On a lighter note

I’ve been really busy for the last month, particularly for the past two weeks. I’ve been juggling more than a dozen projects at work, plus working on ZeroPercentCards with Van, and a book release site for another client. This weekend was supposed to be a bit of time off aside from some stuff around the house. And for a good part of Saturday, it was just that.

It started with a MUCH-needed morning of sleeping in. Two of the previous 3 nights I had been up until 4:30a.m. and up by 7. So, I slept to a ridiculously late 11:00 in the morning, with my wife keeping the animals occupied and (mostly) out of the bedroom (a feat considering we have no bedroom door right now because we’re rebuilding the door frame). Once I got my lazy butt up, we decided to do something we rarely do anymore – go to the mall and just walk around.

The mall is a pretty big mess right now as they are remodeling about 80% of the place all at the same time (which seems odd if you ask me). We were hoping to hit the remodeled food court for some sushi at Yanagi Too but alas, the mall has only 2 restaurants set up in the new food court – while having the old food court completely under construction. Since Saladworks and DQ/Orange Julius weren’t really what we were looking for, we decided to go hit the only remaining choice – The Bistro – at the other end of the mall. Yes, you read that right – a big mall with only 3 restaurants in the whole place.

But the food was worth it. An open air restaurant with seating around a central ‘kitchen’ in the middle of the mall walkway, the place actually has pretty good food. I got the pepper-crusted tuna ceasar salad, while Shari got Seafood Penne with Vodka Sauce, which was delicious (and probably better than my meal).

After eating, we did that rare thing: shopping. She and I are both relatively anti-shopping, particularly at the mall. As we walked past the stores where we would NEVER go (is the 80’s fashion scheme really coming back?), we had to laugh at how many stores we didn’t even recognize or that had changed since the last time we were there (before Xmas last year). But it was still fun to do a little window shopping and even pick up some new clothes (although she didn’t get any shoes, like she wanted. I’ll never understand the desire for lots of new shoes).

When we were done at the mall proper, we went over to the Container Store and Crate & Barrel. It’s funny, but the stores have been there for over a year, and we always joke about going in (I’m a sucker for cool gadgets and new ideas for how to put up things on my bulletin board) – but we had never made it in. Okay, so we’re strange when it comes to our quests for places to visit. We don’t get out much.

Sunday was spent doing things around the house – and I actually enjoyed doing them. I know that I’ve been so busy and stressed that doing chores has been just that, but this was nice because I did stuff that made the house and yard look better and I had a decent time doing it (sure, I’d rather have been birding, but I could always say that…). It’s nice to be productive AND happy.