turkey day near the beach

Yo.

So I had my first Thanksgiving off from work in a few years.  It was legendary.  I got to make my Grandma Duffy's Sweet Potato Casserole.

Not to bad if you ask me.  It might not be the prettiest, but it was pretty tasty.  My sister Abby and Josh came down from Irvine to celebrate with us.  We bought a Turkey meal from Vons and enjoyed it together in our apartment on the floor.  We had the first course on the rooftop however but it got pretty cold up there so we moved back downstairs.

That night we went on a walk around Mission Bay Park for a bit and had a bonfire on Ocean Beach.  To view the rest of our photos visit here.  There are also some pictures there from when Lisa and I visited Old Town last weekend.

Friday we also went out and picked up a new inflatable mattress.  Turns out ours has bit the dust.  Over the last few weeks it has been getting holes in it that we have had to fix.  I had been using Car tire hole fixing kits but I think it has gotten to the point that we just can't keep up with it.  Every night if slowly deflats no matter what we do.

Here's Lisa waking up one morning basically laying on the floor.

Also we are planning on shipping our crate out to us soon so we hopefully won't need our new inflatable mattress for too long.

I also get to work 40 hours next week.  Hollah!  The money will be nice.

Also, here's a video of Abby driving our scooter:

a lot of ground to cover.

So it's been 11 days since I've updated this.  Whoops.

I had told myself I wouldn't let it get to backed up so I want to apologize to those that read as well as myself.  It may seem like this is a way to let people know how we're doing but it is also partially a way to chronicle things for us as well as vent our own things.

I think part of the reason it was hard for me to make a new post is because I wanted to make a post specifically about my old dog Moe who was put down last Friday.  It was hard for me to know exactly what to write however as it was difficult to put into words what Moe meant to our family and what he taught me.  I think that in itself speaks to what he meant to us.  I guess I'll just share a quick story though.

 

I had the luxury of growing up with Moe in while I was in Middle School and High School.  We used to go on works frequently in McHoose Park in Boone.  He was always scared of one of the bridges we had to cross.  I would walk across and he would stand at the other side whimpering while I was begging him to cross so we could continue.  He would analyze every other way to go first, making sure the bridge was his only option before sprinting across it like a cat.

When I went to college sadly I missed a lot of Moe aging.  Its kind of odd to think about that now.  I would notice it when I visited home however.  The extra warts, and lumps.  However I still always viewed him as the young pup I remembered.  He always seemed happy to see me, sure he smelled a little worse than he used to but that was okay.

One time that will always stand out in my mind though is when Lisa, Moe, and I went to Ledges State Park by Boone when we were dating.  It was really the last time I got to take Moe with me to a park for a big walk.  In a way it was fitting that it was with Lisa, as odd as this sounds I think it was really great that we got to spend that time together, just us.  It was nice to be able to show Lisa what part of my life was like growing up (taking hikes with Moe), and in a way for Moe to spend sometime with Lisa.  Moe was really acting like a young pup although he was really pretty old at the time.  For a long time Lisa, Moe, and I sat in the Des Moines river at a low point where the current wasn't very strong and just enjoyed the weather.  It was weird too because Moe was literally laying on the river bed with us.  The young pup that used to be so scared to cross bridges was laying in a flowing river bed.  Enjoying life with us.  So it goes.


......


So thanksgiving is coming up!  Pretty excited about that.  Lisa and I *may* have the next three days off together, (Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday) and on Thursday we're having a lunch/dinner with Abby and Josh which should be delightful!  I'm going to attempt to make my Grandma's Sweet Potato Casserole so wish me luck.

Lisa and I have also began receiving our checks from our jobs.  We finally have some income!  Booyah.  So that's pretty nice.  Now hopefully sometime after the holidays we can move our box out to us and we can finally have our bed and other belongings.

We also went to a Old Town this weekend in San Diego.  It is a touristy kind of neat place just east of us that used to be the old mission grounds or something.  Actually I don't really know now that I think about it.  Think living history farms.  But of San Diego.  We also tried a Church last night call Flood and it was really good so we might start trying that place out.

Well this was kind of long and winded.  So I will try to update it more now.  Also I've started use a Motorola Droid so I might be doing more social media thingys with it so look for those I guess.  Gross.  Dr. Oz is on.

the plates, the jobs, the swagger

Recognize.

We've been busy.

Lots of good news to report.  Lisa has completed her training at See's Candies and it went pretty well.  So she is now in the world of two part time jobs.  God willing one will lead to some form of Full time employment for her after the holidays.

I am a little over half way through my training at Provide Commerce.  I will be working the call center for Redenvelope.com and Personalcreations.com.  Eventually I will also be doing Proflowers.com.  Its going pretty good.  Training can be boring at times but it should be a good gig.

I also finally heard back from Time Warner Cable today and they want to hire me on full-time!  So that is fantastic news!  They are however backed up on the amount of people they can fit in their training classes so if someone drops from the class that starts on December 3rd I can start training that day, otherwise I will probably have to wait until next year to start training there.  So it's nice that I am working this temp job at the moment.

