Wordless Wednesday

The problem with planning group vacations

At the beginning of the year, I was at Harry’s with my girlfriends sipping cocktails and having a great time. Since Australia was looming on the horizon, we were talking about vacations and wouldn’t it be fun if we could all go somewhere together!?

I have that timeshare in the Dominican Republic.

We all squealed with excitement. Let’s do it! December!

In the following weeks, lists were made. There had to be the perfect mix of people… we wanted no-drama, fun people. Folks were blacklisted. If you fought publicly with your boyfriend, girlfriend, or spouse, you were out. Like a wedding, there were more friends we wanted to invite than we could accommodate. Even worse, we had to divide the list between us – Jay and I could only invite at most 5 people each. So we narrowed the list to those most likely to say yes. For me, that ended up being only the girlfriends (and their intended guests) present at Harry’s.

I made arrangements with a Shareholder Lifestyle Vacation Club friend to use one of her weeks to get a better deal (saving $180 a person on the all-inclusive fee). The $1200 all-inclusive price (including airfare) made this trip a no-brainer. Cheaper than a week in Ocean City. Seriously, who could say no?

After careful planning, an email was sent to the chosen few.

There was a lot of initial enthusiasm with the first responses.

Can’t wait!

The wheels fell off the cart a few weeks ago. People who had given us verbal confirmations were now turning down the invitation. Initially, we weren’t concerned… there were others that we’d love to have. But those were also the folks we thought wouldn’t be able to make it for one reason or another.

I think - Maybe we’ll cancel it altogether, save our vacation time and go somewhere we really want to go next year, like Europe. Or maybe get back to Australia to see Nancy and Darryl. Get to see Uluru and maybe even Perth.

Then our friends found a good airfare. They asked me if it was still happening. We had six people (us, the other couple and two of my girlfriends) at that point, so I said go ahead and book it.

Four days later, I got an email from my girlfriends. They were really sorry, but they had an awesome opportunity come up for another vacation in September. Basically the kind of thing that was much more exciting than the Dominican Republic. 

Having done much of the planning with them, I was majorly bummed. However, my husband was seriously pissed off. This was their idea to begin with! 

Then there was a message from an invited couple who weren't able to make it because of a new job. They had a suggestion:  Ryan and Kristy LOVE to travel! We mentioned it to them and they would be interested.

Umm, okay but we didn’t invite them. They’re a lot of fun, but I’ve only hung out with them a handful of times. And of course we’re friends on Facebook. Could they be a secret disaster on vacation? Hopefully not. I sent Kristy a message on Facebook about the trip.

Count us in, this place looks amazing.

And then…

Please let me know when you guys get the airfare, I am not an experienced traveler. This would be my first trip out of the US. Thanks.

I know that I’m a travel snob. Especially compared to most Americans. I acknowledge this. But how can someone say that they love to travel when they’ve never been out of the good old USA?

Anyone want to go to Puerto Plata December 7^th-14^th? (I'm serious, we need at least two more people or it will be an extra $67 a person)

We'll save you a drink!

Or will we? 

Couch 25k First Week

Tonight I did my third run of Couch 25k. I'm so glad that I have two days to rest... I pushed myself a little too hard tonight and am pretty sore. 

But you know what? I'm not dead yet!

Sunday I'll start week two. Hopefully I'll be more patient next week and not push myself so hard.

This is my first day. Actually wasn't too bad.

My second day was awful... it was hot, I felt like crap and I was exhausted. I was just happy to survive.

Today felt like the best day and obviously it was based on my average speed and everything. However, my body is paying for it. I stupidly threw in a few intervals of higher intensity running when I shouldn't have. Consequently, my knees and feet aren't very happy with me at the moment. Progress not perfection. I need to remember this. I'm not going to be able to run a 5k tomorrow or even next week. I have to build up to it or I'm going to hurt myself (as usual). 

Last night was our first SCUBA class and as luck would have it, we had our swim test. In order to get your open water certification, you're required to swim 200 yards (untimed and any style) and float/tread water for ten minutes. Thinking of my previous exercises of death in the pool, I thought "no problem." Hell, I was swimming 100 yards using just my arms and not kicking. I neglected to remember that the last time that I did exercises of death in the pool was two months ago. Yeah. Oops. So my bad-ass self decides to go into the locker room and grab my goggles so that I can show my 15 classmates (who have already started) what an awesome swimmer I am. 

