Logic trees can EAC

I have been at a two day long, grueling meeting, and my brain literally hurts. Let's just say we had to work on "logic trees" and they are about as fun as they sound.

Things I thought about while pretending to care about logic trees:

- On Wednesday in University Circle, there are these events called Wade Oval Wednesdays where they have live music and all these tents set up with fair food and local merchants and stuff. I wrote to Christy on Wednesday and asked her if she could get me some kettle corn, and she did. And now we are getting married. And I am constantly sick to my stomach because I can't stop eating kettle corn.

- Suzanne, who is amazing, knows people who work for Bonne Bell and while going through a basket of free samples, she found a Cherry Coke Lipsmacker and immediately stole it for me. OMG!! You guys, I literally cannot stop applying it. It's amazing. I want to eat it. Also she told her cousin who works for Bonne Bell that her friend Sarah loves the Cherry Coke Lipsmacker, and he said, "Oh well I'll call down to the production guys and have them make her a big one." First of all, I didn't know they even still made the Biggy Lipsmackers and second of all, they are custom making one for me! Is this what it feels like to be a celebrity?

- The guy who hit me last week has awesome insurance, and by awesome insurance I mean no insurance. He still has the insurance card for a policy that was cancelled two years ago, and that's the information he gave me. This is fantastic news and by fantastic news I mean I want to punch him in the larynx.

- I cannot stop watching the movie "Step Up". It's been on Starz constantly for like the last 6 months, and every time it's on I watch it. I think maybe it's because I like to believe we live in a world where at any moment we can all break out into a pre-choreographed dance. Also my Glory Road boyfriend is in this. And the guy who vacillates from hot to almost hot every time I see him.

- Oh and I simply must share this with you. It's something I've been wanting to tell you since the inception of the blog but was under strict orders not to. So you guys may have heard of my friend Steph. She's responsible for roughly 90% of my blog material. Well she recently got a new job, and yesterday was the last day at her old job. Do you remember three years ago when that KFC scandal hit? They released a video of the chicken farm, and they were kicking chickens and stuff? Steph was so horrified, she decided right then and there to become a vegetarian. She told everyone at work about this new life change. A couple weeks later, her CEO brought it up and said, "Whatever-this won't last. Your generation never sticks to anything." Steph was outraged. However, by this time, unbeknownst to the CEO, she had already given up the vegetarian thing and was eating meat again. But Steph was so offended by his comment that she pretended to be a vegetarian at work for three years just to prove him wrong. THREE EFFING YEARS. For three years she never once ate meat at work. She made up some excuse why she could eat eggs, though. And maybe fish I think. But that's it. They threw her a surprise party on Wednesday since she was leaving, and it was all vegetarian potluck. Holy Christ, do you see why I am in love with this girl? Who does that? Man how bad do your lives suck right now for not having a Steph. That's all I'm saying. It's endless entertainment over here in Cleveland/Steph-land.

Here we go, Brownies. Here we go!

On Thursday we went to a fundraiser for the family of a local cop who was killed in the line of duty. He happened to be the friend and mentor of a good friend of ours so we went in support of him. It was at a bar downtown, and they blocked off the street. They had at least over 2,000 people show up. It was a fantastic display of community, and at one point I almost cried. But not for the reason you think.

Okay so here it is-I'm inside the bar standing up on the stage area looking at all the items that are up for silent auction (signed Muhammed Ali boxing gloves-are you serious??). I turn to walk down off the stage, and I see my sister and Drew both standing stiff, staring to their right-basically looking totally creepy. I catch Diane's eye, and I mouth "What the hell?" and she quickly flicks her eyes to the right a few times, and nods her head in that direction. I look over, and it takes me a second to register what I'm seeing. Bernie Kosar. The best Quarterback in Browns history and my personal childhood hero is standing there. Bernie. Fucking. Kosar. My eyes open wide, and I'm pretty sure if this was cartoon they'd have popped out of my head, and you'd have heard that ah-ooo-ga sound. I turn back to Diane and mouth, "Holy shit." And then I almost cried. You guys, I know this might not be a big deal for a lot of people. But to most people my age who grew up watching the Browns back in the 80's when we almost won the AFC championship (fucking fumble), this is huge. Enormous. I mean it's Bernie Kosar.

