New addition to the family
And this time it's a real addition! I spent this weekend in Arkansas co-hosting a baby shower for my sister. It was lots of fun. I got to see work and family friends that I haven't seen in such a long time. I've been crocheting a baby blanket, but it's only half-finished now, so everyone got a big laugh when she pulled out the unfinished blanket. She got a bunch of great stuff for the baby. It's due at the end of February, and it's going to be a boy!

I also scouted out a possible wedding locale, and Victor and I are checking another one out tonight. I went to Mass with Diana at her church, and it was surprising how similar it was to the Methodist services I used to go to. I wasn't lost at all (unlike I will be tonight at Spanish Mass).

Music news, sorta
Did everyone look at Pitchfork today? Not only is there a glowing review of the new Super Furry Animals singles collection, but also there is a list of their Top 100 Singles of 2000-2004. I was pleasantly surprised at how much I agreed with them. Also, they have the Coachella lineup in their news section.

Usually, Pitchfork makes me want to slap someone, but not today.

Wedding plans update... kinda bad news, kinda good news
So. I may not get my dream wedding after all. I really wanted to get married at this super cute Catholic church kinda near my parents' house and then have the reception at the historic hotel next to the church. It's probably not going to happen now. Turns out, the priest at the church is really by-the-book, and he's not too happy that Victor hasn't really had a local church since he left home almost 12 years ago. Victor still goes to church occasionally, but hasn't become a member of any other church other than the church where he did his baptism/confirmation/stuff, and that church is in Mexico. So the priest is already giving us some grief about that, and he's saying we have to be a member of a Dallas church for six months before he will even talk to us about setting a date at his church.

Also, a friend of the family is getting married at that same church back home in June. Like me, she is a non-Catholic marrying a Catholic. They already have special permission to get married in that church, but the priest has apparently been lecturing her hardcore about how she should become a Catholic. I don't want to deal with that. He's also very strict about only allowing sacred music in the church (no Wedding March or even other classical music)... anyway, it sounds like it would be a big headache to deal with all of that stuff if he did decide to let us get married there.

And finally, I hear that the historic hotel is really expensive for receptions.

So we may be changing our plans to have a Dallas wedding instead. Of the other Catholic churches I've seen back home, there are none that really stand out to me as a fitting place for my wedding (I want a traditional, "older" look to the church, so that the pictures are really pretty and so that the ceremony is nice). Victor is going to scout out some churches here this weekend. There's a huge one near our apartment that looks really nice, and I've been trying to get Victor to go there for a while now, since I'd like to attend a mass there. Also, just in case we did decide to get married there, it would be really easy to get a bilingual ceremony.

For the record, I'm totally OK with marrying a Catholic, and raising the kids Catholic, and I've always planned on sending kids to Catholic school anyway... but for now I'm probably going to stay a non-Catholic. I don't mind going through all of the pre-marriage requirements, and I don't mind being told about how great it would be if I was Catholic, but I don't want someone constantly pressuring me to become one. I know there are plenty of priests out there who will be less authoritative about the whole non-Catholic thing.

Work = insane!
This week (and last week too) have just been crazy at work. We are training agents to take calls for our new client, and I'm the trainer that gets to do it. So basically, I've been running around like a chicken with its head cut off, and sometimes I just get to gulp down lunch and head right back to work. When I get home, I'm exhausted.

The training class did get me a birthday cake and card, and one of the agents told me I look like a 1930's or 1940's film star.* So I can't complain too much. They're a nice bunch of people!

* Apparently it has to do with how I dress, and maybe my shortish curly hair. One guy told me I reminded him of Shirley Temple, and he hasn't even seen me tap dance!

Restaurant Review: The Press Box Grill
Last night, we went to dinner at the new restaurant in our building, the Press Box Grill. It's on the corner of Elm and Ervay, in the Post Wilson Building. We were able to get free food in return for coming during their staff training session. I think they open officially tomorrow. That's the plan anyway.

The whole place is set up as sort of an upscale sports bar, with bunches of flat-screen TV's all over the walls. The TV's are awesome, and they have somehow managed to make them visible yet unobtrusive, so you don't feel sensory overload while munching your burger. The rest of the decor is newspaper-themed. It was a very comfortable atmostphere... something I can't say about most sports bars.

