You are flawed if you are not free

I only have one favorite from this week’s batch of secrets. Be sure to check out the rest at PostSecret.

…and I’m not going to tell.

Yet.

Just a few highlights from my Fourth of July:

- Found out my uncle hit a man with his car not once, not twice, but three times!
Edit: My mom mentioned I should explain the reason why he hit someone three times. My uncle saw some guy stealing a woman’s purse and ended up chasing him. The guy kept getting up so he kept hitting him. Finally the guy got away but told my uncle he already dropped the purse. Sure enough, he did drop it and the woman had all of her money.
- I am not as good at Wii bowling as I thought.
- Regardless of what underoos I wear, I will have to pick a wedgie at least four times in one evening.
- All fingers, toes and appendages are intact.
- The crazy people at the corner put on a pretty decent fireworks show.
- Kid Rock does not live here.
- Bump.*

I hope everyone had a fun and safe Fourth of July. Enjoy the weekend and tell me all about your holidays!

Note to self: Put bras away.

* Bump does not mean that I’m preggers. Silly Binary Blonde.

Eff yeah I’m patriotic!

Happy really loud noises day!

Remember to:
- Eat a lot of food
- Have fun
- Don’t blow any fingers off.
- Don’t chase Jenn around with sparklers, it is not nice.

Confession: Fireworks scare me. I used to hide indoors during the fourth because I was afraid one would hit me. Also, the loud noise scares me. I’ve gotten better and now enjoy watching from a safe distance. You will never see me light one.

Request: Dear neighbors on the corner, I appreciate your firework show every year. Could you limit the amount of M80s thrown in there? I’m tired of the car alarms going off and/or waking up believing there is an earthquake. Thank you.

To the bad blog reader who tried to reset my password, I have only two words for you:

For shame.

The other day I asked my mom to guest blog for me. At first she was hesitant since she is new to the Blogosphere. Once I told her she could write about whatever her little heart desired, she was game. I read her post while I was at the Sox game and was cracking up at the stories she chose to share. Some may think these are embarrassing, but they’re not. I’m quite proud of my chubby cheeks and hamster-like storing abilities. As promised, I have selected a few pictures to share. If I left this up to my mom she would probably choose my “Zest-fully-clean” pictures. That’s not happening. This is a family blog (no it’s not.)

Before I post, if you haven’t already checked out my mom’s blog, I highly recommend that you do. She just finished her first month of NaBloPoMo and I couldn’t be more proud. They grow up so quickly! ::snif::

Forgive the quality. I used a less-than-amazing scanner.

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I had that duck for years after this picture. I’m curious why I’m wearing it in the house and not in a pool.

Pantsless. Nice. My aversion to pants started early.

There’s the pool! In addition to sucking on a “vi-vi” I really enjoy drinking out of spray bottles.

I don’t remember this, but my mom tells me I was trying to be a monster.

One of my many mornings at the kitchen table with waffles. This is an amazing product placement shot.

Making Out 101:

1. Play a video game.
2. Invoke all of the ninja skills you learned while watching Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, jump up and hit the maker outee with the remote.
3. After he/she falls, the maker outer climbs on top of him/her to make out.
4. (Optional) Repeat the following: “You WILL make out with me!” Or, “Sneak attack!”

Please see example below:

This can be modified for different activities, such as bowling, underwater basket-weaving and cooking.

Thank you to Jessica for inspiring me to draw this picture.

Coming up tomorrow: Ridiculously embarrassing adorable baby pictures of yours truly and her chubby cheeks of glory. (No chicken involved.)

You really like me! At least Nuttycow does. She nominated me for Best Blog about Stuff! How spiffy is she? Very! And I highly suggest you check her out.

How about we turn that 0 into a much higher number…like 13? Click here to put a smile on my face.

