Now That's a Knish!

So I've been a bit busy and am way over due for a blog post. My apologies to all 5 of you that read this blog for the delay. So back to New York. New York was awesome but cold! I completely forgot how cold other places of the country get. I forgot what it's like to have a physical need for a hat, scarf and gloves and that people use them for function and not just fashion.

So on Saturday, my friend Beth took me out and about to show me a little glimpse of NYC life. We did some shopping in Soho and went to an amazing designers market in an old church on the lower east side that had all sorts of original pieces of jewelry, clothes and bags. I scored these awesome bracelets made out of vintage vinyl that I plan on using as holiday gifts. But really the highlight of my day had to be Yonna Schimmels Knishery. As we walked through the cold and damp streets of the Lower East Side, I grew tired , hungry and chilled to the bone. I think I must have shown my pain while walking as Beth kept asking me if I was okay and through my cold and icy mouth I would respond "oh yeah, totally fine..walking is sooo good for me." Beth promised the walk would be worth it and when we approached the small and paint chipped door of Yonna Schimmel's Knishery, I knew everything was going to be okay. We sat down in the tiny warm cafe and ordered two "Knish Platters" and shared them. This delightful lunch of $8.40 consisted of two GIANT knishes, a bowl of coleslaw and unlimited home made pickles. The Knishes were amazing and warmed every part of my frozen body. This place was truly a gem only something you would find in New York City. I texted my friend Jen who is a true New Yorker to the core (Queens to be exact.... and she would be mentally adding that if she were reading this) and told her I was eating a delicious Knish and thinking of her. She texted be back and asked where I was consuming this delightful Knish and when I told her where I was she replied with such enthusiasm "Now That's a Knish!"

View from my room


Yonna Schimmel's


Knishes... mmmm

Room with a View

So right now I am on a business trip in New York City. I really hate flying so I wasn't too happy about the 6 hour flight to get here but now that I on solid ground and in the city, the trip has been really enjoyable. My company is putting us up at this ridiculously wonderful 5 star hotel right at Central Park, and I don't know how I managed to get put on the 36th floor but I did and have a full view of Central Park and the surrounding NY Skyline.It's AMAZING!

Every time I come back to the room I just stare out the window at the tiny people walking on the sidewalks or I look at out and adjacent buildings and peer into peoples luxurious places that live in these high rises. Since the duration of my stay, I've been people watching a few people that are on similar floors I am on. I noticed one woman who eats dinner very late at a lavish dining room table. She has granite counter tops, modern fixtures and sub zero appliances but she's eaten alone for 2 nights. There is another apartment below where another woman reads every night on her couch surrounded by her two slumbering golden retrievers. I can't imagine how much these places I'm viewing cost to live in, but it must be nice to live that high up. There also seems to be people ice skating every night and every morning on the outdoor ice rink in Central Park even though it's freezing at both of those times of day. I wish I didn't have to go into the NY Office each day so I could continue to see this little glimpses into other peoples worlds. People watching is much better/more interesting from 36 stories up.

Blast From the Past

Then



Now
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Last night Tony surprised me with tickets to see Silverchair at the Wiltern. I was really excited as I use to love Silverchair, along with various other grunge rock genre bands from the 90s. I wasn't expecting much out of the show, I thought they'll play some old stuff, they're older, more mellow whatever but they were AMAZING! The boys are much more clean cut than in the old days and their newer songs definitely have a more mellow mainstream sound, but they sounded great! And when they played their old stuff it took me right back to the mid nineties at my parents house, listening to Fogstomp on my very large yet so cool portable boom box in my room.

Daniel Johns is truly an amazing performer. He got the crowd totally amped up, was rolling on the ground, jumping in the air, playing guitar with his tongue (the ladies in the crowd were loosing it at this point) laying on the piano playing with his foot. I was truly blown away with how great the show was. I was talking to Tony about how all music genres of the past are coming back. For instance, new wave is huge in the rock genre now, I wonder when someone will bring back the raw, edgy, heavy base/guitar sounds of grunge. I know it sounds nerdy, but I love grunge rock and I can't wait for someone to bring it back. So if anyone is a thinking of starting a grunge rock band, make it happen! I guarantee you will already have one fan!

