For all of you who remembered I do have a birthday, I truly thank you and am grateful to have such good friends.  For those of you who didn’t know my birthday was coming up please don’t sweat it.  I can never remember birthdays and if it wasn’t for multiple entries on my calendar, mostly done by Kate, I’d probably miss all of my family and friends birthdays.

In under one week I turn 30.  A milestone some tell me but I feel no excitement about hitting “the big” 30.  It’s just another year older but this time with so much social stigma put on it by others.  People seem to think that 30 means I should act and feel a certain way, yet I don’t feel any different than I did two years ago.  I guess being on my third decade is something to celebrate; especially as reckless as I was with the first one and a half.

Some kind folks have asked me what I’d like for my 30th birthday and I’ve found myself without any answers.  It’s not that I am trying to be difficult but I honestly want very little lately.  I am becoming realistic and realizing just how much waste there is in the craving for many things and I no longer want things I’ll rarely use.  In contrast to years past just having the latest gadget no longer makes me happy.

I am also so happy for the changes in my life over the past two years with driving and my health that I feel full and satisfied.  I am still living on what I can only classify as some kind of emotional high that has left me no longer craving small material items.  That doesn’t mean I wouldn’t appreciate a gift, it just means that I can’t spout off a list of things I want like a child can the weeks before Christmas when writing a letter to Santa.

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Well the first month of 2009 has blown right by me without a single post.  I know I don’t need to apologize to the audience I don’t have, but I feel guilty as this blog is one of the few ways I have to express myself and my creativity.  I started this blog many years ago as a way to release the stress and anxiety I internalize and I feel it has become one of the few creative outlets I have.  I am not an artistic person, nor am I musically inclined.  I used to really enjoy writing and always had something to say but lately life has been so busy with the mundane routine of ordinary work that I’ve neglect to put myself out there with blogging.  Furthermore I’ve been neglecting my photography and I hope to make a change on that front as well.

So here we are into February of 2009.  My thirtieth birthday is just around the corner and I’m going to take this moment to stop and reflect on myself.  Over the past thirty years I’ve learned a lot about myself but I think the past three years have taught me the most.  I’ve had to deal with a lot of amazingly difficult personal issues and have come out on top of each and every one of them.  I am proud of myself and feel stronger than I ever thought I could be.  I think, for the first time in my life, I have come to terms with who I am and my limits.  I am aware they exist, I respect them and I am comfortable telling those around me what they are.  Finally I am not fighting myself.

I’ve a few topics I’d like to delve into in more detail and will begin posts on each of them to be published later.  Right now I want to spend time in my bed with my cats while I wait for my wife to return from a day in the city.

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On Wednesday evening at 11:59 I won’t be sad to see 2008 become part of history.  To say the least, it was a tough year for me.  I spent my first entire calendar year as a graduate student while working a full time job.  It wasn’t easy but it was a learning experience (no pun intended).  I started a new job in June and worked long hours in the office all summer.  As the year went on I learned that I was really struggling to stay sane and happy.  So, in 2009 I am making a promise to put myself first more often.

I pledge to not beat myself up if I only make it to the gym twice in a week.  I pledge to sleep in on Sundays when I have no where to be. And, I pledge to bake once a month, for someone or some reason.  I think that’s a good list to start.  To kick off my year about me, I’m going to an excellent scrapbooking retreat that is held annually in CT, about 45 minutes from my parents.  It is 48 hours of creativity, fun, and a whole lot of estrogen.  I went two years ago and had a wonderful time, so I’m using my Chanukah money to go again this year.  I will FINALLY be able to start my wedding album.  Woohoo!

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It has now been three days since Krispy’s surgery.  He seems to be recovering well.  There is no inflimation on or around his incision which is a very good sign.  He is slowly regaining his appetite and each day he is awake more and more.  He’s already doing things he shouldn’t such as jumping on and off furniture.  I try to keep him from doing as much physical activity as possible but he’s rather stuborn; much like his owners.

Kate and I would like to thank everybody for their kind thoughts and wishes throughout this entire ordeal.  I am sure Krispy would thank you too.