The menu is standard bar/grill food, and the food quality is high. We started with jalapeno poppers, which were cheesy and wonderful. Victor got a burger smothered in bleu cheese and buffalo sauce, while I had fish and chips. We also had plenty of beer (Victor said the Guinness was good). One thing I would have changed is to have real "chips" (or as we like to call them, fries) with the fish and chips instead of the homemade potato chips they served. I like the traditional big fries with my fish rather than waffle chips.

I hope this restaurant succeeds, because I would love to have another nearby alternative in case we don't want to cook. However, because it's downtown (which empties out after 5pm), and there isn't a parking lot or garage, it has some hurdles to overcome. But I'm pulling for it. Oh, the staff is really friendly too, which is important to me.

We didn't have dessert because they didn't have any available for their training session. Luckily, Victor's parents were thoughtful enough to ship me a homemade birthday cake, so we ate a bunch of that when we got home.

Well, that just figures.
In the news today: According to calculations performed by a UK psychologist, January 24 is the most depressing day of the year.

And it's my birthday.

Tomorrow is my 28th birthday, in fact. After that, only one more birthday till thirty! This weekend Victor and I drove to Austin to spend the weekend with our friends there. I had a great time celebrating my birthday on Saturday. We ate dinner at the lovely Suzi's China Grill, which is my favorite Chinese restaurant in Austin (maybe favorite Chinese restaurant ever?), and then we all retired to Aaron and Debbie's for cake and games.

Friday night, however, we saw The Arcade Fire at Emo's. The show was spectacular. I had a feeling they'd be really good live, and they didn't disappoint. In fact, they were better than I ever could have expected! So much energy. They were theatrical, passionate, even wacky... everything you need for a good show. There was a scuffle at some point (which I really didn't see very well... we were close to the stage but I was behind a bunch of tall boys and a pole) between Win and Régine, who are the two principle singers and also husband and wife. Apparently he pushed her off the stage with his bass or something. Anyway, the consensus between most of us was that it was all part of the act, but our two friends who were closest to the action said that it looked malicious. I dunno. It was a great show nonetheless. I would love to see them again.

Hey everybody, I've finally set up a flickr account. You can now see pictures of our trip to Florida to see my friend Ellen. We snorkled in a big spring, and there were a few gators lurking around.

Stuck in a rut
Yep, that's what this place is. Stuck in a rut. I never really wanted this to just be a journal about my rather mundane home life and somewhat exciting travel. I wanted to put in amusing cultural junk, music stuff... whatever. I think quality has really started to go down. Well, it started several months ago.

Most of this I simply blame on my own lazy ass. There, I said it.

The rest of it I blame on how lazy Victor and I have become. Sure, we're gone almost every weekend to visit family or friends or some exotic locale (and seriously, we're exhausted and can't wait to sleep in late tomorrow). But when we're at home, we don't do anything, really, except watch TV or movies, or play video games, or cook... have we somehow become boring? What is wrong with us??? Are we OLD???

So, over the next few weeks, I'm going to turn over the proverbial new leaf. Get some real freaking content on here. Maybe redesign things a bit. Get a flikr account. Resurrect the old Thursday Top Tens beast, and figure out how to best archive it. Post all of the stuff I've been promising to post since Moses was a baby. Yep, I'm going to become better at this. I've even put it on my 43 Things list.

Is there anything you, my faithful four or five readers, would like to see? I know Mark has suggested in the past a sidebar account of what I'm reading or listening to (kinda like Kris has on his sidebar). Anything else? Help me out here, folks, because as you can tell, I'm feeling creativity-challenged lately.

I suck! I know it!
Sorry, this just hasn't been the week for blogging, even though I have plenty of stuff to say about Florida (which was great, and there will be pictures). I've been holed up in the house watching episode after episode of The OC, thanks to Victor. I've also had a rather nasty asthma attack which made me miss a day of work. So anyway, I promise Florida, pictures, and top tens soon.

Make new friends, but keep the old
This weekend Victor and I are flying to Florida to see my friend Ellen. We went to high school together, and then she moved to New Zealand. I only see her every once in a while now, and I think it's been about three and a half years since I saw her last. Her parents live in Florida now, and she's there visiting them.

