Sitting here watching the Black Eyed Peas’ Saturday Night Live performance with Southern Honey and he just gave me the quote of the night:

She reminds me of Fergie.

I burst out laughing and pointed out that that would be because she is indeed Fergie.  To which he responded:

All I know is that they’re both ugly as shit.

So, sorry, Fergie, but apparently you are not only not high on my husband’s “To Do” list, he confuses you with yourself and only vaguely recognizes you for a lack of cuteness.  I know I shouldn’t laugh at that, but I just couldn’t help myself.  It came totally out of left field and took me completely by surprise.

In NaNo news, I’m caught up to where I need to be and am nearly done with my weekend’s contribution.  That’s right, I’m almost to 25,000 words — nearly halfway done!

I took a challenge that was thrown out at me and created a sparkly character, a la Twilight.  So, now my assassin is in the market with his intended victim, getting propositioned by a smoking hot, glittering prostitute.  I think he’s having a pretty damn good night, myself.  *grins*

Hey Guys! I Think We Should Have A Morning Mod On XatChatGroup “Help” Because In The Mornings No Mods Are Online, & People Ads,Swear,Flame,Talk Diff Language All They Want…About 50 People Agree We SHOULD Have A Morning Mod

I needed to get out of this house. Yes. I had class on thursday. Yes. I skipped class. But I did turn in all my work, and even turned a paper in early because I was an idiot and thought it was due thursday instead of this coming tuesday. Oh well, one less thing to me to worry about.

So what exactly gave me the impulse to drive 2.5 hours south of Gig Harbor for a couple days?

Well, I wanted to hang out with my WAS buddies, and going to Portland was my chance to do that.

Aren’t we cool?

But I also went to go see a great show – a benefit for Portland’s PDX Pop Now organization, which celebrates the local musicians of Portland. It’s pretty cool. Actually, when I emailed a woman from PDX Pop Now about the photo policy of the club, Mississippi Studios, she said I wouldn’t be able to get on the main floor since I’m not 21, but she did say that she could get me on the list for the festival in the spring.

Portland people are so damn nice.

The guy taking our tickets asked me if I had a photo pass for the show. I told him I didn’t, but then he said, “I don’t wanna give you any grief. Just don’t use any flash.”

I never use flash if I don’t have do. And I didn’t.

See. I made this one my desktop.

I’m finally proud of my concert photography. It feels nice to actually have good pictures to send to PopWreckoning instead of the shitty ones I’ve been sending from my Coolpix. YES!

Here are a couple more of Britt Daniel and the other bands, IOA and The Robinsons.

It was a great show, and the balcony had some pretty sweet seating. It wrapped around the stage on three sides, which gave extra room for us youngins. We were the first ones to get to the balcony, so we got the best seats out of the 35 seats upstairs. 35 seats. Isn’t that cool? We need cool clubs like that in Tacoma. Because Tacoma’s lame, and only has The Viaduct that plays shitty-ass hardcore music and Club Impact that caters to 16-year-olds.

After the show was over, Laura and I drove to Sabrina’s to stay the night, and hang out with her cool baby, Curtis. He’s like a monkey, makes gremlin noises, and he head-bangs. Or he’s just squirmy. Anywho, he’s funny. We stuck around there for a bit the next day and had children climbing on us for a good two hours. We watched Cinderella and ate bacon. Then it was time to meet Adrian and Renee, and Renee’s friend Ahmad.

Another reason why Portland people are so nice – the guy running the parking garage gave us the code to open up the door if we needed to get to our car after 6, which is when it closed. See? Nice.

We walked over to the Burnside Powell’s. And let me tell you, up until then, I felt like a terrible word nerd for never having been to Powell’s. It’s an entire block of books. Four corners of shelves up to the ceiling of books. It was overwhelming. Like a labyrinth of new releases, old classics, an entire nook of moleskines, and room filled with sci-fi. The first thing I did was go find the new Postsecret book to see if my secret made it in. It didn’t, but I did find this.

It says, “I called in sick to work today so I could buy this book.”

It made me extremely happy. I almost bought it just because of that, but I was being cheap, so a photo sufficed. About 20 minutes after Laura and I got there, so did everyone else. And we browsed the many rooms of Powell’s, and Ahmad had a certain interest in girl gangs.

“Wouldn’t it be great if when you went to heaven, everyone was in a girl gang? No one would fight, but we’d all be ready to fight. And we’d have great matching outfits? That’s be perfect.”

We asked the woman working at the desk if there were any books on girl gangs, but sadly enough, there weren’t.

Actually, I didn’t spend a lot of money this weekend at all. I only spent it on food and a new sweater. We ate some pretty interesting food while we were there though. I had a couple new culinary experiences while in Portland. One being lamb meatballs at a mediterranean restaurant, and saffron rice at that same restaurant.

This one. Doesn’t it have a ridiculous sign? What are those purple claws supposed to be?

Lamb was really good. I can say that now.

But the true wonderment of culinary confections was where we went later that night. No, we never got to hit up Pine State Biscuits, because we had no idea where Belmont St. was, and we walked about 8 miles that day back and forth from Powell’s to Renee’s hotel, to Everyday Music, to Am App, to Buffalo Exchange, and then Voodoo Doughnuts.

Yes, Voodoo Doughnuts opened my eyes to the most confusing, most tasty doughnut I think I’ve ever had.

You may think this looks disgusting at first glance, but trust me, if you ever get to chance to go to Voodoo Doughnuts, you need to try one. YOU MUST.

The Maple Bacon Doughnut.

