March 2009 Archives

1. I bought a ticket to the KCSA reunion...and then I promptly lost it. I realized after I did a massive cleaning session this weekend that I had no idea what I did with it, and I probably recycled it in my cleaning spree. Just hoping they can reprint it when I get there...

2. Dear Val, tomorrow is April Fools Day. Don't forget that.

3. Monday was 24 night. Jack Bauer got naked but they censored it.

4. Dear Val, really stop starting to watch a movie that begins at 11:45 becuase then you will stay up until 2am watching it.

5. How come what I like to do and what I am good at and what I feel like doing at the time never seem to ocur at the same time?

6. This is the most disturbing commercial of all time.

one.
Easter is my favorite candy holiday of the year. I mean, Halloween is mostly just regular candy in orange wrappers. And Valentine's day is all about those disgusting Russel Stover heart boxes. But Easter brings out the good stuff. I mean, everything tastes better in bunny form (especially this ADORABLE bunny from Vosges Haut Chocolat). There are also peeps which I hate to eat but once proved would survive a year in your backpack, through a house fire, and through a couple of months in a car trunk with little to no damage). And you cannot count out Cadbury and their Creme Eggs and my personal favorite the mini egg, which is chocolate candy coating perfection.
Today I decided to try out the Great Easter Candy Baking Experiment 2009: Cadbury Mini Egg Cookies!

All I did was replace chocolate chips in a chocolate chip cookie recipe with Cadbury Mini Eggs. But they are damned delicious.

two.
So I always remembered seeing this Alfred Hitchcock show when I was a kid. The episode was about a girl who had this doll that came to life. I looked it up last night and found it for free on Hulu! (I won't ruin anything else because you should go watch it because it is awesome.) Anyways, I find it quite ironic that this long lost TV show I haven't seen since I was 10 apparently began with Hitchcock talking about having a pie-eating contest.

three.
I am more than excited about Robert Irvine coming back to Dinner Impossible! Who cares that he lies on his resume, he made that show great!

four.
My reasons for saying no would be stupider than you'd think. My reasons for saying yes would be stupider than you'd think.

five.
Being woken up at 3am to your cell phone vibrating under your head can be very confusing.

1. Last month I went through Ron's calendar and added a bunch of random things. On March 26 I wrote "Eat a donut!" so I brought him a surprise this morning.

2. Thank you to everyone who has contacted me about doing photos! It will be really helpful! THANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOU! I'll get back to you all soon! If anyone else wants a totally free photo session let me know! I've gotten requests for family photos, dog photos, car photos, theater promo photos and more, so the sky is the limit!

3. I can't possibly owe $2,000 in taxes...right?

My camera is starting to look amazingly...what's the word I'm looking for...oh yes...ridiculous.

---

So this summer I plan to be shooting a lot and practicing a lot and, yes, trying to learn how this camera works a lot. Anyone reading this want to be my model?

I'll do engagement sessions, couples photos, family photos, Christmas card photos, baby photos, messing around in a park photos, photos in front of a giant W sign (coughWaltercough), photos of dogs, photos of cats, boudoir photos (if you really want?), event photos, headshots (but I won't do your makeup Eric), or anything you want! I really just want to practice taking pictures of people in more of a planned setting.

I'll get to practice, you'll get a DVD of images. You can use them for whatever you want or not use them at all. Sound good? Drop me an email or leave a comment if you're interested in helping a girl out!

1. Monday was 24 night. No House. JoeJoe made guac with enough avacados! And chilli. and green beans with onions.
Dear 24, really? You can't just have a security guard, you just need to have a security guard with a wife pregnant with twins? Really?


2. Tonight was wine tasting night. I got 2 correct. This did not happen:



3. Here is our current Idol pool standings. Last week I felt so much better about my third choice being kicked out in the first week when Paula's first choice/Eric's second choice was kicked out in the second round.

