Favorite Pastime of the Unemployed

Enjoying coffee at various cafes with friends, especially ones who are also unemployed or have flexible work schedules...

This delicious latte and hot chocolate were from Amandine, a place also with delicious croissants!

It's All A Sham

A knock on my bathroom door as I finish brushing my teeth. The bf peeps his head in.

BF: I want some cookies.
Me: Um, ok. You want me to bake you some?
BF: :)

I wander over to the kitchen and whip out the frozen Otis Spunkmeyer cookie dough from Costco.

Me: You know, you can bake these yourself too.
BF: ???
Me: They're precut. You just plop them on the cookie tray with parchment paper.
BF: That's it?! And here I thought you baked them from scratch every time! I thought you were slaving over them.
Me: Uh no.... How did you think I was able to bake them so quickly every time?
BF: It was all a lie!

Dragging My Sorry Sick Ass To A Couple More Fun Things

My body is waging an all out war for me. The actual cold may be gone, but it left a parting gift of continuous coughing that has ravaged my voice. And perhaps some dizzy spells and a stomach virus just for kicks. So that I'm reduced to pretty much eating baby foods like rice porridge, soup, jello, applesauce, and if I'm lucky some bread every other day so that my stomach won't freak out and reject it right back. God I miss ice cream. And pies. And perhaps a big ole steak. At least my lack of ability to go work out will be balanced out by this necessary diet. Pooh.

Despite all that, I still had plans nearly every night this week, including two concerts to attend, concerts that I should have gotten out of to rest, but didn't really want to.

On Tuesday, I joined Sly and the other Banger Sister to see Orange Lights at the Viper Room. Yup, thee Viper Room of River Phoenix's death fame. I forgot how tiny it is. It was a chilly night, walking along the Sunset strip, but I wanted to see Orange Lights because they sound a lot like Coldplay, they could be the next big band, and it was at a small venue. The music didn't disappoint, and hey Sly got free vodka and a press pass to take pictures of the band.

Last night, I saw Swell Season, the band that consists of the two leads from one of my favorite movies of the year, Once. Though I had tickets for general admission floor at the Wiltern, all I wanted to do was sit and enjoy this mellow music. I found seats in the back near the bar but the sold out concert had so many people there, that I often only had a little window between someone's head, under another's person arm, or through the spaces between a couple's necks in order to see part of the band. I even whacked some guy on the arm with my purse when he walked over and stood right in front of my chair. He quickly moved away.

Glen Hasard, the Irish male lead loves to chatter and explain the back story for a good minute or two for each song. It makes him as endearing as Marketa is sweet and cute with her delicate voice. I would definitely watch them again if they decide to continue as a band once the fervor of the movie has died down.

With little sleep and a continually queasy stomach and light head, I went to see the play History Boys at the Ahmanson Theater this afternoon. Luckily Sly drove. The play takes place in the 80's and in between the stage acting, they bridge the segues with black and white pre-filmed sequences set to 80's music like Duran Duran and Depeche Mode. It's a little jarring and strange but overall the play was compelling. It involved things I know nothing about, such as prepping for university in England, all boy Catholic schools, and sad to say, history, one of my poorest academic subjects next to chemistry.

It was a draining week but fun nonetheless. And I wonder why I'm not getting any better.

Mi Casa Es Su Casa

I love my eating out, traveling the world, buy what makes me happy (within reason) lifestyle too much to buy a home. My parents however have hounded me with home ownership as diligently as they've hounded me with business school. So far, I've succumbed to neither plea.

Today, I met my friend M. Night (we call him that because he is seriously M. Night Shymalan's doppelganger, much to his chagrin) for lunch at a cute little bistro type restaurant, Piknic, in Playa Vista. It's a new city that sprouted up in the Westside, touted as the first new community development in LA in over fifty years. There was definitely some careful planning and thought that went into this little village and I was kinda won over by the layout, the mix of residential and commercial space, and the sense of community (even if it was calculated more so than natural).

