Recent Posts

Thursday, September 22, 2011

Sea Lion Naps

I had a wedding in Pacific City this last weekend. Pat kindly accompanied me and lent his assistance in lantern and paper crane hanging. He's handy that way. Pat, Myself, the planners, and their husbands all stayed in a lovely beach house near the Pelican Pub where the wedding was held. They had something like 6 different Michener books. It took a LOT of will-power not to steal them. Hardbacks. That match my copy of Caribbean. Maybe not everyone knows how wonderful Michener books are. Well, they're wonderful. Put one in your brain. This one or this one are my suggestions.
The wedding was small and super easy. But there was of course one obnoxiously drunk gay man who insisted on serenading the bride and groom. Which in itself, isn't necessarily bad. However, his song choice was strange, if not totally inappropriate. China Girl, by Bowie. I don't think that there was a single Chinese or otherwise Asian person at the wedding. So strange. Besides, I think it's safe to assume that any song with the word 'swastika' in it is NOT a wedding appropriate song.
We had Sunday to ourselves and Pat suggested we go to Bob Straub park. It was cloudy but not cold and we actually had a really nice 2 hour walk on the beach. Because the beach isn't one of the super popular ones, I found all kinds of treasures. Totally legit sea shells and my first whole sand dollar! Pat helped me treasure hunt. There were also little jelly things all over the beach but they didn't have tentacles. I had to investigate most of them. Some were orangey. One blue one. Lots of clear ones. Still very curious what they are. The internet has not been able to answer this question in a satisfactory way.

Impressive, right? Usually you have to purchase sea shells this awesome.

Other beach happiness? Stepping on those sea-weed balls and they make that awesome popping sound. Which, makes me think of these super awesome little yellow balls with spots that me and my brother used to love to step on at my grandparents house in Hugo. Everytime I tell people about these expecting that they too will recall the childhood delight of annihilating these crispy little balls, I get blank stares. And I am crushed. I have thought for years that I made these things up. Sometimes I have really realistic dreams. BUT, the internet has come to my rescue. This, my friends, is a Gall.


See how festive it is? How poppable it looks? The inside is kinda furry. It turns out that this is basically a little protective home that oak trees create for larvae of various insects. This is the only picture of a Gall that I've found that looks exactly like the ones I used to step on. I think that I was stepping on dry dead ones.

UH, apparently kinda all over the place on this one but. CHILDHOOD MYSTERY SOLVED!

Back to our beach stroll. We came upon what looked like a dead seal. Which was sad but also I wanted to investigate. I was crouched next to him looking at his adorable dead little face when he opened his eyes and lifted his head up. Totally not dead! Pat kept his distance but I went over to the little guy(not little) and started saying "heeeey buddy. whatcha doin?" He didn't answer me, but he did raise his fin at me. A friendly greeting, one would suppose. I did back up a little when he started to stand up. Pat then said that we should probably head back. I was worried that he was all by his lonesome and stranded on the beach or sick. I couldn't leave the little guy in distress so I googled and then called stranded mammal hotlines until someone answered at the Seaside Aquarium. I described our friend and the nice man told me he was a sea lion. And here's the best part. Sea Lions take naps! Seaside Aquarium guy told me I probably just woke him up from a nap and he was groggy. Apparently when they get sick of swimming, they plop themselves on a beach for a snooze. Aquarium guy said he'd send someone out to check on him anyway but I was already very happy that I'd met a sleepy sea lion and not a dying one.

They have the cutest freaking faces.
Once we got back from the beach, we decided that food was necessary. When we parked at the restaurant, Pat noticed that next to us was a truck that held the biggest dog I have ever seen. So naturally, I snuggled him. He was amazing. He was still there when we came out so while Pat walked around the corner for an energy drink I creepily hung out next to someone's car and snuggled his giant dog.

That is my hand. I do not have tiny hands.

So, good beach trip.


Groupon Cat

Things that I love about the Groupon Cat: everything, his gold "groupon" chain, his bed is a cloud, he's always got his mouth open.

Here are a few samples of the wisdom bestowed upon frugal consumers by the Groupon Cat (Marty? I think it fits). 