		Val		Eric		Matt		Paula		Sue
First		Danny		Danny		Lil		Alexis		Danny
Second		Lil		Alexis		Danny		Scott		Lil
Third		Jorge		Kris		Matt		Allison		Scott

BLUE = still in it
GREEN = kicked out
ORANGE = third place
YELLOW = second place
PINK = first place


4. And here are the locations and dates for the Nathan's hot-dog eating contest qualifiers...

View Larger Map
None in Chicago this year :-( Anyone want to take a road trip or 12?


5. It's funny. When someone ignores you it can make you mad. But when that person later tells you that it's not just you that he has pushed away it can make you even more upset because you're no longer special. If that makes any sense. It doesn't.


6. It is really hard to take a self portrait.

Dylan at 3 weeks.

Since Jennifer and Josh had pretty small weekday wedding they are also throwing a few more celebrations throughout the year in different areas. Saturday night was their Northern Illinois one. It was fun times...and there were probably more people there than were at the actual wedding :-)

The shindig was at Irish Times in Brookfield. I never knew there was a back cottage! I had wine. And lots of fried foods. And shrimp. Yum. I caught up with Will and some of Josh's friends who I probably met once in college but am not sure.

I didn't feel like busting out the big camera after spending a week finishing up their wedding pictures...but of course I took some snapshots...

The thing I hate most about being the wedding photographer? No pro pics of me! (Of course, that may not be a bad thing as the one of me and Christine at her wedding was HORRENDOUS because I was laughing too hard to look pretty).

But anyways.

Here are two pics of me from Josh's wedding!

And this is no where near done and I can't come up with a good design concept yet (or something to write for "About Me" other than "Val pretends to know what she is doing"), but it is at least somewhat functional: Valerie Bromann Photography.

I am finally done!

Josh and Jennifer got married back in December, on the Monday before Christmas...and I finally finished editing all of their wedding photos! I posted a few back in December, and here are a few (OK a ton) more highlights (I managed to widdle them down to only 367 good ones...):

The wedding ceremony was at Uptown Baptist Church and the wedding reception was at Atwood Cafe in Chicago.

I am not allowed to watch Throwdown ever again. Whatever Bobby Flay makes I crave the next day. So Monday I had to go get pad thai for lunch. YUM! It wasn't too bad out so I walked to Millennium Park to eat.

pad thai:

bean:

WTF? Millennium Park uses an OLYMPIA ICE RESURFACER!?!?! That's not a Zamboni!

broken fountain:

green fountain:

Eric "working":

p.s. Val thinks her camera looks awesome...everyone else probably thinks she is a tourist.

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Monday night was 24 night. The episode featured the most ridiculously choreographed fight scene in the history of the show. Meredith made chicken mole and JoeJoe made an angel food cake that didn't deflate. And on HIMYM Doogie Hauser wore a pyjama suit...I told MK he needs to get one.

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Saturday morning I took a lighting and portrait class at Calumet. I've been taking a ridiculous amount of classes there. This class was their first in their new annex, which is a huge room with lots of space. Hopefully this will mean that there will be more hands on classes soon!

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When Ron eats an apple he eats the whole thing, core and all. It's weird. Just sayin.

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so...if I were to backpack Europe and/or roadtrip the USA for a bit in maybe a year from now...would anyone be interested in joining me for a portion of it?

Saturday was Alina's birthday!

A bunch of us headed out to Bucca di Beppo where we had waaaaay too much food! It was all yummy. But there was a lot. But I still ate as much as possible because it was yummy.

There was a Apple Gorgonzola Salad, Ceasar Salad, Bruschetta, Fried Calamari, Fried Mozzarella, Prosciutto Stuffed Mushrooms, Spaghetti with Meatballs, Penne Basilica, Gnocchi al Telefono, Proscuttio Stuffed Chicken, Garlic Mashed Potatoes, Italian Broccoli Romano, Tiramisu, Double Dark Chocolate Cake, Homemade Cheesecake, Apple Crostata...

...and 2.5 litres of wine!

Yum!

Although we weren't at the creepy pope table, we were sitting by a giant picture of a spaghetti-eating contest, and a picture of the bear! (It's a bear damnit!!!)

