The Best of San Francisco and it's outlying areas

Just a few pics of some of my favourite spots

Random Streets that were so steep

that I should have lost a couple of pounds.

Perhaps, the fact that I kept stopping to take

pictures nullified my actual exercise

I use to have boobs this big

before I opted for the more compact perkier version

Ghirardelli square.... mmmmm chocolate

and yes I broke my no sugar rule

Yountville

(hated the name, but loved loved loved the place)

Carmel (where I wish to retire, right after I win the Lotto)

And finally,

Alcatraz (oh yes it is)

Crazy beautiful how nature takes over

and makes something so horrible into

something so beautiful

Hope you are all well...

I will be posting more pics in the upcoming days

and you will be able to find them at my other blog

As I Dream It 

should you be interested.

Until Next Time.

Tracy

She said "You are one in one thousand", I said "Oh lucky me!"

I'm back.  Yup, did my stint at San Francisco.  Toured my face off and my feet apparently!  Been and saw every attraction possible, zoomed down to Napa and Sonoma Valley, saw Yountville.  Did a 12 hour stint down the California Coast with pit stops at Davenport, Monterey, Pebble Beach and Carmel and I lived to tell you all about it.  Over the next few posts I will share some pics and some of my adventures.

And you can find a few of my photos HERE from one of the vineyards I toured in the Sonoma Valley.

In the meantime, you know an adventure is just not an adventure without it going slightly haywire.

It started off simple enough, well at least you would think so. We left at 3:30 a.m. from our home and drove the hour and half to the airport.  I was excited or at least I thought I was, in fact I think I was just so crazily tired that I was drunk with fatigue.

I jauntily sailed through the airport looking for the Horizon air ticket agent, okay I walked like a zombie with big baggie eyes up to the ticket agent, who swiped my passport where the handy dandy ticket machine spit out my ticket with a resounding "blech".  I looked up with my two peas in a snow hill, tired blue eyes and smiled and said my polite Canadian 'thank you so much' for which the ticket agent gave my a sympathetic smile and said 'I'm so sorry'.

What? sorry for what?  But before she could answer, the line behind me moved me up and out of the way so that they could greedily get their tickets. I tried to elbow my way back in but was met with a strong opposition of impatient, tired, and none to happy fellow Canadian travelers.  Believe you me, Canadians are not a polite as you think we are especially at 5:00 a.m. in the morning!

Puzzled, I walked over to security where I was stopped by a friendly and slightly thinner version of Santa Claus, who looked at my ticket, sympathetically smiled and took a pink highlighter and swooped it across my ticket and sent me through the scanner who loudly blared a triumph "BUUUUUZZZZZZZZZ".  I was immediately rushed by several security officers and one in particular, mumbled at me with his thick Asian accent and pointed his finger to a quarantined area. I couldn't understand a bloody word he said nor the instructions he was trying to impose upon me.  I kept insisting that I had metal in my leg, it was just metal in my leg.  Hello, anyone listening to me, it's metal in my leg!!!!  A friendly, but firm looking RCMP officer than escorted me to a secluded area for which I sat for the remainder of the time prior to boarding my plane whilst I continuously, nervously and feverishly glanced over at my better half with pleading eyes.

Finally, boarding for our plane was about to begin and while I watched all those start to board, a female security officer approached me and told me stand with my legs and arms spread apart while she frisked me and then I had the joy of having my hands swabbed and tested for illegal substances.  

For some reason, I broke out into complete laughter, whether it was because I was past the point of fatigue, or whether the situation just seem absurdly crazy, neither the police nor the security officer seemed amused by my early morning cackle.  Apparently my fellow Canadians lose their senses of humour at certain times of the day! My stealthy escort, Mr. RCMP cocked his head and said "what's so funny miss". Well, says me, see my fiancee that is waiting over there for me, he is an Arab, and I am the one standing here being swabbed! So much for having a round apple pie face! By the way, my better half was not too amused that I was trying to get him nabbed!  lol

Finally I passed the Canadian Security Test and as I exhaled a big sigh of relief, Ms. Security Officer looked at me sympathetically and said "Don't be too happy hun, you are going to have to go through this again in Seattle..."  WHAT?  "Yes, we have a system that randomly picks people to test for security breaches, and you are it.  Look at it this way, you are one in in one thousand!"

And she was right, I got to Seattle, spent time in a glassed in security box, yelled at because I was standing too close to some guy who was in there too, apparently we could cross contaminate each other, and then I had the not so happy pleasure of being aggressively felt up by some female American Security Officer who apparently took her job very seriously.  And you know what, I still have the wedgie to prove it!

Oh lucky me!!!!

