6 Records In Don't Know Where To Begin

Over the last few weeks (mostly while I was on the east coast) so much incredible music has been added to my inventory and taken over my life. Out of all that has been added one band has definitely taken precedence over all the others, and I basically can't stop listening/thinking about their songs. That band is: Coconut Records. For those of you unfortunate souls who have never heard of them or their music, do yourself a favor and click here and then you can feel a little bit better about yourself and the life you live.

Also you will probably recognize the singer:

Mmm not bad. Also I guess he used to be the drummer for Phantom Planet, which makes him even more attractive (not the Phantom Planet part, although I guess they could be a good band. I know nothing other than "California") But apparently he has a wife. He would. Dumb.

Honorable Mentions (of the rest of the music recently added):

• Paul McCartney Ram - I feel sorry for my life previous to the knowledge of this album and am forever grateful that it has crossed my path. I've listened to "Uncle Albert" probably 100 times since I got it.
• Atmosphere's "That Night" - the drums mixed with the lyrics to this song are enough to give you chills, also make you a little sad. It's a true story.
• The New Pornographers Together - Never actually listened to this band before today when I walked into the record store in Bellevue and asked what band was playing at the moment. I liked it, so I bought it.
• Jaydiohead - Jay-Z mixed with Radiohead, actually very good and fun to run to.

All incredible music. Really do yourself a favor and listen to all of the above. But if you don't have time for all just at least listen to Coconut Records and then you can thank me for how much better your life just got. You're welcome everyone.

The Adventures of Mal and Lou

Here is a quick recap of the newest chapters of The Adventures of Mal and Lou that took place over this last weekend.

Thursday: I spent the morning taking a stupid math final. I felt like I was going to throw up the whole time I was taking it and it totally sucked. I joke about throwing up a lot and I usually use it too describe something exciting, but this time I for real wanted to puke. I didn't though. And after the test I felt fine. Dumb. We will have to see how the crap test went. Then afterwards I headed to the airport to catch my flight to Newark. At about midnight or so Lindsey got me at the airport and we headed to her house to basically go right to sleep.

Friday: We woke up and ate breakfast then headed to the train station to catch the train to NYC. When we got there we spent the next few hours just wandering around from Time Square to Central Park to Staten Island to basically wherever we wanted. While we were in Central Park we happened upon a baseball game and stopped to watch. Lindsey started cheering for a "Timmy" because well, why not. Obviously we knew no one on the team, but it was pretty funny to us when the team members started yelling for Timmy too and thought we were actually looking for him. Well, just watch this video of it and it will make more sense. We also filmed some prime people watching and our commentary of it while we were there. (It may be posted on the internet somewhere someday, but for now it was taking way too long to load so we gave up.) After we got tired of walking around the city it was pretty late so we headed back to Lou's and pretty much went straight to bed.

Saturday: SIX FLAGS! That's basically all that needs to be said. It was pretty hilarious when we almost lost our bags at the end of the day. Our ticket for our locker wouldn't open the locker so we had to get the park maintenance people to come open it, and when they did someone else's stuff was in there. We were like - um crap that's probably not good. So then we had to open all these different lockers until we finally found our bags. The park people were super nice about it so that was good. We were so happy to find our stuff that we seriously wanted to hug the cute old man that helped us find our things. But we didn't. Then we left and got Rita's (Italian ice) and headed home to get pizza and Ralph's (even better Italian Ice) and watch a lot of episodes of Arrested Development. (quite possibly my favorite show now) Then we met up with Dave and Bryan to head to their house to watch Hot Rod. Lindsey had never seen it, which appalled me considering it's probably the best movie ever made, so we had to watch it.

Sunday: We drove to Philly and wandered around most of the day looking at all the typical Philly sites. We also probably got Ralph's like 2 or 3 times. It's one of the best things that has ever happened to my life and I wish we had it on the west coast. When we got home we spent the rest of the night watching Arrested Development.

Monday: We went back to NYC and wandered around SoHo in the pouring rain. When we got hungry we went to Chocolate by the Bald Man, this incredible chocolate restaurant, and ate so much chocolate. We both wanted to just pass out, it was so good. We left feeling way too full, but it was totally worth it. Then we headed home to get Ralph's and watch Arrested Development. (see a pattern?)

