My Love For Puppies Is Unmeasureable

Meet the newest member of the Phamily: Delilah Jones.

She is 8 weeks old and a faun-colored fun-loving Pitbull. She went on her first walk this morning and wanted to explore and sniff all her new surroundings. I'm officially her Aunt but that just means I'll get to spoil her more than anyone. This is only our first photo together, so rest assured there will be many more puppy pictures and cute stories to come, seeing as how she's stealin' hearts just like her predecessor, top-dog Kaia Goldman.

Happy BEARTHday Mother Nature!

It's Earth Day! And I love the Earth! So to celebrate, Boone and I started making plans to see the new DisneyNature documentary, Earth.  

BUT, it turns out that Disney's Earth is really just footage from BBC's Planet Earth cut down to 99 minutes for cinematic release on Earth Day. Seeing as how I own BBC's Planet Earth on DVD already, it looks like we won't be paying $10.50 to hear someone other than David Attenborough narrate. 

It doesn't mean I love you any less, Earth. 

On The Up and Up!

I'm not sure if that's the correct phrase, but whatever.  I've had a couple of (random) dollar-creating opportunities these days.  Like the day I spent on the 56th floor of the Prudential Building downtown, overlooking Millennium Park and everything around it! Gorgeous! If I could figure out how to upload pictures from my lame camera phone, I'd put one up!  

It wasn't such a bad gig because I got unlimited soda and an hour lunch to bask in the sunshine.  I would totally answer the phone a few times for free soda. I LOVE soda.  I think it has something to do with my childhood soda deprivation.  I had so much caffeine, I don't think I fell asleep until well after 2 AM. 

I visited a dear friend at her office downtown recently as well, to discuss the lives of copy writers, and got a peek into the offices of DraftFCB.  Not only are the employees allowed to wear jeans, but some of them even bring their dogs to work! Plus they have a coffee bar that donates all proceeds to charity. I am beyond impressed! (Oh year, I also really am impressed by the work they've done as an ad agency!)

These opportunities are great for me, because I'm saving up for my Summer Camp Festival ticket, which isn't too cheap, and quickly approaching! It goes down May 22-24. 

Finally, I want to mention the AWESOME cover band I saw Saturday night at Fifth Avenue in Royal Oak, MI. I ventured home for my darling girlfriend Erin's birthday. Anyways, this particular Saturday featured 80's Inc., which originally, someone insisted was 80's techno. It wasn't.  

It was a GREAT 80's cover band.  Their outfits alone did it for me.  One guy wore a red nylon jumpsuit, another the most colorful vest I've ever seen.  At least 4 people commented on it to me, alone.  AND they had a costume change during set-break where all five members donned mullet or metal wigs.  I love the 80's and I can't deny it. They started out with a little Duran Duran, went into some Journey and finished with a banging bit of Whitesnake.  AND they had a Keytar!!! The 80's deserve so many exclamation points. 

The catch was- the dance floor was broken, so dancing wasn't allowed.  Seriously, if you jumped up and down, or even just danced aggressively, you could feel the floor sinking beneath your feet.  It was pretty intense. A few friends chose not to dance only because they feared for their safety. Security was also on hand to calm down people as things began to heat up- for the floors sake.  

The night was an overall great reunion of old friends and I can't not put in a birthday shout-out to Erin.

Meat Freeaster

Due to recent economic times and other important factors I've decided to try and eat more healthy.  What does this actually mean?  Well, for starters, it means less frozen pizza, and more actual nutrients. It doesn't mean I'm giving up cheeseburgers, or even cheese fries, but I have started buying things at the grocery store, instead of just from Philly's Best, Chicago's or Wal-greens.  Basically, I'm sick of sucking down chemicals and clogging my arteries. 

And this isn't too hard with support from my resident raw eater and roommate, Chris!  Friday we spent the day preparing a raw dinner with some great ingredients from Whole Foods.  We made a raw lasagna made of zucchini, squash, tomatoes and several types of pesto and pine-nut almost-ricotta.  It was delicious.  The raw chocolate pudding made of fresh coconut meat was not-so-delicious as only a Vita-mix  can blend as smoothly as probably needed.  Some things just shouldn't be raw. At any rate, the veggies were fresh, delicious and packed with nutrients.  Yum. The recipes for both dishes can be found in the book Raw Food, Real World.

Tonight, in honor of Jesus and his rising from the dead yesterday, Chris is preparing Kenmore's first Tofurkey ham-like-roast with veggies and other delicious items. Will it be as delicious as the lasagna? Or will it be eco-friendly fire?  Is soy REALLY an appropriate replacement for meat? 

