Construction right outside my window
"Bring your plank out here!" That's what I hear (and other things) right outside my window. The construction that's going on is sort of distracting, so I'm blogging instead of working.

GYGO 5
Our fifth annual "Get Your Grub On" BBQ was this past Sunday, and it was great! The weather was nice (my back got sunburned!), lots of food, friends, and games! Alan and I made different colored flags this year, and each time had to make up their team name with the color they got... Let's see there was 'Yellow Jackets', 'Orange Crush', 'Blue Balls', 'Green Goblins', (I don't remember the purple team's name), and the winners ... 'Red Period'. Check out the pics!

Afterwards, a couple of people came over to our house for the afterparty, where we ate some more and played Texas Hold 'Em. It seems like every time people come over, we play poker. :)

Adios Amigos
My good friends Eileen and Rick are moving out of the bay area, so we had a little going away party on Tuesday night. We ate lots of stuff out of Jane's freezer, and went to the infamous Taco Truck that they always go to on International and 22nd in Oakland. Yummy tacos for $1 each. Then we went back to Jane & Oscar's and Oscar, who just took bartending lessons, made us lots of drinks. Played Texas Hold 'Em again (see the pattern here?) and had fun, and even watched an old Berkeley PCN. It's fun reminiscing.

Wedding planning
Alan and I have finally gotten around to start doing more stuff for the wedding... met with our priest, met with a couple of photographers, made an appointment with a florist, emailed some videographers. Only about 5 more months! Plus my mom's getting a lot of stuff in the Philippines, so I think we're good.

It's here!
My wedding dress is here!  They said I have 30 days to pick it up, but I think I'll let the store keep it for a while so I don't have to store it at my house.  I'm excited to see it.  I hope it fits.  Time to start working out my arms  :)

Meet with the priest
Alan and I met with our priest last night, and went over some of the basic things that we need to do.  We both had to fill out this form (in separate rooms, so we couldn't compare answers), and when he was looking over it with us, I felt like we were in grade school again and getting our tests graded or something.  We both answered '5 years' for the question how long have you known each other, which seemed to impress him.  Also, that we're both willing to have kids.

He gave us a booklet of all the different readings and prayers that we could have in our liturgical celebration.  I'm glad there are so many options.  I already know which one I want for the second reading.  (can anyone guess? it's been my favorite reading in the Bible for a long time now).  And for the vows - we have to decide whether to use the traditional one that ends in 'until death do us part' or another one that ends in 'for all the days of my life'.   I always wondered at other weddings how many options there were, and now I know.

DSL
Today SBC is supposed to turn on our DSL.  I hope it works and isn't slow.

Goodbye July (almost)
Where did this month go? It went by so quickly!

Our first non-family guests!
Dale, Lisa, and Rex came over last night just to hang out and have dinner at our new place! They were our first non-family guests to see the house.  It was fun sitting around our new kitchen table and just talking and catching up.  Alan cooked some chow mein-like noodles and I fried some of the crab & cream cheese wontons that I made last week.  It's nice to host people :)  Can't wait to get a couch so we can lounge in the family room.
 
AIDS Walk SF
Alan and I participated in the AIDS Walk in Golden Gate Park on Sunday.  We weren't on a team - neither one of our companies had a team this year - so we just walked it for fun.  We caught up with Eric, Marjorie, Oscar, and Jane, and we got lots of free food along the way and afterwards - chips, energy bars, ice cream, peanuts, and even boxed lunches from the Target/Mervyn's team (since they had a lot of extras). 
 
Sinugba and hot tub party
After the walk, Oscar, Jane, Alan and I went to eat at Sinugba near my house in Daly City, and then we jumped in my mom's new hot tub.  It was really relaxing, especially after the walk.  My knees hurt really badly after doing the walk, but the next day they were ok... I think it had to do with the fact that my shoes shrunk after I washed them, and also that I got a bad cramp in my leg the night before.
 
