International Teatime

Every so often I fall in and out of a certain habit. It's neither good nor bad, but it does stain the teeth a bit. Did you think I meant coffee? Well you're wrong. I've never been a coffee drinker. I'm talking about the age-old English habit of tea-drinking. My mother always loved a good cup of chamomile or peppermint tea, and so, being a contrary child, I resolved to hate drinking tea and never be a tea-drinker.

That resolve lasted me until the age of 22. I was sailing the lovely MS Maasdam for the second summer in a row and enjoying my time immensely. I'd made a fantastic bunch of friends from all over the globe: a couple of Americans, Canadians, Brits, Aussies and Dutchies. We were all crew members and would all meet up for meals in the ship's buffet, gather our food and retreat to eat away from the mayhem of the passenger world at the tables on the back deck. We'd watch the sea churn by and admire the sunsets,  and sea-life. We'd do "high-low" where we'd talk about our best and worst moments of the day (trust me, always hilarious tales involving passenger craziness!) and after our meals, we'd get ice creams, cheesecake, chocolate, whatever desert we pleased followed by a steaming cup. Then we'd sit outside in the blazing Caribbean, drinking our hot tea. After all, that's what civilized people do. Earl Grey for our lovely Brit, Barker. Various herbal black and green teas for the others. And for myself and the Dutch fellow I was dating: soothing red Rooibos that he'd brought from home. ("The tea on this ship is Terrible!" He'd say, in the completely emphatic, Dutch way of his) I was, at first, resistant to the idea of drinking tea without sugar or cream, but I was persuaded rather easily by the afforementioned highly opinionated (and hot) BF, so I gave it a try.

A beautiful cup of red Rooibos tea. It's South African in case you were wondering.

At first sip: Blech. But by the end of the cup I was hooked. It was lovely and calming.

This morning, after a couple of "dry" years without tea, I was hit with the craving and popped into the coffee shop downstairs for a cup. All of my stress melted away and I found myself, for the first time in weeks, relaxed, one with my work chair.

Now I'm on my second cup and shall endeavor tonight to buy a few boxes of tea to keep with me at work.

Here's to you fellow tea drinkers, enjoy!

Spotted on a BART Train

I commute to work, which means that some days I drive the 16 miles to work, but mostly I ride my bike 1.5 miles to the nearest BART train station and ride the train 24 minutes to work. Lately it's been getting cold, which seriously cramps my personal style (or lack thereof). I like to wear flip flops. Actually, I don't like shoes at all and would prefer to live life with my toes sunk into white sand on a warm beach somewhere. But seeing that I live in Northern California and work at a Fortune 500 Corporation, I must wear shoes daily. But, also seeing that I work in the creative services department of said Corporation's headquarters, which is a very relaxed place, I deign to wear flip flops. Daily. Truly. And jeans most days. I love my job.
So now in the wintery cold place that is Northern California, I bundle myself up in my long-sleeved tops, jackets and ski-coat. Sometimes I pile on a scarf. I pull on my warmest wintery gloves. And then I don my beloved Rainbow flip-flops, roll up my right pant-leg, hop on my bike and cycle to BART. It's freezing at first, but by the time I get to the train I'm okay. A small sacrifice to have wiggly-free, happy toes at work all day.
But I digress.
After my wiggly-free and happy toes made it onto my train this morning, I noticed a guy get on the train the stop after me. He was really good looking. We made eye contact, smiled and sat across from each other. It occurred to me that he seemed very familiar (for you LDS people out there - don't start singing "I've seen that smile somewhere before" just yet!) and then I realized why. He was a dead ringer for the comedian Dane Cook.
Okay.
Interesting. I spent the rest of the train ride stealing
glances over at him and contemplating fame. And thinking that if it was Dane Cook, he was much cuter in real life than in photos/on TV. I found it interesting and refreshing that no one was bothering this man. Maybe he wasn't Dane Cook. Maybe he was and no one cared because everyone was preoccupied with their morning commute and the upcoming Thanksgiving festivities. Why would Dane Cook be riding a BART train? In any case, why should we care in the first place? At least to the degree that people value fame these days. And so I smiled to myself and went back to reading my book, The Time Traveler's Wife, which is a very good book, in case you were wondering.

Extra! Extra!

Super sweet deal on British Airlines (ba.com) right now. Actually a couple of them, but only one I'll be able to take advantage of presently.

First: Book a flight and fly "across the pond" by Jan 31st and get a complimentary companion ticket for your next international flight. (NICE!)

Second: A credit card offer (Blargh, you say, I know... me too. BUT:) After your first purchase you'll receive 50,000 airline miles (enough for a flight from the States to London, Germany, Switzerland...).

