Weekend Words Challenge

Okay, so I'm a little late, and I'm cheating because I only have one half of the assignment complete.

Lately, Los Angeles has been experiencing suffocating weather. It's been hot and humid for over a week, and we're ready for it to be over. We're used to a dry 75 degrees, maybe 80, every day. It's been in the 90s and 100s, with 70 to 90 percent humidity. However, with this weird heat wave is a low pressure system, which has been giving us clouds. We rarely have clouds in LA. It's nice to see them. So, the low pressure system is the Giver, but I don't have a picture of it. Here are the gifts:

SPF

Stuff Portrait Fridays! as encouraged by Kristine Stone:

1. Stuff Unnoticed

As hard as it might be to believe, some people don't notice that I have my tongue pierced.



(Composition is hard when you're doing a self-portrait!!)

2. Your Wish



Is there anything else to say?

3. Stuff Under Your Sink

The magical place beneath our kitchen sink isn't really that exciting, but here it is:



What is pretty exciting is our Shoe Pit, which is all of our shoes in the only place they'll fit: the floor of our closet. This, ladies and gentlemen, is what Gina and I have to dig through every single day to find the shoes we want to wear. Good (or bad) for us, we each alternate between only 2 pairs of shoes.

Weekend Words Challenge

Dream:



7/18/06: This is taken from an airplane over Los Angeles ("city of dreams") at sunrise.


Dare:



7/18/06: This is my friend Lindsay, who is a trainer and dabbles in just about every sport imaginable. She was kind enough to pose for this pic for me.

San Diego

Gina and I had a fantastic weekend in San Diego. We saw the Indigo Girls here...

'

...and saw sunsets like this:



This is where we spent most of our day on Saturday, having drinks and food brought directly to us...



...and THIS is what happens to my face when I'm in the sun for a whole weekend:



And for the first time in a long time, we got to just be with each other, without anyone else:



It was a good thing.

Weekend Words Challenge

I found another game. It's called the Weekend Words Challenge. It's at The Odd Mix. Every week he gives two words, and he wants you to post pictures illustrating those words. This week's words were Entice and Fulfill.

Entice:



Fulfill:



Happy Monday.

SPF

I recently found out about Kristine Stone's website where, every week, she gives you three prompts and encourages you to take/post pictures inspired by the three prompts. This seemed nothing short of amazing to me, so I'm doing it! Hopefully every week. The game is called Stuff Portrait Friday. And guess what? It's Friday! And I have pictures of stuff!

She's getting married this weekend, so there's a bit of a wedding theme...

"Your Love"



Most of you know, that's Gina. Most of you also know that we don't have a kid (yet), and that sunshine you see pouring out of her face is there because she's holding her very first nephew, Giovanni. Imagine what her face will look like when she's holding her first child.

"Honeymoon" (Take us somewhere with your photo.)



This was taken way back in Katie-is-crazy-and-doesn't-own-a-digital-camera! phase of my life. This is in Hawaii, on Maui, near the Sheraton Maui. I was there NOT on vacation but for work. I only spent three days there, and two of those days were travel days, and it rained the last day, but Hawaii is still the best place I've ever visited.

"Something Blue"



I kinda like this picture. Can you guess what it is?

And that's it! The very first Stuff Portrait Friday on It's Katie, everybody!

Have a great weekend. We're off to see the Indigo Girls in San Diego tonight.

All night in Vegas, Recovery, small town Los Angeles, life as an older sister, and independence.

What a week it's been. I debated in providing several entries for you to peruse, but instead I'm lumping everything into what promises to be a huge entry. I'll try to break everything up for easy reading.

All night in Vegas
I go to Vegas about twice a year. Every time I go, I tend to have more fun than the time prior. This past weekend in Vegas was no different.

We stayed at the Imperial Palace, which is sort of a pit, but it's our favorite casino. Well, it WAS our favorite casino, until they went all Disney Vegas on us and started offering only $15 Black Jack tables on Friday and Saturday nights. Still, the Dealertainer pit is nothing to shake a stick at, and we were grateful for the few times we were to sit and bask in the knowledge of Dolly Parton, and also receive terrible cards from one of the stupid Blues Brothers. However, most of our time was spent DOWNTOWN.

Downtown Vegas is old school Vegas. It's the Vegas you see in movies. It's incredibly tacky and fun and outta control. We hung out at Binion's Horseshoe, where we played $5 Black Jack all night long, and where I won $70 and drank and drank and drank. We hit Fitzgerald's, where I lost $40 of that $70 (BOO!), and then we decided it was time to go home. We left the casino and something seemed really weird. I looked around, totally buzzed, wondering what it was. And then I realized...

The sun was up.

It wasn't sunrise. The sun was full on UP. It was day. It was 6:15 in the morning, and it was day. And we hadn't slept.

The rest of the weekend pretty much followed suit, no pun intended. There was heavy drinking (mainly Miller Lite and Bloody Marys, with a few dirty martinis here and there) and lots of card playing. I ended up losing, but everyone that I rode with on the way there and back won. That was fun for me. However, after my requisite 30 minutes of mourning the loss of my money, I remembered how much fun I had and all was well. (I think it's totally fair to have 30 minutes of a hint of crabbiness after you just lost money and everyone you're with won money. Crabbiness for me = not talking.)

I laughed last weekend more than I've laughed in a long time, and it was awesome. I am so grateful for my beautiful girlfriend and my amazing group of friends.

Recovery
This section is labeled recovery for two reasons. One, my laptop is back and better than ever, whooo! I cleaned her up when I got her back on Monday, deleting about 1000 pics and freeing up tons of hard drive. So now she runs more quickly and hasn't given me any trouble. Yay!

