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  • Emilily 1:44 pm on November 24, 2011 Permalink | Reply  

    Weird places… 

    These two pictures were taken from my car (obviously) while driving through some town in Pennsylvania. Previously, I did not know anything about Pennsylvania, except that 1) there are Dutch people there, and 2) it inspired one of my favorite shows, “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.” Now I know a bit more, thanks to one of the people in my OCS class and a dinner in Steubenville. Steubenville is a small coal-mining town in Western Pennsylvania, whose economy clearly has not seen any new developments since dynamite and railroads were introduced to the coal mining industry. I try not to watch horror movies because they scare the living crap out of me, but I am pretty sure Steubenville could be the setting for many a crazed-ax-murder scene. After my mom and I had dinner in Steubenville, we were both so impressed by the weirdness that she sent me an article of some crazy news story that had recently happened in Steubenville. (I don’t remember what it was, but it was bizarre.)

    The other thing about Pennsylvania…my drill instructor always likes to insult people by guessing where they are from, and then implying that every negative stereotype of that place is a direct result of their existence. One of the guys in my class is from Western Pennsylvania, and his nickname is now “Western Penn,” said in a tone of voice that suggests this guy could only be the product of multiple generations of cousins marrying cousins.

    I didn’t start this post with the intention of just bashing on Pennsylvania. I guess my point was that, when I started the road trip, I thought Ohio was backwards and Pennsylvania was relatively urban. However, now I think Ohio is lovely, and the Appalachian region of Pennsylvania makes those little towns way out in the woods in Humboldt County look like thoroughly modern centers of civilization. Anytime my perceptions are changed, I feel like I have learned something, and that is always good. Sorry Pennsylvania.

    And, finally, unrelated but also new and weird – small hamburgers from the middle of the country.

     

     

  • Emilily 12:37 pm on November 24, 2011 Permalink | Reply  

    Old Stuff 

    So…it’s Thanksgiving, everything’s closed, and I’m sitting here with coffee and cookies and I figured I should catch up on my blog posts. I know you are also doing something creative today, on a far grander scale, and I wish I was there helping out! But for now, here are some pictures of where I am…

    …………………………………

    This is a picture of the back yard of the B&B my mom and I stayed in when we were in…the city before Indiana…I think it was Springfield, Missouri. It was very eclectic-Victorian, in a nice part of town, right across the street from a University. It was cute and comfortable, but I liked the place we stayed the next night, in Terre Haute Indiana, much better. It was called Sycamore Farms, although this barn (below left) was the only farm-ish thing I could find. Most notable – the breakfast was AMAZING.

    …………………………………….


    Next we have some leaves, in a park in somewhere…

    …………………………………….

    And at the bottom, a picture of the side of the road in Ohio. I should say something for Ohio here…it was, unexpectedly, one of the most beautiful parts of the entire road trip. Some of it was just flat cornfields, but once we entered the Eastern part of the state, it was all rolling hills and streams and fall leaves.

    …………………………………….

    There was this town, called Winterset, that looked like something out of a storybook. I thought that surely I would find a ton of great pictures of it online, but alas, this was all I could find – one image of a covered bridge. And we didn’t even see this bridge. I am seriously considering driving the 15 hours back to Ohio and taking some more pictures.

     

     

     

  • Emilily 6:03 am on October 7, 2011 Permalink | Reply  

    Crap…I don’t remember what comes after Oklahoma…

    What are you doing? Specifically, I mean, what are you doing besides looking at the blog and posting witty replies to my posts?!

     

    • Carmen 10:58 am on October 7, 2011 Permalink

      I’m way behind on the witty replies to your pretty posts. I’m currently trying to learn how to be a good Project Manager. Its hard! My brain is learning new things, new concepts. During all that time I worked at my dead end job my brain was like ‘hheeerrrrpppderp’ and it never felt good because it was half dead all the time. Now its like my days are wonderful and perfect but I need to get my brain in good working order. Its in progress. And now that I’m in charge of my schedule I have to learn better self discipline. I was thinking of writing up a specific day schedule like: 7am – Wake, 9am – work… etc. But what are the consequences if I don’t stick to it? What are the rewards if I do stick to it – you know? I was thinking a reward could be chocolate but that could turn out bad. I don’t know what do you think?

      So are you going to do a post on why you are driving across the country? I think our readers want to know! Oh whats that? we have no readers? well, for posterity then.