As you saw above we have our California License Plates now!  It was quite the task, we had to get a Smog test done to the car as well spending hours at the DMV.  It's all done though now and we only have to take our Motorcycle driving test to be fully licensed California Motorcyclists.  Also Lisa has been taking her scooter to work this past week and it has been working out real well.

Also, shout out to my Cuz Mallory Riggs and her Hubs Ryan as they welcomed their baby boy Asher into the world November 8th, Holla to tha baby Mamas!

our new scooter

Don't even ask me the brand.  It's Japanese or something.  It's a 150cc Honda Style engine is really all I know.

Lisa and I went to Pacific Hope Church this morning and afterward we drove to Point Loma Scooter and picked it up.  It's a pretty fun drive.  We took it for a test spin to Lisa's workplace Micheal's and back.



Also here are some pictures of us with it and one of Lisa by Micheal's.  Lisa starts at See's tomorrow and is working 9 to 5:30 and I start doing my call center training for Proflowers/Redenvelope tomorrow night at 5:30 so we both needed a vehicle.  There are also a couple pictures of Harold and I.  He came to visit us again.

Much love.

a quick story about a cat

Meet Scrooge McCat, aptly named for the hair style it has in line with a one Scrooge McDuck.

We came home last night after walking out the pier to watch the waves to find this little kitty in our apartment.  We had left the screen door to our patio open a little bit and it had found its way in our warm apartment.  We're not really sure where she came from but she took a liking to us pretty fast.  So we played with her and cuddled a little bit then tried to ignore her so she would leave.  We can't really afford/care for a cat right now, what with an inflatable mattress.  The only problem was she wouldn't leave.  She would look outside occasionally but then come not go out.  Eventually we had to actually put it outside and close the door.  It seem really confused and kept trying to walk back in through the glass sliding door.

We went about out business and got ready for bed.  Then we noticed it was sitting on the edge of balcony going to sleep.  So our hearts were already breaking and we decided to make it a little bed on the patio with a blanket to keep warm and we put some tuna and water out for it.  That was probably a dumb decision because when it realized we were still inside it started meowing when we went back in.  Eventually it stopped after a few minutes and we closed the blinds.  Before getting into bed I look outside and it was sleeping on it's little blanket.

This morning it was gone but we've seen it come back to the patio and look around a couple times, it can sneak around the front of the patio between apartments patio's but other than that we're not sure where it goes, maybe its a neighbor's cat because it kind of smelled like cigarette smoke a little.  However I think these are smoke free apartments.  Or it could just be our neighbors Alex and that girl he lives with but we know of another cat they have so unless they have two..... either way we don't know.  It was definitely hard though to say goodbye.

on the road to residency

So I left the last post kind of short and sweet and left out a lot of details.  I'll try to fill them in here.

I have a job.  I start next Monday working for the company E-Commerce based in San Diego about a half hour from where we live.  I will be answering phones for ProFlowers and Red Envelope customers, taking orders, dealing with problems, and blah blah blah.  I train next Monday through Friday.  I am still also waiting to hear back from a couple other places as well.  I believe the E-Commerce job is full time but it is only seasonal, however there are opportunities for corporate positions such as their product photography department.

Lisa and I got our California Drivers Licenses today as well as our Motorcycle permits so we can drive our scooter that I just purchased today!  Woot!  Its a 150cc Honda GY6 engine inside this frame:

I don't know what any of that means, but we're pretty excited.  We aren't getting a blue one though I don't think.  Lisa has to pick out the color yet, because I frankly don't care.  We had to take a California Driver Written exam and a California Motorcycle Permit written exam too.  Now we have to take a full motorcycle driving test eventually to be able to have a full license.  But we can practice with our permit on our bike.

In other news our Mattress popped a hole last night around midnight.  So we took evasive maneuvers and repaired for the night with Duct Tape.  Then this morning I picked up a tire repair kit and viola!

It took a couple tries.  Hopefully it holds all night otherwise I am not gonna be a happy boss.

Other than that I got to take out my boogie board I bought at Goodwill for 6 bucks to the Ocean earlier tonight.  It was around 85 degrees out, the water was much colder but it wasn't to bad once you got used to it.  The waves were way to high though for a novice like myself (6 to 8 feet) so I just kind of putz'd around.

All in all things are going really well, we're just rolling with life as it comes.  Lisa is enjoying her job in the Framing department at Michael's and is excited to see what See's holds next week.

the days begin to blend

So it was Halloween weekend and Lisa and I dressed up as Team Zissou from "The Life Aquatic"

We went downtown Sunday night and people watched as well as put our dance shows on.  It was fun and really busy.  There were a lot of crazy costumes.

Also today I had an interview with Wells Fargo.  It was a group interview (boo) so there was 12 other people there with me and it took us 2 hours to answer 4 questions.

Good news is though that I have got a job with E-Commerce as a Call Center Rep for Proflowers, and Red Envelope.  I start training for that next week.