So Say I

someone has been playing with...

2011-11-29T13:34:00.000-08:00

Did you think I DIED?

Well, I really almost did. But I'll save that for my next blog post.

Just popping in to remind everyone at this special time of year that if your relatives are bat-shit crazy, you're not alone.

Background: Last year my immediate family all pitched in to give my wonderful Grandma an i-Pad! We set her up with a Gmail account, and even her own Facebook page!

She still doesn't really get the whole "internets" so everytime we visit we make a point of breaking out the iPad and going through the basics.

Rewind to Thanksgiving... my sister and I decide to show grandma Margie YouTube. You can imagine our surprise when YouTube greeted us with a recent browsing history filled with tits, vajayjays, big weeners and the like. Evidently, someone had been using Margie's iPad to Choke the Chicken.

There's no shortage of suspected [monkey] spankers in the family, as the men in the family take turns staying at the house once a week to give the in-home nurse a day off. But, thanks to a couple of surgical procedures viewed within a few minutes of some rendition of Debbie Does Dallas, we're pretty sure the culprit is our cousin, soon-to-be medical doctor, who was unable to make it...

Honestly, I think porn is kindove gross, but I realize a lot of men are into it. Whatever. But using your grandmother's iPad in your grandparents' house to do your business is just fucking wrong.

So I sent my cousin a message that said:

Someone has been looking at a lot of youtube porn on marge's ipad. Quite the shocker when we went in for the Thanksgiving youtube demo. Anyway, whatever.. but AT LEAST have the decency to clear your browsing history! Happy thanksgiving.

His response:

Hey Cuz. LOL that you thought it was me. Probably one of your uncles.

Unconvinced, I responded:

I really don't care who it was... Just super awkward for us. Marge basically thinks that's what the internets for now.

And then I get back:

Lol. That IS what the internet is for cuz!

BLEH!!!!

Please stop calling me "cuz" ...
Can we just pretend we're not related? LOL.
[who says that?]

Gee, I can't wait for Christmas!

Mister Bondi + Lidda Homie (gratuitous puppy post)

2011-04-28T21:02:00.000-07:00

About a year ago, I used my super duper powers of persuasion to convince my Mister that we needed to adopt another puppy.

And so we did, and he was named HOMIE.

My other Mister Bondi was not very happy about this.

Really not at all impressed.

Mister Bondi had to teach Lidda Homie how to do many things...

...like ride in the car.

... and "just this one time" turned into, like, every time...

Eventually, Lidda Homie started to kindove sortove grow on Mister Bondi...

but Lidda Homie was still not wise to the ways of the world.

There was still much he needed to learn....

... before they could be friends....

... even cuddle buddies...

And now, many months later... they pretty much like each other.

Lidda Homie is not so "lidda" anymore.

And Mister Bondi is pretty much cool with that.

But every once in awhile...

he just wants the damn front seat to himself.

our new ninja roomie...

2011-04-18T14:23:00.000-07:00

We have a BIG problem...

For the last couple of weeks, we have heard an unbelievable racket coming from the ceiling above our bed. It sounds like an animal eating the house.

The scratching, scraping, clawing and gnawing is impossible to ignore, so Bondi and I lie in bed from about 2am-5am wondering when the ceiling is going to come crashing down on us. It's really restful.

After one too many sleepless nights, I decided someone needed to go up to the roof to investigate. Up the rickety wooden ladder to the moldy, sagging, decrepit roof....

So on Friday, Joe went.

He found a 3' x 3' hole that had been chewed through the tar paper, through the wood frame and into the drywall and insulation. (This helps explain the new leak that has developed in our bedroom ceiling.) He covered the gash with a sheet of plywood as a temporary solution... a sort of "find somewhere else to burrow" message.

Well, around 4am Sunday morning, we suspected our new furry roommate was not so easily deterred.

This was confirmed Sunday afternoon when we found a note from our neighbor:

"Guys,

Giant raccoon is digging a hole in your roof. He just climbed up there now. (12 noon). He uses the bush by the kitchen, NW corner of house, to climb up. He is like a ninja.

The insulation and tar paper from the hole keeps blowing onto our lawn which we are trying to seed.

Jon"

I refrained from responding:

"Dear Jon,

Thank you for the note about our ninja raccoon friend. We have consented to allow this nest building, as the relentless horror movie soundtrack and imminent threat of the roof collapsing on us while we sleep is little price to pay for disrupting your lawn beautification.

Cheers!"

Just kidding, kind of. Jon's a nice guy... This is just misguided hostility that I will instead be directing to our landlord ~~or any well-rested person who crosses my path~~...

Oh and by the way, here is what our "ninja" raccoon did just last night. Note huge sheet of plywood covering previous huge hole, new small hole, and new displaced insulation.

It was another peaceful sleep.

Just as an aside, pretty sure the ninja culprit is a pregnant she, not a he... one fierce mama desperate to make a nest for her little ones!

Regardless, today I purchased this:

It's made from coyote urine and it's supposed to tell the raccoon(s) to go somewhere else. I'm thinking she's probably gonna "bahaha" in the face of this synthetic predator pee, but we'll see.

Oh, and I just sent "something" along these lines to our landlord.

Dear Landlord,

Per our lease agreement, I am writing to notify you of additional occupancy in our home. There is a giant "ninja" raccoon that has taken residency in the roof, having displaced about 9 square feet of the insulation to make a den for her kits, which are likely due any day now. I was going to "evict" her myself, but am wary to spend too much time on the roof, due to the whole "rotten wood" and "valuing my life" thing. Plus, I find I have little energy to do anything more than lie in bed anticipating a raccoon party in the bedroom, should the ceiling collapse on me while sleeping.

Sleepless in Seattle,

Jenny

Still waiting to hear back...

The house next door to the pedophile is starting to look pretty nice right about now! Just saying...

EDITED TO ADD: Here is the picture our neighbor just emailed me of our new furry friend in action, along with the note: "Here is one of the photos. I got his face in this one so maybe he can be identified down at the station."

chicago, now and then

2011-04-08T09:23:00.000-07:00

Last weekend I was in Chicago for a tradeshow. Second time time in five years. (The last time was quite an experience... more on that below).

Even though I was there for "work" we managed to pack quite a lot of fun into a few days.

We arrived Thursday and after setting up the booth and getting settled in the hotel, we found our way to a jazz club called Buddy Guys. The Chicago R&B Kings were playing and they sounded incredible. They were your "typical" R&B group... except the blues guitar player. He was hands down the best guitarist I have ever seen play.

Somehow I don't think we'll be seeing him in the limelight anytime soon, though, given that he weighs probably over 300 lbs, is a ginger and sports pig-tail puffs.

I think he just doesn't have what the judges on American Idol call that "star quality"... Too bad for those who will never witness what his magical fingers can do. I'm sure he makes his girlfriend very happy.

After a long day at the tradeshow, Friday night we ordered the "Chicago's Best Pizza" from Giordanos. I kid you not, the thing weighed about 10 lbs. Apparently Chicago deep-dish is something you have to do. I was not a fan. I guess having a weeks servings of carbs in one meal is not my thing?

Saturday night rocked. After the tradeshow, exhibitors and buyers were treated to an open bar and private concert by Keith Urban. I'm not a huge country fan but holy hotness he is beautiful. And Australian.

I may have to trade my Uggs in for some cowboy boots. Afterall, I do like dogs and beer. I'd probably do just fine as a country convert!
After the show we decided to take a 'shortcut' back to the hotel, but somehow managed to get lost in the underground of Chicago. Every 'exit' sign led to another staircase or tunnel and after wandering for half an hour among fiber, tunnels and electrical conduit, we came across this Mason sign.

My dad was sure it was some kindove conspiracy. (We'd had a few drinks...) Well, I pressed a service elevator button to see where it would go and when the door opened there was a union dude just standing there. Silent. Then we got escorted out. It was odd.

After the last day of the show we headed downtown to explore the city - all I can say is I was impressed. I was expecting dangerous and dirty (see below) but it wasn't at all.

Clean, vibrant, beautiful architecture, impressive history... good times!

Monday after packing the booth up we headed uptown to Wrigley Field to catch a Cubs game! We sat in the bleachers where all the cool kids were and enjoyed a few drinks.

There were seagulls on the field, which made me think of that time Randy Johnson killed a bird with a 95mph fastball.

We had more time in the city Monday than we expected, since our flight was seriously delayed. Apparently Southwest needed to make sure the plane wasn't going to spontaneously tear open before departing. Fine by me.

All in all I'd say it was a pretty great (long) weekend.

Much better than the last time I was in Chicago 5 years ago...

Funny ~~near death experience~~ story actually.

After graduating from college I set out from Durham with all of my posessions and Mr. Bondi crammed into my Ford Explorer, heading home to Seattle.

That first day I drove until 2:00AM when, almost out of gas, I had to pull off the freeway for the night... in south Chicago.

Being a frugal college student, I was looking for a cheap motel. I pulled into the first one I found. There were some questionables in the parking lot, so I hurried inside to book my room.

The first thing I noticed was the window covered with bars. Not a good sign. I thrust my credit card at the clerk through the little hole in the barred windows, who then proceeded to ASK ME IF I WANTED THE ROOM HOURLY OR FOR THE WHOLE NIGHT.

Granted, I had been driving for 10 hours... but it is seriously disturbing to think I looked that awful.

No, I will not be sucking cock for crack, thank you very much.

Meanwhile another 'customer' is waiting in line behind me. And by customer I mean pimp, complete with the mouth full of gold, dreds and snakeskin boots. And by behind me I mean about an inch away from licking the nape of my nake... Breathing hot nasty breath on me.

I was actually scared for my life... and seriously regretting leaving Bondi in the car. I actually pondered what Bondi would do if I never came back for him!

I explained to the clerk that I was 'lost' and out of gas, and asked if there was any safer place to stay nearby.

"He said sorry hun, you're in south Chicago on a Saturday night. Everywhere is gonna be pretty cranky. Your best bet is to go to your room and lock the door."

That's comforting, I thought, as I wondered if he meant crank as in meth, or crank as in the sound my neck will make if I stand in front of pimpdaddy for another second and he decides to kill me.

And with that, I took my key and proceeded to my whore den, where I was surprised not to find a crack rock waiting for me on my pillow. I heard no less than three gunshots during the night, but I survived, no doubt thanks to Mr. Bondi, who dutifully growled and barked at the door for the duration of the night.

What a difference 5 years makes, Chicago!

And speaking of, I am currently on the way to Duke for my 5 year (oh.my.gawd. where has the time gone?) college reunion. No worries, though, I'm not driving back.

cutting it close.

2011-04-01T18:06:00.000-07:00

Hello from Chicago! I'm here for a tradeshow this weekend. Just barely made it, in fact.

Funny story actually, though it wasn't really at the time...

Yesterday morning I had a 6:30am flight. Have I shared with y'all how much I am not a morning person? Like, please don't talk to me until I've had my coffee... for your own sake... so we can still be friends.

The 6:30am was the only option to get me to Chicago in time for booth set-up. I backwards count to when I have to wake up...

Must arrive "1 hour" prior to flight to check a bag.. (you can actually push this to 30 minutes, just saying)... must allow 40 minutes for driving to airport (20 minutes presuming no traffic, which I do)... need 15 minutes to wake up, brush teeth, etc. (can push this to 3 minutes if necessary)... you get the idea.

Well, long story short I wake up at a time that starts with a FREAKING 4 and still manage to cut it close to make my flight. Apparently other people - a lot of them, actually - fly at this ungodly hour.

6:00am: I pick the shortest looking security line, but quickly realize I have chosen wrong. My line is like amateur hour at the airport. One lady in front of me literally spends minutes removing her lace-up boots. Who wears lace-up boots to the airport? Actually, who wears lace-up boots, period?

6:07am: There's an influx of flight attendants. Like, 7 of them. Did you know they just get to bypass the whole... waiting in line thing? I am literally next in line to send my carryon through the x-ray when they come, one after another, to place their snazzy little carryons on the conveyor belt... right in front of me.

6:14am: Finally, the last of the flight attendants is through. I'm up! Then TSA lady taps me on the shoulder and tells me I've been selected for the body scan. Yippee! She tells me I will need to wait until my bag has entered the x-ray, though, before I can be "viewed". That's when I see a new influx of flight attendants hurrying to put their carryons in front of mine!

6:15am: The man behind me tells the flight attendants "We've been waiting for quite awhile, if you wouldn't mind just letting us go through really quickly" after which I blurt out "Yeah, I'm going to miss my flight... please, I'll be quick."

Well guess what some snatchface flight attendant says? "Oh honey, you're not going anywhere without us! Planes need flight attendants to fly."

Oh do they now? I thought they needed flight attendants to serve peanuts and soda, thank you for clarifying. I don't say that though. I actually say, "Oh, are you on the 6:30am to Chicago? Didn't think so..." and promptly shove my bag through the x-ray.

Is there just something about airport security that brings out the best in us all? Or maybe it's just me... in the early morning.

6:16am: I am treated to my first full-body scan. The TSA man tells me it's okay to smile. I don't. When I'm finished, he doesn't even say congratulations or nice boobs or anything. Ridiculous.

6:18am: Run to flight. Make it. Barely.

Well, that's pretty much the whole story. It was funnier in my head... sorry about that!

NEED advice for this girl I know...

2011-03-28T13:13:00.000-07:00

So there's this girl I know who has been with her boyfriend for almost three years. They've lived together for a couple years, have furbabies together, and talk about a future together. They have a good relationship. There are ups and downs, of course, but at the end of the day, they share common interests and have a strong physical and emotional connection. They love each other.

And then, the other night her boyfriend went to a bachelor party and had too much to drink and apparently let a girl sit on his lap and kissed her (or "she kissed him") not once, not twice, but three times. When he came home that night, she naturally asked him how the evening was. He said it was a blast, describing where they had gone but not really what they had done. He awkwardly mentioned some girls and some flirting. Minutes went by and then she asked him, on a gut instinct, if he kissed any of these girls. He said yes.

That night while still drunk, her boyfriend said the girls were kissing "all the guys" and it "wasn't a big deal" ... but it was a very big deal for her. She felt betrayed by her boyfriend, who she had never imagined was even capable of such transgressions. (I have even heard her say, many times, "He would never cheat on me" and she believed it wholeheartedly.)

And to make matters worse she also felt horribly embarassed, because "all the guys" at this bachelor party were her friends too, and they had witnessed her boyfriend drunk and kissing on/being kissed by some girl that wasn't her.

And then it came out that it wasn't really "all the guys"... it was pretty much just him, and maybe one or two other (single) guys.

When morning came, her boyfriend felt absolutely awful and apologized profusely for his horrible lapse in judgement. He said he was a "real dick" and felt terrible for hurting her. He realized being drunk was no excuse, and couldn't really say why he had let that happen, but only that he wished it hadn't. He promised it would never happen again and was willing to do "whatever it takes" to make it right.

But now, the girlfriend doesn't know if it ever can be right.

One the one hand, she has made similar mistakes in the past - maybe not quite so egregious, but mistakes nevertheless that her boyfriend forgave. He has never done anything like this before... and it was just a kiss. Or three.

On the other hand, she feels hurt, devastated, betrayed, and sick to her stomach every time she thinks about it. How will she ever be able to trust him again?

If you were this girl, what would you do? (If you need any more details to render an opinion, I'm sure I can ask her...)

FML

2011-03-24T12:06:00.000-07:00

F: FLAT TIRE
I finished my CrossFit workout the other night, all excited to meet a girlfriend for a beer, and discovered this:

Deja vu much? Promptly called the boyfriend, who wasn't too eager to be my knight in shining armor, so I called AAA.

Who needs a boyfriend when you have AAA anyway, right?

Truthfully, my dad would be so ashamed that I did not change my own tire, but I could not for the life of me find the tire iron. It was probably somewhere under the overflowing pile of shit occupying my trunk.

M: MY AILMENTS
On pull-up 79 out of 80 in the above referenced CrossFit WOD, my hand ripped. Just like in the good ol' days of gymnastics.

