Homestar Snowman

To help make the big Crack House party this weekend even better, Joey and Kaleb built a Homestar snowman! He was so realistic!! Look how handsome! The party was to celebrate Joey and Meredith's Birthdays, and Joey's graduation!

Emma, Meet Emma!

It's been almost a month since I last wrote. November has been a pretty cool month so far! The most exciting thing was, the week after Halloween, I was the 97x woxy.com pic of the week!!! This was super exciting. 97x is this really great radio station out of Oxford, Ohio, and I listen to it almost every day through the internet at work. On Halloween, they were asking people to call in with requests, and to let them know if they were wearing a costume. Of course, I emailed in a request, and included a pic of myself dressed as a bunny on my webcam. Here is what you would see if you clicked on the "97x pic of the week" link at woxy.com. Alas, I am no longer up, but it was great while it lasted.



Let's see, what else happened this month. Oh! I had fun visitors!!! Julie and Kelly came down the second weekend. We had a really great weekend. We did a lot of shopping (especially at Payless), and played games and cooked dinner and went to some bars. It was a fun time. The following weekend, Emma came to visit! And she finally got to meet kitty Emma! That was fun. Emma (girl Emma) and I went out to dinner, went to bars, watched movies, etc. Whee!! I'll try to remember to post pictures. The weekend after that, Rabecca had a birthday party at her house. The party was for Aryn and Dawn. It was a great party. I got to go in an outdoor hot tub for my first time EVER! That was really cool. There were a lot of us crammed in there. We all recently decided what we're going to do for New Years. A bunch of us, about 14 people, are going to rent out this huge cabin out in the country. There is a HUGE outdoor hot tub, so I'm really excited for that.

Thanksgiving was really fun! It was the smallest gathering we've had in a really long time, because my sister and her husband were visiting friends in San Francisco. So it was just Adam and I, and mom and dad.

Halloween Recap

So the last three weeks have been super busy! We'll start with Halloween. Halloween was a great day. I got to wear my bunny outfit to work! The only other person in my office that completely dressed up was Tracy. He was Ash from Evil Dead. So we were basically complete opposites. That was really fun. Summer wore her bunny outfit to work also! Her company was having a Halloween breakfast, so I met her for that at 8:30. It was DELICIOUS! Then, that afternoon we went uptown and ate lunch at Subway. She came to my office to pick me up so that all my coworkers would get a chance to see her. That was great. Nobody else uptown was dressed up for lunch. Party poopers.





That weekend, I had some guests come down. Kara, Jenny, Anne, and Tim. Friday night we drank some beers at my house, and looked at a bunch of funny web sites. Tim's brother Joe was playing at the Union, so we all went up to see him play. After him, this act called "Captured By Robots" played. I've seen it once before. It's REALLY weird. It's this one guy, and he wears a really creepy mask, and he has an entire band of robots behind him. They're all different looking. There's one tall lanky wirey robot, and there's also a HUGE Chucky Cheese-like monkey robot. Ick. It's scary. And three or four other robots. He has them all rigged up so he can make them say stuff whenever he wants, and have their lights blink and stuff. Overall, I would say it's a cool show, but probably a little too creepy. My sister was there for that show too, so that was fun.

The next day we went to Taco John's for lunch. Mmm! Then we hung around all day and worked on our costumes. Well, I didn't have to work on mine because mine had been done for ages, but everybody else did! I had a bunch of people over that night to hang out before we went to the Uptown Block Party. Athens has a HUGE block party every year on Halloween. Thousands of people bombard the streets of uptown, dressed in costumes. It's nuts, and also really fun. At my house we cooked up a huge pot of chili and made cornbread. We hung around and had some drinks, played some games, then went uptown. PICTURES COMING SOON!!! Uptown was really fun. We stood on the Courthouse steps so that we could see everybody better, and we hassled people who weren't wearing costumes by yelling "NICE COSTUME!" to them. Ha ha we're cool. Then we went to the Union to hang out for the rest of the night. We were a motley crew.



Here we are! Tim = The Bear in the Big Blue house; Jason = cowboy; Anne = Elliot and ET when they dressed up for trick or treating; Summer and Kate = bunnies (duh); Kara = Succubus demon; Jenny = Popple; Schuster = scary evil Jester. There was a whole other group of people, but they had headed uptown already. As I said, more pictures coming soon!!

The following week wasn't very eventful. At work, we were putting the finishing touches on our total site redesign, which was very exciting! Other than that, I had an eye appointment AND a flu shot. Oh and I voted. That brings us to this past weekend! I had more guests! Kelly and Julie came down. On Friday night, Adam and I went to my friend Carrie's birthday dinner. It ended up being at the China Fortune, and it was DELICIOUS. Everybody brought a bottle of wine, so there was a lot of delicious wine to sample. Afterward, we all went to Carrie's apartment for some DQ Ice Cream Cake. MMMM! After that, I met up with Julie, Kelly, and Jason uptown. We went to Tony's and the Union.

On Saturday, Julie, Kelly and I went shopping. I bought myself a new game! It's really really fun. It's called Electronic Catchphrase. It kind of looks like a cd walkman. How you play is, there's a little computer screen on the game, and a word comes up. You have to get your teammates to get the word by giving them any hints you can think of. Meanwhile the little thing is beep beep beeping. When they guess it, you pass it to the opposite team. Kind of like Hot Potato. When it goes off, whatever team is holding it loses that round, and the other team gets the points. It's super fun. That night, we cooked dinner. We made whole wheat spirals, with red sauce, zucchinis, and mushrooms. Also salad and bread. It was delicious!

After dinner, Kelly, Jason, Julie and I played Catchphrase. After that we went up to the bars. We went to Tony's first, then the Union. (Notice a pattern?) I decided I wanted to have after hours, so Dirty, Jason and I went to pick up some beer. After that we met up with Julie, Kari, Kelly, Craig, and Ali. On the way to my house we decided to stop by another after h ours party that we had been told about. It turns out it was a gay party and they weren't very welcoming of us. They made us leave because we brought a (very clean, very harmless) bicycle inside. Oh well! So we went to my house instead, and played fooseball and Catchphrase all night. Whee! We stayed up too late - til 6:30 AM. I should be catching up on sleep RIGHT NOW but oops! I'm working on my web site! The next morning, Julie, Kelly, Adam and I went to Union Street for some breakfast. It was delicious. Afterward, the girls did a little more shopping.

Whoo. Today is Monday. We had our weblaunch party at work! It was really fun. I made cupcakes, and Tracy brought cheese, pears, apples, and champagne. MMM!!!! cupcakes. That's all for now. Lots of pictures coming soon! Halloween, various pictures from the summer, lots of kitties... and there was an entire roll of film taken at the after hours party so if any of them turn out good I'll post those. good night!

Kicked Out of the Wilco Concert

Wow. The weekend FLEW by! Friday night I didn't do much of everything. I was taking it easy because I knew that I had a big day ahead on Saturday. Saturday morning I left for Columbus at around 10:30, with Rabecca and Summer. We met Leighanna and her two friends at Fridays for lunch. Jenny Wray met us there too! Mmm. I had a gardenburger. Afterwards we went to the mall, and shopped ALL DAY. I was good and didn't buy too much.

The Wilco concert started at 7, so we headed there around 6 PM. We got ready in the car, and went to the restaurant next door to the concert for some chips, salsa, and margaritas. Then we saw Wilco! They were awesome. Right before the end of the concert, Summer and I decided to go to the car and put our bunny suits on. We ran back to the PromoWest Pavillion, and ran back in to meet Leighanna and Rabecca. But we didn't get very far, because we got KICKED OUT!! Apparently, there is no re-entry at the Promowest. Whoops. So we got dragged out by the scruffs of our bunny necks, to our protests of "But you can't kick us out!!! We're BUNNIES!!!!" He didn't care. It didn't matter because the concert was almost over anyway. So we hung out near the exit doors, and entertained the masses on their way out of the concert. We danced around for them. Some people really liked us, and other people were not amused. But I would say the majority of people were happy to see us.

After the concert, we went to Summer's boyfriend's friend's Halloween party. On our way, we went through Taco Bell. I went with Rabecca, and Leighanna went with Summer. In the drivethrough, Rabecca and I tried to convince the drivethrough guys that we should get free food, since there was a BUNNY in the car. They didn't give us any free food, but they gave us a free drink!! It was a BIG free drink, too.

