Traveling rocks the house!

I love to travel, in fact it is probably one of my favorite things to do. Airports don't stress me out, I love airplanes, and not knowing where I'm going or getting lost in a crazy place is a cool thing to me.

Erin and I have been talking a lot lately about getting out to Europe again to do some traveling, and I think we're going to make that happen this Fall perhaps, which could be so cool! I lived in France for a year, and Erin studied in Spain for a semester, so we've seen Western Europe a bunch, so I think this time we'll hit up Eastern Europe, which I've heard is amazing!

Anyway, check out this cool website. You check the places you've been and it makes a map for you, and tells you just how few places you've really been! And it makes you want to travel more!

PS: If you're reading this on Facebook, you'll need to click "View original post" at the top, if you want to see the map.

Stacy & John: CSI Engaged!

How cute is this couple? Yesterday I spent the afternoon with Stacy and John down in Ocean Beach, and we had a blast! Stacy & I went to college together, and we have a lot of fun memories! Both John & Stacy are both CSI people in real life, and I just think that is so cool. Stacy is the lab rat, and John is the field guy. So not only are these two good looking, they are both basically brilliant!

We shot a bunch down in Ocean Beach, and then decided to head over to Old Town for dinner, but continued the photo session while we waited for some other friends to show up.

It was such a blessing for me personally to get to photograph them, they are so in love, and you can really tell. And I'm not just saying that - it's true! As I said, I've known Stacy for years, and when John is around her, she just lights up and glows like nobody's business. It's so cool!

Click here for a little slideshow action!

Dinner & a Hot Tub

Remember my friends Dave and Jenny who got married about a month ago? Well last night a bunch of us went up to San Clemente to their new place to hang out with the newlyweds! In the picture above you see almost the whole gang - Jenny, Josh, Erin, Brewer, Dave, and myself...

While the women-folk were inside working on this amazing pesto pasta thing, us men hung out outside next to the grill, because we are awesome. Aside from grilling up a bunch of chicken for dinner, Dave also threw on this giant porterhouse steak and we seriously just grilled that thing up, and then ate it right off the grill. It was so good!

After dinner we just kind of sat around and hung out, and laughed a ton. We also hit up the hot tub (of course) and that is always a fun time! I'm so blessed to have such awesome friends- I just get so excited every chance I have to just kick back and hang out with buddies!

Fun night out!

Last night was so much fun! I went out on the town with two of my friends, Gretchen & Joe, and we had the greatest time. Joe used to be a chef (and I mean a real, real chef, like the kind that work at fancy restaurants) and so he knows so much about food, wine, and the like. So of course, we just followed his lead all night!

We started off by going to "The Temple Bar" in Harvard Square, and it was incredible! You want to know what we had? Of course you do. For appetizers, we had spicy pork riblets and "lomi lomi" salmon civiche. If you know me, you know that I hate seafood and fish of all kinds. But, since we were out with Joe, I decided that I'd try everything once. And I LOVED the salmon! It was yummy! For dinner, I had moroccan lamb steak, Joe had monkfish (which I also tried, and LOVED) and Gretchen had scallops, which were kind of odd to me. Oh, and we had some outstanding Mojitos, and a really great Shiraz.

After the Temple Bar, we went to "Rialto" which Joe said is regarded as one of the top 5 best restaurants in Boston, and it was definitely a classy place. We just wanted dessert, so we hung out in the bar area, which was good because I think if we wanted to go into the main dining room, they wouldn't have let us, on account of our jeans! We ended up having a cheese course with some awesome cheeses (none of them were too stinky) and an incredible bottle of Chardonnay. It was amazing.

We had so much fun, laughed a lot, and really got to know one another better, which I am always down for! This is a pic from Gretchen's camera. I can't believe we didn't take more pictures last night, but we were just too busy having so much dang fun!

I'm Here!

Wow, what a day. This is the view from my 21st floor room here in Cambridge, Mass. It is absolutely beautiful-the buildings in the foreground is MIT (some mom-and-pop trade school out here)

It seems like it took me forever to get from San Diego to Boston, but I've finally arrived, and it feels good. I've unpacked all my stuff (that's a habit I get from my dad- I do it as soon as I get in the door) and I'm sitting here in my beautiful hotel room...it's nice to relax...finally.

It was all just another normal trip, until I showed up to the San Diego airport. The line for United was longer than I had ever seen it before. Ever. And I travel a lot. The line was looooooooooong! Luckily, I had checked in online last night, so I was all set for that, and then I just had to wait in this super short line to give them my bags. That was good, because I definitely didn't show up early enough to have been able to wait in line and still make the flight!

I had to fly through Chicago O'Hare, which was nuts. There was about .5 mile visibility, which meant I didn't see the ground until about 5 seconds before we landed. That was fun. There were delays leaving due to weather, but eventually we got going, and I think the pilot "floored" it because we were only about an hour late to Boston, even though we left Chicago 2 hours late!

My friend Christy helped me book a car to take me from the airport to the Hotel, and it was so awesome! I had to go to where all the Limos and stuff were, and when I got there, there was a guy with a sweet SUV waiting for me, with a big sign that said "J. Youngren." I would have taken a picture of it, but I think that would have ruined the moment. It was sweet though.

Time for bed. Night night!

Sweet.