Baxter Bark Twice

Do as I say, never as I do

Archive for the ‘Arbitrary’ Category

« Previous Entries
Next Entries »

Seattle: The Sunshine State

Posted by AllieB on July 30, 2012

Should you find yourself planning a trip with me that includes flying on an airplane, do yourself a favor and don’t. Or at least book a different flight; it’s become glaringly obvious that I am the proverbial black cat of air travel. Exhibit A: the woman who died on my plane to my France. That sucked. I know it was way worse for her, obviously, and her loved ones, but it was no picnic for yours truly, either. Exhibit B: my flight to Seattle last week. I was in an exit row, enjoying the leg room and another chilling Lisa Gardner mystery, when I heard a loud thud. I didn’t even look up – I already knew I wanted nothing to do with what was happening. Sure enough, a woman had passed out standing up and fell down, breaking her pelvis in the process. Having no medical background, I didn’t feel the need to join the crowd gathering around her, and I figured someone had to man the exit row anyway…I’m not totally useless in emergency situations, but I’ve learned that sometimes it’s best to just stay clear of the fracas. I guess Exhibit B isn’t so bad, and had I been sitting elsewhere on the plane I probably wouldn’t have even known about the incident, but that’s kind of my point – I always seem to be in close proximity to ground zero of the trauma.

Anyway – Seattle! Great city. We even had awesome weather, which is kind of unheard of given there is some sort of precipitation 220 days out of the year. Bleak. Here are some pics. Neat.

Vistas! Elliot Bay; Space Needle at night; Mt. Ranier

if you don’t love sea otters, you are probably dead inside

I tried on Avatar shoes at an Avatar exhibit – they fit perfectly :|

The end. It was great having all six of us together, and I even got to see NANDI – good times, y’all, good times…

Now I have to move out of my apartment, and I have no idea where to start. Moving is the worst. Does anyone want to buy a couch/table/bed/dresser/another table/rug/rug again/arm chair? A, the tv’s got your name on it…let me know.

Oh. I was WILDLY incorrect re: my crush on Ryan Lochte. Retract!!! In spite of winning first place on Saturday, he is nevertheless a complete and total LOSER. I think it surprises no one that he lives in…wait for it…Gainesville, Florida. He would. And it gets worse! I just goog’ed Ryan Lochte grill and it turns out he has several and has been wearing them at medal ceremonies for years – it seems that custom-made bedazzled grills are his “thing”…I just threw up a little.

“Yes, I am wearing one in London, and I wear them because they are different and fun. That’s my personality,” Ryan told USA Today.

And on that note, I bid you farewell. Take solace in the fact that, no matter how mis your Monday is, at least you’re cooler than this guy. You might not be in as good shape as he is and you probably have fewer Olympic medals, but you’re definitely cooler.

Posted in Arbitrary | Tagged: , , , , , , | 4 Comments »

The end of just so many eras

Posted by AllieB on July 25, 2012

Honestly, I’m glad I’m moving because too many things are changing around here. I don’t prefer change unless I instigate it, so when people suddenly start doing things that they haven’t previously done, I do not respond well. You may move, A and K, when I tell you you can move. Pants, you may purchase a home when given my stamp of approval. Erika, why did you come to Atlanta when you clearly should be in NYC – come with and we can continue our overly aggressive fun and breezy Saturdays there. I DO NOT PREFER CHANGE.

K and A are moving out of P’tree Mem, and, frankly, I am devastated. I didn’t realize they’d lived there for five years, so I suppose I understand relocating, but I do not like it. I’m glad y’all are moving into the same building and I’m glad, A, that you’re buying a sofa called the Kennedy, but that doesn’t make up for all the memories. A lot of stuff went down at #3 P’tree Mem; attention must be paid.

