tales from the weekend...

i went to barnes & noble this weekend to pick up a little bit of summer reading. okay $60 worth of mindless summer reading. i bought 5 books and decided to start with "a million little pieces" by james frey. you know, the guy that went on oprah claiming that it was all true and then was discovered to be a liar. the book is about his 6 weeks in drug and alcohol rehab in minnesota. so far i'm really enjoying it - in a way, it's a male version of "girl, interrupted." and i got to thinking about it last night...i'm not really sure if i care that it's not all true. sure, it's supposed to be a memoir, and memoirs are supposed to accurately reflect a person's life, but how accurate can you be when 10 years of your life we're spent drinking bottles of liquor, snorting and smoking cocaine, and sniffing large amounts of glue and gas? and from what i've read so far, the first week of rehab is a bit hazy due to the detox. so, personally, i cut the guy a little bit of slack for not accurately portraying the account.

this weekend also consisted of a lot of strange dreams. tim went into the army and left me back home in one. it was the same one in which my mom got married to somebody who kinda looked like burn reynolds. another one consisted of a really f'ed up version of punk'd where this guy stood on a cliff while a hurricane came in. cars and people and houses were swept out to sea in 100 ft waves. somehow i survived. and part of one dream early this morning was me taking a shower in this nifty bathroom that looked over the ocean. but strangely, when i looked down i was black. yah, explain that...

the best part of the weekend was friday though. friday night ended up being an unexpected good time. i love it when you have no plans but your night ends up being fun anyway. i think they are better than the ones you figure out before hand. anyway, i went to jupiter in berkeley with some co-workers (and boyfriends) after work. we enjoyed some great beers and food and chatted it up before it got too chilly to sit outside any more (yes, that's right...northern california in late june equals 60 degrees or less in the evening). after that a couple of us went our separate ways, but tim and jesse and i headed to a local watering hold in oakland called baggy's. and let me tell you, this place was great.

we walked into a dimly lit bar full of late 20 to mid 40 year old people talking loudly and drinking a lot. a jukebox played in the back and the smell of popcorn filled my nostrils (they had a popcorn machine in the back, it was awesome!). above the bar hung a picture of baggy's back in the day. it didn't look much different from how it does now, just some different barstools and booths instead of tables. for all i knew it was the same bartender serving when the picture was shot. i wasn't really in the heavy drinking mood and the beers from earlier had filled me up, so i opted for a coke and took in my surroundings. jesse had explained earlier that this bar is "the white bar" and that within three blocks sat the bars where other groups of people tended to migrate. there is a place for everyone. and what i thought was funny is that in each place jesse observed pretty much the same thing: guys sitting around watching sports, drinking, and hitting on women. we may be from different parts of the world, but god bless the things that make us all the same.

at one point we all stepped outside for some fresh air. while pacing around on the sidewalk a man on a bicycle rides towards us shouting "i don't have insurance! i don't have insurance!" now, this is oakland...you see some crazy shit in this town, so i just waved it off as some crazy homeless man out for a joy ride. but then he stopped.

"i was trying to tell you, i don't have insurance, you better move so i don't hit you." he laughed. we chuckled nervously.

he kept talking. "you know, i come out at night and i make people smile. that's what i do. i sleep in the day and come out now. i like to have a good time. people should have a good time."

he had an accent...not sure where from. but it made listening to him interesting. "let me tell you a joke. you gotta think. okay?" we agreed...all a bit confused as to why this man was talking to us.

