The Unraveling

I swear, I will stop posting about my job. But I have to update all of you on the latest happenings. Sure enough, Karley is gone for good. I actually sent her a text message "innocently" asking her what is going on, and if she's coming back. She responds that no, she's not coming back. That the job "wasn't for her" and that right now she's out of town. But when she comes back into town, she'll drop off our office key. I tell her that's too bad, and to let me know if she needs any other help or anything else from us.

Can I tell you how my insides are rejoicing? Literally, rejoicing and shaking inside. I don't know how else to describe my complete delirium. Here's why: There are 2 things Jean doesn't know. The first (obviously) is that I'm pregnant and will be leaving May 16th. She will know this info in 2 and a half weeks and will have some time to "prepare" for my departure. Currently, she's thinking that I will be her little errand boy forever and that I'm going to be there until my ovaries shrivel up like hers. She also thinks that Jamie will be coming to work for her full time starting the first of May. So right now, she's not even advertising for a new assistant.

Well, the second thing that she doesn't know if that Jamie has no intention of coming to work for her full time. She's actively looking for a full time job to start the first week of May. She's going to be unavailable for a few days becuase of graduation, and then she'll be gone that last week of April for a family vacation. She doesn't have a full time job *YET* but as soon as she has one lined up, she'll let them know. It will be a SUBSTANTIAL announcement.

Now, remember when I said that Jean isn't going to hire someone else until Jamie comes full time? Well, I've already got permission to take my vacation April 24th to the 30th. What is Jean going to do for those days? Jamie won't be coming in, that's for sure: She's GRADUATING those days!!! I think that Jean has TOTALLY forgotten about it. Or she figures that she can "convince" Jamie or myself to stay. She always says things like "well, if they want this job badly enough, then they'll make it work." Well, Jean, your crappy job isn't worth someone missing their graduation. And I've already bought my ticket, so there is no way I'm canceling!

So what happens the 28th? I'm in Arizona, and Jamie won't be showing up to work because of her family vacation. They are going to be 100% without an assistant for 3 days. What will they do? Will Matt and Dan ACTUALLY start answering the phones? I doubt it, but it will be interesting to see how this all pans out. I want to see Jean's reaction when she realized that she's going to be high and dry for 5 days without an assistant. I bet she tries to bully Jamie or myself into trying to get us to stay. Good luck on that, you sorry excuse for a human.

So here is the timeline for those of you who are confused about what this all means:
April 17th: I drop the baby bomb on that office of turds.
April 24th-April 30th: I leave for a week of vacation. The office has NO ASSISTANTS to help them for 5 whole days.
April 24th-May 4th. Jamie is gone all this time because she's graduating and then going on a cruise with her family. (I think that I need to go on a cruise very soon.)
May 1st: I come back to HELL
May 5th: Jamie comes back. Or not. She might have another job lined up working somewhere else. She's not sure.
May 16th. My last day of work. I skip joyfully knowing that I never have to go back there again. and see those people and their ass faces (that's a reference to "Waiting for Guffman," if you were wondering)

So basically, the whole reason that I started writing this blog was to let you know that Jean's going to be without an assistant for 5 days, and she's totally not aware of it. She's already given permission to both me and Jamie, and there is no taking it back. There will be great gnashing of teeth when she realizes what she's done. I'll try to get it on tape for ya'll.

And finally, I have been requested to put some "belly" pictures on my website. I would like you to all marvel at how HUGE I've gotten: not just in the belly area, but in the hips, thighs, face and buttocks areas as well. Mostly in the buttocks. Every time I turn to the side, I swear this baby is growing out my butt. So if you don't want to see a large woman carrying a large baby, just close out of this window right now.

This is my work outfit. Every day. Rain or shine. The black pants and black sweater. Jean LOVES this sweater. Can you blame her? Doesn't it just bring out the HOTNESS in my eyes? You KNOW IT DOES.

Here are the "belly shots" you asked for.














Do you love how Raya HAS to be in the shot? She has no idea what I'm doing, but she knows that I'm holding very still for a few moments. So she decides to to the same thing.

Anyway, you can't say I didn't warn you , right? I am monstrously large! But like I've said many times before: This is the only time in the history of the world that I've ever been appreciative of my weight. It's allowed me to carry on one of the greatest deceptions that Utah has ever seen.

Now, there is one more photo that I was *thinking* of taking, but I'm pretty sure I will spare you all. It's a shot of my bare belly. Reagan can testify that my bare belly is RIDDLED with stretch marks. It's quite unattractive. If you really REALLY want to see it, I think I'll just email it to you directly. Take my work for it: It's NOT something you want to see more than once.

So that's my blog. I'll try to have a better topic for you next time. Food? Maybe I'll talk about the 2 packages of Swiss Cake Rolls I ate today. Or maybe about how I had just 2 Oreos today, and they were chilled in the fridge and they were AWESOME. Even though I don't like Oreos all that much, the fact that they were slightly chilled made them so delicious.

Yes, tomorrow's blog will be about food.

The Announcement

Don't get too excited. I didn't tell my boss yet about the baby. I know many of you know about my "D-Day" deadline of April 3rd to tell my boss. That is in 4 days. However, I have decided to change the date. The new date is the 17th, two weeks later than my original date.

And why, you ask, did I decide to do that? Well, I think you all read about my horrible day on Thursday. (That was the blog about workplace bullys, remember?) The short story about the day is that I lied and Jean totally caught me. I'm a HORRIBLE liar, and she called me on it. When the truth came out, she told me that I was being "sneaky" and I shouldn't "go behind her back" and do things without her permission.

Wanna know the ironic thing about that? Jean lies ALL the time. About EVERYTHING. Even small, stupid, inconsequential things. Most of the time it's easier for her to tell a lie than to tell the truth. Even when it would only take her 30 seconds to find out the truth, it's easier to make something up and spread it around like it's truth.

Anyway, after this incident where she caught me telling her ONE lie (compared to the one lie a minute she tells) she then proceeded to treat me like crap for the next 2 hours. Here is a partial list of comments/demands I got in those short hours:

Where are those papers? (me: I put them in your box Monday) Her: Well, I don't have them. Do them again.
I need this now. Get it for me now.
Did ______ call? What did they say? Why didn't you tell them ______?
What is going on with the ____________ file? Why didn't you tell me that ______ ago?
What is that smell? I have a sensitive nose.
It's too hot in here, turn on the air.
Now it's too cold in here. Alicia you have to be BETTER at monitoring these things.

And my personal favorite:

What did you DO today? It seems like you didn't do anything today.

Please remember that as she's screaming all these things to me, the phone keeps ringing and Matt, Dan, Maria and Peggy keep calling in with things for me to do. Agents keep calling to show houses, so I have to call the home owners to set those up. Inspectors, agents and clients continue to call to find out questions about their files. I'm the ONLY one answering the phone, and I'm the only one doing anything. And I have Jean, the Harpie, 15 feet away barking orders at me.

Here's the thing: I think that I'm a fairly realistic person. I'm very VERY good at seeing things sensibly and from a rational point of view. For example: I am mature and self-aware enough to recognize that while I don't really like my father, I have certain characteristics of his. (Those tend to be the things that I hate most in myself) But I don't think that everyone has this ability. I think others want to excuse their actions away, or justify that the rules don't apply to them for SOME reason.

Anyway, my point is that Jean is the least self-aware person I've ever met (besides my father, that is) because she never takes responsibility for anything. So when things make her mad, she's not bright or aware enough to say, "Why am I frustrated? What is making me so mad? What is affecting my mood right now?" Wait. Let me take that back. Whenever she feels mad, she's quick to blame me.

But most of the time, she just REACTS and doesn't question her actions. Why should she have to question them? She's the boss right? And the boss answers to no one, right? Well, that's what she did Thursday afternoon. She just reacted to her frustration and didn't actually stop and pull me into her office and say, "Alicia, I'm frustrated with you because. . . ." When she finally did that 2 hours later, things were resolved and over.

Can you imagine if those two hours lasted 6 weeks? I do NOT want her to treat me like that for 6 continuous weeks. That is my main reason for not telling her. If I didn't fear her reaction, then I would've told her MONTHS ago. I wonder if this experience will "teach her a lesson" about the way she treats assistants? I bet it doesn't, and all she does is make her agent contract even MORE strict. (Strict=making agents waive certain civil rights right at the beginning of working here)

But here's the other reason I'm not going to tell her: I think Karley quit. This has a back story too. So Monday Jean sent me an email saying that Karley told her she's sick and wouldn't be in that day. I've never taken more than one day off for being sick, except for last month when I took a few hours on 3 different days, and then told a lie and took off TWO days. (I still think that action was necessary, especially because I'm STILL coughing up fluid from that cold to this day)

Anyway, so I was expecting to see her on Tuesday. When it was 8:50 and she still wasn't here, I assumed that she had called Jean again about not coming, and that Jean just forgot to tell me. But 30 min later when Jean comes in and says, "where is Karley?" I'm stumped. Jean calls Karley, and finds out that Karley said that she sent her a TEXT message, and figured that was good enough. Jean says that she comes from a different "generation;" a generation that thinks texting is RUDE (and also apparently a generation that doesn't take "handouts," right Heather?) and so she wants a phone call when you call in sick.