The Halloween party was pretty fun. There were some really cool costumes! There were a lot of creepy costumes. There was a creepy Oomaloopma, and a creepy dracula. Oh, there was another bunny there but it was the kind that you RENT, and it had one of those huge heads where you can't see the person's face. I kept telling him he was creepy and that ours were better because we made them. Oops that wasn't very nice. But it WAS a creepy bunny. And he responded to us calling him creepy by going and getting a big kinfe. See? CREEPY!!! Oh and there was somebody totally decked out as Spongebob Squarepants. Now HE was CREEEEEPY. I screamed and ran away. Spongebob is scary. We hung out for quite awhile, then we were exhausted. We all went to sleep in one room. Leighanna, Summer, and I were on the bed, and J and Rabecca were on the couch. I woke up with some serious cramps in my neck! I think we all did.

We went to Bob Evans for breakfast the next morning. I swear it took FOREVER for our turn to come!!! They told us "15 minutes," and it took like 45 minutes. Eventually Leighanna went in to see if we were coming up soon and the lady told her we were next. However, at LEAST 10 more people got called before we did after she told us that. When we finally got called, we walked past the announcer lady's podium and I heard her telling somebody, "You're next on the list!" And I wanted to scream "Don't listen to her!! She LIES!!" But I was too hungry. After dinner we drove back to Athens, and when I got home I did nothing but lay around and watch TV all night. It was nice. The reeeeally long Stephen King-directed version of The Shining was on (it's like 6 hours!), so I watched the last half of that. It's pretty cool, but the little kid is SO annoying in it. Ick.

Highlights

Oops I have GOT to go to SLEEP! I went out tonight though. Tab Benoit, a famous blues guitarist from New Orleans was in town tonight, playing at the Blue Gator. My hairdresser Pat has been telling me about him for AGES. She recommended I find him when I went to New Orleans this summer but I never got around to it. So I went with my friend Debbie tonight. He was great! It was fun. Except I'm always so tired on work nights. So I need to go to bed NOW! I've been pretty good this week about going to bed early.

Today I got my hair done! I got some really fun highlights. Pat had just been to a conference and learned some fun new dying and cutting tricks. Here's a pic of my new hair. Very red and very blonde. I love it!

I Went Running Today?

Yay. I fixed the time on my computer so it's the correct half of the day. Eeek this weekend is Daylight Savings Time! Sunday morning. Yep. So Summer and I finished our bunny suits two nights ago! We added lining to the insides, and secured the tails tightly. Wheee! I can't wait for the Halloween party this Saturday night. Should be fun.

A couple of nights ago, I had the greatest dream. I've been having lots of very complicated dreams recently, and this night was no exception, but there is just one moment that I remember completely clearly. I went to somebody's house to drop something off or pick something up and there was a baby giraffe in the side yard. Except, it wasn't your ordinary baby giraffe. It was the size of a KITTEN. It was SOOOOO cute. It was running around and it let me pet it for a little while then it got scared and ran inside and peeked out at me from the window. It was amazing. I love it when dreams create something so beautiful, something that you would never be able to see in real life.

Speaking of real life, I went running today. ?????????? I NEVER go running. Ever. But I kind of liked it! So maybe this will be a new thing. Who knows. Adam went with me because I was self conscious that I would have horrible form. We ran on the track. He said my form was fine! But I'm telling you, my front thighs are KILLING ME. owowowowowow.

Now I think I will play piano for a bit.

Bunny Wunnies

I wish it wasn't 11:25 PM because I should be in bed. Very very soon though... So I've been sick the past couple of days. I had to take off work. I had a fever, head cold, etc. It wasn't much fun. Bah. But I had a nice weekend! Friday night I cooked Yellow Chicken Curry with Sweet Potatoes. It was AWESOME. So that dinner was awesome, I cooked it for Adam, Summer, and Jason. Unfortunately, I underestimated how complicated it was, and I was at least an hour late serving my guests. Oh well. I'm making it again this Friday, except this time I'm going to do most of the big work the night before. Whew! Adam's friend Marc is coming into town so It'll be Adam, Marc and I eating it this time. Mmm...



After that, Jason, Summer and I carved pumpkins. I made a cat. Summer made a fancy pattern with leaves and little faces, and Jason made a desert scene. It was REALLY cool. Maybe I can get him to get some pictures of it. Summer went home after pumpkin carving, and Jason and I played this VH1 Pop Up Video game that my aunt gave my mom to give to me, apparently my cousin left it behind when he moved to Texas. It was pretty fun.



Saturday is when Summer and I were embarking on our costume adventure. We decided we were going to be bunnies for Halloween. So we went to the fabric store at eleven o'clock Saturday morning. We bought all the materials we needed, and drove out to her house to get to work. We spent 10 hours on Saturday working on them. I took a break at one point to whip up some chili and cornbread, while Summer continued to sew. We got a LOT done. That night, Jason and I went uptown at midnight. It was homecoming, so there were a bazillion people in town. We ran into some friends at Tony's and hung out with them. Afterwards I decided to host an impromptu afterhours party. It was just the Jason, me, and the four people we met up with at Tony's, and it only lasted about 45 minutes. But it was fun!

Sunday I went out to Summer's at one to work on the costumes some more. Six hours later, we were DONE!!! They look AWESOME. Mine is light gray and Summer's is dark gray.








There are only a couple last minute things we need to perfect, such as making the tails stay on better, and adding lining to the entire costume. Right now only the hood has lining. Summer is in Vegas right now, but she's coming back on Saturday, and on Sunday we're going to do the finishing touches. Of COURSE, I will post more pictures, when I have pictures of both us us, and pictures of us with some face paint on and stuff.

Eeeek I'm excited because this Saturday I get to go to a WEINER ROAST!! It's a work thing, and it's going to be FUN. There will be so much awesome food there, and I can't wait to pig out! I loooove fall.

Oh, I have a new picture to show! In early September, a friend of a family friend drove into Athens from Chicago. She has hand-beaded and decorated her entire car, as a tribute to her father! My whole family was out in the yard, staring. It was unbelievable. There were a million different cool things to look at. My uncle took a bunch of pictures of it.

August Through September

It's ALIVE! My website has come back to life!!!

Hmmm. You'll probably notice that if you click on "back", you go to July, when it would make more sense to go to September. Well, the reality of the situation is that I haven't updated this thing since July. Shame on me!! Oh well. Maybe later I'll do some sort of "recap" for months where I never wrote. Or maybe I won't.

Well, it's Monday. This was a pretty fun weekend! Friday night, Adam and I drove to Belpre for our friend's birthday party. His wife got him a surprise - a limo to drive us around for the night! But it wasn't to arrive until 10 PM, so we hung out from 7-10. Rabecca (the host) and various other helpers had cooked a Mexican Feast. It was delicious. Chad (the birthday boy) made one of his infamous punches. His punch is always delicious!

So at 10 PM, the "limo" arrived. Turns out the guy decided to bring a short bus instead! It was like a mini tour bus or something. The seats were like couches and went around the perimeter of the bus. The middle section (the floor) was taken up by the various coolers that we brought. It's actually a lot better that the guy brought this bus thing, because there were 18 of us, and we wouldn't have all fit inside the limo!! It was pretty crowded in the bus, but it was FUN! When I get pics, I'll post them.

The limo/bus drove us around to various bars, from Marietta to Parkersburg. It was tons of fun. At the end of the night it drove us home and we stood around and snacked on leftovers! Wheee! Saturday night we were all a bit tired from Friday night. Summer and I were supposed to meet Jason to see Sweet Home Alabama, but he thought we meant Movies 10, and we went to The Athena, so we didn't quite all get to see it together. I even smuggled in some popcorn for Jason! I don't really like movie popcorn, so I microwaved my own at home and separated it into little bags for Summer, Jason and I (just call me Martha Stewart!), and snuck them in. Since Jason wasn't there, I got to eat his portion! Cha ching! That night, Summer, Jason and I went out to Summer's friend Myron's bonfire party. I guess he usually has a couple a year, and Summer had no idea if it was going to be big or small.

Well, it was BIG! "Parking" was in the field, there was a huge bonfire, a band, and a PORTA POTTY! That PROVES it's a big party. We stayed there until about midnight then went home. Sunday night, my parents cooked a turkey dinner! YUM! That was a nice surprise. Mmm.

So that's it for this weekend. Let's see, what happened in August and September that's worth mentioning...

In August, I went on two vacations! Vacation #1 was with Adam, we flew to Atlanta to hang out with some of our friends. Atlanta was a neat place! We had a good time. Except Adam and I were playing catch-the-tennis-ball in a pool, and at one point, the ball came HURTLING down from above, and stoved my finger!! It swelled up and got bruised. And the sad part is that it STILL HURTS! Not constantly, but if I bend it wrong. And it's kind of achey tonight. Maybe that's because it's getting cold outside. There's a frost advisory for tonight! I wonder if I'm going to become one of those people who have a body part that aches according to the weather. That would be kind of neat...

