Same Great Product, Amazing New Look

I'm moving to a new address.

http://turquoisehandlebars.blogspot.com/

Come visit! And bring gifts!

You like?

I thought it was time for a change.

P is for Paris.

P is also for pee. Which is what the entire city of Paris smells like. Sorry to any Parisian folks, but your  city stinks.

Otherwise, here's my trip (yes, from October) in a nutshell:

• My French sucks. One lady even had to slowly repeat "MA-YO-NNAISE" several times.
• I could live on baguettes alone.
• Hot chocolate in America is bullshit.
• Parisian men have fantastic hair. Fantastic. Amazing. 
• I can get lost in a paper bag.

But man...what an amazing trip. I've found that I love traveling alone. And I spent my birthday evening on a terrace looking up at the Basilique du Sacré-Coeur, dining on duck, pastries, and champagne, with new friends from all over the world. How was your last birthday?

I don't care if Notre Dame is a tourist-laden nightmare. Amazeballs.

 Loved this bridge. Loved.

 Pretty sure every Disney character ever lives here.

Justins Party

Tuesday, 4:06 p.m. A text message from a number I don't recognize:

Is Kayla like planning justins party

Oh well. I was hitting a mid-afternoon slump.

Didn't you hear kayla was in a bus accident?

No I didn't

So your running the party

Yeah but I'm thinking about changing the theme. What do you think?

Um I just want to go a sport theme like the world series

How did she get In a bus accident

I don't know. She's been drinking a lot.

Who

Kayla. Everyone knows that.

O noo she was not in a accident  and can I go to justin party

I don't want to do World Series. How about Rocky Horror Show?

Yea that works   I really want to know if I can go. Jack and Mikey are going

Are Kayla and Justin still together?

What I don't know

Why wouldn't you be able to go?

I'm just asking to go I went last time I hate the science hw

IDK I'll think about it. Maybe you can do my HW for me. TTYT.

Bye

Another milestone reached.

Well, it finally happened. 

My mother asked me if I'm a lesbian.*

I have crossed another bridge every single 30-something must bravely cross.

*I'm not. Yet.

Pardon our dust.

Yep, the neon cupcakes are gone. Also, since Ramona is no more (RIP), I felt it was time for a new title.

Here's the quick explanation. A friend of a friend of a friend was dragging a story out until everyone's eyes were sufficiently glazed over. His extremely long-winded point? He found five dollars.

As most of the crap I blog about falls into the same utterly painful category, I feel like this is pretty accurate.

I ought to wear a helmet.

So I woke up with a big puffy eye the other morning. To everyone's shock and disappointment, it was not pink eye. I am actually able to refrain from sticking the same fingers in my eye that I stick in my butt. I have two hands, people. No, this mini-shiner came from a direct face-wall collision the night before. If you are a long-time reader, you may recall that I hate getting up to pee at night. I bet you didn't know this was the reason. Fortunately, the only damage was a little goose egg-type situation that lasted about 24 hours.

I'm a walking disaster. At any given time, I am 98 percent guaranteed to have an injury somewhere. I will often find mysterious giant green bruises…on my ass. How do I get a bruised ass? Am I sitting with too much force? Are my britches too tight? What am I doing wrong?

I broke two fingers playing kickball when I was a kid. Who does that? I went to scoop up a gently rolling grounder. And broke two fingers. So 20 years later, here I am, back on a kickball team. (The KILFs. Don't hurt yourself figuring it out.) Proudest moment of the season? My face-first flop onto first base. Not into first base. Just onto it. In my defense, it was muddy. Which really just meant that I looked like an asshole…covered in mud. I almost passed that dive off as intentional. Almost. No, seriously. At least I didn't break anything. We'll see how indoor season goes this fall. A lot more hard surfaces involved there.

I'm just glad my name isn't Grace. That would be a lot of pressure. Grace Kelly pretty much killed it. But I would not have been able to hang. Who's got two thumbs and has walked all the way across a college campus with the back of her skirt tucked into her tights? This girl.

How am I still allowed to go out in public?

Netflix is totally trying to win me back.

Don't you find it strange that the same week I cancel my Netflix DVD subscription (which is now Qwikster or something), this just happens to arrive in the mail?

But wait. Here's the crazy part. This DVD? Totally not mine. No, seriously. It's not.

Uh-huh. I see right through your ploy, Netflix. You're trying to lure me back in with your little "mistakes." I'm not sure what I'm talking about. But rest assured...I've got my eye on you.

Subject: Construction Paper

Allison,


Do you have any construction paper? Can I have a piece?


Thanks,
X

This was a work email I received today. Please keep in mind that (although it might seem like it most of the time), I do not work at a preschool.

