Friday afternoon

There was this.

Oh and also this.

This is supposed to be me and my roommate.

Go ahead and ooh and ahh over my photoshop prowess.

I'm sad about Michael Jackson

I know that in he was sketch with the young boy situation but I really loved his music. And I don't know anyone who doesn't like at least one of his songs.

A Michael Jackson song will make a party. If you want people to get up and dance just start up a little Don't Stop Til You Get Enough or maybe Billie Jean. My personal MJ fav is Do You Remember The Time. It doesn't get played as much but I heart it, and when I hear it I go to a good place.

And his videos....Michael Jackson did some really amazing videos! I loved yet was terrified by Thriller. His videos were like little movies. I feel like I'm very jaded to the awesomeness of real unique creativity because I get the feeling that everything's been done and everything new is just variations on the same. But MJ was really creative and awesome and for lack of a more sophisticated phrase--his shit was bomb.

July 30th = New Fav Day

Fantastic news right??

I need NeNe and Atlanta after those crazy ass Jersey prostiution whores.

In other TV news--if you haven't seen it already, make Nurse Jackie something you watch in the near future. And when you watch it, you should know that girl who plays Zoe is my new favorite actress.

I tried to watch NYC Prep, but sorry Bravo--it sucks. The kids are HELL.

And TLC--STOP I never want to see a 10 year retrospective on Jon and Kate's marriage and that's exactly what they are planning on airing next Monday since Jon finally came to his senses and got the hell out before Kate could chop off any more of his balls. Do we really need to see 10 years of Kate forcing him to do what she wanted? "Oh Jon I know I'm 26 and you're 24 but I NEED in vitro!! TWICE!! Who cares that I'm a nurse and your an IT guy and we're just getting by with twins! I want six more you fucking son of a bitch and then I want a reality show to pay for it. Haven't you NOTICED that Jon and Kate rhymes with 8???? GodDAMNIT Jon." I got what I needed from the show--to see Jon tell her to shut the fuck up. Granted he didn't actually say that but he DID file for divorce--and THAT says shut the fuck up almost better than saying the actual command aloud.

The most amazing experience

Today from about 530am to 615am I was naked on a beach in Montauk Long Island, near the Montauk lighthouse.

There's a better word for it but right now all I can come up with is amazing. I was on a beach with about 200 other people and we were Spencer Tunick's latest installation piece.

I was so incredibly nervous. I've only been completely full monty naked in front of myself and a few men over the years. But never more than one person at once, and certainly never for a professional photographer's camera. So I had to pull out some balls for this one. Honestly though, once the first person stripped everyone just followed suit, and after 5 minutes I was totally over the fact that I was completely nude and surrounded by many other people in the same state of undress.

Being on the beach at the northern tip of Long Island as the sun rises is really incredible. The sky was so many shades of blue, shades that I could never recreate in a photo or in a painting. Shades of blue that have to been seen and experienced. The waves were picture perfect. Spencer Tunick couldn't have asked for better weather. He placed us all along the rocky beach and the surrounding cliffs. At one point I was face down clinging to the side of a cliff. Just me and the sand and for once I didn't feel the immediate urge to get all sand off of me. I just laid there and felt the roughness of the rocks against my bare skin and it was out of control.

He got all the women together at the end and we had to go across all these huge slippery rocks that jutted right out into the ocean. I was dirty from the sand and Spencer told me to take some of the water pooled on the rocks and rinse off a bit. And do you know that before I could even kneel down, 2 or 3 of the ladies nearest me were scooping up water and rinsing me off. It was such a surreal experience being on a huge rock like 5 feet away from a 10 foot drop into the the ocean, surrounded by naked women rinsing sand and mud off my back and legs.

We get a copy of the print in a few months and I'm so excited, yet freaked out to see it. In a lot of the shots I am pretty far away but seeing as that there were 200+ people there and only maybe 5 or 6 of us were black, I don't think I'll be hard to spot. That makes me a little nervous that it could just be floating around and that at any moment a friend could be perusing an art gallery and may just catch a glimpse of good old Naked Brandy.

After the shoot there was an afterparty at a nearby hotel. It was at 7am though so it's weird to think of it as an afterparty. Usually it's the 7am afterparties that make you feel like a total drug abusing alcoholic and I haven't been to one of those in about 4 years. But there was a heated pool at the hotel and it felt wonderful. And my friends and I just talked amongst ourselves the whole time about how much we were looking forward to McDonald's breakfast.