My second vacation was to Los Angeles to visit Jason! My other friend Amanda met us there also. That was really convenient, because now she is in Africa w/ Peace Corps for the next 2 years and 3 months! So Jason and I got to both hang out with her before she left. It was a fun trip. We did all the usual stuff, like visit Hollywood, Santa Monica, Melrose Avenue, 90210, Chinatown, etc. I have some pictures, hopefully I'll get around to posting some soon.

September was the greatest month ever because it was MY BIRTHDAY! I like to make my birthday last, and considering my present from Beth (my almost-birthday-twin, mine is the 23 hers is the 21) arrived today, that means my birthday lasted for WEEKS! Thanks, Beth! You rule! It was a special birthday because it was my "Golden Birthday," meaning I turn my age on the date. I turned 23 on the 23rd. Yay! A bunch of my friends (15 total) all met at Lui Lui's for dinner. We hung out there for a long time, eating and drinking wine. Then we met up at my house for a small party. There was foosball, darts, and BIRTHDAY CAKE! After awhile, we all headed uptown. It was a fun night. September is also Dad's birthday month - Happy Birthday, Dad!!!

Let's see, something fun that happened in late July was Summer's slip and slide party. It was AWESOME. The slide was really wide, and 100 FEET LONG! And there was even a LANDING POOL at the bottom!!! It was sooooo fast. After just sliding down began to lose its novelty, we all began sliding to the bottom and then racing each other up. Considering the fact that we were also pouring baby oil down the slide, this was a nearly impossible feat! Needless to say, we were covered in bruises the next day. It was definitely worth it though. I have pictures of that too.

Well, I think that's enough updating for tonight. I'll do better with updating this time around, I promise.

The July Entry

Hahah. It's been awhile hasn't it!? Every time I do like three in a row, I always say that "from now on, I'll REALLY update every day!" Hahahah. It never happens. B

This week I'm taking the week off work to be an assistant in a Photoshop Workshop. I did it last year and it's so much fun! It's hosted by the Ohio Arts Council, and is open to teachers throughout the state of Ohio. One of my professors from college is leading the Photoshop workshop (there are other workshops also: Video Storytelling, Animation, and Photography.), and my job is to provide additional help to the workshop participants. It's a lot of fun, AND we get to go out to dinner almost every night! mmm!

Dora's Dunkin' Donuts

STILL SICK!! My throat hurts again today and I don't feeeeeeel good. And I'm coughy. Blech. I have to get better by Wednesday so I'm alright for New Orleans!! Today was an okay day at work. I went in a tanning bed for the first time in my life. I always said I would never try one, but Summer had a few extra sessions and she offered two of them to me for free! So I tried it, and it wasn't bad! It was pretty relaxing! I would never actually buy tanning sessions, I'd feel too guilty, but I can justify these two because they're free, and in preparation for my vacation! This way, hopefully I won't burn the second I start running around in the hot Louisiana sun. So I had that appointment today, and I have another on Monday, and then that's it for tanning beds for me!! I must say, I enjoyed it, though!

So after work I didn't do much, I didn't feel so good. Jenny Wray was coming tonight, so I was all prepared to go out even though I knew I shouldn't. Well she just showed up at about 10:15, and I actually decided NOT to go out. I'm very proud of myself. It sucks that I don't get to hang out with her since she's only here for one night, but I have GOT to get better and that would've been extremely counterproductive. Hey, she's crashing here - I'll see her in the morning!

I watched The Little Princess tonight. Every bit as good as I remembered it. It came with two extra "shorts" on the DVD - "Dora's Dunkin' Donuts," and "Kid Goes to Africa." The Africa one was REALLY weird. It was Shirley Temple, in the African Jungle, by herself. She was hanging out with a circle of little African children (there were no adults in this movie), when they suddenly start screaming "CANNIBALS!" and a group of slightly larger African children jump out from behind bushes and trees. These children have war paint on their faces. They sneak up behind the non-cannibal kids, and begin pouring salt on their heads, as if they're food!!! It's so weird! Then they chase everyone around, and eventually it cuts to a scene with Shirley Temple in a big pot of water, and the cannibal kids are cooking her. They keep sampling the water with a ladle to see if the stew is "done." Shirley is just sitting there yelling "HELP! HELP!" the whole time. Then suddenly a little boy in a cheetah skin appears in a tree. He yells a couple of times (in a man's deep voice, which is pretty funny), and eventually comes and saves her. She's really happy. Then cut to a scene of them in normal clothes and he says he wants to go golfing this afternoon, and she says "absolutely not. you're going home and doing the dishes." THE END!! It was soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo weird. It didn't make too much sense. It was funny though. Oh, at one point the leader of the cannibal group picks up his coconut shell phone and calls the leader of another group and invites him to the feast, and the second leader goes, "If there's one thing I like, It's missionary stew!" I thought that was funny.

So, um I need to get some sleep for once. I'm going to go try and do that now.

Blackout

So, since yesterday I had practically the entire evening free, I figured I would work on my website all night. I can't think of another time I'll have an entire free evening for awhile. However, at about 6:30 p.m., the power went out!! I was in the basement doing some situps, and I was staring at the ceiling as I was doing them, and all of a sudden, BOOM! No power. So when it started to get dark I had to decide what to do. I wasn't tired enough to go to bed yet, and i didn't want to hang around in the pitch dark. So I went uptown and had a couple beers with my friend Lauren. We went to Tony's, then to The Union. I decided that midnight would be a safe bet that the power would be back on. I was wrong. I got home at midnight and it was still completely dark. The whole block was blacked out. Adam was going to to out and hang out at his friend Zack's house, and sleep out there since they had power. I figured I would just drive to Mom and Dad's house, because even though their power was out too, they had their AC on all day long, so there house would've been much cooler. I ended up changing my mind though, and just staying at the apartment. At 3:50, all the lights in the house came on and it made a big sound. It totally woke me up, and scared the holy hell out of me!! The power then went off a couple more times throughout the night, and at least once today. SO ANNOYING! So I didn't get my tons of work done on the website.

Today was an alright day at work. I still feel kind of sick, so I wasn't the happiest ever. But it was okay. After work, Summer and I drove to Parkersburg. Rabecca lives there, and every Wednesday night at the River City Grill, it's Working Women's Wednesday. You get a free drink, and a ticket to win prizes. You can also win more free drinks. I won a prize. I won a CD - "Inside Traxx 2002," featuring Travis Tritt, Tim McGraw, Dwight Yoakam, etc. WOO HOO. Oh yeah, I also won two $10 gift certificates towards the purchase of BINGO tickets. Uh? Pretty funny prizes, I guess. Anyway we wanted to go there so we could talk with Melissa and Rabecca to see if there were any questions we had about our New Orleans trip, which is now just a week away! EEEEK!

Adam picked up some plants today from his friend Zack. So we'll finally have some plants in the house! I hope they do okay with the cats. Oh! I got my first DVD in the mail today. It'll be the first one in my collection. I got it from ebay, and it's the Shirley Temple movie, "The Little Princess." I think I'll go watch a little bit of that before I go to bed. I'll get to those BBQ pictures eventually...

Pretty Drugs

Nope, not tonight either. I have BBQ pictures to put up, but I'm too sick again. I went to the doctor today and found out I have a sinus infection. My favorite. I have to take antibiotics. They're pretty. They're turquoise and purple. When I was in middle school, what I wanted to be when I grew up was the person who designed the exteriors of pills and drugs. I loved mixing chemicals in test tubes, and was always fascinated whenever I'd be sick and get to take a new fancy looking pill. Anyway, yeah, I'm gonna go to bed early and hopefully advance the healing process a little. Hopefully I'll get those pictures up soon.

Ice Hockey

Well, my *plan* for this evening was to do a bunch of work on the web site, but now I'm really tired and my throat hurts so I'm going to go read instead. Then go to bed. I actually did sit down at my computer with the intent to get started, but instead I spent some time choosing and purchasing a plane ticket to LA!! Yay! I'm going to visit my friend Jason in August! That'll be awesome. So the least I can do tonight is add a little to my journal.

This was a pretty full weekend! Anne and Tim came down! Friday night, three bands played at Ellis Hall, OU's English building. It was weird seeing bands there because I had so many classes there in college! Tim's Band, "In the Black Hearts of Men" played their first show ever. It was awesome. Their friends' band, Denovo, played too, and they were great too! They all stayed at my house, along with two of their friends and of course, Anne and Tim! So I got to have another fun filled weekend of guests! Everybody LOVED Emma, which was great. I'm sure they loved Charlie too, but he just wasn't putting in as much of an effort to be cute this weekend.

