fly that ocean in a silver plane.

It hit me today that I will be in on vacation in a little over one week -- Barcelona, Madrid, Seville & Lisbon, followed by Fez, Tangier and Casablanca. I've never been to Spain or Portugal, though I've dreamt of visiting them both since the last time I traveled abroad. Africa, however, is the place I'm most excited to visit and to check off my list of visited places; truth be told, I get giddy at the prospect of adding another continent to my travel log! One of my good friends will be in Africa as well, studying abroad at a university in Algeria, and I wish we could visit her while we're in that region but there won't be enough time. I can't wait for the food (the falafel! and tabbouleh! be still my heart). And the beautiful scenery, the palaces and the plazas. And the experience, seeing all of those amazing cities with my mother as my sidekick. It's going to be an amazing two weeks and I am pee-my-pants happy in anticipation.

As I sat at work today, filling out work orders and invoices, the duprees' 'you belong to me' came over the radio and I couldn't help but think about this upcoming trip and how much I am going to miss everyone. . . especially Josh. It's such a lovely song and the lyrics were totally speaking about how I felt: the singer croons about the faraway places he's seen and explored, and all the while, he keeps his loved ones in his heart no matter the distance. I always get frustratingly lonely when I travel, from the couple-hour road trips in the car when I visit my boyfriend to the few months I spent studying abroad -- I always need someone I care about close by because traveling doesn't mean quite as much unless you're sharing the sights and the sounds and the memories with someone you love (and someone to hold my hand and pukebag during in-flight turbulence. . . that, too). I wish I could share this experience with everyone I love and I wish I could take everyone I love with me!

Let's all take a trip somewhere, together. Revel in the sights, feel the heartbeat of the cities, pack our gullets with the foreign cuisine. Where do you want to go?


(and that part about the pukebag? totally an exaggeration. . .)

a (very late) brew year, month three.

I've been slacking, I know.

So. San Diego, back in March. Visiting my wunnerful, wunnerful cousin & husband and their precious boys (also my bebe cousins). We squeezed in a bunch of sightseeing during that week and we shoveled a ton of amazing food into our bellies, too. Basically, when Josh and I weren't doing this:

that be the Torrey Pines Reserve right there!

Or devouring this:

note my wimpy in-n-out burger, sans onions. wee bit allergic to 'em, I am!

We were drinking and checking out this:

doesn't Josh look like the tour guide? his friends look slightly skeptical. except for the bro in the wwu shirt. he looks mighty interested.

Stone Brewery in Escondido is definitely in the running for my favorite brewery yet. Josh raved about their Ruination IPA (well, all of the Stone brews, actually) for months before we made it out to California and drank a fresh pint of it. I wasn't big on IPAs until I had one at the Stone bar and man-oh-man, did it make my taste buds explode with hop-y goodness. I wish I could remember the ratio our tour guide gave us about how many hops were used in their beer versus the average brew but. . . I'm thinking it was triple the amount. I'd insert a ratio here but all the humidity here has fried my brain. Anyway. Just know that it makes for a gigantic bold, bitter flavor, folks. A pint of the Ruination IPA - and just the regular IPA, too - gave me one of those great 'stick to yer ribs' feelings the way a good, full meal can; the Stone brews were like full and tasty like that.

So.

The REAL tour guide, the guy picture above, led us through the usual run-down: where's the tasting room, what's in beer, what is beer, what are hops, how long til we drink, how do you make beer taste like beer, where's the bathroom, how long do we have to listen to your voice before we get to go try some of this heavenly concoction that you keep shoving in our faces, etc. After a half-hour or so, the guy finally led us back to a long line of taps. Tall taps! Short taps! Big taps! Baby taps!

Which I don't have a picture of. You're gonna have to take my word for it. Or go there. And tell them I sent you. . . which means nothing because they don't remember me. Ey-oh!

when do we get to driiiiiiiink?

(Green note: Stone does not use additives, chemical preservatives or a pasteurization process with any of their brews. We may have inhaled 5,000 liters of smog-filled air out in California but I'll be damned if we drank preservative-filled beer!)

F-I-N-A-L-L-Y THIS HAPPENED!

You can probably tell that the answer to 'can I have one more glass of [blank]' results in a resounding NO from this guy. I think that might have been his name, actually.

Moving on.

Stone Brewery was really damn cool and their beer has the taste to back up any arrogancy they may have written all over their bottles (ahem). Unfortunately for us, Stone isn't sold waaayy out here in the middle of the country so Josh and I figured our last taste of this sweet, sweet nectar was going to be just a favorite memory from our trip to California. And then! We stumbled upon a mound of Ruination IPA six-packs at the local liquor store in Josh's hometown. He was super stoked and snatched one up to savor when we had gone back to our little joint in the Midwest.

It was a birthday miracle!

Spring! Break!

March was nuts. Complete and total insanity. Before I could hop a plane with J to spend a glorious spring break week in California, I had about 15,000 things to do... and one of them was fail that French test I whined cried complained wrote (and probably told most of you) about. But! Despite my heartbreak, I discovered that I could take a class online this summer to fulfill the requirement. So. Stay tuned for that little nugget.

After I'd slogged through an entire day's worth of mid-term finals, epic Victorian poetry and probably, like, 3 bottles of San Pellegrino (read: my LIFE FORCE), I was finally free for break. Less than three weeks after school started again from the Snowpocalypse in February. I wish I had a break every couple of weeks. I'd never leave this joint.

I think the pair of us were expecting a sunny & warm California trip, but what we got was a torrential downpour on the way in, rain for the first couple of days and not a degree above 65. Didn't matter. I love beaches and anything that doesn't involve reading about the British empire. And! I got to wear my favorite thing in the world every.single.day we were there -- my trench coat. Take my eyes but not the coat!

Of course, no trip is complete without a thorough sampling of the beer! J and I stopped in at a little bar in Oceanside, one that topped the list of 'must-try places' by my cousin and her husband. They are the greatest hosts in the world -- they let us stay with them for the week and gave us the (best) run-down on where to hang out in southern California. I got to spend a huge portion of the trip with my cousin's sons, M & T, the sweetest little guys I've ever met. J and I spent the last day at M's school, where they were putting on a cultural fest about Poland and where M was chosen to learn and lead a Polish dance in front of his class. It was adorable!

This beach was fantastic -- Moonlight Beach in Encinitas. We spent the morning there, scarfed blueberry pancakes at the cafe in town, beach combed and then headed up the coast in the little Yaris we rented (which will forever remain a huge joke between J and I, that car blew and couldn't function in the rain). Seeing as we had only planned the trip around eating, J and I ate our way up the coast, stopping at Oceanside, Pacific Beach and Dana Point. We had the most amazing fish tacos after our hike at Torrey Pines and wonderful salmon and swordfish on our last night on a mini-date with my cousin and her husband.

It was the best way to remember end my March, I'll tell you what.