Now washing my hair stings like a bitch.

Also, my vision. I realized the other night while trying to read the bar menu on a blackboard about 10 feet from me that I'm going blind. I need glasses... badly. This makes me feel really old.

L: (A)LLERGIES
I realize everyone is all on the *I LOVE SPRING* bandwagon. Blah blah blah. I freaking hate Spring.

Can we please just skip to Summer so I can breathe? Or walk outside without lactating from the eyeballs? MMkay? Thanks.

Not to be a Negative Nancy or anything but that's my life right meow.

However, seeing as tomorrow is Friday... (things are looking up?) I'll leave you with this:

Or if sparkle unicorns aren't your thing, there's always these guys:

They're pretty rad too.

And the WINNER is.... (and the LOSER is... ME!)

2011-02-25T15:22:00.000-08:00

The winner of my very first giveaway is.......

...Shasta Anne!

And in case you're wondering why it took my five.stinking.days to post this, it's because I'm a big LOSER.

At life.

See, this past weekend we celebrated Joe's 30th Birthday at a vacation house we rented in Sandpoint, Idaho.

Beautiful place on the lake. The company of great friends and family. Confetti birthday cake and a keg of Coors Light. Fresh powder and blue bird skiing at Schweitzer.

... and a very unsanitary hot tub.

Or at least that's what I learned from eMedicine when I researched all the itchy red bumps developing in my bathing suit areas on Monday.

It started looking like this:

A trip to the doctor confirmed a bacterial skin infection caused by Pseudonomas aeruginosa.

Guess where that bacteria hangs out? In dirty hot tubs.... like the one I spent 30 minutes soaking in every night this past weekend after a long day on the slopes.

Basically, dead skin particles fester in poorly treated hot water and it's a breeding ground for nastiness. Lovely, right?

So what do I get to take home from this weekend besides good memories?

That would be the worst case of BACNE (and sidene, and crotchne, and boobne) that you've ever seen:

Don't worry. I won't share with you the images from today. Just trust me. They're a lot worse and pretty disgusting... and I don't want to lose any followers.

Joe was "affected" too. His 5 minute one-night stint in the hot tub left him with this red bump on his armpit:

*tear*

I only took the picture above as evidence that I'm not the only loser with this "hot tub rash" in case I decide to sue these assholes for neglecting to use, oh I dunno, CHLORINE, and the subsequent loss of sanity I have experienced (not to mention the fever, fatigue, days off work, did I mention butt crack sores?).

Not because Joe's armpit bump is a big deal.

In fact, Joe's not allowed to talk his armpit bump.

Or I scream. And lift up my shirt and stamp my feet.

Joe is, however, allowed to feel very sorry for me, and he also is allowed to help apply Emu Blue Gunk to my pimple boobies.

I know, right? What a lucky guy!

Well, I hope everyone has a fabulous weekend. If you need me, I'll be sitting on my hands whilst praying for some Xanax to magically appear so I don't claw my skin off. Cheers!

regifting: my first {giveaway}

2011-02-11T17:04:00.000-08:00

{So Say} I am having my Very First Giveaway!!!

I was a very lucky girl for Christmas this year, and besides my onesie I got some awesome presents and I have some leftovers that I am going to REGIFT.

Now before you go leaving my giveaway already at the sight of that "R" word, I should say that unlike my extended family, I do not regift expired restaurant gift cards, Hello Kitty socks, or the like.

I promise, it's good!

This giveaway includes a $20ish gift card to H&M and a $25ish gift card to lululemon athletica.

With $20 at H&M you can practically buy a whole new wardrobe! And at lululemon you can find workout pants guaranteed to make your ass look fabulous, though to be fair with $25 you may be able to buy a scrunchie. Just saying.

BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE!

Since I feel a teensy weensy bit guilty about not specifically 'getting' anything for my giveaway, I'm also including something extra special.

It's Made in Seattle.
It's Made in Seattle by friends of ours... friends who are expecting their first baby TODAY!
It's our most favorite Shampoo and Conditioner.

It's Duffy's Brew Beer Shampoo and Conditioner!

From the Duffy's Brew website:

Duffy’s Brew Original Beer Shampoo and Conditioner use the nourishing benefits from Elysian Brewing Company’s Dragonstooth Stout to strengthen and revitalize your hair and scalp. The bitter Cascade & Centennial hops, roasted barley, and rich chocolate malt found in this beer provide a restorative coat of vitamin B, proteins, and minerals to each strand, adding volume and body to your hair.

But that doesn't matter. All you need to know is that Duffy's Brew is the best thing since sliced bread. It smells incredible and it does wonders for your hair. You will be in love. And you will be supporting some awesome people and a local Seattle brewery to boot!

So that's it. My first {giveaway} includes:

♥ $20 H&M giftcard
♥ $25 lululemon gift card
♥ Duffy's Brew Shampoo
♥ Duffy's Brew Conditioner

Here's how you can WIN:

Follow my blog or let me know you're a follower and leave me a comment letting me know which of my Misters featured on the right sidebar is the cutest... there is no wrong answer :-)
Follow me on Twitter (which I really never use for anything but giveaway entries) @Jenny_DB
Follow Duffy's Brew on Twitter @DuffysBrew
Tweet about this giveaway and tag @DuffysBrew and @Jenny_DB
Blog about this giveaway and leave me the link (5 entries)
Put my giveaway button (above) in your sidebar... just right click and grab the image!
Like Duffy's Brew on Facebook

That's 11 possible entries!

No need to leave a comment for each entry... Just let me know what you've done in your comment and I'll figure it out. I'm good like that.

You must enter by Monday, February 21, 11:59 PST.

One more thing... If you don't win, you can always find Duffy's Brew Shampoo and Conditioner on Amazon and use coupon code DUFFYS82 for a limited time insider discount!

You're welcome :-)

xmas eve part I: bible reading and how i got shafted by uncle #3

2011-01-20T22:41:00.000-08:00

Christmas traditions. Every family has them, right? Well in our family, we do Christmas Eve at my dad's parents house. Among the various personalities present, the two most important:

The Matriarch - Amazing woman, Commander of Crosswords who sings loudly and often, generous to a fault and in her old age becoming a tad forgetful... as in, she bought my then 13-year-old brother a LEGO set for Christmas last year.

The Patriarch - 90 something formerly prestigious Doctor, now selectively deaf UBER religious grandpa who I'm pretty sure believes we are all going to HELL because we don't go to the Catholic church where women wear doilies on their heads (or any church, really, but I digress).

Well grandpa always insists on Bible Reading before presents, which is fine. It probably would be less fine if he could hear the intonation and improvisation that goes on...

Like Uncle #1 (Organic farmer - loud when drunk, but aren't we all?) who surmised ... after skipping from the birth of the Lord to the circumcision chapter... that after the SNIP the son of God was named "Oh Jesus"....

Or my Aunt #1, Cousin #1 and #2, and Uncle #2 who all said PASS when the Book came to them, like roll-call for a bunch of ADD toddlers.

Or like my Mother (well she is my mother, so I will leave these parentheses devoid of criticism) who insisted on taking her reading very seriously... commanding everyone's attention and stopping with an 'ehem' at any distractions that then set everyone into giggles.

Okay, I am not doing this any justice. Maybe this picture helps?

No? You can come see for yourself next year. I promise you will be very entertained, or very offended. One or the other.

After the Bible Reading comes the Presents. In the past, we all used to get everyone Christmas gifts, but a few years back Aunt #1 decided we should do a gift exchange instead. Frankly, this idea was quite alright by me.

Really, receiving a gift certificate to a steakhouse as a vegetarian is one thing, but realizing it is expired... now that's the kind of joy I think people mean when they talk about feeling the Christmas love. Seriously, that happened once. And Hello Kitty happened too. And socks. Lots of socks.

So anyway, the gift exhange was really a good switch... and with everyone buying only one gift, things have been much better. We have a $100 limit which means - in my book - you should spend about that. Yes, "limit" implies do not go over but you don't want to go too far under either, right?

For example, I got my twenty-something cousin by marriage a $75 gift card and this amazing beer shampoo and conditioner:

(Side note: This stuff is THE Best. It's called Duffy's Brew and it's home made by friends of ours and it smells better than anything you've ever used on your hair and basically it's unicorn sparkle amazingness. But better.)

Anyway, I feel that for someone I don't know well, that is a great gift. Something that I really like... and something useful for him. And most everyone else in the family shockingly did really well with presents this year too.

Well, I'm just going to come out and say it.

I got shafted.

Not that it really matters, because I am sooo spoiled and lucky and I have a onesie so whatever... but I got shafted. By my uncle... Uncle #3... the one who didn't come to family Christmas because he thinks everyone hates him (and some of us do) because he is trying to take all of my grandparent's money before they die.

You know, I could excuse this if he were, oh I dunno, really poor or something. But he's not. He's just greedy and bitter.

(This might all be oversharing because we're "friends" on Facebook and there is a good chance he will read this... or I could follow in my mother's footsteps and defriend him... decisions... decisions...)

Oh, so you want to know what I got?

A paperback book.

The Art of Racing in the Rain.

Great book, actually. Just read it. Now I have two copies.

Do you know what's great about giving someone a paperbook book as a gift?

Absolutely nothing.

Okay, well maybe it would be a nice gesture from a friend, ya know, just because. But NOT for a Christmas gift in a $100 gift exchange.

I'm sorry, my puppy Homie gives better gifts than that... like every poop that is not inside.

(Sidenote: I just decided I will be including this copy in my UPCOMING GIVEAWAY... YES I'm having a giveaway, because I have over 100 followers now and that's what you do when you have over 100 followers. And I promise to include better Christmas leftovers than bitter uncle book... like unused giftcards. So stay tuned...)

Well after I opened my gift (the book), my dad just laughed and said:

"Shit rolls down the hill, Jenny. Shit rolls down the hill."

I'm not really sure how that applies, but did I mention I love my dad?

Oh, and I love my dog Bondi too. Even though he's like Uncle #3 bitter to be wearing a Christmas hat...

So anyway, Uncle #3, if you're reading this, you suck at Christmas. And sometimes at life. You should probably grow up and get a job. I hear they pay maybe even better than my grandparents' savings account. And maybe you didn't need to buy that vacation home or the new motorcycle... Just saying.

Phewww, I feel much better.

Coming up next, (1) why Christmas Eve this year was hilarious - there will be a video! and (2)introducing technology (ehem: IPAD/Facebook) to the Commander of Crosswords... the Matriarch... my Grandma :-)

my new onesie!

2011-01-20T21:18:00.000-08:00

Christmas was amazing, as usual. We are all so blessed and so spoiled. I know I missed the boat on going into details, so I'll just share what has turned out to be my most favorite gift... an "I Love Sushi" onesie from Joe.

I was skeptical when I first opened it, and I'll admit... I even looked into exchanging it. I mean, seriously, it has smiling wasabis on it. Well as it turns out, Jumpin Jammerz has a horrible return policy so the onesie stayed. And I couldn't be happier!

The fleece onesie topic actually came up in conversation pre Christmas at my girlfriend's house. She was raving about hers (this must have been when Joe got the idea...) but her husband warned Joe... "Don't do it, man. You will not get any."

Well obviously Joe must have been confused when he saw this picture online:

I mean, who wouldn't be? :-)

But in real life.. or as us bloggers say IRL the onesie is even more amazing than DD boobies and come get me face. The onesie is soft and snuggly and warm and this:

And as Joe now knows, once the zipper goes up... it rarely comes down.

Weirdly, Joe has been doing a lot of laundry lately, and my new onesie seems to be getting washed quite frequently! ;-)

EDITED TO ADD: After some thought (and a glass of wine) I have realized a few instances when the onesie has been NOT so great:

When I drove Joe to work early in my onesie. I had to slam on my brakes and almost got rear ended and all I could think about was how the medics were going to come and find me in my *I Love Sushi* onesie and have to cut it off of me and I would then be nakey in the hospital and without my onesie.
Last night, when Mr. Bondi decided to run across the street to "greet" the neighbor's dog, and by greet I mean growl at. And I had to chase after him, stammering apologies, in my onesie. I doubt the neighbor thinks too highly of me.

Just saying.

merry christmas and happy new year!

2010-12-28T11:32:00.000-08:00

The holidays get a little nutty around here, and I have lots of funnies to share.

Like how at my Grandparents' house on Christmas Eve we all gathered to read the birth story of Christ, and my uncle kept reading beyond the whole manger scene to circumcision story... specifically, he explained that when the penis was snipped the baby was named... "Oh Jesus."

Or like how at my work Christmas party, my sister asked my coworker's (15 year junior) girlfriend if her "Daddy" was a good Santa Claus. In her defense, it was an honest mistake ;-)

But for now, I'll leave you with the holiday cards we scored from Shutterfly!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

hello, december!

2010-12-03T14:37:00.000-08:00

Wowzas, November was gone in the blink of an eye!

We spent last week with my family in Cabo, narrowly escaping the ~~blizzard~~ 4" of snow that shut down Seattle.

Seriously... schools closed, cars abandoned on the freeway, city on lock down. Yeah, we don't get a lot of snow in these parts...

When we touched down in Seattle on Monday night, sun burnt and clad in shorts and flip-flops, I was greeted by freezing rain. To offset this major kick in the ass, I had to immediately do a switcharoo to Christmas mode.

So I was very productive ~~Christmas shopping online~~ at work on Tuesday and Wednesday, and then yesterday my computer got a nasty virus, requiring me to take the day off.

So while my computer was being poked and prodded by the computer doctor, I was playing domestic diva, shopping for Christmas decorations, tidying up the house, and even shaving my legs!!

Oh, and Bondi and Homie and I picked out our very own Christmas tree!!! (This certainly beats last year, when Joe tried to pass off a Rosemary Bush as a Douglas Fir... Now, I'm no Martha Stewart, but when after dinner half our "Christmas Tree" was gone, I started to wonder...)

Once we got the tree into the house, though, the pups and I had to have a little discussion. I told them:

IF you lift your leg on mama's tree,
you're getting COAL in your stockings.

Good talk.

Today, the pups were very sweet to me...They obviously must know it's my birthday (woohoo... more grey hairs) because they got me the BEST PRESENT EVER.

The gift of humiliation.

Oh, pups. You made my (birth)day!!!

Before I go back to ~~refreshing my Facebook wall every 2 minutes to see if anyone else has left me a birthday message~~ work, I want to leave you with something I heard on the radio this morning:

25% of women say their dog is a better listener than their spouse
13% of women would rather talk to their dog than their spouse

Thoughts? :-)

ceiling fans are the new crack!

2010-11-17T15:23:00.000-08:00

This past weekend, when Joe and I were in Idaho for the notorious BSU game (more on that later), Homie made many friends. Among them, his most favorite was by far this ceiling fan.

The ceiling fan and Homie spent many special hours together.

As you can see, ceiling fan plays hard to get.

And Homie longs for ceiling fan.

Craves it... like CRACK.

In all seriousness, this craziness had been going on for about 20 minutes before I finally got out my camera to document.

Please excuse my snorting on the video.

I'm not proud of it.

Or my neurotic dog.

Thinking it may be time to call in Cesar, because this most definitely is not "balanced" behavior.

UPDATE: I'm saved!

2010-11-10T15:16:00.000-08:00

You know that horrible dilemma I was having earlier today?

Well don't you worry! I will not have a lidocained labia, after all!

I've been SAVED (from the horror or having to go buy tampons) by my amazing mom, *~*the tampon fairy*~*

Yes, the tampon fairy delivered a grocery store sized bag of tampons to her full grown daughter at work. Discretely, of course, lest anyone know said daughter had any need for such thing.

(And yes, I recognize I'm talking about myself in the third person here. Cut me some slack... this is a touchy subject!)

Apparently mom ~~has accepted that she no longer has any use for these~~ felt really sorry for her 26 year old daughter who, according to some, "seriously need[s] to seek help regarding [her] reticence to purchase feminine products in (gasp!) a store!"

Yeah, I'll get right on that! Swearsies.

