4th of July!

I hope everyone had a great 4th of July! It is getting so hot out in California! I got my hair chopped off to fight this heat wave. Of course, yesterday, my husband decided it was the perfect time to take a walk to my parents house, instead of drive. For some reason I decided to wear the one top I got recently that covers the back of my neck which totally defeated the purpose of having short hair. Yup. I'm just brilliant.

The walk was nice though. Especially the first half before it got too hot. Then we stopped for Menchie's midway and when we left, the sun was beaming. We had a great day though! Once we got to my parents, we had a barbecue and spent most of the day in the pool. Gwith and I were attempting tandem noodling. It mostly ended in chaos, but it was tons of fun! Then, we drove up to Topanga Canyon to try and find a great view of the fireworks. Note to self for next year: Do not drive up the canyon to watch. It sounds great in theory but first of all, it's super crowded (and a truck decided there was enough space to pull in right where we were standing with my sister and her boyfriend, and it nearly hit us) and secondly, you can barely see the fireworks! They're so tiny from that high up. After Gwith and I arrived back home though, we were pulling into the garage and started hearing fireworks. Thus began our yearly tradition of firework chasing. We got lucky and found them in a park not too far away!

Last year, our firework chase led us in the direction of these people in my parents neighborhood who were setting them off. We stopped at their location to watch and the second we arrived, they'd jump in the car all freaked out, and drive off. We kept finding them in different spots to try and watch...and they kept leaving. It was pretty funny. They must've thought we were going to call the police or something.

You should know that I was worried about Willow freaking out from the sound of fireworks so I turned on the Castle marathon for her. Ironically, she decided she wanted to wait to watch the fireworks and hopped over to the window and eagerly looked out.

Today, I'm planning to FINALLY watch this week's episode of The Bachelorette. Yay! I feel so behind and I'm sad that I haven't read the EW recap of it yet. I love those.

This week, a friend and I are going to see Joss Whedon's Much Ado About Nothing. I'm very excited to check it out and see Fred and Wes reunited!!

It appears I've run out of things to say today. Must be the heat! I think it's melting my brain.

Anyways, how was everyones 4th of July? Did you see fireworks? Have you seen Much Ado About Nothing?

Willow waiting for the sun to go down!

Talking the Sims 3, the Bachelorette, a Vending Machine that sells $1,500 of caviar, and the most scarring music video ever!

The good news: I got pictures of my resort that I worked so hard on. The bad news: I can no longer load that game. It keeps crashing during the loading screen. Luckily, I did manage to get in and save the resort to the bin.

By far, my new favorite feature from The Sims 3 Island Paradise is the waterfall! I know, out of everything, that's kind of silly, but I've always wanted that! I don't have much to say about the game today. After my game wouldn't load yesterday, I got fed up and decided not to play for the day. I needed a glitches reprieve.

I caught up on The Bachelorette yesterday. My family has a voting chart where we guess each episode who is going home. I'm happy to say I was wrong about Ben vs. Michael. I thought for sure Michael was going to bury himself as most previous contestants have. But I was wrong. Apparently they need prosecutors every season to convince the judge that their is a fraud among the bunch. Bring out the guards, Chris Harrison! Take Ben away! I was finally right about Mikey T. going home!! I've been giving his little box an X since night one. The funny thing is, I almost changed it tonight because of their moment building a little snow family on the mountain. If I had changed it, that would've sucked. The night he finally gets eliminated would be the one time I didn't eliminate him on my chart! Good thing I stuck with my original decision! Now I can start guessing someone else to be eliminated in future episodes and not just Mikey. It's a shame about Bryden. I wouldn't care so much if it wasn't for the fact he was in my original Final 4 prediction. But then again, so was Ben. Yuck. As it stands now, my final four prediction was actually sitting around last episode all talking to each other. Brooks, Chris, Drew, and Kasey. Unless Drew and Kasey tell Desiree about James and both get sent home! That would really mess things up for me. But, she seems smart, so I don't think that's going to happen. For those who don't read spoilers (I do not want to know! Not this season anyways), who do you think is going to win? Brooks or Chris? I know. I'm jumping the gun a little on the finale two but I really do think it's going to come down to those two.

On another note, I saw the weirdest thing at the mall yesterday. Apparently, you can now go to a vending machine and buy caviar for $1,500! I know. That is madness. I don't know why anyone would even spend that much on food in the first place but even worse, from a vending machine? If you're going to spend $1,500, at least do it in a beautiful restaurant with outstanding service and the most amazing food you've ever tasted. I forgot to mention, you can also get escargot and a nice teacup set from this machine. I. Don't. Get. It.

For my final thoughts, have you seen that horrible Miley Cyrus music video "We Can't Stop"? I literally can't wipe that shocking image from my mind. I'm not a fan of hers in the first place but why would anyone make a video like that? It didn't make any sense and it just seemed like her way of saying "I'm grown up but I'm going to prove it by acting really immature". I really wish I could unsee it. Unfortunately, I don't have that power.