The trip on a whole was really fun. My friends and I rented a car and by the end of the trip her name was Zuki (short for Suzuki) and we each felt really close to her. We went to McDonald's twice. The second McDonald's trip probably deserves it's own blog because in case you didn't know--there's NO McDonald's in the Hamptons. (Okay that's a lie--we found one in Southampton but it was a BITCH AND A HALF to get there thanks for nothing Google Maps). But in our defense, the 2nd trip was for breakfast and a McDonald's breakfast is DEFINITELY something to get excited about.

Oh, and we made a surprise trip to New Jersey, since we had to return the car--this is something I hadn't been planning on being a part of but when one falls asleep decisions are made without one's input.


Sidenote: One kind of awesome thing that came out of the many conversations that we all had on the way there and on the way back was that Top Secret Jpeg is a really great band name. Right?

Enjoy the pics below--and DON'T get excited.

I didn't take any pictures of the nakedness.

This is my "I was just naked but now I'm in New Jersey?" smile.

My fellow travelers.

The wonderful Miss Zuki The Car.

2 for $3 bacon, egg, and cheese.

Finally, a fucking McDonald's in the Hamptons.

What do people out there do when they need a Filet O'Fish??

Empire the Series

On July 12th, my friends Brian and Greg will be unveiling their new web soap opera!!

It's called Empire and it's going to be great. You can visit the website here and make sure to take a look at the trailer!





Make sure to go to the website to find out about the premiere party. Brian and Greg put a lot of work into this and it makes me feel good inside when I my friends are doing something they love.

I'm getting naked.

Yes--I'm being literal.

I am posing nude on Sunday for a Spencer Tunick installation. I am going to be among like 200 other naked people including 4 of my friends (okay 2 friends and 2 friends of friends). I’m incredibly nervous and I’ve been practicing by walking around my house naked more than usual. It’s been easy because my roommate has been working nights so I come home from work and if I want, I can be naked right up until the time I decide to go to bed. It’s kind of awesome. I am still incredibly nervous though. Understand that even though I like to wear slutty clothes, for the most part I’m a pretty modest person when it comes to full nudity. In middle school I used change in the bathroom stall because I was too embarrassed to change in front of the other girls. I mean I got over that after 6th grade I think but I have never been super comfortable about people that I’m not about to engage in naughty activities with.

I’m posing for a photo by Spencer Tunick and I’m doing it early Monday morning in northern Long Island. Oh…and I can’t wait. My friends and I are renting a car and making a mini road trip of it. I’m really interested to meet the other people who will be posing because I think it will be hundreds. And I love meeting new people. I’ve actually decided that this will be the Summer Of Meeting New People. Tonight I met like 4 new people at a birthday party at the Jane Hotel--which btw is one of my new favorite places in NYC)

Lately I’ve been really loving New York. I’ve been here 5 1/2 years now and I can’t even believe it. I think that maybe makes me a real New Yorker—I mean for 4 years I’ve actually lived in Manhattan proper. I have been paying attention when I walk down the street for a change instead of zoning out to my iPod. And it’s been awesome. I live in a fabulous place and no matter which way I decide to walk, even if I’ve walked that way a million times before, I will see something new. I feel like New York is where I’ve become a woman, It sounds so cheesy but it’s true—I came here a naïve country girl and I feel like I’m finally becoming a learned city woman. I’ve had 4 awesome jobs that have continued to move me forward in my career, I worked my way out tens of thousands in debt, I’m finally at a point where I can take a second and just breathe and enjoy.

I’m loving it and I can’t say it enough. New York City is an amazing place and I am so happy that I finally feel like it’s my city. There’s always something exciting and different happening and I love that every person, every street, every building, everything here has a story to tell. I've been walking everywhere recently and just soaking in the city and the summer. Even though this constant rain is KIND OF KILLING ME. But I'm telling myself the weathermen are full of shit and every night I go to bed happy that maybe in the morning I'll wake up to sun streaming through the window. It's nice to be able to hope.

Way to go 2 different directions in the this blog post right???

The Housewives Finale was everything I dreamed it would be

Teresa you are my idol.

Do I have to say anything?

I know this is old.....but I rediscovered it just now. It's screaming "share me!" and a chuckle should be had.






