Moving into My Boss's Office

My apartment hunting/roommate finding struggles have been well-documented here, and now I've decided to move out. But I've said it before, and I'll say it again: looking for a roommate on Craig's List is like trying to talk Helen Keller through an obstacle course.

So, I've decided that I'm going to start slowly moving into my boss's office while she's in meetings.

Here's how I'll do it:

1. Propose the idea of an in-office couch Hey boss, everyone loves an in-office couch. All of the hot shots on TV shows have couches in their office. Don't you want one? You totally do. Oh, what's that? It's not in the budget? Good news. I found one that we don't even have to pay for. It's called my living room couch. It's a sectional, so it'll be great for naps.

2. Speaking of naps... You know what would go great with that couch? A bed. Certain employees here seem to sleepwalk through the day, so why not just let them lay down instead. We'll make a strict NO SNORING rule, so that when people are napping, they don't disturb you while you're trying to work. Hey—this is a place of business, after all.

3. Wardrobe changes!! We both know how stylish you are, so why not bring in a dresser for you? I mean, when I say "for you," I really mean it will be filled with my clothes, but I'm up for sharing (even though you're not my size). It's important for your IMAGE as a busy lady business woman. Think about what people will say when you have multiple "costume changes" throughout the day?! It worked for Cher, it can work for you! We'll treat every meeting you have throughout the day like Cher would approach a different "number" onstage—a different meeting, a different outfit. Wasn't she just wearing a different shirt?, they'll say. OBVIOUSLY, because you're IMPORTANT. Come to think of it, I better bring all of my clothes from my clothes as well just so you have a lot of options (I hope you like Polo shirts and Clearance items!)

If these things don't work, I don't know what else will, besides sobbing hysterically about how I'm going to be out on the streets.

Come on, Boss—LEAVE ME MY DIGNITY, and let me move into your office.

Love always,

Amanda

The Night I Reenacted the Scene from Big (No, not that scene, the one without the piano)

All right, bitchez, listen up. Now, I'm not all for the pretentious stuff. I take the subway every day and drink Bud Light. BUT: sometimes a girl wants to party in styyyyyyyle.

After a work party down at South Street Seaport, Scott and I went for dinner and drinks at The Paris Cafe in the Financial District. Of course, we were drunk and ended up writing all over the paper they put on the table and asked the waitress if she was really Irish (our hypothesis was that she was an "actress" from Massapequa).

We decided that the subway was for suckas and decided to splurge on a cab. While trying to hail a cab, a stretch limousine comes rolling up. He pulled over.

We laughed, and asked him how much and he said "HOW MUCH YOU GOT?"

In unison, we said $30, because that's about how much it would have cost to take a cab home anyway.

He agrees and we are riding through New York City in a stretch limo, with our heads sticking out the sun roof.

I love my life.

The Taxonomy of "Ours"

In college, Darby O'Gills, a faux Irish pub in the middle of a mini-mall in between a sex shop and a Subway, was—hands down—our favorite bar. Of course, we were in Poughkeepsie, so it was slim pickings, but that's not the point.

One night, after my standard 287 beers and 3 jagerbombs, I declared to all of my friends that I wanted to have my funeral there.

"Put the casket on the bar, serve pitchers of Bud Light and Irish nachos," I slurred.

It really sounded like the best idea—to me and everyone there at the time.

To this day, I can't hear "Don't Stop Believin" without thinking of our stupid bar in that trashy plaza in Poughkeepsie. We were there so often that we should all be partial owners now, as all of our money we spent over four years of college seemed to be divided equally between Darby's and K&D Deli.

But after I moved to New York, I had about 2 million bars to choose from. This is why people so often move to New York and flip the fuck out—you want to experience everything and end up with a drug problem and $0 in your bank account.

As someone who knows exactly what I like and don't like (like: polo shirts, light beer, jagermeister, and TV crime documentaries; don't like: rainbow flags, Time Warner Cable, and dark beer), I find myself struggling against a pull to go somewhere I know I like and try somewhere new.

Abi and I stumbled (literally) into Dempsey's in the East Village after downing Texas-sized margaritas at our favorite secret shame, Dallas BBQ. We walked in and they were playing obscure Clash songs and we immediately knew that this was going to be our bar. They serve beer to you in buckets, for fuck's sake.

