Just Jess

2011-05-01T20:14:00.000-05:00

Rufus had the right idea today....

It's been a super lazy Sunday around here. Though Jazz Fest is rampaging on across town, Bryan's exams (and my desperate need for a summer job) kept us close to home this weekend. This week, as a whole, was relatively low key on the adventure front. But even a girl like me needs a break from all the fun-ness every once in a while. Here are a few of the things I did get up to this week...in no particular order(not pictured: Wednesday matinee movie: The Bells of St Mary's!)

On a walk in the park, McCoy and I spotted a van with this (and other) fabulous bumper stickers. The van was from Portico Construction, and I loved all the affirmative slogans plastered on it, some of which were quite lengthy. But I mostly loved the simplicity of this one. It's almost screaming, "I dare you!" huh?....Or maybe it was just me...

So, I've once again embarked on an over the top diet plan which seems to be slowly *but surely* working....HOWEVER...just as I laid off the dieting for the Best Chefs Fundraiser I mentioned in my last post, I laid off for Easter....AND HOW!!!! I made these muy deliciosos cake truffles from this Recipe Rhapsody recipe They were truly divine!....and I have sworn to not make them again until I have a much more robust work out ethic...

So much of the last two weeks (well, the semester in general) has been spent *helping* B get through finals. By *helping,* I mostly mean staying out of his way, and trying not to distract him too much with my epic hours of television-watching...But every once in a while, the best *help* he can get comes from our Annie (the oldest of our furry children).

Also this week, I got an impromptu phone call from Banacek, who needed me to come and help her move a coffin.....yep.

Don't be totally creeped out, she's turning it into a fab bookshelf!

This one is a warning pic. I'm OCD and on a complex diet. Much of my little brain's capacity is almost constantly preoccupied with food these days. The above pic is the amazing lunch I had a few days ago: baked chicken with fresh oregano and rosemary from my garden, turkey sausage, and a bit of fresh pureed tomatoes. The salad is fresh spinach with basil, mint, and tarragon (also from my garden), a tiny bit of blue cheese crumbles, and a couple of sliced grapes. Clearly this was my major chowdown for the day, and totally worth it!

This coming week, I'll be preoccupied with trying to find a summer day job. Cross your fingers that I can find a casual restaurant/bar where people will want to throw money at me 4 or 5 days a week!

He not busy being born is busy dying...A delayed post

2011-04-30T10:56:00.000-05:00

Ok. So, this is an entry I actually wrote almost two weeks ago, and apparently saved it as a draft, but forgot to post. So, read on as if it were actually April 19th…

Whew! I’ve survived McCoy’s 30th birthday festivities! And, while I still firmly believe that birthdays are better if they are 4 days long instead of 1, I am EXHAUSTED!

Yesterday, a friend and I experimented with spray paint, and it was super fun! We saw this video about creating mystical universes with multiple layers of spray paint. We also decided to add our own chaotic nature to the “art” by including magazine pics, beads, glitter, and whatever else struck our fancy.

Then we went home to get dolled up to go downtown to sing karaoke…among other things! I’m not sure I’ve ever talked about my experience with Bourbon Street, perhaps (unfortunately) the most distantly-famous New Orleans landmark.

Hanging out on Bourbon Street is not something we do with any regularity. The Quarter is expensive in comparison to our neighborhood, and certain parts of it (Bourbon in particular) are always jammed up with drunken tourists who have lost all sense of social decorum. I do often notice that I appreciate this touristy city center more than most of my local friends. I value how important tourism is for our city, and I actually have many times met some amazingly cool people who would be immediately written off as “tourists” by many. And, as all of us who are not born and raised “yats,” I started off my New Orleans journey as a tourist on Bourbon Street many years ago.

All that being said, Bourbon Street does NOT adequately represent the French Quarter, much less the city of New Orleans. We all get very frustrated when visitors don’t make the effort (minimal, truly) to explore other parts of the city and leave with the impression that everyone in town parties 24-7 at neon bars and seedy strip clubs. PS – We don’t.

HOWEVER, most locals I know will agree, for a serious tongue-in-cheek birthday throw down, the Quarter is a super fun option! So, for Day Three of McCoy’s Super Rad 30th Birthday Weekend of Doom, we headed downtown for some Technicolor cocktails and karaoke!

Fortunately, I work at a religious institution and have off all of Holy Week, so it wasn’t a problem for me to step out on Sunday night….or Monday night…..or Tuesday night, the next night in my chronicle…

Tuesday, 19 April was the day I had been waiting for for two months!

The Best Chefs of Louisiana fundraiser event!!!!

All you could eat, drink, and experience, and all by some of the most talented chefs in the world! This event provided me with experiences I would never have otherwise. While I will likely visit one or more of these chefs' restaurants at some point, I was able to sample them all for less than a dinner at any one restaurant! So delicious! So fun! I'm gonna leave you with some pics of the decadence! Hooray!

There is no cure for birth and death save to enjoy the interval.

2011-04-17T10:08:00.000-05:00

Well, this week has been a little quieter than the last few...but just a little!

After my bike was stolen, I spent two days in quite a funk. I was pouty and whiny, and, in general, not much fun to be around.

Fortunately, Wednesday came quickly. McCoy and I made our usual lunchtime trek to the Prytania Theater, where we watched "Laura," a great noir film starring Dana Andrews and Gene Tierney. I love watching these classic films every Wednesday. It provides me with an amazing sense of nostalgia and a desire to create beautiful things, to be around beautiful things, and to adopt a more romantic perspective in general.

We decided to take a break from our usual Wednesday trek to the zoo/aquarium since I'm off work all next week. So, I went home to sew! I've made two wearable muslins this week out of some good quality thrifted bedsheets. I plan to make several summer dresses from multiple patterns, in search of the perfect pattern for this fun Day of the Dead fabric I got at Joann's. I don't plan to make this dress until I've lost a bit more weight, but I want to have the perfect pattern picked out!

I'm pretty happy with both of them, though I'm definitely leaning more toward the halter pattern for the skull fabric. Something really strange happened with the zipper on the green dress, but that's fixable. Both dresses fit well and the fabric is soft and breathes really nicely...important, as "spring" in New Orleans has already brought +90 days!

All that sewing put my brain back in a peaceful place. My good friend, Pickle Freak, loaned me her bike so I can still get around and be exercised, and the last half of my pre-spring break week at work was quite enjoyable.

Tomorrow is McCoy's 30th birthday, so a full weekend of fun celebrations has already begun! Friday, Bryan and I hosted McCoy, Banacek, Pickle Freak, and the Equalizer for a birthday cookout and crawfish feast! I made two birthday cakes: one for McCoy, and a belated one for my sweet husband, who didn't get one for his b-day a few weeks ago (*pouty face: I'm a terrible wife!!!*).

Crawfish Feasting! Oh, and hey! Don't my plants look great?

Jac's "Happy Super Rad Birthday Weekend of Doom" Cake: Lemon with Cream Cheese frosting and gummy creatures

Bryan's "Creed Sux" belated birthday cake: Chocolate Fudge with Coconut Pecan frosting and chocolate Ichthus fish

Yesterday, the birthday festivities involved going to the Convention Center to watch a taping of WHEEL OF FORTUNE!!!! It was so fun and interesting! I can't blog about details until the episodes actually air, but plan for a more detailed account mid-May!

Today's fun will commence in the French Quarter, where karaoke will happen. Oh yes! I'm ashamed to say that I haven't been to karaoke, not once, since we moved here! So, expect hilarity in the form of pictures and commentary soon!

Hasty, apologetic catch-up post: The Final Chapter

2011-04-12T11:59:00.000-05:00

I really am going to try and not to get so behind on posting from here on out, but there’s just so little time and so much to do!!!! I hope you’re having a great week! Here's the last of my catching up posts, and this one has a little good news, and a LOT of SAD!!!! You have been warned...

Last weekend was the French Quarter Festival! It's a huge, 4-day extravaganza of great music at 20 stages throughout the Quarter....and it's FREE! I must admit, I did not properly partake of the festival this year, only watching one band perform (The Pinettes, an all-female brass band!), but I still had an extremely busy weekend!

Saturday morning, my friend Pickle Freak and I had way too much fun with spray paint and cheap, plastic flower pots! Look at the transformation of this ugly, green mess (rescued from a neighbor's trash bin) into shiny red happiness! Now my little garden is colorful and cheery!

I also made this fabulous Empire Strikes Back dress! Oh yes, folks! I re-found my stash of childhood bedsheets!!!

Sunday, I lazed around with the TMC Elizabeth Taylor marathon and some fancy cheeses!!!!

BUT.....THEN THE WORST THING EVER HAPPENED IN THE NIGHT!!!!!!

My beautiful little green bicycle, Sally, was STOLEN RIGHT OFF MY FRONT PORCH!!!! I was (and still am a bit) devastated. Sally is, by all accounts, a worthless bike (the basket is worth more than the actual bike)....WORTHLESS TO ANYONE BUT ME!!! I truly loved my little friend. She got me through quitting smoking, and we've spent time together every single day! Bikes get stolen with extreme frequency here, and I'm not even overly surprised that someone finally noticed the craptastic cable lock I was using. And I feel extremely petty for being so sad about this loss, but I can't seem to help it. There will be another bicycle for me one day. And a better lock. Until then, thanks, Sally, you were a good bike. Farewell.

Hasty, apologetic catch-up post: Take 3

2011-04-12T11:29:00.001-05:00

I can't believe how behind I've gotten on this blog! Argh!

Okay, where was I?

Last week was just as hectic as every week before (surprise, surprise!)

Early in the week, a friend and I created a unique and sporty bridesmaid dress for her to wear to a very unconventional wedding this weekend!This picture truly doesn't do it justice, though I will admit the construction was a little hasty.

Wednesday was, as always, THE DAY OF ADVENTURES AND GENERAL WINNING, during which Banacek, McCoy and I took in a classic film (San Francisco starring Clark Gable and Jeanette MacDonald), champagne, and a trip downtown to the Audubon Insectarium!

Banacek’s work schedule is changing, so it was her last Wednesday adventure day, but have no fear! McCoy and I will gladly add another ladies’ day to our weekly schedule to accommodate such an important member of the Adventure Team!

We had ENTIRELY too much fun at the Insectarium. Looking at bugs, taking pictures of bugs, climbing on giant fiberglass bugs, eating bugs....YES, EATING BUGS! It was all just super! But I think we may have frightened some of the employees!

Okay, I think I can catch it all up in one more post before another Wednesday of adventure arrives tomorrow!

Hasty, apologetic catch-up post: Take 2

2011-04-12T11:14:00.000-05:00

The Freret Street Market is a regular monthly market, but last Saturday marked the Freret Street Festival, a great kick off to street market season! Local artists and crafters shared their wares with the world! I bought this A-MA-ZING embroidered Bearded Lady Yearbook Photo! I almost DIED when I saw it and had to take it home with me!

There was carnival food, of course, as well as more fancy schmancy food offerings!

Two stages showcased several live music acts, and, to top it off, at the end of the day there was a roller derby bout in the parking lot of a local thrift store! Hoorah!

Oh, and I finally made some more stuff! The apron is from a vintage pattern which I now officially HATE, as it is so detailed and complex I could make a dress much faster. For the red market day dress, I used an old pattern I had re-sized from a now long-gone-and-forgotten proper pattern. Both are from refashioned bedsheets.

Hasty, apologetic catch-up post: Take 1

2011-04-12T10:58:00.000-05:00

Spring in New Orleans is full-on festival season!....I mean, it’s not like we don’t have festivals year round, but April is offering day after day of potential adventures packed three or four deep!

Last Friday night (oops! Two Fridays ago now, I AM behind on my posting!), I went to a friend’s birthday happy hour! It was a super good time (too good, I might have said the next day)! I am so grateful to have met such amazing people since I moved here!

Somehow, I managed to get up early that Saturday morning without much of a hangover (quitting smoking has helped dramatically in the hangover department), and traveled with friends down to the Crescent City Farmers Market, it’s Saturday morning location is downtown in the CBD. I was able to buy fresh strawberries and stock up on my plants for the season! A woman who saw me with my giant plant purchase called me the "Muses of Plants!"

After the market, McCoy, the Equalizer, and I took the streetcar to the French Quarter for the 2011 Road Food Festival. Royal Street was lined with dozens of tail-gating tents, each offering unique and delicious-sounding treats!

As if we didn’t gorge ourselves enough at Road Food, McCoy and I couldn’t resist a crawfish feast in my backyard on Sunday morning. The sun was out, and it was just a perfect time! After pigging out on spicy, salty deliciousness, we played the fun and grotesque "Pose the Crawdad Corpse" game!

As you’ve seen, the Adventure Team and I have taken to going to the noon Classic Movie Matinee at the Prytania Theater. Two weeks ago, the selection was Giant, and, in tribute to the late, great Elizabeth Taylor, we smuggled in champagne and a strawberry cream cheese pie! Don’t worry, we support local business (we got drinks and popcorn too!) Wow, does living in this town make it difficult to be on a diet!

I even made that blue cotton dress just for the occasion!

The rest of that week managed to be only slightly mundane, as I live in the town of Winning, and even Thursday afternoon bike rides are beautiful and made of fun! But, Saturday morning, New Orleans was ready to get its festival on again!

We live in a wonderful world that is full of beauty, charm and adventure. There is no end to the adventures that we can have if only we seek them with our eyes open

2011-03-27T17:36:00.001-05:00

A POSSIBLE NEW BLOGGING ADVENTURE: A couple of years back, my best friend and I waxed drunk about having our own reality show, called “Jess and Jill Do Belize.” It was going to be a tasteful mix of educational documentary a la Time Team America (showing our day jobs as Mesoamerican archaeologists) and Taradise (documenting pretty much what you’d expect). We even pitched our idea to a couple of Discovery Channel guys over a keg of cheap beer one night, but to no avail. That show just wasn’t in the cards for us…PS - Did you know my gallant husband was IN Time Team America? Yeah, he's pretty much awesome!

But today, I was reminded of that little adventure-y dream by a dear friend, who I like to call McCoy. McCoy and I, along with gal pals Banacek and Magnum (I’m Fletcher), go on near-daily adventures in this, the most made-of-fun city on Earth! We’ve done so much in the last week, it’s almost too epic to post about here, so I’ll just make a quick list:

Super Sunday Festivities!!!

Banacek and Fletcher’s Crawfish Feast!

McCoy and Fletcher Take the Zoo by Storm!

Champagne with Strawberries at the Prytania Theater Classic matinee, Double Indemnity!

McCoy, Banacek, and Fletcher Tour the Aquarium!

And, of course, there are too many happy hours to document! In fact, since I started writing this draft, I've had 60 amazing Facebook pictures worth of fun, so watch out for new posts soon!

