37 DAYS!

So...this travelblog thing says it has been 37 days since my last entry. Had this been during my travels, I would have had a plethora of hate mail from my many fans, followed by worried emails, then frantic emails and then my friends and family would've hopped on planes and would be crazily running around Asia looking for a dirty, curly haired former Bollywood star lost somewhere. Most would probably start with anywhere within Asia that sells cheese and the rest would start anywhere that sells anything. My guess is, that at some point, I would be found and I would have just been too busy running around like a crazy traveler that I forgot how to type. I would have been found by all the inquiries to the local people of whatever country I would've been in when they all realized they had seen someone who fit my description. A fluffy haired, bubble butted, pale skinned, big feeted American girl carrying color coordinated bags, telling a story, eating ice cream, laughing, giving hugs, telling more stories, smiling, falling, and having a great time. All roads would lead to me and then everyone would once again hate me for not updating them on me being alive and the hate emails would start all over again. That is why I was a good blogger and called my mommy and daddy along the way.

These past 37 days have been full of different kinds of fun and adventures. I arrived home to have to then leave to go to my cousin's wedding in Maryland. My family piled into my dad's car (including Shrek as he is my pillow when I am in NJ), picked up my favorite bagels (yay Oakland!), got my Granny and headed down to Maryland. It was great to see everyone-some relatives I hadn't seen in 7 years and others it had been even longer! The wedding was beautiful and everyone had a wonderful time. The dinner the night before was super and Sunday morning we had a brunch to see everyone one last time. Everything worked out really well, except when my granny's short nightgown was ripped and I had to share a bed with her! ha ha! Shrek survived his first road trip and even got some loving from granny! On the way home, I insisted on stopping in New Brunswick to visit my old stomping grounds and to have my favorite soup! yum!

I got back to Ringwood and threw some more stuff in a bag and headed to the bus station to go into the city. It was a last minute decision, but worked out well. I hopped on the bus and then journeyed down to Jessie's apartment to stay over so she could drive me to the airport the next day to go to Vermont. It was good to be back in NYC-a city for sure, but one that I absolutely love and know my way around. I took a dance class at STEPS in the morning and wandered around the city for the day. Afterwards, Jessie and I met up with Bridget in Hoboken to have some Cinco De Mayo Mexican food. I then headed to Vermont to visit my sissy.

I flew to Burlington and was bummed to see that my cell phone had no service in the whole state of Vermont. I was supposed to call Tara to pick me up as soon as I landed, but noone around me had phones out. I got off the plane and found a pay phone (didn't know they existed anymore!) and tried to call her. It was 90 something cents! I didn't have that much change! what happened to it being 20 cents? I then wondered around and found someone with a phone out and asked to borrow it. This would have seemed strange months ago, but after being in foreign countries where you don't have a phone, asking a stranger to use one is no big deal. Tara came and picked me up in the Gilape and we headed to some bar in Burlington. We danced a bit, drank a gimlet (Tara had the old people version...with soda) and went back to her house. The next few days were spent slaving me around, carrying magazines places and exploring Vermont. I got to cheese, wine, beer and ice cream taste and that was fabulous! I had a great tofu scramble one day, yummy barbequed fiddleheads, veggies and tofu another and delicious Thai food another (minus the fish sauce!). The Ben and Jerry's factory made me want to work there (you get 3 free pints per day...talk about job perks!). I took Miss Tara's tumbling class where I proved that I can still do back handsprings, which made me really really happy! We went to Honky Tonk Tuesdays and I learned to hula hoop! I also rode a bike on Lake Champlain, danced around on benches and thanks to Dan, ate my first creemee (basically soft serve ice cream that Vermont gave a cute name to)

I left Vermont and was picked up by Jackie to go on an Indian food eating adventure. It was delicious! Jackie, like me before my trip, thought she didn't like Indian food...she was wrong! yay! It was delicious except in order to make the tea taste like real Indian Chai, we had to put 6 packets of sugar each! how bad is that?! We stuffed ourselves and then headed to Jaime's for a slumber party!

The next night, I had dinner with my parentals and then hopped the bus to the city again to have dinner for Bridget's bday! We had yummy tapas and then went to a jazz club that had seen us in our scandulous 19 year old form many years before. It was a fun night and Bridget survived turning another year older! Saturday I went to meet Jen Ma at the Self magazine work out in the park. She was all important with her walky talky and stuff and couldn't take part in the fun classes, but I had a blast! It was great to see her even if just for a bit! That night we celebrated Bridget's bday once again and again it was a fun night! I also got to see Hollie for a little that night, although it would've been good to have been able to join up with her and Stephanie sooner...oh well-family fun day 2008 is already in the works! Sunday was Mother's day so I headed back to NJ on the bus to join in the family festivities. Aunt Marge made my favorite salad and Aunt Debbie made my favorite brownies! yay! I helped with the barbequed tofu, but my parents did most of the cooking. Stacey, Jill, Jackie, Jaime and Joey all stopped over to say hi!

Monday my mom took off work to spend time with her wonderful daughters and Dan. We went out to lunch and then they all went to a movie while I took a dance class with Miss Jaime. Afterwards I met them for dinner where I had cheese fries!

The next day, Jessie, Jaime and I did some shopping (yay Loehmann's and GSP) and then headed back to the airport to take the trip to Cali! My traveling was sort of over which was super sad, but I was looking (sort of) forward to returning to real life (or atleast to see my Cali friends!)

Katie picked me up and it was nice to return to the SilberChan B&B. I got up the next morning to bring coffee to my friends at my old job and then headed to ballet class. I have now gotten used to the life of a lazy bum. I get up (almost) every day to take ballet class and then scrapbook, run, do yoga, clean, shop, cook, eat, go to the beach, play tennis, go hiking (forwards or backwards), go for long walks or whatever else to fill my time. I will be returning to the actual real world during the next week where I will be working a mix of inpatient and outpatient at UCLA (Santa Monica and Westwood). I think I have extended my time off as long as possible and it will be nice to have some sort of worth after so long!

Oh yeah...I also spent a great Memorial Day weekend in Yosemite, camping and white water rafting. We had a terrific time, despite the super harsh weather conditions (it actually snowed)! Oh and when I first got back, we hit Campanile's grilled cheese night which is always awesome! Even though I disliked the down fall of the dollar while I was abroad, it is nice to see so many backpackers here in Santa Monica (more so than any other year!) and that makes me happy....I feel like they are my people that I miss so much! I may have to pick up a Cali lonely planet and join them!!

---

---