Whirlwind

I was told once, by a very wise man(child), that once I started working full time my weekends would become so jammed packed with stuff that I wouldn't know what to do with myself. I would seek "real life" and "stuff you didn't even know you wanted to do" like it was...well, my job.

And it's often true, as it was this weekend. The moment I left the office Friday I bounded, skipped, leaped with my coworkers into Audobon Circle for some tasty margaritas. Then I went to Sunset for birthday burgers with friends from Tufts.

Upon waking (and thanking my good sense to have that gigantic turkey burger to balance out the 'ritas) we went to Weston for an awesome maple sugar shack's pancake breakfast, complete with a live bluegrass band. Delicious and a lot of fun. After some traipsing about Boston buying clothes I don't need (but look really good in!) we returned home for a bit to prep some dishes to bring to Wise Old Manchild's Girlfriend's Potluck Game Night.

Boyfriend made oatmeal walnut chocolate chip cookies (he bakes! with a bit of reverse psychology maybe...) and I made avocado deviled eggs - both were a hit and I'll definitely make the eggs again come picnic season.

This week Boyfriend's sister and bro-in-law are coming into town - which will be great since we rarely see them and they're staying at Casa de Brighton for a few nights. I need to get Apples to Apples to play with them because I looooved it at the Game Night. It's so much fun. And the game website has ideas on how to make it even better... I'm slightly afraid I'm going to become a Game Night freak and host lots of nerdy board game events, but whatevs.

food fails again

Almost weekend!

Nothing could ruin my day, except this. About eating "Almost Meatless."
Really? This is all you can come up with, foodies of America? Puh-leeease. We are just about the only culture with three square meat-centric meals a day, and to talk about this new "trend" is to ignore the fact that America's carnivorous tendencies are the real trend. A century or so worth of unsustainability and heart disease.

In reality, centuries (millenia!) of people have subsisted on mostly-meatless diets. Another "duh" moment for all of you. I'm still waiting for Nobel prize on how eating less meat can save the world, you know, for that big paper I wrote in high school.

Yeah, I scooped the Times six years ago.

Food articles always cycle back to this, though, and constantly report this ancient and natural way of life as yet another socially-conscious trend, you know, back in here and here and here... Maybe it's eating all that meat that's effecting everybody's memories.

Bah! Ok, I'm done being shrilly liberal.


Happy weekend all!

an open book

I'm finally into my book, Christine Falls by John Banville, writing under the nom de plume Benjamin Black. Now this is noir...foggy city streets, manly men with drinking problems and sordid pasts, and the wily damsels that somehow surprise even though we knew they were hiding something all along. I admit it took some time to get into, and really it's not knocking my socks off. But I can't blame it, it's a tough act to follow after the stellar The Reader and it had formerly seemed like yet another disappointment. Instead, it's currently ranking at about a B.

Kara reminded me of my ongoing book organization - I don't bother with authors/genres to organize (and I tend to mentally categorize them by the order in which I read them anyway) - I go by color, so the spines in similar color families are grouped together. I spend more time looking at the bookcase than I do searching for particular books, and I know them well anyway, so I don't find it all inconvenient. Instead, I think it's purdy.

Now, the BIG issue at hand here is: which books to bring on vacation? I think Angels & Demons might be a good beach book, and timely considering the movie will be out soon... but I'm open to suggestions. Thoughts?

c'mon get happy

I needed to be cheered up this week.

Seeing The Watchmen on Saturday didn't help too much - it was violent violent violent and as much as I wanted to like it I found much of it to be really...stupid. We went to the Jordan's in Reading for the full IMAX treatment and the only redeeming part was the hilarity that is Jordan's Furniture. And when a 15 foot animatronic Wally the Green Monster outshines a movie, you know it's bad. The story deserved some solid action treatment to showcase the artfully twisted characters, and instead we got the usual superhero cliches and spandex clad babes. I wish I could give a better review but my eyes were closed half the time to ward off scenes of people blowing up (seriously, how many shots can you have of people looking shocked at after being DRENCHED in a passerby's blood?), and also I plugged my ears more than a few times to block out some God-awful soundtrack choices.

