cool stuff

last night we were making our bi-weekly target run and i turned from examining english muffins and frozen chicken strips [SO delicious, btw -- those chicken strips taste just like my favorite ones from tgi fridays, sans the yummy jack daniels sauce] and i saw this guy plastered to the side of the freezer:



this is my friend daniel. we went to elementary school, junior high and high school together but i lost track of him around 10th grade. he was always one of my favorite people -- even though all the other girls fawned all over him [for obvious reasons], we were just always buddies and did algebra homework together.

and NOW he is a model. i saw his giant face painted all over life-size gap ads for the first time when i lived in nyc and had a minor heart attack right in the middle of 42nd street. since then i've gotten used to it. i've spotted him in j crew ads and most recently target. yay for daniel!

then we proceeded to purchase seven packs of gum, a personal record. why, you ask? because they were on sale! and also we love gum. and -- we've discovered a new flavor of orbit and IT was on sale too!

i've always loved orbit gum, mostly because of it's yummy flavors and it's lovely packaging. but these new mist flavors [while verging on being too sour for my tastes] take it to a whole new level! i've been saving my gum wrappers -- i think i'm going to use them to make a card one of these days.



in other news:
- the price of stamps goes up again in a few weeks, so go buy your forever stamps now.
- i went to the dentist today and encountered a brutal dental hygienist who repeatedly stabbed my non-flossed gums until my mouth filled with blood.
- i started out the week terrified of the swine flu but now [ironically, because the WHO caution level is now at a FIVE] i have resigned myself to the fact that if i didn't care enough to get a flu shot this year, i must not be that susceptible to the flu and therefore will take it if it comes. but if ONE person in my office shows flu-like symptoms, sorry tracy -- i'm working from home until further notice.
- look what i did to my cutie tangerine/orange!

"she could peel an apple in one long, curly strip." -- tom hanks, sleepless in seattle
[i can't do the apple -- i've tried, numerous times -- but i CAN do the cutie! yesss.]

and lastly, ONE WEEK till my mini stay-cation. that is all. happy wednesday!

the chair

on thursday night, we rode the train home from the farmer's market. while walking home from the train station, we saw a blue armchair on the side of the road -- it was in perfect condition and looked good. so good, in fact, that i couldn't decide if it had been left there as a giveaway or if someone was just in the process of moving it.

we went home and i forgot about the chair. later that night, right in the middle of 30 rock, b said "hey! i wonder if that chair is still there!" it had been about three hours since we'd seen it, so i figured if it was still there it was now free game. so we hopped in the car.

and there it was! we were excited. i have no shame when it comes to picking up furniture -- our coffee table, in fact, was rescued from someone's front lawn on trash night a month before we got married. it took a while to figure out how to get it in the car [i ended up riding home in the trunk -- a first for me -- holding onto the chair with one arm and my forehead. fun times] but we made it home in one piece.

so now we have the chair. and i think i want to put it back out on the street:



i sort of like the color, but don't like how it looks with our other furniture. i sort of like the artsy two-sided back instead of the regular three-sided version, but mostly don't. i sort of like finally having another thing to sit on besides our couch, but our front room just feels awkward now that it's there.

b says i should open it up for discussion on this blog and let you guys decide if it stays or goes. what do you think? [and am i a robber for taking this chair after only three hours?]

date night

thursdays are always "date night" in our house [although i suppose EVERY night is actually date night for us seeing as how we don't have kids and end up doing whatever we want most nights anyway] -- we started calling them that a while back because all of our favorite shows -- survivor, 30 rock, the office and formerly scrubs -- are all on that night.

date night mostly means we don't go to the gym and instead park it in front of the tv for a good three-hour stretch. b also tries to leave work at a normal hour and i try to actually cook something for dinner that doesn't come from a box. but once in a while we actually DO something on thursdays.

case in point: this week. south pasadena has a little farmer's market every thursday right in their old town area, possibly one of the cutest streets around. we can see it from the train each week and i have always wanted to go. this week, the stars aligned -- we left work on time and together, we had no other planned activities and it was still light outside when we got there. [sorry for the crappy quality photos -- left the camera at home, so these are all from b's phone.]



the street was fullll of people [mostly yappy small children, ugh, but plenty of young couples like ourselves as well] and we had a delightful time browsing all the booths. there used to be a farmer's market on our street in downtown every wednesday so i've become accustomed to the puny fruit and flower stands [and stealing strawberries and pear slices from the sample cart :) ], but this one was WAY better! they sold sprouts and kale and rhubarb and salted caramel ice cream [which was DELICIOUS, if you're wondering] and corn on the cob and orchids and other amazing things.

for dinner, i went with my normal standby of tacos:



and b opted for peruvian:



we sat on a rock and ate our food and enjoyed the evening -- it was a little cold that night, but other than that it was everything we hoped for. i love date night! then we came home and watched our shows and stole a chair off the side of the road, but that is a story for another post.

