I’m in Portland, OR for CHI. We have a booth to help with recruiting and it came out fairly nice. The best part are our giveaways. Green goo. They’re going really fast!

We got married the day after Christmas, in Sao Paulo, Brazil at the Casa da Fazenda. The best part of the wedding (aside, of course, from the whole bit about getting married) was that my mom did all of the planning while we just got updates here in California.

For anyone who’s planning on getting married, I highly recommend this approach.

We were not as smart when planning for our honeymoon. We decided that since we had friends and family flying from the US, that we’d all go up to my parents house in Bahia.

That was actually a great idea, their place is awesome and it felt like being in paradise.

The bad part was that we decided to rent a bus to get all of us there so that our guests could see other parts of Brazil.

The drive up took three days, we couldn’t stand the sight of the bus by the end of it. Luckily, we had planned to fly back to Sao Paulo.

Flying to Reno tomorrow for a one hour meeting. Ugh! That should give you an insight into why I haven’t written much lately. Things are crazy busy.

As usual, I copied this from Jenny’s awesome blog. The places I’ve visited are in bold text.

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1. The Grand Canyon
2. Great Barrier Reef
3. Florida
4. South Island
5. Cape Town
6. 6 Golden Temple
7. Las Vegas
8. Sydney
9. New York
10. Taj Mahal
11. Canadian Rockies
12. Uluru
13. Chichen Itza/Mexico
14. Machu Picchu/Peru
15. Niagara Falls
16. Petra/Jordan
17. The Pyramids/Egypt
18. Venice
19. Maldives
20. Great Wall of China
21. Victoria Falls/Zimbabwe
22. Hong Kong
23. Yosemite National Park
24. Hawaii
25. Auckland/New Zealand
26. Iguassu Falls
27. Paris
28. Alaska
29. Angkor Wat/Cambodia
30. Himalayas/Nepal
31. Rio de Janeiro/Brazil
32. Masai Mara/Kenya
33. Galapagos Islands/Ecuador
34. Luxor/Egypt
35. Rome
36. San Francisco
37. Barcelona
38. Dubai
39. Singapore
40. La Digue/Seychelles
41. Sri Lanka
42. Bangkok
43. Barbados
44. Iceland
45. Terracotta Army/China
46. Zermatt/Switzerland
47. Angel Falls/Venezuela
48. Abu Simbel/Egypt
49. Bali
50. French Polynesia

10 out of 50 is nothing to be proud of (especially when 2 places are in Brazil and I used to live in SF). Even more embarrassing is the fact that I’ve never been to Yosemite. Although I’m really not an outdoorsy nature person so I really have no desire to visit many of these places. So I’ve highlighted in Italics the places that I still would like to visit.

For other lists, check out the Travel Channel and Lonely Planet sites.

1,000 Places to See Before You Die

Patricia Schultz. Workman Publishing Company 2003, Paperback, 972 pages, $19.95

Row 22, Seats A & B CD set (Canfield & Mackenzie, Publishers)

Scott Brick (Narrator). Canfield & Mackenzie, Publishers 2006, Audio CD,

I really enjoyed one of these stories which I got to read on the plane’s magazine.

This was probably one of the craziest business trips I have ever been in. On our way back, we had a lot of time to kill (see the end of this post) so we came up with the following stats:
3 days
3 girls
5 airports (6 if you count LAX)
4 airplanes
1 train
5 Lincoln Town Cars
2 cabs
2 hotel shuttles
2 hotels
2 hotel breakfasts
2 lunch meetings
2 in-room movies
12 hours to fly from Boston to San Francisco

Yep, it took us 12 hours to get from Logan to SFO. We left Boston at 1:30 PM Pacific Time. We connected in Denver at 7:30 PM PST. We were supposed to arrive in SF at 9:30 PM PST. At around 9:00 PM, the pilot informed us that we were being diverted to LA because of strong winds and a terrible storm. We landed in LAX at 10:30 PST. They kept us I the plane the whole time. We had only been served a half a sandwich in the flight from Boston to Denver and a small bag of party mix in the flight from Denver to SF. The flight was packed. We were starving, tired, and cranky. After 3 hours of being stuck in the plane, we took off from LA at 1:00 AM. We landed in SF right before 2:00 AM. I was home at 3:00 AM. I was not happy.

The nice thing about having a birthday in late October (other than the fact that we get to reset our watches on my b-day every seven years or so and I get to party for an extra hour) is that it is followed by Halloween (by far my favorite holiday). Except that I can never decide on a costume. I am now undecided between being a pirate or a 40s gangster. So I bought props for both… What will I do?

PS: I know they are pretty crappy choices but I’m not that creative when it comes to costumes. Plus, there are benefits to both choices. Pirate - get to wear an eye patch, tons of jewelry, I already have the hair, cheesy velvet jacket, red scarf. Gangster - the machine gun and the hat.

It was a good birthday (even though my parents got the date wrong). It started out with a call from Stefan which was a nice surprise (although now I need to find out when his b-day is. 1/5?). Then my sis called, then Sofia, my aunt, etc. I also can’t believe how many gifts I got.
I don’t think I had received these many gifts since I was a kid.

the trip

The trip was actually quite fun, much better than what I had expected. We went to this Hacienda del Sol Thursday night and had a great Spanish meal. There was also this “wine guy” there so we tasted some pretty good wines (all Spanish too). We started out with some sparkling wine then had an ok white wine with the appetizer. We then had this very nice (and cheap) red wine with the main dish and a not so good sherry with dessert. One of the marketing guys managed to bring a couple of bottles of the red wine back in the bus with us so that made the ride back to the hotel that much better. It’s amazing how work people become much more human after a couple of glasses of wine.

