Do you love the 90’s? If you were born in the late 80’s, probably the answer is “HELL YES.” If you were born in the 70’s and you love the 80’s, the same thing applies. Et cetera. Et cetera. Et cetera. What if I told you that you could be instantly transported to the best jamz of your youth, curated FOR YOU, with a click of a button? You’d totally be down, right? I thought so. Well that is exactly what Spotify Time Capsule is. It has changed my life and made my week. This feature has been available since September 28th, and I don’t know how I have survived a month (or 30 years) without it.
During my Monday night Spin class, I casually mentioned that I had done an all throwback 90’s playlist last Thursday (listen to it here!) so a newbie to my class came up to me afterward and informed me of this magical feature on Spotify. Somehow, through a mix of creepy stalkage, magic, and voodoo (and by asking the year you were born), Spotify creates a playlist of every song you listened to from 5th grade through twelfth. AND BEYOND. Ok maybe not EVERY one, but 55 of them! This is a creepily accurate list.
According to Spotify’s press release, this feature can be designed for any user over the age of 16, in 60 Spotify markets, and “gathers the 30 most nostalgic tracks from your teens and early twenties, creating the soundtrack for a trip down memory lane.” My capsule had 55 songs, so I guess it ranges per person. Maybe it’s because I obsessively use Spotify every day, and also because I pay for premium. But this feature is not reserved for only premium users! Most tech blogs presume that this idea comes from the “battle for subscribers” between Apple Music and Spotify, with both of them trying to add more personalized features. I have always been Team Droid, but in my completely biased opinion, I have to say, Spotify NAILED this one.
It would be one thing if it only picked songs from my already-downloaded library, but no. This list includes songs I totally forgot about but TOTALLY listened to. It starts with “This is My Party” from Fabolous and goes to “Case of the Ex” by Mya, two of my favs. At first, I was skeptical. Didn’t everyone love those songs? Also, are they only picking hip hop because I play a lot of hip hop for my spin classes? But then I scrolled down and realized a large majority of southern rappers, Trick Daddy appears more than once. Did they know I grew up in south Florida? HOW!? I didn’t even have Spotify back then!
Then I thought to myself, I liked more than Southern Rap. These Spotify biatches don’t KNOW me!! So I scrolled some more and found Backstreet Boys… then Fiona Apple… then Whitney Houston… a song from Pocahontas… OK THEY KNOW ME! THEY KNOW ME BETTER THAN I KNOW MYSELF! I have been listening to this playlist for two days straight. You guys absolutely must try it out and tell me if my playlist is different than yours! Click here to make your own, and then check out mine in all its glory. If you’re using the Spotify program and not the browser version, just type “time capsule” into the search bar. I guarantee you it will make your day.
Halloween is Coming!!! Halloween is my favorite holiday of the year (except my birthday). How could you NOT like a halloween that is about candy, talking to strangers, and best of all: COSTUMES. I love dressing up, and I always have. If you have not already subscribed to my blog, you are missing weekly emails with CLASSIC #tbts of me in costume. I have dressed up as everything from a drag queen princess to a gypsy; you can see I have loved costumes since the beginning of time. At least the beginning of MY time. Also, I love love love crafting.
Drag queen or princess? YOU DECIDE.
Really with that facepaint?
GYPSY! So PC.
Growing up, I often had handmade or hand-thrown-together costumes, and I have been a fan of the DIY costume ever since. The best part about making your own costume is that no one else will have it. Anyone can go into a Spirit of Halloween popup and buy a sexy nurse or sexy army girl costume. But not everyone can put together a super-not-PC gypsy costume complete with crystal ball made of tin foil.
Which brings me to my next point: the point of Halloween is NOT to be sexy. October 31st is not an excuse to forego half of your clothes. I don’t know who decided that a costume is just leaving half of your outfit at home and putting on cat ears, but that will not cut it. Reminds me of the infamous scene in Mean Girl, the epitome of this:
There is a meme that makes its rounds on Instagram every year, about “sexy girl Halloween costumes vs. me,” and that perfectly personifies my idea of Halloween costumes. The weirder, the better. This all started in 2009 when my best friend and her sister (and I) decided to be Treasure Trolls. This was LONG before the Troll movie. We made the most amazing troll costumes ever known to man. Photos are coming. Get excited.
So why and how are my ideal DIY costumes 100% awesome but 100% NOT sexy?? Let’s break it down step by step:
The base of the costume must ALWAYS be a unitard.
This is a tradition that has been unbroken since 2009. The most epic unitard was definitely the 2009 treasure troll one, because it was see-through. And ordered from eBay. According to the reviews, it was supposed to be used for fetish play. As in… there was a hole. In a choice place. In fact, one of the reviews recommended wearing it backward… depending on what you’re into. You catch my drift. Anyway, after this year, we realized that the hole was incredibly convenient because a unitard made of pantyhose material is not easy to take off and on! Think about how tough it is just to put on tights! (Ladies, you know what I’m talking about.) When you are pub-crawling, you are most likely drinking in excess, which means you are taking bathroom trips in excess as well. That hole in the unitard came in handy. These unitards were especially epic because they matched our skin and people thought we were naked. The next year we used a unitard as the base of our costume again, and a tradition was born.
