review

i really loved annie hall.  and i think even in my worst moments, i'm not as neurotic as woody OR diane.  (or does that just mean i AM ultra anxious and uptight?  isn't it long purported that the loony people believe they're NOT crazy, and the lucid amongst us fear unnecessarily for their sanity?)  

my favorite line was, "You know, I don't think I could take a mellow evening because I - I don't respond well to mellow. You know what I mean? I have a tendency to - if I get too mellow, I - I ripen and then rot, you know."

and as for the grilled (or in the end, baked) stuffed apples, it actually turned out ok!  usually when i cook it is a waste of money and time.  the toiled o'er ingredients are as a paper airplane, against all odds, colliding with a firework mid-eruption.  and sizzles all the way to the unfriendly ground.  but this was a redemptive cooking experience, and i'm all a'twitter over it.

2 firsts

fire water. i, meredith kathryn eaton, for the first time in the 5 years i've been legally able, purchased wine.  finally, a reason for my drivers license to say "AGE 21 IN 2003" in a large stripe.  ah but irvine stake members, before you get on your blueteeth to spread the word, let it be known: it's for cooking. all the fermented and inherently evil particles shall be zapped right out in the grilling process involving some stuffed apples.  this recipe is something i intend to kick into the next century on the morrow.

why haven't i seen a woody allen movie yet?  i love neurotic people.  neurotic people are the best.  have you met my family?  have you met me?

i think annie hall and i are going to be fast friends.

happy labor day.

my gift to you:

a blog of beauty is born

sometimes lindsey freaks me out with her knowledge of movie lines. i thought i was good, but she could wipe the floor with any movie fanatic any day.

she has taken her blogging chisel and a big ol' phatty hammer and hacked out her own little piece of internet this very day, and has invited me to contribute (among some other lucky ducks).

i think many of us could have entire conversations purely borrowing bits of movie genius.

i think of the screenwriters who toil and suffer and ache for their craft, bent over their computers until the sun peeks o'er the mountain tops, hoping for some director to take a chance on it and, hopefully, not violate it to pieces in the sell-out attempts.

i think it should make them very proud to know their ideas become so well loved and used.

and now i present, fuel for the movie quoter fire:

(drum rollllllllll....curtain opeeeennnnnnss)

http://yuleuloo.blogspot.com/

see she's so good at this i don't even know what movie that URL is from.

the reason why he's shakin in his boots.

do you want to know why obama is really nervous?

because he knows i'm voting for the first time this year*. and he knows i'm completely unimpressed with his parthenon backdrop from last night.

we think he's going to start making house calls, bringing me turkish delight to win me over.

*i have really tried to vote before, i have great excuses as to why i haven't, but then, excuses are in the likeness of belly buttons, and also "my guy" has won every time without my vote, so all's well that ends well.

who am i?

"babeldeee rama doo del hobbanaa twinkeldah -- mo mo!"

who am i and what did i say?

give up?

jesse jackson! duh! and i said, "i'm going to go buy a twinkie to munch on during obama's speech -- a man gets hungry!"

visit

this week sally the sarah has been in the house. i just get a kick out of my sister, never a kick to her. that would be rude.

on my mission she'd make up conversations we could have had, email them to me for p-day, and this was the cause for many a tico looking over my way and thinking in the internet cafes, "my, but gringas do laugh boisterously." she's plucky, she's hard-working, she's frugal, she's a gem. let me give you some visuals:

she's good with kids. and look at heh skin! who does heh hair?

she's snuggly.

her hair blows in the winds when she helps give us a tour of versailles.
not everyone can pull that off.

but after all that, sorry to disappoint fellas,

but she's pretty much taken.

this week we've been getting yogurtland every night like the miserable addicts we are, watching arrested development like the miserable addicts we are, and it's been a grand old time. i happen to be very pleased with this week (except for the fact that i hate my job with the fire of a thousand suns). tomorrow the family is going to an angels game, and i am pretty sure that my life is so basically perfect!

spirit fingers!

quick fix

my friend says if you're having a bad day you need to just go buy a new lipstick (unless you're a dude).

i say if you're having a bad day you need to go buy a new haircut.
nat, you are a genius.

An afternoon of Merzy

for radiohead day i took off the whole afternoon to avoid traffic and play in los angeleeeees. the getty museum is one of my favorite things about southern california, and i was itching to go.
i would have taken these pictures if a) someone had given me my own jet in time and b) if it hadn't been closed on monday. woops.

so i had about 4 hours to kill in santa monica.

hmmm.

basically the driving push for me to throw down mucho dinero i don't have and get an iphone is for the GPS system. i am, most of the time, lost. i do my homework, but usually the navigational fairies forsake me, and this usually causes smoke to pour out of my ears, as i hate to watch my gas tank dial go down while flipping endless -- and usually illegal -- u turns. so i stuck to streets i knew like sepulveda and santa monica blvd until i got tips on where to go. it was an afternoon of merzy time. LA has some extras. i saw 3 transvestites, 2 orthodox jews, and hey, you don't see that in irvine very often.

i window shopped to my heart's content; my quota is indeed filled until late november. i finished my little book club book. i ate at a little french cafe and there learned i don't like soft tofu but i LOVE seaweed. i mostly kept thinking of how i would probably not be able to do this again on a monday afternoon for quite a while. an afternoon free and clear and all to myself? yes please!where the streets have no naaaaame
this is the store where they sold "team aniston" and "team jolie" shirts back in the day when brangelina was still a scandal and not an icon of brady bunch philanthropy. i'm not one of those "uh, wealth disGUSTS me" people, but i did see a dress there that had no discernible shape to it and cost $550.
i just wanted to look around and pretend i was at versailles. but this german accented woman came out and said i could only look if i were a buyer for myself or a client. i told her i was a buyer by profession and she asked, "what are you looking for?" "......a statue......" and then i snapped away like i was very directed and knew this was just the one that my very rich client wanted. then i sneaked out when she wasn't looking so she wouldn't ask for my card or something.

good day, LA!

+1 to Radiohead of the World

-the opening band's lead singer does his big ol' bring in the fun introduction, "heeey los angel-eeees! heaven or hell?"

huh?