  • Emilily 5:11 pm on October 6, 2011 Permalink | Reply  

    Oklahoma 

    We didn’t stay in Oklahoma – we just drove through – but we stopped for lunch so it probably deserves a short post. Overall, not a bad impression of Oklahoma City, but I can still say the best thing about Oklahoma is that the speed limit is 10 mph faster than Texas, which was an annoyingly sluggish 65.

    We used Yelp to find a good place to eat, and ended up at Sage Marketplace Cafe. Sounds pretty good, right? Like they might have smoothies and salads and maybe a take-out deli, or something to that effect, that would have prompted them to call themselves a “marketplace.” Well, that was not the case; it was a smallish lunch place with a full bar and no market to speak of.  Maybe Marketplace was just Sage’s last name? Regardless, Mom and I both had the slider trio, and they were delicious. After lunch, we went to get cupcakes at this place recommended by one of the local “marketplace” patrons, called SaraSara Cupcakes. Yum!

     

     

  • Emilily 6:33 pm on October 4, 2011 Permalink | Reply  

    Texas again 

      And two more of Texas…since it is photogenic in the same way that those shots of grotesquely obese people shopping at Walmart in their camouflage skinny jeans and mullets make us look, and look again…

    This is a junkyard for old cars, and by old, I mean they were probably abandoned here when route 66 was the only way through town. I wanted to get closer to get a better shot, but I felt like this was prime junkyard-dog territory and I am just not that much of a car buff.

     

     

  • Emilily 6:22 pm on October 4, 2011 Permalink | Reply  

    Texas 

     So…this is Texas. I believe this shot captures the true essence of Texas, and there is really not much else to say.

    Except I should probably explain what is going on in this picture. I was experimenting with Hipstamatic lenses, and unfortunately, you cannot read the sign out front, on the left side of the shot, but it says “amusement. open.” I believe it is referring to this wooden shack with boarded up windows. Also difficult to see, but there is a giant iron hook of some sort, maybe a type of winch, hanging from some solid looking rope over the door. I think they must be using the word “amusement”rather loosely.

     

     

     

     

     

     

    In case you were skeptical…

     

  • Emilily 5:44 pm on October 4, 2011 Permalink | Reply  

    New Mexico 

    This is a shot of the inside of a Día de los Muertos store that we went into in Albuquerque, New Mexico. We spent a few hours window shopping and sightseeing here before continuing on to Texas. There’s not much else to say about it…it is hot, and the speed limit is 75 mph.

    Since this post was about to be really short and boring, I looked up Day of the Dead for some more content…

    The Day of the Dead celebration takes place on November 1 and 2, which corresponds with the Catholic All Saints’ Day (November 1) and All Souls’ Day (November 2.) The holiday dates back to the Aztec culture and festivities to honor the “Lady of the Dead,” who has evolved into today’s Catrina doll.

    In the Guatemalan celebration of Día de los Muertos, they prepare fiambre. Fiambre started out from the tradition of taking to the cemeteries the favorite dishes of dead family members. As all different families brought food to the celebrations, they became mixed, eventually mixing them together to this all-encompassing salad. Ingredients usually include numerous sausages and cold cuts, pickled baby-corn and onion, beets, pacaya flower, different cheeses, olives, chicken, and sometimes even brussels sprouts or shrimp. Something about that is very intriguing, I think next time I have a kitchen, I will find some fiambre recipes.

     

  • Emilily 5:16 pm on October 4, 2011 Permalink | Reply  

    More Arizona… 

    …………and more hipstamatic fun!

    The picture on the left was taken in Williams, after we left our hotel. As a follow up on the last post, we did follow the pig tracks to breakfast, then immediately declined that option, and went to the Greek-Italian cafe across the street. After eating, we stopped at a gas station to fill up (more later about the gas prices here!) and I took a picture of this train. The train is significant because, apparently, much of the middle portion of the country exists only to support the train tracks that move stuff from one side to the other. I also thought it was funny that there was a school bus parked in an empty lot…on a Monday morning. In Arizona, they don’t go to school on Mondays; once they removed science and biology from the curriculum, there really wasn’t a need for five whole days of education.

