Live from Lebrija, Colombia its the Arnold and Amelie show.

first disclaimers-keyboard in colombia are both sticky and have keys in strange places so
Something else I love about colombia is the relaxed pace of life. Here it seems that people are never striding with purpose, they are more like meandering to their destination. Surely this would irritate me if I were not on vacation, but after spending the last few months juggling school work and maintaining some semblence of cleanliness/contact with the outside world it is pure bliss to literally have no idea what time of day it is for the past four days. This is of course not to say that people don´t work here, au contrair, my brother in law Richard was rightfully disgusted by my 9-5 workday. I can´t blame him seeing as he gets up around 4:30 am to start kneading bread. 4:30 a.m.! This is inconceivable to me as arnold usually phsyically drags me out of bed between 7:30 and 8. What´s brilliant about vacation is here there is absolutely no reason to do anything at any particular time which is why I took a nap yesterday at 6 pm. The other thing Ive been indulging in is beauty treatments something that I am way too cheap to do in the U.S. However here it was only like seven bucks for a manicure and pedicure so I packed up my mother in law and off we went.

Now usually I try to avoid sepdning time alone with my mother-in-law not because she is mean but because she is smart... since Arnold is the type that always manages to wriggle around any quesiton he doesn´t want to answer she uses any time alone to extract information from me because she knows I am weak willed and prone to blabbing. So we go to get our nails done and I´m just hoping thatthere wont be an interrogation or intervention of any type, but it turns out she had nothing of the sort on her mind. Her goal yesterday was quality assurance of her only daughter-in-laws pedicure experience, much like the women in my family, my mother in law is not to be messed with in a retail setting. so as soon as we sit down she starts assaulting the manicurist with questions about what she´s going to do and peppering me with questions I am not equipped to answer such as whether I want french tips or little flowers painted on my nails and in what shape they should be filed. I´m on VACATION, I can´t be expected to provide instanteous answers to all these questions. As I sit there blankly considering my many options my MIL continues firing of missives, presumably on my behalf to the manicure girl who begins (based on this whole scenario) to think I am mentally retarded. Seeing her concerned look my MIL chooses to explain why she´s speaking on my behalf by saying "she doesn´t speak spanish very well, talk to her slowly and loudly"

OH NO SHE DIDN´T!

... but she did, and who can I blame but myself since I routinely pretend I don´t understand what she´s saying to avoid answering questions, eating certain foods why we don´t have children, etc.... insert reason to ignore here_____. After recovering from the indignity of having just made it half way through an M.A. program in Spanish only to have it announced that I dont speak well I decide that it is to my advantage to continue to feign stupidity, at the very least it gives my MIL the opportunity to "help" me navigate social situations. Álso in the end there was no way to escape the manicure place without looking stupid since I giggled uncontrollably through my whole pedicure, I mean honestly it tickles when people are going at your feet with a pumice stone. I could barely stop wiggling enough to avoid kicking the girl in the face. So there you go, life in Colombia. Talk to you all later, I need to get back to my schedule of heating hot dogs, papayas, taking naps at unreasonable times of the day and watching fireworks from the balcony of my in-laws house.

Well, the final exams have been taken, the last work projects have been wrapped up and all the Christmas shopping is done! And now we are bound for South America. I'm not sure if you can tell by the picture on the right but we are excited to board that plane. I'm not sure yet if the blog is going to be able to report from Colombia but if we have the opportunity we'll try to give you some insight into Christmas in the Carribean.

Plans I have for our time in Colombia:

1) Eating Hot Dogs at what I like to call "Hot Dog Plaza", they put all sorts of stuff on top of the hot dogs that we don't use here, I don't know what the toppings are besides crushed up Lays potato chips, but I don't care it is SO good!

2) Eating at Crepes and Waffles... actually maybe I'll just hold it at that for the list of things I'm planning to eat.

3) Avoiding the fireworks that will be haphazardly shot off in front of the church on New Years. While everybody else is oohing and aahing I will be joining my mother-in-law by cowering in a corner.