Radiohead of the World

last night peter and i went to radiohead at the hollywood bowl. i knew it was going to be horn-swoggling fun, but there were some delights even i hadn't anticipated.

i've now learned for myself that only at a radiohead concert can you:

-hear the featured artists "get over themselves and play their biggest freaking hit, karma police."

-buy a shirt (green in eco make-up and yet gray in human eye absorption) that says, "you used to be alright, what happened to you?" i would definitely wear that on a date with michael jackson...if he ever asked me on one...and if i were ever loopy enough to accept....)i was going to wear it to work today but it smelled kind of funny...see next....

-sit in, and i mean no exaggeration to befall this sentence, a thick cloud of pot the entire time. hold on, i'll be right back, i gotta go buy another bag of doritos. ooooh, and maybe some twinkies....

-have your mind blow over the lack of muffin tops. it laughs in the face of the long honored tradition that is attending a concert and spotting oozing amounts of people who prefer to ooze out of their pants. what, don't radiohead fans like to eat?

-see your very own fist fight after the concierto. i hadn't seen one since 8th grade!

-spot an RULDS2? couple. this was done after careful analysis and deductive reasoning. young, fleece (for him), 3 sizes too small shade top (for her), BYU bling, peaceful of countenance, short hair and clean-shaven. if we're going into details i'd have to also say they hail from texas or south jordan. i don't know how i know, i just know.

-be sucked into a vortex of high school nostalgia when they play the song from baz' romeo and juliet.

-see a girl whose outfit involved items i'd never thought could be clothing. her demeanor reminded me of luna lovegood from harry potter, and when she and her posse reached their seats' row she turned her head ever so slightly toward me and said in an ethereal voice, "tight."

-peter adds this one: "and the domino-like phenomenon of one person standing up in the front and then hundreds behind him / her have to stand up in order to see the stage." and wouldn't you know it, there were a few people a few rows ahead who drank, oh i'd guess, 5 million redbulls before the show, so they were shakin' what their mamas gave them like ravers from 1997 from start to finish.

the concert was genius. absolute genius. i intend to share a better slice in a moment. but there was a dollop of whipped cream for the evening's end:

because parking was stacked, we weren't exactly sprinting to the car after their 2nd encore finished. we sat to people watch, as there is no better circumstance under which to participate in said activity. right in front of us, dispersing leaflets to the masses, was this dude. he was saying to everyone, "halloween! lie to your girlfriend/boyfriend/wife/husband about what you're wearing! halloween! lie to your girlfriend/boyfriend/wife/husband about what you're wearing!" after a few rounds he'd start speeding it up, and then he'd slur it and trip over his words...and then he wouldn't finish the ad campaign. he'd kinda let it drizzle like a "niner" and then start over. the tragic hilarity of it is he spotted us watching him and he came over and half-whispered, "i know it sounds crazy, but i say it and they take the flier." i loved the dude justifying his chosen path of employment. meet halloween guy:radiohead, i salute you.

gettin away with it

we all know those people who can, with minimal output, get away with nearly everything. i am not one of those.

but there is my dear friend alyson. in college she would run out of her cell phone minutes by mid-month. one of those chatty types that's always taking care of everyone and would therefore plow through her contracted allowance quicker than you can say "bob's your uncle."

no minutes? no problem! she'd call t-mobile customer service and, if necessary, hang up and redial until she would get a dude on the phone. using her flirtatious wiles and energetic charm she'd paint a picture of why she used up her minutes, always striking an empathy cord and winning 1000 or 1500 extra minutes for the month, a la gratis. this is just one instance in a series of many (ask her about getting her name legally changed at the DMV last week even though she forgot her marriage license.)

there's my old friend matt. he had a really magnetic personality and would just kinda look at people in a way that sang, "hey. how are you? i love you. you're my friend." he would get away with everything, and besides that, hooked up with loads of free stuff.

there was pot-head mcgee who was in my history class junior year of high school. his scholastic routine consisted of:

I. swagger into class
II. sit down at seat in back
III. allow head to thunk onto desk, padded by thick crop of unruly hair
IV. sleep through entire 90 minute class (we had block scheduling)
V. wake up when bell sounds, clean up lake o' drool, swagger to next class
VI. repeat

no one ever had beef with this. nary a word was said in objection by the teacher.

i stumbled into class one morning after pulling an all-nighter with lanz finishing a project, and teacher started plugging in the VCR for a video. cha-ching! i decided, for the first time, just this once i was going to see how life is on the other side. i layed my little heed down on the desk. it was there not 10 seconds before mrs. history teacher called out in a chirpy voice, "meeeeredith, you need to stay with us, here." what, mr. fuzzy top over there hasn't been conscious for a moment's discussion on the rebel army, and i'm not allowed to vacation from a documentary narrated by jane seymore about stalin? jeopardy sean connery from SNL said it best when he said, "it's unjust."

i wonder what in my chemical make up seems to preclude me from the "gettin away with it" club.

i've tried. oh but i've tried.

in high school my choir toured in new york. we were with 2 other high schools from orange county, and on the last big apple night our hotel was drenched in the scent of teenage ne'er do welliness. i could describe many of the shenanigans, but i'll let this single one paint a sufficient picture: boys from fountain valley high school wore snorkel gear and towel-capes. are your minds reeling yet? i thought so.

i had to return a dress i'd borrowed to a girl i'd met from fountain valley (actually, THE alyson i speak of up above!) and it was "lights out" time, but i knew that half of the hotel was blatantly disregarding this fact; why not i? my friend jamie and i 007-ed our way to alyson's hotel room, not spotting a single gestapo chaperon. we dropped off the dress, chatted for a minute, flirted with the audacious and dreamy towel-caped capers (they'd written their hotel room numbers on my hand earlier so we'd know where to visit...oh my butterflies!)

jamie and i were about to return 5 flights up to our hotel room, and i suggested we take the super-sleuth stair well. jamie whined that our legs would fall off if we did that; the elevator would be quicker. "but mr. messenger [our very formidable choir teacher] could be on the elevator!" "no he won't meredith, it'll be fine. it'll be much faster this way."