    The picture on the right is where the aliens landed. No, not really…it is a meteor crater, from a 80 ft wide meteor that landed outside Flagstaff about 20,000 to 50,000 years ago. (By the way, I am not impressed with this date range. I really thought we could carbon date stuff better than a 30,000 year window.) Anyhow…the aliens shot this asteroid at us, and it made a hole 4,000 ft in diameter and 570 ft deep. In the 60′s, NASA used it to train astronauts how to collect samples of moon rock…and hunt aliens.

     

     

     

  • Emilily 9:16 pm on October 1, 2011 Permalink | Reply  

    Arizona 

    So here is Day 1 on our way out to Rhode Island, otherwise known as gas station in The Middle of Nowhere, AZ. (This Hipstamatic is pretty cool, it really captured the heat and grittiness of this parking lot!)

     

    Right now we’re in Williams, Arizona, at a B&B called Canyon County Inn. There’s live country music across the street, and in the morning we follow the “pig tracks” to the place where they serve breakfast. Weird.

     

    Kinda tired now, going to bed. I’ll post again tomorrow, from Amarillo, Texas!


     

    • Carmen 12:39 pm on October 4, 2011 Permalink

      looks exactly how I pictured Arizona to look! Following pig tracks out to where you eat sounds a bit creepy, its like following the pig out to the slaughter house so you can have bacon for breakfast.

  • Emilily 3:03 pm on September 25, 2011 Permalink | Reply  

    The zoo at night! 

    So, here I am at Starbucks JUST to do a blog post on what I did last night, since it was pretty cool. Chris and I went to the San Diego Zoo’s Food and Wine Celebration. They open parts of the zoo at night and there are a bunch of vendors serving samples of wine and food and wine, and wine. We also saw part of a presentation by Joan Embery about sloths, which are quite cute, and probably should have been given a nicer name than “sloth.” I mean, sloth is one of the seven deadly sins, and implies a degree of laziness that should be punished by burning in hell, which seems a little extreme. After all, sloths aren’t any slower than turtles, and no one was rude enough to name them “lazies” or “couch potatoes.”

    Here are some interesting facts about sloths. 1: they eat lettuce, 2: they move 4 to 5 meters an hour, and 3: on a scale of 2 to 10, their sense of touch, sight and hearing rate a 2.  Their sense of smell rates a 3, which means they could probably smell an approaching threat approximately 1.2 seconds before they became said threat’s dinner. With such a poor perception of the world around them, what’s the point of moving any faster? It’s not like it would do them any good. They do have one natural defense; their fur is home to an algae that turns brown in the dry season and green in the wet season, allowing them to camoflage with the foliage they live in. It also explains this picture of what appears to be a happy swamp creature crawling across the road.

    Okay, I guess the algae is not that unfortunate, since the giant claws are already a pretty effective snuggling deterrent.

     

    • Carmen 2:20 pm on September 26, 2011 Permalink

      I was just thinking about sloths – truly! Maybe we are telepathically linked and when you were at the zoo I could see sloths in my head! I bet that happened. Anyways, what I was thinking is – how the hell have they survived all this time? They have a couple defense mechanisms – they are slightly camouflaged…. uh I think thats their only defense. Sure they have these super awesome claws but if they went to gouge your eyes out you could just move out of the way, they’re that slow. Another defense could be that they look scary and cute at the same time, thus confusing you too much to want to eat them. Also, I think its possible that they taste really bad and other animals have just learned that over time. Its probably a fact that if it wasn’t for the sloth sanctuaries around the world that they would be extinct by now. Humans are their ultimate defense mechanism.

  • Emilily 5:33 pm on September 19, 2011 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Bitter melon   

    Dinner 

    Here is a picture of my first official dinner at the new apartment. Previously, I had been too lazy/busy to do any real grocery shopping, aside from bread, cheese and eggs, which I could live on quite happily, but don’t make much of a meal. This is a Filipino dish (I cannot pronounce the name, not even phonetically) with ground beef, eggs, tomatoes, shrimp, onions, garlic and bitter melon. I don’t know if you have ever had bitter melon (Briana once had a pleasant experience with a bitter melon, you should ask her about it) but it tastes exactly like it sounds. However, the bitterness wears off once you cook it down, and it adds a nice layer of flavor to cut the heaviness of the beef.

    20110919-183302.jpg

     

    • Carmen 7:12 pm on September 19, 2011 Permalink

      Well that looks pretty delicious and I’m a big fan of Filipino food so I would probably like this. Although I can’t say I’ve had any experiences with bitter lemon. I did accidentally smell a durian once and I had an automatic gut reaction that I thought the building was going to blow up because to me it smelled like propane gas. I was urging everyone to leave the building and call PG&E. They were like “calm down whitey round eye, its just durian”.

