top ten upcoming movies i am most excited to see

in honour of one of the funniest movie trailers of all time (which i just watched on youtube!), i give you a list of other such specimens of cinematic excellence which will have me (almost joyfully!) forking over the $7.50 to see them. well, $15 when you add in the delicious new york fries poutine.

seriously... it's hard to settle for popcorn when you're faced with the temptation of fries, cheese and gravy.

1. alice in wonderland (march 5, 2010) - i've always felt a kind of kinship with alice. when i was a kid (probably 9 or 10, now that i think about it, since that's when i learned to read), my mom gave me copies of alice's adventures in wonderland and through the looking glass that had belonged to her when she was a kid, and i can remember crying my eyes out at the walrus and the carpenter (those poor, poor little oysters!), and being terrified of the jabberwock (the whole time i was trying to memorize the poem cause, well, that's what i did.) i also kind of had a crush on the chesire cat, although i have a feeling after i see the movie i'll have more of a crush on the mad hatter.
   
   
   
   
   well, maybe not
   also (and this is one of my greatest claims to fame), in university my friend jen and i did a summer study program at corpus christi college in oxford, which is where lewis carroll, lecherous tenured professor, first saw the dean's daughter, alice, frolicking in the garden below his window. so, as you guys can imagine, i then totally had to frolic in that garden, too.
   
   
   
   
   we also might have frolicked in a pub or two
   okay, i'm totally digressing here -- my point is, i love alice in wonderland and i think it's brutally dark and weird and funny and i'm feeling pretty confident that tim burton can pull that off.
2. hot tub time machine (march 26, 2010) - this is the movie whose trailer was the genesis of this list. HOT. TUB. TIME. MACHINE! do i really have to say anything else?!
   
   don't be put off by the misspelling in the title. it's still funny! 
3. date night (april 9, 2010) - so i'm kind of on the fence about this one. i mean, on one hand, you've got tina fey and steve carell. tina fey and steve carell! there's no way you can go wrong! it's like a dream team made on thursday night nbc (or, as we like to call it "good tv night")! on the other hand, the trailer looks, well, strange.
   
   nickelback? really?
   strange as in, okay, it was kind of funny and action-y, but it doesn't really seem like they're using tina fey and steve carell for all their tina-fey-and-steve-carell-ness. but still, i'm hoping it's just one of those movies that they just weren't sure how to market, and therefore decided to just throw in a bunch of car chases and mother-in-law jokes, slap some nickelback on that sucker, and call it a day.
4. the a team (june 11, 2010) - my analysis of the central thesis of the a-team movie breaks down thusly: can anyone play mr. t other than mr. t? i'll admit i have a newfound fondness for the fool-pitier since he started throwing mohawk grenades at gnomes, and mma star and apparent wannabe criminal quinton "rampage" jackson seems like kind of a d-bag. but from the pictures i've seen, it looks like they may manage to bring the 80s a-team vibe into the whatever-decade-we're-in-now without going off the deep end, miami-vice-style. also, i guess bradley cooper looks pretty good.
   
   
   uh, yeah, what was i talking about again? mr. who?
5. toy story 3 (june 18, 2010) - how can you not love toy story? i mean, i'm not assuming you don't -- in fact, i would more likely assume that you do, and that you're just as psyched to see this in 3d as i am (i admit, i just like the big glasses), and i don't have to say anything else to convince you. but i will anyway, by telling you a story, oddly enough, about et. i came to et very late in life, and i blame it on coke (or maybe pepsi, i can't remember which). we had sent away our bottle-cap liners or labels or whatever it was to get our free vhs copy of et a couple of years after it came out (i hadn't seen it in the theatre cause i thought it looked too scary) and that free vhs copy sat on top of our vcr gathering dust for a couple of more years after that. when we finally decided to watch it, we popped the tape in and it was blank. blank! defeated on all (well, my only) attempts to watch it, i gave up and moved on with my life - presumably to john hughes movies and dirty dancing, bad comedies, pretentious art house films that i pretended to understand, and a burgeoning obsession with james bond. i never realized what an important cultural/generational moment i had missed out on until my friends started finding out i had never seen it and i became known to all as "the girl who has never seen et." as in "hey, meet my friend amy. she's in my english class and she's never seen et," and after a while this became so entrenched in my identity that i didn't even really want to see it. finally, one of my boyfriends basically tied me to a chair and made me watch it. and i cried. and i cried and cried and cried and felt like i was finally part of something, something big, something monumental, something that belonged to us, and only us, and it was huge and beautiful and important and suddenly i was included, and all my hopes and fears and dreams all culminated in that one true moment of cinematic excellence, and it was good.
   
   
   
   i get it now! really.
   so, yeah. the first time i saw toy story was nothing like that. but it was a lot later in life than i probably ought to have seen it. and it was good. and i was happy that tim allen still had something to do.
6. ramona and beezus (july 23, 2010) - i'm pretty sure someone designated this year as "the year to make movies based on amy's favourite childhood books" (because clearly there's someone in hollywood whose sole job it is to study me and my diverse tastes and interests, because i have my finger so firmly on the pulse of a generation!) did anyone else read/love these books? i was a little worried when i read that selena gomez was going to play beezus (i'm so totally on team demi) but the little one they cast as ramona is bordering on illegally cute, as is josh duhamel (albeit in a very different way). so really, there's something for everyone.
7. step up 3d (august 6, 2010) - given the fact that, as you all already probably know, i will watch anything that has even the remotest chance of having the actors break into a choreographed dance routine, i guess i don't really have to explain why i want to see this. what you don't know is, secretly i am writing a script for a dance film in which the untrained but passionate dancer lead who teaches the technically brilliant but uptight dancer lead how to love again is going to be played by me. watch for it in theatres... uh, on dvd... oh, okay, fuck it, in my living room.
8. scott pilgrim vs. the world (august 13, 2010) - based on the graphic novel series by canadian cartoonist bryan lee o'malley, starring canadian quintessential awkward teen michael cera, with a tie-in video game made by canadian game developer ubisoft montreal, it basically has all the markings of a canadian awesomefest. and i am nothing if not patriotic. eh, oh, canada go! or something.
9. the green hornet (december 22, 2010) - i think the idea to cast seth rogen as a superhero is downright inspired. also, it's directed by michel gondry who, as a white person, i am apparently expected to like. god, i am so predictable.
10. the green lantern (june 17, 2011) - another green superhero played by a canadian (this time, my secret boyfriend ryan reynolds). this could be good, will probably be terrible. i don't really care; by 2011 i imagine we will all be living in little pods on pluto and downloading movies directly into our heads to watch on the back of our eyelids. so if i don't like it, i guess i can just open my eyes and watch the pod-people/plutonian war going on outside my window instead. now that's entertainment!
    

live list number two: top ten reasons why i would make a terrible miss america judge

this list was originally going to be called "top ten reasons why i would make a terrible miss america." but besides the fact that, you know, i'm not american, i'm sorry, i would make a fabulous miss america. i mean, i basically live in heels and a bikini, sleep in evening wear, and can rock a vaseline smile with the best of them. plus, you guys, i was totally born to wear a crown. why does no one recognize this?!