Don’t forget to check out the other 20SB bloggers who have been nominated:

Oh! How Lovely!
The Larissa Monologues
Surviving Myself
Distracted Spunk
No Ordinary Rollercoaster
Must Love Geek
The Lisa Show
Beyond Megapixels
Keep Your Receipt
Margo to Bed

Thank you muchly to Nuttycow, you’ve made my day

Edit: Just noticed I was also nominated for Best Humor Blog as well. You’re too good to me!

Our second stop on the cupcake crawl was Swirlz. Originally we had planned to visit more, but due to time and full bellies we stopped here. It would be pretty difficult to top the delicious cupcakes at Swirlz anyway.

The options excited me. The first place seemed to have a lot of different cupcakes, but only vanilla was available. Sure the frosting changed, but it didn’t change the taste. At Swirlz they have key lime pie, banana nutella, peanut buttercup, and so on. See below for a list of their flavors.

Everyone got a different cupcake so we could taste a little bit of everything. I settled on key lime, mostly because it’s green, partially because it’s lime. I’m pretty sure it was the most amazing cupcake I’ve ever eaten.

Someone had let it slip that we were bloggers and we were given two free cupcakes! That was really nice of the staff and we really enjoy it.

I don’t know why the mouth never saves!

Swirlz is located at 705 W. Belden. I definitely recommend stopping by for a tasty treat. It’s a great way to satisfy your sweet tooth.

I’m toying with the idea of having birthday cupcakes instead of a birthday cake. Living on the edge!

Flavors

Thanks to Angela and Jessica for letting me use their pictures

Sorry this is so late! I didn’t get my blog swap partner’s post until after I left for the Sox game. In case I didn’t get it, I didn’t want to miss one of my Blog365 days so I had my mom guest post for me. Now that I’m home, and with an hour to spare, here is W0rdvomit’s 20SB Blog Swap post…

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Hello there. I am Jenn’s guest blogger Kenyata. I am from W0rdvomit.com where I write about my everyday life, thoughts, opinions, and anything else my little heart desires. I guess I can start by telling everyone a little bit about myself. I am a 22 year old college kid from Las Vegas. I am going to school to become a high school English teacher. Everyone thinks I am brave for wanting to do this, but I feel like the high school kids are the ones that needs the most help. I am currently single (so far it’s been 3 months) so if there are any eligible bachelors out there, please shoot me an e-mail lol. I wasn’t to sure what to write about today, hell I totally forgot about it because I was sort of stranded at the lake yesterday.

So has anyone seen that movie Open Water? Ya know the one where the people get stranded in the ocean? Well this is like that…just kidding, but not really, it’s totally like that lol. I went out onto the lake with my best friend and her family, and it was suppose to be a great day of me learning to knee board, and learning how to wakeboard and all that jazz, but it turned into something totally different. I am trying this new thing in life where I am trying to be the more adventurous type, so this trip sounded like a really good place to start. We get out there and everything’s great, the water feels wonderful and it was super hot. I was learning how to kneeboard, and I almost had it, but I got knocked off. They went to go pull it for us again, and then the boat died. Yep dead, gone, went to boat heaven. I of course was not worried, because I knew that her parents were fully equipped to take care of the situation. So we kind of just hung out for a few hours and put the anchor out and just swam around. We were in our own secluded area so when it came time for us to really get out to try and flag someone down we had to get out and push and pull the boat. We found someone on a seadoo and they actually pulled us halfway to where we needed to go, and then we managed to flag down some other people with a boat, we made it back to shore and voila here I am to tell the story of my being semi stranded lol. Boring yes, but I thought I’d mention it.