we go one flight up. one flight, and ding! the elevator doors open, and in walks mr. messenger, with gamma rays of penalty shooting from his eyeballs. it helped ever so much that we were the only 3 on the elevator. that's all i'll say there.

no gettin away with it.

until! until!!! friday night i drove to vegas. i feel in the year i've been home from rosta cica i have taken so many, bordering on too many, road trips. i'm never in one place very long at all (don't get too excited, i vacillate between only about 3 places), and while i enjoy the visits and travels on ever so many levels, my accident/ticket/tire blow probability is on a constant spike. i already got 1 ticket last month, which i haven't even gotten around to paying yet, so imagine my fervent annoyance when a copper pulls out of nowhere and flags me down when i was apparently going 93 mph. blast and wretch. i went to my happy place (a lake house with calorie free brownies and a single, mormon, hetero rufus wainwright) and breathed deeply and braced myself for the verbal lashing and promise of a personalized astronomical fee.

the cop asked for all my materials, asked where i was headed, and how fast i believed i was going. there was compliance but no hope of mercy.

he went off to run my info through the system. i looked in my rear view mirror to find that 2 other cop cars were behind his. what, did he call for back up because he took one look at me and noted the probable num-chuck skills? he returned with a big toothy grin, handed me my stuff, and let me off the hizzle!

i could have kissed him. i didn't but i could have.

i got away with SOMETHING!

with david sedaris making his grand debut in my life this year, plus getting away with something, plus seeing radiohead last night (post to come) my life just might have peaked!

you know you're obsessed with blogging when:

because i'm paranoid that i'll lose my spanish, often i'll translate in my head sentences that i say, are said to me, or things i think. or movie lines.

i realized yesterday that somewhere along the lines, out of deep necessity due to frequent use, i invented a verb, and have conjugations in all tenses.

blogar: to blog

yo - blogo
tu - blogas
el/ella/usted - bloga

nosotros - blogamos

ellos/ellas/ustedes - blogan

preterit

yo - blogue

tu - blogaste

el/ella/usted - blogo

nosotros - blogamos

ellos/ellas/ustedes - blogaron

imperfect

yo - blogaba

tu - blogabas

el/ella/usted - blogaba

nosotros - blogabamos

ellos/ellas/ustedes - blogaban

and so forth. of course these could already exist in the espanish version of google. but the point is when i realized i talk about blogs and the act of blogging enough to merit my own creation in my other language, i didn't know which adjective was more appropriate: pathetic or passionate?

and a lovely monday to you!

a birthday girl song for me

birthday parties take a lot out of everyone involved. the only difference in reaction between children and adults is the adults crash and take naps and the kids continue playing, just a little bit strung out on sugar and a tad grumpy. but niece the bday girl still had room for caring and concern.

sarah, harry, and i all ended up on different couches taking splendid naps. after who knows how long of sleeping, i felt niece climb onto the couch and snuggle up next to me. she started to brush my hair with her barbie brush, she covered me up with her blanket that covers 1/16 of me, and i feigned sleep through it all. and then came her lullabye song thing:

"aunt meerrrrzyyyyyyyy, what's wroooong with yoooooooooou? aunt meeeerzyyyyyyyyyy, what's wrong with yoooooooouu?

before i forget

i'm back in begas for, among other things, niece's 3rd bday party (i burst into tears even as i type that), and i just have to publish this occurrence before it escapes my short term mem'ry:

niece's princess party guests arrive. the great thing about motherhood seems to be if you just latch onto a few she-friends with children around one of your childrens' ages, odds are the rest of your kids will also be about the same age. the 2-3 year gap between siblings seems to be time tested and true. so it is with elizabeth.

when one of the party guests arrived, the elder brother (who is nephew's age and dear comrade) was at the doorstep for the drop off. this elder brother, whom i shall call G, had his eyes enlarge to the size of lemons and he threw out his arms with all the vigor and vim in his 5 year old frame, like he'd just seen his first trans am.

G: HAPPY BUTHDAY [NIECE]!!!!!!
niece: looking at him like, "i know! i know! i've been gettin that all day, and i'm not sick of it yet!!!"
[G's mother starts to usher him out, now that the little sister has been deposited and is happily squealing with the other princesses.]
G: AREN'T YOU GOING TO GIVE ME A HUG, [NIECE]?!??!?!?!?!?!
nephew's eyes enlarge to the size of canteloupe's. he is absolutely horrified.
nephew: [bodily restraining G] NO! NO YOU CAN'T!!!

sarah whispers to me, "wow. now we know what to expect 14 years from now."

it is a great thing to have a big brother.

Thank goodness for Vampires!

book 4. twilight.

i couldn't quite stomach it, but i read part and lindsey filled in the rest to give me closure.

with her worldwide audience (and largely self-esteem needing, impressionable, hormone-raging 13 year old fan base), this is what bella the ex-human wanted to share:

1) life is really crappy without a guapo, affluent vampire to be in twinkly loooooove with. in fact, life is sort of unbearable without a vampire! how any of us have managed anything resembling happiness in our vampire deficient state is really just puzzling.

2) without supernatural powers, we're just...ordinary. ?!?!?!? [insert "euh!"-ish undefinable noise that we all made as teenagers, and sometimes make as adults.] ordinary (the new 4 letter word) is also unbearable and a complete waste of time, so praises be for the option of turning into a vampire yourself, because only then can you really feel good about who you are. phew! catastrophe cleverly avoided, check!

3) if your BFF happens to be in love with you, and you love him too on some level but, unlike that silly twit in the notebook, elect rich vamp-boyfriend instead (plus to enhance your physical features and become immortal), DON'T give a hoot or a holler about your BFF's feelings. plead with him to still be there for you whenever and wherever and however, no matter what sort of turmoil vortex this sucks him into. because, shucks, after all, it's all about you!

4) another tip: it's best when the vampire-human love isn't really love, it's more like obsession and infatuation that never dies (coincidentally, just like yourself!). that way, whenever you make a mistake, your human or vampire lover, will not call it out as a mistake. you can do no wrong -- ever! it's great! between the 2 of you, no one ever steps a toe out of line, even veers toward error. if you're really smart enough to find them, there's always going to be another person or situation or other superhuman to blame it on. guilt is, just like ordinary mortality, a tragic waste o' time.