She then continues on to say, "I don't care if you are on your death bed. I've never been too sick that I can't pick up the phone and make a 3o second call. And I don't want your fiance, or brother or husband or someone else to call for you. I want you to call." When I heard that, it seemed quite clear to me. Doesn't that seem clear to you?

Apparently, it was NOT clear to Karley. Come Wednesday, she didn't show up again. I asked Jean if she had a call from her, and she said, no. Same thing Thursday. Same thing Friday. For THREE DAYS the girl doesn't show up, doesn't call, doesn't tell us where she is. Friday morning I ask Jean, "Any news from Karley today?" and Jean says, "KARLEY DOESN'T WORK HERE ANYMORE"

I'm thinking, "Holy crap!! She fired her over the phone." But she the continues and says, "Well, she doesn't know that. Don't tell her if she calls. But I don't think I want her around anymore, someone who would do that. But she doesn't know yet. She still has my key. I need to get my key back from her." (even to the end, Jean is protecting herself and her belongings)

The truth is that I can see Karley coming in and telling some sob story and Jean letting her stay around. Jean is SO indecisive and won't do something if there is a chance there would be some sort of inconvenience to her. But Karley is just WEIRD, so I can also see her just not showing up ever again. It's just so up in the air right now.

So here is the bottom line for all of you:
Karley may or may NOT be fired.
I'm a horrible liar.
I'm not dropping the baby bomb until the 17th
I have Lynn's tape recorder that I will be wearing in my cleavage 24/7 in order to catch jean in some illegal conversations. This means that I hope to have some good recordings of Jean's illegal comments very soon!

Have a good Sunday, everyone!


P.S. At my ultrasound on Monday, my Radio Tech said that my baby has TONS of hair. We know it's Latino now for sure! I just hope it doesn't look like a gremlin. I think that sometimes half Latino babies look like gremlins. Please pray for my gremlin baby!!

Vacation- Day Three and Four

I've decided to combine day three and four together because nothing really happened on those days. Well, that's not REALLY true. Saturday morning we got up and had plans to go to Sea World. We also wanted to go to the temple because we were married in the San Diego Temple nearly 4 years ago. However, I was pretty sure that it wouldn't happen because I knew that we would be walking a whole lot that day and I would be really tired. But I left the option open in case time (and energy) permitted.

I have to mention that Marcelo tried to get in some exercise so he does like 14 push-ups and calls it good. Delusion. He's seriously got it going on to think that 14 push-ups and then nothing for days will do anything for his physique. Moving on.

That morning, we were having "food issues." By that I mean that we didn't know what to eat and we didn't want to spent lots of money again on the food at the hotel. But what to do? Marcelo once again left the decision up to me, but he kept vetoing all my suggestions. I suggested going and getting something from McDonald's or something else fast. He thinks McDonald's food is crap (I don't think I could really argue with him on that point) but what other option did we have? We didn't know where to find a supermarket, we didn't want to go to the hotel restaurant, and we didn't' want to go to like a Denny's or anything.

And I'm STARVING. I don't think I need to mention that. I'm sure that you all can assume that if I'm awake, then I'm starving. Here's the thing, I know that Marcelo is ALSO starving and it's taking a toll on his mood. (He would never admit that, though). We still are not sure what do do, so we go back to the little restaurant inside the hotel. We still don't know what we want to do and we are like ARGUING in front of our poor waitress. Marcelo's like "Why do you always ask me what I want to do? You never decide."

Well, I WOULD just make a decision if I had any hope that you would like my choice. But when I give you many options, and you say no to all of them, that's when I ask you what you want to do. I finally said, "I just came up with 4 different options for what to do for breakfast. You said no to all of them. It's your turn: you come up with 4 others. GO!"

Well, that finally shut him up. I could see that he's not going to be hospitable in the next few minutes, and in those minutes I NEEDED to eat something. So we just stay there and he orders the fruit bowl and I order a bagel with cream cheese. We eat in silence. I've learned my lesson (remember my previous blog?) and I don't speak to him.

Remember how I said that Marcelo is moody like a woman, but not able to recognize it? Well, I knew that the fact that he was kinda tired and REALLY hungry was taking a toll on his mood. But I couldn't say so. And I knew that once we got to Sea World and he saw a few dolphins do some flips for him, and he got his hands on some Bat Rays, then he would be fine. So I just hauled it as fast as I could to Sea World.

And guess what? I was absolutely right. I'M A FREAKING GENIUS!!! As soon as we walked in (and I went to the bathroom, of course) he was instantly happy. The first thing we did was go to the Walrus & Seal show. As you know if you've ever gone to Sea World, most of the shows and their jokes are geared towards 7-10 year olds and that kind of humor. Wanna know something about Latinos? Their humor is EXACTLY THE SAME.

Think about ANY Spanish "comedy" show. It usually involves people wearing ridiculous costumes (like clowns) slip & fall gags, and a little song and dance with some animal tricks thrown in. That's why Marcelo doesn't think that I'm very funny: I deal more with vocabulary humor, and not so much slip and fall. (However, I do have a GREAT fake fall. After I'm pregnant, ask me to do it for you in a Bed Bath & Beyond. Or maybe walking down the isle of a theater. I actually considered doing it with Reagan last week when we were once again at BB&B, but at the last minute I decided that it wouldn't be the best idea right now, seeing is how I'm 8 months pregnant. Meh!)

Point simple: Marcelo doesn't think I'm "THAT" funny because I don't wear silly clown costumes as I tell lame jokes and make horrible puns. However, everyone else thinks I'm freaking hilarious, so I'll take their opinion as fact. Why? Because that's the opinion I want to believe.

So here are a few pictures from that show:
















That person in the photo on the left? Yeah, it's a girl. Marcelo was confused by it's gender for like 10 minutes. He must've asked me like 4 times if it was a boy or a girl. And I always said it's a girl. And then 3 min later, he was like "That's a guy, right?" Oh man, the 4th time I was like, "GIRL! IT'S A GIRL GIRL GIRL!" I still think he didn't believe me 100% and he only would've believed it if he could've seen her naked.

Here are a few pictures from the Dolphin show:















He LOVED the dolphin show. However, I'm going to say this: I think they are letting the animals "rest" during the off season. I mean, I remember when I came to Sea World when I was 13, and those dolphins were flipping the crap out. They had the pole that they put up, and they would keep putting it higher and see the dolphin jump higher and higher to reach the pole.

There was no pole jumping!! There was hardly any "showmanship" from those dolphins! I want to see them spinning in the air, wearing funny wigs and doing my taxes! I PAID GOOD MONEY TO SEE THOSE DOLPHINS DO MY TAXES! What a jip. Actually, I bet it was the same show as when I was young. It's just that now, I'm not as easily impressed as when I was 12. I didn't tell Marcelo that I thought the show was "better" back then. I let his little kid mind soak in all the grandeur of flipping sea mammals.

So when I was last at Sea World when I was 12 or 13, there WAS a dolphin petting area but the dolphins were scared of the people. I bet they had one too many 3 year-olds poke them in the eye. So they wouldn't swim up to you, and that broke my little girl heart. But NOW, they let you buy fish and feed the dolphins. With the prospect of food, those dolphins will come RIGHT up to you and open their mouths. It doesn't even matter if you have a fish or not. You can hold your hand up over the tank PRETENDING to have a fish, and they will come up an open their mouths right up. It rocks because even if you don't want to pay $5 for 4 little fish, you can psych them out and then get a pet on the head in for a quick photo op. (I only did that once. I felt guilty teasing the dolphins.)

So here is Marcelo showing us how he pets them. And then showing the fish he's about to feed the dolphins.
But I think that this picture is my favorite:


The dolphin got too close to comfort for Mar and he pulled his hand away fast. Look at the scared look on his face. And look at the devilish grin on the dolphin's mouth. HA!! That kills me. He totally thought that he was going to lose a hand. So freaking funny. I'm glad I got it on film.

Do you want to see more pictures? If you do, let me know and I'll post them in a slide show or something. But I don't really think you care anymore, do you? I didn't think so.