So while I was over at my best friends house, her little sister had a couple of friends over. We somehow got onto the subject of them being rich, and it made me wonder what it would be like to be born into money. I wonder what it would be like to have everything just handed to you on a silver platter, and never have to worry about how you are going to pay for college, or have to worry about any bills because mom and dad will take care of it. I work at a day camp, and this camp is expensive, so this means these kids are filthy rich. I have 8 year olds coming to me and telling me that they have ipods, cell phones, and laptops. I didn’t get any of that stuff, minus the computer, until I was about 18 and older. These kids have everything, and I know that it will only increase as they gets older. It’s so funny to me how rich kids differ from kids who don’t have nearly as much money. Last week one of my girls was talking about some boy that she didn’t like. I was somewhat listening to the conversation, and I heard her say “well all I know is he better marry for money” I was shocked. How does she even know exactly what that means at 9 years old? Said child also told me that she didn’t want to be a teacher because she didn’t make nearly enough money and that would be pointless. I know it’s not her fault, but what kind of parent teaches a child to think like that? I unfortunately was born into a not so rich family, so I know what it’s like to be without stuff. When I was thinking about what I wanted to be when I grew up, money did not really play a role in that decision, and here I have this child telling me that being a teacher is pointless because they don’t make enough money. I just think it would be very interesting to live a day in the life of a filthy rich girl who has everything. Would I get bored easily? Would I have any true genuine friends? Would I be like Sharpay from High School Musical? Are any of you spoiled rich children? If so tell me about it lol, but that was just a random thought that ran through my head today.

Hello to you all. This is Jenn’s mom. She asked me to step in for her today, and gave me free reign over what I should write about. Hhhmmm…… shall I share of all the embarassing baby stories and post naked baby photos? Nah…would I do that? (no, I don’t know how to post photos on here just yet, Jenn needs to teach me) I will just tell you how cute she was.

She was so cute! She had chipmunk cheeks. Big round full cheeks. Literally full. One night, as I put her to bed, I discovered she had some chewed up chicken between her jawline and her cheek. We did have chicken for dinner that night, but a few hours before. I don’t know why or how, or what she was saving it for.

I could have saved a lot of money and avoided Toys-R-Us. Would you like to know what one of her favorite things to play with was? …a doll, no, a stuffed puppy, no, a xylophone, no. She played with empty 2 liter pop bottles. Why? I don’t know. But, they were safe toys. Light, no sharp edges, no small parts to swallow. (I threw away the caps)

At bedtime, besides having to tuck her in with the 4 dozen stuffed animals she kept on her bed, (ok, not quite 4 dozen, but close enough that she could get lost among them all!) there was one other thing she had to have. A vi-vi. For those of you who did not assist in raising or ever babysit Jenn, a vi-vi is a wet washcloth that has been wrung out, but still has a little bit water in, but not at all drippy. Yes, she had to have a fresh vi -vi each night. Again, don’t know why vi-vi, she named it.

And then, for years, all she would want for breakfast, was waffles. Every day, sometimes even for a bedtime snack. But let me tell you…..whoever had the chore of serving the Waffle Princess her waffles had to make sure that there was syrup in “every square”. If any were missed, we had to go back & fill it. How could we expect her to eat a waffle with syrup missing out of one of the squares?

Although she still enjoys her waffles, I think they may have been replaced by pancakes. You may have noticed she brings the subject up now & then. Guess it’s easier to spread the syrup.

Thanks for letting me share a few memories of Baby Jenn with you!

How Jenn does laundry.

• Think about it for 2-3 hours.

• Separate clothes.

• Put colors into machine, start water, completely ignoring lid.

• Go upstairs for an hour.

• Go downstairs only to find the lid still open and clothes sitting in water, still dirty.

And today I’m sober

Stay tuned tomorrow for the 20SB Blog Swap.

I really wish I wrote some of this down when I got home Friday night so I could remember everything in better detail.

Friday: Renee and I had the opportunity to watch our Angela in TnTs Wedding. It was a great show. Chicagoans, if you haven’t seen it by now, go. You’ll laugh for pretty much two hours straight. Plus, it’s a good excuse to come up with a fake name and pretend you’re someone else for a while. Angela was fantastic in it, as expected.

