I miss olive garden

I think I might be turning into Kendra with my eternal love of the Olive Garden. I love pasta in general but the real draw here is the salad dressing. I could bath in that stuff. I could drink it straight from the bottle. When I was younger, I remember taking a salad in 3rd grade for lunch and then using a smaller container for my purchased Olive Garden dressing. #WhatALoser #ThirdGradeNerd

Well anyways, you can imagine my excitement whenever I leave the great city of Cville and am able to purchase the salad dressing. I buy truck loads of it and stuff it in all the crevasses of my suitcase. Case and point, my recent vacay to Myrtle Beach. I came home with two bottles and wouldn't share with Nik.

What does it look like when I approach an Olive Garden??? That is a good question. I mayyyy get a little ninja in my excitement. Here's an example:




Everyone knows unlimited soup, salad and breadsticks tastes even better when they don't see you coming. Plus I'm much better at scaling building after a bottle of wine, which works well in an chain Italian restaurant.

life in the country

Yeah maybe you shouldn't let your children play outside, this fun game just got more dangerous:

Sonic has the most patient employees

I have never worked in the fast food industry. I wouldn't have minded before this whole career path thing I got going on. It would have been one of those experiences that shape you, you know in never wanting to eat fried food again because you can still smell it in your clothes (this is my worry about being a barista and not liking coffee again).

Well anyways, you gotta give it up to those employees for having to deal with all us bitchy people who just want cheap, quick food. I mean take this Sonic employee who is losing minutes of her life while this songwriter sings his order. I'd like like "DICK, what do you want?" and I'm gonna spit in your food:



Remember when "coning" became the new planking in those viral social trends. Well the fast food employees had to keep making new ice cream cones for all those asshats jholes too!!! Damn people, give these folks a break...Here is an example of coning:



Those poor, patient employees....

bumper stickers revisited

I've been having a field day lately with all these car decals....they are direct, they are creative, and they are snarker than me. I really like them. I mean, I'm not putting any of them on the plastic pinto but that doesn't mean I don't enjoy the creativity. Here is a new one for you truck-lovers...I know about 40 FFA guys from High School that I used to run with that would be all over this business:

You're telling me that pickup doesn't have nuts hanging off the back? Mind blown.

Also that is some great girly, cursive like decals. Good work.

tips for my pic problem

I've been getting some emails and ideas recently from my friends and family. Thanks ya'll, you must really like when I blog and tell you your business. Oh good, I can still be sassy....

But I digress. For those that don't know I have this propensity for taking photos from an arms-distance away when traveling, or getting drunk, or just trying to capture a fun moment. This generally works well for me because, well you know, I'm tall as shit. Yeah I'm a female giant. But occasionally this leads to profiles of my chicken winged arm or flashed white pasty face, and let's face it, no one wants to see that.

Enter the 10 tips for better self-portrait photography. These are great tips so that you don't end up like this asian lady being a personal party of one tourist with a picture taking contraption. Let's break down these tips and take note for future LL reference:

1. Figure out your best angle. Good suggestion, mine is definitely NOT on the end of a large group. I'm much better placed in the middle where my gigantic wing span can grasp the entire group (see this post with a photo in front of the police station).
2. Find interesting backgrounds. I couldn't agree more, although this can be difficult given a number of factors that include angles, head size, and hand shakeyness.
   
3. Don't worry about angles. True that. Don't take your V8 and snap away. No worries.
   

OK good things to think about.

another alternative for the plastic pinto

We've had this conversation before. I really don't like those family doodle stickers on the back of minivans. They piss me off. I will never have one of those and if I ever change you have my permission to push me into on-coming traffic.

Couple months ago I came across a sticker I would consider using. It was about some hot copper colored Honda owner and your mom. Brilliant. Good play on words and sticker usage.

Recently I ran across another good option, albeit slightly more violent. I don't particularly like violence but you have to see the humor in:

No, still don't see it? Well this driver's bumper probably also has a sticker that says my child beat up your honor student. I just wonder what type of car it is...

it's been one of those weeks

You know how you have those types of weeks...the ones that make you drink....the ones that exhaust you...the ones that make you want to run into on-coming traffic. Well I had an exhausting one, and I will be the first to admit that it pales in comparison to Helga and McBetty's everylives. Let me explain...

Case and point #1: Learning how to walk again and drive with my left footsies

I have been prone to ankle sprains for over a decade and this last spring was no surprise when a spikey pine cone of death look all 6 feet of me out. I was on the ground before I even knew what had happened. Then during a later spring hike I tweaked it again. Since then apparently I have been walking funny or at least in a way that has irritated my old stress fracture from 2002. Same foot, same bone-like-area. Now I can't put pressure on my front of my foot without pain and there is no way I can push up or stand on my toes.

Is this why I stopped doing yoga? Yeah that could be a subconscious reason. And now I don't get to work out for a month. That makes me happy.

Here's my new accessory for the month of October:



God, isn't that sexy? And those pasty white legs...grrr! I've been workin on some good stories to go along with it. Bar fight? Sword fight injury? Got any other ones I can use???