MEMORIEEEEES: Feb Bdays 2008 (?); A and K; BBT’s bday 2009

K, I find great humor in the fact that we’re both moving in with our parents for the month of August and, that, in a wonderful alignment of the stars, it just so happens that the Olympics are on. K and I were the #1 fans of the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, and for two weeks straight you could find us sandwiched in her living room easy chair eating Breyer’s Mint Chocolate Chip ice cream, cheering on the gymnastics team (KERI STRUG), and bird dogging Bob Costas. Looking back, I’m not real sure where that Bob Costas obsession came from…we were 12; whatever.

I’m seriously very excited about the Olympics: I love the swimming and gymnastics and track and field, and most of all I love the behind-the-scenes stories about the athletes and their heart-warming tales of hardship and eventual triumph complete with the fuzzy camera and melodramatic soundtrack….I love it. I even downloaded an Olympics app.

As I’ve previously mentioned, I am not a fan of The Bachelor/ette and I’d rather go play in traffic then sit through an episode of either/or, but even I took note of Emily Maynard’s wardrobe. She’s totally fake and ridiculous, but whoever was in charge of getting her dressed did a great job, even if her outfits were a little too outfit-y. You, too, can dress like Emily (credit: Lauren K. of the Q+DD) thanks to the vigilant research of The Possessionista. I think Emily went a bit far with the plastic surgery – she looks like a less intelligent Heidi Montag, something I heretofore did not think possible.

If you’re a Neiman Marcus devotee then you’ve already seen this, but the 2012 pre fall book featured a random Los Angeles vs Atlanta bit, and The Shepherd Center, an establishment many of us hold near and dear, got a pretty cool shoutout…Caro, if I don’t stop talking about you on this thing, people are going to start to wonder….

I also appreciate the H&F mention…I’m going to miss H&F…

That’s Tina and me being funny with the cured meats/pig carcasses at HF. I’m prematurely embracing my nostalgia; sorry I’m not sorry.

Enjoy today! Yesterday was National Tequila Day, but you can pretend like it’s National Tequila Week if you want.

Posted in Arbitrary | Tagged: , , , , , | 5 Comments »

Top 10

Posted by AllieB on July 13, 2012

When Lucy Chastain, owner of Xanadu Fine Art, a boutique art consulting firm, asked me to do a list of My Favorite Things for her company blog, I said, “sure!” And here it is. If you’re a devoted BBT reader, none of this will be brand new information…but for the sake of having two posts this week instead of one: happy reading.

1. Beverage: a summer time Shandy (credit; Carol Harrell). I like this southern (read: red-neck) spin on the English cocktail: light beer and frozen limeade. The alcohol content is very low, and it’s so refreshing – a perfect daytime, poolside beverage:

4 light beers to every can of frozen limeade. (I like Bud Light and Minute Maid Limeade).

Pour beer into a bowl, add limeade, mix. Voila.

Don’t let an aversion to watery light beer keep you from trying this tasty treat, but if you’re not convinced, I also love Moscow Mules (Esquire’s recipe).

 

2. Beauty: Oscar Blandi Dry Shampoo. The best of the best in this ever-growing market…everything else is just a knock-off.

3. Monthly Read: Vanity Fair. I love this magazine – it’s like the perfect hybrid of The Atlantic and People.

4. Trend: Neon. I’m not big on color, but I’ve come around on this…in small doses. Props to El and Caro for embracing neon so enthusiastically: respect.

Essie: off the shoulder

5. Dining: I love everything that has become the Westside in Atlanta – particularly the shopping (Free People, Anthropologie, Jonathan Adler) and the dining (JCT, Abattoir, Taqueria), but right now my favorite spot is The Optimist Fish Camp & Oyster Bar. It’s the newest venture from owners of JCT and No. 246 and is a great spot for cocktails, food, socializing…and maybe a few more cocktails. I actually wrote up a little review and posted it on Yelp – for reals, check it out. 

Photo from Atlanta Dish

6. Exercise: Flywheel/Flybarre. It’s as great as everyone says.

7. Travel: Australia. I studied abroad here in college and I look forward to going back someday. The Whitsunday Islands in between Sydney and The Great Barrier Reef are home to the most beautiful beaches I’ve ever seen, Whitehaven Beach in particular. In fact, it was recently named The Cleanest Beach in the World as well the Top Eco-Friendly Beach…so it’s got that going for it, which is nice.