Two, we needed some recovery from Vegas and haven't had it. Monday we went to play Poker (goodbye another fifteen dollars!!). Tuesday we went to see Sara Bareilles at the Hotel Cafe. Wednesday I went to Happy Hour. Last night, I got a pedicure, Gina went to Target, and I packed for this upcoming weekend (will discuss in a bit), and we watched Six Feet Under and crashed. This morning: more packing, making sure everything is thrown away, everything's turned off, etc. Exhausted. Can't wait to leave.

Small town Los Angeles
After picking up my laptop on Monday afternoon, I went to Target to buy a case for her as I promised myself I would. I was shopping around, as I can never NOT look at every section in Target. It was hot and muggy here on Monday, and Angelinos deal with mugginess as well as they deal with rain. People are crabby and confused. What is this "moisture" in the air? I finally decided to leave Target and who do I run into, but Gina, in line, her arms full of stuff. Immediately, I realize it's stuff I'm not supposed to see.

I say in my sarcastic manner, "Well, well, well..."

Turns out, she was doing some EARLY birthday shopping for me. Since she works in Pasadena and I work in North Hollywood, why on earth would we run into each other at the Target in West Hollywood?? Well, we did, and so a big birthday surprise has been ruined. But, to keep the surprise from being totally out there, I'm not telling you what it is she bought me... you'll have to wait until my birthday. SUCKAS!

Life as an Older Sister
I've talked on here before about my little sisters and how much they mean to me, and how I feel like they're my own kids as opposed to my sisters, because they're so much younger than me and I spent so much time as a kid babysitting them. Because I think of them as my own, I worry about them. All. The. Time. I think about those two girls more than I think about anything else. I miss them, I'm scared for them, and I WORRY. Are they safe? Are they being looked after (even though they're 17 and almost 20 - Happy Birthday on Sunday, Jess!)? Are they making the right decisions?

Jackie, the 17 year old, called me this morning and I could tell something was wrong. She was sniffly and deep-voiced, as though she just woke up or she was sick or she was crying. Unfortunately, she was crying, and after three times of telling her to slow down and explain what was wrong, she told me she was on her way to calling hours for a friend that OD'd. Eighteen years old, and this girl OD'd on heroin, coke, and Xanax. EIGHTEEN. I'm speechless. I'm freaked out. And I hate that my baby sister has to go to a funeral of a friend, not to mention the fact that Jackie is even friends with someone who would OD...

Independence
On to something happier...

Happy Independence day everybody! I'm going to Catalina this weekend until Tuesday. Have a safe, happy 4th of July, and among the beer and fireworks, take a minute to remember that despite its shortcomings, this IS a great country, and we are lucky to be here.

Much love to everyone.

Things I have learned in the past week that I should have already known, like, six years ago.

1. CD-RWs do not play in every CD player. As a matter of fact, they seem to refuse to play in ANY CD player. Buy CD-Rs for burning music, and use CD-RWs for saving documents.

2. Saving documents - since the floppy was rendered virtually obsolete, especially for us Mac kids, little do I think of actually "backing up" things. From now on, back up at LEAST once a month, if not twice, or every time I make any changes anywhere. Buy that circle CD case you've been wanting for the past two years and use it for all of your computer files and pictures.

3. Organization - don't worry if you don't have the most practical system of organizing your photos. Don't wait until inspiration strikes you with the most perfect organization system ever. BACK YOUR SH*T UP.

4. Print - Print more photos. Buy a scanner, and scan in old photos like you've been meaning to, and BACK THEM UP.

5. RAM - RAM is like short term memory. The more you have of it, the less you need to rely on long term memory to do different things at once. Buy more RAM.

6. Invincibility - Just because someone ran over their powerbook and it still didn't break, that doesn't mean that the computer is totally invincible. Buy a laptop carrying case, and quit carting her around in the back seat of your car.

And finally, something that hasn't changed: Macs rule. People have asked me several times if this incident with my laptop is the end of my love affair with Apple. "You've only had that thing two years and it's broken? Why not switch to a PC?" This is the first time I've ever heard of a Mac busting up this early. And to be clear, I've had her for over 2.5 years, and she's not given me one iota of trouble until now. My mom has had to purchase a new PC desktop every 3 years, and when she does try to get them repaired, the repairs last maybe 3 months before they start SUCKING ASS again. Furthermore, why buy a PC when the newest Macs run Windows as well as OS X point whatever, AND they can run both simultaneously?!

If anything, this experience has made me love my Mac even more. I checked my status online today - the computer is already on its way back to the Apple Store at the Grove. How's THAT for customer service?

I can't wait till she's home.

Absence makes the heart grow fonder.

Today's edition of Laptop in a Coma (I know, I know, it's serious...)

What was really cool about yesterday was that gina and I got $400 for our housesitting gig last week. What was not really cool was what followed the receipt of the $400 check.

We dashed to the the Apple store at The Grove to make my 6:45 Genius Bar appointment. Somewhere, in the deepest part of my heart, I hoped beyond hope that they would have some magic wand to wave over my little laptop to fix it, or that there was some magic key combo that they could push to bring my iBook back to life.

Needless to say, no such luck.

They took it from me and prepped me to pay nearly $400 for repair and data retrieval. (Da da da dun da daaaa, CHARGE!!) Of course, he asked, "Did you back up?" And of course I said, "Uh... no..." I just backed up some pictures this past weekend through mid 2005, so I basically have a year's worth of pictures on the computer that may or may not be lost. He made sure to tell me that there's no guarantee they'll even be able to retrieve all of my files. So pictures, music, and all of my writing... which granted, isn't a lot, but it's enough to feel sick in the stomach to say goodbye to it.

So there's that...

