Tout Va Tres Bien, Mada-meu la Marqui-seu

It's a typical Tuesday night, I'm listening to the kind of music she doesn't like...

Wait, what?

It's Monday!

The start of another week. But a week can't start until I tell you about my weekend:

Friday night: really nothing, except that I got an email from my doctor saying that my knee x-ray came out normal. So all's well, I'll just keep letting it heal slowly but surely, and will try physical therapy. Rather good news to start the weekend, don't ya think?

Saturday - errands, walk on the beach (5 day storm made a new 5ft cliff down there), went to friend's house for dinner (Malaysian curried noodles - oh so so good), poker and Apples to Apples.

Sunday - Beach volleyball (I actually played this time! I stayed by the net as the setter, didn't move more than a step... and I have to say, my knee does not feel any worse at all). I then went out to dinner to have Pho, and saw "The Book of Eli" with a couple of friends. Very good movie! I don't want to spoil it... but in a way, at the end you feel like "The Sixth Sense" where you go "Oh, that makes sense and I want to go watch the movie again to confirm it!"

Anyhoo, I've said too much. Really good movie though.

Yesterday and the night before, while watching some TV, I started doing bicep curls, triceps exercises, and shoulder exercises with these 5 LB weights I have. I love doing it in front of the TV! It's brainless! Except for one thing. After only 2 days of working those arms, at work today, in the middle of my meeting, I put my elbow down on the table and rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrriip! Shirt rips by the elbow. They all thought I was going to turn into the Incredible Hulk. My complexion has been rather green lately... :)

So this weekend I should be going to Vegas, baby! That's right! Vegas with the Volleyball peeps. They want to party and dance, and I'll just go to the all-you-can eat restaurants! Lol. Who knows. I'll keep you posted and post some pictures!

Today I'm grateful that I had a great day at work, left at a decent time, and have been on Windows Live talking to my sweetie for 3 hours. Saves my cell phone minutes :)

Good night everybody!

La Vie Est Belle

Bonsoir bonsoir,

It's getting late and I will be going to bed soon... it's definitely been an interesting week. Even after working 50-52 hours I still haven't gotten everything done at work... we are so busy! Great thing, the economy is recovering. But man, have I been exhausted this week! No energy to cook or anything. Let's see, this week's recap...

Tuesday night, saw "Un Prophete" ("A prophet") a very good French movie. It was a special screening at Sony Studios in Culver City (that place is huge!) in a tiny theater that seats perhaps 30 people comfortably in black leather seats. It doesn't officially come out until the end of February but I recommend it. Lots of violence thought, be ready for it. After the movie I went to an Indonesian place, apparently a food joint that most UCLA students love to go to. I had myself some delicious chicken lime soup and browsed their grocery stores with lots of good stuff. I even found an Indonesian version of French chocolate cookie thingy's - "Prince". Remember them? So tempted to buy... but I'm trying to be good.

Speaking of being good, I'm proud to say that I've lost 7 pounds since I got back from Salt Lake... simply by cutting my calories a bit and doing 100 sit-ups every morning. Hurray! Now, back to the week in review...

Wednesday I saw the doctor about my knee and another kind of pain. Again, just take it easy, but since it's been two months now why don't you get an x-ray to make sure nothing's broken. She can give me a cortizone shot or take advil to ease the pain. "Will it help me heal faster?" "No, but alleviate the pain" Well, I don't care, I can tolerate the pain even though it's a real pain in the buttocks (or in the knee, rather). If it won't let me heal, I'm not putting unnecessary drugs in my body. She suggests physical therapy since I like to keep active and right now the knee's preventing me from doing that. Oh, and you need to get an ultrasound for your other kind of pain you're having. Greaaaaat.

Friday: had my first on-property strategy meeting, which went well, although went way longer than it should have because the GM has a short attention span (he admitted himself), but they're always glad to see me and keep saying they love what I do... so that's a good self-esteem boost. The rest of the day there was so much I planned to do at work but didn't get to do because, you guessed it, other stuff came up. That always seems to happen, doesn't it?

Today was fairly relaxing, drove by an open house and decided to go in, because that's my hobby. The house was up for 2 million. You know, I thought, if it were 1.7, 1.8 million, I would've put in an offer... but 2 million was just a little off budget. :) Now, I hate lying. It doesn't feel good, and I'm horrible at it, so I don't lie. Worst case scenario, I just don't tell the whole truth... "What kind of price range are you looking for?" "Um, well, really more like under a million." (That's not lying, right?) and the questions continued... the agent really wanted to find a house that's ideal for me.... really nice lady, and she actually gave me some really nice tips, advice, and overall know-how on what to expect when I'm ready to buy a home, after she got the hinch that I'm really looking for a cheap-o house. Not that I'm looking to buy here or now anyway, I just love visiting homes. I love getting ideas on architecture, tiles, paint, molding, decorations, landscaping, etc... and if it's got a Mediterranean look and has charm, you've won me over. Nice lady. Hate lying, though.

