lettuce lake
last week was perhaps the most enjoyable week i've had in a long time. i think i did something every single night after work. on monday, i went to sunset tavern/deli lane with jose, jessica, lorena and christina. it's so cool that the two houses are congregating more now. we're like a big extended family and if that's an overstatement, then we're just 8 people who are extremely nice to one another. on tuesday, i began my recruiting crusade and enlisted a few people to join my temp agency. armando being one of them, we hammered out his path to success over sushi at sushi hana. while we were there, we ran into chris and fat d., marquetti and domo whom we'd plan to meet earlier but ran late and so they were just leaving. even more amusing, the people whom i was trying to call to invite but failed, showed up spontaneously. i mean of course carlos and elly. carlos spotted my copy of 'bonfire of the vanities' and declared he wants to be tom wolfe (the author) and we chatted away fervently, for it seemed like far too long since we've hung out.
on wednesday, which was only a week ago but feel like much longer, i guzzled down a great chic pea soup that daniel snatched for me at his job. then we went over to hangout with lorena in hopes she would be in the mood to cut our hair. she wasn't. instead we watched a bob dylan dvd. jose popped his head in and said he was going bike riding. lorena so graciously lent me her super-fast bicycle and the road whizzed by beneath me at a speed i've never felt before. i wasn't even halfway around the corner by the school when i spotted chris fraga's jetta and david deschamps' hair portruding out of it. i made an about face and raced them home. lost by a hair. we all got on our roof and smoked a great bowl or two and i saw some water collecting on our ceiling that i hope to soon remedy. i was in the mood to ride more, so i said adieu to those blokes and went around the school a couple times before returning the bike back to lorena. the rest of the evening is a bit fuzzy.
but i know thursday well. when i went to work that day, my supervisor kept snatching bits of my stack of paperwork, so as the day progressed i drew closer and closer to finishing and then, unprecendented...i finished! i finished my whole stack, so i told my supervisor and he gave me something else to do, but not twenty or so minutes later i was called into the office of the dept. manager and they let me go. due to low work volume, not my general lack of propensity to be a 'go-getter' or a 'rising-star' at the office. which was mega-sweet! if they only knew the stuff i got away with and i even have a small stack of finished papers that i took home by accident one day. good luck getting those back! i think i'll use them to roll j's. my timesheet was already in and i managed to log 40 hours despite friday being a holiday. they said i could stay until the end of the day, which is something that always baffles me. i picked up my stuff and semi-checked to see if i left anything behind and dipped, like no one has ever dipped before. upon closer inspection, i left my am/fm radio and my copy of 'beck-guero' in the computer. maybe i'll go back and get them, but so far i don't intend to.
i got home just in time to catch ryan getting ready to go to work. as i sat back and reflected i was temporarily swamped at the implications of being suddenly unemployed. i don't look at uncertainty with fear but rather with excitement and i'm always happy to restructure my life and setup new challenges for myself. for now it means i can catch up on my studies and read my books that i neglect, hang out with jose at home since he's unemployed as well and basically be out in the daytime and get the sun and activity i need. so i went wall-climbing with noel that evening, at the wall-climbing gym that he frequents and occassionally works at. i think my climbing skills are improving, this is only the second time that i've gone but i was much less winded and tired after climbing each wall. i tried to learn how to belay, but i think i should rather leave it to the professionals, less noel get hurt. noel brought his friend karen and on the way home while listening to NPR, she proved to be very world-conscious and delightful liberal, though i think she might've fumbled when she characterized bill clinton as a liberal.
i got home in time to find jose and rob cooking up a storm of spaghetti, i picked at the garlic-y remains and they were most delicious. the rest of the night involved a 13 year old kid popping into our house, which turned out to be our neighbor. we were smoking in my room at the time and as he peaked in and saw what was going on, he grew an ear to ear smile. and though it was a bit wierd to be smoking with a 13 year old, he brought some really good herb and was most generous with a box of kitkats he also brought. jose and i smelled a narc, but we shrugged it off.
