The Daily Bite: November 2001

Thursday, November 29, 2001

Feeling Better

After lots of sleep, Niquil and chicken noodle soup, I'm finally feeling better. I still feel like my head is hollow and my words reverborate through my head, but at least I can breathe through both nostrils.

Got a flu shot today too. If this stinkin little cold made me feel so bad AND made Chuck worry that I had Anthrax, then imagine what the flu would do!

On a side note, if and when my face is ever zit-free again, I think I'm going to throw a party. Right now I look like a clumsy vampire tried to bite my forehead. Ugh!

Tuesday, November 27, 2001

Sicky

I hab a code. Hobe sick. Yuck...

Saturday, November 24, 2001

Estamos indo a Brasil

Thanks to a very generous invitation by Daniela and her family, Chuckie and I are going to Brasil!! We are going for 2 weeks over New Years, to both Sao Paulo and to her parent's beach house on the ocean. It looks like paradise. I am sooooo excited! I've never been anywhere outside of North America.

New Year's Eve will be wonderful. Daniela has told me a little bit about the customs... you wear all white and at midnight you wade into the water... This will all bring good luck. There is also a tradition involving underwear, but I'll have to brush up on the details. I know that it must be new and you wear a specific color to bring you love, money or health. I'll be wearing the color for money (no, it's not green).

Here are pics from Daniela's site of the beach where her parents have a house (now you can see why I'm so excited!):

Mmmmmmm

Well, Thanksgiving was great this year. My stepdad makes the best damn turkey and gravy! My stuffing came out good too, but the Double Layer Pumpkin Cheesecake was an even bigger hit.

Tuesday, November 20, 2001

Pumpkin Pie

Well Natalie, now I'm baking pumpkin pie (for tomorrow and thursday) and it smells yummy. Of course it's courtesy of Mrs. Smiths, nothing homemade. I will be making, from scratch, Double Layer Pumpkin Cheesecake (Grammy goes nuts for it) and I'm even going to try my hand at homemade stuffing - after tasting how yummy Sarah's turned out. If it comes out bad, there's always Stove Top =-)

Monday, November 19, 2001

Birthday Bash

This birthday had to be one of the best ever! It got kicked off to a great start with the visit to Daniela and Su in CA and ended in a finale of owls and wizards. I was showered with gifts, cards, and good wishes, ate lots of cake, and got a GORGEOUS bouquet of velvety red roses from hubby (from Arenas!!).

On Thursday, I had dinner with the family at Gram's. My Uncle and his girlfriend got me an adorable little plant. After I raved about it, Gram came out of the kitchen, saw it, picked it up and exclaimed, "thank you! thank you! thank you! Is this for me?" Nobody could speak... we didn't have the heart to tell her... but she quickly figured it out and started giggling... we all had quite a laugh over it.

Friday was my actual birthday. After getting spoiled at work, we met everyone out for dinner at Jack Astors. I couldn't believe how many people showed! It was Jenny & Aaron, Abby, Matt, Andy, Sarah & Denis, Jo & Steve, Joel & Lara & Hannah (she's such a cutie pie), Kenn & Jen, Tony & Ange, and of course Chuckie. The "Astors" made me get up on a chair, stand like a teapot, pointed out to the whole place that I was turning 21 (I told the guy I was turning 33, he lied FOR me... I liked him after that), and sang a version of "I'm a Little Teapot". How embarrasing! But fun. Jenny coordinated it and set the locale, so she'll be the one I seek revenge upon ;-) Not sure any place in Rochester embarrasses you MORE than Jack Astors, but I have a few months to find out!

Then most of us went to see Harry Potter (thanks to Matt for ordering tix online and making life easier). Not as amazing as it was hyped to be, but a good movie. I think it may be better to people who haven't read the book... I was thinking too much about what matched, what didn't, what was going to happen next... etc. I give it a 7.

Thank you again to my family and friends who all made me feel very special. I am a lucky girl!

Friday, November 16, 2001

Blessed

I am truly blessed with a wonderful hubby, a loving family, and kind, thoughtful friends.

Thanks for all the birthday wishes and cool gifts and a dozen long stemmed red roses from hubby, too!!

More to come... for now I have to run off to an evening planned with fun and frolic.

Wednesday, November 14, 2001

IQ

I took an online IQ test this evening. Got 138. The site says: A person whose IQ score falls in the range of 129-143 is considered to be "highly intelligent". But considering Madonna got 140, I don't feel too great about myself right now.

...I took it again and got 158. Now I'm "gifted". THATS more like it! Left Madonna in the dust and I'm catchin up to Bill Gates.

Is taking it again cheating?

Oops

Oops, I think I left off a quote in the image tag in my last post (the one entitled Zit Face). It screwed up the post and now I can't edit it.

Anyhoo, THIS is what I look like today:

I thought one of the benefits of getting older was no more zits. I was sadly mistaken.

Zit Face

This is what I look like today:

Zit Face

This is what I look like today:

Tuesday, November 13, 2001

Nickelhead

My Mom finally has internet access at work and is now reading my blog. She told me today that she had an early birthday present but wanted to tell me about it so I wouldn't go buy it. I said, "ok, what is it?". She said, "Nickelhead." I said, "you mean Nickelback?" Hee hee.

Yep, Mom read my blog and saw that I was wanting the CD. Hmmm. I'll have to try hard not to abuse my blogger power to manipulate my Mom into buying me stuff =)

Monday, November 12, 2001

Chat with Me

I used this Liveperson chat tool today to talk to an advisor at RIT. It was very cool. They have a 6-day free trial. Good luck actually catching me online and able to chat, but I thought it'd be fun to try.

