Else what's a heaven for?

I forget how awesome it is to spend time with TRQ and visage. Weds night, we met at the theater for Seminar. The pre-show conversation was at least as good as the show, like when TRQ commented, "That's so racist to say that all M-towns look the same." I'm not sure which was funnier - visage's face when TRQ was describing her recent adventures in programming or his face when we were discussing how lawyers work. I laughed as TRQ explained that there are lawyer firms, which are lawyers all the way down, and in-house lawyers, which is like being embedded. (And Pongo laughed as I commented it must be like hearing Lucky and his BFF discuss, well, anything.) ( The play, with spoilers ) I should see more plays.

TRQ and visage also get mad props for keeping me on task Thurs morning and for being so patient with my attempt to wade through the Macy's Parade crowd. Despite everything, Pongo, my cousin, and I all managed to turn up in the right place and my grandfather took us to my parents house. The family parts of the weekend all went well, with two particularly hilarious moments. While Pongo was buttonholed by my father, I was helping my mother and aunt in the kitchen and my aunt said, "When Dad told me he was picking you and a friend up, I thought you were bringing home a girlfriend." *facepalm!* Sat afternoon, my other aunt and uncle were disappointed to have missed Pongo but told me they were checking my hands for jewelry, bc why else would I bring someone home. My family is so confused. And it's not all my fault.

The food was better this year, despite the developing tradition of oven mishaps. There was no dish I didn't like and I noticed that if available, I will eat an awful lot of vegetables. It was also my grandmother's birthday, so we had a St. Honore cake, as well as the traditional Thanksgiving flan.

Fri afternoon, Pongo and I went for a walk in the Audubon Society. I haven't been there since I was a small child, so it was cool seeing where I used to go to camp. We got lost, went off-trail, and ended up with very muddy sneakers. Thank goodness Pongo always carries his compass and a flashlight. We talked about Roman life, as one does on hikes. That night, my sister's fiance came over and we all watched an episode of The Avengers and Source Code. I liked the latter a lot, mostly bc of how it all fit together in a neat little package. Sat morning we took Pongo to the best French brunch place in town. Then we went to a consignment shop and DSW, where I somehow picked up a pair of rain boots, booties, and a very fetching pair of flats. We had a quick bowl of soup at Meli Melo before hopping on a train home.

I had a bit of a meltdown over the next 36 hours. I was rested (or caffeinated), I had small discrete tasks to complete to help me get away from the awful badness, and yet I couldn't get myself to do any of it. I watched 2 episodes of Breaking Bad and played a lot of Sims Medieval and Zombieville 2. *sighs* However, I read 80 pages of my Lightroom book, got a facial, and bought vegetables, so that's something. The woman in the banh mi shop didn't understand me when I tried to ask for a Vietnamese cold cut sandwich, bringing the weekend full circle.

It turns out that Patagonia has a lifetime guarantee on their products, so ( I have a new fleece ) so please don't laugh when you see me in Muppet blue, bc I am warm.



Sat was supposed to be my day to get stuff done at home, so I made a list, bought food for the week at Fairway, and came home to cook a week's worth of chili and do laundry. ( spice geeking )

As the chili was just about finished, I got a call from LBro, asking where I was. Turns out he'd joined my sister for an appt at the energy worker's - and they'd be in my apt in 15 mins. ARGH! Apparently he'd made chili the night before: when I called my mum to ask how long she cooks hers for, she told me he bought a box of chili mix, brought it home -- and was outraged to discover that he had to go back to the store to buy meat. HAHAHA. And then he called her back to ask what "brown the meat" meant and was indignant that he had to brown all of it. Needless to say, he was trying to impress a girl with his favoritest dish in the world, tacos. Which didn't stop him from coming into my apt and demanding I make him tacos. I had old taco shells, so they took the spinach and tomatoes and avocado I bought for lunch this week, grated my buffalo parmiggiano, and ate it all up. Then Lbro said he was tired, flopped in my bed, and asked me to wake him at 6:30. *sighs*

I did laundry and entertained my sister. He wouldn't shoo at 6:30 - actually, he wouldn't even leave my bedroom so I could dress for dinner - and then he complained about my outfit saying, "You just need a spear and you'd be ready to hunt zebras" and "Can't you wear a nice dress? I know you have nice dresses, I bought you one, wear that." I tried to explain it wasn't a cocktail party, so I didn't need to wear Betsey Johnson, but he wouldn't leave until I dug out an old purchase from Gilt, so yeah. And then he and my sister argued about what shoes I wore and then my sister wanted to do my eye makeup and that, my dear, is why I was half an hour late for drinks. Sorry. Best line was when my sister wouldn't let me use my fave new Kate Spade bag and insisted I find a little clutch, saying, "It's a woman's job to freeze to death so she can look nice" and "Your bag should be large enough to carry your phones, your ID so you can drink, and cab fare for tmw morning." *snigger*