Just think about it: sweet and salty is never bad; candied maple bacon is tasty; don’t you always dip your bacon in syrup? I know I do.

Once we’d walked to and from Voodoo Doughnuts, Ahmad found some sweet tights for his Halloween costume and we sang down the street back to Renee’s swanky hotel.

As we sat and watched the rerun of thursday’s Project Runway, Ahmad came up with a great idea. We’ve started a band. And we’ll look like a girl gang. And we’ll be called Hot Carl. Laura will play keyboard, I’ll play guitar, Adrian will play bass, Ahmad will sing vocals, and Renee would be our band manager. We wouldn’t need a drummer, only a drum machine. Because that’s how we roll.

Hot Carl.

And yes, we know what Hot Carl means. I can’t remember who suggested it, but once they did, I knew it meant something else, but for some reason, it slipped my mind. So I googled it. And then we all laughed. It was PERFECT.

So…. when we left, Laura, Adrian and I walked literally for almost an hour trying to find our damn parking lot. I’m pretty sure we went around the same block three times.

Hot Carl.

But eventually, we found it, opened the door, and made our way through Vancouver to drop Adrian off, since it was on our way.

Hot Carl.

We stopped at a restaurant called Elmer’s for dinner. We got there at about 8:40, but it closed at 9. The waitress who seated us didn’t really care because she worked the bar later, so she let us stay after hours to finish out sandwiches and fries (and onion rings).

Hot Carl.

Seriously, if you don’t know what that means, google it right now. Urban Dictionary will be the first one that comes up, and that is the definition. Seriously.

We drove back to Sabrina’s earlier than we had the night before, so we got a little bit more sleep than the previous night. The next morning, we went to this restaurant – I’m not kidding – called Fatty Patty’s in Battle Ground. And we ate – I’m not kidding – slop. Well, it was hashbrowns with bacon bits, ham, cheese, green onions, all covered in white gravy. I like my hashbrowns a little bit crunchier, but it was pretty tasty. And even after my coco-puff doughnut I’d had when we first woke up.

Yeah, pretty much the food was the best part of the trip, other than the show on thursday, and how fucking huge Powell’s is.

I’m off to listen to Child Star some more.

ADDENDUM: My review’s been published! Click here to go to PopWreckoning.

<3 Abby

One would expect a film about bloodthirsty undead monsters to be riddled with cheap shots and clichés, as we’ve seen zombie movies for a good thirty years. But the genre is far from dead, as evidenced by one of this year’s best comedies, “Zombieland.”

The movie follows Columbus, a recent college graduate with problems with paranoia, played by Jesse Eisenberg, and Tallahassee, a gun-wielding tough guy with a strange fetish for Twinkies, played marvelously by Woody Harrelson. Along their travels they get duped by sisters Wichita and Little Rock, played by Emma Stone and Abigail Breslin. Eventually they all team up against the zombies, and then laughter ensues.

What made this zom com different from other zom coms was that they all had a plan. In fact, all the characters nicknames came from their goal destination. The film started out presenting Columbus’ rules for surviving zombieland – including “cardio,” “beware of bathrooms,” and “doubletap,” just to name a few, and you get to see how unlikely of a hero Columbus is. Sure, Eisenberg is playing pretty much the same character as he did in “Adventureland,” but here he isn’t as pitiful. I mean, he’s fighting off zombies with a double barrel shotgun. And his love interest Wichita, is pretty badass herself, conspiring with her 12-year-old sister Little Rock to hijack both of the cars Columbus and Tallahassee acquire.

What’s also different from other zombie movies is how wonderful this movie was shot. The opening credits play over a backdrop of artfully crafted slow-motion zombie pursuits, blood spewing from their mouths, and a manic deadness in their eyes. In terms of an extra, being a zombie would be a pretty fun gig if you ask me. Somehow throughout the director found these barren locations to shoot as the empty wasteland that is zombieland. Los Angeles couldn’t have actually been Los Angeles. There would have been no way they could have cleared out that much space to make it look authentic. And if they did, kudos to them. Bravo.

But let’s talk about Woody Harrelson. Being the versatile actor that he is, Harrelson was at the heart of this film’s quirkiness. His treatment of zombie killing as sport, his constant quest for a Twinkie, and his laugh-out-loud dialogue brings this zom com to much more than just that. His motto, “nut up or shut up,” could be perhaps the most true slogan of bravery we’ve heard in a film in a long time. As well as the last line in the film, “not bad for a whiney little spitfuck.” He provided a lot of the cackling within the theater. But my favorite was “I’m not good with goodbyes, so…that’ll do pig.”

The best portion of the film was largely attributed to a certain cameo that the filmmakers tried to keep quiet. In honor of the element of surprise, I won’t spoil who it is here, but when reading about the cameo, director Ruben Fleischer said that he originally wanted to have Patrick Swayze make an appearance and do a “Dirty Dancing” sequence, but that option fell through. Other options were Sylvester Stallone, Kevin Bacon and Matthew McConaughey. Personally, whom they got for the scene-stealing cameo is way funnier than all of the other guys they considered. You won’t be disappointed.

As much as “Zombieland” was a comedy about mutilating zombies, it was also a love story – about Columbus and Wichita, and also about the family unit that the four of them build while they’re running towards the unknown human sanctuary. There is a very tender moment when the four travelers shack up in a Hollywood mansion where Tallahassee breaks down and cries when talking about his family. And as far as other humans go, the audience never gets to see if there are any other people left, but after the epic shootout in the movie’s climax, you can’t help but feel like it’s a victory for the living.

