Oh my. Revealed?

Today, Toby and I canceled our Netflix subscription because they are joining forces with Walmart. We talked about canceling before we heard this because we already spend enough on cable but in the end we still found some quality in using Netflix. But the news about Walmart sealed the deal.

This weekend we wandered around and enjoyed the great weather. We saw art and sat in the park. And we met two new wonderful people. I took some pictures. They are below. Enjoy!

(You may click on each thumbnail to enlarge.)

I watched this little boy have his face painted. (Images are shown in reverse.)

Central Park. A little boy has his face painted.

I love the little girl’s reaction behind him. She looks green with envy. Perhaps she went next.

A woman has her portrait done in Central Park.

We went to the Whitney to see the final day of the Hawkinson exhibit. Which was absolutely amazing. I think Anna summed it up well when she said, “I love that everything here, no matter how small, holds an element of surprise.”

She’s right. His sculpture really makes you feel included somehow. Truly amazing. All I was able to capture from the event were the banners that hung outside the Whitney. When I tried to take a picture inside, I was quickly scolded by a guard. Oops! :]

Anna, Gerry and Toby Joe on a rock in Central Park.

Gerry and Liz outside at Union Pool.

Anna. (You can tell here, but that dog only has three legs. He’s missing his front, left leg entirely. But he got around just fine! He also hated cameras. Every time Toby and I pulled ours out, he’d freak out and start barking. Weird.)

Evolution of a laugh.

Liz and Anna laughing.

Alex and behind him another woman named Anna who befriended us moments later.

Missy and Anna outside Union Pool.

Today, we’re off to see The Hawkinson Exhibit at the Whitney. Nothing quite like waiting until the last possible minute. :]

If we’re lucky, we might even pop by Ashes and Snow at Pier 54. I hear that one is pretty amazing as well.

From CNN: Survey: Northeast has dumbest drivers.

The state of Rhode Island leads the nation in driver cluelessness, according to the survey. The average test score there was 77, just eight points above a failing grade.

Those in neighboring Massachussets were second worst and New Jersey, third worst.

Yay Rhode Island! Go New Jersey!! New York is up there, too as well as the Nation’s Capital.

If you knew someone was having an affair, or had and affair would you tell their spouse?

This is probably impossible to answer but I’m curious.

Edited to add: This post is about a man named Matt who doesn’t read this site. I don’t know him either. I do know a friend of his, tho. And he knows a thing or two about Matt’s “side projects”.

Come Sunday, Toby Joe and I will be half-way through the first phase of this god damn diet. I’m only using the term “god damn” because not eating breads and sweets and pasta dishes has been so unbelievably hard. I won’t lie. I love pasta. I love cake. Yesterday, my office held its monthly Birthday Bonanza. You know, the one where they say “Happy Birthday!” to everyone who was born during that month? And when I walked into the conference room, there were about 150 multi-colored pink, blue, white and yellow cupcakes laid out before me. This horrifying realization could have only been slightly more traumatic for me had they been cookies. Because I love cookies. I love them. I practiced as much self-control as possible and am proud to announce I left the room without a beautiful colored cupcake. Marvel at my strength, would you? I must reap at least one benefit from turning down 150 cupcakes. I’m a nymphomaniac for sweets.

Otherwise, it’s been hardest at night. At some point yesterday a guy was on the train scarfing down a bag of potato chips. Only they weren’t just any old bag of potato chips. They were these:

Toby and I finished off an entire bag of these from our hotel bed in Disney. That’s how serious I am about potato chips. And I thought about asking him for one. One won’t hurt right? Had he been eating these:

he would have lost arm and the chips. (PENNSYLTUCKEY REPRAZENT!)

So we have 8 more days of this. And I know you’re not supposed to weigh yourself during the first 14 days, but I have done so every day and already I’m down 5 pounds. It’s a bit of a reward to have that happen. I only wish it were a bit more noticeable.

That is all. Enjoy your vacation day/weekend whatever.

I’m sure that for some what I ate today for my pre-lunch snack will sound totally gross. But holy shit balls, would I totally pay someone to bring me a few more right now.

I took Tofurky deli slices and smeared some fat free creme cheese on each slice. Then, I rolled them up. Holy crap, it was really good. Those South Beaching should try it sometime. :]

It seems that SPD went off with a minor hitch last night. Sorry to anyone featured today who might be reading this. To err is human. heh. It was sort of whacked for several hours. Our bad. But we managed to catch it before 7 a.m. EST. thanks to a slew of email letting me know. Oops. We had a minor mess-up with the renaming of folders, etc. But that’s o.k. because there are some really great people featured today. Thanks to all.

my 10 year old student work!