My dream home if I really had my way includes a porch with rocking chairs, a swimming pool, game room, sound proof room for my piano and a drum set, central AC, and walk in closets. Never mind all the other basics. BUT, all of a sudden, I thought "I would live here." It's brand new, close to the ocean, the temperature is divine, everything I need is within walking distance, freeways are still close enough, AND work is still only ten to fifteen minutes away. If I had to fork over something like four hundred thousand dollars for a one bedroom apartment, this would be the type of place I'd like. M. Night even mentioned that they had a pretty good program for first time buyers. Also, check out all this foolproof technological upgrades they include in every home. Drool...

The catch? There always is... Um, it's built on some crazy hotbed of methane gas AND ancient Indian burial grounds. I'm normally not THE most paranoid superstitious person there is, but that is asking for some seriously bad juju right there. I am NOT down with angry evil spirits, gas explosions, or pissed off environmentalists. Nor should consulting a shaman for the blessing of my home be on the required checklist of "Things a Homeowner Needs to do Before Buying the Place." Guess I'll be a renter for awhile longer.

Mind (and Appetite) of a Child

I have the appetite of an eight year old but stuck with the metabolism of a thirty-one year old. It's all pretty unfortunate. At our work, we have free catered lunches every other Friday and I remember suggesting a kid's themed lunch for one of the Fridays. You know, hot dogs, corn dogs, JELLO, chicken nuggets, fruit punch... that kinda stuff. The office manager looked at me as if I were criminally insane.

Like the gazillions of other kids and adults around the globe, I embarked on the ten hour marathon of reading the last Harry Potter book this past weekend. (LOVED IT!) Nutrition went out the window as I scrambled for whatever was in the fridge. Two hot dogs with buns equaled dinner. Dryer's Dibs equaled dessert. Oops dropped one on the floor. Three second rule, picked it back up, we're good!

Work Hard, Play Hard

In the past week, I broke my rule of not working past 8pm every night. And to make up for the extra work and stress, I went out and socialized even more than usual, running the gamut from a rock concert to the ballet, to loud bars and an art show. I am exhausted.

Monday: Since Wavy is soon leaving SoCal, we decided she had to eat at Mulberry Street Pizza, hands down the best New York style pizza out here. When given the choice between Pinkberry and the Gelato shop for dessert, we stood in the middle of the street debating. I caved in to the more fattening gelato.

Tuesday: I was all dressed in my running gear, ready to meet up with Jigaho at the track, when Polar Opposite friend called. "It's raining. Let's just all have dinner instead." So instead of exercising, we headed to Tofu-Ya where I scarfed down a hearty meal of Soon Tofu and Bulgogi, washing it down with a Pinkberry frozen yogurt. I was the only one to eat EVERYTHING. I am like a goldfish that doesn't know how to stop eating what's in front of me.

Wednesday: Hit the Troubadour with Sly and another friend to see The Bravery. I only knew this song below and their latest single "Time Won't Let Me Go" but heard they were great live.


The lead singer is a little funny looking but his voice is a cross between Robert Smith of The Cure and a little bit of Morissey. I hung back at the bar where I could sit down and be the old lady that I am but I still enjoyed the energy of the band and its rabid fans packed together up front.

Thursday: I had friends in town this weekend, one of whom was the couple from Vegas. Since I was traditionally the "stunt double" who took the wife out to the ballet, we carried on the tradition and left the boys to fend for themselves (I think they went to watch turtle races at some local bar. Go figure.) Luckily the Joffrey Ballet was in town this same weekend and we caught Program A, the more classical of the two programs with music from actual Russian composers like Stravinsky. None of that modern dance stuff with people plopping around barefoot.

Friday: Another friend in town. This town, I met up with the college crew in Little Tokyo where we ate at a place that left us as hungry as we started. Izakaya Haru Ulala is a traditional Japanese tapas place, serving different food in tiny little dishes. Unfortunately, each dish took about 10 minutes to come out at a time.

