The Dirty Girl Is Tomorrow

Tomorrow Leah and I are leaving Elgin at like 5:30 in the morning for the Dirty Girl Run.  We're stopping at Starbucks on the way to pick up our other friend Katie.  So I emailed Katie and asked her what she wanted.  I totally thought she answered that she wanted three drinks.  I was wrong,  only wanted one, but it was pretty funny.
Hopefully I will have pictures and commentary about the Dirty Girl next week!

Personal Issues

Last weekend I had some friends over for a Mary Kay party that I won a few months ago.  It was a lot of fun, but... It was also a good opportunity for my poor friends to realize what's been going on in my head lately.  Even I hadn't really realized how bad it had gotten until the Mary Kay lady had to invent a new game called "throw things at Tina when she makes fun of herself" because I had been on myself so hard.  I kept talking about every part of myself being stupid or looking dumb, or just me in general being to dumb to apply makeup correctly.  According to my friends, it was bad.  The worst part was that compared to what's been going on in my head lately, it really wasn't all the bad.  So now that I'm more aware of it, I know I have to do something about it.  The problem being that now that I'm aware of it, it's one more thing for me to be down on myself for.
Also, now that all of my friends know about this crazy nonsense in my head, everything they say to me feels like it's in response to my head drama.  Almost like no comment can be made unless it is in some way going to be uplifting to me.  So then I feel like I'm not alot of fun to be around lately.
When Avengers came out I had been stuck in my head for about a month, and I took some time off to go to a day long marathon.  It took awhile to really get out of my head.  Iron Man Two caused some drama because Tony is dying and I think part of my problem is the uncertanity regarding my own medical issues, but all in all it helped.  For several weeks I was out of my head.  I could think again.  Unfortunately I'm back down even lower than I started.  I'm going to do it again at the end of July with a Batman marathon (this time with my friend Sarah Mason), so hopefully that will help again.  Clearly though, that's a short term solution.  I can't spend all my free time watching explosion-y action movies.  Plus I suspect I would eventually develop a resistence to it.  So now I'm on the lookout for a long term solution.  But, that's something to think about another time.

Trivia Night

Last night my friends and I went out to trivia night at our local bar, which is also one of my favorite restaurants.  Usually Kristin's brothers and Jessica's husband round out our group so that it's not quite so...estrogen-centric.  But, for a variety of reasons last night it was just us girls.  And we were awesome.  We came in fourth out of like ten, so not at the bottom of the pack at least.  We sucked at the music round (as we often do), and having at least one of the brothers would have helped us out a bit in the picture round (none of us knew who Moonlight was, and I read comic books, so...).  But fortunately one round was "cats" (the animals, not the musical) and one was bascially the nerdy book round (which, since most of us know each other through bookclub, worked out okay. 

Well That Was Fun

So, I'm kind of digging steampunk right now. Do you know about this? It's like a cool, techy, vintage style with awesome little details (gears and dials and such) and I love it. Anyway, I found this fun dressup game where you can personalize the little lady and dress her in supercute steampunk stuff which amused me for hours until I had her every detail right (you can't see her stocking, but yeah I had to pick just the right ones). Here she is...

Now you go play, and then show me what you came up with.

Lit Fest

A few weeks ago I found out that one of my favorite bloggers(Jenny Lawson, aka the bloggess, whom I've written about before) was going to be in Chicago on her book tour (I loved her book btw).  I was very excited and for days I searched for dates and information and couldn't find anything.  And then Leah texted me "We're going to see Jenny Lawson on the tenth at two."  That's all, but it's all the information I needed.  Turns out it was a good thing Leah grabbed the tickets when she did, because by the end of that day they were sold out.  So on the tenth (which was Sunday) Leah, Jessica, and I set out to the Publisher's Row Lit Fest.  Which was awesome.  It was an amazing street fair full of tents and booths of books, often manned by authors who would sign their books for you.  There was a company that sold t-shirts that were sports shirts with author's names on the back instead of an athlete's name, and a symbol from their most famous work instead of a team symbol (i.e.a raven for Poe).  Those were awesome and I should have bought one, but I didn't because I thought I would have time to go back later after I'd seen everything.  Then we went to see Jenny who was having a moderated conversation with another author (Rachel Bersche, who wrote MWF seeking BFF which I also enjoyed).  It was everything I wanted it to be and then at the end we waited and had both authors sign books (or in my case, my nook).  Leah mentioned to Jenny that a few of us have formed the Unicorn Success Club walking club to do 5k's (as I mentioned before) and Jenny told us that when we had walked ten miles we would be in Double Unicorn Success Club.  Which a little bit made me squee.  Also, I had planned on mentioning that myself, but then I geeked out at the last minutes and couldn't really speak to the like famous and amazing author who I'm a little in awe of.   So I'm pretty pleased that Leah mentioned that.
When we got back home Leah and I went to a sushi place recommended by a three year old in my class, where the sushi comes around on a conveyor belt.  It was pretty yummy.
All in all, a great day!

