Here are some reasons:
1. I AM STILL SICK. Today is Day Five. On Day Eight the doctor might give me some drugs for this SNOT TAKING OVER MY FACE.
2. Work is really busy so I haven't been able to take any sick days. I have been in a STELLAR mood, obvs.
3. There was an incident with my checking account on Wednesday and I was charged $99 in fees. NINETY NINE DOLLARS. I NEED THOSE DOLLARS.
4. I am TWO WEEKS behind on The Hills.
1. Paul was it?
It an effort to use Craigslist for me instead of against me, I RSSed anything "Joshua Radin" hoping that maybe I could thwart TicketMaster and get tickets for less than one million dollars. Sure enough, the day of the concert someone named Paul posted two tickets for $30. That is a savings of THIRTY DOLLARS off the TicketMaster price. Haha, TicketMaster, jokes on you. Paul, who I immediately started calling Paul The Ticket Guy works for a PR Firm in LA (Business Cat) where I presume he got the tickets for free and Paul The Ticket Guy doesn't like my boyfriend, Josh. Paul The Ticket Guy thinks Josh is too emo. So we played phone tag for a while Thursday afternoon and he wasn't flakey and I met him at a McDonald's where he gave me the tickets. BAM!
2. The Scrubs cast was in attendance.
Seriously, I was in the same room as Zach Braff and Turk and Sarah Chalke who is so the new Katherine Heigl. Like I said before, I've known about Radin since ZB gushed about him on his Garden State blog. I guess he was gushing everywhere because he took Josh's music to the Scrubs set and everyone loved it and they put a song on the show and BAM! Josh had a record deal. So in the encore Josh was all weaving this yarn and the Scrubs cast was cheering back and it was a regular famous people gush fest and Josh played the song that was on Scrubs and they all got so excited and Sarah Chalke whipped out her digital camera and was taking pictures of Josh. For her scrapbook presumably. Josh said they were all going out for drinks later. Those are the drinks I want.
3. I, too, am a sucker for the hometown crowd.
When we arrived at the House of Blues, we saw Josh in the parking lot hanging out with some people. Normal people who must be his token not-on-TV friends (I have a few of those myself). They fell in line behind us to get through security and Josh with his lanyard and badge attempted to bypass the line to get backstage and the security guy TOTALLY DIDN'T LET HIM! Josh was like, "I'm, uh, playing the show?" And the security guy was all, "House of Blues rules, sorry, man," and wanded and patted him down. As he was receiving his nearly-cavity search his friends started teasing him. When he took the stage he swelled with pride at the city of angels and people hollered his name and the names of his band guys and roadies. Because they were all from LA. These people we were standing with in the show were the roommates and the bar buddies of the bands. And so when someone would come out to change the guitars their name would be hollered. When the backup girl stepped into the spotlight she was cheered. Everybody was the star and everybody in the audience knew the star. Josh kept swooning about it. Me too.
4. Buy his new CD, Simple Times, out on iTunes on 9/9 (this Tuesday!) and in stores 9/30. Here is a story about his second album: when Josh finished writing the album and took it to his producing big wigs at Columbia they said they didn't like. Or rather, they liked it fine enough, but they wanted more. They wanted a song that would make it big on the radio. Josh was all, "Um, my songs aren't like that, sorry guys." And they were like, "Sorry, no album til you finish it." So he bought himself out of the contract with Columbia and is putting out Simple Times himself. Cool story, huh? Buy the CD.
You can listen to his music here.
I successfully used sick time today so as to watch Gossip Girl (and use up a lot of tissues, sorry, trees). I love this show. There was a time when I was a bit indifferent but those days are so long gone. And the characters are even hotter this year. Like Dan? He's always been hot but now he's all edges and strong cheek bones and making out with girls in bookstores. And Nate, oh sweet Nate, man bangs, yes.
I had a fantastic Labor Day weekend full of all sorts of Labor Day Activities like outdoor concerts and grilling and afternoon naps. Howevs, somehows, yesterday I manufactured a cold from doing too many poorly-formed handstands in the swimming pool and now I'm a sniffling, snuffling, snot-filled zombie. Last night, the season premiere of Gossip Girl did not even get watched, so hopefully I'll jail break out of my office today to come home early and watch it, I mean, drink some tea and rest up.