Oh, yeah. And I got a haircut and a new tattoo with money I would normally spend on cigarettes!!!!

So, McCoy came by my office on Thursday to discuss our plans to try and get ourselves in to the upcoming Wheel of Fortune tapings at the Convention Center (McCoy beat the hell out of Wheel of Fortune two years ago, officially making her my most famous friend ever!!!). We decided to take an impromptu picnic in the park because the weather was TOO PERFECT.

While enjoying our admittedly jealousy-inspiring lives, we discussed how awesome it would be if our jobs were just to BE US. If we could get paid to explore the city and write about it, it would be the most awesome thing ever!

Well, it was only lunchtime, so we hadn’t been drinking yet, and couldn’t actually convince ourselves that this was a realistic idea.

However, we did decide that it would be a great idea to start a new blog, where we document daily our biggest and smallest New Orleans adventures. We’ll write about our food, our sunburns, free excursions, splurges, shopping (ok, window shopping, who am I kidding), drinking, crafting, taking photos, meeting cool people, meeting not-so-cool people, and, in general, everything we do and see that represents why we love this town so much and why all of you should love it too! We'll be operating on a teeny-tiny little shoestring budget, so that anyone could replicate our journeys. What do you think?

Every human being is the author of his own health or disease

2011-03-27T16:32:00.001-05:00

As of today, I am 20 days smoke free, and I’m feeling fabulous about it!!!

Clearly, quitting smoking is still an annoying effort, but I’m keeping my head up, and trying to focus my frustrated energy on developing new, positive, healthy habits. I’m trying to fill in the empty space in my personality which used to contain my “smoker-ness” with other traits and identities.

1. GETTING FIT: The first thing I knew I had to develop was a way to counteract the inevitable quitting-smoking-weight-gain monster. Here’s the problem…I HATE, LOATH, DESPISE, AND ABOMINATE EXERCISE!!! I truly wish I was one of those folks who get into ugly footwear, grunting, soreness, the feeling of utter defeat, and all other athlete’s foot ridden things and emotions found at the gym. Clearly, I am not.

However, I genuinely enjoy being “active.” I love dancing, riding my bicycle, walking in the park, swimming, and many other activities that potentially burn calories, but do not happen exclusively for the purpose of burning calories.

So, I’ve been riding my little bike, Sally, to work every day and usually around the park or neighborhood after that. I’ve been averaging around 10 miles a day on my bicycle, which, granted, isn’t that much, but it’s a start. And, most importantly, it’s fun!

2. CREATIVE WORK IS PLAY: One great tragedy of my smoking cessation is my creative life. I haven’t sewn one thing in almost three weeks! Part of my problem is that I don’t want to make myself anything new until I lose some weight. The other part of my problem is that I can’t seem to get motivated to make anything for anyone else either (though I have a few people waiting for things, yipes!). Maybe I’m still too burned out from Mardi Gras Mayhem. Hopefully I’ll have some creations to share soon. I’m planning to get some work done this week.

3. YOU ARE WHAT YOU EAT: In addition to my fitness goals, I do not delude myself into thinking I can continue shoving gummy bears and bread into my pie hole (mmmm, pie…) every time the thought of a cigarette crosses my mind. Two weeks ago I started back on my Oprah-inspired “No Whites” diet. I did this a couple of years ago with substantial success. But then a girlfriend came to town for a visit, looking BEYOND FANTASTIC. She spent the span of several glasses of wine explaining to me the concept of the Primal Blueprint (a diet similar to the Paleolithic Plan, but more realistic for us modern folk…..AND IT LETS YOU EAT CHEEEEEEESSSSEEE!!!) Clearly, I’m going to give it a shot!

4. THE GRASS IS ALWAYS GREENER: I don’t know if I’ve ever documented my lamentations over the state of our backyard. I can't complain, even having a backyard space in the city is unbelievably lucky. And it’s a great, large space, but it’s been filled over several times with now-broken concrete, has zero shade, and just isn’t pretty to look at. BUT, I’m determined to have a few cookouts this summer, and, if nothing else, it’s a great place to enjoy a few pounds of freshly boiled crawfish from the local fish market.

Last weekend, some girlfriends and I went to the 2011 Home and Garden Expo at the Convention Center.

And, I picked up a few pretty living things for the backyard! Now, it’s much more pleasant! I still need an umbrella for shade and a few more things, but I’ll share a photo when I get it as pretty as possible!

I’m keeping myself as busy as possible, and trying to do so in healthy ways. It truly helps that my life in New Orleans is so freaking amazing! Oh, and it’s a double post day, so stay tuned!!!

Just cause you got the monkey off your back doesn't mean the circus has left town

2011-03-15T13:55:00.000-05:00

So, the elephant in the room that I haven’t blogged about yet is my latest attempt to quit smoking. It may still be much too early to divulge my progress (I’m cigarette free for only 8 days), but, in the hopes of reinforcing my own resolve, I think I’m going to blog about my journey so far.

If you’ve been here before, I’d love your input and encouragement, and if you’re trying to quit too, I hope I can encourage you as well!

Let me preface:

I am not a casual, social, or sometimes smoker. I am a HARD CORE smoker. I love smoking, and do it as often as is possible. If I’m in a bar, it is likely I will consume an entire pack of cigarettes. I’ve been witnessed many times to have a cigarette hanging out of my mouth, lighter in hand, well before I exit a building, ready to fire it up the second I’m outside (think Patsy from AbFab) I think smoking is sexy. I think it is cool. I love the taste, smell, and feeling of smoking cigarettes. I secretly like it when strangers tell me it’s gross and that I should quit. I am also not stupid, and know how terrible cigarettes are for my health.

I decided quite a while back that I would try to quit smoking after Mardi Gras. Don’t worry, it wasn’t because of Lent (y’all know that the only things I like about church are the creepy statues and wine samples), but because I knew that I would have 5 solid days after Fat Tuesday before I had to return to work. I could lock myself in the house as long as necessary and slowly work myself back into the public sphere before jumping back into my regular routine.

Sequestering myself for at least two days was the first and most important part of my quitting strategy. So much of smoking is habit building. There are certain things that I do in my life that I have a truly difficult time separating from cigarettes. This is true for all smokers. I knew I needed to clearly identify my most salient smoking associations so that I could avoid/target them strategically. For me, the things most difficult to separate are: food/cigarette, talking on phone/cigarette(s), class break/cigarette, BEING OUTSIDE/CIGARETTE…yeah, I told you I was in a bad way.

So I stayed inside and did not talk on the phone. I played computer games. I ate candy, bread, pickles, and whatever else I wanted for the first two days. I also was a horrible bitch toward my husband…fortunately he is a very patient soul.

My biggest, most frightening moment during my first nicotine-free days actually ended up becoming my strongest ally in battling the cravings. I had an out-of-body/mind moment when I saw myself: mouth jammed full of candy, fingers jittering on the keyboard as I played my 780th game of tetris in an attempt to distract myself from the constant, annoying whining going on inside my head, becoming more and more frustrated, paranoid, and, quite frankly, sad. I managed to reach out and catch one of the discontented thoughts spinning around in my brain so that I could see it more clearly. It was a worry; a big ole squiggling, screeching worry…

...that no one would like me anymore if I quit smoking...

...That I would cease to be fun, desirable, needed, or maybe even noticed. My fear was that I would cease to be myself. The identity that I had so carefully nurtured as a teenager and become proud of as an adult was in jeopardy because cigarettes had almost always accompanied its development. I never had a job, went on a date, fell in love, felt anguish, traveled alone, drove a car, etc, etc, etc…without “being” a “smoker.” The majority of my icons and role models, from old movie stars to subculture paragons, either smoked or hung out in glamorously smoky venues. I had constructed a large chunk of my identity around an unhealthy, chemical stimulant. This realization completely terrified me, and put me in a stubborn sort of mindset. I am now totally determined to become a “nonsmoker.”

Here’s the biggest problem…I don’t know how to “be” a “non-smoker.”

This is the tricky part to explain to people. Even though I am horrified at how I felt my personality was so affected by cigarettes, that realization doesn’t offer me a solution to the problem. I still don’t feel quite like myself. The best thing I’ve come up with so far is to think of myself in a state of liminality, of metamorphosis; still me (at least mostly), but evolving into something *hopefully* more fun, more desirable, more cool.

After the worst days (the first 3 for me) were over, I let my husband convince me to go out for one glass of wine at a nonsmoking bar. It was still very stressful for me, but I was proud to walk home, smelling fresh and feeling successful. I cut back on my junk food consumption and sat on my front porch with a crossword puzzle a few times. I have been out several times now, had drinks, been around my smoking friends, even went to the St Patrick’s Parade, and I’m doing ok. I've almost completely cut out the junk and am doing a pretty strict two week diet to battle the natural bulging likely to occur when you cut out 20 years of chemical metabolism. I'm riding my bike every day. I think I may even be getting a bit of my sense of smell back. That feeling like I’m always a step away from myself, that there’s something missing, hasn’t gone away yet, and I don’t anticipate it ever will; at least not any time soon. But I’m just beginning this journey, and I’m feeling optimistic about it.

As for continuing the mission:

So far, I have a three part mantra, which I attribute much of my current success to:

THE THREE RULES TO REMEMBER

A very kind friend/professor/fellow quitter gave me these three ideas to keep in mind whenever times get a little tough. I cannot thank him enough.

1. The urge to smoke WILL pass, whether you smoke or not.
2. Think about what you are gaining, NOT what you are giving up
3. No Exceptions (nicotine or smoke in ANY form or amount will send you backsliding)

It really has helped me, though number two has proven to be the hardest! Oh, and I can always listen to my favorite songs to keep me motivated! Why yes, I am still a complete nerd, nicotine or not.

A little motivational Dokken?

Super hardcore workout/health inspiration?

There's always the best song in the history of the world ever?

I really enjoyed the last scene at the Ewok celebration after the battle

2011-03-15T12:46:00.000-05:00

Okay, back to the Mardi Gras chronicles…We are still reveling in the relaxation that comes after the end of a 12 day long party...

I knew Sunday would be a very long day, with 5 parades running back to back! I also knew our fabulous parade-watching spot would be doubly busy and extra early at that! So, I sucked it up and went to stand on the corner 3 hours early! At first it was lame, but then my brother came to join me, and I met a bunch of nice folks, and soon the Bacchus Sunday madness was on! Before I knew it, I had been standing on the street almost 13 hours and was desperately in need of a foot massage and food, so I called it a night, leaving just half way through the final parade of the day.(Oh, and ANDERSON COOPER threw my girlfriend beads!)

Fortunately for those of us who were hard core about seeing every last moment of the weekend’s festivities, Monday was a working day for most people, so no big parties or parades were planned to begin until the evening. Whew! Bryan and I spent the day recuperating and cleaning the house, which had become quite the sparkly sty over the weekend. By 4:00, I was ready to hit the street yet again! We watched Proteus and Orpheus (always celebrity encrusted: this year, the cast of Treme and Fleichmann from Northern Exposure!!!!)

And FINALLY, at 6 am on Tuesday, 8 March 2011, my alarm informed me that it was time to get ready for one more, full-on day of balls-to-the-walls fun-ness!!!

I was disappointed with my costume (especially since it was the only one I actually finished), but really love my new green wig!!! And, of course, I was totally stoked to experience my first ever ZULU parade!!!

It was CRAZY, Y’ALL!!!! Zulu starts really early, and for good reason! It’s so popular, that if they held it in the evening there is no way the streets could hold all the people! As it was, at 8am, the crowds were 40 people deep! Fortunately, my good friend, Pickle Freak, had managed to stake out a prime piece of Zulu real estate!

AND I caught a Zulu Coconut!!! This whole tradition of screaming and reaching for parade riders to hand you trashy trinkets and painted fruits may seem strange to out-of-towners, but it’s as normal here as ass cracks in Wal-mart! Zulu coconuts are among the most coveted of Mardi Gras throws, so I’m very proud of mine, especially since it was given to me, not for screaming and pushing, but for asking politely!

Unfortunately, I did not have the tiniest bit of energy left to watch the final big parade (Rex). This was disappointing, as I had been the most true parade goer all season long, but I genuinely couldn’t stand up any more. I couldn’t carry one more string of beads, wave at one more float, or take even one more picture. So, I said farewell to my fellow parade enthusiasts, stumbled home on my sore, swollen feet, put out my last cigarette (more on that in the next post), sat on the couch, and drifted into happy nap land.
The End.

Damn everything but the circus

2011-03-15T12:20:00.000-05:00

Last Tuesday marked the end of the 2 celebration/preparation-filled months known as Carnival Season. Festivities specifically associated with “Mardi Gras” went on for 12 days! There has really been entirely too much going on to chronicle it all here, so I’m going to focus on a few (okay, more than a few) highlights.

I don’t have many pictures from the first weekend of parades I attended with some friends (Sparta, Pygmalion, Carrollton, and King Arthur), but here’s a couple of memorable moments!

Wednesday, the 2nd marked the beginning of the major parades, starting with Druids, which I watched with some fab folks!

Thursday was one of the biggest nights on the parade calendar, featuring Babylon, Chaos, and Muses back to back! Muses is the oldest all-female Mardi Gras Krewe, and their signature throw is a hand-decorated shoe! Clearly, I wanted one! I dressed as Marie Antoinette, bought a king cake, and made a sign while my students were taking a test!

I ended up handing out the cake to random spectators instead of trading it for a shoe, so I ended the night shoeless, but had an amazingly wonderful time!! My brother drove into town later that night to join us in our celebrations!

Friday morning, we threw a Mardi Gras Party for the students! We made a king cake, played Mardi Gras themed games, and crowned our own King and Queen!

Then it was home again, home again to do some last minute costume preps and get ready for more parades! My brother made a sweet hat, and I threw together a “saloon wench” inspired look of sorts to watch Hermes and Krewe de Etat!

After the parades, we trekked uptown to catch one of our favorite bands (the Old 97s) at Tipitina’s. The opening act, Those Darlin’s, was rockin’ too!!

Saturday, we watched the Krewes of Iris and Tucks, from our now infamous parade spot: just two blocks from our house and one block from the Mayfair, ensuring we always have drinks/restrooms! Also, I made friendly with the cops early on, so that I would always be able to have my primo spot right out front!

Saturday night there were no parades, and a huge rainstorm, so after pigging out with friends at the Mayfair, Bryan and I came home for a much needed nap…

…and then got up and met one of my best girlfriends to cab it up to the Marigny to experience a true cultural treat: ACROCATS!!!

It was MORE THAN FUN!!!! After a late night breakfast at the St Charles Tavern, we caught a ride with a super nice, convertible-driving Tulane student (thanks, Ben!!!), which pretty much ended our evening on a truly fabulous note!

Okay, that leaves Sunday through Tuesday to recap, but I’m going to stop this epic post right now before your eyeballs start to bleed!

