2009 Recap

January

• Jan 2: Mike took me to see Stomp for my birthday. I hadn't seen them since high school, and as always, they put on a wonderful show!
• Jan 20: Barack Hussein Obama is inaugurated as President of the United States. Whether or not you like his politics, it was a historic election. I'm so proud to say in my lifetime that we have finally moved towards quality (ok, so not completely, but we are taking steps). I like to think that a lot of this is because my generation is not only being more open minded, but is actually taking action (for example, voting).
• Jan 30: Mike and I saw Tesla in concert... what a great show! I hadn't heard of them before (apparently I was the only one on the planet), but I had a fantastic time!
• 
  
  Jan 31: Kati got involved with the Make-A-Wish Foundation and we were invited to attend the Make-A-Wish Food and Wine festival. It was such a blast - we got all dressed up, took a limo and tried just about every wine you could imagine!

February

• Feb 20-21: Mike and I drove to Solvang to watch the Tour of California. We not only got to see some incredible riders, but got to see Lance Armstrong himself! I learned who a lot of the big riders were and actually got interested in cycling (I would later obsessively watch the Tour de France). We had an amazing time looking through the expo where they had all sorts of bikes and cycling gagets. After the race and lunch at the famous Pea Soup Anderson's, we drove through Pismo Beach so I could put my toes in the water. It was a fantastic trip!

March

• Mar 15: I ran the Fifth Annual Shamrock'n Half Marathon, my first half marathon. Dad flew home, Adam and Eva came from the Bay Area and my whole family was there to support me! I was completely terrified that morning and Mike was called to a fire in the middle of the night, so it was looking like he wouldn't make it. The family made these awesome signs and popped up in lots of different places to cheer for me! At the very end, as I crossed the finish line and walked up the stairs, I looked up and saw Mike standing there... he had gotten about 2 hours of sleep, but still made the long drive to come see me finish! It felt so wonderful to finish the race and it was so awesome to have my family there to support me!

April

• Apr 11: Kati, Brigitte, Amber, Kristine and I went to see Britney Spears. While I was not impressed with her singing (she lip-synched) or her dancing (if you're going to lip-synch, you should be doing some seriously hard dance moves), the overall show was great... just plain entertaining!
• Apr 16: I had laser vision correction. One of the best decisions I've made in a long time. I was scared to death that I'd end up blind, but after just a day or so of blurry vision, I said goodbye to my contacts and glasses!

May

• Apparently I was boring in the month of May...

June

• Jun 7: Tim, Nicki and I competed in the TBF Tri for Fun triathlon under the team name "The Gladiators". Our final time was 1 hour, 34 minutes and 28 seconds (our goal had been less than 1:40). I swam, Tim biked and Nicki ran. It really was fun!
• Jun 25: Michael Jackson died. I know that a lot of people had issues with him, but you can't deny his brilliant moves or catchy songs. Regardless of the issues that swirled around him, he was an icon. Very sad to see it all end the way it did. Seriously, who doesn't love the Thriller video?

July

• Jul 4: For the first time that I can remember, we actually took the boat out on the 4th of July. We had a blast floating in the water and even watched a deer swim across the lake!
  
• Jul 11: Mike competes in the Death Ride. He and Mark completely rocked it! It was a total of 129 miles, 5 mountain passes and 15,000 feet of altitude change! The crazy boy is going to do it all over again in 2010!
  
• Jul 14: The supply line to my master bathroom toilet breaks and floods my entire house. I come home to an inch of water and one incredibly happy black lab. Little did I know that my house would be torn apart for the next 2 months.
• Jul 25-31: Trip to Lake Almanor. The whole family, plus Nate and Mike were able to go... the weather was beautiful, the fishing was fantastic and the water was smooth for skiing! It doesn't get much better than that!

August

• Aug 15: Sean and Mike compete in the Alcatraz Sharkfest swim. I think they're crazy, but I think I'm even crazier because it sounds like fun. Maybe on 2010's recap I'll be telling you about my own swim. Maybe.

