In the Pink

There are things that some people care about that other people don't.
Though i appreciate a beautifully made bed with matching pillow shams and throw pillows and dust ruffle, etc, i simply can't be bothered. At one time i had the whole bed ensemble, but now i am happy with just my fuzzy blanket.
Don't get me wrong, i make my bed every day, it just isn't pretty.
My sheet is purple, my blanket is brown and i keep 2 extra blankets at the foot for cold nights - one is pink and the other is yellow. As long as i am snug i don't really care that it is a mismatched mess.
I normally take the linens off of my bed, wash them and put them right back on; yesterday, after i stripped the bed i didn't get around the laundry so i had to dig around in the closet to find other sheets. I dug and dug and dug and finally found some; i think i've only used these sheets once in the entire time i've lived in this apartment.
Then i had to grab another blanket from the living room cause my fuzzy brown blanket is being repaired (part of the binding came undone).
In the middle of the night i was a bit cold so i reached down and grabbed one of the extra blankets in the dark and once i was wrapped up i fell right back asleep.
Imagine my surprise when i woke up this morning, got out of bed and looked down to see a nest of pink!
I didn't realize that inadvertently i had picked all matching bedding.
No wonder i had good dreams, surrounded by fluffy pink on every side.
It made me laugh first thing this morning and set the tone for the rest of the day: the High Holy Day of the Nikiverse, my birthday.
Yes, right after noon my odometer turns to 39 years.
Have a piece of cake today on me - i declare all desserts calorie-free for the next 24 hours!
Enjoy.

yet another note to self

The pharmacy closes early on both weekend days. You wouldn't think so, but it does. Not knowing that info means that, hypothetically, you might not be able to pick up your prescription. Which means that, hypothetically, you could be without your vertigo meds for over 24 hours. Good luck with that - hypothetically.

VooDoo Doughnut Too

When i travel i only do a little bit of research and planning.
I like to have a few goals in mind, a few must see and/or do things for the visit, but without so much information that it takes the adventure out of it. When i go to a new place i like to explore and discover which is easier to do if you have something that you are trying to find: it's like a scavenger hunt.
At the top of my list for Portland was Voodoo Doughnut. A team member told me about it after seeing it on Food Network. After perusing the website it looked fun, weird and different, plus it involves pastries so i was all in.
Apparently, so is the rest of the world.
On an airport run (i had a rental car so i did some wedding chauffeuring) before the reception I detoured through downtown to get a feel for Portland and to look for the Voodoo Doughnut. After much searching and U-turns i found it in a non-descript cinder block building that anyone would have driven past, if it hadn't been for the line. People were out the door, down the block and around the corner.
DANG!
I had to get Francie's friend Amna to the airport so there was no time to stop and wait through that mess. But, it was a beautiful, sunny Saturday afternoon so it made sense that it would be mobbed. The next time there was room in the schedule for me to try again was Sunday night around 10:00. It is open 24 hours a day. Surely, there would be less people then and there were: the line only went out the door and down the block.  
Screw that noise. 
Luckily, i knew there is a second location, called Voodoo Doughnut Too that is open 21 hours a day (closed 3am-6am). Francie's step-sister Lynn had gone there earlier in the day and said that there was no crowd, so i set off to find it, armed with the address and a rental car city map.
Oh, and i knew it was a pink building, though in the dark i didn't know if that would help me.
There was a lot of driving and searching and turning because a river runs through the middle of Portland, but the city planners thought it wise to have the same road name on both sides of the river even though they don't connect.
Good choice, fellas.
But i was on the hunt and finally found it.
Yep, that's pink alright.
Even from the parking lot i knew that this place had character.  
Hello, Ivy Monster on the fence.
Can you say crazy town?
That pretty much describes the oddly lit, oddly colored, walls covered in bits and bobs, crazy collection of furniture interior of Voodoo Too. It was all i had hoped for, but I was so overwhelmed by the sights and smells that i forgot to take a lot of scenery pictures.
The one thing that i looked for specifically to take its picture, though, was a velvet Elvis because at the original location you can get married under the velvet Elvis. Alas, the King was not in the building.
BUT, much to my great joy there was something not only as good as a velvet Elvis, but actually a little better due to the rare nature of the piece:  
YES - velvet Kenny Rogers!!!!!!!
I thought that i might have been hallucinating when i saw him, but there was quite a bit of Kenny Rogers paraphernalia around the place so i knew it was true.
How can...? Where did...? Why don't I...?
I want to get married under the velvet Kenny Rogers; heck, i want to live under the velvet Kenny Rogers. How could something so pure, so wonderful, so bizarre exist and i didn't know about it until now? I wanted to call Mel and squeal with glee into the phone (you see, Kenny has never wronged us), but i realized that it was 1:30 in the morning in North Carolina and that might not be such a good idea.
sigh...
I settled for a photo of the silver-haired magnificence and eating my doughnut at a table facing the velvet Kenny Rogers.
Speaking of doughnuts... there were a lot to choose from, including a whole shelf of vegan varieties. I went in thinking that i wanted the one with Captain Crunch on it (far left in the picture), but then became fascinated by the Tex-ass Challenge. If you can eat that huge, honking doughnut in under 90 seconds, it is free.
I was mesmerized by its size.
The employee on the counter said that she had only seen 2 people ever do it, though many had tried - most of them drunk at the time.
In the end, i decided that the huge one would be ridiculous cause i wasn't that hungry and that local places like the Fractured Prune might have the Captain Crunch one so i went with a Voodoo Doughnut signature pastry: Doesn't he look a fright?
I just love the pretzel voodoo pin sticking out of his chest. Not only was it hilarious, but it was tasty. After eating his head first (of course) and then his arms, i bit into his body to find that it had a jelly center.
teehee
This was the last thing i did in Portland since i flew out early the next morning.
[yet it is the first thing to get posted on the blog; hmmmm...]
It was getting late, given all of the weekend activities and my level of tiredness, but i am really glad that i found Voodoo Too. Now i just need to figure out how to get the velvet Kenny Rogers out the door next time...

