My First Thespian Experience
My good friend Dan is a playwright (or, as he prefers, a writer). I met him soon after I moved to New York, and over the past year or so, he’s been trying to get me in something he’s written. First, it was just a reading – that fell through. Then, a couple of months ago, he asked me to read for a character in a short play he’d written. The play was only about 10 pages long, and would be just one of a short play “lab”. I read it, and liked it, and before I could talk myself out of it – I agreed.
And I have to say…it wasn’t bad! The play was only about 15 minutes, and my part was sort of as a narrator, so it was really almost more of a storyteller than actor – I sat in the middle of the stage and talked to the audience, and then interacted with the other two actors as they came and went from the stage. There were only two performances, and as it was just in a small black-box theatre, the sold-out crowd was still only 60-80 people. But was I nervous? Well yes, yes I was. Though I think the process of rehearsing/learning lines was almost more nerve-wracking than actually performing the thing! But it went well (if I do say so myself). I did flub a line on the 2nd performance, but (according to the director) I covered it and nobody could tell.
But yeah, the whole experience was pretty fun. It was neat being part of the process, and nice to meet new people (I obviously know the writer and also know the director, aka Dan’s roommate, but I didn’t know the other two actors before we started). I can’t say I’ve caught the acting bug full-on; I am definitely not quitting my job to pursue a career on stage. But would I do it again, if asked? Absolutely.
On how I got sun, sleep, and a new superpower
Last week was vacation – yay! What did I do for said vacation? Went to Fire Island.
This pic is actually from last year, as I didn't take any this week.
See, Robert and Kevin have been out at the island all summer. Now, I’m not going to lie: I much prefer it when they’re just a few blocks away. I miss our weekly drinks/food/game nights! However, the one upside (for me) to their being at Fire Island for the summer is that they let me come there to stay with them. Such is what happened last week – and it couldn’t have come at a better time! The week was fairly low-key, but that is exactly what I wanted/needed. I’d been having some insomnia issues, getting maybe three hours of sleep a night. So a few days away from work and the city was a perfect remedy to that!
I got there last Monday, midday – in fact, just in time for the infamous “noon whistle”. First things first: Robert & Kevin had purchased a pair of sunglasses for me at an event on the island back in late June, and so they finally gave me those…
Super cute - thanks, boys!
Kevin had some work to do that afternoon at the island’s community house, so Robert and I went with him. Hung out there for a bit, and even in the brief amount of time that I was outdoors walking and then sitting in the sun on the deck at the community house, my skin started to get some color! Yay! Monday evening we ate (and drank…and drank…) at home, and then walked over to Cherry Grove (the next community over on the island from where R&K stay, in Fire Island Pines) to see a drag show. It was actually a good drag show, too – the first one I’ve been to in awhile! The hostess is named Shequida and she’s pretty hilarious, plus does a pretty wide range of numbers (everything from traditional dancey stuff to singing opera. Random, but it works). The show went a bit long, as it was Shequida’s birthday and she proceeded to get drunk on stage and kept doing “…one last number”, so we didn’t get home til after 4:00.
Tuesday woke up late-ish and the sun was out! (So much for the week of rain that had been forecast). So, since the sun was out and Kevin didn’t have any work that needed to be done, we went to the beach.
Yes, another 2008 pic - and this one has actually already been in a blog, from September '08. Sue me.
The water wasn’t too cold, but it WAS very choppy, so I didn’t get in the water past my knees, nor did Kevin. Robert did, though, so good for him; he’s a braver man than I. After that, we went back to the house and swam in the pool some, then back out to Cherry Grove for dinner. (Cherry Grove apparently has some of the best corn dogs ever, but they had run out, so we had to have hamburgers. Bastards!). We left Cherry Grove just after midnight and walked back to the Pines, got home around 1:00. Kevin went to bed, but Robert and I decided to stay up for awhile longer, talking and walking around and, to use Robert’s term, “being ridiculous”. It was a lot of fun! – and a lot of going to bed after 4:00 again.
