pressure cooker. HOT DOG!

i work in an area that is populated by all sorts of LAWYERS AND AGENTS. to be specific, britney spears has often been spotted here visiting a lawyer (hers? K-feds? who knows), and the agents in the complex are of the CAA-variety (translation BIG HUGE DEAL).

and we all know that i'm kind of a big deal, but… i, too, can get intimidated by agentylawyery-type people. yes it’s true. i kind of still think of myself as a tomboy from the stixx of minneapolis. like a tiny little weird fish* in a giant LA ocean. but in reality, i'm probably a regular-looking medium-sized fish in a regular old pond. yeah?

i do have a point here.

so anyway, i usually stick to a few tried and true lunch spots where i know EXACTLY what i want. I go in, I order, I leave. bam-bam-bam.

so i guess you could say i get intimidated? when i'm in line at a new eatery and there are people behind me who KNOW what they want, but i totally don't. so then! I panic. I order whatever seems the most easy and least caloric, just to get out of the way of the agentylawyery people and just get OUT. I don’t know why they scare me. most of them are probably douchebags anyway.

but they do, they scare me, so shut it.

so my point is this: today I went to the stand. and I wanted to BRANCH out and maybe get myself a nice HOT DOG. or even a chicken sandwich with WHATEVER FIXINGS I wanted. DESIGN YOUR OWN DOG! DESIGN YOUR OWN BURGER! seems like a simple (AND EXCITING!) proposition, right?

but then, someone was behind me in line, SUDDENLY. like, from out of nowhere. so then. I PANICKED. I couldn’t think of what I would actually like on my chicken burger (OR MAYBE? TURKEY DOG! OMG, SO MANY CHOICES!) so I did the obvious.

“greek salad with chicken, please.”

so, so lame. I sheepishly wandered over to where The Facility*** was waiting and confessed that I had lamed out and ordered a salad. even though, moments earlier, I had also confessed a craving for hot dogs after seeing a whole storyline about them on gossip girl last night. or so I heard, there was a storyline about them?

but hey! in a VERRRRY interesting turn of events, the salad was f*cking awesome.

so I win!

take that lawyeryagentydouchebags!! take that, you!!!!!!!!!!!


*i'm doing alright for myself, anyway…despite all my projections as a fresh-faced midwesterner upon arriving in LA and promptly HATING** it and thinking i was going to die a slow miserable death here.
**one year into my life in LA, i promptly LOVED it and could never imagine moving back to the frozen tundra. but anyway.
***my research partner in crime

NOOOOOOOOOOoooooooooooo. ok, yes.

at 5am the alarm went off and scared the ever-living sH*t out of me. i sighed as i rolled over and painfully opened my eyes to see what aaron was going to do. please don't wake up please don't wake up please don't wake up.

and yes, of course, by the time my eyes were able to grasp objects in the dark around me, i realized he was UP, and he meant it. HONEY? he questioned tentatively DO YOU WANT TO GO TO THE GYM WITH ME? i sighed again and replied curtly "NO." OK. and he went back to his business. at that moment, i realized that there were CLOTHES IN THE WASHER that need to GO IN THE DRYER. and within seconds i was AWAKE. and in the same thought, i realized that YES, YES I WAS GOING TO GO TO THE GYM.

damnit.

So, now, it's 10am. I've been up for 5 hours (I normally wake up at MAYBE 7:30a) and i have eight miles logged on the treadmill. i should feel awesome, right?

nope. just f*cking exhausted, is all.

the good news? i'm jumping on a red eye tonight and should sleep like a baby (with the help of some delicious airplane wine!).

in other good news... the reason aaron was up so early was because he had a call time of 8:30am on the set of a new A&E show that he is doing a little stint on. i got a text at 8:37am with the message that his TRAILER IS HUGE! so that's good. stay tuned for more on this.... when i wake up.


ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

something stinks.

this morning at the gym, there was a man who smelled like he hadn't showered in a few years. this fact was made even more unbearable when it was coupled with him running a few treadmills down from me so that his scent wafted through the gym air and into my delicate nostrils.


it sucked.

contradict me.

