NYC 2011

Saturday:
Took the train into NYC from Newark.
Went to McDonalds for breakfast.
Went to the South Shore for  TKTS and shopping.
Wall Street.
Katz Deli.
Memphis on Broadway.
Train back to Newark.

Katz was delicious.
Memphis was good - but I didn't really keep me singing the tunes all night long. The high note was that, as a fan of Rent, it was cool that I recognzied the leading man in Memphis as the leading man in Rent. He was my least favorite character and actor -- but alas! Earwax. I saw someone I recognized by name and by voice.

Sunday:
Train the NYC from Newark with all the luggage.
Dropped off bags at Hotel and ate breakfast there.
Went to Church.
Back to hotel to change.
Rockefeller Center.
Apple Store.
FAO Schwartz.
Dinner at some random Deli that was pretty good..
Cheesecake from Carnegie Deli.

Church was the best part of the day. It was crazy. First of all I saw Naomi from taza-and-husband.blogspot.com outside. She's not as cute in real life as on her blog. She looked to thin and trendy. Then you go up into this buidling and you are in a normal looking church. I saw some kids I recognized from BYU but not real friends. The bishop of the singles ward (that we attended) is our neighbors dad so it was intersting. He's very nice.

Monday:
Ice Skating in Central Park.
Lunch at Cosi.
Shopping at American Girl (for Rosie) and H&M (for me).
Dinner at the Shake Shack and dessert from PinkBerry.

Ice skating was the best part of the trip.

Tuesday:
Downtown for TKTS and 9/11 memorial.
American History Museum (love!)
Phantom (love!)
Juniors (yet another deli - love!)

Wednesday:
shopped
walked in central park
ate pizza
flew home


I love NYC and I love Duane Reade.

Weighty Issues

2005 High School graduation                - I weighed 145
2006 After 1 year of college                  - I weighed 178
2006 Court's wedding 4 months later    - I weighed 148
2007  August                                          -  around 155                                     
2008 August                                           - 148 serious running
2009 Next August                                  - back to 160
2010 College Graduation                       - I weighed 168 lbs
2010 September before NYC                 - I weighed 160
2010 September after NYC                    - I weighed 169 
2010 November Florida Trip                  - I weighed 155
2011 My Birthday in April                     - 163

TODAY                                                            155

I feel good about 155. I want to weigh 150. It seems like a good round number. 145 would be a dream though huh, HS grad weight!

Necessary Evil (cont.)

Necessary Evil #2

the stickers on apples

please know that before i corrected myself, the initial sentence i typed was "the apples on stickers"

Combination Man

Whenever I listen to The Fiddler on the Roof soundtrack (Sunday showers) I tell myself that I need to marry Tevia.

I want a man that treasts his family like Tevia does. Also his love for the Lord and his Faith is beyond comforting.

If I Were a Rich Man Lyrics: "And I'd discuss the holy books with the learned men, several hours every day. That would be the sweetest thing of all."

Get off YOUR high horse

To all those people who write stupid things about being offended by "You're" "Your": CALM DOWN. So somoene made a mistake. What of it?  I'm sure you make a million but no one makes a pinterest image or a someecard about it.   Sometimes, nay, frequenlty I type "nad" when I mean "and".  This is far more problematic. Nad is another word for ball. They use it often in Beavis and Butthead. But not one freaks out at me about that embarassing mistake.  I think they just want to seem superior - but honeslty- you're just spelling a simple word.  It doesn't make me cringe to see things spelled wrong. I do cringe a bit at the "4" used as for. But I don't go around parading my anxieties. I realize I need to accept them.  Life goes on, and it goes on beautifully.

Andecdote:

Last night I posted a picture of the decorated Christmas mantle on Instagram  (the best part of having an iPhone).

 I wrote "Coco's stalking" and clicked enter. Immediatley I realized that I meant "stocking" not "stalking". I turned it into a funny joke.  But had I not re-read my post and left it - no damage would we done - no harm befallen the world as we know it.

Calm down with the You're/Your images on Pinterst.  Unless you are correcting someone out of care, it's probably best that you just accept the fault and go along your merry way.

In the past 2 years I've had a the strong desire to part my hair down the middle.

I always have residual bangs from haircuts past. These make it difficult to achieved the desired look.

I think today - it finally kinda worked. I didn't do my hair, I just rolled out of bed, put on yesterday's church outfit and went to work. My hair just kinda looked fabulous which was unexpected since I did not realy like how it looked yesterday. With the small amount of dirty that is there - oily but not too oily to look bad - it stuck really nicely in a center part.

