Weekend news

I:

• Saw Sicko on Friday at the Tower Theater, a historic theater here that has been operating since the 1930s. The movie actually opened to a small audience of doctors and nurses here in Sacramento on June 12th, before it was shown anywhere else in the country, as Michael Moore was here in town testifying at a hearing held by Senator Sheila Kuehl regarding a single-payer health system. The movie, which laments the pitfalls of our current healthcare system, was excellent--it was definitely one of the best movies I have seen in a long time. It was thought-provoking, funny, and heartbreaking all at the same time--I both cried and laughed out loud in the theater, which I rarely do. GO SEE IT as soon as you can.
• Discovered the Natural Foods Co-op near my house. I think that their vanilla-almond granola and whole dried pineapple rings (bulk foods section) are the best I've ever tasted!
• Did various important errands like going to the post office and going to the bank to deposit a few checks, including my first paycheck. This was very exciting, despite my not having yet figured out all the "investing stuff" with the percent that is automatically withheld.
• Went to the local AAA office to transfer my membership to California and came away from with about 20 maps of various parts of the state (free :)) for my (future) travels. I love free stuff!
• Visited the dollar store (I had to get a backup pair of sunglasses), where I came away with a few other steals. Cheap stuff is almost as good as free stuff!
• Got to chat and catch up with a bunch of people on the phone including Cathleen, Wendi, Tia, Natasha, Matt, Justin, and Kyla. Free weekend minutes are wonderful (and don't forget free!) :)
• Took my rental contract to a local coffeeshop (Temple Coffee & Tea) to get a free $10 gift certificate they advertised in a "Midtown Grid" welcome handout and used it to get some Guatemalan roasted coffee. Okay, I think that's all the free-ness I will talk about for the rest of this post.
• Thoroughly cleaned my apartment (including kitchen, bathroom, and doing laundry). It's quite impressive how much mess one person can make and I would have been embarrasssed to have anyone over in the state my place was in; however, the situation has now been remedied. I'm going to do my best to keep it this way.
• Saturday evening, went to Sarah's (just graduated FP/OB) summer graduation/celebration party where we had wonderful cheese, fruit and veggies, kabobs, wine, yummy lemon cake, and more (she and her husband Matt are trying to buy/eat all "local" stuff-- i.e. things grown/made within 100 miles, which is commendable and definitely very doable here). Although some of the families, including two lesbian couples and their respective children (which I think is so, so neat-- something that would be very rare to come across in MN), left fairly early, Sarah, Matt, Kate (they all knew eachother from MN) and I hung out for a while afterwards.
• Found out from Matt that there is an Ultimate Frisbee league in town that plays at Curtis Park on Saturday mornings, which I may have to check out.
• Was loaned (by Sarah and Matt) A Thousand Splendid Suns, the new book by Khaled Hosseini (author of Kite Runner). Earlier in the day, I had tried to get it through the library, but found out that it's only on lease right now. I just read a few pages today, but think it will be a great one.
• Watched Venus and Federer win Wimbledon. I'm become a real slacker in tennis-watching (and playing... my Mom suggested I scope out the local USTA leagues), but always enjoy the finals of the Grand Slams. I was very grouchy this morning because I got up (breakfast at Wimbledon starts at 6 a.m. on the west coast!) to watch the men's final and HAD NO CABLE reception. I went for a run, hoping it would be functioning when I returned. No luck. I called Comcast and they thought they'd be able to sent someone Wednesday (I've been having some poor morning access) to check it out and didn't have specific area outages or anything, but that wasn't going to help me today. Grr. I finally got reception at the end of the third set and was ecstatic because I was able to watch till the end--what a great match! I often root for the underdogs, but I really like Federer... and continue to be amazed what a smart, collected, and mentally-tough player he is. Nadal can win on clay as much as he wants, but I think Federer deserved to take the Wimbledon crown.
• Finally repainted my toenails. Before going to Africa, Wendi and I got pedicures because of all the sandal-wearing we anticipated doing. That was in March. I hadn't done a thing since then. It took a patient telling me last week, "You know your toes are only half-painted" to really get my butt in gear. So I took off the gold (the half that was left ;)) and put some magenta polish on today. I hope that wasn't too gross for the blog.
• Went back to Arcade for Sunday morning service. I have to get used to the services being about an hour and a half (Matt, who is a pastor at a Methodist church here in Sac was saying that he gets "congratulations" for keeping services under 60 min!), but so much of it is filled with music that it is worth it! I realize that in order to get connected there, I have to be more outgoing and actually say hi/talk to people (rather than just making it there for the service, sitting by myself, and leaving immediately afterwards), but I haven't made the effort yet.
• Think I've figured out the highway entrances/exits. Previously, I did a lot of driving around, trying to figure out where to get on, and then, after taking an exit whose street number looked familiar, would just find my way back to my apartment (or to wherever I was going). Now I actually know where the exits put you off so I can choose the exit that best matches my destination. Sweet :)
• Tonight, went out with some FP classmates (and friends) to Gaylord, the first Indian restaurant in town that I've tried. It was very yummy and a very fun time! Here are some pictures from the night.

Adeel DOES have a family! Here is him with his wife, Fizzah, and their 6-month-old baby Fahtima Adeel, Fahtima, and Oliver The group. From left: Adeel, (Oliver-- not visible), Phi, me, Michelle, Anika, Mahsheed, and Brenden
Some of the food we truly shared, family(medicine)-style... including two chicken tikka masalas, tamarind chicken, tandoori salmon, and more...

And this is completely random but, in the spirit of Wendi, I thought I'd share some furniture pics too. It's not as fancy, but here is the futon/sleeper thingie that you could have the chance to slumber on should you come visit.

And here is a closer view of my high pub table in the "breakfast corner" of my small kitchen.
Adorning the walls of my bedroom are some photo-montages I made from our Africa trip (I am into pictures of pictures :)).

And yes, call me strange, but I do keep my bike in my living room.