I hope you had an amazing Mardi Gras wherever you are!

Throw me somethin, Mister!

2011-03-01T13:25:00.001-06:00

It’s Mardi Gras time, y’all!!!

I’ve spent the last few weeks frantically preparing costumes, and now, Carnival season is finally hitting its crescendo this week! Fortunately, I have good friends, moonshine, and a fail safe publication to guide me!

So far, I’ve seen 4 parades, collected more than my fair share of baubles, hung out with hundreds of friends, and, in general, had a BLAST!!! Super Fun-ness FTW!!!

Most costumes are still in the works, even now, in the eleventh hour. But here's some pics of our progress...

Well, heck. All of a sudden, my computer is throwing a little tantrum....hmmm, WELL THEN! I promise a full-on EXTRAVAGANZA ELEGANZA when this week is done! HAPPY MARDI GRAS, Y'ALL!!!!!

Families are like fudge - mostly sweet with a few nuts.

2011-03-01T12:51:00.000-06:00

Well, I’ve fallen behind on my planned weekly blogging, but, boy, have I ever been busy! Besides the impending crush of Mardi Gras festivities and prepping for midterms at work, I had a long and eventful visit with my folks and youngest brother!

My dad has been itching to get back to the 504 ever since he came to help us move last summer! So, I spent a good portion of the new year planning out places to take the fam on their visit!

Our first outing: My favorite, the Audubon Zoo!!!

My husband has oft noted that noone over the age of 4 acts the way that I do at the zoo, but, come on y’all! It’s the ZOOOOO!!!

We had a low key night at home that night to prepare for a long day in the French Quarter. We got Chinese carryout and watched movies: Red and The Social Network. Red is not my usual style of movie (there is very little gore in this film, and comedy-action just doesn’t do it for me). Maybe it was the presence of the statuesque and sexy Helen Mirren that did it, but I was pleasantly surprised with this little “romp” (a word one cannot really use to describe my usual cinematic fare). I knew I would enjoy The Social Network, and I did, nuff said.

The next day, after a lot of carefully coordinated preparation (5 people in a 4 room shotgun apartment can resemble a game of Twister), we headed downtown on the streetcar! It was the first time to see the French Quarter for my mom and brother, so I wanted to make the most of it!

We saw it all!...Ok, so not ALL of it….but the family friendly portions…Bourbon Street, the mighty Mississippi, the French Market, Café du Monde, Pat O’Briens, Jackson Square, all the famous architecture, character, and characters of the district, and, of course, we watched Krewe du Vieux!!!! My family's first Mardi Gras experience!!!

The next day we were all exhausted, and took a day off to relax. Dad and I walked to the market and stopped off at Big Fisherman to pick up some freshly boiled crawfish!

Monday after work, my folks picked me up in their rental car and we drove uptown through the Riverbend and Carollton, looping City Park, and stopping for a moment at the Canal Street cemetery complex! We completed our journey by trekking through traffic to Mardi Gras World, so my fam could see the innerworkings of the big Mardi Gras parades!

Tuesday, mom and dad went on a date night, so my brother and I went out on our own. He's really into all things supernatural, so I took him on one of the Haunted History tours. It turned out to be really fun, though, I occasionally felt a little more like a tourist than I'd like.

It was an eventful week, and I think (hope?) a good time was had by all! After the fam left, I cleaned up the house....only to immediately trash it again with fabrics, sequins, patterns, and beads to resume the increasingly serious work of Mardi Gras! Laissez le bons temps roulet!

One of the most sublime experiences we can ever have is to wake up feeling healthy after we have been sick

2011-02-15T11:52:00.000-06:00

I feel good today! Not only have I overcome all but the last annoying remnants of a mucousy plague that ate almost all of my weekend, but it is 70 degrees outside! 70! 7-0, as in BEEE-Yu-Tee-Fuull!!!

Last Wednesday was Mardi Gras craft shopping day! One of my best girl's and I drove all over town, manically scratching fabrics, feathers, sequins, decorations, and other sparkly sundries off our shopping lists! We took a quick break to have some guacamole and iced tea at the Blue Tomato, which was really good (just in time too, as my frantic shopping was turning me into a zombie)!

It was a wonderful day!...but did I mention that my lovely, vivacious shopping partner was nursing one hell of a cold?.....duh, duh, duuuuuuuuuh...I was down for the count by dinner time, and didn't resemble a living organism until about mid-way through Saturday...

My sickness set me back on sewing and housework, but I did manage to pull myself out of funkiness on Saturday night just in time for some out of town guests! One of my best girlfriends and her rocker boyfriend drove down for a show, and we got to tag along! We decided to take a cab, since the performance venue was far away and in a neighborhood we were unsure of. The cab driver was wicked confused when he dropped us off at the bar...can you guess why?

The bar is new (hence the no sign), and is called Siberia. It was appropriately freezing inside the bar, though it wasn't actually a cold night outside. The fun inside the show belied the stark exterior.

I know my friend took some fabulous photos of the bands with her snazzy camera, but I'll have to get those from her later. Our friend played with Oxford's own Unwed Teenage Mothers, and a Jackson, MS band we (Los Buddies) love played too! Two other bands played too, one of which had a group of 12 yr old (ok, maybe they were 21)hipster moshers....if you can mentally conceptualize that...But by that time, my dayquil-induced haze was wearing off, so I called us a cab and climbed into my cozy bed with a roll of toilet paper and an entire bag of Ricola cough drops...

Sunday, I enjoyed a little late brunch at Coulis with my friends before they headed north, and then spent most of the day ironing freshly washed Mardi Gras fabrics and shoving cough drops, pickles, vitamins, and orange juice into my face.

By yesterday morning (VALENTINES DAY!!!), I was feeling tip-top (aside from a little lingering mucous), and ready for a romantic date with my favorite archaeologist! We decided to take the streetcar downtown and scout out locations to take my folks when they visit later this week.

We started with oysters at Acme! Bryan even offered to order them on the half-shell (my preference) instead of char-grilled!

Then we walked down Royal, and paused by my favorite antique shop to get a pic of my FABULOUS outfit!!! I actually didn't make this dress, it was last year's one-time RTW purchase while I was in New York last spring! I had totally forgotten i had it, and am SO glad I found it again because I got so many compliments on it, it made my little face blush!

We wandered for a while, had dinner at Coop's Place, and finished the evening with my VERY favorite: A hot buttered rum at the Erin Rose!

Here's a couple of pics of us wandering around looking fabulous!

After work today, I've gotta get some housework done in prep for my fam's visit Thursday, but after that, I'll be sewing up a storm and hopefully will have updates soon! I hope you had a grand Valentines Day!

These are a few of my favorite things...

2011-02-08T20:42:00.002-06:00

How could I resist the chance to post this historic meeting of two of my favorite things: Betty White and KoKo!!!

Without friends no one would choose to live, though he had all other goods

2011-02-07T15:58:00.000-06:00

This weekend, B and I drove up to the Arctic tundra known as Oxford, Mississippi to visit with friends. The farther north we got, the grayer and colder it got....good thing I picked up a Van Holten's Hot Mama pickle to keep myself cozy!

We've officially been gone long enough now that I felt like a visitor to Oxford instead of just a displaced resident. But of course, my friends treated me no differently, and I was so happy to see some of the people who made my ten years in Oxford so very excellent!

In addition to those folks and more, I saw some less welcome, though highly amusing people, places, and, well, mostly things!

I'm not sure who THESE belong to, but, really?

And, this girl was trying to kill this guy, why? Who cares?!?!?! This is the hands-down best photo of the weekend!

Oh, Oxford "fashion."...In addition to the usual mini skirt/ugg boot/diamond earring ensemble, the youth of Oxford have many overly priced boutiques where they can purchase expensive items made of flimsy fabrics...and they think it looks good. I'm calling this one "Little House on the Prairie Meets Foxy Brown while Trippin' on Shrooms at the Gay Bar."

Yesterday morning, we went to my favorite Oxford breakfast spot! Bottletree Bakery!
A Bowl of Soul, an Uptown (salmon cream cheese, tomatoes, onions, and capers on a sesame seed bagel), and a Ginger Scooooooooonnne (I really need to just start making these on a daily basis)!

And then, full of delicious foods and still slightly bleary-eyed from two crazy days of funness, we hit the road to head home. Home, sweet home. On the way back, I did make this gas station discovery, which would have made my friend, Pickle Freak, smile!

After work today, I needed a quick crafting fix, so I made up this pleated skirt made from a super fun circus print cotton! I'm calling it the "Greatest Show on Earth" skirt, and it's a tribute to Holly's (Betty Hutton) stupidly daring trapeze tricks in the classic film.

The skirt is soft and sweet like Holly, but one of these days I'll have to make something inspired by Gloria Grahame's slightly sluttier, grittier, elephant rider Angel (the true heroine of the film as far as I'm concerned)!

I have one more day dress and skirt to finish up this week, and then the next three weeks will be devoted to Mardi Gras crafts! Hoorah! I'd better get started, with guests coming in in only a few days, I've got a lot to do!

Pride is a powerful narcotic, but it doesn't do much for the auto-immune system

2011-02-01T11:40:00.001-06:00

11th Hour Dresses: A Lesson in Sticking to What You Know:

Many of my friends are familiar with my 11th hour dresses. I usually make them at the last minute before a party or some other event for which I suddenly cannot possibly imagine wearing anything in my wardrobe. I become obsessed with having something new to wear, and I can’t shop, so I make quickie dresses. They generally take me about 4 hours.

Important things to know about my 11th Hour dresses:

1. Usually, I make these dresses out of cheap materials I have on hand, and use familiar patterns. I made this one a while back out of a 99 cent curtain panel from Goodwill with a pattern I'd used many times:

2. Usually, these dresses lack finishing details, such as overcast seam edges or slip-stitched linings. If I decide I really like the dress, I’ll go back later and finish up the details. If not, it goes back in the WIP pile to be transformed in the future. This red one was a one-time-only wear, but the purple one above has seen its share of nights out:

3. I put very low expectations on these dresses. They are exciting adventures, but I never delude myself into thinking I’m making a masterpiece…

What happens usually is certainly not what happened Saturday.

For a week, I’ve been daydreaming about a fluffy pink 50’s style party dress to wear to the Pussyfooters’10th Annual Blush Ball. The Pussyfooters are a sassy bunch of ladies who a) dress in pink wigs, corsets, and tutus, b) perform sassy dance routines in parades and at roller derby events, and c) raise money for important local causes. So, what’s not to like??? And, this year’s blush ball was our first New Orleans “function” as residents, so Bryan and I were stoked!

I had nothing suitable for this imaginary dress in my stash, so a few days ago, I walked down to Promenade Fabrics. This store is full of crazy beautiful fabrics and trims, but most of them are out of my price range. So, after sadly bypassing some beautiful pink silks, plaids, seersuckers, and florals, I settled on some good quality, baby pink Italian cotton shirting. I decided it needed some punch, so I also purchased some black lace to overlay sections of the dress. I had already chosen my pattern from my collection at home: Vintage Vogue 1172:

Remember, as of 7:30 Saturday morning, in my mind, this dress was going to be the most perfect party dress ever (already in violation of 11th Hour Dress rule 3 above). I had my doubts about the lace, but, hey, I could just leave it off if I liked the pink by itself!

8:00 – I cut out the pattern and fabric. There isn’t enough lace for the whole dress, but I’m ok with that! I decide to fully line the bodice instead of using facings. I start to sew.

9:30 – Bodice constructed. I’m starting to have creeping doubts about the lace, as well as the fit of the bodice….but they just look off because it’s not far enough along yet….it’s still very beautiful in my head…

12:00 – Skirt constructed. I’m frustrated at my time management, but I’ve never used this pattern before, and the Ball doesn’t start til 9, so I have plenty of time… I pin the skirt and bodice on Stella….du-du-duuuuuuhhhhhhhh:

I flipped and rearranged it every way I could. There was no hope for this dress.

Can I tell you how much I hate this lace! And the dowdiness is such that Michael Kors would blow an artery! Ugh! I store-bought the supplies! I had too high hopes and NO backup plan!......So, being in that obsessive state where there seems no other way….I started another dress at 1:30.

This one had more promise from the start. I used a super soft, buttery yellow, thrifted duvet cover ($4), and a simpler pattern I’ve used before. I cranked through it, relishing the adrenaline that comes from deadline pressure. I thought the bodice seemed a little roomy when I tried it on, but figured with a zipper and a little extra in on the darts, it would be fine…

6:00 - I finished all but the hem, added a raspberry velvet ribbon belt and an ostrich feather….not my dream dress, but it will do!...

…or not….The dress is SO too big in the bodice it’s ridiculous! I’ve used this pattern before, and (though I have lost a little weight) it should not have been this big. In my haste, I must have made a major (and completely amateur) error somewhere…Sorry, Pride, you’ll be ok…

Lesson Learned. The 3 rules of 11th hour dresses must be followed at all times. SOOOOO, after 2 dresses and almost 12 hours of near-constant creative activity, I had no fabulous creation, and wore the sailor dress I made last week to the ball…

BUT it was still the most fabulous of times!

AND, I did have one creative victory last week: My first ever man’s button-up shirt! Here’s Bryan sporting his new sailing shirt!

I wish I'd asked him to wear it out to the Marina last Friday, when we performed the renaming ceremony on his boat. I knew that sailors were superstitious, but this was my first hands on encounter with this old nautical tradition, which involves the invocation of water and wind gods, the sacrifice of (cheap) champagne, and the consumption of said (cheap) champagne while carefully following a detailed procedure!

Thankfully, my creative rut seems to be at an end. Yesterday, I put together a green buffalo plaid dress (same Butterick pattern that I used and loved a couple of posts ago). It's comfortable, and (though I wish I'd taken more time to match the pattern) I'm very happy with it. I'm wearing it at work today, but my camera died. I'll put a photo up soon!

I'm hoping to be more frequent with my blogging, as I'm embarking on several weeks of crazy adventures! Travels, houseguests, school projects, and, of course, the impending crescendo of Mardi Gras season! Here's to more successful crafting for me and for all of you! Tonight, I may have to invoke the gods of creativity and stamina with a little (cheap) champagne!

Cheers!

To live a creative life, we must lose our fear of being wrong.

2011-01-24T09:00:00.017-06:00

Ok, finally! I think I'm ready to post one more epic catch-up blog! This is the third installment, and should catch you up on everything I've been sewing for the last two months. I'll try to present these chronologically:

Warning! This is going to be epic! Feel free to just scroll through and look at the pictures!

Thanksgiving Break I decided to get a head start on Christmas crafting, so I whipped out this (still unfinished) 1950s apron for a friend! Turns out, I made it too small, so I'm going to have to start from scratch on another. It also turns out that vintage apron patterns are as complicated/time consuming as dresses, so I'm going to have to find something a little more efficient.