We were going to stay till the end of the day and see the nighttime Shamu show, but I was SO tired, I just wanted to get home. Oh!! and Marcelo somehow talked me into going on that "Rapids" ride where you and 6 others are in like a big floating tire and you go in this chute of rapids. I think it would've been awesome, had it not been 55 degrees because you get SOAKING WET. I was so freaking cold and I just wanted to sleep.

So that's what we did! We went back to the hotel and Marcelo did some homework. I tried to get some lovin' from him (I mean, we WERE on our second honeymoon, right?) and he was like "I'm doing this homework." And I pretended to be offended/hurt for like 2 minutes, but that was the LAST THING I REMEMBER!! I was so exhuasted I think I fell asleep right in the middle of a pouty sentence asking him why not. . . . ZZZZZZZZZ. Obviously I really didn't want the lovin', I just thought that we should because we were in a hotel. We laughed about it the next morning.

And then next morning we had PLENTY of time to laugh becuase we were driving home. Marcelo of COURSE made me drive through the "busy parts" again. Seriously, I need to do a whole blog on Marcelo's fears. One of them is DEFINITELY driving in busy & unfamiliar places. Even though that makes me nervous too, I always have to suck it up and do it. What a baby.

And we were on our way to Vegas. Why Vegas? Well because we hadn't eaten in nearly 24 hours and we were totally going to eat at the Mandalay Bay Resort for the awesome buffet. And why the Mandalay Bay specifically? Because they have king crab legs and Marcelo has been craving them for months. How many king crab legs did he eat? Guess. Did you guess 17? Then you are right!! Isn't that disgusting? 17 king crab legs, and like nothing else. I of course have 2 plates of food, I SHOULD'VE had more, but I was SOO hungry and thirsty when we sat down, that I had a whole glass of juice before we had even eaten a single thing. Dang juice filled me up!! CURSE YOU DELICIOUS ORANGE JUICE!I still ate enough to make my stomach hurt for the next 3 hours. So it was money well spent.

The drive home was pretty uneventful. Except that we almost ran out of gas again (why won't we learn?) and then it was snowing a little bit as we came into town. It was ironic that it was freezing cold coming back, but I had been sunburned at Sea World the day before and my face was on FIRE. It was very hard to stay comfortable.

But we made it!! We went and picked up Raya, and she was happy to see us. We went home and tried to get the smell of Star Crunches and King Crab leg farts out of our car. I don't think that I'll ever get that smell out of my seats. So if you ever travel in my car in the future, I'm going to apologize for it right now in advance.

Well, that was our vacation. It was really fun, and I'm really glad that we did it. If we ever go back, I'm definitely going to Mapquest some grocery stores. If we only knew where one was, we could've avoided lots of moodiness on both our parts. I also really loved the fact that my ankles were skinny for a few days. I wish I could reclaim that again.

And King Crab legs. I want some of those right now too.

New post?

I promise I'll ill post something new and hilarious soon. In the meantime, I want you to know how my week went. To do that, you need to read this article here:

http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/TakeControlOfYourLife/Story?id=4526313&page=1

And this one too:

http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fsb/fsb_archive/2007/07/01/100123041/index.htm

So that's so you can get an accurate picture of my work place environment. I also found this awesome story that I sent to Reagan back in June of 2006. I've been dealing with this kind of behavior for FAR too long. I think you all really REALLY support me when I tell you that I'm going to light my boss' hair on fire one day. Please enjoy my misery.

Dear Reagan,

You have to forgive me. I’m so sorry I couldn’t write yesterday. The s**t fell from the sky. I had like a million things on my desk, and then my boss decided to throw a tantrum like a 2 year old. Here is how it worked:

9:30 am: “Alicia, you need to call Circuit City and tell them my laptop won’t turn on”

I have the following items on my list of things to do for the day: Process 4 contracts (on those 4 contracts, I have to hunt down 4 different people to get 4 separate sets of signatures), process a listing, set up multiple listing appointments, inspections, home warranties fill out deposit slips for deposits that HAVE to be made today (or the state will shut down our office), set up all the print advertising for our office and answer the never ending ringing phone

I figure that even just ONE of those items is more important than her freaking computer. But I am, of course, wrong.

11:45: “Alicia, have you called Circuit city yet?” I say, “No, I got tied up with other *more important* things (items indicated between the *'s are words that were going through my head but not expressed out loud). “Let me call them right now”

I call and learn she has a warranty until 2009. I go into her office and I bring the laptop. “You have a warranty until 2009. It can be dropped off and they will look at it for free.” I say as I put the laptop on her desk. Her response: “Ok, do that”.

“Do it? Oh, I thought you wanted to take it in yourself. You want me to do that right now? I have 4 contracts and a listing to process. Can I wait until they are done?” She says, “NO, this is WAY more important than that.” And then she says the clincher: “I CANNOT FUNCTION WITHOUT MY LAPTOP.”

In my opinion, it is crazy to say that you cannot function without something that you only use 1 hour of the day. When I say I cannot function without something, I am usually talking about my thumbs, or my anal sphincter, or OXYGEN. But a laptop? A laptop that’s only purpose is to store her iTunes? She is in this office A LOT and she has a desktop computer here. She also has a desktop computer at home. In addition to her laptop she has at home!!! What can she possibly have to do that cannot be done on one of these other two computers?

So I have just had it. And I am thinking, “Fine, the 2 year old who writes my paycheck wants her cookies and juice right now, so I will go and take care of that RIGHT NOW!! GREAT!!!"

Then I realize that I don’t have a car because Marcelo has taken my car to get his oil changed. So I come back into the office and tell her this and work on those other million of things to do. And I’m secretly happy that I can’t do what she wants me to do RIGHT THEN.

After lunch I go to circuit city. I take it in and wait in a long line while about 9 Circuit city employees roam around the store and ignore the 5 people waiting in line! Hey asshole! I know you work here!! You are wearing the obligatory nasty red CC shirt and have chronic acne. I’m SURE you work her.

Then I go back to work and go back to the mountain of work I have to do. Then I get a call at about 4:30.

Apparently her computer is so fried that she has to mail it to Sony. I could have them mail it in, but it will take 3 weeks to get it back, when it would only take 1 week for us to get it back if we mail it in ourselves. I say, “Jean, I have to go pick it up. We have to mail it in ourselves. Your motherboard is fried. I’ll call Sony, they will send us a box, and then we’ll send it to them.” And here is her response, “I need it by Friday. Will they get it back to us by Friday?”

I have to S-L-O-W down my speech and use small words because obviously she isn’t listening to me. So I repeat again, “No, we will have to wait for them to send us a box, and then we will have to send a box to them. It will take at least a week AFTER they received the computer”

And here is the last thing she said. I almost flipped my shit AGAIN when she said this: “Well, you missed the mail deadline for today. That’s why I wanted you to do this so early in the morning. Now we lost a day. You should’ve done it in the morning”

WHAT PART OF “They have to send US a box before we can send it to them” DON’T YOU UNDERSTAND!!??? So I slow down and for the THRID time, I repeat myself telling her that it didn’t matter because we have to wait for THEM to send us a box before we can send it to them. She *finally* gets it, and lets me leave.

I am not kidding when I say that I am dealing with a two year old. You know how you have to tell piper something 3 times and she STILL doesn’t listen? Welcome to my job. That's my boss. a 54 year old college graduate has the same intelligence as your daughter.

Love, Alicia

Vacation- Day TWO

We woke up early on Friday morning. This day starts off well enough. We go breakfast at the hotel. We figure that between driving around and looking and then paying 9 bucks at another IHOP, It’s worth it just to eat here. They have a breakfast buffet and I eat my weight in eggs, sausage and French toast. It’s heavenly. And it keeps me full all day, until we eat again at like 3 pm.

And then we go to the zoo! It’s fun and gay and tra-la-la. I’m being silly. It’s actually really fun. We use my mom’s AAA card, and we get like $7 off each ticket. (I'm such a cheapie. Especially because we spent so much already and we'll definitely be spending more) We decide that we will look around everything on foot first and then get on the bus for the guided tour.

I don’t know it at the time, but this means I have just signed myself up for 6.5 hours of continuous walking. And there are multiple hills of various heights. It’s not fun for someone who’s a)Seven and a half months pregnant and b)hasn’t done more than 30 minutes of exercise since last summer.

And it will surprise you what's hurting me the most: It's my feet. The actual bottoms of my feet. The heel, the arch and the ball of the foot. I’ve always known that I have low arches, and I need to get shoes with arch support. Usually this means paying WAAY too much for them. But it’s all worth it when my feet don’t hurt. Well, these shoes were cheep, (free, as a gift) so I didn’t worry too much about them. I should’ve. Seriously, it was bad.

