The Blathering, Part 3 and the conclusion

I hate when people who just got back from vacation talk about it all the time and force you to look at pictures. God, that's so annoying. I promise, this will be the last vacation post until Vegas (in TWO WEEKS). I've said before that I have the memory of a raisin or a tiny pebble or whatever other object that has no memory so I feel the need to document everything here so my feeble mind can look back someday and actually remember details like cities we went, food we ate and the people we met. The important stuff.

The last 3 days of this vacation were filled with even more awesome and excitement. Waking up in Carmel was a dream. It's just such a beautiful place, a place I absolutely cannot wait to go back to. I was a bit nervous, I can't lie because the only experience I'd had to associate Carmel to was this news program I saw about this crazy ass man who murdered his neighbors over a piece of land that was smaller than 4 feet. Thankfully as soon as I saw the Dr. Seuss shaped trees, felt the cold sand on my feet, saw the blue waters and heard the water crashing I was sold. Sign me up to move there and I'd die happy. Do you not just want to run, slo-mo, into that water?

We ate breakfast at a local, recommended place that pretty much was nothing to write home about and then walked around the main drag where Jennie and I found a clothing store that every woman should have access to. It was called Inago and I'll be damned if they don't have an Internet site. The dresses were the most beautiful, frothy things. I found a dress I fell in love with but it was $500. Don't get me wrong, I am the kind of person who would spend that much on a dress if I really and truly loved it but it was the wrong shape for my body and I knew it just by looking at it. But! Silver lining! I found the most heart-stopping necklace that makes me smile and beam. It was not $500, my bank thanks me, but it wasn't cheap. It's definitely a piece I'm proud to own and I have to stop myself from wearing it everyday. It's made from some type of golden brown oval faceted stones and has a fabric oval "patch" that's covered in rhinestones. I DIE. (Excuse my crazy hair, it's my ocean wind blown look apparently.)

After leaving Carmel we wound our way through a mountains to eat lunch on the water in San Francisco. Our parking meter time allowed only a short stop and we ended up at la mar, a beautiful Peruvian restaurant were I ordered the most fantastic mushroom risotto. I literally stopped this blog post to look up the place and I just sent them an e-mail asking for this recipe. Cross your appendages for me that I can get the recipe.

After lunch it was time to meet up with THE LADIES! I won't talk about how traffic sucked balls on the way to Elizabeth's house, but it did. Suck, that is. It was totally worth it, though. Have you seen the photos Elizabeth posts of her home? It's really that freaking adorable in person. All of us ladies talked about how we were going to hire Elizabeth to come decorate for us. The offer stands, by the way. The food was beautiful and the table setting was straight out of a Real Simple magazine.

Friday night we ate the most delicious dinner and I was so pleased that an effort was made to accommodate my veganism, it really made my heart melt. We drank lots of wine, broke furniture (not it!), laughed and just generally had an excellent evening. I wasn't nervous really to meet these ladies. I had met Elizabeth before and I knew she was lovely and I had Jennie there to hold my hand if I needed it. I was truly excited to meet these women from all over the country and share stories with them and hang out like old friends.

Saturday we all took in some downtown shopping or manis and pedis. I choose the shopping route and got a cute little dress at the Sugar Shack and a necklace at Cuffs Urban Apparel. Loading up on cheap-y jewelry at Forever 21 made the list also. All that shopping made for a hungry group of girls so we headed to Cafe Bernardo where I got a delicious peanut sauced pasta dish. (I just love peanut sauced pasta dishes.) As we walked in to the restaurant people stared at us ladies and our loud, giggling selves. They thought we were having a bachellorette party or college reunion. One lady I told how we actually met may have literally rolled her eyes and then kept on walking.

The late afternoon was another gab fest about all sorts of random life things that come up. It was a leisurely afternoon that I carved an hour out of for a nap. I like naps people, it's my thing. Boy did I need that nap too because I had no idea where Saturday night would take us. We had dinner plans at Zocalo where I got the fanciest tostadas I've ever seen and drank the yummiest blackberry margarita followed by drinks at Lounge on 20. The drink I got there was TO DIE FOR. The Bella Fragola was more like a summery beachy drink made from strawberry, basil and Gvori vodka. I drank two in less than 30 minutes and that is just not like me. The Lounge on 20 also had this refreshing cucumber water that I am intrigued to make myself. It can't be that hard, right?

Faces was the last stop of the night and it couldn't have been a better choice. Basically this place is a gay bar with multiple rooms, the country music room, hip-hop room and dance music room. There was a "lady" there who came into the dance music room while we were shaking our booties that put us all to shame. 6" tall with 4 inch heels, a dress cut up to there, the blondest wig and the perkiest "boobs" I'd seen in a long time. We may have scared "her" off with the crowding around and staring.

This is the part where I profess my ignorance. There was a bathroom that I found that had the male/female sign on the door and I was all "Oh! Aren't they progressive and pioneers, they don't care how uses the bathroom! Sacramento is so cool!" and not until many hours later did I realize that that bathroom was for the "lady" with the perky "boobs". I may have wanted to melt into the floor when I realized that. Moving on...

We ladies danced our asses off and by the end of the night we all looked like we'd taken 6 straight jazzercise classes. I knew approximately 1 song that was played and felt like a total loser but it was just so fun to dance and act like a kid again. Also, it didn't hurt that a lesbian totally hit on me. Uh huh. I suppose that's my next option is the male population keeps failing me. I digress.

I fell asleep content and happy that night and thanking my lucky stars that such an excellent group of women had come into my life even if only for a few days. I count this vacation as one of the best I've ever had. Thank you ladies for making me feel welcome and being kind and generous and awesome. Thank you, Jennie, for letting me come with you on your adventure and making it our adventure. I am so fortunate and grateful and I can't wait till we do it again next year ladies!

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The vacation ended with losing my car in the airport parking lot and wandering around for an hour with my arm raised in the air pushing the panic button on the clicker so we could locate the car, a long ass drive home and with Jennie reading me tweets to entertain me. I was grateful for the time I'd had away and grateful to come home to see my little man sleeping soundly. The awesomeness of coming home is excellent.

You can see all my Flickr photos here and our group photos here.