Tamarack Vacation

My first week at SSU has come and gone, so how better to celebrate than flying to Boise and taking a weekend vacation at Tamarack!? It was really inspired by Andrej as a surprise for Wes's birthday. Ashley picked me up from the airport Friday and we went to the store for supplies. After that we headed over to Andrej's house and met up with Sarah, Andrej and Wes. Then we all headed up to Tamarack! The cabins were just phenomenal. There was a master suite with jetted tub and fireplace. Two separate large rooms with their own bathrooms and a loft area- plenty of places for everyone to sleep! We played board games, had some drinks, some great food (Thanks Wes!) and spent a lot of time splashing in the hot tub. Three days and two nights just went by too quick!

I had a great time tracking some of our silly quotes:

When trying to correctly identify the 10 commandments Ashely proposed one of them was "The right to bear arms!?"

When describing a story where she'd been driving, Sarah said "And then I got lost in a cul-de-sac!"

When Sarah saw Ross's first name on his license and said "Oh, I like Samuel" Ross replied with "Yeah, Samuel's my first name, but I go by Ross."

Green Music Center

This afternoon a couple of my co-workers and I got a tour of the new Green Music Center on the Sonoma State University campus. It's a state of the art music and arts venue. The entire facility is made of a beautiful oak wood from the flooring, to the banisters and the blinds. You may be able to see the temporary seating in the picture. The facility isn't quite completed and is expected to be completed this year. I'm looking forward to experiencing my first concert here as the sound is supposed to be amazing.

California!

Well I've been here for four days and I'm only just now taking a minute to blog. There's been so many things to blog about- the drive down with Chuck, moving into my new place, my hours and hours at the California DMV. But I'll start at the begining...

Friday (January 22, 2010)
I picked up the rental truck. I drove the massive beast with trailer in tow to my house. Backed it around the tiny cold-a-sac and unhooked the car trailer. Then backed it into my driveway. I frantically packed the last few items around the house with much help from Casey, Chuck and Javier (Thanks guys!). Then I slept my last night in my home on an air mattress.

Saturday (January 23)
Chuck and I got up really early. I finished tossing in the last few items into my car (Sheets and towels). Grabbed my stereo, gave goodbye hugs to Chelsie and Javier and we were off. The weather was bad so we headed through eastern Oregon instead of south through Nevada. We went through Burns, Redding and stopped for the night in Vacaville. The worst part of the driving was just inside the Northen California border after Adain's pass. It was snowy and slushy. But we did ok. Poor Chuck was so hot the whole trip, and I was freezing. I was wearing a coat and winter gloves and he was wearing track pants and a t-shirt. Here is a picture of Chuck trying to cool down:

Note there is SNOW outside and that on the inside I had the air on COLD. What is wrong with him!? Gesh, I wish I had that kind of metabolism. After 15 hours of driving we were getting rummy and we were glad to stop for the night about 11pm.

Sunday (January 24)
Chuck and I got up early again... 7am. We had a breakfast and headed out at 8:15 for Rohnert Park. We drove through Napa and then Sonoma Valley. It was beautiful. We got to my new house about 10:30 and unloaded the truck. Then we cleaned it out and took it up to Santa Rosa to return it. Then Chuck and I hopped in my car and off to Oakland to Melo's for lunch. It was an italian restaurant in Pleasant Hill that Chuck really liked. We also met up with a friend of mine named John. Later I dropped Chuck off at the airport and headed home.

Monday (January 25)
I unpacked things and settled in a bit in my new place. I went to the DMV and applied for my CA drivers license and took the drivers and motorcycle exams. This took about 3 or 4 hours. I was unfamiliar with some of the unique laws so needed to study up on the motorcycle exam. (like "When being pursued by the police and you choose to evade arrest and if someone is killed during said pursuit you are subject to 1) a fine of xxxx 2) 6 years in jail 3) not more than 1 year in jail) Sorry California, I'm not used to knowing the laws on being pursued and evading the police...

Tuesday (January 26)
I went back to the DMV and passed my motorcycle exam and got a temporary CA permit. Then I registered my car (both of which I needed to wait in lines for about an hour). Before my vehicle registration could be completed I had to 1) verify the mileage and 2) go get my car smog tested. I waited outside the DMV to get my car mileage verified. This took about an hour, meanwhile the car in front of me died so they had to push it out of the way... 0_o' Then I went to a smog tester where they rev'd my car for about 20 minutes and said I passed. Back to the DMV again, where yes, again I took a number and waited about another 45 minutes to give them my smog paperwork.

