grand cayman

My "are you kidding me" face.  Very attractive.

Growing up on the west coast, I had always lusted after the crystal clear, light blue waters of the Caribbean that I saw in magazines.  Like lots of Californians, I had been to Hawaii a bunch of times, but the Caribbean seemed so EXOTIC and so much BLUER.  Then I moved to the east coast, and started to think that "The Islands" weren't all they were cracked up to be.  So many people told me that outside of the resorts, the islands are quite poor.  I'm the type of person who likes to explore and likes to get out of the resorts and hotels, so I began to second guess my childhood dream.  On the flip side, so many east coasters lusted after Hawaii.  The water is always bluer on the other side I guess!!

With a few vaca days to kill, P and I were looking for someplace warm, relaxing, and easy.  The Caribbean seemed to be the logical choice.  So we looked around for flights and hotels, and chose the cheapest that seemed desirable and had the best flight choices - Grand Cayman.  The only way I know about this island is from the book, The Firm.  It's where rich people go to keep their monies!

Turns out, it IS really rich.  We saw giant mansions and expensive cars.  We also saw plenty of kids (pre-teens/teenagers) dining out on their own at expensive restaurants.  We figured they were the offspring of rich people there to visit their monies.  In general though, people, including locals, seemed really nice and content.

And there was plenty to do!  We went snorkeling everyday, went to Stingray City, and P went scuba diving.  There are 365 dive spots around Grand Cayman to choose from.  I also have residual safari tendencies so took some pictures of the local wildlife.

The water really is blue and clear around Grand Cayman.  We had been to Puerto Rico a few years ago, where I was hoping to see the famed waters, but it was a deep blue just like anywhere else.  The waters around Grand Cayman were what I had imagined, so beautiful and warm - not WARM like around the equator, or COLD like around the states, but nice and cool.  It's all I was hoping for from the Caribbean island.

We had one near disaster with our rented Kia Picanto, which would have left us marooned on the other side of the island.  In short, our remote key wasn't working, and without it, we couldn't drive the car.  THAT'S RIGHT.  The physical key itself won't work if the remote isn't working.  If you use the physical key, the car alarm goes off, and it goes into "safe" mode.  The engine won't turn on.  I googled this, and it turns out this is a common problem with Kia's.  Kia designed a car that won't work independently of a battery-powered remote.  This is extremely short-sighted.  Luckily, we eventually got the key working and drove it right back to the Hertz rental and exchanged the car.  Hertz will be seeing a nice review on yelp or tripadvisor for making the process so easy for us.  Having driven another Kia rental, the Soul, you know, the car that hamsters drive in the commercial, I know that I will never ever buy a Kia for myself!  Fortunately, the car trouble didn't force us to lose too much vacation time!

Thanks, Grand Cayman, for a nice vacation!

CHAMPIONS

I tried my hand at photographing action.  Not so good, but I managed to get a few that are... decent.  So much BLURRINESS.  This is my Zogsports volleyball team, Some Spike It Hot, competing in the playoffs.  We eventually won the whole tournament, which means our league fees go to the charity of our choice, Animal Haven!  For the puppies and the kitties!!

izzy

Everyone enjoys the sun. :)

lasagna

This lasagna was made almost entirely from scratch.  It took almost the whole afternoon.  P ground dark meat chicken with a meat grinder, combined it with sweet italian sausage (ok, not homemade), and made a sauce out of it.  We then made our own pasta, which is simply a combination of egg and 00 flour, kneaded, and passed through the kitchenaid pasta making attachment.  We layered sauce, pasta sheet, spinach, ricotta, and then topped it all off with mozzarella (also not homemade).

I've made lasagna in the past with no-cook noodles and regular dry noodles, but homemade is by far the best.  It came out soft, rich, and flavorful.  I savored each bite.

These pictures were taken immediately after the lasagna came out of the oven, which is why everything is so gooey.  Not the best representation of the layers, but I couldn't wait for things to cool down before shoving it in my mouth.

photoboooothes

Congrats A & W!  What a gorgeous bride!   

happy donut day!

Phi-style may have started a trend - Donut Day.

Since Valentine's Day is a made-up holiday, why not invent a tradition of our own?  And there's no better food group than doughnuts to do it with.

So when Dunkin' Donuts started making these heart-shaped donuts, I got excited.  Last year, we weren't going to do much for V-day except for stay home and make dinner (not unlike every weeknight, but we were gonna make it spatial), but I thought I'd add a little festivity by stopping by Dunkin' on my way back from work to pick up these deliciously looking fun shapes.  But to my dismay, they were OUT.  OUT!  Since then, I've wanted nothing more, so I asked P for heart-shaped donuts this year.