Mr. X might have let the cat out of the bag here. Clearly other departments are having Krazy Kraft Korner time with glitter and pipe cleaners and safety scissors. They probably even have nap time!

Meanwhile, the marketing folks are out saving people's lives. Who do you call when you're stuck in the elevator? Marketing. Who do you count on to pull the fire alarm when the building goes up in flames? Marketing. Who's going to scream, "run" at the top of her lungs and then take off full speed in the wrong direction during an earthquake? That one was all me.

Southern Fried Kidlets

I spent Labor Day weekend in

with my sister Anna and her family.

There are the twins, Madeline and Eli (4), and a new addition, Ward, who is two months old. If you're an aunt, you probably already know that you have to come bearing gifts. This consisted of circus peanuts, trucks for Eli, a princess beauty kit for Madeline, and a stuffed lion for Ward.

You could say the beauty kit was the hit of the weekend. In the kit was a selection on pink and purple hair accessories...and a tube of "lipstick." (A piece of plastic that looks like lipstick.) Madeline spent a lot of time deciding which clip(s) and scrunchies to adorn herself with each morning. And then there was the lipstick. She toted it around in a stuffed unicorn purse all weekend. And I have never seen anything like it. This little girl reapplied every 30 minutes.

"Oh, I just ate. My lipstick came off."
"I got sweaty playing outside. My lipstick came off."
"It's raining. My lipstick came off."

Hilarious.

We had a ton of fun playing outside.

At some point I was the bad witch(?) and the monkey bars lifter-upper. But mostly it was just, "Allison, watch me!"

They are total hams and posed for me at dinner time. I told them to "pretend you're eating." So they did.

But it was really because they didn't like what was for dinner at all, which they made crystal clear soon after.

I mentioned Ward. Remember?

It's kind of easy to forget this kid sometimes. He's so quiet. He just hangs out like this most of the time. Note the very serious expression. This is not just a random expression. This is how he looks all the time. I'm fairly certain he's a genius. He's pretty stinkin' cute, though.

I had fun with Anna and Brandon too, once all the little heads hit the pillows. We watched some serious football on Saturday. I had no idea that my bro-in-law played for Auburn his freshman year. Pretty bad-ass, right?

Day 21

Here's a pretty pattern.

It's my shower curtain. I don't know if I've mentioned it yet, but I am borderline obsessed with World Market.

By the way...

It was this thing.

The Tsaritsa was so close.

Days 18, 19, 20

Slack attack. Sorry, I've been avoiding natural disasters in D.C.

I spy with my little eye...

The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell. This is an awesome book. Awesome. I just finished Freakonomics by Steven D. Levitt & Stephen J. Dubner. Fantastic. Before that? Confessions of an Economic Hitman by John Perkins. Wow. I'm on a roll here. I hope my next book doesn't suck.

Here's where the magic happens. And of course by magic I mean surfing the Interwebs while eating Easy Cheese straight from the can.

Day 17 - On the Shelf (Virginia Earthquake 2011)

What a coincidence that today's photo would be "on the shelf." By now you have probably heard about the 5.8-magnitude earthquake that struck the East Coast today. Here's my shelf after the quake.

Nope, no damage. I came home to crooked pictures and opened doors(?), but nothing broken.

Let me say that that earthquake pretty much spoiled the thought of ever moving to California. Or Indonesia. That shit was not cool.

Day 16 - What I Ate

Busy drafting a sales proposal + lost appetite =

Yep, that's it. Straight out of the pouch.

Weekend Agenda: Zombie Apocalypse

It was just a typical Saturday night for me, running from flesh eating zombies.

My zombie apocalypse emergency kit: a map, a zombie warning whistle, water, a wipe for cleaning zombie bite wounds, a glow stick for when my flashlight dies, gum(?), and one "brain" token.

Days 14 & 15

We have reached the halfway point.

I thought it would be a good idea to head to the United States Botanical Garden to take my day 15 photo. I snapped this when I wasn't running from the bees.

And here are my shoes. Plastic flip flops and band-aids...typical.

Day 13

This is the George Washington Masonic National Memorial. I always thought the Masons were a secret club like the Skulls. Guess not, since the guy who sold me my car is a member.

I cannot say "from a distance" without Bette Midler popping into my head. I know all of the words, by the way, since this was a song from one of our awesome school musicals.

Day 12

Can you guess what this is?

Day 11

Reading is fun.

If they had the Book It! program for adults, I would eat so many personal pan pizzas that I'd have to have a wall removed to leave the house. If I had a twin, we'd buy motorcycles and hats and ride them around, and we'd hold a Guinness World Record.

But I don't have a twin. So I'll just have to try another route.

Man, I love those personal pan pizzas. And reading.