She Likes It

April

April is a huge birthday month for me.  So much so that I don't think I can support another friend whose birthday even borders this month.  Seriously, here's the list:

• Dad
• Sister
• Niece
• TWO cousins
• Companion Cube
• THREE Good friends

All those people suffer present-wise because I, well, because I panic sometime around March about all the birthdays I have to shop for and then end up getting crappy stuff or nothing for most of them. It's sad really.   So, please no more Aries!   And now that I think about it, those in late March and early May get hosed too.

But speaking of birthdays, I did score one great present this year at least. I got the Companion Cube a trip to Colorado for his birthday. We're going to The Overlook Hotel and doing the ghost tour and probably skulking around the National Park.  We're going this Friday!  I can't wait. It's going to be awesome.

The giving of the gift was pretty sweet too. I had been talking up the present I got him for about two weeks when his birthday came rolling around. I had purchased a copy of the book and, taking my friend Christy's idea, made a bookmark that had "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy" typed repeatedly down the front. Then smack in the middle, I hid the details of our trip.  He unwrapped the book and although he was very nice, you could tell he was a little disappointed that this book was what I had been talking about for two weeks.  Ha!  I love it when a(n evil) plan comes together.

I wonder if it'll be spooky. I kind of hope it will, but then again, I kind of hope it won't.

dont-invite-morrissey-to-your-birthday-party care of nataliedee.com

More Portland love and Wolfmother

The weekend before last, Beard Boy and I went down to Portland to see the Wolfmother show. We had planned on seeing them up here in Seattle, but we did what we are so so good at - procrastinating - and the show sold out.  In our defense, I think it sold out pretty quickly, but still.  Upon figuring out that tickets to the Portland show were still available, we thought this was a good excuse for BB to finally take the train down and see the awesomeness that is our sister city to the south.

First, let me gush about how much I freakin love the Seattle-Portland train. Half-hour wait times in the station - as opposed to check-in 2 hours before take off. Friendly and funny conductors. Being able to get up and move around.  Big seats. The view. They even have more recent movies playing on the train than they do in the plane.  I love it.  Plus, the Portland station is in town as is Seattle's.  Oh and did I mention that it's $62 round-trip?  Totally cheap. 

Anyway, we got into town, cabbed to our hotel (and spa, la-la-la), had a very rich meal at the hotel restaurant, and then headed back to downtown for the show.  I must say that I was a little put off by the cleanliness and bright lights of the front of the Roseland.  Not to mention the patting down and the metal detector.  But once we got up to the balcony (where the bar is), I was placated.  I have very strong opinions about venue size and I think the Roseland is just right. For reference, I also like the Newport down in Columbus, the Showbox here in Seattle and the Black Cat out in DC, to name a few. Not liking? Anything with amphitheater or outdoor in its name or skinny little weird places that make it impossible to see or move or drink your beer without spilling. 

I can't remember who the first opener ... oh wait, Simon Dawes!  After the way they drilled that name into the audience, I don't know how that could have slipped my mind. Local band, I assume.  They were fun.  The Silversun Pickups who have been touring with Wolfmother were next and can I just tell you that from where we were sitting it looked like Muffin had taken up bass and joined a band. I turned and looked at BB and said, "Look it's Muffin's non-evil twin!"

Before I go on to the headliners, let me say two things:

1. After seeing Jet live a couple of years ago, I have been hesitant to see a band with only one album under their belt. The Jet show was saved by touring partners and completely awesome band, Sloan, but I was still a little worried.
2. Holy crap there were so many people blazing up (hee-hee, I love that phrase) my eyes hurt.

Which is just to say that I had cautiously high hopes for the show and was most likely high from second hand smoke. That said, the show was maybe the most fun show I've seen in a while. The band was tight and the crowd, all of it, was 100% into the show. Okay, maybe not the two people I saw who hilariously smoked too much and fell asleep, but the other 99.9% were loving every minute. And the fro! My God that thing was amazing. Did you ever see that movie Ice Pirates? Oh wait, hold on. Imdb to the rescue. Dang! No pictures.  I guess you'll just have to take my word for it. 

