Giving thanks!

In the spirit of this Thanksgiving weekend, I thought I would share a little of what I am thankful for. Here goes (in no particular order):

• I'm incredibly thankful to live in San Francisco. SF is such a fantastic city and I could not imagine living anywhere else at this juncture of my life.
  
• I'm thankful that I have a job that I don't hate. When so many are unemployed and others feel stuck in jobs they hate, I am so grateful to have found a job that brings me satisfaction and a decent paycheck.
• For the wonderful individuals who have donated to my Team in Training Cycle team. I am riding a century to raise money for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. The minimum amount to raise is quite substantial and until I got my first few donations I was having trouble sleeping at night, wondering if I would be able to do it. I am still far away from my goal, but am close enough to be able to sleep through the night.
• My boyfriend who is always there for me - good days and bad.
  
• I am thankful that I have a warm, dry place to sleep, food to eat, and booze to enjoy.
• I'm thankful for my health, both physical and mental.
  
• Old friends and new friends
• And my family. My parents, grandmothers, brothers, sisters, in-laws, aunts and uncles, cousins, nieces - they are all amazing people and I'm so grateful for them all. I may not be able to spend holidays with them but they are always in my thoughts.
  

Yep, that about sums it up.

LIfe in the big city

Life in the big city is a little overwhelming sometimes. The only thing I really have to complain about is that there's just too much going on to keep track of it all. And then there's the hard part of weeding out the crap and actually making a decision about where to go/what to do.

Today, for example, I had such a difficult time deciding what to do that I ended up staying in bed, reading, taking a nap, surfing Yelp, looking in my new favorite guide book and perusing the Google Reader for tips on today's goings on until about 1pm when I finally left the apartment - okay okay it was actually closer to 2.30pm when I left.

I finally decided to hang out in the Castro. I walked around for a while, checked out the gays and their gay stores (they have some pretty awesome housewares shops, surprise surprise) and then hung out at this cafe called Spike's (lame website, sweet sidewalk seating) and finished my book about Motley Crue (I'm currently obsessed with band biographies, I also read Rotten, the Sex Pistols bio). I bought some gardening stuff so that I could finally re-pot this plant I bought about four weeks ago.

Four weeks. Wow. That means it's been exactly one month since I moved to SF. I love it here but to tell the truth, I miss my Nebraska friends terribly, especially Elisabeth and Conrad and Mart (who technically isn't a Nebraskan but will forever be associated with Nebraska so it counts). Even though we only knew each other for a relatively short period of time, I spent most of my free time with them. Riding bikes, boozin it up til all hours, and countless late-night meals at El Chappy's. And lest we forget the infamous Soup Nights. Oh the good ol days.

I digress. The point is SF is pretty rad but so is Nebraska. For as much crap as I gave it while I was there, towards the end I really started to understand why people like it so much and often go back there. So from now on when people start to crap on the NE, I will be there as its defender. I'll say things like, it's actually not THAT flat, the people really are THAT nice, and you know what? The Mexican food there IS more authentic than the in the Mission. So phfffffft.

However, NE doesn't have views like this:
So, I guess what I'm trying to say is that I like it here but I look forward to meeting more awesome people and I really look forward to when the Nebraska contingent come to visit. :)

Where disgusting is synonymous with awesome

This is why you're fat.com is the awesomest collection of food photos I've ever seen. The Turbaconucken (a bizare and even more unhealthy version of the Turducken) is just one disgusting example of the joys to be found on this website.



And this one, the Krispy Kreme bacon cheddar cheeseburgers. MMMmmmmm:

Nice bag

Going for coffee with Mr. Conrad.

W+K Radio

I just read on Creativity Online that Portland ad agency, Wieden + Kennedy, launched their own internet radio station this month, presumably as a way to create a sense of cohesion across their hundreds of employees worldwide and not to show off how much cooler they are than everyone else.

I was a tad skeptical but after a listen, I think it's pretty rad. As the article notes (and we all know by now), internet radio is not new - but when you launch the player, there are no ads (at least I haven't heard any yet) and no gratuitous plugs for W+K or anything like that. It's just good tunes and the promise of cool interviews with bad ass musicians.

Tune in this Wednesday when they interview weird PDX rockers, YACHT.

Listen here.

see sprout run

I just heard about this website that takes all the fuss and frustration out of photoshop, enabling users to create their own little banner ad-like thingees.

It's called Sprout and this is the silly thing I made with it