1. i would immediately disqualify miss indiana for saying "the job of miss america is to make everyone around them feel special."
2. i would want to just spend the whole time backstage with clinton kelly making fun of the contestant's evening gowns (only after tying him down and making him shave that beard. i mean, seriously, how did stacy let him out in public looking like that?!)
3. i'd get in trouble for constantly referring to mario lopez as slater.
4. i'd also get in trouble for punching rush limbaugh in his smug little face.
5. i don't think any of the girls look particularly amazing in their bathing suits. didn't anyone see the behind the scenes special that was on right before?! (no? that was just me?) miss puerto rico rocked that two-piece (in fact, i'm pretty sure i heard clinton call her "sex on a stick.")
6. i'd disqualify miss california for being a doctor and also being able to dance en pointe. i mean seriously, do you really need to be miss america too, you greedy bitch?
7. i'd immediately give the crown to miss dc for singing that aria from gianni schicci that always makes me cry.
8. i'd spend the q&a portion secretly hoping for a carrie-prejean-esque moment (okay, wiki-reseach tells me that this actually happened at the miss usa pagent, not the miss america pagent. but i mean, what the hell? i was taught in high school geography that america and the usa were the same place...). either that or i'd have to leave the room to save myself from having to listen to their borderline-retarded answers.
9. i'd disqualify the black eyed peas FROM LIFE for SELLING THEIR STUPID SONG TO ANYONE WITH FIFTY CENTS AND A SANDWICH.
10. i'd totally be watching the leafs/canucks game on someone's iphone under the judge's table.

daily dose of listalgia

i used to lose my voice all the time when i was younger. and while i'm sure that there are some people in my life right now who wished it still would happen every now and then, i'll have you know that back in high school my (ahem, real) friends missed my incredibly witty banter and incisive observations so much they tried to come up with other ways to communicate with me.

top ten reasons i need to stop watching muchmusic

... i mean, other than the fact that, although i try to fight it, i am no longer a fifteen year old girl.

1. i'm suddenly getting this overwhelming desire to change my name to something with a money-related symbol in it, as this is apparently the only way you can become famous these days (if the amount of times they talk about ke$ha is any indication). and guys, i seriously want to wake up in the morning feeling like p. diddy as much as anyone. unfortunately, am¥ is just not all that cool. well, except in japan, where it's totally crunk!
   
2. they play the trailer for dear john every single commercial break. and although i'd like to say that i'm mostly crying because it looks like such a terrible movie, i have to admit that i'm mostly crying because of that snow patrol/martha wainwright song.
3. i also cry every time they say "and your new number one video on this week's countdown is owl city."
4. i've already seen every episode of video on trial, and they are not funny the second time around.
5. if you're old enough to remember watching caitlin yelling "you fucked tessa campinelli?!" at joey on prime time television, you're too old to be watching degrassi: the next generation.
6. my television is too small for me to be able to read the little stupid text they run at the bottom of every video on mod.
7. i can remember candace cameron-bure when she was just plain old candace cameron. (also, ps, before she and her brother found jesus. i mean, maybe they had always known where jesus was, but i'll just say that the way i imagined kirk cameron was looking at me from all those posters on my walls when i was 11 was anything but holy.)
   
8. because of the amount of commercials they are featured in, i know all the hooky parts of every stereos or lights song without having any idea of how the rest of the songs go (not that i want to, you realize. just that it's damn annoying to have one line of a song in your head repeating over and over and over, with nowhere else to go...)
9. rihanna's haircuts continue to scare me.
   
   
sort of like a fraggle on steroids

10. they totally screwed me over on my new year's eve text message. and no, i can't let just things go! it's a blessing and a curse, really.
    

my top two favourite lines from reviews of what boys like

this is why i love reading reviews.

1. "what boys like, the title of amy jones’ latest collection of short stories, is actually incredibly misleading." - erika zell, the peak, vol 134, issue 3.
2. "i went to a reading a few weeks ago where i bought a book by amy jones called what boys like. the stories match the title precisely." - alice zorn (interview), the short review.
   

things i like about toronto

i admit, toronto and i have not really gotten to know each other very well. in fact, my burgeoning friendship with toronto has pretty much been completely overshadowed by my wild love affair with thunder bay (seriously. don't laugh). so i still kind of live in the city a little bit like a tourist, and hence this is kind of a tourist-y list. but i figured since i'm stuck with toronto for a bit, i might as well remember why we started hanging out in the first place.

1. the galleria mall, also known as "the mall by my house" - there's a very smelly price chopper, a pharmasave with a post office with a line that's always at least ten people long, an lcbo, and a zellers that i've never been in. there's also a store that sells bongs and ceramic figurines, off-track betting, a women's clothing store that i'm pretty sure must cater exclusively to the women who work at the house of lancaster down the street, a kiosk that sells pink wigs and rasta hats, another kiosk that sells aquariums, and a store that i'm pretty sure is selling stolen electronics. oh, and old men everywhere, sitting on every available surface, shooting the shit and watching the world go by. please go there. it's amazing.
   
2. bloor street - it's just soooo long. and basically everything is on it. i still think my little strip of it is the best, though.
   
   
   my hood


3. lucky strike bowling alley - i've only ever been here once. and i lost miserably.
   
   
   quel surprise
   but it's still pretty much the coolest bowling alley i've ever been to (sorry, mario's bowl). and the shoes were surprisingly comfy.
   
4. high park - i was living close to (well, in toronto terms) high park for about 4 months before i went there. and discovered there were animals. and not just puppies! (although there were plenty of those). it's like a little zoo. also, there's apparently a restaurant in there that serves a $2.99 all-day breakfast. i didn't even think those things existed anymore.
   
5. the puppet theatre store - i've honestly never been in this store, although i walk by it all the time. i just think it's amazing that there's an actual store in toronto that is completely and totally dedicated to the purveyance of puppet theatres, which in my mind walk the very fine line between being totally cool and totally creepy. maybe this is why i've never been in there -- i don't really want to see which side of the line this store falls on.
   
