Happy Mardi Gras!

God I feel so far removed. No King Cake, No Beads, No overwhelming Stench of Urine and Beer and Vomit. At least I have St. Patrick's Day to look forward to. Chicago, you better measure up.

I Can Smell The Cake

No seriously, there's cake in my kitchen.

Well my friends, today I turn 26. The big boss yesterday told me I was getting up there. So did my grandparents on the phone last night. What's up with that? Also, what's up with everyone in my family calling me YESTERDAY to wish me a happy birthday "tomorrow"? Aren't you supposed to call the person on their actual birthday? I guess it just fits into our consistent pattern of familial dysfunction.

Moving on, I spent the majority of the day at work yesterday (besides eating cake) enjoying my new iPod Nano - an awesome birthday gift from my mom. My dad, who didn't want to outdo himself from last year, got me a candle and some coasters from Hawaii. With the price tags still on them.

This morning, I was left with instructions from Mike not to go digging around for my present from him while I'm home today. This is torture. I WANT TO DIG! I might have to, just a little :)

Tonight I believe Mike and I will dine on some very fine sushi at Kamehachi Café and tomorrow night we have plans to celebrate further with pizza, beer and live blues.

I'm not sure what I'm going to do today. Defnitely not laundry. The weather looks great, so I am most definitely heading out. And it looks like my free Thursdays might be coming to an end shortly, so if any day were the day to take advantage, it is today.

Well wishes, cash and/or chocolate donations are all welcome. References to wrinkles, approaching hills, and any phrases including the words "up" and "there" are not.

I Need More Sugar

Erg. My neck hurts. Most likely this is because the cat forced me to sleep in an awkward pretzel-like position to ensure her extreme comfort at all times. She made Mike sleep on the couch.

Today, on this day of Valentine's, I have once again succumbed to the traditional gorge-sumption of excessive high-fructose corn syrup (really, does anyone use just plain sugar any more?). I am currently staring down the barrel of a heart-shaped Jolly Rancher lollipop and the crumpled silver and pink foil wrappers of the also heart-shaped Nestle crunch chocolates are littering the confines of my trash can. I have also consumed chocolate in the form of a Tootsie roll pop and I expect I will probably eat even more chocolate as the day progresses.

Hmm. I wonder how one becomes a professional chocolate taster.

In related news, I had Subway for lunch today. I eat at Subway a lot. The same dude (I say dude because he has long hippie-curly hair pulled into a ponytail and wears what I'm pretty sure is Hemp necklace) makes my sandwiches every time I go in there. I always order the same thing: Roasted chicken breast on wheat, not toasted. When making a roasted chicken breast Subway sandwich the sandwich artist must heat up the chicken. He then assembles the rest of the sandwich while waiting for said chicken to reach the desired temperature. It never fails that this particular sandwich artist forgets about the chicken in the microwave and starts to close up my sandwich sans chicken. I always have to point this out to him. He always says something along the lines of "duh" or "doh." OK, so I'm not really sure where I was going with this. Maybe drugs are bad? I don't know. I have to go back to work now.

Thank you, that is all. Sorry for the pointless post.

A few random, unrelated bits

I've been reading this book lately and I think I am in love with Merrill Markoe. Seriously hysterical, but probably only to females and gay men. Last night I came across her thoughts on Valentine's Day in an essay in the book entitled "Deranged Love Mutants: The Story of Romeo and Juliet." Very nice. I highly recommend this book.

I've noticed that design-wise pizza boxes are different here. It's very perplexing to me, although I'm beginning to see why. The lids have little flaps that fold into slots on the side, making it a more efficient to stay shut. OK, a little hard to explain. Just trust me.

I've also noticed that apples are way better here than in Dallas - or anywhere I've lived for that matter. I've even branched out from my Granny Smith fetish and started buying all kinds. They are so crisp and juicy and refreshing. True happiness, my friends, is a delicious apple.

Mooovies

The Lou, who is behind the times on all technological fronts, has just subscribed to Netflix. First in queue: Ikiru. She is excited. So much so that she must write in third person.

I feel like a housewife today and I don't like it

One of the problems with having a day off during the middle of the week is that I wake up feeling a bit worthless. Of course, the first month it was fantastic, I was able to take care of all of that looming I-just-moved-to-a-new-city crap such as obtaining a driver's license with very bad personal photo representation. But now, I've gotten myself into a Thursdays funk. I've become a soccer mom, without the soccer and without the kids. My typical Thursdays consist of sleeping in about 30 minutes, promising myself I WILL look for freelance work today but never getting around to it, getting out of bed, working out, and spending the rest of the day doing laundry, cleaning, folding clothes and running errands - mostly to the grocery store and Petco, with the occasional visit to World Market where I inevitably buy chocolate. Today, I've already started a load of laundry, cleaned out the refrigerator and folded some laundry that's been sitting in the office since Sunday. I've got on my workout clothes and was just getting online to pay the bills when I decided that being off on Thursdays really isn't that great when it comes to my ego. So here, at this moment I am dying to say fuck it, I will NOT be that laundry-doing-dinner-cooking person. But see, the problem is, I can't stand looking at all of the laundry piling up, knowing that I will eventually have to do it anyway and Sundays the washing machine in my building gets crowded. Plus I have no clean underwear. And I'm getting to the point where I get the anxiety when things are messy and dirty. And I HAVE to pay the bills otherwise we'd have no heat or *gasp* Internet. So, I'm stuck. At least I'm not cooking dinner tonight. Maybe I'm just cranky about all of this because I'm feeling all congested and tired and cold-like. And ever since Lorie's post I want a fucking cupcake too.