We cut our losses about an hour later, making our way to Broadway Bar to meet up with more friends. (On a completely unrelated note, they were holding "So You Think You Can Dance" auditions next door at the Orpheum theater and I really really wanted to sneak in and watch instead of hanging out at a bar.) After straining my voice for about half an hour trying to talk over the loud music, we hopped to the next bar. Golden Gopher was more crowded and since some of us were still starving, drinking wasn't a great idea either. At least there were more interesting people to look at.

Sometimes, especially on weekends like this, I feel like I've lost any last bits of socializing skills I ever had. I never know what to do with bars. I rarely drink at bars because I know I'll have to drive myself somewhere else. I have a hard time talking loudly over the usual decibel level. I hate small talk. And, well, if you just sit there not drinking and not talking at a bar, really what's the point?

Anyway, we ended the night at a King Taco in downtown, a place I've managed to never notice or hear of the whole time I've lived in LA, probably because I've never liked Mexican food. Fortunately, this place was authentic and delicious. They had good meat and horchatas! Success.

Saturday: I promised the whole day to the Vegas couple. So I had brunch with them and another couple friend, followed them around for some shopping, had dinner at Typhoon (an Asian-fusion place that actually serves insects as part of their menu.) and attended his Art Show opening with an assortment of coworkers and former coworkers. Yay.

We went across the street to a bar called Good Hurt, where the bartenders dress like naughty nurses and a couple of very loud and not so good bands played on stage. Seeing that I had just endured loud bars the night before, I stuck in some ear plugs and sat down for awhile. (Yes I bring ear plugs with me everywhere in case I go to impromptu concerts.) As an added bonus a trio of bad burlesque dancers came on stage to do two numbers. After that, I was ready to go.

When another awful band started warming up, I stood up and said "I'M LEAVING." Surprisingly enough, the whole group followed me out. But as they loitered around outside of the bar chatting and saying their goodbyes, the cranky old lady in me snapped and in my head I thought "Ok, I'm done here" and I walked off. Just like that. The exhaustion, the cold, and the smoke swirling around me finally did me in. The week was done. And I was in bed soon after midnight.

Mortification, Violence, and Gluttony

Last night, I dodged out of work before 7 and met up with friends to see Get Mortified. It's a show where people are invited to read their journals, letters, random poetry, etc from junior high and high school to a live paying public. Thus, the mortification.

It was a last minute decision to drag myself all the way to Hollywood, but I had been feeling kind of bummy and figured going out and being around friends was the way to go. Oh and laughing at other people's pain from 20 years ago. That's always fun. It puts everything into perspective - my silly diaries from the first one at age 8 all the way to the current one. All fourteen of them filled with questions, angst, complaints, hopes, and fears. Some more melodramatic than others. But all equally mortifying and eye opening as a chart for emotional growth.

Tonight, though I'm starting to feel tired and achy, I left early once again to watch a hockey game. My Spelling Bee friend offered me free Kings game tickets from her firm. Since I love watching live hockey games and I especially love free seats close enough to smell the ice, I continued the going out trend of keeping busy and being around friends.

I took the biggest hockey fan friend I knew, and we crawled through traffic to Staples Center, missing the entire first period but still enjoying a huge part of the exhilarating game. I love their brawls, the players flying across the ice, the sound of the players getting smacked into the plexiglass... and the beauty of it all is they just get up right away and keep going. No whining or flopping on the ground hoping to get a foul call from the referee. It's nonstop action and the perfect sport for people with ADD.

Being at the Staples Center, I also indulged the moody, achy me with some McDonald's. Something I've rarely had in the past couple of years, but still really love. However, I went a bit overboard. Quarter pounder with cheese, fries AND a hot fudge sundae (because I need to dip my fries in something!). OH it was a sinfully delicious and enjoyable meal but I'm going to pay dearly for it tomorrow I'm sure. To compensate, I came home and ate a whole orange and chased it with some Tylenol. That should make it all better, right?