I walk up to Diane, and I'm like, "Holy hell what is going on." And Diane says, "Drew is waiting for an opportunity to go up and talk to him to ask him to take a picture with us. Thank God I have my camera with me." Drew turns around and says, "If you didn't, I would dump you right now I swear." So the three of us are standing about 3 feet from him just staring. We look completely insane.

Steph walks up like, "Hey what's going on?" And in a whisper-scream I'm like, "It's Bernie Kosar!" And she's like, "Oh. Where?" looking straight at him but not recognizing him. We point him out, and she's like, "Neat." She's clearly not impressed. So we decide to make her take the picture of us, and she doesn't care because she doesn't even really know much about him. I know, you guys-it hurts me, too.

After literally standing there staring at him for 10 minutes like a bunch of creepazoids, Diane's like, "That's it, I'm going up there." She marches up to within maybe a foot of him and stops and says, "Okay no I'm not." Then we push Drew at him. Drew goes up, shakes his hand, and HAS A CONVERSATION WITH HIM. It looks like they are friends. Man, Drew is the best at this! Then he points to me and Diane and he says, "Hey, man, we don't want to take up too much of your time, but we're big fans of yours. Would you mind taking a picture with us?" Immediately Diane leans in and says, "We're really big fans!" then she spills her beer all down the front of her. Bernie's like, "Yeah, yeah! Of course!" and as soon as I get the all clear, I am on Bernie like flies on shit. I run up and basically cling to his right side because I figure if I'm going to be in a picture with Bernie, he better be touching me.

We take the picture, and I'm like, "Thank you so much!" over and over like a freak because that's all I can think to say other than, "Tell me to go long and then throw something at me." which, let's be honest, is what I really want to say. After we take it, he walks up to Steph and says, "Don't you get to be in the picture?" and she laughs and says, "No I get to take it." or something like that, and he goes, "Come on!" and waves her toward him and they get to take a one-on-one picture. Um...hell no! How is that fair? Stop flirting with her, Bernie! She doesn't care about you! Not like I do. Oh well. At least I got to take a picture with Bernie. I still haven't come down from that high. He's looking old, and he was wearing a Six Flags* shirt. But none of that matters to me. I told my dad I was going to try and date him. I don't think my dad was that disappointed.

Also at this party, we took a break to watch the space station fly over Cleveland. We were standing there staring up at the sky, and our friend Fats walked up, looked up and was like, "What are we looking at?" We said, "The space station is going to fly over Cleveland in a couple minutes." He goes, "This is the nerdiest party I've ever been to." We watched the space station fly over us and then the space shuttle was following it in the same orbit, and I'm sorry, but that is effing cool. Space travel is amazing, and you're insane if you don't agree. Afterward Fats goes, "So...are we done in the science lab now or do I have to wait to go get another beer." Awesome.

Other happenings:

- Diane and I took the day off on Friday to go to a spa. We went in a whirlpool for 12 minutes-the first 5 of which were spent just trying to get in because it was so effing hot, I thought we were being cooked alive. Then we got massages, pedicures and an awesome lunch. I still don't know why there are people who choose to touch people's bodies and feet for a living, but thank God for them. After our massages we had to wear our robes to the pedicure and to lunch, but here's the thing: we had nothing on underneath. We kept asking-are you sure this is okay? Should we put clothes on? And they were like, "No it's fine. This is part of the experience." And I was like, "Is it part of the experience for the pedicurist to have to see my vag while she's filing my toenails?" Cuz I'll tell you what, you guys, I tried to shield her from that, but there is no way that at some point she did not see it. Don't worry, I tipped her well.

