My Trip To Miami...

First off, lets start with an apology....we haven't updated the blog in a bit....but we have a good excuse; we've been out doin' stuff with a visitor!!  Terri's Mom is here from Altona spending some time with us and it has been wonderful.  We're trying to show her as best a time as we can (under the soon to be explained circumstances) in the short time she is here (she departs us on Wednesday - Sandy-allowing that is).

Now, one thing we'll mention to ALL of our visitors - as a condition of you coming and gracing us with your presence, we'd like you to pen a blog entry for us....ya know, tell everyone how magical it is here for you!  So, without further adieu, here is our first 'guest blog' being penned by Terri's Mom.

Enjoy!
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My visit to see Terri & Jeremy in Miami started great. The scare of hurricane Sandy and flying into a wind storm did not happen.  Both flights were uneventful.   Leaving the plane I breathed in the Miami air and the fragrant smell reminded me of the years we went to Kissimmee.   After a 3 mile walk thru the huge airport to the parking garage, an unplanned tour of the area between the airport, Imagina and Doral (Jeremy got a tiny bit lost) we picked up Terri at work and headed to their new home.  A beautiful home in a great, safe neighborhood.  For those family members who are worried about the violence in Miami, not worries!

Some changes at work has required Terri to work long days and many hours.  So Sunday morning 7:30am Terri was off to work.  Jeremy cooked up a batch of yummy chocolate chip waffles for breakfast.  I played with the pups, carefully as I was scared of throwing the ball over the fence.  Johnny has good vertical and being hyper, I think he could clear the fence and then would be gator lunch.  I don't want to be responsible for that.  Walk about the neighborhood then off to Starbucks for Internet.  Oh, coffee too!

"Jonny, do you know how this oven thing works?"

Stopped by beIN Sport for a tour and picture-op with the Anchor/Game Host Terri Leigh (above).  Even Jeremy wanted a pic with a celebrity!

That is a yellow dress!

A beautiful view for 'Happy Hour'.

Whipped up a batch of Vereniki (Mennonite perogies) and Saurkraut perogies for dinner.  Haven’t made them in a very long while, and they turned out pretty good.  Haven’t lost the touch!

Here's a 'Before and After' shot.  If only we had smell-o-vision on here - you could take a deep breath of the glorious perogy aroma that enveloped the house - and clothing!

Monday was Terri’s day off work, so Frankie & Johnny had a date with puppy day care and we went for a Miami drive.  This city is way, way bigger than I imagined!  Google earth really doesn’t show the reality!  On that note, when I checked the kids address on Google, it was 2 turns of 74th, the same street beIN Sport offices are.  Turns out there are about 127 turns, and after many trips I still have no idea how to get to their house.  Ok, back to our day.  Terri took us on a nice casual ride to Miami Beach, traffic was backed up, so I had a chance to take in lots of the city.  There is lots of busyness, lots of traffic, but the city is very beautiful.  We went by the Marina, where Terri raced a cruise ship.

Here we are on Miami Beach.  See the surfers in the background!  I think they were waiting for the Hurricane Sandy wave to arrive.

Miami Beach, Terri & Jeremy can come here everyday if they want!

Cargo ship leaving port.  Is that Jeri’s new school bus at the front?

Then it was off to beautiful Biscayne Bay.  Oh my goodness, this is a beautiful area.

Terri looks cold!  It wasn’t cold out, but she had one!  A small nap was had on the beach, where Mr Jeremy soaked up all the sun and had a wonderful red lobster farmer tan! (No pictures...)

The highlight of the day was Jeremy making a new friend with the Haagen Daaz lady. That ice cream had lots of Jeremy’s favorites, bananas and caramel sauce.

I think Jeremy is excited for his Caramel Dulce Dazzler!

Jeremy & Terri are still without TV, cable or internet.  It was so evident how much we rely on this as Hurricane Sandy crashed down on the eastern seaboard and we had almost no information.  We collected bits and pieces thru Jer iphone and updates from Jeri at home.

