my sister lizzy has arrived

There have been many times in my life when I have really missed having a sister around. For example, I hate watching movies alone and there are certain movies that Matt will just refuse to watch. The following movies can only be watched with certain sisterly female companions:

A Room With A View

Pride and Prejudice (A&E version, with Colin Firth)

Dirty Dancing

Reality Bites

Empire Records

Legally Blonde

Troop Beverly Hills (yes, that's right)

And this list doesn't even get into the sleazy television shows that I can only watch with a female companion (Sex and the City, What Not to Wear, the OC etc.). I love how you can call up a sister whenever and not feel wierd about it. If you want someone to go with you on a long shopping quest for a certain pink dress required by a certain brother's wedding, a sister is the perfect candidate. Or if you just really feel like going out to lunch at your favorite sushi place, she is always up for it. Maybe you've had something really crappy happen to you; Who do you call? Your sis of course.

I am so happy that my wonderful sister Liz has moved out here (yeah!) as of yesterday. It makes living in Utah much more bearable.

bathroom re-do

Matt finished the bathroom remodel, and just in time too as he started another school year today. Here are the pictures; notice the surprise eggplant color. Unfortunately, we never took pictures of the old bathroom to compare. For those of you who had to see the original, I'm sorry. For those who have never seen the original, just imagine cheap wood paneled vanity and wood paneled perma-crooked mirror and you'll get the idea. Believe me, it's a huge improvement.

goodbye, alessandra ferri

One of my favorite ballerinas of all time just retired this summer. You can read more about her career here. As a young dancer in New York, I remember being amazed along with my classmates (at the School of American Ballet), to find out (amid all the dancer gossip) that once she became a principal dancer, she never took a ballet class with the company again. When I saw her first perform Romeo and Juliet opposite Julio Bocca at ABT, I was blown away by their passion---they were so REAL---complete with passionate groping/kissing---it caused my fourteen-year-old mind to implode. I was so inspired by her. Here is a clip from Romeo and Juliet with another heartthrob, Angel Correra (he was drool bait for us baby ballerinas when he would drop by for the mens class--sigh).

are you hot?

Matt and I borrowed the Best of SNL TV Funhouse Cartoons from the library the other day and I couldn't stop laughing at this segment. Robert Smigel is a comedic genius. Enjoy!

house projects

My husband, Matt, is a high school teacher (and a darned good one). One result of this is that he has most of the summer off and becomes subject to HOUSE PROJECTS. Being that we live in an old house, the projects never end. For this summer his three projects were:

1. Paint the outside of the house (trim, windows, eaves, foundation etc.)
2. Re-do the bathroom (replacing the vanity, mirror, and paint)
3. Install lighting over the living room mantle

As of now, he has finished #1, and is very close to being totally done with #2. I don't know if he will be able to finish #3 before the school year starts but he has often surprised me with his ingenuity in the past and whose not to say he might do it again.

He painted the bathroom yesterday in a surprise color. We had been looking for a week or two at paint samples trying to decide what would complement the "eagle gray" eighties tile in our bathroom. Would it be yellow? off-white? greenish? Nothing seemed to work and the beautiful golden yellow we had thought would work ended up looking like puke and casting a sickly hue on any person who dared look in the mirror. So yesterday he called me and said that he had painted the bathroom, that it looked awesome, and that he would wait until I got home so I could find our for myself what mystery color he had chosen---EGGPLANT! And it does look awesome. I will post a picture of the bathroom when all the finishing touches are done so you can see for yourself. For now, here are before and after pictures of our house.

Escort's "All through the Night"

I found this courtesy of www.3quarksdaily.com I think it is so clever.