Alphablog - K

K is for Kitten.

A few weeks ago, a coworker of mine found a kitten under her hood at work one day and she couldn't keep it. Even though I'm allergic, I really couldn't stand to have it just be abandoned in a parking lot, so I took it home until I could find a better home for it. Emmy was not impressed.

 
I held onto her for a couple of days, posted photos on Facebook, and exhausted all of my friends and family but unfortunately nobody wanted her. She was really small and super pretty after I cleaned her up a bit.

I had her for two days and she was affectionate, friendly, and playful. The kitten and Emmy weren't best friends or anything, but they got along fine with each other, so I thought kitty would be fine in a home with a dog.

She didn't have any accidents in the house but I don't have a litterbox to know if she is trained - I had just been taking her into the rocks outside and waiting until she went to the bathroom. I don't have any cat stuff at all as I never intended to have one - I just bought a couple cans of food to get by for a few days. As sweet as she was, I really couldn't keep her any longer - she was getting too comfortable with us and I was very uncomfortable with my allergies, but I really didn't want to drop her off at a shelter if I could avoid it!

On the third day, I had an idea - I remembered that one of the local radio DJs here sometimes talks about how he and his wife rescue animals, so I decided to ask him on Twitter if he had any ideas for me - he asked to see a photo and when he saw how cute she was, he said he wanted her! He asked if I could meet him at his gym with the kitten so I did, and he said even if he couldn't end up keeping her, he would be happy to find her a home. So cool! We even took a photo and he out it on his Twitter.

The next day, he told the whole story on the radio and said he was going to name the kitten after me, so he kept saying things like, "Whitney is the prettiest thing I've ever seen", and my friends were messaging me saying how weird/funny it was! It was a pretty cool experience and just goes to show you than no harm can come from asking, even if you think it's farfetched!

The best part of this whole thing, though, had to be when we came home sans kitten. Emmy had been on high alert for 3 days and once she realized the kitten was gone, she finally allowed herself to really sleep, and she was paaaaassed out.

Can't beat that cuteness! The kitten was pretty cute, but she's no Emmy.

Alphablog - J

J is for Jack Dawson.

Titanic is in my Top 5 favorite movies, which people somehow thing is comical, but I never understand why. I guess everyone forgets that the movie won ELEVEN Academy Awards. Eleven!! Writing an entire post about all the things I love about the movie, however, would take far too long. Somewhere a little over three hours. *wink*

So let's just stick to good old JD, shall we?

First, Jack and Fabrizio win their tickets to board the ship in a hand of poker that Jack dominates. Good job, Jack.

“We are the luckiest sons of bitches in the world, you know that?”

Soon after boarding, he sees the beautiful Rose and is so enamored by her that even when his friend waves his hand in front of Jack's face, his gaze is not broken.

Soon thereafter, he happens to see that lovely girl have a meltdown on the back of the ship, and he saves her life. If she jumps into the ocean, then he will jump into the ocean. Because he is Jack-goddamn-Dawson and he will save the life of someone he just met just because he is a nice guy. Since he saves her life, he gets to join her and her family and their friends for a First Class dinner, and he shines up "like a new penny", as Molly Brown so lovingly puts it.

Even though Rose's mother is a total bitch, Jack still manages to woo the shit out of everyone else at dinner with the wise words that only a vagabond could utter sincerely.

And oh yeah, he looks damn adorable while breaking barriers.

 After dinner, Jack tells Rose to meet him, because he wants to take her to a real party - and take her to a real party, he does.

Despite the amazing time he shows her, Rose gets scared and tries to run away from him even though he is clearly the love of her life, but Jack doesn't give up on her.


“I’m not an idiot. I know how the world works. I’ve got ten bucks in my pocket, I have nothing to offer you and I know that. I understand. But I’m too involved now. You jump, I jump, remember?” 

She realizes the error of her ways (obviously. Because Jack is beautiful.) and goes back to him. They share an iconic sunset kiss and then go to Rose's parlor, which she assures him is "quite proper" - and then, suddenly, it is not proper at all because he is drawing her nude! No worries though, Jack is a classy fellow and remains very respectful.

Oh yeah, have we not mentioned yet that Jack is a fabulous artist? Let's mention that. JACK IS A FABULOUS ARTIST. Ten more points for you, Jack Dawson.

After the ship starts sinking and Jack is locked up for a crime he did not commit, he still manages to be funny and charming.

And then there's that little, hotly debated scene where Jack lets Rose stay on the door floating in the middle of the freezing ocean after the ship sinks, but he's willing to make that sacrifice because he just loves her that much and wants her to live a full and happy life.