Before I knew about the emoji pillows, we used pillow stuffing.
People literally thought we were naked.
BELLY BUMP!
Built-in beer stand.
The Troll Stroll.
The next year we were a huge wolf pack. The fetish unitard only came in two colors, “nude” and “black” (racist, much?). Anyway, I chose to be the one black wolf in the wolf pack, like I’m the black sheep in my family. JK JK. Anyway, it was a hit yet again, with cutoff shorts and amazing hair and makeup to top it off, done by our friend who is a makeup artist.
GRRRR!!!
We roll deep.
Black Wolf.
Nothing to see here!
The next year, I did a costume all by myself, and I knew I had a lot to live up to. I kept all of the preparations a secret! How could I outdo the Treasure Trolls from years past?? If you dream it, it will come. I became the World’s Tallest Oompa Loompa, and it was terrifying. Face paint, wig and all. I made the entire costume by hand, all the way down to drawing the stripes on my soccer socks, and buying long johns from Walmart.com. This was 2011, the year of the Halloween Blizzard. I was still living in Brooklyn and I knew I couldn’t miss the Halloween party in Manhattan, so I camped out at my friend’s house all day, scared that they would shut down the subways if I waited longer to go into the city. Painting myself into an oompa loompa in secret in a friend’s bathroom is NOT an easy feat. This look took some real determination, but I did it! For this look, I actually used Rit Dye to color my unitard the perfect orange-brown-skin-shade. Talk about dedication to the cause.
Around this time, for some reason, unitards became avant-garde. Of course, they were not avant-garde to us, but the addition of the word “morphsuit” to the Halloween lexicon was a gamechanger. Don’t get me wrong, we would never dare to purchase a morphsuit skeleton and that be the end of the costume. I like crafting too much for that. At first, they only had about 6 colors available, and we did our best with those. The first year we made use of morphsuits we were uni-corns. Get it? Unitard – Unicorn? I thought it was a great idea. We made horns out of Crayola Model Magic, and we painted and glittered ourselves into oblivion. Then we put on some false eyelashes. Then we added a tutu. TADA! Done.
Blue Unicorn.
Falsies and a tutu make the perfect costume.
Unis in the street.
Frolicking through NYC.
This brings me to my next step to ensure ugly but classic costumes: DIY no-sew tutus! I originally learned how to do this from youtube, and I have mastered the skill throughout the years. I can now make a tutu with my eyes closed. Literally. I currently have 5 tutus in my closet. I will have 6 after I craft my current costume tonight (tutorial coming soon).
This brings me to the next and last step to ensure a not-sexy costume: stuffing your belly! You know how some girls diet so they can fit into their (lack of fabric) costume? I do the exact opposite! There’s nothing like covering your belly with some extra belly, so people can’t tell which part is natural and which part is just extra padding! It’s like they say in Miracle on 34th Street, “since I carry my own padding with me, I got the job, see?” Often when I am researching DIY costumes and looking at how to make mine better (pinterest has been a lifesaver here, and I’m not even a member!), I have noticed that I often pick costumes that are picked by pregnant women. This is extra fun, because when people think I am pregnant, and they see me drinking in excess, it provides for some great looks and comments. LET ME LIVE, OK!? When I began stuffing my belly for Halloween, I used pillow stuffing that you can buy by the bag from Michael’s. Last year, I discovered a much easier way, I stuffed an emoji pillow in my unitard! The stuffing stays together and it’s perfectly round!
Emoji in my belly!
Built-in beer stand.
Before I knew about the emoji pillows, we used pillow stuffing.
The best part about making your own costumes is that you can repurpose the different parts for different things. I repurposed my wolfpack black unitard to make it a bee unitard by making a new last-minute tutu. I have used my yellow unitard to be a Minion and a Care Bear (Funshine Bear), and Winnie the Pooh. I’ve used my blue unitard to be a Unicorn and a Smurfette (terrifying, really). I’ve used my silver unitard to be the Tin Man and a Hersey Kiss. It’s all about repurposing and #BallinOnABudget.
Black Wolf.
Black Bee!
Tin Man.
The whole Wizard of Oz crew.
Silver Hershey Kiss.
Blue Unicorn.
Blue Smurfette!
MINIONS!
Funshine Bear and pals. Same uni.
Same uni, different costume!
I wish I had this blog years ago years so I could have shared my ideas and steps to make my costumes.
My costume for this year is a surprise, but considering I was supposed to be in a big group costume that only fell through last week, you can be sure I will be repurposing a few items from my costume box! (Yes, I have a costume box… it takes up valuable closet space in a New York apartment but it’s #WorthIt.)
I will be posting a DIY blog specifically for my 2017 costume next week, after the big reveal this weekend at the traditional annual pub crawl. I hope you guys like it!
This has been a hard week. And a tough month. Actually, it’s been a tough year since last November. I consider myself lucky that despite the fact that I know many people in Las Vegas, I didn’t personally know anyone at the Route 91 Harvest Festival. I am fortunate that despite my friends from all over the world, I don’t know anyone personally affected by the tragic hurricanes in the Caribbean. Despite living in New York, a virtual melting pot, I don’t know anyone by name who will be affected by the decision to repeal DACA. Despite being Jewish, I don’t know anyone who was in or around the white supremacist rally in Charlottesville. But that doesn’t mean I wasn’t affected.