The last time I enjoyed a zombie movie this much was the British comedy “Shaun of the Dead,” but by the end of “Zombieland,” I honestly worried about any of them dying. Fleischer opted not to have unimportant secondary characters that will die anyway, in favor of building the story of the four main characters to where you really cared about Columbus, Tallahassee, Wichita and Little Rock.

And to tell you the truth, by the end of the movie, I was really craving a Twinkie.

<3 Abby
(check this out in this week's Ledger on tuesday.)

1) LEEROY JENKINS
If you’re a WoW player, or not, but especially if you are one, everyone knows not to pull a “Leeroy Jenkins”.  This video became huge after a player yells out “Leeeeerooooy Jenkins” and storms into a fight too early, ultimately killing all the players.  Video game players started to spoof the happening on their own games such as Halo.  The person behind Leeroy Jenkins even appeared at BlizzCon 2007; and was even used in reference to a question on Jeopardy.  If you go to special features on the movie “Year One”, which just came out, there is a spoof of Leeroy Jenkins that is totally unexpected.

2) GREATEST FREAKOUT EVER
After his parents cancel his WoW account, this kid starts freaking out, and his brother gets it all on video. This kid goes crazy!

3) DUDE, WHERE’S MY MOUNT?
Brought to you by Machinima, one of the biggest WoW video makers on the web, they bring you a series of episodes entitled “Dude, Where’s My Mount”.  Here you’ll follow the adventures and shananagins of Dave and Phil as they journey to find their mount.  There appears to be 9 full episodes, and then dozens of spoofs/continuations of Dave and Phil’s “non-adventures” after that.  Here’s the first episode here, it only gets funnier as the epiodes progress.

4) ROFLMAO
Based on the  pre=”the “>Muppets sketch entitled “Mahna Mahna”, Oxhorn Brand Movies brings you their ROFLMAO music video.  With all the gaming acronyms included, this video is simple, yet hilarious.  Make sure to check out other stuff that Oxhorn Brand has done, including other music videos, as well as “Mighty Morphin’ Midget Gnomes”.

5) WoW TOYOTA COMMERCIAL
Probably one of the best commercials for WoW, comes from Machinima once again.  A player uses a Toyota Tundra as his mount…

6) WORLD OF WARCRAFT: DANCING
Every wonder where the creators of WoW got their ideas for the dance moves each race has?  This video shows you where it all came from…

JONATHAN COULTON MUSIC VIDEOS
Jonathan Coulton creates some of the most random songs ever.  Although hilariously lyrically written, he actually has a great voice. Here are just a couple of his songs:
7)CODE MONKEY
A monkey in love with a night elf, and hates his job, but loves fritos and mountain dew….don’t ask, just watch:

8 ) TOM CRUISE CRAZY
The title of the video pretty much says it all.  Jonathan’s tune in this one is quite catchy, and this WoW group makes a music video to it.  Jonathan Coulton is known to appear in a lot of WoW related videos.  This song was even featured in episode 9 of  “Dude, Where’s My Mount”.

9) ONYXIA WIPE ANIMATION
So this one may be a little outrageous, but it’s had its popularity and talk abouts throughout servers on WoW.  Getting ready for a raid, a guild leader is telling everyone in the raid what they are going to do, with foul language and poor animation, this video shows the set up, then his reaction to failure.

10) ALL THOSE WoW COMMERCIALS
Of course there are too many WoW commercials to put on here, but there have been some good ones.  A lot of celebrities are often featured in them, including Mr. T, William Shatner, and even Ozzy Osbourne. Here’s a few of them:

This has nothing to do with DC comics. Or chocolate milkshakes. Although I did have a glass of chocolate milk this morning.

Nevermind. I just figured that’s one of the songs I’ve been listening to for the last few days that has the most extraneous title. From Art Brut vs. Satan. It’s been that album, Erasure’s Greatest Hits, La Roux, Boy Kill Boy, Editors, and Phoenix – that haven’t left my ears. And of course Muse. You can’t forget Muse. And I have been listening to AFI, mostly just because I reviewed their new album, “Crash Love,” which isn’t that great, BTW. I reviewed it HERE. Hopefully my La Roux review will be up in the next couple of days. Other than music, I’ve just been at school. And you know that school hasn’t started yet, right?

Yeah. The first issue of the Ledger always takes the most willpower to not procrastinate. We had two separate orientations last week, a freshmen lock-in, and lots of layout. And not the mention the fact that there are 6 of us. For most of last week, there were only three of us, as the other three of us were in Europe somewhere. I wish I could go to Europe. Seriously, if I win the lottery, or somehow get a huge amount of money, I’m putting some of it away to keep me out of debt once I’m off my dad’s medical insurance, and taking the rest of it to go to England, Germany, Scotland, and Sweden. And possibly Italy. But I’m pretty sure there’s a higher ratio of people in the four latter nations that speak English rather than in Italy. I like understanding what people are saying, so Italy’s a question mark at this point. But they do have the best food. Hmm…

Anyway!