Lazy Sunday

Today was my perfect Sunday and included the following things:

-Sleeping in.. plus bonus hour due to daylight savings
-Reading the magazines I never get to read during the week over a cup o' joe
-Not showering until noon
-Making Orange Chocolate Cookies
-Watching movies w/ my hubby and cat
-Not doing laundry
-Knitting part of Tony's never ending scarf
-Wearing Ugg boots around the house and not being ridiculed for it

Slutty Blog

So Halloween is on Wednesday but as usual, the Saturday before the big day there are plenty of drunken costume events to attend. My friend Angelica had a party where every lady attending had to come dressed as Amy Winehouse. Since I love Halloween and dressing up, I was happy to meet the challenge and pull together my best Amy Winehouse attire complete with bee hive wig, pounds of liquid eye liner and powdered sugar smudged nose.

So Saturday comes and before we went to Angelica's party, we have to make a stop at another Halloween party where one of Tony's bands was playing. I don't know why I didn't put two and two together before since the band we had to go see is a metal band, but when we got there I realized I was in the epicenter of a metal rock trash party. Everyone seemed to have the same costume theme.... Slut. I was a lone Amy Winehouse in a giant sea of slutty nurses, slutty fairies, slutty police and slutty angels. You name it, the girls added slut to the end. I mean, not that I'm trying to be old or prudish because when I was in college, sure I had my share of revealing costumes, but never ones where my whole ass was hanging out and barely covered by a pair of fishnets. And never did I wear a transparent shirt with stickers covering up my nipples.

Ahhh it was a classy event. Anyhoo, so I'm sitting on a couch with Tony (who is dressed as Amy Winehouse's husband but all scratched and beat up), and Jen (who is dressed like Lily Allen) and every two seconds some goth dude with chains and creepers or some drunk girl in one of the formentioned costumes above would come up to me and ask "ummmm like who are you supposed to be anyway?" Have these people seriously never heard of Amy Winehouse? I mean I'm wearing a bee hive wig and have the illusion of coke all over my face for God sakes!


I realized I needed to leave this party fast before the keg ran out of PBR and an angry mob of white trash swept through the party kickin' ass. We eventually went to Angelica's and everyone there definitely appreciated my costume. After that I came home, spent a good 30 minutes stripping of layers of eyeliner. Halfway through the deconstructing process, I realized that I totally looked like a drag queen. Thankfully, Tony snapped this picture below to capture this look.

Corporation Blues

TGIF pretty much says it all. This has been an incredibly difficult week as my company decided to implement a huge layoff that ended up hitting my department, which no one saw coming. I lost a friend and co-worker that started the same time as me and was essentially my "pledge brother." If that wasn't anguish enough, I have spent the whole rest of the week scared of loosing my job in the next round of layoffs. I keep getting reaffirmed that our department won't be "affected" (which is how the head honchos describe being laid off.. like it's some sort of grotesque disease) but that's what they said originally too. As my friend Andy puts it... I have a current case of the "corporation blues." I guess we all get them, I mean Elizabeth Shue did get a case of the babysitting blues.. I suppose.. corporate blues exist too. So in order to turn this frown upside down, I have been trying to take pleasure in the little things in life. The following things are helping to get me out of my funk (sort of)

-Dark Chocolate M&Ms.. damn are they delightful
-Watching 5 episodes of Weeds at a time.... I guess watching Mary Louise Parker's character Nancy go through her own dramatic issues of trying to balance running a suburban pot business, being a mom to two kids and a wife to a DEA agent makes me realize my life isn't so bad.
-Reading my TMZ gossip and laughing at Brittany dig a deeper hole in her giant ditch of a life
-Making Sheppards Pie
-Driving my car.. it's new, it's plaid, it's amazing, and it's all mine

I'm headed to the bay this weekend to visit my Aussie relatives who are visiting my folks. I haven't seen them in years and they always have cheery and bright dispositions so I'm sure I'll come back refreshed and happy.

