It's basically Friday!

As I sit at my desk sleepily munching on banana bread, I realized that I haven’t blogged in a while.  In fact, I forgot that I was a “blogger” at all.  Oops.

Updates:

My fishy Stanford died last night L  He was my first and (so far) only pet.  He was a good little fish, but I knew it was his time.

 I discovered a GREAT new blog.  Most of you know of my interest-slash-borderline-obsession with perezhilton.com, and though PH is still #1, www.dlisted.com is a HILARIOUS celeb gossip site.  It’s extremely vulgar and inappropriate, but this guy has no shame and makes fun of some of my faves: Beyonce, Tom Cruise and Britney Spears (the usual celeb gossip blog fodder).  So that has provided me with lots of entertainment today.

 

I get tomorrow and Thursday off!  YAY! 

 

I talked my bf’s friends into going to downtown LA for New Years.  I cannot convey to you how HUGE this is.  This group doesn’t like going out normally.  I brought up the idea to Bret a few weeks ago, and he was like “Nah, I don’t think anyone will want to do that.”  Shot down in a huge way.  So then I brought it up to his (cooler) brother, and he was like “yeah that sounds like fun, I’ll ask around.”  Seed officially planted.  And low and behold, the other night I get a call from Bret saying “Hey, my brother suggested we go downtown for New Years, it sounds fun, huh?”  I had to roll my eyes and just bite my tongue.  Just goes to show the amount of power of persuasion I have over Bret, in comparison to his brother.

 

Do any of you watch Keith Olbermann on MSNBC?  Yes, my BF is a hard-core liberal, and coaxed me into watching a few episodes with him before the election.  Anyway, he has this feature on his show called “Special Comment” where he basically goes on a tirade for the last 10 minutes of the show.  Consider the following my own Special Comment:

 

I spent the last 8 days hanging out with my 9 year old cousin Grace.  She is TOTALLY into the High School Musical phase of her life.  Have any of you SEEN HSM?  I watched 1 and 2 with her… and wow.  This is the crap that Disney is feeding America’s youth nowadays?  Oh my gosh, I had to stop myself from yelling at the TV for Grace’s sake, numerous times.  Seriously, in HSM 2, the main character (played by Zach Efron, who ONLY wears teal colored shirts the whole movie to bring out his dreamy blue eyes I’m sure) yells to his dad that “my future isn’t as important to me as what my friends think of me!!” (paraphrased).  Basically, some college recruiters had been talking to him, and his friends were all jelly that he didn’t invite them along.  WTF?  Friends are important and all, but if you don’t look out for #1, no one will.  I made sure to talk to Grace about it after the movie was over.  But seriously “I care more about what my friends think” !!???!?  It’s a perfect segue into “My friends won’t think I’m cool if I don’t do drugs, and since that’s the MOST IMPORTANT THING, I’m gonna use!!”  Disney, what have you done?????

 

I also saw Camp Rock, which was also shiteous but its saving grace was Nick Jonas.  What a cutie.  J

 

My Social Calendar is sooooo full!

Tonight- Date night with Bret, which also includes some last-minute present finishing!  Also, Family comes in from Europe tonight- if they don't get snowed in at their layover in NY

Tomorrow- Gift exchange at Bret's, his brother's birthday, then me going home!

Wednesday- Christmas Eve! Which means for my family, wrapping presents and baking all day, then church then opening presents!  Oh yah and I have a haircut at 10am so Hillary and I can compare cuts on Friday!!

Thursday- Christmas Day!  Includes lazing around in my PJs, lots of fun activities with my 8-year-old cousin I'm sure, and more lazing.  Probably a movie in there too.  

Friday- Breakfast with my GIRLS in the morning (remember girls, 930am at Britt M's!!) then a possible lunch with Betsy, then more cuz time and then Bret is coming for dinner (and the Spanish Inquisition from my Aunt!!)

Saturday- super secret surprise for my Mom's Christmas present takes place at 10:30am

Sunday- Nothing planned yet... though my European Family is probably going to try to spring a trip to Disneyland/ Sea World/ CA Adventure/ Legoland on me.

Monday- Back to work, boooooooooooooo!!!!!  

I wasn't joking!!

THIS isn't normal!!!!!!!!

It's freaking COLD!

Yeah so I don't have cool pictures to post of all the snow on my block, but I CAN tell you that it is 45 degrees today in Los Angeles, and I work in an old, brick building with no heater.  

