All my friends are home! Therefore, they are spending quality time with their friends and families, puppies and kitties, not to mention their pillows, couches, refrigerators and TVs. Thusly, I have no amazingly long and wonderful emails to read. Since procrastination is my crack, I have resumed posting on the blog! Exciting. Except no one is reading it due to the aforementioned usual suspects during vacation time. This is purely for posterity.
Lately my body has been trying to purge itself of my lungs. Apparently they are having an hardcore lovers' spat because right now my lungs are harboring a torrid little love affair with some bacteria and my body is just the raging jealous spouse, trying to beat my lungs with a rolling pin. I believe what was a cold a couple of weeks ago nicely incubated and turned into a sweet, mucus-filled bronchitis concoction. I will verify this later today at my doctor's appointment. Mmmm, antibiotics. Bring it.
I leave for London Tuesday night and let me tell you people, I am fucking excited. Of course I was not excited to hear about the crazy fog that has hit northern Europe, but hopefully that will clear up within the next 4 days. Right? RIGHT???
I have a lab party tonight. Hot diggity dog. More than eight Asian people gathering in one place! Is there a law against that?
So I've been looking up "what to bring" restrictions for my flight. I was refered to this site from my e-ticket. I have copy and pasted for your enjoyment:
Other potentially dangerous items not permitted include:
- Cigarette lighters
- Non-safety matches
- Toy or replica guns (plastic or metal)
- Catapults
- Sharp items including household cutlery, knives with blades (of any length), paper knives, razor blades, darts.
- Hypodermic syringes (If you have a medical reason that means you need to inject during the flight you are permitted to carry syringes in the cabin. However, you must be able to produce medical evidence, such as a doctor's letter indicating the name of the person to whom the equipment is prescribed, when you check in and/or at security screening. The letter should be kept with you at all times.)
- Scissors (scissors with blunt/round-ended blades, metal or plastic, less than 6cms in length or scissors with metal blades and pointed tips under 3cms are permitted)
- Sporting bats
- Billiard, snooker, pool cues
- Tradesmen's tools
- Any dangerous articles such as flammables, erosives, poisons, radioactive materials, ammunition, firearms or explosives
That's right, friends. I know you really wanted to bring that replica catapult with you to the Bahamas but Virgin Atlantic says no.
Hello my friends!
Sorry for the lack of posts. My camera was recently hijacked by a certain Limey and thusly I have no beautiful pictures of birthday sopresas and turkey yummies.
BUT, I do have this wonderful link to share with you all:
http://www.ucsusa.org/scientific_integrity/interference/a-to-z-guide-to-political.html
It is an uber outrageous list of errors of science from the Bush administration, as documented by the Union of
Concerned Scientists. They've just released a letter with 10,000 signatures including 50 Nobel prize winners condemning Bush's maniplulation of scientific data for political goals.
Um, I love them.
T minus 12 days before flying to the current theme of this blog! (Wowee! <-- Borat voice)
P.S. Here's South Park Me! (Go here for procrastination funness!)
My friends threw me a surprise birthday party on Saturday night! It was really fun and I was definitely definitely surprised. Not in a heart-attack kind of way, but in a "wow all my friends are in the same room!" kind of way. Mostly because there was nothing fishy about the whole deal--my friends 'little and Belgie were so cute! They got lots of good food that I like, lamb curry, mediterranean tappas platter, and Alli-Oop was awesome enough to make her famous "better than sex" chocolate cake. Dude. Amazing.
I have pictures, but they are still on my camera.
Have a Happy Thanksgiving!
Man, I love food. Anything having to do with food and I'm drawn to it like a moth to a hot hot death flame.
With Thanksgiving on the way it's like I'm in my own world of food happiness. Of course the downfall of the perfect evolution of charred meat on a stick of our friends Homo erectus to the flaky cloud perfection of a good pâte à choux is that food makes you fat. But that's what friends who are going to be plastic surgeons are for, right? Right??
On a completely unrelated topic, Milton Friedman died! This is insane. He is pretty much the single most influential economist of the modern world. He's all about free markets and the conservative ideals of small government and laissez faire. I find the whole world economy and free market thing completely and utterly fascinating. To me, it is such a representation of something that is so insignificant yet is the whole of every person's life on this planet. It is an excruciating example of the power of man-made forces on natural human life. Which leads me to this documentary that was shown three years ago by PBS called "Commanding Heights" (which was brought to my attention by the greatness that is Amarpod). Based on a book by the same name, it tells the history of the world economy through the perspective of world leaders, internationally reknowned economists, and historians without the usual heavy heavy American bias. Refreshingly, they actually include other countries because they pretty much have to if they want to give a complete story about the world economy, as opposed to the white people economy. Since I knew nothing about this before I first saw it, I found the documentary to be pretty much awesome and very very interesting. They interview a lot of the Big Daddies of economic policy and there are appearances by the always frighteningly stone-faced Cheney and the Rhodes scholar, Bill Clinton. I recommend it! It's free, it's split into a billion chapters so you can watch a little every day. Or all at once until 3am, if you're psychotic like me.