It’s not easy living in this world. As a human being who has feelings, empathy, sympathy, all the things that our leader seems to be lacking, it’s not easy to wake up every day in these times. Unfortunately, or fortunately, we still have to keep doing it. It often feels like there’s not much we can do, but there are little things. No, I’m not talking about posting on Facebook about sending “thoughts and prayers.” But there are some easy things, like VOTING (COME ON PEOPLE, REGISTER!), or using and texting resistbot to contact your local Senators (TEXT “RESIST” to 50409). Sometimes, though, you don’t even feel like doing anything. You just want to wallow in your sorrows. I totally get that. Unfort., your job probably won’t allow a lifetime of mental health days. And meanwhile, if things aren’t getting better, what can you do to de-stress, simply so you feel like you can get out of bed?
I put together a list of a few things I do to try and forget the world we live in temporarily, just to keep my sanity.
Watch nice things on the internet.When I go on twitter, it is a sh*tstorm of terribles. It’s so bad. It’s so depressing. So sometimes I just seek out heartwarming things to watch. If I liked animals, it would be puppies. But I don’t like animals, so it’s Ellen. She recently did an 8-minute montage of nice, amazing humans, doing nice, amazing things. I only cried 6 times at my desk. But they were happy tears! There are good people out there!! **hits replay**
Watch YouTube tutorials about hair braiding and do my hair and my coworkers’ hair. This may not be for everyone, but it’s therapeutic for me. Plus, it’s nice to see your work actually amount to something beautiful. I talked about me braiding my hair for races before, but I have taken my skills to new levels!
I learned this 5 strand braid, check out my first attempt!
Work out. I will say, my workouts have now taken on a life of their own. My stats at Peloton have skyrocketed. I have so much stress and anxiety, that the best way for me to take it out is on my body and on the bike. The participants in my spin classes may not appreciate this new power from within, but they are reaping the benefits as well 😉
Stay busy by finding fun, random things to do. The cheaper the better. I have been taking advantage of the random events New York has to offer. In the last few months, I have gone to a free Oktoberfest celebration, a free yoga class (also counts for my last bullet point), a $20 pumpkinfest, and a free bootcamp class on a roof deck. I have found that by forcing myself to keep busy, I can stay off of the internet and focus on uplifting things. I highly recommend grabbing a TimeOut NY if you live in New York to find events. Or follow FitForFree on Instagram; I’m going to a Bollywood class in 2 weeks! If you live outside New York, take advantage of Google! Use your internet time to search for offline things to do, instead of getting down the Twitter rabbit-hole-of-horribles.
Read.Uplifting things. Nothing heavy, just fun “beach reads.” Or even join a book club! P.S. I’m looking for a good one to join. Anyone out there? Bueller?
Go to the movies.Nothing takes your mind off of the here and now like escaping into a far away place. Or any place with a happy ending. Rom coms are the best for this. I know movies can be expensive, but there are ways around that. Join advancescreenings, like I mentioned in my first-ever blog post. Then you can even see movies before they come out! Or, join the AMC Stubs program. It’s $15 for the year, and they constantly have deals like right now, $5 ticket Tuesdays. Plus, you get points for even more rewards. And you can skip the line at the concession stand. Nothing takes your mind off of our current world like a handful of melted butter from popcorn. Which brings me to my next point.
Eat. Tina Fey caught a lot of backlash for her emotional eating/grassroots movement #SheetCaking.
And obesity isn’t always the answer. But there’s a time and a place for emotional eating, and sometimes a pint of Halo Top just hits the spot. Ok, two pints. If it makes you feel better, it’s #WorthIt. Everything in moderation. I’ve been to Halal Guys more in the past month than I choose to admit. I’m a #HalalVIP. I’ll stop with the hashtags now.
Guy in line behind me at @HalalGuys told me he was in line behind me last time he was there. Then he asked if I go every day#VIP #whitesauce
The whole point here is, do what makes you happy. Literally. In these times, I do not suggest that you sit back and do nothing, just the opposite. Volunteer if you can. Donate money. Donate blood. Get the word out. Speak up. But also, it’s important for your mental health to take a step back and smile every once in a while. And in the meantime, I’ll try and keep you entertained here. So subscribe!!
IT’S OCTOBER! The best month of the year for basic betches everywhere. It’s the month of the PSL, the month of the best holiday ever involving costumes and booze (more on that another time), the season of apple picking and other insagrammable white betch things, PLUS if you work for the Jews, it’s the month where we work half the time and get paid the same amount. That’s a win-win. But even more, it’s the month of PUMPKIN ERRTHING. Pumpkin candles. Pumpkin coffee creamer. Pumpkin cookies. Pumpkin-colored president. UGH.
Anyway, I’ve never met a pumpkin I didn’t love, besides the rotting ones in November. When my best friend sent me a link about something called “The Great Jack O’Lantern BLAZE” I was 100% in. Then I saw that NPH has been there with his twins, and I was 125% in. Did it live up to my expectations? HELL YES. Did I see NPH? Unfort no. I guess I’ll have to hang out in Harlem more.
