Embracing It

 A very Happy Birthday to my Amazing and Beautiful Mother, wish I could be there to celebrate with you!  It is such a special day for such an incredible woman.  She is embracing her 60th year with grace, poise, and a lot of class.  Thank you for being such an incredible role model and mother and for always being so supportive.  I love you.  ~LB

Cheers to many more happy years....

Looking amazing all dressed up 

I love you and miss you so much!!

Sorry about the Sari

So I think this falls under the "Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus," chapter.  I have known that we are going to a birthday party this weekend for about 6 weeks.  E did his due diligence on that one and let me know and I put it in my calendar, thus making it an official event.  He rsvp for us both and it sounds to be a grand soiree.  So you can imagine my surprise this morning as I try to blink the sleep from my eyes when has casually drops this minute detail, "Oh yeah I ran into N yesterday and he told me that the party has an Indian theme."

Me: "what....?"
E: "Yeah, Indian theme."
Me: "So what would have happened if you did not run into Nick yesterday?"
E: "I guess we would have shown up in normal clothes..."

This is what I came up
with, long skirt, and one of
my infamous scarves comes
to the rescue.

I groaned an rolled over.  I know this is not a huge deal but I am new here, trying to make friends, and this is a 30th birthday party filled with E's co-workers so I need to look nice.

I padded out to the living room where E was pulling up the invitation, that he rsvp to just weeks before, and there are three lovely paragraphs setting the tone for the night, describing candle lit setting, delectable indian food, and that girls should wear light and colorful clothing fitting with India influences.

Oh boys, they just do not understand the need fro the right outfit.  I am sure it will be a beautiful night and I will try to snap some pictures of what I come up with.  How has a similar situation played out in your relationship?  I would love to hear your little men are from Mars anecdotes!  But for now I am  sorry I have to run, time to scrape together a Sari.

Nepal is Cool. Where is that Again?

So it is pretty easy to distinguish that I am not a world traveler, I did not ever do well in geography, and I do not speak in any other language but good old American.  I do realize that I have been doing a lot more traveling as of recent but before I met E, I had literally only been out of the country once (not counting weekend trips to Rocky Point, Me-he-co).  So when Nepal was brought up I acted like, "oh yeah Nepal, I have been wanting to go there forever, so cool,"  but what I was really thinking is really "where in the world Carmen San Diego is Nepal?"  So I googled, did some research, packed up my Vera Bradley tote and we hit the road.

What a cool picture right?
E took that one...

When we landed I knew it was going to be poor, because TOMs shoes have been there to launch their new eyeware campaign, but I was not expecting people living in huts on the side of the road, garbage piled up, and cows sleeping in the streets poor.  It was definitely an eye opener.  Lucky for me, we stayed in some really nice accommodations up in the base of the mountains at Gokarna Resort.

So I do not know if you have to google Nepal, but it is really know for its outdoor extreme activities, like trekking, bungee jumping, and white water rafting.  Since there were no extra strength, extra long rubber bands or rapids at Gokarna, we settled on a nice little trek, that I think most would really call a hike, or it was rather slow, so maybe it could even be defined as a stroll in the woods.  We walked up to the front desk to book our hike and they handed E this little teeny tiny bottle and called it "medicine."  Eric pointed at me and said, "just don't tell her that."  At which point I immediately began to pay attention and started to ask questions.

"Medicine for what?"
"For the leeches Mam, it is rainy season."
"Are we going in water?"
"No Mam, they are in the mud."
"Huh?"
"Namaste Mam."
(Namaste my ass I am not going where any leeches are...)

E got the death stare and then I remembered, I am in Nepal, it is cool, I can handle any of this let's hit the trails and if there are any issues we have our trusty guide, Amit.  So I  rubbed the medicine onto my legs, shoes, ankles, and then I double dipped for more, there will not be any little blood suckers on my precious limbs. (If you have read past posts you will remember that I have had encounters with these little buggers before)  So we set out of our rainy hike.

We walked out on the slippery golf course and up into the lower trails of the hills.  It was a misty morning and I was feeling quite sprite and happy after my yoga session so we walked and chatted with Amit, as he practiced his English.  About 10 minutes into the hike he stopped us and did a leech check.  Everyone came out with a clean bill of health and we continued on in hopes of spotting deer and monkeys.  Well I was hoping, E has a phobia with monkeys, but then again I have one with leeches so I told him to suck it up.