And then, as if one "free" (Annual fee = $75) international ticket wasn't enough! If you spend $2k on the card in the first three months of having it they'll award you ANOTHER 50k miles. Seriously. (Like that'll be hard... I buy EVERYTHING on my credit cards. Gas, Groceries, everything and then pay them off each month - I do it specifically for the mileage. Last year I went to Barbados on an award ticket. This year - Virginia and Utah.)

Considering that right now the award price for the trip I'm planning for the spring (Did I mention I'm going to Rome?) is 30k miles... I could potentially get enough miles out of this promo for THREE trips to Europe. Uh, yah. SIGN ME UP. Now. I mean it. I want those miles. ;)

www.ba.com
or direct to:

http://www.mychasecreditcards.com/britishairways/header

The Frozen Northwest

After much decision making, decision un-making, planning, un-planning and re-planning, it looks like I'll be headed to Portland for Thanksgiving.

Originally I was going to spend turkey day with my sister and her husband and then hop over to join the friends I grew up with for another feast... maybe I wouldn't have so much hopped as driven. Well, we recently found out that our brother from Boise and his Wife and kids will be making the trek to Portland to join our other Brother + his Wife, Kids, their Mom, her Partner and our Parents (did you follow that?). We were recently in Portland so we opted to do our own T-day... but the temptation of having EVERYONE in one place for ONCE was a bit too much to resist. So that means nine hours of traffic each way, tons of crazy family all in one place and lots of food. I'm excited.

I'm Allergic to the Desert

Do you have allergies? Do you know what it's like to wake up with puffy, red eyes, disoriented and exhausted? (And no, if you're a drinker, hangovers don't count!)

As a kid I'd watched my mother suffer through allergies constantly but I never had a problem with them. I mean, I don't have allergies! At least that's what I thought until I woke up in my hotel room Tuesday morning in Arizona. Wham! Red, puffy eyes, tired.... you get the picture. It was utterly new and bizarre to me. As soon as I stopped going back to bed for another quick nap, I hauled my butt down to the giftshop and bought precisely this: 3 bottles of water and two packs of Benadryl. Knowing that I was a bit out of it, I read the label repeatedly until I ascertained that the drug would not make me drowsy. I had to shoot a video that afternoon and drive a rental car and needed to be awake. It looked safe, but as I was about to proceed I remembered one instance with my Mother up in the mountains - her allergies acted up BIG TIME and she was given Benadryl, which promptly knocked her out and she slept for the next two days. So I read the label for the fifty-first time and found this:
WARNING: may cause marked drowsiness.
Great.
I took one instead of the recommended two.
Twenty minutes later I felt much better. Phew!
As shocking as my previously undiscovered allergy to the desert was to me, the trip was actually quite lovely!

Normally business trips suck. Normally they mean 10-14 hour workdays and zero chance of any sightseeing. But I have to admit that even with all of their suckage, I'd rather be across the country on a business trip than not on one at all. I like getting out and moving around! It makes me appreciate my house so much more. And my bed. Except for the cleaning up after myself part. That sucks. I also love the fact that all expenses are paid on business trips, meaning: I come home (usually a week later) and find that my bank account has a LOT more money in it that it would if I'd stayed home. Nice. Hellloooo vacation fund!

This trip was different. It was only two days. It was enjoyable. Dare I say it? It was fun.
I flew in to Phoenix on Monday morning. It's an easy 1.5 hour flight from SFO. After picking up my rental car (brand-spanking new little Chevy Equinox, thank you very much!) I headed over to my hotel. I expected Arizona to be stifilingly dry and dusty, with giant, looming dust clouds overhead. Nope. It was hot and sunny and the sky was a gorgeous shade of blue. The hotel I stayed at was an oasis of green, perfectly manicured lawns and beautiful, brightly-colored flowers.

One of the perks of corporate travel is the easy (and free) memberships to rewards clubs. I say easy because the rewards points generally accumulate much faster for corporations than normal, private travelers. The hotel/travel chains do that on purpose to attract corporate travel to their franchise. It's big business. And so, with my "Elite" membership status, I meandered up to the eagerly waiting "Elite membership specialist," gave her my name and she handed me package stay details, free access to the special spa and gym and the key to an upgraded king suite on the top floor overlooking the pool, gardens and golf course. I headed up and found this waiting for me:

Ahhhhh... Life is good! The bed beckoned immediately and I obligingly fell fast asleep. I had, after all, been up at 4am in order to catch my flight. And I didn't have to do anything for work until the next day! That never happens!

