FABULOUS FEBRUARY 2014 :)

Things I'm excited about February:

First of all, February as always been my favorite month because my birthday's in February! Besides that, we are (well, I was) in the middle of summer vacations. 

1. My Birthday!

2. The Superbowl 2014, but most of all I'm excited about the halftime show because Bruno Mars is performing this year's!

3. Disney and Busch Gardens trip with Tio Ricky!

Acun's 80th Birthday Party

Yesterday we celebrated Acun's 80th birthday, although his birthday really is in January we did it because I'm in Panama right now and my dad is here too. A lot of people think it's just because of me but it's also because of my dad. So we planned the birthday to be in Bristol and we did the secret video as a gift (I feel very sad about the video because nobody really liked it and instead of keeping their mouths shut or giving compliments on the positive things like the gesture, they complained...). Apo invited around 70 people and they were all Acun's closest friends, it surprised me that the majority of them came on time, even a little bit earlier, but of course, they are third aged people haha. My job in this party was to take pictures and so I did, I posted some of the photos below. Half of the food was good and the other half I did not like very much, same goes for the deserts. The amount of people asking me about my college life was overwhelming but I guess that's what comes when you study abroad.

I hope my grandpa really liked his party, since he said this was the first real birthday party he's had. The funniest part of the night was when everybody left and he was handed the bill haha. I love my grandpa.

Week #34: Finally in Panama! (12.16.13 - 12.22.13)

On Monday I had the Mickey Mouse Mac and Cheese for lunch, the Mac and Cheese I wanted so bad since 2006 or so. I bought it in Thanksgiving when I went to Magic Kingdom with my mom and Patty. They weren't the same as the one I used to have as a child but it was good nonetheless. After lunch I drove to my grandma's and took the wrong lane when going there because now we have all these new mini highways and tunnels. I ended driving an extra half an hour. I picked up Patty in Alfavinyl and Luis at his house and went to my grandma's. We filmed over a couple of scenes for the video we are going to present in my grandpa's secret 80th birthday party that is this Sunday. After filming all day I went to dinner with Alex and Jose to Conos. Which is a restaurant in San Francisco that serves these sushi kind of things but instead of a roll, in an algae cone. It wasn't that bad but the service was kind of below average. After eating we headed to my grandma's because Jose was going to install me Photoshop and Final Cut. Btw. Jose came to pick me up and Alex, isn't that sweet? After they left, Luis, Patty and I filmed some more and then I stayed the night at my grandma's because my mom didn't like the idea of me driving late at night.

On Tuesday I woke up around 11:30 and went to my grandpa's office, he gave me some of his gadgets for my camera since he doesn't use them anymore. I had steamed fish for lunch, I wasn't planning on staying for lunch but the moment I heard we were having fish I put my bags down. I tried to cut it the right way but it was just too hard so I had a little help from my grandma hehe. At 5 pm, Rod came over! And we watched Home Alone. We also just chilled a while after the movie and had a really good time :)

On Wednesday Rod came over around 5 pm and he helped me fixing my external hard drive, because it had only permission to read but not to write on it because the hard drive was set in a Windows format. We watched Avatar and I even let him watch his LOL live streams or whatever that was. At 7 pm my mom asked me if I wanted to go to dinner to El Tambor de Oro, due to Patty's graduation and of course I wanted to. Of course that meant that my time with Rod was over :( What I hate about family dinners is... well, is when Yoyi acts up... He gets mad about everything, he yells when we are just having a conversation and it just ruins the evening.

On Thursday Patty, Luis and I kept filming the secret video for Acun's birthday and he never noticed us, he knew we were there but he never wondered why we were there or why did we have Apo's clothing and we Luis was in dress pants. That's what's funny about Acun, he never notices. We finished filming and then Patty, Tia Marilu and I watched the X Factor together. For dinner we all went to Lai Chin so I could be close to my house and did not have to drive by myself late at night, Patty drove with me because I refused to be in the same car driving with Apo by my side. She would have made me nervous and I know she would've corrected me in every single turn I made. I missed eating Chinese food :)

On Friday I woke up around 11 am and watched the X Factor finale! I'm so happy that Alex and Sierra won, they will be so big one day just like One Direction. I spent the whole afternoon watching Avatar and later at night I'll be heading to Patty's to edit the video in Yoyi's computer, wish me luck because it is going to be a long night!

