We're so close to something better left unknown.

I actually ventured into Fashion Week events on Friday with the celebrations of Fashion's Night Out. Who can turn down the free stuff? I catalogued most of of it on Tumblr for "10on10" - an endeavor organized by Caitlin in which you take ten pictures over the course of the day of the 10th. But the details of Friday include this -

How hot does my Zoya Julieanne manicure look? Amber, Erica and I all decided to get painted the same color! I love how it's basically a deep black with shades of purple shimmer. Three days later and I'm still staring into my nails every few hours. Even better - I got to take home this color plus three others from Zoya's Fall 2010 Wicked & Wonderful line. I have a new fave polish brand, I think!

Friday night was also highlighted by an acoustic performance by Metric at the Juicy Couture store. Sure, I've never stepped into a Juicy store before (and probably never will again...) but it was worth all the pink sweatpants and "bling" to check out Emily Haines' belting out songs acoustically. I've had "Gimme Sympathy" in my head ever since. She has a hauntingly beautiful quality - both in her voice and appearance. A definite girl crush...

A couple of hours later Erica and I were in Brooklyn at a bar with a bunch of friends, and upon checking Twitter, I realized that I missed another girl crush, Alison Brie (Community, Mad Men) who happened to show up at Juicy mere minutes after we had rushed out of there. Instant sadface upon my realization.

After my one fashionable night wrapped up, Jesse and I spent Saturday hanging out together and planned a little date night of Thai food on St. Marks coupled with the film Machete (review forthcoming). A nice quiet evening after a fluttering couple of weeks of travel (him), work (me), and organizing (me). We left the movie theater to find out that Diaz was a few blocks away, so we headed to see him and friends. Ending up at Hi-Fi, our night was suddenly joined by more friends in the form of Adam and Kelly and Jon Cheese - who spotted us in the window. The night stretched into the morning, and I haven't seen the hour of 4am since probably the first year of dating Jesse. We referred to it as "just like the old days!" (Three years ago.)

Jesse heads out to Los Angeles next weekend for Tony Thaxton's Analog Playset Custom Toy Show & Auction. He'll be displaying his own version of the toy, along with the likes of Joe Ledbetter, Sherri Dupree-Bemis, and many others. If you live in Los Angeles, I'd check it out next weekend, too! Jesse is working diligently on his piece. And yes, you read this poster right, Andrew McMahon of Something Corporate and Jack's Mannequin will be performing!

On Sunday we ventured to Queens to hang out with Erica and Diaz at a sports bar for all the Fantasy Football fun. I'll refrain from bogging this place down with Fantasy talk and perhaps keep that to Tumblr. I must say that my team performed pretty well this week, despite my previous misgivings about my roster.

Now I'm back to the grind - which you may have caught a glimpse of on Friday's 10on10 - and staring at my manicure for the most part. How was your weekend?

The years were flying by, they soared.

Got a few more questions sent to my formspring! -

I love the fact that you love to read, sorry if this has been asked. I've been searching for new books to read...what books would you recommend to read?

I am usually asked this by friends who want to know what to pick up next; I size up their tastes and favourite genres and base my recommendation on that. Since I don't know you, here are the best books I read this year and books I'd recommend  to anyone and everyone (i.e., 2666 simply isn't a book I'd recommend to everyone!) --

The Road, Cormac McCarthy
Fun Home, Alison Bechdel
Never Let Me Go, Kazuo Ishiguro
The Sound of My Voice, Ron Butlin
Ender's Game, Orson Scott Card
Slouching Towards Bethlehem, Joan Didion
The House of the Spirits, Isabel Allende
Breakfast at Tiffany's, Truman Capote
Chronicle of a Death Foretold, Gabriel Garcia Marquez
The World in Half, Cristina Henriquez

Hope that helps!


Also, New York is an amazing place! I'm here on vacation, it's wonderful. Love the vibe you get from here. Different from the west coast where I'm from. Anyways, what do you do during your free time in NY?

My free time in New York is mostly spent with friends. During the week I do a lot of running errands, grabbing after-work dinners or drinks with friends, and occasionally go to a bar if something is especially enticing. Lately, the weekends have been me trying to catch up on household stuff or relaxing due to my sickness (ugh!) but before the holidays I would try to fill my weekends up with stuff that really interests me - a bookstore I read about online, an independent movie getting good reviews and only playing in one theater, a small art gallery I heard about, a vintage store I eye on a walk through SoHo, any restaurant Kells wants to try out (that's been real fun!), and whatever else my friends suggest that interest me, etc. In any other season besides winter I love walking around with no aim, and just finding whatever the streets have in store.

And believe you me, I'm still not done exploring New York. I have future trips to certain museums and galleries and restaurants planned for upcoming winter weekends!