On the table, someone had carved, "What will we do with our lives?" I carved "Everything" as a response. Now as a ritual, each time we walk through the door, we need to sit at our table with our carving on it.

We go there so often for Trivia Night that we've made friends with an opposing team of very, very smart gay men (How did we know that they were gay? They were knitting). We call them "our boys" and promise each other that one day, we will team up and beat everyone in the bar.

We have the menu memorized and when we order fries, we ask the waitress to bring us aioli and not the roasted red pepper or ranch dips. Every time, our request falls on deaf ears and the roasted red pepper and ranch dips remain untouched.

Each Trivia Night, we lose, but win the pity prizes, such as Best Team Name (Trivia Newton-John and Swine Floozies) or (last night) Best Dressed (?!). Last night, the Motown-loving bartender plugged in my iPod and played my Martha & the Vandellas, Marvin Gaye, and The Temptations.

Usually, we're out of the bar after Trivia before midnight, but we ended up staying until 3am. That's an entire 8 hours in one bar.

After going to the bathroom for the 10,000th time that night, I realized that I could recite all of the bathroom graffiti word for word.

I realized that I don't spend this much time at Dempsey's because I don't have any other options, I spend so much time there because I literally love this bar.

Not to wax poetic here, but it's nice in a city where everything seems unattainable, to have a place that feels unequivocally yours. And it feels even better to have a place that feels unequivocally ours.

There Goes the Neighborhood

The New York Post is reporting that Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick just bought an $8.45 million brownstone in about ummmm 7 blocks from my house.

I desperately don't want to leave my apartment/neighborhood and this just stands as a reminder why I can't afford it.

Maybe I can put in my ad for a roommate on Craig's List that all dumbass, aspiring Carrie Bradshaws only have a 10 minute walk from my apartment to SJP's stoop, where they can sit and fawn over her expensive outfits and hats with feathers on them.

Things in My Fridge/Freezer

Fridge:

1 bottle of BBQ sauce
1 bottle of hot sauce (for Bloody Marys)
1 bottle of Worcestershire sauce
Butter
Cheddar cheese
Brie cheese
1 loaf of Bread
Arugala
Baby carrots (my roommate's)
Blueberries (my roommate's)
1 onion
1 lemon
1 lime
1 pack of Old El Paso tortillas
1 bottle of Coke
1 bottle of Cranberry juice (for Vodka Cranberries)
1 bottle of V8 (for Bloody Marys)
1 bottle of Tonic (for Vodka Tonics)
Soy milk (my roommate's)
Yoplait yogurt
Roasted Garlic Hummus

Freezer:

1 half bottle of Jack Daniels
1 half bottle of Absolut Vodka
1 nearly full bottle of Mandarin Orange Vodka
1 full bottle of Bacardi
1 half bag of ice (leftover from Memorial Day)
Edy's Fruit Bar popsicles
2 Lean Cuisines
Frozen peas
Frozen green beans

Conclusion:

My roommate doesn't eat and I have a drinking problem.

Looking for a Roommate on Craig's List is like trying to talk Helen Keller through an Obstacle Course

I'm having difficulty finding a roommate and I've decided to open up the scope to include guys. After all, most of my friends are guys—all they wanna do is have a beer, right? I can handle that.

Well, I'm still a little uncomfortable about living with a guy that I don't know. Trying to put the whole roommate thing into perspective, Abi gave me some advice:

"I like to think that the people I’m living with would be evenly matched with me in a physical altercation."

In other words: if you think that you could probably kick their ass if you had to, welcome home, baby! If not, take a hike, dbag.

This is a nightmare.

Remembering Michael Jackson by drinking 30985 beers

[Also posted at Fucked in Park Slope]

As the King of Pop "beat it" yesterday (haha, see what I did there?), I did what any person grieving would do: I went and saw The Proposal at the Pavilion, followed by burgers and beers at The Dram Shop.

After scarfing down the Dram's signature basket filled with a delicious cheeseburger and hand-cut fries, we drank about 700 ice-cold beers. Finally, one of the bartenders arrived with an iPod filled with Michael Jackson tunes (isn't it interesting to know that no matter how many kids you molest/name Blanket/hold over a balcony, you die and every bar across the country is singing along to "Billie Jean" and "Thriller"?).

