Che Guevara T-shirt

I'm back! Let's do this thing!

So I just returned on Tuesday from a visit to Chicago to see my lovely and amazing friend Lani. More on her and Chicago in future posts. But first I know you are dying to hear my thoughts on topical matters. Namely, Sandy and Halloween. For Halloween this year, I dressed as Andrew WK again. And for the second year, not a single person knew who I was, or had any reaction whatsoever. I need to face facts. The Andrew WK costume is just not going to happen.

In fact, the bouncer at the club — a fancy Chicago speakeasy called Untitled — almost didn't let me in. "Is this some sort of costume?" he said, looking at my white jeans and Brooks running shoes.  Yes, yes, it is. Just because I'm not dressed as a slutty cat, no one can identify that I am in costume?

Thankfully, he eventually let me in, and I got in at Paris Club too, meaning that I visited two clubby, bottle-service establishments wearing running shoes. Holla. I may never go back to stilettos, now that the precedent has been set.

Anyway, when I wasn't wearing ridiculously unsexy Halloween costumes, I was on the phone, attempting to reschedule my flight on Monday back to D.C. because I figured it would be canceled due to the hurricane. On Saturday night, Lani went out to DJ and I stayed home for a bit to deal with Delta. Four hours later, Delta finally called me back and I was on the phone with a guy in India when there was a knock at Lani's door.

It's always a little unsettling when you are alone, not anticipating any visitors and you hear a knock, but I decided to open the door. And here is what I saw:

Photo courtesy of Lani!

Lani's neighbor Benny, dressed exactly like this. He wasn't expecting to see me, and I surely wasn't expecting to see him. I was still on the phone with Delta and I tried to close the door but Benny needed help pulling the t-shirt over the cardboard rigging to complete his Che Guevara t-shirt look, so I attempted to yank the t-shirt down in the back while negotiating flight times on the phone, all the while without even explaining who I was to Benny.

Lani said he won $400 in a costume contest for this. Well deserved, no?

BRB

Hello! Just wanted to say that I'm gonna take a short blog break, because I want to come back in November, full steam ahead. Better than ever (although the bar is set pretty low here).

By that I mean that the plan is to post an entry every day that month. So check back here, November 1, pretty please? It's gonna be fun.

Tunes Tuesday, "The Fox," Niki & the Dover

Image: Niki And The Dove's Facebook Page

Yesterday's Twin Shadow concert at the Black Cat just confirmed to me that George Lewis Jr. is a hearthrob in the classic sense.  You know, perfect voice crooning about broken hearts, between-songs banter with an arched brow, on-point pompadour.  Yeah, that's the stuff.  I love his music and if you do too, you absolutely need to see the band live.  Joe said that he looked like Lenny Kravitz, and the keyboard player was Lisa Bonet (editor's note: she really did look a lot like Lisa Bonet).

But for today's Tunes Tuesday, I'm picking a single from the Swedish opening band, Niki & The Dove. The girls standing next to us were the biggest super fans I've ever seen at a show. It was impressive, and I'm saying that despite the fact that one of them elbowed me in the skull. I almost wonder if they went to high school with the band or something. They immediately started screaming requests for this song, "The Fox," so that's the one I'm going to pick.  I really do like the fizzy chorus, then again I'm a sucker for choruses about staying up all night and watching the stars. And if there is a sing-along "oh, oh, oh" section, I'm done for. So fun.

As for Niki & The Dove's live performance: Malin Dahlstrom's stage presence brought to mind a Kristen Wiig SNL performance.  Lots of frantic smiling. The props reminded me of Lady Gaga on a budget. Check out that flower crown in the picture. Then imagine it + rave-style light-up ring accessories. A pom pom was also bandied about. Trippy, eh?

Tunes Tuesday: "Go Hard (La.La.La)," Kreayshawn

Travels with Gosh Gee Golly!

I'm so excited to be featured as a guest blogger for Smarter Travel!  I wrote about how I used the Vélib' system during my trip to Paris this spring, and you can check out the post here!  Thank you so much to my good friend and travel editor extraordinaire, Caroline, for the opportunity.  This girl travels more than anyone, she just got back from an incredible trip to Australia!

