From Zero to Hero

Its been six months since we bought our Wii, and let me tell you, it has been the most awesomest six months ever. We have been spreading the Wii gospel to anyone that will listen, and have convinced a few people to go out and buy a Wii for themselves. In fact, I think Nintendo probably owes us some money for that.

We are such dorks that back in August, we pre-ordered Guitar Hero III for the Wii, and after church yesterday, we drove over to Best Buy to go pick it up. Despite the usual drama that accompanies a Best Buy trip, we got the Wii home and set it up.

The cool thing about Guitar Hero is that you get to play a "guitar" with buttons instead of strings. You have to hit the "notes" in the sequence they appear on the screen. The notes get more complicated as it goes on and on. And that's pretty much about it. Its really addicting, especially for certain people in the house who played for 3 and a half hours yesterday before I told him that we had to eat dinner. For the Wii, they've incorporated the wireless remote into the guitar, so there's no strings, and you get cool effects like sound coming from the guitar and not just the TV, and vibration when necessary.

I'm not terribly good at the game, but its really fun nonetheless. Unfortunately, I'm going out of town this weekend, so I'm concerned that somebody in the house is going to take advantage of that to beat the game, thus leaving me in the dust.

The best piece of bass in three counties

When I think about how much I was disgusted by the idea of sushi when I was a kid, I have to wonder why. Sushi is really awesome! My first foray into sushi was in Berkeley with a woman whose mother is from Japan. She knew exactly where to go and what to order. I probably stuck with rolls for the first few times, but it wasn't long before I was eating nigiri (the raw fish). I've never had sushi as good as I've had in Berkeley. It was so fresh and tasty.

Here in DC, there are lots of sushi restaurants as well. There are some really good ones, but lots and lots of really bad ones. Not that the fish itself has gone bad...just lower quality, I guess. I had some sushi the other day, and all of the fish tasted the same. But it was cheap, and that's why we were there.

Today I stumbled upon this online chat in the Washingtonian magazine that gives the ins-and-out of sushi eating, and more importantly, how to get the best pieces of fish from your sushi chef, especially when sitting at the bar. Some of the stuff I knew, some I didn't. For example, did you know that you're not supposed to use chopsticks with nigiri, or rub wood chopsticks together? Also, good chefs find it insulting when you cover your sushi with soy sauce or wasabi because the fish is already supposed to be perfectly seasoned.

I'm also not a big believer in making sushi at home because I think it would be very difficult to find sushi-quality fish at the market, but this chat does talk about ways to make sushi at home.

I guess one of the benefits of eating sushi is that its really low-fat, and great if you're on a diet. Of course, that's assuming you stick with fish, and don't get those really expensive rolls with cream cheese in them.

Hmm, all this talk about sushi is making me hungry for some, but unfortunately the only place around here is one of those carousel sushi places. Some other time, I guess.

college students today are a bunch of whiny little bitches

One downside of living so close to my college is that I still feel the need to check up on what those crazy kids are up to every now and then, despite the fact that I graduated eight years ago. There are often articles in the Washington Post about American University, and I, of course, feel compelled to read them. For example, this article about a newly renovated dorm that features double beds appeared last month in the paper. My friends and I just shook our heads and lamented how entitled kids today are.

However, my recent foray into Facebook has lead me to become more knowledgeable about the present-day AU, and through Facebook, I learned that students now have fall break, which is basically one day off in the middle of the semester. I'm thinking to myself, "Fall break? WE never had a fall break." We would just sludge our way through the semester, with a holiday for Labor Day and a few days off for Thanksgiving. We always had at least three to four weeks off for the Christmas holidays. Researching the evolution of fall break, I find out that it was instituted as a two-day break in 2000, and later scaled back to one day in 2005.

An opinion piece published in 2005 in the Eagle, the student-run newspaper, argues against scaling back fall break by saying:

"Removing rest days for AU students will create dangerous consequences. AU students are special and different from other U.S. college students. At any time, approximately 1,000 AU students work internships, much higher than national percentages. Compiled with part time jobs, studying and extracurricular activities, AU students find themselves working 50 - 60 hours a week to remain successful. Fall Break and study days serve as means for students to recuperate from their busy schedules, explore the District of Columbia and help prepare for midterm and final exams. Without these breaks, students will prepare less for their exams, miss more classes, and underperform in the workplace and classroom."

