adventures in young adult land: vacation!

I'm sorry about the delay in updated posts... Brent and I are preparing to go to California tomorrow for almost a week. We'll actually be there for just 5 full days, since we leave tomorrow night (we don't arrive until like 10:15pm, which will actually be 11:15pm for our bodies), and then we come back to Boulder next Monday early morning. Our flight leaves DIA tomorrow at about 8:30pm, and then we leave San Jose International at like 6:15am on the 16th. Two of Brent's aunts will be in town, so he planned on visiting CA this week, and I decided that it was as good a time as any for me to visit as well. It is kind of strange not to be going during school holiday time, but I will only be missing one class on one day, so it worked out well. I know a few people in the class that I'm missing, so I should be fine to get notes and everything.

Many of you know that I'm not exactly a fan of travelling by airplane. I didn't really like it when I was younger, but then I was okay with it throughout high school, until I had a bad experience on a flight, and now I'm not too good at it. I'm basically terrified of a plane crash, or something going wrong where it explodes in midair or something horrible like that. Since I had vertigo last summer, I developed a bit of an anxiety problem, which just makes my fear of flying even worse. This is why I have pretty much avoided taking trips where I have to fly alone at all costs. However, I have been getting better, or at least my round trip last Christmas for a week wasn't too bad, and I'm hoping this flight will go just as well. I know that I just have to keep flying, and I will get over it eventually, but the point is, I am not looking forward to tomorrow evening at all. It's so not fair to have to pay a chunk of money to do something that I hate, but at least I am doing it so that I can see people (and a kitty) that I love, and I wont have to do it alone (yay for Brent!). This summer, we are thinking that we'd like to maybe take a trip to Texas, since Brent hasn't met my family there, with the very important exception of my Dad and Taherah. I want him to meet my grandparents and aunt and uncle and cousins, because I know that they will love him. That will be good flying practice as well, which I need to keep doing as often as I can afford to.

Last weekend was really icy and freezing, until Sunday late afternoon, when all of a sudden the sun came out and it warmed up a good 10 degrees. We went to another grad student and his wife's house to dye easter eggs and have a bbq. I brought leftover noodles and salad, which were super yummy instead of sausage or salmon (yuck!). It ended up being so much fun, and playing with their cats made me very excited to get to see Jilly (my family's 15 year old awesome kitty) tomorrow night. By the time we headed home, there was barely any snow left along the roads, and the road itself was dry. I love that about Colorado!

On Saturday, we stayed home all day because it was so unwelcoming outside. We opened Brent's scrabble game and played it for the first time... it was really fun. Even though Brent lost two turns (he challenged one of my words, and he exchanged his letters once), he still beat me by a good 20 points or so... and my words were even less common than his!! Oh well. I'm sure with practice I can beat him bad one of these days!

While we're in California, I probably wont be able to update the blog since we don't have fast internet there. I will, however, be back in a week with lots of pictures and stories to add. I hope everyone has a safe and happy week! In honor of the trip, here are some pictures of Jilly, being a tiger. I LOVE my kitty.