Until Next Time.

Tracy

PS, A special thank you to Paul, Mynx, Ruth and Beliza for the recent awards... I will be addressing your utter kindness and generosity in a future post.  Thank you for thinking of me!!!  Love you guys!

By the way, I hope y'all being doing good!  Can't wait to catch up on your blogs!  Cheers!

Happily on Hiatus

Whilst I skip over to my neighbours to the south to have fun in their country for a bit.

Have a lovely week and half and I will be back on my birthday!

See you in a few.

Keep safe.

And be happy.

Cheers

Tracy

I’m sneezing like a banshee and passing gas like a trucker, but at least your lunch looks good!

Once upon a time in a far away place lived a beautiful, vibrantly young, blonde, blue-eyed girl.  Okay, she didn’t live too far away, her blonde hair was from a bottle, her blue eyes were bloodshot, beautiful was in the eye of the beholder or a drunk man in a pub and the youthful girl comment was more debatable.  What?  You are not allowed to fantasize about your appearance?  Sheesh, everyone’s a critic....

Anywhooo, this lovely ahem ahem many-years-before-becoming-a-middle-age woman (even though her boobs would argue that point) was gearing up for a lovely holiday away with her better half.

She was doing everything possible to ensure that she was calm and collected and was proud of her accomplishment.  Until.......

.......She woke up on a dreaded Wednesday morning.  Fraught with running eyes, sneezy nose, and itchy throat which caused her to make the horrific “CCCCAAAAAAAAAAAAAA” noise in attempt to relieve her itchy throat and ears. She thought that perhaps in her kleenex induced delusion that she had a very minor case of hayfever.

Ever the trooper that she was, she popped an antihistamine, got dressed, headed to work and hoped for the best.

However, later that morning, she realized that perhaps it was not hayfever afterall as now her bowels were playing heavy metal music out loud for all to enjoy, or not to enjoy depending on the company.

And if that wasn’t bad enough, she broke out into a rampant case of the hiccups followed by a not so lady like belch.

By the time lunch time rolled around, she was reduced to a stinky equivalent of a one man band.  With sounds and smells emanating from ever orifice of her body, she hung her head in shame and proceeded to slink down to the shared/office bathroom where her array of musical accouterments continued on until she heard someone giggling outside the washroom door.

As she tried to muster up all the courage she had (which wasn’t much) to leave the bathroom, she opened the washroom door and proceeded to walk past the lunchroom of the downstairs doctors office.  Just as she thought she was in the clear, a burst of laughter came forth from the lunchroom.

With all her dignity, she turned around with a smile and said as sweet as she could: “Yes, I’m sneezing like a banshee and passing gas like a trucker, but at least your lunch looks good.  I ate that just before all this happened to me....”

And then she walked up the stairs with a smug smile.

The end.

CALM DOWN....

Well it won’t be long now, 4.5 days and I will be on my way to San Francisco.

I am definitely looking forward to it, but I am taking a much different approach to leaving on a holiday than I have ever before.

If you are like me, you become a crazy woman (or man) and rush around like a maniac in your quest to have your house spotless, have your yard in a manicured state and get every piece of paper cleared off your desk at work. And then if you are even more like me, you are ridiculously exhausted the first 3 to 4 days into your holidays or worse yet, you come down with some moronic cold because your immune system was shot to hell due to the frantic pace of the previous two weeks prior to leaving.

This time, I decided to have a “screw it” kind of attitude which is no easy feat for this anal retentive chickalet.  But instead of short circuiting out, I just realized the following:

a.    The heat pump will continue to load every piece of furniture in my place with every particle of dust it can find whether I am there or not

b.    The grass will continue to grow and the weeds will continue to sprout. And most likely, if I was at home anyways, I would just be watching it all blow in the wind wishing for a sexy, ripped, Spanish dude named Roberto to mow it in nothing but his tight jeans and oiled up chest.  I’d like to tell you that I fantasize about my better half mowing the lawn, but he curses a great deal during the process.  Perhaps due to the fact that I keep digging holes in our yard and plopping in new plants which ultimately has created an unpleasant obstacle course for my him.  And I have to tell you that somehow blue air blowing from his lips and his stink eye directed at me kind of takes the sexiness away, if you know what I mean.

c.    And finally work.  There isn’t a day I remember working at this particular job that I was ahead of the game.  The likelihood is that it will all be there some ten days later exactly where I left it waiting for my return, with my lovely kind friend and temp, apologizing because she wasn’t sure what to do.

So I ask myself this, why not be mellow this week and go into my holidays already relaxed. I am not even letting my “Wound Up Type A” counter part get the best of me.