Arguably the best thing about the BLAZE is their FAQ page, addressing incredibly pressing and hard-hitting questions like “what is a pumpkin?” and “It’s raining and I dress exclusively in suede. Can I get a refund or exchange my tickets?” and “Did I mention I’m studying for a certificate in Freudian analysis?” Answer: “Great, you might enjoy our installation of shrunken heads.”
Seriously, the FAQ page is legendary. But they also answer some of the questions you may actually be wondering about like how many pumpkins are involved and how long they’ve been doing it. Answers: 7,000+ hand-carved jack-o’-lanterns for 13 years running. Each BLAZE involves ordering more than 10,000 live pumpkins, because they don’t survive the whole time. This equals a total of more than 200,000 pounds of pumpkin!!! They start carving in JUNE and they are helped by more than 2,600 volunteers. The carvers are led by Creative Director Michael Natiello, who leads a team of Historic Hudson Valley staff and local artists.
The best news for you, it’s just begun!! It goes through November! The bad news is that a lot of the best tickets have ALREADY sold out! Click here to purchase them ($22/person, which may seem steep, or may seem like a BARGAIN depending on the strength of your pumpkin-love).
Being “real” New Yorkers, we didn’t have a car to drive to the BLAZE, but luckily for us, we have legs and unlimited metrocards. The only tickets left were for 9 pm, so we embarked on our Pumpkin Journey at 6:45 pm just to be safe. We took the 1 train to 225th street, then hopped on the MetroNorth for a 45-minute ride deep into the burbs, $11 round trip. Not bad! They didn’t even check our ticket on the way there. What a waste. Anyone want to go back? I’ve got a ticket!
One Subway down, one train to go!
Casual Sunday night in the Bronx.
2nd train. Worth it.
Anyway, after our journey, which included a 13-minute brisk walk along the highway, we found the entrance. They sold pumpkin EVERYTHING. From headbands with jack-o’-lantern antennae to pumpkin curry. Oh, and of course pumpkin pie. But before refreshments we had to walk through the jungle-o’-jack-o’-lanterns. Holy cow. You walk in and immediately see this massive bridge made of pumpkins, aptly named the Pumpkin-Zee Bridge, as well as a full-on Statue of Liberty (Statue of Pumpkin?). Van Cortland Manor was completely transformed with LED lights and thousands of intricately carved orange fruits. Yes, according to the FAQ page, they are fruits from the gourd family.
Pumpkin-Zee Bridge
Dragon-o-jack-o’-lanterns
Spider web of pumpkins and besties.
CHOO CHOOO! MORE PUMPKINS.
Spooky house with flash…
Spookier without.
More.
There is “spooky” music piped in throughout the manor, and the jack-o’-lanterns are organized by theme, from a huge spider web with spiders, to a walking dead/Sleepy Hollow graveyard. There are fish in the “water” on both sides of the Pumpkin-Zee Bridge, not to mention the many moving aspects. There’s a working grandfather clock made of pumpkins, as well as a fully functional carousel. Maybe not fully functional since we weren’t allowed to ride on it, but still. I was impressed.
Carousel a bit blurry because its MOVING.
Light show. Yes, those are all pumpkins.
Statue of Pumpkins.
That is a working grandfather clock.
Some of the pumpkins were super intricate. Especially the possums. I took so many photos my phone nearly died from pumpkin-overload.
Single pumpkin intricacy.
Look at those skills!
Multiple-pumpkin artistry.
After we made our way through the whole manor, we did some mandatory pumpkin-posing, as one does, and then we got some warm apple cider and a cider doughnut. TBH, this was 50% of the reason for going. Gotta get those cider doughnuts. It’s the official food of October! We made the long trek back to the city and arrived home after midnight. Some may say we are crazy, I just say we are incredibly passionate about the white betch cause. So was it worth it? You tell me!! How cute are my Instagram pics? These ones? How about this boomerang? #WorthIt.
The walking dead, and us. Dead in the eyes from the flash.
My boyfriend has many pitfalls, the main one, of course, being that he has an emoji for a face. But recently he has been KILLING the date-game, and I must give credit where credit is due. You may remember less than a month ago, when he surprised me with 4th row tickets to see The Book of Mormon in preparation for our trip to Utah. TBH, I didn’t think he could beat that.
He has asked me early last week for a “date night” on Friday. Color me impressed. That was already a huge improvement. Pre-planning a date? Allowing me more than 3 days’ notice to put it in my always-full social calendar? I was excited.
Friday morning, he texted me while I was at work and said, “I checked your calendar. You don’t have anything tomorrow morning, right?” That’s right, ladies and gents, we share Google calendars. We are the COOLEST couple of all time. But honestly, I don’t know what we would do if we didn’t; I have too many things going on! Luckily, I had nothing going on the next day, since the UF Football game was canceled due to Hurricane Irma.
Anyway, my interest was piqued. A date that requires no plans the next morning? Were we going on a trip? We don’t have a car! Were we going out super late? Sleep No More? He knows I get scared way too easily for that shiz.
