what i resolve to do in '09

Happy almost 2009. I am pretty excited for 2009 although I hate the holiday which is New Year's. So stupid. I'd much rather prefer to stay at home and watch Dick Clark's Rockin' New Years Eve, but the stigma attached to staying home alone is so intense that it overwhelms me and forces me to go out. That's right, forces me! I have no control over anything!

I've thought of a few resolutions that aren't useful at all.

1. Vacuum more.
-I definitely don't vacuum enough and its giving me anxiety.

2. Drink less coffee.
-Recently I've determined that the large travel size cup of coffee that I drink every morning is causing severe eye twitching. Or that's what my research has determined. Coffee=eye twitch. No cofffee=no eye twitch.

3. Learn the dance to "Single Ladies"
-I mean, who wouldn't attempt this? It's impossible not to sing or dance to it.

4. Learn all of the words to "It's the End of the World As We Know It" by R.E.M.
-This song has plagued me my entire life. I can sing like 4 lines correctly. Honestly I don't know if they are correct. Here's what I think they are?
"That's great it starts with an earthquake, birds and snakes an aeroplane, Lenny Bruce is not afraid, eye of hurricane"
"6oclock tv hour..."
"uh oh this means no fear cavalier renegade steer clear a tournament a tournament a tournament of lies, offer me solutions offer me alternatives and I'll decline"
"LEONARD BERNSTEIN"

I'm totally useful. Happy 2009!

surrrrriously? some random thoughts.

• People who sit next to each other in booths. What is wrong with them? Do you know what I mean? Its the two-some who has to sit next to each other when there is a whole empty side of the booth across from them. Way to waste a booth for a fun group of four who might like it. Maybe because I'm not in a relationship I don't understand the need to sit next to someone and eat...but even if I was, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be one of those people. Isn't it more awkward to turn and talk to someone while eating? When they are in front of you, conversation is much easier. The couple that sits next to each other looks like they are lording over everyone and judging people since they are both looking forward.
  

• Why are the people in my body flow class so insane as well? They ruin the very idea of relaxation by being crazy and weirding everyone out.

• I now have a Wii and may or may not play American Idol Karaoke by myself...which is really no different than me singing around my house...just now I'm being judged. I'm still just as bad at Super Mario Bros 3 as I was when I was 9. How am I not any better? Did I not pay attention during my 5,000 viewings of "The Wizard"...the 2-hour commercial for the game?
  

• I blame my somewhat fear of the city on the movie "Adventures in Babysitting". In the movie, they basically prove that going into the city will get you carjacked, involved in an accident, chased by drug dealers, harassed by Thor look-a-likes, and get caught in a blues club. Direct quote from the movie, "This is the city kid, I don't take care of anyone but myself". Scary.
  

As usual, I feel like I'm taking crazy pills.

That's all.

PS

Yay Ravens.

2 Albers for the price of 1

I've discovered that I get a lot of comments when John Albers is featured in my blogs...so I'm taking it a step further...I'm reposting some old blogs that John wrote in 2003. He sent them to me today at work and they filled me with such Christmas joy that I figured it was appropriate to publish on almost Christmas Eve. Enjoy!! Don't forget there are 2!
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December 11, 2003

John Goes to the Mall

Over my lunch 'hour' today, I went to Tysons mall. Generally I like going to the mall over the Holidays. I may actually return to Tysons Corner on Saturday if anyone is interested. Anyway, here are some neat things about the mall during the holidays.

- If your Christmas music includes the combination of some white person singing and the use of turntables, it sucks. Tony Bennett does not need a DJ.

- It is funny to watch a woman walk by the make-up counter and give a woman having make-up applied a sideways glance. Almost like, "Darling, what are you letting them do to you." Keep in mind that the woman giving the glance appears as though her make-up was done by Maaco and involved masking tape and newspaper.

- It is also funny to watch men in the jewelry store. They all have that deer in the headlights look on their face. Their signifigant others might as well have just sent a guy with a black hood and an axe along with them, and have this gentleman whisper in their ear "You are a screw-up all year long, but if you buy something shiny enough you can get away with it for one more year, don't F it up." Jewelry stores, have some program where the hapless guy can go in, pick out three things he thinks she'll like, put the item numbers on some kind of certificate so the chicky can go in and pick out one she likes. It will seem like he tried, she'll get whatever trinket she wants, and no one gets hurt.

