Silent Treatment

I am getting it. Turns out I may have been getting it for several weeks and nigh on a month now, and I had no idea because if I don't see or speak to this person very much anyway, I am not going to notice a silent treatment.

I think it is supposed to hurt my feelings, but the silent treatment is not the best way to punish me. Turns out, if you give me more time to talk, I am not upset by that. It usually doesn't pain me, and in this case, I didn't even notice. Actually now that I have noticed, I find it more hilarious than anything else. Because although I was quite mean to him the last time we spoke--there was an argument, my feelings had been hurt because I felt I had been disrespected and me with hurt feelings=anger, often lots of it--I kind of felt that on the sliding scale between right and wrong I was more in the right than he was (objective judge that I so clearly am). I don't think that is how he sees it. According to my roommate, apparently he declared he is done with me. I no longer exist to him. This makes me howl with laughter! God, I am not a nice person, not at all--as evidenced by my response to his attempt to hurt me.


Oh, for any of you wondering, the person who is mad at me (and who knows maybe rightly so, but this is just too much ridiculous for me) and treating me to silence, well his name rhymes with Wyan Wurpin.

Boring movies

I feel like I have been watching the wrong movies on netflix lately. They have been boring me. However I don't think they are all as bad as they seem to me. I just am looking for mindless fluff and somehow have put deep serious important at the top of my queue. I should fix that I guess. However, I have been using my on demand to watch lots and lots of law and order CI because I heart me some D'Onofrio even when he is being ridiculous.

Ahhh, the boring movies are Interiors and Little Children.

Also the other night I decided something. I am going to write and perform some sort of one-woman show by the time I am 30. I have tossed this around a lot in the last few years since I moved to Chicago, but it is now a big thing that I am determined to do.

Tired making weekend

I flew in and out of Buffalo for a weekend, for Renee's brother's wedding. It was very fun and a lovely, lovely wedding. It was however a quick trip, and I didn't get tons of sleep so I am now exhausted.

Sam didn't get to come with me because he was sick. He still is a little sick. It is a bummer. Hopefully he will get better soon and it won't be a bummer anymore.

I feel a little better since I checked in on him this afternoon.

I have so much more that I think and would like to say about this, but I don't really know how to start or what I want to say. And. . . yeah. That's about all I got, and I can't find the freaking corkscrew! So the wine, sits on the coffee table taunting me.

They are stealing my team

Some rich, oil baron Oklahomans are trying to steal my Sonics. Well as they actually own them, they effectively have already stolen them. Now they are trying to wreck them so no one will care when they move them to Oklahoma City--because the Oklahoma City Sonics has such a great ring to it.

OK, now true I do not really care about sports, but the only time I ever cared so much for a team that I prayed for them--these guys were it. I loved Gary Payton, I loved Shawn Kemp, I was wiling to start a religion whose Deity was Nate MacMillan. And, no really, once upon a time those guys could play basketball and 2/3 of them seemed like actual gentleman and statesman and the other third was just youthfully brash. Now, well, that may not seem true, but back in my youth it was true. And they were good! They were great! In the early 90's they posted the best season record of any team ever!! And they did it by smashing the old record, smashing it! It was awesome. Of course a few seasons later their record was knocked off by a little team called the Chicago Bulls because it turns out they had a pretty good run in the 90's. Turns out.

BUT THEY ARE STEALING MY BABIES!!!!! I might not care about sports much anymore, but this is ridiculous. I disapprove. Sam is going to hear about this on our trip tomorrow. He is from Oklahoma. He might need to apologize for his whole state.

Oh yeah, I am going to Buffalo tomorrow for the weekend for a wedding. I will tell you all about it later. After the weekend.

Taxes

I totally owed money this year! That is kind of a bummer, but I guess it is ok too, since I wasn't counting on the money to do anything. Although this may mean I need to be serious about putting some $ away for plane trips this summer to Washington and California. Also I only owed a very little amount of money. I basically came very close to breaking even, which means I paid the government exactly what I owed. Which I guess is ok, but I kind of miss getting big fatty checks back. Oh well.

Oscars, etc.

I watched them last night on TIVO delay. They were kind of unremarkable--there were many, many lovely dresses, but not too much else remarkable. Yea for the Once kids! That was the happiest moment, and Tilda Swinton is much funnier than I would expect, but am I the only one who thinks she looked like she was wearing a graduation gown and it got blown off in the parking lot?

I had entirely forgotten that I live blogged those last year. That was very fun. Thank you Miss Amy for reminding me!

I bought a cashmere sweater and some make-up today. The cashmere sweater cost less than the two eyeshadows--mostly because it was obscenely on sale. It is a cardigan and it is royal purple, and I LOVE IT! Also the eyeshadows were kind of upscale cosmetics. They are however crease less, cream to powder, and AMAZING!

Sam is putting all of his electronic TV toys into the new cabinet he purchased to house new flat screen TV. He's adorable, also he is freaking funny. I think he is much funnier than he gets credit for.

Curled up in the recliner at Sam's house

My laptop all fired up blogging (and reading others blogs) with nothing at all to do today. Apparently I could've gotten tickets to the Oscar thing, but I didn't find that out until late, late last night, and well two things. One, I am going to a birthday party with Sam tonight and two, I would've needed to be more emotionally prepared for that after my two 60 hour weeks.

Instead, I may go rent movies for me and Sam. He is cooking stew right now because he likes to cook and does that on the weekends. He also has an actual record on the turntable, playing some lovely jazz piano. Last weekend he was actually playing the jazz piano when I was in the shower and I had a very difficult time deciding if it was a CD or him because (contrary to his self deprecation) he is very good.

It is beautiful and sunny out today, so I feel I ought to get out in it. I was going to blog more, but it might be time for errands!

I had clever things to say

In fact it always seems that way to me. As I sit on the bus, I ponder all sorts of interesting thoughts and ideas. This happens at work too, and then I get on the computer and it has all eluded me. Nothing is left in my sad little brain. Well nothing interesting anyway.

Tonight all that is left is a debate on whether or not it will be warm enough tomorrow to wear the sweater dress I bought last weekend with leggings and a shirt underneath? The leggings may not be warm enough--unless I wear them with boots and then I can wear the long socks I bought the week before that or I can wear jeans too and just take the jeans off at pier one when it is time to work there tomorrow night. If Chris ends up having a birthday party or I end up going someplace cool with Sam, I will be very fashionably dressed, so that would be good. Although I will for sure have to get up early enough to wash my hair tomorrow, and that is going to be rough.

Can I say I hate winter? I am done with it. If this were a regular February, it would have some sort of warming trend which may well mean just being warmer than the freaking teens!! And then I could wear the sweater dress. Grrrrr. . . . Also my cat keeps biting me really hard and then flopping away from me all indignant when I react negatively to the fact that he is fucking biting me really hard, hard enough to make me holler, as if how dare I disturb his gnawing of my flesh by making noise. Steve Alphabet McQueen Kinion, you may just be getting a little to big for your britches.

Gifts

So Valentine's Day happened for real, and Sam and I were not together for it because well I work a whole shit ton. I have decided to allow him to describe his hiding o my Valentine's Day balloon bouquet under his desk as "storing" because it turns out that brilliant plan did not discourage his coworkers from finding them, liberating them, prominently displaying them, and giving Sam much grief over the whole thing. It was wonderful.

This weekend we finished exchanging gifts, which I thought would be cards and some sort of trinket or something (like tickets to a concert here in Chicago or a show, something along those lines). He did give me a card, and inside the card he told me that he was taking me to New York City sometime this spring for dinner and a Broadway show and a night at a jazz club. This will take place April 18-20. There is a list of shows that I would like to see, and he will get to see two famous and great jazz musicians whom he has never seen before play at a club that he has never been too (Ron Carter and Jim Hall at the Blue Note). He is very excited. I am too! I am hoping to see either Spring Awakening or Sunday in the Park with George (but Spamalot, Young Frankenstein, and Legally Blonde are also contenders), and I might just maybe have to get tickets to a matinée on Saturday if possible too. It might just have to happen that I see two shows--although I might opt for the non-musical all-black Cat on a Hot Tin Roof for the other.

I have already called Lauren to tell her I am on my way there. Now I just have to figure out what to do with the rest of the time in NYC, although two ish days is not a long time. BTW, this fabulous gift is why I decided that he can store my gifts under his desk whenever the heck he wants. Also, btw, how freaking lucky am I? I mean really? I have the best boyfriend ever.

Have a house guest in for the weekend. Tbert explored some neighborhoods, went to my company party, had late night nachos with my roommate because I was wasted, went for sushi but the place was closed so had Oaxacan instead, was subjected to a piano bar where now Sam's bartender knows my drinks too, froze to death in the awful wind, and hung around my house today because it was way too frigidly windy to want to leave and go about. That was his visit in a nutshell, and I feel I was not the best host, but. . . I don't know. I had a really long week and I don't really know his tastes well enough to tailor a good visit to them. I did however assume (probably correctly) that my greatest hits of big lame chains that we don't have back home would be a bad bet for him. I save that one for people from the Tri-Cities. They like all the touristy schlock: Bubba Gump's, the terrible parts of Michigan Ave and downtown. But they are also the people who can't like a restaurant if they've never heard of it. So, Teebs, I am sorry that I was a kind of lame host.

I think my arms want to break up with me

Because I made them carry home a 15 or so pound table in a box from work (all smashed flat in a little box). It hurt a lot. There was burning and an inability to work them for a few minutes after I finally got to set the tables down. Yeah, so that happened.

Then the kitteh's (and I am looking at you James Dean) tried to eat my sammich before I ate my sammich, and this did not sit well with me. However, I defended my sammich's honor.