    • Briana 9:44 am on September 20, 2011 Permalink

      As I recall, you shoved it in mouth while I had a line full of customers and it was one of the worst experiences of my life! It instantly sapped all the liquid from my mouth and all it left behind was the inability to swallow and a horrifically bitter flavor. Definitely a story to remember and one I still tell to this day! ;)

  • Emilily 2:42 pm on September 13, 2011 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , iPhone, wordpress   

    Blogging from the phone 

    This is an experiment to see if posting from my phone will work. I am at the doctor’s office with my dad, hanging out in the waiting room.

    Okay, well, problem #1, there is no page scrolling on the screen. So you type a few lines, then everything you are typing goes down below the screen and you can’t see it. You can still type, but it is invisible, forcing you to blindly trust the apple spell checker, which often likes to replace what I have typed with phrases like “what the duck.”

    I think my dad is coming out now. I’ll upload a quick pic!

    p.s. I saw you started a post on shoes. You should definitely finish it, since I am like a 7-month fashion time warp and have no idea what shoes I need to buy with this wad of cash burning a hole in my pocket!

    20110913-154134.jpg

     

  • Emilily 8:41 pm on September 11, 2011 Permalink | Reply  

    We’re baaaaaack…. 

    Well, I am not even sure I remember how to do a post anymore, and according to the dashboard notices, I am using an outdated version of Safari and am not enjoying the full WordPress experience, but I should be able to limp through this one…I’ll warn you right off the bat, I am not feeling very funny or inspired, but I’ll do the best I can.

    I have just conducted some research on the Pajama Jean for you. It seems that many people have been lured into this sordid fashion disaster! I imagine these people also own snuggies.

    If you google “pajama jeans” you will find a lot of sites selling them, like HSN, the Pajama Jean parent company (PajamaGram, of course) and the website associated with the infomercial, PajamaJeans.com. (Be very careful going to this website; there is noise, and someone nearby might think you are actually purchasing these!) But you will also find a number of “style” blogs celebrating them, and even a few “fan” websites posing transparently as impartial reviewers. They often have comments from other customers saying things like “Pajama jeans are seriously my new found love! I can pair these jeans with a sexy top and wear it out at the club to get my drink on and then come home and pass out in them!” Like, who doesn’t want that? Maybe they could have a version with a built-in diaper so you didn’t have to wake up from your drunken stupor to use the bathroom. Another one of the reviews said “Sadly, the smooth butt-lifting design is not available in men’s sizes.” Interesting…I was not aware “butt-lifting” was a feature desired in men’s jeans.

    Perhaps the most fascinating thing about PajamaJeans is what pops up when you Google search for images of them. Mainly, you get all kinds of pictures of people who have been let loose in public their real pajamas, or even worse, people who would have been better off if they had just left their pajamas on that day…

     

    For anyone seriously considering the Pajama Jean, I have one piece of advice: go to Target and use your $39.95+ shipping & handling to purchase one pair of real jeans AND one pair of sweatpants, and then trouble yourself to change into the appropriate pair when you leave the house. If that sounds like too much work, by all means, wear whatever you want while you wallow lazily in your slothiness. (I invented that word. I guess PajamaJeans have inspired me after all!)

    Also, since we haven’t blogged in about a year, we have probably all but disappeared from the blogosphere, so here’s a shameless plug: these people are funny…check out heir blog The Steel Closet.

     

    And I’ll leave you with one final thought…what does one wear under pajama jeans?


     

     

     

     

     

    • Carmen 10:22 pm on September 11, 2011 Permalink

      I cannot even express how thrilled I am in this moment.

    • Pajama Jeans 12:09 am on December 24, 2011 Permalink

      The picture of the tight denim shorts is hilarious. I’d love to buy my boyfriend some as a gag gift!

  • Emilily 9:12 pm on November 26, 2010 Permalink | Reply  

    So. I tried to check out the blog from my office on the ship, and while I could see the pictures, I couldn’t see anything else. All of the buttons and links were replaced with the letter “R” and some weird little rectangle icon; it took me about 17 tries to find the “R” that corresponded to Reply, and once I had typed my reply, of course, there was no “R” for post. So, mostly a fail.

