Why I LOVE Portland

Today has reinforced to me why I love Portland so much. Here is my list from today:

1. It is beautiful and green (especially right now when all of the trees and flowers are starting to bloom).

2. Portlanders do nice things- I saw a guy (who wasn't homeless or trying to just collect cans for money) walking down the sidewalk and picking up trash. A lady stopped and tried to give him money thinking he was homeless, but he said, "No, ma'am. I'm just trying to do my part". An aside- he definitely didn't look homeless either, so I'm not sure why that lady did that, but oh well.

3. Portlanders are unique- many examples of this today, but driving down Burnside today I saw the following unique styles: a.) Lady with bright lime green rain boots on, yellow thigh high socks with bees on them, cut-off jean shorts, a cable-knit cardigan and ear warmers. (she wasn't homeless either) b.) A man with silk pajamas and slippers walking to Starbucks c.) A guy wearing all bright neon spandex ALL OVER. BRIGHT.

4. The Zupans guys are nice- went in to buy a sandwich for lunch and the deli guys were super nice (as always) and never more happy to make a sandwich for someone.

5. When the lights turn red, people stop. Believe me, in other states this is not the case. It's nice to not have to worry more about the others driving around me as much.

6. Things are open LATE here. I'm a night owl. If I could, I would stay up until 2 or 3 and not have to go to work until 12 or 1pm. But mostly I stay up and find things to do anyway.

There are many more but I also wanted to share a couple of funny and cute stories from today. First as I was driving to Zupans to get my sandwich a guy pulled up next to me to turn right at the stop light. We were patiently waiting for the light to change and I looked over at him inadvertently because he was in my line of sight for pedestrians. I saw no pedestrians, but I did see him picking his nose, and pretty hard core. I understand that sometimes you have an itchy nose and need to fix that problem, but this guys was really going at it. He then looked straight at me and caught me watching him. What did he do next? Wave. That's right... he waved his boogery hand at me. And smiled. I smile back and the light turned green so I took off and started laughing pretty hard.

Second, I stopped at Ben & Jerry's after the sandwich to get a delicious Strawberry Kiwi fruit smoothie. These high school kids walked in just in front of me. The boy was a little twitchy and nervous, so I was assuming that they must be on a date or something. The girl was wearing a pretty cute linen dress and some awesome goddess-y sandals, totally a date outfit. Anyway, so they went to order and the girl ordered a single scoop of ice cream in a cup and they guy ordered something (who knows, I was trying to decide on a smoothie flavor). Anyhow, so the girl got her order and the lady behind the counter handed her a spoon and napkin. The girl started picking at her ice cream while waiting for the boy to get his. She took the spoon out of the napkin and then noticed that there was something written on the napkin- and it wasn't a Ben & Jerry's logo. The napkin said "Will You Go to Prom with Me?".
She said,"Did you write that?" to the boy.

The boy blushed, "Yes".

"Of Course I'll go to Prom with you! That was totally sweet!"

A moment of silence as the boy rejoiced silently and the girl grabbed the napkin and put it in her purse.

"How did you get that set up? She handed me the napkin?" the girl asked the boy. "That was smooth."

"Oh, he was totally smooth," said the Ben & Jerry's lady. Clearly the boy had come in earlier and set this up.

FREAKING ADORABLE. How cute was that?

Anyway, I like this place.

UTAH... without pictures

So I went to Utah last week and got back last night. Sure, I brought my camera, but did I take any pictures? No. Why? Because I was too busy to remember. Then on my drive home yesterday I looked over and saw my sad little camera still in the case on the passenger seat. Not that there weren't wonderful beautiful things to take pictures of, especially on Sunday when the weather was "absolutely premium"... but you know how it goes. Oh well.

I drove, by myself, to Utah on Wednesday which took WAY too long because it decided to snow in the Blue Mountains so the trucks and such had to stop and chain up and we had to climb the passes going a "safe" speed. And by safe I mean UNBEARABLY SLOW. So instead of the 11 or so hours it should have taken it took more like 14. Awesome. But once I got part way into Idaho it was clear and easy the rest of the way. Except when I almost peed my pants.

