Surfin' safari

Here in the Bay, it was a weekend filled with surfing. There were the most excellent guys down at Mavericks. *sigh* I remember back in the day (over ten years ago), when I first heard about this contest and would contemplate calling in sick to work so that I could see the action live. Maybe it's all those years I spent in San Diego that makes me love surfing so much. Maybe it's the way that surfers describe the feeling they get when they connect with the perfect wave. Maybe it comes from too many years of hanging out with guys who make me watch surfing movies. OK. So maybe sometimes I watch them on my own these days.

And this all seemed add some balance to my weekend since I was surfin' the crimson wave, as one of my friends would say. And when I'm feeling that way, my first inclination is to watch a lot of chick flicks and Lifetime. Thus the need for balance.

And I should have realized what was going on when I headed into Trader Joe's. I have years of practice at shopping hungry. The key is to write a list and to stick to it. But I didn't stick to my list on Saturday. For the first time in months, I bought frozen prepared food. Chicken taquitos? In the cart. French onion soup? MUST HAVE! And since I was planning to give Cyndi's fish tacos a try, I had put black beans on the list. Because I needed something to go with the avocados I already had. But once in the store, I thought, "I must have tortilla chips. And if I get those, I'm going to need cheese. Because I might want nachos later in the week."

It's all my fault. I should have looked at the calendar. A former friend used to tell all the other women that she knew that they should all take my approach. Back then, I would head out and rent a bunch of chick flicks. And then I'd head to the grocery store for my favorite foods. There was usually duck pate on the list. Basically the theme seemed to be fatty and salty foods with a few sweets mixed in. And then I would hole up at home with my food and chick flicks. Because I really should not go out in public for those first 24 hours or so. I like to think that I am doing a public service. One of my personal greatest discoveries was that with birth control pills, one can basically dictate when those 24 hours will be. I like Sunday. You can still get some weekend partying in and make it to work without being a raving homicidal fool. OK. So just on either side of that 24 hour window, I can be mildly so.

So what was on the menu on Sunday? I started off with chicken taquitos with guacamole, sour cream, and salsa -- for breakfast. Around lunchtime, there was French onion soup. Late afternoon was time for a crab Louie. Then dinner was the fish tacos with black beans. Yes, I really did eat all of that. Because I get really hungry.

But it's the one day a month during which I really take care of me. If I want to cry hysterically, it's OK. If I want to eat a bunch of "bad" food, that's OK too. Key to this is no contact, or at least minimal contact, with the outside world. Because sometimes we all need to decompress.