Usually my most fun show of the year award goes to the Woggles, but the garage tour they did earlier in the year was disappointing, they only played for 30 minutes! Plus, this crowd was no Seattle, coax me into bobbing my head crowd.  I wonder if this has anything to do with the town. If so, I can see why a lot of musicians are packing up and moving down there. I would love to hear how the sold out show was here in Seattle.

After the show ended we went to a neighboring bar and played some pool until close.  Which may or may not have been a mistake.  When I woke up the next morning, my head HURT.  We planned on skipping our Portland tour and taking an earlier train up which didn't happen as they were sold out.  So, we ended up walking around Portland and having a nice coffee at a bakery and later having some hair of the dog at the Life of Reilly Tavern.  If you get to Portland and are feeling poorly, stop in there for their tomato soup and grilled cheese. It might just cure what ails you.  Plus, the barkeep is a very friendly guy.

License and registration, please

So, as I've mentioned several times - even though some people (Em) think that I haven't - I recently went to DC to attend a friend's (Em's) wedding.  I went early so as to be in town to participate in the CBP (aka the Cheesy Bachelorette Party).  Said party was organized by one very nice friend of the bride whom we'll call Allison, since that is her name. 

A quick note is in order:  Enough cannot be said about how awesome, nay, instrumental Allison was helping the bride in all aspects of planning this wedding. I will be so bold as to say that if Allison wasn't there, there would not have been a wedding at all.  You see, although Em did want to get married, she did not, does not, have the patience that is required to arrange a wedding. Em is the type of person that once she decides something, she wants to get it done right now, not some far flung date in the future. This combined with the fact that Em's mom would probably die of heat exhaustion wearing her wool bunad (aka bru-na-na) in an Elvis drive-through church in Vegas, Allison's ability to make decisions and plan a successful wedding is what got this baby off the ground.

That said, what the hell was Allison thinking when she ordered Officer Brad off the Internet?

Sure, I agreed that getting a stripper would be cheesy fun.  But, let me just say that before Brad, I had never actually witnessed a male stripper in the wild.  I only had TV and the movies to guide me in my decision making process.  I didn't know!  So when OB arrived, I was immediately disappointed that he wasn't hot.  Sure he has a body that he obviously works hard on, but in addition to his "butter face", he was cheesy and sweaty and, well, stubbly. 

I know you're asking yourself, how does she know about the stubbly.  Well, there was this whole portion of the evening which revolved around whipped cream - which by the way, Brad had Allison buy for him.  What? Yeah.  Anyway, several of us were ordered - at different times - to lick whipped cream off parts of Brad's body.  Lucky me, I got the stomach area.  Of course I was completely mortified and embarrassed, but I wasn't going to be the party-poop that refused. No way, not me! So, I do it. I lick his mid-section. My first thought was, "Holy Shit! Stubble!"  And I have to say, even now after about a month of therapy further consideration, I still believe that 5 o'clock shadow on your torso is completely inappropriate for a stripping professional.

I would have demanded my share of the money back, but the maid of honor would have probably just given it back to him via the circuitous route that started in her shirt.

To Allison's and Brad's credit, most of the audience enjoyed his show and to be honest, I would have too, if I could forgive the serious grievance he perpetrated upon me with his body hair. Ew.

After the jump you can see a picture of Officer Brad's best side.  Not really safe for work, although it's not THAT bad.

Apparently I've gone insane.

I was in Portland last week for work and had a fabulous time.  I got to meet some people in person that I had only conversed with via email and phone.   There were some surreal moments - such as one of the girls braking the rental car on a bridge and attempting to reverse  or the fact that my bed would inexplicably shake at 7:39 every morning - but mostly it was good clean fun. By good clean fun, of course I mean drinking, laughing and making fun of those less fortunate than I.  I would write more about it, but I don't want anyone from work to find this and dooce my ass.  Oh and I did learn some things.