Next I went to KP to get my ultrasound... I ran across the road by PCH to avoid a cop giving me a ticket for jaywalking (I guess they're pretty strict here), and running wasn't the best for my knee of course... why do I keep doing that?? Right after the ultrasound I got my knee x-rayed. then I stopped at Whole Foods, got my vegan food for the week and indulged in a slice of pepperoni pizza and orange chicken for my linner. At 8PM, my friend calls me as I'm in the middle of my TBS movie "Hey, we're heading to that Mexican place for margaritas, wanna join?" "Sure!" "Ok, we can pick you up. We're actually right around the corner." Lol. I got ready in 3 minutes and off we went. Of course, margaritas for them (3 of them) and coke for me. Chips and salsa too. More fun than not doing anything, right?

Tomorrow's laundry and other boring crap. No volleyball - it's actually supposed to rain the next 5 days, that's nuts!! Should've taken advantage of walking on the beach today or something.

Monday I'll be working from home and hopefully get all my projects done. I've been feeling rather happy lately. Not sure why. I mean, I could be miss pessimist and think, "Great, I'm 25 years old, my knees are giving out on me, I have pain like a 50 year old and other crap happening to me". And I did think that way briefly. But you know what? I'm lucky. I have a great life. I have tons of people in my life that I love and love me for who I am. I have a great career right now, live in a great location, have great friends, am in love with the man of my dreams, my parents would do almost anything to help me if I need it, life is good. When you think of the tragedy of the Haiti quake, we have a lot to be thankful for. And please, I encourage donating to help them out. Texting was easy and felt great!

And also, life is short. I'm living it up. I'm going out with friends and discovering LA County without spending a fortune. I'm going to Vegas in 2 weeks with my buddies (nothing too crazy), will spend a lovely weekend with Babe for Valentine's, the next weekend in Palm Springs with M&B, Mom's coming back in April to Orange County, $teve is planning to visit SoCal in April/May too... the next quarter is all planned out! LoL.

I wish you all a fantastic holiday weekend!!

Fondue Chinoise & Coupe de Fruits

So it's safe to say I've worked my full 50 hours this week... and then some (regular weekend morning stuff I have to do). Point is, everytime I got home, especially after kickboxing, I was absolutely exhausted and let my apartment get messier and messier everyday... and that just doesn't fly in Lilie's world.

So I decide to throw a fondue party. That'll motivate me to clean my place up. And I did. Last night (Saturday) I invited Leo, Lyndon, Ben & Renée (Japan, China, China & Spain) over for dinner, and we had tons of fun. And this is when I realized, in a way, that I love entertaining. Well, scratch that, I love doing dinner parties (I really don't think I'm the most "entertaining" person out there). But I love preparing everything, making sure my apartment is clean, everything is organized... especially since this was a group that hadn't been here before. It all has to be perfect. I like to impress, ya know. It went really well, we had good conversation, we laughed a lot... I heart great company. the Cheese fondue was great, I decide to be daring and in addition to bread, I had grapes, granny smith apples, mushrooms and red bell peppers (leftovers, really! lol). I also made nice cantaloupe and strawberry fruit cups for dessert - as you can see below. I finally found a use for my martini glasses:

Friday night I actually had "Shabu shabu" which is basically a Chinese fondue - and it's brilliant. Instead of deep frying everything like a fondue bourguignone, she used vegetable broth instead. It was so yummy! Very different. my friend Lynn is from Singapore, her husband's from Germany, and we had my friend from Malaysia and older woman from Korea over too. I love the diversity that's around me - so many different cultures, and oh-so-much yummy foods that I've never experienced before. Here's what a shabu-shabu table looks like:

So that's about it! This morning I went to a place called "Bloom" for breakfast in West LA, and it was pretty good... owned by a French guy... and suddenly, out of nowhere, the Blues Brothers started driving down Pico Blvd...

Fun day. I'm about to head to volleyball. One thing I want to say though - I'm really, truly, so grateful to have friends out here. I mean, nothing beats being with my babe or my parents or other family and friends... and I've only really known my friends in Cali for 6 months... but really, they're awesome. They're so friendly and hospitable... and when I know I've got the potential to be a depressed wreck, it sure is nice to know that they're there for me when family and loved ones are farther away... and for sure, when I move back to Salt Lake, I'm going to miss them a lot. Utah friends are really hospitable too, don't get me wrong... it's just different out here. Anyway, I'm rambling.

