the fifth

i went to a new bar the other night for charlie's birthday festivities.
it's close to home, it's roomy, it has comfortable couches, it is called The Fifth, and its sign has flashing lights.

at the end of our visit, matt went to close out his tab. at the end of one couch perpendicular to the one i was on, there sat a man. a creepy, creepy man. he was a bit older, had greasy tight curls on his head, and i believe he was wearing glasses. think doug from flight of the conchords, but grosser and creepier [i like doug].



anyway. matt stepped up, and i was sitting there by myself and i happened to glance over at this man. i'm not sure if i heard him say something and i looked over or if i just happened to make eye contact with him, but somehow he got my attention. he put his hands around his mouth and said something. i had no idea what he said. so i got up [why?] and asked him what he had said.

"can i buy you a car?"
"excuse me?"
"can i buy you a car?"
"haha, yeah that'd be nice. i could really use a car."
:stares and says nothing: then, "what?"
"what?"
"can i buy you a car?"
"uhh, no thanks."

he said some other things [i think?] and then stuck his hand out. imagining him as a sad old man rather than a registered sex offender, i shook his hand. he didn't let go. he held onto it, his chubby sweaty hands making me want to vom, kissed it, then tried to put his hand on my face. i proceeded to pull away, managed some sort of smile, promptly turned around and bent over next to baxter and her friend who was showing her something on his cell phone. aware that this man was now probably staring at my ass, i whispered, "just let me pretend i'm interested in what you're looking at." they picked up on what was going on and engaged me in conversation. matt soon showed back up, we left, and he couldn't believe what had happened. a lot can happen in 2 minutes.

monday morning

i am in such a good mood this morning that i did not flinch once when a man almost killed me with his death stare and road rage this morning.

apparently it was my fault. but i didn't see it that way. and i didn't even get angry when he thought otherwise. let me lay out the chain of events for you.

i was driving south on western and was stopped at a red light waiting to make a right onto melrose. there are three lanes going west on melrose at this point, with the 3rd lane only a 'sometimes' lane, as after 9am it can be used for street parking. anyway. i saw that the 3rd lane was open, and that a tractor trailer driving west was turning right at the light, leaving me a bit of a window to turn right on red.
following so far?
so i turn right on red and hear honking and when i look in my rear view mirror there is a pick up ON MY ASS. i have no idea where it came from, but deduced that it was either behind the tractor trailer and passed it in the middle of the intersection, or it was in the 2nd lane and moved to the 3rd lane in the middle of the intersection. because it certainly was not in front of the tractor trailer to begin with, otherwise why would i ever have pulled out?
anyway. so this truck beeped at me, and then it passed me on the left and then tried to get back in front of me, but instead of just proceeding to go in front of me, he deliberately slowed down and pretty much almost made me hit him. so i hit my brakes so i WOULDN'T hit him, and now he is in front of me. then i saw a parked car coming up in our lane, so i turn signaled and started to go over to the left lane. he did the same at the very last minute, just staying on the line between our two lanes so that i couldn't really do anything. all the while he was on his brakes, swerving in between the two lanes so i couldn't pass him, and giving me a nasty nasty look in his side mirror, shaking his head. finally he moved left, so do i, and then i passed him on the right, not making any effort to glance his way or make any sort of gesture. normally i would return his kindness by staying right on HIS ass and making a big scene with horns and ugly faces. but this event honestly did not phase me one bit. i didn't get that feeling in my stomach that i usually get when i am in traffic and want to scream at everyone at the top of my lungs. i didn't feel a single urge to rear end him [what do i care? my car's a tank].
anyway.
screw you, mr. truck, if you feel the need to be an asshole on the road.
because frankly, i. don't. care!

for kristina.

saturday arts and crafts

I FIGURED OUT WHAT TO DO FOR MY CHRISTMAS CARDS THIS YEAR AND I AM SO EXCITED.

would you take pity on me?

sent to united customer relations:

Hello,

I received your email address from a nice man named Sidart, who suggested I write you.
I am writing with a question/complaint about a free ticket voucher I received last year.

Last Christmas I gave up my seat on a United flight in order to make room for someone whose flight had been canceled the day before. In exchange, I received a voucher for a free round trip flight to use within the next two years.

I attempted to use this voucher this holiday season to fly from Burbank, Ca to NYC. I had picked out my flight times online: [insert flight times/dates here]. I phoned a reservations agent to redeem my voucher and was told that I could not fly at these times. I could only fly out on Dec 23 at 9:59 am and there were, in fact, no flights that I was eligible for to return on January 3rd. This does not work for me. I have to be at work on December 23rd and cannot fly out in the morning, and the fact that I cannot fly back on January 3rd at all clearly does not work, either.