I don't really feel old. I don't think 25 is old at all. I do actually (for the first time) feel that I'm getting OLDER. Which is a change for me because I haven't really felt the pangs of age. This is mostly due to the fact that up to a couple of years ago, people asked me if I was thinking about applying to college. Uh...yeah, I thought about it so much that I got a diploma. Only recently have they FINALLY stopped carding me. For alcohol, not movies. Sheesh.
Seeing as I have arrived at the great quarter of a century...I would like to present to you, me as a baby! Baby pictures! Oh boy. Well, yeah, I looked like a boy, but only because my mom left my dad alone with me and a pair of scissors. Both of these pictures were taken in Hong Kong when I was visiting my dad's extended family before I was 2 years old. I was on a plane before I could even really walk.
Haha, look at that ugly stuffed animal!! What the hell is that? It's like a cross between Mr. Peabody and Blue, from Blue's Clues. I'm such a trend setter. Also I look so...placid. They must have sedated me.
I think this picture is REALLY funny. Mostly because my cheeks are about to eat my eyes. At least I look like a girl--what with the pink bunny onesie overalls.
And another year begins...
The MUSIC!! Ooooooo, the music. Seriously, friends. SERIOUSLY. I literally got out of my ice skating lesson last night and drove straight to Best Buy, ran to the soundtrack section, grabbed the first copy of the Marie Antoinette soundtrack that I could see and promptly paid for it and ripped it open out in the parking lot. I don't think I actually got in into my car's CD player fast enough.
But I was totally justified in my insanity! (Isn't that always the case?) Never have I listened to music that so powerfully transcended all my emotions of the day. I mean, sure, there are those tracks that make you happy (Brown Eyed Girl by Van Morrison, Country Girl by Primal Scream) and the ones that make you smile and strut (Suspicious Characters by The Blood Arm, These Boots are Made for Walkin' by Nancy Sinatra) and of course there are loads and loads of other songs that will transport you back to your senior year of high school or to your golden summer, etc. The music is so good in this movie that when you ear the songs again, not only are they fun and pretty but they make you think of the beautiful images of the movie. They will make you sad and happy, lustful and contemplative with every song. Therein lies the magic of soundtracks.
The other magic of this particular soundtrack is that it helps make me feel cooler than I actually am. I always like that. It also gives me the craving for macaroons.
Gifts for you, ma petite champignons:
I'm off to Providence for the weekend to visit the Elroy. See you when I'm older (and hopefully?) wiser!
Don't be turned off by Kirsten Dunst either! I know I am guilty of always kind of wishing she would just bite the bullet and get braces for her crazy, outta control upper canines. I find her mildly irritating and not the greatest of actresses. Of course she was good in Interview with the Vampire when she was 12, so maybe she's just really good at parts in period pieces with corsets and big flouncy dresses? Maybe her teeth are a holdover from that movie! It doesn't really matter because she's wicked cute in this movie and she plays the part really well. She's got really big dimples! I don't really know why I never noticed them before. As a side note, I have a friend/crew teammate with really big dimples and on long bus trips to regattas we used to try to see how many gummi bears we could stick in her dimples. Five, three on the left and two on the right--pretty impressive, no? I bet if we stopped giggling hysterically we could have fit more... Of course this escalated to decappitating the heads and then sticking them to our faces. Man, don't ever try to drive from Maine to Atlanta if you want to keep your sanity.
So, if you want to see an absolutely beautiful movie with stunning scenery and costumes and a great soundtrack, go see this movie. If you want to provoke your political mind to think about governing, being king/queen, and your responsibilities to your people, your family, and to yourself, not to mention how you can govern a peoples from a place as remote and expansive as Versailles then see this movie. Also you should know that there is an interesting commentary on France, their role in aiding Americans during the civil war, and how Americans feel about the French today (who decided NOT to help out in the current ridiculous war). The French heavily helped the Americans financially during their fight for independence from Britain (which of course was an added bonus for the French) and yet we feel the need to disrespect this country by renaming fried potatoes as freedom fries? Please. If general population of Americans were at all interested in respecting the rest of the world by learning about their cultures and traditions, they would know that French fries are Belgian anyway.
