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I've started tweeting and love it so far.  Hooray.

A Letter Inspired by the new Cotton ad

Dear Zooey Deschanel,

WHO THE FUCK RIDES A BICYCLE IN STILETTOS. Get over yourself! I liked you as Trillian, but you're quickly making me regret ever watching any of your movies. It's sad, because I want to see 500 Days of Summer, I really do, but now I'm not so sure I could enjoy a movie with that much of you in it.

And, please, please, please, stop dressing like one of my mother's dolls from the 1950's.

-Me

I'm sorry, too

About a week ago I first read about this breaking news of a model's body being found in a dumpster in outside of Los Angeles, but I couldn't really find any photos of the victim at the time. So I looked up her model mayhem page (it's like facebook for models) and after coming to terms that she might have one of the weirdest faces I've ever seen, I began reading all the messages on her wall. When you think about it, it's kind of a new phenomenon to write an unlimited number of messages to a deceased person in a place that's public and highly accesible to everyone, you know? And, while I haven't studied a great deal of "memorial walls" or whatever you wish to call them, I've seen so many cases of people just not knowing how to appropritely express their feelings. Hence, I share with you what I found on Jasmine Fiore's Model Mayhem wall that has had me chuckling over the past few days:

Quickie

Just forced John to watch the new Target Women: Doofy Husbands with me. It was cute. Not the funniest one, but fun.

Now back to my head exploding from all the packing left before London!

we know a place where no ships go

i envy the people who know what they want to do and are doing it. lots of people make this claim and are just lying to themselves, but there are a few out there who really are happy. it seems that these few are the fortunate ones for whom opportunity and chance collided at the perfect moment.

HOLY SHIT I FINALLY DID IT I FOUND A GOOGLE SEARCH TERM THAT ONLY HAS 1 FUCKING RESULT GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH

What I learned yesterday.

Don't watch someone get a mole removed.

Just...just trust me on this one.

Ahead of the Game

So for the first time in at least three attempts to enroll in this digital photography class that I've had my eye on I'm actually aware of when registration opens and you bet I'll be waiting for 11:59PM to pass on 4/27 so I can grab a spot. Yeah, they go fast. I have learned that now.

It sucks that the course would eat up a good chunk of my Saturdays, but it's something I know I love and hopefully good things will come from the time investment. I'm also amused at how perfectly the course squeezes in between the St. Louis wedding in May and the trip to London in August. Well, maybe not "perfectly," as I would miss the first class from being in St. Louis, but I'm optimistic that it wouldn't be a major snafu. After the final class meeting John and I would drive to Dallas in order to fly to London. Nice.

I'm in the process of acquiring appropriate attire for this upcoming wedding, and acquisition of proper clothing has never been one of my strong suits. I also dread the process of online shopping - checking the sizing charts and squinting at low quality photos and eventually the excitement of receiving the package only to ultimately go through the trouble of returning everything - but it's probably the most practical way to go about it right now so I'll have to deal. I'm also realizing that online shopping is one of the fastest ways to find incredibly marked down stock at j. crew for example.

I feel like accomplishing something today, but I have a suspicion that it might only be something like logging a few more hours in Fallout 3. Speaking of games, I must finish the article I started yesterday on Bioshock 2, which sounds incredible.

the 101st post!

Over the past few weeks, the tree outside my window has blossomed, so to speak, filling my view with bright green, delicate, fresh leaves. It's very beautiful. I wish I could tell what kind of tree it was, but I'm sorely lacking when it comes to tree knowledge. Maybe someday I'll find some kind of book randomly, online or in some bookstore's miscellaneous section up by the registers, and know.

Last week I went to half-price books and picked up a few selections of London travel guides for the trip to London in August. Hopefully I'll start reading through them soon.

BTW, trivia last night sucked. Fucking Shakespeare.

Probably the most thought-provoking thing I've read about this

IN the hallway of Hostos-Lincoln Academy in the Bronx this week, two ninth-grade girls discussed the pop singer Chris Brown, 19, who faces two felony charges for allegedly beating his girlfriend, the pop singer Rihanna, 21. At first, neither girl had believed Mr. Brown, an endearing crooner, could have done such a thing.

“I thought she was lying, or that the tabloids were making it up,” one girl said.

Even after they saw a photo of Rihanna’s bloodied, bruised face, which had raced across the Internet, they still defended Mr. Brown. “She probably made him mad for him to react like that,” the other ninth grader said. “You know, like, bring it on?”

