The Cavalier

You know the "I'm on a boat" song?

Replace that with "I bought a car" and keep the same tune. Cuz that's what's playing in my head right now.

Long story short, the brakes on my S10 went out again. That was strike three for the good ol' S10. And so the hunt for a replacement car began.

Dad and I went up to Miramar on Saturday to check out a white Cavalier being sold from a used car lot. The salesmen were friendly, if not typical salesmen, and my dad's not one to take any BS, so it was up to me to play good cop. While Dad checked under the hood, I was trying out the driver's seat and learning about the MP3/CD player that was installed. Score! The even bigger score was hearing that they had a brand new player with ipod hookups that they'd switch in for free.

The car looks something like this:

It's pretty clean, inside and out (and they're detailing it too), runs great, has brand new tires, the new MP3 player, and new brakes. The only major thing wrong was the air conditioning wasn't working properly. But we were able to strike a deal, and they threw that getting fixed in too.

Gosh I hope they can fix that air conditioner.

Chris and I went up there again yesterday evening to officially seal the deal, so it looks like tomorrow will be my last day with the S10.

I'm kind of sad about it. Why do I get so sentimentally attached to my stuff?

Um... two weeks ago?

Warning: There are many consecutive Picture of the Days of the OSF in this post!

This is not one of them:

This is. August 13: The OSF, being a man of many talents, searches for the leak coming from somewhere in that mess of mechanics.

August 14: The OSF plays in his living room for an audience of one.

August 15: The OSF has fun with spray paint during Garage Renovation time.

Ahem. It has been brought to my attention, by a certain OSF who shall remain nameless, that he is too often the subject of my picture of the days, to which I respond that he should a) offer to take pictures of me more often, b) no longer invite me over to play, or c) stop being so gosh darn cute.

The photographer has spoken.

Sunday Afternoon Boxing

Chris has an adorable little cousin, Jessica.

Jessica loves to play on the Wii.

Her current favorite games are Wii Fit, Pro Wrestling, and Boxing.

Oh, and any game where she can kick the pants off her twenty-five-year-old cousin, Chris.

He tries. He tries so hard.

But then it's her turn. And he just looks at her like this as she makes her move.

And it always ends up like this:

And the moral of the story is: Don't discount five-year-olds. Because sometimes they can kick your butt at video games.

And it's hard to live that down.

So...

... it looks like I've been a total slacker on this blog. Ha! I'm no slacker! You just can't see what's going on behind the scenes. Behind the scenes of this here blog, I've been editing and uploading pictures, choosing picture of the days, and generally just trying to remember what happened on specific days, or why those pictures were important.

So, without further adieu, I bring you the mass blog update of August '09.

We'll start with the OSF.

He is just adorable. Right?! Just look at those beautiful green eyes!

If I remember correctly, this was a last hour of the day, haven't taken any other shots today, Chris-please-turn-around-for-the-picture-of-the-day, no-I'm-working, kind of picture. The two of us geeks, hanging out at the computer station again.

Friday night, we went to visit Jen and Justin during their second night home. This picture is by no means perfect, but it spoke to me still somehow. I think it's the way Jen is looking down at her daughter, and the way Zoey seems to be looking back at her.

Paint War! Chris has been renovating his garage lately, and I've been enlisted for painting. Two coats later, and we can still see the splotches from patch-ups. We learned that primer is always a good idea.

Okay, now we're on to an actual event. I don't think I've ever mentioned here that my friend/pseudo-roommate Katelyn just so happens to be good friends with Chris' cousin Emily. Katelyn and Emily were in the nursing program at Biola together, and are now each working off those private school loans as real-life nurses in real-life hospitals. They even have real-life work stories that involve real-life injured people, real-life babies being born, and real-life needles sticking them on accident.

Hmmm. I wonder what it's like to have a real-life job. I work with high schoolers. I think I'll call that a pre-life job.

Anyway, so Emily's been wanting to come to San Diego to visit for awhile now, and somehow we were able to work out everyone's schedules so that everyone was free on the same day. The itinerary: Mission Cafe for brunch, bowling, and dinner back at Chris and Sarah's.