Unrelated: My windows are open right now and I some little princess neighbor of mine is playing the Enchanted soundtrack at full blast. But I don't mind because it was a pretty cute movie and there are worse fates than having to listen to Amy Adams sing "That's How You Know" on repeat.

Sometimes you have storms.

20 years ago today, my mother’s youngest sister died.

I was 8 years old, and my parents had just separated for the first time. My brother and I were living with my mom in a condo in Riverdale, a town near the Atlanta airport on the southside of the city.

My aunt Rhonda was 19. She had been driving home from her boyfriend’s house in Atlanta and she fell asleep and veered off the road. She was thrown through the windshield and died from a broken neck.

My grandmother’s sister Pat came to our condo in the early hours of the morning of June 11th 1989. My brother and I shared a room and were both recently in the habit of sleeping on the floor in our new sleeping bags because we loved them so much. Aunt Pat and my mother got us up from the floor and we dressed quickly and got into the car.

I was absolutely sure that we were on our way to Macon, Georgia. Macon was a city south of where I was from and I always saw the name on road signs. 67 miles to Macon, Macon this way, Left lane-Macon. I’d told Mom weeks before that I wanted to go to Macon and she’d promised that we’d go. I didn’t bother to think that it was odd to start a vacation in the dark of the night.

I remember the orange light of the street lamps. But even when we pulled into the hospital parking lot, I still thought we were heading to Macon. I jumped out of the car as soon as it was parked, ready to behold this new city. The first person I saw was my grandmother, tinted orange in the glow of the light. She’s in Macon too! I thought, How great is this?

“Momma where is the hotel?” I asked.

“Take your brother back to the car,” she replied.

I was holding his hand and he was leaning against me, still half asleep. There was something wrong with my mother’s voice. I couldn’t tell then what it was but now I know that she was in shock.

Instead of going to the car I put my arm around my little brother and went to where my grandmother stood. I saw her face and I knew that we weren’t in Macon.

“It’s your aunt Rhonda, Brandy. She’s dead.”

I didn’t know what dead was then. I’d had great grandparents who’d passed away, some old cousins, some great uncles and aunts. Funerals were just another party for me, I’d see cousins and aunts and uncles and yes there were caskets and old scary looking people in those caskets, but there was also food and lots of people to play with. Dead didn’t mean dead. Not yet.

Rhonda had dropped my brother and I off earlier that morning at the townhouse. She’d bought me a new plastic purse full of little girl things like fake make up and doll brushes. Dead? But I’d just seen her. My brother looked up at me, his eyes full of sleep and questions.

“Bran, what happened?” he asked.

“I guess she died.” The words came out of my mouth flat and meaningless. We weren't in Macon and what did she mean Rhonda died?

The next few days were a blur. There would be a closed coffin because of the damage done to her face. My cousin Kari wanted to see what she looked like but I didn’t. My mother and her other sisters didn’t let my cousins and I go to the funeral. Only my younger cousin Chasity was allowed. Because she was being a brat and started crying when the funeral procession left from my grandmother’s house. The rest of us stayed behind and played Uno in the garage and ate all of the desserts and casseroles that our town turned out in force to give my family.

My mother’s oldest sister died ten years later. I was 18 and weeks away from graduating high school. Gretchen had been sick for a few years but no one thought she would die. I never even knew how sick she was which is one reason why I only saw her once in the hospital. My brother and I went to see her and the sight of her small frail body leaking tubes and blood was too much for me. At one point my mom asked my brother and I to stay in the room with my aunt while she went to make a phone call. We opted to go with her to make the call. That was the last time I saw Gretchen alive. Her poor sad face as my brother and I left the room haunts my dreams to this day.

Now I'm 28 and the enormity of what it is to lose a family member is no longer a mystery to me. I know what it means. And knowing what that means makes me really admire my grandmother because she lost her oldest and her youngest daughters within 10 years of one another, yet she remains the most positive and amazing woman I have yet to meet. She's always smiling and ready to laugh herself or make you laugh. Even when she's pissed she's still so nice. She can tell you that you're full of shit one minute and she's giving you the shirt off her back the next. I can't say that I empathize with her loss because I've never lost someone that I gave birth to, but I do feel like I understand her more and connect on another level because I see that she went through a really awful storm and she made it out okay.