6. boom - when i first moved to toronto, matthew and i had a weekly breakfast date at boom. then stuff happened - matthew went to banff, i went to thunder bay - and we never really got back on track with the weekly thing. but whenever we manage to squeeze a breakfast into our incredibly busy lives, this is where we go. i'm guessing that all the food at boom is good, but every time i go i just end up getting the two egg breakfast. although matthew does enjoy the benny. and one time we had the chocolate chip pancakes. that was the best day.
7. the lights - back when i first, first moved to toronto, i used to take the bus to the states a lot, and for some reason the bus used to always get back in to toronto really late at night. it didn't matter how many times i saw it, coming into toronto on the gardiner and looking out the window and seeing the city all lit up kind of took my breath away.
   
   
   seriously, it's pretty, no?
   
8. the subway - on the same lame tip, i love riding the subway. i know, i know... if i were really down with the 416, i would be bitching about the ttc like it was, i don't know, metro transit. but i never really got over the excitement of being crammed into a steel tube with hundreds of other people and hurtling through underground tunnels at breakneck speeds.
   
   
   erin is scared of falling onto the tracks. but not me!
   little known fact: all subways all around the world smell the same. well, actually, it's probably a widely known fact, but whatever.
   
9. ikea - some of my favourite memories as a kid were going to ikea in dartmouth and playing in the ball room (remember how when you would get home from a hard day of playing in the ball room you would lie in bed at night and it would still feel like you had balls all over you? maybe that was just me. also, maybe i should really re-think that sentence). then ikea in dartmouth went away. apparently we were not good enough for inexpensive but stylish swedish furniture, or fifty cent hot dogs. so maybe i should have been mad at ikea. but i can't help it: i see that huge blue and yellow exterior and i feel like an excited little kid again.
   
   
   this is also where i learned to dip sausages into maple syrup
   little known fact (for real this time): contrary to popular belief, you actually do need your own tools to assemble ikea furniture. for real. and if you're like me, and actually listen to those popular believers, you'll end up banging the nails into your dresser using your ten pound hand weight instead of a hammer.
   
10. sushi on bloor - a good place to impress your out-of-town friends with delicious sushi. oh, ps. it's ridiculously cheap.
11. the hippos at the metro toronto zoo - all the animals at the zoo are pretty awesome. but hippos. hippos! i can't even look at them without laughing.
    
    
    hippo front, hippo back!
    i seriously could have sat there for hours and watched them. you know, if it hadn't been raining out. and a certain person hadn't been super hung over and needed to go back to bed.
    
12. lovecraft - this was the first sex shop i ever actually bought anything at (sorry, mom!). they've got tonnes of stuff and everyone is really nice and it's not tacky at all (well, as un-tacky as a store that sells butt-plugs can possibly be, i guess).
    
13. playdium - i guess this technically is in mississauga, not toronto, but whatever. it's still pretty fun.
    
    
    it is a truth universally acknowledged that all boys like pinball
    there's a deal you can get that's, like, all you can play for two hours, plus wings! just make sure that you finish playing the games before you eat the wings, cause it is also a truth universally acknowledged that wing sauce is generally hard to get off of joysticks.
    
14. the city's beleaguered sports teams - i have been to see the leafs, the blue jays, and the raptors (twice) and have yet to see any of them actually win a game.
    
    
    sad faces at the raptors game
    
    
    sad faces at the leafs game
    
    
    sad faces at the jays game
    it's pretty pathetic, actually -- my teams keep letting me down, and i just keep coming back for another beating, another hopeful little foam finger, another eleven dollar beer.
15. the victory - specifically, the chili cheese fries at the victory. they also have beer, which is good. and a patio. and it's basically the only bar that my friend jeff and i ever go to. which is okay, cause like i said. they have chili cheese fries. and beer. and a patio.
    
16. the indian restaurant at the end of my street that sells ten samosas for three dollars - they sell ten samosas for three dollars. enough said.
    
17. canada's wonderland - you all know how i feel about theme parks. and although, yeah, it's pretty much my dream to travel the world and visit every theme park, my heart will always belong to canada's wonderland. want to know why? mostly because it's the place where this happened:
    
    
    for the record, i did not show anyone my boobs
    isn't that beautiful? don't you totally want to go on it? no? okay, fine. if that doesn't win you over, maybe this will:
    
    
    giant ice cream cookie, in case you were wondering
    i once tried to make one of these at home, but the cookie was still too warm and all the ice cream kind of melted out of it and i think it's still sitting uneaten in cory's freezer. so i can appreciate the skill that goes into making these. it's kind of like the caramilk secret! or not. whatever.

top ten... ah, forget it

I've started and re-started this post about a hundred times. i like to think that maybe the mark of a truly great writer is to know when to just say, "oh, fuck it," and just go make some tea and curl up on the couch and watch jon stewart. i mean, there's tenacity, and then there's stupidity. right?

in the meantime, here are some things you can do:

1. check out the av club's best of the decade lists. well, don't check them out if you're, say, a writer of lists who is having list-writing-block. then it'll just make you feel bad about yourself.
2.  make some tea, curl up on the couch and watch jon stewart in solidarity.
3. your laundry.
   

top ten forgotten toys from the 80s

so i am, unapologetically, a child of the 80s.

me and erin and midnight

i probably had more than the average small town's share of toys when i was growing up, and i think it might be because my mom was trying to distract us from playing with the cat, who was obviously secretly the spawn of the devil. (seriously. i know there are no toys in that picture, but i had to post it. doesn't that cat look like she's about five seconds away from transforming into the gatekeeper?). and sure, i loved cabbage patch kids (my first cabbage patch kid came with the name davina helga. i changed it to jenny sue) and my little ponies (i even had the dream castle! i told you i was spoiled) and barbie and care bears and strawberry shortcake or whatever. but my favourite toys were mostly weird ones that no one remembers (even the internet! and the internet remembers all).