5) your love will grow and fester and continue at a rolling boil if you make most certain you whisper absolutely everything you say.

i'm so glad i learned these things NOW, before it was too late!

thanks, bells/steph!

p.s. i will say however, the movie looks really good, and..........i'll probably totally end up seeing it.

Disappointing. Very disappointing.

I bet he still uses a mac at home.

brain vomit

i used to get a kick out of thinking my dreams were more like visions*.

this all started in 11th grade when i had a dream that 2 friends from different social pools started dating. both stood on their scoff boxes, and yet, about 3 months later, boom! a couple took flight (and 2 months later crashed and burned, but hey, i never said my vision included wedding bells).

fast forward to 2006. my missions papes were in, and the mail carrier and i were, of course, becoming fast friends. i was absolutely dying to know where i would go on my mission. one night i had a dream that i was called to serve in the virgin islands. haha! salt lake, don't bother sending it in writing, i know where i'm headed. then the next night i had a dream i went to costa rica. that one, interestingly enough, put a stop to me thinking my dreams were dictating my destination, since going to 2 missions at once is something i'm just flat out not talented enough to do -- i'll be the first to admit it.

i went on to have dreams that carried my missionary service to sweden, germany, and then finally i dreamed my family played a prank on me and took my real call, and made a fake call, had me read both letters, and try and figure out which was the real one. one was to texas and one was to ohio, and in my snobbery i said, "well who cares? they're both stateside!" and then i woke up on a tear soaked pillah. then got the snot-nosed wind knocked right out of me with the whole stateside-is-boring theory as soon as i entered the MTC. anyway so i thought, when i received my call, that since costa rica HAD indeed been in one of my dreams, i could still have my visionary groove....? maybe? since i ws asking myself i answered, "yep," i thought, "i still got (a little bit of) it!" carry on, carry on, carry on.

a few months ago i had a dream an ex-boyfriend of mine no longer prefers women, and i'd find out if that makes me visionary if it weren't for the fact that i don't want to know.

fast forward to last night. this is what lindsey calls a brain vomit dream. and it answers the question once and for all that my dreams are dreams, not visions, not indications of the events of the rapidly charging future, and this sits just great with me. last night's dream involved a juicy love triangle including

and

and

and david hopkins was also there wearing some awesome boots.

so yes, brain vomit.

*i hope everyone who reads this blog knows me and my sarcasm/exaggerative tendencies/self-deprecating-yet-perfectly-content-with-herself/self-appreciating-self-centered-yet-gloriously-humble ways. and if you don't, it probably would be a very annoying link to ever click on, but i don't care, because it's ALL ABOUT ME, as is, pretty much everything, right???

Yesterday I joined a book club.

I don't really know why, because half way through my English literature degree I paused to ask The Lady of Shalott, who hung despairingly on my wall, "WHY AM I IN THIS MAJOR?? I AM THE SLOWEST READER THIS SIDE OF THE EQUATOR!!!" But I girded my loins and pressed forward and somehow finished it (cough cough www.sparknotes.com cough ahem). I really loved it, and I love reading (some books more the destination than the journey), but I never did well with reading combined with deadlines.

However, I feel that turning 26 last month rejuvenated my due date tolerance, and besides, what are club members going to do to me if I skip and read the last chapter before continuing on? (I admittedly do with some books... with a certain kind of book I have to know what sort of a return I'm going to get on my investment.)

So I'm glad I said I'll taste it, I'll give it a whirl, cause now I am a book clubby girl, uh-oh, I said I'll taste it, I'll give it a whirl, cause now I am a book clubby girl!

#1:

simple mathematics

my desk is right by the front doors to the office suite + our office suite is right by 4 elevators + the elevators are very busy + upon "landing," they ring this bell that sounds almost exactly like the front desk bell at my previous job, but a little bit more like the ghetto blaster microwave we had at home until i was 11...

=

i'm craving microwave popcorn and keep having the impulse to get up and see who's waiting to be helped with insurance needs.

P.S. to previous post:

*i loved e's audacity...maybe not so much that she'd use it on ME, but i love that she had the audacity to use her role as the eldest to better her life. there comes a time when we all gotta just look out for #1.

*and, the hike up mt. kilimanjaro's likeness was completely worth the time spent at the sparkling beach.

when i was but a lass i shared a room with my darling older sister. she was my hero, she was everything i wished i could beeee, and i could fly higher than an eagle, cause she was the wind beneath my wings....

one thing i admired was her brains. another thing was her self-awareness. and another thing was her audacity to use and abuse the prowess of her age and wisdom on her well intending and ADORAble younger sister, i.e. ME. i would venture a guess that on an average of 5 nights a week as we drifted off to the visionary land of sugar plums, i would get the massage request. she was so sneaky at it. with the pillow smushed against her ample cheek, she would begin her back pain campaign.

"merzyyy?"

"yes?"

"my back hurts so bad. i had to like, run to school today with my math book AND my social science book in my backpack. i am sooooo sore."

"but lizzy, i'm almost asleep."

"just 5 minutes...pleeeease? i'll give you a massage for 10 minutes when you're through."

*note: my back was in near perfect condition. i pin it on the 4 months of ballet classes i whined through as a 5 year old, but my posture was flawless and my back never bothered me, nary a twinge. therein lies the sneakiness of elizabeth. she knew to promise me something that wouldn't hurt or help me, so if she never paid up i wouldn't really care.

"but i don't need a massage, elizabeth."

"i promise it'll be good for you. loosen up the muscles. my back hurts, come on."

in the end, i would climb over from my trundle bed to hers, and 5 minutes would inevitably turn into 20, by which time elizabeth would have hit a heavy REM cycle, from which even a fog horn could not wake her. and i wouldn't really mind, because i hadn't really cared for a massage when my muscles were never tight to begine with. i was happy to oblige deep down, despite my complaints, because she was my hero, and she let me tag along ad nauseum et infinitum.

however.

i figure she owes me a good 390 hours of massages.

i climbed 200 vertical stairs then a mountain to return to our parked car on this last saturday's beach excursion. this with a purse and a beach bag beladen with trashy magazines and an idiotic vampire book and a 7-11 purchase, now that can tighten a muscle or 2. and i have some belongings left behind in vegas that i definitely have not forgotten.

elizabeth, consider the massage debts called in!

world's smallest skim boarder

yesterday at the beach we saw this little toddler-ish boy. he looked like a 2.5 year old mogli fromthe jungle book, was just chewin the fat with men 20 years older than him about the poor surfing conditions, and sauntering around the surf with his skim board. muy cute.

today's dazzles

1) i found my new favorite beach. i'd say which beach we went to, but it was demure and uncrowded and fanciful and if i say the exact plot, then shucks, millions will know about it and it'll be like, so freaking congested (i love indirectly fluffing my ego).