Thank you so much for all the votes for the Southwest contest! I did make it into the top 10 which means I should be getting a phone interview. Now I just wait to hear from them. I'll feel anxious about it until I've got the interview penciled in and then I'll feel anxious that I'll still be the snuffling snot zombie and then I'll feel SO NERVOUS about what to say. That's the next project.
For now, I'm trying to talk myself into drinking lots of fluids. The not-fun kinds like water. Boo hoo.
I have submitted a video application for the Southwest Airlines Blog-o-spondant. It's a really cool blogging gig and I really, really want it. I kind of think it's perfect for me, too.
Here's the embed video:
But head on over HERE!
to vote!
Check out the other videos, too. There are some funny ones (and you can vote for more than one, so click away).
Remember that one time some whore named ~+Honey+~ posted my phone number on her erotic services ad on Craigslist?
That was fun when all the perverts called me.
Upside, at least it was just a phone girl and not something worse. AND, I got these stellar voicemails:
This weekend was a big celebration of nothing to do, yay! I slept in Saturday morning, and sort of cleaned my room which turned more into a feng shui-ing event. So now the furniture is in new places and it still looks like I just moved in. Someday, the paint in my garage for my walls will be used.
I did, however, buy some black spray paint and started making things I got for free look like I bought them at Ikea. I also researched some prints online and might even buy them tomorrow. Do you understand the magnitude of this statement? Twenty months I've been living here and taking "before" pictures and soon, SOON!, I could have "after" pictures.
When I wasn't motivating myself with to do lists, I managed to see two movies. I was really excited because I've only seen like three movies this summer before now and I have a lot of catching up to do. At least TiVo makes it really easy to rent movies. House Bunny was Legally Blonde meets Girls Next Door meets Never Been Kissed. It didn't have a very good feminist message, but it could have been worse... like it could have actually been Girls Next Door. It was funny though and also endearing and there is an Aztec-themed party which is AWESOME.
Henry Poole Is Here is nice and indie with an excellent, excellent cast and a good story about hope and faith. It has received some bad reviews, mostly for not handling the questions of hope and faith carefully enough. I disagree though, thinking it was good because it handled those questions in the first place. It's a thinking movie, but not painful. I'd see it again. Also, it was filmed in my town. So, wooo!
Now I need to go check my spray paint job in the dark. Cross your fingers I don't lose steam.
I need a word for all the clever things and fun facts that bloggers share with the rest of the world. You know the funny things you share in Google Reader, or read somewhere on the internet, or find yourself reciting to strangers at the gym.
This word could be a verb... like the act of sharing the wealth....
Or maybe it's a noun... like a thing you have...
Does this word already exist? What is it? Should we make it up?
"Have you ever noticed how interesting professional sports is? If there's one topic that I enjoy spending hours thinking about and ruminating upon, that is it. Every match or round or game is an endless source of deep and satisfying contemplation. I never tire of watching a player rounding the bases, crossing the threshold into the end zone, or beating another professional athlete into unconsciousness, and then obsessively dissecting and analyzing every detail. A night spent speculating on the outcome of a sporting event—Will the first team win? Or will it be the second?—is the most intellectually stimulating evening I can imagine."
Professional Sports is very interesting. Or so our new TiVo thinks.
We set the TiVo up just in time for the Olympics and that is pretty much all we've been watching (well, Olympics and The Hills and Project Runway) so TiVo's feature where it suggests things for us is a little confused.
Because it recorded all of ESPN for us.
"When I'm not watching and then thinking about sports, I enjoy listening to other sports enthusiasts talk about the sports that they watched. Most of all, I enjoy my peers' descriptions of certain feats of athleticism they've witnessed. In turn, I like to reply with a similar anecdote about something I have seen myself, and then follow with a historical precedent that parallels both. Hours go by like seconds when I'm involved in a discussion like this. Invariably, one of us will say, "That's one for the record books," and, though exactly which record books is never totally clear, it is a professional-sports insight that will always be true."
We LOVE LOVE LOVE the Olympics. We halt our lives for global athleticism, for American pride, for sell-out McDonald's commercials, for story packages with Weird Mary (props to Sizzle for the nickname), for MICHAEL PHELPS, for beach volleyball and synchronized diving and track and field and triathalons and archery and BMX and everything else our TiVo records. We are dedicated.