Now, keep your fingers, toes and eyes crossed that no urgents happen within the next 4.5 days!

In the meantime, I will just keep sucking back my herbal “relaxing” tea that is dosed up with copious amounts of honey because I am nothing but at peace with the universe and calm my friends. I said, I am calm my friends. What do you mean I am not! OH YES I AM!  DAMN CALM I SAY... DAMN CALM!!! Now where the freak is my vacuum cleaner!

Until Next Time.
Tracy

It's all about the Dribble!

For those of you who have been with me a long time, you might recall my party post in January. One of my most successful posts of all time.  97 comments in total.

It was just a simple post of handing over the keys to my digs and you in return got to leave a little blurb about yourself, a link to your blog and the opportunity to meet new bloggers.

From my perspective, it was a blast watching everyone have so much fun!  

Well my lovely friend, Mynx, over at DRIBBLE hit her 300th post mark yesterday and wanted to give back to her blogging friends and decided to do a similar post, which I think just rocks!

Can you imagine if everyone held a blogging party? How many new bloggers and friends they would meet.  The thought of it is endless!  If you want to see how I set my Party Post up, just check out my link HERE!!!  Perhaps, you will decide to have a party of your own!!!

Anywhoo, if you are interested in meeting some new bloggers and getting to know that fantastically wonderful Mynx, skip on over to DRIBBLE and tell her and her loyal readers a little about yourself! And don't forget to check out Mynx's blog as well as her amazing peeps!

Happy Monday my blogging friends and thank you to the latest and greatest to click my follow button!

Cheers

Tracy

The Tale of the Hoighty Toighty Doctor and the Roll of Toilet Paper!

I have had a pretty bad day.  It happens.  Not every day can be a rainbow of sunshine unless you are one of those bloody perky care bears where rainbows spew out of every orifice of your body.  I wonder if they eat rainbow skittles and that’s their secret. (*pause for reflection*). 

Okay that's a few brain cells I won’t ever get back.

Anywhooo, as I was saying, this day has kind of sucked and my face has been in a perpetual state of bright lollipop red from how upset I am, which will disperse in a few hours once I relax a bit.  But you know, nothing irks this girl more than a certain hoighty toighty doctor who works down below me.

A gynaecologist who thinks her *ahem ahem* does not stink, she spends a ridiculous amount of time standing in the one bathroom we share primming herself daily.  She neither smiles or has the courtesy of acknowledging me when our paths sometimes cross.  Being neither a fashionista of her caliber (or wealth) or a woman with a med degree, I am deemed insignificant in her eyes and she makes no bones about it.  Fortunately for me, this rarely bothers me because I am well versed in the ability to give little Miss Hoighty Toighty Snug Panties a significant snub back, when I deem those moments necessary.  However, today she irked me to a level that saw my already fluorescent face seeing red.

As you know, using the bathroom is an absolute ordeal for me as I have to transfer my lines to my sister office, put a sign on the door and lock it, run down a long hallway, and down a flight of stairs that eventually leads to the bathroom we share. After sitting on the bottom of the stairs, crossing my legs and praying that the Pee Fairy would hold off and bother some non toilet trained 2 year old, I found that I was waiting an inordinate amount of time for her Royal Hine-ass to finish her beauty regimen in the bathroom. When she finally emerged, she gave me a disgusted look and proceeded to walk past me with that bit of limp she has from that unfortunate stick infliction that seems to be permanently inserted up her scrawny, boney bottom.  As I ran, okay sprinted into the bathroom, I realized that the Mz. Queen Bee used the last of the toilet paper and did not bother to replace it.  Apparently, performing a hysterectomy is a significantly easier task than actually putting a role of toilet paper in the toilet paper dispenser. 

Two things crossed my mind at that moment: first I visualized tackling her and cramming that toilet paper where the sun won’t shine, except that it would be fighting for space due to that already pre-existing stick condition she has, and secondly, I fantasized about beating her over her head with a role of the generic, take the skin off your bottom, single ply toilet paper that our landlord has the courtesy of providing to us, rendering her quaffed hair into a big pile of toilet paper lint.

Since my bladder did not seem to have the time to wait for either of those options, I decided to say at the top of my lungs: “Really, they didn’t teach you at medical school how to put toilet paper on the toilet holder. Boy I think I would have asked for a refund!” Followed by “you freaking lazy woman!”  And as I went to close the bathroom door, I caught the look on her face.  And guess what, apparently I wasn’t the only one sporting a red face today!  HA!

Until Next Time.
Tracy

Deep breath into a free fall....