Week #29: Beach on a Monday (11/11/2013 - 11/17/2013)

Monday was Veteran's day so we got the day off. Armando invited me to the beach with his friends from Castor, Kiley took Armando, her boyfriend and I to Treasure Island where we met with her roommate Adrianna and her boyfriend Alberto. It was the kind of day to lay down in the sun so that's what we did for the first half hour or so. Armando was in the ocean so I stood up and went over there to cool off but the water was as Armando says "cold as my ex wife" in his scale of 1 to ex wife. Armando and I played some Frisbee and let me tell you I improved with practice. It felt weird being in there because it was two couples plus me and Armando and I definitely felt like a third wheeler, plus the fact that my shyness and being new to the group made me even more introvert. I kind of wanted to leave at some point, when Armando fell asleep and it was just me and the two couples but I just took it like a big girl. I really enjoy being with Armando, but it's really hard for me to make new relationships, like REALLY hard. Today Rod started his new workout routine, which I basically arranged for him and I'm gonna remind him every night to do his workout.

I have a lot of things in my bucket list, and one of them is to write a book. A couple of days ago I started writing this book about a name girl Elise, and this is the longest I've kept writing a book. For now is seven pages long and about to start the third chapter. I wrote the second chapter on Tuesday after having lunch. After class I went to the library and finished my chemistry homework, as a reward I went to Starbucks because I was craving a Cinnamon Toast Crunch Frappe, but they don't sell it anymore! :( So I had to deal with a Double Chocolate Chip Frappe, which was so-so. At 5 PM I met with my Foundations for Engineering Lab group and we just built the slinky iPhone holder in about 5 minutes, we'll get together again on Friday to make the video commercial.

On Wednesday the weather was super cold, not a lot but still, it was around 17 C but it was very windy. It was also a bad choice to just wear a cardigan and leggins. Today was just another common day, the highlight of my day was honestly being the last in line to get French Toasts. The server served about 6 french toast sticks to the guy in front of me! So I got what was left which was one whole stick and like 6 nuggets of toasts. The night was so chilly I opted to go back to my dorm in the BullRunner. I also skyped with Alex today! I guess that could be the second highlight of my day, she asked her mom if she could come for spring break and her mom says that that is a good idea! I'm so excited! :)

On Thursday Sara and I went to the Metropolitan Ministries for volunteering and we got assigned in the kitchen today. I saw Juan, the guy kind of in charge of the kitchen and he remembered me! I remembered I'm from Panama :) We made sandwiches and cleaned the kitchen. Today was also out last chemistry lab! We finished an hour and a half before time and our TA, Justin, didn't let us out until it was time so we just hung out watching vines and stuff. I learned about something called Raw Diet, which is eating like a vegan, but like food that is not processed either so like not cooked vegetables; and let me tell you, I'm kind of interested in that. For this week I'm gonna be a full vegan, eating raw. This weekend I'll go out and buy some fruits and veggies from Sweetbay and a blender from Target. I want to change, and I'm inspired because I weighted myself today after two and half months and I'm over 3 pounds heavier! I wanted to become skinnier in college not thicker, although I do see myself skinnier which can be the muscle adding pounds, but still there's a lot lo loose.

It's Friday and the USF Study Abroad Office finally uploaded the 2014 course list for next summer! I'm so excited, I saw a fine arts course that I really liked it's a Collage Workshop, and I also want to enroll in the Breads of Italy and Italian for Beginners courses. So all those courses are on Session A which is from May 18 to June 28. I also decided to begin my raw diet today so I went to Sweetbay after chemistry and bought 5 apples, 4 peaches, two pouches of cashews, some bananas, strawberries with whip cream, baby carrots and celery. I had the strawberries and whip cream for lunch and I am full! For dinner I kept going with my raw food diet and had an apple and a peach, but I was getting tired of the flavor so I dipped them in whip cream. It's going to be hard to heat fruits and veggies without whip cream :( I was supposed to meet up with Chad and Nick to do our Foundation of Engineering project but Nick is out of town so I'm just chilling in my dorm. At the end of the day I consumed less than 1500 calories and I feel kind of full so I guess it was a good day. I also drank nothing but water today!