Wednesday (January 27)
I did not go to the DMV today, I could not stomach it. Instead I put my new plates on my car.

Then I went to SSU where Meryl helped get my Emplid established in PeopleSoft. I'm hoping tomorrow to get my parking permit and ID card (in opposite order...). I also need to get some new clothes for work and insurance on my car. I suppose I need to go back to the DMV once more to register my bike, but not sure I can do that before it arrives Friday as they have to verify the mileage. ugh.

I'm glad I have a week before work starts, how could anyone get all of this done in less time!? AHHHHH!!!!!

On a happy note, the weather today was gorgeous and I had to have my sunglasses on just to see. The rolling green mountains are very pretty and I'm very much looking forward to driving my motorcycle!!!

A few shout outs too- without Chuck I couldn't have done this and survived; thanks Bro. Without my parents I couldn't have left my bike in Boise, thanks Mom & Dad for getting it to the transport guys even though they were late! And thanks to Javier and Chelsie, I'm not worried at all about leaving my house in their hands. They're the best!

Miss you all very much~

Chocolate Covered Strawberries

Tonight Chelsie took me to dinner at Chili's and we both had the boneless buffalo salad, with jalepeno ranch, Yum! I had the presidente margaritta which was ALSO a yum. When we got home we got out the strawberries and chocolate and made up some chocolate covered strawberries. It's always fun cooking with Chelsie, especially because she always learns something. Tonight she learned when I say it's HOT I really mean it's HOT! I overheated some of the white chocolate and dang was it HOT! I'm excited to take them into my co-workers tomorrow for my last day at Boise State University. It's nights like this that remind me how lucky I've been to have such great friends, and how much I will miss Boise, ID. But I WILL be home, to Boise, often.

My Last Poker Night

It was sad to think this is the last time I'm hosting Poker in Boise, at least as a resident of Idaho. Generally for poker night we have about 5 to 8 people and then we go out afterwards. Tonight there was about 20 people and 14 of us played poker; I had to make a whole separate table in the living room.

While we were playing poker, Kari led Chelsie, Krystal and Tashauna in Wii dancing. They were really good and I even took a chance at it once. I wasn't very good, but now I'm thinking of buying a Wii! It was a lot of fun!

And the winner is...Kristen! With so many people playing, the winnings were over $100 dollars! Congratulations to Kristen winning the biggest pot ever.

Ashley's Surprise Party

Today I went over to Ashley's surprise 30th birthday party. She had arranged a game day and we all decided to make it into a surprise party for her, it went really well! I always enjoy spending time with my Boise State HR buddies.

Regan was absolutely hillarious fun when playing the game "Taboo". We broke all sorts of game rules and got so bad as to actually spell some clues out.
Here's a picture of us trying to figure out what on earth Regan was describing.

I'm laughing now just thinking of how much fun we had. There was even a point where Ashley's brother was giving terrible clues and so I just gave up and shouted out "Ducks" as a completely random answer. That had Michelle and I in tears and it took us a few turns to compose ourselves. What a great time!

Goodbye Boise State Co-workers

Tonight co-workers from Boise State came to eat dinner and talk as a sort of goodbye-dinner. Next week is my last week at the University and I wanted to spend some time with them outside of work. We had the banquet room at Smokey Mountain Pizza & Pasta on Parkcenter reserved. It was so nice seeing everyone and talking about things other than work (mostly!).
It was great that Diana was able to make it with her newborn, Kailee and Ben. Here's a picture of Kris holding little Kailee.

After dinner several of us headed over to Bardenay for drinks in Boise's Basque district. On the way there we met up with Ashley, her boyfriend Casey, Adrian, Andrej and Wes. They had the most thoughtful gift, a picture frame collage of our Cabo San Lucas trip! I'm really looking forward to hanging it up in my new room!

After a couple drinks at Barenday, we walked over to the Balcony. It was so sureal being with my co-workers at my favorite dance club. I can't even remember how many songs we danced to, but it was great fun! The club closed down and we had to go home all too soon.

This was a night I will always remember.