Hipsters Always Ruin the Fun

Last night I went to see Justice at The Fonda. I was really excited to see them play because they were AMAZING at Coachella, however last night was definitely not like Coachella. The main differentiator was the abundance of hipsters that were present (at Coachella I don't remember seeing crazy hipsters when Justice played the dance tent, although they weren't that popular then and I was probably too busy dancing to notice anyone). So, I understand why hipsters exist, what I don't understand is why the do the following annoying things:

- Wear dirty mismatching clothes from the early 90' with a pair colorful Nike's and not wash their hair for 2 weeks and assume it's hip.
-Constantly bump into people and not apologize...when you become a hipster do you loose depth perception?
-Document every single second of a show with a digital camera even if blinds the people around them.
-Get into ridiculous fights with gay men.

So to note on that last point. We are all laughing, dancing, having a great time when all of a sudden this aggro hipster dude starts screaming at a group of uber fashionable gay men and starts up a fight for no apparent reason. There was pushing, there was shoving and it totally ruined the light hearted " I just want to dance my ass off" mood. Tony and Josh being the good guys they are,  jumped into break it up to try and end the scuffle quickly so we could all get back to enjoying the show, but of course that only opened up a can hipster worms and led to Muhammad Ali's drunken girlfriend stumbling through an explanation repeatedly about how her boyfriend was a "crazy Palestinian" and how "he'd fuck them up." After the fashionable gay men got kicked out, and the crazy hipster Palestinian dude returned to his drunk girlfriend to make out, the mood was sort of spoiled and we all called it a night. Next time I go to see Justice, I will tell them not to invite their annoying hipster friends.

Did the Great Pumpkin Pass Me By?

Fall is my absolute favorite season. I love everything about fall, the crisp smokey smell in the air, the crunching sound of dried leaves, the cool overcast weather that is warm enough to allow you to be outside if you want, but still cold enough to motivate you stay inside and snuggle by a fire. Not to mention the best clothing in the world are fall clothes.. cute boots, jackets, sweaters, knit dresses  etc. All of these things help to get me in the mindset for Halloween and Thanksgiving. All of these traits of Autumn are magical, unless you live in Los Angeles where there is no such thing as Fall!!

This past weekend everyone was complaining about the rain and cloudy weather. However, I took full advantage of this weekend and stayed in sweats all day, turned on a fire with our seventiesesk switch-on fire place, baked yummy treats, knitted the scarf I've been working on for Tony for over 2 years and curled up with my cat and watched movies. It was the best weekend I've had in a long time. Having seen LA affected by Fall-like weather for 2 days, I got excited and assumed that this great weather would continue until I turned on the TV today and saw the damn weather report that says the rest of the week is going to by sunny and in the high 70s! Ewww Gross!

So in order to try and keep up the ritual of welcoming the best season ever, I am going to celebrate Fall in my own little controlled environment by doing the following things:

-Continue to wear Fall type clothes but modified to SoCal (i.e. scarves with short sleeve shirts, boots with skirts but no tights :(, light jackets and light sweaters.. maybe I can trick the universe into being colder?
-Buy the best seasonal Fall products stores have to offer, the wondrously amazing Trader Joe's Pumpkin Butter and Pumpkin Ale and tiny drops of heaven otherwise known as Candy Corns
-Cook up Fall by making homemade apple cider, soups and stews served with hearty crusty bread, and dishes made with hearty squash
-Burn pumpkin and spice candles to create the illusion of Autumn smells

If anyone else feels the way I do, please feel free to celebrate your own personal Fall with any of the above ideas. In the meantime, I am going to do an "overcast rain dance" and keep my fingers crossed that the clouds come rolling in.

Been a While......

Well, It's been a long time since I've written a blog and I have probably lost all 5 of my readers! I have been traveling for the past month which has caused my lack of blogging, but I am going to try and blog more frequently. So to get everyone up to speed, this is what's been going on.

- Celebrated Tony and my one year wedding anniversary in Portland and Seattle. I LOVED Portland, it was beautiful, hip, affordable and fun. No sales tax = happy Marta. I got some anniversary ink on my ankle as a nice souvenir. Seattle was cool but much cleaner and slower paced than I would have imagined. I guess I expected a grungy, dirty, flannel Singles(esk) early 90's Seattle. Seattle was still cool, but Portland took the cake.



