Brafftastic has been replaced

While waiting for a chicken quesadilla with Stephen, I started looking in my gigantic purse for something entertaining and came out with my pocket Farkel. Farkel is a game that was first introduced to me as 10,000 several years back while serving my time at BYU. It is a dice game played until someone reaches that magic score of 10,000. The game recently reemerged as Farkel and I am known to take it out in any waiting situation (we are back to the quesadilla). Stephen and I begin our game and quickly decided to raise the stakes and play to 100,000. We also decided that bonus points can be awarded at any time for Farkelrific comments (look who's taking a paaage. . . out of momma's strategy book) and actions (like saving a baby from a burning building). I will be giving periodic updates as to where the score is at in our Farkel. . . to the extreme!

Current Score:
Stephen 37,500
Rachel 37,050*

If for some reason we reach 100, 000 to quickly we will play to 1,000,000. Feel free to place bets.

*It should be noted, mostly because this is MY blog, that I was winning for the majority of the game. Also, the golden gopher has nothing to do with Farkel, aside from being a good time.

Heat waves may be uncomfortable but cold just hurts

My favorite time of the year is the Los Angeles warm winter; that time of year when most of the country is freezing under a grey sky and blanket of dirty snow yet LA is a garden of Eden-like sunny and 75. It is those couple of weeks, typically in late February after some degree of "cold" weather but before any serious rain storms barrel through. It is the time of year when Angelenos are at their most arrogant (why would anyone live anywhere else?) and are able to stop cursing about how bad the traffic is for five minutes.

Today was a prime example of this climate phenomenom. 77 degrees, blue skies interrupted by puffy white clouds, and a breeze just strong enough to make the trees dance; a day so stunning I am writing like a 14 year old girl with a crush.* As if that wasn't enough, I was sent an extra slice of wonderful when I happened upon an alley in downtown Claremont carpeted with little white blossoms from the canopy of trees above. It almost looked like snow on the ground accept it was soft and white, not freezing and wet. Below is a picture of this perfect alley complete with the bright yellow ladder (always useful).

So here is to everyone who has bad things to say about LA. . . enjoy your snow; I'll keep mine.

*I may be having flashbacks to the days of My So-called Life and the crush that every girl had on Jordan Catellano. We all wanted to be dreamy and conflicted just like Angela so we could bag some Jared Leto.