Fight crazy with crazy	July 31, 2006

This weekend, I shall be a bridesmaid for the fourth time, for Cara and Devin’s wedding. On Saturday morning, we are all going to get our hair done. I’ve been trying to decide what I want to do with my hair (I put my hair up in a bun every damn day, so I want something a little more interesting than that), which coupled with other wedding-prep projects has lead me to look at bridal websites and magazines, and frequently consult the bride-to-be.

Through this looking-glass into bridal-world, I have come to the conclusion that weddings are insane. I mean there are just entirely too many details, and a well-prepared bride-to-be can make herself insane keeping on top of all of them. Cara is doing an amazing job of keeping everything in order, catching every detail, and not spazzing out on people. I am majorly impressed.

In the same situation, I think I might go nuts. So I have come to the conclusion that if I should ever have a wedding, it will be so non-traditional that no one will notice if I skip any details. Who’s going to question the seating chart when all guests are seated in inner-tubes floating down the Mississippi? How will anyone notice a slip of the tongue during the vows when they’re being recited karaoke-style to the tune of Rock You Like a Hurricane? This is now my plan. You better hope you’re on my guest list.

These vagabond shoes are longing to stray	July 25, 2006

Best. Vacation. Ever. Steve and I left for New York City on Saturday morning and I just got back this afternoon. Coming home was such a bummer, as we had so much freaking fun. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again – I’d move to NYC in a heartbeat were I to get a job offer with a salary that would allow me to maintain the lifestyle to which I’ve become accustomed. But… I don’t see that happening any time soon.

This blog entry is going to get ridiculously long, as we did a lot of cool things and I took a lot of pictures. In the event you don’t have the attention span to read the whole thing, here are the few key takeaway points: 1) I am forever grateful to Ben Dover, 2) Stephen Colbert is a comic genius, and 3) Steve and I make excellent rock stars.

We got pretty lucky weather-wise. It was hot as hell when we first arrived but it rained shortly thereafter and stayed pretty cool the rest of the time we were there. We went up via Amtrak and hooked up with Ben Dover upon arrival (he’s a friend of Steve’s whose last name isn’t really Dover but that’s what he calls himself sometimes). Accompanied by Erik, who was also crashing at Ben’s, we hopped on the subway and went down to the Lower East Side for the evening, starting off with drinking beer while record browsing at the Cake Shop, followed by good cheap Mexican at the Hat. I took this picture of a billboard posted in the area. Do read it. It is funny.

We then hopped back on the subway and went to the Upright Citizen’s Brigade Theater, where we caught some improv from the house troop Reuben Williams, which was a great time. And then we headed back to the Lower east Side to round our evening out with more drinking at Tonic, followed by Schiller's Liquor Bar. After the subway ride back up to Ben’s place, it was 4:30 am by the time we went to sleep. Oy.

It was extraordinarily kind of Ben to take us in on Saturday night, given that we asked him at such a late date and he already had a houseguest. Our previously arranged housing fell through at the last minute and the dirt-cheap lodging we were able to find was not available on Saturday. Said dirt-cheap lodging came in the form of the East Village Bed & Coffee. I gotta say, I loved this place, and would highly recommend it to anyone seeking dirt-cheap lodging in Manhattan. The room was tiny, but clean and cleverly decorated, the accommodations were great, (free internet, access to a full kitchen, free coffee and tea!), the folks in charge were friendly and helpful, and did I mention that it’s dirt-cheap? The room we stayed in was $100/night for two people, inclusive of taxes. Awesome. The subtle mosaic lettering in the sidewalk is the place’s only signage – it’s kinda hidden.

Anyhoo, after checking in on Sunday morning, we got some tasty brunch at a French sidewalk café (ooh la la) and got our walk on. We wandered around south Manhattan all afternoon, visiting Chinatown, Soho, the World Trade Center site, and Battery Park. When we arrived at Battery Park, we caught this great acrobat street act – they were awesome (and raking in the cash, I must say!) We decided to hop on a harbor boat tour, which was a lovely cool and breezy way to see the city skyline, the Statue of Liberty, and the Brooklyn Bridge.

For dinner we had Famous Original Ray’s New York-style pizza, then we headed over to the Village to catch some jazz at Village Vanguard, a NYC jazz institution. There we caught the Joe Wilder Quartet on their last night, and they were amazing – particularly the drummer (who is unfortunately rather hidden in the dark in this not-so-great photo).

Monday started off with a trip to Katz’s Deli, another NYC institution. Unfortunately, it is blurry in this picture of Steve enjoying his meat-wich, but there is a sign over his left shoulder indicating that the table below is the table where Meg Ryan was sitting in that oh-so-famous scene from When Harry Met Sally (the sign says, "We hope you have what she had.") Clever!