1.5) i got buried in the sand for the first time in my life. glad i did it. news flash: it's all fun and games till you're covered in heavy, damp sand, and somewhere down by your stilled fingers you feel something alive and lurking around...then you say, "hey, uh, i think there's a bug crawling around down here with me..." and someone refutes that, reassuring, "nah, it's probably just the sand settling..." and then katie says, "or it's one of these things," and points with her toe to this clear-ish, ugly, NO-business-crawling-by-my-immobile-self bug that's zipping across the mound of sand which covers my torso. no sir, no quick fix there.at least i could communicate my concerns better than this guy:
2) at 7-11 i had a (mostly caffeine free) diet coke with hazelnut flavoring put in. dericious!

3) i returned 3 items to stores from which i currently have no business purchasing items. gene kelly's immortal words, "dignity. always dignity" could be turned into, "self control. always self control."

4) very liberating moment: i think anthropologie has some great ideas on what to wear. i think anthropologie has some great ideas on how to help you go broke in a jiffy. i have realized, after many trips over there to ogle and try on their products, that they also have great ideas for making clothes that don't fit my body type. carved for a different goose and gander. SO, i am free! free at last! i no longer have to sit and wish i had millions of dollars to shop there. i feel like i just got out of a really unhealthy relationship or something. until i have want to start decorating a house or something, and then the cupboard knobs alone make me swoon.

17) it's good to be here in california. it's just a happy place!

5) and yes, yes, michael f/phelps the champion of our lives. he reminds me and mom of cam, which makes me thoroughly miss him. and morgan freeman is apparently psychic, because RIGHT after mikey (as i have affectionately christened him) won his gold numero ocho, there was a GO WORLD commercial with morgan at the narration helm talking about how we'd need new adjectives for the glory thereof. how'd he do that (the omniscience stuff)?!

6) i saw a commercial for a new tv show kath and kim with selma blair and...some guy that looked so familiar...then i realized it's THE CHEEZITS GUY FROM THE DAVID BLAINE SPOOF ON YOUTUBE!!! the power of one...one youtube video.

i'm the king of the woooorld!

every time i think i don't really like working FOR someone else, which is a lot, my mind starts to pitter patter over options where I would be the big enchilada.

here's what i've come up with today:

-painting houses. inside or out, i care not. i'd listen to my ipod, min' m' bidness, get an arm work out so i can maybe one day ask someone if they got their tickets to the gun show.
-move to costa rica and open up a pulperria, which is basically a mini mart attached to your house where you sell anything from individual chocolates to plantains to coke lite to karate belts to plastic necklaces to breast pumps (the last piece of merchandise was in the chinese-owned pulperria/internet cafe in my first area).
-buy a golden spoon, which i probably would but to afford one i'd have to marry for riches, and by becoming such an one as a gold digger, i wouldn't need to work anymore. also golden spoon isn't franchising any further right now.
-buy millions of vending machines and put them in office parks like the one i currently sit in, where everyone is so weighed down by the dolldrums of the grind that their sugar intake is so incredibly high that at any given moment they are 0.8 seconds away from slipping into a diabetic coma. then i sit back and watch the quarters and the dollah bills roll through the slots. excellent, smithers.

phone interview

cut her off regularly, smothered on my cheery enthusiasm, and now i'm starting tomorrow.

J.K.I.

J.K.I.

ever since i watched that 60 minutes on sleep deprivation, which taught that, under no uncertain conditions, sleepers of few hours will have miserable, forgetful, fatty, frumpy, grumpy existences, i've been quite the bed-on-time enthusiast.  and yet, here i am at midnight, wide awake and considering embarking on a myriad of activities (dying my hair or watching a feature length film or burning cds for pals) before i have a date with mr. sandman.  why???

because i have nary an obligation tomorrow.  because, get this: i didn't interrupt/talk enough!!!

wait i'm just going to say it again because i can't believe it's even true.  i.  didn't.  talk (?). enough!

today i had an interview at a ridiculously successful architectural firm that, quite honestly, had me all glittery and twinkly.  i would be editing, which made the happiness alarm in my head start wailing, "HAHA!  me and a red pen!"  i was drunk off the bounty of possibilities.  

i can talk the cap off a pen.  if i'm next to a person with whom i have something in common i get all excited.  i'm like jojo the idiot circus boy with his pretty new pet.  the pet is my possible sale.  oh my pretty little pet, i love you.  so i stroke it, and i pet it........

[nervous giggle] just kidding.  or at least i hope i have a minimal amount of things in common with tommy boy.

but anyway i've felt lately that no matter my enthusiasm level, no matter how many things i have to interject, moments of similar opinion or experience, whatEVer, i should zip my lips and wait until i believe the other party has completely rung out their idea's sponge before i jump i with my 200 cents.  it all comes back to that self control thing my mom's so good at.  i've wondered lately if i cut people off too much, and if i do, that's a level of selfishness from which even i am ready to step down.

and tragically, today was day #1 of that project hush-hush-merzy.   

and tragically, today was day #1 of that biting me big time, as my feedback in my job-letting-down was that this translated into a lack of interest and passion.  and they gave it to someone who seemed really excited.  i'm not accustomed to getting turned down on the job i want.  it stung/k.  i almost stole a line from sense and sensibility and said, "i shall brook no refusals!"  if they only KNEW the firecrackers that had erupted up to my esophagus as they told me what i'd be doing and as i knew how experienced i am with it all.  as i imagined working in their heavenly edifice, scratching out errors with my blood-red pen, sprucing and gutting their verbiage to my heart's delightful indulgence, alongside guapo, brainy architects, 2 inches from where friends' offices and fashion island with the paranoid fish pond.

lesson learned: J.K.I.  Just Keep Interrupting.  i'm making stickers.  maybe that'll be my new job.  if i'm self employed i get to wear jeans every day -- christmas bonus!

lesson learned: after a 5 minute panic of self-doubt and "why did i quit my job and move when the economy is VICIOUS?!" i realized, "hey, i have a loosey goosey day tomorrow.  i'll sleep in...maybe get 10 hours!  i can finish that blasted book i won't openly admit i'm reading.  i have sunny skies, an empty house, a pool, a beach...."  

and now i'm off to paint my nails.  

just for the record:

1) i do know that the olympian michael is a PHELPS, i just spelled it with an F in the previous post because i'm so impetuous.  isn't it great?

