Let the Bachelor Bashing Begin!

Another calendar year has gone by and after the usual Christmas/NYE bacchanalia it's time to start fresh. Having an additional day off from work I chose to spend yesterday rife with cliche - cleaning the house and working out.

As a reward for all of my clean-slate-ness I indulged in the season premier of The Bachelor (along with a turkey burger with mozzarella on a toasted sesame seed bun and a glass of red wine - it's good for the heart! - for dinner). While I haven't watched this show in several seasons, I was happy to see that it's basically the same. Chris Harrison is still my absolute favorite part of the show - what I wouldn't give to hear his inner monologue! The girls are all bat-shit crazy, their mental conditions only exacerbated by wine and competition. And the gowns they wore for their arrivals ranged from fab (Jennifer's blue sequined floor length number) to fail (blogger Jenna's insecurities were hinted at the minute she stepped out of that limo in that sparkly white sack which also appeared to be missing sections of sequins).

Any of the women who arrived without a gimmick critiqued those who did (while I do see Brittany's move of bringing Grandma Sheryl along as a bit of an easy in, I didn't think it was necessary for the other girls to point out the poor woman's wrinkles - she's a grandmother for crying out loud! And she's obviously got more spunk and personality than most of you crazies). My personal favorite was the girl who just walked past Ben and into the house. Sucker that he is, his only response was, "bold move!"

But gimmick or not they all seemed to have really strange opening pick-up lines that were primarily profession related. Someone obviously suggested they do this, but one has to wonder if it was a clever producer looking for a laugh, an intern looking to earn brownie points or perhaps one of the ladies themselves (who then of course didn't use whatever cray-cray line she posited since she actually just hoping to make the rest of them look stupid).

The episode went on to capture the usual cattiness, that bizarre moment when Monica seemed to be hitting on one of the other female contestants and of course the final melt down of Jenna, which of course lead to her not getting a rose her securing a rose from Ben.

Lesson learned: perhaps Ben is still single because he's a bad judge of character, which conveniently makes for excellent TV.

Image courtesy of flickr.com user DartmoorGiant.

Aloha - I'm Back!

Summertime is for relaxing and since I can't seem to unwind when I'm near a computer I jumped at the chance to take a real vacation (for the first time in over 2 years) to Hawaii with the old roomies.

Hawaii was everything we'd hoped for and more - beautiful weather, great food and adventures abound. On Oahu we swam with the dolphins at Sea Life Park (where 50 First Dates was filmed), paid homage to fallen heroes at Pearl Harbor, and hiked Diamond Head.

We were supposed to go zip lining in Maui, but the winds were too strong so the more adventurous of us went ATV-ing instead. We did the Road to Hana: a 68 mile drive along highway that included stops at a the black sand beaches, waterfall we could swim in, and winery, attended a Luau at the Hyatt and at the end of our trip we watched the sun rise over Haleakala, aka the East Maui Volcano, and then biked down 23 miles.

On both islands we stayed in Aston properties. While I would definitely recommend the Aston Kaanapali Shores on Maui, which were basically cute and very well maintained condos, I have mixed emotions about the Aston Waikiki Beach hotel.

Allow me to start with the positive: the decor was cute and kitschy and the restaurant/tiki bar was delicious (food and beverage-wise). However, the whole place was like a hotel version of trading spaces. It was like they slapped on new bedding and threw some surfboards up as decor, but didn't bother fixing the bathrooms because the websites don't show those anyway. Our bathroom was almost scary; the shower head was violent (in both pressure and the fact that for some odd reason it sprayed out the side as well as straight down) and the shower curtain rod was so rusted one might get Tetanus just from looking at it (okay so apparently the whole tetanus = rust thing is a myth, but you get my point.

The bathroom didn't ruin our visit by any means, we just kept it quick and made sure not to touch the rod (a safe rule for any group if single girls on vacation *couldn't resist*). Besides, after the Aston Waikiki Beach we were all too excited to see our fancy Florida-meets-Hawaii condo in Maui. Well played Liberty Travel agent.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Being of Irish Heritage, I have always observed the American celebration of St. Patrick's Day.

On a few points of common confusion that seem to come up surrounding the holiday, I would like to clarify:

Yes, I know that corned beef and cabbage is not a traditional Irish meal, the real Irish meal is ham and cabbage, but it is an American Irish tradition since that was a common meal that the immigrants ate when they came over from Ireland. They couldn't afford the ham from the Kosher butcher (not throwing stones, just sayin'), so they made do with corned beef. It's not authentically Irish, but it's a part of the heritage so I still consider it a good way to celebrate since the whole holiday is an American convention anyway.