1. lundby dollhouse - lundby was totally like the ikea of toys (the fan website's slogan is "it's never too late to have a swedish childhood"). although my lundby dolls had nowhere near as much fun as the ones in that little promotional video (they spent most of their time driving around in their car going to visit my my little ponies, or sleeping) they had a pretty sweet pad. it looked something like this and the lights really worked and they had everything you could possibly buy for the house. i mean everything. my lundby dolls were way more spoiled than me.
2. snuffles - my snuffles totally had it rough. i worked them hard. i would make them go to meetings! when clearly i was stifling their real talent:
   
   
   yep, my snuffles were out there chasing down stories (they were the intrepid reporters of my writers' club, populated exclusively by my stuffed animals, because they were cute and no one would ever suspect them) while their cousins were out there partying it up. i feel like i should dig them out of the garbage bag they're buried in and apologize.
3. my melody toothbrush house - a few things about this: a) my melody was hello kitty's bunny friend b) to a normal child, a toothbrush house is not a toy. but i was not a normal child c) there are stores that sell hello kitty alarm clocks, waffle makers, stamp sets, kitchen utensils... but a toothbrush house? forget it. just to be clear: i'm not talking about a cup with holes in it to stick your toothbrush in end-first. i'm talking about a little house that sticks to the wall of your bathroom and has a door and opens up and you hang your toothbrush in it. i'm not making this up, i swear, and if i ever find one, i will prove it.
4. hot looks dolls - these dolls were international teenage models. and when i was ten years old, i pretty much thought that i was also going to be an international teenage model. therefore, i felt that these dolls and i had an awful lot in common. plus, there was stacy from america, chelsea from london, mimi from france... "amy from canada" sort of seemed like a natural fit.
5. she-ra - okay, so she ra is probably not really forgotten, but i was so obsessed with these dolls that i really couldn't leave them off the list. i wanted to be she-ra so badly. And I mean, seriously, who wouldn't want to be she-ra? she's the princess of power!
   
   
   
   
   i am not even joking about this: for one entire year of my life, i wrote every day in my journal as if i was actually she-ra: "dear diary, normal day on etheria. had some cheerios for breakfast, saved some villagers from the evil horde. the usual. planning a vacation to eternia to see adam sometime in the near future, although it's not like he deserves it. that guy never writes!" i had some real secret identity issues: i also spent a lot of time pretending to be jem (you know, of jem and the holograms). on the plus side, i have now have not one, but two ideas for halloween costumes for next year.
6. oodles - in retrospect, oodles are kind of creepy. for one thing, they're naked. for another, you're supposed to hang them from stuff by their hair (that's what the little loop at the top of their head is supposed to be). they also all have "oodle" in their name which, the more you say it, starts to sound pretty stupid. but, they were cheap and tiny and you could collect them, therefore i liked them. they also smelled really good. incidentally, these are all the same reasons i really liked charmkins, which by all accounts should probably be on this list.
7. little professor calculator - okay, let's get this out of the way: the little professor calculator did not help me learn to love math. i hate math. in fact, seeing a bunch of numbers strung together in various combinations basically gives me a total panic attack. and although i sometimes tried to do the math problems that the little professor was supposed to be teaching me, i mostly just played with him like he was another doll. in fact, he was the one, at all the writers' club meetings, who would teach the rest of my stuffed animals all about what had happened on general hospital that day. i mean, he was a professor, after all.
8. nerfuls - don't freak out or anything, but this is an actual page from an actual sears christmas wish book from 1986:
   
   
   
   
   
   and in the middle there are nerfuls. i have a theory about why i liked them so much. let me tell you a story. when we were younger, we would spend summers at my cottage, and every saturday morning, our dad would play tennis with our neighbour angela's dad. the tennis court was kind of in the middle of the woods, and at that time had some pretty ghetto looking fishing nets around it, so inevitably a few balls would get lost in the woods every game. erin, angela and i would come across them while we were playing in the woods, and eventually we decided to "rescue" them (it's funny how many of the games we used to play had all had something to do with rescuing something else). we drew faces on them with markers and called them "fuzzballs" and kept them in those little baskets you buy fruit in at the market. they all had names (i remember one was called "watermelon") and we treated them just like any other toy. then one day we realized that the balls our dads were playing tennis with were also fuzzballs, and decided to go on a humanitarian mission to rescue them. under the guise of being ballgirls, we infiltrated the tennis match and stole every ball we got our hands on. our dads were not amused. so yeah, then along comes the nerful, which is basically, what? a ball with a face. i'm pretty sure we were given nerfuls to keep our mind off of the plight of the fuzzball.
   
9. sweet secrets - these were kind of like transformers for girls. they were dolls with hollow bodies that you could fold the arms and legs into and wear as jewellery. or, you could leave the arms and legs out and use the hollow body for hiding stuff. i'm not sure what my obsession was, as a kid, with hiding stuff -- it's not like i had any real secrets, and as an adult i am pretty much the opposite (as evidenced by this blog, obviously). it's like my ziggy diary with the lock on it... all i ever wrote about in there was stuff about she ra, and why would i need to hide that from the world?
10. poppets - it's unclear, at this moment, whether or not these really exist anywhere outside my imagination. i can't find them on google (although, in fairness, there are a whole lot of things out there called "poppets". and most of them are goddamn creepy). maybe they're spelled differently? or called something else (and no, i'm not talking about popples, which were also awesome). they were little dolls made of plastic, maybe an inch and a half high. they came with stickers of different outfits, which would stick to flat pieces of plastic that would snap onto their stomach to change their outfits. i remember buying them at shoppers drug mart. does this sound familiar to anyone? could i have really made the whole thing up? it doesn't seem possible, but then again, i had a writers' club with my stuffed animals.

XKJ27NF6ND5A

ways to donate to haiti earthquake relief

we here at listophelia don't just cry at fake tragedies.

1. the canadian red cross - donations can be made online or by phone. in addtion, if you live in toronto, the red cross will be accepting donations at 5 different ttc subway stations from january 18-22 (bloor-yonge, king, finch, sheppard-yonge and kennedy.
   
2. the salvation army - donations can be made on their website or by texting "haiti" to 45678 (rogers/bell customers only).
3. medecins sans frontiers - online or by phone.
4. the humanitarian coalition - online or by phone.
5. unicef - online or by phone.
6. united nations world food programme - online or by phone.
   
7. the cbc website has a section for anyone who is still searching for friends and family members.
8. the government of canada website has a guide to helping during international disasters, including tips on how to make sure your donation goes to reputable agencies.

seven steps to picking up hot foreign guys in coffee shops

for the record, just let me say i have never picked up a hot foreign guy in a coffee shop, nor do i have any real interest in picking up a hot foreign guy in a coffee shop. i do, however, have real interest in the girl who i overheard picking up a hot foreign guy in a coffee shop.

1. spot hot foreign guy having coffee with his equally hot male friend. wait until hot foreign guy gets up to order a refill.
2. approach hot foreign guy's friend and ask if he is together with hot foreign guy.
3. wait for hot foreign guy's friend to sputter, laugh, and then call hot foreign guy back to table in order to tell him the crazy story about how this girl totally thought that they were a couple. laugh with hot foreign guy and his friend about your ridiculous mistake.
   