Today (Tuesday) we are all at beIN Sport.  Jeremy is doing some writing for Terri and I am abusing the internet on their dime.  This is an energetic exciting environment to be in.  Everyone is super nice.  If only I could understand what they are saying.  Everyone speaks Spanish.

Terri going over Jeremy's writing - and her own.

Are we working or is this an Apple commercial?  Can you tell that Terri is ill?

I am off  to Toronto tomorrow, Hurricane Sandy willing.  Our visit was a quick one, and I look forward to getting back here with Jeri so we can share in Terri & Jeremy’s adventure together.

Meat Sweats: Living the American Dream

Happy Birthday to Us...  er, Jer!

It's October 23rd.  This means it's the day AFTER Jeremy's birthday!!

His 41st birthday, to be specific.  And we celebrated the big day... by purchasing a membership to Sam's Club!

We decided to go check out the 'Costco of the South' and see if a membership was something 2 people without children would actually make use of.  After nosing around for 5 minutes, we stumbled across the cereal aisle, realized we could get double the amount of cereal we were getting for the same price at Target... and sprinted to Membership Services to get set up.

Two and a half hours later, we were loading up our car with all our new SC purchases.  See, now that all my pots and pans and kitchen utensils are safe and sound in my kitchen... I've realized just how bare my fridge and pantry really are.  Not being able to transport any liquids or perishables with us into the US, I had forgotten about all the little things we were missing.  Like ketchup.  And Tabasco.  And peanut butter!  Not to mention all the ingredients to make a proper Gin & Tonic.  Sheesh!

So this Sam's Club trip was fruitful.  Some of the highlights of our outing:

1) Chicken Breasts - 6 lb. bag for $11

2) 24x Milky Way ice cream bars for $8

3) 24x Heinekin (that's right, we can buy booze ANYWHERE!)

4) Box of Florida fresh grapefruits... and they're almost as big as your head!

And CHEESE!  Look at our stash -

Get ready to get bunged up!

5 lb bag of shredded mozza, 120 'American' cheese slices, Pepper Colby Jack cubes and a big-ass tub of Parmesan.  We are set for a while...  I'll never get used to the whole 'American' cheese thing though.  It's CHEDDAR, people!

A few of the things we kindly left on the shelves at Sam's Club, put couldn't resist snapping some photos:

It is precisely these types 'foods' that result in stores like Sam's Club and Target to provide shopping cart scooters.  Can't tell you how many perfectly able bodied people I saw driving these things through the aisles. 

"Get off your a$$!", I screamed telepathically...

Clearly I need to work on my ESP skills, because these incredibly lazy people just whizzed right by me.

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Jeremy is such a lucky guy, not ONLY did he get a Sam's Club membership for his birthday... I also took him out for dinner!

We got 'gussied up' and drove downtown to a trendy area called Brickell.  (pronounced BRICK-ul)  People tell me Brickell is full of shops and restaurants and is a great place to park your car and just wander around in.  We drove around for about half an hour trying to find these so-called shops and restaurants.  Then, and only because it was Jeremy's birthday, we dusted off the Garmin to give us some assistance.  I'm pretty sure if we would have kept driving for a while, we would have found our way.... but it was Jeremy's day, afterall. 

Garmin showed us the way and we soon were driving through a very busy and spiffy part of downtown.  A lot of fashionable people walking the streets, sipping wine in the outdoor lounges, leaving their Mercedes and BMWs at the various valet stands.  I found myself wincing as we came to a stop-sign in the middle of it all.... and our little Mazda's brakes creaked to a half.  "OMG... SO embarrassing!"  I got over it.

We parked our squeaky car and walked to Rosa Mexicano.  It was around 9:30pm at this point. (I'm sorry Oma, dinner is a little later here than it is back home!)  But Rosa Mexicano was already closed.  We discovered a lot of these places have earlier hours on Monday/Tuesday and then open late the rest of the week.  Luckily, a Tuscan restaurant called Tuscana Divino was open next door, so we strolled in.

