lots of limos and screaming

Looking out the window of the plane as it lifted off in a LA-bound direction, I saw such a great view of the top of the clouds (which the photo doesn't do justice). It really, truly looked like you could swim in them. The tops of the mountains looked like peaks rising above the ocean, and each curve of each cloud looked like a cresting wave that didn't crash down. It was an eerie still-shot of some strange ocean from a different planet, frozen but still moving... I took the first photo there only after we were allowed to use our "electronic devices," but the true picture I wanted to capture was the one I saw when we were only barely through the clouds, and it seemed that if I jumped out of the plane I could land in a soft, pillowy bed of whatever those clouds were made of, and they would envelope me as I sunk in and hold me up and keep me safe in the middle of the sky and the ground. But of course, we all know that if I really did that I would plummet through that pillowy layer like a bullet racing to the Earth. This weekend was great. Not only did I find a new place to spend more than my daily allotment of calories: Cha-Cha-Chicken, but I went on a great run along the beach in my Vibram Five Fingers, completely and blissfully secure despite their odd appearance. I liked the looks I got, as opposed to before when I would try to find backroads to run to avoid those same looks. But back to Cha-Cha-Chicken. Eating my Jerk Chicken Enchilada dish, with yummy spicy steak-fries and fresh fruit, with watermelon agua fresca, and with the company of my boyfriend who wisely chose an equally yummy dish of chilequiles, I realized I'd been eating quite well of late. And when I say "well," I don't mean "healthily." I mean, WELL. From Skates on the Bay to Cafe BaoNecci's to Hash House to Cha-Cha-Chicken, among other places that I simply forgot to take iPhone photos of, I'm starting to get a little concerned that I'm spending too much money eating out. But I just LOVE to eat, and eat with friends, and above all, eat with my boyfriend. He and I have a lot in common, but one of the best things we have in common is our common love of walking around with each other, talking about anything we can possibly think of, and then stopping in at a restaurant that tickles our fancy and enjoying more great conversation over two dishes of food. You'll see us both shamelessly alternate reaching over and picking at each other's plates, stuffing our faces, and laughing about something inane. Before you vomit (I felt a little bit gurgle up as I typed that last paragraph), I'll move on. Notice the limos, the seersucker suit jacket I'm wearing, and Quang's football grease-stickers on his face. Saturday was the USC v UVA football game, and as Q went to UVA for undergrad, he was obnoxiously anti-his own business school (USC) at both the tailgate and the game. A spot of orange in a sea of red-and-gold, his friends, him, and me engaged in elevating degrees of heckling and screaming as the night, and the beers, wore on. It was exhausting, and fun. I'm a Cal girl myself, UC Berkeley class of '07-ish (I took an extra semester), so I really didn't care if I was rooting for UVA as long as I didn't have to wear a USC shirt. There, I said it. :) Though in other more causal situations, I do wear the Marshall t-shirt. It's a v-neck and it looks cute. :) Today, I'm officially relaxing. I don't fly back until tomorrow evening, and I have a date with 3/4ths of the "mean girls" crew + boyfriends that we've formed (1/4th of us is with her parents :) to watch the Cowboys v Redskins game. I'm not big on football, but I can pretend with the best of them. Which reminds me, last Thursday night was also a great "mean girls" night. Lemonade @ Abbott Kinney, which by the way is a great street, was awesome, as was the so-fun meet up afterward with the guys at Barney's, albeit the AWFUL jager shot I was forced to consume and tasting what might be the most disgusting combination of jack-and-soco-in-a-"lemon cocktail" I think I'd ever tasted. I was also on Abbott Kinney on Friday for Fashion Night Out, but I did not make the attempt to go because my accounts are glaringly low. But the grilled cheese truck was phenomenal, and the bars a little pretentious/"hipster," as Dhivy calls it, and better suited for us girls rather than a bunch of raucous boys. End of today's story.