Long Weekend Plans. Not that you care or anything.

No comments of any kind on my last two entries and you fools wonder why I never update? It's because NOBODY LOVES ME, clearly. Sheesh. I'll admit I've been putting most of my blog energy into my new venture because it's fun and new and stuff but I don't want to entirely abandon my post. I just haven't had much to say. Or much to look forward to... looking forward to.

This weekend is something, though. A long weekend! Three whole days. I don't get any significant vacation time until the end of July which might as well be December, it feels so far, far away. This weekend is tangible, though. I can almost taste it. Plans:

Saturday: Those chairs I posted about a few entries ago? I'm finally going to do something about them. My friend Nina is coming over to help me make them awesome. I spent some time cleaning them up last weekend and hey, guess what? A Magic Eraser is not what you want to use to get rid of chair grunge unless you want to remove the finish too. Oops. So one of them will need to be stained. Yeah. They're both utterly filthy but I hope when we're done they'll be transformed and I'll have something to show you. (Not that you care.)

Sunday: Perhaps a riding lesson? I've slacked off on the horseback riding partially because of cost and partially because my instructor is kind of a flake. We'll make plans and she'll forget. Then we'll make plans and she'll discover she has to work her other job. Then we'll make plans and I have to reschedule and she acts all put out like it's not something she does ALL THE TIME. It kind of takes the fun out of it. Anyway, if not a horse ride then a mountain bike ride followed by a barbecue at a friend's house. Activity followed by relaxing and beer! My kind of Sunday.

Monday: I will probably try to clean my filthy house or something in the morning, or maybe do a bike ride if I don't go on Sunday. Then lunch with Kate. Then piles of laundry. Then whining, weeping and rending of garments.

Thus far this is the plan. Sometimes my mother tries to hijack a long weekend with a LETS DO A BIG FAMILY LUNCH BECAUSE I MIGHT DIE SOON kind of thing but it's Thursday and I haven't gotten so much as a subject-line-only email from her, so I think the coast is clear.  Fingers crossed.

Friday Stuff I Like

Hi! I haven't done this in a while so here I am, doing this. Here's what I like:

BeneTint. I know! How very 90's of me! I had a big container of it (it lasts forever) and ran out last year. I finally bought another one and damn, I forgot how much I love this stuff. I only use it on my cheeks but it gives a lovely natural rosy flush unlike anything else and it lasts all day. It's a bitch to apply until you get the hang of it, but I adore it anyway. BeneTint 4ever.

The Brightest Star in the Sky. Marian Keyes is just beyond lovely and I look forward to her books with an impatience that's embarrassing. Her latest, The Brightest Star in the Sky was worth waiting for - it's engrossing and fun to read, hilarious and tragic and personal. I love her characters like they are my personal friends. She also writes an online newsletter that I love, but she hasn't done one in a while. Come back, Marian! I miss you.

White Whine. A friend of mine introduced me to this Tumblr page and it's just something you have to see for yourself. Careful, this site will cause snort-laughing.

Pretzel M&M's. YES. Okay, so I haven't actually tried these yet (only because I can't find them) but I know I will love them a lot. The salty/sweet/crunchy/chocolate thing is just so perfect.

Edit: I found them at Target! They are intense but a little dry. I kind of wish they had more chocolate- the ratio is off. But they are crunchy and salty-sweet and I'll happily eat the whole bag.

Alright, that's all I've got for you today. Go and have a good weekend and think good thoughts for me tomorrow around 4pm when I'll be suffering through my first mountain bike race of the season.

Lunchtime Update, real quick-like.

I've completely neglected the original B.L.O.G. mostly because it's way easier to post some dumb photo of myself than it is to talk about the eleventy billion things going on. To recap:

Three craft shows:

1. Awesome show, non-awesome sales
2. Unspeakable.
3. Filthy and windy, but decent sales.

A visit from my friend Ashley which resulted in:

1. Several bottles of wine consumed
2. Weird pedicures
3. Enough intense conversation to get me through until the next time I see her.

One mountain bike race (this coming Saturday):

1. Filled with dread.
2. Sure, I'll do the long course this year.
3. Filled. With. Dread.

Three rescued thrift store chairs that I plan to rehab and recover (fabric swatch in second photo) with help from Nina:

(Potential, yes? I haven't even had time to lay a finger on them, but soon! Soon.)