Fun times!

After dinner we went back to AlOe's place and played some Mario Kart and Guitar Hero and watched Mickey Mouse Fight Club for JoeJoe!

first.
How did I already lose at the American Idol pool? I suck. I swear he was better last week. Maybe I need more sleep. Or to actually pay attention to Idol...

second.
Rumors are probably just rumors, but they are still going around. I don't know whether I am scared or excited. Excited is a really dumb attitude to have.

third.
awesome.

fourth.
WTF?

fifth.
The other day driving home I was merging from one highway to another and got cut off by a guy hauling a boat. He almost compeltely smashed me with the boat.

sixth.
I had to bake on Thursday night for a co-worker's going away party on Friday. I made strawberry lemon bars that didn't quite set but I managed to get them into bars and serve them anyways. I also make onion muffins. Any "cupcake" recipe that calls for a pound of onions has to be good...right? I also discovered that thinking that a recipe that makes 12 muffins will make 24 mini-muffins was dead wrong. It actually made a gazillion mini-muffins. Mini-muffins isn't even the correct term. It was more like mini cornbread onion balls. But they were delicious. Even if I was up way too late baking :-(

seventh.
Friday was Judie's last day at work. We all went out to Italian Village. SHe's leaving the company to become a teacher so we went around the table telling anticdotes from gradeschool. We also went around saying what alternate career you'd want, which is a weird thing to tell your coworkers what you would rather be doing. I said wedding photographer.

eighth.

Wednesday night was...

- Fundraising party for Ron's Project 891 Theatre Company.

- Getting introduced to everyone as "we went to see New Kids on the Block together"

- Drinking three glasses of wine because it was free...or at least paid for by donation at the door

- Drinking a rootbeer shot (it involved dropping something into a glass of rootbeer) becasue the bartenders brought a round to me and Chelsa for free. (and, of course, taking a million times longer than everyone else did to finish it)

- Watching Chelsa win a t-shirt and CD of the band who was apparently sitting next to us.

- Yelling at Ron because I didn't win a raffle and getting yelled at BY Ron for trying to sneak all the tickets down my shirt.

- Getting pulled out of the bathroom line by another bartender who wanted to show me off to her friends declaring "She looks like she's 14!"

- Chelsa singing Rainbow Connection.

- Trying (and failing) to get Ron to sing New Kids...or anything

- Dedicating a karaoke performance of "When I Saw Him Standing There" (Tiffany version of course!) to Ron!

(When I fucked up the first line the dude asked me if I wanted to sing the Beatles version...heck no!)

(most awesomely horrible but still awesome video ever)

Sunday = Blackhawks game with Walter and Emily and Dude named Nick.

The pretzel was good. The game was not. We sucked. Or at least the other team acted better and therefore made us look sucky. There were a couple of good fights though. And did I mention that the pretzels were good?

Oh, best moment of the game was when they did the fan cam and it went to a mother and son. THe mother immediately kisses the boy on the cheek and he jumps back with a horrified look on his face. Awesome.

Walter made fun of me for looking like a deer in headlights instead of mean and for wearing cherry coke lipsmackers.

And then the hawks lost. and that sucked. and i didn't win a lemonhead. and i didn't win a big mac. and i didn't win a coffee. but i had a pretzel. but i had to pay $3.50 for that.

cryptic

1. My backwards thinking is backwards.

2. I shouldn't agree with things that I don't agree with. For the record, I said "I know" but I don't know and don't believe it.

3. I came to an epiphany. Or maybe it was just a realization. Does a change in attitude have to occur in order for something to be considered an epiphany? Because when I thought of it I was just kind of "wow, that maybe sucks."

not so cryptic:

1. Daylight savings and I just aren't getting along. I feel like a brick in the morning.

2. Mammoth Men! Mammoth Men! Mammoth Men!

3.
Mistake #1 - buying target brand sushi
Mistake #2 - eating the piece that spent the night tocuhing the wasabi
Mistake #3 - looking at what I was eating and seeing a huge pocket of roe, which made me throw up a little

4. I am not above eating apple slices and cheddar cubes out of a Mickey Mouse shaped container.

5. (24 spoilerish) Monday = 24 night. Joe made Indian Guacamole. Well, he attempted to just make guacamole but may have made it wrong. It still tasted OK, but it sure wasn't guac. 24 has moved on to it's third plot line of the season. Although after last week anything at all seems plausible. Why do they always kill off the best people on the show?