The Mission Cafe, as per us, was fantastic. I was torn between breakfast and lunch for awhile, but opted again for the naked pancakes and wonderful eggs. I think next time I'll branch out and try a lunch dish... maybe the quesadilla.

Ryan and Sarah got mimosas. Don't worry, it was like two in the afternoon.

After sitting around in the booth for awhile, trying to decide between mini golf, laser tag, and bowling, the votes were cast and bowling won. We actually got a pretty sweet deal for an hour of bowling- as much bowling as we could handle and shoes- for only $35 total. Let's just say that the second run-through could have been a new sport called Speed Bowling.

And for once in my life, I got some pretty sweet pictures in a bowling alley. Thank you, Canon 1.8 50 mm fixed lens.

Alright, weekend's over. Time for last week.

On Monday night Chris and I decided to go grocery shopping together, since both our cupboards were bare. As we're getting into our cars to go to our respective houses and put away our goods, he hands me a box tied with with a bow and a card, and tells me not to read or open it until I've gotten home. And put the groceries away. What a meanie he is.

So I get home, bring my groceries inside, and tear into the card. (What? He's lucky I even brought the groceries inside.) This is what I found:

I take it back. He's not a meanie. He's a cute, cute, cutie is what he is! Inside the box were a pair of Reef sandals. Because my current sandals are falling apart. And he knows I won't buy new ones until they are officially unwearable.

Heather stopped by the office this week to run something through the fax, and for once she had Gavin with her. Usually she leaves him with Neil or has her mom watch him while she runs errands. But she brought him this day, and I happened to have brought my camera that day. Isn't Gavin, the little old man baby, just too adorable?

That's all for this episode. Tune in later for what happened the rest of last week!

Zo-Zo

Can you believe this kid here has a baby of his very own? This is the kid I remember playing Stratego with during elementary school recess. The one who got me and him a detention in fifth grade. The guy who is part inventor of the barrel game. The one who typed up our whole high school round robin story, and who, I think, actually treasures it the most.

Sniff. They grow up so fast!

After a long hard day at the hospital on Monday, the doctors finally decided little Zo just didn't want to be bothered with a little ol' thing such as being born, and at 11:32pm, Zoey Dawn Aubrey was brought into the world via c-section, to the two most loving and wonderful parents I could ever imagine anyone having.

Seriously, Jen was a trooper the entire time. All the pictures popping up on facebook depict a smiling, happy, high-spirited Jenafer all day long. And when I went to visit Tuesday morning, not a mere twelve hours after the ordeal, she was still bright-eyed and glowing with joy. You go, Jen!

The best thing about Jen and Justin having a baby? Jen's totally the type of mommy who wants to do newborn pictures, immediately, before she grows another inch! So sometime next week we're going to have ourselves an awesome photo shoot, complete with bright blankets and an alert and naked baby. ;)

How precious is this one? Right?!

And me with little Zo-zo. Justin handed her off to me the second I walked in the room, despite my usual newborn hesitancy. (Of course, at nearly 10 pounds, Zoey makes it feel like you're holding a one month old.)

August 17, 2009: Happy birthday, Zoey!

Zoey's Playlist

Finally! A day to sit down, get stuff done... including this here blog! Get ready for the mother of all blog updates. And while I'm uploading and typing and all that bloggish stuff, I'll just set up here the special playlist I made for little Zoey Aubrey who finally decided to make her appearance at 11:32 last night! (And she's the cutest little thing, just wait until I get to that entry!)

Wicked

No one mourns the wicked! No one cries they won't return! No one lays a lily on their grave...

So Chris got me a ticket to see Wicked on Thursday night for my birthday, and he and Ryan planned a whole group to go, including Chris' sister Sarah, their roommate Kristen, and two of their friends. I was super excited to see Wicked, even though I still claim that watching the entire show from a daredevil videographer on youtube was enough to give me the right feel for the show. And I knew that if I could see that the show was amazing from the mezzanine of a youtube video, it was going to be amazing in real life.