Apparently, my voucher is only good for certain flights - W, V, and Q classes. I did not know what this meant - no one told me there would be restrictions, nobody explained what these "classes" were, and now I am stuck. Yes, there are flights out of LAX, but as I live 4 miles from Burbank Airport, that is clearly the more convenient option, not to mention that on these dates/times, I have no way of getting to LAX.

So basically, I am writing to see what there is that you can do for me. I feel a bit duped by the person who handed me this voucher and told me I could use it on any round trip flight I chose. I gave up my seat as a favor to you. I sat in an airport for 14 hours as a favor to you. I saw my family and friends one day late at Christmas as a favor to you. And now, I am asking, in the spirit of the holidays, please do a favor for me and help me book the flights I need.

Thank you in advance, and thank you for taking the time to read :)

-----------------

now we wait.

rash.

i have a rash on my face.
i noticed it two nights ago at the gym. it was in the corner of my eye.
the next morning i woke up and it had traveled across the rest of my eye. it was on my eyelid, on the other corner of my eye, and underneath my eye. throughout the rest of the day it creeped onto the left side of my nose and to the outer edge of and behind my ear.
after watching me put my hair behind my ear this morning, detective matt concluded that i must have had something on my hand, rubbed my eye, scratched my nose, and put my hair behind my ear.
this sucks. now my eye is swollen.
it's only gotten worse since two nights ago and it itches like a mofo.
not to mention i look like a freak.

yellow

the apartment downstairs is playing music really loudly. rock music. this usually means that the two boys' parents are out [the van being gone confirms my suspicion].

currently 'yellow' by coldplay is on. and it is bringing me back to 10th grade. man. i remember sitting in a car with kristina and maybe maria? ugh i don't remember. but some parent was driving and this song came on and i was so excited.

now viva la vida is coming up through the floor.
seems to be a coldplay kind of morning.

edit: metallica.
edit: frank sinatra
edit: michael jackson

just let me eat you!!

do you ever feel like some unknown force is trying to keep you from doing something?

i do.
like just a minute ago.

after halloween, my boss brought in the pounds of extra candy that she was left with after the last of the trick-or-treaters had gone. most of this i left in the kitchen on the 3rd floor [it was gone in a day] but i horded just a wee bit of it for myself: the haribo mini gummy bears. i brought most of them home to hermitage, but i kept a few hidden on my desk for when i was having an afternoon craving or felt like i needed to reward myself after getting through another busy day. today after my walk i thought i should treat myself to something sweet and gummy [it was a long walk!]. i went over to the spot on my desk in between the cd cases and the organizational paper basket and i reached for the last bag of bears. these guys have gotten me through a lot over the last couple of weeks, and i was sad to be finished with them. i reluctantly began to tear open the 2 in. x 2 in. plastic bag.
it wouldn't open.
i tried from the other side. it still wouldn't open.
i tried from the middle, i tried twisting my hands in the opposite direction, but this bag would. not. open.
so finally i tried opening it like a bag of chips.
and this is what happened.

trai my chai

when i worked at the garden street cafe we would make our own chai tea. it was so delicious and i had to have the recipe. when i went back to skidmore i took the recipe with me and made it on a semi-often basis [the spices were a bit pricey considering i had to get most of them from four seasons, and we all know how ridiculously over priced local health food stores can be..]

anyway.
the last time i made this drink was when i was in london in the fall of 2007. i made it for one of the students' study breaks. i had found a bangladeshi grocery store on brick lane, and i got these amazing spices [cardamom seeds, whole star anise] for SO cheap. they were 2 pounds or less. and when you are being paid in pounds, there is no need to think about the conversion. so these were a steal. i bought a whole bunch and made my 38 students a big batch of chai.

anyway - that's the last time i made it. 2 years ago.
i talk about making it every once in awhile, but it is a bit of a production, and to be honest, it's hard to be inspired to make a traditionally warm and cozy drink when it's 80 degrees out.
but the weather here has been getting a bit chillier, and when i was at Jon's last night [international supermarket] i happened upon their middle eastern spice section. the prices for these spices [rhyme!] were quite reasonable, and in front of me was basically everything i needed. i have some left over from london, but don't quite have the heart to finish them off [sentimental pack rat that i am]. so i splurged and bought my supplies and went home and made myself a batch. and now i would like to share it with you. :)