But for now, it looks like I'll be good for the next year or so... and Joe's off the hook!

HELP: WebMD doesn't cover this...

2010-11-10T11:41:00.000-08:00

I have a BIG PROBLEM.

My last two tampons are covered in Nyquil. See?

I mean, just a little bit of NyQuil...

It apparently leaked in my suitcase (which I still haven't unpacked from Orlando - for shame!) and spilled onto my last two tampons.

So... I just need to know if it's still safe to use them? Seriously... (kindove)

Because there is NOTHING worse than going to the store to buy just tampons.

(Except that one time my ex came to visit me in Australia and he came down with a terrible case of diarrhea and implored me to go buy him Immodium and so I did and then my credit card was rejected. That may have been worse.)

I mean, I can handle buying tampons at Costco because there at least it's not like the cashier is sitting there thinking about how your bleeding out of your lady parts.

But a trip to the mini mart for tampons... I CAN'T DO IT.

If I can just make it through today with a little bit of NyQuil-laced coverage... (What's the worst that can happen???) I can make a detour to mom's to restock after work.

Thankfully, my mom ~~hasn't yet come to the terms with the fact that she's going through menopause and~~ still stocks her cupboards with tampons. So I just "shop" there when I must.

And then, tonight Joe and I can have a talk about progressing our relationship.

We already live together, have a dog together, and have a joint credit card. So, if we're not going to get engaged... I feel like the obvious next step is him buying me tampons. Right?

If he disagrees, I guess we'll be making a trip to Costco tonight!

merry christmas (don't kill wolves!)

2010-11-05T13:41:00.000-07:00

If you hang around these parts, you probably know I'm a huge animal lover. Well, awhile back I made the mistake of making a small donation to one of my favorite charities, Defenders of Wildlife. They apparently sold my information to every NPO from here to Djibouti (thanks for that) and now my mailbox overflows with a plethora of junk from every conceivable organization.

Most of it goes straight into the fireplace while I consider the irony of all the resources these (mostly) environmental organizations waste in their solicitations. But the other night I held onto an offer for personalized Holiday cards featuring endangered wolves.

The Gray Wolf is like my kindred spirit.
(Don't laugh. I love them.)

So I was pretty pretty devastated when I learned that wolf hunting was legalized in Idaho and Montana in 2009.

It was a controversial topic of conversation during visits to Idaho with the boyfriend. His friends and family had mixed opinions, but I knew it would be bad... and it was. It decimated the wolf population and thankfully this year they are back on the protected list.

No more hunting wolves!!!

Anyway, I talked with the boyfriend and he was super excited about the prospect of sending Save the Wolves holiday cards out to all his friends and family in Idaho.

I kid... I kid. He thought it was not very *in the holiday spirit* and suggested I look for something else.

Well the Universe must be on his side, because the very next day I stumbled upon this post by Miss DSS. Apparently, Shutterfly is doing a fabulous promotion giving away 50 free holiday cards to bloggers! Seriously.

While I don't think Shutterfly has any sexy "Save the Wolves" cards, they have something maybe even better: Personalized Christmas Photo Cards!

So instead of showcasing Canis lupis, I think boyfriend and I are going to go with Canis bondi and Canis homie.

Shutterfly has an amazing selection of Christmas Cards to choose from. Two of my favorites:

Of course, photos of these cute little kiddos would be replaced with ones of my *cuter* little pups.

And no worries... if you're Jewish, Muslim, atheist, politically correct, etc. Shutterfly has a wonderful selection of Holiday Cards to choose from as well!

To get 50 free cards from Shutterfly with your own blog, go here.

lowering expectations

2010-11-03T23:22:00.000-07:00

I've been getting shit from some of my blog lovelies about how I never post anymore (though in my defense I'm an avid reader). Usually after not posting for several ~~days~~ weeks, I make a whole lot of excuses about how busy I've been - blah. blah. blah.

Well, I have been busy. But after thoughtful consideration, I've decided I'm just going to skip the BS acting like I actually post regularly and just say why don't y'all expect to hear from me about once a month or so.. that why when/if I post more frequently you will be all jumping for joy and throwing a party and what have ya!

See what I'm doing? I'm lowering your expectations. I always feel it's better to set expectations low and be pleasantly surprised when they're exceeded than to have high expectations and be disappointed.

That's why birthdays and New Years Eve always suck. Expectations are way too high.

I have been trying to communicate this point to Joe lately, since he's gotten in the habit of setting my expectations too high.

One (PG-rated) example is the subject of when he's going to be home. Say, he tells me he's going to some "networking event" (aka Happy Hour) after work, and he'll be home by 7:00. So, I plan to be home around then so we can catch up, have dinner, relax, etc.

Well, say (hypothetically, of course) that 8:15 comes and he's still not home. At this point I am defintiely a cranky pants. Actually, in truth, I'm a cranky pants by about 7:30. Come 8:15, the whole "etc." is definitely not going to be happening.

Best to just say "Honey, don't expect me until midnight." That way if he saunters in around 9:00 I'd be so excited I might just do a little jig... nakey...

Probably not, but you never know! Excitement is a funny emotion :-)

Anyway, now that your expectations of my blogging are much lower, let me share with you what I meant to a while back: Adventures in Pumpkin Carving.

It was a good time... minus a little weirdness over the whole - host is a recovering alcoholic and everyone else likes to enjoy a few adult beverages at a "party" - thing.

So obviously it was BYOB. No big deal.

But it was also BYOWG... yes that is BYO wine glass.

Now it's awkward enough bringing your own alcohol to a sober dude's pad... but your own wine glass??? Thank God for keg cups. (Did you know, by the way, that you can fit almost an entire bottle of wine into a keg cup? Just kidding. Kindove.)

There are benefits to this whole scenario too, though, like getting to take home all the leftover pumpkin beer if you're the last people to leave. Wouldn't want to leave any temptations lying around!

Here's the whole group of us...

...and here are our creations... Can you guess which pumpkin is mine??

YES... yes I did.

I wanted to leave my special pumpkin out for the Trick-or-Treaters, but it started to get moldy and collapse on itself. So, what started as a risque pumpkin featuring a sexy (albeit big-chinned) girl engaged in some sexytime turned into a pumpkin featuring a diseased dude sucking leper cock. (I hope I didn't just lose any readers... but seriously that's what it looked like.)

After the pumpkin carving party, I had no time to mourn the transformation of my love-child because I was off to Orlando for the Ace Hardware convention.

The highlight of this tradeshow is always the Ace Party with a Purpose. I've blogged about it before (remember my Tina Turner wannabe performance at the Mardi Gras party?) but I've been looking forward to this fall's at Universal Studios Island of Adventure sooo stinkin' much I wasn't even (that) sad about missing Halloween celebrations last Saturday.

Given the theme of this post, I probably should not have set my expectations for Island of Adventure so high... but seriously, it was AMAZING beyond expectations. (Universal Studios 1-Boyfriend 0).

Unlimited access to all the coolest rides with NO LINES... AND and open bar! Soooo FUN!

(Sidenote: Rollercoasters + Open Bar = NOT FUN for the 8 year old boy who got puked on by some drunk guy.)

But the BEST PART (besides the open bar, of course) was... OH HELLO the NEW Wizarding World of Harry Potter.

Actually, who am I kidding, Harry Potter World was TOTALLY better than the free drinks. I know, I'm a HUGE nerd. Just call me POTTERPHILE..

Of course, after all my talk of Hogwarts and Hippograffs and Wingardium Leviosa spells and Dementors and Gillyweed and Butterbeer my dad and coworker/friend thought I was a bit loopy. Fair assumption. But if you haven't ~~obsessed over~~ read the books, don't judge.

I assume I wasn't the only one who devoured the books and waited for hours in line for every new movie release because a midnight Harry Potter showing was a rare opportunity to hold hands slash thighs with your Mormon crush in 9th grade.

Just me? Weird.

Seriously, if you have the chance to go, GooOOO!!!!

Flying on a broomstick drunky through a magical world is un-freakin-believably AMAZING.

That is, of course, until the next day if you have to be up by 6AM and in a booth HUNGOVER for 11 hours dressed up on Halloween Eve. Of course, I set my expectations low so it wasn't too terrible. Actually, after a few bottles of water it was kinda fun... as fun as wearing nylons, fishnets, spankies, and a wig in 90 degree weather can be, anyway.

See? That's me, totally having fun. With a crooked wig. I may have still been cross-eyed when I put it on. I hope no one expected us to look really good or anything :-)

GO NUTS!

2010-10-07T14:27:00.000-07:00

It's been over three weeks since my mom's big 50th birthday party I planned... you know, the one I was going nuts over!

Like I said, I have a new found respect for all of you ladies who have planned your own weddings. Invites, guest list, caterer, tents, heaters, food prep, bar prep, balloons, band, bartenders, kegs, decorations, cake, entertainment... it was almost more than this girl can handle!

Just about now, I can finally relax and share the sparkle unicorn awesomeness of the celebration with y'all.

Well I have to say, it went off without a hitch... unless you count the creepy old neighbor who wouldn't stop talking about his "little pecker" and his ex-wife's "stinky pu$$y" in front of my 5th grade teacher (so embarrassing) and me. But I digress...

One of the very last things I arranged for the party was the birthday cake. I did not want it to be BORING, but I was struggling with ideas.

If I lived in New York I would've just called on Miss Summer to come up with something, since *super awesome* is like standard for her cakes. A girl can dream...

So I thought of the Erotic Bakery in Seattle... you know the type of place where bridesmaids and bachelors galore flock to procure tasty desserts flaunting boobies and penises (penii?). However, call me crazy but I didn't think their "big black cock" special would be appropriate for the fifty plus crowd.

When I ran the erotic bakery idea by my dad, he agreed. "Not kosher". But he thought maybe they could do something else funny. Of course he was mum when it came to actually helping in that department.

So I got to brainstorming... and I thought about my mom and her squirrels:

And then I remembered a funny picture I had seen awhile back online:

And then it came to me!!!! A squirrel with NUTS!

Not too tacky... not like a porn-star penis or an old lady vagina... but a cartoon squirrel with large testicles.

I have to say, the girls at the erotic bakery were amazing. They knew just want I wanted. Well pretty much. They didn't know if I wanted a penis on the squirrel... probably because I was unable to answer that question. I hemmed and hawed over this dilemma for a good three minutes.

Penis? No penis? Penis? No penis?

Finally settled on a little penis. Good compromise.

Feeling pretty confident about my decision, I called up my dad and reported to him on the details of the cake. He was not happy, so I had to call up the girls at the shop and instruct them to ix-nay the penis-ay on the squirrel.

She says, "Roger that. No penis. Just large balls."

Well, here is the lovechild of my brain nuggets:

Amazing, no?

Funny story... my mom definitely asked where the penis was. Go figure!

The rest of the party was pretty fabulous also... I mean, besides the cake. My good buddy Jesse was working magic behind a full open bar, and thanks to the fabulous finger foods by Lynn's Bistro, almost everyone was able to keep it together, dancing to the Beatniks and singing karaoke until the early morning hours.

I mean, for a bunch of old fogies, I think my folks and co know how to party!

Want a FREE Bed? Live in New Jersey/New York?

2010-09-16T11:53:00.000-07:00

We interrupt my regularly scheduled blogging to bring you this PSA.

(Who am I kidding? With my mom's big 50th coming up TOMORROW, my only semblance of a schedule right meow includes *stress* pull hair out* repeat* but I digress...)

Do you live near Closter New Jersey? That pretty much includes everyone in New York, right?

If so, do you - or does anyone you know - want a FREE Twin Size Modeno Bed from Costco?

All the bed info is here.

I know this is totally random, but my family's company makes this furniture. (I may have mentioned it before...) A customer purchased it and then changed her mind and now we either find someone who wants it (FREE!!!) or we have to pay to ship it back ($$$) so our loss is your gain. All you would have to do is pick up the bed (new and in its original packaging) in Closter, NJ.

I would ask all my DUKIES, since graduation was pretty much an exodus to New York city, but I'm pretty sure at 25+ we should all be sleeping in a little bigger beds now :-)

This bed is perfect for a little one, so ask around and let me know.

First one who wants it gets it!

PS: re: homie

2010-09-09T13:59:00.000-07:00

Oh, I forgot to mention... my lovely pup Homie is totally ADORABLE. And also apparently feeling totally exhausted too.

Anyone feel like taking a nap??

words i never thought i'd say....

2010-09-09T13:23:00.000-07:00

I said it.

Words I never thought I'd say.

I'm so glad NOT to be going to...

LAS VEGAS

this weekend.

I know, I know, I'm old... and lame... and exhausted.

But it's just too much right now. I can't do it.

A long long time ago I booked tickets for Joe and I to go here:

Because I knew we wouldn't want SUMMER to be over... and hoped to do maybe some of this:

... and some of that:

And then, last week, Joe came to me with this *I just kicked your puppy* look, and I knew it was gonna be bad.... and he said:

I really don't think we should go to Vegas... it's too much, we've been going non-stop... I don't wanna go.

And so I did what any girl would do who is blatantly not getting her way. I huffed and puffed and stamped my feet and pouted and blamed his work and his stress and blah blah blah.

I was a real gem.

And now, I am eating my words.

So I just thought I'd share that:

Joe was totally right.
And I was wrong.
He made the best (uni-lateral) decision ever.

And I can't promise those words will ever find their way here again either :-)

So this weekend.. I don't know what we're going to do. Hopefully a whole lot of nothing. Though to be honest, we already have a BBQ and a double header softball game and possibly camping (Joe's idea, of course) planned. That's a "relaxing" weekend for us. Just sayin...

go! go! go!!!

2010-09-02T13:34:00.000-07:00

.. story of my life!

I feel just like this:

POOPED!

The last month has just flown by! There were friends in town, weddings, concerts, dinners, softball games, happy hours, road-trips, trade-shows, birthday parties, doggy birthday parties...

... which equals a lot of FUN!

And also, a lot TO DO.

Never-ending piles of laundry, loads of dishes, suitcases to pack/unpack, doggy poop to scoop, groceries to buy, photos to upload ...blah. Blah. BLAH.

I just got back from a work trip to Minneapolis Tuesday night... BTW, I like Minneapolis. It's a strange city, I think. Strangely clean, for sure! Strangely quiet, too... I mean, for a city. They have above-ground walkways that connect all the buildings apparently for when its 40 below in the winter. They have an amazing pub called Brit's with lawn golf and movies on the roof, and the best Tuna Melt I've ever had. Oh, and they have a PEDAL PUB.

This is amazing. I want one.

The only thing is you actually have to pedal while drinking... on a bicycle seat. Or else it's just a stationary beer wagon, I guess. The whole exercising thing might get old... Nevertheless, I'm thinking of bringing these to Seattle. Just saying.

So anyway, last night was date night and we went to the Can Can and saw the Castaways cabaret show. If you're ever in Seattle, I highly recommend it. It's simply amazing.

Here's a trailer of sorts for the Can Can... probably not work appropriate, unless you're boss is cool with occasional pasties shots accompanied by uncensored Outkast.

Not only are their acts hilarious and entertaining, but some are divinely beautiful. This one has no pasties, I promise.

I think they could be on SYTYCD.

After the show and several drinkys (I always say "drinkys" ... I think it sounds much cuter than drinks, especially when combined with several) I insisted on street meat. This seems to be a pattern :-)

Nothing like a $5 Veggie Dog smothered in cream cheese, grilled onions and jalapenos to end the night. MMmmm... It always seems like a good idea at the time, anyway.

Well, Joe only had just enough cash, and being a gentleman, he said that's okay, he didn't want one anyway (of course he did!) and paid for mine. (That's Joe for ya... being all classy at a hot-dog stand!)

Well, I managed to convince the nice man making my dog to make Joe one too, and I didn't even have to give him my Idaho hat! Major WIN.

This weekend we have more big plans. We're heading to the Gorge to see Dave Matthews tomorrow. Nice little 10th grade throwback. I fully expect to see some finger banging action and lots of Vodka water bottles. I'm taking Ashley's word for it, since I have no memories of my own high school DMB experiences. Weird.