I got home from work and he told me to pack a bag. SO EXCITING. I packed an outfit, a gator outfit for the next day (it doesn’t matter if they aren’t playing, #InAllKindsOfWeather), a swimsuit (you never know) and some makeup. Then we headed out to our chariot (aka our Via, SIGN UP WITH MY CODE emily5s6e for $10 off!) and he still kept it a mystery as we headed downtown. I cheated a little by looking on the Via’s GPS, but all I cleaned from my snooping was that we were going super far downtown.
We arrived at the Hilton Millennium hotel just as the sun was setting. My emoji-bf has many great qualities, one big one being he is a Hilton Honors Gold member, so we got the highest room available, on the 48th floor. The room was overlooking the Freedom Tower, the 9/11 Memorial reflecting pool, and the Oculus. I’d argue there is no better view within Manhattan. The best view of Manhattan is from New Jersey, but really, WHO GOES THERE!? The view of the Freedom Tower could not have been more timely, the weekend before 9/11. 16 years later and I still have so many feelings.
A little Pano-Action right before sundown.
I mean, COME ON.
9/11 Memorial Reflection Pool.
We settled into our room in the third-best Hilton Hotel in Manhattan, and checked out the room service menu. How do I know it was the third-best? Because emoji-man was very upset when he looked it up and found out. Turns out the Waldorf Astoria is #1 and The Conrad is #2, in case these things matter to you.
Anyway, the emoji-BF decided on this mystery date because of an Amex offer (more on his and my credit card churning another day), which said that if you spend $300 at a Hilton Hotel, you get $350 back. FREE MONEY! MY FAVORITE KIND! We needed to figure out a way to spend $40 more to get the offer, so we perused the room service menu for items to “fit the bill,” literally. Unfortunately, this is NYC and room service, a lethal combination. Nothing on the menu was that cheap. So we started looking for other options.
We decided to dine at Osteria della Pace, a southern Italian restaurant inside Eataly. The food was delicious and I had a glass of no. 139 dry rose cider, which was sort of like a sparkling rose champagne. Yum! What is one of the worst things that can happen while dining downtown within one of the World Trade Center buildings? OH YEAH. THE ALARM CAN START GOING OFF. And sure enough, it did. In the middle of appetizers, the lights started strobing and an announcement started. I’ve never seen New Yorkers shut up so quickly in my life. It was quieter than a subway at 5 am when everyone is still asleep. The only problem was, no one could understand the announcement! It was static-y and the guy speaking had a very strong accent. After about 30 seconds of heart-pounding panic, we heard one word, “disregard,” and there was a collective huge sigh of relief. Besides that, dinner was DELISH.
In bed waiting for some possible room service…
Trying to find an option besides uber-expensive room service.
Do I need to cover the back of his head with an emoji, too?
Such a pretty drink.
Oolalatte.
We decided to stop at the newly-opened Oculus on the way back to the hotel, since we had never been there before. We actually had no idea what it was, besides that it looked like an exoskeleton of an ENORMOUS animal. And that is cost a sh*tton of money to build (first budgeted at $2 billion, but rose to $3.9 billion by the end). We entered, and I was immediately dizzy. It’s crazy-looking! In between fighting people for a space to take a selfie – this is a V popular place for selfies, go figure – we realized it was a train station. It connects the NJ Path to the NYC subway. As I said before, I clearly never go to NJ since I did not know this. It smells there. Ok, it smells in NYC, too. But I digress.
Woah. Exoskeleton.
Very Dizzying.
We fought people for space for this one.
After our selfie, we went back to the hotel where we watched parts of 3 different movies on 3 different HBO channels. Remember life before HBO Now and Netflix? Where you had to tune into a movie in the middle? Those were rough times. Anyway, we also ordered a bottle of wine to reach our $300 minimum. The bottle was $45 (we are SO fancy), but with the extra added fees, it was $62. Those hotels are fee-machines. Oh well. We didn’t even open it, but we sure felt fancy getting it to our room! If anyone wants to come over to our apartment to share, no guarantees on quality.
So fancy!!
Our (unopened) bottle of expensive room service wine.
We went to sleep and planned to wake up to swim in the pool. Unfortunately, the best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry, i.e. we overslept. We packed our bags up and headed down to the checkout.
After following my Snapchat/Instagram story and seeing the hotel view, no less than three of my friends texted me asking if I was getting engaged. To set everyone straight, I definitely did not get engaged. But I DID have an awesome night with my emoji-faced boyfriend. And for the record, mister, you have officially set the bar incredibly high if you ever do plan to “pull out all the stops” in the future. WINK WINK NUDGE NUDGE. I sure hope you have another Amex Offer in the pipeline! In maybe a year. Or maybe more. 😉
Ladies and Gents, it’s looking more and more likely that the deadly Category 5 Hurricane Irma is headed toward South Florida and I am terrified for all of my friends. Also, I am GLUED to every meteorologist on twitter (Bryan Norcross, anyone?? What a silver/blond fox). Personally, I have been tracking the storm since Saturday, paying closer attention to the direction of the “cone of uncertainty” than I paid attention to any of my classes in college. Or high school. Or anything in my life, TBH. The one class I did pay extreme attention to in college: Extreme Weather; thanks UF for those interesting GenEd Science credits. I took that class the year of Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Wilma and I remember tracking them in class using cold and warm fronts, air pressure, wind speed and direction, altitude etc. Something about hurricane-tracking is mesmerizing. Maybe it’s the fact that we don’t really know where it’s going. We’ve all seen the meme about weathermen constantly being wrong.