State #33

In the new thing category for April we can add visiting a new state.

Done and done.

mobs of people - pioneer style

Last night i went to a book signing with the Pioneer Woman, Ree Drummond.
I've read her blog for a few years and really enjoy her recipes so when i found out that she was going to be in Fairfax, VA i decided to go. I had several important meeting yesterday that couldn't be postponed so i couldn't leave work until 3:30. I figured on afternoon traffic so the plan was to get there at 5:30, but the traffic gods smiled on me and i got there at 5:00.
Good thing, too.
Arriving 1 hour before the scheduled start time, i received ticket number 200. Wow; there were a lot of people there. It was a bit of a mob because the bookstore only anticipated 50-100 people. Really? In fact the manager had never heard of her and apparently didn't look her up. Don't you think that if you are hosting a book signing that you would want to know more about the author than her publicity blurb? Though the staff seemed a bit shell-shocked, the crowd was mostly well behaved and jovial.
Of course, if you are 5'3" the event looks like this:
I brought a book to read while we milled about waiting. Almost on time the manager did an introduction and the Pioneer Woman emerged. At least i assume she did cause people clapped, hundreds of cameras started flashing and someone with a different voice started speaking.
Let's see if we can find her by holding the camera up over my head:
There she is!
  - over there, see?
 I was surprised by how soft-spoken Ree is; you would expect someone louder given her writing style. Also her accent was interesting, not really strong and sort of a mix between midwest and southern (which i guess if you look at the position of Oklahoma in the country, makes sense). She spoke for a few minutes, took a couple questions and got to the signing pretty quickly. They called us by color tickets (50 tickets to a color) to line up. By my count they had at least 8 color groups so there the line snaked in and out and around every corner of the store.
It was kinda crazy.
Every once in a while as you turned a corner you could see progress:
is that the signing table?
Yes, it was a long time to stand around and be in maze-like queues and yes, it got hot and stuffy and yes, some people don't seem to understand that if their Screechy McWhiny toddler goes off like an ear-piercing fire alarm every 10 minutes for a sustained 7 minute scream they should Go Home because he is not gonna calm down and yes, some people thought it appropriate to get five books signed at once (sure i can see 2 - if i had the money i certainly would have gotten my beloved BFF one and maybe even 3 if you had 2 sisters, but don't you think FIVE is kinda selfish and ridiculous considering that there are at least 400 people in line?), but overall it was a fun experience.
I like the communal experience of large groups of people that are all interested in the same thing (sporting events come to mind) cause it is easy to start chatting with complete strangers. I like watching group dynamics. Plus, i was able to read 163 pages of my book.
And, in the end, i did indeed get my cookbook signed by the author who was gracious and took a minute to not only chat with each person she saw, but had someone (publicist, maybe?) ready to take a picture on your camera. [and i just realized that i get to count this as a new thing in May as i have never gone to a book signing before!]