He had all of the hits, of course, but we were waiting for "Man in the Mirror"–a lesser known, cheesy anthem from Jackson's Bad album. We figured they wouldn't play it because it's not exactly a good bar song (it's more like a song you sing alone in your room at the top of your lungs and then you realize that your roommate came home and heard everything and is paralyzed with laughter outside your bedroom door—not that that's ever happened to me).

All of a sudden, we hear the beginning notes of "Man in the Mirror" (ie: angels singing). The bartender lets it play, and we're all singing along. Once he realizes what a ridiculous, sappy song it is, he turns it off and searches frantically for another MJ song that's a little more upbeat.

The bar FREAKS out.

An acapella version of "Man in the Mirror" was then sung by myself and my fellow Dram Shop patrons, even punctuated with MJ's signature "woos" and "hehe's." The bartender realizes what he'd done and starts the song over.

Hey, if you wanna make the world a better place, you better look at yourself and make a change.

Well played, Dram Shop. Well played.

An Insider's Look into my Daily Subway Commute

8:35: Arrive on the subway platform
8:36: There is a cute young couple holding hands. He just kissed her on the cheek. Precious.
8:40: Okay, he has kissed her on the cheek 3 times so far. What is she, your grandmother? Knock it off with the weird, sterile PDA.
8:42: Where is this stupid train? Yesterday, I waited 10 minutes for the train and then a garbage train showed up. The garbage gets better service than people do. Thanks, MTA.
8:45: The train shows up, and I position myself in the prime spot against the doors.
8:47: Hey. I like that girl's necklace.
8:48: I should integrate more green into my wardrobe.
8:52: Train arrives at the station, I have to wait on the platform to transfer to another train.
8:54: Hey, that guy is reading a book I was supposed to read for class in college, but I was to drunk to do so.
8:55: I regret nothing.
8:58: The train comes and I elbow my way in.
9:00: We get to the Broadway-Nassau station and I try to get a seat but fail miserably. Good thing that middle-aged guy with a scooter got one, though.
9:01: If you have a scooter and you're over 14 years old, you should be shot. No exceptions.
9:02: I knock some bitch down to get a seat.
9:07: Honestly, if I see one more person reading "Eat Pray Love," I'm going to scream.
9:10: Oh, see you later, Mr. Scooter. Tool.
9:13: Oh fuck, this train isn't express.
9:15: Who gets off at Spring Street anyway? Nobody.
9:16: I'm just gonna put this out there: neck tattoos scare me.
9:17: Apparently, "Gjjfguhbdtilj Street" is next. Thanks, Queen Latifah, for once again being so coherent.
9:19: Arrrive at Penn Station.
9:20: Go down two flights of stairs only to go up four more flights of stairs. Tell me how this makes sense?
9:22: On the street, walking to work.
9:23: Whenever I get off of the train, I am always surrounded by Hasidic Jews. They all go into this one building. I'm German, so naturally, I think this is a conspiracy.
9:24: I pass the Duane Reade Recruiting Center. I didn't know they recruited people. I thought they just let any vagrant or degenerate who could manage to stumble in the front doors work there.
9:25: Speaking of vagrants and degenerates, I pass the meth clinic, which is suspiciously located right next to the Duane Reade Recruiting Center. Never have I seen so many people with so few teeth.
9:27: Trying to cross Dyer Avenue at the mouth of the Lincoln tunnel. There is no light, so the street is named appropriately. I'm confident, that one day, I will die trying to cross Dyer Avenue.
9:30: I am at the office. End scene.

Growing Up; Falling Down

I am definitely not in college anymore.

Living with a 19-year-old roommate has definitely highlighted that. When I go out, I'm usually home by midnight, shitfaced. When I'm walking (read: stumbling) in, she's just going out.

I just don't have the energy anymore. Anyone who knew me in college (or read this blog when I was in college) knows that I'm a boozehound, but while I still love to go out (New York/Brooklyn has a little bit better of a night life scene than Poughkeepsie) and drink like a fish, having a full time job makes you tired.

Nowadays, there's nothing I enjoy more than coming home from work, sitting on my couch and watching Jeopardy and Wife Swap.

Well—enter Scott.