The full NY Times article here.

MOST OUTLANDISH SONG EVER

ugh.

I See The Want To In Your Eyes
Sung By: Conway Twitty
Written By: Wayne Carson

I see the sparkling little diamond on your hand
It's plain to see that you've already got a man
I can see you're not about to fall for any of my lines
I See the want to in your eyes

Deep in your smile there's a quiet, soft desire
Like the embers of a once raging fire
You know I could light that fire again, you know it isn't why
I see the want to in your eyes

How strong's a band of gold
Is it strong enough to hold, when a love has grown cold
And a woman wants a love, sweet and warm

How many women just like you have silent schemes,
How many men like me do they sleep with in their dreams
You can stay or you can go and although I sympathize
I still see the want to in your eyes
I see the want to in your eyes

The Muffin Escapade

Banana Chocolate Muffins.

They're all the rage, nowadays. Well, they have been since Robert, John, and I went to Fricano's Deli and stumbled upon them.

By the way, Austinites both former and current, Fricano's Deli rocks. Best deli in Austin, I think. And the owners, who are the nicest ever, went to PSHS - woah!

Back to the muffins. Over my next few visits, I've been in negotiations with the Fricano's staff concerning the making of more muffins. After a few phone calls and visits, they finally came through for me, preparing six of these hot bastards for to pick up this past Thursday.

It's now Sunday, and there are 2.5 left. One was consumed immediately after purchase (gotta check 'em, right? RIGHT??). Another was nibbled upon by the muffins' cohabitants over a span of several days, and finally, last night, I came home tipsy and gobbled a half while I sobbed to myself over how fantastically nommalicious they were.

In a few hours, Robert, Marion, Priya, and Kyle will be here, and I don't expect the innocents to last much longer with so many predators afoot. I will be calling Fricano's again. Soon.

And that is my muffin story. The End.

What.

People actually exist that enjoy Elizabethtown?

What.

Saucer Trivia Night

Last night was the third time I've been to the trivia competitions at the Flying Saucer. Although our team has not been having much luck, I think we've all been enjoying ourselves.

The very first time I went, I was delighted to participate in a round where the theme was "video games." One of last night's rounds wins for worst theme, though. It was "the residences of past presidents." Who the fuck even knows shit like that?...unless you give tours of Monticello and shit. Hopefully it'll get better.

The Alamo Update, Vol. 1, Ed. 2

I started writing this a week or so ago, but it just took me a while to finish it. So, sorry for the lateness. Enjoy!

I suppose this could become a reoccuring post, seeing as how I love reading the bi-monthly Alamo calendars and my hunch that this could potentially lead to more Priya-Marion-visits. Anyway, I just got my copy of the March/April calendar last night as John and I left the "Oscars at the Alamo" shindig. It was sadly not that fun, so I think I'll just go back to watching the Academy Awards at home.

So without further ado...

RANDOM EVENTS
3/2 - Music Monday: URGH! A Music War (tickets just $2!)
"...Unbelievable live footage of the groups and artists that changed sound forever, including Devo, Klaus Nomi, Dead Kennedys, The Go-Gos, Wall of Voodoo, Oingo Boingo, XTC, Joan Jett and the Blackhearts, Pere Ubu, Gang of Four, X, 999 and many more...Not available in any format..."

3/3 - Terror Tuesday: Lifeforce (this is free and sounds *amazing*)

3/5 (and 3/12, 3/26) - Monty Python and the Holy Grail quote-along
(I wish I could have seen this after the wedding)

3/10 - Girlie Night: Empire Records

3/14 - Kung Fu Theater: City Hunter (free showing!)
"This Jackie Chan martial-arts comedy is about as close to insanity as we ever hope to get...Here's one example of of the craziness that awaits you: Jackie gets thrown into a Street Fighter arcade console and electrocuted cartoon-style. When he wakes up, he is inside a low-budget live action version of the video game..."

3/22-3/23 - Princess Mononoke

3/26 - JAWS 3D w/ Brad Neely live
"...we had comic genius Brad Neely out at the Ritz several months ago...the Q&A session went in some pretty strange directions. One person asked him, "What's your favorite 'Part 3?'" He thought and replied, "JAWS 3D!" and then proceeded to act out a large part of the movie...his pantomimic evocation of Dennis Quiad straddling a sea-doo made more than one attendee jump onto his chair and scream "YEEEEEESSSSS!".

