So I did it. I bought a new saddle. It seems to fit Isabella decently and it fits me very well. Before you go into sticker shock at the price, keep in mind that I talked the owner down several hundred dollars from the asking price and brand new these saddles go for $2800 (yipes). I also was able to sell my old saddle for a good price, so out of pocket I am only out a few hundred dollars, which will go onto my 0% interest credit card for the time being. :) Time will tell if it is a *really* good fit for her.. I probably won't be able to ride for a while with this rain that's supposed to last ALL WEEK LONG here. Poopy. :(

We're supposed to move Isabella to the new barn on Saturday. Nan was going to tractor out the compost pile that currently resides in the middle of Isabella's pasture, but with this rain it's not going to happen. So she'll have a nice little mountain in the middle of her living quarters, ah well.

I went ahead and bit the bullet and joined Curves last night. I'm really excited to get going with getting back into shape. 3x a week baby.. I'm gonna do it! Last night they took weight and measurements and the numbers were scary.. be very afraid.
I certainly was.

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The boys at Malibu Grand Prix
Originally uploaded by Julienne:).

Doesn't everyone look dashing in their oh so large helmets?

Have I mentioned that Matt and I are newbie curling enthusiasts? I may have written about our newfound love for curling during the Winter Olympics earlier this year, but I think it bears repeating how great curling is to watch. The way their bodies jiggle as they rough up the ice, the way they yell so nonsensically at each other, the exhorbitant prices people pay for curling supplies. It's all so novel and wonderful.

As Walt putputted around the mini golf course last week at the Malibu Grand Prix company event last week, Matt and I curled for him, aiding in his efforts to get his ball in the hole. It was good times. The whole evening was so much fun.. we had really bad Top Dog hotdogs (which caused indigestion in 3/4 participants) and got to have a run around the go cart track. I was particularly happy that I broke my 70 second time from last year with my best time being 68 seconds. Woot! Matt had a crazy record of 58 seconds.. which was one of the fastest time recorded. My right arm was pretty sore the next day from playing so many shooting games (video games were all free) and Amit hit a young girl with the air hocky puck. This was not good times, my friends, this was great times, especially when young children get hurt (Matt also elbowed a young boy in the head).

On Saturday Devil's slide was closed because of debrie in the road, so I circumvented the barn and went through Half Moon Bay up the coast to see Isabella. I had another good ride in the saddle I have on trial (pictures are in my flickr account if you really want to see the saddle fitting photos). I placed an offer on the saddle today so please keep your fingers crossed that the gal accepts my price! Searching for a new saddle is such a pain in the ass, you have no idea.

Sunday I recruited Amit to help us work on Isabella's pasture. I bribed him with yummy breakfast from Kerri's Cafe and Halo. Home Depot had a brand new weedwacker with razor sharp edges and clearing out the remaining part of the field took about half the time it did before. We cleared the logs out and called it a day. To top off the most delicious breakfast, we introduced Amit to the Philly hoagie sandwich from Columbo's deli.. which is just pure heaven on earth. Amit also bought some ice cream cones and we basically stuffed ourselves full. The boys proceeded to play several hours of Halo while I passed out. It was definitely a day of gluttony.

Which leaves me to today.. today I'll be at Curves filling out my membership form! I really need to get some activity in. Butterfly life is an extra 5 minutes down the road but I think just that little bit of extra driving time would be enough to dissuade me (even though they have classes at Butterfly life). So I'm signing up for Curves.. woohoo! Time to get this big butt into shape.

This past Sunday Matt and I went to Isabella's future pasture and did some landscaping work. It was a pretty good workout.. I was definitely feeling it in my arms and back yesterday. We rented a Weed Wacker from Home Depot (they're the cheapest tool rentals in the area!) and with a rake and shovel in hand, we cleared away about 1/3 of the grass and weeds that were about waist high in the area Isabella will be living in. For those of you non-horsey people out there, too much grass all at once isn't good for horses.. in fact, the sugar content can cause them to become septic and break down soft tissues/bones, specifically in their feet (called 'founder' or 'laminitis'). Nan, the manager of Morning Star Ranch, was there as well with her tractor, clearing out the compost pile left there last year that didn't really compost, but unfortunately the ground was too wet from all the rains we've been getting, and the tractor became stuck. :( We managed to shovel the dirt and mud around the tractor to un-stuck it, and she called it a day and had some cocktails. She is really a hoot, I think I'm going to really like boarding there.

Forget what Matt and I did Saturday.. I did manage to get in a short ride. What the heck else did we do??

I've been having some really crazy vivid dreams lately with this new medication I'm on. Previously, I would sleep dreamlessly, and I could only remember little snippets of nonsensical scenes once in a blue moon. Now I seem to remember in detail what my busy REM sleep brain is processesing and I often wake up remember everything like it actually happened. Matt hasn't been too fond of this since I've been dreaming of other guys (I know why I'm dreaming this - it's a married friend of mine that sleeps with other guys), but my dreams have been so random.. like last night, I dreampt I was at a baby's funeral, but at the same time in the church it was also an old high school friend's wedding. WTF. It's just so random.

Anyhoo, Thursday evening my company is sponsoring an event at the Malibu Grand Prix and Matt, Amit, and Walt will be there to tear the race track up. It'll be fun.. they're having Top Dog from Berkeley cater the event and free track racing, mini golf, and unlimited video games. Good times. The forcast calls for clear weather so I'm looking forward to it!

Lately I've been feeling like I really need to get in shape, especially since it's been so muddy and I haven't been riding much. So tonight I went to the local Curves gym (which is like 2 miles away) to give it a test run. It's an interesting concept.. they have a bunch of resistance machines with "cardio spots" in between and you make your way around the room twice for a 30 minute workout. They also have a stretching room where you go after your workout. I haven't made up my mind about it yet.. there's another all women's gym called 'Butterly Life' in Pacifica that I'm going to check out as well before I make a decision.

