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While watching Project Runway last night, I couldn’t help but admire Heidi Klum for the zillionth time. She’s just drop dead gorgeous – and without being scary skinny. (The gossip mags have shown her working out all over NYC lately – lady? It’s paying off.)

Her career is off the charts, even as she’s creeping up on her 40s – and it ain’t easy for a model to make the transition off the runway to something else lucrative and not sad or trivial. Her kids are impossibly adorable, and she and Seal seem to be one of the few celebrity couples who have a truly healthy marriage – and are still nuts about each other to boot.

Well, aren't you two just vomitously cute?

And the worst part is: she’s so darn sweet that jealous as I am, I can’t even hate her. In fact, I utterly adore her.

WTF, Klum?

(Disclaimer: I’m in no way saying these are the things (career, love, kids) that every person should want. But as they seem to be what she wanted, I think it’s fair to say she has an exceptionally well-rounded life, and has successfully managed the balance between career and family, which I think we can agree is award-worthy all on its own.)

Anyway! I was thinking of all this… but then I checked myself before I wrecked myself, because my eyes are a lovely green, but my ‘tude doesn’t need to match them. And more importantly, I remembered this little nugget: nothing’s ever as perfect as it seems. I’m sure there are certain aspects Heidi hates about her job, something that Seal constantly does that drive her nuts, mundane or annoying things she wishes she could change about her day to day life.

And it occurred to me that I might even seem the same way, were someone looking in through the windowpane into the sunshiney breakfast nook area of my own life. Since landing the job I worked so hard for in January, things have certainly fallen into place in a way they never have before. I have the career, the incredible friends, the lover, and the kids (even if they are four-legged). Sure, I’m not a world famous or fabulously rich supermodel… but at the end of the day, my biggest problem is the 10 pounds I’d kill to lose and how to manage my hair in this disgusting DC summer humidity. It’s a good place to be, to put it mildly.

And even now, I sit here, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

How effed is that? Finally everything falls into place, so I sit here, poised, preparing for the next valley to follow this peak. Rather than sitting back and enjoying everything I’ve made for myself, I’m counting down the minutes until something horrible happens. I know it’s crazy, and probably more than a little unhealthy, but I can’t help it.

Do you do this? Does Heidi? How do you shut your brain up and make it smell the f#^%*#@ing roses?

Mama said share.

Great deals on magazine subscriptions with no auto renewals.

So, you all know that I started a lovely new job in January. (And if you don’t, consider yourself EDUCATED, fool!!)

Said lovely new job involves a bit of travel. One and two day trips to consult with clients around the country; a conference here and there. At first, I was excited. “I’m so Big Time!”, I thought. “I’ll get to visit e-friends all over, see new cities, huzzah!”

Anyone who’s ever had to travel for work would now like to tell me one thing:

I’m an idiot.

Work travel is basically everything that’s stressful about a vacation, except, yanno… minus the vacation. You agonize over what to pack, only times a bazillion because it’s FOR YOUR JOB. You worry about being late, only times a bazillion because it’s FOR YOUR JOB. You actually have to shower in the morning, only times a bazillion because it’s FOR YOUR JOB. (What?)

In a nutshell, it’s travel without sun, sand, skis, or wine. Hopefully at the end of the day there is a job well done, and maybe HBO in the hotel (but never Bravo, WTF?!) – but that’s about it.

Now, I’m not complaining. Because even considering all that, traveling to meet with clients is still pretty cool, frankly. And I love my job, so putting a checkbox in the “great meeting!” box feels fantastic.

It’s just, you know… stressy and such.

(For those of you who were following my journey to Wisconsin on Twitter yesterday, which totally involved me DRIVING A CAR, LIKE, FOR THE FIRST TIME IN FOUR-ISH YEARS??? … I’m alive! So is everyone else who I encountered on the road! The car is even intact!)

