For the last three nights of this trip we’ve been staying in the fanciest hotel that I have ever seen, much less stayed in, Dromoland Castle. It’s a total first class kind of place and I think we’ve been on the verge of eviction multiple times. On our first night here jparks and I were walking around with some friends from the tour when the boys apparently lost their minds and started acting like fools.

Here’s jparks sporting wood:

And look, here they are molesting really old artwork:

And lost in the bushes in the front of the hotel. (You can’t really tell, but the bushes are cut into a fancy design)

When we went back inside the lobby people were giving us some really dirty looks. Imagine Emily Gilmore but make her a bit more uptight and you have the kind of folks we were getting looks from. Not that I entirely blame them, but we weren’t being loud, causing damage, or pestering them in any way, we were simply acting like 12 year olds. And really, every once in awhile, I think that’s okay.

Jparks and I leave for Ireland on Tuesday. Yay! But also, crap! I looked at the forecast for Ireland about two weeks ago and haven’t looked since then. I’m expecting cool temps and rain, but how cool? Don’t know. And how rainy? Uh, some. Yeah, I’m on the ball. I haven’t even started packing and jparks doesn’t even have something to pack. As in, he has no piece of luggage because the duffel bag he likes to travel with broke. No way can we pack for a two week vacation with one piece of luggage between the two of us. Where would my shoes go?

When we return from Ireland we will be heading directly from the airport to a wedding in San Francisco. I almost feel bad for saying we would go to this wedding, because the jet lag? It will not be pretty. But it’s good friends getting hitched and other good friends will be guests and we are honestly really excited to celebrate with these amazing people. But again, the jet lag might make us crazy. I was also supposed to book us a hotel room so we don’t have to drive home that night, but I haven’t yet. Because why take care of it when we first got the invite when taking care of it at the last minute is so much fun.

A more puzzling situation than booking the hotel room is how will we get our wedding clothes? I’m not traveling with jparks’ suit and my fancy dress and heels, so do I fedex them to the hotel? Do I leave them in our car? Ugh, but then we have to pay for long term parking. I am incapable of figuring this out. Seriously, I’ve been thinking about that problem for over a month now and the solution is still not clear. Maybe jparks and I should just head over to Union Square and buy new clothes before the wedding. Now if I can only guarantee that Banana Republic will have outfits for both of us, in our sizes and lengths, that look good together but are not too matchy-matchy, along with accessories and shoes. What are my chances of this all falling into place?

And I’m still not really sleeping. Bring on the frying pans.

In our household typically jparks is the insomniac. He’ll stay awake all night if I let him, playing on the computer or on the wii. His internal clock seems to be set to be nocturnal and I have to beat it into submission to get him to come to bed with me. But for some reason, for the past few days, our clocks seemed to have switched places in some Freaky Friday move that has me staying up all night and letting that bastard jparks sleep soundly.

It started on Thursday when I had a nightmare that I had gotten shot in the head and jparks wouldn’t take me to the hospital. Except I wasn’t really shot in the head so much as I woke up, in my dream, with a hole in the back of my head and I assumed I had been shot. Jparks told me that “No, if you wake up with a hole in your head you haven’t been shot. You’re fine and you just have to live with it.” I spent the rest of the dream poking at the hole and suggesting that maybe I should you know, have someone like a doctor look at it. It’s safe to say that I woke up in a cold sweat and pissed off at jparks.

Since then my nights have only gotten worse. Friday night I had dreams of earthquakes (no doubt because we had one that night). From Saturday night I don’t remember specific dreams, just that I tossed and turned all night and never seemed to really sleep. Finally we hit Sunday and I thought for sure I would sleep like a rock.

On Sunday I went for my long run and, to motivate myself during it, I kept chanting “You’ll finally sleep tonight.” I got home that evening and was exhausted. I showered, ate dinner (and then a cinnamon roll and maybe part of a cookie. stop judging me), and headed to bed. Yes, I know all that sugar couldn’t have helped the no sleeping situation, but shouldn’t a day of running and not much sleep in the three prior days cancel out the sugar?!? Apparently not.

Last night was the same situation, jparks and I got in bed and I listened as he fell asleep. After 30 minutes I honestly thought about waking him up, but figured why bother; I was too tired to have sex and too cranky to have a conversation, so I let him be. God, I should have woken him up just so he could suffer too.

Today I have bags under my eyes. Big, black bags that are so attractive I don’t know how random strangers are resisting approaching me to make out with them. My head feels like it’s in a fog and I would slap a puppy if it meant I could take a nap. I’m hoping tonight my body finally cries “uncle!” and I get to sleep. To stack the odds a bit more in my favor, I’m going running this evening. I’m going to run until I can’t take another step, in the hopes that the extra bit of exercise will guarantee tiredness. And so help me, if this doesn’t work I might just hit myself in the head with a frying pan.