- On Saturday we went to the open air market which is a bunch of stands set up outside the West Side Market. It's local artists, jewelers, merchants, etc. who sell their stuff in these tents. We stopped at every jeweler's tent, and my mom said, "I'm a total jewelry slut." I have never heard my mom say the word slut in 30 years of life with her. It was amazing.

- Saturday night was pretty tame. I mean I don't remember any of it because of all the wine and the grapefruit vodka I drank, but I'm just going to assume it was tame so that I don't have to imagine how big of a jackass I was. I know that at 3am, I tried to mop Diane's kitchen. I remember her yelling at me a lot. Apparently I was not doing a sufficient job. Whatever, Diane. You're not sufficient.

*I can't sleep thinking about this story.

Crash Bandicooter

Dear guy who was in front of me last night on Great Northern Blvd around 10:40ishpm driving the Jeep Wrangler with "Sahara" written on the tire cover,
Thanks ever so much for slamming on your brakes for a freaking useless mole thereby causing me to almost run into you and in turn the guy behind me to smash into the back of my car which propelled me into the back of yours. I think maybe my favorite part was when you drove off afterwards not even checking to see if the mayhem you caused resulted in any injuries or damage to your own fucking car. Why don't you EAC. Thank God the mole's okay so he can go spread rabies to the rest of Cleveland's wildlife.

Dear guy who ran into me,
I promise I will find the cheapest place I can to fix my car. I am okay. Stop having a panic attack.

Dear Faye,
Baby, I promise mama's gonna get you a new rear bumper and a new muffler and fix you up real nice.

Dear everyone who has to be near me while I'm driving my car until I can get a new muffler,
I know it's loud. I promise I am not white trash. I mean I do keep my Christmas lights up way too long and wear ill-fitting sweat shorts and no shoes to get my mail, but really, I'm not white trash. I'm just white and trashy which is a completely different thing.

P.S. My back hurts.
P.P.S. The post title made me laugh really hard.

Thoughts floating through my mind

So to be perfectly honest I don't give a crap about the royal family. I mean it was sad and shocking when Princess Di was killed but mostly because she had two small boys who loved her and needed her, and it was heartbreaking that she had to leave them so soon. But I just watched those formerly small boys on the "Today" show, and I need to ask this: when in the hell did they become grown up and wickedly hot? Holy crap are you kidding me? Perhaps I should be watching the royal family more closely in the future. You know just so I know when Harry gets his hot little red-headed self over to the states. I'm sure he's into 30 year old chubby chicks who know nothing about England and are pretty sure Cricket is just a fancy version of Croquet.

Yesterday I was following a car into work that said "Channel 3 News" on it, and the only thing I could think about the entire time was, 'If I ram the back of this car will I be on the news?'

We went to see The Fray on Monday. They were excellent. I was so impressed. Mae and OK Go were the openers, and I thoroughly enjoyed them, too. I think I need to come to the realization that at every concert I attend I'm either going to be at least 10 years older than the crowd/band or 30 years younger than the crowd/band. This time it was the former. Can I just ask the parents of high school girls something right now: Are you aware that the skirts your daughters wear out in public are about one bend-over away from showing their va-jay-jays to the entire world? Or do they change in the bathroom after you drop them off?

I made some progress toward becoming an adult this weekend:
1. I put together a table and chairs by myself. Kiss my ass, Bob Vila
2. I learned how to stir fry vegetables. Listen I know it's probably easy for everyone, but for me, this is a big deal. I mean I messed it up the first time so I had to throw those away. But the second time I totally nailed it. If you guys need anything stir fried you just let me know. Well it has to be either carrots or zucchini at this point. I don't know how to stir fry anything else. But still. I am like Rachael Ray. Like a more retarded version of Rachael Ray.

I was in a meeting yesterday in a conference room with the biggest table I have ever seen. It had to be minimum 15 feet across. All I wanted to do was get up and roll around on it while singing "Cherish" by Madonna. What was I just saying about becoming an adult?

Public Enemy #1. This little effer keeps eating my effing flowers, and IT'S PISSING ME OFF.