OH MY GAWD I ALMOST FORGOT ABOUT PREMIERE WEEK! Holy balls. Okay – monday: Big Bang Theory was AMAZING. Raj + beard = <3. And Leonard + Penny = <3, even if they had awkward sex. How I Met Your Mother was so much awesome, I don't even want to go into it. I'll just say that it made me really happy that new television is back. Speaking of new television, Accidentally on Purpose was pretty cute, as was Jon Foster. Damn, he's adorable. Hopefully people liked it, because I'd like for it to stick around. I'm sick of Two and a Half Men. We need a new and fresh comedy on monday nights. After the laughter came…well, some more laughter and other stuff with Castle! Uh, I was so excited when it go picked up again, because Nathan Fillion always needs to be on television. He's too good just to be on cancelled SciFi shows and internet sing-along blogs. Um. Nothing good on tuesday. Wednesday was GINORMOUS, with new Criminal Minds (Gubler broke his leg!) and CSI:NY (Danny can't walk!), and Top Chef and America's Next Top Model started a couple weeks ago. But I was happy that Ashley on Top Chef was in the top again. I'd really like to go to her restaurant in Seattle one day, but I've heard that she moved to Brooklyn, which is kind of depressing, but whatever. What else?

OH FUCK. Thursday. Thursday was the day I was so damn anxious for it was kind of ridiculous. New Office, 30 Rock, SNL Weekend Update Thursday, and Grey's Anatomy. Let me tell you, I'm glad I waited to watch the comedy shows after Grey's Anatomy, because I needed something to suppress my tears, because there were a lot. Literally, there was on-and-off tears for the first hour, and at the end of the second hour, more tears came. I, being a Grey's fangirl, reacted differently had I not been so involved in the characters. It didn't make my mom cry. And to be honest, retrospectively, the premiere was not that good. It should have been just an hour. Two hours was too jumbled, and had too many storylines that had nothing to do with George's death. As my mother said, "ER would have never done that!" referring to a couple scenes that were incredibly disrespectful towards George's memory. Sure, George is a fictional character, but it's not that like it's been 2 seasons and he's dead. He's been there since the beginning, and this is season 6! They should have had one other patient storyline and left all the sexytime drama to next week. It wasn't fair, and it didn't seem to honor George at all. I know it was messy departure for TR Knight, but Shonda could have at least done the character justice in his death. The only character that seemed to speak of him not in this distant manner was Owen, who told George's mom how much of a hero he was, and how he was a great doctor. And Callie was the only one who seemed to react completely appropriately. Yes, I know Izzie just died and woke up again, and she's kind of a nutbag right now, but laughing at the funeral? Gain some tact, Shonda. And Bailey was completely void of emotion that you almost forgot it was Bailey. So I guess I was crying for two reasons – 1: George is actually dead now; and 2: He didn't get a proper sendoff, and as a diehard fan, that hurts.

Okay, enough of Grey's talk. You probably don't care.

Now, onto Saturday Night Live. Wow, this is turning into a tv-centric post. Oh well. I'll just mention a few things – Megan Fox was great, "Arkansas: where being pregnant doesn't even stop you from getting pregnant," and this:

HAHAHA. I frickin’ loved it, but who knows what the FCC will do. But what’s weirder is that we’re on the west coast feed. I’d understand if they missed it in the midst of all the friggins and freakins on the east coast feed, but they have three hours to catch that to bleep it out for our timezone. Sounds like someone at NBC will be getting in trouble, not Jenny Slate, who sadly enough, wasn’t all that funny – and this sketch was her DEBUT. Yeah, way to mess it up. Hopefully she won’t get in too much trouble, as I’d like to give her a second chance. But like always, Kristen Wiig was on top of her game, not even missing a beat after the f-bomb. Love her.

Oh, and guess what starts in three months??? SKINS! I saw some new pictures from the series 4 set, and I’m so anxious. Without True Blood, what else will fulfill the naughty factor for my television viewing other than Skins?

Oh Freddie, you’re so sexy.

Guess what my mom did yesterday? I burned a photo disc with all the pictures from last weekend for my uncle who’s leaving today for california. I told my mom to write his name and what’s on it on the CD. I got home from layout last night, and she told me that she wrote on the silver side. It’s a pink disc. She wrote on the wrong side. The side that the laser reads. Wow. I literally almost pissed my pants I laughed so hard. Then I grabbed her hand to slap it because she’s so dumb sometimes. And the dog got up like I was hurting her. She stared me in the face like, “don’t you touch her!” Millie does that if anyone hits any of us. Or if we dance.

Now back to music, because it’s mah laahf (yay Sookie Southern!) I found out YESTERDAY, that Natalie Portman’s Shaved Head, this band:

is gonna be at the Showbox at the Market tonight with Ladyhawke:

Yes, THAT Ladyhawke. And Semi-Precious Weapons, which I haven’t heard much of, but they aren’t bad. I hate Perez Hilton, but he puts together a killer tour. Apparently, NPSH filled in for Ida Maria last week when she had to leave the tour. That’s why I didn’t hear about this until now, and I REALLY REALLY REALLY wanna go. It’s $23 at the door. Hopefully everything goes well and I drive up to Seattle tonight for a dancetastic finale to my summer. How perfect would that be? Go see an awesome show and possibly meet NPSH and Ladyhawke, then start school! And it’s an all-ages show! Which is something the Art Brut show didn’t have, which made me very sad last week. But what DID make me happy was when I mentioned something to Eddie Argos on his twitter page about it, and he tweeted me back! I’m such a fangirl. But I’m okay with that.

I’m just shaking in my boots with excitement!

Now I think I’m done. See, I told you this one would be random. Yay tangents!

Oh, and listen to this badass Neighbours remix of Rome by Phoenix, featuring Devendra Banhart

<3 Abby

Greetings people…

Well, if you are hoping that I have some more news for you this week, after the lack of news from last week… well, you are in luck.

So this week was a little on the slow side for the wife and I, and we went ahead and got some movies out to while away the time. On offer was Twilight, which I had avoided until then on the grounds that it looked crappy, and The Legend of Bagger Vance. Bagger Vance was great… enjoyed it immensely. Twilight…. well, Twilight… I reviewed it elsewhere on the blog.

