We're All Just 12-Year Olds at Heart

Friday was playing with fire.
Saturday was watching TV and playing with my dog.

Sunday was watching High School Musical. (Really. So bad. I wanted to like it. But...no. BAD)

Monday was watching Ratatouille.

I AM 12 years old. But I'm a 12-year old with a driver's license, the ability to drink (legally), and a steady paycheck.

All is good.

Chicago Weather

It was a bit windy and rainy last night.


This pic is out of my bedroom window and doesn't really convey how big this tree really was. It cover half the street and part of the corner as well and when it fell, it took out the bricks and some concrete at the top of the building you can see in the picture. If it helps, size-wise, the balcony that is partially hidden by the tree branches starts about 5 feet up, so the tree was still taller than me laying down! By the time I walked Sadie this morning it was already half gone. Go city workers! I hope you got overtime.

Bright Lights, Big Ass

I have a perpetual cycle that I go through when reading books: first, I spend a month or two with magazines: Entertainment Weekly and Glamour, specifically. Once I grow bored of that, I move on to chick-lit types of books and then eventually onto the more "high-brow" books when I feel like I need to actual learn something or spend my time becoming more cultured (that's the only reason I've read things such as Catcher in the Rye and The Red Badge of Courage...which, I'd like to congratulate my wonderful schools for allowing me to have 4 years of advanced English AND and English degree but it took reading the Shopaholic series to get me to ready Catcher in the Rye.)

So. I'm currently on my Chick Lit month and I've just read one of the funniest books I've encountered in a long time: Bright Lights, Big Ass by Jen Lancaster. Hilarious. To the point where I had to stop and compose myself on the bus this morning before someone thought I was having a seizure trying not to laugh.

This woman is hilarious. Read it--you'll love it. And just TRY not to laugh when you read about her exploding out of her pants after working out. I dare you.

I'm off to Amazon to buy her other book (Bitter is the New Black) right now. Because I just can't get enough. Good thing she has a blog too.

Weekend 8.17.07

Friday: Lemmings to "celebrate" two friends being laid off from their jobs. Luckily they're both getting a severance, but it still sucks. It was a fun night--lemonade and blueberry vodka is a tasty summer drink!

Saturday: 12 hours of scrapbooking with my mom. It was really fun--I got a lot done and am now inspired to do even more. I also won a prize again. I think that's 4 out of the last 5 drawings. :) Lucky. I'm working on photos from 2004 and REALLY want to get more caught up.

Sunday: Met up with Christy and her adorable son Jacob. We went to target and McDonald's, which...fun! You can't go wrong spending time in either of those places, although you might be very poor after. Jacob and I had fun running around the store and asking "Where's mommy?". Hopefully strangers didn't get the wrong idea. I didn't steal him!

It also poured rain all day on Sunday so once I got back to the city Sadie and I took very short walks. We still got pretty wet though.

Yawn

So, my dog is adorable. But she is apparently also a little anal retentive.

Every once in a while she can't wait to be let out in the morning and goes into the kitchen to pee. (she's still learning. And I should cage her at night but I don't.)

The problem is, is that once she does this, she has to come and wake me up so that I can go clean it up. At 4am this morning she jumped on my bed and nosed me a bit, but when I didn't get up, she laid down next to me and whined. And whined. And whined. Not super-loud and not like she was crying--just loud enough that I would wake up.

I finally got up, she led me into the kitchen so I could see what she did (and clean it up) and then we went back to sleep.

Silly dog.

Under My Umbrella

Mandy Moore covers Rihanna? yes. and it's good.

Really.

(well, it's good to a girl that just listed to a country album and is currently going through Diet Coke withdrawal)

A Dirty Job

I finished reading A Dirty Job by Christopher Moore on the way to work this morning and considered writing a review of the book.

But that's pretty hard.

So I'll just say that I enjoyed it a lot and found myself laughing out loud a couple times (always embarrassing when on the bus). It also leads itself well to discussions of life and death and reaching your potential in life and all that jazz. If you're so inclined to discuss that stuff. If not, it's just a good book.

