JMU Love

I need this, right?  

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I think this is going to have to be my little shoot-yeah-you-made-it-through-another-school-year gift to myself.  Plus, it'll look pretty awesome on our [future] yellow living room walls.

If you are reading this and you are married to me because you met me and fell in love with me while we attended school at JMU, you could even buy it for me for our upcoming anniversary.  I wouldn't be mad.  (It's bookmarked.)  xoxo

Barbie Girl.

Hey!  Don't forget to head to my reviews page to enter to win the $100 HomeGoods gift card!  Just leave a comment and you're entered to win!  Shoot yeah!


Here's something that probably won't surprise you: I love Barbies.

Barbie, her kid sister Skipper, her [probably gay] boyfriend Ken, and her Island Fun ethnic friend Miko were my toys of choice in the late '80s.  MY GOD, how I loved to dress them and come up with twisted scenarios for them to act out!

Most of these scenes involved the ladies fighting over Ken.  It was a supply and demand kind of thing, and there was only one of him and there were like 12 of them.  Barbie and her gals had to turn a little slutty.  (It was very much like attending a liberal arts college.)  I would usually spend about two hours dressing Barbie and brushing her hair and setting up her house, only to climax with a sordid scene during which Barbie and Miko got in a big fight because Ken liked Miko more, and Barbie would slap Miko with her bent-elbow arm and then drive off in her Corvette.  And then Ken and Miko would strip down to nothing but their rubbery bodies and slap themselves together while making kissing noises.  It took about 2 hours of preparation for about 3 minutes of drama.

My friend Sloan and I playing Barbies in my closet.  Note the headless Barbie to the left.  

And the Osh-Kosh overall straps.  Oh, the eighties.

Later, I'd decide that Miko needed different arms because she wanted to slow dance with Ken (you know, after the hot sex), so I'd rip Barbie's head off of her body and put Miko's head on that bent-arm body.  As time passed, I had accidentally broken the neck piece that allowed the heads full rotation in almost every one of my dolls, so I had to smoosh their heads down.  So I had a bunch of tall, skinny, no-neck supermodels.  Oh well.  At least their clothes were cool.  And at least they could still go chill in the Hawaiian Hut.

My Barbie interest would ebb and flow.  In middle school my friend Krissy and I would go hide in her room and play with all of her Barbies.  Her parents were divorced and her mom spoiled her something rotten, so she had the dream house and boxes and boxes of clothes and cars and dozens of dolls.  We knew that we were too old to be playing with Barbies, but we didn't care because they were SO AWESOME!  And if you think that the plots of my late '80s Barbie play were awful, you should've heard what our mid '90s Barbies were up to (this was also during 90210's heyday).  Unfortunately, the content of these storylines is not blog appropriate.  Shooot.

Later, during college, I again became very into Barbies.  This time it wasn't so much for the playing, but more for the nostalgia.  So after a few birthdays and late-night shopping trips, I quickly found myself--again--the owner of a brood of Barbies.  They even featured part of my Barbie collection in the feature that our school newspaper did about our house on JMU Cribs.  (Which kind of deserves its own post.)

Fast forward.  I move to Savannah and grow up and get married.  And then I meet Iris, a little fashionista on whom I love to bestow gifts.  For Iris's second birthday, Cassie and I wanted so badly to buy her a Barbie.  But, no!  Ann, Iris's mom, was dead set against it, claiming that Barbies promote negative body image, and that Barbies are whores and so on.  Cassie and I persisted, later telling Ann that we would be buying Iris either a puppy or a Barbie for [birthday, Christmas, random Wednesday].  But Ann was so against Iris having Barbies that even our manipulative tactics were futile.

"Don't you dare buy my kid a stupid Barbie!"

You can imagine how aghast I was, then, when yesterday, at Iris's 5th birthday party, I saw Iris receive not one, BUT TWO (!!) Barbies.  AND ONE WAS FROM HER MOTHER!  And you can imagine Cassie's reaction when I emailed her these pictures.  There was lots of language that is also not blog appropriate.

Basically,  Cassie and I are now in a fight with Ann. And you know what Cassie and I do when we're in a fight with someone?  We go to Target.

