Things For Which I Am Eternally Grateful, episode II

Kisses from babies.

Free stuff at baseball games.

Popsicles in summer (not serial killers, though).

Beautiful women.

The flea market at approximately New York Ave, NE and Florida Ave, NE, and also the wholesalers around there.

Fresh mangoes. $7 a box!

My ticket to the New Pornographers show! which is 27 hours in the future from now!

Kisses from babies. Back me up on this one, they're just that fantastic.

The Letter C

I finally figured out how to keep score at yesterday's Nats-White Sox game... Except not until halfway through the fifth inning, so there's a scorecard that doesn't make any sense for half the game. I moved around a bunch and decided Section 416 is where to be when I'm alone and want to keep score. At least 'til I move down to the 100s in the 7th inning.
Demonstration:


I feel like such a nerd going to the games alone, mostly because I laugh out loud at some songs that the organist plays. Yesterday I texted him and asked him to play Hey, Soul Sister (my favorite guilty pleasure song, as has been previously demonstrated), and he was all "Oh man I don't know if I can fit it in today, I'm trying to play songs that fit with Father's Day! but I'll try to squeeze it in" but then, there in the middle of the 8th inning, at double speed, were the tiny electric notes of Train! And then I laughed, and looked at the audio/visual box grinning, and everyone thought I was insane.

In other news, I have unmistakable tan lines on my feet from the sandals that I've been wearing every single day, which is pretty crazy, because I have never been tan in my life. I also still have tan lines from this time, in which I am wearing convertible tights from ballet class that stop mid-calf. I burned slightly from that mark down, though the rest of me was not burned, thankfully, because burns are bad. Instead of just going back to white like normal, it turned into tan, which now looks like a reverse sock tan on my legs. With sandal marks on my feet.

Here is a present for Solstice: the blog of my friend James! Read it, it's real real good, and also funny, and I'm not just saying that because it's my friend writing it. Especially read this page.

Bad Decisions Dinosaur

That fried chicken sandwich after my first ballet class in 3 months may not have been really smart.

Looking at wedding photos while already in a weird alone-mood also may not have been that great an idea, either.

Letting Stellina walk to Eastern Market pushing her bebe strubber! bebe strubber! (baby doll in the toy stroller) in 85 degree weather - maybe should have thought twice about that one.

Choosing to work Saturday night - leaving me with no free nights this weekend! - instead of going to the Nats-White Sox game which will be broadcast nationally on Fox, I might end up wishing I had made a different choice.

Making another blog post that is yet another list, yeah, I really shouldn't have done that.

Awesome Shit that I Have Already Done in DC

1) Sunrise Easter service at Arlington Cemetery

2) Midnight Mass at the National Cathedral on Christmas

3) Easter mass at the National Cathedral

4) Various Smithsonians - Air & Space, American History, Natural History, American Indian, Castle, American Art

5) Inauguration of President Obama

6) Inaugural Concert!

7) Inaugural Ball! Western States reppppresent

8) White House tour

9) Nats games at both RFK and Nats Park

10) Pride Festival (though not the parade, boo)

11) Cherry Blossom Festival

12) Flown into and out of all three airports (lame, I know, but it's a thing)

13) Lunch at the Senate cafeteria

14) Experienced a summer thunderstorm on top of a house in Columbia Heights

15) Tended bar at a DCWeek event

16) had days where I go to all four quadrants

17) eaten at Ben's Chili Bowl

18) mini-golf at H Street Country Club

Ok! some are boring. but there are some things that I think are cool because they can only be done in this city. SUCK IT, OTHER, LESSER CITIES.

there's lots of other stuff I can't remember right now

Mental Forces

Prince Philip and Captain Bananio, who I get to see tomorrow, too! Maybe we will do Play-Doh for TWO WHOLE HOURS again.

I played in the water in the backyard with Stellina today. Splash splash splash! When the UPS man came and rang the doorbell with a package for Stellinadaddy, we answered the door in our swimsuits.

And then I ate a bacon cheeseburger at the Nats game, and we beat the dread Pirates, and it was great.

He's confessing his undying like for me

Strasburg delivers! 14 strikeouts, every single member of the Pirates' starting line-up, in 90ish pitches. I'm glad I didn't buy his jersey in vain. Well.... so far. Chickens still have some hatchin' to do, but it looks like we're off to a good start.

I took a stinging nettle to my right heel yesterday evening, just where the scar is from my slice-on-the-bed incident. Let me inform you, that plant lives up to its name. It should be called "omg don't ever accidentally briefly touch this plant just trust me don't do it stay awayyyyyy" - that would be even more accurate.

I suddenly feel like I have started something in the middle and am struggling to figure out what the hell is going on so I can try to catch up, and in the meantime, I'm just faking it and hoping eventually it will turn out real. As though me trying to learn how to ride my new bike, clipless pedals and all, is a giant metaphor for my life. I get going for a couple blocks or so, and I know I look like a total badass on my sweet retro road bike, and I feel like I know what I'm doing and I look like I know what I'm doing, and then I get to an intersection, and have to stumble off in an undignified and sometimes painful fashion and walk for a few blocks, until there aren't many people to see me try and awkwardly get back on and get started again.

I haven't been good at bikes in a loooong time, if I ever was. I have a very clear memory of remembering to brake at the last minute and stopping with my front wheel an inch away from falling in the duck pond at Westmoreland Park, just when I had recently gotten to a point where I felt a mastery of no training wheels. I was ... nine? ten? Only now, a decade and some odd later, instead of the duck pond, it's traffic, and kids with grandparents, and stone retaining walls, and hot dog carts, and construction workers, and that curb, and trees, and more retaining walls, and I have to remember to relax my grip on the handlebars because I'm holding too tight, but don't relax too much or I'll forget to steer and end up in the duck pond.