2) driving in CA is a much bigger headache than driving in vegas.  everyone in vegas drives like a maniac, so it works out great because i'm not a GOOD driver, i just drive like everything's emergent and rushed.  and the coppers just truthfully have bigger fish to fry, so they pull you over about as often as a cactus sings an italian aria.  such was the driving delight of vegas.

irvine's a bit different.  your road neighbors go more erratically slowly.  the red lights have this love affair with my car, or i think they do, because i hit every single one. i just want a reason why i hit every red light, that's the one i'll go with.  and when you're zipping through town rushing to an interview, you're about to go into cardiac arrest.  this seems to be caused by the fact that the car in front of you, to the left of you, to the right of you, and yes, the car behind you, is a porsche, a german something or other, a corvette (blech), and a BMW, so the prospect of smashing one with your scion xA is ten times more terrifying.  i can't remember the details of my insurance policy right now, but i know i pay next to nothing for it so a car accident should just not happen right now.

3) i feel like OMH my life's so perf right now.  EFY CLAP!

it's the little things that get me:

1) arriving in irvine without getting a speeding ticket.

2) tasting mom's freshly conujured engrish toffee.

3) feeling my hair get 3 to 7% poofier for the sudden spike in humidity level.

4) watching the household name MICHAEL FELPS get another crop of gold with my own sleepy little eyeballs.  my olympic curse has been lifted!

5) talking in the hallway with lindsey for approximately 45 minutes when we should have been going to sleep.  i think tired conversation is the best and the worst because everything's funny but then you don't have your wits about you to say, "hey.  going sleep.  night."  you just keep chatting about the non-mysteries of the universe....

6) dumping all my stuff in my room, wanting to vomit over witnessing how much crap i have accumulated, then making a path to my bed and putting all the crap that had previously been deposited on my bed into niece's port-a-crib that's still set up in my room from the end of may when they were here for cam's farewell, sifting through post-haste to find my "interviewee ensemble" for tomorrow.  ah, a bed is made available once again, a responsible looking outfit saved from the wrinkle monster.

ok i'm going to bed.  incoherency imminent.  

p.s. my friend and now-former co-worker made me a "moody and contemplative road trip cd" and it has an acoustic BBC radio version of clocks by coldplay that will change your universe.  ken, you're the bomb to the diggety.

last day in vegas: the leavitts will be the end of me

me and my going away gift: my very own freaking bum...bun....bonk....no, bunt cake.

if you're ever in vegas, be sure and get yourself a "nothing but bunt-cake" as they are quite dericious.

i love my leavitt people.

last day in vegas: anti-goodbyer

does anyone really enjoy a goodbye? i suppose we all enjoy goodbyeing the bad situations in life.

but vegas hasn't been a bad situation. quite the contrary. i've loved the last 11 months and 1 day i've lived here. i just feel ready to move on to a new spin on the old orange county where my momma and daddy done raised me. it's a-singin my name, and i am not one to stand on good feelings and brimming opportunities.

3 things i love about today, the last day in vegas:

-lindsey's living in cam's room for a month until we find a nice boho-chic place close enough to the ocean so that i can officially say, "you can't swing a dead cat without hitting a lifeguard tower." i really like knowing that she will be there with my mom and dad when i roll into town tonight.

-this morning my mom said to me on the phone, "welllll...maybe you could stay till november or something!" they know it's better for everyone if i have my own little plot of land to call my own, but it makes me feel fuzzy that my parents still consider me such a rock star that they want me to stick around and soak them for free rent, food, and laundry services. my parents are indeed themselves rock stars.
-every move savors of high school graduation. i loved graduating from high school, so it's fun to have the nostalgia running thick in my blood stream.

3 things i despise about today, my last day in vegas:

-i can't do goodbyes. i have to keep it to "see you later"s. i am sure i will see some people later, but i know in the cavities of my soul i won't see everyone. it's like in costa rica after my first transfer ended with saying DESPEDIDOS to everyone to whom i'd said so much as "hola," and i cry at all the wrong times, and i know it'll be many years before we see each other again, if in this life at all...it's just horrible. horrible horrible. i vowed i'd sneak away every other transfer as a thief in the night. i did, and it worked like a charm. no painful, sobby, or not sobby when they should be goodbyes or even "see you later"s. i can't quite pull that off today. they all know i'm takin off.

last night i gave my nephew and niece hugs goodnight,

not sure if i would be able to squeeze in one last stop at their house today, and big, crocodile tears were pouring from my face. i couldn't say anything for knowing that would release giant sobs, and i'm known in my family to be a non-cute crier. nephew looked a little startled, niece didn't really notice the make up disheveling that was taking place.

me and nephew almost a year ago when i first moved to las begas.

sitting here at 9:18 in the morning knowing at 5:00pm i'm going to have to say goodbye to loads of people whose association i have guzzled up the last year, really really puts a damper on it all.