    Instead, I thought I’d do a post, and in keeping with the theme, I’ve included a picture of the sky. Boy, do I miss you…oh, and you too, Blog.

     

  • Emilily 4:36 pm on March 31, 2010 Permalink | Reply  

    Now that I am one (small) step closer to life as I knew it… 

    Guess what?! We can take the counter down! Because as much as I love the concept, I am not crazy how it says “…she returns in 0 days.“

     

    • Victor 1:13 pm on April 1, 2010 Permalink

      Hi M
      Can I call you a squid now lol
      Glad you made it through boot camp (wasn’t it so much fun??)
      Anyways just wanted to congratulate you on a job well done.
      I bet you can’t wait to get on a Navy carrier and be on the ocean for months at a time huh? :)

      Vic

    • Carmen 1:18 pm on April 1, 2010 Permalink

      Yeah, good point, Ok, I took it down.

  • Emilily 1:57 pm on March 28, 2010 Permalink | Reply  

    Back…sort of 

    One tag goes around your neck, the other on your boot - that's how they know who to return the feet to.

    So here I am in A-School! I could complain about the middle-of-nowhereness of Meridian, Mississippi, but I am really just thrilled to be anywhere besides bootcamp. The highlight of my week was watching a DVD and eating M&Ms until I was (almost) sick of chocolate – it sounds boring, but it was wonderful. Seriously.

    I start classes next week, and shortly after that should receive my next orders, so I’ll know where I’ll be spending the next ~3 years very soon!

    Okay, enough about all that. Not that I have any other news…oh, and sorry for the short iPhone post – I did go to the computer center this afternoon, but had to spend the whole hour catching up on The Sartorialist.

    Will write more soon!

     

  • Emilily 12:41 pm on January 18, 2010 Permalink | Reply  

    bye! 

    I’m off!

    Yikes.

     

    • olga 2:20 am on January 20, 2010 Permalink

      I’m going to miss you Emilily!

  • Emilily 11:19 am on January 14, 2010 Permalink | Reply  

    yuck 

    Okay, I know you can’t see this photo very well, but basically it is a picture of Burger King on a lovely sunny day in McKinleyville. I tried to zoom in on the marquis, which was the reason for this picture, but it is still fuzzy. It reads “TRY NEW BK BURGER SHOTS.” What?!?!

    I looked it up online, and apparently, they are trying to promote their new sliders, but whatever marketing genius came up with the term “burger shots” needs to be fired. Immediately. I mean, not only is the idea of “shooting” any form of a burger completely nauseating, but they come in a “six-pack” because, clearly, just one alcoholic-beverage reference was not cool enough.

     

    • Carmen 12:06 pm on January 14, 2010 Permalink

      Mckinleyville – so progressive.

  • Emilily 8:22 am on January 14, 2010 Permalink | Reply  

    where in the world is carmemily? 

    ok, it’s been sooooo long, I had to make a post, even though I have nothing much to talk about except for maybe some of the exciting things I am doing today, like going to the mechanic, listing my car on Craig’s List, and doing my taxes. Fun. Also, I am in the process of upgrading my adobe products, and so cannot post any new photos. To make this post more interesting, I have included a picture of my camping trip to Joshua Tree this past fall. Actually, I haven’t posted any of these pictures, and I’ve done some editing work to a few of them, so here they are…oh, crap, the files are too large, I am crippled without photoshop.

    Huh.

    I’ve been slacking on my fashion sales sites, K Dukes is not inspiring me, and today’s news – the earthquake in Haiti – is tragic but not controversial…I’m at a loss. I guess I could just post a bunch of pictures of my cat doing cute things with a hackey sack…or not…hey, what’s everyone else doing right now?!

     

    • Carmen 12:06 pm on January 14, 2010 Permalink

      Oh emily, I hear you. I’ve seen some bad fashion lately but not bad enough to post about. Especially when I am keenly aware that you are not waiting impatiently by your computer for my next post.

  • Emilily 11:13 am on January 4, 2010 Permalink | Reply
    Tags:   

    la luna azul 

    So here is my post on the blue moon. Very appropriate that it follows your picture of the blue moon, since I have no actual picture of the last blue moon, only one I lifted from this Wikipedia article, of the December 2009 blue moon with a partial lunar eclipse, as was visible from certain parts of the world (I don’t know which parts, but not ours, obviously.) There is a lot of interesting information here, so I’d recommend reading the whole thing, but here are some of the highlights!

