this distrubs me. those poor bears. mauled to "death" to make this coat! it was designed by this guy in south america who looks cute actually and does some other nifty stuff. but this bear thing. oh hell no! it's all cute and cuddly and creepy.

anyhow....the coachella lineup is out. well...most of it. needless to say i am NOT thrilled about the headliners. depeche mode and tool. ugh! DM i'm ok with but tool, hell no. i hate tool! anyhow, i await the full lineup. i am convinced there is one more big band for the second day. i am also convinced that either the strokes were supposed to be that other big band and they backed out last minute so the promoters are scrambling for a replacement or the strokes are being bitches and just need to sign the contract already. either way, this year is the year of the smaller bands. and boy i can't wait!

gung hay fat choy

it's chinese new years! michael just informed me that this girl in his writing class is all into that stuff and she said that people in the year of the rooster aren't gonna have a good year. i don't wanna hear that!!! anyhow, andrew left this morning. he had an 8am flight! and now he's off to japan. comes back sunday. *sigh* he said he may have to go to china next month in the middle of the month. i hope it doesn't overlap with the plans i made for v-day. if so i think i will cry. 1) because this is my first v-day ever. yes, EVER! age 24 thank you very much. and 2) i'll be out a chunk of money. =(

today i hung out with my old coworker, cynthia. we worked together at the twins' company. we went to mani's (twice now i've tried to go to doughboys on a weekend and failed due to lack of parking and a long line) and then went to santa monica so i could exchange my free pumas and go to lush. it was fun times. we got makeup and all. woo! and now i'm at andrew's watching seinfeld while he packs for japan. andy is going to japan again for a week. boo.

ah finally the credit cards are coming back. but yesterday i did have to get gas by paying cash at the window. so weird. i haven't done that in ages! i forgot what it was like and what a hassle it was. anyhow, my discover card came today and it had this ugly beach scene on it. and i was wondering what the hell happened? what happened to my nice plain silver card? so when i called to activate it i asked and the woman laughed. apparently when they cancelled my card and reordered me new ones, they ordered me a beach one. she assumes because i live in california the person who ordered it thought i would like it. well i don't. but as it turns out there are 150+ card designs to choose from! and so help me god when you give me choices like that. part of me just wanted to stick to the basic silver. reorder a silver one. but i couldn't. i browsed the collection and it's sorta like ordering checks. do u go with the basic check your bank gives you or do u order something cute and fun? they had cards of all varieties. skylines, flags, dogs, flowers, etc. but in the end i narrowed it down to two chocies. a shot of the golden gate bridge which wasn't that attractive but at least i could rep SF whenever i make purchases or this 70's decade card with a disco ball. well needless to say i chose the ball cuz that's why it's shown below here. i thought it was too good to pass up. a card with a disco ball! not only do i love the 70s but it also calls to the dance party in me!

anyhow, that's my new discover card. i wonder if my mastercard comes in designs!?! this weekend is packed with lots of stuff. work and all.

ok so i can't decide what is worse....losing your wallet or losing your wallet, cancelling every card in it including your video and library cards, and then FINDING your wallet the next fucking day. hmm..what do u think? all i know is i'm devoid of all my cards and it sucks until i get them back....

on another note, emily is now gone. so sad. =( it was good times having her back here for the weekend. we went out shopping yesterday. just our usual shop and rant. haha now it's back to the grind. hopefully coachella will be announced soon so i don't freak out!

last nite was so amazing. brian's party was lots of fun and i got wasted beyond belief. but good wasted. like fun dancing and all that. no puking. great fucking times. i wish i could post this video i have of shaun and joe dancing. cuz that shit is so great. so fucking great. sadly today is not such a good day. i lost my wallet. yep, lost my wallet. very painful thing to happen. cancelled all my credit cards, debit card, etc. gotta get a new license, AAA card, ralphs card, video card, etc. all those fucking little things. all gone. everything gone. lost the money order em gave to me for her AA clothes. so sad. fucking hassle as well. such a fucking hassle. gotta go the DMV bright and early monday morning. hopefully i can get in without an appt. i think i'm gonna get there before it opens and just get in and do my shit. and hope i can get it all done within an hour and a half before going to work. ugh anyway, i'm going to bed.

