Tuesday, September 22, 2009

Ship Jumping

ATTENTION PEEPS!

I'm ditching this blog because I don't like the creepy, stalkery searches that keep bringing people here so I created a new one.

How to find me:

1. If you're my Facebook friend you can find the link there.

2. If you know me from the ORIGINAL "blog" you can find the link there.

3. If you know my email address you can ask me and I'll send you the link.

4. If you know my dad, I'm sure he'll hook you up.

I hate to abandon the shocking number of hits this blog has been getting (seriously, WHO KNEW??) but I love my family more than I love my hits, so it is what it is.

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

San Francisco Sidewalk Art





The recipient of these sentiments is a lucky duck.

Things

Oh me oh my, I've been a baaaad blogger. I thought "Oh hey, it's only been a week, whatever" and then I looked at the calendar and realized that OH DEAR it's been nearly TWO weeks.

Here's what I have to say today:

1. I ran for 45 minutes IN A ROW yesterday. It was only a few months ago that I would shoot to run a mile and then walk a mile and then one day I decided to see if I could push through and just keep running and OMG I COULD! I remember someone saying that once you get past the first 20 minutes it's easy to just run on auto-pilot and I remember thinking that PSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHH I CAN'T RUN FOR 20 MINUTES!!!

Except now I can and HE WAS RIGHT! 20 minutes turned into 40 minutes in the blink of an eye and then I figured well shoot, let's just go around the block again just so I can hit 45 and POOF! I was at 45.

2. I've also been going to kickboxing classes taught by a former Power Ranger (for reals) and he's this tiny little thing who flies through the air like a gnat in track pants. There's this move we had to do that involved squatting so your thighs were parallel to the ground (I challenge you to do this, Internet...it's crazy hard) and then SWISH SWASH, doing a 180 turn and landing in a squat again.

When they started doing this insane maneuver I took the opportunity to get some water and "dab" the sweat that was pouring off my face but then I figured OH WHAT THE HELL and gave it a shot and I CAN DO THAT TOO! Not for the 60 seconds of insanity that Le Petit Power Ranger would have preferred, but HOT DAMN.

I got home and showed my parents and can report the following:

A. My dad thinks he can do it too. But only once.

B. My mom, who I'm sure thinks that my "running" is really code for "walking briskly," was shocked at my moves.

I've been thinking lately that my ability to push through pain + my newfound ability to kick my own ass = Maybe there's an athlete under there somewhere??

3. My nephew continues to be wonderful.







4. I went out for dinner with a couple of lady friends and we ordered the big, giant mondo combination meat & cheese carving board and it was LARGE:



We did some significant damage and then each ate about two bites of our entrees before we reached maximum capacity:



I'm hungry right now though so I'm looking at that after shot and wishing I had that leftover cheese and meat to shove in my face. Poor cheese. I hope it doens't think we didn't love it.

5. This is what I look like when I'm waiting for prospective renters to come look at my apartment and decide that in the absence of chairs, ohhhh, draping myself over the bar will be comfortable:



My hair looks like an eskimo hat and my face looks OLD and HAGGARD so hey, why not share it with the internet?

Also, I would note that being folded over the counter is a difficult position to un-do. My dismount was not comfortable.

6. I don't know why they sell these:



7. And now that I've burned your eyes with those last two images, I'll leave you with the cutest dress ever that, I'm sad to report, bags out like crazy after sitting on a bar stool for a few hours:

Thursday, September 3, 2009

Bullet: DODGED!

I showed my apartment to several more people on Tuesday evening.

The first guy showed up and had kind of a "I'm young and slight but I'm going to show you how important I am by using my authoritative voice when talking to you" demeanor about him that I found kind of annoying, but whatever -- I don't have to live with him or anything.

He had his positive attributes:

* Tidy-looking

He had his interesting attributes:

* He is a funeral director and has his degree in mortuary science or something.

He had his middle-of-the-road attributes:

* Mediocre credit

He had his hmmmm attributes:

* Fake blue contacts (WHO DOES THAT ANYMORE?)
* Appeared to be wearing makeup, which, given his profession, made me wonder if it was dead person makeup!

