Miserable, Magical Monday

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I've been MIA for about a week and I feel kind of awful about it. Not because the content on this blog is anything life changing, but because I'd been on such a good writing rhythm (guess how many times I had to re-spell that word) and now I've lost it. But my resolve to bring you semi-consistent updates about the goings-on in my life won't quit, so I'm back this week to remind you I'm alive and well. Just tired.

P.S. I get slightly judge-y when I read bloggers post about needing a break from blogging to enjoy the real world. Obviously, I'm in no position to pass such judgement, but does that ever stop any of us from doing it? Oh yeah, my point. This isn't one of those posts. I've just legitimately had the busiest week of July. I've started looking back at my Costa Rica trip as chill, even though we had a pretty packed schedule despite it being a "vacation."

1. One of my friends got married this weekend! Brandon and I carpooled out to Salinas with some friends and enjoyed a good old country wedding complete with a stunning barn. Seriously, this venue was awesome. I wanted to be sure I got photos of this wedding since I missed out on documenting the other wedding I went to a few weeks ago. Boy, did I deliver. I posted almost all of these on instagram but here they are once more (with feeling).

I kept my place card. Because nostalgia, that's why.

Bouquet toss.

Garter getting.

Blurry dance floor duck face selfies.

#blurry

The most boring photo we've ever taken. Seriously, I almost don't like it because of how
normal we look.

I had such a good time at this lovefest of a wedding. Seriously, the love was palpable and it made everything that much more beautiful. Also, I just love love so I was bound to enjoy this wedding.

2. So this summer I've finally come to terms with the fact that I'm approaching my mid-twenties. Everywhere I look my friends are going through major moments in life; making a big move, getting engaged, getting married, buying houses, planning for a family, kicking off their careers. Seriously, just this weekend I had a cousin make the move from home to the OC, I witnessed a friend move into married life and another open her own business. It's kind of weird to finally find myself at this age. I spent a lot of time thinking about what I'd accomplish by 25 as a kid...I wasn't completely wrong about myself. I for sure thought I'd be married (check) and have my BA (check) but I also planned on being done having children by this age. And that's totally not in the cards right now. I guess the funny thing about being in my twenties is as much as I'm still a kid, I'm also starting to get the hang of this "real" life. I kind of like it.

3. Having finished New Girl, Brandon and I had been searching for something to watch during our veg sessions. I've written about us trying to watch The Office and Parks and Rec, but neither one of them really hooked us the way New Girl did. I wish Modern Family was on Netflix because I think that would help me transition into the mockumentary style of the other shows. Anyway, we finally decided to restart How I Met Your mother (HIMYM from now on). I've only ever seen it once through, so I'm rediscovering the hilarity and brilliant writing this show has. Also, knowing the end makes it more fun for me to put clues together that I missed during the first run-through. I firmly believe we as the audience judged the show by it's cover name and that's why we never saw the end coming. But that's an argument for another time (aka never).

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4. Almost all of you who read this blog already know this, but I have to share out of sheer excitement: I've secured a new job! It all happened very quickly. I sent in my resume and cover letter after some epic (and requested) scrutiny editing from my best friend, got an interview, wore the hottest office-appropriate LBD of my life (also courtesy of my best friend), rocked said interview, and then a job offer a few days later. I'll be working out in Napa starting next week. Although my commute is growing again, I'm still really excited about the opportunity. The position seems to be a really great jumping off point. I met at least five people who all started off in the position I'll be in before moving into management positions in other departments, which is super reassuring. Also the grounds are gorgeous and everyone seems a thousand times friendlier. I can't wait to start. But really quick, back to the LBD from heaven. I looked like freaking Clair Underwood in that dress. Plus I got so many compliments on it. As a person who almost always looks pulled together, if someone says you look nice, then you probably look really nice. Was that conceited? Oh gosh, probably.

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5. I'm reading Divergent right now in my effort to actually finish I book I pick up to read. I've literally started four other books and haven't finished them. I don't know why. I always say I don't have time, but if I have time to watch hours and hours of HIMYM then maybe I can spare one a night reading. Anyway, I'm enjoying the book so far. It reads in first person the way Hunger Games does, but this hits me as less choppy than Suzanne Collins' writing. I'm in chapter 11 or something and I still have no idea what Divergent means in the series. I think I found out more in the trailer for the movie. Still, I'm keeping in mind that it's a three part (?) series so I'm guessing I'll find out what the big deal is about the Divergent label in the book's unvierse closer to the end. I'll keep you posted.

6. The start of a new job will mean a new dress code. From what I saw it's a pretty casual office (jeans are allowed on all days of the week) but based on my one day of training, I can tell my idea of casual is sub par. I'm going to have to step it up on the cute clothes thing, which is the perfect justification for spending some money on clothing. I've been stuck in a style rut, anyway.

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Almost every day, I wake up and look at my clothes and hate them all. I hate that the only color I own tops in is blush. My one pair of gray pants are so old they're low rise jeans. I haven't purchased low rise jeans since 2009. If I'm honest my style rut feels more like a style crisis. But I haven't just been wallowing in my "ugly" clothes, I've been working on defining the look I'm going for. I've made lists, I've made secret Pinterest boards, I've online window shopped. I've even made excuses to go to the mall over my lunch break (side bar: going to the mall alone is the worst idea ever). My biggest obstacle is not being able to find the pieces I'm looking for. No joke, I've been searching for a freaking white t-shirt with small black stripes for ages and can't find one anywhere. I'm tempted to take BART into San Francisco just to shop at the two H&Ms by Union Square. Yes, there are two. It's almost heaven. 

