Stories, Photographs, Recipes, and More Straight from the Dirty South

I love the internets

2011-10-26T13:21:00.008-04:00

Odd things found:

The perfect song to play at your next pizza party:

Some of the saddest scense from "classic" TV shows. Carlton makes speed look great:

Tumblr sites can get a bit crazy:

Kanye'd by the Bell - Kanye lyrics placed on screen shots of everyones favorite "Saved by the
Bell"

Ryan Gosling mixed with Cats and Disney: Click Here

Recipe of the week

2011-10-24T15:01:00.002-04:00

I follow loads of cooking blogs. Despite owning dozens of cookbooks I still need to look at some sort of recipe on a daily basis. I used to follow through and make a lot of these recipes. Weekly potluck with the friends was one major reason- I always had to bust out a new and unqiue recipe so I could "beat" everyone else, despite it not being a competetion. In the past year our weekly potlucks have faded and I have stopped cooking near as much. I miss it and miss chopping; it always helps me get my anger out. I was driving around looking for errands to run yesterday when I decided to go to the grocery store. I mean if I'm going to stop eating out on a daily basis I might as well stock some food in my fridge to allow me to want to stop eating out. On the drive to hipster Kroger I noticed a printed out recipe in the passenger seat. It was one I printed out just days ago. A healthy macaroni and cheese, or at least a health-IER version. Being Sunday I decided to jump into the cooking pool feet first. No toe dipping for me. I bought the ingredients, not cheap by the way since the cheeses required were not cheap and god forbid I use cheaper cheeses, and rushed home to cook my little heart out. I cooked my heart out so much and chopped so fucking much that I have a blister on my finger. Improper knife holding anyone? Anyhoo despite the pain, the recipe also brought me glory. Glory for getting back into cooking with only 1 blister to show.

This health-IER mac n' cheese contains roasted acorn squash, gruyere, sharp white cheddar, spinach, wheat bread, basil, sour cream, wheat pasta, and tomatoes.

Broccoli-Basil Mac and Cheese
*ever so slightly adapted from 101cookbooks.com

1 small acorn squash, peeled, seeded and cut into tiny chunks
olive oil
1 bunch of basil, stems removed
2 slices wheat bread, stale or dried out in the oven
1/2 a small head of broccoli, roughly chopped
5 tbsp sour cream
slightly less than ½ lb grated white cheddar cheese
slightly less than ½ lb grated gruyere cheese
a large handful of (yellow) cherry tomatoes
1 pkg whole wheat macaroni elbows,

Preheat your oven to 400F with a rack in the middle. Put a large salted pot of water on to boil.

Place the squash on a baking sheet, drizzle with a bit of olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper, and bake for about 20-25 minutes, or until golden.

In the meantime, pulse half the basil, all of the bread, the broccoli and a lug of olive oil in a food processor until you've got a fine crumb. It'll be a bit damp. Transfer to a small bowl and give the processor a rinse.

In a separate bowl, combine the sour cream and grated cheeses.
Place the cherry tomatoes in the food processor with the remaining basil. Pulse a couple times to break things up, then add to the sour cream/cheese mixture and stir well. Can break into bits if you don’t have large processor.

Boil the pasta in well-salted water for a bit less time than the package suggests - you want it ever so slightly undercooked. Drain, reserving a big cup of the hot pasta water for later use.

Return the hot pasta to the pan and add the cheese mixture to it. Add the squash and give it a good stir. Add pasta water to thin the sauce to the consistency of cream. It can be a bit runny as the pasta will soak it up in the oven.

Transfer everything to a large baking dish or casserole. Sprinkle the green breadcrumbs evenly across the top and bake for 20 -25 minutes at 400F or until the topping is crunchy. Remove from the oven, and wait 10 minutes before serving.
Serves 8 - 10.

Late to the Game

2011-10-20T16:12:00.002-04:00

I love Charlie the Unicorn, so despite being late the the game I have given my heart and soul to llamas with hats. It's sort of my kind of humor. The embedded clip below shows episodes one through four. Just for kicks I am going to post my boy Charlei below in case you are one of the five people left who hasn't heard of dear old Charlie.

Aunt Viv

2011-10-19T10:50:00.002-04:00

Go to this link and be prepared to giggle:

http://wayblackwhen.tumblr.com/post/10435372882/fresh-prince-of-bel-air-the-big-4-0

Thanks Ken

Striving for

2011-10-18T11:48:00.001-04:00

enjoy it, a photo by i enrapture on Flickr.

DC trip

2011-10-18T11:19:00.005-04:00

A long while ago I promised you DC pictures. Looking through my memory card I found far more pictures of the airport and my friends baby then I did of DC itself. Oh well. Here are a few of my faves from the trip even if they aren't quintessential Washington DC.

A shocked babe

The freakiest store window I ever did see. Whats up with the lil' chipmuks too?

Hushed

On the tarmac

Preparing for liftoff

Father son bonding

Photography shoot

2011-10-10T15:26:00.003-04:00

Told you I would be back with some pictures of the shoot I did a couple of weeks ago. Unfortunately I haven't finished editing them all yet since I've been a bit lazy, but the goal is this week. Here are some of the pictures I have done:

The lovely couple:

Grandkids 1:

Grandkids 2:

Friends:

I'll have more later this week, but that's all for now.

One whole week

2011-09-27T13:43:00.006-04:00

I know, I know. It's been a whole week since I got on here chatting about my life and all other kinds of boringness. I don't think much is going to change for today. I do want to bitch (shocker) about how I am the last woman left standing. Literally. Every single F***ing one of my single girlfriends have begun dating someone. (I'm not really sure if it's has or have; both sounded odd). Let me say that I do love my friends and I love that they are finding men who make them happy, but can't a girl get a break and share in the available men. The funny thing is that some of my friends have such reverse dating styles from me. For example a couple have already fallen off the face of the earth or will soon. One of those is 2 months in and already has plans to spend Christmas with her new beaus family. Really? No matter how happy I am for a friend I still throw up in my mouth when I hear them making plans for an event that takes place months longer than the actual relationship. Another one of my friends has found her true "love", but before true "love" was found she went on a date with every one of the hundred guys who contacted her through Match, the online dating web site. Every day for multiple months she had one to two dates scheduled. Again I love said friend, but I don't have the time nor want to put in the effort that it takes to pen pal it up with loads of different men, go out on loads of dates, and keep all of their stories straight.

Anyhoo.. I know me bitching about my dating life can get old so I pre-apologize, but jeez already. This leads me into WTF is wrong with me? I feel like I'm a nice lady. I'm a bit chubby, but strong under the layer of potatoes and fried chicken, which in reality I eat very little of. I know I'm not super model gorgeous, but at the same time I'm not fugly.. or at least no one has ever said that to my face. I feel like I'm semi-smart, tell semi-funny jokes, and am semi-humble. I don't have that many issues. I don't bitch needlessly at men unlike a lot of women I know. I don't tell men what to do, again like lots of women I know. So why can't I find a nice guy who is fairly attractive, semi-smart, semi-funny, and isn't a total tool?

Do y'all have any of these issues? Do y'all get annoyed at friends when they pull the disappearing act? Oh I especially love the friend that tells me while she's single about how miserable it is to be single and how sad she is when she loses touch with new friends who start dating new guys. "It's just so sad that they don't think of their single friends eating home alone because they have company at their house". Funny that she is one of the people who gets a boyfriend and immediately doesn't have time to catch a bite to eat. Makes me sad.

Anyhoo I want to end this bitchfest on a positive note. I am not one of those people that has to be in a relationship. I function perfectly fine on my own and I enjoy not having to compromise on weekend plans and such. So while you think my life is sad and lonely, please know that it's not. I just sometimes get sad when friends go missing and I get left behind so I feel the need to vent:)

And finally check out the map below... maybe that explains why I can't find a decent guy?

My first REAL pro photog job

2011-09-21T15:29:00.006-04:00

I am veering away from my typical bitchy posts about my weight, other people, and how lazy I can be to tell you some exciting news. Well let's just say semi-exciting since I don't want to lose my negative edge that some say I carry around like Linus and his blanket. Anyhoo.. I shot my first paid photography gig this weekend. What what!!! Granted I have done 3 different pregnancy photo shoots and one wedding. but all were done for friend pay which equals nothing of monetary value. This one was done for real money, of which I am rolling in nekkid as we, or better yet I, type. I shot the 50th wedding anniversary of Larry and Olivia; an ultra-sweet couple who were married while Olivia was still attending high school. They were married by the Justice of the Peace with no family present. At the party their kids threw them a surprise renew-your-vows ceremony including a veil, bouquet, and wedding cake. Olivia's mother was also at the ceremony. It was a perfect party for a perfect couple and I enjoyed every minute of it. I will try and post some pictures once I finish editing them.

Other than my one paid gig I am just hanging tough. I have a great project I want to share with y'all soon, but I have to get the item back and take pictures of it. Just wait until you see what I sort-of, kind-of did.

Lady, my former foster dog, is back on the market. She lived with a nice couple for a few months, but it didn't work out so now she needs a new home without small children. If you know anyone who is interested please have them contact Smoky Mountain Great Dane Rescue. She is no longer living with me due to my own dog issues, but they do adopt in the greater Atlanta area.

30 x 30 is done.. for now

2011-09-09T09:35:00.006-04:00

Perhaps you don't remember my 30 x 30 list, AKA 30 things I want to accomplish by my 30th birthday, or perhaps you do since I have been chattering about it on this damn blog for the last month. Well if you have no clue what I am talking about you are about to be schooled since I'm posting it below so that you can see how I fared on my list. The ones I didn't do are in Bold RED and I also posted my finished descriptions of each. Also there are a shit ton of hyperlinks so anything that is italized is linked to something, mainly another blog post that's related, but some are to other websites.

30 by 30

Health and Fitness:

1. Lose 20 lbs. I would prefer to lose 30, but we shall see
**I've lost 15. Does that count?

2. Hike a piece of the Appalachian Trail
**Backpacked a piece of this biotch with friends;)

3. Work out on a regular basis
**Back to daily 6 am boot camp. Good for the body, bad for the sleep.

4. Run two 10Ks
**Nothing chased me this year therefore I had no reason to run this far. Actually I'm not going to make excuses; really I just didn't feel like running this far at any one time.

5. Run the ING half again
**This is out- missed the race:( **...not like I would have run it anyway

6. Spend a day biking
**I could have done this, yet I couldn't find any jeans skinny enough that would allow me to look cool on a bike.

Travel and Home:

7. Take a road trip with no destination in mind
**Drove up to a friend’s wedding in Virginia and took random routes and back roads stopping where ever I wanted.

8. Go camping
**Got this done with hiking the AT

9. Go to South Africa
**I decided to replace this with shooting a gun since this shit was never going to happen despite all the WANT in the world.

10. Have a “just the girls” weekend
**I semi did this. It was supposed to happen on my 30th birthday weekend, but that weekend was "rained" out so instead I had a mini staycation with some friends.

11. Spend a day taking pictures of Atlanta
**Did this and did it goooood.

12. Go to the Cotton Picking Festival; it’s been a couple of years
**Went with the moms and a couple of friends. The only thing that I decided I like about this festival now is the amazing homemade fried pies that we sampled to and from the festival.

Relationships with Family, Friends, and Others:

13. Visit a nursing home
**Sadly I didn't do this nor did I even attempt it.

14. Volunteer at the food kitchen
**I tried to do this, but the food kitchen that I have volunteered at before is closed in the spring and summer, then I tried to contact meals on wheels, but they have yet to get back to me.

15. Have a “theme” party at my house
**Oscar party theme what what!

16. Babysit Ben
**I did this a couple of times including one fun filled visit to the 'gogue

17. Pay for someone behind me in the drive through line
**Checked off somewhere near Calhoun, GA at a delightful McDonalds drive thru

18. Don’t say anything negative all day
**I think I did this, but knowing me there is no telling.

Be Selfish/ Finish Things That Need to be Done:

19. Buy all new underwear, just 'cuz
**Done it and in the process I learned that I love me some hanky panky.. it's underwear peepsies, get your nasty little minds out of the gutter.. though I do love what your thinkin' of too.
20. Get fitted at Saks and buy new bras
**Checked this bad boy off the list and I got a sneaky deal too, but I can't tell you what that is or I'd have to kill you.

21. Write a will
**Did it in blood. The judge will take that right?

22. Paint my kitchen
**Painted the cabinets and stuck on new hardware

23. Redo my front yard
**Pops helped me do this project. It was sorta kinda fun.

24. Finish putting my house in order; there is still no art on the walls of the bedrooms
**All is done, but the bedroom and I didn't finish it because of lack of funds. I am counting this as unfinished though.

25. Stain the back deck
**Sadly enough no. I meant to pound it out the weekend before my birthday, but laziness took a hold of me and hasn't let go.

Other:

26. Give away something I own
**Did this with some books and other various assorted items.

27. Take a cooking class
**Checked off thanks to Buford Highway Farmers Market and some bitchy English chef claiming to be a blonde thai. Whatevs.

28. Try baking something complicated
**Does Cauliflower and Parmesan Cake count?

29. Try making a pizza from scratch
**Oh yeah and it was glorious!

30. Learn how to can
**I thought about it, but somehow never got around to it.

EEeeekkkk 19 out of 30 isn't so good is it. That's a 63% success rate. I would have failed if this were college algebra.

Best blog follower EVER!

2011-08-30T11:46:00.004-04:00

I am giving major kudos and claps and snaps and whatever the fuck else a person can give out over the internets to one of my blog followers. To all the rest of you, you had better step up to the plate or I will cut you. This snaps in Z formation goes to Sunny of unknown origins who has decided to bless me and my birthday with a gift certificate to a bad ass spa. I am not sure I know who Sunny is, or maybe I do and the person is just hiding under the cover of the world wide web, but the Sunny I picture in my head looks like this:

If anyone sees the above walking around the streets of the A give them a "Fresh Prince of Bell-Air and DJ Jazzy Jeff "Pssshh"" greeting from me.

Le sigh and le guns

2011-08-26T13:31:00.006-04:00

My birthday is quickly approaching and some shitty things are going on. Leaves me sad and actually ready to get the fuck out of my 20s. I don't really want to talk about it now, but once things get a bit better I will fill you in.

In other news I have 2 more semi-planned (not really since I just made this shit up) 30 x 30 items this weekend. Hopefully I'll get them done so that I can cross more shizzle of the listizle. Also I shot a gun for the first time in my life this past week. Crazy right? That's how I roll. Speaking of the list.. I went to the gun range with 3 co-workers; all of whom are very into the right to bare arms. Oh excuse me, I meant the right to "bear" arms... or did I;) So shooting a gun wasn't really on my 30 x 30, but going to South Africa was which didn't happen. I decided that I would substitute South Africa for shooting a gun. While I realize shooting a gun is a poor substitute for traveling across the Atlantic it has to be done in order to get close to 30 items crossed off. Besides it's my list and I'll say what i can and can't do.

