How I know my family still loves me even though I moved 3,000 away from them

My mom called me this morning to tell me that I will be receiving a package in the mail. The contents of said package?

"Well, you know your grandmother. Once she gets an idea into her head, there's no stopping her. She wanted to send you an Easter package. She made sweet bread, so she sent you some of that. And a smoked sausage from that deli you like. And two hard-boiled eggs that you may or may not want to throw out by the time you get the package. It's all wrapped in a frilly apron that she bought for you. And when I say frilly, I mean it's frilly. Also, be careful when you throw the box away because she also put $20 at the bottom for you."

You guys, how cute are they?!

So how will y'all be spending your Easter? Church or no church? Dressed up or casual? Are you going to your family's house, or are you hosting? I myself will be going to church in my Sunday best, which will be followed by some day-drinking and dinner at the Rad Boyfriend's family's house. And when your Rad Boyfriend has three teenage step-siblings, one brother and sister-in-law, one 3-year-old half sister, and a bevvy of entertaining relatives that regularly throw each other into the pool fully clothed, your Easter Sunday is sure to be fun =)

As per your requests

Mrs. Mia Wallace.

I can't argue with that

Boss's wife: So what were you for Halloween?
Me: Uma Thurman from Pulp Fiction. I had a syringe sticking out of chest and blood coming out of my nose and a black wig. It was pretty cool.
Other attorney in office: I love it!! Did you carry around bags of heroin too?
Me: Nah. I thought that given the profession I've chosen to embark upon, that might not be appropriate.
Other attorney: Oh, so.... coke?

A programming note and an Asian

I grew up mere steps from Flushing, Queens, the mecca of New York Asians. It's fair to say I've come into contact with a good number of them over the years in a multitude of places. (I won't name those places for fear of perpetuating a stereotype, but let's just say that they're food is delicious, their produce is fresh, and my suits always come back spotless.) But for as many Asians whom I've met over the years, not one of them was as funny as this guy. Or cute. Come on, you know he's cute.

So. That takes care of the funny video for the day. Onto more pressing matters. Like the fact that I'm leaving for San Diego this afternoon!! If y'all don't know, I heart San Diego with the passion of a thousand suns. You can read all about my love for the City of Awesome here and here. Because I'll be away for a few days, posting will likely be light. Stories and pictures upon my return, I promise.

Whatever you're doing, I wish you a fun Memorial Day weekend. Be safe, eat hot dogs, and wear sunscreen. I'll be here:



Maybe doing this:

Happy Mother's Day!!

Justin Timberlake should quit his day job and work for SNL full-time.

Not that I would know anything about this subject

Marijuana is still illegal under federal law here in the United States, despite it being legal under state law in California. In AMSTERDAM, however....

...it's perfectly legal EVERYWHERE.

Happy 420, y'all. Be safe, don't eat too many Cheetos, and definitely don't go to work stoned. Unless you're this guy.

This guy can do whatever he wants.

I've taught her well

Me, trying desperately to open a stubborn bottle of wine: Sometimes you just gotta put it between your legs and pull.
Aunt: That's what she said!
Mom: Oh my God Danielle, why did you teach her that?
Me: Hey, it's not my fault she's a quick study. I said it once, and all of a sudden she was throwing it around like a pro.
Aunt: That's what she said, that's what she said!!

The day on which we eat eggs and idolize a giant bunny

It's a Great Friday

Did you know that hot cross buns are traditionally eaten on this holy day? I certainly did not. And I'm Catholic!

Whether you have the day off and are cooking a great big fish dinner or you're stuck at work wishing you were Jewish, I wish you a GREAT FRIDAY!

And in case anyone's interested, here's what we're making tonight:

Crab stuffed flounder

Shrimp and scallop risotto

Grilled branzini

As the new year approaches, I'd like to take a minute to reflect on what really matters

Happy New Year, Internet!!

Inspirational

While it may not show in this here web log, I love to read. Like hardcore. The best gift I could possibly get from anyone is a gift certificate to book store. When I was in the Motherland this year, I read seven books. SEVEN. That's a book a week. I thought I was only staying for two and still brought four with me. The other three... well those I had already read in years past and decided to read them again. Yup, I'm a nerd.

So one of my favorite gifts this year was a $50 gift card to B&N and a copy of The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch.

Randy Pausch is truly the definition of an amazing human being. He was a professor of computer science at Carnegie Mellon before being diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer. When he found out he was definitely going to die, instead of laying down and feeling sorry for himself, he made the conscious decision to keep living. He decided to make the most of the time he had left with his wife and kids. In September 2007, he gave his last lecture at Carnegie Mellon. He talked about his life, about acheiving his childhood dreams, and how he has helped others acheive their dreams. His attitude is awe inspiring. If everyone lived their lives with that kind of hope, with that kind of gratitude, with that much enthusiam and persistance, this world would be....I honestly can't quantify how much better it would be. He's that good, people!

Randy sadly lost his battle to cancer on July 25th, 2008. I had never met the man, but I cried like he was my uncle. People like Randy deserve to live to 108, not 48.

