gnat greeks out

this year's greekstravaganza 2.0 (the greekquel) was bigger, badder, and greeker than last year's.

for one thing, this time there were decorations:

what's that you say? did i go from chicago all the way to the parthenon to throw a greek dinner party? no, that's my living room, but i can see how you might be confused.

there were celebrity guests:

of course, tons and tons and tons of food:

and TOGAS!

this time we went big on the cheese on fire - in case you need a recap of how last year's cheese on fire went down, here it is:

"a lovely little greek lady at fresh farms market told us to use sherry, but after several failed attempts to light the cheese we resorted to vodka. even so, the cheese was not as on fire as i had hoped it would be.

next time we'll use bacardi 151."

well we didn't find 151, but eileen brought me something polish called spirytus (a rectified spirit!) which definitely did the trick:

we even had ancient greek olympics,

with ancient greek olympic gold medal winners:

alright, they were silver medalists (technically they were cardboard and aluminum medalists but in this arena the cardboard and aluminum medal is the highest honor that can be bestowed upon an olympian).

it was all very exciting and very greek, and so far the best greekstravaganza yet. we'll see if i can top it for next year's greekstravaganza episode III: live greek or die hard.

(this was the first of many throwback posts, written from nor cal about my many backlogged chicago adventures. on a more current note, the first thing my mom said to me yesterday was that there were record high temperatures in chicago. the reason this is funny is that for two years she did this every morning over gchat, telling me from nor cal that it was raining in chicago as i looked out my window at clear sunny skies. well... this time i finally had to take her word for it.)

gnat survives the snowpocalypse

let me preface this by saying that of all the chicago adventures i have had thus far, snowpocalypse has been without doubt my absolute favorite.

it all started on monday morning when i had the following conversation with my mother:

ma: tomorrow and the next few day there will be a blizzard storm you need to go get food to store

gnat: i went today

ma: candles there might be power outage

gnat: but the store is very close

gnat: a blizzard?

ma: i am telling you whats on the news

gnat: in chicago?

ma: yeah all over and they said chicago. the next few days worse on tuesday and wednesday

ma: just check it

ma: go to walgreen get a couple of flash lights and a lot of batteries

ma: you dont want to find yourself alone at home pitch black

ma: your stove is gas?

a quick google search turned up a story from the chicago sun-times with the headline "'life-threatening' blizzard on its way to chicago area."

naturally i did what any scared californian who had never lived through a blizzard before (and who had a fear mongering parent sending doomsday messages from the other side of the country) would do - i prepared for the worst. over the course of monday and tuesday i amassed a respectable collection of candles, flashlights, snacks, and water in anticipation of the impending snowmageddon.

what i forgot to get (and what would later prove essential) was wine. by the time cara and i realized the omission, the winds had picked up and the "falling" snow was flying horizontally. we suited up in our snowpocalypse survival gear and trudged through the abandoned streets to the nearest trader joe's.

our provisions:

we dined and caroused with our taco tuesday guests (because i wasn't about to let the end of the world get in the way of taco tuesday, and neither were they, although we ate slightly more blizzard appropriate foods) and then somewhat foolhardily headed out to experience the storm.

it was chaotic. frenzied. helter skelter. really the only word for it is apocalyptic.

the next morning (my first snow day!) we examined the aftermath of the storm. things i found buried in the snow included my street,

a fire hydrant,

and (probably) a bicycle.

we snowball fought - well, i attempted rather pathetically to snowball fight and the andrews pummeled each other with continent shaped chunks of snow,

and i made my first snow angel, which is truly as satisfying as all those little kids frolicking in the snow on tv make it look.

snowpocalypse is, sadly, over, and it's sunny and beautiful (albeit really, really cold) outside, but the streets and the sidewalks are still piled high with snow. i'm not sure how long it will stick around, the snow plows have been at it outside my window since about six o'clock this morning. thanks, assholes.

