Random picture post time!

WORLD CUP 2006

To celebrate the World Cup final between Italy and France, The Best Friend, Pepe and I met up with Will and Paul at Alehouse. Football, beer and food so good/bad that it'll probably give you a coronary just looking at it? Ahhh, sounds like heaven to me

















The chicken nachos exemplify this good/bad food thing. A veritable mountain of chicken, chips and cheese, I swear I felt my arteries hardening when they arrived at the table...and I'm a vegetarian.

















Pretty much everyone at the restaurant except me was supporting the Ities. This is because everyone at the restaurant was stupid. On the money, yes, but still stupid.

















Italy won [those bastards!] and because he's part Sicilian and a big Mario Bros. fan, this made The Best Friend very happy.

















Will was happy too. He doesn't have any cultural ties to Italy but their win put money in his pocket and he got to make fun of me (which is always fun).

















I, on the other hand, was not a happy camper...until Zidane head-butted Matarazzi right in the solar plexus. That was awesome on a level comparable to Mortal Kombat and the only way that could have been better was if the crowd had growled, "Finish him!" afterwards.

WEEKEND FUN

Every year we've gone to school, we've always been too busy with classes to attend any of the homecoming festivities. However, this was not the case this year. On Friday, UCF had a free concert featuring Amberlin, Mae, Story of the Year and Jack's Mannequin, so The Best Friend and I decided to attend.

















On our way to the show. I look like I've been honey-dipped.

















We got to the Memory Mall and realized just how old we are. We were the only two people who wanted to hear some Freebird.

















Mae took the stage....

















...and we weren't impressed. They were thoroughly generic.

Then, Dana called and said she was back from Rome, so we junked the show and went to hang out with her instead.

















I was starved so we headed to Qdoba for dinner. I like food and explained to Jerry where it goes -- in my mouth.

















If you love queso, you'll love Qdoba's nachos. I do not love queso.

In the pantheon of Mexican cuisine, here's how the totem pole goes:

Tijuana Flats
Chipotle
Moe's
Qdoba
Something you scraped off the bottom of your shoe
Something science can't even identify
Taco Bell

Tijuana Flats > EVERYTHING. Know this. Understand this. And the next time you go, check out the 'Don't Be A Chickenshit' Sauce. It's yummy.

















Kelly's one of my favorite people to eat with because she appreciate fine dining [and ermmm, queso] more than anyone I've ever met in my life.

















Dana bought us back boxed wine from Rome. She said she saw homeless people drinking it on the street. If it's good enough for the hobos, it's good enough for us [note: the only redeeming qualities of the aforementioned wine are a) it's cold and b) it's wet. Apart from that, it tasted like a combination of urine and anti-freeze]

And as usual, more dry-erase grafitti was added to the board. Instead of scribbling about bodaggets and bonches, though -- we went a sweeter route. I think this is because D and I both miss our respective boyfriends [Steve's in Sicily, Dan's in Philly].































RANDOM

















Yay orthodontia! Living with these guys is the best thing that ever happened to me. Without them, I would have never known the glory that is The Legend of Zelda.






















Zen from a Hooters wet-nap. That's deep on a whole 'nother level. By the by -- Big Daddy Beers = ♥ of my life. $5.00. 24oz. Happy Jaime.

And finally -- something a little more inspirational than booze and fake Mexican food:

















Steven Spielberg calls them 'God Lights.' I'm inclined to agree.

Happy Halloween! Be safe!

And if I stared too long, I'd probably break down and cry...

A lot of rock bands are too fucking wimpy to have any sentiment or any emotion....unless they're in pain -- Axl Rose.

Before he lost his mind and balls, Axl was actually a pretty passionate cat. A screaming serpentine slithering onstage under spotlights, a wild-haired, wild-eyed wildcat who wailed and warbled wicked vocals.

Writing about pain is easy. It provides a fantastic catharsis. Pissed off at your girlfriend/boyfriend/parents/boss/school/world? Tell them to fuck off and play in G....loud.

When coursing through the human body, pain is amplified. Being dumped is the worst pain the world. Nothing compares to it -- no gunshot wounds, no purple-black bruises worn like tattoos, no broken limbs. No-one in the history of human pain has experienced more rage, more grief, more heart-mutilating sorrow, more emotional anguish than you do at the moment your significant other decides they don't want you around anymore.

