The Pants

This is why I created the animal pants from the last post...

... so Sean and some co-workers could partcipate in the Battle of the Bands (via Rock Band) held at his office Holiday Party a few weeks ago. Sean took inspiration from a Red Hot Chili Peppers' video ("Higher Power") where Flea wore red animal pants covered in stuffed animals. Since "Showmanship" counted for 70% of the band's final score - his band went all out on the costumes.

Here's his band, In Like Flinn, just before their first number. They did eventually win first place - I'm pretty sure it was all due to the pants. Which by the way, weighed a good 20 pounds. Luckily, they had a drawstring waist and I made Sean cinch them as tight as he possibly could.

While Sean and his co-workers got to play rock gods for a night, I got to play Vivienne Westwood for a night (and the week leading up to the party) and it was fun.

For Richer, For Poorer...

... in sickness, in health...

Nowhere in those vows is there any mention of gluing animals to red track pants.

Someone should have warned me.

More on the WHY and the HUH of the red animal pants later.

And So It Begins

As you all know, Thursday was Thanksgiving. Which meant that Friday was 'put the Christmas decorations out' day.

The two stockings in the background were made (by me!) two years ago. I meant to make something new this year but never got around to it. Every year I tell myself that the following Christmas I'll make a handmade ornament to add to the tree and then give as gifts - it just never happens. The closest I came this year was making 3-d snowflakes for the tree.

Here is village #1. Village #2 is on our CD/DVD rack. The village has officially grown out of its space. Starting next year, it'll go under the tree. The shelve/mantle has worked so far because my village is too tiny to justify being on the floor. But, this year I plan to do some serious damage at Department 57 so my village can take its next step to becoming (cue booming voice) the spectacular, dominating village it's destined to be.

Here's Santa's village and the Eskimo village. I really want to flesh out my Eskimo village and make it the focus of my overall village. Did you know that you can buy most of the Eskimo village figures, dating back to the very first ones, on eBay?

And here are the Santas From Around the World. Each time Sean goes on a trip, he'll bring me back either a Christmas ornament from that town or a figurine. During his last work-sponsored tour 'o Europe, he brought me back half of the Santas you see here.

I think this is the oldest ornament on my tree. Just thought I'd share.

Can I Apply For Betty Crocker's Job?

With Sean in Vegas this weekend, I had the entire condo to myself and it was fantastic. My weekend was equal parts productive and lazily-self-indulgent. One of the more productive things I did on Sunday was bake some cookies. The kids of some friends of ours sent us M&M minis from their Halloween booty and the M&M minis inspired me to bake something using them (the M&Ms, not the kiddies). It was a toss-up between cupcakes and cookies...and the cookies won out.

Chocolate chip cookies with M&M minis. I used the recipe that came on the back of the Tollhouse bag. Yes, I realized I failed to make creative leaps and bounds. But, after comparing the recipe on the back of the Tollhouse bag, to the recipe in my Betty Crocker book, to the recipe that came on the back of the flour bag - they were all basically the exact same recipe. So I went with the popular Tollhouse recipe. And I learned the lesson that the most popular choice isn't necessarily the best choice. The cookies came out average (I thought.) Nothing spectacular - no "holy cow, best cookies ever" moments. I've yet to make a great chocolate chip cookie. They always turn out flat and crispy. I dream of making a batch of big, chewy chocolate chip cookies. Alton Brown has a recipe that calls for cake flour - I may try that next.


Date-Nut Pinwheels. The recipe came from the Betty Crocker Cooky Book - the leading source for all of my cookie recipes. Considering it was the first time I made these cookies, they turned out really good. The date-nut filling was subtly sweet and the cookie itself had a great background taste of brown sugar. The cookies turned out a little chewy - but I don't know if they're suppose to be chewy or if the humidity in the air caused it. Either way - these were my favorite of the two.

San Francisco

Last weekend (Oct. 19-21) we spent a quick weekend in San Francisco to watch our friend Angela run her first marathon (the Nike Women's Marathon). We hardly need an excuse to go to one of our favorite cities in the country, but cheering Angela on was a great excuse.

Our hotel was great (not as great as the Kimpton hotels up there, but it was great nontheless). We stayed at the Hyatt Regency on the Embarcadero. Here's a view from our room:



We arrived late Friday night and met up with Angela and a friend of hers for dinner. Then we called it a night because I'm an old lady and have an old lady bedtime.