Breaking news

I just received this urgent email:

coprinus accipiter batavia abetted. above chauffeur digitalis bad beijing alleviate. bantus butternut
collapsible aqueduct carbohydrate commend denunciation demolish crank. chairman barracuda dairyman bilingual confucian blackfeet disputant.

Seriously that's what it said and exactly how it was written. It might be the greatest email I have ever received. I'm not sure, though, because once John sent me a picture that he had drawn of a toilet in the men's bathroom on the day that a piece of poop was lying on the floor next to it. He was trying to explain to me the logistics of how everything was laid out and felt that the only way to really describe it to me was in an artistic rendering of the bathroom stall. That was pretty sweet. The subject line of my email today was "balk big archetypal". Fantastic.

P.S. I heard a rumor that Nicole Richie was pregnant. Is there a way that we, as outsiders, can stop this? Seriously I'm open to all ideas at this point.

I am still a witness

Dear Cavs,
Don't be too down on yourselves today. You played a ridiculously talented team and completely held your own. You went down fighting, and you should be proud! BEST SEASON IN FRANCHISE HISTORY! Hell yeah, baby! Not only that you gave this city something they haven't had in a while: hope. That's what you did for us. That in and of itself is enough to make me want to hug all of you till it gets embarassing. So chin up or else I swear I will lay down a Rudy-type speech about believing in yourselves on all your asses.

Dear rest of NBA,
We'll be back next year so get ready!

Dear LeBron,
If you are interested in procuring another baby mama, you give me a call.

P.S. Um...Tony Parker is only 25? What? Do they mean like he's 25 + 10 years? Otherwise this does not compute.

7 more things about me

I was tagged by Golightly. I haven't been tagged in a while plus I don't have much to write about right now unless you want to listen to me talk about the new table I bought. Hint: you don't. So here you go. It's a list of 7 random facts or habits about me. It's hard to think there's anything I haven't told you about me yet, but, you guys, I am like one of those infinity pools: there's no end. I mean unless you get real close then you can see that it's just a trick, and, like the pool, I just keep recycling the same crap over and over to mask the fact that there's not much to me. Man this analogy sucks. After I post this I'm going to go kill myself. Just kidding-I have to drink tonight. There's no way I'm missing that.

Each player starts with 7 random facts/habits about themselves. People who are tagged need to write their own blog with their 7 things as well as these rules. You need to tag 7 others and list their names on your blog. Remember to leave a comment for them letting them know they have been tagged and to read your blog.
1. I am obsessed with fans. Not the autograph-seeking kind. The kind that cool you down. I don't care what kind-table fan, stand up fan, ceiling fan-I love them all. I go into Wal-Mart about once a year at the beginning of the summer so I can go to the fan aisle and stand in front of them when they're all on.

2. I miss Pinwheel.

3. I don't want to live in a world without Pay-at-the-Pump.

4. Loser Alert: One time in Vegas, we went to the Stratosphere which is a thousand feet tall and my friends made me go on the ride at the top which takes you up another 200 feet and drops you into a "free fall". I got a bloody nose from the height.

5. My Grandpa's nickname for me from the time I was a baby is Corky. Corky Thatcher really messed things up for me.

6. When we were little, whenever my sister and I would run up the stairs in front of our mom she would play this game where she'd say "Bottom, bottom, bottom" over and over while tapping us on the butt. It made us giggle a lot back then, but now we can't walk up the stairs when someone is behind us without clenching our cheeks and covering our backsides and feeling very stressed out. It's just best if you let us go last up the stairs, okay.

7. My inability to cook or retain any cooking training causes me so much stress and mental anguish that it actually makes me question my worth as a human being. It's just such a constant struggle and so tiring feeling so inept so often. One time I went to the grocery store to buy cilantro, and the labels for it and the parsley next to it were missing. I didn't know which one was cilantro, and I stood there staring at the two of them for about 10 minutes then I started to cry. This is how my thought process went "What kind of moron can't even tell the difference between parsley and cilantro? My God I'm useless. I'm going to be a horrible mother." You see? The crazy happens 24/7 here, folks. And I don't even like cilantro.