Brace yourself for the Barbie-splosion!

Did JMU Really Beat Virginia Tech?

Yeah they did!

I don't normally give a rat's ass about college football, but today I do.  (Matt always cares about college football, and what I thought would be a Sophie's Choice type of situation really isn't.  Matt's giddy about the win.  So is Mitch.  When I got home today he demanded that I put on his JMU collar.)

The first weekend I was at JMU, our football team headed south to Blacksburg to get pummelled by Virginia Tech.  The score was something like 69-0.  It was out of control bad.  Later I learned that Virginia Tech actually pays JMU to play the game in the first place--a sort of ego boost, I suppose.

Today, a little more than eleven years later (has it really been that long?), JMU trounced those silly turkeys. 

JMU's not a big football school--hell, the football team doesn't even play in division one.  And that's precisely what makes this victory so remarkable.  A few nights back, Virginia Tech came close to beating Boise State, a team that's supposedly very good (and could win it all, I guess). 

And now, tonight, they lost to JMU.  I wonder if Mickey Matthews was just having the Dukes watch inspirational pep talks from Coach Taylor in the locker room?

Because I can tell you one thing: Clear Eyes, Full Hearts, Can't Lose.



Oh, to be in Harrisonburg right now, singing the fight song and actin' a fool.



Oh, and one more thing.  Looks like someone's been talking to Miss Cleo.

They Couldn't Have Found a Cuter Shirt?

When we were in college, Becky saw an ad for Clorox that had some mom trying to wash her son's shirts (because he, of course, was WAY into sports), claiming, boys will be boys.  She was deeply offended.  Becky believed that the Clorox company was being sexist and claiming that only boys participated in sports, while the girls stayed indoors and helped Mom with the laundry.  She wrote letters to the Clorox company, and boycotted Clorox forever.  She still gets pretty riled up if you bring up that commercial.  At first, I thought she was being silly, but the more Clorox commercials I saw, the more I started to side with Becky.  Like this one. 


"Oh, would you look at those wild and crazy boys just being boys, while the little women get to stay inside and clean up after them."  (Though, I suppose that if they'd had little girls in a similar mud bath, there would have been outrage for different, more lewd reasons.)

Anyway, the only reason that I was thinking about Becky's hatred of Clorox is there's a laundry commercial on right now that I absolutely loathe.  It's this one for Tide.  You've probably seen it.



I get it.  I mean, there are only so many ways that you can market laundry detergent, and it seems like everything's been done already.  Surely there's a dearth of ideas.  I guess this commercial's got one thing going for it, and that's that it's memorable.  Memorable for being stupid, sure, but memorable nonetheless. 

But I hate it.  And I don't hate it because I think it's sending out some kind of awful message to society, like this girl does, but I hate it because, well. . .

THAT SHIRT IS SO UGLY!

The color!  The length!  The side ruffles!  I'm surprised that the stain didn't come from someone puking all over the shirt after catching a glimpse of those side ruffles in that hideous shade of green.

 I don't find it hard to believe that Tide is powerful enough to remove stains, but I do have trouble believing that both a mother and daughter would want to wear something so heinous.

Pineapple Coconut Sorbet

 When I get into my car and see this. (Also, I'm in a contest to see just how many miles the Volvo will go, and the car was covered in dog hair.  Judge away.)

I know that it's high time for some of this.

Why haven't I made this before?  Pineapple and coconut and sorbet?  July in Savannah, when the heat index today is supposed to be something like 118?  Yes, I think I will.

This doesn't earn the title of "Mandy's Famous Pineapple Coconut Sorbet" because all I did was modify a recipe.  Honestly, I wasn't sure where to start with the coconut.  So I found this recipe, but decided to ditch the ginger and go for more of a pina colada feel.

And I'm pretty sure that fresh pineapple is one of my favorite foods on earth.

And coconut's not too shabby, either.  (Granted, I did not use fresh coconut because I was afraid of it.  In college, when we would drink frozen drinks out of coconuts, the only way I could get the coconuts open was by throwing them off the balcony onto the concrete.  I don't have a balcony here.)

