EastGirlsWest

Hi there - quick update on the status of the EGW’s:

We are both currently traveling. I’m in Austin, TX and Angela is in San Francisco. And I was in DC earlier this week. The point is, we’ve been quite busy galavanting around and apologize for being negligent in the posting. I can only speak for myself here, but so far traveling has produced much to write about. As soon as I have a moment, you’ll hear all about my religious experience here in the Lone Star State, plus adventures at the denim bar, Ranch 616 and my purchase of the Best New Shoes Ever. I know, you can’t wait, right?

If I had more time I would blog about how THRILLED I was to read the news of the emerging Randy ‘Duke’ Cunningham sex scandal, but my dear friend Aaryn beat me to it, and is no doubt much better at expressing the unbridled joy this story brings. Do read.

More soon y’all!

We’re all Grups. Just read an article by Adam Sternbergh published a few weeks ago in New York Magazine - one of those amusing, insightful and frightenly dead-on observations of my (our) cohort.

You see, Adam thinks us GenXers (and Cuspers) are resistant to becoming what one might call Grown Ups. Instead, we buy better iPods, listen to Bloc Party and Wolf Parade, wear designer jeans and indie t-shirts, prefer self-employment and a flexible work schedule, and write self-involved blogs about our hipster lives.

Actually, the one thing he did not mention in the article is our propensity to blog, which I think was a huge oversight. He did point out that the Grup parenting strategy is to dress our children in the same Grup uniform, expose them to The Strokes instead of the Wiggles, and generally attempt to mold their tastes and aesthetics to mirror our own. Although I am not a parent, if I ever become one I TOTALLY plan to take this approach, and there are plenty of blogs out there to teach me how.

Oh - and the sneakers. We all own lots and lots of sneakers, which we wear as fashion statements. Excuse me? My black Converse are on my feet for PURELY orthopedic reasons, thank you very much.

Of course, this article isn’t really talking about my whole generation, just the urbanites of a certain income in my generation. But that includes everyone I know, and I think Adam has us nailed.

Seriously, while not everyone I know exibits every Grup characteristic simultaneously, this article actually does describe ALL of my friends in some way. Although, I’m not so happy with the term ‘Grup’. Doesn’t have a pleasant ring to it.

Click the link! Read! Comment!

Hello readers (Mom, Andrea and Tay!)

I know I’ve been absent from the blog since its launch. Please forgive me. I’ve become obsessed with my new camera (thanks, Mom!) and can’t seem to release it from my grip long enough to type a post. How to contribute to the blog while feeding my obsession? Post my photos!

I just posted this one on my Flickr site but decided to share it here as well. It’s from my trip to Costa Rica and this little girl’s parents owned a restaurant in Cahuita. I love her red sandals. If you zoom in (easier on my Flickr site where you can view in All Sizes), you can see little mosquito bites on her ankles!

Starbucks = Fat City. For some of us.

Let’s face it, we love us some coffee treats, and we’re okay with that. But there are many temptations in the mass-produced pastry case. In fact, while in the dreaded ‘backwards’ mode on our favorite machine, Angela revealed that she suspected a previous Starbucks muffin habit was what landed her on the damn elliptical in the first place.

Today I found myself at a Starbucks in Newport Beach, where three of the women in line ahead of me had clearly not eaten since the 90s. While I eyed the orange frosted cupcake, they all ordered their liquid, nonfat breakfast/lunch/dinner and sauntered out into the sun obscured by freakishly large sunglasses.

Potayto, potahto.

Thank goodness Scott McClellan resigned today, because I really couldn’t take looking at his weenie face or hearing his evasive whine another, single second.

Of course, another will spring up in his place.

Sigh.

Have you noticed that if you mouse over the girl on the left in the masthead the sun comes out?

So I’m only a week or so in to this whole blogging thing, but so far, I rather enjoy it. Much of my desire to blog came out of my obsessive reading of others. And thinking, “Wow. I could never write that well, be that interesting or exploit the medium to it’s fullest potential in such a clever, meaningful and aesthetically pleasing way.” All true. How that translated into the launch of East Girls West is a mystery.

This is all to say, now more than ever, I am thinking about blogging, reading even more blogs, ruminating on what it means to be a blogger and what sort I aspire to be. Yesterday I read something that I clearly need to share with you, Readers, since I both brought it up at a party last night and lay in bed thinking about it this morning while my dreamy domestic partner was still sleeping.

I found the following post at the famous Jason Kottke blog. While Jason was away on his honeymoon for two weeks, he had a couple of friends fill in for him. And the end of their substitute stint, one Greg Knauss had this to say:

The theory: There are two kinds of bloggers, referential and experiential. Kottke is one. I, now two weeks too late in realizing this, am another.