We decided because this was a bit of an upscale type of restaurant that we would curb our 'sharing an American-sized meal' trend and each have our own.  Expensive restaurant should mean the portions are much smaller, right?

This was the case with my meal, a lovely bowl of traditional gnocchi that was just the right size.

However, Jeremy ordered a half a cow with a vat of potatoes.

Terri wanted to swim in this.

To my surprise, he polished the whole the thing off... but this may have been a mistake, as Jeremy soon after was haunted by the 'Meat Sweats'.... this was followed by the 'Meat Sh!ts'... and this morning, the inevitable 'Meat Hangover'.  Poor Jeremy.  At 41, it's not just the booze that causes you hangovers anymore, it's the food too!  Though the fact we don't eat that much meat probably throws a body into shock when we over do it.

After dinner, we were invited over to my co-worker Ian's place for a drink, which was conveniently located across the street from the restaurant.  Ian is a Scottish lad who is a former professional soccer player (with Real Salt Lake - pronounced RAY-al Salt Lake) and is now a colour commentator at beIN Sport.  He and his lovely girlfriend Nicole have a posh 33rd floor apartment in Brickell that overlooks the bay.  At least, this is what Jeremy tells me as I didn't go near their balcony to admire the view.  My paralyzing fear of heights prevented me from enjoying the night skyline.

Ian and I were regailing Jeremy and Nicole with stories of shenanigans from the weekend at work.  Normally I share the weekend workload with a co-worker.  But this weekend, I was on my own.  I worked a grand total of 30 hours from Friday night to Sunday night.  Needless to say, by the time Sunday night rolled around and we were into our last half hour of recording, I was starting to get a little goofy in the head.

The final show I produce on Saturday and Sunday nights is called Express Extra, which is a half hour highlights show that Ian and I host.  At the end of the show on Sunday, we were viewing footage of a big fight that broke out in the middle of a soccer game in France between 2 rival clubs.  The fans got involved and it certainly had potential to be a much scarier situation that it ended up becoming.  Ian was talking about the situation and relating it to the passion between the clubs and the fans and how something it gets out of control.  I was about to add my own 2 cents with a final thought before steering the conversation towards the next topic.  But, as I opened my mouth to add my 2 cents... my brain decided to shut down and de-evolve to that of a Neanderthal and out I blurted, "Passion is good.  Danger... is bad.'

Really, Terri?   Never before had I wanted to grab these words from their bubbles above my head and shove them back down my throat from whence they originated.  In the words of Homer Simpson - stupid brain!

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Did you know that it's almost Christmas??  We didn't until we saw the houses in our community all have their Christmas lights and decorations up already. 

Doesn't Halloween come first?

We received an early Christmas present a few days ago when the people who live across the street from us decided to leave their keys hanging from their front door.  A construction worker noticed this and decided to let the home owners know, not realizing they weren't home and had actually left for an extended period of time.

When he tried the door to toss the keys inside, he set off their house alarm.  The thing is, you need the alarm code in order to turn that sucker off.

So for about 4 days now, if we don't have a fan or music or some kind of background noise in our house... we hear the "beep, beep, beep.... beep, beep, beep.... beep, beep, beep" from the house across the street.

It's a pleasant kind of repetition...

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Speaking of Christmas, we booked our flights back home in December!  We will be back in Manitoba from December 23 to January 3.  Looking forward to seeing family and friends... we anticipate it will be busy!  And we are thankful that my parents are storing a Rubbermaid tub of our winter jackets and boots for when we come home for the holidays.

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We are starting to notice the seasonal changes here in South Florida.  It certainly is not as drastic as a snow storm... but we have noticed the weather has become a little more comfortable.  Don't get me wrong, it's still gorgeous, but a light wrap has become necessary at night.