I was going through some closet junk recently and I discovered some slides that were taken of my student work from Penn State. (ha!) Wow. That’s all I have to say about that. Enjoy the weirdness! The impracticalness! The non explanation!

Soap for women. (Apparently dismembered women)

Magazine spread for “World of Dreams” (Title given my the professor in Italian. ha!) I can’t seem to find the other spread—you know, the one that explains it all.

Self-promotional piece. This one really calls for an explanation. But I don’t have the time.

And last, but not least, the UGLIEST candy store shopping bag ever conceived and created. yay!

I am officially employed again. YAY! Tonight, I celebrate somehow. How does one celebrate while dieting? Oh, that’s right, one celebrates by doing freelance tonight. Ah well.

I can’t seem to send images to Flickr from my phone. I try and I get an error. It reads: UNABLE TO SEND. I’m sure it has everything to do with my T-Mobile account and nothing to do with my ignorance or Flickr. (Yeah right. I’m sure it’s totally me.) This might be something for the husband to answer.

When I was growing up, one of my most favorite beach “casino” games was the one with all the quarters. Seeing all those shiny coins waiting to drop off that ninety-degree angle and fall with a clink into the metal cup before me was too much for me to avoid. I would beg my parents for dollars, and quarters and more dollars just to see if MY COIN, the metal body I dropped in, would be the one to push them all over the edge. I rarely ever got anything more than a dollar in return, but over the years I must have dropped hundreds of quarters into those machines just hoping I’d eventually knock a bunch off and make room for more.

Every weekday, I take the L train from Brooklyn to Manhattan. I get off at 14th Street, Union Square and then hop on the 4/5/6 headed uptown. Most of the time, I get to work in 20-30 minutes just because the 4 Express runs from 14th to Grand Central which is my stop. But on occasion, the 4/5/6 gets constipated, anyone going anywhere from the Brooklyn Bridge all the way along the western side of Manhattan is pretty much screwed. Rest assured, however, most of any office will arrive late, that’s many people use that line.

Usually, it’s not so bad. The 4/5/6 runs nearly every 4 minutes—sometimes even more often. So getting to work isn’t usually a problem. However, on the days where something goes wrong, Union Square is an absolute mess.

For example, take the very first day I worked at the new office. I left a little before 8:30 leaving me ample time to get to work by 9:30. Plus, I really wanted to test just how long this commute would take me should I get the full time job. The only other time I had followed the route was during the afternoon on the day of my interview, and trains run differently when it’s not rushhour. But on the morning of my first day, even the L was even on its best behavior; things were looking good. That is, up until I hit Union Square.

The platform of the 4/5/6 train was JAMMED packed with human sardines. It was so crowded, the NYPD were forced to block all those coming downstairs from above. Somehow, I managed to get down before this happen, not my experience on the platform was more pleasant by any means. You see, the platform at Union Square running alongside the 4/5/6 is thinner than most trains’ platforms. While this makes little to no sense to me given it’s a major artery for most commuters, that’s the way it is. Maybe that’s why they run so frequently. Who’s to know? So as I stood there there, behind scads of tightly packed people, with another pack of humans directly behind me, asses touching asses, as they waited on the local track, I couldn’t help but picture what would happen should the NYPD not show up to stop the flow of people.

One might now consider me a waiting quarter. And should another coin choose to disobey the NYPD on a day where we’re backed up in rows of five or more on the platform of the 4/5/6, I might surely meet my demise in 2 inches of some of the most toxic, trashy dumpster juice known to man.

My rabid fear of flying brings out some of the weirdest ideas and spoken word. I’ve asked Toby Joe what clouds are, how a plane works, whether the wings are attached and if they can handle being hit with a 90-degree wind at 37 thousand feet. It’s almost as if when I’m afraid, I become a 7 year old all over again.

Last Saturday, as our plane circled New York City and more precisely, JFK, I began to freak out a little bit. Not that I hadn’t totally lost it before when we were flying up the coast of South Carolina and the pilot suggested we return to our seats because it was “Gonna get a bit bumpy folks. We are experiencing a wind shift at 90 degrees.” At that moment, I just sat there, white knuckled as the dripping sweat from the palm of my right hand saturated my left pant leg while my left palm took on Toby’s. Man, I know you’ve heard it before. Man, I know I’m predictable. But man, do I hate flying.