Wanna know the funny thing? They don't hurt while I'm walking, but when I stop and I'm standing there it's excruciating. I have to dance back and forth from one foot to the next trying to block out the pain. When I sit down, the pressure is of course released, but that can't happen all the time. The worst was standing in line to see the pandas. We stood in like about 15 minutes to see the most adorable pandas. Here's a picture.

I totally feel like that panda is my kin. Rolling back, relaxing, eating and propping things up on its belly; that's my kinda guy! I've been in that position for like the last 2 hours today, and I was that way whenever I was on the bed at my hotel.

Anyway, Marcelo is actually very good about my sitting down. He takes LOTS of pictures. So After I look at the animal, read things about it, I find a bench where I can sit and watch. Marcelo spends 5 to 15 minutes (all depending on the willingness of the animal to perform) trying to get a good shot of the animal’s face, or paws, or something.

He tries to talk to every animal and get them to do a little dance for him. The Lynx actually HISSED at him. It was freaking awesome. Except for the fact that we don't have any pictures of us with the animals. It's just the animals. And Marcelo just took pictures of the animals, not their names. So all those crazy animals? We don't know what they are. (Menos efficaz, Marcelino) Here are a few no-brainers:

Just so you know, that zebra is NOT trying to hump the other one. They are both males. and they were just like messing with each other. I think they were bored and they were trying to entertain themselves. They kept crashing in mid-air and biting each other. Seriously, it was awesome to see the fight.

So after we walked a million miles, we finally took that sky-tram. Here's the view:

So back to talking about my feet: I'm wondering how I’m going to make it tomorrow when we have to walk another 6-7 hours around Sea World. My only consolation is that Sea World has lots of SHOWS and one can sit down and watch the show for a half hour. That’s what my plan is, anyway. Oh, and I also bought some Dr. Scholls Gellin’ arch supporters. I think those will work nicely. I took them out for a spin when we went to dinner, and they seemed to be working well. But more on dinner later.

We finally get food at like 3 pm. It’s all really expensive and it looks yucky. I decide to get a barbecue pork sandwich, or something. It comes with fries. Marcelo says, “It comes with fries” I say “yeah? And.” He says, “do you really want to eat those?” and I say, “You know what? I don’t care what I eat at this point. Just buy me whatever YOU decide I should eat.” And then I go and sit down.

The reason I was so upset was because that wasn't the first time he commented on my food choices that day. The first one was at breakfast when I took a croissant for the road. He of course commented on the fact that I was eating bread. I told him to shut the hell up. I really did. I knew it would be some time before we ate again, and I wasn’t going to let a tasty croissant like that just pass me by. That kind of put him off guard for a while, but at least he shut up about food. Well, until the French fry remark.

He was like "Why do you have to get so mad?" I didn't even respond to that. He knows damn well why I was upset. But I just eat my sandwich AND ALL MY FRIES in silence. I think the exhaustion was taking a toll on my attitude, and that was a pretty bastard thing to say. But he doesn't bring up food again for the rest of the trip and I'm fine with that. He's got to learn that everytime he says something like that, he's going to get a wife slap to the head.

Ok, I just read over this whole blog, and it's NOT funny. I need to add some funniness. I don't know if I can. There is more drama to come in the day.

We actually are back on speaking terms after we get some food inside of us. We finish looking around the zoo and head home. While I'm driving home, I get a call from my mom. She said that plans have changed. See, the original plan was that she would be home and be able to watch our dog until we got home Sunday night. When we got home, she would drive away with my oldest brother to go to Arizona and spend the week there.

Well, now the plan was that instead of driving away Sunday night, my brother Nate would drive her down to Richfield on Saturday where they would meet my brother, ride 4 wheelers for the day, and then Nate would drive home while my mom would stay and drive with Jeff down to AZ.

So my first question was: what's going to happen to my dog? My mom said, "oh, when we go down to Richfield, they are going to leave her in Orem and leave her in the cage all day. We'll be leaving at like 10 am, and they should be back by 10 pm. Hopefully your dad will let them out the cage at sometime to go pee"

(excuse my language right now) WHAT THE HELL??!?!?!? What part of that plan sounds somewhat ok to you? Do you know anything about the breed of my dog? Or do you know anything about dogs in general? Why do you think it would be ok to leave a dog in a cage for 12 hours in a row? Andy why did you decide that would be ok to do to my dog? Maybe you can do that to your dog, but I can't, and I don't appreciate you making that decision for me.

So, that was my first complaint. I asked my mom what would happen the next day. She said, "oh, Nate will watch her." Here is the thing about my brother Nate: He thinks it's ok to hit his dog. Marcelo and I don't agree with that like of thinking. We have NEVER hit Raya, and you know what? She is a wonderful dog. She never pees in the house, she doesn't bite, and if I let her off the leash, I can keep her right by my side using my tone of voice and the words "Stay close."

Viszla dogs NEED love and attention. Raya is the BIGGEST cuddler. If you let her, she'll tuck her head in the crook of your neck and wrap her arms around you and give you a big hug. Marcelo will pick her up and carry her around the house like a baby and the whole time, she has her arms around your neck holding on. These dogs just want you to love them, and the fact that Nate and Denisse have no problems hitting their dog really upsets me. It lets me know that they will have no problems smacking their kids around either.

Point simple, I did NOT want Nathan watching my dog. My mom did not understand this, and I was in TEARS trying to explain it to her. She was just like "well, I don't know what you want to do." and I said, "I WANT YOU TO TAKE CARE OF HER LIKE YOU PROMISED!"

Marcelo was SO upset. He was like "we should just go home tomorrow (Saturday) and not go to Sea World. We should just go home and take care of her. When my mom heard him say this, she was like "so from now on you can never go on vacation again because you have a dog?" and I said, "No, from now on we'll just make sure that the person who watches our dog won't up and walk out if something comes up. If this happens again, I'll make sure the person who watches her will be more reliable"

I was REALLY pissed. Marcelo and I tried to think of other ways to have her be watched. His friend Juan Carlos said he could come over on Saturday and let her out to play several times. Then he would do the same thing on Sunday. Here is the problem with that: His wife is in her first trimester and puking her guts out every 30 minutes. And he can't drive. So what do you think will happen when he says, "we need to go let Raya out" and she says, "No, i can't take you, I don't feel well." Raya will INSTANTLY take a backseat to his wife. As well she should, but I didn't want to take that risk.

The other problem with that is that they wouldn't be here for her at night time. Night is when Raya needs the most attention. She's used to sleeping around during the day, but starting at like 8 pm, it's TOTALLY playtime. And sometimes that playtime lasts all the way to midnight. She sleeps by our bed, and if she can't see you at night when it's dark, she starts crying uncontrollably. I can't bare the thought of her crying all night.

So that's why Juan Carlos isn't a good option, and neither was my sister. You know, she wasn't going to hang around and babysit my dog. She has people to see, dates to go on and boys to kiss. (Jules is a lip whore)

So my next thought was Lisa. Lisa I KNEW would take Raya, and she would let her sleep in the house, probably next to the bed of one of her kids. (You have to watch Raya though, if she gets the chance, she'll climb into bed with someone and snuggle right next to anyone. Like I said, she's a snuggler). And sure enough, the moment I brought it up to Lisa, she was like "OF COURSE!!!" (THANKS LISA!!! YOU ARE WHAT MY FAMILY SHOULD ASPIRE TO BE)

The problem with Lisa is that her backyard isn't fenced. I don't worry about Raya running away, but if she gets really excited, (like I know she would with the opportunity to play with Milo, Lisa's dog) she doesn't listen very well. If Lisa were to take her, I would want to be there and teach Lisa the words and the tone of voice that I use to control Raya when she gets all excited. Honestly, I didn't want to do that over the phone, because I thought that Lisa would think I was crazy for talking about my do like she were a person.

Basically, I was really pissed at my mom. And hungry. During all the dog drama and trying to find out what is going to go on with Raya, and where she will stay, we once again decide that we are going back to Prospect Street in La Jolla to look for more seafood. We went to the south of the street, but we decide to head north this time to see what was up there. We heard there was a good place up there called the "Crab Catcher." That sounds promising, right?

Wrong. Again, we were greeting with plates of Mahi Mahi and Salmon for $50 each. We were SO pissed. And we had dog drama. We ended up finding an Italian place that had some fresh seafood items on the menu. How pathetic is that: in Southern Cali, right next to the beach and we go to an ITALIAN restaurant.

While there, we kept getting phone calls trying to work out the dog situation. It was not a good night. I'm super freaking emotional and crying all the time. Marcelo keeps threatening to go home tomorrow. I start crying again. I'm worried about Nathan hitting the dog, and worried about her staying in the cage all day long.