On Wednesday the promised rains finally came, so it was definitely a relaxed sort of day. Hung around at home, read a bit…I think “recovering” is the best word for it. So, of course, by Wednesday evening it was time to get started again! This time we stayed in the Pines. We went to get Planter’s Punches (a deadly combination of about 80 kinds of rum with a touch of something that makes it taste like punch and not like rum at ALL), and it was at this point that I realized I had my superpower: invisibility. See, Fire Island Pines is, oh, 99.997% gay men (most of the ladies are at Cherry Grove). And while many of these men are nice to me, most will not acknowledge my existence unless forced to do so. For example, R&K may stop and talk to someone they know, and that person will not even look over at me until either Robert or Kevin say, “…and this is Joey, our lesbian friend”. It’s kind of funny, actually. And it must be said that this is not true for every guy on the island: some are perfectly nice and even talkative, and I even met a guy who had gone to see Paul McCartney last week as well, and we totally bonded over love of Paul. But I digress. After the Planter’s Punches we ate dinner at home and then hung out with a couple of guys R&K know (and yes, they were ones that actually talked to me :-)). Nothing too extraordinary happened, and I think we were even in bed by 2:00! Crazy.
Thursday: sun was back out! Robert and Kevin had things to do around the house, and thankfully Robert had me “help” (“help” in that he would’ve been perfectly fine doing it himself, but knows that I get bored just sitting doing nothing). So while Kevin trimmed trees around the yard, Robert and I cleaned the pool and watered the plants – they’re growing their own herbs, as well as tomatoes, and strawberries (though sadly none of the tomatoes nor strawberries were ripe yet when I was there! C’est la vie). We swam in the freshly cleaned pool that afternoon, and then Thursday evening one of the other housemates came back to the island with a load of things from the “real world”, so we met him to bring stuff back to the house, and had a late dinner. After eating I went to bed “early”, which is to say midnight. I was exhausted!
Friday was time to go home (and for the best, as the rain was coming back and Kevin had work to do!). So I left that afternoon, not long after the same noon whistle that had greeted me Monday. It was altogether a great week: relaxing, entertaining, and it was SO good to get to spend time with Robert and Kevin! Though I realized on my way home that we never played a single game while I was on the island. Quelle horreur! I suppose it will have to wait until they’re back in Manhattan…um, you are coming back eventually – right, guys? 😉
Paul McCartney in Concert = AMAZING
Last night I went to see Paul McCartney in concert at Citi Field. Citi Field is the new home of the Mets…wait, let me Beatles Geek-out for a moment and explain. See, The Beatles played the first-ever concert at Shea Staduim (the former home of The Mets). Not only was that show the first at Shea; it was the first show at a stadium ever. Pre-Beatles, there weren’t big stadium and arena shows…anyway, last year they shut down Shea, and Billy Joel did a big “goodbye” concert there – and Paul made a surprise appearance. So, since he’d been in the first concert at Shea and the last concert at Shea, it only made since that he’d do the first show at the new “Shea”!
Waiting for the show to begin...
Note: Pics were taken with my iPhone, which has the unfortunate side-effect of making us look further away from the stage then we actually were.
So, last night was that show. It was, in a word, Incredible. Best concert I’ve ever been to? Absolutely. Am I still on a post-concert high? Hell yes.
First, though, there was an opening band, The Script. They’re an Irish band I’d never heard of before, but they were good! I’ll definitely check their stuff out.
And then…out came Paul. He came on shortly before 9:00 and started his set…and because I knew I’d want to blog about it, I kept track of the set list during the show…
Drive My Car
Jet
Only Mama Knows
Flaming Pie
Got to Get You Into My Life
Let Me Roll It/Foxy Lady
Highway
The Long and Winding Road
My Love
Blackbird
Here Today
Dance Tonight
Calico Skies
Mrs. Vandebilt
Eleanor Rigby
Sing the Changes
Band on the Run
Back in the U.S.S.R.
