friday randomness

Happy Friday, y'all! 

The rain in the northeast has finally ceased for 7 minutes and the sun.is.out. That is reason enough for celebration.

Because it's so nice out my attention span is not up to par, so instead of a poetically written long post, I have some snippets that should get you through your Friday.

We went to a beer fest in Boston last weekend. For 3.5 hours we drank our way around the World Trade Center. 100 craft brewers, 560 beers (or something like that, I lost count after my 7th double IPA). After the beer fest - because we're old - we knew that we had to keep drinking or we'd go to sleep. So off to two more beer bars it was! By the end of the night, I looked like this:

Did I mention it was raining cats, dogs, elephants and any other animal you can think of? NOTE: this girl didn't need more beer.

To pay for my beer addiction affinity, I have come up with the next BIG IDEA for a tv show. It's a take-off on Hoarders, except it's about CAR Hoarders. I found the first person to feature on this new series at my local grocery store:

Qualifications include - but are not limited to:

• a back seat that looks like a Goodwill donation bin
• a year's worth of fast food bags, containers and food particles
• an unhealthy number of stuffed animals
• a collection of paper that when added up could rival the number of trees in the Redwood Forest

I confirmed yesterday what I've known for years: I HATE linen. Sure, it's a cool option in the summer heat, but so are skirts.

Yesterday I went shopping during the afternoon (I got to leave the office in the middle of the day! I know, right???) And against my better judgement, I tried on a pair of white linen pants. 

You know what you can't see in this online photo of the pants? That when you put them on, you can see your pubic hair through them. 

(So, no, I didn't buy them)

Now go and drink too much beer and wear see-through pants.

is all stress created equal?

The other afternoon I was lunch with some coworkers, welcoming a new hire. We were seated at a newer hot spot, and the service couldn't have been slower.


"The problem with lunching in Westport," I said to the group, "is that they assume everyone is a Westport Mommy who doesn't work and has all day to sit here and eat lunch because her Nanny is entertaining the kids."


My coworker – a hard-working VP (who happens to have a Nanny) – replied, "I've learned that everyone has their stressors."


Silently I agreed with her - to a point. I have all the respect in the world for Stay At Home Moms...it's a ridiculously hard job that I'm not sure I could ever do. Their harried days make new business pitches and cross-country travel seem like a cake walk.


She continues, "Compare our jobs to people fighting cancer. Don't our stresses seem silly?" 


Well, of course they do. Worrying about getting a QR code approved pales in comparison to waiting to hear about life-threatening test results. 
I want to tell her that I held a full-time job AND fought cancer, but she doesn't know that and doesn't really need to. And I don't feel like derailing the conversation right now, especially with a new hire.


I'm not talking about people who were unfortunately laid off or searching for work, and stressing about making ends meet. I'm talking about the women who live in affluent communities, who don't work OR have children. Who spend their days on the Avenue or attending fund-raising benefits. Are their stressors the same?


"My cousin's wife doesn't work," another coworker piped up, "and they don't have kids yet. She mostly plays tennis every day with her friends, and is always complaining about how she doesn't like the tennis balls one lady brings, how they don't bounce well off her racket, and how she can't always find a playing partner. And she's always SO busy. It's kind of crazy."


"Those aren't stresses," I calmly reply. "They're called 'white people problems'."

burying the lead.

I had this text conversation with Mr. KK this morning:

Oh, and I started my novel.


(finally!)

some emails just need to be written.

Yesterday, I sent this email to Mr. KK:




From: KK
Sent: Tuesday, May 29, 2012 4:47pm
To: Mr. KK
Subject: your wife knows shit


Remember when I was in my wallpaper phase A YEAR AGO, and I wanted to hang it in our bedroom? Well, check out this pic from Target's Home catalog. THAT WAS THE PAPER!

love,
your awesome wife




btw, you should check out Target's Home Catalog, it's totes fabu.

what's trending now, in kk's world

You know it's bad when you call your grandmother at 7:27pm on a Monday and she says,"Wow! You're home from work early!"