Job security FTW.
Cones of super uncertainty.
At this point though, it’s pretty clear Florida is f*cked.
Or maybe it’s the fact that it’s the one major devastating weather pattern that we can actually track days in advance. Talk about Must-See-TV… The Weather Channel LIVES for this! And one week after Hurricane Harvey, too. I didn’t forget about the thousands of people affected by Harvey, but I have a much more personal connection to Florida, so Irma has been catching my eye.
Irma is already record-breaking, with sustained wind speeds of 185 MPH. As a point of reference, the Saffir-Simpson scale, which measures hurricanes (common knowledge for a Floridian), has 5 categories of hurricanes with 5 being the biggest. Category 4 is 130-157 MPH, which is a 27 point range. Category 5 is over 157. Irma is 185, 28 points above that. Basically, if a category 6 even existed, it would be that. That is terrifying.
I moved to South Florida in 1997, hot on the heels of the last huge category 5 hurricane that hit Florida, Hurricane Andrew. Andrew hit in 1992, so you may argue that 5 years later was not “hot on the heels,” but I would disagree. I remember specifically the real estate agent mentioning hurricanes when we were looking at houses, because it was still on everyone’s minds. Would a house withstand wind gusts of 100+ mph? If we get a house with 20-foot ceilings and 20-foot windows, as almost all two-story houses have in South Florida, who would put the hurricane shutters up? Are the windows hurricane-resistant? I distinctly remember these questions.
If you didn’t grow up in South Florida, or any hurricane-prone region, you probably think I am nuts. Alternatively, you think Florida peeps have it all figured out because you have seen all of the memes that Floridians post about “preparing for a hurricane” aka buying beer and wine and downplaying the whole thing. But I can tell you from my very selective Facebook sampling of my South Florida friends – they are all officially freaking the f*ck out. Many of them are using the popular hashtag #Irmagerd. I had one friend who saw two armed police officers guarding the new supply of water at the grocery store. I have another friend who woke up at 3 am to try and beat the lines and fill her car up with gas, only to wait 45 minutes in line and then find out that all of the pumps were empty.
Social media can be both bad and good in these times of crisis:
Bad: Group hysteria. Horror stories abound. Also, sometimes fake news is shared. Don’t tape your windows guys, come on. I thought this was common knowledge by now.
I have some fond memories of my hurricane-preparedness in South Florida, and luckily, a big one never hit. Rather, I should say I never personally experienced one. Hurricane Wilma was pretty big and my family lost power for over a week. Also, the back windows blew out and my mom and brother evacuated to Atlanta. I was already at college at the time, so I didn’t personally feel the effects. But the fact that a big one didn’t hit when I lived at home doesn’t mean we didn’t prepare for a big one more than once. I remember filling the bathtubs with water, filling the cars with gas, stocking our canned goods and readying our internal camp-out room. We used to uninstall the shelving from the closet underneath our stairs, line the floors with cushions, pillows and blankets, and settle down in our window-less bunker, waiting for the hurricane to pass. My brother and I used to love hanging out under the stairs. Once, we even convinced our mom to keep the pillows and blankets in there as a play fort for an entire week after the storm. Luckily for us, it was all fun and games. And luckily, we were smart enough to be prepared every time.
So to my Florida BFF’s, BE SAFE OUT THERE!! And keep making memes. If you laugh, it’s harder to cry. And if, FINGERS CROSSED, this thing takes a sharp turn east and misses you, please still prepare next time. Better safe than sorry. Build your blanket fort and grab your beef jerky and transistor radio. I’ll meet you under the stairs.
In case you live under a literal rock and never come out, yesterday there was a full solar eclipse across the United States. A solar eclipse is a celestial event in which the moon passes between the sun and the earth, and blocks the sun from view. We are in a unique position on Earth because it only happens because the sun is 400 times the size of the moon, and also 400 times further away. No other planet can enjoy this phenomenon, not like anyone is planning to travel to Neptune any time soon (remember when we had a space program? LOL). Anyway, if you are in the path of totality, it gets dark like nighttime in the middle of the day, and it lasts approximately 2 minutes and 40 seconds. A LOT of people I know traveled long distances to see this awesome event, the first full eclipse in the USA since 1979.
I didn’t leave the state (or the city), and unfortunately, we were only able to see a partial eclipse from New York City, but it was still a pretty amazing experience. One of the best things about this eclipse, IMO, was the full-out frenzy for eclipse glasses. According to NASA, you should never look directly at the sun (duh), so you needed these “ISO 12312-2 compliant pair of these special shades!” Quote from NASA, not me. There were different vendors like Warby Parker, and certain public libraries that were giving them away for free. There were some satirical conspiracy theories about how it was all an Amazon scam to get people to buy them. Again, in case you live under a rock and haven’t seen a million photos of these on social media, they basically look like the crappy paper glasses they used to give out at 3D IMAX movies, the ones that never actually stayed on your head, before they started using the actual plastic, recyclable ones. FYI, if you have extra eclipse glasses after yesterday, you can click here and learn how to donate or recycle them!