Okay, is it just me, or does anybody else hear how elitist this sounds? AU students, if not all college students, are starting to feel entitled to things like double beds and extra days off. Maybe I, as a government employee, shouldn't really be talking, but hello children, welcome to the real world! You're not going to get random days off in the middle of the semester. Its not like I spent every waking minute of those study days studying either, and my jobs/internships were fun, and often let me do homework at the same time. Stop whining, or else you'll be sorely prepared for what a real job is like.

Okay, end of rant. I promise I'll post about something more fun later.

Whither the video store

You're going to think that we're pretty old fashioned over here, but Matt and I liked going to the video store to pick out a movie. Of course, its very rare that we would go to the video store in the first place...maybe once a month, if that. Between not really watching a whole lot of TV in the first place, and having other plans, and oh, yeah, getting that occassional video out from the library, we just never rented movies enough to subscribe to Netflix or Blockbuster online.

Last spring, however, Blockbuster gave us a pretty damn good reason to not subscribe to their service...they closed their store that was located only a mile away from us. Didn't matter, we thought, there's a much closer independent video store that we would rather go to anyway. Unfortunately, at the beginning on August, we walked into that store, and found out that they had lost their lease and were being forced to close, so they were selling off all of their videos and DVDs as well (all the good stuff had already been bought). So we were forced to go to another video store to rent "The 40 Year Old Virgin ", which, by the way, was the only video we rented the entire summer, I'm pretty sure. This past weekend, we were going to that store to rent a movie, and sure enough, they had a big store closing sign, and they were selling off their collection as well. And once again, we had missed all the good stuff.

So now I have to sign up for Netflix, and I'll probably get the cheapest option, and even though its only $4.99 a month, that's still more that what we would usually pay per month to rent the occassional movie. Its all a scam, I tell ya.

So I bet you're thinking...

I bet you're wondering, "Wow, now that Laura is 30 and sexy, does she not have time to blog?". Well, yeah, its been kind of a crazy month for me, so even though several things have happened to me that I've thought were blog-worthy, I haven't had a chance to talk about them. Here goes.
1) Matt's parents were in town last week, so we had a week of fine dining. Unfortunately, I had to work on Saturday, so Matt had to find a way to entertain his parents himself. Luckily, he had the brilliant idea of taking them to a brew pub, Rock Bottom Brewery. I come home from work to find this giant--empty-- glass container sitting on the counter. "Don't touch my Growler!" Matt yells. Yes, this is a refillable container that holds 5 pints of beer that can be taken home with you for the low, low price of $6.95 per refill.

2) I've decided that I will never watch another video of YouTube for the following reasons: a) It has become too ubiquitous. b) Most of the crap that's on it, is well, crap. I'm not really intersted in watching your hamster roll around in the room in its hamster ball, and c) the other stuff that's on it is probably a copyright violation. So there. Don't send me any YouTube links. I'm not gonna watch it. You know how much I hate hype anyway.

3) I've joined Facebook, but honestly, I don't really see the point of the whole thing. Its like MySpace for lazy people. Seriously, you can't blog, but they expect you summarize how you're feeling in one little status sentence. Also, what is the point of "poking" people? Maybe I just don't understand because I'm no longer in my 20s, but I feel pretty lost using Facebook.
So that's my post for the month. See you in October.

Karma

Two things of interest happened to me today:

1. I bought lunch for a homeless guy at Subway. It was a spur of the moment decision, and it surprised even me. He had a footlong seafood sub with extra mayonnaise, chips and a drink. He was very grateful.

2. A bird shit on my arm as I was walking to the gym. It was truly disgusting.

30 is in fact the new sexy

I bet you've been wondering if I've been too hungover from my birthday party to tell you about it. The answer is yes...ha ha not really! What, me drink? Hee hee.

Elisa hasn't had a chance to get her pictures up yet, but my friend Avery has sent some to me. We had such a great time! Elisa flew in from San Antonio and brought a surprise with her...a watermelon pinata filled with Segovia candies (pralines, caramels and coconut flavored).

