Lava lands

I'm in Oregon for the long weekend for my best friend's wedding. It's so beautiful here and I'm having a blast so far. I could definitely get used to this view.

lacma

Last time we were down in L.A. I dragged Derek to LACMA. I like doing things like that, just going somewhere I've never been before and seeing something new. Some of the pieces in there were really neat, and now I'm even more eager to go to some of the amazing museums in San Francisco.

The only bad thing was that a lot of the exhibits were closed when we were there, and they had almost one whole building closed off for a Stanley Kubrick exhibit that you had to pay twice as much to get into.

But I did get to see the unnecessarily large amount of light poles outside, so all in all, not bad.

I really liked the collection of Japanese painted screens

it's right beside the La Brea tar pits, so you find random tar bubbling up here and there

sleepy bear

This is me today:

My sister is here visiting, and we had a really fun weekend, including a birthday party, a wedding, some power shopping, and a marathon binge session of "American Horror Story". Possibly as a direct result of that last activity, I didn't sleep very well last night, and I hit snooze for an entire hour before I managed to grudgingly drag myself out of bed.

 I talked to my sister at lunch and she was cuddled up watching TV on the couch. I don't want to be at work today, I want to stay home and bake cookies with her.

homesick

I met up with a new group of ladies last night, and we were getting to know each other and talking about where we are from. We started talking about winter and the leaves turning colours and it made me really homesick.

Then today I saw this:

"A Canadian can be English, or French, or Italian, Irish, German, Spanish, Polish, Russian or Greek. A Canadian can be Mexican, African, Indian, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Australian, Iranian, Asian, Arab, Pakistani or Afghan. A Canadian may also be a Cree, Metis, Mohawk, Blackfoot, Sioux, or one of the many other tribes known as native Canadians. A Canadian's religious beliefs range from Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, Muslim, Hindu or none. 

In fact, there are more Muslims in Canada than in Afghanistan. The key difference is that in Canada they are free to worship as each of them chooses. Whether they have a religion or no religion, each Canadian ultimately answers only to God, not to the government, or to armed thugs claiming to speak for the government and for God.

A Canadian lives in one of the most prosperous lands in the history of the world. The root of that prosperity can be found in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms which recognize the right of each person to the pursuit of happiness.

A Canadian is generous and Canadians have helped out just about every other nation in the world in their time of need, never asking a thing in return. Canadians welcome the best of everything, the best products, the best books, the best music, the best food, the best services and the best minds. But they also welcome the least - the oppressed, the outcast and the rejected.

These are the people who built Canada. You can try to kill a Canadian if you must as other blood-thirsty tyrants in the world have tried but in doing so you could just be killing a relative or a neighbour. This is because Canadians are not a particular people from a particular place. They are the embodiment of the human spirit of freedom. Everyone who holds to that spirit, everywhere, can be a Canadian."

I can't find the original link where it's from, but I wanted to re-post it anyway. Obviously this is idealized, Canadians aren't perfect, but they are pretty great and I'm proud to be one of them.

Excuse me while I go sob in the corner and hum the national anthem in French. Humming is the same in every language (probably?).

eat all the things.

I have a friend coming in to town over Labour Day weekend from L.A., and she was wondering about the best places to eat in San Francisco for a truly delicious, unique experience. I asked my food-loving co-workers for suggestions, and I got a lot of feedback. It turned into a pretty impressive list, so I decided to share it.

I've been to the first few, and really enjoyed them, and I'm pretty excited to start eating my way through the rest of the list.

Tacolicious- The tacos here are really delicious, they have a bunch of different kinds, and they have really interesting margarita flavours to try as well.

Spruce- This place is a little more expensive but it's really funny because if you go in here, every.single. person. is eating a burger. Their burgers are amazing, their fries taste like potato chips, and they gave us a free giant cookie when we came in for being first time visitors, but I was already so full from eating everything else that I was like "I'll never be able to eat this cookie, I'll have to save it for tomorrow". And then I ate the whole thing before we even made it home.

Cafe Delucchi- In North Beach, the "Italian" part of the city, I went for dinner here a few weeks ago with my Italian girlfriend and it was so friggin good. Then we went across the street for hot chocolate and cannoli's, it was one of the best meals I've had in a long time.

Tartine- I've never been here but I've had food from here. It's pretty much an SF institution, and their flourless chocolate cake might be the best thing I've ever eaten.

Flour and Water- Pizza and pasta, came very highly recommended

Thanh Long- Vietnamese fusion cuisine

Burma Superstar- Apparently a very unique experience. 

Yank Sing- Deem Sum

State Bird Provisions- This place has a constantly evolving menu, and is apparently a cliche, but classic San Francisco suggestion

Golden Boy- People are pretty crazy about this pizza place.

Frances- A bit expensive but really good food-

AQ- Uses seasonal ingredients to make brand new

Mission Chinese- Life changingly good Chinese.

Swan Oyster Depot- A place to get very fresh seafood. I'll be taking my sister and brother-in-law here for sure.

