Stuff

"The Story of Stuff is a 20-minute, fast-paced, fact-filled look at the underside of our production and consumption patterns." Click the link above to see this pretty cool video. I love the graphics, and Annie Leonard captures your attention. It's pretty much "another way" to look at environmental concerns and goes beyond recycling because as this video shows recycling is just not enough! I've been trying to cut down on my own personal consumerism because there is more to life than just accumulating stuff and you can't take stuff with you when you die and stuff won't make you happy and now I know I am being environmentally conscious too!

Movie Weekend

I haven’t posted a pic of my baby nephew in a while. Here he is in his Bumbo. Just before this pic he was positioned to look outside the open sliding glass door that’s behind him and he couldn’t have been happier. He’s such a cool baby. I hope he’s always this relaxed and chill. Mike hasn’t had a chance to see him very often because he works so much but he saw him this weekend and was holding him and playing with him, it was the cutest thing ever! When we got home, I was like you liked him, and he was all, he’s cool!

So, I’m sure everyone and their mother saw Batman this weekend. I’m sure because I saw them all when I was there. After we went to my parent’s house for July birthdays (yes plural, three to be exact) my sister and niece along with my husband wanted to go see it. I didn’t want to go try to see it late at night because I’m lying that I’m 25, I’m really 65 and I have a bed time. We went home before meeting them at the movie theater and I looked at Fandango.com just to see if the movie was sold out or not and it was. At this point I’m thinking alright I get to stay home now and go to bed! Not so much. They all wanted to go to a theater on the other side of town that Fandango couldn’t give me info on. So I went along. We were trying to see the 10:15 show, but it was sold out until 11:15. Again, immediately I think yeah we get to go home! Again, not so much. When I’m tired I’m cranky so I was like “I don’t wanna, I don’t wanna!” I still lost. We waited around for an hour for the movie to start. Now, you may be asking me “hey Amanda, what did you think of the movie that you drove around town and went to so much effort to see?” Well, the answer, my friend, is I don’t know. Because I fell asleep. That’s how old I am. It seemed like a really GREAT movie for the first hour and forty-five minutes of the two and half-hour running time. I’m totally bummed that I don’t know what happened. But Heath Ledger did do an awesome job. I’ve already seen the quote “I can make this pencil disappear” on someone’s Twitter. If you didn’t wait in line for an hour to see this movie this weekend then you may not know what I’m talking about. If you did then you can go ahead and quote something from the last half of the movie and I’ll be the one left out with no clue what you’re talking about.

Finally San Fran

AHHH!!! It’s been almost a month and I haven’t written about my recent trip to SF with the hub. Despite my prediction that we would bicker over silly things and spend most of our short time together trying to make up, I was surprisingly wrong! We got along beautifully the whole time. I’m pretty sure I know the reason why…I think Mikey has discovered that he just needs to do and say what I want and I’m perfectly happy and if I’m happy then he’s happy. Oh how my little bear has grown, I’m such a proud mama.

On to little tid bits of our time in the cold, overcast, city.

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We get there and drive around our hotel and notice three Indian (my FAV) restaurants right away. So we throw our stuff in our hotel room (after a lengthy check in process see previous post) and run to go eat. As we are leaving the hotel there are several sedan drivers waiting around and Mike asks their opinion of the best one in the area. The guy says we HAVE to go to this one that’s further away than all the ones I can see from where we are standing and gives us directions. Well, gives Mike directions. Never trust Mike with directions. NEVER. So we are going along and suddenly find ourselves in the scariest part of any city I’ve ever been in. We are now surrounded by obvious prostitutes and people that heavily support the underground drug industry and fear that I will feel the sharp pain of a knife in my kidney any second. Mike is trying to look at a map and I scold him “look like you know what you’re doing and walk fast!!!”

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Walking around the city we pass by some of the happiest and friendliest bums we’ve seen and the man shouts out to me “ooh lady, you got good taste. He’s WOOONDAFUL” we’ve been laughing ever since.

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Scene: Mike and I in the elevator with a hotel employee. Mike: “Your name is Hakeem?” to the gentleman wearing a nametag engraved with “Hakeem.” Me: (in my head) OH MY GOSH, he did NOT just say that! You may wonder what is wrong with this. Anyone seen the movie “Coming to America”? The second the man exited the elevator I KNEW I was going to get Mike’s LOUD impression of the father in that movie going “HAKEEM!!!” you have to hear Mike do it to really get this story…

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And some more pics...

Us in the car at the beginning of our road trip.


Our new car knows my name!!



The view from our hotel room.

Nordstrom, Forever 21, Anthropologie are just a few of the stores visible from our room!

We went to the aquarium out on Pier 39. This is me in a tunnel with millions of school fish all around. I love how they look like little lights behind me in the dark!

Mike in the tunnel. More schools. And a Starfish.

Mike getting interactive with the fish.

Me and the famous seals of Pier 39. This is the only thing I remember from my San Fran trip when I was a kid. It wasn't the season for them this time so there weren't very many.

Mike and I on the double decker bus tour. It was one of those things that you can hop on and off as much as you wanted for two days. That is, if the bus actually shows up. We waited around for 45 minutes for the first bus. And then at the end of the day I lost my ticket! Two pieces of advice: if you take a double decker bus in SF DON'T take the older run-down looking bus (we purchased our tickets without seeing the equipment) there are other newer, nicer looking buses if you wait outside Macy's in Union Square. Two: Don't keep your absolutely-necessary- to-ride-the-bus ticket in your back pocket when you are walking around all day. It will shimmy it's way out with every step you take. Fortunately for me, I was able to wave the bus map to the ticket checker as the long pushy line behind me distracted the ticket checker. Also note Mike's new shades. I've been hearing about these amazing $7 shades since we got home and how he should have bought more!

Me on a lion in China Town. To most people this is abnormal behavior. Whenever we are away from home and we see big lion sculptures, it reminds us of our big kitty, Murray.

Me on an anchor. Also possibly classified as abnormal behavior. I have no explanation for this one. I just thought it was cool. I asked Mike to pose with it and he stood next to it like a boring person, so I had to show him how it's done.