For your reading pleasure: three daze!

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Saturday
A wonderful, relaxing day.
We woke around noon and spent the early afternoon surfing the Internet, our appetites surpressed by coffee, yesterday's breakfast haul...er...treats, and "sparkling flavored beverages." I finally heard one too many growls and we dined at our favorite local thai restaurant. The owner was very pleased; apparently there was a local food tasting thingie going on nearby and it drew away the scant few folks who had not gone away for the holiday. Pleasantly stuffed (with lots of leftovers) we drove out to the local Barnes & Noble.

We didn't drive directly to the bookstore, though. R. had read the new Canon A95 had been released. We checked out Circut City to see if they had received a shipment yet. They had not but we discovered the 8 megapixel cameras. As we resumed our trek to Barnes & Noble, we began to rethink our choice of digital cameras.

The rest of the afternoon and early evening was spent at home watching DVDs and surfing the Internet. I was amazed at the drop of participation over at Tribe. Most people weren't updating their blogs, either.

We ended the relaxing evening dining at our favorite local japanese restaurant.


Sunday
We woke early (for us) to greet contractors. R. and I had decided to price how much it would take to replace our staircase with our damaged wood floor. After the gentlemen left, we lunched on leftovers then headed out to R.'s workplace.

R. is a physician and, like most, has way too much paperwork and is not given an administrative time to do them. We had discussed (okay, I pushed) about driving out to Northridge during one of our three days off and chose Sunday. It was a good choice: the drive was light due to people being on holiday.

We arrived mid-afternoon. R. gave me a tour of the office then left me to my own devices. I set up laptop, notebooks, and books in the kitchen. I read East of Eden until I began to feel a bit sleepy. R., seeing my yawns, put me in one of the examining rooms to rest. "Don't play doctor while I'm asleep," I joked, then quickly fell into slumber which lasted a good half hour.

We took a meal break around 1800. I alternated reading East with jotting my goals for the rest of the year. Whew! Do you know how time-consuming that is? Later, as I reviewed the pages, I realized I had yet to note my employment goals.

Later, I thought. When I can extend the 24-hour day to 30.

Some of the goals can be found here and here.

R. finally finished the day's session around 2100. Since it had been an age, we decided dinner down in West Hollywood.

Wow! We were amazed how many people were in town. At our favorite local restaurant, I asked the host about all the eye-candy. He laughed and pointed out that, as many folks are leaving town for the holiday, there's a whole slew of folks coming in the sunshine state.

Besides having dinner, we made our regular tour of our favorite shops. The homeward journey was uneventful except that I noted there were so many cars out and about even at 0100 in the morning.


Monday
My spouse and I don't immediately jump on the technological bandwagon at the same time like many of our peers. And some fads we'll probably never try: instant messaging, webcams, internet telephones.

We're not adverse to new technologies. Far from it. We love our toys. However, like everyone else (well, except the very wealthy) we have a limited amount of resources much of it we lavish on books. But, for a variety of reasons, we've been focusing our attention to electronic ones this year:

I purchased my first personal digital assistant (PDA) only a couple of years ago. I finally upgraded it last year when the old one broke.

Though DVDs have been out for years, we purchased our first DVD player last year. And we would not have done so except the anime we loved so much was being discontinued in VHS format.

We've been eyeing high definition televisions (HDTVs) for some time now. Actually, R. was drooling over them while I looked out, nonplussed. I just didn't see the benefit to them and couldn't justify the cost. Finally, though, their prices dropped within acceptable limits and I reluctantly agreed to the purchase of one. We also upgraded our DVD player and cable to take advantage of all the device's features.

Today we finally joined the digital camera age. As some long-time readers will remember, we were originally looking at the Canon A80 since late last year. We tried to purchase one last month but discovered they were being phased out to make way for the A95.

Then we discovered the 8 megapixel cameras while visiting Circut City looking for the A95 (see above.) This time I was the impetus: if we're going to get a digital camera, why not a good one? So after research and the discovery CompUSA had them, we came home this afternoon with our brand new baby.

Gak! I can already see I'm going to find a new job or temp assignment fast!