For Your Boyfriend- Randall Jr. Beer Infuser

Right now I’m on a break from trying to put together the bar cart I ordered because it’s not working and there are too many parts and using the screwdriver gave me a blister SO FUCK YOU, BAR CART. Instead, I’m just gonna lay all the parts out on the floor and stare at them while drinking my wine and eating goat cheese straight from the package. This is hard! I’m assuming my roommate’s girlfriend will come home and finish my work. Leave it to the lesbians to do the heavy construction. In a good way. We can all celebrate today’s historic DOMA ruling by toasting over the brand new bar cart! Only she better get home soon before I drink all the wine.

Speaking of alcohol! (As if there’s a moment I’m not.) Here’s something you can give to your boyfriend (if you have one. whatever. they aren’t that great.) Dudes love beer. I mean, ladies do too, I suppose. But it feels like they like it less. Unless you’re a lady who loves beer. Good for you. I don’t because you have to drink too much of it to get tipsy and then your stomach is all distended and you’re wearing a bathing suit because it’s summer. ANYWAY.

This thing lets you infuse whatever flavors you want into your beer! Say your dude friend LOVES fried chicken- just throw a wing ‘er two in there and BAM! Grease flavored beer. Or maybe he’s more partial to cinnamon. Add it to his infuser and he can drink all the spicy beer he wants all night long! AND it’s only $20 so just buy it and give it to him as a Just Because gift. Just Because gifts give you like 10x more girlfriend-points than Reason Gifts do. Imagine all the episodes of Bridezillas you can make him watch while he’s distracted by his bacon-flavored beer!

Wait. That’s a good idea. I’d be willing to get the beer bloats if it tasted like bacon as it went down. NOTE TO SELF.

For Your BFFs- Slizzes

Welp. It’s nighttime again. Nighttime is when I start feeling all the feels. All the feels. SO LET’S IGNORE IT FEELINGS ARE THE WORST DOES SOMEONE WANT TO COME OVER AND MAKE ME A SANDWICH?

Here are some of my distraction techniques:

– Watch Catfish and try to figure out how to meet/marry Nev.

– Drink bourbon but know it’ll probably make things worse

– Eat lots of chips

– Go to bed at 9:30pm

Unfortch there’s a whole ‘nother 30 minutes until bedtime and I already ate all the chips. What to do!? The only obvious answer is, of course, to online shop. So I accidentally spent $150 on Amazon for a bar cart for my house. Now I will be able to prominently display all of the chipped, half-sets of martini glasses that I stole from my mom!

Also on display- our 1500 Slizzes.

If you’ve never heard of a Sliz, you probably didn’t go to a Big 10 school. I didn’t either, but my roommate went to Penn State and besides learning a lot about football and English lit and whatever, she also graduated with an extensive background in um… fun having. When we moved in together three years ago, she tried to teach me. Usually I’m kind of bad at alcoholing because it’s hard and vodka tastes gross unless it’s in a bloody mary. But if you’re looking to get things going FAST, Slizzes are the way to go. And it’s way easier than straight shooting Popov.

Basically you put a shot of alcohol in first, then top it off with some juice/soda/whatever chaser. Then, cheers and chug! Something about the science of drinking through a straw is weirdly helpful, and the chaser’s right there in the glass to smooth out the finish. No lifting an extra cup post-shot! I hate unnecessary lifting!

The number one rule on the website is: Never Sliz Alone. That’s why my friends just keep buying more slizzes for each other every time one of us has a birthday. Now you can too!

For A Housewarming- Homemade Chalk Board

 

What if I became a carpenter? Like the kind that only works in Southern California where the weather’s nice and that doesn’t care that much about money, but that gets to spend all day outside, be their own boss, wear cool goggles, and at the end of the day has something tangible to show for their time. That’s a thing, right? I think those people are on HGTV all the time.