And then this morning, gina and I went running, which was great. We came home, she showered and left, and then I showered and got ready to leave. And I could NOT FIND MY ATM CARD ANYWHERE. Our apartment is so small... and I couldn't find it anywhere. I finally gave up at 9am so that I could get to my car before I was slapped with another $30 parking ticket (it's one hour parking starting at 8am). I forgot where I parked my car and finally remembered, only to stumble upon it and find... A PARKING TICKET ON MY CAR. But not for $30... for $45! Street cleaning! I am so incredibly careful about parking tickets, and I treat them as though they affect my insurance - getting one is like getting a speeding ticket to me. I treat them like that so that I never get them. Well, last night, neither gina or I thought to check the signs in our neighborhood, which was obviously a mistake.

So of course, I started crying. For no reason other than frustration. I texted gina about my ATM card (do you remember where I set it down?). I got on the freeway and guess what? Traffic. Stopped.

Gina texted a few minutes later - SHIT! I have your ATM card. I'm so sorry! I accidentally picked it up.

Good thing I have $2.00 for Coffee Time!!

Traffic was stopped because of a horrible accident where the car was totally flipped on its side. And then of course, I had an annoyingly humble moment where I realized I didn't have it that bad.

ACK.

My laptop is in a coma right now. Seriously. Won't turn on.

I'm sad.

What's a meme?

And how the hell do I tag someone else?

I know – I'm lucky.
I believe – perspective is the key to happiness.
I fought – with my sisters a lot growing up.
I am angered – by ignorance and mean people.
I love – my girlfriend, my friends, and my family.
I need – my confidence to continue to grow.
I take – figurative things literally sometimes. It's a bad habit.
I hear – women reach their sexual peak at 32.
I drink – water, coffee, beer, dirty martinis.
I hate – mustard, and the word "hate" when referencing people.
I use – baby lotion on my hands and feet before I go to bed.
I want – children.
I decided – to try to put nothing into the world but love and see what happens.
I like – laying in a comfortable bed, watching Six Feet Under on a flat screen TV with my beautiful girlfriend.
I feel - caffeinated.
I wear – flip flops from March to November.
I left – my mom in charge of my sisters.
I do – everything in my power to avoid confrontation or conflict.
I hope – some day I make enough money to buy a house.
I dream – of gina and I having kids, a dog, and a back yard.
I drive – 12 miles to work every day.
I listen – to KCRW and KROQ in the morning, and Jack FM in the afternoon.
I type – so quickly people think I'm faking it.
I think – way too much about things that aren't important.
I need – to listen more.
I wish – gina and I lived in a bigger apartment.
I am – grateful. Every day.
I compensate – my savings account when I take money from it to do something fun. Well, I try to compensate it.
I regret – nothing.
I care – about bettering myself.
I should – exercise more and write more.
I am not always – in a good mood.
I wonder – if I'll ever accomplish half of what I wish for.
I changed – a lot from ages 22 to 26.
I cry – when I get angry.
I am not – organized.
I lose – EVERYTHING.
I leave – my cell phone in my apartment a lot, and then I have to climb back up two flights of stairs to retrieve it before going to work.

Confusion

We went to Gay Pride this weekend. I have yet to go through the pictures, but I have to tell you about the most exciting thing that happened on Saturday.

When we got there, we were, as usual, welcomed with open arms full of free stuff. Bags, frisbees, stickers, temporary tattoos, free samples, flyers, CDs, contest entry forms. I grabbed a Pride Guide and looked to see who was performing on the stage. They usually have one big name act and a lot of smaller ones. I let out a loud gasp when I saw who was headlining that night.

The Bangles.

The Bangles weren't going on until 10, and we arrived at 2pm. We knew it was going to take an extreme amount of endurance to drink all day and still manage to be awake enough to see the show. We paced ourselves, and despite every instinct to go home, we stayed for the show.

Best. Choice. Ever.

I hadn't really given the Bangles a thought in a few years. More specifically, I hadn't thought about them much since I came out. But as soon as they started singing, the image of Susanna Hoffs from the Walk Like An Egyptian video came to my mind and didn't leave. And I realized, even though I was by no means an MTV kid (MTV was not permitted in my house), and I probably only saw the Walk Like An Egyptian video a handful of times, that image has remained burned in my memory for twenty years.

My cousin Mark was very vocal about the crush he had on Susanna Hoffs, and I remember being very jealous that he was allowed to have a crush on her and I wasn't. And every time I heard that song as a kid, as well as Eternal Flame, I thought of Susanna in that video, just that one part, after she sings her verse, and the camera is on a medium close up of her face, and she's quietly singing, and her eyes are shifting from left to right.

Sigh. I tried to find a screencap of it, but could only find a thumbnail, which didn't seem to that shot justice. Instead, I'll leave you with this shot:

Cut the shit, Britney! and other Ack! files

Britney Spears will be appearing on the Today show on Thursday. Seems Brit forgot that she's fired any stylist that ever worked for her, because she looks terrible. I know she's pregnant... but I think pregnant women are HOT. Britney? Not hot right now. She needs to tone down the bad makeup and put some more clothes on. It makes me sad. Britney, come back to us! Dump the loser and come back!

In other news, and this is my only note from the Ack! files, I read on my favorite news source, Huffington Post that Tom Cruise wants to convert Angelina to Scientology. Have you ever heard me say that Angelina can do no wrong? Well, I lied. Scientology would make me lose all respect for her. It's a fool's religion, created by some science fiction writer to make MONEY. He knew that was the best way to make MONEY - create a religion. This would be okay by me if the religion made any sense at all. Perhaps I need to be some high level operating thetan to understand why I should believe some guy who, 40 years ago, proclaimed that we're all descended from alien pods or some similar bullshit. Perhaps I need to pay hundreds of dollars to be audited to different levels so I can understand why Scientology thinks homosexuality can be, or more importantly NEEDS to be, cured. Also, maybe Jenna Elfman can teach me, for a discounted fee, why she thinks AIDS is a STATE OF MIND and not a disease that deserves funding, and then how she can, in good conscience, seven years later, attend an AIDS benefit hosted by Elton John. And finally, how do you make me believe that psychiatry is not a science? Who are you to tell me that? Who are you to tell the whole world that? It's poisonous, and it's not helping anyone. The Scientologists are minimizing many people's problems, including people that are very close to me. Who knows? Maybe we are over-medicated as a country. But there are some people that need medication that science has to offer, and they should not be made to feel like their suffering is invalid, or can be cured by clearing their mind (and their wallets).

