2 Weeks Ago...

Alex was visiting me 2 weeks ago, when I last wrote. We had a pretty great time and talked a lot. Lots of bonding, a bit walking around...sadly, I was still working and studying for midterms when she came over, so a lot of the sightseeing she had to do on her own. But for the jetlag she first felt, she was QUITE the trooper! She came to Chamber rehearsal the first night and partook in our singing extraordinary attempts. Poor girl, wanted to conk out and I wouldn't let her until 11pm.
We went one night out to dinner with one of her Polish-American friends from Australia (this is her normal relations with people; meeting them in their unnatural countries). It was this pretty overpriced restaurant in SoHo, Boom, where the waiter acted dim and I had to explain in full detail 3 times what "gluten" was. It was frustrating, but the company was alright. I later parted ways with her and her group of friends to get a flourless chocolate cake from Cocoa Bar (which, I will admit, was a bit disappointing, too) and spent the remainder of the night with Lauren and Jenni chez eux.
That Saturday Alex and I ran to meet up with Kami before he left for France. I will miss that boy, he was such a sweetheart.

Monday through Wednesday were pretty boring. I just worked and studied. I had a big midterm on Wednesday, and when that was done, I ran around and finished many errands that I had been avoiding.
Thursday night after work I went ou to dinner with my boss and co-worker. We went to this LOVELY tapas bar called Alta, where we spent 5 hours drinking wine, eating tapas, and talking about all kinds of interesting topics. I learned all about Santiago! Scary... After getting home not-so-sober around midnight and drunk-dialing a certain Matt, I went to bed and woke up in the morning to say farewell to my dear Alex. She left for DC that day, and the next day I was out of town myself. Parting is such sweet sorrow to those you hold dear. I was treated out again by my boss to lunch, where we finished our conversation a bit before heading back to a long day at work.

Saturday morning I had to haul my luggage and me all the way to Newark. It took two hours. Yet again I missed out on making nice talk to a cute guy who was going to sit next to me, in which the fates scolded me by having a big grumpy man sit right between the two of us in the plane. Another trip where I was smeared onto the window of the moving vessel. I slept most of the way to Tampa. And then, I was picked up by "them": the grandparents. The ones who say terrible things to me and my family on a frequent basis. Waiting for my mom's flight, grandma scolded and lamented about all of the trouble she had put herself in just to buy my mother and me treats for our one "short" day visit that neither of us could eat (meet diabetes and celiac). Despite my attempts at being helpful and showing them a long list of Tampa restaurants with gluten-free menus, my grandmother insisted on a buffet-styled dump for dinner where they didn't even understand what I meant by eating limitations. Yeah, I got sick that night a bit. And grandma & grandpa complained the whole dinner about how terrible it all was, though they picked the darn place.

The next morning my mom and I rushed to get ready and leave so we could get to the ship port as early as possible to escape the grandparental grips.