Zoophoric

So...I guess I'm the only one who likes grainy videos of one-ton hominids appearing out of the Rawandan jungle and scaring the ever-lovin' guano out of a bunch of British photographers? Apparently so. How 'bout these apples? Watch this and tell me it doesn't remind you of sitting in a verrry.....lonnnng....meeting.

Since yesterday was the third Sunday of the month (and I am cheap), we spent a couple of hours cruising around the Natural History Museum, browsing their various bird, bug and bone collections. We were also able to get up close with an American Kestrel (kitty hawk or sparrow hawk), a Screech Owl (so small! so cute! so able to puncture your finger!) and a beautiful, broken-winged and half-blind Red Tailed Hawk. I've written about how much we both love birds, especially birds of prey*, but yesterday was a nice reminder. I grew up going to this museum, the zoo, and of course the beach, so this brings back a lot of good memories for me. What are/were your favorite places to go when you were little?

*Gorgeous, extremely effective pest control and unlikely to poo on your head and ruin a day at the beach or park.

Of Gorillas and great food

I actually have one of my clients to thank for showing me this video last night at our tasting. Did I ever mention that as part of my job, I sometimes get to go and eat food? For free? Really delicious food? And sometimes taste wine? That, my friends, is a Certified Perk, if I ever heard of one. Any rate, last night I was here (don't let the name fool you, they do everything) and there was fooood, glorious food. I actually fasted yesterday so that I would be hungry enough to eat from this menu. Check it out (not if you're hungry, though):

Starters:

• Trio of soups served in espresso cups for a warm 'sip' starter (no spoons needed!): Lobster Bisque, Red Bell Pepper and golden tomato basil soup topped with creme fraiche, cream of Butternut Squash with cinnamon and spices. Winner: Red Bell Pepper!
  
• Sourdough bruchetta topped with balsalmic vinagar reduction, goat cheese, fresh fig.
  
• Grilled tequila-lime shrimp served with drawn butter.
  
• Herb-grilled asparagus wrapped with procscuitto, served with a lightly spiced remulade dip.
  
• Cheese/Polenta Bites topped with osso busco in a wine sauce. Deeelicious, and I don't eat lamb. Ever. (My note about bites: Anything that says "Bite" should be A BITE. Served in a spoon or a neat bit size. There is nothing more awkward than doing this number at a party, "Mmmhmmm..thith ith...rwrreally goodth" because the bite is too big. These were the correct size and came in an unfussy spoon.
• Cherry tomato bite, stuffed with cheese, fresh herbs. Yummy!
  

Salad - Spring Green Pear Salad with caramelized walnuts, pears, feta cheese and a balsamic dressing. *I love this salad, but it's better with a Gorgonzola or a crumbled Stilton.

Main Course:

• Mesquite Grilled Tri Tip, horseradish and salsa. For those of you who aren't familiar with tri-tip - click on that link. If I only ate beef.
  
• Barbeque Chicken Quarter
  
• Cedar Planked Salmon with a brown sugar dry rub.
• Cheese Ravioli in a tomato basil cream sauce.
• Potatoes au gratin, Corn souffle* and bourboun baked beans*, garlic bread
  
• Grilled Vegetable Medley - included portabello mushroom, peppers, heirloom tomatoes, and eggplant. Delicious!
  
• *These two are the owners' family recipes and are easily over a hundred years old. People come in and are offered all kinds of more sophisticated sides, and pick these. I could eat the corn souffle alllll day long - it has fresh baby corn as well as sweetly creamy cornmeal all together. Mmmmm!
  

Dessert:

• Fried Brownie (no, you did not mis-read that....fried brownie) bite with raspberry sauce. Seriously good, and majorly rich - one bite is all you need.
  
• Warm white-chocolate macadamia cookie and vanilla ice cream, fresh berries.
• Veuve Clicquot. Hic!

Good thing I took a long, fast-paced walk afterwards, isn't it? This business can be dangerously delicious.

Somebody call the Supah!

Well, Peter asked me to post a new video report already, no one wants to hear about your cats A-GAIN ...and let me tell you, folks - You do NOT mess with the SightSpeed guy if you know what's good for you. Look what happened to Beyonce and sumo wrestlers everywhere.

Please Note: The last word that got cut off in this report is "resonsibility"...as in, "It was also my responsibility to re-record that video, but the natives were getting restless." Shout-out to guys at the hardwear store: You suck monkey ....fingers for selling me the crappy tools. Just because I have boobies doesn't mean I don't know what I need to get the job done. May your street be torn asunder, blocked off, coated in dirt and covered in large construction vehicles and materials.

Shout-out to my dad: Thanks for teaching me to be comfortable around hand tools. Now if only we could have got to power tools....I'd probably be up in my attic, creating a venting skylight.

