Monthly Archives: February 2012

2012 Week 8: “you look amazing there stuck between me and the moon.”

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On Wednesday I had the second part of my root canal and on the drive home from Avondale, I saw this handmade penguin piñata in the storefront of Dulcelandia and I stopped in to check it out. This weekend my boo turned 31 and though he does love a good penguin, I couldn’t justify $20 on something we’d just smash apart. He had a nice birthday weekend anyways sans penguin.

I finally went to see Hugo and I was bummed it didn’t win Best Picture at the Oscars. I enjoyed The Artist, but Hugo was something special. Very few films these days provide that sheer sense of wonderment that Hugo did. I couldn’t stop telling Z how much I loved it after we left the theatre. It made me feel like life was full of possibilities. Also awesome this week was that Z and I saw The Promise Ring at the Metro and then The Holy Mountain at Music Box. It was a cool one-two punch for Z’s birthday! Z was not familiar with TPR, but I belted out nearly every song with the crowd and ran into friends aplenty. Hearing “make me a mixtape” and my boo having a great birthday weekend made for a nice week.

Films watched 8th week of the year:

Hugo (3D)
Bill Cunningham New York*
Beautiful Boy
The Crazies (2010)
Solitary Man
The Holy Mountain (Jodorowsky)

*documentary

Anyone who loves documentaries should see Bill Cunningham New York. Bill Cunningham totally rules. He has see so much in his life and documented most of it on film. He rides his bicycle everywhere. He’s had 27 stolen and yet he is such a happy person. He writes it off with a laugh. I have never known anyone like this in my life. This man has ethics that I am sure journalists today rarely, if ever, follow. It is fascinating to see someone completely married to his art, but at what cost?

2012 Week 7: a duck a day keeps the quacking away.

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Since I started working out with Wii Fit Plus, I’ve been craving protein like crazy. I usually would eat poultry a few times a week, but this week I had duck three times. That may sound like I’m the 1%, but in only one instance was it “fancy” duck. For V-day, Z and I went out the night before to (k)new restaurant and I had the roasted duck with porcini risotto. We attended Amanda’s birthday outing on Thursday, where I had to order the new duck and lentil dish they plopped on the menu. Saturday because Z and I were already downtown for movies at River East, we decided to try the wait at Xoco. The line was nowhere as long as it was last time, so we waited and it was completely worth the approximately half an hour wait for a table. I got the “winter market” caldos and the server/host type person who brought it to the counter we were sat at said it was his favorite thing. By golly, it was the best duck soup imaginable. The Marx Brothers would approve. Rick Bayless, you rule.

Rest in Peace, Maude

My duck eating has been balancing out some bad and sad things going on. Maude, beloved store pug of Stacy at Paper Doll, passed away this week. Tilda lost her only friend. I found this news out immediately after experiencing the worst pain I have ever experienced in my entire life, after having the beginning of a root canal done on an infected tooth. Really, Wednesday was one of the worst days imaginable. Losing a longtime friend like Maude and having such an exquisite pain in my mouth. Z said he has never heard anyone outside of a movie scream like I was over the phone. My wonderful boo met me at CVS to drive me home after I picked up the pain med I was prescribed and an antibiotic for the infection. I just could not fathom driving that last few blocks in that pain. The second part of the root canal will be done on Wednesday. Reminder: STOP EATING CANDY! Additionally, this morning Tilda somehow slipped out of her Easy Walk harness and jumped on a shih tzu. I was able to wrestle her away after about 10 seconds of biting and yelping. Thankfully, the dog was alright, but it left me terrified of this ever happening again. I carried my squirming pup home where Z put the harness back on her and we tried to figure out how she escaped and were left dumbfounded. Tilda’s middle name is Houdini. Stacy of Paper Doll recommended another brand, which we are going to buy ASAP as soon as she reminds me of the brand again.

Rhymes with Twee - print gocco inks

Isn’t organizing pretty? This also allows me to see what colors I am running low on, so I can scour the internetz for them. Today I got brackets for my shelves at Home Depot so the craft room organization will continue this week. I sent in my paperwork to reactivate my IBT number, so fingers crossed they get all that done. Now comes the fun part of doing my IL sales taxes for 2009-2011. I’ve got most of it sorted out. Now I just need to sit down and do the dirty work. Yuck.