There's something about the dynamic of Scott and I that makes each of us want to drink until we're hospital bound. Even in college, when it was normal to slam 12 beers in a night, everyone looked at us and were like "whoa" (Not Joey Lawrence "whoa," more like "whoa, you're probably going to die tonight").

One example that springs to mind is the time we accidentally did a power hour with double shot glasses, meaning that we each drank 6 beers in 30 minutes before realizing what we did. I promptly went to the bathroom to throw up. Scott told me that throwing up was like "hitting the reset button." We still went out and the evening ended with our IDs being inspected by Poughkeepsie police.

Scott has officially moved into my neighborhood in Brooklyn. About a 10 minute walk from my apartment. We have drank nearly every night since he's moved in, and somehow Patron shots found their way into my life on a week night.

This is not going to be good.

Or, it's going to be the kind of good that John Cougar Mellencamp mused about: Summer 09: It Hurts So Good.

Shameless Self-Promotion

Check out the June/July double issue of Every Day With Rachael Ray magazine.

I wrote an article about how to free your snacks when they get trapped in the vending machine.

I interview a guy from a vending machine company.

Thrilling stuff, I know.

Check it out mofozzzz.

As if I needed another reason to love Betty White

Landlord WHYYYYYYYYYYY

Remember all of the times I've written about my sweet, adorable, 80-year-old landlord?

I TAKE IT ALL BACK.

My lease is up in August and my roommate (who was subletting for the summer) is moving out, meaning I need to trick someone else into living in a bedroom the size of a closet (hey, I did it for a year—it was cozy) while still paying an insane amount in rent. Well, girlfriends, that's why we moved to New Yawk Citayyy, am I right? Am I right?

Fine, whatever.

My rent is already an obscene amount of money and now "Mr. I Maquerade as a Sweet Old Man but will have no problem stabbing you IN THE HEART" is upping it by $75 a month. Now, in the grand scheme of things, $75 a month is not that big of a deal. This is what he told me.

Well, if $75 a month is so inconsequential, why do I need to pay it? ANSWER ME THAT.

What bothers me the most is that he has this little schtick that he plays—saying that his sister out in Toledo owns half of the building and that SHE'S the one insisting that he up the rent.

"If it were up to me, Dollface," he says. "I wouldn't up it at all."

Yeah, okay.

Then he says that the new amount is what market will bear and I'm all like "I don't understand what bears have to do with anything."

What it comes down to is that I really love my apartment, and I don't want to leave, but I already couldn't really afford it at the current rate. How am I going to afford it now?

I wish I was dead.

Maria Bamford, who I coincidentally interviewed on the phone today, said it all:

Hello, Newman

Summer is gearing up and so my calendar is taken up a notch as my schedule gets inundated with work events to go to (read: open bars, many, many open bars). As most of you know, one of the major perks of working in the media (at my magazine in particular) is that you get to go to awesome events for free. A movie premiere here, a rooftop event there. Basically, events I would never get invited to unless I was wearing my staff badge.

Since I've been with the company for a year, while the events are still cool, I'm starting to get all New York blase about them. However, tonight, there was nothing to be blase about. I got free tickets to the Tribute to Paul Newman at the Lincoln Center, hosted by Robert Redford and Julia Roberts. It was a charity benefit to raise money for his "Hole in the Wall" camps. The tickets were $1,500 a piece.

The auditorium was packed, but I just kept thinking to myself, "these people can afford $1,500 a seat?" Where the hell am I?

The entertainment for the night included Art Garfunkel, Kristen Chenoweth (from the original Broadway cast of Wicked), Harry Connick, Jr., Yo Yo Ma, Jerry Seinfeld, and James Taylor. Very special guest? A very incoherent Bill Clinton (isn't he supposed to be a prolific speaker?). Basically, my mother freaked out when I told her.

It was a really awesome evening—Kristin Chenoweth was amazing, Jerry Seinfeld killed, Harry Connick, Jr. was unexpectedly hilarious, and James Taylor ended it all with "Shower the People"—but there's something weird about Julia Roberts saying "give us all of your money."

Just saying.

Regardless, Paul Newman was a great philanthropist, and quite the fox, if I may say so myself:

Great Balls of Fire

Yesterday, my subway car caught fire.

Okay, maybe I'm being dramatic.

I don’t know if the car was on fire, or if the track was on fire, or if some homeless man was on fire on the platform. What I DO know is that there was a fire somewhere near me.

