Archives for May 2012

We had a fantastic weekend, peeps, and I got home so late on Sunday night that you’re getting this recap a day late.

On the flight down to SoCal on Friday morning, we had an amazing (!) view of Yosemite National Park from the plane. I’ve never seen the Yosemite Valley that clearly from the plane. It was absolutely breath-taking and I was able to snap a quick picture (click on the picture to see notes). Luckily, this time I remembered to get a window seat on the left side of the plane (I tend to have my “duh”-moments when I realize that I chose a seat on the right side where I can’t see a damn thing.)

We made it to Ventura around 2 p.m. and I helped my MIL pick out some plants for her patio in the afternoon. We headed to dinner at Anacapa Brewing Company in Downtown Ventura for a belated Mother’s Day dinner in the early evening and then went to the Ventura Improv Theater. Oh my goodness, belly laughs for two whole hours!

On Saturday, I had a lunch date set up with Maegan at the Lazy Dog Café in Thousand Oaks. It’s a SoCal chain restaurant, but the food is pretty amazing and we had excellent service. When I ordered an iced tea, the rather cute waiter recommended an Arnold Palmer, which I had never heard of. Then he said, even better is a Tiger Woods (and Arnold Palmer with a splash of cranberry juice). We were persuaded to try it (“if you don’t like it, it’s on the house“) and it was quite delicious! As first time customers, we also got a free order of garlic-parmesan flat bread — so, you can imagine  that was an easy way for us to be SOLD on the place!

I had a delicious Maggie’s Snake River salad (with bacon bits and goat cheese, yum!) and Maegan and I chatted away. OMG, how I love to meet online friends that turn into IRL friends so, so easily! I don’t think we shut up longer than 10 seconds for the entire time we were there! It was like she took so many thoughts right out of my mind.

We got some fro-yo around the corner for dessert (and frankly, because I didn’t want to let her go home quite yet, ha!) and it could have been an absolute PERFECT day, if Maegan hadn’t injured her foot on the stupid glass door at the fro-yo place (pictured below on the right). Our meeting ended with gushing blood on the top of her foot. Ouch. I really hope she won’t always keep that as a bad memory of our first date! It went so well otherwise!

We had a BBQ at J’s parents place in the evening with yummy steaks, potatoes and salad.

On Sunday morning, I helped J’s Mom plant the plants and flowers we had bought on Friday and then we went to the beach! First stop, the Ventura Pier (which I love!) for some fish tacos at the new Beach House Tacos.

Later  in the afternoon we met up with J’s brother at San Buenaventura Park for some fresh oysters at ‘The Jolly Oyster‘. (Sadly, no other pictures.) I am not really eating oysters (as in, not at all, at least not raw), but I indulged in some Sauvignon blanc, french bread and brie. Yum. There is nothing better than a seaside picnic!

Despite it being overcast and breezy, it was pretty warm and I just loved to spend some time on the beach the last couple of days! And just like that, the weekend was over again. Fortunately, we were able to take advantage of the whole day in Ventura, as I had booked the last flight of the day to return to Sacramento. We headed back to the airport around 6:30 pm.

Of course, I noticed that it was “getting kind of dark early”, but completely blanked out on the fact that there was a solar eclipse happening on Sunday. Duh! Did you see it?

How was your weekend? Did you do anything fun?