My first free product!
It's finally happening y'all - people are sending me free stuff to write about. In this case:

1. Four bottles of Cheribundi juice.
2. But not a pony.
3. Also not an Hermès bag.

I've been working my way through the four varieties they sent and will post an entry about it later this week.

And...that's it for now. I'll probably do a race recap next weekend and now that craft show season is over, I'll try to summon up the brain cells necessary to post Stuff I Like again. Because I still like stuff. And I like you. Mostly.

My own personal cake wreck.

Kenny's birthday is today (happy birthday, Kenny!) so some time in the last week or so I got the brilliant idea to make him a cake. A layer cake. With homemade icing and coconut. It seemed like an average sort of goal because idiots make cake all the time, right? Hell, if idiots can do it, so can I!

I am here to tell you that baking is FOR SUCKERS. Man, I am good at a lot of things but baking is not one of them.

Initially I was very proud of myself for remembering to call and ask Kenny to take the butter out to soften. By the time i got home it was REAL SOFT. Maybe too soft. Whatever. I should also mention I got home after 8pm, having met some friends for an early dinner. So, really, this was panic-baking at it's finest. Nothing like sobbing in a cloud of flour on the sticky kitchen floor at 10:30PM. Okay, that didn't really happen, but I was certainly not calm. I made the following rookie mistakes:

• Realized halfway through that my flour was of the "better for bread" variety.
• Didn't read the recipe in advance and was flailingly desperate in my attempts to "completely cool" the cocoa/boiling water mixture. Kenny helped.
• My attempt to not over-mix the batter (PER DIRECTIONS) resulted in some very obvious butter lumps. Great for biscuits! If I were making biscuits.
• I made the frosting from a totally different recipe that, um, wasn't a layer cake. Do you know how much frosting you need for a layer cake? A LOT MORE THAN I MADE, that's how much.
• I set the timer for the time the recipe indicated and when it went off I pulled the cake out to cool. Yes, that's right, I didn't test them for done-ness. LOST was on! I didn't have time for that.
• LOST was on.

When I pulled the cakes out they looked okay, but ten minutes later they'd all fallen. Oops. I removed them from the pans to cool further and when I started to assemble one of them completely buckled in the middle. I did a quick flip-slap and made it the center layer, filling in the huge dip with frosting (which might explain where it all went.) The final layer had a surprise chocolate-lava center, so yeah, it's probably half raw. Or "not dry" if you want to be all glass-half-full about it. Oy.

Kenny came it to watch me attempt to frost the monstrosity and we both laughed hysterically because, dude:


I ran out of frosting, obviously, so I tried to doctor it up with some shredded coconut:



It's got a nice lean to it and weighs about 80 pounds. That's not worrisome at all, right?

PS. I know I've been a pest about this, but if you haven't already, please vote for my friend's baby Lulu! This is the final day and she's lost her lead:

http://www.babble.com/impossibly-cute/fan-favorite/index.aspx

You don't have to register or anything, just get clicky!

Releasing the Kraken.

I've spent most of this week under a cloud, a dark cloud created by hormones and a specific pre-condition condition that I forget about every month until I'm in it. In it to win it, y'all, with my nameless rage at I don't even know what. Everything, I guess. Rage against my car, the potholes, my fluctuating weight, my inability to not eat things I'm not supposed to eat, at the cat for hocking a hairball on the rug we haven't even owned a week, emails I can't answer fast enough, flaky eBay sellers, flaky riding instructors, beautiful days that I feel like I"m missing, all of it. Rage.

But then this morning I woke up and the cloud had blown over and the day was new and sparkly with weekend-to-come promise. If I were a religious person I'd say today was a gift from God, but I'm not, so lets just say the day felt like a gift in general. As I drove across the bridge to work I enjoyed the view and was grateful to be part of it all, to have woken up and still be in the world no matter how weird and messy it is.

So, there. A mostly non-snarky entry from me. Also, my outfit is cute today if you were wondering.

Have a good weekend!

Not everybody knows your rules Larry!

