I've been going back and forth on whether or not to post an entry. It's not that I feel crummy or that I'm depressed.... quite the opposite. Other than the bad morning I had yesterday, I'm in pretty good spirits. Just haven't felt like posting until now and alas, here I am. *grin*

As far as catching up with you guys...well, how 'bout we just make a pact and agree that I'll start from today forward? I think I'd be so overwhelmed if I tried to go back and read ALL of your diaries from the last several days. I hope no one is offended by this decision.

I had a great time on my mini-vacation. My gfriend arrived Tuesday morning. We first took a tour of my office and I took her up into the tower cab which overlooks the city and the runway (of course). She liked that. We had lunch at my favorite Japanese restaurant. She introduced us to bento boxes. I LOVE THEM! And, I'm addicted to veggie tempura now. Double Yum.

We also went to Key West for two and a half days. Maybe it was almost three-quarters of a day. Anywho, so we went down to the Sunset Celebration, visited Duval Street, hung out with Ben's oldest sister, Kay and later, Kay's long time boyfriend, Lorenzo met up with us and we ate at an Italian restaurant. The next day we took her to a pirate gift shop (I thought of you, Poolie!) where she picked up a really neat pirate blanket and I got a cute tie-dye tee-shirt that says: "Pirate Girl". Hee, hee... We also ate breakfast at this AMAZING restaurant (famous down there) called Pepe's. Soooooo good.

We were enticed to stay the extra night (that we had not originally planned in our trip) with the promise of Lorenzo's cooking. Oh. My. Gawd. I don't even know why we bothered to go out to dinner the night before. In fact, I said this to Lorenzo. His response was, "I just didn't feel like cooking." (Don't blame him there.)

Now, lemme give you a little background on Lorenzo. He is a professional chef. He used to own 9 restaurants in Minnesota. Now he owns 1 or 2 with his business partner. The man can cook.

He made bruchetta from scratch. He served it with slices of fresh bread that he got at the specialty market earlier in the day. He grilled the bread and rubbed it with fresh cloves of garlic. He also served a homemade olive tapenade. Also on the table were homemade thin strips of seasoned, crispy tortillas to accompany the torilla soup that he had made. It had black beans, roasted corn, tomatoes and other tasty veggies. It was UNFREAKINBELIEVABLE. I have never...ever... had food that tasted this good. And I'm not just saying that. I swear. It was like going to heaven on earth.

And, to make things even better is the fact that the brownies that I had brought with me, Lorenzo (and everyone else) raved about. In fact, since he was making dinner for all of us (he and Kay invited 3 of their best friends), I bought all the ingredients to make another batch of brownies only this time I added other ingredients such as toasted almond slices and things like that.

Lorenzo couldn't stop talking about the brownies. Everyone else loved them as well. When I happened to be in the bathroom, he said to Kay, "That girl can BAKE!" (Ben told me this later.) What a HUGE compliment coming from a Professional Chef! I was glowing. In fact, he admitted to me the next morning (Lorenzo) that he had eaten 8 of the brownies!!!! hee hee...

When we left Key West, my friend J. wanted to see Miami. Since we have to drive right through Miami to get home, we decided to stop in South Beach. We took our shoes off and walked in the sand as the sun was setting. Then we opted to have dinner at one of the many restaurants on the strip. (And yes, this is the famous South Beach that a lot of celebrities visit, though I'm not exactly sure why.)

Also (not in chronological order) we went to my favorite mall, my favorite Super Target (she'd never been to a Super Target), and to the brand-new HUGE Whole Foods in Palm Beach where I snagged some bbq seitan from the hot bar. And, we picked up some ice-cream that was made from coconut milk. (We'd never tried it before.) We also visited our chiropractor who gave her a free adjustment because as he said, "Any friend of Ben & Michele's gets VIP treatment and a free adjustment." Score!

I can't think of everything that we did but we had so much fun. I was sad when she had to leave this week. Both of us are looking forward to the next time we can get together. She is truly a gem.

As Oscar Wilde once said, "Real friends stab you in the heart."

Until next time...peace, love & HEALTH!!!