4. tell hot foreign guy and his friend that you're sorry, it's just that you find it unusual to see two handsome, well dressed north american men having coffee together.
5. wait for hot foreign guy to tell you he is foreign, then ask him a series of interesting questions about his home country. tell anecdote about how you spent two nights in said country while you were backpacking during undergrad but never really felt like you, you know, experienced the culture.
6. when this conversation has come to its natural end, tell hot foreign guy that the real reason you were inquiring about his sexual orientation and relationship status is because you'd really like to go out with him sometime.
7. make sure he enters your number correctly into his blackberry. shoot dirty looks at the girl waiting at the counter who is staring at you, awestruck by your obvious balls of steel.

this girl is my hero. i really hope it works out for them.

top 25 most played songs on my ipod

(ideally, you want this to be full of hip, obscure songs that will impress all your music friends. realistically, there's that 80s-synth-pop song that you listen to every time you take a shower, or that schleppy ballad you sing along to every time you're depressed. in other words, you're hoping for a cbc radio 3 podcast, you get the mod countdown from 2003. me, apparently i only listen to my ipod when i'm depressed or driving. you? post away, if you dare...)

1. let go - frou frou
2. high and dry - radiohead
3. raw sugar - metric
4. kathleen - josh ritter
5. long time running - tragically hip
6. paper planes - mia
7. 9 crimes - damien rice
8. your ex-lover is dead - stars
9. slow show - the national
10. one too many - luke doucet
11. paris train - beth orton
12. 23 - blonde redhead
13. we will still need a song - hawksley workman
14. the scientist - coldplay
15. superstar - lupe fiasco
16. i get around - dragonette
17. landlocked blues - bright eyes
18. happen now - joel plaskett
19. time to pretend - mgmt
20. she's a jar - wilco
21. untouched - the veronicas
22. day n nite - kid cudi
23. my favourite game - the cardigans
24. all these things that i've done - the killers
25. lovestoned - justin timberlake
    

daily dose of listalgia

back in high school, i went to visit my friend laura in winnipeg and we made these two lists on the back of some flyers while sitting in a coffee shop called the roasting house (seriously. i can remember that, but i can't remember the plot of a movie i watched last week). it's kind of funny, reading them, how many things i used to hate that i now like, and vice versa. although number 18 on "things we hate" makes me laugh every time i read it.

things we love

things we hate

and, as an added bonus, look what's on the back!

top ten favourite short stories

i've kind of wanted to do this for a while, but it's kind of a daunting task for a short story writer, you know? cause inevitably my picks are going to be a) too contemporary b) not contemporary enough c) too predictable d) too obscure e) too canadian f) too american g) too unchanging h) all of the above. what i'm saying is, when faced with the possibility of millions (okay, tens) of people reading my lists, i suddenly realize that my taste in short fiction is actually something on which i am actually afraid of being judged. i know, right?! i have admitted to you that i love bon jovi, dan brown and bacon-wrapped avocados without so much as a flinch at what you might think of me, but when it comes to short stories, i'm like a neurotic high school girl.

whatever. this will be good for me. i'm in the process of trying to get back into the daily writing grind, and re-reading these stories is just one way to remind myself that, uh, hey, you like this writing thing, remember? it's kind of, you know, fun for you? so i don't care what you think. wait, forget i said that. you still like me, right?

1. "demonology" - rick moody (from demonology)
2. "fell this girl" - aimee bender (from the girl in the flammable skirt)
3. "among the ik" - steve almond (from my life in heavy metal)
4. "sheep dub" - lee henderson (from the broken record technique)
5. "body and soul" - barbara gowdy (from we so seldom look on love)
6. "something that needs nothing" - miranda july (from no one belongs here more than you)
7. "twilight of the superheroes" - deborah eisenberg (from twilight of the superheroes)
8. "run" - annabel lyon (from oxygen)
9. "back there" - elise levine (from driving men mad)
10. "werewolves in their youth" - michael chabon (from werewolves in their youth)
    

top ten tv couples

so the season premiere of chuck (which i was pretty excited about, not sure if i mentioned that) totally reminded me of the season three premiere of battlestar galactica. without ruining anything for all those people who now totally make fun of me for watching it but will eventually end up watching it and love it and having to swallow all their mean, mean words, i will just say that it picked up a few months in the future from the end of the previous season, and everything is all weird and different and everyone is all split up -- which, i don't care what anyone says, is very traumatic for the viewer and will cause them much undue angst and consternation until everyone is brought back together again and back to some version of normal. but i digress. the real thing i want to talk about here is how this version of normal for chuck is back to being all "will they or won't they" with sarah. and while i understand that bringing together the sexually-tense couple on a show that relies heavily on sexual tension can be the first sign the show is jumping the shark (i'm too young to really remember moonlighting, but this is usually the show they use to illustrate this, no?) there's really only so much of this a viewer can take before they start to get annoyed. really annoyed.

so basically what i'm saying is, while i don't claim to know absolutely what makes a great tv couple, i do know that, as with real-life relationships, they have to keep moving forward or they'll die. you know, like a shark. the one that they might potentially jump. oh, i don't know, it sounded clever when woody allen said it.

1. jim and pam (the office) - now to negate every single thing i said in my introduction. i do not want jim and pam's relationship to move forward. i want it to stay exactly where it is (i am not the only one who feels this way, apparently). i waited five seasons to see their relationship culminate in what can only be described as the most perfect wedding ever on television, and i'm quite happy to leave it at that (although how they kept their hair so neat on the maid of the mist, i'll never know).
   
   
   television
   
   
   
   
   
   
   reality
   so, yeah. let rashida jones rot in a closet, and let erin and andy or dwight and angela have all the sexual tension, oh, hell, give it to phyllis and bob vance, vance refridgeration. leave jim and pam alone, they've been through enough already.
2. marshall and lily (how i met your mother) - the great thing about marshall and lily is, because there is enough will-they-or-won't-they crap with all the other characters on the show, they can just be their awesome selves. granted, i have only watched two seasons of this show, and maybe the whole perfect couple thing will get old for me eventually, but all i know is, watching the few shows where they were broken up was torture for me. i just wanted them to get back to having adorable conversations like this one, when they discuss lily changing her name after they're married:
   
   lily: we should come up with a whole new last name.
   marshall: oh, that's easy; lily and marshall skywalker.
   lily: lily and marshall hasselhoff.
   marshall: oh, got it. lily and marshall awesome. hey, have you met the awesomes? lily, marshall, their son totally and their daughter freaking?
   
   and everyone says nph gets all the best lines on that show.
3. monica and chandler (friends) - yeah, yeah, i know, ross and rachel, blah blah blah. those two drove me crazy. i mean, i was happy that they got together in the end, but i wasn't really surprised --  or moved, even (i know i was crying at the end, but it was for totally different reasons, okay?) when it happened. but monica and chandler surprised me at every turn. i was surprised when they slept together, surprised when they kept sleeping together, surprised when they got engaged. their whole relationship was apparently pretty much one big shock to me. and the biggest shock of all was how much i liked them together. although i guess i shouldn't have been so shocked at that; there really is nothing better than best friends falling in love.
   