Also a couple of weeks ago I sent a package to Alex in Panama with a bunch of little presents because her birthday is this Sunday. I sent it to my grandpa's address and got Brandon to give it to her at FSU. She got it Thursday and it felt awesome :) I also sent Rod a couple of t-shirts for his birthday since his birthday is one day after Alex's. Among Alex's gift I bough a USF t-shirt, 3 pairs of thighs, whoppers, an EOS lip balm, a poster for her dorm that says "keep exploring" or something like that, and a bunch of other silly gifts.

Family Sunday (6/30/2013)

Today mom and I went for lunch with my grandma and great grandmother to Multiplaza Mall. They ate at Crepes and Waffles while I ate chicken tenders from Carl's Jr. I know what you are thinking.. "How lame, you could have eaten a sophisticated crepe but chose mediocre chicken tenders". The thing is: I've always been like that. Choosing crappy food over luxurious one. After lunch we went and bought Cristy's birthday cake at Dairy Queen (Oreo Blizzard), then we stopped by the tech store to pick up dad's new tablet (which is totally a surprise) and finished our outing going to the super market. 

When we got back home mom went to charge the new tablet while I read my new book: "Beautiful Disaster" by Jamie McGuire which is turning out pretty good. Right now I'm about 50% of the book through and don't know how is it going to develop because there has been so much drama in this half of the book. Also the girl is finally with the guy who she's supposed to be, at the middle of the book. I have no idea what's coming ahead. 

At 6:30 we went to a Chinese Restaurant in celebration of Cristy's 23! The menu was kind of put together by her, so there was a lot of green stuff. Everybody showed up at the dinner, including my dad, Luis and David (Cristy's boyfriend). We had a nice time and specially enjoyed the birthday cake, yummy!

When we came back home we gave dad our present! He was so so so excited! I though he was going to be mad because we spend so much money on him, but he was actually thrilled to have a new toy. We spent about hour and a half installing his games, e-mail, and else. He was smiling the whole time, so happy we got him that; specially now that he is working on the mines and has nothing to do and no way of contacting with us. I miss him so much :( But I'm happy we got to put a smile on his face tonight. 

I'll miss my pop so much when I departure for college, and my mom too. Poor mom, she'll be alone at home, and dad alone at work, while I'll be alone at college. Either way we'll make it through.

I loved this day, primarily because of dad's face when he got his present. Life's not about presents and objects, it's about the joy that comes out of them, or out of anything. Material things are not bad ways of happiness, but is another source capable of giving us joy. 

Enjoy Those Little Things

Last night was my cousin's 14th birthday, and she wanted to go to Hard Rock Cafe. So we went, sat down on a table at the back of the restaurant and our waiter came to serve the drinks.

What I love/hate most of restaurants, stores, anything that has to do with service is: the attitude the server has.

And when I get a cranky waiter, I get cranky and that ruins the whole evening. But when I get a happy, funny, loving waiter, our whole evening shines.

It first began with - don't you remember my name?- he said. Obviously we didn't because he never told us, but my cousin quickly look for his tag and said "Samuel!" haha. He bought it and kept smiling.

My granddad is a big photography man, and while he was setting the fancy drinks to appear on the shoot, he tilt over my mom's mix of Pineapple and who knows what else. Everyone was laughing, ever the waiter. Normally a waiter would get cranky and treat us poorly the rest of the evening. But Samuel was more than happy to clean up the mess my grandpa made.

Those little things.. Whenever you get a waiter as good as ours was, be thankful. They are rare and in extinction.

There you can see a yellow spot on the table behind the glass of pineapple whatever. Samuel took the picture. And a random waiter snicked in the picture haha.