Everyday, I park on P4, which is the bottom-most level of our colossal parking structure.

Reasons why:

• Even though I consistently arrive at work 15-20 minutes later than I should (9:15/9:20a), I always get a primo spot near the stair/elevator door because P4 is SUPER CREEPY and STINKY and MOSTLY EMPTY so no one parks there
  
• This allows me to walk four flights of stairs to the "D Level" where I can catch the "Express" elevator. Four flights of stairs roughly translates into 40 per floor, so let's say 160 stairs total. I know it doesn't seem like a lot, but when you add 20lbs of weight due to my purse, gym bag and computer bag, it actually is a lot.

Every single day, I do this. But still, EVERY SINGLE DAY I am tired and out of breath by the time I reach the top of the parking structure.

~~

Yesterday, I ran 3 miles in 24 minutes, give or take a few seconds. I did this directly after attending a 45-minute step class with weights followed by a 15-minute abs class.

~~

Today I ate two huge greasy chocolate chip cookies. But I threw away the bread (bad carbs!) from my sandwich and only ate egg whites with a salmon patty for breakfast.

~~

On Sunday, I told Aaron that we should "not drink" on Monday & Tuesday. It doesn't bode well for my mental clarity, I said, to drink so early in the week. He agreed. But then he said, so why do you always want to have wine on Wednesday nights?

Because! I clearly NEED to have a drink by Wednesday because I am so dry from not having any on Monday & Tuesday!

~~

Is it bad that I'm SUPER excited for the return of Gossip Girl? that show is too much awesome. i'm also VERY excited for LOST to return tomorrow night.

~~

Does being a PISCES have to mean I have to ALWAYS be battling both sides of EVERY equation?

~~

Is it Friday yet?

the hour of happy.

i don't want to brag, but aaron and i are pretty much the Most Awesome when it comes to finding the best happy hour(s). so it comes as no surprise that we found yet Another best happy hour place recently.

but the whole journey has been a long ....and quite sordid one.

at first, i liked the place. but then? i hated. and then i hated again. spotty service, missing items from the menu, lackluster ambience, etc. etc. but yet? it was less than a block away! so we HAD TO HAVE FAITH that this place would eventually figure itself out.

but yet? i wanted to Hate. because, it was much easier to Hate and Set Low Expectations that to think we could actually have a super cool happy hour place this close to home.

so Friday. we went. the menu had EVOLVED. there was an actual Ambience. the servers were Much Better. and they had ALL THE DRINKS THEY ADVERTISED ON THE MENU. a huge, but subtle detail. or a subtle but HUGE detail.

at any rate.


we went back tonight, because friday was SO AWESOME. and it was EVEN BETTER.

we met the owner(s), exchanged pleasantries, got free drinks due to our undeniable charm, and ate some of the best food Ever. we even convinced the Owner(s) to create a chicken-wing-eating-contest and signed ourselves and (several of) our friends up for the first official contest.

to that i say: ruby and aaron? well done, madam and sir, WELL DONE!

and in case you live in the area and want a new place to get cheap (delicious) drinks - LYCHEE COSMO, anyone? and also? yumalicious food?

go here.


and. SCENE.

mailbag!

dear Guy who Likes to Admire Himself,

it's dangerous to stare at your reflection to the left of you while running in a forward direction on the treadmill. and anyway, you look like a douche. get over yourself.