Today I am wearing:

-Tank top

- tee shirt

- long sleeve thin sweater

- cardigan

- pullover sweater

- pea coat

- wool scarf

- two pairs of socks

- jeans

- boots

- thin gloves 

And I'm still cold.

Big news... perhaps

Big news, dun dun duuuunnnnnnn...

So I may be moving again.  BUT it's not like the last time I moved, where I had a fairly dramatic exit from Mr. Creepster Landlord's palace home.  This time... well, I had to find a place in a hurry, and I don't really know the people I live with.  My friend Kristin (who lived with me and still lives in said creepster's house) wants to move out (I wonder why??) and we found a GREAT place in Venice.  Seriously, you girls are gonna be SO jelly of me.  It's fairly affordable (whatever that word means in the context of west LA).. anyway so it's affordable, in Venice right on Abbott Kinney (the main street with all the cute shops and bars) and.. the best part... ready for it?...  HARDWOOD FLOORS!  AAAHHAKDSkjhklkdfjglhdmf;;m!!!!!  

So, it may happen.  And Kristin has offered to help me pay for a moving service to bribe me into doing it.  

More info to come.

Current obsessions:

- Chow mein (so healthy! hah)

- crafting

- obsessing over whether my lotto ticket is gonna WIN BIG tomorrow

- the smell of pine

- Christmas decorating

I figured out why Twilight sucked.

The woman who wrote the screenplay also wrote the screenplay for "Step Up."  Really, enough said.

PS: This is too funny!!! 

Los Angeles Survival Tip #1: What yellow lights are really for

Never, never, NEVER slow down for yellow lights.  That yellow light means you freakin pedal-to-the-metal as if your life depends on it.  Because, it probably does.

This morning in the intersection outside my work, a high school kid driving to Venice High slammed on the brakes at a yellow light.  Needless to say, the car behind him crashed into him and sent kid's car sailing through the intersection.  No one died, but there were ambulances aplenty everywhere.

On a side note about yellow lights:

You know how if you are already in the intersection when the green light turns yellow, it's ok for you to run the red light?  Well, Los Angeleans believe that even if the tip of their license plate is in the intersection when the light turns red, they can run the red light.  That means opposing traffic ALWAYS has to sit through at least 3 seconds of their green light while the other cars clear the intersection (and that's only if the intersection isn't blocked.... but don't get me started!).

Word to to wise: if you aren't an aggressive driver (or plan to become one) stay the hell away from LA.

Weekends are never long enough!

I had such a lovely weekend, filled with crafting and lazing around with friends J

 Friday evening Bret and I had a little date.  We drove to Santa Monica and did a little shopping on the 3^rd Street Promenade and then treated ourselves to Gelatto.  I got Pecan Pie flavor and Bret got Mango Sorbet.  Bret bought a few presents for his family, and then indulged me by letting me roam around Anthropologie (under the pretense of looking for a present for his mom).  Of course I found tons of stuff I love but cant afford.  Sigh  Someday maybe!

 

On Saturday Bret and I slept in and then had a wonderful breakfast of Denver Omelettes, pancakes, and home style potatoes at the Grinder (a great breakfast place close to my apartment).  Then he went off to play basketball and I went over to my friends Matt and Kaio’s apartment (they live like 2 miles from me).  They needed female advice on how to decorate their place for Christmas.  So they had a tree, and I went out and bought some ornaments (I got this box of 76 ornaments from CVS for $8.. some of the ornaments are totally crappy, but some are really nice too!).  The theme was red and gold, so I got all red and gold ornaments, and some gold tinsel and white lights for the tree and their balcony.    I had SO much fun decorating their place, especially since I am not going to have a tree or anything of the sort at my place. 

 

On Sunday I woke up sniffly, so I went over to Bret’s house and he babied me all day J  We watched tivo and movies and I made all my Christmas cards (which are way cute if I do say so myself!).    We were LUCKY enough to catch Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire on ABC Family… which means watching R-Patz as Cedric Diggory!! Mmm.  The guy actually can act, despite trying to prove otherwise in Twilight.  During the movie, they were running all these “First Look” specials of HP 6 (The Half-Blood Prince) which doesn’t come out until JULY 17 2009!!! I don’t know how I will last so long!! 

 

(in other news, I read on perezhilton.com today that they are rushing production of Twilight #2 “New  Moon” to be released in 2009 as well… yay!)

 

Something else I should mention that I know a certain reader of this blog will appreciate.. I spent all of Saturday AND Sunday in these cute black sweats that I just got… I may never go back to jeans!!! 

