Sam's Blog

Link: http://www.erykahbadu.com/

Hooray for sunny weather again! I was hating the overcast days and the sporadic rain. Looks like it will be a bright and warm Memorial Day Weekend. I am so excited!! Kate will be here and theres so much to do, but very little time. Summer Fridays at work start this week and I will have a half day. Yes!! It's the little things that really matter in the end.

Things are different. All around me things are changing. People are changing. It feels like everyone around me is going through something. I am a firm believer that everybody is always "going through" something whether or not they are open about it. But it is more palpable now. Little issues building up and realizations occuring. Maybe its because it is Springtime. Maybe its because its time for change and new beginnings. In any case, things are happening around me while my life stays the same. There's a sense of unnerving comfort in that. I think that acceptance is a big part of their change. Acceptance is not to be mistaken as a compromise or giving up. It is basically coming to terms with the way things are (or what they have become) - whether good or bad. It is interesting to watch and listen to people work things out and rationalize things and accept the best possible scenario. I am being vague because I don't want to necessarily reference specific people, but in a way, I am speaking about a lot of my friends in general right now. There are lots of turning points as well and huge decisions that will be made. I can feel the change in the air. I am hoping for the best and work with every outcome, like all of the previous years.

I finally have a bit of time to post. The weekend was super jam-packed with events. Friday night Jonathan and a few others met up with us at Fiesta Cantina (in West Hollywood). They have great happy hour specials and the location is sweet - between many gay bars. We drank a lot and met a dancer at Micky's (who was straight, gasp!) and took a few pictures with him. Sinead, Aussie's Irish roommate was smitten. I don't think she's ever been in a place like that before. We galavanted around and ended up at The Abbey the rest of the night. It was good fun adn I was surprised that Josh had a good time too, considering it wasn't really his scene.

Saturday was YAR (Young Alumni Reunion) at UCLA. I missed last year's because I was at a wedding in Modesto. It was a lot of fun - running into old friends, etc. I was happy to see Vanessa there with Mel (and her huge rock of an engagement ring). I miss Vanessa and our lunches at Whole Foods. Too bad Chicago will have her for a few more years. I also saw Kiran who was in town for an interview, luckily and just happened to attend. She is back in New Orleans and I miss her too. Everyone is so spread out now. It's crazy!! the usual suspects were there and a few others that I hadn't seen in a really long time, so it was perfect. The only thing was - I had to stay until 2am and then come back the next morning at 6am for the UCLA Run/Walk 5K. I didn't realize that all this volunteering is exhausting.

In the early evening, Mike had a BBQ in honor of his graduating law school. He finally made it!! I am so very proud of him and I know that he will kick butt on the BAR. His family was tehre to support him and his sister gave me the skinny on the family tree. There were a lot of second or third marriages and kids were a product of a few of their marriages. It was one long, complicated, and very nuclear family. Wow. A lot of people came to the BBQ. I guess free food draws them in!

I am falling asleep as I am typing this. It's sad. I will post more soon!

Link: http://www.thecure.com/

"Seventeen Seconds" is the name of last week's Grey's Anatomy episode. Coincidentally, it's also the name of a song by The Cure. I figure that it's worth the mention because Grey's Anatomy just had aired their season finale on Sunday. It's hard not to get wound up in their lives, though they are fictional. I know that I mention a lot of shows on here, but I don't really watch that much TV. I only watch a few select shows and that's it (with the exception of Conan O'Brien sometimes). I like the writing on Grey's. And McDreamy is very hot. That helps a lot. I am going to miss it along with my other favorite shows.

I don't remember these past few weeks. It's all been a blur. I guess that's one of the reasons why I carry a camera to document everything. I have an awful memory with things like that. I can't remember what I did two Saturdays ago but I will start on Sunday and go forward.

Sunday - Scientology brunch - a bit creepy but there's good food, Barney's & Macy's, Thai Food with Mike & Matt | Monday - Dinner with M | Wednesday - Staff dinner with folks from NY | Thursday - E3 & Cocktails at Zucca, Death of Ed - a client that I worked with (he was so young), a coworker's going away party (so sad, I miss her) | Friday - off! Spent it a M's graduation and going back to Modesto | Saturday - Elaine & Sinh's Wedding (craziness that night) | Sunday - Go to Sacramento with Ali B and search for a Taco Bell on the way to the airport.

It's so busy lately - socially and in the work place. Starting tomorrow, I will be going nonstop from event to another event. It's fun but exhausting all at the same time. I really have to elaborate on the wedding though. It was great seeing everybody but there was so much history between all of the people in that room. You put all of the ex-boyfriends and ex-girlfriends in the same room with the current boy/girlfriends, drama is surely going to happen. That's all I'm saying about that for now.