Tuesday: We went to New Hope, PA and wandered around the shops looking at whatever. Then after we were there for about an hour the power went out and no one was letting people into their shops anymore. So we left to get more Ralph's. Then I headed to the airport and back to the west coast.

The trip was way too short and it was so incredible to hang out with Lindsey again!! I am seriously considering moving to the east coast sometime in the future. Maybe just for Ralph's, but no seriously I could live there, I'd love it.

Rip City

Going to sleep at 3am and waking up at 8am to run 14 miles (I'm marathon training again for the June race) before driving 3 hours to Portland is probably not the smartest thing to do. I, as well as my passengers, were pretty nervous of me falling asleep at the wheel. But thanks to some Mountain Dew and Dr. Pepper we arrived safely at Rose Garden in time to spend an hour in the Blazers fan store before the game started.

Mitch, Xander and I had decked ourselves out in Sonics gear to show our rebellion towards the Blazers opponent: OKC Thunder. Most people understood the message we were sending and would walk up to us and say a quick "Sorry they moved" or "They should have stayed" throughout the game. We were not alone in our rebellion, we saw plenty of people in Sonics jerseys and t-shirts all over the arena. Before the game started we noticed a couple 20 something yr old guys sitting maybe 5 rows back from the court so we headed down there to become friends with them and see if they wanted to trade seats. It turns out the seats weren't theirs either. So no go on the seat swap, but we did become friends with them. They were super drunk and kind of annoying though.

We were pretty excited when the Blazers won and the boys went to buy Roy jerseys before it was time to get back on the road and head home. At this point I was pretty tired and really was not excited about driving for 3 more hours, but the boys were helpful in keeping me awake. Xands and Mindge had a great time pointing out how every sign for food coming up at the next exit had Taco Bell, Subway, and McDonald's (or McDank's like Mitch likes to say) on it. They were just baffled that all three of them were at every exit that had food. I know it's fascinating right? Also blasting Third Eye Blind and The Beatles helped aid in the safety of our drive home. It was a glorious night for sure. I also may have developed a huge crush on Fernandez (Don't worry Deron, no one can replace you. No one) And I wish Roy wasn't injured and had played. He's a Husky so we were all pretty yoked to see him play, then he hurt his knee or something dumb and shattered a portion of our dream for the evening. Even so, it was an incredible night.

America Jr.

I had a couple days off in a row, which hasn't happened in quite a while, so I took full advantage. Also one of those days was my birthday, so I figured I should do something worthwhile. I had plenty and I mean plenty of things that I needed to get done and those days off would definitely have been the perfect time to get those things done, but instead I decided to stress myself out and lose sleep to get those things done before Sarah and I left for our quick Canadian adventure.

Vancouver is only three and half hours away and I've never been to that part of Canada before so we thought it'd be a great cheap place to go. We spent most of the time there walking around and filming really pointless explanations of things we knew nothing about. (I would post them here, but they were taking a long time to load. So, if you are in dire need of seeing me on film talking about nothing that matters to anyone, you better hope you're my facebook friend). We went to some incredible restaurants and had the best Malaysian fish there is known to man. Then I decided - that's it, I'm going to Malaysia. I need to eat this on a regular basis. Or I guess I could just learn how to make it myself, but somehow I don't think it would be the same. We also had some French crepes that were worthy of throwing up and re-eating as well. (it makes sense, stop it) The hostel we stayed at was small and cheap, like normal. Except this one had an entire flock of birds nesting in the room with us. Well, I guess they were outside the window, but it sounded as if they were on the pillow squawking right in my ear all night. I slept well.

I was ecstatic that they had an HMV and I spent a fair amount of time perusing the CD's. I was upstairs looking for the newer Jape album and also Coconut Records when Sarah came up with an expression of horror on her face and exclaimed that she had just seen a penis. WHAT WHY!!! Apparently some homeless guy on the street didn't care that the entire walls of HMV are made of glass and chose to face the store and all of its customers and relieve himself. I'm glad I missed the show.

The new Vancouver temple also just got finished being built so we went and saw it. We were two days early for the open house so we unfortunately didn't get to go inside, but it was beautiful.