You cry -- sobbing heavily into tangled sheets until your eyes are raw and red-rimmed. You scream. You pout. You mope. You might even resort to physical violence and kick the shit out of that bookcase which you swear was laughing at the pathetic loser you've become.

Then, you pick up a pen.....

And proceed to purge all the pain and misery you've been self-indulgently wallowing in for the past week/month/year/decade.

You seethe and you compare your ex to vicious, disgusting beasts and various parts of the human anatomy. And you feel better. Not entirely because a little residual ache remains, but for the most part -- you are sated.

Easy as 1-2-3.

Writing about anything not shackled and bound by pain? Tough.

Not just tough, but blood-from-a-fuckin'-stone burdensome.

How do you write a real love song, anyway? An honest one devoid of saccarine promises -- sweet, but ultimately artificial -- and fantastic claims? A song that isn't trite. A song that hasn't been cribbed from an amalgamation of a lukewarm boy-band ballad and a Hallmark commercial?

If you're Axl Rose, you write Sweet Child O' Mine.

It's a simple song and that is part of its genius. All a real love song needs to do is the same thing real love needs to do:

Connect.

Sweet Child O' Mine connects on the most basic level with even making mention of the word, "love." Instead of promising Erin Everly the heavens, Axl tells the truth. Being in love is wonderful and beautiful and hopeful...and, ultimately very, very scary. "Yeah, we're in love and it's amazing, but where do we go now?" That vulnerability helps define Sweet Child O' Mine as a real love song.

Love isn't giving someone the moon or promising them the stars. It isn't champagne, starlight and red roses. It's isn't pretty, placating perjury. At the end of the day -- love is about being completely honest in a way that you yourself might be scared to hear.

Despite the fact that Rose and Everly had their marriage annulled a year after they wed, despite the God-awful Sheryl Crow cover, despite the fact that Axl Rose ruined Axl Rose for me [Cornrow-sporting, Slash-insulting, date-cancelling, egomaniacal, Kanye-West-lookin' motherfucker. Fuck you, Axl. You didn't burn out and you didn't fade away. You just ended up becoming a tool. I may forgive you for the Chinese Democracy debacle, but you effectively ruined Axl Rose for me and I'll never forgive you for that.] -- I still love this song and honestly believe in it. It's a honest testament to love and...well, when was the last time you heard one of those that sounded that good?

If you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything.

Back To The Future has been my favorite movie ever since I was a little girl. The first time I saw it, I was convinced that I was going to marry Michael J. Fox. You see, he was little and so was I and in my 5-year-old mind, it made perfect sense that we'd be together.

Eighteen years later, I know that nuptials are out of the question, but I still adore and admire Fox as much as I always did.

This is just one of the reasons why. The man is passionate, eloquent and a class act all the way through.

Stem cell research has the potential to change the face of modern medicine. Just imagine a world where diseases like Parkinson's, Alzheimer's and even cancer are nothing but shadowy memories of the past.

This is still America. This is still a democracy and the people are still in charge. Be the change you wish to see in the world. Get out there and vote. Do the right thing.

The Michael J. Fox Foundation.
Team Fox

I've got a mouth like a sailor who just lost shore leave

Me: Michael J. Fox needs to get in the Delorean, go back in time and bitchslap all these fuckholes who insist on shit-talking about issues they know nothing about.
The Best Friend: Wow....
Me: I have rage issues.
The Best Friend: Yeah...I kinda like that, though.

Sidebar: Does ovulation make me a sinner? I mean, I'm not getting knocked up every month, therefore destroying precious babies eggs, so is that like, onanism for women?

All the stars and boulevards ain't close enough for you

Rush Limbaugh is a pill-popping degenerate asshole. I realize referring to Limbaugh as such is akin to saying water is wet, but saying that Michael J. Fox was faking it in his campaign ad for Senate candidate Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.)? That's low -- even pompous, hypocritical douchebag like Limbaugh. I would ask how he looks at himself in the mirror every morning without convulsing with disgust, but I'm sure the copious amount of OxyContin he gobbles down numbs whatever meagre shred of humanity he has in him (if he has any at all).