I’m Down
Something
I’ve Got a Feeling
Paperback Writer
A Day in the Life/Give Peace a Chance
Let It Be
Live and Let Die
Hey Jude
And at this point, the concert “ends”. Of course, we all know that encores are a requirement for live shows at this point…though frankly, after the last few songs he had played, I had no idea what he’d do for an encore. Well, he did:
Day Tripper
Lady Madonna
I Saw Her Standing There
That was ending two…and then, though I wasn’t sure he’d do it…encore two!
Yesterday
Helter Skelter
Get Back
Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Heart’s Club Band (Reprise)
The End
So yeah. Fucking amazing set list. Granted, he does have 5 decades (!) of material to choose from…but he played every song I wanted to hear, and then some. The man may be 67, but he played for 2 1/2 hours. And during the entire concert, he never even stopped for a drink of water. I don’t even know how that’s possible.
And the thing with Paul is, he’s so adorable. There’s a reason he was called the cute Beatle – he was always the flirty, charming one. That hasn’t changed. And there is nothing better than an artist that plays and still seems to know how lucky they are, that they get to be a successful musician, one that thousands of people will pay good money to go see. I’ve been to some concerts where the performer seems pissed off to be there – that ain’t Paul. He still seems like he’s having so much fun with the whole thing.
But highlights from the show? Well overall, there is this sense of nostalgia that’s sort-of permeated his work for the past few years (not including his last album, released as The Fireman). During the whole show, there was a giant screen at the back of the stage showing whatever might be relevant to the song at hand. They were all really good – and then, for some reason, during “The Long and Winding Road” they were showing photos of the American desert. Random…until I remembered that, when he was married to Linda, they lived in Arizona – in fact, she died there. So all of a sudden it made sense, “subtle tribute to Linda”…and sure enough the next song was “My Love”, which he had written for Linda when they were married and which he dedicated to her. And then a couple of songs later he played “Here Today”, a song he wrote for John after he was murdered. Paul actually seemed to choke up a little while he was singing that one, it was pretty touching. And later still, he played George’s song “Something” on a ukelele George had given him. So yeah, lots of reminiscing.
However, it wasn’t all downers! He played new stuff, more than I thought he might (which is great, because his last couple of albums have been pretty good, especially his most recent). And he of course played tons of Wings stuff. But he didn’t disappoint those that only know him as a Beatle (like my coworker who came with me) – he played a TON of Beatles numbers at the end.
My favorite moment of the night? It would have to be “Live and Let Die”. Yes, yes, this is a Wings song and not one by my beloved Beatles. But “Live and Let Die” is a total stadium-rock type song – Wings did a huge stadium tour in the 70s, and this was always one of the highlights. Big pyrotechnics, the whole bit. So I was curious to see what we would get last night, as it was the first time i’d ever been to an outdoor concert of this magnitude. Fireworks? Why yes, yes indeed…
Live and Let Die
That photo also give a good sense of how the venue was set up – the screens they had to the right and the left were ENORMOUS, and yet totally HD (that doesn’t come across in the photo, either).
So here I am, the day after. My voice is hoarse from the yelling, my hands sore from the clapping. And I’ve already created a playlist on iTunes to recreate the set list from last night. (note: I’m missing way more songs than I should be, five or so. It’s downright embarrassing). The concert was absolutely the best I’ve ever been to (including the last time I saw McCartney). I’m so glad I was able to go – and able to blog about it, so I can try and re-live it in the future 🙂
The weekend, in brief:
– Saw an old friend from Tulsa days that is a new New Yorker.
– Watched Away We Go. It was good, I highly recommend.
– Enjoyed beautiful weather on a pier on the Hudson River.
– Celebrated the 40th Anniversary of the Stonewall Riots at Stonewall
– Lost my nose ring (or is it nosering?)
– Enjoyed a chocolate croissant
– Looked at birds, reptiles, and other non-cuddly creatures at a random pet stop in the west 80’s
– Bought new makeup
– Learned new makeup techniques
I’ve Moved!
Okay, honestly? I don’t have a lot of time to blog right now! I’m busy trying to unpack…but I also promised that I would blog again before June 1st, so there you go.
