Winter Holidays 2009

     OK, I know every day is a holiday for me, but I'm talking about Thanksgiving, Christmas, etc.  Christine and I stayed in Portland this year.  She couldn't really get work off and as long as I’m not working, we don’t really have the funds to travel.  Though after I start working, I ironically might not have the time off.  

     We had Thanksgiving with the Hines family, however I got to spend some time in California with my family just before.  Christine’s mom makes awesome turkeys and great pies, so it was a nice Thanksgiving. 

    We also had Christmas  with the Hines.  Because I haven’t found work yet, we couldn’t really afford to buy each other Christmas presents, so we had a $5 limit.  Christine chose to buy some fabric and make an Oakland Raiders apron with matching hot pads.  For graduation, Bronson got me a pillow with a Raiders pattern, and Christine used the same pattern for the apron and pads.  It is awesome!  Although she didn't spend much, it was a very nice gift.  (I didn’t get much, just a simple thing for the kitchen.)  I really needed an apron because I keep cooking since she works and I get grease splatters and I hate ruining shirts.  Also, the Bishop from our church, who knew how difficult things were for us dropped off a food basket with a little extra in it and that was a great help.  Thanks to any who read this and helped with that. 
    To welcome the new year, we moved to a new crappy one bedroom apartment at the end of the year.  Our new year's resolution is to live within our means.  We couldn’t afford to live in our old place if I wasn’t working.  At the end of the lease, since I hadn’t found a job, we moved to a cheaper place so that we could live within our means.  The new place isn’t as nice, but it’s closer to Christine’s work, more central to stores and things, and much cheaper.  Moving is a hassle and I hated it, but I think we are finally done now that it's February.    
    Other than that, nothing changes.  I still can’t find work, but at least Christine has a job.  We’re still poor and I still need a Playstation 3 so I can spend my time being productive by progressing in video games rather than applying for jobs!

Celebrate No More Studying

I will post for the foreseeable future since I am the one with all the free time. That means this post will be less humorous and quirky, though more dry and pedantic. Awesome.

We celebrated my finishing the bar by driving to LA and taking a cruise to Ensenada. It was the most cost effective vacation since the cruise was cheap and it included meals and lodging and we could spend some time in LA while staying at my Grandma's.

Of course the first lunch we had in LA was at Tommy's, the best place in the world. We took my grandma and visited her sister. We also visited the 99¢ Only store (the only good dollar store) where I got some weird, possibly expired candy, which is my tradition.

My friend James and his girlfriend Nikki took us to Balboa Island and Newport Beach so that I could give Christine the Brandon Childhood Memory Tour Part 4. We got some frozen bananas, walked around, and ate dinner at Mutt Lynch's. Then we played a few hours of Rock Band at James's house. Rock On.

The Carnival Paradise was our home for the remainder of our vaction. It was fun and somewhat relaxing, though not as fun or relaxing as I remember my first cruise being. Each night we were welcomed to our cabin by a different towel animal, a Carnival tradition. We also participated in the cruise tradition of keeping our bellys constantly full: including a hot dog and chili fries everynight at the midnight buffet for me and a perpetual ice cream cone for Christine. I payed for the food, so I'm gonna eat as much of it as possible!

In Ensenada, we found a Home Depot (Christine just can't get away) and saw the Bufadora, which was more active than I'd ever seen it. The carne asada tacos we bought from a street vendor were delicious, but would have been better with a delicious beverage - after walking up and down various shady streets, I was unable to procure a glass-bottled Pepsi to accompany my tacos. No ceviche was consumed; I didn't like it last time, and it scares me. I probably won't take the Ensenada cruise again, but it was fun to share a fond college memory with my wife.


When we got off the boat, we visited the Long Beach Aquarium since it was right there and walked around the nearby shops and marina. Of course for lunch, we could not resist an opportunity to consume more delicious Tommy burgers and chili-cheese fries. Apparently we just can't punish our bowels enough.

My Bad

Brandon reminded me I needed to update.
We found out Brandon passed the Bar. Yeah!!!! He was sworn in Oct 8th. So, if anyone hears word about a job....feel free to send word our way :)
Until then, Brandon is very diligent in applying for anything he finds on the school career site. And he's a sweetheart by getting up early to fix me breakfast before I head to the Depot. (I can brag, right?)

Juris

Well, he did it. Brandon graduated over Memorial Weekend. What an amazing accomplishment! I'm so proud that Brandon stuck with it when school was tough and reached his goal. I know that he still has 2 months of study in order to pass the bar, but he can do it!!! And I can't wait to have my husband back come August. Way to go Brandon!!!