The sparkling wine (the bottle was beautiful, the wine was not so nice)

I’m leaving for Tucson AZ in a half hour. For work. I come back Friday night. We have meetings scheduled from 8:00 am to 8:00 pm tomorrow and for most of Friday. This is not fun. Hopefully I won’t be too tired to go out on Friday. I always enjoy the night before my birthday more than the actual birthday day.

VP19 Candy Hearts Valentine Fun Pack

PK Press. Peaceable Kingdom Press 2006, Paperback, 21 pages, $10.00

When you reach into the candy heart bag, there’s no doubt you’re coming up with a fire red heart that reads “Hot Stuff.” It’s not so much a label as it’s your style — turning heads, getting numbers and raising room temperatures a few degrees when you walk through the door.

You’d love someone who could match your flame-throwing ways, but so far, everyone just melts like wax when you turn on the heat.

Got a romantic fireside dinner planned for you and your very own hottie? Better keep a hose nearby because sparks could start flying.

And if you’re still on the prowl, waiting to find someone who can hold their own against your undeniable sense of romance and action, keep a close watch. They’re sure to come around soon when they see your “Hot Stuff” coming their way.

I wish! Which candy heart are you?

Awesome news and not so good news

Ever since I moved from Brazil, I haven’t really been able to travel for fun that much. That’s because I feel guilty if I don’t use my vacation time to go see my family so I always just go back home. That means I don’t get to see too many places. And I love to travel! So I thought I would suggest to my parents that we meet somewhere different for Christmas this year. I thought that their response to the idea was less than enthusiastic but I knew that my sister was on my side. And then, surprise! My mom calls me up last night and says: “How about Barcelona”? Yep, that’s where I’ll be spending Christmas this year. I can’t wait. I’ve always wanted to go there and so did my sister. It will be awesome. I’ve already started tallying up all my vacation to see whether I have enough time off to also spend some time in London. I want to move there eventually but haven’t been there since I was a teenager so I need to make sure I still like it. And then maybe I could go visit my ex in Dublin. Hmm, but what about Germany? Oh wait; I only have 2, maybe 3 weeks off. Oh no, what will I do?

The not so good news? Now I can’t go to Rochester like I had promised Tuna. Rochester or Barcelona? Rochester or Barcelona? Rochester or Barcelona? I think she’ll understand…

I leave tonight. I can’t believe it’s been two weeks already. Well, I better start packing…

I am freezing! It’s about 50 degrees but it’s so humid that it feels like 10.

My hair is very short. I don’t think I’ve had it this short since high school. It will take some getting used to…

Par-tay

My sister threw a party for me last night. It was awesome! It was supposed to be a small get-together but there were 30+ people there. Some were her friends whom I met for the first time and there were also friends of mine whom I hadn’t seen in ages. There was a huge mix of people which is what made the party so much fun:
Mom and dad – yep, they were there but only for a short while since my dad was really tired and he had to catch a plane at 7:00 am today.
Marcio – I went to high school with his brother. My sister ran into him recently and invited him to the party.
Sandrine – Friend of my sister, she’s French and a vegetarian yogi chemical engineer. She brought her two dogs, Charlotte and Charlie. They were adorable.
Marli and Simone – they both work at another magazine at the same publishing company as my sister. Simone writes the sex advice column. How cool is that? Picture this: What do you do? I work for a magazine. Cool, doing what? I’m the sex editor.
Gerson – Simone’s husband.
Nino and Joe – Also friends of my sister. Joe is British so he speaks Portuguese with a cute accent.
Tia Marilda and Tio Brandao – My aunt Marilda is my sister’s friend and a fashion designer. She’s one of the coolest hippest aunts ever. Tio Brandao, her husband, works for an advertising agency and is equally hip and cool.
Giovanna and Boi – Giovanna went to school with my sister. I went to school with her sister, Graziella. Gi is finishing up college; she’s studying fashion design.
Marcelo – my sister’s friend. He’s an interior designer.
Sofia – one of my best friends and ex-roommate. She’s doing her doctorate in molecular biology.
Ana Lucia and her boyfriend – Sofia’s cousin and friend of my sister from school.
Deuke – My sister went to school with his sister.
Mariana and Antonio – my sis’s neighbors. Very cool.
Katrine – sister’s friend, also from France and a photographer.
Girl #1 – I can’t remember her name but she had the cutest northern Brazilian accent.
Girl #2 – Another one whose name I don’t remember.
Guy – Also can’t remember his name but he had a cute outfit on.
Luciana a.k.a. Lu – one of my best friends from high school. She just got back from France three weeks ago (she was there for 4 years). I hadn’t seen her in quite some time. She’s currently looking for a job as a book editor.
Cris and Luna – Cris is Lu’s sister and works at Abril, where my sister works. I think she and her husband are both graphic designers.
Paula a.k.a. Palu – I have known her since 3rd grade. She’s a fashion producer.
Graziella a.k.a. Gra – I have known Gra since 1st grade. She’s an actress.
Pati and Ed – Pati dated my brother several years ago. We liked her some much that we kept her as a part of the family even after they broke up.

The last group of people left around 4:00 am and we stayed up until 5:00 cleaning up. Needless to say, I’m very sleepy. Poor Mikha had to go to work this morning.