This reminds me of a little surprise I found while unpacking some boxes.  When we left Manitoba, I also had to leave behind some duties & responsibilities with some organizations that are very important to me.  Such as the Steinbach Arts Council, and the Manitoba chapter of Canadian Women in Communications.  I have been obsessively dedicated to CWC Manitoba for the better part of a decade, and leaving the regional board is one of the hardest things I've had to give up as part of this relocation.  When I met with the board for the last time in August, my fellow board ladies presented me with a parting gift - a set of GORGEOUS crystal wine glasses.  They came in a special box that I opened for the first time while we were unpacking.  And in the box, I noticed they had left me another little surprise.

These are too small for me.

A little reminder of home that I can take with me wherever I go, no matter what the temperature is.  Thanks ladies!

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Closing note, as I write this in our trusty, neighbourhood Starbucks:

We still don't have home internet.

They're Heeerrrre....

Look!  It's our stuff!

I said I’d believe it when I see it and Thursday morning, just after 8am, I became a believer…Our stuff had arrived!  Sort of.  The driver of the semi was at our door but he was also telling us he had parked three blocks away and wasn’t quite sure how he’d get to our street given how narrow things were. 

(Ah HA!!  I was right!!)

But wait…He says he’ll be able to do it.  I said, ‘I’ll believe it when I see it…’.

About 20mins later, there he was rounding the corner to our house and getting that big beastly semi parked and ready to unload!  WOW.  To say I was impressed was an understatement.  The guy was dripping with sweat so I’m making the assumption it was because of the stress of the short drive versus the 28C heat at 9am…ya, that’s it.

Now the REAL fun began…Deciding where all these boxes should go!  Suffice it to say, our house was no longer empty.  Once the boxes were all brought in – and the furniture – the duo began unpacking. 

As an aside, can I just say that watching people load and unload your stuff is quite possibly one of the most uncomfortable/boring experiences one can have.  I mean, you don’t want to look like you’re supervising, but at the same time you want stuff put in the right spot.  And the unpacking part?  Tedious…So, I just joined in.

Terri had to go to work just around the time they were finishing (how convenient!) so I was left with a house FULL of stuff/boxes in every room and wondering where to begin.  You see, when they unpack everything, they don’t unpack it and put it away – they unpack it and leave it there for YOU to put away.  I didn’t know that!  Terri gave them strict instructions to do so in her kitchen – which she wanted to organize herself….So, here’s what the kitchen looked like once everything was unpacked.

After Terri got home, she dove right in and by 8am Friday morning, here’s what it looked like:

Not bad, not bad at all.  There are still a few little things here and there to stuff away but she’ll do that easily.  I can say that our bedroom, spare room and bathroom is also done – and living room (umm, TV set-up, PS3 and other associated electronics was the FIRST thing I did – hello?!).  The upstairs ‘office’ looks like an episode of ‘Hoarders’ but I’ll get that sorted Saturday while Terri spends the day at work.

Having all of our stuff here gave us each moments of pause today – and a wee bit of sadness.  Our stuff is here.  This is real.  This is happening.  It hit each of us at different moments today and there were some tears shed, not going to lie.  But, I’m happy to report it is only temporary – as in, OK, that chapter is over.  Let the new chapter begin!  We truly know we are no longer in Canada though and it has us a bit homesick.  I may actually MISS some of the cool fall weather…Maybe. 

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It’s been so wonderful hearing from everyone in these past weeks.  With our phone set-up and Skype ready, we’ve each had time to talk to our families and Melissa (Terri’s best friend) and it has been great! 

Terri’s Mom is coming for a few days next weekend and it will be great to see her!

For those that have been regular emailers, texters (via Apple and WhatsApp), please keep it coming!  We love hearing from you - and about every little thing we are missing back home (I’m looking at you Erin and Andrew – and Kevin - and Ashton!!).  We miss you all and look forward to your correspondence!

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Friday morning – and afternoon – we had a wonderful new experience: setting up a US bank account.  Now that Terri has all her documents, we decided we should probably set-up an account here. 

