Okay I really need to share this post from today's Cheat Sheet on The Daily Beast: Mormon Beefcake Calendar about how some Mormon dude was excommunicated for making a "Hot Firefighters"-esque calendar of "sexy, shirtless Mormon missionaries." The greatest part is that it's called (wait for it) "Men on a Mission."

Kathryn is pretty great because she invites us all to her house and throws dinner parties and makes an astounding amount of food (we are talking five kinds of dessert, people. Including one with Heath Bar bits). In all a lovely weekend complete with a mini road trip and pit stop in Fairfield, gorgeous weather, lots of deck-sitting and drink-sipping, delicious Giada food, blueberry pancakes, new sunglasses, and being treated to the beauty that is the downtown Hartford train station.

spring | freelance

It's Friday afternoon and I am actually in a real spring-cleaning mood (what with spring in the air and all), and my apartment sort of desperately needs some organizing of the piles of jewelry littering my dresser top and the piles of mail stacked on my desk and the various unpacked luggage on the floor at the foot of my bed, and a good once-over with the swiffer, but instead I will be putting in three more hours of proofreading this extremely horrifying book about Nazis and mindrape (yeah, you heard me). Whee! Looking forward to the actual weekend.

can I get a "YAY"?

So excited about this:



Especially since the weekend will be spent at Kathryn's with her lovely deck and yard.

hello, monday.

It's always a little blech-feeling to come back to the city after a visit home, especially when the trip back is a seven-hour one. So while it wasn't a superb day, and it was raining and freezing, I'd say it was a Pretty Okay Monday owing to the following:

Three new episodes of How I Met Your Mother on my iPod for the subway

My first Maghound magazine arriving

A total day of Mom-provided food (which, okay, spent seven hours in my Vera Bradley duffel bag, but whatever), starting with a breakfast of whole wheat mini bagels which I swiped from home, a lunch of homemade spicy chicken Pad Thai, and a plate of leftovers from my sister's birthday dinner complete with a slice of Funfetti cake

Making a dent in my behemoth 800-page freelance project

happy spring from chelmsford

more shameless consumerism

I haven't bought a Beanie Baby since 1996, but today I will only semi-sheepishly admit that I kind of want one. Come on! Look how cute he is! Plus, how cute are the Obamas with the actual, live dog, seen here. And he's Portuguese, what up?

mailbox happiness

This really cool girl gifted me an unlimited Netflix subscription last year while I was at home and sans real job or life, and it was awesome for those six months. (I watched the complete run of My So-Called Life, which is fantastic and I highly recommend.) Now I'm so cheap though that I can't even justify spending the five dollars a month for the lowest-level subscription, because I feel like I won't end up watching the movies because when I'm at home I usually just have the TV on in the background rather than sitting down to watch a full two-hour feature.

But, lo and behold, I found Maghound, a.k.a. Netflix for magazines. A mere $4.95 a month gets you three magazine subscriptions. Three! My first one hasn't come yet, so I'm not entirely sure yet that it's not too good to be true. But from what I understand, it's three full subscriptions, meaning if it's three weekly magazines, I would get each one every week. It almost seems like cheating. I signed up to try out New York, Time Out, and Martha Stewart Living. The first one is due to arrive in my mailbox on May first!

you'll look sweet upon the seat

I used to love reading the Boston Globe Magazine every Sunday when I lived at home and I still like to read it when I go home. On the cover this week was Boston's hopes to start a large-scale bike-share program like the one in Paris, called Velib ("velo" = cycle, "lib" = free, duh). In Paris it costs one euro to borrow a bicycle for the whole day.

If this kind of thing existed in New York (well, Brooklyn), I would be so on it. I don't have room to store a bike in my apartment, but if there was a little bike station down the street it would be superconvenient for a trip to the grocery store or to Park Slope.

But while it's nice to imagine ourselves all earth-saving and Parisian-like, the one thing I find wrong with the photo above is that these people look 95% chicer because they're not wearing helmets.

Photo courtesy boston.com

happy easter, peeps.

My family is recently obsessed with recipes from the Food Network, it seems, which is A-okay with me because I get to eat delicious things like this:

Rachael Ray's Buffalo Popcorn Chicken Bites

(made by my sister)

Nigella Lawson's Raspberry and Oatmeal Swirl

(made by my mom)

click my heels

I haven't been to visit home in about 4,000 ages. On the to-do list:

See family and Lili (even though she hates me)

Get a manicure at Bubbles and Polish in Westford, whose manicures are infinitely better than both the nail salons I've tried in New York

See Becky and her baby, Rachel

Shop at Kohl's and Joann Fabric

Drive a car and try not to hit anything/anyone

See the puppies Auntie Pam's dog just had

Revel in the use of a dish washer and washing machine

Drop more unsubtle hints to my mom about how there had better be black jelly beans in my Easter basket after their egregious omission last year

Currently freelancing

Becoming an expert on the finest state schools Nebraska and Montana have to offer.

step in time

Going to see one my favorite ladies tonight.