New Addiction

Thanks to Wavy, not only is the song "Pop, Goes My Heart!" still stuck in my head, I'm also addicted to Pinkberry, the latest frozen yogurt craze here in LA. Supposedly, it's healthier at only 20 calories each and I AM eating it with fruit. The first time I had it, I hated it. It was too tart for my humongous sweet tooth. Now, I want it EVERYDAY. It's all part of my grand "diet." Hmmm, maybe the diet thing isn't so bad...

V-Day

Got into a bit of a baking frenzy for V-Day. Chocolate cupcakes for my friends, and a bundt cake for the coworkers.



Icing cupcakes and adding the sprinkles is the best part. I had leftovers so I gave some of them to people I like at work. Ah, the joy of playing favorites... Guess who didn't get one?

Vegas, Baby, Vegas

This is the only picture I took in Vegas this weekend, sunset outside the Primm outlet mall, as the cars from Los Angeles crossed the Nevada border.

It was a low key, yet interesting trip to visit a couple friend of mine. The husband was a trusted work friend, my daily coffee buddy and work confidante. His wife was a cool girl friend I could watch chick flicks with. We barely had anything in common with completely opposite upbringings and personalities, but we complemented each other and shared the same sense of loyalty and stubborn dislike of injustices, being Libras and all. She was the one that would try to get me drunk every time, but also the one that would always keep an eye on me, keep me safe, ward off any strange men, and make sure I had a good time without getting too sick by the time they dropped me off at home.

They lived a block away and often invited me over for dinner and a movie. He called me his stunt double when I'd go out with his wife to attend all the free ballets she scored from work. It was almost what you'd call a perfect relationship amongst the three of us. So when they broke the news to me last year that they were moving to Vegas for her job, she asked "Are you mad at us? Will you ever talk to us again?"

The first thing they hit me with after flying in Friday night was "we have something to tell you." For the past few years whenever anyone says that to me, my first response is always "You're engaged." or "You're pregnant." Because really, what other big news in our age group warrants such an anticipatory announcement? But then she threw me off and stood up, as if she were going to walk off and fetch something to show me. So I said nothing. Then she unbuttoned her jeans and showed me her flat little tummy. Still I said nothing. (Trust me, you don't want to err on these assumptions.)

I looked back at her, thinking "well, my unpregnant stomach looks a hell of a lot bigger than her allegedly pregnant one. This sucks." I looked at the smiling couple again and said "No. No way." They kept beaming. And I was floored. Only a few months ago, she had confided that she was fairly confident they weren't going to have kids. And she responded "well, it was always going to be zero or two."

After luxuriously sleeping in till 11 the next morning (though waking up in the middle of the night anyway), we hit the outlet mall to buy her some new clothes. How surreal is it to help your friend buy tops that could work as regular tops and maternity wear? Especially when you're wearing those same types of tops because they're in style AND they hide that extra ice cream sundae or burger you've been eating. Another humbling moment.

Shopping wiped us out. And the way the desert that is Las Vegas saps every ounce of moisture from your body is unnerving. We were constantly drinking water and going to the bathroom every hour. We managed to see a very Vegas like musical comedy show Saturday night - Gordy Brown at the Venetian hotel. (Yay, it was free!) And we squeezed in the movie Pan's Labyrinth this afternoon. (What a beautiful, unique, creepy, and sad movie all in one! A must see.)

The best part of the weekend was knowing that these two are the only people who will give me no pressure to wake up by a certain time on the weekend nor stick to a strict schedule. We lounged, they cooked delicious meals for me like the good old days, and we sipped lattes from their fancy schmancy espresso machine that puts Starbucks and Coffee Bean to shame.

The bad part? Seeing how I was bigger than the pregnant woman, hungering every two hours like the pregnant woman, running to the bathroom and waking up during the night as much as the pregnant woman and often tired in between going out like the pregnant woman. Sympathy symptoms?

