seasons change was a conduit.

hi! i'm pretty excited! is it because i work today? or that i work tomorrow? is it because i worked during that ridiculous storm and all  the customers asked last night (because they sure as hell weren't buying anything) is why our interactives were off, they wanted to play them!?

no, it's not. it's because i've been trying to fanagle a way into affording foo fighters tickets all last month, which was pretty impossible with that trip to california under our belt, and i won some last night! and i'm very happy about it!

so watch one of my favorite foo fighters videos and rejoice with me!

43. madagascar.
44. persepolis.
45. kung-fu panda.
46. wall-e.

yeah, midnight showings. i might be too old for those now. i saw all three lord of the rings movies at midnight showings, and those were over 3 hours. plus, back then, i was working morning holiday shifts so i had to be into work by seven. what the fuck was i thinking?

anyway, wall-e was so good. it might top my list of the best pixar movie (previously held by monsters, inc.) but i think i'll need to see it one more time to be sure. or two more. maybe three. the only annoying thing about the movie was the group of obscenely loud laughers (who laughed at EVERTHING, by the way) in the row behind us. those damn kids!

my boss said at work yesterday (before we saw it) that he didn't see the appeal in it, although he might've just said this because he has fun challenging the general consensus. i told him i thought it would have the appeal the lego games have. very little dialog, good amount of slapstick, high entertainment values. which was pretty much spot on, except it has alot more heart than i was expecting. i knew i'd cry like a fool at some point, i kept telling jay every time we saw the trailer.

and in popular pixar fashion, they had an animated short at the beginning of the film. i had caught a snippet of it on tv a few weeks ago, and that short is so good it's worth the price of admission. in addition, the credits were done in a pixiated video game way and were so cute we stayed until the end, even through the thanking of the caterers.

i also like the movie theater we went to, because the giant lobby always has those intricate movie standees. like this one:

Walle-display

you were probably one of my top favorite people ever, because you're normally right and always funny. i will miss you.

man, what a rough week.

for the past six days i've been working with the other assistant manager to make our store spotless and perfect and most of all, organized. the boss was out of town for his anniversary and the day he returned we'd be having a visit from his boss, his boss' boss, and ... his boss' boss' boss? i don't know, but plenty of higher ups. we got some instructions from our district manager this week including, "don't be cocky about your store. don't over share any information, just answer their questions and that's it. be professional."

so now i'm picturing sitting in a cold room with a spotlight on my face while they slam their fists on the table and ask me what our shrink percentage is. i'm not sure though, because i won't be there to witness the investigation. i partially wish i was, because when it all goes well i'd like to be the one standing there with my arms across my chest and rocking on my heels in pomposity, but i'm sure the guys can do that without me.

in other news, jay is a sexy beast, especially when he brings home cake after my rough day.

things never done by one, or both of us, before going to california:

* eat thai food.
* pet a sting ray.
* eat sushi at a sushi restaurant.
* watch knights joust.
* see a polar bear.
* eat "bacon pancakes". (yes, pancakes, with bacon in them. so good.)
* went to a kidrobot store.
* stood on the stage of the kodak theatre.
* sat in johnny depp's oscar chair at the kodak theatre. (seat 7.)
* try, then devour, chocolate dipped cheesecake on a stick.
* fail to tip the pizza guy on a 40 dollar bill. because the service was that bad.
* see gary coleman in an airport.
* watch sea lions do slap-stick.
 

tripoverview.jpg

we got back last night around 1:30, to a very surprised (and whiny, understandably so) cat and hot apartment. it was an amazing vacation, and being back in kalamazoo has made me pretty miserable. if it was up to me i'd take my asian and my cat and head back right this minute and send for our things later. i imagine when i get back into the daily grind those feelings might dissipate, but i highly doubt it.

i'll update about it all later, but i'm going to go ahead and post my favorite photo my brother took now. can i get this blown up, please?

Ele

have you ever read one sentence? "true stories, told in one sentence" is the tag line. it's kinda like post secret, in the way that when you read them, some make you laugh out loud and some make your heart break. anyway, i hadn't read them in awhile and i thought i'd post some of my favorites and some of the more popular ones:

In January we got married, in February we bought a house, in March we took in a 14-year-old boy, and in May I'll turn 22.

I never imagined that the first person to call me a "fucking cunt" would be my husband.

My parents believed that black and white people were equal until I started dating a black man.

My 86-year-old grandmother told me she'd always wanted to "blaze up a fat one."

This morning, when my mom wasn't looking, I saw her put birth control in my sisters orange juice.

My atheist neighbor has helped more people in the past year than my entire congregation has in the past ten.

I wanted to tell him, but I couldn't think of a tactful way to say, "Hey, your glass eye is crooked."