I'm a fairly accepting person when it comes to religion, as I think that every religion requires a leap of faith, and I respect that and appreciate that. But this... this religion is ridiculous and foolish. I'm sure there are good things about it, but it seems like those good things are only yours if you promise to keep paying the church and keep learning, and some of the teachings do, in fact, include something about aliens and 75 million years ago, and Xenu and pods and a volcano.

So Angie, please... no Scientology.

(The comfort: HuffPo's link about this story was to the National Enquirer, and it's one of her tongue-in-cheek blurbs that she often throws on her website - stories that are sort of non-news but make you shake your head and roll your eyes.)

On Angelina...

I’m not sure if you’ve heard, but Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt gave birth recently to a little girl named Shiloh. Yeah, I think a couple of small papers picked up this story.

I have a special place in my heart for Angelina Jolie. No, it’s not because she’s hot and I like women… although, that helped at first. Rather, she’s always been crazy and honest and never uninteresting, which you can’t say for many other celebrities. To boot, she’s a good actress. Sure she makes some bad decisions about which roles to play, but she’s a kick-ass actress.

I’ve been a fan of her since ’99, and she’s never disappointed me. People can say anything they want to about her: “Ew! She wore blood in a vial!” or “Ew! She made out with her brother!” or “Ew! She married Billy Bob Thornton!” or “Ew! She broke up Brad and Jen’s marriage!” Of course, people overreact to these things. So, she wore blood in a vial? Who cares? People walk around wearing their own NAME on RICE in a vial around their neck and no one says anything! And folks, she did not “make out” with her brother. Making out means there is tongue, physical groping, and sexy love. There was none of that. Get over it. And Billy Bob? Who cares! They loved each other. He turned out to be a dick anyway. And Brad and Jen? Don’t even get me started. Jen Aniston’s doing fine on her own. She can take a bath in her money if she’s upset (I’m a huge fan of Jennifer and prefer not to victimize her at all – I love her). Divorce SUCKS for everyone, but it’s a popular fact of life.

Anyway, now that Angelina is on every magazine cover imaginable, I feel like I should write something about her. Let’s face it, kids. This woman is an incredible woman. She adopted two children from different countries, which is more than a lot of upper class American folks are willing to do. She has given birth to her own baby now, who has Angie’s lips and Brad’s eyes (cutie!). She’s the goodwill ambassador for the UN. She cares about people less fortunate than herself and shows the world that, not by going to some charity event in Los Angeles, but by actually getting in the trenches with these people and trying to help.

As my friend Christian says, saying you like Angelina Jolie is like saying you like money. This statement was born out of frustration with the lesbian world’s obsession with her. But what better actress for young women to obsess over?

Regarding the hullabaloo about the birth of lil’ Shiloh, my friend Kim said, “It’s like no one has ever had a baby before!” It’s true, people are going ballistic over this kid. But I have to say, the fact is that we see Brad Pitt and Angelina all over the newspapers, magazines, websites, etc. And when my friends give birth to babies, I am all about it. I bring my camera every time I visit and take tons of pictures. I show off the pictures like they’re the most important kid pictures in the land. To my friends that are moms, the birth of their children is more important than any other birth, and the people in their family make them feel that way (ideally). Because Brad and Angie are so visible, people want to see pictures of their baby, because babies are a big deal! It’s just magnified because instead of 30 relatives wanting a peek of a baby, Brad and Angelina have a whole world wanting a peek of theirs. And to my friends that are moms, don’t you think your own beautiful children deserve to be seen by the whole world, even if they never get the chance?

More on Kim… I was there for the birth of her first (and only, to date) child, and let me tell you, on that day, it WAS like no one had ever given birth before. Nothing else mattered but the fact that I just witnessed my friend bring forth a life. I talked about it as though tens of thousands of other mothers didn’t go through the same thing that very day. I’ve told Kim before and I’ll say it again, that day was the most exhilarating, amazing day of my life, and I imagine the only thing that will top it will be the birth of my own child.

I say, way to go, Angie and Brad, for bringing eight more pounds of cute goodness into the world! Because your baby is the most anticipated birth since Jesus, several charities in Africa will split an untold sum that has been rumored to be as much as seven million dollars. Killer! Sure, Angelina hasn’t saved the world, but I’m glad she’s making an effort.

Now, if we could only get as many people to pay this much attention to the Bush administration’s endless mistakes…

Ladies and gentlemen... SUMMER!

While I was comfortably sitting at my desk last week at work in the cool 68 degree office, summer barreled through Los Angeles with no warning, leaving people stunned in its wake.

Sure, it felt about 80 degrees at 10am when we would walk to get coffee. Sure, the apartment seemed a little warm when I would get home at night. But I'm here to tell you I had no idea how serious summer was being this time around. Summer was not kidding around this weekend.

I've been pleading for summer to join us. I'm ready for everything that comes with summer - barbecues with friends, beach volleyball, drinking beer in the afternoon on weekends, swimming in the freezing Pacific Ocean, 4th of July weekend in Catalina. Usually, summer in LA is full of 80 degree days, cloudless skies, a cool breeze, and a sort of disgusting haze (smog) hanging over the skyline. Obviously, you have to take the good with the bad.