It was when I saw the lightening over Manhattan did I begin to realize we were going to die up there. That’s when I tried to convince myself that death wasn’t so bad, it was HOW it was going to happen that scared me the most. I sat there irrationally waiting for my life, Toby’s life, and my brother’s life to come to a blazing fiery end.

Fear is a weird thing. And if you have a legitimate fear of something, it brings out the most bizarre, irrational thoughts.

During our flight, I began to wonder about something. Let’s say that somehow we were all born with the knowledge of HOW we’re eventually going to die, do you think we’d still fear the things that we know won’t actually claim us?

A friend of mine used to remind me time and time again when I’d go into one of my regular moments of second-guessing everything and assuming the absolute worse, that “there is nothing to fear but death itself.” Granted, he was a goofy philosophy major who, back then, really wanted to believe it as well. But ultimately, I guess that’s true. When you boil it down, fear can be condensed to dying.

All that being said, and assuming that this (albeit sophomoric) philosophical view is something you might buy into, if we knew what would eventually take our life, would we still fear? Would it then boil down to pain? Would we begin to fear smaller things like riding a bike, crossing the street, using a sharp knife or driving?

And finally, could someone please tell me exactly how I am going to die so I can fly to India? Thanks.

Here is one of the images I took while in Orlando. Obviously, there are more to come. (I’m waiting for our film to get processed, too.)

I swear to all that is sacred and good that what you’re seeing here isn’t as naughty as it appears to be. But holy crap, did we ever laugh like a bunch of neanderthals when it was discovered.

Due to the fact Toby Joe and I were in Fort Wilderness during the gearing up of the Half Ironman contest, we have begun the South Beach Diet. There is nothing more humiliating and inspiring and humbling than seeing a bunch of unbelievably healthy men and women prepare for a triathlon while on vacation.

My goal is to lose 25 pounds. (But I’d be pleased with losing 20.)

Wish us luck.

Last week, Toby Joe and I met the ENTIRE family down in Florida for a reunion, which had been planned nearly a year and a half ago. We left last Sunday on an afternoon flight that was scheduled to touchdown in Orlando at around 4 in the afternoon.

Have you ever put something off due to unwarranted dread up until the very last minute and once you finally decide to go ahead and do it, you look back and you regret the fact that you hadn’t discovered/attempted/embraced said dreadful deed before your time was up? That’s how I will begin to describe Epcot’s new ride Mission: Space. We didn’t actually try it out until Friday, our last day there. Add to that description a (permanent) plastic barfbag holder, some claustrophobia, Gary Sinise and a whole lot of biting back nausea and you have an overall description of the ride. Oh, but I forgot the most important part; It’s frickin’ brilliant.

The ride simulates traveling into space. It begins at Cape Canaveral and ends on Mars. The warnings thrown all over the inside of the ride were almost more frightful than the actual ride. And I’m convinced they are (along with the sick individuals waiting for their braver [or dumber] loved ones who can’t stop riding) the main reason the line never broke a 5 minute wait; people are made to fear it. Not that said fear isn’t warranted. Toby never made it on. Especially after I got off the ride the first time and told him I had to bite back vomiting as that horrifying yet familiar feeling of nauseous warmth moved from my head all the way down to m my toes. Some of you might think I’m exaggerating. I’m glad I’m not. It was, by far, the most exciting “ride” I’ve ever been on.

First, they strap you into this rather small vessel. You’re to share it with three other people. Up until you actually enter the vehicle and pull down the safety bar, you’re able to bail. (I bailed twice, actually. I bailed twice even AFTER going on the damn thing once before and knowing what to expect.) But once you’re in that seat, you’re captive and the only thing left to do is keep your eyes open at all times, and stare at the monitor straight ahead of you no matter what happens.

Blasting off was the worst part. The vessel you’re in moves so you’re lying on your back. At that point, the monitor shows a blue sky. As the countdown begins, smoke fills the screen and then it happens – the weirdness.

