The Thursday of every month here in Seattle is First Thursday. This means that all the museums are FREE. The art galleries also premier their new pieces and stay open late serving wine and cheese. For most people it’s an excuse to stay in the city after work and look at the new art. Typically you see people in black turtle necks with berets and skinny jeans walking from gallery to gallery while smocking Clove cigarettes.

Okay, they don’t all look like a beatnik, but you get my drift.

Back before we moved into the new house and were living in a high rise apartment in downtown Seattle, we used to frequent First Thursday. This was much easier when Babboo was younger and not able to reach the canvas on the wall. From time to time we would even meet friends at the Seattle Art Museum and take advantage of the awesome Happy Hour menu at the Museums restaurant (that place is awesome, by the way).

When we moved into the new house we learned that our community also hosted a First Thursday, or sorts. Sure there was no swanky Seattle Art Museum to attend or any official art galleries, but there were some cool jewelry stores and real estate agencies that showcased local art for the event.

Plus, it’s a good excuse to get out of the house and be able to be apart of something cooler then cleaning bathrooms and going dishes. It’s always makes me feel like less of an Old Lady when I can say, “Oh we went to First Thursday last night” to my coworkers on Friday morning.

As far as I knew only the art museums were free on First Thursday. But guess what? It’s not just about art anymore. The Museum of Flight is also free as is the Experience Music Project. Holy crap, score!

Last week I went with the youth from my church congregation to the Experience Music Project, or just the EMP, if you’re from around here. I had been to the EMP years ago after someone gave us tickets for a wedding present, but that was a long time ago.

The King and also attended a special night with Rhett Miller, lead singer of the Old 97’s, at the EMP weeks before Babboo was born. This was something we bought tickets for without knowing what exactly we were buying tickets for. That event ended up being very, very cool. (But also hard for a very, very pregnant woman to sit through without multiple trips to the potty.) Anyway, The King and I had been able to sit in the audience while an interview with the lovely Mr. Rhett Miller was recorded for the EMP’s archives.

So last week I returned to the EMP. Not much seemed to have changed since the first time I toured it all those years ago. Except this time they had a wall documenting all of the recorded interviews they’ve done for their Music Archives.

You’ll never believe whose name I found.

Yes, I forced one of the 12 year old girls from church to take my picture.  Yes, I looked like an idiot.  Yes, none of the teenagers knew who Rhett Miller was.  And yes, I proceeded to inform them.

(Yes, I am a nerd.)

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Check out my latest post over at SeattleMomBlogs where I discuss my commute hurting my heart.

You know how I mentioned a certain something-something I saw written on The Berlin Wall? And then once I got home from our trip to Europe I never mentioned it again. Nor did I share the picture proof I swore to have?

Yeah, that’s because that was the day we toured around Potsdamer Platz WITHOUT A MEMORY CARD IN OUR CAMERA! Yeah, I was sick about it. So instead of thinking about it, I just blew it off and tried to put it out of my mind.

“I’ve been to Potsdamer Platz before”, I told myself, “I don’t need no stinkin’ pictures from this trip.”

I changed my thinking this morning while I was downloading some other pictures. Dude, I found the missing pictures!

That’s right, I found all most of the pictures from that day. Apparently, at some point, there was a memory card in the camera.

Without further ado, may I present you with the Deutschland edition of “Oh my heck, we love teenage vampires“, written on THE BERLIN WALL.

(The best part may be the “me too!” written underneath! To which I think most of us would agree!)

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Hey, did you check out my latest New Thing?

I haven’t seen a rated R movie since 1999. That’s right, I don’t watch rated R movies. In those nine years a lot of rated R movies have come out that I’ve wanted to see. And by “a lot” I guess I mean there are a few that I’ve wanted to see. Like “Garden State”. And “Knocked Up”. And maybe “40 Year Old Virgin”.

One particular movie I was bummed about missing recently was “Sex and the City”. Like most women I was a huge fan of the television series. But unlike most women I never watched SATC on HBO. Instead I waited until the show had ended, was edited, and was shown on TBS. It was a happy day at my house when TBS started to play the entire series, EDITED. Sure I was a few years behind the rest of you. I was drooling over Carrie Bradshaw’s outfits long after all of you had tried to incorporate her style into your own wardrobe.