Then we're spending the rest of the weekend at Suncadia Resort for a dear friend's wedding. I've never been there, but Kelsey says it is amazing.

Obviously, we're bringing the dogs. Homie is ready to party!

Speaking of parties, did I mention I've been planning a BIG Birthday Party for my fabulous mom?

She's turning 50!!!

So I made this little invitation and sent it to a couple hundred people...

I even invited an awesome band!

Well, the big day is coming up... and let me just say, this whole party planning shit is exhausting. I have a new found respect for all of y'all that plan your own weddings.

Anyway, I will leave you with this:

Curious?

fun at subway in arlington

2010-08-04T16:56:00.000-07:00

Just poppin' in for a quick story time, then it's back to ~~work~~ counting down the minutes to seafair and refreshing weather.com every 12 minutes imploring the weekend forecast to improve. What's seafair? only the most amazing time of the year in Seattle... better than christmas! More on that later.

About last night.

So my lil bro Gabe and I were on our way back from sarvey after 5 hours of fun times with wild animals. I managed to make it out of there with only a little raccoon shit in my hair, so it was a good night.

We pulled up to Subway for dinner at 9:58 pm, just two minutes before they closed. We still had a good hour long drive ahead of us. Gabe and I wait patiently to order our subs while, likely reeking of God knows what... but then (I kid you not) the large man in front of us orders his sub: white bread, cheddar cheese, olives, ranch dressing and 3 chocolate chip cookies IN THE SUB. *Don't think that's what Jared had in mind... just saying*

The kids behind the counter were struggling to keep it together, as were we. ... Strangely this made me feel a little bit better about our smell :-)

Anyway, we get our sandwiches and while Gabe's paying - his treat! - I head out to the car... only to discover *SHITSKITTLES* the doors are locked. With my keys (cell phone, money, ID, etc. etc.) in the car.

I never lock my car door. In fact, as I type this my car is sitting outside unlocked with the keys inside of it. Call me stupid, but unless I'm in the city or a sketchy part of town, I don't lock the door. Definitely not for a 5 minute stop at Subway.

Well, Gabe felt pretty bad. Yes, my 14 year old brother locked me (us) out of the car over an hour from home... past my bedtime... in Arlington. You may have heard of Arlington as I'm pretty sure it was in the news recently when a man suffered fatal injuries after having sex with (being penetrated by) a horse. Yes, this confuses me too.

Anyway, Subway Boy said he might have a SlimJim to get my car open. When I think SlimJim, I think:

Apparently, a "slimjim" is actual a tool that criminals use to break in to cars. Why Subway Boy had one... well, I didn't ask.

I told him to give it a go, but he clearly didn't have much practice with it - good boy - so I called AAA. And by I, I mean Gabe, because I did not have my trusty BB with me (for shame!) and I am about as useful a chocolate teapot with his alien music touch phone thinger.

They tell me it's going to be an hour, so I tell them I am going to cry. Seriously. I said that...

I said, I'm going to cry if it takes an hour because I have nothing but a t-shirt on (I forgot to mention pants - oops!) and it is cold out and we're hours from home and there's nowhere to go...

A little exaggeration never hurt anyone....

So, AAA calls back to tell me they have a closer company who'll be here in 10. I Win!!!

Less than five minutes later, a tow-truck rolls up and Mountain Man, with a cigarette hanging from his mouth, jumps out and immediately gets to work on the car. No hi, how are you, who are you. Nada. Mountain Man finishes the job before his cigarette (and strangely I never saw him remove it from his mouth to exhale the entire time... this must be a finely developed skill... quite impressive).

And we're off.

But not before Subway Boy tells me, "Be sure to come back next week, it was great to meet you."

Well, I guess if things with Joe don't work out, I know I have options!

must see: the earthlings

2010-07-23T15:22:00.000-07:00

DISCLAIMER: the bottom of this post contains disturbing images. there is a warning before that section of the post, if you do not wish to see.

have you heard of the documentary "earthlings"?

image source.

apparently it was released in 2005, but i never heard about it, until i read an article in the seattle p-i about the mistreatment of the elephants at woodland park zoo and saw a reference to earthlings in the comments section.

i watched the trailer online...

okay, i lied. i watched about half the trailer online, until i got to the part showing dogs, raccoons and foxes skinned alive in china for their fur, and i felt like vomiting. it was horrifying and disturbing. the images of animal cruelty, abuse, slaughter...

it wasn't that i didn't know this is a sad reality of the world we live in. it's just it's so easy to ignore. bury my head in the sand, so to speak.

anyway, i knew i had to watch earthlings.

i ordered it on netflix, and it sat on my coffee table for 6 days, daring me to watch it.

finally last night, with butterflies in my stomach, i put in the dvd, and cuddled up on the couch with bondi as my little spoon, and pressed play.

it was beyond disturbing. profoundly grotesque.

and i think you should watch it!

i know, i know. you will say "you can't bear to watch it" it's too awful. blah blah blah.

~*~this is me on my soap box~*~ if you eat bacon and eggs for breakfast, and steak for dinner... if you wear cute patent leather shoes and carry a lovely coach handbag, if you have a designer dog (or any dog), if you've ever been to the zoo or the circus or the rodeo, if you live on this planet we share with non-humans... you owe it to yourself to be informed.

~*~this is not me preaching~*~ telling you what decisions to make for your life. i do not judge you for your choices.

~*~i will not lie~*~ i eat chicken and turkey and eggs and milk and cheese. i wear leather.

i am just as complicit in the torture and suffering of animals as the next person. and that is exactly what it is. torture and suffering. but i know... and i choose.

i choose not to eat mammals.

i choose to adopt my dogs from the shelter.

i choose to volunteer at sarvey.

i choose not to support seaworld or the zoo.

i choose to support defenders of wildlife.

and...

i choose to share this powerful documentary with you.

fyi: you can watch the whole movie documentary online here: www.earthlings.com

here is a summary (from wikipedia):

EARTHLINGS is a multi-award winning feature length documentary about humanity's absolute dependence on animals (for pets, food, clothing, entertainment, and scientific research) while illustrating our complete disrespect for these so-called "non-human providers." [...] the film is narrated by two-time Academy Award nominee Joaquin Phoenix and features music by the critically acclaimed platinum artist Moby. [...]

With an in-depth study into pet stores, puppy mills and animal shelters, as well as factory farms, the leather and fur trades, sports and entertainment industries, and finally the medical and scientific profession, EARTHLINGS uses hidden cameras and never before seen footage to chronicle the day-to-day practices of some of the largest industries in the world, all of which rely entirely on animals for profit. Powerful, informative and thought-provoking, EARTHLINGS is by far the most comprehensive documentary produced on the correlation between nature, animals, and human economic interests.

Phoenix has commented on the documentary that, "Of all the films I have ever made, this is the one that gets people talking the most. For every one person who sees EARTHLINGS, they will tell three."

consider ~this~ me telling three.

here is what people are saying who watch the earthlings:

"earthlings is the definitive film of all time that americans don't want to see."

"for those who watch the earthlings, the world will never be the same."

"earthlings is nothing short of a masterpiece"

"it is a rare experience to be changed by a film. earthlings has that power."

"the most powerful movie i have ever known."

WARNING: Below is a preview of certain disturbing images in the movie.
DO NOT SCROLL DOWN IF YOU DO NOT WISH TO SEE.

images courtesy of google "earthlings" images

lovely surprises!

2010-07-13T16:01:00.000-07:00

We spent the past weekend in Lopez Island in the San Juan Islands enjoying gorgeous views like this:

I have stories and pictures to share later, but I will just say I was surprised by a few things.... like, I *heart* private beaches (read: no tan lines)! Well, that's not really so surprising but I just wanted to make y'all jealous.

Oh, and SURPRISE: I don't do well with bossy Type A females ~~who are probably a lot like me but obviously I'm less obnoxious because duh, I'm awesome~~.

Saturday evening, while Joe and I were enjoying the sunset and a lovely dinner, I received an email from my hilarious mom who had her own lovely surprise.

I have something crazy to share :) David and I were sitting at our fire table, under the 100 foot evergreen tree that comes through our deck, just finishing up dinner, when suddenly a giant half eaten catfish bounced heavily off David's head and landed with a splashy muddy plop on his plate. I kid you not. We then noticed the crows flying around and causing trouble. They must have made the eagle in the tree above us drop his dinner! In the words of your cousin Isaac, "THAT doesn't happen every day!"

Yes, that is seriously a half eaten catfish that fell from an eagle's talons to my dad's dinner plate.

Well, apparently it hit him on the head first.

Can you imagine???

One of the lovely perks (surprises) that comes along with living in the gorgeous Pacific Northwest.

Tomorrow, I'm off to San Diego bright and early for work. I asked Joe if he would take me to the airport for shits and giggles. (BTW is that an expression anyone else uses? Just me?) I have to be there by 6:00am so I naturally assumed he'd so say no way jose but I must be a really good girl because he agreed. And I was surprised! Especially since there's no way I would take him to the airport that early, and I told him as much.

I KNOW, I KNOW, I'm terrible... and some of you bloggers are like crazy wake up at 4:00am for workout peeps and 6:00am is like sleeping in. For shame.

Anyway... see how I tied this totally random post all together??!! *so proud of myself right meow*

blogger: fail!

2010-07-06T14:52:00.000-07:00

Hi lovelies!

It's been well over a month since I last graced you with my presence here.

Blogger: FAIL!

excuse #1: I'm a new mommy to this lovely pup who keeps me on my toes with his silly antics.

Joe's dad came in town for 10 days (excuse #2, and that alone deserves its own post!) and introduced him to the laser pointer... Yeah, thanks for that!

Lil' Homie will chase that damn thing for hours. (And here I thought only cats chased those things.) If you stop playing with him, he just stares at the floor and waits. It's a little disconcerting...

PS the photo in the bottom left corner above is (L to R) Sophie, Homie, Tanner and Bondi. Sophie and Tanner are my mom's pups. We decided we needed a picture of all the dogs after a couple "pomtinis" and I believe this was Take 14.

excuse #3: I have this whole JOB thing that's quite an inconvenience... plus I've been traveling for work. See!

Well... that's enough excuses. Now here are a few collages courtesy of Picnik from our Memorial Day Weekend camping trip (yes, I know that was a REALLY long time ago)...

...And a few fun events Joe and I have been to here in Seattle.

Well, that's all for now! I promise I'll be back with exciting adventures and funnies soon.

i'm a bear.. hear me GaaarrRRR!!

2010-05-26T16:37:00.000-07:00

We have plans to go camping/backpacking this Memorial Day weekend. Joe is an avid camper... being from Idaho and all :-)

Or should I say was, since we have only been camping together two times in as many years?

The first time we went with another couple overlooking this ~~algae-infested pond~~ beautiful lake and it rained the whole time.

Oh, and the chick we were with went and took a dump in the woods and came back and put her used TP in the fire. Let's just say no one wanted to cook smores! It was a 'shitty' experience.

Our second backpacking/camping trip - just the two of us - went much better, but it's been almost a year now since we've been.

Now don't get me wrong, it's not that i don't like camping trips.

It's just hard to find the time... But we're going this weekend with a group of friends for 3 nights! With 3 dogs (yes, 3 - I'm dog sitting for friend and don't ask how i thought that would be a good idea, but I digress).

One of my friends, a transplant from Cincinnati, is coming along and she has never been camping before, so she is basically making the stockholders of REI very happy "getting ready" for this trip. Yesterday she sent me over her list, which REI conveniently supplied, of everything she "needs" for camping. I tried to assure her that she did not, in fact, need an headnet or flares, but I think she just wants to be prepared :-)

Yesterday was a long day. I was tired,but it was Tuesday so off my lil bro Gabe and I trekked to Sarvey Wildlife like we do every week. I didn't get home until well after 11:00pm and Joe was already dozing off on the couch with a glass of wine. I was too exhausted to be jealous. We got in the shower and I started to tell him about my day. I was laughing about the thought of my friend showing up with a star identification map, an ice-axe and head lamp in tow.

Joe was laughing with me, until I got to the part about the head lamp.

"Uhh... you'll probably gonna be the only one without a head lamp."
"Why would I need a head lamp? I have a flash light!"
"They're just super convenient, you know... for night hikes."

Okay, first of all I DON'T believe I will be the only one without a headlamp. Just saying. But more importantly, why the HELL would we go on a "night hike"? Isn't the whole point of hiking to enjoy your surroundings?

And I don't know about you but I like my ankles - I've liked them for a long time. The way the are, ya know. Not broken.

The only way I'm going to be doing any hiking at night is very quickly if I'm.. ya know.. running from a rapist or a bear or something..

So I told Joe all of the above. I was tired and cranky so I pretty much said it just like that. And then I threw in, ya know... just for good measure:

"YOU can go hiking at night with your precious headlamp. I will be drinking whiskey by the fire. And Homie's staying with me, because Homie doesn't go night hiking EITHER!!!"

Did I mention I love camping?

Anyway, I went to bed for some much needed rest and I slept. Until 6:30am when Joe's iHome awoke me from the most amazing dream ever (so annoying) and Joe barks "Hit the snooze".

See, Joe gets up (and goes to bed) before me, and I like... no I NEED... my morning sleep. It's my best sleep. It's my - if I don't get it you don't want to be around me - sleep.

Now, usually I don't even wake up to Joe's alarm. Usually I'm a pretty heavy sleeper and Joe just reaches over me and presses the damn snooze button himself.

Probably since I was having such an amazing dream God awoke me to punish me for making fun of that girl who pooped her pants in my second grade class.

Anyway, so I pressed the snooze button... and tried to get back to the part where Bondi and I were running off into the sunset to frolic with sparkle unicorns and rainbow butterflies....

*BEEP*BEEP*BEEP* 6:37AM

I rolled over and looked at Joe, waiting for him to, oh I dunno, shut the goddamn alarm off.

Mother-pooper's still asleep!!!

Well this morning, Joe snoozed his alarm from 6:30AM until the time he actually got out of bed at some point over an hour later!! And by Joe I mean me because I am the one who actually had to reach over every time and press the damn snooze button. Because Joe was ignoring me!!! Despite the fact that I was screaming and bitching and carrying on (no I'm not proud, just honest) every time the alarm woke me up. 14 times.

I am one of those people who, when upset, needs to be Heard. Validated. Acknowledged. ~~Pacified.~~ All I got was a few annoyed grumbles and that WOULD.NOT.DO.

So I did what any ~~crazed, sleep-deprived, PMSing~~ normal girl would do. I unplugged the alarm and chucked it across the bed at Joe. Oh yes I did. And I said that alarm would be on his side of the bed from now on. "GaarrRRR!!"

So what did Joe do? He calmly plugged the iHome back in... got out of bed and said "You are out of control."

Finally... victory!!! Joe is up and getting ready and I get to go back to bed!!!!

And then do you know what happened? 7 minutes later, like clockwork, the piece of shit went off again.

Tell me is this iHome like super human? I unplugged it!!! Don't you have to reset it or something?

So from bed I gave my best... "GaaarrrRRRRRRR!!!"

Yes, I ROARED.

Speaking of, I am thinking I need to beware of Bears this weekend... something Brick said in Anchorman.

Wishful Wednesday - Dream Room (i'm biased)

2010-05-19T15:48:00.000-07:00

It's time for Wishful Wednesday, courtesy of my IRL lovely friend Miss Kelsey.

'I wish' I could come home to...

this bedroom each and every night!

I LOVE the bamboo construction and funky low profiles. Just my style :-) I would want it with different (maybe Bamboo?) floors and a shaggy white carpet...

I'd have to throw in this "Chiffonier" ... I just learned this word a few months ago and basically refers to really tall dressers like the one above. It would be PERFECT for all my little clothes.. not like pre-college weight, but you know.. socks in top drawer, then undies, then bras, then bikinis, etc. etc.

Okay, okay. Full disclosure: I'm a little biased.

I helped design this furniture!!!

Yup, our family company makes this bedroom collection and we sell it on Costco.com here.