Anyhoo a friend left a gun in my car the other weekend so he said I could have a go with his puppy. That puppy was a mean black glock named Jim Bob. Just kidding. I don't think it has a name, but if it did, it would be Jim Bob 'cuz it sounds mean. Well I played with Jim Bob a bit, but he freaked me the hell out with his constant jumping.. like I was scared he would jump out of my hands.. so I gave Jim Bob up in order to play with a pup named Paulette who was much kinder, nicer, and calmer. She was a .22. While playing with pups I have learned that I am a fairly close shot at close ranges. My co-worker who was showing me the ropes told me it was great that I knew how to use a gun now. Since I'm not planning on owning a gun, I'm not sure how knowing how to pull the trigger will help me. Unless of course there is a zombie attack and I find a gun on a dead comrade who hasn't yet morphed into a blood thirsty zombie. Then knowing how to pull the trigger might help. Let's just hope those zombie guns have large clips because I still don't know how to load the ammo.

**Sorry for the bluriness. My co was taking them on her cellie and they didn't come out so clear which is why I am posting a fabulous picture of myself with Jim Bob below. This was back when I didn't know how to shoot guns. Now I know. :)

Dos Items

2011-08-16T11:34:00.016-04:00

Like I be saying yo'...two more items were crossed off the 30 by 30 list this weekend. #2 Hike a piece of the Appalachian Trail and #8 Go camping are both finished thanks to the help of some friends.

Saturday I borrowed a pack, grabbed a couple of friends, and off we went into the wild wild wilderness. We started off at Walasi-Yi and made our way up Blood Mountain, the highest point in Georgia, via the Appalachian Trail. Our plan was to go up Blood Mountain, take some trails to make a loop, and get back to the car by Sunday afternoon. After the map got dropped on the hike up, we decided a change of plan was in order. We changed the plan to head back down the mountain, cross the street, go under Walasi-YI, the only spot on the whole 2, 200 mile AT where the trail is covered (i.e. a breezeway), and hike the opposite way going southbound on the AT until we got tired and wanted to make our camp. We hiked up a ridge down a steep mountain side, and made camp at the bottom. We never saw any hikers on this part of the AT until the next day when a trail runner past us. We set up camp, T made a banging good camp fire, we cooked up some hot dogs and s'mores, I proceeded to get a bit drunk on my bag of wine, and then I was forced into bed. It was a bit of a rough night. Bella came with and while she is an awesome hiker she couldn't get very comfortable on the ground so she kept moving around, disturbing my tent mates. It also got a bit cold and my fleece was in my pack outside. I didn't get much sleep other than my couple hours of pass out drunk sleep. We woke, ate some delicious cheddar cheese on bagels that I had brought, and hiked out. It was a good time and I now plan on trying to backpack more often.

Next time I am going to need to outfit Bella in some booties (her feet were jacked up from the rocks) and her own pack (I have one, but she chaffed bad last time she had it on). She's also going to need her own blanket to lie on so she will be more comfy. See below for some pics from the trip.

Random rock outcropping

Hiking it up

Close to the top of Blood Mountain

Highest peak on the Georgia piece of the AT trail

Setting up camp. Bella was a bit pooped.

Enjoying a nice glass of wine (or 6) post hike.

Good Morning Appalachian Trail

Bella and I

Appalachian Trail

2011-08-15T09:05:00.003-04:00

Two more items crossed off the list this weekend. I will write about that later, but I wanted you to see this sweet 4.5 minute time lapse with accompanying music of the entire appalachian trail taken by Kevin Gallagher during his six month journey along the 2,200 mile trail. *It doesn't start until 15 seconds in so wait for it.* BTW I was at the 30 second mark this weekend.

Go HERE to see the time lapse.

Crossings

2011-08-11T11:59:00.006-04:00

I just wanted to brag to you fine people about how I just accomplished two more items on my 30 x 30 list and how I will also be completing two more items this weekend. Who's the bees knees? I'm the bees knees! First off I made pizza crust from scratch. I used a Pioneer Woman recipe that didn't call for a rolling pin which is good because I don't have one. Here is the pizza crust recipe:

Pizza Crust
Yield: 2 pizza crusts

Ingredients
1 tsp or 1/2 packet active dry yeast
4 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp kosher salt
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil, plus more for drizzling

In a mixing bowl, pour the yeast over 1 1/2 cups of warm water, stirring gently. In a separate bowl, combine the flour and salt. Using an electric mixer on low speed, drizzle in the olive oil until just incorporated. Add the yeast mixture to the flour mixture, mixing until the dough forms a ball. (You can also do this by hand.)

Drizzle a little olive oil into a clean bowl. Toss the ball of dough in the bowl and turn over to coat in oil. Cover the bowl with a moist kitchen towel and set in a warm place for 1-2 hours, or cover with plastic wrap and store in the fridge for up to 2 days.

Divide the dough in half, then using your hands, stretch the dough to the desired shape, pressing it into an oiled pan with your fingers. The thinner the better. The surface of the dough should be lumpy from finger marks -- all the better to receive and hold toppings.
Put Toppings on pizza then bake for 11 minutes at 500 degrees or until pizza crust is browning at bottom.

The other half of the dough may be wrapped tightly in plastic wrap and refrigerated up to 3 days before use, or frozen for up to 6 months.

The first pizza I made was a grilled veggie pizza. I grilled up some zucchini and roasted some red bell peppers. I started with a layer of store bought pesto on the bottom. Then I sliced fresh mozzarella and placed that atop the pest. I threw the grilled and roasted veggies on top of all that and crumbled goat cheese atop. Half of the pizza is pictured below.

The 2nd pizza I made was a potato leek pizza. It was delicious, but whatever you do don't forget to salt the potatoes. I also subbed out turkey bacon for regular bacon.

Potato-Leek Pizza
Yield: 1 pizza

Ingredients
1/2 recipe for Pizza Crust
extra virgin olive oil
kosher salt
6 slices thick-cut bacon, cut into 1-inch pieces
3 leeks, rinsed well to remove grit and thinly sliced
5 small red or Yukon Gold potatoes, sliced paper thin
1 lb fresh mozzarella cheese, sliced thin
4 oz goat cheese, crumbled
grated Parmesan cheese
freshly ground black pepper

Prepare the pizza crust by drizzling lightly with olive oil and sprinkling lightly with salt.
In a skillet over medium heat, fry the bacon until cooked but not crisp, then remove and set aside. Pour off most of the grease, but do not clean the skillet. Return it to the stove and, over medium-low heat, saute the leeks until soft, about 3 minutes. Remove the leeks from the heat and set aside.

Using a sharp knife or mandoline, slice the potatoes very thin. Be careful not to allow them enough time to oxidize. Arrange the potatoes in a single layer all over the crust, slightly overlapping the edges. Sprinkle the potatoes lightly with salt, then lay the mozzarella slices in a single layer on top of the potatoes. Place the leeks on top of the cheese, then sprinkle the fried bacon pieces over the top. Add a generous dose of crumbled goat cheese, grated Parmesan, and a sprinkle of pepper.

In an oven preheated to 500 degrees F, bake the pie for 8-11 minutes, until the edges of the crust are golden brown and the cheese is melted and bubbly. Slice it into wedges or squares and serve immediately.

The second item I accomplished was paying for someone behind me in the fast food drive thru line. I was on my way home from dropping Kohl, my foster dog, off with the rescue people in Chattanooga... oh did I tell you Kohl got adopted. Yay! It makes me sad that he's gone, but I know he has a great home with a new pug sis. Odd couple you say? Why yes indeed! Anyhoo back to the story. I was on my way home and decided to stop off at the outlet malls to do a little shopping. Post shopping and I was starving I made a quick turn into McDonald's. It occurred me that this was perfect and I could get my list item out of the way. After sitting in the slowest "fast" food line ever I got up to pay and told the country bumpkin lady taking the order that I wanted to pay for the person behind me. "Why you gunna do a thang like that?" she asked. Just said "'cuz" which seemed to placate her and she went on her merry ol' way. I wasn't around long enough to see the person behind me get told their meal was paid for which was a good thing. I hope it was a bright spot in their day though. Getting something for free from a stranger should always be.

Smoochies and I'll be back next week to tell you what 2 things I crossed off my list.

MOVE

2011-08-08T10:26:00.001-04:00

A 1 minute long bad ass movie:

MOVE from Rick Mereki on Vimeo.

Birfday Gift #2

2011-08-05T14:21:00.002-04:00

My #2 birthday gift would be a massage. A nice long, relaxing massage. Sigh, just thinking about it makes me relaxed and calmer already. Who doesn't love a good massage and not one of those sketchy massages at a place called GOLD SPA or green spa or asian love you long time spa?

Birfday Gift Idea #1

2011-08-04T15:16:00.005-04:00

Starting now until my birthday I am going to be posting ideas for birthday gifts for moi. Feel free to get me 1, 2, or as many as you can hold in 2 hands. I'm just sayin'.

Birfday Gift Idea #1 (cost $3999, also known as 4K)

This will probably be the most expensive gift on my birfday gift wish list, but feel free to purchase this excellent gift for me if your heart so desires. My birfday gift idea for today is a trip with REI travel to Bhutan. This trip is called "Festivals of the Thunder Dragon" and consists of a whole lot of hiking, as well as visits to remote villages to check out their local festivals. Anyone who knows me knows I love a good festival. If you wanted to skimp and save $400 I would also accept "Mongolia Multisport: Through the Land of Nomads". Don't be a bitch and not purchase a ticket to the meetup point for me. Also if you buy me one of these trips I would be okay with you buying one for yourself too. I mean, I guess I can hang with you for the 14 days we will be traveling.

Down an' Out

2011-08-02T14:45:00.008-04:00

Another slackadaisical post. I try, I try. Debt deal done. Good thing, since listening to the news caused my anxiety levels to reach new heights. Kind of weird that I would freak that much about governmental money problems, but I gots a lot in the bank and in the markets therefor I need my money to be secure. Besides my own money situations give me anxiety so why shouldn't the free worlds money issues bother me. I am so sick of this fucking government. The petty bullshit politics get on my last nerve. Can we get a multi-party system and get rid of this war between the republicans and the democrats? I think it's like a marriage or any other relationship.. you have to make compromises, not fuck you, fuck you, fuck you, I'm right, you're wrong type of shit. Drives me cu-ray-zay!

Things here are spectaculair and meant to be spelled wrong. OFB (or ol' fat bastard as he is known) has left me alone which is nice. No more heavy breathing in the ear or in the face.. not that heavy breathing in the face under the right circumstances is bad, but when it has to do with OFB it is terrible. My new boss is throwing a party for my co's and I at his lake house which should be interesting. Do I show up with beer? Bottle of wine? Some salvia? The invite said wear a bathing suit, but do I really want to be in a bathing suit around my new co-workers? MMhh, I am gonna skip to hell no on that.

I went on a short trip to Nashvegas this past weekend. It was gravy. Ate at some delicious restaurants, a couple of which I would like to relocate to the A (see Yelp in the next couple days fo deets), took a dip in Mr. Percy Priest, went to a beer fest put on by my homeboys competitor... it was lame; I'm supposed to say that right?, did a bit of downtown bar hopping, and had a couple of Pimm's cups. I'll post some Nashy picks in a couple of days, but until then hold your breath until the count of twelve then go live your life.

Um... lastly my 30th is coming up quick and I have done nothing to prepare. My bomb shelter isn't yet built, this delightful 30 extra pounds are holding on to my body like a vise grip, and I have yet to get anywhere close to finishing my 30 by 30 list. Sort of, kind of, a lot of SAD. My goal is to do a bit o' camping this weekend to at least get one thing out of the way (#8). I am thinking that "#29. Making a pizza from scratch" and "#28. Try baking something complicated" will need to get a move on this week and can I change "#9. Go to South Africa" to "Pay a super speeder fine just for fun.. or because they told you 4 months after the ticket was issued"? Looking at the list makes me want to crawl into a ball. I think I am gonna have to pound this shit out quick like in order for the September 3rd deadline. There are some things that aren't gonna happen like

A. run 2 10Ks... I can do the running, but I can't afford paying for 2 10K races

B. stain the back deck.. a little help please

C. learn how to can...don't have the material and can't afford it:(

But by golly, gee whiz I am going to give it my best procrastination worthy try.

Climber

2011-07-20T14:18:00.003-04:00

Climber, a photo by moke076 on Flickr.

Hola! It's been a long time right? Slackers unite. I think only like 3 of you miss me... well 3 and there's probably an extra stalker or two as well. I'm cool with that. So news that's going down right? You want to hear about what's been happening in the life of this ATLien. I'm sure.

Mostly nothing. My "new" job in the same old place is going alright. One of my new "clients" is this super fat, super asshole, micromanaging mouth breather who I don't really get along with, but hey, a girl can't get everything she wants can she? Seriously this one dude is gonna be the death of me and to make matters worse he wants to call me anytime he needs something. I just love hearing breathy noises in between every pause. Guh-rosse. From here on out I am bestowing on him the nickname Fat Bastard. It suits him well. Other than that I'm being treated like the princess I was always meant to be- I mean corner office (I should probably mention it's actually an interior corner office;) though I can see a sliver of window through my door), 1 gig connection (especially for moi), 2 super sized double screens ('cuz that's how I roll), and the constant reassurance of how much they need me. So delightful.

Another delightful thing in my life is that I am about to be the proud new owner of a tankless water heater. Hello environmentalism. Next on my hipster hippy list is a Prius which I would have totally been all over except for the small backseat. Two danes don't fit very well back there. I had this great contractor come out to my hiz to give me a price on redoing my kitchen. I was so amped... new counter tops, sink, back splash, and more here I come. Then for shits and giggles I wanted a quote on the hot water heater. You see that bad boy is tucked away behind my stackable washer and dryer in an unreachable part of the closet. Guy went underneath to check out room under the house and noticed that the hot water heater had been leaking for who knows how long. It was then that I kissed my soon to be bad ass kitchen goodbye and said hello to a piece of equipment that has no bearing on my life other than that it works. I wanted eye candy not a necessary evil. Arg!

On the positive I have a new foster pup. His name is Kohl. He is a 3 1/2 year old SBM Gemini looking for an active partner in crime. He likes long walks, animals, and eating with his mouth open. Interested? Please find out more about him at Smoky Mountain Great Dane Rescue

Hipster B

2011-07-19T15:36:00.001-04:00

167/365, a photo by moke076 on Flickr.

Gonna go shopping for some new chucks and skinny jeans later.

Old Lady B

2011-05-26T15:37:00.001-04:00

Old Lady B, a photo by moke076 on Flickr.