If you'd like to be inspired, if you'd like to see the true definition of awesome, I encourage you visit his website and watch his Last Lecture. If you have more than 70 minutes to spare, read his book. I read it in a few hours and it was the most well-spent few hours of the holidays.

I hope I can give to this world one tenth of what Randy Pausch gave. Rest in peace.

Grandma didn't get run over by a reindeer...this year

Merry Christmas, Internet!!

Oh Jason Mraz

I think I'm falling in love with you. You had me at Merry Holidays.

In a New York state of mind

It snowed here on Friday, a good few inches. Enough to slow down traffic and force me to clean the flakes off my car. And I loved it.

I don't know what's gotten into me this holiday season, but I'm finding myself loving New York all over again. Slushing along the sidewalks of Manhattan and jumping over puddles on Friday literally put a smile on face. I thought about how I spent last Christmas (doing cartwheels on the beach in San Diego) and decided right there in the middle of Union Square that I would never again spend the holidays away from home.

Random internet finds: Santa's Gmail

I always pegged Mr. Claus as a Gmail person. (FYI: for any law people out there, I totally spelled his name "clause" the first time I typed it. Old habits die real hard 'round here.)

I used to like Christmas, then I hated it, now I like it again

Cuz I'm fickle like dat, yo.

I loved Christmas as a kid. My mom wasn't really your typical mom (she didn't bake cookies and she definitely didn't decorate the house for the holidays) but she always made sure we had a nice holiday season. The tree, the presents, the Christmas music, the fish (we're Catholic), it was all pretty awesome.

And then I got a job in retail. Oh. My. God. There is no better way to ruin the spirit of the holidays than listening to a combination of the same 20 Christmas songs for 6 weeks straight and customers bitching about coupons and a lack of Hanukkah gifts. (That was a completely unintentional stab at the Jews, but it stays.) I could tolerate it while I worked at a bookstore because it was a small environment and I was just a lowly employee; the biggest thing I had to deal with was running out of singles in the register. And then I became a manager at a department store. Holy birth of Jesus. Have you ever tried to manage a department with one working register and a line of 50 people? Have you ever had your life threatened by a tall Asian man who demanded that one cent be put back on his credit card? Have you ever stood in the middle of a sales floor and shouted the words, "Ma'am, please let go of Kermit the frog and stop calling my employee a racist bitch"?

Ah memories. Such special times, the holidays. You can see how retail sort of messed with my ideas of giving and receiving, of celebrating the birth of our Lord savior Jesus Christ. The last thing I wanted to do after 10 hours of listening to "Jingle Bells" and running out of boxes was go home and listen to more Christmas music while wrapping presents.

But then a wonderful thing happened: I quit that retail bitch like Oprah quit pasta. No more working 12-hour shifts. No more folding wool sweaters until my hands were itchy and swollen. No more pleading with customers to leave the store after the lights had gone out and the doors were locked. This will be my fourth year of not working retail during the holidays, and I think it may be the magic year. Because for the very first time since I was 17, I am actually singing along to Christmas songs. I can walk into a store and not have a panic attack when I hear the words, "I want to speak to your supervisor." I am strangely looking forward to putting up the tree, and I didn't roll my eyes when my aunt got sucked into the 30% off Christmas Decorations Sale at Bloomingdale's last week. In fact, I bought her an ornament for her tree. Me! Spending money on such silly things!

Now that I can finally enjoy Christmas again, I have some things to say: Mom, I'm sorry I refused to help you decorate the tree all those years. I was in a really bad place. It was called Macy's. I'd also like to take this opportunity to apologize to my roommate Stephanie for threatening to shank her if she put Christmas decorations in the apartment we shared during law school. Steph, you did a really great job and I'm sorry Mike and I teased you about the stockings on the mantle, cuz they were actually pretty awesome. And finally, to the store manager at the Macy's who took my blood, my sweat, my tears, my Christmas spirit...to the woman who forced me to work on every holiday because I wasn't married with children and then lectured me when I took off July 4th weekend to be a bridesmaid in a friend's wedding...to the person who rolled her eyes at me when I told her I was going to the emergency room because I broke my finger at work:

SUCK IT, BITCH. I hope you enjoy your 100th Christmas working as a retail manager. You are the only reason I am still considering pursuing a career in law, in hopes that I will one day represent an employee who collapsed in your store because you forced her to work ten twelve-hour days in a row while she was 7 months pregnant and had the flu. (True story.)

Hmm. I guess I didn't completely get back my Christmas spirit. Ah well. Maybe year 5 will be my magic year....

This truly disgusts me

I don't go shopping on Black Friday. I never did and I'm pretty sure I never will. For one, I hate crowds. I like to go into a store, pick up what I came for, and leave. Fighting my way through obnoxious people at 5am to save $20 on a digital camera does not sound like my idea of a good time. Secondly, I have a very low tolerance for stupidity. And people who come out at 5am to bum-rush the doors to Wal-Mart, trampling and killing a man like a piece of garbage in the process, rank pretty high on my Stupid List.