So things are hotting up at Work . One of my co-teachers has decided to return to university and to follow her dream. That that means that she will be unable to work any longer at the school seems to have escaped my employer. She leaves early next week, and I have yet to see anyone stepping into the void. This means that I am about to inherit basically half of my classes…without the benefit of a co-teacher. NICE.

My bike has been giving issues lately. Seems to be something of a bug doing the rounds. I know Plastic Rat’s bike needed a fairly serious overall, and Talking Watermelon has had some really crappy luck .
There isn’t anything specifically wrong with the damn thing, but it doesn’t like starting with the lights on, it cuts out in the rain… very easily, unless revs are held quite high… it is randomly as sluggish as anything, and then… well, it rattles a lot. A weird bell-ringing sound, and a normal gutteral rattle. Anyways… it must just last until we get back from our trip, and then I will take it in.

Swine Flu has finally hit our schools… not in terms of the sickness (Although that is surely not far away), but in terms of stupid temparature checks and face masks. Now… I haven’t had to wear a face mask yet, and I am going to kick and scream if they make me. But I do have to submit to the temp checks. I am happy to say that for some strange reason, my temp is always about 32 degrees. This is across multiple tests, and multiple thermometers. Weird eh? I mean, the temp OUTSIDE is 36 degrees, there is no way that I am totally cool.
Ah well… I guess when I do register as normal, that is the time to go home with a fever.

******

Ranting time?
Nah…

Have you seen the new Need For Speed : Shift game? Oh yes please!

Just because it is funny

Musical find this week.
Arrogant Worms – Jesus’ Brother Bob. And yes… these were the guys that brought you “Cows with Guns”

And some pictures:

Anti - IQ

ROFLMAO

Byebyebyenow.

I’ve driven so much in the last week, that I’m all Altima’d out. I’ve spent more money on driving and parking in the last week, it was nice to do something that didn’t take any work or money. Well, driving to Lacey took some gas money, but I haven’t seen any of my friends from SMU in way too long, and I wanted to see a nice, small comedy show. Two weeks ago, the Demetri Martin show didn’t go quite as planned, and I’ve driven up to Seattle a lot this week for volunteering.

Not that I haven’t liked volunteering. I have. Everyone’s really cool – Taylor, Corina, Charlie – I was working with them for the most part the last 3 days of volunteering. And it was nice to work with a smaller group of people, which made it much easier to get to know everyone. Fun times. I might try for an internship next year, who knows? Maybe it will work perfectly for the comm. major.

But that’s not why I wrote this blog tonight. I went down to St. Martins tonight to see Christina, Jacki, Aimee, Amanda, Emilee, Tara, and everyone else. I hadn’t been in… way too long. Since December I think, at least since when everyone was there. I missed them all. A lot. I needed some time at SMU, because it’s relaxing, and fun, and stress-free. And it’s nice to know that people remember me and say hi, even though I was there over a year ago. And to be completely honest, even though I love still going back there for visits, it makes me realize how right I was to leave after a year, and makes me appreciate having privacy, and having UWT.

But again, as you can see by the photo I posted on top, and the headline – the reason for this post is mainly Jeff Dye. His gig was why I went down today specifically to hang out. If I get a free comedy show out of it – it’s doubly awesome.

“Hello Catholics!” Silence. “I really thought that there’d be more Catholics. I have 45 minutes of jokes about Catholics. Hmm…”

Let me tell you, none of the comedians who came when I was a freshman had that big of a crowd. Like, they had to bring in more chairs. And that room is tiny. Like Jeff said, it’s the side room of a building in the middle of the woods that you can’t find. Haha. SMU is kind of inconvenient to get to – especially in rush hour. Jeff made a joke about that too – how ridiculously slow the traffic is coming south on I-5 from Tacoma to Lacey. Fort Lewis and McChord AFB traffic is the WORST. I can’t remember exactly what he said, I just remember thinking – TELL ME ABOUT IT!

It was so much fun. Jeff had a mixture of the bits that I remember from LCS – the gym on ecstasy, guess who – and…interesting banter with the large, albeit small, crowd. Four girls sitting in front – who actually were in charge of booking comedians – kept whispering and talking while Jeff was talking, and every time he caught them, he called them out. It was awesome, but from what I remember, they were annoying as hell when I was a freshman. At one point, Jeff said that he hated them, and he wasn’t going to tell anymore jokes because of them. He just stood up on stage for a few minutes, staring them down, making them feel worse about whispering. Then they said, “we’re laughing.”

“That’s not how people laugh!” (and he motioned the whispering hand signal and laughed ridiculously into his hand) “Oh, you’re not laughing, have some of mine! You don’t laugh into other people’s mouths.”

But my favorite bit, at the least the one where I laughed the most was when he was talking about the huge burly guys at the gym and how they make grunting noises when they lift weights.

“So just to mess with them, I grab a five pound hand weight, because that’s what I’m working with, and go like this,” and Jeff lowered the mic and screamed as he mimed lifting weights. Like actually screamed.

“What are you doing?”

“Oh, I thought we were all making noises….”

I laughed so hard, I almost peed my pants. I actually almost did several times, especially after this one joke about how Unicorns are actually really scary and badass. “It’s a horse, with a horn coming out of it’s head. It should be called a rhinocehorse!” I really had to pee, and I didn’t want to get up during the show, because then I would have been singled out and had to explain that I needed to go to the bathroom. Nah, I just sat and held it. For a good hour and a half. Oh well.