CHAI!
1 gallon H20
.5 cup sugar [i would even go less next time. this batch came out super sweet, and while the milk calms it down a bit, i bet you could afford to go with 1/3 cup of sugar..though i haven't tried that yet, so don't quote me]
.5 cup honey
1 oz fresh ginger, thinly sliced
5 cardamom pods, broken open
2/3 T ground cardamom [i cut this recipe down from a much larger one, so disregard the strange measurements]
1/2 T ground nutmeg
3 cinnamon sticks, broken in half
1/2 T ground cinnamon
1/24 oz [maybe about 2 T?] cloves
3 peppercorns
2 star anise
1.125 oz black tea, loose [assam and darjeeling work well if you can't find straight up black tea. also, if you can't find loose tea, you can always buy bags and cut them open. this is sometimes easier, math-wise, as you can figure out the weight based on the number of bags, total weight, etc.]


-Combine sugar, honey, water and spices in a large pot [now you can do this one of two ways. you can either throw the spices right into the pot and strain them afterwards, or you can make a bouquet garni with a bit of cheesecloth and throw the little package right in].
-Bring to a boil and let simmer for 10 minutes
-Turn off burner
-Add in tea [again, in a cheese cloth or straight into the pot. i find that the tea diffuses much better if you pour it straight into the pot and then strain using a very fine strainer or a strainer + cheese cloth..or very carefully with paper towels like i used to do before i invested in a $3 package of cheese cloth].
-ONLY KEEP TEA IN FOR 6 MINUTES. this is very important. if you leave the tea in for too long you will end up with bitter chai. black tea is strong - so be careful!
-strain tea and/or spices if you have floaters
-pour yourself a mug of hot tea, add milk, and ENJOY.

:)

jason segel rocks my world

last night i went to see the swell season [glen hansard & marketa irglova from the movie Once].

more on this later, but in the mean time, take a look at the special guest who showed up at the end of the set.

AH JASON SEGEL. HOW COOL.

a very large berry

right??

my turn for synchronicity

it seems like synchronicity is the thing of 2009. at least for kristina and a girl whose blog she is subscribed to.

so here for you today, i have my own case of it.

sometime saturday, matt and i were talking about the film fargo and the fact that i hadn't seen it. so we got home and asked tim if he wouldn't mind downloading it.

i got to the gym and up on one of the tvs was steve buscemi. my friend jeannine commented on how great he was in reservoir dogs and then how even more wonderful he was in fargo.

i stopped at home after the gym to grab some things and checked the mail. in the pile was a piece of junk mail that i decided to turn over and inspect. it was from fargo, nd.

the film had not finished downloading by the time we got home, but it WAS finished yesterday, and so i watched it last night. and was not disappointed. i wished it had gone on for longer.

i chose the wrong machine

i got to the gym on saturday and almost the entire back row of ellipticals was free. there were 2 women and 2 men spread among the probably 15 machines. there were more than enough machines for me to have an empty one on each side, but i wanted to be in front of a certain television, so i jumped onto an elliptical next to a woman on the phone. i put in my headphones and found the channel for cnn. all of a sudden i heard the woman next to me saying something. i took my headphone out of my right ear and said "what was that?"
"i have no idea how to use this thing! my sister just bought it for me and i have no idea how to use this stupid thing!"
she was referring to her iphone, which, i found out, she had just received that day.
let me tell you what else i found out.

"2009 has been such a rough year" for her. her last cell phone broke, she paid $100 to have it fixed, and "the fucking thing broke again." she has no money, so her sister bought her an iphone. her son was taken away from her today and is now in "the freak house." i believe she was referring to her ex-husband's house. ["do you know michael madsen? he's my ex. he's fucking crazy. drunk lunatic. bitter because he was supposed to be brad pitt." -give or take a few words-]

i looked down at her machine and saw that she had only been running for 8 minutes.
oy.

she proceeded to tell me all about the mess with her lawyers and about her dentist [?] and her doctor and how everyone is yelling at everyone and how she is allergic to second-hand smoke and no one will believe her, and how she missed her first audition in a year [for Cold Case] because she was sick, and how her doctor told her that she was only sick because of stress and that she should eat well and take care of her body ["even though it's really because of the smoke."] "what is it with these people? is it really just the town??" i said that yes, i thought it was just the town we lived in, and i asked her how long she had been here, thinking maybe she was new to the scene ["oh, pretty much my whole life."].

