Live from Playa

Here we are, in paradise. There's not a worry in my mind and my fingernails are even growing. The weather has been fabulous, with a little bit of rain at night, but it cools our pulsing skin.
Tomorrow there will be some adventures and some serious Feliz Navidad coming from the band. Tonight there may even be some karaoke action. Pics will be posted as necessary.

There's something liberating about....

leaving the wallet at home. I mean all of the points cards, id cards and gift cards. If you've ever seen my wallet, it's not normal, nor can it really close. Speaking of gift cards I received many generous denominations from my students for Starbucks, in particular. Being a non-coffee drinker, I decided to spent some of my loot on a Starbucks thermos cup for Mexico. I figure my draft beer will stay colder that way. I'm off to the bed to get a few hours of rest prior to the cab's arrival at 4 am. My next post shall be from Playa.

2nd shortest date ever!

This almost compares to the gelati date of months ago. That one was 35 minutes and this one was 1 hour and 35 minutes, but we had dinner this time and 10 minutes of that was spent looking for parking, which evidently I overpaid for!

He's decent looking, the conversation flowed, he joked about my need for a guy who can spell and is grammatical in his thoughts. We talked hockey, family, Mexico, careers, Toronto and life, yet I could sense that he had no interest in me and he asked for the bill quickly and was just counting down the seconds until I finished my beer. I'm not saying that I wanted to date the guy, but what the eff is wrong with me? I can't even get a goddamn second date. If it's the hips and the ass, then I am starting to save up for lipo. Sad, but true.

This is the life I crave.

One of rushing around, having lots going on and getting home late. 12:35 am is a little bit late for a school night, but I had a great day. I worked, ran a couple of errands, went to a fundraiser dinner, bought Chanukah treats for my hockey team and played a half-assed game of 11:10 pm hockey.

The dinner was wonderful. It was well planned, really well attended and I got 2 numbers! Don't get too excited. They are 80 year old men who want to share more of their stories and they are SUCH characters. There were plenty of good looking young professionals in addition to the charming geriatrics.

At hockey I also found out that my lawyer connection got my teammate a job after being unemployed for months. I really hope it works out because I do feel like they are a total match.

Tomorrow is mental health day, currency exchange, some trip prep and dinner with friends. Tonight, I love my life.

It's been a dull few days

around these parts. I had a busy week, and yes I did cook my fresh basil and chicken pasta, for MYSELF! It was delicious. Cold sore phobe made no contact, the diplomat said his goodbyes and I'm counting down the days to Mehico!
My nearest and dearest had a Chanukah dinner on Friday which was exquisite. The food, the setup the wine. The vino was a flowin'. Slept mostly yesterday and started to pack.
Mexico is really the only place I coordinate my outfits. After realizing last night, that 1 bathing suit wouldn't cut it, I purchased another top. It was overpriced but it is gorgeous. I wandered through the overpriced neighbourhood after an early morning work out and general sweating out of my toxins. Much needed.
Tomorrow I work, am going to a fundraiser dinner and then have a super late hockey game. Not to worry, Tuesday is a preemptive sick day.

It's go, go, go, CRASH.

So, since we spoke last I have accomplished very little but did have a great night last night. After doing a serious deep clean of the loft, including the tubs and the toilets I met up with friends for dinner and drinks. Ironically, we went to the same place that I had been on Friday night. We had a few pre drinks at a friend's apartment then to da club.
It became packed and they were playing some pretty good music so naturally I was givin' 'er on the dance floor. We stayed until about 1:30, then I took a cab home. As per the usual, I logged onto my online "profiles" and there was a message from, the cold sore phobe. Read the post from November 13, 2006 if you don't recall this:

********
I went on a date with this dude from lavalife. We went for breakfast, picked up coffee and bagels and he offered me a piece of a muffin. I mentioned that it had nuts on it so I should stay away from it because I could get cold sores. He freaked out. We were in the car and he freaked out. I dropped him off on the street corner, shocked and amazed. That evening, I got this e-mail:

Dear Naomi:

Sorry about what happened today, however, I can't date girls who get cold sores and have herpes simplex virus 1 (even though 80% of the population has some form of the virus).

I think you're a great girl and that you will find someone who makes you happy.

Take care of yourself.

It was nice meeting you. Good luck meeting the love of your life.

I responded with, "Good luck with the other 20%". Very strange indeed. I'm still in shock, really.

*****

We chatted, I told him that he made a very poor judgment call and in fact, I hadn't had a cold sore since early in the summer after a nut and peanut butter binge. He laughed but did say, that it's something he really couldn't get over, but I guess since it had been a month, he came to his senses. I told him it was unfortunate because we could have had great times, and I felt that he was actually dateable.
At this point, it was 3:30 am and time to crash. We made plans for breakfast, and I crashed. So this morning a friend phoned and said, "just don't go for nut-filled" muffins.

