1/15/2008

When Brian woke me up this morning, he informed me that I had been sleeping with my pillow rammed halfway up the wall, thus, my head was traveling up the wall, and I was bear-hugging one of our Euro pillows which had started the night out on the floor. I'm a hot mess.

I've been feeling really happy lately. Probably because it's a fresh new year. I've been keeping on top of housework, actually finishing things I start, cooking dinner every night, and really working on taking the worry out of life. I even started watering our house plants again. Brian decided that our family theme for 2008 is "Health and Wealth". I'm really working on saving more and determining if things are really something I need or just a pesky want. The health part will be a little more tricky, seeing as I like nacho cheese dripped on everything I eat.

They're not allowing me to go to my big music convention in Annaheim this year. It really, really disappoints me. I guess mostly because I just got an e-mail asking me if I could be the EM representative to show up on Wednesday when Mackie brings in Snoop Dogg and his tricked out van to the tradeshow. Or because my French advertiser wants to meet me. But mostly because I'll miss my regular lunches of a soft pretzel and mountain dew.

I've been reading "Eat Pray Love" every night before I go to bed. It's another new thing I'm trying: trying to read before I fall asleep, instead of watching 5 dvr'd episodes of Sweet Sixteen. It's a different book than I would usually read, but I'm finding it to be very, very insightful and definitley one that I can connect with. It's nice because I feel like the author is just talking to me and I can hardly put it down. Thanks, Sweet Meliss, for the reccomendation. It's a powerful book about self strength and realization.

It's been colder than a witch's titty in a brass bra. I think it's gonna show for the next two days. Fine by me, as long as the new American Gladiators is on TV. Did you get a load of that show? One gladiator has a plastic Ken face, "WOLF" howls and has a mullet and probably drives a camero, and some of the chicks are one chromosome away from being dudes. But it's cool cause one contestant totally cut her face open during the Eliminator, but still managed to beat her opponent because that girl jumped about 0.3 millimeters away from the pipe that was on fire under the water.


In addition to finally taking down the live Christmas tree that we still had up in our house, Brian and I went to see the Jayhawks take on stinky Nebraska in Lincoln. Compared to Allen Fieldhouse, their gym is like my middle school gym. I was really pumped to go see this game, until the ticket-assister-lady informed us that the "SR" on our tickets meant STANDING ROOM. Which meant that we were behind the final row of seats, standing on concrete. Which, actually worked out great and we were surrounded by fellow Hawks. And a few young couples that thought it would be a good place to make out.



Of course, KU killed it and everyone started leaving at halftime. Those dirty huskers are so supportive of their basketball. But, we stayed and thank God we did. The halftime feature was some contortionist boy who did two things: slid a toliet seat up and down his body and bent his head down and under his legs in such a way that he was literally sniffing this B hole and man parts. I was all like ARE YOU SERIOUS? This is why me and Nebraska don't really jive.

In other news, my little sister got an XBox 360 for her birthday and the world doesn't make sense.

1/09/2008

hot damn I love my mac. I think I'm about 2.6 seconds away from needing an eyeball transplant, though.
Seriously, what if I had to wear an eye patch?

Brian's been in Chicago for the past three days at a big sales meeting where they do things like smoke 7 cigarettes at one time or if you're real hardcore, they just cut the bottom off of a pack and light it while you're just sucking off of the other end. Before he went off to the windy city, he got this huge care package promoting the upcoming meeting. It included some luggage tags, a nice invitation, and an even nicer coffee table book featuring the history of the cowboy. Duh, because that was the theme of the meeting: THE AMERICAN COWBOY.


Yes siree, Brian informed me that during the first day of meetings they gave each attendee a Stetson Cowboy Hat. I guess one of his buddies looked up the price online and they generally retail for around $180. This will be a fun accessory when Brian comes home. Loading the dishwasher in his cowboy hat, playing XBox in his cowboy hat, and me making him sleep at night with his cowboy hat tipped off his head and down on his face. With a long piece of wheat coming out of his lips.

Brian called me tonight and told me that when he went back upstairs to his hotel, there was a new CD on his bed with a fancy invitation. All attendees of this meeting were invited to attend a private concert by Toby Keith that night over at McCormick place. Just Phil Mo people and apparently he heard that they paid around a cool mil to have him come play. Personally, I would skip this opportunity, because to me, listening to country music is the equivalent of finding out that you have cancer.

