I Surrender

Ok... so pretty much everyone and their mom has that Facebook note with the 25 random facts about them... and I'm too much of a rebel to do it on Facebook. But it looks like TONS of fun, so I'm going to do it here. Here goes:

1. When I was younger I had blonde, very curly hair.

2. My mom died of breast cancer when I was 3, and I have one vivid memory of her saying, "You look maaaahvelous daaahling." I don't know if this is a real memory, or something I saw on a video, or even something I just made up in my head that seems to fit. It's quite possibly that last one.

3. I'm procrastinating right now.

4. I've had a lot of dream jobs in my life, but currently my goal is to be a correspondent for NPR who gets to interview interesting people and report interesting stories. Much like Terry Gross.

5. My dream broadway role is Eponine in Les Mis. I know it's cliche. Shut up.

6. I just started a book called "This Common Secret: My Life as An Abortion Doctor" by Susan Wicklund. I got interested in it after hearing the author interviewed on none other than NPR.

7. My two best friends in high school were a gay guy and a lesbian. We had endless amounts of fun. I mean good clean fun, not that kind of fun.

8. Once in a community theatre show I played a sassy, cowgirl-esque grasshopper. During one performance, I was ad-libbing and mentioned something about one of my bug relatives being squashed. Apparently a woman in the audience complained that my reference was too violent for her daughter.

9. I really like the taste of cherry Nyquil.

10. I'm not extremely into sports, but I get really cranky and angry and take it personally when a team I'm rooting for loses (I'm talking about you, Eagles)

11. I bought scalped tickets on the street for a U2 concert in Dublin. It was totally worth it.

12. Speaking of Dublin, Ireland is my favorite country in the world. Scotland comes in a close second; Nicaragua is third.

13. I lose respect for people if they don't spell or punctuate things correctly. That said, I am often guilty of these offenses myself, but when I do it it's ok. :)

14. There's a show that I watch pretty much every night of the week. Monday: House. Tuesday: Scrubs. Wednesday: Lost. Thursday: The Office. Friday: The Soup. And... every night I like to watch Jeopardy and reruns of Scrubs on Comedy Central. I also have a weakness for bad reality TV like Tool Academy, Double Shot at Love, and Ruby... but also good reality TV like Project Runway, Supernanny, and What Not to Wear.

15. I'm surprisingly good at the game SSX Tricky on Playstation 2. I also KICK ASS at Tetris and always play the hardest level of game type-B so I can get a spaceship.

16. Thinking of 25 random things about myself is really tough.

17. I only got accepted to 2 of the 7 colleges to which I applied, but ended up being really happy at Muhlenberg.

18. While at Muhlenberg, I volunteered as an ESL conversational mentor. One of the students in my session was Indian, and worked at the Dunkin' Donuts near school. He gave me free bagels and hot chocolate. It was pretty much awesome.

19. My favorite restaurant is The Olive Garden. But it's always so darn crowded!

20. I got a good piece of advice today when interviewing someone for an article. When writing an email to a potential employer, it's a good idea to write it in Word and then copy and paste it into the email. That's so you can spell-check it.

21. My grandparents on my dad's side are holocaust survivors. My grandfather doesn't know his real birthday or age. He was shot in the leg during WWII. Sorry... that was a few facts in one.

22. My apartment still doesn't have HD.

23. I used to own a red Jetta and her name was Frida. I named her that because [gory imagery to follow] there's a scene in the movie Frida where she loses her baby in bed and is surrounded by bright red blood. It's honestly the first thing I thought of when I saw my car.

24. I have this memory that always stands out in my mind of sitting on my swingset late on a summer day, looking up at the darkening sky and pondering the vastness and mystery of the universe. I was probably like 12. But it still baffles me.

25. At the house where I grew up, I had a sandbox. For my brother Mike's bar mitzvah, which was Hawaii themed and held in our backyard, my dad screwed a life-size fake palm tree into my sandbox. That's just the kind of guy my dad is.

Phew. That took a whole half hour. Now back to work... in the meantime, check out the article I wrote! I'm published!

Ewwww, Fishy.

So there are a lot of things I want to learn to do in life, and one of them is cook. My dad is a spectacular cook. He always eats things at restaurants and then goes home and recreates them perfectly (sometimes even better). And he is constantly trying out different ethnic foods so we're always sampling new tastes - Indian, Persian, Thai, Greek - you name it, he's cooked it. I can't for the life of me figure out how he comes up with such organic taste combinations, like he just intrinsically knows what goes with what. 

I hope someday that I can have that intuition and gain the ability to create my own meals that make people say, "Wow, this is restaurant quality!" But in the meantime, I've got my tiny apartment kitchen, my hand-me-down pots, pans, and dinnerware, and allrecipes.com. 

And though I'm no Giada De Laurentiis (much to my boyfriend's dismay), I am extremely proud of myself when I can follow a recipe and create a delicious dinner. Here's one I made last week - Lemon Garlic Tilapia with steamed snow peas and brown rice. Sure, it sounds impressive, but it was totally easy to make. In fact, fish is my new favorite thing to cook since it's SO simple. Throw a flavorful sauce on it, stick it in the oven for 15 minutes, and you've got a delicious, nutritious fillet that even people who don't normally like fish can enjoy. You can bet my kitchen will be filled with more of this in the future.

