Kingston, Jamaica Island jam 2010!

This year for Thanksgiving, we bravely packed up our sunscreen and boarded a plane down to Jamaica for Rodger's sister Leisha's wedding extravaganza. This was my first trip to Jamaica so I nerded out and took the most pictures ever. This is just a smattering of the pics I took but I hope they give you a little taste of our trip!

First things first lets start with the food. Rodger's step mom made us Aki and Saltfish for our first breakfast in town. This was the first time I had ever had it, but it is apparently the national dish, and very tastey. Rodger even got a special vegan bowl made for him.

Rodger mushed some up for his neice Charlize and she gummed some down. She is still working on getting her teeth but fear not! Everyone got to join in on the eating.

Of course it got nice and messy. BABY AKI ATTACK! :)

But she liked it. Also she is a fan of the hair and dangly earring pulling. No ladies are safe!

Later that night we went into town for Rodger's Brother in Laws birthday party at a club in a neighborhood called New Kingston. We had our money converted into Jamaican dollars, so we felt rich. We then proceeded to make it rain.

The club was pretty fun. Rodger's sisters told us that if we drank white rum, we wouldn't get a hang over. We were suspicious of this so we put it to the test. I can report back my findings that they are INCORRECT. WOAH! that stuff is strong. haha But then the rest of the trip we had a reputation for being all about white rum. Go figure! Just trying to fit in with the locals! That's what you get when you try to keep up with the big dogs!

BLAME IT ON THE AA-AA-AALCOOHHHOLLL!!

But we had a good time. Here I am with Rodgers sister Leisha. Pretty ladies stepping out!

This frowny face from the next morning summarizes the hangover. haha. But we had a good timem, the hang over just made the pre wedding errands the next day all the more brutal.


Here the the view from Rodger's step mom's house. She lives up in Red Hills, on a mountain that looks down over Kingston. It was really beautiful and gives my view of Spencer and Mytle a run for its money!

Here is a view of her house. It was really nice, and relaxing to be at a real live mom's house. VIP treatment! Here is Rodger and Charlize playing in Sharron's front yard, peeping out some foliage and dabbling in a little light adventuring.



We set out to go find Leisha some wedding sandals, so we went to Bridgette's boutique, where I got some sweet sandals. My heart wanted me to get these obviously. They were encrusted in charms for God's Sake! But there was no way I could comfortably step out in these hot little numbers. But they were AWESOME. Rodger said they would have made me the dance hall queen. Guess I have to pass on that title. But you can't deny these shoes.




I got these instead. I felt like the potential for crazy blisters was significantly lessened. I also felt like the risk of someone melting down my sandals for the raw materials was lower. Thus I wussed out and got the more sensible option. SO MATURE!

So the wedding errands pressed on in spite of the white rum hangover, and I got my nails done. ALSO! AMERICANS BEWARE! Jamaica is more Englishy than Americans, so they like tea instead of coffee. Like forreal, I spent the first 4 days in a, "where is my coffee?!" daze. Everyone thought it was so funny. They were like, "Americans really like coffee!" and I was like "Yo! The whole world loves coffee! We can't get trough the day with out it!" haha, but at the manicure spot, there was a fancy cafe next door where we got some coffee, in a fancy tea pot and everything with little crumpets. So posh! We drank it with our pinkies up.
So we got some fancy coffee treats and got our nails done. READY TO STEP OUT!


We did a lot of driving around and preparing for the wedding stuff, so I took a little video from the car. This is driving outside Kingston en route to the wedding location.


So we rolled out to this beach where they had the wedding. It was in Portmore, which was outside Kingston by the sea and they had a friend who had a house out there. The drive once we got outside the city was really pretty.

There was a little dog who hung out at the house where the wedding was. The flower girl was chasing him around rubbing sand in his already shabby fur. His name was "Gypsie" and she kept trying to get me to pet him. I told her, "honey he is named gypsie for a reason, you probably shouldn't touch him." #realtalk that dog was shabby chic.