4/2 (and 4/9) - Young Frankenstein Quote-Along

4/4 - Adventureland w/Martin Starr live! (You know, the dude who recommends saving up bathroom breaksin case you need to go #2!)

4/11 - Saturday Morning Cartoon Cereal Party (w/ all-you-can-eat cereal)
"...Your eyes will devour classics like MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE, REN & STIMPY, THUNDERCATS, and RAINBOW BRITE until your pajamas practically burst with excess!"

4/13 - Music Monday: Rolling Stones' Rock 'n Roll Circus (tickets $2)

4/14 - Terror Tuesday: Never Too Young to Die (free!)
"...Gene Simmons is Velvet von Ragnar, a supervillainous hermaphrodite overlord bent on world domination...We are proud to bring you the types of images that are normally only experienced at the moment of one's death."

4/16 (and 4/23, 4/30) - 1987 Sing-Along (I like the idea of this)

4/20 - Music Monday: I Need that Record! (just $2)
"The death (or possible survival) of the independent record store is examined in this doc that aggressively tackles why over 3,000 independent record stores have closed across the U.S. in the past decade."

4/25 - Kids' Club: Secret of the Nimh (I fucking love this movie...I'm just not sure about all the kids, though.)

4/27 - World's Most Dangerous Improv
"Legendary improv fanatic Les McGehee brings you the cream of the local improv crop, special improvising guest stars from TV and film, and... The Most Dangerous Improv Comedy in the World!"

4/29 - Fantastic Fest presents: Dr. Infierno w/ the director live!
"...a demented gynocologist discovers a cure for all the world's illnesses and uses it as leverage to become the sole dictator of the earth."


MASTER PANCAKE SHOWS

The Matrix (3/6)
Jurassic Park (3/13, 3/14, 3/20, 3/21)
Lord of the Rings (3/27, 3/28, 4/3, 4/4, 4/10, 4/11, 4/17, 4/18, 4/24, 4/25)
and "Choose Your Own" (4/26)

:(

UT = nope.

Oh, if only I ran into this fucker on the street

On Tuesday morning I rang up a customer for the correct price of his drink, despite the fact that he tried to word his order in a way that I would charge him less. (People like that are my least favorite types...and sadly they are pretty abundant.) Well, when I apologetically wouldn't budge on the price (my manager was right next to me!) he left without getting anything.

I found out today he called the corporate line to file a complaint about me. He told them I was very rude and embarrassed him in front of the other people in line. If my manager hadn't been working with me when this occurred, I'm 99% sure I would have been reprimanded and had corrective action taken against me. But since she was there, she backed me up and pointed out his lies. Corporate, however, did not back me up, and told us that we should have basically let him get away with his (flawed) logic.

The difference in his drink price, folks?

Fifty fucking cents.

GTFO.

Morning times!

I'm the kind of person who stresses over many things, but something peculiar has started happening where the more things are completely fucked up behind the counter the more serene I become at the register. It's really quite lovely. A coworker once told me that one of the reasons she loves opening is that you pretty much know what you're walking into and what needs to happen. It's a clean slate, I guess. That may be why I stress over mid-shifts so much - I just don't know what I'll be walking into.

But yeah, this morning was good (for me at least). Also, my manager mentioned me in the weekly store notes, saying that customers come up to her frequently to complement the drinks I have made for them. Weird, I know. I guess they're just trying to get into my pants or something. On that note, we really do get some creepy ass dudes in the store who like to leer and slip inappropriate comments into the normal business conversation. One of my other female coworkers (who is a latina [and this is relevant]) has even had a dude try and kiss her! She also has had some dudes call her "brown sugar." Gah-ross.

T R I V I A and why St John's sucks.

Last night was too much fun. It was around 8:30pm, and John was on his laptop and I was probably on mine, and we had eaten and were doing that thing where one of us is like "what do you want to do tonight, watch a movie?" and the other says "yeah, sure" and then nothing happens.

Then I think I sent Robert a random text and he calls and invites us to join him at the Flying Saucer, because it's trivia night and he and a few guys are going over to play. And without really asking what John wants I'm immediately like "we're so there."

Well, I don't really say things like that, but you get the idea. John was dragging his feet (haha) but we went and had a BLAST. We didn't place, but we scored like three points less than the winning team and got an honorable mention. One of the rounds was "video game trivia" and although there were no FF or Elder Scroll questions, our team collectively shat ourselves and answered everything perfectly. Maybe even too perfectly.