So while Brian is out brushing elbows with Toby, I'm at home on my second box of macaroni and cheese in two days. Throw in a little ham on a dollar roll and I basically want to kill myself. I'm slightly bored and miss my Brizzy Sizz. How will the house get clean? Who will arrange the pillows perfectly on the sofa at 5am? How will the dishes make it out of the dishwasher? Who will purchase our Hilton Head June vacation airline tickets NOW? Haha. He always thinks that I won't be able to function by myself while he is gone, but I've got sour news for you Jack, I'm doing fine and I've become an avid fan of that MTV reality show featuring that 16 year old hottie pro-skateboarder.
Did you see his buttcheek muscles coming out of his jeans on the last episode? Christ almighty.

So I'm on the hunt to find the perfect desktop background. One that really screams me. Something wildly creative and clever.
Here is the one I have come up with so far.


God, I am so gay.

So courtesy of Mighty Gal, I have found a cool flickr club: http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/desktopahh/

Go on and post what your desktop looks like. While you're at it, if you have any cool sites with rad desktop wallpapers, send them my way FAST. I want to be cool.

1/07/2008

Ah, is there rehab for wintergreen lifesaver addiction? Because I am so there.

Okay, I'm going to skip ahead and a little out of order so that I can cover my weekend's exciting events. Brian and I went into KC on Thursday to celebrate Dad's 60th birthday. Weird? Yes. He's basically a Grampa without the grandchildren. At one point during dinner, he even pretended he was in a wheelchair and did some hand motion like he was spinning the wheels real fast. It kind of spooked me out.


I was so glad to be there for my Dad's special day. I will fight you if you say you have a better dad than mine. He's hilarious when he needs to be, he does a solid John Wayne impression, he used to drink 6 mountain dews a night for about 20 years, he always stayed up late, thus protecting me from robbers and murderers, he's been to all 50 states, he will always ask if anything is made in America, he has given me about 19 gyroscopes on various Christmas's, and sternly he reminded Brian that husbands do not beat their wives under any circumstances while Brian asked for my hand in marriage. I love my Dad a million times.

I think he kind of didn't like the actual number part of turning 60. My Aunt was in town from Chicago and made the mistake of buying him a lot of gifts that reminded him of how many years old he was. I think Dad was slightly pissed at the "Sixty Things to Do at 60" book that she had picked out. He turned to a chapter and in a funny voice described how it advised you to rid your body of sludge. That's sort of why I opted for the card that had a little gray bear holding a shitload of balloons.


For dinner we ate pasties. They are dad's favorite and my Grampa used to eat them in the mines in the upper peninsula of Michigan when he was down there mining. They'd wrap them up in newspaper and they would give the minors enough warm food and energy to carry them through the day. Now, we don't eat them wrapped in newspaper, and my mom puts filet in them, but they are a homemade pie crust filled with steak, potatoes, and rutabaga goodness. Dipped in lots of salt and catsup. Which does nothing for me but aid in my obese stomach taking over my entire body.

Then I had a hell of a Friday at the office. No comments, but I ended up just going home and crying. That place really stresses me out on a ship day. And I'm not allowed to go on my trip to Anaheim for the NAMM trade show. That really frosted my cookies. But I press on. Because I stayed up until 3am for the last few nights trying to get the magazine done, I just kind of crashed Friday night. Except not before I caught a few prison tours on that MSNBC show I like.

Saturday was the day we had planned to throw a surprise birthday for my Dad. For those of you who know my dad, you know that he doesn't really leave his easy chair in the family room and his thousands of war-related DVDs. So this was going to be hard to pull off. Mom was about to have a heart attack due to all the heavy secretive planning, so we ended up using my brother-in-law's seizure history as an excuse to have dad drive him to a fake dinner about 30 minutes away. Classy, I know. This would give us time to arrange the shrimp platter and have all of the guests arrive. People: WE EVEN HAD BEER IN THE HALL HOUSE. This has not happened since the house was built in 1987.

Luckily, after a basketball game and softball practice, Mom forced dad to shower it up. He got pissed at her suggestion, but I'm guessing he was glad to be wearing a crisp polo when he rounded the corner and saw 50 of his closest friends. We had told him that day that we were having a Southern Living party. This way, we could make food in front of him and he wouldn't think twice about cars being parked in front of the house.

When he came in, we all started singing Happy Birthday. We thought a huge SURPRISE!!!!! would probably give the man a stroke, so we opted for the song. I looked at him and could read his thoughts: He thought the Southern Living party was singing to him. He thought it was cute. And then he started looking around. We had gone so far as to invite his best friend from Oregon, his two sisters from Chicago, best couple pal from Cincinnati, and even the Brian's parents came in from St. Louis. He started seeing everyone and couldn't believe it. I'll never forget that moment. It was one of the coolest things. To see my dad in one room, surrounded by all of his best people. It was a very great moment.