Old Lady B and I went to the river yesterday for Potluck dog beach style. It was good times with good friends and extremly well attended. Everyone seemed pumped for this years potlucking evenings so hopefully they will continue to be well attended. Makes me feel good that my baby is taking off;)

In other news, I was offered a job. I can't for the life of me remember, and I'm too lazy to look, to see if I told you that my companies contract was coming up and that my company wasn't bidding for a new contract. That meant a loss in job. So anyhoo the comany that got the contract offered me a J.O.B.!! With a RAISE! and a loss in vacation days:( Eh.. who knows 1 months vacation right.. right.. right? Whatevs... a job in this climate is fantabulous. I still have my head to the grindstone in case anything comes up, but I am at least safe in the seat for a bit.

That is all the news on my end. Good news from you? Answer me bitches!! Is there any good news from you(finger pointing out of the monitor)?

Adopted!

2011-05-23T15:46:00.001-04:00

111/365, a photo by moke076 on Flickr.

Lady has been adopted and is no longer living with Bella and I. Very sad news, but she now lives with her new family approximately 3 streets over from me so she's in the neighborhood. I am keeping my distance right now so that she can have time to bond with her new familia, but I hope to soon see her around.

When I first got her, I thought she was going to be like most other fosters; delightful to have, but more delightful when they leave. I am delighted about the lack of puke in my house now that her and her water issues have gone, but I am truly sad that she isn't around. She was like a younger, semi-better behaved Bella. The semi-better meant that she doesn't bark at every noise she hears and she is nice to pups on off leash, as well as on. Bella certainly isn't. She was a good girl and I will truly miss her.

Cheers to her and her new fur-ever home.

Lack of Motivation

2011-05-04T13:57:00.006-04:00

While I was all about demotivaters the last time I was on here, I really am unmotivated now. I am experiencing some major work/exercising/dieting/writers block at the moment. It's never fun to feel your creativity slide away. I am still doing 365, but the vast majority of photos lately have been taken with my Droid and most are pretty darn shitty. I even forgot a couple of days. I think that brings me to a total of 4 or 5 missed 365 days now. Not good. I am going to try and perservere since I have already hit the 100 mark, but I am not digging my lack of enthusiasm on anything. Going out and drinking doesn't even appeal to me. I just want to curl into a ball and sleep. I know I am not the only one who goes through the spells, but it's certainly not making me feel great. I always wonder how depression feels and maybe this is it. It's probably much more severe, but it still make me wonder. It also makes me want to go on another vacation quick like. Where I would go is the issue. and where I would find the money to go is an even bigger issue.

blah blah blah just trying to get my write back on.

I did get a ticket on one of my vacations for going something like 17 over. I call bullshit;) Ticket turned out to be $300. Not too shabby. I got it in Laurens County, Georgia right outside of Dublin on I-16. This area has to be the worst place in Georgia as far as speed traps and I still got a ticket. Damn cellie. I was using cruise control up until that bad boy rang. I also had my third hyperventilation attack while cop was writing me the ticket. Not sure why.. Dude told me it wasn't a big deal...I said no shit, I have received about 14 speeding tickets in my life. Actually I didn't say that I really said " uh uh uh uh uh uh I uh uh uh know uh uh uh I'm uh uh uh not uh uh uh sure uh uh why uh uh uh uh I'm uh uh uh doing uh this uh uh uh uh". Weird. The other two times I hyperventilated had to do with exercise. The first when I finished my first 3 minutes in the kickboxing ring sparring with this bad ass professional kick boxer. The other was after taking about 7 years off moving and then joining yuppie boot camp.

Here's some beachy drinky bellaliness:

And here is my newest foster Miss Lady from Smoky Mountain Great Dane Rescue:

Scary

2011-04-08T09:55:00.003-04:00

Found a new website that is freakin' me out. http://christiannightmares.tumblr.com/ Yeah, Have fun with those videos.

Demotivaters

2011-04-06T12:58:00.005-04:00

This picture sure makes me demotivated....and slightly queasy. Is that really a woman? Or a man with a wig? No matter what Pat is, I sure do feel sorry for her. After all that's a big pile of dishes to wash. To see more demotivators click HERE

84/365

2011-04-05T13:38:00.001-04:00

84/365, a photo by moke076 on Flickr.

Love is in the air...

77/365

2011-03-30T15:54:00.001-04:00

77/365, a photo by moke076 on Flickr.

Hidee hodee neighbor. It's been a long time. You know I am a slack ass so what can I tell ya'. Not much new in my neck o' da woods. I am starting to look harder for a j-o-b since I got 3 months until lights out. I was "approached" by a company who put in a bid for the contract and they told me they would love to hire me on if they get the bid. I guess some fingers should be crossing right about now. Namely my fingers.

I am heading up to Nashvegas next weekend for a booze filled good time. A friend of mine is putting on East Nashville's first Beer Festival. It should be good times. There even might be some photographic evidence.

I've got plans in the works for a week of sun, sand, and old lady bathing suit (for me) with friends. Now if I could just lose that 40 lbs of water weight. MMMhhh! I might actually try and take some photos for this beach trip. My last couple of beach trips were much more sad on the picture taking side of things.

Other than a couple of fun mini vacations I got nothing. What have you been up to lately?

Boy's a balla

2011-03-10T15:48:00.001-05:00

Yup.. that's my nephew bringin' the heat!

new faves

2011-03-10T09:14:00.001-05:00

a photo by moke076 on Flickr.

My new favorite photo to date. Love it! Hope you like it to.

Shit That LeAnne Says

2011-02-23T12:51:00.002-05:00

51/365
Originally uploaded by moke076

I am not gonna even get to where the hell I have been. That is for another time and place. Not to say anything spectacular has happen in my life; far from it. Just saying I don't wants to share. However I am going to share with you some new deliciousness from my life that is not in the form of food. I know, shocker!

So I now carpool with a co-worker 3x a week. She rides with me to and from my house were her husband drops her off and picks her up. Let me give you a little background about this co-worker: 60s, southern, from a small town outside Atlanta, sheltered, judgemental, super duper Christian, republican, believes that the man is the ruler of the house, conservative, opinionated, and on, and on, and on. Such a great partner to my open minded, liberal, culturally Jewish, but leans towards the agnostic/atheist side of things, slightly judgemental( actually a lot), opinionated persona.

We normally share a lunch together and have already had such great convos such as her saying all Muslims kill people in the name of their religion. When I disagree and tell her that other religions kill people in the name of their Gods, like the good Christian Scott Roeder who killed abortionist George Tiller, she then tells me I am the most Christian hating person she has ever met. She also came in one day and said "I went to see my doctor today. Oh, he's one of your people". Um.. okay.

Anyhoo you can imagine that hilarity will ensue with us riding together and chatting. Yesterday our conversation some how got on the topic of race and how she believed that "Blacks" are extremely scary and violent, but that "Mexicans" are even worse. "They will just as soon look at you as kill you", she said. She also told me the prefer knives to guns. "How do you know this", I asked. The news. Yes, because our local news is oh so accurate and unbiased. I then explained my reasoning about why she thinks what she does. When she got out of the car she called me a communist. Really.

Pretty fun stuff, which is why I am planning on getting a digital recorder and taping the things that are said so I can get some accurate quotes from our convos. I will be calling these posts "Shit that LeAnne says" so look for them.

**Name changed to protect ME**

Happy Valentines Day!

2011-02-15T13:40:00.003-05:00

44/365
Originally uploaded by moke076

Did you survive the Valentine's Day fallout? The one where you see 5 million couples walking down the street holding hands, whispering sweet nothings to each other. I know I did. I had a good Valentine's Day with a 3.5 mile run, friend time at the dog park, one pet sit, shopping for groceries, cooking lunch and dinner for the following days, and eating a delicious veggie sandwich from the new place near my house, Victory sandwich. I am tired just thinking about it all. I even got to listen to those stupid Bachelor bitches whine about how they have to go on group dates and how it's sooo hard. Don't you dumb bitches watch the show?? That's what happens, so shut it.

Sorry for not dropping in more frequently- I have been a busy girl. What with working, sleeping, and eating I feel like I have time for nothing else. Did I mention that I fit in a work out every now and again;) HooHaa OBC.

This time tomorrow I will be getting new windows installed on my house. Stay tuned for close up shots of the new most expensive thing in my house;)

Love to all from Bella and I. MUAH!

28/365

2011-01-31T15:19:00.002-05:00

28/365
Originally uploaded by moke076

Yo, yo, yo!! Not much to report in life other than lots of work and no play. Last week was deliciously international. Made a Latin American quinoa dish (not surprising) and ate out at 3 different ethnic restaurants- Brazilian, Vietnamese, and Chinese.

Boot camp is going... going.. going...Today was a blast. It was drizzling and they picked the lowest spot in Piedmont Park for us to work out doing different ab and arm exercises. I love being wet, cold, and soggy in the morning. I do love boot camp though. It's gonna be hard to stop. I love the camaraderie with certain people. It's a delight to cut up and joke with friends in the am. Especially when I don't typically see them that much. If only it didn't cost $270 a month. Anyone want to donate to the "poor lil' jewish girl" fund? I'm taking donations.

Third thing on the list of items up for discussion is my loss of friends. Not really the loss of them. I guess technically I would be gaining friends, but I don't really want to gain friends; I've got enough already. What I am talking about is how my group of single girlfriends are slowly dwindling. I made it my mission post-college and post-beau to find single friends to go out with. I love my couple friends too, but going out with them isn't the same. I need wingpeople. Unfortunately the majority of my wingpeople have taken up with boyfriends themselves. While I am really happy for them, I am really sad for me. WTF happens if I don't meet my one and only true love (so corny). I feel like I might spend my life in odd numbered wheel perpetuity. I couldn't stand that shit. For a time or two it's cool and then it gets old and tiring like wet shoes on a long run.

Banksy's Pet Store

2011-01-27T15:02:00.004-05:00

Not sure if any of you have ever heard of Banksy, but he is a British graffiti artist and activist. No one is certain of his real identity, but he does awesome artwork out on the streets. Read more about him here. This pet store is apparently an art exhibit he put together a couple of years ago in NYC. I quite like it.

I tried embedding the video, but so far I am having loads of trouble so click HERE to view. Even if you don't ever watch the other videos I post, you should defintley check this out. I'm talking to YOU!

Some Deliciousness for your Tuesday

2011-01-25T11:42:00.003-05:00

22/365
Originally uploaded by moke076

I made this dish Sunday night and thought you might like to have the recipe as well as a semi-drool worthy picture of said dish. It is easy as pie and tasty to boot. Make it now.

Roasted Tomatoes with Shrimp and Feta
makes 4 servings

5 ripe tomatoes, seeded and diced into little chunks- the chunk size depends on your affinity for tomatoes.. mine happened to be on the smaller side. (you can also use a can or two of diced tomatoes. just make sure to drain well first.)
3 tablespoons olive oil
2 cloves minced garlic
a few pinches of sea salt
freshly ground pepper
1 1/2 pounds medium shrimp, peeled and deveined
2 teaspoons fresh oregano
1 cup crumbled Feta cheese
couple pinches of red pepper flakes.

Preheat oven to 450°F. Stir together the olive oil, tomatoes, garlic, red pepper flakes, salt, and pepper and place in a large baking dish. Place on top rack of oven and roast for 20 minutes. Remove baking dish from oven and stir in the shrimp and oregano. Sprinkle with the Feta. Place back in oven for another 10 to 15 minutes or until shrimp are cooked. Serve warm over pasta or with bread. I decided to have bread this go 'round so it could suck up all that delicious juice.

A walk in the snow (and ice)

2011-01-14T15:55:00.001-05:00

A walk in the snow (and ice)
Originally uploaded by moke076

In case you didn't know, as if you even care, it SNOWED in Atlanta this past Sunday night. SNOW is in caps for a purpose because this wasn't the typical pissant usual Southern US snow, this was a romp'em, stomp 'em, the world has shut down snow. It could have been due to the layer of ice that covered every inch of the world Monday, but whatevs right? All that matters is work was canceled for 3 days.. and on the 4th day we worked. (on the other 3 we drank and ate).

Bella is not really enjoying her outing into the icy snow infested park. She prefers the powdery stuff.

4/365

2011-01-06T10:28:00.002-05:00

4/365
Originally uploaded by moke076

Yes, Bella is wearing a penis headband. "Why?" you ask. Because she wanted to. Actually this is part of my gift I brought to our weekly potluck plus Dirty Santa party. The other items in the gift I brought was a small blowup doll that we named Shenae and a mini monkey vibrator. Other funny gifts brought to the party was a beginner anal kit, shake weight, and edibles panties. Somehow the gift I picked was a Curious George lunch box with a white elephant ceramic creamer. Back to Shenae, who had 2 different holes which allowed her to be penetrated. We have some great pictures of the guys sticking a wine bottle through her and drinking red wine out of the bottle. Let's just say the shit wasn't pretty. Especially since it was red wine. I will post some pictures if I get them from the photog in charge.

I was looking on Flickr today trying to see how people make it to view my pictures from the web and I stumbled on a little beauty. Someone found a picture of mine due to googling the phrase "picture of a person executed while wearing a tutu". Not sure how my picture came up other than it's a dude wearing a tutu, but hey if that's what floats your boat so be it. Here is the picture he found. Guess he was a little dissapointed.

I want

2011-01-05T15:55:00.000-05:00

Black is the new black

2011-01-05T08:49:00.003-05:00

Josh Groban has a new album out "The Best Tweet's of Kanye West". Check out the fabulous preview.

2/365

2011-01-04T16:17:00.002-05:00

2/365
Originally uploaded by moke076

Look at me, posting so free. I am here for you... and you...and you... and you. Posting made easy by Flickr.. so when I post a 365 photo I will probably be posting some unbelievably boring post with said picture. Look forward to it people. This is my soul you are looking at.

Blah Blah Blah. So I have to tell you about this funny dream I had the other day. Funnily enough I made a statement to a friend the night before saying " I never remember dreams". Can I please retract that statement? Because the very next day I did. Early New Years Day, after I got a good 3 hours shut eye, did my petsits and came back home, I decided to get another hour of sleep before I made the long lonely trip out to the 'ville. Why I agreed to go visit my parents the morning after New Years Eve, I will never know. Anyhoo.. I set my annoying phones alarm and went to sleep. I remember waking up for the first two alarms and hitting snooze. My dream consisted of me hanging out with friends at a brunch place, leaving the brunch place with one friend to meet other friends at another restaurant, walking to my one-seater car (must have forgot about that when offering her a ride), and then my phone started ringing....in my dream. I tried to answer and nothing. I tried to turn it off and nothing. I then thought in my dreambound head that maybe the phone was frozen, so I attempted to remove the battery. The battery had a little fluid that stuck to the phone; tried to remove that and it still rang on and on and on. I then walked around with a ringing phone in my pocket and a headache for the rest of my dream. 15 minutes later I finally pulled my ass out of the dream to turn off my alarm, which had been ringing for 15 minutes right next to my ear and full blast. Alcohol and lack of sleep just don't mix.