The final round (and the hardest round) was "Euros," and I was really terrified that it would be all about the currency and that the game would fall on my shoulders as the only coin-collector. There were a few non-coin-related questions, but sadly a few were and I had no clue about them. However, one question asked something like "which European country has featured or will feature King Juan Carlos I on a coin?" and I totally knew it was Spain (duh) but an overly-confident teammate (who went to St Johns HS [ew] and happens to be currently going to UT Law) was fucking determined that the answer was Portugal. I really couldn't offer any reasoning besides my gut feeling, and so the group decided to go with Law School Dude. :( It wasn't the difference-maker, but the first thing I did when I went home was pull out my coin collection and find my King Juan Carlos peseta. Sigh.

Last Week

Last week was a weird one. I didn't have to work on Monday, so I was going to go to lunch with a friend and take it easy, but my mom called and told me that my grandmother had died. Everyone thinks that her heart just gave out after 99 years, which I guess I'm inclined to believe as well. The assisted living staff found her in her favorite chair, and since she never pushed any of the call buttons for a nurse she probably went in her sleep.

I still have her birthday invitation on my fridge.

It's kind of funny how even though she was 99, and even though my mom and dad had been giving my brother and I the whole "we need to go and visit for ____ occasion because it could be her last!" for what seemed like the past ten years, no one really seemed ready for it. Nor okay with it. I mean, this is only the second funeral I've experienced, but the entire congregation of people seemed drastically more upset than at the first funeral I ever went to, Dylan's, and he was in his teens and it was much more tragic in that respect. But maybe I'm biased, being that it was the first death in my family, and that I was sitting with and hanging out with all the other family members. By the way, if there were a prize to be won for the weepiest person at that gathering, I would (amazingly) win it. I guess I say amazing because I was definitely not as close to her as many of the other people there.

I think even if I tried I will never be able to forget the image of my grandmother's sister, the last living sibling of that family, walk up to the open casket at the end of the service and just lose it. It required three fully-grown men to lift her from the floor and help her back to a pew.

So I'm still a little bummed about all of the past week's events, but my coworkers and bosses were so nice and helpful when I had to get all of my shifts covered at the last minute, and John was definitely there for me when I needed him.

Excerpt from "The Meaning of Tingo - and other extraordinary words from around the world"

Kicking the Bucket
Other languages have highly inventive euphemisms for the tricky subject of passing on:

nolikt karoti (Latvian) to put down the spoon
colgar los guantes (Spanish, Central America) to hang up the gloves
sucrer les fraises (French) to sugar the strawberries
de hoek omgaan (Dutch) to go around the corner
bater a bota/esticar a perna (Portuguese) to hit the boot or to stretch the leg
avaler son bulletin de naissance (French) to swallow one's birth certificate


I like the fourth and sixth ones the best. The fourth is pretty cute and comforting while the sixth just makes me laugh.

Colossopendium of New, Revolutionary Sex Positions

In another attempt to get my friends interested in Achewood, I am transcribing an article from the Achewood zine Man Why You Even Got to Do a Thing, written by Ed E. Haskell (aka Roast Beef [aka Chris Onstad]).

Stick of Nitroglycerin
As everyone knows, a stick of nitroglycerin is extremely dangerous, likely to explode at the slightest scrape or movement. In this position, the lady treats your "companion" like it could blow up at any moment, and moves extremely slow and careful as you lay on your back and "have wood." It is extremely important that she is nervous, and has shop goggles on. If either of you talks, the other person has to say "ssssh!"

The Sugar Loaf
The man lies on his side under a single white sheet, curled in the fetal position. The sheet is tucked pretty tightly around him. He is in the middle of the bed. When he hears the lady come into the room, he quietly says, "don't you want to examine this sugar loaf?"

The Gammalon
This is the only sex position believed in by the Church of Scientology. It is said to lead to superior offspring. The principle is that by lying on one's back on a large ball or convex mattress, with the man's "companion" being the highest point of the body, only his strongest seed are able to scale the heights. This concept is easily disproven when one considers that seed are always scaling that height whever the dude is on his back, not just when he's on a dome-shaped mattress.

The Stick It To Ya
Not as raunchy or straightforward as it would seem, this position is actually all about the lady. There is almost no literal "sticking" of "it" to anyone. In fact there is no penetration of any kind. This position is bad. It is pretty weird for the couple. In this position, the lady dies and the man if foreced to grapple with the tragedy alone. They may not even be at the same place when she passes. He may hear about it on the phone.