This weekend was different. Yes, there were the cloudless skies. But my God, was it HOT. The forecast called for 87 degrees both Saturday and Sunday. When the forecast calls for 87, it's saying it will be 87 in downtown Los Angeles. See this map of LA:



See where it says "LOS ANGELES"? That's right around where we live. Do you see where it says "NORTH HOLLYWOOD"? That's where I work. That's in The Valley, also known as The San Fernando Valley, also known as The Fuckin' Valley, and its gang name, The SFV.

Why am I illustrating the geography of LA? Well, when the forecast calls for 87 degrees in downtown LA, you can bet your sweet bippy it'll be near 100 degrees in The Valley. And the deeper you go into The Valley, the hotter it gets. This is why I don't want to move to The Valley.

Conversely, when the forecast calls for 87 degrees in downtown LA, it'll be no hotter than 80 at the beach (usually closer to 78), in places like Santa Monica, Venice, and the like. And there is always a nice ocean breeze the closer you get to the water. This is why I want to move closer to the beach.

Because as middle of the road downtown LA is temperature-wise, nothing provided relief this weekend.

We spent Saturday morning in Santa Monica with Elizabeth, making buckeyes, which are an Ohio cookie of chocolate and peanut butter. Santa Moinca was beautiful, breezy and warm. And in a moment of sheer beauty, Gina uttered words I will never let her live down. As she could smell the ocean, feel the cool air, and walk on the streets without stepping over trash, she said, "I... I'd kind of like to live down here." (Up until that point, she'd expressed no interest in moving out of Hollywood. And while I love Hollywood, I'm ready to go west, young man.)

All was fine and dandy, we were welcoming summer with open arms. Then... we got home. Our apartment, normally a perfect mix of bright and breezy, had turned into a 350 square foot high pressure system, making it feel quite like the feeling you get when you open an oven to check on a casserole.

Now, I grew up in a house with central air, where during the summer, it was not uncommon to come visit my house and see my whole family in sweatshirts and three pairs of socks. Everyone except my mother, of course, who insisted on keeping the house at near-freezing. Despite my complaints about how cold it was inside, I became very spoiled, and enjoyed the sticky Ohio summers only because I knew I could easily get out of the heat. When I have no escape from the heat, I become cranky.

We had two fans running, including a ceiling fan, and opened all the windows. The usual breeze that inhabits our apartment had gone elsewhere, and left us gasping for air. After about an hour and a half of bitching, I decided on a whim to turn on the wall unit air conditioner. The heating function of this never worked well in the winter, so I imagined the cool air function wouldn't work well either... not well enough to keep it on while it emits harmful chemicals into the atmosphere. I was right... it cooled only the spot directly in front of the unit.

We decided we needed to get out of the house for a while, so we went and ran some errands. Despite my instinct to turn everything off before leaving... despite my instinct to run the air conditioner as little as possible... we left the wall unit on while we were away, hoping beyond hope it might help. And sure enough, when we got back, the apartment was like heaven again. I attributed it mostly to the sun going down, but the next day, before we left for the farmer's market, I turned on the AC. We were gone for about three hours, and when we got back, it was downright cold in our apartment.

Of course, it was only cold in the living area... the kitchen was hot as hell. And wouldn't you know it, I decided to bake cupcakes in celebration of Gina's 30th birthday! today!! So... that didn't help. But Gina got to eat her share of cake batter, got to take cupcakes to work today, and we found out the trick to enjoying our summer.

All is well.

Water

In Long Beach, at sunset.




In color.

Hilarity Files

I forgot to include this news story yesterday, which has been making me laugh since I read it.

This is taken from Pat's website: (Link)

HEALTH
Pat Robertson's Age-Defying Shake

Did you know that Pat Robertson can leg-press 2000 pounds! How does he do it?

Where does Pat find the time and energy to host a daily, national TV show, head a world-wide ministry, develop visionary scholars, while traveling the globe as a statesman?

One of Pat's secrets to keeping his energy high and his vitality soaring is his age-defying protein shake. Pat developed a delicious, refreshing shake, filled with energy-producing nutrients.

Discover what kinds of natural ingredients make up Pat's protein shake by registering for your FREE booklet today!

And this is taken from a response, written by a sports columnist named Clay Travis, on CBS Sports Line: (Link)

Three things:

1. I am going to drink this protein shake of his and try to leg press a Mazda Miata with three clowns sitting inside.

2. There is no way on earth Robertson leg presses 2,000 pounds. That would mean a 76-year-old man broke the all-time Florida State University leg press record by 665 pounds over Dan Kendra. 665 pounds. Further, when he set the record, they had to modify the leg press machine to fit 1,335 pounds of weight. Plus, Kendra's capillaries in his eyes burst. Burst. Where in the world did Robertson even find a machine that could hold 2,000 pounds at one time? And how does he still have vision?

3. It's rare the ClayNation Guarantee makes an appearance, but here, it is justified. There is no way Robertson leg presses 2,000 pounds. Period. If he can, I will box a round against Andrew Golota without wearing a jockstrap. After about 20 minutes on Robertson's Web site, I managed to find a way to send an e-mail without having to give my credit card information. Here was the text:

"I would like to interview Pat Robertson about his leg-press workout and protein shake. If possible, I would like to accompany Pat on his workout where I could help him stack on the 44 different 45-pound plates he would need to attach to leg press 2,000 pounds. By my calculations, his leg press of 2,000 pounds requires 22 forty-fives and one ten-pounder on each side."


I particularly like the bit of the Mazda Miata with the three clowns inside. And the poor use of punctuation in the bit from Pat's website. (Hint to you, Pat: When writing a question, you should end the sentence with a question mark, no matter how ridiculous the question posed might be.)