September

• Sept 21: Mike and I survived a year together! :) Time really does fly when you're having fun!
• Sept 26: Chris and Alyse get married. Their wedding was a total blast! After a slight mishap the morning of (there was a major power outage that caused the water pumps to go out, so the boys couldn't shower - they ended up climbing into a nearby lake with bars of soap to wash off), the wedding went off without a hitch!

October

• Oct 19-23: Mike and I went on vacation to Yellowstone National Park. We had the most wonderful time seeing loads of animals, playing in all sorts of weather (one day we went from sun to rain to snow in a matter of an hour!) and just spending time together! My favorite critters had to be the buffalo... they were so much fun to watch!

November

• Nov 20: Our beautiful Darcy lost her battle with cancer.
• Nov 26: Hullaballo 2009. As always, Adam and Eva hosted an extravaganza! The food was delicious, the games were awesome and there was tons of Wii fun to be had!

December

• 
  
  Dec 6: Nicki ran the California International Marathon. Skyer and I tracked her all over the place and had a really fun time together!

I really can't believe that 2009 is almost over! It seems like the year has just completely flown by! I remember how far away and futuristic "2010" sounded when I was little, but now it's actually here!

Merry Christmas!

I just wanted to take a minute to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas! Without getting too sappy, I have to say I am the most wonderfully blessed woman on the planet! I have the greatest family, boyfriend and friends a girl could ask for!

My Christmas was wonderful this year. I went to Mom and Dad's yesterday and hung out with Mom, Dad, Oma, Kati and Nate. We went to Christmas Eve Mass followed by the traditional Smithson family hors d'oeuvres. It's not Christmas without the fondue! Kati, Dad and I did a little singing around the piano and we each opened one present.

This morning, Shadow started the day by capturing and killing a Christmas rat. He was so dang proud, but it was completely gross. We're working on introducing him and Tucker, so we decided that now is as good as any time. They did surprisingly well... there were a few little growling matches, but they're definitely getting the hang of it! We opened the rest of our gifts this morning and had a fantastic french toast breakfast!

This evening I headed up to have Christmas dinner with the Blankenheim clan... and 7 beef ribs... we had FANTASTIC prime rib! It was a really nice time with tons of good food!

As I said, I'm so incredibly lucky to have such a wonderful life. I'm so happy I had the chance to spend time with everyone that I did, and to those of you who texted or emailed, it was great to hear from you too! Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

I Am Spoiled.

I have the best boyfriend in the whole wide world. Really. Possibly the whole wide universe. For Christmas this year Mike got me a brand new iPhone 3GS. I got to get it early (last night) because we figured the store would be a mess the closer we got to Christmas (or in the couple days after). I have had it for less than 24 hours and I honestly do not know how I lived without it. I know that sounds really dramatic, but honestly, there are so many cool things that this phone does that just plain makes life easier!

So far, one of my favorite "aps" is the to do list. I'm attempting to use it as my planner, contacts, to do list, etc. Very hard for me since I really like to write things down, but I like the idea of having it all in one place. I also thing Shazaam is pretty cool - you can hold your phone up to the radio and it will tell you the name of the song playing as well as who sings it. No more trying to guess the name of a song! I haven't had much time to play with most of the aps, but I also found a grocery list that I'm going to try. I can't wait to see what else is out there... there seems to be something for everyone!

Since I'm terribly hard on all things electronic, I asked the guy at the AT&T store which case they recommend. I ended up ordering the OtterBox... he claims that you can drop it, throw it, even get it a little wet and this case will protect it. The case is bulky, but I'd rather have that than destroy my new phone!

I think back to my first cell phone (one of the fabulous Nokias) and the fact that all I did on it was make calls. Now I have a phone that will show me a satellite picture of the top of my house! I'm completely amazed at how much technology has changed!

Fight for Your Right

For those of you not up to date with the wonder that is my little life, earlier this year (July) I had a flood in my house. Long story short, a supply line to one of my toilets broke, filling my entire house with a good inch of water. Every square inch of flooring in my house had to be replaced (seriously, thank God for insurance!). The whole process took a good month, much of which I couldn't live in my house.