After the show, Aimee, Emilee, Cece and I all asked if we could have a picture with Jeff, and I haven’t felt that short in a long time. He’s so tall. I was actually kind of nervous to ask, because I guess you could say he’s the most famous person I’ve ever met. Waving to Ryan Stiles at a Mariners game when he walked by us doesn’t really count. But I didn’t act all goofy and be like “I follow you on Twitter!” because THAT wouldn’t seem weird at all. :/ He was really cool, and when I told him that I didn’t go to that school, he said, “well that’s what I call cheating.”

I USED to go to that school. I gave enough of myself to that place in one year that I can come anytime I want and enjoy free entertainment.

Hopefully I’ll get to see Jeff’s stand up again, because it’s the kind of stand up you can’t get embarrassed about laughing at. It’s not dirty humor, or low brow, the kind of humor that everyone can enjoy. Now I just wish I could find Jeff’s comedy CD somewhere. It’s impossible to find.

Jeff Dye – you rock. And you’re not an asshole, the “triplets” did need to shut up.

<3 Abby

I’m going to halt from talking about the UWT Leadership Retreat for a bit, because honestly, last night was way crazier.

That’s Demetri Martin up there. He’s a person. And Libby and I went and saw his comedy show last night at the Moore. But it took us quite a lot to get there.

After getting home from the retreat, Mom and Libby and I bolted over to Grandma’s so I could take a shower and Mom and Dad could meet up to go to the Seahawks game. Oh, thank god they were in Seattle.

We got going right on time to our night of hilarity. It was about 7:30, and we were on Second Ave. but as we were turning on to Virginia Street – I shit you not – my car died. Like, right as I turned the corner, and stepping on the brakes a bit, it stalled, then died. I could see the Moore in front of us. Literally, it was like 200 yards away. The parking lot was…maybe 50 yards away. People started honking, but it was a one-way street, so we were lucky at least in that. Libby got out and told people to go around, because my emergency lights wouldn’t go on. We sat there for a minute, I’m freaking out, and then a few guys and this girl with pink hair helped us parallel park by pushing. Seriously. My power steering was dead, so it was really hard to turn the wheel, but we actually got it out of the road, with the help of these great people randomly on the street. One of the guys actually was at the Demetri Martin show and we saw him leaving right as we did. But as we were almost into the non parking spot, a cop pulled up behind us, and told us that he wouldn’t get us towed, because we were in a bit of a jam. But he told us that someone would eventually tow us, because we were in a no parking zone.

This is where Mom and Dad came in handy. Since Libby didn’t answer her phone, Mom and Dad drove down to the Moore to see what was up, because they’re that weird. It was 20 ’til 8 o’clock, and I was starting to think that we weren’t going to be able to go to our show, and I was really starting to freak out. Once the parentals arrived, we jumped it, and Mom and Dad told us to go to the show. Little did we know, once they got my car started again, it went merely 20 yards up the hill. Dad had to call our AAA tow truck, and they couldn’t leave the car alone, or else it would have been towed. So Mom and Dad didn’t get to go to the Seahawks game.

Thank god I didn’t know that while I was in the show, or else it would have made me feel REALLY REALLY fucking guilty. I mean, I still feel kind of guilty right now, but at least I got to enjoy the comedy show.

And it was PERFECT.

We had the same view as that photo up there ^^^^ I haven’t uploaded my pics and video because I was too tired to go find the camera cord for the new Coolpix. I’ll upload them as soon as I find the cord.

Demetri had everything from the Large Pad to the keyboard, his guitar, his harmonica, more drawings and the laser pointer, and a new part of the act that was so freaking funny. Demetri painted an army man, set him on a stool, mic’d him, and “interviewed” him by stepping on and off a voice changer to basically talk to himself. What was so perfect was the high voice his tiny man had. And his shoe had a very deep voice.

“Hey man, can you not take me off using Steve?”

“Steve?”

“Yeah, Steve, the other shoe. You just did it on stage, his face goes right into my ass.”

“I’m sorry, man. I’ll try not to do that anymore.”

“Cause we gotta hang out, like, all the time. It gets awkward.”

And picture the shoe talking in a REALLY REALLY low voice.

And speaking of awkward – Demetri did a great song about ways to end an awkward silence.

Jazz hands.

Wicka wicka wicka.

Awk-ward si-lence. CLAP CLAP CLAP CLAP CLAP.

Shhh….shhh… and you touch their lips.

Those are just a few, but there were many more. I just can’t remember them at the moment. My favorite part, actually, was the random banter with the audience in the front. There was this girl celebrating her Sweet Sixteen right in front. “Happy Sweet Sixteen, how old are you?” He asked. And at one point, that same girl shouted out, “do you want to go into the bathroom with me after the show?”

“A sixteen-year-old is asking me to go to the bathroom with her.”

“There’s a keg by it.”

“There’s a keg in the bathroom?”

“No, outside the bathroom.”

“Well, that’s a good way to remind people that they have to go to the bathroom. ‘Oh look, here’s a keg…fuck I have to pee.”

And there was a woman who brought her 6-year-old to the show, Rhiannon. I’m just guessing how to spell that. It didn’t seem to stop Demetri from swearing though. It was weird hearing him swear, because he always kept it clean on Comedy Central specials and on the CD.

Speaking of swearing, that quote I used for my headline was in the encore. Demetri was talking about a point in your life when a sentence that comes out of your mouth that sums up exactly where you are in your life. And his was in his New York apartment a few years ago – “Where the fuck is my tambourine?”