4. quinn and puck (glee) - so probably a lot of you haven't seen this show, and i admit i haven't seen all the episodes. and i totally thought, when i first started watching the show, that i would totally be a finn/rachel kind of girl. but the more i watched, the more annoying i found rachel, and the more endearing i found quinn. and finn... zzzzz. what really won me over was the scene where puck and the pregnant quinn sings "papa don't preach" to the hellion kids they are babysitting.
   
   
   
   it was cheesy and cute all at the same time. and who cares if only minutes earlier, puck was sexting one of the other cheerios? it's kind of part of his charm.
5. chuck and blair (gossip girl) -i think people underestimate this show. yes, it's basically just the oc with headbands, with the exception of the totally evil yet surprisingly nuanced characters of chuck and blair. and even though leighton meester is out there trying to totally destroy her personae by singing terrible pop songs with other equally terrible pop singers, it will take a little more than heavy eye make up to distance her from blair waldorf. and ed westwick... well, you just keep doing what you're doing, hon.
   
6. chase and cameron (house) - i know that house and cuddy are supposed to be the hot-couple-that-never-was of this show, but chase and cameron's romance surprised me in the same way that monica and chandler's did... every step of the way i kept thinking "this is never going to work." but it did work. well, until it didn't. but i'm pretty sure this is just a minor glitch in a major love story, and that cameron will one day pull her head out of her ass and realize that she's not going to find anyone better than her sexy australian husband. i know, i know, i'm such a romantic!
   
7. amy and kif (futurama) - she's the sexy, spoiled daughter of wealthy chinese ranchers; he's a "squishy green alien" from planet amphibios 9. really, their love was never meant to be. but kif and amy's relationship transcended time, space, and species... not to mention a super weird pregnancy and a first date that kif prepared for by reading zapp branigan's book of pick up lines:
   
   kif: amy, (reading) if I said you had a beautiful body would you take your pants off and dance around a little?
   amy: what?
   leela: lieutenant kroker!
   kif: (reading) i find the most erotic part of the woman is the boobies.
   
   and i mean, green alien or not, who can resist being serenaded by a karaoke version of "total eclipse of the heart"? it's like the ghetto blaster over the head of our generation.
8. starbuck and apollo (bsg) - they love each other, they hate each other, they're doing each other while married to other people, they're trying to kill each other in a boxing ring... i'm not saying no one on galactica had a more complicated relationship than they did (i mean, saul tigh poisoned his wife for giving intel to the cylons on new caprica; baltar had a hallucination of caprica 6 following him around all the time trying to convince him he was god) but theirs was by far the most tragic. i mean, she was the harbinger of death! and he, well... he got kind of wussy at the end. that's the problem with putting a former viper pilot in a suit.
9. mulder and scully (the x-files) - okay, maybe this is a little old school (and a lot predictable) for this list, but mulder and scully were the first tv characters that i felt i had a huge vested interest in them getting together. or maybe it was just a huge crush on david duchovny, i can't really remember. those days are a little hazy... ahem. anyway, remember that episode where the shape-shifter guy shape-shifted into mulder and totally went to mack on scully? that was, like, my favourite epsiode ever. david duchovny was so cute, when he kept pulling out his badge and saying "fbi!" um, yeah. what was i talking about again?
   
10. bert and ernie (sesame street) - rumours have been circulating around the nature of bert and ernie's relationship for years. recently i had heard that they had finally come out of the closet, but muppetwiki (yes! there is such a thing as muppetwiki! i can die happy now) tells me that this has all been vehemently denied (my favourite quote: "they are not gay. they are not straight. they are puppets"). whatever, sesame street execs, whatever. just check out these lyrics from their song "do you like me," on the 1980 sesame street album, love, and tell me they're not in some sort of co-dependent relationship:
    
    ernie: do you like me? do you think i'm swell?
    do you like me? you know me well.
    if you like me, won't you tell?
    i want to hear it from you.
    we always have a super time,
    when we play and sing a song.
    but I wonder if you still like me,
    even when I do things wrong?
    bert: (oh, ernie.)
    yes, i like you. that is right.
    oh I like you. can you turn out the light?
    i like you. now can we say good night?
    now that you've heard it from me.
    ernie: (oh gee, thanks bert. i think i can sleep now.)
    bert: (ahh, that's good. good night.)
    ernie: (goodnight! oh, but, ah, bert?)
    bert: (ernie, what?)
    ernie: (i like you, too, bert.)
    
    case? rested, thankyouverymuch.

top ten lists i wish i had written: mcsweeney's edition

it's sunday afternoon and i'm tired and lying on the couch watching tv shows about extinct apex predators on the discovery channel and it's making me feel like i haven't really done anything with my life (i mean, the south american terror bird could crush skulls with its beak and run 48kph, and even still it became extinct. what have i done lately?!) and hence all attempts at hilarious list-making have been put on hold until i start feeling less sorry for myself. which could be later tonight, who knows... the season premiere of chuck is on, so maybe i'll get inspired to make a "top ten reasons chuck keeps getting all these hot girls even though he is supposed to be a dork" list or something.

in the meantime, here's some other lists that are funny.

1. my personal netflix recommendation categories
2. my mfa workshop responds to my twitter status updates
3. what to expect: the third decade
4. youtube comment or ee cummings?
5. eleven things one should never say while climaxing with a new lover
6. failed one-liners from my audition for host of australia's funniest home videos 
7. reasons you might die of consumption in a 19-century novel, in order of least likely to most likely
8. self-analysis of last week's dreams
9. secure website authentication questions
10. titles from the babysitters club: the college years series
    

top ten roller coasters i will ride before i die

so i'm back in toronto for a bit and feeling kind of blue (not that i don't love you, toronto, but let's face it, january is not your best month). i really just wanted to write something to cheer myself up, and even though it'll probably be a while until we make it to disneyworld (and will probably have to settle for a mid-winter vacation to the edgewater, which, don't get me wrong, is supremely awesome in its own way, and is now making me think i should do another post waterslides. they're just like roller coasters, but wet!), this has not deterred me from daydreaming about future roller coasters. and it's not like i'm cheating on the behemoth, you guys, because roller coasters are totally not monogamous.