We spent pretty much all day on Saturday running errands for what would turn out to be the most rockin' party that we've ever thrown...literally. We rented a karaoke machine, and it turned out to be a huge hit. You know, there's always that concern that people would be too shy or modest to want to get up and sing. Luckily I have friends who are neither shy nor modest.

The pinata was planned by Matt and Elisa, but since Matt had never been to a party that involved a pinata, he was a little unsure about the logistics. It took a while, but they finally got the pinata up the tree. Elisa spun me around 30 times, and went to town, totally whacking the pinata into submission (apparently, I have a gift for hitting the pinata). When it cracked open, I heard a cheer come up from the crowd, so I tore off my mask...but no one was picking up candy. C'mon y'all! There's candy all around! Hoarde it greedily! We had to prod people along to get the candy, but they all finally took it. A few more people took a turn at the battered watermelon, and although there was no more candy in it, it was still thoroughly enjoyable.

Ah, the rest of the night was kind of a blur, but I do remember singing, drinking and eating that delicious cake...marble cake with strawberry icing filling and cream cheese icing on top. It was quite nice too.

My house still hasn't recovered completely, which is a sure sign that it was a memorable party.

A life with no regrets

Today's the big day! Its my 30th birthday! Elisa's here and we're off soon to go pick up some party supplies. I'm really excited, and a friend of mine from college just called from Qatar to wish me a happy birthday.

I was telling a co-worker of mine that I don't feel like this is really a significant birthday, and she said that its probably because I'm happy with my life. And its true...I am happy with my life right now. I can honestly say I don't have any major regrets in my life. I've done things my way. And I'm really happy about that.

Getting ready to par-tay!

My birthday is in a week. That's right, on August 18, I turn 30. I'm really excited about the whole thing, and we are having a party at our home to celebrate.

One thing that's kind of frustrating about D.C. is its lack of regular bakeries, and that's important because I love cake, especially birthday cake with my name on it. The famous bakery is Cake Love, but I certainly do not love that cake. Its too dry, and the frosting tastes too much like lard in my opinion. Plus, they are incredibly expensive.

For Matt's birthday last January, I tested various cupcakes around the area. I had a cupcake from the now-defunct Reeve's bakery, which actually gave me heartburn. Reeve's bakery was a fixture in downtown Washington for a long time, and I really wanted to like their cupcakes, but I just couldn't. However, they were most well-known for their pie. I also tried a cupcake from Heller's Bakery, which tasted more like your standard grocery store cupcake. Not bad, but just a little too sweet (I bet it would be a good cake for a kid's birthday, though). I finally ended up getting awesome cupcakes from Buzz Bakery, in Virginia. It was well-worth the expense and the drive. The cupcakes were moist and dense, and the icing was not too sweet. Plus, they were beautiful little things.

For my birthday, I really wanted a cake though, and I had to begin the process of searching for a bakery again since Buzz doesn't really do large cakes. Back to the foodie message board for ideas. Of course, the problem with asking foodies about stuff is they tend to give you suggestions like this. Don't get me wrong, those are beautiful cakes, but really, I just want a cake, not necessarily a work of art. There's a lot of French bakeries in DC, some places aren't open on weekends because they do more a breakfast pastry kind of thing. At some point you start to think, "Why can't I just get some damn cake?!" And then I remembered a place that I had come across online in my previous research.

This morning I tested out a cupcake from Just Cakes. The cake itself was nice and moist, and although I find the icing a little sweet (perhaps because they dusted the cupcake in decorative sugar), I liked it enough to order it for my birthday. We'll see how it turns out.

Oh, and this morning I also bought liquor for the party. Lots and lots of liquor. I think it will be a good party.

When I say its hot, its really hot

Okay, I'm the first person to snicker when people start complaining about the heat here in DC. Yes, 85 degrees can be considered quite warm, but don't start bitching about how humid it is too. Believe me, 78 degrees and 40 percent humidity is not all that uncomfortable...actually, I find it a little on the cool side.

But when you hear me complaining about how hot it is, you better take notice. Because then you know its hot enough to get a Texan complainin'.

