Monday, October 31, 2005

I'm full of twizzlers and wearing mouse ears...

Sexy, right? Happy halloween!!

A few scary things that happened today:
1. Scalito (AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)
2. Epstein (Is there any chance he could come to DC? He'd skyrocket to most eligible bachelor in town in about 1.2 seconds.)
3. The brain-shaped jello mold in my office.

Sunday, October 30, 2005

The best Sunday ever...

The Giants kicked major arse (sorry Ellen). The weather was perfect. I had an english muffin pizza. What more is there to life?

Saturday, October 29, 2005

"C'mon boy, DIG MY LOVE" - The Tick

This is going to be an awesome weekend, and what better way to start it off than with a few quotes from the Tick!!

Arthur: Tick the letter said her name was Eclair, she's a woman?
Tick: Yes, and she's a DELICIOUS CHOCOLATE COVERED PASTRY!!!

"My name is Blitzen, speed demon and trust fund party darling of justice!!"

"Milk beats cookies!!"

"Let's just see how you fare against two bits of shiny, flat America!"

I heart the Tick. Name the episode and win, um, my undying admiration?

Anyway, brother George is coming into town, so there's Five Guys and a concert in my future, it's snowboard tuning day, the Giants are playing the 'Skins so I get to see them on TV in the comfort of my own living room, and next week I get to see Audioslave and some fascinating focus groups, and possibly how the sausage is made at a network on an election night. Woo-hoo! It's also possibly the last weekend of blissful ignorance of the conservative madness to come via the next court appointment, so enjoy it, people!

Plus I think I've decided that my first day on the slopes (barring weather issues) will be Dec. 10, it's SO CLOSE!!! On the off chance that there's snow in NJ by Thanksgiving weekend, maybe I'll hit Mtn. Creek that weekend, but that seems doubtful. Happy weekend everybody!

Thursday, October 27, 2005

Huh?

I don't get it... I'm watching CNN, absolutely frantic reporting about the long gas lines in south Florida, but no one is saying where exactly all these people are going that they need gas? There is no power in most of the area, you can't possibly have to go to work unless you work in like a hospital or are a cop or something, so... where are they going? Why do they need gas in their cars right now? If they have enough to wait in that long a line, surely, they have enough to get to the grocery store if they have to. WTF?

Wednesday, October 26, 2005

A dim bulb...

"I used to know a little square
So long ago, when I was small
All summer long it had a fair
Wonderful fair with swings and all
I used to love my little fair"
This line from Jeff Buckley's take on Je N'en Connais Pas La Fin came lamenting (this is so not the right word, but what does Jeff Buckley do? It's not singing, it's like emotion turned directly into sound waves) out of my iPod last night while I was walking home from the metro, hidden under an umbrella, weighted down by my backpack-work bag-buttoned up coat-racing mind. I'd been in Chicago, just for a day, but it was my first work trip at the new job, and we were there for a conference on communicating environmental messages. Sounds really mundane, but watching people work and process all the information we presented... I felt ridiculously useless.
I know I made the data into something useful, and I wrote an analysis that made a lot of sense, which is cool, but I also feel like i'm hitting a wall. It's like I have to teach myself how to think all over again, and it kills me, and I don't know what it is. There's a part of me, the generally cocky part, that thinks I've got some variation on imposter syndrome. Sort of twisted that that's cocky, but I don't know what else to call it, optimistic? That's worse. There's also part of me that just thinks I've reached my limit or forgotten how to make my mind go somewhere original or creative, and I'm never going to make it to the next level. They say that people only make it to the level above the one for which they're actually qualified, and since this is the first time I'm really in a position that's not wholly upward looking, I'm worried. I don't even feel creative in my personal life! Exhibit A 'your mom' and exhibit B 'whatever.'
So all of this was bouncing around my head when Jeff Buckley started singing. His square became my mind, and I want the fair to come back.

Saturday, October 22, 2005

Mmmm... Koa.