So if you see the little button on the left say "click to talk with me LIVE" sometime this week, give it a shot!

Mike Wazowski

A gang of us went to see Monsters, Inc. Friday night. I usually have a hard time with animated movies when I recognize the voice, but I guess I'm getting used to it. It was a very cute movie. My absolute favorite thing was Little Mikey - Mike Wazowski's (the eyeball) stuffed monster doll.

Smooth Goodness

This weekend I also tried my new Soy Body Facial by Get Fresh. It's supposed to get rid of "yucky skin texture", but I bought it because you can use it like a mask (slather it on and let it dry), then jump in the shower and it lathers up like a body wash. Dual purpose spa products... aaahhhh.

I did notice an improvement in my arms but let's face it. I don't really try all these spa products because I think they'll work. I like them because they smell so yummy and feel so good. Hello, my name is Tina and I'm a spa product addict.

Friday, November 09, 2001

I'm an Icon

THANK YOU to Jenny for creating an iconic version of me. She was doing some cute caricatures for work and I seemed to be the only one who noticed that she had a starring role. I then said, "me too, me too, me too" and within 10 minutes, I'm ready for my role on South Park.

And finally, here's a decent picture of me and hubby from my sister's wedding. Though I think the digitization process made Chuck look a little funky.

Breakfast at Tiffany's anyone?

Thursday, November 08, 2001

TI 2

So, was I the only sap who watched Temptation Island 2 last night? I didn't mean to, it was an accident. I just wanted to relax a bit then on to other things, but there it was, in my face, TEMPTING me to watch it all.

Jenny's not the only one addicted to tv. Chuck asked me last night if I thought I was a couch potato. I think he thought I'd deny it. I said, "yes, I am. I am a tv-addicted couch potato." He said at least I admit it, that's the first step. TV Addicts Anonymous, here we come. Do you think they meet someplace that has cable?

Aaaaaaaahhhhh

I am going to bite you and keel you with my eye "lasers"

Thanks to Natalie for the great link to the kitties (the cute ones and the insane looking ones =).

Mac Attack

My new computer (my Mac at work) crashes at LEAST 5 times a day!! In calling Apple support, I had to recite my serial#. For security purposes, I won't type the whole thing, but this is a significant portion of it: FCKSD

I think that's an omen about my relationship with my Mac.

Tuesday, November 06, 2001

Sooo Tired

Despite the fact I could barely stay conscious on my drive home at 9:30pm last night, I still stayed up until after midnight. Ugh. Time to check into the sleep disorder clinic. Today, I am suffering.

Monday, November 05, 2001

I'm Baaack

Back to the burbs for me. I had a great time in San Fran visiting Yelli, Su and H. Heidi cracks me up. I got her a little gifty of nail polish, without realizing she's a bit "different" when it comes to beauty products. She swore she could barely lift her drink from the extra weight on her fingernails. This makes her very different from Jenny, despite evidence to the contrary, because though Jenny doesn't wear alot of makeup, she's still very much a beauty-product-addicted-girly-girl like me.

Oh Deer

My drive home is like being in a Deer Hunter video game. They're everywhere, just waiting to walk across the road and be mowed down. I find myself compelled to slow down, roll down my window, and yell at them like I'm their mother, "get away from the road! Go back into the forest! Go on, shoo, shoo!"

I wish there was someway to signal oncoming vehicles that there are deer near the road. I flash my brighties a few times, but I think the other drivers just think I'm an a**hole who's blinding them. When they get closer, I make little hoppy signals with my hand, but I don't think they can see me. Guess I'll have to invent some kind of warning gizmo and become rich and open Jamba Juices throughout the western NY for those I leave behind as I move to LA and become a professional shopper and fly to San Fran every week to go out with Yelli.

Friday, November 02, 2001

Weekend in California

The Daniela-Tina-Birthday-Halloween-Brazilian-Party on Friday night was very cool. I had a few Caipirinhas, but I made them myself so they were mostly sugar, not alot of alcohol. Good thing. Daniela's friends are very funny, particularly Heidi and Jason. Even with all the Caipirinhas I made him, we couldn't get Jason to put on his Zorro costume, but we did joke that he was going to put it on and stand in front of Target, saying something (in a very authentic latin accent) like, "allo, welcome to Target. I am slashing prices today."

We had a great time this Saturday too. Daniela hit on the main points of interest. While we were at the Irish pub with the Russian bouncer, we watched a couple, who appeared to be from Utah, who also seemed to think it was 1985 and they were starring in Flashdance, kick it up on the dance floor. I mean this girl had her hair flying up like she was an astronaut. I got an ab workout from laughing. At the second Irish Pub/Disco dance club, Daniela got the most CLASSIC line from a faux Irish guy named Damon. Here's how it went down:

Damon to Daniela (in a fake Irish accent, making him appear authentic): "Do you have a little Irish in you?"
Daniela: "No"
Damon: "Would you like some?"
Tina thinking: "Oh SNAP, he just laid the oldest line in the book on her."

It took me a while to realize he was not actually Irish, especially since he spoke pretty good French to Su before he went back to his Indiana wonder bread boy accent. I think after he said "I'm corn-fed and hand spanked", I realized he was just a drunk jerk.

Daniela told me later that she should've replied, "yes, it was very little and I didn't like it."

Heaven Can Wait

I'm made it to San Francisco, no terrorist attacks or plane crashes. Daniela picked me up and luckily, we did NOT (and will NOT) have to drive on any bridges!

I had Jamba Juice today, a Razzmatazz with a Vita Boost. Happy, happy girl.