Today I'm working from home today. Working from home is pretty nice, mainly because I don't have to get dressed. My ideal job would be one where I could wear scrubs all day long.. scrubs are like pajamas. Uber comfy and you don't have to think of coordinating, if it's too risque, too ghetto, too clashing, too formal, too casual, etc. In a few minutes I need to go drop off my truck for a routine tire rotation. Last year I paid over $1000 for a brake job at the local shop, so I'm fully taking advantage of their 'free tire rotations for life'. Oh, they shall rue the day they charged me so much money.

On the Today show they're running their Spring Cleaning segment.. it just makes me look around my place and see how sorrowfully my place needs a good cleaning. I often step on things that I have no clue what or where it came from and my bathroom has about 2 inches of grime. Usually I'll have people over enough that I stay pretty up to date with this cleaning thing, but lately I've just gotten to a point where I don't care or don't have people over enough.

Off to do some work.. it's sometimes a bit challenging with Matt up and around the apartment, "Whatcha doin'? What're you lookin' at? Are you going to hang out with me soon? Let's go eat lunch! Hey, what's up?" But for now the cute little boy sleeps, and I have to run to drop off my truck.

Have a good weekend everyone!

Snowy trees

Snowy trees
Originally uploaded by Julienne:).

Tahoe pictures are up..! Click here to view them. They're in chroniclogical order if you're bored enough to sit through them all.

Work has been ultra mega busy so I really haven't had too much time to update. Had a great relaxing weekend in Tahoe and the place we found was sooo incredibly nice. Basically it snowed the whole weekend so we didn't drive away from the cabin at all, but we were within walking distance of a few trails and had LOTS of snow to play in at our disposal, so we really didn't have to leave. I had major gastrointestinal issues the whole weekend and I think I may have annoyed enough people talking about my issues as well as demonstrating for them. :)

I'll get pictures up soon (maybe tonight?). I've been so busy.. Isabella, selling saddles, shipping saddles, watching TV. No rest for the weary.. tomorrow night I'll be up in SF to have dinner with Matt and his 'rents and then this weekend we go to Morning Star Farms to start work on Isabella's new pasture - clearing out brush and making sure her new home is spic and span for her arrival on April 1st.

Poor Matt is having major ass issues. After Korean food Friday night, meatball sub Saturday afternoon, chili for lunch Sunday, and very spicy Indian food on Sunday evening (dinner with Marky Mark), he sat on the toilet for several minutes in agonizing, burning ass pain. And as always, I have no qualms about sharing my boyfriend's intestinal disturbances with you, Internet-land. Enjoy!

Good news is that I finally sold my saddle. Woohoo! Now for the everlasting saddle hunt. I've ordered a Sensation Treeless saddle that I can easily resell if it doesn't work out.. I custom ordered one that will fit my stubby short legs, but that custom order means I'm on a waiting list for about a year.. so I went ahead and ordered a standard model to bide me in the meantime. Unfortunately I've heard from one person that this saddle can leave pressure points where your seat bones lay on the saddle, and because there's no tree it can affect the horse's back. Although I seem to have quite a bit of padding in that area, I notice when I'm riding bareback that seatbones do get pressure spots.. so I'll have to see how this all works out.

This is going to be a crazy week for me. I have class Monday and Wednesday evenings after work from 6-9:30pm, and it takes about an hour's drive each way down to Cupertino. Tuesday and Thursday I need to manage to see Isabella and Friday morning bright and early we're on our merry little way to Tahoe! woohoo!! Sometime in between then I need to go grocery shopping for myself and for this weekend. Argh, too busy..

yummy goodness at the korean market..

yummy goodness at the korean market..
Originally uploaded by Julienne:).

Mmm... pusse...

My crazy to do project list at work.

My crazy to do project list at work.
Originally uploaded by Julienne:).

Such a wierd dream last night..

First off I had planned a picnic with Matt and a few other people. We were at a rather large park and I was designated to find a picnic table for us to take over. I made a few loops around the park (which was filled with Korean families) and I thought I'd never find a place for us to sit down, but eventually after a while I found one. Matt arrived later, driving in his truck and friends in the back of the truck (which is wierd now but seemed normal in my dream).

I remember sitting down at the table and reaching down to find a few sheets of discarded international stamps. They were from mid-European countries that I wouldn't be able to recite now, but I remember seeing the value of those stamps were something like $1US each. Each sheet of paper had about half of the stamps used with interesting pictures for each country.

Pretty boring, but what the heck? Why did I dream this? So bizarre.

Thursday, time for a new bloggy update.

This morning while I was half-asleep I had a wierd recollection that there was someone knocking on the door. However, it didn't make China bark so I wondered if it really happened.. it annoyed me in any case and made me determined to go back to sleep. So determined, in fact, that I snoozed my alarm for an hour after I usually get up. DOH! I didn't even realize I was snoozing because I was so set on sleeping.

Then, I get to work and my office door was locked. Grr.. had to call facilities over for them to unlock the door. I'm assuming the cleaning people closed my door just enough for it to click shut and lock. Whatever, bitches..

Isabella is in full on shedding mode at the moment. She's shedding her winter coat like it's going out of style. I've pulled off enough hair off of her to keep a tribe of Eskimo's (I guess the PC term is 'Inuits') warm for an Alaskan winter!

Not too much else going on.. I need to get my taxes done. Watching way too much 'American Idol' and playing way too much Bejewelled Multiplayer (up to the 2000's rank now, woohoo!).