Today it reached a 102 degrees. Plus, our ac at work was basically not functioning, so inside my library it was 80 with 63 percent humidity. Nevermind the fact that the library is supposed to close when the humidity surpasses 60 percent (we didn't, but that's a whole other rant). I was uncomfortable all day, and when I stepped out for a smoothie in the afternoon, I felt like I had stepped into an oven. I'm just glad that my deodorant kept working.
So yeah, y'all, today was hot.

Southwest airlines boarding passes

I learned something this week about printing a boarding pass on Southwest airlines. If you have access to a computer but not a printer, you can reprint your boarding pass at the airport (either at the kiosk or with an agent). You don't lose your boarding group assignment or anything. The boarding agent says that when she has to fly but isn't near a computer, she calls a friend to check her in and she picks up her boarding pass at the airport. Just something to know.

I'm dying here

Today is the day that Harry Potter comes out. I am also at work today. Luckily, I work in a public library so getting my hands on a copy wasn't difficult. I just really, really want to be reading my book right now.

Harry Potter predictions

I predict the following characters will die in the last Harry Potter book:

Neville
Ginny Weasley
Lupin
Bellatrix Lestrange
Severus Snape
Voldemort

Laura vs. the Volcano

We're back from our annual fourth of July trip to a national park. This year, we chose Lassen Volcanic, one of the smallest and least visited national parks in the country. Why would we choose such a place? Well, proximity to gambling is one reason. The other is that we were meeting quite a few people from the West coast for a weekend of hiking and camping.

A scant 2 and half hours from Reno, this national park doesn't really have any "oh, wow" moments like the Grand Canyon. The mountains are in the southern Cascade region, and the namesake mountain, Lassen Peak is only about 12,000 feet. But while it may lack sexiness, this park is still a fun place to hang out and hike. Also, there's an element of danger here too...Lassen Peak is still an active volcano, and it last erupted in 1915, spewing lava and volcanic rocks all over the place. If you're a badass (which I'm not), you can even hike up the volcano.

This was a fun trip, mainly because we were with such a great group of people. Despite the fact that I like to camp with at least one former Eagle Scout and none were present this time around, making fire was not too complicated, thanks to the dry conditions in California. Actually, I'm surprised that there weren't fire restrictions in the campground.

There was one really scary moment when a few of us got lost in the wilderness, literally. We were following a trail that just seemed to kind of die off, so we wandered around aimlessly trying to figure out where to go. Finally, we heard cars on the main road so we made a beeline for the road, only to discover that we were about a mile from the trail head.

One of the great things was the big, blue sky. It was such a brilliant blue, and for most of the time, there was nary a cloud in the sky. At night, the stars were out in full force, and it was amazing to me that there were so many. Matt even saw a few shooting stars.

It was a welcome change from big-city life (although I really missed the food...the one time we went into town we had a crappy experience at the local pizza parlor/bar), and I would gladly go back.

Owning a home, without owning your building

Okay, there are some really great things about owning a condo. One, I never have to hassle Matt to mow the lawn, because we don't have a lawn. Two, its easily affordable in DC.

Lately though, its been really frustrating just doing general home improvements. We tried to get a ceiling fan installed in our bedroom, but the electricians said it couldn't be done because the ceiling didn't have enough depth to hold a fan, and also, the only way they could run the wires would be through the outside brick, and obviously, they can't do that.

We thought about replacing our scary little spiral stairwell with a real stairwell, but found out that it would be very expensive (we used the money to pay down a little bit of our mortgage instead).

We're lucky enough to have a private entrance to our unit, but the door has to be replaced now because of several cracks. A contractor came out and said the entire door frame would have to be rebuilt, and to do that we need pre-approval from our condo board.

This was supposed to be the year of home improvements, but so far everything has gone by the wayside. Maybe I'll just go ahead and get the carpet replaced and feel like I've actually accomplished something.

Worst...first day of summer...ever

Actually, today wasn't too bad in general. Matt and I met up with some friends, ate some crab, drank some wine. What totally sucked was the temperature. A rain storm swept into the area during rush hour and brought a cold front (the second time this month). When I got out of the Metro, the temperature had dropped to 69 degrees, but it had mostly stopped raining. Later as we ate on the patio, another rain storm came through, with huge gusts of wind. We were freezing. However, we did enjoy a gorgeous sunset once the storm blew out of the way. It was bright orange, with gray clouds swept across the sky.