After the show, we all went to The Union. They had new drinks - The Lemonbomb and the Chandra. They're the same drink, except the Chandra is drink-size and the Lemonbomb is shot-size. They had TONS of lemon in them!
Since I loooove lemon, these were the perfect drinks for me. They were so sour! The funny thing is that by the end of the night, they had to take down the "Try a Lemonbomb!" signs, because they ran out of lemons!

After The Union, we went to an afterhours party. We hung out on the porch for awhile, then played around in the kitchen. The next morning we all headed uptown for lunch, then ate it on the college green. When we were finished eating we went cd shopping. We were hanging around outside the cd store, and for some reason (a bike race? maybe?) ALL the parking spots on court street and union street had those yellow plastic "NO PARKING" bags over them. Well, this tough biker in leather pants with fringe, a leather vest, tattoos, sunglasses, etc... pulled into a spot, RIPPED the no parking bag off the meter, and went into The Duplication Station (a place you go to photocopy stuff)!!! Then he came back outside when he was done, got on his bike and sped off!! It was totally tough. He didn't put the bag back either, but I guess I wouldn't really expect him to.

At this point Denovo had to take off to get the van they rented back to Columbus in time, so the rest of us headed to The Front Room. There, I played Ice Hockey with Anne, on the patio. Ice Hockey is a game I made up freshman year of college. You sit on the wall of the patio, and try to spit ice cubes into the hole in the grates on the sidewalk that trees grow out of. Before I go any further, I think a diagram is necessary:

There, hopefully the game makes more sense now! Anyway, if you spit an ice cube directly into the hole, you get five points, and if it hits the ground and slides into the hole you get 2 points. This game rules, and I was always the reigning champion, but Anne beat me!!! It sucked. Luckily, the guy I usually play, Adam Goldman, showed up and so I got to play him and beat him. He still has never beat me! BWA HA HA! So that was fun as usual. The bad thing is that we got sunburned pretty badly while we were there. It didn't show up for a few hours though.

Anne and I went to the Lake and laid out for awhile afterward, but we put plenty of sunscreen on. But after a few hours the sunburns we got at the Front Room really began to surface. OWWW. Mine still hurts. When we got back to my apartment, Adam had mowed the yard and set up the patio furniture and got out the grill! My parents just got a new gas grill so they gave us their old one. YES!!! And THEN.... sorry! To be continued. I thought I could make it but I can't. I'm WAY too tired and my throat hurts so I should go to bed so I'm not sick all day tomorrow. Anyway, more on the BBQ soon! Hopefully tomorrow! I'm not even going to proofread this, so I'm sorry for any mistakes!

Stupid Keys

This past weekend was so fun! Adam was going to Cincinnati to record music with Marc, and I hitched a ride with him, then drove the rest of the way to Dayton to spend the weekend with ANNE! YAY! I make that sound so easy - actually I got lost BOTH ways. Oh well. Anyway Friday when I got to Anne's house we had 15 minutes to get to this bar where there was a surprise party for their friend Ian. So I shoveled in some Chinese food that they had ordered and we took off. We met up with Clark, Michelle, and Dan there. Ian's girlfriend had paid for some kegs at the bar, so we got free pitchers of cold Miller Lite all night. It was delicious. Later on, we went to this bar called Elbo's, for Danceable Solution, a thing that usually happens here in Athens. They just play really cool music, along with showing old movies and stuff on TV screens. We danced a lot. Joe and Schuster showed up. We took a taxi home and it was TWENTY BUCKS! eeek!

The next morning (well, about lunch time) I got to try Chipotle for the first time. Anne and I split one. It was DELICIOUS. We at them in Lincoln Park (I think that's what it was called) it was beautiful. Then Tim, Anne, Clark, Michelle, Joe, Schuster and I went to the Dayton Art Museum to see Linda McCartney's photography exhibit. It was awesome! Then we split up. Anne, Michelle and I went to Riverscape for awhile - it's supposed to be a place where events happen along the river, and Saturday was supposed to be a big art show but there were only like FOUR artists there. It was boring, so we met up with Tim and Clark at Ben & Jerry's. I got Chocolate Fudge Brownie frozen yogurt in a waffle cone. It was DEEEELICIOUS.

Then we split up AGAIN and Anne and I drove around. I got to see where she works. Michelle, Clark and Tim decided they were going to watch a movie, which Anne and I didn't want to do. We decided to go bowing instead. When we got to the bowling alley though, we discovered that a tournament was in progress so we couldn't bowl. So instead we walked around this little plaza and stared at all the girls' prom dresses (it was prom there and they were all out on their pre-prom dates). It was funny. We went to Starbucks, then Petmart, where I got some presents for Charlie and Emma! Anne's friend Kelly works there, so we visited with her for awhile. Then we went over to the Clark's house. We were all starving so we went to Fuddrucker's. It was DEEELICIOUS. I got an ostrich burger and onion rings. mmm. Then we went to Murray's - Anne's bosses' favorite bar. They have karaoke on Saturday nights, so that was funny. We were all really tired though, so we went back to the Clarks at around 12:30 to catch the end of Saturday night live. Then we went back to Anne and Tim's to go to sleep.

Sunday morning I was all packed and ready to go when I discovered my KEYS WERE MISSING! Yuck. So I called Triple A, and they said to call a locksmith and then bring in the bill and they will reimburse me for part of it. So I got the locksmith. He was really nice. It sucked because it was raining half the time he was trying to break into my car. (Subarus are hard to break into!) I snuck a couple pictures - I'll put them up when I get the roll developed. I feel the need to document my stupidity sometimes. Anyway, the total was $159. Argh!!! Oh well. Then I drove to Cinci and waited for Adam to finish up recording, and we came home. Sigh. It was a fun weekend, except for the locksmith crap. So today I went to AAA to see about the reimbursement, and the lady said that the AAA agent I called at the 800 number SHOULD have sent a mechanic from the nearest AAA garage and then I wouldn't have had to pay anything ever. She was pissed and said she was sorry and that was the second time this month someone at the 800 number has done that. So I don't know if that means I'll get LESS money back, or FULL reimbursement. They should fully reimburse me, since they screwed up, I think. We'll see.

In other news, I've won THREE ebay auctions in the past week, all for vintage magazines. So hopefully, the 40's/50's section of my site will finally be getting some new material! Yay! And tonight I bid on The Little Princess Shirley Temple movie. I couldn't help myself. I have a Shirley Temple craving and it was super cheap. It ends in like 20 minutes so I'm pretty sure I'm gonna get it. Well I have got to take my contacts out before they dry up right on my eyeballs. Later!

I saved Dawson, and Adam is the Incredible Hulk

This has been a pretty fast week! I would have to say the highlight of my week was getting to see Spiderman Tuesday evening. Adam and I went to the 6:45 showing at the Athena, which was also exciting because I hadn't seen it since they reopened it. It looked nice! Anyway the movie was AWESOME. I loooooooved it. As soon as we got home I went straight out to the mall to see if they had any Spiderman underoos sets left. They did! They had one left. So I think I'm going to wear my Spiderman shirt to work tomorrow. Yay. You can just call me Spiderkate!

This past weekend I got to see Margaret Cho on Friday night. She was really funny. My friend Jenny came into town from Columbus with her coworker Wendy. Saturday morning we all went to the Farmer's Market. I was wearing my new Rocketdog flipflops which I THOUGHT I loved, until they made me fall down in the middle of the market in front of EVERYBODY! I skinned both knees, both hands, and ended up with bruises. Ow. Today I went by the shoe store on my way home from work and returned them. Whew! Saturday night I made lasagna - meat with zucchini, mushrooms, and spinach. It was delicious!

Tomorrow Adam is going to Cincinnati to do music with Marc, and I'm going to ride up with him, then drive to Dayton to hang out with Anne for the weekend! YAY! Should be a good weekend.

So I've been having some weird dreams recently. Earlier this week I had a dream that I was in a grocery store, and inside the grocery store there was a bowling alley and a pool. In the bowling alley, there were a bunch of mascot-looking things, like squirrels and dogs and stuff (people dressed up like animals). Then all of a sudden Dawson from Dawson's Creek was drowning in the pool!!! Along with a couple of other people, I started life-saving procedures on him. These weren't CPR though. We cut him open, and inside his body I found a bunch of dinner plates! These are the exact same dinner plates that *i* have - white glass with navy blue flowers around the edges. I had to get them out of him in order to save his life. It was gross. I was reminded of this dream last night when I was doing the dishes.