I’ve come across an interesting dilemma: having room for furniture (finally! If you’d seen my former room, you’d understand). The dilemma being that I haven’t a clue what to buy. Like, what do I really need? Right now, I’m going with bookshelves. Eventually I’m going to buy a TV, and then I’d want somewhere to put my DVD player and movies…but then again, that could wait awhile. In the meantime, should I just leave a big gaping space in my room? And what’s the best way to organize my rather sizable closet? Agh! I don’t know how to live with SPACE! It just…feels…so…strange…
Okay, so back to listening to Garth Brooks and unpacking for me. In the meantime, please enjoy this photo of the view from my apartment (if you’re facing Southeast, that is):
The Oklahoma/Texas Recap – FINALLY
Okay, so a month ago I left for a 10-day trip to Dallas, Waxahachie, Duncan, and Tulsa. I have yet to blog about this trip. In fact, I have yet to blog about anything, really, since that trip! I don’t know what my deal is. I guess I go through blogging phases. Sometimes, I share every damn thing I find on the interweb on this site…and then sometimes, all of a sudden three weeks have flown by and I realize I haven’t posted anything. Such is life, I suppose!
I could blog about my trip now, though I’m not sure it really needs to be done at this point. And yet… so here it goes. The highlights:
1. Hanging out with Kristen in Dallas First on my trip was seeing Kristen! She was kind enough to pick me up from the airport, and then we spent the day together. Plus, I finally got to eat at her father’s fabulous Italian restaurant in Arlington…I’ve been hearing about the place for a decade now! Totally lived up to the hype. I also had the “pleasure” of helping Kristen create paper turtles…it had something to do with keeping kindergartners from going postal. Also, Dr. C_________ (no last names in this blog!) has asked me to be in her wedding, so I’ll be making a return to Dallas next spring, complete with bridesmaid dress. Stay tuned for that…
2. Hanging out with Leslie in Waxahachie It’s okay if you don’t know where Waxahachie is; I didn’t, either. Leslie has been one of my best friends for nearly 15 years now, and is pregnant with her first kid, so I had to make time to spend with her! In fact, the timing of my visit had a lot to do with her – going during this time meant I could go to her baby shower. Yay! But before that, we had a lot of good downtime in Waxahachie. I don’t get to see Leslie enough, and I doubt she’ll be visiting me anytime soon…but I can’t wait til her little boy is born! The ‘nephew’ will make up for less Les time in NYC 🙂
3. Hanging out with family in Duncan Since I’ve moved away from Oklahoma – holy crap, I just realized – that was THREE YEARS AGO TODAY! Weird. Anyway…since I left Oklahoma three years ago, I’ve made 4 trips back, but typically stuck to Tulsa during those visits; family in Duncan was often neglected. I promised myself that this time, I would spend quality time with the fam! So that’s what I did. And it was a good time! Baked cake with Gran, watched movies with Dad, dinners with Gran and Granddad – it was nice. Also, while I went to Duncan I got to attend Leslie’s aforementioned baby-shower. I won’t lie – it was a little foreign at first. It was held at a Baptist church, and (save Leslie’s family), most of the other attendees weren’t really chummy with me…BUT! I didn’t go there for them, I went there for Leslie (and for myself!) and it was great to be a part of it. Honestly, Leslie cracking up at me picking “engorged breasts” during a pregnancy-themed Memory game almost made the entire trip worth it!
4. Hanging out with friends in Tulsa Though I tried to make this trip more SW-Oklahoma centric, I realized I couldn’t be in that part of the world for 10 days and not make a trip to Tulsa. And frankly, spending more than 72-hours straight in Duncan makes me a little nuts. So to Tulsa I went! This time, I had the luxury of a car – the first time since I moved (THREE YEARS AGO!) that I’ve been able to drive myself around. It was great! I got to see [the outside of] Karen’s new house; discovered that Tulsa has an actual, almost-Chinatown-ick-worthy Asian Market; ate a fanfuckingtastic meal with Mike in Utica Square; lunched with Christopher and realized that Halim & Mimi’s (or whatever it’s named now) is just as good as it used to be; attended a drag show at Renegades and discovered that, save Catia, it’s nowhere near as good as it used to be; and got to do a game night with Karen and Mike (I almost won Phase 10, damnit!). It was a pretty great time.