7. My best friend Barbara lives in Northern California now which means I get to see her all the time. We got together to celebrate her birthday with pizza at Woodstock's then moved across the street to Wunderbar for some drinks and two very terrible games of pool. Then Friday, we reinstated our Friday Night Family Dinner tradition. She and I made orange chicken with rice and stir fry veggies. It was a simple meal but by far the most elaborate one I've co-prepped in a while. Usually I bake chicken or make pasta. I've gotta step my dinner game up. Anyway, we ate, watched HIMYM as well as the trailer for the new Assassin's Creed game. Not only is the theme music the song Lorde wrote/performed for the Catching Fire soundtrack, but the game's story line is based on the French Revolution. We all agreed that it would make a killer movie. Once Derek showed up we popped in Shaun of the Dead. It was the first time I'd seen it, I'm told it totally counts as a classic, so maybe I'll finally get to knock another thing off the 12 Things list.


I promise I'll keep telling you about Costa Rica one day soon.
Later, friends.
♥ A

Rio Aguas Calientes + Le Bistro: Arenal Part II

In case you missed it: Volcano Land aka Parque Nacional Volcan Arenal

After chugging water in the humid car, we decided to ask the park ranger for directions to this supposed warm river I'd read about on TripAdvisor. There are plenty of resorts with private thermal pools, but since a part of me was really interested in staying away from resorts, I was definitely hoping this mysterious river was real. His directions were: go back the way you came, the road will dip, then climb and then dip again. At the bottom of the dip you'll see cars parked along the road. The river will be on your left.

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I had no clue if it would work. Not because of the directions, but because I doubted whether I could decipher them. A dip to me could be a bump to him, you know? But I worried for nothing. Sure enough, we found the parking spots at the bottom of the second dip. We paid a guy 1 mil (about $2) to assign us a parking spot and watch the car then headed down.

We walked maybe 50 feet before getting to the river. I let Andrea step in first because I wanted to watch her reaction to the warm water. She told me after that she expected it to be lukewarm and was surprised at the actual warmth of the river. Success! We walked under the overpass and across the river to the opposite bank.

We settled on a small, shallow pool with it's own tiny waterfall as our spot. The atmosphere was lively but relaxed (I guess that kind of describes the vibe of Costa Rica in general, too). I set our backpack down on the bank and in we went. The experience was amazing.

Have you ever enjoyed something so much that you physically lose your ability to articulate it? That's how I felt about this place. All I could say was "OH MY GOSH. I'M HAVING SO MUCH FUN." Over and over and over again. I couldn't believe that something so awesome existed in nature. Maybe more than that, the fact that it's a public space that belongs to everyone. I feel lucky that I was able to experience the thermal waters in an authentic way. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the resort pools with the magnificent view of the volcano during my last visit to Arenal. They were gorgeous and impressive. But this river gave me a glimpse into what pre-resort life in Costa Rica must have been like.

I've written a little about how my dad has these amazing stories of growing up in El Salvador. They'd go camping at the beach every summer and pick fruit off of wild trees and swim in the ocean all day. I've secretly always wished for an experience like that and I feel like a got a little bit of one at the Rio Aguas Calientes (literally meaning Hot Water River or River of Hot Waters if we're going Game of Thrones style).

I heard later on that this place is completely different at night. People (mostly couples) come down, light candles all over the place and hang out in the pools. I wish we could have stayed to see what it looked like, but we had to get on the road to get to Monteverde before dark. I'd had an interesting experience on my ride there on my program's bus thanks to nasty rain mixing with dirt roads. Seriously, the possibility of us tumbling off a cliff was real that day. I wanted to do what I could to avoid driving on a dirt road in the dark, so we reluctantly skidaddled.

Getting ready to probably break a law.

Hoping a fence to a warm river? Priceless.

We climbed back through the hole in the fence and made our way back to the car. Although Monteverde is actually less than 30 miles (or something like that) from Arenal, the drive time is closer to three hours because you have to drive around Lake Arenal to get to the cloud rainforest. Our local friend from the night before had mentioned that a 45 minute shortcut exists, but that you have to drive through two rivers. Our little rented sedan would have never stood a chance, but if I ever make it back to Arenal I want to see this road for myself.

We passed a sign advertising this restaurant called Le Bistro at the start of our drive. I kind of immediately decided that's where we would eat, mostly because of the panoramic views it supposedly had. Even though over 100 signs for the "famous" Toad Hall tried to sway our opinion (we didn't get a photo of these signs but they were absurd), we held out for Le Bistro, which oddly enough was right next door to Toad Hall. Anyway, Andrea and I decided to eat outside so we could fully appreciate the view.

I figured I should order something relatively filling since we'd skipped lunch and were eating our dinner at like four in the afternoon. Andrea and I both ordered the same pasta dish and pretty much fell in love with it when we tasted it. The alfredo sauce was homemade and holy crap did it hit the spot. There was spinach and chicken...I want to recreate it at home because it might be the best pasta I've ever had.

We heard some howler monkeys in the distance while we ate and enjoyed the true panoramic view of the lake. It was so serene and it reminded me of the kind of place my mom would really enjoy staying. Heck, would have liked to stay there, too! The rain sprinkle came soon enough, but we didn't get hit with the strong rain since we were driving away from the storm. The rest of our drive went fine. I not saying smoothly because the road was anything but smooth. We're talking winding, rocky dirt roads here. But we made it without damaging ourselves or the car. More on Monteverde in the next post!

I leave you with a photo of me and Andrea under our personal waterfall and this thought: if you ever get a chance to get away from your resort and see a place through a local person's eyes, take it. I promise you the experience will be way cooler than the beauty of the resort.

♥ A