my weekend so far

This morning, I went to Rolla with a couple of fitness instructor buddies to get my CPR/AED certification. The course and instructor were pretty darn lame - that woman should NOT be an instructor! She was just so random and disjointed, and could never seem to actually answer a question - she would just talk in circles. And we were disappointed to find that we were not covering child/infant CPR, but only adult. Oh, well. At least I got my certification, and a yummy lunch at Panera.

So, last night, we took our good friend Mike out to dinner to bid him a fond adieu, as he is moving to Ft. Hood, TX. We went to this amazing restaurant called Sybill's, which is about 30 miles from here. It was WONDERFUL! Brian and I had eaten there before, but Mike never had, so it was great that he got to experience it before he left. The bad news is that I ate enough calories for several days. (On a side note, we discussed the unfairness of that. Say you normally eat 1500 calories a day. If you eat a 3000-calorie meal, then, why can't it be that you wouldn't be hungry again until two or three days later? Wouldn't that make sense? But no - I woke up this morning just as hungry for breakfast as I always am. ) The good news is that all of our food was amazing. We had simple but scrumptious bread and butter to start with, and we also ordered spinach artichoke dip with crostini to dip in it. We bought a bottle of yummy local red wine, and enjoyed delicious salads - mine had Romaine, cucumbers, tomatoes, red onion, bleu cheese, etc. Brian had pork chops, Mike had a chicken dish, and I had this amazing ravioli that was stuffed with portobello mushrooms and various cheeses and surrounded with olive oil, spinach, sweet peppers, red onions, feta cheese, etc. OMG. It was so rich that I simply couldn't finish it. Actually, I was proud of myself, for though I did eat a staggering amount of food, I actually left part of everything on the plate, even the peanut butter pie I had for dessert! (Brian had peach cobbler and Mike had lemon raisin bread pudding.) This restaurant is very ambient and posh, and our waitress was amazing - she really knew her stuff and was very attentive. Here's how fancy the place is - when she brought out our bottle of wine, she actually poured a little into my glass and then stood there waiting for a second, and I realized that I was supposed to do the whole "tasting" thing! I was rather embarrassed, as that's a bit over my head, but I think I pulled it off pretty well. I picked it up, swirled it around a little and sniffed it, and then took a sip, swirling it around in my mouth before swallowing and pronouncing it delicious. :) The total bill ended up being in the triple digits, but it was well-worth it, in my opinion. It was a once-in-a-blue-moon occasion, and the perfect way to send off Mike, who is quite the foodie.

Mike left today, and I'm pretty bummed about that. I'm really going to miss him! He was a good friend and such an interesting, layered person. He never ceased to surprise me, and we had the best conversations, and various interests in common. And the great thing about him was that unlike all of my other friends here, who have families, he is single, so he was almost always available and willing to "hang out" with us, even on very short notice. That was rather refreshing, and will be missed. I know we'll keep in touch, but it's not the same. I wish him the best of luck, though, and hope he has a great experience in Texas! And I hope that he'll visit us sometime - he'll always be welcome.

This afternoon, after a short nap, I commenced (finally!) about taking down the Christmas tree. I've got everything off of it, and after I'm done blogging, Brian and I just have to take the tree apart and shove it in its box. Yay! It'll be good to have that monkey off my back. And, true to my goal, I did manage to purge several ornaments as I was taking them off the tree.

Well, I guess I'd better go and get that tree down. How's your weekend going?