OK, here's how me and Eric did on picking the top THIRTEEN (they decided on having 13 over 12 at the "last minute" which in other words means it was planned from the start.)

Val	Eric
Danny Gokey	Danny Gokey
Anoop Desai	Anoop Desai
Tatiana Nicole Del Toro	Ricky Braddy
Adam Lambert	Adam Lambert
Jasmine Murray	Jasmine Murray
Matt Giraud	Matt Giraud
Megan Corkey	Mishavonna Henson
Nick Mitchell	Ju'Not Joyner
Scott McIntyre	Scott McIntyre
Arianna Afsar	Kendall Beard
Von Smith	Lil Rounds
Kristen McNamara	Alexis Grace

BLUE = Performed and Made it to the Top 12 13
GREEN = Did not make it

So Eric won 8 to 7.

Here are the picks for the final three...

		Val		Eric		Matt		Paula		Sue
First		Danny		Danny		Lil		Alexis		Danny
Second		Lil		Alexis		Danny		Scott		Lil
Third		Jorge		Kris		Matt		Allison		Scott

BLUE = still in it
GREEN = kicked out
ORANGE = third place
YELLOW = second place
PINK = first place

He's going to be a rockstar...

Question of the day: If you dropped $20,000 to buy five bottles of wine, do you drink that wine or do you save it?

On one hand, if you save it you don't get to drink what is (hopefully) some pretty good wine. On the other hand if you drink it you are basically destroying something incredibly valuable....

***

So Friday night was our black-tie wine auction at work. We only do it every three years so this was my first opportunity to go. I love these events because I get to get all dressed up and go somewhere I would never ever be able to afford to go to.

The first part of the night was the silent auction. There were all kinds of wines including a bottle of Remy Martin valued at $2,000 and a bottle I was told had terrible wine but was famous because there is a Picasso on the label.

My job was to follow around the photographer and take down peoples' names. It's kind of a daunting job because there are always a lot of people I should know and I don't. I think I managed to not ask anyone too obvious what their name was. Also, for the record, I think my camera body cost more than the photographer who I was following's did. Oh, and celebrity spotting of the night was Alpana Singh.

After the silent auction we headed upstairs to eat. I loaded up on a lot of veggies, because they had salad and vegetables and a delicious veggie lasagna for us. YUM.

At that point I was done with my duties, but decided t head down to the theater to watch the auction.

The auction was insane. While it was mostly wine, there were also luxury vacations, private opera performances, and opportunities to do things like co-pilot a fighter jet.

Early in the night I thought it was crazy when someone dropped $19,000 on a lot of twelve bottles...until later when someone dropped $20,000 on a lot of FIVE!

Man, I wish I had the money for that kind of wine.

one.
I think I am flagged at the airport. I cannot get through security without getting searched. On my way back from DC I made sure to separate out anything that could even remotely look like a liquid. And what happens? "You shoes have been selected for further inspection."


two.
Ghetto bluetooth award of the month goes to the guy yelling into the phone he tucked into his earmuff.


three.
Val: When I get married I should just have Portillos cater it.
Dad: (points to pasta brochure) They do have catering...
Val: Hrm, do you think they would do a hot dog cart?


four.
Ron: That guy was hot. The one who killed his girlfriend.
Val: Eeew, he was ugly, you have terrible taste in men!


five.
Someone really needs to invent a VCR that can record two shows at once...


six.
Val: But all my dance recitals are on tapes.
Eric: Do you ever watch your dance recitals?
Val: Not really. But I have this great horror film I can't find anywhere else.
Eric: Is it called Val's Dance Recital?