I've been in my own little storm recently and I'm coming through to the other side now. My storm was nowhere near what my grandmother's was but it was thinking of her that helped me get through it.




PS: It is also from my grandmother (actually BOTH grandmothers--my dad's mom is also a fabulous and fantastic woman who merits her own blog posting) that I learned to love and need housedresses.

Vampires I Love

Because who doesn't love a good good vampire?

Vampires I Love

1. Barnabus Collins – from the early 90s remake of Dark Shadows. He made me feel all kinds of wonderful in 5th grade. I was really sad when the show stopped coming on. That seemed to happen to a lot of shows I loved as a kid: Pacific Palisades, Swan’s Crossing, Models Inc, Noah's Ark. I could go on but that's another posting methinks.
   
2. Edward Cullen—I think that casting Robert Pattison as Edward Cullen was the best idea EVER. I was totally love-hating the books while I was reading them but I have to admit that picturing Robert Pattison as Edward made me totally overlook his incredibly stalkerish and crazily possessive tendencies toward Bella. Even though I HATED Bella. Talk about an awful female role model. Even when she finally stands up and is the hero for once it’s only because of her undying and unending and completely insane love for Edward.
3. Lestat—Who didn’t love Tom Cruise in the early 90s? He was totally in his prime. I read all of the Vampire Chronicles (I was a HUGE Anne Rice fan surprise, surprise) and Lestat was just such a great character. Anne Rice’s vampires are actually my favorite vampires. And I think it’s because of Tom Cruise.
4. Bill Compton – I’ve read the first 3 Sookie Stackhouse books and I have to say that I like the Bill from True Blood better than the Bill in the books. I can’t tell you who I really like in the books because I would give away a big secret that I think is going to come out in the second season. I think my life would be complete if I could hear Bill drawl out "Brandy Crawford" the same way he drawls out "Sookie Stackhouse"
5. Claudia—this is the one and only role I have ever liked Kirsten Dunst in. Okay I take that back—she was really great in Bring It On. And it’s not so really much her that I like as it is the character. I read the book before I saw the movie and really loved Claudia and was secretly jealous of her getting to be a kid vampire. I didn’t realize then that Kirsten Dunst would turn out to be really annoying. And no, I don’t know her. I’m making a sweeping generalization based on her choice in movie roles.

Side note: Scariest vampires? The ones that live in Salem’s Lot. I was a HUGE Stephen King (okay I admit I still am) and I think I was maybe 12 when I read Salem’s Lot for the first time. IT SCARED THE SHIT OUT OF ME. But I loved it just like I loved all his books—but that’s another story all together.

Phase 10

Phase 10 is the most fun card game ever.

I have played many many card games in my day so I feel completely confident in saying that Phase 10 is absolutely amazing. My roommate brought it home one night about a year ago, having been introduced by her celebrity friend who shall remain nameless. The box of cards kind of just sat around for a while gathering dust with so many of our other games that seemed so fun when we bought them but haven't been played in months. Then, a few weeks ago, Christos and I broke out Phase 10 and a love affair was born. I've now introduced the game to at least 5 other friends and they are all extremely into it and they all recognize its awesomeness. I love it so much that I made an excel spreadsheet to keep score--I'm in the process of figuring out how to make it automatically know what phase you are on. (Secret: I love making excel spreadsheets that utilize formulas)

And then, somehow, the Phase 10 cards went missing. I played last Monday, it was amazing, and I put the cards back in their box and I put the box in this green bowl thing that sits on one side of the shelf on our TV stand. I know that I can be forgetful but I know that I put those cards back in the green thing. Long story short, Friday rolls around and I'm on my way to a friend's house and I want to take the cards. And I can't find them anywhere. ANYWHERE. I won't lie--panic set in. I texted my roommate and she said that she'd last seen them in the green thing. And I'd last seen them in the green thing. So I came to the obvious conclusion that the firemen tidied my roommate's room up so nice because they'd stolen our Phase 10 cards during their little break-in session. I was upset but it was 10pm and I was already late leaving for my friend's so I took the Uno cards instead.

Saturday I actually cleaned my entire apartment looking for those damned cards. Nowhere to be found. I text my friend Brian (huge fan of Phase 10 and had been very disappointed the night before to learn of their disappearance) and ask him if he wants to meet me at the Kmart at Astor Place because that's the only place I can think of that would have the cards and I vaguely remember that that's where my roommate got the last deck. So we meet up at KMart for what I think will be a ten minute trip total to get the cards, pay for them and get out of there. Brian decides to buy a deck too so that we never run into this problem again.