ok so this morning i was walking to my car when a guy spotted me and stopped his car, rolled down the window and said "hey. what's your name? where are you going? can i give you a ride?" i said "no. that's ok. i'm going to work. my car's right there." and he persists asking over and over "what's your name? let me talk to you." etc etc. i was like shit man. what the fuck? its 9 in the morning and u are cruising for chicks? so i get in my car and he pulls up right next to me and mouths through the window something like "let me talk to you. what's your name?" and i just keep shaking my head. luckily there was space for me to back out of the parking spot because he was totally in my way and looked like he wasn't going to move cuz he so desparately wanted to talk to me. anyway, that was my morning. good grief. checking out chicks in the AM! what has this world come to?!

last night i went to the coachella movie. holy crappola. it got me sooo pumped. i want to go to coachella very badly this year. very badly. i got chills watching arcade fire in the movie. it took me right back to the moment. the glorious moment. oh coachella. i CAN'T WAIT!!!

ok so i can't stop listening to the ricky gervais podcasts. i just listen to the old ones again and again. they fuckin crack me up so much. i will be sad when all 12 are done with and i can't listen anymore.

could this day get any more weird? i just got back from trader joe's with andrew where i ran into two people who work with me. the don't work in the same office. one works on the print side and the other works in like community relations or something. that one is the guy who if i wasn't dating andrew i'd think he might be pursuable. this is all of course based off of the way he looks. slightly attractive but very friendly looking. coincidentally his name is also andrew. anyway, it was funny in the store. us running into each other and giving formal introductions since i never really met them properly. i now need to decide if they are dating. cuz it sorta seemed like it but sorta didn't. i couldn't tell for sure. i also finally formally met this girl at work who seems really cool and is quite cute. if i was a lesbian i'd go for her. and since i'm not i wouldn't mind recommending her to a guy friend. but i need to get to know her better since we've only spoke a few times. anyway, today has been quite the day of oddities. and now it's time to eat din dins with andy.

umm so i nearly shit a brick just a minute ago. john from SC just came into my office on a tour. holy fuck. seriously my blood pressure rose and everything. i haven't seen him since the time we ignored each other at the roost. holy fuck. we said hi and gave half hugs. fucking hell. that really threw my day out of wack. if i could i'd have a drink right now. just to soften the blow. he STILL has my guitar. and i won't even get into that...i think out of everyone that reads this only brian, kyla, and emily will really understand.

home alone working while many folks are out playing games. literally. i have to work tomorrow. i realize i'm not the only person who doesn't get MLK day off. thank god. i was going to be pissed if i was the only one. went to the griddle today for the first time. ate way too much but really didn't make a dent in my huge ass pile of oreo filled pancakes. i have to go back to that place several times. the food there is really fucking good and so reasonably priced. i mean in terms of value it's amazing. i think my pancakes weighed at least a couple pounds. shit. our waiter looked like he was trying to look liked brad pitta cira 1993 give or take. the era when brad was grungey looking. needless to say i couldn't stop looking at the waiter. jen said he was probably an asshole and i'm sure he was. but goddamn he was attractive. and i think partially only because he resembled mr. pitt.

so i really need to start back at the gym. i hope to go a couple times this week. it's so hard when i have so much fucking freelance work. but i looked at my list and it seems to be diminishing. so that means there will be time to hit the gym.

andrew comes home tonight. but late. so i won't see him. he should be back soon actually. but it's nearly 11:30 so yea, won't be seeing him.

currently planning out my coachella list for the pool. trying to figure out what is the best strategy. gah!! so hard. altho it's only $5 so it's not that big of a deal. but goddamnit, if i'm going to play i should at least come up with a strategy. whether it's a good strategy or the right one is irrelevant. but there needs to be a strategy. otherwise it's like shooting darts blindly.

bored at work right now. lull btwn projects. so i'll post.

