The Guilty Pleasure List

Sometimes I can’t believe how long I’ll go between posts on my blog.

I’ll think, “Oooh, I should do a post about this!” all the time about something dumb, like how I kind of have Dan addicted to The Bachelor with me, but then I end up falling to bed exhausted after grading another class set of essays and wasting time on YHL. This month has been especially tiring and cold and blah.

When I’m feeling overwhelmed, the first thing to take a backseat is being creative and anything social technology related, like updating Facebook or replying to e-mails. Instead, I kind of fall into a stupor and just randomly start surfing the web. Seriously, if you could see my browser history this month, you would cringe. But sometimes you have to indulge in some frivolous time wasting...

During January, I’ve Googled any guilty pleasure I can think of just to take the edge off, like:

1. Bachelor questions

via hereI’ve only watched The Bachelor once when I was in college, and had no interest in it until this slow January when I heard Dan guffawing at the premiere episode after accidentally flipping to it. We watched it ironically, only to make fun of how seriously the girls vying for the attention of Bachelor Ben are about the whole thing.

**We also did a faux drinking game where we knocked back invisible shots of vodka every time a person says “amazing connection”. If we had been really drinking, we would have both needed our stomachs pumped. **

While we still watch the show just to laugh our ass off when another girl sighs smitten after five minutes alone with the bachelor, we started asking questions about the show. “You think girls get paid for being on the show?” “Do the girls get to tour these cities, or are they told to stay in the hotel if they are not on a date?” “How many weeks do these girls take off for the freakin’ show??” Yep, I Googled every one of those questions (answers are: “no”, “no”, and six-eight weeks, in case you were interested). Don’t judge.

Okay, go ahead and judge. You know that sarcastic viewing of this show is bordering dangerously close to actual interest when the viewers are debating who should get the rose: Emily or the one that wears more make-up than a kid from Toddlers & Tiaras.

(Answer: Emily. Duh.)

2. Cupcake Wars

I know... I know... How original: a girl who likes cupcakes. But this is my guilty pleasure list for an otherwise slow month, so I have to include them. There are two amazing cupcake shops in Richmond, and one is around the corner from the school where I teach. I indulge in one every Friday, especially the tiramisu ones. Creamy marscarpone frosting, chocolate flakes, expresso soaked cake with a fluffy center= best. dessert. ever.

Anyhoo, I went on their website and saw that they recently appeared on Food Network’s Cupcake Wars and made their tiramisu cupcake. Thus, a full Google search for the exact episode ensued, followed by an hour of watching the bakers talk smack about whose icing and cupcake display are better. It is an hour of my life I'm not getting back.

3. Useless trivia

My friend Mali turned 31 on a Wednesday, and just to mix things up, we went to trivia night at Penny Lane, a Beatles-themed bar owned by a couple from Liverpool. Dan is pretty amazing at trivia; he even made it to the second round of a Jeopardy try-out a couple years ago. But even he couldn’t save our team from being in eighth place. I guess the regulars at the bar are hard core about their trivia.

Anyway, I have been Googling non-stop useless trivia topics from that night ever since. It’s become a sickness. Can you say which celebrity had her ass x-rayed to prove it is real? Or what movie President Obama used to parody his life in his Correspondents’ Dinner speech? I’m ashamed to say that I can.

We’re already planning on making the occasional Wednesday trivia night, just as a
Also, I’ve been listening to “Eleanor Rigby” on repeat, which I heard for the first time while I was there. It’s the perfect rainy day song for this rather dreary month.

4. Books that don't make me think, like...

I just needed easy reading this month. How can you not breeze through a book like this one by Kelly from The Office, which had a deliciously quirky chapter: Alternate Titles for This Book, including:
The Girl with No Tattoo
Harry Potter Secret Book #8
There has Ceased to Be a Difference Between My Awake Clothes and My Asleep Clothes

Still reading? It's been twenty days between blog entries and all you got was this lousy post about cupcakes and the Bachelor.

Hope we still have an "amazing connection".

12 Restaurants in 12 Months

Last year, while everyone else made resolutions to try Jillian Michaels' work out tapes, tone their abs, and stop reaching for the staff room doughnuts, Dan and I made a vow of a different sort:

Try (at least) 12 new restaurants in 12 months

Lazy? Yes. Fattening? Uh-huh. Best resolution ever?

Oh, yeah.

Not that it was a hard one or anything, but we nailed this resolution. I believe you've already heard about these three places:

Pescados at Church Street

* Food: Creative seafood and killer mojitos

* Decor: King Tritan meets Miami Vice

* Memorable quality: creamy avacado tart for dessert!

Lehja
* Food: Upscale Indian

* Decor: Domino magazine and a belly dancer have a love child

* Memorable quality: best. naan. ever.

Amuse

* Food: Artsy and creative
* Decor: Art museum chic with a splash of The Jetsons' retro-mod

* Memorable quality: Celebrating our 5th anniversary there

And for anyone interested, here are a few more, broken down superlative style.