Speaking of rambling, another reason why I love dinner parties now... is because I found a killer deal on clearance dinnerware. I think I just need to find cute placemats (mom, the forest green provencal ones you gave me don't really match anymore), and I'm in business and will throw more parties, that way it'll force me to cook, discover my own culinary talents... I just need test subjects. who wants to be my test subjects???

Updates on who's coming to see me... Mom, Brent & some Frenchies from Cavaliere (or Cavalaire?) are coming on Thursday to discover what is great California after they discover Salt Lake, Vegas, Bryce, Zions and the Grand Canyon. It'll be great to have them over for a few days!!! Then, Babe's sister will be coming back from her mission from Brazil on the 15th - so he's gotta be there for that... then the plan is for him to come live with me for about a month until he needs to get back to register for school. Then, the week before Thanksgiving I get to hang out with Dr Mookie & friends for a few days... Mid-December I get to see JR & L, and Christmas time will come... and a beautiful week's vacation will enable me to spend time in Salt Lake with family. How awesome!

Ca fait drole

It's such a weird feeling, when you go from 3 people living in your apartment for 5 days... then 5.... then 2 en amoureux... and then it's just me again.

Sigh.

Well, at least I had a blast these past few weeks! My best friend from elementary in France, Laure, came to visit with her boyfriend, Maxime. I hadn't seen her in at least a couple of years and it was my first time meeting him. They discovered LA, Malibu, took a day trip to Vegas (yes, a DAY trip... I told them they were nuts and should just spend the night there...), Hollywood and Orange County. Not bad for 5 days and crazy 9 hour jetlag!

I wanted Maxime to try something very American: a root beer float. Problem is, from past experience, I know that most Frenchies do not like root beer. "It tastes like Coke that tastes like medicine." That's what I used to think ages ago... but I'm pretty americanized now. However, Max likes Mr. Pibb. So I told him to try a Mr. Pibb float when we stopped for ice cream. When they first saw it, dropped the ice cream in the soda and saw the chemical reaction, the look on their faces was priceless. He loved it! Laure also tried some kind of shake with melted marshmallow cream (also very American) and loved it. It was really fun. It was a really hot day in Hollywood/ Here's proof, because I usually never wear shorts unless I'm on the beach...

Babe and I had a few days to ourselves and we always try to make the most of it. To give you an update, he decided to start school in the spring. I was a little pissed at first (ok, really pissed because I'm like that), but all of his counselors highly, highly encouraged him to start in the spring because a) all the good classes for fall are pretty much taken b) he should start job shadowing to see what he wants to do and start doing some volunteer work because the college of law and other fields he's thinking of going into really look at that stuff c) it's important for him to get good grades and get in classes he's interested in. Well, whatever works best for him... I trust him to make what he believes is the best decision. It'll just take a little longer than expected to graduate, but that's ok. Many people get married and have families while going to school. I know he wants to be better prepared for everything and I know he'll do very well and make me proud :)

August 13th was Babe's birthday. His younger brother, Ty-Dogg, came here for the week so that they could spend some time together on days when I was at work. On his b-day, we went to "Spark Woodfire Grill" (Right by the RI Beverly Hills) and he had the best kobe burger ever. I had a tasty shrimp pesto pizza. We then ventured through L.A. and visited the automobile museum, wanted to go in, and it turns out we got in for free. We got tricked by the Johnny Rockets waiters who told us we could go in through the restaurant, and suddenly we're inside. It wasn't until we were finished that we passed the admissions office. Oops! Well, we were only able to spend about 45 minutes anyway because of parking. It was really interesting. We saw really old cars and such. Something different. Always up for that...

Happy birthday to my man who doesn't look a day over 22.

That's about it! Getting really excited for my next trip, which will be a Salt Lake/ New York combo the week after labor day. Meanwhile, I've got a month to do the following; We'll see how I progress every week. How's that?

*balance checkbook

*eat healthy

*exercise at least 5x a week

*try either bikram yoga or 7 day complimentary gym pass

*enjoy the last few weeks of summer.

By the way, I haven't been to volleyball in a while - been spending time with the man and letting my left wrist rest a bit. I'll start it up again this Saturday, followed by a great BBQ with friends.

Today I'm grateful that even when I'm lonely, I still get phone calls, sweet emails and quirky text messages. Thanks for those who are thinking of me. I think of you guys too :)

Have a great evening & a la prochaine.

Les Vacances...

