Birthday Shopping Trip!

Summer and Yumi took me to Columbus today for a birthday shopping trip! They also arranged for a bunch of college friends and out of towners to meet up with us at lunch! It was great to see everyone, and have lunch and beers and ice cream and shopping time. It was the perfect day, in fact! With my shopping money, I bought myself a belt from Anthropologie, some Urban Decay makeup, some Henri Bendel perfume, and the pirate T shirt you'll see in the photos!



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Birthday Party!

Mom, Dad and Mer threw me an awesome birthday party this year!! They cooked up an awesome dinner: pork tenderloin, sesame peanutty cilantro noodles, and a fancy salad. Mer hired Atira to make me a FANCY fancy cake, with italian merengue frosting. It was delicious. Michelle and Aaron came from Columbus, and brought Jeni's Ice Cream with them! That always makes for a great night! We drank beers, listened to music, ate great food and had a fun time. Thanks, everyone for throwing me such a fun party!



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Junior Brown

Junior Brown played at Stuart's Opera House tonight! A bunch of us met at the Mine Tavern beforehand for some beers. We ordered pizza from the Italian place across the street. Boy, do they have great pizza. The show was incredible!!



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Modey Lemon

Summer, Melissa and I went to the Union to see Modey Lemon tonight. It was a great show, except some drunk jerk pushed me over and I fell right on my injured knee! Jerk. I took a bunch of photos of the band.



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Happy Birthday, Dad!

For Dad's birthday this year, we had a party at Mom and Dad's house! We ordered a bunch of Casa takeout, and ate on the deck. It was a good time! Dad really hammed it up, which always makes for a fun night. Happy Birthday, Dad!



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Girly Weekend

This weekend, some girlfriends came to Athens to have our annual girly weekend of eating and drinking and playing games! Kara, Jenny Wray, Anne and Beth made the trek, and Rose joined us for the festivities. It was an awesome weekend full of delicious food and plenty of fun! We also shopped and made brownies.



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Road Rash

Yesterday I decided to ride my bike. Often, I turn around at the Plains, but today I felt like going all the way to Nelsonville. It's 26 miles round trip, and takes me a little under two hours. I made it all the way to the end, and turned around to head back to Athens. About ten minutes into the return trip, I totally wrecked my bike.

I'm not sure what happened, there was nothing on the bike path that I could see. All I know is that I hit the ground really hard and skidded along the blacktop on my arm. I stood up and looked at my bike and tried to see if I could ride it and the whole front part was twisted to the side, and the chain was all mangled. I did a bunch of swearing, and then remembered that I had just seen Movie's 10 before I wrecked. I decided I could walk there, cross the stream and walk through the field to the theater. From there, I could call someone to pick me up.

As I was walking there, though, this couple on a tandem bike saw me and pulled over. They were so nice. They said, "first, let's make sure that YOU are okay. Then, let's fix up your bike!" The guy said he could fix anything. He twisted the frame back to shape and fixed my chains. Then they said I should use my whole bottle of water to wash out my cuts, and that they had extra water they could give me to refill. Haha, at first it was confusing because they asked me how far I had to go, and I said I lived in Athens right off the bike path. They looked worried and said, "you do know that you were walking towards Nelsonville, right?" and I laughed and said yes, that I had been thinking about walking to the theater. I said, "THAT would have been a bad sign, huh!?"

They set me up and helped me get going and I rode the 45 minutes back to my house. It didn't hurt too much because I wasn't stiff yet. The wind stung a little though. I came home and had Adam take some pictures of me. Then I cleaned out all my cuts and went over to Mom's to have her look at it. We went out to Peter's house (our doctor friend, Jason's dad), and he said I had done a great job cleaning it out. He said that if I HAD gone to the ER, they would have put some stitches in my elbow, but that I didn't need them. He said the most important thing of all was to keep it clean, and that I should soak it in the tub several times.

So I went home, did a little stuff to get ready for the week, and then settled into the tub. Adam made me a nice, stiff whiskey drink, and that made me feel better too. After the shower, we played some Trivial Pursuit and I had another whiskey, put some bandages over it to sleep in, and hit the sack.

















When I got home, I went to Mom's to get some supplies. Here's how the cuts look after a shower and a good scrubbing.









And here's a diagram that Mom made, detailing my leg injuries:

Welcome to Transylvania

So, remember awhile ago when there was a bat in our house? Well over the past week or so, there have been about five different nights where we had a bat. It has been completely unnerving. Adam has had to spend tons of time each night trying to catch them (since he stays up late, they come in while he's still awake.) One night he was just too tired and so we shut the bedroom door and hoped he would be gone in the morning.

