Another Awkward Week [6.20.14]

Guyyys, hi! I did NOT make good on my promise for wedding updates this week, now did I? I hope no one actually died of anticipation.  I don’t know if I could handle the guilt.

Now, I know you’re all just aching to hear about the fight I had with my mom about addressing the invitations (I’d make Emily Post turn over in her fancy little grave) and my bridal shower (spoiler alert: it was awesome!) and the long, overly poignant 700 paragraph essay I keep drafting about the complexities and anxieties related to composing the guest list. And I am aching to share these stories, too! What do I love more than talking about myself? NOTHING, that’s what. But sometimes you can’t do what you love and instead you have to work and go to physical therapy and clean your house and do laundry and sleep and be responsible and ugh, being a grown-up is the WORST!

But just stay tuned, ok? I’ll get around to it. I must!

Meanwhile, was my week all work, no play and no weird moments? Of course not! Let’s take a look at what was keeping it awkward this busy week:

This Beverage:

On Tuesday night I went to a work event and they had a few bottles of wine and a few bottles of seltzer (and cheese!!) for guests to imbibe upon so I decided to get my Real Housewife on and make a little white wine spritzer.

Turns out the seltzer was the flavored kind.

And turns out you can ruin pinot grigo by adding a few splashes of lemon-lime seltzer water.

I mean…I drank it but still, woof.

And while we’re on the topic of vino (am I ever not on the topic of vino?)…

This Bottle of Wine:

Last night I went running for the first time in weeks, after taking some time off to nurse my broken butt cheek and it was SO great. I missed running and breaking a sweat. Pitbull has a new (ish?) song out called Wild Love and as with all things Pitbull it is equal parts ridiculous and amazing and I listened to it four times in a row. HAH. Pitbull is my spirit guide.

ANYWAY, I brought along some cash and my ID in this little runners’ fanny pack of Brian’s so I could stop at the wine store on my way home and grab a bottle for the weekend. My mom is in town, so I figured we’d need the double bottle, or as I like to call it “family sized.”

The wine store in my neighborhood is this tiny little yuppie place that sells all kinds of fancy stuff but I always buy right off their “discount table” because, duh.

On this particular evening, they were hosting a tasting at the front of the store, so a group was gathered around a tiny table sipping and talking about tannins and soil and whatever the fuck else fancy wine people talk about and I barged in DRENCHED in sweat and made a beeline right for the bargain table, grabbed the family sized bottle of sauvignon blanc and plonked it down on the counter. As the snooty cashier run it up, I began digging crumpled dollar bills out of my fanny pack. The total came to $19 which is like, $12 more than I prefer to spend on wine, but they’re the only game in town, so you gotta do what you gotta do. Unfortunately I realized I only had $17 on me so I got all frazzled, as I do, and blurted out “I don’t have enough cash! I need another one. A different wine. Cancel the order. Cancel the order!” I grabbed the big bottle, raced back to the dicsount table, picked up my go-to regular sized, screw-top sauvy b (still priced at a cool $12…come on, store, would it kill you to stock some Barefoot brand?) and sprinted back up to the register.

At this point I caught myself in the mirror behind the check out. I was straight up glistening with sweat, wearing a fanny pack and waving around a handful of crumpled one-dollar bills.

Did I mention I only had ones on me? I don’t know why I had such a big stack of Washingtons.

This guy must have thought I was some kind of frantic, crazed, wino stripper or something. Sprinting in and out of the store, grabbing bottles, throwing around one dollar bills.

I’d say I can never show my face in there again but let’s all be real, I’ll be back within the week. Ok, weekend.

This Wound:

Technically this happened last week but who’s counting? No one. Great. My friend reminded me of this story THIS week so it still counts. Hi Ami! Thanks for the reminder!

ANYWAY recently I was at a 30^th Birthday Party (June is 30^th Bday Party Month round these parts – we have one every weekend!) at Brian’s friend’s gorgeous apartment in midtown. This guy lives in like, a TV apartment – it has a BALCONY. A private balcony! What the actual what.

(To all y’all who don’t live in horrible cities are like, I have 17 wrap-around porches, why are you so excited about a balcony? I know. Just…don’t go there.)

The door from the living room to the balcony was super heavy and hard to open. It felt like when you’re trying to push a door against a heavy gale of wind, but the night was perfectly still. It was VERY difficult!

I was NOT the only person to have trouble opening the door but WAS the only person to somehow get their finger caught in said door and end up gushing blood all over the place.

You 4 real can not take me anywhere.

This Flyer:

 

The corner around my office is like a wind tunnel, always blustery and blowy and ten degrees colder than the rest of the city. It is weird and the WORST.

The other morning I was walking the one block from the subway to the office and a gust of wind blew this flyer up and it got stuck on my leg and the wind just kept it there for the whole block!

HAHA this is a horrible story but oh my god, guys, I can’t even tell you how much this made me laugh. I was like peeing myself laughing, walking along the street with this paper stuck to my leg, sporadically stopping to take photos for my blergh.

Even the local homeless man who stands on the corner every day and asks for money so he can take a taxi back to his costume shop on Broadway (aww, it’s sad I know) thought I was a loony tune.

This Drawer:

 

Oh, and this one too:

I’ve now shown you the grotesque hoarder nightmare zones under my desk and inside my purse. Today I bring you: my desk drawers.

If you read any Real Simple magazines, and I read them all, one tip they’re constantly sharing on organization is to avoid drawers. Drawers are the worst. You can just toss all your crap in there, slam ‘em shut and never think about it again.

I am SO guilty of doing this, to the point that yesterday I wanted to put some paperwork in a drawer, thought “oh there’s too much garbage in there” and then THREW the paperwork out instead of trying to file it.

I then realized maybe I could clean out my garbage drawers so I would have room for actually important things. And so I did.

Here are just a few of the tippy top highlights of what I discovered:

• A Christmas card for my friend and her husband, dated Christmas 2012 (Merry Christmas 2012, Liz and Bobby!)

• A cutout from Marie Claire Magazine entitled Sex in a Blanket, tips for having sex while wearing a snuggie. I kept this.

• And a cutout from Glamour with tips about how do do a workout while laying on your couch. I kept this too. Apparently I am the laziest mf-er known to man.  

• About five dozen photos of myself from various points in my youth. What do you think it says if a person keeps drawers full of photographs of themselves? Don’t tell me. (PS. see below for an especially choice image of a young Liz Ho.)

• Two Christmas tree ornaments

• Program to Brian’s school’s 2012 production of Clue

• A Tiffany pen, my gift upon reaching five years of employment. Per the internet, this pen is valued at $125 or more. It has never been used. It is also the only item I own from Tiffany and Co. WHAT THE HELL, BRIAN! BUY ME SOME DIAMONDS.

• Two vials of store brand bug bite cream

• One button

• One box of sparklers, a gift from the resident office crazy to thank me for giving her a book

• My annotated Taylor Swift CD, which I have obviously now been playing on rotation for hours. LOVE THAT GURL.

• Saline spray

• A blonde wig worn for Halloween when I went as, that’s right, Taylor Swift. I’m the worst.

• One box of old conversation hearts

• One Half eaten box of Girl Scout cookies. I can’t believe I never ate these! I don’t even remember when I put them in there?! Disgusting? YES.

• One package of bamboo skewers… you know, for all the grilling I do in the office.

• One pair of hideous sensible black wedges I bought my first winter on the job (that’d be winter of 2007) in an attempt to dress more mature and professional. I think I wore them twice?  

• The folder from the first campaign I ever did solo. No paperwork inside, just a manila folder with the author’s name written on the outside. AWWW! I guess I was feeling sentimental? 

And that’s just the tip of the iceberg, pals. I filled up my office trash can lickety split and had to go get an empty cardboard box out of the supply room, fill THAT up with garbage and bring it down to the big communal trash can in the copy room, where I then covered all of my discarded belongings with a layer of paper because I didn’t want everyone to know how grotesque I am.

I did not pitch everything, so if anyone would like a blonde wig or an expensive silver pen or a box of sparklers, just let me know, I’m sure we can work out a fair deal.

And that, my friends, was my week. How was yours?! What’s everyone up to this weekend?! As I mentioned above, my Schmoopster is comin’ to town! We are going to shop for a dress for her to wear for my wedding. I am so excited. I want her to feel like the beautiful special goddess she is! Love that lady.

On that note, I will leave you here to stare at this beautiful photo found in my desk drawer, of Liz Ho at her 5th Grade Field Day. It’s hard to pick a favorite thing about this photo. My height? The Seattle Mariners cap hooked to the belt loop of my Bermuda length mom jorts? The pose? The Jon Lennon sunglasses?!?!

 

It always shocks me I never had a career as a child model.

Happy weekend, buddies. And Happy First Day of Summer – it’s finally here!!

xoox Liz

Another Awkward Week [4.25.14]

Hi guys!! How was everybody’s week? Mine was extremely eventful. As you’ll see below! I only wish it had been a scoonch warmer, you know? It’s so hard to get dressed this time of year. It’s freezing in the mornings, warm during the day and chilly again at night. It’s not warm enough for bare legs, and yet I hate the idea of wearing tights into April.

