Concerts: Dave Brubeck

Yesterday, my mom, my brother, Max, and I went into the city for a free outdoor jazz concert at Lincoln Center.


But first things first. Results of the $25 hairspray:

(I was underwhelmed)

Anyway. I didn't get any pictures of the musicians playing (that's illegal, yo!) but I did take some of the program. This is definately where I want to be next Friday...


The opening band was Amir Elsaffar and the Two Rivers Large Ensemble. I did not enjoy them at all. But it was worth sitting through because the Dave Brubeck quartet was absolutely amazing. I'm not a big jazz fan, but I just wanted to wrap their music around me like a blanket.


Some person who was bolder than I recorded this and put it on YouTube. It was much better live, but you can get the idea.

And, ok. I did take just one picture. :)


The train we took back home was a local; in other words it felt like an eternity sitting on the train. So we amused ourselves playing charades (my mom's idea), 20 questions, and listening to music.


After we got back to Stamford, we stopped at Stop & Shop and got Ben & Jerrys. We spent around five minutes in front of the freezer discussing the various benefits of each flavor, and we had just started eeny meeny miny moe when this random guy (who I guess had been in the freezer aisle while we were debating) walked by and said, "Chubby Hubby." So we went with that. And it was delicious.


Then we, uh, played instruments until 4:30 AM, with a brief interlude for The Pokemon Board Game. I'm not joking. I wish I were. I will never get that time back (The Pokemon time, not the jam time. Alex has been teaching me how to drum and I'm really enjoying it)







In the morning we made pancakes.




And that's it! :)

Back to school shopping!

Today I went into the city to go back to school shopping! I didn't take many pictures of the actual day but I did photograph my purchases...

First of all, here are the sheets I'll be using in my dorm next year!

From Home Goods


From The Container Store


Sephora. I find the amount of beauty products in this store to be astoundingly intimidating, and the only reason I got something was because I had a gift card. This tiny bottle of hairspray was $25. Will definately be reviewing this later.

I also got a tiny foldable subway map/map of New York for free, which is by far my most useful (and cheapest!) find of the day.


Urban Outfitters


Close up of the shoes


PB Teen (planning on using this for books until the leather satchel of my dreams (in brown) goes on sale)

And finally, my favorite purchases of the day were from Housing Works, a thrift store in the city that carries books, clothes, apartment furnishings, and other random doo-dads.


Dress that fulfilled every Disney princess fantasy I had as a child. (I did not buy this. I just thought it was awesome.)


Aaand some records! These were only 25 cents each and in mint condition.


I'm planning on hanging the sleeves on my wall, and after I transfer the music onto my computer I have something crafty planned for the records as well...

We had dinner at Le Pain Quotidien. I had fresh baked organic bread with black bean hummus, avocado, and veggies. Deeeeeelish. And it looked pretty, too!


Elana (who is going to school with me next year!) and Kayla. Naomi came too, but she left before I got my camera out.


I am so excited to live in this city for the next four years.

Random snapshots and such

So I haven't really been updating this thing...again. And the only real excuse I have is that I feel awkward whipping out my camera at random moments and asking my friends to pose because "I have a blog." Right.

I have a theory and it goes like this. The way other people react to you taking random pictures of them depends entirely on your camera. If you have a legit camera, people will think you are being wonderfully artistic when you shove it in their face at random moments. If you do this with the same intentions but with a shitty camera, it's just annoying.

I'm not asking for a better camera or anything because I'm not really interested in photogaphy and the one I have now works fine. But yeah. There's your excuse, and I'd be interested to know what you think of my theory.

Anyway. Here are some things I've been doing in the past week:


A few Fridays ago I went to an amusement park with Emily (right), Rachel (center), and Pam (not pictured). The first thing we did was go on the skydiving thing, because I always wanted to do that but my parents never let me.


It.


Was.


So.


Much.


Fun.

Unfortunately, the rest of the day went downhill from there. The rollercoasters were just painful, as were the other kiddie rides we went on, and the experience ended when one of the attendants didn't lock my door on a ride that went upside down, and I literally had to hold on for dear life.

I have another theory: Amusement parks are rife for the next Bolshevik Revolution. The divide between the dour people who run the rides and the gleeful people who enjoy them is like Marx's theory of class conflict times 20.

Moving on.


Diners are my new favorite place to eat. They are relatvely cheap, have a large selcetion of food, and most importantly, they serve breakfast all day, which I always thought should be an obvious thing to do. This is an amazing salad I had for lunch the other day and will try to recreate sometime.

What was in it:
-Lettuce
-Cucumbers
-Dried cranberries
-Almond slivers
-Mandarin orange slices
-Goat cheese
-Cherry viniagrette
-Tomatoes (if you're into that kind of thing, which I am decidedly not)


I went on a walk with Kayla.