1/365

2011-01-03T09:32:00.003-05:00

1/365
Originally uploaded by moke076

365 Day One bitches. Like everything else I started a day late (January 2nd). Normally "they", who "they" is I don't know, say "a day late and a dollar short", but I am just gonna believe that despite getting my 365 off on the wrong foot, that I will soldier on and actually take a picture a day for 365 days. Damn, I hope I don't fuck up again.

And in other news... my New Years started off on a good foot, which means I didn't puke and was not too hungover for the 1st day of 2011. The eve of the 1st, I accompanied some friends for a birthday party that ended at the Clermont Lounge where I danced the night away while watching old and/or chunky strippers taking it all off. These 2 nights of perfection surely mean that this will be a good year.

I hope you had a fabulous start to 2011 as well. Virtual Cheers to you and yours.

My new calling

2010-12-30T08:17:00.002-05:00

Maternity photographer. That's right, mulitple friends are preggers and they wanted me to take some pics of them, the pops, and the baby bump. You can see the best of the best here:

Photos

New Years 2011

2010-12-30T07:57:00.004-05:00

New Years Eve is coming up and I decided to look back to the beginning of 2010 to see what I resolved to do. Here is a link to the post in it's entirety and here are my 2010 resolutions:

#1) Get back on the workout train
#2) Start eating healthy again
#3) Run the ING half marathon

Did I meet these goals? Um, sort of and not really. I definitely didn't complete number 3. Instead of running the half, I stood on the sidelines and cheered on the runners. From the wheelchairs competitors to the lazy walkers at the end who were barely moving faster than the cone pick up guy behind them Bella and I were there to scream, cajole, and clap for them. I also have running a half marathon on my 30 x 30 list, which may or may not actually happen. As you can see, I apparently don't keep promises to myself and if I don't keep promises to myself, I definitely wont keep them for you people.

As for my other resolutions, I sort of completed number one. I started working out about 3 times a week at a gym near work, had a personal trainer for a whole month (wowza), and did a 5 day/3 week bootcamp with Operation Bootcamp just a couple of weeks ago. Have I worked out since bootcamp finished? No, but I have been really busy. Maybe I should run today so I get one last workout in for the year. Then I can tell myself I completed something. Lastly my 2nd goal was not really met. I have begun to cook healthier, but I also eat out way too many meals a week and when I eat out, I certainly don't pick the healthy shite on the menu. Somethings gotta give.

So on to my new resolutions. What will they be?

#1) I will turn 30
#2) I will not eat beef or pork
#3) I will get lazy, stop blogging for a bit, and then start afresh, telling myself (and you) it will never happen again.

MMhhh, now there are some resolutions I will keep. I hope you like my list. If you get really excited, I hope you will comment with your own resolutions for the year ahead.

FYI- I am going to try and do ANOTHER flickr 365, but this time I will be doing a picture a day of anything, not of me. I think I might be better at that. We shall see.

Best punctuation point ever?

2010-12-29T16:00:00.002-05:00

I give you the Interrobang. You be the judge. Good, Bad, or Indifferent?

So long..

2010-12-10T13:36:00.004-05:00

Both Thanksgiving and Hanukkah have come and gone without mention on my blog. As a matter of fact, not a whole lot has been on the blog in the past month and for that I apologize. Here is a song that will make it up:

For a quick recap of the past 3 weeks:
-Friends potluck at my house rocked. Sadly, we didn't manage to finish the keg [hanging my head in shame], but we did eat a lot of good food and drink a lot of PBR. "Some" of us tried to work on the keg Sunday in the warm fall sun, but it was not meant to be.

-Thanksgiving: Ate lots of turkey, stuffing, mashed taters, and roasted winter vegetables (I made it and they were del-fucking-liscious) . I also worked my arse off, pet sitting like crazy. I had about 22 petsits on Saturday after T-day. It was cold, I was cold, but I made bank so all was worth it.

-Boot camp: Just started it up again 2 weeks ago. I have one five day week left. The first week was HARD. I did a cross fit workout on the first day and couldn't walk without major pain the rest of the week. It was so bad that I had to hold on to the toilet in order to sit down. TMI right? Second week has been cold as hell. standing around at 5:45 am in the 20 degree weather, waiting to workout is hard. I did it, but I didn't like it. I am getting some energy back which is awesome.

-Hanukkah: Lit the candles nightly and hosted a dinner for the fam on the 5th day. It went off without a hitch. I made chicken stuffed with arugula and goat cheese, quinoa with cherries and pistachios, sweet potato and regular latkes from SCRATCH, and roasted asparagus. I did flip my latkes in the air and say "Heyyyyyoooo, light the dreiiiiiiidel" and I think it might have made them taste even better than normal. Just in case you were wondering, Hanukkah Harry hooked me up with a yard package. The pops and I will be redoing the yard come spring. Yay! and my yuppified picket fence is up. It hasn't been painted white yet, but once the weather gets warm enough to fry eggs on the concrete it will be.

Have a great weekend!

Giggity

2010-11-19T13:48:00.004-05:00

Just wanted to let y'all know I didn't get taken by the mountain people. I have however, had a very long and busy week which is why I haven't been posting. I did get some cool shots which you can check out on Flickr. I am still busy so I will get back with ya on Monday. this weekend is a 30th birthday party and my annual Thanksgiving Potluck. Let the games begin!

Off to VA

2010-11-10T15:56:00.003-05:00

It's that time again. Time for this lady to mark another item off the 30 x 30 list. EEk! Technically I listed that I would take one random trip without knowing where I am going. Since my job might not exist in June and I'm already lacking the funds needed to survive, I am wrapping this item into my weekend trip to Virginia and slightly changing it to fit a broker girls needs. A good friend of mine is getting married on Saturday in Charlottesville. Despite all of my friends taking airplanes up there, I have decided to choose the route less traveled; the 8 1/2 hour car ride alone. I got lucky in that I don't have to be at work tomorrow (YAY Veterans!), which is Thursday, so I am leaving tomorrow on the longest route possible from here to Charlottesville. Did I say it took 8 1/2 hours? Well, I strategically planned out my route to be as long and remote as possible so the route planned is now 12 1/2 hours. I figured I could do this since I don't have to be in Charlottesville until Friday night. I am planning on packing my camera and taking in the sites. I also want to meet Jesco White, but somehow I don't think I have the balls to go hunt him down in West Virginia. So back to 30 x 30. My original plan was to not have a plan at all, as in take a weekend and just go somewhere last minute. Since I don't have the money for a solid weekend somewhere, unless sharing a room with multiple friends like this weekend, I have decided to change the list item to be just randomly picking a place. While I have a semi- decent itinerary, I have no plans nor have I researched anything about my 12 hour journey other than moving check point dots around on a google map, so my plan is to take my time checking out whatever sites and shit there are to see and stop when I feel like it. I am a pretty big planner so this in itself is going to be hard for me. Anyhoo, I will get back at ya on Tuesday, that is if I don't get taken by some Dew mouthed Appalachian folk.

My pictures gonna be in a book

2010-11-09T15:34:00.003-05:00

A picture I took is going to be in a book. Not because it's a fabulously well taken photograph that is so beautiful that it takes your breath away, but more for the sheer funniness value. I submitted it to the website awkwardfamilypetphotos.com and they liked it so much they put it up on their site. The comments about the picture are hilarious. Some people thought the picture was funny, others thought it was animal cruelty. Really?? It's not like the dogs are buried 10 feet under the sand. Besides the fact that they are Jack Russel's, which are excellent diggers, so if they wanted to get out of the shallow hole they were in it would take two cussing seconds. The website people sent me a request to see if it could go into a book they are making. While the photo doesn't really showcase my astounding photography skills, I do like that someone appreciates the humor behind it.

Click HERE to link to the website picture and the comments. Some of my favorite comments, which could also be titles are:

"now they know how the bones in the backyard feel" -RatTrap007
"a warning from the Chihuahua drug cartel" -R. Michael Bortman
"This is evil, it isn’t funny! Those dogs would have had to be held down, they don’t look relaxed, they look scared! and being buried in sand up to your neck, would be different to having washing thrown on you. Sand is constricting, they wouldn’t be able to move under that, this photo is animal cruelty and should never have been put on this website" - Tangle

Oh wait. That last one shouldn't be in my favorite comments. It should be in the most idiotic comment category.

Hope you like!

Happy Friday!

2010-11-05T13:23:00.003-04:00

Tommy wishes you a happy friday! See y'all next week and don't forget to bundle up- it's gonna be cold out there.

Krog Street Tunnel and BP

2010-11-02T13:12:00.003-04:00

A friend of mine sent me the following video. It is a pretty cool time-lapse video that takes place at the Krog St Tunnel right around the corner from my house. I actually have a couple of pictures of Krog Tunnel with the graffiti pictured, but I had never seen the video of it being done. My favorite part of the video is when the cops roll by during the painting of the banner. Pretty funny! In case you don't know Krog St Tunnel connects Inman Park with Cabbagetown. It is a long tunnel chock full of graffiti. If you drive through the tunnel during the day you are destined to see lot of photographers and models, using the tunnel walls as a backdrop. The banner overhead at the end of each tunnel change continously based upon any new underground shows playing.

Bye, Bye All Hallow's Eve

2010-11-01T13:07:00.006-04:00

I'm sad to say that Halloween is donzo for this year. It had a good run and I am wiped out. I wanted to show y'all a couple of pics from the weekends festivities which lined up exactly as planned... other than the lack of motivation to move on Sunday. So if you click HERE you can see who I was modeling my costume on. I don't have a great full shot of me, but as you can see cuffs, mask, emblem, cape, and hair spray were all done in super cheap fashion to emulate the bad guy Red Mist. Here's me:

and here is the whole group of people at Village Theatre before we hit the bars. I didn't bring my large camera out so these pictures were taken from a friend. As you can see there are some TMNT's, a strawberry, the guys from dumb and dumber, a cat, an 80's beauty queen, a grenade, and Sid and Nancy. There was also a sexy prisoner, but she somehow got cut out of the picture.

I will post some 'burb party pics in the next couple of days. Oh can I please tell you that apparently my outfit was not well known. One guy put it at me being ahead of the curve. He said "that {you} can't bust out a costume from a movie that was released the same year- not enough people had seen it". You know what though? I didn't see a single other group busting out our outfits, which means next year when the costume is hot we will have already done it.

Sweet Video and My Halloween Plans

2010-10-29T09:14:00.007-04:00

I'm gonna be honest with y'all - I would never do nor accomplish any of the shit on the montage vid below. I'm just not that talented and/or cool and/or bad ass.

Also Halloween is this weekend. Hurray! Who's pumped up?? I am, I am. The weekend line up is a little pet sitting. Party tonight in the burbies. I'm going dressed as a sleepy person and I am busting out these beauties. I was going to wear them to the bar and thought better of it. They don't have a drop down bum hole (imperative, or so I have heard)which means you gotta strip them off to the bottoms when you want to take a wee. I am just not comfortable with doing that in a tiny bar bathroom with scum on the floor and who knows what on the walls. I mean what if some part of my outfit touched something like that? I would have to burn them, so instead I'm busting out the footies. A friend of mine thinks I should add a Care Bear and bow and arrow to my costume and be a Care Bear Hunter. I like the idea, but I don't have the time to hunt down my props. Maybe next year.

Saturday I am doing more pet sitting, a possible maternity shoot (we will discuss my feelings on this later), selling shit at a yard sale, and for the Halloween weekend finale I will be celebrating my friends 30th birthday by hitting up the comedy club and then the bars with most of my closest Atlanta friends. Oh and I got a Cabbagetown party to hit up post bars. Should make for a long and crazy night. I am dressing as Red Mist from Kick Ass. The whole gang will be there- Kick Ass, Hit Girl, and Big Daddy.

Sunday is the great day of rest so I will be doing more pet sitting, feeding candy to trick or treaters (I hope), and then going to a friends party in Grant Park. Gee Willikers, I am tired already.

Have a good weekend and don't eat any unopened candy; My bffs cousins, brothers, mothers, frenemy ate a piece of candy last Halloween from an open package and swallowed a razor blade. It too can happen to you. ;)

Some shots of the best halloweenie parade

2010-10-20T15:54:00.004-04:00

Back again and I come bearing photos. No Holga shots, since Wolf Camera didn't inform me that my roll came back empty. EMPTY! They couldn't have told me that over the phone. Grr... Guess I will have to try and play around again. So I will post a couple of pictures from the Halloween parade in Little 5, but to see more you can go here

Random woman dressed as a "sexy" ram?? I know she had to be hot.

They're Alive!!!!!

Freakiest mother/daughter portrait!

Fu Manchu busting out a mini motorcycle trick

Oh Em Geeeee!

2010-10-19T15:38:00.002-04:00

Hello again! Yes, I am back so soon. Don't act so shocked. I had a hot moment and thought I would come visit. Not sure what I want to talk about, but I am feeling another free flow post.

Weekend recap (pictures to follow): Fri night dinner and drinks with friends, as well a showing of the movie "Youth in Revolt". First of all 2 delicious beers were enjoyed during the movie.

The Southern Tier beer is a supreme desert stout. I love my stouts and all and can generally drink multiples in one sitting, but one glass of this creme brulee was enough for me. There is never a bitter note in the beers taste and the end note is all vanilla. Delicious, but SWEET! The Imperial pumpkin has just enough pumpkin and spice and is slightly sweet. It isn't as good as the pumpkin ale I sampled at Hotoberfest, but it still gets me in the fall season.

Can I please mention how much I love Michael Cera? I can't think of a movie I have seen where I hadn't absolutely loved his character. I love how his lines are always witty and delivered with a sarcastic tone. I just wish the guy was a bit more to look at though if he were he wouldn't be near as funny. Am I the only one who likes him? I assume there are plenty of others since otherwise how would he get so many leads.

Went to the Halloween Parade in Little 5 Points. I haven't messed with any of my pictures, but when I do you will be the first ones to know about it. I am also getting my first Holga pictures developed so I might post a few of those as well. It's my first shot at shooting my new Holga and shooting multiple exposures per frame. Let's hope they turn out. I'm going to head on out, but when I get back I will post some pictures and stories.

Oh and I have a public service announcement. If you thank someone in an email can you please put an exclamation point after it. I can't stand when someone just puts a period after thanks. It's either an exclamation point or nothing bitches. See Example below. Now really, which one do you feel most makes you feel like you are actually being sincerely thanked.

Thanks!

Thanks.