We go downstairs to the toy department and there were the Phase 10 cards should be are...Phase 10 dice. WHAT THE FUCK. NOT THE SAME. There no cards anywhere. There were a million different kinds of Uno but no Phase 10--except for the stupid dice. I couldn't even believe it. And for a second I hated New York a little. If I were home I'd run over to Wal-Mart and be back at my house in 15 minutes. But no, I was in New York. And there was only one other place that could possibly have these cards and I NEVER wanted to go there on a beautiful Saturday afternoon:

The Toys R Us in Times Square.

It's like the only Toy's R Us in the city. There was another KMart on 34th Street but we were afraid it would just yield more....dice. We really wanted the cards. So we headed to the N on 8th Street and went to Times Square.

The Toys R Us in Times Square is hell on earth. It's huge and crawling with children. Children who don't watch where they are going so they're always fucking underfoot. It's bright and loud and if I was a kid I think I would go nuts from the stimulation of just about everything all at once. Brian and I made a beeline for the games section on the second floor, right beside the life size Barbie House. It's Toys R Us, of course they have these cards--it's Toys R Fucking Us.

NO CARDS.

Once again--a million versions of Uno--Disney Princess Uno, Transformers Uno, Uno Snap, Uno fucking everything. No Phase 10. I get this horrible sinking feeling in my stomach. I was going to have to buy them online. And that meant waiting days or even WEEKS. Brian and I were both pretty much aghast. As a last resort I suggest walking to the Kmart on 34th Street. It was near the F and it couldn't hurt. Right?

So we walk to Kmart and my heart is feeling heavy. We get there and head for the toys.

I see the cards as soon as we come off the escalator and I actually kind of ran over to them. It was such a great feeling to actually hold the box in my hand. Brian grabbed a deck for himself and we both went to pay the also amazing price tag of $6.17.



PS: If I ever walk past the fire house and see them playing Phase 10 I am totally calling them out.

PPS: Never judge until you've played it.

The fire department stopped by

So today my roommate g-chats me that our apartment management company called her because our downstairs neighbor was complaining about a leak that seemed to be coming from our place. As an afterthought he said to her, "The fire department maybe came by and went in through your window so your apartment might be open right now."

My roommate was in New Jersey and I was in the middle of something at work. That is, until I heard that "maybe" some firemen had come into my apartment and had the audacity to leave it unlocked.

So for the first time I think ever, I left work, got right into a cab on 2nd Avenue with explicit instructions for the driver to take the FDR and I actually said the phrase "And can you please step on it?"

I got to my apartment to find that the fire department had indeed come by but thankfully there was a) no leak and b) no real evidence that any beefy firemen had ever stepped foot in the place except for my roommates window and AC being a left a little haphazardly askew. But the super had turned off the water until the source of the mysterious leak was solved. This sucked for me because I really had to pee but the plumber was coming to my apartment because the latest theory was that the leak was within the wall by my bathroom.

So I had to pee and I had to wait for the plumber.

Long story short, my roommate came home, we watched 4 episodes of Weeds in a row. and the plumber showed up and cut out a fairly large hole in the wall by my bathroom. He found and fixed the mystery leak and also left the fairly large hole in the wall because he's "the plumber, not the super."

He leaves and my roommate gets paranoid that all the rats and bugs that live in the walls will not mosey on into our apartment with a new front door. We call the super and conveniently it goes straight to voicemail. We decide to patch it up ourselves and looked around for anything to cover it. Our solution ended up involving about 10 sheets of canvas paper that's made for inkjet printers--it was an impulse buy 6 months ago when I had a notion that I could make some cool art that never happened. With the canvas paper and some packing tape we created a barrier that any general contractor would be proud of. As I was tearing off tape, I had a flash of what my life could be like in 10 years--on the floor in my house whereever it may be patching up a whole in the wall. It was a nice little flash.

So now the leak is fixed, the AC is back in, the wall has a band-aid, the water's back on and Kristyn and I are ready for Weeds season 5.

Oh and tomorrow's Friday and it's supposed to be beautiful and sunny all weekend.


Things are okay right now even though strange men broke into my house 6 hours ago and didn't make a mess.