Hand-Written Wednesday....sorta

Shhh! This is my tribute to Hand-Written Wednesday! Ok, I admit it, I did this before I knew anything about H.W.W.....but this should give you a tiny taste of what I go through every...single...time a game is on. Turn up your volume.

Glam Squad

Wanna see something funny? Or possibly....really sad? I'd like to blame this video report on bubbly, but sadly that cannot be done. Watch here for the Glam Squad Report that is my life. I mean, job. Embarassing but oh-so-true. Well, its 4:25 a.m. and I have a seven o'clock meeting tomorrow (p.m. not a.m. come on now, I'm not that crazy!)

PS. Please be nice to your waitstaff. They could put bodily fluids in your food. I'm just sayin'.

Short N' Sweet

Hi Everyone! Just a quick note of happiness and love for The SightSpeed Guy. Y'all go on over there and say hi now, o.k.?

Not-so-merry maid

There are those of us who are neat and tidy (See: Chiada, my mom and sister Roni). And there are those of us who....have eight million projects exploding out of our brains at once, all the time. I fall firmly into category B. Here, watch my plea for help on TV. Hey...that rhymes...I could write a poem about being a Walking Disaster! Wow!

However, I've got two new secret weapons: Graciela and Maria.

Friends don't let friends blog without makeup

"Good Morning, EV-RA-BAAAAHHHHDY!"
My old boss used to say that (at top volume) when he entered the office. Since he usually 'came in' at ten or eleven, it was the harbinger of a good rest of the day at work. Sometimes, I miss having office-mates, (of the human persuasion) and familiar, office-y noises and rituals. Like today, when I thought...."Weeeellll shoooot, for all the good this did, I may as well be in an office right now."

Well, I'm off to go slouch at my 'desk'...what was once our dining room table is now mine, all mine, I tell you... and that's the way I like it. Happy Friday to everyone!

PS. Please, please don't tell me what happened on the season premier of Grey's Anatomy. Do not mock the depth and breadth of my love for this show, or I will cut you. Yes, I realize it is completely and utterly laughable (medically speaking), and overly dramatic...and if people really have that much sex in hospitals, no wonder doctors have such high liability insurance. It's my McSeason premier, I will be absurdly excited if I want to.

Facts or Fictions?

Ok, I hereby challenge you: Which of this list is true, and which are complete figments of my imagination? Please note this video was also done in one take, pardon me. No tiempo- forgive me, please. Of course, don't worry, somewhere around mid-November I'll probably be posting twice a day and driving y'all crazy.

Now speaking of later on this year - here are things that will be happening at that time:

a) I turn twenty-seven at the end of November. Twenty-SEVEN years old. I'm wondering if my Official Grownup, I mean, Adult, certificate will be coming in the mail. Judging from that video, probably not, which is fine by me. What is not fine with me is the fact that November is always, without doubt, by far the least attractive of all the pages of the calendar. Trust me on this one.

b) Our Annual Beachfront Death March. Technically, that's the first of next year, but let's not split hairs, ok? Ladies and gentlemen, start your fall training. Real life people: The Annual Big Email will be out before too long, please forward it to anyone you think would be up for the challenge. Please note that dogs are welcome, but cannot ride the bus so you'll need to arrange for alternate transport from Carpinteria back to S.B.

c) I will be shaking my fist at the heavens, as I do every year, because I hate cold weather. Not so much an event as something I can anticipate (and also not control). Once upon a time, I hated September (back to school) - now I just dread The Holiday season, the frenzy, the enforced cheer, the long lines. Call me Scrooge...and that's a fact.

The Shame

Because there are times when simply sprinkling some catnip on their beds or into a sock just isn't enough fun and everyone knows - an embarassed cat is one of the more humourous things on the planet. Fynn's version coming soon.

The Rules

Last weekend, when I was half out of my head with fever, the man who had the table just behind us spent quite some time telling me I needed to go immediately and read "The Proper Care and Feeding of Husbands". I nodded, smiled, and murmured something to the effect of "Aahhh Haaa! I'll definitely look into that... isn't Dr. Laura? I used to come home from third grade and make my mother cry with laughter by making fun of her radio show.." He also informed me of the following: I do not, can not, and will never understand men, due to the facts of my family (no brothers), my job (mostly concerned with women) and my interests. He then proceeded to explain how his wife also didn't understand men, and that "thirty years later, she never will..." I just tried to back away from the crazy.

The other day, I talked about breaking the Eighth Commandment of Wifedom. I got to thinking about that, and wondered to myself, So...where are the rest of the Commandments? What are they? How many of them are there? Here's a rough draft of them, by me:

1. Thou shalt not do everything for thine husband, thereby making him into a large child and you into his mother, and causing much frustration all around.
   