In unrelated news, it's also worth mentioning that Comcast woke me up at 7:19am with four phone calls spaced 15 minutes apart to remind me of my 9am appointment with the internet installation man.  All that is in the past and I am surfing the web from all over the apartment--and no longer in the corners of Maggie and Alison's rooms.  So expect (or hope for) more frequent posts! Huzzah!

Really No Substance Here, Sorry

Warm weather was upon us today so Boone and I did some shopping.  A visit to Bed Bath & Beyond led us down Broadway and into a few cool shops along the way.  We picked up some music at Reckless Records, Boone got himself a few Dubstep CD's for less than $5 and I got two really awesome Joan Baez Vinyls for $3.  America IS on sale! One of them is a collection of Joan singing Bob Dylan songs.  Lovely!

I also wanted to report on my visit to the Chicago Canine Rescue.  Alison and I fell in love with a 2 year old pitbull boy named Bertie.  He's all black and was rescued from being starved and used as bait in dogfighting.  Terrible.  This poor guy was so friendly and loving and had the cutest saunter due to a weird turnout of his hind legs.  We had to hold ourselves back from filling out the preliminary adoption papers because neither of us are really financially (or time-commitment) ready to have a pup yet. 

The best part about the Chicago Canine Rescue is they're always looking for dogwalkers and other volunteers, so Alison and I were able to take Bertie for a walk after just meeting him.  And we can come back whenever we want.  I can't wait to spend my summer helping out and walking cute pups around Belmont & Western. 

So latley I've had a really hard time knowing what day it is.  Like Monday, I was convinced pretty much all day that it was actually Sunday.  Then on Wednesday, I thought it was Thursday until about 2pm when I was informed otherwise.  Then, in line with my thinking yesterday was Thursday, I thought today was Friday.  It's like I've somehow missed a day.  Probably Monday.  I've never really liked Monday's anyways.  

I'm glad, however, that today is actually Thursday because there are two new episodes of the Office on tonight, and the new Amy Poehler show, Parks and Recreation, starts tonight.  I've been to a few Chicago Park District meetings and I laughed pretty hard so I can only imagine how funny park district meetings will be when they are actually part of a joke.  

Emmit-Nershi Band is tomorrow at Martyrs and EOTO at the Portage Theatre is Saturday so another weekend of madness is sure to ensue. I will keep you posted. 

Greet The Puppies

Another amazing weekend of music!  Lotus played an awesome show Saturday at The Vic.  That night's version of Greet The Mind was so awesome. We raged hardcore on the balcony, which had a great view of the lights and the band.  Then, after the show, Chuck, the percussionist came by Boone's apartment!  We also dropped in at a crazy burning man party in Ukrainian Village that involved some fire spinners, a karma wash and a band dressed like farm animals.   There was so much to see, I don't think my eyes have ever been open so wide.  We eventually ended the night around 6 or 7 am with a freezing cold overcast sunrise situation on the roof. I might have been involved in the planning of that failed event. 

After a short nap, Ed and I zipped to Grand Rapids where we saw Lotus rock it again, this time at The Intersection, which is actually a really cool venue.  They have a huge bar up front then an even bigger area with a stage and a few bars.  Plus, the bathrooms were really clean!  Kudos, Intersection!  Lotus really made my night when Chuck brought Ed and I some Bell's beer and when they opened with Spiritualize, one of my favorite songs.  Plus I'm pretty sure Chuck smiled at us while he was playing (or maybe he was just drunk). 

Now, after weeks of scouring petfinder.com for adorable puppies, Alison, Peterboy and I are finally going to see some in person.  A visit to the Chicago Canine Rescue should not only warm our hearts with adorable soft puppies but also probably make us burst into tears because Kaia is millions of miles away. I will let you know how that goes. 

Holy Crap It's Been How Long?

It was like one minute I'm in Florida enjoying the sunshine and then the next I'm in a monsoon-turned-snowstorm only to be followed by the saddest times of my life when one of my best friends and the infamous lovepup departed on their journey to Portland.  It was almost surreal waking up without Kaia prancing and trotting around the hallways making the morning rounds.  

That bit aside, I'm moving! So that also makes for a slow-topia. However, the job search is on and Lotus is this weekend at the Vic. Rumored to be the biggest (and best!) show of their tour! Which is good because I've been dreaming of the disco ball from Park West for months now.  I love disco balls.  See you there!