Or do you have some sleep inducing trick that works like a charm and that you’re willing to share? Please, save me from one more sleepless night and from the pain of a frying pan slap. And by sharing it, you save yourself from one more rambling post where I whine incoherently about not sleeping. See, we all win.

Not to beat a dead horse, (or a dead chicken in this case) but roasting that chicken on Monday was the best idea ever. It served as dinner for jparks and myself on Monday and Tuesday. Then on Wednesday I ate it again, while jparks had a fancy dinner at Google. After I was done eating, I was going to dump the body, but then I took a good look at the poorly carved remains and realized that there was meat left. Like a lot of it. Because my carving skillz are not mad.

What happened next is not for the faint of heart or vegetarian. I thought about taking pictures, because it was so entertaining to me, but then I decided against it. I mean, do you really need to see a torn apart chicken body? Probably not, and I will openly admit right here and now, that this will probably not entertain anyone but me. Sorry

I didn’t grow up in a roasted chicken kind of house. We lived with my grandmother from when I was four until I was in second grade and she cooked dinner every night. I seriously don’t think we ever went out to eat, including McDonald’s (there is no good reason for why I like McDonald’s as an adult. It does not remind me of being a kid, it was not served to me as a “stop your crying now” comfort food. I like it now because I am a freak with an unrefined palate). But we never had anything like roasted chicken. Sure we had fried chicken, but never anything that actually had the shape of a real bird. (We also had fried cauliflower, fried salmon croquettes, fried eggplant, and fried okra. Were we a southern stereotype or what?)

After leaving my grandparents’ house, I survived on a steady diet of tv dinners. Kid Cuisine was my drug of choice and I swear I had one every single night. My mom worked a lot and there wasn’t time for home cooked meals, and I don’t blame her, but this is probably why it’s so hard for me to understand how to fit cooking into my daily life. I didn’t envy friends that had dinners cooked by their mom’s nightly. I felt sorry for them, they never had a say in what they ate, where as once a week, I got to go to the store and pick out my own dinners! That was so very exciting to 8 year-old me.

So, when faced with my very first roasted chicken not only did I not know how to crave it, but I also didn’t know that there is meat hidden all over that thing. Tasty little bits of meat ripe for the picking. Not knowing how to get at it, I first grabbed a fork. Jabbing at it yielded really poor results; I pulled out a little meat, but could see that I was missing quite a bit. My next step was to roll up my sleeves and attack the chicken with my hands.

Dude! SOME. MUCH. MEAT. It was extremely satisfying to watch my pyrex bowl fill up with little shards of chicken. I did a once over on the carcass and realized that if I popped off the wings then I could get to more meat. After a moment’s hesitation (I am an ex-vegetarian after all) the body was wingless and I had a whole new bounty of meat.

I honestly had to make myself stop hunting for more meat. When I stepped back my hands were covers in meat and chicken juices and the bird was just a heap of bones. At this point I considered boiling the remains for chicken stock, but I am not that Martha Stewart-y so I just pitched it into the trash. Tangi then circled the trash can for the next hour plotting how to topple it.

Thursday I ate my chicken shards on a gordita shell with some refried beans and it was the best meal ever because it was sprinkled with my success over the chicken carcass. Take that you dead chicken! Your tasty, tasty meat was pulled from your bones with my bare hands and I consumed it with some beans. nom nom nom.

I’m digging my place at the top of the food chain and my new found chicken picking apart skillz.

OMG, the Peach Pit! The theme song! The campy-ness! 90210, I am only 32 minutes into you and yet, I think I love you! You’re not Gossip Girl, but I saw a blowjob in your first ten minutes, so points for that! And you ran jparks off in 9 minutes, so bonus points for that.

Hey looky, here’s jparks after biking 24 miles and me after running 18 miles. The Golden Gate Bridge was behind us, but our big heads cover it.

So I roasted that chicken yesterday then realized that I have no idea how to carve it. Jparks and I basically hacked at it and it’s not yielding the best results. Seeing as how I planned on roasted more chickens in the future (it’s going to be a chicken genocide over here at Parks Place) I should probably learn. Any suggestions or tips?

Speaking of roasted chicken, the other day there was a guy on CalTrain eating a roasted chicken. Not a plate of roast chicken, not a sandwich, but a whole roasted chicken. With his fingers. I know we’ve been through this before, but dude, why? How do you walk into a grocery store, knowing that whatever you buy will need to be eaten on public transit, and pick out something totally ridiculous? A sandwich from the deli is acceptable. A whole chicken is not. Disgusting person. Sorry this is blurry, but a flash would have been too obvious.

