Just because… April 25, 2006 ~ 2:37 pm
Posted by Julie in : Daily Grind, Urban Family , comments closed…it’s been forever since we had some photos on here. And how many times have I talked about Jordana and Thabiso? You must be wondering what they look like. Oh, and Thabs has a birthday coming up on Thursday (which is also Freedom Day in South Africa - I think this is akin to being American and having your birthday on the 4th of July). For all those reasons: pictures of J and Thabs at the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens, sniffing lilacs:
Jordana, breathing in Spring.
Thabs, also enjoying the day.
Off to Minneapolis bright and early tomorrow (our flight leaves JFK at 8:14 AM), and I am bringing the computer as well as the camera, so if there is actual wireless internet in the hotel, we should have a documentary of my trip to Capitalist Island the Mall of America in the days to come. Along with a story about the Scientologists, which I promise I will actually write when I don’t have an entire desk full of crap to deal with before me.
Keep your fingers crossed that the Piss Crusader doesn’t go on a rampage while I’m gone and various friends are looking after him and Joe. Seriously. He does that when I’m gone for extended periods of time.
AIDS Walk April 24, 2006 ~ 10:17 pm
Posted by Julie in : Shorty , comments closedIt’s that time of year again. For the next month, I’ll be accepting donations for AIDS Walk New York via this website. If you’d like to donate and help men, women, and children living with AIDS, please click the button over on the right. If you would like to donate a smaller amount than the website allows, click my email button over on the right and I’ll email you my home address so you can mail me a check or money. Every little bit helps, so please, please, please donate. Thanks!
Kill me NOW April 24, 2006 ~ 4:56 pm
Posted by Julie in : Academic Office Monkey , comments closedI haven’t had a spare second since I got into work today, because I’m trying to put together six lists of candidates for graduation (with different requirements outstanding), all of which are due tomorrow, all of which had to be proofed today before I could do anything with them. The long and short of it? I’m juggling 2,000 names on my desk at the moment. 2,000 names that have to be taken care of by close of business tomorrow because baby, I am at the Mall of America Wednesday-Friday.
Never before have I needed a vacation so badly. Or maybe I have, but never have I had one planned at such a good time.
Unfortunately? I have no cash right now. Yep, going to the Mall of America without cash. I view it as the ultimate window-shopping trip. And I don’t even care that I have no money, because dudes? I will be AWAY.
T-minus 36 hours and counting.
Wilkommen, bienvenue, welcome April 21, 2006 ~ 12:08 pm
Posted by Julie in : About a Julz, Story Time , comments closedI’ve had Cabaret stuck in my head for the past two days, and when the review for Threepenny Opera (starring Alan Cumming, who also played the Emcee in the revivial of Caberet years ago) came out, I realized that I had never shared with the Internet the story of How Alan Cumming Introduced Me to the World of Sexual Fetishes. It’s short, but good, and will tide you all over until I write up the story of My Visit to the Scientology Center While Drunk. With TomKitten out of the womb, I figure it’s time for that story to come out as well. But first, Alan Cumming.
The summer before my senior year of college, my friends Kim and Dawn joined me on a weekend jaunt to New York City to see the play ART. Because Victor Garber was in it, dammit, and we loved Victor Garber long before he was Spy Daddy in Alias. It was our first trip to New York, and we were in awe of the big city. We stayed in a hostel in midtown, where I learned about irony (The Sound of Music was playing in a theatre right beside the Private Eyes Sports Cabaret. Side note, I still don’t understand the concept of “sports cabaret.” Were there nekkid gymnasts inside? Did someone re-enact Lady Godiva’s ride? What?), about drug dealers, and about the clubbing lifestyle (one of our roommates slept all day and clubbed all night).
None of this has anything to do with Alan Cumming, but it serves to show that we were comparative wide-eyed innocents. So when we got the chance to see Cabaret standing-room only (the cheap seats), we jumped at it. And waited afterwards to get Alan’s autograph. He had to wear heavy makeup for that show, and was notorious for taking a while to get out after the show. So an hour later, he emerges, and by this time they were turning the theatre into a club for the night. The velvet ropes were out when I asked if I could get my picture taken with him. He said sure, and stood behind the ropes while I stood in front of them. He put his arm around me, and as my friend was readying the camera, he leans in and whispers to me:
“I like these ropes. They remind me of being in a pen.”
The picture shows me smiling through gritted teeth, because as soon as the flash went off, I ducked out from under his arm, thanked him, and bolted down the street with my friends. What can I say? I was 20, and I knew absolutely nothing about s&m. Alan obviously knew this and was having a little fun with me.
In retrospect, however, having the “frolicky bisexual sex symbol for the new millennium” talk to me about pens in his Scots accent? Prety hawt. And probably a major reason for me moving the New York a year later. Thank you, Alan.
Mandatory juvenille behavior April 20, 2006 ~ 4:20 pm
Posted by Julie in : Shorty , comments closedIt’s 4:20 on 4/20. *snicker*
If you don’t get it, read this.