“Listen, Rose. You’re gonna get out of here, you’re gonna go on and you’re gonna make lots of babies, and you’re gonna watch them grow. You’re gonna die an old… old lady warm in her bed. Not here. Not this night. Not like this, do you understand me?”

And she does. And after all of those years, after a long, full, presumably happy life, Rose finally gets back to her one, her Jack.

Close, Rose, but not quite. He exists in your memory, and my heart. MY HEART, ROSE.

Alphablog - I

I is for Indians (of the Cleveland variety).

I became a fan of the Cleveland Indians by association. My grandfather was from Ohio originally, but moved to Arizona to help manage his emphysema. Despite the move, Grandpa John was a huge fan of them up until the day he died. To this day when I picture him, I imagine him wearing his original Indians windbreaker - he wore that thing year-round over his blue and grey henley t-shirts.

I always kind of semi-rooted for the Indians because of him, and then when Clinton and I actually went to Cleveland a few years ago to see a game, we had an experience that made me a life-long Indians fan.

Before we left, I asked my step-mom if I could borrow Grandpa John's jacket so he could "come with us" to the game. I kept the jacket on my person at all times - I did not dare pack it in a checked bag, but made sure to have it in my carry-on. When we got to the stadium, we walked around to check things out like we usually do, and they had a statue and a big mural for Bob Feller, a hometown hero (Check out this link for a good article on Bob Feller). It was a cloudy day, and as I walked around the statue a bit of sun burst through the clouds down to an old man sitting on the ground near the mural. I don't know if he was homeless or if he was maybe just waiting for the game, and I don't know how to explain this, but I just knew it was Grandpa John letting me know that he was there.

Eventually we made our way into the game - I laid the jacket down over the seat and bought Grandpa his own Pepsi to set down next to it.

I just know he was there, I could feel him watching the game with us. It was awesome. Sadly, the game ended up getting rained out! There was a rain delay at first, and it seemed like they would continue to play, and I still felt Grandpa John lingering - but once they officially called it, I immediately felt a change and knew he had gone back up. "Thanks for the Pepsi honey, I'm out of here!"

Ever since then, I've just known that they are my team and always will be. When we went home I told my step-mom all about our experience and about a year later she ended up giving me that jacket. It hangs in my closet now and only comes out when I go to games, on the anniversary of his passing, and if we're watching a game on TV I'll throw it over a chair so he can come watch with us if he wants to - but he's got a pretty good view anyway - better than the one from my living room, I'm sure.

Clinton and I at a spring training game here in AZ a couple years ago - and check out that beard!

My custom jersey.

Every year on December 23rd I take the jacket out and put it on for a few minutes and talk to my Grandpa John. It's been several years since he left us, but every time I put it on I can smell him and see him lounging outside in the sun, or standing with his sweatpant-clad tush next to the open oven - my eternally cold, pepsi-drinking, JAG-watching, don't-try-to-fool-him-because-he-can-see-right-through-you-and-will-love-you-regardless grandad.

Alphablog – H

H is for Halloween.

The original plan for Halloween this year was for Clinton and I to go over to my sister Beth’s house to hang out with her, her husband and kids, and whatever other family decided to come over. I was pretty excited to see all the kids’ costumes, walk door-to-door with them, and hand out some candy of our own. They talked about everyone dressing up as clowns, so Clinton and I considered dressing up as well.

Unfortunately, I was basically forced to cancel my plans when I was told I would have to change my shift that day to cover for someone else. I wasn’t a happy camper, but what can you really do, right? I told Clinton he should still go, and send me photos of everyone so I could live vicariously through him.

Beth hung back at home to hand out candy while her husband Garrett and Clinton, plus my other sister Jacque and her guy Nate walked around with the kids. One of my nieces was a super scary clown! The picture freaked me out for sure! The party consisted of a tiny cowboy (with fringe on his chaps!), a punk rock princess, a geisha (Maybe? I am just guessing), a racecar driver, 3 clowns, Jason, and a St. Pauli girl.

 

 

Even Emmy got into the holiday spirit.

 

I really wish I had been there to witness this next bit – Clinton told me that Emmy was walking around with the group to the different houses and at one point, one of my nieces was carrying her – when she put her down, Emmy just sauntered right on into someone’s house when they opened the door! He said that you could hear people laughing inside, and the girl had to step away for a moment to go grab her. It’s obviously the sort of thing that you apologize for, but still really funny!