Sun I finally got my day of lead climbing with JBeau and it was a wonderful way to end the season. ( I should get Black Diamond to sponsor me )

Overall, he gave me a B+ for the day, saying that 90% of my placements would hold a leader fall; hopefully when I take a leader fall, it'll be on one of the good ones. In general, JBeau told me my cams could be placed 20% tighter and my nuts need to be placed more firmly. Throughout Ken's Crack, he kept saying things like, "NRod could belay you through this, if you told her to hold you tight on this section..." which seemed weird bc zomg I'm not ready to climb with a non-leader! I told him that I've been assuming all along I'd need a half dozen days of pure, supervised leads and so far he and I have done 2. ( this year in numbers )

I don't understand why anyone, let alone a teenager, would fail to respond to a message (over Facebook natch) about what you want for Christmas. Esp. when it's someone who has, in the past, gotten you or your sibling major presents like a freakin' iPod classic. If I was buying presents on behalf of just me, they'd be getting fucking coal.

Last year, my aunt-by-marriage strongarmed everyone into doing secret santas. This year, she's convinced the adults to do a grab bag. What. The. Fuck. Grab bags are things you do at holiday parties, not with your alleged nearest and dearest. A random present I pulled out of a bag is the very worstest present ever - it shows no thought on the part of the giver (thus violating my love language) and takes up space. I'm so horrified by this idea, I cannot express.

Then again, this is coming from the woman who told me she's giving her adolescent children money bc she doesn't know what to buy them. Oh. Em. Gee.

I know she's going to give me grief about not participating in her stupid little game and bc Kates are slow, I need a really good comeback as to why I'm not participating. Maybe Stick will give me one for Christmas.

So... where do teenage boys want to buy clothes from? HIS mom says if we give him cash, he'll spend it on Warcraft and I somehow have issues with that.

Edit: all the other kids are getting books and a check, so he's getting Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman. Hope he likes it, but even if he doesn't, maybe someone in the house will read it.

After a very tempestuous day at work, I had the pleasure of celebrating another revolution around the sun with Godkitty and her bf. We went to Redeye Grill, one of my go-to restaurants for celebrations: they have a broad range of interesting food and excellent service. Up 'til now: I was shocked that when Godkitty sent her steak back for being overcooked, the chef sent it back to us with a cut through the middle to let us know that no, he'd cooked it right. Um, what? No amount of cookies afterward is going to change my horror that they told my guest that. *sighs*

I didn't get nearly enough studying done this weekend and I feel about a week behind. I was supposed to do the 2006-2007 essay parts, finish reading the secret sauce, and then spend Sunday doing a practice test for time. I did miserably on 2007 on Sat and then read about half of the remaining bits of secret sauce yesterday. shitufkcshit.

Since I had to go downtown anyhow, I went to my first weekend crossfit on Sat. 42:30 for my first Kelly, with stepups on a 2' box and 10# ball. Good eye candy, better coaching, and more camaraderie. I accept!

Bbro was annoying and I still haven't figured how he conned me into fetching Jamba Juice for him, but his insights on work were as insightful as expected.

Sat night, I got to meet more people from inside my computer at a foodie's Chinese restaurant, Grand Sichuan on St. Marks. I ordered badly - the red pork was awfully fatty - but surprisingly, I liked the spicy lotus root and the pea shoots. (I'm eating the latter as I write this.) The orange beef was an unnatural color - and delicious. Under rosefox and sinboy's careful tutelage, I got over my post-dumpling stress disorder and had one of their delicious pork soup dumplings. (Apparently you're not supposed to bite straight into them while lunching with your boss.) The broth inside was so very pork-y. Mm.

The highlight of my weekend though was watching the lesbian couple simultaneously pull out their laptops and happily type away on my couch. And then waking next morning and reading their lj entries. *giggles* We went to Alice's for brunch, which is apparently fabulous for someone who can't eat protein. This is the first time I've ever been there without eating a pumpkin scone.

I was supposed to run at least 7mi last night, but it was going so horribly, I cut it off at (a hilly) 5mi. Not sure if I was too tired from Kelly the prior day, the heat (I usually have no trouble with this), or my lack of sleep lately :( I was more exhausted than I should've been when I got out of the shower and was inefficient and went to bed too late :( but slept until 7am, so yaay for that at least.

I was going to write about my fabulous weekend - best ever second week in a row - but it's gonna be a rough morning. My first best weekend ever, Fannie and Freddie go bye-bye. Second one, two more stalwarts go buh-bye. I wonder how long before Hank starts paying me to stay home from climbing and riding.

Y'know what's really weird? Flame wars among "alternative" lifestyle folks. They write horrible bitchy things - and sign off "Namaste!"

