Choose To Shine

Perimeter

2011-04-05T21:06:00.000-04:00

I feel, about my work right now, like an animal that's been kept in a cage for a long time, and learns certain rules and ways of existing, and then suddenly, you let them out into the wild, with all this freedom, and it doesn't know what to do with itself, and therefore stays in the same kind of space as the cage and keeps the same behaviors as before. It's even more frustrating to know this is happening and recognize it, but still feel like there's not much to do.

So many of my work skills were not utilized at all in the last nearly 4 years that I'm rusty. I forget how to do things, to juggle multiple tasks and priorities, to do long term planning. And that's damn embarrassing. I knew it was true, which is part of why it was so so time to leave my old job. But now that I'm in a new place, it's all becoming so apparent. And I"m sure it's not so apparent to everyone else, but it feels really scary to me. I don't know how much of my anxiety I should share yet, because I"m still trying to make a good impression, and learn, and impress, and I know that they think I'm talented and want my skills or else they wouldn't have hired me, and I can tell by the way they talk to me. So I don't want to give them a reason to doubt me, but I also want to be realistic. I think I have to not verbal diahrrea my concerns this early, give it time to learn, but be realistic about the things and tasks I DO need help with, without seeming like an insecure know-nothing.

It's mentally taxing in a completely different way, to be the newbie, to not know the rules, the group dynamics, when to push, when to step back, when to just say yes and when to chime in.

RVA Food and Drink Happy Hour Specials FALL 2010

2010-10-20T16:32:00.002-04:00

Richmond Food and Drink Specials. Happy Hour and More!
Anytime

Acacia: Prix Fix menu-$23 M-Th 5:30-9pm Fri&Sat 5:30-6:30pm. 562-0138
Amici: Sun-Thur $25 3-course meal. Bottled wine 25% off. 353-4700
Blackfinn: 7 days a week, 4-7pm $4.95 flatbread pizza. 643-3466
Bouchon: $20 3-course prix fixe menu 5-6 pm Mon-Sat. 225-2118
Café Caturra: Social Hour Daily 5-9 pm $5 wines by the glass & $3 beers
Caliente: Happy Hour at the bar M-Th 5-7. $1 Miller High Life, $3 rail highballs and Jager shots. 340-2920
The Camel: Happy Hour 5-7pm. $2.50 rail, $3 drafts, $5 cosmos & martinis, $7 Long Islands.
Current: Happy hour 5pm-8pm with appetizer specials. $1 Drink Power Hour 8pm-9pm. 788-4281
Davis and Main: 1/2 price well martinis from 4-6pm M-F. 353-6641
Dot’s Back Inn:”Neighborhood Hour” 3:30-7pm. $2.50 10oz drafts, $2.25 domestic, $3 highballs, $3 house wine. 266-3167
Europa: M-F 5-6pm. 1/2 off all Small Plates. 643-0911
Fish Bowl Bistro & Bar: Happy Hour 3-7pm daily. $2 off rails and drafts
Garnett’s: M-Sun Happy Hour 3-6. $3 beer and wine. 367-7909
Globehopper: M-F 4-7pm. $2 off wine by the glass. Discount beers. 523.8083
Grandpa Eddie's Alabama Ribs & BBQ: M-F 4-7pm Sun 12-6, $2 Miller Lite draft, House highballs, House wine, fried onion straws or okra, smoked kielbasa. 270-RIBS
Kitchen 64: Daily specials 3-7 pm. Rail Drinks:$4, Domestic Bottles:$2. Smoking is allowed on the patio after 10pm. 358-0064
Lemaire: Happy Hour M-F at the bar and lounge 4-7 pm. $2 House and $4 Craft and Import Beers. $5 Red and $5 White glasses of featured wine. 3 appetizers for $20 from our bar menu 4-7pm and 10-11pm. 3 courses for $30 From 5- 6pm: 649-4644
Mojo’s: $6 dine-in lunch, incl beverage. M-F 11am-3pm. M-F 4-7pm $1 off All Drafts, $3 House Drinks, $3 Glasses of Wine. Any Nachos $5. Any Pizza $6.
Nacho Mama’s Mechanicsville: Fiesta Hour M-F 3-7pm. 730-7311
O’Toole’s: Daily M-Sun 3-7pm All Draft and Bottled Beers $.50 off. All House Wines $.50 off. All House Liquors $1.00 off. 233-1781
Poe’s Pub: Everyday 4-7 pm $2.25 domestic bottles, $1 off drafts. 648-2120
Sam Miller’s: $2 10oz Miller Lite, $3 House Wine 4-8pm. 644-5465
Six Burner: $24 prix fix menu M-Th 5:30-9:30pm. 353-4060
Strawberry Street Café: M-Sun Happy Hour til 9pm. $2.50 highballs, $3 martinis, $2.25 domestic bottles. 353-6860
Stronghill Dining Company: Happy Hour M-F til 7:30 pm. $6 wine, 25% off appetizers at the bar. 359-0202
Tarrant’s Cafe: Happy Hour 4-7 M-F.1/2 off drafts, wine glasses, rail drinks.1/2 off select appetizers. 225-0035
Tobacco Company: Th-Sat, $1 drinks from 8-9 pm, $4 Red Stag Cocktails and $4 Red Bull or White Grape Cocktails all night (always mobbed in there at happy hour though). Free valet parking during dinner hours and all day on Sunday. 782-9555
Weezie's Kitchen: Happy Hour: 3-7pm M-F $1 off all drinks. 726-1270

Monday

Avenue 805: Cheap Date Night: a choice of a large house or Caesar salad to split, a large bowl of pasta, a dessert & a bottle of house wine all for $35. 353-2505
Baja Bean: $4 burgers all day. 257-5445
Bank: $1 sliders during happy hour
Bouchon: Entrée portion salads, choice between 4, $20
Buddy's: $3 quesadillas, cheese fries, grilled cheese 5-9 pm. 355-3701
Café Caturra Short Pump: Blind wine tasting. Discounts given for correct guesses. 5:30 - 7:30pm
Caliente: ½ off po’boys 5-10pm
Capital Ale House: $1 burger nights (with purchase of a beverage). 4pm-1am.780-ALES
Cha Cha’s Cantina: $2 off quesadillas. 726-6296
City Limit: ½ price appetizers, 5-7pm. 282-4232
Cous Cous: Date night: soup or salad, choose of 3 select menu items, dessert to share and a ½ carafe of Sangria or bottle of house wine-$40. After dinner: mystery beer night--different beers each week are $1. 358-0868
Curbside Cafe: 35c wings, ½ off quesadillas 5-10pm. 355-7008
Europa: Pasta Night-all pastas $9. 643-0911
Kitchen 64: Mojito Monday: $6
Legend Brewing Company: Buy 1 dozen oysters, get a half dozen free. 4-7 pm. 232-3446
Lemaire: $5 high balls 4-7pm in the bar and lounge
Little Mexico: $1 tacos.
Mojo’s: 7-11 pm or til end of MNF: 35-cent wings. $1 off any Philly Cheesesteak. $6 Miller Lite & Yuengling Pitchers. 644-6676
Nacho Mama’s Mechanicsville: All You Can Eat Tacos with Rice & Beans $9.99
Six Burner: Any bottle of wine $50 or under is 1/2 price. 353-4060
Star-lite: taco specials starting at 5 pm. 788-7077
Sticky Rice: half-price sushi 10:30pm-12:30am. 358-7870
Xtras: $5 appetizers for those in the 23221 zip code. 355-0446

Tuesday

Acacia: ½ price wine
Avenue 805: Cheap Date Night: a choice of a large house or Caesar salad to split, a large bowl of pasta, a dessert & a bottle of house wine all for $35
Baja Bean: Buy 1 Get 1 Free tacos all day
Banditos: $2 Aristocrat highballs all day. 354-9999
Bank & Vault: 50 cent wings, $3.50 rails, $2.00 domestic beers, $3.00 premium beers, $5.00 house wine 4-8pm 648-3070
Bouchon: Date Night—3 courses $50/couple
Buddy's: Wear Buddy’s shirt, get a discount 5-9pm
Cafe Caturra Short Pump Crossing: 3-6pm. $5 Glasses of Wine.$4 Wine Fare.$3 Bottled Beer. 360-3377
Caliente: ½ off burgers 5-10
Capital Ale House: Steal the Glass Night. Order one of the featured brewery beers, keep the named glass it comes in. 4pm til glasses run out.
Cha Cha’s Cantina: $1 tacos from 8-9 pm
Cous Cous: Facebook specials. After dinner, it’s Musi-ko (music trivia).
Curbside Cafe: 75c tacos 5-10pm
Europa: Date night: three-course meal for just $16 per person. Weekly Wine Specials at $16 a bottle
FW Sullivans: $10 buckets of Alaskan Snow Crab Legs 6-11pm
Infuzion: $5 off all pasta entrees. 447-6852
Kitchen 64: Tequila Tuesday: $4 Margaritas
Legend Brewing Company: Buy 1 pound shrimp, get a half pound free 4-7 pm
Lemaire: $5 Sparkling Wine Cocktails. 4-7pm in the bar and lounge
Mojo’s: Taco Tuesday $1/each--build your own at the fixins bar-7pm. Tecate tall boys $2.50. Date Night 7-11pm: Order any 2 entrees or vegetarian item and get a select starter or nachos for only $17
Nacho Mama’s Mechanicsville: $1 Tacos all day
New York Deli: 35 cent wings. 7-10pm. 358-DELI
O’Toole’s: Martinis & Cosmopolitans: $4
Pescados: two tacos with coconut black beans & achiote rice for $10. 379-7121
Sette: 1/2 price bottle of wine from 5-9pm. 788-7077
Six Burner: Wine by the glass is 1/2 price
Star-lite: $2 Aristocrat highballs all day. 254-2667
Strange Matter: ½ price hamburgers 5pm+
Tastebuds: Prix Fixe. Salad, Entrée, and Dessert for $16. 261-6544
Tiki Bob’s: 10c tacos, 25c beers 6-9 pm. 644-9091
Xtras: Date Night: ½ price bottles of wine
821 Café: Moto Tuesday: come in on a motorcycle or moped and get 10% off any one item. 649-1042

Wednesday

Baja Bean: ½ off quesadillas all day.
Bank and Vault: Wine Down Wednesday: ½ price bottles of wine during happy hour 4-8pm.
Blackfinn: $1.50 burgers 5-10 pm. Wii Wednesday at 8pm
Boathouse at Rocketts Landing: Wine Tastings 6-8pm
Bouchon: Steak Night: Marinated Top Sirloin with sauce, Frites and Salad: $20
Buddy's: 5-9 pm Fajitas $6.95 & Half Price Nachos
Cafe Gutenberg: half-price select glasses of wine
Caliente: Local Night-ID w/23221 or 23220 zip gets 10%off food bill 5-10
Capital Ale House: Pints of most Virginia beers are $2.50 from 11am-9pm at all locations.
Cha Cha’s Cantina: 50c drafts and $1 tacos 8-9pm
Curbside Cafe: half-price burgers 5-10pm
Europa: half-off bottles (up to $40) with the purchase of two entrees
Havana '59: ½ off mojitos 780-CUBA
Kitchen 64: Wine Wednesday: Merlot and Chardonnay: $4
Legend Brewing Company: Buy 1 dozen clams, get a half dozen free 4-7 pm.
Mojo’s: 12 oz. Can o’ Beer of the Week - $1. 7-11 pm: Any 7” Philly Style Cheesesteak - $4
Nacho Mama’s Mechanicsville: Kids Night 1/2 off
Pescados: Margarita specials 379-7121
Sam Miller’s: 35 cent Wings 4-8pm
Star-lite: 1/2 Off All Pasta Dishes and Pasta Date Night: 2 salads, two pasta entrees& a bottle of house wine for $30
Tastebuds: Prix Fixe. Salad, Entrée and Dessert for $16.
Zeus Gallery Café: Wino Wed-all bottles of wine under $50 are half off
Xtras: $10 bottles of champagne
821 Café: Taco Night. Drink specials. $1 mystery beers

Thursday

Baja Bean: Until 7pm, appetizers half off
Bouchon: Ladies Night: ½ price wines by the glass and desserts
Buddy’s: $3 quesadillas, cheese fries, grilled cheese 5-9pm
Café Gutenberg: 5-7 pm seasonal microbrew and PBR specials
Fish Bowl Bistro & Bar: Steal the pint glass night 4-6pm
Havana '59: 1/2 off appetizers
Legend Brewing Company: Buy 1 pound mussels, get a half pound free 4-7 pm
Lemaire: $5 Classic Cocktails 4-7pm in the bar and lounge
Mojo’s: PBR - $2 / Bourbon - $3. Prime Rib Night 7-11 pm. 8 oz. cut - $7, 12 oz. cut - $10, 16 oz. cut - $14 served with side salad and choice of 2 sides
O’Toole’s: Margaritas on the rocks: $3.50
Sam Miller’s: $0.75 oysters 4-8pm
Sette: 1/2 price beer 5-9pm
Star-lite: 2 for 1 burger night & cheapie cans of Coors & Coors Lite.
Tastebuds: Prix Fixe. Salad, Entrée, and Dessert for $16
Xtras: Ladies Night: $5 cosmos and $2 Woodchucks
821 Cafe: happy hour all day

Friday

Bank&Vault: Extended happy hour til 9 pm. (5/18)
Blackfinn: $20 surf n turf and $20 select bottles of wine.
Café Caturra Grove: $5/glass wine until 6 pm. (5/3)
Café Gutenberg: 5-7 pm seasonal microbrew and PBR specials
Ellwood Thompson: $1 off wine and beer until 6:30ish (5/3)
Infuzion: 10% off dinner for 2 (excludes beverages)
Joe’s Inn: $1 PBR and $2 Legend beer until 7 pm (5/3)
Legend Brewing Company: Buy 1 dozen oysters, get a half dozen free 4-7 pm
Lemaire: $5 Cosmos and $5 Manhattans. 4-7pm in the bar and lounge(10/20)
Mojo’s: 24 oz. Coors Light Cans- $2.50. Shooter Special - $3 (10/14)
Nacho Mama’s Mechanicsville: $6 Anything with Redbull (5/10)
Rare Old Times: Prix Fixe: Soup or Salad, Choice from a Selection of Entrées, Dessert or Irish Coffee:$14.99 5-8pm. 750-1346
Sam Miller’s: $0.75 oysters 4-8pm
Sticky Rice: ½ price sushi, 5-6 pm. 358-7870

Saturday

Capital Ale House: American Micro Brew Day-most American Micro pints for $2.00, 11am-7pm
Curbside Café: ½ off appetizers 5-10 pm
Infuzion: 10% off dinner for 2 (excludes beverages)
Legend Brewing Company: Buy 1 pound crab legs, get a half pound free 12-4 pm
Mojo’s: RVA Special: PBR & Shot of Bourbon - $5. $5 Redbull Drinks. 10am – 4pm buy any Philly Cheesesteak & get ½ off another. Pizza Night 7-11pm Any Pizza, Any Toppings - $6
Rare Old Times: Prix Fixe: Soup or Salad, Choice from a Selection of Entrées, Dessert or Irish Coffee: $14.99, 5-8pm. 750-1346
Sette: 1/2 price Bloody Marys & Mimosas. 12-5pm
Xtras: $2 dessert slivers

Sunday

Baja Bean: $1 cheese quesadillas, $1 an hour pool, $1 12-ounce cans
Bottoms Up: $3 Mimosas and Bloody Marys all day
Café Caturra Short Pump: Extended social hour 5-9pm. $5 wines/glass and $3 beers
Cafe Rustica: Sunday Suppah: $15 per person: three courses with a monthly rotating menu. 225-8811
Capital Ale House: Prime Rib Special- 8 ounce prime rib dinner w/ potatoes & vegetable-$9.99 or a 16 ounce prime rib dinner w/ potatoes & vegetable-$16.99. Noon-9 pm.
Cha Cha’s Cantina: $1 Tacos, 25 cent Wings. 9pm+
Can Can: Beer specials til 9 pm.
Curbside Cafe: half-price appetizers 5-10pm
Europa: half-price tapas
The Hard Shell: crab leg, including all-you can eat specials. 643-2333
Kitchen 64: Drafts $2.50. Pitchers: $9
Legend Brewing Company: Buy 1 pound crab legs, get a half pound free 12-4 pm
Mojo’s: PBR Tall Boys - $2.50. 10am – 4pm buy any Philly Cheesesteak & get ½ off another. Burger Build 7-11pm $6 – add as many toppings to your burger as you'd like
Nacho Mama’s Mechanicsville: $5 Angus Burgers w/ Fries all day. 10% off check with church pamphlet
Pie: $3 Jumbo slice margherita pizza and pint of PBR. 257-7940
Sette: 1/2 price Bloody Marys & Mimosas. 12-5pm. Date Night 5-9pm, share appetizer, salad, pizza & a dessert for $25.95.
Six Burner: Sunday Supper-$20. Kids 10&under eat free w/ an adult.
Star-lite: 1/2 off appetizers 5-10pm. $2 PBRs, other drink specials.
Weezie's Kitchen: Food & Drink Specials 3-9pm
Xtras: Industry Night

Sofia Coppola's "Somewhere"

2010-10-14T13:02:00.001-04:00

I just found a link to the trailer below of Sofia Coppola's movie "Somewhere" Filmed in Los Angeles in the legendary Chateau Marmont hotel. Not sure when it's available here.

