On Sunday I decided to get a mani/pedi, since my nice, long nails had some not-so-nice cuticle action going on. And since they were nice and long, I figured a Frenchy manicure would look v. chic.  I went to a place that was close to the apt, Tenley Nails, since the online reviews sounded decent. OMFG, what a disaster.

I’m sitting in my chair, reading a book while the lil’ Asian chicky does her pedi-thing, when she asks me something. I have no fucking clue what she said. I don’t think it was English at all. She repeated herself and I still didn’t get it. 4 times I had her repeat what she said, but got squat. I think I heard “spa pedicure” but I have no idea. I pointed to the lil’ menu for what I wanted (not the spa pedicure) and she nodded. Then she rattled something else off. Another round of WTF. I just ended up nodding.  I don’t usually have an issue w/ accents, but there was no cracking this one. For all I know, I agreed to marry someone.

After a quick foot massage, she started “painting”. And by painting I mean, slopping white over half the nail, tidying it up and placing ONE coat of a pinkish clear polish over that. I’m slightly annoyed, but it’s my feet. Whatevs, I probably won’t be wearing open-toed or flippys much longer anyway.

And then the mani part. She asks me something that I can’t understand again but she does, however, manage to speak clearly later on when it was, “You pay now” time. I assume she’s asking about the shape of the nails so I tell her I want them squared. Well to her squared means hauling out a clipper and hacking the nail off and then filing what’s left to a nub. It’s not like I had claws to begin with, but they were a little shorter than this pic:

Now, all my nails were reduced to being just a teeny bit above the quick. And that thick tip of white that you see on those nice nails in the pic? That globby mess gets applied to my nubs, only somehow she manages to make it look crappier than the pedicure. You know what makes the french manicure work? Having an actual nail to paint the tip onto. Otherwise, unless you do a thin white tip, it just doesn’t work. The tips look lumpy and the line isn’t even at all.

After I see the first hand, I give up on even mentioning it to her, since I already decided that I’m taking the polish off when I get home and the communication problems we’ve had don’t bode well for getting her to fix the nails. So instead of the sleek nails I was hoping for, I got french manicured nubs, that looked grubby.

I’m pretty sure that my face is showing how utterly pissed off I am, since she asked “You ok?” Yes, bitch, I’m thrilled that I wasted my afternoon with you when I could have just had a neighborhood spawn-child do the EXACT same thing to my nails w. her Bonnie Bell kit.

I get my bill, which was more than I thought it would be, which pissed me off even more. There wasn’t a line for a tip, which is just as well, since halfway thru the hacking, I decided she wasn’t getting a tip. I sit for a minute in front of a little fan drying my nails and then all my fury starts setting in. I jump up, grab my purse and march out. All the lil’ chickys are saying “be careful”  as I stomp, since I might ruin my nails, I yank open the door far harder than I needed to and practically sprint out of there.

The urge to kill has rarely been that strong outside of work. I bought a tiramisu at Whole Foods to make me feel better and after nomming that I redid my nails while taking in the splendor that was Marc Singer’s jeans in the original V miniseries.

So, if you have a friend that you’re really pissed at, send her to Tenley Nails and ask for Kathy. Trust me, this is better than saying she does look fat in those jeans.

I’ve been feeling more guilty about leaving Nutsak the One-Eyed Wonder Kitty alone while I go to work and school. Seriously, that one eye = Jewish mother-esque guilt trips.

My apt is is only 520 sq ft, so I’m not sure getting a 2nd kitty for company would be a great idea. Plus, I’m sure there’s nothing a dude loves to hear more than “I’m 30, single, live in a basement studio and have 2 cats. Wanna bang?”

So I leave the  TV on  Animal Planet (I doubt he would like Sci-Fi SyFy) when I’m gone,  but this morning I remembered there are cat DVDs.

