Jan
18
This happened at our house last night:
That’s Riley. Spooning with Marshall, a 16 week old kitten that ways 30 times less than Riley. I wish they got along better.
Jan
17
There’s a ton of snow on the ground and it’s supposed to be -5 tomorrow night. I think it might be wrong that I’m ready for baseball season. But I am. Baseball season gets a little tricky for me, because it runs at the same time as WNBA season. I know that’s a problem for everyone, right?
In any case! The Twins are packing up to start spring training. Pitchers and catchers report in less than a month! And thanks to this fantastic article, I’ve been dying laughing at the projected packing items for some of the team.
Some examples:
Pat Neshek: An issue of Beckett Baseball Card Price Guide from August 1988. (It’s like vintage pornography for card collectors.)
Jim Thome: A three-gallon jug of maple syrup with weird stuff floating in it
And for the love of Pete, I really hope Joe Mauer is packing Colombian nose candy to take with him. That dude needs some scandal.
Jan
16
As evident from my list of 101 things to do in 1001 days, I need some new glasses. I visited the eye doctor in March of 2010. Chances are that prescription may very well be null and void, because I’m getting so old and you know how things go when you hit the ripe old age of 33*. I’ll very likely order glasses online, mainly because the variety is awesome, I don’t have to deal with annoying people that work in the eye clinics I’ve visited, and it’s incredibly cheap. I’m not sure what’s taken me so long just to go ahead and order glasses.
The thing is, I like having the ease and comfort of browsing through designer eyeglasses or rimless eyeglasses or eyeglasses that I wouldn’t be caught dead wearing. The bonus is that this website lets me upload a picture of myself and “try on” different frames. I look way fly in some transitional lenses, let me tell you.
A couple of visits back home ago, I had to go through this whole fashion show at my brother’s house that entailed him modeling all of his five billion different pair of eye glasses. He has ones he wears to art shows. I didn’t even know he went to art shows. He has a whole process about the he goes to get his eyeglasses, including making sure he has matching tennis shoes for each pair. Not kidding.
I’m excited to get new glasses and stray away from the standard black frames I’ve had for years! And check this out, you can save 10% on next time you order prescription glasses from GlassesUSA.com by entering the code Blog10.
*I’m kidding.
Jan
13
One of my favorite bloggers in the entire universe (Jodi) recently posted a list of all of the words she looked up in the dictionary in 2010 (or something – I’d look to refresh my memory, but it seems my work firewall has deemed iwilldare.com inappropriate):
Now, rest assured, I’ve never seen porn there, but I’m not going to try to convince my IT guys that.
The challenge is this: use each of those words on her list in a blog post. This will not be an easy task. My vocabulary, which honestly isn’t all that shabby, usually contains more swear words than multi-syllable words. I have always been ensorcelled* by new words, so I’m hoping this challenge will give me some new ones to use around a certain 13 year old who likes to use big words.
Very similar to my days of newspaper sportswriting, where my boss at the time would challenge me to use a specific word in an article (why, yes, Sedalia, when you read the word kibosh in an article about high school soccer several years ago, that was totally a dare.), I’m sure this will be enjoyable by everyone!
*One down.
Jan
6
We got home from bowling, took care of a few things, and our dogs have not moved from this position. It’s a shame they live such a rough life.
Jan
5
As soon as I saw this shirt, I knew that I had to have. See, the thing is, I rather enjoy SPORTS! and I also rather enjoy t-shirts. See how it’s a winning combination, much like Reese’s cups or Redheaded Sluts? Someone had sent around a link to it on Twitter and I forgot who it was. I wish I could remember, because I owe you a drink or something!
This morning, I was hanging up the t-shirt and noticed Matt Wilson’s name is actually on the inside of my shirt. While that may be creepy, it’s okay. He’s the designer of the shirt. And not the doucheturkey kind of designer like Ed Hardy, but just a local Minneapolis boy who has awesome ideas for t-shirts!
Anyway, I was on Threadless again this morning (shocker) and ended up doing some major nerding out. Matt Wilson (current blog/Tumblr here), as it turns out, used to have the most hilarious blog I ever read in my life back when it was mecawilson. Like had it been possible in any way, shape or form, I’m pretty sure I would have gotten a blog boner. I can’t even remember how long ago that was, but I feel like it was only yesterday.
To wrap up: my now favorite t-shirt was designed by my then favorite blogger and I didn’t even put all of those little facts together until this morning and now I can’t stop thinking about it.
Jan
4
It wasn’t by choice.
I ran home from work long enough to change clothes, say hi to the dogs, and cash in on the 14 (including rollover) hugs The General owes me, and then I headed out the door again to do a home visit for Pet Project Rescue. This little jaunt barely got a mile down the road before I felt Danger the Vibe starting to limp along.