What you’re seeing before you on the monitor is forward movement, yet you’re not actually going anywhere. Your body begins to feel heavy, your cheeks move to the back of your neck and your fat moves in alongside of you; the ride is spinning to simulate the speed at which one takes off. And then the warmth hits. While this was happening, a sound came up from my throat. While sounding it out would work best, it might be written like this:

Auuulrrrgggahhh

Before you know it, you’re breaking through clouds and you’re floating through space. And somehow, they simulate weightlessness. And somehow, my brother, my father and I spend hours trying to figure out how. Without a point of reference, there is no way of knowing which way you’re spinning or if you’re spinning at all. And if you are spinning, what degree do they have your body? There is no way of knowing and it’s all done perfectly. What I mean to say is you REALLY feel as though you’re taking off. You are REALLY made to feel as though you’re in space and weightless. You are REALLY made to feel frightened and sick. You are REALLY there – in space. And holy shit is it ever the coolest, scariest most potentially disgusting ride I’ve ever been on. And holy shit is ever worth the potential nausea and barf.

And I simply cannot stop thinking about it.

After blasting off, you orbit the moon to get enough momentum to get to Mars. This too is a bit harrowing. But they give you enough breaks (I guess from spinning) as to avoid projectile vomiting. And as long as you keep your eyes open and PEELED on the monitor before you, you’ll do just fine. They simulate turbulence during a meteor shower. The ride ends with a manual landing onto the surface of Mars – an event providing the last and final moment of biting back the barf.

Finally, the ride is over and you drunkenly get off and dizzily stumble through the exit doors. Five minutes, an hour, three hours later, you’re still dizzy but that’s not nearly enough of a reason to not totally want to go through it all over again. And my bailing out two out of the four times was not due to fear. It was due to a gleeful dread a dread that has me wishing they had on in NYC or everywhere so everyone could experience it. It’s totally worth a puke or two.

To quote a wise man named Will Oldham, “Fear and dread cannot be confused; by dread I’m inspired, by fear I’m amused.”

Last night, we touched down in New York City. Greeted by rain, wind and 50-degree weather, it’s hard getting back into the swing of things. Moving from head-jolting roller coasters or simulated trips to Mars into the slow, sputtering stench-filled bowels of the MTA is a bit of a shock. But last night as I watched the small graphic of our plane skip up the Jersey coast on the tiny screen before me, I imagined it returning to any other place; I ‘m happy with its final destination.

Vacations are kind of evil, actually. The anticipation is exhilarating, the actual vacation is usually a blast, but returning to the daily grind is damn near crippling. It’s almost crippling enough to bypass vacationing entirely.

I will upload pictures soon. There are many but I will try my damnedest to edit. In the meantime, I am trying to catch up on all that I missed.

Tomorrow, it’s back to work.

Starting Sunday, we’ll be in Florida for a week of fun in the sun. I’ll probably update from there as we’ll both be working from time to time finishing up freelance, etc. Plus, SPD has to be pushed live on Wednesday night. I have everything prepared already so if need be I can upload everything while drunk. I always think ahead.

In the meantime, please feel free to peruse my Flickr account as I will be uploading images of humans dressed as stuffed animals. Yes.

If you’re reading this, might I suggest visiting this person, and this person, or this person, and there’s always this person and of course this person and don’t forget about this person. Ok, I’ll stop now.

I gotta tell ya, I’m pretty happy with this week’s Self-Portrait Day. I feel like I discovered a couple of new sites and faces. I also rediscovered one I hadn’t been to in a while. If you haven’t already done so, go take a look. One guy is seemingly having sex in his portrait. Which I didn’t notice until after it went live. I thought it could just be me and my filthy mind, but then Amanda sent me an email suggesting as much, too. Actually, I think it was more like DUDE, THAT GUY IS DOING IT!

Have a look. See it for yourself.

Last night, I met Missy at Von for a few beers. And then we went to Bontanica and had a few more beers. There, we were joined by Toby and a coworker of his as well as my brother, Ryan. We also ran into an old friend, Jimmy but he left right away because he had a hot date. Good times were had by all—maybe too good of times were had by all. It was nine o’clock and I realized I still hadn’t had anything to eat besides the 1.5 deep fried cheese stick(s) Ryan graciously gave me after I begged for it.

