29 March 2001 (Thursday)

Thursday was Maddy's real birthday, but as is the case of all my friends, birthdays stretch over the course of a few days. This year, Maddy's birthday extended through the weekend. A group of us (me, Michael, Maddy, Jason, Carrie, Maggie and Nyssa) met up for sushi dinner.

After dinner, we had cookie cake for dessert back at my place. All Maddy had been clamoring for is a "cookie cake! I want a cookie cake!" It was funny because the retard at Mrs. Field's spelled "birthday" as "barthday" so Maddy had a "Happy Barthday Maddy" cookie cake.

We ate about 1/2 of it, and then the other half fell on the floor and over Maggie's shoes.

30 March 2001 (Friday)

I picked up the rental car after work on Friday, and there is something about rental cars that pleases me. I think it's because you can totally make a mess and not worry about cleaning it up. My rental car this time around was a Dodge Intrepid, with only 1300 miles. It still had the new car smell, and it was huge! I looked like a midget behind the wheel of that momma. I drove home, and then Maryann picked me up for Mexican dinner. Then she took me home and I picked up Nyssa for snack shopping and getting ready for the night. We hit Trader Joes and Safeway, and stocked up on road trip snacks. Then we picked up Maryann and Chris and headed down to 111 Minna, for Ubiquity. Some electronica-thingy night that Maryann's company was co-sponsoring. The music was okay, but it had that creepy lurky boy vibe...the kind of scene where there are too many single boys and they tend to lurk around the girls. I looked funny that night - sort of a mix between dyke (capri pants and boots) and urban girl (backless shirt). After kissing Maryann and Juscina good-bye at 11:30, Nyssa and I headed home to bed.

31 March 2001 (Saturday)

The alarm went off at 4:15 am and I could barely rouse myself out of bed. Nyssa was the one coaxing me up. We made it out of the house by 5 and picked up Michael and Maddy for our last snow trip of the season, for Maddy's birthday. We left the Easy Bay around 6, and got caught in traffic barely out of Vallejo. We were routed out of the way because Highway 80 was shut down. As we crept down a parallel road, we could see a yellow body bag, and people scooping guts off the road into plastic baggies. We tried to listen to the news to find out what happened, but never found out.

After that detour, we continued on our way and made it to Sugar Bowl by 9:30. Had all our gear and lift tickets by 10-ish and were on the slopes by 10:30. The snow conditions weren't that great - sort of slushy and sticky but we all made it down intermediate slopes. I kept getting frustrated with myself because I am not too athletically inclined, so I was always last with all my friend whizzing past me. I really can't stand coming in last for anything - I get flashbacks from elementary school, where I was always picked last for kickball.

I learned that it is not good to wear jeans snowboarding. I fell more than usual - once getting off the chairlift, where I skidded down on my ass, twice when I lost control, and the third time was when a snowboarder crashed into me. This nice old man helped me get up because I was in the middle of the slope and could not get up. We had a fun day, regardless of my aggravation with myself. Maddy was snowboarding in a tanktop, and Nyssa was boarding in a T-shirt. They both got pretty sunburned. And Michael's face got pretty burned as well. I applied sunscreen before and after lunch, so I didn't get burned except for on the front of my neck where I forgot sunscreen.

Nyssa's sister has a timeshare in Tahoe (King's Beach), so we stayed there for the night. It's a funny cabin, totally 70s with an 8-track player and shag carpeting. It's huge though - 2 stories with a third story loft. We unloaded our stuff, showered, and headed into King's Beach for dinner. We ate at Steamer's, this pizza/sandwich place, and experienced the best service ever! We ordered a few appetizers and split a couple entrees - the waitress brought our entrees out, already split on two separate plates! This doesn't happen in SF. If you split an entree, you get an extra plate at most. We were amazed. And the bill came so promptly - none of that waving down server business. I love it when the bill comes before you have to ask for it.

I fell asleep at 9:15, and I think everyone else followed shortly thereafter.

01 April 2001 (Sunday)

Sunday morning, me, Michael and Maddy went for a little hike around the complex. From the back blacony, you can see a little stream. So we decided we wanted to play around the little stream while Nyssa showered and packed.

We decided to detour into Tahoe City on our way out, and had brunch at this place called Annie's Cafe. All along Tahoe City is an amazing view of the Lake and snowy mountains - it was beautiful. I know I sound like a cheesey nature lover, but I am a complete urban girl at heart. But. I think in my old age I am more and more appreciating getting out into nature.

The drive home was pretty uneventful, getting stuck in traffic, stopping for fast food. Nyssa and I dropped off Michael and Maddy and then headed into the city to return our rental car. We lost an hour because of daylight savings time and were 10 minutes late into our checkout time, so Dollar tried to charge us an extra two hours! Everyone needs to watch out for this rental car scam - if you are even 1 minute late, they charge you for a full hour and then add sales tax on top of it! So Nyssa blows into the rental office and convinces the rental lady to take off the extra charged time. We think she just wanted us out of her hair, but still, Nyssa did good.