Did anyone know that there are about a million off ramps between Burley, Idaho and Tremonton, Utah... but NOT ONE of them has any services (ie: Gas Stations, Restaurants, BATHROOMS). In order to keep myself motivated to drive I kept a full supply of cold water and Vitamin Energy water with me... bad idea. So while I was out in the middle of nowhere I found that I really needed to go... badly. I had to wiggle in my seat until I FINALLY found a rest stop with a ladies room a couple miles outside of Tremonton. I sprinted to the bathroom and barely made it in. There was a nice family that had stopped to stretch their legs and I had flown into the parking lot and seriously flung myself as fast as I could out of my car and didn't even bother to take anything with me or lock my car up. They just stared at me, mouths open as they stood around their car. I didn't care. I probably looked a right mess from driving all day as well.

Anyway, so we ate at The Pie in Salt Lake Wednesday night; I had the Greek pizza and it was a dream. Thursday I went to the Salt Lake Temple and then around town shopping (like I need to do more shopping). Friday I went shopping some more and drove up to Park City with Katrina, who happens to be one of the funniest people ever. Side Note: Katrina should move to Portland, it just makes sense. After our hilarious trek up the canyon, we came back down and I watched Slumdog Millionaire at the boys' house. Saturday we went to the afternoon session of conference which was amazing, but parking was a nightmare and it rained/sleeted/snowed on us. More shopping ensued and I went out to dinner with Dani and had some delicious onion rings at Goodwood. We then came home and watched a fabulous movie of which I will not name for Dani's sake (because she might die if someone we know read this and made fun of her for it). All I'll say is that it was a new movie that I happened to see twice in theaters and have just happened to read the series 3 times.

Sunday was a regular Sunday. We watched conference from home and napped all day until evening when I napped and watched Food Network until bedtime. Monday morning I got up and drove home. The weather was fabulous and it was an enjoyable but LONG drive. I did NOT almost pee my pants on the way home, thankfully.

I do feel bad for not having taken one single picture of anything in Utah or during my drives. Oh well, that just gives me a reason to go back!

Beware the Produce Aisle!

As usual this morning I had the news on as I was getting dressed and doing my hair/make-up. I always have the news on so I know where the traffic spots are going to be and just generally what's happening in the world. This morning I heard and truly horrific story about a deadly spider found in a Whole Foods Market in Oklahoma.

I guess this HUGE Brazilian Wandering Spider was found wandering in the bananas. A store clerk caught it in a plastic deli container and they called the local university to see if someone could come and identify it. See below...

YUCK! If I saw this in my grocery store I would have a heart attack right there! Apparently the Brazilian Wandering Spider is poisonous an it's venom will kill you if left untreated IMMEDIATELY... (as in, you better get bitten at the hospital or else) which then reminded me of another story I heard a few weeks back about another produce loving spider.

Everyone loves Costco... heck, I'm the biggest supporter of it and go there a few times a week. BUT ever since I heard this story I steer clear of the grapes:

A lady bought a pack of red seedless grapes from Costco (the kind that comes in that huge plastic container with holes in it). When she got home she wanted to wash the grapes before putting them away, so she dumped the container of grapes into the sink to rinse them off. To her surprise this is what greeted her...

A BLACK WIDOW SPIDER! GOODNESS GRACIOUS! The lady luckily wasn't bitten, and was able to capture the spider in a jar and called someone from a vet clinic that referred her to an insect expert at the university in that city.

I don't know about you but I have a serious case of the heebie-jeebies and I don't even want to touch produce, nevertheless go near the produce aisles. I was already avoiding grapes, and now I must avoid bananas?! I know I don't have to avoid them, but I don't want to come across ANY spider.

Everybody Knows...

...it sucks to grow up, but I can honestly say that I'm not having a crisis about my birthday like I did last year. I feel more at peace with the big "2-4" for some odd reason. Who knows why. Maybe it's because I'm keeping myself occupied with new adventures, or maybe it's because I realize that my time lines don't matter so much anymore.