Thanks

Once again I am slacking

2010-10-15T13:41:00.005-04:00

I have been a shitty blogger as of late. I have had a lot to say, but wasn't really in the modd to write. I am so sorry little blog. I got multiple things on the agenda. Firstly, the bachelorette party weekend in Destin. It was good times in Destin. 4 Beautiful days in sunny Destin and the only day it was rainy is the one day I happened to get a hangover. Perfection, I think so. Despite being 29 and typically going out once a week, I went all out 2 nights in a row, throwing down from 8 pm until 4 am without consequence that is until the 2nd nights next morning:( One of the bars we hit up in Destin was a sauasage fest packed with under 25s and some under 21s ready to try and take any lady home. If you are an older girl that wants to get with a young buck I've got 2 words for you- Electric Cowboy. Oh and Friday nights are $15 all you can drink. Don't say I didn't warn you.

I have been pet sitting a ton and have had a long lingering illness which is why I have been so slack on here. I just wanted to apologize once more.

Other than being a blog slacker I have also been a photog slacker. Boo! I did however snap loads of photos of an adults only food fight that I was invited to. When I say adults only, I don't mean that everyone was naked and sliding on jello or anything like that, but instead there were no children particpating. I will say that it was a fun, but short food fight. Some of the ammo food items were jello, whipped cream, soda, spaghetti, cheesecake filling, and garlic hummus. That's right people, some one brought garlic hummus to chuck at people. I don't think they played fair. The fight was pretty funny despite me only shooting it and not actually particiapting. It was what 8 year old dreams are made of and I seriously wished that there were about quadruple the number of people involved with way more ammo. To see pics click on this link.

Another thing that I did in the past couple of weeks which I have not written about is Hotoberfest with Old Unreliable. He just happened to know the right people which means we scored VIP tix to the beer fest which means instead of 130 beers we could have possibly tasted 170 beers which means had we done that we would have been way more fucked up than the average festival goer which means that we would have had way more fun which means that for next years Hotoberfest you should purchase VIP tix. Basically what my run-on sentence is saying is that you should get your ass in gear for next year and join us vippers. Another plus at VIP is that a huge TV is setup to show fall football along with some couches and chairs so while sampling 170 beers you can also watch some college gameday. I just sealed the deal right? Anyhoo, we had fun, the weather was perfect, the band was rocking, and boiled peanuts were cheap. Can't go wrong with that.

How do you like my content today? A little sporatic right? I am actually writing this just like it comes into my head, which is why shit probably doesn't make a lot of sense. Sorry 'bout that; it's just how I roll.

Did you get a chance to watch any portions of those miners coming up to the surface the other day? Can I please tell you that I had tears coming to my eyes. I also have had Ch! Chi! Chi! Le! Le! Le! stuck in my head. I heard something about some of the guys getting to the point, during the 17 days before they were discovered alive, of thinking that if they died the other guys would eat them to stay alive. This immediatley made me think about wanting to reread the book "Alive". Not sure, why since the book is rather dark, but that is how my mind works. If you have never read "Alive" you should. It's all about that rugby team who's plane went down in the Andes and they lived for 10 weeks before being discovered. They actually cannabalized some of the bodies to stay alive. It's a sad story that will make you cry, but I think the ending is good.

Okay, I think I have pretty much caught y'all up on my life until now. I am out this weekend, ready to tear it up. Wine and Dine tonight with the ladies, the always spectacular Halloween Parade and Festival in Little 5, and then I am going to shoot some Zombies with friends at Zombie Apocalypse. Have fun and stay safe this weekend.

Happy Birfday!

2010-10-05T09:36:00.003-04:00

This birthday shout out goes to my friend Old Unreliable who is 33 today. Happy birthday!! I am glad you were born:)

McNuggets No More

2010-10-04T12:35:00.003-04:00

I love McNuggets from McDonalds, but I think I might give them up after seeing this picture and reading this post. Goodbye McNuggets; you will be in my dreams:)

A recipe and some pictures

2010-09-23T14:29:00.004-04:00

I am heading to Destin in a couple of hours and I am pumped up. I have caught a bit of a cold in the last day, of course, and have been asked frequently by my cubicle mate turned illness monitor if I am getting sick. I am this close to yelling "Fuck You" at the top of my lungs. Luckily have a modicum of class. Anyhoo I feel the ocean air will be good for whatever I got. Plus I am looking forward to stretching out on the beach with nothing much to do for the next 4 days.

So who likes bananas out there in the blogosphere?? Here is a terrific and easy looking pie recipe that I found which melds the flavors of toffee and banana into a pie. Fabulousness in a pie tin. Recipe found here.

I am only going to post one photo since my internet connection is acting up. You might be wondering if I am taking the B dawg with me, but I have to sadly announce that I am not. However, she is going to her second favorite household in the world. The one that contains her 2 favorite mammals, David and Hobie. I know she will have her own little mini vacation there and maybe she will chill out with a bit since most of her life spent with me is worrisome.

#16 is now checked off.... sort of and a recipe!

2010-09-22T07:51:00.005-04:00

So I am back, better than ever, though I will soon be leaving you again to go on a bachelorette filled weekend of debauchery and gumbo in Destin. "Gumbo" you ask? I will be hitting up The Boathouse multiple times to get my fill of oysters and gumbo in a super scenic environment.

This past weekend's festivities weren't all that exciting. A couple of friends and I got together for a lazy (i.e. cheap) night of potluck food and a movie. For dinner I threw together a delicious Mexican casserole (See bottom of this post for the recipe). Later that night I met a college friend out for some drinks and a close up look at how the melting pot of Atlanta melds. That pot was seen at the Majestic at around 2:30 in the am.

I had to wake up early in the morning so that I could have time to pick up my nephew and get my biscuit on before Synagogue. Oh yes, getting my biscuit on at the Red Barn could mean other things, but in this case it means I didn't fast for the holiest of Jewish holidays, Yom Kippur. Despite the fantastically huge biscuit that I downed that morning I hope I get back in the good book.

So back to the Saturday morning at hand. This is the first time I have sat for my nephew since he started eating solid food- He's now 3. Obviously it's been awhile. When I told my brother that babysitting Ben is one of the things on my list of 30 x 30, he immediately jumped on the offer so that he could go to the UGA game unhindered by a 3 year old with a very short attention span. After I picked him up, he kept chattering away in the back seat about going to Synagogue. He was pumped. Little did he know what was ahead. We made it to the 'gogue late because I had to pick my mother up. I went to sit with the boy at the children's service while my mom headed to the adult service. Ben stayed fairly quiet for 10 minutes before he informed me he had to use the restroom. We went to the bathroom and he used it. Back out to the children's service. I gave him his toy cars to keep him quiet. He did well other than the slight kablooms and kablams he whispered when crashing his toy truck into my hand or the chair in front of us. 15 minutes later he has to go the bathroom again. I thought this kid was lying, but took him any way. Dude dropped an adult sized deuce in the toilet and then wanted me to wipe his ass and flush for him. It made me gag a bit. I don't think I am cut out for this mothering business. Second time out of the bathroom we went back to the service but i could tell the boy was getting restless. I decided to forgo the rest of the service and get him out to the playground stat. We played for a bit then my mom took over. I went back in the 'gogue and suffered through about 20 minutes of service before my mom was back asking me to take Ben home. I was pumped. I didn't get chewed out for telling my mom I didn't want to go to services this year, but I also didn't really spend that much time in services. It made me happy.

The rest of the day went along well. Ben and I played. I watched Sixteen Candles while Ben took a nap. I ate dinner with my brother. All in all a good day with only one ass wiping and I can now scratch one thing off my list. Only 29 more to go. I didn't want to tell my brother, but I do plan on offering up my services a couple more times this year. Unfortunately now is the time I would typical show you some pictures I snapped of Ben, but I forgot to bring my camera. I guess you will have to amuse yourself with a couple of old photos of the boy.

Mexican Casserole:
Ingredients or whatever you have in your pantry that is fairly mexican or tex mexie:
-Corn tortillas
-Can of black beans
-Cooked, shredded chicken
-Jar of salsa
-Cheese
-Can of Rotel

Method:
Make sure you lightly cover the bottom of the casserole dish with salsa before you start. Layer items starting and ending with corn tortillas. Throw a bit of salsa in the middle of the layers and on the top of the tortillas. Top with cheese. Bake at 350 degrees for about 15 minutes or so. Enjoy!

Blah

2010-09-16T08:43:00.002-04:00

I have a major case of the blahs. I have been in a bitchy mood for days now and all I feel like doing is hiding out under my duvet. Is that bad? My incessant mouth diarrhea has kicked in to high gear and I have been feeling guiltier than usual on the seemingly bitchy things that stream out of my mouth when surrounded by friends. I hope they all realize that the way I word sentences has a tendency to be a bit harsh when I really don't mean it like that. I think I need to take a long vacation alone, without animals or work, to do nothing at all, and relish in the solitude. I think it would probably do me and my psyche a whole lot of good.

30 by 30

2010-09-07T15:20:00.014-04:00

I am now 29. My birthday went over without a hitch and with a lot of beer. There were some good times that were had at the saloon/dance club/sports bar known as The Palace Saloon in Fernandina Beach. I even got to dance to my favorite song of 2010.. I'm on a boat. Love it. The weekend at the beach with my friends was one of the better times I have had in the past couple of years so I am glad everyone made it. This wasn't why I brought you here though. Actually you brought you here so ignore that. The reason for this post is to come up with a list of 30 things to do before I turn 30 years old next September 3, 2011. So my list is below.

30 by 30

Health and Fitness
1. Lose 20 lbs. I would prefer to lose 30, but we shall see - I've lost 15. Does that count?
2. Hike a piece of the Appalachian Trail
3. Work out on a regular basis
4. Run two 10Ks
5. Run the ING half again **This is out- missed the race:( **
6. Spend a day biking

Travel and Home:
7. Take a road trip with no destination in mind
8. Go camping
9. Go to South Africa
10. Have a “just the girls” weekend - semi-did.. I was supposed to do this on my 30th birthday, but that got "rained" out. Instead I had a staycation with some girlfriends.
11. Spend a day taking pictures of Atlanta
12. Go to the Cotton Picking Festival- it’s been a couple of years

Relationships with Family, Friends, and Others:
13. Visit a nursing home
14. Volunteer at the food kitchen
15. Have a “theme” party at my house
16. Babysit Ben
17. Pay for someone behind me in the drive through line
18. Don’t say anything negative all day

Be Selfish/ Finish Things That Need to be Done:
19. Buy all new underwear - just because
20. Get fitted at Saks and buy new bras
21. Write a will
22. Paint my kitchen **Painted the cabinets and stuck on new hardware**
23. Redo my front yard
24. Finish putting my house in order- there is still no art on the walls of the bedrooms.
25. Stain the back deck

Other:
26. Give away something I own
27. Take a cooking class
28. Try baking something complicated
29. Try making a pizza from scratch
30. Learn how to can

The Good "Shit"

2010-09-01T09:19:00.003-04:00

So as many of you know, or none of you, I do not have cable. I would rather spend money on pointless shit like expensive food or lottery tickets. I never buy lottery tickets, but I figured I was bound to be lucky if I purchased some during my birthday week. Sadly enough $5 just went down the drain...And now I remember why I don't buy lottery tickets. The main reason is that I went through a brief period of scratch off purchasing after hearing a friend say his friend won $500 off of those $20 scratch offs that you can then mail in and possibly win by a drawing. I spent $140 on 7 scratch offs within one months time and didn't win a damn thing. Perhaps I shouldn't gamble.

Anyways, back to the set up at hand. So I don't have cable which means I miss a lot of horrible TV and some really good "shit"- like The Jersey Shore (yeah right) or Tosh.0. Since I miss a lot of good "shit" I have to live vicariously through friends and hope that they share good "shit" with me. That good "shit" can either be told, which is never as funny, since it is really a time and place type thing, or the good "shit" needs to be forwarded to me so that I can get my fill of good "shit" in person without needing to pay $30 to watch. Luckily some of my friends come through, which is how I got to view some good "shit".

Tosh.0

Weds 10:30pm / 9:30c

Video Breakdown - Wig Dive

www.comedycentral.com

Tosh.0 Videos

Daniel Tosh

Web Redemption

Pity Party

2010-08-30T13:27:00.004-04:00

I was hanging with some friends the other day when a friend who happens to be 33 and single told me and another girl that she had been throwing a pity party for herself. The main reason, amongst others, stems from her gyno informing her at her yearly visit that now is the time to start thinking about freezing her eggs. My friend, who happens to be in the health care profession and knows that your egg "health" goes down at age 35, was freaked out to say the least. She, like most women, had planned on getting married and having a child naturally. She didn't want to be brought down by the fact that if she is not married and trying for babies in the next 2 years, that shit is gonna get a lot tougher for her.

While I don't want kids and I don't really care to be married anytime soon it sort of got me thinking too. Then two more blows hit.. my 29th birthday is in 5 days and I happened to be going to spend it with a bunch of my friends on the beach. The thing about this trip to the beach is that every single one of my friends is now bringing a significant other. Two of them are married- cool. One of them happens to own the place we are staying at- that's obviously fine. The other 4 people have no fucking excuse. Why this bothers me so much I don't know. Maybe because it's automatic pairings; after all 3 is a crowd. Maybe it is because I always thought I would at least have someone special by now. Maybe it's because I want to hang out with my friends and not have some weird couple dynamic kicking in the group.

I was never the girl who had to have a boyfriend. If anything, I like being independent. I can go where I want, when I want, with whom I want any time I want. I can buy whatever and decorate my house without judgement. Still though, 29 means that I am a year away from 30. It also means that more and more of my friends are pairing up and I will be left behind. Despite some friends thinking that nothing will ever change, I know what happens when people get married. They start having to split time between groups and friends and between themselves which means less friend time. Then they start having children. They might go out here and there for a chance to get away, but the more likely scenario is that they want to hang out with like minded couples who have children so they can bring about what great children they have and they can discuss developmental issues with like minded individuals. They can't go out that much due to said children, and their partner thinks that if they do go out they might get in to trouble. Marrieds with children always seem to look down upon us singles. It pisses me off and while I never plan on being in their boat since I sure as hell don't want a Stephanie Junior running around I would love to find that perfect guy who is my best friend so that I don't care so much when friends start spending all the time with their guy and kid and none of their time with me.

On to guys; one of my friends made the comment the other day that sort of pissed me off. When I told her I had gone on a couple of dates with a new guy and wasn't really feeling it, she said "what else is new?". It angered me. While again not looking for a husband, I would like the guy I am interested in to meet all physical and mental needs. I am not just gonna date somebody to say I have somebody. If I am not feeling it, I'm not feeling it. The friend, who shall remain nameless, tends to constantly be in relationships and honestly, the guys she dates aren't attractive- to me anyway. Maybe she tends to be more open or maybe I am just picky. Whatever it is I am sick of the assumption I don't try. I do.. I go to bars. I try and always make it to different friends gatherings so that I can meet new people. I have even tried online dating. It is just hard. It always seems like whenever I meet a guy I connect with they are married, dating, or don't get my number. The online people, while nice on paper and screen, never seem to spark anything in me. I'm gonna keep on keeping on, but damn it gets harder every day and this impending birthday soon to be shared with a whole bunch of couples is really not helping anything.