so first of all. there is this awesome unsigned band that james raves about and soon enough dwayne and i will too. colored shadows is their name. and they hail from los angeles. james, dwayne and i are actually going to see them at the troub this month. anyway i just ordered their two EPs off their website because i couldn't find them in stores. they came in the mail yesterday and the return address is literally down the street from my house!!! curson street. same zip. goodness. they live down the street from me. i had no idea. anyway they are really good. check them out.

ok so this coachella pool. it's got me all working the numbers game in my head. what to do. go for big or go for perfect. i dunno. i can't decide how to play it. but im formulating ideas of who to choose. the thing is there is one main rumor list circulating the net. and everyone in the pool has seen it. so basically it's a matter of who thinks that damned thing is right. and clearly it's not all correct. and furthermore, can any of us find other sources to pull from to formulate a more perfect list. anyway, we shall see.

so i said i was going to go somewhere this year overseas. and goddamn i will. initially i wanted to with andrew cuz that would be awesome. going somewhere foreign with my boyfriend. i mean come on. but....he can't go anytime soon. ie, at least 6 months. cuz his schedule is so irregular. as it is i had to gripe to make sure that he will be around for the weekend after valentine's day so that i could plan my first ever vday. yes the first ever official one. the one with brian a couple years back doesn't count. even if it was fun. anyway so i planned out a little fun weekend thing for andrew and i. and i hope and pray he doesnt have to travel. cuz then i'll be pissed, upset, and out a wade of cash. we shall see.

anyway so then i was gonna go somewhere with jesscia cuz she said that brian couldn't go with her to buenos aires. but now he can. so stacey and i started talking and now she and i are going somewhere. either brazil or spain. and we are VERY excited. and it's me and stacey. how can we not be excited? so we planned out both trips very roughly. we decided if we go to spain we are stopping in england to go to THE MUTHERFUCKIN READING FESTIVAL!!! 3 days of musical maddness. IN ENGLAND! surely it will be similar to coachella. but both of us have always wanted to go to reading or glastonbury. and this year glastonbury is cancelled. don't know why. anyway we will decide this weekend what we are doing. make more solid rough plans. and then tell everyone those plans in case they want to come along. i can't fucking wait. i need to go travel somewhere goddamnit!!! it's been too long....

so i got a little worried about andrew for a bit. i hadn't spoken to him in a couple days and my text messages/emails had gone unreplied. i was fine with that til sami called asking where andrew was and said she hadn't heard back from him after leaving two messages in the past two days. i said i didn't really know cuz i hadn't spoken to him in that timeframe either. so i tried calling a few times today and no answer any of the times. so then i got a little worried. but rest assured andy is A-OK. just a busy little beaver finishing up the vegas shit. he called me a little bit ago so i know he's alright. and he comes back tomorrow!!! yay! i can't wait to see andy. if only for two days.

went to see munich today with lawrence. quite good movie. it's funny because i don't really have much to say about. everyone who's seen it has asked me what i thought. and i said simply, "it's good." and they're like, "that's it? just good?" yea, that's about it for me. just good. i can't really think what else to say. it was long and felt even longer. it was well-acted and well-directed. there were scenes that i especially liked the color/saturation spielberg chose. but i mean overall i don't have anything groundbreaking to say about it. the events that occured during the munich olympics were something that i never really knew about. i have heard vaguely of the killings but i never knew that after that there were all these attacks on the arabs and whatnot. so it was sorta like watching a well-played history lesson with very dramatic scenes. i recommend it but only if you are ready to feel sorta somber and exhausted. because that's how i felt after seeing this movie. now what i really want to see next is match point. the new woody allen flick that i just learned about the other day. looks really good and those who have seen it say the same thing. and think i will like it. so i gotta jump on that movie. also need to still see syriana but i heard that movie is confusing. so i'm not looking forward to being confused. but i did like traffic and everyone says syriana is like traffic except about oil instead of drugs. so we shall see.

farewell jordan. have fun in NYC. like i said, it's like a long vacation...