Here is her mom following her around trying to keep sand out of her hair to no avail. Adorable.
haha apparently Gypsie wanted a pice of what Rodger had!

Here is a view of the wedding location, with me posing by the water. It was so nice to have the fresh air blowing in our faces!

Here I am posing w my new Duty Free Ray Bans :) #dutyfreediscounts! #thisishowwedoit!

Here is a picture of Charlize and her Dad. Look at that belly! So freaking cute.

This was another dog that was hanging around the beach. He looked really majestic for a pit bull, so I figured I would capture the moment.


So after the wedding rehersal, we rolled down the beach to go get Fish and Festival. We got to pick our fish out of a cooler, and drink beers on the beach while we waited for them to be fried up. This is fresh yall!

We hung out outside, and an old Rasta dude tried to sell us some carved piggy banks. He gave one to the flower girl bc it was her birthday. She was psyched on it.
We relaxed and waited for the fish to get fried, and watched the sunset on the beach. It was the closest thing to a Sandals Jamaica moment as we were going to get. Check out this horse!

Here is the "after" shot of the fish in the cooler. This meal was the JAM. I seriously ate so much fish and festival it was intense. Rodger had a meal entirly comprised of festival, which are fried sweet dumplings that are sort of like less sweet dougnuts. OMG these were the bomb.

The next day, we rolled to the price mart to get liquor for the batchlor/batchlorette parties. Check out this sweet Xmas tree! Just in case you forgot where you were.


Check out this sandwich of cuteness.


Then we rolled to the batchlorette party. Here is Rodger's other sister Laura. She planned this feast. And I was put to work making sandwiches. Rodger's Aunts liked my sandwich making style and I got props for being an efficient sandwich maker.
After the sandwiches were hand crafted, I ran off and got gussied up. Here is a pic of Leisha and I before the party gets started. Don't I look like a giant next to her?

Everyone bough a bottle so we had a serious bar. These ladies were ready to get CRAZY.

I basically followed the bride around the club all night trying to convince her to drink some water so she wouldn't be sick the next day. AKA her wedding day. #voiceofreasonrepresent! Here I am w my prop of the evening.


Here is Leisha letting her hair down. We had a really good time, and by the end of the night I had seen some next level dancing. My feet were also subsequently ready to fall off. Oof! I can't keep up w these real deal clubs! Give me sneakers and a booth at a bar anytime! We got in at 4am and I crawled into bed. Here is rodger the next morning w Charlize. It looks like I wasn't the only one who had a rough night! Somebody get that baby a cup of joe! ;)

Here is the Mini Bride. She looks like a little cupcake!

I think this is the only picture of Rodger and me at the wedding. We were all behind the camera at the party. But I snuck this one in at the bathroom line.

Then we tore up the dance floor. Feast your eyes on this next level cuteness.

This baby has some good moves!
Next morning, we rolled out to the country to visit Rodger's grandma's house a few hours outside Kingston. We stopped on the way for jucie patties :)

I also got a better picture of my new sandals. These sandals got lots of compliments btw. They have a good MIA vibe I feel like. HOWMANYHOWMANY!


The view from the road was crazy! There were lots of goats, and crazy vistas from the tops of mountains. There were also lots of murals painted on all the little bars and restaraunts along the side of the road. I tried to capture some of the magic.




I felt like the murals were pretty amazing. They probably thought it was funny how many pictures I was taking. But I had to make some memories damn it! Finally we reached Rodger's grandma's house. She lives on the top of a mountain in a little house. We basically turned off the main road and drove up this gravel/rocky road straight up! We finally reached and I heard lots of cute Rodger baby stories from his Grandma bc he used to live with her when he was a little boy. It was cute. Also apparently when Rodger was a little boy he was swinging around a machate, and when she told him he wasn't allowed to have it, and took it away, he got all salty, and said, "BUMBACLOT!" HAHA omg. Babies using swear words! Never fails to be cute. Also why does it not surprise me that Rodger was a salty baby that swung around a machete when he wasn't allowed to and generally causing mischief. #SOMETHINGSNEVERCHANGE!
Here is Rodger peeling us some Jamaican oranges.

