playing Uno at Fallout

It's fun.
You should try it sometime.
But would someone please tell me what is up with the colored cards that have no numbers on them?

rockin'

I went rock climbing at Exposure in Carrollton this morning. It's the second or third time I've been there, but I haven't been rock climbing in well over a year, so I was out of practice to say the least. But it was fun, and I met some really cool people. I would also like to try Summit Climbing Gym to see how it compares. I really wish there was something inside 635 though; I start getting hives when I get too far north into the 'burbs.

shoe fetish X 2

I'm not sure there is room for two shoe fetishes in this 517sf loft. But I am not willing to give mine up. I really scored on this tax-free weekend at DSW. Big time.

2 words: Michael Kors
One discount: 80% off
Total price: $19.99

oh yeah.




Maggie the dog has her own fetish. With my sandals. On many mornings I wake up and look over to see that at some point during the night Maggie has dragged one of my flip flops into her bed. She never chews on it, and there is always just one. A friend told me that she does this because it smells like me. Um, excuse me? I do not smell like a sweaty flip flop. He said to sleep in an old tee shirt for several nights and then give her the tee to sleep with and she will stop the shoe-napping. I did, but she is too smart for this. But, since she is not chewing on the shoes I suppose I really don't mind. Plus it is partially my fault for being too lazy to put my sandals away every night.

evidence:

Spiral Diner coming to Bishop Arts!

How excited am I that this small vegan restaurant in Fort Worth is expanding to Dallas? Words cannot express. I LOVE IT! Spiral Diner is consistently voted in the top 10 lists for vegan restaurants for the entire country (!) and it's hard to believe it's nestled inside "cow town." And now good news for Dallasites - Spiral Diner is coming to the Bishop Arts District in the OC in October. Hoorah! Rumor is that it might even be dog friendly. Yeah!

The menu is extensive, and even your hard core carnivore friends will find something delish to try. I have had the "Ate Layer Burrito," the "all day lunch plate," spaghetti, hummus appetizer, potato salad, and the McNut burger. They have all been delicious, and the price is oh-so-right. All of their ingredients are not only vegan but organic, and their mission extends beyond just the food.

Spiral Diner pledges to:
- Use only cruelty-free and environmentally friendly biodegradable cleaning products
- Only purchase recycled and un-bleached paper products (with the highest post-consumer content available)
- Always buy Certified Organic ingredients whenever possible with conventional only as a last resort
- Use environmentally friendly, biodegradable take-away containers and disposable cutlery (we also encourage our customers to bring their own reusable containers with them to help us reduce packaging waste)
- Recycle 100% of all the accepted materials that come through our kitchen
- Donate a portion of profit to local grassroots organizations that are fighting for human, animal, and environmental causes
- Reduce waste by purchasing in bulk as much as possible and donating excess food to local food banks and shelters

And their take on pricing:
"Spiral Diner's prices are set as low as they can possibly go. Our goal is not to make tons of profit; it is to provide the community with tasty vegan food at a reasonable cost. Our goal is also to pay everyone working at Spiral a decent wage. We will never charge more than we absolutely have to in order to pay the bills.
So when you eat at Spiral you know you are getting high quality food from happy employees.
Additionally, we will continually to adjust our prices to reflect food costs. As organic ingredients go down in price we adjust our menu prices accordingly. The more in demand organics become, the lower the price."

And if that wasn't enough, they also have vegan cooking classes, hip retro decor, and a bakery.

Who wants to go with me in October?

Sufferin' Succotash!

I recently happened upon a vegan food blog and saw a recipe for "late summer succotash" from the Vegetarian Times which looked delicious. For those of you who don't know, I have been inching my way towards being a vegetarian, but it's hard with the no-wheat and little-to-no-soy thing, which rules out quite a bit of wheat-based meat alternatives like seitan, and also tofu, soy sauce, and such. I eat at Spiral Diner whenever I get a chance (thank goodness they are coming to Dallas soon) and love the fact that they use all organic produce and recycle as much as they can and all that stuff. So right now I am an ovo-pescatarian, meaning that I am a vegetarian but eat eggs (cage-free and organic eggs) and fish. Basically I don't eat anything with legs and am not eating/drinking bovine fairy but I have not excluded goat dairy. It's complicated. Most vegetarians would laugh at me and say that I'm not really a vegetarian, which is true, but I have given up a lot since January and it feels like a huge step to me.

Anyway, I emailed the recipe to Carly and was like "we should make this sometime!" And on Monday I just happened to be at Target getting groceries and things before going to Whole Foods to complete the day's list, and lo and behold I get a text from Carly asking what I was up to, which surprised me considering she was supposed to be at work. Turns out she was home from work and I just happened to be at the SuperTarget just down the street from her place. So I ran over there and we decided to make the succotash that afternoon which was quite handy since I had to go to Whole Foods anyway. We were able to find everything there except for lima beans, which we substituted edamame for.

Everything in the kitchen went well, except that the onion won in the onion-vs-Hollis'-sensitive-eyes contest. (The next day I was watching Martha Stewart and she said to burn a candle close to an onion when you chop it and the candle will burn off the onion fumes. I tried it today and it works like magic.) Our Late Summer Succotash was divine if I do say so myself. The tomatoes really made it, and I don't normally like tomatoes.