Enough. I'm not wasting breath on a waste of breath like Limbaugh any longer.










Cobain looks like he's going to break in this picture. Like he's made of a thousand hairline fractures that threaten to shatter at any moment. It's beautiful and heartbreaking.

Certain aborigines believe that having your photograph taken will steal your soul. I don't necessarily agree with that, but I do believe that a camera, in the hands of guys like David LaChappelle, Herb Ritts and Mark Seliger, captures a part of your soul.

I wish I could write the same way Ritts and LaChapplle and Seliger take pictures [or took pictures in the case of the late Ritts]. I want my words to be as potent and vivid as their pictures. I want to capture life, but in a river of ink as opposed to on film.

In other news:

It is currently 65°F in Orlando. I love the fact that it's warm enough to wear shorts, but cool enough to warrant wearing a sweater. I love wearing flip-flops no matter how cold it gets and I love having all the windows opening, drinking Mexican hot chocolate and eating Hobo Meals for dinner.

Jack's Mannequin on Friday! I'm excited. I love Andrew McMahon and it's been forever since I saw a live show. The only thing I'm not looking forward to is dealing with a bunch of "rawking" 18-year-olds. I'm with Greg Behrendt on this one -- I'm all about the adult rock show.

♫ Download:

Dark Blue
Into The Airwaves
Holiday From Real

You know what? Just buy Everything In Transit. It's a great album and if you like Something Corporate, Jamison-Parker, Augustana or just well-written piano-centric music, you'll dig it.

If you don't dig the music, dig the cause and check out the Dear Jack Foundation and Project Flip Flop.

In more music related news, I love Nonpoint's cover of In The Air Tonight. Phil Collins has never sounded so cool. If you haven't heard it, you can check out the track on their MySpace or you can pick up a copy of the Miami Vice soundtrack [which also features Moby, India.Aire, Goldfrapp and Mogwai].

Thanks to Jake for the heads-up and on that note, I'm off to enjoy the rest of my night.

Things I would hit like the fist of an angry God...

Sprint just hired Ron Livingston to star in a series of commercials.

Despite what The Best Friend/The Boyfriend/Everyone else in my life says, I'd still hit it like a bag of hammers.

Goodbye, old friend

A moment of silence for my flat iron. It died today after four years of loyal service.

I had an emotionally bond with it. It made me feel pretty. Having straight and shiny hair made me feel much more capable and in control [Ladies, back me up here. You know you've got those little aesthestic triggers too]. And now, it's gone. And my hair is fluffy.

Goodbye, old friend. Thanks for everything.

The reason a dog is considered man's best friend is because he wags his tail and not his tongue

My niece Phoebedog is the greatest creature in the world.

Yesterday when I saw her, she leapt three feet in the air from excitement. Three feet! I can't even jump that high.

Then, she proceeded to make the loudest 'Phoebedog noises' ever -- these usually consist of a cross between howling and attempting to speak. I'm convinced that she's going to be speaking in English the next time I see her.

Dana and Steve -- I love your dog. She makes me happy.

RAWKtober!

The Best Friend and I spent some quality time at the Oktoberfest celebration in our neighborhood. The plan was to get all sorts of legless on some good biere, but since it was just the two of us -- that didn't pan out quite the way it should have.



I live in the most gorgeous neighborhood ever all thanks to HUD. Yay low-income housing!



The Best Friend is amped for ROCKtoberfest...I mean, Oktoberfest.



One of the community's numerous fountains. I wonder if you can make wishes in these things. What's the deal with that?



We encountered a very nice man making cotton candy. While I can understand its importance in the pantheon of carnival/fair food, I've gotta admit -- I've never been a big cotton candy fan. Kettle corn, on the other hand? I would tear that up.



Ahhh, fair food. Just looking at it will probably give you a coronary, but damned if it doesn't smell divine and taste delicious. This was one of the coolest fair food inventions I've ever seen -- a power drill used to cut up potatoes. Handy and yummy.



This reminded me of the Pirates of the Caribbean display at Downtown Disney.



Nothing says Halloween like a giant, inflatable gourd.



Trash is kinda scary too, right?



Carousel ponies. The only way to travel in style.



