Cake v Pie: Sweet Sixteen Results

Behold!  From 32 desserts we have whittled down the competition to Eight.  It was a fierce battle filled with sugar, icing and crumbs flying everywhere.

Birthday and Apple are still turning out strong support.  Neither Pound Cake nor Pecan Pie could muster up enough supporters to take down their respective #1 seeds.

In the Pie conference Boston Cream got, well, creamed by heavy-hitter Pumpkin.

And it was no cakewalk for German Chocolate—it just barely beat Coffee to advance to the next round.  Will it prevail over Birthday Cake next round?  Reply hazy, try again.

Wedding Cake lost at the blood-red hands of Red Velvet.  Not a pretty sight.

Key Lime Pie, meanwhile, made a pulpy blue mess of fallen favorite Blueberry.  A moment of silence, please.

Moving on, 2-seed Ice Cream froze out its competition Carrot Cake.  No love lost there!

And in the final Pie Conference match-up, Cheesecake handily took down 10-seed underdog French Silk, which just couldn’t rally after its surprising defeat of fan favorite Cherry Pie.

And so in this brutal competition for Dessert Supremacy, we are down to Eight.

Next week in Cake, it’s by the books:

1 seed Birthday Cake takes on 4 seed German Chocolate

3 seed Red Velvet is up against 2 seed Ice Cream

In Pie, all the top seeds made it too:

#1 Apple goes against seasonal heavyweight #4 Pumpkin

#3 Key Lime pits its regional flavor against #2 Cheesecake

This is, folks.  Time to batten the hatches and prepare for a storm of sugar, because it’s about to get ugly out there!

Rain, Rain, Stay and Play!

It's been raining in LA for two days now, which is the Los Angeles equivalent of a hurricane. Or the threat of ice in South Carolina. People go out and buy bread and milk, the smart ones also buy batteries, and people try not to leave their houses.

It's also and excuse for people to forget how to drive.

"It wasn't my fault, I slipped on the ice!"
"Sir, there is no ice."
"SEE WHAT I MEAN?!

I try not to drive when it rains if at all possible. Not just so I can maximize on the lazy feeling of an overcast day and revel in the sound of rain hitting the roof. It's because someone tries to murder me with their car no less than three times per drive. I am not exaggerating.

Driving in LA is a chore. It's going to take you about 4 times as long to get to where you're going as it would in a sensible place. For example:

According to Google Maps, my place of work is 5.8 miles from my doorstep.

It should take me about 15 minutes, with lights, to get to work.

It takes about half an hour.

So I've devised a series of games to pass the time. One is called Car Points. When you start your trip, you identify the car next to you by some distinguishing feature: a pro-Bush sticker, an obnoxious license plate, it's two different cars soldered into one. That is your ZERO CAR. Now for every car that crawls past you, mocking the fact that you chose the wrong lane, again, you get minus a point. For every car you pass, you gain a point. (Busses are two points, one for each half that you pass.)

You can also award yourself points for Passing a Jackass, Keeping a Jackass Behind You, and variations there of. I also like to award myself points for Not Killing the Idiot on a Motorcycle and Spotting the Bicyclist Before S/He Dies.

The 'Rainy Day' driving game? Count the number of cars that don't have their lights on because it's "daylight hours." Yeah, I can't count that high either.

Times are Tough

For those of you not in LA, one of the biggest talent agencies, CAA, throws a yearly "Young Hollywood" party/fundraiser. The assistants are invited, and most of the established companies buy tables and spots. And there's a swag bag involved.

Last night, the CAA grab bag included a hat and sample of EXTENZ.

Apparently the economy is hitting everyone hard...

It's alive!!

Yes, yes I am! And things have been crazy. I officially have a Master's degree from one of the most prestigious universities in the country, arguably the #1 school in the world for what I want to do. What does that mean?

Nada.

No, really. It means nothing other than I paid lots of money to meet some really cool people. (Okay, it's more complicated than that, and I really do like the people I met through the program, but let's not mince our words, K?)

But in the time since I last posted, I experienced my first bout of how crappy people in this industry can be. I accepted an internship with a brand new company that was a really good job prospect. Four execs in the office, a burgeoning TV side, looking to expand to about 20 people within three years. Seemed like a great first job with the possibility of expansion. And the execs, who liked me, would say things like "we want to put you on the payroll," "you could have a niche here," and "we want to hire you." So graduating-me is all excited.

Only once I graduate, I get "finish up your internship and we'll help you find a job." Um, EXCUSE ME? WTF mate. What happened to "we want to hire you"?? Yeah. So I speant a couple of days being angry, then decided to take a much needed break and go home for four weeks, with a stopoff in Texas to go to my best friend's sister's wedding. Sometimes the answer is to get the hell out of LA. Because the moment I got back? Job interview Thursday, hired on Friday, started on Monday.

With some place that didn't include a crazy receptionist/assistant who hates me. But more on that later, I have plenty of Internship Horror Stories to start updating with. But hey, at least you know this story has a happy ending!