And then, after I'd pureed and made syrups and squeezed limes and gnawed on the part of the pineapple that you're not supposed to eat, therefore making the corners of my mouth sting, I realized that I'd left a crucial part of the ice cream maker at the lake house.  Shooooooooooot!

So this didn't churn like it was supposed to.  Instead, it sat in a spinning frozen bowl.  But, you know, it worked fine.  I'm curious about how the texture of the sorbet would be different if it had actually churned, but it's really good as is.  (Which means that you can make this one even without an ice cream maker!)

Pineapple Coconut Sorbet

Ingredients
1 pineapple
1/3 cup sweetened shredded coconut
1 cup lite coconut milk
1/2 cup sugar
juice from one lime

Instructions

1.  Bring one cup lite coconut milk to a boil.  Add 1/2 cup of sugar, stir to dissolve, and then remove from heat.

2.  Puree pineapple and shredded coconut in a food processor.

3.  In a large bowl, combine coconut milk syrup and pureed pineapple and coconut.  Stir in lime juice.

4.  Chill mixture for one hour, and then freeze in ice cream maker (or just in an airtight bowl) according to manufacturer's instructions.

Happy Friday to all!

Chocolate Peanut Butter Ice Cream

I wax nostalgic about my days at JMU, if you haven't noticed already.  Because my family was, oh, CRAZY, I didn't return home during the summers after sophomore year.  Instead, I would stay in Harrisonburg in my big empty house, and I would do things like paint kitchen cabinets (orange and yellow!) and try to quilt (one patch!) and watch Family Ties.  I couldn't cook anything but oatmeal and pasta at that point in my life, so I was a frequent visitor of the eateries around town.  And because "being healthy" wasn't terribly high on my to-do list when I was twenty-one, sometimes I would just go to Kline's.

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Ohmahgod, Kline's.

Kline's is a staple of life in Harrisonburg.  It's just this old-fashioned little ice cream stand, but it's so good and so fun, and for that reason it's one of the first things you hear that you must do when you go to JMU.  I don't know if it's changed or not, but Kline's always had three flavors: chocolate, vanilla, and the flavor of the week.  The ice cream was f'ing amazing.  Hell, there were times that Caitie and I would roller skate to Kline's to get some ice cream.  (How very 1950's of us.  Also, is there anything more fun than roller skating?)  And when I worked at BW3 during the summer, if the shift was slow, then we would allow a server to get off early, only if they agreed to take Kline's orders for the entire staff, wait in the long line, and deliver them to us.  It was basically win/win.

And we'd all go apeshit for Kline's on the weeks that Chocolate Peanut Butter was the flavor of the week.  (Also, imagine how difficult it is to carry and drive with six ice cream cones.  It's hard.)

So when I saw this recipe on Annie's Eats for Chocolate Peanut Butter (a flavor combination sent down to earth from the gods) ice cream, I knew it was something I absolutely had to try.

And I'm happy I did.  It takes me back to those lazy summer days where I had nothing better to do than to sit on my porch and drink gin and tonics and talk to crazy Tex across the street.  (Tex = old crank across the street who had a terrible life.  He and his twin brother, Rex, had been in the rodeo but then his brother got killed in the rodeo when he got smushed by a cow or something.  His life only got worse from that point, and he was more than willing to tell you about it when he was yelling at you for parking on the street in front of his house.)

Now, I'm  not as happy about the fact that I might need to go invest in an entire new wardrobe because of how much of this stuff I'll be eating.  Did I have it for breakfast today?  Yep.  Sure did.  Will I have it for lunch?  Perhaps.

Anyway, here it is.  The only change I made was that I used two cups of heavy cream instead of two cups of half and half, because that's what I had in the house and because I, apparently, want to die young. (I'm sure that half and half is fine, if not better.)

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

Chocolate Peanut Butter Ice Cream (Adapted from Annie's Eats, who adapted it from David Lebovitz's The Perfect Scoop)

Ingredients

2 cups heavy cream
¼ cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder
½ cup sugar
pinch of salt
½ cup creamy peanut butter

Directions

Whisk together the cream, cocoa powder, sugar and salt in a large saucepan. Heat the mixture, whisking frequently, until it comes to a full, rolling boil (it will start to foam up). Remove from the heat and whisk in the peanut butter, stirring until thoroughly blended.