YES!

Perfectly shaped hearts filled with nothing but love and goodness.

sweet and savory

I discovered some photos on my memory card that I had meant to post last year!

Sweet

Over the holidays I wanted to make some sweets for my friends and coworkers but didn't want to spend a whole lot of time baking.  So I went with simple and quick recipes - peanut butter brittle and peppermint bark.

Embossed cards and pretty packaging makes everything look extra special.

Savory
This Superbowl Sunday (booo, next time Niners! :( ) compelled me to make this chili that I haven't made in about 4 years.  I finally felt ready again.  It's sooo time-consuming, but so gooood.

2 hours prep time, 3 hours cooking and stirring every 5 min, 3 types of fresh chili peppers, espresso, chocolate, and beer?  All these unusual ingredients come together to make a chili with a harmonious taste and lots of layers of flavor.

Thanks for the recipe, Joey!

introducing dr. drea and the temporarily B.I.G

W hinted multiple times that a great Women of Honor speech (I hate the term "matron", so W nicely complied) at her wedding in San Francisco would be a rap.  We did not want to disappoint.

Yes, those are my yellow doggie boxers.

Weilyn and Arthur - WOH rap from Andrea Lo-Rossi on Vimeo.

11 days at home!

Happy new year everyone!  Or as P likes to say, Happy New Yeaz!!

It felt like we got a few more days out of this holiday season.  Since Christmas was on a Tuesday, and P and I split the holiday by being with his family on Christmas Eve and flying to CA on Christmas morning to be with my family, we had a whole weekend of nothingness before we had to travel.  Bliss!  We hung out, ate, and were able to take our time packing and getting ready for our trip.  Let me just emphasize what a treat that is since most times, I'm a hot mess rushing to get out that door.

In the Bay Area:

• Fuh-reeezing!  WTF??
• Epic Christmas dinner - squash soup, crab and endive salad, prime rib, scalloped potatoes, sweet potato casserole, stuffed mushrooms, roasted brussel sprouts, Yorkshire pudding, coq au vin, carrot cake.
• Hog Island oyster farm - 112 oysters for a party of 5.  We were an hour late to our reservation, but managed to shuck and grill everything in 2 hrs.  While everyone else was relaxing and drinking their wine, we put together an assembly line and got down to business.
• Lake Tahoe for 2 days - Sugarbowl and Northstar.  P and Sister both got sick on this trip but managed to soldier on.  It's a good thing because the snow was great!!  Incessant raining in the bay area means lots of good powder in the mountains!
• Low key, delicious, and relaxing NYE with good friends. I'm too old for mega parties.

Lots of stuff coming up every weekend in January:

• Phoenix trip for work
• Back to SF for W's wedding!
• Atlanta trip for work

I will be missing Sundance for the first time in... 6 years?  While I'm okay taking a break from waiting for 4-5 hours in the cold for a movie, I'm going to miss that Park City snow! I also wouldn't mind making friends with Ryan Gosling.  Small sacrifice to make - I wouldn't miss this wedding for the world!  I'll be back, Park City!

the girls party

Last weekend was W's surprise bachelorette party!  It was an elaborate undertaking with a carefully constructed diversion, but it came off without a hitch!  Good job, B and me.  

The groom's bachelor party was coincidentally planned for the same weekend, and at some point we discussed how girls' parties are different from boys' parties.  The below details are some good examples of what boys would never bother themselves with.  A 24-pack with stripper would do it for them.

Tissue paper pom pom's

I youtube'd how to do this.  Martha Stewart charges $15 for a pack!  If you DIY, it becomes $2 cheap and fun!  I basically kept cutting the sheets in half to make different size pom poms.  Then I folded it up like an accordion, with 1 to 1.5" folds.  Make sure to fold on the short edge because that makes it poof more.  Either round out the corners or cut points.  Then use twisties or staples to secure the middle, and then poof!  I thought I would like the rounded corners more, but after poofing out the pom poms, I actually like the sharp points better. 

Here's what I used.

13 sheets of 16.5 by 12"

11 sheets of 8.25 by 12"

10 sheets of 8.25 by 6"

Goody bags
Ever since I got a heat tool, I've been embossing everything in my path.  To go along with the pom pom theme, I got a magnolia stamp and embossed the goody bags.  YEAH.  We had T-shirts made for all the guests, which I rolled up and put next to the goody bags.  I then sprinkled phallic and x-rated confetti all around the bags to class it up a bit.  Not pictured here because for some reason I decided to keep this a family post.