I guess an answer would be to wear tights to the office and then take them off…just maybe not in a public place, like this person did:

Yes those ARE a pair of ladies’ stockings sitting on top of our communal office microwave. Gross? UM YEAH. What the WHAT?! I don’t even want to know how this happened. I swear these aren’t mine, guys. You know I’d tell you. And even I’m not THAT weird.

What’s up for everybody’s weekend?  My half marathon is tomorrow morning. AAAAAH! I’m so excited. Slash nervous. But mostly excited. But mostly nervous. Just kidding, I”m excited!’ Right now the weather channel is calling for rain during just the exact hours while I’ll be running. Adorable, Mother Nature, truly charming. But I won’t let it get me stressed. I will race in the rain! If Garth Stein can do it, so can I.

(Fist bump to any nerds who get that reference!)

I’ll wait until after I finish to wax poetic about my new found love of running, and how empowered it’s made me feel and how I’ve become the sort of person who can talk about say “empowered” in a totally serious way. But I will state right now, on the public record, that even if I don’t finish the race (which I totally will!) (But just in case!) that I am so dang proud of myself for undertaking this challenge. Just in the training, I’ve pushed myself farther than I thought I could go and it feels so good. I’m shamelessly patting myself right on the back.

You go, self!

Ok enough of this mumbo jumbo. I have to start carbo loading immediately & I have MUCH to share, so let’s cut right to the chase and take a look at what was keeping it awkward this week.

This Iron:

Totally unplugged!

But I couldn’t remember if I truly did unplug it after half-assedly ironing a shirt on Monday morning so instead of taking a gym/lunch break, I left my desk at 9:45 AM, took the subway all the way back to Brooklyn, reassured myself I was not burning down the apartment, and returned to the office.

Nuts? Maybe! Possibly yes.  know it seems a little crazy, but I couldn’t shake the anxiety and I knew I’d get no work done if I didn’t just quiiiickly check. I’m working hard to manage my emotions and not let my worries get the best of me, but usually my worries are totally abstract and insane, like, if Brian doesn’t respond to an email for a little bit, I assume he’s either dead, or cheating on me. Or BOTH: he’s cheating and was just murdered by his mistress in a fit of lustful rage. Or if I have a weird throat tickle, I instantly assume it’s, at best, a viral infection, at worst: fatal cancer.

Those sorts of mega-fears, I can quiet, convince myself are not true, but leaving the iron turned on, smoldering my apartment into a fiery blaze? TOTALLY within the realm of possibility.

I have no regrets! Except ironing in the first place. Next time something’s wrinkly, I’m just throwing it in the garbage. Ain’t nobody got time for this!

This Faucet:

This faucet spray nozzle thing is an excellent tool, especially when rinsing out the sink or blasting especially hard to clean dishes, like the inside of the reusable plastic straw from your travel smoothie mug. To make it work, you turn on the regular faucet, pull out the spray nozzle and push a button and WHOOSH! Power blast. As soon as you release the button, the water once again runs just out of the regular faucet.

Why am I even going into this? Y’all know how to use sinks.

I, however, do not.

I always wash dishes first thing when I wake up, while Brian’s in the shower and the coffee’s going, it’s all part of my slow wake-up routine. The other morning I must not have been awake enough, or like, at all, because I used the spray nozzle and then tried to put it back in its holder without removing my finger, effectively SOAKING myself.

Like, soaking.

And once again, may I present a real-life counterpart to a fantasy. I like to sleep in Brian’s old button-downs because they’re really comfortable and also I imagine that they’re super sexy. Like, you know that scene in basically every movie and TV show ever where the male hero sleeps with a new woman and then wakes up in the morning and there she is, wearing his oversized shirt and nothing else, leaning against the doorframe with a mug of coffee, bathed in the morning sunlight smiling like a perfect, sensual angel?

Andd then we have reality: oversized shirt, usually buttoned incorrectly so it hangs crookedly, atop a pair of 1 zillion year old pajama bottoms, messy grease-mop of hair, smeared mascara everywhere because NO MATTER HOW MANY HOURS I spend trying to take off my eye makeup, I always wake up with smudges under my eyes and water everywhere.

A perfect, sensual angel!!!!

This Bus Seat:

This weekend Brian & I were in Philly visiting my sister for Easter and we took the city bus uptown to the Art Museum area to spend some time outside. When we got on, we found three empty seats together and promptly plopped our booties down. Point two seconds later, I felt a weird wetness seeping onto my thigh, and realized my seat had a wet spot right smack dab in the middle.

I leapt to my feet, touched the now wet spot on my running tights, smelled my hand to assure myself it wasn’t pee (it wasn’t! I swear. Maybe it was but I say it was just water and I’m sticking to that story) and the three of us moved up to the next row of seats all, mercifully, bone dry.

Our new seats were right above the ones we’d just abandoned and at the next stop a man got on and immediately went to sit in the wet seat.

“That seat is wet!” I squawked, not wanting to anyone to suffer my same fate.

He thanked me and moved to another spot.

At the next stop a young woman got on and where do you think she headed? You know!

I blurted out another warning: “That seat’s wet!” and she nodded in thanks before even beginning to sit.

The next stop…repeat! And repeat and repeat and repeat for essentially every single stop on our 15 minute bus ride. I had somehow become the de-facto guardian of everyone’s butts. Once I’d warned one passenger, and then a second, the pattern had been established. I couldn’t just stop warning them…I knew the seat was wet AND everybody else on the bus knew I knew the seat was wet because I told them when they got on, so not only would I knowingly allow someone to soak their bottom, but everyone would know my deceit and oh, how they would judge.

Being a good Samaritan is exhausting, guys.

Also, just for my own sanity, could you all please reassure me that it was totally just water and not pee?!

This Liquor Store:

So Pennsylvania has these ridiculously strict liquor laws about how and when and where and in what quantity alcohol can be purchased and consumed. One positive result of this is that the majority of restaurants in the Philadelphia area are BYOB and thus, fabulously affordable. However, a negative consequence of this is that it’s nearly impossible to find a place to purchase  said B. In NYC, at least in the yuppie, gentrified neighborhoods I frequent, wine and liquor stores are as easy to come upon as Duane Reades and Chase ATM’s and you can buy beer at bodegas, grocery stores, even CVS. But in Philly, there are like three state-run liquor stores, all spread across the city and they’re only open from like noon to five on Saturday’s and you have to buy beer at a special beer distributor and it’s just a whole hot mess. I know this next sentence is going to make me sound like some kind of raging wino and I swear I’m not, but whenever I’m in town I get very stressed about where and how we’re going to purchase wine. The pleasure of BYOB dinners are instantly negated when you have to add on a 4 mile trek to the nearest State Store just to get your $8 bottle of Rex Goliath Sauvignon Blanc.

I’m getting stressed now just thinking about it!

So anyway, blah blah, last Saturday we were in Philadelphia with Margerie, like I mentioned above. At about 3 PM we had just finished a 10-mile run (humblebrag) up by the Art Museum and were heading back to her home in South Philly, many miles away. We had 9:30 PM dinner reservations at a (BYOB) Italian place on her block and decided we’d spend the time between sitting on her patio, soaking up the sun and sipping homemade sangria. We just needed to pick up some wine! We figured it would be easier to grab while uptown than back in her ‘hood, so we used our trusty smartphones to search for the nearest wine distributor.

“There’s one just a few blocks away,” Maggie told us, looking up from her Google Maps. “And right by a bus stop, too.” And off we went, following the map to the address they’d listed: 1814 Kater St.

When we got to Kater Street, we were dubious. It appeared to be entirely residential, a small alley flanked by identical townhouses. 1820, 1818, 1816…finally we came upon 1814 and it was not a wine store or a store of any kind, but a private residence. The map told us we were standing in front of Vinocity Events but we were quite clearly not.

A man was outside of the house next door, playing with his adorable children. He saw us looking lost and asked us what we were looking for.

“Wine!” we replied in unison.

Totally normal. This man is just trying to enjoy a day with his kids while strange winos dressed in workout gear roam his pleasant residential street.

He gave us a few addresses and sent us on our way, but we decided to just take the bus back to Maggie’s and try downtown.

Upon our return, we asked Maggie’s roommate where the nearest wine store was located (Maggie doesn’t know her nearest wine store? Are we even related?) and she gave us some convoluted directions to walk a few blocks to the Safeway, through the parking lot and “it’s right near the Home Depot.”

Sure? Marge seemed to understand what she was talking about so off we went! We trudged through Maggie’s cute neighborhood, then a sort of shady area full of gas stations near the highway and then came upon the Safeway, nestled among a smattering of strip malls. We walked through the parking lot and scanned the storefronts – FedEx, Dress Barn, Krafty Korner…but no wine. We came to the end of the parking lot and saw the Home Depot in front of us, but still hadn’t located the wine.

We were standing on the street corner next to a pop-up tent selling Easter flowers, looking lost, when suddenly we heard a voice.

“Hey ladies. You lost? Looking for the gym?”

We turned around. The flower seller must have spotted us from his tent and assumed from our running clothes that we were headed to work out.

“The opposite!” we replied. “We’re looking for the liquor store.”

“Liquor! Niiiiiiceeeee” he leered, looking us up and down. “What are you guys drinking? You partying tonight?”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a small child lingering in the flower tent, probably his own son. Real classy, dude. We tried to extricate ourselves from the conversation, and fast.