Adam has been trying to narrow down where the bats have been getting in, and he narrowed it down to a couple of spots. So, with the help of my mom's friend Chuck, he sealed up all possible entrances, and finally we have been bat-free for awhile. We bought a couple of cedar bat houses and Adam filled them with guano, hoping they'll decide to live in those, outside. Here are some pictures of Adam with his bat net, and some pictures of what was HOPEFULLY the final bat.

The Fair

I went to the fair tonight! I hadn't been in a couple of years, and it was a lot different. They had tons of different rides than they usually do! Unfortunately, the ferris wheel was broken. That was unfortunate.

The first two rides that I rode on, the teacups and the swings, there were barfers. On the teacups, this girl with an orange lei was barfing, and on the swings, this girl got off her swing when the ride was over, barfed a little trail over to this spot, and then collapsed and barfed all over the place. It was gross.

I had lots of good fair food! I had a fish tail sandwich, a choco-vanilla swirl soft serve cone, and a candy apple. I also got tastes of two different kinds of fries, and a bloomi' onion!

My favorite ride of the night might have been The Scrambler. Rose and I could NOT stop laughing. Much of that had to do with the two guys in the cart in front of us. They were these two goth guys with longish black hair, and they were both swiveling their heads with the rhythm of the ride, such that their faces would be pointing into the wind so that their hair would flow back behind them. They did this for the ENTIRE DURATION OF THE RIDE. It was the weirdest thing to watch. They weren't laughing or smiling, just making sure that their hair was flowing.

I also walked away with a sweet unicorn necklace, engraved for FREE. It was a good time, The Athens County Fair.



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Race to the Hills

Today was Race to the Hills at Lake Hope! Mer helped organize the race, and I went as a photographer. Mike Brown helped me find good spots to take pictures, since he wasn't racing. He was, however, in charge of one of the cowbells! Several race volunteers carried cowbells to ring as racers rode past. It was fun and exciting!

At some point during the race, I swore I heard a cat meowing. We were way out in the woods, though! I was like, "are there cat birds in Ohio?" Later when we went back up to the water station, Christina and Tina had a little kitten! They had heard meowing too, and called "Kitty kitty kitty!" and he came tearing out of the woods!

He was tiny and skinny and hungry. They fed him some leftover Casa and he chowed down! Some jerk must have dumped him out of their car. We took him down to the finish line with us, and almost as soon as we got there someone said they wanted him. Yay! He was the cutest. So yeah, there was some bike racing and stuff but ALSO, there was a KITTEN.



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Fish

Last night was poker night at Suzanne's! She lives in one of the oldest houses in Athens, which is now a sorority house. Delta Gamma. Anyway, it is haunted by the original owner, Mary, and during poker a bowl of tortilla chips FLEW OFF THE SNACK TABLE and spilled all over the floor! It made the loudest sound ever. I think really she was trying to tell me to lay off the chips and black bean salsa, because I ought to save room for the delicious raspberry pie Suz made. I didn't win poker this time. But I still had a lot of fun.

When I got home, Adam was outside. He said there was a SURPRISE inside! I went into the living room, and he had unpotted all of his giant plants and put them into FISH TANKS! He had done some experimenting and found that they need only water to survive! So he rigged up three tanks on our windowsill and the plants wind between them. It looks really great, and the kitties are going NUTS.

Fourth Annual Slip 'N' Slide!

The weather was perfect this year for the Slip 'N' Slide. Hot and sunny! The slide was fun as usual, with the added bonus of an actual pool liner at the bottom. The plastic sheeting was a different brand, and the consensus was that we did not like it as much as the old stuff. Another improvement this year was Summer's inflatable pool, which offered another spot to cool off!

There were lots of delicious snacks as usual, and plenty of delicious drinks. This year was a little more dangerous than usual, with a grand total of two trips to the emergency room! Jason went down the slide haphazardly and hit the back of his head, splitting it open. It sure was bloody. He ended up getting six staples in his head! Ouch. The other casualty was Clark, who got stung in the face by a bee! The wound didn't seem that bad that day, but the following day when he got back to Dayton, it swelled up more and the swelling moved onto his neck, so he went to the hospital. Eek!

Even with the added perils this year, the event was a huge success. There were many, many harmless runs down the slide, so much summertime fun! And the hot tub, and the pool, and the carrot cake... What a party!

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Also, Anne and I were drinking Miller High Life Light, and were talking about how the bottles are so old-fashioned, and if we had black and white pictures of us drinking them, they would look TIMELESS! So we kept trying to look "timeless" with our beers. Here's one of Clark, too, because PBR is old-fashioned too.

Layer Cake

Yumi had a little pre-Slip 'N' Slide dinner party tonight! I decided to bring a layer cake. Banana-Raspberry with Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting. I had never made a layer cake before, I just bought the pans last week! So, that was exciting!

