February 22, 2010 Good Stuff - iPhone Pic Edition!

*The new app on my iPhone that lets me count down the days until I get to see Debi and co. :D


*The new 32 oz. size coffee at my favorite coffee shop :p

*While at the french quarter today, Megan and I discovered this little "park". It's kind of odd, but very pretty. It's odd because it's as big as what you see and it's considered a national park and actually has 2 forest rangers that work there....in the middle of the quarter. Very strange. But it's neat because they have all this info on the history of the french quarter in the attached buildings and all sorts of native Louisiana plants outside.

*This is one of said native Louisiana plants. I haven't seen them in ages! They reminded me of my aunt Shirley. When I was a kid, she was my favorite aunt and she had them in pots all over her back yard. We used to call them "rubber plants" because the leaves have the consistency of rubber. I learned today that their common name is actually a "ghost plant" How cool is that!?


*We then went to Royal Street which is the street in the quarter where all of the art galleries are. We found this amazing gallery with an artist who paints people while they are nude and then photographs them and I was blown away by his art. But I couldn't take pics in there. I did take a pic in this mask shop though ;) I've been wanting one of these masks forever! Aren't they cool? Didn't buy one, but you can see them at least ;)

*We then found a lovely little restaurant called Pere Antoine right on the corner. Great food and drinks and great prices. And the weather was just gorgeous out today, so they had all of the windows open. Here's our view.

*And here's our drinks :) An Abita Bock for me and a Bloody Mary for Megan.


*My song obsession of the week. Seriously, I think everyone needs to go to iTunes right now and download this single. And then go watch the video because it's afuckingmazing.

*The two shirts I bought today at Urban Outfitters. I'm in love with my Where the Wild Things Are shirt :D I've actually been wanting one for ages, but couldn't find the right one! This one is just perfect. It has that nice worn and soft feeling to it and I just love it.

*This was my other purchase of the day. The french quarter has lots of "occult shops" so we stopped in one of them and picked up a couple of things. One is a bag of lavender because lavender is supposed to help migraines. I might put some in a sock or something to smell when I get a headache. The other thing that I bought is a charm! It's for people who are depressed or stuck in a funk and you're supposed to carry it around. I bought one for myself and one for a friend who's been going through a lot of crap lately.

All in all, it was a fantastic day :D

February 20, 2010 Good Stuff

*Oh Lush how I love thee. Though you are quite expensive. I went a little crazy at the Lush store today, but at least bath bombs to last quite awhile now :p And a bubble bar that will last me for at least two baths. I've been taking lots of baths and reading in the tub lately. I find it helps me relax a lot!

*The Mighty Boosh. I'm forming a mighty obsession with that show. The UK has the best shows in the world :p

*Atlas Sound, Jonsi, Yeasayer, Avi Buffalo, Owen Pallett, Alec Ounsworth, Broken Bells and Fanfarlo...my current obsessions musicwise.

*I vlogged finally and it was fun :D

*My clients did NOT cancel on me today!! On Wednesday, both of my clients cancelled on me, so it was nice to actually get to see both of my clients today.

*Handmade afghans to cuddle with from one of my bestest blogging friends, Pat :)

February 16, 2010 Good Stuff

*Dad is home and is feeling better. Well not feeling better, he's still really sore. For all those who've been wondering where I've been, this is what happened. My dad is an alcoholic. He went all day friday without a drink and had a seizure while he was driving because he started detoxing and crashed into a telephone pole. My little brother was in the car with him and thank god he's ok. Just a little sore. Needless to say, I've been a mess and on the verge of a breakdown ever since, but I'm doing better now I promise. He didn't break anything, he's just really sore. He's still not willing to admit he has an alcohol problem, though he did come closer to admitting it than he ever has. It's amazing how much power alcohol can hold over some people. I don't know what to do at this point. It's easy when I'm on the counseling side of the situation, but so much harder when I'm the family member.

*I finally got some rest. I slept until 1:30 today after going out for a couple of drinks last night with Megan and spent the whole night just listening to good music and singing loudly in the car. It was exactly what I needed and everything was off of my mind for a little while. I really needed that and I'm feeling much better now.

*It's Mardi Gras! I didn't go to any parades this year, but the feeling in the air is just wonderful during Mardi Gras time.

*I have the best friends in the world. I can't thank you all enough for the emails and twitter messages and for the phone call. Thank you all.

*Good good good good music!!!! I'm still so excited that I'm going to see Vampire Weekend and now Rogue Wave and Avi Buffalo in March!!!! And I finally listened to the CD that Ana sent me "virtually" like a month ago and I'm in love with it. Especially the acoustic Fanfarlo song and I now have a new obsession with The Pains of Being Pure at Heart.