Remember awhile back I twittered about the very expensive whiskey I was sipping? Here’s what it looked like:

Doesn’t it look extra fancy? No? I know. Shouldn’t it have gold flakes in it for that price? Oh, but then it would be Goldschlager and only 16-year-olds would drink it. For the record, the right glass is the $1000 per bottle whiskey and the left is the cheap $750 bottle. Bitches, that’s how I roll.

You can all probably guess that I didn’t have a relaxing weekend. I stayed tied to my computer, as much as possible, constantly refreshing two sites, trying to get the most up to date information available. It seems Gustav was bad, but not as devastating as we were all expecting. Don’t get me wrong, things are not great in New Orleans and it’s surrounding areas, but we’re far from the worst possible outcome of a hurricane Gustav’s size.

And while I did stay online way more than necassary, I knew that I had to cut the cord occasionally or else jparks would be dealing with post-Katrina freaked out Regan, and that’s not good for anyone. So, in order to distract myself some, jparks and I had a movie marathon weekend. On Saturday we were the last two people in the world to go see The Dark Night. And while it was good, it made me nervous. Like, not able to watch the screen, tapping my foot, poking at jparks nervous. After the movie we walked around Great Mall, which is so much fun because jparks can’t stand all the people that are there not shopping, but just aimlessly wandering around, cutting each other off, and generally being pains in the asses. He so can not handle these people and his reaction to them is free entertainment at it’s finest.

On Sunday we went to San Francisco and I ran 18 miles while jparks rode his bike. On the way home I ate a chipotle burrito in record time. Seriously, I killed the burrito in less than 10 minutes. I knew I would be hungry post-run, but I didn’t really expect to be that hungry. Also, it was the best burrito I have ever consumed and I’ve consumed a hell of a a lot of burritos. After digesting the burrito we went and saw Tropic Thunder, which I had my doubts about, but really, go see it. Right now. That was followed by tapas with friends and, if you’re judging me for the amount of food I ate on Sunday, let me remind you that I ran EIGHTEEN (18) ((10 plus another 8)) (a whole butt load) miles. I could have eaten a whole cake and it would have been acceptable.

Today jparks and I finally got updates from our families back home and they are all out of power but generally okay. Our friends that evacuated haven’t been able to go home yet, but from the news reports, I’m betting their houses will be okay. I spent the afternoon roasting a chicken and making a cake because I am Martha Stewart and Betty Crocker in one body. I had no idea that roasting a chicken was so easy because I am dumb. I shoved a couple of lemons up the chicken’s butt, stuck it in the oven, and less than an hour later we had some good eats. It’s safe to say that roasted chicken has earned a spot in the regular cooking rotation.

And now it’s time for bed. Because that much running really does leave you tired for at least two days and honestly, I didn’t sleep that well last night. I felt compelled to stay up hitting refresh for half the night. You know, because that accomplishes so much.

At the beginning of this month I was going to write a post about how much I hate August, but I never could come up with the reason for the hate. Sure August is hot, there’s not a holiday in it, and it’s back to school time (which means Girl Scouts is starting up soon), but those aren’t reasons to really hate the month the way I do. I’ve spent the past 26 days trying to put my finger on where my hatred for it comes from and all I’ve got is that August sucks.

I could take the easy route and say that Hurricane Katrina happened in August and yeah, that did suck and so damn you August! But I’m not convinced it’s that. The hurricane hit so late in the month that my life didn’t really turn to shit until September. And I have no ill feeling about September. If anything, I like September more because it means August is gone. Goodbye August, don’t let September hit you in the ass on the way out!

Last August jparks and I moved into our house, and I feel like I should be able to look back on it and remember August of 07 fondly. We bought a house! It’s the ultimate adult purchase! It’s the foundation I needed to start building my family! And yet, it doesn’t make me like August any more than I did previously. In fact, when I look back on August of last year all I can remember is getting really frustrated with various painters and puking while movers slowly packed my apartment into a van. I bet none of that would have happened if I had moved in October. (which is my favorite month. Yay October! I love you like a fat kid I love cake)

The moral of the story is that August just sucks. It sucks for no good reason, other than the fact that some month has to be my least favorite and August won that title. I guess I better starting planning now to not get pregnant in December because dammit, I will not have an August baby. That child would be a cross between Damien, Rosemary’s Baby, and The Problem Child and, seeing as how it’s going to have some of jparks DNA, my child will not need any extra help being a handful.