So, moving on. I'm going to have to say that being away during the week for work and coming back in time for the weekend is pretty damn awesome.  Except, Beard Boy bought himself an xBox 360 and I fear I will never see him again.  So, to give myself something to do while he's lost in Oblivion, I have signed up for the NaNoWrMo.  Can I do it?  I don't know.  I don't want to be a loser but 50,000 words sounds like an awful lot, especially since I have been totally slacking on the blog recently.  This isn't going to help in that arena, but maybe I'll post excepts.  Or something.  I've got a week or so to obsess. 

Good times.

You're in perilous peril!

Finally, I have returned to the land of the living and breathing.  And by living and breathing, I mean relaxing and not coughing. 

I think I'm allergic to the East Coast as I was sick for most of my time in DC.  And don't even say anything about correlation vs. causation, I'm not hearing it. 

I used to live in DC.  For 8 years!  In fact I have never lived anywhere for a longer period of time. And yet going back there for 9 days did not do anything to make me miss it. At all.  Sure, I have family and friends there and I love and miss them, but shit, they should move here! And if they know what's good for them, they will.  I mean, my GOD. The people there.  So uptight.  About everything.  I think I might have given several aneurysms just by driving around in my slow, west-coast grandma-like manner. I know for sure a couple of horns were busted. 

The one good thing was that the trip totally helped me appreciate how very much I love it here. So much so that I was a one-woman Seattle tourism board.  Not that any of those people will move, the freaks.  So many people are rooted in places for no other reason except they already live there. And then they come up with these moronic reasons why they should stay.  For instance, one guy told me, completely straight-faced, that he couldn't move to Seattle because of the, wait for it, traffic. "But you live in DC," I said like 15 times.  I was so confused. My 8 mile commute in DC often took me over an hour. 8 miles! The same amount of time it takes to get from West Seattle to REDMOND.  Sheesh. I guess I gotta let people live their own lives, even if they're doing it wrong.

Yes, this is a lesson I have yet to learn despite the fact that I have been attempting to foist my (correct) opinions on others since oh about kindergarten. I remember very clearly my little  friend crying because I told her that her name was spelled J-U-L-I-E not J-U-L-Y. J-U-L-Y is the month July, I insisted, and her parents were wrong. Oh so cute and precocious I was. *cough* And people wonder why I am terrified of children. Although I can allow that not all are as horrid as I was.

But I digress.  More stories of my trip to come.  For instance: Officer Brad and also falling down at 7:11.  In the meantime, let's get pumped up for the geekathon that will be going down in my and living rooms across the country:  Battlestar!  This video is a combination of two of my favorite things:

And since it's not a full length video, here's a bonus one.  It's okay to cry when Goose dies!

Meet me in St. Louis

Yesterday, I was leaving the office and wanted to tell Muffin that I had finally purchased a dress to wear in her wedding.  I dropped off a FedEx package and flipped open my phone to text her.  You know what happens next.  Yes, I was crossing the street, looking at the phone instead of the ground and whooooaaa! BUT the good news is, I just did an incredibly non-graceful trip that didn't result in any non-foot parts of my body hitting the ground.   Yay!  God, I'm such a dork.

So, I'm heading to St. Louis today. I keep hearing things like "Heat Wave" and "100 degrees." Holy Shit, I'm scared. I am already so acclimated to Seattle that just thinking about anything higher than 85 freaks me out. And to top it off, I'm stopping in Vegas on the way back. Desert. 100+.  But it's a dry heat, I've heard.  Stupid summer.

So anyway, back to St. Louis.  Is it known for anything besides the arch? I mean, we drove through St. Louis - and in fact it was there that we decided to abandon the middle road for the southern route across the country - but we only really stayed in a motel and hurried on our way through. Anyone got any insight? Cam?

Road Trip Report

So, Beard Boy and I went to the Olympic Peninsula with his parents this weekend. For some reason I was completely and utterly overjoyed by the sight of the Pacific.  It's weird, really. Especially since I see what is technically water from the Pacific Ocean many times each day. I do live at the only beach in Seattle, after all. But this was real beach, with waves and sea birds and a beach that is more walk-on-me friendly and less likely to contain the Giant Pacific Octopus right there on the shore.

