Belated Friday five.

On our last day in Alaska, we had wi-fi access and after checking his various internet sites, the (several years younger) Aussie announced that Amy Winehouse had died. I expressed the proper sadness, and then I told my story of being in South America and learning that Corey Haim had died. The Aussie had no idea who Corey Haim was.

Damn, I'm old.

Being the Lisa Simpson that I am, I had Corey fever as a tween/teen - taping every photo of both of them to my wall, watching every movie they put out (even the eventual crappy ones), scouring the magazines for info. I never properly mourned this loss, so I'd like to mention my top five Corey Haim moments and tip a glass to him. Say what you will but life was not easy for him, and I really do hope he's resting peacefully. And Amy too.

• The Two Coreys - a train wreck to watch, but I am probably one of the 100 people that watched it religiously.
  
• Silver Bullet - my intro into the world of werewolves, which (with a little help from Steven King early on and Joss Whedon cementing it later) would subsequently lead to my obsession with vampires and other mystical creatures.
• Dream a Little Dream - a beautifully underrated movie featuring Piper Laurie, Jason Robards, Harry Dean Stanton and a line I often quote ("it's a party! WHO'S GOT THE CHIPS?").
  
• Lucas - if you didn't cry at some point during this movie, you have no heart and I don't want to know you.
• The Lost Boys - if I were stranded on a desert island I would want this movie with me, that's how much I love it.
  

The end is near.

I'm packed. A full FORTY-EIGHT hours in advance. (Think I'm ready for a vacation?)

Of course, this means I have 48 hours to stew about what I'm forgetting. AKA, why I ALWAYS pack at the very last minute.

Photo walk #1: "a" for effort.

I tried a few "shoot from the hip" shots in Forest Park tonight. Most of them turned out like this:


But a few were pretty darned close:

How cool would it have been if the little girl was in perfect focus and the rest was fuzzy? Time to practice!

Trial run.

Avatar - I thought it was over and then it just kept going and going... and going.

3Q goals, at last.

Honestly, I didn't put much thought or heart into this quarter's goals. Heat and/or hormones and/or general meh has been rampant lately. But finally, I have them:

• one photo walk a week - reading this guy's blog inspired me, not necessarily to take street photos but just to get outside regularly, and now that it's staying light until forever o'clock I have no excuses
  
• weekend at the coast - which will probably occur the weekend I've rescheduled (x3) the kayak trip
  
• survive Hood to Coast - I offered to be an alternate a few months ago, and mostly hoped I wouldn't have to actually run, but someone's injured and now I'm officially signed up
  
• anything on The List

Ready, set, go.

Let's try that once more with feeling. Ready? Set? GO!

Put a Mayor on it.

Hey, Portlandia writers - I have a sketch idea for you: a couple sees the Mayor everywhere they go. Happy hour at the bar across the street from the office. Hiking in Forest Park. At the Doug Fir. Walking down the street on a Thursday night. On a remote beach out at the coast. In the shower at the gym. At SantaCon. The sketch can end with the couple realizing that the Mayor is stalking them.

I will admit being very amused when he started following me on Twitter, back when I did that. But in true "damn small town" fashion, seeing Mayor Adams has become so commonplace that I don't really think about it as everyone around me points and whispers, "oh my God, isn't that the Mayor?"

So there's my contribution to the show I don't even like. (And can't actually watch, even though I live here.) Annnnnd scene.

Roger Ebert, he's not...

... but I might have to steal this methodology.

Humble thyself.

To counterbalance my temporary bout of paid self-righteousness, I volunteered at the local nonprofit movie theater tonight. I did this once before, on a really sunny Sunday evening where it was slooooooooow, and the staff and other volunteers were really nice, and I was totally in my comfort zone. Plus? Volunteers get free passes and free popcorn, what's not to love?

This time I decided to step it up and opt for a Friday night volunteer stint. The staff and volunteers were still nice, but otherwise? NEVER. AGAIN. In the course of three hours I managed to do five amazingly awesome things, including:

• registering $100 in tickets as "comped" in the system, even though I'd taken money for the tickets (the operations manager had to reverse everything one by one by painful one - he was a great sport about it, though, and kept reassuring me that he'd had to clean up far worse messes before, and it really did only take him a few minutes to correct... though he did send me upstairs to clean the bathroom right after he said this, which I took as a penance sign)
  
• almost burning the popcorn (almost! but I caught it in time)
  
• squirting butter on my t-shirt (I'd been warned extensively about this my first night, but tonight there was a line! and I was hurrying! because people love their popcorn! I mean don't you?! and as an aside, personal observation shows that EVERYONE wants butter on their popcorn so go ahead and just ask for it, you know you want it)
  
• pointing people to the wrong theater (not entirely my fault... but mostly)
• asking a guy who was not a senior, if he wanted the senior price (after that I stopped asking, figuring if they were, they would tell me)
  

And this was a slooooooow Friday movie night! I kept having flashbacks to "Doublemeat Palace."