Then, last night I had a dream where I ate some spinach and all of a sudden became a superhero? I can only remember sections of this dream. I think I became pink when I was a superhero. Anyway I was at Adam's mom's house with him, except it wasn't really her house and it was in Big Rapids, Michigan (where I lived until I was seven.) As soon as I was "super" it seemed like Adam was my enemy?? I just knew that I had to get away, so I ran outside. Across the street there was a HUGE mansion with golden gates surrounding it. I leapt up onto this gate (just like spiderman!!) but once I landed on the top, my super powers faded away. I was a regular person again. I fell inside the fence onto the lawn. Luckily, the older lady that lived in the house saw me and beckoned me inside. We looked across the street, and Adam's house was glowing this blinding green light out of the windows. And we saw his silhouette standing hunched inside one of the windows - his body was undergoing a transformation. He became the Incredible Hulk! It was so weird!

Then all of a sudden I knew I was in danger. I knew he was coming. Then next thing I knew, he was in this lady's basement, waiting for me. It was a nice basement, the kind with carpet and couches and stuff (it wasn't like he was lurking in the cobwebby basement or something). I was in the kitchen, which was at the top of the stairs to the basement. I knew that he was waiting to confront/fight me. I began frantically searching for spinach so that I could regain my super powers. The closest thing I could find was this bag of frozen veggies in the freezer. It was like spinach, cauliflower, cheese and stuff. I microwaved it but only halfway because I felt like I had to hurry. I remember that the veggies and cheese were DELICIOUS! Then I went down to see Adam and we stood there like we were going to fight and then I was just like "I don't want to fight you..." And he said "I don't want to fight either!" And we hugged and that's all I can remember! Anyway, yeah. Strange dreams...

Felicity Makes Everything Better

Well, tonight I laid around and watched Dawson's Creek and Felicity. What a night! I would've done something active like ride my bike but for some reason my toe is KILLING me today! It feels like I broke it or something! And Dawson and Felicity make everything feel better. Or something.

This past weekend was pretty fun! Friday night I went to an Around The World party with Lauren. Most of the "countries" were already dry when we got there, but it was fun. Then we went to a couple of bars. Saturday night, Summer had a birthday party for J. It was such a beautiful day! Adam and I went out there at five. Summer made chicken pot pie for everyone, and had fruit and veggie trays. It was delicious! We played Caps on the deck for awhile, and just hung out enjoying the nice air.

Looks Like a Turd

April's been going pretty well so far! It's been BEAUTIFUL out these past couple of days. I've been riding my bike almost every day when I get home from work. Last weekend was fun! Julie came into town on Friday, so we went to Tony's for some beers. Saturday night I had a dinner party! I invited my mom and dad, and my sister Mer and her husband Pete. I made George Foreman Quesadillas (my FAVORITE!), Mer brought rice, and I made Chocolate Banana Bread for dessert! And this time, it turned out PERFECTLY. Need proof?:



Mmm! Actually, here it kind of looks like a turd, but trust me it was delicious. MUCH better than last time...

In other exciting news, Adam and I are going to Atlanta in July! That'll be cool! We're going to visit our friends Andy and Sylvia, and our other friends Marc and Julie are also going. Andy and Marc are brothers. Yay! A trip!

Also, I got the confirmation that I get to be an assistant for sure for the Photoshop Workshop this summer! YAY! That is soooooo much fun. I just hope my friend Emma gets to be an assistant too, because that would be the BEST! We're still waiting to hear.

March Randomness

Happy Easter!! Wow. It's almost April! I am SO READY for warm weather I can't even stand it!! Mmm. The easter bunny brought me some candy! And the CUTEST kitchen towels and oven mitt, with bunnies on them! Soooo cute! Well, I only managed to get one entry in during March! Hopefully I'll be better about that in April.

This was a nice weekend. On Friday night I went to Summer's house and watched Donnie Darko. I think that's what it was called. WEIRD movie. Saturday I went shopping in Parkersburg with Mom. It was fun! We went to Olive Garden for lunch, and had TONS of free samples at Sam's club. I got a new pair of jeans!!! woo wooooo! Saturday night, some people came into town and we all hung out at Skippers. Since most of the students went home for easter weekend, we had the place pretty much to ourselves. We got a couple 42 ounce Long Island Iced Teas, and drank them together - we'd all put a straw in, and on the count of three we'd drink! There were like eight of us doing that. It was funny!

In other news, I'm waiting to hear from the director of the Ohio Arts Council to see if Emma and I get to be teacher's assistants for the Summer Media Institute this summer. I would be a Photoshop assistant, and she would be a Video assistant. I want to SOOOO BAD! I got to do it last year and it was so great. And it would be even better if Emma were doing it too! That would be so much fun. We can't wait to get the verdict. The suspense is KILLING ME!

Let's see, not much really happened in March. On Thursday, we went to see The Dismemberment Plan at Baker Center. That was pretty fun. My favorite bar, The Union, got a little remodeling job! They took out the drop ceiling for the first half of the downstairs section of the bar, so now the place has really high ceilings. And they're made of tin! They're awesome! They're sooooo old. The bar has been there since 1923!!! It looks so good, and it's so much less smoky now! Hmmm... anything else exciting for March... I got two new ab machine things. An ab roller, and an ab slide thing. Ow! That's all for now, I think I'm gonna go be productive and play a little Tombraider.

Banana Bread Disaster

Not much new to report here. We played another round of "Show Us Your Hidden Talent" last Friday night, and there was a lot more nudity than the first time. In fact, for the grand finale, just before the bar started closing and the bartenders started kicking people out, the last guy of the night took off EVERYTHING except for his SOCKS!! And it was FREEEEZING out that night! Weirdo! Yes, we had lots of participants, but this time I'm just going to mention a few of the results: 10 middle fingers, 3 DOUBLE middle fingers, 6 moonings, 2 backflips, 3 little dances, 2 boob flashes, 4 tongues to nose, 2 guys pretended they were pregnant, 1 curtsey, 15 dirty looks, 1 talking belly button, five hot dog tongues... the list goes on and on. It was really fun. As I was writing those results, the tune of "On the 12th Day of Christmas" kept running through my head.

Last night I made chocolate banana bread, but it didn't turn out NEARLY as good as when I made it the first time. First I put one banana more than i was supposed to. I halved the entire recipe and then without thinking (duhhhhh) halved the TIME too (Obviously I WASN'T thinking!). So after 30 mins. (it was supposed to be in for 60) i pulled it out and it was still gooey and i kept putting it in for 7 more mins, 5 more mins, etc. and eventually i thought it was done and gently shook it over above a plate and it sorta ripped in half and wobbled, so i put it back together, put it BACK in the oven for 10 more mins, and then pulled it out. i dumped it over onto the plate AGAIN and this time the insides fell out but the edges stayed in the pan!!! Luckily i was able to gently lift the edge out of the pan and fit it over top the insides, so it sort of resembles a banana bread...

Hmmmm this has been a pretty normal week. Monday night, Julie, Jason and I hung out because it was Jason's last night in Athens for awhile. He left for LA on Tuesday! He's driving! By himself! Crazy! He was supposed to call us Tuesday night but he didn't. I wonder what he's up to!

Tonight I went to Zachary's with Summer to meet up with Julie and her roommates. Every weeknight, from 7-9, Zachary's has this thing called "Zachary's Daquiris," where daquiris are only $2! So I got two mango daquiris. Mmmmm....

And I think that's all I have to say.

New Car!

Ahhh! I have slacked on my journal. How awful of me. But I've been pretty busy. Let's see if I can remember everything that's happened since my last entry. Last Wednesday, the only thing I remember doing for sure is lying around watching TV. Dawson's Creek and Glory Days, I believe. Thursday was Valentine's Day. Adam and I ordered dinner to pick up from Mistretta's. It was delicious! And we drank some wine. Mmmm.

Friday, right after work, I left for Detroit with Summer and Rabecca. We got to Leighanna's place after midnight. On Saturday, we drove to Ann Arbor to meet Emma and go shopping! We went around downtown for awhile, then went to Briarwood Mall, where I've actually been a few times when I was little. I went with my grandma! It was weird seeing that mall, because the last time I saw it I was a lot smaller! Saturday night was the night of the Breeders concert. It was in a place called the Magic Stick, which is connected to a place called the Majestic, which is a restaurant. Enclosed in this huge building, spread out over a number of areas, are a couple bars, a restaurant, a pizza lounge, a bowling alley, a pool hall, and a concert area. It was fun! We ate dinner at the Majestic. Actually, we just ordered appetizers and drinks. Our waitress was SOOOO NICE!!! And cool. She recommended appetizers to us, and also her favorite shot - an 18-wheeler. It kind of tasted like chocolate milk. After dinner, we went upstairs to see the Breeders. It was so fun! They were cool.

