Good times

Clickie on the layout above for details and a bigger picture. I am sure there are more to come, but I need to finish MINE first before I finish theirs. My mother would kill me if I finished theirs first. lol

My sister’s graduation was last Friday. It was a four-hour program at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. Superficially, it sounds very :O, but it is an art school, so you can imagine, there was a lot of showcasing of talent from the graduates. It was the best graduation ceremony that I have ever been to. There was opera, gospel, ballet, film clips, theater snippets, jazz music, and a video of the visual artists with samples of their work. It was a beautiful event. I am so proud that she survived that school. It was the most intense thing ever.

Then as you all know, it was Father’s Day on Sunday. I invited my dad and the girls over for a lazy day of watching movies and eating some burgers and hot dogs from the grill. The grub was good, and it was nice to just sit and watch a movie and hang out. After cruising through what was available on Pay Per View and on the Xbox Live Marketplace, we ‘rented’ THX 1138 from Xbox. It was really good. HRB says that she has always wanted to dress up as one of the officers for Halloween, and I really hope that one day she does because they are really cool! Anyway, if you love sci-fi, I highly recommend it. It is a romantic sci-fi flick, so you romantics out there might like it too. Oh, and it stars Robert Duvall, which was a nice thing. The thing about good sci-fi is that it is timeless. That aside from the fact that you may have technology and/aliens etc, the story itself is relevant to you or your society now, fifty years ago, a hundred from now. Sci-fi suffers from the stigma that it is only about the flash of technology or space, but like any other genre, it really is about a good story, and it usually has to do with the human condition. This film, even though it was made in 1971 (George Lucas’ first), it is still completely relevant.

Yesterday, the

  made her trek all the way out here to visit me before she heads out to London for an infinitely long time! We spent some time in the apartment and then headed out to eat at Sharky’s. I had two fish tacos (they were delish!) and Pen had a burrito which she approved of with a full mouth. After that we drove down to Belmont Shores and peeked into a Body Shop for a bit. We looked at the stuff on sale and sampled a plethora of oils and sprays. She helped me find a foundation that looked good and now know what to ask for from my sister who works at one. There was also something that caught my eye. It was this brown thing that when I opened looked like a glycerin solid deodorant made of brown shimmer. It was a body and leg shimmer and I rubbed it on my arm but before I knew it Pen had glitterpoo references and wisecracks and I just about died. I put it down immediately and we walked out of the store.

  , I swear, I will drown you in glitterpoo one day!

So anyway, we walked down a block and went in to The Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf. The two employees stared at us as Pen explained what the different teas were like and suggested a few. After some lengthy deliberation, I went for a strawberry cream green tea and she ordered earl grey, hot (no, the joke isn’t old to me yet).

Anywho, it was so hot even after sitting and chatting and stirring a while, she recommended I put some milk, so I went and did and when I came back she approved the amount that I decided to put in. The tea smelled really nice but in the end, I think that it was simply too mild for my brute taste buds. I need more flavor, I just don’t want bitter. But at least I know that I can enjoy a green tea.

But the funniest thing happened before we left. On our way out my apartment, we stopped by the mailbox to get my mail and I had a rather large envelope mingled with my week’s worth of magazines, bills, and paper spam. It was from

! Pen suggested it may be tea, but I wouldn’t believe it with the size of the envelope. I tore it open and sure enough, there were three sheets each holding 12 tea bags of Tetley White Tea, half of which was Classic – or as Canoodles says, ‘Plain” – and the other half is Mandarin. I am excited about trying out the Mandarin later today (I brought it in to work), but after my green tea experience yesterday, I fear the Classic may be too plain. Never fear, as I read out the notecard she sent me, she said, “PS: If you hate it, send it to San!” and we both laughed hysterically.