“Can you just tell us where the State Store is?” we asked, avoiding eye contact.

“Oh yeahhhhh…you just take a left, walk past the safe way and over to the Meinike and you’ll find it. If you go under the highway, you’ve gone to far. You ladies have a great time partying tonight, drink up, yeahhhhh.”

First of all: GROSS, DUDE, GROSS.

Second of all: WHAT THE FUCK, PHILADELPHIA!?! Why are you making it so hard to buy wine! Why do we have to wander around in car repair parking lots and under highways just to find the nearest liquor store?! I don’t know if the state thinks that by limiting alcohol vendors they’ll reduce consumption but this whole excursion is DRIVING ME TO DRINK.

Finally we found what we were looking for, hidden behind a Jiffy Lube. We grabbed a family sized jug of Barefoot and a smaller, more sophisticated Cupcake to bring to dinner and hightailed it out of there.

At this point we’d run 10 miles, walked about 1 more to get to the “Vinocity Events” aka some man’s house, then walked at least two more to find this stupid godforsaken liquor store and we still had to get home. We had no water. My legs were cramping, I wanted to cry.

I suddenly understand why Frodo is such a whiny brat throughout Lord of the Rings.  Epic journeys are exhausting!

Next time I go to Philly, I”m B-ing my own B all the way from New York.

Annnnd the end. What a week, you guys. WHAT A WEEK! What’s everyone up to this weekend? I hope you have plenty of wine, whatever it may be.

I’m off to eat 36 bagels, refresh Weather.com repeatedly and pretend to be calm. Wish me luck!

xoxo Liz Ho

Another Awkward Week [4.4.14]

Good morning, everyone! How’s your day? Mine is already off to a very … Liz-esque start. I wasted like 30 minutes this morning dealing with a hard-boiled egg situation. It’s been what, like 2 weeks since I’ve done something weird involving eggs?

Basically I needed breakfast this morning and didn’t want to buy because I’m trying to be responsible with my cash flow these days and I remembered I needed to make an egg for right before I wanted to leave for work, so I put it on the stove and finished getting ready and then remembered that hardboiled eggs need to chill before you eat them and how can I simultaneously chill and transport my egg this morning?

Option one: ziploc bag full of ice…leaked.

Option two: ice water in a tupperware container that guess what? Leaked.

Option three: This was the clever one – I’d fill my water bottle up with water, drop in the egg, drop in a couple of ice cubes et voila! A handy dandy egg-transporter-cooler. Except when I dropped in the egg it broke and then I realized my water bottle, which I like to drink from, was now filled with eggwater and the egg was inedible so the last 30 minutes were a waste and oh, look, I’m going to be late for work and still don’t have breakfast.

And after all that, I’m out an egg and the five dollars I then spent on a breakfast sandwich. Worth it. Also, patent pending on an egg cooler transporter – it seems like an item EVERYONE needs in their life!

Anyhoodle – GOOD MORNING KITTENS!! Happy April! Were any of you fools this week? My roommate pulled a good one:

Tee hee! Brian went to bed before I did the night of 4/1 and when I went in to use the lav before bed, I found the toilet lid shut. I didn’t suspect a thing and surprise! Balloon! Good one, prankster.

And it’s a prank that keeps on giving because, oh yes, that balloon is still sitting on the floor of our bathroom. We are nothing if not deeply committed to keeping a tidy home.

Le sigh.

Ok, I’ll stop rambling about eggs and things and cut right to it. Let’s take a look at what was keeping it awkward this week!

This Week’s Spill:

Black & white striped dress. Where do you think the salad dressing landed?

YUP.

This Bar:

Last night one of my favorite authors was in town and we met for a drink – she also reads this blog. I’m really blurring the line between personal and professional these days. Whoops.

Anyway.

We met at this kind of hip (I guess??) bar in the West Village called The Other Room. It was a gorgeous night (FINALLY!!!) and the few seats set up outside the bar were taken when we arrived, but we were lucky to get second best: two seats at a little counter at the big front window. Score.

Except…maybe not. We got the sense right away that we were not exactly welcomed by the hipper than thou bartender. We asked for the cocktail list and he informed us they only sold wine, beer, port and sake. Port and sake. OH NYC you’re the worst. We were struggling to order our wines without fully butchering the pronunciation (something called “gwendochino blanc, or something?”) when another patron rolled in, an attractive woman with a serious ‘tude. She was clearly upset that all the good seats were taken and complained openly about it to the bartender in the way that girls who think they’re funnier and cuter than they are often do, a little too loudly, pretending they’re ‘just joking haha!” but actually quite seriously believe they deserve preference.

For the record, in case you can’t pick up the subtlety, I do NOT find this charming.

“I wanted to sit outside.” She told the bartender. “Can I at least sit at the window.”

“Someone else took those seats,” he replied with a shrug and disdainful look in our direction.

they both stared at us…trying to get us to move?

We muttered apologies, awkwardly chugged our grmuncmody blancs.

“Just wait it out til they get up and leave” the bartender said.

They (WE!) continued to gulp our wine as the bartender and Ms. Hot Shit talked loud and proud about how soon, so soon, “they” (we!) would just get up and vacate the premises.

It was overall a welcoming, warm and inviting bar!

And in the re-reading I’m realizing this might be one of those “you had to be there” kind of stories but sadly you were not there so you’ll just have to go right on ahead and trust me and maybe just politely laugh a little bit to make me feel OK?

THANKS!

This Dress:

Wrap dresses. They’re all fun and games and figure flattery until the top won’t stay shut, no matter the fact that you’ve afixed it to your bra with a spare bobby pin and multiple, and I mean MULTIPLE, of your coworkers have to casually pull you aside and politely whisper “Liz your, um…top” while trying not to stare at your exposed hooter.

This Picture:

My camera must have gone off at some point? One hundred* dollars to the person who can correctly guess what this might be.

(* zero)

These Manicure Tools:

I have a terrible habit (only one!) of biting and picking at my nails and cuticles. I know it is unattractive and unhygienic and all around gross but I love it and can’t stop.

Brian’s a biter too and we’ve realized we really need to curb this scene before the wedding – our photog will try to take those cute romantic shots of our brand new wedding bands and there will just be blood dripping everywhere. We can’t have that.

So! Per a recommendation from Brian’s sister (hi Emily!) I’ve been trying to use this Essy Apricot Cuticle Oil as a replacement – whenever I want to bite, I slather on the cuticle oil and it keeps my nails from getting ragged. Also it makes me smell delicious!

I also keep a bottle of clear topcoat at my desk because it’s super appropriate and professional to paint your nails in your office (false). Earlier this week I week I slathered up my fingers with cuticle oil and thought something felt off – it was kind of thick and gloopy and OH WAIT, I just painted all over my fingers with nailpolish.

Thankfully it was clear?!

And that, my pals, was my week! How was yours? What’s everyone up to this weekend? I’m reuniting with my college roomies at our friend’s brand new house in New Jersey (adulthood!!) and we’re going to gossip so effing hard, the world might collapse. I can’t even pretend like we’re going to discuss smart, valuable life stuff because we’re super not. We’re just going to dish on people we went to college with (maybe even YOU?!?!) and celebrities (I’m deeply concerned for Zac Efron) and drink so much wine and it’s going to be Tony the Tiger style GRRRRREAT!

April Showers, May Flowers & Plenty O Pilgrims to you and yours, my fine friends. Have a great weekend!

xoxo Liz Ho

Another Awkward Week – Christmas Edition! [12.20.13]

Pa rum pum pum pum, everyone! Sorry I’m a little late this AM. I was off receiving the gift of my annual gynecological exam.

Merry Christmas, cervix!

Are you guys getting excited for the holidays?! I am SO excited but I also might die of early onset diabetes by next week if I don’t cool it with the Chrismas snax. My bloodstream is basically just refined white sugar, brie cheese, caramel corn and wine at this point. Yiiiiikes!

Today is my last day in-office until 2014, I’m spoiled rotten with much vacation time between the holidays so we’re headed down to PA tomorrow morning for Christmas with my family and then off to Brian’s parents in NJ on the 26th. This is our first Christmas spent together and with each other’s families and, as with Thanksgiving, I’m simultaneously excited and also a little mournful about change and growing up and all that business. LIFE! Moving on, sands through hour glasses, etcetera. Enough mourning, Liz: celebrate!

And with that, let’s take a look at what was keeping it awkward this (Christmasy!) week.

This Gift:

A One Direction Sticker Book for my assistant Margaret (she’s basically the greatest person alive), wrapped in romantic silver and gold hearts, the only wrapping paper I could find laying around my office.

At least I wrapped it?

This Wine:

Ok this actually has nothing to do with Chrismtas but did happen in a bar tricked out with garland and twinkle lights so…it fits.

Last night I had a few drinks with some pals and at the end of the night, the waiter sat down a glass of red wine in front of me, one I hadn’t ordered.

“For you…” he said.

I immediately sat up straighter, smiled and tossed my hair. For ME?!?! Was some gentleman watching me from across the room, so taken by my good looks and sex appeal that he noticed what I was drinking and sent one over to me, hoping we might meet eyes and fall in love/lust?! I have only ever seen this in the movies but have dreamed that some day such a classy, sexy thing might happen to me and IT FINALLY HAS!