Smuggled in my Rebel to get pictures of us at the show, and since the ushers were old guys who never once glanced our way, I snapped a picture of the stage too, before the show began. That's the map of Oz, in case you're wondering.

Of course, it was amazing. Even Chris loved it. We actually had the understudy Elphaba, Meredith Kaye Clark, who had a great, strong voice for the role, but we really loved the girl playing Glinda, Katie Rose Clarke. They've really added a lot of blonde ditz to that role since Kristen Chenoweth originated, and it really makes the whole musical come together, I feel.

And what's a trip downtown without me making my friends pose against brick backdrops?

August 9 is not my favorite day of the year.

But it's always better when it's on a jam-packed, picture-taking weekend to take my mind off the fact that my next birthday won't be for 364 more days.

(I really like my birthday.)

After the beach excursion and birthday festivities of the day before, we were ready to relax with Kris and Becky, who'd come down from Chris' hometown of Redding for their 3 year wedding anniversary vacation.

We decided to start the day off with brunch at the Mission Cafe, which the other Chris and his wife had raved about the night before. Not going to lie, I was a little skeptical by the looks of the place. But it was AMAZING. Becky and I got pancake breakfasts... best pancakes I've ever had, hands down, with a side of perfect eggs and bacon. All for $6. They boys got lunchish stuff like quesadillas and turkey clubs that they enjoyed too.

We decided to do some shopping, and Chris took us down to Practically Mexico to visit this outlet mall down there. Pretty much every store you can think of is in this place. Also pretty much? We could literally spit into Mexico from the parking lot. (Not that we would. I'm just saying.) Three of us found the Mexican/United States border fence at the back of the parking lot absolutely fascinating. (The fourth had to be dragged over.) We found it so fascinating we decided to do an impromptu wall photo shoot by the Practically Mexico wall.

When we lost interest in the wall, we hit the mall, in search of nothing in particular, just killing time before we met up with some others for dinner in Old Town.

(Just to give you an idea of how I am so not kidding about how close we were to the border.)

We went to dinner at the Coyote Cafe in Old Town, meeting up with the other Chris, his wife Mel, and Chris' sister Sarah. Kris really loves Sarah.
And he took this picture of me and the OSF. (Isn't the OSF a cutie?)

And I took this picture of cute Chris with the bokeh in the background.
Good food. Good peeps. Good times.

twenty-five

So the big 2-5 came and started with a trip to La Jolla to meet up with Chris' friends from high school (Chris, Kris, and their wives- everyone in that group is named Chris). The OSF so graciously bought me lunch at Subway and even let me get a 79 cent coke on the way home- because it was my birthday of course. He's so thoughtful that way!

We had to leave the beach after an hour and a half to come home and get ready for the shindig at the girls' apartment. Ry brought the Wii over again, in anticipation of having a crazy vide game party like last year, but no one really got into it until the end of the night. We started off with a little Demetri Martin on DVD, followed by much snacking on Jenafer's and my part, and finally getting Jen's baby barbecue pictures on a DVD for her.

The other Chris' and their wives showed up a bit later. Mel's pregnant, too, so the conversation immediately went to babies. And with Jessica there with Lucy and Gwen, everyone was a little baby happy. Somehow Chris Holtz ended up carrying Lucy around because she'd cry with anyone else, despite her general fear of boys. Maybe she liked being so close to the ceiling when he had her. Different view and all. ;)

We had Britt's homemade ice cream (she attempted to make Moose Tracks!), and I got fun presents (scrapbooking supplies, woot!) and it was just an all around good time. I like it when all my friends gather together and get to meet each other.

All in all we had Jen and Justin, Jessica, Gwen, and Lucy, Chris and Mel, Kris and Becky, Dan Blair, Boy Jordan (River), Colleen for a bit, Brittany, Jen, Ryan, and Chris (mine). Brian stopped by for literally ten seconds after his show. After that we spent the rest of the night playing Mario Party until Kris and Becky had to go.

And, as usual with my birthday, the weekend was only beginning....