Speaking of eating, Sam took me to Gibson's last night for dinner. It was outstanding. Their food is crazy amazing, and by food I mean meat because mostly that is what they cook. The ginormous "small" sirloin I had was exquisite! Best steak I ever, ever had. So yummy. I do though find it funny that they explain to me what medium meant--I know, I grew up on a farm I could show you on a real animal where my steak came from and I could do better with more cuts on a pig and I could even point out some cuts on a lamb, I get it. I mean turns out I am not just a pretty girl in a dress and high heels.

Which leads me to a dress and high heels and tights in the winter on Chicago streets. Yup, I walked slow, and yes I did feel ridiculous. But I looked pretty for the v-day dinner. I guess that was the important part, and I did strongly suggest we take a cab home from dinner.

Tomorrow is the valentine's day. Still don't know what Sam got me. That may not happen until the weekend because it turns out I won't get to see my fabulous new boyfriend on or very first valentine's day. Oh well!

Mac and Cheese

That is what I am eating right now. I have been kind of obsessed with it lately, but not the Kraft variety, the homemade style (or some sort of approximation). No one at my home ever made mac and cheese from scratch, so I have no mom recipe to compare it with, but I love it. What is there not to love about warm gooey cheese?

The one I am eating right now I baked in my oven--it is a tv dinner version that is tasty if unnaturally orange. I had one last Friday that could've been richer, and there is an excellent one up in Andersonville that I have been missing (it includes red peppers).

Tomorrow night Sam and I are going to celebrate Valentine's Day. We are going out to dinner, but I am not exactly sure where. I am going to wear my new dress (that I bought for $10 this weekend at Nordstrom's Rack). We have to celebrate early because I am working at Pier 1 on V-day and next weekend Chrissy's (well and mine now too) friend tbert is coming to town.

Sheets

There aren't any on my bed right now because I took them off to put them in the laundry pick up for this morning, and since I thought there was a big possibility I was going to end up in Sam's bed tonight (because I was going to go downtown and see Erin before she leaves tomorrow and Sam's bed is just a little north of downtown) I just didn't put any back on. But I am home tonight since Erin is not downtown, so after Pier 1 I was just going to go to bed. Now I have to put them on. Boooooo. I don't like that story.

So I was listening to an episode of the Savage Love podcast (audio version of his advice column that appears in alternative weeklys everywhere), and it made me think today. Mostly, it made me think about what a whiny pain in the ass I have been in my past. I mean, could I shut up about a couple of my past would-be/wish-it-could-be relationships? Obviously not. How were some of you still my friends through my whining and vacillating and endless hypothesizing? Why did no one literally smack me in the mouth? I so obviously needed it. Anyway, belated apology for all who lived through Clowngate and The tragedy of Luke parts 1 and/or 2, hell even all the way back to the Jesus Boy fallout (which was mostly pre-blog). Please, if I am ever that damn stupid again please tell me. I obviously knew that things were not going to go the way I wanted or that I was not going to step up, and so did everyone who had to listen to me. Thank you for being patient, kind, good friends, and I am sorry to have so abused my friendship privileges.

Voting

I voted. It made my whole day better. I like voting, even if it is for very small things like county commissioner or anything like that.

However the following was an editorial in my hometown newspaper (hat tip to Lauren J for posting it) that kind of makes my skin crawl. This is where I am from people, this was on the editorial page.

"Men presidents only

I think that having a woman president would be a bad idea for our country. Women are not meant to rule countries and be in charge. They are meant to make decisions but not confirm them.

Our president deals with some countries that don't respect or allow women in leadership positions. I wonder if the United States would have more terrorist attacks because we would be seen as weak with a woman leader. I agree that women can do many things, but leave the ruling of the countries to the men.

BRITTANY BAYLES, 13, Kennewick "


Seriously people?

Late Nights

I had them all weekend long. It started out when I went to bed at 5am on Saturday morning--after 11 hours of work even! Silly Erin Faulk visiting. Then on Saturday night, Sam and I went out to dinner at 11PM, and even though we went home and went to bed pretty quick, it was still past midnight, and then last night it was midnight before bed again, stupid superbowl.

I am whupped by it too! I am tired, tired, tired. But watching the movie "once" on the recommendation of Chrissy. It is really good so far.

Better

Today I was pretty good. Only a couple of really atrocious coughing fits. My biggest problem was the weather. It was snowing this afternoon, quite badly. I waited 30+ minutes for the bus, and then it took 30+ minutes to go what usually takes it 25 minutes tops, so I was late for Pier 1. However, since there was a storm, it was ok. But the weather meant I didn't get dinner, so at 9:30pm as we were closing up I was feeling faint having subsisted the entire day on a granola bar (or 2 depending on how you count the ones that come in the green package), a smallish microwave dinner, a few squares of dark chocolate with caramel candy bar, and a lot of peppermint tea with sugar. Yeah, 14 hours on only that. Whoops!

Anyway, potbelly's to the rescue after work and my coworker Lynn's offer of some peanuts. Holy crap was I starved. Tomorrow and Monday, I will have to rethink the meal options between job one and job two.

Oh the weather was snowy, but much, much warmer, like almost freezing! It is sick to think that that is warm.

Oh and Sally, I hear from my brother they actually closed school out there for this storm? It must be one huge storm!

Still Sick

I am feeling better, I just need to dry up the crap in my sinuses and make my throat stop coughing. However, I did not go to work today because I still feel crappy and it is soooooo cold and windy here. It is 2 degrees (not a typo, single digits here) with a real feel of -17. My throat would never forgive me if I ventured out in that, I would not stop coughing, it would make it hard to breathe. I cannot leave the house in that not if I want to get better. It should be warmer tomorrow, thank God!

Home sick and watching movies

I did go to work for the first part of the day. I got all of the basic stuff done that I needed and then headed home. My head and body just felt icky and I couldn't stop coughing, so here I am on the couch with "The Way We Were." When I first saw this movie, I was convinced that I was Katie--isn't every girl who watches it. I think I have even dated some Hubbell's, but the thing about real life Hubbell's is that they aren't as good and kind and perfect as the character Robert Redford plays. They are messier, messier like Katie who really isn't all that messy.

Watching it now--way, way after high school (or undergrad--sometime in that time span is when I first saw it, before I had ever dated anyone at all), I don't really see as much Katie in my current self as I did then. Neither of us can seem to shut up and our mouths can get us in trouble, but I am not quite the angry, force of nature she is. I'm pretty sure I am my own force of nature, but not like Katie.

Domesticity

Sam made me dinner. It was excellent--some sort of chicken and green chile stew and a gruyere, ham and potato casserole. So delicious! He also made peanut butter cookies. This is what happens when I go off to work and leave him at homes on the weekend. And he tries to convince me he isn't the best boyfriend ever!

Sam met Holly

I'm pretty sure she liked him--because how do you not like Sam? I mean really. He's great (although my younger brother is a little nervous that he is perhaps not outgoing enough for someone from our family).

Ummm, we are going out to dinner tonight and then to a party. I feel a little like I am getting a cold, but I have decided to stop being sick and start being Awesome! (Thanks Barney).

Ummmm. Not so much anything else happening.

What is the deal?

Kids (or once upon a time kids) who are or were friends with my younger siblings have found me on my space, and they want to be my friend. I don't get this. We live far apart. I know next to nothing about them except that I thought they were cute and funny when they were six, but now they can legally drink and I don't care. AT ALL. So, I feel bad actually declining them, so I let the molder in unaccepted land hoping they will just go away.

But I still don't get why they want to be my friend? Some of them I have not seen or talked to in something approaching a decade. Weird.

A week

A very busy and not busy and uneventful week where I swear I did stuff but I sure can't remember what.

There was much sleeping in to recover from the brother visit because woowee did we drink and have fun. The Friday night I went out with friends and had the worst waiter in history (while Sam was in Virginia visiting a friend from high school).

Saturday and Sunday were consumed by season 4 of the Wire which I watched while swaddled in anything on earth that would make me feel a little bit warm because it is fucking freezing here in Chicago. The temperature right now even is not a positive number BEFORE you factor in the 10 mile an hour winds which make it colder. Yeah, nothing happened this weekend except work. It was too cold to move.

Sam came back Sunday, and I informed him I was sleeping over at his house because it is warmer. His buildings heat works really well, possibly too well, but I prefer that over the heat at my house which actually works fine, the main problem is that my room used to be outside in a porch and now it is inside and not really insulated well enough for not a porch. I needed to sleep at the warm house. He didn't mind though--turns out he might like me.

Monday was a nothing day. Tuesday I got in trouble at work for things that were not my fault by the person who's fault it actually was, but since he owns the company it turns out he gets to do that. Sam was going to make me dinner as a comfort, but he accidentally made a bottle of bar-b-que sauce fall off a shelf and explode all over his kitchen and dinner, so we ended up having to go out. Which was good, it just was awful cold to walk up the block for food.

Lake Michigan is freezing over, and I would take a picture some morning, but that would mean stopping in the cold and using cold fingers to take it, and well did I mention how flipping cold it is? Frozen Lake Michigan is pretty sweet.

Last night I ventured out again to a fundraiser for Jon, Chris, Sara, Luke, Branson, and Turpin's theatre project/company. I drank some, introduced Sam to the rest of the Idaho in Chicago gang (who were all together for the very first time ever!!!!!--this exact group anyway), and sang some karaoke. I did a duet with Chris Plummer on our song (Cruisin'), a duet with Anna on Dixie Chicks "Sin Wagon," Jamie made all the Chorus Line types sing "What I Did for Love" because she is cruel and unusual, and then I sang "The Shoop Shoop Song" all by my lonesome.

And yet it feels like nothing happened. Except it turns out I did something dumb with my finances which I am in the process of fixing. Blech.