Mid-November, I was walking barefoot and noticed that there was a part of my floor that was curled up a little bit. It was right in the center of the room. I called the company that installed the floor, who sent an installation specialist out to make sure that everything was correctly installed. He told me that everything was put in just fine and that my dog had probably had an accident. It would cost me almost $500 to fix the 5 boards that were curled. Warning bells went off in my head because the "new" floor was the same one that I'd had since I moved into the house. God knows that Shadow has had accidents and that things have been spilled. Did they really mean that they didn't recommend this floor to pet owners?

I called back (once they had provided me with the estimate) and told them I wanted to get a factory representative's opinion. They set up an appointment for today for both companies to come out and review the situation. Wow, I guess that wasn't such a short story...

Anyway, I'm so glad I stood my ground. The factory rep said that there was no way this was caused by me or my dog. They do recommend the floor to pet owners and it should definitely not be doing what it was doing now. He's going to submit the claim and sometime after New Years, I'll be getting my floor fixed... free of charge!

Recovery

Today was a day of recovery. One of yet another million signs that I'm not 18 anymore... after just two days of singing, I'm exhausted. Granted, they were a crazy two days, but still. The shows went really well. I was so excited that so many of my friends and family came out to see me sing. This year was a record - I had  six people at the first show and fourteen at the second! I can't even begin to describe how much it means to me to have familiar faces in the audience. I know that classical music is not everyone's up of tea and I know economic times are tight. It's even more meaningful this year. My favorite part of the show has to be the audience sing-a-long. They turn up the house lights, so I can actually see the people (normally it's dark and the stage lights are sort of blinding). Everyone seems to really get into this part and it's so cool to hear a thousand people singing back at you (I know, it's my nerdy version of being a rock star) and to see how happy everyone looks!

This morning I headed over to mom and dad's for breakfast (hooray for hashbrown cassarole and french toast cassarole) and then came up to Mike's. To apparently take a two and a half hour nap. I'm such a fun girlfriend. After that it was time for a little grocery shopping, followed by delicious chicken fajitas. Tonight is a night of football and Wii tournaments. Woo hoo!

All Hyped Up And Nowhere To Go

As poor Mike can attest to, when I get done with just about anything that I'm passionate about, I tend to call him on the drive home and babble on and on about how fantastic it was. It's like my own little personal version of drugs... go out and do something I love, then come home on a "high".

Tonight is no exception. You see, tomorrow is the Sacramento Choral Society's two Christmas shows for the year, so tonight was the dress rehearsal. After a long three and a half hours of singing, here I am at 11:30pm... nowhere near tired. Tomorrow is going to be another long day, so I know I should be sleeping now, but I just plain don't feel like laying down yet. While rehearsal wasn't that great (you know what they say - bad rehearsal, great show), it still got me all excited for tomorrow!

I do have to say, it's going to be a wonderful show. Christmas is one of my favorites. It's generally much easier music than we normally do, but it really connects with the audience. The audience sing-a-long is one of my favorite parts... it's so cool to stand on stage and have a thousand people singing right back at you. People just look happy when they're at the Christmas show! If you're interested in coming, there are two shows, one at 2pm and the other at 8pm. We're singing at the UC Davis Mondavi Center and you can buy your ticket at the box office!

I'm off to try to get some sleep!

Return to Blogger and Christmas Shopping

Well, a couple years ago, I switched from Blogger over to Vox. Now, I'm making the switch back. I recently switched my email address to a Google address and found that they've done a ton to make Blogger easier to use and it now actually has all of the features that I wished it had before I left. I figure, why not tie it all together with my email address? So, if you're looking for the 2 years of posts that are missing from this blog, you can go to http://annabananna81.vox.com to catch up. I don't promise to post tons and tons on here, but I miss having a blog. So here we are.

Today I did something I've never done before. I did my Christmas shopping online. That's right, all of it. For those of you who don't quite know me well enough, I hate shopping. With a passion. People are mean, you have to wait in line and you end up getting stepped on. I knew what I wanted to get everyone, so I checked into getting it online. So many places are doing free shipping for the holidays that it ended up being a bargain! I put my jammies on, cranked up the Christmas music on Itunes and was done in about an hour! Talk about the comforts of home! I couldn't be more pleased with my shopping experience!