so jordan is moving to NYC for 6 months to intern at the focus features out there. we decided to throw him an 80's style dance party. so that meant wearing the DP shirt and/or dressing 80's. i did both. check that shit out. rockin the bright blue leggings and drinking tab. i'm 80's to the max! woo! and joe wore his NKOTB shirt which i apparently saw one night while puking in his toilet but i certainly don't remember. i just remember hearing the mention of the shirt. i love it!

today has been sorta productive and mainly just chill. andrew comes back to LA either tomorrow or monday. unfortunately he leaves again for new york on wednesday. i am sad. i miss my andies.

verrrrrry peculiar....

i just got a phone call from a restricted number on my cell phone. no answer. just call. i said hello. click. done. then five minutes later i got another call from a restricted number. so i assumed it must be the same person. and i figured it must be a wrong number. because that tends to happen. you call once. person answers. you realize it's a mistake. sometimes you say "oh sorry, wrong number" and sometimes you just hang up. very common. then you try again and get the same person because somehow you transposed the numbers or something. so i thought this must be the case and i nearly let the second call go to voicemail because i figured the person would figure it out when they got my voicemail. but i decided at the last minute to answer. and a girl said hello. here is how the conversation went:

me: hello?
girl: hi. is this jen?
me: yes this is jen.
girl: hi. i was wondering if you are going to being any baked goods to the amnesty bake sale tomorrow.
me: huh? amnesty bake sale?
girl: yea. at school tomorrow...
me: umm...i don't go to school anymore....
girl: oh?...is this jen?
me: yea this is jen...
girl: jen miller?
me: nope. jen mur_se.
girl: hmm...how weird...
me: yea....weird. jen m. and jen m.
girl: oh well...umm...bye...
me: bye...

so that was the strange conversation. now i say strange because this sounds like the conversation you have with someone who is looking for you. or is looking for you on behalf of someone else. because to me it seems like she probably called the first time and heard my voice and didn't have a story yet thinking she might just get voicemail where i'd say my name and she could know it was jen. so then she calmed and came up with a story and called back 5 minutes later. and because it was off the top of her head used a last name that started with the same initial as my last name. what do you guys think? any thoughts? emily, any thoughts? haha i'm sure you have some. freak occurance or premeditated phone call?

ugh so it's bad enough my team lost by the slimmest of margins. but all morning long i heard this girl basically gloating about texas winning. omg i wanted to punch her in the face. shut up about it. i don't gloat when shit is good. and i certainly don't wanna hear you gloat either. are you even from texas? or did you go to school there? my instinct tells me "no" is the answer for both. whatever. enough said. moving forward. hopefully leinart and bush get good draft picks and don't end up at truly shitty teams. as for vince young. we gotta do something about that shit.

so i'm currently at andrew's doing as much laundry as i possibly can within a reasonable amount of time. looking at the amount laying there, something tells me it won't all get washed. that's ok because it doesn't all have to. but the more the merrier. i hate doing laundry. i'm also working on more freelance. good grief. i'm so glad it's nearly the weekend. i need a break badly. tomorrow is jordan's goodbye 80's party. then i think the rest of the weekend i'm going to work and stay home. no going out. need to just chill alone for a bit. san fran was people overload. so much talking on the phone, driving, around, and all that jazz. i got shit to take care of and it's hard with people around. no offense. love people. just not all the time.

anyhoo, freelance is kicking my ass. i can't wait to see andrew. he comes home next week. like monday or tuesday. i just found another ring i want to take onto the existing $150 ring i already want. i watched a bunch of movie previews and now there are a slew of movies i want to see. and there just isn't time in the world for everything! gah gah triple gah!