adventures in floristry

You might recall that a few months ago i took a lesson in creating boutonnieres in preparation for Francie's wedding a week ago. Joan had used a specific finishing spray that kept the flowers lovely in my fridge for over a month. I, of course, took a picture of it so that i could get some for the wedding flowers. See? There it is. Obviously it exists because i have a picture of it, but when i went to purchase some at my local craft store - nada. Okay, i tried a different store. Nope. Okay, maybe it needs to be purchased through a florist. No. Okay, maybe through a florist supplier. Success! Oh wait... all those places are in the UK. Jeez Louise - I couldn't find this stuff anywhere. Two days before i left for Portland i was starting to get a bit frantic. What if i couldn't find finishing spray? What if the flowers wilted? What if the wedding was a disaster because I screwed up the flowers?!?!? In a last ditch effort i went to a local florist - they were closed. I tried another florist - they were closed. So the day before i am supposed to fly across the country i finally get into a florist shop. The very nice ladies there knew what i was talking about, but didn't have the same brand i was looking for; they had another brand and it can only be bought through a supplier by a florist. Great. Taking pity on me they sold me a partial bottle that they had in the back, though the receipt says $10 cut flowers. Sneaky Success! Now, how to get it to Portland... This should work. I put each bottle in a separate bag in a separate suitcase so that one way or another there would be finishing spray with me. Francie was in charge of having an empty spray bottle waiting for me. Thursday evening i picked up the flowers from her apartment after dinner and took them back to my hotel room for their pre-wiring overnight feeding and watering. Since they will be out of water for the entire wedding day, you have to trim them, cut them and soak them in hot water with plant food, followed by warmish water for at least 8 hours. Luckily, my bathroom had plenty of counter space right next to the sink and bathtub. I can only imagine what my housekeeper thought when she cleaned up all of the floral debris the next day. [so about that lilac - Francie loves lilac and it was in bloom in Portland so she hunted and hunted to find a tree that wasn't on private property to take a cutting. I was going to work it into her flowers and dutifully carried it from place to place to place for 2 days, but try as i might to keep them alive, they expired the morning of the wedding.] On Friday, all of the bride's attendants, along with a few friends and her mom joined Francie at the church hall to cook the reception food (pictures in a separate post) and i brought along the flowers so that i could do them with company. Look at the concentration, people. The night before i had had horrible dreams about ruining the flowers, but in reality it turned out okay. I did 2 bridesmaids bouquets, a maid of honor bouquet, 5 boutonnieres and 3 corsages while the ladies cooked. By the time we had to pack up for everyone to go to the rehearsal i still hadn't finished Francie's bouquet so i took stuff back to the hotel and finished it that night. Also, i did the ribbon wraps on all four bouquets that night after the rehearsal dinner and bridal shower (mayhaps it was the next morning by that point), but have no pictures of that step because of the late, late, late hour. It was quite an experience putting together the flowers for the bridal party, well outside my fields of expertise or comfort level. Though i worried and worried and fretted about every little thing, it was cool to have to stretch myself and try something different. The only downside is that as i finished the last bouquet i finally felt like i knew what i was doing. I almost, almost, wish that i had a chance to do it over again cause now i know i could do an even better job.

science fair

I heart science fair season. Really, i do. You know that my favorite thing at this one science fair we go to every year are the trash robot models. Unbelievably there were NO trash robots this year. sigh... BUT, there was this giant styrofoam ant which totally made up for it. Check out those mandibles! I also saw one of the greatest projects, ever. It was about comparative weights and using percentages, which sounds really uninteresting, but the author used herself as the object. I now know that this student weights the same as 72,800 Q-Tips. Good to know There is always something that makes me smile while strolling the project lanes, like this background board that was not only well laid out and informative, but included the imperative piece of information that this student does indeed love science. It is an empirical fact - the board says so.

just a taste

Here is my super quick, one-photo impression of Portland:

I believe quirky just about covers it.
I felt right at home.
[this fish-mobile was parked next to the Jack-in-the-Box drive thru; i'm unclear what it was or why it was there; it made me smile]

do these things happen at your job?

One day before i left for Portland i came in to work and TM Sam told me that a bus had run over a fire hydrant and gotten stuck. Really. Then we had a discussion about National Cheese Ball Day and how her mom, the Senior Director of Visitor Services had received some cheese balls for the festivities. SOME?!?!?! Well, i would say so!

Swirling Madness

I am home from Oregon. The trip was fun and the wedding lovely. However, between the time zone difference and various unfolding dramas at work i have been dealing with a maelstrom of insanity. By the time i got home from work last night i was so distraught and mentally fried that i thought i was hallucinating when i walked up my front stairs and caught a glimpse of red out of the corner of my eye What the @#$*? ummmm... - that's Santa Claus. Santa Claus holding a tray. Santa Claus holding a tray on my front porch. Santa Claus holding a tray on my front porch in April. Santa Claus holding a tray on my front porch in April, that wasn't there when i left for work at 6:25am. What? Where? Who? How? WHY??? It is the perfect metaphor for the current state of the Nikiverse. Once i get everything sorted out i'll post pictures from the wedding and various west coast adventures, plus attend to the 5 posts that i already had half-written in the queue before i left. Wish me luck.