One door closes, another opens

Sunday night I was awaken by a phone call from my dad. It was only 10:30pm but it had been a long weekend and i had an early shuttle to the airport.

It was sad news, my grandpa Mert had passed away about an hour before he called. Apparently Mert had been taken to the hospital on Friday via ambulance with pneumonia. Unfortunately he lost his battle.

I am not sure on dates and times for the service. I'm not sure if I will be able to make it back.

I am back from a very busy wedding weekend. I arrived in Buffalo, New York on Thursday morning where I met Laura, Ryan, and Jason and we headed to Rochester for lunch and a nap. Thursday night was dinner at the Distillery and Mark's bachelor party and girls night. I spent the night with Beth, it was very relaxing. Friday we had a full day of rehearsals.... the wedding rehearsal (very complicated, good thing we went through it 4 times), then rehearsal dinner on Lake Ontario followed by desserts by Mark's parent's pool.

Saturday morning we were at the salon by 8:30am... only mishap was that Beth didn't have her veil so we had to wait until the church opened to get the veil. Once the hair was done, the limo shuttled us to the church where we barely had time to get dressed and it was wedding time. The ceremony was really nice, not too long and it almost went without a hitch. But since the bridal party was required to move around a bit, we all missed one cue so Beth had to get our attention. Aside from that everything went great. The reception was a lot of fun....dancing with the kids and I even got elbowed in the lip (it bled and is a bit swollen).

Sunday I attended the gift opening, then Laura, Ryan, Jen, Jason, and I headed to our hotel in Buffalo. We went to the home of the "Original wings" the Anchor Bar and then for ice cream.

My flight back today was a little slow going. I had a delay in Detroit which caused me to push back an interview I had scheduled this afternoon. I must admit, it is nice to be back.

Busy weekend here in Colorado. Friday Lynn and I went out for a few cocktails with some friends. It was a bit of a late night but that didn't really slow me down on Saturday.

Early Saturday afternoon, Alexis, Lynn, Buckeye, and I drove out the Genesse to tackle an "easy" 3 mile hike. I don't know who Alexis was talking to about this hike being easy... it turned out being 3.5 miles long and taking us about 2.5 hours. Thankfully the only wildlife we saw was a grass snake, but it left an impression on one of us in the group (not me). The adventure for me was when I fell into the river. Yes, I slipped on a rock and fell basically face first into the water. I have a few scratches but thankfully no major injuries... I guess after I fell I laid their for a bit (stunned I think) before pulling myself out. If you are wondering, I wasn't playing too closely to the water, in fact we had to traverse the river multiple times on the hike that lead us into a valley and back up a mountain. Beautiful.... but a bit rough for my first hike in CO.

After the hike Alexis and I went to a Denver Outlaws game. The Outlaws are the Major League Lacrosse team here in town. They played the Chicago Machine and won. It may have been one of the most boring things I have been to (because I don't know anything about the sport and I was a bit tired). But the cool thing is they play there games at Invesco Field where the Broncos play. And thanks to some internet magic, Alexis had gotten us the "Ladies All Access" pass for the game ($3-5 more than a regular ticket) where we got a beer and we went onto the field to meet the players after the game. It was really neat because there were only 10 of us women that got to go behind the scenes and actually onto the field. They had one of the players, Mike Ward (former Duke Lacrosse player) ready to take pictures with us. The team photographer took our pictures and then had it printed for us, so Mike was able to sign them also. In addition, we met about 5 other players and the head coach, having them all sign the free poster we got for attending the game.

After the long day Alexis and I went to the Tavern Uptown for a drink where we met one of my friends and called it an early evening.

Today, we started the day by going to the Greek Festival for a gyro on the way to the Rockies game. The gyro wasn't worth the money or the wait. Plus it was 90+ today so it was a bugger being outside. The Rockies lost to the Mets but it turned into a pretty decent day for baseball. Gotta love them Rockies.....

Friday the 13th Happy hour at The Tavern-Downtown was a blast. One of the local radio stations (Alice 105.9) sponsors Friday happy hours all summer with prizes, drink & appetizer specials, and free live music. While driving back from a meeting Friday morning I heard a live version of my favorite song, "Come on get Higher" on the radio. Following the song they announced the the singer would be playing at happy hour. I came home and told Lynn and it was on.

We stood right at the front of the stage for the show, sang along, meet some of Matt's stalkers, got video taped by the radio station, and afterwards we got to meet Matt. His music is very chill.

After the show we went to Jackie's apartment for cocktails and then hit the town with a bunch of girls. It was a great night!

Alexis, Lynn, and I started our road trip to Las Vegas on Thursday afternoon. Off we drove in Lynn's rental car into the great wide open. Once into Utah things took a turn... we missed the "no services for 106 miles" sign and nearly ran out of gas. Luckily two very nice girls stopped and followed us to the nearest town, where of course, the gas station was closed. Our new friends called the sheriff who called Randy, the gas station owner, who in turn came down to open the gas station. With that pit stop we were set back nearly 2 hours, making our trip around 12 hours long.

Thankfully when we arrived in Vegas, Courtney had already checked into the hotel... to bed we went. The Excalibur was a great location and a not a bad deal.

Friday we walked around and found some cool places on the strip. The Kenny Chesney concert was at the MGM Grand at 8pm, Leann Rimes was the opening act. Overall the entire concert was great. Afterwards we went to the "official after party" for the concert then headed to TAO, where Paris Hilton was filming her new MTV reality TV show. To end the night we met up with some friends from Denver that happened to be in Vegas too. It was a long night, but a lot of fun.

Saturday we relaxed and went out for a nice dinner, Courtney got a tattoo at Hart & Huntington then we hit the town again. We went to the popular club LAX, where we had a few drinks and called it an early night (like 3am).

We left Vegas around noon on Sunday getting back to Denver in a fast 10 hours.... not too bad. But next time we are gonna fly.

Here I am still in Denver trying to survive. There are so many things to do and see here. In the past few weeks I've been to a couple more Rockies games, a luau, Wisconsin, and I've actually started to work. Yep, I decided to apply for internships for experience (since that's all I could be lacking because I have the education). So I now have two internships, one paid they other not so much. I am working at a nonprofit in the marketing department and also for an event planner. It should be an interesting summer.

As for last weekend I was in Wisconsin for Beth's bridal shower and bachlorette party. It was a pretty good time. But once again it was very busy with little time to relax. This weekend I am heading to Vegas for a girls weekend that we planned months ago (at that time I thought I would be working full time and could afford this trip, so now I am going to be on a budget). But at least I have been there before so I've seen alot. I am hoping to enjoy the pool area...and I am guessing the 11 hour car ride is going to suck.