Plus, I helped develop the flash product demo for it... check it out, but just warning the music get's really annoying. I take responsibility for ensuring the inclusion of a MUTE button :-)

It's my most favorite bedroom collection we sell, and I would totally have it in our little house, if our bedroom was just a teensy bit bigger. Because of the low profile overhangs (which I love) the bed takes up quite a bit of space... maybe in our next house!

Of course, to complete the dream bedroom, the window in the picture would need to look out upon this view, and not the fake skyline we painted for our furniture showroom :-)

 image source.

To play along with Wishful Wednesday next week, head over to Miss Kelsey's blog The Seattle Smith's!

homies where the heart is!

2010-05-13T14:51:00.000-07:00

I know, I know... you have all been wondering if I was run over a truck. I did spend a week in Las Vegas, which is a close equivalent, but alas, I AM ALIVE!

The real reason I have been so MIA is....

.................. I'm a new mommy!

Not THAT kind of mommy, but a mommy to this little guy:

Friends, meet HOMIE.

I apologize in advance, all these pictures are gonna kinda suck because I can't find my camera at the moment. That's another story (which incidentally has nothing to do with Vegas, shocker!)

Anywhoodles, we weren't exactly looking for a new puppy, but we had talked about it. Remember, that's why we moved! From Feb 18:

Background Info: Our apartment lease is up in a couple weeks, so Joe and I have been looking for a house to move to... with a yard... so we can get Mr. Bondi a little brother/sister that Joe will insist on naming "Homie"... which I think is the worst name for a dog ever, but I digress.

Well, we waited a good 2 months so I say that's responsible.

What happened is about two weeks ago ~~I insisted~~ we decided to go to Tuxes and Tails, a big charity auction put on by the Seattle Humane Society.

I wore a snazzy dress and Joe looked quite handsome and we mingled with a bunch of well-to-do Seattleites. There was delicious food and champagne.. and wine.. you get the idea.

Then once they get you all good and liquored, they start parading around with all the adoptable dogs. Ingenious. (The thing about this event is you can put a "hold" on any one dog you see and you have until noon the next day to adopt him/her. This is a huge factor in why I finagled us into going, because it is almost impossible to get a puppy from the pound otherwise.) Anyway, at some point in the evening we saw "Thunder":

I was in love!

We put a hold on him and drug our asses to the shelter bright and early Sunday morning and adopted little "Thunder" who Joe lovingly renamed "Homie" ... Now I do not take credit for this name (though I do have to admit it's grown on me) and I let Joe go with it because:

(a) He's always wanted a "Homie"
(b) He's paying the vet bills
(c) I get dibs on naming our first non-furry child

Bondi did not take to Homie very well. Bondi is a VERY only child and the first couple days were rough for him. More rough than the time he hid in the bathtub, aka Bondi's Terrible Tuesday. The sad part is little H wants nothing more than to follow B around, nuzzle up with him, and be just like him.

Riding in the car goes like this: Bondi sits in the front, as usual. Homie whines to come sit in the front. I help him up. Bondi abandons co-pilot seat with an audible groan and goes to the back. Homie whines to go sit in the back with Bondi. REPEAT.

You can see Bondi's totally annoyed in these pictures:

In the past few days, things have notably improved (probably now that Bondi realizes he's not being replaced). Here are some of Bondi's more tolerant moments:

Anyway, I know this is excessive sharing, but here are some of my favorite shots of Mister Homie (who, not to brag, but has only had 4 accidents in over 2 weeks and already knows SIT and COME)...

Besides the fact that we're totally in love with him, we love how perfect a fit he's going to be for our furry family. Can't you tell how much Homie looks up to Bondi?

Someday, Homie. Someday!

on rugby boys and anorexia

2010-04-16T12:16:00.000-07:00

Last night my friend Ash propositioned me with accompanying her to the Eastside Rugby player auction. Yes, you read that right... they actually were auctioning off players for "labor or lust" at FADO in seattle. Beefy hot boys, drinkies and prizes?? Twist my arm!

We walk in to see all these rugby players dressed up... some in tuxes, others in chaps! We grab one of the auction preview booklets and read up on how it works...

If you "win" the auction, you get "roughly 4 hours of their time"... Some suggestions they give:

Help moving or yard work
Designated driver for evening
"Arm Candy" for an event
You have no friends

So I thought that maybe I could get one of these MEN to help out with some of our new house's "issues" ...

SO I promptly texted Joe:

Me: Babe I'm at the lust and labor party... I'm gonna buy a rugby player :)
Joe: WHAT? NO ur not. I'll be right there...
Me: No baby he's gonna do labor... Remove the raccoons from the roof.. in his undies!!
Joe: Hope he has a job cause he's going to need to help you pay rent

Hmmphff. And I thought that was such a brilliant idea!

We got finagled into buying raffle tickets. $5 for an arm's length!! I must have really long arms because I WON!!!! Not once, not twice, but three times... "a ladyyyyy"

First time up I won a set of 6 wine glasses! SCORE... because Bondi is always breaking 'em when he's had too many. (Joe is always blaming the dog for his stinkies, so I figured.. ehem, well anyway...)

Second time up I won a bottle of wine with a bird on it. Seriously, that's what they called it. Whatevvs, I'll take it :-)

Third time up I'm feeling a little guilty that I keep winning?? Okay, I'm over it. Give me that Jameson shirt!!

Somewhere in the midst of all this, the rugby team auctions off this ~~stick figure~~ girl named "Ciara". I kid you not she was 5'9" and not a pound over 95. She was like Olsen twin intervention * Someone get this girl a cheeseburger * a bear hug'll break her * kind of skinny. And I am not just saying this because I'm one of those girls who hates on skinny girls. Legit, this girl had the fuzz growing on her arms... just sayin'... NOT.SEXY.

Apparently I was not the only person who felt this way, because they couldn't get the bidding above $45. Seriously... way to bruise the anorexic chick's ego.. she's probably not going to eat for a week now!

Ciara promptly disappeared off stage and I went to potty. I sit down to tinkle (damn, and I was so close to another post without mentioning pee/poo) and notice the girl next to me is quite an explosive pee-er (peer?). Like... PSSHH - PSSSSSSH... or maybe she has really bad diarrhea? (Eeew I hate that word). Don't judge me but I peeked under the stall and what did I see?? Oh yes, miss The chick's distinctive heels facing the toilet. She's anorexic AND a puker. Lovely.

The next couple minutes were followed by gagging sounds and more pukeyy noises. She was definitely making herself throw up. How do I know this??

It was only about 7pm - too early to be drunk and involuntarily puking... on a weeknight anyway
I went to DUKE. Bulimia is to Duke as Herpes is to ASU. Actually, that's not even accurate... only 1 in 4 peeps have STDs at ASU... the whole eating disorder thing is much more prominent than that at good ol' Duke. No joke. And this is a whole other post, but I digress..

Anywho, I felt a little awkward and debated waiting until she was finished to "confront" her. How would that go? Maybe give her a reference for a psychiatrist? But that didn't play out in my head so well...

She was taking her time in the stall (presumably waiting until I left) so I blurted out "You are wayyy to skinny to be making yourself throw up" and waited a few seconds... *Silence* So I walked out.

Now that I think about it, that didn't come out so right... like, if you weren't so skinny it would be just fine to make yourself puke? And this girl probably thinks she's a lardo. So ipso facto (or ergo facto? whatever...) she definitely can justify it all in her ~~peach fuzz covered effed up little~~ head.

Next time I think I'll just keep my mouth shut, and my eyes on the ~~beefy hot rugby players and raffle ticket numbers~~ prize.

UPDATE: Just to clarify, since some of you asked... Ciara was NOT a rugby player... (DUH!) She was one of the girls they auctioned off as 'lust' not labor..

wish i could give all my moola to sarvey!

2010-04-15T15:28:00.000-07:00

Disclaimer: If you don't like wild animals or are a fan of Sarah Palin, you probably won't like this post. Actually, you probably won't like me either. Just saying...

I haven't played in a long while, but this week Miss Kelsey my amazing IRL friend who does her thing over at The Seattle Smiths used *my* idea for Wishful Wednesday.. so even though I'm a day late and a dollar short, here goes:

"I Wish" I had never ending funds
to donate to Sarvey Wildlife

Sarvey Wildlife is a wildlife rehabilitation center that takes in injured or orphaned wildlife - from starlings to black bears and everything in between - and cares for them in hopes of ultimately being able to release them back into the wild. It is a small non-profit run exclusively on donations and the hard work of volunteers.

All images from www.sarveywildlife.org

I first learned about Sarvey when I was around 10 years old. My family was in a park when a baby Grey-Horned Owl fell out of a tree. It was going to be attacked by dogs so since it clearly couldn't fly, my mom grabbed a towel and scooped it up. Shortly thereafter the mama owl swooped down and put her talons in my mom's back so needless to say we hurried to the car with the big fluffy basketball baby owl. After several phone calls we made our way 90 minutes north to bring the baby to Sarvey. It was spring time and they were so slammed when we got there, a lady begged us all to help with the babies. What did they have us doing, you ask? Oh, just bottle feeding and "pottying" baby raccoons... a never ending supply of baby raccoons. We later learned the baby owl was released several months later in the same park, and well.. that was the beginning.

When I was in highschool I did my senior project up there, working full time as a volunteer "intern" for a month. Sarvey is a very special kind of place where, in just a few hours, you may be cleaning crow shit from a cage one minute, and hiding food for a bobcat the next. One of my most memorable experiences there happened late one night when it was just Sarvey's founder the late Kaye Baxter and me in the clinic. She was hurriedly working to hydrate and remove bullet fragments from a gorgeous golden eagle that had been shot (who does that?) when a baby deer came in that had been hit by a car. It had a huge gash on its head. The golden eagle obviously took priority, but Kaye told me to fix up the deer... Say Whaa?? I didn't even know where to start! Kaye was very calm (or totally out of her rocker!) and told me it was just like sewing a hem. Well nevermind that I didn't (don't) know how to do that either... I gave it my best effort. It was probably the best sewing I've ever done :-) I don't think that baby deer lived, but in that moment I was so... alive! Anywhooo...

Nowadays I don't have much money, but I still make time to go up to Sarvey to volunteer. Last year my brother turned 13 and started bugging me to bring him. The age minimum is 14 but we fudged a little bit on the volunteer form and now brother and I go up pretty much every week!!! He keeps me company on the long drive and is becoming quite the little caretaker! I love spending time with him working up there, and we have had some amazing, some hilarious, and some not so funny experiences.

Towel drying river otter pups... they are just like puppies, and you haven't lived until you have seen what otter pups do with a towel!!!
Surprises when "pottying" baby raccoons. I will just say this: PROJECTILE.
The time I held the hawk while Gabe tube fed it and somehow the food missed the hawk's throat and went directly into my eyeball.... Not fun.
Chasing the escape artist squirrels all over the clinic.... It's a fun little game!
Sneaking a peak at the "off limits" black bear cubs... they couldn't see us, so it was ok :-)
Chopping up frozen rats... not pleasant!
Bottle feeding wobbly baby deer... precious!

Gabe and a *fat* river otter pup after bathtime

Gabe's first time 'catching' a bald eagle for meds

So if I am MIA from blogging Wednesday evenings, it's because I'm probably being pooped on by a baby raccoon, sorting through frozen rats to feed the raptors, or maybe stitching up a deer's head!

Disclaimer: They are much more professional now than a decade ago, and they would never just be like.. go sew that deer. But truly, it happened!!

If you can't tell, I'm a major animal lover... and like I said I don't have much money, but I do donate (not my time but my beer fund) to a few other awesome charities as well:

Conservation International
World Wildlife Fund
National Resources Defense Council
American Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals

and my favorite...

Defenders of Wildlife
because Sarah Palin and her aerial wolf hunting ~~can go to Hell~~ makes me want to vomit.

The only downside of these $10 here $20 there donations? They put you on massive mailing lists and now I get junk mail from every NPO from here to Timbuktu... and address labels. I have a lot of address labels :-)

i've been busy: part 2

2010-04-13T11:07:00.000-07:00

So in my last hodgepodge post I left you with adventures at Schweitzer, and threw in some V-Day tights cause I knew Miss Summer would approve! Well I have lots more to share, so let's just rewind almost two months to Joe's Birthday Weekend in... you guessed it... Land of the Tater.

He's an Idaho boy through and through, that's for sure. Anywhoodles.. we like to celebrate birthdays (duh, who doesn't?) so we planned a weekend trip that involved festivities at the Coeur d'Alene resort, gallivanting in Sandpoint, and fabulous skiing in Schweitzer.

FRIDAY NIGHT

Joe's folks had a suite at the Coeur d'Alene resort Friday night, so we kinda sorta crashed their party. They loved it though :-)

~a few of us girlies~

~joe's folks and us~

~yup... give me some champagne and i'll give you a handstand~

~channeling my 14 year old gymnast~

~all together now... with the security officer mwahaha~

~take 2: he musta really wanted this pic b/c he asked to be our friend on facebook!~

~the silliness continues. birthday boy channeling his inner ninja, i think~

~obligatory bull statue photo op~

~admittedly aggressive~

~birthday boy in the loo. LOVE this pic! hehe~

SATURDAY

Joe rallied the troops at the butt crack of dawn to head up to Schweitzer for a day of skiing. I am NOT a morning person, especially when I've had too much to drinky (who is?) ... but I am proud to say I kept the bitching to a minimum, since Saturday was Joe's birthday and all. Schweitzer is about a 45 min drive from CDA, and after a ridiculous stop at Burger King with the most inept employees I have ever encountered, we were on our way.

~bondi and i were in the same boat. yawns all around!!!~

~joe's bud is a 'lifty' at schweitzer.. they like to keep things entertaining~

Somehow I didn't take any more pics on the mountain Saturday, but it was an amazing day of skiing. However, some of our friends ~~made me look like Lindsey Vonn~~ had a hard time keeping up.. and I am not Miss Patience. However, I wouldn't have felt right about inviting them on a "ski trip" and then ditching them, so yeah. That ~~sucked ass~~ was mildly annoying. Anywayy....

SATURDAY NIGHT

We got a little hotel in Sandpoint and enjoyed the pool and hot-tub. Joe's folks came up and met us for dinner, and then we went out on the town. There are approximately two bars in 4 square blocks so we weren't exactly overwhelmed with options. It was a great time though... as we found a lil hole in the wall with SHUFFLEBOARD and Joe and I dominated. Yeah, I'm a big fan of winning.

~view from our $75/night hotel!~

~joe's folks and the birthday boy at dinner~

~shuffleboard!!!~

~more silliness~

~LAST pic of the night... can you tell?~

SUNDAY

On Sunday I insisted that Joe and I rent snowboards so that we ~~wouldn't want to stab ourselves in the face all day waiting for the slowpokes~~ could improve our snowboarding skillz... ya, well that backfired!! I have snowboarded just a handful of times and am okay, mainly cause I can wakeboard, but definitely not great by any standard. Everything was great at first, since we could all stay together without anyone feeling rushed or bored. But there's this whole edge thing on the snowboard that really didn't work out so well after I got a little cocky and started going fast... and yeah, I'm glad I was wearing a helmet because I got a *bad-ass* concussion. As in, I FELL like a slingshot onto my head and that was the last run of the day for me. Good times.

~beautiful day!~

~me and mine, on our boards~

~beer break~

Alright, that's all I got! Happy Tuesday, and check out Miss Kelsey's Wishful Wednesday this week... I may have contributed :-)

how rude!

2010-04-02T13:49:00.000-07:00

Forgot to mention in today's random post in which i do not speak of pee or poo..., before I went to New Orleans for the Ace show I HAD to get a hair cut... it had been over six months and was getting gross-long.

Like Ashley, I'm very attached to my long hair and I really hate getting it cut. But... I hate spending money getting my hair cut even more... probably because it's so simple even ~~my tipsy mom in Cabo~~ a monkey could do it...

