Long time no see!

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. I've been busy. Of course, now I'm sick and staying home, but that's a recent development.

Of course, every year, at least one of us is sick on either Thanksgiving or Christmas. This year, Thanksgiving was fine, but we had quite a few of us sick on Christmas. R and little E stayed in FW, although R did make it down for the weekend before. She had to go home on Sunday, and was already feeling bad. Then, both M&M were sick, but managed to make a lunch for us (Dad and me) on Christmas day. It was simple, just some tamales from HEB, which were made in their kitchen and not the storebought kind. So they were really good. And sis M made some rice. Really the tamales were so huge, we didn't need anything else. I ate 2 of them and was sorry. They're about the size of 2 or 3 regular tamales, so I felt like I ate a ton. But it was nice, and we stayed a little while, while BIL M showed my dad some tricks with the Playstation 2 as they'd gotten him one and he was stuck in a couple of the games. We also got a sample of what the PS 3 looks like and it's pretty awesome. I don't really play games enough to get one myself, but it looked good.

Then, Dad and I left as M&M wanted to take naps as they still weren't feeling too well. So we went hiking at a local park and it was a beautiful day, not too cool and not too hot. Actually, as we started walking it was cool, but got warmer the longer we were there and we had to take our jackets off. By then, the people that were arriving were only wearing T-shirts, so it wasn't just because we'd been walking a while. But we saw a part of the park we hadn't been to before.

The next day, I had dinner with N, the guy I've been seeing. It was supposed to be something he cooked, but he got home too late and we went to this Vietnamese restaurant we'd been to before, but they turned out to be closed, and we went to a second restaurant that ended up being closed as well. We ended up going to Blanco Cafe, which I'd been to before, but at a different location. It's this Mexican restaurant and it was packed (probably because nothing else was open). The food was fine, but I had trouble eating it because I'd seen a roach on the wall and couldn't get past that. I mean, what are the chances they're only in the outside part where the customers are and not in the kitchen? I was just really grossed out and creeped out. But anyway. Now I'm not feeling well either and slept most of the day yesterday. I'm still tired today and the congestion is worse, but I hope I get better soon. I'm taking zinc and green tea to help.

Anyway, I have a job interview next week. I'm not really qualified, but I hope they'll be good enough to show me how to do the things I don't know how to do. We'll see. I'm not too optimistic about it as I've been interviewed for these things before. I just have to keep looking, of course. Hopefully I'll be feeling better by then, too.

The Lamest Christmas Party...

Okay, this is a big employer here in SA. Thought their Christmas party would be fun. It's usually a really big deal. They book a huge venue for the thing and have several rooms with different entertainment in each one, along with lots of food to choose from, dancing, etc. But in the car on the way over there, Mom breaks the news to me that there will be no booze! What? At a Christmas party? Sure they're an insurance company and all and they know about risk, but that's pretty sad. But we get there and they're busing everyone to the event. It took forever to get on the bus, but they were more like motorcoaches and had comfortable seats and TVs (which they never turned on--WTF?). Traffic is always horrible downtown, so it took forever to get to the event. It actually took an hour and doesn't normally take quite that long. But we get there and I'm looking forward to it. And they've only booked 2 rooms. So EVERYONE was crammed into just these two rooms. You could hardly move around. There was no space to mingle or anything. There's only one band booked. That's it. And there were so few buffet tables that the lines were longer than the ones at DisneyWorld. Really. The food didn't look that great to begin with. Mom says they had a different caterer this year. I think it must have been a cheaper bid, rather than a choice to get us better food for the event. THEN, as if this wasn't lame enough already, there were hardly any tables for people to eat at. People were walking around with food with nowhere to go. It was so bad, people were leaving the event in droves to go to the hotel across the street that had a bar, and then taking the next bus back to their cars. In fact, we just skipped the hotel bar thing and went straight to the bus. We were extremely disappointed at how little they cared about the party and how little they actually spent on it this year, when they've always gone all-out for it. Then, we went to a restaurant and had a dinner and a margarita, just because we were so p-o-ed. Not sure if we want to go to the party next year. : ( What a let-down.

A DATE!!!

I went to a Meetup event recently. It was a coffee singles group, which I wasn't too excited about, but I thought I could at least make friends and enjoy a cup of coffee. Turns out I met a few people and had some good conversations. One guy even wanted to see me again. Another guy wanted to e-mail me, so that's good, too. I think the second guy wants to be friends, which is okay with me.

The date turned out fine. We went for coffee last night and then to dinner. It was a pleasant evening, although we're still in the getting-to-know-each-other phase. Too early to get really excited, but he seems like a nice guy. I did read his profile, though, and he's a Republican, so that could be a problem, but we'll see. I don't expect us to have everything in common, you know? But he wants to see me again, although we couldn't arrange anything for this week as he's busy on the days that I'm not. And he's going to Austin this weekend, so that's out. Maybe next week.

Also, this past weekend, R and E came down from FW and we had a nice visit. It was busy as we were visiting family and friends the whole time. So I was tired yesterday, but it's okay. It was fun. R got her Tex-Mex fix, which she was happy about. I didn't mind it either, of course. : ) I also got another cranberry bliss bar, which was really yummy. I know they'll be gone soon, so I want to have as many as possible. It's a shame they're 8 points for one, so I can only have a little at a time, but it's worth it. R and I were also naughty in that we had pizza from HEB, but I still have a few flex points left. Not many, but a few. I will get more tomorrow, so it's okay, I suppose.

Anyway, I've got a Meetup on Thursday evening that I want to go to, although it's at a restaurant I've heard isn't that good. But 2 previous Meetups were at places where there would be smoking, which I can't do. This one is the atheist Meetup, which I enjoyed when I went to a past one. That's pretty much it, as my life is pretty dull at the moment. Hopefully there will be some job interviews soon, but I'm not holding my breath.