So anyone out there want to join in on my mini pity party? I promise that good food and lots of alcohol will be served.

At least Bella won't leave me:

Wednesday Wednesday

2010-08-18T15:33:00.002-04:00

I'm back, large and in charge. Tubing never went down last weekend so we are starting afresh this Saturday. Let's pray for NO RAIN!. The Hollidays rocked the house Friday night. The whole joint was jumping and this super cute old dude asked me to dance. If he wasn't 60+ I might have gone home with him. Dude had moves. I think he danced with every lady there so I don't feel too special. :(

Tonight is potluck and despite my tendency to cook food for this thang, I am grilling up some pre-marinated Korean BBQ boneless chicken thighs. They will be delicious! The dog isn't making shit. Shocker. Damn dog, doesn't ever provide to the household, other than a growl or bark here and there.

So I was discussing guns with a co-worker at work. He feels that everyone should have guns in there homes which deter burglars. I feel that why have a gun when you could have a big dog. My feeling is that the people robbing places aren't going to necessarily know that a person has a gun when robbing the joint, which means they would be more likely to rob a place with no dog. However, if the person had a loud dog, hopefully large, the robber would rather pick a house with no apparent dog which means the robbery will never happen to begin with. Who feels me??? It's hard to argue with my co-workers though because they grew up with a different upbringing. I grew up in a middle class family that doesn't believe in guns, hunting, etc. They grew up where all this shit was the norm. There are things that come out of their mouths that amaze me like me asking if they knew what the statistics are on people who own guns and how many accidents there are with them either shooting themselves or kids/friends shooting one another accidentally. He says it doesn't matter because he puts it up when people come over and his 4 year olds know not to touch the gun in his nightstand. Yeah...okay. I love playing devils advocate though. They get so flustered. It's fun. However I am not a fan of people who pull that shit on me.

Slacker:

The one who lived with me for awhile:

Friday the 13th... bum bum bum

2010-08-13T09:31:00.004-04:00

Hey yo!! I know you are shocked that I am checking in for the 3rd time in a week. I gotta be honest, I'm shocked too. So the weekend is here, finally, and I got plans.. big plans, fun plans. We are looking a schedule that consists of watching the Hollidays playing at Northside Tavern tonight, shooting the 'hooch Saturday, and a date Sunday. That's right- a date. We shall see how that turns out. To all my friends who are skipping our tubing sesh tomorrow- FU! LOL

I think I forgot to share in my high school reunion experience. It was rather fun and quite a bit like high school only with real IDs. I walk in at 8ish pm and i see multiple people... some who look the same, some who I wouldn't have known them if i sat next to them on the bus. I chatted with some friends that I hadn't seen since our crazy high school graduation party, where I got extremely fucked up and never slept. At the reunion I drank heavily throughout to kill the slight panic attack that was brewing as well as to have a little more social lubrication. I love that alcohol helps with nerves. Anyhoo most of the people I was "more" friends with in high school didn't come. There were however, thank GOD, some of the guys I was friends with back then so we all hung out. Some random girl I don't really remember told me I intimidated her in high school. I wanted to say "get in line bitch" since I have heard that from numerous people throughout my life. It's odd too since I think I am one of the nicest people, despite my prevalence to talk about people behind their backs. I really do do that, but it's more so I don't hurt that persons feelings. I don't talk shit about friends and the people who I say shit about are people I dislike anyways, but I still have a little southern sweetness in me and don't want to hurt them despite my dislike. Anyhoo let me get off that tangent. So I took numerous shots with these guys and then Gordon Biersch cut one of them off. Who knows why since he didn't appear all that drunk to me. Time to take the party elsewhere. We then went, caravan style, to the Cheetah, which in case you couldn't tell by the name is a strip club. It was the nicest strip club I have ever been too, but weird because there were loads of tables and women dancing on the banquets above. I didn't see lots of girls walking around and the room was so large it reminded me of a work conference. We stayed here for a beer and then went to CosmoLava, where some of our other friends had ended up. Let me just tell y'all that CosmoLava blows ass. I refused to pay to get in since who wants to pay for shitty drinks and a DJ, but a friend paid my way so that I could come hang. The night went on and on and I got no nookie. The end. Let's see what happens in 10 years.

I am tired of writing now, but did want to say that I picked one of the better wines for wine night last night. I love bringing the good wine.

Oh and here is my best 365 from the last month or so. I only took 5 pictures in the last month. EEK! Better get on it.

A healthy recipe just for you- Mediterranean Eggplant and Barley Salad

2010-08-12T11:13:00.006-04:00

So Potluck at the river was yesterday and I made some kick ass salad for it. I thought it was delicious with a nice spicy, sweet, roasty taste. Yum!! I think some people loved it and others were anti-olive. Crazy bitches! I LOVE olives! The recipe is below with my notes to the ingredients in italics. The actual method of cooking really didn't need any changing, but please note that you should make sure your veggies are well salted and oiled when they go on the pans, other wise they will stick as mine did. Oh well. The salad still taste delicious and makes a TON! Hope you like it.

Mediterranean Eggplant and Barley Salad
Adapted from Gourmet, September 2006

It says it makes 4 main course dishes, but I think it makes more than that

1 1/2 lb eggplant, cut into 1/2-inch cubes (Use 2 eggplant)
3/4 lb zucchini, cut into 1/2-inch cubes (Use 2 or 3 Zucchini)
10 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon black pepper
1 cup chopped scallion
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon ground coriander
1/4 teaspoon cayenne (I used a full tsp which gave it a lot of bite)
1 1/4 cups pearl barley (8 oz) (I used fine barley, don't use the regular Quaker barley)
1 (14-oz) can reduced-sodium vegetable or chicken broth (1 3/4 cups)
3/4 cup water( I had to use about 1/4 cup more water because the liquid was almost gone and the barley wasn't soft enough)
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice (1 juicy lemon)
1 garlic clove, minced
1/4 teaspoon sugar
1/2 lb cherry tomatoes, quartered (I used 1/2 a can of drained, diced tomatoes)
1/3 cup Kalamata, pitted and halved
1/2 cup thinly sliced red or white onion
1 cup chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley (I omitted)
1/2 cup chopped fresh mint
Optional - Feta

Roast eggplant and zucchini: Put oven racks in upper and lower thirds of oven and preheat oven to 425°F.

Toss eggplant and zucchini with 5 tablespoons oil, 3/4 teaspoon salt, and 3/4 teaspoon pepper in a bowl, then spread in 2 oiled large shallow (1-inch-deep) baking pans. Roast vegetables in oven, stirring occasionally and switching position of pans halfway through baking, until vegetables are golden brown and tender, 20 to 25 minutes total. Combine vegetables in 1 pan and cool, reserving other pan for cooling barley.

Cook barley: Heat 2 tablespoons oil in a 3- to 4-quart heavy pot over moderately high heat until hot but not smoking, then cook scallion, cumin, coriander, and cayenne, stirring, until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add barley and cook, stirring until well coated with oil, 2 minutes more. Add broth and water and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer, covered, until all of liquid is absorbed and barley is tender, 30 to 40 minutes. Remove from heat and let stand, covered, 5 minutes. Transfer to reserved shallow baking pan and spread to quickly cool, uncovered, to room temperature, about 20 minutes.

Make dressing and assemble salad: Whisk together lemon juice, garlic, sugar, and remaining 1/4 teaspoon salt, 1/4 teaspoon pepper, and 3 tablespoons oil in a large bowl. Add barley, roasted vegetables, and remaining ingredients to bowl with dressing and toss until combined well. Serve with cheese slices.

Do ahead: Salad can be made 1 day ahead and chilled, covered. Return to room temperature before serving.

My Parents stuff

2010-08-11T08:28:00.002-04:00

Found a new blog today called "Crap at My Parents House". I bet you can figure out what it's about. Let me just say that this is a site I will defintley try and contribute to. Do you think anyone thinks that 60+ year old people who still have 2 water turtles living under their roof is wierd? What about a multimedia picture in the bathroom that is all about Elvis- there are pink clothes attached along with barbie shit? MMHH. I think I am gonna have to come up with something really good to get my parents on that site. Something that will beat out a statue of Jesus playing statue. Damn, why can't we believe in Jesus.

Bad Girl

2010-08-05T14:24:00.003-04:00

On July 26th I mentioned that I would update the blog in "a day or two". It is now August 5th and I am updating this bitch. Damn, do I keep my word or what??? Don't answer that. So my life is going. I am still alive, going out, having fun, exercising, and eating like complete and total shit. Yay! Can you hear the sarcasm dripping from every letter of that Yay, because I meant for the sarcasm to flow like lava over rocks.

Fun things I did this last weekend included vegging out, going out on the town with some of my ladies, and hanging out with an old Savannah friend who I dearly miss and meeting his new lady. Damn, if only I were Eritrean and Catholic. I also watched the band, The Hollidays- they rock, and I kayaked it up on the Broad River outside of Athens with some other friends. BRO is goooood. After kayaking I ate fried chicken, mac n cheese, mashed potatoes, and a piece of cornbread along with a piece of cobbler. You know how many calories that is.. roughly 1000! But I burned about 9 hundred calories kayacking. Whew!

Okay so enough about the overindulgent puff muffin that is me. Did you hear about this dumbass who robbed a Wendy's in the A and then called back to complain twice about his meager take. Really fucker, you just got away with a crime and then you want to complain about it? Take your money and run.. and leave $100 bill for me under my mat. Gracias!

Oh, one last and uber important thing to tell y'all. My 10 year high school reunion is this Saturday night. I am freaked the FUCK out. I wasn't going to go at first. I was super nervous, still am, and was thinking about the fact that I am larger than I want to be when these people who haven't seen me in 10 years see me. I have come to terms with the fact that I am slightly larger than I once was, okay 25 lbs heavier, when some of these peeps saw me at my most fit when in D's wedding 2 years ago and 45 lbs heavier than my high school weight. However I am excited that I can finally bust out my true 'do, since back in my high school days I didn't know jack shit how to fix curly hair unfro-like so I just wore it up every day. Now I have some great long curly locks and I will be busting them out in all their jewish glory. I will also be busting out some heavy duty makeup, a suck-me-in, and a hot dress annnnnnddd I will be lying about what I do and say that I invented "post-its". Nah, just kidding. I won't lie since I do have a badass job of sitting on my ass all day mapping it up. ;) The main reason I decided to go to the reunion though is that the party takes place 5 minutes away from my hizzle at Gordon Biersch. Worst thing that happens is that all the people blow and I leave. the best thing that happens is that I have a one night stand with some random dude who I don't remember from high school. OOOH I hope he's not a party crasher.

A pretty picture from me to you:

sup sup

2010-07-26T15:59:00.002-04:00

Holla mi amigo! Was ist das? Comment était ton week-end? My weekend was good and these past weeks have been zehr gut other than my car trying to make life miserable. I mean damn Highlander thinks that after 100,000 miles it can get all slappy happy and punch drunk on me. No, you can not dear Highlander. You must continue to run your heart out for Miss Stephie. Damn, I make my car sound like an indentured servant. Well, maybe if it worked a little harder and stopped guzzling so much gas I would give it a day off or two.

So I watched one of my friends preform with her band, Lindsey Rakers Band, at Smiths. It was loads o' fun and the night culminated in a preformance by Chris Knight, whomever he is, and a dude macking on a speaker. My friend sat on said speaker later in the night and got a bit of previous dude's love juice on her dress. She's such a slunt. SLUNT = word of the day. Have fun with that kiddies and I'll be back tomorrow or the next depending upon if I recieve a bunny filled with money or not. I am holding out hope.

The last of Chicago

2010-07-23T08:48:00.003-04:00

Action Jackson:

Millenium ParK:

For more Chicago photos taken by moi, go to my Chicago Flickr Set.

For my Yelp Chicago reviews, go to my Yelp list.

Chicago Pics Part Dos

2010-07-20T14:58:00.001-04:00

My Fave:

This is how Chicagoans lay out:

Chicago in Pictures Part 1

2010-07-08T11:29:00.005-04:00

Flying In

My gracious Hosts

A skyline water view

Some of Castaways characters

................More on Chicago later

So close

2010-06-29T10:50:00.005-04:00

Sorry that it has been so long. Boo! I have been crazy busy doing nothing and everything. Yeah, I know...excuses, excuses. So my 365 project has once again come to a screeching halt. I forgot a couple last week and I decided to take a break starting last Friday. Hopefully I can pull my ass out of the gutter and start again in a day or so. I am going to keep up with the number count starting on the new days.. no restarting or endings here.

So this weekend is 4th of July weekend. What does that mean? It means that I am going to Chicago. Whoop, whoop!! I have never been nor have I taken a vacation from work since last summer, so as you can tell I am pretty darn psyched. I am heading off to the Windy City on Thursday morning and coming back Monday afternoon. I have no clue what's in the plans since I am going with my good friend Easy E. I know we are staying in the 'burbs, Arlington Heights, the first night so she can see her fam, but after that the city is our oyster and OMJoe will be our "Pearl". Taste of Chicago is going on this weekend and Steve Miller Band is playing so we might take that in. I will be sure to post some fat daddy pics on here next week so be on the lookout.

I wanted to make y'all aware of a new website I have found; new to me that is. Shit as funny as hell, but apparently the writer is on hiatus so who knows how long we will wait to get another issue. The Plug is the name of the site and to find stories, you click on an issue, and then hover over one of the icons. There are multiple stories per issue. Some of these are pretty damn funny like this one and this one.

And finally, a picture of 365 from the past week. They mainly sucked so this is the semi-best of the bunch.

Oh and I wanted to post a couple of random new pictures that I feel like posting.

Sets of 3s

2010-06-24T08:18:00.004-04:00

They say things happen in threes right?? I have always wondered who the they is in this. Who was the first person to come up with the word trifecta? Who was the first person to realize that shitty things happen in threes, or so I hope that's the case. I have had a string of crappy luck as of late.

It all started with the damn AC a couple of weeks ago. I finally have central heat and air, which I am pumped about; no more U shaped house with the lone window unit blowing only into the living room. I am a bit of a cheapskate, at least when it comes to things like this, so I waited awhile to turn on my air. When I finally did nothing happened.. that's right, nothing. It was blazing hot in my house - I think it was in upper 80's that week. Let me preface by saying that when I purchased the house last November the AC worked. Anyhoo, I called out the repairman and $440 later my AC was blowing hard.