From there on, the night was full of stories, laughing, my Dad's booming voice, and some meatballs my mom made that were soaked in grape jelly. People slowly left, some stayed a little longer, and then some stayed until 2am telling stories about my Dad back in the day. Like how he got arrested. By a crossing guard. In Alaska. John. Hall. Then after my dad's best friend (Mr. Red Clark, hottie) left, the whole family stayed up until 3am just talking about how great the party was and how incredible dad felt. He couldn't stop smiling and like I said, I'll remember that day forever.


Then, after that, Laura and I thought it would be cool to walk around the block with the dog and just sit out on the driveway talking. We were laughing about things like peanut butter, I showed her my cottage cheese, and we tourmented Joey with a rolling water bottle. It was a nice way to end a great evening, in the warm dark night. (Gayest sentence I ever typed.)

All in all, I ate a buttload of chocolate cake and got to see my dad at his happiest. It was one of the best weekends of my life.
If I can say I've done half of the stuff my dad has experienced by age 60, I'll count myself a lucky lady.

(click here) to see my Flickr set.

1/02/2008

One rainy night in St. Louis over Christmas, Brian, Jenny, and I went to see the movie, Juno. I immediatley added it to my list of must sees in 2007. This is one INCREDIBLE movie. Skip work tomorrow, make your baby feed itself, and wear the same clothes next day to work because you couldn't do laundry because you were seeing this movie. Because I told you and I told you HARD.

It might be highly illegal that I have a large crush on Michael Cera.

Yeah, I know he's probably 12 and I'm more closer to 30, and confession of my love could land me in jail due to the him being a minor, but I just want to be his best friend and his full time lover.

I also want to be Ellen Page in this movie. She's 16 and pregnant and probably the most wittiest gal in the land. And I loved how she didn't give a shit about her clothes and did random things like set up a family room in Paulie Bleeker's front yard. And she owned a cheeseburger phone, so that practically makes us life mates.

I don't know. The movie held my interest, was intelligently cute, and had a nice cast. I can't wait to buy it and immediatley memorize it. And just when you think it can't get bettter, it does. The soundtrack will blow your mind. It's like God handed a CD down to you from heaven. It's that perfect. I've already listened to it a zillion times.

I really like the lyrics to "Anyone Else But You" by the Moldy Peaches:
You're a part time lover and a full time friend
The monkey on you're back is the latest trend
I don't see what anyone can see, in anyone else
But you

I kiss you on the brain in the shadow of a train
I kiss you all starry eyed, my body's swinging from side to side
I don't see what anyone can see, in anyone else
But you

Here is the church and here is the steeple
We sure are cute for two ugly people
I don't see what anyone can see, in anyone else
But you

The pebbles forgive me, the trees forgive me
So why can't, you forgive me?
I don't see what anyone can see, in anyone else
But you

I will find my nitch in your car
With my mp3 DVD rumple-packed guitar
I don't see what anyone can see, in anyone else
But you

Up up down down left right left right B A start
Just because we use cheats doesn't mean we're not smart
I don't see what anyone can see, in anyone else
But you

You are always trying to keep it real
I'm in love with how you feel
I don't see what anyone can see, in anyone else
But you

We both have shiny happy fits of rage
You want more fans, I want more stage
I don't see what anyone can see, in anyone else
But you

Don Quixote was a steel driving man
My name is Adam I'm your biggest fan
I don't see what anyone can see, in anyone else
But you

Squinched up your face and did a dance
You shook a little turd out of the bottom of your pants
I don't see what anyone can see, in anyone else
But you

In other news, I kind of am thinking that I'm starting to develop a receding hair line.

1/01/2008

Yeah I know. I didn't blog in December. And I was rolling in November.
But I guess the important news is this: I HAVE A NEW LOVE IN MY LIFE (see below)


Yes, I am the proud new owner of a mac daddy. For the last couple of days, ever since we got back from St. Louis, I have been staring at a 24-inch screen of glory. It's practically like surfing the internet on a billboard. The pictures are crisper and tastier. It comes with a baby remote. Stuff works like it should. It takes a deep breath when I turn it on. It's pretty. I can video chat with my sister and her dog. It's an organizational dream. I will never ever purchase another PC in my young life. I'm forever changed and impressed.

Brian cleverly disguised the gift on Christmas morning:


Straight from the airport, we went to the Omaha Apple store. I told the sales man that I felt like when I would carry the big box out the door, there should be a spotlight on me with some flashy music playing. Maybe trumpets and the voices of angels.



More on Christmas in St. Louis and our annual Omaha New Years Party after my stomach becomes more stable and I get over the huge stain that some bag of crap put on my favorite Christmas runner.