And, as a bonus, I had dinner with the absolutely hysterical and extremely freaking talented Jenn of Ex Hot Girl, who then- probably due to the multiple boozy beverages I plied her with- took me to her studio to just, you know, shoot some headshots for fun. Because that’s what awesome fun people who are also photogs do, apparently. And in less than three minutes (no, seriously) – the girl made me look like this:

Click here to see her professional site/portfolio

If you need a headshot for social media (or anything else), wedding/engagement photos, etc – please check her out! She does travel and she IS amazing. Thank you Jenn!!!

Mama said share.

If you follow my tweets, you know I’ve been in the great outdoors for the past few days. While we are “cabin-ing”, not camping, with a couple friends in Shenandoah, it’s still been much more nature-y than I’m used to.

When we walked across the lawn- yes, lawn- for the first time, heading down to the river with our canoes (who am I??), I actually couldn’t remember the last time I’d felt a whole plot of grass under my feet. At least, one not littered with the homeless and stray chicken wings.

Yesterday was spent touring a few of the local wineries, which was delightful… at first. By the time we got to the third one, we were running out of adjectives with which to pepper our banter with the taste-givers. Let’s face it, you can only say the words “bold”, “earthy” and “full-bodied” so many times before even you start to hate yourself. So, we decided to branch out from the average descriptions and make things a little more interesting.

I believe I started it off when I declared a light red table wine “whimsical and flighty”… and it just plain snowballed from there. (I believe the increasing ridiculousness would most likely directly correlate with the number of tastings ingested. Shocking, I know.)

Some of the phrases we quite seriously deadpanned at our poor taste-givers, as well as a few brainstormed around the fire last night:

“naive, yet playful”

“reclusive, with hints of confidence”

“the finish has a sense of immortality”

“positively existential”

“dirty… even sinful”

“starts out with a bit of agony, finishing with a sense of euphoria”

“slightly prepubescent at first…”

“a note of spoonerism in the nose…”

“very cosmic… gives a real sense of animalistic sensuality”

“the nose cajoles you to drink more”

“very boastful!”

“almost iambically diabolic.”

“claims your palette with a hint of dirt”

And finally, the crown jewel from B:

“No wine is an island unto itself.”

Mama said share.

You know how people always claim that they hold everything inside, pretend everything’s fine when it’s not, until the very last possible moment, when they can’t POSSIBLY hold it in anymore?

Yeah.

That ain’t me.

I’m the kind of person where when something happens to me, it happens to my whole goddamn world. No one escapes it.*

I had no idea when I wrote this post about Liz Lemon-ing my way through jury duty selection… I had NO idea what the next two weeks would hold in store for me.

The benevolent judge looked me in the eye, and asked if there was any reason I could not be a fair and impartial juror.

Oh, how I wish I could have lied.

But I couldn’t. I didn’t.

And eight days later, I set a man, a man accused of shooting an 18 year old girl through the heart, a man I believe to be a killer in cold blood…

I set him free.

Yes, there were twelve of us. Yes, we did what the law instructed us to do.

Yet somehow, we all know justice wasn’t served on Tuesday, April 12th, 2010.

I don’t believe in God. But somehow, I believe that poor girl’s sister when she said it’s in his hands now.

Maybe in some way, karma and God are the same principle.

Eventually, the nightmares will stop. With time, the victim’s mother’s tears, the prosecutor dropping to her knees at our verdict… they’ll fade from my memory.

But to that young, beautiful girl who had her entire future ahead of her…

I will never forget you.

None of us will, we dozen who held the opportunity to make your brutal and senseless death just the *tiniest* bit right, in our oh so very tied hands…

And failed you.

*(Dear B, you are a saint. Smooches.)

Mama said share.

Sorry. The “aughts” was just such a great name. It’s going to be hard to let go.

Anyhoo. I think resolutions are for quitters, or something, so I’ll be doing these MY WAY.

Which is, of course, totes different from the way I ever do anything else.

(B, I can hear you laughing.)

My (Not-So-Resolution-y) Resolutions.

1. Start wearing more bling.

I’ve never been good at wearing accessories, be it of the sparkly/shiny, nail polishy, or badass hat/scarf/insert other French thing here. I HAVE them, it just never occurs to me to WEAR them. Matching is hard, yo. Most mornings I’m just trying to remember to wear a bra and some mascara, never mind make sure I have my brown watch on with my gold earrings, or whatevs. But I could probably stand to look a bit more, ahem, put together.

