Ahoy, matey!
Well, happy 2006! Yah, it doesn't feel too different. More laid back, I guess, but that's because I'm still on my super-break away from school. (20 Dec – 23 Jan break, woohoo!) Last weekend my mom and Ron flew out to Santa Barbara. On Friday they came up to see the casa de Conklin. We went golfing on base (Ooooh, I am so terrible! It's only my second time out playing 9 holes, though. Matt promises he'll really teach me.) and then out to a nice dinner at Lompoc's finest, Saletti's. Mmm. They returned to Santa Barbara and we drove down Saturday morning to join them on a whale watching expedition. Well, it's been ten years since my mother or I have set foot on a boat, and Matt's never been ocean-bound (Ron practically grew up at sea). The four-hour tour took us out to the Santa Cruz islands and three of us spent most of it asleep or on the verge of losing our breakfasts. We were so miserably sea sick and no one even saw a single whale. It was pretty stormy and rainy out, so maybe the whales were afraid to come up (and get wet??). It seemed like a great idea and we were all really excited about it, but just couldn't stomach it. No worries about not seeing whales though; we got four free, non-expiring passes to go do it all over again (this time, with Dramamine)! (( Whale boat pictures are up here! )) Saturday we also celebrated Matt's and Ron's birthdays. After recovering from the boat trip, we perused the (closed) stores on State Street until our 9pm dinner reservation. Still raining. The restaurant was great, though. We had a classy band and were seated on the patio (it had stopped raining by then, thankfully) and a terrific dinner! Matt's first experience with lobster bisque or filet mignon. Neither of us care much for lobster. Anyhow, it was an experience for Matt, but not really his style. We decided to celebrate his birthday Matt-style on Monday. Sunday was mostly just sleeping in, kicking back, hanging out. My mom and I went out to see Fun With Dick and Jane because the boys just wanted to sit in the hotel room with their new books. :p That's all right, it's nice to hang with my mom! Despite unfortunate weather and motion sickness, it was great to see her and Ron! Since then Matt's gone back to work and I've been playing it lazy. Well, sort of … I took down all the Christmas decorations and reorganized most of the apartment. I couldn't just be a total bum all week! Mostly I've just been crocheting, though. Last weekend my mom got me a Crocheting for Dummies book, and I've been yarn-wild since! Yesterday I finished my first project: a scarf. I didn't go by a pattern, just flew by the seat of my pants with it. It's hideous and I think I'll mail it to my sister.
All day today I've been working on an afghan. I think it will take some time. I ordered the spring semester's school books online rather than bother with the bookstore lines. The arrived today and got me all excited! I have a piano book, a physics book, and a linear algebra book and they just get me all giddy to jump right in! It's not that I don't like sitting around at home crocheting and watching movies, but I'm just psyched about school. I looked up my fall grades yesterday. Bragging time. All A's! Well, I'm just pleased because it's my first 4.0 college semester. So now I want to see if I can do it all over again! I really need to work hard to bring up my horrific CSU freshman GPA — at least now my cumulative has broken a 3.0! =\ That's about all in the wonderful world of Mel. Today ends my "weekend" (so what if it was nearly three weeks?) I have to work tomorrow and Sunday. Really, my job seems interesting, and I'm sure it will be someday, but guard drills are the most boring things ever! I can't wait to get my security clearance and go to school this summer so I can actually do work and not just sit around once a month trying to look busy. Argh! I hope you all enjoy your weekends! :p Ciao!

[...] All posts from here through January 6, 2006 were posted on my LiveJournal blog. Posts prior to this were handwritten journal entries typed into [...]
[...] All posts from here through January 6, 2006 were posted on my LiveJournal blog. Posts prior to this were handwritten journal entries typed into [...]