3bdrm townhouse by a park

Well, after 10 weeks of scouring craigslist and visiting mildly insane druggies during my free time on the weekends I finally found the living situation of my Philly dreams:
* shiny hardwood floors
* big, open kitchen with deck for grilling
* 2 great roommates
* 2 ridiculously cute dogs
* right next to multiple parks, tennis courts, basketball, running by a river
* quiet, tree-lined street
* 5min walk to center city and friends

...and, as with many great transitions in my life...the move began with a very detailed list (pictured below)
The plan proceeded into the packing stage with the help of a box of black garbage bags purchased at 8am the morning I intended to move...boxes are so overrated
Cat in the early (read: less productive) stages of packing up the apartment
....and then magically...I was moved...and then I ran 13.1 miles in below freezing weather at 7am...no, really.

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So, here we are at my house. Would you like to come in? ..Like any good house tour, I thought we would start with the bathroom on the third floor. I highlight this bathroom (making up a full one of the 2.5) because it is mine.

Here is my stunning bed in a nook in my 3rd floor bedroom
...and a view of my room and two windows from where the steeo, slippery stairs lead into my bedroom
The KITCHEN!!!! Future home of things like COOKING and HANGING OUT
and the stairs of DANGER...please don't visit me and fall down my stairs....leading down into living room on the first floor. (The boys live on the second floor and are not profiled yet)
Stay tuned for pictures of my two favorite dogs and new roommates! :) WOOO! (oh yes, and office Christmas party pictures)

Beautiful weekends

Last night I went to "mix tape club" for the first time. Mix tape club meets about once a month in an art gallery/studio in South Philly. The members of mix tape club put together a themed mix of songs on a CD and make 10 copies to share. When I arrived at 7:30pm with Emma who knows the girl who started the group, there were about 20 interesting-looking individuals scattered around the cozy studio chatting drinking beer and wine and snacking on an assortment of pot-luck style food including a big bag of muddy buddies. One of the mix CDs was playing. Most of the people there were artists with relatively boring day-jobs. I met several comedians, a stained glass artist (it was his studio), a record store owner, an aspiring singer, and a smattering of students and other visual arts people. Discussions on movies and music were way over my head but I felt warmly welcomed and had an awesome time. Later in the evening after everyone had done the brief presentations of their mixes, people migrated toward the back of the studio. I saw someone with an intricate chinese stamp and we decided to find some ink and proceeded to go around giving people acrylic-paint tatoos which were fun but didn't last very long.

I can't wait for next month.


This is part of the "secret garden" made of glass, concrete and found objects on south street.
This is me in my carrot costume at work :)

Cat and sister united

Cat drove down to Santa Barbara, where her treasured sis lives. We ate salads with lettuce we picked from the garden and then through a huge amount of gear in the SUV and headed out to Red Rocks national park.

It sure feels good to be in California...

We went hiking and camping. However, I was severely injured which trying to break off a cat-tail...
Cat posing with horned melon late at night at the campsite
Alex "slack lining"...it is about as easy as it looks

Alex and I made oatmeal with walnuts and raisins and sat on the porch overlooking their vegetable garden.

California...my spirit's home

The trip home to SF was filled with time outside with family...here is me doing a little yoga on Treasure Island after running around the perimeter with spectacular views of the city while my dad read and my mom walked.

We also went for an 7 mi roundtrip hike with a mid-point at the ocean where we played jump-rope with giant pieces of seaweed.
Have you ever wondered what it would feel like to pick up a 2lb dead jellyfish...I used to wonder that too...
Here is dad by the waterfall that drops onto the beach where we played seaweed jump-rope and "get the frisbee out of the ocean after Catherine makes a horrible pass"
View toward golden gate park from Ocean beach.
We visited the new Science Museum in GG park. It has a LIVING ROOF!!! (SF is so awesome)
Here is the scuba diver taking about the fish he is in a tank with in the science museum.
Catherine and grand-dad enjoying each other's company.
Cat at home
Great grandfather Revered Herbert Tweedie's grave in Oakland
Beautiful lilly-pad pond
My family like sky and rocks
and waterfalls and empty beaches
...and being generally awesome

Cat goes to resort

View from the Atlantis hotelroom
Cat and favorite DC buddies on the beach.

In the "personal underwater submarine" that feels like a ridiculously slow underwater scooter. Several of the other fellow submariners got pretty sick and were puking off the side of the boat or dry heaving while floating in the ocean....I however got quite hungy and made friends with an Iranian guy who had a big chocolate chip cookie.
Julia and Frankki looking darn cute.
Cat rushing through the hotel hall to get to dinner
More DC buddies...

Shot of hotel and what I like to call the "wasp temple" - home of several fantastic water slides
Two of the Atlantis resort towers...what a machine
Kirk quote~ "Its amazing how so many trees and fish can result in something so unnatural"...however, I am a huge fan of giant Manta Rays! They are smart and can move their little horns if you feed them fish.
Cat has returned to California after completing study in NY...stay tuned for family awesomeness

Things look up (despite the distinct sound of falling in NY)

if the US financial market crashes in the middle of a forest
and no one understands what happened
did anything really fall?


Meanwhile...in the real world, there was music, profanity, community and laughter. I went to a "living room concert" with a crowd of friends in a lovely house in the south end. Both Adam and Steph sang songs of heartbreak, betrayal, and crazy but hot women - a good time was had by all.
Rayna (b-day girl) and Cara looking glamerous in the foreground, while Nate, Adele and everyone else pay attention to the performers.
A special sing-along with the ladies of the night ends in smootches.
News flash: Catherine's suitcase has continued to shifts its portfolio toward traveling gym equipment, putting less emphasis on "work clothes"
Princess Julie visited Catamaran and there were birds and pitchers of sangria.

...and then I went for a bikeride with Rohit and came upon a big Indian festival with a life-size poster of Barak2 days left of working in the concrete jungle, then back to Philly, and then fly away on a chartered flight to the Bahamas with several hundred coworkers (the next post should be good!). Then back to Philly for a week of doing random work before I head out to San Francisco and SantaBarbara until late October.....wooooooooshhhhh! (imagine a big cape and fading out into a glittery mist)

Cats like old and new friends

Cat and Rayna leaving for morning in Harvard square.

Shopping "underground" to feed Rayna's most recent obsession...ain't she cute!
We saw a player piano in Harvard square (a piano that plays songs by itself when you pump a foot pedal). I hear that a Tea for Two remix is rising in the top-20 dance hits in Europe.
...the sign on the player piano read: "Its a great workout"...haha
Fabulous...
Cat celebrates newest life achievement: GONADS medal winner 2008
....much later...
...and later...
RayRay and Bry!!!
And turkey-taco finale on the roof deck at sunset!