This makes me terribly sad.....

Jean Claude is dead at 74

I LOVED the works that she and her husband created. The Gates was one of the most amazing things I've ever experienced. I've always envied Matthew's coworkers because they got to help with the installation and got to meet them. My heart breaks for Christo...those two were an amazing team, and they made so many beautiful things together. :(

In which there is much learning of things!


( lets get some Knowledge! )

The adventure begins!



Buckle your seat belts!!

( YEEHAW! )

Okay, I figure I should just go ahead and start posting our Kuwait photos, or they will end up like photos from our other trips and just waste away, forgotten on our hard drive ;)

So here we go... Kuwait Day 1 :Traveling! Because getting there is half the fun!



Onboard our Qatar airlines flight at JFK, ready for adventure!

( MOAR ADVENTURE! )

Good grief it's hard to come home! LOL! We got back to BK on Tues. night after taking a few days to recover at my parents' house in NJ (yaaay jet lag!). I had forgotten the MESS we left our apartment in, it was pure chaos! I have been doing nothing but cleaning and unpacking since, talk about a rude awakening!

Kuwait was AMAZING, absolutely AMAZING! I have never been anywhere like it, and honestly I can't wait to get the opportunity to see more of the Middle East (enshala!). Though I will admit the fact that everyone seems to have servants and drivers and the veiled ladies took a bit getting used to...

I've also decided that the Kuwaiti lifestyle of eating sleeping and shopping suits me just fine. I have never eaten so well in my life! It might even surpass Florence in that respect... The meals were HUGE and DELECIOUS. I knew I liked Middle Eastern food before, but now I LOVE it! XD

Also; everything smells good there!! That I was not expecting, but OMG. They burn incense everywhere there, in particular a wood called Oud, and it was AMAZING. Apparently perfumes are also a big deal there and a lot of them are made with Oud...I bought a TON to bring back with me. It's a woody scent that is really really rare to find in the perfumes here, so I got as much as I could carry.. ;)

Hopefully I'll be able to sift through all our photos and put together some blog posts about it soon..

In the meantime, omg how did it get to be Halloween already?? I guess I'll just be breaking out my ol' standby Hermione this year ;)

Today Matthew and I went swimming in the Persian Gulf, and watched the sun set over the desert. It's been a pretty awesome day!




Kuwait has been AMAAAAAAAZING!

For those who don't live in or around NYC, let me share with you the BEST AD CAMPAIGN EVER....





This campaign also includes posters of baby animals on city busses, in subway stations and in subway cars. Words cannot describe how much this brightens my day. NYC has never been more adorable!!

(BTW jigglykat you are totally right, the bunny one is EVEN BETTER)

I am now officially 30!

I feel old..... O.O

DUDES okay seriously BIG TV NIGHT.

FIRST => ( JAM wedding!! )

Second => Project Runway, YOU ARE ON NOTICE. This season has just been wacky and lame but, tonight? Dudes, we are SO not on speaking terms anymore.

STOP SMOKING CRACK KLUM

april_drawing is having an October drawing challenge! I figure it's a good excuse to make myself draw something everyday..hopefully I can keep up better then I did last april..lol! Anyways, the theme for today was "Warm Up" so I warmed up by drawing a gal doing warm ups.....



Whee!!

Also, here is a photo of Oskar since I promised one ages ago but he was too camera shy to let that happen...as you can see he's gone from shy to a ruffled back the f@#$k off! ;)



We're still working on him, my hands are healing somehwhat...but he has learned to mimic "Peeper peeper peeper!!!" (I call him Mr. Peepers, because Oskar isn't cutsie enough for me). He will not say "Peeper peeper" when I am with him however, it's more of a "you're far away and I want a cheerio" trick that he pulls.. ;)

So...Matthew and I decided to go to Al Di La in Park Slope for our 7-11 anniversary. OH MY GOD. IT WAS. SO GOOD. We went all out and had a proper Italian meal, and seriously I haven't eaten that well since we went to Florence...

It was so good infact that we took photos to document the goodness (and also because Matthew got his new sexy camera in the mail)

First....look at the pretty!!!



( MOAR NUMMINES )

And now I am quite exhausted, so off to bed with me!

(georgia is sleepy too!)

Today Matthew and I have our 7/11 anniversary! 7 years married, 11 years together! WOOT WOOT! I feel we should toast it with a Slurpiee!



Heehee! I am SO EXCITED about our nummy dinner plans...I like having excuses to eat at fancy nummy restaurants ;) Also, I have to say, good golly how I love that boy! I feel very lucky today!!

IN THREE WEEKS I MIGHT BE ON MY WAY TO KUWAIT. SERIOUSLY OH MY GOD.

Our friend from college is getting married, and her parents want to treat her by flying us out for a week so we can attend her wedding. HOLY SHIT I THINK I MIGHT DIE I AM HYPERVENTILATING I AM SO EXCITED. They want to pay and arrange for the flight and our hotel and our transportation...HOW DO YOU EVEN PROPERLY THANK SOMEONE FOR THAT? I cannot think of a gift that would even come CLOSE.

OH MY GOD I NEED TO BUY FANCY WEDDING CLOTHES OMG.

OMG I WANT TO RUN IN CIRCLES

OMG THREE WEEKS TO PLAN A TRIP TO KUWAIT WHUT!? HOW DOES ONE EVEN DO THAT!?

So I TOTALLY got my ass kicked in my old lady yoga class last night...