Next, I made the dreadful mistake of making my New Years dress much too early, not accounting for the holiday pounds I was going to put on. The result is a very cute rust velvet dress that wouldn't come close to zipping on the designated day. It's from McCalls 5094, and was loosely inspired by the red velvet dress Judy Garland wore in "Meet Me In St Louis." I'm calling it the "Esther" after Judy's character.

I knew I had several fun parties coming up, so I spent the early days of December working on Xmas themed party clothes. This wool-blend houndstooth circle skirt in need of pressing was a personal design, based on the skirt (which you can't see in this picture) Vera Ellen wore opposite Danny Kaye in my favorite holiday movie ever, White Christmas!

I imagined my fancier Christmas party dress for weeks before I actually made it. Inspired by Rosemary Clooney's party dress in White Christmas, I searched for the right green velvet, and found the perfect pattern (Vintage Vogue 1084). It was all going so well....until I tried to construct the bodice....Clearly, I had chosen a pattern a little outside of my skill set, and, after sewing and ripping out seams three times, it became clear that this dress simply wasn't going to happen. I was crushed! But I'd spent too much on the store-bought fabric to simply trash it. So, I dug through my supplies and found a pattern that I could puzzle together with my already-cut-out pieces (Vogue 8615). The final result was not at all what I initially envisioned, but it worked, sort of. I don't know if I'll ever be completely happy with it.
However, while looking for stock photos of my inspiration pieces, I happened upon a blogger who shared my inspirations this year! Yay! here's some pics of the original inspiration dress, the back view, and me wearing the "Not so Betty" dress by the "fire" at a dinner party.

After New Year (for which I had to wear a sad thrifted dress, due to the above-mentioned Esther dress tragedy, I had another event to plan for: a friend's wedding! I was feeling bloated and terribly un-sexy after all my holiday eating, so I knew I wanted something flowy and forgiving. I chose Vogue 1102, and I'm pretty happy with it, though by the looks of these pics, I desperately need to shorten the hem dramatically! I was in a hurry, as I made the dress the day of the occasion, so I'll alter it soon. I'm calling it the "Holly" dress, because, though it in no way resembles the Breakfast at Tiffany's dress, that's what I watched while making it.

After all of that event-dress making, I was still finding myself doing battle with my closet every morning. I needed some dresses that I could easily wear to work and/or out for a casual Tuesday happy hour. So, I bought some cotton prints, and dug out some easy, comfortable looking patterns (Vintage Vogue 1171 - blue and Butterick 5315 - black) and got started. Unlike most of my creations, these don't have names yet because they were inspired by necessity, not by a childhood pop culture reference or old movie. I think they feel left out, though, so suggestions for names?

I've already worn this one twice, including out for a night with the girls for a bachelorette party! Here's me, rockin' the "Shopping Cart" dance....only one of the other ladies recognized it, but, as we were in a bar playing Jersey Shore on TV, I wasn't too surprised.

Whew! I think that catches you up! Sorry this was so huge! I guess I've had too much coffee! Mardi Gras season is upon us, so watch for costume updates in the next weeks! I'll try to keep up and keep further posts shorter!

Have a great Monday!

People are so worried about what they eat between Christmas and the New Year, they should be worried about what they eat between New Year and Christma

2011-01-18T13:00:00.014-06:00

So, here's the second installment of my trio of New Year 2011 blogs, and this one is all about food!

Within literally a few hours of submitting final grades in December, I was cooking up a storm in preparation for the Christmas party season! This year, I expanded my Christmas candy repertoire, making my usual Peanut Butter Divinity (I use an old family recipe, but this one is really similar),

and adding Peppermint Bark and Kentucky Bourbon Balls!

During my stay with family over the holiday, my mom gave me the greatest gift ever! A cookbook she found while cleaning out the attic! It's the 1939 edition of Household Magazine's "Household Searchlight" cookbooks. I'm in love!

In addition to many somewhat humorous finger food recipes, and pointers for the diligent hostess, this book is a compendium of clever and useful recipes! I decided to jump right in by planning my first New Year's Day Brunch!

So, after twisting the night away to the Soul Rebels at Les Bons Temps, I woke up early and got busy!

"Eggs on a Savory Bed": This is a baked egg casserole, and the recipe seemed a little bland, so I added some garlic, cajun spices, and (of course) cheese!

Sour Cream Tarts with Merengue: Really tasty treats! They are primarily flavored with nutmeg and cloves, so they taste very seasonal and happy!

Brown Sugar Bread: A quickbread that's TOO easy and very tasty. I froze half of it, and it held up fabulously!

I also made hashbrowns, black eyed peas with a lucky penny, cheese grits, Japanese soba noodles (a must for a lucky new year), and of course mimosas and bloody marys!

After I recovered from New Years celebratin', I took a bit of a break from fanciful cooking as I prepared for a new semester teaching at Loyola. But last weekend, a friend invited us to a fab dinner party and asked if I could contribute dessert! Could I?

First, I candied some orange peels. I used this recipe, and was very happy with the result though they did not turn out very pretty.

I also did a perfect chocolate mousse, which I, sadly, didn't get a picture of before it was completely devoured! But I was amused by this highly unnecessary bit of cheap marketing on the bag of chocolate chips I used:

Whew! I'm totally blogged out for now...and hungry! I'll be back soon with my Christmas adventures in sewing! What sort of things have you been cooking up lately?

For last year's words belong to last year's language and next year's words await another voice.

2011-01-01T15:53:00.024-06:00

Happy New Year, everyone!...

Yes, yes. I know it's a bit late, but 2011 started fast and hasn't slowed down yet. SO much has happened since the end of fall semester! To make up for lost time (and yet not bore you to tears with the most epic blog ever), I'm going to post 3 catch up blogs: one about my New Years "resolutions", one about my recent cooking endeavors, and one about my recent sewing projects!

For many years, I essentially scoffed at the whole tradition of making New Years resolutions. It seemed so counter-intuitive to me to make myself an unrealistic promise to improve my life; a promise which by design begins on a day when I'm destined to be horrifically hungover. However, I grew tired of having no particular liminal tradition associated with the passing of the years, so I began re-thinking my anti-resolution resolve.

Now, I choose to make a New Years "To Do List" instead of prohibiting myself from tasty foods, guilting myself into approximately 10 days of exercise, or denying myself experiences that, quite frankly, make my little life more enjoyable. My To Do list doesn't include any items that are realistically unattainable, in fact, many of them are quite small. They are simply things that I would like to see myself do over the next 12 months.

So, here goes!

2011: The Year of Exploration...and General Fun...

1. Explore Flexibility:

Stretch, mentally and physically, every day.

2. Explore Possibilities:

Discover a new place or experience in New Orleans at least once a month.

3. Explore Potential:

Continue only thrifting, refashioning, or making clothes and gifts. (This was the first dress I made after taking the Wardrobe Refashion pledge last January).

4. Explore Heritage:

Cook from vintage recipes, utilize snail mail more, and finish Omi's quilt

5. Explore Exciting-ness:

Become more interesting (Thanks, Bill!): I'm not sure how to go about this, but I'll try!

6. Explore Opportunities:

Sell something I made/Educate self more on selling my creations

My actual To Do list could be quite a bit longer; there are about a zillion other little things I want to do this year, and I keep writing them down. These are just the major trends on my agenda. That, and I didn't think I'd bore you with such gems as: Set the TV sleep timer if you're going to fall asleep to Law & Order reruns before 11pm, or Don't forget that whole "liquor before beer" thing next time...

So far, this "do this" technique has worked better for me than the usual "don't do that" method. If it works for you, I want to know your big plans for 2011!

Exit, pursued by a bear.

2010-11-17T13:00:00.009-06:00

I've only got a few minutes before my next class, but I've been swearing to myself that I would blog more often, so, here goes!

I've had a sinister, nagging feeling all week that's left me mildly cranky most of the time. I've felt at odds with the world, and am realizing today that I've wasted half of the week feeling sorry for myself. I still have whining I could do, but instead I'm going to remind myself that there is no bear (metaphorical or otherwise) nipping at my heels...

I've started a few new sewing projects (I'll post pics when I'm done), and I've been cooking up a storm! There is not much more comforting than preparing (and, of course, eating) delicious seasonal foods when the weather starts changing.

Three Bean Chili

Coconut Jalapeno Cornbread Muffins

Crab and Cream Cheese Stuffed Jalapenos

Lemon Cream Cheese Cake

Hmmmm, it does seem I was really into jalapenos and cream cheese this week, doesn't it!

Last weekend, B and I attended the annual Tulane Graduate Student Gala at Generations Hall in the Warehouse District. It was out of control, and besides the fact that they played some of the most atrocious music I've ever heard (lots of Miley Cyrus and horrific Journey and Bon Jovi remixes), there was a good time had by all!

Generations Hall

A few of the revelers

So, if you've had a cranky/sad/boring/aggravating week, just remember: Like I always say: At least you're not being mauled by a bear.

Enjoy your Wednesday, 17 November 2010, there won't ever be another one!

A lot of people like snow. I find it to be an unnecessary freezing of water.

2010-11-05T11:16:00.008-05:00

Whatever my mother told you about a childhood Just Jess running around in the snow in nothing but panties, chanting "I-like-the-cold-I-like-the-cold-I-like-the-cold"....wait, she didn't tell you? Well, winter is NOT for me. Give me steamy, sweaty, breeze-less summer days!

Last night was the first time this year I had to crawl out of my blanket cocoon to turn on the furnace. This morning was the first time my poor little bare feet had to brave the chilly floor (*note to self: find slippers*). Today was the first time I had to don not only a jacket, but a long sleeve blouse, to go to work. It is the first day I've had to feel that miserable ear ache that comes from walking in a cold wind.

I don't mind all of this, but I'm not exactly thrilled about it either. Fortunately, I live in a city with a relatively merciful winter season. And another bout of warmer temperatures is predicted for next week. But tonight will be the first night I'll have to lug around a coat at happy hour, and spend half my time peeling off/putting on layers of clothing. Ugh. When I'm out on a Friday night, the only things I want in my hands are a)a cocktail b)my cute little e-cigarette or c)my camera.

On the bright side, last weekend, the weather was magnificent! Halloween the high was 82 and the low was 65! And I was super happy with how our costumes turned out! (all from scratch except for my t-shirt and Bryan's shoes!)

All weekend I hung out with some of the coolest people you could know, and met some new folks in the process!

Though my epic Halloween weekend ended kind of badly (cab driver pulled over and threatened by cops, me = hit in the face by random Halloween reveler - LONG story), overall a good time was had by all! The only thing that could have made it better (besides possibly not being sucker-punched)was if my old Halloween-loving Oxford peeps had been here. I miss you all, so much!

I hope your Halloween was creepy and full of sweet treats! Now, onto surviving this chilly weekend! Have a great one and be safe!

Something Wicked This Way Comes

2010-10-20T11:07:00.006-05:00

Since I cannot hope or promise to do much blogging over the next two weeks, I'll take this rare moment of free time (which actually coincides with internet access) to compose a little blog about the most wonderful time of the year....October!

Everyone who knows me at all knows that, if I could have it my way, I'd wear Halloween costumes every day and always drink cider, eat cinnamon-y foods, and, of course, watch gore- and ghoul-filled films. I can't believe my favorite month is already half over! My obsession with the carefree masquerade attitude that characterizes this time of year began at a young age, as evidenced in this photo, of my "I Dream of Jeanie" inspired Christmas attire:

I feel dreadfully behind on my October mischief-making, but I've managed to celebrate the most glorious month of the year in some little ways:

I've purchased all my fabrics and materials for mine and Bryan's costumes (ssshhhh! Still a secret!)But here's a hint about mine:

I'm making Cauldron Cupcakes with my students. Here's the link to a fun tutorial

I've watched many, many horror movies (but what else is new). One I recently revisited was Halloween 6: The Curse of Michael Myers. Now I remember why I don't make this an annual tradition. It was lame, y'all, even with Donald Pleasance's much-anticipated revival of his Dr. Loomis persona. The supporting cast was pathetic, and since it was released in 1989, I was on peg-legged pants and hair scrunchy overload. It cannot hold a candle to the seriously underrated classic, Halloween 3: Season of the Witch. For that installment, the producers took an almost franchise-destroying strategy - eliminate Michael Myers all together and replace him with a villainous conspiracy plot and tag on a completely unrelated title. However, for hardcore fans like myself, this film is magic, particularly the annoyingly catchy commercial featured in the film. (PS - don't watch this clip if you are epileptic):

Tonight, after America's Next Top Model (Tyra Banks is kind of a Halloween freak show in her own right), I'll pull out a more appropriate Halloween classic, possibly Killer Klownz from Outer Space or maybe my all time favorite, Poltergeist. Speaking of, remember my killer Carol Ann costume from a couple of years ago?

Clearly, my construction skills have improved over the years. Last year's Marie Antoinette was my best effort yet. I'm not sure if I can beat it, honestly, but I'm going to give it the old college try!

I hope your holiday season is magical and spooky! If you don't hear from me before then, HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!

Our doubts are traitors, And make us lose the good we oft might win By fearing to attempt

2010-09-16T10:00:00.009-05:00

Just a quick post before I run home to do a little cleaning and a lot of sewing! I'm settling well into my new schedule and I'm finding a lot of inspiration and time for being creative, which was one of my main goals in moving to New Orleans! I do find myself falling into a blueish mood at times, but it's getting much better! Had two weekends in a row full of fabulous visitors and fun, so I'm glad for a low key time this weekend. I'm feeling crafty, ambitious, and optimistic!

Labor Day brought long-lost friends as well as Southern Decadence! Southern Decadence is basically Gay Mardi Gras...clearly I was on a mission. I had too much fun collecting beads at the Friday night parade (I got alot! I was the only hag on the block!) and heckling the protesters! Saturday I watched a live reading from the Proposition 8 hearings and cheered for every fab drag costume I saw before meeting up with old friends for some good convo and beer!

I can't really show pics from our Oxford Invasion weekend, as my friends might sue me. But let me just say, it was OFF DA HOOK!!! I can't believe what a good time we had!

And here's a quick peek at my newest creations.

I don't know what to call this one, but I liked the way it turned out. It's refashioned from some curtains. I was proud of my drafting on it, except for a wonky hem due to a stupid cutting error!!!! That stunning gal in the pic with me is one of the most fabulous people you'll ever meet! I'm so glad she could visit and accompany us to Saturday's Fleur de Tease burlesque version of the Wizard of Oz!

This a from-scratch, not a refashion, but I really haven't had the cash or energy to explore my thrifting opportunities yet. I'm calling this one the Caddie Woodlawn (this fabric was originally destined to be more Laura Ingalls inspired, but then I felt like pleating for some reason). I'm pretty much thrilled with it!