I loved working on these details, many of which probably went unnoticed, but I believe every detail adds to the feel, whether noticed or not!

SPOTTED: Coco, Mrs. Ice T

coco was on my flight back from Vegas this weekend, in all pink, bright blue, platinum blond, and fake eyelash glory.  She looked exactly like herself.  She did take time to talk and take a picture with a fan though - for someone without any real talents, I guess she's got to milk her fan base.

More from the surprise bachelorette weekend to come!

SPOTTED: LOCKE

imdb.com

Terry O'Quinn (aka John Locke from LOST)

Apparently this guy lives in my neighborhood and goes to my gym (UWS)!  I passed right by him when I entered the gym and did multiple takes because honestly, he looks like a normal old white guy.  (They all look alike!) But I verified that this was him with a couple of people, and was told that he usually goes early afternoon, when I'm never around.  It must be really convenient for him to live in my neighborhood and film his new show 666 Park Avenue (someone told me that it's gonna be cancelled) around the corner.  What they say is the upper east side is actually the upper WEST side!

ROUNDABOUND

While in Amersham, I got reacquainted with all the roundabouts - those Brits don't much like stop signs.  This kept playing in my head.

While awfully European to have ROUNDABOUNDS, they posed quite an obstacle for my running excursions around town.  No matter how much I tried to look the correct (wrong) way for traffic, I felt like I was constantly putting myself in danger when I crossed the street.  They don't have those signs to "look right" like they do in London.  So I tried to remember to look right, then left, then right, but the cars come at you in a very disorientating way since they're on the "wrong" side of the road.  I decided that I could only cross the street if there were absolutely no cars coming from either direction.  This is all fine if I'm just crossing one street, but how are you supposed to cross a roundabound?  Well, I came to the conclusion that you're not.  So my rule became to never cross the street.  If I came to a roundabound, I had to go left.  That actually came in handy for not getting lost, but it also made me go in circles.

THOSE ROUNDABOUNDS.  Correct.  YES, that is what I said!

harry and sandy

warped rooftop

hobbit door, as tall as me

the OFFICE

Harry Potter-ville

I was called to go on a last-minute business trip to the London area with 48 hours notice!  I freaked out because it seems like a big trip, but I had forgotten how easy of a trip it is.  It's just slightly longer than my usual westward trip to California.  It was cold and dreary with yellow and orange leaves falling everywhere.  This is exactly how I picture the English countryside. SO DAMN QUAINT!!

See it?  Way out there - it's the scary, broken crane.

I luckily made it home from London before Hurricane Sandy.  I got to hunker down with my hubs, which is quite frankly, what we'd love to do all the time anyway.  We maintained power, internet, and water through the whole ordeal.  P and I even ventured outside (against all warnings from public officials) to experience the wind and take a peek at the Hudson.  I hadn't experienced a hurricane before, so I just HAD TO SEE!  The wind and the swooshing trees made the short walk over to the river an exciting one to say the least.  You can first HEAR, then SEE, and lastly FEEL the strong gusts of wind coming at you.  The river water wasn't gnarly like you saw at the beach, but it did rise to the level of the pier at the time we saw it.  The water eventually covered the entire pier and went up the embankment behind it.  We watched the river for all of 30 seconds before we were ready to head back to safety.

While we have emerged unscathed from Sandy, I cannot begin to fathom how others have to pick up the pieces of their lives and go on.  Coping with the destruction has only begun, and the amount of work to rebuild is unnerving.  While I have my fair share of complaints about New Yorkers, it is in times like these that their inspiring resilience and bravery shine.

a bunch of firsts

1. Santigold concert at Roseland Ballroom
   
   Got picked up by and then hung out with  2 lesbians.  One lesbian was in the army.  27 years old, 5' and 165 lbs of muscle.  The other lesbian was 23 years old and in school for forensics.  She likes to work with dead bodies and figure out what happened.  She watched a lot of TV shows when she was little.
2. I've been drooling over pictures of sandwiches from Graham Ave Meats and Deli for weeks.  Finally got to try them!



Willy's Special



Philly Pork



Chicken cutlet



The Godfather



3. Bowled my personal best at our company BOWL-a-palooza!  I placed first in the category of female bowler.  My epiphany - a 10-pound ball is better than an 8 pounder.
4. Fall mosquitoes are invading our apartment.  They have sunk to their ultimate low and have bitten me on the BOTTOM of my foot.  Assholes.