I was all ready to flash a smile and my engagement ring, give a smug “flattered by taken!” shrug in the direction of my secret admirer when the waiter finished his sentence.

“…I accidentally entered too many, so you can have this one.”

Insert that screeeech hitting the breaks noise here as I tumble right off my high horse.

The wine was less sensual come-on and more just, you know, waiter error.

UNLESS the whole reason he accidentally ordered the wine in the first place was because he was so taken with my beauty and charm he just couldn’t think straight!

Yeah…let’s go with that one.

These Cards:

I was in charge of writing up some holiday cards on behalf of my department and OBVIOUSLY barely made it 2 seconds without spilling ramen all over them.

As for personal Christmas cards, I managed to get out about 12 a vast improvement over last year’s six! But again, if you did not receive a card from me, remember, I DO love you and think of you at the holidays and always, I just still haven’t gotten the hang of the whole mailing cards situation. Maybe someday! Goals!

This Sidewalk:

We’ve had a lot o’ snow around here lately (I like it!) and apparently this is what counts as “shoveling” on my block? Three days after our latest storm I thought it was safe to wear regular shoes, instead of the clunky snowboots I’d been rocking, only to discover that all the sidewalks, while cleared of the fluffy stuff, were still coated with a thin layer of ice.

I slid and scooted along, carefully, oooooohhhh so carefully, inch by inch by inch. It took me 17 minutes to go the 2 blocks to the subway BUT I didn’t fall once.

Victory!

This Ornament:

We spend every Christmas Eve with our very dear friends – this year will be our 27th Christmas together! They have three sons right around the same ages as the three of us and we’ve known each other essentially since we were in utero. Christmas Eve with this gang is my most favorite night of every year, bar none. We are all mildly majorly obsessed with the Muppets Christmas Carol and have, on several occasions, performed our own version of The Christmas Carol (adapted from the movie, obvs) for our parents and it’s always hilarious and amazing and we should probably have won at least 17 Tony Awards by now. We’ve been robbed!

Anyway, their oldest son Robert got married last year to an amazing gal, Jackie, who is a truly spectacular addition to the crew, and this year, Rob & Jackie will spend the holiday with her parents in Louisiana, so our group will be apart for the first year ever. I won’t make you listen to yet another dramatic monologue about growing up and changing and sadness and adulthood and life but will just say that we will miss them very, very, VERY much.

I got the amazing idea in my head to send them a Muppets Christmas Ornament, which turned out to be easier said than done. I could not find one single licensed MCC (Mupptes Christmas Carol, duh) ornaments for sale, even on the interwebs, so I had the brilliant thought to make my own DIY ornament. There are zillions of sites where all you have to do is upload a photo, hit send and voila: your own personalized ornament.

Except I guessss you can’t just upload any old picture you find on Google Images because when I tried this at Zazzle.com, they told me it violated their acceptable content guidelines.

Bah humbug!

I was initially impressed by their excellent legal team, catching this one little order, but then realized I may have tipped them off myself. The gift message with order read:

“Merry Christmas! This is ridiculous and probably violates copyright law, but I wanted to make sure you guys had some Muppets in your holiday this year!”

(Emphasis added.)

I basically handed them this one on a platter. What a terrible criminal I would be! Just walk into a bank with a bunch of counterfeit bills and a note reading “LOL these are fake!!”

So Rob, Jackie, you’re not getting a Muppets Ornament this year. But please know that all of us kids and parents and Rizzo the Rat and the Ghost of Christmas Present (a LARGE absent minded spirit!) and Michael Caine and Charles Dickens (aka Gonzo) and Charles Dickens (the real person, RIP) and the whole gang will miss you terribly and wish  you the very merriest of Christmases!

God Bless Us, Everyone!

These Skirts:

Happy Annual Everybody Wear Your Inappropriately Short Festive Skirt To the Office and Pretend it’s a Coincidence Even Though You Totally Planned It Day!

Like, so planned it that we had a calendar reminder and everything.

It’s the little things that keep the holiday spirit alive, you know?

This Tin:

A Christmas bribe!

We’re totally in love with our apartment and desperately want to stay at least one more year, so we’re actively trying to remind our landlady why we’re the very best tenants ever and she so shouldn’t raise the rent on us. We thought that a Christmas gift and card would be nice just in general and also would help demonstrate how invaluable and amazing we are. The plan was cookies and an ornament…except the cookies have now been sitting in this tin since Sunday night and I can’t, for the life of me, find the godforsaken ornament we bought for her. WHERE ARE YOU, ornament?!

She might just end up getting a card reading:

“Merry Christmas! Please enjoy some stale cookies and also we got you an ornament but lost it, whoops, please never raise our rent and Happy New Year! Love, Liz & Brian”

How could she ever kick us out after receiving that?!

And speaking of our landlady, I know you’ve all been dying to see, here is this year’s Christmas decor:

Classy in blue and silver. I actually LOVE this year’s display! Understated and sparkly. I’m into it.

And, of course, the seals make their annual return to the foyer:

Oh those two!

And, finally, because it’s never Christmas without it, let’s all pause and watch…

The Most Awkward Christmas Commercial of All Time: 

‘Tis the season for creepy sibling love!

And there you have it, friends. What are you all up to for Christmas? Any trips planned? Cookies baked? Presents under the tree? You’re Jewish and don’t celebrate? My bad! You’re offended that I say Merry Christmas instead of Happy Holidays? Oh BAH HUMBUG!

Wishing a Happy Merry WHATEVER to everyone near and far. I hope a lily white Santa brings you everything you wished for and more.

Hugs & Mistletoe, Liz Ho Ho HO!

Another Awkward Week [11.22.13]

Good. Morning. Dudes. How’s everyone doing? I’m not gonna lie to y’all: I’m a scoonch on the cranky side. I just can’t seem to accept the fact that it is not yet the weekend. That we still have 8+ more hours of working and wearing pants and generally being not on the couch. I can’t get behind that. I call a foul on the whole earth. Everyone, it’s time to go back to bed!

Ok to save me from launching into a full on melodramatic tirade about the cruelties of the modern world, why don’t we just try to put on our happy pantsand take a look at what was keeping it awkward this week.

This “Poncho”:

One possible factor in this morning’s mood: it is grey and rainy here in the NYC. Also, I couldn’t find a single one of the dozens of umbrellas I suh-wear we own, so I fashioned a poncho/rain bonnet out of a garbage bag.

Genius or pathetic? I’ma go with genius. Watch yo’ back, MacGyver. Two can play this game.

Wish I could say this was the first time I wrapped myself in plastic this week but wait, nope…

This Bib:

I got to go to a super swankadoo work event on Wednesday night (The National Book Awards! One of our authors won!) so I was looking extra good at the office all day. A blazer over a cocktail dress can instantly take it from day to night! Did you know that? I should write for Vogue!

ANYWAY. We all know how good I am at eating food and I was worried about getting my lunch all over my dry-clean-only, snazzy day/evening wear so I hooked a grocery bag to the lapels of my blazer et voila: a bib!

Pure sophistication right there.

Speaking of pure sophistication…

This Makeover:

If you recall, one of my New Years’ Resolutions for 2013 was to figure out how to wear red lipstick and drink whiskey. Lofty goals, I know. On Friday evening I hosted some of my lady friends for an evening of trying whiskey and lipsticks. We called it Classy Broads Night. To give you an idea of just what kind of broads we’re dealing with here, one gal announced that she’d arrived via car service (classy!) … but also wasn’t wearing a bra (less so!). It was one of the best nights I’ve had in quite some time.

One friend, Kathleen, has become a fermented grain mash aficionado, so she led us in a guided taste test of  four different types of whiskey, each one more disgusting than the last. She was very official about the whole thing. First she poured us each a small portion (possibly called “a finger”)  and then instructed us to “spend the next five minutes smelling it.” Fun activity! While we sat and sniffed, she gave a dramatic reading from the back of the bottle, explaining the whiskey’s history, flavor palate (i.e. “mint, leather, papaya, wood and Sweden” – yum!) and other general information. All of these were hilarious. If you are a struggling creative writer looking for a place to get out all of your best metaphors, flourishing adjectives and overblown narrative, might I suggest applying to be a whiskey company copy writer? These jabronies take themselves wa-haaaay too seriously. From the website of one of them:

WE DIDN’T SET OUT TO EMBODY
THE SPIRIT OF ADVENTURE AND
SELF-RELIANCE OF THE HUDSON VALLEY,
IT JUST TURNED OUT THAT WAY.

Did you, though, really, guys? It’s whiskey. I love my booze as much as the next Irish Catholic lush but let’s all just calm it down a notch or 73.

Moving on. After we sat around and sniffed, Kathleen then allowed us to begin sipping.

“Like a shot?” someone asked (see what I mean about sophistication?)

The thing about whiskey is – it is terrible! Every sip burned. Kathleen told us it’s supposed to hurt, just power through the pain. When one pal exclaimed that her esophogus was on fire, Kathleen assured her “that’s good!”