Did I mention that all 15 of us were also confined to two lanes because the college wasn't prepared for us? Talk about a total clusterf*ck.

By the time I re-entered the pool area, everyone had already completed about 100 yards of their swim. No big deal, right? I dove in. The water was as warm as bathwater. Gross. Right after I dove in, my band-aid started flopping around. Great. I'd just had blood drawn at the doctor's office before class, so I ripped off the band-aid and started swimming with the latex-cotton-mess in my fist. Not sure if you've ever swam with a closed fist before, but it's not too easy. I passed a few of my classmates, trying to make up for my time out of the pool and catch up... but not so easily done with my closed fist. On the start of my 3rd lap, I saw Jay coming towards me in the next lane (finishing his swim). I begged him to take my soggy blood-soaked band-aid. It took some convincing, but he's a pretty awesome husband. 

I was finally free to use both my hands effectively.

About 100 yards into my swim, I started to suck air. The pool was too warm, I'd just eaten Chipotle, and I'd had an awful run the day before. I stopped trying to impress everyone and flipped on to my back. By this time, everyone was out of the water and watching the stragglers finish. Swimming on my back was too easy. I was trying so hard to get it over with that I wasn't paying attention and whacked myself in the head at the end of the pool. After that fiasco, I decided to watch where I was going so that I didn't run into any more walls. The problem is that I'm not very good at the crawl and am much better at the breast stroke. Which of course is slower and requires more energy. So everyone watched as I took my sweet ass time on the last 50 yards. But I refused to doggy paddle. And I passed the test. 

So this week I've had two wins. I'll take them.

No big plans for this weekend, which is just what I need.

Hope you all have a fabulous weekend!

Wordless Wednesday

101 List

My new 101 list has been posted... check it out!

It's been a busy few days... I need a weekend to recover from my weekend. I started Couch 25k yesterday and ended up doing about 2 miles in the time allotted. Not too shabby. Unfortunately I overdid it last night dancing... my legs are killing me today. My fitbit says that I had 18,000 steps for the day. No wonder I'm sore.

July 4th Fun

Jay's friend Brian came down from New York on Wednesday night.

Yesterday we celebrated with our friends Laura and Jared (and their adorable munchkin Lincoln) on Assateague Island. We met up with some of Jared's family for the fireworks and generally had an awesome time.

I think I want a boat.

Great people, cute babies, tasty food, cold beer, a cozy fire on the beach, fireworks.

Life doesn't get much better than this. 

Lots of Lists!

So I'm back into making lists... long-term and short term lists. A few years ago, I started doing the 101 in 1001. That list was started in 2007, which seems like an entire lifetime ago.

Well, I'm bringing it back. Go check it out. I've also created a link at the top of the blog for easy access so that you can shame me into doing things.

I'm working on my new 101 list that I hope to have up on Sunday. I arbitrarily chose Sunday July 7th as my start date. It seemed as good a time as any.

Here's how the Summer Bucket List is going:

• Send Aunt Nancy & Uncle Darryl a Thank You basket

I've bought all of the things for their basket... now I just need to assemble it and get to the post office. I also had a wonderful Skype with her tonight... it was so cool to see the background and know where she was in her house. I know that sounds weird. But seeing her sitting at the desk and thinking that I was sitting there less than two months ago is kind of cool. And sad. But cool. We are talking about meeting up in Europe next year, probably in September. Fingers crossed that it all works out!

• Send Sally & Chris (our NZ people) a Thank You basket

Ditto on this one... although I need to find my recipe for shrimp and grits. I'm sending them some grits as part of their thank you basket and thought it'd be cool to include my recipe.

• Find frames for koala and lorikeet photos – then hang them

Done! Well, kind of. They're now framed and on display, but I have to check with Jay on where he wants to hang them. I'm thinking of putting them in the hallway/up the stairs.

• Have rooster for dinner

We were supposed to do this on Sunday, but Jay had a rough day/night at work and slept for most of the day.

• Do the adult ropes challenge course at Tuckahoe

I need to sign up for this - it's on the 27th of this month I think.

• Go fishing

I was supposed to do this on Saturday, but apparently it created an uproar amongst other women and then all of the ladies wanted to go fishing with their men. So now I'm not going. C'est la vie. D'accord, pas vraiment. C'est le poisson! 

• Complete two weeks of Couch25K (I’m aiming low)

I was thinking of starting tonight. That has to count for something, right?