Rage Against the Machine

Woohoo! Dmitri the iPod Doctor is coming to meet me outside my office to fix my iPod tomorrow! God bless.

Random Job of the Day

Supervisory Tree Climber

A few random notes about the job...

Special Conditions include:

"...The majority of the work is performed outdoors in heat and humidity, cold and snow, over public streets and on private property. Poison Ivy is common in work areas. Incumbent will also come in contact with mosquitoes and other biting insects."

"...There is danger of falling tree limbs and trees resulting in cuts, bruises and strains. Serious injury may result from falling from various heights."

"...Incumbent must attend annual tree climbing refresher training as well as other training deemed necessary and appropriate for the position."

and most importantly

"...The incumbent will be required to undergo and satisfactorily pass and subsequently retain an agency provided tree climber certification consisting of a knowledge and proficiency test. "

FYI -

"***Incumbent will be paid an environmental differential at the rate of 25% of base pay, for any day where he/she climbs trees to a height that exceeds 50 feet."

"***Due to the high volume of applicants (?!?), we are unable to confirm receipt of either faxed or mailed application packages. You should retain the e-mail confirmation of received fax or any certified mail receipt as proof of submission."

If you'd like to apply, here is the website: Supervisory Tree Climber

Come Sail Away With Me

Another Fleet Week has come and gone in New York City. For those who may not know what it is (Brits/foreigners perhaps), it's the week when thousands of sailors descend upon our fair city primarily with the hopes of getting laid.

My friends and I only had to face the sailors once this week, but oh what a life-changing experience it was. The convo started out when a sailor tossed his hat across Down the Hatch and it landed on me (and I threw it right back at him - disrespectful? I just say uninterested.) If that doesn't sound like the beginnings of a truly romantic story, then I don't know what does.

Actually there isn't much to tell. Basically, all of these dudes were 18 (one was 17!!), most thought they were being slick (come on, we are 27!), others were extremely shy and didn't know what to say or do. When I asked the one who was hitting on Meghan where the boat was docked, he replied "Staten Island, unless I have somewhere else to stay tonight." Then he said it like seven more times. Blagh! They were so annoying and were on top of us for a long while. One guy was telling me about how they are usually stationed in the Gulf, he was the only normal one who didn't try anything. Maybe that's because he was the 17 year-old and it was his first Fleet Week. I have much respect for them in the patriotic sense obviously, but seriously guys, learn to control the hormones!

Take My Breath Away

Lots to catch up on. I'll break everything up into separate posts methinks.

Last Tuesday was Elliot Yamin's show at Bowery Ballroom. That was after a crazy man in the 2nd Ave. subway screamed at me that I was a "fucking asshole" and threw stuff up the steps at me (I've never ran so fast in my life.) Still shaken from that freak, I decided to accept an ever-so-nasty Jaegermeister shot from the bartender at that red bar on Ludlow, I can never remember the name.

Josh Hoge was the opening act. He was pretty good for someone I had no expectations of. This is him:

This is me and Heather with him after the show (he wasn't very friendly tho):

Elliot was so great! His voice is smoove like butta.

Hoge came out for a duet too.(why do I have so many photos of this show?)
At the end Elliot did a one song encore with just his keyboard player which was "A Song For You." I didn't record that one though, I recorded "Take My Breath Away." The vocals get really good towards the end of the video:

We tried to meet him at the end of the show. Instead we met J.H. and Elliot's brother. We talked to him for like 5 minutes, he was so nice! No Elliot - he ran out once and all the 40 year old women we were left with (literally) chased after him (I think Heather touched his back though.) When he finally came out to take photos, the security guards ushered us out, so this was all I got:

Great show Els!

Um...

This is the real name of an organization - International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research. Can you imagine how embarrassing it would be to explain your job if you worked there?

Wanted Dead or Alive

So, I've been selected to take part in a focus group about tequila (paying lots of $$ which is fantastic.) Before joining the group I have to prove that I am articulate with a three sentence answer to "If you could have dinner with anyone, either dead or alive, who would it be with and why?" I think I'd sound a bit corny if I said my boyfriend because he lives in England (no offense Dave.) The answer I used to give when I was a teenager was John Lennon for x, y, and z reasons, but I'm over that. I kind of want to say Pablo Escobar because I studied him down to a science last year and would like to pick his brain, but I don't want to sound like a coke addict. Although this is a seminar about tequila so I guess does it really matter?

Quarantined

I just got home (it's 10:45 pm.) The Bachelor finale is on and it's ending at 11:00 pm. This means that since I do not want to see the ending (it's being taped), I am stuck in the den with nothing to do for the next 15 minutes. My mom is watching it in the living but for some reason which no one will ever understand she is taping it in the den so I've got to sit in here with the TV off while it records. Luckily my dad was nice and heated up dinner for me so at least I can eat that in here in the meantime. Let's get this thing over with already!!