Either that, or start working from home and never, ever wear pants again.

God, option two sounds GREAT.

2. Call my sister more.

She’s pretty awesome. And she’s the only one I’ve got. And she gives me MAD SHIT when she calls me and I don’t answer and then email her back a month later with a link to some tardy cat video. I know, redic. Fine, woman. I will call you every damn day and ask you alllllllllll about your JOB SEARCH (holla? Anyone in Beantown hiring a genius, incredibly funny 23 year old?) and your LOVE LIFE and your BOWEL MOVEMENTS until you’re screening my calls because you don’t want your friends to hear me yelling about your stools. So there.

Love you mean it.

3. Never, ever, ever drink Firefly sweet tea vodka again.

No, really. NO, REALLY. I am still hungover from Saturday. That stuff rips me up. Firefly going in, FIRE coming out. Just sayin. *dies of death*

In fact, I think I may take January off from drinking, in honor of both shrinking my ass, and this awesome Scottish dude I used to work with in a Maggiano’s who always did it “just to make sure he still could”. I’m pretty sure Scottish dudes are wise, or something. Especially ones with as many awesome “this guyyyyyy!!!!!” jokes as he had.

4. FOUR? Whoa, whoa, whoa, little overachiever. Let’s take this slow. Mama’s still hungover, remember??

Happy New Year, lovers.

P.S. Did you vote for me yet in the 20SB Bootlegger Awards? You totally can. Til Sunday. I won’t even get mad. Swear.

Mama said share.

I’ve been waiting to share this oh-so-LiLu moment with you guys for a couple weeks, partly because it’s humiliating, and partly because it’s taken me that long to go back and get a very necessary picture for full-effect-y-ness and all that. Shocking, I know.

SO.

It was a particularly grey day, the nasty kind where it’s sort of misting sideways, you know? DC has been ROCKING those lately.

Dear Weather Spirits: Please stop. Or at least make it SNOW so we can have a day off, yes?

It had been one of those, how do you say, “looooooooooong days” at the office, and all I wanted in life was to be on the couch with these fools. I dashed through the disgusting, frizzy-hair inducing mess outside towards my bus stop, and quick-like-a-bunny’d up underneath the protective shelter area with the other sopping wet Washingtonians.

As I shook out my umbrella while simultaneously trying to look up when the next bus was coming (thanks to Restaurant Refugee for showing me http://wmata.com/mobile !), I suddenly realized that I was, quite rudely, standing directly in front of someone and boxing them against the wall of the crowded (emphasis on crowded, here) shelter.

I whipped around, very clearly exclaiming,

“Oh my goodness, I’m so sorry! I didn’t… see you.. OH.”

Because I had just realized that I was apologizing to a quite famous lady…

ON AN ADVERTISEMENT.

With many, many witnesses around to see.

Yup… no doubt about it. I had just publicly- and loudly- apologized for standing in front of an ad for the Joy Behar Show.

In front of, oh, a dozen or so Washington business-types.

I AM SO AWESOME.

At least it wasn’t Hassel-butt…

I know, Rosie. I KNOW.

Sigh. I need a cup of cocoa and a hug.

***I’m going to decide whether tomorrow will be a Post Secret-style TMI Thursday based on how many entries I get, so send ‘em in now! Instructions here.***

Mama said share.

We all know how this game goes… basically, whenever my friends get so offensive it shocks even me, I save it in my cute little “Shiz” gmail folder to share with you at a later date, entirely at their expense.

Love it.

Past “Shiz My Friends Say” here.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Lexa was less than thrilled when she saw this picture of me from my Costa Rica album… and it wasn’t because of my massive sunburn.

New comment on your post

Author : lemmonex

Comment:  Please tell me you did not PET those mongrels. 