But, to accentuate the positive (much like Superchick's spandex number...) Spring Cleaning 09 officially took place this weekend. So I have prematurely switched out my winter clothes for the summer wardrobe, and will have to be artfully decked out in lots of layers until spring actually arrives.

Last night I made my favorite recipe - a tofu pesto sauce. It's from the Moosewood Cookbook, a veritable vegetarian bible, and even though I've only tried a handful of recipes from it they've all been amazing. This one is basically a traditional pesto with a block or so of blanched tofu added to make it creamy. I can eat it by the spoonful, and I do. It makes me want a big food processor though, which would handle it much better than our poor overworked blender.

It's very nice to be able to come home to a super clean (and organized!) house with a well stocked fridge. Now, we wait for patio season...

ready for my close-up

Good news and bad news:

I get to order a cake! And it will be AWESOME.
Then I'm doing my taxes. And it will be BORING. (But lucrative! I can has refund please?)


On the film reel:
This weekend I want to see I Love You, Man because I adored Jason Segel in Forgetting Sarah Marshall. But Boyfriend still wants to see The Watchmen, so...let's keep our fingers crossed.

I saw a trailer for Observe and Report for the first time last night - looks like it could be mall-tastic glory akin to Mall Rats... I also caught the trailer for Sunshine Cleaning (Thanks to Doug for the review link) and was really excited - a smart dark comedy with two female leads? I'm in heaven!

kiss me I'm Polish

In honor of everything that has nothing to do with St. Patrick's Day, I give you this:

Corn Pops

You can thank me later.

cloud nine

I did it. We did it. Finally.

A vacation is happening, at the end of April. Go ahead, check out those highs in the mid 80s. I dare ya.

It isn't Prague, but that's okay - I'll plan a better trip, a less frantic and get-me-outta-New-England kinda thing. Since Mr. Boyfriend is a former expert on the Dominican Republic, and I look really good holding fruity pink drinks with umbrellas, this couldn't be more ideal.

Unless it was free - I'd take that.

Because I like to have money. And, super conveniently, so does this lady. Inspired by this major financial commitment (though I do feel our Orbitz vacay package was a good deal) and the artful debtor, I'm gonna make a big step and work extra hard to cut down on my biggest spending drain: dining out. To soften the blow of this hardship (and one of the things I like to blog most about) I've decided that if I'm hankering a takeout dish I can cook it myself and make a trip to the grocery store. So my wallet won't suffer, and my culinary skillz can get an upgrade. And it'll probably help me be less lazy in the kitchen.

Also, my random blog-stalking has yielded as awesome cache of silly images: Who ate the damn pizza rolls

freebie

Cold, but sunny. It's a lovely day.

I think I'll get a cookie and window-shop on Newbury. And then go bowling.

And, yes, thank you for noticing, I did do something to my hair. Glad you like it.

You and Mii, and Mii and You...

Second Life fascinates me. I haven't ever participated, and I really don't know what it looks like - other than one small clip on The Office where Dwight is playing and his life is EXACTLY the same - except he can fly.

But the avatars are amazing - what a perfect way to look into how people view their own selves. Take Dwight, our fictional friend. Equal parts egomaniac and supernerd, he views himself as perfect other than what his mortal body cannot - achieve.

The closest thing I have to my own avatar - my Mii on Wii - looks as much like me as it can. I just find it funnier to see a cartoon of myself doing everday, mundane things - hula hooping or boxing or racing cows... Okay so maybe not mundane, but you get the idea. It's like kids and cameras - and I specifically mean today's digital cameras with viewing screens. If you take a picture of a toddler (or any teenager) they immediately ask to see it - it's the novelty of viewing themselves that they crave and find thrilling. I enjoy my Wii avatar for that reason - and considering the limitations of the design features (at least to date), that's the kind of use it seems built to serve. That's part of what makes the Wii as a game system so popular.

Miis and Second Life are obviously different, but they relate to each other in that the opportunities for escapism afford greater artistic capabilities. In SecondLife you can enhance your own self by taking on social roles that you hadn't imagined or perform impossible physical feats. Or you can replace your own self completely. Does this mean, though, that each and every Second Life avatar created is a psychological experiment for its creator? No - to me, this is bordering on something close to performance art.

