January

This month is only 18 days old -this year is only 18 days old- but so far we're off to a good start. I hope this momentum continues.

5 Cool Things About January (so far):

• My mom won a kick ass award for her job as a Family Services Coordinator at an elementary school. She is the new Top Partnership Liaison for the state of Texas.
• My older sister and her family won Family of the Year for the town she lives in.
• My birds, Napoleon and Pedro, turned a year old this month.
• I perfected my Baked Chicken Parmesan recipe.
• My sweetie and I celebrate 6 months TODAY!

5 Crappy Things About January (so far):

• I thought I was eating a black jelly bean, but it was a mutant bean with multiple flavors and they were all bad.
• My Wonder Woman mouse pad had to be thrown away because of a freak accident involving a three hole punch.
• American Express withdrew the wrong amount out of my checking account for my last payment; thus making my car payment, phone bill and cable bill late.
• My neighbor's outdoor faucet broke and flooded his yard and mine.
• My other neighbor's daughter quit Girl Scouts and I have no link to the cookies this year.

All in all, the good outweighs the bad by a landslide. Here's hoping 2006 brings better things than 2005.

Did you hear about...

...the burning mouse that started a house fire in New Mexico? This mouse must be a descendant of Stuart Little. No shit, man! Get this... a dude in NM was burning leaves and found a live mouse. In order to "dispose" of it, he threw it into the pile of burning leaves. That mouse was clearly seeking revenge when it miraculously ran out of the fire -even though it was covered in flames itself- and went straight under the house near a window. Shortly, the whole house was on fire and the homeowner lost everything! Can you imagine what it was like to see a mouse engulfed in flames running across the yard and directly underneath a house? Good gravy.

There are so many lessons to learn from all this - so many metaphors - so much symbolism. But none of that matters when you stop think about what will happen when PETA gets a hold of that dude.

Happy New Year Ya'll!

Happy 2006! Wow, I can't believe it's 2006. The other day I was watching Good Morning America and they were talking about an actor who has not made a movie since 1997. And they were talking like that was FOREVER ago. Then I stopped and thought, holy crap that was 9 years ago! That is a long time for an actor not to make a movie. I was so thrown by how fast the last 9 years have gone by that I tuned out - I never got the name of the "disappearing" actor.

So then I started doing the math. I realized that my ten year high school reunion was TWO years ago! Man, I'm old! My ten year COLLEGE reunion is in TWO years. Damn, I'm really old! I'm not gonna lie, I got a little depressed. But then I remembered my grandma is 83. Guess I'm not so old after all.

Ok, so... resolution time. I actually have resolutions this year! I will need lots of luck and many blessings to get them done. And there's not even that many. Here they are in no particular order:

• Finish my novel
• Attend a taping of The Price is Right
• Go to bed earlier
• Cook for myself more often

I hope I can do it. I'll keep you posted. (ouch, no pun intended there.) If you guys have any resolutions let me know. I'd love to hear them.

The Wedding Story

Ok,

I apologize for taking forever to finish up this story...but here goes. So I'm in NY for my friend's wedding. We get there and everyone is super duper nice. I'm taking sugary sweet, man. The ceremony was positively beautiful. It was meaningful and deep - which was very different from the quickie weddings I've been to lately.

After the ceremony, the wedding party had to go up to the front of the church for pictures. My sweetie, M, was in the back taking photos with another friend of mine that was at the wedding. One of the ladies from the church walked over to them and said hello. We'd met her the night before at the rehearsal dinner. Let's just call her B for the sake of privacy. So, B walks over to M and starts talking about the lovely ceremony. M comments to her that the church itself was lovely. It's nestled in a wooded area full of large trees and hills. B looks right at him and says, "Yes, but this area is changing. People are forgetting about what happened on September 11 and they 're letting the Muslims into this area." She said it with a firey tone and almost metamorphosied into Hitler.

What made me mad was that we were in a church. No one should say crass comments like that in a church. Secondly, B is the pastor's WIFE. How could this "Christian" woman say such a nasty thing? Finally, she said that we are all forgetting what happened on September 11 to my sweetie.... who's a FIREFIGHTER! Of course he did not forget what happened. He almost cried at the World Trade Center Site. Firefighters are a brotherhood - he still aches for those that died that day. How dare she make such an insulting comment to my M. If that bitch were not pushing 60, I would have given her a titty twister on the spot!

Always a Bridesmaid

Once again I have had the honor of being a witness in a wedding. I love being a maid of honor. I'm the one that gets to remind the bride that "I do" means F-O-R-E-V-E-R. (insert voice over from The Sandlot here!)