2. Thou shalt not cease caring about thine general appearance, be it removing hair from anywhere it ought not be, getting some excercise or having a facial. However the reason thou shalt care about these things shall be because thou hast respect for oneself and desireth not to look like a bag lady.
   
3. Thou shalt not hint at what one would like done around the house, bedroom or other areas of life. Thou shalt ask directly, more than once if need be.
   
4. Thou shall save much of thine complaints about thine husband for the ear of a single, trusted friend, and not thy parents, thy in-laws, the internet (overmuch) or, heaven forbid, thy husband.
   
5. Thou shall have other interests, seperate friends, and activities, and bank accounts (at least savings) and thine own line of credit. Furthermore, thou shalt encourage thy husband to pursue his own interests, friends and activities, and thou shalt not complain when he wishes to go camping with his friends for a week. That way, the both of ye shall savor those activities which ye do together, and additionally he will not be able to complain when you want to go somewhere for a weekend with your girlfriends.
   
6. Thou shalt make the first move, more than once per annum. Thou shalt also make moves two through ...whatever if need be.
   
7. Thou shalt try to conquer thine own personal issues with fat, clutter, children, skinny-legged pants, substance abuse (cheeses, alcohol, fabric), and too many projects. However, failure at any of these maketh not a bad wife, so do not berate thine self overmuch.
   
8. Thou shalt not disturb the watching of a sporting television program, on penalty of much painful whinging, yea verily, that it may go well with ye and ye shall not have to hear complaining all night about how you do not taketh care of thine husband. Even tho' you haveth the DVR and he doth not misseth a second, you have broken this, the Eighth Commandment of Wifedom, and are therefore doomed to watch ESPN or SportCenter forever and ever, amen.
9. Thou shalt not crush his tender spirit by laughing overly loud when thine husband sings aloud, dances funny, or does strange impersonations. No, but thou shalt instead either applaud or join in. Additionally, thou shall help him to feel good about himself by any means neccessary, be it by coloring his hair, making him take a walk, annointing him with cologne or telling him how adorable he looketh in those clothes.
   
10. Moderation in moderation: Screaming into pillows is perfectly acceptable under the right circumstances, as is retail therapy, three-martini happy hours, and sudden changes in hair style. Under the right circumstances, of course. Taking a walk, of course, would have been wiser.

What say you? Add your rules, make suggestions, challenge me.

Not a Rules Girl....

My Video on The Rules

Fantastic Four Plus Video!

In Which I explain what the hell is wrong with me

Take Four:

Four jobs you have had in your life:
1. Opticians' Assistant - Grinding and trying on glasses was fun, the time this old lady showed me her bumcrack, not so much.
2. Florists' assistant - as we all know, this lead to my current job in events - a definite favorite
3. Office drone/manager for an insurance brokerage - I still "sub" in here and there for the office, they are my friends. (Hellooo, Lindsay!)
4. Wearhouse 'rat' with a bunch of smelly boys and one girlfriend - fun times for a few months.

Four movies you would watch over and over:
1. Ghost World
2. Lost in Translation
3. any Indiana Jones. Yep, I am a dork.
4. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Original version.

Four places you have lived:
Ummmm.... I can list five HOUSES I have lived in. In two towns that are within fifteen miles of each other.
1. Age 0-13.5 - I lived in basically one room of one house - born IN the house, loved the house, still dream of being at/around the house. I hope the mean lady who moved there is happy with her dogs and took good care of my cats who wouldn't 'move' two houses over with us. It seemed so incredibly unfair that our entire family could be so displaced by a single person - and her money.
2. Age 14-17 - Horrid house that took us a lonnnng time to make into a decent house, never comfortable there. My poor mother basically stopped eating here, due to the nice present of a stove with insulation that was soaked in rat piss the prior tenants left us.
3. 17-20 - Actually moved house three times here (from Horrid house to another, nicer house with the exact same floor plan, where we lived for about a year - then from that house to another house, where I lived for about six months, and than to our little studio as newlyweds)
4. Four months after we were married, we moved into our house. My goodness was I sick of moving at that point. These days, I actually wouldn't mind it, just so that I could, (coughs, looks around) get rid of some stuff - you know, things that might not be mine...but are completely taking over my house.

Four TV shows you love to watch:
1. Lost. Why? The 'plot' is hysterically full of holes, the scenery reminds me of our honeymoon and Hawaii in general, and Daniel Dae Kim's cheekbones/Matthew Fox's incredible stubble pretty much kill me. Plus! Sun's pregnant! Baby Turniphead! Television Without Pity Recaps!
2. 24. Need I say it? Next season, I'm definitely playing the 24 drinking game at least once.
3. Grey's Anatomy. Sorry, I know, it's ER meets Allie McBeal, but I love it. Scott makes relentless fun of me for it.
4. The Daily Show or the Colbert Report - toss up!