It wouldn't be Oktoberfest without men in lederhosen. Do those shorts remind anyone else of the Boy Scout uniform?



And what goes better with a frosty cold Beck's than a hat with a feather in it?



Prost! Now, we dance!



Is The Best Friend very big or are the mugs very small? Hmmm....food [or root beer, rather] for thought.



Ziggy socky, ziggy socky, hoi hoi hoi



And when I'm not chugging down mini mugs of root beer, you can find me writing front page stories for the Central Florida Future.

Annnnnd, I'm jonesing for Costa coffee. The one in the bookstore across the street from Trafalgar Square. Transatlantic coffee run, anyone?

Music is the knock on the door of spirituality that opens you up to God and sets you free.

According to this website, Stevie Ray Vaughan has a 59% chance of being inducted into the 2008 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame class.

Other possible 2008 inductees include Metallica, Social Distortion, The Smiths, Run DMC, Wham [?!] and Frankie Goes To Hollywood [You've got to be joking...].

Anthony DeCurtis bought up a couple of good points in an article he wrote for Rolling Stone. He talked about whether artists were being rewarded for their musical merit or if the entire Hall of Fame was becoming nothing more than a popularity contest.

I really hope the latter isn't the case because, honestly -- how can you possibly place a band as influential as Led Zeppelin in the same category as fucking Soul Asylum? Yes, we all loved Somebody to Shove and Runaway Train, but neither of them even begin to compare to Kashmir.

Another point that kind of irks me is the inclusion of hip hop in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. I love hip-hop. I do. I could listen to Juicy by the Notorious B.I.G. for days [I actually think I have]. I love the stuff the guys at QN5 are doing because it's so clever and so fresh [Check out Commercial Rap by the QN5 All-Stars] and ?uestlove from The Roots is just an amazing musician, but at the end of the day, I think the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame should be more for blues/rock-influenced acts as opposed to the bombastic beats and lyrical linguistics of hip hop.

That being said, I'd love to see the creation of a Hip Hop Hall of Fame so pioneers like Melle Mel, the Sugarhill Gang and Afrika Bambataa could get their dues. Granted, there's the VH1 Hip Honors, but it's kinda not the same thing.

And finally, in other news:

• Check out clips from past Hall of Fame induction ceremonies. My reaction upon discovering this stuff? Well....I think the neighbors think my boyfriend's back in town.
  
• Hahahahahahah. Slash rules everything around me.
• Damon and DiCaprio -- the new Pacino and DeNiro? Discuss.
  
• I think I might be coming down with a cold. If this is indeed the case, expect a rambling, medication-fueled post sometime in the near future.
  

Woody when God said, "Let there be light," you were there waiting to hit the light switch.

I met the coolest woman today at the Bob Crippen presentation. Her name was Ernestine and she was 87 years old.

A real spitfire. She was passionate about the Kennedies, always referring to JFK by his full name -- John Fitzgerald Kennedy. That's the reason she attended the presentation -- because she believed in Kennedy so much and supported all of his ideas, especially the space program.

She was politically active, talking about what a mess it is to vote down party lines and about North Korea's nuclear policies.

After watching a pretty indoctrinating video provided by the Astronaut's Scholarship Foundation, she proclaimed, "That was worse than church!" pretty damn loudly.

She giggled with excitement over meeting an astronaut, wore bright Schiaparelli pink and held my hand for the full fifteen minutes that we spoke. She referred to her husband as her 'honey' and proudly told me that they had been married for 51 years.

You know, it seems more and more people fear getting old. They lift and tuck. They enlarge and reduce. They fill up and suck out. They inject poison into their faces, rendering them as emotionless as mimes.

Why? So you can look like a 25-year-old with three kids and a minivan as opposed to a 40-year-old?

The hell with that. It's cool to get old. To have stories and scars. Every wrinkle, every crow's foot, every laugh line is a memory, so why would you want to erase all that? I want my body to be a roadmap of my life -- wrinkles, scars, bruises, birthmarks and all. My right ankle may not be pretty, but its misshapen form will always remind me of a time when I was passionate and reckless.

You earn all of those things and to take them away through whatever means is betraying yourself and your experiences.

