Halfway Hip

Video from Skate Party

Courtesy of Victoria.

80s chicks from Victoria Akselsen on Vimeo.

80s Skate Night from Victoria Akselsen on Vimeo.

20th Friendiversary Gallery

This is circa 1988 or 89. We were bored and messing around at Kristen's house.

Here is our "before"

Here is the "after"

Who were we trying to be???

Robert Palmer's women, of course! Kristen's little bro, Davey, was such a good sport.

Here is us a year or two later, waiting for the bus, 10th grade.

Skip a few years, to sophomore year in college. Notice that I have the same hairstyle that I did in 8th grade!

Before my college graduation, 1995. Kristen's sportin' The Rachel. I wish I had more pics of this apartment. It was pretty bad!

1998, rockin' the MIA sandals:

1999, New Years Eve. God, this was a fun party.

Better late than never: My New York trip

Outside the hotel, March 12, originally uploaded by Halfway Hip.

I'll again have to rely on ye olde bullet format to recall info that's gone a bit stale!

Air Travel Lots of factors came together in a perfect storm on Friday, which caused multiple delays all day long. Almost nothing about my travel day on the way there went smoothly. I left my house at 7am and arrived at Hotel Chelsea at 10:30pm, about 5 hours late. I wrote down a blow-by-blow account of the day in my paper journal, but I will spare you. Luckily, my flights back on Wednesday were the complete opposite.

Trade Show Basically, for me, this meant a lot of sitting and/or standing around and/or fetching things since it wasn't my line of work. By the last day, I felt like my brain had been turned off a little too long, and I was ready to return to my own planet. It was really interesting, though, to see what my best friend goes through in her working life. I'm really grateful, too, for the fact that I could come along on the company's dime. I would have easily traded that, though, for five days of freedom to roam the city.

The City Unfortunately, the trade show stuff kept us from seeing a lot. We got the experience, but there wasn't a lot of time for the serendipitous roaming around that I crave when I travel. We did slack off on Monday afternoon, and it was the best day, by far. We went to SoHo for lunch (the only bad meal we had there) and a little shopping. Most of the shops were way out of my league, but it was fun to dream. I've decided that I want to shop at DKNY when I grow up. I had a real New York Moment when I said, "I could go for a coffee and cookie right now," and found that we were across the street from a cool, TINY shop. I almost killed myself on a student's power cord in there, but the coffee was divine.

I was continually amazed at how friendly everyone was, everywhere we went. A friend of mine, who happened to be in NY at the same time we were, commented on her blog that she didn't want to pull out her camera and look like a tourist. I found that in the moments where I was obviously a tourist, people just got friendlier. People seemed to eat up the fact that we were there from Texas and Oklahoma.

Hotel Chelsea I knew a little about its history, but I wish I had read this blog before I went. However, if I had known all about the ghosts, I probably wouldn't have stayed in the room alone at all, though I don't technically believe in ghosts. I have to wonder, though, if the drag-queeny voice I heard for two hours early Weds. morning was actually the ghost of Nancy Spungen. He kept saying over and over, "God dammit FUCK. God dammit FUCK," like he was stuck on something. I kept wondering if he was stuck in the elevator or something, but I was in too much of a sleep-funk to think it through. I couldn't tell if it was coming from the floor below ours, where Sid Vicious is rumored to haunt, or from the room beside ours.

The hotel was extremely noisy in general, which I had remembered from an old episode of Globetrekker. There's a club in the basement, which didn't help, especially on Saturday night. There were lots of meathead guys on the street yelling and fighting in the wee hours. Friday night, in a room somewhere near ours, we could hear singing and tuba playing. That was the type of noise I fully expected and enjoyed. The radiator banging at 6am sharp every morning? Not so much! The jackhammers on the street at 8am Saturday morning? Not so much!

The Chelsea is covered with artwork. I really wish I had walked the entire stairwell and halls to see it all. I barely left enough time to take pictures. The photos in the Hotel Chelsea Flickr group are better than what I could have taken, anyway, so look through those.