Happy Birthday Kristin

A few days ago it was my best friend's birthday.  She decided she wanted everyone to go to a Cougars game for the event (the Cougars are a minor league baseball team- I think.  I don't really watch sports.)  So we're all walking back to the lawn seats and one of my friends* and I are basically acting like fourteen year old boys and laughing at the slightest innuendo, like when Chris mentioned he liked to mow the lawn and I was all "hee-hee, mow the lawn" and then convulsing with laughter.  And then the universe gave me an early birthday present.  The lawn we were headed to was situated so that every time we got up or sat back down we had to see this giant sign the read "Wallace Mortion Third Base Tent"** and all I can do is laugh.  Every. Single. Time. I see it.  My friend even said "ha, we all know what happens down there huh?" and made me laugh about it even harder.  What makes the whole thing even greater is that the friend who was also in a dirty mind kind of mood is generally the most...conservative of this group of friends, so I generally don't expect her to be in that kind of mood.
Also my friend J had had surgery a few days prior, but he didn't want us to treat him any differently than normal.  But all I wanted was for him to stay put and stop trying to walk around the concession-y area of the stadium (is that what it's called? As I mentioned, I don't really watch sports.)  I'm pretty sure at one point I threatened to punch him in the knee if he didn't just sit still and watch the game.

*I hope you appreciate the fact that I left you anonymous in this entry, because I would prefer to call you by name :)
**in the interest of full disclosure I should admit that I don't actually remember the male name, it was definitely a guy's name, but I don't remember what the name was.   Sorry.

Well now I can't wait until December

I love musicals.  Like, love them.  And my very favorite one is Les Mis.  There's nothing I don't love about Les Mis in fact.  The music, the characters, the setting, the plot...all is magical.  The problem with Les Mis is that for all of the years that I've loved the story there have existed two movies.  One with acting and no singing, and one with singing and no acting.  Well come December 14, that will cease to be a problem for me!

A quick overview of the cast-

	Sacha Baron Cohen	...	Thénardier
	Anne Hathaway	...	Fantine
	Amanda Seyfried	...	Cosette
	Helena Bonham Carter	...	Madame Thénardier
	Eddie Redmayne	...	Marius
	Hugh Jackman	...	Jean Valjean
	Samantha Barks	...	Éponine
	Russell Crowe	...	Javert

Painting

When I moved in with Leah, between the two of us we had four pets.  Leah had two cats (Mad Catter and Mia) and a dog that looks like an ewok (Zoe) and I have my darling cat (Buffi the Mouse Slayer).  Sadly we are now down to three pets because Mad Catter was nineteen and the time eventually came that Leah had to put her down.  So now that everyone is comfortable with the new arrangement, Leah needs to redecorate her upstairs in a pretty serious way (nineteen year old cats are like hundred year old people, but they don't make Depends for cats.  If you know what I mean.)  So two weekends ago we started moving furniture and painting.  Then we painted after work Monday through Wednesday.  Then we declared a break and basically didn't move for a few hours.  Then we picked up our rollers again and finished off the painting.  And now everything looks great.  Except we pulled up the carpet before teh painting and the new carpet doesn't come until next weekend.  Which means that poor Leah is living on a mattress and box spring on the floor of the guest room, surrounded by pretty much every piece of furniture from all the upstairs rooms (an office, a guest room, and her bedroom) surrounding her until she literally has to sit on the foot of the bed and scoot back into bed at night.  And she's stuck like that for another week.
So, in that context, let me tell you the hilarious thing that happened a few nights ago.  Leah and I were standing in the kitchen, still in our painting clothes.  Which for me is an old pair of workout shorts, tied tight, and an over size t-shirt.  Zoe was so excited to see us in a palce where we could pay attention to her and she started jumping at me.  Which was fine.  Until she started tugging on my shorts and I realized that while she was jumping she had managed to untie my shorts, so when she started tugging, she pulled my pants off.  In the middle of the kitchen.  In front of the window.  While Leah stood there.  Watching me.  So I pulled my pants back up and tied them.  But not tight enough because Zoe started tugging again, and totally pulled my pants down again.  Awesome.