Apparently he needed a tambourine.

The encore was my favorite part though, because he was taking requests for “oldies but goodies,” and just random questions. Some girl asked him to marry her, people asked a lot about the movie, Taking Woodstock, which comes out on friday, and about “Important Things,” which isn’t going to air until next spring.

However, the last two questions were asked in perfect unison from two opposite ends of the theater, which is HELLA tall, BTW. We were in the first balcony, and we already thought we were high up. The second balcony must have been in the fucking ceiling.

“What’s your favorite flavor of ice cream?”

“Where are you staying tonight?”

“My favorite flavor of ice cream is the Four Seasons.”

So funny, and so worth the frustration of a dying car battery. I was just kind of pissed that we had to leave right away afterwards, and I REALLY wanted to stand outside the theater and see if he would come out and take pictures with people. After Lindsay and I missed out on that at the Flight of the Conchords show in May, I didn’t want to miss out on it for Demetri. But sadly, my car wanted me to miss out.

Oh well, Demetri was amazing. Libby and I had a blast…ladies.

Hehe.

<3 Abby

After I posted the update about Seaside yesterday, I completely forgot to mention the fact that I had a near-death experience two days ago.

Okay, maybe not a “near-death,” but a “near-horrendous-burn” experience.

Actually, I’ll talk about all the fireworks I saw in the last 3 days. We’ve been going to Emerald Downs on the 3rd for the last ten years (I think), and that’s the one day of the year that I’m surrounded by white trash by choice. This year, however, my Uncle came with us, and my mom actually had something she needed to accomplish. She and her best friend from high school, Keith, are planning their 30-year high school reunion, and they’re holding it at Emerald Downs, because what better place for Thomas Jefferson High School graduates to hang out than the horse races? That’s what I thought.

But I’m not sure if the whole event has gotten exponentially more lame as the years have gone by, or if I’m just become more of a snob. It’s probably the latter, but the former looks quite likely too. You see, every year, following the last race on the 3rd, a cover band plays for an hour or so before it gets dark enough to shoot off a shit ton of fireworks. A few years ago, they had an all-girl AC/DC cover band called Hell’s Belles, who were pretty cool, but every other year, it’s been the Beatniks, a random cover band that plays whatever the hell they want. And I swear that they used to be cooler. They used to play Beatles stuff, some Beach Boys, and other 60s rock. But now, they migrated south, metaphorically speaking. It was all Mellencamp and Skynyrd-like stuff. It’s like they’ve given into the wishes of usual crowd of the horse races – rednecks. Not that I have anything really against Mellencamp or Skynyrd, but they have a distinct twang to their music, and the Beatniks didn’t used to rock with a twang. Courtney and I were the only ones at one point that were “dancing” over by the band, and I couldn’t help but notice the smell of body odor, strong cigarettes, and the sight of overweight women who were seemingly oblivious to how ridiculous their rolls looked in the unattractive tanks shaking everywhere like a drunken chimp.

And I fully realize how much of a snob I sound like right now. I’m not putting myself on a high horse – I feel like I can look ridiculous at times, and I know I have rolls, but I feel like I’m a lot more cultured than the people I was temporarily adjacent too. I feel like I’m cooler than those people. At least I think. And what was the funniest part was how apeshit everyone went when the Beatniks started playing Sweet Home Alabama. They were taking requests, and I can just imagine that everyone was like “Skynyrd!” We’re in Auburn, WA. How southern can you be?

Then came the fireworks. And as my Uncle Gary said, “I wonder what aliens will think when they look down on us and see how we react to fireworks? Like ‘hey, they really like shiny things.’” At least some people do. First of all – I don’t know who picks the songs to play during the fireworks. It was Final Countdown by Europe, Viva La Vida, some random patriotic songs, Time of My Life by David Cook, and another patriotic song. Are they trying to make us feel warm and fuzzy and touched? Like an epic final scene in a bad 90s action/love story? They might as well play Aerosmith and Celine Dion simultaneously. But there was this woman dancing a few yards away from us, and she was clapping, throwing her hands in the air, at one point tripped over a cooler and fell, and got right back up and danced. All by herself. And other people clapped and cheered. It’s not like there’s going to be an encore. The fireworks guys aren’t going to say behind the cloud of smoke, “dudes, they want more! We gotta find some more shit to blow up!”

Oh, how rednecks amuse me so. I’ve just realized the absurdity of the appeal of fireworks. At least the appeal of watching fireworks. I, personally find setting off fireworks more exhilarating. Coming in very close contact with green sparks just give me goosebumps, as well as make me run faster than a jack rabbit to the other side of the house, away from the stray colorful, fiery plumes.

I’ll explain.

On the fourth, I had nothing to do because Mom took my car, and Libby took her truck to Ruston Way for the street fair. I spent the fourth on Ruston Way last year, but I’d rather not discuss it. Anyway, I went to Michael’s house to hang out with him and Patrick, set off fireworks and play Wii. At first, I wasn’t going to stay for any fireworks because I thought I’d have to stay home with the dogs, as Millie is scared shitless of any kind of explosion (come to think of it, that’s the logical response), but Mom was home, and Lucy wasn’t coming over, so I stayed until about 11 to see some fireworks.

