10 Down, 2 To Go

This was Orange October. Orange for the the October Quest post-season games that the Giants were playing. Orange October was good, in fact very very good to me because my team, my love, the San Francisco Giants won their 2nd word series trophy in three years. So yes, that would always be the highlight of October. Three glorious weeks in October were for watching the baseball games, the pre- and post-games and reading all the articles online. It was madness, and maddening at the same time. I am just in heaven right now, orange and black heaven. Today is the victory parade. I am not going. I went to the first one in 2010, it was craaazy, lots of people, shouting, crowding, just total jubilation. I am not going, because, well because I wasn't feeling it this year. I know I got a better camera and hubby just picked up a little upgrade for his camera as well. However, I am going on a cruise in a few weeks so I don’t want to use up another day off for this. But the DVR is recording two different stations covering the same parade. I hope I taped all the happenings, with DVR you don't know. It always cuts off the best parts.

In addition, I have won (or given, however you see it) a cruise. There's a lot of things attached to claiming the prize, but as long as there's no money leaving our pockets we're going to go with it. Plus, our thinking is even if we fork out some money, as long as the cruise would still be less than the regular price of the cruise then we'd take it. Right now, we are awaiting for the processing of claim to be completed. But this was really fun for me, because I join many contests, raffles and drawings over the years and I never really get to win something substantial as this is. So this is really neat!

And speaking of more winning, we received a thank you card over the mail yesterday from a fellow church member thanking us for the Pirate cruise along the Sacramento River that we donated for the church fundraiser last June. She won the cruise, which was tagged as second prize. The first prize was an overnite stay in a lighthouse converted into an inn in a little island between Contra Costa and Marin counties. Anyway, she said that after years of joining raffles and losing she was shocked when her name was picked out. They only used their prize last weekend, and she and her husband had one wonderful night and experience. And she sent us a card to let us know. How thoughtful of her. And I thought that sending cards via snail mail is completely gone. I love receiving and giving cards over snail mail. I hope to send Christmas cards this year as well.

Hubby and I also joined a local newspaper's photo contest where the prize is a trip for two in the Pacific, something like a tropical vacation. I'm not very hopeful about my entries, although I stand by them, but I've seen the sampling of the entries and boy oh boy compared to those images, mine look like a 5-year-old snapped them. I didn't do a lot of picture taking this month.

Darby came early for trick or treating. He is growing up to be such a darling of a boy. My niece is raising him so well. It's a hoot to hear him call his parents Nanay and Tatay. He yelled with glee when my mom came down the stairs to greet him and said LOLA!!!! He calls me Tita and my hubby Tito.

Looking forward to November I'm very sure I'd be more rushed than October.