    • There are a number of different definitions of a blue moon, the most accepted being the 13th full moon in a year, occurring once every two to three years. The Farmers’ Almanac follows the rule of the extra (fourth) full moon in a season, and the definition of the blue moon as the second full moon in one month stems from a 1946 interpretation error, revealed in the May 2009 issue of Sky & Telescope. (In case you missed the May issue, here’s the article.)
    • The moon before the blue moon is called a betrayer moon, because it was seen as coming ahead of its appropriate time (the blue moon was one appearing at the right time, then?) and thus confusing the clergy when they were trying to determine the dates for Lent and Easter, which apparently were based on the dates of the full moon.
    • An interesting list of the traditional English names (e) for full moons, based on the Gregorian calendar, followed by the Native American (na) names, based on an older method of dating full moon according to seasons:

    January: old moon (e), wolf moon (na)
    February: wolf moon (e), snow moon (na)
    March: lenten moon (e), worm moon (na)
    April: egg moon (e), pink moon (na)
    May: milk moon (e), flower moon (na)
    June: flower moon (e), strawberry moon (na)
    July: hay moon (e), buck moon (na)
    August: grain moon (e), sturgeon moon (na)
    September: corn moon (e), harvest moon (na)
    October: harvest moon (e), hunter’s moon (na)
    November: hunter’s moon (e), beaver moon (na)
    December: oak moon (e), cold moon (na)

    • Finally, here is a handy equation you can use to calculate the dates of future full moons (all full moons, not just blue moons):

    d = 20.362955 + 29.530588861 \times N + 102.026 \times 10^{-12} \times N^2

    where d is the number of days since 1 January 2000 00:00:00 in the time scale known as Terrestial Time. For Universal Time (world clock time) add the following approximate correction to d:

    -0.000739 - (235 \times 10^{-12})\times N^2 days

    and where N is an integer number of full moons, starting with 0 for the first full moon of the year 2000. The true time of a full moon may differ from this approximation by up to about 14.5 hours as a result of the non-circularity of the moon’s orbit.

    The next time the blue moon will fall on New Year’s Eve is 2028, at which time there will also be a full lunar eclipse! Whoa! (I did not calculate this myself, although I feel like we should test this equation to make sure mathematician Jean Meeus is correct.)

     

  • Emilily 9:35 am on December 23, 2009 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: amazon, kindle   

    a new toy 

    Hey, guess what! Mis padres are getting me a Kindle for Christmas! I’m getting the smaller one, that has international download capabilities. I know this doesn’t mean a whole lot for the blog, except that I will still be able to read all kinds of cool science articles. There’s even a Wired blog I can subscribe to. Although I will completely ignore any misgivings I might have about jumping on the e-reader bandwagon at the expense of real books and bookstores, both of which I love, I also feel like I am being suckered into an expensive yet cool gadget that will make me think “how could I have survived before I had this?” just like my iPod. Thank you technology, for ensuring my life is more entertained, informed, complicated and expensive.

    I was reading reviews before we purchased it, and found that there are lots of people who are really down on Amazon. I suspect it is just because they are scarily massive. Someday I might regret saying this, but I cannot help but root for them because they started small but through a combination of luck, good timing, and shrewd business strategy, have built an empire – it feels like good old fashioned American capitalism, which certainly won’t cure world hunger, but it’s nice to know it works every so often.

    Also, I bet someday we will look back at Jeff Bezos as one of the most notable entrepreneurs of our generation; in fact, there are probably already MBA courses analyzing his every move as we speak. In a recent shareholder meeting, he was quoted as saying, “Advertising is the price you pay for having an unremarkable product or service.” Probably not entirely true, but his arrogance is endearing.

    On an unrelated note, I was trying to find a funny review I read last night slamming Amazon for not releasing sales figures* and I came across a blog that you may already know about, but that had some cool stuff. It’s called Geeksugar, and it appears to be some sort of offshoot of Popsugar. They have a combination of geeky, techy gadgets and girly fashion stuff, including these cool little travel speakers.

    *The quote was something like: Amazon, on their self-proclaimed remarkable Kindle sales: “The good news is, we’ve sold every Kindle we made. The bad news is, we made 5.”

     

    • Carmen 10:22 am on December 24, 2009 Permalink

      awesome. i’m jealous.