nicolas cage was on one of the tv's. "ugh, what a jerk. do you know he just kicked the mother of his son out of the house? their son just turned 18 and the day that he did, he kicked them out. he could've bought them a nice house in the hills and maybe given them a million dollars or something to set them up. but he didn't. 'get out my house NOW!!' and he gave them $1500. can you believe that??? i've been friends with this woman for 22 years, poor thing. and her son just attacked the paparazzi the other day and now he'll face jail time because he's 18. ugh and nicolas cage is not even attractive. he never was."

she asked me how many hours a day i work out and when i said not very many [uhh...one?] she asked me why. i said because i worked and had other things to do. she asked me if i had roommates. she asked me how i met my boyfriend. she asked where i went to school. she asked what liberal arts meant. she said she used to dance. she kept saying 'huh? huh? huh?' because she thought i was saying something when i actually wasn't. i was trying to elliptical.

she would stop pedaling when she had something really serious to say and she would look me right in the eye, sometimes touching my shoulder.

she went on for 21 minutes. i know this because i looked down at my machine when she abruptly left. she had received a phone call, had no idea how to answer it, had me do it for her, and then finally said 'hello?' after i said 'talk! say hello!' she then told whoever was on the phone that she was going to step outside. and with that she jumped off her machine, scooped up her pink towel from off of the floor, and left.

no 'see you later,' 'be back soon,' 'nice talking to you' or anything of the sort. which i was slightly surprised about, and then thought better of the situation and started to laugh. of course she wouldn't acknowledge me when she had something better to occupy her time with. it is, in fact, how the people in 'this town' operate. i kept looking behind me to see if she was coming back in the gym. i didn't see her again.

i wondered the entire time that we were talking if anyone else was seeing what was going on. did they know that a. this woman was crazy and b. i had no idea who she was and she was literally holding me captive? i laughed again at how funny we must have looked and then thought about how grateful i would have been if i had been in another's shoes and was watching my situation from afar. while i was in it, all i wanted was for her to stop talking and leave me alone. but now, well now i've got one more 'only in la' story for the books.



[i did think for quite awhile that maybe she was just one of those crazies that had done a lot of research and was able to lie through her teeth very very well.
so when i got home i did my own bit of research and found that this woman does exist. and that her name is jeannine bisignano. and that she was, in fact, married to michael madsen back in the day.]

friday the 13th

for as long as i can remember, my friday the 13ths have been extraordinary days. my luck seems endless, and great things always happen. i'm wondering if today might be different.

i woke up to cat vomit on the living room floor [chris graciously cleaned it up].
matt told me he may NOT be able to meet chris perone, his boyfriend and i for dinner after all.
my coffee spilled in my car, seeping into my ignition [my ignition is down by my seat].

this is all i have to work off of so far, but i'm hoping my day turns around.

will keep you posted, as i'm sure you're all waiting with bated breath.

500 days of joseph gordon-levitt

please. for your own sake, watch this video.
if you've seen 500 days of summer, you know what it is. and you should watch it again.
if you haven't, you don't know what you are missing.

seriously, if you are ever in your whole life feeling just a little bit blue, this is 100% guaranteed to put a smile on your face and a flutter in your tummy.

AHHHH.

random thoughts of the morning

microwaves are amazing. this machine can bring almost any stale food back to life. i just used it for a stale chewy molasses cookie.

if there is suddenly a packet of hot chocolate in the cabinet, i'm going to assume i can have it.

there is a man/boy/male singing bad spanish songs in the studio. to be fair, he may not be singing badly, and the songs may in fact not be bad, but it is bothering me to no end.

i left my salsa out on the counter. i hope no one ate any.

i can't wait for lunch.

i despise the new itunes store. i can't see complete song names if they don't fit in the space allotted them; there is no way to expand the columns. [i think i may have just used a semi-colon correctly?]

i really hate that when i am typing something that requires emphasis on the word "I," i cannot do it just with capitalization like i can with most OTHER words. i end up writing "IIIIII" and that's just not as clear.

this hot chocolate is delicious :)



edit: 4:15pm the boy is STILL singing. yelling, actually. at the top of his lungs. and i am at my WIT'S END.

blogger annoyance, pt. 1

in two parts:

1. why is there not an iphone app so i can easily blog from the road?