-Went to NYC for work and got to attend my very first Yankee game which was also the night dreamy all star A-Rod hit 2 home runs in the same inning. I'm not a huge baseball gal but I think I would be if I lived in NY. There is just something magical about Yankee Stadium. Ventured out to the Lower East Side (all thanks to Josh and Jen) and went to Max Fish which was very fun and I got a glimpse into what East Coast Hipsters are like.


-Went to SF for my best friend from 7th grades wedding which was great. Also celebrated my dad's 60th Birthday with a bunch of local yocals who honored him with music, poems and lots of wine.


-Randomly inherited a pair of tickets to the Emmy's this Sunday and got to walk the red carpet and gawk at celebrities with my college buddy Jewls.



-Currently in exciting Dulles Virginia to go to the current yet soon to be former headquarters. Am staying at a hotel with hundreds of middle age portly business men who all look like they are named Bob. I tried to order a bowl of Chicken Soup from room service only to get 3 calls back to re-confirm that I ordered Chicken Soup.. Yes people I just want a fucking bowl of Chicken Soup!

LOVE IS....

Yesterday I went home from work sick and was bedridden all day. After 2 episodes of Sex and the City, 1 episode of Rock of Love, Practical Magic (yes, I watched and it and still love it) and half of Walk the Line, I was one more show away from being a zombie. My whole body was aching and I was miserable. Then my knight in shining Fred Perry came home with some delicious wonton soup from pick up stix and the best "get well" gift I have ever received... An Optimus Prime Voice Changing Helmet along with some lemon heads and gummy bears. Can a girl really ask for more than that?

Lake Tahoe

Last weekend Tony and I went to Lake Tahoe to spend time with my family. It was so great to see everyone, especially our two month old baby niece Issabella.









Lake Tahoe was so relaxing. Everytime we go up there I never want to leave. I can't wait to go back.

Luciano

To all three of you that read my blog (so sad) I apologize for not keeping it updates this past week. Last week was a very rough week for me as I lost a friend to cancer. It's so horrible because he was only 36 and one of the happiest and well humored people I had ever met. What was even more tragic is that he never drank, smoke, or did drugs and exercised everyday. It's so insane that some of the healthiest people can get cancer and at such a young age.

This Saturday I had planned on going to his memorial which I had braced myself for. I thought, I'll stop by just for an hour pay my respects and go but instead I showed up to a full fledged funeral. The minute I opened the door to the little chapel, I knew it was going to be extremely rough. The funeral room was very formal and grim, like a smaller version of the chapel at Fisher and Son's a la Six Feet Under. There were huge red and gold curtains and dark uncomfortable chairs with red satin cushions. Hardest of all, his coffin was at the very front of the room surrounded by his pictures and huge sympathetic floral arrangements. I have never been to an actual funeral in my life. I have always gone to memorials or celebrations of life where people show pictures and sit around and reminisce so it was even harder to go a "real" funeral of a friend and someone who was so young.

After the funeral, I was in a very weird mood, somewhat reflective and saddened which made it very difficult to go the Daft Punk concert that we had planned to attend to for months. When we first arrived, I hated every moment of it. Here I was, coming from an experience of real and true emotions, and I was entering a room with 20,000 people, half of which were in some drug-educed false state of emotions. Walking through a sea of snooty hipsters and drugged out ravers I had so much contempt for everyone. All I could think was "these people spend so much of their life wasted pouring drugs into their bodies or trying to be cooler than everyone." I had contempt for them because they had body free of illness and so much life they didn't appreciate.

I finally knocked myself out of this angry and void state when we found our group of friends and I saw another friend of ours who is in his late twenties and currently battling cancer. Looking at him, knowing that he was in so much pain but living for every moment of the show, I realized that there was no use being angry at strangers and that I should enjoy this experience. The rest of the night I had a great time and danced with my friends but I couldn't help but think occasionally how none of us know exactly how much time we have in our weird little lives. I can only hope that I remember this when I am complaining about stupid things like work, money, etc so I can stop and appreciate everything I currently have.