Sink or Swim

This weekend was fun! On Friday night I streamed 3 episodes of Lost (thanks ABC.com) - by the way the end of the Ben episode was soooo good. Then I watched a Sopranos from a few weeks ago (hi, Vito's son - you are gross, and hi producers - I can't believe you showed that!!!), then an Entourage and 2 Sex and the Citys. I love Fridays.
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On Saturday I went to the mall to return a few things, then my brother took me for pizza at Eddie's. We split a pizza skins pie (cheddar cheese and bacon) and a bar pie with spinach and anchovies, YUMMYLICIOUS!
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At night Heather and I went to Marcus' birthday at Hotel QT. We were really hesitant about it at first because it was a pool party but how could I resist? It was actually one of the most fun places I've been to since I returned to NY.
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The pool isn't huge, about 4 ft. deep, but it's so cool - it's heated, has a swim up bar, and there's also a steam room and sauna (which I didn't venture into.) You can go to the regular side of the bar also in your bathing suit (the swim up bar uses the same bartenders as the regular one so you can see the clothed patrons right through the ordering area on the other side.) The DJ played a really good mix of music, ranging from oldies to rock to hip hop (and people were actually dancing in and around the sides of the pool.) They were showing Edward Scissorhands on the screen above the pool and the DJ was scratching it so ES would look like he was dancing to the music - I have to say it was so funny I almost peed in the pool (much funnier than making the smiley face on Minesweeper mouth the words to hip hop songs - don't even deny you've never done that.)
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Also, the clientele was totally normal. The bar was expensive, but the people were an eclectic mix, no one so shee-shee that I felt uncomfortable, even walking around in my bathing suit. I give it 2 thumbs up, Heather you'd better have your birthday here.
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This is what it looks like:

On Sunday, Robyn and I went to Julie's, had lunch at Bourbon Street, and watched Julie play with cockapoos in the puppy shop (one peed on her.) I then stopped at Gail's to pick up my bridesmaid dress. I haven't tried it on but fingers crossed that I have to get it taken in.

I Feel Like Chicken Tonight

"Despite staying at Manchester's five-star Lowry hotel, Justin spurned the a la carte menu for a chicken dinner at chain Nandos."

Although I still stand by my motto "chicken is for wimps", I do enjoy the occassional Nandos. Good pick JT!

I'm Saving Up My Voice Now

Yes! We Are Scientists are playing Siren Festival, woohoo!

Also, Pete Yorn is playing Beacon Theater (with Crowded House?!) I find that shows usually stink here in the summer, but so far so good.

Oh Happy Day!

Yo dog, what just happened on American Idol?! That was crazy!!

So, I have to say that today was really great! A total stranger approached me in the street and said to me that I was "absolutely beautiful!" I was like uhh what? He asked me my name and told me his while I was thinking oh he's just hitting on me, but then he said "I just had to tell you that" and walked away in a complete different direction, not hitting on me like I thought. And the guy seemed totally normal. AND I had my hair in a ponytail and looked pretty messy today. Thanks so much random guy, you really made my day!

Current Music: Mat Kearney - Nothing Left To Lose

Apolo, You're My One and Ono

I'm temping for Nickelodeon Music. It was only my first day but man was it boring! And I don't mean my usual boring day at a temp job where I surf the net...it's because I DIDN'T HAVE A COMPUTER! Oh, the horror!!!

I know this isn't a life or death thing; I did spend a majority of the day reading some book on 1000 album covers, a Time Magazine, and an In Touch (I had to balance out the Time), but when it comes down to it, the day just drags when you've got no technology. They are trying to hook me up with a computer but I'm just a lowly temp so nothing's definite.

A nice man I was working with did give me some free CDs today - Matt Kierney which I'm excited about, Incubus, then everyone who has ever been a finalist on American Idol - Taylor Hicks, Carrie Underwood, Daughtry (blah), Clay Aiken, and even Kelly Pickler (which I gave to my dad.) Probably all the free CDs they received and subsequently rejected. I like that C. Underwood song they play on the radio though where she bashes up the dude's car.

While we're on the topic of reality TV, I hate Dancing with the Stars most of the time, but now that they are down to the finals I'm more invested. I actually voted for Apolo like 10 times yesterday (here was a glitch with the system that let me do it more than 5 times.) I did give Joey one vote just because I felt like I had to. Have I stooped to a new low?

Don't Call Me (Baby)

About 5 and a half years ago when I was temping while I was looking for a job out of college, I temped for an agency who got me a short term (3 day) assignment working for a music company (I was trying frantically to work in anything involving music at the time.)