I couldn't resist anymore, so today I took a trip to my friendly sorta local board shop (it's all the way in Fairfax, but it's one of the few independent ones, and pretty much the only one selling Arbor in the DC area) and checked out the new Arbor line. I was there for the Push, the first time they've done a women's board for freeriders like moi (screw the park!), but in chatting with the guy (who was the first snowboard salesguy I've ever felt like I could trust), he kinda convinced me to look at the Element, their men's board with the same purpose. He said he's been riding it for four years and has never been disappointed. And because I've got relatively big feet for a girl, I'd be able to control a men's board with women's bindings. Sweeet.

Of course it's $70 more, but such is life. Apparently it has a carbon core running nose to tail which the Push does not have that gives it a more stable ride. Plus it looks super hot to me, smooth and clean, none of that flourescent graphic that'll go out of style in a year b.s. He also showed me a pair of Ride bindings, the Vxn (perfect, no?), all shiny and black, they'd look nice on an Element. While we were standing there looking at them, all I could smell was the wood and it smelled SOOOOOOOOOOOO freakin' GOOD. So in the off-season, I could just smell the board to keep myself at one with the snow...

Friday, October 21, 2005

The Bridget post...

Calories: 8,964 (v. v. bad)
Alcohol units: 6? 8? Hard to tell... 1/2 a pitcher of Margaritas and a Sam?
Cigarettes: 1 1/3 (v. good considering the above)
Random W&L references 1,749

Ugh. Went out to dinner last night with Jill, Lauren and our friends from the 'SPAN, Kristi and Rick. Got a ride to Cactus Cantina straight from the office, door to pitcher service, if you will. The margaritas were flowing, enchiladas had been ordered, chips were eaten, and the W&L reminiscing was well underway. And then the margaritas hit, our better judgment was compromised and we ordered a second pitcher. The second pitcher prompted a trip across the street to Zebra Lounge, and before I knew it, we were headed home blasting German drinking songs and yodeling from Ricky's car. No, I'm not kidding.

Woke up at 5:15, freaked out that it was much later, seriously parched, and not wearing pants (always a bad sign).

Biggest news of the night: Jeff Cook is (exploring) running for Congress! He was BORN to be in Congress, I just didn't think it would be so soon! Best of luck to him...

Wednesday, October 19, 2005

Top ten things I love about October...

October is my favorite month ever. It sometimes makes me work really hard because, you know, politics gets a little nutty right before elections, but what it gives in return is SO worth it:

10. Sweaters and sweatshirts and jeans and corduroys and comfy shoes. Fall clothes ROCK.

9. Great light. Everything looks like it's glowing nearly all the time.

8. Apples.

7. Baseball playoffs. Even if there isn't a team I want to root for, they're just exciting.

6. Shopping in all forms fully justified by the looming onset of the Holidays.

5. Awesome weather!

4. Hockey comes back.

3. Negative ads. They don't come out until October, but they are so bad it's good.

2. Halloween is a perfect excuse for purchasing snack size candy and eating 497 of them at once.

1. Sam Adams Octoberfest. Yum...

Monday, October 17, 2005

Happy first shutout Henrik!!

I really didn't mean for this whole thing to be about sports, but that's about all that's going on right now.

Hooray beer!

I was happily procrastinating this afternoon, browsing the New York Times Web site, thinking I was about to read an amusing adult-written article (you need a login to read this one) on a young people's phenomenon -- in this case, Beer Pong and "flippy cup," yeah, they called it flippy cup, I laughed, there's also an Edward 40-hands reference. HA! -- when I came across a horrifying statistic without anything approaching a decent explanation. The article says:

"Thomas J. Johnson, a psychologist at Indiana State University, has published seven articles on student alcohol use in peer-reviewed journals since 1998 and has studied thousands of students who play drinking games. He found that 44 percent of men who played said that they did so to sexually manipulate other players. Twenty percent said they had done things after playing a drinking game that could be defined as sexual assault."