*moment for my religion: yesterday i taught relief society, which was about consolation in the time of death. it was a happy lesson. with the knowledge we have of what happens to our eternal souls after death, "we can learn how to live and we can learn how to die." i am happy to know death is the furthest thing from a quiet, stifled end. i kept thinking while nobody's dying here today, i'm just moving one state over, i'm so thankful for the time when we all just get to BE together. there are other people i've had to say goodbye to before, and i'm still quite perturbed about it. there are so many people to whom i've said the last couple of weeks, "well just move to irvine with me!" not plausible. i know i can't have everyone around all at once, and even if i could, we have stuff to keep us busy, kinks to smooth out, etc. distractions from the real happy place, which for me is just TIME with ALL the lovelies. is that too much to ask??? someday, it really won't be! i love knowing that everything that matters most to us in this life, everything we spend our time cultivating, will continue to matter and grow after we "sink asleep in Jesus."*

-i have an ottoman. i have an ottoman the size of an 8 year old that i need to fit in my car which is roughly the size of an edamame pod. then i need to fit most of my clothes, my vitamins, my books, my comforter....i'm starting to panic just thinking about how much of a non-planner i am that i didn't think about the ottoman before and how yes, i may have toted it home from target successfully, but that's when i wasn't hauling the rest of my junk with it. wheeze, cough, wheeze. my friend asked me a few days ago if i was packed, and i scoffed and said "no way." and he scoffed and said, "it took me 3 days to pack the last time i moved!" and then i said, "well that's because you're classical and i'm jazz." now in this moment i love mozart and i hate miles.

-i haven't seen any of the olympics yet, and know that because i'll be cramming objects into my car or sitting myself in my car, i'll not be able to watch any tonight.

i have an olympic curse.

when i was 14 and kerri strugg did that apparently terrific, gold winning american jumpy thing, i was in summer school and helping math "tutor" (guess) my friend andi on the phone while the TV blared downstairs. i was deeply engrossed (for the first time in my life) and then all of a sudden she shrieked into the phone, "WE WON! THE US WON WOMEN'S GYMNASTICS!" i heard my family cheer downstairs. i missed it. and even though they oft replayed the jumpy balance beam thingy that is now the stuff of legends, every SINGLE time they did this i was distracted, and now 12 years later i have yet to see the full show. everyone was talking about it for months. [kick pebble on ground in petulant 6 year old frustration]

last night when i came home some friends were there watching michael phelps' bit of athletic brilliance. they rewound a bit of it to show me. a LOVELY girl, who is so great i just want to wrap her up and put her in my pocket, accidentally changed the channel when the race was just about to flaunt sir phelps' skill, thus erasing the "build up" my DVR had worked at, and it wasn't recording.

my bit of saving grace: youtube.

now just for fun: i saw these on a 2 month old baby on friday and just about had an ulcer of joy, wonderment, and awe.

see you in the land of the happy cows.

last week in las vegas: they'll never really be rid of me.

living in vegas has meant i have had the chance to bond with my nephew and niece like i always wanted to. christmas bonus!

i love them ever so.

last week in las vegas: tribute to norma

it would be a great time to work behind the counter at a gas station mini mart. or at least that's what norma makes it seem like.

as the sun sets on my time in vegas, lashing its fury and licking my heels with its dripping temperatures to the very last, i find myself cherishing time in familiar places like the gas station mini mart that kisses my office parking lot. since i walk to it from behind, i don't even know what the exact name of this little spot is, i just know they sell sinclair gas to the masses on the corner of charleston and buffalo, and they had the good fortune long ago of meeting norma, a willing and hopeful employee, and they snatched her up good.

for the last 11 months i have click clacked over there at least once a day for a diet soda, perhaps a "2/$0.50" baggie of candy corn, or if it's a bad day, a zipping bag of planter's trail mix at an outrageous "take me for a ride because i'm desperate" sort of price. and every day i've gotten a "hello, sweetie, how are you?" heavy on the jersey accent, from norma.

norma has fluffy gray hair parted down the middle, and wears the same maroon polo shirt every day, as the gas station uniform dictates. she's overall shaped like a grape, but for all the attention and loyalty she gets you'd think surely she were jessica simpsonn or some other silver screen siren.   every morning a stream of males come in alongside me.  some of them are headed off to a construction site to sweat it out all day long on a balance beam.  some of them look like they've done so much crack for so long they'll momentarily blow away in the wind or at the very least start muttering profanities to beat the band.  and some are dressed in well cut, stiff shirts and ties.  no matter where they're headed, they bee line to norma and wrap their arms around her, sometimes planting a smoochy smooch on her cheek or forehead.  i think my favorite was when a latin man of small, stocky stature, snuck up from behind and wrapped his arms around her as she restocked the cheetos.  then he hoisted her a few inches off the ground and said, "mmmmorning norma!"  then he picked up his 20 ounce can of beer, paid, and was out the door.  i know many grown men who don't make it a habit of showing such affection to their mothers.  but for norma, it is to be shown, no way around it.  while i haven't taken our friendship to the hug level (large radius of personal space), i'm sure if i ever needed a hug she would be loathed to deny me one.

i am also pretty sure she is a workaholic, because she doesn't seem to leave that mini-mart.  about once or twice a month i'll have an enrollment meeting i must translate for which begins at approximately 6AM.  i almost always drive with my office manager, and we meet in our vacant office parking lot.  i know, it's like seminary except it lacks the presence of the Spirit, and i get paid for it.  sometimes i'll stumble into the mini-mart before the meeting, and who's there reading a cheesy romance novel behind the counter?  norma.  a few times i've filled up with gas after work, and it's norma who's still there at 5:30PM to accept my cash.  norma lives and breathes her mini-mart, and happily so.

she's calm and doesn't care, but she does.  she don't take no crap from nobody who's trying to buy ciggies without showing an ID.  she knows who's coming in for the bathroom key before they can say a word and forks it.  a cheery grin is included in all transactions, unless you look like a smart alec, in which case she'll obliterate your smirk with a smirk of her own.  norma is the boss.  she's mrs. weasley mixed with fran drescher mixed with the donald.  she's got snacks within reach at any given moment, she's got pals, she's got opinions, she's got power.  

