my friends are missing a good friend, Daniel Hughes - no one seems to know what has happened since he left for a bike ride on the morning of 6/5/9 ….. click the link here for info of how to relay information if you recognize this man, missing since a bicycle ride…

• there is no parking lot under the national mall
• maggie likes to eat moisturizers of all time
• none of my clothes fit
• king neptune has killer abs and doesn’t wear underwear
• arlington cemetery is eerie and beautiful. and the staff helpful, though they don’t know where the nearest cupcake store is (god forbid).
• though not a professional speaker, jai pausch definitely shares a flair for public speaking with her late husband 
  

  photo courtesy of "talking to air"

• i should have done all my mother’s day ordering LAST week
• beauty podcaster = fabulous thank you gifts!
• i talk way too much about nothing when i am nervous. or there is silence. and then i just get nervous and talk more.
• it was really nice to spend a weekend with a girl! doing girly stuff! and not having to get up really super early…
• i eat waaaayyyyyyy more ice cream than airdrie
• that bathroom at catch 31 IS really dark
• snow crab = yummy
• making new friends is really really fun!

dear pal,

i CANNOT wait for your arrival! we are going to totally have the best time! and i promise to NOT say “totally” the entire time you are here!

when you arrive on friday, i will be there to pick you up. you are going to stay in my room, whilst mags and i slumber in the guest suite (aka maggie’ room). that way you can have the whole bath to yourself and privacy as well. now, i did move any kind of TV out of the master in an effort to aid my sleeping abilities. however, worst case scenario, i do have my little 13″ and a cable jack in the room… also, i’ve got product (shampoo/conditioner, lotion, hair gunk – even a potential product trial for L&L wating for you in the halls). pack a toothbrush and some mascara…

saturday, not sure how early you will or will want to wake up! this can be our mellow day, just hang out, want to show you around were i live, take you out to the beach! i think you might enjoy sharing the seafood appetizer from catch 31 (aka “the tower of terror”) that i like to take my favorite peeps to enjoy when they visit!

eli says "two big claws up!"

trace's visit

included on saturday will be, hopefully, nice weather (nights not below 50 and days in the 70’s-80’s?) and a couple of nice walks with the magpie and a trip or two for coffee! let’s play it by ear, i know the time change is a bi-otch..

sunday is the go for broke day! i think i misspoke a bit when i said it was 2 hours to DC. i google mapped it today at work, and that says 3 ish hours. but i know we can make under 3 with timing. it would be best to leave as early as you can stand to (you can snooze in the car!). not sure yet exactly where will be the best place to park, but once in the city, we can walk and/or ride the metro to grab a quick, yummy and healthy lunch at one of the 8, 000,000 cosi’s around the city! the washington mall is cool – all the memorials and museums (we can see julia child’s kitchen!!) and a walk to the white house (maggie wants a picture of bo). still not sure where to find the bobble heads….

i”ll be driving back home (i actually registered the thought “i wonder what side of the road they drive on in canada?” running thru my brain – don’t be afraid!). we shall sleep.

monday we will attend the super neato lecture for which you are flying cross country. in my mind, i will ask the speaker’s “people” for a brief interview – i know my podcast listeners would totally dig it – but that scares the SHIT out of me! instead, i look forward to a great afternoon, hopefully some great weather and time spen with a new/old friend.

tuesday i will take you to the airport, sending you on your safe journey back home… oh, and don’t think you are getting off without an interview for MY podcast, a plea for advice on recording equipment and, by the way, i need to know what size T shirts the whole fam wears… and KA too. oh, and i have wireless but i know realize i don’t know the “password” to my signal that i had the nerd herd set up for me. so just use mine? its not a mac. sorry

xoxoxo,

your pal from the interwebz

*in the millennium, pen pal = internetz

• just got back from a kickin’ vacation
• now it’s time to prepare for a friends visit! i can’t wait – just over a week to shower, shampoo and shine this place up! woot!
• the bunny project? all the peeps wuz gone this morning…. sigh
• maggie went to the doctor this morning for her annual physical and immunizations…. clean bill of health, more clomicalm and a bill more than me and the guy spent at a fancy dinner the other night. with me drinking wine!!!
• back on weight watchers as of yesterday. i felt like a huge, funky cow all during my trip… sigh. though that is kind of an insult to cows! haha! seriously, i was uncomfortable and all my summer clothes were tight. arg! so here’s to making changes and gettin’ back to my fightin’ weight!