I wasn't expecting it to be about his relationship with a kid, but I like the trailer. It's got a similar lonely, world-changing, life and love lost feeling that "Lost in Translation" had.

Source: El Beso

too much writing

2010-10-14T12:42:00.000-04:00

Now that someone's actually paying me to write(part time), I find it a lot harder to come up with creative energy to blog. This is not a bad problem to have, but I feel bad about not having this outlet anymore. I'm excited about all the articles I have coming up that I have to do, and trying to teach myself NOT to get overwhelmed by it, and to just GET STARTED, bc that's the hardest part for me, and then I get all anxious for nothing.

My best friend is eloping tomorrow with a guy I've never met that she's known less than half a year. I'm very conflicted about this. I want her to be happy, I love her, and she's a big girl, but I can't help but be worried and feel like she's moving WAAY too fast. Also, I knew she was never going to be a poofy-dress-fancy-wedding person, but getting married in City Hall? I'm sad I don't even get to stand next to my best friend on her wedding day. I never thought she'd be the first of us to get married, mostly bc she'd never been in a serious relationship. I feel like I've lost my last "single in the city" friend, and now it's just me. She and I could always make chat about our hs friends who have married and have babies and live in the suburbs and how we just aren't interested in that life. I'm sad that now I can't just up and go stay with her whenever I want. We're only children, I"m not used to sharing her. I don't want to have to think about what he'll think , or that it's now THEIR space. What about holidays? She and her mom have always been my family, especially when I didn't have any. Now she'll have a new family. I don't even know how to relate to this concept as it comes to her. She's my longest friend. We've been friends for 20 years(!!). I don't have a current relationship anywhere NEAR that close with anyone else.

Pep talk

2010-10-11T11:20:00.000-04:00

Daily Pep Talk From A Best Friend:

You will have more than one opportunity to design your life

Pep Talk: I know it seems like you have to make the right decision for the rest of your life right now or else, but that’s not totally true. Make the best, most informed choice you can now and, when that choice stops working for you, make another choice. As long as you stay in the moment, when you’re 65 you’re not going to look back and say, “Curse this fine arts degree! I should have been a business major.”

aw

2010-10-06T10:57:00.000-04:00

More from One Sentence
#3775
I had always fantasized about hearing that four-worded question, but I never imagined how perfect it would look as it did when he signed it to me.

(wow, heartstrings!)

Down time

2010-09-09T12:11:00.000-04:00

I have existential crises in the car on the way to work in the morning. Do you do that? I think because it's often the only part of my day that's not scheduled, or interacting with someone, so that I have time to think the BIG THOUGHTS alone in my head and freak out about them.

Yesterday morning I was thinking about how desperately sad it makes me that we only get one life and it's really short and shit! have I done all the things I wanted to do? and what about love, and my purpose in life, and career, and what about these people in my life I care about that I don't see, and what about this?...etc.

I've been doing a fantastic job of ignoring important things this last year. It started with being overwhelmed by the legal issues related to my grandmother, then the deaths of my dad and her, the mortgage, the stuff, the life insurance, the debt, the taxes, etc, and has trickled down to me not being able to step up and get my oil changed, write the articles I'm contracted to write, fix my 401K, go to the gym, or call maintenance about that crack in the wall, and even to my relationships. I've been hiding. I've been throwing all my attention in very specific directions, and while that makes me happy in the short term, I'm not sure it's ultimately good. I've been neglecting friends. I've not wanted to put the effort into seeking people out, making plans. And I've been trying to fill the giant hole where my best friend was with other things. It works fine until something triggers it, like "Hey There Deliah" on the radio, or an opportunity for ninja, a glimpse of that UVA shirt, or having to catch myself making a joke no one else will get. And as much as I'm a fixer, I don't know how to fix this. But my heart hurts. It aches so much. Apparently only time is the answer, but that's not a fast enough answer. And since time just takes people and things away from you, that doesn't seem right.

skeptical

2010-08-26T15:24:00.000-04:00

I know I've been neglecting my blog. I've been swamped at work and not wanting to do much else besides come home and do nothing, and I've also been busy worrying about everything and getting overwhelmed, like I do, and doing little about it.

Anyway, I feel like the older I get, the less I believe in true love. Now I've been in love before. But it's been awhile. I've never had anyone I thought was the "love of my life." I've certainly had amazing, wonderful,crazy, all-consuming, fine, good, friendship, etc relationships, that served their purposes at the time, but never anyone who I was like, Yes, I want to spend the rest of my life with that person.

And more and more, I see relationships and marriages fail, fall apart, fizzle out, and I don't know that I believe in forever anymore. I don't think I believe it's possible that one person can make you happy and serve all of those needs for your whole life. I think you have to choose what you give up. I go back and forth from thinking it's best to not settle, that I should keep looking for "the one" because when you know, you know(so they say) and then thinking that's naive and foolish and that I'll end up alone....to thinking that I'm being unrealistic to assume I'll find the one person who will be everything to me, who will make all cylinders fire, forever, and that I should just be with the one I know who makes me laugh, who is my best friend, who gets me and my jokes, who I trust, who cares for me.

I think any relationship that's good can be good for awhile until you really get to know someone and spend a lot of time with them, and start to hate their idiosyncracies, tire of them, hate the way your self has become. Then you have to decide whether to keep going, to see if it gets better, if it turns into something else, or if you're just being unrealistic. The longer you spend, the messier and ickier when you decide to leave. And then all of it was for what? Now you've hurt someone you care about, burned that beautiful and unique connection, and you're back to square one.

anniversary

2010-07-30T09:39:00.000-04:00

A year ago today, my father died unexpectedly. It's a long story. It was jarring and sad that he died, and it triggered a chain of complicated legal issues, but I didn't lose a father that day. I lost my father 15 years ago when my mother and I left. He was troubled in many ways. Only last year, we had just started reconnecting, to the best he was able, over the care of my beloved grandmother (his mother, whose death later that year still haunts me), and then he died. He lived a sad life, so his death was sad, made even more so by the fact that he had probably died several days before he was found, alone in the house.

Obit I wrote.

My mother and I scattered his ashes over the Atlantic Ocean in Rehoboth. His late-in-life wish was to travel to Turks and Caicos, or Mexico and spend the rest of his life on the beach. While his passport was unused, I know that he'll get there someday, perhaps he's even there by now.

Okay, I have to stop writing now, as getting teary at work is really not appropriate.

Economics terms

2010-06-29T18:44:00.002-04:00

It's really rather remarkable how much one blog can influence me. I've spoken before about The Happiness Project. The writer there said something that struck me today:

If you try to preserve every opportunity, you can’t move forward.

Yeah, that's me, all right. I feel often that I'm wasting time, time I could be spent doing this thing, that thing. I also have trouble getting started because I'm waiting for the perfect moment, or the perfect person, or the perfect set of supplies or circumstances.

In her most recent post she also talked about opportunity cost, a term I learned at Econ Camp that really stuck with me.

Opportunity cost is the cost related to the next-best choice available to someone who has picked between several mutually exclusive choices

Relatedly, there I also learned the term sunk cost. Both of these ideas were crucial to how I looked at the world.

In traditional microeconomic theory, only prospective (future) costs are relevant to an investment decision. Traditional economics proposes that an economic actor not let sunk costs influence one's decisions, because doing so would not be rationally assessing a decision exclusively on its own merits

I had to learn that there's no point worrying on sunk cost. Once it's gone, it's gone. Wikipedia has an excellent example:

Economists argue that sunk costs are not taken into account when making rational decisions. In the case of the movie ticket, the ticket buyer can choose between the following two end results:

1.Having paid the price of the ticket and having suffered watching a movie that he does not want to see, or;
2.Having paid the price of the ticket and having used the time to do something more fun.

In either case, the ticket-buyer has "paid the price of the ticket" so "that part" of the decision no longer affects the future. If the ticket-buyer regrets buying the ticket, the current decision should be based on whether he wants to see the movie at all, regardless of the price, just as if he were to go to a free movie. The economist will suggest that, since the second option involves suffering in only one way (spent money), while the first involves suffering in two (spent money plus wasted time), option two is obviously preferable.

I love days when I get to go in late and can watch The West Wing on Bravo in the morning. I want President Bartlett to be my president. I want to be like CJ, want to have Amy Gardner's job, and want to work with everyone in that office. And Sam. (Rob Lowe, swoon). I keep forgetting that's Mary Louise Parker because she looks so young. She is ageless. And Marlee Matlin! Everyone was on that show.

My favorite quote from this morning's episode "Women of Qumar"

SAM:The President's being sued.

SAM: The Washington Times' running it under the headline "Bartlet Accused of Contributory Negligence."

LEO: I didn't know The Washington Times could spell all those words

Homemade dinners and farmers markets

2010-06-27T21:47:00.003-04:00

This was dinner from Saturday night. Amazingly put together, and I even helped! At the top left of the plate is the fresh cold salad we've named Citrus Tuber Salad: turnips and beets from the South of the James farmers market, backyard garden cucumbers and parsley, some orange, honey, olive oil, lime juice, pepper, salt, olive juice, and pine nuts (a last-minute addition that turned out to be perfect).

Here's a close up:

The beets made everything pink

The main dish was a combination of homemade pasta, grilled and marinated chicken, mixed cooked fresh veggies, fennel (the bottom left there, didn't turn out that great).

The food was all complimented so nicely by an acidic Spanish white and then a bottle of sparkling. I can't believe I ate as much as I did, since I ate so much by nibbling while we were cooking.

This is an edited-color photo of a flower I discovered in North Carolina. The flower is a purple-pink, but my crappy camera didn't do it justice, so I edited the tint. It was so so fragrant and soft. I was afraid it didn't grow here but turns out, it's everywhere! I picked these from the tree in the Ellwoods parking lot!

This was dinner from the other weekend: a salad with all kinds of greens from Victory Farms and other yummy veggies from Ellwoods, and my corn salad (corn, red pepper, feta, lime juice, pepper, olive oil)

It was my first time at the South of the James Farmer's Market this weekend. It is arguably the best/most popular one in town. I was feeling a bit car-sick and ill from the heat, and needed sustenance, so I had my first-ever Nate's Taco Truck Taco. I know, it's sacrilegious I've lived in RVA as long as I have without one of their tacos. Well for $3, my chicken taco got eaten in about 3 seconds. I would have liked a little more lettuce, but I always want more lettuce on everything. I went back for seconds after getting my iced coffee from Blanchard's Coffee, but they had gone on a break because of the heat. I was SO mad. So instead I wandered in search of more food, and felt like I might pass out if I didn't eat something. I found a table of someone selling homemade pastries and fresh cold salads and had the most amazing bow-tie pesto pasta salad with fresh fresh cherry red and yellow tomatoes, carrots, and beans. God it hit the spot.

The produce from Victory Farms was amazing and delicious looking and SO MUCH CHEAPER than Kroger. Why am I not buying all my produce here? I may have to start. I'm being turned into a hippie, I swear. Lots of people were selling really scrumptious looking blackberries, but I am holding out for picking access to a backyard bush I know. Oh, and I also had yellow watermelon for the first time. Weirdly, tastes just like regular watermelon.

While there, I also ran into several familiar faces. Wouldn't be Richmond without it.

Music tonight with a cup of Illy coffee--The I-Am-An-RVA-Hipster-Mix:
Untitled 4: Sigur Ros
Hang Me Up To Dry: Cold War Kids (fun band name)
Idioteque: Radiohead
1901: Phoenix (my new favorite band)
I Turn My Camera On: Spoon

Touching Strangers

2010-06-24T22:45:00.005-04:00

Do something that will make your night. First, read below about Richard Rinaldi's exhibit Touching Strangers. From his site:

Touching Strangers is an ongoing photographic project stemming from my interest in the dynamics of group portraiture. The premise of this work is simple. I meet two or more people on the street who are strangers to each other and to me. I ask them if they will pose for a photograph together with the stipulation that they must touch each other in some manner...

My objective was to introduce an unpredictable variable in a very traditional photographic formula: to create a spontaneous and fleeting relationship between complete strangers in front of my 8 x 10 view camera.

Though these situations involve orchestrated collaborations between subject and photographer, the emotions captured are both genuine and honest. Touching Strangers encourages viewers to think about how we relate physically to one another.

Then, go to this link right now to view his photographs in a slide show, make it full screen.You may have to click to forward the photos.

Then click this link to get to the song, sync it up, press play.

Song: The Crane Wife 3 by The Decemberists.

I just happened to have it playing when I went to view the photos. They go amazingly well together. It will make your night. Trust me.

Ooh, Horoscope on point

2010-06-24T10:00:00.002-04:00

You could run into some emotional roadblocks today, Taurus. This could be due to a lack of honesty on your part. Make sure you're sticking to the truth at all times. A strong, forceful energy could challenge your ego. Don't be surprised if this force is emotionally highly charged. Conflict is apt to result if you aren't honest about your feelings as soon as they arise.

Megan Fox photoshoot

2010-06-23T18:32:00.000-04:00

Holy sokes, this is a weird/hott/creepy/sexualized photo spread.

Source

I saw this magazine in the flesh yesterday and may have to go back and pull the pages out of it. The ones online are too small to do it justice. I can't believe myself either, because I don't really like Megan Fox. I think she looks like a tranny most of the time--too severe, too tacky. She's clearly got great bone structure and a great body, and this photoshoot shows it off.

Image Source

It's so so creepy that the mannequin has her exact face. I'm not sure how they did that. I assumed it was photoshopped, but when you look at the video, you can see the mannequin. Perhaps they tweaked it for the final print version?

because

2010-06-23T17:54:00.000-04:00

I love this picture so much. I've been sitting on it, waiting for the perfect occasion to use it, but have not come across one yet, so here you go. (From pretty.little.world)

Now that's a party I'd like to be at

2010-06-23T11:39:00.000-04:00

I want to hang out with all the beautiful, unique, and well-dressed people in this post. Scroll down on that link to really see the folks at the party.

So cheap mimosas

2010-06-23T11:21:00.000-04:00

I discovered maybe my favorite drink special yet last night at Ipanema. On Tuesdays, they have $2 Mimosas from 9-11 pm. The juices you can get include not just orange, but peach, pear, mango, and pineapple. I got both the pear and peach ones and they were refreshing and delightful. Who would ever ger orange now?

And from the end of the bar, they appear to be using Goya juice, so that's a plus too.

Brunettes with Bikes and Books

2010-06-22T16:02:00.000-04:00

(Images from pretty. little. world.)

------------------------------------------------------

Summer Reading List, pulled from Elle Blogs.

(Photos all from Elle Blogs)

Anthropology of an American Girl-A Novel by Hilary Thayer Hamann
Seems a little dark, the way I like them: profiles a girl through her life. Rain, bikes, sketching, autumn, relationships

Cum Laude by Cecily von Ziegesar
From the author of Gossip Girl.
Fluff, fun, stories about college life

No Place Like Home-A Memoir in 39 Apartments by Brooke Berman
I like the idea of chornicalling your life through the apt-hunting and moving process. Probably very relatable as a twenty-something. Also, how fab is this coat and cover in general?