Here is Rodger's Dads friend Arel, he was the owner of the sturdy SUV that made it up the mountain. He chopped up some sugar cane for Rodger's grandma.

She had some cute animals that lived on her farm. This muel was just kicking it w this bird while we were chatting.

Here is Rodger w his grandma.

We rolled back to town and crashed out. We left town the next morning. It was an awesome trip. Thanks to Rodger's family for the awesome hosting and making us feel so welcome! Can't wait to visit again.

End of year post!

Hey friends! Alot has happened to me this fall and I had a really busy fall. Thus I have been the laziest blogger of all time. I now am sitting here a day off, sitting pretty with a fresh manicure, laundry laundering away, and a fresh bag of trader joes apple slices ready to bring you all up to speed!

Things that I did this fall:

1. I was laid off from my old job in August. At first I was scared I would be homeless and unemployable. But then I realized that as a freelancer I am making like drug dealer about of money, and I can work from home in my straight up jammies if i want to! pants w/ zippers are overrated.


2. Got a new computer (RIP laptop!) We lost the laptop to a rouge glass of breakfast wine. But the end result was a new 27' screen IMAC! SO GANGSTA! I used to try to use after effects on my lap top and I would hit command S to save, and it would be like, gimme a minute I need to figure out how to save this thing. haha it was the slowest ever. Now we are rendering out at top speeds! BOOSH! This also is allowing me to do said freelance work in my jammies (see #1).

3. Over thanksgiving we visited Jamaica to see Rodger's family for his sister's wedding. I'll put some pics up so you can have a vicarious island experience from the comforts of your laptop!

4. Started running. I haven't done any running since before thanksgiving, but I got up to 3 miles and did my first run with the Bridge runners! This probably sounds like some small potatoes to you marathon runners out there, but this was the longest distance I had ran since high school, so I was feeling pretty good about it.

I think that about summarizes the high points of my 2010 fall. Im going to post some pics up so you can relive the magic with me!

New Baby Niece In Effect!

Here is a new video of my baby niece! Talk about good looks!

Bike Shop Sexism Gets Smacked Down!

Well its officially the first hot as balls day of the spring season, and given that I wore my only warm weather outfit yesterday, I cobbled together whatever I could find to wear to work. Having gone on weightwatchers after my brother's wedding last year, and subsequently getting way buff, all of my clothes pretty much look terrible on me. Everything is about 3 sizes too big and what is left of my wardrobe from last summer is totally crazy town. I got rid of most of my clothes in an attempt to look more age appropriate at work, and then due to recessionary saving tactics never replaced the items after i got rid of them. recessionary saving tactics quickly became depression style "going without". that combined w a much needed laundry day that never happened w the perfect storm to create a work outfit of a next level.

I was trying to keep up the momentum in the mist of my shopping trip that so far had yielded an unsuccessful trip to TJ Maxx and 95 degree weather. I walked out to retrieve my bike to press on to the next store. Before I was able to ride off into the sunset I heard a large bang and my front tire went out! Defeated and tooless, I walked over to the bike shop prepared to let them change out my tube and tire for me. I went in and tried to explain that I couldn't tell if i needed to replace the tire, or if the tube had just blown out. The man stated really slowly that the problem was that i had a flat tire. Um really guy?! are you also going to tell me what day it is and that im wearing red sneakers?! obviously. that is why i am in this bike shop right now?! it was so hot and terrible outside, and i totally would have other wise had them fix it, but as they seemed to think i was retarded, i now had to fix it myself DIY style just to show these fools what was up. I started to ask the man if i could borrow his tools to fix it, and he said, again really slowly like i was struggling with english, "you need to buy a tube and a tire to fix this flat". This might not be translating to the written word, but in real time, the way this man was talking to me like I had never been on a bike before, I was seeing red! So i managed to explain to him that i needed to borrow tools so I could fix it. He seemed skeptical, and tried to tell me what tools I needed. UGH this man was killing me. I went outside and fixed it in 5 minutes and came in and paid. I put my credit card down and said, "Satisfaction!' as all the eye brows were raised by the shop boys. haha then they all tried to kick it to me bc they were impressed by my skills.