- If I had known my parking space was in such demand, I would have put it on e-bay.

- People are not beating their children enough. It's cute for about a minute to have your kid whimsically wandering around the walkway of the mall. After that minute is up I am going to walk by with the anvil I have in a Hecht's bag and knock some sense into him.

- I don't go into half of the stores that sell men's clothes even if I am looking for clothes. Why? Because I can't tell if the sell men's clothes, because they are tucked into a closet way in the back behind the four hundred different types of silk scarves you can buy.

- I like walking around and seeing that the shop that was the Halloween store is now the National Zoo store, and the same people are working there.

- There is a kid's Bath & Body works. You don't need this. If you get your kid fruit scented shampoo, they are going to drink it. Get them stuff that doesn't make them cry when it gets into their eyes.

- Chespeake Knife and Tool has buy one, get one 30% off. Exactly how many knives do you want me to buy? I want to buy two, come back to rob the place, throw one at an employee and whip out the second one, and inform everyone that I got it on sale.

- A gentleman on a cell phone was overheard suggesting that he was going to sell something for a "three-thirds" mark-up. "Three-thirds" equals one. Good luck making a profit on that one you preening schmo.

- For all your fashion designers, when a new style comes out, the first thing I think when I see it should not be "Do I have brass ones big enough to wear that?" They are clothes, this is not Jackass. Dressing myself in the morning should not be some kind of stunt involving my dignity. You know why your clothes look good? Because you put them on waifs with pretty face. I never even look at the clothes because I am trying to count the right angles on this coat hanger with legs that you have dressed in a parka and a tutu. Hot people look hot no matter what you put them in, and I am going to look like crap by comparison no matter what you put me in.

- I saw a tie with Rhinestones on it. I wanted a regemental tie that was red & either white or light silver. It's christmas, and it would look like an F-ing candy cane. Got it? I should not be able to come up with a design that includes a primary color and white in alternating stripes that does not exist. But I can get a tie with rhinestones.

- Shouldn't you be in school?

- Stop dressing like that, you're not old enough to know better. Yet.

- It is not a salesperson stalking me while I shop. It is by own reflection in the mirrored pillar you dolt.

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December 29, 2003

Costco

Here is the last dose of John before the New Year, musings as I strolled through Costco:
- Two fire extinguishers in your cart? If encounter a problem that requires two fire extinguishers, before you cast yourself in the lead role of "Backdraft 2," try dialing 911.
-Housewives, stop sniping at each other about your place in line. I have a solution: Spatulas at dawn. Whoever can make a Western Omelette the fastest wins.
-It is impossible to shoplift at Costco. The quantities are too big. No one is smuggling out a 55 gallon drum of Crisco. This observation comes from a person who has smuggled not only a jack-o-lantern candle holder out of a bar in his pants, but also a candy-cane candle the size of a coffee can in his coat.
-While the developments in toaster technology are amazing, I still burn mine. Fix that before you develop something that would allow me to toast an entire loaf of bread at a time.
-My life can be had for less than it costs to purchase a single Taylor Made driver.
-There are gravity bike stands. I encourage you to purchase one of these, as I purchased an anti-gravity one, left it outside, and now I can't find it or the bike that was on it.
-You, in the bakery section, I want to smash your face into that giant sheet cake over there. Not in a mean way. In a playful way, banking on the fact that I am faster than you, and any Costco employee I might encounter.
-The dungeness crabs they have there scare me. I wish they would stop hassling me for money.
-Who wants to join me in a Dr. Phil book burning? You can solve all the world's problem and look like a child molester at the same time. Kudos.
-There are gummi bear vitamins. Should I ever chose to do myself in, this is how I will do it. I will pound bottle after bottle until I am invulnerable to cold, yet die of an overdose of any number of insoluble vitamins. Death by iron overdose sounds kind of manly, no?
-What is better than 5 pounds of gummi bears? 10 pounds.
-There is a "Trading Spaces" episode guide. This is not the worst news. It is the first of three guides. I will now light myself on fire.
-They have "natural style" beef jerky. I can only interpret this to mean it is beef jerky as it occurs in nature.
-There are bathing suits that now have the flotation devices sewn into the suit itself. If there was any question as to what Michael Jackson will be bobbing for next Halloween, now you know.
-In my time I have seen people snort jello, flour, and ritalin. Future experimentations I would like to see include parmesan cheese, raisins and dishwashing crystals.
-If [insert metallic superhero] had nose hairs, would they be like a scouring pad?
-In Costco, you can conduct 'ramming speed' runs on unattended shopping carts with little to no repurcussions.
-The picture of the hot dog at the food stand is approximately 8 feet long. I need an adult.
-They are hiding the weapons of mass destruction behind the 5 pound Chicken of the Sea containers.