Post-naptime brought me to donning a swimsuit (horror!) and heading out to the pool complex. I planted myself on a deck-chair and read for a good hour while enjoying a poolside service of one mango smoothie and one bowl of berries with lemon-mint yogurt for lunch. YUM.

Seem extravagant? It does to me too. However, when I booked my hotel room, I found a deal online at my favorite travel website, travelzoo. The deal included a $100 room credit and free breakfast. Done and done! Oh room service, can you hear me calling??? (I actually didn't call room service once! Mother would be shocked. Dad would be proud.)

After doing a few laps on the lazy river and then drying out in the sun, I headed up to my suite and took another nap. That's right. My favorite pastime (besides traveling): napping while traveling. Yup. After my nap, I was two things: hungry and tired. Why in the world would I be tired? Bring on the Allergies! So I went to the gym.
An hour later, feeling much better about going to dinner, I left the gym and dressed to go to the restaurant my brother recommended: Roy's.
Never heard of Roy's? I hadn't either. But after eating there, I recognize the error of my ignorance! YUM. YUM. YUM. Hawaiian fusion food. Oh heavenly bliss. I savored the seasoned Edamame. inhaled the Grilled Endive, Apple and Gorgonzola salad with Pomegranate dressing. And then, the Pièce de résistance: Roasted Macadamia Nut Crusted Mahi Mahi with cognac lobster butter sauce.  Oh my!

I left fat and happy. Which, I do believe, is the point of Hawaiian anything. A bit of balcony-sitting, some on-demand watching of Harry Potter, a bit of giant-bathtub soaking/bookreading and off to bed in time for a good eleven hours of sleep.

WHAT? Eleven hours? That's right. Thine eyes doth not deceive you. I owe it to those lovely allergies. Eleven hours of sleep brings me right back to the beginning of this post: red-eyed.

Skimming through Tuesday took me through my video shoot (which was a ton of fun), an authentic Arizona-mexican feast (including tacos, tamales, beans and rice! Yum! - but still no Cafe Rio) with my work co-parts and then on to Camelback mountain for some hiking!

Camelback was pretty intense! It's only 1.5 miles each way. But geesh! It's akin to the stairs on the Mist trail to Yosemite (which I hate and loathe with the passion of a thousand burning desert suns. I love to hike. I HATE tedious, vertical climbs). Maybe worse. There are sections that are just rock face - no stairs, nearly straight up. Nearly rock-climbing. Add to the mix: DRY heat. 92 degrees, and I forgot my Bandana at home. I did remember my Camelback water bladder though, thankfully! (THANK YOU KELLY!)

Add this up: Allergies, 1,800 feet in extra elevation that I wasn't used to and one determined-to-hike the d@&! mountain. You get what? One sweaty, exhausted Christy headed straight to the airport. Probably not the best idea in the history of ideas.


In my allergy/benadryl fog, I neglected to do the following in the right order: 1. Remove clean clothes from suitcase and place in carry-on bag. 2. Check suitcase. 3. Change into clean clothes. 4. Proceed through security to flight and go home.

Instead, I did this: 1. Check suitcase. 2. Proceed through security. 2b. Feel extremely self-conscious when I had to remove my sweater and the guy behind me saw my t-shirt drenched in post-desert-hike back sweat. Yum. 3. Head to restroom to change. 4. Realize I'm a sweaty idiot without a change of clothes.

In hindsight, I think I should have gone hiking on Monday. But logically, going Tuesday was the only way to get everything done that I wanted to do (pool lounging, reading, sleeping and Roy's - you know, just the essentials!). Knowing now how it all panned out, I'd do it all again. Except I'd remember to put fresh clothes in my carry-on. And I'd remember my bandana. They really are quite helpful in sweaty situations when worn across ones' forehead.

I'd go back to Arizona. Well, I'd go back if Florida had somehow been severed from the continental US and Hawaii and the Caribbean islands all sank. So pretty much that means I'm not voluntarily going back to Arizona for a vacation. Shame, because I rather liked it!

A couple more pix:

 So apparently I'm not creative enough to have seen the praying priest in Camelback mountain. I'm not bothered. I can't see 3-D either. BUT, I did find the above gem. Doesn't it look like there's a ginormous T-Rex skull in the rock?

 

Off to Spend Some Quality Time in the Desert

I leave for Phoenix tomorrow morning, bright and early! The early part I've resigned myself to, the bright - not so much. I'm just SO not a morning person.

In any case, I'll be spending Monday and Tuesday in Phoenix and returning home Tuesday night. I'm going for work. Usually work trips are a ton of... well, work. Gobs of it. So much so that last year I spent a week in Chicago and a week in Boston and saw absolutely none of what those cities have to offer. Lame. But, this trip is different. I'm actually going to have a few hours on Monday to do a bit of sightseeing and enjoy the sunshine. Yay!