What you can't see is the A-line skirt, which is super flattering, but, unfortch, not amenable to the application of pockets. *shakes fist at the sky* The bodice is based on ElaineMay's "Coffee Date Dress" that I downloaded a while back on Burdastyle.

Last night I dove into my stash again to find this nautical print cotton sateen, and decided to do a little Grace-Kelly-on-a-yacht high-waisted, soft-pleated skirt. The pic is terrible, since my camera's dead and I'm using my webcam at work, but you get the idea.

And, of course, this one has pockets!

Now I'm off to do some cleaning and (hopefully) creating! I hope your weekend is smashing!!!

The first step to getting the things you want out of life is this: Decide what you want

2010-08-25T15:12:00.003-05:00

It's been an eventful week, to say the least! If the last three days were a lesson in a book, they would be called "Making Choices on the Fly." In a seemingly short period of time, my little mind has spun out of orbit, my stomach's been in knots, and I've barely slept; I've been a serious mess! I've felt, in general, ill-equipped to make decisions, whether they be routine or hugely important. In the end, I've had to be honest with myself about what I really want out of my new life. Bryan and I spent a lot of time before we moved talking about how we wanted/didn't want our lives to change, but in my efforts to find a way to make a living and become some super version of myself, I think I forgot those goals. So, I'm composing a list:

1. I want to live like an urban explorer. I want to walk, bike, and ride public transit as often as is humanly possible and enjoy the time and space I'm traveling through at all times.

2. I want to do work that is meaningful to me and that inspires me to be creative.

3. I want to explore all creative avenues available to me. Music, books, lessons, fabric, paint, language, photos, found objects, plants, animals, ideas, experiences, you name it!

4. I want to take lots of time to spend with my husband; traveling, talking, planning, playing scrabble, and everything else that makes him pretty much the most awesome person ever!

5. I want to spend more time with my friends. I want to cook and entertain more, and I want to surround myself with amazing people and spend more time having great conversations.

6. I want to be responsible with my lifestyle, but I do not want money to be the determining factor in what I choose to do.I strive to become a clever thrifter!

7. I don't want to constantly be in fear of, or stressed about, the outcome of things. There's never an excuse to not have a good time.

...I also want a 1972 El Camino in brown or blue with vinyl upholstery....a girl has to have at least one impossible dream!

She refused to be bored chiefly because she wasn't boring.

2010-08-22T13:38:00.008-05:00

What an exciting weekend! After a lot of exploration, I now feel like I LIVE here! Counting down the fabulous events of the last few days:

1. I set up my sewing machine!!!!! I don't have pictures right now, but I've done several refashions and made one dress from scratch (though I don't really love it). It's so comforting and refreshing to return to my favorite creative hobby!

2. We went to a midnight movie, something I haven't been able to do since we left Kentucky a decade ago! We saw "Human Centipede," and I frankly don't understand why it is becoming a cult classic. It was gross, as anticipated, but otherwise a pretty weak movie. However, I thoroughly enjoyed going to some new-to-us neighborhood bars before the movie and the peaceful walk home at 3am.

3. I bought a bicycle!!!!! Her name is Sally, and Bryan's bike totally has a crush on this green piece of cuteness!Oh, and the skirt I'm wearing in the pic is a refashion from an old cute-but-ill-fitting dress.

4. After buying Sally, we went to the Creole Creamery for some ice cream decadence! They have all sorts of ingenious and unexpected flavors. This is me enjoying the Mascarpone and Lemon Zest flavor! Bryan had two scoops: Oatmeal Cookie and Bosque Pear with Balsamic Caramel!

5. After a much needed nap, we drove out to the marina to watch the sunset! It was beautiful! The skirt in the second pic is also one of my weekend refashions.

6. And after THAT, we walked down to Magazine for a couple of beers while we watched the Saints game. I'm trying my best to become a football fan, but I admit to being a bad student on this front. When we left Ms. Mae's after the game, we stopped in a local gallery opening where we sipped free wine and met some cool artists! It felt awesome to say that we were "from the neighborhood"!

7. Today we rode our bikes to La Boulangerie (MY FAVORITE!!!!) for French pastry and coffee and then continued on to Audubon Park for a leisurely ride! We stopped for a New Orleans style snoball! With the 110 heat index, it was a necessary pitstop!

Aah, now we're home to relax for a bit! I know that not every weekend here will be as exciting as this weekend, but I'm so grateful for a few days of truly getting familiar with my new stomping grounds! I hope your weekend was wonderful too!!!

To travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive.

2010-08-16T09:30:00.004-05:00

Well, my projected summer of sewing and blogging evolved into hectic weeks of excited planning and frantic packing/unpacking.We're now pretty well settled into our cute New Orleans home. Despite a few bouts of homesickness (or, more appropriately, friendsickness), I am feeling optimistic about my future here. I have a part time teaching job lined up, and have opted to wait a couple of weeks before pursuing a second job. I think I need more time to explore and acclimate myself to the city. The cats, however, have already acclimated completely!

I can't access any of my sewing materials currently, as they are meticulously packed, Tetris-style, in a closet. Realizing how difficult it will be for me to craft in our new place has been truly difficult. I'm in a city where I want to make and wear cute dresses, but it has been approximately 7 weeks since I've sewn a single stitch.

Though our housewarming party was a fabulous time, and I was wicked excited to meet all my new neighbors, I have to admit to catching myself depressed that I can't call one of my Oxford besties to immediately meet me at the City Grocery or in my modest little carport for a cheap beer and chat. Can it be that I've lost my skill for meeting people?

On the upside, Bryan is ecstatic because he's putting the sailboat in the marina today! I admit, when compared to the relatively predictable and calm waters of Sardis, Pontchartrain makes me a bit nervous, but I'm so glad the boat will be easily accessible for daysailing.

We've also dived right in to our neighborhood! The local movie theater shows classics during the day! Last week, Bryan and I saw Casablanca on the big screen! AND they show cult movies at midnight on weekends! Human Centipede is showing this weekend, do I dare? We've explored local bars and restaurants, been to the zoo, compared several shopping options, decorated our little porch with flowers and lights, and pretended to be "real" locals when with tourists on the streetcar!

Dirty Linens Night was this weekend, so we wandered the Quarter, appreciating great art...and free drinks! While there, I saw my first in-person Mardi Gras Indian!

I'm fascinated by, and admittedly under-educated about, this unique tradition. I'm determined to learn more!

We still don't have internet at home, which has actually turned into a great impetus to get me out of the house in the mornings. So, I hang out at the bookstore on St. Charles Ave and drink entirely too much coffee. It's nice. Now I just need a bicycle!

Nothing is as far away as one minute ago.

2010-06-23T19:52:00.005-05:00

WHAT A SUMMER! I am so grateful for all the opportunities I've been given this summer, but GEEZ! I'm so busy! Here's a quick recap of my June:

It's hot.

I introduced my students to the grand Southern tradition: Moon Pie. *Actually, there have been a lot of amazing moments with my students, but I don't want to post their pics on the interwebs*

My B's been out of town a lot :(

Also:

I have sewed zilch!

I got sick *plus side - by the time I finish my antibiotics, it should be WAY cheaper to get me drunk!*

I have had time to pack almost nothing!

AND:

It's actually been kind of awesome! Though I'm clearly stressed, I'm choosing to view this summer as an uber-compact Oxford experience...my last for a while...

Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not one bit simpler.

2010-05-19T08:52:00.007-05:00

Simplifying my life has proven a seriously complex endeavor! But the last two weeks since graduation have been eventful and promising!

Having survived the fun of graduation weekend, I embarked on the epic moving process. Though we aren't technically "moving" for 8 weeks, I am determined to get a massive head start in the organization department, especially since our move involves a huge downsizing effort. We had to sign a May lease, so, technically, we already live in New Orleans. Last weekend, we took advantage and drove down to check out our new neighborhood! We're in LOVE with our new place and the location is to. die. for. B is way excited to start classes in the fall, so now I just need a job!

We were wicked fired up to eat seafood while we still can. Along with other fabulous new NO residents, we walked down to Magazine and were sad to see that Casamento's posted hours ended 15 minutes before we arrived. We resigned ourselves to finding somewhere else (not like that's a problem on Magazine), but a local informed us that they would be open an extra hour for their last day of the season!

It was a fab weekend, and I can't wait to go back next week!

Also, last week we had a send-off shindig for this shrinker

who is spending a glamorous summer in Ecuador! It's the flouncy, flouncy. We drank margaritas and sang karaoke! It was so very! Summer in Oxford will just not be the same without that slut!

This weekend will be my and B's "eleventy-onesies" anniversary! That's together 11/married 1 years! Here we are last May, alone (minus our random tourist photog)on the beach in Costa Rica, reading our vows to the accompaniment of a punk version of REO Speedwagon's "I'm Gonna Keep on Lovin' You." Perfection!

We'll be celebrating with a fancy dinner and by purchasing a fab guest bed for our new place so we'll be all set up to host all you beautiful people!

I've done zero sewing this week, but I'm organizing a group of crafty ladies to meet weekly this summer so I will always have a bit of time to create!

I hope your summer is welcoming you! We've all had one hell of a spring! Here's to a season devoid of disaster, full of friends, fun, and sunny inspiration!

The great aim of education is not knowledge but action.

2010-05-10T13:45:00.009-05:00

The Epic Semester of Doom known as Spring 2010 has officially ended with the submission of grades this afternoon. I am done taking classes; please don't ask me what my next degree will be in - I've sworn off school indefinitely! Now I can settle into my planning for summer classes and feel relieved that all of my energy can be devoted to teaching and to the ever constant organizing and packing of our house.

My dad drove down for my graduation weekend, which was a great respite after a very hectic week! I did not attend commencement (there's been enough wearing of black polyester in the Mississippi humidity for me, thank you), but we had a grand time going out, cooking out and enjoying the company of good friends.

Now that I've had a bit of time to be creative (and now that I got a new camera for graduation! Thundercats, Ho!!!), I can share my latest graduation endeavors:

For Friday night, the Graduation Dress Challenge! I had three hours waiting for my dad to arrive and decided to tackle a wearable muslin. In the end, it took three hours and 20 minutes. And I don't think it turned out half bad, considering how quickly it was constructed, and the fact that it originated as a 99 cent curtain panel from Salvation Army:

For Graduation Day, the Graduation-Superhero-Retro-A-Go-Go-Party-Girl Dress! I worked on this one bit by bit in my spare moments during finals week! It began its life as one of my childhood bedsheets!

And, during the last crazy weeks of the semester, nothing can make you feel more girly and giggly than coming home to this brood:

If you can imagine it, you can achieve it; if you can dream it, you can become it.

2010-05-06T15:39:00.003-05:00

8 years.

That is how long I've been a student.

As of 3:00 pm, Thursday, 6 May 2010, that era has ended.

Feel free to call me Master-Master Jess now.

Any sewers out there know how to do this?

2010-04-22T12:36:00.003-05:00

I keep forgetting and then remembering how anxious I am to try this stitch that Shirin used for waistband of her dress for the Maternity challenge in Season 6 of Project Runway. I thought I remembered her calling it a "lattice" stitch, but can't find anything searching for that (outside of embroidery and crochet, of course). Any ideas?

The camera doesn't make a bit of difference. All of them can record what you are seeing. But, you have to SEE.

2010-04-21T13:17:00.002-05:00

I hadn't really thought about how much I rely on my camera to capture feelings and memories until after I'd lost it. When I was younger (before the digital revolution), photography was still a hobby, but a more expensive one, and therefore reserved for vacations and events. Then, I "saw" things and retreated to my journals.

I don't know when photos replaced words as my life-markers, but, in the absence of Happy Pink Camera, I will attempt to return to words to describe my experiences over the last few weeks, taking a cue from a friend who loves music that "sounds like air-conditioning smells":

What I've SEEN:

Affliction. Sadness and relief combined in the days leading up to and after my grandmother's death. It is the blurry wrinkled edge of an old photo. Its color is butter.

Ability. On my students' faces, confusion at times, but also smiles of a "Eureka!" nature. It is moments when completion sneaks up on you. Its color is pomegranate.

Awakening. Green trees and sprouting shoots, snows of pollen, and wispy clouds. Its color is sunrise and mangoes.

Achievement. As I slowly sift through mountains of possessions once thought priceless, I find more and more that *this cherished _____* morphs into *thing that keeps me from doing _____* It is the hiccups that keep you trying more and more ridiculous cures until they magically vanish. Its color is lime peels.

Artistry. Though I haven't had much creative time the last couple of weeks, when I have found time, I have pushed myself to try new things. It is a twitch behind your eye at the most perfect and inconvenient time. It's color is magnetic.

Anticipation! This already amazing year still has so much in store for me! It is melty ice cream in the sun and the sound of a loved voice. Its color is caribbean.

A new home!....But no pictures...

2010-04-11T22:48:00.003-05:00

This weekend, B and I drove down to our future hometown of New Orleans to look for an apartment. We have some wonderful friends who generously offered to let us stay for free!...Very generous indeed, since the first night I sleep-walked and pulled a bookshelf off the wall!...don't ask, I have no idea...

Friday afternoon I had an informal meeting with the coordinator of an exciting IEP program! It wasn't an actual job interview, folks, so don't get your panties bunched up! But it was a truly enjoyable time, and got me itching to work on some cool ideas for my summer classes!....ah, but I must get through the rest of this semester first....

Saturday morning we set off to look at rentals in three different neighborhoods. We'd decided a while back that location was our highest priority, and that we'd just have to compromise on size and storage space in exchange for a great neighborhood. The first place we looked at was in the most TO DIE FOR location....unfortunately, there was NO way we could compromise enough to live in it's teeny-tiny rooms. We sighed and set off for our next appointment...

The second place was amazingly huge, had independent bedrooms, had been completely remodeled, and, aside from having carpet, it was fabulous!....and on a very undesirable street a great distance from the places we want to be.....Sighing again, we began to consider the possibility that we might have to keep drive back and forth from Oxford to the Big Easy many times in this already insane spring before finding a home....

Then we arrived at the third destination. Now, let me tell you, this place has some small drawbacks: it's a non-closed-off shotgun - which means you have to walk through the bedroom to get to the kitchen; it's certainly not tiny, but certainly not ready to handle all of our stuff; and it's a bottom unit in a 4-plex (hope we have cool neighbors!)

However, it is two blocks from the streetcar, 1 mile from campus, two blocks from parade route, and in a very safe neighborhood full of beautiful homes, tree-lined streets, a local theater, shops, restaurants, and history: the Garden District!!!

I took many, many pictures of the house, all the rooms (with plenty of angles, so I could plan furniture arrangements), the block, the neighborhood....and then lost my camera Saturday night.

So that's my weekend, folks! I hope yours was swell! This week I begin the epic process of cleaning, organizing, and downsizing possessions! Let me know if you need anything, you never know - I might have it!

