My personal special edition weekend paper, featuring traffic and sports reports, dining and entertainment reviews, and editorial.
Black Friday morning was stunning, shot through with rays of sunshine like sheets of muscovite. I got up and out of the house before anyone else even woke up. Apparently everyone in the mid-Atlantic region was also either still asleep, or being trampled at WalMart, because the roads were so clear, which made the drive very pleasant. I won't tell you how fast I got to Amsterdam, but I'll just say Mike didn't believe me when I called to say I was half an hour out.
The whole point of leaving so early, if you recall, was to make it to the Annual Turkey Bowl ultimate frisbee game. The Four Diamonds were covered in mud--foreshadowing for our state a few hours later? It was so warm people were stripping down all the layers they usually needed to play outside on Black Friday, but a few people refused to shed their traditional Underarmor. Not that it probably mattered much; everybody looked and smelled just about the same by the end of the day regardless of what we were wearing.
I love AUL, mostly because I love playing anything with that crew; but I might have to learn how to play football by next year because I really miss the tackling that used to be a lot more common before anybody actually knew how to play ultimate.
Maybe I should just learn how to play ultimate.
I hate rules. And strategy.
As Rich aptly pointed out at dinner, those of us who grew up in Amsterdam (whatever growing up I didn't do there I made up for in passion--I insist!) tended to perceive the Raindancer as this untouchably fancy restaurant, "a five-star joint, like if you went out to eat there, you would probably run into Snoop Dogg and Jay-Z, they go there all the time."
This is not true. The chances of Jay-Z or Snoop Dogg having even heard of the town of Amsterdam are pretty much zero, even though Jay-Z did grow up in New York. The chances of any of you, dear readers, having heard of the town of Amsterdam, is nearly as negligible. Oh, wait--did I mention my hometown to you once? What's that? You don't remember?
That being said, the Raindancer historically does hold the position of Amsterdam's "time-tested local 5-star restaurant." One of the only places in town you ever make reservations for. It sort of feels like Applebee's, covered in a vinyl cucina-style vodka penne sauce, and garnished with Rainforest Café light strings and plastic ivy.
The food was delicious, although of course there was too much of it, and there were too many people there to focus on eating anyway, and my mojito margarita was too delicious. I was delighted to see and catch up with a few people I hadn't seen literally in years.
Rich later complained that there was too much reminiscing throughout the evening, a mostly harmless statement I latched onto the same way my parents latch onto my passing comments about persistent absenteeism and feel horribly guilty about it. The dilemma is, I come back to Amsterdam once a year or so, and usually miss out on seeing half the people I want to see. When I do run into them, they ask me what I'm up to now and I really can't think of anything I desperately want to share with them about my incredibly mundane life. So I boomerang the question, hoping they'll tell me what has made them laugh and cry lately, their drinks of choice, who they're constantly checking their text messages for these days, and the latest developments in their life trajectory. You know, the important stuff. I just don't quite know how to ask.
Also, there are too many skeletons and too much dirty laundry hanging around after 10+ years together for us to stage a non-awkward dance party, and I have very little interest in drinking games.
Although, come to think of it, my birthday this year has involved what seems like an inordinate amount of icing. Yes, there was a lot of it on my various cakes... But I meant the other kind of icing:
All I wanted was to split a few bottles of wine with a few close friends and sit around and talk! But instead, predictably, we ended up with a house full of good friends, a mysterious amount of beer, wine, and Ice, and a collective headache for most of Saturday.
It was completely worth it. As we have found, I refuse to go uncelebrated.
Saturday at the G.W.I.B. (which is on the market! How badly do I want it?!) we decided to go see the movie Hugo in 3D. I was skeptical, because 3D movies usually give me a splitting headache--as if I needed a headache on my headache! But it was actually very well-done. The cinematography and imagery was really beautiful, and despite a few moments of really awkward/unsuccessful dialogue, we all enjoyed ourselves quite a lot. Rich and I, at least, were laughing, and I'm pretty sure I cried at some point. Not that that is unusual at all these days. (I also cried at Ramona and Beezus last week, and yesterday at The Muppets. Just to put things in perspective.)
On the topic of 3D, Titanic is coming out in 3D and I have never been so excited in my life.
Full circle, back to traffic. Back to traffic circles? I took a route sans traffic circles back from Amsterdam, and ended up getting stuck in traffic on the north end of the Jersey Turnpike. Both Bizz III and I tend to get cranky in stop-and-go traffic, once I get sick of my solo sunroof dance party and eat all my snacks, I start noticing all the weird things her 10-year-old engine does, and freaking out about it, and then she freaks out and stops shifting gears properly. So I pull off frantically to a rest stop and make a phone call, and by the time I get back on the road traffic has mostly dissipated and the transmission is back in action. Can we apply this to real life relationships? Couldn't hurt.