I want to go for a hike. Have you been to Phoenix? What's your favorite day hike?

Roman Daydreams

Work has been boring lately. Seriously boring. It's the time of year. Things slow down in my department. So I've had a considerable amount of time to surf the internet, do homework (I'm taking an online class), facebook... but mostly, I check out travel deals and research hotels in Rome. Specifically hotels near the Pantheon. Having nothing to do at work for eight hours a day is a horrible little catalyst for my Italian (Roman) obsession.

You see I'm planning a two-week vacation for next spring. And it's going to be fantastic. After this spring's three-day Roman fling, I've been dreaming of going back. The past three days at work have even lent themselves to giving me time to daydream of strolling down the Via del Corso. Lunching on authentic pasta con pancetta in the Piazza del Popolo. Making short work of a dark cioccolatta e nutella gelatto con crema! And yes, even flirting with HOT Roman men, the self-same descendants of the ancient Romans, in fluent Italian. Perhaps I should have mentioned them first.

Just one problem with those daydreams. I don't speak Italian! But somehow in my daydreams I'm as fluent as an acrobat is lithe.

Okay, I speak a little Italian. Ma solo um 'po, e non multo bene! (But only a little, and not very well! - Though my knowledge of that phrase, combined with a convincing and [I'm not ashamed to admit] rehearsed-in-the-shower oratorial delivery has in the past led groups of Italian sailors to begin conversing in native Italian dialects, rather than straight Italian, with me around!) My Italian was ample to get me around on the aforementioned previous Roman holiday. Quite nicely, I might add.

Here's the proof:
Italian detour blog 1
Italian detour blog 2
Italian detour blog 3
Italian detour blog 4
Italian detour blog 5

But I digress. I'm good at digressing.

The point is that after several months of lightly perusing hotel listings and three days of labored searching through hotel listings, my obsessive compulsion to find just the right hotel in just the right location at just the right price has paid off!

I was about to book a lovely little hotel. It's located in a 16th century palace. It's facade is covered in ivy vines. Nothing luxurious, but nice, cute and clean. It was price was affordable (given the Euro to Dollar conversion) and location desirable. But something urged me on. You see, my taste of Rome this past April helped me to understand something about Rome: It is a city where you have to be in the know. Sure, many cities are like that, but with Rome, that attitude includes over a millennium of inherited family pride, patria and a sense of self-identity so engrained in a people that they feel no keen need to advertise an especially lovely little family run albergo (hotel) on a monster site such as priceline or hotels.com. The people come to them and find them. Always have, always will. After all, it's ROME!

Bearing that in mind, I knew what I was looking for. I had a picture in my mind's-eye of the perfect little mom and pop hotel located in an alley adjacent to the Pantheon (You might ask "Why the Pantheon?" Because that's where the picture-perfect Roman holiday takes place this spring in my head! Don't ask ridiculous questions!).

The hotels were either gorgeous and correctly located but way too expensive, or attractively priced but located by the Vatican or by Termini station (the main train station, about a thirty minute walk) instead of by the Pantheon. Dilemma! Dilemma! Dilemma!


I almost caved and booked something that I wasn't perfectly happy about. And then, after three days of exhaustive searching, I happened on this little item:

The Hotel Mimosa. Undyingly proud (in only the way a Roman could be -seriously, check out the website) of it's 1-star accomodations and service. Located directly (and I mean practically as an appendage) behind the Pantheon. Fantastico! And what's even better - the price! Several hundred dollars less expensive than the other modestly priced place I was looking at. I know, I know, you get what you pay for. I tripadvisor.com'd it for reviews and found it to be exactly what I was expecting it to be - something more akin to a hostel than a hotel. Bingo. I'm a single traveler. I'm from the US, home to the dollar, which is getting crappy exchange rates currently. Were I married and looking for a romantic getaway with a gorgeous, flower-laden balcony and snooty people to cater to my whims, I'd book this hotel. But this trip is down and dirty backpack traveling. With an en-suite bathroom.

I'm satisified.

Plus, as an added bonus, in case I should change my mind there are no penalties for cancellation (a rare thing in Rome) up to seven days prior to arrival. 5 nights @ 70 Euro/night. The other hotel: 120 Euro/night. Convert to dollars.  That's a three hundred dollar savings that will be spent on pasta, gelatto, chocolate pastries, museum entries, shameless flirting with hot Italian men (okay, that's free) and a flight from Rome to Istanbul, Santorini or Cyprus. (To be determined later.) Brava!