The exhausting part was I walk uneven now, which means you either don't move or you are pretty sore by the end of the day. Damn muscles you don't typically use. And crawling out of the plastic pinto, all 2 inches from the ground, really blows. Plus I have to wear a tennis shoe instead of my beloved flippy flops.

Case and point #2: Butt plugs for your eyes

This week I had my annual eye doctor appointment, and I really hate people touching my eyes. Due to side effects of my lupie drugs, I have eye complications and they have to absolutely rape me with every test in the book. I only do afternoon appointments so I can go home and start drinking afterwards :) Better yet, why wait till afterwards?

The last two years I had eye plugs put in, which I call my eye butt plugs. This blocks the duct from my eye to nose and thus keep moisture in my eye balls. They completely numb your eyes (like your teeth at the dentist) and then shove butt plugs in your eyes (it's fun). Turns out the plugs are expensive and don't stay in for me, so this week they announced that I should have them soldered shut. HOLY BALLS!!! You want to sew my eye ball ducts? That beyond freaks me out.

Yeah I may need a week to process that business before making a decision, I mean I just got put in a moon boot, OK? How much can one girl take in a week relating to health problems? Well apparently all could be butt plug free though.

Tomorrow's a new week, one which I'll still be adjusting to my new life as a cripple.

an impromptu NYC trip

Well last month, I decided to take an impromptu weekend get away to NYC, to shake myself out of a funk. My best friend/soul mate/lover pants was commuting cross-continental for work and crashing with our MN friend Sarah (now dubbed 1.0). I decided this was a good weekend to take the train up to Manhattan to accomplish the following goals:

1. See someone having sex against a wall in the meat packing district
2. Spot an anorexic model in 4 inch heels (and hope she takes a digger in front of you)
   
3. Dance until 4 AM
4. Walk through Brooklyn with Spike Lee
5. Sit on a rooftop patio overlooking something inspiring
   

Well I'm happy to report that Helga, Sarah1.0 and I accomplished a number of these goals with typically MN flare. Couple years ago we tore up Austin and attempted to the same last year in the OBX. We only had about 2 days this time, but there was plenty of laughter and fun.

After my wicked 7 hour train ride directly from Cville into Manhattan without any transfers, Helga and I had drinks on an NYC sidewalk with a tiny British man who I think may have liked my sassiness (insert half accomplishing goal #2 above). Then we took a taxi into the depths of Brooklyn only to walk back to a grocery store for booze and supplies. Unfortunately, the booze turned out to be "wine product" which roughly equates to glorified grape juice. My goal for the rest of the weekend was to drink these two bottles of wine product--I didn't want to waste any booze, be that from the "wine product" category, and I felt like a college student again walking around with a backpack full of pseudo booze. Success.



That night we walked to some huge Brooklyn park with meet up with 15 other Minnesotans, and about 15,000 other New Yorkers for an outdoor concert (insert half accomplishing goal #4 above). Sometime past midnight, after many all the other concert-goers had left, we pealed the crusted cheese puffs and cherry pits from our butts to drag ourselves home.

The weekend was perfect for me, cloudy and atypically cold. Let's run around naked!!! Instead, we stayed inside cooking phattie brunches, watching HP (which was brought all the way from CA), and recovering. Cheese grits anyone? I got to see the Statue of Liberty in all her glory after waddling around a hipster grocery store eating organic granola.

Later that night we went into Manhattan for an impromptu BBQ with those 15 Minnesotans in some downtown? uptown? midtown? (OK somewhere on the island) loft. After much relaxing and drinking, we started walking to the meat packing district in hopes of finding some dancing. Luckily we stumbled across a club where Sarah2.0 danced in a basement fountain with floating plastic balls. At some ungodly hour, we headed upstairs where there was more fountains and a number of beds throughout the dance floor. Sarah2.0 tried to jump out a window but luckily there were bouncers who gave her the evil eye. There were those fake candles throughout the upstairs which we danced with and which I pocketed in my clutch for future use. This little light of mine:



That candle led us home at 4 AM (insert full accomplishment of goal #3 above), provided us with light during extreme hung over states the next morning, and will continue to provide comfort within Sarah1.0's apartment for years to come. Sunday was a traveling home day, but not after Sarah1.0 and I relaxed on her apartment's rooftop patio drinking coffee for an hour or so (insert full accomplishment of goal #5 above).

Well that means that I did not reach goal #1 above. I didn't see anyone having sex, which is really OK, but perhaps necessitates a future trip.

On unrelated note, I received the most wicked awesome set of pillow cases from Helga. Check these bad boys out:



Mustache rides anyone? Yes please.

time to spare at the airport?

jimmy does charlie

I have to admit, I never thought Jimmy Fallon would survive in late night (I mean did you see him in Taxi? or Taxi driver?), but he actually knocks my socks off regularly. Case and point, his new Charlie Sheen video. He really must be #winning. This impression is so accurate it is like initially watching Tina Fey do Sarah Palin, match, point, set:

a spiky pinecone took me out

Well I have another sad report in the world of LL. For those who don't know, I've been plagued by bad ankles since I was an athlete who just keep playing year-round on damaged cartilage. I remember a doctor at some point saying to me "the only think holding your ankle together right now is your skin." Joy. Good work.

