Then, whoosh, it's been two or three weeks since you've written a blog entry and you're ashamed of yourself.

For those who care, the New Job continues to be peaceful and undemanding. It's not the most exciting employment ever but it's certainly the least-stressful job I've had in the last 25 or 30 years.

The annual California Trek was delightful. I met up with Meg at DIA and we flew to Vegas to meet up with friends. The next day five of us piled into a van and road-tripped into Ventura for four days of sun-and-surf and gabbing and eating and general what-not.

I'm a fan of Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives because it showcases mostly the kind of food I used to love and haven't really allowed myself to eat since The Diet. Turns out that Ashlyn, our designated driver, is also a fan! In comparing episodes we'd seen, the subject of the Mad Greek Café came up and she mentioned that we were going to drive right past it on our way to CA.

And, yes, I am eight, so I whined until she stopped and let us visit. (Obligatory YouTube link for them as likes that kind of thing--I found it but did not actually watch it, so at your own risk.) It was lovely.

Food was a big part of this weekend. The part of Ventura we were close to, known as "old town," seems to be the place to go for fabulous food and I did my best to eat it all. Next year, I'm going to try every restaurant I didn't make it to this year. Including that cute little Ben & Jerry's on the main street.

And! I went a little crazy one evening and had half a glass of wine! I might have had the whole glass, but a couple of friends wandered by and tempted me with an Argentinean café they'd discovered, so I abandoned the booze in favor of yet another new dining experience.*

Our hotel was right on the beach, making it easy for us to stagger through the sands or hang out on the patio and gaze with admiration at the distant surfer boys.** I spent a fair amount of time there, basking in the balmy warmth and thinking that maybe, just maybe, there might be really good reasons that sane people choose to live in California. Like 75-degree temperatures in March.

Then the five of us road-tripped back to Vegas and the next morning I flew home.

Before, during, and after the trip, I continued to suffer from bronchitis. A visit with my doctor last week wound up providing me with antibiotics and an inhaler, both of which I used faithfully, but with all of the changes of climate and location fighting against them, there was only so much that modern medicines could do. Now that I'm home, I hope to get rested up and healthy again very soon.

Sorry this wasn't more interesting. Maybe next time?

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* The Argentina Café? Was fabulous. I had a potato-and-onion soup and my dining companions had kale salads. We all selected the inexpensively priced mix-and-match empanadas for our main courses and swapped bites to sample as many items as possible.

** Sadly, when someone wandered down for a closer look at the surfer "boys" she discovered that most of them were our age or older.*** After I got back to Denver, a California Expert I met admitted that our part of the coast wasn't trendy for the younger generation.

*** Not that I'm being ageist or anything. It's just that I always have a mental picture of surfers looking like Frankie Avalon and his friends.