WHAT! No. “Pain is good for you?” That’s what they tell people in like, the NFL. Or concentration camps. Why are we consuming something that smells like nail polish remover, burns our esophoguses (esophagi?) and requires time and effort to enjoy.

I’m still not on board. I tried. I really tried! I know that whiskey is sexy and rugged and sophisticated and girls who sidle up to a bar and order bourbon, neat, are totally smokin’ hot babes and I really want to be all of those things…whelp, I am not.

I’m an extra large glass of bargain brand Sauvignon Blanc. And I’m just going to have to live with that.

In the midst of our tasting, our other friend Nicole, who is a makeup artist gave each one of us a brand new, beautiful lipstick and showed us how to apply, complete with lip liner. Ooh la lah. Everyone looked stunning and amazing and then, since none of us know how to wear lipstick, we spent the next several hours alternating between staring at ourselves in the mirror (Kathleen!) to sitting very still, trying not to move our lips when speaking, for fear of smudging. We all need so much help.

My color was called Russian Red and as you can see above, it looked pretty good! I was feeling seductive and badass until…this happened:

How. HOW HOW HOW did lipstick end up on the bridge of my nose? I guess I touched my mouth and then wiped my face? I was probably biting my nails (gross, I know!) but why was I then rubbing all over my nose? There are no answers to these questions.

So there you have it. New Years Resolution 2013 … complete? I drank whiskey and wore red lipstick and pretty much failed at both of them but I’m just going to go ahead and call it a wild success.

Cheers!

And I guess I’ll just take this whole classy drunk theme to the end with a story for which I don’t have a picture because, as you’ll see below, I wasn’t quite in the photographing state.

As I mentioned, Wednesday night I was out at this fancy party for the National Book Awards. The party started at 10 PM (on a school night! Are you kidding me?!), so to kill time between work and the party, some friends and I got a few glasses of vino before hitting up the high endopen bar for several more hours. A whole WORLD of good decision making right there. I am not joking when I say that I am still hungover. I can’t hang like I used to, guys, I just can’t. How does anyone a) stay up past 10 PM on weeknights, just in general and b) drink heavily while doing so and then c) leave the house the next day? My entire body is in pain. All day yesterday I was just wishing the grim reaper to come upon me with his cape and his scythe and just put me out of my misery.

Anyway, I think that I had the idea to include something in my blog about wearing a blazer and then putting a coat over it and how weird that feels. Double the coats! Does anyone else ever experience this? Men? Do any men (aside from Ross, hi Ross!), even read this blog? Do you ever get used to wearing a coat over another coat? What a strange strange world we live in!

So I guess that was in the back of my mind and then I had a semi-awkward incident again involving my jacket at this NBA party – I’d left my coat & tote (rhyme!) in the coat check but of course couldn’t find my check ticket when I was getting ready to leave, so I had to walk around the cloak room with the attendant til I found my stuff. She then wouldn’t just give it to me, I could be a common thieving robber, so I had to give her more explanation.

“What is the brand of this coat?” she asked.
“It’s from H&M, I got it on sale, and it still has an old dry cleaning tag stuck to it from when I took it to the cleaners several winters ago.”

Nailed it.

“What’s in this bag?” she asked.

“Dirty Tupperware!” I declared, triumphantly.

Nailed it again.

I should not be allowed in fancy places.

I guess I thought this was hilarious and amazing and wanted to be sure that I remembered to blog about it, so on the taxi home I sent myself a drunken email that reads as follows:

Coat clog: coat over blazer, coat check lost ticket.bag full of tullerware . 

Also.dont forget apple

So there you have it. My coat clog! And what do I mean about the apple? No freaking clue.

Famous last words: I am seriously never drinking again.

And that was my week! God willing this hangover will subside any minute now. Otherwise I might just end up in the fetal position under my desk listening to the Dream Girls soundtrack and quietly weeping. I don’t know if I could blame that on booze, though, that actually sounds like a nice little Friday afternoon right there.

Hoping everyone is in a significantly better state than I am at the moment! Any good plans for the weekend (I’ll be sleeping) or stories from the week? Make me laugh, it’s Friday!

xoxoxoxo Liz Ho

 

Another Awkward Week [11.15.13]

Hello, my beautiful butterflies.  How y’all doing? Is it just me, or did this week feel utterly interminable. TGIF to the highest power today, my friends.

Here’s a deep thought for your Friday, something I can’t get out of my head: why is “Jack” a nickname for “John”? It doesn’t make any sense! There are plenty of nicknames that don’t phonetically seem that logical – like, Peg + Margaret or Dick + Richard (LOL she just said ‘dick!’), but at least the nicknames are shorter than the originals. What is the point of Jack / John? It is the same amount of letters! It’s just a totally different name! That’s like, if your name was Ryan and you were like, oh everyone calls me Todd.

WHY GUYS WHY?!?!

One Awkward Year: Nothing but the hardest hitting issues. You’re welcome!

Now, why don’t we take a look at what was keeping it awkward this week:

 

This Instagram:

Ok technically this is from last week but don’t judge me. Those who live in glass houses should not throw stones. Or something? I need more coffee.

Regardless: I snapped this so-so photo of the NYC Marathon the other Sunday and posted to Instagram because what was I not going to gram that shiz? Please, you all know me too well.  My phone is set to such that I get notifications whenever someone ‘likes’ an instagram photo…but it doesn’t notify you if someone takes back that like. SO! I quickly got a notification that my friend Peter liked my insta…but when I went to check, he was not on the list of people who had liked the photo. BURN ouch. Rejected! PETER! What happened? Did you change your mind? Was this photo not good enough for you?

I’d like to say I didn’t care about this but of course I did. I mostly just wanted to ask if this has ever happened to anyone else? Or worse, have you ever accidentally ‘liked’ a photo or post of someone you don’t even know? Like, say, the cousin of a wife of a college friend who you somehow stumbled upon and now you can’t stop looking at her artfully staged smoothie photos?

No? Just me? Ok, well, I’ll be in jail if anyone is looking for me. You can find me on the restraining order wing…right next to Alec Baldwin’s stalker.

This Bar:

Wait…no, that’s not actually a bar!

Here’s the tale. Last night I was meeting a media colleague for a few drinks and she picked the location, a bar called Strong Place in the Cobble Hill neighborhood of Brooklyn. I’d never been to this place before, but a quick GMaps search told me where I needed to go – Court Street between Butler and Douglass! – so I skipped on out with wine on the brain.  I came to the spot where the bar was said to be located and sho ‘nuf, there in front of me were giant block letters reading STRONG PLACE. On either side of those words it read “Inglesia Bautista” and “Baptist Church,” which I found semi-suspicious, but guys, this is Brooklyn, they would turn an old Hispanic Baptist church into a bar. That’s about as BROOKLYN as it gets.

The two windows of the “bar” were covered by thick curtains and all of the doors were closed. There were no markings on how to enter.

“How cool!” I thought. “This must be some kind of hip speakeasy! What a trendsetter I am, going to this bar, that everyone thinks is really a church!”

I tried the door to the left, it was locked.

The door on the right: more of the same.

In the middle were two large metal doors with no handle. I tried them.

No dice.

I knocked: nothing.

I paced around, trying to appear casual,  hoping someone else would go in and I could follow. But all other pedestrians just walked on past, paying me no mind.

I didn’t have a cell for my drinks date, plus I’d never actually met her before so I didn’t want to reveal how utterly uncool I was, unable to gain access to this sexy, mysterious speakeasy, so I did the next best thing: I pulled out my phone and googled “How do I get into the Strong Place bar?”

The search provided ZERO answers to my specific plight, but did pull up the bar’s address, 270 Court Street, an even number. I was standing in front of 271 Court, on the other side of the road.

I slowly turned and there, behind me, on the other side of the street, was a completely and utterly normal bar, with lights on and an open door, a tasteful wooden sign displaying the name Strong Place.

I take ZERO blame for this misunderstanding. You can’t just name your bar the same thing as something that ALREADY EXISTS! And is right across the mother flipping STREET! Confusing.  I call shenanigans. I bet the owner is named John but calls himself Jack.

The whole world makes no sense!

After a few drinks, I predictably ended up where I always do when I’ve got a nice buzz on:

This Hot Spot:

Trader Joe’s.

Obvi! I really need to stop drunk grocery shopping.

Though, I was 100% sober earlier in the week when I stopped by the Key Foods in my neighborhood to pick up a few essentials. I had a basket full of  canned beans and ground turkey (3 pound family pack on sale! We’ll be eating turkey burgers for the next 73 weeks!) and spotted an open check-out register, so I sidled up to the conveyor belt and began to unload my goods. I then realized that there was actually an organized system, with a line forming behind me and I had not just stumbled upon the good fortune of an empty register: I had butted in line.

Instead of just casually accepting that I am an asshole and powering on ahead, I became SUPER flustered, turned around, apologized to everyone in line and frantically began putting my food back in my basket, screeching “Oh god! I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to but in line! Someone else go! You’re next! You go! I’m so sorry!”

Everyone in line was normal and polite and waved me off “no, no! It’s fine, you carry on, you insane spaz” but I insisted. I grabbed my food in my arms and ran away from the register to the back of the line…

…only to realize that the line had now disbanded – everyone was already being helped at different registers so through all that, I had really not made one iota of difference in the timeliness in which my fellow customers paid for their groceries. We all would have ended up in the same place. I just caused a huge and weird scene for essentially nada.