On the plus side... They use chalkboards outside each theater to list which movie is showing, and my idea for chalkboarding one of the movies was very well received. After I acknowledged my major ticketing screw up the ops manager still left me in charge of holding down the fort while he and the other volunteers did other tasks (instead of making me clean out the recycling bins, which is what I probably would've assigned a volunteer like me tonight). And I got another free pass which I am sooooooo going to use to see Troll Hunter.

There is some old "me" that would've called it a day after this stupid night. But the new "me" is going to keep going back. The last time I threw myself into something like this, the first few attempts were awkward and uncomfortable but eventually I gained great friendships, great new skills, great challenges and eventually, even a great job. Who knows what could come of this?

I hope it's not mean to say that his question totally MMD.

Occasionally, there are some interesting characters on public transportation. Some days are better than others.

This morning getting on the bus I passed by a seat adjacent to a tall, thin, white man spouting statements like "I hate The White Woman... the White Woman hates me because I have bad teeth... Ice Cube and George Clooney told me that... I have no friends or family... I do not need people... people are irrelevant... I am alone... I hate The White Woman."

The speech was directed at the passing scenery out the window. And it continued for 20 minutes with slight variations here and there. Everyone else was either ignoring him, snickering or rolling their eyes. All I could think was, "Oh boy, it's Tuesday. Better hit the books."*

The man I sat next to was also a self-talker, although his was a more Rainman-like rambling obsession with how the windows had to be shut because of the air conditioning. He was very concerned about this. And honestly, rightfully so - there are year-round stickers on almost every window letting riders know that the air conditioning works best with windows closed. TriMet is very serious about this and clearly makes no assumptions about the wits of their ridership. (I appreciated his tenacity. It was hot on the bus.)

A nearby woman mentioned to him (after he almost accidentally hit her in the head while ensuring her window was closed) that the air conditioning was not, in fact, on. At this point the man's obsession turned to making sure every window in the near vicinity was open. (I was grateful. It was hot on the bus.)

If I'd sat next to the first guy I would've moved immediately. I almost got punched by a man spouting vile back in Oakland so I treat them carefully, and from a distance.

The second guy was totally harmless, so I stayed put. And I'm so glad I did. If I'd moved I probably wouldn't have heard him mumble out loud to himself, "wait, is [tall thin white man] talking to himself? I thought he was on a cell phone but I think he's just talking to himself... that's weird."

________________

*Sadly, the link to the study is no longer valid and a quick scan of teh intarwebs revealed nothing. Little help, Whedon Universe?

Belated Friday five.

Top five cookie/cake recipes from 2Q, in no particular order except the last one:

• strawberry shortcake cookies - you would think these would be too sweet, but they're actually quite perfect
• blue cornmeal chocolate chip walnut cookies - unusual, in a very good way
• orange butter cookies - the orange was very subtle, and the icing was a nice touch but not necessary
• blackberry crumb bars - the guy at work who never takes two? he took two... and these were amazingly easy to put together
  
• chocolate pistachio cookies - took about 3 hours in total but OH MY GOD were they delicious... and I don't really like cookies (or chocolate) all that much
  

Runner up was the rhubarb streusel muffins. I'd never used rhubarb in anything, let alone baked goods, and I found it pleasantly interesting.

July, July.

2Q goals in summary:

• cookie o'the week: done, for the most part - I think I only missed one week due to work insanity, and some weeks I did coffee cake instead of cookies
  
• buy cheap and local: ehhh... this was a dumb goal because I am so frugal, but I do still love my socks, I finally checked out a few food co-ops, and I supported local movie theaters and restaurants more than usual
• 13 miles by 6/30: I got to 11 last week and the 1/2 marathon is Monday, so we shall see
• anything on The List: nothing during 2Q but I might get to cross a few off during 3Q

Speaking of. I haven't come up with 3Q goals yet. Stay tuned.

Brought to you by Fight Club and the witching hour.

with insomnia
you're never really, fully
awake or asleep