So the day before we left for the show I went to Great Clips on my lunch break. Classy, I know... I sit down and tell her I want only the ends trimmed. I always say this so that when they cut 2" I don't freak out, because you know when you say 2" it ends up being 5"... maybe it's a language issue? I don't know, but it's frickin' annoying.

Anywhoodles, no sooner do I sit down then the asian lady about to butcher my hair goes:

"OOOhhh, you have white HEH" (I'm pretty sure she was trying to say I have GRAY HAIRS... but "gray" must be a tough word to say?)

"Really b*tch? I wasn't aware."

No, I didn't say that... I said... "NO TIP FOW YOU"

That's a lie. Didn't say that either... really wanted to though... Seriously, who does that!

In the words of Stephanie Tanner, "HOW RUDE!"

Speaking of rude, did anyone watch Grey's Anatomy last night? You know, the episode in which Alex Karev's brother comes into town and needs his umbilical hernia repaired? Well I have an umbilical hernia. A couple years ago I felt something rip playing softball... and yeah, it wasn't fun. It is not and never has been as bad as this:

image source.

In fact, it's barely noticable... See it in the picture below?

However, they never go away on their own and it's possible it will just get worse.

Basically, I eventually have to have surgery on it. I'm no stranger to surgery - I'm at 5 and counting - but I am really not looking forward to this one because (1) I can't find a doctor who will agree to do it laproscopically, in other words I will have a big ol' scar on my tummy, and (2) it means no physical activity for a month. Anyway, so I'm in procrastination mode on that one.

But how did this come up? Oh yes, I was speaking of rude.

So my grandpa (you know, the one from TMI Thursday the other week?) is a retired doctor. I asked him what caused the hernia and if there was anything I could do to make it go away.

He told me... well it's probably because you're fat and it might go away if you lose weight.

Pmmf... Whatever he's senile and almost deaf, and now I'm thinking he may be going blind too :-)

But seriously, thanks Grandpa! I know you were never the King of Kindness or anything, but truly, your medical advice is very much appreciated. I'll get right on that...

in which i do not talk about pee, poo or toilets...

2010-04-02T10:27:00.000-07:00

MCW says all my posts lately have been about poop and pee and other gross stuff. Well no more of that ~~shit~~ stuff, I promise! I WILL NOT speak of such disgusting things in this post.. seriously. But I got lots of other stuff to say, so here goes...

Joe and I recently moved to a new house... not the one with the creepy sex offender neighbor. This place has a big ol' front yard for Mister Bondi, wood floors, a fireplace. Good times. We managed to convince the landlord that no non-refundable pet deposit (aka pay $500 to have a dog) was unnecessary since Bondi is so well behaved. Well it was a little awkward when we pulled up to the house to unload our first truck of stuff and Bondi hopped out right.in.front.of.landlord and ran to the first pile of dog poo and covered himself in it.

... oopsies I already mentioned poo, but I mean.. "dog poo" is NOT as bad as people poo, so whatevs.... sorry. won't do it again. anywhoodles...

Moving is a bitch... and we have still yet to unpack everything. Our second bedroom now is the designated room o' crap we ~~are too lazy to~~ haven't had time to put away. Can you find the puppy?

Joe and Bondi are quite comfortable in the new place. Can you tell they like each other?

So as I was saying, the new place is great. Big front yard, fenced side yard for the dogs - did I say dogs? I meant dog.. really, we're not getting another dog... truly - and lots more space.

Well it's not all sparkles and unicorns... as we quickly learned that we are not alone in the house. I should've been suspicious when the bird feeder I put out the first night we moved in was almost empty the next morning... and we had seen nary a starling. Well, on night two I woke up sometime around 3:00am to the sounds of gnawing and scurrying.

Joe... do you hear that?

<<mumble grumble>> Hear what? Go back to sleep!

THAT. <<chomp.chomp.pitter patter pitter patter. chomp. chomp. chomp>>

Oh yes, we have company... rodent company. As in, we have rats in the walls. More on that later, but I will say nothing turns me on more than the sound of scurrying rats when I'm in bed.

We also have one of these that does his thing from approximately 6am-9am right outside our bedroom window.

Such a ~~noisy fucker~~ beautiful bird!

I was off to New Orleans... just a few days after we moved in. I work for the family company which involves several times a year going to hardware tradeshows.

There are lots of perks to working for the family biz. Namely, I get to make my own hours and bring Mister Bondi to work with me. (Warning: here comes the sap). Perhaps the best part, though, is being able to spend so much time with my family. My parents work their freakin' asses off for this company, and they rarely take vacations. (Their 2-night getaway to Schweitzer with Joe and I was a huge deal for them...) So, going to tradeshows sometimes turns into a mini family vacation.

Usually my dad and I (along with another sales rep) go to most of the shows together, and just in the past year or so we've been to a hockey game in Atlanta, done the New York New York rollercoaster and learned to play craps in Vegas, and most recently frequented amazing jazz clubs on Bourbon Street. We saw this 500 lb dude sing his heart out one night last week.

I desperately wanted to tell him to go on Biggest Loser, but I refrained myself. *good girl*

One of the best nights in NOLA went to the Ace Mardis Gras "Party with a Purpose" - it was a charity event with dinner, OPEN BAR, and live entertainment. At one point the host asked for several girls to join him on stage to help out with a Tina Turner number. My dad (seriously, I swear he did) insisted that I do it... I wasn't so sure, as I had only had one adult beverage and the thought of ~~humiliating myself~~ standing up on stage in front of 3,000 people, most of whom were prospects or existing accounts, did not sound like a fun time.

Somehow I was coerced into doing this though... and what I thought was going to be some sort of "Rolling on the River" sing-a-long turned into a full on Girls-Gone-Wild style dance competition including a very older woman who pulled her thong out of her pants. WTF??

I behaved though. Really. The wildest I got was swinging my Mardis Gras beads over my head and throwing them into the crowd. Too bad so sad most hardware folk are technologically challenged, otherwise I would be sharing a YouTube video of my ridiculously horrid dance performance. These pics from my dads phone will have to suffice.

You get the idea. Anyway...

It was good to come home. Bondi is a total mess when I'm gone... like OCD to the nth degree. He is already a ridiculously neurotic pup... (click thru "neurotic pup" to see him hiding in the tub!) and when his routine changes he goes a little bonkers. When I leave him at my mom's that usually involves him repeatedly locking himself in the storage closet downstairs... for reals. And this last time, he decided to bite all the hair off his bum.

It's slowly healing, but we may have to break out the cone if he doesn't knock.it.off.

Since it's Friday... I'll leave y'all with this precious pic of my pup from last night.

*no words*

Hoping to be back to my regularly scheduled musings, funnies and other garbage next week...

just say no to auto flush

2010-03-25T20:06:00.000-07:00

hello from NOLA - or for the abbreviation challenged, that's new orleans.

aaah, brings back memories from a ~~4 day binger at mardis gras~~ lovely trip in college. but now in my grown up life i'm here for work, specifically slinging locking mailboxes at the ace hardware show for the family business. actually alot more fun than it sounds. anywhoodles...

so the convention center here has these "nifty" auto-flush toilets. oooh snazzy... yeah until i used one a few times today...

the verdict is in: i am decidedly anti auto-flush toilet.

reason #1: i think they're supposed to save water and all, and don't get me wrong... i'm all about saving the earth... seriously, i am. but heRRo! news flash: they don't save water. think about it... has this happened to you? you sit to potty and then before you're even done it surprise flushes? four times? unnecessary. (kinda like the 3rd "hurricane" last night and the convention center jumbalaya.)

reason #2: auto-flush toilets (especially in new orleans apparently?) are super aggressive. when the toilet decides to prematurely do its thing, you get splashed (SO gross) by dirty toilet water. lesson here? potty time with auto flush toilets includes a fun game of sit - stand to avoid being splashed - sit - repeat. fun times.

reason #3: auto-flush toilets pretty much preclude any opportunities for sexy time in the bathroom. just completely takes all the romance out of it. so distracting also. not that i would know because i'm far too classy for sexy time in public bathroom stalls... but just, hypothetically.. ya know?

conclusion: let me flush the damn toilet when i am good and ready. mmkay? thanks!

oh, and here's an elephant using a toilet, just for fun:

i *heart* elephants. they're so dang smart... surely they say no to auto-flush too.

i've been busy: part 1

2010-03-19T17:16:00.000-07:00

it's so exhausting keepin y'all entertained with my funnies from san francisco... but i just don't have the energy for any funnies today, or i'm guilty of being #85 uncreative bitch.

(btw if you haven't seen this "types of bitches" list in full, check it out here. you won't be disappointed.)

anywho.. so i've been really busy these last couple months. most recently, we moved!! and haven't been so great about sharing my day to days and weekends. so today, i will do it.. well part of it anyway..

back in january (yes, I know... that long ago... for shame!) we took a trip to schweitzer and invited my family minus the sister along. (paybacks a bitch). sooo it was joe and i, my dog bondi, my folks and gabe, and their two dogs sophie and tanner. let's just say it was a packed little cabin.

here's joe with the 3 dogs.

the skiing was incredible.

joe and gabe got into. i won't say who won :-)

we played scrabble and yahtzee.

my mom is the worst scrabble cheater ever. literally she was hiding tiles everywhere, sneaking peeks in the dictionary, etc. not cool!

i still won though. i'm that good.

mister tanner loved the snow but his golden doodle coat just wasn't having it...

so he needed to be robed like a person, obviously.

hmmm i've got lots more pics and i'm still in january. moving on to february....

here's joe and i on valentine's day. we ate at sazerac. it was delicious.

we went for drinkys after...

here's a shot of my tights i was wearing. i think i'm a fan. thoughts?

a v-day kiss for good measure.

well that brings me up to feb 14. and now i'm off to crossfit to start the weekend... more on feb-march later!

rainbow parties??

2010-03-18T23:31:00.000-07:00

So 13 year old brother comes home the other night and tells my mom all the cool kids are having "rainbow parties" and he's not invited.

How this kid is not "cool" I have no idea:

8th graders are like pirhannas, or termites, or some vicious grotesque cannibalistic animals... that's for certain. I can't believe some of the shit they post on FB.. but I'm getting off track. Back to "rainbow parties"

What are they? Oh, please... let me explain.

A rainbow party is when several "cool" girls where lipstick according to the colors of the rainbow: We're talking ROY-G-BIV lipstick. Then.. they give the appointed "cool" guy a rainbow on his PENIS!!!!

SERIOUSLY???

First of all, WTF??? What is wrong with children today? And yes, I consider 13 year old children.

Secondly, logistically speaking I'm stumped. We're talking a 13 year old boy here. How is his penis even large enough to accomodate the ROY-G-BIV rainbow??

Thirdly, THANK GOD my brother isn't a "cool" kid.

And when I have kids, I'll be certain to warn them of these rainbow parties.

Scratch that. If they're girls they'll be under lock-and-key. Save that girl on girl stuff for college, thank you very much.

And nobody looks good in green lipstick.

bodily functions in san fran, ctd.

2010-03-17T15:53:00.000-07:00

So last week I graced you with the poopy part of san fran. If you have not read yet, please do...and as Miss Ashley of Kiwis and Cocktails said, bring a barf bag. (Thanks, Ash!)

Today you get our story from Friday night. It involves the other primary toilet function #1. Not really. Well, kindove.

So Friday evening, after Joe and I have walked several miles, we finally make our way to the evening's destination: The Punch Line Comedy Club San Francisco.

We get there early and I, of course, insist on sitting at a table in the front row.

Front row at comedy clubs brings me back to Wednesday nights at the Coogee Bay Comedy Club in Sydney and the time I was pulled up on stage and instructed to jump up and down... aah, that's another story.

Anyway, Back to San Fran... So I sit myself down front and center. Joe protests heavily, sitting several tables away for approximately 57 seconds before he realizes I am not moving. He begrudgingly joins me, saying "this is a very bad idea..."

We order a round of Coors Lights and wait patiently for the first act for a few minutes. Then, adult ADD sets in and we begin self photo shoot marathon:

After Take 47 Joe is bored of this game, so we move on to Hang Man.

Luckily we find some handy dandy scraps of yellow paper on the table... the front says something or other about subscribing to some email list... yaddah yaddah. More junk mail? Thanks, but no thanks.

The backside, however, is nice and blank.

Proceed Hang Man Round 1.

I start and pick a nice easy word: _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Right off the bat Joe gets _ E _ _ A _ I O.

Seriously, who picks all vowels off the bat??!!!

It's FELLATIO!

Shit, balls. How did he guess it??

Quick thinking on my part and I have a new word. He doesn't get BELLAGIO and I win!!!! Hooray.

Proceed Hang Man Round 2.

Joe's turn: _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Not bragging or anything, but I'm a avid crossword puzzler and got an 800 on my SAT Verbal, so I easily guess GOLDEN SHOWER in a few turns... (I remember covering that one back in Junior Year, for sure) and we order another round of Coors Lights.

My turn: _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Joe gets:

NECROPHILIA !!! He exclaims. (Apparently that shit's exciting to him.) A few heads turn. The opener hasn't come on yet and it's still pretty quiet.

Alright, my turn again: _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Joe gets: C _ N N _ _ _ N _ _ _

He's apparently stumped. Really??? Well that's just great! I am about to give my opinion on this when the opener comes on. Joe is visibly relieved.

The comedians are pretty funny. I'm amused. We both have another round of Coors Lights, and then the headliner Al Madrigal comes on. We order one more Coors Light for good measure, to share...

Don't judge: there was a 2 drink/person minimum, we were on vacation, and bottled domestics were the only drink under $5. For shame.

This guy Al Madrigal was picking on a few people in the crowd... but not too bad. He mostly picked on the flaming gay group next to us. The San Fran crowd likes gay jokes... surprise!

It seems we're in the clear when there comes a pause in the act, and out of nowhere the comedian snatches my little yellow paper off our table.

Phew... he is just asking the audience to fill out his little thingers. Apparently you might win a CD of him, but wait.. there's more... you get free SPAM for life. (Sign me up!)

Then... he saw the back:

"Oh great. THIS COUPLE has decided to denigrate my property!"

Denigrate? Property? Really?? Not sure about your word choice, Mr. Madrigal.

He took one look at our table:

"I wonder what THEY'RE GOING TO DO TONIGHT??? Drinking Coors Lights? Getting all hot thinking about what they're gonna do later??? They're gonna go home and pee all over each other. Aren't YOU???"

In our defense, we did not, in fact, go home and pee on each other. Home was several hundred miles away.

BTW - Can you guess the word that stumped Joe? I sure hope so.

the poopy part of san francisco

2010-03-09T17:00:00.000-08:00

We spent the weekend in San Francisco. It was mostly all sunshine and rainbows :-) Delicious food and drinkys, swanky hotel, lots of walking, window shopping, and people watching...

... But some of the trip was pretty poopy... quite literally.

I haven't decided if this is even funny or not, but it is most definitely gross. Consider yourself warned. OK, here goes...

So it all started when Joe and I were looking at renting a condo from a lesbian couple who were originally from San Fran. We asked them to recommend some "non touristy" places to check out, and they suggested Polk Street. I distinctly remember they said be sure to avoid *some part* of Polk Street, which I wrote down on a little piece of paper that I promptly lost.

Well, Saturday morning Joe and I are feeling all spontaneous and decide to head to Polk Street.

We're hip. We're cool. We're fresh. We ain't no tourists!

So we start walking south on Market Street... and walking... and walking... Now we're at Polk.

"Joe, seriously stop pulling that map out every few seconds... you'll blow our cover!!!!"

I'm so distracted by chastising Joe for his excessive map consultation that I hardly notice there are now bars on all of the windows.

We pass a smoke shop, a strip club, a liquor store, a condemned vacant building, the 57^th homeless person, a woman with oozing open sores all over her body moaning loudly in the threshold of a doorway...

We're REALLY in a bad part of town now. WTF... There was no warning on the map that said ghetto??

And then my tummy starts hurting. Bad.

Maybe I'm just sick to my stomach from ~~the Crack & AIDS in the air~~ feeling incredibly disturbed by all the sadness?? Nope.. that's not it.