DVD For Cats: While You Are Gone or DVD For Cats: This is Why I'm Never Getting Laid Again

There is also a companion cd with such stirring musical numbers as “Twisted Whisker” and I Am Cat, Hear Me Roar”:

Music Cats Love: While You Are Gone OR Music Cats Love: Play this Loudly to Drown Out Your Sobs

Then there’s the Cat Sitter DVD series. It’s very hard to argue with the stellar reviews. “Cats across the country have ecstatically reviewed this lively production. Murray in Phoenix writes: ‘When my human gets home, I lead her straight to the TV. If only I had thumbs to operate the remote.’ Mavis in Savannah raves: ‘I’m positive it’ll win this year’s prestigious Hairball Award!’”

My question is, if I order the dvd should I go ahead and order the ugly bedroom slippers and extra batteries for the vibrator? Because after this post, it’s just going to be me and Waldo, the Adult Pleasure Device for a long, looooooooong time.

Apparently I steal drinks when I’m drunk.

Saturday night was the ever so awesome #pbandtuna. Once Flippy and I had sufficiently carbed up on Pizza Boli’s and gave up on the cab I ordered from Comfort Cab (who NEVER called me to let me know my cab arrived) , we snagged a Barwood cab #692 whose driver was a saint for pulling into a parking lot and waiting for us to sprint across Wisconsin Ave. to get to him.

At Stetson’s,  I got to meet some of the coolest peeps that I stalk on the Twitters and blogs, but fer realzy we need nametags or a cheatsheet for keeping the real names and the Twitter/blog names straight.  LiLu has an awesome linkage thing going on her site and once I stalk through the pics on Facebook, expect friend requests from me.

Some highlights as best I can remember:

• SEEING MY KATERTOT!!!!!!
• Getting my ass grabbed by Lexa
• getting tied w/ 12minds in our impromptu “beaner off”.  I still say you look more Hispanic than I do. Re-count!!
• Flippy and I stealing JP and dmbosstone’s drinks
• possibly walking down U St. with a sombrero. That part’s a lil fuzzy.
• stumbling to Maxie’s and Cavy’s hotel room and having a slumber party at 3 am. 6 girls, 2 beds and no, we didn’t have a pillow fight in our undies.  Or did we?
• Looking like the walk of shame personified in the Breakfast Room at the hotel as I continentaled my breakfast
• finding out that I stole drinks the next morning via Twitter
• the accusatory look that the Pizza Boli’s delivery boy gave me after coming to my apt twice in less than 24 hours.
• dying of death so bad, that not even Gilmore Girls could bring me back

LiLu, you and Maxie looked so freakin’ happy. I’m so glad I could be a part of your night.

ps. while I don’t *think* I bit anybody last night, I do tend to think I’m funny when I’m drunk and occasionally bite. So, if nommed you, much like Lexa’s ass grabs, it was done in love and I’m not sorry.  You were probably damn tasty, too!

Every morning I watch the Daily Show while getting ready for work. I generally let the commercials play, since I can never figure out where I last left the Tivo remote (kitchen counter, bathroom door, under a bra). Today,  I was walking to the kitchen when I saw part of this commercial:

Seriously, what Tabasco marketing genius thought this was a good idea??!  While I love me some hot sauce, thanks to that commercial I don’t see myself having pizza ANYTIME in the near future and I sure as FUCK will not be adding hot sauce when I do.  The last thing I need are creepy-eyed faces bubbling up on my slice with tiny sets of bleached teeth serenading me in four-part harmony as I try to eat.

Especially the dude at the bottom. He looks like he would fly off the slice and try to om nom nom nom my jugular.

And I thought the Snuggle Bear and Wrong Way Willy Wonka would haunt my dreams.

“Die, you Devil Bear! DIE”

Occasionally MommaPithy will do something that completely throws me. It is usually an off-hand comment during a call or the random email. A few weeks ago, she sent me an email forward with the subject:

Fwd: FW: Rv: SEXO ORAL EN EL SOFÁ……………………………….

(that’s oral sex on the sofa)

My mom’s cousin that lives in Colombia likes to send MommaPithy naughty email forwards. Sadly, it is a rare event that these emails get sent to me, no doubt as a last ditch effort to keep me “pure”.  It’s cute that they try, though.  So when I saw the subject line I figured my cousin had sent it. Nope, it was MommaPithy. Several scrolls later, this is what she sent me:

.

