Valentine’s Day came and went this past week, and I didn’t really get to celebrate it with the guy I’ve been dating. I did see him for a little while, but he had to do a system application upgrade and it took place from 9 – 10 pm, so he had to spend much of the evening making phone calls to radiologists, and preparing for the downtime.

he gave me a heart-shaped box of See’s chocolates. I gave him a regular 1lb. box of See’s candy with valentine’s wrapping paper on it.

Friday was a good day. My co-worker found a position at another company as a Network Technician. I’m super happy for him. We had a party after work on Friday that started at Restaurant Row and moved to the 9th ave. rock house and grill along waialae avenue. I liked the place and would go there again to hang out.

The highlight of my weekend was spending time with the guy I’ve been dating. This weekend we booked a room in the Pacific Beach Hotel in Waikiki just for a day. We checked in, walked around Waikiki and did a little bit of shopping, Ate dinner at Genki Sushi in Waiau, drove back to the hotel, and in the morning, we checked out and went to Windward Mall and the new iHop that opened there.

The wait for iHop was about an hour, and we got there around 12:45. We played videogames at Tilt to kill time. We had the Sampler breakfast for $9.99 each. It was a good deal, and a lot of food since it had the option of all-you-can-eat hotcakes. They make pretty good pancakes (you’d hope so wouldn’t you!?) and there were choices of maple, strawberry and blueberry pancake syrup.

In Hawaii iHop’s a big deal since its a fairly new restaurant to open up out here. The iHOP in Waikiki has been open for a while now, but the Windward Mall location only opened on Feb. 5th, 2007. There were so many people buzzing around and excited about going to eat there. It was my first time ever in an iHop. I had fun.

After iHop we took a look at the model home for his future house (being built) and also looked at the lot itself. I’m really happy for him. His parents are helping him out with the downpayment. If you aren’t familiar with the incredibly high cost of housing in Hawaii, let’s just say that in order to own a simple home (3 bedroom, 2 bath) you’d better be willing to lay down almost half a million dollars. And keep in mind IT people in Hawaii are paid 1/3 less than IT people in the mainland USA. Its the price you pay to live in Hawaii, I’m told. I was born and raised here, and hope to live here, but in all honesty I don’t know if I can afford it. I want to get myself a simple one bedroom apartment or studio, and am hoping to get it for under $200K. That’s something I hope to accomplish this year, or maybe early 2008. And when I say simple, I also would like the building to be secure so I don’t get attacked.

We crashed at his house after looking at the model homes, watched a few Samurai X ova’s, which were cool, and ate Chinese food for good luck. I ordered Egg Blossom soup. His dad bought the food for us. It was nice spending time with him this weekend.

rurouni kenshin / samurai x

I feel close to the guy I’ve been dating. I am grateful to have had such a nice time with him this weekend, and will try to remember being happy when things get stressful during the week. I’m still not sure where we’ll end up, but am glad we met, and thankful for the good times we have.

I was supposed to go running this morning. I got dressed, and went to my spot to run, but for some reason couldn’t bring myself to run for more than 10 minutes. The winds were really strong, and it was so cold. I just felt restless and came back home instead. I also cancelled on going to the beach with Rich since I was feeling a little sick this afternoon. I slept for about 3 hours, ate dinner with my mom and sister, and am now blogging about my 3-day weekend coming to a close. I feel a little anxiety, but have to get over it and find a new job already! The winds outside are cold and seem a little sinister. I hope this upcoming week at work goes by quickly and painlessly.