Gnu in the News

Here are the news stories I'm thinking about this week:

Mary Cheney on Dave Letterman
While I am fiercely Democrat, I respect people's opinions when they are well-informed. Well, most of the time. It's hard for me to justify anyone voting for this administration in the last election, but that's because I can't see anything good that's come out of it. It's also because I am firmly against having someone in the White House who wants to write discrimination into the Constitution, and who, despite what he says, does not believe in the whole separation of church and state. To me, the two most important fundamentals of this country are 1. Freedom of Speech. 2. Separation of Church and State. The rest is gravy, baby.

I chuckle slightly when people say that George Bush was the man for the job because our national security was/is the most important issue. Just so everyone knows, no matter who won the election, national security would've been an important issue. No one wants Americans to be harmed. Whatever. What's done is done, I guess.

But this... this interview with Mary Cheney on The Late Show w/ Letterman... this incensed me. David Letterman has a lot of great things to say here, and all Mary Cheney can say is, "I talk about this in my book." It's too late, Mary. Vote for your dad, that's fine. But you had a chance to make a difference, and you didn't. You're a coward.

See for yourself here.

Religious Folks for Gays!
Thank you, mainline Protestant and Jewish organizations! Thank you for standing up against discrimination. This is what I'm talking about when I tell people not all Christians are crazy and mean.

Clergy Group Aims to Block Gay Marriage Amendment

The Lesser of Two Evils
Please get rid of this guy, PA folks:
Rick Santorum is not cool.

He's actually kind of archaic and ridiculous.

I'm not alone in my thoughts on this guy.

I read an article in November in the New Yorker about the best chance to beat Santorum - Bob Casey, who has since won the primary in PA. I looked up the article to link here, and interestingly, I found it on a website called "Catholics For Free Choice." See? I told you not all Christians are crazy.

The thing about this Casey guy, he's pro-life. But man... it's really imperative Rick Santorum get defeated, mainly because he's so full of hatred and ignorance. Read the New Yorker article here about Bob Casey.

That's it for now. These are the stories I'm thinking about.

I used to not even WATCH this stuff.

I went through a phase lasting about 2 years where I watched maybe 3 hours of TV a month.

That has changed, and watching good shows has become one of mine and Gina's favorite things to do. With it being the season finale season, I thought I'd just give you a few thoughts I have about some of the shows we watch. Careful of spoilers.

1. Gilmore Girls - Amy Sherman Palladino and Daniel Palladino, the main creative forces behind the Gilmore Girls, are leaving the show this season. Lauren Graham and Alexis Bledel still have one year left on their contract, so next year will probably be the last season of this charmingly funny, smart show. I'm happy the show is continuing, although I'm worried no one will be able to harness the brilliance of this show as well as Amy and Daniel. Good season finale, with Lorelai essentially flippin' the bird to curmudgeon Luke, who I used to be a fan of, but now he's just annoying me with his, "I'm not ready to get married." It's Lorelai, folks! She's hot! I'd actually much rather see her with Christopher - Rory's dad. He's cuter, and he's much funnier, with a sense of humor very similar to her own.

2. Will & Grace - I remember back in 1998 when this show premiered. I was consistently floored by how funny it was. Every joke made me laugh out loud. I watched every episode with my roommate at the time - it was our favorite show. However, right around 2002-ish, the show started getting... well... boring. And Debra Messing obviously became too close to the actors she was working with, because she cannot get through a scene without cracking a smile. She anticipates the laughter of the audience, and you can see it in her face, and it drives me NUTS. The series finale last night was a huge snooze fest. They did this great hour long special on it where they showed the funniest moments of the show - that was hilarious. But the actual hour long finale was painful and boring, with not even an emotional curtain call for our troubles. Good riddance, I say. Although it is sad that such a groundbreaking show is off the air. A leading gay character is a big deal.

3. LOST - Oh MAN, I love this show. My whole week is built around this show. Friday doesn't mean the start of the weekend... it means one day closer to Wednesday. This past week's episode was kind of disappointing, because we didn't really get any more information than what we already suspected about wacky Michael. It was obvious he was either brainwashed or being bribed, and so the "payoff" of seeing what really happened when Michael went off to the Others' camp was not much of a payoff at all.

Things that still annoy me about the show:

*These folks would have such an easier time on this island if they would COMMUNICATE with each other. They are so island crazy that they think they have to keep stupid secrets from one another. I suppose without this character flaw that every one of them has, there wouldn't really be a show.

*The button - why is it called a button? Why is it called, "pushing the button," when in reality, it's entering a series of numbers and then hitting the "execute" or "enter" key to input the numbers?

*Can't think of ANY BETTER NAME for the other people on the island than "the Others"? It's tacky. Still - can't WAIT for next week's season finale. Looks crazy good - and two hours of it! YESS!

*"The Lost Experience," the interactive website game related to the show, reminds me of that scene in A Christmas Story where Ralphie gets his decoder pin in the mail and the secret code is "Drink your ovaltene."

4. ER - I know what you're thinking. "ER's still on? Who the hell is still watching it??" Well the answer is ME AND GINA. I started watching ER in 2000, way later than everyone else. ER disappoints me a lot, because every single episode is touted as "THIS IS THE REASON YOU WATCH ER," and really, the reason I watch ER is Maura Tierney, so unless the episode is of her naked the whole time, it's not going to be "THE REASON I WATCH ER." But... last night's episode... beyond "Lost," last night's ER was the best hour of television I've seen in a long time. Cliffhangers with almost every character:

-Abby: Did she lose the baby?

-Kovach (who I hate): Will someone find him? He totally can't breathe well and he's strapped to the bed. Oh, and is he gonna lose his job?

-Jerry: Is he gonna die?!?!?!

-Sam and Alex: High speed chase!! OMG**! Scary!

-Kerry: Is she screwed? At least she can walk now.