 

10 things I’m looking forward to before New Years:

 

- Next Sunday’s 2^nd Annual Cookie Date with Bret (where I bake cookies and we watch Christmas movies)

- Seeing my besties on the 26^th

- FOUR paid days off

- Getting paid next Monday (broke as a joke over here!!)

- Seeing my Europe family that are coming to visit the 22^nd-28^th… will probably include a Disneyland trip

- Decorating my parent’s perfect Christmas tree

- Matt and Kaio’s Christmas party on the 20^th- complete with White Elephant exchange at my insistence!

- my stupid classes being done this Thursday!!!

- Getting my hair cut on the 24^th J

- Giving everyone all the presents I have been making!!

 

Twilight: A Movie Review

So for those of you who don’t know, I spent the last two weeks of my life reading the delightfully bad Twilight Series.  Now, I can’t hate on the books too much, because though I laughed at a lot of the dialogue and rolled my eyes at a lot (most) of the plot structure, I was still sucked in and couldn’t put them down.  Hillary and I have had many in-depth conversations about the books (why I think Jacob is better for Bella than Edward, the Mormon undertones of the whole “eternal commitment” issue, if vampires really are sexier than werewolves, etc) and so it only seemed logical that we would go see the movie together. Of course, Bret and Ryan were great sports and went with us.  They were glad they went, because they were treated to Gummi Sharks (they have teeth just like vampires- thanks Hillary!) and a good laugh.

Ok, so this movie was… for the lack of a better word… funny.  Now, I love and appreciate a good comedy (the world needs more laughter!) but honestly, this movie wasn’t trying to be funny.  Nonetheless, Hillary and I were laughing to the point of tears on more than one occasion.   The main actors were so caught up in emoting their thoughts through facial expressions, they ended up looking stiff, awkward, like they had stomach aches, and really just downright annoying.  The best characters were the shallow ones, like Bella’s friend Jessica, and Tyler, the only black kid in Forks.  They at least seemed more natural, and not so... brooding.  Having read the books, I have a general idea of the motivations behind the characters, but it totally didn’t translate on screen.  Ryan, the only one of us who hadn’t read the book, totally gave up on trying to understand the movie and just laughed at all the cheesy lines.

My favorite scene was where Bella goes to Edward’s house to meet his family.  One huge disappointment for me: the house.  Now, I have a soft spot in my heart for architecture, and this house was really supposed to be (in my mind) an old, white, 100-year old Victorian type house.  But the house in the movie was very modern, angular and blue with brown wood accents.  Whatever.  I liked the scene because the vamps finally looked almost normal, and relaxed.  Oh yeah, and the sweater Bella was wearing in the scene was the same sweater I wore to the movie last night.  (I was way too overly excited at that fact!!) 

Other great parts of the movie:

-Emmett’s velour track suit

-James’ abs

-Jacob (love him!! Go Team Jacob!!!)

-Bella screaming in pain (the best acting she did all movie!)

-Billy “keeping it real”

-Edward’s hair (Bret says he’s going to make his look like that! J )

-Jasper- misunderstood yet totally perfect

 

And yes, of course I’m going to see the sequel, cheesy lines and bad acting and all.  Sigh.  

Oh hey guys.... this is awkward

So I was lovingly, if not forcibly, shoved into the world of blogging today. Apparently, my obsessive reading of my friend's blogs (and also demanding daily updates) was getting a little out of hand, so my lovely friend Brittanie took it upon herself to set up this little love nest for me.

Why resist, you ask?  Well, my girlfriends that have blogs all have interesting lives.  You know.. husbands, babies, trips, goings-on, etc.  Me?  Well, Brittanie named the blog pretty perfectly.  Just An Ordinary Desk Job.  My life almost fully consists of working, and when I'm not working, I'm trying to survive the commute there and back.  Doesn't really seem that interesting, and you can only tell SO many stories fueled by road rage... but, none the less, since Brittanie wants to know what I'm up to, I will do my very best to make this blog entertaining.  

Some topics to cover in the future:

- my recent completion of the Twilight series

- Christmas

- What it's like to live in Los Angeles

- My recent obsession with scrapbooking

- Why Dr. Pepper is so much better than Coke (can you say, 23 flavors??)

- Why frozen yogurt is the most effective mood stabilizer

- Best Of lists, because I'm nothing if not opinionated.

... and yes, I just blogged about what I am going to blog about.  Classic Susie.

Because we all want to know what you're doing

That's the reason why this blog was created - so my adoring fans (and best friends) could find out what I am doing on a daily basis. And though it may become an addiction, I will comply. So, here goes nothing!