Plus if I were a carpenter, I’d have to really concentrate on my circular saw or whatever so I wouldn’t have time to just sit and hurt and feel sorry for myself. I’d have a circular saw and goggles, dammit! I’d be in charge of making things! I’d carve my initials into benches and shelving units and stuff. And my neighbors would host dinner parties and their friends would be like “awesome porch swing, bro” and my neighbor would be all “yeah, my cool neighbor made that for me and I paid her in burritos.” I think I could like that life. But like, how do you become a carpenter? Does a poli sci degree qualify me to learn the nail gun? Is there a way to avoid doing any math?

UGH. I forgot about the math part until like RIGHT NOW. So neverminddddd. I’ll stick to being unemployed and reading a book a day and then drinking too much wine at night while writing sad email drafts. That seems more my speed. Sadly there’s less outside time and burrito payments, but on the bright side: more accidental napping and new word learning. We shall see.

Have you ever thought about building something as a gift? It sounds kind of daunting because the ceilings at Home Depot are really high and the dudes that work there always leer in a weird way when they ask me if I need any help in the wood section. But it’s kind of cool to put your time and effort into something that your friends will be forced to display because it’s too big to hide in a closet. Today my friend and I spent some time making a “framed” chalk board that we are going to hang in my living room. In my head, I thought it would be nice to display each night’s dinner menu on it, but then we realized that it would just end up saying “hummus, carrots, and peanut butter pretzels” EVERY night. So instead we’re drawing self portraits of ourselves eating hummus, carrots, and peanut butter pretzels.

Anyway, might make a fun housewarming gift for a friend who’s got some walls to fill. People’s art tastes can be a little unpredictable, but with a hand painted and framed chalk art square, they can turn their wall into whatever they want! Plus, it’s not that expensive. The whole thing cost about $35 and only took a few hours of painting and gluing during commercial breaks of Keeping Up with the Kardashians. Fun all around!

For Your BFFs- Hairy Leg Tights

There are few things more satisfying in life that watching a TV show you helped make. Even if “helped make” means “ate a lot of cafeteria food while reading 50 Shades of Gray on the office computer rolling calls between my boss and an accountant.” And today, because I drank too much Fireball out of a bag that I stuffed inside my bra at a Ke$ha concert last night, I am incapable of doing anything besides hugging my Gatorade bottle and watching ABC’s Zero Hour on demand. Back when I had a life/job/boyfriend and was relatively happy, I worked at ABC and got to meet Cappie from Greek Scott Michael Foster and all of the other actors in this show! Except Anthony Edwards. But I did spend a lot of time looking for “pictures where he looks hot” because the head of casting wanted them and doesn’t understand how photos work.

Also on tap for today: reading all of the internet. I already cried at a dog video, laughed at a list of funny Autocorrects on Buzzfeed, and salivated slash gagged over 1500 lasagna recipes on Food Network’s website. Eating sounds so helpful but so impossible right now!

Then I found these! Now that I’m single, I can tell there’s going to be a lot of bar-going in my future. I might even have to smile at other bar patrons. And because I’m an unpleasant human who doesn’t like to have fun, there’s also going to be a lot of people-rebuffing at these bars. What better way to discourage new friends than with these hair tights? I mean, normally I’d just let the hair grow naturally for about 35 minutes and we’d be all set, but I got a groupon for laser hair removal recently and now it takes way longer to grow. It hasn’t stopped completely because that would be too easy and that’s just not how my life works, but it’s better. Plus, if I ever find someone who hates everything in a way that is compatible to me, It would be nice to pull the tights off. It’s hard to imagine something sexier that watching me strip off hair tights that go up to my belly button and can’t be removed without me squatting and yanking while sweating from all the hard work.

Would be a fun gag gift for your girl friends.

Problem: they are from China and I don’t know how to buy them but I already wrote this whole post soooooo…. sorry.

OK okokokok. Other option for your girl friends- a membership to this terrifying dating site that has your potential matches grade your dating style and tell you all the things that are wrong with you. I can tell you right now, they are NOT gonna like your hair tights. Maybe leave those at home.