4) Seeing if I can at least keep up with my Mother-in-Law at the New Years party. This could be hard since she usually comes home at sun rise and for whatever reason I get sleepy at 11 p.m. Her philosophy "Brandy does you no harm"

5) Sleeping in in Bogota, sleeping in in Santander and sleeping in(on the beach) in Cartagena. Oh how I love sleeping!

FELIZ NAVIDAD!

Going to two Christmas parties in one night

Calling your Mom three times in one day

Running two miles and lifting weights at the gym

Updating your blog even though no one reads it

.... avoiding working on your Term Papers due on Monday.

Priceless!

Well every year at Christmas I have a little mini-reunion with my college roomates, well most of them... somehow we lost track of Maria! Maria are you out there? And then of course there is "She who must not be named" but anyways I digress. My original point is that every year we meet up in S.F. to enjoy the Christmas atmosphere, exchange Secret Santa gifts and bug Mags about when she is going to have a baby so that we can all officially become aunties. Well "Christmas in the City" (I know such an original and creative title!) was last weekend, and it was great. We went to have tea at the King George hotel which was fantastic! The food was terribly cute and ladylike which made up for the fact that none of us is terribly adept at the kind of manners and conversation that tea requires. And then we shopped at all the stores that we don't have in Sac, namely H & M. It was good. Here's the thing though, all of my college roomates and if I am being honest most of my friends are certified lunatics who ocassionally have too much time on their hands... which is how the picture on the right was born.

My friend Emily is currently working in China and apparently is a bit homesick, so Debi, pictured on right, thought it would be great to take a picture in Chinatown and then photoshop Emily in so that we could "keep her company" in China. Of course compliant "Sisterhood of the traveling pants" member that I am I went along with this ludicrous plan. I think the best part might of been when Little Bug decided to scream "You are in China!" as we were taking the picture with our "imaginary friend" between us. I think posing with "nobody" in "China" is a surefire way to promote the image that we are from some rural Midwest town, a sure faux pas for me in Debi who grew up in the bay. Thank God Little Bug is Asian, somehow it makes yelling "You are in China" in Chinatown seem somewhat more acceptable, but what can I say, I myself am not considered un-eccentric to put in nicely, and... especially at Christmas it's nice to surround yourself with the loonies in your life. Justy, Renee, Chhimi, family? Are you out there? Call me! It's Christmas!

What makes a good wedding?

OKay, I might not be super qualified to talk about what makes a good wedding seeing as Arnold and I did our wedding, well I think everybody knows that story... but last weekend I went to a great wedding! The kind I would wish for all of my friend. Why was it great? Good question. I think it's because it was such a personal wedding. As a wedding pianist I've been to so many impersonal weddings, even ones where the couples are not speaking the day of the wedding cause they are pissed at each other! But this one was the kind where you feel that everybody is rooting for the couple and celebrating with them. Plus they spent money where it counted i.e. not on stupid stuff like nice plates, and there was dancing. Javi danced! That alone is worth a two hour drive. So here you go Tarango-Sho's. May you have a long happy marriage and thanks for an awesome night!

Universal City, CA

Well, I'm down here at a work conference and I miss Arnold. Arnold is this the best husband ever and I'll tell you an example of why... last week when I was working in Oakland and didn't get home until 12:00 at night Arnold taped Scrubs for me. This is more complicated than it sounds because he had to wire the cable from our bedrooom to the kitchen by stringing it out the windows in order to do so. And the best part? I didn't even ask him to tape Scrubs, he just did it because he knows I love that show. Arnold is awesome!..... Also he's very cute, check out how adorable he is getting to know Baby Erik (aka BabyChhimi) who is also cute as a button! Awwww!

Here's the thing, I hate excercising, abhor sweating and I love to eat... a lot, but I also hate feeling fat and lazy. Really, it's quite a pickle. Today I was at the gym, hating it all and taking it out on a gym employee who claims to find my verbal abuse "entertaining." But here's the thing, you always feel better when you excercise, so I trick myself into doing it any it anyway I can. It's even better if I can excercise while avoiding sweat or distracting myself mentally from the whole sweating experience. So my point? If I can excercise/eat well, you can too, you just have to figure how to trick yourself into it... you'll feel better.