This does not mean we care about the World Poker Championship, TiVo. In fact, unless Lauren Conrad is sort of dating someone who plays, we don't care about poker ever. Also, we don't care about Little League. I spent most of my early life caring about hometown little league and I don't know how I could possible manage to watch it when I don't know anyone involved. Also, if my memory serves me correctly these kids don't even get to be kids because they're busy playing global little league. Blech. I'd prefer watching underage Chinese gymnasts thank you.
"Perhaps the most wonderful thing about professional sports is that I always have the option of watching well-dressed, highly paid people discussing sports on television if I don't necessarily feel like discussing sports myself. These men and sometimes women often have an interesting take on the week in sports, and it gives me a lot to think about. For example, there may be factors in the outcome of a sporting event that I had not considered, such as the wind speed or a bad decision by a coach. The sportscasters will put forth a conclusion, with which I will either agree or disagree, and then, if the occasion arises, I will share that insight or conclusion with others and assimilate it to my own canon of knowledge and analysis about professional sports."
In conclusion, DID YOU WATCH THE VOLLEYBALL LAST NIGHT? SO AMAZING.
One of the awesome things I got for my birthday was The Last Kiss soundtrack. According to the sticker on the CD cover it is "music selected by Zach Braff (Garden State)." I think it's so funny how marketers try to use old stuff to make you buy new stuff. Like with movies when it says "from the producers who brought you..." and really it's the studio that brought you that movie and really there is no connection besides the deep pockets. I don't think that's the case with this CD since Zach is totally the type to be all up in the soundtrack's grill, but he didn't actually write The Last Kiss so I'm curious.
However, back in the day when I would refresh refresh refresh over and over and over again Zach Braff's Garden State blog* waiting WAITING for him to post about how he reads all the comments, swoon, and about other things too like wrapping up filming or being famous or whatevs, I remember that he definitely mentioned Joshua Radin. Oh, look, there it is on the front page. Anyway, I went to Josh's myspace and was all swoony but since that was years ago I didn't have iTunes yet and never got his CD. Stupid.
*Remember 2004 when I was all up in Garden State's grill? Oh, 2004. WOW.
Fast forward to now where Josh is all over the soundtrack (evidence supporting ZB (Garden State)'s involvement, I suppose) and he is SO GOOD. I threw his songs onto a mix over the weekend and I love him. He's croony. So then I was thinking that it would be cool to see him in concert (in September of course) because I don't go to enough concerts and I really want to change that. Interestingly enough, my buddy Josh is going to be here this weekend. It's like it was meant to be.
Except TicketMaster was selling the tickets so maybe it wasn't. Because a $17.50 ticket suddenly became a $30 ticket BECAUSE THAT IS HOW MUCH IN FEES WAS ADDED.
So, Joshua, have fun this weekend playing to the home crowd, I'm sorry I won't be there. I have to take care of myself and also save some money. But that doesn't mean I love you, okay?
The truth of the matter is that I am submerged in one of the more traumatizing events in my life and my face is disfigured because it is swollen from all the crying. I'm definitely a pathetic mess and I only say this now because later when you find out that this coincided with my birthday you don't start pitying me. Because a) that will just make me cry more, and b) I'm not even pitying myself so please don't, and c) I had an Epic Birthday Party with people who don't cause traumatizing life events and so I will be okay.
The real reason I'm here is to talk about Michael Phelps, my boyfriend. I know that last week I was swooning all over Ryan Locthe and pretending I loved him best but that was only because he had just won a gold medal and you know how I am about those things. In real life, I can't stop talking about Phelps. He won a gold medal EVERY DAY LAST WEEK. Swoon. Dooce said it best when she said, "Interestingly, recent international events have brought to my attention a certain special someone who has so stolen my heart that he has knocked off two of the previous men on my list and now occupies both of those positions." Of course, my list is now 2.5 David Cook and 2.5 Michael Phelps. (I'll break down the scoring later this week.)
I've been a little verbose about my love for him, (Did you hear, he is the Greatest Olympian Ever?!) and last week my entire Facebook page was dominated by him. Well, not actually him, because he APPARENTLY doesn't have a FB account (Michael, are those gold medals too heavy to type with?), but everything on Facebook that is him-ish.
