Last night a few of us went to go see the new Transformers movie. It was on the long side, at over 2 1/2 hours—which turned out to seem longer when you go to the latest showing and thus get out of the movie after midnight.

Overall I wasn’t all that impressed with the movie. It was basically a series of spinning shots, so I would not recommend it to anyone who either has vertigo or has consumed a lot of alcohol. The rest of the shots were just closeups of the robots fighting each other, but it was so frenzied and closeup that you couldn’t tell who was fighting or what was going on. But, considering that there wasn’t really too much of a plot, I’m not sure it mattered.

Ultimately, I think (and hope) that this is the worst movie that I see this year. Ugh.

Posted at 11:17 AM | (0)

Yesterday evening after work, I met up with a bunch of friends over at East Beach to play some beach volleyball. It’s been ages since I’ve played, so it was fun to have the chance to do it again. There were plenty of open courts, not that that was an issue since a couple people left work at like 4 or something to claim a court.

When I got there, a good number of people were in attendance, and a game was already in progress. I wound up playing 2 games of 4 on 4, and while I would definitely not say that I was the star player, I did get some good shots in. I managed to get the ball over the net several times, some of which the other team was unable to return. I also had a couple serves that allowed our team to rack up some points. We lost the first game, but won the second, so that was good.

While it was super fun and I hope to do it again sometime soon, I have a feeling it won’t be immediately—my arms are killing me! If I move them certain ways, they hurt quite a bit—I’m sure the tendons or something in my arms are swollen from being smacked by a ball continuously, especially considering how bony they are. But, as I said, I had fun, and that’s what matters. :)

Posted at 1:59 PM | (0)

Last night Dave and I attended the 2nd Nights of the Summer at the Museum—we missed the first one because of kickball. This event is one of Dave’s favorite SB events, I think because everyone dresses up super fancy.

We didn’t initially know many people going, but as it turned out, we ran into a ton of people that we knew. We spent most of the time socializing, so I didn’t even end up doing any of the crafts or activities that they offer. They are having fewer of these events this summer, due to new management, so there won’t be one next month. Regardless, even though it’s a bit pretentious in the sense that all the beautiful people go to see and be seen, it’s still nice to see everyone you know looking really nice.

Posted at 10:48 AM | (0)

Yesterday one of our friends turned 25, and to celebrate a whole quarter century of being alive, she decided to throw a fancy party wherein everyone dressed up and brought their favorite wines. To ensure she didn’t end up with 20 bottles of Two Buck Chuck or something, she made there be blind tastings with prizes for the best red and best white.

At the end of the night, there were many different bottles to sample, but in the end the red that Dave and I brought won the best red, so we received a book of cocktail recipes as a prize. There weren’t nearly as many whites to choose from, as it turned out, so the fact that we won among so many others is pretty cool. We almost lost out to some box wine though, because some people of course thought it would be amusing to vote for what is obviously the crappiest (and thus I suppose awesomest) wine.

This party also lasted until late in the night, which included one of our friends in attendance to bust out a guitar and start serenading us with songs, until he picked ones that everyone could sing along to, which was pretty fun.

Posted at 2:15 PM | (0)

Yesterday around noon, Dave and I went to a Solstice party at the house of a friend of mine. He puts on this party every year, and tons of people come throughout the day, as it begins around 10am and goes until about midnight. Some people leave to do other parties, see the parade, visit the beer garden, etc, but since the house did not close up for a few hours to go downtown like it did last year, a few of us just stayed the whole time.

There was lots of delicious food (and of course my cupcakes, although there were also some red velvet cupcakes in attendance), and this year saw the new addition of a hot tub, which just got installed the night before, although pretty much only the kids took advantage of it.

There was also Rock Band set up again, which of course we partook in. We wound up staying until a little before midnight, making it once again a truly all-day celebration.

At any rate, today is Father’s Day, and so I am off to drive home to surprise my Dad with a quick visit and join my family for dinner!

Posted at 10:10 AM | (0)

Last night a few of us went bowling, which I don’t believe I’ve done since my birthday. We paid by the hour and when all was said and done, we bowled 2 full games.

I was having an off night or something because I only got 75 on my first game, and while I did slightly better the 2nd game, I still barely got over 100. After bowling we congregated to play some board games. We wound up playing Simpsons themed Clue, and I could’ve won, but I didn’t want to risk guessing when I was only 95% sure and so I was beat to the guess. Still, it was fun though.

After returning back home, near midnight, I started baking some chocolate cupcakes with vanilla frosting (from scratch of course) for today’s Solstice party that I will be leaving to attend in a bit. Should be a lot of fun if it’s anything like last year! Hopefully people like my cupcakes.

Posted at 10:30 AM | (0)

Last night a few of us went to the Joyce to hit up karaoke night, at least in part because one member of our group had talked to someone the week prior and the guy had mentioned he might be there this week as well.

Anyway, we went, got some drinks, did some karaoke, and talked to random foreign people from England and Switzerland and generally had a good time. The guy in question never came, but it didn’t really matter. I did, however, almost get burned alive by a giant birthday cake with 30 candles for one guy’s birthday, because they carried it right past me as I was getting off the stage after doing my song. That would not have been good.

Since we enjoyed hanging the evening, we are contemplating making it a weekly event. We shall see.

Posted at 1:11 PM | (0)

Yesterday Dave and I did absolutely nothing. And it was fabulous.

I had fun showing off the town all last week, and it was nice to get out and walk around a lot. But, after all that time just doing stuff, it was nice to sit around the apartment and not do anything. Well, I did do some cleaning up that had been neglected during the week, but other than that, nothing!