Ta Da! Hopefully I can replicate it more often and it will soon just become my usual look. that's what I'm trying to make my new glasses - just the norm, the usual. Not as much of a converstaon piece.

shamefull, yes, but this 10 year old trick is my main inspiration as of late

 

I Steal Mustard Packets

For lunch I've been really into these healthy little wraps I make.

WRAP

Tortilla

 80 calories and 12 g of Fiber

I don't have to worry about fiber causing problems
I've got a stomach of steel

Cheese

35 calories

I always see these at the grocers not in the fridge
and it freaks me out
what kind of cheese doesn't need to be in the fridge?!
but it's so easy to spread so i just learned to forget the freaky fact

 I take this bad boy spreadable cheese and cover the entire tortilla. Then I put the smothered tortilla in the toaster oven. I get a warm, crispy, melty beginning to my wrap.

TOPPINGS

Turkey

50 calories

 1/2 Roma Tomato

bought a paring knife for the office
makes tomato consumption a dream

Spinach

I microwave a big handful of it for15 seconds

it's warm but not limp

i splash it with salt

and i top it all off with the stolen mustard packet.

It all started by using a mustard packet that I found in the knife drawer

It needs just that small packet sized amount of mustard -

not enough to justify buying an entire mustard bottle

and they are just there at hamburger joints

so i stuff a few in my purse

i'm such a freak

i love it

Marathon & Complain

so. my best friend mallory always joked about her desire to run a marathon. i said poo poo! that goal if far too lofty.
i ran 2 half marathons. i felt done.

sunday oct 30, 2011 i took the dog for a walk. on walks i think of ludacris things and makeup alternate life senarios in my head. on this walk i thought, i should run a marathon.
i ran 3 miles the next day. 3 difficult miles. happy halloween.

well yesterday i ran 4.4 and it was not bad.
today i made a excel spreadsheet of my training schedule.

what the what! am i really gonna do it - i don't know. but it's keeping me running 5 times a week and binging in halloween candy. especially frozen reese's.

now my complaint. ahhh i forgot whatever it was that i felt like complaining about. yay for private blog therapy.

oh i remembered-  i hate that spotify writes all over my facebook wall the embarassing things i'm listening to - like glee cast radio. but it's okay. life goes on.

I hate those Keep Calm Posters

I read half of the book The Hunt For Red October. I need to finish it because I won't allow myself to see the movie until I've finished the book - and my lover Indiana Jones' dad (Sean Connery) is in it.

this is my signed copy i just scanned in, btw
didn't just find this on google images
ps I'm a pathological liar

Today I was reading some article about Isreal, Iran, Germany, Russia, etc etc and nuclear weapons. It's totally scary isn't it, to think about how they are spending $700 billion on war heads, $70 billion on cruise missle systems.

But, I'm not even worried.

I'm more worried about the fact that I forgot to get an itemized reciept when I bought my contacts, which I need to get the rebate. I'm hoping if I stop by the doc's soon they'll be able to print me up one. that's what I'm worried about.

I wonder if anyone else worries about all the scary big picture things.

Good Movies with Better Soundtracks

Until last night, I hadn't seen Shrek since it came out in theaters. That was one of the best family outings of my life. It's a cute movie and I really like.

But my mom, who owns less than 7 CDs, did get the soundtrack and always had it in her truck.
Our choices while being driven about were the Shrek soundtrack or Gloria Estefan. I think she also acquired Faith Hill and the Black Eyed Peas by the time I graduated from High School. We had a limited yet wide variety.
The Shrek soundtrack is outstanding. The movie is great, but the music absolutely definietly outshines.

Another movie in the same boat - My Best Friends Wedding.  Cameron Diaz is the only link between the two but I think it's an arbitraty thing to consider.
It's a good movie. I love to watch it every now and then. The soundtrack though, the soundtrack is a treasure.

Any other movies with this same situation?

On the Contrary

I love contradictory descriptions.

This helps explain my life-long complete adoration of Oscar Wilde.

"The only way to behave to a woman is to make love to her, if she is pretty, and to some one else, if she is plain."

The Importance of Being Earnest.

I recently watched The Picture of Dorian Gray.
A movie made from my favorite book with one my favorite actors (Colin Firth).

They used that line and I still don’t know what I think about that.
Wrong Oscar Wilde work – but it’s still delightfully cheeky to incorporate it in…. anyway that’s a side note.