2. why can i not access my dashboard from MY page? i have to go to someone else's blog to get to my dashboard. unless i am missing something. which is more than likely.

i got back on that horse

i went back to the gym yesterday. and i remembered to validate my parking ticket. and i avoided the gate with the man that i had cried in front of the day before.

it's alllll gooooood.

close to home

PRINCIPAL HELD HOSTAGE AT PINE PLAINS HIGH SCHOOL

this shit made cnn!

whenever i hear about some harrowing local event, i hope i know the bad guy. i rarely do, but i always get excited that it's someone i know who has gone bat shit crazy. unfortunately, i don't believe i know this man. but it's still an intriguing tale of a father gone loco at the school that sits "in a rural valley amid rolling hills." [why, pray tell, was that necessary?]

you know it's that time of the month when...

...the parking attendant tells you that you forgot to validate your parking ticket so you owe him $3.00 and you burst into tears.



thank god i had immediate access to this song on my drive home.

deal with it.

i got girly.
i have a flower as my photo.

..this may or may not change.

but for now,
deal with it.

"and i've done all i can...now i'm starting to see maybe it's got nothing to do with me"...barf.

i just decided in this moment to start an ongoing post about people who use song lyrics as a means to express their feelings in their facebook status updates.

it KILLS me when people do this.
see a movie or a tv show with a funny quote? cool.
politician say something stupid that you want everyone else to see? cool.
got some rad song lyrics you just wanna share with the world? ok, cool.
you're feeling lonely, sad, angry, in love, confused, etc etc and instead of your own words you decide that john mayer can say it better? AHHHHH!!!!

so here is where those updates shall lay to rest.

[i suppose for the sake of us all, i shall spare you the names of the facebook users who have sinned]

here we go.

"Your voice was the soundtrack to my summer..Do you know you're unlike any other? You're eyes are the brightest of all the colors, I dont wanna ever love another, ull always be my thunder. Strike me down with lightning, let me feel you in my veins, I wanna let you know how much I feel you're pain.......... [Boys Like Girls "Thunder"]

"Your face is scarred with age. You'er 23, how could that be?" [Stars "Going, Going, Gone"]

"And we won't be breathing in that same sun again None of this will ever surface again How we get older, how we forget about each other" [Converge "The Saddest Day"]

"cuz theres no tomorrow. just a picture perfect day that lasts a whole lifetime." [Jay Z "Young Forever"]

"let's take our time. i just want to look into your eyes and catch my breath...i've got that feeling" [Darius Rucker, "History in the Making"]

good weekend

dear diary,

i had a lovely weekend. nothing incredibly noteworthy happened, it was just a nice, happy, weekend. and now i shall tell you about it.

friday night i was sick [my weekend looks up from here]. i don't know what it was..i thought it was the fried food from the night before that were causing the stomach cramps, but when i got home from work and immediately crawled into bed [not to arise until 9am the next morning], i figured it was more than just the chicken fingers. i had a bit of a fever and was a tad nauseous and beyond tired. i slept on and off. matt went out and got me saltines and chicken broth, which i ate over the course of a long time while watching america's next top model. i began feeling a bit better before bed, and felt almost back to normal the next morning. weird.

saturday morning i went to EAT for breakfast with matt, chris, and tim. i ordered bacon and eggs and couldn't quite finish it all. tummy was still a little off. they also started using new potatoes for their homefries. instead of crispy, delicious, thinly sliced potatoes, they have small cubes with peppers and onions. not crispy. not the same. very disppointed. my arnold palmer was tasty, though.
matt worked upstairs for a lot of the day while i lied around watching hulu and doing other mindless activities to pass the time. we decided at some point that we would go for a bike ride, but matt had to fix our flat tires. just as he was about to start working on mine, we locked ourselves out of the house. chris and tim had gone to do laundry and all of the normal burglar entries were, for the first time, inaccessible. so we hung out outside. and it was great. we pushed each other up and down the street on the skateboard. one of us would sit on it and the other would run and push. it was remarkably exhilarating. i fell so many times and could not stop laughing. when chris and tim finally got home i didn't want to go inside!

saturday night we had grilled cheese and lipton's soup secrets for dinner [left over from my sick night]. that soup was a high school snow day in a bowl.
afterwards, matt worked for a little bit more and i began making my Seriously Sickeningly Unhealthy Cinnamon Buns [recipe to be posted soon]. as soon as the dough was rising we went over to charlie and baxter's and sat out by their pool with some of their neighbors. one of the girls there had a pure bred saint bernard. i don't think i've ever seen one before. she was beautiful. my timer went off which meant my dough was ready, and matt, chris, tim, and i went home, with charlie, baxter, and [c]k[h]rissy close behind. i told them the cinnamon buns would be done within the hour, which is presumably why they came over. but i forgot that once i put them together and rolled them up and placed them in the pan, they had to rise for another 45 minutes before i baked them.
whoops.
they left before they were finished.
more for us.
they were finally done around 1am.
AND THEY WERE SO GOOD OH MY GOD.