  • Emilily 9:25 pm on December 22, 2009 Permalink | Reply  

    back! 

    I’m in Oceanside now, at my grandma’s, and we’re finally wired again! We had to buy a wireless router today – it was the only solution, since being offline for the next 8 days is not really an option.

    Unfortunately, I cannot think of anything interesting to post about at the moment…

     

  • Emilily 11:30 pm on December 15, 2009 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: fox news   

    oxymoron of the day: Fox News 

    foxSometimes when I am at the gym, they have Fox News playing on the TV in the locker room. They also have the TV mounted on the ceiling, with no volume or channel controls in sight, so I have to quickly change my clothes while singing a little song I made up called The Fox News Song. It goes “la la la la la I can’t hear you la la la la....” Unfortunately, the other day, in between verses 17 and 18, I heard about this guy, I believe he is a Senator, named Inhofe, who has formed something called The Truth Commission. My details are sketchy, because I was still trying to not hear the first half of the story, but apparently, The Truth Commission has made it their mission to debunk climate change. I’m all for challenging commonly held assumptions, even if they do appear to be based on massive amounts of statistical data, but I have two issues with The Truth Commission.

    First, it is composed of three members – one of them is Inhofe, the other was some guy who’s name I did not recognize, and the third member was, and I quote, “…a secret.” Aside from the fact that we’re supposed to believe a three-member commission of politicians has discovered the truth* behind global warming that scientists around the globe have apparently got wrong, isn’t it contradictory to have a secret member in a truth commission?!

    Second, even if I were to somehow accept that they are promoting a truth so infallible it need not rely on the credibility or identity of its proponents, what’s with their name? I think they are trying to emphasize a direct contradiction to the movie An Inconvenient Truth, but they gave up on coming up with anything clever and settled instead for the obvious, PR-equivalent of I-know-I-am-but-what-are-you. If you’re trying to contradict something, you usually pick words that are antonyms or exaggerated forms of the opposition’s title, and then use them in a clever way, so that the opposition can tell you are mocking them, rather than just trying to ride their publicity by using their name as a front for your own hair-brained idea. Here are some suggestions I think they should consider: The Convenience Commission, The Real Inconvenient Truth, The Commission On Climate Staying The Same And/Or Changing But Not From Man-Made Causes, or Team Petroleum.

    *In case you were wondering, the truth about global warming is that “...it is a liberal-inspired hoax, intended to wrest control of world energy policy and wealth from Western countries so the United Nations can have its way.”

    Damn United Nations, damn Western countries hoarding all the wealth from all that oil…oh, wait…

     

    • Olga 4:37 am on December 16, 2009 Permalink

      Yes, Yes, we can always rely on Fox to give us news we can trust. Just look at how they uncovered Obama’s REAL plan on healthcare reform. Obama’s plan says that doctors would be reimbursed for having those tough discussions with patients about how they want their end-of-life to look, ie: do you want everything done; tubes coming out of every hole or do you want to go naturally, peacefully with no aggressive treatments to extend your life. Leave it to ex-gov Palin and Fox news to identify the REAL truth about this part of the healthcare reform bill. DEATH PANELS!!!!! OH YEAH!!! What is really going on is this; doctors are going to decide for themselves, arbitrarily who will live and who will die. Doctors will say “oh, this grandma is too old and ugly, no aggressive treatments for her!” or “oh this guy is my neighbor, he gets every orifice stuffed”. Yes yes, Fox and Palin nailed that one huh?

      I just find it so incredible that such a large percentage of the country believes this crap. Ok. that’s it. That’s all I have to say.
      I think I will go watch Jerry Springer now.

    • Irene 5:12 pm on December 16, 2009 Permalink

      Ditto everything Olga said about the “Truth Commission.” It is truly awful how so many people believe and vote for this propaganda. And it’s only a 3 person committee, with a secret member?? Or maybe it’s really a 2 person committee?

  • Emilily 2:49 pm on December 9, 2009 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: punctuation   

    There’s something unfor-tunate going on here, alright… 

     

    • Carmen 10:34 am on December 10, 2009 Permalink

      Yeah, a misplaced hyphen!

  • Emilily 8:47 pm on December 8, 2009 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: muffins,   

    muffins! 

    blackberry bran muffinsI tried another bran muffin recipe this past weekend, and they turned out pretty delicious. I got the recipe from Dylan’s mom Irene – she sent some home with him after Thanksgiving, and I think I ate about 4 a day until they were gone!