How were your weekends?

On Friday my parents and I went to the Tremont neighborhood and had a fancy dinner and did the community artwalk. What? But that's cultured. And I wasn't drunk. Sarah, how is this possible? I don't know, but it is. Between the four of us we managed to spend $1,000 in like 4 hours. Listen, guys, we are no amateurs okay. We can spend money with the best of them. Some of the art gallerys were really weird. I've said this before and maybe this makes me an uncultured oaf, but I like art that makes sense to me. I like pictures. Paintings of things I can recognize (unless they are experiments with color-sometimes those are okay). But when I say to my mom, "Man all this stuff is so weird. I don't like it." and she says, "Then don't look to your right." and I see a giant picture of a man with one head and four naked bodies, I don't get it. And I don't want to spend money on it. I'm sorry, gallery owner. But I will drink your free wine. And like you saw when we all walked in, my family and I will make a bee-line for the free cheese and crackers.

Also I'm sorry to the gallery owner at whose home we walked through the backyard completely uninterested in your sculptures but totally enraptured with your backyard setup. I would absolutely love to throw parties back there, but maybe it was rude of me to start screaming out how I would set it all up including when I said, "I'd get rid of all this stuff." while pointing to the art back there. Hopefully you didn't hear me. But if you did, can I throw a party at your house?

We stopped by the bar, The Flying Monkey, for a minute because Steph, Christy, Mariella and Lisa were in there doing happy hour. I didn't see them when we first walked in because their collective high pitched screams of recognition temporarily blinded me. I'm not kidding when I say they screamed so high and so loud when we first walked in that the glass around them almost shattered. Apparently it was half price martini night until 9pm, and we were walking in at 8:55pm. So you know. I got a text from Steph later that said, "tell your parents i am sober at least every wednesday." I'm not sure they bought it, Steph, but it was a nice try.

Saturday we played football, and the women dominated. Three of our touchdowns were scored by women: me, my sister and Meg. Oh yeah. For mine Gordo threw the ball really hard at my chest, and Lefty took a hit, but it's okay. She's fine with taking one for the team. It was worth it to see the other team's face when Meg yelled out, "How are your boobs!?"

Then we headed off to Willoughby for a wedding reception in the Metroparks. It was awesome. Casual dress and fun games. Oh and free wine and beer. As we were walking in to the party, we saw they had ponies there to take the kids on pony rides. So obviously Drew wanted a pony ride. I think his actually ended up being a horse and not a pony, and they took one slow lap around the parking lot, but the way he talked about it the rest of the day you'd have thought he rode Seabiscuit around the track and won. We played bocce ball and volleyball and basketball and our favorite game-one armed football catch. That's where you have to hold your drink in one hand and throw and catch the football with the other without dropping it. If you do, you have to drink. It's so much fun. Unless Sharda is playing because she CHEATS! Yes I said it, Sharda. Cheater.

I was so drunk at this wedding that yesterday I asked Diane, "Okay...do I need to apologize to anyone for my behavior on Saturday? Did I make a complete and utter idiot of myself?" and Diane started laughing hysterically and said, "You were really drunk." Um...what? That's not an answer, Diane! What did I do? I heard a few stories, and some of it is coming back to me, and I just want to say to Becky and Steve and the other people at the wedding: I'm sorry. I swear I'm not that big of an asshole all the time. Only like 80% of the time. And I'm sorry if you were one of the lucky ones who got to see the shorts part of my skorts when I lifted up the skirt part and wore it around my upper body. Actually while I'm at it, I'm sorry to my mom and dad, too, since I was doing those activities while using the family name.

I've asked this once, and I'll ask it again: What the hell is wrong with me?