Oh yes, I had missed the boat on SATC. But I didn’t care. I eventually got to watch it. I finally found out who Mr. Big and Aiden were. I knew who people were talking about when they mentioned The Russian. I understood what people meant when they said “I’m a Charlotte.” Or “she’s totally a Samantha!”

(For the record, I never quite was able to decide which “Sex and the City” character I was more like. I often felt like I was most like Charlotte. Except that I wasn’t as dreamy about love as she was. I also felt like I was a little like Miranda. Not in the career-driven way, more in the black-hearted way.)

(And also, for the record, I was always more a fan of Aidan. I know nobody else was. But I was. He was just such a good guy. I guess he didn’t have the town cars and the clout that Big had. Even if Aidan didn’t win Carrie’s heart, he won mine.)

So yeah, when the SATC movie came out this year my heart broke a little. While I knew I wouldn’t be seeing it in the movie theater, I knew I would see it eventually. I was just going to have to wait a few years until it was edited and shown on TV. I knew this; I had accepted it and my wait began.

I read your blogs about going and seeing the movie and about how awesome it was. I was jealous that I wouldn’t be seeing it with any girlfriends. (I’m not even sure any of my real-life girlfriends watched SATC.) Whatever. I was over it.

And then I boarded my plan from Seattle to London last month and saw that “Sex and the City” was one of my choices for the in-flight movies. I thought I had heard that movies on planes are edited. I wasn’t sure where I had heard that, but I was 65% sure it was true. As soon as the flight had taken off and we had reached cruising altitude, I turned my little personal TV screen in front of me on. I breezed through the menu until I found “Sex and the City” and put my headphones on.

I figured I’d known if it was edited about two minutes into the movie. If it wasn’t edited, I would turn it off and watch something like “Indiana Jones”. But dude, if it was edited, I was going to get to see “Sex and the City”. On the plane! What a great way to start my European vacation.

I think I was about thirty minutes into the movie before I realized that I was thirty minutes into it and I hadn’t heard one little swear or seen a single boobie.

IT WAS EDITED!

So yeah, I watched it. I finally know if Carrie and Big end up together. I know if Miranda and Steve are still married. I know if Samantha is now a one-man-woman. I know.

And I got all of this without having to hear the F word or see Samantha naked.

Next on my list I need to convince Zach Braff to edit “Garden State” and put it on TBS. Because dude, I’m still dying to see that movie.

So tell me, were you happy with the way the SATC movie played out the rest of the story about Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte and Samantha? Was there anything you thought should have happened? What was your favorite outfit? What about your least favorite outfit?

(Because I know y’all saw it, right?!)

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In keeping with today’s Sarah Jessica Parker blog theme, my latest New Thing is all about trying out SJP’s “Bitten” clothing line.

I tired to be all smart and crap in high school. I really got into art history and visiting museums with my friends. We would go out to JB’s restaurant (one small step up from Denny’s) and sit and talk about books and poems and art.

During this time I also go into visiting used book stores. I loved buying books that had been read and loved previously. There was something extra special about reading a copy of “Gone with the Wind” that was covered in coffee stains and notes in the margins. To me this just felt more like the way a book should be read.

I would visit the used book store and come home with piles of paperback books to fill my time with. I read the classics as well as books I had bought solely based on the cover and the wear and tear. One visit to the bookstore ended with a hardback book I picked up because the description on the book sounded interested to “pretending to be smart” teenage Isabel.

The story traces the travels of six young people who tour Europe and Africa in the 1960’s searching themselves and a meaning for their lives in a world where they have no control in their own affairs.

I fancied myself somewhat of a hippy, so a book about hippies sounded right up my alley. And so I bought “The Drifters” by James A. Michener and started to read it. From the first chapter about Joe, a Vietnam draft dodger, this book captured my attention. It’s actually quite odd that I loved this book as much as I did. There was nothing similar between my life in small town Utah, as a devout Mormon, to the characters in the book that traveled around Europe experimenting with drugs and having random sex.

They were truly hippies and I truly wasn’t.