It could be the folly of youth talking and maybe I'll think differently when I'm 80 and my face is puckered up like a baked apple, but I really can't see that happening. I want to get old. I want to live my life and earn everything I can from it.

P.S. -- Caffeine-free Diet Coke tastes like battery acid.

He would step across the line. Habitually. He's a habitual line stepper.

A lack of sleep and internet access leads to the following nonlinear nonsense:

Love this man. Love his music. Love his Volkswagen commercial. Love his sense of humor. Check out his blog. Check out the skit he did on Chappelle's Show. Pick up a copy of Continuum. The best part about Mayer is that a lot of people pigeonhole him as this sort of sensitive singer-songwriter, but he's actually a big-dick-swingin' bluesman at heart.

Speaking of Volkswagen commercials -- you can play this motherfucker in your car! Let me repeat that -- in your car! Mayer used the door as a freakin' whammy. The badassery of that is just mindblowing.

The Best Friend made us a logo:

I'm seriously thinking about having t-shirts made.

I need to arrange it so that my home smells like fresh-baked bread all the time. Short of installing an Italian bakery in the kitchen, I have no idea how to accomplish this. Yes, I could bake all the time, but that's just so obvious.

My sister saw Smashy driving a car on the Turnpike on her way down to El Dub. He was driving a goddamn car. Is there anything this dog can't do?! Granted, she was on serious meds from her kidney infection, but still...

This made me laugh for a good five minutes today. I have a thing for Lego humor. See?

And finally:

Dear Men:

Follow this. Get this. [Not guarenteed, but worth a shot, right?]

Love: Jaime xo

The people I love are assholes...

[After losing at Mario Kart]
Jaime: No, no, no, no....Goddamn it!
Paul: What's the matter, little girl? Did you lose?
Jaime: Shut up!
Paul: What are you gonna do? Write about it in your journal, emo kid?
Jerry: Are you gonna blog about it?
Jaime: You guys are assholes.

[Upon discussing a pre-nup]
Jaime: So, if you cheat on me, I get all your DVDs.
Dan: All of them?
Jaime: Yep.
Dan: Alright, if you cheat on me -- your citizenship gets revoked.

In conclusion -- the people I love are assholes...and that's probably why I love them so much.

♫ Download Gimme Shelter by The Rolling Stones here.

Another Thumbs Up/Thumbs Down

Thumbs Up: Onesentence.org -- a quirky, interesting little site which lets your mind wander.
Thumbs Down: How adopting foreign children is the new black. They're children -- Not a political statement. Not a way of garnering press attention. Children. Don't get me wrong -- rescuing a child from a lousy situation and giving them the opportunities in life that they deserve is good and admirable, but to do it for media attention just cheapens the whole thing. That being said -- Madonna, cover those thighs and take a Holiday back to New York's gay clubs. I miss the old-school shit.

Thumbs Up: Joseph Fiennes. Even with a watermark splashed across his face, he's a damn good looking man.
Thumbs Down: Asiago cheese bagels from Einstein. The cheese is like a coating of plasma. Ew.

Thumbs Up: MTV's new football-based reality show, Two-A-Days. It's compelling and really opened my eyes to just how hard student athletes work. I'm amazed at the fact that high school football is such a huge deal in the South. I mean, Hoover High's got a 30,000 seat stadium. UCF, an actual accredited university, doesn't even have one of those [yet]. Amazing stuff...and it totally makes me wanna watch Varsity Blues again. Hmmm....movie night with the boys, perhaps?
Thumbs Down: Feeling like a chomo 'cause I think #24's kinda good-looking. Yeah....

Thumbs Up: Sonic's 168,894 possible drink combinations. I highly recommend the coconut cream pie shake. It's like falling in love...in your mouth.
Thumbs Down: The fact that, despite being a mammoth organization and one of the leaders of sports news in the world, ESPN.com still can't spell!

Two errors in the same sentence?! Dub tee effery, guys. Dub tee effery?

Thumbs Up: Staying on the phone with the boyfriend until 5:00 a.m. ♥
Thumbs Down: Staying on the phone with the boyfriend until 5:00 a.m. Girl's gotta sleep and when the sun rises, that's damn near impossible. Feels like someone's pitching a tumbler of acid at my retinas. Worth it, though.