Tales from La La Land

Before we get started, I would like to point out that I am approaching my two-week anniversary and I am starting to wonder who this person is that I married.

I think we all know about Laef’s extreme budgeting. He was very nervous about the wedding and the honeymoon. He probably thought that I’d go all Bridezilla and insist on Patron, Sea Scallops and Grilled Artichokes as the wedding meal.

That would have been nice, but even I knew our limits.

Anywasted, we did everything we wanted to do in New York, but definitely made a huge effort to cut corners where we could. We didn’t indulge in expensive meals and we certainly didn’t shop as much as I would have liked. We didn’t bother with room service or paying for internet service in our room ($16 per day) – things that would have been kind of nice, but seemed ridiculous in terms of cost.

So, it should come as no surprise that after everything has been said and done, we went under budget. We actually had a decent amount of money left in our wedding account. (A HUGE thanks to all our wonderful friends and family who served as DJ, cake-deliever, guitar player, bouquet-makers, officiant and wedding coordinator. All of those things saved us a lot of money).

I think Laef feels a sense of relief. I feel a sense of accomplishment. I didn’t spend every last dollar to my name – which is how I usually roll.

Yesterday Laef had to make a Costco run to get snacks for a work meeting. He called and asked if we needed anything and I said no because I just went to the grocery store.

When I got home from work, I noticed an industrial size bag of Chex Mix on top of the fridge. I then noticed a box of 80 fruit snacks. The fruit snacks were next to a bottle of 18-year aged scotch.

WTF.

WHO is this person that spends $100 at Costco on fruit snacks and Scotch?

My husband. Who is apparently now a Scotch drinker (Thanks, Sean).

Moving On.

New York City Day 3 – Yankees, Wings and Bar None

The Yankee game was an afternoon game, starting at 1:05 p.m. Let’s be honest, we didn’t do anything in the morning before the game. We slept in again and decided our first meal of the day would be ballpark food.

We took the 4 train to Yankee Stadium and ate at the first place we saw, which had a sign that boasted: “Cheapest Beers at Yankee Stadium”.

So we got two Bud Lite tall boys for $16, a chili dog and a hamburger. It was delicious.

My cousin, Lindsay, and her husband Chris, met us outside with tickets. They sit in Section 203 in the bleachers. If you ever make it to Yankee Stadium, I highly recommend this section.

Lindsay and Chris knew almost everyone sitting near us. They used to have season tickets and met all these other people, who also have season tickets. Same people, sitting the same section for years.

It gives you a great local feel. One of Lindsay’s friends is the leader of what is known as Roll Call.

As the first inning starts, this guy gets the section to start chanting every single Yankee starter. They go through each position, yell the player’s name until said player turns and waves to the section. (ARod, seen below, barely raised a glove because he is a dick, but the rest of them got pretty into it).

It’s awesome.

This is also the section that you will get taunted if you are clearly a tourist and order Guiness with your garlic fries. I don’t know why this guy and his girlfriend thought Guiness was a good idea on a hot New York summer day, but the locals took notice, yelling, “Milk was a bad choice! Enjoy your garlic fries and milk!”

This is also the section that taunted Nick Markakis (who by the way might be my new favorite player because of his hotness factor and because he it a bomb to section 203 after being ribbed for nine straight innings) for the ENTIRE game.

I am pretty sure that the guy in the photo below was yelling this: “Hey, Markakis! We’ve got your mom up here! And we’re shaving her back!”

It was a ton of fun, we drank $9 beers, ate fries and the Yankees won. Good times.

After leaving the game, we headed back to the hotel to shower and figure out our evening plans.

We decided to head to Croxley Ales near NYU because it was Wednesday. And on Wednesday they have 10-cent wings.

The place was packed with locals, which I loved.

There are rules on 10 cent wing night, starting with the fact that you have to order at least 20 wings to begin and have to increase in increments of 10. We made it through the first 20 no problem, but Laef may have over estimated us with the second 20. I think we only managed to eat half of them.

We ended up eating dinner for $4.00 and the drinks were very reasonable so it was another cheap date.

Not too far away was a bar called Bar None, which had $2 well drinks for ladies on Wednesday’s.

This place was a total college bar. It smelled of stale beer and puke, but it was 80s/90s music night and they had cheap drinks. It had Mike Tyson’s “Punch Out” on Nintendo (circa 1987) set up and anyone who was able to beat Mike Tyson won a free pitcher. They say it doesn’t happen often.

The female bartenders took a liking to Laef. He was dancing to 80s music in his barstool and it was one of the funniest things I have ever seen. We ordered a shot of Patron, a Mikes Hard Lemonade and a beer.