Here are some pictures. SWOON.
Really, though, for over 24 hours I have been so care free. There were a couple incidents yesterday morning (losing my lip gloss (read: security blanket) and having to rearrange my schedule to go buy more, and then thinking I forgot my wallet (which I hadn't) but rescuing myself by finding an emergency credit card in my bag (which was TOTALLY THERE that time I had to buy gas with pennies)) but by the time I got my eyebrows waxed and was back at my office, I was breezy. BREEZY!
I wasn't meditating on anything. I wasn't worried about who would or wouldn't show at my party, I wasn't worried about what I was going to wear (Tuesday night I emailed my friends and said "please don't hate me, but I'm not dressing up for the party, I'm too crazy."). I loved my uncut hairs. Do you hear me? I'm breezy.
The Epic Birthday Party was fab, especially since I kept drinking the raspberry mojito martini (ingredients: magic). I had seven drinks by the end of the night, which means I kept doing this:
There are probably pictures somewhere of me looking really hot and tan, very breezy, and maybe drunk. Stay tuned.
HOWEVER, do you know how hard it is to keep my no-planning promise? SO HARD. But tonight I didn't go to the bar, I watched the Olympics. And I had a chat last night about a cave trip, but I'm not taking action until September 1.
I am getting on an AIRPLANE tomorrow and I'm not even freaked about that.
Would you like to see my eyebrows? First picture is four weeks ago when you can start to see them come alive. Second picture is Sunday when I was dying from sunburn. Third picture is post-wax.
Last but not least (can you tell I haven't packed yet, hmmm?) lets talk about Ryan Lochte. I LOVE HIM.
I'm going to go ahead and call it my Epic Birthday Party. On account of:
1. Third year at the same restaurant.
2. Best martinis EVER.
3. I invited WAY too many people.
4. BECAUSE I LOVE TO PARTY.
On account of the crippling anxiety I promised my friends on Sunday that I would "take it easy" until my birthday so I could CHILL THE FUCK OUT. Taking it easy means only watching Olympics and hanging out with Carolyn. It means staying in my comfort zone and no shenanigans involving stores, other people, my car, ANYTHING.
BUT, I had to install the TiVo because a) it arrived last week and it's just been sitting in our living room while it could be being awesome, and b) TiVo emailed me and told me they had a very! special! Olympics! plugin! TiVo totally let me down. It's installed now, after a trip to Radio Shack that made me cry, and I still have two things to return to two different stores, and GUESS WHAT?? The freaking plugin thingy doesn't work. I totally tried to research it on the TiVo forums and everything. Boooo.
Fail, Abigail, fail on the chilling out.
After THAT I knew that I needed to scale back some more so I canceled my birthday hair cut. Which sounds crazy, right? I mean, if you're feeling upset, doesn't being pampered seem like the appropriate solution? Sadly, it took me all the way until today to realize this would so not be the case. Evidence: me being undecided and flip-flop-y about what I want to do with my hair. Usually (always) I'm like, "do whatever you want, I'm tired of it!" The fact that I'm having thoughts (multiple thoughts!) other than this is bad news.
I HATE feeling this way. So, after all my birthday festivities are over, I am going into quarantine. No more parties, no more fun, no more stores. I might even have to make myself stop planning fun too. Because I am doing this to myself. Sigh.
Ending up note: I AM SO EXCITED FOR THE PARTAY.
Hi.
Can you guess how sunburned I am?
It's not Amanda's leprosy but it's bad enough that I can't stop complaining about it. Last night my mom was taking Carolyn and I out to dinner and she suggested we walk. I was all, "Bllllllllllllllllllargh, can't we DRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIVE?!" And my mom was all, "What is wrong with you?" And Carolyn, all resigned, was like, "she's been like this all day."
My desk chair at work which I LOVE (just searched my blog and I can't believe I've never written about this chair. It's called Sexy Back and it is made of mesh and chrome and is infinitely cooler than anything else I own, save my headlamp which is THANKGOD found) is causing me pain. I can't lean back into Sexy Back, I have sit up all proper like. Which is a total waste of the chrome and mesh head rest.
I think the word you're looking for is ANYWAY.