One Day by David Nicholls
Romance, growing up, growing old, regret, hearbreak. Perfect for me right now.

eyjafjallajökull video

2010-06-18T15:01:00.000-04:00

This is a stunningly, well-shot, fast-motion video. I'm in a trance now. I think I could watch it over and over again.

True

2010-06-16T12:28:00.002-04:00

"You can't have everything--where would you put it?
-Stephen Wright

Recover from hate

2010-06-08T11:04:00.000-04:00

I love that the Internets can give me a pep talk, silly as it is. From Daily Pep.

Recover from hate.
Pep Talk: It doesn’t feel that great to hate someone. Yes, some people really suck, but you don’t have to wait for them to change before you start feeling better. If someone truly awful is giving you that hateful feeling, you can take control and change your feelings. In your mind, you can wish that terrible, icky person good fortune and a happy life. You can want for them all the positive things you want for your best friend and, with enough practice, your feelings will follow your wishes. You won’t feel hate; you’ll feel better and that’s all that matters.
Today remind yourself: Recover from hate.

I am going to do better in remembering this because people who are evil and cruel and gross don't deserve so much of my mental energy.

words of wisdom

2010-06-02T14:14:00.002-04:00

Dallas Clayton has a blog where of short and clever poetry accompanied by drawings. Here are some recent ones I like.

Success
By Dallas Clayton

Thousands of years of art history
and the safe money
is still on a picture of a naked girl.
-----------------------------------------

Pair
By Dallas Clayton

Deciding
that your greatest fear
is dying alone
will have you shopping
at the bargain bin
more often than you’d care
knee deep in discount fashion,
bent on the chance of exhuming that one irregular gem
that none of the others seemed to catch
because they didn’t have time to dig
-too busy, caught up in
dying alone.
-------------------------------------------

You
By Dallas Clayton

Unlike most words
which dull and fray
with usage
a well-intentioned
“I love you”
seems only to sharpen
growing consistently more effective
refined
through each and every
hurried utterance.
---------------------------------------

Graded
By Dallas Clayton

How do they decide
what information
is worth knowing
and what isn’t?
Like why is the monarch
the only type of butterfly I can name?
And when did I even learn that one?

Worried

2010-06-01T14:54:00.000-04:00

I am in a WEIRD mental headspace right now. I can't talk about it without crying, and damnit if I didn't get teary at work today. I'm not going to say more about it than this, but it's been a harrowing weekend. I drove over 500 miles in less than 36 hours. I slept for about 1 hour on Saturday night, in a chair. My brain and heart are all conflicted and I don't know what I want to do about it. Everything will be okay, but it's very very scary when you think you might lose someone you love. And I'm not sure what's worse really, the idea of losing them to death or the idea that they may never figure out how to be a part of my life again. More or less the same thing. I have things to look forward too, but I can't bring myself to be quite as excited about them as I was before Saturday. I am conflicted.

So I'm going to try very hard not to get overwhelmed and overanalyze everything and just take it one day at a time.

Hug your family, call your friends, invite someone over, tell someone you love them. Life is too short.

Oh summer

2010-05-28T15:57:00.000-04:00

(From Unruly Things)

Blond

2010-05-28T14:11:00.003-04:00

These photos make me want to be blond

Matt Jones for ELLE Italia March 2010

Matt Jones for Marie Claire US May 2010

(All Images From DDD)

Amber Heard by Guy Aroch - French Revue de Modes Spring 2010

getaway

2010-05-26T18:10:00.001-04:00

(From The Fashionist)

I want to be this woman. I need to get out of Richmond for awhile. Hopefully this weekend going to Deltaville. Then my cousin's graduation party in MD. I need a weekend away something bad.

Give me road trip ideas people. For 2-3 day trips away. What's driveable and back in that amount of time that I should visit? Where are cool/affordable places to stay?

The Listening Room--bluesy folk

2010-05-26T11:52:00.001-04:00

Last night was my first time at The Listening Room, a grassroots local movement for an intimate gathering to hear music, in the basement of a building attached to St. James' Episcopal Church. Blogger friends had written about it before, and a friend told me last week about this one, so I dove out of VLPP a little early last night to attend. I'm so glad I did.

The room had over 100 people in it, with standing room only, which apparently was the biggest crowd TLR has ever had. The first trio, Brown Bird, was amazing. Seriously wow. They were folksy and bluesy and from Rhode Island (never would have thought this kind of music would be from RI). I was lucky to be surrounded by music geek friends and everyone in the room truly appreciated the music. One guy sang lead, played guitar, and played a homemade drum set of sorts. I was flabbergasted that he could keep 4 different things going at once. His voice was scratchy and strong and full of emotion. The woman sang, played guitar, cello, and violin and was great to watch. The third member was playing a dobro, which I'd never seen before but am told is a popular blues instrument. It's like playing a guitar on it's side, with strings higher off the frets, and plugged in. It has a such a honeyed, high sound. Their songs were intricate and enjoyable.

The poor musicians were melting under the hot garage-like lights. Someone needs to work on better lighting for next time--that was just cruel. The second group, Homemade Knives, had 5 members, and the sound was much more mellow. I didn't know an accordian could sound pretty. The singer admitted he was nervous, but did himself a disservice because, while I totally relate to stage fright, the more you tell us that you aren't any good, the more likely we are to start to believe it. His voice was clear and strong and twangy with no hint of nervousness. RVA Magazine has an in-depth interview with one of the musicians from the band. It's got great insight into their personality.

It was wild to hear these all fairly young musicians sing and play with such emotion. The lyrics were so smart, but old soul.

Brown Bird was definitely my favorite. I even considered buying a CD, had I brought money, but my friend got the vinyl so I"ll be able to hear it again. Clearly a requirement for male membership in a folk band that night was to have a full-on beard, and the room was full of hipsters, but also had quite a few older participants and non hipsters like me.

We finished the night up with a lovely walk to Cous Cous for a nightcap and some conversation. They have a fun cocktail menu and I got a Pimm's Cup, something I've been talking about lately. It was very sweet. I love my city.

suuuper f**cker

2010-05-25T13:44:00.000-04:00

Love this image (Aesthetic Outburst)

I have too many design blogs on my Bloglines and when they cap at 200 posts, it's intimidating to even start reading them, because I don't want to miss anything. I finally started digging through Aesthetic Outburst today and have been "mark as new" ing nearly every post so far to look back on again. That's a sign of a good blog.

Today is a day of stupid questions. Can it just hurry up and be 7:30 so I can listen to music and have coffee and pastry with good friends? It's so intimidating to know that I have to get through 2 jobs before I can even do that today.

(From Superbomba)

I had a catch and played frisbee on Sunday on top of my normal gym workout and now I can't move my arms. But in good news, a female coworker friend told me that I was looking particularly fit yesterday (even when I didn't feel it), so that was a nice ego boost. I WILL be fit for summer. I was looking at photos of me from the Kugel Ball from '08 and DAMN I was nice and skinny. I want that back. Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels, eh?

Superbomba makes me think of the song Superf**ker by a Venezuelan band called Los Amigos Invisibles. I still laugh that the CD I own, The Venezuelan Zinga Son Vol.1 has an "Explicit Lyrics" sticker on it because of that song. It's the perfect summer breezy party CD. It's loungey and Latin and electronic and fun.

hott on a Monday evening

2010-05-24T21:57:00.002-04:00

I am the girl you won't admit you adore

(My Daily Style)
Music by Esthero

I'm finally uploading to my Lookbook all the images I've been saving on my fashion Bloglines. Fashion spreads, streetstyle images, and real style bloggers. The images are all pretty hot, especially these few here. It's getting me a little hot and bothered, I must admit. Pair that with a quiet evening with cool breeze in my apartment, light rain, and loungey music, and woo-ha.

(A Glamorous Little Side Project)

Black is the colour of my true love's hair
His lips are like some roses fair
He has the sweetest smile and the gentlest hands
I love the ground, where on he stands

Black is the Colour--by The Corrs

What odd lyrics but the song is so sweet and bittersweet.

(Vogue Italia October 2007)

(A Glamorous Little Side Project)

Stepped off the train, I'm walking down your street again
I passed your door, but you don't live here anymore
It's years since you've been there
And now you've disappeard somewhere
You got a space. You found some better place
And I miss you...

Missing--Everything But The Girl

Ghostbusters improv

2010-05-18T11:45:00.000-04:00

Okay, I smiled SO HARD at this. LOVE.

Color Me Katie is such an uplifting and positive blog. She participates with something called Improv Everywhere where they do crazy/fun things and video them. In this one, people dress up like ghosts and go through the NY Public library and then the Ghostbusters come in and try to capture them. Go to the site to watch the video, it will make your day.

(photo from Color Me Katie)

May-updated Richmond restaurant food & drink specials

2010-05-18T10:53:00.003-04:00

Updated Fall 2010 Here

My list of Richmond restaurant food and drink specials has been updated (and is updated fairly frequently) here.

I'm working on getting active links to the locations and menus as well, so check back often.

When the Internet is your friend

2010-05-18T10:22:00.000-04:00

Daily Pep Talk is usually correct

It's fine. Forget it.
Pep talk: Whatever you did, it can't be that bad or wrong. I'm sure everyone else was too busy thinking of their own drama to even notice your mistake. Your secret is safe, it's not a big deal, and anyway it's been over for, like, 27 hours by now. Moving on.
Today remind yourself: It's fine. Forget it

Any minute now.
Pep talk: Be patient. No really. Chill the fuck out. Everything that is meant to happen will. It just takes time. You’re a speed demon and the universe needs a second to catch up with you but, when it does, you’ll get everything you need.
Today remind yourself: Any minute now

Your job is not your life. (this one is especially hard for me to remember)
Pep talk: Let’s talk worst case scenarios, shall we? Let’s say you really fuck up and get fired, what then? You pack your shit and get out of there, that’s what. Then you hold your head high and remember that that job didn’t define you. Then you forgive yourself for your mistakes and you try to improve. Then you hunt for a new job, one that makes you happy. Then you keep on living your fabulous life. You may not love any job you ever have, but you have so much going for you that a shitty gig can’t hold you back. You are fantastic and don’t you forget it.
Today remind yourself: My job is not my life.

can you see me?

2010-05-18T09:19:00.002-04:00

(Sandra Juto)

I feel like this picture is a good indicator of my mood. Dark and stormy in the background, but those cheery flowers are shining.

I am in a weird mood and do not wish to be, so I am spending my morning looking through my Wordnik list of vocab words, hungrily eating up the images on Sandra Juto's site, drinking coffee, and writing. It's always strange when someone tries to analyze you, especially if you feel like they are analyzing you wrong, or even scarily--correctly. Maybe this is why most people like to surround themselves with familiar people. Much as I like meeting new people and making new friends, it's scary, because then you have to be on, you have to try to establish a connection, get them to see the real you. I don't let people in easily, though when I really do connect with someone, it's easy to. I don't volunteer parts of myself, but I share easily if asked in the right way.

Here, have some words:
ersatz: adjective. Being an imitation or a substitute, usually an inferior one; artificial

sylph: noun. A slim, graceful woman or girl.

renege: intransitive verb. To fail to carry out a promise or commitment (I didn't know how to spell this for the longest time).

aplomb: noun. Self-confident assurance; poise

ani

2010-05-17T17:14:00.001-04:00

I read a lot of fashion bloggers, but one I've been reading for a long time is The Clothes Horse. She often posts little animated GIFs of her doing things and I think they are quite charming. Click on over to her site to see the one above, which is a fave.

I just napped at my desk on my lunch break and actually started to dream. I would really like to go home and cuddle up with someone or something soft and warm, listen to the rain, and take a nap.

Fitness, Free, Food

2010-05-17T11:46:00.001-04:00

I am proud of myself for being in a fitness kick right now. I, with horror, discovered I'd let myself get a little too squishy over the winter when I went dress shopping for my birthday. Even my arms were flabby, which is SO not acceptable, so I've been going to the gym more regularly and watching my food better. I hate working out but I love the feeling of being strong, of feeling kick-ass, of being in shape, so usually once I get started, it's easier to continue. I am relishing the idea of being toned and sexy again. Of course I tend to overdo it the first few times, so now my back muscles are screaming at me. I'm going to take it as a sign of progress that my abs no longer are the ones so sore it hurts to laugh. Not that I'm close to having a six-pack, but it's an ideal. I love good abs, on girls or guys. I'm just not willing to give up the bread and cheese and beer required to have them.

Went to see the Youth Sympony Orchestra at the Carpenter Center last night. I love that my city has so many things going on, and I can see orchestral music for free. (Thanks, Style Weekly for the notice). I probably will never get to sit that close to the stage again. I love the crazy colors and decor of that theatre. My coworker asked me this morning how I find out about all these cool things, and I told her about Style (I'm always amazed when people don't know about Style, but then, I guess I'm probably more active than the average person). I should probably be telling her to go to the site I write for instead, (well, only as it relates to food).

The violin looks like such an easy instrument, but of course it isn't, that just means that the musician is good at it. I remember a guy from another school at a leadership conference I went to in high school could play violin, and even then, it was the hottest thing ever (well, 10th grade hot, before we really knew what hot was). Girls are always suckers for musicians, aren't we? Throw in singing too? Sold.

It's slow at work because we are in between semesters, and while I guess I shouldn't complain, I like,nay, need to be busy. I should use the opportunity to pay bills and write, but I'm not wanting to live in the real world at the moment after the great weeks and weekends I've had lately.

handsome

2010-05-07T16:56:00.000-04:00

(Photo: Go Fug Yourself)

Aren't we all excited at how well Pacey has grown into a man? He's a gorgeous specimen. And Diane is beautiful and classy too, though I often think her makeup is too severe.

Want to go there

2010-05-01T17:13:00.000-04:00

I wish these guys lived here so we could be friends. I want to live this life too. Or really, I want to visit whatever country they're in and live with them for awhile.

Sandra Juto has the most amazing photos.

Dress shopping

2010-04-30T09:43:00.000-04:00

I went in search for a new outfit for my birthday, specifically a dress. I like dresses in warm weather because they can be dressed up or down. I have a lot of clothes, but I feel like I've worn all my dresses in various rotations and birthdays and parties already, and I needed something new.

I went to Ross first because I've found dress deals there before. I went into the dressing room with 9 dresses and only liked one. I am always duped by juniors sizing. I know that women with a real figure (ie, hips and a butt) shouldn't shop in juniors, but the "misses" (what a crappy, dated word) dresses are often so frumpy and not fashion-forward.

So of course all the juniors dresses, while looking cute on the hanger, were awkward on me. Also, after this weekend, my get fit program goes into full force. Nothing like a dressing room mirror to show how squishy I got this winter when I wasn't looking and this is NOT acceptable. AT ALL. I am trying to not let it get me down on my birthday. I will just be better about going to the gym and eating better and it will be ok.

But I did try on a beautiful, jewel-green dress by Calvin Klein which of course was the most expensive but it fit so well and looked so nice that I bought it. There's a big difference there in the quality of fabric and cut, imagine that! It has such nice pleat detailing at the neck, back, and skirt. I can't decide whether to wear it tonight or tomorrow now.

I then went to Old Navy, which is a favorite of mine, to see if they had anything better/cheaper, but there is absolutely nothing feminine or pretty or classic in there right now. Everything is tshirts and shorts and ribbbed tanks (I HATE RIBBING on clothes) and beachy/gauzey things that are mostly terrible and were not at all what I was looking for a dressy birthday.

I did, however, buy 2 new tees and some underwear, so the visit was not for naught, but still, disappoined in their selection right now.

Things that come to you while out and about

2010-04-29T10:36:00.001-04:00

2 nuggets of wisdom I had this week:

I had a hard time picking out a Mother's Day card. How do you choose a card when you do not particulary like your mother? I realize that sounds terrible and before everyone who has a perfect family life jumps down my throat, let me explain. Surely I have only one mother. And I am very very grateful for all the hell she went through when I was young and the things she did for me. We went through a lot together, and we are the same person in a lot of ways. She provided a lot for me as a single mother. I'm grateful for that.

