Moving pt 1

Hey everybody! Lots has happened in the past week.

I packed up my valuables into my Nissan Sentra and tossed the rest in the dumpster or just left it in my apartment for the cleaning people to deal with (my security deposit was just $150 and $75 was unrefundable, so no big whoop). A few large items were given away or sold to good homes.

I guess it'll just be easier to give y'all the run down:

Saturday Nov 18th

I woke up early after going to bed late to finish packing the car.

Then I had lunch with Marivonne and Luo at an awesome Chinese restaurant. We ordered so much that we had to be moved to a big round table with a lazy susan. I tried a couple new dishes that I loved including honey batter fried fish served cold. But my favorite, if I HAD to choose, would have to be the potstickers that were soooo insanely good and a lot better than any other than I've had. Even though we had so many dishes, we were envious of other tables that were ordering duck and got that to go.

Stuffed and ready to burst, we drove back to my apt so that they could buy my T.V. and DVD player. Thank you Marivonne!!! That money really helped :)

Shortly after they left, Grace called. She had arrived at Hobby Airport!

I picked her up and we drove back to my apt to finish the last of the car packing while she snacked on the Bejing duck take-out.

Then I took her on a driving tour of the medical center. The tall buildings fooled her into thinking it was downtown. And as I was pointing out the M.D. Anderson skybridge that crosses 2 streets and spans at least a quarter mile, we got PULLED OVER by U.T. police. Apparently I rolled through a stop sign. Honestly this fake cop had nothing else to do on a Saturday as the medical center is DEAD on the weekends. Ah well, I got a written warning, LOL.

Since I no longer have access into the building, we continued our driving tour. I drove through Montrose and along Westheimer to the Galleria. I have NEVER been to the Galleria on a Saturday evening. I know better than that. So thank goodness, over 4 years, I had finally learned other parking options at the Galleria. For homebodies like us, a Saturday at the Galleria was a little overwhelming. I took Grace to the Louis Vuitton and insisted that we were still in a mall that has a Sbarro's and Claire's. Then we walked around and got lost trying to find a store that had the M.A.C. lipstick in Misty in stock. And, not that they are rare, but I was glad that Grace was able to spot the quintessential Galleria shopper: Middle aged rich woman dressed like her 14 year old daughter.

After we had just enough of the strange world that is the upscale mall, we headed back to the medical center because Marivonne was in the lab and could let us in. I was able to introduce my friends to each other, show Grace around the lab, and print out another copy of the map. It was getting late, so I said farewell to the lab one last time and said my goodbyes to Marivonne.

Grace and I then met up with Katrina and Will at Amazon Grill. It took forever for them to give Grace her salad but other than that it was good and super yummy as always. Grace got to taste the magical dressing and the soupy kind of tres leches that is common in Houston and nothing like the one she had for her wedding from Richmond's CubaCuba restaurant.

Since we couldn't leave town without going to Dessert Gallery, it was time for second dessert. Sure we had one dessert already. But what was there to stop us to have another??? I had the Luscious Lemon cake and Grace had the Chocolate Pecan pie a la mode. Needless to say, we didn't finish.

Grace and I had to get up early the next morning so we bode farewell to Katrina and Will, but not without snapping another Aznz Rule Peace out photo (this one is actually from earlier that week).

Even though I'm glad to be out of Houston, I will miss my friends. Thanks for a fantastic last day.

I'll post more about the rest of the trip later.