The 2nd thing to topple in my house was my bed, literally, and not in a good way either. Nothing sweaty about this bed breaking session. I was having people over and I happened to go into my bedroom and lie on the bed, I also just happened to have had a bit to drink so I needed a soft place to lie. A friend came and sat on my chair to talk with me. Another friend decided that we looked entertaining so he came and leapt upon the bed. Most beds would hold up under this; mine unfortunately is not one of those beds. The one peg holding up all of the slats popped off leaving a mattress, sans bed spring, floating precariously. I brought this bed, this awesome mid-century teak piece of furniture art, to a local antique "fixer" and the bed still lies there. My wallet has since been relieved of $460 for the work.

Here comes the third, and hopefully final, piece to the story. Yesterday I came home from work and went to take a sip of water. The water from the fridge was not near as cold as usual. I didn't think much about it since the light in the fridge came on. I made food for potluck, went to potluck, and went to take another drink of water from the pitcher in the fridge. The water still wasn't cold. It got me thinking that maybe something was wrong. None of the other food in there felt all that cold either. I opened the freezer and saw the ice glistening wetly despite the fridge light and obvious fan noise sounding from the back of the fridge. No price yet on how much this shit is going to cost, but I will say that I hope this stops the bullshit problems that are floating around the house just waiting to pick a moment in order for something else to fuck up.

Scorned Lovers

2010-06-22T14:34:00.000-04:00

Brought to you by the good folks at list of the day

Bleh

2010-06-18T13:48:00.003-04:00

Nothing like a super heavy meal in the middle of the day to make a person feel good. I went and ate some delicious roast duck and Singapore noodles at Hong Kong BBQ in the food court by Dinho (off of New Peachtree Road). While this random food court isn't really attached to anything other than an outdoor strip mall, it has some of the cheapest and mighty tasty Asian around. Hong Kong BBQ is down at the end of the food court to the far right - look for the dead animals hanging in their window. Another delicious place in the food court is Chong Quing Hot Pot. $8 will get you a massive hot pot filled with your choice of meat, veggies, noodles, and broth. It is by far enough for 2 meals. The Szechuan Fish in Spicy Chili Oil is amazing and they have all you can eat rice...just walk behind the counter and to the left to get it out of the gigantic rice cooker. Another popular place in this eatery is the chinese joint next to Chong Quing- it has some pork soup buns that people go mad for.. get 10 for $6. You can find all this awesomeness here:

View Larger Map

Okay one of the better 365s of the week is me all Suzie Q. Homemaker like with my banana-black bean empanadas:

I hope everyone has a delightful weekend.

Recap and a Recipe

2010-06-16T13:50:00.006-04:00

Hello, hello. How's everybody today??? Good? Good! So I think I am still recovering from a whirlwind of a weekend. I had a semi-house party Saturday in between watching the USA vs England game, which was equal parts exciting and hot, and drinking at the hiz.

It felt like an international festival at my house since we had been taken over by Hungarians and a Frenchy. Out of the 4 cases of beer we consumed, there are 2 lonely singles left in the fridge and the 7 layer dip left us somewhere around 4 pm. Sad. Cabbagetown Park's soccer event was a lot of fun, what with the lack of breeze, 100 degree weather, and loads of soccer fans rooting on the US. We will just forget about those limey Brits sitting a row or 2 up from us. Really though, I had loads of fun hanging with old friends and gaining some new ones. Oh and Yay USA!!!

Sunday Funday was actually Sunday Cookday. I took my mom to a wine tasting/cooking class for a late Mom's day gift. On the menu was chicken in a pomegranate reduction, asparagus risotto (better than mine but more fatty), shrimp with feta and 'maters, and a flourless bittersweet chocolate cake. Yum!!!. I might have to hook y'all up with the recipes at some point. Maybe baby.

Lastly, Sunday night led me to a cookout at a friends house. Good times, tired times. Friend grilled it up and we all did a little trampoline jumping. I brought Cheetos's. I am such a thoughtful guest.

Recipe from Last weeks potluck:
Smoked Salmon and Apple Carpaccio
adapted from Giada De Laurentiis
(Makes 3 Servings, if you are serving hungry people)

Sliced French Bread, toasted
6 ounces Smoked Salmon
1 green apple, cut into very thin slices
1 tablespoon capers, rinsed and drained
Extra-virgin olive oil, for drizzling
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

Place an oven rack in the center of the oven. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.

Place the sliced bread on a baking sheet in a single layer. Lightly coat with olive oil. Bake for 8 to 10 minutes than flip to the other side for a couple of minutes. Let cool.

Arrange the smoked salmon in a single layer on a serving platter. Lay the apple slices on top. Sprinkle the capers over the salmon and apple slices. Drizzle with olive oil and season with salt and pepper, to taste. Serve with the toasted bread.

Let me just forewarn you... this got eaten up extremely quickly, like only a couple of people made it to potluck on time and it was gone way before the rest of the people showed up. If you or your friends are fans of smoked salmon y'all will kill this quick, so you might want to up the recipe. Look at the beautiful Droid picture I took. Awwww- it's like a flying heart!

Oh and my ah-ree-ble (pronounce like the British) 365 picture of last week is.... dun, dun, dun

I'm so domestic

Recipe- Asparagus, Goat Cheese, and Lemon Pasta

2010-06-09T16:07:00.006-04:00

Honestly, I copied this recipe from Smitten Kitchen, whom I adore. She adapted it from Bon Appetit, whom I don't adore or give 2 shits about. Basically this makes a load o' pasta, enough for 6 or 7 at least. I wasn't the biggest fan of this recipe because I thought it was a bit on the bland side. Perhaps if I had used Sweetgrass Dairys fresh chevre then all would have been good, but I didn't so it seemed to be a bit goat cheesy bland. Whatevs... just telling it like it is. Anyhoo recipe below:

Ingredients
1 pkg spiral pasta
1 pound asparagus spears, trimmed and cut into 1- to 1 1/2-inch pieces
1/4 cup olive oil
1 tbsp finely grated lemon peel
2 tsp chopped fresh tarragon (FYI has a licorice type taste, substitute basil if you don't like tarragon)
1 5- to 5 1/2-ounce log soft fresh goat cheese (the pre-crumbled stuff will not melt as well)
1 - 2 tbsp Fresh lemon juice to taste

Cook your pasta in a large pot of well-salted water until it is almost tender, or about three minutes less than what the package suggests. Add asparagus and cook until firm-tender, another two to three minutes. Drain both pasta and asparagus together, reserving one cup of pasta water.

Meanwhile, combine olive oil, lemon peel, lemon juice, tarragon and cheese in a large bowl, breaking up the goat cheese as you put it in. Add hot pasta and asparagus to bowl, along with a couple splashes of the pasta water. Toss until smoothly combined, adding more pasta water if needed. Season genersously with salt and pepper. Throw in some fresh spinach at the end if you want a bit more veggie in this dish.

Photo below was taken with Droid phone on the way to the weekly potluck.

Wherever did the weekend go?

2010-06-07T16:03:00.008-04:00

I had an interesting weekend. My favorite local festival was last weekend so I did it up big. Went to see the first band- Lindsey Rakers Band- because I know a girl, not Lindsey Raker, who's in it. They rocked. Luckily a friend of mine lives around the corner to the closed to alcohol music fest so we proceeded to say "fuck the man" and snuck our beer in all day. I saved major money this way. Score! The money savings meant I could purchase a hot waffle ice cream sandwich which was deliciously good. Went back and froth from the friends house to the stage hanging with different friends. Final band was tonic, the 'roid band from the late 90's.. they were ok. I mean, it was free so who can complain. Oh wait, me. Met up with some long-time-no-see friends and headed to Mellow Mushroom for dinner. We lost some people there after deciding that we would go to the Atlanta Eagle for a "lonely" friend.

About the Eagle- it is a gay bar in Atlanta that caters to gay men who like leather and all that stuff. So it was me, a female friend, 2 straight males, and my gay friend who went to the Eagle postsummerfest. I didn't wander around to the back rooms so I don't think I got a glimpse of all that the Eagle has to offer. I did however watch a 350 lb man wearing dress shoes and a speedo cutting a rug on the dance floor. It was a sight to behold. I was well into a 10 hour drinking fest so the dancer in me shown through. A guy even came up later and told me I was a fabulous dancer. I will relish that comment until the end of my days. Especially since the last time I got a comment on my dancing was when a girl in a Savannah bar came up to me and told me I had no rhythm. In your face, bitch! I would like to say that my straight guy friends rocked. I am so glad that some men are comfortable enough in their sexuality that they can go into a gay bar, especially this one, and not freak out about it. Unlike some other men, who told me that they would never be caught dead in a gay bar.

**Picture this guy with dress shoes and socks on, dancing to the music. Pure Eagle.

After our friend found himself a man, we left him and headed to MJQ. I don't think I am really the MJQ type considering I am not into hip hop, house, techno, or straight leg jeans, but I had fun all the same. That club always wows me when I walk in since it is so different than any other club in Atlanta. I love walking down the long sloping hallway to the underground rooms. It makes a person feel so gangster and hip.

The next morning I had to walk the 3 mile stretch between my house and the Highlands in order to pick up my abandoned car. I felt good walking off a portion of a days worth of food, drink, and waffle ice cream sandwiches.

Here's a pic from the festival festivities.

Operation Fat Ass

2010-06-04T14:24:00.005-04:00

So I wanted to clue y'all in on Operation Fat Ass. It is time for me to get back in shape and I am actually working it now. Like no more "I'm gonna work out but I'm too tired" nonsense. I am done with my self pitying bullshit, while I continue to stuff my face. For the past month I have been consistently working out 4 days a week with hopes to expand upon that amount. I have also been eating better, though not smaller. I am starting back up with the 1400 calorie a day good measure meals next week and I signed a plan with my work gym as opposed to my spin and boot camp gym near my house)for a 1x a week personal trainer. Now that shit isn't going to fly long. I am doing the special that is 1x week personal trainer, classes, and gym use for $90.. it's regularly $250 or so, so I am dropping that after the month ends- don't tell them though. I'm sure they are going to try and hard sell my ass. The good measure meals thing will hopefully allow me to start eating less, but we shall see. No matter what the fuck happens I am sick of this fat girl body and I will drop some lbs. Depending how much weight I lose I will post a pic of before and after. I would prefer to post my before pic after i lose the weight. I don't want to sicken y'all immediatley. giggle.

On to other things. The BP spill. While it makes me sick that this oil is poisoning the Gulf, beaches, marshes, plants, and animals, and effecting peoples lives, I don't think that boycotting small business owners is the way to go about showing anger. Right now BP needs all their money to go to dealing with this catastrophe so why should we try to hurt businesses that aren't even theirs by boycotting owners?? I realize that they make billions in profits. But it is going to take a shit ton to clean up this spill as well as help out the people who are being effected so let's leave them alone. I also believe that while they did play a huge part in this can we stop affixing complete and total blame. What happened on that rig was an accident. Should they have been better prepared? Yes. Should they have had loads of backups in place? Yes. Should they have been more responsible? Yes. But it is over and done with now. Let's stop putting blame and focus our attentions to helping the environment and people work through this catastrophe. I just pray that they can fix that well as soon as possible and I pray that the ecosystem can get over thois major environmental hurdle. Next->

365 picture of the week is below- it's Day 10. I already missed a day, but didn't skip the number; I just started the next day remembered as the next day the number is up. Most of my shots sucked this week, but what can a person do when said person can't find said persons expensive tripod's connecting piece rendering the use of it useless. FUCK!

Very quickly i wanted to let you know that after I wrote this post, I spellchecked it and had no spelling errors!! How awesome is that!!

I'm still alive,

2010-06-03T16:09:00.003-04:00

Just tired and out of sorts. Let me show you these a picture of these dookie looking pretzels I made the other day for broke ass potluck (took the pic with my droid, not my SLR). I should probably tell you that by made I mean I bought the mix for 1/2 off at Williams-Sonoma and mixed/kneaded that shit, formed those dukes, dipped them in water, salted, and baked them. They tasted good, but they look like crap.

365

2010-05-28T12:49:00.001-04:00

Here's my pic o' the week:

I took a better one last night but don't have it on this drive- doh!
I'll be back after the weekend, but I wanted to send you to a delicious recipe which can be found here Yumm!

Winner, winner, chicken dinner!!

2010-05-27T11:14:00.004-04:00

I got 5 whole comments on my giveaway- damn, I'm hot- and I will be announcing the winner in one moment. But first, I need to tell you about a very good cookbook that is out on the web. This cookbook's free ebook can be found here. Some of the delightful recipes (with pictures) are testicle pizza, testicle pie, and barbecued testicles and giblets. Sounds delicious right?? There are even video how-to's in the ebook. I know that this is the cookbook that you have been waiting for so I wanted to make sure to let you get the info 1st.:)

The winner is.....drum roll.......comment #2, Mrs. Showers!!! I will be contacting you shortly about how to send this gift card to you. Oh and I want to thank y'all for commenting!! I feel like I am in an empty room with my voice echoing so despite the fact that I tried to promote (weakly) my blog, I appreciate y'all taking the time out to comment.

FYI I used Random Number Generator to pick the winner, I wanted to stay impartial.

One last day

2010-05-26T09:52:00.002-04:00

to win free shit. Go here and write a comment. I don't give a shit what you say, just do it!!.

Here's a pic of B-dog doing what she does best- looking pretty!

One of my fave petsits

2010-05-24T14:32:00.003-04:00

This is Zac. He is one of my favorite clients. He is super fluffy, loves to lie on my belly and stare at me, and he loves to be brushed- thank god. He also likes to tell me about his day and how bored he has been since I have been there last.

This is the look he gave me when I told him I was going to profile him on my blog.

And this is the main picture he didn't want me to post of him. He thought it might be considered innapropriate.

365 days are here again and a GIVEAWAY!!!!

2010-05-21T11:42:00.009-04:00

Okay so about a year ago, June 22, 2009, I decided to try and take one self portrait a day for a year. Not sure if I mentioned on this blog- probably, but I am not checking.. I lied, I did- but I failed miserably. I only took 58 photos (out of 365) in 63 days (I missed 5- whoopsie). What a lame-O right?? I know you're thinking it. Actually it goes with my typical modus operandi of saying I am gonna do something and never following through... sort of like this blog (giggle). So once again I am going to pre-insert my foot in mouth and say I am trying to take a photo (of me) a day for a whole entire year. Let's hope I actually follow through. No, seriously, pray to your pagan god for me; I'll take unpagan gods as well. "Do do that voodoo that you do so well(Cole Porter)."

So now that I am doing this whole 365 thang (whose album can be found here).. I am gonna try and post my fave shot or 2 on here a week. I wont bore you with 365 pictures of me, but I will bore you with 52 weeks filled with glorious me-ness starting with my shot from yesterday.

