1. celebrating Sarah's citizenship at a BBQ in our backyard with lots of friends. highlight of the Springtime (it felt like August in PDX). I'm soaking it up as much as I can before the real summer weather starts.

2. birthday week! i got so many emails, calls, FB messages & cards yesterday. felt so wonderful, especially because i'm so far from so many people i care about! i had a paper due & and exam yesterday, but it still felt like a special day. we went to dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant, where they served tacos on hum boa (they looked like this). Sarah bought me a red velvet cake & i blew out the candles as the tornado raged outside (but more on that later).

3. Sarah & I road tripped out to Tibodeaux on Tuesday night so she could check out a place to live this summer. she'll be working for the office of public health out there, doing disaster preparation. Tibodeaux is only about an hour and a half away, but it feels like the middle of nowhere; the drive is really green (and it's this tropical, bright green that is so different from the PNW). we saw lots of trailer parks, farms, armadillo road kill, roadside daiquiri stands, and lots of houses floating on swamps and set up on stilts. we looked around the place, ate fried chicken & then headed back home.

4. i've been doing crossfit for the past two weeks! i'm enrolled in the fundamentals series, which teaches you how to do all the movements. i've been doing lots and lots of squats, lunges, and pull-ups. it's in a warehouse in mid-city, and the class is at 6:30 AM twice a week. it's totally weird, but i always like trying something new.

i'll post again about yesterday's crazy weather when i have more time! Happy Thursday!