No, no one through excrement at me through a screen door, these are freckles and I love them. It's been said that a face without freckles is like a night without stars.

Yes, we are stubborn, but that stems from our passion. Passion for Ireland, our families, and our beliefs. As Sidney Littlewood said, "The Irish don't know what they want and are prepared to fight to the death to get it."

And to clarify one more point on why we wear green, here's a note from Wikipedia:
Originally the colour associated with Saint Patrick was blue. However, over the years the colour green and its association with Saint Patrick's day grew.[2] Green ribbons and shamrocks were worn in celebration of St Patrick's Day as early as the 17th century.[3] He is said to have used the shamrock, a three-leaved plant, to explain the Holy Trinity to the pre-Christian Irish, and the wearing and display of shamrocks and shamrock-inspired designs have become a ubiquitous feature of the day.[4][5] Then in the 1798 rebellion in hopes of making a political statement Irish soldiers wore full green uniforms on 17 March in hopes of catching attention with their unusual fashion gimmick.[2] The phrase "the wearing of the green", meaning to wear a shamrock on one's clothing, derives from the song of the same name.

So while I will not be out in NYC today, I am wearing the green and eating soda bread and drinking tea, which I will replace with either Guinness or Smithwicks later because Is d'Eirinn me (I am of Ireland).

Christmas Eve Eve Eve

Each year as I grow up the holidays seem to come out of nowhere that much more quickly. There's the standard commercial rush that pushes Christmas on us before our Thanksgiving turkey is even in the oven, but it's more than that. I could pontificate endlessly about Christmas cheer spread thin, but that's all been said before. Besides, my feelings on the subject are far more selfish.

Regardless of the Christmas commercials and holiday stores specials and p.c. decorations, I just feel like Christmas has become a bit hollow for me. In college it was so easy to get caught up in the Christmas spirit. Having attended a Jesuit institution, Christmas was everywhere you turned (not "the holidays" mind you, but Christmas thank you very much), it was easy to remember "the reason for the season" as my mother would say. There was Lessons and Carols, where students, faculty, alumni and residents from the surrounding areas came to sing Christmas Carols and hear the passages that related to them. There was Christmas break, not to be confused with winter break. And Christmas decorations covered the campus, making each walk home from campus just a little bit more magical in the evenings (or the early morning hours).

Post-college it seems that my Christmas gear-up consists only of shopping and even that doesn't do much for me anymore. The malls are crowded with people who aren't even shopping, but came along for the ride. It is my firm belief that the stores should be open for 1 hour each morning during the holiday season for serious shoppers. You're not allowed to enter the store without a list, you are given a time limit of 15 minutes per store and you have a 4 store maximum. If you need to get to different stores in 4 different corners of the mall, then you'd better walk fast.

Maybe it's the recession this year, maybe it's the fact that I don't have a significant other, maybe it's just that I'm growing up and I don't like that at all, but whatever it is, I need to seriously ponder how I can change it for next year because I'm not a bah-humbug kind of gal and this whole Debbie Downer Christmas Special just isn't going to fly two years in a row.

Now I'm going to put on The Waitress' "Christmas Wrapping" and see if I can't lift my spirit a bit.

Eggs Friday

At my old job, when I worked in the city, every Friday my friend Meghan and I would get eggs for breakfast. Since we worked "in fashion" every girl was super weight conscious, even if they didn't have to be, so eggs on a Friday was a treat.

Personally, I got a toasted sesame bagel with cream cheese every other day, so eggs Friday was more to break the monotony than shrink my waist size (especially since even when the rest of my body shrinks, my waist stays the same as always, like that of a 12 year old boy).

But now when I observe the holiday all it does is remind me of the fact that I no longer work in the city. Bummer.

Yesterday I applied to 2 jobs. Postings have slowed considerably with everyone cutting back and I must admit that I miss the days of sending out 5 cover letters a day. Despite my best attempts to "always look on the bright side of life" I'm finding it difficult not to notice that I'm several cast members short of the Monty Python kick line required to perform that song.

Plenty to do to keep me busy though, holiday parties and whatnot (the holidays are my other standard answer as to why no one is hiring right now). I may need to go all shopaholic though and freeze my main CC in a block of ice, freeze my spending if you will.