The cool thing is that this is not a picture from Goog, but from my point and click disposable – it had like negative pixels and you can still tell how incredible this place is.

8. Easy Appetizer: Manchego cheese with honey. I fully intend to start cooking more one of these days, but til then I make-do with easy dishes that require zero preparation. This is a sure thing with pretty much any crowd – just be sure you have enough cheese.

To serve: One large piece of Manchego (I asked the guy at Whole Foods for a milder variety – there are several) on a platter with a bowl of honey for dipping/drizzling.

I suggest a cheese board and serving dishes from Scout for the Home.

 

9. Shop: Zara. I’ve never met a white blouse I didn’t like, and Zara always has several different styles at great  prices.

And it’s on sale! They’re having a huge sale right now, you should probably check it out. This actually pretty much sums up my uniform: jeans + white blouse.

10. Best Kept Secret: Full Cup Whole Wheat Chocolate Chip Cookies. They’re not even that bad for you – there’s no refined sugar or processed flour, but you’d never know it to taste one. I’m kind of a cookie snob, especially when it comes to chocolate chip, and I usually only like the homemade ones, but these are definitely an exception to the rule.

Honorable Mentions: pizza, Pour la Victoire pumps, Ryan Lochte, Game of Thrones, Lights by Ellie Goulding

This might be the most boring list I’ve ever read/written. That’s too bad, considering it’s about me…

Happy Weekend!!

Posted in Arbitrary | Tagged: , , , | Leave a Comment »

When the teacher becomes the student…

Posted by AllieB on July 9, 2012

Restaurant Spreadsheet: UPDATED. I made the new additions blue and the coming soon items yellow. I think I’ve got everything on there that should be on there – feel free to politely point out any omissions. I don’t know who’s going to take this over when I’m gone – Caro and K are generally (always) very in the know about this sort of thing, but I’m not sure they’d do it.

***ATLANTA RESTAURANT SPREADSHEET – JULY 2012***

I’m a little uncomf at the notion that I’m going to live in a place where I don’t know things and where I routinely get very lost. I am very well acquainted with Atlanta and where to go and what to do. I like to know stuff, and I’ve served as a resource for many who are too lazy to utilize the wonder that is Google friends – from where to dine to where to buy a top hat (Costumes, Etc.. off Cheshire Bridge), I tend to know what’s what around the Dirty. With NYC..not only do I not know much, I specifically struggle. I’ve never been able to wrap my head around where things are in relation to one another, like neighborhood-wise. When I visited Allison in Winter 2k10 I made a conscious effort to get hold of a map and try to sort out the neighborhoods. Fail. Every time we walked out her door, I instinctively turned in the exact opposite direction of where we were going. Then I’d try to figure out how to get back to her apartment – sure enough, off I’d go towards oblivion. I get that the Lower East Side is on the lower east side, and I also comprehend that the Upper West Side is on the upper west side, but I lose all sense of direction when I’m in NYC – up seems down and vice versa. Soo…wish me luck! The good news is that there are a lot of apps for NYC navigation, a few of which I’ve gone ahead and downloaded…always be prepared is not only the Girl Scout’s motto, it is also mine. I’m not a total moron, and I know people who kind of are who’ve managed to get around up there, so I think I’ll be ok…right? Seriously, wish me luck.

help.

I’m not going to really touch on the TomKat break-up because it’s not a break-up when a contract runs out and the two parties involved go their separate ways as was planned seven years previous, but I enjoyed this pop cultural gem: snippets of Joey Potter’s self-deprecating humor that are extremely applicable to her – Katie Holmes’s – current situation.

Dawson: “Here I am. Single, sandwiched in between two women who both dumped me. I am pathetic.”
Jen: “Hey, look at me, I’m dating a bible thumping hypocrite, okay?”
Joey: “Hey…my boyfriend may be gay.”