Alamo Updation

I was rereading the post about Alamo shows, and I felt the urge to post that John and I went to see Master Pancake: Pretty Woman and Super Happy Fun Monkey Bash '09.

The former was alright - the latter was absolutely a let-down. Ugh. I was *so* bored towards the end.

But thanks for being a trooper and seeing them with me, "babe".

Order of Events

• I arrived at my parents' house in Houston.
• My brother is playing computer games in the back of the house.
• He asks if he can help me unload my car, and I tell him yeah, after I use the bathroom.
• I exit the bathroom and yell to him to come help me. He says ok.
  
• I start unloading the car.
• I finished unloading the car.
• I move everything inside and my brother, halfway changed into his work uniform, is already making plans to go hang out before work. He asks me if he can help unload the car. I tell him that I finished already. He is surprised.
  
• My brother finishes changing and takes my car to go get sushi with friends and afterwards go to work.

...and now I'm bored. I guess I'll nap until someone gets here.

Laughing so much I'm crying

Man, I got John *so* good.


John: (probably looking at woot.com) Man! I didn't know that they make 64 gig jump drives! That might be nice, to not need an external, and just carry around the jump drive.

Lauren: Hmm, yeah, but I bet it'd get pretty heavy.

John: (looks at me with a terrified face) N.... oh... Whew.

Some kind of resolution?

I've cried so many tears over this, but I've reached the point now where no more can be done. Hopefully the mourning over my (inevitable?) rejection won't be too bad.

I don't know how I didn't keep on top of this

...maybe it was the christmas errands, the traveling, work consuming my mind. I just checked my UT application status and one of the people that agreed to write me a recommendation has still not sent it in, an entire month after UT emailed her requesting it. I reminded this person a few times when my deadline came and went and she still hadn't sent it in (she said something about it being a different format than she expected) and she said she'd submit it right away.

I'm incredibly distraught, terrified, and furious. This person owed me big time, too. I fucking finished almost the entire fucking yearbook after I graduated when all the other seniors dropped the ball. And now I probably won't get in to fucking grad school.

Gran Bambino

Right now John is complaining that his fingers smell like weed. He has theorized that our neighbors must be smoking out right now, and that their smoke must be seeping through our vents...and making a B-line straight for his fingers?

Anyway, tonight John and I saw The Wrestler at the alamo downtown. I was initially excited about this because I've been in desperate need of a new alamo event calendar booklet (I hate using their website; it's so oddly organized) - more to come on that in a sec. However, I really did enjoy the film, probably only because of the main character played by Mickey Rourke, who was fucking awesome in the film. I think I may like wrestling now.

By the way, after seeing all the short trailers for Gran Torino, I doubt another trailer exists that could make me take a film less seriously than I take this one. It almost seems like a spoof trailer. It has this sort of "grr, get off my lawn" *point crooked finger in shape of gun* feel to it. Ridiculous! But it must be captivating *some* slice of humanity since it seems to be selling out everywhere.

Ok, so, the part I've been waiting for - Alamo event calendar. I have the familiar problem of seeing too many good things going on there. Hopefully alamo won't leave me broke!

• Girlie Night: Mean Girls with special cocktails! (13th)
• Anchorman quote-along! (15th, 22nd, & 29th)
• 90's Pop Princess sing-along (also 15th, 22nd, 29th, & Feb 5th)
• Master Pancake: Pretty Woman (16th & 17th)
• Super Happy Fun Monkey Bash (17th & 28th) - yay japanese wackiness!
  
• Master Pancake: The Matrix (23rd & 24th, 30th & 31st, 6th & 7th, 20th & 21st, 27th & 28th)
• Master Pancake: Choose your own movie (25th) - could be good?
• Saturday Morning Cartoon Cereal Party (7th) - this time they're showing Care Bears, Thundercats and She-Ra!
  
• Sickest Fucking Stories (8th) - is it weird that I think this looks interesting?
• Three different valentine feasts! Out of the three, I would go with Annie Hall, but Romeo + Juliet and Casablanca don't sound bad either. However, with each film is a specialized feast, and New York cuisine is a fav of mine.
• Academy Awards: Red Carpet Bash & Feast (22nd) - this looks absolutely amazing.
• Hey Homo!: Top Gun (24th)
• The No Shame sing-along (26th)

See what I mean?! Too many things! There are a few things on here that John isn't too keen about, so hopefully I can find some other people to drag along.

OMG, happy new year, everybody!