WHA?!? They're telling me nearly half of all men who at some point in their lives have played beer pong, flip cup, asshole, kings, hi-low, etc. etc. were doing so with the intent to sexually manipulate another player? Say it ain't so, fellas... or even better, if anyone out there has got a j-stor subscription and can find the article that actually contains this stat, I'd be ever appreciative. A sample size, the sample definition, the question wording and more (like, say, what exactly could be defined as sexual assault?) is clearly in order when you're using survey research to accuse so many people of something so rank. Bad job, New York Times...

OK, now back to building my shrine to Tai Shan...

Sunday, October 16, 2005

I heart Henrik.

The Rangers are at the top of their division, and I have a new sports crush... goalie Henrik Lundqvist. The spunky Swede is doing a fine job of minding the Rangers net, though Renney claims he's still not our number one goalie. Whatev. He's number one in my eyes...

There's madness going on in the NLCS right now, apparently the ump threw out Jim Edmonds with two outs in the eighth of a one run game. Wha?

I'm starting to warm up to the White Sox, and I'm perfectly fine with being a bandwagon fan in this case. I really don't know what to do, I don't have the Mets to root for (not surprising, sadly) and I don't even have the Yankees to root against (quite shocking). So, I'm at a loss. I was kind of leaning towards supporting Houston, but they're from Texas and there's Roger Clemens involved, and that's not stuff I really want to support. Plus the White Sox have a nice story.

And finally, to bring this sad sports page to an end, the Giants broke my heart today. That was just painful to watch. If ONLY we'd won the damn coin toss, we had so much momentum. I still have a sports crush on Jeremy Shockey. As long as he doesn't talk. Ah... the G-men...they look so good in those football pants.

I went to watch the aforementioned heartbreaking event at a bar to remain nameless to protect the innocent, had a few Magic Hats, tipped the bartender well, and never got a buyback. He showed me one of the #9 caps (they always say something kinda funny) and this one said, "The only true gaffe is not to laugh." Which made me laugh, but wasn't as nice as a free drink.

Thursday, October 13, 2005

I've got a fever, and the only prescription, is more...

...Panda. This is the coolest bleepin' thing I've ever seen. It's so cute! And he's growing and has TEETH! How awesome is that?

This message sponsored by the letters N, E, R and D, and the number 7.

Wednesday, October 12, 2005

"This game is deteriorating quickly." - Joe Beninati

It's 6-2 'Canes. Apparently they can score on themselves AND on Olie. Poor Olie...

And I remembered the link! It's Wednesday... happy hoppering everybody!!

Weirdness on so many levels...

Weirdness number one... Watching Caps/'Canes, and the 'Canes for some reason had no goalie five minutes into the first period, and they scored a goal on their empty net for the Caps, so the Caps are winning 2-1. What the...? They just said that the goalie had gone off for the extra man for the delayed penalty, so it sorta makes sense, but still, who passes to their own goalie?

Weirdness number two... I was watching Jeopardy. But not just any Jeopardy, KIDS Jeopardy. I was oddly transfixed by Matt's 1987-esque rat tail. It was the thickest braided tail I've ever seen on a kid, and if you are a kid going on kids' Jeopardy, why in the world wouldn't you leave it in the back? He had it draped casually over his shoulder. AND he spelled cotton candy wrong in his Final Jeopardy answer, and they accepted it! Shocking! Anyway, after being wrapped up in the train-wreck-that-was-his-hair, I was further horrified by the Kilgore ad that followed Final Jeopardy. It was this woman whose policeman husband was killed, and his killer is on death row. She was insulted (!) that Tim Kaine would even consider a moratorium on the death penalty. It's not justice, she said. It's also not justice for poor people to wind up on death row because they can't afford a decent, non-overworked lawyer, but that point was lost on her. I'm insulted that she thinks her case is exemplary of every death penalty case in Virginia. And it always makes me sad that there are people in the world for whom state-sanctioned murder is justice. Maybe it makes her feel better or find closure or something, I don't know, but I don't think it's ever ok to kill people whether you're a plain ol' person or the government.