-Neela: Will she and stupid Ray hook up now that they killed off Gallant (totally cried during that episode)? Will she FINALLY MAKE OUT WITH ABBY?!

And the shooting scene was SO well shot, so interesting, so tense, amazing, scary. It's hard for me to get that sucked into a show. I hate when shows give away all of their secrets in the preview for the episode. I knew there would be a shooting, but I had no idea it would be by way of infiltration through the dumb EMT wannabe who claims someone's blood pressure is "34 over 28." Even this TV producer knows that's not right.

So basically, the two shows that I will be agonizing over all summer are Lost and ER, and I haven't been this sucked into cliffhanger TV finales since the early seasons of Friends.

The good news: Gina and I are latecomers to Weeds, the amazing show on Showtime starring Golden Globe winner Mary Louise I'M TOTALLY HOT Parker. The season finale of that was amazing, and we just saw it a few weeks ago. I think the new season starts on July 17. NIICE.

And... we've decided that we're going to make two shows our summer shows: Grey's Anatomy, which I've never seen, and Sopranos, which neither of us have ever seen.

Seriously though... is it September yet?

**"OMG" is an acronym I use with my tongue firmly planted in my cheek. I'm not a big fan of online acronyms, but I feel that they've around long enough that it's funny to make fun of them. Also, I've probably been reading too much of Pink is the New Blog.

Disneyland - Funniest place on earth.

As Gina and I were on our way to Disneyland on Saturday, we were discussing how we've never been at any sort of theme park with each other. And then we realized that wasn't true - in 1994, we both went on a marching band field trip to Walt Disney World for a week. However, seeing as our relationship was that of small dog following big dog around hopelessly, we didn't really see much of each other, except when we actually marched in the parade together. So we were comfortable in naming this Disneyland trip in 2006 as our first actual field trip to an amusement park together. For this, we were excited.

Whenever there is a moderate amount of stress in my life, my body responds by not allowing me to sleep well. I woke up at 6:30 Saturday morning, for no reason at all. I ran some errands, and by the time we were heading out of town to go to Disney, it was 12:00pm. We arrived at 1, anxious to start the day, excited, a clean slate of amusement park fun between the two of us.

We decided it was our job to take a bunch of pictures. We started right away.

Happy 50th Anniversary, Disneyland!

This is all flowers. Even the Mickey is flowers. Neato!

Inspiration! "It all started with a mouse." How sweet.


Waiting in line for the Matterhorn. As we stood in line, Gina took note of my shoulders and insisted we find some sunscreen. Luckily, a guy in front of us had some Mary Kay sunscreen that he swore by. He shared. We were happy.


We were very sad to find out that there is absolutely NO DANCING at Disneyland.

Bummer.

And then, about 3pm, something happened. I'm not sure if it was the adrenaline rush and subsequent crash, the heat, or sheer exhaustion, but the two of us got.. well... slappy. As evidenced in the following photos.











Someone in front of us smelled... really terrible.


We stayed for the fireworks, which, if the truth were to be told here and now, was the main reason I wanted to go to Disneyland in the first place. I remembered that my camera has a fireworks option, so I started experimenting. Some shots came out pretty well (framing not withstanding), like this shot of a Mickey Mouse head.


Other times, it sort of looked like Operation Shock and Awe.


And, to top it off, after much time spent deciding on which fun Disney hats/ears to buy, we went with the obvious choice:


Who says gays can't get married?!

Circle

I've been a little... off the past couple days.

On a little scrap of paper at my desk is evidence of this. I had to divide $5507.60 by 3. So I did it long hand. On paper. Even though I work on a computer that has a calculator, I decided I needed a little long division.

Help.

Adventures in Communications

Here now, for you, dear reader, is a chronicling of my adventures trying to get internet for my apartment.

Last week:

SBC says:
You need to order phone service. $10.69 a month for basic.
Wireless internet: $19.99 per month for one year
$79.99 charge for modem
$49.99 rebate
$50 Visa gift card

Woo hoo! This is going better than I thought. Better check with Gina to make sure we're cool with this.

Call back SBC this week.

SBC says:
No, you can't get the $50 Visa gift card unless you're switching over from another phone company. But everything else is the same. No, I'm sorry, we have no way of contacting Aleysha, who told you you could get that deal. No, I'm sorry, there's nothing we can do. You don't want to give us your money? Okay then, we don't care if we lose a customer.

Call Earthlink.

Earthlink says:
You need a phone line.

Call Comcast. Get phone line advertised in my cable bills for $10.00 per month. Comcast puts me through their 3rd party verification system. Fails. I call back. Fails. I call back. Fails. I call back. She puts me through to a live operator. The live operator says, okay, you have to call Comcast back and confirm. Call Comcast back, ask what will my service be, exactly? $17.64 a month. $17.64??? What happened to $10.00?! Oh, there are taxes and a LINE MAINTENANCE FEE. Sigh.

Call Earthlink.

Earthlink says:
Oh, we can't give you DSL, but how about dial-up? (Akin to saying, Oh, sorry, we're fresh out of CD players, but how about this cassette deck?)

Call SBC, again, just like Justine said I would do. I ask what the deals are, I say I'm a Comcast customer. Homeboy offers me the whole gift card package, but this time, I have to have the enhanced phone service, including long distance, CALLER ID, call waiting, etc. If I don't have that? Internet is $39.00 a month. I do not NEED long distance, caller ID or call waiting. I need a phone line to hook me up to an internet, and so that people can dial us from the entrance to our apartment and we can let them in. I say to the guy, "Your company is crazy, I've gotten three different offers from you this week alone..." He hangs up on me.

That's right. A salesperson. Hung up on me.

It's becoming crystal clear to me that there is no way around paying out the ass to have internet in our apartment, unless we want dial-up.

