2005 August | whoorl

My Kind of Town

August 10, 2005

This is the view I will be gazing at for the next four days. Chicago! Chi-town! The Windy City! My husband has been working in Chicago this week, and I am flying up to meet him tomorrow. I can’t even describe how excited I am, considering we moved to California from Chicago less than two years ago. Wow, I can’t believe it has already been that long!

If I had to choose between the two places, I definitely would choose California. Nothing beats living by the ocean, and don’t even get me started about horrible Chicago winters. However, I really miss the brisk pace of living in downtown Chicago. Restaurants open 24 hours, fun pubs on every corner, being able to WALK to places. Nobody walks anywhere in Southern California. Ever. Doesn’t matter if the destination is within 3 blocks. No walking. Seriously, you probably would get arrested unless of course your sole purpose is to exercise. Then walking is strongly encouraged because you better be in skinny-ninny shape if you think you are going to live around here, plus you better have perfect makeup and hair AND be wearing a Juicy Couture velour tracksuit while you’re at it. Barf. Anyway, we have so much to accomplish in the next four days! Catching up with old friends, checking out Millennium Park, and most importantly, eating massive amounts of food. Of course, in true whoorl fashion, I have created a list of all the restaurants we must eat at while there. If my calculations are correct, we will have to eat every 3.2 hours to complete my list and I am not fooling around. This is serious shit. Chicago has some of the best food anywhere and I am totally prepared to put on a couple of pounds. Don’t worry though; I’ll be sure to walk it off when I get home. But I’m NOT wearing a Juicy Couture velour tracksuit, thank you very much.

Have a great weekend!

COMMENTS (12)

Secret Agent Josephine Rocks

August 9, 2005

SAJ and I walked down to the beach last evening while I wallowed in self-deprecation about my blog with comments like “Why did I force my husband at gunpoint to build this site for me? Why would anyone choose to read this damn thing? CSS blows. No one will ever visit this loser blog.” Don’t I sound fun?

Whoah! Hold your horses, little lady! Keep in mind that I just posted my first entry on August 3rd. Impatience. That’s a trait near and not-so-dear to my heart. I have a history of jumping into new projects with an insane amount of fervor (need! results! now!), only to have it slowly wither away over a couple of weeks or months. One project that immediately comes to mind was my all-consuming search for my family’s genealogy. The Whoorl Genealogy Project. I literally called my parent’s home 20 times a day.

“Dad! Did you know your great great great great grandfather lived in Kentucky?” â€œ

“That’s great, honey.”

Twenty minutes later, “Mom! Did you know that our ancestors lived on a farm in Ballymoney, Ireland?!”

“That’s great, dear.”

Fifteen minutes later, “Dad! Did you know your great great great grandmother had triplets, Anna, Alfred and Angus?”

Click.

“Dad, did you just hang up on me?”

Silence.

You get the picture. Eventually, the only parental voice I heard was the one on the answering machine. However, my ancestry insanity did fade after I realized most of my conversations with my father were similar to this:

Father: Sarah, I think it is really neat that you are trying to attribute your personality traits to someone who lived 300 years ago, but don’t you think you might be taking it a little too far? Maybe you should get some air.

Sarah: But Daaaaaad, I’m Irish. That soooooo explains my love of Guinness beer, my rosacea AND my fair skin, which mind you, has resulted in two moles being surgically removed with stitches involved! Had I known my heritage before, I might have worn a higher sunscreen! Duh.

Other recent projects involved learning to cook items other than Zatarain’s black beans and rice, and my secret incognito-burrito project that must remain under wraps for the time being. Well, I guess I am my father’s daughter- this is the man who dove head first with every ounce of his being into hobbies such as photography, guitars, coin-collecting, scrap gold parts (wtf?) and watch repair. Mind you, he excels at absolutely everything he does, but I don’t hear much about those coins and cameras these days, if ya know what I mean. By the way, this is also the man who would like me to refer to him as Bishop Stu Tu on my blog. Don’t ask.

Back to Queen Josephine. After our walk, I had some dinner and lurked on some of my fave blogs. And then, I saw it. My overly excited face on SAJ’s new entry. She was telling people to check out my blog. Could she BE any cooler or more helpful? I went to sleep with a big smile on my face, knowing that I, whoorly girl, was so lucky to have such a great new friend.