Sanity

It's July now and I can't help but feel the theoretical summer glass is half empty. Whenever I think of summer, I think of hanging out by the beach, eating watermelon, and going on lots of vacations. So far, all I feel I have done is go to the beach twice and work. I suppose that's what happens when you get older, summer becomes a season and is no longer an activity. The two things that are keeping my spirts up are knowing that in 3 weeks I will be in Lake Tahoe and next month, we will be off to explore Portland and Seattle. I don't really have too many things to pour my heart out about at the moment so I'm just going to focus on things that are keeping me sane. I apologize for the similarity in format to the last blog. Hopefully I'll feel more inspired after some highly needed vacation time.

Things that are keeping my sanity:
-Coppola Roso : a delicious and cheap blended red table wine. Just 8 bones with your Ralph's Club Card y'all!
-Dryer's Slow Churned Rocky Road Ice Cream - Makes me feel like I've been outside all day
-Feist The Reminder -helps me to mellow out
-Flight of the Conchords - This show always gives me a good solid laugh and I look forward every week to watching it.. I know.. sad.
-My hubby -my rock.

Love it/Hate it

Things I heart:
-Looking up potential vacations for our anniversary
-Knowing that the idea of a vacation exists in our future!
-Ice Blended Mocha on a hot day
-My new Lacoste red, white and blue sneakers
-Seeing The Police Reunite
-Driving a car with a working air conditioning system
-Hanging with my cat


Things I hate:
-DB guys in my building elevator discussing their detox diet of cayenne pepper and lemon juice
-Being inside an artificially lit building when it's 80 degrees and sunny outside
-People being rude to servers at restaurants
-Gas prices
-Cell phones at the gym

Workin' for the Weekend

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I Think I'm in Love

Today, I hit a milestone in my adult life. I purchased my very first new car. Gretchen the GTI has already brought much joy to my life. It's amazing the things that come standard with a car these days. My past car Pepe the Camry (God rest his soul) was a great and reliable car but after driving that car for so many years, I was amazed at any new features just above a cup holder. This is me.... "wow these keys come with one of them new fangled buttons that locks and beeps."

Gretchen purs like a kitten, rides like a cadi, and drives like a race car.... I think I love her.

Office Space

It's the strangest thing.... in my years so far in the corporate world, I have found that the head honchos of any corporation have no etiquette what so ever. At my last job, my monster of a Marketing Director was the biggest slob I have ever met. His shirt was always wrinkled, he chewed with his mouth open, and his desk was always covered with old crusty cookie crumbs. I did not understand how someone with who was making a six figure salary could have such crude behavior, especially one that lived in Japan, a country that has manners and etiquette ingrained into every aspect of the culture!

So today at my current job, it was one of our head honchos last days. In honor of his last day, someone went to Toast and picked up some cupcakes to celebrate his departure. After he did a little speech, a few of us were standing around chatting and he proceeded to reach towards me (at which point I am confused for what he is reaching for) and takes a chunk of my chocolate cupcake with his fingers and then eats it! Who does this?! Even if Tony did that I would be disgusted but someone in management.. come on?! That's like having someone lick your slice of pizza or stick their finger in your jar of peanut butter!!! I don't get it if it was supposed to be an endearing thing... where we are like family and he felt it was okay to do since we are all so "close?" Or maybe it was a "this is my last day so I can do whatever I want thing." Regardless, it was nasty and ruined the appeal of my chocolate cupcake with chocolate sprinkles. I don't even think Lumbergh would have done such a disgrace to Milton! LUMBERGH!

Hollywood Freaks in the Hollywood Scene

Last night I attended a UCB show of my very talented and very funny friend Mary Catherine. I felt silly going over to the hipster side of Hollywood dressed in my work clothes (most people who attend UCB dress like they are in a "my sneakers are cooler then yours" competition) but I sucked it up drove east. I stopped at a mediocre Sushi place next to the theatre, ate dinner alone for the first time in 3 years (which was actually quite relaxing and enjoyable.. no offense honey) and stared at the huge Scientology Celebrity Center mansion in all it's creepy glory. Afterwards, I picked up a cookie from the sceney coffee shop two doors down, where the barista spoke with a very cunning British accent and I wondered if he was really British or was just some actor rehearsing for a minor role in a Dyson commercial. From there I wondered into the every growing line which I didn't expect at all for a Monday, ate my cookie and read The Onion quietly while I waited to enter the Theatre.