which is why i was glad i threw up into her trash can this morning of all the trash cans in vegas.  i should have seen it coming, i've thrown up enough the last couple years to last 3 lifetimes.  reason implies i'd be able to accurately estimate to the very second when my stomach's going to say, "SORRY, SUCKAH!"  but all i knew was that as i stood there, filling a cup of diet coke (indeed, i got addicted to it on my mission trying to soothe my violent stomach with the carbonation, and now i love the stuff to an almost unnatural degree), i wished to be laying on the floor in p-a-i-n.  and then 2 seconds later i whirled around and tossed it all into the rubbish bin to the right of the soda fountain.  an elderly man restocking FUZE bottles in a nearby fridge case gasped a la jennifer love hewitt.  norma was right on the scene, "oh, i'm so sorry, honey, here i've got napkins for you."  she asked questions, directed me around the store, and then i was cleaned up and on my way to report i wouldn't be coming in to work today.  

good old norma.  i wish all my diet coke providers could get the cheers theme song stuck in my head.

last week in vegas: verifying info on hotel high rollers

sometimes i have a picture in my mind of what someone looks like before i see or meet them. sometimes i'm dead on (danielle steele) and sometimes i'm yards away from accuracy (steve miller).

i was was spot on for steve wynn. punto!

last week in vegas: jordi's pool and a christmas miracle

this face is the "bunny rabbit who's just ransacked a crystal meth lab" face.

ah, m' gals.
the christmas miracle of 2008.

you know your office has reached subzero temperatures when:

-you still make daily use of your space heater in the desert's summer months.
-you pick up papers fresh off the printer and hug them close to your goose-bumped being.

the mother stallion

i give a sunday's evening high 5 to my sister elizabeth.

 

here's why: she's mucho pregnant and currently standing on her tile floor (oh the aching feet!) measuring squares for her quintessential-soccer-mom quilt, at 10:00 at night, singing mr. brightside by the killers a la opera.  wait, now she's scatting it.  and now she's bobbing her head along with her own tune, and when i tried to interrupt her she ssh-ed me to better focus on the musical task at hand.  

and she told me a story a little while ago about calling her health insurance provider to clear up some hogwash discrepancy.  i actually have worked a lot with this particular insurance carrier, and know what they weren't being fair and "code following."  the story goes that after elizabeth asked the chronically unhelpful insurance person if she could speak with someone in management, she said, "no, you can't talk to nobody."  in this funny little accent that elizabeth did that was, in fact, quite hilarious.  and do you KNOW what elizabeth did?  she widened her eyes, took a deep breath and moved on with life.  that's why she's elizabeth: a true mother stallion.

*yes i realize that we used to call steve ubl in high school a stallion, but he was the iTALIan stallion, because we were so clever. and anyway, she's the MOTher stallion.

thou shalt not covet. woops!

i'm obsessed with turtlenecks. this just might be a stroke of genius (just add length and presto!), and i would consider turning thief for it.

this little number 4

tomorrow this comes out. and while the healthy-as-a-jellyfish-sting quality of the vampire+human relationship is something i don't like, the twilight series is something i will most likely see through to the end. i have to know what happens. kinda like LOST. lots of things that irk and lots of the ridiculous, but i can't bail now! i read the 1st, the end of the 2nd (i couldn't handle seeing her melt down like that when the vampire dumped her cold), and the end of the 3rd. and now at midnight one of my co-workers/friends is going to be THERE at barnes and noble, cash in hand, ready to slap it on the counter in exchange for her front row seat to the conclusion (i hope?) of the "relationship that is too passionate to exist in this world."

it reminds me of the summer's eve in 2000 when the 4th harry potter book came out. i hadn't yet been singed by the harry potter flame, but i had been charbroiled by the flame of "I'M A GRADUATING HIGH SCHOOL SENIOR HEADING UP TO P-TOWN IN 3 MONTHS AND I'LL STAY OUT LATE IF I WANT TO!" without question the #1 topic of disharmony between my parent's and i was the topic of curfew. for about a year i'd felt too mature and old to have one, they SO were not in accord. it went about like this: 12:01 am return home = warm smile and "goodnight" from my mum. 12:15 am = "merzyyyyy, you're late, and i was worried about you." 12:30 am = lecture. 12:45 am or later = my parents might have commissioned elizabeth to prowl the streets of irvine looking for me either dead or still at a friend's house. then when i'm not dead i get either the "i'm disappointed in you" silence from dad (10 times worse than any lecture, and knowingly so) or a "consequence" and a 3948 minute lecture from mom.

anyhow on this june evening i happened to be rolling up to my digs in my geo prism at 12:50 in the am. i turned off the ignition and audibly groaned. i could see my parent's bedroom light on, and the family room's too. bad, bad, bad. my mind got busy conjuring all sorts of valid excuses/rationalizations. "in 3 months i'm going to live somewhere else entirely, and you won't have any clue if i'm home at 12 or 2, and you'll still be able to sleep! just pretend that's already what's happening!" or "i'm hanging out with lani and ben bollard, what, do you think we're rolling doobies or something??" "i'm 18!!! the US government finds me capable of making decisions about how much sleep i need, but my own parents don't?!"

i was on a roll when i opened the front door, smiling slightly to myself over the snappy rhetoric i was about to zing them with. i was all the way into the kitchen when i realized mom hadn't been standing at the top of the stairs, leaning over the banister. dad wasn't in his recliner in the family room. i checked every room in the house to find that i was the only living thing there. the dinner plates where still on the table and in the sink, the back yard door was open ajar, something was definitely fishy. i panicked. had they been kidnapped? they'd been kidnapped! oh no, my family is gone and some bounty hunter's taken them from me! my lovely parents, my dear, compassionate, kind parents, why did i have to be such a stinky, obstinate teenager?! that's all i was, a teenager who barely knew how to tie her shoe strings! my sister elizabeth, so wise beyond her years, so clever and talented, why did i always steal her clothes?! sarah, sarah sunshine, princess sarah, why did i insist on teasing her so cruelly and making fun of her n'sync obsession???? and cameron, my little/huge camer, never hurt a flea in his young life, and now, in the hands of some ne'er-do-well law-laugher!!! gone, gone, GONE!!!

i grabbed the cordless phone, and just as i went to the 9 in the 911, the front door opened and i heard 5 squealing, chipper voices.

"hello??? you guys?!?!"

"MERZY! WE WENT TO THE BARNES AND NOBLE MIDNIGHT RELEASE OF HARRY POTTER AND THE GOBLET OF FIRE!!!"

i hugged em all, and then i could have killed them.

merry twilight, everyone.