Kaelyn 15 Months

Kaelyn is the cutest little girl in the whole wide world. Seriously. Here are some of my favorite memories from the weekend:
♥ I was sitting in the living room of Andrews house when she came walking out of the bedroom. Sleepy and smiling, she looked around the room and spotted a book on the arm of the chair. She picked up the book and brought it over to me as a hello offering. The book was Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus. I said, “Yes, Kaelyn, I do need some relationship advice.” We all got a laugh out of this and she walked away, satisfied.
♥ She loves music. Dancing in the car, dancing to a random commercial song she liked, dancing at the band review when the bands marched by. As she be bopped around in my arms she held her hand up like a slight wave toward the band and it kind of looked like she was hailing Hitler as they marched by. Andrew said the other night a salsa song was on a movie they were watching and instead of her usual bouncing dance she started shaking her hips like she knew the salsa beat required more of a hip movement.
♥ We walked around the backyard of Andrew’s house and she played and explored. Andrew is building a little fence around his garden with old wooden pallets. One of the pallets were laying flat on the ground in the corner of the fence and to me, it looked like a little stage. So, I walked up to it and started tapping my foot on is and dancing around. Kaelyn squealed with delight and immediately wanted to jump up and do it too. One foot at a time she got up by herself and watched as I stomped my foot and of course started to do the same. I cheered her on and she looked up at me with this look like, “You are the coolest. This is awesome!” This is the shot I took at that moment. You can see her little arm us up as she dances around:

♥ She loves my camera. The camera strap provides her with hours of entertainment.
♥ “Doooogy” is everything but when she sees a real doggy, she says it really excited and points. She loves animals.
♥ She is always happy. I spent most of the weekend with her and she never fussed. She just loves and wants love.
She is a doll and honestly the cutest little girl on the face of this earth.

Reason 1,756 why I left Merced

While driving over to my brother’s house this weekend, I was admiring the fall colors as the season changes. The colors of fall might possibly be the one and only thing Southern California lacks so every year when I am in town for Thanksgiving, I soak up the beauty as the trees lose their leaves in preparation for winter.
I had my Nikon loaded up with a roll of film to take more pictures of Kaelyn, so I decided to pull over and take some of Bear Creek. I thought it would make nice wallpaper for my work laptop.
I hopped out of the car and a slight feeling of insecurity came over me. I brushed it off as paranoia and walked across the bridge at the busy corner of Bear Creek and G Street and took the shot above.
Feeling accomplished, I smiled, and turned to walk back. A greasy old man in a rusted old bucket of a truck hollers across his passenger side window, “Yea sweetie, the trees are almost as beautiful as you are heee heee.”
Wow. Thanks.
I continue to walk along and pay no attention to him.
Retrospectively, I should have pointed my camera and taken a picture of his annoying, smikring face and then posted it on here to laugh at. He probably would have been pretty surprised when the lens pointed his direction.
That greasy old man symbolized all that bothers me about Merced. He was the reason why I felt a slight insecurity as I stepped out of the car cause around town you can’t just take a beautiful picture without someone, somewhere, being a smart ass. I could go around HB all day taking pictures and probably wouldn’t be bothered by a single person. Why, Merced, Why?
As I appreciate your beauty and some of your good qualities Merced, I will mark that one down on the “reasons why I left” column. Sheesh.

40 hours

A look into my everyday life...
I took this panoramic picture of my desk where I spend 40 hours of my week. It a collection of papers, pictures of Kaelyn, a bamboo plant that is almost dead, lollipops, farm animals, and other gadgets. It's pretty small. Most desks around here are much bigger but it's cozy. ITunes and my tracker program is on my screen. Right above my two screens is a 16 foot screen of video cameras, monitoring and tracking systems. It's pretty sweet. Anyhow, that's my little spot in this company and I kinda like it.

-- Post From My iPhone

Spinster once again...

Our 3 1/2 month relationship came to an end last night. It was bittersweet, as most endings are. In a nutshell, I don’t feel like he accepts who I am but only wants to see the parts of me he is comfortable with and I know someone, someday, somewhere, will appreciate all of me. He didn’t want it to end. I didn’t want it to end. And as it was happening it felt wrong. I had a few moments of denial and thought it will never really be over. As certain as I felt leading up to it, it didn’t feel right when it was actually happening. It was really weird.
I didn’t sleep. I’ve been up for almost 48 hours. I tried, but the knots in my stomach kept me awake. I can’t wait to go to bed around 7 tonight and sleep for 12 hours. I am exhausted.
Getting over someone is the pits. Every little stupid thing reminds me of him.
Time, 12 hours of sleep, and a weekend in Merced with my brother is all I can see right now.