How long until your Sims game crashed? Do you think Chris or Brooks will win The Bachelorette, or someone else entirely? Would you spend $1,500 on caviar from a machine? And have you seen that horrible music video? If you have, here's a cute picture to try to erase it from your memory:

Willow sleeping in her cage during The Bachelorette!

My CD, The Sims 3, and Tons of TV Talk!

I am super excited to announce that my five song CD "Stepping Stone" will be released on iTunes July 15th! Currently, you can listen to the songs on Soundcloud.com.

My single, which shares the same name as the full CD, "Stepping Stone" is already on iTunes for purchase as the full version and in a ringtone version. A ringtone for "What Went Wrong" will also be available on July 15th!

In anticipation of the release, I will be blogging every Monday between now and the 15th about a different song on the CD. I am very excited and I hope for the day when I hear one of my songs blasting on someone's car radio! Please help support my dream and play my music for your friends!

Now, onto the usual.

I caught up on Mad Men last night and oh boy does it look like we're in for an interesting finale. I have never seen Don Draper looked so unprepared! Every time he's had an affair in the past, he walks around like it doesn't mean anything. He transitions into each role he has during the day, flawlessly. Until now. Sally catching him has really turned the tables and I hope to see this all come out and his world fall apart in tomorrow's finale! Is that mean? By the way, did anyone else love when Pete said to Ken, "any of us would gladly trade places with you." Yeah, right. I'm sure even Pete wouldn't be singing that same song and dance if he was shot in the face. It's crazy how self righteous these characters are. I feel bad for Ken. I'd want out too! I tell you though, Sally has become my favorite character on the show. I've always enjoyed watching her character grow up and develop on the show and I'm wondering if next season is going to have an even stronger focus on her? She's an interesting character, after all, she is the product of a very screwed up father and a very evil mother. I liked how she turned down that guy. Although, I think it was mostly because she wanted to see Glenn and him fight over her. She did seem pretty happy about it! It's weird though. Why did Glenn say she was like a sister to him? They had their first date recently and kissed! It's creepy how these Brandon Walsh type statements just pop up in other shows sometimes.

Hmm, what else? I watched The Bachelorette and thought that talent show was pretty funny. I could have done without the whole Hurricane Sandy date though. That was absolutely depressing and I don't understand why anyone would bring a date on something like that! It sucks that Bryden isn't really feeling it with Des. It sucks even more though that she didn't call him last and that he didn't reject the rose. Can you imagine if he did? That would have been, in ABC preview fashion, "The biggest twist ever!" on "The most exciting season yet!". Especially since then, Zac K would've stayed and then been all sad thinking he was supposed to go home!

For my gaming portion of this blog, I played The Sims 3 some more today and my sims bought a second home. Note to fellow simmers: When you build a home on the water, it will let you place the lot wherever, so be careful that you do actually have it on a nice portion of the sand...otherwise apparently your sims will not be able to get on the lot! I had to learn the hard way and move my sims new beach house to a different lot. Although, it worked out nicely. When I did that, it automatically sold the house, gave my sims back the $69,000, and then a weird glitch caused the new lot with the house to only cost $1,900. So actually simmers, don't take my advice. Learn the hard way like me! It may benefit your sims bank account! I think this new feature however is still not working exactly right because after I bought the house, my game gave me the usual "Error Code 12". I wish I could figure out a way to stop this error from happening! I've tried everything but nothing seems to work. If only EA was designing their games better for us Mac users. Grr.

So that's it for today. I have to go feed Willow dinner and watch more episodes of Party of Five with her. I grew up on the show and now that the seasons are finally being released on DVD quickly, I'm re-watching it! I don't remember much but I do know that Bailey should be getting into a bad drunk driving accident soon with Sarah in the car and that even though Julia currently doesn't want to go to Stamford, I'm pretty sure I remember her going and having a very abusive boyfriend, Ned, who threw a TV at her! Of course, what I'm most excited about is the fact that Tim DeKay, Christopher Gorham, and Maggie Lawson all appear in the upcoming seasons! Yay USA actors! Did anyone else find it weird by the way that Claudia dated a character played by Ryder Strong and then the next season, Ben Savage came on the show as a guy with a crush on her? It was like the invasion of Boy Meets World! Shawn and Cory must've had quite a fight over her. Poor Topanga!

What did you think of Mad Men? Is Don going to finally get what's coming to him? Was that Hurricane Sandy date the most depressing date you've ever seen? Should Bryden have called it a day and took off? What is the worst Sims 3 glitch or error you've ever had? And did you watch Party of Five?

Keep your eyes (and ears) opened for my CD release on July 15th!! Thanks everyone!

Willow cleaning her ears!