But as I've gotten older, she's also consistently been the most unreliable person I know, and she hasn't come through on a lot of things she really needed to last year, especially when it came to all the heartache and struggle and legal issues etc related to my father and grandmother's deaths.

Previously, my mother and I didn't talk very often anyway. I never understood those people who talk to their moms every day. There would often be weeks or months between our conversations. This is even more true since all the tragedy of last year. I can't remember the last time I spoke to my mom but I think it was at least a few months ago. She isn't a mother figure to me now that I'm an adult. Yes she still birthed me, but she doesn't really have any role in my life. And it hurts to type that, and without knowing the whole story, makes me seem really cold. We're not friends. We don't really have anything in common. She doesn't know how to relate to me. She's not motherly--I've been taking care of myself for a long time now. And while now she's the only family I've got, I still feel like a true orphan because all of my family members are gone. It makes me sad, but I'm used to it. Like I said, I've been looking out for myself since earlier than most, earlier in life than I really should have needed to.
----------------
Other nugget of wisdom: When you are a single person without any family nearby, who do you list as your Emergency Contact? I've been struggling with this for years now. I often just have to put my mom, even though she's not in the state, and so I don't know how good of an emergency contact that really is. At times, I've listed serious boyfriends, but relationships always end, and then I have to try to remember who I put where and what to change. I've put Joe down before. And I suppose he'd still be an appropriate person, so long as he's here, but it doesn't feel right. I know a lot of people. I have a lot of acquaintances. But no one I would think would be fitting for this so-common but so elusive title.

illusions

2010-04-28T18:34:00.000-04:00

I have to stop having illusions that I like Caliente. I keep trying. I think it was even nice once. It's in my backyard, it's usually quieter than the other joints in the Devil's Triangle. But lately it's just seemed hazy and sketchy and a little gross. AND last night when I was there, I discovered they are just blatantly disregarding the smoking ban, so that automaticaly gets you kicked off my list.

I am a big nerd and love thesaurus.com. I'm sure I've shared my affinity for big words before, and I still bemoan the closing of my favorite site: wordie.org. Apparently, it's turned into something else now but every time I try to retrieve my password, I get nowhere. :(

Updated RVA food/drink specials

2010-04-27T10:06:00.006-04:00

Updated Fall 2010 Here

I am reposting this updated list of food/drink specials in Richmond. The details of which can't be shared apparently on "official" publications, which is total BS, because the whole reason I started doing this in the first place was for the details.

So here they are. Updated as of May 18, 2010

Richmond Restaurant Food and Drink Specials

Anytime
Acacia: Prix Fix menu-$23 M-Th 5:30-9pm Fri&Sat 5:30-6:30pm. 562-0138
Amici: Sun-Thur $25 3-course meal. Bottled wine 25% off. 353-4700
Blackfinn: 7 days a week, 4-7pm $4.95 flatbread pizza. 643-3466
Bouchon: $20 daily prix fix 5-6 pm Mon-Sat. 225-2118
Café Caturra: Social Hour Daily 5-9 pm $5 wines by the glass & $3 beers
Caliente: Happy Hour at the bar M-Th 5-7. $1 Miller High Life, $3 rail highballs and Jager shots. 340-2920
The Camel: Happy Hour 5-7pm. $2.50 rail, $3 drafts, $5 cosmos & martinis, $7 Long Islands.
Davis and Main: 1/2 price well martinis from 4-6pm M-F. 353-6641
Dot’s Back Inn: "Neighborhood Hour" 3:30-7pm. $2.50 10oz drafts, $2.25 domestic, $3 highballs, $3 house wine. 266-3167
Europa: M-F 5-6pm. 1/2 off all Small Plates. 643-0911
Garnett’s: M-Sun Happy Hour 3-6. $3 beer and wine. 367-7909
Grandpa Eddie's Alabama Ribs & BBQ: M-F 4-7pm Sun 12-6, $2 Miller Lite draft, House highballs, House wine, fried onion straws or okra, smoked kielbasa. 270-RIBS
Kitchen 64: Daily specials 3-7 pm. Rail Drinks:$4, Domestic Bottles:$2. Smoking is allowed on the patio after 10pm. 358-0064
Lemaire: Happy Hour M-F 4-7 pm. $3 beer, $8 Specialty Cocktails ($2 off) 3 appetizers for $20 649-4644
Poe’s Pub: Everyday 4-7 pm $2.25 domestic bottles, $1 off drafts. 648-2120
Sam Miller’s: $2 10oz Miller Lite, $3 House Wine 4-8pm. 644-5465
Six Burner: $24 prix fix menu M-Th 5:30-9:30pm. 353-4060
Stool Pigeons: M-F Happy Hour: $1 off bar drinks, select appetizers are $5. 344-4490
Strawberry Street Café: M-Sun Happy Hour til 9pm. $2.50 highballs, $3 martinis, $2.25 domestic bottles. 353-6860
Tobacco Company: Th-Sat, $1 drinks from 8-9 pm, $4 Red Stag Cocktails and $4 Red Bull or White Grape Cocktails all night (always mobbed in there at happy hour though). Free valet parking during dinner hours and all day on Sunday. 782-9555
Weezie's Kitchen: Happy Hour: 3-7pm M-F $1 off all drinks. 726-1270
821 Café: Happy Hour 4-7pm. All drafts $3.

Monday
Avenue 805: Cheap Date Night: a choice of a large house or Caesar salad to split, a large bowl of pasta, a dessert & a bottle of house wine all for $35. 353-2505
Baja Bean: $4 burgers all day. 257-5445
Buddy's: $3 quesadillas, cheese fries, grilled cheese 5-9 pm. 355-3701
Café Caturra Short Pump: Blind wine tasting. Discounts given for correct guesses. 5:30 - 7:30pm
Caliente: ½ off po’boys 5-10pm
Capital Ale House: $1 burger nights (with purchase of a beverage). 4pm-1am.780-ALES
Cha Cha’s Cantina: $2 off quesadillas. 726-6296
City Limit: ½ price appetizers, 5-7pm. 282-4232
Cous Cous: Date night: soup or salad, choose of 3 select menu items, dessert to share and a ½ carafe of Sangria or bottle of house wine-$40. After dinner: mystery beer night--different beers each week are $1. 358-0868
Curbside Cafe: 35c wings, ½ off quesadillas 5-10pm. 355-7008
Europa: Pasta Night-all pastas $9. 643-0911
Kitchen 64: Mojito Monday: $6
Legend Brewing Company: Buy 1 dozen oysters, get a half dozen free. 4-7 pm. 232-3446
Little Mexico: $1 tacos.
Mojos: 35cent Wing night. $1 off all "Philly Style" Cheese steaks, $7 Miller High Life, Miller Lite,Yuengling pitchers. 644-6676
Six Burner: Any bottle of wine $50 or under is 1/2 price. 353-4060
Sticky Rice: half-price sushi 10:30pm-12:30am. 358-7870

Tuesday
Acacia: ½ price wine
Avenue 805: Cheap Date Night: a choice of a large house or Caesar salad to split, a large bowl of pasta, a dessert & a bottle of house wine all for $35
Baja Bean: Buy 1 Get 1 Free tacos all day
Banditos: $2 Aristocrat highballs all day. 354-9999
Buddy's: Wear Buddy’s shirt, get a discount (5-9pm)
Caliente: ½ off burgers 5-10
Capital Ale House: Steal the Glass Night. Order one of the featured brewery beers, keep the named glass it comes in. 4pm til glasses run out.
Cha Cha’s Cantina: $1 tacos from 8-9 pm
Cous Cous: Facebook specials. After dinner, it’s Musi-ko (music trivia).
Curbside Cafe: 75c tacos (5-10pm)
Europa: Date night: three-course meal for just $16 per person. Weekly Wine Specials at $16 a bottle
Infuzion: $5 off all pasta entrees. 447-6852
Kitchen 64: Tequila Tuesday: $4 Margaritas
Legend Brewing Company: Buy 1 pound shrimp, get a half pound free 4-7 pm
Mojos: "Cheap Date Night" Any 2 Pastas and any 1 Appetizer - $15. Featured Bottles of Wine-$10, 6-10pm
New York Deli: 35 cent wings. 7-10pm. 358-DELI
Pescados: two tacos with coconut black beans & achiote rice for $10. 379-7121
Sette: 1/2 price bottle of wine from 5-9pm. 788-7077
Six Burner: Wine by the glass is 1/2 price
Star-lite: $2 Aristocrat highballs all day. 254-2667
Strange Matter: ½ price hamburgers 5pm+
Tastebuds: Prix Fixe. Salad, Entrée, and Dessert for $16. 261-6544
Tiki Bob’s: 10c tacos, 25c beers 6-9 pm. 644-9091

Wednesday
Baja Bean: ½ off quesadillas all day.
Blackfinn: $1.50 burgers 5-10 pm. Wii Wednesday at 8pm.
Buddy's: 5-9 pm Fajitas $6.95 & Half Price Nachos
Cafe Gutenberg: half-price select glasses of wine.
Caliente: Local Night-ID w/23221 or 23220 zip gets 10%off food bill 5-10
Capital Ale House: Pints of most Virginia beers are $2.50 from 11am-9pm at all locations.
Cha Cha’s Cantina: 50c drafts and $1 tacos 8-9pm
Curbside Cafe: half-price burgers (5-10pm)
Europa: half-off bottles (up to $40) with the purchase of two entrees
Havana '59: ½ off mojitos 780-CUBA
Kitchen 64: Wine Wednesday: Merlot and Chardonnay: $4
Legend Brewing Company: Buy 1 dozen clams, get a half dozen free 4-7 pm.
Mojos: $4 cheesesteaks 6-10pm. Drink Happy Hour extended til 9 pm. Thumb-wrestling competition at 10 pm.
Pescados: Margarita specials 379-7121
Sam Miller’s: 35 cent Wings 4-8pm
Star-lite: 1/2 Off All Pasta Dishes and Pasta Date Night: 2 salads, two pasta entrees& a bottle of house wine for $30
Tastebuds: Prix Fixe. Salad, Entrée and Dessert for $16.
Zeus Gallery Café: Wino Wed-all bottles of wine under $50 are half off

Thursday
821 Cafe: happy hour all day
Baja Bean: Until 7pm, appetizers half off
Buddy’s: $3 quesadillas, cheese fries, grilled cheese (5-9pm)
Café Gutenberg: 5-7 pm seasonal microbrew and PBR specials
Havana '59: 1/2 off appetizers
Legend Brewing Company: Buy 1 pound mussels, get a half pound free 4-7 pm
Mojos: "Bucket Night"-Special menu of favorite items served bucket style. 6-10 pm
Sam Miller’s: $0.75 oysters 4-8pm
Sette: 1/2 price beer 5-9pm
Star-lite: 2 for 1 burger night & cheapie cans of Coors & Coors Lite.
Tastebuds: Prix Fixe. Salad, Entrée, and Dessert for $16

Friday
Blackfinn: $20 surf n turf and $20 select bottles of wine.
Café Caturra Grove: $5/glass wine until 6 pm.
Café Gutenberg: 5-7 pm seasonal microbrew and PBR specials
Ellwood Thompson: $1 off wine and beer until 6:30ish
Infuzion: 10% off dinner for 2 (excludes beverages)
Joe’s Inn: $1 PBR and $2 Legend beer until 7 pm
Legend Brewing Company: Buy 1 dozen oysters, get a half dozen free 4-7 pm
Mojo’s: All things fried on special all day.
Rare Old Times: Prix Fixe: Soup or Salad, Choice from a Selection of Entrées, Dessert or Irish Coffee:$14.99 5-8pm. 750-1346
Sam Miller’s: $0.75 oysters 4-8pm
Sticky Rice: ½ price sushi, 5-6 pm. 358-7870

Saturday
Capital Ale House: American Micro Brew Day-most American Micro pints for $2.00, 11am-7pm
Curbside Café: ½ off appetizers (5-10 pm)
Infuzion: 10% off dinner for 2 (excludes beverages)
Legend Brewing Company: Buy 1 pound crab legs, get a half pound free 12-4 pm
Mojos: Special menu of herbed flatbread pizzas-$5. 6-10pm
Rare Old Times: Prix Fixe: Soup or Salad, Choice from a Selection of Entrées, Dessert or Irish Coffee: $14.99, 5-8pm. 750-1346
Sette: 1/2 price Bloody Marys & Mimosas. 12-5pm

Sunday
Baja Bean: $1 cheese quesadillas, $1 an hour pool, $1 12-ounce cans
Bottoms Up: $3 Mimosas and Bloody Marys all day
Café Caturra Short Pump: Extended social hour 5-9pm. $5 wines/glass and $3 beers
Cafe Rustica: Sunday Suppah: $15 per person: three courses with a monthly rotating menu. 225-8811
Capital Ale House: Prime Rib Special- 8 ounce prime rib dinner w/ potatoes & vegetable-$9.99 or a 16 ounce prime rib dinner w/ potatoes & vegetable-$16.99. Noon-9 pm.
Cha Cha’s Cantina: $1 Tacos, 25 cent Wings. 9pm+
Can Can: Beer specials til 9 pm.
Curbside Cafe: half-price appetizers (5-10pm)
Europa: half-price tapas
The Hard Shell: crab leg, including all-you can eat specials. 643-2333
Kitchen 64: Drafts $2.50. Pitchers: $9
Legend Brewing Company: Buy 1 pound crab legs, get a half pound free 12-4 pm
Mojos: Select menu items on special and build your own 8 oz. burger or chicken breast sandwich with as many toppings as you can cram - $6. 6-10pm. 24 oz. PBR Cans $2.50 all night Sunday Funday Night-play old school video games on our project screen TV. Starting around 9pm.
Pie: $3 Jumbo slice margherita pizza and pint of PBR. 257-7940
Sette: 1/2 price Bloody Marys & Mimosas. 12-5pm. Date Night 5-9pm, share appetizer, salad, pizza & a dessert for $25.95.
Six Burner: Sunday Supper-$20. Kids 10&under eat free w/ an adult.
Star-lite: 1/2 off appetizers 5-10pm. $2 PBRs, other drink specials.
Weezie's Kitchen: Food & Drink Specials 3-9pm

enough already

2010-04-27T08:38:00.005-04:00

Enough already with the strange dreams, brain. Let's just say I woke up this morning really grateful that what tortured my dreams all night was not true.

I've been thinking I may need to go to a chiropractor (I've never been) because I keep getting the same crick in my neck that won't go away. I must have slept all kinds of funny Sunday night because yesterday I couldn't move my head to the left at all. It's a little better today, but not good. It would never have occurred to me to go to a chiropractor until we had a professional development workshop about it and accupuncture that made me consider it. Plus, the medical professional who gave the workshop was really great, and his office is nearby my work.

I need to make a list of (not new) movies I want to see because it's gotten quite long now and I keep forgetting:

Cracks. Never heard of it but a blogger I read wrote about it. Has Eva Green, so clearly a must-see
Sherlock Holmes
American Gigolo
A Single Man
that lovestory movie with Miley Cyrus (when it comes to the Byrd or on DVD) I know, lame, right?
Date Night (once it comes to the Byrd or on DVD)
Pan's Labyrinth

Movies coming to theaters that I want to see in the theater:

Sex and the City II
Iron Man II

New friends

2010-04-23T14:35:00.000-04:00

Isn't it just delightful when you meet someone new and you have lots in common and conversation comes easily? I'm still kinda high from the meeting I had this week with a new acquaintance. Lately I've been fortunate to have met all kinds of fun new people, and continue to be grateful for my twitter friends, both those I have met and those I only know from online who I haven't (only a matter of time really).

This week's meeting started as a meshing of minds about coffee culture in RVA. I couldn't quiiite tell from the invitation if it the sender was strictly interested in business or not, but I figured I'd give it a go. The coffee shop where we were going to meet was closing by the time I got out of work, so we headed down to Cafe Gutenberg instead. It was half price wine night (which is the only day you should even get wine there, because all but the house wine is marked up so high it's ridic), so instead of coffee, we had to say yes to wine.

We brainstormed lots of great ideas about future Barista Jams and other coffee related things, but then got off on personal tangents too. Conversation flowed easily and after 3 hours, we finally parted, since it was a school night and all. I had quite a high after that, and I can't tell if it was just the wine talking. Either way, I'm always glad when meetings are both productive and interesting.