The referential blogger uses the link as his fundamental unit of currency, building posts around ideas and experiences spawned elsewhere: Look at this. Referential bloggers are reporters, delivering pointers to and snippets of information, insight or entertainment happening out there, on the Intraweb. They can, and do, add their own information, insight and entertainment to the links they unearth — extrapolations, juxtapositions, even lengthy and personal anecdotes — but the outward direction of their focus remains their distinguishing feature.

The experiential blogger is inwardly directed, drawing entries from personal experience and opinion: How about this. They are storytellers (and/or bores), drawing whatever they have to offer from their own perspective. They can, and do, add links to supporting or explanatory information, even unique and undercited external sources. But their motivation, their impetus, comes from a desire to supply narrative, not reference it.

It’s clear I’m headed for the latter, although I tend to have more interest in and respect for the former. I suspect the world needs more navigators, and fewer people who just throw up their life on everyone else. But the truth is I’m 34 years old, and not likely to change. No doubt I’ll keep throwing, and I hope someone keeps reading.

So now I’ve written the ubiquitous post on blogging, linking to another blog where a guest-blogger blogs about his blogging theories. It’s all so meta.

And with that, I’m off to pilates class.

Today is my sister’s birthday. Happy Birthday Tay! Since it’s your special day, I’d like to take this opportunity to let all 5 people reading this blog know how much I love you. Not sure how we both ended up being in our 30s. It’s shocking, really…

When you were born on Easter Sunday lo those many years ago, I remember seeing bunnies hopping around the yard. Mom and Dad were at the hospital, Grammie was there with me, and she let me eat jelly beans for breakfast out of my Easter basket. It was a fitting start, because having you for a sister has meant only wonderful things - candy and bunnies being the least of it. You are my best friend, my reality check, my audience of one. My mirror, my truth, my history and the safest place to be. I would not be me if there was no you.

As a tribute to the day of your birth, I just ate a piece of licorice before 10am.

You are more beautiful, talented and wise with each passing year, and this one will be no different. Hope you get to ride your horse AND eat your cake today!

Went to see Fruit Bats last night at the Casbah. Fantastic show, despite the outrageously drunk girls trying to play quarters on a table less than 20 feet from the stage. Of course, I’m the old person sipping on my Diet Coke, resisting the urge to “shush” all the people who WON’T STOP TALKING while the band is playing.

If you’re not already listening to Fruit Bats, I highly recommend.

I heart Maureen Dowd so much. Today’s column (”Wag the Camel”) is one of her recent best:

Speaking before a mural of fluttering white doves, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad bragged that his scientists had concocted enriched uranium… The nuclear doves announcement was embarrassing for Mr. Bush, who had said on Monday that he was determined to prevent Iran from getting the know-how to enrich uranium. But the Persian logic cannot be faulted. If you pretend to have W.M.D., the U.S. may come and get you. Ask Saddam. If you really have W.M.D., you’re bulletproof. Ask Kim Jong Il.

I know, I know. I hate to toture you if you don’t subscribe to NYTimes Select and can’t read online (which I do). But here’s the thing - I really think The Dowd is worth the price of admission. And when Frank Rich finally returns from book leave? Bonus.

Also, now would be a good time for my RAVE about the NYTimes online redesign launched last week. I have to admit, I wasn’t this enthusiastic the first 20 minutes into navigating through the new look. But that was just the shock. The fear of change. The nerves of a woman so settled into her morning ritual that having to actually open my eyes all the way and put some minimal effort into locating the Most Emailed Stories was too much. But now? I can see that a better NYT is the way to a better me. Really.

Read a much more eloquent toast to the improved NYT.com here.

Now, looping back to Maureen Dowd: Angela and I go to the gym together on Mondays and Wednesdays. We spend 40 minutes side by side on the elliptical…which is sometimes a challenge, because we go right after work and it’s crowded. We dart among the scores of machines, scouting for two empty ones next to each other. Sometimes we spot a pair, but then realize there’s another couple across the room vying for the same synched-up exercise session. Then we have to make the mad dash…

HUGE digression. Maureen. So, once we score the equipment, we obviously talk while ellipsing. Hence, a new topic I’d like to introduce called “From the Elliptical” (Angela’s idea). On Monday Angela mentioned that she’d seen a picture somewhere (Vanity Fair?) of Maureen Dowd, Bill Maher and Aaron Sorkin all sitting together at a post-Oscar party. Around minute 23, we decided that in terms of compelling and hilarious conversation, it probably couldn’t get much better than being seated at that table with that threesome.

There’s always a TV tuned to CNN while we’re on the elliptical, which has caused Angela to observe on more than one occasion that Nancy Grace looks like a drag queen.