so on the latest lipgloss and laptops , miss airdrie mentions her upcoming trip to virginia (shameless self promotion of upcoming visit from pal from across this great continent) . she and her cohost, kerry anne, also read out some listener mail, and a question from someone asking for podcast recommendations has spurred me to finally start up on a series of blogposts i’ve been meaning to do for quite a while. and i think if i attack it a s a series, i can do a better job than trying to make some exhaustive list, at the end of which i will lose steam and stop linking and all that and what a mess it would be…. sigh…

OK!

soooo… fave #1 must go to….. the aforementioned L&L!

started in 2006, L&L is all the way up to episode #132. currently, the ladies are putting out a show every other week, earlier shows were on a weekly basis (hey, ife happens, people). truth be told, i was a bit worried when my favorite gals went to the bi-weekly (or is it bi-monthly? i never understand how that phrase is supposed to work) format – i was worried that it would be the beggining of the slow fade to black (or sometimes immediate fade to black) that podcasts can be known for – but no! and huzzah for that!

so, the show centers around beauty products and reviews from KA and air, usually some kind of “reality check” topic about beauty or the beauty industry, occasional interviews or guests and some podsafe music to round out the show. Intertwined with all that is the “laptops” portion of the show, that is, the influence technology and science have in their lives is obviously going to permeate the show, making it much more fun, modern, tech savvy and with a POV that is similar to my own.

i must say that i look forward to every episode of L&L – i’ve been listening since its inception (it is the only podcast i still listen to that i started following along with my first iPod!). and thats not only because i had a major heart attack the first time i heard a letter i wrote read out on the air! their canadian roots sometimes give the show an interesting twist, and the general “girl talk” format has provided many a LOL moment…. sometimes in embarrassingly public places….

ultimately though, its the “friendships” if you will, developed over time, with both gals, and listening to the trials and tribulations of theirs lives, how they parallel or completely differ from my own, and the honesty and humour they both bring that makes lipgloss and laptops my “must listen” of this week.

ok. i’m home from work now and am off for the weekend! woot! trying to catch up on all my blog reading and prepare for catching up on blogging of my own…. so here is just a little awesomeness until i decide to sit back in front of the computer again tomorrow:

• thanks to derek, whose wife is coming tovisit virginia next month (wootie woo!), i have now seen this:    
• maggie mae is doing ok on her meds. however, she seems to have developed a weird case of kleptomania. she is not a dog who has ever chewed things up or any shenanigans like that – although she will, on rare occasion, steal and eat a chapstick or other such emollient product. in the last 2 weeks or so she has taken to carrying my bedside night time lipglosses about the house (but not eating or chewing them), digging into my purse and plucking out items and carrying them about and, last but not least, grabbing the ENTIRE bottle of my new pain meds and gnawing on the child proof plastic cap 4 feet from my whilst giving me a “you lookin’ at me??!” look out of her wee, beady little eyes
• the peeps abide. witness:  

though donna would tell you that friends’ll help you move, GOOD friends will help you move the body, i think friends are for getting you hooked on pointless yet entirely WAY too amusing internet ephemera..

  jennifer has me reading graph jam every day now..

and it WAS airdrie who linked me to the dramatic chipmunk and the otters holding hands. awwww they are so cute!!!

and i came across the movie “boys on the side” so i DVR’d it yesterday. i LOVE this movie! i haven’t seen it in a little while, but, with the viewings i shall make in the next 6 weeks, my average view per year should still be about 850.

kind of a silly chick flick. whoopi goldberg is great, mary-louise parker is awesome (as usual). the relationship between the two is so sweet. won’t give away any spoilers or anything, but i just love their friendship and the surface message – cause it’s early and i am sure if i put my minor-in-womens-studies brain to it with full force, probably the entire movie is REALLY some kind of hateful indictment of women in a patriarchal society, i don’t know. also, we have appearances by the indigo girls, a really fun soundtrack, a road movie and – thank god – as far as i can remember – absolutely NO shopping montage!!! woot!