I loved the people crowdsourcing for eclipse glasses on Facebook and Twitter. Who knew we all loved astronomy so much? Honestly I hadn’t thought much about it since my Astronomy for Dummies class, freshman year of college to satisfy my GenEd Science credits. But as Monday got closer, my social media followers and followees starting ramping up for the eclipse, and I am totally guilty of getting wrapped up in it.
When I got to the office, I immediately went to NASA’s facebook page, where I heard they would be live broadcasting starting at 11 am. As the countdown to the first totality in Oregon went down by each second, I got more and more excited. I originally didn’t care about procuring glasses, I figured I’d just look straight at it, like an idiot, or use one of the other ingenious contraptions to see the sun’s shadow. Of course, I didn’t bother to make one of those contraptions. Once I had the NASA live feed up, I started to worry about not having the correct equipment. I walked down the hall in my office to ask around to see who had super special 3D movie glasses. THANKFULLY, a girl whose father loves science sent her 5 pairs. I made sure to have her come pick me up on her way to watch.
As the morning went on, my best friend on the west coast was sending me photos of the partial eclipse in Seattle, where she is, and of the total eclipse in Oregon, where her friend with an amazing photography hobby was. I was giddy with excitement. When I got outside, I was not disappointed. The sidewalks were filled with people with all different viewing contraptions, from cereal box pinhole viewers, to double paper plates, some colanders, a printout from the NASA website, and of course, the handy-dandy 3D movie/eclipse viewing glasses. Regulation, as per NASA.
Some kiddies on their way to watch the awesomeness.
Photo taken through regulation Eclipse Glasses.
We have all this technology and cereal boxes still work best.
Double paper plate shadow trick.
Awesome photo, thanks to the clouds.
Overall, I was incredibly impressed. It left me super jealous of my friends who traveled to see the totality, and I’m already thinking about how to get to Texas or Maine on April 8, 2024, when the next total solar eclipse is visible in North America.
My favorite part of the eclipse was possibly the social media aftermath and memes. And of course the fiasco and ridiculous memes after our Commander in Chief looked directly at it. Some of my favorite tweets:
Leaving the office for 15 minutes in the middle of the day, with an excuse no one could argue about.
The temperature dropped for a few minutes. Any respite from this heat, I will appreciate.
I got to socialize and meet other people in my office building, and strangers on the street.
Seeing Bonnie Tyler’s Total Eclipse of the Heart go to #1 on the iTunes chart. That’s a 2,859% increase in the U.S. and an 827% increase globally.
Seeing New Yorkers, in general, socializing with one another.
Looking at the packed streets in midtown via social media.
Forgetting for two short minutes that our entire country is going down the you-know-what.
Now back to our normally scheduled programming of antisocial behavior, looking down at our phones instead of up to the sky, and shielding our eyes with expensive shades instead of free paper ones from the library. Until next time in 2024!!
I spent the last week in Broomall, Pennsylvania, helping my mom out after she had a hip replacement surgery. Or in her words, I have spent the past week as a “full-time slave.” But TBH, this is not fair, because she is recovering incredibly quickly, and she really doesn’t need full time help at all. I did do 6 loads of laundry over the course of a week, but with my excessive amount of gym clothes, that’s not much more than a normal week for me.
By the time I arrived, 8 days post-surgery, she had already graduated from a walker to a cane, and she was walking around without much help at all, albeit at a slow pace. Also, she bought a grabber* from Amazon so when she dropped things, she could pick them up herself. Once she found where she had left her grabber, of course. We hung out at home, watched The Handmaid’s Tale (WTF!?), I read and finished a book (The Light We Lost, by Jill Santopolo, HIGHLY recommend), we ALMOST finished a 750-piece puzzle, AND we did crossword puzzles every day.
My first day there, BFF and Mommy, and puzzle!
Some backyard blogging action. #BlogginInTheBurbs
The puzzle, close to completion, on the day I left.
But we also left the house! We went on a lot of adventures to the mall, to the library, to a yard sale, to Moe’s (WELCOME TO MOE’S!), to Rita’s for 99 cent custard, to Staples, to Ross; basically we did a lot of shopping and eating. And a LOT of walking! She added on 500 steps/day on her fitbit, and by the time I left, we were up to 7,500/day! She was a walking machine.
First night in philly, big outing to Little Baby’s Ice Cream.
WELCOME TO MOE’s!
99 cent frozen custard for National Frozen Custard Day!
Our outing to the mall, where I bought things I shouldn’t have. Thanks mommy!
However, there were definitely still things she needed help with, and I was happy to help. I don’t take my working body for granted, especially since I tend to sprain my ankle at least once annually. But this experience definitely opened my eyes some more to what would happen if I needed help because my joints weren’t working at 100%. What would you not be able to do if you couldn’t bend more than 45 degrees? Here’s a short list in all of its hilarity:
Dry the bottoms of your legs. Nothing like having wet calves. Drip dry anyone?
Shave the bottoms of your legs. I’m now a pro. Also, I have learned that I shave OTHER people’s legs much more carefully than I shave my own. On my own, I usually miss an entire strip of hair. Or 3.
See anything on the bottom shelf of the refrigerator. It was a true (smelly) adventure going through the contents of the bottom shelves. And don’t get me started on the contents of the drawers. The grabber couldn’t slide them open.