Bachelorette Party Bus
Friday night was my friend Nina's bachelorette party.  We had dinner at Amici's pizza in San Mateo, and the party bus picked us up at around 9:30pm.  We hit 3 clubs - Suite 181, Velvet Lounge, and Club NV... I thought Velvet Lounge was the funnest - I think it's my favorite club in SF.  It was fun taking the bachelorette out for a good night out with the girls :)
 

Sister ESP
Weird. After I wrote that post, Kitchie called me from Beijing! Funny! :)

I miss my sisters! ...and Mom & Dad too :)
Heidi called me this morning at around 6:30am our time from the Philippines, and it was good to hear from her. She said she has a bug bite infection and that her leg is really swollen. I haven't seen my sisters in a long time, or talked to them too much since they're out of the country... I miss them! I pulled this up from an email that Heidi sent to me before. I modified it to fit three sisters instead of two... :) Click here!

Building our furniture repertoire
We got our fridge installed on Sunday, and so we finally went grocery shopping for real stuff. We went to the Asian market to get some meats and then Food Maxx for other groceries, including orange juice (which I've been dying for) and milk.

On Monday, we picked up our new kitchen table and chairs from the wherehouse, where it was all in boxes. We got a good deal for a nice table and 8 chairs, but the catch was that we had to assemble it ourselves! So after work, we unpacked all the boxes and started assembling. The first chair was the hardest because we were just learning, but after that, it was a breeze! Plus I think working on things for the house gives us a sense of ownership and accomplishment when it's done :) I love our new table!

Next up -- finding a couch!

Championship game loss
Tuesday night we had our championship game in softball against by far the best team in the league. I mean... they shouldn't even be in our league. Anyway, needless to say we lost, but I had a personal victory - my real base hit ever :) None of these slow rollers near home plate, or fielder's choices where although I didn't get out someone else did.... but a real hit, where it dropped in the outfield. It was a little bloop to shallow left center, but it was a hit! yay :)

Quick week, but TGIF!
This week went by so quickly. But I'm glad it's Friday! Tomorrow Alan and I have an appointment with a wedding photographer, and then we have a 'Natural Family Planning' seminar, which is required to get married at the Mission. Then probably do more stuff with the house this weekend. Oooh. Our fridge gets delivered on Sunday! Now we can have real food :)

Have a good weekend!
Back to the five-day work week next week.... darn :)

3rd of July BBQ
Saturday we went over to Johanna's house in Danville for a BBQ with the Berkeley crew. Was really hot, had some good BBQ skewers, pork chops, chicken, spinach dip and sangria! Then we went swimming at her community pool... Nice and refreshing. I can't wait for our's to be done, so we can swim there too.

4th of July - Home stuff!
Worked on the house, installed our new ceiling fan and other stuff. The house is really coming along nicely.

5th of July BBQ
On Monday, Alan's family planned a BBQ which ended up being at our house. BBQ'd some ribs, Korean short ribs, and hot dogs. Alan's parents made a lot of other food and brought it over. Ben and his family came over too, which was nice. It was good to see Ben walking around again and even playing Texas Hold 'Em. We played a full table of 8 players and Ben's little sister won the whole thing. Then we played Upwords (similar to Scrabble, but you can build words by putting other letters on top of previous ones) and Cranium guys-vs-girls. Of course, the girls won :)

SBC DSL or Comcast Cable?
We realize we need some sort of internet connection at our house, so we signed up for a phone line through SBC thinking we're gonna get DSL. We were getting free cable already (we just plugged in the cable and it worked) so we figured why not let it last as long as we can. But once I plugged in the tv connection in the master bedroom, we lost it. I guess they caught on to us. So now we're thinking if we get Comcast Cable TV, we could get cable for our internet. Any opinions either way?

Slowest afternoon ever
Time has passed sooo slowly this afternoon. Probably because I can't wait for the long weekend to start. I feel so lazy, I don't want to do any more work.

Weekend plans
BBQ on Saturday, BBQ on Sunday, home shopping on Monday. Can't wait to see if we find any good deals on things we need for the house. And boy do we need a lot of things.

Happy Fourth of July!

Article about our softball game
Here's a copy of the Contra Costa Times article about our softball league. Scroll down to Coed D-4 section. My name's in there a couple times. :)