This is all I'm going to say about this then we move on to actual important things (alcohol)

Paris, stop being a fucking baby and take your medicine. You're a spoiled, irresponsible brat, and jail is not supposed to be easy. That's by design, my dear. It's so you won't want to do the things that will cause you to have to go back there. I have no idea why the world cares about you this much, but this is the last bit of attention I will be paying to this whole ridiculous situation. You are horrible. Eat a sandwich.

Can you snort it?

Leave it to people in the Netherlands to invent alcohol powder while also finding a loophole in the legal system. Best line of the whole article: "We are aiming for the youth market." Man Europe's awesome.

Question

Does it mean I'm an old lady that I am staunchly rejecting the popped-collar-on-Polo-shirts resurgence?

I will marry the Cavs

Saturday was a great day for the city of Cleveland. Definitely one of the greatest days in our sports history. The Cavs won the Eastern Conference and are heading to the NBA Finals for the first time in team history. My thoughts on this are: Ho. ly. Shit. We went downtown to watch the game. We weren't at the game, we were watching it at a bar. But it was maybe one of the most amazing nights of my life in this city. When we won, I hugged about 25 strangers as if they were family. I screamed till I was hoarse. Then we ran outside, and I hi-fived dozens of strangers, and can I just say that I LOVE hi-fiving strangers? If none of you have seen the footage on the news, thousands and thousands of people flooded the streets after the game and remained there for hours. The best part was that it wasn't violent. There was no rioting. Everyone was just cheering and dancing and hugging. It was absolutely amazing. I've never seen my city so happy.

While running around the street cheering I literally ran into Keith and Russ. It was fantastic. Russ and Keith, I'm sorry if I was being a total spaz. In addition to being drunk, I was high from the Cavs' win. And also just high. Just kidding.

A few minutes later we were walking across the street. We saw a bus at the stoplight that looked a lot like the kind of bus we took for Becky's bachelorette party when we got into the infamous accident. As we walked closer we realized it was definitely from the same company and that the driver was our driver! We ran up to the side of the bus. Diane was yelling, "Do you remember us?" I was yelling, "Bus accident? Bus accident?" and Steph was yelling, "Akron! Akron!" so if he listened to all three of us, he got the complete picture. He said, "Yeah!" and we said, "We're from the bachelorette party!". Then we all completely freaked out and hi-fived him. He asked us how we were doing and if everyone was okay, and we assured him we were. Then we asked if he was okay and thanked him profusely for everything he did for us. Then, if memory serves, we ran across the street screaming. Seriously, you guys, what are the chances of us seeing that guy again? Awesome!

We then went to a bar on West 6th, and it turns out the Cavs were having their after-game celebration a couple doors down. We saw Damon Jones pull up in his Lamborghini. Then we noticed all the ridiculously expensive cars surrounding us: Bentley, Mercedes Benz, Maybach. It was all insane and out of my price range 17 times over. Then Meg disappeared for a few minutes and came back with a full pizza. I love Meg. She is magical. As we walked to her apartment, we were like the Fellowship of the Pizza, guarding it from all those who wanted to get their hands on it. D actually had to threaten to whack someone with a rolled up poster. It was awesome. Maybe my only regret of the whole evening was not getting to be in the arena when they ejected Rasheed Wallace. My God that was magnificent. Go home you whiny. ass. baby!

LeBron James, you are amazing. You are the reason we are here. Not only did you TEAR UP game 5, but in game 6 you gave the ball to the person who was hot even when that wasn't you. I've said it once, and I'll say it forever: you are one of the classiest players in the NBA. 22 going on 35, I swear. While the whole city of Cleveland was screaming "Detroit sucks!" all night long you had nothing but wonderful things to say about them and you endlessly thanked your teammates and your coach and then you said, "We still have a job to do." I don't know any 22 year olds who are that mature.

Boobie Gibson, you've got to be kidding me. Where did you come from? You're amazing! It's too bad you don't know how to throw three-pointers, though. The day after the game, Sudha said he's going to name his kid Boobie.

Rest of the team, I love all of you, but if I write a message to each one of you we'll be here all day.

Spurs, we're coming for you.