(side note: perhaps due to the sun coming in through the windows and the garbage-truck like beeping of the snow plows i woke up thinking i was on kelton, that it was wednesday, and that i was late for work. i even strained to hear if patty had beaten me to the shower.)

there's a small part of me that wishes it could be snowpocalypse every day.

well, not every day.

gnat gets her recommended daily dose of vitamins A, B, C, E, and K

mom has told me horror stories about the year we lived in illinois. for example, she claims that during winter months grocery stores included bunches of free parsley with every purchase in a lackluster attempt to mask the absence of other fresh green things. understandably this caused me some concern as, despite what previous blog entries may have led you to believe about my eating habits, vegetables are a very important part of my daily life. in fact since moving here i have been anticipating with considerable apprehension the possibility of being forced to prepare meals using exclusively root vegetables and kale.

luckily just half an hour and one bus transfer away from my apartment there exists a veritable tropical paradise of cheap fresh fruits and vegetables:

stanley's produce market!

cara and i made the trip on monday and came home with a cornucopia of beautiful things, including the single most important food for the maintenance of my happiness - tomatoes.

if you look closely, you'll notice that root vegetables and kale made the cut. i'm just glad they aren't the only things i have to eat.

gnat and harry potter and the deathly hallows (and some other things too)

whereas a few years ago they were commonplace, in my advanced age (24) all nighters have become something of a rarity prompted only by the most special of circumstances. last week the planets aligned and the midnight opening of harry potter and the deathly hallows immediately preceded fakesgiving 2010, leading me to embark on a cross country costuming harry potter watching train plane and automobile taking dead bird disassembling extravaganza.

in anticipation of the adventure, i foolishly stayed up into the wee hours of thursday morning. i was awoken by cara (who had already been up since about the time i went to sleep) and we headed to the south evanston salvation army, which had previously supplied the pieces for my prince halloween costume.

we spent the day studying and marathoning the first six harry potter films, until later in the evening guests began to arrive. cara made harry potter snacks (pumpkin pasties and cauldron cakes) and i made harry potter beverages (the nearest approximation of butterbeer google afforded me):

we costumed up and headed to the theater. i channeled emma thompson's madame trelawney:

unfortunately my hair shrank considerably on the way to the theater and i shattered my teacup in the parking lot while climbing out of the trunk of aleck's car. nevertheless, i enjoyed the movie and the people behind me enjoyed a view unobstructed by my less enormous hair.

all of my fellow movie-goers headed home and to bed, i changed into muggle clothes and headed back out. this is what my train stop looks like at four o'clock in the morning:

somewhat comatose i took two trains, an airplane, and a shuttle to westwood village, was intercepted by my sister, and eventually made my way to laguna, where i deliriously participated in a few rounds of flipcup, sliced my thumb open while removing a turkey's spine and ribcage, and promptly passed out at 9pm. i woke up after an hour or so and rallied for the rest of the night, but man did it feel good to finally get to sleep.

team turduckie was up bright and early the next morning putting all of our deboning practice to good use, taking apart and reassembling huey, dewey, and louie (the chicken, duck, and turkey, respectively) into one large frankenbird:

worth it. he wasn't as easy to slice or eat as we thought, but he was ridiculously delicious.

also delicious during my stay in california, the one, the only...

in-n-out burger!

typically my praise of in-n-out is countered by non california/nevada/arizonans by talk of another lauded burger chain, five guys. well, since my last visit to california a five guys has opened just minutes from my parents' house! naturally, mom and i went to check it out.

guess what: five guys sucks! i would eat at mcdonald's before i'd go back to five guys. the quality of the food is comparable and mcdonald's is about 1/3 the price of five guys.

seriously how can you compare this:

to this?

it's laughable.

i'm back in chicago, briefly, for my last chicago week of 2010. i fly out to vegas on friday and won't be returning to the blustery state of illinois for the rest of the year. i'd like to say i'm going to cram as much chicago adventuring into the next six days as possible, but in all likelihood i will spend the remainder of my time here inside the apartment/corner bakery/the library scrambling to finish readings and papers before the end of the quarter. we shall see.

gnat has angered the gods

i woke up to this text message from mom:

"worst storm in 70yrs in chicago"

yeah right, mom. a mere 12 hours ago i was posting an entry about how perfect the weather was, and weather.com didn't give any indication of any kind of storm (although it does now)... i looked out the window first, and i guess it's a little windy? then i consulted google.

"chicago faces possible worst storm in 70 years"

"powerful midwest storm knocks out power, flights in chicago"

"chicago storm may beat 1975 gale that doomed edmund fitzgerald"

my bad, chicago.