At Last.....

My loooooove has come alonnnnnng, my lonely days are oveeeer ...and life is liiiiike a ...etc etc. You know that song? Sung by the great Etta James? Well that is what I heard in my head as I slowly approached the freezer case at my local Stop and Shop which displayed Ben and Jerry's Mission to Marzipan ice cream. After complaining to you in a post below about not being able to find this amazing sounding stuff, I tracked it down today. I was so excited, the world stopped revolving for me for a second as I locked "eyes" with it. It was like finding a priceless gem at a garage sale. No one else seemed to even notice it, there was a full display of it untouched. After lovingly gazing at it for a tender moment, I gently placed it in my basket knowing that we would be alone later on and I could tell it how special it was away from the prying eyes of my local Stop and Shop frozen foods aisle. I got home and greedily grabbed a spoon the minute I got inside my door. My lips eagerly trembled and my heart was pounding like that of a virgin on her wedding night. And this, this is the image that I saw as I closed my eyes and swirled that glorious almondy sweet cream concoction around again and again with my softly probing tongue in disbelief that it was really as good as I thought it might be.




Yes, Mr Hugh Jackman, you've got competition in my demented, fantasy ridden brain. It was THAT good. It it didn't already have a name it would have earned it right there. The only thing that I can imagine tasting this good is Hugh Jackman himself. The idea of Hugh Jackman actually covered in this stuff was just too much for me to even let myself consider. I felt faint just imagining that one. I did actually get to "meet" him once when I saw him in a play on Broadway. I never liked him before meeting him but after that I became completely gaga over him. I also worked with a woman who knew a friend of his wife's and she ended up getting to hang out with him when she went back to her native land of Australia and she reported that yes, not only is he a total sex bomb, he is the most genuinely nice guy you could ever imagine.

This ice cream is like what I would imagine a nite with Hugh to be like. It starts out as smooth and pleasingly sweet but not too sweet, just the right amount of sweet, then you get pleasant little surprises of different textures and mouth feels throughout. A tiny bit of bitterness with the bitter almond flavor, that bitterness give it a little bad boy edge that makes it even more irresistible. Just when you think you've had enough, you want one more taste, and again and again. You want to stop ,but you can't because it is just sooooooo goooood and what the hell, how often do you get a chance to do something like this? So you go for it and when it's done there you are, completely satisfied, the slight guilt from overdoing it doesn't matter because you know it will be a long time before you do it like that again and you sit and daydream about how it was again from beginning to end till you eventually drift off with Hugh, er, I mean the container next to you as a fond reminder that yes, it really did happen.

*slaps self*.......So back to the Ice Cream..... OH MY GOD. People, if you like marzipan or almond, this is IT. It reminds me of a frozen Amaretto Cream cake, or a pimped out version of a Good Humor Toasted Almond bar. IT KICKS ASS! PLEEEEEEASE guys, do not ever discontinue this one like you did my all time favorite White Russian. I used to drive to the first B&J shop in Saratoga NY near where I grew up with a cooler in the back seat of the car and buy a quart at a time. That was the best ice cream I ever had in my life and nothing has ever come close since. According to Ben and Jerry it became too expensive to make so they stopped. And my heart broke on that day. I still remember it, it was an ivory color, you could taste the Kahlua in it....oh my was it just the most heavenly ice cream ever. When it was coldly ripped away from me I turned to Pistachio, Pistachio. That is my current favorite. They stopped making that one for a while too but it is back and just as wonderful. This Marzipan offering is going to take the top spot for me at this time. I also tried another new one that was outrageous as well, it was called "Cake Batter". It is yellow cake batter flavored ice cream with a fudge frosting swirl throughout. This too is really worthy and delicious, everything you would expect it to be.

I must say that I normally do not eat "real" ice cream. It does not fit into my relatively healthy diet and I am always looking to lose a few pounds or at least maintain myself at a good weight. Ice cream does not fit in for me. I usually have the low fat stuff but for this, I would gladly measure out 1/2 cup and fit it into my plan as a treat. This was worth the search and the walk to get it but I am a bit relieved that it is not sold on every corner around here or I would end up on the biggest loser as a contestant in the next year.

5 spoon salute for Mission to Marzipan!!!!!

8 years ago today I remember.....

---Waking up to my best friends voice crying and screaming out of my answering machine asking me to call her and tell her that I was OK. (I was scheduled to be at the World Trade Center at 8 am to take my licensure exam and cancelled the day before because I am a lazy ass who cannot function mentally before noon).