seven.
Val: He won't breast feed. He hasn't learned yet that he is a boy and is supposed to like breasts.
Eric: Well, we all learn that eventually. (looks at gay coworker next to him) Well, not all of us.


eight.
Monday was 24 night. Meredith made delicious chicken and pierogi and broccoli. 24 is getting more and more ridiculous. This episode was the most farfetched yet. SPOILERS: If you're the president and someone says there is going to be a terrorist attack in the area...don't you think "hmm, maybe they will attack the White House" would at least cross your mind? And if you are a terrorist, don't you think you could have better drawn-out plans then a hokey drawing of the white house anyone could pick up from the souvenir shop? And if you are White House security, don't you think you'd have surveillance cameras, and someone watching them? Or at least patch up that ridiculously easy to break into failing brick wall in the basement that you just hid behind a cabinet? Maybe?


nine.
Tuesday was wine tasting night. I got only a couple correct. I got the Riesling right because I determined that the one I liked best had to be the Riesling. Scott brought icewine. I love icewine. Afterwards I went to MK's to hang out for a while. I think we were supposed to watch Top Gear but didn't. He drank watered down expensive Scotch he stole from Ken instead. I don't think Ken was happy with him. They were somehow impressed that I like whiskey. It's not like I like it straight up or anything. I can't drink anything that's not mixed into fruitiness.
I got home after midnight but had to watch a two hour American Idol so I didn't go to bed until around 2:30. I could have slept sooner but, while I did finally find my remote, the batteries didn't work, so I couldn't fast forward.


ten.
Wednesday night I had an appointment with my financial panther. He told me that even though I am down $6,000 I am doing extremely well compared to most people. Is that supposed to make me feel better? He at least cooked me dinner (well, he cooked the pork chops, I cooked the potatoes, and I am pretty sure an artisan made the bread, but he bought it all so it's OK) and gave me lots of wine.

I am apparently a special client who gets this all out treatment and he doesn't actually cook dinner and give wine to all his clients. I am special :-) Although he was probably just trying to drunken me up so I would feel better about losing all my money and so I will stop saying nasty things about him on my blog.


eleven.
Stolen from Brian...Skittles has taken this social networking site thing to the extreme...


twelve.
Best thing ever: when you get a $90 rebate gift card in the mail that you completely forgot was coming to you.


thirteen.
Ahh! Haven't been able to post an Idol update yet! Basically...everyone SUCKS. I did find it hilarious when they made them do a dance number but they all had to be sitting down because you can't make a blind dude dance. I also thought the blind dude was a decent singer but there is no way they would be praising him to high heavens as they are doing if he wasn't blind. Come on Simon, I am COUNTING on you to cut him down!

Here are our standings thus far...still have the wildcard episode tonight:

Val	Eric
Danny Gokey	Danny Gokey
Anoop Desai	Anoop Desai
Tatiana Nicole Del Toro	Ricky Braddy
Adam Lambert	Adam Lambert
Jasmine Murray	Jasmine Murray
Matt Giraud	Matt Giraud
Megan Corkey	Mishavonna Henson
Nick Mitchell	Ju'Not Joyner
Scott McIntyre	Scott McIntyre
Arianna Afsar	Kendall Beard
Von Smith	Lil Rounds
Kristen McNamara	Alexis Grace

BLUE = Performed and Made it to the Top 12
GREEN = Did not make it
PINK = Wild Card, still has a shot

So the realreal reason for heading off to a weekend in DC was for Rob and Christine's wedding! It was an exciting day because I have known Rob for a long while now and am probably one of Rob's friends who has known Christine the longest since I went to visit him right around when they started dating!

The wedding was awesome. The ceremony was short and sweet. I liked that they did a sweetheart table for dinner (yes, I am up on all the wedding lingo) so they at least had a little time alone. The food was really good, and you could have seconds on meat, although I didn't even get through my entire first serving. And they had slushy drinks! I had a lot of pina coladas and strawberry daiquiris. a lot. Oh and one of their hors d ' oeuvres was a cheesestick on a toothpick. Cheesesticks? Best hors d ' oeuvres ever.