"Umm, Joe... I need to use a bathroom."

"Well, honey..." (He pulls out his handy SF map for the seventeenth time.) "We have less than a mile until it should start cleaning up and then we can stop for lunch and use a bathroom."

"Umm, Joe, I have about 2 maybe 3 blocks in me."

Shit! There's nothing around... Now if I just had to #1, I would happily pop a squat in an alley with the rest of the San Fran homeless population.

*When in Rome* right?

However, I do not poopy in alleys.

Joe's walking faster than me now and almost doesn't see me duck into the Taco Bell on the corner. No, not because I am craving a 7-Layer Burrito. I have to go like right meow. I ask the cashier to buzz me into the bathroom. He informs me I'll have to use the men's room because the women's is "out of order".

Whatever, I'm not scurred. I've done my thing in plenty of men's rooms before. I open the door to the bathroom and immediately regret touching the door handle.

The overwhelming stench, OMG... There are blue plaid boxers in the trash... covered in shit. There is literally CRAP smeared all over the walls and there are turds... multiple pieces of human poop... on the floor. In fact, I just stepped on a piece of poopy.

Oh, my poor UGGS!!

You have got to be shitting me!

And the women's restroom is "out of order"?? WTF. What could possibly be worse than THIS?? I mean, ~~short of someone having an abortion in there and clogging the toilet with the fetus~~, seriously.

I consider running away. Far, FAR AWAY. But then I realize that I probably won't make it ~~without my undies ending up in a garbage somewhere~~.

I would be lying if I said I didn't seriously contemplate pooping on the floor. Really, it wouldn't have made any difference in the level of filth. However, I play the dodge the human feces game - like Hop Skotch, only more precarious - on my way to the toilet where I proceed to thank my lucky stars for CrossFit.

Yes, I'm an excellent squatter. Not even any splash-age, (thank God!)

No, I will not touch anything in this restroom, not even a seat cover (not that there were any to speak of)...

TMI yet?

Umm okay, I'll skip the rest of the shitty details. mwahahahaha.

But for your future reference, here is a little guide I made for you illustrating the Poopy Part of San Francisco:

*Made in Paint, yes I am skilled... cuz Photoshop is ~~on my laptop~~ for elitists. Click to enlarge and appreciate all the glorious details.

You're welcome.

Anyway, the rest of the day was all sparkles and rainbows and sunshine! Seriously. But this stuff is not nearly as exciting as a poopy Taco Bell.

Joe's "Crab Shack" at Fisherman's Wharf.

Homeless man "fishing" for change from a trash can.

Yes, I took a picture.

Funky car parked downtown.

PS: In case you were wondering, we have since learned that it is "not safe" south of California on Polk. I mean, for future reference and all... cause we just spent two hours of our life there last Saturday. No worries, we survived. It was a ~~poopy adventure~~ wonderful time. I would highly recommend it. To anyone.

happy freakin bday

2010-03-03T17:15:00.000-08:00

It has been forever and EVER since I've really shared.. and I have no clue where to start! So how bout something that ~~I'm not particularly excited about~~ has nothing to do with me...

It's my lil sissy's 25th birthday Friday and ~~we're~~ she's going to *Vegas* . YAYYY!!!

Without me.

I don't know why she didn't want me to join her entourage in Vegas?? I mean, with my gambling prowess and peer pressure abilities combined with my affinity for strip clubs and tipsy VIP haggling skills, I'm a no brainer choice for the invite list.

But whatever, I'm going to San Fran this weekend anyway...

*Trying to convince myself that San Fran trumps Vegas. MEH.*

Still, I'm a good sister so I got the birthday girl a lil' sumpin sumpin today. You likey??

This card (so appropriate):

This scarf:

And some Bling (not to be confused with Blog Bling):

This bottom necklace I got at Macy's for $34.95 - 65% off of $100. Score!

I may or may not have left the $100 tag on. Boy will she be surprised when she tries to bring it back with the gift receipt!!! mwahahaha ;-)

Anyway, Happy Freakin' Birthday Sister.

I love you, and hope you ~~lose all your money and dignity~~ have a great time in Vegas without me.

fun with phototag.

2010-02-25T16:21:00.000-08:00

Since I can't get my shit together to do a real post, I think I'll procrastinate with this fun phototag game I saw at keeping up with kelly & co. I've always been an excellent procrastinator!!

Here are the rules:

Open your 1st Photo Folder
Scroll to the 10th photo
Post the photo (no cheating) and the story behind it
Tag 5 or more people

Alright, here's my #10, and even though I look ridiculously amazing... I promise I didn't cheat!!

Here we have Miss Shelby and me in Whistler MLK Weekend 2008.

Aaah, Whistler... Whistler is like Mardi Gras with snow. Hmm, I could go for a Kokanee right meow. But I digress...

Shelby is a bff from highschool. AMAZING. Heart of Gold. More fun than coloring on Adderall.

Incidentally, it is Miss Shelby's 26th Birthday this weekend. As such, I'm feeling pretty confident that my weekend might be better than yours ;-)

Anywho, in this pic we are clearly having an amazing time. Not sure what we're doing, exactly, but if I had to guess we're at the Dubh Linn Gate, because it's the only place in Whistler that actually requires you to be 21 to come in.

Since MLK Weekend also = UW College weekend for 18 years olds with fake IDs that say they're 19, this Irish Bar is about the only place we can go if we don't wanna see this:

'Nuff said?

PS - know how I found this pic? I googled "short skirt uggs hot girls" - Google FAIL. But mental pic, if you will. They abound in Whistler MLK Weekend.

Tall Uggs + Short Skirts + Snow = Cold UW teenyboppers.

Now, I "tag" a few bloggy McBlogsters:

See, wasn't that fun? Don't have hurt feelers if you didn't get tagged. You can ~~procrastinate~~ play too! (I did.)

love thy neighbor

2010-02-18T15:44:00.000-08:00

Background Info: Our apartment lease is up in a couple weeks, so Joe and I have been looking for a house to move to... with a yard... so we can get Mr. Bondi a little brother/sister that Joe will insist on naming "Homie"... which I think is the worst name for a dog ever, but I digress.

We just found a place that is dirt cheap - I won't even tell you how cheap cause I don't want to make any Manhattanites cry. And really, it's perfect for us - well, except for the fact that it's really a really old house and has a strange odor, a little bit like what I imagine crack would smell like, and umm... then there's the sex offender neighbor and the stuttering landlord.

Red flags? No, we'll just work around these little issues. So Say I.

Friend: did i hear you and joe signed a place??

me: not yet

we did FIND a place though

and we are meeting tonight to potentially sign

Friend: sweetness - where's it at?

me: need to determine if the neighbor is a level i sex offender or just a sex offender "dabbler"

i'm gonna knock on his door and bring him cookies
Friend: and children?

haha sorry bad joke

me: no seriously, on the king county sex offenders list, the address DIRECTLY next door is listed as sex offender, so i studied the pic and im gonna go knock on the door - check him out.

Friend: haha creeepy

me: WELL... the landlord legit said on the phone to me, "there's just the problem of the neighbor. he's a little cranky. But if he gives you any problems, just call us and we'll get a restraining order"

WTF

Friend: uhhhhh

me: but actually the landlord stutters, ALOT, so it was more like, "we-e-elll thah-ah-rrS ju-ju-just the"

me: So maybe we just have a cranky neighbor and then somewhere close by a sex offender. Probably best if the cranky neighbor is the sex offender, that way we kill two birds with one stone?
Friend: hahahah

me: place is right behind kangaroo and kiwi pub..

like 2 blocks from greenlake on 99

it is an OLD house

but has a lot of character

each room has different color walls haha

big basement with space for beer pong, etc.

and if i felt so inclined, i could decorate it really vintagey

Friend: i'm a big fan of old houses - i think they have a lot of character missing from today's housing

me: yeah.. well theres the problem of no dishwasher but joe fancies himself a handyman and thinks he's gonna install one :-)

im going to point and laugh.

So here's what I got:

***LOCATION

PROS: Easy access to freeway for commuting, 2 blocks from Greenlake, Across the street from my favorite Pho restaurant, stone's throw from one of my favorite pubs, and directly next door to a great pizza place. On second thought, that might be a con.

CONS: Directly next door to a pizza place, "cranky neighbor" that we potentially need to get a restraining order against?, sex offender neighbor possibly (hopefully) same person as cranky neighbor.. But since little kids don't like cranky men, probably he wouldn't have been a very successful sex offender. So probably not. Oh, and if you're thinking he might not have been a 'child molester' sex offender, he was. I saw.. on the creepy and addictive find a sex offender near you site.

***LANDLORD

PROS: Lives over an hour away.

CONS: Has serious speech impediment. Conversations take 3x longer than humanly necessary.

***HOUSE

PROS: Spacious, new carpets, big rooms, big basement, washer and dryer...

CONS: Smells funny, possibly like crack. Not that I would know. Every room has different color walls. No dishwasher.

Thoughts?? Besides the obvious, that I have Mad "Paint" Skillz. Have you ever tried to use that program? It is less user-friendly than those grocery store Self Checkouts. I think I'll stick with Photoshop.

earplugs please!

2010-02-17T18:05:00.000-08:00

I was watching TV the other night when a Jergens Commercial came on. I thought it was for shampoo but apparently they only make lotion, so obviously the commercial wasn't very effective. I wonder why...? Oh yes!! I was so distracted by the fact that the spokes-model used the word moist about eighteen times.

*** Thanks to DSS for emailing me this image.***

*** Really, thanks. It made ~~me want to vomit~~ my day. ***

My hair is so moist... my skin is so moist... I love being moist...

AAAAaaaahhh... EARPLUGS!!!

I HATE the word "moist". It makes the hair on the back of the neck stand up. I shudder even typing it!

Moist is to the English language as Nickelback is to Rock Music.

Like that analogy? No? OK...

Moist is to the English language as cats are to the animal kingdom.
Moist is to the English language as ice dancing is to the Olympics.
Moist is to the English language as Lilly Pulitzer is to fashion.

Hmm.. okay.. that last one doesn't really "work" so well.. but thought I'd throw it in there.

I would appreciate it if we could just remove this word from the Dictionary (along with queef and pimple.) And also, please fire the Marketing Director at Jergens. Immediately.

K? Thanks.

TMI Thursday: anything but anal

2010-02-11T00:45:00.000-08:00

So I've never done this before, and I've had a several ~~bottles~~ glasses of wine, so.. I'm going to partake in TMI THURSDAY!!!

This past weekend, my boy Joe and I took my grandparents out for their xmas present: a trip to the South Pacific at the 5th Avenue Theatre and then Sazerac for dinner.

Background info:

My grandpa is a special sort of 90 something year old. VERY RELIGIOUS. As in, at some point between ~~sane~~ 70 and now, he became a "Catholic" man who:

(1) Believes in a church that does not recognize the Pope.

(2) Participates in a strictly Latin mass that lasts 1+ (painful - I went, once) hours in a church that requires women to wear DOILIES (is that the plural of doily?) on their heads while praying.

(3) Fears that all of his family is going to HELL if they do not convert to this new (or old? not sure) Catholocism. As in, he recently told my parents (his son and DIL) that their son (my lil bro Gabe) was born out of wedlock because their marriage was never valid in the eyes of his church.. or something.

Good times.

Random Thursday insertion: apparently I use parenthesis alot when I'm drunky~~~

Anyway... so we went to the awesome play The South Pacific, and then this awesome restaurant The Sazerac, and while at dinner,

this

TMI

conversation

happened

OLD RELIGOUS GRANDPA looking back and forth between me and Joe: So what kind of relations do two have?

JOE: omg omg omg wtf omg

ME: practiced at interpretating half deaf grandpa, realizes he said "what kind of RELIGOUS VIEWS do you have" because that's obviously ALL he cares about, whether we're going to Hell or not.

Umm RELIGOUS VIEWS.. what RELIGOUS VIEW DO YOU HAVE??

Joe: ""Relations we have?"

Me: "RELIGIOUS VIEWS"

Joe: Oh, cuz I was gonna say, "EVERYTHING BUT ANAL"

Joe didn't actually say that. But afterwards he told me he was thinking about it. And that's TMI. No??

PS I'm ~~somewhat very meh carrghh how do I use this damn thing???~~ disappointed in the Quality of this blogpost. Wednesday Trivia Night = WARNING! BAD! DANGER! I am "tipsy" as they say..

PPS Update my Grandma is NOT hard of hearing and she heard the whole thing and new exactly what Joe thought grandpa said and read his face and mine and just started cracking up... one of those laughs that had heads turning :-) Love her.

does anyone read friday posts??

2010-02-05T23:00:00.000-08:00

...because my thought is whenever I hit "publish" on a Friday, approximately three people will read it, including my mom. I forgive you, though, if this gets the "Mark as Read" - just sayin...

Anywayyy, I am NOT a morning person. Especially when I find gray hairs. Like this morning. TWO.

Tweezers please!!!

Do you ever run into people in the morning who are all chipper and perky and just feel annoyed?? Well I do, pretty much anytime I encounter one of these so-called "morning peeople" until 11:30am or so...

For example, this morning - after finding said gray hairs - Bondi and I are headed to the car when Miss Apartment Manager (M.A.M) uber-excitedly intercepts us in the foyer. Seriously, she must have had about 12 cups of coffee with happy pills.

M.A.M.: OOoohh, it's KLONDIKE!!! His coat is soooooo gorgeous!!
Actually his name is Bondi. Whatever.
ME: Grumble.grumble.
M.A.M.: What do you feed him to make him so shiiiiiineeeyyy????
BTDub, at this point she is squealing. And ba-geezus, do you really want me to go into this??
ME: Dog food.

Actually, that's a lie. I just WANTED to say dog food. I actually mumbled a quick response and walked out the door mid-sentence calling "Have a nice day!" as an afterthought. **PHEW**

Anywayyy, it is Friday night and I am at home with Shiraz (yup, that's code for Yellow Tail :-) doing this while Mr. Joe is having "boy time". He just texted me to say he's coming home and I said 'Don't worry about it, I'm blogging' and you know what my silly Blackberry Bold on T-Mobile did?? It CHANGED "blogging" to "logging". The nerve!!!

Seriously? What decade are we in? Do people really use the gerund (oh, yes i did say gerund!) "logging" more than "blogging"? Why thank you, Blackberry, you're so much smarter than me!!!

*WTF* How is "blogging" not in the dictionary of a mobile phone in 2010? C'mon Blackberrry/T-Mobile. Get it together. Be professional.

PS: There are a shit-ton of other words the BB always changes on me while texting, but they're escaping me right meow. Must be el vino :-) Does this happen to you?

love this boy

2010-01-25T16:50:00.000-08:00

... even though I bitch about laundry, and often aren't as nice to him as he deserves. He is my person, and my favorite. Just a little about Joe (and me), and a few of the reasons why I am so very lucky to have him in my life:

(1) We met playing softball on our co-ed team "Smack My Pitch Up!" and, well.. the rest is kinda history. I could tell right away Joe was a good person because he was still fun and supportive even when I some girls on the team sucked... He was always carrying the cooler, hitting ground balls to everyone, and generally being a good guy.

* team player, in more ways than one *

(2) He let me teach him how to wakeboard. This was arguably our first "date" (depending on what that even means now a'days....) and he was quite a sport! Didn't even act nervous about me driving the boat...

*spontaneous * fun *

(3) Speaking of driving the boat, he is much better at pulling me wakeboarding than anyone else that comes to mind, and he has skillz, meaning I totally trust he will not run me over and take off a limb. PLUS he looks sexy in a life jacket!! Not an easy feat....

* can handle 350 HP. GRRRrrr *

(4) He is not embarassed when I feel the urge to rock a side ponytail. Very important.

* appreciation of dorky *

(5) If I was lost in the wilderness, I would want Joe around. Not only for the obvious companionship reasons, but also he's quite handy with the whole fire-making, shelter-building, knife-wielding sort of stuff...

