NEWLOVE

I am still amazed by how invigorating New York can be. I don’t know if it’s all the wonderful friends I have here that I so rarely get to see or if it’s the energy of the city itself but I am always so inspired and motivated after each and every trip to this place. I really do freaking love New York.

Today I got to see old friends as well as meet new people and have a few really exceptional meals. Tomorrow will be more of the same, I’m sure. I definitely need to schedule more frequent trips to New York.

I’m finally in New York after a 6 hour lay-over. Ixel picked me up from the airport and we had a great time partying in Chelsea. We met up with Kirsten, Mo, Mariana and Michael. Then we went to lots of different bars/clubs. All I know is that I didn’t wipe out (unlike last night.)

Teresa, Jesse and friends joined me last night to celebrate Teresa’s 30th in Sarasota. Unfortunately, there was too much drinking involved and I spent a majority of the evening in the Ladies Room with a puking friend. When it was time to go, I got body-checked and fell to the ground with my head out the front door and my feet still inside the club in such an embarrassing way that I couldn’t bring myself to go back in. We got Teresa out and home safely and shortly thereafter, without sleep, I went to the airport with Tara. (Thank goodness for Tara.)

Tomorrow, I might meet up with a myriad of different people and Ian and Gregg get back from Norway. Yay!

Samantha woke me up yesterday asking, “Gahbaamah?” After making her repeat herself a hundred times I realized she was saying “Go to mall?!” Apparently Teresa had run down our schedule for the day with the kids before sending them upstairs to wake me.

We went to a French café for breakfast with the 2 younger kids after dropping Morgan off for school. Then we went to the mall. Samantha decided pink is her favorite color and we got big red balloons to amuse her and Simon, both of which popped but didn’t cause the intense crying scene I expected.

Teresa and I relaxed at home for a few hours and chatted over tea after our exhausting shopping frenzy. It was the calm before the storm. We had no idea the magnitude of the comedy of errors on the horizon. At 3:40 she looked at me and wondered aloud why her husband, Jesse, wasn’t home yet. I was to leave no later than 4pm for the airport. I told her I wasn’t worried about Jesse yet but to check back in with me at quarter past four. We went back to our conversation.

At four o’clock Jesse walked in. For some reason, I thought he was picking up Morgan (the almost 10 year old) from school on his way home. He apparently thought we were picking her up. Oh no! Where’s Morgan?! Poor thing. The last thing she said when we dropped her off was, “Please, please, please don’t be late picking me up!” Oh well, it’s not like she was abandoned. There is after-care at her school, luckily. So if a child isn’t picked up on time, the child gets put into the after-school babysitting service. What a great idea!

Teresa and I were finally on the road to the airport at a little past four and thought everything would be fine since it’s only 50 miles away. Two hours and miles and miles of jammed-up traffic later, we arrived at the airport with only the faintest shred of hope that I would make my plane. I jumped out of the car and Teresa began to drive away. “Wait!” I yelled as I banged on her car. “My bags are in the trunk!” She popped the trunk and I retrieved my bags as I realized her cell phone was in one of her other cars. “What am I going to do if I don’t get on this plane? How will I reach you? Your cell phone is in the green car.” She replied, “No problem, my husband’s blackberry is in here somewhere.”

I fished out the blackberry and tried to turn it on. No juice. “Teresa! It’s dead!” She replied, “No problem. I’m sure there’s a charger in here somewhere. We’ll just plug it in.” I find thirteen different car chargers, plugs, adapters, wires, all sorts of things but none of which function to bring power to the blackberry. Teresa says she’ll meet me at the gate but I don’t know what gate to tell her so we decided we’ll meet at the train that takes you to the gates. I run into the airport.

I got to the counter and the attendants laughed at me before printing out my United ticket and telling me they had no more flights that evening to NYC but that I should try to check in with USAir. So I tell them to be on the lookout for a very tall, thin woman with short hair and a black top and khakis who might be running in here any minute frazzled and looking around like she’s lost. They said, “What’s her name?”

I ran over to USAir and waited and waited in line. When I finally get up to an attendant, the lady was pissed that United decided to burden her with my problems. She was very nice, though, and got me the last seat on the last flight out to New York through Philly. She charged me $100 even though she claimed I should be paying at least $700 and I agreed.

While she processed it all, a few minutes went by and Teresa somehow found me. She had been driving around and around the airport, repeatedly missing the short-term parking. On her third try, she got into the parking lot and parked her car and then went the wrong direction on the elevators, ended up on the wrong side of the airport and had to click her heals three times and sing a merry tune before she finally got it right.

By the time the ticketing agent was ready to hit “print” for my boarding pass, THE SEAT HAD ALREADY BEEN TAKEN!! So I am still in Florida although I hear the weather in New York is great today. Oh well. As it turns out, Jesse hadn’t understood that I was leaving Thursday and he had planned Teresa’s big birthday night for Friday night - not Monday (her actual birthday) as I had previously understood it. So now I get to be a part of the birthday party. Yay!

