Knut

There's gotta be something wrong with a 31-year-old woman who comes home after the bars and watches videos of baby polar bears. How do I ever expect to find a boyfriend?

But on the other hand, look how fucking cute Knut is...

Diary Thursday: Last weekend

I owe you a Diary Thursday. I don’t have one. Instead, I’ll write a new diary entry about my camping trip over the weekend.

Monday, May 26, 2008, 31-years-old, 11:30am

The time has come to say goodbye to our little log cabin on the Yuba River. I’m looking around our campsite – everything is wet and soggy, yet our campfire is still smoking, surrounded by empty Bud Light cans, wine bottles and S’more remnants. I’m amazed at how much fun we were able to have in such unfortunately weather. Whiffle ball, beer, hikes, beer, lots of food, sing-alongs, and more beer. Pretty much the perfect weekend.

We're hesitant to say our goodbyes because it will mean returning to the real world without a rushing river next to our make-shift kitchen, without Wes singing us songs around the fire, and without sleazy river guides giving us free massages.

But we soon will, and we'll head off in our various cars. And this weekend will soon be just another fond memory.

Bret & Jemaine

Last night I went to see Flight of the Conchords live. For those of you not familiar with their work, they are a two-man band from New Zealand who have a comedy show on HBO. And they’re hysterical. And adorable.

For some reason though, I was under the impression that most people were unaware of this. You would think the HBO show might have tipped me off, or the fact that their concert sold out in minutes on Ticketmaster.

But no, I still was under the impression that they were kinda my thing.

Which is why it was so upsetting that the auditorium was full of very vocal, expressive ladies lusting after MY men. Ladies with signs saying “I want to have your babies.” I had thought that they were reserved for me and Molly alone. I even sent them a message on Myspace inviting them to meet up after the show to make out. Now I feel so dumb. Why does this keep happening to me?

However, their performance was great. So I still love them, even though everyone else does too.

Here’s a clip I found on Youtube of an old concert:

Cats and dogs

I just checked out the weather for Downieville, the place we're camping this weekend.



My weather search was quickly followed by this:



Looks like it may be a fun weekend after all.

Bay to Breakers 2008

As an annual SF tradition, Bay to Breakers continues to amaze. For those of you that have not experienced the wonder that is Bay to Breakers, the whole city transforms into one giant party. It makes me proud to be a San Franciscan.

Here are the top five reasons I love Bay to Breakers:

1. The crowd




2. Alamo Square (check out Molly in the middle)


3. Creative “clothing”




4. Impromptu tattoos (it’s Richard Simmons riding a pony that’s stepping on a duck)


5. My drunk roommates


White Trash Geisha from Audrey on Vimeo.

Spray Simmons

I should’ve been tipped off by the orange hue of the man checking me in. Instead, I remained undeterred and continued into my spray tan appointment. This was all in the name of my Richard Simmons costume for Bay to Breakers, to which I was extremely devoted, beyond good judgment.

“So, is this stuff toxic?” I asked him as he showed me to the small booth.

“Not at all, it’s just sugar molecules, so it’s totally fine to breathe.”

I did not believe this carrot-faced man, but listened carefully to his instructions anyhow.

“Once you see this flashing green light, you have four poses,” he actively demonstrated as he spoke. “1. Ballerina 2. Charlie’s Angels to the left. 3. Charlie’s Angels to the right. 4. Turn your back.”

I tried to take it all in.

“Once you’re done, go back to the room with your clothes. You’ll notice that your tan is uneven. Use the towel to blot and the babywipes to clean certain areas.”

I was already lost. “Wait, so I take all my clothes off? Do I close my eyes? Are you sure it’s okay to breathe this stuff?”

“You’ll be fine. Come get me when you’re done.”

The booth itself was interesting, in a gas chamber kind of way. I tried to remember everything the Oompa Loompa said. Once I’d been sprayed down on all four sides, I went back to my small, mirrored room and gazed at my body. It was streaked, splotchy and awful. My face looked dirty and my feet looked like I’d been hiking barefoot in mud. Four baby wipes and some towel-patting later, I looked far worse.

I decided it was time to leave before I did any more damage. Richard Simmons, I kept telling myself. Richard Fake-tan Simmons.

Traffic Cone Head didn’t laugh at me when I exited, he just reminded me that the spray tan is buy one get one free. Yes, like I would ever return to the gas chambers by choice.

