Happy New Year everyone!
I hope the holidays treated you as good as they did me. I was able to spend six days with my family and close friends in Stockton, California where I was born and raised. I had the most amazing time. Yes it was short-lived but I appreciated ALMOST every second. I’ll explain the “almost” later on.
After our victory against the second best team in our league on the evening of the 19th, I drove straight to Madrid for my flight out to California. In my head I planned on every restaurant I wanted to go to while I was home. All my favorites. And I succeeded above and beyond! As most of you already know, I had an obsession with Portillo’s when I was living in Chicago. Hot dogs are my favorite food. So naturally my favorite hot dog place was first on my list. Let me tell you, I enjoyed every bite of, not one, but two huge chili cheese dogs and could barely move for the rest of the day. Well worth it though.
When I’m home I enjoy working out with my high school trainer, going on my 2.5 mile run around my neighborhood, spending time at the house with my family, and eating at all our favorite restaurants. Wow, I sound like all I live for is food. Sort of. But yes these are my favorite parts about being home. My short-lived trip was really special this time because I was able to go to San Francisco and enjoy the city for the day. It’s about one hour from where I live so I don’t always make it to the Bay Area. But this time I made a great day of it. I went to fisherman’s wharf where you can take a ferry boat to Alcatraz and see the old prison, did a mirror maze and went into the wax museum. They had a Rihanna wax figure and that was my highlight; I am obsessed with her. Then I drove to the Golden Gate Bridge to see the amazing view on such a nice, sunny day. It was beautiful. And then I drove down Lombard Street, which is the street that curls all the way down where my best friend Asha’s job is to visit her before I drove back to Stockton. It was a full day fulfilled with so many wonderful things.
Christmas Day was really special for me. My sister Johnna is in her third year of residency at Scripts Hospital in San Diego. You can imagine how busy she always is with her work schedule. And I am playing basketball year-round, so when we are both home together it’s really special for our family. We had Christmas dinner and sat around the fire all day talking and laughing. And at the end of the night we went to see the movie Creed. Overall, it was a magical day.
Of course, it had to come to an end and this is where the “almost” plays a factor in my trip. My flight was from Sacramento to Dallas and then Dallas to Madrid. My first flight to Dallas took off an hour late and when we were in the air the plane had to reroute to Austin because of the weather conditions in Dallas. When we landed in Dallas we were stuck on the tarmac for almost six hours with no food or water. It was terrible. When we finally got to Dallas I obviously missed my connection to Madrid so I spent the night in Dallas and had to fly out the next day at 1:30 p.m. to Miami where I would then catch my flight from Miami to Madrid. Again, my flight in Dallas was delayed four hours so when I arrived in Miami I missed my connecting flight to Madrid, again, so I spent the night in Miami. I had a wonderful morning in Miami where I was able to go on a run on South Beach and have a nice breakfast before catching my flight at 5 p.m. That flight was on time and I finally made it to Madrid three days late. It was the craziest travel ever! But I’m not going to lie; spending the night in Miami wasn’t all that bad.
Now that we are in the New Year, I hope everyone fulfills their New Year’s resolutions and has an awesome year. I know it will be a special one for the Chicago Sky. Take care Sky family and I’ll be back!! 🙂