On Sunday, we went to the Gap Outlet and the Nike Outlet on our way back to Athens. That was great! I love outlets!!!! Monday I stayed home from work because I wasn't feeling well. So nothing eventful happened. Monday night I was feeling well enough to see a movie, so Jason and Julie and I saw Crossroads. It was definitely an experience. We were laughing the whole time. It was just ridiculous. Some parts of it were actually funny but mostly we were laughing at how dumb it was.

Okay but now I'm getting to the big news. On Tuesday, I BOUGHT A CAR!!!! Totally unexpected. The Volvo isn't doing too well, and needs a lot of work done to it, so Mom was going to buy a new used Subaru for herself and give me her old Subaru. I asked if it would be possible for me to trade the Subaru she'd be giving me in for a smaller Subaru. She said that she was going to Parkersburg that day to look at Subarus and that I could come. Well, while we were there, she decided that she didn't want to buy a new car til Fall anyway, so somehow we decided that I would buy myself a car! That is something I hadn't even considered! But it made sense. I got a white 2000 Subaru Impreza 4 door sedan. I LOVE IT! It was owned by this doctor who buys a brand new Subaru every 2 years and trades in his old one. And he took PERFECT care of it when he had it. So it is in great condition and I love it!!!! I am so excited! Not excited for car payments but hey, it's worth it! And that's my big exciting news. And that brings us around again to another Wednesday night, which I just spent watching Dawson's Creek and Glory Days. Fun fun fun!

Georgie

Wow it's only Tuesday. It feels like Wednesday. It's felt like Wednesday ALL day! I'm pretty tired. Yesterday after work I worked out on the Nordictrack. I'm doing pretty good about exercising every day. My arms are sore. After that, Jason took me to the mall and I bought myself a GEORGE FOREMAN GRILL!!!! Which I've been wanting for a long time! It was SO EXCITING! Then we swung by Kroger's so I could pick up some veggies to try cooking on it.

Then it was time for the Real World/Road Rules Fantasy Challenge, so we went over to Julie's house, as is tradition for viewing anything Real World-related. Afterward, I grilled up some chicken to use for lunches at work this week. I made myself a chicken, lettuce, feta, and caesar dressing pita for lunch today and it was SOOOO GOOD! Today after work I did another turn on the Nordictrack. It was harder today, I felt really tired. Afterward I grilled some yellow and green zucchini on the Foreman grill and sprinkled some freshly grated parmesan on top. I'm turning into a little chef! I gotta split, because the Real World is on soon, and Jason and I are going over to Julie's! Yay!

Kara's Annual Birthday Weekend

Wooo! This was the GREATEST weekend! It was my friend Kara's birthday on Sunday, and Julie decided to have a party for her, so eleven people came into town, seven of whom stayed at my apartment! I love having guests, so that was exciting! Saturday night, eight people actually stayed over because Chris was hanging out with us and he didn't feel like walking home. It's great having so many overnight guests because it's like slumber PARTY fun the whole time. Anne, Tim, Joe, Clark, Jenny, Kelly, Schuster, Becky, Kara, Dan, and Chris were all in town! Friday night we all went to the Union, where the Party of Helicopters was playing. After the bands, Charlie (my friend, not my cat!) was running his dance event, Danceable Solution, which is always a fun time. After that we all hung out at my house then went to sleep. Saturday was a cool day. It was sunny and warm!

T-shirts in February! So a bunch of us walked uptown and at lunch on the college green. Then we went to the record store, and visited some uptown shops. Then we went back and hung around at my place doing nothing for awhile. Then Kara, Anne, Jenny and I went to buy beer for Kara's party, and we went to the mall. For dinner, Dirty cooked for EVERYBODY over at his house, and it was AMAZING!! He made meat lasagna, vegetarian lasagna, meatballs, garlic bread and salad. And it was all absolutely fantastic. Everybody had seconds. After dinner we all went to Zachary's for fancy drinks. I got a grasshopper, and it was DELICIOUS!

Then it was about time to go to the party. It was a fun party. I will have pictures soon. The most exciting event of the night involved Jenny Wray's disgusting orange drink. She had a bottle of that orange crap called "Orange Dream." It comes in a big plastic bottle, has alcohol already mixed into it, and is supposed to taste like a creamsicle. Jenny insists that this is a delicious drink, but all the rest of us agree that it is revolting. So Anne and I ran back to my house and grabbed a permanent marker (I live about 6 houses down from Julie) and went back to the party and wrote "Nightmare" over "Dream" in big black letters. I thought that was pretty funny ha ha ha! So it was "Orange Nightmare!" HA HA!

Anyway, Jenny kept saying that this drink was soooooo great, and in an effort to prove it, announced that she would, in fact, drink the entire bottle that night all by herself. So our next mission was to ensure that this happened. We failed. We did get her to drink at least one though! You're supposed to mix it with crushed ice. There was no blender to be found, so Clark made do with a meat tenderizer and a paper towel. Jenny successfully avoided drinking much at all. But she got a lot of random people to taste it. Several of them actually LIKED it, too! Yeah... maybe this story will make more sense when I get the pictures developed.

We stayed at Julie's party until about four, when we ordered a bunch of calzones and walked back to my apartment to wait for them. It was a fun party. This morning, we all went to Union Street Cafe, a little diner that ROCKS. There were 13 of us, so it was a little difficult for them to seat us. They ended up splitting us into three different booths. Breakfast was delicious. Afterward, everyone packed back up into their cars and departed. Sigh.

Webcam

ARGH! I'm up too late again. I should be going to sleep NOW! But I will soon. I'm just so excited because I have a WEBCAM at work now! Tracy helped me set it up. It's so much fun! Now the whole world can know what I'm doing every second of the day (well, Monday through Friday, 9-5). I don't see why anyone would WANT to know that, but the point is that they CAN!!! Other than the webcam, nothing of interest has happened today. I nordictracked in front of the television, which was pretty cool. My arms and legs are TIRED though. I think that's adding to my drowsiness. Hmmm, I know that if I attempt to write anything more in tonight's entry, it will just be a long boring complaint about me being tired. So instead, I will go to sleep NOW!

Detroit

It's been a long weekend! I went out of town. Summer and I went to Detroit! I've never been there before. Her friend Leighanna lives there, and my friend Emma lives nearby in Ann Arbor, so we went up. Leighanna's sister Rabecca, and three other girls (Melissa, Maia, and Carrie) came also. It was fun! Friday night we went to a restaurant in Royal Oak called Sangria's. Guess what we drank?... It was my first time ever trying sangria. It's pretty good! It was so exciting to see Emma! Dinner was pretty fancy. After dinner, all the girls wanted to go back to Leighanna's except for Emma and I. We went to a bar called The Rock or something for a beer, and it ended up being somebody's 30th birthday party, which was weird! EVERYBODY knew each other there! It was fun, Emma had her laser pointer with her, and she has cool attachments for it like skulls and flying saucers. So we kept pointing the laser pointers at people and pretending it wasn't us. And it was fun! Nobody really noticed except this one guy that looked like Hulk Hogan, and he was trying to be funny, but he wasn't.

After that, Emma dropped me off at Leighanna's apartment. The next morning, Rabecca made everyone pancakes! MMM! And then we went to the Detroit Zoo! That was GREAT! They have this amazing polar bear exhibit. It is so cool! It is a glass tunnel INSIDE the polar bear environment, so they swim right over you and stuff! They were wrestling the whole time it was so cute! Cute, but they are the most vicious animals in the entire zoo, and would eat you in a second if they could. But that's easy to forget when there's four inches of specially made glass between you and them! I got some pretty cute polar bear ears in the gift shop. We ate lunch at a place called Smoky Bones or something. Then I took off with Emma to go to Ann Arbor. All the other girls went to a club in Detroit called Clutch Cargos. I was going to finally get to meet Emma's boyfriend Dave!! And see Emma's house. She lives in a Frank Lloyd Wright house! The Palmer House! It was AMAZING! Wow.

Then we went shopping downtown, and went to a bar called The Brown Jug. I had some pretty disgusting pasta, and some beers! That's where we met up with Dave. He was playing a show that night at a little student union place called the Halfass - he was playing for the first time with this band called Saturday Looks Good to Me, which I guess has several members and they change often? Or something. But he's a good drummer! It was fun! Then we stayed in Dave's parents' basement, which was funny because it was COMPLETELY seventies! There's even a roll of saran wrap in the basement kitchen that's from the seventies! Bizarre! Sunday we made the long trek back.

When I arrived home, Adam had a few friends over to watch the Superbowl. One of those friends was Jay, who I went to high school with, and who was down for the night from Columbus — his mom made CUPCAKES! They were AWESOME!!!

