dar

  • A New Fornia Family Member

      


    Mike came home from his business trip on Sunday and we went to breakfast and celebrated his birthday.  I had a special gift for him as well.  His loft, has officially become the newest member of the “Fornia” family of luxury boutique hotels worldwide.  This honor, adds “The Hotel Mikeyfornia” to the pantheon of legendary resorts like The Hotel Careyfornia, in West Hollywood, CA. 


    Founder and General Manager of Fornia Hotels Ltd., Carey Anthony, surprising Mike on his birthday, with the news that his home is now a 5 Star Diamond “Fornia” property!



    Here’s a short video tour of our San Diego flagship hotel, The Hotel Mikeyfornia



    After breakfast we drove over to Coronado Island and the Hotel Del Coronado (a modest property by Fornia Ltd. standards).  While there, I found my next hotel investment:



    We walked along the beach and took some video of the grounds, as well as our trip back over the bridge:



    It was a picture perfect California day:

    I had Vivek take this out the window while driving over the bridge at 60 mph.



















    On the way home we stopped in Mission Viejo for Darlene’s birthday celebration with my family.  Happy Birthday Dar!  Thanks to Mike for the accommodations.  Happy Birthday to you too!  xoxo

  • How Do You Measure 43 Years In A Life?

         

    …In daylights, in sunsets in midnights, in cups of coffee. In inches, in miles, in laughter, in strife.
    In 22,600,800 minutes…how do you measure 43 years of life?  How about love?

    Thanks to everyone who sent me birthday wishes this weekend.  I kind of know what Albert & David mean now about Facebook, but it’s still nice that people take the time to actually send me birthday greetings!

    Voicemail You’ll Love
    Share this …

    My Aunt & Uncle and cousins had a party for me today in Orange County.  I had a great time and got lots of swag, LOL.

    Kevin & Tommy butting heads


    This is what happens when Cody doesn’t listen to his favorite cousin!!


    Actually, he had a very bad
    skateboarding accident Wednesday and broke his collar bone.  It was
    really nice of him to show up for my party.  He was in a lot of pain. 
    Poor little guy.  I’m pretty sure he won’t be hanging on to the back of
    a moped while skateboarding any more though!  I’m really glad he’s
    going to be OK.      This was after he got home from the hospital.  See how much higher his right shoulder is?


    Me & my cousins


    Andy attack!


    No fair!


    Say cheese!


    The newest addition to the Hotel Careyfornia.


    Hand embroidered towels!


    This card was hilarious.  It’s from the Republican side of the family!  On the front was Barack Obama saying, “Obviously you’ve had a lot of
    experience with birthdays…”, and inside it said, “But who needs
    experience.”


    Lisa, trying my new foot massager


    My gorgeous cousins


    My wacky cousins!


    Uncle Georgie & Aunty LuLu


    When I got home, I got this from Claudio & Ryan!  I love the wrapping paper!!


    My swag


    All of my cards had lottery tickets in them!


    And I won $8 and a free ticket! 


    Best of the rest!

  • Money Money Money – “Don’t Insult Me!”

    Darlene was nice enough to let us into Disneyland and Disney’s California Adventure for free this past weekend, and Vivek was like a kid in a candy store.  We had a great day, and I took some nice photos.  On the way there though, my car started making a strange clicking noise.  The next day when we drove to Santa Barbara, it got worse.  My friends thought it was the bushings, so today I took it back to Honda of Hollywood today.  Sure enough, it’s the bushings.  They need me to bring it back in on Friday morning, and they don’t know how long it will take to fix.  Hopefully it won’t be another five months!  Oh, and they have to go back and fight with the stupid insurance company that should have totaled the car in the first place!

    Speaking of the accident, I had this delicious exchange with Safeco insurance recently.  They represent the girl who hit me, and they’re trying to settle with me, so I won’t sue their pants off, since my car was out of commission for five months!  It took me five minutes to write my response to her initial email, and a few minutes later, she upped her offer by $300.00.  Not bad, for five minutes work!  Everyone tells me I should get a lawyer and let them handle it.  What do you think?  I’ve never been in this situation before, and despite my dramatic emails, it really has been a huge nightmare!  She claims the offer is just for my injuries, but what about the rest?



    Carey Anthony


    Claim #484504363007
    3 messages


    TWITCHELL, STEPHANIE L
    Thu, Aug 28, 2008 at 8:13 AM

    To:
    Carey Anthony

    Carey,

    I have reviewed the updated photo of your hand and would like to extend a settlement offer to you for your injury.

    I would like to make an offer of $1,000 to settle your injury claim.

    Please let me know if this offer is acceptable.

    I have attached a release that will need to be signed by you and returned in order for payment to be issued.

    Have a nice day.

