Nina steals Dylan’s blog

 

hulaOriginally uploaded by nina.

Not only because she’s an awesome Hula Hooper, among her many accomplishments, but she’s also taking ME as her guest to the preview of X Men 3 this week! How cool is that?! But you won’t hear a peep from me about it, since that’s her job (well, a small part of her super-cool job). This is also a good time to once again thank Rob for taking me as his guest to the ultra-premier premiere of Star Wars 3 last year . Good luck comes in threes I guess. People are nice!

Dylan and Brad Zellar (from the Rake mag) at the Library Gala Opening last night - taken on my little cell phone camera. Our favorite part was the cool 3D earth map for the new Planetarium and Space Discovery Center, although we’ll have to wait 3 years for it.

Fluffy

Originally uploaded by nina.

This was taken in 2001. Man did I ever love that cat. he lived for about 18 years and was my first and last pet. (Dylan developed mid-life allergies and we weren’t able to replace the cats when they started dying out.

 

lilacsOriginally uploaded by nina.

Because I’m ignoring the blog. Here are some pretty lilacs in our yard - this is our best year ever for them. I read Dylan’s latest story “the Car Enthusiast” last night and it is so good! He has a real future with this. What else - Dylan tried on my motorcycle jacket and he can play the bad boy look with the best of them - what a fox, I actually had a visceral reaction to it. Plus I ordered my bike! A new Ducati 695 - go over the the permanent links to see the exact picture - it’ll be the closest I come to it for awhile until the real thing finally arrives.

dinner

Originally uploaded by nina.

I’m cooking, quick everyone sign liability waivers.

Squirrel

Originally uploaded by Sam Driscoll.

OK, I discovered how loud I really can scream when a squirrel jumped out at me and Jack when we opened the door to the stairwell yesterday. Then it ran upstairs and hid behind the fridge and we ran into a corner of the basement. Then Dylan and his dad created a path of boxes and got it to run back downstairs, but it went in the basement not out the open door.

Meanwhile the guy who runs the squirrel resort is busy capturing others on the roof in prep for closing up the various warrens, which now must offer house egress.

And all this is going to cost as much as 2-3 pairs of Pradas!! Oh well, I bought some Pradas anyways on Saturday morning - you know, I really NEEDED them.

hey I nabbed this guy’s photo off Flickr - thanks unknown guy.

View from top of the Palatine Hill

Originally uploaded by nina.

Oh man I would like to live here, in one of these rooftop apartments in Rome. This was probably one of the best trips we’ve ever taken. The 2nd best was to Brazil in 1999. But we didn’t have time to properly plan that and weren’t as thrilled with some of the hotels the agency put us into.

Dylan is finishing his next story, called “The Car Enthusiast.” I haven’t read it yet, but have heard a lot about it. It sounds very funny, and I have also heard laughter drifting through the walls while he’s been writing it two rooms down, so I think that’s a good sign.

I have been busy as a bee at work, which is a pretty unbroken pattern for the last few months. But more importantly, I think I have decided upon the motorcycle purchase. I’ve been looking at a few used Ducati’s, but think I am going to pre-order one of the new Ducati Monster 695’s, the one in gloss black with a red frame. yuuuummmmy. Anyways, I want to thank the fine folks at Manley Cycle, Minneapolis motorcycle repair and service maestros, who have been incredibly nice and helpful. They looked at some used bikes for me - for free! - and gave very good advice and opinions.

double dog dare

Originally uploaded by nina.

 1) Dylan is standing on his tip-toes.
2) What is going on with his hand up the back of my shirt?

We saw the movie Friends with Money the other night and liked it, although perhaps not quite as much as her earlier movies, which we liked a lot. However, in the full scale, it was on the “recommend” side. Anyways, there was a scene near the end where various couples were coming home from an event, and two of the spouses said to thier wives: “you were the prettiest one there.” I fully believe in that sort of subjectivity - it’s one of the many great things about love isn’t it? I joked somewhere that Dylan probably thinks I always look like that biker chick photo I have below, whereas for everyone else I only look like that through the bottom of the glass.