Unfortunately, Ixel is wasting away without me as a drinking buddy in New York. (Teresa just asked me if Ixel was still teaching and I said, “Yep. Working on her second year in the Bronx.” Samantha said, “Bronx?” Teresa said, “Wow, she must be a tough girl.” Samantha piped in, “Tuff grrrl. Me tuff grrrl too.” I FREAKING LOVE THIS KID!)

Oh, and for you owl fans, Samantha is still obsessed. We were coloring before her nap and all of a sudden she shouted “OWL!!” There is a tiny owl statue in the play room that must’ve caught her eye. I can’t wait for Brad to meet her.

So when I posted yesterday, Samantha (the almost 3 year old) had just entered the computer room and demanded my attention. So I quickly finished writing and clicked “Publish Now” and then watched as the new post appeared on my blog. To simultaneously entertain her while I was finishing up, I pointed to the picture of me on my blog and told her “That’s me. That’s Aunt Kathleen.” She looked at me with a HUGE smile and exclaimed, “So cute!” I love her.

I said, “Thank you. That’s a nice thing to say.” She repeated, “You’re cute. So cute.” Then I replied, “Thanks, Sam. You’re cute too.” And in her tiniest of voices, as if to indicate that she has humility, she said, “Thank you.”

Today, the children were a little less angelic than they were yesterday but still super cute (when not consumed with screaming, crying or temper tantrums.) Brad would be falling all over himself in love with these kids if he was here. He loves kids.

While we were watching Elmo do a tap dancing number as baby Simon napped, Sammy was engrossed in Elmo and kept announcing, “Elmo!” to us all in case our attentions were diverted with adult conversations and the like. Then, there was a segment with Elmo and Julia Roberts throughout which Sammy remained perfectly silent. Then, there was a very Sargeant Pepper-ish slash Yellow Submarine “music video” with Elmo singing lead vocals. Throughout this video, Sam kept perfectly quiet and perfectly still. All of a sudden, she shouted “OWL!” and I looked up. Sure enough, there was Brad’s best friend the Owl on tv - who knew he was so famous?!

I wanted to surprise my friend, Teresa, on her 30th birthday by paying a visit to her house - in Florida. I booked my ticket a few weeks ago and knew that since I was working the Oscars that I would not be able to leave Sunday night. So, I booked the earliest ticket out Monday morning which meant we had to leave for the airport at 4am. Since I am not a morning person and can barely function at that time, I stayed up all night puttering around with my new phone and syncing contacts from my address book and such.

My flight was at 6am, and after 25 minutes in the security line (I would have had to wait almost an hour and a half if I didn’t get to skip the line due to my premier status with the airline) I barely made it to the gate on time. When I changed flights in Denver, I had such a short layover that I almost had to run to catch my next flight in a different terminal. I plopped down in my seat right as the purser came on the PA system to inform us that something was wrong with the luggage hatch and it’d take an hour or so to fix.

They let us get off the plane and an hour and a half later, we reboarded the flight. As soon as I plopped down in my seat, the purser came on the PA again to let us know that now something was wrong with something else on the plane that needed to be fixed, so we’d be delayed even further.

Finally, after another hour, we were on our way. But instead of arriving at Tampa International Airport at 3pm, I landed at some point in the five o’clock hour. That meant, Teresa’s husband was unable to pick me up at the airport since they have 3 kids who need to be picked up from school and chauffeured to ballet classes and such. So we had to ruin Teresa’s surprise and have her pick me up instead when she finished giving her presentation in one of her post-grad classes for her continued studies in mental health. But her class wasn’t finished until 8:30 or so and since I hadn’t slept the night before, it was a long, long day.

But I’m here now and her children are just so precious. Beautiful. We spent the morning walking down by the marina and playing at the playground with the 2 youngest kids while Morgan (almost 10) is at school. We had lunch on the water and now it is time for a nap!

I know it’s been a few days since my last post but it’s been a busy week. I took Thursday and Friday off so I could get my hair cut and colored, buy a new Oscar dress and A NEW PHONE!!! Shut up, I know!

Here’s a picture of me talking on my fabulous new phone. I haven’t quite yet figured out my bluetooth headset. I finally figured out how to turn it on and off but sometimes it does weird things that I can’t anticipate.

Thank you to Dana “Dance Party” Power who patiently waited by my side while the Cingular dude did his thing.

And here’s a photo of me and Brad at the Oscars, outside the ballroom.

And can I just tell you how hot George Clooney is in person?

I forget how much I love my work friends from The Casting Studios sometimes because I don’t get to hang out with them enough outside of work.  The last two nights in a row I have had dinner with some of them and have enjoyed myself thoroughly.  I love you guys!