Chill the mixture thoroughly, then freeze it in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s instructions.

(Note: This ice cream is very peanut buttery, which I like because I like peanut butter more than I like chocolate.  If you're more of a chocolate lover, than you may want to use less peanut butter.)

That Baby Gives Me the Creeps.

When I first heard about Toy Story, oh, fifteen years ago, I thought it'd be dumb.  And then one night I was babysitting one of my two-hundred thousand cousins, and we popped it into the ol' VCR, and I was hooked.  And why wouldn't I be?  It was funny, and endearing, and appealed to my baby sister, to me, to my grandparents.  What's not to love?

And then Toy Story 2 came out while I was in college, and my friends and I--including tough Becky--went to see it at our school's cheap movie theater.  It was fun, cute, and oh-my-god-so-sad when this part came on.



I've always been a big sissy when it comes to sentimental stuff like this (I completely lost it during the episode of Boy Meets World when Corey and Topanga got married, and I can't get through a cotton commercial without some lip quivers), so I sat there, true to form, sobbing like a little baby.  But then I looked over at tough "I'm-an-athlete-who-has-no-human-emotion-other-than-rage" Becky and saw her whole body shaking while she wept about Jessie's misfortune (Jessie's owner, Emily, put her in the donation bin).  Years later, I'll still call up Becky and just start singing the song (that I've memorized because I downloaded it), just to see if I can get her to cry.  I know, I know, I'm the greatest friend that has ever been.

I loved Toy Story 2 so much, and wanted so much to share it, that I bought a Cowgirl Jessie doll for Chloe that year (when she was 3 1/2) and took her to see the movie.  (She was much better behaved during this film than she had been when we took her to see Prince of Egypt when she was a couple of years younger [what the hell were we thinking?], shortly after I'd taught her the phrase "sexy man."  My adorable little [not at all bratty] sister yelled through most of that movie, "Moses is a sexy man!")

I texted that adorable little darling the other day (that adorable darling will be going to high school next year--EEK!) to ask her if she still had her Cowgirl Jessie doll.  "No, I got rid of that a long time ago," she texted back.  DID SHE UNDERSTAND THE MOVIE BUT AT ALL?

My sister's heartlessness aside, you can only imagine how excited I was when, month and months ago, we saw the trailer for Toy Story 3.  So many great characters, so many fun memories, so many tears in store.  Andy's going to college?  WTF?

So Matt and Collin and I went to see it today, strategically deciding to go to the 11:40 show that was not in 3D, thinking that this way we would have the fewest number of kids in the theater.  Foiled.  Foiled because we neglected to think about the fact that we would end up in the theater with a smaller number of children, perhaps, but that they would be the smaller children, the children who wouldn't give a rat's ass about 3D.  Fantastic.  I mean, I guess it could have been worse, and what were we to expect when going to see a movie aimed at small children?  But, seriously, would it be so hard to set aside a child-free theater for Toy Story 3 viewers?  Yeah, I heard it, too.  That was a stupid and selfish idea.  Fine.

The movie, by the way, is wonderful.  It's perfection, like I knew that it would be, even if it does have what I believe is the creepiest character ever to grace the screen: Big Baby.

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That droopy eye is the stuff that nightmares are made of.

Strawberry Lemon Sorbet

Some back story. . .

I have a little history of being a lush.  Well, maybe not so much a lush as a drunk.  But probably a lush.  What can you do?

So, the first time that I met Maureen's husband, Brian, was when they came to visit me at JMU during the summer between junior and senior year.  It was a fun night full of libations and spirits, highlighted by my moronic moves such as 1.) blending a straw in the blender with my daquiris and, 2.) deciding that I would just drink the straw, because I was too cheap--and too lazy--to pick out all of the little bits of plastic.

