How lucky am I to have another year of life to celebrate? It has been quite a challenging one, to say the least, so I am hoping to usher in a new year full of wonderful things. Hopefully, you’ll continue to stick around with me to see how wonderful things really get as life continues on.
For today, I wanted to reflect on how the weekend went for me. From being a responsible adult to expecting surprises, I think this was a very calm weekend to usher in this year of my life. I’m hopeful that the rest of the year is just as calm, with more joy if I’m lucky.
Financially Responsible Friday
This is called the financially responsible Friday, because I think as a human who needs money to live in this economy, I did not call out of work even though Friday was the day to celebrate. To hammer in the fiscal responsibility, I fully took advantage of the free birthday drink from Starbucks to get me through my day (someone had gifted me a Starbucks gift card during the year, so cheers to that!).
After work, I came home and made chicken Parmesan for the first time ever with Asanti. It’s not something I typically order, and I thought it was pretty good for a first attempt. Asanti wanted the cheese to melt a little differently, so that will probably be a note for next time.
Another possible title of this blog was going to be “The Weekend of Pluribus,” because we ended up watching the Apple TV series every day of the weekend. We watched a few episodes while eating dinner together, and then went to bed.
Saturday of Surprises
Since I worked the day before, I thought I would sleep in on Saturday, but that actually didn’t happen. We woke up pretty early, started on our laundry, and continued watching Pluribus. Maybe I was excited to see what my surprise was going to be, because Asanti said he had a surprise date for me on this day. Or maybe we were both just excited to watch Pluribus and see what happened next, and that was the real reason we were both up early.
When we got hungry, we went out for brunch. I love First Watch, and actually had a birthday coupon where it was buy one entrée, get one free, which was perfect for the two of us. I always get a skillet hash because I love potatoes, and this time I tried the seasonal Chimichurri steak and eggs hash. It was good, but I kind of hate that the seasonal items don’t include the normal side of toast and fruit. For me, it makes the meal more well-balanced, but so it goes.
Asanti went home and took a nap, and I went home to get ready while he napped. I was told to dress nice, so I went with an evening dress and nice heels, which I regretted once I found out how much walking was involved.
We went to The Boheme first, which is a lovely restaurant attached to The Bohemian hotel in downtown Orlando. I had never been before, and when I walked in and saw the piano player in the entryway, I said, “Oh, this is it. There must be something special about this restaurant.” I assumed that because my hint of what was in store for the night was that music would be involved.
It turns out that the piano was a coincidence, because the reason we were at the restaurant was because they were apparently one of the best people in Orlando to serve my favorite dessert. Obviously, taste is subjective because I have had better. What I can say is that the vibes were great and so were the cocktails. And of course, I am always happy to just have time with Asanti.
After dinner, we walked to my actual surprise, which made me wish that I had picked more sensible shoes. I followed directions though, and I believed we looked great for the candlelight concert that Asanti surprised me with. We saw strings renditions of Hans Zimmerman scores, which was a unique experience. It’s something we never experienced before, and it was a cool thing to surprise me with and start this chapter of my life with.
Walking back the way we came wore me out for the evening, and we pretty much went to bed once we got home. To give you an idea of how much pain I was in, I hopped in the shower and nearly hopped back out because the hot water made the blisters on my feet feel like they were being fried. It was bad.
Slow Sunday
You would think that my body would’ve slept in after the pain I put it through, but it turned out that my circadian rhythm is just good at keeping me steady. We woke up early again and spent the first half of the day watching Pluribus. For breakfast, we had some of the leftover chicken Parmesan.
We finished all of it. They’ve definitely left room for a season two, and now my husband and I have an Apple TV subscription. That’s handy, since I know I’ve been wanting to watch Lessons in Chemistry, and since I’ve put the Hulu/Disney Plus subscription on pause…
Once we finished that, Asanti went to play games and I went to hang out with my sister. We walked Damian and crafted a bit until my other sister came home. That was the signal to order dinner.
We ordered Chinese food, and then Asanti put Madagascar on the TV for us to watch. This came about because when he asked me what I thought about the candlelight concert, I said that it made me want to watch Madagascar. I had never seen it before, and I wanted context.
It was a good time. We watched the sequel that featured the penguins after, which he thought was the better movie. My thoughts were that penguins made me reminisce on my middle school days when I was obsessed with them, and then seeing the octopus made me want to read and watch Remarkably Bright Creatures. That is now on my docket for this year.
And I hope other, brighter things happen throughout this year of my life. Do you have anything you’re excited about this coming year? Have you been to a candlelight concert? How did you spend your weekend? Let me know in the comments below!
As always, thank you for taking the time to read this blog. If you enjoyed it, please let me know by liking this post, commenting your thoughts down below, and sharing it with your friends. And of course, you could always subscribe to the blog so that you don’t miss a thing that I put out, which would be a nice birthday gift to me.
Love Always,
Kristi My ❤
Kristi My Dao 