Our little apartment was amazing. Lots of space in which to spread out and entertain guests. (Not that we had that many, but still.) You can check out pics on my Flickr by clicking on the photo above.

Food It was mostly great! It's not hard to eat vegetarian there. I did splurge on some sustainably-raised chicken at Cookshop, just because I could. Patsy's, which supposedly serves the best pizza in the city, was just down the block from our hotel. Now I'm sad that I didn't try the famed pizza, but I was really in the mood for salad and pasta. My God, it was the best salad I've ever had. Angelica Kitchen in the East Village was phenomenal. The staff there was so friendly. When I went up the hostess stand to remark on their choice of music (the entire Joy Division "Substance" album), we got into a nice chat about where were were from/what we were doing/the show "Dallas," which she happened to love (and few of us who actually had lived in Dallas had actually seen). I asked about where we should go next, based on the fact that we loved their music, and one of the servers went back to the kitchen and compiled a whole list for us.

Nightlife We had the best time on our first night there, even though by the time it was over, I had been up for 24 hours. We went to Mondo. I had pretty low expectations for being able to fit in to any club in the city, but this place felt like home as soon as we walked in. We heard songs we already love, including New Order's "Age of Consent," which I had never gotten to dance to at a club, "Fa Fa Fa" by Datarock, which the DJ played at my request, "Crash" by The Primitives, and loads of new stuff that we didn't really know but loved anyway. The crowd was age-mixed, and people were friendly and in no way too cool for the room, which we found a bit the next night we went out. I hope Kristen makes good on her promise to try to recreate something like this in the Dallas scene. It's desperately needed!

Saturday night, we stayed in due to exhaustion, the time change, and the fact that our dinner at Cookshop didn't end til 11pm. Sunday, we went to Sway Lounge, where it was Morrissey/Smiths night, on suggestion of the fine folks at Angelica Kitchen. The music was great, but there really wasn't a real dance floor, and the crowd was a bit too hip and fashionable for our taste. All of that would have been easily tolerated had it not gotten so damned crowded. When we could no longer move, we bailed. Made us appreciate our new friend Mondo even more. On Monday, after looking up some bar reviews, we chose to go to Hi-Fi to check out their famed jukebox. It was dead, but we had a good time watching Pop-Up Video minus the sound while we waited an hour or more for our songs to play. Next, we headed to Niagara, which was very cool, but a little dead, too. I thoroughly enjoyed myself, though, especially looking out at Tompkins Square Park, which played a prominent role in East Village Inky, a zine I still love.
While I was away, the kids and Matt seemed to fare just fine. The kids didn't really ask about me til the last day or so (when I was wanting to come home, too!) and Evan never asked to nurse. I don't want to be away from home too much, but I think it was great for all of us to realize that it could be done. Overall, I'd say that my trip was about one day too long, but I did have a great time. It was a little hard to come back to so many demands upon my personal space and time, but now that I've had a week to settle in, I'm used to it again. Being away also had an unexpected bonus. I got to see a bit what Matt goes through when he has to travel. I realize more how important phone conversations are to the person who is away from home. It's the only connection with the kids. There were days when I didn't make enough time for quality phone calls, and I regretted it. Also, I got to feel what it's like for him to come home and try to get back into the swing of homelife. It takes a while!

The week in review

Swiped from my good internet buddy, Sassymama.

1. What was your biggest challenge this past week? Now that Evan is totally night weaned (knock wood), he has replaced night nursing with sticking himself to my face like a barnacle, or like that thing on "Alien" that laid an egg in that guy's mouth. Consequently, I haven't been sleeping too well at night. We moved Evan's toddler bed over so that he's more on his own, but he protested so violently when he woke up at 10:30 last night, we put him back in bed with us. Baby steps, I guess.