Breakfast was great. A little diner near my place and fantastic conversation. He is a great conversationalist, animated and intelligent. He's a litigator, so naturally quite articulate, has lived all over the country and I really think he's good times. He had to get some work done, so I dropped him off at work and went to my favourite Polish bakery and deli and my favourite Korean fruit and vegetable market for my Toronto-style grocery shop. Did some laundry, chilled out and took a nap which JUST ended 30 minutes ago. I slept for 8 hours. Oy, vey!

Maybe this week I'll cook a meal for my new prospect. I'll be sure to lure him in with my Fussili with chicken in a white wine basil sauce.

Sometimes, I'm irritable.

I had grand plans to shlep the bed this afternoon, but after a week of irritation and work, I was glad to find out that my credit cards didn't have liability insurance for the rental of a commercial vehicle, so I decided to scrap the manual labour. I booked a mover for tomorrow morning for $100 plus taxes, which is what I should have done to begin with.

Even though my students have been making me insane and the school has made some ridiculous decisions and I had one meltdown regarding a curriculum issue this week, something SO funny happened during a class today. We were playing Taboo with some vocabulary and then once the students got bored, we played a word game with definitions and sentences. The kids asked, "Do our Hebrew sentences have to make sense?" I responded with, "no, as long as you're using your Hebrew." Well, the word in question was "sneh" which means "bush". In the context of Moses and the burning bush. The student responded with the following, home-made sentence, "Moshe ochel sneh." Translated - Moses eats bush. I died. I laughed hysterically and couldn't contain myself. Due to my reaction, one of the students (a male) said, "Ani ochel sneh" - I eat bush. Then a female student said the same thing. I lost it. At least I can laugh it off!

Munched out on chips and cookies after the non-bed-shlep, took a nap, went for dinner and went to see Will Farrell's new movie, Stranger Than Fiction. Firstly, I was drinking a smoothie. Secondly, it is winter here. Thirdly, there was no heat in the theatre and I could NOT sit still. I was not enjoying the movie and I was itchy, agitated and unimpressed with one of my favourite actors. It got a 75% rating on www.rottentomatoes.com, which is usually a good gauge. Maybe I just wasn't in the mood and apparently it has a good message at the end. We'll see what the consensus was from the rest of the crew....

The dinner of champions!

Kraft dinner. I sometimes crave it. I craved it after I listened to Barenaked Ladies at the gym when they talk about spending their million dollars on Kraft dinner. I accompany mine not with ketchup, but with tuna. Speaking of the gym, I actually stopped working out today because I was SO hungry. Really normal.

After not hearing back from the Sunday date, I emailed him with, "I've noticed you haven't emailed me back. Are you shy or uninterested? Let me know either way."

I have deflated the air mattress in the guest bedroom for the last time. It is finally in storage where air mattresses belong in anticipation of the bed I'm picking up tomorrow. I'm renting a truck and a friend of mine is helping me shlep the bastard. House guests welcome!

It's been a while

I had a very busy week last week with the parent teacher conferences which really is a good time for teachers. We get to realize where these children come from and that as one of the parents said, "the apple doesn't fall far from this tree". Friday was a ridonculous professional development day and it was important that on Friday evening, we drank!
We played the most hysterical drinking games. We had to follow rules like not showing your teeth, or not laughing or else we HAD to play DRINKO to drink a surprise shot of either wine, diet coke, beer, coolers or water. Hysterical. Had a sleepover, went to the gym and had a delicious brunch in comfy leather chairs.
Saturday night I went to the BEST house party ever. 3 bars, awesome music, once we took over d.j.ing and we partied hard. We made a pit stop in our old 'hood to get some food. I was ravenous and they were closed. After knocking on the door, the Lebanese fellow opened the door and committed to making me a chicken Greek salad. It would take 20 minutes and being so hungry I asked for an appetizer of tzatziki and grilled pita. Passed out and had my second sleepover of the weekend.
Sunday morning I went to the gym which was shocking and took a nap prior to my date. I met up with this very nice guy. He's attractive, highly intelligent, sarcastic, and VERY successful, but he may be just a bit too conservative for me. We'll see. The conversation flowed well, we have a lot in common and I'd be interested in a second date. Time will tell. We mentioned something about later this week.
My students are making me insane. It's the season, the change of weather, the pending vacation and Chanukah. They are off of the walls!
We played hockey tonight at 10:10 and we got nailed 11-1. The beauty of my league is that they stop counting after there's a 5 point spread. I was also flirting with a dude on the other team. He kept letting me win the face-offs. Oh, me!