alla rip van winkle

If it wasn't for the comment of concern from laurenj, it probably would have been another week or so until my next post. I feel like I fell asleep from my blog and woke up 100 years later. But since there is a demand for my writing, I am willing to oblige.

Where-o-where has tarak been over the last couple of weeks? Well, last week I spent a few days in Toronto. My friend Jessica really wanted to see the musical We Will Rock You (the Queen jukebox musical for those of you not in the know about those sort of things) and invited me along. Toronto is a beautiful city. Really walkable. Surprisingly clean. Tons of green space. If you smooshed Park Slope with Prospect Park, the Financial District, and downtown Tampa together, you would get a close approximation of what Toronto is like. I could easily come back to visit.

There is also a big arts and entertainment community there. Jessica and I got caught in the rain on Tuesday walking to our hotel and we happened to run into a film shot. Anyone want to be an extra? Unfortunately, they weren't hiring that day.

The show was good. That's all I say about that. We ate very well, shopped a lot, and I felt so relaxed the entire trip (minus the bus trip there and back).

I came back on Thursday, went to work on Friday, and got on a bus again on Saturday morning to go to the German Alps Festival in the Catskills at Hunter Mountain. My goodness, talk about one of the most beautiful views I've seen in a long time. I went with my other and we listened to German rock bands, ate extremely good German food, and rode the ski lift to the top of Hunter Mountain. In a little co-inky-dink related to my title, we saw two stone carvers sculpting a Rip Van Winkle statue at the top of the mountain. The carvers only work on the statue during the summer months on the weekends (so people can see the carving process) and they estimated that the statue will be completed in 2010. I may have to go back in a year or two to see how they're coming along.

And then rest day on Sunday. I didn't do a damn thing. Screw the laundry. Not gonna make anything harder than leftovers. It was really nice to just veg.

As to what I was doing the two weeks before my international trip, I've been focusing on being more sensitive and open with my other since we started going to counseling. He's admitted to me that he's never really took to heart much of what I said when it came to our disagreements and now what I've been saying is starting to sink in. As much as it hurt to hear him say that he wasn't listening to me, I'm glad he admitted it.

Well, I guess that's it. Really looking forward to going to see the Cyclones with all of my favorite peeps and also looking forward to today's half day at work. I feel sooooo exhausted and need a nap. But I want an iced coffee. I'm so conflicted, can I have it all?