---Turning on the TV and seeing planes fly into buildings that were a mile from me. Wondering if this was a movie, seriously wondering if this was real. Blinking, blinking and realizing that yes, it was. A few Radio and TV stations were no more due to their transmitters being located at the top of the World Trade Center.

---Grabbing the phone and calling my boyfriend who was supposed to be on the train under the WTC on his way to work in Brooklyn at that exact time. Screaming when he answered the phone at his job and just crying and crying and crying at hearing his voice. He decided to drive that day.

---Throwing clothes on and running outside and seeing people walking around in a daze, some crying, some scared, anxious, people talking to each other out of fear and wondering if it was over or if more was coming.

----My boyfriend coming home to me and standing in the doorway and hugging each other for a very, very long time. Then crying and laying on the couch in silence and just looking at each other and wondering what was going to happen to us and to the world. Not leaving the house for 3 days. Everything being closed except the occasional deli or food store. Waking up the first few nights from the sound of helicopters flying overhead and just hovering in place for hours on end.

----Hearing stories everyday for weeks afterward that bridges were being shut down, men were caught with bomb building materials and arrested, etc etc. Bomb scares on a daily basis. Everywhere. Grand central station was next. Being a little afraid to go into high rise buildings. Living in a military zone. Seeing the national guard and guns everywhere.

----The smell. The horrible horrible smell. Burning electrical wires and flesh. wafting into my windows for months afterward. It took forever for that smell to go away. Sometimes, I think I still smell it.

----Photographs of happy, smiling people with the word "missing" next to their faces. These flyer's were everywhere. There were walls and walls of them. A large one at Union Square. Even at my grocery store, Laundromat and gym.

----Morgue trucks in the streets filled with dead bodies. Reports of body parts and bones being recovered on rooftops and odd places on a daily basis.

----A good friends boyfriend's body being found. He was a Port Authority Police officer. She called him for days. Wondered if he was buried in the rubble. He never answered that phone. He was found 3 months later.

----This same friends children looking up to the sky as they came out of Century 21 from shopping and seeing bodies falling out of buildings and dropping to the ground right in front of them.

----My boyfriends Uncle running for his life from those buildings as he got his morning coffee from the cart in front and saw and heard the planes go into those buildings. He ran all the way across the bridge to Brooklyn with thousands of other people who were in shock and terrified. His mother telling him that he looked like a soldier coming home from a war as he walked into her kitchen covered in white dust and soot from head to toe.

-----A friend telling me about how she was on the phone with her niece who was on the 102 floor, listening to her cry as the buildings started to collapse around her.

----People I worked with volunteering at ground zero and going down after work everyday to help out.

----People being kind and patient to one another. Listening to each other and trying to help and do whatever needed to be done.

----Hearing from people I had not heard from in years, just "checking up" to see if I was still alive.


If you were not here, you may think you know what it was like from watching the news or reading about it. Trust me on this, you do not really know. You cannot even begin to imagine it. And even now, there are occasional stories about plots that have been uncovered since, and things have never been the same since. I don't think about it on a daily basis, it doesn't affect how I live my life at all but somewhere in the back of my head, the innocence that once was is gone, things have drastically changed forever. Even today, there are ads all over the subway offering services to people who have physical or psychological symptoms related to this event. Most people who lived through this are keenly aware that anything can and just might happen when you least expect it to.

My sincere condolences go out to everyone who was affected by this event and lived through it. There is nothing more to say about this except that my greatest wish is that people never ever forget this and the horror of it. Maybe if we can manage to do that we will truly treat each other with the respect and love that often seems to be missing between us.

God bless.

Mission to Marzipan

DEAR GOD WHY DID SOMEONE TELL ME ABOUT THIS? .....And I quote: SWEET CREAM ICE CREAM, ALMOND COOKIES AND A MARZIPAN SWIRL. Taken from the Ben and Jerry's website:

"We're not sure when marzipan captured our imagination, but after we captured the sweet almond stuff that marzipan's made of and boldly froze it like nobody froze it before, we knew it would go whirls beyond our almond cookie nuts' wildest fantasies. So next time you're cruising the ice cream galaxy exploring cool new swirls and amazing taste combinations, don't forget the directions to the almond frontier!"

Now I will stop screaming but DAMN. I LOOOOOOVE anything marzipan. I will eat almond paste raw with my bare hands. I have since looked for this flavor everywhere in creation and cannot find it! I normally do not eat regular ice cream. I am just not willing to deal with the fat and calories due to possessing a metabolism like Oprah Winfrey's. If I even LOOK at something high fat/calorie, I will gain 5 lbs instantaneously but for this, I will make an exception. I am going to intensify my search and get back to you on this. If I do find it, expect me to simultaneously swoon about how earth shattering it was whilst bitching about how bloated and gross I feel after eating the entire pint by myself.