* can build a fire *

* resourceful *

(6) Love me, love my dog. And he loves Mr. Bondi.. so much that he would take him out in the middle of the night when there was a foot of snow on the ground when Bondi was sick. That may have been more love for me (and un-love for cranky morning Jenny who hasn't had enough sleep) but regardless.. this one is definitely on my list!

* excellent big spoon, with bondi and me *

(7) Joe is sweet and thoughtful. He likes it when I get "dressed up" and never forgets to tell me so... in orther words... he's a good at giving compliments!!! And PS- it's so easy to take that for granted unless you've been with someone who doesn't do that, and it REALLY sucks. Well, that is not a problem my amazing boyfriend has. SweetHeart. Oh, and I think we clean up well together :-)

* can "vegas" with me - muy importante *

* will wear a suit just so i don't feel over dressed *

Mmmmm.... now I'm feeling all warm and fuzzy inside.

That is certainly not all.. but I also certainly need to get some work shit done. Like right meow...

Just thought I'd let y'all know how lucky I am :-)

one more thing...

2010-01-21T19:55:00.000-08:00

PS on laundry...

... the whole beauty in *not washing* everything after wearing it just once (besides the obvious benefit of having much less laundry) is that it's actually a sort of an excercise in self-image therapy.

What I mean is, if I washed my jeans every time I wore them, I would constantly feel like I was gaining weight. Every day I would have to go through the whole Jeans Aerobics process of *bend and squat* stand* lunge left* lunge right* repeat.. and on really bad days (I always blame the dryer) insert *lay down * lean back *button *sit-up and hope zipper doesn't break prior to the whole *bend and squat* stand* routine.

Whereas... and here's the lovely part... if I wear my jeans ~~57 days and counting~~ a few days in a row without washing them, I feel fantastic :-)

I mean, every day is just like "Woww.. I feel GRRrreat, my jeans fit sooo well!!! Must be all that CrossFit..."

image source.

Just sayin...

you win some, you lose some

2010-01-21T19:17:00.000-08:00

I recently got a VPN from my laptop at home to my desktop at work, which is pretty awesome because it means sometimes I can work from home!!

Working from home = HUGE PLUS because:

(1) I get to skip the whole.. sitting in gridlock traffic thing that is so lovely in Seattle... member my rap about it?
(2) ~~Excluding the usual gmail, facebook, blogger, etc. there are~~ No distractions, so I actually get much more accomplished.
(3) I can catch up on laundry while I'm working.

While we're on the topic of laundry, today I had a a miniature laundry breakdown. I hate laundry. It freaking NEVER ENDS...

Lucky for me, laundry is my responsibility... because Joe is "scared" to do laundry. I have no idea why that would be. It surely has nothing to do with the fact that I might have freaked out a teensy weensy bit after the 11th time he WASHED my dryclean only and DRYED my lacey undies and bathing suits.. surely that cannot be the reason. I mean, we had several lessons on what can and cannot be washed/dryed, but apparently I have instilled the Fear of God in him and he will.not.touch.laundry less he be subjected to the "Wrath of Jenny". His words.

In all fairness, he does dishes. But I would SOOooo rather ~~let him deal with the whole 'cleaning' thing~~ do dishes.

Anyway, relationships are all about compromise and what have you. That's what they say... so I do the laundry. Here's what I accomplished today... these are clean, btw:

Somewhere under this massive pile is actually a basket. It's a-freakin-lot, right??? I mean, seriously. How is this even possible???

Well I'll tell you why: Mister boyfriend goes through about 12 lbs of clothes a day! Yes, that's right. NONE of those clothes are mine. They're ALL Joe's. Seriously.

Here's Joe's day with clothes:

Wake up and throw PJs on floor... unless they were already on the floor ;-) Regardless, they end up on the floor.

Get dressed for work... that involves at least 4 items of clothing, more if its a "professional attire" day.

Get home from work and change into comfy clothes.

Add gym clothes if it's a work-out day.

Shower and throw towel on floor (actually truth be told Joe's towels usually make it in the 'laundry' wherever that is, and mine end up on the floor, but heyyy at least I usually reuse 'em).

Change into comfy clothes (*not the same* as before post-work, pre-shower comfy clothes) which may or may not end up on the floor by the morning....

This is totally.out.of.hand!!!

So I kindly sent Mr. Joe a few text messages just now:

"If u don't stop throwing everything u wear ONE TIME in the laundry I'm going to kill you."

"I know where you sleep."

"Unless you sweat/poop/pee/make sexy time in it, it is NOT dirty. Unless it touches your balls, then it can be washed."

"Blood, blood counts too..."

I thought this was short and sweet! But no response....

UPDATE: Joe just got home from work. He's wearing sweatpants, sneakers and his button-down work shirt. This is actually a cute look, btw :-) He said he was going to the gym tonight but the dress shirt threw me off, so I asked what the deal was. He said he was trying to "save" his shirt from wrinkles.

Good boy...I guess I DID make my point!!!

However, he wouldn't let me take a picture. Oh well, you win some.. you lose some... :-)

need a laugh?

2010-01-20T16:30:00.000-08:00

OK I got some more good ones to get you through this hump day.

DISCLAIMER: The last one is really awful. Don't scroll down if you're not prepared to be seriously disturbed.

WARDROBE: FAIL

HARD HAT: FAIL

RESTAURANT NAME: FAIL

PATERNITY: FAIL

HYGIENE: SERIOUS FAIL

parenting: fail

2010-01-20T13:29:00.000-08:00

From one of my favorite ~~time-killers~~ websites, the Fail Blog:

Parenting: FAIL!!!

image source.

Ridiculous. That is all.

Bring on hump day...

2010-01-19T19:15:00.000-08:00

... because I'm ready for ~~this week~~ today to be over.

Our Subaru has been having a rough time lately.. to the tune of, oh, ~~a bajillion dollars~~ $2,000+ in repairs rough in the last few months.

Rewind to Sunday while I'm being all independent and what have you, driving to ~~get some space~~ "run some errands" and all of the sudden there is smoke coming out of the hood. Lovely...

So I pop the hood, because, clearly, I.CAN.HANDLE.THIS.

What to do? Of course... check the oil!!! I pull the little oil dipper doo-dad out, wipe it off, stick it back in. Hmmm... There's oil in the car. Now what?? I was not going to call Joe just yet, cause I.CAN.TOTALLY.HANDLE.THIS. but SHIT... dad's on business in China... don't know country code or need a $78 international calling charge.

Next man on the list: My Uncle Jack. He tells me to check for anything that could get lodged in the engine that may cause it to smoke, and I find a piece of cardboard (which I later learn Joe uses as a funnel and stores on the side of the engine intentionally, go figure) and determine this must be the cause of the problem.

Remove cardboard. Restart car. DAMN. Still smoking... and lovely, there's green stuff coming out of the hood. This, apparently, is antifreeze. Good times. (Sidenote: antifreeze is very tasty and incredibly poisonous to, as in sure fire way to kill, dogs).

At this point I call Joe. HANDLING THIS: FAIL.

Long story short, the radiator was cracked which I have learned causes the antifreeze to leak, the car to overheat, and can do all sorts of bad stuff. So there goes another $500. Yippee!!

Oh, and the car was supposed to be fixed this morning but it wasn't so I had to reschedule my dentist appointment that I urgently scheduled yesterday because I keep having dreams about my teeth falling out and this one tooth is killing me and I'm SURE I have a cavity but when I went in this afternoon I just found out it's just phantom pain (whatever that is?) which is good, I guess, except now I'm pretty sure my dentist who I've seen since I was 3 thinks I'm crazy because I told him about my recurring teeth dreams... and *breathe* aaahhhh.... was that sentence long enough?

So I decide to go to CrossFit to blow off some steam. Good plan. Except I get there and realize I have no sports bra. Whatever, I'm gonna do this anywayy...

And then I learn the WOD (workout of the day) is "Annie on the Run" - translation: a VERY bad day to forget your sports bra. This workout involves a lot of double unders (yup-Jump Rope, lovely) and a lot of running. I hope it was entertaining for all the men.

Oh, and one more CrossFit woe, because I haven't complained enough in this post. Back in December I did a benchmark WOD that was freakin brutal. I think it's called "Fran" or "Angie" or I dunno, but regardless it is:

100 pullups
100 pushups
100 situps
100 squats

Afterwards I was literally so sore that I COULD NOT straighten my arms for days. One night, I was using those hand-warmers some people use while skiing to try and relax my biceps, and I fell asleep with one on my arm.

Well, it slipped from my bicep down to my forearm and I woke up with freakin' 2nd degree burns on my arm... seriously!! I had 4 blisters that oozed and hurt like hell and were just plain nasty. And worst of all, they were in the shape of a freakin' PENIS!!!!

I did the whole neosporin - don't touch - don't pick thing for weeks. I'm kinda OCD about picking but I SWEAR I was really good about it because I DID NOT WANT A PENIS SCAR.

But alas, it was meant to be. Today in the elevator, I looked down at my forearm and have come to terms with my Angie-Induced CrossFit Penis Scar:

Okayy it doesn't really look like a penis anymore, but it used to!!!

Now it just slightly resembles a long skinny curved one with very small testicles. Or it looks like I cut myself. Not sure which is better... thoughts??

So how was your day?

8===D

PS-that could totally be a new smiley face!

quick thoughts on haiti

2010-01-18T12:24:00.000-08:00

There's been a lot of buzz about the earthquake in Haiti... because shit.. it's devastating and sad! But the buzz is bothering me a bit too... and here's why:

Haiti has been raft with devastation for years, no decades, now. This is NOT news. Haiti is one of the poorest nations in the world, and hundreds upon hundreds of people - men, women, children - die there every day due to poor drinking water, easily preventible and treatable diseases, etc. But the mainstream media is covering the earthquake as if these people's lives have been devastated by this natural disaster, when in reality, their whole lives have been pretty damn destitute, earthquake or not.

A few years back I read this book called Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder. It is a biography of the incredible Paul Farmer... a doctor who has devoted most of his life to helping the people of Haiti (as well as other disease-ridden impoverished countries).

A quick summary:

"At the center of Mountains Beyond Mountains stands Paul Farmer. Doctor, Harvard professor, renowned infectious-disease specialist, anthropologist, the recipient of a MacArthur "genius" grant, world-class Robin Hood, Farmer was brought up in a bus and on a boat, and in medical school found his life’s calling: to diagnose and cure infectious diseases and to bring the lifesaving tools of modern medicine to those who need them most. This magnificent book shows how radical change can be fostered in situations that seem insurmountable, and it also shows how a meaningful life can be created, as Farmer—brilliant, charismatic, charming, both a leader in international health and a doctor who finds time to make house calls in Boston and the mountains of Haiti—blasts through convention to get results."

It's a good book. You should read it.

Anyway, I'm not sure now what the point of this little rant is. Just sayin' ... the world is an f*d up place... and it's sad and tragic that this happened in Haiti. But Haiti's been sad for a long, long time... I wish there was more awareness (and action) in general, not just in times of "crisis" ... because really, it's a perma-crisis over there.

And don't even get me started on Africa!

FYI - pink giveaway week..

2010-01-18T12:03:00.000-08:00

Happy MLK Day!!

Just poppin in to let y'all know that Teresa at Blooming on Bainbridge is doing a giveaway this week.. in honor of the color pink, I think...?

Anyway, it looks fabulous so go check it out :-)

If her fabulous giveaway isn't a good enough reason to head over there right meow, well here are two more:

She's from Seattle. Well, Bainbridge... Very cool.
She has an adorable pup named Doogan. I think he and Bondi are long lost pals.

Just sayin'....

in case you had any doubts...

2010-01-17T20:21:00.000-08:00

DISCLAIMER: This post probably won't be interesting to anyone except me... just sayin'

I'm obsessed with my dog Bondi. He comes to work with me, and he sit's like a little man in the front seat of my car just about every where I go, he is my perfect little spoon in the evenings, and when it comes to social events, if I can take him, he's coming!! And you never know unless you ask...

Speaking of, did you know you can bring your dog into any Nordstom or Macy's??? It's kinda inconvenient if you're trying lots of stuff on.. especially because Bondi has this bad habit of sticking his nose into other people's changing room stalls.. I imagine that could be somewhat alarming to the unsuspecting nakey person! But for the most part, we just make lots of friends, and sometimes convert dog-scared people to Bondi fans.. that's my favorite!!

Anywayyy... In case you had any doubts that I'm a ~~crazy dog lady~~ "dog person" let me just say... it's true. And I can prove it. Here is a sampling of January from my camera:

Bondi with his beloved bear.

Bondi with Mr. Giraffe and mommy.

Bondi snuggling with *lucky me*

Joe and Bondi... on a walk along Elliott Bay.

New Year's kiss. Had to throw it in there :-)

No, Bondi was not with us, but he did join us later!

Can you tell he's not a fan of his new sweater?

Found it at Value Village for $3.95 (so random) - score!

Chillin' on his dog bed, by Epoch Design

New Years - Bondi and I playing Up the River, Down the River.

Bondi was concentrating cause he hates to drink beer.

My sexy boys, chillin' on New Years Day.

Love.LOVE this pic of Joe :-)

More Up the River, Down the River and Catch Phrase..

at my new favorite bar: Twilight Exit

Cheap drinks, tater tots, pin ball, a photo booth, and *dog-friendly*

Doesn't get much better than that!

Gangsta dress up.

Bondi is such a tolerant little spoon :-)

Love this guy.

Joe and I - clearly enamored with Bondi...

at my new 2nd favorite *dog-friendly* bar: Summit Public House

Bondi's eyes match my shirt!

We like other dogs too. Meet Cooper! ..and Teia... :-)

Precious. Just sayin...

And this is Tanner, the newest addition to the family.

Our girl Sophie is in the background...

...and this crazy-dog lady is my mom.

I don't know where I get it from! :-)

starts with "m" .. rhymes with scary

2010-01-15T12:21:00.000-08:00

Sooo the other night Joe were doing some our thing... lounging with Mr. Bondi, watching man vs. wild or some other ridiculous show, and enjoying a glass of vino....

... when Joe decided to share some (apparently) newly acquired knowledge.

**background info: Joe and I have "cohabitated" - as it's called now, I guess? - for a year next month**

Joe: "Did you know that couples who live together before getting married are twice as likely to get divorced as those who don't??"

Moi: "Hmmm...." **long pause while I carefully craft my response**

Hurt my head trying to remember Statistics. Sampling error, hypothesis testing, normal distribution and confidence intervals jumble my thoughts. Not sure what applies here...?? Wishing I would have gone to class more regularly instead of just cramming for those exams.
Must.respond.intelligently.

"Well I think the Mormons seriously skew that statistic quite significantly."

Joe: "How so?"

Moi: Well, they certainly don't live together before marriage. Most people, I think, probably do. And they aren't lining up for divorce either... pretty sure that's not "allowed".

** conversation ends. next topic.**

Good talk.

But you know what? Marriage is kinda scary! For lots of reasons, but oh.my.gosh -- could NOT believe when I saw this about Weddings on Consumerist the other day! $50k??? REALLY???

Take a closer look at this graphic here.

Anyway, that's all I got right meow.

inStyler giveaway

2010-01-11T19:24:00.000-08:00

Fabulous Giveaway by Juliana at "A blonde walks into a blog" ...

She's giving away the InStyler:

QUICK! Head over there now and check it out :-)

grieving greys

2010-01-08T00:32:00.001-08:00

This is from my crackberry (first time!) so it's gonna be short, cause I'm too lazy to go to my computer. Sad, I know.

I just have to say... Ohh Grey's Anatomy, where have you gone??

After a lovely evening of ice skiing, I came home to find neither Grey's nor Private Practice was in 'My DVR' ... What gives? Did the folks at ABC just decide to take the whole freakin' winter off?? Is the cast pregnant, incapacitated, getting plastic surgery, hungover, all of the above???

Or worse, did my trusty DVR malfunction and after weeks, no months, of anticipation.. I MISSED it??

Please bloggies, say it ain't so!

I can't take these 'games' .. Given this total lack of trust, communication, and dependability.. I think we might have to break up. Just sayin'...