Sincerely, The Awesome Girl on the Treadmill directly behind you

100% class, ya'll.

typically, after working a 12-hour day, i'm pretty much spent.

typically, people don't have raging birthday parties on a tuesday night.

however, somehow, i found myself at a dive-bar-birthday-party at midnight last night.


and first, let me clarify that by "dive bar" i actually meant to say "GOURMET dive bar." which is a perfect oxymoronical description of my new favorite place, AKA The Happy Ending Bar.

it's pretty much the perfect place for sophisticated trash, like myself.

it's plastic cups of alcohol, but with cloth napkins.
it's cheap drinks and shots, but gourmet appetizers featuring ingredients like... lobster.
it's a gathering place for the post-dodgeball game crowd, but it's also high heels and glitter.
it's karaoke and 80s cover bands. and, yeah. there is no classy counterpart to that.

anyway, i only wish i hadn't been dead-faced tired (even though i slapped on a happy face for the few hours i was able to rally) because i think i would have danced my face off while spinning the wheel of drinks and catching lobsters with a claw machine after tossing back a few vodka red bulls.


but alas, i did not do any of the above things (i blame WORKING MY FACE OFF for such things).

i did however sample the filet mignon slider on a pretzel roll while sipping some vodka soda drinks, and i only wish i hadn't eaten earlier in the night, cuz that shizz was gooood. someone else at our table ordered the turkey andouille sausage corn dogs, and i had enough good sense not to try one ( i have PANTS to fit into, PEOPLE!) they were devoured by others at a breakneck speed. and! they smelled like YUMMMMmmmm.

anyway.

we left just as the party was getting into full swing, but i made a promise to the fat lobster in the tank that I WOULD BE BACK. and i would be eating him, or his friends. mark my words.

anything but routine.

now and again, patterns emerge in my routine. this is actually atypical as much as most people would think routines to be typical.

this is like, maybe the the third friday night in a row where i am sitting with my boys (aaron, eddie and camus) and my one bitch (cosette), drinking wine, eating some sort of random sweet item (tonight? sesame honey almonds, i know, the hell??) and watching some sort of super weird movie.

week 1. star trek episodes from the 60s (um. the hell)

week 2. the mist (mehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh)

week 3. the king of kong (!?!?!?!!?!?!!?!?!?.!?!?!)

guys. seriously. this HAS GOT TO STOP. i can totally handle the KING OF KONG on a monday night. but friday? no. NO.

but secretly? friday night is the night where i loooove to do "nothing." maybe? king of kong is "nothing" to me.

tonight, however, i decided to end my workday with a 7-mile run. this means i have energy to do something other than mindlessly veg out to nerdy movies. or i should say i HAD energy. but once i had the vino, i turned to mush.

but secretly? i can't wait to wake up early tomorrow, go to my sculpt class, run 4 miles and then get massaged.

the only way THAT tomorrow can happen is if THIS tonight happens.

and so it goes.

doggs in da haus.

monkey see.

so we moved into our new (and hopefully) final office space on monday. i feel pretty settled in, even if there is still residual construction happening all around us and there are construction workers up in this piece on a daily basis. whatevs, it's still 10000000% better than where we were previously.


here is my new office:

and my view:


and directly across the hall from me sits my sr. analyst, who we now call The Facility.*



this is an odd set-up.



1. when i look across the hall, i first see a reflection of myself in my own glass window. then i see a reflection of myself and my office in the glass of HIS window. then, somewhere past my double reflections, i can kind of make out The Facility in his office, working dililgently away. conversely, he has NO reflections because he does not have a window behind him (see, that's how i wield my power: NO WINDOW FOR YOU!). therefore, he can see me PLAIN AS DAY. or in "MY FULL GLORY, IN LIVING COLOR" as he likes to say. damn you Facility, damn you.



2. we are located right next to the reception area and next to everyone's favorite conference room, THE FISHBOWL (every office has a fishbowl, right? i heart fishbowls) and THE BIG BOARDROOM. translation: HIGH TRAFFIC AREA. which means we get a lot of people coming by and, because we are behind giant glass windows, people feel the need to GAWK? OGLE? OBSERVE OFFICE WORKERS IN THEIR NATURAL HABITATS? i don't know. but we feel kinda like this:

Ruby: i feel like we are animals in a zoo
Ruby: everyone walks by looking curiously at us
The Facility: Everyone's looking at us - Fenty tapped on the glass at me and I went crazy
Ruby: i want to make monkey noises

And trust me, i have made A LOT of monkey/gorilla noises in the past few days. because, hey, why not? the best is when one of the "gawkers" turns out to be the CEO of your company, visiting from NY. and you make some subtle monkey noises as he walks by. and then someone points out that hey, that was the CEO. and then you were all, OHHHH so that's why he looked so familiar.

oooo oooooooo oooooooo ahhhhhhh ahhhhhhhhhhhhh!