Tomorrow I see Holly Harper and maybe Emily Gann-Korff, and they meet Sam.

MY BROTHER IS HERE

He is in the US and here in Chicago!!!! He is at my house for a day. He called me at 3am last night from Baltimore and said he is coming. It was so good to see him. I was tearing up on the train towards the airport but was relatively well-behaved there.

He is visiting me for a day with two friends before he ends up in California. We are going to the field museum and other things.

I only got bumped by a car

I am totally fine, but I did get kind of hit by a car on Friday. I was walking (you know like you do) and a woman was pulling out of the Walgreen's parking lot onto Fullerton Ave. (which was very busy and very, very slow moving at the time). She didn't look before she started to ease out into traffic, and I had just crossed in front of her and she slowly (because it was slow enough I could kind of move sideways as it was happening in speed with the car) nudged her car into me, but she very quickly saw me and stopped. So her car touched me and I kind of like grabbed at the hood to keep from falling over, but I didn't ever fall over and I am totally unharmed. Most of Friday I kept telling people that story over and over again to see their faces. It was awesome.

I am going winter coat shopping with my Christmas gift card to Macy's tonight. I will probably also get some underwear at victoria's secret, and I imagine sam will call me and coax me out to dinner since I am already downtown and need no coaxing whatsoever to go out to dinner.

Anyway, that was the car story.

Sorry for falling off the face of the planet

I just got busy seeing plays and people (and not just Sam) and then they cracked way down on internet usage at work, but now that I have internet at home I will try to keep better up. Or blog from Sam's itouch some more.

Momentously I discovered how to make my cell phone t9 capable this week as well as went out drinking a couple of times, had my favorite dinner at my fave restaurant twice in one week, kind of got hit by a car (I am fine now), and still have a plugged up ear. My week in a very poorly structured run-on sentence.

Home sick

My ear is all uncomfortably plugged up and I can't get to my doctor today, so, well mostly I am hoping it gets better and flirting with home remedies.

New Years=nap time

Well I had a very busy weekend that was supposed to be relaxing and calm. Whoops!

Sam and I went out to Howl at the Moon Saturday night after going out to dinner too (I think). We were just going to stay for a tiny bit because we were kind of tired and we shouldn't stay long, so we stayed for four hours and were kind of blitzed on whiskey and coke (him) and raspberry vodka and sprite (me).

Sunday Mary Hotter was in town and we went out for pizza with Anna and Branson (where we got inexplicably cheap pitchers of fat tire). Also apparently I have taken to calling Anna and Branson Branna. So there is that. Then we all went back to my house where Chris joined us and we drank until 3am for no good reason except that it was awesome.

Monday we got up and Mary and I went with her friend Derek to get mani-pedis. Sam prepped for his party where it seems like everyone I know ended up for the night. It was a great time. I got to meet some more Sam friends, there was a great deal of champagne drunk, there were fireworks at midnight, and at about 1:30am I decided I needed to puke or nap and chose napping. People came to ask me what I was doing, and I answered rather petulantly, "Sleeping!" because, well duh. It was good fun, good alcohol, general good time with lots of people I love and care about.

Then Sam and I just hung out for most of new year's day. We watched a lot of My Super Sweet 16, and Sam finds it hilarious how indignant I get about some of the bitchy teens on that show. We ate at the place called flat top grill where you sort of make your own stir fry (like a fancier Mongolian Bar-b-q place). The food was delicious!!! Basically, this was a good, good weekend, but I wanted it to be calmer--less going out and getting wasted I guess.

happy 2008!

I am blogging this from Sam's itouch-he got it for christmas. It pretty much confirmed that I really really really want one! It is way too much fun! It does however take an eon to blog.

Feeling better

Much, much better. I did awake with a sort of headache today, but I don't think it is related to the cold and could've happened any day (or that is what I am deciding).

I am at work today, at the 9-5 M-F work. What you say? Today is Saturday? Well, how right you are. We "get" to work Saturday in order to take Monday off. Yippie! I say with great sarcasm--although I suspect I will relish not working on Monday, so there is that.

The agenda is clean Jamie's desk (so she does not kill me on Wednesday when she is back at it) and then clean my desk and then do all the work that would create. Then I do the work that Maureen left me and then help Sonia file and then invoice. Yeah that will be just as much not that much fun as it sounds.

Ok, well the good news is that after today I get like three days worth of unbroken time with the boy who I have missed very much in the last two weeks where I hardly got to see him. (PS he got me a really nice Christmas present that I will get to enjoy for the next six months--wines and cheeses of the world every month).

Christmas for tomorrow

Here am I wrapping presents for Sam and my Christmas which we are celebrating tomorrow. I am also watching "The Last King of Scotland."

My cold seems better today. I don't know if I have zicam or robetussin to thank for that, but I am glad. Who knows how long I will stay feeling better--I have this premonition that this is just a brief holdover.

Blech. I hate being sick.

Sick

I am full blown sick now. It isn't awful. I can still function, but it is niggling, constantly a little unpleasant, and I get to play receptionist all day like this, and it is no fun. I also Pier 1'd tonight and will do so tomorrow night as well, and it makes me miss my associate days when I could just call in sick because in fact I am sick, but now I cannot call in. No one can cover for me-not this time of year and not with as few managers as we have on schedule. So I work, and I work some more. However, easy work on Saturday and Sunday and no work on Monday and Tuesday, and I look forward to napping a lot on those days. They were going to be days of fun, but now they look to be days of napping.

Sam, I think, feels bad because he was sick first ergo perhaps he got me sick. But Kathy in my office was way sick too. There was no way I am escaping it. Plus, it seems like Sam and I will be spending more than enough time together in the foreseeable future to keep getting one another sick which is a weirdly happy thought.

Merry Christmas

Yeah I know for like twenty more minutes. I had a nice Christmas and the Branson-Schlegal-Peterson-Plummer residence (but without the Plummer). I definitely fell asleep on the floor after two appletini's on Christmas Eve, and there was napping today.

The crap thing is that I have a cold. Scratchy throat, runny nose, coughing. I might have had a fever earlier in the day, but I was really, really hot in my coat while walking home--although that could've just been the temperature.

I am apparently too sick to be interesting this fine holiday. Oh well.

I miss Sam. Hopefully I get to see him day after tomorrow.

It works!!!!!!

My internet works. FINALLY!!! Seriously, I can't believe how hard it was to get my aircard to work, but now there is internet everywhere, and I am happy with it. It did take a half hour on the customer service line and 4 different customer service representatives--including one of them that was stumped for a while--for it to work. But it now works and I can have a very merry internet filled Christmas.

Why am I still at work?

Being here at regular day job right now seems pretty pointless. I mean, I did get to meet and talk to a woman named Santa (no joke) and girl Santa is awesome! I also got to play with a puppy, and we had a secret Santa giveaway that was great (and I got Amish peanut butter and raspberry jam--super tasty!). But seriously, I have basically no motivation to work for the next hour. At all. None. I want to go home. I no longer want to answer the phone--which has rung far more than I expected. The puppy who just left was the best part of the afternoon, also messaging Sam who is sitting at home, since he took some vacation that he has to use up. Although it totally is unfair that he is sitting at home and I am working, and later I am working some more at job the second. I am getting a little burnt out from the psychotic amount of work I have given myself.

Good news though. I get the 30th, the 31st, and the 1st off and probably have only a short day on the 29th. This will be awesome! Especially since Sam has all those days off and will be back in town. Yes!

On a not-so-much-related note, I am getting curiouser and curiouser about what he is getting/has gotten me for Christmas, but we aren't going to be having our Christmas until after he comes back. So I have almost a week to wait before I find out. Hmmmmm. . . I have some ideas (and basically no clues) as to what. But I was always the kid who liked to ponder and reason out what was in a particular gift, and I got really good at it--using the package itself but also my knowledge of the gift giver to guess.

Don't worry. I will spill the beans here as soon as I have beans that it.

Last night I was at Sam's going to blog as soon as the air card was up and running, but it has not yet been activated because I have to call, and I didn't have it in me last night. This weekend. I will call then.

What I did have in me was pizza with walnuts and Gorgonzola and pears on it and polenta fries and a nice Chianti. They were yummy and what Sam and I had for dinner at this great little Italian place in the Near North River North restaurant district because Cafe Iberico does not want me and Sam to eat there ever again.

I am also super busy at work (not that it is stopping me from this right now--whatever) being multiple people, and that means I am sitting at the receptionist's desk. Her desk has a different keyboard than the last time I did this. Her keyboard rocks! The old one used to not type w's, i', r's or 8's which got really old, really fast. This one makes a very satisfying clicking when you type. I like that.

I was also going to post about how snow is pretty, but when you live in a neighborhood full of dogs its poses a problem if it does not melt off the sidewalks right away. I live in a neighborhood of yellow snow. Everywhere. Since last Saturday night we have been coated. And the twenty or so dogs I see getting walked around my block have turned the snow yellow. The little melting that has occurred has unearthed some poo too. That's awesome for walking in, except that it is not. I really do not like yellow snow. It grosses me out. It's oookie. I no like it.

Jim sent me more DVD's of TV in the mail. I think that is awesome! Renee gave me a speaker thing for my ipod to dock into, its also an alarm clock, and it is little enough to fit into my bag, so I took it to work and now the dixie chicks are serenading me (among others, punchline was the last song).

Sometime soon, I get two days with no work off in the space of a week. Also I might get some sleep. That will be a nice change.

Sam's morning doorman called me sweetheart today and told me to keep warm. It was sweet, and then I saw my coworker Brad at the bus stop. He asked if I was going to work or home. I was going home briefly before work. Yeah, that was awesome. No, Brad is my friend and just teased me about it a little.

