Hey...have ya seen the shopping page? I'd love it if you'd shop from there, but I'd love it even more if you'd give me some suggestions on what ELSE to have there. Drop me an e and let me know what you think it's missing. I'm considering a few places like LLBean.com, j.crew and a few others. What say you? I've been spending some time thinking about where you might like to spend your money. Let me know what you think.
It's been a couple of months since I've checked in, but at least they've been *busy* months! Stockwood Renaissance Faire, road trippin' with Mike and the Girlcats, having yard sales, etc. We're both looking for jobs now that Ameritrade has laid Mike off and I've still not gotten any assignments from The Weasel.
Speaking of Stockwood, while I was up at Twin Lakes Lodge pre-faire, I was reading a new book by Eric Bogosian. I should have known better. Eric Bogosian isn't really known for lighthearted frolics. Even his characters on Law & Order aren't the nicest, happiest guys. But reading this book, this *fabulous* book, in the middle of an abandoned "resort" in upstate NY in the middle of the night with a very flimsy lock on the door is not a good idea. Read it in your home. With your big dog nearby. It's called "Mall", and it rocks. It rocks in a dark, twisted way, but it rocks. My friend Sairey gave it to me as a little giftie, and I am forever grateful. Great great book. You know me, and you know that I wouldn't recommend a book I don't like. I love it. If you have a liking for a nice, dark little romp through the various human addictions, you should definitely check out this book.
Click here and get it all for yourself! Happy reading!
I'll start with tales of the Road Trip, since everyone seems to want to hear all about it. We started out just going to MD, to see Mike's family. Spent a few days there getting used to the camera equipment and making sure that the Girlcats were going to do okay with the traveling. They were fine, and we were ready to move on, and so off we went. First stop: Ohio. Mike's nephew had some Events that week-end, so we decided to show up and tape them for the family. Nick qualified for national competition at his Taekwondo competition, which was awesome. Stayed at a *wonderful* little B&B while in Ohio, called Rocking Horse Inn. The Proprietor was lovely, welcomed the Girlcats with open arms (even put their names on the welcome card! His reasoning? "They're guests too!"), had all manner of luxuries available for us (snacks 24 hours, lovely continental breakfast setup, coffee and tea whenever we wanted it, wine, soda, usage of the huge jet tub down the hall) and introduced us to his pet chinchilla as well. If you happen to be in Ravenna, Ohio, definitely go there for a lovely room at an affordable price. Remeber to bring nuts of some sort to feed the black squirrel who will take them out of your hand if you happen to be chilling on the side porch.
While there, we headed over to Kent (home of Kent State University) for some adult beverages. Happened into a typical college bar called The Loft. Well, there was a booth of 3 girls sitting behind us, minding their own business and having a fine time on their own. In walks "Biff". Biff looks the same on every college campus everywhere. Jeans baggy enough in the legs, but more form fitting in the crotch/butt area, to show himself off. Sweater that on a girl would be considered "cropped", with a boatneck. Blonde hair, perfect. Muscular. You get the idea. So Biff walks in, and decides to grace these girls with his company. All was okay, but then Biff's drunk self started talking about these girls accepting Jesus as their Lord and Savior, and *then* tries to get one of these girls to sleep with him. Well, she tells him that they were fine by themselves, and that if he'd leave, they'd be happy once again. He replies "Get off of my cock, bitch". Jamie replies simply by flinging the contents of her pint of beer on him. He stands up, makes as if to hit her, and instead picks up the pint glass and flings the *maybe* 3 tablespoons of liquid remaining in the bottom at her and her friend, managing to splash me in the process. Needless to say, he was ejected from that bar, and we all had a fine remainder of the evening.
From Ravenna, we headed on down to Columbus to meet GypsySpice, one of the lovelies who hangs at the Bad Girl Swirl. She showed us all around the area, and gave us more information about Columbus than I think I'll ever retain, but we did have a wonderful time. I will say that the people who were working at the Apple Store at Easton Towne Center in Columbus were a bunch of unpleasant jerks, and I wouldn't recommend shopping there unless you doublecheck the compatibility of everything you're planning on purchasing *before* you lay out the jing for it.