Then we walked over to get a last look at CBGB’s, which I did not know was going to close! They’re getting evicted in September! How messed up is that? Apparently they’re getting rubbed out of the neighborhood and they aren’t pulling in enough dough to be able to combat it. So here is a picture of what it looks like on the inside. Come on! How could you not want this joint in your neighborhood?

Another subway ride took us up to Central Park, to see the zoo! It’s not a great big zoo or anything, but I wanted to go. We saw snow monkeys, marmosets, and a ton of turtles! Not to mention polar bears and penguins. It made me very happy. We then wandered around the park (read: got lost), trying to get over to W 54th, where we were going to see the taping of The Colbert Report (which, in case you didn’t know, was the impetus for this whole trip).

I’ve never been in a studio audience for anything before. It was so freaking cool. They have you arrive all early, wait in a long line, then they let you inside where you wait in a room, then they let you sit in the room with the set and while you’re waiting some more, comedy dudes on staff tell jokes and get you all hyped up for the show. Apparently we were waiting longer than folks usually do – something must’ve gone awry backstage. But eventually Colbert came out and we got to do a brief pre-show Q&A. He called on 5 members of the audience to ask a question, and who should be among the lucky five but my beloved Steve?! He wrote about it on his MySpace blog, so I won’t steal his thunder, but there was a dialog there. It was awesome!!

The show itself was as funny as it ever is, but all the cooler since we were sitting right there watching it live. I just watched the rerun of last night’s show. They did show the audience as Colbert was running over to the interview area (as they often do), and if you were to watch it on slow-mo you may be able to spot us, but I doubt it. It was very quick!

We were so jazzed afterwards. It was such a cool thing! We headed back down to the East Village and stopped to drink iced slushy coffee drinks. There, we met up with Steve’s friend Annalee, who had suggested we go to Arlene’s Grocery for their World Famous Live Rock & Roll Karaoke. That’s right. Live Rock & Roll Karaoke. Their house band knows a lengthy list of good ole rock songs, and they let schlubs off the street (like us) get up on stage and sing along with the band. Once we got there, we met up with my beloved fellow Iowan Nick, and headed in for karaoke madness.

After we’d been there a little while and I was feeling particularly confident (read: drunk), I followed Steve in signing up to get on stage. And after watching a seemingly endless stream of performers deserving of Rock God status, I was starting to regret my decision. These people were regulars, who knew their shit, and even had the proper Rock God look going. After a little prodding from Annalee, we made it on stage. First Steve got up and sang "Lust for Life" in true rock star fashion. At one point he was lying on his back on the stage. I went after him, doing my customary karaoke song, "Me and Bobby McGee." I confess I was mad nervous about it, but once I got up there and the music started, I totally let go. I’m sorry to report that there are no pictures of my performance, though there was a professional photographer in the audience and we do want to try to figure out where he was from. The feedback I got from the band and some audience members was that I was awesome. We are Rock Gods!

Getting up and coming home this morning was a challenge. Honestly, we had such a great time and I loved being in NYC, despite the stinky streets, the nonsensical subway system, and the occasional rat sighting. The city just has an energy that is contagious. I find myself counting the minutes until I can go back.

Public Transportation or Toaster Oven?	July 21, 2006

Ha ha. Aren’t I clever?

I realize that my last post was about the unfavorable combination of heat and public transportation, so I’m sorry to be duplicative. But on that same release that I linked to last week (which has been removed from their site!), WMATA noted that they would endeavor to ensure that their buses and trains had air conditioning. And they haven’t done such a great job of that.

No, more specifically, they haven’t done such a great job of that on the buses that go to Columbia Heights. I also take buses that go from Downtown to Georgetown, or to Northern Virginia, and they’re always shiny new buses with too-powerful air conditioning. The Columbia Heights buses are always the shitty ones with no air, or ripped seats, or cracked windows. Like the one I rode in on today. I tells ya – nothing makes folks crankier than sweating on a crowded bus first thing in the morning. All the more reason to get the bike…

I’m leaving for New York tomorrow morning. Have a great weekend, ya’ll. I shall do my best to take blog-worthy pictures.

This is getting ridiculous	July 18, 2006

DC in the summer is hell. This is not news in any way. It is hot, it is humid, and many streets downtown are completely devoid of trees, such that walking down the sidewalk means getting pelted by sun. It’s all so gross.