Chased

2010-04-23T12:52:00.000-04:00

I'm not trying to turn this into a dream blog all of a sudden, but when I have particularly weird and interesting ones, I want to write about them.

I am going to blame my dream from Wednesday night on the fact that when I came home from work yesterday, I fell asleep on my loveseat, book open on my lap, for 4 straight hours. Then I got up, went to sleep on the couch for another 3 hours, and then finally got in bed. So I slept an entire night's sleep before I actually went to bed. Total sleep hours: 12. Yipes.

So Wednesday's dream. It was a "being chased/trying to get away dream" which is maybe why I was tired the next day. I dreamt a band of militant, crazy, anti-terrorism people were going around my neighborhood and rounding up people, kidnapping them and making them join their group. You couldn't resist their force, and you knew that if they didn't get you yet, it was only a matter of time, because they'd gotten everyone else. Like with all my dreams, there's never a logical order to my dreams. Many friends from different areas and times in my life were in it. At one point, I was physically fighting off a burly attacker and losing and remember threatening that I was going to call my dad and he was going to come beat them up. Here's what's trippy: Clearly, my dream self must have been thinking of the fit, strong dad of my youth, not the one that would be old and fragile now at my current age. In the dream, I actually called my dad, and halfway through calling realized that my dad was dead (which in real life is true, he died last year) I remember being so sad to realize that. It wasn't as if my dad and I were close for most of the last part of his life, but I guess a little girl always wants her daddy to protect her.

In other parts of the dream, we kept trying to come up with plans to escape, and some of it involved actual flying (like superhero flying) and hiding and getting lost in crowds, and scaling tall buildings, all very odd things. At one point, we were in a movie theater and thought we had lost them, but then they found us.

Dream interpretation from Dream Moods:
Chase
To dream that you are being chased, signifies that you are avoiding a situation that you do not think is conquerable. It is often a metaphor for some form of insecurity.

Imprisonment
To dream that you are imprisoned, suggests that you are feeling trapped or unable to move beyond a certain point. Perhaps your outdated beliefs or old ways of thinking is preventing you from going forward

I think these both stem from some of the anxiety I was having this week over getting work done and my writing.

Goo Goo Dolls at the National

2010-04-21T11:28:00.002-04:00

Last night was the Goo Goo Dolls show at the The National. It was a big crowd, which makes sense because they are probably one of if not the most commercially successful, biggest names that have played there.

I hadn't been to The National as a viewer yet. My chorus performed there a few years ago shortly after they opened, and it was SO COOL to see all the backstage areas and the rooms they hadn't quite completed. The historic theater still had little nooks and crannies, and there was one unfinished room where an old painted tapestry of sorts was peeling off the wall. I don't know if they were planning to restore it or just cover over it but remember thinking it'd be a shame just to destroy it to put up shiny modern walls of some kind. There were all these little backstage lounges, a sauna and a 20 person hot tub. The hot tub was not finished at the time, and I wonder if it's still there. I long to be a groupie just so I can get backstage again. It pained me not to be able to walk around the back areas at the show last night.

The opening act was decent, though I don't remember their name because the name they had in lights (cool, oblong baloon shaped lights) on stage turned out to be the title of their new album and not the band name (which I thought was a little backwards considering no one had ever heard of them). I think they got to open for GGD based on the fact that the lead singer had Johnny Reznik's hair from 20 years ago (which turns out, Johnny kind of still had, and it looked good on him).

The opener's not-band-name-but-album-title was "Of Men and Angels" which honestly would be a cool band name. The lead man liked to put him hands in the air a lot, was pretty emo hipster and was quite showy, but they rocked good, so it was ok.

The Goo Goo Dolls played for 2 hours without a break (including encore) so that was impressive. It took Johnny 3 songs to really get energized though. He came out very subdued and even bored-looking. He did "Slide" third, but you could tell he really hated singing it, because he really diverged from the melody and was half-hearted about it. Luckily, as the show went on, he got more animated. Word is, he's actually kinda stage-frighty, and he even told us during one of his guitar solos that he hated playing them. Johnny also forgot some lyrics to a slow song he was doing with acoustic guitar and cursed and joked about it (much to the audience's delight) and that was really endearing. You know musicians play thousands of shows and it's only normal that they'd forget a lyric or two.

Johnny talked to and interacted with the audience, which I appreciate. When he first mentioned the hot military girl in the front row with a sign, I thought for a second it might be questionable rationale. Turns out it was a marine who was about to get deployed to Afghanistan. He gave her a kiss. Apparently there were quite a few military folks in the audience.

Despite a scuffle between some drunk older women and my friend's sister, and the group of 15-year old couples swaying and dancing and bumping into me, it was a good time. I really hate when people have no respect of other people's space. The 15 year olds were singing along and enjoying themselves but I couldn't help but think that none of them were even BORN YET when this band got popular. And if they bumped me one more time (after asking them nicely 2x to stop) I was going to smack them.

My friend had tweeted the bass player earlier in the day, requesting that he play some older, more obscure tracks, in which the bassist actually sings, and he ended up doing 4 of them, so my friend was elated. This friend is also a multi-talented musician, and we both marvelled at how many guitars were lined up on stage--more than 20 in total. My friend tells me that the GGD play in some unusual keys and tunings and that's why they needed all the guitars. Johnny switched guitars for every song.

My friend swears the drummer was wearing a Flying Squirrels t-shirt (which weirdly, my friend had on that night too) but I couldn't confirm. It looked similar, but he was hidden by the drums.

Dreams of fantasy cruises

2010-04-20T08:47:00.002-04:00

Had another of my incredibly detailed, weird o dreams last night. This one was at least enjoyable and not disturbing. It's funny when real-life and real-world things work themselves into your dreams.

I was trying to fly somewhere, but all the flights were congested and stalled and people were having trouble getting them (real world-volcano ash problem). Somehow, the plane was not a plane, but essentially a giant parking lot/parking garage, and I kept seeing all kinds of people I knew from H.S. and college. I was sitting with Patrick from the Boka Truck (I've run into him 2x in the last week, so that made sense) and we were having a grand ole time and getting along quite well. Suddenly, Joe comes up and he looks forlorn because he was supposed to be going someplace else but got stuck on this flight thing and there were no seats. We happened to have seats near us, so he sat there.

Then the dream switches to a bigger thing, like the plane was suddenly a cruise ship, but it was like a virtual world, it was all fantastical and like a little moving island of sorts. There were cars and grass and trees and even this water like substance that people were swimming and walking and boating on. The water turned out not to be water, but millions of tiny silvery stones that gave the impression of water. It was all verry surreal. I had gone back to my seat to get money to buy food and ran into someone, some sort of authority figure in my life, or a colleague that has more experience than me. She offered to do a "reading" of me, some sort of psychic thing. I told her I barely had $ for food, but she offered to do it for free. In the dream, I never got the chance to figure that out, because when we went outside, we were so amazed by all the things this plane/cruise had on it, that we never got to the reading.

The problem I have with dream interpretation is that I am never just dreaming about one thing, like falling, or teeth, or knives. My dreams are complicated and interweaved and often about the doing, not things. So I'm never sure if I have several of these "things" in my dreams, if that means my subconcious is thinking about all of them , or if there's a dominant theme I should pay attention to.

Dream Moods says:
Cruise
To dream that you are on a cruise, represents some emotional journey that you are going through. The dream may also be a pun on "cruising" through situations in your life with ease and little effort.
Airplane
To dream that you are flying an airplane, suggests that you are in complete control of your destination in life. You are confident and self-assured in your decisions and accomplishments.
Fantasy
To dream of a fantasy world, may be a way for your mind to highlight what is normal. Alternatively, the dream may be telling you to expand your thinking and use your imagination and creativity. Explore all your options no matter how strange or illogical it may be.

full weekend

2010-04-18T23:15:00.000-04:00

I did a lot, was lonely, spent a lot, and enjoyed the weather this weekend. I took some slow steps to figuring out how to be friends with my ex, and got props for my writing. So overall good, but there was definitely periods of alone time that got kinda well, lonely.

But that's not why I'm posting. I MUST go to bed, so I won't post photos now of all the loot I got at the Spring Bada-Bing (lame name, cool organizer--the Richmond Craft Mafia (much better name).

Got rings made out of buttons, cool photos, a possible purchase of a real art piece, a sunglasses case, art for my friend's birthday, and a blingy belt buckle.

Here's a fun site I read, they have original art, cool photos, drawings, and music, including this video I've never heard of but enjoyed.

Batzy Shop

Espresso judging and Indian food with wine

2010-04-16T14:23:00.000-04:00

What IS it with boys and bacon? I got to drink and judge all kinds of specialty espresso beverages this week, including those with goat cheese, chili, honey, and BACON. Here's my review below over at RVA News.

RVA Barista Jam Review

2 articles of mine were published today! I also wrote a review about Olio's wine dinner from last weekend. I enjoyed the experience, though the wine pours were a little scant, and the atmosphere and staff there never disappoint.

Olio Wine Dinner Review

parody with cats

2010-04-11T18:21:00.000-04:00

Ha, there's a Sartorialist parody with cats:

The Catorialist

At first, I thought it was a serious street-photography of cats, but after reading, you can tell it's really parodying The Sartorialist's writing style, layout, and photo titles. Clever.

Overheard in Richmond

2010-04-11T16:18:00.000-04:00

Overheard yesterday in Mongrel:

40s-50s age woman, reading a coaster or shot glass or something out loud: "You know you're drunk when you can't lie on the floor without holding on."

Elderly man with her: "I know how that is."

I laughed to myself.

After getting all dressed up to go to a disappointing alumni recruitment committee reception that consisted of me, 3 staff, and 2 old couples, I stopped in Carytown on the way home to see if Chop Suey had any interesting books on their sidewalk sale rack (they didn't). I bought myself a pair of oversized black sunglasses in Bygones instead, and ran into a college friend who had been walking around Carytown taking photos to "make her own art." Walking back to my car, I weaved through the line for Avatar at The Byrd, which had reached the end of the block already.

WASPy

2010-04-06T15:34:00.002-04:00

(Photo: HGTV)

I've decided I need more WASP-y stripes like this in my life.

Speaking of WASPs, I had a conversation like this with my neighbor this weekend when we walked to Easter on Parade. I was looking at his Brooks Brothers catalog and while everyone in there was decidedly beautiful, there is such a thing as too preppy. And I like preppy. I went to UR, after all. 2 of my major boyfriends have been preppy. But too much preppy that screams WASP or Daddy's Money, I have a problem with. In researching this article, I was suprirsed to find quite a few preppy-centric blogs and websites. Here are some illustrative examples.

Good Preppy:

Boys with bikes/glasses/ties

This is Matt Bomer (unfortunate name for him) who stars in USA Network's White Collar, which is a good show. This is from a Glamour spread that I have as well. This look is really more hipster-preppy though.

(Ten Gossip)

Anything White

Especially Eyelet. So dainty and feminine.

Eva Mendes (Fab Sugar)

Stripes and Argyle (in moderation)

Especially shirtdresses. I think I saw this blue and white number on a gal at Easter on Parade and I covet.

Ralph Lauren Shirtdress. (I Am Fashion)

(Posh Tots)

----------------------------------------

Bad Preppy:

Sweaters tied over your shoulders.

You look like a douche if you are guy and like a soccer mom if you are a woman.

(Eighties Online)

Vera Bradley
I am a proud member of the Facebook group Your Vera Bradley Bag is Not Unique or even Attractive because after I graduated, EVERYONE on campus had this type of handbag. And the FB group just says it all for me.

(Glamour Vanity)

Madras (see also: Seersucker)

Obviously a madras suit would be overkill but I don't really like it in general because everyone wears it. I don't like it when everyone dresses the same in general. (ala, Strawberry Hill Races, or Pig Roast at UR, or in the oversized seersucker suit I saw my college ex wearing at Easter on Parade this past weekend)

(The Young Gentlemen's Guide)

Printed Pants

Alligators, whales, horses, ducks, I don't care. You look ridiculous.

(Fashion Preserve)

I actually own this book, which I bought as a joke at a used book sale.

(Worthy Style)

I will say, like most styles, if you have the confidence and that certain something to pull these looks off, I will give you a pass.

Contemplative at work

2010-04-02T11:20:00.000-04:00

(From: Daily Pep)

Photos to go with the mood I'm in at the moment.

(From Rockstar Diaries)

I love that I can listen to my mp3 library away from home on Last.Fm

Contemplative songs scrobbled on Last.Fm this morning:
Destiny by Zero 7 (god, this song is magical)
Run by Snow Patrol
Let Your Loss Be Your Lesson by Robert Plant & Alison Krauss
Boston White by Umbrellas
Citadel-Anna Nalick
Somebody To Love-Queen

It's been a few perfect weather days this week and will continue through the weekend, so that helps one's mood. It also helps to geek-out with new friends during the week, and have all kinds of things to look forward to this weekend, like First Fridays with Questionable Rationale, and Easter on Parade with my gay bois, my backyard neighbor and hopefully an old college friend.

I recently found a blogger writing about my hometown beaches: I Love Dewey Beach which makes me both excited and wistful at the same time. She appears to live year round somewhere else, but has a summer cottage in Dewey. I wish my mother's house was not a mess so that I would actually have a place to stay for free when I want to come home to my beach. Luckily my best friend's mom has offered her house for me to stay in the future.

sing dinosaur

2010-03-24T21:04:00.001-04:00

This is funny because of the singing Brachiosaurus.It also reminds me a bit of the Loch Ness Monster, which makes me sad, because there will probably be no more dramatic readings of THE ORM.

Daily Pep Talk

2010-03-22T09:43:00.002-04:00

Daily Pep Talk From A Best Friend knows what I need often when I don't.
She posts little "pick-me-ups" and pep talks, which could sound cheesy, but are really nice. Sometimes you need a positive reminder. I am a cynical optimist, but the emphasis there is optimist. I really am a happy person. I'm trying to give myself time right now to adjust, to be sad, to be cynical, to be anti-social, and I need that time, but I'm trying not to get sucked into the dark place. I want to see the light. I want to be my normal cheerful, enthusiastic self, but it's just hard to do that right now. I don't want to socialize, then feel bad for wasthing perfectly good days doing nothing. I get tired of making all the plans all the time. I don't reach out for help if I need it. I've been taking care of myself for too long. So when I'm left suddenly truly alone, it's hard to figure out where to go.

Here are some of her pep talks below:
Dating is not so bad.
Pep talk: If this one isn't THE one, you'll survive without them. It's daunting to go back to dating but you can handle it. You're foxy as hell and you will not settle.
Today remind yourself: Dating is not so bad.

You can forgive.
Pep talk: Forgiveness frees you from the pain of the past. It allows you to progress and to stop feeling like shit. If you forgive, you don’t necessarily have to forget, but you can at least stop obsessively thinking about who done you wrong. I can’t even wrap my head around how angry and twisted my life would be without forgiveness. Forgiveness is a blessing.
Today remind yourself: I can forgive.

You're boldly going.
Pep talk: If you don't care what a person thinks, don't ask for their opinion. You know you're heading in the right direction and you can be confident without feedback.
Today remind yourself: I'm boldly going.

She's started lately to post videos of things she's edited for Gawker, which I don't care for as much and detract from the message of her blog.

. .

2010-03-17T22:41:00.000-04:00

I came home from work today and did nearly exactly what I'd been waiting all day to do-- sat outside and read until the sun went away, and then slept for hours. Now I'm going to bed. I don't think I ate dinner. I've got a permanent crick in my neck, probably from sleeping on my love seat. I'm not feeling myself right now. Nothing is exciting or worth looking forward too. I couldn't even get excited for St. Patrick's day, and you know how I feel about holidays. Everything just seems so boring and hard and strange. Going to go to bed now and hope that things look brighter in the morning. The nice weather we're supposed to get will help.

hott

2010-03-16T20:03:00.001-04:00

I like it when friends are open to impromptu get togethers. Isn't that what Twitter's for, anyway?

