Leaping Humps

In honor of it being Leap Day and Hump Day, my coworkers and I went to happy hour at Birds of a Feather for Scotch and Sushi. I had a highlands Scotch, neat, and a tofu and veggie roll.

Yarn Art

On Saturday, we went to the open house at the Creative Alliance art lofts at the Patterson Theater. There were a bunch of cool artists there, but the coolest was this Mexican dude who created these 2D yarn murals that popped out in 3D when you put the glasses on. Plus, these dudes played some music and we ate tacos and drank Manhattans.

Yay for Gays!

"C'mon girls! If you believe in equality - Then I've got something to say about it. Don't settle for second best!"

Gay Marriage passed in Maryland yesterday! Cheers to Equality!

Immigration

If you're driving in a Chevy and you feel something' heavy... Immigration.

We had our interview this week. Wait, let me start at the beginning of the week. Last weekend I had Monday off, so I went to the Four Seasons to use the spa gift card Derek got me for Christmas. The spa is really nice. Super fancy and relaxing and very classy. But the massage was just 'meh'. I told her I liked it hard but she barely got into it at all. It felt like going to a cheap nail salon and getting a calf massage by a small lady with no biceps. Then, the next day, I had a sore throat and couldn't breath out my nose but had to go to work anyway because I used all my sick time when I had "food poisoning" a couple weeks ago. And I forgot that we were hosting the MDASLA monthly board meeting at our office that night. So, not only did I have to go to work sick, but I had to put in a 14 hour day. During the meeting I was nominated by my boss to be one of the Young Professional Reps for the Chapter. I'm not really sure what the job entails except for the fact that I have to show up for the meetings and plan at least one event this year.

Then on Thursday we had our interview with the nice people at Homeland Security. We had to sign a waiver since we didn't have our lawyer with us. They took us into a small room where this nice young lady, who looked to be the age of a high school student, asked us a bunch of weird questions about each other while looking through our wedding photo albums. The best part was when Derek said my middle name wrong and I almost laughed at him but decided to just go along with it. The interview went well but we're still waiting to hear whether we got a Greencard or not. She ended the interview by saying "Well, we have up to 4 months to make a decision, and if you don't hear from us in 4 months, then let us know." Awesome. But our lawyer said they always say that and he thinks we should have something in the mail in a few weeks. I hope he's right.

To celebrate, Thursday night after work we had drinks at the new Four Season's bar. The bartender was super nice and the drinks were delicious. I had something called a Jalisco Sour. It had Tequila, lime juice, grapefruit marmalade, and fresh ground cinnamon. Derek was drinking something that involved Whiskey, as usual. We also ordered a fancy cheese plate and hush puppies to go along with it.

Last night we all went to this new bar called Rye in Fells Point. They have fancy delicious cocktails there too. I was drinking a creative concoction called a Moneypenny. It had lavender cinnamon infused Scotch and Walnut bitters. Yum. They offer cocktail making classes there too. I want to take a class. You can't burn a cocktail, so I think I'd be pretty good. After Rye, we went to a dive and played 3 intense games of darts. Boys v Girls. I was average - except for that double bullseye I hit. Oh Snap!

Flash Mob Dance Off

Derek and I participated in the Red Line Now flash mob. We stood on a corner in Harbor East and danced to disco music and cheered for the Red Line. We got on the local ABC Channel 2 news. Such dorks.

DC Weekend

Derek and I took the train down to DC for the weekend. We stayed at the Dupont Circle Hotel where they served us corn nuts and wasabi peas. They had a fun bar where we sat and watched it snow sideways while drinking Old Fashioned Old Fashions and eating cookies and milk (courtesy or Matt and Morgan). We went shopping in Georgetown and down U Street. I found a kick ass leather jacket at a vintage shop and a churro at an Argentinian gelato shop. We had dinner at Smith Commons on H Street and a drink at H Street Country Club. We also went to the National Portrait Gallery where they had an exhibit of Annie Leibovitz's photographs of famous people's things. It was really great. They have an amazing central courtyard too. Weekend trips are the best.