People of Walmart

I am extremely happy to present to you this glorious website.(CLICK ME) Apparently it was created by some kids that work at Walmart. I am eternally grateful to them for the hours of entertainment it has given me. The woman pictured here is a Walmart shopper. In case you can't read it, her shirt is proclaiming "I like it from behind". Interesting statement for her to make isn't it? There are some really insane pics featured on this site like the girl in the Nazi sweatshirt who is shopping with a black man(!!!!) and the child playing with a plastic bag over her head while her Mother is completely oblivious to it. Good times all, good times. Makes me proud to be 'merican.

The Business

Look at these boots. Look at them. Are they not powerful? The style name of them is "The Business". I am not a heel wearing woman but from the minute I saw these I was completely mesmerized by them. I wanted them so badly. They are hooker boots in the best sense of the word. Classy, 5k an hour hooker boots. In person they are wondrous. I tried them on and I felt invincible, like I could conquer the world in them. They are surprisingly comfy for a boot with a 4 inch heel. The toe has a 1 inch platform making the heel actually 3 inches, as if that matters. Here I am in the midst of lacing them up. A very helpful gentleman named Anton instructed me as to the correct way to do this as he did it for me. In the pic,I am half way there. Anton had run off to get more appropriate laces as these were not long enough.

So why am I babbling about them to you? Well first of all, I do babble here, you know this about me if you come here on a regular. I am telling you about the boots because besides being head turners, they appear to also be magical. After leaving the store where I tried them on I was strolling down the street with my BFF. I was feeling really "top of the worldish" and still on my boot high. We were chatting and I was oblivious to the people walking around us.I suddenly became aware of a man talking to me. He called out "GREAT HAIR!"...I thanked him and he followed up with "How is your day going?" to which I replied "Great". He took the in and said "if I give you my number would you call me sometime?". I was a bit taken aback because I normally do not talk to men on the street but people, this man was HOT. Yes, I'm being a superficial jerk. Men do it everyday so why can't I for a change? I have been feeling frumpy and fugly after my blood clot drama and this was a very nice little boost for me. I responded to him "well, there's only one way for you to find out isn't there?" He took my phone and entered his number and that was that.

Without giving any more details and in respect of this mans anonymity, lil' ole me was blissfully unaware that this man was not just any ordinary guy on the street. It turns out that he is the baby daddy of the child of the most famous female entertainer in the world. *FIST PUMP* CAN YOU BELIEVE THIS? I've lived in NYC for about 23 years and nothing like this has ever happened to me. I've met celebrities, I used to chat with and shop next to Andy Warhol back in the day but that was normal in the 80's in the neighborhood where I lived. I've never had an encounter like this. I'm not going to talk about it any more here but I am extremely curious to see how this situation pans out. ONLY IN NEW YORK KIDS, ONLY IN NEW YORK!

That's all for now :)

Now what would Martha Stewart think?

Oh Ma Gad. I've seen it all. Can you imagine having guests over and asking them to turn the lights off when leaving a room? Unless you work in the porn industry I cannot imagine that this would be accepted by others in your home as being "normal". I would love to install this in someones home without them knowing. Cement it to the wall. Talk about sweet revenge on a douchbag. This would definitely be it. To be honest, I have a very flambuoyantly gay male friend who has a penis light switch so I guess this is just an equal rights type of thing, sort of? I'm just speechless here. Without speech. I have no speech. The end.

But on a positive note, I got hot new boots this week ..... :)

So this week I was quiet here. I really couldn't verbalize anything to you. Quite frankly, I felt pretty shitty about life in general and this is really not me so I decided to zip it and not prattle on here. But now, after the worst day in a very, very long time I feel like venting a bit so fasten your seat belts if you intend on reading more. Apologies in advance for sounding like an annoying self indulgent twitter post, today is all about MEMEME...

Things have been going pretty well till recently. You know when you feel like hey, life is so good, gosh I'm blessed...and then shit hits the fan and everything seems to all go at one time? Yeah, that was this week. I'm not going to go on about deep personal stuff ,suffice to say a few people really surprised me and I've been trying to make the adjustment from my expectations to the realities of human behavior. Today in the midst of my really bad day, the most supportive person in my life sent me really unsupportive, nasty text messages for no reason other than their own bad mood while I went through my ordeal completely alone.

