This weekend I attended two halloween parties and had a great time. The first was hosted at a gigantic home in Belle Meade and there had to be 200 people there by midnight. I went early to this party and left around 10pm to go to the other party, knowing I would want to return. Anyway, NiT has a link to some pictures. Alas, I am not in any of them, but they do capture some of the controlled craziness that ensued. I actually only knew the host and one other party guest, so I walked around the house countless times looking at costumes and made friendly conversation with some other guests. Open bar + yummy food + lots o people = good times!!

The second party was hosted by one of my Actor’s Bridge friends, Pru, and it was great to see all my theatre buds in their goulish getups. I opted for a nondescript costume combination of a black satin dress, some black wings, and a black halo. I was hence referred to as a “dark angel”. Worked for me.

Last night, although it wasn’t a halloween bash, I participated in a work function at 100 oaks mall. Vanderbilt is going to be moving some clinics and opening up some new ones out there starting next year. This was kind of a pre-party for tenants of 100 oaks as well as lots of employees and donors. I spent the whole night demonstrating some parts of our EMR and socializing with co-workers. Not a bad way to spend a “work night”.

As some of you know, I went on vacation last week to see my mom for her 65th birthday. I started out on Wednesday and headed for NYC to meet up with my brother. The original idea was for me to use a companion ticket he had through his new AmEx card. I bought my roundtrip ticket to NYC before he found out he wasn’t going to get the ticket for some reason, but he used miles to still get me a free fare.

So Wednesday night and Thursday, we hung out in NYC. I got to see a high school friend who lives in the city and we had a nice chat, plus I got to meet her boyfriend’s dog and cats. You all know how crazy I am about animals, so that was a great little surprise.

On Friday, Brett and I flew to CA and mom met us at the airport. We immediately went to get lunch because American Airlines now charges $5 for wrap sandwiches, which is bad enough in itself, but they were also SOLD OUT by the time we wanted one. Anyway, we enjoyed some yummy mexican food at Enrique’s in Long Beach, a local favorite. Later we saw “The Assassination of Jesse James”, which I hadn’t even heard of until then. How did I miss that Brad Pitt did a movie about Jesse James?? Well, it was pretty good, told in an artistic way (maybe too artistic for some of the audience in Long Beach) and Casey Affleck was marvelous.

Saturday we headed up to Santa Barbara as a little “getaway” for my mom. As with most of my childhood, I don’t remember going there, but my mom assures me I’ve been there. That, of course, hurts her feelings because I remember so little of my childhood, even though it was pleasant and I was exposed to many wonderful things that most kids don’t get to see or do.  Oh well,  I can’t help that I don’t remember stuff! So anyway, we met up with one of my brother’s friends from Harvard who now lives in LA, and my aunt and uncle, who I haven’t seen in probably 6 years. We had drinks and chips on the beach, then headed back to our hotel to change for dinner. We ended up going to this amazing indian food restaurant on State Street. A good time was had by all.

Then on Sunday, Brett went golfing with his friend while mom and I walked up and down State Street. We found this cute dog/cat clothing/toy store and spent some time looking around. Cute stuff! I didn’t end up buying anything though. Later, we met up with Brett and his friend again, plus another aunt and uncle, and my cousin’s wife and daughter (I know, even I get confused about it). Two other friends joined us and we had a great meal at a mexican restaurant on State Street. This was the big celebration for my mother’s birthday. Everyone seemed to have a great time and me, Brett and mom went to a few bars afterwards to hear some live music. Everyone else was driving home so they hit the road.

On Monday, we drove back to Long Beach, after stopping at an outlet mall to do some quick shopping. Of course, I found some good deals at Ann Taylor, but had to mail the clothes to myself since I didn’t have room in my suitcase. I didn’t buy a ton but it was enough to make a difference. Monday night we saw “Eastern Promises” with Viggo Mortensen and Naomi Watts. My advice? Save your $8.50 and see something else. It was overly gorey and the plot was a little muddy. Plus, the screenplay was really rushed towards the end.

Tuesday we flew back to NYC, which took 8 hours due to a delay on the ground in LA and then a delay in the air circling JFK. I guess the weather made the landings difficult; they even shut down Newark for a while. We eventually made it back to Brett’s apartment around 12:30am. I left the next day for Nashville and here I am, back at work.

Overall it was a nice visit with family. I wish I could’ve seen a few more friends while home, but with only a very short time actually at home, that made things difficult. Oh well!

Jason and I netflixed  this movied and watched it last night.  I have to say that this was one of the worst movies I’ve seen in a long time. Not only was the child acting pretty awful, the script was lacking and cinematography screamed “b movie”.

I was actually really hoping it would be surprisingly good, seeing how it was Ashton’s first attempt at something serious, but the weaknesses named above really ruined his chances. I mean, the plot was just quite ridiculous and the sequence of events was obnoxiously unconvincing. I feel about it the same way I felt about the second season of Desparate Housewives. Everything that could possibly go wrong went wrong and it was just too much. I was laughing throughout the whole movie.  What a shame.

We went to the zoo again on Sunday for a work celebration. They have these new red river hogs and as we walked up, this woman with a young girl kept saying ‘how cute!’. I was surprised that she thought they were so cute, but then I realized they are Pumba’s relatives, so they’ve got to be cute!

Well, we made it through our skydiving adventure and have videos to prove it.

The skydiving place was a little further out than we thought it would be, so we were a little worried that being late would cause trouble. They were very laid back though and said we’d have a shorter wait time before our scheduled jump since we arrived a little later.

It really wasn’t all that scary, really. I never once felt like my life was in danger and I definitely was not as frightened as when we swam with sharks in the Bahamas. We opted to go with the higher jump, 14,000 ft, so we could free fall for 8,000. I don’t know if I would’ve been able to tell the difference, but the free fall was definitely the most overwhelming part. It was a little hard to breathe, mostly because of the speed of the air entering my mouth, and I’m sure the fact that I’d just jumped out of a plane had something to do with it. It didn’t really feel like I was falling, more like I was flying. It was pretty awesome. If I had to do it over again, I’d make sure to have “better form” and I’d wear something that covered my arms. It was pretty chilly up there, plus the wind speed does awful things to skin on video.

On Sunday, our actual anniversary, we did attempt to eat the top part of our wedding cake, which has been in our freezer since the wedding. Let’s just say it tasted like…freezer. It was pretty nasty. I’d heard it might be, and it was. We should’ve stored it in something airtight, but didn’t. Oh well. It was fun to take part in the tradition, but we only ate enough to say we ate some of it.

I know my dad and brother have something to do with the fact that I find this extremely entertaining: Dude…

On our way to Jennifer and Tyler’s wedding.

I thought this dress was a great find, considering her colors were brown and pink. and I did my own hair! I was a little impressed with myself.

Jennifer asked me and Jason to light candles before the ceremony started.

Jennifer’s wedding was this past Saturday and we had a great time. This is Thomas, who was quite enamored with me the whole evening. Such a cutie.