After the show we met up with all of the other Chicago bloggers and visitors. Because I got there late I’m not sure if I had a chance to meet everybody. I saw a lot of faces that I recognized and a few new ones. I definitely have to thank Deutlich and Maxie for putting up with a 12 hour drive to spend the weekend with us. I’m already planning your next trip in my head

I have zero pictures from Friday night because I was way too overwhelmed to even think about my camera. So just be patient. I’m sure some will be popping up on many of the other Chicago bloggers’ pages and I’ll be able to steal them

Oh! And the best part of Friday night is that I saw my very first prostitute in Chicago! Yes I’m really excited about that. You would be too if you had super amounts of alcohol in you. Okay that’s probably not the BEST part. Seeing Angela’s face when her baked apple pancakes arrived was pretty amazing, too. Yelling “gay bar” and learning about drilldos (Mom, don’t Google that) from the ever modest Joy was a highlight as well. Spending some much needed time with my favorite Jamie and leaning on THE Dan Mega was pretty fantastic, too. I could probably go on about the evening, but I won’t

Saturday was ridiculous. First waking up moving was probably the hardest thing I attempted all day. I declared it a great day by 9 a.m. just because I was able to get out of bed and down the stairs without tripping over the massive elephant that was walking all over my brain. Note to self: Drink water. Later I met up with the most fantastic women I know for some delicious cupcakes. I’m going to save all the cupcake reviews for another post. I have some pictures and I believe I may have found heaven in cupcake form.

After filling our bellies with cupcakes, we made the smart decision to hit up the Taste of Chicago because it only made sense to eat more food. I can tolerate the Taste, but I don’t like it very much. Every year I seem to forget that because every year I go back. The food is alright, but the crowd just kills me. Once you’re officially “in” the Taste, you can’t move. We made our way through all the stinky, sweaty people for a photo-op at Buckingham Fountain. It’s so much fun playing tourist. After filling our bellies even more we went to Millennium Park for some much needed relaxation.

We spent a good amount of time resting in the sun with our feet in the foot bath and I spent about 60 percent of that time being teased . The occasional rain drops were very welcome. The sun was way too hot. Dan joined us later in the afternoon and put up with our lack of/poor decision making. When it came time for dinner, we decided it would be best to go get the car and park it closer to downtown, where we were originally planning to eat. After fighting traffic, finding closed parking lots and refusing to pay $30 for other garages, we decided to go back to where the car was and eat over there. Some might call that a waste of time, I call it an adventure Many laughs were had along the way so that’s okay.

Giordanos is always a good choice in my opinion. I don’t eat deep dish very often, but I’m quite the fan. Two bottles of wine and three-ish hours later we were ready to sleep. But fear not! We didn’t. After a quick run to Walgreens for a hoodie (it was cold!) we were on our way to crime scene #2 the bar. Nothing too crazy happened there except for the golden retriever Deutlich ran into in the bathroom. That doesn’t happen every day.

Okay, so forgive my lack of pictures. I’m waiting to steal some from others because I just don’t think about pulling out my camera often enough. Plus I’m a bit too lazy to upload the ones I have right now. I’m pretty confident that you’ll be seeing more of the Chicago bloggers than you ever wished to see in the next week.

The fun doesn’t stop there…ooooh no. I’m taking a day of rest today. I gotta brush up on my Wii bowling skills. I’ve been mastering the hula hoop for so long I forgot about it. Anyway, back to the fun. Tomorrow night after work I will be joining Jamie (and her lover) for the Sox game. I’m not a super huge fan, but it will be fun to be at the game with friends. Plus…pretzels with cheese…need I say more?

Once again, thanks everyone for a fabulous weekend! I’ll leave you with this picture:

Allow me to introduce myself, I am Andy. Jenn took a day off so I am here.

I find that I assign memories and more specifically locations to particular lines, or even notes of songs. I am currently on the train in to work, where the majority of music listening has happened. Amongst these maroon uncomfortable seats, my ears have grown and developed and changed.