My dad is in the hospital right now. I think they are going to release him soon. They are running a lot of tests to see why there is sporadic numbness on the left side of his body. Because of his brain aneurysm years ago, they think that it may possibly lead to something serious so I am glad that they are being cautious and providing preventative care. He is actually doing fine there and is complaining about the food, like normal.

I will hopefully get time to write something more thoughful on here. I hope this will do for now.

Link: http://www.greenday.com/greenday.html

I uploaded onto Flickr a scrapbook that I made a few years ago. It is basically all of my pictures that I took during my senior year of high school through the beginning of my 3rd year of college. It was done during the ancient times before digital cameras and all the fancy technology that we take for granted every day. I am glad that I can share it with everyone now. Hopefully some of you will find yourselves in there. You can find the pictures here.

Link: http://www.rollingstones.com/index.php

No, it's not writer's block. It's not indifference either. I guess I haven't been in the writing mood lately. I can't explain it. I think that I can't do two things at once anymore. In this case - reading and writing. I have been reading The Devil Wears Prada based on many people's recommendations and also because the movie is coming out really soon. It's not that the book is dense - it's actually really light reading, but for some reason my writing is flailing and I just haven't been in the mood nor do I have time for either. But I digress. I have to try now that I know that I have this issue. I hope to write more.

Anyhow, this weekend was really short. It felt like I had to squeeze everything in and yet be spontaneous at the same time. It was hard, but managable. A brief summary below:

Thursday - Andrea visits from Denver. We hit up one of her favorite spots - Tom Bergin's and while she got crunk, we hung out in the back of the bar and got all sweaty (the bar was really hot and muggy). It smelled like a gym locker, but the drinks were good. Pics are here.

Friday - Spring Sing 2006. I don't think I have ever missed one Spring Sing since my freshman year of college. The Company was fantastic and they brought back my favorite jumprope and juggling skit and spiced it up a bit with fire! Burt Bacharach was the George and Ira Gershwin Award recipient and he performed an impromptu song for us. It was amazing! During the entire show, Nemika and I kept on making commentary for some of the acts. It kept us amused. We couldn't help it, they were awesome. Pics are here.

Saturday - Went to Manhattan Beach with M . Had a great lunch at The Kettle and took a long stroll on the beach. It was a beautiful day. A bit overcast at times, but the sun was out most of the day. Later that night, I met up with the girls, minus MichGarr (who was at Coachella) and a few other friends for Dre's brother's 21st birthday. I had met her brother Chris the night before at Spring Sing. He looks so young! We drank a lot and had a great time. Met one of Christy's friends, Casey, and had a booty contest. Of course I won. He said that it was a 9.5, though by that time, I think he was toast. I still appreciated the booty comment though. Nemika joined us later and we went back to the girls place to hang out. Pictures from that night are here.

I ended up crashing there for the night and the next morning, we grabbed some brunch. Dre's bed is awesome and I am thinking about getting a similar kind. I am assuming Eva's feels the same since they got the same type of bed. A Costco run later in the day and then we met up with Aussie, Jon, and Lisa at Cabo Cantina. The best part about Cabo is that their Happy Hour is daily from 4pm-8pm and drinks are 2 for 1. We fully took advantage of the special. We went over to Lisa's for The Soprano's and Grey's Anatomy. Good stuff. Full weekend. Very tired still!!

My bosses have been gone all week for the big network meeting that was held last night. It's nice to have them all gone and have the office to ourselves. (Only the assistants are left.) But they are back tomorrow and work with resume like normal. With some good connections, I was able to watch a screening of Mission Impossible 3 last night. I didn't want to watch it at all actually. I'm not a big fan of Tom Cruise. I do, however, like Felicity and J. J. Abrams. So I figured I should at least go to the screening, since it is free and at the Cinerama Dome. After watching the movie, I was pretty impressed. I actually liked it. Well, I liked it for what it was: an action movie. I have seen tons better, but the action sequences were great, though some of it was just unbelievable. The semi-predictable plot was typical but I found myself on the edge of my seat at certain points in the movie. It was indeed entertaining. Don't watch it for Tom - watch it for Billy Crudup, Keri Russell, Laurence Fishburne, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Ving Rhames, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, the "hot" Asian chick, and the others. Watch it for them. It's a fun movie! I say go in there with no expectations and you won't be disappointed.

I am still in shock about what happened in LOST tonight. They are killing off characters left and right now!