Steve McQueen went to the vet. He is getting to be a very spendy free kitten, but he no longer has ear mites and he does have his rabies shot. He just has to be neutered and we need to make sure we have killed his worms. He has decided he does not like Dr. Amy our vet because well she pokes him with things and sticks stuff in his ears, and so he hissed at her. Then he would come and sit in between my arms whenever she let go of him like he wanted her to know that he was mine and that I was going to protect him, but really I kept letting her fix him. He should be fine for a long time though. He's pretty healthy.

That's all for my long ADD post today. 5 days until Christmas!

So no magical internet yet

I have to convince my computer that it can use the aircard and the aircard that it can use the computer. I was supposed to do that last night, but it had a battery that needed to charge and I started that process too late.

Plus Sam and I have been enjoying some of the last of our pre-Christmas time together. I work my butt off for Pier 1 this week (our holiday hours are out of control), and then he leaves for Oklahoma. Sometime after that we get to hang out. We even have a whole day off together!

In lieu of real posting I am going to include the teaser to "Don't Clown Around With Love" with the disclaimer that NONE of it is real. It is a fantastical representation based loosely on some facts about the lives of friends of mine. It all started when Jamie (one of said friends) would say something and I would joke about it and she would squeal thus exponentially increasing the likelihood that I would continue to tease her about it and the teasing would get more and more ridiculous ending up with this wild stab at silly trashy romance novel. Here we go. It is awesomely bad.

Don’t Clown Around With Love
By Heather
Chapter I.
Janey’s Arrival


“Well, Marilyn Monroe, I guess this is it,” Janey said to her fluffy gray cat as she pulled her car up in front of the non-descript graystone. “We sure are a long way from Idaho.” The trip took almost three days through mountains and deserts and forests and plains and ended up here on the northwest side of Chicago in a neighborhood that was Starbucks and gentrification-free. It may not be very trendy, but Avondale fit her budget.
Janey got out of the car and looked around. The car was filled with all of her possessions- her furniture had come with her roommate and fellow newly-christened college graduate the month before in a U-Haul. The apartment on the second floor was inexpensive, clean, and roomy. “What more can a girl ask for?” she quipped to Marilyn Monroe as she picked up his cage, her blond ponytail bouncing with each eager yet apprehensive step. “That’s a good boy,” she cooed. (The name Marilyn Monroe was the result of an unfortunate kittenhood where no one had managed to notice he was, in fact, not she.) “We’ll go inside as soon as I find the landlord.”
And that is when she saw him, coming from the backyard, his forehead glistening with sweat on the bright, late summer afternoon. His biceps bulging as he carried a large box to the curb. Her throat caught – there was something about him, something primitive that caused her stomach to stir…or was it her stomach?
“Hi,” he said, extending his hand, “you must be Janey. I’m Pete.”

Chaos

At work. All day. It won't stop.

Sam's work party was great fun! I met lots of wonderful people, and I won a $25 gift certificate to linens and things.

Now I leave for home. More laters because magical internet box has arrived!!

Cinderella

I feel like that sometimes when I go back to the ladies in embroidery. They are all so excited to see me and help me steam the camisole I am wearing under a cute little shirt/wrap for Sam's work party tonight, and they ask me all sorts of questions and demand that I come back and tell them of it. Maybe Cinderella isn't the right fairy tale, but if they are not the funny little mice who would they be? Fairy godmothers? Speaking of, still have not seen enchanted. I will do that while Sam is gone for Christmas, or maybe I will drag him along this week.

Anyway, marathon of Christmas parties are about to start. One tonight, one tomorrow, two Saturday (really three but I can't go to Katie's there is just not enough time). Also, Sam comes back from Miami where he has been all of two and a half days, so I feel kind of lame missing him, but whatever. Turns out I am lame!

The novel will come soon, or the teaser of it. As soon as I have time to write a disclaimer to preface it.

Christmas me!

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Public transportation and walking

I do so much more of it now that I am dating a boy. I mean I did a little before boy, took the train to and from work, walked to and from pier 1. But new place has much shorter walks in between these places, so the walking is less, and the bus is less because it is a faster street (more lanes and more frequent buses).

Since the boy though, there is walking to the red line and walking to his place. And after an initial few weeks of being very, very bad with the cab taking. I have generally shaped up, and we even don't cab it together if we are eating near his house--although lately that means crowds of Christmas shoppers making me angry.

I may need more books to read, or actually I need to buy a little notebook because I am going to write a trashy romance novel in installments about Jamie (my UI friend/the receptionist at work). I have decided her landlord is in love with her, and in my fictitious world this will play out in a very harlequinn romance formula. It will be awesome. I decided I am going to write them on the bus, and then she can type them up, and it will make us both happy (and yes UI types, Paul is her landlord HA!).

PS I am ridiculous in case that was not formerly known.

More on ice

I told Sam about the almost dying on his buildings grounds the other day, and his response was, "Oh, you mean you didn't grab on to the ropes?" Because apparently they put up a guide wire (which I have seen and never dreamed was for this purpose) in the winter, so "the little old ladies to hold on to when it gets slick." That last bit was a quote from one of his doormen.

I like his doormen, they are an interesting crew. Two of them are very nice and friendly with me, but they are jovial sort of men. One of them is less so, but I am not sure he is jovial. He has kind of a Gothic personality (and I mean that in more of a Byronian sense than in a Mansonian sense), so maybe he is being a friendly and jovial with me as he can get.

I must admit, it is weird that Sam's doormen now know me. I mean, they see when I arrive and when I leave and who I am often with. That is a whole lot of two and two to put together and kind of a lot of bidness to know. It is just an odd situation to be in. My house is a regular old house. The only person who KNOWS bidness is my roommate. But she would KNOW the bidness anyway. Strange. The world of doormen is strange.

Negativity

I have been kind of that for no reason in one facet of my life, and I can't seem to stop it. The thing is, bitching about what I keep bitching about is kind of making me complicit in it. So I decided yesterday to stop it. To follow my grandmother's advice of, "If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all." Done. I am shutting my damn mouth, and changing the subject to something happy like kittens that poop rainbows or something. It mus be so since I have declared it to the Internet.

Also there is snow here, lots of it. It was beautiful falling downtown last night. The bridges are lit up for Christmas as are some of the trees and big flakes were falling softly. It was nice. And then this morning it was super slick outside Sam's place with a knock you over wind blowing off the lake. I almost died by the wind smashing me into the concrete/polished granite or marble slab that is his walkway. It wanted to push me down, but I stayed up. Then I walked past the MCA (Museum of Contemporary Art) and it hadn't been swept clean of snow, so the whole steps were a big white blank as was the big entry in front of it, and the sculptures that live a top on of its low roofs were dripping in big snowy hats and capes. I wish I had had my camera to take a picture. I love Chicago! Even in the snowy-cold winter.

Interesting

I met a good number of Sam's friends and coworkers at a party he threw on Friday. I got there while they were already wasted because I was three hours late since I had to work at Pier 1. Sober Heather, blitzed Sam and everyone he knew. I also managed to break something as I walked in creating a large crash (fortunately it was just the box encasing 3 bottles of wine in cute excelsior all decorated gifty). It was a present for the guest of honor who I met as she helped me clean it up. She's one of his best friends. She wanted me to know he is fantastic (I've noticed), later when she was even more intoxicated she kind of threatened to hurt me if I were to do him wrong. That was odd.

Others of his friends scolded me because he had not yet introduced us. I don't think that is my fault. All in all, it was really cool to meet Sam's people. It was interesting to hear their assessment of me. Jess (a fiery red-headed bombshell who works in Sam's office) asked if I was Sam's bitch--much to his horror. It was actually quite funny because I think she was referring to me being his bitch in the style of rap guy's girlfriends not in some other way. They also kept telling me how much he talks about me and how happy he seems to be since we have started dating--which since he apparently was a happy person long before me brings forth other questions (like how do you tell? for one).

I also enjoyed hearing how they speak of him. They like him. He is, it turns out, a good guy and maybe the good guy everyone knows but never seemed to be able to find the right good girl. Plus we seem to have become quite firmly a couple. He was asking me in email today what 'we' should do about New Year's Eve because he is planning on throwing a party at his house, and he is thinking of it as 'our' party. All of this I find kind of lovely.

Oh, and for whoever (Alan?) asked about the car. Toyota 4-runner, early 00's. That is what he drives. He drove me to the train the other morning because it was raining quite hard, and I had left my umbrella at home.

Sam is right about everything

He is. He just is. He isn't know-it-all about it, and he even sometimes seems embarrassed about it, like he would try to be wrong if he thought that would work. I am usually the one who is always right, and I am not so humble about it. I can be a know-it-all pain in the ass. I can. I probably am. Sam not so much. He just simply is right, and he knows a lot more stuff than I do. He is kind of amazing that way.

Amazing and a little infuriating. Last night he was even right about things he shouldn't have been right about, like how long a red hand flashes on a crosswalk and whether or not we would have time to cross. It was like the world was conspiring against me in order to make him right about absolutely everything.

And yet, we spent most of the evening laughing, even about that because Sam smiles and laughs more then pretty much anyone I have ever met. He even greets what would be totally inflaming situations for basically every other person on earth with a shrug and a smile or a giggle. I don't know what it would take to get Sam upset. It is kind of like he only has three moods happy, tired, and content. There is nothing else. He is never mad or bitter or moody. I have dated too many bitter, moody men before him, and that would make me angry at them because if they were moody or bitter I would end up being that too, or I would spend a great deal of effort trying to fix their problems or cheer them up, and none of that effort would ever be appreciated. I don't have to cheer Sam up, he does it himself. I have not had to ignore his mood to get on with the rest of our evening or day. His mood always seems to be fun, often more fun than my mood. I will gladly join his mood and go along for the ride.