Then today started off pretty shitty, when I skidded off the road on my way to work. My office is in an old Lunatic Asylum, "The Ridges," and I was turning off the highway onto the long Ridges driveway and I didn't know it was icy and I skidded right off the road, narrowly missing the ditch. Ugh. So I had to walk up to the office and get Tracy and Dean (the only two guys who work at NBIA - they get stuck with a lot of fun tasks!) to come and help push me out. I drove my car up to the parking lots and as I was walking to the buildings, Adam drove by!! I said "How did YOU already know about this!?" I guess Sergio had driven by my car on his way to work, saw that it was skidded out on the side of the road with nobody in it, and called Adam. I thought that was funny. One thing's for sure about Athens — you do something stupid, and within ten minutes, everyone in town knows about it! Great start to the day!

Then after work I decided to go to Kroger's, because I needed lunch stuff, and knew that once I got home, I wouldn't want to go back out. So I went there, and while I was there, I decided that I would make lasagna!! I've never made it before, but for about 2 months, I've been saying that I will try. So I bought the ingredients, and made it!!! Adam's brother Jared stopped over right as I finished, so he stayed to eat too. He got seconds! Everyone loved it. I am very proud. That's about all I have to say for the first installment in February!

Mmm Turkey

This morning I was making a turkey sandwich, and i took a teeny piece to give to Emma, and I put it on the floor and she batted at it like it was a toy!!! So then I ran to find Charlie to see if he would eat a piece, and he wolfed it down! So I went back into the kitchen and picked up Emma's piece and held it up to her mouth. Instead of eating it, she did that thing that cats do when they rub their cheeks against stuff to scratch their face!! She tried to scratch her face on the piece of turkey! So I just gave up and gave it to Charlie. Oh well. I went over to Julie's to watch the Real World tonight. It was okay. Then we watched an episode of The Newlywed Game on the Game Show Network. Interesting. It was from 1997. I'm really tired, I have to go to bed now.

Orangek8's Buttkicking Champions

Not a bad Monday! I got to work on the design for the conference web site at work, which was pretty fun. Then Adam set up my parent's old NordicTrak in the basement for me! I'm going to try to start working out on the NordicTrak. It's right in front of a TV, so I won't get bored! Sounds promising! Probably the most exciting event of the evening (other than my mom making a turkey dinner and sending us leftovers — score!!) was the kickoff of the Real World/Road Rules Fantasy Challenge. I make no apologies, I am not ashamed that I am playing. In fact, my team —orangek8's buttkicking champions — is going to kick the competition outta the WATER! (About 15 of my friends are also playing, we get to check each others' scores online. NERDS!!!) Summer and Julie came over to watch the action.

Show Us Your Hidden Talent

I had another weird dream last night. It was my dad's birthday, and we had TWO refrigerators full of cake for him! And there was one piece that I had sliced that I wanted to eat, and I couldn't find it ANYWHERE! My cousin Dan was there (he's my age, but in the dream he was seven). In the living room, there were Christmas trees, and someone had hidden pieces of cake under them. So I searched and searched for my piece of cake. The further back under the tree I went (it went back really far!), the stranger the pieces of cake began to look. They were shaped like little log cabins, and there were little gumdrops and plastic trees and stuff set around for scenery. And I found a present my mom was giving me — it was a stuffed gorilla that talks. It had 300 different things it could say, and its eyes lit up and stuff. It was one of those "intelligent toys" that can learn if you help them. The funny thing is, I don't really like big monkies. I like little fuzzy monkies, but not big ones. And she didn't just get me one, she got me TWO! I never did find my piece of cake.

This was a pretty fun weekend. On Thursday night, Adam and I went out to eat at the Court Street Diner, then went to see The Royal Tenenbaums. It was a pretty cool movie. Friday night, Summer came over and we went to The Union. We just sat at the bar all night, drinking beer and chatting. It was fun. Then on Saturday, I didn't do anything productive all day. Saturday night, Julie and I went to Tony's bar with her roommates Ann and Megan, and we met our friend Charlie there. My parents have a Volvo station wagon that has seats in the way-back, and when I was little, my friend Jason and I used to sit back there on trips and hold signs out the window to people in cars. Since we were sitting in one of the front window booths at Tony's, I thought it would be fun to hold up a sign to the people walking by! So with a piece of paper I had in my purse, we made a sign that said "Show Us Your Hidden Talent!" We held it up in the window as people walked by, and we had a lot of participants. Here are the results:

Number of people that did this talent	What people did for their hidden talent
1	Had double jointed fingers.
1	Had double jointed elbow.
1	Wiggled their ears.
1	Flipped eyelids inside out. (GROSS!)
3	Gave us a thumbs up! (oooh! special!)
1	Pretended to think reallllly hard, as if they were trying to come up with a talent.
10	Guys pretended like they were going to take off their pants. (WEAK!)
4	Guys pretended like they were going to moon us. (equally weak!)
1	Guy pretended like he was going to take his pants off AND pretended to moon us.
1	Guy pretended as if he was *thinking* about dropping his pants. (weakest of all!)
1	Dropped pants completely, exposing boxers!
1	Girl flashed her bra at us. (The same girl actually did this two different times during the night.)
1	Mooned us from the sidewalk.
1	Mooned us and actually pressed their buttcheeks to the glass!!
1	Pulled ears out and wiggled tongue.
5	Dirty looks given by males.
7	Dirty looks given by females.
2	Showed us his nipples.
1	Touched his nipples.
1	Licked his nipple.
2	Made an upside-down "bat eyes mask" with their fingers.
1	Gave us the vulcan sign.
1	Did the "magic thumb" trick, where it looks like you are pulling your thumb off.
2	Did a dance.
2	Did a jig.
1	Held a flourescent green glow stick in place of his crotch.
1	Pretended to pick their nose.
2	Crotch grab.
1	Pretended to play guitar.
3	Gave us a "tsk tsk you shouldn't be doing this" mom-like motion.
1	Smacked their own ass
1	Wiped face all over glass like a bug on a windshield. NOTE: This happened *after* the guy pressed his buttcheeks on the glass. Hee hee.
1	Pretended to sew a thread through his pants and then pretended to tug on it, and thrust his crotch accordingly, so it looked like he was pulling it. (whatever!)
1	Old man scratched his butt through his pants.
1	Zipped his fly up and down really fast.
1	Pretended to go on a pony ride.
1	Stuck his hand in his pants, stuck one finger out through his fly (pretending it was his wang), and then dabbled that finger around in the palm of his other hand, which was holding a small pile of loose change.

It was quite an amazing night. At one point I went to stand in the bathroom line, and I heard these two girls talking, and one was saying "Yeah. I missed seeing that girl's boobs!! Well, not like I WANTED to see it, but I missed it!!" And I said, "Are you talking about that girl who flashed her bra?" And she said, "yes!" and I said, "I'm at the booth that's holding up the signs!!" And she laughed and said "I'm at the booth right behind you!" I thought that was funny. We're thinking about doing it again in the future, but bringing a camera! That would be fun.

Happy Birthday Mom!

Today was a pretty average day at work. I went to aerobics again tonight. Owwww... HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM! It's my mom's birthday. I got her the Queen double disc set and she loved it! Otherwise, nothing eventful. Adam and I were supposed to see The Royal Tenenbaums tonight, but now we're going to go on Thursday, and probably get dinner first. I can't wait to see that movie! Oh! I had a VERY bizarre dream. I dreamt that my parents were having a small dinner party thing, and my friend Schuster came over because he was my date. Although I knew in the back of my head that he was just a *pretend* date, because I was *really* dating Adam! But I think in the dream, Schuster thought it was a real date?? All I know is that I was getting ready and putting my makeup on and i began to use my pink eyeshadow. I was applying it as eyeliner and Schuster got really mad and said that he doesn't like that color and doesn't want me to put it on. I said "too bad!" and continued to apply. He said that if I don't stop, he's going to leave.

So I kept going and he stormed out to my parents' back porch, where he sulked. So then, mt friend Claudia and I started to make homemade temporary tattoos to put on my eyelids. We were making these strange drawings of a bunny and a rainbow. (So I finished them and applied them to my eyelids. AFTER they both were on, we noticed that Claudia forgot to put the eyes and the nose on her bunny. So I had to wash them off. Then I settled for pink metallic eyeliner, gold metallic eye shadow, and teal metallic accents, such as browbone and sweeping cat-eye effect So we all went in to eat with everybody else. I decided that I should probably go convince schuster to come in, even though I KNEW he'd HATE my makeup. So I went in and he had his arms crossed in denial and wouldn't look at me and was being really stubborn. He said it was completely unfair and that I wouldn't listen to him. I just kept telling him that he's being stupid and to get over it and it's none of his business and stuff. Because I knew that I didn't really have to worry about being nice, because I was *really* dating Adam, so it didn't matter if I hurt Schuster's feelings because there was nothing at stake!! Or something like that.