You probably hear this a lot but you are super pretty! I always love your hair and makeup!! :)

Aw, thanks! Secret: I legitimately can't do make-up. I try! I TRY! (And apparently succeed sometimes!) But I really have no idea about how to apply eye shadow, blush, etc. The only thing I really have down is liquid eyeliner and red lipstick. Otherwise, I beg my friend Jiscilla to let me in on her secrets.

I totally see the resemblance with both Lea and Idina. Can you say, Triplets? This isnt a question but I just want to tell you how much I love love love reading your blog and your tumblr. I've been reading your blog ever since you started and may have left you a comment or two on some of your posts. You've inspired me to read more and get my nails done more often (LOL). - Lurker from Seattle :)

Awesome! Thank you, lurker! Glad you're hitting the books. Ha. Also, I just started becoming obsessed with getting myself manicured since moving to New York. Only had had one professional manicure before moving here when I was 23. And ever since finding a couple of cheaper manicure salons, it's become quite a little ritual (especially with my friend Amber). I'm becoming accustomed to nail files - something I wouldn't let near me a year ago. (Seriously, they make me shudder.) Of course, I also spend a lot of time just doing it myself, too!

Indoor living, lacerated to the bone.

My Chicago weekend marks another great, amazing, splendiferous weekend of 2009! I was sitting at the airport looking back on all the fun I've had this year, and I almost can't believe it. I almost can't believe the year is basically OVER!

Last Wednesday, I met up with Erica after work and we got a car to LaGuardia, an airport inferior to JFK in my opinion. Anyway, we waited at the gate for a while and with minimal delays (besides Erica yelling "Mom" for me from two rows behind - I'm such a mom these days to my friends?!) made it to Chicago. Her dude Diaz picked us up as the kindly gentleman he is, and they dropped me off at the Days Inn in Lincoln Park to meet up with my hotelmate for the evening, Adam.

Jesse and the Motion City dudes wouldn't be arriving from their rehearsals in Minneapolis until the following day, Thursday, so Adam and I had the night to BE ON VACATION. I called up Ang, who lives in Chicago and blogs at Loud & Proud, and apparently could get to the area quickly - she took us to a little bar with cheap sangria and we had a lovely evening! She's completely adorable and hilarious and our collective sangria conversation didn't end until around two in the morning, and Adam and I were so surprised how late we were up! But, time, flies, fun, etc.

Angie!

On Thursday morning, Adam and I made the most of the free continental breakfast and woke up at 10:30. Well, actually, I was up at 10am and then tried getting Adam up at 10:30 with a quiet "Adam?" at which he practically bounded out of bed, ready to shower and eat. Just learning each other's habits!

And I tell you what: that breakfast was delicious. Adam here just scored some donuts, but I remember having a smorgasbord of cereal, donut, toast, fruit, and coffee. You could also make your own waffles. And it's all free! (Everyday we woke up in time to get to breakfast before the 11am shutdown time.) These type of things excite me, and thus, I blog them.

After breakfast, we walked to the brown line of the El and met up with our friends Jim & Sam who were also in Chicago for the marvelous shows.

We had a plan: Art Institute to see um, art, and because it was where the friends go in Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Yes. Then eats, then Millenium Park, some minimal shopping, etc.

Grabbed this shot of Adam and Sam taking in some pieces.

Adam got this shot of me looking at Georges Seurat's A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte. Very Cameron, you see. This whole area of the museum kept in step with my reading of Madame Bovary, so that's probably what I was thinking of in this picture. The rest of his fabulous photos from the entire weekend are on his flickr HERE.

We saw some great and sometimes weird art, and then we looked for somewhere to eat. We found a restaurant called Midtown and settled in. I'm not afraid to say that I had the best sandwich of my entire life there - a roasted pear, brie, and turkey sandwich. Holy majoly, I devoured it. With a desert pear margarita. Reasonably priced and delicious - I'm sitting her typing and drooling just thinking about it.

Then, of course, we stopped at Dunkin' Donuts because Jim simply CANNOT LIVE without the chain. (True story: Jesse made me take a picture of him next to the Dunkin' in Aruba on our Honeymoon FOR JIM.) Also, Sam conquered her fear of revolving doors (finger accident as a kid) since every building in Chicago has one. We stopped at one of the millions of popcorn stores downtown for Sam, and then at a beauty supply store for me since I am a sucker for nail polish (duhhh). I also totally forgot my makeup bag for the trip, so I look very pale and monotone in all pics of me. But I didn't get makeup, who cares.

Then we headed to Millenium Park to see the mirror bean thing among the other sites:

I think you can tell that we were having an incredibly fun day - and my friends, if I haven't mentioned it before, RULE! They are THE BEST! We wandered away from the bean to see the ice skaters below and decided that we should attempt to ice skate! Jim and Adam were skating pros, given their hockey backgrounds, but Sam and I hadn't ice skated in quite a while. They also gave me hockey ice skates since they were out of figure skates in my size, so I was at an added disadvantage at never using hockey skates before!