This Decadent Misuse

I don't necessarily think it's healthy or normal for a person to know how they want to die, and I don't really think a person should spend a lot of time, if any, thinking about that. That being said, I know exactly how I want to die. I've had this idea for many years now, but it was brought to my attention again the other night as I was eating some incredible chocolate peanut butter cup ice cream with Sarah. As I took a bite an orgasm of flavor exploded inside of my mouth and caused me to relate my glorious idea to her. She started laughing pretty hard and told me that I needed to write a blog about it. Since I do any and everything other people tell me to do, here it is. I love peanut butter so much, and I eat it by the spoonful. I probably have a spoonful every single morning with some banana as I'm waiting for my oats to cook. MMM yeah so good. And I love chocolate even more than that. My life would suck without them in it. Mix them together and I can't even describe the joy that I feel when that taste touches my tongue. I probably like it better than ketchup. Although, I can't smother all my foods in peanut butter and chocolate. Well, I guess I could, they just wouldn't bet edible. Oh but I could smother everything in peanut butter and ketchup! You know what that equals- peanut sauce.(missing brown sugar and some other stuff) You know what peanut sauce is used for- Thai food. You know what is one of my top favorite types of food-Thai food. (It's an ongoing battle between Indian and Thai always won by whichever one I happen to be eating at the moment. Oh crap, Mexican is incredible too. I love food) Nice. So basically, I want to die drowning in a vat of melted peanut butter and chocolate. Just imagine eating yourself sick while swimming in the heavenly mixture, passing out then succumbing to the ultimate death by chocolate...and peanut butter. MMM. Delicious. If at all possible I would like to make this happen. Not sure how, but if any of you reading this are around when I die (since we know when that will be!?) if you could aid in this happening that'd be great thanks.

So what the crap do you do when your "wife" gets engaged? Well, I guess it means I have to get a divorce, well a Facebook divorce. This blows. Because, you know, whatever Facebook says is super important to me...? But I guess I'm happy for her. OK I'm extremely happy for her. JANIE'S ENGAGED!!!!! She called me sometime after midnight a couple nights ago right after it happened and I couldn't be more excited for her! Although, I totally hate Quinston and his crap band. He's probably the worst guitar player I've ever heard, and seriously who plays the accordion?! Well, he does and he totally sucks at it. I was not happy when he asked me to divorce Janie so he could marry her. Ugh whatever. NUGGETS BLOW! Anyway I get to be the maid of honor! Rad. Considering we have been best friends since 13, I think it's only fitting that I am. What does a maid of honor even do? I HAVE to live with my Janie one more time before she gets married, and help her plan the wedding/throw her bridal showers or whatever. I think those are some of my duties as a maid of honor, right? Yah I'm pretty sure they are. It's going to be somewhat hard to do that from WA. Oh no, it looks like it just might be a UT summer (possibly longer) for me this year. Ugh life decisions, you are not my friend.

I Am Heaven Sent. Don't You Dare Forget

So, it's commonly known that I eat cereal for 2 0f the 3 meals basically every single day, but I do freaking love cooking. I just have a hard time cooking for myself. I love cooking for other people, it's a lot more fun. Plus I crave cereal all the time, and when I'm not eating it I want to be. So why deprive myself? I think I'm a pretty good cook. I mean I think it tastes good and that's really all that matters, right? I mean seriously have you ever had my Thai coconut curry soup? It's incredible. Remember when I made it for you guys Kelly? Ya amazing. And I personally think I make pho pretty much the same, if not better, than most places I've been. I mean I can obviously improve, but I'm pretty good. (not to be full of myself) Is it wrong that when I'm old and married and dumb that I totally want to be that wife that has dinner on the table every night when her husband gets home from work? And that I totally love cleaning and organizing? I submit that it is not. And I personally want to give a big sarcastic "Thanks a lot" to Susan B. Anthony and friends for starting the women's rights movement. What a joke. I know my place.

Song of the day: B.o.B. & Bruno Mars "Nothin On You" I hear a lot of rap/hip hop these days because Mitch just freakin loves it. I'm not into that much rap, though early 90's stuff is rad, but I heard this song and I freakin love it!! Plus it has the best line I have ever heard in a rap song: "You the whole package plus you pay your taxes" hilarious.