It took me a little longer to get home to Wilmington than it took me to get home to Amsterdam. (Ha, confused yet? Welcome to my life.) But my family was waiting for me and we all went to see The Muppets, which I'd been waiting for with bated breath for WEEKS. It fulfilled all my wildest dreams. I laughed so hard, and for so long, especially at all the 80s jokes and the 21st-century celeb cameos (Neil Patrick Harris, John Krasinski, and Zach Galifianakis, to name a few). It's hard to say whether my tears were a side effect of intense hilarity or of the touching moments interspersed throughout the script. Lots of real issues addressed in this film. I definitely recommend this movie to any diehards, and anyone who knows the song "Rainbow Connection," and anyone who watched Sesame Street back when it was still good, and anyone who likes puppets or Jason Segal or Amy Adams or basically any hip young celebrity out there--except Justin Bieber. Sorry Beliebers, no sightings in this flick. But you should still see the movie.
I'm feeling a little dazed still, but my feeling after this weekend is that 23 is going to be a good year. Emotional detox is going well and I could be ready to get back on the horse. But greater than this is less than three, my mantra/amulet/lucky charm. I am SO amazed and thankful and just completely blown away by all the wonderful people that make my life what it is, interesting and agonizing and rich and hilarious and drunk and soft, in the case of my brand-new birthday flannel sheets! This sounds cheesy, but I really mean it. Everyone was teasing me on Friday night (and every other day of my life) because I kept walking into rooms full of these people and just laughing. And they would all stop and look at me, because I obviously had no idea what was going on in there before I stepped in. But all I could say is, "I am so. happy."
The 22 Review brought to you today by my parents, my grandparents, and all my other ancestors, without whom I would not exist; also my homeboys and -girls in the Dirty, especially Mike, who planned everything; and just a general thanks to everyone who made 22 what it was. I'm investing in 23. You in?
Black Friday morning was stunning, shot through with rays of sunshine like sheets of muscovite. I got up and out of the house before anyone else even woke up. Apparently everyone in the mid-Atlantic region was also either still asleep, or being trampled at WalMart, because the roads were so clear, which made the drive very pleasant. I won't tell you how fast I got to Amsterdam, but I'll just say Mike didn't believe me when I called to say I was half an hour out.
The whole point of leaving so early, if you recall, was to make it to the Annual Turkey Bowl ultimate frisbee game. The Four Diamonds were covered in mud--foreshadowing for our state a few hours later? It was so warm people were stripping down all the layers they usually needed to play outside on Black Friday, but a few people refused to shed their traditional Underarmor. Not that it probably mattered much; everybody looked and smelled just about the same by the end of the day regardless of what we were wearing.
I love AUL, mostly because I love playing anything with that crew; but I might have to learn how to play football by next year because I really miss the tackling that used to be a lot more common before anybody actually knew how to play ultimate.
Maybe I should just learn how to play ultimate.
I hate rules. And strategy.
As Rich aptly pointed out at dinner, those of us who grew up in Amsterdam (whatever growing up I didn't do there I made up for in passion--I insist!) tended to perceive the Raindancer as this untouchably fancy restaurant, "a five-star joint, like if you went out to eat there, you would probably run into Snoop Dogg and Jay-Z, they go there all the time."
This is not true. The chances of Jay-Z or Snoop Dogg having even heard of the town of Amsterdam are pretty much zero, even though Jay-Z did grow up in New York. The chances of any of you, dear readers, having heard of the town of Amsterdam, is nearly as negligible. Oh, wait--did I mention my hometown to you once? What's that? You don't remember?
That being said, the Raindancer historically does hold the position of Amsterdam's "time-tested local 5-star restaurant." One of the only places in town you ever make reservations for. It sort of feels like Applebee's, covered in a vinyl cucina-style vodka penne sauce, and garnished with Rainforest Café light strings and plastic ivy.
The food was delicious, although of course there was too much of it, and there were too many people there to focus on eating anyway, and my mojito margarita was too delicious. I was delighted to see and catch up with a few people I hadn't seen literally in years.