Dancing was funfunfun. You have to love Thriller...and I have to dance to my song Low, although it is so not the same without my girl Jodie there.

I caught the bouquet...although I wasn't trying...at all...I was standing behind people and it shot through them into my stomach. So...does catching the bouquet at THREE weddings now mean I will get a date or something sometime soon?

As always, the party seemed entirely too short. Afterwards some of us headed to the hotel bar and had a drink...and maybe a shot...and hung for a while. I traded my awesome shoes (my shoes were amazing...and I thought they would last no more than 5 minutes and I ended up wearing them all night) for fuzzy knee socks and Vans. I rock the style with that. When we all retired for the night I went back to the room and my key wouldn't work. I didn't want to wake up Heather or Walter who were sleeping so I went to the front desk. The dude asked for my ID and then said "Oh, she's not Kirsten Dunst." Sorry to disappoint.

It was a rocking wedding and I am so happy for Rob and Christine and wish them the best of everything. Congratulations!

More of Rob and Christine's Wedding Photos here!

Saturday I managed to not eat breakfast or lunch and get a massive headache which turned into massive nausea, which turned into me dropping my nose ring down the sink! Coke + Tylenol + nap + cheesits + water helped on the nausea/headache front. But my nose still had to be naked for the wedding :-(

But anyways.

We woke up early and headed off the DC. We had a couple of cars of people and collectively we managed to not meet up together and not really do anything. I started off my day with Walter and Heather and we headed towards the Washington Monument.

They went off to see some more monuments, but I have been to DC and seen most all of that before so I called Jeff. They were at the Air and Space Museum and I have never seen that so I went to meet them, but then Jeff said they were leaving and he'd call me back when they had a plan. Two hours later I never received a phone call.

Luckily Joe and Alina just arrived at the mall and when I called them they said they were going to the National Archives at 9th and Constitution. I looked up and was on 9th and Independence so I met them there. We went in and saw the Bill of Rights and the Magna Carta and the Constitution and all that.

Joe pointed out that this guy looks like the other guy cut off his leg and now he is trying to cut off his peg leg and that is just cruel.

I pointed out that it looks like George Washington has his hand down his pants.

Just saying.

After that we headed over to the Botanical Gardens to meet everyone else. But they were all leaving. We walked around a bit there and looked at pretty flowers and odd phallic cactuses then decided to head on back to get ready for the wedding... (or in my case sleep and throw up and lose jewelry down the sink).

More Washington D.C. photos here.

Friday, after a late night at the hospital, after waking up early, after taking off, after a bumpy landing, after a bumpy metro ride, and after a bumpy cab ride, I made it to a motel in Greenbelt, Maryland. Luckily they let me check in both early and despite the fact that my name is not Walter. So I threw up in the bathroom and took a nap. Lovely eh? But anyways.

Walter and Heather arrived and then we took off for CVS, hung out in the hotel room, and then grabbed dinner at Friday's where we had the

slowest

service

ever.

Then we headed back to the hotel, did some ironing (fun vacation activity?), and waited around until it was all clear to head down to the hotel bar after the wedding rehearsal. Drinking cures nausea...right?

We met up with the soon to be married Rob and Christine and boatloads of others. We played some pool. I am horrible at pool but I probably played one of my better games against Sarah. By that I mean she still won, but I only had one ball left, and I didn't even play by the Nadia/Val creative scoring rules (i.e. cheat).

More and more people showed up throughout the night and we had a good night of celebrating for the day to come...

More Photos Here!

Meet my nephew, Dylan John!
Born Friday, February 27, at 1:39 am. (Jennifer had a C-section shortly after I left the hospital)
7 lbs 10 oz, 21 inches long

He has a bit of jaundice so they are keeping him in a baby tank. Luckily my flight arrived 20 minutes early today so I rushed to the hospital and arrived just in time for his 20-minute feeding break. :-)