stay-cation

Ahoy!

Due to an unfortunate circumstance, our friends were situated in a hotel for a while and they got sick of it. They had vacated the premises but still had the hotel, so they offered us their room for the weekend. And it was a blast! It ended up being less than 2 miles away from us, but it was still so fun. We walked to get pizza & pasta the first night.

The next morning we left somewhat early for Snow Summit, much to my dismay. My 2nd time snowboarding was more frustrating than the 1st time. The conditions were icier and more slippery. I feel like I spent a lot of time going down the mountain just trying to slow down. Going downhill is terrifying. It will never be not terrifying. A had fun once I freed him to go off on his own. He would have wasted a lot more time waiting for me, the record holder for the slowest run down the slopes ever. My prize for participating was Chinese to go for dinner. We also made use of the pool/jacuzzi that was strangely located underground. The RRS and I had fun making up games to play in the large lukewarm jacuzzi.

We had a major sleeping in session the next morning in honor of daylight savings. We didn't leave the hotel until noon. It was such a pleasant morning laying around in bed watching tv and reading. After driving to our proposed brunch place, we kept on driving because we had never seen such a long line for anywhere ever. We found this cute little French cafe attached to a cute kitchen store. It was a great meal, and we left for the tar pits museum fully satiated. It is a tiny museum and totally inconspicuous. I had never noticed it before. It was thoroughly informative regarding fossils and getting stuck in tar. Fascinating stuff. Iranian new year was happening in the park that day. I had never heard of Iranian new year, but they had the full displays and goldfish mascots. Always interesting to learn about other cultures.

delightedly aloft,
jt

bay area birthdays

Ahoy,

We ventured up north for a weekend, really a day, of birthday celebrating. The RRS's birthday is in March, as are his sister's, dad, and brother. Despite the rain, he somehow convinced his family to go on a coast walk by the sutro baths. My dress got thoroughly soaked when it started raining sideways towards the end. It was a fun adventure to see the forest in the rain. It's always nice to see anything in the rain.

We waited 2 hours for dinner at the Cheesecake Factory. I had never been inside that Macy's, the one where they have the Cheesecake Factory at the top. We spent some time wandering around the store and hanging out in the furniture department.

The next day we got on a megabus back down to LA. And it was so nice to be home.

swimmingly bubbly,
jt

dia del museos

Ahoy,

Our seats from the Coffee Museum. It was lots of fun to sit above the street and observe the unknowing streetgoers. The cloud game was on point our whole trip. So many stellar postcard moments every time we looked up at the sky. The RRS found himself sunburnt for, apparently, the first time in his life. He was unfamiliar with the condition and process. I am not a sunburn newbie, and whined appropriately.




We spent this day at 4 museums, making pretty good use of a leisurely day. I was pretty proud of ourselves. The coffee museum was incredibly proud of their organic product. The RRS reported a good cappuccino, and the sandwich we had was surprisingly tasty. He was in love with their sauces for the basket of potatoes (think potato wedges). Peru is home of more than a thousand varieties of potato. They are a very proud agricultural economy. We went to 2 history/cultural museums to get some more context for Peru & Machu Picchu. The chocolate museum was our last stop of the day where A had his first chocolate covered orange peel. We tried to sign up for a truffle making class or a cooking class, but they had not enough attendees for either. Too bad, we ended up going to a class elsewhere that did not have a max participant requirement for the green light and we got a personal class!

slightly cultured,
jt

fotos

Ahoy!


This chicken noodle soup was recommended to us by the chef from our cooking class. It is made with spaghetti noodles. A claimed it to the best chicken noodle soup he ever had. It is probably because the broth is made from all the chickens that have ever been simmered in the eternity of time.


I was told everyone goes to San Pedro Market for everything. There is a section for souvenirs, aisles for smoothies or fruit juices, fruit & vegetable aisles, meat & poultry aisles, spices, dried goods, etc. The end of the market has sections for ready made foods, where we saw locals actually eating. A lot of the stalls look like they have the same items as their adjacent neighbors, so it was anybody's guess which one to patronize. Most of the tourist places had restaurants advertising burgers, pizzas, pastas, etc. And no locals. It was somewhat difficult to figure out what local Peruvian cuisine is. Peruvian cuisine apparently had a heavy Chinese influence so some local dishes have a Chinese flair. We came back to the San Pedro Market upon multiple occasions. I love a good covered market anywhere we go.

delectably appalled,
jt

lunar new year

Ahoy,

We made our annual pilgrimage to Chicago for Chinese new year. The highlight was probably Beaver Donuts, which I got to eat 5 days in a row. My record thus far. It was glorious.

O & H flew in for the weekend, H's first time in Chicago! We did the usual for first timers to Chicago, spending most of our time exploring the downtown area. We made stops at the Architecture society, cultural center, library, eataly, french market, millennium park, maggie daley park, billy goat's tavern, water tower place, etc. I"m sure you don't need a laundry list anymore because I've probably mentioned all these places here before. Winter was pretty mild because of el nino, so it wasn't as uncomfortable as it could have been while we were walking everywhere. Somehow we made it to a 10pm dinner reservation at Girl & the Goat.

Sunday was a late start, which was fine. We mostly hung around Bridgeport because it was new year's eve. We got some coffee, went to the park to throw ice in the quarry. We dropped off our amigos at the airport, excited to see them in May again.

I was pretty apprehensive about our trip that week to Machu Picchu. We had some errands to complete before we could leave. The RRS was pretty sure he could wear his non-waterproof sneakers. Much to the contrary, I voted he should buy some weatherproof shoes. After a long fruitless search we ended up at Northface, which is where we should have begun with all along. It ended up raining only one day despite the forecast for all days, but it rained hard that one day at Machu Picchu. If I had a nickel for every time I told him so.

justifiably agloat,
jt

first time going to snow?

Ahoy,

The idea of "going to the snow" is so strange to me. Why doesn't it come to me? Like it has been for the majority of my life. But A has been wanting to take me for a while. We got snow pants last year and never used them. They proved to be excellent additions to our snow gear.

We drove with a friend, whom we routinely bum rides from, up to Mammoth. It was snowing at a pretty good rate as we rolled in, but his car has all wheel drive so we just drove past everyone putting snow chains on their cars. I've also never really heard of snow chains until A asked me about them. I don't think I've ever seen anyone in Chicago with them.

We arrived somewhat late, and woke up pretty early to get out. We didn't arrive in time for the first lesson, so I ended up in the afternoon class. We had some time before, so the RRS panicked as he tried to figure out how to teach me to snowboard when he didn't really remember to begin with. I fell a lot, but I was told I was doing pretty well for a beginner. In conclusion, snowboarding is thoroughly exhausting and expensive. I think it's kind of a silly sport for mostly affluent people. Shoveling is a much more useful skill. I would probably do it again, but it's not a sport I would devote myself to.

Ironically, the RRS got sick/altitude sickness after our first day out, so we ended up not going to snowboard the next day. He was originally super adamant about us going both days so we'd have more time to get better. He ended up spending our second day in bed and taking a day off from work. Thrilling. I continue to be super, duper grateful to the folks we were with for being able to accommodate him in his sorry state. When he gets sick, it's usually just a wrench in my our plans, but I was so sorry to be an inconvenience to the rest of the party. And so incredibly thankful for their help and kind gestures. I feel like we will encounter more situations like this, and I'm not sure how to return the kindness or express enough gratitude.

liftingly blizzarded,
jt