And that's the kind of two weeks I've had, folks. There were a few days when I had breakfast, lunch AND dinner at my desk. Glamorous, right? Well, if you're one of the 16 people watching AMC's The Pitch, then YES! It's TOTALLY glamorous! That's what the cut-throat world of advertising and marketing is all about.*

All of this is the finish for the unspoken sentence 'I haven't written a blog post in a while because...'

But I've thought about writing blog posts every day. (Does that count?)

So here's what travels through my mind, but doesn't always make the blog, but sometimes makes Facebook, or at least an IM to a coworker.

My musings:

On Adele

If I hear "Set Fire To The Rain" one more time on the radio, I just may set fire to myself.

On my guilty pleasure song for the summer


"Call Me Maybe" by Carly Rae Jepsen. She can't be more than 14, and she's into guys wearing ripped jeans. But, oh, is that tune catchy. 

On the Fifty Shades trilogy

Admittedly, when I first heard about the books, I didn't want to read them. A coworker described them to me as, "Soft porn for middle-aged women." Immediately I wrote them off as modern-day versions of the Fabio novels my mother reads. BUT, I was going on vacation, and thought I'd give them a try.

Verdict? Guilty. I plowed right through them (golf clap for my subtle sexual reference right there). And I liked them. WARNING: they are not 'literature'. But I found myself strangely addicted to them. And not because of the sex. (I'm sorry, but any woman having THAT MUCH action in her hoo-ha would be on permanent UTI medication.) I craved the 'story', their demented conversations, his control issues and 'wounded past'. 

The rights have been purchased (for a cool $5MM I think) for a movie. My thoughts on who will play Christian and Ana: Bradley Cooper and Anne Hathaway. (They are a little on the old side, but Bradley Cooper would be an awesome Christian.) Now, if they can just figure out a way to keep it R-rated; perhaps they eliminate the scenes with the silver balls? (teaser! now go read the books!)

On it almost being June

Hey, 2012? Can you slow down for a hot second?

On suburbia

Next weekend marks a year that we've been in the new house. I can't tell if it feels longer (since we were renovating for a year before moving in) or shorter, because we're still living with naked walls and a basement full of boxes that haven't been unpacked yet.

What I don't know if I'll EVER be used to, is our crazy neighbor and her animal kingdom. 


These lovelies have made themselves at home in our yard.

You might wonder, "Do they wander into your yard at 6am on Saturday and Sunday mornings and quack right outside of your bedroom window?"


Why, yes! Yes they do!


On getting old


Over the last few weeks we've gotten a bunch of messages from this older gentleman Jim, who's looking for his friend Henry.


He calls during the week, during the day, when we're at work. The messages started out something like this:


#1: "Hi Henry, this is Jim. Can you call me today? Thanks."


#2: "Henry, Jim again. Did you get my message? Can you please call me back?"


#3: "Why aren't you calling me back, Henry? It's rude. Call me. It's Jim."


Then one Saturday, Jim called. And I was there to answer.


KK: "Hello?"


JIM: "Hello."


KK:  "Who are you looking for?"


JIM:  "Henry. Is he there?"


Now. I have to imagine that Henry is as old as Jim. When Jim normally calls Henry, does a lady who is probably 40 years Henry's junior answer the phone? Does Henry keep company with young ladies?

KK:  "No, I'm sorry. You have the wrong number. You've left a few messages, but not at the right house. You have the wrong number for Henry."


JIM:  "Oh. Oh no, I'm sorry."


Two days later, we get another message for Henry from Jim.


And then another one.


Yesterday's message sounded like this: "Henry, WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU? Can you please call me when you get up? You can't be THAT busy!"


We had to tell this poor man that he's still leaving messages at the wrong number. So I did the right thing and had Mr. KK call him.


On all of my favorite shows ending at once


Say it ain't so! I'm totally going to check out Dallas on TNT.

*Oh that poor show. Could it be more boring? If they could find a way to translate the energy and non-stop pace of what an agency feels like during a pitch into each episode, then they've got something.

shut up so I can read, por favor.

Mr. KK and I just returned from a mini-vacation in Puerto Rico.