The next day, I was almost too embarrassed to go to yoga. Brian didn’t help by saying “I wouldn’t leave the house like that if I were you.” (This coming from the man who made me smell his wet hair this morning because he couldn’t remember if he’d shampooed in the shower or not.)

But a couple days worth of new skin and an exfoliating shower later, my tan doesn’t look half bad. It worked out well for my Richard Simmons outfit; I looked just like this (real pictures from yesterday to follow):

Hot summer nights

This week, San Francisco turned into everything I miss about New York summers…
People in flip-flops at night, sitting in the park under the stars, standing in line for ice cream.

This hottest day of the year happened to coincide with California’s legalization of gay marriage AND Bike to Work Day. So every single person in the city was out in good spirits to celebrate. I rode my bike around San Francisco all night, taking it all in. Oh how I love those hot summer nights. Hooray or global warming!

Diary Thursday: Luca and the pie

The trip through Europe continues. Carolyn and I stayed with various host families along the way through an international non-profit. We basically did it for the free food. And the cute sons of the host families, like Luca, the oldest son of a sweet Italian family we stayed with outside of Rome.

Tuesday, July 11th, 1:52pm

I had told Luca that we’d be home around 7:30pm, and we were actually doing really well with time except we took the bus going the wrong direction and had to sit and wait and at the end of the line. Then, we got off at the wrong place entirely and walked along the road asking everyone who passed where the right street was, and no one knew, which meant we were really lost. After walking for a while and refusing a ride from some Italian guys that pulled up next to us, we were getting really worried. But then who should pull up but Luca! Our knight in a small white car of questionable make.

He drove us home, informing us that it would just be the three of us tonight because his parents and sister were gone. At first I was disappointed that there’d be no home cooked Italian meal like last night, but I don’t know what I was thinking – we had so much fun. First, we watched “Tremors” dubbed into Italian. Then two of Luca’s friends came over, they were nice and spoke English. We watched Ghostbusters in Italian and ate pie. Actually, only Carolyn and I ate the pie.

Then they took us to a pub and bought us drinks. The guy that spoke English told us that Luca has a girlfriend of 10-months and to “keep him a good boy.” Damn the girlfriend! Damn the girlfriend! After the pub, we went home and said goodnight to Luca (Damn the girlfriend!) Luca went to bed and then Carolyn and I ransacked the house looking for more pie. I hope Luca didn’t hear us tearing apart the kitchen (we really wanted that pie).

Beards. They’re growing on me.

My dad has always had a beard (always, since he was born… okay, maybe only since I was born). As a kid, I always wondered how my mom, and then my step-mom, could find all that hair on his face attractive. Then again, I was dating boys with braces and acne.

But I find that the older I get, the more I enjoy facial hair (on other people, that is). It started with just a mustache fetish, but now I find anyone with a beard attractive. It’s sort of a tease because, the beard can always be shaved, and then I may not be into the guy at all.

Don’t they say something about women always ending up dating someone just like their father? Well, my future partner has some pretty tough shoes to fill, since my dad’s an exceptionally intelligent, kind, funny and bearded man. And it’s also his birthday today.

Happy Birthday Dad! I love you.

Photobooth

This is sacrelig coming from the mouth (hands?) of a photographer’s daughter, but I was at a wedding over the weekend that did something very cool to record it. They did not have a photographer nor a videographer. They simply had friends taking pics, and to make sure they got everyone at the wedding, they set up a MacBook in the corner with the Photobooth application.

If you have not already experienced the endless entertainment that is Photobooth, I recommend that you get yourself to an Apple store and do that immediately. It’s much like, well, a real photo booth, only there are many special effects to chose from and make yourself look even uglier than you actually are.

Here is what some of the wedding photos turned out like:



I guess I should expect nothing less from a couple that had their wedding rings brought up the aisle by a robot that the groom constructed himself out of Tupperware.

(thanks Jess for posting these on Facebook)

Diary Thursdays: Austria & Germany

I’ve decided to keep in the theme of traveling – moving on from the Israeli journal and on to my trip through Europe in the Spring/Summer of 1995. This was the trip to end all trips – 18-year-old Audrey and Carolyn set loose on the entire content of Europe for four months. In my memory, it was another contest between the two of us to see who could hook up with more guys, this time an international competition. But I opened my journal and rather than finding intimate detail after intimate detail about boys. I found intimate details about what we ate. And we ate a lot. Turns out it was actually an international competition to see who could get fatter.