5. Hanging out with Lyndsie in OKC This was brief, but memorable. Why? Well first of all, Lyndsie is pregnant! That’s right, both of my BFFs from high school are pregnant with their first kids at the same time. Crazy! Lyndsie is just now hitting 12 weeks, so I’m [fairly certain] at liberty to share this news widely. Anyway, we hadn’t been able to see each other much in Duncan the previous weekend, so I stopped in OKC to grab lunch with her on my way from T-Town to Duncan. It was excellent to see her again, though it didn’t feel so long since I’d seen her, since she and Kevin (her husband) came to visit me in October. What made this leg of the trip even more exciting? The driving tribulations I had to endure: I was stopped in traffic on the turnpike driving to OKC (good thing I paid all that money for the privilege of going 20 mph!), and after being made to stop without warning was almost rear-ended by a semi (it was fishtailing and burning rubber on its tires. Not cool). I finally made it to OKC and had lunch, and while driving back to the highway was stopped in a neighborhood, “city-within-a-city” in OKC called Nichols Hills, whereby I was given a $79 ticket (okay: I was driving WITH THE FLOW OF TRAFFIC, I live OUT OF STATE, was going 37 in a 25, and was pulled over 20 feet away from the 40 mph sign. COME ON). Left the officer, continued on my way to Duncan, and as I was entering Duncan, had an old man pull out in front of me, while I was going 60 on the highway, and was (barely) able to swerve and miss him. I was SO ready to get back to NYC by this point. But I couldn’t yet, because I still had one last bit of my vacation to go…
6. Hanging out with Brent in Dallas My flight back to NYC was leaving from Dallas (I bought my roundtrip, NYC-Dallas flight, for $140! I KNOW!), which would’ve been fine – except I was suddenly without a way to get from Duncan to Dallas. I ended up taking Amtrak (yes, they have trains in that part of the country. Barely), and made it there earlier than planned. Once I arrived, Brent came and picked me up, and we were off. He lives right by Dallas’s gayborhood (Oaklawn), so we lunched there, then did the uber-nerd thing and saw Star Trek. On IMAX. On opening night. Yeah, I know. But it was awesome! Totally worth it. After that, back out in Oaklawn. We went to Sue Ellen’s, the one lesbian bar I know of in Dallas, and I was able to meet up with a girl I know there, someone I’d met 2 1/2 years earlier at an Indigo Girls concert in SF (random!). The next day Brent made me a hungover breakfast, and then drove me to the airport.
So, that was that. My Oklahoma/Texas adventure. It really was a great trip – but a lot of traveling-while-traveling, which meant I returned from vacation pretty damn tired. As soon as I returned, I had to jump straight into apartment hunting…but I’ll cover that in another blog post 🙂 (and I swear, it will be posted sooner than June!)
Babies, Beaches, and Birthdays!
Yes, yes, I know. I haven’t blogged in AGES. I’ve been traveling a lot for work, and frankly not been in the bloggiest of moods! But that’s all changing now…and i have a whole month’s worth of blogs to catch up on.
So, lets start with a month ago. The last weekend of February I went to West Palm Beach, Florida to see Rachel and Lili, and their 7-month-old twin girls, Casey and Marley. It was so great! I hadn’t seen Rachel and Lili in five years (crazy!), and it was nice to catch up. It was a fairly low-key, homebody-ish weekend – which was EXACTLY what I wanted. It couldn’t have been better! Rachel and Lili claim the girls were fussy and just beginning teething, but I thought they were great. I also learned that it’s probably for the best that I live far away, because I would spoil them rotten. They stop crying when you hold them! And those smiles! How could I just let them lay there? Yeah, it was like that. But who could resist? I mean, look at these two!
