Barn dancing, Mango and old friends

Two weeks back Marcia gave me a call about a barn dance that was happening at a place called Pie Ranch, just north of Santa Cruz. We hit the road just as the sun was setting, top down and the most beautiful sunset. We stopped at a local café just short of the Ranch – fab food. The “barn” is just off highway 1 and really is a barn! The place was packed with a live band and a guy who called the moves. I’ve never square danced…..it was hilarious fun. People were really into it. Really eclectic crowd, friendly and good clean fun. Dance is dry, just as well if folk were drinking it could get really untidy, the place was so packed.

Following day, with record temperatures, I headed off to Big Sur on the bike. WOW, this is the most beautiful ride. The coastline is honestly breath taking. I rode down by myself, about 80miles south of Santa Cruz, along the coast

line. The weather was scorching hot so I got to try out my new summer weight bike jacket and gloves. Perfect - I’m not one for shorts and teeshirts on the bike!
Sim has arrived to stay for a few weeks. She’s camping out in my spare room, changing out with my roomie Ruby on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. Over the weekend we (Michelle, Sim, Dee and I) headed off to San Fran to go to a “tea dance” – read dance held outside (mostly), starting at 3pm and heaving with people! It’s mostly for women of colour but all welcome. It was great fun and nobody cared how anybody looked or danced…..my kind of venue. Afterwards Marcia joined us and we went off to a fundraiser for the group Marcia works with in San Francisco (El/La Transgender Latina HIV Prevention Program). These girls were wildly funny and even got some audience engagement! Sunday was mostly a day of recovery as we drove back from San Fran at about 1am in the morning.
Life certainly isn’t dull!

OMIGOD - this is fantastic!

So YouTube won't let me embed this....this link might work.  If it doesn't go to YouTube and search.....Susan Boyle - Singer - Britains Got Talent 2009 (With Lyrics).  It might not be around forever on YouTube so get in quick if you are interested.

Les Mis is my all time favourite musical...but this is quite the thing to watch!  It is somewhere between "why not me" and "I have too much to lose".

New car, Dinah Shaw and commitment

So I went and bought a car....I didn't actually intend to buy one, it was a spontaneous moment!   I had reached the point where I realized only having the bike (yeah I still have the bike!) wasn't quite workable.  I really only went to look at the car - rode the bike to San Jose, took her for a test ride and....bought her.  She's an 06 Mazda MX5 Miata and (as Marcia says) as close as you can get to a motorcycle in a car.  She's fun and has me feel entirely rewarded for the last few months of never ending work (that's my story, sticking with it).

Dinah Shaw in Palm Springs was last weekend.  It was great to see everyone and the house we stayed in was as grand as expected.  The whole event was very Southern California (very L-Word) so not exactly my thing but I really did

 enjoy myself and the "sights" ....Katy Perry (I Kissed a Girl) sang at the White Party, which was fun- I danced alot and had lots of laughs watching folk, quite an eye opener.  We also went to the "pool party".  100s of women all in various states of undress, music blasting and more than enough going on to keep everyone 

entertained.  The NZ gals were in fine form and held up remarkably well given they had travelled.  I've never been to Palm Springs before and as part of the adventures we went up the Cable Car which takes you just over 8000ft up the mountain then there is a huge park where you can hike.  It was incredibly beautiful and, get this....we hit snow.Given Palm Springs is in the desert it was an odd shift in mindset.  A couple of us then went on a self guided architecture tour....very interesting. It was so lovely to not be working, see the kiwi gals and relax. Coming back to work has been funny (and predictably full on).  This week I've had to repeat myself several times when talking - I clearly took on Kiwiana again and my accent came back in full force, it's always there but there's no doubt that spending time with Kiwi's brings it on even more!

As to commitment, well I've signed on for a second year in my little cottage.  I'm still open to the house buying but want to see how the next financial quarter goes.  It really is tough times here.  Lots of layoffs and you can't be complacent about having a job.  Work continues to be very busy, complex and full of challenges.  My boss is incredibly supportive and I've learnt alot about budgets, she also lets me get on and do my thing so it works for me.  I am also enjoying the role I have with the consultancy I work for - building business and day-to-day client liaison.  It does make for some stressful times when I have to manage small dramas but I feel like my skills have expanded hugely and I now have a far better sense of how business works here.  I've been very fortunate to land where I have and love the share size and complexity of Cisco.  In the Valley people acknowledge the different type of characters that can and do successfully work for the various companies e.g. HP, Microsoft, Google, Yahoo etc etc. Cisco is, apparently, closer to HP in culture....must be true there are a huge number of ex.HP workers at Cisco!