So the book follows this group of kids from all over the world. They each have their own story and reason for ending up in Torremolinos, Spain. But that’s where they end up, at the Wilted Swan bar in Torremolinos. James A. Michener writes about Torremolinos like it’s some kind of magical place for people who love life. The front of the book had a map of all the locations in the novel. I studied where Torremolinos was in Spain and just assumed it was a mythical location that had been dreamt up for the sake of the novel.

Meanwhile I lived in Utah, where it snowed all the time and the only beaches were ones near salt lakes and chemical filled lakes.

Over the next years I read and reread “The Drifters” any chance I got. I wrote a paper about it for my high school English class as well as one of my college English classes. I tried to talk my friends into reading it and often quoted passages to boyfriends.

As far as I recall I never convinced anyone to read it.

Until about three years ago when I loaned my paperback copy to my BFF May. (My hardback copy has since been lost.) I’m not sure that I really believed she would read it. And if she did read, I wasn’t sure she would like it.

But she did read it. And she did like it. She also asked me how in the heck 17 year old Isabel had gotten her hands on that book? She understood that it really wasn’t the typical book a 17 year old who is stuck lives in Utah would read. I agreed with her and recounted the story of just finding it in a random used bookstore and being drawn to it.

And yet I never got online and looked up anything about the book. It was like this little gem of a secret that was mine alone. I took it with me when we went on vacation so I could read about these kid’s travels while I traveled.

(Mexico 2005. Reading “The Drifters” on the beach.)

And still, I never really thought much about where the book was set.

That is until The King and I were driving to our destination outside of Malaga, Spain and I saw this sign.

I freaked. The King was all “I told you this place existed and that we’d be driving through it!”

I was all “I don’t remember!! HOLY CRAP!”

And then I freaked out a little more.

I sat in the car trying to channel my teenage self. I pictured myself sitting alone in the bedroom of my youth, reading “The Drifters” and dreaming of far away places. Places that I never ever for one second could have dreamed I would one day visit. I wanted teenage Isabel to know that I was there.

I was in Torremolinos.

Days later, on our way back to the airport to fly to Formentera, we took a little detour and drove around Torremolinos. I didn’t see a bar called the Wilted Swan. I didn’t see anyone that looked like Joe or Yigal or Gretchen or Cato.

But I was there. I was in Torremolinos. And that’s all I cared about.

Teenage Isabel was happy.

So tell me, what book local would you like to visit? And why?

I finished the last book in the latest round of FluentBrittish’s Super Duper Blogger Book Exchange (SDBBE). I love the SDBBE. I love reading new books. I love getting to know old and new bloggers and I really love reading all of their comments in the books. (Oh yes, we read the books and WRITE OUR COMMENTS IN THE ACTUAL BOOKS!)

I was very sad to see this round of the book club end. Mostly because I was anxious to have a SDBBE book to take with me to Europe. I just thought it would be cool to take a blogger’s book with me to read on the beaches in Spain. Alas, I have no Super Duper Blogger Book Exchange book to take with me.

I mentioned this to Britt last week and she was all, “Would you mind if I picked out a book for you to take on your trip and sent it to you?!” And I was all, “on my goodness, I would love that!”

It was a mere two days later that this book arrived in the mail from Britt:

Along with the book was this note:

I was so excited to start on the book. A little too excited. We don’t leave for another six days and I’m already almost 100 pages into the book. While reading the book on my bus ride in this morning I realized I’m going to have to take a few other books with me on the trip.

Oopsie.

Here’s the problem, I have no idea what books would be the perfect fit for our little trip. We’re spending most of the time on the beaches off the Mediterranean Sea. That makes me think I’ll need a beach read. But we’ll also be spending time in big cities like Berlin, Barcelona and London. Which isn’t so much conducive to a beach read. (Are there books that are considered city reads?)

And, let’s be honest here, Babboo might not allow me a lot of reading time. And while we’re being honest here, The King might also not allow me a lot of reading time. (Dude, he likes to talk to me and crap. What’s that about?)

Thankfully I spent most of yesterday downloading TV shows to my iPod for My Sweet Babboo. Maybe he’ll enjoy some alone time with his friends Tigger & Pooh and allow me to read.

After spending most of the summer looking for the perfect (read: inexpensive) shoe for the trip, I bought them yesterday. I figured the blue would go with both brown and black outfits.