What a schmozzle.  We’ve been doing our research and have discovered the following:

-If a bank cannot verify your address - ie: if you live in a new development - they cannot verify that you are real – call back in 6-12mos.

-If your Social Security Number is too ‘new’, they cannot verify who you are and do not believe you are real...even though the SSN proves you ARE indeed real and can legally get paid to work.

-If you want to set-up an account at an online bank (like ING Direct/Ally), you have to have another US bank account somewhere else that proves you exist...to someone else (ok, if they trust you, we can too.)

-Even if you HAVE that US account, if you do not have your name on some kind of bill payment or credit file elsewhere (US credit), you are also not real – even if you can answer all the security questions they had you set-up for safety TO VERIFY WHO YOU ARE on a previous phone call.

-You cannot set-up ANY US account that will link with a Canadian bank account for the purposes of electronic transfers – you must ‘wire’ the money to yourself between countries….for $40 per transfer.

The one bank that DID let us open an account let us do it as ‘foreigners’ and then promptly told us to go get a gas credit card and start building up our credit so that in 12-24mos we can qualify for a REAL credit card.

Apparently – as previously stated – the credit history we’ve been building up in Canada is useless anywhere else BUT Canada.  Does that seem strange to anyone else reading this?  Do these companies honestly believe that the average, right-thinking, responsibly employed person would decide 'ya, I'm gonna move there and I'm gonna just go hog-wild with credit - spend, spend, spend'....destroying that which has taken years to build up?  I would think US banks/creditors should be more leery about their OWN citizens versus ones from other, more economically stable countries.

Now I’m sure that if I was to apply for a mortgage or a car loan, they’d access that same credit history and use it against me if they could – but they’d never let it be used in your FAVOR, oh no...

To say this has been frustrating is an understatement.  But, thanks to Alex at the bank we ended up going with, we now have a suitable place to put our US money into…Getting it back to Canada may be another story.

Erin, if you’re reading this, I may need that sign you and Andrew were working on so I can walk into a few banks with it…walk in, shout ‘HEY!’, point to the sign for 30-seconds so everyone has a good look at it, turn around and walk out.

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We found out an interesting tidbit about our dog last weekend – he likes the water!

Now, we expected him to be somewhat cautious and enter the water with some trepidation...like Frankie would.  Nope.  Jonny goes right in and plops right down.  We were stunned...but we laughed and knew we had to get it on video.  That dog is an oddball...  

Terri mentioned this in a previous blog post but here is the video…

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I don’t have a job (yet) so I started my new duties as ‘house husband’ Friday by whipping up my first batch of chili!

Terri gave me the idea to document the process in a ‘photo blog’ so, enjoy the pictures below!

Most of the ingredients required for my chili...

Gotta brown that lean beef & add some seasoning salt...

Chopped onions & garlic - peppers next!

First - don't rub your eyes with onion hands...that's bad!

Adding stuff to the beef - looking tough...or constipated.

A gorgeous array of color and substance.

Stir it, stir it good...

Once it's done, taste it, make sure it is yummy!

And it is...

It's also freakin' spicy like a mo-fo!

One of many quick glasses of agua...

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Lastly, many of our Manitoba friends know that both Terri and I used to work for Global TV.  When I was working at Global/Fox, I used to work with a gentleman by the name of Rich Pope.

Rich worked in the graphics department and was one of my favorite people to work with - one of many people's favorite actually.  Like many of us, he is a bit of a sports nut and plays hockey so we had a lot of things we could discuss and give each other grief about.  Rich is very jovial and every time I've run into him since, he's still the same ol' Rich - and that is a good thing!

Workwise, Rich is the kind of guy that when you brought him a graphics request at 4pm (when the deadline was 3pm), he’d get it done (and get it done well) for you without a complaint.  And that’s on top of his regular exemplary work.

A Bombers scout watches Pope kick for a million..

Rich left Global years ago – as many of us did – and is now a multimedia editor at the Winnipeg Sun, where his high level of proficiency and exemplary work ethic continues to build the Sun’s online video content.