I’m not prone to panicking, but when riding on the subway, I have very little confidence that my conductor, who can barely put together a coherent sentence, will be in control of the situation (ie: the gigantic fire).

I mean, there are a ton of things that could catch on fire in the subway. Check out this Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles bullshit I saw on the A line track at Penn Station:


Did someone get slimed? Where’s Rosie O’Donnell? I want my Kids Choice Award!

Anyway, everything was going as per usual: I was wedged up against the door of the train, uncomfortably close to a Hasidic Jew, observing how perfect his curls are (for realsies, do they use a curling iron?).

All of a sudden, we get to the Broadway-Nassau station and all of the Wall Street jerks get out. I knock an old lady down so I can get a seat.

All of a sudden, the subway car fills with smoke. If Ralph Wiggum were in the subway car with me, he would have shrieked, “it smells like burning!”

The train goes out of service (presumably because it’s on fire) and everyone is told to wait for the next subway car. Firemen are running on the platform.

Call me a nervous Nancy, but I’m gonna take a cab.

Because the MTA now “encourages” New Yorkers to complain by providing an email address to write to, I figured I would do it. If a Smoky Robinson train isn’t cause for an email, what is?

Subject: Great Balls of Fire

Hey,

My subway car caught fire this morning.

Keep up the good work.

Best,

Amanda

I thought it was funny, and I figured I would never get a response. A few hours later, I get one (probably from an intern) with a case reported incident number, titled “Great Balls of Fire Incident 090604-000084.”

The fact that this douchey email subject line I wrote is filed somewhere warms my heart.

Joe Jonas Makes One Hot Lady

And this is why I can't tell my parents anything

Ever since I moved out of the house, if I ever call my parents and over the course of the phone conversation mention I feel a little under the weather, they FREAK THE FUCK OUT.

I mentioned to my father on the phone that my neck hurts and I have a headache. We hung up without incident and then I went into the living room without my phone to watch Law & Order.

I come back to my phone with FIVE frantic voicemails from home. They've enlisted my little brother to look up symptoms of terrible diseases that I might have (child abuse?) and of course I have all of them.

I know the world has gone batshit crazy and swine flu is infecting Brooklyn grade schools, but let's calm the fuck down, mom and dad.

I have a headache, not tuberculosis.

Don't Question the Trilogy

In one of the first episodes of Kirstie Alley's hysterical, short-lived Showtime series, Fat Actress, she calls former colleague, John Travolta and suggests that he help her jump start her career by making Look Who's Talking: 4. No one could be more supportive of that idea than me. Anyone got about 10 million dollars to help make this happen?

I keep trying to tell people of the value of the Look Who's Talking trilogy, but no one seems to believe me. Really? You think Look Who's Talking is lame? What are you watching? A Night at the Museum? Fuck you. You cannot deny the awesomeness of the Look Who's Talking trilogy.

Check it out:

Look Who's Talking: The beloved first movie in the trilogy, we find a moderately hot Kirstie Alley having an affair with her boss, Albert. Through a very graphic, weird late 1980s CGI rendering, we see a million sperm heading towards Kirstie Alley's egg. They are all hooting and hollering as they make their way to their target, which is indeed accurate, because as far as I understand it, sperm all have different voices and all sound like obnxious frat guys (for the record, I have had no practical experience with sperm).


Well, what do you know? This bitch iz pregnant. What will she do? Have the baby in John Travolta's cab, obviously. John Travolta plays James Ubriacco—essentially a grown up version of Vinnie Barbarino—a dopey but endearing cab driver.

In real life, Kirstie would just get out of the cab and give the driver a shitty tip, because let's face it, he was jabbering on his cell phone the entire time with the folks back home in Al Qaeda. I'm reporting you to Homeland Security (ala Liz Lemon in 30 Rock).

But movie life, we have to find something that will link these two star-crossed lovahs together again. OMG she left her purse in the cab! And of course, her license has her address on it (like anyone in New York actually has an updated license with their address on it. New Yorkers switch apartments like hermit crabs switch their shells—see what I did there? Check out that badass simile that was not only FUNNY but gave you some legit scientific information. My mission is to entertain AND to educate), so he shows up at her apartment to return the lost purse.