Now, every time I have gone to UCB, I am usually with a group of people talking and not really noticing my surroundings. What a fucking scene that place is! Every person in line was a wanna be comedian/actor but of the extreme case.. I'm talking high school president of the drama club times 10! I mean these people were worse than talent agents, kissing the cheeks of every fellow UCB class mate, interrupting each other every other word to try and top each other with a funnier or wittier comment. I mean I just wanted to stand up on a chair and yell "IT'S OKAY PEOPLE, EACH ONE OF YOU ARE BRILLIANTLY FUNNY AND LOVED" while simultaneously shoving Xanex down their throats. All I could think was just let me in so I can see my very funny friend MCand can stop listening to you crazies, and THANK GOD I don't work at Innovative anymore where I had to deal with people like you on a daily basis!

My First Blog -Magic at the Greek

I am a blog virgin. This is my first blog ever. Sure, I've written half assed attempt postings on myspace, but those are not real blogs. I really never felt that I was cool/smart enough to have a blog. I thought, what the hell would I write about and who in the hell would want to read it! But last night, I experienced something so amazing that it inspired me to write about it. So here I am, writing my first blog. I secretly hope it becomes an addiction...

I've been to many great concerts in my three and a half year in LA but nothing like the Arcade Fire show last night at the Greek Theatre. Sure I'd seen them at Coachella, but when you are out in 100 degree weather, fighting for an ounce of shade and a cold glass of beer, and there are so many bodies running around in gold Lemay ridiculousness, it's hard to concentrate on any band, no matter how great they are.

Initially I entered the show annoyed as Tony and I spent 30 minutes in traffic just trying to park. Once we finally wedged our car between a Honda Element and a giant tree amongst a sea of cars, we sprinted to the theatre, our hearts tearing every time we hear the crowd applaud wildly. We finally arrived at our seat in row 7A (which was only a few rows back from the stage and the closest I have ever seen a band at a venue of that size) immediately I forgot about how tired I was from my work day and how I hated moving an inch every 5 minutes just to park our damn car!

The 10 members of the Arcade Fire were the most mesmerizing people I have ever witnessed. Each member was wildly running around stage switching off instruments, yelling into bull horns, smashing down on organ keys, banning on drums, and singing as though their lives depended on it. The entire crowd could sense that every ounce of energy this band had was being poured into each song. The energy was so strong that you felt as if you were going to cry at any point because you were witnessing something incredible that wouldn't be created exactly the same again.

Now, excuse me while I get even more hippie here but just being in the outdoors, surrounded by trees and engulfed in a full moon made this show incredibly magical. There was this weird mesh of smells that filled the air too that added to the experience. The fresh and clean smell of soap, mixed with nutty pine trees and of course the pungent scent of weed coming from the people behind me. All those smells together oddly reminded me of my family's camping trips and how the simplicity of being in nature with great people made me so happy. All of this came back to me and made me so delighted that Tony had dragged me out to a show I thought I was "too tired" to go to.

This was a once and a life time show that one could not shake off. The bands energy was like a drug that made it's way into the blood stream of the audience. Even the numb hipsters and industry snobs in row 7A were dancing. A true testimate to this is Tony, who no matter what show he attends never does more than cross his arms and bob his head. Tony was dancing, singing and clapping with the rest of us who were letting their inner band geek shine on.

I hope everyone can experience a show like this in their lifetime. It was the type of show that motivated you to your core. It made you wish you hadn't had quit your "oh so uncool" violin in 7th grade only to waste your talents at Suzuki Book 5. It made you want to go find bits of shrapnel and start a modern day jug band. It gave you faith, that in a world where so much shit music is shoved down your throat on a daily basis, somewhere in the universe exists talented, innovative musicians who had found their own way with out compromising their own musical style and still"made it."