This trip will always be exciting and fun - going to Vegas and not spending the whole time on the strip for the first time, being one of the first few friends to know their secret and having to keep quiet to our mutual friends about it for another 6-8 weeks. BUT it's also the trip that marks the beginning of my first ever diet. A sad resignation to age and slowing metabolism, cutting back on my great love of SUGAR.

To put it into perspective of how difficult this is going to be, as a child, a relative once told me (incorrectly) that if I kept eating so much sugary things, I'd get diabetes and never be able to eat sugar again. And I stubbornly responded "I will die without sugar. I guess I'll just have to die then." Ironically, the fear isn't so much of death. It's the fear of being alive but constantly unhappy with myself that's going to drive me.

It's October!

Since I was a kid, October has always signified the start of good things. Happy times. Good food. My birthday kicks it off in October, followed by the holiday involving gobs of candy. Then there is my brother's birthday, my dad's birthday and Thanksgiving in the next month. For December, the whole month is just a countdown to Christmas, with my parents' anniversary wedged in between, and finally my mom's birthday on the last day of the year. I can't help but be happy the last three months of the year since it means gifts - giving and receiving them - family, and friends. I'm almost depressed come January and the rest of the other 8 months.

Today, I am happy. Happier than I have been in a long time. My belly is stuffed full of some of the best food I've ever tasted, I've spent a very relaxing day with a great friend, and I've had a lovely weekend away from work.

On Friday, I received my first birthday gift - a beautiful knitted hat
from UBBF which I've stowed away in my purse and already worn this weekend. Last night, I joined a couple of work friends, a different group from the usual cliques, to watch The Science of Sleep, which I loved and also perfectly encapsulated how zany and emotional your dream life can be.

For this first day of October, it sprinkled rain and stayed coolly overcast all day. Just the way I like it most of the time. Wavy helped kick off the birthday month with brunch at Coral Tree Cafe and treated me to a massage at The Massage Place. Both brunch and massage were amazing. Suitably oiled up from the massage, we wandered over to Century City Mall, trying on overpriced t-shirts, and strolled around until dinner.

Dinner was the best part. Out of pure serendipity, we parked in front of Katsuya before brunch. We knocked on the door to make dinner reservations to the chagrin of the hostess, giving us an annoyed "can't you see we're not open yet and I'm busy typing on my chic laptop?" kind of look. Luckily that was the only snobbery we encountered the rest of the day in the shishi town of Brentwood.

I can't even begin to describe how wonderfully scrumptious the food was. The dish on the right is the seared salmon and avocado wrapped in tempura while the dish with the leaf is spicy tuna on crisped rice.












Tom Hanks, his wife Rita Wilson and their kids dined two tables away. Peter Gallagher from the OC, ate with his family in the next room over and made a point of stopping by Tom Hanks' table to say hi. We didn't try very hard not to stare.




All in all, a perfect day. In the end, the best part was spending a whole day with Wavy. And the best gift was the gift of her time.

Scottish Rockers

Citing the reason that his "throat fell out", the lead singer of Snow Patrol, explained why the concert had been postponed from June until now. Back in June, when life felt so different from now, I was going to go to the concert with a certain redheaded Irish boy whom I had a latent crush on for years.

Now in September, said redheaded Irish boy was visiting the motherland of Ireland. Luckily good ole Bizarro twin stepped in to save the day. She introduced me to the wonders of Silver Lake as I fumbled my way through the hilly and confusing hipster town, trying to find one of her favorite Vietnamese joints Pho Cafe. I swear this place was as fast as a McDonald's drive-thru but with better food.

After another great pep talk and quick catch up with our lives, we made it into the Wiltern at the tail end of the 2nd opening band Augustana and found a spot standing smack in the middle of the place. To my surprise, instead of the usual short and slight, trendy Indie music crowd, the crowd was littered with tall white folks. I mean, it looked like a frat and their Amazonian blond women. Not that I have anything against tall white folk, but I've never had so much trouble seeing over the crowd to catch a glimpse of the band. I guess this means the band has really made it.