I have a good story about why I'm sunburned and it will probably be best with pictures which I don't have yet, SO INSTEAD, here is a photo from the last time I got really sunburned (thank you, geocaching) at Emily's wedding.
The anxiety is still with us. Hoping to stifle it before my haircut and birthday party on Wednesday.
Well golly. I wrote a whole post about how my friends made me make a list of things I want for my birthday and how the whole thing makes me feel awkward, but then I felt awkward posting it. I love getting presents, but asking for them makes me feel awkward. And talking about asking for them makes me feel even more awkward. So I'm shutting up now.
I have a date with the DMV. (Meltdown mode doesn't happen for no reason.) I need to register my car and it's already late (30 days) and there is all this drama with a surcharge related to a parking ticket that I paid and so hopefully if I prove it was paid they will reduce the high, high amount I owe to register my car. Then I have to take the car to the mechanic and have him smog test it. Which... I don't think I'm going to pass. Boooo. (Then I give the mechanic a million dollars and he fixes it, so I can have the privilege of owning a car. Sigh. At least I've stopped using it. If that makes it better.)
But tonight I got to see Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 and it was heart-warming and perfect. Also, themed-party:
Orville totally totes popcorn in this case.
Laundry is still not done which is SO A PROBLEM, but it has become insolvable. And the headlamp? Is causing me panic. I NEED it this weekend and I'm running out of time to get a replacement. Let's do some brainstorming as to where it can be.
I had it the night of Emily's wedding. I really, really don't think I left it at my aunt's house because she would have found it by now and I've been there since then.
I think I put it back it the "electronics satchel" I travel with. And I think (like Winnie the Pooh, tapping my noggin) I took it out of that satchel when packing for BlogHer because there wasn't enough room for it. I remember thinking at the hostel that I was an idiot not to bring my headlamp to the one place where it's actually necessary.
But I could be creating all these memories like the incident at the library yesterday.
I haven't scoured my room yet because I'm nervous. Sigh. Any ideas? Anyone heard me talk about it or seen it?
I wove the library a very lengthy, detailed yarn about how I returned a library book ("Two Saturdays ago! I remember I was on my phone when I did it!") and I swear I did, but here is the book. Sitting in my library bag by the door.
On Saturday I had a near anxiety attack when all my anxiety triggers combined into a Syndrome-like Attack. I was driving (trigger) my mom's car (trigger) with my mom (trigger), and it's a smaller car (trigger), so when this douchebag started TAILING ME all I could see was the grill of his big, ugly SUV in my rear view mirror. (Trigger.) I'm usually good with those types, I just slow down to a mile under the speed limit and taunt them. But since I was out of my comfort zone in the small car, I didn't even try to taunt him. I just tried to not get hit by him. When we arrive at a unprotected green where we were both turning left, I pulled into the intersection and then waited while an old lady started to cross the street. He starts HONKING while she is still IN THE STREET. That's when I started sobbing. When she was about one third across the street--not to the halfway median, but close enough that a car could maybe pass--he whipped around me to make the left turn.
I stuck my hand out the window to flip him off real good.
Of course, because of the panic attack, I couldn't quite achieve full posture, so it looked more like this:
Managing to feel embarrassed on top of everything else, I pulled through the turn, where I ended up right beside him. (Hey, douchebag, see how you go NOWHERE faster?) His window was down so I yelled, at the top of my lungs:
"YOU'RE AN ASSHOLE!!!!!"
That's when my mom started to panic.
Mom: Pull over the car! You are blinded with rage!
Me: WHAT? HE SHOULD BE IN JAIL. (Still sobbing.)
Mom: Pull over the car. You never should do stuff like that.
Me: I HATE HIM.
Mom: What if he had pulled over and started yelling back at you?
Me: I WANTED HIM TO. THEN THE COPS WOULD HAVE COME AND HE WOULD HAVE PAID.
Mom: What if he had a gun?
Me: I DON'T CARE!!!!!!!!
Then I cried a lot about how he was tailing me and about how I don't want to be scared of driving, but I am, and how I don't want to be scared of her, but I am, and it was all very traumatic.
That's also the first time I've ever flipped anyone off while driving or yelled at another driver. I tend to react with aggressive driving, taunting, or giving the benefit of the doubt. This was new for me. It would have felt good if he had actually suffered. I still feel like I want to follow him and then crush his car with a bat. Poor old lady.