I responded by chat…

Me: there were multiple times we were sitting at dinner and i had feral cats SNUGGLED in my lap
Lexa: OMG
Me: hahaha
Lexa: i am sorry but that is really gross
Me: i know
Lexa: no hugs for you
Me: i washed my hands!
Lexa: those scabies burrow
Me: i’ll let you know if it starts itching
Lexa: gross
Me: they wanted pets!
  who am i to deny them pets!
Lexa: uh huh
  when all your hair starts falling out
  and you start frothing at the vagina
  those pets will not be cute
Me: FROTHING AT THE VAGINA
  hahahahahahaha
Lexa: ha
   thats for shiz your friends say material there
Me: oh i already flagged it

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

You should know that my friends Katie and brad have a good-sized mutt that everyone in their “up and coming” DC neighborhood refers to as a “WOLF DOG!!!” whenever they take him for a walk.

Me: okay 
  you will appreciate this 
  i was just walking through my hood
Katie: uh huh
Me: girl sitting outside at a coffee shop has a huge dog with her 
  boxer or something
  the halfway house is next door 
  one of the guys leans over the fence 
  and yells at her
  “i thought they outlawed ponies in this neighborhood!!!!”
Katie: HAHAHAHA!
  that absolutely beats wolfdog
Me: i mean he was being playful 
  but i just died 
  and all I could think was WOLF DOG
Katie: hahaha
   i get it EVERY time we walk
  either directly or i can hear it being whispered
Me: hahaha
Katie: where are all these people seeing actual wolf dogs???
  we live in DC
  i should just start saying yes
  and that he hunts babies at night for his dinner
Me: hahaha please do

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I spent a lovely Saturday morning catching up on my guilty pleasure TV…

Me: OMG
Maxie: what???
Me: THE MAYOR IS A CHILD MOLESTER
Maxie: who the dc mayor?
Me: THE KIDS IN THE BUS WERE ON HIS LITTLE LEAGUE TEAM
  no
  veronica mars
  duh
Maxie: OH HAHAHA
  for a second i was concerned that you cared about politics
  it was rocking my world and not in a good way
Me: hahahahahhaha

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 Lexa told me about the St. Bernard her family had growing up…

Lexa: the st bernard was actually a good dog
Me: they’re so sweet looking
  big teddy bears
Lexa: right
  she was actually very gentle
  only dog we ever had that i fucking liked
Me: hahahaha
Lexa: best part
  i dont know if i told you this
  my mom has a big RAINBOW STICKER on our car
  for the dog
  ie
  my mom drove us around in a big gay car
  in small town RI
Me: hahahahahahahhahahaahaha
  in the 90s
  before it was cool to be gay
Lexa: right
  my mom was a visionary
  i call her the harvey milk of north smithfield
Me: hahahaha!
  thank god she’s better looking

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Life is good when you surround yourself with entertaining people.

Happy Monday Wednesday!!! Hooray short week!

Mama said share.

You know how when people go on fabulous vacations to sunny and exotic places, and they come back and they’re all “it was a-maz-ing and so gor-geous and I’m all tan and glow-y from the rays of the sun!”

And it’s really freaking annoying because everyone else has just been doing the same ‘ol, sittin at their desk, looking at that freaking motivational poster of a cat “hanging in there”, and kind of wish the cat was hanging ITSELF because at least then you could laugh about something- I mean, not that hanging kittens are funny, but hey, it WANTED to go, and it’s really much more fitting with the office atmosphere?

Or something.

Anyhoo, I’ve decided that instead of a JOYful CHEERful OHEMGEE look what I did while you were toiling away at your desk jobs! post, I’m going to take a slightly different direction with it, and tell you all about every last thing that went terribly, horribly wrong.

You see how I love you?

Let’s do this.

1. Thursday, we arrived in Costa Rica at midnight, and grabbed a taxi to a hotel nearby… only to find that it didn’t exist. Our driver took us to the exact address… and it was a cemetary. $75 dollars down the drain later, we gave up and stayed at the stupid Hilton.
2. We bussed up it to Arenal Volcano and hot springs the next day, where we hiked up an enormous and treacherous mountain to NOT see lava at dusk… and then hiked back down in pitch black darkness. Believe me when I tell you it’s a miracle no one lost a limb.
3. While lying in said hot springs, I slowly realized the jacuzzi-esque water felt like it was scalding me… which turned out to be a side effect of the INCREDIBLE sunburn I had already obtained on our FIRST day that covered 75% of my front. Somehow, my knees were 8 shades pinker than anything else. ??????