2. What was your biggest accomplishment this past week? Little things...I fixed two necklaces, made a pair of earrings, made a new necklace. We started a babysitting trade-off with a good friend of mine, which will save us the $40 a week I was paying for Evan's weekly babysitting back in the fall. While Evan was happily playing at Stephanie's on Monday, and while Aidan was at school, Matt and I had lunch at Thai Raja and then spent a few hours cleaning up our upstairs disaster zone. Filing, box-shifting, finding stuff to give away, discovering more storage in the crawl space. We also discovered more stuff that the workmen left here from the renovation...a sharp circular saw piece, two nasty couch pillows from the previous owners, and a whole lot of dust. Now, we're working on emptying our rental storage unit, which will save us another $50 a month w/out causing too much pain.

3. What was the most exciting thing that happened in your life this past week? It was a little over a week ago, but I'll write about it anyway. Last Friday, we went out to celebrate Matt's birthday with our friends Derek and Melissa. Dinner at Abuelo's was fresh and delicious, as was the pitcher of margaritas that Matt and I shared. We then went on to Nonna's upstairs bar for desserts, where I had a drinkable Tiramasu cocktail. We probably should have tried harder to find a more suitable spot to hang out next, but it was freezing outside, so we didn't feel like walking around. We ended up at the SKYY Bar, a meat market-like dance club. The music was pretty fun, with lots of 90s R&B/pop hits. I had a few too many Citron and sodas and kept repeating that I was "dancing ironically." Matt had a blast watching me get drunker than I've been in a whole lot of years. See pics at my Flickr. It took all day Saturday to recover, but it was worth it. Don't want to do it again anytime soon, though. Will have to research more age-appropriate nightlife options in this area. I also got to go to my book club, as well as to dinner out with two of my friends last night.

4. What one thing made you the happiest this past week? Not really any one thing. Despite lots of anxiety about our future, I've felt basically happy and contented. Matt and I have been communicating brilliantly. I'm really enjoying my SAHM status a lot more these days, knowing that it will all come to an end soon. I've had time to work out more lately. I got in 4 workouts this past week with NO resulting injuries. The weight I've put on due to holidays and weaning Evan is slowly starting to come off. I got a chance to get some minor errands done, such as getting my OU transcript to send in to get a new teaching certificate and taking two pairs of jeans to the tailor. Oh, and I also had time to go to Cindy's Resale by myself. I had $50 in credit, and spent exactly that on a nice pair of black work-type pants, a cream short sleeved sweater shrug/jacket thing, a knit top, a work skirt, a pair of almost-new Indigo by Clarks black ballet flats, and three $1 bracelets (two of which I used to make that cool necklace.)

Overhead, Christmas edition II

"Santa won't come to a filthy house."

"Santa might trip over all my toys."

"Hiding wrapped presents under the Christmas tree isn't really hiding them," someone told me after he picked up his gift to check it out. We usually have a strict "no shaking" policy.

Aidan Turns Six

I'm kind of sad about it! These days, I almost can't help but gawk at him. His body has changed so much in the past year. There's not an ounce of baby fat left. His legs and arms are so incredibly long and lean. His legs are hairy, which won't come as a shock to those of you who have met Matt. His personality is developing by leaps and bounds. I posted a line by Bill Murray's character in "Lost in Translation" in my old blog a few years ago, and I think it's very apt now: "It gets a whole lot more complicated....when you have kids. It's the most terrifying day of your life. The day the first one is born. Your life, as you know it, is gone. Never to return. But they learn how to walk, and they learn how to talk, and you want to be with them. And they turn out to be the most delightful people you'll ever meet in your life."

I remember that when I first wrote down that quote, I couldn't wait to get to that point with my own children. I think it's finally arrived. Mostly.

Last year, we had a Pirate Party here at home. Because it was here at home, our tiny home, we could only invite about 10 friends. For the past year, I've known that I wanted to have a bigger party so that we could invite everyone. I really wish that we could do a party at a park, but that's a very dicey proposition during the first week of December. So, we decided to rent out the local skating rink for 2 hours and invite everyone. At my latest count, we have 88 people coming. The party will be no-frills...just a grocery-store cupcake on a napkin for each kid. No balloons, no streamers, no table cloths, no effin goodie bags. The skating is the reason for the season. So is the music, which Aidan helped us select. Aidan's choices include "For Reasons Unknown" by The Killers, "Disappear" by INXS and "C'Mere" by Interpol. I've also put some of his kid music on there, such as "Puff the Magic Dragon" (kind of a downer at a party, but whatever) and "Mahna Mahna" by Cake. Oh, and some Dan Zanes, too. Every night this week, Matt and I have been working on either the cd or the DVD slide show, which will be projected onto the big wall at the rink. Aidan will get to choose where we eat dinner after the party (which ends at 6:00). It will be interesting to see what he picks.

