5-Alive!

Happy Birthday Adeline!
I miss you like crazy and can't wait to squeeze you!

Love,
Aunt Annie

three cheers!

To real girls, and the real boys who date them. Slancha!

my love/hate relationship.

The Gap is retarded.
I know this because I shop there all the fucking time.

For as long as I can remember they have been the number one source for my basic, All-American fashion needs. Jeans! Shirts! Sweaters! Coats! Flip Flops! Tank Tops! Scarves! MUST HAVES!

And especially lately, I've grown to loath their lack of variety, their acne-enhancing dressing room lighting, and their inconsistent sizing.

But every holiday season, soft, brightly colored and/or stripey things appear in the display windows and I'm drawn like a moth to a flame. No matter how hard I try, no matter how identical current stripey merchandise is to the stripey merchandise of Christmas 1999, I consistently "fall into the Gap" again and again. Year after year. Discounted stocking cap after discounted stocking cap.

I thought I would be able to resist this time. After all, I live in a major metropolitan city now! I have more to choose from than just the vendors of South Point Pavilions and Westfield Shoppingtown Gateway! Plus, most of my friends' wardrobes are compiled of treasures they found in "free" boxes on the side of the road. Portland chic. My fashion consumption standards are shifting.

But dammit if those marketing gurus don't know their shit. Emotionally manipulative bastards! They cut me to core this time. How do they do that? HOW?!

Walking through the mall after lunch to avoid the rain, two twelve foot posters came into my line of vision. I came closer. The images towered over me. I'm pretty sure I started ovulating right then and there.

Before me stood the unbearable cuteness of my all-time favorite celebrity couple. My comedic heroes. The perfect pair prototype. Next to them stood my current celebrity fantasy cuddle partner. All of them fresh-faced. Smiling coyly. Hawking soft, brightly colored, stripey things.

I mean, Jesus Christ. I get excited when any of these folks so much as appear in an inset photo on the 92nd page of an obscure magazine. And here they were, towering over the patrons of the Pioneer Place Mall as they shuffled off the escalators. How could you not be in love with them all?

How could you not want to meet up with these two downtown for a few whiskey sours? How could you not be excited about seeing them at the after hours gathering, dancing to Christmas In Hollis, popping rum balls and throwing back tall boys?

How could you not want to take this young gentleman to your best friend's ugly Christmas sweater party? How could you not want to stick your cold, wind-chapped cheeks into the welcoming warmth of his pea coat panel embrace? How could you not want to do things with him under the mistletoe for 12 hours or so?

How could you not want to buy the scarves and sweaters these people endorse?

25 years ago today, someone gave birth...

...to the one and only Miss Catherine Monahan!

And I'm so happy they did.
(Shout out to Jean!)

Happy Birthday Kitten!
Miss you madly and hope you have a great day!

check out these sweet kicks.

You guys.
NIKEiD is so bad ass.

It gives me the same sense of consumeristic giddiness I used to get when the eight pound JC Penny Catalog arrived.

Also bad ass? TWEED. On a sneaker.

Love it.

it's a shame.

I am a full-fledged supporter of the Writer's Guild strike that's going down, but I must say, when stupid (and despicable) shit like this goes down, it really makes me hope this strike ends quickly. It's going to be hard to let things like this fade into historic ambiguity without any poignant and well-deserved jabs from the funny press.

And I know everyone jokes about getting their news from the 'fake' news, but sometimes that comedic commentary is the most relevant (and therefore, necessary) social commentary available to the masses. It puts everything out there for what it is - good, bad and/or ugly. Plus, when world events start the make your blood boil, laughing lowers your blood-pressure.

I can only imagine that the writers at The Daily Show and the Colbert Report (not to mention all programs that rely on current events and cultural relevancy) are itching like crazy right now to say some things of significance.