Hey, guess what? A frazzled, single working mother needs a babysitter. Wouldn't you want to get away if your newborn baby had the voice of Bruce Willis? And what the hell, this nice, slick-haired cab driver seems to be available, why not him?


Hilarity ensues, as John Travolta mistakenly drinks breast milk, drives the kid around in the cab, etc. etc. John Travolta and Kirstie Alley obviously give in to their raging sexual tension, and the movie ends with the birth of a new baby (read: OMG SEQUEL).

Look Who's Talking Too: I cannot get over this clever spelling pun. Imagine a movie studio meeting in the early 1990's:

Movie Exec 1: Well, it's the sequel. Look Who's Talking 2, right?
Everyone at once: Yeah, yeah, great, where's the coke?
Movie Exec 2: Whoa, guys, I'm getting an idea: how about "Look Who's Talking Too?" is in ALSO?
Everyone at once: DUDE YOU ARE BLOWING MY FUCKING MIND—WHERE IS THE GODDAMNED COKE?



Done and DONE. Also, presumably after our movie executives found the coke, the obvious choice for the voice of the baby sister was none other than Roseanne Barr, because if anyone could evoke the childlike innocence of an adorable baby girl, it's the overweight comedienne who grabbed at her crotch after signing the national anthem on TV.


Bruce, Kirstie, and John were all on board for the fun, as Mikey tackles the trials and tribulations of adjusting to having a baby sister and get potty trained.

The potty training is the big focus of the plot, and we have Kirstie and John doing a "Potty Medley" that features riffs of "My girl wants to potty all the time..." and "You gotta fight for your right to potty." At one point, there is also scary Mr. Toilet Man who has eyes and teeth and screams "Give me your pee pee!"

You know when you can tell that the writers got totally fucked up when they wrote a scene in the movie? Yeah, it was that one. Good job, Amy Heckerling.

Some other shit happens, but the best part is when John Travolta goes to the baby gym (which is inexplicably run by obvious pedophile Gilbert Godfried) and dances to an Elvis Presley song. Oh, Mr. Travolta. Even though you look totally gross in the new Taking of Pelham 123 ads, you were quite the stud back then. Come to think of it, time has not been good to any of the stars of the Look Who's Talking trilogy. Those kid actors are probably heroin addicts or dead or something.

Look Who's Talking NOW: Because everyone is greedy as fuck, why not make another Look Who's Talking movie? I don't even care, this is honestly my favorite one in the entire franchise.


Since the kids are old enough to talk now, it would obviously make sense to feature two talking dogs, by brilliant voice actors Danny DeVito and Diane Keaton.

Oh and guess what? John Travolta don't drive no cab no more. Nuh uh, he flies himself a plane for some rich lady. We know she's evil because she has a British accent. And if I know anything about simple American cinema, you can always tell the bad person by whether or not they have a British accent. Take any Disney movie for example. Jafar from Aladdin? Bastard was Middle Eastern and he still had a British accent. Scar from The Lion King? Bastard was a lion and he still had a British accent. I could go on, but I think you get it. British obviously equals evil.


Kirstie Alley loses her job for some reason (maybe because no woman who wears gigantic bows in her hair will ever be taken seriously in the business world) so she is forced to become an elf at Macy's and for some reason the kids go back into the changing room and hear "Santa" talking to his bookie. Christmas is obviously ruined now that the kids know that there's no Santa, so in an effort to inject some happiness into their terrible lives, John Travolta goes and gets a dog from the pound.

But wait! Evil British lady dropped her crazy French poodle off at the house too. Now they have TWO dogs that are nothing alike! One's from the streets! One is pure bred! A comic mismatch made in formulaic heaven! But under their surface hatred these two have an undeniable passion for each other (yes, I'm still talking about dogs).

Also, the daughter has a crush on Charles Barkley for some reason and there's a fantasy scene where the four-year-old actually plays some one-on-one with Barkley (she wins, much to old Charlie's chagrin) and everyone watching the movie at that point is like WHAT. THE. FUCK.

British lady obviously has a crush on John Travolta because this is before he starred in Battlefield Earth. Since she's his boss, she makes elaborate plans for him to fly her everywhere, thus depriving him of his beautiful wife and family and talking/sassy dogs ON CHRISTMAS EVE.