friday, i prepared everything for my trip to tampa. chris fraga ditched our entourage, so it was just michelle and myself. but it was still really cool. michelle talked endlessly, but that's still a lot better than not having something to fill the void of the drive. and now i know entirely too much about her family, their history and their eccentricities. we smoked on the way there and the timing couldn't have been more perfect, for when we stopped shortly after we witnessed one of the funniest spectacles that rural florida had to offer us. this gent walks into a mac donald's with overalls and nothing underneath. he was a portly fellow, bald, with tattoos and jeans half tucked into his boots. we couldn't help but laugh a bit, this guy in the corner laughed too but gestured to me to stop laughing in between his own laughs.
we got to tampa and that night i lived the luis lifestyle and all the food it entailed. he made rosemary chicken for our with couscous, which luis and i picked at several times throughout the night, and i caught luis with mouthfuls of couscous the next morning as well. after that, he sprang for these ice-cream sandwich cookies which was the most delectably unhealthy things i've devoured in months. it didn't stop there though. as i sat half-awake, reading at 2am, karol suddenly sprung for pizza and despite luis giving the wrong address they knew where to send it because of his trademark phrase-"gimme the biggest pizza you got!" luis's bed was the best i've slept in in years with the foam contouring to my body in a most comfortable fashion. saturday, we walked around downtown tampa to baffling discover that everything was closed. so we headed to a place down by the water called channelside to eat. we walked around a town called ybor, which is like a brick version of coral gables. there was a store a lot like 'miami twice' called 'le france' where the clothes was even more vintage and even more expensive.
there was an urban outfitters nearby where some shoplifting took place. and later back at luis's we ordered in from a place called 'pita-pit' and after soo incredibly long since that day at 'maroosh' where i had a bit of that fallafel sandwich, i was able to order another from there, it was absolutely great and exactly what i wanted. we hit up a hookah bar, which was perfect timing after being so overly stuffed, but it seemed a bit short-lived for even a seasoned smoker such as myself. we talked and smoked the night away and very burntly went to sleep without noticing.
the ride home always goes by quickly. we stopped by this place called 'michelbob's in naples which is reportedly the best bbq ever and a place michelle always frequents with her family on trips. but it was sadly closed on sundays. at least it wasn't burned down. so we opted for something almost as good and went to 'crate & barrel' after smoking a bit. i experienced a bit of a high moment when i sat down and inspected the paper menu and ripped off something stapled to it without thinking much. well, as soon as i ripped that paper off the menu it was as if somebody had scratched a vinyl and the music stopped. the waitress asked me why i did that and i delicately sought out to explain why i did what i did, instead of simply apologizing. the catfish i ate was not exactly the broiled tilapia i'm used to, but it got the job done. a few more quick hours and we were back home in miami. a great place. intersections in tampa had me thinking i was still in miami.
it was a good week.
on wednesday, which was only a week ago but feel like much longer, i guzzled down a great chic pea soup that daniel snatched for me at his job. then we went over to hangout with lorena in hopes she would be in the mood to cut our hair. she wasn't. instead we watched a bob dylan dvd. jose popped his head in and said he was going bike riding. lorena so graciously lent me her super-fast bicycle and the road whizzed by beneath me at a speed i've never felt before. i wasn't even halfway around the corner by the school when i spotted chris fraga's jetta and david deschamps' hair portruding out of it. i made an about face and raced them home. lost by a hair. we all got on our roof and smoked a great bowl or two and i saw some water collecting on our ceiling that i hope to soon remedy. i was in the mood to ride more, so i said adieu to those blokes and went around the school a couple times before returning the bike back to lorena. the rest of the evening is a bit fuzzy.
but i know thursday well. when i went to work that day, my supervisor kept snatching bits of my stack of paperwork, so as the day progressed i drew closer and closer to finishing and then, unprecendented...i finished! i finished my whole stack, so i told my supervisor and he gave me something else to do, but not twenty or so minutes later i was called into the office of the dept. manager and they let me go. due to low work volume, not my general lack of propensity to be a 'go-getter' or a 'rising-star' at the office. which was mega-sweet! if they only knew the stuff i got away with and i even have a small stack of finished papers that i took home by accident one day. good luck getting those back! i think i'll use them to roll j's. my timesheet was already in and i managed to log 40 hours despite friday being a holiday. they said i could stay until the end of the day, which is something that always baffles me. i picked up my stuff and semi-checked to see if i left anything behind and dipped, like no one has ever dipped before. upon closer inspection, i left my am/fm radio and my copy of 'beck-guero' in the computer. maybe i'll go back and get them, but so far i don't intend to.