Thursday, September 15, 2011

Cousin Road trip

Most of my family lives within an hour's drive of me. I'm lucky that way. It's easy for us to spend holidays and birthdays together. My uncle Ron, Aunt Wendy, and baby (she's 19) cousin Ivy live in California. We get to see them about once a year. They've been trying to get some of us to come visit for a while and finally my cousin Samantha took some initiative and planned a weekend for us to go. It was quick since neither myself or my brother could take more than a day off. Samantha, Andy, myself, and Samantha's sister Randi drove down on a Thursday night, arriving at about 4am. (This is not the first time we've made this drive. When I was still in high school, Samantha, Andy and I drove down to Sacramento for a couple days during spring break. To this day, I can't hear Remix to Ignition without thinking of that trip. Samantha honked her horn all the way through the passes to keep the deer away.)
Before our drive, we stopped at WalMart to pick up some essentials like massive amounts of junk food for the drive. I decided to get a subway sandwich at the in-walmart subway. There was one lady in front of me and the woman working was sweating and ranting about how busy she was because the kid who usually works with her is on drugs so she had to send him home. Fair enough, but since there were just two of us standing there, I didn't really see how she was so overwhelmed. The woman in front of me ordered a pizza because the rotten kid she was with was refusing to eat vegetables. So the subway lady puts the pizza in the oven and just stands there, staring at the oven, waiting for it to cook....she waits the full 3-5 minutes for it to cook which happens to be roughly the time it takes to make me a tuna with spinach, olives, lettuce, and cucumbers on wheat. She doesn't address me until the pizza is cooked, packaged, and paid for. She makes my sandwich and then when I give her my card makes fun of my last name, asking me if high school was awful. My last name isn't dickmouth, okay? It's Ridderbusch. I don't think it warranted the reaction. When I walked away, she was discussing my horrible last name with the line that had formed while she waited for that pizza to cook. I digress.
My brother managed to lose his wallet at about 1am at a rest stop. So I called the highway patrol and the security at the rest stop which happened to be run by Seven Feathers Casino and the nicest rest stop I've ever been to. Everyone was very helpful but nobody found the wallet. Bummer, Dude.
When we got to Sacramento, we took a nap and got up 3 hours later to get on the double decker boat that my uncle had rented for us to hang out on for the day. We got to lounge on the lake and eat all the great food my Aunt Wendy packed for us and just hang out together all day. It was really relaxing-just a great way to spend the day with my cousins and uncle. I did manage to fall asleep on the top deck, completely frying my back, ass, and legs. And I also lost one of my favorite clip-on earrings because I forgot to take it off before I jumped in the water. Gotta take the good with the bad right? Wendy had delicious enchiladas waiting for us when we returned.
The next day they got us bagels and then us girls went vintage-shop roaming while my uncle and brother had man time or something. We spent some time in old town where my aunt insisted on continuing what was turning out to be quite a fat-kid weekend by buying us tons of candy and taking us to lunch.  When we got home, we laid out at the pool and played Kinect. Which I kick ass at, by the way. If someone has one they don't want, send that puppy my way. Dinner outside, a nice family walk, and smores in the backyard ended our day. Oh, and I dropped my phone in the pool that day. I put it in a bag of rice hoping it would heal itself but while I did get it to turn on, it wouldn't stop vibrating and was just generally ruined. Which is why I now have an iphone, as mentioned several posts ago because I do things out of order. Sue me.
Another thing that happened is that my brother bought a turtle. He does shit like that. I think it's name is burt, having to do with a conversation earlier in the weekend about hazelnuts/filberts and how only an Oregonian would EVER call a hazelnut a filbert.
We got up Sunday morning and began our long drive home, which included stopping at the Seven Feathers rest stop to try once more to recover Andy's wallet. And, YAHTZEE! They had it. Pretty awesome.
 I really enjoyed spending time with my cousins. Samantha and I always have fun together and Randi just moved back to Oregon so it was nice to have her there. And I even enjoyed my brother who is so old these days (he's only a year and a half younger than me but still) and is always hilarious. Ivy is so grown up, too. There are pictures of me holding her as a baby so it's weird and awesome that she's now a beautiful, smart, and sweet as can be college sophomore. 






Thursday, September 8, 2011

Camp Ridderbusch

Even though I didn't get to spend as much time as I would have liked at Camp Ridderbusch this year, it was still great to be there. Had drunken silly fun with family on the first night and a couple really nice last-two-at-the-campfire-nights with Pat. He and I also found a really great little beach with starfish and sunshine and a quirky little stairway leading down to it. Scrabble with my aunt, singing disney songs with my cousins and brother, and getting to hang out with my uncles were a few highlights.
Queen's Bicycle was playing.
Cousin time. My brother's hair is getting RIDICULOUS.