Happy New Year!

So I went back to the East Coast, visited with family and friends (miss y'all!), and have no returned to the Land of La. And boy, what a homecoming.

So I no longer have a roommate. This is not terribly upsetting since I'm pretty content to live alone right now. AND this means I have a spare bedroom/bath. (Anyone want to visit?) However, the bathroom, until now, was not in a usable state. by any stretch of the imagination.

I'm quite sad I didn't take pictures, but it looked something like this:

My Google Fu has failed me. I found no comparable photo on Google. Just imagine your pretty white bathtub. Not paint the bottom green and black, with a smattering of red, and an almost florescent green around the edges. Yeah, that's what it looked like. We've been living here a year and a half, and I'm fairly sure she's never cleaned it.

So what to do?

Well, I started off with a bleach solution: 2/3 bleach to 1/3 hot water. Now, for those of you who know anything about mold/mildew, you're probably all filled with angst right now going "But bleach doesn't kill mold! Or make it go away!" Yes, thank you, I know that, but the bleach made me feel better. And the top layer of gross went pouring down the drain.

Next was a gallon and a half of white vinegar/hot water solution. I let it sit over night, and the second layer of filth went merrily down the drain; the water was swirling black. YUMMY.

And the bottom of the tub? No white to be seen.

So at this point, I need to bring in the big guns. Time to head to the store.

I buy three different kind of cleaners: heavy duty, foaming, and after-shower. I'm currently on application five of the heavy duty (and a pass with the foaming to spice things up). The first application was...nothing short of awe-inspiring. Truly phenomenal. The grossness just...washed away. I could suddenly see white! THERE REALLY WAS TUB UNDER THERE! (I'm more shocked than you.)

All the next coats have rinsed away the rest of the gross, though there are still areas of discoloration. I'm giving myself a few days off from scrubbing/cleaning, then trying again. If it still doesn't work, I'm going to see if bleach will restore the rest of the white coloring.

My house is so clean now! I've even cleaned out the vacuum cleaner so that it vacuums at maximum efficiency. I am a happy hommemaker :)

Next post: My Sister stories!

Only in LA

I've figured out why in TV shows, everyone is insanely hot--even the people in the background. It's because here, in LA, it actually happens.

I must say there's a huge upside to having an entire city of wanna-be actors needing day jobs.

My Mac crashed. Gloriously. As in, there's no bootable drive that it can detect and it won't launch from the OSX install DVD. I'm not freaking out because a) I convinced the Apple people they wanted to give me AppleCare even though I'd missed the window by a month and b) I backed up everything right before the crash. So I take my poor, abused Mac into the store.

I'm greeted by two really, really hot women and one cute (but kind of young) guy. This day? Already better than it could have been.

I next wander over to the Genius Bar to try and get a stand-by appointment. They guy who comes to help me? WOW. Yes, please. Feel free to help me out however you want. Can I see you tomorrow? Can my appointment be with YOU? PLEASE?

So after I make my appointment, I think to myself, "This would be a great time to look into AppleCare and see if they'll give it to you despite the fact you're a month late." So one of the hot girls calls a manager who ends up being a hot guy with rainbow eyes. I'm not kidding. His eyes were bands of color, going from brown to light yellow-brown to green to a thin band of green-gold to black. WOW.

He explains that I need to call the AppleCare center to make sure they'll give me the service retroactively, and while I'm waiting Matt will sit with me to make sure everything is OK. Matt is California cute--kind of scruffy, skater/surfer kind of college guy. I can't go wrong in this place. It's like speed dating with electronics. I approve. And I'm going back tomorrow.

Karaoke - LA Style

As one of my final forays into the LA nightlife, my South Carolina posse and I went to this club called the Brass Monkey for some wild drinks (the X-Rated Monkey and Red Headed Monkey Slut to name a few) and some bad singing.

We signed Xan the Big Man (think basketball player big) up to sing the ever inspiration Spice Girl anthem Wannabe. It went over well with the boys and girls alike.

While the rest of us were waiting our turn to go up, a strange thing happened...someone started singing Dean Marting. Well. Like, really well. So we look up and it's...Seth MacFarlane?!?! Huh. I suppose I watch enough Family Guy to know he's that good but...he's good! Even at Karaoke. Wow.

We then proceeded to slaughter Rocky Horror's Time Warp, but everyone was too busy staring at Seth to really notice.

Sophia and Blanch Go to Another Bar

Continuing with Sophia and Blanch's exploits in bar, the same group from the previous post, minus Adam, went to Cabo's Cantina in Santa Monica. Drinks and food, nummy goodness.

Now, I don't normally go for the 'dumb blonde' stereotype, but I'm starting to reconsider the 'dumb blonde Californian' stereotype (that applies to both girls and boys, btw). We order food and drinks and every thing's awesome, except Sophia's toquitos ended up in her purse. But we were really cool about it, the serving guy went and got her new ones AND gave her purse a rather through cleaning. Plus, it's just too much effort to get mad about something minor. But we're doing good, except our waitress disappears. Well, not so much disappears as just ignores us. We had to flag her down to get another round of drinks, and then to get our check. And I mean, laid in wait to find her.