Carry heavy things. This was my second workout after my free trial pass at Anytime Fitness. Did you read that blog post?
Put on socks and shoes. To bunny ears, or not to bunny ears? After 25+ years of tying my own shoes, it was backwards and took me a few times tying my mom’s to realize it was the same as when I tie a hair ribbon in my hair. Which I still do at least 3 times a week. Yes, I am 30.
Pick up a roll of paper towels. Again, grabber was no good here. Maybe we should return it to Amazon.
Drive. This was a big one. It is rare that a New Yorker who has not driven in almost a year is the driver of choice, but by process of elimination, it was true. I think I make a damn good chauffeur, too. Maybe my mom is even starting to like hip hop. Maybe not. I was jammin’ to Q102, Philly’s #1 Hit Music Station. I think I finally know all the words of Despacito.
Anyway, my life of servitude has officially come to an end, and I am back in NYC, the smelly land of rotting garbage and effed up public transit due to drunk people on the train tracks. Unfortunately, this also means I need to start paying for my own meals and clothes again. I’d do someone else’s laundry for free shopping trips any day of the week. Hell, I do my bf’s for free! Should I move back home? Thoughts?
*”grabber” (n.) (gra-ber) – a term of art. Not its given name according to amazon.
As I write this, I have earbuds in my ears and I have air traffic control headphones on over my earbuds. Am I at an airport directing planes to their gates? FALSE. I am sitting at my desk in my office. While 20 construction workers are literally drilling into the wall outside my window. I can see them. In fact, last week, one of them was texting and I could actually read the words in his text. That’s how close they are. One guy left his iced coffee right outside my coworker’s window yesterday and she almost grabbed it for herself.
Typical morning here at the office.
Taken right after he waved to me. We are friends.
No caption needed.
Just a couple work permits.
Was this construction completely unplanned? No. But does that make it any better? ALSO NO. I did not know when I started working at this non-profit in a seminary that I would be dealing with asbestos warnings posted in the lobby. Nor did I know that I would be learning the very important skill of typing on a keyboard that literally vibrates from a drill as I type. So exciting. I’ve never been within centimeters of a blowtorch before. How enthralling. This is all very thick sarcasm. In case you didn’t catch that.
The access to the elevator on our floor has been cut off for 6 weeks and counting. The original warning email they sent said that “work will proceed in the hallway on Wednesday June 7th.” It went on to say that the elevators would not stop on our floor “while this work is in progress.” At first skim, it looks like it will only be for one day. June 7th. Well here I am on July 20th, and there is no sign of it being finished anytime soon. Now, I know I am a fitness instructor and that these stairs should not be a problem. I take the elevator to another floor, then go up a flight. But after teaching 4 spin classes in 2 days, that single flight of stairs may as well be the Mayan ruins. And the last thing I want to do is three flights of stairs every time I have to use the restroom. I almost cut down on my coffee consumption for this reason. ALMOST.
Speaking of teaching fitness classes, I change clothes at work 3-4 time/week to teach at the gym. Sometimes when I am running late, I use our empty conference room as a changing room. I always make sure the door is locked. But of course I sometimes forget that there are now men scaling the exterior walls of the building. Two weeks ago, one of those men got more than he bargained for while walking outside the conference room on newly-erected scaffolding. No pun intended. Good thing they wear harnesses.
Asbestos Abatement. NBD.
Another one of my good friends.
Anyone need some duct tape?
Another day, another air traffic control look.
The blocked off hallway to the elevator.
The stairs are not even the tip of the iceberg. There is smoke. A lot of it. Here is an actual excerpt of an email I sent the head of Facilities Management:
There is quite a bit of smoke throughout the hallways. It is visible to the eye, it looks like it’s foggy. Also, the fact that the people doing the work are wearing welding masks, and keep walking through the halls, and yet nothing has been done to protect the people working here for 9 hours each day is alarming.
They have repeatedly told us that it is “not dangerous,” but I can’t help but wonder why the workers are wearing masks. And a girl who works on my floor and is pregnant has started to take an alternative stairwell to avoid the smoke. For now, there’s not much I can do, and from what they tell us, it’s only going to get worse. They have barely even broken ground on the new building yet! This is just “prep work.” Kill me. Since I am here for the long haul, I guess I need to get used to wearing air traffic control headgear to the office, and try to be optimistic.
Here are a few positives I can glean from this experience:
I know how to work a blowtorch, simply from my extensive observation.
My calves are lookin’ GREAT from all the stairs.
There’s never a dull moment. The people walking by my office are always carrying fun things: steel beams, piping, insulation, etc. Sometimes all three!
I like to think I make some of these guys’ days when they accidentally see me in various stages of undress.
If I die from asbestos, I can tell my mom to stop worrying about liver cirrhosis from my drinking.
I never have to answer the phone; I can’t hear it ring!
There are a lot of cute guys walking around the building. The rabbis weren’t cutting it.
It makes me more thankful that I have air conditioning, looking at the guys outside sweating (even though we have been instructed not to use the AC on certain days when welding fumes from the scaffolding will be “too intense”).
If you need me, comment below, and don’t call as I will not be able to hear the phone! I’m well on my way to Career #5: Air traffic controller.