For those who hadn’t heard, Rich was also picked to take part in the ‘Wendy’s Kick For A Million’ contest this fall (thanks to the 1,047 entries he submitted) and Friday night, got his shot at $1-million bucks at Skydome in Toronto during halftime of the Bombers/Argos game. 

Prior to this, Rich had beaten out a few others to reach the final.

Down here in Florida, we didn’t get to see it happen LIVE but we followed the commentary by former co-workers online and even had my Mom msg’ing me us she watched it.  Rich didn’t win the million but he won a $25k gift card from 'The Source', a 2012 Nissan Titan and $42,000 cash ($1,000 for every yard his 50yd kick travelled in the air if it didn't go through).  Not a bad haul – but Rich is worth much more than all of that and judging by the responses online and on Facebook, I’m not the only one that thinks that. 

This could not have happened to a nicer, more deserving guy.

I LOVED the Winnipeg Sun headline when it was over - "Pope Doesn't Win A Million - But He's Still Rich". I imagine he'll get quite the reception when he heads into work on Monday.

Way to go Rich!

Have a great weekend everyone!

Life's A Beach

I'm out of the hooooouse!!!

Can it be??

After multiple delays and over 3 weeks since we left Canada... our moving company says they will deliver our stuff on Thursday.

Wait a minute... Thursday is tomorrow.   TOMORROW!!!!

You hear that?  It's a chorus of freaking angels...and they are singing Hallelelujah.

{abrupt record scratch}

Jeremy "I'll believe it when I see it!"

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What a great day today!  Jer and I took full advantage of my day off from work and decided to head to the coast to do some exploring.

See, where we live in Doral, we are about 25 minutes from the beach.  And we've been spending a lot of time in Doral getting our place and our lives set up.  The whole transition from being a Canadian resident to being an American resident has proven to be a bit of a lengthy process (as prior blog posts clearly communicate!).  So, taking some time out from that business to explore this beautiful city was exactly what we needed!

East we went, towards the water!  Hopped on the Dolphin Expressway, deposited $1.25 at the toll booths and zipped towards downtown Miami.  We drove South through Brickell.  Brickell is where a lot of my co-workers live.  It is a condominium laden piece of land that overlooks a Biscayne Bay.  It is breathtakingly gorgeous with beautiful walking paths and big tropical trees and very square, modern looking shrubery.  I'm told the boutiques and bars are fantastic, but today we didn't stop to look around... we will definitely go back there soon!

I hope I'm not sitting in an ant hill..

From Brickell, we turned onto the 913 which starts with another toll booth ($1 this time) and takes you via a long bridge across Biscayne Bay to Key Biscayne, a gorgeous island that starts with a state park and ends with a state park with a cute little retirement community in between.  Or rather, a community for the retired and the filthy rich.  We saw unbelievable estate houses and cars.  And golf carts!  Apparently it's the way to get around Key Biscayne.

We had a cute Mexican lunch at a place called 100% Natural, which we understand is also a bit of a chain, including a restaurant in Playa Del Carmen.  Homemade tortilla chips with fresh guacamole to start (mmmmm!!!!) and chicken and mozza quesadillas with a side salad to finish.  Delish!

On our way off Key Biscayne, we drove through Crandon State Park... which I might mention has a gorgeous bayside golf course.  Me thinks we will hit that up sometime soon.

Side note - I cannot express to you enough how frustrating it is not to have our household contents.  But further to this... and I dare say even more vital to my sanity here in Miami... my golf clubs are transit!!!  I drive past golf courses almost daily and yearn for my previous clubs so I can get back into the 'swing' of things.   

I long to be this person again.

Is it Thursday yet??

Back through downtown Miami we went and drove past Bayfront Park and Marina, which also has an amphitheatre and arts centre which I will do some reading up on, see what kind of events happen there.