    Stephanie Twitchell

    Claims


    Carey Anthony
    Thu, Aug 28, 2008 at 8:26 AM

    To:
    “TWITCHELL, STEPHANIE L”

    5 months without a car.
    5 months of
    more than 75 hours of telephone calls, emails, waiting on hold and
    getting cut off by insurance companies, rental car agencies, and auto
    body shops!
    5 months of countless miles of shuttling back and forth

    5 months of interruptions to my job, where I earn my living and had to miss work to manage this
    5 months of painful needles all over my body
    5 months of headaches and uncertainty
    5 months losing sleep from said problem.

    No, $1,000 is actually insulting.

    Read the blogs.  It’s all there, as any court will agree.

    5 months times $1000 would be far more appropriate. 

    $5000
    is a drop in the bucket for a major conglomerate like yours, whose
    client, through their own admitted negligence, caused me pain and
    suffering (not to mention a tremendous loss of productivity) for FIVE
    MONTHS. 

    And is that suffering over?  I FINALLY have my car back, but only
    time will tell the rest.  Perhaps 10,000 would be more appropriate!

    I await your response, and please don’t insult me again!

    –
    Carey

    TWITCHELL, STEPHANIE L
    Thu, Aug 28, 2008 at 9:22 AM

    To:
    Carey Anthony

    Carey,
     
    I
    am sorry that you are not happy with the offer that was made in the amount of
    $1,000.
    Please be advised that this settlement is for your injury only and
    is not linked to the damage of your vehicle or your time without the
    vehicle.
    If you have evidence of your lost wages, please forward those to
    me for review.
     
    Based on the fact that you received Acupuncture from a person that
    we can not confirm is a licensed acupuncturist, there are no records of the
    treatment, other than a photo of you with a needle in your leg, the treatment
    was not done in a treatment facility and there are no bills.  I can not
    evaluate the treatment as it was not acceptable treatment.  All treatment
    must be deemed reasonable and necessary and have medical records and bills in
    order for me to evaluate them properly.
     
    I
    can offer you $1,300 to settle you injury claim.  Again please be advised
    that this offer is based off of your injury only.
     
    Thank you

    Stephanie Twitchell

    Claims

    The funny part is, that these are the photos of my acupuncture that she’s referring too.  A friend of mine does it, and it really does help.  Ugh, I just want this to be over!  

    Maybe Colin should be my lawyer!  He seems to know a lot about money, money, money…and he sings much better than me!!  (I could watch this all day long!) 

    Anyway, here are a few of the Disneyland photos and a video:


    I let him win!


    The girl in the ferris wheel with us was so scared!  It was kind of funny.

  • 8:08 PM – My Olympic Hopes

    It’s actually 4 AM (despite the 8:08 time shown below that I started this post!) and Vivek and I are sitting here on the couch blogging from separate laptops and watching Project Runway.  Before that, we watched the opening ceremonies which were really impressive.   Especially the gymnasts!

    Beijing is off to a good start!  Yesterday I had dinner with Dar, Jenn & Tressa, and I also took the dogs to the dog park.  There was a woman there who looked vaguely like Kate Walsh from Grey’s Anatomy (without makeup).  She was actually really nice and took a picture of me with the dogs.  Still not sure if it was her, but several people insisted it was.  At any rate, Oreo & Shadow are really getting acclimated to the Hollywood lifestyle.  They may not want to go back to Orange County when their family returns from Hawaii!


    Living the dream…


    Kate Walsh?  You decide.


    I took this for Christine.


    A pre-Olympic dinner at Fat Fish!


    Getting used to chopsticks!


    Dessert!

  • Up Up & Away in my Beautiful Honeymoon

    Tonight we took the kids to The Great Park in Irvine.  They have a huge, tethered helium balloon that stands 118 feet high and holds 30 people.  It flies 500 feet above the park, which used to be the El Toro Air Force Base that was closed in 1999.  We timed our visit perfectly.  We only had to wait about 1/2 hour and the sun was just starting to set when we went up in the balloon.  It’s really a great park, and the balloon ride is free.  We all had a great time.

    P.S. When I was little, I was fascinated by hot air balloons, but I before I could say “hot air balloon”, I simply said “honeymoon”.  For some reason, my parents never corrected me, and as I grew older, I continued to call them honeymoons.  Once, when I was in college, I saw three hot air balloons and announced to my friends, “Look, honeymoons!!”  Suffice it to say, I was the laughing stock of the dorm.  Sad, but true!


    Best of the rest.

    Here’s a cheesy blast from the past


    ON THE LIGHTER SIDE
    “The
    earthquake [in Los Angeles] was powerful enough that an entire group of people
    lined up outside to see ‘Batman’ ended up lined up to see ‘Mamma Mia.’” –
    Comedian Jimmy Kimmel

  • Taco Tuesday, Photoshopping Drool & Returning to Sender

     


    Buster (the one eyed horn dog) & Roxy

    I’m house-sitting and dog-sitting for Buster & Roxy this week and next, down in Mission Viejo.  Tonight I met my cousins and friends for Taco Tuesday at Tortilla Flats.  It was a beautiful summer night on the lake.