Back to my love of contradictory descriptions. Everyone has heard Crazy by Gnarles Barkley. I inexplicably came into ownership of the entire album, St. Elsewhere,
for free.
I fell truly madly deeply in love.
Here are some of the lyrics that make me go weak at the knees:

Basically I'm complicated
I have a hard time taking the easy way…..

….It's deep how you can be so shallow
And I'm afraid cause I have no fear

-Who Cares. Gnarles Barkley

When J.R.R.Tolkien describes Samwise’s first sighting of the oliphaunt I about died:

“To his astonishment and terror, and lasting delight….”

I mean come on…. 

I think I’ll send out a mass text questions asking “what two seemingly contradictory adjectives would you positively relish in being described as?”

My answer: Ethereal and Down-to-Earth.

Google: How Tall is.....

I don't know how I lived before IMDB and Google.

I was watching The Hudsucker Proxy last week. The plot was eh. The costumes austere. The Coen brothers directed and produced it.
Much like True Grit, they take a medicore plot and make it fun to watch. As I recently learned (from my last post, you see) the word auteur, the directors unique stamp. I can use it here, with the Coens way of creating films that you can tell are their very own.

Anyway - back to the Hudsucker proxy. Tim Robbins (ew) & Paul Newman (the salad dressing guy - ps I'm totally kidding by labeling him that) are standing face to face.
Google images didn't find exactly what I wanted, but look at them side by side.



Tim Robbins looks HUGE!
so I had to Google... "How tall is Tim Robbins?"

6'5

WOW!!!!

So that sent me on a roll...

How tall is Paul Newman. 5'10 (wow my height, he's less sexy in my book now, something I never thought would be possible after seeing Butch Cassidy)

Kobe Bryant 6'6 (shorter than I thought but still quite nice)

Vince Vaughn 6'5 (he always looked tall to me, so I finally decided to learn exactly how tall)

...and I decided I needed to get back to the movie and continue to take in their enticing costumes.


Well now... I can't watch anything without not only IMDBing them to make sure I know all other characters they have played, but now I have to know how tall they are. Sometimes it's a shock!!!

Jon Hamm 5'10 (lame)

Mos Def 5'9

Zack de la Rocha 5'10

Will Farrel 6'3

Greg Kinnear 5'10


These ones popped in my head the next day at work so I had to check.

She's 5'8 - awesome
He's 6'1 - acceptable


Zach (2nd on left) - 5'10
Tom (2nd on right) - 5'11
Short Band

Love Walked In - Vocab Test

I read a decent book. Perfect for airports becasue the writing style was so easy to focus on and conversational. I did have to look up a zillion words though. Not really that I didn't know what they meant or couldn't at least figure it out from context clues - but if I didn't know EXACTLY what it meant I liked to highlight it and see what my good friend dictionary.com had to say about it.

Marisa de los Santos, the author, took some liberties in stretching what some of the actual definitions meant so it was pretty neat to see what they actually meant and how she was using them.

Clever.

Here they are:

• rueful: pitialble
• palpably: tangibly
• harbinger: one that initiates major change
• denizen: inhabitant
• blowsy: sloppy, unkempt
• beseeching: beg urgently
• spangly: small piece of glittering matieral to decorate with (especially a tree)
• hackels: erectile hair on back on neck
• futility: uselessness
• fluted: having grooves, like a column
• auteur: filmakers personal and unique stamp
• benighted: intellectually or morally ignorant
• imperially: pertaining to an empire or whole
• mellifluous: sweet/smoothly flowing
• stentorian: loud powerful sound
• sonorous: loud, deep, resonant sound
• conduit: pipe to convey liquid, passage of liquid
• tumult: violent/noisy commotion
• trepidation: tremulous fear
• lithe: slim
• aria: elaborate melody
• superlative: highest quality
• unimpeachable: about suspicious
• unassailable: not open to attack or dispute
• lilting: rhythmic swing or cadence
• convivial: friendly
• restive: impatient, resltess
• enervated: without vibor/force/strenth
• attrition: reduction
• obviate: to anticiapte and prevent or eliminate
• unregenerate: opposing new ideas, not renewed
• ostensibly: outwardly appearing as such
• claret: a burgendy color, or wine
• garish: crudely/tastelessly colorful/showy/bright
• ellipsis: ommion of words that would have been repeated
• prescient: knowledge of things before they exist or happen
• solicitous: anxious or concerned
• bereft: deprived
• incorrigible: bad beyond correction
• asinine: foolish
• obliquity: divergence, sometimes from moral conduct
• chaise: carriage, lounge chair
• accretion:growth in size
• extemporaneous: done without advance preparaton
• peignoir: womens dressing gown
• petulant: sudden impatience
• plaintive: expressing sorrow, melancholy
• blithe: joyess, merry, carefree
• beatific: blissful, bestowing happieness
• cheogsam: oriental dress
• ad nauseam : to a disgusting degree
• ad infinitum: without limit
• transubstantiation:changing of one substance into another
• capacious: capable of holding much, roomy
• inscrutable: incapable of being investigated, inpenetrable, not easily understood
• sluiced: artificial channel for holding water

