Moses (I couldn't help myself)

The Love of My Life

LUCY!

*If you want to see Lucy's adoption story and how she won "Cocker Spaniel of the Month", click here.

Hello Sydney....

Well, I'm saying Goodbye to New York....but Hello to Sydney! Things I am looking forward to about living in Sydney:

* My great apartment in Kirribilli.
* Warm weather.
* Australian politics (yes, they do exist)
* Wearing shorts on Christmas.
* Lamb roasts and meat pies (I've become a convert)
* Taking the ferry to work.
* Joining the yacht club and learning to sail a skiff
* Riding my wicked witch of the west bike
* JL, JL, JL!

And to all my loved ones out there, I'm still only a plane flight away (particularly from Cali) so hop onboard and come visit! Open invitation but you must bring gifts! :)

Stacy's Black Eye

In response to my sister Debbie's request in her blog (see http://www.debztalkin.blogspot.com/) I will tell the story of "Stacy's Black Eye".

I went to college in Utah, and Stacy was my best friend and roommate. We used to do everything together. One day we went to the mall and after hours of "window shopping" (we were poor students) we were hungy. So we went to the food court to get some potato chips and a gossip magazine to read while eating them. As it was a really busy day at the mall we had to share seating so we sat at a table with some random man and put the chips between us. All of a sudden, this man reached across the table and ate one of our chips. We were in total shock, but how do you say to someone, "ummm, excuse me, I think you're eating our chips", so instead, Stacy just ate one herself. We sat there for a little while in silence pretending to read our magazine with the air thick with tension. And can you believe it...he ate another one! So Stacy ate another one....and then he ate another one, and then Stacy! They went back and forth with this for a while until they were all gone and then the man stood up and walked away. Stacy and I looked at each other in shocked awe, and then burst out laughing. That is, until we picked up our magazine and realized that our bag of chips was underneath!

I was so angry I punched her in the eye (see picture below)!

THIS STORY IS A TOTAL FABRICATION....every ounce of it. Stacy's black eye was actually caused by me trying to get out of the backseat of a hatchback car and her eye getting in the way of my flailing elbows. Poor girl. She still likes me though....I think!

Goodbye New York

This is my last weekend living in New York, probably forever. While I'm really happy about the direction my life is taking, I am feeling a little nostalgic. I will definitely miss the following:

* My friends! The best in the world.....
* Lupa (Mario Batali restaurant two blocks from my house).
* How you can order anything for delivery....including dog food.
* The first snowfall (before any traffic drives in it, yuck).
* My little apartment, above a bar, in Soho.
* The plethora of taxis!
* Ben's Pizzeria.
* Going out to dinner at 10 pm, and still needing a reservation.
* Having "locals". (I.e., a local bar, a local bodega, a local restaurant...where people know me.)
* The homeless man who begs for change outside my local market....we always have an....interesting...interaction.

But mostly I'll just miss the place that's been my home for almost 8 years. The first place I lived alone. The place I found Lucy. The place I started my career!

New York is difficult, and that's why you have to love it. When I first moved here a friend of mine said, if you can make it here you can make it anywhere. I'm not sure that's factually true, but it FEELS true! I've been lost, verbally abused, threatened on the street with a lamp and lived in the ghetto. I've also chased a cab down the street shoeless, slipped and fallen more times than I can count on icy streets and struggled to sleep through the thumping bass from the bar downstairs. But....I made it! I even made it onto the jumbo screens in Times Square (see below)!




So goodbye to the place of my adult emancipation. I'll always love you!

XOXO

32

Sooo, I am turning 32 years old on Monday. Yup....thirty...freaking...two. I'm frankly astounded that I'm so old! When did that happen. So far, the only thing that has kept me from throwing myself off the Harbour Bridge (besides how cold the water would be!) is knowing that JL is working on 36!*

Anyway, in attempting to work through my angst at turning thirty...freaking....two, I've come up with the following reasons why this year is going to be THE BEST:

1. 32 is Magic Johnson's basketball number.....I'm not sure what that has to do with anything but I'm taking it as a good omen.

2. I'm finally moving out of the tiniest apartment in the world and into a real adult apartment....with a garden!

3. I no longer have to shave my legs every day. I mean, really. Who cares?

4. Children have to listen to me. Not that they do.... But still, its something.....

5. My boyfriend can wear a Hawaiian shirt to go out on the weekend (ala, an 82 year old Floridian retiree). I'm not sure what that has to do with me, other than it probably wouldn't have happened when I was 23!**


* Not that JL is miserable. In fact, he seems very well adjusted to his oldness. :)

** He actually looked really cute (which he knows), but I'm having a hard time thinking up anything good about being 32 so this is going to have to count. Plus, I don't iron, as my mother can attest to, so sometimes end up wearing bizarre outfits myself.

Meat Raffle?

In the great Aussie tradition, last Wednesday night JL won THIS at the pub:

Oh, yes. This IS a tray of meat, and he won this tray of meat in a raffle at his local pub the Nags Head. The most, ummm, interesting thing about this is that he had a choice between the above and a $50 gift certificate.......But as he explained to me, the meat tray is a "great Aussie tradition".*

Since I had to carry this home, I was very glad we only had to walk across the street to get there....carrying a platter of raw meat under my arm at 11 p.m. was a little strange....

But long story short, look how HAPPY he is!!!!

Oh, the joy of meat!

* And as I explained in return, in the great "American tradition" I would be happy to eat it!