For Your Little Sister- Fancy Alcohol

So, predictably, I still have NOT finished cleaning out my closets. I got it to the pull-everything-out-and-put-it-in-piles-on-the-floor-and-bed-stage. But that was pretty taxing, so I decided to skip out on the organizing/cleaning/putting everything back stage and drive home to my parents house to watch Alias on my computer in a clean room and let my parents pay for dinner.

AND YOU GUYS. Michael Vartan! How did I forget about Michael Vartan! True story: I met him once at work and got to ride in an elevator with him late at night by ourselves. And then we almost made out but right before he could reach over and shove me up against the wall, some other bitch from the 3rd floor got in. At least I’m pretty sure what was happening. GEEZ he is a good looking dude. This has nothing to do with my gift idea, I just wanted you all to know where my head is at right now.

Anyway, guess who else was at my parents’ house this weekend- my baby sister! And even though in my head she’s still the 8 year old terror that used to physically assault me for eating the last pop tart, IRL she is turning 21 this year! Obvs I will be taking her to ALL of the gay bars on her birthday, but as a special fancy present I am gonna craft up some bottles of terrible alcohol because that is easier than getting her what she really wants (a Lee Pace sex doll, I’m assuming). Plus, I’ll already have a lot of leftover glitter from the Ke$ha concert I am going to tomorrow.

21st birthdays are tough to gift for because there isn’t generally much present opening and appreciating time at the party. Everyone is just getting wasted. (Unless you’re me. I had a daytime tea party for my birthday because I’m lame BUT WHATEVER BECAUSE I MADE SCONES AND THEY WERE FUCKING DELICIOUS.) So to solve that problem, attendees generally just make MOAR ALCOHOL the gift. Which is perfectly acceptable if you want to be a normal gift giver and not The Best Effing Gifter Ever. SO. Here’s what you do- spend a little extra time fancy-ing up the bottles of Malibu and flavored Smirnoff and whatever else people drink when they are 21 so that your present will stand out. That way, even when your sister wakes up the next day and can’t remember anything that happened, she’ll see your fancy bottles and know that you love her and are sorry for eating all of the pop tarts when you were growing up.

OK! Time to go buy some neon outfits for Ke$ha and maybe see a movie by myself so that I can avoid being in this disaster of a bedroom…

For ME- An Encouragement Edible Arrangement, Please

Today is my one-month single-versary, and in honor of me, I am celebrating with one last post about my sad sad life before I stop boring you with my complaints. After this, it’s all roses and sunshine and summer alcoholic beverages! I’ll still be writing melancholy contemplative emails to myself, but it’s time to move forward. At least blog-wise. Because hoping this is just a bad dream that I’ll wake up from and walk into the kitchen and there’s an omelet and hash browns is NOT gonna happen, I guess. And waiting for it is keeping me stuck in this omelet-less rut. So here we go. Good bye, old life. Hello, a lot more alcohol every day! But first, just for fun, shall we recap some things I did in this month of heartbreak? I…

• Read approx 7 million books
• Learned how to properly clean a shower
• Tortured some herb plants and maybe grew the beginnings of one tiny jalapeno
• Cried a lot
• Watched ALL the episodes of Chopped
• Developed a cheese allergy (WHYYYYYYYYYYYY)
• Kicked my Starbucks breakfast sando habit (damn cheese!)
• Cried more
• Exercised three times!!!!!11
• Almost died in a freak Baskin Robins accident
• Wrote a multitude of pathetic emails
• Ate mystery sliders in a bedroom at a party instead of talking to people
• Taught myself to save pathetic emails into the drafts folder instead of sending them
• Read the entire internet every day
• Stared solemnly out of car windows
• Went to all the happy hours
• Bought some awesome, remote controlled flameless candles that I can turn on with the push of a button in a badass, sexy way if I ever have a gentleman caller in my home
• Watched a recap of Pretty Little Liars so I finally kind of understand the plot
• Finished three bottles of bourbon
• Laser-ed all of my body hair off
• Drove to old relationship landmarks to make myself feel bad
• Took a cooking class
• Discovered buying prepared foods at Trader Joes is easier
• Watched Steel Magnolias 15 times
• Cleaned out my closets
• Made out with my ex and got confused about what life is
• Decided to control my own emotions and just try to feel better