Marley is on the left; Casey, on the right
Other than spoiling babies, we went to the beach (Lili caught fish, the rest of us chilled on the blanket)…
Check out that hair!
Rachel with Casey, who was refusing to sleep
I’d put a picture of the fish Lili caught, but the Rachel I’m related to would kill me…
We (we being Rachel and Lili) made a seafood feast…and I finally saw crabs being cooked while still alive.
Poor guy. But he sure was delicious!
We also played games, went to the library…like I said, low-key. And so fun. I can’t wait to go back! But don’t worry, girls – I’ll come visit even if you move to Texas 🙂
———————————————
The weekend after I returned from Florida, it was Robert’s birthday! He decided to do his birthday in…and make his own seafood feast. No complaints from me! We had mussels, shrimp, and lobster – and Tucker made a new friend!
Tucker and Lenny
Robert bought Lenny, a 2 1/2 pound behemoth, for the meal. And once again, I was educated to the ways of cooking shellfish. It seems that putting still-living lobsters into the boiling water is actually bad: they, well…they urinate when you put them into the water, and it changes the taste of the meat. (and Robert, feel free to correct me in the comments if I didn’t get that right!) So, what to do? You stab them square in the brain, and then you cook them. Note: watching a lobster stabbed in the head was much more traumatic than watching a crab being thrown into a pot. When Lenny was impaled I screamed like a girl. But the end result? Well, I’d never had lobster meat before – and it was delish 🙂
Lenny before...
...and Lenny after.
So, all-in-all, the first week of March was pretty fantastic! Much more happened in March, of course – but those posts will come later…
Brent’s “Goodbye Blue State – Hello Red State!” Party
Ah, parties. I haven’t thrown one in quite some time (and nothing to the extent that this one was…but I’m getting ahead of myself!). Brent, for reasons that only he can quite understand, decided to pack it up and leave NYC for Dallas. Now, I can understand why people would want to leave New York (well, sort of). But leaving NY to become a Texan?! Mon dieu. However, this post is not to question Brent’s judgement; he’s excited to be moving, and I’m happy that he’s doing what he wants to do! This post is about Brent’s going away party.
Oh, the party.
Originally, [note: at this point in the blog writing, Time Warner’s always fantastic internet screwed up, and I lost a few paragraphs. So I’m going to attempt to recreate what I’d already written, but I can guarantee that it won’t have the wit and charm of the original draft]
Okay, so… Originally, Brent planned to have dinner with a few people at a restaurant here, and then possibly karaoke after. Yet he didn’t seem super-excited about these plans, and Robert and I thought he might enjoy having a party instead. We wanted to try and surprise him, realized there was no way that was going to work, and so asked him about the party. He was into it, so we went for it.
Now, most of you don’t know, but Robert doesn’t do anything “small” or “simple”. The planning for this turned into hours of conversations about menus, guest lists, decor, music, entertainment, etc. etc. Of course the end result was fab and all the attention to details totally paid off. But I can’t tell you the debates that went around guacamole vs. 7-layer dip (n.b.: we went with the 7-layer, and it was a hit. It seems 7-layer dip isn’t really a “thing” in the N.E., and all the Oklahoma transplants at the party got REALLY excited about it.). On the plus side, I have learned that one can order a flag for any state in the country, and have it express delivered, for a relatively low price!
So. I got over to Robert & Kevin’s early the day of the party, and while Kevin worked Robert and I got the place ready (fun fact: it takes 3 hours to cover their ceiling with crepe streamers), made food, and juiced 70 limes for homemade margarita mix (thankfully, Rachel came and helped with this!). Despite the planning and prep, we were rushing around to finish up before people started arriving at 8:00 – and we just made it.
The party was a lot of fun, if I do say so myself! Let’s go to the pictures…
[note 2: this is where I was when the internet messed up last time – trying to post the first pic. Fingers crossed…but just in case, I’ve saved a draft!]
Balloons all blown by Robert.
The flag is 100% polyester. Nothing but the best.
We went with a Texas theme for the party. Texas flag, Tex Mex food, and more margaritas than you can shake a Texas-sized stick at.
