Cha cha now, y'all

So, I went to this wedding, and I must admit---I hated it. It was in a small Episcopal church that was colder inside than it was outside. I was even wearing a sweater over my dress and I could not stop shivering! And the organ was too big for the space and the woman playing it was basically the definition of terrible. And then she sang a random song and holy warble Batman, it was awful. I have no idea what any of the words were and she just kept going on and on and on and then I realized that she was singing along with a recording. She had recorded herself playing piano and was singing along to that. OMG. And, of course, they used the 1 Corinthians 13 reading. Except...that's...that's not how it goes. Damn you Protestants!

Speaking of crazy Protestants, I am pretty sure that the old women minister brought her female life partner with her to the reception. After the vows---which were super sweet, guys, because he couldn't stop crying and then she had her shit together until "Until death do us part" when her voice went up about 3 octaves--so, after the vows, the crazy lesbian minister was all "We will now join hands and say the Lord's Prayer. The regular version that we all know." Maybe I'm just an awkward Catholic, but what other version is there? Correct me if I'm wrong, but I am pretty sure that The Our Father is the most stand prayer in Christendom. ANYway...crazy lady.

Also, I didn't know anyone there. Except the Bride. Don't worry, I went to the correct wedding this time. So...I was cursing MMMono for being a beezie and lying to me to get out of being my date for the reception and Jasperse looked AMAZING!!!!1 (PS, MMMono, I gave Nanette dirt on you in the girls' room. Sweet, sweet vengeance).

Luckily, Lindsay Iwan was there at the reception, also flying solo, so I had someone to talk to who was not socially awkward. They had a recycled theme, which was adorable and still fall, but super creative. The invitations came in envelopes made of paper grocery bags and the favors were these super cute candles made from a fallen tree branch!



ALSO, Open bar. And she had a vegan meal option. Yummy pasta with a chunky tomato and summer squash topping. Delicious.

It never fails--every time I go to a wedding, they play the Cha Cha Slide. And they always play part 2. You know, the one with the Charlie Brown part. So, not only do I always end up counting a cha-cha step to those in my immediate vicinity (right-left-right,right-left-right), I also am always, without fail, the only one who can Charlie Brown. You know, the swing move. I found this snarky video that outlines the move.




Trip update: My departure date changed from "Available" to "Definitive Departure"! You guys! now it's for sure, for sure!

Cha-cha now, y'all.

Come fly with me. Come fly, let's fly away!

Hey guys! It's been a while.

In the past few weeks, I bought these boots:



And went wine tasting with Toi. And had cider. We need to go back, because their wine list was pretty delicious-looking and when you bring your glass back, you get a free tasting. Whee! I was a bit disappointed, because other tastings that I've been to gave you more than a splash. I was thinking more like this:



And then we went to eat with MMMMono...and then we saw the Three Musketeers. After the fourth time in two minutes that I twitched violently and said, "That. That wasn't in the book." MMMMono turned sagely toward me and said, "Maybe it's better if we just think of this as fan fiction."

On a whim, I decided to look at the pricing of flights on London around the time of my trip. I pulled-up a round trip flight with taxes at just over $1,000.

That's not too bad, I thought to myself. I wonder if Wednesday would be cheaper...

FALSE! When I changed the day, it was suddenly $2,300! After a great deal of date fiddling, I came to the conclusion that the original date was meant to be. I bought my ticket! Yay! My trip is becoming more and more real! And why were the other tickets so expensive? The Olympics, of course. I am leaving a few days after the Olympics end, so everyone and their mom (literally this time) will be trying to escape London.

Now, if only Frank were going with me. I could use some exotic booze...



Pack up; let's fly away!

Tralalala! Cookies!

You guys, I have been super busy. With choir, school, planning a retreat for the kiddies, and cantoring, it has been a full schedule.

I started taking the bus to work on days when I don't need to be home or somewhere else right away. I really like the walk in the morning. It is about 10 minutes form the house to the bus stop, and then another 10 minutes from the stop to work. I think I am more awake when I get to work in the morning...plus I can eat more since I am doing more exercise, right?

Speaking of food, Halloween oreos are back! I love them!


Speaking of awesome food...I made cookies (which were delicious). But the point I really want to make about these cookies is that I candied my own ginger root. I started with this:



and ended-up with this:



MMMono, I know you will enjoy this:

Decision time

Guys, which one? Also...when are we going to Bronner's?!?!?!

http://www.amazon.com/Nordic-Ware-Christmas-Morning-Pancake/dp/B0027FGD66/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1317605595&sr=8-1


OR


http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000VEOC04/sr=8-5/qid=1317605595/ref=olp_product_details?ie=UTF8&me=&qid=1317605595&sr=8-5&seller=

I wants it

You guys! I want it! OMG I want it!
Give it to meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!

Older than dirt

I had a lovely birthday yesterday! It was pay day. I had vegan no bakes. I even had dinner at Marie Catrib's! Thanks Jennifer!!!!!!!!!!!

Before dinner, I had class at Aquinas. It was the first night of our class. I was all serious, saying "You guys are so lucky to have me for class. Not only am I made of awesome, but today is my birthday, so we are getting out early." They applauded. After going over the syllabus and lecturing to them about how if they plagiarize, God will hate them and they will make Baby Jesus cry, I said "Any questions? Okay. See you guys next week!"