I’m wearing them today. I need to get them broken-in in time for the trip. I’ve only been wearing them for a few hours and already they aren’t the perfect fit. So either that was $20 down the drain or I just need to wear them a little longer.

So tell me, what would your recommendation be for both a beach read and a city read book? Seriously my dear interweb, I need your help.

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Want to read all about my latest New Thing? Yeah, The King and I took Babboo to the local zoo for the first time. We ran into some good friends there. Good times ensued.

The King likes to tease me about my blog. He really doesn’t get blogging and sort of feels like it’s just this little thing I do on the side. Of course I (and the rest of you) know blogging is much more then that. Dude, I am consumed by my blog.

He teases me by asking me questions about HTML and then laughing at me when I give him the answer. And, you know, he calls me a nerd. (Which, I am. I know.)

One of the biggest things he does to make fun of me and my blog is to refer to any readers/commenter as “fans”. I’ll tell him about something that someone online told me and he’ll be all “who is that one?” and after I explain “she’s the one that lives in Kansas City and is remodeling a loft. And makes robots. DUH!” And he’ll be all, “oh right, she’s one of your fans.” And the he’ll roll his eyes at me.

Dude, he makes it sound so nerdy and lame. When really, I’m more of the fan around these parts.

Anyway.

If you were to ask The King what the mission statement of my blog would be he’d probably say something like “Isabel is so awesome and pretty and awesome! And her blog is so awesome”. That’s when I roll my eyes and remind me that I’m a nerd and not awesome at all. And then he’ll roll his eyes and talk about my fans again.

I think he’s just jealous.

If, by chance, I’ve written a particular post that I feel it’s imperative for him to read I’ll ask him if he’s read it and what he thought about it. He’ll usually come back with something snippy like “all I got out of it was how awesome your fans think you are.” I admit this can hurt a little as I feel I put a little more thought and preparation into the majority of my posts. It really isn’t all about “hey am I awesome, or what?!”

I’ll be the first to admit that it is nice to hear someone validate you and your thoughts. That need isn’t exclusive to blogging. Blogging just helps to facilitate that, I guess.

On a recent extended car ride with The King we started talking about my little blog and I shared with him my dreams and goals and hopes for my blog. I told him that I felt like I could make the (blog)world a nicer place, one post at a time. I told him I tried to be a good example to the interweb. Even if I maybe don’t come off that way, it really is my plan. I told him about how I would like to share my message of Goodness around the (blog)world.

Of course I usually end up blogging about my kid, my house, my job, my family, my friends. Um yeah, pretty much what I talk about is Me.

Squee!

This morning I read the following comment that the lovely Bethiclaus left on a recent post and got instantly excited:

Dear Isabel,

Thank you for being awesome and pretty. Also, can you please tell me more about the Seattle area as we are contemplating a move.

Signed,

Your bestest fan ever (or something), Beth

First off I got all giddy. Bethiclaus (and her adorable family) might be moving to Seattle! Yippee. I am all about cool bloggers taking over Seattle. I excitedly wrote her right back and asked for more details of this rumored move to my neck of the woods.

After hitting “send” on my message to Bethiclaus I read over her comment again. And then I died. Dude, it was basically the exact comment that The King is always teasing me about. Not only did she tell me I’m “awesome”, but she also said “pretty”. And then the cherry on top…she called herself a “fan”.

Crap, The King can not see this. He’ll never let me live this one down.

(And by “The King can not see this” I mean “I’m going to blog about this and totally call his attention to it.” I’m not that bright.)

Okay, so while I tell myself that I want this blog to be more about The Bigger Picture and Goodness in the (Blog)World and all the peace and love mumbo-jumbo, you’ve totally got to see a picture of my new jacket that I got from Ann Taylor Loft yesterday and then tell me how awesome I am.

You might wonder what about this picture makes me awesome.

The fact that I got this jacket on sale for $5.99 makes me awesome. And it was originally priced at $94.00!! Oh yeah, it was also 25% off, so really it was $5.18.

Nothing is more awesome then a new jacket for less then a fiver.

So tell me, what have you done lately that deserves the title of Awesome?  Don’t be shy.  If you can’t share it with the interweb, then who can you share it with?!