celestial marriage.

i'm not going to talk about the gays in this post. stop looking so shocked.

i support celestial marriage. i am happy for my friends and family who enjoy it as part of their lives. i look forward to it for myself someday, so much so that i spend a good deal of some days searching for sleeved wedding dresses on theknot.com. but you know what? I AM NOT GOING TO BE A "FAN" OF IT ON FACEBOOK, SO SOMEONE GET THAT DAMNED SUGGESTION OUT OF THE UPPER RIGHT HAND CORNER OF MY HOME PAGE BEFORE I HAVE A SIEZURE!!!!!!

oops. too late.

maybe tuesday will be my good news day.

everything on this list deserves its own post. we'll see if that happens:

{ } cowboy boots are en route from norway. i was feeling like a big shot, navigating (with minimal success) the website of the norwegian postal service. then i found the button (conveniently marked "english") which made things easy to understand but less like an international parcel delivery adventure. i just hope they arrive in time for a trip to the shoemaker and his elves before the big day.

{ } ah yes, the big day. it approacheth.

{ } on july 3rd, to commemorate the discovery of pitcairn island (1767), idaho's statehood (1890), and the spanish legalization of same-sex marriage (2005), i got a weave and spent the day at coney island. miss kate and i ate like demons, swam like mermaids, and played skeeball like the champs we are.

{ } on july 4th, to commemorate some other stuff, i had the best ever day.

{ } the pool has reopened. hopefully, this means my heart will too.

{ } i have a new job that is everything i could have (and have, for awhile) asked for. i feel like i know things and can help and people like me and i get to wear whatever i want. a collection of shoes is building beneath my desk and i know how to make the copy machine do all kinds of zany things. "survival job" doesn't seem like the right word anymore.

in other, less blogable news, the old neurotransmitters don't seem to be firing up to snuff--my heart has the jumpies like i've spent the week on a roller coaster. sleeping it off, while enjoyable, doesn't seem to be doing the trick.

also, why do pretty girls make me so nervous? i might have on princess slippers, but inside i can't help feeling like the awkardest of ugly stepsisters sometimes. a conundrum, for certain.

at least i have my mermaid hair to keep me warm.

how it's really done:

double plus bonus: my darling downstairs neighbor, nycb romeo of the moment.

and palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss.

why does so you think you can dance persistently succeed in making me cry like an idiot? as far as ballet goes, this is underwhelming, but i loved it just the same.



beautiful ballerina is a dream i've had to let stay in dreamland, like so many others...but i have faith that in my heaven, i'll dance the way i've always wished i could.

dan savage.

is it weird that i really like listening to his podcast during my 4:45am commute to work for the opening shift? and really pretty much all the time? i just think his no-nonsense, slightly lispy voice is strangely soothing and he's often saying things that make me laugh inappropriately on an otherwise quiet train.

as i like to picture him, probably encouraging someone to dtmfa

i've been reading his column forevs, since i started reading alternative weekly newspapers, which was probably around age 12. will cannon and anna brones gave me a book of his columns for my 21st birthday (along with annie sprinkle's guide to spectacular sex--i was about to start a yearlong tenure as a sexual health advocate in residence at nyu; they were trying to prepare me with an adequate lending library). he's had several stories on this american life, including a touching one where he talks about explaining to his son why he and his partner want to get married, even though 5 year old d.j. doesn't seem to think it's a good idea. his writing is matter-of-fact, touching, witty, everything i like in an essayist. i'd put him in a top three along with sarah vowell and david sedaris. he's coined such useful terms as GGG, santorum, saddlbacking, and DTMFA and i think he gives sound, sane advice to his weekly podcast callers. he also seems like one of those moderately famous people i could totally see myself being friends with if we ever met through regular life circumstances.

good job being awesome, dan savage.

download his weekly savagelovecast at www.thestranger.com/savage

GWP!!

this afternoon, while waiting to line up for an event at macy's (more on that later), i decided to take a little stroll around the cosmetics arcade on the first floor and see if there was anything i didn't know i couldn't live without. there totally was:


since i had about an hour to kill, i asked one of the lancome makeup artists to do a face for me and show me some of their new colors for summer. i ended up looking fresh and sunkissed and feeling totally confident and adorable. this was a very effective marketing ploy on their part because it convinced me to purchase the bronzer and lipgloss used by the artist. i ended up the winner in the long run, though, because i got to walk away with a seriously sweet gift-with-purchase. even though the GWP was invented by estée lauder, pretty much every cosmetic company worth their lipliner uses it as a way to introduce customers to new product and lure them into bouts of mindless consuming. i justify my actions by mentioning that i got paid today, it was raining, and i wanted it so stop judging me.

a little insiders tip: keep an eye on www.mygiftwithpurchase.com, wherein a wonderful woman tracks the gifts with purchase being offered instore and online by basically every cosmetics company ever. in the whole world. props to you, gift-with-purchase-blog-lady!

baby=princess.

once upon a time, a very long time ago, i had a terrible horrible no good very bad job.

yes, even worse than the one i have now.

but something great came out of that time i had to take six qatari children to disneyland, and recently miss lily was finally big enough to show it off!

you can't tell, but the top of the dress says "disney princess" in silver glitter.

i got it for her when she was still teensy tiny, at the disneyland gift shop during a brief and frenzied break from the children. i think that may have also been the day i technically quit, even though it was the last day of the job anyway. oh yes, it was when the five year old spit on me and punched me in the sternum while i was attempting to haul him out of the "soarin'" ride at california adventure for hitting his sister and then having a tantrum. he hit the ground, latched onto a post, and screamed at me in arabic while i tried to pick him up and carry him out. the family's security detail helpfully watched, motionless, and when i asked them for help said, "i don't understand. i don't speak english." when i finally got him outside, the little angel called mom on his cellphone, who proceeded to scream at me for interrupting the movie she was seeing and not letting her kid have fun. yeah, that was worse than making coffee for a living. but i digress.

look! she can even wear high heels! (with a helping hand from grandma smith)

i don't even know how to describe how much i love this little girl, even though i haven't been able to spend much time with her so far. when my mom was here visiting me in february, every night when we would have prayer together she would include how grateful she was for lily and i entirely concur. i hope she'll grow up knowing she has an auntie rachel who loves her very very much. and so you know she's not just a princess:

she can also help wash the car. please note how she is wearing socks with sandals. i will forgive my sister only because they live in the pacific northwest where people do silly things like that, and also waiting for the light to change at empty crosswalks in the rain.