Look close and you can see Brandon waving to us

Brandon receiving his cap

The Beach - or should I say The Coast

This weekend Bran and I headed to the beach. Around here everyone calls it the coast. I think that's because it's usually too cold or windy or rainy for there to be much beachfront activity. This weekend proved that theory.

Bran has not stopped talking about the seafood buffet at the casino in Lincoln City since Matt told him about it. We ate so much that we woke up Saturday still feeling full and sick. I will admit I loved the Indian Fry Bread - yum! Newport ended up with a lot of rain Saturday. We were lucky enough to walk around town before the major storm hit. By the time we got to the aquarium, it was pouring and the wind started picking up. Everyone else in town decided it was a great time to get under cover - so there were lots of families there to watch along with the sea creatures. The storm was so bad after the aquarium, we decided to stay in the hotel for the evening. We grabbed a movie and listened to the howling wind. It was so windy that night. I woke up to our bed shaking slightly. I finally realized the shaking happened each time the wind blew. The wind was so strong it was shaking our hotel! That didn't help me fall back asleep. I was wide awake for a while wondering if the wind was going to break apart our hotel. We were on the top floor, which really didn't help calm my fears with all the noises from the roof. I finally had to pray that the wind would settle down enough to allow me to get back to sleep, which it did. Brandon slept through it. And he calls himself a light sleeper...

Bran and I were not happy about having to head home. We both needed the break. The sun started to poke his head out as we were headed back to Lincoln City. We tried to walk on the beach in Newport but it was just too windy and cold. We tried in Lincoln City, but the same thing. After lunch we tried again. The wind seemed to have calmed down enough for a short walk. We didn't really make it to the ocean beaches, but we walked along Siletz Bay. We could see the huge waves coming in from the ocean. It was so gorgeous. Portland was gorgeous too! The sun was shinning and it was almost warm enough to not need a jacket. It made coming back a little easier...

Christmas in Cali

Since we were in LA, we decided to have lunch at Bob's Big Boy.

Brandon, Christine, Bronson, Bob, Mom
Justin, Dad, Jamie









This was only my second time visiting Grandma. I had no idea what to do since last time we did a lot. I was asked every 5 minutes what I wanted to do. My buddy Adam Carolla often speaks about the La Brea Tar Pits. I was dumb enough to think they would take it as a joke to go see the tar pits. This is what I found....tar. And I learned my lesson.

Let it snow!

This year, Mother Nature decided to surprise the Portland area with a ton of snow. It pretty much started on Dec 13th and didn't stop until....well I'm not sure because we were one of the lucky ones who got to leave town for Christmas. I heard they had a lot of snow on Christmas. People were at their wits end due to all the snow. Portland is not ready for 6 inches of snow, let alone a couple of feet. There were not enough plows to clear the roads. The temperature never got above freezing so for two weeks we'd wake up to new snow, the snow packed down during the day, froze overnight, and then it snowed again. The roads were really slick. They were covered so much that ruts started to form in the snow where everyone was driving. I like driving in it, but I wasn't thrilled with other drivers taking it too fast(I had one car coming at me sideways down a two laned road where either he went off the cliff to miss me or I ran into a hillside. Thank goodness he missed me by inches and was able to stop just in time to stop from going off the cliff!) ODOT usually tells everyone to use the buses, but that was hard when the buses were shut down. Brandon was planning on taking the bus to campus to finish his finals. He found out as he was leaving that the buses had stopped running for the day(and it ended up being for the week). The school finally wised up and stayed open a couple of days so he at least was able to drive over and get finals over with. Everything stayed closed as workers couldn't make it in.
All in all, I thought this storm was so much fun! I love having everything covered in snow. The trees were gorgeous. I had to go to work so we chained up Brandon's car and I drove in. I really enjoyed coming home. One road was uphill, and with all the snow frozen over on the roads the ruts in the snow made me stay on the road like a roller coaster track. With being bumped back and forth and the chains on, it truly felt like I was headed up on the Colossus.
We weren't sure if we would be able to leave for Grandma's in Southern Cali. The roads had been so bad on I-5 south, the way we were headed. But we had to leave on the 23rd. There had been a bad accident they were clearing as we left the house. Traffic was backed up, but once we got on I-5 we didn't move. It took a while but we finally found out that ODOT decided to close I-5 to scrape and de-ice the bad areas. BAD TIMING!!! Everyone was leaving town for Christmas. It took us 5 hours to get to Salem, which normally takes 30 minutes. Our plans to hit Medford at 9 obviously did not happen. We hit snow in the mountains, which we would have missed if we hadn't been stuck on the freeway. 3am we drove into Medford, totally exhausted. Brandon was such a trooper - he drove the whole way, though he tried to talk me into turning around to sleep in our own bed. But we made it safely to Grandma's and had a great time with the Hignites.