Sunday, June 30th, 5:38pm

Yesterday we walked around exploring Salzburg and we got pizza. Then, we got really gross ice cream that tasted like rum. Earlier that day, we got candy that we thought was coconut, but it turned out to be filled with rum! It was the most disgusting thing I’d ever eaten in my life. Blech!

Monday, July 31st, 4:50pm

Today we went up to the fortress which was cool and we saw a museum with torture methods (smiley face). We looked inside a church and got a pretzel (a yummy one with apples), got a Coke, bought chocolates, and then we got ice cream. Now we’re sitting by the river. It’s very pretty, but I feel like I should be looking at churches or something.

Tuesday, August 1st, 11:00pm

We’re in Germany! Everything here is really clean and they have really good twisty fries at the Burger King. Their Coke is kind of tasteless though. Also, we have lice. I think we picked them up in Greece. I don’t know what we’ll do – I don’t know how to say louse in German.

Trip to Sephora

Now that I know how to put on makeup, I figured I should probably buy some. So Monday night I rode my bike down to Sephora.

Here is one conversation of many I had with the salesgirls. Why does it all have to be so confusing?

"Excuse me, can you tell me which mascara I should buy?"
"Well, they all do different things. This one lengthens…"
"Uh huh."
"This one conditions…"
"Okay."
"This one curls…"
“Uh huh.”
“And this one is non-clumping.”
“Okay.”
“This one curls and lengthens, but it can get clumpy.”
“Uh huh.”
“And this one conditions, but doesn’t lengthen.”
“Okay…. so… which mascara should I buy?”

Sephora is crazy expensive. I kid you not. I’m not going to tell you how much my items totaled, but let’s just say that it was more than I spent on my iPod.

Makeup lesson

“There’s no right or wrong way to put on makeup,” Racine told us. “It’s all based on personal preference. Did you all bring your makeup from home?”

We spilled the contents of our makeup bags across the tables that had been set up in her brightly-lit living room. Of the four of us attending the class, I won for most makeup illiterate. Jolanka had a variety of glosses and powders, Katy had the most brushes, and Lizzie brought almost the whole Mac counter with her. I poked embarrassedly at my Forever 21 eye shadow.

Luckily, Racine let us use her palette to practice. She started with my left eye, and explained each step carefully, from the concealer to the varying colors of shadow, to the carefully applied liner, to the mascara.

It was a lot of work, and I decided then there was no way I would ever have the patience to go through this every day. As I’ve said before, my office is lucky I take the time to put on pants.

“There,” Racine held up a mirror and I peered into my reflection.

Who was this mysterious person looking back at me? She looked chic, she looked sexy, she looked nothing like me. Perhaps, now that my eyes are 31, it’s time to stop buying shadow at Forever 21.



I came home after the lesson and walked in to Brian's room. He waited about two minutes until he asked: "What the fuck happened to your eye?" Hmmm, not the response I was looking for. I think I need to do some experimentation with this whole makeup thing.

The Bike Racks

For the few of you that are not already aware, it is National Bike Month. And I am proud to announce that I am taking a leadership position at the office as Captain of The Bike Racks, for the Bay Area's Team Bike Challenge.

I take my Team Captain duties very seriously – making sure everyone logs their points regularly, takes safety precautions while riding, and rides to work as many days as possible (because that is how we win).

I also composed the team photo.



It’s clearly been a slow week at work.

Diary Thursdays: Gilbert & Edmond

Mom's response to the last Diary Thursday was "Wow, very... educational." So I thought I would continue the parental education with another Israeli entry... the quest for cute boys continues. This time in Tel Aviv.

Tuesday, August 2nd, 1994, 17-years-old, Tel Aviv

Today was great. After wandering around some weird mall for a while, we went down to the beach. The waves were HUGE. They were the biggest waves I’ve been in in years. We also met two guys – Gilbert & Edmond, I think their names were. They were really nice and moderately attractive (I got the cute one again). Mine kind of looked like a poor man’s Mel Gibson. He's really sweet and funny.

Anyhow they came and sat on our towels for a while and bought us Cokes and ice cream. They’re rock musicians in bands – isn’t that cool!?!

I want to hang out with them tonight, but Carolyn doesn’t want to. Why is she trying to ruin my life?