Anyway, last Friday I was on an express bus from Port Authority in midtown NYC and heading to Wayne, New Jersey. My friend got married in Wayne but we were staying in NYC. So that express bus was our ride... and it took 30 minutes and cost $5.50! What a steal! That's cheaper and faster than the train.

The rehearsal at the church was a breeze. Then it was time for the rehearsal dinner. I sat inbetween my friend getting married, L, and my sweetie, M. Everything was going fine until one of the pastors from the church and his wife made crass comments about other religions. They bashed Catholics, Methodists, Episcopalians, etc... It was bad. Then they turned to M and said, "Are you and Clara involved in the church?" M said, "Yes, we're both Catholic." I thought those people were going to barf up their $20 chicken. It was a very awkward moment and made us all feel weird. We called it a night shortly after that and hopped the express bus back to NYC.

That night, we froze our asses off but demanded to do more sightseeing. We strolled through Times Square, saw the famous tree in Rockafeller Center, posed for some corny pics and M ate a pretzel from a street vendor. He actually ate a hotdog from a street vendor in Chinatown, I thought for sure he'd get food poisoning and spend the whole day in the hotel room. But he was fine. And the pretzel did him no harm either.

Anyway, it was close to midnight and we had to be up for an EARLY bus ride back out to New Jersery. Wait til you find out what happened after the wedding...yowza!

Here are some of my fav. pics from the city...

Me in front of the arch in Washington Square near NYU


















L and me at her wedding
















L and me at rehearsal

I Wanna Be A Part Of It...

Ok, so I just got back from NYC. My friend, L, got married up there and I was her maid of honor. My sweetie, M, and I flew to NYC on Thursday so that we'd have some time to sightsee. This posting will cover just the first day. In the first 24 hours in NYC we managed to do the following:

• survived a cab ride in rush hour traffic from La Guardia to the Upper East Side
• almost purchased a Coach knock-off on Canal St. but ultimately refused it
• saw a movie being filmed in Little Italy starring John Leguizamo
• saw Oprah being escorted by David Letterman to The Color Purple on Broadway
• saw Donald Trump, Sidney Poitier, Gayle King, Jamie Foxx and David Hasselhoff also going to The Color Purple
• took a horse-drawn carriage ride in Central Park
• went ice skating in Central Park and only fell once (it was M's fault)
• got 2 slices of pizza and an orange soda for 4 bucks to share with M
• strolled into Serendipity for a frozen hot chocolate and a drug store sundae
• sobbed at Ground Zero
• shopped at Century 21
• walked by a group of NYU student workers that were on strike by a university library
• posed for a photo under the arch in Washington Square
• accidentally ended up in East Harlem and freaked the hell out

Long Time, No Post

I've been swamped, people. And J, I do not appreciate your tacky e-mail about me not posting in a while. I know I've been slacking off... sorry. :)

So here's what has been going on...

I SAW OPRAH!!!!!!! My sister, Connie, and I flew to Chicago at the end of October and went to a taping of the Oprah Winfrey show! The guest was George Clooney. He is positively dreamy. I had this weird out-of-body experience because I was sitting far too close to him. I almost flashed him. Then, ironically, we had a second taping that day about finding the right bra size. It was weird, and no, George did not see my boobs. (He left the set right after his show stopped taping.) I kinda did want Oprah to touch my boobs, but no luck. But it was FUN. We ended up with $250 in Nordstom's merchandise and the soundtrack to George Clooney's movie Good Night and Good Luck. You can see Connie and me in the audience during the George Clooney episode. It's on my TiVo if anyone wishes to come over and see it. No cameras are allowed inside so I only have 1 pic of us outside the studio...it's below.

I had my annual Halloween party again this year. I found this Mexican dress that my parents gave me when I was in 5th grade. That sucker still fit so that was my costume. My dad won the costume contest this year... he was Zorro. I added a photo below.

I finished my bellydancing classes. Those were SO fun. I know a slow routine that I do with a veil. And I learned 2 really fast routines. I'm far too embarrassed to show anyone, except my sweetie, M. So you'll have to just trust me that the classes paid off. :o)

Of course, I turned 30 on Nov. 22! My family and friends planned a big surprise party for me, but my dad spilled the beans. He sent me an e-mail saying, "Clara, are you having a margarita machine for your party?" I questioned my family and they came clean. However, they would not tell me the theme nor would they tell me the date, place, etc. It turned out to be a kick ass Mexican Fiesta! I haven't resized the pics yet, but I'll get some on here soon.

Sorry for this choppy post and I promise to be better about posting in the future.

Connie and me just before we saw Oprah!
















Dad and me at the Halloween party.

















I'm so geeky that this *should* be my car.