Yeah, that Giant Metaphor of my Raleigh Technium TriLite.

My polka-dotted skateboard helmet is securely fastened.

Just not the one?

Bored and the babby is asleep. Long boring post is about to happen.

Things I accomplished today, in order!

0.5) got out of bed. Accomplishment!

0.75) got an email from Deanna, was really happy and sad at the same time

1) took a shower

2) acquired tickets to the Nats-Mets game for Thursday with Allison!

3) took the bus! to Friendship Hay-eights Station. talked to Maeg on the way!

4) ate Panera for lunch! Was generally obnoxious. Drank water! a delicious experience, if a bit awkward.

5) went to Gap, bought jeans that actually maybe fit! for $25 off! Now I won't feel so bad when they rip and become unwearable in 8 months because I didn't pay 60 bucks for them. also acquired two new tanktops in colors I had not previously owned.

6) went to new babby house to meet new babby! different than the babby I have right at this moment. I have many new babbies. Once everything settles I will give ALL OF THEM internet names.

7) went home, fed my cats. yay cats, I love them. They're extra cuddly today. Because of the rain, you see.

8) came to other babbysits. fed babby, bathed babby, put babby to bed, sang Psalm 23 authoritatively to babby, finally had to let babby cry babbyself to sleep.

9) tried to get Verizon representative on the phone for the 15th time today. All I want to do is switch my service to the new house, and it is being painfully full of suck.

10) watched this:

11) Brad called this the "AD EQUIVALENT OF ORGASM," with which I politely disagreed

12) found out that one of my friends moved to New Mexico without telling me?!?????!?

activity 13 is to figure out how to get the child lock off the toilet lid so that I can pee.

and I don't want no substitute

Both my roommates are gone now. One will be back next weekend for Georgetown's graduation, and she'll be back next term, but we won't be living together anymore. The other is gone for who knows how long? That Peace Corps thing is super time-consuming.

I can't wait to be moved and have my work schedule set so I can start focusing on what really matters during summer: baseball, grilling, and drinking.

and going to the zoo.

not in that order? in that order?

blerg.

Perfect couldn't keep

I learned something new today! Boxes of Cinnamon Toast Crunch come with a little pull-back car! And it comes SHRINK-WRAPPED.


so that's cool. it makes me miss KinderEggs. KinderEggs are better than this car though. This car comes with Pennzoil and Shell stickers to put on it. LAME. Basically the coolest part about it was the shrink wrap, and also, that it came with my cereal.

I'm on an unfortunate Kelly Clarkson binge. I really hope it's over soon.

BASEBALL IS ALMOST BACK!!!!!!! yesterday was the last Sunday without a baseball game until November 7!

Spinning (out) in Infinity

Some of the reasons I hate winter.

1) I wear at least two pairs of pants at all times from October to mid-March. Not to mention multiple shirts and pairs of socks.

2) Because of that, I have to do laundry way more often. Laundry is expensive and time-consuming, and the laundry room is freezing.

3) There is snow everywhere. It's at least 2 feet deep on pretty much every surface. Because of plowing the roads, there are piles covering the sidewalk that are about 7 feet tall. so that's excellent.

4) I have to blow my nose immediately every time I get inside.

5) Dry skin! Chapped lips! Staticky hair and clothes!

6) Also, staticky cats.

7) I don't get to wear cute shoes or clothes. Boots and sweatshirts all the time.

8) Very slim pickings on fruits and vegetables at the grocery store. Nothing is in season! I love tiny oranges in December but by February they're gross and I'm sick of them.

9) The coldness outside makes my iPod headphone cords stiff and then it's really easy for the wind to blow the buds out of my ear. I hate this more than I hate a lot of the other things, actually.

10) Trying to get Stellina (who is now almost 19 months) to wear gloves at the park is very, very difficult. I am generally always nervous that she is too cold when we're outside, so I just bundle her up so that she can barely move, and then I worry that she's not having fun at the park because she's too bundled up.

11) No baseball. I cannot WAIT for baseball season.

12) When I'm riding on the bus to places that aren't that far away (i.e., Tenley, half a mile, or even Dupont, only 20 or so blocks, mostly downhill), all I can think about is how I wish I was walking instead, but it's way too damn hell ass cold.

Reasons why winter is okay sometimes.

1) When it has just started snowing lightly, and the breeze is still kind of making the snowflakes float upwards. float float float.

2) THE WINTER OLYMPICS

JESUS H. MACY I LOVE THE OLYMPICS.

but, I have no TV and so I haven't gotten to see any of the Olympics at all. Too bad it's a cold cold cold walk to the bar.

There was an unusually large cookie at the dining hall today. Trent was really impressed. I put my hand up there for comparison as well, because Trent is like 6'6" and thus has large hands, so it was necessary to provide a proper scale for this unusually large cookie.

But then Trent eated it.

Stirred

Today Former Governor Romney dropped out of the race for the Presidency. I don't really know what that means. I guess that Former Gov. Huckabee and Sen. McCain will get the votes that would have gone to Romney, obviously, but I don't know how they're going to split. I mean, not that anyone does know how they're going to split, really...

I am insanely busy. I am supposed to be in three places at once on Saturday (literally three), plus find time to do my homework? And I have a ton that I haven't done this week. I'd love love LOVE to work for Sen. Obama's campaign this weekend but it might just have to be on primary day. I have an ungodly amount of mock trial to work on, as well. I could spend 95% of all the hours in the days between now and Feb 23 on mock trial and it still wouldn't be enough. My expectations are also unrealistically high.

In better news, spring training starts in about a week! This is so great.

Kind of addicted to this, even though I wish it were about a minute shorter.