Of Coming Home, Virgin Margarita And Town Clean Up

After a long drive yesterday from San Jose to Ripon, I made these drinks, "Virgin Margarita" (because there is no tequila) to refresh us before dinner. It was excellent! I put on mint leaves to make it more appetizing. They were taken from my own garden that has survived two spring seasons now (they die at winter then sprout again each spring). For late lunch at 4 PM, I cooked my dad's favorite "Chorizo" a'la Chinatown Manila (served with slash of onions and vinegar with sugar) with steamed rice. Over dinner, I baked then broiled drumsticks (with turmeric, cumin, garlic powder, lemon and saffron) and made "Thai Spicy Noodle Salad." Tasted good!

Husband and I had a long day yesteday driving from Mariott Hotel in San Jose to Hayward where he dropped off his PC at his company's tech support guy's office (husband's laptop won't boot after the initial boot up). Husband's work rely heavily on internet use, email, palm pilot, long haul driving, etc..so when his PC breaksdown, he can't work and make business transactions. Ayayay! That is why even in his work van, he has internet connection in his laptop, portable printer, blue tooth headphone, etc- so all would be a breeze in terms of information technology. Anyhow, from Hayward we drove fast to San Francisco (to check out the apartment in Sutter- yikes! Not to our liking-ayayay!) then went to Pleasanton (bought the moving boxes). Finally (***sigh***), we were home in Ripon; left at 10 AM from San Jose and finally making it at 3 PM at last! Seeing my plants needed watering, I at once watered them. They were all right. In fact, my roses were flowering a lot- the lemon and lime trees are starting to bear fruits...from the flowers last week! The drip system works!

Today is a Saturday and I thought it was a Sunday (this happens since I stopped working two years ago)! We'd discard stuff we don't need at home in accordance to our annual town cleaning up. We started discarding things last Monday before we left. So far some people had taken our stuff for the town's annual pick up from home to home. A lot of folks do this- would drive around Ripon and pick up things that could be useful to them and put them in their trucks. This is what happens usually- so before the town truck picks up the stuff, they are mostly smaller in volume- which could be good in a way. It's like the week for people who are into this "finder's keeper's gallore." The trend is for people to start putting out their stuff a week before the clean-up date comes.

For our part we had put out a lot of office supplies, refrigeration parts, work out apparatus, lots of clothes (size large shirts, shorts and slacks for men- as well as women's petite M and L cocktail dresses, shirts and slacks). We also had comforters, bric-a-brac, luggage, iron, brand new underwear for my father-in-law, night table, stand lamp, skiing wardrobe, golf shoes, etc. These were meant for our planned "estate sale" but last minute, husband said to just dump the whole stuff in front of our garage for this year's 2006 annual town clean up. In a way it is good as we didn't have to go through time and space of waiting for the yard sale date to happen then discard the left over. Last year, whatever was left, we donated to the Thrift Shop downtown and the owner, bitch- was not even grateful to us. Mamamia! Surely, we could have earned like $400 or more if we sold those on a yard sale but we are now limited by time and space. Preparation to moving and relocation takes a lot of time. Husband didn't want to burden ourselves of "what-to-do-with-these-now" once the dust settles.

I was excited to check out what happened when we were driving near our house yesterday from our week's stay in San Jose. So far so good- only a few items were left! Official collection of appliances and other huge chunks of things start Monday next week.

Today, we will start packing and fill the 75 pieces of moving boxes we purchased yesterday at Pleasanton. We hope to get an apartment of our choice. We have been picky so far. It has to be in the location we like- Nob Hill or Lower Nob Hill. I'll see how it goes in the days to come!