Rich later complained that there was too much reminiscing throughout the evening, a mostly harmless statement I latched onto the same way my parents latch onto my passing comments about persistent absenteeism and feel horribly guilty about it. The dilemma is, I come back to Amsterdam once a year or so, and usually miss out on seeing half the people I want to see. When I do run into them, they ask me what I'm up to now and I really can't think of anything I desperately want to share with them about my incredibly mundane life. So I boomerang the question, hoping they'll tell me what has made them laugh and cry lately, their drinks of choice, who they're constantly checking their text messages for these days, and the latest developments in their life trajectory. You know, the important stuff. I just don't quite know how to ask.
Also, there are too many skeletons and too much dirty laundry hanging around after 10+ years together for us to stage a non-awkward dance party, and I have very little interest in drinking games.
Although, come to think of it, my birthday this year has involved what seems like an inordinate amount of icing. Yes, there was a lot of it on my various cakes... But I meant the other kind of icing:
 |
| A St. Croix Falls friend wisely thought twice about sending this package. "I like my bread like you like your men: ICED!" ...Or was it coffee? I forget. |
All I wanted was to split a few bottles of wine with a few close friends and sit around and talk! But instead, predictably, we ended up with a house full of good friends, a mysterious amount of beer, wine, and Ice, and a collective headache for most of Saturday.
It was completely worth it. As we have found, I refuse to go uncelebrated.
Saturday at the G.W.I.B. (which is on the market! How badly do I want it?!) we decided to go see the movie Hugo in 3D. I was skeptical, because 3D movies usually give me a splitting headache--as if I needed a headache on my headache! But it was actually very well-done. The cinematography and imagery was really beautiful, and despite a few moments of really awkward/unsuccessful dialogue, we all enjoyed ourselves quite a lot. Rich and I, at least, were laughing, and I'm pretty sure I cried at some point. Not that that is unusual at all these days. (I also cried at Ramona and Beezus last week, and yesterday at The Muppets. Just to put things in perspective.)
On the topic of 3D, Titanic is coming out in 3D and I have never been so excited in my life.
Full circle, back to traffic. Back to traffic circles? I took a route sans traffic circles back from Amsterdam, and ended up getting stuck in traffic on the north end of the Jersey Turnpike. Both Bizz III and I tend to get cranky in stop-and-go traffic, once I get sick of my solo sunroof dance party and eat all my snacks, I start noticing all the weird things her 10-year-old engine does, and freaking out about it, and then she freaks out and stops shifting gears properly. So I pull off frantically to a rest stop and make a phone call, and by the time I get back on the road traffic has mostly dissipated and the transmission is back in action. Can we apply this to real life relationships? Couldn't hurt.
It took me a little longer to get home to Wilmington than it took me to get home to Amsterdam. (Ha, confused yet? Welcome to my life.) But my family was waiting for me and we all went to see The Muppets, which I'd been waiting for with bated breath for WEEKS. It fulfilled all my wildest dreams. I laughed so hard, and for so long, especially at all the 80s jokes and the 21st-century celeb cameos (Neil Patrick Harris, John Krasinski, and Zach Galifianakis, to name a few). It's hard to say whether my tears were a side effect of intense hilarity or of the touching moments interspersed throughout the script. Lots of real issues addressed in this film. I definitely recommend this movie to any diehards, and anyone who knows the song "Rainbow Connection," and anyone who watched Sesame Street back when it was still good, and anyone who likes puppets or Jason Segal or Amy Adams or basically any hip young celebrity out there--except Justin Bieber. Sorry Beliebers, no sightings in this flick. But you should still see the movie.
I'm feeling a little dazed still, but my feeling after this weekend is that 23 is going to be a good year. Emotional detox is going well and I could be ready to get back on the horse. But greater than this is less than three, my mantra/amulet/lucky charm. I am SO amazed and thankful and just completely blown away by all the wonderful people that make my life what it is, interesting and agonizing and rich and hilarious and drunk and soft, in the case of my brand-new birthday flannel sheets! This sounds cheesy, but I really mean it. Everyone was teasing me on Friday night (and every other day of my life) because I kept walking into rooms full of these people and just laughing. And they would all stop and look at me, because I obviously had no idea what was going on in there before I stepped in. But all I could say is, "I am so. happy."
The 22 Review brought to you today by my parents, my grandparents, and all my other ancestors, without whom I would not exist; also my homeboys and -girls in the Dirty, especially Mike, who planned everything; and just a general thanks to everyone who made 22 what it was. I'm investing in 23. You in?
The conundrum of not knowing what to talk about when around is exactly why I have subscribed to your blog Clara ^_^
ReplyDelete-Jon Ugalde
I'm confused. Didn't you turn 22? :)
ReplyDeleteAlice
Yes but that means I'm starting my 23rd year now.
ReplyDelete...I just like to throw random numbers around ;-)