Yumi made an Italian feast! We had salad, bruschetta, grilled veggies, and spaghetti and meatballs. After dinner, we had coffee with kahlua and whiskey, and shot the shit. It was a nice time, and great to see everybody!



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Internet Friends!

I had some internet friends visit me today!! Melissa and Jess were driving a car from Denver to Boston, where it's new owner lives. They stopped in towns along the way to visit different girls from the message board!

I got them on Wednesday night. We went to Purple Chopstix for a taste of Athens! Then we hit up Tony's and The Union. The next morning of course was spent at Casa for brunch! It was a quick visit and I was sad to see them go! They still had a lot of driving ahead of them, though.



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Rose & J'aime Visit!

Rose and J'aime visited this weekend! We had quite the nice time. Friday night, we had Pita Pit for dinner! Then we had lots of rounds of beers at Casa. We almost drank a Fruit Basket... a great concept I'm currently working on. More on that at a later date.

On Saturday, Rose and I made whole wheat blueberry pancakes and eggs with spinach and feta! They were delicious. Then we met up with Jason and J'aime and saw Willy Wonka! It was crazy! I liked it. Casa for dinner, then Apples to Apples!

Sunday was Casa brunch and then good-bye. Which wasn't as sad as usual because Rose is MOVING TO ATHENS. Well, for a three week trial period but I'm hoping the trial is successful!



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Detroit Girl's Weekend

This weekend, Summer, Yumi, Melissa and I headed up to Detroit to spend a Girl's Weekend with Rabecca and Leighanna! We got to see Rabecca and Julien's new place, which has a pool!! The weather was perfect all weekend.

On the way up, we stopped at the North Market in Columbus for lunch. I went to this little Greek place and got a falafel! Of course, we got Jenny's Ice Cream for dessert. As usual, it was almost impossible to decide. I went with Bananas and Honey, since I love it, and tried two new flavors - Cucumber Fraiche, and Avacado with Lime. Both were incredible!

When we got to Detroit, we sat by the pool for a bit, and then had a little birthday celebration for Melissa. Rabecca had made cupcakes - white with strawberry frosting. YUM. And pink champahnyuh! Cheers! Then we went to Little Tree in Royal Oak for sushi. The sushi was incredible! They had good Tom Yum soup, also. I think Purple Chopstix's is better though.

Then we went bowling. This here country girl will never get enough of bowling in alleys where they score for you on COMPUTERS! And you can buy BEERS! It's just heaven.

On Saturday, we went to the Plymouth Art Fair. It's a 3 day event, with vendors set up all through the downtown. It's HUGE! I bought some earrings and an embroidered purse. Then I popped into a little boutique and OOPS, bought some jeans. They were 20% off because of the art fair! After the fair, we got some lunch and headed to the pool. Julien and his brother Blaise, who had just arrived from France for a week in the U.S., joined us!

Later, we made dinner. We ordered pizzas, and boiled some fresh corn on the cob, cut up watermelon, and made a salad. It was fresh and delicious! Then we played a fun dice game and headed to the club, Envy, where we danced and hung out.

On Sunday we had to head home. But not before enjoying the SECOND of Rabecca's delicious breakfast casseroles of the weekend. On Saturday, she made a hashbrown, egg and cheese casserole, and on Sunday it was a french toast casserole, that has ICE CREAM in it. Ice cream for breakfast. So good. Then we drove back to Athens! Quite a fun-filled weekend!



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Fourth of July!

Adam and I had a Fourth of July Potluck Cookout this weekend. It was technically a Second of July Potluck Cookout, but you get the picture.

We cooked up some greek turkey burgers on the grill, and everyone brought food! We played bocce and Apples to Apples and had beers. Then we headed to the Blue Gator to see the Speedknobs! Adam and I ended up heading to The Union and then to an afterhours party. It was a long night full of fun!



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Bike Polo

After the Benefit BBQ Bash last night, a bunch of people headed down to the fields to play bike polo. I decided to swing by and bring a bunch of cupcakes along.

It was a great summer night. The weather was warm, there was plenty of beer, and the fireflies came out in full force! Bike polo is exciting to watch.



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Afterward, we headed down to Kaleb and Joey's house to hang out and take a tour of Joey's new trailer, Purple Rain. He bought it from his cousin for $150, and it's parked between Kaleb's house and the Crack House. It's pretty sweet! All the cabinets inside are painted purple, and the kitchen appliances are tiny and brown. Joey, Craig, Adam and I had some beers.

There was a roll of wood grain contact paper left in the trailer, and Joey gave it to Craig. When Craig unrolled it, there was the creepiest clown printed on the back side. Eek! I had my camera phone with me, so I took some pictures.