Par for the course.

(We did this for dinner that night, in case you’re curious, with spicy seasoned ground turkey and it was A++. New easy go-to meal for the winter!)

And let’s just round out the morning with…

These Animal Droppings:

On the sidewalk outside of my office. Did I step in them?

And that was my week. Let’s just power right on through this Friday, team. We can do it! Anyone have any good weekend plans? I’m having some lady pals over tonight for a Classy Broads evening of whiskey tasting and makeovers (true story!) and tomorrow having dinner with my bffs from college. It should be a pretty girly, boozy, cheese-filled couple of days and I can. not. wait!

Hoping your weekends are all equally delightful and look out for sidewalk poop!

xoxo Dave (that’s my new nickname. Because apparently, anything goes!)

 

Another Awkward Week [10.18.13]

Friday! How was everyone’s week? I’ve eaten Thai Green Curry four times and have been listening to a lot of country music. It’s getting kind of weird over here.

And please forgive me for being MIA last week. Once again I was out of commish due to phone issues and unable to take photos. (And, ok, I’ll be honest: I was pretty preoccupied reading wedding blogs.) While waiting for my third and hopefully final replacement phone to arrive from Tmobile, I was working off this sweet cellpiece:

I would have been the hottest thing in Freshman Year English Lit 101 with this bad boy. Remember when Paris Hilton had a sidekick and it got hacked and she sent all these ridiculous sexts? No, just me? It was a perfectly serviceable phone (Brian actually has one just like it, hah!) but still made life semi awkward – I was able to receive calls and texts but didn’t have any numbers saved, so I couldn’t recognize anyone who was trying to get in touch with me. And unlike last time I wrote about this, when I predicted (correctly) that no one cared I’d been off the grid for days, people actually wanted to get in touch with me last week. I have never been more popular than the week I got engaged. I might break up with Brian and get some new guy to propose to me, just for the attention.

Jokes, jokes!

I felt like kind of a tool asking everyone who texted me to reveal who they were so I tried to make it into a fun guessing game based on context clues,  for example, what friend with a 717 number would make a joke about me being pregnant? (Hi Jefferson!) – and got most of them right! Some I begged to reveal themselves and some like the nice friend from high school who texted “congrats! See you at the reunion” are still a mystery. Thanks, friend! See you at the reunion? 

But, praise be to Xenu (I’m currently reading this book and considering converting to Scientology), after three replacement phones, two batteries and seven trips to two different TMobile retailers, I fiiinnnally seem to be back in the 21st Century. What a traumatic experience this has been!

Melodramatic much?

And with that, why don’t we take a look at what was keeping it awkward this week.

This Stew:

I can already tell that this is going to be a stupid story, but no stopping me now. So, I had a can of white beans in the fridge that I had opened maybe a week ago and decided not to use, so they were just chillin’ in some off-brand Tupperware, waiting to be eaten. Tuesday night we wanted to make an easy, home-cooked dinner and I figured I’d use up those beaners, so I found this recipe for sausage, kale and white bean stew. Turns out, friends, that the beans had actually gone 100% rancid. Did you know that canned beans, when uncanned and left in poorly sealed plastic containers can go bad and stink up your entire kitchen?

Well, now ya do.

I don’t know that the beans would have been that necessary to this recipe anyway, which turned out to basically just be spaghetti sauce in a bowl. Basically, dump two cans of diced tomatoes, some kale and some sausage into a pot. Heat. Eat.

Mmm mmm, meat sauce with a spoon. Not gonna lie: it was amazing.

I’ll be expecting my James Beard Award annnny day now.

Speaking of spaghetti sauce…

This Free Sample:

I had to meet an author for an interview at a studio in Chelsea Market , which is this big old market in …wait for it…can you possibly guess…the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan. I know, crazy, right?  Well! On my way to meet him, I passed a vendor handing out free samples and, you guys, I didn’t even look to see what it was, I just heard “free” and “food” and grabbed it like some kind of zoo animal.

It turned out to be some kind of spiral pasta in a tomato sauce – boring, but delicious.

I was chomping away when I came to my elevator bank and, without thinking, hopped on the elevator with the sample still in hand. The author and producer were meeting me on the other side of my ride…what was I going to do, just hop off this elevator holding a half-eaten tub of spaghetti?

I panicked, slurped as much of the sauce as I could out of the container (P.S. there was someone else on the elevator, what!) and frantically dug around my purse for a napkin or tissue of some kind to wrap the garbage in, hopefully saving my bag from being covered in spaghetti sauce. The best I could come up with was this paper receipt…from the TMobile store OBVZ…and it worked like a charm.

And by “worked like a charm,” I mean I now have spaghetti sauce all over my tote bag.

Rounding out the meal…

This Mess:

Later that evening I met a friend for a drink in the neighborhood and while wildly gesticulating during a passionate speech about how I’m going to bribe our landlady into never raising our rent by constantly gifting her with holiday trinkets, I knocked over my glass of rioja, effectively soaking my skirt, coat, tote, purse and scarf.

My new signature scent is “Ladies’ Night at The Olive Garden.”

This Contraption:

As I‘ve mentioned before, we have a realllly sensitive smoke alarm in our apartment – it has gone off while I’m boiling water. Fact. The only way to get it to shut up while you’re cooking it to have someone stand underneath it holding a fan blowing cool air in its direction. Diva much?

We were cooking up some delicious bacon the other night and the smoke alarm was going NUTS, so we came up with this excellent new system which involves one fan in the kitchen, a towel hanging from a pull-up bar creating a sort of curtain/door to block the smoke and a second fan in the hallway, aimed at the alarm.

Stops the alarm from beeping and also creates a truly gorgeous, feng shui layout in our home.

And finally…

This Salt – N – Pepa:

Just the spices, not the band, I WISH. This past weekend we were in beautiful Cooperstown, NY for the wedding of my good friends Kevin and Jenni. (This is KEVIN! I’ll never stop telling this story!) The weeks leading up to the wedding saw me encountering some major bathroom issues (which I won’t re-link to, once was MORE than enough to read those stories) and he asked me to make it a hat trick by having some kind of horrible bano related malfunction at his wedding and despite my best efforts…I failed. Kept it classy the whole damn wedding. I’m so sorry, Kevin. I hope you’ll forgive me

The best Awkward Moment I can muster from the weekend came earlier in the day – pre-wedding the boys went to the baseball Hall of Fame and the ladies hit up an apple cider farm with a completely baller snack stand. I was not even remotely hungry but immediately zeroed in on a large table of condiments (mustards! hot sauces! dips!) and ordered some sweet potato fries solely so I could have a vessel with which to scoop honey mustard into my face. While saucing up I managed to knock over a container of salt and pepper packets…and then immediately, as if on cue, whipped out my phone to take a picture.

My friends were so lucky to see the OAY live and in action.

Exciting stuff, I KNOW. Sorry I couldn’t do better for you, Kevin. I’ll make it up to you somehow!

Annnd that’s what I’ve been up to! What’s new with y’all? I’m going to say y’all whether anyone likes it or not, just FYI.

Have a fan-freaking-tastic weekend and thank you (again!) for being so enthusiastic and sweet about the engagement stories and for putting up with all that mushy stuff.

xoxoxo Liz Ho

Kevin’s wedding salt and pepper.

Another Awkward Week [9.27.13]

Holla! It’s Friday! How was everyone’s week? Mine was longggg. I woke up Thursday AM and swore. Like sah-wore, would stake Jon Hamm’s life on it, that it was Friday. NORP. Only Thursday. RIP, Jon, my bad.

Anyone else barely make it through the week? I feel ya, pals. I feel you.

I’m extra glad it finally is Friday, because my Schmoopster and sister Maggie are visiting for the weekend. Yay! Marge came up last night and we went to a concert together to see this band Okkervil River. Heard of ’em? Probably not, they’re pretty cool hipster shit, you know that’s how I roll. Just kidding, that’s how my sister rolls…y’all know the kind of tuneage I jam out to.

The concert was quite fun but also a very palpable reminder of just how old and grouchy I am. Their opening act was some guy called Black Joe Lewis who played very loud rock and roll music with lots of electric guitar solos and all the songs sounded the same (I’m sure they were great! I admit: I have no taste) and all I could think about was how loud it was and how much I wanted to sit down. Okkervil River, the main act, is energetic but still sort of mellow, gentle music. Nearly everyone was being cool and normal and bopping to the tunes except for four kids in the audience who were WAY INTO IT and jumping up and down, literally jumping and flailing their arms and clapping and singing all the lyrics at the top of their lungs. Guess what unfortunate soul had to stand right next to these clowns? ME. You know how dogs can smell fear? I swear that these annoying rowdy types can sense who’s a crotchety no-fun and just get alll up in their business.

Listen, I don’t want to tell you how to enjoy live music but maybe enjoy it quietly and politely from within your own personal space bubble and keep  your elbows and sweaty long hair and terrible voice out of my zone.

In other words: get off my lawn!

Anywaaay, that what’s up with me! 29 going on 90. Why don’t we stop complaining about the youths and take a look at what else was keeping it awkward this week:

This Lineup:

Getting dressed Sunday afternoon it took me three tries to find a pair of pantalones not covered in food stains.