The cherry on the sundae happened yesterday. I was working and I was going up a flight of stairs. All of a sudden, my leg hurt very badly. I pulled up my pant leg and my entire calf was covered with black raised veins that were rock hard. They felt like ropes under my skin. It was straight out of a horror movie. I stopped and felt a feeling of panic for a minute and I then went into my patients house and sat down. I called my Dr immediately and made an appointment for first thing this morning. I treated her and she noticed that something was wrong and she gave me a bottle of the most disgusting smelling stuff I've ever inhaled. She is traditional Chinese, she does not use any prescribed medicines, she only uses herbal remedies. She won't even take an aspirin or Tylenol. She rubbed this foul stuff on my leg. I knew that medically it was not going to do anything for me because my problem was obviously vascular, but I let her do it anyway because she is adorable ,97 years old and she insisted. She felt bad for me. Honestly, it felt better for a minute or two, I think it was because she was so caring, I knew it had nothing to do with that concoction.

The rest of the day was uneventful but I was in pain and I knew I had a major issue. Fortunately my translator drove me around and I did not have to walk too much.I came home and went to bed. This morning I went to my Dr. He told me what I already knew. It was a blood clot. I need surgery and I need a few other things, among them $70 Jobst compression socks that I cannot afford at the moment. Oh and please do not spam me if you sell Jobst, it will piss me off and you will not get any money from me. If you know a discounter I would be up for that info however. Normally insurance does not cover this or the surgery and it is a few G's to have done. For me however, it is a potentially life threatening issue so my wonderful Dr is going to write a letter appealing for it to be covered as a medical necessity. I also had to go for a Doppler study to my leg immediately to make sure the clot was external this time and was not going to break off and travel to my heart or lungs and kill me. Off I went. got the study done along with an x-ray and then on for blood work.

Now here is the dramatic ending to my unbearably sexy day. As I sat at that lab, I became increasingly crazed with needing to eat something and go home. I had not eaten in almost 24 hours. Too much had happened and I was too worried and anxious to eat and with all that happened today there was no time to eat. So I waited, and waited and waited. Between the Dr's office, the Doppler test and the blood lab it had been 6 long hours. Oh and I forgot to mention that a baby threw up on me at the radiology place. Yes, that was adorable. So I got to my breaking point and I went up to the desk and asked the woman there how much longer and she looked at my name on the list and said..."oh I already called you". WHAT? said I. "Isn't your name(insert totally incomprehensible butchered pronunciation of my very simple and easy to pronounce name)?? "NO" said I and I pronounced it correctly. She sheepishly apologized. Then, SHE took me by the hand to take my blood. Yes peeps, this was my blood taker.

She sat me down, did the make a fist thing, got the needle out and proceeded to stick it in and move it around for a good 5 minutes and failed at getting my vein. I kept saying "did you get it?"....she kept saying no. Finally I said, "I don't feel so good".......and BOOM. I passed out. THE MONEY SHOT BABY! My head went down and I don't remember anything but a white mass in front of my eyes. I woke up and got it together and she got her sample from my other arm and I went out in search of food.

Ten minutes later I was eating the best pizza on the planet which is thankfully 4 blocks from my apartment. It was heavenly. I then had a nice cup of snickers caramel ice cream and just sat by myself and took it all in. And then I did what I do when things are bad. I cracked up. It all just seemed so funny to me. The blood clot, the baby throwing up on me, the lack of support, the passing out, just the whole series of events. It has been almost ridiculous. And I was blessed to have a lot of support from my BFF by phone so it wasn't all terrible. And when something as surprising as a blood clot in your leg comes along it really does make all that stupid petty shit seem like the stupid petty shit that it really is, you know? I actually think I may have "needed" that clot to wake me up to the reality of what is really important and worth being upset over. Thank you Mr. Blood Clot for helping me get my brain back to where it belongs and for helping me stop giving all that unimportant crap space in my head. This experience has reinforced what I already knew to be true about myself but seemed to forget during all the commotion. Yes,it would have been nice to have someone sitting there with me throughout all that drama yesterday, holding my hand for support but there wasn't and I was perfectly fine advocating for myself and taking control of the situation with no help or support from anyone. It's what I do. Every single time. And I think back to my Mom and what a Herculean-like person she was, so strong and determined and brave in everything she did. I always wanted to be just like her. And now, I am. And this, this makes me smile a very big smile of contentment and satisfaction.

I am now off to the pharmacy to pick up a few prescriptions and my National Enquirer and I shall take to my bed for a bit with my hot new boots. Tomorrow is a new day and I can't believe it but I am actually looking forward to it!

That's all for now! :)