So, you know, mixed bag. One month later and I’m slightly healthier and my house is clean, but I still can’t unsubscribe from my fake Knot.com account so I’m being tortured by emails about happy couples and wedding cake everyday. You win some, you lose some. On to the next phase- making out with anyone who has a British accent, real or otherwise. Commence happiness! I hope? I dunno. Here goes nothin’. I don’t know what I’m doing here.  If you feel like sending me an encouragement edible arrangement, I’ll take it. Everyone loves Edible Arrangements, even if they pretend they are dumb. It’s free food! And I love free food. Make sure there’s some chocolate covered pineapples in there. Maybe some fish ‘n chips.

“If you’re planning on sending me an edible arrangement, I prefer a meat one.” — Liz Lemon (30 Rock)

For Your Dad- Bacon Box

My to-do list today is comprised of basically one thing- clean out the closets. It’s time to get rid of some shit! Including a dress that I spilled a tub of clotted cream on in London in 2009 and still haven’t had dry cleaned (and that I found crumpled in really gross smelling box…) Also on the chopping block- 15 pairs of high heels that I wore once and forgot about. Why do I have so many shoes with glitter on them!? A girl can only go to so many Ke$ha concerts. The ones I can’t jump up and down in while beer bonging, smearing myself in the glow liquid from inside of glow sticks, and belting all the words to “Sleazy” HAVE GOT TO GO.  If you guys want anything, NOW IS THE TIME TO COME OVER AND GET IT. Bring some Diet Dr. Pepper and we’ll trade.

After the shoe purge comes the vacuuming and Clorox wiping. Obviously that sounds absolutely terrible so I’m avoiding it by watching First Wives Club on repeat and googling “fancy bacon” because reasons. And thank god. Because now I know that my best friends at Oscar Mayer are selling something called the Original Collection, which is basically a special box of bacon that comes with a novelty gift of your choice! They keep going out of stock, but they also “restock daily.” Which kind of makes me feel like they should just get better at predicting how much stock they need, but that is neither here nor there. They are delicious pig meat experts, not restocking geniuses. If they are out when you check in, just -you know- check back the next day. They’ll figure it out eventually. And we’ll all get our pork box and bacon cufflinks! You are welcome, dad and myself!

 

 

For Your Dad- 23AndMe

Father’s day is coming up! When I asked my dad what he wanted (besides the Macklemore CD. Seriously, he wants that), he literally said, “I would like you guys to leave me alone.”

Soooooo, thanks dad! Love you too! And sorry- Because what you are actually getting is me sitting on the couch at home all weekend because I ran out of wine at my house. And probably my sister coming home too and both of us fighting over who gets control over the TV, AND SO HELP ME GOD I WILL NOT AGREE TO WATCH MORE THAN TWO EPISODES OF CSI. I don’t care what anyone says, it is the poor man’s Criminal Minds and I won’t have that. Then we will all go out to dinner to a place you don’t want, and you will get to pay! But we love you! Really!

Anyway, maybe a better present for YOUR dad is the 23AndMe health and genetics DNA mapping service. It can tell your old man what health concerns to look out for as he ages based on his unique DNA markers, and let him know if he’s descended from the House of Lannister or something. But beware, my friend did this and found out that her dad is distantly related to her mom so….. gross. But also like the House of Lannister.

When I try to buy my parents luxurious things, they NEVER use them. Usually they forget I was the one who got it for them and try to give the gift back to me six months later when they are cleaning out the closets. Because of that, I have to get creative. I like this idea because it’s science-y, which dads like. AND it’s helpful. You could save your dad’s life so that he’ll be around to listen to Macklemore and take you to dinner for years and years to come.