I love a good intrigue

I looooove questions so I had to copy Brittany Anne's blog.

i thought about this all day after i posed it so i'll make some edits in orange

Thirty Questions

1. Favorite Song.

Nearly impossible to say. Let's go with "The Spirit of God" - Hymn #2

also - Rufus Wainright, Hallelujah

2. Favorite Movie

Edward duh?

Scissorhands that is.

3. Favorite Show

currently: X-Files

4. Favorite Book 

The Picture of Dorian Gray

5. Favorite Quote

"If it wasn't hard, everyone would do it"

6. Favorite Food

Apples

7. Favorite Beverage

Diet Coke

8. Favorite Place
The Capitol Building, of Texas

9. Favorite Thing to Wear

Yoga Pants

10. What I Wore Today

some old mustard flats

my birthday dress from Anthro

a gold & silver grandma watch

11. What I Did Today

so far... awoke,

dressed,

packed lunch,

ate,

tried to get the dog to eat,

chatted with my parents,

dropped some stuff off at the dry cleaner,

got to work,

chatted with Karla,

worked,

renewed my registration at the tax office,

ate lunch,

started to blog.....

worked
drove home in traffic
snacked
fixed my tire pressure with my dad
went to the car part store with my mom and dad
went to Wendy's with my mom and dad
went to HEB with my mom and dad
put the new brake light in (well watched my dad do it)
unloaded groceries
changed
volleyball

12. What I Ate Today

thus far

Oatmeal with apple cooked into it.

Soup, carrots, an apple.

Yogurt & cottage cheese.

but the days is still young
pop tart crisps
fruit leather
nuts
cheerios
apple
cherries
frosty (chocolate of course, they ask you which flavor as anyone would chose anything else)
another apple
another apple after vball

13. What's in my Purse

head band - phone - pens & pencils - sunglasses - directions - keys - an eraser - bobby pins & hair ties - wallet - camera - ipad - business cards - temple recommend - gun range entry card - cash - pills - paper - clips - tampons - lips glosses - chap sticks - comb - bandaids - mirror - eyedrops

14. A Bad Habit

diet coke

15. A Pet Peeve

that scatching your throat noise

the taking off of shoes at a front door
(whether my door or the expectation of me having to do it elsewhere)
the cutting of gum in half

16. A Memory

We went to visit my grandma in Argentina when I was 7. That year, while we were there, Argentina won the world cup. Being woken up in the middle of the night and standing on the front porch in my nightgown dress watching the dancing and partying in the street.

17. A Goal

Lose weight

18. A Secret

I think I'm very beautiful.

19. A Wish

That Pushing Daisies had never ended.

20. A Hobby

Yoga

21. A Recipe

http://smittenkitchen.com/2009/02/crispy-black-bean-tacos-with-feta-and-slaw/

22. A Blog

http://www.thesartorialist.blogspot.com/

23.  A Piece of Art

This whole movie.

24. A Tumblr Crush

www.thoyt.tumblr.com

25. A Tumblr Favorite

www.thatkindofwoman.tumblr.com

26. A Dream

When I run I day dream, sometimes about digging for dinosaur bones.

27. A Quote from a Recent Chat

"Well listen to this crock: I'm the employment specialist in my ward. How's that for a made up calling? And don't they know I don't find jobs, people just give them to me."

28. Something That Made You Laugh

that last quote-  out loud - in church

it was embarassing

Also - George W. Bush

29. Something that Gives Me Wanderlust

Stephen being in Argentina & Austin going to Japan.

30. An Anonymous Shout Out

I don't know what I'd do without you - so I just don't even want to think about it.