I wasn't expecting that at all..I mean it was called "gentle yoga" Holy shit ya'll I am out of shape. As expected, I was easily the youngest person there and easily the stiffest, gimpy-est, and most compromised. Kind of depressing. But I also LOVED IT. The instructor was GREAT and they had all sorts of props to help with the poses. I was getting into positions that I never thought I could! Hell, at one point I was actually in a kneeling pose (granted with a pillow and two blocks under my ass, but STILL) I have NEVER kneeled in my life. Oh my god it hurt. Made me realize how much range of movement I've lost in most of my joints, and how my body has adjusted to compensate. It was pretty eye opening, the the instructor was super nice and attentive and showed me ways to adapt the poses around my joints. I think this will be a great thing for me. I wish the class was offered more then once a week!

Also, 2.5 hours of yoga instruction for $10?! in NYC? Dood you CANNOT beat that!


But now I have a question for you active people out there... with activity like this are you supposed to rest the day after, or try to do some stretching? The class is only once a week, but I think I'd like to keep up some activity at home during the rest of the week , I don't want to loose momentum, and my goal with this is really to build up the muscles around my joints so that they don't hurt so much. I'm just not sure how to set this sort of thing up and what would be pushing it too much...


I hurt like HELL today. I am sore in places I didn't know I had... I want to go lay under a heating blanket

So ever since I got laid off and started working freelance from home, my diet has taken a bit of a tumble... And by tumble I mean shameless reveling in comfort foods like take out chinese, and spaghetti, and pizza, and OH MY GOD RED VELVET CUPCAKES... There was no more cooking, no point counting, no healthy eating, and OH MY GOD IT WAS SO DELICIOUS. For awhile there I was getting away with it too (lord knows how!), but Monday I got on the scale and was greeted with a pleasant 5lb gain. I think my body decided to pull the plug on "happy go lucky crazy food medicating Lauren". So here we go again, back on the diet!

The problem is, it is SO HARD to be good when I'm working from home, and my kitchen is literally RIGHT THERE, and I have no motivation to leave the house or go anywhere. I'm soooo lazy.... So I thought I'd at least try to keep better track of my food consumption, and today I joined Spark People.

Any one else out there on http://www.sparkpeople.com? Anybody use it? I'm still trying to figure it out, and who knows how long til I get bored with it, but I figured it was a good free alternative to the Weight Watchers site since I am po' and cheap. If your on it come friend me! My username is lberghol We can be miserable and healthy together! ;)

And tomorrow is the first "gentle yoga" class at the center in my nabe. I'm gonna make an effort and go...even though I don't think I own any yoga appropriate clothes and it will probably be filled with old people and will depress me ;) But I'm excited about getting out and moving again! Whee!

I drewed a background!! (sort of) I sat down and attempted to finish that gryff pic I mentioned a few posts back... I still kinda like it...I just need more practice doing colored, more thought out pieces. I'm such a lazy artist person sometimes :P ;)

OMG TruBlud, Hung and Mad Men tonight!! It's an embarrassment of RICHES!

I am feeling much better now. Have some RL fluff, because I'm disgusting like that.....NOMNOMNOM internet PDA!


Rainy days make working the weekend easier. Also they make for awesome lazy snuggle times... Tonight's entertainment will include; Chinese take out, power watching Weeds S3, and red velvet cupcakes. I swear watching Weeds gives me the munchies. It makes me crave baked goods and cereal like nothing else!

I'm having a case of the sighs today....




I'm sure I'll be over it tomorrow.. It's one of those "have I made the right choices/am I doing the right things/what would have been different if..?" things. Mainly centering around the fact that I know SO MANY awesome people who are doing SO MANY awesome things out on the west coast. They are all rocking and deserving, and I don't begrudge them in the slightest, but it just makes me wonder what would have happened if I had gone out there instead of moving to NYC. Not that it would have been better or easier, necessarily, because it would have brought it's own set of challenges, but it just makes me wonder. I guess this is just the result of watching the already small animation industry around NYC shrink smaller and smaller these past few years. Sigh sigh SIGH!

In lighter news, I think I might join a beginners yoga class in my neighborhood, because it's only $10 a class and it might be a good way to get myself out of the house. I'm kinda loving the flexibility that comes with working from home, I have to say! Pretty sweeeet!

I would just like to take a moment to thank the world for baby aspirin, because this weekend it saved me $400.

My poor Kiki hurt herself at my parents house while we were all out to dinner. My best guess is that she pulled a back muscle jumping on or off the couch. Her lower back over her hips was all sore, and she was MISERABLE...so miserable in fact that she punctured my fingernail with her teeth when I tried to check her over for breaks or wounds. My poor baby! Why does nonsense like this ALWAYS seem to happen on a holiday weekend when a $400 visit with a random emergency vet tech is a guarantee?

I immediately called my Aunt, who is our family dog "doctor", being that for as long as I've know her she has never had less then 6 dogs at once and has years of rescue/foster work under her belt. And she recommended we give her a baby aspirin and wait a few days to see how she feels.

Let me tell you, aspirin in a MIRACLE DRUG. Once we persuaded her to take it, she turned into a new dog. She's still not back to her full self, but now that were home again and away from the chaos that a with a house with 5 other dogs can be, I think she'll start rebounding faster. At the very least if she doesn't seem to be improving I can take her to our usual, though still expensive but at least well qualified, vet.

GOD BLESS YOU BABY ASPIRIN!!! My still-trying-to-make-it-on-my-last-unemployment-check-until-my-first-freelance-payment-comes-through ass is in debt to you...

So my doctor is bringing his 10 year old son to my apt. tomorrow so I can talk to him about my work and stuff, since the kid is super into cartoons and animation. I'm not quite sure what I'm gonna say really, I'm so bad at stuff like this.. ;)