Free Ice Cream

It's the 30th annual Ben and Jerry's Free Ice Cream Day on April 29th. I thought you'd probably want to mark that on your calendars.

Don't believe me? Check out this reputable website with all the info (Ok, so it's not crazy reputable, but this *is* a word of mouth event - how reputable can a website be?).

Stuff White People Like

I was reading about this blog via a friend and it is the funniest thing ever, probably because so many of these observations are spot on.

The blog is called Stuff White People Like, and the person who writes it is a genius at picking up on racial/cultural stereotypes.

The thing about stereotypes is that they are based on truth. For me personally, 36 of 76 of those things were spot on (approximately... I may have lost count). I'm not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing, or perhaps neither good nor bad. It is interesting, though, well written, and crazy funny. I recommend you check it out.

The #1 Women's Magazine

Brittany and I recently purchased the March issue of Cosmopolitan. Just to save face, let me say that we don't regularly buy this magazine, but there is no other source of reading material that can entertain/shock like Cosmo, and we had a long bus ride ahead of us. Ok, now that I've made my lame attempt to clear my conscience, moving on to my point...

Today I noticed on the cover that it says it is the #1 women's magazine. While this isn't as bad news as, say, global destruction and general doom, I must say I am still a little disappointed. Who were they surveying when compiling these results? "In a recent survey of Cosmopolitan subscribers we found that 100% of women read Cosmo." Yeah.

Ok, I admit, I like fluffy *ahem*trashy*ahem* reading as much as the next female. But still, I'd like to think that women care more about the finer things in life. It makes me want to watch my world news webcast with renewed vigor, so I guess something good has come out of reading a magazine with the word "sex" on the cover 4 times... in bold print.

Snow in NY

9 days out of 10 it is crazy cool to be a teacher. Today it was especially cool when I got a call from the department chair saying that we had a snow day today and school was canceled.

How much snow does it take in New York City to merit the cancellation of school? Not a whole lot:



I actually really lucked out with the weather for several reasons. First, I decided to go to DC on Saturday instead of Friday (today) and this was a good decision. Second, I'm still crazy itchy, so much so that I was having trouble focusing on teaching/sleeping/acting human. Third, my day is now entirely free to get Zyrtec, bathe in hydrocortisone cream and possibly make an appointment to see the doctor.

Now if only my momentum was not hindered by the inclement weather. I think I am going to reward my efforts with ice cream and/or chocolate chip cookies (voilà, now I have some *real* purpose in life).

Stoner Movies and Other Random Thoughts

Last night Brittany and I went to Blockbuster to trade in the two movies we were sent for two better movies (we had been sent Step Up *retch* and Xanadu *no comment*). When Brittany found a movie called Smiley Face which claimed to be a stoner movie with John Krasinski in it, we were both sold (me because of the genre, Brittany because of the cast).

Turns out, there's a huge difference between movies about stoners (which we love!) and movies you'd only find funny if you watched them when you were stoned. It's a crazy bad movie. Don't rent it.

I went to the bank today and there was a crazy big line. While this frustrated me somewhat, I found it exceedingly rude when a finicky elderly lady behind me pulled over the bank manager to tell him how utterly understaffed this branch of the bank was. Sure, we're all in a hurry and it stunk to have to wait so long, but give me a break. I have to say that I don't really see how complaining about it would change anything - extra tellers are not going to materialize out of thin air. If she really wanted to put her money where her mouth was, she should have closed her account and gone next door to the competing bank. Now *that* would have shown them how she really felt about it.

I was feeling a bit unsatisfied with my doctor of late. Not because of any malpractice sort of issues or anything like that, but simply because the interactions were so impersonal. I couldn't tell if that's just the New York way or what. Anyhow, I was really pleased to get a call from my doctor today and everything was sorted out. Now if only my butt would stop itching (seriously, I itch absolutely *everywhere* which you of course needed to know).

Brittany sent me a text message the other day which made me crack up because she spelled out a garden implement when she meant to be referring to what UrbanDictionary defines as "A word Santa Clause says three times when he sees your wife, mother and sister together in the same room." The context of this text message will not be divulged in order to protect, um, myself.

I have discovered the cosmic secret to success at 5th grader domination! Students are really cooperative when class activities involve candy. Why had I not thought of this sooner? I estimate that in order to complete our current assignment I am going to go through about six bags of jellybeans this week, but that's ok. My classroom was calm and blissfully focused. Well, wonders never cease.

Vacation Week Summary

This week was, in a word, good. I went to lots of concerts (free and otherwise, classical, etc.). I walked all over the place on several occasions and in all sorts of weather. I spent a lot of time with people I really enjoy spending time with, new and friends from NYC and other cities. It was really good.