We are made to persist. That's how we find out who we are.

2010-04-05T22:00:00.008-05:00

There have been no less than five moments today when I honestly felt like I couldn't continue. It seems I have either nothing or fifty things to do at any given moment. The realization that got me through today was that I didn't HAVE to continue, but I wanted to. As of this moment, 10pm, I have successfully (well, somewhat) maneuvered yet another hectic day...and I still love my job, my life, and all the people in it!

This weekend I had a whirlwind trip home to Kentucky to visit the fam! I had a brilliant night of hanging out with the Hardy clan on the back porch around a fire pit on a beautiful evening - what could be better! I visited with my grandmother in the hospital, and I'm ecstatic to report that she's doing remarkably better and will be moved out of the ICU into a regular room soon - what could be better! Saturday night a fab girlfriend and I went to my favorite Lexington drag show at Pulse - what could be better?!?!? This pic was intentionally blurry, but also adequately captures my condition toward the end of the evening...

After feeling stressed all day, I also thought I'd share some of the things I have to look forward to after a few days of chaos:

I have a meeting on Friday in New Orleans! We're *hopefully* going to find a house on Saturday! AND I have a fabulous new stash (thrifted as well as gifted from my fab hoarder mom) to explore soon! Check out these patterns I got for 29 cents each at a thrift shop in KY!!!! The 60's dress is my most fave!

And this gigantic ziplock bag? FULL of fabrics and fab childhood bedsheets!

And some gorgeous non-thrifted (but on sale) fabrics for spring dresses!

One of these days I'll have enough free time to use these things, but for now, it's exciting just to contemplate them. Enjoy your night, folks! And, when all else fails, just remember: as bad (busy, ugly, stressful) as life gets, at least you're not being mauled by a bear!

The very first law in advertising is to avoid the concrete promise and cultivate the delightfully vague.

2010-03-31T23:25:00.011-05:00

I've been trying to get around to blogging for days, but have, once again, been having technical issues. Not to mention, I'm still busy as a moth in a mitten, even after surviving comprehensive exams last week! But I have several things to be excited (and somewhat vague) about!

I'm excited that it's spring!!!!

After several weeks of feeling like my responsibilities were trying to draw and quarter me, this week I'm excited about teaching again! In both my writing classes, we're discussing advertising, and ways to use words to "sell" your ideas. We're working on a big group project that everyone already seems excited about (*crossing fingers*)!

I'm also excited about the ever so slight possibility that I may be much closer to having a job lined up for the fall! I'm afraid to talk about that too much right now, so I'll just give you this image...

And I'm also excited that this week I've found the time to return to my creative endeavors....with a vengeance! I'll leave you with some images and hopefully be back soon!

New York City is itself a detective story...

2010-03-22T17:42:00.011-05:00

For spring break this year, Sweet Pickles and I chaperoned a group of 10 adults and 2 children on a cultural excursion to New York City. We were in luck with the surprisingly spring-like weather and the fortunate location of our hotel in proximity to plenty of bars, restaurants, and shops. We met with some frustrations along the way (most concerning time management *insert image of JustJess twitching here*), but also had some truly wonderful experiences. Here is a seriously abridged account of our trip presented in images of things I love about New York:

One of the things I always love about cities is all the little details, like this elevator control panel in our hotel
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I also love art museums! Here is the Solomon R. Guggenheim!

I love how big cities revel in their history and culture, and it is evidenced on every street corner, from Central Park to Chinatown:

It wouldn't be a true JustJess big city adventure without great food and a visit to a gay bar (at least one of which I don't have access to in Oxford). Appetizers from The Hummus Place and Candle Bar:

And, of course, shopping!

This trip was a whirlwind, and I'm glad to be home! I hope you all enjoyed your spring break!

For a list of all the ways technology has failed to improve the quality of life, please press three.

2010-03-22T10:14:00.003-05:00

My plan for today was to blog about my spring break adventures in New York and post some pretty pictures. Upon returning to my office this morning after an amazingly hectic week "off," I was devastated to encounter my empty desk and remember that my work computer was taken away by the secret agents of the IT department before spring break. To top things off, for whatever reason, my laptop cannot see the OleMiss wireless network. My only means of logging on to the interwebs is via a coworker's computer. Of course, none of my pretty pics are accessible here, so my fabulous photo-bedazzled blog will have to wait til I get home tonight.

Overall, my life has been stressful of late. Many things, good and bad, have stretched my sanity to incredible reaches. I'll detail the New York trip in my next post. There has been no crafting for over a week!!! Yipes! Hopefully more creative things soon! My grandmother is still in the ICU, but stable. Our dreams of owning a house in New Orleans were dashed....for now at least, but we are still feeling optimistic about the future! Though my brain feels a little like Shibuya Crossing at rush hour right now, all will be well soon...

The weather today is frightful! What a horrible, grey re-introduction to the work week! Feeling a little under the weather, but hoping some tomato soup will cure that right up!

This week will continue to be a strain on my mind and emotions, but if I can get through comprehensive exams at the end of the week, everything else should be downhill.....*crossing fingers*

Until later, enjoy today! I hope the weather is better wherever you are!

The best way to predict the future is to invent it...

2010-03-14T20:58:00.006-05:00

I don't know where to begin! I fear these last couple of weeks are only ripples in the ridiculous flood that is this spring. What season of change we are embarking on! This year promises a roller coaster of both stressful and exciting events and opportunities.

Since I last blogged, it has become spring in Mississippi! Sweet Pickles and I celebrated with some beery marys in the carport...

Also since I last blog, the destination of our big move became official! We are moving to New Orleans! B accepted a very generous offer to join the Anthropology department at Tulane to work toward his PhD! Here's a pic from when we visited for the Krewe de Vieux in February...I don't want to upload a picture of the house we're looking at for fear of jinxing the deal! This particular momentous change is going to be a major source of stress for several weeks to come, so please forgive if I get a little snappy at times!

There has also been a lot of stress over the recent weeks. My grandmother is still in the ICU and, while she's doing better now, our family still has a long road ahead of us. I flew up for an impromptu visit. I took a self-portrait of a dress I recently designed/made while I waited at the airport...

And yet another bit of excitement! It's almost time for the shrinker and I to take of for the Big Apple with students! Expect moments like this to be documented later...

I know, I know! It's all too much! Wish me luck this year! I will most definitely need it!

Take rest; a field that has rested gives a bountiful crop

2010-03-06T08:45:00.006-06:00

The last two weeks have been a maelstrom around here! My grandmother has been terribly ill, and is still in the ICU, but is doing a bit better today. It is BEAUTIFUL outside, and my plans are to do a bit of cleaning, a bit of crafting, and a LOT of well-earned relaxing!

Sweet Pickles and I have been manically preparing for our spring break trip to NYC! We're accompanying 10 students on a cultural excursion which should prove to be very exciting! Finally! All the arrangements are in place,and we can relax...and watch Party Girl for inspiration...

B and I are driving ourselves crazy trying to work out our fall plans to move - this is one aspect of my life which will remain a little stressful for a while, but it's worth it! I've been crazy hectic at work the last two weeks, but am finally getting into my groove! I've even made time to do some crafting this week...a freestyle amigurumi project which turned into a pig-like creature:

And my new obsession - Portable Pockets: the money hiding version. These are for Sweet Pickles and myself for our NY trip. The pouches loop onto your belt and are low-profile enough to tuck into your pants to keep your moolah safe! I'm thinking about trying to perfect the pattern today so that I can make them for all my friends who travel a lot!

That's it for now! Go enjoy this fabulous day!

Change is the constant, the signal for rebirth, the egg of the phoenix

2010-02-21T12:19:00.005-06:00

I know this post is a little premature (as we're expecting another cold front next week), but I just can't help it - today it feels like spring!!

Every year there is a quick moment in which I remember how much I love driving around with the windows down, music blaring. It conjures happy memories, not of specific occasions, but of familiar feelings: content, bubbly childlike joy, and mischievous adolescent glee. Of course, I was driving to rescue B, whose car battery was dead across town, but I didn't care, it was fab!

Here's the first moment of what we'll call pre-spring here at our casa:

Changing seasons are always times for other sorts of change! In addition to my re-fashion challenge and my goal of continually cleaning, organizing, and packing my house in prep for the upcoming move, here are a couple of other things that the seasons will change:

It's almost officially time to let Tori out of the box. Spring is for redheads! I'm going to stick with the green for 2-3 more weeks so as to not jinx the seasons, but look out for glam photos soon!

Time to switch drinks! The time of bourbon and dark beer is past (as any of you who suffered my incessant chatter on Friday night will appreciate)! Bring on light summer cocktails! Look for my famous iced teas and lemonades at parties soon!

Time to clean out the carport! Now that it won't be utter misery to step outdoors, I have to prep our fave party space for springtime fun!

Time to get back to the gym! With fab travel opportunities upcoming and the prospects of short skirts and sundresses looming, it's time to zumba away those holiday pounds!

Alright, I've been inside too long while writing this! Going outside to play!

Weekend project: Striped Pajamas

2010-02-21T09:13:00.005-06:00

I started working on Colette's free mini bloomers pattern Thursday during Runway. My material is a thrifted yellow and white striped bed sheet (99 cents!!)Decided to finish the shorts last night, and they are SUPER cute, but SUPER skimpy...

...So I made a fun babydoll top based on a design of my own to go with. All together I am really pleased with my new pajamas!

Hmmmm, what next???

My Crafty Week!...and some fun pics!

2010-02-19T10:04:00.006-06:00

Whew! This week has been a whirlwind! But somehow I've managed to get caught up on work, tidy the house a bit, and do just enough thrifting to keep me crafting this weekend!

B and I had fabulous news this week! Nothing official yet on our moving destination, but we're getting MUCH closer! Decision to hopefully be revealed soon!

I babysat for a friend this week (two boys, 3 and 10), and learned several things about how non-child-proofed my life is!

a) I cleaned like crazy, picking up every cat toy and fuzzball that I thought might cause problems for my 3 year old charge....but somehow didn't notice the GIANT bowl of candy on my coffee table. Let's just say, the little guy noticed.
b) I gathered together all sorts of craft supplies to occupy the boys, but the most popular item by far was a 79 cent bag of balloons...

c) FYI - Windex gets bloodstains out of children's t-shirts really well!
d) FYI - I don't own a single dish appropriate for feeding children.
e) FYI - I don't own many DVDs appropriate for family viewing (go figure)...we ended up watching my favorite classic "Swiss Family Robinson"

Last night one of my besties and I watched Project Runway!...and also some of that Olympics thing...I wanted to show B one of the male skater's ridiculous costume, so I took a photo of the screen. Never done that before, and it doesn't show the costume well, but I thought it turned out cool...

Oh, and one more thing! Here are the objects of this weekend's re-fashioning! I can't wait to take some scissors to these thrifted beauties!!!

After shots coming soon!

Bad Shoe Day

2010-02-15T10:37:00.005-06:00

Once again, I've been betrayed by my shoe-a-day calendar. Already miffed at the epically clinging-on winter weather, and feeling uninspired, this is what I was greeted by this morning:

Nothing about this shoe, in and of itself, really bothers me that much. It's clearly not my style, but I can appreciate it. However, it's cheerful summery colorfulness on a day that actually looks like this:

...is just downright irritating.

I know I should't complain. I have many, many friends enduring much worse and much more epic winter weather. But y'all, I live in the south for a REASON!

A weekend to blog home about!

2010-02-14T21:47:00.004-06:00

Wow! This weekend has been a whirlwind of exciting times! For week's I've been anticipating "A Night at the Boom Boom Room;" a local BURLESQUE and FIRE show!!! It was amazing!!!! I only wish we had more fabulousness like this in Oxford regularly! After the show we went to the Jucifer show at Larry's. This was possibly the loudest show I've ever seen, but with ear plugs (I'm no longer 18, y'all) it was a decent time.

Unfortch, because I had SUCH a good time at the Boom Boom Room and subsequent Scandinavian Death Metal extravaganza, I was pretty much out of commission all day Saturday. So that night, B and I rented a soon-to-be classic: Saw VI, and got us a hot-n-ready Little Caesar's cheese pizza!

This morning, I felt refreshed and crafty again! Hoorah! I made my first ever amigurumi, which looks absolutely nothing like the picture on the pattern, but I'm still proud of my attempt. Then I got really ambitious...

Baking is something that I've always been very wary of. There is too much chemistry involved, and therefore WAY too many opportunities for me to create catastrophe...but I decided to go for it today!

I made FROM SCRATCH Iced Spiced Pumpkin cookies (recipe from allrecipes.com)...and they are TERRIFF!!!

I packed up some cookies and got dolled up. B and I had a fab V-Day dinner at Taylor Groc! Then we dashed to a friend's house to watch Big Love (LOVE slutty mormons!)Now, home-again-home-again and crossing fingers that we get some winter weather so I don't have to go to work tomorrow!

Oh, and I made this hat during polygamist drama...I call it the "Mrs Olsen."

As I sit at work, daydreaming about craft time!

2010-02-12T16:40:00.002-06:00

I've been in a winter funk. As my shrinker friend, Sweet Pickles, would put it - this weather has given me a major case of the SADS. I'm proving myself a lazy slob by not fulfilling my self-promise of returning to my pre-holiday workout regime, and all of our work and travels to plan for B's return to school has me tired and stressed (albeit pretty excited too!).

I've been inspired by the creative people around me and am just itching to do some major crafting! As you know, I'm relatively OCD about these things, and will disappear for days on end, ignoring everything in my life that is not craft-oriented. I'm trying to think of a way to keep my life productive and creative at the same time. So, I'm going to try to dangle a carrot before my face...so to speak...

I really want to buy myself a new dress form (tried to upload fab picture here, but couldn't get it to work). But my house looks like an episode of Hoarders as it is, so I've decided that I can buy myself the form if I manage to get the spare room cleaned up enough that there is a place to put it. Granted, the spare room currently functions as the cat room, the craft room, the shoe show, my closet, makeup station, office, and general hidey-hole for stashing things when company comes. This could take a while. Wish me luck!

Feeling crafty...

2010-02-11T12:49:00.003-06:00

Maybe it's because it's Thursday (Project Runway night!)...maybe it's because I'm procrastinating at work (shocking, I know)....maybe it's because I'm a crafty sort of girl....and maybe it's because I've been feeling like this blog needs a little bit of a theme.

Whatever the reason, I've been exploring fabulously themed blogs (celebrity gossip, movies,sewing, crafting, more crafting), and trying to get inspired about something creative. Helping my friend set up his blog last night made me feel like writing some fiction, reading about re-fashioning had me off to Goodwill, where i purchased some fabulously bad dresses to experiment with, looking at ugly tattoos just made me feel giggly, and realizing I'm badly in need of a haircut...made me wish my girl BH still lived here...