OK, yeah this got mushy fast. It was not intended to be some sort of adoration of Sam and his happy smarts, but that looks like that is what it is. I wish you guys could meet him--those of you who haven't. He is great.

F-ing toothache

I have wisdom tooth that is coming in. After I was told 7 years ago that mine would probably never come in. Well, guess what never? Meet probably. This hurts. It has happened before, and it just hurts for a few days and then everything is back to normal. But for those few days, I understand why teething babies cry.

Took Steve McQueen to the vet. He is in remarkably good shape except for the ear mites--he's got em. Actually the vet was very impressed by what good condition he is in considering his parentage or lack thereof.

He was mostly happy about it, until the very end until it got to be too much. There was blood drawing and ear cleaning and a really big pill and being felt up and gunk rubbed on his shoulders and a shot. Plus I had locked him in the bathroom all night to get a stool sample. He was not impressed with me. In fact he kept giving me a look that said, "Lookee here bitch, we ain't doing this again! And I don't like her neither." Insert pointed look in vet's direction after.

Because of all the stuff it was a pretty spendy vet visit, but he has a little follow-up which will be cheap, then the boy bits, and then he is fine until next November when he gets the big check-up all over again.

The other cat very confused by all of this. Confused as to why Steve had to be in the bathroom all night, confused as to why he smells funny when he came back from the vet, totally confused by everything. James kept following me and Renee around and mewing at us and mewing at the door to the bathroom, like he was checking to make sure we knew that Steve was back there and it wasn't an accident. It was actually quite sweet if totally annoying.

Cooking with the boy

Sam is hosting a good-bye party for one of his co-workers who is leaving his company. The house is getting cleaned, he has tables and tablecloths all set out, all his glasses out, you name it, he's ready.

He is also making most of the food for the party. There are beef skewer things, lots of cookies, some chicken (which was seasoned and cooked but not sure for what), chocolate tartlets, and banana tartlets. I helped him make the banana tartlets last night. And by helped him, I may have sort of taken over. I didn't mean to be rude, but he didn't know to slice the bananas with the peel still on (way easier that way and less messy), and he was just going to randomly smush the puff pastry dough into the little tart pan cups. So, I rolled out the dough for him, and I helped make the caramel sauce the bananas were to go in while he sliced.

I may have accidentally been condescending when I saw how he was making things (with the laptop set to the food network website on the little table across from the counter and stove), but he needed assistance. We were quite funny I am sure cooking together. I am from a long line of fantastic cooks and bakers even if I have very little practice--there is a lot of helpful theory wrapped up in my brain that just shoots out at moments like this and I never even know it is there until it appears. He cooks much more frequently and ambitiously than I do, but it seems he is mostly self-taught from the recipes. He is pretty good though. I was very impressed. I would never have done the work he did for this kind of party. He is also pretty adorable for getting all excited about his party and his work for the party (he has lists for the day of and the day before the party of what needs to get done). He is adorable.

He also is being forced to watch project runway. Which he seems to be taking to all right. His tivo however, hates me and does not want me ever to see the slapultimate episode of How I Met Your Mother. However, Internet of high speed has been ordered and may be happening at my house by this weekend. We can only hope.

There, Macaela, more about the boy and a picture from when my sisters roommate was visiting (that is her coworker, her, Sam, and me at a dueling piano bar).

i am back

My trip was wonderful and relaxing. I napped a bunch, I ate a bunch more, and I may have watched as much football as done anything else.

It was my "birthday" at the restaurant we ate at after Friday shopping, and I had to wear a shark hat, so in revenge I ate the entire birthday sundae--take that thinking it funny to make me wear the dumb hat.

There was also wine tasting, and I did in fact get lost but only briefly.

It was great to see the family, and it was great to have a vacation. I am going to try having more of those.

More later.

Leaving soon, maybe not soon enough

I am just tired and done here right now. My brain left for vacation a while ago. It shows no signs of returning before my body leaves for vacation tomorrow.

Goals for vacation:
Sleep
Drink wine
More sleep
Mmmmmm, raw milk
eat myself silly
not hit any deer in a rental car
not get lost while driving to my grandparents dairy farm in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night on a road I have not been on driving for 5 years and not been on driving at night in at least 7, so this last one could be tricky

also there might be karaoke.

There may not be a lot of posting from the middle of nowhere, it all depends on if I want to fire up someone else's computer that is on, gasp, wireless internet.

Have a happy t-day all!!!

Long days but vacation ahead.

Whew has this week been a week. And the few days of the weekend and the next week before the vacation will also be long. I seem to constantly fill my time with things and stuff. I wish more of it was family and friends and a little less of it was work. Although, when I was less busy with work and had only one job, I spent less time with friends and more time watching my netflix movies and tv. So, I guess this is good. I guess.

Tonight some friends will gather to watch a Tivo'd Project Runway, I cheated and already watched a bit and peeked online to see who got booted, but I am excited anyway. And Sam seems excited too, even though he is not a fan of the show (yet I say) and we are taking over his house and his tivo to see it. He is so wonderful to me. It is nice and strange, like I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop. But I guess it is good that it doesn't. Not that I think he influences my thinking that it will--this is pretty much all of my own neuroses.

Hmm, me neurotic. I know, who saw that coming?

I met the parents and other relationship related topics

Because it turns out Sam and I are in a relationship, and I like it that way and it seems he does too--although we haven't really talked about. The signs are all there. My last relationship (and I am not counting the almost relationship I kind of had this summer because of all the qualifiers involved) suffered from me being way too clingy and forcing myself into his life which turns out he didn't like, so this time I want to avoid that. Last time I didn't really give it much thought. This time I have tried to make sure I am not just assuming he wants me to come over or assuming he wants to come over, but frequently he invites me over or just bundles me into a taxi back to his house.

Speaking of his house, the doormen of his building lent us a Mies van der Rohe documentary last night, and it was very surreal to watch a documentary about a building (well one segment only) that you are actually in while you are watching it. Very odd, but the movie "Super or Regular" does capture the beauty of his building which on first glance looks like a lot of other glass and steel apartment buildings. You wouldn't know that it was the first one ever and that they were not sure people would want to live in a house with floor to ceiling windows.

Also the reults of the parent meeting went well. His parents are wonderful, smart, funny, lively people. I loved them. He said they liked me and gave me no further information. My sister saw photos of the two of us and told me that we look alike. Which I guess I kind of see, but also no. Her roommate thinks she is crazy. I include a picture of us here for your curiousity. Sara took it at our housewarming party way back when we were barely dating. Also there was drinking at the party and SJ was not always giving fair warning that pictures were going to happen.

I am trying to think if there is anything much exciting else to tell but not really no. I guess that is all exciting enough.

Sorry about that!

Jim's rule is now taken to heart--no sad awful scary VAGUE blog posts. I resolve to get specific when talking about the awful.

I left the full story in the comments of the last post. For those who are interested. It isn't even that good of a story. It will be a total let down, and chances are you will mock me for it.

Tonight I meet Sam's parents. They are in town. I have only known Sam for a little under two months, so I admit to being a lot freaked out by this. Not by meeting them. I am sure they are lovely because Sam is pretty wonderful, so how awful could they be and end up with Sam? I am more freaked out at the idea of already meeting them. ALREADY. This seems soon. I guess. It makes us seem very serious. I mean, I guess we are serious--but very serious is something I am perfectly content to pretend isn't happening until long after it is already true and this whole meeting the parents thing might gum that up. Yeah, plus I want them to like and approve of me. They seem to think their sons are amazing, so I want to be someone they deem worthy. I washed my hair for them. And I am wearing way nicer clothes to be a Pier 1 Assistant Manager than I normally would. So that should fix everything, right? I still look like me though. I don't want them to meet a not me. Then what will they think if they meet me a second time. Perhaps it is too early in the morning to be writing about this?

Totally sick to my stomach

Over something that might be quite bad or might be nothing at all. See at this juncture I just have no idea. I will know when I get home from work but not until then. Hopefully, it is nothing. Hopefully someone was being helpful in a way that turned out just to scare us to death and minorly inconvenience us but not mess anything up in any way.

Or not. I don't want to think about the not. And yet I can feel the not hanging over me and settling in my stomach like a stone. I will update tomorrow. Man, oh man.

Libraries

Posting from the big ole CPL downtown. I stayed off from work today and went to the Chicago History Museum, rode the L, went to Millenium Park, and near Navy Pier (ran out of time)--can you tell I was playing tour guide?

It was great fun, and then I went to the Museum of Contemporary Art--which has some really phenomenal installations right now. Mapping the self made me wish I had enough free time to create some sort of map of me and my life.

Tonight or in the next few days I might meet Sam's parents. They are coming into town from Tulsa tonight for a conference. I am kind of nervous. Plus I think it is weird. Not bad weird but, I don't know sudden--but it isn't like they are making a special trip up or something. They are just coming to town and they only come up every once in a while. So yeah.

Must go--plans in my busy life and day!

People, people, people

In town. My sister's roomie is in town, and Sam is helping me be a wonderful tour guide. They came to my show last night, and then we went out to hear some live music and drink some martinis which was fun (but I was pretty tired after my post-show wired wore off). Tonight we are going out again, but I must first visit my polling place to vote and return a movie to blockbuster and hug my cat a little. Tonight we are going to a dueling piano bar that is apparently the most fun ever--Sam loves it and the guests are psyched.

Also, my friend Jamie and I wrote a drinking game to go along with a DVD of the truly horrid version of A Chorus Line I was in during grad school (because I know I am the first person you think of when you think professional Broadway dancer--and sadly I was one of the more like Broadway professional dancer in our cast). This weekend it is going to be put to use. Jamie and I tell my roommate about it all the time at work and Sam has heard it from Anna and I too--so Sam and Renee get introduced to it this weekend. It should be pretty funny.