I somehow turned into cafeteria lady when everyone was getting food…
And what did we do, beside eat and drink? Well, we were going to play trivia (questions about Texas and Brent!), but that never really happened. We did take turns saying favorite Brent memories, which was nice. And then, since there were so many OSU alumni at the party, we decided to go old-school and play beer pong.
Beer pong was a bit tricky, insomuch that I had rarely played in college and don’t remember the rules. And, it turns out that every university has its own rules for playing (multiple cups? bouncing on the table?). Regardless of that, my team lost. Brent chose all the girls there to be on his team…I don’t want to say that sex played a role, but – yeah. We didn’t get them to drink once. Not ONCE.
No red plastic Solo cups here...
The party went by quickly – too fast! At the end, a flag ceremony (with sword!) was performed to pass the Texas flag along to Brent, and everyone trickled home. Eventually, it was just Robert, Kevin, Brent, and me…and all those decorations.
There are no words
There are more pics from the party on photobucket, but you’ll have to get the password from Robert.
Last weekend, and Chicago
Yes, yes, it’s already Saturday – but there were two things of note that I wanted to mention about last weekend, and I wanted to be sure that I didn’t miss doing so!
1. I went and saw Slumdog Millionaire. Finally, weeks and weeks after it opened here – I don’t know what took me so long. Anyway, it’s a fantastic movie (that’s right, you heard it here first). It’s way more intense than I imagined it would be (I was expecting a sweet, heartwarming story about a poor kid who goes on a game show. Um, not quite.). But it’s definitely a must-see. And the soundtrack is fantastic, I bought it as soon as I got home. The best song is called “Jai Ho”; they play it over the closing credits (the only part of the movie that is even a little bit “Bollywood”). So I’m posting a “video” here (you know how I love to post the YouTube); however, since this movie is still in theatres, it’s not the scene from the film. Rather, it’s a photo of the film while the song plays. In other words, you’ll want to just push play and then keep reading…nothing to see here, move along, move along 🙂
2. I finally learned how to flip things using only a
skilletcorrection: according to the chef, it was a saute pan. On Sunday, Robert made carnitas and I went over to learn to make homemade tortillas. Not only that, I learned to turn one over using only the flip of my wrist. (let it be said: Robert is a patient man). So watch out pancakes, here I come! Um, if only I could make decent pancakes to begin with. Damn.
So that was last weekend! Then this week, I went to Chicago for work. I have never really spent time in Chicago before, and it was nice. The downtown is a lot better than I expected; there’s actually life in their downtown (restaurants, etc.), and the architecture is pretty fantastic. I also got to meet up with an old friend while I was there. I hadn’t seen Ray for three years or so, so that was nice! Granted, I was out later than I should have been…but it was totally worth it.
I’m in the city for the weekend…I had thought I’d go to Princeton to buy Rachel a drink for her 21st. However, I have to turn around and go to Phoenix for work on Tuesday, so I decided I’d stay close to home for the weekend. A fun-filled Saturday of catching up on the DVR, and a Sunday of laundry and the Grammys (or is that Grammies?). Yeah, probably won’t have much to blog about for a couple of days…
Christmas Candy!
I decided that this year I would make Christmas goodies to send to family in Oklahoma. Originally I was going to make shortbread with Robert at his and Kevin’s place; however, he had to go out of town at the last minute (more on that in a moment). So instead, I decided to make fudge and haystacks at my place. This should have been simple, and making the actual candy was easy. But there was a little problem…
I could not find marshmallow creme or chow mein noodles anywhere in New York City.
Eventually, obviously, I did get everything I needed – they don’t sell Kraft marshmallow creme here, they sell something called Fluff. And the chow mein noodles were found at the last place I looked – in the small grocery store in my neighborhood (go figure!). But in the end, it was all good…
Fudge. Obviously.
And what did Robert have to do instead? He went to Jersey to help Kevin’s dad slaughter the deer he’d hunted.
Poor Bambi.
Aide-mémoire 