Four Places you have been on Vacation:
1. England
2. Costa Rica
3. Australia
4. Finland

Four websites you visit daily:
Wouldn't say I go anywhere daily, but 99 percent of the days, I go to:
1. Most of the sites on my links. It's true... I do, I really, really, do - that's why I made the links -because I'm far too lazy to type. in. the. actual. websites.)
2. Santa Barbara Wedding Guide
3. MSN/BC, en route to check on email accounts

Four of my favorite foods:
1. Indian. Seriously, bring on the curries, the masalas and the Mango lhassi. Aloo gobi me. Take me to your garlic naan and let there be chutney and the smooshy peas.
2. Chocolate
3. Ok, really....All fruits except papaya. Papaya, despite being the only word that I know of that rhymes with my name, is horrid and disgusting and quite slimy.
4. Ice cream. Technically, the following: -cinnamon ice cream with chocolate chunks and bits of oatmeal, or plain chocolate or blueberry from Double Rainbow, or mango mochii.

Four places I would rather be right now:
1. The Land of Good Health
2. Costa Rica - it couldn't be any hotter than it is now, plus there are monkeys and iguanas and things like that.
3. The beach - our beach would be fine, actually.
4. A cool pool. Anywhere would do, as long as I felt better.

> Four friends I am tagging that I think will respond…..
1. Chiada, because I will nag her until she does and she'll get all concerned and list-y and do it.
2. My sister, because....above?
3. Chiefbiscuit?
4. Janet? I couldn't say.

Four Places you’d love to visit (with money)
1. Prague.
2. Italy
3. Thailand
4. New Zealand/Bali (we'll pretend it's a Pan-Asian tour?)

Four foods you don’t like:
1. Most sushi - mostly bad memories, but suffice it to say that one bad boyfriend really and truly ruined sushi for me in a far more lasting way than say, bad food poisoning.
2. Beef and most pork= Tummy ache for me!
3. Salmon. Gahh!! People are always saying, "oh, people who don't like fish, loooove salmon, its not fishy at alllll." No. That is not true. Salmon is the spawn of eeevile, and it tastes like nothing BUT fish. I love fish, but please, I beseech you, do not make me eat your "special salmon" - I have tried everyone's 'special salmon', and it tastes like what I imagined it would: Salmon. Which is akin to me saying quite a rude word, but this is supposed to be a family-friendly blog.

Listie

Video, Take Two

Whatdya guys think? I get thirty seconds. This took like seven or eight tries. Gaaah!

Ok.. part B of this entry: This afternoon consisted of the following:

• Helping Scott do 'sound reinforcement' in (what felt like) seventy thousand degrees at this lovely spot. Alice Keck Park. To be entirely honest, I've never actually felt perspiration run down the back of my legs - at least not that I can recall; not in Costa Rica where the humidity is at least 90 percent, not in Australia in mid-March, not in Finland or Demark during the heat wave that killed a bunch of elderly people in France...nowhere. If you haven't experienced this, I reccomend that you miss it, at all costs.
• We ran home immediately after the happy couple said their "I dos" and I stood in the cold shower for about fifteen minutes to cool down, after which we followed up with a session in front of the fan. Ahhhhhhhh!
• Took in Pirates of the Caribbean, part the second (and a homemade "Blushin' Russian" - that's pink lemonade and vodka for those of you who thought I smuggled a shy Eastern European into the theater/re with me) followed by sending a friend a text message that read, in part, "Yo ho ho and a bottle of vodka..."
  
• Had a lovely dinner at Jacks' and a 'muy romantico!' walk on the beach with The Mooshi, picked up the latest copy of Santa Barbara Magazine to visit one of my wedding couples over a shot of wheatgrass juice. Mmmmm!
• Watched Donnie Darko. Finally. Of course the opening five notes solidified it as "one of the best movies ever" for Scott .... (Echo & the Bunnymens' "Killing Moon", for those of you who aren't familiar)
  

Quickie... Now With Updates

Check This Out

Again a big thanks to Pete over at SightSpeed for setting my new video blog-capable SightSpeed Account up for me - I am without doubt the least tech-savvy Mac addict in the world. I'll be posting a video as soon as someone... (cough) stops hovering over my shoulder like a fart in a trance.

Poll Number One: What color(s) do you think I should do my hair on Monday?

Poll Number Two: What could/should I do with thirty seconds of video? Please - G or PG rated suggestions, ok? I have family that reads this blog.

See you later!