So, okay, the comraderie was nice. But its just wrong to have a summer day in the 60s, especially since is the second time this month that this has happened. I'm pretty sure this weekend will be really nice though.

Summer in DC

Nothing says summer in DC like families of tourists coming in droves to the city. They walk around in matching shirts, stand on the left side of the Metro escalators--blocking the way of people walking on the escalators--and look around instead of looking at where they are going. Pretty much typical anywhere you go.

Good tourists try not to take up too much room on the Metro during rush hour, and make way for us drones who aren't lucky enough to be on vacation.

Coming home from work today, there was a couple with a very small baby in his arms. The wife was following behind with the stroller, which she proceeded to fold up once she got on the train (good). Someone offered them seats behind me, and they sat down gratefully. After a few minutes, the baby started to get fussy, and you could tell they were mortified, as people turned their attention away from their iPods, and toward them. "Shhh," the dad said. "You don't want to disturb the workers."

The workers. I felt like calling him, "comrade". It was a strange end to an otherwise uneventful day.

Best of my love

Someone forwarded me a link that tells you what the number one song is for the day you were born. My birthday song is "Best of my love" by the Emotions!
Speaking of birthdays, mine is only two months away. I've been trying to figure out what a cool 30th birthday party would be. I think it will probably involve eating and drinking, but that's about it.

Oh yeah, that song link: http://www.joshhosler.biz/NumberOneInHistory/SelectMonth.htm
Go Spurs Go!

The Slug Course

For our fourth anniversary, we decided to do a very Matt and Laura thing and go out for dinner (of course). We chose a restaurant in our neighborhood that has a very good reputation among the foodie community, that we hadn't been to yet because it can be a little pricey. Like many high-end restaurants in DC, they pride themselves on using local, in-season and organic products.

Our first course consisted, of course, of salad. I enjoyed a salmon seviche (that's the way that they spelled it, so that's how I'm going to spell it) with greens, and Matt had rabbit with romaine. As we were finishing up our salads, I saw Matt stop and look very intently at his plate. He kept staring at it, and I could tell he was getting very, very ansy. I glanced over at his plate, and saw a teeny tiny little slug squirming on the very last piece of lettuce. It was horrifying, but at the same time kind of amusing. The slug, if that's what it was, kept moving around, clearly terrified. Matt looked completely distraught. He flagged the waiter over (who was very, very good), and said, "There seems to be an animal on my plate, and it seems to be alive," while the slug kept squirming. The waiter was properly mortified, apologized, and whisked the plate away. He came back a few minutes late, apologized again, and said the manager was coming over to speak to us. The manager came a few minutes later, apologized profusely, and offered us a complimentary glass of champagne to give us a few extra minutes to decide if we wanted to continue our dinner. We decided that we wanted to stay, and enjoyed the rest of the meal. We support organics, after all.

All in all, the salad was comped, as well as our bottle of wine, and two glasses of champagne each. All of this without throwing a hissy fit in a nice restaurant, like some people would do. We'll probably go back, but probably won't order salad again. Supposedly, they also have the best burger in town.

Under the boardwalk

At the beginning of the month, I thought to myself that I should try to blog more often. Well, I didn't. Lately it seems like my life is all about work (or working out), and when I get home, I'm re-reading Harry Potter. Lots of excuses, right?

This past weekend, Memorial Day weekend, we kicked off the beginning of the summer with a trip to the Jersey shore. We camped in Cape May with some friends, and were pleasantly surprised by the beauty that is south Jersey. The weather was great for most of the weekend, except for Sunday night when it rained pretty hard. I didn't feel like there were a whole lot of people on the beach, and when we visited the boardwalk amusement park in Wildwood, we didn't have to wait in line much. Actually, apparently they were anticipating a small ground on Memorial Day, because the entrance fee was discounted pretty heavily. Plus we got to eat carnival foods, like ice cream, fried Oreos, and funnel cake. Thankfully we did our eating after the roller coasters.

It was cool to see a real, live boardwalk, with rides and skeeball, like you do in the movies. I guess the real downside about the beach was that the water was freezing cold, although there were a few warm currents coming in (it felt like someone had peed). But otherwise it was a great weekend. Jersey...its not just for mobsters.