I don't think my blog will ever have a single theme, but I'm going to try, for the next few weeks, to incorporate some of these ideas into my blogging. My hope is that this pledge will inspire me to do creative things outside of the blogosphere....wish me luck!

Wherein I help Charles set up his new blog

2010-02-10T20:24:00.003-06:00

As CHe and I sit on my couch, drinking cheap wine and setting up his new blog, I realize how few of my fab blogger options I utilize. I feel as though I'm in a competition with CHe for who is the most tech-savvy, and as we are both relatively deficit in this department, I'm going to attempt to embed a link to a much more successful blog.

Upon a remeniscence of a moment in the video store...

2010-02-08T20:56:00.003-06:00

...While watching a decidedly non-horrific film ("New York, I love you" - really good! Check out "Paris Je t'aime" as well!) B and I began discussing our usual video rental habits. I remarked upon the unnaturalness of us renting a non-horror film. He argued that we often watch other genres. I responded with the memory of a moment in Blockbuster...

B and I were renting an epic drama (what B refers to as a "life movie"). The pock-faced 12 year old clerk took the familiar 1 Night Rental case from me and looked at it for an awkward amount of seconds and then glanced again at our membership card. "I thought you only rented horror movies," he stated. He typed our account number into the computer, scrolled down, reading, and nodded, as if confirming his own recollection.

It was true, I realize now. We really do rent horror movies 98% of the time. Tonight, Bryan clearly articulated why:

With horror movies there's no risk. You can enjoy the hell out of a bad horror movie and still feel like you got your money's worth. The same cannot be said of dramas, comedies, or (god forbid) romances. Horror is an equal opportunity genre; anyone and everyone can make a horror movie and the result will always be entertaining...I'm fairly certain that's a genre-specific phenomenon...an interesting thing to consider...

Film: A month in big and small screen diversion

2010-02-02T23:01:00.002-06:00

It's too late for me to be up, playing on the internet. I have too much work to do, and too little time to finish it.....so, of course, it's time for a little more procrastination...

Here's a quick lowdown on what I've been watching lately.

In the theater:

The Lovely Bones: Beautiful....brilliant....yet, somehow, left me unsatisfied. Stanley Tucci is unrecognizably amazing.

New on DVD:

The Surrogates: Timely and fun. Drawing on recent themes of cultural relativity and fears of technology making us less human in some way, this was a relatively lamely executed film with a smart underlying plot.

Pandorum: More sci-fi interpretations of the horrific yet somehow inevitable nature of the loss of humanity feared to come with technological exploration. Pretty entertaining overall, if mildly predictable.

Paranormal Activity: The Amityville Horror in the style of The Blair Witch Project. Yawn.

Deadline: Rented from Redbox on a whim. One of Brittany Murphy's last films, and sadly forgettable.

Jennifer's Body: Surprisingly witty for a one-time watch. I appreciated the satire, but not Megan Fox.

The Carriers: The only thing Americans fear more than terrorists right now is the swine flu. This one pretty tidily addresses the dehumanizing nature of disease and the inescapable demise of careless, uninformed people.

On TV:

The Red Carpet at the Grammys: WTF
The premiere of RuPaul's Drag Race, Season 2: There are prettier queens at Ole Miss.
The premiere of Caprica: Waiting on my Tivo. Clearly, I'm not that excited.
The premiere of the last season of Lost: I hate you. I love you. I hate you.

Inspirational Quotes of the Day: Those who can't...

2010-01-14T09:55:00.004-06:00

This week has been a whirlwind of prepping and planning. In moments between projects, I've glimpsed sadly at news of the devastation in Haiti and, more tragically, the response of ethnocentric, egotistic, misinformed fools like Pat Robertson. The "news" is full of violence and apathy, all candy-coated for mass-consumption. We live in a frighteningly uncaring pocket of the wider world. I find myself frequently falling into an easy attitude of selfish nonchalance just like everyone else. It’s painless to mourn the state of the union over a beer with friends. It’s not complicated to chat about my own relative prosperity compared to most people on the planet and feel thankful. It’s much harder to actuate those casual discussions into meaningful action. I haven’t figured it out yet; I don’t know how I can activate change, but I have identified what I feel is the root of many of our problems: apathy toward education.

The fact alone that we have colloquialisms such as:

"Those who can't teach."

The fact that:

“America believes in education: the average professor earns more money in a year than a professional athlete earns in a whole week.”
--- Evan Esar

What happened to thoughts such as these?

“All who have meditated on the art of governing mankind have been convinced that the fate of empires depends on the education of youth.”
---Aristotle

“The strength of the United States is not the gold at Fort Knox or the weapons of mass destruction that we have, but the sum total of the education and the character of our people.”
--- Claiborne Pell

“Peace has never come from dropping bombs. Real peace comes from enlightenment and educating people to behave more in a divine manner.”
--- Carlos Santana

We have countless seminars, public service announcements, facebook memes, and programs dedicated to making people “aware.” How about making people “aware” of their ability to learn, grow, and act? I’m just sayin’….

Teachers: Do not fall into a cycling pit of doom-and-gloom predictions about the annoying stupidity of your students. Do not begrudge the grading you *have* to do or the time you will spend prepping lectures. Teaching and learning will never become a higher priority (and your salary will never go up) if we don’t start making it valuable. And we can’t do that by making students feel unimportant, by shrugging off our responsibilities, or by ditching our office hours.

Students: Stop dreading the 50 minutes of your life you *have* to be in class. Stop arguing that nothing you do in school will ever be *relevant* to your life. Don’t ask me when you will ever do algebra again. Think about education as something you *get* to do – both in and out of class.

I completely believe that education and concern for the education of EVERYONE is the only answer to most of the messes we get ourselves into.

*This public service announcement has been brought to you by coffee. Thank you.*

Avatar: A Review (and a return to old blogging traditions?)

2010-01-08T22:56:00.002-06:00

It's Friday night, and, surprisingly, I'm not out livin' it up and being obnoxious. I just got home from the movies and thought I'd try to brush up the old reviewing skills...though I'm fairly certain I've lost my touch...

I've been intentionally avoiding reviews of Avatar; all I knew of the film was that it was a) in 3D, b) really long, c) almost completely computer generated, and d) really expensive and lucrative. Normally this combination is not something that lures me into a theater seat, especially on a Friday night(minus the 3D thing, I did LOVE Jaws 3 and Captain EO). But I decided to give it a go...

...And I really cannot complain. Here's the lowdown:

Premise: Humans set up shop on another planet with the goal of mining some really priceless ore which happens to be situated beneath the territory of a group of big, blue hippies with tails. Through some unexplainable future technology, they create genetically hybridized avatars for some botanists (*cough**anthropologists**cough*)to store their psyches in to communicate with the locals and scout out their crazy plant life. Of course, as in all contact situations, this clashing of interests and perspectives isn't working out so well for the military-backed human mining corporation. That is, of course, until a dumb marine becomes a new avatar and starts actually studying the innerworkings of the Na'vi (alien/other) culture. War ensues...there's a budding romance...and war ensues...trust is gained and lost...and war continues...and you get the idea (it's a wicked long movie - even for me and I grew up on Cecil B. DeMille epics).

Plot: A little long and drawn out (to say the least). A little simple and obvious, but also comfortably thoughtful. Nothing outrageously unpredictable happens, but the script is put together nicely enough that you don't really mind.

Setting: Okay, clearly, this movie is beautiful to watch. The more subtle 3D effects were my favorite, and the color and texture of the images were amazing...The 3D did give me a slight headache and made me worry whether I was giving myself wrinkles, but I don't appear to have any permanent side effects (much less motion sickness than I anticipated - perhaps Cloverfield made me paranoid).

Performances: I always have a hard time gauging performances which are primarily voice-overs. All the characters seemed well created and portrayed. My personal favorite was Sigourney Weaver's portrayal of Dr. Grace Augustine....okay, who are we kidding here - Sigourney was basically reprising her role as Diane Fossey in Gorillas in the Mist....however, it was appropriate! It was appropriate given both the literal role she was playing and the symbolic one. *I will note that, for the record, I think making Sigourney a ginge for this role was a bad call. I'm just sayin.*

Overall Impressions: This movie is politically and socially very timely. The clear analogy of alien beings to indigenous peoples in cultural contact situations may seem simple and common(see District 9 for another good recent example), but is a message which, sadly, bears revisiting now more than ever. My biggest complaint was the stereotypical villainization of the humans (particularly the marines) in the film. I would have liked to see all the characters equally portrayed as valuable living beings. The caricatures of white, ethnocentric, gun-happy, misogynist soldiers gave this movie a little too much of a Ferngully feel. It made the Na'vi a little sad and puppyish, pushing them back into the realm of "noble savage" when the whole point was to battle ethnocentrism in this time of war, fear, apathy, and globalization.

I recommend this film to: people who can hold it for a really long time, fans of 3D or special effect spectacles, Intro anthropology teachers, and parents seeking to subtly introduce their children to ideas about culture, ethnicity, and differentness.

Inspiring Quotes of the Day: HOLIDAYS

2009-12-14T09:08:00.002-06:00

I have every intention of getting some work done today....I promise! BUT FIRST! A little holiday-themed procrastination!

I talked a lot in my anthropology class about holidays. We had a whole class about Halloween traditions and horror movies. We spent another class making a "web of significance" (Oh, Geertz!) diagram on the board about Thanksgiving, Black Friday, and Christmas. Holidays make for great class discussion because everyone always has something to say. However differently we all may feel about "the holiday season," it is something (in our culture) that unites us.

Whether you feel that holidays are a socially-constructed equilibrium maintenance mechanism (Oh, Harris!), a cultural celebration of history, tradition, and family, an excuse to gluttonously indulge in food and shopping, a semi-annual celebration of religious values....or just a day off of work, I really hope you enjoy your holidays! Make of them what you will! Here's what a few other folks think about them:

A perpetual holiday is a good working definition of hell. - George Bernard Shaw

Come, woo me, woo me, for now I am in a holiday humor, and like enough to consent.
- William Shakespeare

Christmas is a time when you get homesick -- even when you're home. - Carol Nelson

There's nothing sadder in this world than to awake Christmas morning and not be a child. - Erma Bombeck

Isn't it funny that at Christmas something in you gets so lonely for - I don't know what exactly, but it's something that you don't mind so much not having at other times. ~Kate L. Bosher

There are some people who want to throw their arms round you just because it's Christmas, there are other people who want to strangle you just because its Christmas
- Robert Lynd

And the Grinch, with his Grinch-feet ice cold in the snow, stood puzzling and puzzling, how could it be so? It came without ribbons. It came without tags. It came without packages, boxes or bags. And he puzzled and puzzled 'till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before. What if Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store. What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more. - Dr. Seuss

Probably the reason we all go so haywire at Christmas time with the endless unrestrained and often silly buying of gifts is that we don't quite know how to put our love into words - Harlan Miller

Shoe-A-Day Calendar

2009-12-08T08:59:00.002-06:00

I have a shoe-a-day calendar on my office desk. For Sweet Pickles and the others working around me, my daily ritual of announcing what “sort” of day it will be is familiar and likely pretty annoying. Every morning I ask: "will it be a good shoe day?" Surprisingly, the calendar has way too many days of really boring or ugly shoes! Who wants to wake up on a Thursday morning to see a Lucite wedge with plastic sunflowers in their future?!?!? (Andrea Pfister, what the hell happened to you in the 90s???) Greeting the day with a bad shoe (albeit a photo of a bad shoe) is never good. I’ve never understood how so many people don’t notice this phenom…feeling crappy, are you? Look down! Maybe it has something to do with those puke-pink fake Uggs you have on…But I digress…

Today’s shoe predicts a mid-spectrum day: A metallic Michael Kors ankle strap pump. Though a little M.O.B. for my personal taste, it’s better than a technicolor Croc or, god forbid, an athletic shoe. This weather alone gets me down, I don’t need to look at ugly footwear all day to boot (pun definitely intended).

So, what do I plan to do on this rainy, grey, cold, Michael Kors day? I must grade approximately 40 essays instead of staying home to work on my new set of designs (working brand name: Polygamy Cult Slut); so, I’m going to make the most of every opportunity I find to utilize MK classic lines such as “it’s SO dowdy,” and “slutty, slutty, slutty!” and wave my hands around dramatically like a flaming New York yenta! Go find whatever you need to make the most of this crummy day! And if you happen by Wal-mart, let me know how well they’re stocked on calico…

A New Day

2009-11-29T18:49:00.002-06:00

Having completed the final tedious (and relatively pointless) set of epic grammar exercises for my online class, I'm feeling relieved, motivated, and reflective. As I quickly catch up on recent Facebook activity and ponder the events of the past week, I sit content, sipping green tea and anticipating the rest of the year.

How much will happen in the upcoming weeks? How much do I want to relish (or grieve) from the past? How much to I want to alter in the immediate future?

I've come to realize that self-reflection is only worthwhile if it is done for the purpose of modifying future behavior. So, in the interest of constructive reflection (as opposed to holiday-themed pity-partying), my goal for the rest of the year is not only to reflect on 2009, but to begin creating my goals for 2010.

Yes, folks, this means you can expect several Pollyanna-ish blogs...for at least as long as I stay caffeinated.

Enjoy the beginning of the last week of classes! This is the only November 29th 2009 we will ever have.

A Sappy (and Snarky) Thanksgiving Blog for Charles

2009-11-26T08:46:00.003-06:00

I’m sitting at the kitchen table at my folks’ house. It is around 8:00 in the morning. It is quiet.

That quiet will soon and suddenly disappear as my parents and brothers stumble into the kitchen to have coffee, cheerios, and loud, cacophonous disagreements about nothing that really means anything.

Thanksgiving to me is the most pernicious of holidays, full of loud, unavoidable annoyances and academy award worthy performances.

I don’t know when it was exactly that my mother stopped speaking at a normal volume. It must have been an awfully long time ago, because it seems she has always been shouting from a different room to communicate with us. It’s a sad sort of ritual; it reeks of stale, rote behavior easier to maintain than change….It’s annoying as hell.

I don’t know when my dad got so jaded, and began waxing sarcastic about all the stupid people in the world, how dumb they are, and all the idiotic things they do (which he’s an expert on, due to hours of educational programming in the form of such gems as COPS and Smoking Gun Presents: World’s Stupidest). It’s always funny at first, but after a while it grates like cheap government cheese.

I don’t know when my brothers started throwing me under the bus at holidays. Every time my grandmother and mother end up in the same room, these fools up and disappear. If my grandmother happens to take a breath in the middle of a tirade about her cats’ shitting habits, I excuse myself and find mine comrades hiding in another room, grinning like fucking Cheshire cats. It pisses me off.

I don’t know when I started drinking too much on holidays so that the dysfunction and discord become funny instead of frightening. It makes me feel like a cliché…and an asshole, but I continue to do it. After all, traditions are important in my family.