The heat actually caused damage to the Metro track yesterday: "Late Monday afternoon, the heat caused a kink in the track between Cheverly and Deanwood on the Orange Line. Trains shared one track between Cheverly and Stadium Armory for about an hour while crews repaired the rail." And metro is responding to this by making bus fares free today, which is great and all. But as hot as it was yesterday, it is likely to get hotter. Are the tracks really not able to withstand DC weather? That’s very frightening.

All the more reason to buy a bike. I don’t think I’ll be jumping into the cycling abyss right away (I’m in a bit of a money-crunch, what with the upcoming trip to NYC, Cara’s wedding, tuition, and the upcoming not-so-cheap Virgin Festival for which I don’t think I’ll be able to stop myself from buying tickets). But sometime before school starts I think I need to hook it up. One bonus of this global warming is that I’ll be able to ride said bike all the way into December!

A birthday present from my hometown	July 14, 2006

Thanks, CR, for doing the right thing.

Onyah the Crime Dog	July 14, 2006

I’m simultaneously spooked and proud of myself.

I have a credit card with a bank that we’ll call Bankey Bank. This morning, I got an e-mail that said secure@bankeybank.com in the "from" line. So I opened it, and this very official-looking e-mail said, "We’ve been trying to reach you by phone and can’t. Click the following link to verify your contact info." Last year, after I moved, Bankey Bank closed my account when my statements didn't reach me by mail, so this sort of action seemed normal for them.

The link they provided looked like it was taking me to www.bankeybank.com/customerid=awholelottanumbers. But when I clicked it, it took me to www.bankeybank-us.com, which is not my bank’s domain. There, it asked me to enter a whole lot of stuff, including my 16-digit account number and my 3-digit verification code.

Now, I get these sort of phish-ey e-mails all the time, but this was the first time I got one from a bank with whom I actually hold an account (an obscure one at that, not a Capital One card or such), and it had me very spooked. How did they know I was a customer? How did they get my e-mail address?

So I called my bank, and after wading through many many customer service reps who repeatedly made me tell them my account number, I finally got to talk to a fraud prevention supervisor-guy who understood was I was saying and appreciated the seriousness of the situation. I e-mailed him all of the correspondence and code so he can try to figure this all out (and possibly prosecute). Hells yeah!

Republicans are shitty dressers	July 13, 2006

For reasons that I won’t get too specific about here (getting specific may have the side effect of getting me fired), I’ve been spending some time in the company of Republican women lately. This is an entirely new demographic for me – I’ve spent a fair amount of my life purposefully avoiding this arrangement.

If you would asked me a while back to speculate about how Republican women dress, I would’ve made the logical connection that a) Republicans have money and b) money buys nice clothes, so c) Republicans are good dressers. And I would’ve been dead wrong. Assumption A appears to be entirely correct – these are women with lotsa money. But the clothing does not hold up. They seem to fall into three categories of glamour-don’t:

The New Jersey Closet-Raiders. Picture Dixie Carter’s wardrobe in the early years of Designing Women. Think unnatural-looking fabrics in unnatural-looking shapes and colors, enabled by such things as mammoth shoulder pads. Now add opulent touches such as gold buttons and rhinestone-studded handbags. Now put all of these things on mousy-looking women who’ve paid very little attention to their hair, makeup, nails, etc. The combination is very incomplete, and jarring. Like 45-year-old little girls playing dress-up.

The Too-Preppy Prepster. Straight from the windows of Brooks Brothers. Pink, light blue, plaid, seersucker, double-breasted, pleats, oxford, khaki, more gold buttons – you’ve seen it. I don’t know, there is apparently a big old subset of the population that finds this category attractive, which may or may not include Democrats, but it kinda makes me wanna vomit.

The Cheapskates. I suspect these are the fiscally-conservative Republicans. They’ve got high-ranking positions, and summer homes in New England, drive Lexus SUV’s, yet they buy $59.99 double-knit polyester suits from Dress Barn. These suits are always poorly cut, poorly stitched, and take wholly improper advantage of any and all bias in the fabric. It hurts to look.

I have photographs of all of these phenomena, but I cannot bring myself to share them, again, for the fear of getting fired (they have ways of finding these things out, you know). Trust me, it’s frightening.

Happy Birthday to me!	July 12, 2006

It’s my birthday. That’s right. I am 28 frickin’ years old. 28 is so old, man. I feel like I need to start taking calcium supplements or something.

But the birthday celebrations are going well thus far. There was Kings Dominion, which rocked. The night before that, Steve and I went to go see Nacho Libre at the Tyson’s Corner theater (we had intended to see Pirates of the Caribbean II, but it was sold out), and before the movie we went to T.G.I. Fridays, where he made them sing to me and give me free ice cream.