the homies

i have a ridiculously acute sense of smell. i owe this to my dad, who used to tell me upon entering the car to go to church on sundays exactly what scent perfume, lip gloss, lotion and hairspray i was wearing.

this is a nice trait to have for, say, smelling what my korean neighbors are cooking for dinner, or riding on the back of a motorcycle through georgia forests. not so nice for being near people with bad breath, cleaning out refrigerators or riding the train with homeless people.

earlier this week, we had 90+ degree temps. this means the percentage of bad smells on the train goes up exponentially each day. on tuesday, we were patiently standing in the subway waiting to leave union station when a large woman got on the train. i caught a major whiff of her and knew something was NOT right...and then had this thought reinforced five seconds later when she barked "CHINA." for no reason. just wanted to yell china in front of 50 strangers. then she sat down and started mumbling about how effing hot the train was. yep, cuckoo.

today it was cooler [cold, in fact -- aren't crazy temperature shifts like this supposed to cause earthquakes? or migraines?] but the crazy homies -- my pet name for the homeless, in case you're just now catching on -- were out in force. on the short walk to the train station we saw 1.) a man hitting a public bus with a two-by-four, 2.) another man chomping on air with his three teeth as he walked, and 3.) a guy playing long, loud notes on a trumpet but not playing any music.

pershing square seems to attract the homies, making it sort of a scary place. which brings me to tomorrow, the day the movie "the soloist" comes out. i read this book last year and liked it a lot -- it's about a homie from our very own pershing square, who was befriended by an l.a. times reporter. this guy is still alive and, i assume, still hanging out in pershing square and the 2nd st. tunnel, so every time i see an african-american homie in downtown i wonder if it's nathaniel ayers. tooootally excited to see the movie, and not just because i have a natural soft spot for anything filmed in downtown.

someday i'm going to have a ton of good stories to tell my kids about all the crazies in l.a.

swaddling

so, we are really lucky because some of our favorite friends live next door. last summer, b and i noticed a new car with utah license plates parked on our street and started saying how funny it would be if that car belonged to new mormons in the area. subsequently, we met the mcmullins at church that next sunday and have since spent many many hours together playing ticket to ride, eating and watching football games.

anyway, we had them over a few weeks ago for general conference, and they brought baby henry. [side note: i was thrilled when they moved in and had no baby in sight. finally! a baby-less friend! then i found out melanie was four months pregnant. whatever. i'm getting used to it now.]

henry likes to be swaddled and we are always watching jeff wrap him up. so b decided being swaddled looked comfy and requested it also. the two boys spent conference all wrapped up, lying next to each other. jeff took a picture and it makes me laugh every time.



a. i love that b's legs stick so far out of the blanket. yep, definitely doesn't fit.
b. i love that little henry is just chillin, like this is his normal activity to hang out with other swaddled friends.
and c. CHECK IT, people! he is wearing a byu blanket!! miracles will never cease. tell that to his crazy ute-fan friends. mwahaha.

free cards

so...no pressure or anything, but i'm currently doing a giveaway on my stationery blog. the winner will get a set of eight of my handmade cards & envelopes. all you have to do to enter is leave a comment on this post by next friday at midnight. i'd love to give the cards to YOU!! so go enter :)

we like movies.

tonight on idol, kris allen sang "falling slowly" from the movie once -- and we freaked. that's one of our favorite movies!! we adore the soundtrack and the movie overall. [um, kris -- best song choice of the night! that's saying something, since i'm head-over-heels in love with allison AND adam.]



which reminds me. i've been meaning to blog about some awesome movies we've watched lately. ["meaning to" for like eight months because i'm pretty sure we watched "once" during the summer.] so here goes:

man on wire. it won the oscar this year for best documentary and i looooved it. the whole thing is like a suspenseful crime caper, i loved seeing the world trade center from such an intimate perspective, and "man" -- philippe petit -- is hilarious.



good bye lenin & downfall. we have a thing for german movies in this house, and both of these are awesome. one has to do with a family dealing with the end of the cold war; the other is about the last days of hitler. both are great. hope you're good at reading closed captioning :)



the burbs. um...i had never even heard of this movie until i married b. the first time we watched it, i hated it. the second time, i could barely breathe i was laughing so hard. it's now an eternal favorite. it's from 1989, stars tom hanks and corey feldman, and involves an exploding house. need anything else?



best of all, slumdog millionaire arrived this week from my netflix queue and i can't wait to check it out. i actually wrote a series of papers in college about bollywood and the indian film industry and i have been dying to see this movie.

so, with that. any other great movie recommendations out there?

disclaimer: i try to stick only to uplifting, quality movies that make me feel good (i.e. i would rather die than watch a judd apatow movie) -- we avoid movies with lots of violence, language, sex scenes etc. some of these movies are rated R or include content i wouldn't be comfortable watching...so we wait for them to come on dvd and then watch them on our clearplay and self-edit out all the bad stuff we don't like :) it's truly brilliant. so, sorry if you watch these "uncut" and think they're a little questionable.