Up next: Metaphysical Quandary Green Bean Salad

Recipe here

proof we really cooked and didn't steal the above pic:




So on Sunday and Monday I got to cross 2 things off my summer to-do list and one thing off my lifetime to-do list. Hoorah! Feels pretty awesome. Next up is learning how to change my own oil. I'll keep you posted on that one.

At the Drive-In (a.k.a. Galaxy night)

Four friends and I finally stopped talking about it and went to the Galaxy Drive-In Theater in Ennis, TX this past Sunday. I got to cross "go to a drive-in" off my summer to-do list. It's only about 20/25 minutes South of me, which is closer than much worse options like Studio Movie Grill. It rocked my socks off. Well, I wasn't wearing socks to start with, but you get my drift. They have 4 screens, each showing a different double-feature, and it is always just $6 per person! AND they have Dippin' Dots, the "ice cream of the future" (but somehow available today)! Since the movie studios take most of their box office profits, they rely on the concession stand for their main profit, so don't eat before you go. It is very affordable (think cheesy fries and a coke for $3.50). This is my new favorite thing to do in DFW for sure, so let me know if you want to go on a Sunday or Monday! We saw the double feature Simpsons/Transformers.

During the ten minute "intermission" they show old fashioned ads and graphics and stuff, so it's cool that they have kept up the vintage flair and didn't try to modernize it. they still have the metal speakers that you can hang on your window, and you will probably need to use your car radio (the sound broadcasts over different frequencies for different screens) to hear well, but we didn't have a problem with this wearing down the car battery.

Here are some things to remember about the drive-in:
- CASH ONLY!
- Um, they have Dippin' Dots now - how awesome is that?
- Bring plenty of bugspray and chairs/blankets
- If you get there after dark don't forget basic drive-in etiquette, such as turning off your lights ASAP and driving slowly through the aisles.










After the movies were over we headed a bit further into Ennis on a small road and pulled into a field to watch the meteor shower, and I finally saw shooting stars (I had never seen one before...yes, really, never). I must've seen about 10 at least. i don't have any pics of this so you will have to take my word for it. This concluded our "Galaxy Night."

whevever i start feeling alone in this world...

...i just remember the mosquitoes, and their never ending love (for my flesh and blood).

Commando much?

To Whom It May Concern:

Please remove your faded black Calvins from the stairwell.

Thank you,
#217

What American accent do you have?

I have a Midland American accent, which isn't very surprising considering that I grew up in Indiana. I'm glad to find out that living in the South hasn't rubbed off on me too much and that I haven't developed a draaaawl.

everything's better in vinyl

So my friend Scott and I went to VooDoo Chile last night, a.k.a. "Jimmy's." If you are not familiar with VooDoo Chile, it's, well, amazing. It's this shop in Deep Ellum owned and run by Jimmy. Jimmy is this stick thin Japanese hippie who is always wearing skin tight bell bottoms and has long hair. He is super nice and always friendly and always serving wine. His shop is sort of a vintage shop but there is newer stuff too...everything from records and record players to VHS tapes to books to clothes to art to Halloween costumes. He told me last night that he's moving the shop to Lower Greenville in August, which is probably smart on his part because he will get a LOT more foot traffic, but stinks for me because he will no longer be right around the corner.

Last night I picked up some good vinyl:
Talking Heads More Songs About Buildings and Food produced by Brian Eno ($3)
Elvis Costello & The Attractions Armed Forces ($7)
Donovan's Greatest Hits ($1)
Jan & Dean Golden Hits Volume 2 ($3)
Ricky Nelson Ricky ($3)
The Beach Boys Surfin' Safari ($7)


Today is my Saturday so I am going to do laundry and swim! Hopefully also do some freelance work. Ok, now it's time for that swimming part....

logo oh no

It seems there is some serious (and well-deserved) controversy over the recently approved logo for the 2012 Olympics in London. It has even made the front of a gossip mag with the headline "Olympics Logo Triggers Epilepsy" (this headline referenced the animated version of the logo). An online petition has even been started demanding its immediate withdrawal. It harks a bit of Keith Haring in my opinion, but not necessarily in a good way. I can't imagine how hideous it will be on all that merch they'll be selling...just picture it embroidered on hats and sweatshirts and printed on everything from pencils to pins to thermal mugs. Ouch...that's a headache.

self served

I loathe the self check-out line. And the place that irritates me the most as far as the self check-out line goes is Home Depot because 90% of the time they don't give you another option. Checking out at Home Depot would be about 5 times faster if someone did it for me in a regular old check out line. And I hate that the call it the "express lane." There is nothing express about some calm machine lady voice bitching at me that there is an "unknown item in bagging area" when she was the one who just told me to "place item in bagging area." Besides, it was a friggin shelf that wouldn't fit in the stupid bagging area to begin with. And the person watching over the self check-out just stares at you while you struggle instead of being helpful. I end up looking like a crazy person because I start talking back to the calm robot lady sayng "but you JUST TOLD me to place the item IN the bagging area - make up your mind!"

The same goes with those automated calling robot people who want me to tell them outloud what I need on the phone. Today I call Sprint to make an account change and I get "please say outloud what you would like to do today. You can say something like 'make payment' or 'billing question.'" So I say "upgrade my plan." And the machine says "did you say 'billing question? please say YES or NO." I say "NO." Robot lady says "our billing options have changed, please hold while I transfer you." CLICK. I call back and finally get it to understand "upgrade my plan" and she says "ok, I will transfer you to a representative." I hold for fifteen minutes. I can't take it anymore. I go clean my bathtub.

Hipster Bingo