Weirdness number three... six degrees of separation are not enough in Washington, DC. Who is that guy dancing with my college friend's former roommate at 2 a.m. in that funny drunken picture forwarded to me yesterday? Oh yeah, guy I used to hook up with but not date because really, no one dates here. Sweet.

And weirdness number four... I have a buzz from a glass of white wine. When did I turn lightweight?!?

Hmmm... there was some clever link I wanted to include, but I'm buzzed and it's gone.

Saw the preview for the Johnny Cash movie, and I. CANNOT. WAIT. FOR. THIS. MOVIE!!!! I might have to see it over and over and over and over... Joaquin and Johnny, it's too much for words...

Sunday, October 09, 2005

dammit!

Derek Jeter. AAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!

Weekend Update

Right now the Angels are winning, seventh inning stretch. No offense to Cheryl, but WOO-HOO! I made a comment to similar effect about Karl Rove while in mixed partisan company, and I think I came off much meaner than I intended to. Somehow, the Yankees and Karl Rove inspire the kind of anger that make me forget my manners and sense of judgment, and I really don't think there's a single other thing that makes me do that over less.

I watched the Last of the Mohicans (beautiful movie) on Encore tonight and at the end, over that beautiful shot of the mountains, Encore put up a chyron that next up is the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Ack.

This was a movie filled weekend, so, bear with me... I also saw this movie called Spring Forward, really interesting. It was about two parks and rec guys in New England working together over the course of a year, one a young former con the other an older guy near retirement, and I really liked it. Not a whole lot happens, but it's a movie told from a guy's perspective in a way that doesn't happen all that often. Movies about guys seem to be either Terminator or In The Company of Men - you're sexual louts or killing machines - it's quite unfortunate. As a girl, it seemed like a side that isn't out there all that often. Boys, feel free to tell me different. Then I turned to girl stereotype extraordinaire Cinderella. The special edition DVD is great. And the bonus features have interviews with the ACTUAL VOICES of Cinderella and Prince Charming. Really odd to hear "So this is Love" coming out of a real person's head.

I don't think I'm cut out for online dating. Why is it less creepy to kiss a complete stranger in a bar than it is to kiss someone I thought well enough of while sober to agree to a date? It can't ALL be alcohol.

Ooh... Gary Thorne (or is it Dave O'Brien?) is practically doing Bernie Williams' obit.

Bye weeks suck.

And on a much more serious note, we've probably all given to the Red Cross once this year, and I'd urge everyone to do it again for the tragedy in Pakistan and India.

Friday, October 07, 2005

It's eight a.m. SHUT UP.

For the love of god why why why can't Miles O'Brien interview anyone/report any story without being a total jackass? Seriously! He interviews a disaster recovery expert and instead of asking, "How do you salvage a home with so much mold damage?" he says "If you cut out the drywall up to the flood line..." blah blah blah. LET THE EXPERT TELL THE STORY FOR ONCE!!! Bill Hemmer never did that...plus he was cute.

OK, rant over. TGIMFF.

Thursday, October 06, 2005

Eight Track Flashback

The post I didn't get to on Tuesday...

So, this weekend. I was in New York exhausting the stockpile of tickets I buy way too far in advance in order to have something to look forward to (seriously, I'm considering opera tickets for my birthday, a full seven months away), and although all events were great in and of themselves, there was something about all of them that just made me a little sad. There was so much ending there and not nearly enough beginning! But I'll accentuate the positive for ya...