Saturday, we met up with Angela and we went to Hang Ah Tea Room - the BEST dim sum restaurant in San Francisco. We ate like kings who stuffed themselves past the point of bursting for only $22. $22!!!! Insanity.

Afterwards, we dropped Angela off at the black hole that was Niketown where all of the 22,000 marathoners were picking up their commemerative shirts, bags and sweatshirts. We went to Cafe Trieste for coffee and a snack. I know you must be wondering what it's like to be me on all of my travels. Here's what I typically see when traveling with Sean:




Here's the fiance mugging for the camera. Notice the scruffiness - his souveneir for me from his trip to Ireland. (I really do like it, by the way.)

After this picture was taken we met up with our friend Adam and headed to Zeitgeist, where we met up with our friend Eric. Zietgeist is now in my top 3 list of favorite bars. As Sean said, it's the least pretentious bar. Ever. It had a great big outdoor patio (patio's putting it mildly - it's a big expanse of dirt with rows of dirty picnic tables) and was filled with every single type of person imaginable: hipsters, faux-hipsters, bikers, bike messengers, stoners, tourists, the list goes on. They make fantastically strong bloody Marys (strong in both spice and alcohol content) and you can't knock a place that has a wall of port-a-potties in the back in order to keep the line for the real bathrooms inside short.

Sunday was the marathon - the big event we came up here for. Angela's spent the last 6-8 months training with Team In Training for the marathon. Here she is at mile 12. TNT raises money for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society - so all of the ribbons on her back are for people that she knows with Leukemia or lymphoma. (there's one for JG on there.)

And here's Angela at mile 26!!! Only .2 miles to go until a fireman in a tux hands her a Tiffany necklace.
In the TNT tent at the finish line. I am super incredibly proud of Angela for not only running the marathon, but for sticking to her long training schedule and accomplishing a major goal. Kudos to her.
And, finally, a picture of two of marathoners in my life. I'm not sure what it is about me... it seems that more and more people in my life want to run as FAR AWAY from me as they possibly can.

Our Travels

This is the first weekend in the entire month of October that Sean and I are able to spend at home together. Last weekend we went to San Francisco to see Angela run her butt off (I'll post photos soon); the weekend before that I went to San Diego with Sunshine under the pretenses of visiting wedding locations (more on that later) because Sean and his dad were on the "father-son bonding expedition in the Old Country" trip in Ireland; and the weekend before that Sean was running his butt off in Chicago. Enjoy the posts and photos that are soon to come chronicling these trips.

Fire Smoke

For the first time since the fires started I saw the blue sky tonight on my way home from work. I haven't seen the sky in an entire week. We've been living in thick smokey air for a week and it's nice to see it finally starting to dissapate. I opened up the windows in the bedrooms for the first time since the fires started today; we'd been keeping them closed to avoid having a fine covering of ash and soot on our furniture. But, I saw blue sky today - that makes me happy.

Here are some NASA photos of the So Cal fires.

Marathon Man

First off, let me start this post by stating that my fiance is a rock star. He is a freaking rock star.
He ran the Chicago Marathon last weekend and finished in great time, considering the heat, humidity, water stations running out of water, incompetence on the organizers behalf and the over 200 people collapsing due to heat exhaustion. You can read Sean's point of view of the marathon here. Here is my take on it.

Let me set the scene: it was approximately 88 F with 60-70% humidity. You walked outside and it felt like Miami. We're staying with our friends Joni and Mike in their fabulous apartment in the city. (which, FYI, is in the same neighborhood that my grandpa grew up in - they live across the street from his high school - but I digress...). So, we wake up at 5:30am, hop on the El and head to Grant Park. At that time in the morning the El was filled with runners and their cheering squads. We say our good-byes and good lucks to Sean in Grant Park. At this point in the morning (7:00 am-ish) I'm already starting to notice how sticky I'm feeling and wishing I had an ice cold water to drink.

We took the El up to mile 7 (Wrigleyville or Lake View, depending on who you talk to) where Ericka and Pepe meet us to cheer Sean on. Luckily, Sean told us that he'd be running on the right hand side of the road, so we were able to grab a spot on the same side in the hopes of increasing our chances of seeing him.