At around 10, Ryan left to drink more beer with fellow NYU Master Graduates (He graduated on Tuesday. YAY RYAN!) and the four of us took off on the F Train heading towards a section of Brooklyn that I hadn’t been before. Once out at Bergen Street, Missy headed home and Toby, Keith and I headed towards the water. And I may have gotten a bit grumpy and for that I am sorry. Our goal was to dine at Alma. We’ve been told that not only does it have some of the best food in Brooklyn, but it sports the most amazing view of Manhattan as well. (It kind of reminded me of Loreal Plaza in D.C.) Unfortunately, I was unable to rate the goods because by the time we got there, the idea of Alma serving anyone food was a mere memory for them. So we had a few more beers instead. It was a liquid dinner, indeed. Which reminded me of the old post September 11th Michele—the girl who drank her nightly meals and fell into bed every night wondering if there’d even be another day. Only the current Michele is a lot happier and a lot less fearful of every passing minute.

(Derailment, sorry.)

By midnight, we were so exhausted and I was pouring Jelly Bellies down my face as if they were peanuts. Toby and I headed home in a taxi and I fell into bed, dead.

That is how we roll in our Hobo gear. That is what we did last night, it is.

It’s morning now. I’m at work. And I’m still hungry.

Here are some photos of an abandoned island in Japan. How amazing would that be to see? (Thanks, Ben.)

Here is some information about the actual island. Enjoy!

I haven’t had much time to peruse the cell phone picture-uploading option on Flickr. Is this easy? Up until last Saturday, I didn’t even have a phone with a camera. Now, I do. And I’d like to upload them from time to time. While I realize I could read up on this, I love to cheat. If anyone would care to share any information regarding the showing of cell phone images, that would be great. I’m most interested in knowing whether there is a way to send them directly to Flickr without downloading them onto a computer first. A gentleman I work with said he’s having a lot of trouble getting the images off his phone and onto his Mac. I haven’t even tried this yet and so I anticipate issues from the get go. Toby and I are heading to Florida next week and I’d love to be able to send images on the fly.

Ideas/suggestions/warnings welcome.

Every once and a while I’ll read something in the newspaper that makes me want to spit like a pack mule. It happens, I can’t deny. And then I have arguments with myself about what I just read. Does this have anything to do with me? Not really. Is it easy to pass judgment? Totally and completely. Am I right in doing so? Not really.

When I was in college, I took a few anthropology courses. Some of them were what one might expect; which is to say they were boring classes where hundreds of kids were made to sit in a the dark and look at hairy slides all the while taking notes. However, there was one course, taught by one man, which really stuck with me.

One day, we were learning about an African tribe. The topic of female circumcision came up.

IT’S SO WRONG! WHY! WHY!?

I HATE MEN. MEN ARE SICK. WE SHOULD CASTRATE THEM ALL.

OF COURSE THEY DON’T WANT WOMEN TO ENJOY SEX.

What would a college career be without those stereo typical, staple discussions? But this time it was different. When one of the girls became worked up about this particular culture and its practices, the professor calmly tried to enlighten us all. He brought up an idea that still sits with me today. And every time I feel myself falling into that same judgmental trap, the one where I become a self-declared knower of all, I think about the point he graciously made.

How can we judge any culture we aren’t a part of? How can we understand or pose this concept of right and wrong on a group of people who know of a life entirely different from our own? Who gave us this right? Us?

And this concept sees itself into other parts of an every day life as well. It doesn’t just rear its head when another foreign culture is brought to light. Living in New York City, I see it all the time, on Subways, in cars, on busy streets, people who believe that for whatever reason they have the right to get to work faster, turn right sooner, take the already over-stuffed train first, be the first one on and the first one out. It’s a goofy display at best. It’s a hateful display at worst.

Truthfully, I get worked up a lot. We all do. I guess the only way I don’t totally piss myself off is to realize when I’m doing it and try and breath a little bit. We’re all in this together, right? We’re all supposed to be biding by some unwritten yet given social contract, right?

I realize that fighting with fellow commuters on the subway and female circumcision in Africa are two entirely different things. I also realize that the article I read today about a widows’ cleansing in Africa pales in comparison to any one New Yorker’s shitty commute on the express 4 or 5 train or how rude the woman on the stairs was at Grand Central Station. But after I read the article about how a widow is forced to have sex with a husband’s living relatives, and after my blood pressure rose above 125 (not something I like to do that early in the morning) I found myself thinking about my sophomore anthropology professor and the time he tried to teach us how to expel judgment and take a breath every once and a while. After all, if one were only allotted a certain number “annoyances” (for lack of a better word), in a lifetime, what would one REALLY apply them to? What unfairness would you actually get behind? Because I think there’s an opening in the Annoyance Division of the NYC Commuting Department—especially if you’re heading uptown. Today, something occurred to me; I’ve got it pretty damn good and most likely, you do, too.