I was really touched by all the comments that was left on my "Stuck" post last week.  Unfortunately, Blogger, that bugger, in it's efforts to restore whatever happened, wiped out all my comments on three posts on three of my blogs.  But I did hear you all and appreciated what you had to offer. 

I had already set the wheels in motion the week before to start getting serious about the photography aspect of my persona.  By contacting a childhood friend of mine who is a photographer, she has invited me to attend, and possibly join, the camera club in my local town.  I am going to try to check out this club this Wednesday night, and while most likely I will be incredibly shy, reserved and in awe of those with big lenses, I really believe in that saying that "knowledge is power" and I hope to garner some knowledge from those with more experience.

In the meantime, I created my first photography book and posted it up on my facebook to get some feedback.  If you have friends like mine, they are a pretty encouraging lot and I often wonder if I took a picture of my better half's big hairy toe, if they would still awe and ooh over it because they are just that kind to me.  However, with that said, one of my friends has an online store and suggested that I create calendars and that she may be interested in purchasing them for her website.  And I have to admit, that that got me a tad excited.

Anywhooo, I thought I would show you what I have been up too, note the colouring is off and I am currently trying to find another company that creates a better quality book for half the price.  I know, I ask for a lot.  So, here it is in all its glory:

Cover and back of book:

Some of the other pages:

 

  

The nice thing was that when I went to pick up the book, the clerk asked me if I was a new photographer in town and where was my studio.  Yes, of course, my head swelled for a minute or two, then I chalked it up to her just trying to get future business... ha ha ha!  Yes, I always try to put compliments into perspective or I would never get thru my doorway with an inflated head.

Anyhow, thanks for all the encouragement my friends. Your words were fabulous.  Now, I just have to remember to take a deep breath and free fall!

Until Next Time.

Tracy

Hmmmmmm.........

*pause to scratch head*....

So with this updating on blogger, I seem to have lost my last post and of course any changes I made recently to the appearance of my blog...

Anyone else suffering from this same problem?

Stuck

I try not to blog about my work.  It has taken me years to master the art of “not taking work home with you”.  I only vent once and that’s on the five minute ride home, and the moment I shut my front door of my house behind me, is the moment I close off work until 9:00 a.m. the next day.

But today is one of those days in my life where I am wondering what the hell I am doing with my life.  I am skilled in my job, and I am not saying that as a boast, but more as a fact.  Twenty-four years of this job, not in this office, but in this particular field, and I suppose I should be skilled, or at least know enough that it looks like I actually know what I am doing.

But I have come to a point where I realize that I may have steered my career down the wrong path.  In fact, I am pretty sure I have been riding this roller coaster far too long and I am starting to get just a tad motion sick from all the ups and down, and I think the last five years, I have been constantly look for the proverbial barf bag.

I feel stuck. 

With our economy not as hard hit as the States, jobs are still scarce, well at least those ones that pay above the substandard par or above the poverty level. 

To top that off, I have never looked at my job as a career.  I have always just looked at it as means to subsidize my real life outside these four bland walls five days a week.

But today I was wondering what I was doing with myself.  My boss, a mild manner man, in all respects is pretty good to work with.  However, in the past two years or so, he’s become a bit verbally aggressive in his emails and some of them even borderline on meanness.  And today, after an onslaught of these emails, I yelled some choice profanities into the empty airspace around me, got up from my desk, went to the bathroom and hid in there where I proceeded to have a good cry.

As I stood there in the disgusting, shared public washroom, I started thinking to myself, when do you make the decision to change.  Do you change your career to something else that you would thoroughly enjoy but would ultimately put you at the bottom of the seniority heap with the lack of experience and a lessor pay which would no longer fund the things you enjoy outside of your work life?  Or do you just suck it up, put in your time, pray for retirement to come quickly in the next 25 years and stay in something that is sucking your soul dry in order to retain the monetary happiness of enjoying your few blissful days of freedom per week. It's not an easy choice especially when you value the freedom to do whatever you wish on your days off, but you also value being happy every day and not just the days unrelated to work. In all honesty, I don't hate my job, but it's moments like today that I find myself not very fond of it either.

In my dreams, I work for myself on a creative basis as a contributor for a women’s specific magazine with a monthly column on trying to maintain your sanity as you grow older, or I spend hours of my day just taking photographs of foliage and fauna and publishing it in nature inspired magazines, or better yet, I write a humorous bestseller on existing in an Average Life.  But as I get excited, my lack of confidence squishes my dreams and that niggling little voice says: “who would be interested in you Tracy”.  And then I get up in the morning and repeat each day as I have for the last 24 years.

Oh how I long to be unstuck, but I am careful what I wish for, because perhaps, once I am unstuck, I will wish I was stuck again.

Until Next Time.

Tracy