It was sold out, no crazy people around me (though the couple blocking my view should have got a room), no pot smokers, and no rabid fans with the urge to bellow out inane song requests or I love yous every five minutes. To top it off, Snow Patrol actually sounded really clean and strong live. At the end, the lead singer got into the moment and started taking off his sweat drenched shirt. And nothing beats the sight of a cute scrawny Scottish rocker prancing around shirtless and singing his little heart out.



Feed a Cold or Starve a Fever?

After nearly two months of 60+ hour weeks at work, my body has had enough and broken down. I'm congested, kinda achy, and want to sleep all the time. The nice thing is it's my get out of jail free card. No one bats an eye when I leave before 7 these days. The bad thing is breathing and coughing are kind of an issue.

I made plans this week long ago when I didn't realize the craziness would still be going on. Despite the slight cold, I joined some girl friends for Dine Out week at Windows in downtown. The view was amazing.









Sly kept joking that Citysearch had rated this place as "very romantic" and periodically brought that up during dinner. Though it was a quiet Tuesday night, it felt like a special occasion to be out on the town eating a delicious meal and enjoying good conversation with friends.

Apparently I was feeding a cold, because even though I was with girls who could eat (no picking at salads type girl friends for me!), I polished off my 3 course meal - from calamari to steak to a brownie sundae ala mode, the size of 3 CD covers - shocking even myself. It was not pretty. But sooooooo worth it.






A Quick Note on Hawaii

I have tons of pictures to share, but that will be another longer post for another longer night. For now, the highlights: seeing a beautiful rainbow while driving across part of the island (see picture on the left), McDonald's fried apple pies, finding Whatchamacallit bars at stores everywhere, snorkeling, and living with all my old roommates again, one last time before everything changes forever.

Sweets

They opened a Beard Papa's near my parents' house and now down the street from my apartment!!! Must go and visit the cream puffs tonight.

Now if they'd only open up a Tea Station/Ten Ren Tea near my apartment, life would be complete. I'd be happy as a pig wallowing in mud. Probably as fat as one too.

A Night of Elvis and Britpop

It's the third time this year I've visited Thai Elvis at the Palms Thai restaurant in Hollywood. If only me@co had had her date there tonight, the evening would have been perfect! Heh heh...
It's decent Thai food for a good price; plus it was just down the street from the Henry Fonda Theater, where Vaj and I had tickets for Keane.
Since the people at Palms Thai are crazy quick about getting you in and out of the restaurant with food served within 10 minutes of your order, we had time to kill before the concert at 9 pm. I decided to drag Vaj down the street to Lickety Split Frozen Custard, hoping it would be as scrumptious as Scooter's in Chicago. After circling Hollywood Bl a couple of rounds, we decided that I'd run in to get some, while Vaj stayed in my illegally parked car. "It's alright. I don't mind. I understand. You're a chick and it's icecream," he said. And this is why I love Vaj.
Unfortunately, nuts... it was so not worth it. Scooter's Frozen Custard it is not.
We got into the theater just after 9 pm and caught the last two songs of opening act, Kid Beyond. He looked like a 40ish year old bald man, likely running one of those scary boot camp workouts while working as a motivational speaker on the side. Armed with what seemed like his Mac and the program Garage Band, he was a one man show, looping his own recordings live as his music and background vocals. My dislike for Kid Beyond was instant and Vaj laughed at how strongly and quickly I reacted to this odd musician.
Keane, however, was so good I'm running out to buy the album as soon as I can. The band started their show dramatically with its U2-esque spotlighting (ala Rattle and Hum) on the keyboardist and the lead singer. The crowd cheered at every song and SCREAMED every time the band played a song from their first album, Hopes and Dreams. And except for their penchant for seizure inducing flashing lights and occasionally blinding the audience with spotlights, I was impressed with the stage lighting and color sequences that were chosen. (I notice these things because one of my old bosses used to be a lighting roadie for the Jimmy Buffet tour)
Never have I seen such a grateful and genuinely appreciative band of their audience. The lead singer Tom, who resembles a 6 year old ruddy, round-faced English school boy, managed to sincerely thank all of the audience and the city of Los Angeles no less than half a dozen times. I was also amazed to see that their music consists of only keyboards and drums. I could have sworn some of those sounds from the keyboard were the wails of a guitar.
Their crowd was equally entertaining to watch. Vaj and I spent much of the concert watching the exuberant and perfectly coifed Asian boy in front of us. Throughout the show, this boy waved his hands and bopped his head like a cross between an orchestra conductor and a wannabe gangsta rapper. Amazingly enough, his girlfriend didn't seem embarrassed to be there with him. And of course there was the loud and possibly drunk guy a few persons back, who yelled "F*CK YEAH!!!!" every 5-10 minutes from beginning to end.
I didn't feel as old at this concert as I did at the Arctic Monkeys one. However, I still proudly wore my earplugs, and stumbled out of the venue, rubbing my sore back from standing so long, blinking hard from the eye strain of the flashing lights.