I say 'mini' because it was only 5 days, and I'm already home sitting at my computer.

We flew out Sunday morning, on a crowded Jet Blue flight. The funny thing about flying to Puerto Rico? Almost everyone on our plane was FROM Puerto Rico. I'm not sure what they were all doing in Connecticut (sitting in traffic? sightseeing...something?), but they were headed home. And we were going with them.

I was deeply engrossed (and laughing my ass off!) at Jenny Lawson's "Let's Pretend This Never Happened", and annoyingly interrupted by the flight attendant who felt the compulsive need to keep talking to us...twice.

First, he'd interrupt me to say his spiel in English. Then I'd settle back into my book. Then, I'd be dragged fro my book again when he'd repeat the whole thing in Spanish. 

Upon landing, the pilot's voice crackled overhead. "Welcome to Puerto Rico!" And the plane erupted in applause. Applause! Mr. KK and I were all 'wtf is this? a Vegas show???' while the people around us cheered and clapped.

And, of course, the flight attended HAD to repeat everything the pilot said, in Spanish.

"Just thing, when he's done, they'll all applause in Spanish this time." I said to Mr. KK.

See? Isn't it comforting to know that I packed my sense of humor for the trip? And good thing, since we had about 6 hours of sunshine the whole time, and a whole lotta rain.

Side note: Don't you love it when you're on vacation in the Caribbean, and it's raining, but you're still wearing your bathing suit anyway because the downpour might pass and the sun just MIGHT miraculously pop out of the black cloud over head, and you're at the hotel bar having too many mojitos because really, what the hell else is there to do??, and you're complaining about the rain on your first vacation with your husband alone in FOUR YEARS and the waiter overhears you and says with a smirk, 'Well, we ARE only 30 minutes from a rain forest' and then looks at you like you're crazy because the sun isn't going to come out tomorrow...or the day after that.

Clouds and rain aside, we had a great time. And I did manage to capitalize on the sun we did have, so I have a slight glow to me and my skin's no longer the color of winter.

We stayed in Old San Juan with its charm and cobblestone streets, away from the chain hotels and beaches. It's a beautiful place, with delicious food and friendly people.

the architecture was amazing (vacation nerd alert!)

our hotel, El Convento. big thumbs up!

a typical street in Old San Juan.

look! quickly! it's sunny!

there are cats EVERYWHERE. and signs not to feed them. 

because apparently they want San Juan littered in dead cats.

there I am, learning on vacation. check out those clouds!

numbers aren't my thing.

I started counting calories.

No, for real this time!

I've been complaining about losing 10 pounds forever. And everything I've tried to do seems to take me in the opposite direction. And with summer approaching, and all of my favorite warm-weather clothes taunting me because they don't fit*, I had to get serious.

I joined a gym in January.

I signed up for this kick-your-ass strength-training class. After my first class last week, my arms hurt so much I could barely lift them to wash my face in the shower. They were like jello. It took 5 days before I could pull up my pants without wincing. If it hurts that much, it must be working. Right???

And I started counting my calories with this app, or, how I like to refer to it, the Best App In America.

I'm not an unhealthy eater**, but manually entering everything you eat into a counter, well that's rather eye-opening. I'm sure this is what it's like with the Weight Watchers app. It's just so cool. And telling.

You set up a profile,  heights, weights, how much you want to lose and by when. Then you can enter any exercise you do each day. Then you enter your daily food intake.

It searches foods, and just about everything I've entered is in there in some way, shape or form. So you can see how many calories you have left for each meal and snacks. 45 calories left for dinner? You might need some adjustment.

Yesterday was my first day with the app. It allowed me to finagle what I was putting in/on my salad until I got the calorie combination correct. And I even had enough calories left to enjoy ONE Cadbury Mini Egg. (that was ONE egg, not ONE handful).

So we'll see how long this lasts. To get to my targeted weight by August 1, I can only eat about 1400 calories a day. Or 87.5 Mini Eggs.

*How is this possible? I slimmed down training for my 5k. I'm still running, and I have a 5K this weekend, but the clothes don't fit. WTF?

**Except on the weekends, when calories don't count.