This morning, I poured myself a big cup of decaf. Yes, I drink decaf because caffeine makes me turn into one seriously anxious freak of nature. As my doctor informed me, I am naturally caffeinated. I logged on to my email, and there they were. Comments. Huh? People visited my site? HOLY SHIT! YAY YIPPEE YAY YAY YEE HAW!! I stood up, did a little dance, sat down and then it hit me. Doom. Big Doom. If people visited my site and liked it, then they will probably come back. That means I have to write something witty or funny or something. The pressure! How do you all do it? I was the girl from high school and college who morphed into a sloppy puddle of failure when a teacher mentioned the word “essay”. However, today I made a pact. This will be the project that doesn’t wither. I will continue to ramble on incessantly as long as someone is still reading. Woohoo! By the way, thanks to everyone who commented. I felt like I was 8 years old again shooting the duck at my rocking-roller-rink-fun-skate birthday party.

Oh, and for those of you who haven’t had the chance to meet SAJ in person, she really is THAT creative, inspiring and super cool. Plus, she’s got that whole pregnancy-glow-thing down pat.

COMMENTS (15)

Evil Knievel Beach-Style

August 8, 2005

Hola,

Wow, I can’t believe it is already Monday again. This year seems to be flying by at warp speed. Like they say, the older you get, the faster time flies. Whoah! Slow down, Puh-lease! This Saturday, my fabulous friends from the City of Angels came down to the beach to spend a glorious afternoon by the ocean. It was such fun- mainly because I was in the company of the cutest 4-month old known to man, aaaand it was his first time to the beach!

I guess most babies aren’t supposed to wear heavy-duty sunscreen until they are 6 months (huh?), so his parents bought him a little baby wetsuit and sunglasses. We sat out on a blanket on the sand and dressed this little cutie in his new gear. Once he was fully beach-ready, we noticed he looked familiar. Who could this kid look like? He’s 16 weeks for goodness sake. And then it hit us. This darling child had been transformed into baby Evil Knievel! Take a look for yourself!

How darling is he? I just love him so!

Must run- I’m off to take a walk with Secret Agent Josephine. Talk soon!

COMMENTS (12)

Everlong

August 4, 2005

I don’t watch a lot of television. When it’s on, it’s usually something sports-related. Football is my passion (fantasy football draft is less than a month away hell yesssssss), but let’s save that for another date and time. Lately, I have come across a show called Rockstar: INXS. Has anyone seen this show? How could you not- it’s on THREE times a week. I’m freakin’ hooked.

Simply put, I adore rockers. I’m not sure what Dave Navarro’s job on the show is, but I love him- even though he wears way too much makeup, over-plucks his eyebrows and generally looks like a transvestite. If you haven’t been sucked into this teeny black hole of deliciousness, here’s the premise. Lots of rocker chicks and dudes perform every week hoping to eventually win and become the lead singer of INXS. Man, what has happened to INXS? Sellout city, but hey I’m watching this shit so what gives. All of these tattooed, leather-clad rockstar-wannabees belt it out while flashing that rocker hand signal. You know the one.

Call me crazy, but growing up that hand signal meant one thing and one thing only- ‘Go Texas Longhorns’. Stop. The hatred I feel for the Texas football program. I grew up in Oklahoma and I am a die-hard Sooner fan. Sooners and Longhorns don’t mix. So, the hand signal throws me off a bit. By the way, the Sooner nation will whip some Longhorn tush for the 6th consecutive year in 2005. I digress.

I just realized last night for the very first time in my thirty years of living that INXS alludes to “In Excess”. Oh. My. God. I thought it was some crazy Australian acronym. How could this be? I was their biggest fan! I owned every CD (actually, cassette tape). I would rock out in my room with my sweet metal orthodontia and Hawaiian-print jams belting out “Donnnnnnnnt Chaaaaaaaaange”, and then proceed to french kiss my pillow (aka Michael Hutchence). Or maybe my pillow was Nick Rhodes from Duran Duran.

Let’s proceed to the heart of the matter. Everlong. Quite possibly one of the greatest rock songs of the 20th century. The intense love I have for Dave Grohl and the Foo Fighters is impalpable. That song is soooo good- can’t ya just hear it?

And I wonder
When I sing along with you
If everything could ever feel this real forever- ba da da ba da da ba dadada (that’s the kick ass drum fill)
If anything could ever be this good again – ba dada ba da da ba dadada (again, drum fill)

I can be anywhere- sitting on the couch, grocery shopping, standing in an uncomfortably crowded elevator- and if that song is looping in my head, don’t think I won’t bust that wicked air drum solo on some unsuspecting peeps. Well, it turns out that one of the rockers on the show had to perform that song live. He did pretty horrible- yes, it is a hard song to sing, but his excuse was that he had never HEARD that song before. Hmmmm. Now, if Perry Como and Bobby Darin get your musical juices flowing, I could fathom not knowing that song, but excuse me? Aren’t you supposed to be a rocker, Mr. Tattoo McMohawk?! Even INXS and Dave Navarro were clearly annoyed. Damn him for disrespecting my sweet Foo.

Clearly, I have invested a tad too much emotion into this issue.