I blacked out.  I remember falling asleep on the kitchen floor, beating my fists against the hard wood.  I remember waking up in my bed.  HOW DID THAT HAPPEN?  Blackouts are awful, but let's all admit that they're kind of neat.

Where was I?

Oh yeah.  Strawberry lemon sorbet.

So you know that I've been on a frozen-treats-making kick, and you know that I love strawberries (I mean, who doesn't?).  And I was eating that pink grapefruit sorbet like a mofo until Becky [Shecky] told me that it would make my birth control less effective, at which point I was all, "WTF!!!" and researching the shit out of the internet, finally deciding that the internet was a sham and had nothing credible to offer.  And Becky was all, "I mean, it wouldn't affect you unless you drank like half gallon per day" and I was all "I DO THAT!" and then I was all "IF I HAVE A SURPRISE BABY I'M GIVING IT TO YOU!" and she was all, "No."  Shit.  Apparently, you can't just pass off a baby on the person who told you why your birth control might not have been working.

 So I called my pharmicist at Target (best pharmacy in Savannah, by the way), and he calmed me down.  Note: if you are on the NuvaRing (a.k.a. "best birth control ever"), then you do not have to worry about over-indulging on grapefruit.  You're GTG.  Eat away.  Come over and enjoy some sorbet.

But back to the other sorbet.  It was pretty, but it sucked.  I wish it hadn't, because I spent $6 on the ingredients.  Six dollars for 1/3 gallon of gross sorbet is too expensive.  I could have a pack of Pilot Precise V Rolling Ball pens for that, plus a Diet Dr. Pepper.  So, yeah, $6 is too much for sorbet that will give me Type II diabetes with every bite.

And, let's be honest, I should have known.  Two cups of sugar?  That's a shitload of sugar.  What the fuck was I thinking?

I liked the flavor combinations, overall.  The strawberry and the lemon flavors were great, except that they were dwarfed by the ridiculous sweetness brought on by the pound of sugar.  Seriously.  A POUND of sugar.

At least it's pretty, though, right?

Here's the original recipe. (But next time I'd put in 1/2 cup of sugar instead of 2 cups.  Someone try it out and let me know how it is.)

Strawberry Sorbet (from The Way the Cookie Crumbles, who stole it from Smitten Kitchen, who reports the original source as the London River Cafe Cook Book)


Makes 1½ quarts


1 lemon, seeded and roughly chopped
2 cups sugar  (Use 1/2 cup, unless you want to have a toe amputated)
2 pounds strawberries, hulled
Juice of 1 to 2 lemons


1. Place the chopped lemon and sugar in a food processor, and pulse until combined. Transfer to a bowl.


2. Puree the strawberries in a food processor, and add to the lemon mixture, along with the juice of 1 lemon. Taste and add more juice as desired. The lemon flavor should be intense but should not overpower the strawberries. Pour the mixture into an ice cream machine and churn until frozen.

For Real, Though, Who Threw That Pan at Me?

Spring break has been spectacular.  The weather has been so perfect that it's seemed fake, I've got a tiny bit of sunburn on the backs of my legs--not enough to hurt, but enough to remind me that summer is fast approaching--and I haven't been this relaxed in a loooooooooooong time.  I'd be a damned liar if I didn't admit that I miss my child:

But my birthday gift from Matt's parents is helping to soothe the pain.  If I haven't said it before, I have some of the greatest in-laws around. 

This has nothing to do with anything, really, but I want to share a story.  Back at JMU, one of my friends was buying beer at the local Food Lion.  Ahead of her in line was a gigantic woman wearing a mu-mu (moo-moo?) who was buying a single toothbrush.  When she moved forward to pay for her toothbrush, an entire ham fell out from underneath her mu-mu.  She looked around, seemingly surprised, and yelled out, "FOR REAL, THOUGH, WHO THREW THAT HAM AT ME?"

Happy Easter!

(Matt and I spent the last two hours watching Breaking Bad, and now we're watching What a Girl Wants.  I'm definitely having bad dreams tonight.)

Buffalo Chicken Pizza

Wow, what a shitty shitty shit week it's been. Matt, Mitch and I are all fine, albeit stressed. It's just that the world all around us is falling apart. And I'd go into more detail, but it involves the private lives of others, so I'll respect that for now.