i got home just in time to catch ryan getting ready to go to work. as i sat back and reflected i was temporarily swamped at the implications of being suddenly unemployed. i don't look at uncertainty with fear but rather with excitement and i'm always happy to restructure my life and setup new challenges for myself. for now it means i can catch up on my studies and read my books that i neglect, hang out with jose at home since he's unemployed as well and basically be out in the daytime and get the sun and activity i need. so i went wall-climbing with noel that evening, at the wall-climbing gym that he frequents and occassionally works at. i think my climbing skills are improving, this is only the second time that i've gone but i was much less winded and tired after climbing each wall. i tried to learn how to belay, but i think i should rather leave it to the professionals, less noel get hurt. noel brought his friend karen and on the way home while listening to NPR, she proved to be very world-conscious and delightful liberal, though i think she might've fumbled when she characterized bill clinton as a liberal.
i got home in time to find jose and rob cooking up a storm of spaghetti, i picked at the garlic-y remains and they were most delicious. the rest of the night involved a 13 year old kid popping into our house, which turned out to be our neighbor. we were smoking in my room at the time and as he peaked in and saw what was going on, he grew an ear to ear smile. and though it was a bit wierd to be smoking with a 13 year old, he brought some really good herb and was most generous with a box of kitkats he also brought. jose and i smelled a narc, but we shrugged it off.
friday, i prepared everything for my trip to tampa. chris fraga ditched our entourage, so it was just michelle and myself. but it was still really cool. michelle talked endlessly, but that's still a lot better than not having something to fill the void of the drive. and now i know entirely too much about her family, their history and their eccentricities. we smoked on the way there and the timing couldn't have been more perfect, for when we stopped shortly after we witnessed one of the funniest spectacles that rural florida had to offer us. this gent walks into a mac donald's with overalls and nothing underneath. he was a portly fellow, bald, with tattoos and jeans half tucked into his boots. we couldn't help but laugh a bit, this guy in the corner laughed too but gestured to me to stop laughing in between his own laughs.
we got to tampa and that night i lived the luis lifestyle and all the food it entailed. he made rosemary chicken for our with couscous, which luis and i picked at several times throughout the night, and i caught luis with mouthfuls of couscous the next morning as well. after that, he sprang for these ice-cream sandwich cookies which was the most delectably unhealthy things i've devoured in months. it didn't stop there though. as i sat half-awake, reading at 2am, karol suddenly sprung for pizza and despite luis giving the wrong address they knew where to send it because of his trademark phrase-"gimme the biggest pizza you got!" luis's bed was the best i've slept in in years with the foam contouring to my body in a most comfortable fashion. saturday, we walked around downtown tampa to baffling discover that everything was closed. so we headed to a place down by the water called channelside to eat. we walked around a town called ybor, which is like a brick version of coral gables. there was a store a lot like 'miami twice' called 'le france' where the clothes was even more vintage and even more expensive.
there was an urban outfitters nearby where some shoplifting took place. and later back at luis's we ordered in from a place called 'pita-pit' and after soo incredibly long since that day at 'maroosh' where i had a bit of that fallafel sandwich, i was able to order another from there, it was absolutely great and exactly what i wanted. we hit up a hookah bar, which was perfect timing after being so overly stuffed, but it seemed a bit short-lived for even a seasoned smoker such as myself. we talked and smoked the night away and very burntly went to sleep without noticing.
the ride home always goes by quickly. we stopped by this place called 'michelbob's in naples which is reportedly the best bbq ever and a place michelle always frequents with her family on trips. but it was sadly closed on sundays. at least it wasn't burned down. so we opted for something almost as good and went to 'crate & barrel' after smoking a bit. i experienced a bit of a high moment when i sat down and inspected the paper menu and ripped off something stapled to it without thinking much. well, as soon as i ripped that paper off the menu it was as if somebody had scratched a vinyl and the music stopped. the waitress asked me why i did that and i delicately sought out to explain why i did what i did, instead of simply apologizing. the catfish i ate was not exactly the broiled tilapia i'm used to, but it got the job done. a few more quick hours and we were back home in miami. a great place. intersections in tampa had me thinking i was still in miami.
it was a good week.