Here are the rules: (Please note Susan played "Cassie" and Amanda was our choreographer--she had only 1 and 1/2 arms and played the role of the assistant choreographer in the show)

A Chorus Line: The Drinking Game




 Half of the people are odd numbers half even numbers, drink every time one of your numbers is called

 Anytime Amanda tries to demonstrate a dance move with a hand or arm that doesn’t exist, take a shot

 Every time Susan/Cassie does her wavy hand gesture

 Anytime someone claims to be of a race they clearly are not or participates in a racial stereotype, take a drink.

 Drink if they reference someone famous from the past.

 Drink if they reference a member of their family, two drinks if it isn't a parent

 Anytime someone references sex or a human body part, drink


If you are familiar with the show, you can see how we might get bad shitty real fast!

In lieu of contest, please try to quote lyrics from as many songs from A Chorus Line as possible without repeating a song.

So it turns out

Sam has been blowing his friends off to hang out with me, or so they think! I told him to stop doing that. Please spend time with your friends, so I am not THAT girlfriend. So tomorrow he is hanging out with his guys. It cracks me up.

New quiz:
What if everyone is crazy?
What if the person who comes to save us all is crazy?
What if the people in charge, arbitrarily assign crazy?
What would you do?
Who would save us all?

New Quiz

So I went out last night on Halloween, and it was fun, but I am pooped. After work tonight, sleeping is happening. Lots of sleeping, and this time I mean it. Maybe some cat cuddling, that might happen too.

The kittens are friends. I keep meaning to take pictures, but they stop being cute once I get it out. Soon, soon. Maybe boy pictures will come soon too.

Next musical is probably giving you all way, way too easy of a clue.

It would've been more interesting with a landgrab.

Happy Halloween

I am hoping to get trick or treaters this year on my lovely little side street. We shall see. I was going to dress in costume today but I couldn't find my tiara or a can of peas--so there went my princess and the pea idea.

As you can see Donald won the last contest with Bye, Bye, Birdie. The next hint is that I am thinking of a modern musical thouroughly obsessed with what can happen with good or bad PR. Remember, you must express your guess through lyrics of the songs of the musical you are guessing (just google it if you must). Donald lucked out that his had a title song with those lyrics in it.

If it gets rough, I will add more hints.

Many things

Well, there are a bunch of things happening with me. We have officially boyfriend and girlfriended. Officially. He's kind of totally adorable and seems not to be frightened by my friends, so that is always good (and then have even told some of the really embarassing stories). It is nice.

Jim sent us more stuff!!!! Seriously it is like he is competing in the awesome friend olympics or something. Really. We are very excited. We also hope to get tv and internet in the next two weeks or so, maybe. Stupid boys who lived there before us.

Thirdly, went to very scary haunted house this weekend and screamed a LOT!!!! Yeah, screaming happened, so did whimpering and grabbing peoples' hands, coats, hair and bags quite hard. It was fun though.

Also, new contest in my blog, probably once a week or whenever I feel like it really. I stole this from Lauren. I am going to think of a musical and give you vague hints of it, and you must guess which musical by quoting lyrics from whatever musical you think it is. Guesses must come as quote from lyrics from that musical. First hint, this musical has an oft repeated chorus and probably involves as much screaming as that haunted house and a whole lot more fainting.

You can also request more hints in the comments.

I touched Tom Colliccio's plate

Well, I touched a plate that was purchased from my Pier 1 for the restaurant wars of the next season which is being filmed right now in Chicago.

They actually shopped at the Pier 1 in Old town, but we packed up some stuff for them. It was kind of exciting. I love Top Chef, and I am definitely DVRing next season so that I can see all of it.

Yea for living in a great big city.

Mirrors

Most girls are familiar with the concept of the skinny mirror. It is a mirror that at least one person you know owns. A cheapo wall mirror from Walmart of Target that is a pain to make stay on the wall, and that should NOT be moved from dorm to apartment after apartment, but it is anyway. It is moved because from some miracle (or more likely cheap and shoddy materials and construction), it makes everyone look at least five to ten pounds thinner.

Kelsey had the skinny mirror at U of I. I am not sure who had it at CMS, and I for a while had a version of it--not as awesome as Kelsey's but still awesome. H & M has the opposite. Last night in their dressing room I scared myself with the sight of my mid-section. It looked bloated and flobby and just downright terrifying. I see it everyday, and in general I know what to expect from it, but what I saw in their dressing room was something else, something strange. Then I realized that I had seen my gut in such a terrifying state before, mid-summer when I was dress shopping--it was at an H & M too!!

Now you would think that a store trying to sell you clothes would actively pursue skinny mirrors for its dressing rooms. Make all the chicks think they are skinner than they are and they will take home armloads of the magical clothes. This seems to be a problem that they would want to fix. And yet. . .

Note to self, work out before I hit an H & M, or buy it all and take it home to try on and then bring it back.

It was almost scary enough to get me to give up ice cream and candy. Almost. . . but not quite.

Mies van der Rohe

He's a pretty famous architect. He was instrumental in the Second Chicago School of Architecture, and he totally designed the building Sam lives in. It was on a plaque in the lobby which probably has authentic Mies chairs in it. So, this morning I googled him to see what I could find. Turns out Sam's apartment building is one of his more significant structures--it has a nickname the "glass house apartments" and he has one on the corner of the steel and glass building.

Now, I have always thought Sam's apartment was amazingly cool because it is, but it is also crazy important in the scope of modern architecture. Crazy, huh. Also kind of intimidating, not gonna lie.

You can see a picture of it on the Mies Wikipedia page. It also has its own Wikipedia page. This is them too.

Jim Rules

Just so you all know, it's true. My little present of premieres arrived yesterday--although I have not had time to watch them. I will probably watch them while getting the house all gussied up for its warming party. But how cool is it that he sent me a DVD of all the things I wanted to see but couldn't?

I know that my friends are really great people. I feel like I wouldn't be friends with them if they weren't awesome, but then one of them goes and does something like this and I am reminded how truly lovely they are. Usually I am reminded that they are all lovely not just the one who has done the particularly awesome thing that triggered the reminder.

My friends are some pretty freaking phenomenal people! They are kind-hearted and generous (with their love and their sarcasm). They are funny and smart and I don't think I remember to tell them how awesome they are on a regular basis.

So, Jim you are awesome, and the rest of you. . . better send me a fucking present if you want me to tell you the same.


Just kidding. :) The rest of you are pretty awesome too!

Oh, and there was another date last night. It went well. Sam has met the roommate and the kitty and all went well.

Date Update

The date was great, and if I rhyme anymore in this post, someone should kick me. It also involved some sitcom-esque events (because sometimes I wonder if my life is not secretly a reality sitcom that no one has ever let me in on--remember my best wedding story ever).

First we met for dinner at the Kinzie Chophouse, a steakhouse down in the north loop restaurant district. The food was good, the small talk was good, the server was terrible. He just wasn't really with it. Then it comes to the time when he offers us dessert, and he starts to, but then he stops, mumbles something about having something for us or knowing what we want and disappears. Sam and I just look at each other, and ask if he just said he was bringing us dessert--because neither of us have ordered dessert. We are very confused, and we become more confused when crappy server brings out a big dessert plate with chocolate torte and little pile of hipped cream and sliced strawberries surrounded by drizzled sauce on the plate, drizzled sauce that spells out "Happy Anniversary!"

I laugh because what else can I do? Sam looks a little stricken until he realizes that I know he did not plan a Happy Anniversary Dessert for us. This does not happen in real life. So we flag server down, and we tell him it isn't for us because it is really not our anniversary. He seems confused that it isn't ours and tells us to eat it anyway. We do, but we laugh about it a lot! When the server comes back with the check, he asks us, "Are you guys even married?" Yeah, not so much. It was funny, and I kept mentioning that it is after all our anniversary as the date went on. Like after the symphony, he asked me if we should do something else, and I said, "Well, it is our anniversary!"

The symphony was awesome. Symphony center here in Chicago is AMAZING! Plus we sat on the terrace. Which meant we were behind/over the musicians and the conductor was facing us. Branford Marsalis was really close to us during one song. Watching the conductor was really cool--he was visiting us from St. Louis where he leads their symphony. Then they played a Thessolonius Monk song instead of the Copeland piece that was scheduled, and wow! Seriously wow! Soprano sax sounding as un Kenny G like as possible. It was great!

Then there were drinks, and then I got locked out of my apartment because I don't actually have a key to my apartment, and I forgot that Renee would be out later than I would be. So we went back to his place. All I am saying is that I no longer fear we won't be able to get past the first date situation. That problem has been solved.

Although, now I worry that I seem like a totally scheming bitchy girl when I really just don't have my own key to my apartment. I realized after the fact that this was just the kind of plan I needed, but I know I wouldn't have been able to go through with it if I had figured it out in advance. It is just too. . .evil and planny. I am not that girl, really not. But it probably seems like I am. Or hopefully, he doesn't think I would do that.

Anyway, things are going well. I imagine that Sam will become my boyfriend soon, if he isn't already--I am not always the best at figuring these things out.

Feeling Better

I am feeling better. Quite a bit. I am rested (or more rested). I took a hot shower (at Anna, Branson and Chris'). I have a date tonight. Dinner at a chophouse and then the Symphony after--with Branford Marsalis. It should be very nice. I am so excited!

God dammit!

my feelings hurt today

Hot water

We were supposed to get this today, this morning, but not so much. Turns out our hot water heater is broken, and if it were turned on it would poison us with carbon monoxide.

So, I was really looking forward to a hot shower and shaving my legs, but that won't be happening at my house until. . . later?

Yeah, later. This blows.

