages". I do not even know where to begin to explain how complicated and ridiculous getting married is. Here is my first attempt:

First: getting married is a social event. There is no way to get around this. The entire reason "marriage" exists is for the continuation of society; this is the foundation of the concept of marriage (This is at the root of why people get pissed off at people who elope). Therefore, if you are under some strange delusion that entails your marriage is actually only about you, you are helplessly wrong, and you do not understand the concept of marriage.

Second: Based on fact #1, A marriage involves having a party of some sort where all your family and friends celebrate the beginning of your new life in society.

Third: Since this marks the beginning of your new life, and a social event with the gathering of all the people you care about, you feel obligated to host the best party you have ever thrown in your entire life, in order to impress everyone. This is where things get complicated and ridiculous.

Fourth: The average marriage in California costs around 27, 000 American dollars. That alone is enough to make me sick. A wedding celebration usually only lasts 5 to 6 hours. To spend the amount of money that some people do not earn in one year, over the course of six hours is mind boggling. This is a problem. This problem can be solved in several ways:

4.1: Make the father of the bride pay. As my wise father clearly pointed out at my meager suggestion of his involvement in the celebration: this is an ancient ritual that dates back to the times when fathers (and men in general) paid to have their useless female descendants married off, because women were burdens that made no money. My father was clearly against this sexist ritual, me being a feminist and all.

4.2: Make any parent pay. After all, there are four. Surely one of them will be moved enough by your young love to help you out in this time of need.
I have several issues with this solution. I do not like taking money from people. And, people who contribute lots of $ to your event will inevitably have ideas or suggestions that you may not enjoy... but since you are not paying for it, you must oblige. This is clearly a not-modern solution to a modern wedding.

4.3: Pay yourself. After all, it is your wedding. In order to claim that your marriage is truly an event revolving around you and your fiance (thus tweaking and modernizing the concept of marriage as a social event), this is the only way to proceed. But starting off your new life in debt is not very appealing. Therefore, you must either be rich or very frugal.

4.4: You must reach a compromise between being a feminist, a modern bride, a modern couple, what society means to you, and what your dream wedding will be.

Fifth: There is a lot of coordination after #4 has been dealt with. Now the wedding planning can begin. I have always laughed at the idea that it takes some people 12 months to plan 5 hours of their life. However , based on #3, this should come at no surprise.

Details, Details

I’m getting Married! To the most wonderful man in the world!!! I’m sure by now you have all read the wonderful fairy-tale like story of the night Alan proposed. I would like to add a few details of my own:

OMG! It was the most romantic evening of my life! I ate and drank and celebrated the New Year completely oblivious to Alan’s designs. Looking back I should have seen the signs… but I think marriage was the last thing on my mind that night. Therefore, I was even more surprised when he proposed.
After my answer, and a couple moments of utter brain-numbing-surprise-space-out, I came to the realization that I was engaged. I started hyperventilating.
Have I mentioned that I ate and drank quite a bit, and that I was wearing something very similar to a corset, and that I was obviously very excited. I thought I was going to faint. I had to rush off of the boat once it docked, through the streets of Paris, underneath the Eiffel Tower, to the Hilton Hotel, to take off the awful garment that was not allowing me to breath (All of this in high-heels).
We spent the rest of the week wondering through the City of Light, enjoying all the sights and complaining about how much people smoke in restaurants. I love traveling during winter; it is much more calming and relaxing. Besides, after all the Christmas hectic-ness and consumerism it is nice to just get away from everything.