i just love it. and of, course, how can one NOT love drew barrymore in this?? was i ever that young, perky and cute? no. of course not. i must say, that watching this again only reinvigorates my lust for her hair in this movie. i did try to incorporate the daisies in the short blonde bob look in my youth, and suddenly, i feel i may have to go there again! also, may i mention , the INCREDIBLY shag and marry-able matthew mcconaughey (as police officer honest abe lincoln) is SO GORGE in this movie you may die.

so i feel it has everything. the heroine triad is actually more reflective of the parts of me than the cultural monolith that is sex and the city (ok, i do love that series as well and chris noth – yum!) (note to self – i guess i am horny girl or something today!!?? go fig). i am more holly, jane and robin in everyday and in every part of my life than i am the SATC gals. and actually, if you divide up samantha and miranda and distribute them in parts between charlotte and carrie and make a new pile that is jane (not to call you a pile, dahling), who is smart like miranda and driven but with the artsy, musician, earthier side – well, they are many of the same archetypes.

and i do find holly’s fashions more wearable on a day to day basis, though perhaps not quite as envy inducing as some of carrie and charlottes stuff, but she has a funkier fashion sense that actually is more true to the carrie, the early years, before pat fields made her entire wardrobe that of like the olsen twins…

 so go watch that movie and then make a graph about your favorite side dishes (boys!!)

 omg. matthew mcconaughey is so hot.

my on-line pal, kerry anne, was on a canadian TV show last night. sounds like a pop culture type quiz show, and it was bloggers v. celebrity look a-likes:

bloggers won! if you’ve never checked out her podcast, with another internet pal o’ mine, airdrie, please do! Lipgloss & Laptops is fun, informative, and probably responsible for me being on the interwebs in the first place.

you may want to send them letters of gratitude. or not.

* title refers to one of my favortie jokes:

Q. what did the hot dog say when he crossed the finish line?

A. “i’m the wiener!” (throw arms up in the air at end for extra laughs!)

airdrie’s hubby, derek, over at penmachine.com has a link up to the vancouver 2010 olympic mascots!

which mascot are YOU like?

i like quatchi!

 tip of the bloghat to derek and darren barefoot

i wake up. i have to walk miss maggie. ideally i would then hop on the treadmill in the buildings gym that is, like, 20 steps from my terrace, then eat a hearty, filling and healthful breakfast. then shower, shampoo and shine! first, however, i check out ALL of the following before i can get out of bed. then it’s like 5:45, mags barely gets a walk and i go to work with wet look. so, in order of their appearance on my favorites list – and in no way exhaustive of what sites i visit and read daily – these are my morning rituals:

• NY Post Page Six gossip column
• Matt’s studioscentral.com - and not just because he likes turtles (there’s also jentasmic!)
• the disney geek boys over @ imaginerding
• yes jennifer AGAIN - well, we’ve known each other since the 7th grade and she’s jentasmic!
• two eonline! sites: the awful truth (some times irritating but i do read every day) and the hum
• KA’s blog - she hasn’t been posting very regularly at all lately and she probably wonders who is the one weird blog hit every day. well, it’s me.
• mouseguest.com – now this can be a trouble spot. i often get caught up in getting some autographs and checking the forums.
• derek’s blog – i like his writing and pics! i sometimes get lost in the geeky MAC stuff, but probably i’ll have a MAC like in 6 months or something…
• talking to air - she just moved over to wordpress and is a somewhat frequent format tweaker – there might always be a surprise waiting. but also she – and KA – of lipgloss and laptops fame, really inspire me to expand into the internets
• the superficial – this is truly a guilty pleasure as often it’s pretty rude and square in the middle of the whole fame frenzy thing that is such a waste of time and energy. but theres always something amusing and well, i like to watch

usually i’m 2/3s down the list when i go “crap!” no gym in the am for me, but i always have the hope that i will get up and do it. or at least get to the serious internet sites etc.. that i do partake in. but usually not..