I call Comcast back, effectively laying my hands wrist up towards them, telling them to just give me the fucking cable internet. How much is it? $39.99 per month. That's the DISCOUNTED rate! They don't even OFFER DSL! How much is my cable, which Comcast also provides? $84.55 per month.

The kicker? I ordered a phone mainly for internet. And now? I don't need a phone for cable internet.

I hate it here.

Weekend Update

Every day here has been the same. Marine layer, marine layer, marine layer. For those of you who don't know what a marine layer is, it's a thick layer of clouds caused by the massive body of water known as the Pacific Ocean. Well, we've been having a heavy case of marine layer in all of Los Angeles, and a lot of us are not lucky enough to live by the water, thereby we are experiencing the shitty marine layer, missing out on the sunshine, all while NOT having the benefit of being withing walking distance of the ocean.

My skin finally got to see the sun this weekend, and I paid for it all day yesterday as heat radiated from my body. We were in the bay area... again... this time for a wedding. Here are some things I learned, in pictures.

Most of the time, smoking is disgusting.



Sometimes, it's hot.



(She rolls her own cigarettes, folks. That's tobacco in there, nothing more.)

Above all, I seriously have the cutest cowgirl in the west. I don't know how I got so lucky.



This baby gets cuter every day, and actually grew noticeably in the week we didn't see him.



The wedding was held at a winery. Not only do wineries have WINE (and lots of it!), they're actually really beautiful.







We love wineries. And sunshine.



And finally, if all goes according to plan, this is what my future looks like:



I can't wait.

Corporate America can kiss my ass.

I'm dumbfounded at the ability of big communication companies to incense me. I had a huge problem with Comcast about a year ago. And now, I'm trying to order internet for the apartment, and AT&T/SBC has effectively made me not want to ever give them any of my money. The problem? If I want wireless internet, they're the only company in my area that can give it to me. This is why they can treat people the way they do, because people like me have no other choice.

Seriously. Me = furious.

Giovanni takes LA.

Gina's brother and sister-in-law brought the little peanut down for a visit this past weekend.

This is actually his hair. It does not lay to flat to his head. It always looks like this. He is saying to me, "Oh, lady... I have to drink to make you bearable."




He really liked chilling out on our heaven bed. He must take after Gina.

What it feels like to be real.

For regular readers of this blog, you might remember that with Gina's help, I realized my headlight was out on my car. The light went out in the beginning of March. Replacing the light has been on my to-do list for nearly eight weeks now, but there was always something else going on, some dog to watch, some tequila to drink.

After a party where Gina and I got home at 4:30 in the morning Sunday, we woke up and went to the Farmer's Market. After the market, I asked Gina if she'd help me go to the auto parts store to get my car taken care of. I should note that by this point, not only was my right headlight out, but my left front turn signal was not working, nor were my daytime running lights.

As a lesbian and sort of a stubborn person in general, I like to think I don't need anyone's help for anything. Except killing bugs. But changing a simple lamp in an American made car, I was certain it would be easy. I've changed my rear turn signals on several occasions and without any incident. Little did I know, this was different.

Vastly different.

The gentleman in Pep Boys insisted it would be easy, that I would just have to pop the headlight out and replace the bulb. No big deal. I popped the hood, and Gina and I took a little look-see. The directions told us to use a flat head screwdriver to pop out the plastic shield running the width of the front of the car. We didn't have a flat head screwdriver, of course. So Gina forced it off, breaking all but two little plastic fasteners, despite the warning in the manual: Be careful not to break the plastic fasteners. This took us about 15 minutes to get the shield off.

We looked at the next step: using a 13 mm socket wrench, unscrew the bolts...

A socket wrench? To change a headlight? Sure enough, there were two very tightly screwed in bolts keeping us from getting to the meat of the headlight. Foolishly, we tested the strength of the bolts (and ourselves) by trying to unscrew them by hand. This less than 12 hours after Gina tried to open a NOT twist off beer bottle with her bare hands... it wasn't healthy for either one of us. But our hands were getting dirty, so we thought we were getting somewhere. We also collectively thought that if we just stared at the guts of my car, something would hit us, some divine moment of inspiration, a way to unscrew these bolts without any proper tools.

After about 15 minutes of unproductive staring, a young guy probably in his mid-20s came over to us. I knew what he was thinking. "Here are two girls, one of which is taller than me and maybe even stronger, obviously not knowing how to do what they need to do. If I assume they want my help, they might kick my ass. But it looks like the actually do need help, so how should I approach this?"

He came over to us and hesitantly said, "What are you trying to do?"

I said, "Replace a headlight..."

And Gina said, "...but we don't have the tools we need."

He asked us what we needed and when we told him, he nodded and went back to his truck. He was back within a few minutes with some tools, and then asked softly, "Um... do you want some help with this? I might be able to help out."

He then told us, "One time, a buddy of mine, a male friend, he came with me here to replace my windshield wipers. Well, we tried and tried but couldn't figure out how to do it. We tried everything we could think of. Finally, a woman came over and said, 'Uh, do you guys need some help?' And she came over and snapped on the wiper, and told us how it's done."

We let him loose under the hood of my car. This boy, who probably has tinkered with his car every weekend for the past 15 years, shoved his hands in every nook and cranny he could, trying to pop out the headlight. After about seven minutes with no luck, I couldn't help but notice he had cut his hand on my car, trying to force out the fucking light. After another five minutes or so, he finally got the thing out, replaced the bulb, and moved to the other side of the car to replace the turn signal. Another 15 minutes of molesting the headlight and it finally pops out, and the new bulb is plugged firmly into place. We thanked him and he left, and I drove away in a car with two working headlights, two working turn signals, and convenient and safe daytime running lights.

It's amazing how something as simple as replacing your headlight can make you feel like a real person, and also remind you of the importance of karma.