1. incredible hulk - this had to be number one, simply based on the fact that it is the roller coaster against which all other roller coasters are measured, apparently. it might not be the tallest coaster, or the fastest, but what makes it awesome is that it was one of the first coasters to feature a launch lift hill instead of the usual chain lift. this means it goes from 0-60 in about 2 seconds. 2 seconds! i don't usually mind the climb up the lift hill, at least not as much as some people, but holy crap, even just watching the video is enough to give you whiplash.
   
   
2. kingda ka - some roller coaster freaks are all about height, or length, or the number of inversions, but for me it's all about speed. and although there are some up-and-comers that are gunning for its title (see below), the kingda ka at six flags great adventure in jackson, new jersey is currently still the fastest, at 205 kph. and i've wanted to ride this coaster for so long that even if some super rich kid decides to make a real life version of the 0-200mph, 300-story coaster he designed in roller coaster tycoon and stick it in my backyard, i'm still going to want to ride the kingda ka. and secretly hope for a rollback.
   
3. ring°racer - leave it to the germans to make a coaster that will supposedly go from 0-217 in 2.5 seconds. i say "will supposedly" because in its limited run (it was supposed to open in fall 2009; this has now been pushed back to 2010) it only reached about half that speed before the pneumatic launch blew up. other than the launch (which is designed to give the rider to experience the feeling of being an f1 driver) it doesn't seem to have that much going for it, and even the launch speed will no doubt be surpassed when ferrari world abu dhabi opens in the uae. but you know, if i just happened to be in germany, i guess i would stop by and check it out. the explosions might just make it that much more exciting.
   
4. cyclone - i'll be totally upfront about this: i usually haaaaaaate wooden roller coasters. they are not fun; they are painful, as anyone who has endured the great canadian minebuster (rattling down the first drop while wistfully watching the behemoth glide silently along beside them) will tell you. and yes, the first drop on the cyclone has been described as falling down the rungs of an 85 foot ladder (feet first, i'd imagine, with your chin smacking off of each rung). but it's a piece of americana, you guys. you can't go to coney island without riding it. and you can't call yourself a theme park junkie and not go to coney island. if only to see if the hot dogs live up to the ones they make in westfort (apparently, they don't!)
   
   
   hot dog at coney island
   
   
   
   coney island hot dog
   
   
5. sheikra - so the last time i was at busch gardens in tampa, i was about 10 years old. i really liked all the wild animals. i did not even consider riding the sheikra, which is north america's first diving coaster (i guess i probably wasn't tall enough anyway, but seriously, 10 year old me, what's wrong with you?!). its 90 degree drop is similar to the one on the spongebob coaster in mall of america, but outside, a bazillion times bigger, and without any floor. yeah. no floor. none. oh, and lots of hang time, 4 seconds, in fact - long enough to, say, make your slightly acrophobic riding companion pee in his pants a little.
   
6. bizarro (formerly superman: ride of steel) - from what i have read (armchair rider, i) this roller coaster at six flags new england seems to have everything: a smooth ride, underground tunnels, tonnes of airtime, nonstop speed. it doesn't hurt that it has been named the best steel coaster for five years in a row. and as you may or may not have noticed, i'm kind of a sucker for top ten lists.
7. canyon blaster -  lest you think that all the roller coasters i want to ride are in the eastern us mega-theme-parks, i give you the canyon blaster at circus circus on the vegas strip. there's actually a bunch of coasters i'd really like to ride in vegas (those and the all-you-can-eat shrimp are really the biggest draws for me), but if i had to choose one, i'd choose this one, simply due to the fact that it is an indoor loop coaster. you get all the excitement of an outdoor thrill ride with all the comforts of the indoors! plus it's cheaper than losing all your money in the slot machines.
   
8. dodonpa - not that vegas wouldn't be awesome, but i'd like to go somewhere super exotic to ride a roller coaster, and i think the japanese would be pretty good at this type of thing. the dodonpa was the fastest and tallest coaster in the world before the kingda ka came along, and the thing that intrigues me about it is that the big hill is in the middle of the ride, not at the beginning. well, that and the fact that everyone else riding it would be japanese.
   
   
   
   big hill, little japanese people
   
   
9. tower of terror - while i like any ride with "tower" and "terror" in the title, they are usually reserved for drop tower type rides. but this one is an actual coaster, at a park called dreamworld in australia. it blasts you straight up 38 stories at 160 kph and then lets you freefall back down. the backwards drop might be a little much for the queasy-stomached among us, but i kind of think it would be worth it (green-faced riding companion aside).
10. apollo's chariot - apollo's chariot? you ask. why apollo's chariot? it's a decent roller coaster at a sort of decent theme park (busch gardens williamsburg). it's won some golden ticket awards, it has a good number of drops, and it pioneered the t-shaped clamshell harness design that my beloved behemoth currently uses. but what's really special about apollo's chariot is this:
    
    
    
    yup. remember this? this happened. on this roller coaster. riding it would be like riding a piece of history, you guys! and really, isn't that what roller coasters are all about? (no, actually, i guess not. but if they were, that'd be a pretty good last line, don't you think?)
11. this is more of an addendum, but i once had a dream that i was on a roller coaster with an invisible track, so you couldn't see where you were going (also, i was riding it with harry potter and the dude who does the weather on the cbc news, but i digress). so if any roller coaster designers out there think they're up for the task, i have to tell you, that would be the roller coaster to pwn all other roller coasters. true story.
    

things to do in toronto tonight

1. come see me, nik beat and rocco de giacomo read at strong words at the free times cafe, 320 college street, at 8pm.
2. unless you are the type of person who really likes watching reruns, there isn't even anything good on tv tonight. so number one is really your only option.
   

top ten life lessons i learned from sims 3 that turned out to be disasterous

so, sims 3 is pretty much one of the best christmas gifts of all time. my little amelia jonas is a super rich rock star with a giant house dating an international super spy, proving once again that i am better at fake life than i am at real life. and as it turns out, life in sunset valley does not, in fact, have much to teach me about life on planet earth. it seems like it would, but it doesn't. sigh.