Ginger Affininty

unlike brittany anne who posted that she didn't like gingers - i have a weird love for them

i was sitting in my office thinking about the carrot cake we're having this afternoon for a co-workers bday and my love for cream cheese frosting

and it (bizarely) and suddenly came to me - if i had to choose between the existance of cream cheese frosting or fred and george weasley - i'd pick f+g

i love those gingers - they are my ultimate

but they are not the only ones for me

More of my favorite things

some times i feel prettier on days where i didn't put on make up and have a ponytail on days that i get fully ready.
it's delightful. just capital.

Domestic Godess of the food made on a cast iron skillet variety

Hello I'm no Ashley Wise.
www.colorsareblushandbashful.blogspot.com

I'm no Barefoot Contessa.

And I'm not Bree Van DeCamp Hodge.

I just make really good easy food on a cast iron skillet. Whenever I'm cooking one of my divine little meals I think, oh if I could just feed this to a man he would straight up marry me! I am having a terrible memory lapse but I used to say, the day i make on of these for a boy I'll turn around and he'll be on his knee proposing to me. I turned around after making one for my roomate's [hott like fire] little brother and she told him to get down on his knee. Even as a joke, it was one of the best moments of my life.

Well here I am today, fresh on a simple but outstanding egg sandwich I put together wishing I could have made it for a boy b/c I'd be planning the July 4 wedding right now! I fry and egg on extrememly hot cast iron skillet. I fry 1 piece of Kirkland brand (b/c it's the very best and saltiest and fits best with this meal) lunch meat ham on the pan. Toast a normal piece of bread. Spread a Laughing cow on it. Cut tomato slices all over it. ham. egg. pop the yoke and let it soak up all over. DONE.
It's so good.
I also do a similar bit with chicken, Essence of Emeril, and spinach that makes me go weak at the knees.

Contact Us

"Never mistake movement for action" - Earnest (best name ever) Hemmingway





I frequently come across, even at some of my favorite business institutions,  bad customer service. So what is there to do about it? Complain of course. But complaning, like EH said, is not action unless you do something about it.

That is why I love "Contact Us" on business websites.

Once at Costco (Heaven on Earth) I had an uncharacteristically bad trip. Long story summed up - everything that could have gone wrong before even getting to the door did - but everyone was nice and apologetic and basically made me feeel good about being a customer there even when they were having problems.
THEN
at the door - the employee couting items realized that my water bottles were not on the reciept. They forget to charge me for the water bottles under the cart. So instead of appologizing for the inconvenience and letting me know of my options of going back and paying or leaving the water the horrible employee does this - in this accusitory voice he says"
"You didn't pay for those"
pointing at the water.
I didn't really know how to respond
I paused
so I just said "I just won't keep them then"
He just stood there... tapping his foot... waiting... for me to take it off my cart.

I got in my car, called Costco (you know I had that number in my phone), and I let them know how that whole thing went down.

I DO THIS TYPE OF THING ALL THE TIME!
People think it's weird.

But if I go to Jimmy Johns and the Coke tastes bad - I email them.

If I go to Central Market, and have a great experience all around, except for the abrupt awful rudeness of the catering people. You know they get an email about it.

If bathrooms are in a state of disrepair - you bet that place gets an email about it.

I love it.

I email businesses more than I email friends (that's not true, but lying is fun)

Waltz

a good makes for a good interesting and powerful movie scene.

cases in point.

The Waltz for Eva and Che



they are not in love, that's not the point of the dance

Che (Antonio) is more of the narrator of the story and not an actual character

you know this song played on repeat for 3 weeks after i bought the album

i love 0:55-1:15 where you see her face as she realizes she loves him



my girls in white dresses with blue satin sashes

My dear friend Brittany Anne wrote a song of her favorite things. I tried too as well, but I couldn't make them rhyme so i used one of my favorite things to find pics - google images!

If you want to see a far superb attempt at being inspired by fraulein maria: http://brittanygolightly.blogspot.com/]

also wanted these but couldn't find the right pic for it: french perfume, dresses, having clean hair, going out to eat, government buildings & lazy pj saturday mornings

apples

aliens

texas wildflowers

blush

brothers

bundt cake

buns

dark chocolate

diet coke

doing dishes

eye drops

folding laundry

f & g

frosting

frozen yogurt

gumballs

maps

marie

theater

muppets

the color

oscar

pearl studs

questions

quotes

republicans

rick

stickers

tanning

town lake

dinosaurs

watlz

=w=

napkins