Syndrome was following me around all weekend, trying to ruin me and when I realized I didn't have a ride home from the train station on Sunday night, I could only think of two possible people who could pick me up. In reality, there are at least ten people I could ask, but I was so paralyzed that I could only come up with about four and then I felt too guilty to ask two of them.
The guilt was all-pervading. I felt guilty about asking for a ride on short notice. I felt guilty about the distance (even though I was going to pay for gas). Guilt guilt guilt guilt guilt. So, when the only person available told me to use him as a last resort because he was maybe busy, I couldn't bring myself to use him at all. Guilt. So I paid for a $60 cab ride. Do you hear this? The crazy? I prefer it when my anxiety disorder lays dormant and doesn't ruin my life.
Things have been infinitely better since I got back on my own turf and I haven't cried or felt like it since then. But I'm going out of town this weekend (again! I am addicted to summer!) and I have a million things to do before I leave and I'm throwing a themed party tonight, and I'm going to an Angels game this afternoon. Because I can't say no to fun. (I really can't. I've tried.) I keep telling myself if I make my lists, then I'll be okay from then out because I will just need to follow the lists.
But I don't know where my headlamp is. And I really need to laundry.
So my new favorite thing in life is the Banana Chocolate Vivanno from Starbucks. What? You haven't tried it yet? It's been out since July 15! Get to a Starbucks right away!
I didn't think I'd like it because I think banana splits are gross and bananas only belong in a very select circle of ingredients, but apparently this "cupful of simple ingredients" (that's what it says on the cup) is magical because I LOVE IT.
The simple ingredients:
a whole banana
Protein & Fiber Powder
2% milk (I sub skim milk)
mocha sauce
ice
espresso (optional) (but you're crazy if you don't)
It's 270 calories (or less with the skim). Since I stopped eating food from Starbucks a few months ago, I've been spending less money there which means I can totally afford to have this every day! (Well, almost every day, and by afford, I mean I should be saving this money for something important, but look! I'm saving the economy one Vivanno at a time!)
If you don't like banana mixed with other things, you won't like this, but if you like smoothies with bananas and you like frappuccinos, please try this drink. It is my perfect breakfast. It's sister drink, the Orange Mango Banana Vivanno, isn't bad either.)
Disclaimer: You could totally make this at home. But if you factor in the time and energy it takes to clean a freaking blender AND peel a banana, you are totally saving money by getting this at the 'bucks.
The “Blog” of “Unnecessary” Quotation Marks
quotation-marks.blogspot.com
User-submitted pics of bad quotation mark usage.
"Eric in WA sent me this one. It's like someone wrote this especially for the "blog". I can't think of any other explanation. And what's the deal with the (SAFETY)?"
Cake Wrecks
When professional cakes go horribly, hilariously wrong.
cakewrecks.blogspot.com
"From what I can see, this appears to be a pimp-mobile on a suicide run through a radioactive river of blood - only it's a radioactive river of blood with jaunty blue outlining."
(I found out about these from my MOM!)
It's Ashley IN MY LIVING ROOM. I lured her into my home yesterday as part of my master murder plan. (Don't tell her.)
She wrote on her blog last week that she was looking for interesting things to do in LA and I was like, "um, I LIVE IN LA." (Not that I'm an interesting thing to do, I mean I am, but that's not what I meant, but I'm an interesting thing to see.) She was all, "well we're just driving through" and I was like "what? That's dumb?" And then, through a series of coercive text messages, I convinced her to spend the night at my home. I am so the creepiest person ever.
My biggest concern was that her friend Emily (who is also in my living room) would prevent us from meeting because I am from the scary internet. Turns out Emily is less scared of the internet that anyone I know. She was involved in anime forums fifteen years ago. I think she once attended an anime wedding. (Emily, I'm not making fun of you, promise.)
They're about to leave so I'm giving them tips on which Starbucks to stop at (the ones with Sorbetto), and how to get to Arizona (you go that way, until you get there). Ashley is totally waiting for me to kill her, so I'll wrap this up. If you don't hear from her in a while, you'll know why.
![[seven]](http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3189/2764063177_15f03dd502_m.jpg)