(Photos from This is Glamourous)

Music: Run-Snow Patrol

How not to be boring in conversation

2010-03-16T14:58:00.001-04:00

Today I'm posting something I saved awhile ago from The Happiness Project. I find that too often, people go on and on and don't know how to talk to other people, at parties, on dates, in networking events, so I wanted to post this list. I also find concentrating on these things myself helps ensure I'm not boring others either.

Post below is from Gretchen's site. I espeically think 5 and 6 are important.

Eight Tips to Know If You're Being Boring.
By GretchenRubin from The Happiness Project

Once you’re talking, how do you know if the other person is interested in your conversation – or not? One challenge is that the more socially adept a person is, the better he or she is at hiding boredom. It’s a rare person, however, who can truly look fascinated while bored.

Here are the factors I watch, when trying to figure out if I’m connecting with someone. These are utterly unscientific – I’m sure someone has made a proper study of this, but these are just my observations (mostly from noting how I behave when I’m bored and trying to hide it):

1. Repeated, perfunctory responses. A person who repeats, “Oh really? Wow. Oh really? Interesting.” isn't particularly engaged.

2. Simple questions. People who are bored ask simple questions. “When did you move?” “Where did you go?” People who are interested ask more complicated questions that show curiosity, not mere politeness.

3. Interruption. Although it sounds rude, interruption is actually a good sign, I think. It means a person is bursting to say something, and that shows interest. Similarly…

4. Request for clarification. A person who is sincerely interested in what you’re saying will ask you to elaborate or to explain. “What does that term mean?” “When exactly did that happen?” “Then what did he say?” are the kinds of questions that show that someone is trying closely to follow what you’re saying.

5. Imbalance of talking time. I suspect that many people fondly suppose that they usually do eighty percent of the talking because people find them fascinating. Sometimes, it’s true, a discussion involves a huge download of information desired by the listener; that’s a very satisfying kind of conversation. In general, though, people who are interested in a subject have things to say themselves; they want to add their own opinions, information, and experiences. If they aren’t doing that, they're probably keeping quiet in the hopes that the conversation will end faster. Or maybe you just aren't letting them get a word in -- recently I was talking to someone who, though fascinating, didn't want to let me contribute to the conversation. I enjoyed it, but not as much as if I'd been able to talk, too.

6. Abrupt changes in topic. If you’re talking to someone about, say, the life of Winston Churchill (I have a tendency to dwell at length on this particular subject), and all of a sudden the other person says, “So how are your kids?”, it’s a sign that he or she isn’t very interested or perhaps not listening at all. When someone makes this kind of switch, I have to fight the urge not to drag the topic back to what I want to talk about – but the fact that someone has introduced a completely different subject is a sure sign that the subject is not engaging.

7. Body position. People with a good connection generally turn to face each other. A person who is partially turned away isn’t fully embracing the conversation. Along the same lines, if you’re a speaker trying to figure out if an audience is interested in what you’re saying:

8. Audience posture. Back in 1885, Sir Francis Galton wrote a paper called “The Measurement of Fidget.” He determined that people slouch and lean when bored, so a speaker can measure the boredom of an audience by seeing how far from vertically upright they are. Also, attentive people fidget less; bored people fidget more. An audience that’s sitting still and upright is interested, while an audience that’s horizontal and squirmy is bored.

I often remind myself of La Rochefoucauld’s observation, “We are always bored by those whom we bore.” If I’m bored, there’s a good chance the other person may be bored, too. Time to find a different subject. (Here's a list of some topics to avoid, if you don't want to risk boring people.)

Have you figured out any ways to tell if you’re boring someone?

Quotes for living

2010-03-16T11:21:00.000-04:00

“No man knows how bad he is till he has tried very hard to be good…Only those who try to resist temptation know how strong it is.”
-- C.S. Lewis

“If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant: if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome.”
-- Anne Bradstreet

"We make a living by what we get, we make a life by what we give."
--Sir Winston Churchill

Glare of the computer screen.

2010-03-15T00:41:00.003-04:00

This is what I get for sleeping all weekend. Now I can't make myself go to bed. I'm listening to this music, as per @tokyohanna . It's a little too upbeat for bedtime music, though, which was her suggestion.

(Photo from This is Glamorous)

I want to do a pink lip like this. Love the lighting here. 'Course, I'm not blond, so it wouldn't look the same.

I'm in a weird mood tonight. Not bad, just pensive. It feels good to be pensive. I wonder why I'm so resistant to the idea of other people having children, of getting married. I've got to assume it makes them happy, but those are not things I see for myself, so it seems so odd and unpleasant. Not that I don't like the idea of marriage, I've just never really been with someone I thought I'd spend the rest of my life with, and it seems rather sophomoric that soo many people think they have. I believe in love. I've been in love, several times. None of us wants to end up alone, but I think its awfully unrealistic to think that one person can meet all our needs for the rest of our lives. I realize this all makes me sound like a terrible cynic, and I don't want to be a negative person because I'm really not.

Do I just read people better than they read themselves? You know how sometimes you hear someone talking, you see their actions, and you just go, wow, they're really deluded. Sometimes they do it purposefully, but its scarier when they don't see it at all.

I'm having flashbacks to up-late-IM conversations in college. God, those were so dramatic, so life-changing, or at least they felt that way when I was 19, 20 years old. I always said the best art comes out of melancholy, out of unhappiness, out of tragedy, of unrequited love. I wrote some good poetry back then, ha. Shit, some of this music brings back memories. I love how music does that. Smell too. Bionic nose and all. How many of you have saved IM conversations on your computer? Be honest. I still do.

(Photo from Altruism in the Morning)

Is sleep deprivation just another addiction, a punishment of the modern world? So many people I know have insomnia all the time. I never have a problem sleeping. I'm a sleeper, in fact, I'd be more likely to oversleep. But I wonder how much we now compete to sleep less, we each trying to out-busy the other. Trying to show how brave we are by not sleeping. A more postmodern(? I hate this term, no one has been able to accurately define it for me) form of self-punishment, like starving yourself, purging, or cutting?

My cat is curled up in my spot on the couch.

Tonight's blog writing playlist (on random, more or less):
Citadel-Anna Nalick
Goodbye Girl-Hootie & the Blowfish
Kiss From A Rose-Seal
Rain-Madonna
Best I Ever Had-Vertical Horizon
Walking After You-Foo Fighters
Same in Any Language-I Nine

Stop Motion

2010-03-14T22:19:00.001-04:00

Found this enchanting stop-motion video from Nectar & Light. Clearly I really do want to be a redhead.

Angela Kohler's photography is amazing.

Streetstyle blogs

2010-03-11T14:28:00.000-05:00

I just posted a lot of new inspiration photos in my Winter Everyday People. Here a few teasers:

Deniz Baran

Found at Cafe Mode

Kendi Everyday

I'd wished I could have gotten an outfit photo of the student earlier in my office, but that probably would have seemed weird. She was dressed casually in jeans, but had an overall theme of sparkles. She had a embellished crystal beige top, with a glitter beige shrug over it. She had a fascinator with sparkly stones on it, and her thong sandals were crystallized too. She had 3 large crystal bangles on one arm, and another with thinner bangles. It was a lot of accessories, but it really worked on her. Oh, and she had red hair. I covet red hair, but I've never really seen it look good on someone who isn't naturally a red head, and I don't want purple hair. I think hers was dyed, but she was fair and freckly and it looked good on her. Sigh. Shear Genius (I never watch this show, but I caught it last night), had a Gorgeous natural redhead as a model for one of the challenges. She's here, click through to number 9. Other fav redheads of mine:

Rene Russo in The Thomas Crown Affair (also a fav movie)

This was from an Etsy site I think, but I love both the color, style, and the hair fascinator.

new food at RVA News

2010-03-11T09:48:00.000-05:00

I've got a few new articles up over at RVA News about food focusing on new places that have opened up, including Spoonfed, Strange Matter, and Fan House

http://rvanews.com/sections/food

The Oracle says

2010-03-10T17:06:00.009-05:00

I'm a little creeped out that the upgrade of our content management system is now called "Oracle" in red letters (in the same font as Honda, I might add).

------------
I love Cake Wrecks. If you haven't read them, you are not my friend. Go. Go now to the last post. The Oracle says so. Wait for the last bit, it's the best.
------------
At work, there's a quote on event flier at work by Winston Churchill:

You make a living by what you get. You make a life by what you give.

Every time I see that, I start singing the "You Get What You Give" song by the New Radicals.

The singer is bad at lip-syncing.

Ukelele in crochet

2010-03-08T09:11:00.003-05:00

Found this from my friend's blog Snippets & Snapshots.

So cute, awfully realistic, and the music is good too! Apparently there's a whole series of vidoes on You Tube. I'm watching them now.

Richmond Noir reading

2010-03-03T08:48:00.002-05:00

(from Chop Suey's Blog)

Oh, clever photo.

So I'll be going to this book reading this week. After I posted a bit ago about reading Richmond Noir cover to cover.

THURS, MARCH 4
8:00 PM
NEW YORK DELI

featuring readings from contributors X.C. Atkins, Clay McLeod Chapman, Dennis Danvers , Dean King, and Howard Owen

w/ editors Andrew Blossom, Brian Castleberry, and Tom De Haven

Book sales and author greeting will begin at 8:00. The readings will start around 8:45, with the performance from the Scott Burton Trio following. I have a date with RHONY at 10pm, so I won't be able to stay all night.

I hope to see I Could Go On and On there.

In other small Richmond news, I found out the piano accompanist for the chorus I sing in is the mother of a friend of mine. All this time, and I didn't know!

Happy things

2010-03-02T09:34:00.003-05:00

Borrowed from Taza, it's good to do these now and then.

10 things that make me happy
1. sunny days
2. Eastercrack
3. getting published
4. the smell of a new book
5. invitations
6. the first warm day after a long winter
7. new stationery
8. sparkly jewelry
9. spooning with Kia
10. a good hair day

Faces, facets, and fanpages

2010-02-22T12:39:00.011-05:00

I was just talking to someone who blogs about markets, under a pen name, and how his article got linked to by a big name writer in that area. But since he writes under a pseudonym, will anyone ever really attribute that article to him? How do we prove we are our pen name? Do we need to? What's the benefit and drawback to being anonymous online?

I was trying to find an article about this very topic on Penelope Trunk's blog (I'm still looking and that's a post for later--WAIT, here it is) but came across this blog post of hers about social media identity instead:

Because mashing our social media together for the purpose of marketing one feed to another dilutes the value of social media. If you express yourself in the same way on a blog and on Twitter, then you don't need both.

Each of us is multi-faceted. With a selection of media to choose from, we can express different parts of ourselves in different ways.

(Emphasis mine). I cannot agree with this point more. I used to always complain with my friends would write a LJ entry and then post the exact same thing on their MySpace. They'd get mad and say they could do what they want, but they were missing the point. Why would you just repost the exact same thing, when you have 2 audiences with the potential to write twice as much? I'm just going to stop reading one site or the other if you post the exact same stuff. This is why I will not follow any Twitterers that simply post links to a blog, or add a company on Facebook that just says the same stuff I can find on their homepage.

Penelope continues:

Mashing all social media together to create one image of ourselves doesn't make sense because we are all already accustomed to showing certain parts of ourselves only in certain parts of our lives.

Also, people who want to meet you in one format, won't necessarily want to meet you in another, and that's fine. Jason Warner, at Google, for example, explained that he doesn't want to check out your MySpace photos before he hires you because it's not the part of you he's expecting to show up at work

I totally agree with Jason's point, though think that the conventional wisdom is the opposite--employers, associates, friends, whoever, will look at all parts of your online life when trying to put together an initial impression. I think this is why I tend to want to be anonymous when talking about non-work, non-professional things online. Sometimes I want to be outrageous, controversial, silly, sexy, whatever, but not have it be tied to my professional self. My personal life is different from my professional life. But then it becomes hard to have ANY identity, when you chop your life up into parts. You forget who you told what name to, have to decide why you share what parts with, and the result is all very confusing.

This also brings me to "fan pages." Sociologically, FB is a goldmine of interaction, case studies, and I told you so's. With a slew of companies adding fan pages, it makes me wonder what makes us decide to publicly declare our love for a company. Surely most of the time, we are not so rabid a fan that we must declare our love for Chipotle, naps, or our local media person. It's all just a show--a way to prove to others what we have. Our likes and dislikes make us who we are--our groupie love is how we connect to others. You like the same things as me, even things as mundane as high heels or Swiss cheese, so you must be like me. I understand you. What does being a fan really mean? And what does it mean when we must profess it so publicly?

Richmond Noir

2010-02-22T11:19:00.005-05:00

Richmond is 2 degrees of separation as usual.

I had found the collection of short stories, Brooklyn Noir, a little bit ago at a used bookstore. I got bout halfway through and thought it a clever concept--several short stories, each centered on a partiuclar Brookyn neighborhood, told in the noir style.

Little did I know there was a whole series of books for other cities, most newly, our very own RVA!

I first heard about Richmond Noir from reading I Could Go On and On's blog post about it, not realizing the series were connected.

I got my copy on a whim at Chop Suey yesterday, after being drawn to the cheap used book sale outside the store. I haven't bought a new book in a long time, and Chop Suey was offering 10% off. I also combined with Joe and we got 10 books for $5 fron the outside carts (8 for me, 2 for him. He doesn't really read fiction, so less to choose from for him). I got a biography of Nicole Kidman, several short stories, a Larry McMurtry book (a fav author), a book about retaining customers (in case I ever open a shop), and some quick-read novels. Yay.

I spent 5 or 6 hours yesterday evening reading Richmond Noir cover to cover. I hadn't sat quietly in my apartment and just read a book in way too long, so it was a perfect way to spend my Sunday. I heard they are having a reading on March 4 at NY Deli, so I might go to that.

things i want to see, and the crow

2010-02-19T22:29:00.003-05:00

I'm not normally a movie person. Especially not when 2 people at the movies costs more than a meal at most places!

But after being hammered with advertising for nearly 6 months, I want to see
Shutter Island
twisted storylines, I legit want to know what happens, I like a scary story

and also
Alice in Wonderland
star-studded, cool visuals, Tim Burton obvs, classic story

I want to rent:
A Single Man
I talked about this awhile ago,and missed my window for seeing it in the real theater. I can hope it will come to the Byrd, but I doubt it. Colin Firth, gay storyline, the 60's, stylish, Juliane Moore looks fantastic.

I just watched:
Whip It
Good story, watchable, but somewhat unrealistic and choppy plot at times (and I am SO not a plot critic). I really need a roller derby name.

Did you know that Vera Wang designed The Crow's skating costumes?
(photo: Oregon Live.com, David J. Phillip/The Associated Press)

Only part of my Valentines

2010-02-14T21:53:00.002-05:00

Hydrangeas hand-delivered to my work Friday, a chocolate heart, and a ticket stub from Valentine's Day, the movie, which was perfect for the date and entertaining and star-studded.

The other part was a Starbucks gift card and dinner at Tastebuds.

Normal size

2010-02-14T18:26:00.008-05:00

Okay, so I just found out about this Kevin Smith thing. Director/writer Kevin Smith was apparently seated on a Southwest Airlines flight and was told he must return to the ticket counter to buy another ticket because he was oversize for the seat he was in. Basically Kevin live-tweeted his experience, causing a hullabaloo, Southwest responded with a public statement that was not exactly the same as his experience, yadda yadda.

I'm surprised to see the first handful of comments on that Gawker article are all about how it was a good thing Southwest is shaming people into losing weight and how it's not fun to sit next to large people. I figured they'd defend him.

So this brings me to something I've been thinking about regarding size and weight. I know I'm risking possibly offending some people, but I'm just starting some commentary here. I read a lot of fashion magazines, many of which have come under fire lately (well, it's basically an ongoing conversation, that flares up now and then) for not showing enough "normal-sized" models. Glamour magazine recently had a whole fashion thread with a plus-sized model and got rave reviews for it, but I couldn't help thinking that some of the shots could have been done a little more flattering for her. Any time weight comes up in fashion, experts always chime in that the average clothing size for a woman is a 12. That's not normal size to me. But does normal mean a healthy weight, or does it mean the number that the majority of Americans are? And just because the majority is something, does that make it normal?

