"So lets get up, lets get on it"

You know that you had an amazing time when you can't even find the right words to start a post about how much fun you had. There just aren't any perfect words to describe how wonderful it was having some of my best buddies visit about a week ago now. Austin, Michelle, and Brian came to visit our side of the states and we sure painted the town red.

Michelle and Brian had been here before with Ed and me but for Austin this was a first time. We made the rounds to Muir woods and took a fantastic cruise around the bay and under the bridge. We wandered around Fisherman's Wharf, had Irish coffees at Buena Vista, got free chocolate from Ghiradelli, watched Ed swim in the freakin freezing cold bay along with the other nuts. Ate delicious ginormous Dungeness crabs.

We even got taken by a local scam artist who specializes in conning people looking for parking, later finding out he's even been in the paper. Bounced around Sonoma and had lunch at Apple HQ the day of the new iPad announcement. I think one of my favorite moments though was having dinner with Dad and Debbie - (Who generously lent us their car so we could all get around without having to throw Austin in the bed of the truck). Many bottles of wine and laughs and delicious food and just such a fun evening. It was all over way, way too fast and I cried like a baby on my way home from dropping them off at the airport.

There are so many details of the visit that would just seem ridiculous to put here, the main point of all of it being that it was just the greatest visit and I'm sure with the passing of time and idealization it will grow to seem like the greatest group of friends outing of all time. :) On the bright side, I seem to have finally conquered (well, learned to cope with it, at best) my fear of driving out here! I still miss my tiny civic like you wouldn't believe, but I drove all the way up to Mill Valley, crossing the bridge, and driving on 101 and 280 like a champ in our Taco (short for Ed's Toyota Tacoma... not to be mistaken for the delicious food).

Since they left it's been preeeetty quiet around these parts. I've been training a lot... now reader, do not misinterpret that as losing weight or getting faster. In my mind the only thing I've actually become really good at is forcing myself to continue running despite my wish to keel over and die 10 minutes in. So far I'm up to 35 minutes as my maximum... next Sunday I'm supposed to go for my first 40 minute run and I'm a bit terrified. My training mileage plan says I'm behind quite a bit... I should be running 4 miles continuously at this point and I've only come just past halfway to that. :-/ I must really buck up since I signed up for another 10K! Yeah, I'm riding this delusional training high as much as I can and trying to keep the motivation going. This one coming up is the Presidio 10K and you run along Crissy Field. There was a Groupon or LivingSocial deal for it so I thought why not! Pray for me.

I'm back on track with my reading goals too... I fell a bit behind caught up with visitors and those damned Game of Thrones books that just go on FOREVER. I love them, but Jesus. They are a lot. So I'm 12 books in now... I had a realization with Ed the other day. I have been SPOILED by my current and my previous library. The Mountain View, Reston and even Alexandria libraries have all been 800% more incredible than the Wheaton, Silver Spring and Kensington libraries. The quality, number and availability of books... having Kindle books readily available, easy online access, beautiful facilities...Moving back to libraries less awesome will be a tough pill to swallow for me. I know, I'm ridiculous, but reading is like food to me some days. It may be all I need that day.

Wedding plans are falling into place. Invites are in the works thanks to the amazing Joe Lamour who has patiently waited for text while I drag my feet with every task. The website is about 98% put together. It occurred to me that shortly I'll have to face the decoration of the barn and tables and what not... Deeeeep breaths. I wonder if other brides out there hate accomplishing any tasks because they know that will only lead to 7 more tasks that need immediate attention. Gretchen Rubin in The Happiness Project calls those kind of tasks 'boomerang tasks' and I swear that boomerang has been hitting me in the face a LOT.

Ed's friend Kirk visits next week and we're really looking forward to that. A couple of concerts lined up... Eric Hutchinson (I am sooooo excited for that!), Faderhead, Thomas Dolby, DJ Shadow possibly... lots of little activities to keep us bouncin' around out here.

Now to attend to these darn boomerangs...