TiVo my love

You guessed it, it didn't rain on the day of my supposed birthday party. But, of course that's after I made a game-time decision and decided to postpone it. Doh! Murphy's Law strikes again! However, I decided to take my mom's advice and do kind of a Christmas in July kind of thing by telling everyone that we'd postpone celebrating the existence of me (hehe) till a much sunnier day in July. I'm an only child, so I'm all for extending the birthday season as long as I can. As an alternative, I did meet some friends out that night for some drinks, and I must say that as far as friends go, mine are excellent:) Flowers, gifts AND microbrew beer! And now onto the good stuff (presents)...

This was a good year for me my friends. An embarrassment of riches rained down on me, the mightiest of which came in a package called TiVo. Now, I love TV, always have and always will. Call me a junkie, call me a fool, but at least I'm increasing my pop culture knowledge on a daily basis to be used to whomp yo' ass at Trivial Pursuit at a not to distant time in the future. I used to hesitate on the topic of TiVo because I never thought I'd see the light of day one I was able to digitally record and download all my shows, but I finally gave in to the glory that is TiVo. If you're not familiar with TiVo, and I think you should be educated on this matter, it is a digital service hooked up through a DVR (digital video recorder) that enables you to digitally record your shows. At it's most basic level, it takes the place of VHS tapes. But as you use it more, the more you wonder how you ever lived without it. In the beginning TiVo provides generic recommendations of things you might want to watch. It stores in it's memory every single show that will be coming on TV for the next 2 weeks and updates that list every day. You, as a picky consumer, have a thumbs up and a thumbs down button on your remote and can start to rate shows you like or not. And like Amazon.com, TiVo learns what you like to watch. It's so cool! And you can tell TiVo if you like certain actors or directors or genres of programs and it looks for them and tapes them for you. So bitchin! I seriously could go on and on and on about my TiVo, but I won't (mostly because I'm getting tired of typing). But check out the TiVo site of you want to hear lots more about it.

The new slogan should be, "TiVo, the best thing since Dunkin Donuts!"

Stupid F*$&%^ Rain

Good morning friends! I'm happy to report that yesterday's search for free birthday goodies went off without a hitch. Emily did not have to open her wallet once the whole day. So thank you Starbucks, crew at Jimmy Johns, and other friends for all the free loading:)

Okay, so I decided to prolong the birthday fun and have a big BBQ in my backyard this weekend. Lots of friends, beer, burgers and horseshoes. Good times, no? Then I see the change in the weather forecast. Fucking weather! There's a 90% chance of thunderstorms tomorrow. 90%!!! If it was 30% or even 50%, I'd stand outside and dare the weather to rain on my parade. But 90%! C'mon, even I won't take those odds. So I have in a dilemma: cancel my party and try to reschedule for a time when everyone can come OR try to fit 20+ people in my small apartment. After the BBQ, we were all headed to a baseball game, so I guess that's out too. Fucking rain!

So the poll of the day asks: What would you do? Would you reschedule? Try to cram people in? Pick a new activity? I'm open to suggestions, believe me! Alrighty, gotta go fret some more. Do a little rain dance for me in the meantime:)

Calling all sidekicks

Good morning all! It's a glorious 22nd of June and as of 8:18 this morning, I am now 27 years old. I wish I could say I felt wiser and more mature, but I don't. But, as an only child, the one thing I do know how to do is milk every last drop out of my special day. Yes, folks, I feel no shame in telling perfect strangers that it's my birthday if it'll get me free stuff. It'll be like my 14th birthday at Kennywood when I casually mentioned to strangers on the Teacups that it was my birthday and proceeded to swindle Dippin Dots from them after the ride. Shameless, yes. Guilty, no!

In order to milk this day for all it's worth, I'll be making the rounds at all local establishments this afternoon for free birthday cookies, coffee, and appetizers;) If anyone would like to come with me and be my sidekick for the day, there are certain qualifications you must be in possession of to be considered for the job:

(1) You must have good lungs. This is a marathon, not a sprint. In order to suck the marrow out of one's birthday, you need to be in top vocal shape in order to handle the many rounds of "Happy Birthday" that will inevitably follow the day's activities.

(2) You must be multilingual. There is nothing more embarrassing than having the gang at The Olive Garden or MadMex sing a birthday ditty in Italian or Spanish and not being able to sing along.

(3) You must have excellent hint-dropping skills. Some places (and I won't name names) take a little more cajoling to give into the birthday fever and give me free stuff. Therefore, a good side-kick knows how to finesse that extra free dessert from the waitress while preserving the integrity and pseudo-modesty of the birthday girl. God forbid the birthday girl seem spoiled in public and have to request free stuff herself.

(4) You must have a big appetite. With the bevy of goodies that we will undoubtedly reap, you need to be a champion and not waste the free treats. It's just bad karma!

If you or someone you know is interested in fulfilling the birthday sidekick position, please send all applications to RedRedRine "aka birthday biznatch", Starbucks (where I always am), State College, PA, (some zip code). Okay, I'm off to enjoy the goodness that is my birthday. Later!

*NOTE: As of 11:30am, the good crew at Starbucks decided to treat me to a grande iced caramel macchiato. The free stuff has begun! Whoohoo!!!

Back in Blog

Hey everyone! Miss me?;) Yes, I do realize that it's been a month and a half or so since I've blogged, but there's been so much going on that I haven't really had any time to sit down and blog my adventures. For starters, I was out of town for almost the entire month of May. After finals (which were a bitch!), I headed off to L.A. for a week and then to Hawaii for another week. As soon as I got back, I spent another week at home Ohio. Since I've been back, I've written 2 more papers and started teaching a new summer ESL course. And of course my birthday is this coming week and I start a new Intensive French Reading class next week too, so the whirlwind continues. I have so many stories to backtrack and share that it's going to take lots of blog entries over the next week to cover them all, so bear with me. But I AM alive and well and getting back in the blogging spirit. Till I can write more, here are a few pics from my various adventures to whet your appetite. Later gators!
















Em, Laura, Lindsay, and puppy Lenny livin it up in L.A.

















Waikiki sunset

Hot Hawaiian Hula Men (Yummy!)