Kittens are awesome

I would post pictures of Steve McQueen, but I am not sure where my digital camera is because well, not so much with the moved in. Living room is painted and partially unpacked (it will look sooooo awesome once we have finished). There will be a new hide-a-bed in it next weekend (which means comfy and free place to stay for visitors, hint, hint). Renee's room is painted and almost all put away. It looks great! It is super pink and bright, but cool looking.

The rest of the house not so much painted or really unpacked. That means my room and the book room/tv room. Also no internet, and the amazing unsecured network has disappeared or been secured and renamed. I have to get all that ready to be hooked up. It looks like we can get the internet pretty easy. I have a modem, so I shouldn't need the comcast stuff (which they lease to you making it cost more then just buying one), and they say it is easy to install yourself, so hopefully soon. Also soon would be TV with cable and on demand and DVR. Cable in two rooms on two tvs. How awesome will that be?

My show is tonight. The boy will be there. He asked me to do something (direct quote) Sunday on Saturday but unfortunately I had rehearsal and work on Sunday so I had to say not Sunday but later in the week. That request came via text but in response to friendly jokey text from me, so I am not sure if this is really progress. However his response to my text (which was something like moving is dumb and I hate boxes and painting, hope your weekend is more fun) was immediate and included invitation. I think this is giving me a little more understanding of the situation. Maybe?

Yeah, right. Like I have any clue what is going on.

I have a kitten

He is adorable and lively and he seems to love me--altough we have only hung out for about two hours. He lives in my room right now. However, he does not have a name yet. Right now it is looking like he will be named Colonel Brandon, Steve McQueen, or Bobby. The first two are front runners. I am not sure whether to go for the more nicknameable one or the full name only cat name. Maybe tonight he will behave in a manner that makes it apparent he is one or the other (for example if I find him at home trying to jump a motorbike over a barbed wire fence, buying me a new pianforte, or whatnot).

The date went well. There was a good show (although the audience was full of the cast of the bad show I saw last month--weird!), with a beautiful final moment--it was lit very dimly for last scene and they pulled all the light slowly away except a candle on the lead who sang the last bit of the final song and then he blew it out (it was a real candle). Really nice (oh the show was Steven Sondheim's "Passion"). Anna Gasteyer was really good! Then we had a drink and some food, and I had a good time, and I think he did too, and then he saw me to the train station.

So, date two went a lot like date one, but better show, less drinking.

Moving or "I wonder how I got that bruise?"

We have moved. There are boxes everywhere and someday we will paint (tomorrow? tonight? soon?). Next weekend/week everything should get settled in. This was the longest move ever!!! I have way, way too much shit, and I thought I had done a good job of throwing things out. Not so much.

We need another key for our apartment, we need gas, we need stuff for the kitty we get tomorrow morning. I don't know where our mailbox is. I cleaned a shower for three hours, and it went from gray and off-white to gleaming white--which was strangely satisfying and super gross all at once.

My show opened, barely, kind of. It was the train wreck of all train wrecks with the 'opening' essentially also functioning as only dress/tech. Somehow it was kind of good (it should have been awful). Someday I will write more about the show.

I have a date tonight, and hopefully once I am settled blogging will be a thing that happens more. Hopefully!

Also insanity seems to be spreading through my office.

"I Had a Date" and "Is This What It Is Like to Be a Boy?"

The date was mostly very good. The dinner was very nice and the drinks after the movie were excellent. Nice conversation. He was sweet and smart and funny and so was I (I think), and I believe we both generally had a good time at those things--if not a great time. This was a longish date and it totally could've been longer just fine, or that was how I felt.

We however saw the totally wrong first date movie. "Superbad" is very funny but very juvenile and teenage boy raunchy and by raunchy I mean RAUNCHY! Now this would've probably been less weird if we had in anyway known how the other would react to that sort of thing, but we didn't, so there was that kind of awkwardness. The wow this is weird to be watching this right now sort of awkward. Also, not a whole lot of opportunity for really much closeness at all. Not in dirty teenager comedy, maybe should've picked something a little more grown-up even if it would've been less funny. I would've swapped comedy for potential hand holding or something.

However the date recovered from that very well when we had drinks, and I saw him again last night although not in any formal capacity. He goes to see Anna's show, and I decided that if I got to see him, I should totally go under the auspices of "studying my character" which really translated to more seeing of him. I tried to intimate that in a text, but who knows how it came across.

This is where my wonder from the title comes in. I like Sam, and I think I like him a lot, but half the time I am not sure if he at all likes me except that he responds to my texts and comes to the movies with me. Now, I accept that he is a much more shy person than I am, and my spy Anna has led me to believe it has been a while since he really did much dating, but often I can't tell if he really likes me.

Is it this hard to date girls and do all the work? How do you keep asking them out? Is it really this uncomfortable? I am sorry. This is why I always tried to be decisive (even if sometimes I majorly failed) although chances are if my response wasn't enthusiastic, I wasn't interested.

Ugh. Hopefully sometime I will have time to have a date with him that makes some of this more clear. Except moving is taking up all my time. grrrrrr. . .

Ahh packing. . .

How I freaking hate it. Anyone have any spare moving fairies or house elves I could borrow? I really don't want to do it. I don't think mind moving the boxes, but the packing and the unpacking might just kill me. Plus we have a finite window for movng truckness. Seriously, I can't wait for like two weeks from now to happen because then I will have a new place and a cat and all sorts of things will probably have calmed the fuck down.

Seriously, I offer beer to help move. Seriously.

Oh and we have no TV. No new Heroes, no new How I Met Your Mother. God hates me.

Bossiness

I am a bossy person. I just am. And I don't think I can always avoid it. I have been bossy since I was a toddler--it is just way too late to fix it now. Sometimes this bossiness serves me well. It gets shit done, decisions get made. It can help me be productive and efficient at times (as long as I don't use my powers for evil--as my friend Chris would say).

I do try to avoid being bad bossy. By bad bossy I mean so bossy that I bully the people around me into doing what I want. Lately, I have not been sure if I am bullying a few key people in my life. Part of me very much wanted to just make them agree, but the other part also realized that it would be completely unfair to allow them to be swept away by my momentum. My momentum can be pretty overpowering. I acknowledge that when I get going on something, you have to resist me very strongly in order to change my momentum.

And I don't always recognize in the moment when I am being a bully--especially if people seem to just want to go along with me because I care more. I don't think my cares are automatically more important than the cares of those around me just because my cares are often louder. Striking the balance, and figuring out the cares of some of the people in my life who are not very likely to loudly state their own cares can be hard for me. I expect everyone to be able to voice their own cares as loudly as I voice mine, or rather I expect them to be as unable to suppress the voice of the cares as I am.

I don't want to be a bully, but I can live with some of my bossiness. I hope that the people in my life realize that all I need is to be told what they want too, and I will take it into characterization.

First Rehearsal

It is hard for me to be a smart ass without jazz hands.

Now obviously I mean figurative jazz hands. I don't make jazz hand with my actual hands when I am a smart ass, but I do sort of make jazz hands with my voice. I kind of take it up and out, but I am playing a smart ass who serves it way under, and that was a challenge for me in the first rehearsal. Hopefully it will get easier. That was the big thing I came away with at rehearsal, oh and I am playing someone a little more deeply rooted to the earth then I am, but I think I can fix that with appropriate warm-up preparation.

Rehearsal was fun though! All my scenes are with Anna, so it was just us and the director and the learning to be a stage manager. That was it, nice and cozy. Sunday I have my first big rehearsal with other people, you know like a week before I perform for the first time. So that is cool. And a little strange, but whatevs.

My date may have to rain check tonight because he has been very sick, and if he is still sick, then a date would not be all that much fun. Anna said he had to leave work yesterday he was so sick, and apparently he is not one of the people who ever leave work, so yeah. I will wait and hear.

Maybe not so much homeless

I emailed landlord of the perfect location apartment this morning, and I should hear back from him soon. We are going to take it. It isn't perfect, but it is in the perfect place, and we get to paint it!!!

This is a huge relief. Seriously, I think I had been making myself ill over this. Soon there will be a housewarming party, and anyone who wants to help paint can.

Also, I have a date tomorrow night. That is all.

BTW

Still fucking homeless. The apartment we looked at was a teeny tiny hole. There was no closet in one bedroom, only the couch would fit in the living room. So not happening. Some hot prospects on Craig's List though, even one close to Pier 1 and close to Fullerton bus. That would work.

Project Success

That's me. I seem to have become a project for my friend Anna because I went and got headshots, so she thought I needed to have them sent to the director of the show she is in. That led to a little cold-read audition last night that led to a part. Yeah, I am in a show. In fact, I am in a lesbian stage soap opera (it is a soap opera that is a play that is in a bar with a new episode every week set in the GLBT community).

I am going to replace another actress who is leaving, and my friend Anna apparently just finagled me a gig where I play her new best friend. So, first rehearsal tomorrow and first show two weeks from yesterday (oh holy fuck I just realized that), plus I don't get a final script until Wednesday. Goody, that will be nice. Thank god I can memorize lines on the bus.

By the way, this is the same Anna who arranged for me to meet the boy she works with because apparently a month or so ago she woke up, took a look at my life, and thought, "I could do this better." Not that I am complaining, it is possible she is doing it better. Now if she could arrange for me to get a much better paying job that works me much less. Hmmmm. . . Just kidding.

Although, now I am glad that I hadn't had time to call and ask the new guy to go to the movies with me on Wednesday because I would've had to stand him up (and that would've been terribly not ok for first date). So, tonight I am going to call him and ask him to a movie on Thursday night because I have decided I am going to be a girl who asks boys on dates. (Really just this one boy).

Sidebar, kind of scared of the part I am getting in the show. Unlike anything I had done in a long time before I took a long time off from acting, must work hard on supressing lame ingenue tendencies as they will fuck up this part. Might have to get all jaguar up in here--actually, that would work awesome! Hmmm...