One of the few bright spots in our week was Monday's meal, Buffalo Chicken Pizza. Mmmmmmmmmmmmm. I love all things Buffalo chicken, and Matt fancies himself a wing snob because much of his family comes from Buffalo, and he believes that the only true wings come from the Anchor Bar. Snob. Matt's a snob.

And Buffalo wings played a role in my formative years as well. I spent three years during college slinging wings and beer at boys. I wouldn't eat wings at all when I began my stint at Buffalo Wild Wings (job I hated at the time, but now am super nostalgic about, probably because I formed so many lasting friendships during that time and because now I appreciate it--I made as much money there as I make teaching). By the end, I could even eat a wing without getting sauce all over my face, even though it's not nearly as fun.

To be as authentic as possible (which still isn't very authentic), we use Frank's wing sauce on everything we do Buffalo-style, since that's apparently what the Anchor Bar uses. But let it be known: if I lived closer to a BW3, I'd be slathering this stuff with Spicy Garlic sauce all day and all night.


Boneless skinless chicken breasts, pounded with Saran wrap over them (thanks for the tip, Danielle!) to avoid eye infection, and marinated in Frank's.

Here's the dough after it has risen (dough = Christ ?). (Here's the dough-making process.) Last time I used this amount of dough for one pizza. This time it's making two thin-crust pizzas, which is even better.

And around this time I fumbled about, wishing I'd invited Cassie over for dinner, a.k.a., "invited Cassie over to show me how to do this again."

I ended up cooking up the chicken in a cast iron skillet, but would have preferred to grill it. Matt had been called away for an emergency (remember, shitty week?), and I'm not allowed to light the grill by myself. Something about fires and eyebrows. Next time, though, Matt will grill the chicken. He is the master of the grill.

Instead of a tomato-based sauce, I brushed the dough with Frank's. I considered putting ranch or bleu cheese as the base, but was trying to be a little bit more healthy. It wasn't long, though, before that effort went out the window.

Onions.

And sharp white cheddar cheese.

And then I am reminded again that I need to get smoke detectors for the house.

Celery.

Diced up chicken.

And then more cheese (no more healthy pizza). This time it was a mozzarella/parm blend.

Bake for something like 20 minutes. I lost count. Bake at 350 until it's the amount of brown you want. Drizzle with ranch, or bleu cheese, or whatever you want. You could also sprinkle on some crumbled bleu cheese. Mmmmmm.

Dough:
3 3/4 cups flour
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 tablespoon sugar
1 packet yeast
1 1/3 cups warm water
3 tablespoons olive oil

Other ingredients you'll need:
Wing sauce
Celery
Onion
Cheese
Chicken
Ranch

Pretty basic, pretty flexible, somewhat healthy, really delicious. What are you having for dinner tonight?

Cupcake Wars!

There's a lot that sucks about getting older (slower metabolism, loss of memory, gray hair, pain where there didn't used to be pain, etc.), but it's got its perks, too.

One of the greatest joys of getting older, to me, is watching my friends get older and, in the process, do amazing things. My friends have pursued their dreams, taken risks, and grown into impressive adults. They're doctors, and lawyers, and scientists, and teachers, and bakers, and small business owners, and parents, and writers, and people who work hard to make the world just a little bit better. My friends are smart and creative and challenge me to do better and be better.

Sometimes it's hard to believe that we've all grown so, but it makes me smile when I think about it.

One such friend is one I've mentioned here before, the other Matty F. that I almost married. Matty F.'s cupcakery, Frostings, is his own dream come true. I swell with pride when I see what he's done. (My body also swells with fat, because anytime I think about Frostings I want to bake, and then I do, and then I eat too much.) Matty's currently auditioning for Food Network's Cupcake Wars, and if you've got five minutes, you should check out his audition video. If you live anywhere near Richmond, you should go buy some cupcakes from him. (I will be there over spring break. Maybe we should all arrange a field trip?)

Best of luck, Focker!

