For Trish With Love

Today I enjoyed the weather, it was 80 degrees and sunny and my day off (kind of, no work until 6pm). I had an interview with Joe Rogan, you may know him as the host of "Fear Factor" or "The Man Show" or just as a rather manly man comic. Anyways we chatted on the phone a bit and I have my feature for Accidental Tourist for the 10/26 issue officially done now so that's nice.
After the interview I headed to H&M and nabbed a couple of cheap tunic-lenth tanks ($5!) and the perfect scarf/pashmina to go with my chocolate brown a-line cocktail dress (care of Aunt Suz). I'm wearing it with some lovely red peep toe pumps to the Philadelphia Orchestra on Thursday. I got the tickets from my editor-in-chief because he couldn't go and I think my editor told him I'd enjoy it. Anyways, free tickets to the orchestra are always good in my book and I'm looking forward to a night of fancy with my dear friend Jess...whom I now refer to as JLo due to her name being Jessica Locherty.
The rest of my afternoon was spent in my front yard finishing this painting for my parents. "Harvest Moon" is going to hang happily above their couch in the family room and is their anniversary gift (very late but ya know). By the end of the afternoon I looked like this---> sexy, I know. Notice the lovely colors on my ankles.
Now I'm trying to be patient and let my fingernail polish dry. I've become a nut about painting my nails again, though I find I lack the ability to not do anything long enough to let them dry completely without me messing up the finish.
My first piece in the Arts section will be running this week. I've been pitching stories to the Arts section editor for 4 weeks so it's exciting that he's finally picked up one of my stories. As much as I enjoy writing things for Arts Agenda and Agenda, it feels a bit more like real journalism when it runs in the pure Arts section so three cheers for breaking through to Pat Rapa, the Arts and Music editor.
After 10 days of entertaining guests the past few days of quiet have been enjoyable. I had an absolutely lovely time with Beth and we got to see Sufjan Stevens among other highly entertaining moments throughout her weekend here. We also explored the best bar in Philly, Dirty Franks, A+ service (three-fingered bartender anyone?) and A+ bloody marys. I took her to the theatre's local watering hole, Moriarty's 2 times during her stay. She got to meet JLo and her boyfriend Luke as well. Her time here was too short but hopefully I've convinced her to join me in the city of brotherly love come Jan. 1st.
Dominique and Matt got into town Tuesday afternoon and stayed around until Friday morning. I've only seen Dom a handful of times since high school so it was fun to catch up and to finally meet her husband. They are riding bicycles from Michigan, along the coast, down to Florida. I think they really enjoyed having a bed here in my apartment for a few days of retreat before heading back on the road. The Hoff's also got the chance to go to Moriarty's and kick back a couple rounds while they were in town.
My parents got into town Friday and stayed in a hotel in Mt. Laurel, NJ. They came to the theatre Friday night and saw the play, which they loved and afterwards I joined them at their hotel for the weekend. It was really nice to get away from Philadelphia and totally relax with them. We went to Batsto, a historical site in South Jersey as well as a nice winery on our way to Atlantic City. We stuck around casinoland long enough to go into the Taj Mahal and the House of Blues. We put $10 into a nickel slot machine and after about 10-15 minutes we were losing and so I said "alright, one more and then we're cashing out" and ended up hitting a minor jackpot and winning back our original $10 plus an additional $3.40, oh yeah! We then went to dinner in the neighboring island of Ocean City and headed back to the hotel. They spent Sunday morning/early afternoon with me and then were off. It was SO good to see them. I enjoyed getting to be gluttanous with their time for a few days.
I'm exhausted just typing this so I think I'm going to go to bed now. adieu.