You know you're getting older

When you spend a Friday night ripping apart a bathroom, followed by dinner and posting on the blog. How much more exciting could we be?!

I posted some new pictures in the May photo album. You can access it by clicking on the photo to the right.

We spent some time ripping out the rest of the tile in the third floor bathroom in preparation for our remodel. Our toilet arrived today, and the tiles were shipped today and should arrive soon. I ripped out the tile on the bottom of the walls while Markus got stuck with the stinky (literally and figuratively) job of removing the existing toilet. I was happy to just keep chiseling away at tiles...

Last night we went to the gym and decided that we should go out for dinner. I picked a new vegan restaurant that recently moved from Willow Grove to a location about 3 blocks from us on S. 7th Street. It's called Horizons. Check out their website at www.horizonsphiladelphia.com. It was one of the best restaurant meals I've had in a long time, and I loved the atmosphere. It's one of the few places in the city where the bartender chatted us up and we talked to some of the servers and the people sitting next to us. We had to sit at the bar, even though we walked in at 9 pm for dinner, because the restaurant was reviewed by the Inquirer last week and received 3/4 bells. I had been wanting to go for weeks and knew our best shot to go now was on a weeknight and I'm so glad we did! I had cucumber avocado soup and yucatan salad while Markus had a hearty black bean soup with quinoa and seitan tips, and paella. I tell you, it was simply delicious. They have a cookbook that I'd like to buy because the food they served is exactly the kind of vegetarian food I love and would like to cook at home. We still eat meat, but also like to switch it up every now and again with tofu, seitan, tempeh, and other non-meat products. I also found a beer I love and could drink more than one of - Celis from the Michigan Brewing Company. We're going to search for it this weekend I think.

I have to return to Indy next week; it wasn't a planned trip but I'm glad to be going. Markus is always asking me if I need to spend more time there. I wonder if he's trying to get rid of me? We're working on rolling out a new software application and I am going to train some of the staff that will need to implement and use the product in the future.

I've been reflecting recently on the fact that I really enjoy my job and how lucky I am to be in such a position. For those who don't know, I am a business analyst. What the heck is that (I didn't know what it was til I became one)? Well, at my current job, the executives and senior management determine what our software applications need to do in order to maintain and generate new business (i.e., make money). When new features and functionality need to be developed, I would begin identifying the requirements (what does the software need to do, how should it behave in certain scenarios). Then I'd create detailed functional specifications that outline exactly how the features will work; these documents are then used by a software developer to write the code that makes everything work. I'd also work with a user interface designer to determine how the screens should look to a user of the software. If you think of any website you use, someone had to figure out what the software behind the scenes needs to do in order for the website to work (think Amazon or Expedia and placing an order), and how the website and its different screens should look, based on what information needs to be captured, whether the user can move forward or back when making a purchase, and so forth. I also work directly in our database to add additional records/information, make edits, or delete things that shouldn't be there. Since we're building something new, there are no pretty screens that make it easy, so we have to access the database to make any changes right now. I've learned quite a bit about MS Access, Toad, PL/SQL Developer, and Oracle databases; these are things a Spanish major would never dream of...

But, I have to confess that this type of work really suits me. Anyone who knows me knows that I'm extremely left-brained, anal retentive, detail-oriented, and this job allows me to swim in details all day long. Now that the weekend is here, though, I'll stop talking about work. I figured I'd take a minute and explain what I do, since most people aren't sure, and they wonder what the heck I'm doing when I go to Indy all the time. Now you know!

Markus and I are going to hit the gym tomorrow for Tae Bo, then go to Home Depot or Lowe's to get supplies for the floor and patching the walls so we can paint. I'll take pictures over the weekend and maybe post our progress on Monday night. We're looking forward to a neighborhood block party on Sunday - this will be our first opportunity to meet several neighbors, so it should be fun. Then Markus has to hit the books to read up for his next class. Lucky boy...

Happy Memorial Day, everyone!