On Sunday I set out to run 18 miles. Unfortunately I did not actually complete the full 18 miles. At mile 10 my knee started to hurt but I was about 4 miles from my car. My options were either I plow through the pain and run back to the car or die on a bench on the side of the road. I can honestly say that the bench might have been the smarter option but I’m dumb so I ran back to my car. I ended up finishing the day with only 14 miles completed and, since I had set out to do more than that, I wasn’t allowed to have a post run doughnut. My running rules suck. I think I need a backup treat for days when I don’t run as far as I had wanted. Something as tasty as a doughnut, but not as indulgent. Does such a thing exist?

After my morning of running, jparks and I headed to a birthday dinner for a friend’s daughter. I warned our hosts that I might eat them out of house and home and I don’t think I let them down. They had a lovely heirloom tomato salad and I think I ate about half of it. And it was meant for 9 people. I probably should have been embarrassed by my rapid consumption of all the food but HUNGRY.

After eating myself sick, the hunger was replaced by TIRED. Not like, “gee, I could take a nap” tired, it was more like “I can’t function as a human, please come lower me onto the toilet and then lift me off of it, because that much work is too much” tired. Once we got home I resisted sleep as much as possible and, like a toddler, I got myself all worked up about something and started the irrational kind of crying that jparks can’t help but laugh at. I’m fairly certain I was all worked up because I realized I had been giving Lily exactly half as much medicine as she was supposed to get and that’s why she’s still sick. Hi, I suck as a dog mom, imagine how awesome I’m going to be as a human mom. And that thought was enough to make me cry big, wet, can’t catch my breath tears.

After much sobbing and “waaaa, I suck! Dog protective services is going to come take Lily away!” jparks knocked me out with some tylenol with codeine (my prescription is about to run out and it is seriously good for the night after a long run. How do I get more without seeming like a junkie? I mean, you can’t really ask a doctor for more tylenol with codeine, can you?) I slept a full night, dead to the world, but still woke up this morning feeling like I could sleep some more. I got through my day at work with no additional caffeine, but it was a long, tedious day and I routinely felt like I was about to fall asleep on my keyboard.

I’m home now and, after about two sips of wine, I feel like I’m about to pass out on the couch. I’ve given Lily her correct dose of medicine and cleaned up the dinner dishes so I see no reason not to go to bed, even thought it’s still early. (8:30 early to be exact) This is definitely the one side effect of running I never saw coming, the constant exhaustion. Who would have thought long distance running would take so damn much out of you.

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Man, I didn’t know you would all be so accepting of my incoherent whining. I’m impressed! Maybe I’ll whine all the time from now on. It was hoooootttt today. I was sweeeeaating. Whiiiiiiine.

Kidding. I’ll cut that shit out now. It was even annoying to me.

Today has been a little bit better. Lily went to the vet and was diagnosed as having an upper respiratory infection. She got a shot, which I had to hold her during (okay, I lied, will whine one more time. She was so pathetic when she got the shot. She yipped and cried and it broke my heaaaaart) and some medicine to take for about a week. I bribed her with peanut butter when we got home so she would forgive me for holding her during the shot. That dog owns me.

Then jparks went to the doctor for a mole and the doctor was all “You might have cancer” so that is fun. I’m totally not freaking out about this yet, I’m waiting until they slice a piece of his leg off and do a biopsy on it. Then I might freak out, so if you see a post that’s just “ejhrgniwrotnviegwhcwng CANCER cwioehfcngoegurghn JPARKS neirncgovtbcrnfoxewg!” you’ll know what’s going on.

After that bit o’fun I went to the doctor (we were all about medical treatment today in the Parks household) and had an xray done of my knee. Since falling at BlogHer last month, I’ve had some pain in it when I run. And then the day after running. And then anytime I encounter stairs. The xrays showed nothing and now the doctor wants me to spend money, out of pocket, for an MRI. When I asked how much money we were talking about he said “Not too bad, about $1000. A real athlete like Mr. Phelps would spend that on his knee in a heartbeat.” Uh, Mr. Doctor, I am not Mr. Phelps. I do not have enough money to fill a swimming pool, then do laps in it to break the world record for fastest 100m butterfly in a pile of $100 bills. Mr. Doctor told me to think about it overnight. Do you guys think that if I concentrate really hard, a spare $1000 will appear in my checking account? Also, can I concentrate and get a pony?

I also wore cute shoes today which helped lift my emo mood and I had this:

You might say eww, but I say yum.

Also, my hair is looking awesome and the guy at the Border’s coffeeshop gave me an extra shot of espresso in my latte. I’m fairly certain it was thanks to my cleavage. So, yay for boobies!