     

    After being impressed by Amos’ car and reading my post about The Golden Compass last year, Pang was nice enough to work some Photoshop magic (a skill I don’t have) on the picture of me sleeping through that boring movie!

    It joins the pantheon of other great Photoshopping excursions with my big head, like my most recent and topical profile photo from Tony:

     

    And the not so great ones that I did (without Photoshop), like this one for my Steroid/Rehab post:

    Or this, pre-blogging classic, when the abominable Catwoman movie came out:

    Sometimes, Photoshop isn’t even needed, like in this snapshot Rebecca took on our drive to Michigan last month,  Thank goodness the drool was covered.  And yes, I was cold.  LOL

    Regular readers of this space know that I despise snail mail.  This year, I have decided to only open mail twice a year, in July and December.  Period!  (Christmas cards are a whole other conundrum:  http://weblog.xanga.com/CareyGLY/632811811/the-christmas-conundrum.html).  All of my monthly bills are on autopay, and anyone else who I might owe money better email me!  This is the stack of mail from the past six months that I didn’t even open.  I simply wrote “RETURN TO SENDER” and “REMOVE FROM MAILING LIST”, and stuffed it all in a mailbox on my street corner today.  On some of these envelopes I wrote my email address.  We’ll see how effective my new strategy is.  At least I’m making all these companies pay for postage twice.  If everyone did this, it might start making a difference!!  (Did you know there’s one number you can call to stop all pre-screened offers of credit and insurance?  Also, there’s a # to call to opt out of all of those coupons and circulars that come in the mail.  Simply check the fine print on each item and call the number listed for the publisher.)

  • “And the Rockets’ Red Glare”

    Best of the rest

    jiazhousarcasmo‘s excellent summation!

  • T’was the Night Before Fireworks


    As I’ve recounted before, I’m not a big fan of the 4th of July (Independence Day in America).  This year should be fun though, as I’m spending the night with my cousins.  This morning we’ll take the kids to the parade and then we have a cabana rented by the lake for the day.  We’ll watch the fireworks, and then I’ll head back up to LA to greet yet another guest at the HC.  If any of you Orange County Xangans are going to be at the parade or lake tomorrow, text me.  My # is on my Facebook badge to the left. 

    We took the boys to Chick-fil-A tonight, and then took Tommy to get a birthday present.  Here are a few snaps:


    Notice the sign to my left.  LOL

     


    I love Chik-fil-A!  Instead of giving out horrible plastic toys in their kids meals, they give out CD to help kid learn another language!

     

    fireworks
    Have a safe, happy 4th everyone!

    It’s OK Or!! xoxo

  • Bend It Like LuLu!

    My Aunt turns 81 next week, so Dar and I took her and my Uncle out for dinner last night.  All I can say is that I hope I look and feel half as good as they do when I’m 81.  At one point, after we got home, she programmed her VCR to tape “Lost” so she could watch it after I left (the finale was great by the way).  I don’t know many 80 year olds who can program a VCR, let alone download and print pictures from a digital camera, which she does all the time. 


    Uncle Georgie, Aunty LuLu, me and Darlene


    My aunt and uncle have been married 59 years on June 11th

    Dar went to the LA Galaxy game and shot some pretty good pictures of David Beckham which I turned into these collages:


    Move over Posh!


    Happy Birthday Aunty LuLu! 

  • Speaking of Faith

    The Flying Spaghetti Monster (also known as the Spaghedeity) is the deity of a parody religion called The Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster and its system of beliefs, “Pastafarianism” The religion was founded in 2005 by Bobby Henderson to protest the decision by the Kansas State Board of Education to require the teaching of intelligent design as an alternative to biological evolution. Because intelligent design
    implies the existence of an intelligent, but not necessarily omnipotent
    or omniscient designer, some, like Henderson, argued that this designer
    could, in fact, be anything imaginable. (Source: Wikipedia and  Haochi)


    Cole had his First Communion this past weekend.  It brought back many memories of my own First Communion as well as some of the more ritualistic things I actually enjoy about the Catholic Church.  Coincidentally, on the way home, NPR‘s weekly religion show “Speaking of Faith” departed from their usual format to “listen to a spectrum of lay Catholic voices on the force of vast and ancient tradition on their lives, the way they struggle with it, the sources of their love for it. Even to be a “lapsed Catholic,” we hear, is a complex state of being.“  It was really interesting, and helped me understand some of my current struggles with religion a bit better.  At any rate, it was a beautiful day, and Cole seemed to have a great time!