Do you feel good? April 20, 2006 ~ 2:45 pm
Posted by Julie in : Shorty , comments closedSomething that I’m sure will make only Vince smile, besides myself of course:
My local classic rock station just played “Death On Two Legs” from Queen’s A Night at the Opera album. This is the third Queen song they’ve played today, and by far the most obscure.
I think it’s obvious, but I heart this station.
Things that are annoying April 20, 2006 ~ 9:05 am
Posted by Julie in : Academic Office Monkey, Daily Grind, Politically Incorrect , comments closedIf I was playing Pyramid (that annoying gameshow leftover from the ’70s), these would be the clues I would give today:
One of my co-workers, henceforth known as Timid, who asks questions she either already knows the answer to or should know the answer to, just to get a response from someone. So far today, she has asked me if she should make a copy of someone’s record to add to the ticket list. When I asked her if she had checked the ticket list we already have first, to see if that was necessary, she hadn’t. I told her if I found out she was adding people to the list that were already on it, I was going to be more than a little irritated, since she’s been through Commencement before and I already reminded her three times what the procedure is. It is going to be a long month.
Karl Rove. Sure, he’s stepped down from one position, but the asshole is still running things from the “Bat Cave.” Wherever that is.
My boss is out again today. She was out most of last week to visit her parents in Florida, and is out today for (I think) the end of Passover. I do not begrudge her either of those, but it means all the morons come out of the woodwork and want to deal with me instead. I will not feel guilty when I leave for the Mall of America next Wednesday.
It’s already 68* outside, and I am stuck inside. Pleh. Maybe all the students will go to the beach today.
People in other offices who have no clue of what I have to do telling me how to do my job, in particular telling me that I’m doing something wrong. Do I tell you how to do your job? No. I wouldn’t presume to do so. Get your nose out of my business, and trust that I’m doing it right. Because I am. And you are not the boss of me.
And now, to counterbalance all of that, a thing that is funny. Or at the very least, a really weird coincidence. Brooke Shields gave birth to her second child on the same day as Katie Holmes unleashed that crazy man’s child into the world. Let’s see who gets post-partum depression this go-round. (I’m betting on Katie, because wouldn’t that be a bitch?)
The Difference Between Men & Women, #6,038,750 April 19, 2006 ~ 9:56 am
Posted by Julie in : Coupledom, In Da Hood, Rick , comments closedThis morning, Rick related a story that his friend had told him. Said friend was in Central Park playing guitar last week, and had gathered a small crowd of cute 18 and 19 year old girls. Friend told Rick that they set off his AMS - Automatic Masturbatory Syndrome. (Okay, I’m pretty sure those weren’t the exact letters, but you get the general drift.)
Julie: Is that really what men think of when they see 18 or 19 year old girls?
Rick: For the first few seconds, yeah. You think that it would be nice for them to be all over you.
Julie: Really? Because when I look at an 18 or 19 year old boy, I think “Jesus, this is going to be awful, because he and his friends will start shouting at each other to prove how cool they are, and I’m going to have to sit on my hands so I don’t slap one of them upside the head and tell him to shut the fuck up.”
Rick: Well, it’s only for a second that men think about sex, then we remember that teenagers are annoying.
Julie: Yeah, see, I don’t even have that first second. Maybe it’s just me.
Also, it could just be me in New York City, where the teenagers behave as if they were raised by wolves and never ever ever shut up on public transportation. Because Rick and I both agreed that if we had acted like these kids do when we were growing up in Western PA, someone’s parents would have found out, and every kid in the group’s asses would have been grass. Sometimes I miss that “It takes a village” mentality. Especially when my hand is itching to slap a high schooler on the bus.
My skin, it hates me. (UPDATED) April 18, 2006 ~ 11:57 am
Posted by Julie in : Random Insanity , comments closedBecause the little tiny bump invasion wasn’t enough, today we have a new contestant in the “Drive Julie Nuts” game. A cold sore, still in the tingly stage, but forming nonetheless. Bugger.
Off to the drugstore to buy some Abreva. And some more Benadryl for the bumps. Oh, and tonight I actually get to see my boyfriend, but because my skin has it in for me, I won’t get to kiss him. Or approach any part of him with my lips. I am beginning to feel like a leper.
**Update**
Rick has informed me he has the beginnings of a cold sore as well. It’s like the old chicken or the egg riddle: Which came first and infected the other? Julie’s cold sore, or Rick’s cold sore? See, it’s exactly like that riddle: there’s no way of telling, and both options are annoying.
Irritation April 17, 2006 ~ 11:30 am
Posted by Julie in : Reviews , comments closedMy new spray-on sunscreen has given me a rash, and my work’s server crashed when I tried to post about it, thus effectively eating my post. Stupid server. For that matter, stupid work.
I spent my Easter morning watching Dogma on Comedy Central. A film that, no matter how many times you watch it, never gets old. Thank you, Kevin Smith, for casting Alan Rickman as the Metatron: “Tell a person you’re the Metatron and they stare at you blankly. Mention something out of a Charlton Heston movie and suddenly everybody’s a theology scholar.”