For Your BFF- Monogrammed Beach Spike Beverage Holders

I’m about to get real all over you guys. It can’t all be fun and games. This is real life. Not some sort of adorable Cheerios family commercial where your biggest problem is that your black husband and super cute halfsies kids made a precious breakfast cereal mess. This is the REAL WORLD. And in the real world, you just tried to eat a leftover sandwich by yourself (because you got hungry watching Chopped) and it fell on the kitchen floor and you still ate it even though you KNOW that floor hasn’t been cleaned since your roommate hired a maid a year ago.

Also in the real world- missing people is a thing. Like, longing. Back when my only experience with this emotion was episodes of Boy Meets World where Topanga is dating the football star and Corey is sad, I thought longing just meant….. wanting. The way I want ice cream. Or the way I want Jo to say yes to Laurie’s proposal every time I read Little Women.

But no, friends. That is not it at all. Missing someone is like just CONSTANT UNEASE, even when you think you’re mostly feeling okay. It’s NOT a vaguely sad resignation like Corey or Laurie felt. It’s a nagging, annoying chest pressure. It’s trying to be normal, but your organs forgot how to function properly. It’s constipation and panic attacks.

Remember when you were a 16 and you took your parents’ brand new car to go see your friends and you backed into a light pole and knocked off the side mirror and then you had to drive home with that horrible anxiety weighing on you? And even though you were terrified to tell your parents, there was no relief from your agitation until you did? Exactly. It’s like that. (No? Just me?) Only NOW there’s no relief. All your atoms just ache. And sometimes you feel good and you think you are cured, but then you drive through Hermosa Beach and have too many memories and it doesn’t matter how loud you play your Ke$ha CD, you’re not crying anymore but the unease is back. And you can’t make it go away.

So that’s fun. Or like not. But you know what IS fun? These drink holders (obviously made for alcohol) that my mom emailed me because she gets me. Do you have friends who live at the beach? Or who like to go to parks? Or who generally go outside sometimes? These are perfect for them! You can get them monogrammed, and in whatever colors you want. Then you dig them into the ground and never have to drink sandy beer again! Would be perfect for a birthday present or bridesmaids’ gift. Plus, bourbon is a proven antidote for longing and, when poured into the plastic cup you got at a college football game, fits nicely in these drink holders.

For Your Crush- Make Out Pillow

Some nights are harder than others. One minute, you’re eating bison sausage at a hot dog restaurant, laughing about a cat auction with your friends (frealz), and only mildly hating everyone at the post-dinner bar. Then BAM! It’s three hours later and you’re waking up in your bed from a really intense make-out dream and realizing that all the good feelings you were just feeling were fake and you’re alone again. AND your roommate ate all the peanut butter pretzels.

To fall so far, so fast. Ah, life.

Speaking of making out. Ummmm, come on brain! Just be cool and leave me alone. None of this dream reading-by-the-pool-with-a-diet-dr-pepper-when-suddenly-your-ex-walks-up-and-brings-you-a-bison-sausage-then-you-make-out-a-lot-and-sometimes-he-turns-into-Ryan-Gosling-but-most-importantly-you-look-really-good-in-your-bikini-and-when-you-take-a-breath-from-making-out-everything-is-happy-and-there’s-donuts-nearby. If you’re gonna force me to have dreams, at least let them be underwater/space alien action ones where I save the world and eat more bison sausages.

Anyway, I found this pillow and even though it’s ridiculous that someone could think that $65 is an acceptable pillow price, I think it’s pretty funny. I’m gonna buy it for myself. Then I’ll sit by it seductively on my couch and wait for Ryan Gosling to come over because maybe he was driving to his agent’s office but his Garmin made him go the wrong way and then he got a flat tire outside of my apartment but it’s a cell phone dead zone so he has to start knocking on doors to ask for a phone to call AAA and all of my neighbors are at work and I just happen to be sitting with my pillow while wearing Dita Von Teese style daytime lingerie and all of A sudden he sees my pillow and jumps on top of me and we do it surrounded by peanut butter pretzels.

Yum.