Kirstie Alley is having none of this. She packs the kids and the dogs up into the car and drives them to the cabin where John Travolta's boss has him trapped in an elaborate ruse to get him to fall in love with her.

Oh, weird. We're just in this cabin in the woods and the phone lines are down. Isn't this fireplace romantic? Can you teach me to dance (or, dahannnnnce in British speak)?

Of course, John Travolta teaches her to dance because he is so good at it. He still doesn't get that his boss is hitting on him, even when she asks him to teach her how to slow dance. Something else is slow here, John: YOU. I'm thinking if my boss ever asked me to slow dance, my response would not be "Yes, anyone can dance! Let me show you! YOU'RE A NATURAL!" It would be like "Will this dancing session also come with a raise and promotion? No? Okay, thanks, bye."

Meanwhile, Kirstie Alley can't drive very well (BECAUSE SHE'S A WOMAN) and she crashed the car in the middle of the woods. She gets out of the car and of course, some talking coyotes drop in for a visit. Danny Devito fends them off and then goes to find John Travolta at the cabin. Meanwhile, Diane Keaton rescues Kirstie and the kids and they have to weather the storm in some park ranger cabin. Before anyone can scream "BUT IT'S CHRISTMAS—THIS FAMILY NEEDS TO BE TOGETHER," John Travolta also shows up at the park ranger cabin to the tune of Joe Cocker's "Have a Little Faith in Me."

OH HOLD UP—what is coming up over the park ranger's radio transmitter? MOTHERFUCKING SLEIGHBELLS. Santa is real afterall, isn't he, kids?!

Dunzo.

Now, if you don't admit that this is the best trilogy in the history of modern cinema, I will fight you.

So, how've you been?

In a message sent to a friend from college that I haven't talked to in almost a year, I summed myself up in one second:

"Basically, I'm more high strung than ever because now I drink Red Bull on the regular."

Trivia Newton-John Conquers Trivia Night

Oh hay l00zers. Think you've got a good name for trivia? You don't.

Abi and I won AGAIN for the best trivia team name.

Trivia Newton-John.

Suck it, everyone. What we lack in actual knowledge that gains us points, we make up for in clever, clever names.

Our prize this week? Silly putty. I found it in the bottom of my bag this morning and had the typical a-ha moment (not a-ha as in crazy pencil sketch "Take On Me," but more like the ohhhhhh, yeah...I'm an adult and I was so happy to win some silly putty...)

Worddddd

One Year Later

I'm not big on anniversaries, but there's something about the passage of one year that forces you to reflect.

One year ago today, I got on a plane and flew to New York. I started my first day of work on the Tuesday after Memorial Day.

I don't need to wax poetic about how far I've come or how much I've accomplished.

I'll just say this: I've built a life where I can tell my boss who is in Hershey Park with her family that I hope she falls into a chocolate fountain, always meet up with friends after work for one drink or a night of complete debauchery, and finally come home to a front stoop where my landlord greets me by calling me "sweetheart," and tell him about my day while petting my dry cleaner's puppy.

As the song goes, it feels like home to me.

I was told there would be porters

My mother came up this weekend for a combination Mother's Day/birthday weekend.

Since my family has visited NYC about 12 times since I started going to college in the greater NYC area, I am running out of shit to do with them.

My mother, with her floral blazer and her watering can purse from Pylones.

We've already done all of the tourist bullshit, and my parents have (thankfully) outgrown Times Square. This past year, they've had fun exploring Brooklyn since I live there, but still, I feel like we've done it all.

So, plans for this weekend involved eating, drinking, shopping, and seeing Jersey Boys (where I was the youngest person in the audience by about 30 years).

Now, let me say this: traveling between NYC and Buffalo could not be easier. With the new Jet Blue terminal out of JFK, it's literally a 45 minute flight. But my mother, afraid to do anything by herself, chose a 10 hour Amtrak ride instead—she'd feel safer on a train, she said.

Regardless of what mode of transportation she took, my father and I told my mother to pack light. When she got to Penn Station with her huge, heavy suitcase, a still heavy smaller suitcase, and large cooler bag (she needed snacks for the long voyage), she was annoyed that there were no porters. Then, she was annoyed that no one stopped to help her carry her bags.

I told her, this is why I love New York. You have to depend on yourself, because no one else is going to help you. It's all about self-sufficiency.