We got out of downtown just as rush-hour was starting, so we decided to head back home.  We'll go exploring again early next week.  We're already planning our daily events and site seeing for when my Mom comes for a visit (in 10 days!!!), I'm super excited, can you tell?

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Jeremy got pulled over by the police last night! 

Let's preface this by saying, there are cops EVERYWHERE here.  You don't dare speed, because you WILL encounter at least 10 police cars in the 2 miles you drive in any direction.

Jer picked me up from work last night and was promptly pulled over by the police.  We weren't sure what the deal was... but Officer "Backwards Wearing Atlanta Falcons Ball Cap" was curious what kind of license plates were on our car.  He didn't recognize them almost as much as he didn't recognize the credibility that comes along with a properly dressed law enforcement professional.  RCMP, he was not!  Ste. Anne police, maybe... kidding!  According to Mr. Cool Guy Cop, it is a common occurence they find when people steal 'tags' and then go commit crimes, blah blah blah.  Anyway, we were on our merry way soon enough and Officer Douchey Mac Doucherton went back to being a rent-a-cop.

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Starbucks is closing, so we have to leave this Wifi zone!  Which means the blog is over... 

But stay tuned for the next one... featuring video of Jonny in a pond!

S-A-T-U-R-D-A-Y.... NIGHT!

Should I tell Oma I'm about to go out at 11pm?

My hair smells like cigarettes this morning.  Definitely one (of the many) things I miss about Canada – smoke free establishments!

In the soccer world, this week is known as international break week.  This means all the major leagues in the world take the weekend off as many of their best players re-join their national teams to play World Cup qualifying matches.

In the beIN Sport world, this was known as… WE GET THE WEEKEND OFF!!!

One of the girls I work with, Brittany, is having a birthday next week and soon after it was discovered we all had Saturday night off, her party was planned. 

A night out in Miami for Jer and I?  Holy crap, what do we wear?  That soon became a literal question – WHAT do we wear??  All of our clothes are in a moving truck in Chicago!

Luckily, I have a plethora of party dresses, shoes and accessories to choose from at work… seeing as that is generally my attire on camera.   So I wasn’t worried about me.  I was more concerned about Mr. No Pants at home.

“That’s a lot of pairs of shorts… you’re not packing any jeans or any kind of pants?”

“Terri.  It’s Miami.  I don’t need pants in Miami.”

On Saturday, Jeremy finally needed pants in Miami.  I also discovered he would need a lot more than just pants if he wanted to get into this birthday party.

When I asked about attire requirements (not having a clue what kind of club scene to expect) I was told nice jeans or dress pants, button down shirt, nice shoes.  If you shoe up wearing a t-shirt and sneakers… they’ll turn you away.  Oh boy.

So off we went to the Dolphin Mall, a giant shopping centre about 15 minutes from our place. 

You may not know this about me… but, I am not a fan of shopping.  I don’t mind it when I know exactly what I need to purchase, that way I can get in and get the heck out. 

One really great thing about working weekends… when I’m running errands on my days off in the middle of the week, everyone else is at work.  Needless to say, when we were at the mall on Saturday, so was everybody else in Doral.  And they brought all their screaming kids with them, too.  What a treat!

“Terri, do you remember when we were at Disney World and saw all those parents with looks of pure misery on their faces?”

“Sure, how could one forget the look of someone who has realized they’ve made a horrible mistake in bringing their toddlers to the most sensory stimulating place on earth before the age of 10?  It’s a look that stays with you… and I’m sure with them as well.”

“I’m seeing a lot of those same expressions today…”

We dove right into the sea of people and after resurfacing in Neiman Marcus, Lord & Taylor and some other stores I had never stepped foot in before… we finally found success at Express.

I love this store.  Very hip.  (is ‘Hip’ still hip?  Rad?  Boss?  Yikes.)

Speaking of ‘Boss’… it’s one of the terms Jeremy is getting used to being referred to as.  The gentleman who set him up in a dressing room, “Right this way, Boss”,  “How are those pants fitting, Boss?”,  “You didn’t bring a single pair of pants with you to Miami?  What’s wrong with you, Boss?”