I got off work at 8p so I was able to stop by for the last little part of the night and see everyone’s costumes in person, but it was a school night so things had pretty much already wound down and we didn’t stay for long. I’m glad I got to see everyone, even if it wasn’t for the whole night.

As for me, I haven’t dressed up for Halloween in probably 10 years, but that will probably change when we have kids of our own. For now, I’ll just look back on the costumes I wore as a kid, like the year my brother and I were Aladdin and Jasmine, or the year I was a hula dancer, he was a (miserable) Dalmatian, and my step-dad was a bum with a cardboard sign that said “Will work for candy.” I’d show you some pictures if I had any, but all I’ve got handy is this one of my brother and I as kids with some Halloween treat bags my dad’s friend put together for us.

 

What do you like to do for Halloween? Do you dress up every year in different costumes? Go to haunted houses or fear farms? Hand out candy? Buy a whole bunch of candy on clearance November 1^st?

Alphablog - G

G is for Gertrude's.

Clinton's mom had her birthday last month and we decided to take her to the Desert Botanical Garden for dinner at Gertrude's, and then walk the trails.

We picked Debbie up and headed over to make our 5pm dinner reservation, not taking into account the traffic in that part of town - oops! It was okay though, when we got there it turned out we really didn't even need a reservation as there was only one other table filled. Not that surprising, I guess, considering it was a week night. We ordered drinks and an appetizer (Poblano & Garbanzo Hummus | House Pickle Vegetable + Cotija + Crackers + Olive Oil + Herbs) and while we were waiting for that, I walked over to the main entrance of the Garden to get our tickets for after dinner so we could just go straight into the exhibits.

While heading over there I noticed that the tables all had different little centerpieces of succulents in all kinds of different (and what looked to be hand-spun) pottery - little pots, mugs, shallow bowls, etc. They also had tealight candles in little wooden holders. I wish I had though to take a photo or two but I didn't.

Unfortunately, I was also unable to take any photos of our food because we chose to eat outside and it got dark pretty quickly. There was a candle in the middle of the table, but it only provided a very small bit of light - which actually leads me into a funny thing that happened.

We ordered our food and by the time it came out, it was completely dark outside so while we could see what we were eating, we couldn't really see it in detail.

Debbie ordered:
Beets
Garden Beets + Seasonal Lettuces + Crow’s Dairy Chevre + Maple-Sherry Vinaigrette + Hazelnuts
3 Napkin Smoked Sow
Smoked Pork + Az. Cheese Co. Jack + Cilantro + Pickled Apple + Pickled Onion + Red Chile Jus + Ciabatta

I ordered:
Natural Chicken
Natural Breast + Brussel Sprouts + Potato Puree + Natural Jus

Clinton ordered:
Red Chile Short Rib
Crow’s Dairy Goat Sour Cream + Fingerlings + Mango + Pickled Red Onion

Everything is fresh, organic, and local if possible, and it was all really good. The funny thing that happened was that while we were all asking if the others wanted to taste, Clinton told his mom he was going to give her a bite of potato, and said that it tasted kind of weird. I looked at his plate and realized that the fingerling potatoes were dark, and what he thought was potato was actually slices of mango! HA! We all got a pretty good laugh out of that because, yeah, that would be a pretty weird tasting "potato"!

Debbie loved her beet salad, and I loved everything on my plate - I usually go for something a bit more adventurous, but that plate of comfort food just sounded really good to me, and it did not disappoint. Clinton enjoyed his as well, but was disappointed when he realized that it had goat sour cream - he hadn't noticed that on the menu, and he hates goat's milk. It wasn't too bad, though, he just scraped it off.

We declined dessert since we intended to get gelato later that evening on the way home, and then we headed over to walk the Garden. When we got there, however, we were dismayed to find that there was next to no lighting! We were pretty surprised by this since they are open until 9pm, we just assumed that the trails would be lit. It also seemed strange to me that the girl wouldn't have mentioned that when I bought my tickets at dusk and mentioned we'd be going straight in after dinner. Oh well. We were able to get a refund when we decided it was too dark and dangerous to attempt the trails, so we just looked around the gift shop and then went to get gelato instead.

We will definitely be going back to the DBG this month, though, because there is a new Chihuly exhibit being installed. We all saw it when he was there back in 2009 and are excited to see what new pieces will be shown. I'll be sure to update with pictures after that trip!

Alphablog - F

F is for Fall.

It's Autumn now, and I love it. The best thing about living in Arizona is that this season lasts longer here than anywhere else. That means more sweater weather, more hikes to see the changing leaves, more time to be able to spend outdoors and comfortably enjoy the weather than, say, somewhere where it starts snowing on November 1st.

