Almost done catching up!

Back in October of last year, the Paramount Theatre emailed me to give me a head's up that Anthony Bourdain was coming back to town. Added bonus? Eric Ripert would be joining him.

My head almost exploded. In case you don't know who Eric Ripert is (I mentioned him in this blog entry in 2009), he is a world-renowned French chef & author, specializing in French cuisine and seafood. I've seen him on several of my favorite shows (think: Top Chef, Top Chef Masters, No Reservations), and was thrilled to hear I would be getting a bang for my buck with him in tow. He and Anthony Bourdain have been friends for a long time, according to both of them, and I figured it would be interesting to see them talk, since they could not be more opposite from one another. Tony is your typical potty-mouthed, drinking, smoking (well, he quit recently), hard-living chef, and Eric is more reserved, polite, and far from in-your-face about anything.

They did not disappoint! They quizzed each other on things, they talked about things relevant to the culinary world that would probably bore most people, and it was all wildly entertaining. Once they opened up the floor to questions, Aaron and I couldn't take it for too long, and ducked out. There are few things worse than listening to people try to sound more intelligent than they actually are, and the douche-baggery that spews from them as they try to impress a couple of famous chefs. I'm pretty sure some of these folks really believed they might befriend one or both of these men, simply because they live in a town where the term "foodie" gets tossed around way too often, and they know what foie gras is. But, overall, it was a magnificent night, and I'm so glad I got to see Anthony Bourdain one more time.

Next, and possibly the most exciting thing to happen since Christmas -- we took the plunge and booked our next cruise. I am so flippin' excited, I can hardly stand it. Now, since we know we need the time to get our money saved up, we booked it for *next* spring break. What does that mean? Oh yes, let the countdown begin.

Thankfully, we got our tax return back pretty quickly, and then we called Royal Caribbean the same day - it was a beautiful thing. We will be heading back to the Western Caribbean, and we are sincerely hoping we get to actually see Jamaica this go round. We are so stoked that we can finally have something to look forward to, even if it is a year away. The way I see it, we started counting down at 420 days with the Alaskan cruise, so at least we've got less to endure this time.

Tomorrow - hospital trip #2. And hopefully the LAST for a while!