I met Ellen in gym class in 10th grade. She was a transfer student whose family had just moved from Alabama. She was horrified to be going to my public high school in Arkansas, because she had been going to a private arts school in Birmingham. I was horrified at just being in Arkansas. Anyway, a friend of mine brought her to a party at my house that weekend. Ellen was extra horrified to find out that it was my 16th birthday party, a fact that our mutual friend had forgotten to tell her. Turns out it was the start of a great friendship. I even wrote a two-part article about the last time we hung out, in San Francisco. note: That's an old article I wrote for a now-defunct website called Radio Free Arkansas. I found it through the Internet Archive Wayback Machine, which has a cache of old websites. The pictures in this article don't work anymore.

So this is the new year!
Happy new year, everybody! I hope everyone had a great time, complete with lots of kissing and champagne. We got back from our trip yesterday afternoon, and we're almost recovered.

We took off Thursday afternoon, and were able to get first class seats, which I have to say were amazing. We are so lucky to be able to travel in such style. I dread the day that Victor doesn't work for an airline anymore. Anyway, we enjoyed the flight over (I watched Win a Date with Tad Hamilton!, because I heart Topher Grace... it was pretty bad), although we didn't get much sleep. I was hoping to sleep a lot since the seats fully recline into a bed, but alas, no luck.

We got to our hotel, the Stylotel, around 10am Friday morning. They didn't have our room ready, but I was apparently so pathetic about wanting a shower that they put us in a different room. It was a triple room, with one double bed and a single bed. It had a little cubicle with a tiny shower, sink, and toilet. Even though it was a fairly small room, we liked it a lot. Budget hotels are usually pretty awful in London, and at least this one was recently renovated and had an amazing breakfast.

We took a nap and then hit the town. Victor wanted to do some shopping, so we headed over to the Oxford Street/Bond Street area. He ended up buying some jeans at Fenwick, which is a nice department store on Bond Street. We also checked out the designer shops, including Prada, Miu Miu, and Burberry, but we didn't make any purchases there. We headed back to the hotel for a nap and a bite to eat at a pub around the corner.

For New Year's Eve, we went to a club night called Popscene 2K5 (short description found here). Basically, it was two floors of a college building overlooking the Thames that had been converted to a 60's retro club and an indie club. We had a hard time finding it, but once we got there, it was amazing. Highlights: Watching the mods and hipsters oohing and aahing over the fireworks above the Thames and the London Eye; counting down the New Year with "Sympathy for the Devil" in the background; dancing our asses off to the Smiths, the Killers, the Walkmen... you name it, it was played.

Saturday we dragged ourselves out of bed for more shopping. We went to Knightsbridge to see Harrod's (which was closed) and Harvey Nichols (which Victor fell in love with). We did more shopping, too... we both made purchases at Mexx, and we wandered around Selfridges for a long time. Here is a silly picture of me from Saturday:



That night we were exhausted, so we got takeaway Indian food. We ate it on the bed in the hotel room. I found a piece of chicken tikka masala that looked like a face. I mean exactly. So of course I took pictures. They didn't turn out so well, so use your imagination:



We spent a lot of Sunday sightseeing. Of course we went to my favorite London park, St. James's Park, where I got a quick picture of a very cold Victor:



We peeked at Buckingham Palace through the gates. Unfortunately, the next changing of the guard was an hour and a half away, so we didn't get to see that. Maybe next trip. Anyway, as we were heading down to see Westminster Abbey and Parliament, we saw some guards marching over toward the palace:



And no trip to London is complete without a photo of Big Ben (yeah, yeah, it's the bell inside the clock tower, not the tower itself):



We also made our way down to see the Tower Bridge and the Tower of London. We didn't have time for the Tower of London tour, which I love, but Victor got a picture of some Beefeaters anyway:



We spent the rest of the day at the National Gallery and shopping around Covent Garden. Victor picked up two very lovely (and relatively cheap) shirts at Paul Smith, a couple of things at H&M, and an early birthday present for me: a super cute suede purse from Ted Baker. We ate fish and chips that night and passed out, since we had to leave the hotel at 5:30am Monday morning. And we were able to get first class again on the flight home.

All in all, the trip was fantastic. The only real downside is that whatever detergent the hotel uses for sheets and towels gave me a horrific rash. All over my arms and legs, and a little on my ears. I'm so miserable. I think it's starting to subside though, especially with all of the oatmeal baths and hydrocortisone and antihistimines... Maybe Kris would say I deserved it... after all, I still haven't posted anyone else's top tens yet. I promise to do it before the end of the week. Promise!