Hot Weekend

I can't believe this is the last weekend in February! We have had a gorgeous weekend here that has been borderline hot at times! I hate to complain, but there it is.
Saturday we went to the Wild Animal Park in Escondido, which is almost into San Diego. It is a part of the San Diego zoo, but it tries to make the environment more "wild." Nick got free tickets when he was at a conference there on Friday, so we made the trip on Saturday. It was fun-lots of things to see-but I underestimated the heat and was beat by 3 PM. It's a huge park and we made it to most of it, but both of us were ready to call it a day. We missed out on a few of the gardens, the elephants and the gibbons. We did take the "Journey into Africa" which is a "bus" ride around the "wild" portion of the park. It was a fun day, especially since the tickets were free. I don't know if it would have been worth it for the two of us paying $45 a ticket. It was also a birth control moment with all of the kids running around being brats!
Today, we have taken it easier. It has also been beautiful here today again. I did some work in the yard, ran a few errands, took Sierra for a walk, and went to Starbucks at the town center for cooling a drink. It's hard to believe that it is winter everywhere else when it's been so nice here.
This week is a four day one for me, but long days. One of our therapists is at a horse physical therapy class in Florida for two weeks, so I've been covering the clinic for a lot more hours since she's been gone. She is back Friday, so I have the day off. Nick is also off Friday because of the furlough. It is supposed to be more seasonable temperatures by then.
Here are some photos of our Wild Animal Park day-enjoy!

February Flash

It's been a busy and fun last few weeks here in Riverside. My parents came for a week leaving last Tuesday. I was off most of the time, which made it more enjoyable. Unfortunately, we only had one nice day before California decided to have some "winter weather," which consists mainly of wind and rain and "cold" temperatures. Not exactly the escape from Minnesota winter that my parents had been planning, they still had a nice time. Our best day was in San Diego and La Jolla where we really enjoyed our one nice day.
This weekend has been mainly about getting the house back together after the parents' visit. Yesterday, on Valentine's day, we went out for lunch at Quizno's, ran errands, and had supper at Chipotle with an evening movie, "Taken." We also took the dog and walked up Mt. Rubbidoux, which was a beautiful light hike on a beautiful winter day. I even managed to squeeze in a trip to Kohl's. Nick gave me a new ipod shuffle since my old one went through the laundry. It will be nice to have something to listen to at the gym again.
Today we did the usual grocery shopping and also a trip to Home Depot for this and that. I was looking for some tile, but didn't find anything I liked. I have three options from Lowe's that I will choose from. We hope to start tiling the first floor within a couple weeks or a month. It shouldn't be a bad job, because it is mostly one big area, but since it is the area we spend the most time, it will be somewhat inconvenient.
I am posting some photos from San Diego from my parents' visit. We saw a world class (World Cup) racing "boat" (for lack of a better term) out for "practice" and had a beautiful visit to my favorite southern California beach in La Jolla (yes, I am standing in the water-it was that nice and the water wasn't cold, just nice). Have a good week everyone!

A Quick Update

A quick update here from sunny and warm California; yes today is supposed to be over 80 degrees.
Last weekend I had a blast at my course in Salt Lake City. I don't usually expect to have so much fun at a course, but so it was. I also learned a lot of great information and the women's health program at the clinic is ready to be up and running. We already have 5-10 referrals, which is great. I just hope that we get some non-HMO patients, so we actually can make money on them! I am going to see how things go and hope to complete the second course this summer or fall, which will be more on pain disorders and rectal examination....mmmm.
This weekend we have been cleaning up a storm. My parents come in Tuesday night and are staying for a week. I am off starting Wednesday and go back to work on Monday, so I only will be working one full day while they're here. We are planning to do some tourist activities including going to San Diego. A lot will depend on the weather, as it is supposed to start raining on Friday. We are happy for the rain, but my parents are hoping for more 80 degree days!
I can't believe it's February already! This year is already flying by! I hope everyone has a nice weekend watching the Superbowl, if you so choose. We are off to Josh and Erin's party, as Erin is a die-hard Steeler's fan, since she is from Pittsburgh. I am sure I will be very full by the time I got to bed! Cheers!

80s club

temperatures that is, not age!
We've had unbelievable weather this past week, making me feel hot at times. Sierra has especially enjoyed being outside when I see her at lunch and after work as the light of day dwindles. It's pretty hard to enjoy the weather completely when you think about how large of a drought we are in and that this is technically our rainy season (supposedly going through March). As much as I enjoy the warm weather and sun, I would be happier overall if we would have at least two days of rain in the week.


Despite the drought, we still have quite a bit of green from the moisture we got before the new year. The wilderness park is quite green as well as the mountain outside our window. It is a nice change from the brown we see most of the year.
This past weekend was uneventful as I have been reading several articles in preparation for a class I'm going to in Salt Lake City. I am going to a continuing education class in pelvic physical therapy/incontinence management with another therapist from our clinic. It is the first in a series of three, which I tentatively plan to complete to get my certificate in pelvic physical therapy. Our boss wants to beef up our women's health program and get some concrete education behind a few of us. It should be an interesting class, but I'm not looking forward to the COLD temperatures! Think of me freezing in SLC next weekend! =)

Zodiac

Has anyone seen this movie? We watched it last night and enjoyed it, but it was pretty long (almost 3 hours!) A lot of the locations in the movie where they were investigating murders have actually been places in California that we have lived or been close to living. A few of the murders were in Vallejo, which was just south of us in Napa, another in Napa County at Lake Berryessa, and a possible one in Riverside. CREEPY!
Luckily, it seems the guy that they are pretty sure did it is now dead-so I'm safe. But still-pretty scary!

Mission Inn: To see the Lights

So it must be pretty sad that this was our second Christmas in Riverside and we still haven't gone to see the Christmas lights at the historic Mission Inn in downtown Riverside. Sure, we've been down there and we've driven past, but we have never gone down to see their lights in all their glory. Thus, Saturday night we set off with friends Josh and Erin to the lights...who cares if it's January right?
We headed downtown and we searched for a place to eat. Since we rarely go downtown, it took us quite a while until we found somewhere suitable where we didn't need a reservation. We ended up at a sports bar (Chargers to be exact, which we witnessed first hand due to the game Saturday night) and had very good food. We then headed over to the Inn and saw the great lights. The large Christmas tree was already down due to fire safety, but there were still lots of twinkling lights to see! The main lobby was gorgeous as well, but my photos did not turn out very well, so the plethora of photos are all from outside.
It was nice to see the lights finally and it is always a pleasure to go to the Mission Inn. I can finally say that I am a real Riversidian now that I've toured the lights!

To be a better blogger...

...is my new year's resolution!
The last month and a half of 2008 has flown by and now we are already in 2009! I am utterly exhausted from working long hours, traveling, and getting "ready" for the holidays. The new year brings getting "unready" from the holidays, which will take a while, as I still have Thanksgiving things out! I thought I would post some photos from the last month or so that I never got around to posting!
Happy New Year!