Old School Faces

We went to a community meeting in Fell's Point the other night to try to get people to support the Red Line Now. It was held at the local Christian High School. All the old timers were there, as well as Councilman Kraft and representatives from the Garden Club and the Crime Report. I'm not sure how effective we were. We had 3-5 minutes to try to get these old school faces to support and donate to our little group. I heard one guy mumble "not in my lifetime".

I made super yummy brussel sprouts and roasted eggplant for dinner tonight. And we face talked with Melanie and Sharon over a glass of wine. They've been running around New York shopping for wedding dresses and mother-of-the-bride dresses. Then Derek made me ice cream with strawberries and chocolate chips for dessert.

Tomorrow, we're off to DC for the weekend to celebrate Valentine's Day!

Feeling It

I'm trying to convince Derek to wear matching outfits with me to our interview.

Creative Dreamer

I set up a profile for my sister on match.com. It's her birthday tomorrow and I thought it would be fun for her to hang out on match for a bit. She deserves to find the best urban grizzly man in Los Angeles. It was fun to set up her profile and pick a screen name. One of the suggested screen names was "Creative Dreamer"... kind of regretting not picking that one. I hope she has fun.

D and I had a meeting with the lawyer today. I'm so excited for our interview! It'll feel so good to complete this greencard process. I'm nervous too. One of the things that the lawyer told us was to not talk a lot. He said to just sit there and smile and wait until we get asked a question. Too bad I have to go with Derek - it would be a piece of cake with anyone else who didn't twitch and laugh and talk so much. Wish us luck!

SKEE Ball(s)

Polio made an appearance in the bathroom at Rad's. And I got the high score in Skee Ball! Here's proof.

After playing a classy game of skee ball we walked up to Salt to be even classier and drink fancy cocktails.

Today, we tried to keep the mice out of our kitchen again. Our landlord came over to close the hole they chewed through the dry wall behind the stove. He also invited us to "come over and use his grand pool in the summer whenever we want" at his house in the suburbs. So nice of him.

Food Poisoning is Contagious

Derek got food poisoning on Sunday and then gave it to me. In the past 48 hours, I've eaten 700 tums, 300 heartburn pills, and 5000 gatorades. I was dying slowly but now I feel better. I went to work today and found out that a bunch of other people got food poisoning too.

Haribos!

I accidentally gave a girl the wrong directions. She asked me how to get to Bond Street. I told her how to get to Bank Street. I feel bad. I hope she's not driving around the ghetto in circles looking for Bond Street.

It made me think of that show Quantum Leap from the early 90's. He traveled back in time to help people. I wanted to rewind 1 minute earlier and tell that girl how to get to Bond Street. Except on Quantum Leap he couldn't control where he leapt to or how far back he went. So that wouldn't work.

I had a Zombie Apocalypse nightmare the other night. We were all there. We had to live underground and be very quite. Derek was bad at that. And I had to live off of Haribo gummies. Which wasn't that bad. So it was a half nightmare-half dream come true.

This is a Canadian Squirrel photograph taken by Canadian Maili.

Sunday Morning

Drinking coffee.

More the Merrier

The lady at Au Bon Pain has three front teeth.

Last night the kids and I hung out in Mt Vernon. First, we met up at Brewer's Art for a couple Ozzys and some rosemary garlic fries. Then we went for Thai food at Stang of Siam where we scared the old lady away at the table next to us because she heard one of us say 'masterbation'. The we went to a bar in a basement and drank Nati Bohs, ate chocolate banana bread pudding, and ran into Neighbor Matt and his crew. Good times on the hill.

Take your vitamins

Walking to the gym, this old guy yells to this other old guy: "Well!? Did you take your Gingko Biloba?!"

Free Movie Night!

Last night we went to the Charles Theater to the City Paper Free Movie Customer Appreciation Night. It was really fun. We waited in the lobby for them to yell out a movie title and then everyone rushed the theater. Plus we got popcorn and booze. We ended up seeing Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy - a british spy movie set in the 70s. It's one of those movies that you have to pay attention to or you won't know what the heck is happening. I was really paying attention and I still got lost at the end. We had to go across the street to the bar and discuss the details over a $2 PBR.