Fall is the beginning of the Holiday Season, which is always a fun way to round out the year. Fall now includes my wedding anniversary - as if I needed any more reasons for this season to be my favorite.

As soon as October hit, I moved my blue table settings and added a new centerpiece and grabbed an orange and green bouquet from the store.

Time to see cute kids in Halloween costumes, get stocked up and menu planned for Thanksgiving, start buying Christmas presents, and get ready for the rest of the year to flash by in a blur!

ps - I hate pumpkin spice anything, and I think I might be the only person in the world! No worries - peppermint season is near, and that's my favorite time of year!

Alphablog - E

E is for Emmy.

Aka: Em, Emmster, puppy, little tiny stinky, etc. (And yes, she answers to all of those.)

Emmy is our puppy who is a dog and not a puppy, but who I will call puppy for the rest of her life. She has a total puppy face and I don't see it changing anytime soon!

Clinton and I adopted her 3 years ago, in October 2010 from MCACC. It's true when they say that you don't choose the dog, the dog chooses you. I wanted a medium-sized dog, and I have never ever liked itty bitty dogs, but Emmy is 10 lbs soaking wet. We went and looked around and thought she was super cute, and we played with her a little bit in the bonding room. Clinton was in love, but I wasn't actually totally sold because I wanted something bigger, so we decided to sleep on it. When we went back the next day, there was another family at her kennel trying to get her attention, but she was hiding at the back and wouldn't acknowledge them. As soon as they left and we walked up, she came up to the front and stood up and whined, licking our hands through the gate - and that was it for us. She picked us!

Our vet thinks she is a Chiweenie, which is a chihuahua dachshund mix. She has skinny, long legs and big eyes like a chihuahua, but she definitely has the doxie coloring floppy ears, and we love her endlessly. She was guessed to be 1 when we got her, and we just celebrated her 4th "birthday".

Emmy is a complete and total lovebug. All she ever wants to do is cuddle, seriously. When she's not cuddling, she plays with toys (plushies only, she'll refuse anything else), likes going for walks or to the dog park, finding a sliver of sun to lay in, or trying to sneak into the kitchen or our bed even though she's not allowed either of those places. We love to hike and despite her tiny stature, she rocks it out with us no matter how far we go - and then spends the entirety of the next day sleeping. We don't have kids, so she's pretty spoiled, but she's a good dog.

We love her. <3

Alphablog - D

D is for Double Date Night

On Saturday the 19th we met up with some friends for a double date night. A few months ago Clinton's best friend Robert asked if we would want to meet up with him and his fiance Ashley to go see a comedy show. The comedian was Anthony Jeselnik who is not really my speed (offensive comedy), so I was definitely more in for the social aspect of the evening.

We decided to meet for dinner first and Clinton and I were in charge of picking where. Clinton thought a steakhouse would be a good choice since the other half of our part is sort of picky. He picked the steakhouse at Rawhide since it happened to be very near the venue. I sort of tried to warn him that the place wasn't exactly known for fine cuisine - it's an old western town with saloons and shootouts and stuff and it's more about the novelty than anything else, kind of like the Renaissance Festival. We went anyway and, well... it was a little bit of a disaster, ha! The food was pretty blah - frozen garlic bread, rubbery/inedible corn on the cop, and Clinton's steak was the most undercooked steak in the history of undercooked steaks - and then the service wasn't good, either. This all sounds like we had a pretty irritating time but honestly, it's the company that counts and we were all laughing and having a fun time, so whatever! It was the first time I had met Ashley so it was good that we finally all got a chance to hang out.

After we ate, we headed over to the venue where the show was, grabbed some drinks, and settled in for some laughs. I liked the opening act - I think her name was Cameron something? She was pretty funny and interacted with the crowd a lot, which was cool. After that, Jeselnik came on and did his show, and it was kind of what I expected - it wasn't my cup of tea, but I didn't have a miserable time or anything - but the guys were cracking up, so that was kinda funny to watch. After the show we all stood around in the parking lot shooting the breeze and joking around for another hour or so, before I had to bow out since I was the only one who had to work the next morning.

Despite the comical dining experience and the not so comical comic, I still had a great night, and I'm really glad we went.

Alphablog - C

C is for Concert.

An AFI concert, to be exact. It was easily one of the best shows I've ever been to, and I've been to some pretty good shows if I do say so myself.