And this article:

Portrait of an Artist as an Avatar

makes some excellent points about what this means. Ahhht is becoming accessible in ways it never has before. Artist DC Spensley, who creates digital "sculptures" that are viewing experiences unto themselves (think mouse controlled roller coaster meets jungle gym), declares that “Art is moving toward the participatory.”

He's right. And better yet, the avatar as alter-ego isn't even necessary to the viewing experience, it's interactive for the people behind their computers - the ones who create it and buy it. From an industry standpoint, even more exciting is the fact that it's still operating as a viable business for its creators. Gotta love that. I definitely recommend giving this a read if you have some time.

so, what am I?

Generation OMG - American youths and the Great Recession

Oh goodie. First we were Gen Y. Then Generation Why Me. And then it looked like we were shaping up to be Scuppies. But not any longer. All thanks to this depression - er, Depression 2.0... The Recession - Recession/Depression (Repression!).

What's this new label? Will we really be defined as children of the Great Recession? I'm hardly a kid (never mind the obsession with candy and puppies). I prefer the "millenial" catchphrase - 20-somethings emerging from the sheltered walls of educational institutions into the working world. Yeah...millenial - we sound like intrepid explorers with flying cars.

I suppose it's better than being "born" into the crisis, or "growing up" during it. I can't say I'd want to inherit Uncle Sam's debt right from the get go. I'd rather my Gen X sense of entitlement heighten the Gen Why Me sense of MySpace martyrdom and top it off with a Scuppie-Can-do attitude so I can roundly castigate my elders for their lack of fiscal responsibility.

The article describes the households of Depression era families:

With incomes dropping, parents fought more and drank more, leaving children bewildered and often alone. Years later, the group looked back on their childhood as a period of unpredictability, and their high school years as a time they lacked direction or a sense of confidence. As one small-business man put it, “my entire adolescence was a period of painful and frustrating disorientation.”

A period of pain, frustration and disorientation? Sounds like high school.

Besides the doom and gloom, some of the researchers imagine the younger of us in this generation will echo the conformist tendencies of the penny-pinching workhorses who grew up in the Depression (1.0). Us elders, on the other hand, are apparently flocking to AmeriCorps, Teach for America, etc, and "public agencies and Internet infrastructures."

Oh, and not to fall out of line with every other piece of Repression Coverage, here's the token silver lining bit:

Regardless of their age, members of the recession generation will most likely be shaped by a return to Things That Matter, a re-definition of values.

And then the author basically says we end up all the same anyway when we reach middle age. Generation Repression will be as diverse and as kooky and gunshy about money as the others are and were. Only we'll be more web savvy because we all learned to type through AIM.

Whatevs. I see the economy as the perfect scapegoat. Late for work in the morning? I get to blame the economy. The T is late? Damn the MBTA's fare hikes. Daylight savings? Everyone's cutting back - even on sleep.

And you just know that we're gonna be all over this when we tell our grandkids our sob stories some day. "We didn't have no hover cars, kids, nope. Only one computer to a household. And - omg - the ECONOMY WAS IN THE TUBES."

My own take? This feels too immediate to gauge how the future will define us. I do know, though, that The State of the Economy is making me hyper aware of costs, funding, spending... for my vacation in April.

thanks for playing

Phew! What a week...

Ms. Andrea and her beau came to Boston to visit and the weekend was full of food and beverage and karaoke and Newbury and beverages and taxidermy and Harvard and snow and Wii and aaack more snow and more beverages. Our house looks like a recycling plant. And that is awesome.

I've also decided Beacon Hill Tavern is my favorite new spot. I haven't exactly sampled the entire menu, but I love the atmosphere and the decor and the staff is friendly and incredibly professional. They win. However, Cafe of India, in Harvard, loses. Big time. I should've guessed - their sister restaurant, Diva, in Davis Square, is lacking too. Both are showy and, in appearance at least, seem like higher end spots. And both have terrible, horrible service.

Tonight the bf and I return to Tasca - maybe they'll start to recognize us there...

I think that about covers it. I would post pictures but you really don't need to see me doing karaoke. Just picture your own least flattering photo and imagine my features on it.

This weekend....no plans? Really? Bizarro. I'd like to plan that vacation I've been talking about...the one that seems like it'll never happen.