But all in all, he was fine, his credit wasn't horrible, he filled out the rental application right then and there and left me with copies of all his financial stuff.

PLUS he said that given his kinda blah credit, he'd be willing to pay up to a year of rent in advance.

Whoa, interesting.

Then the rest of the prospective tenants came through and I liked them all and started to wonder if I should go with the ones I personally liked or the one who was willing to put his money where his mouth was and in the end, I decided that it was fair to go with this guy because I didn't dislike him and he was the first to give me his application and I do not discriminate against men who choose to wear makeup. I mean, who knows? Maybe he has Alyssa Milano skin under there or something, poor guy.

So I called him up to say hey, we're gonna check your references tomorrow, I'd like to take you up on your pre-payment offer if you're still interested in the apartment. He says yes, great, except really, I'm only comfortable paying for six months in advance. I say okay, that's fine, I'll talk to you tomorrow. He calls back a few minutes later and leaves me a message saying hey, you know what, you could totally foreclose and then I'd be left up a creek, so I think I'd rather just give you three months in advance and I'd need it all stipulated in the lease because also what if I decide to break the lease and blah blah blah.

I happened to run into my old friend Bree just as I was listening to the VM and told her about about the 12-no-6-no-3 month thing and she told me about how comfortable she and her husband are with THEIR renters. And then I talked to my brother (who is also happy with HIS renter) and was like dude, I think I want to tell him to go pound salt, he's backtracking, it's fishy, and I think he might wear dead person makeup.

So this morning I called left him a VERY FRIENDLY message saying hey, I've been thinking about it and I think I'm going to pass. I TOTALLY get where you're coming from and that the pre-payment is a risk to you, but I think there's a lack of trust between us and I don't want to get started off on the wrong foot so I'll go ahead and shred your documents as soon as I get home unless I hear otherwise, but hey, good luck to you.

He calls me back and wants to know what made me change my mind and I tell him that you know, I would have rented to you even without your pre-payment offer but I have to tell you, the backtracking kinda spooked me.

AND THEN (because there's always an "and then"):

He cockily tells me that "Yeah, well, you leaving your apartment to move back in with your parents spooked ME."

And I was surprised because I know FOR A FACT I did not tell him that specifically. I do recall him catching me off guard by asking small-talky questions about where I was going but I know I said FAMILY and not PARENTS.

Semantics and all though, right?

It's not UNTRUE, but I'm annoyed that he thinks I'm living with my parents because I'm at risk for losing my apartment and that, Mr. Makeup, is not the case AT ALL.

But I'm not going to argue with a guy who thinks his recent inheritance makes him a high roller so I said "Okay. Good luck. Goodbye."

Things

1. It's pumpkin spice latte season! How exciting! Of course, it was like 74 degrees at 8AM so I didn't get one, but HOOOO BOY that's one of my favorite things about fall.

2. Los Angeles is not my BFF. First of all, it's hotter than heck. Or maybe that's just my go-places-on-record-weather-days bad luck, but HOOOO BOY, it was hot. And smoky. And hot.



And Ben and Sarah think I'm the whiniest OMG IT'S HOT crybaby on the planet but let me tell you something about being a fat person sitting in the back seat of a rented Hyundai on a 100 degree day with a 100-pound person in the front seat controlling the air conditioning: IT IS NOT COMFORTABLE.

To any passers by it would have looked like I was craning my neck for a better view but no, I was craning my neck with the hope that maybe, perhaps, if I was lucky, a little smidge of the refrigerated air would maybe, perhaps, if I was lucky, reach my face.

3. But rest assured, Los Angeles, you are not without SOME redeeming qualities:

A. It's where Karate Kid was filmed:



(Note: The empty iced tea cup is in my hand because I couldn't risk leaving my precious, precious ice to melt in the car.)

B. It's full of celebrity glamour (*cough*):



C. Our hotel was sassy and offered equally sassy bathrobes:



D. Westwood is very cute with lots of very cute little houses and attractive people walking their very cute little dogs.

4. Speaking of attractive people, I had dinner with my BFF Grady last night:



He's quite the charmer.