Below the break is an image of the poor kitty post-surgery

Read the rest of this entry »

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As I sit in my mother-in-laws kitchen this Thanksgiving morning I realized just how much I have to be thankful for this year.  Throughout the year we celebrate good things but tend to dwell on the bad for longer.  We often forget the joy and splendor of some of the happier times.  Beyond that we don’t take enough time to realize how thankful we should be for the things that did happen.  So on this Thanksgiving I have the following to be happy for:

1. This year, after 13 years of being told it would never happen, I became a licensed driver.  I have gained freedom, independence and my life has greatly become enriched from this momumental accomplishment.
2. We went on an awesome vacation with our friends.  It is always great to get some time away from work, it’s even better when you can do it with friends … especially when the vacation ends and you’re all better friends for it.
3. Kate started a new job that is more exciting than her last.  She is in a much more prominent position and while that’s sometimes more trouble than it is worth she is experiencing more than she ever would have gotten to in her past role.
4. I avoided being laid off.  As my company tries to downsize in every way possible it is rewarding to know that the job I do is so important that people fight to keep me on.
5. I have my health.  I’ve always had “health”, but this year I had it be 99% good.
6. I still have my hair, despite my predictions of losing it all.

So I have quite a few wonderful things to be thankful for, and I hope you all do as well.  From myself, Kate and our families, Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours.

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In the past, almost month, since my last entry a lot has happened.  This is not my first attempt to post the relevant news, however on the past two attempts I’ve logged into the site I’ve found updates that have taken the time reserved for the blog entry.  Oh well, such is life.

The last two posts were written on Sunday, October the 12th after I had driven Kate to the airport for a business trip in San Francisco.  We had hoped that I would be able to go out with her and we could extend the trip and celebrate our anniversary in San Francisco but we just didn’t think it was financially possible.

Kate was there for barely 24 hours before she decided that the city was too nice for me not to come out and spend time there.  She worked it all out and found a hotel rate we could afford and even got me on a flight with frequent flyer miles.  So on Wednesday at 8AM I learned I needed to be out of the house at 9AM in order to make my flight.  Amazingly, I managed to get to the airport, park in long term parking, get to the terminal, through security and board the plane with minimal effort!

The first night there I got to interact with a lot of Kate’s co-workers, see a bit of what the entire medical conference was about and then spend the evening kicking back at the hotel bar with a bunch of her friends from work.  By the time I got to bed it was about 3AM Eastern time and I was dead to the world.  How I managed to wake up in time to be responding to work emails and on calls by 9AM Eastern time, I’ll never know!

I can’t recall what days we did what, but overall we had an amazing time in San Francisco.  We did almost all of the touristy things except for Alcatraz as we couldn’t get tickets.  There are some amazing photos here.

Since San Francisco we’ve not had a weekend at home.  One weekend with friends in Maryland, one with Kate’s parents in CT.  We’re both kind of looking forward to a weekend at home.

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Kate and I celebrated our 3 year anniversary in New York City on Friday.  Originally we were going to spend a night in a New York City hotel and spend the two days exploring the city trying to hit museums and other artsy things.  However, money and time allowances did not make staying over a logical plan.

While researching what we could do in the city Kate stumbled accross a tour of the Chelsea Market and Meat Packing District given by Foods of New York.  She has always wanted to go to Chelsea Market since hearing about it on many Food Network shows and we both thought it sounded like a fun enough way to spend a few hours.

From the moment we arrived in Chelsea we had a good feeling.  The area of the city seemed calm, slowed down and cleaner than most of the other touristy areas of Manhattan.  We walked into the Chelsea Market and were immediately impressed by the decorations and design of the building.

We met up with our tour-guide and began the tour.  I knew it was a food tasting tour but I was not expecting much out of the tour.  I figured we might get like a small bite of this, a shot sized cup of that and told about products we should buy.  I could not have been more wrong.  The tour was amazing!  Our guide was very informed about each and every one of the businesses in the market, about the market itself and the people and companies that made it possible.  We were given large samples of food products including an entire bowl of fresh seafood, a smorgasbord from an Italian grocer.

I had my camera with me and tried to get a lot of photos throughout the market, however the indoor conditions mixed with every store having it’s own level of lighting and what not made it very hard.  I never had time to adjust modes on the camera and or balance my white levels for the current rooms light.  We went into the Manhattan Produce Exchange and I got some nifty pictures in macro mode of some produce.

We got to tour Morimoto Masaharu’s restaurant, Morimoto, which is connected directly to the Chelsea Market and we also got to visit Mario Batali’s restaurant Del Posto.  I took pictures in Morimoto’s restauarant as I loved the decor and it allowed me to try different technques to try and get some cool pictures.

After the tour was over Kate and I wandered about on our own and found the Chelsea Apple Store (by found I mean it was right in front of us).  I love Apple’s design aesthetic, especially their grand stair cases and I took a few snaps of that.

All of the photos can be viewed on our photo site.  A direct link here.

