that's what I'm talking about

[Parents, you'll want to stop reading now, sexually-suggestive material ahead. You have been warned.]

The roommate and I were driving home from the grocery store last night and were reminiscing about the absolute deliciousness of Soft Batch cookies. I swear I could eat those things by the package-full; sometimes microwaving them for a few seconds to get that melty chocolatey goodness. You know what I'm saying.

Naturally, the conversation turned to how sugar-filled and overly-processed those cookies are:

Me: "Really, there's nothing worse you can eat, sugar-wise. They are terrible for you."

Andrea: "Ugh. Agreed."

Me: "I really think they're pretty much the most processed sugar-y food item you can buy...well, except for Peeps. Barf. Oh! And those coconut ball things..."

Andrea: "...ew, yeah, Snowballs. Those are sick."

Me: "THE WORST. Just covered in coconut."

Andrea: "That's one set of balls you won't ever see in my mouth."

let your geek flag fly

I am unnaturally excited about the Discovery Channel's Planet Earth series. Like, Early 90s Fifth-Grade Girl Attending a NKOTB Concert excited.


This story on making paper from panda poop is marginally interesting, but I couldn't get past the part where they talk about how much pandas poop: "the center's 40 bamboo-fed pandas produce about 2 tons of droppings a day." That just can't be right. 40 pandas. 2 TONS OF POOP. In ONE day? No way. I call total bullshit. Or pandashit, whatever.


I've been really busy, blah blah, work, blah blah, writing for Chicagoist, blah blah.

diabetes, africa and pot.

I have no intro for this. It is what it is.




On the way home from work yesterday I was flipping through the radio stations and stopped when a DJ announced that the next song was a new one from Incubus called "Dig." Now, I've never been a huge fan of Incubus, but I remember a couple of their songs, popular during my college years, that weren't horrible. So, I thought, let's see what those boys are putting out these days.

Holy bleeding ears, Batman. If that song isn't the biggest steaming pile of crap then I just don't know what is.


My first two posts are up over at Chicagoist. Wee!

none of these blurbs are related.

Last night, driving home alone from a lovely, catered, dimly lit evening in the main Stanley Field Hall of the Field Museum, I started to feel all sad and heavy-hearted and nostalgic and on the verge of tears. Over nothing. I wasn't thinking about anything in particular and it just hit me.

And then, by god, if I didn't start thinking of things, sad things, and I felt more and more down and then I was like, wait. Hold the phone. What day is it? Thursday? The Thursday before I get my womanly monthly visitor? Damn it. Damn PMS. Like clockwork every. single. month. So, I switched the CD to a song that makes me dance around and sing in my car and forgot all about it.

Seriously ladies, you have to beat PMS or PMS will beat you.

~

I've been listening to a metric shit ton of Air lately. Once you start, it's virtually impossible to stop. I haven't ventured beyond their three most recent albums (Pocket Symphony, Talkie Walkie, and Air Baricco) but these have satisfied me nicely.

I feel like I'm living in a movie the entire time I'm listening; a really good movie that's dark and artsy and brilliant and I'm the star and I look like Laura Prepon.

~

Now that I drive to work, my leisurely reading time happens at night before bed. I get all nestled in my covers, position and re-position the pillows, then settle in. This is all very relaxing and gets me in the mood for sleep.

I'm currently reading Dave Eggers' You Shall Know Our Velocity! and the following passage from last night's reading resulted in a punctuated burst of laughter:

"We were fools and now we were driving to our deaths in a rental car. Janet Jackson was tinkling from the speakers, asking what we had done for her as of late."

~

Monday marks the beginning of my regular, pretty much daily, contributions to Chicagoist. Come check it out and ooh and ahh when you see my stuff...or just read the posts that you find interesting, whatever.

I'm still in shock that someone is asking me to write things that will be published on their site. I'm secretly (well not so secretly now) waiting to get the email in which the editor at Chicagoist tells me that it was all a cruel joke and I'm the worst writer in the history of words.

a little peek into my soul

Scary, I know.

But, seriously, I found the combination of humor and science in this to be entirely perfect.

husband and wife

For the second time in my unmarried life, I am being referred to as someone's wife. This time by my dear (very dear) friend, Gary. Who prefers sleeping with men, so (Mom) don't get any ideas.

The first time was back in college. I became really close friends with this guy named Tom. Tom and I decided, second semester of Junior year, that we were going to go to the library every night and study. We both had a heavy class load and we had to keep our grades up. Neither one of us was the overly-studious type (we enjoyed partying a little too much) but we made a pact. And we held to that well into March.