Basketball player: Wait. Are you serious?
Aussie: I said "early" what did you think getting out of class early meant?
BP: You really are awesome! Are all of our classes going to be this short?
Aussie: Not really, no. Enjoy the sunshine!
BP: Are you sure you don't have another birthday next week?

At Marie's, they gave me a free cupcake. It was chocolate. Delicious.

And, And! when I went to choir, Mark made everyone sing my favorite Christmas song. He was all snarky-like "Okay! We have to sing "This Christmastide," because I hear that it is some one's birthday." And I was all "Yes, please!" And we did.

We sound waaaaaay better than this, but you get the idea.

Computers are starting to scare me

How people use them at least. Can we just take a minute to talk about Bow hunter training as an online course? Or gun safety? No surprise from Texas, allowing bounty hunter training courses online. Actually, I could go on about any number of these.



I want to go to ArtPrize this weekend. Who is coming with meeeeeeeeeee!?!?!?!

Brief hiatus

I saw this today and giggled. I love the president.

Comedy Central Roast of Charlie Sheen

Kansas City, MO

I couldn't fit it all in one post. It was too much. Here is Monday evening.

The entire drive I had "Kansas City" and "All 'Er Nothin' " from Oklahoma stuck in my head...especially the line "I heard that you was kickin' up some capers/ while I as off in Kansas City, MO"

ANYway, I was intrigued by the shopping district called "Crown Country Plaza" and it was a good halfway night point for my trip. The Plaza is 3 square block shopping center. Lots of restaurants, stores, and some nice apartments on the fringes...and fountains. I collected them all, just like in the old days!





I--I really don't get the penguin fountain. You can kind of see it in the background. The fountain part is completely separate. But, I do like the penguin statues.




Tomorrow, Kansas!

I heard that you was kickin' up some capers

St. Louis was gorgeous when I arrived on Sunday afternoon. Sun was shining, so I dutifully applied copious amounts of sunscreen (SPF 100!!!!!!!). I was super excited to go to the Art Museum and the Zoo. Both are funded by the city through taxes and massive funds, so entry is free to the public. Of course, being a beautiful day, parking was a beast. I ended-up parking right off this gorgeous fountain. That's the Art museum up on the hill. The hill that I climbed.



It was super windy there, too, so many cute kids were out flying kites. I tried to take a picture to capture this without being creepy, but they all kind of sucked, so to no avail.

When I got into the art museum, I was greeted with some construction workers. It wasn't until a brief time later that I got a little pissed. Okay, you can't get a little pissed. I was actually pissed. Apparently, this awesome museum with 4,000 pieces in its collection, was undergoing renovation, so only 8 rooms were open with a mish-mash of art in them. 8 rooms. That was about 50 pieces of art out of 4,000! Ridiculous. The basement and second floor were both closed-off. Angry face. Construction...likely story, more like massive robbery of all of the good art. The only known artists on display was Monet, and he painted well over 1,000 paintings, so that's not saying much. Lame.

With my angry face full-on, I trekked over to the Zoo--a pleasant hop, skip, and jump away. I love the zoo. They had fun fountains:



And this zoo had losts of cool animals...like a Rhinocerous.



I did suffer some early-spring blues, because the Sea Lion show had not yet started its run, so you couldn't see them at all! But they had lemurs!



Of course, it ws hot so the big cats were not active, but I can't really blame them. Also, kitties are nocturnal. The zoo also had bunches of baby animals! Like this little guy:



Walking around the remainder of the lovely city park area, I stumbled upon this little gem: A Turtle Park.



With a variety of sizes, you could totally climb through them. And in them. And on them.




All in all, a good day.

I spent the night and the next morning trotted off to 7am mass (yes, again). Of course, this was daily mass, but the St Louis Cathedral Bascilica is fabulous. I would recommend it even for just a brief walk-through.





and the inside was shiny! I'm not usually a fan of gold, but I liked it.



And Jesus was all over the place!



I also stopped-by the Old Cathedral, which is by the Arch, which I obviously went-up in.




It was fairly standard, except for the shennanigans of how much room you have. In the "elevator pods"



and in order to get a good view, you had to...



I even took a picture of my car from up high! It's Bond James Bond. Do you see him?!?!?!




Back to the Old Cathedral: good times. As the name indicates, it was once the Cathedral, which makes sense location-wise for a city starting out on the river. As the city (and presumably the congregation) grew, they didn't have room to build a big-kid Cathedral so pretty much said "Fuck it, we'll just start over" and built the old Gothic-style above. Of course, this Old Cathedral has the infant of Prague, so more power to them.

The interior:



Louis XVI:




And their creepy infant:



In the center of the city, inland a bit from the riverfront, they have a large number of pretty pretty sculptures and fountains. I really liked the Bunnies!



For lunch, I had a fabulous smoothie and fresh veggie rolls from this super-cute smoothie shop in the hip bar district. After I had a good lunch in me, it was time for some beer. And what's better than beer? Free beer.



We got two free beers and some free pretzels. Yumm. I tried the new Shock Top Raspberry Wheat. Delicious. MMMono, I think you might actually like this beer. What MMMono might also like--this beerstein:



Next stop: Kansas City, MO.