*Little felt hearts

*This cute slightly demented chicken basket that I bought at World Market. I have no idea why I bought it but it was so damn cute that I had to have it (Debi, you should make these!!):

So I didn't get to go to the Saints parade tonight because I had to work, but that's ok...I'm just glad to hear that it was such a huge success! They're estimating right now that 800,000 to 1,000,000 people were out there!! Crazy, huh? Needless to say, the crowd is still going nuts :p Here's a video to show you what the parade looked like (don't know why there is so much space below :/):

New Orleans Saints Video: Victory Parade

-I have another new client!! It's a 16 year old girl and I'm seeing her tomorrow at 1 o'clock. And I have my other new client tomorrow at 2:30! It's going to be quite a full day because I go to my full time job right after that :/ But it should be a good day too!

-Happy emails from good friends :D Good news and just chatting makes me happy!

-I also got a confirmation from Expedia telling me that my flight is now OFFICIALLY booked :D Yes, it was purchased before, but it is now confirmed.

-I paid all of my fees at the library. I had like $31.45 in late fees because they were trying to tell me that I lost a book. But I didn't. They just didn't scan it when I returned it. So I found it on the shelf and showed them that I had returned it and they took the fee off! So I actually only owed $1.50 and now I can use the library again :D Yay!!

-And finally, I found out tonight that Avi Buffalo and Rogue Wave are coming here together on March 15th!!! They're two bands that I love :D Avi Buffalo has a great son called "What's it in for" that has a fantastic lyric that says "your lips are like two tiny pieces of bacon" :D I just love that!

February 8, 2010 Good Stuff

Phew! I'm still exhausted from last night. And I still don't think that it has actually hit me that the Saints won the superbowl. This whole city seems like it's in a big waking dream right now. It's kind of stopped functioning as anything but a party zone. Today, over 20,000 fans greeted the Saints at the airport and flooded Veterans which is normally one of the main highways in Metairie which is the suburb of New Orleans where I live. Traffic ceased to be able to move. The players all had their windows down and were taking pics of the vans and videos...they were just as excited as the fans. Sean Payton, our coach, even put the trophy out of the sunroof for the fans to touch! Total chaos, but friendly chaos.

Tomorrow is the big Saints parade, but sadly it's looking like I'll have to work through it...once again. But that's ok, because I'm off next weekend for my two favorite parades, Endymion and Bacchus! They're the highlight of my Mardi Gras. And the whole Mardi Gras season this year is just one big black & gold celebration!

I went shopping today and bought my Super Bowl Champions tshirt and hat :) The hats were sold out EVERYWHERE and I finally found them at the 5th place I went to. It was mass chaos at every single store. But once again, friendly chaos...the kind of chaos where you make friends while you're in line.

Aside from that, happy things of the day include eating gummy worms :p I usually can't eat gummy worms or gummy bears because they give me bad headaches. But they are seriously like my favorite food ever! However, today I woke up with a bad headache (too much celebration last night) and had to take a migraine pill (doubles as a hangover cure ) so since the pill was having it's effect already, I figured I'd indulge in some gummy candy :D They were delicious.

Also, I still haven't told everyone, but I booked my flight to see Debi in August!!!!! So it's a definite :D So fucking excited about that!!!!!!

Emails from people I don't even know, but that read my blog, telling me how happy they are for me and my city that we won the superbowl :)

Now I shall relax, try to catch up on email, because it's seriously EMBARRASSING how behind I am, and let this win sink in....

February 7, 2010 Good Stuff

Doesn't get much better than this :D

February 5, 2010 Good Stuff

I finally have new tires on my car. I can't tell you how good of a thing this is really. And they cost me about half of what I was expecting, which is also a good thing. I have bad anxiety at times. Though I don't show it...I keep it inside. But my back two tires were pretty much dry rotted and my front two tires had like no treads left (did I mention I also procrastinate :/) So for the last couple of weeks I have just been constantly convinced that all four of my tires were going to blow out. Now I know they won't :p Phew!

While I was at the tire place, this little boy, probably about 6 years old, came and sat next next to me and asked me if I liked his toy truck. I told him it was a really cool truck. He then asked me if I wanted a sip of his chocolate shake, which I politely declined. Next question was what was I reading? I told him it was a really cool book called The Ask and the Answer. He said "oh!" He then ran to his mom and said "mommy, can I get a book called The Ass and the Anso" He put the biggest smile on my face. I have no idea why random kids like to come talk to me, but it always makes me happy :) Is it that easy to read that I'm still just a giant kid myself?

Best thing about today...I didn't work! Well, I had a session with a client but I really enjoy my private practice and don't really consider that work. Even though the money is better than my 40 hr/week job. That session went totally awesome and ended like this:

Me: S, you've done really awesome so far and you should be proud of how far you've come..I'm proud of you.

S: I couldn't have done it without you, thanks Chris.