We saw this:

And this:

So we did not actually get any pics of monkeys
on the hike but this is from our room.

And here we are scared of the monkeys (I was just pretending but I think E was definitely ready to get out of there):

Hide and seek from the Monkeys and Leeches

After about an hour and a half we came back out onto the golf course.  It was time for the final test, we had been watching our feet closely and discarding leeches as they tried to attack, so last check was inside our shoes.  E took his shoes off left then right, no problems, clean bill of health.  Then Amit inspected his.  Then me, who had probably watched my feet the most diligently of the rest of the trekking team, removed my shoes...And I am sure you have already guessed it but I had one little creature on each little foot, having a nice big lunch.  Dis-gust-ing.  Really?  Only me...Namaste, you gross little leeches, namaste.

Snot rockets and Nepalese Innuendoes

I know I have been on a bit of a hiatus, but I really forgot how time consuming work is.  This past week I have found myself not able to fit the rest of my life in with work, but who wants to hear about that...The weekend before I joined the blessed working world E and I decided to fly off to Katmandu to find our inner chi.  I do not know if total enlightenment took place but something close to that.

Waking up to the Mountains and Monkeys

Flying into Nepal there was only one thing on E's mind, not what you are thinking, it was to detox and jump start his newest infatuation, a health kick.  He is working on the artful balance of eating well, working out, and drinking in moderation.  Being the ever supportive side kick, that means I get to suffer along side of him.  It is not that I am against the idea of health, but rather just find it, I do not know what, but just not always my focus.  So the first morning when the alarm clock went off at 0700 and he was up and at em I knew I was in a bit of trouble.  "Babe, get up, we have to get to yoga!"  I peered out of the covers, moaned, and shook my head no.  But by 7:30 I found myself in a hodgepodge gym sitting a top of an old yoga mat.

The Gokarna National Park

Now, I am no yogi.  I have done my fair share of downward dogs and sun salutations but really I am just not bendy.  Lucky for me all that was really required of me to succeed in this class was to have lungs.  We breathed in and out so many times that I became light headed and it definitely was not for over exertion as we literally sat there cross legged taking deep breaths in and out.  I think our Nepalese instructor was just practicing her English.  Counting in particular.  She randomly would do counts of 10, 16, and 20 but she was pretty emphatic about the counting process.  After I was completely seeing stars and happy to be in a seated position she really brought out the big guns.  Kleenex.  I thought maybe I was sniffling just a bit too loud but nope, she instructed all of us (and by all I mean the entire class of three, I guess no one else's boyfriend's found it necessary to get up at dawn with the monkeys) to blow our noses.  Odd?  Then she instructed us to place our index and middle fingers to our right nostril alternating with pushing our thumb to our left.  What was the result?  Morning snot rockets!  Bats were released from the cave left and right and the chi in my nose was happy, if there even is chi in my nose, (I am guessing not.)

A Hike Post Work out...more on that next time!

After my nasal cavity was successfully detoxed and our instructor thought was had really pushed our bodies into a heap of rigor she requested that we lay down on the mats and I knew right away it was time for my favorite form of exercise: Vinyasa.  For those of you out there that have not been to an Ashram, this is the part of yoga were you lie on a mat, doing absolutely nothing in a meditative state.  In the past when I have partaken in this ancient practice the room is usually dark and silent, but not so in Nepal my friends.  The fluorescent lights were a blaze and our teacher instructed us which body parts to relax all the way from the tips of our toes to the tops of our heads.  She then moved down to the eyebrows, eyelids, chin, and even teeth.  In her best english she would repeat the phrase three times: "Re-wax yo tweeeff...Re-wax yo tweeeff... Re-wax yo tweeeff..."  She continued chanting us down the front of our bodies.  After we relaxed our hips and earlier we had relaxed our upper thighs, there was only one place to go.  And she went there! "Re-wax yo gen-i-tals...Re-wax yo gen-i-tals... Re-wax yo gen-i-tals!"  I look over to let out a girlish giggle to E and what is he doing?  Sleeping mouth wide, snores escaping, looking very relaxed...Oh Nepal!