So cute, I might puke.

http://gawker.com/5270201/pixar-search-no-further-for-your-next-adorable-character

What I've been doing the last two weeks

I've spent the last two weeks hiking, camping and attempting to surf on the Pacific Coast of Costa Rica with the Costa Rica Rainforest Outward Bound School (CRROBS). I did a similar trip with CRROBS last winter and had a blast, so I decided to take advantage of my current situation and return while I'm still on the east coast.

Unbeknownst to me, I would spend the next two weeks with mostly boys between the ages of 14-18 who, once they believed I wasn't 16, took to calling me Momma because I was "old enough to be their mom."

We hiked Santa Rosa National Park, and camped and surfed at Witches' Rock and Avellanas. While I probably would not choose to re-visit Costa Rica with this particular group again, I had a fun and interesting experience nonetheless. A fun, funny, frustrating, exhilarating, exasperating, disastrous, fortuitous, infuriating, annoying and amusing all at the same time experience. I'm glad I went.

Enjoy the pictures.

Brigantine, NJ

P, Manchmod and I went to Brigantine, NJ for the weekend. It's a very beautiful island, despite some of the hilariously ostentatious homes and the neon casinos in the background. NJ can be a beautiful state. For more pictures, go here.

I wish I could paint like this

AL and I went and checked out the work of Valeri Larko one weekend in late April. She does small size studies first, and then large scale paintings. The industrial subject captured in paint is a nice juxtoposition. She told us it takes her months to finish a painting. I don't know how she does it -- it's a study in perserverance.

This is what happens when you hang out with sheep

Longboarding in NYC

So Uptown Skate School is running a coupon special for skateboard (longboard, mind you) lessons. I've signed M and me up for a lesson, although I'm nervous.

I took skateboarding lessons at Chelsea Piers one summer with the hare-brained idea that I would be this super cool badass chick doing crazy ollies and other stuff (that I wouldn't know about, since I know nothing about skateboarding). I was 27, and everyone else was 8.

It's funny how fantasies exist purely in one's head for a reason, as my mental imagery of my skateboarding prowess came nowhere close to reality. At least not in this universe. I am deathly terrified of heights. When my instructor put me at the top of a mini-half pipe, I promptly decided skateboarding was not for me. I gave him back his board and went home.

Douchey Mcdouche

Infamous internet celeb and wannabe actor:

http://arthurkade.com/2009/05/27/philadelphia-magazine/

Note column to the top right of this website

And then visit http://www.tweetingtoohard.com/. Hilarious!

"I had broken a ligament and pulled a bone..."

I can't tell if this guy was trying to be funny, or if he really got the two concepts confused...

Check out the video

Please, just roll me back home

I met a former coworker for lunch today at David Chang's Momofuku Ssam Bar.

I don't even want to talk about the food, because it was too good for me to put into words. Let me just say I love chefs that love pork and offal. I love restaurants that specifically state on the menu, "We do not serve vegetarian-friendly items."

My friend and I both had the prix fixe, where we ordered different items and shared everything. As a take-small-bites-and-taste-everything-at-least-once eater, I like eating with people who can share.

My faves: Pork Buns, Blondie Pie

Afterwards, my friend and I went next door to the Milk Bar where I checked out the Marshmallow Cookie (it was ok), the Chocolate Cake, and the Banana Cake. I've decided that I like my cakes and cookies better when they're slightly warm.

My new teapot

My new kettle. It's tens of dollars less expensive than my old one, it's easy to maintain, and it works. I tried it today, and it whistled. Afterwards, nothing melted.

I had my eye on the lovely Le Creuset Ogive but decided to bypass form and function for just mere function. I'm certain my water tastes the same either way, so I won't lose sleep over it.

With the additional store credit from the original pot and a 20% off coupon, I finally bought the Wusthof knives I've been coveting for quite some time. I'd give up a fancy kettle for a handy knives any time of day. :-)

Welcome to the jungle...

NYC used to be fun and games of another sort. This is what Manhattan used to look like before white people showed up...

http://digg.com/d1tJFy

Even better than LOLCATS!!!!

OK, just kidding b/c nothing can ever top LOLCATS in that saccharin hurt your teeth way, but this comes pretty darn close:

http://www.latfh.com/


Although more in a hurt your eyes and your brain sort of way.

Ah, you fucking hipster. How is it possible that I both love and hate you...

Not sure what the big deal is

but I've read about this place.

The Gates, gorgeous in its chandelier and marble splendor, was a lot smaller than I thought it would be. There's standard front bar area and a medium sized room in the back that's lined with banquets and tables for those who love bottle service.


A friend and I were there Sunday night for an "exclusive afterparty." It was so exclusive, that it was mostly dead even by Sunday night party that start at 10pm standards. But, it was open bar, which is the real reason to show up anywhere, especially a place that is calling itself a super luxury restaurant/bar:

On May 8, Danny Kane and Rod Surut (Naked Lunch, Gemini Lounge) will reopen one of the city’s truly lavish spaces, the former Biltmore Room (the marble walls alone have been valued at $2.4 million) as a “super luxury restaurant/bar,” the Gates. Promotional director Redd Stylez (Home, Guest House, Cain) is overseeing an “ambassador” program that awards keys (the lockets double as pens or bracelets and don’t actually open the front gates, which used to belong to the Biltmore Hotel in midtown) to 125 members of the “New York City elite.”

Um, seriously? What the heck is "super luxury"? Who is New York City elite?

Give me a break.

My favorite part of the announcement isn't so much the Gates as much as this reaction:
...each member will receive a gold enema necklace that can actually inform the doorman that the person coming his way is the king of all douche bags... give me a freaking break. To be seen in the next season of the Real Housewives of Jersey City.
By onestopnyc on 04/21/2009 at 7:26pm

Agreed!

T competes in Miss Fitness Atlantic

www.fitnessatlantic.com

And I go to cheer her on.

(In case you were wondering, T is on the left.)