*Click on the picture to see it in its full glory and please don't judge the state of my floors

Oh and speaking of me not following through.. it has been over a year since I started this blog and I am still going strong (semi). I started it in March 2009 and here it is May 2010. Since I missed my year anniversary of me talking to myself on the internet I am going to do a giveaway. I have a $50 gift card to JCPenny that I will give away to one lucky reader (I think there probably is only one LOL) who comments on this post. All you need to do is write something/anything in the comments and I will pick the random person on May 27th...if there is a random person. Please comment people, if there is any one out there reading this (I feel so alone;). Make sure to leave your email addie so i can get your mailing addie if you win!!

Not long

2010-05-19T14:13:00.005-04:00

So I never gave you a weekend recap and I am sure you want to know just what went down this past weekend. Well in one long run on sentence I will go ahead and tell you:

Came home from work, took Remi and Bella to the park, threw the ball for the Remster, drank some beer with T, took the dogs home, went to the Porter with T for food (fried pickle, pimento cheese, salt and vinegar popcorn, buffalo shrimp sandwich) and beer (great divide imperial stout- deeelicious), shared food with a cute guy couple who wasn't really a couple (T said they are, I say not), did a pet sit, went to Northside Tavern washed my hands 1 foot away from random chick peeing on community toilet, listened to The Hollidays, danced with the 2 T's, danced with random old guy who flung me everywhere, went for second dinner at the majestic, fed the homeless, slept, pet sat, went to taste of the highlands with LoBe, ate food from every vendor, met some nice smokers, drank a shit ton of iced coffee, went to a BBQ with Charles-in-Charge, Nathaniel, and Lind, pet sat, worked on photos, slept, pet sat, made cookies (potato chip with choco chip and rosemary pine nut), pet sat, went to yelp UYE cookie swap, my potato chip cookie won as fave by one of too chef judges, same cookie also won the ugly but yummy category, pet sat, finished my book, slept.

Fun times right??? Just kidding, it was fun times. I hung out with good friends, ate good food, and made a bit of money, in between the spending of it. Now to my vent of the week (actually the month, this shit pisses me off that bad):

The motherfucking Mulberry tree
YOU POS!!! This damn tree sits in my neighbors yard (barely), but overhangs my miniature front yard/sidewalk/porch. This biatch has been dumping what look like blackberries all over my yard. Somehow these little bitches have even been making it under my front porch and have landed on my doorstep. Every time I walk out of the house I step on loads of these bitches and dark purple juice spews everywhere. I can't walk barefoot (boo), nor can I even wear my shoes inside the house since I will track in smooshed mullberries and their juices all over my hardwoods and rug. Damn, it pisses me off. Pictures below so you can see what I am talking about. The unfortunate thing is that no one even lives there for me to bitch at. The other unfortunate thing is that mulberries don't even taste good. Blackberries I could deal with- I love them. They taste good, all tart, and make awesome fillers for cobblers and pies. Mullberries don't taste good, they just taste like bland nothingness that stains my Effing porch. Damn the little beasties to hell and back. Tirade over.

The Dancing Outlaw

2010-05-17T11:25:00.002-04:00

Jesco White, the dancing outlaw, was on point about how he likes his eggs cooked. Agreed Jesco, agreed.

Dude is an interesting cat who is from the mou'nins of Appalachia. His dad was a big time tap dancing dude and he has followed in his pops footsteps. Some guys from PBS were gonna do a documentary on his dad, but after they interviewed Jesco they found that there was too much going on with him not to give him his own documentary. The documentary in its shittly remastered entierity can be found here

White Bean, Chicken Sausage, and Kale Stew Recipe

2010-05-17T10:55:00.003-04:00

The deliciousness that is an easy and healthy weeknight meal:
**I should preface this by saying I hate any type of cooked greens, but love this dish for some reason.

White Bean, Chicken Sausage, and Kale Stew

-1 can white beans (sometimes I want it thicker and I throw in 2 cans of white beans. If that is the case I use both northern beans (large) and navy beans (small)).
- 1 pkg of chicken sausage- you can use fresh (remove liner) or links (I use Applegate Farms chicken andouille sausage which you can get at Whole Foods and Trader Joe's- it adds some great spice which is great)
- 1 lb kale, chopped with thick stems removed (I normally just buy a bag of pre-chopped, use 1/2 and make sure to remove the stems from the pre-chopped)
-1 tbsp olive oil
-2 cups chicken broth
-2 cups water
-2 hefty pinches of red pepper flakes
-2 chopped garlic cloves
-salt and pepper to taste

*Heat olive oil in a large pot. Once hot, throw in sausage and cook until browned
*Throw in garlic and cook for a minute- don't burn it
*Add white beans, chicken broth, water, red pepper flakes, some salt, pepper. Bring to a boil, then simmer for 15 minutes
*Add kale, making sure it all gets pushed under the liquid. Simmer for 10 minutes. Salt and pepper more if needed.

Now EAT!

Sorry there are no pictures- I always dig in before the thought of taking pictures crosses my mind.

Shake It

2010-05-10T13:00:00.007-04:00

So all week I have had the line "Oh baby, I like it rawwww" stuck in my head. Shit is driving me fucking batty, yet every time I try and think about anything that random line from ODB (Ol' Dirty Bastard in case you don't remember circa 1990's) pops in between my thoughts. Arg!! It is really annoying.

Last night was the weekly potluck hosted at Beth's. I love how weekly potluck moves. It almost makes you feel like you are going out to eat only you are saving money by combining forces with other cooks. Last nights menu consits of potroast (couldn't eat), spinach, strawberry, blue cheese, and almond salad (yum), some grilled chicken (tasty), scalloped potatoes (tastier), Irish car bombs (creamy), and my bad ass white bean, chicken andouille sausage, and kale stew. That shit is bad ass and so semi-healthy:) I'll give you the recipe sometime later. You know I like to keep you on your toes. Make sure you buy Applegate Farms chicken andouille sausage though; it's rocks.

ON to the Shake It infomercial. Any one see this??? It will make you giggle for maybe a hot second or so. Still we all need more humor in our lives. I think it would be funny for some man to use it at work below their desk. Then you walk in on them- it might look bit inappropriate. or double up and do to shake its at a time. Below the first is the WII SNL shake it video. Mucho funnier.

Shake It Infomercial

SNL Shake It

Betty White on SNL

2010-05-10T07:42:00.007-04:00

So this weekend I was pretty busy. Friday night I decided to get all gussied up (I would never actually say this word in real life but since this is virtual I will use it to the best of my abilities) and go out with the girls for a night of dancing. A friend said that 80's night was kicking at East Andrews so despite my reservations I dragged my ladies along to the meat market known as East Andrews. I had been here one time before, long ago, and all I remember was being wasted, standing in a huge room, with loads of people eyeing each other up and down like we were all pieces of grade A through D steak. Surely 80's night would be better, right?

We go straight to the bar and order. Bartender, who looks to be about 20 or so, tries to some bad ass flipping maneuver with the bottle opener and my beer bottle. Um, just give me my fucking beer dude. We walk to the other end of the bar, during which we pass a group of men in collared shirts and tasseled loafers who yell out "Hey, Layyyydies". Um, yeah no. We decide to go out in to the atrium and listen to some hopefully 80's music. Queen..Beastie Boys..Jay Z.... what??? Yep Queen and Beastie Boys were the only 80's songs that actually made it 80's night. Damn people, playing with my mind. As we danced to random 90's music my body image started getting worse and worse. Every girl, I say girl b/c they were all about 21, pushing 22, who walked in was wearing tiny cootchie dresses. Like Brittney Spears-esque short dresses. Let's just say that even if I wanted to wear a dress like that, which I don't, I wouldn't because my body is not quite cut for a dress that is 7 inches above the knee. After watching the quality of people, we decided to try another bar in the vicinity with a slightly higher age bracket of people. We went to 2 more bars only to feel like at 28, 29, and 31 we were the old bitches at the bar. Back to the house for dance party 2010.

Saturday afternoon I hung out with a group of good friends and grilled out. This group consists of a lot of beer connoisseurs so we had lots of different beer to taste. The best thing to come out was a delicious beer by Hopping Frog brewery- the Oatmeal Imperial Stout. Very tasty. It was a fairly early night since I had to pet sit, but when I got home I made a concerted effort to stay awake long enough to watch some of SNL. I don't often watch it, since it's on Saturday night and if I don't go out, which I normally do, then I am either having a movie night or passing out at 10 pm. Well I decided to stay up for this bad boy and it was worth it. Betty White was pretty fun, even though every sketch was based upon an old woman cussing and saying dirty things, not that I mind that type of humor much, it just gets old after awhile. The best thing to come out of Betty White's SNL venture is the skit below. While schweddy balls takes the NPR cake, Dusty Muffin is a close second. Go to the link below to watch. mmmkkkkay.

Betty White's NPR Dusty Muffin Video Link

Sunday Morning I hosted my parents, grandma (aka bubbie), and aunt over for a home cooked mothers day brunch. ON the menu:
*Strawberry Panzanella (2 thumbs way up)
*Carmelized Onion Quiche (good)
*Fruit Salad (how can you go wrong)
*My bad ass Chicken Salad ( always a show stopper- haha)

Sunday night- Shake on the Lake. The best thing to come out of this was apricocks. I do love me some apricocks.

Telephone by Lady Gaga

2010-05-06T10:47:00.004-04:00

Crafty outfits, synchronized choreographed dance moves - apparently these soldiers have a little bit too much time on their hands. Just kidding. If I had to go to work every day in a foreign country, eating shitty food, and staying in scary places, fearing for my life, and taking other peoples lives I would definitely want to let off some steam and come up with any diversion I could to forget about where I am at. I appreciate what y'all do and am glad that you had the opportunity to have some fun in the midst of warfare and violence.

Youtube has got some wierd shit

2010-05-06T09:28:00.003-04:00

What the fuck is this about?? The baby and her weird movements freak me the fuck out!

Healed

2010-05-05T08:38:00.005-04:00

I am no longer sick. Hip Hip Hooray!! Despite the lingering sickness all weekend I managed to pull my act together and go out. Friday night I met up with a circa 2004 former college roomie. She was in town for the weekend and in my area so I decided I needed to go hang. It was great to see her and despite my lack of effort keeping in touch with former college friends all was gravy. Speaking of that night, despite being twenty errr... eight years old I have never had an irish car bomb so I broke my irish cherry and chugged one down. You know what... that drink was mighty tasty. Probably one of the easiest "shots" I have ever had. I put shot in quotations because, unless you are me, you probably know it is actually a mostly full pint glass filled with guiness in which you drop a shot glass that contains both irish cream and irish whiskey. Easiest "shot" ever. Probably because I love dark beer, guiness included, and baileys is yummy, though a bit cloying. The most impressive thing is that it has whiskey in it and as some of my friends know, I don't do whiskey well. I actually don't drink any dark liquors due to my odd upchuck reflex the second that nasty shit settles in my stomache. You think I am lying? Not so much.

still sick

2010-04-29T15:46:00.003-04:00

What is wrong with me?? Swine Flu?? Botulism?? I have no idea but I feel like dog shit stuck to the bottom of John Goodman's shoe. I woke up Saturday with a really bad sore throat. The past 3 nights I have only gotten about 4 hours sleep a night due to the long cough attacks that hit me. My nose started running last night and it is still going strong today. Not good folks, not good. I hosted Wednesday night Potluck last night and made chimichurri sauce to top rotisserie chicken. The chimichurri sauce, provided to me by friend Matt, was delightful spicy and tasty. I have a ton left so I will be making some chimichurri pasta early next week. I will give y'all the recipe shortly. I also signed up for a cookie-off through yelp and decided to hit my potluckers with a test batch of potato chip cookies. The cookies were a hit, but I decided that all potato chip cookies have to be made with some chocolate to balance out the salty chips that are in the cookies. I might post a recipe on here for those but don't count on it. I can't give away all of my secrets. Okay, I am gonna go back to convalescing and hopefully I will see you here at this time tomorrow. If not, then fuck off. Just kidding- I love you, please come back, no really, please.

A friend of mine sent me this odd Korean video. You don't know what the little maggots are saying, but you can sort of tell what's going on due to the pictures. Have fun wasting 1 1/2 minute of your life.

Pandas get angry too

2010-04-28T13:26:00.000-04:00

Be back in few

2010-04-26T10:01:00.001-04:00

I am not feeling well today so despite my short run of posts I am not feeling like another post at the moment. I hope you enjoyed your weekend and I will get back later in the week- hopefully minus the frog in the throat and splitting headache.

As you can see

2010-04-23T09:03:00.005-04:00

I am back in black. I had a couple of people mention or call out my lack of blog posts and so I am going to try and get back on the wagon. The wagon is really high though so it might be tough without some huge F350 steps. You know what I'm talking about right? Those steps that are on really fucking huge trucks which you need because the truck is at least 5 feet off the ground? Off subject- all apologies. So my life from the last time I wrote has changed not one iota. Nothing exciting ever happens to me and thought you people were getting bored of my bitch fests. Well, I don't give a shit anymore. Bitch fest here I come.

So since I last typed it up I got a deck built on the house, had a housewarming party, and worked out approximately 5.2 times. The 0.2 equates to the numerous times I thought about working out but didn't. You know how I roll kids.

So the housewarming party went off without any major snafus, but made me think long and hard about my friends. I thought about how many different groups of friends I have and how they don't really seem to mesh well together. It kind of sucks since it means that I have to separate out groups and can't just hang with them all at once. Do you have groups like that or is it just me?? I know I shouldn't give a shit but I think it's kind of odd. Oh well. So my friend, Orin(name changed), made some bad ass low country boil for the party despite his drunkenness. The shit was good and I am proud of myself for purchasing those 12 lbs of shrimp, 8 pkgs of chicken andouille sausage, 70+ mini-corn cobs, and a shit ton of red potatoes. Why am I proud, not really sure, but I am hoping to up my proudness so that when the credit card bill is due I don't shit a brick. Pics below were stolen from Pat. I was too drunk to think about busting out my camera. Why was I drunk you ask?? Because I bought 2 pony kegs- 1 of Sweetwater and 1 of some kind of pilsner urquell or something ( never had that one before and will never buy again). So I think the kegs were tapped at 2 or so and people didn't start arriving until 5. People tried to call me out for being drunk early,but hey, with free (not so much)beer on the porch what was I supposed to do, wait for people to arrive?? Nope. So other than being drunk and having a good time hanging with random friends, who didn't like one another, I had a blast. More for next time.

Believe me when I say...

2010-04-21T11:39:00.004-04:00

...I fucked a mermaid

I swallow sadness...

2010-04-21T11:28:00.004-04:00

...like a BOSS!!