Seven

I was tagged around the end of September to do this Seven Facts/Habits/etc. meme from a friend on livejournal. Better late than never!

1. My favorite bedtime snack is sliced cheddar and peanut butter on woven wheat crackers. The first time I was served this snack, I was in fourth grade. A woman I barely knew was in charge of watching me and a friend for a little while. (I think she was my friend's neighbor??) She had a neat house filled with antiques and oddities. After letting us poke around in her attic for a while, she served this yummy treat to us. I've never met anyone since who likes to eat this!

2. My husband says that he knows I think something is really funny when my laugh causes me to snort. In jr. high, I earned the nickname Sargeant Snorkle Smitty.

3. I am a procrastinator, even with things that are fun. Buying tickets to concerts, working on a fun necklace, sending some random email, doing a bit of paperwork, etc. If it's something on my "to do" list, it will get put off, big time. If I do this for fun things, you can probably imagine what I'm like when it comes to scheduling doctors' appointments, paying bills, navigating a health insurance phone system.

4. In the fall/winter, I must have a hot drink every afternoon, in addition to my 2 cups of morning coffee. This is when my hot tea stash comes out or when I spend a good deal of my pocket money at Starbucks. Today's treat? Pumpkin spice latte (1/2 the syrup) for me and a kids' apple cider for Aidan. In the summer, my afternoon indulgence is a Diet Coke. Crap. Just realized that today, I had my 2 cups of morning joe, a Diet Coke for lunch, AND that grande latte. Must drink only water tonight!

5. I am bad about leaving things half-read. If it's a really good novel or memoir, I will definitely finish it. I've finished most of the books I'm assigned for my non-fiction book club. However, there are A LOT of half-finished magazines, the local independent paper, catalogs, parenting books, teaching files, etc. lying around. I swear, if I didn't like to read or lead a "life of the mind," my house would be so much cleaner!!

6. I like for my clothes to fit very well. The second something becomes too baggy, I just can't stand it. Stretch jeans are baaaad for someone like me. So are cheap t-shirts from Old Navy. Whenever my body gets to the size it's going to be for a while, I'm going to invest in some really nice knits that hold their shape all day long.

7. My favorite season is Autumn. I always loved starting school, getting new clothes/school supplies, the possibilities of new classes/friends/opportunities. I can't imagine *not* thinking about a new year starting in August/Sept. Guess I chose the right profession!

Like a big slice of fried gold

In more happy, frivolous news:

1. At the consignment store, I discovered that I had $70 credit! Amazed me b/c I still saw a lot of my clothes on the racks. I think it might have been the gorgeous B & Lu dress I bought last year that I never got to wear b/c I didn't go to the 2 weddings for which I bought it, and I lost weight. Anyway...the store has a new section of premium denim jeans. Brands like Lucky, Seven for All Mankind, Earl, etc. On a whim, I decided to try a pair of 32s on. I haven't been able to wear a 32 or even consider any kind of jean that is sized with a waist measurement like that in about 12 years, at least. These Paige jeans fit me perfectly, and they were only 30 bucks!!!! For a like-new pair of $200 jeans! I had no idea that these jeans were so expensive til I came home and looked them up on the internet. I took Paige's fit test, and as it turns out, these were the jeans that were the best for my body type. Living in a town with a disporportionate amount of sorority types and bitchy rich soccer moms can sometimes pay off! Speaking of sorority types...I was wearing these jeans while waiting for my to go order at a cafe that's right near campus and attached to a Harold's store. The sales girl from Harold's came over from the store to tell me how cute my jeans are. Score! :) The only problem I have now is that I can only wear them with high heels til I get them hemmed. I'm not sure that I want to get them hemmed, b/c then I won't be able to wear them with high heels at all. What to do?

