finally! im back!

sorry for the long delay...ive been busy busy busy...

for labor day, i went with heather to her parents' lake house in New Hampshire. that was an experience....well, i should say, GETTING THERE was an experience. so, we decided to rent a car to drive up there because it was cheaper/faster/easier (ha!) than taking the train. so, since im not 25 yet, i cant rent a car in my name, so i had to wait for heather to get there with her credit card an all that jazz. and then, of course, she had to sign this thing saying that she wouldnt allow anyone under the age of 25 (me again) to drive. yeah, that lasted only a few hours...

anyway! so, there we are, driving out of the city, following directions that heather had gotten from her mom, who had gotten them from heather's sister. it was at this point that we broke the first law of the day. we had to go through a toll booth. when we got there, heather had just gotten on the phone with a girl from back home in LA, and we pulled up to the window, and i handed heather the money and she started to hand it to the person in the toll booth (who, oddly, was actually a cop), but the cop doesnt take the money right away. he looks at heather and goes, "is there an emergency that is requiring you to call 911?" and heather kinda giggles and goes "no, im fine." but the cop keeps staring at her. and finally heather stops talking on teh phone and goes "is it illegal to drive and talk on the phone?" and the cop, with absolutely no humor, says "yes, it is." and heather and i both just go shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit!!!! we both immediately go into this, "we're from california! we didnt know! we're from caliornia! we're cute girls!!" (we didnt say that last part of course).

so, then, off we go. the directions got us into new rochelle and then they said that there would be a fork in the highway and to stay to teh right. when we got to the fork, i, the navigator, told heather to stay to the left to go north. after a couple of minutes, we both thought that we were wrong because teh directions said stay to the right. so, we decide to turn around, which is easy enough. however, there wasnt an exit for what we wanted, so we had to turn around again. unfortunately, this time, the exit we took to turn around turned out to be a turnpike. so, we had to wait a while to turn around. and then we got back on the highway we wanted, and the exit on the directions. so, woo! we did it! so, we're driving down the highway, following the directions and we go over this bridge. i look off to the right and see an incredibly view of the nyc skyline. so, i decided to take a picture...breaking the second law of the day. apparently, cameras and video cameras are prohibited on whatever bridge we were on...with something like a $1000 fine....oops. but the picture is pretty....


so, we get off teh bridge and continue driving...and then we realize: uuuhh...we're in queens....the opposite directions from where we want to be going! frick!!! so, then we pull off the freeway...but cant get back on from where we exited. double frick! so, heather calls her mom, which was pointless. so, i call my dad. who lives 3000 miles away in california. daaaddyyyyyy! im lost! find me!!! which, he did. awesome. we got turned around and we stopped at a gas station to ensure we were going the right way. and i ask the attendant, where is the 237 (or whatever it was), and he just stares at me. and i say, "the 237? the highway? where is the entrance?" and he goes, what are you talking about? and i point out the window, right past his idiot head to teh freeway speeding by, and i say, "that highway, how do i get there?" and he says "i dont know." dude!!! you work at a gas station! bordering the freaking freeway! and you dont know where the ON RAMP IS??? are you KIDDING ME?! luckily, some guy walked in and said drive right down the road and its on your right. (this actually made me more upset with the attendant because if the on ramp was right down the road--which it was--the guy didnt know. freaking moron).

anyway, we get back on teh high, re-cross teh bridge (a total of 10 dollars in tolls), and get back on the CORRECT highway, and drive on. that detour, plus crazy traffic we hit, added on about 2.5/3 hours to our drive. holy geez...

so, then we get to her parents' house in Eastman, New Hampshire, this teeny tiny little town outside of Hanover, where Dartmouth College is. no, seriously, the town is so small that the video store wasnt open past 10 on a friday night. the exciting news was that they actually now had a video store. when heather was last there, the video store was part of the local gas station...sad sad...the house was beautiful, though.
her parents (sharyn and david) had actually just bought this house a year ago. we figured out that it sleeps at least 15. it is a three-story house, plus a loft. four bedrooms. huge. beautiful. here is the view from the bottom floor backdoor:



this is actually part of a smaller lake. there is a bigger one a little ways away (much bigger actually). unfortunately, tropical storm ernesto was coming through that weekend. so, driving up there, we had decent weather. and the saturday there was alright...overcast, but not rainy or too cold. saturday night we went to eat at this restaurant called jesse's where heather and her family have been going since the late 70s or early 80s or something like that. it was actually pretty funny because they carded heather (shes 30) and she didnt have her id and they wouldnt serve her alcohol. we all got a good laugh out of that. while i wouldnt say she looks old or anything, she definitely looks older than 21...and her parents were there. it was serious crap. =)
after dinner we went driving through hanover and saw dartmouth adn teh cute little college town. that was nice.

so, the main point of us going to new hampshire was to meet up with her parents and then go to her parents' house outside of boston in wellesley where heather's cats were flying in from la. heather's parents have this little dog named kirby. he is very spoiled. so spoiled in fact that he gets whatever he wants. he is not used to sharing his life, or his "parents" with anyone or anything else. we were all very curious about how he would react to sharing his house with two cats for two weeks....

heather's cats, bodhi and jannu, are beautiful cats. but they are bengals, which means they are talkers. loud talkers. but the sweetest most beautiful cats alive (i can say that now.....poor baby....) it was funny. heather said that when she got to the airport to pick up the cats, she could hear them meowing through two closed doors. poor cats.
so, they get the cats back to the house, and kirby just freaks out. stalking them, basically. not in a mean or hunting kind of way, but in a completely interested kind of way. by the time we left the next day, kirby was completely infatuated with jannu--the female cat. and, last i heard, heather's mom had found them laying on heather's bed together, licking eachother...ahh...mixed species lovin....

here is a picture of bodhi. you can see how beautiful his coat is, but you really cant get a true idea of him. he is a rather large cat (21 pounds, i think), witht eh most beautiful eyes. beautiful blue eyes, that turned really red in this picture. that and i had already taken like three pictures and he was pretty much over me putting a flash in his face...
so, we drove home from boston on tuesday. that was a hectic day. from boston to the upper west side, so heather's uncle's apartment in park slope (one part of brooklyn) to my apartment (brooklyn heights) to school...hectic! but we did it!

on wednesday, my mom came to visit! for those of you keeping track, yes, that was less then 24 hours recouperation/cleaning time for me. but we had a lot of fun!!!
we went shopping and i now own a beautiful set of dishes and some new clothes, and i have a wonderfully completely stocked kitchen! yes!!!

on friday night, mom took heather and i out to dinner in the meatpacking district at Florent--it looks a little like a 50s diner, but basically features french food. it was fun, and we had amazing wine and amazing food (both heather and i had the vegetarian cous cous--yum!)
from there, we went to alex's restaurant Belmont Lounge, where we took this fun picture:
Earlier that day, my mom and i went for a walk through central park and then to teh MET. while in the park, we saw a fashion shoot going on, and i thought i recognized teh model from one of those tv shows, but i couldnt remember who she was or where she was from. it was driving me nuts! but, heres another fun little game. the model was wearing bunny ears and a bunny tail, black finger gloves, black jacket, short skirt and leggings in front of a lake in the park...if someone finds this picture in a magazine in the next couple of months let me know!!
in central park, i stopped by and said hello to alice and some of her friends from wonderland:
my mom left today.....sad to see her go! but i know she will be back soon. maybe she will bring my dad out next time!!