Tuesday, September 6, 2011

Ladies lovin ladies

Women are notoriously awful. I don't mean overall. I mean to each other. My friends and I have had to remind ourselves to retract our claws when a new woman walks into a room or even comes close enough for us to smell her stripper perfume and get dusted with her slut glitter (see? that just happened. It's like I can't even control it. retract.) I maintain that judging people is necessary and natural. And to be fair, if I can see the crease of your ass, if your skin is pumpkin hued, or if you're wearing more makeup than clothes, then I am assuming you have low self esteem and immediately dislike you.  However, there are perfectly nice girls that don't deserve the wrath of other girls. Probably the majority.
The point of this is that I try to compliment other women on a regular basis. Their shoes, hair, whatever. Because girls are not nice, and its really refreshing to be complimented by another woman who isn't your mother or best friend. Sometimes you gotta give a lady a little love. This wisdom brought to you by the lovely girl who told me she loved my skirt(that everyone I know hates, but I love). Thanks lady, and nice shoes!

Jamboree

So, this is incredibly late but Melissa, Box, and I went to Jamboree this year. For those of you who aren't oregonians and/or country fans, Jamboree is a three day country music festival. This year the headliners were Ronnie Dunn, Lady Antebellum, and Darius Rucker. We arrived Thursday evening and set up our very very minimal camp-chairs plus beer plus tent. We have learned our lesson. Canopy (read: shade) is necessary. Table, also necessary. We survived with a lot of sunscreen and creative cooler-as-table arrangements.
Friday we started drinking at 9am. Yes, I know that this seems like an obviously poor choice but to be fair we were not the only ones. Beer pong and flip cup with fellow campers commenced at about 11. It gets a little blurry after that. I do know that we made our way to the festival, I bought a hat, we ate some food, and I fell asleep. Combination of unnecessary morning drunkness and extreme heat meant that all three of us were donezo before the main act of the night started. We rode the bus back to our camp site and were sleeping by 7:30. Good thing it was Ronnie Dunn that night.
Day 1:



 Saturday we woke up and vowed not to drink till noon. This we accomplished. Before we went to the festival we took a stroll to the little river running near our campsite and sat in a shady field to escape the heat. At the festival we met up with Beth and Koddie in the beer garden, where we stayed until LadyA. It was a lovely day of beer and country music and sunshine. Lady Antebellum was wonderful. I sang loudly. However, I did not drink enough water that day. I ended up throwing up in a porta potty while waiting for the bus to go back to our site. This is not something I recommend. The combination of the smell, the fact that I was throwing up, and the ass hole pounding on the door telling me to hurry up really made for an unpleasant experience. On the bright side Jbox bought an AMAZING hat that day. Also I bought a trucker hat for a buck fifty or something.
Day Two:




 Sunday was more low key. We packed up, went to Safeway to charge our phones in their starbucks, met up with our friend Maggie, hit the local dollar store for some spray bottles(it was SO hot all weekend) and then went to see Mr. Darius Rucker.  Again, time was spent in the beer garden with Beth and Company. Darius was really wonderful. He gave us a good mix of his country stuff and the Hootie classics. Again, I did a lot of loud singing.I put my arm around Melissa during his cover of Space Cowboy. She doesn't like to be touched but sometimes I choose to ignore that fact.
Day Three:







 And hey guess what? NO SUNBURN.



Monday, September 5, 2011

Catching up on catching up

It's labor day and I am outside on my deck with honey roasted peanuts, bubbles, hookah, bubble tea, Joseph, and Finch. It is a good day. I sat down at about 10am to get caught up on documenting/blogging all the things that I've been doing lately. Two hours later, I'm finally typing. It's easy for me to get distracted by other blogs/facebook/twitter/pinterest/tumblr.
Let's start with how I'm having an incredible summer. It's been very full and consequently has gone very fast. I can't believe that it is September(although, hooray for new Greys and Fringe this month!). I haven't even decided what to be for Halloween. Usually this decision is made many months in advance. My room mates and I have a record of pretty epic group costumes. We have a couple ideas but haven't settled on anything solid yet.
Wicked Witch, Tin Man, Cowardly Lion, Scarecrow, Dorothy. I look deranged.

Tinkerbell, Captain Hook, and Peter Pan. This is admittedly not the most attractive photo of us.

Halloween Party? I hope so. I LOVE decorating for halloween/throwing halloween parties. I just don't know where we'll find the time.  Between boyfriend, work, and super-packed weekends I feel like I never see my wonderful room mates. It's come down to planning room mate togetherness dinners.
Other new things- I got an iphone. I've been complaining about it a lot.  I switched to ATT on a plan with Pat. It'll cost me less per month and I think it's a good small couple step. But oh Verizon, how I miss having service everywhere. And I am having a hard time getting used to my iphone. The Droid operating system made so much sense to me. Talk about #firstworldproblems. On the happy side I love the apps and I love having a phone that actually works. My old one (which finally met its death in the bottom of a pool) was barely functional. Also, instant instagram addiction. As if that wasn't predictable.