While we were over there, we also took a hike or two around the temperate rain forest of Hoh. That's right, Hoh. So, yes, perfect for me, really. Got some snaps of trees and shit over there in the Road Trips photo album if you're interested. I didn't get all of them uploaded last night since when I was 1/2 of the way through, I realized that it was indeed 1:30 a.m. and I really should be getting to bed.

T'was a lovely trip. Okay, it was a lovely trip, despite the fact that I fell down the stairs to the beach in front of Beard Boy's father who I believe is starting to believe I'm something of an alcoholic. I will assure all of you, I am no alcoholic. No, in fact, if I had been actually drunk going down those stairs, I probably could have avoided the bloodshed. Even if I didn't avoid the nasty gash on my well-scarred knee, I'm sure I would have cared less and that's all that matters now isn't it?

So anyway, I'd recommend it, no, not the falling down, but the trip to the peninsula, especially since it included a ferry ride and ice cream. I figure the next time we head over there, we'll try and take a dip in some hot springs, even though that awful movie Dante's Peak makes me cringe even thinking about being in the same state as hot springs.  Ah the disaster movie, ruining vacations and well, sanity, for all of us. God help me if I ever see An Inconvenient Truth, eh?

So, speaking of politics and debates of the day, I want to share a hilarious link with you. First let me tell you that I love Goopymart and I think Defective Yeti is funny stuff, so when I saw that Goopymart and Yeti collaborated, I linked right on over eagerly.  You should too, even if you don't have an opinion on file sharing. So without further ado: Files are not for sharing.

The devil goes down to Portland

As I posted about before, I took a brief trip down to Portland to meet up with my mommy who was partaking of some training there. For the lazies who don't want to read my whole post about my Portland trip, the Reader's Digest version is that Portland was fun.

First of all, I took the Amtrak train. I like to say Amtrak train as it's vaguely reminiscent of the phrase "crack cocaine," so deal with it. Anyway, I took the Amtrak train and I highly recommend the experience, especially if you have the extra hour it regularly takes Amtrak to get from Seattle to Portland. I'm being completely serious. Even with the delays and the extremely loud, never once shut up during 4 hours of a train ride, child in the seat in front of me, the Amtrak train was a great way to travel. I mean, who doesn't like getting up and walking over to the cute "bistro" to get a beer or four when traffic gets slowed down to a standstill or if the kid in front of you doesn't feel like shutting the hell up? Anyone? Yeah, I didn't think so. Plus, it wasn't cheap old Bud Light or some such nonsense, hello? Mirror Pond. Yum. Double plus, the view was magnificent. The track is about 5 feet from the water a lot of the way.

Traveling

I was packing my bag last night for this trip I'm taking tonight and managed to get everything for two days in my wee courier bag. I'm so impressed with myself. But, I should acknowledge that I managed to get everything in there because I'm going to be seeing my mother.

You see, the best thing about going on a trip with one's mother - or maybe just my mother - is that you don't have to pack all sorts of extra things  (i.e. lacy, pretty lingerie) that one would normally pack to impress one's travel companion.  No need to impress her at all. Nope, I can be my normal slovenly self and she'll still love me. 

And now that I think about it, I think this will be the first trip in a long time that I will be able to poop normally because my can't-poop-while-someone's-sharing-a-hotel-room-with-me OCD will be rendered completely inoperative due to the fact that well, it's my mother.  She's seen/heard/dare I say, smelled? worse out of me. I suspect we're going to have a good time. 

Yay! Portland!

My girl wants to party all the time

Do not think, young internets, that I have forgotten this here blog. No, siree! It's just that I have been busy building another blog for the Doberman rescue AND making cds for the CD Nazi AND attending parties AND generally not sleeping enough. All in all it's been a good time, but I have felt guilty not posting about my days here.

It doesn't help that spring has arrived. All that sunshine and warm weather has made me want to think about going outside while sitting on the couch and reading. Yes, I'm quite the active person.

In order to mix it up though I am going to Portland for a couple of days this week. I'm pretty excited since I've never been there. Any suggestions, Portland people?