Go Girl Pee Funnel

Ladies, it looks like you won't have to spend so much of your life waiting in line for the bathroom. Enter, the Go Girl, a female urination funnel. No joke. As the ad says, "Don't take life sitting down."
It's true. We really CAN have it all!

Back to School. . .

. . .Back to school, to prove to Dad that I'm not a fool. I got my lunch packed up, my boots tied tight, I hope I don't get in a fight. Ohhhh, back to school. Back to school. Back to school. Well, here goes nothing.

Tomorrow I return to my beloved workplace. For some reason, I'm not that upset about it, which may just mean that it hasn't fully hit me. Or that I'm insane. Really, though, I'm fine with it. I just had 17 days off of school! And I got paid! So, I don't really fell like I'm in a position to be complaining. This tune may change come 6:30 a.m., but right now I'm good. The sooner I go back to school, the sooner we get to go to Ft. Lauderdale (annual time with Matt's parents, the Godfather, my Soulmate, and the Hard Rock Casino). Then comes birthday, spring break, warm weather, and SUMMER. See, returning to school isn't so bad after all.

A smart Mandy would be in bed right now. But we all know that I'm not a smart Mandy. At least, not anymore. I think my intellect peaked when I was 21 years old. Tonight I came across some of my old college papers and couldn't believe how smart I used to be! Big words, fancy sentences, insight, the works! What happened? Well, I blame Matt. Junior year of college--the peak--was pre-Matt. Actually, that doesn't make sense because Matt is about 200 times smarter than me, in spite of being colorblind and essentially retarded when it comes to spatial relationships.

Maybe I should have a New Year's resolution: to become as smart as the Mandy of 2002. I owe it to myself, and to my students.

Wait--does that mean that I have to stop watching The Hills and The City? If so, deal's off.

Madison for Keeps

Oh, JMU alumni!

In case you haven't heard about this already:



This is how they sucked me in.

"Remember the campus tradition of holding doors for others entering a building behind you? Giving to Madison for Keeps continues that tradition. Please hold open the opportunity for students who want to stay at Madison. This program will run through December 31st, but don't wait — make your gift today."

And if that doesn't pull your heart strings, maybe this will.

Best Friend Portraits

Matt and I first started dating in September of 2002. I spent A LOT of time at Matt's apartment, hanging out, drinking, watching Friends and Jeopardy and The Daily Show. It was my senior year of college, and looking back, it was one of the most fun times of my life. I was surrounded by wonderful friends and roommates and coworkers, I had just started dating the boy I would eventually marry, and the whole world was ahead of me.

Oh, and that was when I became friends with Best Friend. Best Friend (whose real name is Alex Luther--yes--LEX LUTHER!) was one of Matt's roommates. At the beginning of the year he was not on the lease and did not have a bedroom in the apartment; instead he slept in the closet of one of Matt's other roommates. It wasn't a big closet, either. In fact, it was just long enough and wide enough for Best Friend to lie down and sleep. Best Friend doesn't need luxury.

Best Friend and I hit it off immediately. He's my favorite kind of person: cranky, smart, creative, kind of quiet, hilarious, dry sense of humor, mean on the outside but kind on the inside, quirky as can be.

This was during the time of the apartment party at JMU. Neither Best Friend nor I was a big fan of that party scene, so we had to find ways to entertain ourselves other than kegstands or dancing to the latest Nelly song. We decided to lie to people. Although we had only known each other for a week or so, we decided to convince people at the party that we were best friends, and had been best friends since we were children. To make the lie more believable, we began to refer to one another as Best Friend. (An exchange between us would go something like this: "Hey, Best Friend, whatcha doin'?" "Oh, nothing, Best Friend, just working on writing our best friend sitcom." "Cool, Best Friend, can I help?" "Sure, Best Friend. Maybe afterward we'll go get some chocolate milk.")

Best Friend and I would improvise the most elaborate lies about our childhood and the history of our friendship. We convinced so many people that we had been friends since we were nine, that we went on vacation together in Disneyworld and he got poison ivy on his feet and had to ride around in a wheelchair--but it was okay because then we got to go to the front of all of the lines. We convinced people that in the eighth grade we had an "experimental summer," the details of which are not blog appropriate. We played off of each other's lies beautifully, and in the event that somebody didn't believe us, we would go one step farther.