And now for some news about me:
-Last night, walking between two houses in the dark, I ran squarely into a tree that was about three feet tall while carrying wine stoppers (don't ask). I managed to break the skin on my thigh, but the only damage to the pants was a giant hole in the crotch. I cannot carry anything in my left front pocket because it hurts too much.
-Two of my uncles bought each other the identical christmas present; Craftsmen aluminum hydraulic car jacks.
-I bought my father a pair of Motorola walkie-talkies. Unbeknowst to me, he purchased 3 pairs of said walkie-talkies for two of my uncles and my cousin's husband. Now do the math. 6 gifts exchanged hands, while only 2 different products were involved.
-Suppose that my Uncle Tommy has a Toyota Camry. And suppose that my father gave him a small, festively wrapped disc-shaped item as a present. And suppose that upon unwrapping this present, my uncle should find a rice cake with "Fuel Cell for a Toyota Camry" written upon it in black sharpie. My father did this for every relative that happens to have a Japanese car, which is pretty much all of them. It should be noted that when I am home, there are NINE cars strewn about the property. 3 of them run. How can you not love him.

Pretty good gene pool we've got working.

its the final countdown

Totally stole this from Marty because I'm apparently inept at finding out things that are of relative importance to my life....but yeah...this is good news and it warrants its own blog.

the best show that isnt on the air anymore/i heart jason bateman.

Yes it is 3:22am and I have some sort of sleeping disorder.

saved by the bell as seen through the eyes of an outsider.

Dear Normal People,
I sometimes forget that others don't watch as much Saved By the Bell as I do. I was chatting with the lovely and talented John Albers and he schooled me on what its like to not be obsessed with SBTB. Everything seems much simpler even though the whole conversation did upset me to my very core. I've made notes in some key areas.

John: ok, someone said 'this guy mark, blah, blah' and i said 'who's mark?' and they said 'zach morris' or something

me: mark paul gosselar yes

John: and I said 'who is zach morris' (seriously?? and he keeps spelling it wrong)

me: lol, i would have punched you in the face (an almost true statement)

John: which is apparently equivalent to spitting on the pope or something (true)

look

I know who some of the people are

me: lol its true

John: there is dustin diamond (he's got 1)

John: the slater guy (2)

John: mario lopez (3)

i think

me: yes good job

John: the showgirls girl (4)

berkely

me: the slater guy hahahaa ("the slater guy" is a great descriptive)

yes jessie

John: and the black girl (makes sense since the school lacked in diversity (5))

and some other white girl (6)

me: yes lisa turtle

yep, kelly kapowski

John: the white girl is sorta famous

me: tiffani amber theissen

John: she has 3 names or something (bingo)

yeah

me: she was on 90210, yes! good job

John: and mr. belding

me: altho impressive...im still humored that you know details about everyone but the main character

John: ok, but the zach guy has done almsot nothing else though he was in some college movie

i don't really know them from the show (albers is the only person who knows the cast of sbtb by their "other" work)

me: zack. (here is where i correct his spelling)

college movie--dead man on campus

John: right

me: he also was on nypd blue and on tnt now "raising the bar"

John: but there was the porn tape, showgirls, mario lopez was everywhere,

90210 (way to break it down)

me: touche. (i was left speechless....)

get out of my face, facebook!