Last night I had dinner out with friends and we began debating about Joss Whedon shows. (NERDS. I know.) I was all Team Buffy against a bunch of Team Firefly. Now, really. I ask you! I was all, I HAVE RULES ABOUT THESE THINGS. LIKE LARRY DAVID.

Now, if you don't watch Curb Your Enthusiasm and don't know what I'm talking about, first, you need to fix that shit and watch the show. Essentially, Larry lives by his own rules and runs into problems because the rest of the world doesn't know his rules. I feel for him because I have LOTS of rules and it's frustrating that nobody seems to follow them. Here are a few. Please try to keep up.

The Rules.

1. Don't snap gum, wear strong perfume, jangle your jewelry, click your pen, rip up paper, listen to your iPod loud enough for me to hear it, or whisper in an exaggerated manner. You are annoying me.

2. It's none of your business what number is on the bottom of my plastic water bottle.

3. If your shopping cart hits my heels accidentally, my hand might hit your face. Accidentally.

4. Don't bless me and I won't bless you. Deal?

5. If I'm reading, it doesn't mean I am lonely and have no one to talk to. It means I'd rather read than talk to you.

6. Hey you, slow walker? Can't you feel me steaming up your tail? Solution: WALK FASTER.

7. Crocs. No.

8. Adrien. With an E. Not Adrian. Not Adrienne. Not Adriene. Not Adriane. Not Adrianne. NOT.

9. If you do the Rocky thing you are dead to me. If you don't know what I'm talking about, that's great.

10. I don't really answer the phone, especially not my cellphone. You don't pay the bill, so I don't have to answer.

11. Just because I am athletic doesn't mean I run. I don't run. I don't run because I don't want to run. No amount of convincing will make me want to do anything but not run.

12. If I see you in the grocery store and pretend not to see you, it's not an accident. It's just that I don't want to see to you.

13. Yes: The Office, The Daily Show, Community, Glee, 30 Rock, Chuck, Lost, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Rescue Me, Mad Men, Dexter, Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

14: No: The Bachelor, American Idol, Two and a Half Men, Biggest Loser, Fox News, Anything with Guy Fieri, Jersey Shore.

14. Oh, you want me to smile? Why, is my serious face bringing you down, asshole?

15. If you are all germ-phobic I will probably think you are overreacting. Then I'll tell you about skin mites.

Have a great weekend!

It's Friday. What What.

I don't have much for you this week because all my energy has been over here at the NEW BLOG. But, I really needed to give y'all an update on my car because...only me, y'all. Only me.

So, if you remember from last week, my car needed a state inspection and also a new rack and pinion/power steering pump thingy. Got it fixed and on the way home Kenny noticed the airbag light was on and the horn didn't work. He took it back last Friday morning and that afternoon called me at work to let me know that the garage claimed it wasn't their fault.

Wasn't. Their. Fault.

The broken part is called a spiral cable and it would cost about $300 plus labor.

Oh, really.

So, let's review: During the state inspection the horn worked and the airbag light was off. Two hours later after they pulled apart my steering stuff, the horn doesn't work and the airbag light on. And it's not their fault? OH I BEG TO DIFFER.

After I calmed down, I called the garage and had a little chat with the owner, who protested that my car was OLD and part BREAK magically all by themselves. I finally talked him down and got him to agree to install the part for free. Kenny was sure he could find it cheap on eBay (which we did. Maybe.) Okay, fine, FINE.

But!

Oh, there's always a big but, isn't there? Further research uncovered this little nugget in an article:

Steering gear service precaution. Toyota offers the following advice for doing steering gear service on the 1996 and newer models listed below that are equipped with a driver's-side air bag: When the intermediate shaft is disconnected and the steering wheel is allowed to turn freely, the SRS spiral cable may be broken. To prevent this, pass the seat belt through the steering wheel and latch it to the anchor on the right side of the seat. The affected vehicles are: Tercel, Paseo, Corolla, MR2, Celica, Camry, Avalon, Supra, Previa, Sienna, RAV4, 4Runner, Tacoma, TWO and Land Cruiser.

I knew it. Fuckers. So now we have a part that might work and proof that they did freaking break it. I'll let you know what happens.

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Baby animals every day! It will make you happier, I promise.

Have a good weekend!