Clinton is a huge AFI fan. He is the reason I started listening to them back in 2004 - I was totally just trying to be cool when he said I should listen to them like "oh yeah, totally, they sound great!", coming from the girl who, at the time, listened to almost exclusively soft pop rock (think Snow Patrol, The Killers, Keane, etc). Clinton has pretty diverse taste in music, however, and has opened my eyes to more than one band but by far, his biggest success with me (and perhaps most surprising) has been AFI. I'm definitely not on the same level of fandom as he is, but they are for sure one of my favorite bands now.

They started releasing sort of creepy black and white video snippets and photos over the past few months on social media to get people talking, and then it was announced that their new album, Burials, was to be released on October 22nd. Excited is an understatement. Excited probably works to describe my feelings on this news, but I don't think that my husband has looked forward to something so much in... well, possibly ever. So when I found out that they would be coming through Arizona, I decided to snatch up a couple tickets the second they went available for pre-sale.

The concert was on Sunday, October 20th and the album release buzz coming from everyone at the venue waiting for the show was almost palpable. We stood in line with the rest of the crowd for the sold-out show just itching to get inside. There was even a tiny child there who we got a kick out of. I mean, the kid was probably only about 6 years old so whether or not he should have been there was pretty questionable, but he looked pretty cool in his little patch-covered, punky denim vest.

We got in and milled about for a bit until the first opening act came on. The openers were The Coming and Touche Amore - a lot of people there knew all of the Touche Amore songs, but neither of us had ever heard of them. Marquee Theatre is standing room only and your spot is dependent on how early you get there, how packed the show is, and how aggressive you are. Considering we got there at a decent time, the fact that it was a sold out show, and how completely unaggressive I am in public, we still managed to be standing in a pretty decent spot, about 30 feet back from center stage. A circle pit formed to the left of us, but not near enough to bother us. The closer it got to the main show though, the more people started crowding in and packing tight to get closer to the stage. We decided to move back so that we could see better (Clinton said he wanted to "take it all in") and not be crushed. We wound up almost smack dab in the middle of the place which worked out great. Another circle pit (tangent: I do NOT get moshing. At all. It is dangerous and seems painful and you miss the show?? Why do people do this??) formed right in front of us w/ about 2 people in between, but the security at the show was super on top of things and stayed right there the whole show, holding the perimeter so it didn't get out of hand. It was actually pretty perfect for us because there was an opening that we ended up being able to see right past. Serendipity is not just a John Cusak movie, my friends.

AFI came out, and the place trembled with excitement. Clinton yelled so loud I thought he was going to burst a blood vessel. Davey Havok greeted the crowd, and thanked the openers.The air was electri, and suddenly, the opening chords of The Leaving Song Pt. II ripped through the air and the crowd burst to life.

Don't waste your touch, you won't feel anything
Or were you sent to save me?

A few songs in they played their first single from the Burials, I Hope You Suffer.
EVERY person there sang it, which just goes to show how desperate the fan base has been for new material. It was awesome.

Seriously, every single thing about the show was spectacular. They sounded amazing. It is the absolute worst when you go to a show and it sounds nothing like the record, or they use a backup track the entire time - the whole band was spot on but seriously, I've got to give it to Davey - that dude can sing his damn face off while jumping and dancing all over the whole place. Maybe there's something to being a straight edge vegan...

I got a little sad at one point in the concert when they played The Leaving Song because I had a really terrible time for a few months in 2005 and listened to that album a lot, particularly that song - and even though none of that stuff is an issue anymore, hearing that song just brought me back to the way that I used to feel. That's the awesome thing about music though, it's so powerful - you may not want to remember those things but it's a visceral reaction. I'm not complaining because it happens on the opposite end where I hear songs that make me unreasonably happy as well.

That small bit aside, I had a fantastic time. The crowd was rowdy but we were in a good spot, the band sounded stunning, the setlist was really perfect (no stuff nobody has ever heard), my darling husband was insanely happy (He said it was the the second best day of his life), they gave us two encores, and we got to witness Davey prove his Total Fucking Rockstar status when he STOOD on the crowd and sang his beautiful heart out.

It was a show totally worth staying out past midnight for on a Sunday night - I wouldn't change a single thing.

Alphablog - B

B is for Bones.

Bones is one of my favorite tv shows. When we first started watching it I was not a huge fan - I thought it was cheesy. The truth is, it is cheesy, but that is part of the charm. You really grow to love the characters and this week, one of America's favorite tv couples finally tied the knot, and it was perfect.

I just wanted to keep a reminder of it here in my little corner of the internet.