Out of control. So crisis averted, sexism triumphed over, shop boys now in check, I was able to proceed with my shopping trip where I purchased 3 new summer dresses. But really what is wrong with people?!

NO!

I was out to dinner w a few lady friends tonight and the topic of my blog came up. I basically described it as "really totally funny" bc I mean, you gotta sell yourself in the market place! The free market is tough out there for an armature blogger! Well all of the talk of blogging got me excited to write in my blog. But my boyfriend is out of town and he has my laptop. Unfortunalty for yalls, if I can't do it from the comforts of my bed, its not going to happen. Not tonight! I just rode my bike in the shitty rain for an hour in manhattan, picked up a dental gaurd, basically got frisked at century 21 bc i kept setting of the security sensures (i just found the security tag stuck to my wet sock. now i feel bad for yelling at the security gaurd) and kind of almost got hypothermia. So homegirl is not playing tonight! haha all salt aside, I made it in from the elements and would like to go on the record as feeling 100% like jzap and i are no joke! we both made it home safe and i got a hot bath, so aside from this brief fun-down (that started off as a typo) im just going to kick it VIP and listen to some This American Life, and mentally spoon w Ira Glass. When I get my laptop back I'm going to try chattroulette, and that will surely generate some hot blogging topics.

Boosh! Hieronymus out!

NYE keeping it locally epic.

So for the winter holidays i always go to the midwest for chrismahanukwanzakah but i always make it my beeswax to get back to NYC for new years bc you know thats the best holiday! My favorite holiday was xmas when i was little. but now that im older, my brother works in the ER and has to work xmas now. So we like eat xmas dinner on boxing day, and for xmas i get gift cards. thusly xmas has been knocked out of the top ranking favorite holiday! now NYE is where its at bc it involves wearing a hot dress and getting drunk and dancing. Now that's something i think we can all get behind. This is what went down!

No one had any like big ragers planned (weak sauce people), so we just ended up going to 470 flushing for midnight. They had warm cookies and we had hennesey and tall boys for coors light!

Thusly, shit was about to pop off.


It was pretty rainy out and just shittsburg in general but we braved the elements and went up to the roof for the stroke of midnight. luckily there were lots of firecrackers and alchohol and i think we sufficiently frieghtened the neighboring hachidic community.

Jake had this big beer and was like, "this beer is huge! don't worry about it!"


Rodger was all popping bottles with models!


For some reason everyone was wearing black white and red.

Bonus points for red boots!
Oh you didn't get the email on the "black white and read all over theme? akward!"

we were going to go to rubelad and dance after bc we needed to rage! but when we got there, the fire trucks were there and there was a mass exodis. They told us it was "on fire" but more or less it just got shut down. so luckily we didn't get kicked out after we paid the 20$ cover. Unthwarted we walked over to sweet revenge passing around a bottle of champagne and wishing the local Hasidim community happy new years. some of the dudes were into it! Unity!

We got to sweet revenge Soraya busted out some of her Go Go moves. I was like, dang! I need to step up my dancing game! Srsly, she is so good at dancing! Feast your eyes!


Rodger set up this connect 4 game that never actually got fully assembled or played at all.


We danced all night and got drunk and made and lost some memories. It was awesome! We pretended it was webster hall and got up on the steps and danced like it was senior year!


One of the high points was when jodie and i had a "cute picture contest" in the corner. This is the end result.







It's a tie!

As you may recall, one of the major themes of 2010 was "sparkle vampires". This was to commemorate the sparkle vampires for posterity. Do it for twilight!



All in all it was a super fun night, and when we were leaving for closing time, the bouncer told us that we are hilarious and always welcome back. Thats like the opposite of getting kicked out! Hell yea! 2010 is going to be a good one yall!