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kitteh pr0n

I have no words.

To quote the loverly LiLu:

***Alright, folks, you know the rules. Join us all in humiliating the crap out of yourself every Thursday by sharing some completely tasteless, wholly unclassy, “how many readers can I estrange THIS week??” TMI story about your life. Or hell, about someone else’s!***

On Monday I had my usual weekend-catch-up call w/ my bestie, Sex Therapist. Our convo started out innocently enough w/ me describing a pic that Dirty Haiku sent around of a googly-eye vag and then progressed to her having finally seen Twilight over the weekend. I described for  her my first ever clip of Twilight, which pretty much set the mood for when I did go see it.

Inappropriate laughter at “key” scenes, party of one!

At first we debated why chickys thought Robert Pattison is such a hottie, which led to discussing his abs being body-painted on for New Moon and how much yummier Jacob’s non-spray painted and slightly underage bod is in comparison.

Great, now I feel dirty.

Sex Therapist then brought up a plot hole that had nagged her: What did Edward do when Bella was on the rag?

And here’s where the convo spiraled downward.

(10 minutes of cackling followed after I tried singing the Lollipop. Make it juicy for ya, indeed)

I can’t wait to see what we come up with when she finally watches True Blood.

About a year ago, I wrote about my love for the quirky sci-fi show, Farscape. Along with Gilmore Girls, this is one of my most pimped shows and as I wrote, the lone TV on DVD collection that remained out of grasp.

I discovered this show in its final season, with only 7 eps until the untimely series finale.  After graduation, I reacquainted myself with the shows I had missed senior year: Alias, ER and Stargate SG-1. One night, I tuned in a little early for  my weekly date w. the hotties of SG1 and saw the last  5 minutes of the preceding show.

I was hooked. I had no idea what this show was, who these people were, why they were kinda-sorta-breaking-up-but-not-really but something about that scene grabbed me.  I started watched the remaining episodes, along with reruns, scoured blogs and TWoP for everything I could find on this show. The more I watched, the more I fell in love w. it.

It was 20 kinds of quirky/crazy (not exactly True Blood season 2 crazy, but crazy in it’s own way), 2 of the main cast were muppet/puppets things from Jim Henson (which most people have issue getting past) , extremely sexy (tons black leather and  hints of S&M)  visually appealing with colorful set design and the makeup/prosthetic, clever writing w. plenty of snarky and funny lines (“It’s not you it’s me. I don’t like you.”) and finally the epic love story of John and Aeryn. Their relationship is probably one of the best things about Farscape and it takes you on all sorts of an emotional roller coaster. Other than Rory’s graduation from Chilton and the last 2 eps of Gilmore Girls, Farscape is the only other show that can make me tear up, no matter how many times I’ve seen that particular ep.

After blogging last year, I decided that since my Google research and various blogs didn’t seem to have any info about Farscape dvds I should nut up and start buying the series as cheaply as I could. From November until about March, I hunted down deals on eBay and Amazon like a Cougar stalks her prey at a college bar. I had alerts set up,  refined my search terms,  and the fastest double-click this side of the Mississippi.  Sloooooowly I amassed seasons 2-4, in a combination of a box set and individual dvds.  Season 1 was out of even my fangirly price range, starting at 80 for a used box set.

Then came  July 2, 2009.

I was innocently scrolling through my Google Reader when I saw this item from Sci-Fi Wire:

Farscape will drop on DVD in The Complete Series Megaset in November as the show marks its 10th anniversary, with all four seasons and hours of extras; executive producer Brian Henson, creator Rockne O’Bannon and stars Ben Browder and Claudia Black will be at this year’s Comic-Con International in San Diego to discuss their favorite moments from the series and the DVD re-release.”

What followed was me jumping up and down in my cube, excitedly whisper-shouting “OMG. FARSCAPE!?!?!!!!!!!!” over and over again.  I’m sure if you ask Flippy for a demonstration at the next happy hour, she will gladly to re-enact it for you.