Most creative: Sprout, who used old vinyl album covers to hold their menus.

Ignore this terrible picture of me, and check out the Carly Simon album for the menu:

They served healthy, local food, like this mushroom tarte.

Biggest Tree-huggers: Urban Farmhouse, a granola coffee shop that had organic everything, right down to the potato chips

Best brunch: The Black Sheep's rhubarb french toast, that had lavender marscarpone on top.

It didn't last long enough for me to take a picture of the dish.

Most frequented: A tie between Cafe Ole, which became our go-to Mexican place during the summer for the mango, fish tacos and The Mill, which is an American place three blocks away from our house

Best drinks: Xtra's Cafe, which made a mean bellini

We went to this restaurant with two other couples. Yes, my friends and I look like we're trying to be a lame "look-how-sex-and-the-city-we-are" in this photo, but I had to get a picture for the blog of those delicious drinks. I'm such a Carrie.

Totally kidding.

Best make-over: Tarrant's, which used to be an old-fashioned drugstore. I can't believe I forgot to take a picture of the gorgeous stained glass windows it still has

Most old-fashioned: The Courthouse Grille, for its sweet, nostalgic decor to fit with the 100 year old building and the good ole homemade pimiento cheese on everything.

Oldest crowd: Little Venice, the Italian restaurant we went to on NYE since I had a gift certificate. It had amazing tiramisu, and the oldest crowd I've ever seen. Seriously, it was like it was bingo night at an assisted living facility.

Our extra credit restaurants were:

Most haunted: The Pink House in Savannah. See this post.

Best place to feed and be fed: The Crab Shack on Tybee Island, where we fed alligators . See this post.

Most fattening: Amen in Charleston, which served us deep-fried green tomatoes. Can I get an "Amen"?

That was one delicious year.

Tardy for the party

Happy New Year!! Errr... a bit belatedly!

Don't mind this teacher's tardiness. It's all I can do to get my body back on school schedule and not "stay-up-until-2:00 am- looking-at-endless-trailers-on-You-Tube-and-then-sleep-in-until-11:00" time. Winter break rocks my world. :)

Sorry also for the cheesiest title ever.

Since NYE is "amateur night", we try to stay out of the bump-bumpin' clubs and scary roads. This year we just did dinner out together and then some champagne and games with friends. Oh, and the new Italian restaurant where we ate calamari, steak, and the best tiramisu was our twelfth new restaurant in Richmond this year. Yes, this means we completed our resolution to try 12 new restaurants in 2011! Yay for finally completing a resolution, albeit a totally easy, indulgent one. More on all that deliciousness tomorrow!

Dan and I kept our New Year's Day traditions, which include:

Buying a lottery ticket

The above picture is from last year. Ours for this year isn't a scratcher. We'll be watching the drawing to see if we're millionaires tonight. And cashing a surfboard size check tomorrow.

Registering for the HGTV Dream Home
Every year, HGTV starts a contest for a dream home on New Year's Day. We're all in. You see, Dan's the eternal optimist who really thinks he has a real shot at winning any contest. I'm totally all about home shows and blogs. Put us together and you have a couple who tries daily to win the dream home. Every. Single. Year. And feels genuinely pissy when we don't win. :)

Making brinner As I wrote last year, I once went to a wedding where the couple served breakfast food for dinner because "you have breakfast when you start something new". So sweet and fun and unconventional. It's the beginning of a new year, so I have adopted this as our tradition. Really, though, any excuse for waffles works for me.

As for resolutions, I tried to come up with something fun, like my 2009 one to "take more photos". Dan suggested that I do a "try six new things", which seemed conveniently vague, so I may do that. I've toyed with coming up with a different date idea each month, or learning to play tennis. I'll let you know what I settle on.

** Update:  We decided to try twelve new things (restaurants, activities, ventures, etc.) this year.  

Honestly, I am loving reading all of the blog resolution posts. Some are so ambitious and impressive, which inspire me to want to sweat it out at the gym. Others are refreshingly sweet, like "keep life simple" and "just be". I love the latter. I have a tendency to want to jam too many goals in at once, so there was something about that one that stuck with me.

I thought I'd leave this first post of 2012 with a peak at one definite goal:

Bring the beret back in style.

This very blurry, iPhone pic is of Dan and I sporting berets.

Think we'll succeed in igniting a trend? :)

Why are we wearing these stylin' hats? They were a gag gift from my sister-in-law Emily. She wanted to help us look tres chic because Dan and I are going to France later this year! Can you tell we're excited??

Side note: I'm pretty sure if we wear these for a novelty photo in front of the Eiffel Tower, we will be the most hated Americans in Paris ever.

If any of you have been to France and have tips or suggestions, this girl is all ears.

Au Revoir, 2011. Bonjour, 2012!

pictures via here