I don’t know why my family (and probably yours) is such a hot mess at the holidays. We all function pretty normally at least 360 days of the year….

But today is supposed to be about giving thanks, right? It shouldn’t be about frantic upsets about the dreadful pumpkin shortage, or whether or not the dining room centerpiece adequately encompasses our holiday spirit, or about gluttonously performing a tried-and-true ritual which more resembles an MLE challenge than a family gathering…

And I AM thankful…

I’m thankful for my mother, who is annoying, loud, beautiful, kind, and giving…

I’m thankful for my father, who is cynical, hardworking, talented, and sensitive…

I’m thankful for my brothers, who are frustrating bastards, but also my best friends…

I’m thankful for my grandmother, who loves us even more than her cats, however difficult it is to decipher that from her conversation…

I’m thankful for my husband, who will arrive later today and patiently participate in our somewhat frenzied tradition because he loves me more than quiet, peaceful holidays…

I’m thankful for my friends, who will listen to me recreate my holiday adventures, good and bad, even though they surely have more interesting things to do….

And I’m thankful for butchered traditions….

I’m thankful for every stupid argument, every moment of stressful cooking, every dirty dish, every glass of cheap wine, and every fleeting glimpse of genuine holiday bliss in someone’s eye…

I hope you are having an amazing holiday. Be safe and remember that, even the most dysfunctional, unmusical, irritating moments you share with your loved ones are, most importantly, moments you share with your loved ones.

We all have a lot to be thankful for….go celebrate!

Open memo to the dripdicks who stole my mailbox:

2009-11-23T14:16:00.002-06:00

Why?

Are you so lacking in bathroom reading material that my medical bills and the Lafa Shopper were just irresistible?

My credit card statements will do you no good, as they are all maxed out...that is, unless you desperately needed them to use as ironic Christmas wrapping....P.S. - that was MY idea!

Maybe it was the mailbox itself...hmmmm....

It IS, after all, the perfect size and shape for collecting mail....However, you left the mangled post, sadly festooned with wilted strips of duct tape from the last time, when you preferred to simply maul the mailbox instead of actually removing it. Would you like the post as well? Because it is doing me absolutely no good at this time...The sanitation workers simply eyed it warily as it lay there among the trash cans; it was obviously too pathetic to remain, but still did not actually fit their definition of trash...and so, it remains on the curb - a sad, twisted little invalid of white aluminum in need of euthanasia.

Of course, a mailbox may be used for a number of purposes, which I'm certain you're exploring. I'm sure you can store your skunk weed, cheap porn mags, and Miley Cyrus cds in it. You could probably fit at least a dozen cans of Axe body spray, all your Hot Topic shoelaces, and your old, crumpled up class notes in there.

Before you start experimenting with the creative potential of MY mailbox, let me give you some advice based upon practical experience: The mailbox in question will NEVER be as useful to you as it was to me. It will, in fact, probably act out in response to it's capture and be incredibly snobbish to your mail, which does not belong there.

Perhaps you have noticed that we have replaced said mailbox....Please allow this one to remain as, clearly, you already have one and surely have no need for another.

Thank you so very much.

Inspiring Quotes of the Day: BOOKS

2009-11-23T12:11:00.004-06:00

Doesn't the weather today just make you want to curl up on the couch with some cocoa (or bourbon), a cozy blanket, and a good book?

My day is all about grading, cleaning, and getting my life in order for the upcoming weeks of finals drama, but, as always happens when I have more important things to do, I've been wandering around the house aimlessly, calling people for absolutely no reason, and, in general, procrastinating....

My eyes wandered to a bookshelf....specifically to the "to read" shelf wedged between the "hot-as-hell pumps" and "tall, dressy boots in brown or black" shelves.

My first thought was: one day I will live in a house where my shoes and my books don't have to vie for space...More importantly, my second thought was that it has been over a month since I read even a page of literature - fiction, nonfiction, poetry, prose, elegant, trashy, or otherwise - that wasn't completely necessary to do my job or pursue my studies!

I have a lot of work to do, but thought I'd take a break to find some quotes that sum up how I feel about reading. They make me remember why, as a ten year old "library nerd," I thought books were possibly the greatest invention ever.

Find yourself some inspiration, a warm nook, and an old favorite, and let your imagination wander away from this dreary day! Hopefully I'll be able to squeeze in some quality paperback time before sunset!

"Wouldn't it be fun if all the castles in the air which we make could come true and we could live in them?"
Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

A room without books is like a body without a soul.
Cicero (106 BC - 43 BC), (Attributed)

The man who doesn't read good books has no advantage over the man who can't read them.
Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before.
Edgar Allan Poe

Anyone who says they have only one life to live must not know how to read a book.
Author Unknown

...And, a general life lesson:

If you go home with someone and they don't have any books...don't fuck them.
John Waters

Pollyanna Moments, The First

2009-11-22T11:33:00.002-06:00

One of the things that prompted me to start this blog (besides a clear need to waste more time) was a moment last week when I read a little article hypothesizing what would happen if, every time we catch ourselves saying "I have to do _____" we catch ourselves and say "I get to do ___________" instead. It's a change of only one word, but what a dramatic change in meaning....yes, I am aware what a dork I am, thanks.

I started thinking about days in my past that just make me grin from ear to ear thinking about them. Memories that brighten my whole day, even though they have long since passed. Recollections of events that could never be planned or recreated, but manifest themselves in completely organic and unexpected ways...I decided I would periodically write a little blog in memory of those moments as a shout out to those who shared them with me.

Pollyanna Memory 1:

200(6?)

It was a friend's birthday. One of my best girls, S.W. was hosting an intimate little party with all the usual ladies. I wasn't feeling so hot, but convinced myself to go do a little well-wishing and have one, only one, drink with the birthday girl.

As the evening progressed, I began to feel better...to even believe that I had never been sick in the first place, go figure.

One by one, the guests trickled away, until S.W. and I were left alone...with entirely too many bottles of booze...

Happy banter, mindless dancing, and abundant laughter led to sunrise, when we toasted the day's light with shots of tequila...several of them...

Around 7am, we decided we needed some coffee. So we bundled up, careful to arm ourselves with cash and a sippy-cup full of coconut rum (do not ask, I don't know).
We got coffee. We trampled through the cemetary and all around the Square, photographing anything that took our interest.

Finally, around noon, S.W. and I scrambled through the large patch of brambles behind my house, mucking ourselves up pretty damned well in the process. We collapsed in my living room with the biggest stupidest grins all over our faces.

What made this the first Pollyanna moment I will try to recall on truly shitty mornings is the fact that, through over 12 hours of drinking, dancing, hiking, and chatting at a fevered pitch, I don't think we ever stopped laughing once the entire time.

Thanks, S.W.! I miss you!

Reminiscing: My Blog: The Developmental Years

2009-11-22T11:07:00.005-06:00

Sadly, my swan dive into the world of blogging has turned into more of a belly flop, given my tragic lack of internet for the last several days. So, as I sit in the coffee shop, trying to imagine some profound topic to blog about, I realize that I need a little inspiration from the past. What did I do in those long-ago Myspace days that made blogging so much fun?

I decided to check. I even remembered my Myspace password on the third try! I started reading old blogs and reminiscing....

Most of my blogging was conducted in 2007 and 2008. Most of my blogs consisted of movie reviews and travel updates. Who knew I went to so many movies during that time? I don't know where all that movie money was coming from, but it appears to have been wasted, since 95% of the movie reviews I wrote on Myspace were scathing. Here's a couple of fun oldie-but-goodies:

03 Apr 08 Thursday

Sweeney Todd...I’m not sure...This may be a little harsh...
Category: Movies, TV, Celebrities

Perhaps it was because of all the hype, or the fact that several of my friends told me I would absolutely love this film. Perhaps it was because of the Oscar buzz, or the fact that Tim Burton directed it, and Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter, and Alan Rickman starred...

I’m not sure if any or all of these factors influenced the way I approached watching "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street," but apparently I was much too excited to see this movie....

...and was disappointed. The movie exhibited some of Tim Burton’s characteristic dark beauty in the backdrops and costumes, but it was far from his most amazing visual achievement. I, quite honestly, thought Batman, and certainly Edward Scissorhands, Ed Wood, Sleepy Hollow, etc, were much more visually profound.

...as far as the performances went, I was also disappointed. Johnny Depp gave an admirable performance, but far from Oscar calibur. In fact, I think the only reason he was nominated was his attempt at singing, which was bordering on comical. Helena Bonham Carter proved, once again, that she is desperately in need of some conditioner and hair pomade and that if she twitches and shreeks a lot people will think that she is acting and not just crazy. Alan Rickman was his usual stuffy, yet somehow sexy, self...until he started singing, that is. The supporting roles were flimsy and disjointed. Sasha Baron Cohen made an interesting cameo as a greasy swindler, and he was decent...and he had the best death scene. Weaselly Tim Spall (most famous in the States for playing Peter Petigrew in the Harry Potter films) basically played upon his natural creepiness and the role wasn’t much of a stretch for him. Besides these celebrity friends of Burton’s, the remainder of the cast seemed to be experienced singers and musical performers, making the attempts at singing on the parts of the famous stars seem even more mediocre.

...as for the costumes and makeup (one of my favorite scrutinies)...the makeup was cheesy and fake. I’m not certain if they intentionally made the actors look like they were on stage, or if the stylists just got slap-happy with cheap white-face, but the effect was truly more comical than creepy. The costumes were probably "okay" in my book (especially when compared to the other Oscar contenders), but they got lost in the shadowy cinematography and didn’t really serve any sort of aesthetic purpose as far as I could tell.

...Now for the gore. I didn’t expect much, I had been told the gore was over the top and cheesy, so I was therefore pleasantly surprised in a few scenes. Pirelli’s murder in particular was actually almost gruesome...though Burton was cheap to resort to bludgeoning, one of the easiest ways to get at a squeamish audience. After that, there are only so many times you can watch people’s throats being slit before getting bored.

...The music...what can I say about the music. Not much. Besides a few (unintentionally) comical lyrics, such as "all the horrors of the world are as wondrous as Peru," the musical numbers were terribly formulaic.

I would recommend this film to fans of musicals if they don’t mind a little gore (I do realize that not all of your stomachs are teflon coated, as mine is). Tim Burton fans beware, this one ranks up there with "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" and (cringe) "Planet of the Apes".

My apologies to all of you who adored this film. Nothing personal, I was just highly disappointed at this mediocre attempt at mixed-genre film-making. If you want a modern musical, Moulin Rouge was far superior, and if you want horror, suck it up and go rent one of the many decent gore-fests available on DVD.

30 Jul 08 Wednesday

X - Files: I Want To Believe (that they could have made a better movie than this)...
Category: Movies, TV, Celebrities

I'm going to warn you that this review blog is going to have some spoilers in it...but since the things I'm spoiling are more predictable than geeks at a sci-fi convention, I don't feel too bad about it...

I guess you could say that in the late 90's I was a fan of the X-Files. I wasn't religious about it, but there were some pretty fantastic episodes, like The Peacock Family and the 2-part killer bees episode. There were fabulous pseudo-celebrity cameos like Jesse Ventura, John O'Hurley, Kathy Griffin (pre-nose job and gay entourage), and countless others. There was the endless sexual tension between Mulder and Scully, the at-times-very-clever banter and some of my favorite all-time quotes, including:

"I didn't play Dungeons and Dragons all those years and not learn at thing or two about courage!"

All that being said, I knew that the new X-Files movie was not going to be a stellar return to the tv show I once loved...however, I did expect it to be far better than it was!

The Premise:
It's been 9 years: The FBI is hunting down Mulder, Scully is a surgeon at a Catholic hospital, and, oh, first spoiler!!!!!:

They are living together.

Note: You may think that you want to see them in love (the studio clearly thought so) but you don't. Not really. The power of tv duos who want to be together but are conflicted about it IS THAT THEY ARE CONFLICTED ABOUT IT! This movie jumped the shark by putting them together, first big mistake.

Next the FBI shows up, in the form of two way-too-young, way-too-pretty, and way-too-annoying agents (one of whom is Amanda Peet, who I really cannot stand) who want Mulder's help finding a missing agent. Their only lead is the testimony of a Catholic priest/psychic with a dubious past.

Then there is a whole bunch of predictable and boring parts where Mulder and Scully fight about whether or not to believe in psychics and whether or not they've ruined their careers by making this movie....oh wait, that was just my ESP kicking in to show me what was going on in their dressing room...

Where was I? Oh yes. More boring parts....some predictable parts....some really cheesy dialogue....oh, and they solve the case, which (SPOILER 2) is not really science-fiction-y at all. Oh, and they cry and kiss alot.

The performances: Negligible...I didn't like the way they changed Scully's character into a frigid and controlling girlfriend, and David Duchovney looked mildly drunk throughout the film.

The script: Abysmal. There was so little actual science-fiction in this movie! I expected something grander, with inside jokes, celebrity cameos, or at least aliens or monsters...and instead I got a worn-out story with washed-up characters and miserable dialogue.

Overall conclusions:
I felt that "X-Files: I want to Believe" and "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skulls" should have traded scripts and both might have been much better films.

I recommend this movie to: anyone who needs a nap, people who like wasting money on mediocre movies...if you are a true fan of the X-Files and feel you need to see this, I highly recommend waiting for DVD, there is nothing in this movie that necessitates big-screen viewing.

Hopefully there will be a good movie coming out soon, until then,
ciao,
jess

Just Jess delves into the world-o-blog

2009-11-19T16:14:00.000-06:00

Having abandoned Myspace in favor of Facebook, as many of my illustrious peers did ages ago, I have increasingly found something lacking in my social networking life. While I still have my daily fill of voyeuristic fun, trivial pursuits, and frenzied rounds of Bejeweled Blitz between classes, I am seriously missing the fun of pointless blogging!

My good pal and fellow gossip/tangent/adjective enthusiast, Sweet Pickles, has been urging me to start a blog for years, but, like a Twitard contemplating a new, unexplored, well-written piece of actual literature, I was afraid of change.

But, since Facebook has failed to supply me with a forum for my tangential ranting, here I am!

You may ask yourself, what will Just Jess' blog give me that no other blog can?

Well, I have no fracking idea. But I will tell you what it will NOT give you:

Epic, detailed transcriptions of every time a baby cries, shits, makes a noise, or acts like a baby in any other normal way

Carefully edited, unbiased political statements

Slanderous gossip (with the possible exception of shared posts from my fave blog, dlisted.com)

Painfully long surveys in which I reveal to you the all-important answers to "What is your favorite ice cream? Who was the first person to text you today? Are you in love? Etc."

Y'all, I just really like writing! Especially in non-standardized ways and with many, many adjectives! If you don't like it, don't read it.