Over 60% of Americans are overweight, something that is regularly identified as a health crisis. A size 12 would usually make someone overweight, depending on height of course. Now I make a definite distinction in fashion between normal and perhaps what is the "majority." I consider a normal-sized woman to be from a size 4-8, maybe thru 10. You can often be that size and not be over or under weight, and THOSE are the women that are not reflected in fashion. I tend to think that most women are that size, which of course is not true, since 60% of Americans are overweight, but I don't think it's doing anyone any favors if we glorify being fat in fashion or in the media either. If I can't fit in the clothes that I own or are on that magazine cover, well then it's time to get my ass to the gym. I don't think women should try to be a size they will NEVER be or so skinny they look like they'll break in half, but it's not okay to be complacent about being grossly overweight either.

That said, I think it's unrealistic and unhealthy (both physically and mentally) to show stick-skinny models and to tout toned and fit celebrities quite so much. A real human should not look like they would snap apart if you bumped into them. Models that look like skeletons are not pretty or healthy. Celebrities look that good because it's their job to. When you have that much $ and free time, you pay a trainer to keep you in shape, you can afford a nutritionist and quality healthy food. So many women have body-issues because of how we portray and value the way women look in the mainstream media and that's a real problem. Body shape changes with the times, and hopefully it will cycle back to a norm (ah, that word again, hard to get away, what does it really mean?).

I don't have an opinion really about Kevin Smith's situation. Certainly it's embarrassing, and perhaps not well-handled on the part of the airline, but there is a real concern about people being too large to fit in a seat. I don't think that just because a lot of people have a weight problem, we need to start re-building all movie seats, theatre chairs, metro seats, and plane seats twice as big. I keep seeing that scene in Wall-E where they show the humans on the craft in space, so large they have to have hoverchairs to take them around, their meals are in liquid form, and no one actually knows how to walk. That was a bitingly true social commentary about where we might be headed as a society if we keep up our current lifestyle.

Not a problem

2010-02-11T18:58:00.006-05:00

I'm going to choose to call the amount of wine I've drank in the last 2 weeks "European" and not "drinking problem."

So remember Tuesday night's wine comparison?

(wine comparison, with @bcarr in the background)

The one on the left was the CA Merlot I said sucked. Well after talking to the wine guy at Kroger tonight, I think it's very possible the wine had turned because wine isn't supposed to smell dirty/musty. I'm glad to know I'm not crazy.

The bottle of Rex & Goliath white was eagerly drunken by my guest, but since the drunken makeout Kugel Ball of 2007, I can't touch white wine anymore.

So tonight, I realized a bottle @rvafashionista had brought me awhile ago was nearly 2 dollars off ($11.69), so I grabbed one, after a nice lesson on Italian wines from the wine guy. Did you know that Chianti is a region in Tuscany that grows the Sangiovese grape?

Santa Cristina
2008
Sangiovese (90% Sangiovese 10% Merlot)

(My point-and-shoot sucks)

The bottle I had was 2007, this one is 2008, but it's still very drinkable. Light-medium bodied, a bit of bite at first taste, smooth aftertaste, dry but not too dry.

Sit Uboo Sit

2010-02-11T16:44:00.001-05:00

Okay, at the risk of being the crazy cat lady, I couldn't help but post this photo of Kia, because Joe's camera is far superior to mine, and because, well LOOK AT HER.

(Photo by Joe)

Famous wine

2010-02-11T12:34:00.003-05:00

I went over to my neighbor's apt for dinner last night and brought with me the ill-liked, half opened Chateau St Jean California Merlot. I was hoping they would like it so it wouldn't go to waste. Someone had brought the Francis Coppola Merlot, which I'd always wondered about, being so name-recognizable, which I'm sure notched up the price, which is why I never bought it.

It was very drinkable. Smooth, light, fruity. The other guests liked my Merlot, so I didn't feel as bad drinking theirs.

Tarrant's

2010-02-11T09:49:00.008-05:00

I was saving this review for a professional article, but that doesn't appear to be happening, so here it is.

A few weeks ago, I was itching to get out and have dinner. I had made plans to meet a friend at Tarrant's, one of my standbys, but he cancelled at the last minute as I was driving there, so I bravely went by myself. There are only a few places in town that I feel comfortable going alone and eating at the bar and it was a Sunday night, so I figured it would be fairly empty. I felt very much like Karen over at I Could Go On and On.

I sat at the first part of the L-shaped bar, right near the door. It was a cold, rainy, windy night when I arrived around 6:15 pm. While I was there, several parties of 6 or more came in, and the extended space next door definitely expanded their clientele. The phone rang steadily. There were 2-3 guys at the other end of the bar, who the cute, friendly red-headed bartender seemed to know. I enjoyed listening to their conversations.

An older gentleman came to the front of the restaurant and asked me if I'd mind if he talked on his cell phone. It was such a thoughtful gesture since I was sitting right there.

I got a glass of $6.50 Pinot Noir and settled in with my newspaper. I saw that a vegetable tart was on special ($8.95). It said it was layered with mushroom, goat cheese, olives, garlic, asparagus, and tomato, which I eagerly ordered. While I was waiting for my food, the bartender brought me a garlic bread "taco." Now normally I can't eat garlic because I can never get the taste/smell out of my system, but I figured I wasn't going to be making out with anyone that night, so I ate it.

I was hugely disappointed when my food came to find out that the vegetable tart I was promised was actually a flatbread pizza with veggies on it and a side salad. I know Tarrant's has recently gotten into the pizza business, but I did NOT order pizza. Tart implies something sophisticated, fluffy, layers, mostly vegetable. I love pizza, and it tasted good, but when you expect to get one thing, and something else comes out, well that's just frustrating.

My second wine pour was quite generous. After reading in Style Weekly that the 3rd Street Diner was thinking about starting a strip club in their upstairs (WTF?!), I shared this with the bartender, who had heard that news too. She mentioned she'd been there recently at 3AM and had a very pregnant server with her ta tas practically hanging out. Neither of us dared to imagine if she'd be one of the new "dancers" if the strip club opens.

The bartender and waitstaff alternated as front of house/hostess seamlessly. There was a good mix of old and young patrons, newbies and regulars. They offer free parking at Jim's parking lot on Grace & Foushee, but that's across the street from the lot where my friend Kevin got car-jacked at gunpoint a few years ago at First Fridays. Since then, I only park on well-lit streets.

Ellen turned out to be the bartenders name, and one of the guys at the bar was her roommate. He noted that one of her friends had frequently tried to take him home, and another staff member, possibly the owner, Ted Santarella, remarked that perhaps that friend could get a job as a stripper at the new 3rd Street. Ellen and I exchanged knowing smiles.
----------------------------------------------------------
Tarrant's Cafe
1 W Broad St
Richmond, VA 23220-4212
(804) 225-0035

Red Wines are $6-$7.50 a glass. Bottles are $20-$85 with most in the $20 range
White Wines are $6-$7 a glass. Bottles $20-$59.
$9.50 martinis, and champagne, port, and spiked coffee offerings as well.
Beer bottles are $3.50-$4.75 but fancy ones go up to $8.
Drafts $5ish

Snow breakfast

2010-02-11T08:38:00.008-05:00

(Photo by Joe)

This was my snow breakfast on Saturday. I was planning to attend a morning screening of a film at the Reel Pride Film Festival, the first GLBT festival in Richmond, but the snow coming down was so pretty, and it was so cozy in my apartment that I just didn't make it.

I made us spinach and feta omelets, with salsa as a garnish, and that plate in the back is chocolates from my get-together the night before. Add coffee in my grandma's nautical mug and juice in the glasses my best friend got me for Christmas, and DONE.

I did venture out later to attend my friend's pre-show party at The Camel, and was pleasantly surprised to see that since I'd been there last, the place was nicened up. The bar was long and smooth, there were tons of beers on tap, and good happy hour drink specials The bartender was very friendly and knowledgeable about the special microbrews, even offering samples to taste. Afterward, we carefully walked through the ice to the Firehouse Theater down the block to see the final film: Edie & Thea: A Very Long Engagement. It was a documentary about 2 women who fell in love back in the 50s and 60s when lesbians were still very hidden, and it was told from the perspective of the then 70-something women, through photos and stories. It was supremely touching, bring tears to nearly everyone in the room. You could tell, that even after 42 years, the women still loved each other very much. It's sad to think I've never had a love like that, and that maybe most of us will never find it.

At one point in the film, the women were naming all the Lesbian bars in NYC at the time, and they showed a map (probably about 12-15), and my friend Kevin leaned over and said, "and we have one." That point really hit home with me. I realize NYC is a much bigger place than Richmond, but even then, in the hush hush times, they had more places to gather than Richmond does in 2010! That's just sad.

Wine good vs bad

2010-02-09T21:28:00.004-05:00

So I HATE when I try a new wine and HATE it.

This first one was delightful. Was brought to me as a gift, so no idea from where or how much.

I know next to nothing about Italian wines, so I don't usually go for them. This one was good. The other one, not so much.

Ruggero di Classo
Sicilia
Nero d'Avola 2007

From the bottle: "100% of grapes from South-western Sicily. Berry character with soft tannis and a lightly jammy finish"

Fruity, jammy, a little sweet. The description describes it well.

This one, not so good:

Chateau St Jean
California Merlot
2006

Also a gift. Too dry, too herby/earthy.

Wino

2010-01-26T19:08:00.007-05:00

Wanted a cheap wine tonight but didn't want to drive all the way to the suburban sprawl-hole that is Short Pump. So I stopped at my local Kroger, which has a nice wine selection, and scored this Spanish wine on sale (about a dollar off) for $7.79. Because South American and Spanish wines are still almost a well-kept secret, I always feel like I'm in on something special when I buy those wines, especially as compared in price to the other more popular regions, like Italy, France, and California. Speaking of wines, there's an interesting dialogue happening in the comment thread of RVA Foodie's post about a Sideways-style wine duel at his house recently. He better invite me to the next one.

(yes, that's my tree still up in the bg, don't judge!)

I am a sucker for anything in Spanish, and this wine is very drinkable, a little--not sweet exactly, but notes of sweetness. A little dry, but still pleasant on its own. Good buy for sure. Speaking of my affinity for all things Spanish, one of my students, a supercute, immaculately dressed specimen from Guadalajara, Mexico came in today, and was interested in our GSA. I'm looking forward to lobby day.

I might have played hooky from my second job tonight to go to the grocery store, come home and relax, wash dishes, drink wine, and jam out to my iTunes. So far I've had some great Tom Petty, Wild Horses, The Fray, Michael Jackson, John Mellencamp, and now some Queen, one of my all-time favorite bands. Some photos of Freddie Mercury remind me of my dad when he was young.

Do you ever feel like you were born in the wrong era? I wish I could go back and experience the 4o's, the 60's, 70's disco, so many different times. My mom is at the young end of the Boomers, so she really didn't get to see the 60's, so no cool clothes and stories for me. Instead, I remember bad yellow/orange upholstery and bad design that characterized so much of the 1970's.

I plucked yet another grey hair from my part yesterday. Because my hair is so dark, the silverly strands just shout out for attention, such a contrast to the rest of my mane. I remember telling my mom she'd have to stop plucking eventually or she'd have no hair left. Sigh. We all turn into our mothers eventually? I look so much younger than I am, which often vexes me, because I don't like it assumed that I am young and therefore inexperienced and/or naive, though I guess I should appreciate it, because it allows me to bridge the gap of friendships between my much-younger early-20s friends and those in their late 20's and 30's who are closer in experience to me, at least those without kids.

I read a REALLY interesting article in the Chronicle about modern friendships and social media, and when I have some more time this week, I want to craft a thoughtful response.

Used to

2010-01-25T13:51:00.002-05:00

Have some more Dear Old Loves.

Three Rings
You play video games and work a desk job. I’m joining the circus. Do you still wonder why we didn’t work out?

Lonely Tylenol
We were so good together. And not just because of our mutual affinity for palindromes.

Pick One
You will always be the man I love. But he’s the man who loves me.

Ugh, this one especially got at my heart:
Used To
I just referred to you as someone I used to know.

cats and cookies.

2010-01-25T10:39:00.003-05:00

I can't say no to a funny cat video. If I were single, posting this would TOTALLY be getting me laid. (Video found from The Bloggess, which I found from The Checkout Girl)

I went to my local natural food grocer for the first time in like, 2 years last night because I was reminded they have an excellent, healthy hot bar (read: expensive). Every time I'm in that store, I crave refined sugar and high fructose corn syrup, and since I don't recognize any of the brands, I feel a bit like I did when I was studying abroad in Spain--no way to know if the product was any good or not.

So anyhoo, I do like healthy food, and was starved, and so I coughed up ELEVEN DOLLARS for like, 3 things. I must admit, I love this store because of the free samples. Grocery shopping makes a gal hungry, and I like to try before I buy. Well let me tell you about the heaven that was a gluten free cookie I found. I must have eaten 10 samples (self serve, baby) and finally went over and bought the pricey $2.47 or so cookie because it was the GREATEST THING I'VE TASTED. And get this, it's a Raspberry (just a tiny bit in the center) and Coconut cookie. Now not only does this sound like a cookie your grandma eats that's always the last one left on the plate, but I don't really like cookies, and I HATE coconut. The texture is odd, the flavor is not that good, but gosh darnit, this thing was amazing. Soft, sweet, probably about 5.5 inches in diameter.

(I just polished off this cookie as I write this and will plan to return to cough up some more cash for more later)

We're gonna party like it's 1989

2010-01-25T09:03:00.004-05:00

I had a dream last night that I traveled to Ethiopia, except it didn't seem like Ethiopia, partly because I was surprised that people spoke Spanish there and was delighted how well I'd fit in. I think I was visiting an Anthony Bourdain-type traveller, and was staying in a run-down local motel and other people's houses, but the food was amazing and the company was fantastic.

Then we were on a boat, cruising through Europe and then eventually ended up back at my childhood house in MD, where my mom and I were trying to climb out my parents' bedroom window, and my dad was still alive, and it felt like 1989 all over again. There was a mysteroius and powerful man in a white limo waiting for me, clearly designed to take us to something or somewhere important, but my mom couldn't get out of the window fast enough, so I kept telling the man he had to slow down so my mom could catch up.

I woke up to a dead limb--I had slept on my arm so hard that when I realized it was asleep, when I moved it, my brain did not even register that it was attached to me. It was a VERY odd feeling, like moving this heavy thing, and I didn't even know it was mine. Between my black-out, cold-blocking curtains and the cloud cover, the morning came too fast and I couldn't even tell it was time to get up.

Found this cool site for illustration, photos, art: batzy

Jewelry idea

2010-01-22T14:44:00.004-05:00

Inspiration reminder to self

We're not gonna protest

2010-01-21T11:13:00.007-05:00

Did anyone else see the cardboard sign yesterday on I-195 N after the Thompson entrance with WEBB on it and the E was the hammer&sickle communist symbol?

Am I the only one who thought it was kinda clever and not an insult at all? What's happened recently to ignite this protest about Webb specifically, I wonder? For you non-Virginians, Jim Webb is a newish, Democratic Senator, who ousted a long-time Republican. Fun fact: Did you know he speaks Vietnamese? And his wife has a possibly Vietnamese-sounding name.

Communism is not a dirty word. See also: feminism, socialism, abortion, atheism. It's an economic practice, with some smart ideas that don't always work out so well in practice, a bad history, and unfortunate consequences.

Dear Old Love

2010-01-21T10:18:00.004-05:00

I haven't read Dear Old Love on my bloglines in awhile, and looking at them is so bittersweet.

From the site: "Dear Old Love" is short notes to people we've loved (or at least liked). Requited or unrequited.

Here are a few that especially made a mark. The titles are what make some of them so hillarious.

Smoke Signaling
I’m running out of social media to apologize with.

Human Nature?
I just don’t understand why after a year of loving me, you can’t at least be kind.

Party in the Back
I didn’t mind your mullet.

IM in Trouble
I really thought I was over you, until my computer broke and I realized I was going to lose all our old IM conversations. I cried in the middle of the Apple store.

In Spite of Me
I’d beg you to take me back, but I know you can do better than me.

Extra Quiet
We haven’t spoken in six months, so you probably won’t notice, but I’ve finally stopped speaking to you.

Guess
You know that thing you never, ever let me do? The new guy lets me do it.