We saw the first group of runners come by at 8:30 am. The race started at 8:00 am which mean that these guys were running 4:28 minute miles. Those guys are animals - very sedate, relaxed animals, given how effortlessly they ran by us. They reminded me of gazelles - quite the contrast to the wave of runners 30 minutes behind them who were huffing, puffing, moaning, groaning and limping their way by us.

I didn't realize how exciting watching a marathon can be - it's a bit exhilarating. When I finally spotted Sean I was SO excited to see him run by. In my excitement of jumping and yelling his name to get his attention I completely forgot to take his photo. It was thrilling to see him run by. At that point I couldn't wait to head to the next spot on the route to see him, again.

The next stop was mile 21 in Chinatown, where we met up with my mom, my dad, my sister Sarah and her friend Beth. It seems apropro that we met my family in Chinatown. Every trip to the homeland (Chicago) involves at least one trek to Chinatown for dim sum. And my parents were wonderful enough to have leftovers in hand when they met up with us...

... mmm.... barbeque pork bun. Aside from seeing Sean in the race, this is the most memorable moment of that day.

At this point, Mike ran up ahead of us (or behind us??) to hop in the race and run with Sean and lead him to the side of the street that we were standing on (the left side). I got a little nervous when I didn't see Sean in the 3:50 group (his goal was to finish in 3hrs 50 mins). But, he showed up and it was fantastic! He looked exhausted and worn down, but he was still running.

After that, my parents, Pepe and I headed down to Grant Park, to meet up with Sean and Mike. (Mike kept hopping into and out of the race with Sean. Huge thanks go out to Mike for lending Sean moral support and keeping him going.)

This is Sean after the marathon.

Sean and Mike (who ran the two previous Chicago marathons).

And lest I forget about the wonderful food in Chicago. We ate at a great restaurant Saturday night in Lincoln Park where Pepe and Ericka met up with us. I had great pasta with lobster and spinach and a creamy garlic sauce. And the gellato was very tasty, too.

All in all, it was a great weekend. I want to thank everyone who came out to support Sean during the run and even bigger thanks to Mike and Joni who let us invade their space for the weekend. It was great seeing everyone and made me miss home (because it will always be home no matter how long I've lived in CA) just a little bit more.

Sweet Home Chicago

We're off to Chicago this weekend as thousands of athletes, Sean among them, descend upon the city to chase each other around for 26.2 miles.

Things to do in Chicago:

1. Visit my family. Want a quick ego boost? Move across the country, ensuring you only see your family once a year. Then, schedule a trip home and at the last minute (less than 5 days before your plane lands) call your entire family up and ask them to meet you for lunch. Everyone comes just to see you. If that doesn't fill your dark empty hole of self-pity, I'm not sure anything can.


2. Get lots of Erika time! Erika is living the dream we talked about in college - living in Chicago, in a great area of the city, with a fabulous view.


3. Load up on a weekend's worth of Yelp reviews. Between the Italian restaurant we're going to the night before the marathon so Sean can carbo-load, the bars in Wrigleyville that Erika and I will peruse, and the after-marathon feast Sean will need - I'm hoping to break 30 reviews on Yelp.


4. Run around the city with the Sean's cheering section (there's 7 of us) , trying to catch a glimpse of Sean as he runs the marathon. So far we have stops in Boys Town, Chinatown, mile 21 (or 23) and the finish line. Wonder if they give away medals for furthest run as a spectator?


5. Figure out a way to stop off at Three Happiness, have some dim sum, and not miss Sean as he runs through Chinatown. Maybe I'll ask to be seated by a window...


6. Get lots of Pepe time! So far, I've been able to see him every time I've gone back to Chicago. I want to see how long I can keep that streak going.

Wish us luck - and by us, I mean Sean. He's trained incredibly hard over the past year and despite getting hit by a car and then suffering a broken rib, he's still running the marathon. I couldn't be prouder of him.

Stormy Weather

Found it! (Gotta love YouTube.)

Martha Wainwright singing "Stormy Weather" at the concert last night. The video doesn't do her half the justice hearing her in person belting it out did.

Rufus Does Judy

Ron Rifkin (aka Arvin Sloane) loves Rufus Wainwright!

Dita Von Teese loves Rufus Wainwright!!

Bruce Vilanch loves Rufus Wainwright!!!

Santino loves Rufus Wainwright!!!!

How do I know this? Because they were all within spitting distance of me and Sean at Rufus’ Hollywood Bowl show last night. The first three were either two people in front of us (RR and DvT) or two people behind us (BV). Santino – I ran into him just outside my seat. Freaking Santino!!