So what did we end up doing? Well, my mom took Raya with her down to Richfield so she could could play all day. And then Nate watched her that night and the next day. I really felt like I had no other option, but at least Raya didn't have to cry all night long alone I really haven't talked to Nathan about the dog situation, but truthfully, I don't trust him with a living thing. He and his wife just aren't compassionate enough for my liking. Sorry, that's hard for me to say, but that's how I feel.

Anyway, i wanted to give you an update on the pitted edema situation. If you read on my comments on that blog, my old roommate Amy commented on how she had the same situation. (I WOULD put a link to her blog, but Amy is one of THOSE people that only lets "invited" readers see her blog. Don't EVEN get me started on THOSE people. . . ) Anyway, she said that after she walked for a whole day, her feet were so horrible, but she propped them up and in the morning they were completely normal.

So I tried to do the same thing. After walking and walking and walking for hours, I came home and immediately put them up on top of 3 pillows. And guess what? IT DID WORK!! Thanks Amy!! Your advice was invaluable. I think that it was the combo of walking AND the propping. I don't think that just the propping up of my feet would do the same thing. I think you need to get the blood flowing before you prop them up. That's just my theory, but it totally worked. Thanks for your advice Amy. This temporarily lets you off the hook for being one of THOSE people. HAR HAR.

I think that this blog has been long enough, but I'm sad to say it's not funny. It's considerably moody, grumpy and whiney. I'm sorry. I'll try to make my blog tomorrow better. Maybe another fart story or too? Those always seem to go over so well.

Vacation- Day ONE

WARNING!!! LONG POST TO FOLLOW!!!

I know that my many blog fans (ok, the 3 of you) have been wondering where I have been. Well, I've been on VACATION!! I think I did a pretty good job of recording the memorable moments of our little trip to San Diego. So here are the highlights from DAY ONE:

I’m on vacation!! As I write this, I’m laying down in my hotel bed, not wearing pants and loving the fact that I’m not at work. . . and pants-less. I think I would enjoy work more if I didn't have to wear pants. I don't think the others would enjoy it, but I sure would. Anyway, It’s going to be a glorious few days here. But of COURSE I have stories from the road! Did you forget that this is Alicia’s Blog?

Starting Tuesday, night Marcelo was just like really fussy. He kept sleeping on the couch under the excuse that it was my snoring that wouldn’t let him sleep well. I really don’t care about that. Mostly because then I get the whole bed to myself, and he gets the uncomfortable couch. But for some reason, he still woke up mad at me.

I have learned after nearly 4 years of marriage that the best way to resolve Marcelo’s “mystery moods” is to just let them ride. Leave him alone and usually in less than 24 hours he’ll be back to his chipper self. And then I can ask him what was bothering him. That’s the best way if I ever want to get an answer out of him. If I try to get it RIGHT THEN, he will just get frustrated, and so will I, and then that frustration can lead to anger. Some of our biggest fights could’ve been avoided if I had just left him alone and then come back 24 hours later to talk to him about what was going on.

So my point is that after 24 hours, he was STILL not happy. I don’t know why, but I could see that it still wasn’t time to come and talk to him. But I had had enough. It was just getting childish. And it was like 7 hours before we were supposed to leave for our trip!! What if his mood persisted and he ruined our vacation!! I was NOT having it. So when he lay down on the couch again, I got up and I walked downstairs and I was like, “What is going on with you? Do you need to tell me something that I did to offend you? What is happening? Why do you keep sleeping on the couch?”

He tried to say that it was my snoring again, but I reminded him that I snored LONG before my pregnancy and long before the last 2 nights, so what the heck was going on?” I wasn’t answered. He wasn’t ready to talk. Fine, but there was no way he was going to ruin my vacation, so I said, “Ok, I can see you don’t want to talk, but you need to grow up and tell me what is going on. I can’t help you if I don’t know what’s happening. I hope whatever it is that is bothering you is gone by morning. If not, you need to talk to me and tell me, because this silent treatment is really getting old. Get over it by morning.”

And then I went to bed. And guess what? It WAS gone in the morning!! I really don’t know what it was, and I don’t think I will come back and ask him what it was. Honestly, I don’t really care why he was mad. He didn’t want to tell me, and now he’s over it. I’m fine with that! But the point is that we were going to start our vacation off right!!!

So here is a play by play of the first day of our vacation. I hope you enjoy.

4:30 am. I wake up because I have to pee in the worst way.

4:40 am. I hear Marcelo wake up downstairs. He uses the bathroom down there, which is nice because it alerts both Raya and myself that he will be coming upstairs soon. Raya has time to jump off the bed where she’s been sleeping (HOGGING all the covers and bed space, I might add) and give Marcelo the appearance that she HASN’T been curled up next to me on the bed all night.

4:45 am. Marcelo gets in shower.

4:55 am. I get in shower. Seeing is how the hotel we are going to has 5 pools and 4 Jacuzzi hot tubs, I know that I will be needing to shave my “bikini area.” However, I have just discovered that I cannot shave this area with ease. I can’t bend over to see if I’ve got it all, or even if I’m close to where I need to be. I have to do it by feel, (dont' think about that phrase for too long. It will just gross you out). I’m sure I have a fantastic 5 o’clock shadow down there right now. Whatever. At least I don’t have "things" hanging out. And who looks at another person’s crotch, anyway? If someone looks down, they get what they deserve, "things" and all.

5:10 am. I get out of shower and remind Marcelo about bringing his sunglasses. I’m sure that when I’m down there I’ll be stopping at a Walgreens or something to buy myself a $10 pair. But for the car ride down, I want his nice polarized ones. He says he’s already remembered them and they are packed.

5:15 am. Marcelo gives Raya a bath. She goes crazy after it’s over. She thinks it’s playtime. I’m severely scratched, but she smells nice and looks so pretty!! I don't know why he thought it was SO important to bathe her before we go. But he didn't ask me to do it, he did it himself, so why do I care?

5:45 am. We finally leave after last minute instructions to my mom. We've told her how to have Raya sleep so she won't cry all night. Most of the instructions we giver her are about the dog. I don't think my mom needs to know how to run our dishwasher-she can figure it out by herself. However, I DO think she needs to know that sometimes Raya just needs a snuggle. Let her hook her head into your neck, and she's a happy little girl. Anyway, as for my mom, I think that she will have fun living in my house all by herself for the weekend.

5:47 am. Realize that we forgot a toothbrush. Decide to drive on and buy a toothbrush there. (Yes, you read that right. We were 2 minutes from home and we didn’t want to go back.)

5:57 am. I ask for Marcelo’s sunglasses. He said he forgot them. WHAT?!?!? I totally reminded him to bring them and he said, (and I quote) “I already packed them.” Doesn’t that imply that they would be in his bag if he already packed them? When I’ve “already packed” something, I can go get it out of my bag when I need it on my trip. I think we need to work some more on Marcelo’s English.

6:00 am. I crawl in the back of the car and fall asleep. You should know that we laid down our back seat and we made like a double bed back there with a piece of foam, blankets and 2 pillows. A stubby double bed filled with luggage, but still some sleeping space. The reason we did this is because we are planning to sleep in the back of our car the first night. That’s right, we are super cheap, but we figure it will save us money, so what.

8:45 am. We stop at Cedar City for breakfast. I have the IHOP “split decision” and Marcelo has the T-bone steak and eggs. The guy is obsessed with steak. We decide not to get gas there in Cedar City because it’s too expensive. For some reason we think that it’ll be cheaper in St. George.

8:53am. Now back in car, I discover boysenberry syrup in my hair. I must’ve dragged my hair through the pool of it on my plate at the IHOP. It’s dried all sticky and has created a rat’s nest of hair and syrupy goodness. I suck on my hair to remove all the syrup that remains. Hair now clean, I go back to driving.

9:12 am. I start to notice that my underwear is cutting off the circulation on my legs. I remember that I put on some of my “smaller” undies in the morning when I got dressed, but I thought that I would only be sitting in the car driving, not walking anywhere, so it would be ok. It’s not ok. My legs are red and tender and hurt like the dickens.

10:00 am. Stop in St. George for gas. The first places we saw were like $.15 more than the stations back in Cedar City. I am cursing myself for not getting gas there. But then we turn a corner and we hit pay dirt!! Walmart, baby. So we get gas and Sunglasses. I also buy gummy bears, jerky, generic Nutrigrain bars and Little Debbie Star Crunches. Marcelo is able to sleep for a little while, but he’s now awake. Get back on the road heading for Vegas.