"what is one another one?" he looked at us each, one at a time, and raised his eyebrows to demand an answer. we all got it wrong. "eleven! i didn't say plus or and. you gotta listen, see?"

we all laugh at our lack of observance. "okay, how about another one? spell pop." tim steps up to the plate, "P-O-P." "okay, what do you do at a green light?" i jump to answer, "stop?" yah, i fell for it. i've fallen for that one before. but i love it!

for the next 10 minutes he told us riddles and jokes that nearly led to tears streaming down my face. he got us all with some of the best puns i've ever heard. he also told some of the dirtiest jokes i've heard in a while, but i'll refrain from sharing them here...ask if you want to know.

he also shared a bit of his personal life when we inquired. he wasn't homeless. he lived by himself, but he has a wife and two kids in sacramento. he doesn't live with them because his wife is annoying. that's not really how he phrased it, but we caught the drift. "i love my kids ya know, i do, but i cannot deal with the woman!" during his story he paused for a moment, looked at me and said, "you know, sometimes i cannot say things in front of the ladies." i told him it was okay and that these ears were no virgins and he continued. "i went up there to see her, you know? i went to get some p****ang, and then i left. a man's got needs. but she didn't like that. she calls me up after i drive back to oakland and starts askin' why i left. i tell her because i didn't want to stay!" he told us how she kept calling and how he hates cell phones because of it. so he throws them in the lake. "she calls back 3 or 4 times and i finally tell her i'm sleeping! it's 2 o'clock in the mornin' woman! she says she'll call me in the morning. i tell her 'sure, you can call in the morning, but you won't be talkin' to me. you can talk to the fishes, because i'm throwing this damn thing in the lake!"

we all laughed. good times...good times. before he left, he told a few more jokes and reminded us that he comes out at night to make people laugh. and it's good to see people have a good time. and as he rode away i couldn't help but be affected by him. at that point i made it a new goal in life to try and make people smile more, because he's right, it's good to see people have a good time and they should have a good time more often.

decreasing the quality of my blog...

alright, so i realize that these things are pretty stupid. and i usually reserve them for my myspace "blog" (since that site is most definitely the ghetto of the internet world). but this one was different...and mildly cool.

google your answers to the questions/topics! choose a picture from the first page and post it. feel free to decrease the quality of your blog too!

where you were born

where you live now

your name

favorite food

favorite drink

favorite superhero

favorite smell

favorite tv show favorite sport
pet's name
(grace)

&
favorite color

current job

favorite holiday

favorite vacation

a question for my fans...

so i was looking at my site stats today and checking to see how people find my blog, who finds it interesting enough to come back, and where they all come from. (you too can find out if you click on the world map on the right or the "view site stats" button underneath it.)

so i want to know: who are you? all these dots on this map mean somebody from that location visited, so where are you from? how did you find my blog? and will you be back?

leave a comment...

PS- if you do leave a comment, i'll probably come check out your blog too! whore youself out, you know you want to...

while walking the dog...

* large, black hummer parked outside mcdonald's: "we build guitar confidence." awesome, now how about you build some confidence of your own and buy a little bit less of a ridiculous car?

* small, brown, floppy-eared dog hanging his head out the window. so cute when they distort their necks in order to keep watching the dog walking down the street...even if it means blowing their ears back into their face.

* three starbucks withi three blocks of each other. four if you count the one in barnes & noble.

* empty display windows. apparently all of the new window shopping items are changed out in the early morning. crate and barrel just isn't the same with nothing to drool about.

* spring cleaning. also done by homeless people....just on a smaller, shopping-cart sized scale.

half-birthays...

while growing up my grandmother would always celebrate my half-birthday. in case you don't know what this is, it's the date in which you become X years and 6 months. she would bake half a cake (or so she said...i think she just baked the whole thing and cut it in half...maybe feeding the other half to the birds in her yard or hiding it from me), give me X candles and a half of another one, and sing "happy-half-birthday" to me, squeezing the extra syllable into the tune. it is one of my fondest childhood memories.

recently i shared this story with tim, since my half-birthday was approaching. and yesterday i turned 23 and a half. or 23.5 if you prefer. so i came home to an empty house and tim claimed to be helping a friend move some stuff in his garage. while cleaning up the kitchen he called me to say he was exiting and needed me to not be in the main part of the house and maybe stay in the bedroom for about 10 minutes. this is when i began getting suspicious. but, i played along and started doing some stuff in the bedroom. about 7 minutes later he called the home phone to tell me i could come out. i had to search the living room and office before i walked into the kitchen to find this:

he even cut half of the candles off, so it's half of a two and half of a three.