Scrunchie Fetish?
If you never loved me, then why did you buy hair elastics to keep at your place because you knew I always lost mine when I came over?

Ryder Wrong
I had to find out from a Facebook wall post that you moved.

Duct Type
You came up with clever make-shift solutions for every home-repair, but when it was our relationship that needed mending you were suddenly out of ideas.

New Alphabet

2010-01-21T09:44:00.004-05:00

What type (font) are you you?
This is a short, interactive with video quiz to determine the typeface that suits your personality. The video allows for a very, in-the-psychologist's-chair feeling. The password is "character."

I am New Alphabet, above, which I find absolutely aesthetically unpleasing. It is a Dutch font, designed in 1967, based on early computer screens.

(found via DDD)

Quotes and Content

2010-01-20T11:16:00.008-05:00

This weekend my friend asked me what my New Years resolutions were, and seemed shocked when I told him that I don't really make resolutions. While I see the value in them, I don't think there's anything especially important about what I'll want in January that I won't want to do year round. I tend to make resolutions throughout the year as I need to.

“Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not; but remember that what you now have was once among the things only hoped for.” --Epicurus

This is another nugget of wisdom from The Happiness Project. I like quotes, but only when they really strike me. Otherwise, they are just cliche (isn't this true about most things in life?) On my last job, I had written down several inspiring quotes and had them posted around my desk area, and it was nice to have them as reminders and markers of what I believed in. I think I'll try to do more of that here, not just posting the quotes (though that does satisfy my love for lists) but also explaining why they are important to me, and to generate discussion.

This quote above speaks to the "grass is always greener" mentality. Oh and how tempting it is! Blogs and twitter and insta-communication make it so easy to complain about things, and there's value in venting, but I try to remember quotes like this to be thankful for what I have.

I want to do more with this blog. I want more readers, I want the sense of community that I feel by reading my blogs and seeing all the commenters there. I know that to increase readership, I have to provide something unique, desirable, and interactive. I like posting photos and linking to pretty things, but I also need to contribute more--give you something to think about. I don't have strange yet funny happenings like Cafe Darkness, been on 100 bad dates like The Checkout Girl, but I love the Internets, journaling, connecting through social media, and sharing.

Enthusiasm as courage

2010-01-20T09:17:00.003-05:00

I've written before about my affinity for The Happiness Project. Gretchen just published a book and is on tour with it now. I must admit, I do judge a book by its cover, and was disappointed to see that the cover was done in a very childlike, cartoon-y manner, which I don't think is befitting to the subject matter.

Gretchen writes:

Confidence has an overtone of posture; also it relates to the way I’m seen by others, or the way I feel about myself. Enthusiasm, on the other hand, has to do with the way I feel about something or someone else. Enthusiasm is a form of social courage; it’s safer to criticize and scoff than to praise and embrace.

I think she's got a great point here, one I never really considered before. This also goes along with my mantra of choosing happiness. You can choose to be enthusiastic. You can choose to be harpy. Which one of these is going to make you happier? I tend to evaluate the world with a critical eye, so I have to catch myself not to go too far that direction. Gretchen writes that she is not naturally an enthusiastic person, which surprises me, probably because I very naturally am. It's easy for me to be enthusiastic, so I should definitely use the traits I already have.

There’s a dark tendency in human nature to mock or attack other people’s enthusiasms.

This is so true. As I especially found over the past year, negative people only bring you down, and make you become a more negative person. I've cut those people out of my life now, and don't need to apologize for it. In wanting everyone to like us, we can be blinded to the quality of the people whose attention we are vying for, or relationships we are trying to nurture or salvage.

What about you? Do you have enthusiasm attackers in your life?

Spontaneity

2010-01-19T14:38:00.007-05:00

I am not a spontaneous person. I think a lot of people like to use that as one of the words to describe them, but I am NOT one of them. I am a planner, I like itineraries, and planning ahead, and lists, and the giddy anticipation of looking forward to something.

That said, I do appreciate when friends call for a last minute get together, or people who actually follow through on the rare case that I ask them to do something last-minute. This is also why I love having friends within walking distance.

Sunday night was like another weekend night for me because I was off Monday (the only holiday we get until Memorial day-notwoot). I didn't have plans, and wanted to go out after watching the Golden Globes and drinking wine.

Thanks to the magic of Twitter and Facebook (didn't we use to use IM for this?), 2 friends responded, one who was traveling via bike, and the other who lives just a few blocks away. Bike friend had showed his penchant for impromptu meetups before. I walked the 6 blocks to my friend's house, and then another 6 to White Dog, which turned out to be closed. Through the magic of my friend's iPhone (I don't have a data phone), we found out RVAFoodie had ended up at Bamboo, where I happily go now that there is no smoking. Johnny ordered the fries, which were thin and abundant and AMAZING. We chatted, I drank $4.50/glass Merlot, and then walked/biked our respective ways home. The warmer weather made the walking bearable. Now that I add it up, it is a lot of blocks, but didn't feel that far away.

SUGAR

2010-01-13T20:41:00.005-05:00

Can you tell my blood sugar bottomed out? After work I needed candy, so I stopped by the Dollar Tree and ended up with this. I've always wanted to try that bagged Beef Jerky. I liked Slim Jims as a kid and was intrigued by the texture of this stuff, but was always a little wary to try it bc clearly it is not good for you. The package was thin, and it tasted okay, but was sweeter than I expected. In the car on the way home I also had a handful of the wasabi rice things (they all taste terrible/bland except for the wasabi balls), a reese's cup, 1/2 the coke, and now am eating cheese and crackers. Please call and check that I haven't gone into a gluten coma.

The GayRVA fake matchbook wasn't gotten at the store, I just threw it in my still life here as a plug for my friend's blog.

Gotta love RVA

2010-01-09T19:29:00.008-05:00

Nights like tonight make me love Richmond. I had an impromptu meetup with RVAfoodie tonight at new restaurant, Garnett's in the Fan. The nice thing about 2 degrees of separation in Richmond is that it's easy to get to know people. Had a lovely chat with the owner, Kendra Feather, who was manning (womanning?) the bar. We talked about community blogs, gluten allergies, and her other restaurant, Ipanema, which I love even though I am so not a hipster. I will go there so much more now that the smoking ban is in effect. I will be going to Garnett's for dinner tomorrow with my Church Hill restaurant owner friend.

RVAfoodie and I discussed anonymity on the Internets, online learning and higher education, and local food and food blogs, since he writes about food on his blog and organizes Richmond food blogs over at Eating Richmond. We even discussed this post here, where he calls-out the concept of "Best Of" restaurant lists. Go see for yourself and chime in.

Garnett's had gotten great reviews, from all over, but mainly from blogger I Could Go On and On, who writes so eloquently and descriptively about restaurants and fun things in RVA. This being Richmond, we've not met yet, but of course have 900 friends in common, and have just narrowly missed each other, including just this weekend at First Fridays.

Since putting together my list of RVA food/drink specials, patio dining, brunch, and cheap drinks early in 2009, I've gotten interest from other parties to continue this, so I'm going to make an effort to keep updating my list.

At Garnett's tonight, I discovered they have happy hour from 4-6 nightly, which means their already-affordable beer and wines are $3. Tonight I enjoyed the Sallies Malbec (I do love a Malbec) and my drinking companion had the San Vito Organic Chianti, though mentioned it was dry.

Tonight I will be walking to a friend's birthday party to hang out with a bunch of 22yr olds. This will make me feel even more old, especially since I found a new grey hair just this morning :) The friend, turns out, lives in an apt I drive by every day on my way home, so I will happily get drunkitydrunkdrunk if I so desire, and walk home in my chic, flat boots. I hate cold weather, but wine makes it a little more bearable.

Cold, drab, dreary

2010-01-05T21:52:00.005-05:00

Especially in cold, dark winter, I have a lot of trouble dressing myself in the morning. Today I actually woke up on time and showered but when I had to put an outfit together, I just didn't want to. It was too much effort, too many choices. I get like this when it's cold or I feel rushed. I ended up just laying half under the covers and mini napping for 15 minutes, which made me late to work. Much as I love having a week and a half off, and spending most of those days being lazy, it makes the realization that you have to get up early and go to work for the rest of your life pretty daunting.

All of the twitterverse is complaining about how cold and dreadful it is outside, but I never get tired of complaining about the cold. If I didn't like Richmond so much, I'd think I'd have moved someplace more temperate by now.

I did end up putting a very cool and colorful outfit together with my new patterned Twenty By Twelve thrifted skirt. The NP at job 2 tonight said it looked like a Monet.

America's Funniest Videos has been on longer than Seinfeld, Friends, and many other TV shows, they declared this evening. It never gets old, even though people don't really videotape anything anymore, and they still show tapes from 1990. I'm amazed it's stayed on the air as long as it has. My favorite clip of all time is from years ago when Bob Saget did the show and he narrates "Billy said they had a man-eating bush at Mr. Wilson's" as a boy on his bike rides right into a bush that fully envelops him.

A coworker not in my department invited me to lunch today and it was really nice to catch up. I found out she plays in a newly-formed, all female, rock cover band. How cool! She was also very excited to hear about the newly-formed GSA I started and advise for.

odd combo

2010-01-04T22:33:00.009-05:00

Having a full fridge after grocery shopping is very satisfying. My problem then is always, What to eat first? I was having a craving for a dark, frothy winter beer and lo, and behold, Kroger had my favorite Stout, Young's Double Chocolate Stout. Drunk out of my hometown brewery glass.

I'm glad to know I'm not the only one with her tree still up

And then I made these little tortillas with corn, black beans (though Kroger brand are more like brown beans, lime, pepper, and lettuce). I know these 2 things don't really go together, but I had a craving.

The Mexico episode of Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations (new episode, Jan 11--about time!) is on and I'm watching it for the 3rd or 4th time. I do love anything Latino and really want to go to Mexico again, and I want to do it right, with a native speaker. I've really got to stop letting my Spanish go by the wayside. Any time I have a student with a Spanish accent, I get all wistful. Had a Brazilian student today with a lovely Portuguese/Spanish accent.

Wore this to my first day of work after vacation. You can't see them, but I'm wearing my new thrifted tan/yellow wedges. They are def old, but they are leather and in great shape, and Nine West. It felt like a fun combination to do browns with greys. The outfit was comfy, until I wore it for 12 hours (work+rehearsal+grocery shopping).

Sliding cars

2010-01-02T03:15:00.003-05:00

Found this from Your Team, which I found from HeyItsPhil.

Your Team cleverly noted that watching this was like being in your very own pinball machine.

when comics are true

2010-01-02T02:46:00.003-05:00

Click for bigger

I saved this who-knows-when but it is SO true. Had this dream just the other night, actually.

(source: XKCD)

New Years was dark

2010-01-02T00:16:00.007-05:00

My camera is so crappy and only takes acid-camera or dark/blurry shots. Attended a lovely party, were light sabers involved. Also, salsa dancing which I just don't do enough. As I type this, suddenly, there is a cat in my lap.

I did have a rockin outfit though, with my grandmother jewels.

This photo ended up looking like something from a scary movie. It was foggy on NYE, and these people are standing at the edge of an overlook over the city. I couldn't walk outside without breaking into the song The Fog. I sang it in 6th grade chorus. It's a canon, in minor key, and the lyrics are from a Carl Sandburg poem. I'm sure everyone else thought I was just strange. Disappointingly, I just looked all over the Internet and can't find an audio or video of it.

Fog
Carl Sandburg (1878-1967)

The fog comes
on little cat feet.

It sits looking
over harbour and city.
on silent haunches
and then moves on.

I've been off since before Christmas, and a lot of my holiday has been spent lazily, starting with mornings that look like this.

On Christmas

2009-12-27T15:26:00.008-05:00

(Icicles on my fire escape, after the snow last week.)

I've got to say, it hasn't really felt like Christmas this last week. I know I've got good reasons not to be the cheeriest ever this year, but I don't want to get sucked into a funk. I haven't really done much socializing these last few weeks, and as it gets cold and dark more, I tend to stay in and hibernate. I'm sure I get a mild bit of S.A.D (seasonal affective disorder) though I don't think that's kicked in yet. I think just all the changes with Christmas this year made it not seem so much like Christmas. I guess that's to be expected when you get older. This was the first Christmas I woke up alone, to no Santa, no stockings, no one but my own lovely tree and unconditionally loving cat. Which is fine. I chose not to go home this year, but it doesn't make it any less lonely.

On Christmas day, I drove up to DC to visit my longest friend and her mom (who's like a mom to me, and even much more lately, as she's been really supportive with the affairs related to my dad and grandma and everything). We went to a really nice Italian place in DuPont, where the service was impeccable and the Italian men were so friendly and my water was refilled as soon as I needed it (a big plus for me!). We had the pre fix menu and shared 2 bottles of wine. The waiter brought us a complimentary digestif of amaretto in little wine/shot glasses. Lovely. We then went to see It's Complicated, due to my friend's mom being divorced and well, there aren't that many movies for that demographic. It was better than I thought, but still a little sad, though it gave me a glimpse of what it's like to have an adult relationship with your mother. I was jealous of the dynamic the family had in the film. I have other-people family envy a lot. It made me hopeful though that my friend's mom and I could continue to bond, and have that kind of adult mom/friendship.

(from Nectar & Light)

I was grateful to spend the day with them, and be spoiled with dinner, wine, and a movie. I brought them some of my grandma's jewelry for them to choose what they wanted. My grandma had so much jewelry, and this was just a small portion of it. I was so so pleased that they liked so many pieces. My friend's mom adored a cameo ring, and my friend looked good in all the big, chunky necklaces that I could never pull off. It meant a lot to me that someone else could enjoy my grandma's jewelry, and it was like they had a piece of her now, so her memory lives on, not just with me.

(Gingerbread men at a local coffee shop)

After mailing them cards about my Grandma, I had my grandma's old friend and my other great aunt who I haven't seen or spoken to in years call me on Christmas, but I just haven't felt up to calling them back, which I feel terrible about. I do want to hang on to the little family I have left, but I don't feel like I have the energy for much right now. My cousins who came to the funeral are the closest, in MD, and I hope we'll all be a little better at keeping in touch. I grew up with them, and have fond memories of Thanksgivings and Christmases back then.

Anyway, I'm going to not let myself get sucked into holiday-melancholy, because I always hate when people hate Christmas because they had bad things happen to them on it. It's not Christmas's fault.

In Memoriam

2009-12-20T22:34:00.004-05:00

Dorothy Cross

Michael Shaw

Hopefully I won't have to write any more obituaries for awhile. 2010 will be a better year, right?

move over, rover

2009-12-17T11:33:00.004-05:00

BizSense is the new SMCRVA? Especially now that SMC doesn't have open bar anymore. Start-ups like these start with a roar and lots of millennial attention, and then seem to putter out. Let's see how this one fares. I'll probably attend. I like news. And booze. And Ross Catrow. And Style Weekly

Little Letters

2009-12-08T11:30:00.005-05:00

Dear Apartment 10,
Thank you for being cute and posting this little letters idea today (even though it originally came from Taza, but I haven't gotten to her on my blog reader yet). Writing this is keeping me from flying off the handle, or breaking down today.

Dear Nursing Home,
When I drive through 2 states to bring to your attention my grandmother's labored, constant cough, you should take me seriously, so she does not end up in the hospital for the umpteenth time.

Dear Dr. Gallagher,
Please call me back and let me know what's going on with my grandmother. Calling me to talk about possible end-of-life plans and then not updating me at all in 12 hours is making me anxiety-ridden.

Dear Mom,
Please be a little more reliable. Please also don't hate me forever when I tell you that I'm not coming home for Christmas this year. See also, Postsecret.

(photo credit: Postsecret)

Dear Self,
Remember to put on eyelid primer first or else the eye makeup will all slide off, doing a terrible job of hiding the puffy eyes from crying last night.

Dear Students,
Please stop being so dense. I'm losing patience.

Elle's shoes

2009-12-01T12:51:00.002-05:00

This is very cool, a staffer at Elle took photos of what shoes the magazine's staff was wearing. So fun to see everything from Target to YSL. It appears they stopped in September. I hope they keep going, I want to see some hot fall shoes and boots.