10:02 am. I slowly and quietly try to open up a Star Crunch. I don’t think Marcelo will approve of my choice in travel snacks. So I do it as quietly as possible. I get the box open, pull one out, get the package open and take one bite when all of a sudden his head pops up from the back like a freaking prairie dog coming out of it’s hole to check things out. He goes “what’s that?” I said “A star crunch. Wanna try a bite?” I pass it back to him. I hear contented chomps. I say, “I said a bite. Are you going to eat it all?” He hands back a mangled nibblet about 1/32 of the original Crunch. I sarcastically thank him for leaving so much for me. He wants another one. Hum, apparently Marcelo likes Little Debbie just as much as I do. (Update:Marcelo stole all the Star Crunches for the rest of the trip. I had 2 of them total: he had the other 10. Bastard stole my Little Debbies!! Vengeance is mine!!)

10:29 am. Realize I can no longer take my constrictive underwear. I pull out my Leatherman to do the deed. I decide I’m not going to cut them off completely like I did to that other pair outside of Gold’s Gym (That’s a story for another day), but instead I’ll just cut the elastic at the bottom so it gives me more room. That’s the only place that’s bothering me, anyway. But now I’m in a bind: how do I undo my seatbelt, wiggle my pants down to below my knees and make the necessary cuts with surgeon-like precision all while going 80 miles an hour down I-15?

10:34 am. Still working up the nerve and trying to figure out how to take my pants off while driving.

10:51 am. Realize that I’m wearing my green fleece pants that have really big leg holes. I can lift UP the pant legs and do the deed that way.

10:52 am. Instant relief as blood is finally able to rush to my legs again.

12:45 pm. Pass by Vegas. See many signs for what appears to be the World’s Largest “Adult” Megastore. Consider going in and standing around making judgmental comments and/or looks when I see what people have purchased. I decide not to, not just because I don’t want to waste the time, but because those people could be married and trying to “spice up” things at home. Judge ye not. . .

1:25 pm. Marcelo and I switch drivers again. We see that it is 99 miles to Barstow. We know that we have a little more than half a tank of gas. We know we can make it that far without any problem. We decide to wait and get gas In Barstow, CA. I don't know why we decided to do this, seeing is how we were almost screwed by the whole Cedar City/St George Situation, but we do.

1:26 pm. I am again instantly asleep in the back of the car.

2:15 pm. (Time change in effect) Awoken by a panicked Marcelo. I can feel that the car is being swayed slightly by wind. Marcelo says it has been that way this whole time, and that there have been lots of hills up and down. That being the case, the gas was consumed a lot faster than planned. We are not in a desperate gas situation. We *think* we can make it to Barstow, but we aren’t sure. Panic.

2:27 pm. We pull over at one little gas station, but their pumps are like out of the 1930’s And they don’t have nozzle handles on them. It’s weird and sketchy, I tell Marcelo to drive on.

2:49 pm. We find ANOTHER little gas station. This time we can see it from the highway, and all the pumps have their nozzles. And the bargain price for this gas? $3.95 a gallon. Are you kidding me? What, are you like going to another gas station and filling up with their gas and the coming back and marking it up $.35 a gallon? And then I look over and see a man pouring gas from red containers into the ground gas holes!! I thought my eyes were fooling me, but no, he was filling up his underground gas well with gas he had purchased at other gas stations. So I guess I was right. That IS why it’s so expensive.

3:05 pm. That ¼ pound of gummy bears I ate 3 hours ago is doing a number on my bowels and my stomach. I have horrible rancid farts and Marcelo keeps getting mad at me when I release them without warning him. Sorry, buddy, I’m going to get rid of them. And it’s not like I don’t suffer from smelling them either!!

3:55 pm. Make it to San Bernardino where we encounter MORE gas problems. Gas at one place is $.19 higher than the place across the street. However, the place with the cheaper gas? They only take debit cards. (we have NO money in our debit account). And so we drive farther down the highway to find another gas station. We get lost. (kind of). Marcelo says it’s OK because it’s “all part of the adventure”. We continue to drive around for a VERY long time looking for gas stations. We ask some locals. They direct us to a main strip and we find 3 more gas stations. 2 of them don’t take credit cards. The third one DOES, but instead of paying $.19 more per gallon, we have to pay $.21 more. Marcelo no longer thinks this is all part of the adventure. He’s pissed. We switch drivers.

6:03 pm. Finally make it to San Diego. Not very much traffic, even though we were totally driving during rush hours. Marcelo is freaked out by big city driving and always makes me drive whenever we get into unknown places. Especially when they are big cities. He’s not a very good co-pilot either. It’s usually me looking at the maps while trying to drive and then starting to veer to one side, and him yelling at me for not being more careful. The truth is that it would be MUCH better if he were driving, because I read the maps and could tell him where to go. He won’t do it, he’s scared. Wimp.

6:07 pm. Get to our hotel to “check it out”. We can’t actually check in until tomorrow. We talk about what we are going to do that night. The plan was to go into the hotel, change our clothes and go walk around somewhere. It’s right now that I decide to tell Marcelo that I have brought only 2 pairs of pants, and that I’m wearing one of them right then. He’s baffled. “why didn’t you bring other pants?” he says. “What pant would I have brought?” I answer back. He thinks about it and realized I’m right, and I don’t have any other pants that fit me.

6:10 pm. We are stumped. We don’t know what to do. We feel yucky and sticky and there is a funny smell in the car (gummy bear farts, star crunches and sunflower seeds will do that) We want to take showers and refresh ourselves, but we don’t have anywhere to do it. Marcelo says that he would not be opposed to paying for an extra night in the hotel.

6:39 pm. After several calls to our hotel booker, the hotel itself and my mother to get our confirmation number off the web, we DO get the room. It’s pretty cheap because it’s a Thursday night, not a weekend. Marcelo expresses immediate relief and even though I’m secretly doing the mental tally of money spent on this trip, I am also relieved that I don’t have to sleep in the back of the car. Marcelo is relieved he doesn't have to listen to my snoring in our little tin box of a car.

7:00 pm. We walk into our hotel and notice there are 2 double beds, not 1 king. We are upset for about 2 seconds, and then we realize that we would each have LOTS of space to sleep and move. AND there are 8 pillows in this room. And the room is non-smoking. So we are perfectly content and happy.

7: 33 pm. Unload car, get settled, and try to decide what to do. Marcelo says that he really would like to go to this one park called Balboa Park. We discover that that is also where the San Diego Zoo is located. We’ve talked about going to the Zoo, but now I guess it’s official. We are going.

8:03 pm. After getting ready and taking little refresher showers (ie, body washed, but not hair) we decide to go down to where we have been TOLD has great seafood. Marcelo is like a little kid, he’s so excited about the seafood. I, of course, am the driver again. Scary because we don’t know how to get there, and we don’t know what we are looking for. And we didn't have time or resources to Google Map it. But I OF COURSE navigate us directly there as if I’ve been going there my whole life. I honestly think that is one of the talents I’ve been blessed with: A fantastic sense of direction. My brain makes notes and knows how to retrace it’s steps perfectly to get back to where we were. And I can just SEE in my mind where we need to go, and where we came from. So I guess it IS better that I’m the driver. I rub my skills in Marcelo's face.

8:45 pm. After driving there and walking around, we discover that there is NOT great seafood down here. There is only marginal seafood at ridiculous prices. Even places that tout themselves to be “Ocean Dining” have maybe 3 fish dishes. And all of those I could get a the local Red Lobster!!! Marcelo is REALLY upset. I am too. I think, what is the point of having this great location right by the ocean if you are going to serve Mahi Mahi and Alaskan fish & chips? Where are the crabs? Where is the swordfish? Salmon? Tuna? Seriously, not a good night for fish.

9:45 pm. We went to a place called “The Spot” where Marcelo got a 1 ¼ Maine lobster. I had the crab cakes. Even though I only got 2 cakes and Marcelo ate 1 and 1/3 of them, it was still plenty of food for both of us. (I ate his veggies and some of his scalloped potatoes while he was working on that lobster.) We leave La Jolla moderately disappointed, but not upset. And not hungry.

10:30 pm. We crawl into bed, and go to sleep. I immediately start to snore. Marcelo makes a video. I have included it here.

Don't you feel badly for him when you hear that? Man, he is a good husband to put up with that every night.

So that was our trip so far. I’ll have more posts with the other days and their activities. I don’t think they will all be this long. Let’s hope not!! Here’s to Vacations!!

Church Talks

I don't get freaked out about talking in church. I think it comes from the mission, where sometimes I had less than 30 seconds to prepare for a lesson. You know, where you are sitting in gospel essentials and the teacher doesn't show up, and you don't know what to do, so you have to grab a manual from somewhere and come up with a lesson in less than 30 seconds. Oh, did I mention that you have to do this in another language? A language you have only been speaking for 2 months?