Last week (and today) I uploaded a bunch of new images to my flickr account. Go on over and have a look. Some of them are from the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens and the Cherry Blossom Festival.

Last night, Toby Joe and I finally got around to eating the wedding cake Nico made us last year for the wedding party we threw in celebration of our elopement. It was a perfect ending to a perfect evening’s workout. I know that since the Internet can’t actually eat the cake featured here, this won’t be very exciting. But I’m here to tell you this damn cake was still so damn good. So damn good, as a matter of fact, I think we will continue eating it until it’s either gone or we leave for Florida and need to toss it. It’s not bad luck to eat the entire cake, is it?

Who would have thunk one-year old cake could taste so good? I think I might have some more right now in celebration of breakfast.

mmmMmmmmMMMmmmm a close-up of cake.

There was a cat hair on this picture but I airbrushed it out in Photoshop.

Dear Nico, you are the greatest girlfriend a girl could have. One day, I hope you make millions off of this apparent skill. We were amazed. Plus, this cake has brought us and our tastebuds pure joy three times over the past year. Thank you. That George is one lucky guy.

A year ago today we were driving across the country, moving to San Francisco. That’s totally insane.

On Sunday, as Toby and I were walking around our neighborhood, we came upon a chihuahua. The reason he stood out was because he was in really bad shape. Along with the trouble he had walking, his ears were bloody and his nose as well. There was a woman standing near him. She was talking to him. She kept asking him if he was alright. Of course, I stopped because seeing an animal in pain is exactly what keeps me up at night; some people worry about the homeless, some worry about aborted babies, others worry about war and terrorism. Me? I worry about the welfare of animals.

It’s not that I don’t care about everything else, nor am I particularly proud of this passion. It’s that I honestly have no control over it. If I see an animal in pain - even a rat - it sticks with me for days, sometimes years. To be honest, it’s something I wish I could get a hold of. I think my life might be more enjoyable if it didn’t bother me so much.

There have been times, people have told stories which they probably find harmless, stories about animals and how they died in spite of their attempts to save them. While I appreciate the possible intentions behind this type of story, I can honestly say that if the story doesn’t end with a happy ending, I would rather never have had heard it at all. I know it’s juvenile, but I have learned that when it comes to animal cruelty, it’s best to not share it with me. There isn’t a day that goes by where I don’t ponder the number of animals who die so someone can have lunch. This sort of thing really does shake me to my core. For me, ignorance is bliss when it comes to how humans treat (or mistreat) animals.

But I digress, the chihuahua was hurt and this woman was trying to help it. She asked me to go inside a building to see if he belonged to anyone. At which point I suggested taking the dog anyway, especially given the shape he was in. I pictured someone claiming the dog, taking him back, and doing absolutely nothing for the fella. And he needed help. Badly.

Together, we called the local Bedford animal clinic and the emergency vet. Anna (the woman who first found him) took the dog and walked the animal to the vet, personally.

Toby furiously jotted down her phone number and email onto the palm of his hand because I needed to know that the pooch was going to be cared for. Today, I tried to write her and the email bounced. Apparently, we were one number off. I hope to find out about this fella somehow.

This weekend, Toby Joe and I finally changed our numbers from San Francisco to New York City. We walked into a store on 5th and 14th, which sported a HUGE sign that proudly read: T-Mobile Authorized Seller. (Yeah.)

For the past 9 months, Toby Joe has been using a phone he dropped down 6 flights of stairs. The phone went right in between the rails and fell the entire way down to the bottom floor. It hit every rail and wall along its way. The face was cracked. Miraculously, while he could not see any of the numbers, who was calling him, how much battery power was left, what time it was, or if he had a voice message, he could use it to talk. And so he did—for NINE FREAKING MONTHS. In spite of my half-assed attempts at buying him new phones, we just never replaced it. On Saturday, that time came to an end. Toby demanded it.

Right before this past Christmas I stopped in to this same store in a desperate attempt to try and buy him a new Blackberry. That quest failed because I had no idea what the hell he’d want added to it. I did however remember the store. And so when Toby suggested we go to the T-Mobile store in Brooklyn, I suggested going to this more “legit” one. (Yes, I think I actually used the word legit.)