First off, it was an utterly gorgeous NYC fall weekend, there is no better weather for outdoor concerts and baseball games than what we got. Saturday, we got to Central Park, not a cloud in the sky, cute little kids and dogs frolicking all over the place, vendors selling pictures of NewYork on exactly this sort of day, even the horse poo wasn't that bad... and head to our event at Rumsey Playfield where we encounter The Media. Seriously! We were there for the Mary Chapin Carpenter show, which was a small part of a Country Home magazine event called Be Creative New York. As if NY isn't already! Anyway, "country" home my ass... this was possibly the only thing that has ever made me think maybe David Brooks has a point, it was bobo home. They had all these little tents set up and goodie bags for those of us who bought our tickets in advance, and samples of all this stuff they sell at Whole Foods or make at Morton's, and the large majority of the attendees were in advertising or journalists or related to the magazine in some way, and the few who weren't were probably shopping for the Westport/Bridgehampton weekend home. It was kind of bizarre. Nice to get tips on how to set a shabby chic table and shop for vintage, but still, bizarre. Luckily, there were a few other MCC folk there who weren't spending the entire time shopping for $700 cowboy boots (no shit!).

Chapin played all her hits, as she wasn't promoting an album, and had interesting, slightly different arrangements for all of them. My Heaven from the latest album is growing on me, reminder number 1 that I'm old, and she closed with Down at the Twist and Shout, which is the first country song I ever admitted to liking.

Saturday night, in order to save my own sanity and not become another tired driver stat on Sunday, my brother and I visited our Grandma, and then went back to his place to watch the Rangers, enjoy some tasty chinese take-away and a few Rocks.

This is getting seriously long, but Sunday was another perfect day, this one was to be spent in ballparks... at Shea for the Mets last game of the season (and possibly Mike Piazza's last in orange and blue), and at the Richmond County park for Across the Narrows. Shea was awesome, to sum it up, the Piazza tribute made me want to cry and the $2 hot dogs were fab. It was the end of the most satisfying Mets season in a long while. The future's so bright, we've gotta wear shades.

Across the Narrows hit me hard. Definitely Maybe is old. Liam and Noel are pretty damn old. Evan Dando is SURELY old. This makes me feel old. It especially makes me feel old that I can't flippin' stand to be in the middle of the crowd when I survived the front row at a Sick of it All show a mere eight years ago. I can't even take hipster brit-pop fans now? wtf. That aside, they rocked my hipster brit-pop fan's heart. Don't Go Away would've been nice to hear, as would more from Heathen Chemistry or Standing on the Shoulder of Giants, but whatever... I got a t-shirt and some happy singalongs and let myself go a little crazy to their version of My Generation, so all in all, a great day. Plus Jet nearly blew out my eardrums. It was sweeet.

And, for future reference, events to look forward to: Audioslave in Atlantic City November 4, Rangers/Caps in NY November 26, Rangers/Caps in DC December 3, and finally, opening day at Mountain Creek, TBD. More importantly, dinner in twenty... yum.

Wednesday, October 05, 2005

Hello out there, we're on the air, it's hocky night tonight...

HOORAY HOCKEY!!!!! I'm watching the Rangers and Flyers on OLN and I'm just plain giddy. Man I missed hockey, and it's really such a bonus to get Sam and JD calling the game nationally. If I could express to you the smile on my face, it would be thiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiisssssssssssss big. At least.

Plus I finally understand how moving the goal line back can increase scoring, for some reason that was lost on me...

But does anyone know what's up with Neil Smith's fake hair?!?! Egad...

And the Rangers just scored their first for real goal of '05! GOOOOOOAAAAAAAALLLLL!!

Monday, October 03, 2005

Blogger be tired...

I'm going to sleep, so much happened this weekend though, real post tomorrow. I'll leave you with these words from one of the five artists I saw in concert this weekend because I can't seem to shake them...

"Little by little, we gave you everything you ever dreamed of,
and little by little, the wheels of your life have slowly fallen off;
Little by little, you have to give it all in all your life
and all the time, I just ask myself why you're really here.
Why am I really here?" - Oasis

Thank you! Good night! [Insert smashed guitar feedback here]