home of the brave lil toaster

Helloooh my fellow patriots!

I have just returned from our nation’s cap-i-tal. I did not get many pictures, because let’s face it, I am crappy at taking pictures. Luckily my storytelling skills are slightly more advanced, so here we go…

I flew to DC with Amee’s friends, Preya, Rachel and Nisha. We arrived at like, 11pm eastern standard time and we got to see Amee’s cute apartment. It is tiny, but adorably chic and just totally Amee (even smells like her old apt!). It’s in one of those neighborhoods where only young yuppies with BMWs live, but it was real cute. We walked across the street to this bar that was packed with people, and was real loud. Lesson no. 1 about DC: people are rude and are prone to shoving you around. We nearly got knocked out getting off the plane due to crazies shoving themselves down the aisle, and I got tossed about quite a bit at the bar. In their defense, or whatever, most of the people there were drunk out of their gourds (one girl vomited and it almost hit my shoe), but still. Amee’s coworkers were all there (and drunk out of their gourds) but they were all cute white boys and they all adore Amee, so they were charming nonetheless. I decided that the real tall guy was the Jim to her Pam, so I was a lil jealous, as I wish I had a Jim of my own. Oh also, there was this cover band that was full of singers in a House of Pain kind of way, plus drummer, bass, guitar, etc, and they played current songs plus songs that are so last year (Hey Ya), then like, old school hits a la “Push It” and “Summer of 69”. At first I rolled my eyes a lot, but ultimately caved in to their charms (they were actually sort of good!) and bobbed and danced about as best I could whilst not being shoved.

Saturday was shopping extravaganza in Georgetown. I got to cross the Potomac, so I felt very connected to US history and whatnot, then felt connected to current US policy when I shopped till I dropped and deficit spend-ed my way to happiness. There were too many stores to even think about going to each one, and I bought a coat, a blazer, blue ballet flats, 2 lil purses, a tank top, and a skirt that I want to wear to festivus. I gotta say, it was pretty exhausting. I am not very good at shopping without Amee there to tell me what is fashionable and what it is uggo, so I wanted to take full advantage of her skills while I could. But shopping sort of kills me, and as there were no Auntie Anne pretzels in sight, I did not received the required sustenance that I needed to keep my spirits up. Luckily we skipped on the long walk back to the Metro and got a cab back to her place.

Dinner that night was in Chinatown at this Tapas place called Jaleo. It was a cute place, and there was tons of Sangria and whatnot. I got to see Amee’s former coworker Kim, whom I used to hang out with when she lived in Houston. She is real cute and hip and I still love her. I also got to meet her fiancé Tom, who was also real charming and looked a lot like Trey Anastasio, so that was funny. I loved them both because they are totally “my type”, and would totally be best friends in the event that we lived in the same place. I’m pretty sure I charmed my way into an invite to their wedding, so score! Also, Kim’s friend Katie was my dinner date, and I loved her a lot as well. I didn’t get to meet a lot of Amee’s other friends, because we had to split up into 2 tables, so that was a lil dumb, but I got to witness the cake portion of the evening, so yay.

Post-dinner, we tried to go to this club called Indebleu, which ultimately ended up being the equivalent of my personal hell. First, there was this annoying bouncer who claimed it was “guest list only” night, so we stood in this roped off area for alleged losers while these pretentious-looking uggos wearing sunglasses at night and lots of man-jewelry were able to get in. We eventually enter, and the place, as Tom put it, was “packed with assholes”. It was also really loud and smarmy and just so so crowded, you couldn’t even hang out with your friends, really. I was super-irritated, but luckily I think everyone else was too, because we left there after about 30 minutes and headed across town to this other place, where Amee’s friend knew of a brown party at another club. It was a lot more fun, because it was still crowded, but you could actually move around, and the people there didn’t shove as much, so that was a welcome relief. The music was actually real good, and every 8 songs or so they would play Indian “da club” music, and Amee would get really excited and sing along, so it was all worth it. I did miss my own brown boy a lot though, because there were tons of boys there but none of them were him (3 weeks since seeing him and counting). I found one awkward-looking bearded guy with a hoodie on, and pretended that was Aneil and I felt a little better just knowing he was there.

Before we skipped town on Sunday, we went back into the city to eat lunch, sample salty oatmeal cookies at Teaism, and see Dupont Circle in action (kudos to Rachel for quoting “The American President” while we were there). Although there were rude people and whatnot, I liked DC a lot, and it was very cosmopolitan and charming and had great public transportation systems, so I approve. I am also glad Amee fits in so well there and that she has a lot of friends to look after her. Good trip all around.

Sorry Amanda, we didn’t see Abe, but I almost bought a presidential action figure version of him from Skymall for you.

In other news, LSU is going to the Sugar Bowl (think it has something to do with USC losing to UCLA, but I am not caught up on Sportscenter, since I just had the girliest of weekends ever). However, I can easily predict an LSU blowout over Notre Dame (I mean, come on people!).

Also, they are doing the nomination hearing for Robert Gates, the possible new Sec. of Defense. I mean, is it really necessary to poke and prod at the guy just to get him to admit that we are losing in Iraq? If I were him and I got asked whether we were losing in Iraq, I would have responded with an eye roll and a “no doi” and been done with it. I suppose this is why Bush has yet to nominate me for anything.

The whole Russian spy radiation scandal makes me think of Alias, and now I wonder just how much creepy Rimbaldi-esque stuff is going on in the world right now. Also I wonder if there really are spies that look like Jennifer Garner and Michael Vartan (le sigh).

I just bought a new iPod nano (my first iPod!) and I am super excited. I have already started composing playlists for Christmas festivus. "Last Christmas" by Wham!, anyone? Anyone? Get ready to shake those moneymakers!

Anywho, this week I hate: shoving in general, no brown boy visits for 3+ weeks, and not being done with finals yet. Things I hate this week that everyone else seems to love: Laguna Beach, sangria, and cheesecake. And finally, this week I love: independent book stores, rose-flavored soap, Beauty and the Geek reruns on MTV, and beautiful public transportation systems.