From Columbus, we headed northwest, through Indiana and a sliver of Illinois before hitting Milwaukee for the night. Now, I'll say this: People from or in Indiana may love their state, NASCAR racing, and basketball. They may be happy there. We, however, found it to be miserable in many aspects AND the Girlcats didn't like it. The stinkiest in-car poo was laid out in Indiana. The only time there was feline barfing was in Indiana. They both bitched incessantly until we got out into Illinois. Unfortunately, when we got to Illinois, we found that people there drive like complete maniacs. Maybe it's just the Chicago metro area, I don't know. Either way, we made it to Wisconsin. I had warned Mike that there was lots of cheese-related madness there, as well as just some damn funny signs. Sure enough, not long after we crossed over, we passed by the "Bong Recreational Area". I'm not kidding. Of course, it's named after Major Richard I. Bong, but no matter. The sign said "Bong Recreational Area", and the only reason we didn't stop to get a photo was because it had been a long damn day in the car and we were tired. We also passed by the Mars Cheese Castle, and their informative leaflet let me know the difference between processed cheese and a gourmet cheese is that gourmet cheeses are "sold in cheese shops where the shopkeeper will cut the cheese for you". We stopped in Milwaukee for the night ("Home of the Milwaukee Beer Farts" quips Mike), and we got to hang out with the ever fabulous Jenn from Makeup Alley. We talked makeup, we swapped a bit, Charlotte took an instant liking to Jenn and wanted to play all night, Madeline hid in the "cave" under the bed. Of course, it took us almost 1/2 hour of driving around to find a hotel as there was a Bowling Tournament *and* a boat show in Milwaukee. I should have guessed.
The next day, we were off to Bloomington, MN. It was necessary for us to set foot inside the Migraine of America...um, I mean MALL of America, to hit the Apple Store there, thanks to the MORONS at the Apple Store in Ohio. Drove across Wisconsin, saw lots of ads for Cheese, as well as for The Circus World Museum in Baraboo, WI. I narrowly escaped having to go there and be confronted by clowns simply due to scheduling. *whew* Made it into Bloomington, got into a hotel, hung out with Raven and Blake a bit while there. Raven hooked me up with a design for my next tattoo. This one will be a bat, but it's much in the same style as my other tattoo. It will go in my lower back. YAY! Although we did have to suffer through the Migraine of America, we emerged unscathed.
Next day, we headed up to Duluth, MN. The goal was to surprise the crap out of my mom. She was up collecting a few things from the house (including Perkins, the cat) to bring down to the land in WI. It was going to be her last day in town, so I took my brother up on his generous offer to crash at his place the first night. On our way up, we stopped at a rest stop just outside of Wrenshall and saw...BUNNIES! They hopped right up to Mike and said hello. He took loads of footage on the video camera. When he brought the camera down to bunny level, one of them hopped right up and shoved his nose in the camera. Awesome. Not long later, we were just crossing the city line and my brother calls the cellphone, notifying us that Mom and Gerry are indeed at home, Gerry knows that we're coming and will keep Mom at home until we get there. 20 minutes later, we were about 4 blocks away from Mom's house, so we called. I'm chatting with her like nothing's up (she thinks we're still on Ohio...heh), we pull up in front of the house, get out of the car, knock on the door, she says "Oh great...somebody's at the door...hang on....sheesh", and then she sees my pink hair through the door window and shrieks. Awesome! Totally shocked the heck out of her, and she's usually a tough one to get things past.
Spent a few days in Duluth, with the house all to ourselves (since Mom and Gerry and Perkins wouldn't be there). Hung out with friends like Earache and Cris. Raven and Blake stopped over for a bit. Went to sing karaoke (with Earache nearly killing me as he's looking through the book and saying, "Hey...look! Bon Jovi! 'Your love is like...BAAAAD venison!' "), chilled at Sir Benedict's, and generally relaxed. Got to see my brother and his lovely wife (and finally give the woman her Christmas present). Of course, we also went to see the Biggest Ball of Twine and the SPAM Museum. Shot some great footage at both, but were unable to gain access and permission to shoot at the 3M Sandpaper Museum. Apparently, this place is like Mecca for 3M executives. Go figure. Oh, and poor Mike had a heck of a time trying to NOT pick up the northern Minnesota accent. That was pretty amusing to watch.
After collecting as much footage as we could, we decided to cut the trip short and come home. We had hoped to go to Graceland, visit friends in Kentucky, meet up with Crow, and a number of other things, but we were running out of money so it was a good idea for us to come home. First, though, we headed back through Wisconsin so that we could see my mom's piece of land in Viroqua. Nice chunk of land she's got there, and I can't wait to see what happens when they finally build there.