Unfortunately now I seem to have developed some sort of rash/allergy to something and I can't figure out what it is. I thought it might be laundry detergent, but I've ruled out that possibility. I also think it might be some new medication I am taking, but three weeks in is a strange time to develop a new allergy. It's weird and itchy, and currently I'm thinking I might just be allergic to too much fun.

But hey, if that's the case it was totally worth it.

Pandora

I regularly find myself hooked on one particular song. I don't mean I take idle interests in random songs every now and then, but rather that I will listen, obsessively, to one song for weeks on end until I get it out of my system. What can I say, sometimes I just can't get enough of that song!

One of my friends from college introduced me to a really awesome website called Pandora. Basically, you type in an artist or the name of a song you like, and it will play similar music in a radio type fashion. You can rate the selections and learn all about new music that sounds similar to music you already love. Cool, right?

I recommend this site highly. I even like it so much that I added the Facebook app (for those of you who know me, you'll know this is a huge, huge deal).

Like a Kid in a Candy Store

Yesterday I went shopping! I find that in NY it can be terribly overwhelming to store hop and spend hours trying on different things so normally I avoid it like the plague. However, I've lately been wearing the same pair of jeans approximately 4 days a week and have come to be a little self-conscious of this fact. So yesterday I went out determined to find some casual pants.

One of the people I was with shares my passion for all things undergarment so after about 2 hours of browsing at various stores and having no luck, my friend and I agreed it was time to hit an underwear store (where we can almost always realize our full purchasing potential). And what better underwear is there than Victoria's Secret?

It was so much fun. I have never seen so much cute underwear (and, in some instances, some devastatingly horrifying sale items) in all my life! So, if you like polka dots and ruffles and lace and color and flowers incorporated in your undergarments, please go have fun at your local Victoria's Secret. It was certainly the highlight of my day!

Facebook Hating

As if it were not bad enough that Facebook inundates you with pointless application invites, they've now delved into your personal life through other arenas.

I mentioned before that Blockbuster somehow wanted to let everyone know what I put in my queue on Facebook. Now somehow they've got it hooked up to Brittany's account and though we've removed the application several times, I saw that today it had popped back on again. How annoying!

I found this picture and it made me feel better (though don't try and go to the arsebook web page... let's just say it's not anything Facebook-esque).

Two More Concerts

Mika is fantastic live - it was, without a doubt, the best show I've ever been to. That's all I have to say about that. Oh, except Brittany ran into the keyboardist for the band we had seen two nights prior and congratulated him on a job well done (which was pretty cool and random).

The concert I went to tonight was so bad I couldn't bear staying through the opening bands to see the main act. Stella was hosting it and they were funny, but the actual bands playing were horrible. A super disappointing event and a huge waste of money. Apparently you can see the concert online tomorrow, but I won't bother posting the link because who'd want to see it? Honestly.

The Superbowl

The Giants win! I feel so on top of my game.

But here's the thing... Brittany and I had a super hard time finding out the score online. You'd think in this day and age there would be some sort of streaming video or minute by minute online scoreboard. I've got to say, I'm a bit disappointed with their inefficient use of technology to broadcast to the masses.

Public Humiliation

Brittany and I went to a concert for the Click Five the other night. I firsst need to say that it was the poorest attended concert that I think I've ever been to... the lack of excitement over an encore made me cringe it was so painful. This is a shame because the group is really good and their lead singer is amazing. But anyhow, enough about the band, on to my life and embarrassing moments.

Brittany and I had been sitting down for a long time - perhaps 4 hours - watching the 3 opening bands (yawn), and when the main band came out we decided it was time to get our boogie on. Brittany went down the stairs first, and I followed her on my face. That's right, instead of walking down the steps, I plummeted face first down about 8 of them. Miracle of miracles, I did not have a single scratch on me when I hit the bottom. I'd like to say the only thing severely bruised was my ego, but that was not damaged at all - I fall down stairs all the time, so I've gotten over feeling embarrassed about it.

Perhaps even funnier was when Brittany shouted something crazy funny about the emo hipster band we were watching play. They were wearing the typical vests, sketchers, classy sweatshirts and of course tight jeans. Brittany picked up on the jeans and said, "Wow, their pants are so tight, you can really see their packages!" The funny bit about this was she was screaming it just as the song ended, so everyone around us heard her louder than life comment about their packages (probably even the band heard it) and gave her the hairy eye. I was laughing waaaay too hard.

Did I mention I saw some students from my school there? Yeah.

Also Brittany and I had an insanely random and funny meal with a guy who was very very drunk and visiting from Florida. He's a self-proclaimed comedian and I'm not going to lie, he was pretty funny. He did start hiccuping like crazy and eating Brittany's pizza, so we left him to sober up... but it was a funny experience.

We're going to another concert tonight. I hope this one is as eventful as the last, because it's fun to have crazy stories to tell. I'll keep you posted. :-)