I won't lie, I love a good deal as much as the next guy. One of the perks of working as a retail manager for so many years was paying WAY below MSRP for a lot of things. But as much as I like saving money, I like not being bothered more. I'm not one of those people who will travel 5 miles out of my way to save $10 on a sweater because that other store is having a sale. I also won't go somewhere that doesn't have parking, even if I'm missing out on saving $20. Call it laziness, but my time and sanity are much more important than saving a few dollars.

So it follows that I was not one of those people lined up outside Best Buy on Thursday night at midnight. And I was also not one of the maniacs that stampeded the doors of Wal-Mart, killing that poor employee. Out of pure selfish greed, out of some primal need to be first in line, 200 idiots rushed the doors of Wal-Mart on Long Island as they were being opened at 5am, knocked over Jdimytai Damour, an innocent employee, and then stepped on him, trampled him, over and over again until he was dead.

Is this what our country has come to? Is this what Christmas has come to? Killing people in the name of a good deal? I'm pretty sure that's not what Jesus wanted. I hope those people feel real good about themselves this holiday season. But knowing what kind of folk a 5am sale at a Long Island Wal-Mart attracts, I wouldn't be surprised if every single one of those humanitarians is telling their family, "I didn't even see him, I was all the way in the back. It was everyone else who stepped on him, I saw it! I even tried to stop them!" Uh-huh. Which is why when people were told that they have to leave the store because a man had been KILLED, they started screaming, "But I've been on line since yesterday morning!" and continued shopping. Nice.

To everyone that shoved their way into the store that morning: I hope that when your kids open their presents this year, the ones you killed a man in order to save $20 on, you think about him and his family and what kind of Christmas THEY are having. Merry Christmas, America.

Because a lot of us have it better than some of them

Things I am thankful for this year:

Celebrity gossip websites. Without them, I wouldn't have nearly as much to talk about here.

The awesome world we live in. I've seen a lot of it, but I plan on seeing much, much more in the years to come.

On demand and network websites. I have a TiVO but it's not hooked up (long story.) This actually hasn't posed much of a problem in my TV-watching because every show I watch is either on a cable network that has episodes on demand, or on a regular network that posts their shows online. This comes in handy on Thursday nights when Grey's Anatomy is on at the same time as The Office. My world would collapse if I missed either of those shows.

Makeup removing wipes. The last thing any girl wants to do when she stumbles home drunk from the bars is take her makeup off and wash her face. With these, all you have to do is wipe your face. Hallelujah.

On a serious note, I am very thankful for my friends this year. Studying for the bar was a pretty low point in my life. I don't think I've ever felt more down and out (and dare I say depressed) than during those 2 months. My best friend (hi Natalie!) was always, ALWAYS there for me, giving me constant support, validation and positive reinforcement. I could rely on her to listen to me bitch and whine and she never complained. I thank her for that from the bottom of my heart. And thank you to all my girls and their guys for forcing me to get out of the house on a few Saturdays, you have no idea how much I needed that! (And thanks to Bud for supporting my nasty nicotine habit through it all!)

But I also want to thank everyone else in my life that said they missed me while I was gone. As I've mentioned several times on this site, I sort of fled the country after the bar exam. I went home to the Motherland for what was only supposed to be a 2-week vacation. Two weeks turned into 2 months, and I didn't come home until sometime in October. But when I did, I got so many phone calls and emails from people I didn't expect to hear from--everything from "you're alive!" to "when are we getting together?" to "you're back....let's bang." (OK, that last one was a lie... sort of.) I honestly didn't expect so many people to say that they missed me and that they were happy I was back. It really made me feel good, and reminded me of what wonderful friends I have in my life. So thank you. Thank you Nicolle and Natalie and Caila and Bud and all your men. Thank you law school friends for your constant support and for checking up on me while I was away (I'm lookin' at you, Zman, Rob and Russo!) Thank you to my friends in San Diego (hi Liz!) and Florida and Denver and the Motherland for your long-distance friendships and endless entertainment when I come visit. And an extra special thanks to Stephanie, my roommate, my pumpkin, my love for understanding me better than I think she does.

Thank you and Happy Turkey Day!

The day on which we spend too much time and money on costumes and candy

...When we could be spending it on more worthwhile causes. Like clothes for Jason Mraz.

I'm yours, too my love.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN, EVERYONE!!

Just in time for Halloween

Louisiana is home to some freaky stuff: Voodoo, exorcisms, vampires, and Harry Connick Jr. And it is now home to a new version of weird: a glow-in-the-dark cat. Scientists at the Audubon Centre for Research of Endangered Species in New Orleans have genetically modified a cat to make him glow in the dark. I shit you not.

Now that is something I would not want to see skulking around my front yard. Especially in The Big Easy. Can you imagine sipping a Sazerac on the porch swing after a long day of avoiding zombies and seeing a small creature with a green head creeping towards you? Not good times, my friend. Not good times.