so of course, i blew out the candles and stuffed my face full of cheesecake. it was the best half-birthday ever! and what makes it ever better, is that i still have 1/2 a cheesecake in the fridge at home...

is it 5 o'clock yet...?

yup, i'm asking myself that question less than 2 minutes after i get into my office

let me see...how can i explain how long this week has been to you, my readers?

oh, simple: this morning i put on one brown flip flop and one black flip flop. yes, it's been that kind of week.

back to the daily grind...

well, i'm back at work now that my trip to texas is over. and of course, that means i have spent a few hours browsing the internet. enjoy!

"there is something poetic in an e-mail correspondence, even if you see the other person every day. the e-mail personalities can be somehow different."

if only i had a pool...

"a meteor's gonna hit orlando."

"things the devil made me do"

howdy y'all...

well, my visit to texas is wrapping up tomorrow. it's been a great trip...full of wedding fun, visiting friends i haven't seen in entirely too long, and enjoying the laid back lifestyle of a college student during the summer.

the wedding was fantastic! i have never seen ashley or sean as happy as they we're on their wedding day. it was clear that the two of them we're meant to be together and it makes me so happy to see that. being the maid of honor was an adventure as well. i think i did my job well and i know i had fun doing it. while it got stressful at times, i really enjoyed it - bit if you know me well enough you know that i am kinda powered by stress. so needless to say, i stepped up to the plate and did my duties as expected. of course, one of those duties was to take pictures:

the bridal party


blushing bride

me and my sister, the flower girl


the obligatory cake photo


before the garter throwing


the departure

before i forget, i must publicly thank my boyfriend...i couldn't have asked for a more patient and understanding man to be there at the end of each day when the activities finally wound down. thanks for puttin' up with the craziness babe. and of course, i owe a lot to my mom as well. being the maid of honor of the first time, i was a little lost on what to do and how to do it. but leave it to her to step in when needed and help out. so thanks mom!

the day after the wedding i wished the o'neils off on their honeymoon (amsterdam, paris, and london - lucky SOB's). they left me in charge of their apartment for the week to make sure the cat didn't starve and nobody stole their mountain of wedding gifts. it's been hard not opening them...they just sit there and taunt me..."open me!"

tim returned to california on tuesday, and i headed to houston after dropping him off at the airport. if i am in texas, there is no way i'm going to miss a chance to see my girls. so we enjoyed a lovely mexican meal complete with sangria margaritas and good laughs. it's crazy though...after catching up and hearing about everyone's plans i realized how much we are all going our own ways. a year after we graduate one of us has an MBA, another is a semester away from a master's and is interning for the FBI (shit...are they reading?), and another two are headed off to oklahoma and indiana for grad school. but while it's a big change, i am so thrilled that we are all pursuing what we want to do and have found something to drive us in this world.

my return to georgetown on wednesday night led to me an evening of chilling with some friends at ashley and sean's and going to bed later than i'm used to. that of course led to sleeping in the next day, followed by doing a little bit of nothing. exactly what i was looking forward too. last night i went to dinner with another college friend of mine...we sat by lake austin in the hill country enjoying good talk and some margaritas. (have you noticed the mexican food-margarita theme?) and today...i find myself realizing why i moved out of this town. georgetown was great while i was in school and had other activities to entertain me and occupy my time. but now, when everyone i know has jobs and lives, this town gets dull. i keep resisting the urge to shop, because that's pretty much all i can do here...

but regardless of my bitching, my plans are picking up tonight with the 2nd meeting of the alumni council. and tomorrow i'll be busy with more meetings for that. and then i will return to california. this trip back to texas has provided me with the first feeling of "home" being the west coast. it probably has a lot to do with the fact that i actually have a "house" to return to and that i'm anxious to get back to decorating it...but i want my bed. and my pets. and my couch.

so to texas: it's been fun this time...i've missed your warm nights, your good friends, and your oh-so-tasty queso and tequila. but it's time for me to leave...but as usual, i'll be back.