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This very day three years ago Kate and I exchanged our wedding vows.  So much has happened with us since we got married.  Our relationship has been tested with some very huge challenges and we’re going very strong.  Some of the things we’ve overcome since our wedding day:

• We purchased our first house and turned it into our first home.
• Between the two of us we’ve started changed jobs three times and have both begone down the path of having a real career instead of just a full time job.
• With Kate’s help I survived eight months of being very ill.
• I had a major surgery.
• Kate taught me how to drive.
• We’ve made some great new friends and said goodbye to some old ones.
• Kate has made excellent progress on earning her MBA.
• We’ve adopted a second cat.

Tonight Kate and I are going to relax, make some dinner and drink a bottle of wine.

Tomorrow Kate and I both have the day off to celebrate our anniversary and we’ll be going into New York City and taking a tour of Chelsea Market and the meat packing district which includes sampling of food.  Then we’ll probably wander around the city and eventually find a place for dinner.

Time to charge up the camera!

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Yesterday Kate and I went to Norz Hill Farm, our local pumpkin picking paradise, to get our Halloween pumpkins.  We’ve done this the last two years and really have a good time each year.  This year I was feeling more energetic and we opted to do the farm tour as well.

They have a ton of your usual farm animals including cows, chickens, ducks and roosters however they had two very unique animals that I really enjoyed.  I’ve always thought emus were funny.  Something about their appearance and name that just made it fun for me to say and laugh about.  Norz Hill had an emu and I had even more fun telling it that it had a funny name.  To which the emu responded quite vocally … if you can call what it does vocal.  When they “speak” it is by making a noise like a drum!

The even more interesting one was a hybrid donkey and zebra mix.  This animal known as a zonkey was purchased from an Amish farm that bread the animal because donkeys are protective of their land and zebras are natural hearders.  They used the animal to keep their sheep hearded and scare off predators.  Here is a picture of the zonkey stealing corn from somebody who thinks thumb rings are acceptable fashion.

Zonkey!

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Monday mornings are usually the worst.  They symbolize the end of the weekend and the beginning of a full week of work.  On a three day weekend like last Tuesday morning is five times as bad as your usual Monday.  This is especially true when you’ve had as good of holiday weekend as Kate and I had and as bad of a morning experience as I had this morning!

In reverse chronological order, mainly to get the bad out of the way and leave you hopefully feeling warm and fuzzy, the weekend in review goes something like this:  Good food, good times, and very relaxing.

On Monday Kate and I enjoyed a relaxing day with a few errands.  The day was dedicated to sitting around the house/deck and Kate getting some quality time to make some recipes she’s been wishing to make.  She made a peach and blueberry upside down cake and a summertime potato salad (no mayo) to go with our dinner.  For dinner we treated ourselves and made lobster!  Since people are being so cost conscious lately the price of lobsters has been reduced as people associate them with being expensive luxury items.  We picked up three Maine lobsters each of over 1LB but less than 1.5LB for $23.00.  Not a bad deal.  We boiled the lobsters in salted water with some pepper and bay leaves and then served it with a butter sauce made with fresh dill.

Sunday we spent the day again relaxing and running a few small errands.  Off to Target to get some required household supplies, went out to get our propane tank refilled for the grill, and his up a local farm that has an outdoor market.  The Hillsborough Farm Market on Hillsborough Road was fantastic.  Such amazing deals on Jersey tomatoes, spaghetti squash, fresh corn etc.  We picked up a decent amount of produce and returned home to relax for the day. We decided to have our own Labor Day BBQ and I grilled up lots of vegetables to go with our burgers and hot dogs.  I made myself a Colby Jack and Cheddar burger with grilled vidalia onions and some grilled scallion for bight.  That’s two fun and yummy dinners in a row, can we go for three?

Surely we can!  On Saturday Kate and I went to visit my friend Mark S and his fiance Kerry, whom we got to meet for the first time, down in Southern Jersey.  We met at their beautiful condo and lounged around their kitchen drinking wine and eating cheese. This alone could make for a wonderful evening.  We then decided to wander out to eat in Center City Philadelphia, they knew of a restaurant “Audrey Claire” which they like and is a BYOB so we were quite excited.  Kate and I know very little pf Philly but they know it quite well as Kerry lived there for multiple years while in school.  Kate and I split a grilled octopus salad and a flat bread with Jersey tomatoes, buffalo mozzarella, and pancetta.  Both appetizers were phenomenal. For main courses I had a lemon sole with crusted shallots and Kate enjoyed the Fresh Marlin special over risotto.  Kate’s fish was a bit overdone, but the inside was wonderful.

Friday after work we just relaxed at home and had a nice spaghetti and chicken meatballs.  Very relaxing as well.

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