We climbed on a jungle gym at a playground near her house.


Oh, and the other night a friend and I got high and watched this. It's called Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus, and it is a terrible, terrible, hilrious movie.

Music: Phoenix

My manager burned me Phoenix's new CD, Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix. I really like them, though they're peppier than what I usually listen to. You might like them, too, if you enjoy bands such as The Hush Sound or Guster.

Movies: 2 Days in Paris, Fanny and Alexander

I haven't really been sleeping normally. I think it's at least partially because at the end of most days I feel like I haven't really accomplished anything, and there's a little niggling feeling that if I stay up one more hour something exciting will happen. Or else it is just unwillingness to go to sleep without having done or seen or read something. So I've been reading a lot (more on that later) and watching movies late at night.

This is a very funny, touching movie that I watched last night with some friends. It's called 2 Days in Paris.

It starts like this:


The beautiful, beautiful final scene, if you want to ruin the movie for yourself.


And then a few nights ago I watched Fanny and Alexander, which is very long and very creepy but very good. It's set in Sweden at the turn of the century, and it's about two well-to-do children (predictably, Fanny and Alexander) whose parents are involved in theater. After their father dies suddenly, their mother remarries a bishop, who demands that after the wedding the family give up all of their worldly possessions and live with him in an austere, allegedly haunted cottage. The film alternates between being dark and depressing, then silly and heartwarming, but it does so in a way that is more truthful than bipolar. And if that sounds interesting to you, it's all on YouTube! (search fanny och alexander theatrical version 01. warning: it is 22 parts)

So yeah. Those are my cinema picks, and if you have a couple hours to waste I think you should check them out.

Culinary Abomination: Kiwi Bread (cake?)

This is why I don't let the kitchen bitch cook.

My mom went to Costco last week and, in an attempt to keep healthier food in the house, bought a bunch of produce in bulk. This has become problematic, as the fruit all ripened at the same time, and no one in the house has yet expressed the desire to consume, say, twenty apples in the span of a week. Still, the apples are tasty enough and I don't have much of a problem snacking on a few a day. The real problem is the twenty or so kiwis that have been sitting in the fridge for a week.

You can't do anything with kiwi, and eating kiwi for weeks now has started to make it unappetizing. You can't bake with it, cook with it, its uses are extremely limited. The only appetizing recipe I found with kiwi was Martha Stewart's kiwi salsa, which I didn't think anyone in my family would eat. But this morning, Alex and I were both bored out of our minds, and decided to give kiwi bread a go.

Let me just say that I was against this idea from the start and had no part in its creation. I was just glad something was being done with the kiwis instead of just letting them rot. I had no idea that the result would be inedible.


(It looks so innocent when it's asleep)

To try and recify this frankensteinian monster, chef genius over here decided to add frosting. FROSTING. TO THE KIWI BREAD.



Just because you made it, you don't have to pretend to like it.


At first, I think he described it as "strange, but not bad."


After the second slice he wised up and proclaimed it "gross."

I couldn't have said it better myself.

Baking: White Chocolate Macademia Nut Blondies

So I haven't really been updating this thing, mostly because I've been working and so I don't really have much to report. Hopefully, now that I have the next four days off, that will change. For now though, here is an old update that I wasn't able to post until now, because I didn't want to spoil the surprise. :)

I always feel kinda weird when I go out of my way to do something nice for other people, which might sound heartless but really I'm just afraid of crossing that fine line between doing something sweet and being a creep. But Kayla and Adena were going on a road trip to visit some friends we went to camp with (I wasn't able to go because I had to work) and I really missed these people and wanted to send something along to them. Which meant only one thing...


It was blondie time.


Hokay. So the first step is to roast the macadademia nuts.


While they're in the oven, cream the light brown sugar and the butter.


Add the wet ingredients to the mixture (or, get your kitchen bitch...um, that is, little brother, to do it for you)


Then the dry ones.

Finally, add the toasted macademia nuts, the white chocolate chips, and voila!



Wrapped up and ready to go.

Recipe is, yet again, from crepesofwrath. (I promise I look at other food blogs, the fact that I've done three crepesofwrath posts is purely coincidence)

I actually just took this picture because I liked the way all the colorful food looked on the grill

This was my dinner. :)

Thursgay

So sadly, my plans to go to a Man Man concert didn't work out, but I did have the chance to go to a piercing parlor with Noam to get his eyebrow pierced!





And then later in the night I babysat at the pool club, which basically amounted to watching WALL-E for what is probably the eighth time and making sure the kids didn't have any soda. I love babysitting jobs where I basically get paid for existing. :)

Wordless Wednesday: Adena's Party