So, let's get this out of the way- I really like Facebook. I used to be a Myspace kind of girl...but the lure of Scramble and Pathwords brought me to the dark side.

My main *original* complaint about Facebook was that I just didn't get it. I didn't understand why someone was "poking me" or "throwing a sheep in my direction" amongst other things. Again through the games and the ease of posting/tagging photos, I became a quick fan....a rabid supporter if you will.

As of late, I've been noticing I'm receiving more and more requests for what I think is weird. No, I do not want to accept your Halloween/Thanksgiving/Christmas treat. I'm terrified of whatever a "hatching egg" is and guess what--we will probably not actually prevent global warming by accepting a "lil green patch".

I logged in yesterday and I have a record high 27 requests. I did a screenshot to show the absurdity. I think my favorite is "1 kidnap request". So now someone is requesting to kidnap me?? How polite. Don't get me wrong, I appreciate the thought when you click on my name to send me stuff...but chances are I won't accept it. Now its more of a personal vendetta against the requests. Or notifications. How insane is this? Check out the screenshot below.

Here are the requests since it didn't show up too well:

1. 1 friend request

2. 1 own your friends invitation

3. 3 drinking requests

4. 1 purple reign!!!! w request

5. 1 wacko for flacco!!! request

6. 1 heart request

7. 1 my christmas present invitation

8. 1 you're hot request

9. 1 christmas decoration request

10. 1 gingerbread cookies request

11. 1 cause invitations request

12. 1 christmas treats request

13. 3 (lil) green patch requests

14. 1 wacko for flacco! wa request

15. 1 portis hit the purpl request

16. 1 go joe flacco! wave request

17. 1 baltimore gifts request

18. 2 christmas tree requests

19. 1 holiday-cheer request

20. 1 i love the 80s invitation

21. 1 kidnap request

22. 1 thinking of your request

Anyway, time go, I have to open my christmas gifts, wave for joe flacco and have a virtual drink.

wanna rave?

OMG. "Saved By The Bell: The College Years" makes me want to stab myself.

Pretty strong statement, but so true. I love SBTB...but TCY is just SO bad. Not even the good kind of bad like its predecessor. What's the deal TBS? Why must you ruin my Fridays with episodes of TCY between 7-8:30 when I usually watch my old fashioned SBTB?

I digress. TCY are horrible...here are a few reasons why:

1. No Lisa, Kelly*, Jessie or Belding.
-Lisa has been on SBTB since the "Good Morning Miss Bliss Days" (worst theme song ever). She was there during the Rockumentary and the Tori Years...even the Hawaiian episodes and the Las Vegas Wedding.
-Kelly* on the other hand didnt make it in the Tori Years (she was busy on 90210) and didnt make the first half of TCY. However*, she did transfer to CAL-U and somehow managed to be placed in the same exact dorm as Leslie/Alex...right next door to Slater/Zack/Screech!
-Jessie was not in the Rockumentary, Tori Years or TCY. She did show up for the Vegas Wedding and was a total fruitcake.
-Belding. How did Belding not make it to CAL-U? I know he was busy with "The New Class"...but he managed to get to Hawaii as an eff'ing tour guide at one point. He couldnt come visit the crew for Chrissakes?

2. Roger.
You know what? Roger wasnt that bad. He was pretty funny. He wore really ridiculous shirts that were off the shoulder and I'm pretty sure he was a football player in real life.

3. I dont really have any other reasons except that it wasnt funny......or good....except for one episode...

THE RAVE.

By far...THE WORST (BEST) episode in TCY history.

This episode comes right on the heels of Kelly's torrid (not really) affair with Professor Jeremiah Lasky *swoon*. Kelly isnt over Jeremiah and Zack has decided that he loves Kelly again so it makes everything personal between him and Lasky. There is trouble brewing. (Also I will refer to Professor Jeremiah Lasky as Jeremiah or Lasky because both are equally funny names.)

I'm avoiding the nitty gritty details of this episode and hitting a few main ideas.

