it's a small world

Here's a good story for ya about what a small world it is.

This one time a few summers ago, I went to China on a school trip, and as I was walking on top of the Great Wall of China, surrounded by hundreds of people, I heard someone shout, "Erin Manning?!" I looked around and then saw this friend of mine named Kyle Riggs who was on the swim team with me for several years and who I went to high school with, but we went our separate ways after we graduated, and he stayed in Louisville where we grew up, and I went to Nashville, and we didn't speak for at least like 3 years. Then all of a sudden, there we are, meeting on the other side of the worrrlllddd...

Then after that I got interviewed for some weird British television show and they wanted me to stand up on the side of the wall to film it and I said "absolutely not, the wind will blow me over the side," which they thought was odd, but I didn't care.



Now we're friends and I visit him whenever I go home. He likes boys now, so we really have a gay old time together (no pun intended). Life's funny sometimes :)

morning routine

Every morning, I come to work where I am a receptionist at a law office, and have a pretty straight-forward routine.

I make the coffee for everyone, and after I pour myself a cup and add a little bit of milk, I inevitably get "You're So Vain" by Carly Simon stuck in my head because of the line in the last verse where she says, "I had some dreams, they were clouds in my coffee, clouds in my coffee..." I watch the milk swirl through my own cup of coffee...then I start thinkin about my dreamz...and all of my regrets in life...and as I mindlessly stir, I wistfully stare at the ripples and black fading into brown, liquid splendor until I'm shocked back into reality...

Next, I go to my desk and turn on my computer, and we use this data program called AS400 which reminds me of Windows DOS and is an all-around p.o.s. but the best thing about it is it makes these weird little electronic "beep boop beep beep beep" noises when it's booting up and the very first one is the exact same note and rhythmic spacing as Kelis' song, "Bossy," so then I have Bossy stuck in my head for a few minutes until I turn on Pandora and listen to something else and then the rest of my day isn't so routine-y. Thank gawd.

kEeP tHe ChRiSt In ChRiStMaS!!!

Surprise!



I made you a Christmas wreath with Roseanne Barr's face in the middle of it! You're welcome :)

KiDz DaY, Pt. 2: fav kiddie's books

"Once Upon A Potty" was always a favorite because of the illustrations, which were especially dumbed down and very silly to me. The little girl they used was particularly matronly, in my opinion. But I loved'er...








"Ferdinand" was always a favorite of mine. I read it at least 100 times as a child. This little bull sitting in the flowers is so cute because it reminds me of my boo, who is a Taurus. Not in that "bull vs. matador" way, but in the "Ferdinand just wanted to sit and smell the flowers" way. Sooooo cute! :)





"Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs" also occupied my attention for at least 3 years when I was little. I was especially fascinated with the pictures of the frosted sprinkle donuts rolling down the street.

I mean I actually read a ton (1 TON) when I was a kid, so there are a lot more books that I spent a fair amount of time with. I'll be sure to provide frequent updates. Maybe you'll actually be familiar with what I'm talking about :)

KiD'z DaY, Pt. 1:

I recently decided to try my hand at makin' sweet moolawley off of children's music/publishing, which lead me to re-explore some of my favorite childhood movies, songs, stories, and anything else I like to just sit back and reminisce about. So first, I stumbled across some very kooky videos of installments of this children's series called "Pancake Mountain," which is where super popular indie artists perform some of their "kid friendly" tunes for kids. This sounds cute and cool, but it's not really. It's more just weird. Watch this MIA one, for example:

and this Jenny Lewis one is just kind of awkward:

It's like the dancers and people were sort of uncomfortable because the kids seem sort of uncomfortable too. I just know that if I ruled the world, and I was in charge of Pancake Mountain, I'd make those artists write songs exclusively for the show and just record them instead of playing them live. Kids are weird and they're impossible to communicate with. They should just have their own country where they're isolated and they make their own music, then they wouldn't be so uncomfortable. Hey...that gives me an idea for a new series of blog posts titled, "If I ruled the world: Life on Pancake Mountain."

halloween in new orleans

I had the best halloween of all time last weekend when I was in New Orleans. Here's a brief summary:

1) Friday-Sunday: attended Voodoo Music Fest all three nights and saw some prime entertainment, including Chrissie Hynde (from the Pretenders), Ozzy Osbourne (gotta catch'em before he dies :( ), Quintron & Miss Pussycat, BoUnCe (aka Miss Freedia and some other sassy drag queens w/ KrUnK jamz/beatz--i don't know how else to explain that particular performance, but lemme tell ya, it was a spectacle), MGMT, Jonsi, My Name Is John Michael, Cage the Elephant, Metric, Teresa Anderson, Die Antwoord (from afar), aaannnddd I'm sure I'm forgetting some. Now let's cut to the fun stuff.

2) Sunday (HALLOWEEN NIGHT): my very responsible pal/guardian for the evening, who shall remain unnamed, very graciously accompanied me on my journey to the French Quarter. We got there by hopping into a taxi van w/ a group of middle-aged, but very harmless-looking men and women who were hoopin' and hollerin' and said they wouldn't mind sharing their cab because we were all going to the same place.

***keep in mind that my pal and I--let's call her "Shawday," for now--were both dressed up as zebras, which, in my opinion, really adds some razzmatazz to the entire evening***

3) we got in the cab, and our new friends were clearly "whoopin' it up" with a variety of "designer drugs," which they very freely offered to Shawday and I. After confirming that they weren't roofies, (given that the people were using the same stuff they were offering), I may or may not have accepted, as well as been invited by one of the men to hang out w/ their group for a short while after we arrived.