Steamy

The windows at the gym were super steamy. I felt like drawing Polios on them.

Derek threw his chonies on the floor. He wouldn't pick them up, so I told him I would put a picture of them on my blog.

Haha.

Ice Ice Baby

Yesterday we woke up and ice skated to the gym in our running shoes.

Then we met up with the Bank Street crew at the Beer Gardens downtown to celebrate Adam and Julie's 30th birthday. Cassie made a balloon sculpture of her vagina. I took a picture of a turd on the toilet seat in the girls bathroom. Adam got up on the table and danced, chugged, and cheered. Justin Russell rode the bull - twice. And Brett got the new nickname Boobies from our waitress named Scoobie. Overall, it was a pretty good night.

All of the lights.

On the way home tonight, I sneezed inside the collar of my jacket.

This is Buck's Appliance Co. on Fleet Street. They've had holiday decorations up since last year, but it looks like they put up more decorations after Christmas. And now they've added purple lights! So festive.

Face talk my face off.

Check out how beautiful my new computer is. And it has Face Talk! See my face? Who wants to face talk with me?! And did I mention that I got it on sale? I'm still learning how to use it and I haven't transferred all of my stuff over from my old computer yet. What do people do with their old computers?

I got my haircut short. I'm not sure if I like it but I guess it doesn't matter because it's already cut.

Sweet Beaver

My friends reminded me recently that I have a blog, and now that I have a new computer that works, I've decided to start up the blogging again. The past year and a half has been super. In the past 12 months I got a great job, became a licensed Landscape Architect, and got married. But best of all, last week I made a beaver cake for Matt's birthday! Because what guy doesn't want some beaver on his birthday?

Pause For Life Changing Events...

Chicken and Waffles - Vegetarian Style

All of the photos have a purple filter from my iphone case.

On Thursday night we went to a bar called ... wait for it ... Bar.

On Sunday, we went to the Farmers Market. It's downtown under the 83 freeway. It's really fun and has a ton of stuff, including a table of mushrooms.

Then we saw the Art Car.

I made really good leek and potato soup last night for dinner from stuff we bought at the market.

I also made Derek go to Bikram Yoga with me yesterday. It was really hard! I'm pretty sure it's impossible to hold your foot straight out in front of you when you're dripping in sweat. Can't be done. I'm going again today.

The washing machine tried to eat me.

Yesterday, while I was doing laundry, the washing machine lid fell and hit me in the face.

While ma and I were in NY, we saw a 'magnificent specimen' exhibit at the Chelsea Market. All these guys competed in a beard and moustache contest in Alaska, and this guy from Austin took glamour shots of all of them. The fox-head guy was one of my favorite.

We also went to McSorley's and drank some beers and watched the Laker game. Knuckle Sandwich? ha!

Acrobatic Manuvers and such

Side Note: You may think that sustituting a paper clip for a bobby pin is a good idea at the time but it isn't.

Ok, so let me tell you...

Thursday

The dirty old man, who owns the pharmacy next to my work and who is married and has children, kind of hit on me and bought me flowers. Sick.

Friday

I met up with some friends at the Tiki Hut for drinks and then we went and saw Gogol Bordello at the Rams Head. It was amazing. So fun. Then we went out to breakfast at 2am and I ate french toast.

Saturday

There was a Kinetic Sculpture Race through the streets of Bmore. It was sponsored by The Visionary Art Museum. People dress up in these crazy costumes and competed in various obstacles throughout the town and harbor.

Our friends Wally and Jillian invited us to go to Wally's dad's private island. His dad owns half of an island off the coast of Maryland, close to Annapolis. It's called St Helena Island and you can only get there by boat. Honestly. Google it. Before they were the owners, it was a rehab school for disabled children. Kinda creepy. There is all this crazy old brick structures. It's really awesome.

Sunday

Had a really good brunch with Cassie. Did some laundry. BBQ at Bank Street. Derek watched our veggie garden grow in our backyard. We have cucumbers, tomatoes, onions, spinach, lettuce, sweet peas, rosemary, basil, mint, strawberries, cilantro, parsley, and lemon verbena.