Once I had scaled down from OMGWTFBBQ levels of excitement to merely ZOMG levels, I started frantically searching for a release date and a price.  Info was embargoed until the Farscape panel at Comin-Con, later in the month. Day after their panel, I was a woman on a mission. I WOULD find info about the dvds despite the fact that my sci-fi/entertainment blogs were dedicating their CC coverage to True Blood, Twilight and others of the fanged persuasion and had no mention of what was obviously a monumental event. I tell you, journalists these days…a-hem.

Finally I was able to find this gem from TVshowsonDVD.com:

FARSCAPE: THE COMPLETE SERIES MEGASET™ Never Before Available in One Complete Package, All Four Fan Favorite Seasons Have Finally Been United In One Stellar 25 Disc Set ($149.95 SRP) IN STORES NOVEMBER 17

That high-pitched fangirl-y squeeeeeeeeee you heard? Yeah, that was me. Amazon.com had it up for pre-order later that same week,  for a little over $100, (there may or may not have been another squeeeee) which if I do the math correctly is probably less than what I’ve paid for the seasons I have now.  I could order *just* the missing season, b-b-but new packaging? Special features? Brand-spanking new DVDs? Better quality? Mommy want. Mommy want reaaaaaaal bad.  I waited about .002 nanoseconds before ordering it. I did sell most of the Farscape dvds that I had back on eBay to supplement this new purchase. Pretty sure I lost money somewhere in all this, but it will sooooo be worth it in 51 days.

Please don’t judge me.

My flirt-dar is non-existent. Unless it’s blatant “Hola, Mami”-stylings, I am kinda clueless if a guy is checking me out. For example: A few nights ago  I went went to Whole Foods and for once I had worn makeup to work so I wasn’t looking as blah as I usually do. I sorta forgot that I looked decent and was poking around the produce section looking for my spinach when I thought I caught the eye of a somewhat cutie. At first it registered that he was cute, but the pressing matter of finding spinach was more important. Plus, I thought the glance in my direction  was an accident.

I had 3 things on my mind: spinach, avocados and watermelon. Penis was not on the list.

Once I found my spinach,  and I  started my watermelon search, I saw him near the peaches and he was again casting a glance in my direction. As I looked for my watermelon, I started to think, “heeeyyyy, maybe he’s checking me out??” By the time it registered, and I try to  see if I could catch eyes w/him again, he was gone. And all I could think was how I had just FAIL’d at the produce flirting game.

And then there’s the gym. So for the past couple of trips to the gym there has been this dude that I’ve been eying. We’ll call him Abnormally Tall Hottie. He has to be at least 6′8. Seriously, he’s a Ginormotron. I don’t even reach his shoulder.

The first time I noticed Abnormally Tall Hottie was when he was next to me on the elliptical (which doesn’t help w/ figuring out the height).  He’s got a nice lean body, light brown hair,  tends to wear dark blue  and as Vagabondventures would say, “He’s cute for a white guy.”  But I suspect he’s not that bright.

I was well into my 40-min routine when he jumped on and started going, but soon he was making these weird groany/grunt/gasp things. Dunno if that’s how he catches his breath or he has asthma or what, but he sounded like a pussy. It’s an elliptical, dude. Chicks and old guys use it and we don’t moan like we’re dying. Suck it up.

I didn’t attempt a conversation b/c a) I’m chicken and b)  I was afraid the exertion to speak to me while on the elliptical might have killed him.  After a scolding pep talk from Vagabondventures, I was determined to think about considering attempting conversation w/ ATH.

For starters, I usually only see him walking from one piece of equipment to the other, and I’m usually on the elliptical (glowing red and dripping buckets of sweat) so I can’t easily strike up a convo  but I have noticed that he walks around w. a spiral-bound notebook  and writes in it after reps. Now I get tracking your progress, (and I have been known to lose count of my reps and end up overdoing it)  but to see a dude who’s in shape doing that seems a lil’ “speshul”. Or maybe I’m a bitch.