Me: You should congratulate yourself, you're the one doing all the work! But thanks and you're welcome.

S: Well, you're kind of like my anchor.

It's stuff like that that makes me love my job so much. I would honestly see many of my private practice clients, like this guy, for free if I had to. I think I get just as much out of it as he does.

February 4, 2010 Good Stuff

Ah, I missed a day. But honestly, I just couldn't bring myself to write good stuff yesterday. The day after a really bad migraine I just feel drained and I'm probably the most unmotivated person in the world. Today is slightly better despite waking up with ANOTHER freaking migraine. Thankfully the meds actually worked today though and the headache didn't last too long. So that's the first good thing! I think it's all of this horrible rain (not good rain) that's causing these headaches. Other good stuff:

Pandora! Oh I love pandora. I think I love it better than last.fm. I've discovered so many great bands from Pandora. That and XMU are my constant sources for new music. Oh, and Ana gives me new music too :p

I got to watch the Lost premiere last night when I got home from work and oh my god it was so good but so freaking confusing! Not really confusing...I mean, I have my theories of what's going on, but the thing with that show is that you never REALLY know what's going on. You totally think you do and then they throw this giant wrench into your theory.

I got showered with hearts via email by Renay :) That totally made my night :D

My little portable TV came in the mail today and it has SUCH a good picture!! So I can definitely watch the superbowl this weekend even though I have to freaking work. It really won't be that bad. I'm off the next day so I can go out after work and party.

I'm off of work tomorrow and even though it'll cost money, I can get new tires on my car finally!

I have another new client in my private practice!! And I'm so excited about this guy...not that I should get excited about others' misfortunes, I know that...god, it sounds awful when I say I'm excited...but it's the type of client that I really enjoy working with. He's young, 18, has a physical disability (which is the population I worked with for 7 years before I started this field) and really wants the help. Looking forward to working with him!

February 2, 2010 Good Stuff

Ok, so I'm going to start this post off by saying that I just laughed my ass off because I opened my computer and saw what I was looking at last night. Apparently I didn't close the window after I was searching the internet for plane tickets to Portugal :p One can dream, right? Maybe in a couple of years I can afford it...*sigh* It's a happy thing!

Lost is on tonight! Actually as I'm writing this it's almost over, but I just came home early from work sick with a migraine so haven't gotten to watch it yet..so I'll be watching it later on the internet. But yay for a new season of Lost!! Sadly, it's the final season :( But still, yay!

Patrick Ness I want to have your babies!! Seriously, I would have a uterus implanted in me if it meant having the child of Patrick Ness. I started The Ask and the Answer last night and it is freaking genius. Can a book that makes me so sad be a happy thing? Well yes it can because I like being punished with sadness. In books at least. But damn, this man can write. The only bad thing is, I now have 4 books going, 2 of which are chunksters and one of which is Tolkien...I think I'm out of my mind.

Lastly, I am thankful for pharmaceutical companies. You make wonderful pain killers oh pharmaceutical companies. I don't know how I'd survive these migraines without them.

February 1, 2010 Good Stuff

Today was not a particularly good day, but you know what...I stayed happy all day. Because I got back to keeping good stuff in mind! And because I got back to blogging so my iPhone kept letting me know all day that I had comments on my blog posts :) I like that. I like getting comments and I like just getting email in general :p That's always a good thing.

Twitter is a wonderful thing. It allows me to do a quick check in with everyone during the day while I'm stuck at work and find out cool things...things like RADIOHEAD IS NOW ON TWITTER! And and...Patrick Ness listens to really cool music like Muse and Arcade Fire and Radiohead while writing his books!! Thanks to Ana for both of those :p Oh...and AMANDA AND JASON'S KIDS ARE GENIUSES :D They are, I can attest to that :p Fun little geniuses too :)

I came home today to my Vampire Weekend tickets being in the mail!!! And I actually only paid $30 a piece more than I would have by getting them for realz, so I don't feel too bad now. It's not like I paid 4x's as much for tickets. I didn't even pay double!

Ana left a comment on my last good stuff post about how cool it was that I live in New Orleans and it had me thinking all day about how freaking cool it is where all of my other friends live! Debi lives in upstate New York! Ana lives in freaking PORTUGAL! So many friends in ENGLAND! Pat has that awesome pond :D with the beautiful birds! Colin lives in Portland! Yes, I love New Orleans with a passion and probably could never leave for long (I especially loved it today as I ate nearly half of a freaking king cake) but I would so love to move away for a little while....hmmm....we really need to form a little blogger commune :p

And the best news of the week.....my boss approved my week long vacation in August so my vacation to go see Debi and family is all set to go :D :D :D All I need to do now is book my flight which I will do next paycheck :D Yay!!!! She also approved my night off to see Vampire Weekend AND the day after, since I will surely be hungover :p