Jeremy was set up with a sweet turquoise checkered shirt, tie, dress pants and a belt.  He sure looks ‘schmuck’, wouldn’t you agree?

My legs are really longer than they appear here...

I almost had him convinced to get the red skinny pants… but that will take a little more work on my part.  Don’t you worry, Jeremy will own colorful pants before Christmas.  It’s one of my missions.

Oh, and the people at Express were so nice to steam the clothes for us, too.  Seeing as our iron and ironing board are in transit along with our furniture and Jeremy’s pants.

One pair of shoes and socks later, we were on our way out of the mall.  But wait. 

One final detail not to be overlooked - Jeremy’s overgrown mane had to be dealt with once and for all!  Finding a new hair stylist is never fun.  Luckily, I found a good one last week, so we drove over to Rafe Lugo Salon to see if anyone had time to trim up Jer.  A very nice and stylish gentleman did.    We never did get his name… or more than 5 words out of him.

“How would you like it?”

Jer automatically turns to me, “How would YOU like it?” 

Pfff, I don’t know!  So I suggested the hair stylist have at it and do whatever he wanted.  Why not, eh? (Jay & Dan podcast reference… if you haven’t been listening to it, what’s the hold up?)

A little off the top.

He didn’t come out bald, he didn’t come out with a mullet… a nice ‘do’ to go with his nice new wardrobe.

We’re ready to go.  But wait.

It’s only 7pm.  We have 4 hours before this party starts.  So we did what any couple at our age would do to pass the time on a Saturday night… oh yeah, that’s right.

We took a nap.

Feeling refreshed, we got ready to go and by 11pm we were heading out.  My Oma would not approve of me going out that late.  But alas, I had a smartly dressed husband at my side.  Ready to tackle the night!

Still pasty white despite the beachy weather

Using the trusty Garmin, we found our location about 20 minutes from our house in what is referred to as Miami’s Design District.  I’ve been told this was a sketchy part of town up until a number of years ago… and slowly, it has been undergoing change with upscale businesses and shops moving in, art galleries, cafes and night clubs.

Gavanna was the place, apparently an up-and-coming club that is hard to get into.  Luckily, we were ‘on the list’ for the birthday girl.  But, as we arrived, we realized, there was no line, and basically no need for any kind of list.  The men sitting at the Valet stand looked terribly bored and as we entered this ‘hotspot’ we noticed, so were the bartenders.  Not that you could see anyone, the fog machines were set to overdrive.  But, save for the people attending the birthday party, the place was basically empty! 

That is, until midnight hit.  Then suddenly it was this.

And this.

And a whole lotta this going around.

Talk about sensory overload!  Blasting bass, jumping people and rapidly flashing lights enough to give you a seizure.

Please stop strobing!  I can't see!

People pressed up against people.  And dancing, dancing, dancing.  If you don’t dance and you move to a Latin American city… get ready to give in to the beats, because you will dance, dammit.  You will also pay through the nose for drinks… 2 gin & tonics = $30!  Jeremy handed the bartender a $20 expecting to get change back… instead had to go back to the wallet.

Can you see us through the fog?

Constant grooving and singing and laughing.  We had loads of fun!  I will never understand the need to make a slow song from Adele a full-on dance party, though.  I will also never understand what these heavily accented people I work with are saying to me in a loud club.

These places don’t shut down until 4 or 5 in the morning… but we took off around 2:30pm.  The exterior of this club looked a lot different at this point… there was a massive crowd of people eager to get in to the already over capacity building.  The Valet guys were busy parking the BMWs, Mercedes and Porsches.  Our little Mazda 3 was parked down the street… where WE left it. 

So off we went…and promptly hit up a Wendy’s before retiring for the evening.  Two ¼ lb singles with cheese, please.

The gentleman who handed us our burgers through the drive-thru window, “Here you go, Chief.”

Really?