*long story, but basically one of our consultants thought his name was the name of a focus group facility we are using and got very confused and later sent a note saying, "sorry for the mixup! i thought [name redacted] was a facility! his name sounds so official!" which makes no sense, but calling him The Facility is pretty awesome.

sufficiently sophonsified!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

"i am sufficiently sophonsified. any more would be obnoxious to my delicious taste."

"why drink water when you can drink WINE!?"


--aaron's grandma.


loves.

7 names is better than 1.

i have an ongoing problem with pet names. the name i give them is NEVER enough. i have to call them at least 5-6 additional names, depending on my mood or theirs. i don't know why this is... why can't the original name, or perhaps one nickname suffice?? i don't know. *shakes head* i just.don't.know.

so... without further ado, i present to you the name list for each doggin.

doggin #1
cosette*
co-co
mogwai
mogwanovich
croissant (said in a FRENCH accent)
squanch (definition #3)
squishious
croissanthemum
princess (naturally)

doggin #2
camus* (pronounced cam-mew or kay-mus, depending on the mood)
caymus conundrum**
mr. squigglesworth mcgillicudy
camus andrews
mew-mew
'mus (pronounced "mew")
The Little Man

so... there you have it.

does anyone else have this "problem?"

*actual name

**usually sung to the tune of "rainbow connection" AND represents a favorite wine .... someday we'll find it, THE CAAAAYMUS CONUNDRUMMMMM, the lovers, the dreamers and MEEEEE."

tenna likes it in her pants.

Tenna: why can people not put their cell phones on f*cking vibrate
Ruby: because vibrate feels funny in their pants
Tenna: I heart vibrate
Ruby: um. ok.

FROM THE VAULT.

ed. note: i was perusing past blogs and journals for april fool's jokes i've done, and came across this from another journal dated 1.16.2006. my brother was in town and, obviously, we know how to party.

enjoy

The bird bottle opener (BBO, from here on out) just chilling, seems cool enough.

I was like aw, you're cute BBO!!

I even stuck my finger in his mouth to show how much I trusted him. I was a little apprehensive, as you can probably tell.

Ranon thought maybe we should let BBO fly free... he's sweet & kind, you know.

Then, a crazy thing happened. BBO farted, and it smelled horrible. You can tell, because I look like I just smelled a horrible fart stink.

So I was like, BBO, you are dead to me. You farted on my table, gross. Double ew.

THEN! BBO attacked!!! I tried to get him off, but Ranon had to help.

So then! BBO attacked Ranon. Holy crap. What an ASSHOLE!

I would write more, but both of us are dead now, due to BBO-inflicted wounds and severe complications resulting therein.

RIP, Ruby & Ranon.

kinda? over it.

last night i removed "a socialite's life" and "just jared" from my google reader. a few days ago, after seeing perez hilton on ATTACK OF THE SHOW (have i mentioned how much i LOVE this show? guess what? LOVE IT), i decided that i know longer feel compelled to read every day. in fact, i think i only check his site maybe? once a week. which is a far cry from checking it EVERY HOUR like i used to a few short months ago. also removed from my rotation? pink is the new blog and hollywood rag.

basically? I JUST DON'T CARE ANYMORE.

i don't care what (or who?) MILEY CYRUS is doing. i don't care that tara reid is drunk again. i don't care who got in a fist fight outside of Villa. i really really don't care who's had a nip slip lately.

i don't care, i don't care, i don't care.


that feels good.


OVER IT.


ps. the superficial and wwtdd are still in rotation. WHAT? you don't expect me to completely quit cold turkey do you? i'm not that heartless.