One time Johnson was like, "One of our sacrament speakers didn't show up. Will you give the talk?" I had 3 questions: Do you have a topic for me so that I don't have to make on up on my own? And how long does it have to be? And how many minutes do I have? (FYI, The answers were: yes, 15 and 10) And then I was ready to go.

That is the kind of thing I did all the time as a missionary. Other RM's who served in foreign countries will know exactly what I'm talking about. That being the case why should I worry if I have a week to prepare? So, I don't! And I procrastinate preparing my talk until the last moment. That's how both Marcelo and I ended up waking up Sunday morning realizing that we haven't even open the scriptures to THINK about our talks.

So we start doing them at like 9 am. (church is at 2) I stop a few times because I make Marcelo breakfast, and I have to go to my Visiting Teaching interview. Oh, and I helped my mom make a giant roast beef dinner. It was delicious. AND I prepared a rocking talk. I always worry that I won't have enough to say, but I always do, and I always go over. Oh well. I guess next time we give talks I (and there will OF COURSE be a next time, cause we are moving soon) I'll just prepare half of what I think I'll need and I'll be fine.

Next item of discussion: Even though Jean is a horrible person, I don't think that she's going to be upset when I tell her I'm leaving. I really think that she needs me, but realistically, she doesn't like me as a person. Therefore, I don't think she's going to be all that heartbroken when I tell her I'm pregnant and leaving. I know that's sad for many of you to hear because you were REALLY looking forward to hearing her freak out on me. Actually, I was hoping for the same.

But she really does hate me. And why does she hate me? Lynn can tell you why: because she can no longer manipulate me. I don't crumble under her horrible words. I don't believe her lies, and I don't get torn up anymore when I know she's mad at me. Whenever she talks about "my attitude" she immediately goes and starts talking about how I fight against her. Which leads me to believe that anyone with an opinion opposite to hers is viewed as her enemy.

Which I am. I am her enemy. I am happy, I have a great husband. I'll have a baby soon. And very soon I will leave her and be happy with my family. She will never have that. And she hates me for that. It's fine. However, it does make me a little sad to realize that I won't hurt her as much as I want to. Is it petty, low and wrong of me that I want to damage her as much as possible before I leave? To damage her like she damaged me? (I think that the fact that I'm even asking this question means that I already know the answer is yes) Anyway, It's kinda sad that she won't lament my loss.

But I'm still really looking forward to telling them about the baby. And then I'll throw away this BO sweater away and get some maternity shirts and FLAUNT my belly in front of Jean. I'll be sure to talk about how much the baby is moving, and how EXCITED I am that I'm going to be a mother soon. I'll be sure to mention that it was REALLY hard to keep the secret from them for so long, but now it's great that they can all SHARE in my joy. I'm sure there will be LOTS of sharing about me, but it won't be all joyful.

And finally, here is the saddest thing ever: I officially have pitting edema. For those of you who have not been blessed to know what pitting edema is, it's where your body retains water and certain body parts swell to a point that you look like tick ready to pop. Or a swollen leach. Take your pick as to which description you find most revolting. And when it "pits" that means that you can push in on it and it holds the indent. Well, a picture says a thousand words. So wanna see TWO pictures? Before and after pictures? Yeah? Here you go.















So what do you think of that before and after? Isn't that revolting? Don't you get sick just looking at those pictures? And you should know that I have to WALK around on those little kielbasas. It was coming and going for a few weeks now. But now it looks like it's here to stay. WHOOOOPEEEEEEE!!!

Oh, one more thing. I loved Lynn's "pants" story she told me the other day. I have a similar one. Please enjoy: So I still have a little bit of a lingering cough from my cold. It's more like a rogue pest that makes me cough only a few times every day. HOWEVER, whenever it happens, it scares me because I'm afraid that I'm going to pee my pants. And today, it caught me off guard and all of a sudden I the cough is there and I couldn't help it: I farted.

Here's the worst part. I figured out too late that the fart was coming, and to try to combat it, I squeezed my butt cheeks together. This didn't keep it inside like it should've done, but instead it SPLIT the fart. Half of it came up the front, and the other half went out the back. And it made my butt cheeks flap because I had just tightened them up around the fart. It was loud.

Luckily, Karley was on the phone, and Jamie was too far away to hear it (I hope). And I was coughing at the same time, so I think that that masked the most of it. But what to do about the smell? Luckily Jean had TONS of cinnamon spray for occasions JUST like this. Just kidding, I would never want anyone else to experience cinna-farts. Honestly, I just let the smell ride. I was laughing too hard thinking about my splinted fart and thanking the Heavens that nothing ELSE came out.

I don't think that will always be the case. I'll just have to be more carefully in the future.

Spring, Spring Spring

My little girl loves the sun and loves to be warm. (She must get that from me) I think it's because she has such short hair and no body fat. (She does NOT get that from me :) What am I saying, she's a freaking DOG. She gets NOTHING from me!)But when I come home from lunch, she'll jump up on me and get a few moments of head scratching and then go right over and lay on the carpet in the sun. Her favorite place is right by the couch.

But now that the weather is getting better, I'll open the back door during my lunch break so she can run back and forth freely. Her schedule usually goes like this: Watch me eat my lunch and try to beg some food off my plate. When I finish eating, then it's time to go outside. She'll perch herself out the back door for about 10 minutes just listening to the birds. When she gets a little more brave, she goes and walks down the next step and points at the birds for another 10 minutes. Then she comes inside and makes sure that I'm still here. When she's secure about that, she goes out and listens to the birds for another 15 minutes. Near the end, she'll lay down on the warm steps and just relax in the sunshine. See what I mean?

Well, anyway, I got a picture of her just enjoying the sun yesterday afternoon. I can't wait until it warms up even more and I can bask in the sun with her. I'm tired of it being cold. It's time for SPRING.

And the phrase "Spring, spring, spring" needs to be sung, like the version from "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers." If you don't know about that movie, you are missing out on a cinematographic masterpiece. Make sure to take note of the painted back drops and fancy dancers. Gideon is my favorite.

Change of subject. Yesterday on the radio they were talking about how they were taking new photos of all the employees. One of the girls said that she had gained a little weight, and her pants were tighter than normal. So when she came into work, she went up and asked her co-worker if she had a little camel toe going on. He said that she didn't, but she still felt self-conscious about it, so she proceeded to ask the other two men in the room the same question, and waited as they all LOOKED and then gave her their opinion. Do you think that was a little AWKWARD for them? Anyway, this led them all to ask their listeners: What is your most embarrassing moment ever?

Now, my close friends will know that I am constantly humiliating myself. For example, Lynn had only been working 2 months before I farted in front of her. And then I did it again another 2 months later. Now, in anyone else's book, that would be VERY high up on the "most embarrassing moment" radar. But that was old hat for me!! I'd already done that way back in the 7th grade, when I was 11. I'm nearly 28 now. I have filled up those years with much worse humiliation galore.

So, what sticks out in my mind as my most embarrassing moment? That's easy. BYU sophomore year: Physiology class. (I know Judd knows this story. She also got a visual because I acted it out for her when we were in Ecuador. The rest of you will just have to use your imaginations.)

You should know that back in these days, I was just as large as I am now. That is to say, I was heavy AND carting around an extra 50 pounds in the form of a butt load of books. I think on the day of this particular incident I was going to be at school studying and taking multiple tests. I had brought all my book because I didn't want to go home and risking getting distracted. So I had a backpack FULL of books.

Well, physiology class was held in the MARB at BYU. The MARB has 4 large lecture halls, and each one holds around 300 students. The classroom is set up at a pretty steep angle to maximize the amount of students that can be squeezed into a room. At the top of the main seating section, there is a walkway leading to two exits on either side. Lining the wall were boxes with letters on them. My teacher would review our quizzes and tests and then return them in the box that corresponded to our last name.

The worst part is that at the end of class, 300 students rush the boxes on their way out of classes. It creates a very nice bottleneck traffic jam at the boxes, and it can be very difficult to navigate. ESPECIALLY when you have a huge backpack strapped to you messing up your balance and equilibrium.

So I go to the box that has my paper in it, and get it. I and trying to navigate my way out of the horrible bottleneck, but I'm looking down at my paper and not really paying attention to where I'm going. And then: disaster. I somehow make a misstep and get my foot tucked in my pant leg. And then it's happening. . . I'm going down. . . down. . . .down. TIIIIIMBER!!!! And the fall thereof was great.