...the agony of defeat....

usc 38 - texas 41

painful. very painful. and what's worse...i have work to do still. and i'm super tired...

i freelance and i freelance and i freelance some more. i swear it's sort of taking over my life. luckily i have no life. uh i mean....i do have a life. and it's consuming every waking free moment. i suppose it's a good thing andrew is gone. less worrying about being able to see him since there is no way in hell i can. nevertheless, the freelance is taking hold of me it seems. i basically go from one work to another work. and no real rest in btwn. i haven't been to the gym in ages because whenever i get a free moment all i want to do is veg. it sucks. new years resolution is to get back to the gym and also ensure that my freelance gets me somewhere closer to being independent of the MAN. i don't want to work for the MAN anymore. i like my job and all but in the long run i want to be my own boss. freelancing permanently/owning my own small business. anyhoo, i tallied up my earnings for last year and they were surprisingly higher than i expected considering i didn't start working til april. i made nearly as much i would for the whole year (at my salary rate) in just 8 months. not too shabby! it's due to all that freelance i tell ya. ok back to work.

i miss andy... =/

ah...not so good to be back in LA. my SF trip was whirlwind and entirely too quick. but GOD as it good to get away. i mean seriously. i was dying at work. i needed a break. working all those damn holidays and watching every single person in the office take at least one of the days off was getting to me. but i got my time off and now all is well. i return to work tomorrow refreshed and ready to start a new year. 2006 is going to be awesome. i can feel it in me'bones.

so to recap the trip....

driving up to san fran from 7:45pm to 2am was damn near one of the most fun trips ever thanks to dwayne, sami, and stacey. they made it bearable and i didn't ever feel tired. we jibberjabbered on the entire time and barely even got to listen to the 3 mixes i made. we talked about the most random shit. from the infamous mile plus walk in the rain in san fran to camera f-stops. the next day was the day of shopping. H&M was raped and pillaged. well maybe just raped. because i hardly took anything away from the experience. but i finally got to see it so that was good. never found my shoes for the wedding so i ending up buying some online. went out to moroccan food with kyla, eric, sami, and stacey. followed that up with a little local bar action. we had a quiet nite in preparation for NYE.

the next day (NYE) was lots and lots of phone action. i think i was on my phone for most of the day talking to the various groups of people involved with the NYE event. let me outline who all was in san fran for this experience.

kyla
eric

samira
stacey

jessica
brian
gino
josh
dan
eric
ted
dom
wakerly
charlotte
dustin
pedro
jonathan
...and a few others i have never met

jordan
dianne
lauren
...and a few others i met two times during the trip

then those who didn't go to our NYE event but were factors in the SF trip

dwayne
melissa
matt
tinna
donna

and of course myself. 25+ people. it was insane. new year's eve day was filled with random shopping during the day followed by hanging out with mel and talking more about the wedding. then getting ready frantically for the NYE event. pre-drinking and taking way too many photos with the rody's. getting really drunk and blurrily getting into the club and meeting up with everyone else. dancing my ass off til the wee hours. remembering the countdown as being a mere brief moment in the night. (seriously it felt so inconsequential to all the fun i was having.) rocking out to the mashups. nearly losing my coatcheck ticket. calling many people and not being able to hear them. writing drunken text messages. and capping it off with a jaunt in the mission around 4am because we couldn't hail a cab to save our lives. stacey, sami, and i crashed at eric's and in the morning woke up and baked lowfat brownies. i say lowfat because we didn't use vegetable oil so they lacked flavor as many lowfat products do.

stacey and sami left and eric, kyla and i made brunch at like 2pm. then she and i went to her house and got ready for dinner. i shit u not. we went to her house. took showers. then eric came over and we all went out to dinner. burma superstar. great fucking restaurant. 13 people involved. table confusion. getting boba before dinner. along with an awesome chinese umbrella with this wraparound function that i can't describe. eating family style and trying out 10+ dishes on the menu. dispersing around 10pm. going home and doing work before sleeping. then waking up this morning to take the crew back to LA.

the drive back was fun but more tiring than the one entering THE CITY. we again all had great conversation about san francisco elitestness and LA only having one thriving industry -- hollywood. relationships. marriage. the whole nine yards. lots of rain on and off but bucketloads of rain on the grapevine. i'ver never driven so "slow" (45-50mph) in my life on that damned road. now i'm home. i took a nap. ate some dinner. and i'm going to do some work now. the rest of my freelance work that's due tomorrow. this week is going to be tiring. and andrew STILL isn't back... =/