Foreign Cinema- I've heard the food here is amazing, and the really cute thing is that they show movies on the wall of the court yard.

AsiaSF:  It's a bar and restaurant but the servers are really beautiful drag queens. It's apparently a must do for visitors to the city, I might take my sister there when she comes in to town tomorrow.

The Latin American Club: If you like margaritas as much as I do, and I'm not sure that it's possible to, you should check this place out.

And the final suggestion I was given: get a bacon wrapped hot dog in the mission. We used to go to Mazatlan all the time to see my Grandpa, and the bacon wrapped hot dogs they sell on the street at 2 a.m. are a thing of beauty, so we'll see. Big shoes to fill, and what not.

I'd love to get more suggestions, so if you have any for me, please leave them in the comments. :)

put your back into it

I've always been a big fan of backless shirts and dresses, probably because I've never been able to wear them. Well probably not never, but certainly not since the age of about 13. Sadly, having your entire bra hanging out of the back of your backless shirt somewhat destroys the look.

Gabi from Gabifresh kind of inspired me, she is a plus size model and she always says that if she really wants to wear something, she will find a way to make it work for her. I think that's great, and also really true. You can't do something the way someone else would do it, you have to do it the way that you would do it.

So this is how I would wear a backless dress. I got some pretty heavy duty elastic from Michael's, and my favourite bra. I cut off the back of the bra, leaving about an inch on each side of the cup to attach the elastic to, and sewed on 3 strips of the elastic on one side.

Then I awkwardly put it on/ figured out the delicate balance between having it stay up, and having it cut off all circulation. Once I decided on that, I sewed on the elastic to the other side at the right tightness, and voila.

It takes a bit of wiggling to get into it, but it's actually really comfortable, and I think it's pretty cute. I may not be able to go completely backless, but I figured out a way to wear what I wanted, and make it work for me.

back in the saddle

On Saturday night, I finally got to go to the Saddle Rack for the first time. The Saddle Rack is a country bar in Fremont, CA, complete with mechanical bull. There was a big group of us and it was really fun. My absolute favourite bar in the world is Nashville's in Waikiki, so I'm always trying to find somewhere in California that I like as much.

Nashville's is still better, but I'm definitely biased as I basically lived there for 3 years, people I didn't know would come up to me randomly on the street and by like "Oh hey, Nashville's! You work there, right?". I don't have any immediate plans to move into the Saddle Rack, but it was a great time. Often when you're really anticipating something for a long time, it can turn out to be a let down (every New Year's Eve ever) but this was just as much fun as I'd hoped.

such a happy couple

the boy on the bull, he did way better than me

hundreds and hundreds of goslings

My day just got a lot better. A genius woman web programmer designed a Google Chrome extension called "Hey Girl" that turns every image on your page into a photo of Ryan Gosling.

I was intrigued and downloaded it immediately, and found it to be just as amazing as it sounds. I would rather look at Ryan Gosling than almost anything else in the world. Also, he is Canadian. NBD. You can download it for yourself here.

at first sight

I heard from an old friend last night, and it was so nice. It's easy to get busy with work and other things and not make as much effort to keep in touch, and before you know it, it's been months or years since you've talked.

There are a lot of friends like that that I've made over the years, and then slowly, even though you still care about them and miss them, it gets harder and harder to keep in contact, as you know less and less about each other's lives and actually getting on the phone and talking only makes that more obvious, and you start to doubt your friendship, and wonder if the other person even cares to hear from you anymore.

But then there are those people that you just click with, instantly. I don't believe people only have one soul mate, and I don't think that if you do have one, it necessarily needs to be romantic. There are just people in life that I have clicked with, sometimes honestly at first sight, and we've been friends ever since. And we'll be friends forever because even if I never spoke to them again in my life, I know we'd still feel exactly the same way about each other.

Those are the kinds of friends that even if you don't know the name of their dog, or even their address, you could see them after 10 years of not talking and pick up exactly where you left off, and those are the kinds of friends I am lucky enough to have.

white trash beautiful

For our anniversary a few weeks ago we went to see ZZ Top, Uncle Kracker and Kid Rock at the Shoreline in San Jose. It was, as my boss pointed out "The Most White Trash Concert I've Ever Heard Of". It was really fun, people were dancing in the aisles and singing at the top of their lungs and they were selling tall cans of Bud Light Lime-arita. Legit.

ZZ Top was the best of the 3, they have the most amazingly deep voices, and the combination of that many sequins with that much beard has probably never been seen since or again.

Sadly my camera was confiscated as soon as I walked through the gate so I only had my phone to take pictures with and it wasn't really up to the task, but I did get to wear my leather pants with my motorcycle boots without feeling like I was going trick or treating, so I'm going to call that a win.

the fault in our stars

I'm reading The Fault in our Stars by John Green, and I'm pretty much obsessed with it. I've basically given up eating, bathing and talking to my husband because I can't put it down.

I've always loved to read, but a lot of the time, books are somewhat predictable. You can tell right away what's going to happen, or else it starts out really well and you start to get excited, and then the ending feels rushed and contrived, and it's really disappointing.