1. cooking pancakes and/or waffles over and over will not actually increase your overall cooking skill. it will just make you really good at cooking pancakes and/or waffles.
2. you cannot learn charisma from a book, and you cannot learn logic from playing chess.
3. if you meet someone and they like you, a little plus sign will not appear over their head. you will have to figure out this for yourself by their body language and things they actually say to you.
4. right-clicking on a wish will not make it disappear. if you want to stop wishing for something, you have to either attain it or start drinking heavily to try to forget it. along the same lines, if you do attain a wish in life, it does not automatically grant you lifetime happiness points. for many people, this will actually make them more miserable.
5. in order to have sex with someone, you don't actually have to first make them like you, flirt with them several times, give them an amazing massage and then make out a bunch at parties. well, maybe if you're a guy. or in high school.
6. repairmen never come in "about an hour."
7. you do not automatically get cool new outfits when you get a raise at work. although if you are actually a rock star, there is a chance that you might automatically get a pair of really sexy leather pants.
8. you cannot make the walls of your house bigger by dragging and dropping. believe me, i've tried.
9. opportunites for career advancement do not just pop up on your computer screen. well, except for that one about how i can make $6000 a month working at home right from my laptop. that one's totally legit and seriously guys, once i get that ball rolling i am so out of here.
10. there are no cheat codes in real life. chew on that for a while!
    

my new year's resolutions

i enjoy setting challenging goals for myself, you guys. and since i already won my first new year's resolution (that's how it works, right?) by eating a chocolate bar in the shower on new year's morning, i thought maybe it was time to set the bar a little higher for myself.

1. create a soundtrack for my life - isn't it awesome how in movies you always know how to feel about things because of the music in the background? i'm pretty sure my life needs to be like that, too. oh, sure, there's moments where this has happened in the past, like when i was 18 and getting my first tattoo and "everybody hurts" was playing on the radio, or that time i got let go from my office job and so some friends and i went and beat the shit out of a fax machine with that geto boys song in the background (okay. i might not be remembering that quite right). but i just don't want moments, people. i want it all the time. i'm not sure exactly how this would work, but i'm thinking either a) some sort of speaker system mounted on my shoulders or b) the shins or some kind of other indie rock band that will totally change my life following me around everywhere i go.
2. join cirque de soleil - okay, i'm sort of stealing this idea from my friend richie (and to be fair, richie is the one person in the world i know who could actually do it - and, as far as i know, my only friend with a wikipedia page! this is totally going on my resolutions list for 2011). i just want to be able to go to parties and tell people, when they ask me what i do, "actually, i'm a wheel of death specialist. it's super dangerous and sexy and i bet you totally wish you were me right now." of course, if i really was a wheel of death specialist, i'd only be at parties with, like, stuntmen and international super spies and other people will dangerous, sexy jobs. so they'd be able to relate.
3. get the christmas number one - from what i can tell, this used to be much, much harder. you'd have to move to england, get on x factor, win x factor... and well, that was about it. but now, all you have to do is start a facebook group! also, go on the bbc and say "fuck" a lot. i'm pretty excited; i'm actually really good at that.
4. be on jeopardy! - so i already know what my jeopardy weakness is: it's reading the questions quickly. or, more specifically, it's the rate at which information gets processed between my eyes and my brain. in the fake jeopardy world, this means i'm answering questions about half a second too late, but in the real jeopardy world, i'm worried that this will translate into slow buzzer reaction. also, i know nothing about american history. so there's that, too.
5. visit every starbucks in the world - so the catch to this one is, there's already some other guy out there doing it, and he's got a bit of a head start on me. like, a 13-year head start. sigh. why are all the good ideas already taken? i guess instead i could always, say, cook everything in the jamie oliver cookbook and then blog about it or something. it might not be the most original idea, but i can think of a few people who would be really, really impressed.
   
6. win an olympic gold medal - this is a good year for me to work on this one, seeing as, well, there's an olympics this year. because the only obstacle in other years would be the lack of olympics, obviously. since they've already named both the men's and women's hockey teams, i'm thinking my best bet is either aerials or luge... aerials because i'm sure they use some of the same skills as the wheel of death, and the luge because i'm really good at tobogganing. either way, i've still got a month or so to figure it out.
7. travel to the bottom of marianas trench - no, not the crappy canadian emo band, you guys, come on, the deepest part of the ocean. don walsh and jacques piccard made it down 10,911 metres in 1958; i'm pretty sure i can do better. i've got a lot of ocean to cover if i'm going to prove the existence of great-white-shark-eating-sharks. or at least see a jaguar shark. i want my red hat and my speedo.
   
8. beat cory at nhl10 - i'm not going to lie to you guys, this is going to be the toughest challenge of the year. all i can hope for is some sort of thumb-related injury in the middle of the game that makes him have to forfeit. or maybe if i play the nhl all-star team and he plays the italian junior women's team from 1984. i hear they have some sweet jerseys, anyway.

top ten essential components to a super kick ass two person new year's eve party

1. shots of jaeger, preferably at well-spaced but frequent intervals throughout the night.
   
   
   
2. jalapeno poppers and zucchini sticks from m&m meat shops (not pictured: buffalo wings, also from m&m meat shops, which we totally meant to eat later but sort of didn't and ended up eating the next day for breakfast/lunch/whatever that meal was.)
   
   


3. all the other leftover liquor you can find in your house that can be mixed with coke (who need to hit up the lc when people keep leaving crap at your house at parties?)
   
   
   
4. balloons, preferably ones purchased at the dollar store that make your lips tingle in slightly disturbing ways when you try to blow them up.
   
   
   
5. a mostly-cleaned-off coffee table for the food and drinks, as well as some candles (for ambience!)
   
   


6. a... well, whatever this is. i called it a "noisemaker," but it doesn't actually really make any noise. cory called it a "blower thinger," which i'm pretty sure isn't right either. but whatever you call it, just make sure it has spiderman on it. nothing says "happy new year!" like webslinging superheroes!
   
   


7. a feather boa, preferably one stolen from an epic bachelorette party in 2007 that you have carried with you (and lost feather from) across several provinces, and a disney princess party hat. and yes, the princesses have to be disney ones. this is non-negotiable.
   
   


8. a feather boa. oh, wait, did i say that one already?
   
   


9. a cell phone with which to make random drunken texts to muchmusic in the hopes that your message will be put up on their screen during their new year's eve dance party, even though those hopes will be tragically dashed.
   
   
   
   don't lie to me muchmusic, i know you got my text, cause you sent me this one back: (and ps, no i will not catch a new episode of my date with... stereos, because no matter how hard you try to pimp them, the stereos suck, and always will suck.)
   
   


10. sparklers (not pictured, cause we never actually lit them. it was nice to know they were there, though!). also not pictured, but entirely essential to the new year's eve experience: the new year's eve countdown on television, and preferably not one on ntv that was not only an hour and a half too early (being from newfoundland and all) but which turned out to actually have been taped in 2006. also having a computer nearby so that you can play a whole bunch of obscure 80s and 90s videos, culminating in a drunk half hour at 3:30 in the morning spent in an ultimately-fruitless search for the video for "cheryl" by supergarage. whose new year's eve rocked? mine did!