After knowing each other for two weeks, Best Friend and I decided that we needed some proof of our lifelong friendship. We found this proof at Wal-Mart's portrait studio. Best Friend portraits, we decided, would make it undeniable that we'd been friends forever. Plus, they only cost $3.95 for like 1,000 pictures.

Tell me these aren't the best Best Friend portraits you ever did see.

I was donning my newly-purchased jean jacket and nail polish from the Mary Kate and Ashley line, and Best Friend was wearing a tshirt with a dinosaur and a hat with a bald eagle. I believe my great-grandfather had owned a similar hat at one time. You can't see it in the picture, but there is a rope on the bill of the hat. Rope = classy.

And for some reason he had been walking around with an empty cigarette in his mouth for days. He refused to take it out. Quirky.

Best Friend and I were laughing so hard during our portrait session that I was crying. The Wal-Mart photographer was NOT AMUSED. She pulled down the Christmas background (which we did not request), and yelled--seriously, she yelled!--"BE SERIOUS! IT'S CHRISTMAS!" which only made us laugh harder.

Below is my favorite of the Best Friend portraits. We actually made tshirts with this picture on it and would wear them at the same time. There was a minor falling out, though, when Best Friend lost his in a beer pong-related bet.

Our lives have taken us in different directions since, and we don't talk all that often, but Best Friend is and always will be my best childhood Best Friend.

JMU Reunion!

During the wedding weekend, Matt and I got to reunite with several of our old college buddies. Clarissa, I mean, Larissa was there, and so was her boyfriend, Tedd.

Poor Tedd. Matt and I decided that he is a keeper because he not only has the patience to be with Larissa, but he also had the patience to hang out with her and all of her old college friends, and to be fun and cool throughout. At no time did he scream or head butt anybody, which is more than I can say for myself.


At the wedding, I actually got to see some people from high school (Bethy and I went to Westminster High together and then both went to JMU). It was really nice to see people I hadn't seen or talked to in 10 years, and it was amazing how I succumbed to peer pressure in their presence.

Chorus of high school classmates: Everyone take off their shoes!

Me (even though I don't really want to): Okay! [kicking off shoes]



Bad choices. In spite of the pedicure I'd had earlier that day, by the end of the night my feet looked like this:

It really wasn't pretty. And here's Brad. Like most of us, Brad had imbibed too much. He decided that he would put his head in a shoebox.

And I decided that I would put my dirty Wal-Mart foot in his mouth. I don't know why I decided that was a good idea, and I don't know why Brad 1.) let me put my foot in his mouth, and 2.) let me take a picture of it. Like I said, bad choices.

VERY bad choices. It was around this time that I screamed at Brad for biting my toe, fearful that he would mess up the fresh coat of nail polish.

Matt hung his head, ashamed of the woman he married and the friends he's made.

Later, after the toe-biting/pedicure-ruining incident, we all migrated to the room that Brad, Missy, and Trina were sharing. While there, Porky Jean made an appearance. Brad and I were eating some leftover pizza, and even though Brad had his own piece of pizza, he tried to steal mine. My animal instincts took over. I shot him a look of death, head butted him [very, very hard], caused him to drop his pizza on the floor, shoved the rest of my pizza in my mouth, almost choked, picked up his pizza from the floor, and inhaled his, too. Bad choices all around. (Also, how have I avoided the H1N1?)

On Sunday morning, dehydrated and craving protein-rich greasy food, we all headed to Alexis's Diner before our painful drives home. Matt explained to Brad that he should never enter a gross out competition with Mandy, and he should never try to come between Mandy and food. Missy listened and agreed.

Brad remained in disbelief about the greatest head butt of all time.

Trina wondered if a lawsuit may come of this episode. Could she be the lawyer if she was a witness?

And Missy decided that Brad was annoying. She plotted ways to kill him, the whole time wishing that she had been the one to deliver the painful head butt.

In the years since we've left college, everything has changed. And yet, somehow, nothing has changed at all.