And there was the time I was rocking out to my favorite Beto song, while on the elliptical. It wasn’t a full -on Brad Pitt dancing on the treadmill (skip to 1:54) scene, but there was definite musical interpretation movement on my part. And lip-synching. My eyes might have been closed too. When I opened them, I saw him looking away from me. Yeeeaaaah.

maaaaybe I’m the one who’s Speshul.

since I talked my love for rock en Español last post, I thought I’d post some clips of my favorite groups and songs.

I ended with a clip of the amazing Héroes del Silencio  (HDS) headed up by Enrique Bunbury who bears a striking resemblance to Jim Morrison. When I first started listening to him, I was told that he claimed to either be the illegitimate son of Morrison or have Morrison’s spirit.  I couldn’t find anything about that from teh interwebz, so I’m guessing that was a Colombian tall tale.

Morrison link or not, Bunbury is amazing. After Héroes broke up in 1996, he continued as a solo artist and I was extremely lucky to have seen him perform in NYC  in 2004. His solo music has less of the 80/90’s feel to it, but is smoother rock. Not heavy and with more of an organic,  sultry feel to it.

Al Final

And another from the 2007 Héroes reunion tour, because it’s sooooo damn good. HDS is rather comparable to Kansas and GnR in sound.

Deshacer el Mundo

La Ley is another group that is sadly no more.  From Chile, with another hottie for lead singer,  Beto Cuevas. Probably their best album was MTV Unplugged. Beto’s a lil’ dramatic in his performance, but the man can wear a pair of jeans.  I saw them at the 9.30 Club and would have totally been a groupie for them that night. La Ley is a far more polished sound, more pop-rocky to HDS’s  organic sound

Delirando

El Duelo (one of my favorite songs from them, with Mexican rockera Ely Guerra)

Beto now does his own thing. And it’s awesome. I love him. I love this song. I hate his mustard pants. He sound is slightly more electronic and slick now, with hints of Nine Inch Nails.

Los Fabuloso Cadillacs from Argentina. Also broken up.  We would dance (drunkenly) to this song at our rock bar every weekend and it never got old. They have more of a ska sound, and isn’t too heavy on the guitars at all.

Matador

Manu Chao is all over the place. Born in France, spent time in Colombia and Guatemala and sings in English, Spanish, French and whatever else he feels like at the moment. His music is as random as this video is.  He takes his musical influences from the Caribbean, Spain, France and pretty much anywhere he’s set foot.

Me Gustas Tu

Before Manu Chau came Mano Negra, his band which, say it with me, broke up. The music isn’t as random as his current stuff, but still awesome. Has a bit more of a rocky feel. When he came to Merriweather and played this song, it was a field full of dancing, drunk beaners. I was so happy.

Mala Vida

And now to mi gente. Colombian rocker Juanes, started out in Ekhymosis. They broke up (shocking, I know) and he went on to a extremely successful solo career. In last week’s ep of Glee, they played his song La Camisa Negra during Puck’s flashback of seducing MILFs. My favorite song, A Dios le Pido is basically a Colombian anthem of sorts. In the song he’s asking God for survival. For himself, his family and his love.  He’s asking for protection from the violence that has been such a part of Colombia. He’s asking that if he dies, it be from love. Perhaps the most powerful part of the song is this:

A Dios le pido

I ask of God
Por los dias que me quedan
For the days that I have left
y las noches que aun no llegan yo
And the night that have yet to arrive I
A dios le pido
Ask of God
Por los hijos de mis hijos y los hijos de tus hijos
For the kids of my kids and the kids of your kids
A dios le pido
Ask of God
Que mi pueblo no derrame tanta sangre y se levante mi gente
That my people don’t shed so much blood and rise again

(btw, I’m  loving this line in Spanish so much, I’m adding it to the tattoo files)

When Juanes was in Ekhymosis they wrote this absolutely beautiful song about Colombia, the themes of which are echoed in Dios le Pido. In La Tierra, he is asking for his countrymen to love their race, their brothers and their blood and not to throw away all of this for the sake of violence.

For a quick mini-history on Juanes and Shakira, check out this article. While I adore HDS, for pure emotional impact, nothing can compare to Juanes. There’s so many more artists I could add, but there’s only so much awesome one blog post can take.