Last night’s concert was more than just a Rufus Wainwright concert. It was “Rufus Wainwright Sings Judy Garland: Live at the Hollywood Bowl.” He recreated her 1961 concert at the Hollywood Bowl and it was amazing. He didn’t do ‘Rufus does an imitation of Judy’ – that you could have gotten at any of a dozen drag shows. No – he did something better: he did Rufus’ rendition of Judy songs. And it was amazing, energetic, beautiful and one of the best concert experiences I’ve ever had. It’s definitely up there in my top 2 concerts. And it didn’t hurt that we had AMAZING seats. Garden seats, with all the celebrities. (Word of advice: check out Ticketmaster the two days before a show and you’ll notice that a lot of the good/close seats that were previously “sold out” are now are available.)

The big highlight: Rufus coming out in the classic Judy Garland outfit: black nylons, black heels, black hat and black blazer.

Other highlights incude:

Martha Wainwright singing "Stormy Weather" - it was one of my favorite moments of the concert. If I find it on YouTube, I'll post it.

Lorna Luft coming on stage (in a neon pink flowy dress) to belt out a few numbers. She sounds exactly like her mother when she sings. I was hoping against hope that Liza would surprise everyone - but as a faithful Page Six obsessive, I knew that Liza wasn't exactly thrilled with his "Rufus Sings Judy at Carnegie Hall" concert, so I knew that she'd never come out for this one. But I still had my fingers crossed.

All in all - fantastic night filled with Rufus, Judy and celebrity encounters.

Race for the Cure 5K

Thanks to everyone who donated money to our Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure team! While the team got together a little late we were still able to raise close to $600! Sunday's weather was perfect for a run/walk and the crowd was incredibly large. S. and T. got their run on, while me, M. and the 'pugs' walked it.

Next year we'll get a larger team together to run and walk. Maybe a catchy team name will be enough to convince people to join our team? Something like "Operation: Save Boobies" or "Team Ta Ta" maybe?

LCD Soundsystem & Arcade Fire

LCD Soundsystem + Arcade Fire + 4 bottles of wine + great friends = fabulous night

Thursday night, Sean, me and two friends went to the LCD Soundsystem & Arcade Fire concert at the Hollywood Bowl. It was a great concert. And I will forever love the Hollywood Bowl for allowing concert goers to bring in their own picnic dinners and wine.

LCD Soundsystem

• Love them. Love them. Love them.
• Personally, I thought they should have been the headliner. But that feeling was clouded by my infinite love for the band.
• The venue (Hollywood Bowl) was a bit too large for them. They’re better seen in a small club or a tent under the stars in Indio, where the entire crowd is dancing and sweating together.
• I heart James Murphy (just a little bit)

Arcade Fire

• They, like Wilco, are a band that is meant to be seen live. Their albums do not do them enough justice.
• Closest thing this heathen will ever have to an evangelical experience.
• Seeing the band incorporate French horns, trumpets and violins into all of their songs, the band geek in me wished they had been around when I was in high school.

Last night marked the start of our power-concert weekend – 3 concerts in 4 days. That’s a mighty task given that all of the concerts have us trapsing up to LA and braving crazy LA traffic. Don’t believe me? Thursday night it took us 2 hours to drive 46 miles.

Last night: Cat Power (more on that show later)

And after that: Sunday we see Rufus Wainwright sing Judy Garland Live at the Hollywood Bowl.

Our Weekend in Mammoth

For Memorial Day weekend, Sean and I decided to beat the oppressive heatwave that attacked Southern California and escape to Mammoth. We really wanted a quiet, relaxing weekend because this was the first weekend we had to ourselves in a month (where we weren't running around for some reason or had guests visiting). On one hand we talked about staying at home, laying by the pool all weekend, reading and watching DVDs. And on the other hand, we talked about going up to Mammoth, laying by the pool all weekend, reading and watching DVDs. We chose to go to Mammoth because we could stay at his Grandma's condo (thank you!!) and we only get up there once a year. So... here are our photos from the trip.

On the gondola heading to the tippy top of Mammoth Mountain. I think those are the Sierra Nevadas behind me.