So she FINALLY brought us our check. Three cheers for that ordeal. At that point, I'm pretty much settled on a 10% tip for the non-service. So basically what happens is we all turned in our checks with tip included, but you can't actually charge more than the worth of the bill, so Sophia and Thibault's checks were less than ours; they just picked up what we would have paid in tips and it all evened out. We all paid 10%, which was $8. Well, on my check I wrote 'cash' on the tip line. So we're all almost ready to go when blond bimbo walks up with our bills (amazingly enough, when there's money on the line she's on top of things and we don't have to send out a search party).

Blonde Bimbo: So, I just wanted to check with you guys, you're leaving 8 dollars on 80?
Us: ...
BB: Because I can only put the cost of the bill through the machine, and your total was more than that. So...8 on 80? (We're apparently ignoring the fact that the total of the was STILL a 10% tip.)
US: Yeah, we know. We'd added tips to our total, but we took care of it by having those two add our tips to their bills.
BB: No, what I'm saying is that I couldn't add the full amount you wanted to pay on this, and this is 8 on 80.
Me: Yes, we know, I'm paying my tip in cash, it says so on the tip line. (Blatant lie, but I wanted her to GO AWAY.)
BB: Right, but this is 8 on 80. Is that what you meant to do?
Me: Yes. We know exactly what we did, thanks.
BB: ...OK.

So we finally escape. I was actually considering leaving a little more of a tip, because I'd have felt a little bad despite the uber bad service, but that pretty much clenched it. No extra for you, you actually don't really deserve 10% after that. So we're waiting in the line for Thibault to get his car, when I see over everyone's shoulder our waitress walk up into the door.

BB: Thanks guys, thanks for everything!

So yeah, Blanch and Sophia are officially done and not feeling guilty about that whole incident.

Sophia and Blanch Go to a Bar

It's spring break, my friends Jon (of college) and Thibault (of Paris host family) are in town. So we had a great time wandering around Santa Monica and Venice. We walked along the canals, the Venice pier and of course the beach. I also introduced Jon to the wonders of In-N-Out Burgers. So after we meet up with Thibault at Venice, we stop for some food and a drink at this beach side restaurant, then decide to go out. We end up at this hole-in-the-wall bar that doesn't even have a sign out front. My friends Adam and Allison also show up.

It's just your average night out...UNTIL.

Allison is special. She had guys lining up to talk to her. Literally. When one guy vacates, another is right there to fill in. So after guy number two, this Polish guy starts chatting her up. I see him touching her rather...friendly, and step in to talk to her. The guy starts grabbing her around the waist and sort of goosing her. Not classy (though still mostly innocent). Then his short, really drunk friend shows up. He talks to Allison for a while, who introduces herself as...Allison. Well, you may wonder why I'm making a point of saying that. It's because he starts calling her Sophie/Sophia. No idea where that one came from. But I know that he's just...doing it. For no reason. So when his friend makes it apparent that Allison is his, he moves on to me.

The guy pops up and asks me to dance. I'm sitting there going...I dunno dude. So he starts asking me, trying to plead his case. I make him demonstrate his smooth moves and rhythm (of which he only had a little), and the song ends. He also assumes that Adam, who's standing next to me, is my boyfriend. But he still wants to dance with me anyways. But I say, "No, my boyfriend's kind of jealous." He grins and says, "We'll make sure he isn't jealous." I give him a Look and say, "No, I don't think so. He's like, scary jealous. Border-line violent, like almost going to jail violent." He's STILL undeterred.

Since he's so persistent, so I finally give him a chance...as long as he can convince my three chaperons to agree. So he immediately moves over to Adam to convince him to let us dance. They chat for a few minutes, and finally he moves on to Thibault. Adam comes up to me and in a small voice asks, "Um, what was the right answer?" I naturally start cracking up, because the correct answer is there is no correct answer but to just keep messing with his head.

The next thing I know, Thibault is walking away from the guy saying, "No. I will not!" and trying to catch his breath in between gales of laughter. Allison decides that if she has to be Sophia, I get to be Blanch. So when The Dude gets done with Jon, who doesn't so much answer as say, "You can ask her, but don't be surprised by the answer...", he comes up to me and starts asking to dance with me again. So I relent and tell him I'll dance with him...if he can tell me what my name is. So this starts another round of polling my chaperons, and he comes up with neither my real name, nor my fake name. And he starts apologizing for not remembering my name from...yesterday? Apparently, we met when we were checking in at a hotel, and Sophie was with me and three of my other friends were with us, and we all chatted and introduced ourselves.

At that point, we decided it was time to go to bed. So we left the Polish guy and the tiny persistent dude in the bar to sleep and prepare for our next adventure.