Anyway, I think I convinced him. Then I was at the dinner table and Stewart (my dad's boss, and MY boss's husband) arrived with this huge machine. He set it on top of the dining room table. It was painted red and yellow striped, and had fancy carved gold metal accents and trim. It looked like something you'd see at a carnival. It also looked like something you'd see in a Dr. Suess book, because it had tons of bells and whistles and little chutes and tubes, and it turns out it was a BEER MACHINE! Except it made beer that looked like coffee w/ cream, and it tasted like the most delicious coffee you've ever had. But it was BEER! and it came rolling down the little chutes and tubes and conveyor belts and stuff. Anyway it was a weird dream. I need to tell Schuster about it! So we ended up making chocolate milkshakes tonight instead. And they were DELICIOUS!

Mmm Steak

This has been a pretty relaxing weekend. Friday night I was feeling really tired, so I watched A Fish Called Wanda. (Tracy loaned me a few DVDs because I just got a DVD player not too long ago.) Then later that night, Adam and I watched Repo Man, but I fell asleep a half hour into it because I was pooped! On Saturday I played Tomb Raider 3 for over two hours. How pathetic. But it was really fun! Then I did some dishes. My parents called and invited me over for my favorite dinner — steak, baked potatoes, and salad with the added bonus of spinach! It was delicious. They are fabulous cooks!! Then Saturday night my friend Erin was in town from DC, and she stopped by to see my new kitties!! I ended up going over to a friend's house with her. I got to hang out with a bunch of people I haven't seen in awhile, so that was fun. Hunter and I spoke nerd talk for a good portion of the night, about Director, and Dreamweaver, and G4s and stuff. NERDS! I haven't accomplished too much today. I love the weekend. I bought my mom a birthday present (it's tomorrow) and went to Krogers. I made burritos for dinner and I burned my hand! Owwww! Pretty soon Adam and I are going to make chocolate milkshakes. MMM! That's it for now. Cosmo beckons...

Ceramic Cat Lamp!

For once I am writing my entry at the end of a day instead of in the wee hours of the beginning of a new day! Good for me. That is because instead of working on my web site like I have been doing for the past three nights, Adam and I went out! My dad's band, Dogtown, played at The Blue Gator tonight. It was really fun. My friend Emily sings for them and she's great. I'm exhausted though. Okay so I won the thing I was bidding for on Ebay, and now I'm embarrassed to tell what it is, because I paid TOO MUCH for it!. It's a ceramic cat lamp from the 50's, and the eyes glow. It's REALLY rad, but I probably paid too much for it. I'm embarrassed to say how much... It's so cool though! There's this little bar in Columbus named Betty's, and I went there for the first time a little over a month ago, when I went to see Ben Folds with Summer. That was also the first day I had ever seen my kitties — I stopped by the vet's to see them on our way to Columbus. So Summer had to endure me the entire ride up going "I think I want them I think I'm gonna get them what should I name them do you love them *i* love them I think i'm going to get them" ANYWAY, so I was trying to decide if I should get cats, and it was time for dinner.

There are about a million tiny restauraunts and bars on High Street in Columbus, and we see this place called "Betty's." My favorite cat in the WORLD who died about four years ago's name was Betty, so since I was in the cat mood, I said "Let's go there!" and guess what!!?? There were a bunch of cat statues!!! Betty's is decorated all funky — kind of like your grandma's house, but also with cool pictures of retro pinup girls and funky ceramic statues and stuff. Anyway, I didn't pay that much attention to the statues. Then, this past weekend when we went for my cousin Nora's art show, we decided to stop there for a drink first. The weirdest thing of ALL was that Nora was there!!!! Eating dinner with her boyfriend! Small world. Anyway, we got seats at the bar and I sat right in front of the coolest lamp I've ever seen. A ceramic lamp of two Siamese cats, and their eyes glow! They glow any color depending on what color bulb you screw in!!! And they had a green bulb in, so the eyes were glowing flourescent green and I declared right then and there that I would have a lamp like that no matter what it took.

I figured I would try Ebay. And sure enough, I found one. It is EXACTLY like the one at Betty's. And since I feel like I have a connection to this lamp, I feel like deserve it more than anyone else who's bidding on it. So I suppose I should stick in a picture of this lamp. Ok. Now there's a picture. So anyway, I love this lamp. And my problem with Ebay is that, once I'm bidding on something, I become really possessive, and I MUST GET THE THING or else. Or ELSE!!! So I spend too much money. When I declared that night at Betty's that the lamp would be mine, I said I would probably be willing to spend X amount of dollars on it. Well, I spent about exactly TWICE as much as I said I would. But oh well. It's mine now. And it'll look great in my kitchen with the new table!!! YAYAYAYYYY! I'm going to buy a red light bulb, a blue one, a green one, an orange one, and a black light!!! And change them all the time! I'd better end this before I get TOO EXCITED!!!!!!!

I have to quit staying UP so late on work nights! I got carried away with another big web redesign, adding little mini menus to the top tier of every section of my web site. whew. Plus I didn't get started til late. Tonight Summer and I went to aerobics again, our favorite teacher Kara was teaching. I feel like I got beaten up. My abs are KILLING me! If I stand all the way straight up, they feel like they're going to rip! Owwwww! Anyway, I was starving when I got home, and my mom had called to say she had leftovers!! I'm lucky to live in the same town as my parents, especially since they're fantastic cooks! So I went over there and had a pork chop, some garlic mashed potatoes, and limas 'n' corn. Then Adam and I had to swing by my sister's to pick up the table. YAY! I love that table. I'll try to get a picture of it up soon. My kitchen is almost complete. I'm just waiting for the thing I'm bidding on at Ebay. I'm keeping it a secret until I either get it or I don't, because I don't want anyone else to go try and buy it. Yep, I'm being sneaky and selfish. Although, I doubt many people would want this as badly as I do. Except for that damn person who keeps bidding on it. I hope hope hope that I win it! Well I'll stop talking about it. I'll find out sometime tomorrow evening. Then I'll tell what it is...

In other news, tonight was the season premiere of Real World Chicago. YEAH! Yes, I will admit. I love The Real World. From the previews and commercials, I would've guessed that I would hate the new cast. But so far, they're okay! I can't think of any more news, plus I'd better get to bed or I won't be worth much tomorrow at work. I just hope everything I added to the web site works, I'm kind of tired and out of it. We'll see!

Debut of the Journal

As part of a *major* redesign of my web site, I have decided to add a weblog. Wow, the first entry is hard... not only do I not know where to begin, but my kitties are in the hallway taking turns standing on top of and getting inside a big paper shopping bag, and it's making a lot of distracting noise!! On Saturday, I went to Columbus with Summer, Julie, and Rabecca. We shopped all day (I am the best shopper in the world. Period.) and then went to my cousin Nora's art opening, which was awesome! We got back to Athens at about 10:30. Julie and I headed up to The Union, and got a couple of beers. We sat there wondering where the heck everybody we know is until about 1:30 when we realized that, DUH, it's Open Doors Night at Casa, and that's where everybody must be. So we headed there and as expected, it was hot as HELL. There was a DJ playing fun music, tons of people dancing, and as usual, the front window was completely fogged up from so much heat. It was fun! Definitely more exciting than Friday night. I went over to Julie's and watched "Jawbreaker," which was AWFUL. blech.

Yesterday I went over to my sister's house because she went to IKEA in Pittsburgh on Saturday to buy ton of new furniture and she bought a surprise for Adam and I! She got us this awesome silver mod-looking chair. It's great! And she taught me how to make french bread and gave me a fresh loaf AND gave me the recipe for french toast! Which I've made flawlessly three times since then!! And I'm excited because she's getting rid of some of her old furniture, and I get to have the awesome fifties side table that my mom bought at a yard sale. I've wanted it ever since mom bought it —- the legs are turquoise, but the paint is chipping through to the yellow underneath, and the metal top is yellowish green and it has roses in the corners. I love it!

Today I went to aerobics for the first time since before winter break. OUCH! It was exhausting. But I have to keep reminding myself that after a few times I'll feel better overall — hopefully less tired all the time! And today before aerobics, Summer and I went to Ticketmaster and bought tickets to see The Breeders at the Magic Stick in Detroit in February. YAY! That's all I can say for my first entry. I have to make sure everything for my redesign debut is ready, upload it, and get my ass to bed.