If you are visiting from the Smarter Travel site, here are some of my travel adventures.  I promise you that each action-packed link will contain travel tips learned the hard way, some pretty pictures, some misadventures, and let's be real, some photos of stuffed animal souvenirs.  So here are some of the amazing places I've visited in the past few years:

• Iceland — we petted wild ponies and went dogsledding! 
• France — where I visited the French Open and got my lost camera back in a boozy twist of fate
• Peru — check out my hostel accommodations, just missing part of the hotel room door
• San Francisco — including our terrifying GoCar ride
• NYC
• Los Angeles

I hope you take a minute to peruse, find your next vacation stop, or leave me a comment with your favorite travel memories!  Thanks so much for checking out my blog!

Busy Weekend: H Street Festival and Cyclocross

I'd never been able to go to the H Street Festival, much to my chagrin, but the dates aligned this year and I made it out this Saturday.  I always get so excited for festivals, but when I get there and people are shoving past me and I'm waiting 20 minutes for a crappy gyro, I wonder why I was so excited for this.  Is this really a good time?

Nah, it was.  Perhaps the fact that the H Street Festival was so crowded means it is victim of its own success.  Even though I only lasted with the crowds for a few hours, I'm glad I went out and saw what there is to see.

Click the link for more H Street Festival pictures and Joe's new biking adventure!

Namely, art cars.  Peace.

Could it be?  I think it is!  We meet again, weird car.

The Taylor Gourmet sub-eating contest was by far my favorite part of the afternoon (second favorite: snagging a table outside at Granville Moore's).  Can you guess the who tied for the win?  Hint, it's the men who look like they are really and truly going for this, personal health be damned.  Props to you, gentlemen! A Black Eyed Peas album provided the soundtrack for the contest, strangely enough.  "Can you meet me halfway....Dirty bit...I wanna rock right now."

Another exciting part of the contest: the emcees hurled Taylor's subs into the crowd, each with a $5 gift card attached.  They made excellent projectiles.  Everyone could not have been more excited about this development, and with my hands outstretched to the heavens, I tried to lock eyes with the sub thrower and will him to toss a breaded chicken sub my way.  It would've made up for the crappy gyro and everything would've been right with the universe.  We almost got one, but almost ain't good enough.

And the next day, I woke up before 6 a.m. to drive with Joe and our friend Alex to their very first cyclo-cross competition ever.  "Woke up" might be an overstatement.  I stumbled into the backseat and fell back asleep, only to wake up in a field on the PA/MD border.

Have you heard of cyclo-cross? I hadn't.  It's almost like a steeplechase.  As you can see here, there's a twisty course set up in the grass that includes barriers that riders have to hop or carry their bikes over, and hills they may have to carry their bikes up.  Joe can explain more, I'm sure.

One day I hope to have a dog I can bring to these events.  I could play with the dog instead of sitting in a chair reading the Blake Lively/Ryan Reynolds issue of People magazine.

Alex said I was the worst spectator ever.  I did cheer.  On occasion.  No one else was cheering and I felt weird.  Next time I will bring a cowbell and ring it victoriously.  Even this baby being toted around by his armpits had a cowbell.

Kids get in on the cyclo-cross action too!  Their race is called the "Lil' Belgians" race.  Love those lil' Belgians!  Drinking beer is another big cyclo-cross tradition, but we wondered if we could in good conscience drink our beer while watching the kids' races.

Here's part of the hills on the course.

Another big hill that was impossible to ride up.  We watched two riders crash hard on this hill.  One was splayed out on the ground, laying still for a moment.  He must've gotten the wind knocked out of him.  Thank goodness, he seemed ok.

As a spectator, this sport looked really tough.  I'm so proud of Joe and Alex for finishing their first race, they were awesome!  Everyone finished and no broken bones, and that's what I was rooting for the whole time.  Silently, and without a cowbell.  Next time, I will make this right — I'm pricing them right now on Amazon.  Stay tuned!