Well, not sure there’s any “may be” about it, but it’s still a totally cRaZy parallel. At least she got Suri out of the deal.

This week’s to do list:

1. go see Savages - WSJ really liked it, and they never like anything

2. sell my car

3. sort out/giveaway my clothes

4. make some money (babysitting?? petsitting?? I’m your girl. Call me.)

5. read fewer disturbing books so as to improve slumber – I read a lot this weekend and every book involved discomforting story lines pertaining to children. If you’re looking for a night rife with horrible dreams, then by all means check out The Neighbor by Lisa Gardner

XOXO

Posted in Arbitrary, Food & Drink | Tagged: , , , | 6 Comments »

Theories: Conspiratorial & Otherwise

Posted by AllieB on July 2, 2012

Munday. The maintenance men are in my apartment right now fixing my A/C. THEY BETTER BE FIXING MY A/C THIS IS UNBELIEVABLE. I was grateful to not spend the weekend here in the land-locked Hades, but in Charleston, where I spent several hours lounging in this pool (see below). We were down there in honor of Hildebeast Bel (you’re gonna wanna click thru on that link – you’re welcome in advance), and it literally could not have been a more fun weekend. There was a lot of laughing – I mean, a LOT. A rooftop pool situation overlooking a body of water in an urban setting might be my favorite thing.

The pool and the sunset. I do love a good vista!

Should you find yourself in Charleston in the near future, go to the Market Pavilion Hotel & Rooftop Bar and have a Michelob Ultra with a lemon and the Lump Crab Cake Sandwich. Beware of the security detail that comes out at around 8 PM…unless someone stashed the Hope Diamond up there, they’re probably taking themselves a little too seriously.

So, this was recently brought to my attention, and I am completely fascinated: the conspiracy theory surrounding the Denver Airport. Y’all, something is amiss here. The highly reputable and reliable site, skeptoid.com, says the following:

 Its construction began with five mysterious buildings that were completed and then buried intact, with the cover story that they were “built wrong”. Up to 8 levels of underground facilities are said to exist, and workers who go there refuse to answer questions about what they do. The entire airport is surrounded by a barbed wire guard fence, with the barbed wire angled inward, to keep people in, like a giant prison, not out like at other airports. And if viewed from the air, the runways are revealed to be laid out in the shape of a Nazi swastika. Questions about what the government might be doing in this underground base may have been answered in 2007, when fourteen commercial aircraft reported spontaneously shattered windshields as the presumed result of electromagnetic pulses.

Aerial view of the Denver Airport. I think we can all agree what this looks like.

Indoors, the airport gets even stranger. The Illuminati appear to have detailed their plans for global genocide and a New World Order in two large murals. The first depicts a huge Nazi soldier with dead women and children scattered around him…

Mural inside the airport.

Me, I’m thinking that regardless of who or what that painting’s meant to be of, it has ZERO business on the wall of an international travel hub in the United States. WTF! Anyway, I’m 100% drinking the kool-aid that is this conspiracy – something weird’s going on over there in Denver…and if I mysteriously go missing, I think we know who to blame. Illuminati/New World Order: I’m looking at you.

Jessica Simpson tweeted this picture last week. I don’t….why….how….WHAT IS WRONG WITH HER.

50 boutiques in 50 states  by elle.com – I saw they even found one in Delaware, so that’s something.

101 Books To Read This Summer Besides ’50 Shades of Grey’ – this is a very in-depth flow chart with something for everyone. But, I will say, go ahead and knock out the 50 trilogy – you know you’re going to eventually, so you may as well go ahead and join the masses rather than be the dillhole who’s still reading it 8 months from now.

Lastly! To those who reached out in response to my last post about my relocation to NYC – THANK YOU!!! I will be pursuing you all ardently in the coming weeks, so prepare yourselves.

Posted in Arbitrary | Tagged: , , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

« Previous Entries
Next Entries »