62. Visit 5 of the Smithsonian museums. [1/5]

One of the best parts about working in the DC area? We celebrate President’s Day – which means we have the day off! Woo hoo! This President’s Day I decided to actually be productive and try to do something off of my 101 List. So I decided to head into the city and visit the Smithsonians. I was initially planning to go to 2 museums – the Natural History Museum and the American History Museum. I started off at the Natural History Museum. If you haven’t been in a while – I totally recommend going. By far, this still remains one of my favorite museums. I hadn’t been since our 9th grade field trip and so much had changed. They modernized some of the displays – specifically the Aquatic Life and the Mammals section – which were so awesome. I got so engulfed in the displays that I ended up being there for four hours! Suffice to say I didn’t make it to the American History Museum. Here’s some of the highlights of what I saw that day.

84. Visit 10 places on the 1001 Places You Must Visit Before You Die list. [3-4/10]

I love when one task can cross-check with another one. I mentioned last week in one of my updates that I went to New Orleans for work. While I was there, I got to cross of 2 more locations for this task!

#3 - The French Quarter

My first day in New Orleans was a calmer day so I decided to take advantage of not having to do some stuff for work just yet - so I took a walk down to the French Quarter to the shops. The day ended up being more exciting than I was expecting it to be. What I thought would just be a laid back touristy walk – ended up being much more eventful! The Annual Creole Tomato festival was going on that day. Tons of food vendors were there with their tomato dishes. There were tomatoes everywhere . Even had people dressed up as tomatoes! Too bad I didn’t get pictures of this. I thought that was going to be the highlight for the day. NEGATIVE. Lol. Apparently, that day there was also a Nude Bike Ride through the French Quarter as well. This – I did get pictures of which you can enjoy below …LOL… along with more pictures of the French Quarter.

#4 - The New Orleans Restaurant Scene

New Orleans has got to have some of the yummiest food - and I’m not even into Cajun food. This was my 2nd trip to New Orleans and i knew it wouldn’t be complete without my trip to Mother’s. Some of the yummiest food in New Orleans. A definite must do if and when you go.

Of course, another must-do is Café Du Monde. The beignet’s were seriously delicious! I bought a box of the mix to make at home but I know it won’t be as good as the real thing. Don’t expect to be neat when eating the beignets – half of the experience is getting the powdered sugar all over yourself! Haha. I’m not a coffee drinker but I ordered the café au lait as well – yum!

29. Get a Kitchen-Aid Mixer.

i seriously have some of the most awesome friends ever! My 30+ birthday recently passed last week. In following tradition of past birthdays, I asked for the day off. I firmly believe noone should have to work on his or her birthday. The day should be celebrated! Which is what i do - it seems as i have gotten older, i have chosen to celebrate in a much more relaxing fashion than years past - haha - but i guess that's what old age does to you. But i digress...

Let me get to my point. I had dinner with my fabulous friend Kat G. at Lebanese Taverna on my birthday (i'm seriously addicted to the baba ghannouge there). After dinner, she gave me my birthday card, explaining to me that my present was in the car. I opened my birthday card which looked hilarious on the front cover (and somewhat sounded true to life of our conversations with my friends - particularly Kats' part lol) - here's the card below:

i didn't quite understand why she had written names of some friends underneath each old lady. I was literally confused but continued to read the card anyways. The card ended up being from the girls who were named on the front - with a little hint to "bake some cupcakes". I still had no clue to what was going on. While we walked to Kat's car, my brain gears were turning, trying to decipher the hint that was written in the card - and after a few minutes, i thought of my 101 list. Could it be?! Did these girls get me what i think they had gotten me? And the answer was YES!!!

We got to Kat's car and she opened the trunk. It's like the clouds parted for a few seconds and then my vision became clear. There, sitting in her trunk was a KITCHEN-AID MIXER! It was like a dream - it was so surreal. I fell in love instantly... i absolutely loved loved LOVED it! :) What i loved more was that i was totally surprised - i wasn't even expecting it - and that my friends totally got me! May i introduce my new partner-in-crime in the kitchen...i'm still trying to come up with a name for her :)

I'm totally loving the red color! So what shall i make first? Cupcakes? French macaroons? Cookies? or how about all of the above? Thank you Jea, Kat, Kats and Rowena - you girls rock! <3

What's your favorite thing to bake?