Maybe time to pack up my poisonous laundry candy & do some wash?

PS – I don’t care if skinny jeans go out of style, I’m wearing them forever and an eternity. I want to be buried in my jeggings.

And while we’re talking fashion…

These Shirts:

As I  mentioned, Brian and I had a joint birthday party on Saturday cuz we’re cute like that, and apparently the dress code was chambray. It would be so like me to demand that everyone dress like me on my birthday but I swear this was unintentional.

How long am I going to drag out this ‘pay attention to me it is/was my birthday’ shtick? Infinitely.

So let’s keep going!

This Card:

From my seester. If you can’t read it’s a photo of two old ladies, one examining the other’s cardigan, saying “It’s a little early in the day to wear your ‘do me’ sweater, don’t you think?”

Hilarious, I know! Extra hilarious: I saw this card in CVS a few weeks back and laughed and laughed and purchased it and sent on to Maggie, just as a no reason hello, because, like me, Old Marge understands the sex appeal of a good cardigan.

Turns out that she had just bought the exact same card to give to ME for my birthday. Great minds. The HoBag ladies know the value of a sassy sweater.

And also…

These Gifts:

My faves. A homemade BLT (on white toast with mayo, only way to do it) from my friend Kamran and poo-pourri from Maureen. Sandwiches and bowl movement accessories…my pals know me so well!

This Outfit:

Do you ever have those days where you’re just like pwoooompppp. You just feel like a blob? Like a human version of the mucinex guy?

That was me in this get-up on Monday.  My pants were too tight, my shoes rubbed my feet in every possible location – I now have eight blisters and the shoes are in the garbage can – I had food on my sweater, was in the midst of a week-long streak of bad hair days and had to remove that belt I’m holding midday after gorging on too much food at lunch. Granted it was vegan food, but still: apparently an 8 pound burrito is an 8 pound burrito whether it contains animal products or not. Lesson learned!

I felt like such a slobby lump I found it hard to get anything done all day, I just wanted to go home and shower and make myself presentable…or just curl up in a ball and go back to bed.

 I know it sounds like I want everyone to chime in and be like “Omg, what! Liz, you are beautiful!” and yes, I know, thank you, I am amazing, but this isn’t a call for compliments.  I mostly just wanted to look for a little camaraderie from my internet peepz. Sometimes you feel like a blob, right? Right? Anyone? Bueller?

And now…

A Tale of Three Bathrooms by Charles “HoBag” Dickens 

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. I’ve never actually read A Tale of Two Cities, but tell me, how much of the novel involves making a scene in a public restroom? Oh, none of them? Boring. I’ve got that beat x3.

Bathroom One:

A charming wine bar in Manhattan’s East Village. Brian and I spent last Friday night wining and dining our way around Lower Manhattan in celebration of his birthday and one of our stops was for a glass of vino on the patio of this adorable joint. At the end of the evening I popped inside to visit the facilities and discovered it was one of those tiny, quaint places with only one unisex bathroom for everyone to share. So after waiting what seemed like an eternity for the lady in front of me to do her thang (women, amirite?!), my turn arrived. Yadda yadda, you know how human biology works, I went to flush and realized that the toilet water seemed precariously high.

“This can’t be right,” I thought to myself. I knew it was dangerous, and yet I couldn’t walk out and face the line of folks waiting to pee after me knowing I hadn’t flushed.

I went for it.

Water began to pour from EVERYWHERE. The bowl, the tank, everywhere. It was like the boiler room in the Titanic, just a solid wall of water flooding towards me.

I yelped, hoisted myself up onto the bathroom trash can, swung to safety, quickly opened the door and slammed it behind me.

I turned to face the waiting masses and stammered “it’s broken! Don’t go in there. It’s flooding. The toilet. It is flooding.” I then scurried over to the bar, grabbed the nearest employee, yelped “Your toilet’s broken!” annnnd ran out the door, never to return. Well, I still had to sit on the patio and finish my drink and wait for the check but hopefully it was dark enough that noone would recognize me as the bathroom flooding bandit.

Needless to say, this was THANK HEAVENS just a number 1 situation. If it had been the other option,  well, I would have just sprinted out of the bar and never looked back – not stopping for my coat or purse or maybe even Brian. He’d be sad for a while (I hope) but eventually would just move on and find someone normal and occasionally look back and think of me fondly. But it would be best for him. No one should have to be saddled with someone who flooded a restaurant with poo.

Then a few days later…

Bathroom Two:

I was at a community theater production of Les Mis, because of course I was, held in a high school way out in Bay Ridge, deep into Brooklyn. We stopped into the ladies quickly before the show and the school had these weird janky old bathrooms which flushed by pushing the most impossible button – see above. I don’t know how young people are expected to maneuver these things. I’m an adult in relatively OK physical shape and had to put the weight of my entire body behind me just to flush, but I managed to get it to work.

Intermission rolled around and we needed to make another visit so we waited patiently in the endless line of other desperate audience members. I was next up but the woman in front of me could not, for the life of her, get the toilet to flush.

“Don’t worry about it,” I said “I know how to use these, I’ll take care of it.”

BRAVE. BOLD. No prissy business from Liz Ho.

Obviously and no duh, I got myself into the stall, pushed the button and: no dice. I pushed and pushed and pushed and paused for a photo and pushed and pushed and couldn’t get it to flush. So I just sat, peed, tried once more…and then opened the stall, announced “nope! won’t flush!” ….and ran out the bathroom door.

And then, the following night…

Bathroom Three:

On Monday I met some girlfriends to catch up over drinks and crostini at Gottino, which is one of my very favorite adorable bars in the West Village, if you’re ever in NYC and looking for a charming spot to get your pinot greeg on. They have a lovely back yard (pictured above) and, like the previous wine bar mentioned, have just one bathroom, this time located down a set of steps next to their wine cellar.

I snuck down mid-way through the evening and found the lock on the bathroom door to be rather perplexing. It didn’t actually seem to be holding the door shut, at all. I twisted it and turned it a few times but it didn’t click anywhere.

“I’m sure it’s fine!” I thought to myself.

I’d no sooner dropped trou and taken a seat on the throne when I learned the error of my judgement. It was not, in fact fine, it was completely unlocked, allowing for a man to swing open the door and walk in on me.

He stammered “oh god I’m so sorry!” and backed away, covering his eyes, while I half heartedly covered my biz and sighed: again? How had my life come to this?

Turns out I hadn’t actually shut the door the whole way, so the lock was not catching as it should. Whoopsidoodles.

I finished what I came for and then, once again, found myself sprinting away from a toilet.

7 Days. 3 Public Bathroom Disasters. A new record, even for me.

I’m nervous to see what the future holds!

And there you have it. My week. Tell me ’bout yours! And what’s everyone up to this weekend? I’m taking a 1/2 day today to party with the Margepants – Bernie rolls in early tomorrow and we’re taking a trip to Ikea. Whoop whoop!

Wishing everyone a fantastical weekend and just be sure to double check all bathroom locks and take it from me: if it looks like it might overflow…it probably will.

xoxo Liz Ho

Another Awkward Week [3.22.13]

Helllooooo my friends and Happy Spring! I mean, yes it snowed yesterday and is was sub-freezing when I woke up this morning and I still maintain that March is the ficklest of all bitches, but you know what: it’s Friday, the sun is shining, I’m sipping a delicious glass of Emergen-C and life is pretty good. I’ll take it.

But good of course does not mean smooth and normal so why don’t we take a look at what was keeping it awkward this week:

This Shopping Basket:

See how you can see the sidewalk and the great outdoors in the background? Yeaaaah. Over lunch one day this week I went to the drug store by my office to stock up on some goodz, paid, walked out of the store, back to my office, got into the elevator, spotted my reflection in the mirrored doors, thought One Of These Things Is Not Like The Other and realized I’d carried the shopping basket right out of the store.

Whoops!

Is what I said outloud and a stranger riding up with me replied “yeah, I was wondering what was up with that.”

Uh, thanks buddy!

So then I had to get off at my floor, stand in the elevator bank with my shopping basket and wait for a down elevator so I could ca-reeep back to the store and return the basket.

Smooth.

This Manicure:

Notice anything?

Tuesday night I decided to paint my nails – I did my left hand just fine but then decided I was tired and hungry and I needed my right hand to eat food, so I’d just do the other hand in the morning. Of course I overslept and showed up for work the next day with half a manicure.

It’s the hot new look for spring, you saw it here first!

(I’m wearing Charismatic by Revlon, just in case anyone is curious about my personal style and wants to run right out and buy it. Or Revlon wants to give me some sort of endorsement deal. )

This Whole Thing:

Basically, guys, I’m a genius.

We have either a very smoldery oven or a very sensitive fire alarm or a little of both. Every time we cook or bake anything the alarm goes off, so we have to set up this elaborate system of fans and open windows unless we want the alarm to go off for the entire time we’re cooking. One night this week I was baking some dairy free, sugar free, whole wheat zucchini muffins because I am a holistic domestic goddess, and while they were in the oven I was prepping a salad for dinner. I washed the lettuce and then came up with the brilliant idea to use the fan to dry the leaves, since I broke my salad spinner months ago.