2. We've had Shaun of the Dead for over a month from Netflix. I was really hesitant to watch it b/c I thought I had really had enough dead people for one month. We finally saw it on Friday night. What a hoot! If you haven't seen this one, please do, even if you don't like horror movies. Kristen, this is required for you since you're such an Anglophile.

3. Provided that I get enough rest this week and get some help for my health problem, I have tickets to go to Interpol in Dallas this Thursday. Doing stuff like this is getting easier and easier. Aidan is in school all day, Matt can shorten his day to take him/pick him up (since he's not flying), I can take Evan with me (after 10 hours to NM, 3 hours to Dallas is like nothing...we don't even have to stop anymore), and Kristen's husband will babysit while we go to the concert. Hopefully, Evan won't wake up crying at 10:30 like he did when I was at Arctic Monkeys. I do think he's old enough to know that I am coming back.

4. I think Aidan is at the age where he's developing internal thought. While playing with Legos the other day, he told me out of the blue that he has an imaginary friend. "Oh, yeah?" "Yes, he's in my brain and he tells me what to think about. He helps me do my thinking." Also, while going through his Friday Folder from school, I came across a cute drawing that I knew wasn't his. It was of a boy and girl holding hands, and it had the name Faith on it. When we asked him about it, he turned red and started stammering, "I don't know how that got in there! I don't know!" He didn't get angry, but he was clearly protesting too much. Faith is a girl in his class, btw.

5. The Ian Curtis biopic Control is set to come out Oct. 12 in the states. It might show here in OKC at the art museum, but I won't hold my breath. May need to travel to Dallas for this one b/c I really want to see it in the theater. I've been watching this trailer at least once a day. I'd like to reread the book, but I think I gave it away. I saw that it was for sale in Hot Topic recently. That just makes me smile.

6. The soundtrack drops Oct. 1st. It will include The Killers cover of Shadowplay, which is just awesome b/c I really enjoyed listening to their version at the concert. Here's one version, but I think the one they played at Nokia had more a more keyboard, new-wavey sound toward the end. Wow...how stoked and nervy those guys must have been to be playing Joy Division at the NME Awards in England with Peter Hook (the famed Joy Division/New Order bassist) sitting right there in the audience. (I am nursing Evan right now while typing, and he was clapping along to The Killers. Together, we're quite the little machine.)

Camping

A few weeks ago, we took the kids out of the gawdforsaken heat 500 miles away to Northern New Mexico. 10 hours there, 4 nights of camping, 10 hours back. It was planned only in the last month or so, but not too shabby for a family that really couldn't afford a "real" vacation this year, in money or time off. Luckily, my dad and stepmom were already traveling through NM by RV, so they got to Sugarite State Park a few days ahead of time and reserved a great shared spot. It was so nice to arrive in the rain and have a place to huddle. I could just kick back with the kids while Dad helped Matt do all the manly campy things to set up. Oh, and there were cornish hens on the fire for us, too! The next few days were a happy whirlwind of hiking, driving to see new things, taking lots of pics, more hiking, eating food we never eat like hot dogs and s'mores, seeing brand new puppies that were born only hours before (in Dad's RV, no less!) and getting to hold them, hiking the rim of a conical volcano (inactive). Aidan did every single thing with us, and then he also went on separate walks with Dad and even caught his first fish. I can't believe that kid's stamina.
Evan rode along happily in the backpack for the hikes and obsessively gathered rocks at the campsite. I'm still finding them in the dryer, 2 weeks later. After studying the other kids whizzing by on their bikes pretty intently, Aidan announced that he was done with his training wheels. I got a little screechy with Matt and said that it was a bad idea on the gravel, hilly road. Should have known that it would only take Aidan a few tries to just about master it. Now, two weeks later, we can't even keep up with him on foot. We have to buy bikes for ourselves if we ever want to see him again.