This movie is far from shallow and mindless, but if you still aren't convinced and would like to read a nicer, better written review, please visit here.
Wow, friends what a NIGHT and what a DAY! I was super excited last night to watch MSNBC to cover the election results. When I went to sleep it seemed pretty sure that the Dems had taken the House but then this morning to find out that they had probably taken the Senate too? And Rummy resigned?? Holy crap!
I definitely did my part yesterday and voted. I present to you the sticker I recieved as proof of my patriotism uh..."disagreements" with Bush and his administration:
In other news, I almost had an orgasm when I saw the cover of TIME Magazine this week with this article. A debate between Richard Dawkins and Francis Collins?? Dude. DUDE. Best two days EVER. (Sorry, the article is only available to TIME subscribers, but if you really want to read it just let me know. Wink, wink, nudge nudge.)
A couple of weeks ago I had the pleasure of going to Boston to watch the annual Head of the Charles Regatta on the Charles River (between Cambridge and Boston Proper). It was "wicked" fun and for the first time in about three years, the weather was absolutely beautiful. Blue skies and sunshine with a bit of chill, but nothing like the mucus over-production inducing cruelty of years past. I went to see my good old Alma Mater crew teammates row in an alumni boat and to hang out with another non-crew college friend, Tiberius. Elroy accompanied, of course, and we
That night also happened to be the night of the annual Life is Good sponsored Pumpkin Festival in Boston Commons where they try to beat the Guiness Book of World Records record for the most Jack O'Lanterns in one place that was set by Keene, NH (a town of 22,778, by the way) of 28,952 carved pumpkins. Astoundingly enough, Boston BEAT them this year! They had a record of 30,128 pumpkins! Insane. And in a year of pumpkin shortage! I have for your enjoyment included a picture of the always humbling Tower o' Pumpkin.
Elroy is new to all things Boston so we (Tiberius and I) took him on a little tour of MIT with the intention of going to the MIT student center to part-take in some burrito fantastic-ness from an Anna's Taqueria that is situated on some prime real estate admist poor and hungry students. It must be said that the Anna Taqueria experience is much like that of getting soup from the Soup Nazi. You wait in line and appropriately step up to the counter to order your burrito innards, but this must be done in a clear, loud, and decisive fashion. If you don't do this, you get weird garbled grunted English from some very intimidating looking Mexican burrito-istas. This leads to holding up the line and you just never want to be that guy. But these burrito makin' factories (mistaken for people) don't mess around. If you want
The best part of the weekend had to be the Sunday breakfast. I don't know if you're going to find this as infinitely amusing as I do, but let me share with you the golden nugget of the past few weeks. Tiberius was possessed of the spirit of amazing host with a dash of Martha Stewart and made us a breakfast of fresh blueberry waffles and toasted cinnamon raisin bagels. Typical American carb-alicious breakfast. Elroy let fly the notion that he really has never had waffles before, and definitely not for breakfast. You must realize that he comes from a land where they eat meat (read: sheep offal) that has been minced cooked with onions and carrots inside a sheep's stomach. Right.
Tiberius, gracious as ever, commanded us to eat the waffles before they get cold. However, he was in the middle of toasting all of our bagles and I happened to get my bagel first and I thereby skiped the waffle for my crisp warm bagel. After slathering on some cream cheese, I passed it on to Elroy for his pending bagel. I noticed Elroy surreptitiously putting a small pile of cream cheese on his plate, which he was then dipping into to happily put on his waffles with compete disregard for the beautiful amber-colored Vermont maple syrup on the table. At this point I was severly amused and trying not to laugh out loud and I deliberately focused on putting syrup on my waffles, after which Tiberius (oblivious to any waffle desecration) did the same, and then Elroy himself, being the observant scientist that he is, decided to join in on the All-American fun.
The next weekend in Providence while walking back from grocery shopping I casually asked if English people put cream cheese on their blueberry waffles. After some discussion about appropriate waffle protocol, he then proceed to admonish me for not telling him at the time that he was commiting a waffle faux pas. I told him I thought he looked pretty content and pleased with his waffle eating situation and one should be able to eat waffles with whatever topping one likes. I bet waffles with cream cheese tastes great. It's not how people normally eat them, but perhaps what we're dealing with here is a cute English man infamously known wear mismatched socks posing as a breakfast trendsetter.