Advantages of Being A Grown-Up

Today:
Sleeping in till 1:30pm
Eating two desserts and an ice blended coffee for my afternoon snack
Watching as much E True Hollywood Stories as I want on a Saturday afternoon

Last night, I joined some old college friends for an evening of delicious fried chicken at Honey's Kettle Fried Chicken and dancing at Firecracker in Chinatown. The fried chicken was awesome of course. And Firecracker has gotten quite diverse in its crowds since I went years ago before the huge revival of Chinatown. We enjoyed some jazz downstairs, some dancing upstairs, and when we were ready to call it a night...a bunch of obnoxious drunk people sat down at our table for some conversation. They were friends with one of the girls in our group and relatively harmless.
As we yawned and tried to find a polite way to exit, Girlsnob pointed out the guy next to her and said something like "this guy is into glowsticking," got up, and walked to the side of the table to talk to her boyfriend, indicating that she was ready to leave. I got up and followed suit, as did Hungry Monster, leaving the other 2 girls still at the table with the hooligans. I asked if we should rescue Misocrazy but HM thought she didn't need rescuing. Girlsnob looked at us and said "one of the best things about growing up is being able to say... whatever comes to mind."
Though I don't think she meant spewing out any and all thoughts without filtering, it really got me thinking. The whole time I had thought growing up meant learning to hold your tongue. For years, I naively opened my mouth to share whatever thought or opinion that popped into my head, inadvertently offending people and causing misunderstandings left and right. And for years, I didn't even realize I was doing it. Friends who knew me shrugged it off and figured "That's just her. She says things. She means no harm." It was a tough thing to realize and rectify.
Now that we're out of our twenties, does that mean I can regress? Can I go back to not caring and saying whatever I damn well feel like? Because THAT would be a wonderful advantage of being a grown-up.

Random Contradictions

See these roses? They're beautiful and they're right outside my front door. Obviously, I don't take care of them or duh, they'd be dead since I don't like to go near plant life. A couple of weeks ago I'd walk up and down my doorstep to rose petals strewn every which way - nature's way of making me smile everyday as the roses bloomed and then shed its petals everywhere. I don't like most plants (it's gonna take a special guy to figure out which nonscary flowers to get me one day...) but I appreciate these roses.
This afternoon I also rewatched Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith on cable. I don't care what anyone says. It may not be the best movie ever, but I STILL LIKE IT. I still get sad at the whole Padme/Anakin storyline (he turned evil trying to save her!!! He had good intentions...) and I like how everything kinda ties together. It's so bleak but it gets the job done amidst some pretty special FX eye candy. Yes, I'm a hopeless romantic and a big geek. If it has some kind of love story in it, I'm hooked.
To cap off the afternoon of cable movie watching, I had pizza and ice cream for dinner with the parents. Yeah, they rock. My mom made sure to pack some good homecooked meals for me, but then she was all over the ordering of pizza and picking up a half gallon of Baskin Robbins icecream. This is where I get my eating habits from... And this is why even though I hate running and I hate mornings, I have to get up at 7 to run.