However, damn my ankles, it was so much fun! Sam and I would hold on to each other, the dudes, if a precarious moment ever arrived, and neither of us fell on our asses! (A tragedy I kept on imagining in my head.) The rink was playing holiday music over the loudspeaker and we couldn't help but feel festive and sing along as our cheeks reddened in the cool weather. I truly loved it.

Then Erica and Diaz showed up for a hot minute to say hello and check in on our whereabouts before heading off to a dinner together!

Sam gives an enthusiastic thumbs up!

After returning our rental skates, we headed back to our hotel in Lincoln Park to await the impending arrival of my husband and friends. During the day, Jesse had been texting me from their eight hour journey, which stretched to longer when they blew a tire on the road. Sadface.

But not to worry! They all arrived in merry spirits and we told them about that sangria place around the corner and decided to eat and drink there for the evening (thanks, Ang!) and this time the sangria was only $2 a glass. Actually, everything on the drink menu was half-off! That's what I call vacation money-savvy. Or something. Ang rejoined us that night, along with Erica and Diaz.

The next day I made Jesse get up for the continental breakfast OF COURSE, and then he was off to interviews and rehearsals at the venue for the imminent I AM THE MOVIE show that night. Adam, Jim, Sam, Erica and I then decided to walk to the nearby Wrigley Field where the Cubs play. We were blown away by all the rooftop seating for games we saw on nearby apartment buildings! Amazing! The stadium and area also reminded me a lot of Fenway Park in Boston, as both are situated in the city without giant parking lots surrounding it like the majority of stadiums.

We ate at some placed called the Cubby Bear or Bar or something, I don't even know. It was a giant multi-floor bar that...on that Friday in the off season was...you guessed it, completely empty. But they did have a really funny playlist playing basically every pop-punk act that was popular from 2001-2003. Mainly Taking Back Sunday, I'm not kidding. Weird.

On the way back to the hotel, we passed by some sweet shops, like a vintage place where I bought a couple of sweet rings and the boys got shorts and stirrups that matched the shirts of their favourite hockey teams. Guess what they wore under their clothes that night for the show:

Precious, no? We got to the venue and caught up with the dudes for some food and pre-show hangs. I also checked in with some people who came to the show - Dan and lovely reader Brittany! Then I settled in the balcony to watch Ultimate Fakebook, who are definitely amazing and should definitely be checked out!! Then I got really stoked because Motion City was about to play their entire album I AM THE MOVIE from start to finish!

 

Erica and I in the bar at Lincoln Hall before the show! (via Sam!)

Remember, I've been a fan of Motion City before I met Jesse, and it was with this album and...actually, before Epitaph even released this album. I sang and rocked along and it felt like 2003 and I was SO HAPPY. Everybody was really belting it out that night and I was caught up in the excitement generated by that crowd. Also, loved hearing "Shiver" and "Red Dress" and "Perfect Teeth" and hey oh, hows about everything?

Jesse was a bit nervous leading up to the shows, as they had some intense rehearsals for some songs they had NEVER played live before. Each night they played at least one b-side and/or one song they had never played before to an audience. However, after the show, Jesse and the dudes had the biggest smiles on their faces and I'm sure they felt quite accomplished with having conquered that feat. I was so proud of Jesse, and it was so fun to rock out with a room full of people who all loved their first album.

Afterwards, we went to a karaoke place Diaz recommended which was pretty fun, but Jesse and I were starving! (By the way, when we entered, Diaz was singing Hole's "Celebrity Skin.") Jesse and I got some foods and returned to the bar only to be faced with a wall of people who would hardly budge for us to get to the back. After some futile attempts and rude people, we decided to head back to the hotel - and Jesse was already exhausted from the evening's show! I mean, here's a picture from that night:

Yeah, we're kinda nuts. (Via Sam!)

On Saturday, after the requisite breakfast haul, Jim, Sam, Adam, Jesse and I went to a local games store that sold old gaming systems and technology. Jesse got really excited about this, of course, and he bought an Intellivision. Yeah. And games. Then we settled in at Noodles, which is one of Jesse's favourite places to eat, and it was soooo yummy. After a walk in the rain, we were happy to be warm and eating mac'n'cheese and tomato soup together.

The dudes then decided to try to hook up this new (old) gaming system, and the girls and I got manicures! I finally found a place (called, no kidding, Nail.com - no, it's not the address of their website, either!) that carried Essie's Mint Candy Apple color that I've been loving. It was a fabulous treatment for a reasonable price, PLUS they had free wine AND a parting gift of three pairs of socks all wrapped up like a a gift. I mean, amazing, am I right??

My manicure, and those rings I bought the day before!

And that night was when Motion City would be playing their second album COMMIT THIS TO MEMORY------

To be continued...it's time for me to start my journey to Massachusetts for the holidays!

A quick preview: some awesome bloggers came out to the show on Sunday night!!! -