I knew my step-son had been overly sheltered when he told me a character from Guitar Hero III was the "black version of Jimi Hendrix."

we're getting pretty close to california departure time. i realized this week i hadn't made a list of all the stuff to take/buy/carry on, and that's a job that takes at LEAST two weeks for me, so i got started on it right away. you'd be surprised how much crap you take with you on vacation when you write it down item by item.

going on vacation has also forced us to do some things we had been putting off, like getting eye exams and haircuts. when the hell did contacts and glasses gets so expensive? christ almighty, we could've planned another trip to california with the money we spent. we might've saved a little if we bought some more basic frames, but what the hell. jay's high maintenance, he picked out versace frames.

we got our 360 back this week, no problems so far.  we started playing gta last night. jay drives like a maniac, and i make him put on the latin station.

i've been really lax in writing down all the new movies i've seen this year, but i'm going to try to update:

35. iron man.
36. prince caspian.
37. tin man.
38. indiana jones & the temple of doom.
39. indiana jones & the last crusade.
40. final destination 3.
41. 27 dresses.

not in that order, but you get the idea. we're headed out to see the new indiana jones in less than an hour, so i'm going to go ahead and add that. 42.

i had a pretty uneventful birthday weekend. just the fact that i was off was a gift in itself, but on sunday derek, becca, jay and i headed out to holland for the tulip festival.

Tulip

the festival wasn't so much a festival as it was .. downtown? with tulips? i don't know, but we went to the dutch village to take a look around, and buy some absolutely amazing butter almond fudge. seriously, i ate it for breakfast on my birthday, i couldn't wait any longer to eat more.

on the way there we passed a mini-golf course, and since the "festival" was more just a walk-around, we decided to stop there on the way home. they had a weirdly complicated course that managed to work out well for me (because i won), but it was really a beautiful area overall.

on saturday becca and i watched a chick flick (27 dresses), and managed to get derek to watch hairspray with us while jay made dinner. both becca and derek admit it was alot better than they expected, and i think the inappropriate humor had something to do with that. we're real big on inappropriate humor around here.

jay's parents gave me a little money for my birthday, and i used it to fuel my ever growing fascination with designer toys. i bought an 8 inch hellboy designed by tara mcpherson (an amazing artist) from a board member at kidrobot, and he was kind enough to even throw in a birthday present for me:

Book

isn't that amazingly generous of him? i love it, and i think there are even pieces in there that caught jay's eye.
pretty soon i'm going to need another bookshelf for all my toys. or a room of bookshelves. that's the dream.

the only downfall of the week was on my birthday. jay and i headed up to work to pick up grand theft auto, came home, popped it in the system, and got the rrod. i was pretty pissed off, of all days to die it has to be my birthday? we already sent it out on friday. on wednesday night i was testing a system at work and i go, "christ almighty!" out of no where and scare my co-worker. i had just realized - both times i've had to send in a system to microsoft, once with my original xbox and now with the 360, i had been playing (or attempting to play) grand theft auto. you think i'd shy away, but i cannot

less than three weeks before i'm in california. i'm very excited.

so, i've got the weekend off. the whole thing. including monday and tuesday. everyone should have a 5 day weekend when it's their birthday.

i had to pay a price by working 7 days in a row to obtain it. it wouldn't have been so bad if there hadn't been a midnight launch on saturday night, and then the launch of grand theft auto 4 on tuesday. i didn't have to work that launch, thank god, because i was still recovering for mario kart. i did, however, work tuesday night and had to deal with a mountain of ridiculous people. but that's retail for you, isn't it?

Iron man

the good thing about having a birthday in early may is i'm usually off for the whole weekend, and they always have a super hero movie release. and this time it was iron man's turn.

i was really, really praying this movie was going to be good. how could it not be? robert downey jr. looked perfect in the role of tony stark, the special effects looked amazing, the suit looks awesome.

so, imagine how happy i was when the movie was OUTSTANDING. really. capital letters and all that. we planned on going to a midnight showing thursday night/friday morning, but apparently the movie theater knew i was getting up in my years and that i don't pay too much attention at 12 am, so they had an 8 pm showing.

i won't say anything, except if you haven't seen it, stay until after the credits.  if you're a comic book fan at all, you'll get what happens.

after the movie we were standing outside and my co-workers, kevin and grant, presented me with my first birthday gift: the third season of lost! apparently everyone at work had chipped in a little bit (except for my boss, strangely enough), because they are awesome, and when we eventually move i will miss them like cupcakes.

another bit of excitement that happened this week, the bad sort of excitement, is our neighbor's (derek and becca) cat managed to get out and get lost. every time i went to or from work i saw them looking, and we chipped in a few times to help. jay printed up some lost posters on the computer, they made copies, and posted 170 in the area.

yesterday morning a jogger saw the cat and chased it into the laundry room while she called derek, so the story has a happy ending. derek told us if one more person had said to them, "it's just a cat" he was going to kill them. how can you even think that about your pets? luckily, no blood was shed, and frank the tank sinatra is back home safe and sound.