On a related note (food adventures)- vegetarian food is spicy... and I like it. It seems the more and more I'm diving into eating this way, the more I find that you need to keep it interesting and varied. I also like that a lot of ethnic foods are vegetarian so I don't have to think of replacements for part of my meal. New food adventure for the week: Quinoa (pronounced keen- wah). I've eaten it before and not thought much of it, but I realized how versatile it was this week when I made some plain and stored it for a quick filler in dinners. It's a great alternative to rice or cous cous in a dish, and is VERY healthy for you. I guess it's not a taste that pleases every palate (my sister absolutely hates it), but I tend to find that it takes on whatever flavors you pair it with, despite it's inherent nutty flavor. I've been putting an olive oil/balsamic vinegar and veggie (think cucumbers, tomatoes, garlic and some Italian herbs) mixture over it... a little greek-ish almost. Also, I was reading an article about it today and technically Quinoa is an herb. There's your fun fact for the day!

Ok, so back to birthday stuff. My 23rd year definitely wasn't my favorite so far... there were some ominous signs that I should heeded but instead I plowed on through, which is ok too. I learned some things I needed to learn. It wasn't all bad, though. I made some wonderful friends and got to experience some firsts (ie: Foo Fighters concert, Weezer concert, taking Ballet as an adult, traveling alone multiple times to strange places (Boise, etc), going to professional ballet performances that weren't The Nutcracker or Swan Lake, it goes on).

So here's to 24! May it be full of fun, love and laughter and hopefully no lessons will have to be repeated.

(Go ahead and say it, I'm getting old)

Happy Birthday!

I took my sister to Kathy Griffin last night and it was AWESOME. Not only is she hilarious, but the crowd she draws is pretty hilarious too. Not to mention we had AMAZING seats. Seriously 4 rows from the front and a little to the side so there was nothing blocking our view.

Part of our fun for the evening was people watching as we waited for the show to start. Another part of our fun was being on camera a BUNCH. They taped the two shows Kathy did last night for an upcoming Bravo special, and being on the edge of the aisle and close to the front meant that we pretty much had our very own camera man. I know they'll edit it and we may not even end up on tv, but I'll have to watch the special when it comes out to see!

Oh yeah, and we got to dress up all cute and wear cute shoes... so the night was complete.

Going to that show was the best birthday present I've gotten so far. Yay for 24!

I'm Going to Try It...

(Photo Courtesy of VegSource.com)

My sister has bounced between being vegetarian, vegan, and none of the above a couple of times. It seems like it's hard work and requires some planning in order to not eat the same thing every day (out of convenience and lack of suitable food). After talking with her about it last night, I decided it would be interesting to try and, if nothing else, would be a healthy change. Starting last night was already out of the question since I had eaten a chicken sandwich for lunch; oh well.


It seems like breakfast will be cake since I eat oatmeal, a piece of fruit and caffeine free herbal tea most every morning without exception. Lunch will probably prove harder and more time consuming as I rarely pack my lunch since I tend to run a bit on the late side in the morning. Subway is my usual lunch fare, however it changes depending on the weather and upon whether I feel like driving to a close town that offers more than Subway, McDonald's or Jack in the Box (limited choices when you don't work downtown). More planning will have to be involved for a sucessful lunch. Dinner for me is usually something quick since I'm usually starving by then... I like salad with grilled chicken breast or I throw a thin steak or fish on the grill and steam some veggies. Looks like my first stop on the way home tonight will be the grocery store for some animal protein alternatives!


Some websites that are helpful in my new endeavor are:




1. www.vegsource.com

2. www.chooseveg.com


They've got some great ideas for how to have a balanced diet sans beef, chicken, pork, etc. I'll keep you all updated on how this vegetarian trial is going. Who knows, maybe I'll love it and stick to it... or maybe I'll just walk away adopting some healthier habits. Either way, I think it's worth the extra effort.

Early Birthday Gift

I'm just so excited, I couldn't wait to share:

I got an early birthday present yesterday and it's two tickets to Kathy Griffin's live performance this week at the Schnitz. I CANNOT HANDLE IT. She may be a bit dramatic and lewd, but I absolutely love her and I cannot wait to experience the insanity. Kathy is one funny lady. It would be even better if I got to meet her. We'll see how it goes.