Have you heard the good news? She is 26.

Chuck and Kelly

This was the title of Jay's email invitation to a birthday dinner for his girlfriend, Kelly. Kelly, Chuck and Jay met in college at BC, and when Chuck was interviewing for jobs after graduation he came out to stay with Kelly in Manhattan Beach while he interviewed. They spent the day playing volleyball and Chuck was sold on California! The first few months after I met Chuck, we hung out with Kelly and Jay occasionally (mostly while watching BC sports) but not too often for two reasons: 1) they lived in Hermosa which is right next to Manhattan Beach but it is not as close as you want it to be when you are trying to ride your beach cruiser to the bar and 2) Kelly and Jay love to play volleyball (a favorite passtime here in Manhattan Beach) but they play with people considerably above our ability level. All this changed when Kelly and Jay moved to an apartment on my street (four houses away!) last December. Add to that the fact that Chuck and I are currently taking volleyball classes (we still aren't on their level) and we have been hanging out with them more and more often. I have noticed an unusual phenomenon occurs whenever we hang out with Kelly and Jay: we inevitably become quite tipsy by the end of the encounter. I attributed this to the fact that Kelly works for Sam Adams so there is always a large (and free!) supply when she is around, Chuck thinks it is because we are just having so much fun that we don't want the day/night/volleyball game to end so we keep going well past when we would normally have stopped and gone home. I think it is most likely a combination of the two :) Whatever the case, we experienced the phenomenon again Saturday night during Kelly's 26th birthday party. Here is a video of Chuck demonstrating a dance move:

We then worked it off with nearly 5 hours of volleyball on Sunday! The hangovers disappeared somewhere between hour one and hour two. Towards the end of hour three we switched to a game called 'Ace' which is basically the same as regular volleyball only there is a beer drinking penalty involved when someone gets aced (the ball hits the sand before anyone has touched it) and suddenly we found ourselves drunk again - the wonders may never cease.

Jay is in the center of the back row (holding the ball).

Kelly is the photographer.

Mrs. Laura Fraser

Laura got married last month! I have been so busy that I haven't had a chance to post about it. The wedding was in Fort Myers, FL and it reminded me how awesome it is to be from Florida! The wedding was beautiful, the band was amazing and it was so good to see everyone again - congratulations Jay and Laura!

Paige, Ashley, Kim, Tim, Dan and Chuck

One of the best parts of living in California has been my group of friends! Ashley and I knew each other from nursing school and Kappa Delta at the University of Florida, Kim and Ashley were paired up as roommates by the UCLA nursing recruiter since they were both moving to LA from the East coast (Kim is from Connecticut). So during my first year in LA we all lived over in Westwood (not as roommates - remember Kayla?) and hung out enough that it was only a matter of time before I convinced them to follow me to the Southbay. Kim works in the Neuro/Trauma ICU at UCLA with Tim. Last May (before Kim and Ashley had moved to Manhattan Beach) Tim moved to Manhattan Beach and decided to throw a housewarming party with his new roommates (Gaynor, Lauren, Dan and Chuck). I was invited to this party by Tim after a chance meeting with him on Cinco de Mayo during which we realized we had a mutual friend (Kim). Kim was at Tim's party as well, in fact this seems to be the only surviving image from that night:It was a great party and we all started to hang out pretty often (helped along by the fact that Chuck and I started dating). Chuck, Tim and Dan eventually moved out of that apartment and into their current apartment. Last October, I moved in with Kim and Ashley (or should I say they moved in with me because I already lived in MB?) to an apartment less than a mile away from the boys' apartment and since that time the six of us have become pretty close. Here we all are at Sharkeez last weekend for Kim's 25th birthday:

L to R: Paige, Chuck, Dan, Ashley, Kim, Tim