Unfortunately, due to the fact that nobody west of the East Coast sells the food that we feed our cats, we had to switch their food about a day or so before we hit Viroqua. Seems as though the kitten didn't take to it very well, and I got worried and was freaking out. So we managed to find *the nicest* vet there, who not only saw us on VERY short notice, but also hooked us up with all the meds we needed for her, some chicken baby food to mush the pills up in (again, go figure...I never would have thought of it, but she snarfed it right up), and sent us photocopies of the records they took on the cats. Doc said that they both looked really good for the amount of time that they'd been on the road, and told us at least one thing that we already knew: They're gorgeous cats. Problem solved, we moved on and began driving home. One quick stop on South Central WisCompton (thanks, Muggzy) to pick up some Dr. McGillicuddy's Vanilla Schanpps (to make Cherry Cheesecakes, but I can't get it on the East Coast), and then back through godforsaken Indiana We just couldn't make it through to Ohio without falling asleep at the wheel, so we decided to stop on South Bend. Anyone travelling with pets, BE WARNED! It is nigh on impossible to find a hotel that takes pets in South Bend, IN without wanting a $150 "deposit", except that they don't give you the money back. We tried to tell them that if they don't give the money BACK, it's not a "deposit", it's a "charge", but they would hear none of it. Either way, the only place we found, after an hour and a half of driving, stopping, and looking, was the Carleton Lodge. Also the best bed on the whole trip, I gotta say. I wanted to move in.
Home again, home again, jiggity jog. Brief stop in MD again to check in with Mike's mom, and then we headed home. The Girlcats were pleased to have their water fountain back. I was happy to sleep in my own bed again. Mike was happy to have constant online access so he can edit the footage we took. Why all this footage? Are we planning on boring all of our friends with home videos of our summer vacation? No. We're finally trying to get Chirp! Productions off the ground. We have some ideas for a few programs that we'll be pitching, and in the meantime, we'll be working on producing radio/tv commercials and the like. Know anyone who wants a commercial put together? We're very reasonable, and we'll take anything we can get at this point. Anything to help get us off the ground.
Yes, the hair is still fuschia. Seems as though people are busy watching old episodes of The Osbournes, and haven't caught on to the fact that Kelly Osbourne's hair colour and style have changed. At least 8 times throughout the trip, people thought that I was Kelly, and on a couple of occasions, people thought that Mike was Jack Osbourne. LOL Why couldn't they have bought me drinks or paid for my meal or asked for my autograph? I started thinking I should just tell people "F*ck OFF!" when they asked, but then they'd REALLY think I was her and I'd never get them to leave me alone. Ah well. I may as well enjoy it, it's as close to celebrity as I'll get.
Speaking of hairdos, yes, I'm still on about this thing. Help me out. I'd really really appreciate it. See, I wanna play a funny joke on excessively trendy people, and I know you'll make a great accomplice. I wanna start a trend. We'll track it here, and I can't wait to see it featured in magazines. So far, I've gotten ZERO emails about this, so really, people, GET ON THE BALL! LOL
See, I was over at the House of Doom a whilie ago, and I happened to be wearing a hat. Nifty little black felt guy I snagged. Anyway, S'tan decided to remove it from my head, and her 13 year-old daughter 'Mantha said "Ooo! Hat head!" I grumbled that I was well aware of my fierce hat head, and she replied "No...it looks cool". That got me thinking. Thinking so hard, in fact, that that night while lying in bed, I had to cram a pillow into my face to keep my laughing from waking up Mike.
We all know that 13 year olds are now the arbiters of fashion (doubt me? Look around, please.). If a 13 year old girl called my hat head "cool", then it must BE cool. There's probably MORE people who would think it was cool if they saw it on the right head.
So that's it. Hat head. There will be photos in fashion magazines of people on the street in hats so that when they get to their destinations they can remove them and have PERFECT HAT HEAD!!! Styling products can be hyped. Hats can be hyped. I can't wait. Wanna help? Get yourself some fierce hat head, and walk around like that. Proud. Tell people that it's the hottest thing going right now. All you need is a few people in each city. And when you have a hat head sighting, EMAIL ME!!! I wanna know how you're having an effect on the trendoids in your town. Let's do it!
Remember that karaoke contest I mentioned last time? Well, I didn't get a damn thing. LOL Came in something like 7th place. Oh well. Better luck next time.
Other than that, we've just been having an ever-growing yard sale here at the house on the week-ends. Gotta get rid of some of the extra crap in the house. We've finally gotten mostly unpacked from the move and from the trip, and it's time to start liquidating. Books, CD's, clothes...all sorts of stuff. A computer printer, AND a quadrophonic stereo receiver. Not bad, eh? If you're in the area, come check us out on the week-ends. Take some of this stuff off of our hands. PLEASE!
Okay...that's all for now. Stop back every once in a while if you feel like checking on the progress of the HatHead Revolution, or if you just feel like doing some shopping in your underwear (not that you have to be in your underwear to shop at my site). Go outside, enjoy the lovely weather...there's gonna be a harsh winter soon enough.