I should probably finish reading it, I suppose, before I write something about it, but writing a book is hard. Like really hard. It's easy to get distracted, or to get pulled away from your original idea, and before you know it you don't have any idea who your characters are, or why they are doing what they are doing.

A lot of the time I will read a book and think "That's not how I would have done it" or "I could definitely write a better novel than this." It's easy to criticize when it's not your work.

But sometimes I read a book like this one, and instead of being filled with questions or criticism, I am just utterly content because somewhere out there is someone writing the story exactly the way you would do it, and it gives you hope that it is actually possible to do, and to do well.

It seems like all of the good stories have already been told, every movie you see is a sequel or a remake, every book you read follows the same plot lines and has the same type of character. But this one is special. I almost don't want to finish it because either it will not be as good as I thought it was and that will be sad, or it will be, and then it will be over and that will be even sadder.

favourites

Here are a few things that are making me happy right now:

 I've been looking for a pair of black booties for a long time, one that is cute enough to wear out, but also has a low enough heel that I could wear them all day at work without wanting to fling myself off the roof. I found these ones from Asos a few weeks ago and I love them, they are comfy and cute, and there isn't a hint of fringe anywhere on or around them.

This might seem very obvious to every other person in the world, but I had an epiphany a few weeks ago. I have about 5 chiffon button up shirts that I love, and are perfect for work, but I never wear them, because they are really sheer. I've tried wearing tank tops underneath them, but it's hard to have two shirts tucked in, one of them is always rolling up and it's bulky.

Sometimes I'll see a woman on the street wearing a sheer white button up tucked into jeans without her whole bra showing and without looking like she is smuggling something under their shirt, and I think that she must be a wizard.

For years I've been seeing the cotton body suits at American Apparel and I always wondered "who is buying those?" and then last week I was like OF COURSE! Everyone but me is buying them! Anyways, I bought a couple, and my whole life is better already.

Semi-sweet chocolate chip cookies from Specialty's are a thing of beauty. I have to bodily restrain myself from going in to get one every time I walk past, but sometimes I can't resist, and then I thoroughly enjoy every warm chocolatey delicious morsel to the full capacity of my soul.

I hadn't been loving my makeup in quite a while, no matter what I seemed to do it always looked the same, and not very good in my opinion, so I had a little bit of a "me" day and splurged on some new makeup from Sephora.

I actually just went in to get eyeliner, but all of a sudden I was replacing almost every product I use.

The verdict so far: I love the Moonshadow eyeshadow pallet, the Tarte cheek stain is amazing, and the Kat von D Trooper eyeliner is life changing. Go buy it immediately. It goes on smoothly without the dragginess of a lot of liquid liners, and the color stays all day without budging.

I don't know that the beauty blender was an absolute necessity though, in essence I feel like I paid $20 for a sponge.

breaking up is hard to do

I saw this video last year, and it really stuck with me. This couple was together for 5 years, and they are breaking up because he wants kids, and she doesn't. They wrote a song together to break it to their friends and family, and explain the situation.

Even though it's sad, you can tell they still really love each other, but they just know that sometimes, that's not all there is to it. If they stayed together, one of them would eventually resent the other one because they weren't able to do what they really wanted to do.

If you love someone, you want them to have the best life, and have everything they want, even if it means that you can't be together.

"You must understand that love never keeps a man from pursuing his destiny. If he abandons that pursuit, it's because, it wasn't true love..."- The Alchemist.



Link to full article here.

potter

I went to my first pottery class yesterday, and it was pretty neat. The instructor went over the basics with us, and then just kind of let us go, stopping to check in every once in awhile. We all got as much clay as we wanted so we were able to make lots of different things.

At first I made 2 bowls that looked exactly the same, and then a coffee mug that looked the same as both of my bowls. I think I was being a little bit hard on myself, I spent a really long time on each piece trying to get it perfect, but the people around me were just cranking through them one after another.

Our instructor was telling us how pottery is one of the most long lasting art forms, which is true, archaeologists are always finding pottery from ancient civilizations. Maybe one day, thousands of years from now, someone will find one of my pieces, and wonder what kind of society could have survived when it's people were so bad at making pots.

I didn't keep any of the pieces I made for the first class, I signed up for 3 classes so hopefully by the end of the third I'll have improved enough to bring home a mug that will actually be able to hold coffee.

one of my pots will probably end up there eventually, let's be honest

this is where the magic happens

pre-glazing

finished works

before

after

my first attempt at a plate. no bueno.

demi

Happy Friday!

It's going to be a gorgeous weekend, and I'm pretty excited to sleep in and go for a nice long run tomorrow, and then to do some shopping.

But the thing I am MOST excited for is Sunday morning, I finally found a pottery class in the Bay that doesn't cost your first born child to attend, and also offered weekend classes.

This is about to be me on Sunday, but with more Patrick Swayze (hopefully).

If you're interested in taking a class, you can sign up with Create in Clay School of Ceramics, here. They offer classes 7 days a week, and it's only $40 for a 3 hour class.