I forgot how thin the air was up in Mammoth. On Saturday morning, on the walk from the condo to the car - I got breathless. It took the morning to get acclimated to the thinness in the air. At the top of the mountain I saw a guy light up a cigarette - which lead to the stories of when Dad and Jimmy went up to Pike's Peak and all the adults kept insisting they could smoke.
At the (almost) top of the mountain. My Gap shorts look suspiciously familiar... I'm getting flashbacks to summer camp staff uniforms.
Apparently Sean has aspirations to be a mountaineer.
Obligatory "take our own picture" picture. I can't tell you how windy it was up at the top of the mountain. During a couple of these poses I thought I was going to blow over.
After walking around the top of Mammoth, we weren't quite ready to go home, so we headed to the Earthquake Fault in the Inyo National Forest. Yes - that's my shadow.

This was his second choice for poses. The first was to have been called "A Crack and a crack."
Hollow tree + me = this photo.

Sunday we decided to go kayaking. This was met with trepidation given that the last time we kayaked in Mammoth (on Lake Mary) we rented a double kayak and spent the entire afternoon spinning in circles across the lake. Needless to say, lots of yelling, lots of cursing, lots of eye-rolling, and a little bit of resentment was shared that day.

So this year we decided to rent two single kayaks and sign up for a tour, as opposed to kayaking on our own. Thank god.

My first real look at Mono Lake. It's a big freaking lake. Our tour guide was Stuart (his company is called Caldera Kayaks) and he was fantastic. He's a geologist that works for the USGS, so he gave us really informative background information on how Mono Lake was formed, how the surrounding mountain ranges were formed, as well as interesting information on water rights and how Mono Lake was used as a water source for other parts of California. Fascinating stuff. Mono Lake. Those white specs are the biggest birds I've ever seen. They were larger than chickens and were all over the lake.
These are tufa towers. They form under the lake and rise upwards. Something about the alkaline level in the lake and a chemical reaction. It made more sense when Stuart was explaining it.

Our tour guide and me.
More tufa towers. If you look closely, you'll see a nest at the top of one of the towers. Oh! Best news of the day: when Stuart told me there are no fish in Mono Lake. Again, having to do with the alkaline leve. Awesome. That meant I didn't have to pretend that there were no fish in the lake.
During the winter these birds fly to South America in three days to spend their winters.
Every time I'm in one of these, I get the urge to buy one. I must say though, kayaking in Mono Lake was 100% easier than kayaking in the Pacific Ocean. But just as much fun.
This is how the rest of our weekend was spent: napping and catching up on DVDs. We finally finished season three of Homicide: Life on the Street. This is tiding us over until we catch up on Season 4 (and then 5) of The Wire - the best TV show not enough people are watching.

Engagement Party

For those of you unable to make it to our engagement party a few weekends ago, I've put together a photo re-telling of the event.

And for those of you who were there, enjoy reminiscing about the booze, the heat and the hurling china.

Place: Sean's mom's house in La Verne, CA
Time: Afternoon to late, late evening
Weather: I think the Serengeti was cooler that weekend
We arrived a few hours before the party to help set up. 100 degree heat, no shade, 15 tables, 3 tarps, 60+ chairs. See that look on my face? That's the moment it hit me: "Wait a minute - I pay people to do this." The next thought: "the next time we get engaged, the party will be in Alaska, in mid-December."

After we finished setting up, we tapped the keg, opened up some bottles of wine and the guests started arriving.
FYI - see if you can spot the future Cagefighting Champion of the World in the next photo.
Then the fun started. Courtesy of a well-known and well-loved German, we were informed that it's a German tradition to hurl china at the engaged couple while they cower behind a tarp. I kid, I kid. About the hurling - it's more of a throw. Everything else is true, though. Behold the photos.
Annie was the first to go. Which seems fair given that it's her house. And her only son. You think she enjoyed throwing the dish given the force with which it hit the ground...
And then Babe Ruth here decided the best way to celebrate the engagement of her first born was to also throw a dish. (Get it... Babe Ruth... because she's pointing where she's aiming..)

This one's for those of you who thought I was kidding about cowering behind a tarp...
Despite this look on my face - Sean and I had a great time being the target of our friends and family. It was an ice-breaker (ha! another pun!) that got the party off to a fun, relaxed, loud, laugh-filled start. Which is exactly the kind of party we wanted.
We were thrilled to spend it with our closest friends and family...
... and to eat some really good chocolate-raspberry cake!
The new family: Pat, Steve, Sean, me, Annie, Jim.