It turns out, that particular “T-Mobile” store, the one we chose, is basically running out of the back of an unmarked truck. They guys running it are so very shady. I’m certain the store is also a front for other non-cellular items. We both ended up with non-T-Mobile phones. My phone isn’t even offered through T-Mobile. I had to get the latest and greatest hottie. And of course I had to drop an arm and a leg on it because it’s matte black AND it was the last one in the store. And since we were spending so much money on the phones, the drug dealer, I mean sales guy, sold us on the insurance as well. Granted, it’s only $3.00 a month each, but AFTER we took our lovely phones home, it occurred to us that if the phones aren’t supported by T- Mobile, how is it we’ll get new ones should something go wrong with the ones we just bought? Answer? We won’t. You might be thinking, how did we discover that we weren’t actually SOLD T-Mobile phones? When we arrived home, Toby hooked his Treo up to his computer and upgraded the OS. The OS no longer supported the T-Mobile SIM card, and so the phone no longer worked. When he called T-Mobile, they told him it wasn’t a T-Mobile phone and therefore there wasn’t much they could do. His only option was to take it back to the store and trade it in with a T-Mobile version of the same phone. Fine. He called the store, they said come on down. No problem, right?

Wrong.

They didn’t have any of those phones at their store. As a matter of fact, most of the phones they were selling were Cingular versions. Toby got worked up, walked they guy into admitting to a number of lies, and then finally left with the same dysfunctional phone he walked in there with.

In the end, they lied to us about the rebates. They lied to us about our phones being supported (in my case, offered) by T-Mobile. They sold us insurance that isn’t going to be recognized and they lied to us about the cancellation of our previous accounts.

The only GOOD thing that came out of this is that I got a really freaking HOT AS SHIT phone that no other T-Mobile customer can get. It’s so hot; I actually want to use it. I WANT people to call me; I WANT to use the phone. That’s a major breakthrough for me.

Anyway, we called T-Mobile and we gave them the long version of what happened. (Believe it or not, if you’re actually still reading this, this is the short version.) They are upset that this store claims to be an authorized T-Mobile dealership when clearly it is not. They have agreed to back my insurance should something go wrong with my most hot new Motorola Black RAZR. They have agreed to look into getting their “license” revoked. And they’re well aware of our situation should anything go horribly wrong. We are, however, out of hundreds of dollars as the 100-dollar rebate Toby was to get is not real. Plus, he had to drop another 70 on the deductible in order to get an actual T-Mobile version of the Treo.

But we have new New York Numbers and after it’s all said and done, we’ll be saving over 130 dollars a month by using the T-Mobile Family Plan.

Oh, did I mention I got a hot new phone? It really is pretty. I named her Lucy.

For those of you meeting me tonight for dinner and a few drinks, I forgot to wear deodorant. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

I have no idea.

How do these logos get approved? I really don’t get it.

On January 3rd, 2005, Toby Joe and I thawed out the groom’s cake from our wedding party and ate it in celebration of our one year anniversary. Nico, (bless her sweet heart) made us two cakes, one for me, and one for vegan-boy Toby. We decided we’d eat the vegan cake for our real, real anniversary and the other cake for our party anniversary. Well, we missed our party anniversary. We both thought it was the 5th or the 6th, it turns out it was May 1st. For some reason, this makes me a little sad.

Should we still eat the cake? Aren’t I just full of questions today. :/ I hate that I missed that day. I’m usually good at that kind of stuff.

There have been times over the past several years where I have been told by folks that wearing black and brown together is a bad, bad thing and shouldn’t be done. I happen to like to combination. That’s not to say that it is indeed still considered a fashion disaster. After all, this is all coming from a gal who buys her clothing from Target and (on special occasions when she can deal with the overly irriatating crowds) H & M.

There isn’t a week that goes by where I don’t say, “Toby does this look stupid?” I really am retarded when it comes to fashion. I say that with the uptmost honesty. When we were kids we did our back to school shopping at Hills (Sears for shoes). I come from a family where money was spent on trips to Disney World, Vail, The Poconos, boat gas, and weekly pancake binges at a Pennsyltucky Perkins. We didn’t buy fancy threads. Not that I didn’t want them from time to time. ;]

Now, I spend my “extra” money on electronics. I know what to buy if you want a kick ass scanner, but I haven’t the slightest idea what everyone is wearing. I fear fashion. I spend my time trying desperately to fit in just enough so that no one makes fun of me. And that, in my head, usually translates to black and brown. See where I’m going with this one? As a matter of fact, someone should come up with a store where its targeted audience is people like me, people who just want to blend in and feel normal, people who don’t want to call attention to themselves, boring people, black and brown people, those of us inspired entirely by the UPS employee.