I stopped at a stoplight, got out to run around the car to see what was going on, but didn’t really see anything. I got another couple of blocks and pulled into the lot of the closest public library. My damn right driver’s side tire was flat.
I pulled out the donut, jacked up the car, and started the process of taking off the tire. It required standing on the lug wrench thing to loosen up those bad boys, but I eventually had everything to go except getting the wheel off. Easier blogged about than done.
Yanking, pulling, wiggling, you name it and I tried it. Eventually, a guy that was waiting for someone inside the library came over to offer his help. He walked up to me, said, “Que¿” and just jumped right into clanking things against the wheel in these very specific spots like he’d done it a million times.
He didn’t so much as say a word until the flat tire was off, the donut was on, and everything was back in my hatch. I said, “thanks” and he reached out to shake my hand. I took a chance on my limited Spanish skills and winced on the inside when I said “Gracias”. I hate being that person.
“De nada”, he said and, I kid you not, he had the biggest smile ever on his face, even after he was crouched down in the snow and ice and single digit temps hammering away on some stranger’s car.
I love my neighborhood and I love that the friendliest, most helpful people we have encountered have made us realize exactly why we were excited about moving to North Minneapolis.
And now I have to get my 2nd new tire in less than a year. Lame.
Jan
3
I have a feeling I just lost The General to the sexy gaze of DJ Hero. It came in the mail today and someone in this house over the age of 30 that’s not me spent the whole night sitting cross-legged (damn right I wrote Indian-style and then had to delete it!) on the couch mixing Flo Rida and Kanye West on a plastic turnrable. I had it coming, though. Santa brought be NBA Jam for the Wii and The General has been forced to listen to things like BOOMSHAKALAKA for the past five days.
Also another idea of mine involved taking on some freelance transcription work that’s probably way late at this point, which is why I was working on it tonight instead of perfecting my scratching skills on the Wii. I’ve been trying to transcribe 4 hours of a seminar about mindfulness and being centered and finding your inner… zzzzzzzzzz. Wait. What? Yeah, I can’t listen to 10 minutes of it without having to get up and walk around or slap myself in the face repeatedly.
I am full of good ideas, no?
Jan
2
I hate it.
I mean, it’s cool that I can list my parents and my brother and my cousins and aunts and uncles and all that crap, but let’s talk about other family members that are totally not included!
So, Mr. Mark Zuckerburg, since I know you read my blog daily if not hourly, I present to you the following ideas of which should be added on the popular social media site known as Book Face:
1. The Kid. He’s not technically mine. And sometimes I think he’d like to tell me that when I tell him that he has to stop watching Dr. Who on Instant Netflix, but he doesn’t. He has a dad and a mom, though, so I don’t really feel comfortable calling him my kid. Although I do most of the time. I get son, daughter, those kinds of things, but if you could add one that says: “As Close To My Kid As Possible Without Taking Part In Legal Adoption”, I think that’d be perfect for me.
2. My Brother’s Girlfriend. Let’s just hypothetically say that now that he has a super awesome girlfriend (that part’s not hypothetical) who I already consider family, he ends up marrying her. I would like to say she’s part of my family, but Facebook does not allow it. HOW DARE THEY. How am I suppose to let people know that I have a Sister-in-Law? Now, several years ago, I would not have claimed to having a sister-in-law should my brother gotten married, but times (and the person in the role) have changed and I need some Facebook formality for that. Think about that one, Zuckerburg.
3. WHAT ABOUT MY DOGS? Facebook needs to expand that. While Riley and Kentucky do have a fan page, I’d totally set each of them up with their own little Facebook profile if I could list them as my dog. Because, c’mon, just because I call them (and Marshall) my dog (and cat) sons, doesn’t mean I know for all of the internet to know that. And having them on Facebook isn’t NEARLY as obsessive as having them on Dogster… don’t Google that if you don’t want to get sucked into adorable dog pictures and adorable dog biographies.
Call me, Mark. We can talk more and you can hook me up with some commission of some sort. And we can also talk about why you keep putting Wedding Fair ads when I’m trying to Facebook-stalk people. Wedding Fair? Really? Even if I did dream of a pretty pretty princess wedding, you’d have to hogtie me and drag me to a damn Wedding Fair.
Jan
1
As an homage to one of my favorite Flickr photographers, I gave my own version of 2011 a go… until Marshall came in at the tiniest sound of food being dropped onto the table.*
*Afterwards, we decided we couldn’t remember if we fed him today or not. PET OWNERS OF THE YEAR.