    The (modified) recipe was originally from this great blog, Farmgirl Fare. It’s by this woman who one day packed up her California lifestyle and moved out to a remote, 280-acre farm in the middle of Nowhere, Missouri. I think I can relate to packing everything up and embarking on a new adventure! I also like the name of her blog, because it reminds me of The Princess Bride (Farmboy) although I doubt this has any relation to her blog at all. Anyways, there are a ton of healthy recipes, pictures of her farm animals, and a smattering of gardening tips and photos. I think this weekend I might try a batch of these blueberry breakfast bars, but with persimmons instead, since they’re weighing down the trees in the front yard.

     

  • Emilily 10:56 am on December 7, 2009 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: nails,   

    What do you think of this nail polish? 

    Opi by Sephora matte nail polish

     

    • Carmen 1:09 pm on December 7, 2009 Permalink

      Hmm. I think I’m the wrong person to ask. Nail polish and I had a falling out a while ago and I have yet to rekindle any kind of love for it (except for maybe clear). However, from as objective as I can get I can say that color looks….futuristic.

    • Emilily 1:58 pm on December 7, 2009 Permalink

      Well put, it is SO futuristic! It’s matte, absolutely no shine or gloss at all…it’s like my fingernails are absorbing light.

      The color is called Metro Chic but clearly a better name would be Spaceship Primer. Or, What Color Is Your Battlestar.

  • Emilily 6:31 pm on December 5, 2009 Permalink | Reply  

    not blonde 

    Photo on 2009-12-05 at 11.26So, here’s my new cut and color. The color on the box was Marilyn Monroe blonde. The color on my head is Emily Hawkins light brown/dark blonde. Clearly, one of the perils of color in a box; I just gave about 117 of my hair follicles cancer for no point. The cut is probably going to grow on me…I trust Spencer, but he went way shorter than I expected. Lucky for me, the 80′s are coming back in, so my new asymmetrical style will be super on trend. Maybe. Either way, I got carded twice last night, so I’m feeling pretty good about it so far.

     

    • Carmen 9:28 pm on December 5, 2009 Permalink

      That look great Emily! I really like it. I like it better than the other cut for sure. I wouldn’t mind seeing a profile shot!

    • Emilily 11:04 am on December 7, 2009 Permalink

      eh, after a weekend with the new hair, I am not sure if I like it, it is too short, I can’t do much with it. On the plus side, it will now be easier to cut it all off.

    • Carmen 1:13 pm on December 7, 2009 Permalink

      Too short? Well how are you going to feel when its only an inch long?

    • Emilily 2:02 pm on December 7, 2009 Permalink

      Well, I can tell you what I am not going to feel like: 1988.

      All I need is a little hairspray and I could be rockin’ this look today:

      hair1

    • Carmen 2:13 pm on December 7, 2009 Permalink

      Whoa.

  • Emilily 1:04 pm on December 5, 2009 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: holidays   

    State Street Christmas trees from my phone with tiltshift 

     

  • Emilily 1:48 pm on December 3, 2009 Permalink | Reply
    Tags:   

    Posting from my car! 

    p_2048_1536_2B779135-BC96-4E5B-94DA-F007E8AFCEEE.jpegGuess what I’m doing tonight!

     

    • Carmen 1:52 pm on December 3, 2009 Permalink

      whoa whoa wo what
      you just spent all this time getting your hair au natural! what happened?

    • Carmen 1:52 pm on December 3, 2009 Permalink

      And get it done at a salon for goodness sakes!

    • Emilily 1:59 pm on December 3, 2009 Permalink

      I know, but now I’m bored with it, and anyways, when it is 1″ long, it won’t be hard to get it back to my natural color. And why pay for salon color when I pay for my cut in beer?

    • Carmen 2:05 pm on December 3, 2009 Permalink

      Alright go for it. It always looked good blonde! Post a pic afterwards.

  • Emilily 11:50 am on December 3, 2009 Permalink | Reply  

    blog business 

    I just noticed the time on my post last night was not adjusted for stupid daylight savings time. It was not 12:15 am, it was 11:15 pm. I’ve just changed our settings to reflect this. Obviously, WordPress agrees with me in that daylight savings is nothing but a useless annoyance.

     

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