Thanks Jamie for recommending it. :)

Oh, and I haven't had a diet coke for almost 36 hours and am alternating gorging myself on water trying to pretend it's diet coke and falling asleep at my desk. It's been harder than I thought trying to break myself of my DC habit. Wish me luck.

12 of 12 August 2007

It's 12 of 12 for August (thanks Chad!) and while I've only done this once before, it seems that the 12th of the month is the time for drama at 3am. No pictures this time as it concerned my roommate and his friends and they probably wouldn't have taken kindly to me taking pictures of them! (Don't worry--everything's fine.)

7:45am: woke up to see that no one slept on the pull out last night and put everything away

8:15am: Went to CVS to pick up a diet coke and a plunger (3am roommate drama. Sigh) It's pretty quiet at CVS early on a Sunday morning.

8:45am: Used plunger

11:45am: Finished cooking for a birthday brunch at 12. Brownies and Tortilla de Patatas

12:30am: Was greeted at the door with a shot of sambuka. I then added my contributions to the bar

1:40pm: Terri's contribution to the brunch: french bread, cheese, bacon, tomato, poached egg, & arugula. Yum.

3:15pm: We eventually went outside to enjoy the day and continue celebrating Liz's birthday

3:40pm: Pat the cat joined us
6:40pm: I decided I needed a nap. I set my alarm for9pm so I wouldn't sleep the whole evening away.

10:34pm: Woke up at 10:30. Oops.


10:45pm: Took Sadie for her evening walk. She was tired as well and layed down about 2 blocks from home.

11:00pm: Late-night snack of corn chex and water and ready a book, A Dirty Job by Christopher Moore, until about 12, then back to sleep.

12 of 12 August

12 of 12 for August is on Sunday.

Come on, give it a shot. Fun stuff. And it's a SUNDAY so you can do fun things and share them with the world. :)

Happy Friday everyone.

Lollapalooza 2007

Three days and 130 bands. 90 degree heat, rain showers, and crazy humidity. It was a great weekend. :)

To preface this whole thing, I have to say that I wasn't super-jazzed about going this weekend. The lineup was pretty unfamiliar to me and I pretty much planned to going to see a few bands and then leaving early. Happily, I stayed for most of the times on each day and heard some great music.

The two bands that I was most excited to see were The Fratellis and Amy Winehouse. The Fratellis played on Friday, first thing, and they were amazing. For being 11:45 in the morning, they sounded great and were fun a lively. The rest of the day (in the 90 degree heat) consisted of Ted Leo and the Pharmacists, The Polyphonic Spree (wow), M.I.A., a bit of G. Love & Special Sauce and finally the Black Keys. I left early that night to walk the dog, but I hear that LCD Soundsystem was amazing as well.

Saturday was a perfect day for a festival. 80 and overcast. No more sunburn! Ryan Shaw (who loves everyone), Rhymefest, The Roots, The Hold Steady (amazing), and we sat really close for Spoon and while we got rained on (and I got feisty with the stupid people in the crowd), it was a great time.

Sunday started with Rodrigo y Gabriela who are so talented--I was totally impressed. Then Amy Winehouse. Okay. She sounded great, but there was no excitement from her. She was NOT pleased to be there. After the very last song, she just walked off the stage--her band was still playing even! Kind of disappointing, but it was still nice to see her play. I'd prefer to see her in a venue where people where there to see HER and not just to hear her radio song (Rehab). Not the best place for her to play, I think.

Then, completely opposite of Miss Winehouse, was Iggy and the Stooges. Wow. That man is amazing--what a great performer. At one point he let a bunch of the audience on the stage (pissing off his security) but everyone was pretty well behaved.

The last show of the day (after Yo La Tengo, Modest Mouse, and TV on the Radio) was Pearl Jam. Wow. They put on a great show, complete with two encores. I got home around 11:45 last night and fell into bed after a great weekend.

(and yes, this wasn't that interesting, but it's most a list for myself to remember what I saw!!!)

Stop it Already!

Every time I see Amber crying I want to throw something at my TV. It's come to the point where I'm yelling at the TV so I know throwing stuff is the next step.

I better start locking things down.