Yesterday my coworkers threw a little surprise party for me, with treats, cards and a gift, which was very sweet and unexpected (my boss was leaving town today so we had to do it early). I just got back from Caribou Coffee, where I was granted a free birthday drink (FYI, the new mango pomegranate smoothie is awesome). Tonight, Steve and I are going out to Vienna somewhere to have dinner and see a show. I guess I feel adequately celebrated!

A note about movies… I really enjoyed Nacho Libre, far more than I thought I would (even though I’d heard that you’d be sure to like it if you liked Napoleon Dynamite, and I loved Napoleon Dynamite). There is just something so endearing about that kind of humor, and Jack Black, and when you combine them, it is terribly sweet.

Since we were denied pirates on Friday, we hit up the theater again last night and saw Pirates of the Caribbean II. I haven’t read a single review, but I hear they’re saying not-so-nice things about it. I am not entirely sure why – it does pretty much everything you’d expect it to. It’s pretty scary, though, what with the monsters and violence and birds picking flesh off of dead guys and all. I don’t know if I’d recommend it for the little ones

In the Dominion of Kings	July 9, 2006

After much anticipation, yesterday was finally my Kings Dominion Day! It ruled. I don’t think I could’ve asked for a better time.

In attendance were me, Steve, Stef, Sarah, Kevin, Jesus, Andy, Will, and Chuck. We also briefly met up with Janet and Molly and my friend Aimee and two of her friends, but we weren’t able to roll with any of them for long, as they were coming and going on different schedules.

We entered the park at about 4:00pm, which was how I’d planned it. I wanted to be there for the last 6 hours of the day, when the sun was going down and all the kiddies were going home and going to bed. It worked out pretty well – I really enjoyed being there after dark. And we certainly didn’t plan for such a thing, but it happened to be Christian music weekend, so we were surrounded by folks in "Got Jesus?" T-shirts (we even rode the Rebel Yell next to a priest!)

First, 4 of the guys went on the Berzerker, which is one of those back-and-forth swing-ey ships that actually goes all the way around once or twice. Maybe later in the day I would’ve been up for it, but it was a bit too intense for my first ride.

My first ride was the Wave Swinger, which is one of those oh-so-simple rides with chain swings that spin in a circle. Followed by Bumper Cars. I was thankful to start with the tame rides, to sort of ease into things. I admit that I was a bit nervous about the thrill rides – I haven’t been on too many of them in my life and I had every reason to assume they would make me puke my guts out. The first coaster we went on was the Shock Wave (here’s the coaster, and we folks waiting in line for it). It was pretty intense, but I survived.

Next was the Anaconda, which may have been my favorite. Lots of swooping and going upside down, but smoothly, and awesomely. We paused for a moment to have some dinner at the Tomb Raider Café (which was adjacent to the Tomb Raider ride, which looked like the most vomit-inducing spin-o-rama ever – we all passed on that one). After getting some sustenance, we took a trip over to the game booths, where I had seen a booth where you could win Family Guy stuffed toys, including a stuffed Death, which I decided I needed to own, and it was my birthday party, damnit.

Several of us tried, but Jesus was the one who was able to make it happen (he actually won two toys – one for me and one for him). Yay! I got a Death! One could never expect it, but the stuffed Death was the cause of one of the silliest amusement park moments ever. We next went on the Rebel Yell, and as we were going up the slow incline, all of us were cheering with excitement. Suddenly, the ride stopped in its tracks, which had me pretty concerned that the ride was broken. I soon learned that I was wrong. For you see…

Since there were nine of us, Will had to ride by himself, and I had passed him the Death so he’d have someone to ride with. I kinda assumed that loose objects would be OK on this ride because it didn’t go upside down, but I was all sorts of wrong – as we were doing the cheering, Will waved the Death above his head, and THAT was what caused us to stop. The attendant walked up the steps, took Death away, and then we were allowed to move (fortunately I got a chance to snap a picture of guilty-looking Will). They also let me have the Death back, thank heavens. I find it oddly ironic that the roller coaster attendants were so shaken by a stuffed visage of Death.

Next came the Drop Zone, which takes you 305 feet up in the air then drops you, so you rush toward the ground at 72 mph. The view up top is so gorgeous, but my heart was pounding far too hard to really enjoy it! The drop was pretty thrilling, though it only lasted for a few seconds. We then went to the Log Flume ride, but it was broken. So we wandered over to the White Water Raft ride and got all nice and drenched. By this time, it was pretty dark out, and it added a certain something to the rides to be going on them in total darkness.