And now I'm on the ground. And about 75 people are surrounding me, staring at me, trying to walk over me, to get to their papers so they can just get the heck out. And I'm trying to get up. But you try to get up when people are walking over you and more and more keep coming. That was only half of it. The other half, and the worst part about it was the backpack. It was pinning me to the floor, unrelenting.

So picture this: I'm a large girl, with a very large HEAVY backpack strapping me to the floor. I'm like a potato bug on it's back. Picture my legs kicking futilely as I'm trying to get them under myself and stand up. But it's all to no avail. I twist right, legs flailing. Not happening. I twist left, now sprawled out across the floor, doing a sort of "snow angel" on the filthy floor of the lecture hall. The bastard backpack was mocking me with it's weight.

I am a beaten woman. I finally figure out that I've been on the floor for FAR too long, and I just want my humiliation to end. But to make it end, I'm going to have to stoop to the lowest of lows. Here I go: I curl up in a ball, roll over onto all fours and FLING my body to the left. My backpack is now ON MY BACK where it belongs, and I can continue to get up. I crawl for a little bit on my hands and knees so I can get to a more "open" area of the mass, and then FINALLY I get up.

Is that horrifying enough for you? Let me tell you, for a very shy, un-attractive BYU sophomore who could never get a date, this was my version of hell. Well, if you have a hard time visualizing what I've said here, come over to my house. I'll be happy to give you a nice little demonstration.

So, I hope you enjoyed that trip down horror lane. Oh, by the way, Marcelo and I are assigned to speak in church tomorrow. Have I even THOUGHT about my talk? NOPE!! At least I know what my topic is. We'll see what time I start planning my talk tonight. . .or tomorrow morning. Oh, and I have to plan my lesson for my 9-year olds tomorrow too. When will I get to that, I wonder?

Oh well, off to eat another Toaster Strudel.

My Horrible BO

Did you ever see that episode of Seinfeld where Elaine dates a "bad breaker-upper"? He's the guy who gets really upset when you break up with him, and so he says horrible things to upset you. He tells Elaine that she has a big head, and then things keep happening to confirm to her what he said. Some bird in the park flies into her head; a cab driver tells her to slump down because he says he can't see out of the back window with her giant head in the way. She starts to freak out about it, and Jerry tells her that the "bad breaker-upper" is getting to her.

Well, I had a little experience like that on Tuesday. Firstly, let me tell you about Monday. Jean has been on a cruise to Jamaica for the past week, and yet she comes back in a horrible mood. Can someone explain that to me? Why is she so intent on being miserable and taking everyone with her? I had a great week with her gone! I would think that she would've had a great week out of the office. Doesn't that seem logical? Not in Jean world.

Well, she came back with some of that Jamaican sand still stuck up her craw. And to make sure that I felt her misery, she decided to tell me just how horrible I am, and how to do my job. When I stood up to her and told her that maybe it would be better to keep the same system we have, the system that works, the system that we've worked years to perfect, she gets pissed that I am "fighting against her" and proceeds to ignore me for the rest of the day.

She also ignores me the next day. Whatever, I like it that way: it's easier to hide my disdain from her. But then at like 4:45 she decides it's time to talk to me about it. She pulls me into her office under the guise of talking about the Quickbooks files. She needs to tell me that I'm doing them all wrong, and that I need to go back and change things for the WHOLE YEAR. Now, Heather knows what a pain this because she's had to do it before. But we have a way to prevent this: we print off reports every month so Jean could review them bit by bit instead of having to wait till the end of the year and waste tons of time.

But does she review them? OF COURSE NOT!!! She doesn't look at them, and then at the end of the year, she finds all these problems. So guess who's blamed? You know it!! At the end of the year and I get yelled at for "not keeping accurate records." ARGH! So I get told to go back and change ALL the books for the whole year. SUPER!!

But like I said, this wasn't the real reason she wanted to talk to me. She wanted to tell me that she is upset that I'm overweight, and she thinks that I'm ugly. Of course can't say this to my face, so she has to find some "other" way to say it. So this is what she says, "Alicia, I think you need to focus on your personal appearance more." At this moment, I'm thinking she's going to bring up the fact that I haven't worn makeup to work in nearly a year. Or the fact that I haven't done my hair before coming to work for almost 15 months. That's what I'm thinking about. I am in no way prepared for what's about to come. She continues, "You know, I've noticed that you wear the same sweater every day. It's becoming a problem because everyone in the office has told me that as they walk by you, they smell a very strong B.O. smell coming from your sweater"

Stunned. I was NOT expecting that. But really, you think I smell? Me? And you can smell this so-called horrible BO through a shirt, a bra and a garment top? And this coming from the woman who lays out horrible old-woman farts and thinks that a little "cinnamon spray in a can" will cover it? Also, she CLAIMS to have a VERY sensitive sense of smell, but she can stay in a closed room with Suzette P. who I'm pretty sure only brushes her teeth once a quarter. (Suzette aspires to the European way of thinking which is that if you spray on enough perfume and pat on enough powder, then neither deodorant nor BATHING is necessary) Seriously, Heather and Lynn will back me up in telling me that "sense of smell" is NOT one of Jean's strengths.

So you are wondering how I responded, and what did I say, right? Well, I lied right back. I said, "Really? That's strange because I wash this sweater twice a week" "Oh, uhhh, well, um, let's talk about your attitude. . . " That's right!! I got a "change of subject" out of Jean. That means that she had nothing to say, she was stumped. The sweater/BO issue was never addressed again. (My "attitude" however was the topic of conversation for the next 45 minutes. It's what Jean always goes back to whenever she's losing an argument. Because she can't be wrong about her opinions about my attitude. And as everyone knows, Jean's opinion is like gospel law. Don't EVER try to contradict an opinion. You will always be wrong)

Well, I know where the comment came from: The new assistant Karley, is REALLY into her looks. She wears the heavy make-up and she has the acrylic nails with the hot pink sparkley tips. She's probably a size zero, but you can't tell from her face. She kind of has a fuller face, and a chin that's not very strong which gives the illusion of a somewhat double chin. But she's DEFINITELY a size zero. The girl has NO HIPS. Seriously, if she gets pregnant someday, that poor baby has NO CHANCE!! It will definitely have to be cut out of her.

Anyway, I actually like Karley. The first few days, she rubbed me the wrong way, because she had a "I know everything" attitude about her. But that's really calmed down this week. And she said I'm funny today, so you KNOW the girl can recognize talent! (Her actual words were "Do you just keep Marcelo laughing all the time at home? I mean, you have this way of telling just a normal story, and you make it hilarious!" I had to break it to her that my husband doesn't think I'm as funny as I think I am. Oh well, at least I keep myself entertained, right? That's all that matters)

Anyway, Karley looks nice every day. That is the point of my little rant. So I think that Jean wants me to look more like Karley. I think she's noticing that I don't have ANY variation in my wardrobe, I don't do anything to my hair besides the asexual pony-tail, and makeup is a thing of the past but she wants to tell me that my appearance bother her. But how to do that in a way that doesn't make her seem really selfish and superficial? What's the best way to tell your ugly and fat assistant that you want her to spruce up her outfits?

HOWEVER, she knows that she can't say anything because I'm not breaking any of her rules. Her little 37 point dress code? I'm following every single one. Just because she doesn't like my clothes doesn't mean I'm breaking the code. But she's trying ANYTHING to get me to change my clothes, and as everyone knows, lying is what Jean knows and what she does best. So she lies about my BO, with the hopes that I'll feel so self-conscious about the sweater that I'll never wear it again. GOOD TRY, HO BAG!!

Even thought I know all this, I STILL let her get to me. As soon as work is out I call Lynn and ask her if I have BO. I know that Lynn would tell me if I did. Well, lots of people would tell me to my face: Judd, Reagan, Lisa, Joel, etc. But Lynn actually spent 6 months with me, and she spent 5 months sitting 3 feet away from my "BO sweater" and crotch-sweat work pants and so she would know first hand if I really did have some bad smells going on every day.

She tells me that Jean is a whore, and that there is NO WAY that I have BO. I tell her that if I did, she could tell me, but she ASSURES me that I don't. See!! It's my "Elaine" moment, Jean made me believe the horrible lie just by suggesting it. So let's add this to the list of why Jean deserves to die a slow horrible death. Hopefully her death will involve people with BO attacking her. But she'll probably be able to escape from them, because she's so IN TUNE with the BO of others.

*CHANGE OF SUBJECT* On a food note, do you know what I want right now? I would kill someone for a Cinnabon. Doesn't that sound awesome. Warm with all that frosting on it. Oh my hell, I desperately want one now. Who knows where the closest Cinnabon is? And who wants to go there with me? Hands?