Boy, did I see some fireworks. Michael’s soon-to-be stepdad, Dean was setting off the big, illegal fireworks, and his little brother Tyler was setting off the little bottle rocket-sized ones. After a few of the larger and louder fireworks, and sun had pretty much set, Dean set up one of the biggest ones. Can’t for the life of me remember what it was called, but it was green. We were all sitting in the driveway, about 9 of us, and 2 dogs, and as the firework goes off, one shoots down the street, one in the yard to the right of us, one in the yard to the left of us, and one RIGHT DOWN THE MIDDLE OF THE DRIVEWAY. Really. It shot underneath the rickety table loaded with about $800 worth of fireworks, and about 3 feet away from my chair, right next to Tank’s (one of the dogs) face. And it exploded, shooting smaller sparks all around the driveway, one right in Tank’s mouth, one on my leg, one on Michael’s mom’s arm, and another across the yard. By this time, Patrick was in the backyard, Michael had ran after his Grandma to the other side of the yard, and Tank instantly ran back into the bushes after the small explosion in his mouth. Surprisingly, I didn’t get any burn marks on my leg, because I surely felt the spark. After a few minutes of looking for Tank, and regaining our composure, someone noticed something glowing from the porch. Lo and behold, another of the sparks shot onto the couch on the porch, setting a bag of old clothes ablaze. Really. It was pretty scary, as Tank was bleeding, it was getting dark, and I was weary of every firework after that.

I left shortly after. Miraculously, I didn’t get lost on the way to or from Michael’s house, because I hadn’t been there in over a year. I watched a few of the fireworks from the Purdy spit as I slowly made my way across it in traffic, and those were the last ones I enjoyed. Dad didn’t buy any, because we weren’t actually doing anything, and we were being thrifty.

That was plenty fireworks for me. At least physical fireworks. I’d listen to Fireworks by Animal Collective all day (that’s where the lyric on my title came from, btw.)

<3 Abby

I’m dreadfully sorry I never updated on Laura’s and my trip to Seaside. I don’t know why it slipped my mind; it may have been the fact that I was so into my book. I finished reading the Learners by Chip Kidd while I was there – and HOLY SHIT that book is a mindfuck. I strongly recommend it, and I’m hoping for a third. It’s weird, as I’m become accustomed to reading books that come in series, that I always want another one. First, there was Harry Potter, then the Jessica Darling series, HP having seven books and JD having five books.

But anyway, that wasn’t my whole point in posting this entry.

Overall, we had a very relaxing few days in Seaside. We didn’t get to go to Portland on the way back to go to Powell’s, but we did save 50 miles in gas. I hadn’t realized how much further it was to go to Seaside from Portland than from Longview. Needless to say, we saved a hell of a lot of time. We got home thursday at like, 1:30.

So on tuesday, we went shopping through the carousel mall on Broadway, and the other little shops in town. We stopped in this one shop called “Freedom” with witty tee-shirts and souvenir crap.

And a Rasta guy asked Laura which print she liked.

“That sex machine one is pretty funny.”

“Oh, really, is that what you are?”

Awkward. So we left.

Laura thought he said, “is that what you want?” but when I told her what he really said, it was even creepier.

We went grocery shopping so we wouldn’t have to go out to eat, seeing that we were being cheap. It was pretty funny when we came back from Safeway, because we walked into the kitchen, put away our snack food and took our chicken out for fettucine, and a lot of the other guests stared at us as we were cooking the chicken.

What? We like chicken. We like to eat dead animal carcass. Is it a crime? There was this nice woman boiling artichokes and cooking wild rice on the other stovetop while we were sauteing onions, peppers and chicken, adding cream and cheese and pouring it all over carb-y noodles. It was amusing. But not quite as amusing as when we tried to walk through from the laundry room to the main room and some chick was doing yoga on the floor. We encountered a lot of people like that during the week. It surely was a different experience from a hotel.

We were on the Necanecum River, about 10 blocks from Broadway, and on tuesday, Laura and I sat out in the yard and read for a good hour and a half, and I got a terrible sunburn – on my knees. I mean, really. My knees. And not just my knees, but on my left knee, a stripe of sunburn ran up my thigh, leaving an uncomfortable red area. My neck got a little burnt on the left side, as well as my nose, but nowhere else was in direct sunlight. It was a nice day though, not too hot because of the wind, and out sweet and spicy mustard was freaking delicious.

On wednesday, we called Amber Jo, an old friend from high school who’d moved down to Seaside with her daughter a little less than a year ago. Her daughter, Olivia, is one year old now, and she’s adorable. We didn’t realize, however, that Amber Jo lived literally five minutes away from where we were staying.

We called her and was like “what road are you on?”

“Holladay.”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah, why?”

“So are we!”

That was tuesday night, and we went and hung out with her for a bit that night before spending a good portion of the day with her and Olivia wednesday. We rode with her up to Warrenton and went shopping. We went to Fred Meyer and Ross, just to go shopping. It was nice, because I’ve actually never been to Ross and they had a better selection than TJ MAXX. I got a pair of Levi’s for $16. Really. Pretty good deal. We stopped at Starbucks while we were in Warrenton too, and in the drive-thru, Amber Jo actually asked the girl getting us our coffee if she was a vampire because she had cold hands. She was kidding, of course, but it was still funny. That night we lied low for the night after coming back the hostel from Amber Jo’s apartment. We watched that Paul Blart movie, and it was absolutely ridiculous. Like, I haven’t seen such a stupid movie in a long time. Once back to the hostel, we didn’t do much, reading and packing. We had the weirdest tuna melts I’ve ever had, but tasty nonetheless.

The next morning, we had to be out by 10 am, and I don’t think I’ve ever been so on time in my life. We headed out, got some coffee, Laura checked her oil, and we were off. The route home was so much more scenic than the route we took there. We passed through Astoria, and along the river. I love driving along highway 30.