KaiserTales

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Happy Thanksgiving weekend everyone!

We’ve been the quintessential homebodies over the past week. I’ve got more time and more energy these days, now that I’m not babysitting a wayward client, so I’m trying to enjoy life. And Nate’s taken a slight hiatus from his uber-networking schedule for the holidays. He’s played a lot of tennis, and I’ve introduced free weights into my evening schedule after each run.We even did yard work this weekend. If that’s not the epitome of homebody, I don’t know what is.Friday we hosted another couple for dinner at our house. I love dinner parties! And leftovers from dinner parties are the BEST! I guess we really lived it up on Friday night, since I didn’t get dressed until 2:00 the next afternoon. We both got up late, and when I finally ventured out of bed, all I managed to do was meander to the couch. Nate was there, trying to nurse his hangover.Dude was dru-uunnk! He was so funny: He would tell a story, and then, as if someone hit the rewind button, he would begin to tell the story again with no additional information. I love making fun of Nate in his vulnerable state, and this occasion was no different. He was really mad at me, but he didn’t really remember come Saturday

Booze: Here on Friday night, gone by Saturday morning!

Our two great accomplishments of Saturday were going on a run around Greenlake and making a homemade lasagna. We took the lasagna over to Bellevue to provide a housewarming dinner to our buddy who just moved from Juneau. After a nice meal and a short visit, we headed home to be homebodies for the rest of the evening.You know you’ve hit true home-body status when, at 8:00 on Saturday evening the entire family is in their PJ’s, sitting on the couch and ready for bed. But there’s hope for these two homebodies. We’re off to Boston on Thursday, to celebrate Thanksgiving with friends, and then we’ll spend the weekend in New York. Hopefully, we’ll capture some of that big-city mentality that’s been slowly waning from our lives.I can’t wait for the Freedom Trail, Paul Revere’s ride, the MOMA, Central Park and the MET.

This weekend we celebrated my best pal’s 30th birthday. The girls (and a couple of lucky and very patient guys) headed up north to Vancouver, B.C. for a weekend of drinking and international ruckus. My husband was not one of those guys. In fact, he figured that the level of impatience his type-A personality would experience with a group of fun, crazy, sometimes indecisive and ALWAYS 15-minutes-later-than- expected friends was probably more than he could bear.

Wisely, Nate opted to stay home.

And I can’t believe how awesome he is when I’m not around! Nate cleaned the entire house, sweeping the floors, vacuuming the carpets, washing the clothes and even cleaning the bathroom. He also replaced the faucet in the basement and set up a ski rack.

My husband turned into super-husband when I left. If he were Polish, he’d look like this:

He stocked the fridge with groceries (my husband never goes shopping) and even cooked his own dinners! When I got home last night, the living room was neat, the bed was made with fresh sheets and all my clothes were folded in their drawers. He’s AWESOME!

I should leave town more often! … Or should I…

With the good comes the bad. For the first time in my life’s memory, our U.S. dollar is worth less than the Canadian dollar. Our dollar SUCKS right now, the Canadian sales tax is atrocious, and I got to pay an extra 15% for everything as a result! It’s tough to break nearly 30 years of conditioning that makes me want to think that everything is cheaper in Canada. Boo!

Big Canadian > Little U.S.

Half way through our weekend, I got a voicemail from Nate. He was so proud of all that he’d accomplished, but he had some bad news: some a#$hole decided to take a bat to one of the windows in our car. They didn’t even steal anything; they just caused us $100 worth of window replacement. NOT COOL! Right now, we’re driving around with a blue-taped rear passenger window, which works really well when the winds are gusting up to 70mph and it’s pouring down rain.

But that isn’t even the worst of it… I got another call from Nate on Saturday evening that scared the crap out of me. Nate’s sister was in a bike accident that sent her to the hospital. After the numerous deaths caused by trucks hitting cyclists over the past few months, I was really worried. Thank goodness no cars were involved in this accident, and Nate’s sis is OK. She was on a joy ride with her husband when she hit some gravel and went down. The trajectory of the fall made her land flat on her ass, then she hit her head cracking her helmet. The ER doc’s guessed that her tail bone is either badly bruised or cracked.

First, I’m glad she’s OK. Second, I’m glad my mother-in-law wasn’t the one to break to news to me. I guess the way she told my other sister-in-law made it seem like someone really had died. I can just imagine…

“Are you sitting down? … because something serious has happened to your sister.” [Dramatic pause, pause, pause] “She was in a bicycle accident today. ” [More dramatic pause, making the recipient think the worst...]

I would have freaked!

Well, the weekend is over, the Kaisers are all safe and sound, and I’m still enjoying a clean house and a super husband. He had a hot plate of steaming, home-made spaghetti for me when I got home from work today. I think I really do have a super husband, even if he’s not Polish.

As per earlier posts, Marissa and I have been trying to get back into shape… This involves running 2-3 miles every other day, or, if we miss a day (as happened last Friday) we run two days in a row. Now, in conjunction with the social outings and the running, I would consider us an exciting, adventurous couple. But my brother-in-law and sister absolutely put us to shame! Damn them and their damnable rock climbing. (I say this half in jest and half in jealousy.)

Marissa and I started off our weekend with a morning run around Carkeek park, which I guess is just north of Crownhill…

There are a lot of hills associated with this three mile run. It’s fun and quite invigorating to run through a very “natural” park in the middle of the city. Marissa has really started to step it up a notch and is setting the pace and distance for our runs. As we approached the last, grueling hill of our Saturday run, I started to slow down a bit. From a few paces behind me she yelled, “DON’T EVEN THINK OF STOPPING!” And I’m sure that if I had I would have gotten the BOOT…

After our run Marissa headed off to work and I got back down to working on nPost. Marissa doesn’t often work on the weekends, but she has been putting in a lot of hours in the office lately. I guess that’s what happens when you “give good voice to good causes,” as her company’s motto states.

On Saturday night, we were invited over to our friends Dave and Brianna’s house for a small get together celebrating Brianna’s birthday. We ate delicious, homemade pizza, we had a nice sampling of bourbon, beer and champagne, and Dave pulled out his new huka. They even broke out the karaoke that night. To everyone else that attended, the neighbors, the neighborhood pets and any planes that were flying overhead, I sincerely apologize for trying to sing along. I know better.

However, Marissa and Brianna busted out a song or two! As the saying goes, “and good times were had by all.”

On Sunday, Mars and I decided to go for our normal run around Greenlake, followed by church and then we got to go sailing with our good friends Rex and Sharon. They have a 42′ Catalina, which we love to sail! We went out in the afternoon and enjoyed some great sailing. The winds were out of the North at 12-15 knots with a slack tide. We even sailed through a group of boats that were racing for Grand Prix. We ducked a few boats and were well ahead of the others to ensure that we caused no issues with rights or affected the racer’s wind.

I even got a few good photos… Although, the iPhone doesn’t handle low light conditions very well. Here is a great shot of Marissa and Rex both fighting over who gets to drive! Funny, Marissa never wants to drive when we go on long road trips…

The photo at the top of the post is of Seattle as we were returning to the marina. Gorgeous, isn’t it?