You might be asking yourself, “Why would she care? Let it go!” Perhaps it’s residual damage left over from growing up and my family’s back to school shopping habits. I don’t know. But would the Fashion Judge please step forward and finally put my mind at ease; is black and brown really is a fashion fart? Is it a fashion faux pas? Or a good thing?

...I’ll merely post a couple of Email I receive in the past day that made me laugh. Hopefully, they won’t mind.

“Hey, Dirty, baby we got your money Thanks! Just dance like you’re caught up in the Holy Ghost trance If you stop, Ima put sum killer ants in your pants Im the O-D-B as you can see”

And…

“I was in Vegas for four days for my friend’s wedding last weekend. That place is a trip. Here are the HiLites:

• • The hotel where we all stayed was hosting the HawaiianTropic Swimsuit Contest so there were literally hundreds of Moodels running around in thongs and heels. My question is, if you were wearing a thong, hypothetically, wouldn’t you put down a towel before you took a seat at the deli. I mean just out of deference for either your own ass or the asses of other diners.
• • P-Diddy sighting at 4 am Sunday morning
• • about 20 Makers Mark Manhattan’s / 5 Bombay Safire Martinis/other assorted beers wines and liqueurs
• • 3 real bad hangovers
• • 12 hours of blackjack at a net loss of $400 which they tell me is a success

I had so much fun I can’t even tell you but Vegas is a bad place for me. I hope I never have to go back…”

Man, I don’t know what site(s) SPD was linked on last week, because I have little to no time anymore to read any Web site let alone check my stats, but it must have been linked from THE HOT CHICKS WEB SITE because last week, we received a slew of images from hot chicks and they all came in at once! They should go live in a couple of weeks at which point the Internet will feel even more insecure than she already does and then she’ll probably go to the gym and run a few miles.

That’s not to say everyone on there isn’t always totally hot, but these girls are like Internet supermodels. I came home feeling insecure about myself, now I feel even worse. Thanks, ladies.

(Please note: most of this was a joke. Part from the bit about the hot ladies and my raging insecurity. Clearly, I need some sleep.)

Work is going very well. I’m not super excited about getting up so early, but it’s growing on me ever so slowly. Last night, however, some asshat’s car alarm went off at least 2 times an hour from the moment I went to bed (9:30) until the moment I woke up (7:00 a.m.). I was not pleased. I don’t think Toby Joe was either. Asshat Alarm Guy (I just know this was an act of a HE, women would never do such a thing) kept turning it off after about 15 honks but at no point did HE shut it down entirely. It kept going and going and going. I considered throwing my concrete shoe right down from our window straight threw his stupid windshield.

But everyone who reads this site (all 10 of you) know about my concrete shoe and how I tried to sell it Internet last July to buy a new retainer. And so I know this act born out of pure hatred and disgust would come back to haunt me. I know they would find out the shoe was mine.

There is a part of the fantasy where I throw the concrete shoe out our bedroom window and I imagine everyone living on our street giving me a puffy-eyed, pajama-sporting, wobbly - yet standing - ovation. And during that part of the fantasy, I almost convince myself it’s worth it.

Man, I hate this guy. How can someone have such a blatant disregard for other people? I almost want to steal his car. Who knows, if I miss out on enough sleep I just might.

This morning, I got on the 4 train going in the wrong direction. This wouldn’t have been a problem on any other train, but the 4 train is an express train and so I ended up at the foot of the Brooklyn Bridge instead of at Grand Central Station. Mistake and all, it still only took me 45 minutes to get to work this morning.

I developed a roll of film last night. Below, are some images from that roll. Most of them are from Washington Square Park. But there are a few others from Mystic and a night out with friends.

All of the black and white images shown below were taken with a Pentax K1000. The black and white film is TMAX (400). I developed them in our bathroom and then scanned them in using a Konica Minolta 5400 II Negative Scanner. All of the images can be enlarged by clicking on the thumbnail. (Captions, if any, are below each image.)

Mystic Aquarium.

Mystic Aquarium.

Mystic Aquarium.

Toby, Andy, Jon and I at Union Pool.

The fire out back of Union Pool.

Of course, I had to take a close up, or at the very least try and take a close up.