Cinco de Mayo/birthdayness

Saturday was Cinco de Mayo, or more importantly (as she will tell you), Amber's birthday. I love birthdays, but tend to have Sixteen Candles-esque birthdays myself, so I perhaps get overly excited about other people's birthdays.

What's a birthday without cake? I got a Coldstone cake and cleverly hid it in the freezer. I let it sit there for about a week and made her wait til 12:01 am to open it.


It's not really a dead dove, it's cake!


Along with cake, there was a cornucopia (see, Amber, not just for Thanksgiving!) of presents.



Some highlights:

I bought this solely for the challenge of wrapping it.


Success!


This was purchased for the illustration.


And this because it's sweet as hell.


The following is my favorite purchase, mostly because I like to picture the marketing meeting that lead to its inception. In my head it goes something like this:

Bob: We need a new product for kids. Something fresh and exciting.
Pierre: Well, what do kids like? Candy and toys. We need to figure out a way to combine the two. Something like Pez, but radder.
Bob: I've got it! What are kids' favorite things? Gummy worms and lawn care! We'll combine the two and call it Little Sprouts Candy and Grasshead.
Pierre: Genius!
*fin*


Of course birthdays aren't all about rampant materialism, so there was a homemade present as well. It's what I like to call the greatest mix cd in the world, and it contains some of Amber's favorite songs, as well as some random ones I found in my music collection (I'll leave you to figure out which are which).


Track listing:
1. Old Fashioned Fun - from Human Giant
2. The Sign - Ace of Base
3. Rock Your Body - Justin Timberlake
4. Don't Stop Believing - Journey
5. Milkshake - Kelis
6. Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go - Wham!
7. No Diggity - Blackstreet
8. Lonely Goatherd - Sound of Music soundtrack
9. Oops! I Did it Again - Britney Spears
10. Ice Ice Baby - Vanilla Ice
11. Macarena - Los Del Mar
12. I Want it That Way - Backstreet Boys
13. Mickey - Toni Basil
14. Jump Around - House of Pain
15. This Love - Maroon 5
16. Walking on Sunshine - Katrina and the Waves
17. Copacabana - Barry Manilow

"What's wrong with this picture? It's just me...WITHOUT MY BIKE!"

So I got a bike. I'm super excited, but I also feel a bit like I'm in a Choose Your Own Adventure book and I just chose the ending that leads me down a dark path to certain death...and I forgot to mark the last page I was on so I can't cheat.

Anyone who's familiar with my post-driver's license biking history can attest that this isn't that irrational of a fear. Two of my last bike outings ended rather badly - one with me face down in a bush on top of my bike, the other with me face down on the concrete trapped under my bike. Now add riding in traffic to the fact that I haven't been on a bike more than half a dozen times in the five years since the concrete episode, and you'll see why I'm a little afraid of impending death.

But yay, bike!

I'd been thinking about a bike for a while when I heard about the Iowa City Bike Library, which is exactly what it sounds like, provided you think it sounds like a place where you can check out bikes. The Bike Library fixes up donated bikes and lends them out for 6 month periods for a deposit. After the six months you can either return the bike and get your deposit back or keep the bike. Best idea ever. So last Saturday I took the bus downtown and got me a red Univega Nuevo Sport and a youth size bike helmet. It needs a few accessories - headlight, fenders, horn, baseball cards in the spokes - but it rides pretty well. I've ridden downtown and back a few times and have yet to die, and I've been riding to work. I was already walking to work, but now I have an extra five minutes in the morning (which can make the difference in me having a lunch or wearing matching socks) and I can ride to the park for lunch.


Bike!


And don't forget, Bike to Work Week starts May 14.

I wonder what the landscaping at the proctologist's office looks like.

spellbound.

I was flipping through the tv listings late one night when I came across a program called Iowa City Spells. Spellbound is one of my favorite movies, so I clicked on the program hoping to find a local version of the grade school spelling bee, but what I discovered was something so much better. It was an adult spelling bee! With teams! And do overs!



Apparently the public library hosts Iowa City Spells every year as a fundraiser. Teams of three with names like Spellfire and Brimstone, and Spells Like Team Spirit compete for orthographic glory and gift certificates. My favorite part of the bee is that teams can spell a word wrong in the first round and not be eliminated. Too bad, kid who studied his dictionary for a year who gets a word wrong in the first round of the Scripps National Bee! Just like in getting in to that ivy league school so your parents will love you, you don't get a second chance. But in the adult word, we don't let a little thing like misplaced letters stand in the way of a good spelling bee.

Peanuts! Pretzels! Flea dip!

I passed this van parked in front of the Ecumenical Towers downtown:



The picture's not so good, but that's a woman washing a dog in a van parked on the street.

Moo.

The first in a series of giant animals in Iowa:

the T stands for Tiberius

As I'm sure you're all aware, today is Captain James T. Kirk's birthday! Or pre-birthday. Or anniversary of his eventual birth... Is there a term to mark the date of something that hasn't happened yet? Preversary?

Anyway, Captain Kirk will be born 226 years from today in the little town of Riverside, Iowa, which happens to be a mere 20 minutes away (non-warp speed time). Every year the citizens of Riverside hold Trek Fest the last weekend of June. This year is Trek Fest XXXIII: "City on the Edge of Forever."

According to the Trek Fest website, "The festival tries to balance a small town fair that James T. Kirk may experience with a Science Fiction theme," which explains why the festival consists of an odd mix of tractor pulls and Star Trek costume contests (or what I like to call the best of both worlds).

The fact that I have no knowledge of or interest in Star Trek makes Trek Fest no less appealing to me. For one thing, it's basically a weekend devoted to William Shatner. Shatner! Also, it's people in costumes, which is enough of an excuse for me to do anything. I think I might have to experiment with yarn and go as a tribble.

Or R2D2.

my truckstop is bigger than your truckstop

This is the Iowa-80, also known as the world's largest truck stop:


This monolithic oasis is a welcomed sight to truckers as well as those, like myself, who are looking to have that traditional Christmas truckstop dinner ("God bless us, every one!").

Besides the standard truckstop fare - food court, gift shop, gas station - the Iowa-80 also has a ultra exclusive second floor just for truckers with a dentist, barber, movie theater, and fireplace. There's even a custom shop where you can have t-shirts screen printed (or naked lady mud flaps made!) while you peruse the Trucking Hall of Fame.

All this would be reason enough for me to stop, but the Iowa-80 pulls out all the stops one weekend in July when they host the Truckers Jamboree, a "place to celebrate and learn about trucking and those big rigs." The Truckers Jamboree includes events like an antique truck display, a super truck beauty contest, and the Trucker Olympics.

I can't wait.

finger lickin' good

What do Iowans want at their KFC?

Go west, young (wo)man.

I've lived in Iowa for less than a week now, but I've already decided that Iowa is the greatest state in the union. Why, you ask?

Is it because we have the highest literacy rate in the nation? Or is it because we're number one in pork production? Perhaps because Captain James T. Kirk will be born here on March 22, 2233? Oh no, it's because we have a pirate running for Congress. An alcoholic pirate. In a landlocked state:

James Hill for Congress.