The husband and wife thing with Tom happened the first night that we met. It was at a formal in Cincinnati Sophomore year. A group of us headed outside to play in the large fountain in the middle of downtown. I have pictures, really classy ones, of myself and a friend of mine in the fountain, water just above our knees, formal gowns held at mid-thigh. The smiles on our faces though, the kind where you're in the midst of real, true laughter; I don't smile like that nearly enough anymore.

After the dip in the fountain, I went over and sat next to Tom. We knew of each other, friends of friends, but had never had a conversation. We started talking and just didn't stop. Everyone else went back inside and there we sat. At some ungodly hour of the night/morning. At one point, a sort of unsavory, shady fellow approached and took a seat next to Tom. He was clearly out of his mind (natural or chemical causes, one will never know) and repeatedly referred to me as Tom's wife. And it stuck.

I don't know why some friendships stay just that and why some develop into relationships. Tom and I, for whatever reason, stayed in that friend zone. And we were so happy. We spent so much time together that Junior spring semester; library every night, visiting each other at our respective campus jobs, even having sleep-overs. Where, I swear on my grandmother's grave, that's exactly what we did. Sleep. No one understood it, not even us.

My favorite memories of Tom are those nights in the library, leaving notes for each other in books and stifling our laughter. Also, Valentine's Day. Neither one of us was dating anyone, so we decided to get together and make dinner. Well, Tom was in charge of dinner and my responsibility was liquor and dessert. The latter of which was, of course, purchased from the Oakwood DLM (Dorothy Lane Market), only the greatest place in the greater Dayton, OH, metropolitan area.

While at DLM, I ventured over to the card aisle. I stood there debating over whether or not to get Tom a super cheesy Valentine's Day card for a husband. In the end, I did. The card I chose was a deep purple with gold scripted writing; just over-the-top nauseating. Perfect.

Tom and I ate dinner, drank some beers and had dessert. While he was washing the dishes, I went and got the card out of my purse. I was a little nervous to give it to him; even though it was a joke, I didn't want him to think I was lame. I walked over to him at the sink with it behind my back and told him that I had something for him. His face lit up and he ran out of the kitchen announcing, "I have something for you too!"

We both gave each other ridiculously lame, barf-inducing husband and wife Valentine's Day cards.

A couple of weeks later we kissed for the first time.

Our dating relationship only lasted for a couple of months and ended one warm night at the end of April outside of his apartment building. I'm the queen of bailing before I get hurt (no matter if my assumption of impending hurt-dom is well-founded or not...once again, please date me), so I left him standing there not really understanding what in the hell just happened. We didn't talk again until we were well out of college (well, he talked plenty to our mutual close friends about how I was a bitch, but other than that, we didn't speak to one another).

Tom and I rekindled our friendship years later; me in Chicago and he in Boulder. Randomly sending an email or chatting online. Last October I had a work conference in Denver so Tom drove up and met me for dinner.

It was a bit awkward to see each other again after three years. So much had changed, we had changed. The conversation was great though, talking about our new lives and jobs and loves and hobbies.

Towards the end of dinner he got this serious look on his face, "listen, remember that night when we, well, you, ended things? You were trying to explain things to me and I wasn't listening. And, I was high, so it may not have been the best time to have a serious conversation, but that's neither here nor there. Anyway, I should have said something, either then or later. But I went into this defensive mode and it was easier to hate you than to deal with what was really going on. And I'm sorry; I was immature and didn't know any better."

Salsa was dripping from the chip in my hand and I just sat there, mouth agape and blinking. I had always thought that I had been the bad guy in that situation. Granted, I was ending things because I wasn't getting what I wanted from the relationship, but I ultimately blind-sided him and ended it. I guess neither of us was mature enough to see any of that at the time.

Tom and I finished up dinner laughing about how much we had both changed as we'd grown up and into ourselves. We looked into each other's eyes and couldn't see the people we'd been years ago. And, although that could be a sad thing for some, for us, we couldn't have been happier. We found in each other the new people that we'd become; it helped us to define and accept the changes made, the struggles fought. We saw that we were new, better versions of our old selves. And after all, isn't that what friends are for?

vlog

Apparently I am now operating a video blog...just one more, ok?

I dare you to watch the first six minutes of this and not get goosebumps.






and, um, funny.

a little something for your monday...

(a big thanks to the little sister for this one)


In unrelated news, I'm now officially on staff at Chicagoist.

can you get one of those at ikea?

My mom stopped by my dad's office this afternoon. She used his computer to send me the following instant message:

"dad just left me a farty chair."

god, I love those people.