It turned out to be a job doing database entry at Press Play, which was owned by Universal, and worked just like Napster, but it was the first subscription version of an MP3 service. I had unlimited piles of CDs and had to enter into the system every single bit of information on the CD booklet - song titles, authors of each song, publishers, basically all of the small-print copyright information. It was tedious, gave me headaches, and made me just want to plain kill myself.

I worked for the three days and on that last day, the VP of the agency asked me to continue the job into the next week. I said that I was not interested in working that temp job any longer but thanked her (which is of course what happens when you temp - it's your choice of what you do, there may be pressure but it's ultimately up to you.) Well, this woman SCREAMED at me on the phone - the most unprofessional employer I have ever worked for in my entire life. She went on and on about how I should be so thankful for this job and how she is going to look bad and how I'd better take it, all the while yelling at me at the top of her lungs.

Obviously I didn't work for her again.

Then, about two months later, she had the nerve to call me about another temp job! I couldn't believe she actually had the balls to call me, I couldn't be bothered to stoop to her level and remind her previous tirade so I told her I had accepted a permanent job and that was the end of that.

I just now received a phone call from someone from the same agency asking me to come in and meet with them. Now I have a few choices:
-Call back the girl (not the nasty one) and agree to meet with her.
-Call back the girl and tell her about how I had a bad experience with one of her co-workers in the past and see what she says from there.
-Don't call back the girl (I've got some temp agencies I work with at the moment and I did make a vow not to do business with them again.)

I know this woman has no idea of what happened before, I'm sure they dump all their past records after a year or two anyway so there's probably nothing even stating I've ever worked for them but I'm just feeling icky at the thought of the company overall.

I Tried To Love Them Back

Thursday night was The Kooks at Irving Plaza. I have got to say this is the best gig video (in terms of clarity) I have taken with this camera.

Have some 'Ooh La' here:

The show was pretty good. At Benicassim, I thought they were a bit green to be performing on the main stage even though they played well but I had expected they'd be much more suited to a venue like Irving. Again it was good but there was a spark missing despite the fact that they jammed more, played about 5 new (good) songs, and had the audience really excited. Maybe I was just a tad bit anoyed that I couldn't see well and I was a bit drunk and that took away from the experience for me. I don't know what it is that's holding me back from thinking it was amazing.

'Naive' was my favorite.

Here are some photos:

Come to Jamaica and Feel Alright

So I finally got called to meet with the lawyers at 3:45 pm yesterday. Turns out it's a negligence case and out of the 20 of us questioned they only need 6 and 2 alternates and guess what, as of this morning I am officially Juror #2. I didn't think to put down on the questionnaire that I enjoy blogging and gossiping under the "hobbies" section, too late for that now I guess.

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I'm serving in beautiful Jamaica!

Beautiful Jamaica, Queens that is...I was off the blog for a while because Dave came to visit and it was great! We did lots of fun things like...

went to Ellis Island hit up Trailer Park
saw The Fratellis attended a Mets game Shea Stadium was packed as per usual (we had to pay a whopping $5 for our tickets)visited Boston

where the garbage is golden and everybody knows your name we ate mussels and New England Clam Chowda we got lost going to Salem (here's a video of us driving over the scary bridge back into Boston while I'm singing 'Train in Vain')

had Katz's Deli back in NY went to Top of the Rock at Rockefeller Center (my 'Standing on the Shoulder of Giants' shot)

Dave got told he looked like "that guy who killed himself, Kurt Cobain! Don't try to kill yourself" and overall we ate too much food.

Tonight I am going to see The Kooks, yeah!

And the Verdict Is...

Ugh. I'm stuck at jury duty. They have computers here though which is so random. So far they've shown Raiders of the Lost Ark (my least fav. Indiana Jones movie) and I've read the NY Times and a Glamour magazine. They called in about 6 groups of 25 to be interviewed already with some people having gone up multiple times but I haven't been called once yet. Regardless, they told us we are stuck here till at least 4:00 pm anyway so I guess it doesn't matter when I get called. Lunch in 40 minutes though, wahoo!

Some people here are so stupid. Don't talk in the main room on cell phones means "don't talk in the main room on cell phones." What's so hard to understand about that? Also to these rule breakers, I don't care about your island vacation, you are too loud.

One woman did something stupid with her summons, duplicated it or soemthing, and as her "punishment" as instructed by the dude in charge, she keeps getting called up to be interviewed for all the cases. They should do that with all the cell phone rule breakers too.

Please email me for entertainment as I'll be checking this periodically. Thanks!

I'm Still Here

I'm back! I'll write a proper entry later or tomorrow but just wanted to let you know that I have not retired from blogging.