Films watched 7th week of the year:

The Bodyguard
Soldier’s Girl
Pina (3-D)*
The Artist
Drive
Gainsbourg: A Heroic Life

*documentary

I implore anyone reading this to go see Pina in a theatre. It is a work of art that you will never see anything remotely close to in your lifetime. The rest of the films I saw this week were good, but none lived up to the hype that preceded them, except, let’s be real here: The Bodyguard.

2012 Week 6: Life is dandies.

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I made vegan rice crispy treats tonight. I used the recipe here, but I only used 3 1/2 cups of crisp rice cereal because I wanted mine extra gooey! I had bought some Dandies back at Vegan Mania in late 2011, but I hadn’t used them yet, so this was the perfect way to do so. These are definitely best when warm. Due the vegan-ness nature, they harden up pretty quickly. I am a weirdo who doesn’t eat gelatin, but does eat poultry. I miss marshmallows sometimes and Chicago Soydairy’s Dandies are absolutely spot on.

Apparently I had not been getting some important mail from the Illinois Department of Revenue forwarded to my “new” (April 2011) address and this led them to put a levy against me and they nearly garnished my wages at my day job (for $67). Just bonkers. To fight this thing, I am further organizing my craft room, especially all of my sales tax documents. One day, when it’s all done, I will post photos of the finished product. Actually, this makes me want to google and see how other crafters maintain their files. As a result of all this clean-up, I fell slightly behind on my working out. I still ate pretty healthy to balance that out. Luckily, cleaning burns calories and I’ve been doing a heck of a lot of that. Phew!

On Friday night Z and I had Eliza and Mike over and played a game that Z had gotten me for Christmas called Creatures. The game was super fun and I hope they make an expansion pack that has a hedgehog in it! All of the awesomeness that Kickstarter.com has brought into the world is astounding. Friends of my friend nickd funded their game Cards Against Humanity. This game has become a staple of nick and erin’s parties. It is a thrilling thing to see just how many sick minds are in one room, in one group of friends.

Films watched 6th week of the year:

Family Plot
Eden Lake
Tim and Eric’s Billion Dollar Movie
Conan O’Brien Can’t Stop*
One Day

*documentary

Eden Lake surpassed any expectation that I had of it. I enjoy an occasional horror film, but I wasn’t planning to watch this with Z. In the first 5 minutes, I was hooked. This put the THRILL in Thriller. Michael Fassbender and Kelly Reilly’s performances were some of the best I have ever seen. It felt so believable. It made me scour both of their IMDB profiles and I found this quote from Michael Fassbender which made me love him even more:

[on being nude in films and full frontal nudity in Shame] To be honest with you again, I think it’s the idea of male frontal nudity. It just baffles me: Women can parade around naked all the time, but the guy conveniently has his pants on. I remember my mom always complaining about that to me, saying, “This is such bullshit, it’s always the women who are naked” … so I did this one for you, Mom!

2012 Week 5: Slowly, but surely.

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Leigh preparing to Wii!

This was a good week filled with fun and friends. I still haven’t made a whole lot of progress on the craft room, but I did manage to put up shelves by myself. This was a milestone! Also, I finally found some new storage for my A2 cards at IKEA: SAMLA box with lid. Z took the above photo of me pre-Wii Fit one day. In order to better track my calories, I switched from the Lose It! app to My Fitness Pal. It has far more foods listed, so I don’t have to make up my own makeshift recipes as often. They actually have multiple variations of avocado rolls to choose from. Hooray! I wish the Wii had an option I could pick so it did not show me my BMI/weight every day. I’d rather see my weight once a week so it’s not such a constant up and down. Since we started Wii Fit-ing in early January, Z and I have lost 5 lbs., but then every few days it fluctuates back or forth.

Films watched 5th week of the year:

Alice in Wonderland (1933)
Sweetgrass*
A Woman, a Gun, and a Noodle Shop
The Men Who Stare at Goats

*documentary

Sweetgrass was really fascinating. It is a documentary about sheep herding through the mountains of Montana. It uses natural sound. No music, no narration and very little speaking at all. Definitely something we are not used to seeing these days. One of the couple times there was speaking, I learned some brand new swears. Definitely worth a viewing if you think sheep are cute. Holy sheep!