4) Turns out that these classy folks have a timeshare on Frenchman St. and go to it every Halloween. This was wildly entertaining to Shawday and I, so we agreed to accompany them to their glamorous timeshare, which overlooked all of the Halloween festivities on Frenchmen. After curious statements were uttered, such as, "My friend is a chemist," and, "pure MDMA," and, "are ya'll zebras, or cats?" I decided that as long as Shawday was going to be responsible, then that meant that I was allowed to be irresponsible. So I may or may not have accepted some "pure MDMA" (not really believing that it was pure MDMA), and we said our goodbyes to the kindest and least creepy strangers I've encountered, and made our way back down to Frenchmen Street.

5) 45 minutes later: my world transformed into a wonderland of colors and hysterical laughter and the most positive feelings ever...just try and imagine crazy-ass New Orleans on Halloween night--costumes galore, the street packed w/ people, all of the bars and places open w/ live entertainment blaring into the streets, and a pretty much constant parade going on...led by a robot.

6) Yes. A ROBOT: this was very intriguing to Shawday and I, so we followed this robot throughout the course of the night, meeting new friends along the way who were always eager to buy free drinks for two attractive zebra girls, so once 1 am rolled around, Shawday and I were good to go, and had found ourselves at a very classy (not) establishment called The Dragons Den...all thanks to the robot.

7) DRAGONS DEN: what ensued was--by far--the most intense several hours of wild dancing, debauchery, and effing AWESOME-ASS DUBSTEP dj'ing/music that I've experienced in my 23 years. It was amazing. pitch black. building shaking from the bass. mdma runnin' through my veins. (just kidding :/) no but really. i can't even describe how excellent it was. i just wanted to keep dancing. this went on til 3 am. by that time, Shawday's responsible side kicked in, so we hitched a cab ride back to her house and went to sleep and when I awoke the next morning, I felt amazing...and like a new person...and I was still covered in zebra stripes.

8) That's only like 1/4 of my experience there. That'll do for now though :)
9) If you look closely at the picture, you'll notice the smiling robot in the background...

To Do List:

Today I need to figure out how to make a cornucopia hat.



It needs to be in the style of the Chiquita Banana lady.

http://www.exportlawblog.com/images/chiquita_banana.gif
http://reneevisaya.com/banana.gif

But most of all...hAvE fUn!

I recently made a pact with myself that I was going to launch into an all-around health and wellness campaign, because, quite frankly, I've been burnin' the ol' candle at both ends, if ya know what I mean ;) That sounds creepy. I really just haven't been getting a lot of sleep--really forcing my body past its limits with a strong combination of Adderall and Diet Mountain Dew--aaannnddd I've been eating really poorly, and predict that I've gained a rather subtle, and evenly-distributed 15 lbs. I mean, we're talkin' embarrassing eating habits, as of recent. Like, a family-size bag of Lay's Salt and Vinegar potato chips in one or two sittings. Not only is that probably like 9,000 calories (legitimately), it also stings the shit out of your mouth eventually...All that acid...That's enough of that.

It seems like ever since I told myself I'm going to reverse/remove/limit all of these behaviors, I've been just furthering them all to extremes...like pulling that chip stunt twice in a week instead of twice in a year...or life... And I went to bed at 5:48am this morning, and woke up at 8am to go to work. (idiot). In my state of delirium, everything I'm saying seems really funny... Oh well. I'll have to stop misbehaving eventually so at least I'm havin' fun in the process? These kiddies look like they're havin fun:




Remember these silly videos? My pal Suz thinks Mousercise is the shit, and there's one dance move in particular that she loves to do at parties...(kewl!)...something about imitating a police officer lady, repeatedly swinging a whistle around her finger...


My personal exercise video choice, however, is Sweatin' to the Oldies. I used to watch this all the time when I was little because my mom would do them, and I thought they were hilarious because they had so many "real" people. (aka fat people. which sounds mean, but i'm only using that word because when you're a child, that's the word you use, and fat people are funny to you in general...probably because you're a child...) Not to mention that Richard Simmons was popular then and BOY is he a CHARACTER or WHAT?!?! My fav scene is the opening one when it shows a closeup of his gleaming white tennis shoe, tapping the floor to the beat of "Dancin' In The Streets," then the camera pans out and Richard shrieks, "LET'S SWEAT!!!" This vid shows that. Don't bother watching any further than that though because some dingbat added his own abomination at the end where he makes fun of poor Richie and his femininity...

WHY do you think you are NUTS?!

So I've been feeling extremely insane recently, and I think it's because I've been trying to wean myself off of Adderall, which was also making me crazy...but in other ways. Most specifically, I've been waking up in the middle of the night after having extremely vivid dreams, and will deliriously jabber about whatever happens to be concerning me, relating to the dream, i.e., thinking that some sort of strange apparatus was going to fall of my bed and shatter everywhere, which left me screaming, "my stand! shit! my stand is going to fall!" I certainly don't know what that means, and it also took me at least 5 minutes to realize that I had been dreaming. That's kooky. And relatively alarming. So in honor of my growing insanity, I'm sharing this video with you that I discovered like 4 years ago and thoroughly enjoyed. It still hasn't gotten old.

Poop face.