Iced coffee craziness!

I was browsing Food Gawker as I do in my free time now and recipes that look amazing I star and will hopefully go back and make some of these food creations. 

I saw one last week that I decided was easy enough not to wait and looked good enough that I had to try now. 

I'm a skeptic when someone says this is the "perfect thingy thing ever" because everyone has their perspective on what might be perfect. So I decided to try out this recipe titled "Perfect Iced Coffee" Partially because it looked promising using coffee ice cubes, and partially because who doesn't want to prove something wrong? 

So I brewed a pot of coffee, let it cool down a bit, and poured the coffee into an ice cube tray. I put the coffee pot in the fridge to get cold. 

The next morning this is what I got. 

My ingredients....

Final product

My verdict: 

This is THE PERFECT ICED COFFEE! The coffee ice cubes are a genius idea. It doesn't water the coffee down and you end up with more coffee rather than some watered down crap. I also like the use of the syrup rather than sugar because it mixes better in the cold coffee, unlike sugar. 

I will note that I forgot to eat breakfast and got the jitters about an hour later, but that is my fault. The taste was amazing though, and I'll definitely be figuring out other things to use my coffee ice cubes for also. 

Playing catch up

Lots to catch up on, been doing a bunch of stuff lately. 

Some of it more minor, while some a little more major. I've been doing some minor craft projects but haven't taken pictures of them. I will post them though. 

I've recently made a mirror vase, bedazzled pens, painted some frames, and started a project for my friend. 

This weekend felt extremely long, but also felt accomplished. I got things done that needed to get done, and started things that needed to be started. 

Friday: 

I went to the Oinkster with Bill and they forgot to give me my peanut butter and jelly cupcake. I forgot about it while eating my amazing meal, but later remembered and felt a light tug at my heart. We headed to the Verdugo Bar after that where Tino and Joey showed up and we had a great time. 

Saturday: 

Joey stayed over, and we went to help clean their old apartment (Tino's OFFICIALLY living with me now) and then headed to IKEA. See Tino and I like collecting movies I guess because we have too many. We bought a short bookshelf, fits less than we thought when we got home, but it looks really nice. And now all the DVDs are organized to my liking. We got ready, Monique came over and headed to a friends house for Leo's bday. That was fun, but we were all tired. 

Sunday: 

Went to my Aunt/Uncle's house for this new project I'm working on and to hang out with them. My cousins only have a couple weeks left of summer so time spent with them is precious. Spent all day there, but a lot of work was done. My uncle is awesome, he can undoubtedly build anything.

Saturday's adventure

Saturday I went to visit Malinda. We went to the Redondo Beach Pier. Had a lot of fun. Bought some salt water taffy, some other candy for Tino, and craved every piece of fried food available. Settled on an ice cream and shared jalapeno pretzel. 

It was beautiful out, not quite sunset. 

 This is a cute no fishing sign, I liked it. 

We went back to Mal's apartment and her roommate grilled some fish and corn. On the ride back to her place I brought up Mal's delicious peanut butter and jelly muffins. So she ended up making them.

It was a lovely night. The rest of the weekend was slow and uneventful. 

I did however get Netflix this weekend and am beyond stoked for it. I used to have it, and now I get to spend lots of time deciding what to watch next. I can never be bored again!

I am me, you are you and we're both happy

When I eventually have children, and they start going to school, they will have the prettiest pens in school. Thanks to me! I will bedazzle them like I bedazzle my pens now. 

Okay so if I have a boy I won't bedazzle his pens, but that's okay, I'll still bedazzle mine. 

I've noticed lately, and probably only because I've spent some time, or have been reading things the younger peeps have been saying, that people are more often than not being discouraged from becoming who they want to. It's all about what you should be doing, or what you should look like, and who you should date. Why aren't we allowed to make our own decisions anymore? Why can't we say 'Hey, I want to move to Spain, I'm young and have no reason not to...so I'm moving to Spain.'

Instead we receive comments like, well what are you going to do there, how will you live, what about me? And I think why not, I'm supposed to make impulse decisions now and make mistakes or how will I learn anything? Plus now's as good a time as any right? 

If that's what's in your heart, if that's what you feel then you should do it. 

We continually get told we can't do things. What happened to the good ol' phrase "You can be whatever you want to be when you grown up" 

Most of us haven't grown up so why do you put us down when we haven't exceeded your expectations of who knows what? 

I realized when I do have kids, which will definitely be far into the future, I won't discourage them from doing what they want. If they decide they like to draw on the walls with crayon, I'll apply white wall paper and give them a canvas. If they want to dye their hair purple and play in the mud and do things kids are supposed to do, I won't stop them. 

And in return, they will learn that it's okay to be different, it's okay not to look the same way everyone else does, and because of that they won't be so quick to judge and put down people like so many are willing to do just because we're different. 

Embrace your individuality.

Hump day drink I will

I like to enjoy the occasional drink after work, I'm no lush by no means, however a good beer can really get me going. 

I'm not usually the one to decide to have a drink during the week unless work was hectic. Well my new job isn't ever really "hectic" so I pretty much need to be invited to even consider going out during the week, otherwise it just doesn't come to mind. 

Leo (see pic below) texted me yesterday to see if I wanted to grab a drink at Verdugo Bar, our local watering hole/beer bar. I decided I could use a mid-week drink. 

Leo and Tino are always happy guys when they have a beer, but then again, who isn't?

Okay so I went out today after work to meet up with my friend Megan. We went to Spitz in Little Tokyo, and they have a bar, and decent happy hour. So I couldn't resist and I got a $4 sangria. Okay....I got 2! But I only took a picture of one. 

Doesn't that look like the most refreshing summer drink ever? I think so, and it was quite delicious! 

