Today I felt like an adult. Maybe it was because this is the first year that I was allowed to eat Santa’s cookie and drink his milk tonight. Or maybe it’s because I turned twenty-eight today. Or maybe it’s because I’ve traveled far and wide in search of happiness and found it within, not without — just call me Dorothy.

For my birthday my sister and I spent most of the day recovering from a hangover on the slopes… skiing is better than sleep, a shower and Eggs Benedict — my personal hangover cure! Most of the slope was closed — they just haven’t had enough snow up here yet — so we spent the entire day on the bunny slope. No biggy, I suck anyway.

I’ve volunteered for kitchen duty tomorrow, so after the slopes Tina and I headed into town to get food for Christmas dinner. It’s always fun coming up with a menu that everybody can enjoy… Tina’s a vegetarian, my dad’s g/f doesn’t seem to like my roasts (I leave the fat on them for flavor, and allow the eater to work around it, or as some in my family prefer, just chew the fat)… so… it’s a turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, a glazed top-loin pork roast, candied yams, a vegetarian dish of black beans and spinach over a polenta/pumpkin/cheddar (why cheddar? try finding Manchego in Northern Maine!) base. I’m most excited about the vegetarian dish… it’s a new recipe and it sounds great. It might be a new edition to my holiday cooking.

Side note: I fucking love the Gipsy Kings! I can’t get enough of this damn album (’Roots’)… it’s been on repeat since Croatia! The only thing I love more is using an expletive when a proper adjective from the dictionary would suffice.

I keep getting emails and phone messages asking if I’m really back. Yup… but I’m leaving again on Monday to spend Christmas with my family in Maine.

It’s been a week since I landed at LAX, what have I been up to? Well I found a new apartment, partied at Foremost’s Christmas party, hung out with friends that I haven’t seen in months and moved into my new apartment.

What’s the new place like? Expensive and tiny by most standards… but the location makes up for it. My neighborhood in Huntington Beach is a great place to live… There are two markets, a ton of restaurants, a laundromat, movie theater and the beach all within walking distance. Though the downsides are that I had to buy a smaller fridge and a futon… the upsides are that I get a kitchen again, and gained a fenced patio where I can dry my laundry and a small garden where I can grow my own herbs. Yippeee.

Now all I need is a good road bike…

As an aside: I’m still finishing the writing on my last week in Spain, but work and moving has kept me busy… I wrote notes though… so if it takes me too long to write, I’ll just post those.

It’s been good to see most of you again. =D

I bought a new snapshot camera about two days before I left for Europe. After using it almost continuously for 64 days I feel that it’s become an extension of me. I’m so quick with it that I can pull it out of my pocket, make the proper adjustments, take the picture, and put it back into my pocket within ten seconds. Probably the reason why I took 2800 pictures while away. The only bummer is that the damn thing died over the weekend. It survived 68 days. Thank God it didn’t die on me while I was in Spain. I would have had to buy another one. Now the challenge of getting it repaired without it costing me the price of the camera… hopefully it’s still under warranty.

Even though it broke… I love this camera.

…And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time. –T.S. Eliot

My webhost has figured out the hardware issues that they were having with my server, so I should be able to upload images and write blog entries without fear that they won’t be there the next day… it’s too bad that I can’t find internet access for my laptop right now. I’m only a couple of days away from being in Los Angeles again, so you’ll see a ton of blog entries and images soon after I get back on the 6th. I’d like to say that it’ll be good to be home again, but to be honest, I don’t really want to go back. I’m quite happy where I’m at, thank you. Oh well, Los Angeles during Christmas isn’t too bad I guess… I gotta stop with the sarcasm.