I feel like this today

I walked to lunch. In the snow. I bought my lunch and ate it. Outside. On a park bench. Without gloves.

If only I had been wearing flannel and eating jerky from a buck I killed.
With my bare hands. Fuckin’ rugged. 

Trying to find the words….

Every time I watch Pride & Prejudice, I see Mary

I look like that when I cry, too.

and think, “She’s this woman?” Daaaaaaaaaaaamn girl.

UK Esquire.

Pirate Radio breakouts

Looking good for something or other

Also: I get freaked out by Georgiana Darcy – Tamzin Merchant plays a huge slut in The Tudors.

She's cute.

She dies.

The Internet is a Cruel Mistress

She breaks your heart.
She prevents you from picking up the pieces.
She kneads salt into your wounds.

She doubts you.
She tests your resolve.
She wins again.

She’s not discreet.
She’s not upfront.
She’s not sorry.

Even when I try, I just can’t seem to get away from the steely bitch.

At age 24, Charles Dickens

married a 17-year old and published Sketches by Boz and, the work that made him famous, The Pickwick Papers.

All I did at 24 was drop out of grad school. I’m feeling very subpar.

Ode to Etta: 7 Favorites by Etta James

Etta James passed away today.

Sunday  Kind of Love

One for My Baby (And One for the Road)

At Last

These Foolish Things

If I Can’t Have You

Leave Your Hat On

In the Basement

Rest in Peace, Etta. Thanks for the music. 

I’m sitting here

with just

a mustache

and memories of

last night.

-Burt Reynolds in Archer Season 3, Episode 4 “The Man from Jupiter”

Codename: Duchess

Archer is back tonight. There was this three-part teaser to the third season a while back, but tonight, for real, he returns. From being a pirate king.

Anyway, I had hoped to get a post together about my favorite quotes from the first season, but that’s on my laptop. And I’m not with my laptop. So, just watch the first episode “Mole Hunt.” That’s, like, half the list.

Instead, I give to you a smorgasbord* of Archer-y goodness. Welcome to the Danger Zone.

• Archer “Danger Zone” mix: Go ahead, rave at your desk. I am. 
  
• Archer gifs. Fuck yeah!
• Did you get the reference to Bartleby the Scrivener? What about Buddy Rich? I did. Find out about Archer’s 10 Most Obscure Jokes.
• Learn how to Archer. This will go great on the bookshelf I have filled with geeky things I shouldn’t have bought (Jones Soda. The Guild).
• Pam sure love’s to talk. And post on Facebook. 
• Archer’s “Danger zone!” sound clips.
• Archer Live: Where Archer was, is, and possibly will be going (and perhaps a new weekly thing?).
• Twitter: Just the tip (of the day).
• The creator of Archer gets interviewed about this upcoming season. Potential spoiler alert!
• Season 3 guest stars and stuff. (Also mentions potential spoiler. ALERT!)
• More “How to Archer” love. This is especially significant because it’s from GQ. And, I mean, the only thing I would look to more (if I were a boy) is Esquire.
• Try this for other magazine-related Archerness (and almost naked ladies).
• Dude, this is from Mancave Daily. How can you not want to know what they say about Lana Kane?
• Just the tip.
• Sterling Archer Draper Pryce.

* Will be smorgasbord. Work in progress. Check back throughout the day… clearly I’m not doing work. Whoops! Happy Archer Day.

Really? This is legitimate now?

Perfect Moments

No. Not Precious Moments. That shit’s sick. (And yes, I have like five of them from my early childhood. What would First Communion be without them?)

I’m talking about pieces of the past that, considered in the context of your life, are simply moments. I don’t mean things like the general awesomeness of every night you went out in college,

right place, right time, and with a camera!

or the cruise on senior spring break. I’m talking about one time that you knew it was special while it was happening, and even years later, you still feel the same.

This seems silly, I realize. Perfect moments? (Seriously, how many times can I write moment.) But events last month brought to mind three times that I look back on so fondly, and remember those emotions so clearly, that I can’t use anything but the word perfect to describe them. And I don’t even believe in perfection (well, you know, since my GPA went to hell at Tech).

A winter’s night in 1998. The Hall Residence. Sioux City, Iowa. This night was actually my first kiss. As in first time a boy put his lips to mine. Which is way different than the first kiss I told you about in that story where I had game. Anyway, this was after the kiss. I don’t remember who all was there, but I think it was Amanda and Kassi. The boys had just left and we were lying in the middle of JoBeth’s trampoline, where the kissing (I was not the only one getting kissed ) had taken place. We were staring up at the brilliant nighttime when a star shot across the sky. We just happened to see one. All three of us, lying in the cold, talking about lord knows what, and we saw a shooting star. It was awesome. We were in sixth grade, and we thought that night and those feelings and those boys would last forever. I guess some of it did.

Saturday, August 11, 2007. Principal Park. Des Moines, Iowa. Earlier that summer Kunze had gotten hurt in Okoboji. It was pretty bad, and rather scary, but he was doing all right. Pain pills and weed in hand, he said he’d still go to the Collective Soul/Third Eye Blind/Counting Crows concert with me. We got there in the gross August heat, with General Admission, and I was more than worried about Matt having to stand the whole time in that blazing sun. But whatever happened before this moment doesn’t matter. Stephan Jenkins of Third Eye Blind announced that they were going to play a song that everyone seemed to love, a song that was a little off the popular track listing. That song was “Motorcycle Drive By.” Matt looked down at me (damn his height and my lack of it) and asked me if I was going to be okay. I was shaking (excitedly) and I felt like I was going to burst from emotion. I don’t know which one, because I was feeling everything all at once. It was magical. I was standing next to my best friend hearing my absolute favorite song. I never imaged it would mean so much to me. But it does. I still carry that ticket in my wallet.

One Sunday night in the latter half of 2009. Varsity Theater. Des Moines, Iowa. I’m a scowler. I have been told throughout my life that I’m a “fun-sponge” (ahem, man in the previous moment) and that I look bored/unhappy (ahem, man in this moment, and, like, everyone else I’ve ever known) a lot of the time. So you know it was quite the deal when I sat through an entire movie with a smile the size of Texas plastered to my face. That’s a fucking huge smile for, like, three hours (including post-show lingering). The film was Pirate Radio, and it was playing at my favorite theater. I had to convince Max to go with me (I’ll pay! You live right there!) but the movie sold itself. Every actor, every song, every plot twist made me joyful. I knew something was up when my face actually started to hurt from smiling. I was literally delighted. After the movie some capstone-related shit kind of lowered the high, but I went home with a skip in my step and even Max felt the lingering exhilaration, IMDBing “that babe from the movie” once he’d dealt with his photography issues. Watching it now, I still feel a twinge of that bliss.

Pinterest WIN

If you’ve found me on Pinterest, you know I’m an obsessive pinner. Today in our slideshow my magazine picked up a gorgeous “tuxedo” kitchen, that I thought looked crazily familiar.

I went back and looked at my kitchens&baths board, and I had pinned that EXACT kitchen last week.

I must be developing an eye. Woo!

2 hours later: That last statement isn’t necessarily true. If you pin with the ferocity that I do, it might be hard not to pin something we scouted.