Category Archives: random me

… personalized stationery:

Change of plans: if you’re at Overlook in midtown for the Super Bowl, I will be too! Let’s grab a drink and chat politics. I’ll get my nails did just for the occasion.

So I spent the weekend in Seattle. And by “spent the weekend,” I mean I traveled all day Friday to the opposite coast, got to spend all Saturday with my favorite munchkins and aunt and uncle, and then got up at 5am on Sunday to come back to NY. One could also say about my weekend that I traveled pretty far for the little bag of Washington-grown-and-made bing cherries that I brought back from Pike Place Market. And because my coworkers have this annoying habit of eating every freaking thing that they see on my desk, I had to resort to this today:

So of course my boss came up to my desk and read the Post-It and then immediately started opening the bag … “Stop eating those!!! It says ‘do not eat’!” “But I’m your boss!” “Give it back! I brought them back from Washington! (gets bag back after she eats one or two) I’m hiding them now … Geesh …” We are a bunch of babies. I love my workplace.

Then I came home and spent hours and hours making Super Bowl pies to be photographed for this weekend’s paper, but I’m not sure they turned out right:

But the pie sure is delicious (I dug into the ugly little extra pie I made and helped myself to an extra huge dollop of the dip):

I did suffer an injury in the process … burned my arm, yet again, on an oven rack:

Workers’ comp, Dow Jones?

When I realized I’d be picking up gelato at 10am on my way to work (so that it can be photographed for the paper), I decided that I may as well eat some of it for brunch:

Life before il laboratorio del gelato’s black currant gelato + ricotta gelato = not as grand. Pondering salad for lunch with a side of steamed veggies … (did I mention I had an Eggo c. 9:00am?)

Nothin like a box of Jacques Torres “Loves Me, Loves Me Not” chocolates three weeks before Valentine’s Day. According to Damian The Photo Editor, it’s not normal to take a bite out of each one and put it back:

According to me, it is.

Also, I love Jacques Torres. I met him last year in his chocolaterie and made chocolate haunted houses and other chocolately snacks with him and his lovely team. He is one of the nicest men I have ever met in my life. And his love story is a cute one for Valentine’s Day: his wife has a chocolaterie on the West coast, and he has shops on the East coast, so the two of them are essentially Mr. and Mrs. Chocolate. And Jacques lives on a boat, so he is officially the coolest chocolate-making man in the world.

If you visit one of his shops for the first time and are overwhelmed by all the chocolate possibilities, go for the chocolate-covered cereals. I helped him whip up a batch of the Corn Flakes and then devoured it all without sharing. Oopsy daisy.

Brekke: “What a huge bag! I bet you could fit in it.”

Me: “Well my duck boots may be problematic, but … Well … Let’s see …”

I fit …

Today is gonna be a good day.

That’s Monika waiting for an uptown train while I’m waiting for a downtown train. Hilarious. I once saw a couple dance at each other from across the train tracks, and I almost peed my pants from laughing so hard. Monika was almost as funny, but I wasn’t a good dance/communicative partner. Sorry, Mon.

“What is that? A pile of homeless people?!” -Pierre Tardif.

Yup. It is.

I’ve been called an “elf” quite a few times in my life. But never by so many adults as last night. My buddy Linda needed help making Christmas baskets for clients, so my other buddy Monika and I agreed to work for pizza and sushi and beer. She forgot the beer, but we helped Time Warner Cable out anyway:

And so if you’re one of TWC’s top 40 clients, you’re welcome for your beautiful gift basket:

And Monika says you’re welcome too. Based on photo evidence, I’m not sure Linda helped much:

But she did get me a doughnut to make up for the lack of beers:

We elves try to stick to the four main sugar groups …

Does anyone know how much these guys get paid to sit on top of the world and paint inside the lines? Because I’d consider a career change on crisp, sunny days like today.

Also … Does anyone know how birds survive underground?

So I got up early this morning to meet with ebook gurus and learn how to create an ebook for the WSJ. It was awesome. I’ll post a link when the book is available for purchase mid-December. You know you want to buy it for your electronically-inclined loved ones.