Jamie: "Beach, septic tank. Beach.... septic tank... hmmmmm... why would you come to Utah on vacation?"

LoL. Well, I am indeed in Salt Lake... for a vacation. "But you live in a vacation," said 2 or 3 people yesterday. "Well, sometimes I need a vacation from the vacation."

:)

Well, it's been a great week so far. My brother came to Cali Wednesday night, Thursday I worked and he walked around the neighborhood and beach (the sun didn't make an appearance once), and Friday we went to the Santa Monica Pier and 3rd Street Promenade, which was a lot of fun. We had a late lunch at "Monsieur Marcel" and it was delicous - and very French. We just had a charcuterie & cheese plate - and a delicous tartin tatin with ice cream for dessert. Yum - or should I say "Miam."

I even found an H&M - and bought a really cute leopard print bikini. When you live at the beach, 2 swimsuits aren't enough... and we walked around shops and stuff. My brother likes to shop so it was actually fun.

Saturday, drove up to Salt Lake... left around 8:40 (9:00 if you don't count the stop for gas) and arrived at 8pm. We made great time! 10 hours and about 4 stops. Probably because my bro was driving. I swear I closed my eyes after we passed Baker and 30 minutes later I could see the Vegas skyline. After I got home and freshened up, I went to see my sweetie... for the first time in 6 weeks. It was great. Sunday we hung out basically all day and saw a movie, and it was actually really good.

Guru: "What should we see?"
Me: "I was thinking T4... or Star Trek"
G: "You've never seen the Star Trek original series though... let me ask someone that's seen it if they think it's ok"
M: "Do I need to? Can't you just brief me on it?"
G: Well, I could... ok, let's see what you need to know..."
M: "Here's a question: is this happening in the future?"
G: "OMG..." (unstoppable laughter) "Ok, maybe T4"
And the clerk says that she saw it, loved it and was able to understand it even without seeing the original movies. So we go see. Guru briefs me first on Star Fleet Academy, the space Federation, Spock's control of emotions... and the movie was GREAT! They explained it well in the beginning, too. "I might even start watching old Star Trek movies," I say. That is, only if the special effects were that good... which I know they're not.

So it was a great day. We had chicken on the BBQ and ratatouille for dinner, and that was Sunday. Monday I brought my car to the dealership for service, besides needing new brake pads it's in fine shape (woo-hoo!), took Roxy on a walk to wheeler farm, I ran 7 minutes, and on the way back Roxy had to stop and rest - she was exhausted, the poor thing. I actually carried her for about 5-10 minutes (she was probably thirsty too, it was a warm day), then she was fine again. I then got Guru from class, went to dinner and hung out.

Yesterday I went to my old work around 11:15 to see former co-workers, had lunch at the Chubby Toad with $teve and The Mad Scientist, and ended up hanging around for 3 hours before leaving to get Guru from class. We then went to the Gateway, came back home, then I was going to play Petanque at Liberty Park - but a crappy rainstorm ruined it, so we went to Gourmandise, my uncle's bakery instead.

Today, I'm having lunch at Gourmandise with my mom and my aunt, then getting highlights!!! So excited. I think that sun-kissed caramel streaks in my hair will go just perfectly with a California tan. Pictures maybe on the next post...

Today I'm grateful that Salt Lake doesn't really smell like a septic tank. Have a great day!

Last night in Cali

Hi everyone,

Well, the boyfriend finally made it last night... with a 5 hour delay. Meaning, we didn't get home till 1am, and we were so excited to see each other (it's been... 3 weeks?) that we talked a bit, and basically I got about 4 hours of sleep last night as I had to go to work around 7ish.

It rained all day today but started to clear up a few hours before sunset, so when I got off work I thought I'd show him the beach nearby - and it was extremely windy and a little cold, but I just loved that ocean breeze and the ocean was churning. Dinner equaled improvisation with the leftovers I had to cook before it went bad and my man liked it (yay! Got a picky eater, you know...) and we were both exhausted so we're going to bed soon. I'm just packing up because... we're driving to Vegas tomorrow! I'm getting off work at 2 and then here we come. Hopefully we can arrive early enough to go to the Paris and get a crepe for dinner or something. That'd be sweeeeeeeeet. 

Well, it's almost Christmas... and I'm grateful and excited to see a bunch of family and friends, as well as New Year's Eve - I'm seeing a few cousins I haven't seen in a few years. Something unusual today - My man volunteered to clean up after dinner while I pack. What a thoughtful, unexpected and delightful surprise. Also, be sure to check out the one day photo project - I haven't posted my pics yet but I see that Dr. Mookie Love did, and I know many more will follow. Good night!