So I only came on here to blog about drinking, it only means I know how to unwind sometimes. I also will say I had no more than 2 drinks both times this week.

Looking forward to making some S'more cupcakes this weekend! Will show the results when I'm done with them.

Food, hair cut, food, movie, food...

In a nutshell here's how the weekend went: 

Dinner at Outback Friday night, hair cut and lunch with Monique Saturday day, LA Street Food Fest Saturday evening, Inception Sunday morning, Clancy's for the 'Early Bird Special' Sunday evening, and then home to rest. 

And now the pictures that follow: 

We sat on the balcony at Outback overlooking the Americana. It was a beautiful night on Friday. 

 The crowd at LA Street Food Fest

The band Warpaint

This totally awesome pic Tino and I took at the Oh! Snap photo thing. Haha still makes me laugh, and I love it! 

 Inception was an awesome movie. I recommend it to everyone. It goes along the lines of the types of movies Leonardo DiCaprio has been making and I loved it. Apparently you need to listen at the very end. 

Great weekend, and it was back to work today :( 

Weekend update

This weekend wasn't anything spectacular, but I enjoyed it. 

Saturday I decided to take a walk to a new restaurant I've never tried called Spitz, home of the doner kebab. I got the chicken doner wrap with sweet potato fries and an iced tea. I really want to try the street-cart fries (they're too big to eat with a wrap and by myself) and their gelato.

   

On the walk to and from there I took a few street photos. 

 An abandoned house on a busy street

On my walk home it started raining, that was weird. After that I had fun hanging out with my friends Leo and Jorge at the Verdugo Bar. 

After that I drove down to Bellflower to hang out with Tino and his friends Richard and Edgar who was visiting from Colorado. 

They're dorks...or Tino is :)

Sunday Tino and I hung out at his mom's house for a little while, watched the World Cup Finals and got ourselves some free 7-11 slurpee!!! 

 Like I wrote, nothing exciting, just an overall enjoyable weekend.

Concert week

I had an extremely long week and a half starting 6/27. 

I went to three concerts,  a midnight showing of eclipse, and a drunken weekend in Newport Beach for the fourth. 

On the 27th I went to see Dead Man's Bones with Laura and Ali. Pictures weren't so great so here's an okay one from that night. We went to the Oinkster before, and then enjoyed cotton candy, temporary tattoos, cupcakes, and popcorn for free as part of the show. 

Yum!

Laura had a shield, Ali had a canon, and I had a pirate sponge bob!

 Here are Zach Shields and Ryan Gosling. The pics with the Silverlake Choir didn't come out so well. All kinds of red faces. But they can sing!

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That Tuesday 6/29 I went to the Taking Back Sunday show at the Wiltern. Again I went with Laura and Ali as well as Andre. In the parking lot we ended up seeing some old friends and that really made it feel like we were going to a show we would have gone to 5 years ago.  There were some douchy guys, but all in all it was a great show. 

After that I went home to get Tino and meet up with Monique and we went to go see a 12:40 showing of Eclipse at the Arclight Pasadena. The theater was surprisingly empty even though when we got seats it was almost sold out. I don't really want to review the movie, but I will say I enjoyed it. I want to see it again to absorb more. 

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Friday 7/2 I went to see Mates of State at the Echo. They're one of the only bands that I always make it a point to see when they come around. I'm not sure why but something about them just makes me happy. Maybe it's the married duo loving what they do and each other at the same time. But I always enjoy seeing them. Malinda was supposed to go but unfortunately things didn't work out for her to come, so Bill came instead and he seemed to really like their live show. 

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I didn't take pictures over the 4th of July weekend but once my Dad sends me some I'll post those. Basically there was a lot of drinking Saturday, some drinking Sunday, and no drinking Monday so that I could make it to work the next day. 

The sun came out late Sunday and not at all Monday. So that wasn't as great as it should have been. I went boogy boarding on Monday and went under a couple times so then I stopped since I didn't feel like getting more salt water in my nose. 

I'm glad I was able to finally get some sleep this week. But glad I was finally doing things.

Beetle Juice

Beetle Juice @ Hollywood Forever Cemetary

 Hanging out in line before they opened the doors

 Enjoying some Framboise while listening to the dj

 The crowd behind us was pretty large

 Laura met DK from Fast and Furious Tokyo Drift and was beyond excited! 

The screen from where we were sitting. 

We arrived at about 5:30pm even though doors don't open until 7:30 and the movie didn't start til 9p. So we got our pregame on and drank and had a picnic while we waited to get in. There were people dressed up as Lydia and a guy that was the spitting image of Alec Baldwin's character Adam. I definitely want to go back and do it again for another movie that i really like. It was great company too going with Laura, her boyfriend Andre, coworker Ralph and his girlfriend. Next time Tino has to come.

 

A new summer

June has been the start of something new for me. 

I quit my job with a company I was with for 4 years. I changed career paths from Radio to Fashion. I started a new job with a young and thriving fashion company. It's exciting to be a part of something new, and it's exciting to finally be learning something else. 

I've been in radio for so long, but not the area I've always wanted to be a part of and so it's time to take a break from it. 

I'm faced with a new challenge and I'm ready to take it on. 

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A lot of things have happened since I last posted. 

But apparently I didn't feel like they were significant enough until now to update. 

Here are some things I'm looking forward to: 

-Tino's birthday is tomorrow.

-Tino's moving in with me at the end of June

-3 concerts in 1 week (Dead Man's Bones, Taking Back Sunday, and Mates of State)

-Eclipse movie (yeah, i'm one of those)

-Finally getting a couch since Tino's moving in. 

-4th of July weekend at the beach house in Newport! 

-hopefully establishing new friendships at my new job

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More updates and pictures will continue to follow