Finally, we made it to the beach, where we planned to stay for a week of glorious sunshine. Surely things would be relaxing and easy here on out, right?

By mid-week, I had the following afflictions…

1. A NEW sunburn, this time on my entire back side
2. Approximately 53 gigantic bug bites covering my legs and arms, that were about 1,000 times itchier than your average bite, and therefore I was constantly scratching them open because the PAIN FELT BETTER
3. A “sun rash” of tiny red dots on my arms and neck
4. The beginnings of a very unsexy cold. At the beach. In 85 degree weather. AT THE BEACH.

At least one day when we were body surfing, I took a quart of sea water up my nose, which pretty much cleared my sinuses out.

It rained our last two days at the beach, and after a zillion hours of traveling, we finally caught a cab home at Reagan, only to discover the driver had just let out the world’s stankiest, rankiest assplosion of a fart. It smelled like the farts of someone who’d used an entire bottle of Sex Panther. He should’ve knock 2 bucks off the rate for that shiz. BUT, we got to home sweet home in one piece.

So, yeah… all in all?

It absolutely couldn’t have been any better, and I would do it all again in a heartbeat.

I have approximately a kajillion pictures… this is pared down from almost 500. So I apologize, but have at it, hoss…

Costa Effin Rica

Update: I just realized you guys can COMMENT on the pictures. Dum dum dum……

Mama said share.

Last Friday, I had the grave misfortune of attending… dum dum dum… a “Work and Time Management” seminar. You see, I work at one of those huge, incredibly bureaucratic companies where, come Annual Review time, you’d better have some concrete thingamabobs to put on that form that represent trying to better oneself.

I know, I know. Total BS. But whatevs, mama needs a raise. So I’m playing the game, see?

The seminar was from 9 to 5, aka alllllllllllllllllllllllllll goddamn day. So I knew going in it would either be a great thing (i.e. an easy day off work), or complete and utter torture.

I grabbed a coffee and a seat with a few ladies I recognized from my department. I immediately noticed the four “drawing boards” strategically placed at the corners of the room, just screaming “WE ENCOURAGE ACTIVE PARICIPATION!!!”

And the sense of dread set in.

Sure enough, at 9 sharp, a rotund woman in a pants suit that did nothing for her gathered herself at the front of the room, and clapped her hands together sharply.

“Goooooooooood morning!!!”

It was all I could do not to shout “VIETNAM!” at the top of my lungs. The room gave her a half-hearted, “I haven’t had my coffee yet” bedraggled response.

I already knew what was coming.

“I know it’s morning, but you can do better than that!!! It’s FRIIIIIIIIIIday!”

Seriously, lady? SERIOUSLY? That line hasn’t been funny for the past two decades… and I’m willing to bet, neither have you.

She spent the rest of the day giggling at us like Mrs. Butterworth on happy pills while choking on corporate buzzword after buzzword.

“Urgency versus importance!” “Stressful work environments!” “Time management tips & tricks!”

At 10:40, I finally managed to escape long enough to tweet my despair…

“In a seminar w/ teacher Mary Fucking Sunshine. I honestly do not get how one can be so full of PEP and GLEE and STEREOTYPICAL CATCH PHRASES.”

I was just waiting for her to refer to us as her “special people”, a la Billy Madison.

But the most annoying part of it all? It actually wasn’t her. It was the dumbass robots around me who bought every last bit of it, hook line and sinker. The sympathetic nods as people sob-storied about working til 9pm, eating lunch at their desks, even having insomnia from getting up at 3am to handle correspondence with our Asia and Pacific branch.

Um… WHAT? Why??? We’re all assistants. I know what you get paid. Why on earth would you do that to yourself in a dead end job? Didn’t anyone ever teach you to keep the bar low??