[Poll #1145210]

Edit: to clarify: the last question is about someone you don't know socially, but discuss professional matters with sufficiently often that you've said things like, "Have a good weekend," and works for your company.

Rockstar is weird shit yo. For some reason the vending machine at work has it. I could barely keep my eyes open on Friday, literally, which is the only reason I kept drinking it, but good L-rd, just one sip scared me and I took tiny sips all afternoon, terrified of that stuff. And then my pee was all funky, which at first made me think, "NOBODY could be that dehydrated," until I remember the vit. B thing.

Speaking of weird shit, I signed up for Shabbat dinner this week with the Yenta organization, and one of the boxes was, "Is there anyone you want to sit next to and cuddle?" Sna? Aren't y'all a bunch of rabbis?

In other news, it just dawned on me that my life is weird and incestuous in ways I couldn't even begin to explain to a co worker.

Just after I started my run this morning, an older guy came up behind me and said, "Do you know who Jiminy Cricket is?" He told me I was his Jiminy Cricket this morning, for convincing him to keep running. Does that count as my good deed for the day? 'cuz I'm sure I'll be committing more sins than mitzvahs today. Anyhow, he ran alongside me and started quizzing me on authors to famous works. I missed two before he commented that I'm very well read and asked what my major was. It was very surreal. It was also not very good for my run, as I had to run a little faster than usual to keep up with him (before he left the park at the Plaza), so I did the lower loop in <10min-mi pace. Oops. And then in the final part of my run, I came across a father running with his kid, which is not unusual at all, except that he abruptly turned around and ran back the other way, suggesting he was doing hill repeats with a baby stroller. Ai-yah.

Leaving brunch at Otto on Sunday, I ran into little brother on the way home, an object reminder that I'm liable to run into my siblings anywhere. *gulp*

I cooked tacos from the Cook's Illustrated recipe for the kids last night. Must remember that I only need half a vidalia for that one, and that the recipe as is makes filling for 10 large tacos. Might consider substituting half turkey or bison next time as well. For dessert, I served mango, papaya, and raspberries in a ginger-infused simple syrup. I somehow had lots of extra ginger in the house, so the syrup was almost too gingery, which the kids really liked: apparently liking the taste of ginger is a Stine family thing.

Baby bro was hungover and my sister slept until 3 after going out, so both were very appreciative of my efforts. It was also vastly entertaining to hear about their evenings. Bbro apparently went to a club called "Arena", which made me choke a little. ( Baby Stines on sex and clubbing ) So, yeah, I'm starting to feel more in the mood to cook and I might start cooking hangover recovery Sunday night dinners for the baby Stines.

Old people are weird, man. Since when does Whoopi Goldberg have a morning radio talk show? She had Jackie Collins on, talking about a new book featuring an old character and the mature problems she faces, like a daughter who is on the Internet. All I could think was, well how? Is she a camgirl? Does she have a MySpace? Use Google to research her schoolwork?

And then when I was getting on the elevator in my building, an older (but not that old!) woman in the elevator asked about my smallish box, "Amazon - is that a computer?" Er, no, it's two books. Yikes!

I was going to go running even though I was a bit late this morning, but when my iPod decided to go on strike, I realized it was a sign from the universe that it was not to be. Instead, I ( climbed the stairs ) I'm thinking there's a lot more of this in my future.

I had to stop in B&N yesterday, as there was a book I wanted for this weekend, but omg they have so many treats, it's a minor miracle I walked out without bulging bags. I thought I'd gone through all the local hiking guides, but Trails.com pointed me to this one, which lists how to get to the trail head from the train!! I am ridiculously excited about being able to get to hikes by myself, esp. since there's only one appropriate speed hike on Sunday; then again, last time I went hiking by myself, I got lost in the Utah desert and was quite convinced I'd be eaten by a griffin or something.

I was 15 pages into my book about Napoleonic era spies when I realized I didn't really want to spend 400 pages of dense, academic prose on that topic. I realized recently that I have all sorts of categories of books that I need filled at any given moment - there's the book for the subway, the book for before bed, the book for running, and the book for trains/planes (i.e. long rides) - and they make terrible substitutes. Unfortunately, I'm almost done with my current trains&planes book until my next African wildlife book comes in. *sighs*

I think the most entertaining part of the spy book was that when I was reading it in the car on the way to hiking, my cousin looked at the pages and said, "Ew, you're reading history?" and I got to explain that when she was older, she'd find herself enjoying reading it for fun :)

In yet another happy coincidence, I happened to be reading through the 163x books at the same time that I was listening to Robert Greenberg's lectures on Monteverdi and the development of opera. It gave a certain perspective to Mary Simpson. Unfortunately, ( I'm not as fond of the series anymore ) I guess if through a freak space-time accident, NYC 2007 were transplanted to Germany of 1631, we'd be overrun pretty quickly.