But I am moving away from my point. Whenever I hear the song “Side Projects are Always Unsuccessful” by Bomb the Music Industry!, I think it is a great song. However there is one line “Every Fugazi record has a catalogue number and a price tag” And whenever i hear that line, the way Jeff’s voice inflects at that point. Instantly I am on the corner of Devonshire and Water streets in Boston, Massachusetts on my way to work. Every morning, running late because the 8:16 Franklin Train has come late or stalled out again. Once that line is over, I am back. But for those three seconds, it works. I am starting to think that I am going crazy.

I’m also starting to find that I cringe every time I listen to any of my own songs, read any of my own scripts. Just a little shiver up the spine. And I cant really explain it. I spend a good amount of time trying to convince myself that the shivers are my subconscious telling me that I should keep pushing. I just really have a hard time convincing myself that a career in the television industry is going to help me survive in the real world. Eh. Screw the Real World.

Guest-blogging is fun. Almost more than my own.

Andy

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past 2 weeks (or don’t belong to the Chicago Bloggers group on 20SB) you should know that Deutlich, Maxie, Princess Pointful and Renee will be here tonight.

But before meeting up with them at a beer garden, I will be meeting Renee at Tony n Tina’s Wedding to see my favorite Angela boogie her ass off. I’ve never been to TnTs so this should be an interesting experience. I’m looking forward to it!

I am thrilled to announce that tomorrow we will finally enjoy the Cupcake Crawl. Of course the weather calls for rain, but hopefully by noon we’ll see sunny skies, hungry bloggers and a lot of cupcakes.

Jessica sent out an email and message via 20SB about the crawl. If you did NOT get the information, comment or email me and I will make sure you have all the details. After the crawl we will be showing our out-of-town guests around Chicago. Assuming there is no rain, we will be hitting up Millennium Park and possibly the Taste of Chicago.

So! If you’re a Chicago Blogger who has missed out on all the emails, messages and blogs and you want to join us tonight and/or tomorrow, email me! My phone is attached to my hip at all times so I will be able to send you info about where we are and what time we’re meeting.

I’m looking forward to seeing ALL of you bloggers this weekend. As for you non-Chicago bloggers, I think it’s time you moved

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Oh! I forgot! Tomorrow I will have another guest blogger since I will be wrapped up in other things.

And check out Eff you. I love the name of her blog

Remember when I told you that I didn’t like my neckless trainer? I lied. I really liked him tonight. He as a bit more friendly, which put me in a happier mood. Last week wasn’t a whole lot of fun either! All we did was work on my arms and some abs. Tonight we did a variety of crunches, planks, squats, lunges and leg work. It was good. More importantly I felt good!

Am I losing any weight? Not really, but that was never really my goal. My BMI went from 26 to 23 and I am noticing that I’m a lot toner. Who knew this gym stuff works?!

I love how trainers overuse we. “Now we’re going to do lunges.” “Okay we’ll do plank.” Um…no WE are not. I am. You’re sitting there on your little square block all cool and refreshed while I shake as my muscles say “Eff you!”

He even wanted to end a few minutes early. I was like WTF dude? Get back over to the mat and make me do something! I was on a roll. Punch my abs!

Though I have to admit that I missed working on arms this week. One of my favorite things to do when I get home is flex in the mirror and see my little bicep in all of it’s post-workout glory. “Aww, hey there little guy.”

It would be rude of me to not include a paint picture with this week’s gym post. I call this “What I Think of When I Hear Plank.”

That would be my neckless trainer flying off the plank because he can’t count. 12 is NOT 16 buddy! The extra four does make a difference! And telling me I’ll do 14 and then saying 12 over and over isn’t cool. Don’t be all sneaky and throw in the extra ones.

Missing out on other gym stories? More gym woes and paint pictures below:
Super lunge

Up next: Gladiators

Big bucks

I pity my trainer

Glute stretch