Posted at 5:08 PM | (0)

Well, Stepan left this afternoon to head on up the coast, in order to reach his ultimate destination of a conference in Portland sometime next week.

To end his trip, we did go to pub quiz (where we fared about the same as usual), made it to La Super Rica yesterday (which he HAD to eat at, or else risk not being allowed to return to the office), and also hit up the Wildcat at night so that he could see all of the popular spots to dance.

Hopefully he enjoyed his stay and will also have a lot of fun on the remainder of his trip. It was fun hosting and showing someone around—doing lots of fun things in a short period of time. At the same time, it will be nice to do nothing for a few days—although that won’t happen until at least Sunday as there is a cocktail party tonight and a birthday BBQ planned for Saturday.

Posted at 4:02 PM | (0)

So, I meant to try to post various entries for the different days to talk about what I’ve been up to while Stepan, a friend and former coworker of mine, has been visiting. He’s going to a conference next week and since he was on vacation, he decided to stop by and visit SB since he hadn’t ever been here.

To sorta summarize, our days have included the following:

Thursday: Stepan arrives and we take him to dinner at the Palace and then later that evening hit up Tonic so he can see one of the more popular late-night dance venues.

Friday: We go on a hike along the San Ysidro trail, stopping at the water to rest and take pictures. We also drive to a spot along Painted Cave that offers and overview of the whole city and ocean before he heads down to a concert at the Roxy in LA and Dave and I attend the post-season kickball party

Saturday: We go for lunch at the Daily Grind and later go see The Hangover, which is quite amusing. After the movie we go to Arigato for sushi (or teriyaki chicken for me) and get a drink at State & A while waiting for a table. To end the night, we hit up Eos for a little variety in the dancing.

Sunday: We get up slightly earlier than usual so that we can go wine tasting in the Santa Ynez Valley. We do brunch at Roblar and then hit up Firestone, Curtis, Kalyra, and Gainey for tastings. We tried to do Sunstone as well, but they were closed already when we arrived. Since it was also the birthday of a friend in attendance, we decided to hit up a nice dinner at Ca Dario (also because I know several people who work there, and the food is good).

Monday: Stepan and I walked around downtown for like 6 hours, going all over State Street, the wharf, the courthouse, and several parks, taking pictures. He was introduced to The Habit as an alternative to In n Out. For dinner we went to Santa Barbara Brewing Company, which unfortunately was out of several of their microbrews. After dinner we hit up Dargan’s for some pool, before moving on to the Joyce for karaoke.

Tuesday: We got a somewhat later start, walking over to South Coast Deli for lunch before winding up at the Coffee Cat to spend the rest of the day working on our computers—me doing my web stuff and Stepan editing some of the many photos he’s taken along the way. After the coffee shop closed we went to dinner at Pacific Crepes and then met up with some people for pool once again at Dargan’s.

Wednesday (so far): We started out with breakfast at Moby Dick’s, so that we could have the view of the harbor as we ate. After breakfast, we ventured over to Hendry’s Beach for a bit so that Stepan could say he’s been to an SB beach. It’s been hard to do much more than just walk around the beach since the weather has been kinda cold and overcast—not exactly beach weather. He put his feet in the ocean and felt how cold the water here can be and then we walked along the sand for a bit before heading back. Now we are doing work at Northstar Coffee, and who knows what the evening will bring us—perhaps pub quiz??

To make a long summary short though, we’ve been doing a lot of stuff, trying to take advantage of what SB has to offer, and hopefully he will consider this to be a successful and fun trip!

Posted at 2:53 PM | (0)

Well, it only took me about 4 months (though I did not work on this full-time by any means), but I finally completed the sweater I was working on. It wasn’t a hard piece to work on, as it was mostly the same for the entire length of the sweater (especially once you got past the raglan decrease part). For the most part, I did not deviate from the pattern, except that instead of the normal turned hem it called for, I knit 1 inch in 1x1 rib. I also did 1 inch of 1x1 rib on the sleeves, immediately after the last decreases, instead of the belled sleeves.

I found that I had to do many more repeats of the cable pattern, as my row gauge was way off. Despite the difference in gauge, I had a ton of yarn left-I had bought 5 skeins and only wound up using 3 1/2.

Anyway, I think that I am pleased with the end result:

Pattern: Opulent Raglan by Wendy Bernard, Knitscene Fall 2008
Needles: US 5 and US 6
Yarn: 3 1/2 skeins Elsebeth Lavold Silky Wool in #27 Periwinkle

Posted at 5:01 PM | (1)

Yesterday afternoon I went to volunteer at this event called Taste of the Nation. This was a benefit to help feed hungry children, and it consisted of a bunch of fancy restaurants providing food to sample, as well as several local wineries providing different wines to taste.

I helped do the pre-event setup at the auction area. I basically helped layout all the items, group them together by common theme, and so forth. I was glad that I got to help with that instead of something such as cleaning up during the event. The plus side to helping out is that I gained free admission to the event, so I was able to taste everything that I wanted.

I was glad to gain the free admission, because I knew that since the food was so fancy, that I would not be a fan of most of it. Indeed, most of the items were unusual seafood items, or other pairings that I did not think I would like. I did try some things that I definitely would not have ordered off a menu for fear of not liking it, and for the most part I did find that I wasn’t a fan of the fancy items. There were a few things that were good though, so that made it worth it. It should also come as no surprise that my favorite items were the desserts! No matter how fancy and full of unique and unusual dishes that restaurants are, they usually have the most amazing desserts, and this event proved to be no exception.

Posted at 4:55 PM | (0)