Holiday work party...one month late

At work we decided to have our holiday party in January when things weren't so busy. Brilliant idea initially, but when it came down to it, everybody was still pretty "holidayed out" in late January and very few people came. Still fun, though, here's a few pics from the mellow night:

Highlight of the night? Doing a shot of cherry vodka with one of our psychiatrists. Nothing says "professional" like shots in the kitchen, I think.

More girl time

I was a great week of social events, half of which I didn't even take pictures of (wait, somehow that seems super grammatically crazy)...all in all, a fabulous, fun week of dinners, parties and brunches. Last Tuesday our friend Steph came into town from Boston for a conference (incidentally, on child abuse - wheeee!) and we got together for a girls night dinner at Urban Solace - delicious! It was fabulous seeing her and catching up, I love that girl. This picture is funny, clearly I have a go-go gadget arm of monkey-like proportions in order to catch all of our faces...need something reached far away? I'm your gal:

Brunching it up!

Man, I love brunch. It seriously is the best meal of the day. I don't think there would be any wars in the world if we could just all sit down to a nice eggs benedict and a bloody mary. Shall I propose that in the Middle East?

Anyhoo, I went to brunch yesterday with some girlfriends who I hadn't seen in a few months, it was fabulous catching up with Marley, Paige and Mary. Here's our sweet normal photo:


...and the descent in craziness photo. Not sure why I'm nibbling on Paige's pregnant belly, but there you go.

Why we pay a huge mortgage take two

In addition to the glorious weather we've been having, we've also had some rockin' sunsets recently. These pics are from our hallway through the big window above our front door - phenomenal, eh?

Oh yah, THIS is why we have such a huge mortgage!

I'm admitting it, we are totally spoiled here in San Diego. It drops into the low 60's or God forbid the high 50's and we all bitch and moan that it's freezing. It's been absolutely GLORIOUS for a few weeks now after all that rain and we're all reminded how freakin' lucky we are to live here. We went out to brunch this morning with our good friends Aaron and Mo - Poseidon in Del Mar is absolutely wonderful and eating right on the beach can't be beat. After we stuffed ourselves silly with Crab Benedict and bloody Mary's, we went for a walk along the beach. Sigh, so content.

Girls night out - Cougar edition

My good friend Julie just had a birthday and we celebrated by going out downtown to the Shout House. It was so great to see all my old Scripps buddies and to celebrate my sweet friend, I miss all those girls so much. We scored our own area of the club and had such a blast dancing it up and acting like fools.Here's Julie, me, Danielle and Jennifer:

Julie & Julie:
Ok, so the funniest part of the night was when a huge group of guys in their 20's - yes, 20's - came lurking by and started buying us shots. Mind you, most of us are married (and with kids) or at least in long term relationships, but these boys didn't seem to care...nor were they deterred when we told them we were 15-20 years older than them. Cougars in the making, apparently! I didn't know we were old enough to be cougars yet, but somehow it happened without my knowledge. Weird.
I hadn't been downtown in ages, and certainly hadn't done the whole shots scene, but I guess it's like riding a bike...pretty easy to get your groove back. Too funny. I was so proud to report back to Rob that "we still got it" and I think he was secretly proud of us, and yet kinda creeped out by the whole thing. :)

I love how my pinky is extended. So classy, this one.

Christmas: The Aftermath

Man, how depressing is it to take down Christmas decorations? This year I was pretty bitter towards the damn Boy Scouts, whose local troop picks up Christmas trees from the 'hood to recycle for a fundraiser. That's great and all; we had signed up earlier last month thinking it would save us a ton of time and effort...and had totally forgotten they were coming on January 2nd at 8 in the morning. So, let me spell that out for you. That means we had to get our lazy bones up off the couch on the 1st (national day o' hangovers) and take down the tree, when it otherwise would have taken an act of God to pry us off that comfy black hole that sucks the room dry of all motivation and energy.

So, needless to say, we were having some choice words for the Boy Scouts anyway but dutifully were pushing through the task at hand...until it came time to take our gigantic tree out the door. We Warrens have Elephantitis of the Tree this year, cripes! Please see exhibit A, B, and C and appreciate the angst.
Clark Griswold would have been so proud. Stupid &$**&#*$^!!@ tree.