Then came the Hurler (a Wayne’s World themed wooden roller coaster with cars that look like the Mirth-Mobile), which may have been my other favorite, because it goes so fast and feels so rickety that you feel like you have to hang on for dear life. For our last ride, we went on the Anaconda again, because some of the other rides were starting to shut down.

By that point, it was after 10:00, and I was surprised that they weren’t trying to kick us out. Rather, we took the time to buy Icees, play Skeeball, and Steve even played the hammer-poundy game. It was 10:45 by the time we left, which made for a pretty long day. We rode back into the DC area, dropped Stef at the metro, then went to an Irish pub to drink a few beers, eat a few nachos, and make fun of Will for getting the ride shut down.

It really was an awesome day – thank you to all who came! I am so happy that we all had fun, the crowds were tolerable, the weather was good, and I didn’t puke!

Kaboom!	July 5, 2006

I took a few pictures of the fireworks, but they didn’t turn out. So… see the professional photo below. They looked like that.

Yesterday was a fine fourth. Steve and I slept in (well, Steve slept in. I woke up all early and sat on my computer hunting for wedding shoes and bridal shower gifts, ‘cause I’m obsessed like that). Then I made my famous cornmeal pancakes, and afterwards we went to Arlington to go swimming at Upton Hill. We went there for the first time this weekend, but they kicked us out and gave us rain checks due to that wacky electrical storm.

We alternated between swimming laps, sunbathing, and cooling off in the shade, all of which was awesome. I was hoping to get a little bit of sun, but not too much (I am the whitest person alive, and I burn far too easily). I think I came out just right. My shoulders are a little ouchy today, but the rest of me is just a little sun-kissed.

Then we ate an early dinner and rolled into my place to get ready to go downtown. This was right around the time that the sky opened up and rained all over everyone, and we were worried that it may keep going and spoil the fun, but it cleared up pretty quickly.

We decided to walk downtown from my place, which is a long but easy walk, since it’s all downhill. In the morning, I had spotted a Balducci's ad with a picture of a cherry pie on it, and I had spent my day wondering when and how I could get my hands on some cherry pie. On the way downtown, we stopped into Whole Foods, where they had tiny little 4" cherry pies! I was a very happy camper.

We found a spot just northeast of the Washington Monument, threw down our blanket, and just chilled out for a while. We ate the pie…

…and were serenaded by the little drum and fife band (we saw them last year, too!), and lounged in the grass with our fellow Washingtonians. In this picture of us, you can clearly see my sun-kissed glory.

After the fireworks, we had to deal with the usual crappy people-crush to get home. We ended up walking up to the Gallery Place metro and taking the green line home, which actually wasn’t too bad. The train was crowded, but we didn’t have to wait to get on it (we bypassed the Archives metro, where the crowd of people trying to get into the station was a block long).

The walk from the metro to my house was an interesting one. As you may know, I live on top of a giant hill, which is a great fireworks viewing spot, so there were a lot of folks still hanging out around my building, shooting off their own fireworks. What was cool was that from the top of my hill, you could see all the other neighborhood fireworks throughout DC. Steve wrote a blog entry about it as well. All in all, a fabulous fourth!

And the rocket’s red glare	July 4, 2006

It’s the fourth. I love the fourth. What I love most about the fourth is that it is a holiday that resembles any other day of the year from dawn until 7:00 pm, when it becomes a mad dash to see the sky all lit up. At least this is how it’s always been for me. Every year that I have been in the U.S. for the fourth, I have gone to my nearest downtown to see the fireworks, and this year shall be no exception. Watching fireworks on the mall is very majestic, what with sitting in the shadow of the Washington monument and all. It’s pretty awesome.

In other awesome news, I’m a bridesmaid! Many of you who know me know Cara, and know that Cara’s getting married. What you likely don’t know is that she had a bridesmaid cancellation, so I as the runner-up get to step in in the event that bridesmaid #1 cannot fulfill her duties. I just found out yesterday, which turned last night into a desperate scramble to find the right dress, in the right color, in the right size, in time for the wedding (they usually need 6-8 weeks, but the wedding is 4 weeks away)! Eeek… there were some tense moments, but all is panning out – I should have it in three weeks, which is still tighter than we’d like, but they say it’s guaranteed.

Here is what the dress looks like, in case you’re curious (the chick in the larger picture has the dopiest look on her face - please do not judge the dress accordingly). You'll notice that it is in my favorite color! Not too shabby.

Now begins the search for shoes and a wrap and a handbag and so on. And then the hair and makeup and nails and rehearsals and pictures and… I love weddings. I’m so excited!