Seriously?

I am so tired right now my brain has turned to mush and might well give up. However, I maybe found a place to live. It is literally right down the block (we would go from 1242 to 1228) and we might be able to start moving in tomorrow, assuming I don't hate it when I see it (and maybe not even then) and the landlord lets us live there. Please, please, please!

Lesson Learned

That is only to be expected if this is the new CW. After all my dithering last week, I learned a lesson over the weekend that basically told me to shut the hell up (while still seeming like an episode of a TV show).

I had a very eventful weekend that started with a boat cruise and ended with an emergency room visit with some flaming cheese in between (don't worry, none of those things were related).

My friend Anna has been trying to set me up with her friend Sam for some tme--but she has been pursuing this in a way that left me a little worried. Not that she gave me good reason to be worried, it s just that when your friends are trying to set you up they sometimes tell you strange things that sound awful to you but actually are not at all (see the scene from "When Harry Met Sally" where they talk about whether or not having a good personality means a woman is or is not attractive). Sally is attractive and she has a good personality, but you can see where the guys are coming from. Anyway, on boat cruise I meet Anna's friend Sam and for the five seconds he talks to me he seems as nice as you can seem in five seconds. Then he doesn't talk to me again--definitely reaffirming my feelings that I am the scary ogre girl.

Also, this is a work party for his work, and it turns out Anna may have told half of the people there that she intends me for Sam, and I look pretty good (having dressed and made up to you know be a knockout or at least as close to knock out status as possible--ie I look like my headshots). Sam is the head or someone very close to the head of their IT dept and is a little bit of a nerd, and when I was described as "my goofy friend Heather" I think I was meant to look more goofy and less fashionable then I managed to pull off that night. I was supposed to look more like I regularly do, but somehow I morphed into intimidating hot girl--lord knows how. Anyway, he was a little shy, and I can be overwhelming to shy types. Plus, while on the boat, it seemed like a total bust.

Then we all went to a few bars (including a piano bar because he plays and has his own baby grand and is a bit of a piano nerd). Anyway, then there was talking and later, when a group of us was back at his apartment, there was more talking. This was about the time I learned my lesson. It turns out that sometimes I forget actually can be fairly decisive, and there is a world of difference between wanting to go on a date with someone (this Sam person, if you need an example) and not really wanting to go on a date with someone but somehow feeling you ought to (ie some other case I may have talked about). This especially uncomplicated when all people involved live in the same place. So yeah. There is that. (PS nothing really excited has happened yet, so don't get your panties in a bunch. All that's happened is that I think I am going to ask him to a movie.)

The flaming cheese was at a Greek town restaurant Saturday night, and the hospital was my roommate this morning, although I am pleased to report that she is doing fine. Although we can't seem to find an apartment to save our souls. We thought we had one, but nope. Not so.

But I have an audition tonight. Woo hoo!

Would I be a jerk if. . .?

See, I have this dilemma. A friend of mine here in Chicago seems to be kind of, well, in love with me for lack of a better explanation. A very long time ago, when we first met and before we were friends, we had a fling (and by fling I really mean one night stand). This fling is totally common knowledge amongst pretty much everyone we know because we kind of talk and joke about it constantly.

I was kind of a bitch to him right after it happened because I was a big raw emotional nerve still smarting from a really scarring break-up that happened mere months before and because I didn't really know him and kind of assumed he was just a tool (because nice, good guys were not as useful in my sad little brain as jerks were in getting back at aforementioned ex-boyfriend who had no idea any of this was happening--yeah, I know that makes no sense but it is an accurate representation of what my brain was thinking at the time, I told you I was a hot mess).

Then we got to be friends, and we are both part of the posse that moved from the University of Idaho to Chicago, and that group has formed a sort of family unit here. We hang out a lot, we celebrate family holidays together, and we overlook the fact that some of the people in the group have no love for others of the people in the group (Brian Bush and Angie are the example there), but we just decide to be together in spite of that--just like a real family. Now not all parts of this group spend equal time together. There are the girls who watch silly movies, and no boys come shopping with Schlegs and I (except sometimes Plummer in capacity as gay best friend), and there is the baseball fanatic group, and the football fanatic group, etc. The person who is in love with me and I tend mostly to see eachother only occassionally at the big whole "family" events.

Last spring, I first noticed the, "Hey, I think he might think he likes me!" business, but he had just gotten pretty horrificly dumped by a way serious girlfriend, so I chalked it up to a crush that would soon pass, like over the summer which he was spending in New Mexico. But he is back, and it seems not to have passed. It might have gotten more serious.

Now pretty much all of our friends here would be thrilled if we got together, and he is a good guy and I admit that there is some palpable attraction between the two of us, BUT (and I know you all knew that was coming) here is the thing. If I felt this way about a guy, just a random guy who nobody else really knew, I would for sure pursue it in a casual, "Let's just have fun and see where it goes," sort of way. However, I don't think this guy sees us in those terms, I think that he would see anything starting between us as FOR REALS. We jokingly compare him to a girl (and he once said there is a tiny little vagina in his heart--to defend his tears during "The Notebook"), and in this case it is true--he would play-forward the relationship in his mind (probably to our wedding/happily ever after) like girls are generally assumed to do.

Now, if this was again just a guy, that probably wouldn't give me too much pause, but he isn't just a guy. He is part of my family here, and if we didn't work out (and I am not really feeling this as more then just a for fun thing instead of a massive relationship thing), what would that do to our entire family? I think that would be rough. I also think it would especially suck to be the villain in that piece, and it seems very likely that that is exactly what I would be, so I have chosen the path where I just leave this alone unless I start to feel that I would be interested in giving this a big serious relationship go.

All that is background to the current dilemma. He has asked me to go with him to the opening of The Crucible at Steppenwolf. It would mean a free ticket to the show as well as an invitation to the cast, crew, important donors opening party because he works in their costume shop and as a member of the greater crew, has earned a spot for him and a +1. Now, he didn't couch this as a date in any way, but this will be the second or third time he has chosen me out of the group of our family and friends to get to do something like this. In fact, the only time he hasn't chosen me, he took Brian Bush when they lived together or he took the now ex-girlfriend, or he took all three of us, and that was before anyone else lived here. Since the others have moved here, and he has lived alone, he only seems to invite me. So, I have a suspiscion that he is using things he knows I will find irresistable to end up on a date-like situation with me. I really want to go, but I don't want to be a total jerk and keep using him in a manner that kind of feels like stringing him along. I really don't know what to do because I feel like I either get to not be a jerk or go to the fancy-schmancy opening. Any sort of help, advice, perspective is totally welcome in the coments.

Food for thought

Heretic. That is the name of an episode of "This American Life" about a preacher from Oklahoma City who attended Oral Roberts University and was a major force in the Pentecostal and Charismatic Evengelical Movement until a few years ago when other evangelicals branded him a heretic because he stopped believing in and preaching hell.

He is a scholarly pastor, and he has studied the books of the Bible in their original Greek and Hebrew. In fact, he has spent a good deal of time trying to trace his understanding of Biblical scripture to their oldest extant versions because he wanted to be sure that his understanding was as accurate as possible. This episode told the story of how that led him to what he calls a revelation from God that a truly loving God would not send anyone to Hell, that there is no Hell. Everyone is saved. And it changed his life. It nearly destroyed his 5,000 people a Sunday church, and he went from being one of the most influential pastors in the United States to one of the least influential pastors in Oklahoma City all because he preached a Gospel of Inclusion.

Hellfire and demons, to God loves everyone. I reccomend you go to the "This American Life" website and find their archive page for the year 2006. In Novemeber (I think) the episode "Heretic" aired, and it is an amazing revelatory story that made me understand a lot more about people of strong faith in my life, and it actually gave me a new and refreshing perspective on faith (No I am not going to go all crazy Bible thumping on you or even on me). Go the page, stream the episode, come on back and talk about it in the comments.

Meet the soon to be member of my family

I don't know whether or not it is a boy or a girl. My friend/coworker Sherry found the teeny little one in her alley last night, and she has been so kind as to hold onto baby kitten until we get a new kitten friendly apartment in October. Yes!!!! I am so excited.

(Although, apparently new kitties are going around, my friends Robyn and Joe just got one too!)

Bad Shakespeare

Last night Chris Plummer and I saw some. It was Cymbeline at the Chicago Shakespeare Theatre, and it was not good. In fact, it was a good deal like the moneyed Shakespeare productions they make fun of in the Canadian TV show "Slings and Arrows." There was no life in it, there was mostly pretty words and bad, cartoonish characterizations (seriously only an idiot Imogen would've fallen for that Iacomo), and the costume design concept seemed to be color vomited all over the stage. There was some very Caisley-esque flag waving and some cool special effects (which were cool even if really odd in the context of the world of the play, but they were in fact better then watching the story).

Posthumus was good. I actually would've liked to have seen him in a production where the other actors were as good and generous and unencumbered with excessive frivolity, although I wonder how the director allowed him to be so plain--seeing as everyone else seemed to be encouraged to be ridiculous.

Thank God we didn't pay for our tickets (which were in excellent seats--the one excellent thing I can say for the production, although the lighting design was quite good too). I am glad I thanked Holly (my friend who gave me them) before I saw it, so it could sound sincere.

Oh, and for fans of "Gray's Anatomy" the actor who played Posthumus was the pregnant man that Christina and Meredith stole from the psych ward at the beginning of season two (at least, I think that happened in early season two).

It was bad. Chris and I almost inappropriately giggled several times and had to clutch each other at other moments too. In the show's defense, it was their first preview, so it is likely that we saw the show at its worse, but even if it doubly improves by opening, it will still be a bad production.