October: The official birthday month

Connie, Mia, and I (friends from high school) all have our birthdays in October. So every year, we try to get together sometime during the month, which is quite a feat since we haven't all lived in the same state since 2001. We've been scattered between California, Illinois, and New York in various configurations for the last several years. This year, though, we met in LA and Connie (and her fiance Brian) flew in from NYC and Mia from Berkeley to have a whirlwind weekend.

A few weeks ago I had randomly bought tickets through Groupon for hydrobike rentals in Long Beach. I had never heard of hydrobikes, but they seemed like a fun and easy weekend activity to do someday. Luckily, Mia and Connie were interested so we drove down to Long Beach to ride em:

They were basically bikes attached to flotation devices. Pedaling spun some blades underwater that chugged you along. The day was gray and almost rainy, which was sad. But it was still a fun ride!


Later on we fancied it up with dinner at Bouchon in Beverly Hills. The mushroom salad was the star of the night, but everything was pretty good. I do have major complaints about service, though--we had a reservation and we still waited for 30 minutes before they were able to seat us. Then they sat us at the most terrible table in the house; it was literally right behind the hostess stand and in the middle of the most concentrated foot traffic. That table really shouldn't have existed at all. It didn't even feel like we were *in* the restaurant...we were kind of on the outskirts of it. Or maybe in the middle of the exit. I'm not someone who complains about service a lot, but when you're spending that much money I demand SOMEthing.

But anyway, it was about the company, right? It was great seeing the girls again, and props to Connie and Brian for taking that 6 hour flight back and forth just for a two-day weekend! Happy birthdays to us...