The Héroes del Silencio album on my iPod has getting some heavy airplay in my home the past two weeks. During a mental health break at work I was snooping around on Amazon.com, trying to find some music to help alleviate the onset of my current state of ennui when I saw their new (to me) CD. My iPod and perhaps my own musical tastes seem stuck in the 90’s, when I first discovered the genre of music that I now can’t live without: rock en Español.

Growing up, the only approved music was either Southern Gospel music groups that consisted of suited-up white males or select classical pieces. Bach was loved, but Tchaikovsky was hated – Mom had read somewhere that he was gay, so no Nutcracker suite for me. I had to sneak in the album into my collection like most kids sneak in pot. The music from Mom’s homeland, Colombia – vallenato, cumbia and salsa, were also off-limits. I was a sophomore in college before being exposed to my musical heritage.

Slowly I was able to incorporate movie soundtracks in, claiming them as “modern classical music” and Christian contemporary music (CCM) as a holy alternative to the Nirvana that I really wanted to listen to. The soundtracks were met without any argument, but you could see Mom twitching every time she heard me listening to Michael W. Smith. In her mind it was only a matter of time before I  punked out and started crowd-surfing. Slippery slopes, you know?

For a while the musical substitutes worked. I could tell the production differences between CCM and the real rock music I heard as Rush Limbaugh’s bumper music. I took what I could get and it worked, until my freshman year at college.

Pensacola Christian College had a stricter music policy than Mom. Choral ensemble music was the sole approved music. My beloved “Last of the Mohicans” soundtrack and various classical CDs were confiscated and held until the end of the term. It was my own fault for submitting the music for “review” and thinking that they would pass. I soon learned to keep my CDs in a locked box since the room inspectors couldn’t open that.  After a year of listening to “Just a Closer Walk to Thee” in four-part harmony, I was ready for the musical revolution that was about to begin

After transferring to the oh-so-liberal LU  and aligning myself with the Spanish clubs on campus, I began to hear not only salsa and cumbia, but actual rock songs in Spanish.

Maná, was the first rocker group I heard. I thought they sounded slightly drunk, but drunken rock beat somber, spirit-filled music any day. Then the fateful day came when a fellow Colombian (the Unnamed One to be exact) gave me a copy of Donde Están Los Ladrones? by Shakira.  My world was changed.

Something in the music reached out and grabbed me. I don’t know if it was the familiar accent in Shakira’s voice, the exotic music arrangements, the lyrics whose meaning were beyond my intermediate Spanish knowledge and therefore were intriguing, but I was hooked. My CCM collection slowly moved from the top of the dresser to a plastic bin under my bed.  I started borrowing all the Spanish rock CDs I could, making cassette tapes before investing in a CD burner.

Once I moved to DC, I found a bar that played Spanish rock and expanded my music beyond that of the Colombian influences of Shakira, Juanes, Los Aterciopelados and Carlos Vives. Soon Mexico, Chile, Argentina, and Spain were all fighting for equal billing in my CD player and that was just the rock music. The lyrics still mystified, but sound kept drawing me in. The majority of these musicians come from countries that were either under dictatorships, have recently emerged from such or, in Colombia’s case, the country is in a lot of pain and this raw emotion is evident on every track.

This makes the music a little more valuable to me: these artists had to work hard to get their music out, in some cases fighting for survival. That’s not something that can easily be found with American rock music.

The newer Spanish rock isn’t the same as the rock of the 90’s. Reggaeton is now the musical powerhouse in the Latin world, with new bands trying to capitalize on the success that Shakira and Juanes have in more mainstream areas. Perhaps I am in a musical bubble and lacking the proper guide to help me.

Now I can only find “my” music in my home. The bar has long since changed hands, the Spanish friends are scattered around the world and local Spanish radio station plays mostly reggaeton. The Sunday morning “Gira de Rock” show is long gone. Even Shakira’s music has changed. ( you really don’t want me to get started on that or her blond hair)

So I hit replay on my CD player and revel in the sensual sounds of Opio by Héroes del Silencio. I may be stuck, but at least it sounds good here.  And goddamn, Enrique Bunbury looks good in leather pants.