Isn’t this the smartest thing you’ve ever seen?

Don’t worry, there are plates under there, I didn’t just throw my food down on the ground.

Though, the fan was probably blowing all sorts of kitchen dirt all over my fresh, clean lettuce but whatever. I stand by it.

DOMESTIC GODDESS!

This Shirt:

I went to a St. Patrick’s Day party last weekend and it was basically as classy as you’d imagine. I’ve been really, really good about sticking to my healthy eating plans, while I’m trying to diagnose my gross bowel issues (the latest = no soy, dairy or alcohol, my life is the saddest), but if there is one thing in this world that I am powerless to resist, aside from French onion dip…and peanut M&M’s…and brie cheese…and Diet Coke…and cheese fries…and ok, leave me alone, I know I have gross eating habits and no willpower…but aside from all of those things and many more, the one thing that I MOST can’t resist is buffalo wings with blue cheese dressing. Sweet Mother Mary I LOVE BUFFALO WINGS. It is Pavlovian. Just the smell sets my mouth watering until I’m overcome with a desire to feast upon greasy, spicy wings covered in creamy blue cheese dressing.

Just typing this I’m starting to sweat with desire!

So of course when I walked into the bar on St. Patrick’s Day and a friend ordered a few plates of wings, I had to completely abandon any sort of clean eating plan I was on and dive in headfirst. Was it worth it? HELLZ YEAH.

The thing is, wings are a messy, messy food. I already have a complete inability to eat anything without having it somehow all over my face and body so hand me a buffalo wing and suddenly I am literally covered in sauce. Covered.  My friends find great joy in eating wings with me and then taking photos of the results. Above: a mess all over my shirt. Below, a classic photo from someone’s graduation party:

Have you ever been more turned on in your entire life?

Aaand on that note, I’m out!

What is everyone up to this weekend? It’s a pretty quiet one for me. I have to go to a work event tonight (#ugh) and might meet some girlfriends for breakfast tomorrow but otherwise I’m hoping to be sort of productive and who knows what. I mean, I can’t have wine OR cheese so like, what else is there to do on a weekend?

And don’t say like, ‘go to a museum!” “do a craft!” “write letters to loved ones” because I KNOWWWWW there are things in life that are “fun” but don’t involve booze and dairy products but are they “fun,” really? Really? REALLY?

So basically, I’m asking you all for a favor: please spend the weekend heavily imbibing on delicious adult beverages and grilled cheese. Maybe dip your grilled cheese into your wine instead of tomato soup?

Think about it! Could be good!

Just try it, for me?

Happy weekend!

xoxo Liz Ho

 

One Awkward Award

Because today’s post is a bunch of random nonsense about me, here is a gratuitous photo of Liz Ho: Age 11. 

Hiya! On a Tuesday, what whaaat! As I mentioned last night, I’ve been nominated for for the Liebster Blog Award – for bloggers by bloggers. How rad is that? I’m still not 100% sure of the rules or who this Liebster character is, but from what I gather, this is a way that bloggers can shout out to their fave bloggy friends and share them with their readers. I dig it.

I could make a lengthy acceptance speech but who am I, Jodie Foster?

Burn.

My nominee came through one of my very favorite bloggers, one of my first actual blog friends (!), a great fan of booze and Revenge: http://annmaridal.wordpress.com/. Check it. Love it.You’re welcome!

So here’s what’s up:
When you receive the award, you post 11 random facts about yourself and answer 11 questions from the person who nominated you. You pass the award onto 11 other blogs, tell them you nominated them, and ask them 11 questions. You are not allowed to nominate the blog who nominated you.

Makes sense? Makes sense! Let’s do this thang:

11 RANDOM FACTS ABOUT ME:
1) I always brush my teeth with a green toothbrush.
2) My first word was bird.
3) I don’t know why. I don’t really care for birds.
4) I hate the smell of original or “unscented” dishsoap.
5) All the technology in the world, and I’m still hung up on how fax machines work. You put a piece of paper into a …phone? And it prints out on the other side of the world? Bananas.
6) Never have I ever: gotten a massage, been in a hot air balloon, gotten a speeding ticket, gone surfing.
7) Two truths and a lie: I hate feet. I have two tattoos. I love tuna salad.
8) I have my belly button pierced. It is really dumb and not nearly as cute as it was when I was an 18-year-old slimster, but I don’t want to take it out. It’s become a part of me. Weird.
9) I have never seen Napoleon Dynamite.
10) I think Mary Kate is the more interesting Olsen, but at the end of the day, Ashley’s probably the one I would more enjoy hanging out with.
11) As dumb as these answers are, I secretly (not secretly) love filling out personality surveys. Unsurprising, I KNOW.

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS:
1) Who, of all people in this world, would be your ideal dinner date at Red Lobster on a rainy Wednesday evening?
Oh! Another fun fact: I have never been to Red Lobster! Crazy, right? But I’d still take Tina Fey on a dinner date there, rain OR shine.

2) Apples or pears?
Apples. I find it’s tough to tell when pears are ripe. Is that just me?

3) What is your favorite book?
OMG you are talking to the wrong gal here, way too many to list. Off the top of my head: Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn, The Post Birthday World by Lionel Shriver, The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver, anything Ann Patchett, Random Family by Adrien Nicole LeBlanc, Bossypants (obvz), To Kill a Mockingbird, Harriet the Spy…I could go on for days.

4) What’s the thing you consider yourself a “number one fan” of?
Cheese.

5) How are your dancing skills?
Elaine.

6) Have you ever been to Canada? What did you like/dislike?
Yes! I went skiing in Mont Tremblant when I was young. I remember it being cold. We went to a movie theater in the little town one night to see Shakespeare in Love and I felt awkward watching the love scenes with my parents. We then went to Quebec City for Winter Carnival and I remember it being gorgeous and freezing with incredible architecture and ice sculptures. There was a dogsled race through the middle of town. Later in life my sis & I took the train to Montreal – 11 hours. We got very drunk at a karaoke bar where old men brought us roses and we tore down the house with our choreographed rendition of Proud Mary. I was thrown off by how the people looked so American but were speaking French. We got into a lot of sister spats but had an amazing time. Overall, I’d give Canada 4 out of 5 stars and would certainly go back again!

7) Who would you rather be in a movie with; Ryan Gosling, Jon Hamm, Clint Eastwood, Helen Hunt, Lena Dunham or Angelina Jolie? Why?
Jon Hamm. Sex scenes.

8) Is cloning a Neanderthal a good idea? Why/why not?
Um…no. We’ve just come a long way, developmentally, since then, and I feel like if we’re going to clone anyone, let’s clone someone modern. And hot.

9) What is the most awesome TV show ever?
30 Rock! No, Arrested Development. No! Alias. Friday Night Lights! No, Parks & Rec. Freaks & Geeks! Breaking Bad. THE WIRE. I don’t have a very active social life…

10) Would you rather a) ride a horse on the beach while singing “Puff the Magic Dragon” on live TV during the Superbowl halftime or b) drink a six-pack of Pabst in a horse carriage on stage at the Academy Awards?
Ohhhh man. Excellent question. I’d say PBR during the Oscars! I just always wanted to go to the Academy Awards, so if this is my one shot, I’ll take it.

11) What’s the perfect hostess gift?
Wine of course. OR a very nice candle. I know it seems impersonal, but I really enjoy candles. It seems extravagant to splurge on a fancy candle for yourself, but giving one to a friend is a lovely gift. At least for me. Come to my house and give me candles!

And that’s all about me! Fun. Someone seriously please buy me some really nice candles, it would mean a lot. Now onto step two: selecting some nominees of my own! Listed below, in no particular order, are 11 blogs/bloggers who I particularly enjoy and who I think might be up for participating in this silliness. This feels very much like a WordPress chain letter, no? Absolutely no pressure to the nominees to fill out the survey themselves, I mean, I’ll die alone feeling really rejected and unloved, but I’m sure my family will find a way to cope with the grief. Srsly, though, this was mostly just a fun way for me to talk about myself and share some of my faves with my plethora of fans so no hard feelings if you’d rather pass.

Ok, here we go!

NOMINEES, IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER:
Drinking Tips for Teens
Susie Lindau
Home is Where the Warehouse Is
Can I Get Ur Number
Travels and Tea Leaves
Ribbons and Pearls
Leaving the Land of Cotton
Lemonade Jargon
Snotting Black
Brunch for Every Meal
Thoughts of a Lunatic

QUESTIONS FOR NOMINEES:
1. What is your favorite vegetable?
2. If you had one shot, or one opportunity, to seize everything you ever wanted in one moment, would you capture it or just let it slip?
3. Breasts or thighs? Of a CHICKEN, ya perv.
4. Would you rather have an extra nose in the middle of your forehead OR an ear dangling from the bottom of your chin?
5. Who was your hero when you were a child?
6. Floss: waxed or unwaxed? Mint or unflavored?
7. What is your favorite holiday and why?
8. What is your standard daily breakfast?
9. Who is your favorite political dictator and please give a 700 word, 5 paragraph essay detailing why.
10. What is your favorite boy band and who is your favorite member? (I’m judging this answer.)
11. If you could describe yourself in three words, what would they be?