Last night I was out for a hike throughout the trails, law school and business school by my house. I was loitering around, looking at the trees, listening to music, and immersed in my own world when a spiky pinecone took me down. Yep, you heard it here first, a small inch diameter pinecone took all 6 feet of me down to the sidewalk. This wasn't a normal pinecone, instead it was a spiky ball of death. Those mother f-ers are strong! It didn't even crack it, but it popped my ankle and before I knew what was going on I was on the wet ground. I got up and sat there thinking "ohhh it is getting hot, this means it is going to be a bad one." I've done this so much over the last 14 years that I know when it is broken, when it is a stress fracture, and the varying degree of sprain-ness.

So I turned my sorry ass around and headed home. I immediately started rotating icing and elevation, and thankfully wake up this AM with not too much swelling. But that good feeling was shot to shit as soon as I walked the 2 blocks to work where it ballooned up. I think I'll have some wicked bruising too, that goes up my leg. Hot.

I secretly wonder what it looks like when big people fall? Perhaps I videotape me on a mountain attempting to ski again???? That too would be a good illustration.

it's beginning to look alot like christmas

In the sense that Rudolph just can't catch a break!!! I saw this one coming a mile away. Skip ahead to 1:10 and watch the holiday magic:

another classic weekend

Well I'm about two weeks and a dollar behind with getting some amazing pictures posted from when my good friend Nicole came to visit me in the big Cville earlier this month. In preparation for her visit, I went back through many of our classic pictures, including some of her straddling gay strippers and others with our good friend Keith (my gay husband). But I'm happy to report that those 3 days added about 200 more pictures of memories....

I've been so blessed this year to be able to travel to see my friends but also have alot of friends come to visit me here in VA (here and here and here and here and here). We've seen the countryside and witnessed alot of amazing beautifulness in the big VA. Case and point, whilst hitting up alot of random wineries, Nicole and I decided to stop the plastic pinto in the middle of the road and run around enjoying this sight:



For the record, Nicole climbed this tree while I watched for cars ("game on"). The entire day/night included eating sushi, crab cakes, touring grounds, listening to live music, and droving throughout central VA following signs of grapes (which we equated to flowing booze). The best part for Nicole was merrily skipping through the streets after shopping and ordering some vegetarian dish which she might have reached a big O over :)

Like most of my classic weekends, we ended up on railroad tracks. All my fun somehow involves railroad tracks and me having some sort of party on them, whether that is in Cville or TX!!! This time we had to illegally park the plastic pinto, jump a fence, and quickly avoid some scary homeless people while making sure we didn't pee our pants. Here is Nic and I with the setting sun:



Nic and I were wine connoisseurs or consumers, which ever, throughout the big VA. We came, we saw, we tasted and we made friends. We even toured DMB's winery and each bought a bottle that was aged in "MN Oak Barrels"....how awesome is that? Well anyways, this was us for an entire three days:



Throughout the weekend we also experienced a little TJ architecture, went to a Zumba dancing workout class (where I got to yell out and shake what my momma gave me), treated ourselves a little medi/pedi (minus the botox), shopped at the farmer's market, and sat up on the rooftop patio pool. We also made a quick trip to Richmond where we ran into one of my friends at this famous restaurant. We were so hung over that I don't even think I could taste my lunch, but that was all part of the fun (signed book copies for everyone!). See if you can place the following pictures.....grounds, richmond elevator of fun, and rooftop patio bathing (aka LL avoiding the big ball of death in the sky):



As we all know, moustaches were running rampant that weekend. We had an amazing party with all my friends that included amuse bouches, moustaches, lounges, candles and a bar. Despite what people might say, I'm not young and impressionable.....and that whole 3 AM swimming adventure, post moustache rides, was totally my idea. Needless to say both Nic and I jumped a 10 foot fence to silently wade in the water, trying not to get caught by the po-po:



Good times, good times. If I wasn't so stressed/exhausted lately, I could remember the amazing one-liners and funnies that happened throughout the vacation weekend. Unfortunately, neither Nicole nor I could remember shit later.....oh well, it was still amazing.

batman for president

If I was still young and impressible (which I'm not, I swear, that whole 3 AM swimming thing was totally my idea), I would have totally considered this during election season:



BATMAN (say it in the raspy voice) would totally be a good sheriff, then he could work his way up to president. I'd totally vote for Batman, Ron Bateman on the other hand, I'm not sure so sure about. This is brilliant vandalism, and may actually help this candidate.

I once was "arrested" in high school for "stealing" election signs. Of course I was not actually convicted on any of the terms, didn't have to remove my shoe laces, or didn't have to smuggle any drugs in. Once I was pulled over, the officer looked in my backseat (which was stocked with about 50 election signs) and said "there better not be any sheriff signs back there." He also asked if I had anything else in my trunk, and in the spirit of full disclosure I said "there is 100 rolls of toilet paper." If BATMAN was running for sheriff, I so would have stole that sign.....(back in the day that is).