18. Read the entire Harry Potter series. - [4-5/7]

So i've continued in my challenge of reading the entire Harry Potter series.  While I enjoy the literary company of Mr. Potter, Mr. Weasley and Miss Granger, I still can't say that I'm a hardcore HP fan.  The books are very well written, but reading them doesn't keep me on my toes like the Twilight series did.  Maybe i'm just biased since i'm a Twifan - maybe not.  Either way, i'm stoked that i only have 2 more books left in the series.  However, looking at those 2 books beside each other is frightening.  They're larger than all my books that i read in college.  I've taken a break from good ol' Harry - but we shall reunite soon.  Lord...please give me the motivation and strength that i need to make it through these next 2 books.  lol. 

Photos from Amazon.com

67. Participate in at least one "26 Things" project, past or present.

I’m fortunate that I get to travel for work during the year.  It is a Catch-22 of course.  While it’s fun to actually travel and see new places and the best part of all, it’s on the company’s dime… sometimes it does have its downfalls because I’m either way too busy to actually go around the city or I’m just simply exhausted after the work day that all I want to do is lay down in bed and sleep.   

Last year, work brought me to New Orleans again for a trip.  The first time I went was for my first business trip with my company – again, for a conference – back in 2006.  We were the first major conference coming to the city after Hurricane Katrina.  Even though it was months since the hurricane happened, the city was still healing and was still greatly affected by the turmoil of that monster storm.  Shops were still closed, the convention center was still being cleaned out (and yes, our conference was in the same convention center that thousands of people sought refuge at), etc.  When I went back last June, it was definitely still healing, but it was in much better shape than my trip in 2006. 

I decided to choose New Orleans as my “26 Things” project.   While most “26 Things” projects deal with certain words that you use to capture a photo, I decided to go with the theme of the alphabet – using things around the city – architecture, signs, etc. – to capture images for this task.  Some were more difficult that others - but for the most part it was pretty fun trying to be more attentive to detail while i walked around the city looking for the letters.  Below is a compressed photographic souvenir of my trip.  Click to see it up-close! 

42. Watch all of AFI's Top 100 Movies. [100/100]

 Photo from theimitatedlife.net

It's the end of an era... of these boring blog updates about the AFI's Top 100 films - because I have FINALLY finished this task!  Hallelujah (can you hear the angels singing?!)  I finally finished my final movie on December 21, 2010.  Like I mentioned when I first started watching movies on this challenging list, I could undertand why most of the movies made the list.  However, there were some movies that I would have expected to see on this list that weren't.  While I could appreciate that some movies on this list made it because it was groundbreaking in its time, I'm pretty sure other movies in that era would have been better.  And seriously - Citizen Kane was #1?  Someone please explain to me why because I still beg to differ.

Anyhow, here were my favorites (in no particular order) from the list that I would definitely recommend for your viewing pleasure.  You've already probably seen most of these since it seems that I tended to favor the more recent films than the old black & whites ones.

• Toy Story
• Saving Private Ryan
• The Godfather
• Schindler's List
• Star Wars
• E.T.
• To Kill a Mockingbird
• Sound of Music
• North by Northwest
• Raiders of the Lost Ark
• Shawshank Redemption
• Platoon
• Goodfellas
• Ben-Hur

Let's get this blog updated, shall we?

It's been over a year since I've really really updated my blog.  According to my countdown timer, I've got less than 300 days left...eek!  So with that said, let's get this blog updated!  I'm pretty sure i can guarantee that my blog posts will be out of order in terms of the chronological order of events.  But i'm okay with that since my ultimate goal is to just have this thing updated - bottom line!  So here we go.  Check back over the next few days to find out what I've been able to cross of my list!