Inappropriate Music

Music can be deemed inappropriate in the "explicit lyrics" sense, and also, more and more for me as I'm plugging into my Ipod more frequently, in the sense that the music is incongruous with the setting. This is an unending source of amusement for me. I just relish listening to Joy Division while working out. It seems so , so wrong. I should be in my high school bedroom, staring up at the star-stickered ceiling in the dark, feeling some sort of angsty delusional heartbreak instead of sweating on the elliptical, watching HGTV.

This is my treasured Thursday morning getaway/work time and, once again, I'm at Panera Bread b/c I lack the creativity and will to find someplace better. To be fair, there's really not much better in town. Last year, when Matt was slaving away on his thesis every weekend, he would hit a now-closed coffee place on Campus Corner or Winan's. Winan's serves very decent coffee, but they have limited seating and not much a selection for breakfast. At Panera, I always get one of the spinach artichoke souffles, and something a little sweet, like an orange scone. I'm trying to show restraint today, so I ordered something called a muffie. I just could not bring myself to say that word to the cashier so I played dumb and asked for "one of those little muffin tops." My pumpkin muffie is quite disappointing, though, and I'm salivating at the site of the big honkin' Cobblestone muffin, which may as well be called cake. The lady next to me is enjoying hers a lot. Hmmm. Oh, well. Better to watch my own muffin top.

Wasting a lot of time today. Baby kept me in bed with multiple requests to "err ine," which translates to "Nurse, I want to." Didn't get out of the house til after the babysitter had been there for 30 minutes. Then, I wasted even more time here at Panera checking random emails. I'm supposed to be doing something productive with this time. Last week, I spent the entire time reading emails. That was fine b/c they were like novellas and caught me up with one friend. Time wasn't wasted. Now, I'm wasting even more time writing about wasting time checking emails.

Where was I? Oh, yeah...inappropriate music.

The song "Jump" by The Movement played on the IPod a bit ago. Definitely incongruous with this setting...there are 3 Korean women talking at one neighboring table, an older man typing away at another table, what appears to be a job interview going on at another, and a mom feeing her small kids breakfast at another. So, unfortunately, I only have the sanitized version, which also appears on the CD I linked to above. Mine's from Entertainment Weekly's Hot Dance Mix, which I got when I subscribed back in the mid-90s. The version I remember knowing and loving so well goes, "Jump muthafucka jump muthafucka jump! Jump muthafucka jump muthafucka jump!" The part that's the best is the beginning when the guy goes, "Ya'll some jumpin muthafuckas." No, really. Kristen and I were just obsessed with song for a while. So much so that we put it on our answering machine in our freshman dorm room in college. Worked for a while, but then my poor country uncle called. "Uh...is this Leah's room? Uh...Leah, this is your Uncle Bub. I just heard a strange message, so, uh, I'm not sure that this is your room..." I think when I finally talked to him, I just brushed it off and said something about having a crazy roommate.

Sitting here in Panera, I'm very tempted to break out the techno hands when I listen to this song. I will keep the santized version b/c I know that Aidan would love it as much as he loves "White Lines" by Rob Bass. I've gotta go find the unsanitized non-Jock Jam version on ITunes for old times' sake, though. Apparently, it appears only on a certain version of Rave Til Dawn. If you're thinking twice about buying it for yourself, consider this sales pitch, culled from the reviews at Amazon:

"i ve ben listening to rave music all my life and i have to admit that this cd would b ausome to have this cd would b grate for me to remix on my cd mixers on line and 1 track the movement jump motha mix ive hered it its a ausom track i cant find the track aney where but on this cd its a rar track to find the onley verson u will find is the clean verson its pritty dumb but hey its still a good track im a dj in a night club so i know my music if its good or bad what ever u do dont buy dj rap shes junk ide thought shed me techno and rave but i was rong i wasted $9.99 on it from i tunes yall should get moon shine cds they have the best electronic music like ferry corsten carl cox dj dan d fuse keoki all thoes artest its at www.moonshine.com yall check it out thanks dj_gangsta "

How can you resist?