watched the new hbo show, Bored to Death, with jason schwartzman, zach galifinakis, and ted danson. not as funny as i had envisioned, but i certainly set myself up for this one. worth checking out. and i shall continue to watch.
chris fell asleep on the couch and started snoring unfathomably loud. we kicked him and threw things at him and he wouldn't wake up. he finally did and shouted something that sounded like 'oh damn!' the three of us burst out laughing, not able to contain ourselves when he yelled it a second time. while we were trying to figure out exactly what it was that had come out of his mouth, he turned around, big grin on his face and told that that 'lil' man' is what he had said. lil' man is the name of charlie and baxter's dog, who was nowhere to be found at this time of night. we figured he must have been dreaming. i literally could not contain myself and laughed for minutes straight. i was in pain. it felt SO good to have a laughing attack like that. it had been so long. and there has been so much stress built up in my life recently that i felt as if i were pushing it out of my body. this of course, is not true, as it is most certainly back, but for some reason it feels just a little less worse than it did : )

i woke up at 7am on the couch [what? when is the last time THAT happened?] and stumbled upstairs to go back to bed. woke up around 9, showered and went to meet matt's friend joel and his wife for lunch. joel is in the band broke city, which matt did some recording with last year. their songs are great! listen! joel lives in utah but was out here for a conference, so we met him for a quick lunch in between panels. we picked up allan on the way down, only to have to switch into his car after matt's started making funny noises.
we made it down to the westin by lax and ate at habit burger. matt and i had already eaten habit burger earlier this week, and eating it twice in one week, even twice in two weeks, is breaking our fast food burger rule. "but allan and joel and his wife just have to try it! i can't drive by a habit and not eat there!" said matt. so we stopped. and i [half] begrudgingly ordered a burger. ugh.
to the gym today or BUST.

joel and his wife are SUCH nice people. UGH! i wish they lived in los angeles. they would be such a lovely addition to our friend base. his wife is the nicest person i have met that has been wearing an ed hardy shirt. she was so nice that i didn't even notice she was wearing one. matt had to point it out to me. what lovely people.

we went home and sat around with tim and chris and chelsey, picked at the cinnamon buns, watched some Big Love and tried to figure out what to do with the rest of our sunday. matt and i went outside and rode the ripstick and skateboard up and down the street. some of the leaves on the street are changing color and it is beeeeautiful. the air is crisp and just before dusk the weather is perfect. we took the rest of the balloons from our halloween party and taped them to a big screen tv box out back and shot them with matt's blow gun. then we picked a lemon from the tree and shot that. then we got some soda cans and filled them with water and shot those. then it got too dark. sigh. hitting something with a blow gun is probably one of the most satisfying things ever. that, along with fitting the last piece into a puzzle and popping bubble wrap.

we sat around the house for the rest of the evening debating what to do. we watched indian jones and the last crusade. i had never seen it. jb came over. we watched some nature show about the loneliest animals. it was sad. we tried to watch iron man but were unsuccessful. matt and i went to my house to put a load of laundry in and then came back to hermitage. we watched the simpsons. lauren came over. tim put on true blood. chris went to bed. matt and i went back to my house and did more laundry, made english muffin pizzas, watched the office and 30 rock, and went to bed. i went to bed happy and woke up feeling not so bad for a monday. i dropped matt off at home and got an earlier start to my day than i usually do. perhaps the early morning sun is having an effect on me.

citizen's arrest

earlier this evening i looked out the window of the building i am working out of [short-term] and saw 3 high school-aged boys walking across the street. they looked like punks with their big hair and their baggy jeans, and i figured they were probably up to no good. but high-school no good. like sitting on the curb under a tree and getting high kind of no good.
a while later my old boss walked into the room and was staring out the window over my desk. i took a gander and saw a white SUV with 2 armed patrolmen, escorting these three boys in handcuffs into the back of their vehicle.
i wondered what had happened that turned what i assumed to be high school boys into apparent criminals.
i suppose i will never know.
though the knowledge [read: guess] that the building next door is in fact a crack house and the fact that the building i am in has bars on the windows and a gate you must unlock before getting to the front door give me the idea that this is not too uncommon.