Ain't that a beauty? 

Baby steps, that's all it takes. 

Priceless

Saw this ad on a friend's blog and fell in love.

E-A-G-L-E-S EAGLES!

So despite the fact that it's been face-burningly cold for the past week here in the 19107, we've been out and about. We lost at Quizzo (AGAIN), once more proving that Will's random knowledge does not reach far enough to win us $20 at Doc Watson's. Also, it proves that they don't ask enough questions about literature/pop music (my expertise), and apparently that Will is gay because he's utterly useless during the sports round. I mean... the only NBA team with a sword in their symbol? He was sure it was the Sacramento Kings. Good guess, but no cigar. It was the Cleveland Cavaliers, and even I was able to guess that one. I guess being forced to watch Sports Center every morning does amount to something good. 

Then Friday night I had a girls night with (you guessed it) some girl friends of mine. We did lots of random stuff, from shredding it up on guitar hero to watching How I Met Your Mother to playing Rummikub. All in all it was a good time; and made me wish I was personally friends with NPH. 

Then yesterday I went to an art supply store on South Street and found some kick-ass beads which allowed me to make these kick-ass earrings. 

The ones on the left are for Nancy and the ones on the right are for our neighbor who LOVES corn. So of course when we saw the beads, we knew they were very appropriate. I could definitely see myself taking up earring-making as a hobby. I think I have an eye for good bead combinations and I'm pretty awesome at curling wire. We'll see. Considering I spent $30 at the bead store, I better get my money's worth in the amount of earrings I make. 

And that brings me to today, when the Eagles face off with the Arizona Cardinals to see who is going to the Superbowl, and who is left behind, crying in their own pile of bird crap. I'm a bit scared for the Eagles... although last weekend I thought they wouldn't beat the Giants and they did. So who knows... anything could happen!

GO PHILLY! GO EAGLES!

Using Jewish Rituals Incorrectly

Way to go, Akbar. 

Inner Dialogue

Today I got to walk home from work alone, which is a treat since I usually walk with Will. When I'm traversing the streets all by my lonesome, I feel a lot like Zach Braff in one of my FAVORITE shows, Scrubs. That's because I have tons of (random) thoughts flying through my head and it would be pretty funny if there were a voice-over dictating them out loud, like there is for Zach's character, J.D. 

Alas... there is no narrator for my life (just me), so I wanted to include in this blog the meandering stream of conscious that I experienced on my walk home from work today. And go!

Is it still raining out? I hope not. I'm going to put my umbrella up anyway. What if it's not raining, though, and I'm one of those freaks I hate who hold their umbrellas up even when it's not raining? Oh. It is raining. I hate when it rains. I hate having to hold my umbrella. My hand gets cold and my arm gets tired. Why is the lady in front of me walking so slow? DAMN that girl's boots are like 5 inches high. I'd probably laugh if she broke her ankle right here on the street. That's mean. Whatever, she deserves it for wearing those impractical boots. I wonder if I'll ever be rich enough to eat at that restaurant. Uh-oh, that dude in the SUV is getting pulled over by a cop. SUVs are impractical, just like that girl's boots. He probably deserves a ticket. SERIOUSLY this lady is walking slower than death. What is her deal? Is that man homeless? I hope he doesn't ask me for money. I never give homeless people money. Does that make me a bad person? Are my feet getting wet? I'm wearing galoshes, that really shouldn't happen. Maybe they're just cold. I wonder how late Will is going to get home tonight. At least it gives me a chance to play online games in peace. I have to pay the electric bill. And the gas bill. And do dishes. That's a lot of crap. I need a vacation. DAMMIT LADY HURRY UP!

And there you have it, a brief glimpse into my head. I think it explains a lot. 

A Question and a Comment

First - the question. Why the hell are the doors at the Bellevue (on 15th Street) so friggin' heavy? I go there for lunch pretty frequently because there's a great food court with lots of selection (including a Bain's Deli, yum). But I seriously don't understand why I have to pull a muscle in my bicep every time I want to go in. Are they trying to deter people from entering? Do they only want massive body builders to go inside? Do they want to crush me? What did I ever do to them to deserve this treatment? Until these questions can be answered, I'll just struggle my way in, grab my Pad Thai, and struggle my way out again. 

And now the comment - way to go FACEBOOK for having the weirdest ads EVER. Check out this gem: 

Now if you're that suspicious of the person you're dating, you shouldn't be dating them in the first place. But I guess that's what you get for finding a boyfriend on Facebook. Right? Also, if you use this service, you're a crazy stalker. 

Now if you'll excuse me I have to go check if Will's parents are, in fact, his birth parents. 

*NOTE: I haven't written anything about New Year's and all that jazz, but I'm going to post an entry with my resolutions soon. As you can tell, one of them was not stop procrastinating.