After a couple hours of talking about our feeeeeelings, Mary pulls out her handy dandy self-developed “Time Management Matrix” tool, outlining the four categories ‘tasks’ should be labeled as in order to identify their priority in our “work plans”. Whatever, right? Let’s just get this over wi-

And then someone actually tried to ARGUE with Mary that the categories were wrong.

<Insert world’s biggest, huffiest sigh of agitated disbelief here.>

Do you really think the lady who MADE THIS UP is going to say, “Oh hey, glorified secretary, you’re right! I’ve been going about this wrong for 15 years! How silly of me to have been teaching this all over the world!”

It’s a good thing there weren’t any sharp objects in that room. I think I would have been the first person to off another human being with a stapler.

OOOOOOOooooo. I just got the email to complete my evaluation of said course…

This? Should be fun.

*evil cackle*

Mama said share.

It’s bad enough that everyone is posting about being  So Excited! About! Fall! The only reason I’m even slightly glad it’s getting colder is because I’ll reallllllly enjoy being in Costa Rica in a few weeks. After that? Hell. Frozen over HELL until what, May? As much as I try to convince myself that winter’s all about snuggling under a quilt from Gramma with the one I love, giving each other Eskimo kisses while we sip hot chocolate next to a fireplace…

It’s freaking NOT.

Winter sucks. All of it. At least in Massachusetts we could pretend to go skiing on one of our “mountains” every once in a while, which in no way made up for five months of ice/snow/sleet/hail/freezing rain, but at least flying down a hill on a Sno Tube while you fear for your life and the possibility you might lose an eye in the woods at the bottom is kinda fun.

(What can I say. I live dangerously.)

But here in the District, there’s no snow to speak of. It’s just gray and mush and God’s frozen tears covering the land, while I try not to get plowed (twss) by the 42 bus on the walk to work. Because, yanno, the busses are always FULL when it’s cold and gross out, so there’s no point in waiting for one to zip by you.

At least they’re heavier when they do kill you, so it’s over quicker, I’d imagine.

But none of these things account for why I truly hate the weather getting colder. These things are a nuisance, to be sure, but I am a Masshole, after all. I will live.

No, my friends. The reason I REALLY hate the chill of the months that end in ‘Ber, is because of my one true nemesis…

EL PUMPKIN.

I can just hear it mocking me… it and its little green ghouls!

The evil, evil pumpkin and I go way back, to the time it made me hurl an entire Thanksgiving dinner at the tender age of ten. And I ask you to consider, my friends… what was the last thing I’d eaten?!

That’s right, my friends. PUMPKIN PIE. All I saw for the next two hours of food poisony vomiting was that cinnamon-speckled orange goop, mocking me as I prayed to the porcelain gods.

Now the very smell of those repulsive, stringy, George Hamilton-colored innards make me gag and run for cover. I’d rather sit in John Goodman’s fart stank cloud than be in a room with El Pumpkin.

I spend every holiday meal in fear of the end, when an evil convert of El Pumpkin may try to voraciously foist their master’s gelatinous pie form upon me, banking on my good manners that I will be unable to refuse. The pie is the most offensive of El Pumpkin’s pulpy shapes, but not the sneakiest. Oh no, my friends. That honor belongs to the one and only…

PUMPKIN SCENTED CANDLE.

That’s right, people. As if the pumkin pie and the pumpkin cookies and the pumkin bread weren’t bad enough, now El Pumpkin has found a way to infiltrate my BREATHING AIR. He’s gone biological warfare on me, folks.

But alas, it doesn’t end there. As one final grand insult to injury, the corporate demon Starbucks has joined forces with The Dark Pumpkin Lord, and somehow devised an evil potion that has all of the people nearest and dearest to me constantly singing the Pulpy Prince’s praises! The Facebooks and the Twitterings are haunted by one deadly phrase… Pumpkin Spiced Latte. It would seem that only a few strong souls are able to resist its nutmeggy charms… and we are so overwhelmingly outnumbered, the fight ahead of us seems impossible.

But somehow, some way… I must rid the world of the mind controlling chemical “Pumpkin Spiced Latte,” and free my friends from the control of the evildoer, so that we may live our sad little wintery lives in peace once more.

Mama said share.