Zack, Slater and Alex plan to go to Cancun for Winter Break...Zack wants to bring Kelly so that she'll stop thinking about Lasky. Kelly following true SBTB form of course doesnt have the money (and either does Zack for some reason), so the only logical solution is...to throw a rave!! Don't get a job like Slater, its much easier to charge $5 for party with black lights and some trippy pictures. *sigh*

Alex is in charge of music and actually refers to herself as Snoppy Ally Dogg or something completely ludicrous. She is spinning and scratching records and people are having a GREAT time.

Here's where the show gets serious...Screech has fallen into some trouble with a group of guys. They want him to steal some NO (Nitrous Oxide) from the science lab so they can totally get high, man. Screech does it to be cool. One of the finest scenes in TCY history is watching the guys put NO into balloons and then suck it out. Seriously, does this actually happen? I admit I have no knowledge of drug-use but this can't be what people actually do. It's college--there has to be a pot somewhere. I mean, even in high school Johnny Dakota showed up with a joint in the boys bathroom! This is pure lunacy.

Party time, party, party...wait, party is over...Lasky shows up...in his bathrobe.

This is the typical "WTF?" moment in a SBTB episode. Why is Lasky in his bathrobe? To quote a fellow SBTB follower, "Obviously Lasky is homeless". He lives in the lecture hall? Is this happening?

To make matters worse, Slater had to save Screech from the NO guys by raising his fist in a threatening manner and Roger's room was painted black to act as a smaller offshoot of the rave. First of all, how is this possible when Roger lives in the dorm?...is the lecture hall in the dorm? Is the lecture hall THE MAX?

OMG.

Bayside High School=DORM
The Max=LECTURE HALL

I feel like I've stumbled across the holy grail of SBTB.

Actually its between that and the devastation that I can't find a picture of Lasky in his plaid bathrobe. The image that is burned forever in my retina is all I have.

I'm standing at the edge of tomorrow........today...today...today....

conan fever...leno plague

There is no reasoning to this blog title other than the fact I hate Jay Leno so I wanted to associate him with the plague.

Remember back in 2004 when Leno announced his retirement and the world rejoiced because Conan would FINALLY take over The Tonight Show in 2009? Well guess what, its 2009 and things aren't as they seem.

Rumors swirled....
-Leno could move to ABC , Kimmel would then leave
-Leno would take a 10pm slot, etc

NBC announced that Conan would take the 11:30 "Tonight Show" spot and that Jimmy Fallon would move into Conan's 12:30am slot. This news seemed fine to me. Main reason: no more Jay Leno.

I love Conan more than anything, no one is as funny or as bizarre as he is. When I was a freshman in college I found some link on nbc.com where you could receive an autographed pic of Conan. I didn't receive it until my senior year...3 years later...but it doesnt matter. I have it. I have a lovely autographed picture of Conan O'Brien. I heart him.

Wow, no outline as usual. So back to the whole point of this...I found out yesterday that Leno will be taking a 10pm slot on NBC. Which means:

NBC:
10pm-Leno
11:30pm-"The Tonight Show" with Conan O'Brien
12:30am-Jimmy Fallon*

ABC:
12:00am-Jimmy KImmel

CBS:
11:30pm-David Letterman
12:30am-Craig Ferguson

What does this say to Conan? "We didnt think you'd be able to handle the 11:30 slot, so we're giving you Jay as a lead-in like you've had for the past 20 years." The Jay and Conan audience are totally different. This is because anyone that likes Leno has no sense of humor and those who like Conan probably have the best sense humor. Ouch, fightin words.

So in a sense, Conan is still in his same slot, just a different title. He was sort of shafted on the whole getting "The Tonight Show". Kind of sucks. I still wonder what type of show he'll have at 11:30...curious if he'll keep things to the same low-grade humor that we're used to..aka masturbating bear to name one.

The only reason I'm happy is because I'm old and can't stay up to 12:30am most weeknights...now I'll be able to watch Conan at 11:30...or the first 10 min anyway.

sweet, sweet slater percussion

I find it necessary to document any continuity on sbtb in this blog...

dancing to the max:
slater played drums in the band

rockumentary:
slater played drums in the band

small battles.