Reason 1,257 why I love HB...

It's November 2nd, and last night we were beach cruising down The Strand in HB watching the sunset in tee shirts. It's moments like this I cherish and have to pinch myself. This is where I live! This is literally 4 miles from my house! We rode down to main street and had dinner at Fred's outside on the patio with a perfect view of the setting sun and pier. It was spectacular.
Living here will never get old and honestly, I can't imagine moving or living anywhere else.

The Sunset


Randy and his new bike on the pier



HB Pier on a beautiful day!




It's so peaceful when the tourists aren't there. Heehee

-- Post From My iPhone

Halloween 2009

Randy and I had a fun and safe Halloween. I was a cowgirl and he was a crashed mountain biker. You can't really see it in this picture but he has a huge bloody stick going through his helmet. We didn't coordinate our costumes because 1. we're not gay 2. we didn't really have time to create something and 3. I had already decided last year what I was going to be this year. I couldn't find any cowboy boots but my western belt buckle and brown boots that I had tied to together nicely.
Earlier that day we went to the H.B. swap meet and Randy found this super sweet vintage beach cruiser. Since he lives in Hermosa Beach now he really needed a beach cruiser to ride around. I can't wait to help him explore his new neighborhood because it is right between Redondo Beach Pier and the downtown area of Hermosa and a hop away from Manhattan Beach. I haven't explored those beach communities so I look forward to that. We are headed out shortly to cruise my turf here in HB.
Here he is with his new ride:



We hit up 2 out of the 4 Halloween parties I was invited to last night. There's never enough time. First, we went to Sheets house for a Halogen party. We arrived too late to go trick or treating but we were there to see Angela and Brent get engaged! So awesome! Everyone was surprised. We then headed over to Jelena's brother in laws house for the annual party. There weren't as many people there as last year but it was it was cool. We ended the night at O'Mallys to see some live music and dance. The band wasn't as good as I remember it being last year so we dipped out early.

Pictures from Sheets party:

Low light = burry iphone pics but you get the gist.
See ya next year Halloween!

Brand New

I finally got to see Brand New in concert on Saturday. I had to miss the last two shows due to schedule conflicts and the fact that one of the shows sold out in 30 seconds. They just released a new album titled Daisy and it was #6 on the charts the first week it was out, their best debut yet. Last week I fell in love with it, so it was perfect timing to see them play it live.
The opening bands were great. I am pretty picky and both totally won me over. The Builders and the Butchers were first and then Manchester Orchestra followed.
I almost couldn’t contain myself once Brand New took the stage. Excitement and anticipation was so overwhelming. I was really stoked with their song selection. I didn’t expect to hear “You won’t know” and “I believe you but Tommy Gun don’t”. Here is a video of “I believe you…” with the crowd singing along and all the energy you can feel it! Listen to it, and let it build up, it’s worth a listen. I live for this shit. Seriously...



I was a little disappointed with two things.
First, the pit was too small. At one point they had a pit in the shape of a number 6 and the people in the middle were like little sheep and all freaked out, it was awesome. I was glad to be right on the edge for that one. I enjoyed it though. I rocked, I screamed, I shoved, I was headbangin, so all in all I was satisfied.
Second, they didn’t improvise at all. I guess I am used to Coheed who usually strays off the song and improvises and then brings it back. There were a couple moments I was hoping Brand New would do the same but they stuck way too close to the recorded version. Bummer.
I got tears in my eyes when they played “Jesus”. Wow. Amazing. I am so sad I don’t see a video of it on youtube yet. It was really beautiful. I could listen to that song a million times over and never get tired of it. To see it played in front of me was more than words. I had a perfect view (since the pit had stopped and there was a lot of space) and it was the icing on the cake for me.
I will probably see them again and again and again, God willing. Since I know every song, every lyric, and every scream, I can’t help but to go and support them and enjoy the music that I love being played live and in front of me.
Keep Rockin.