Birthday Weekend = Awesome. :)

Ok, first the only annoying part, because it just happened.  I started playing around with the layout of this blog about an hour ago, and MY GOD are the templates fugly.  Then I had a panic attack for the last 1/2 hour trying to figure how to get it back to normal so ya'll didn't think I was on crack.  Sheesh!

Ok, now the great.  The dinner Chris made for me on Friday was nothing short of miraculous.  Steak, sautéed shrimp, a small baked potato, and a chocolate birthday cake.  The cake had to wait until much later, though, because I was STUFFED. 

Then we got our fancy duds on and went to Joe's.  So much fun, so many missed faces, drinks, laughter and great games of pool.  Oh, and 2 virtual strangers bought me birthday drinks....I was so touched!

Needless to say, I was quite tipsy by the time we got home...Chris has some funny stories.  If he ever writes a blog, you can read 'em there.  ;)

Saturday we slept in, cleaned the house a little, and then picked up a friend that we hadn't seen in almost four years.  Greg is one of Chris' oldest friends, going back to middle school.  He had never been to Los Angeles, and never even seen the Pacific, so we took him to Venice beach.  There is an AMAZING Italian restaurant there called C&O Trattoria - it has, seriously, the best Italian food I have ever had in my life.  We had only been there once before, for my birthday 2 years ago, so it was serendipity.  Some other things to love about this place:  the waiters pass out the words to "That's Amore" every hour or so.  When "That's Amore" starts playing, all of the waiters stop what they're doing and walk around clinking glasses with us (because they awesomely get to drink too) as we're all singing.  They also have house chianti "on the honor system".  There are four stations around the room and you help yourself and let them know how many glasses you've had.  Oh, something else fabulous - because there is ALWAYS a lengthy wait to get in, and you have no where else to stand but on the sidewalk, they come and pass out steaming hot garlic knots, which are only the BEST THINGS I HAVE EVER PUT INTO MY MOUTH.  I hope I have adequately expressed the amazing and friendly atmosphere of this restaurant.  Not only is the food delectable, but it also has some of the happiest, best servers I have ever had the pleasure to be served by.   For those of you in the area, do yourselves the favor of checking them out:  http://www.cotrattoria.com/ .

Needless to say, after that build up, Greg had a wonderful time, and we had so much fun catching up with him.  Then, he culminated dinner by snatching up the bill and wishing me a happy birthday!  SO sweet.  Of course I said absolutely not, but he reminded us that it is a tax write off because he was in town for a convention, so we reluctently, but so gratefully, agreed.  Then we came back to our apartment, talked for hours more, and then he hit the hay on our couch.

Today was a nice catch-up, relaxing, resting kind of a day.  We watched 'The Road' tonight - well done, though not as good as the book and quite dark for a Sunday. 

Well, since I missed 2 blogs worth, please consider that the full report, and hopefully it wasn't too boring.  ;)

Tomorrow - back to soap making, working out, and I AM QUITTING SMOKING again, for the 400th time.  I think they say 400 is the charm, right?  Oh, and Greg was raving about the P90X workout (http://www.beachbody.com/product/fitness_programs/p90x.do?tnt=TNT_P90X-PLAC_B) - he said he had lost 2 pant sizes in a little more than a month, so we may try to see if we can find it used.  It sounds like quite the ass kicker, but that's what my big ass needs!

Jenn