The bartender told Laef, “Just give me $10.”

Seriously? We just spent $9 for one beer at Yankee Stadium and this girl was giving us all that for $10?

Laef quickly tried to figure out how to anull the marriage so he could marry this girl. Or Angie Sit who gave us the book that led us to this bar.

We had so much fun at this dive listening to fun music and drinking cheap beer.

After leaving I convinced Laef that we needed a crepe from the street vendor. The dude was making them fresh right there on a grill. It was so effing yummy. And messy. I dropped half of the contents out on the subway, but I saved the Nutella, so it didn’t matter much.

This was the first night that we slept like babies.

That is what Smokey’s mom tells him in the movie Friday when she gives him a crisp $1 bill to buy her a pack of cigarettes.

This is what Laef and I are telling ourselves after UCLA announced yesterday that all employees will take an 8% pay cut.

The good thing about us both working at UCLA: Nooners Having lunch together and carpooling.

The bad thing: When paycuts happen, it affects both breadwinners in our house.

I can’t help but look at the bright side. I really think we are both extremely lucky to have not lost our jobs entirely. The economy has affected the entire country, and for some, it has been far more extreme that an 8% pay cut.

However, I do want to roll up to the Governors house and give him a big, fat: FUCK YOU, douchetard.

But, anyway, we’re going to make it be enough and we’ll figure out a way to readjust everything that we had pretty much just readjusted.

This is very exciting for Laef. This means even MORE extreme budgeting!!

We had already committed to seeing The Proposal tonight, but this might be our last movie in the theater for a while. And, we’ll probably smuggle candy instead of paying $6 for Dots.

I am certain that Laef is SUPER excited that this will be his last theater experience for a while. I say: “We’re going out on a high note, honey!”

I stumbled across this photo of Ryan Reynolds on one of the very intelligent web sites that I read everyday and somehow Laef looked over right then.

Laef: “Wait a minute. Is Ryan Reyonlds in The Proposal? Is that why…Fine. I get to look at porn for a week.”

Me: “You look exactly like him. Seriously. Look. You totally have a hairy chest and a flat tummy. The ONLY difference between Ryan and you is that he got a heavy dose of spray tan. And, Scarlett’s boobies. You don’t have those.”

And, just to prove to Laef that he could have TOTALLY been on the summer issue of Entertainment Weekly, I showed him this gem:

Eat your heart out, RR!

TGIF

Last night I was naughty.

The thought of cooking for myself after a long day sounded about as awesome as one of Lamb’s throat-punches.

I started thinking about Salt Creek’s grilled artichokes and then my car just automatically turned into the parking lot.

This is naughty because one of the things that is no longer in the budget is my solo dining experiences while Laef is on the road. I did so good this month and figured that it was already May 28, so technically it’s like June 1, and therefore I had succeeded.

It was bustling at the Salt Creek. The bar was filled to capacity with Cougars and Cougar-lovers watching the NBA playoffs.

And, OF COURSE, just as I sat down with my first glass of wine my phone rang.

It was Laef.

Crap.

We had played phone tag all day and I wasn’t sure if I’d catch him later. I had to answer. But, it’s so loud, he’s going to know right away.

Me: “Hello…”
Laef: “Busted.”
Me: …
Laef: “Where are you?”
Me: (whispering) “Salt Creek.”
Laef: “DOUBLE busted.”

I am pretty sure Laef understands the dilemma of not feeling like cooking, and also understands it’s even worse when it’s just for yourself, so he quickly changed the subject and let me know the real reason he was calling.

It is 88 degrees in Eugene this weekend.

WTF. It’s raining in LA today.

Totally digressing.

While sitting at my table for one at SCG, a group of 17-year-old boys anxiously awaited for their friend to arrive so they could yell, “SURPRISE!”

The boy came. He was surprised. Happy 17th Birthday. You get to celebrate with $16 appetizers, $30 entrees, unlimited lemonade and 10 of your BFFs.

Birthday boy’s mom was taking a bevy of photos, using her gigantic diamond for a flash and his dad was instructing the waiters to “bring them anything they want. Only the best. I’ll come back to settle the bill later.”

And then his parents left.

They ordered 10 lemonades and bacon-wrapped shrimp to start things off.

(BTW, I wasn’t like stalking them from across the room. They were 10 inches from me. And 17. They talk loud.)

I pondered being 17 with rich parents. I pondered being 17 and having dinner with a group of friends without having to worry about bills, weddings, car payments, litter boxes, wanting to have sex every single day without ever being tired, grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning, etc.

And then a few minutes later, ANOTHER birthday group arrived and sat at a table right next to the boys.

Only this one was for a little old lady. I don’t know how old she was, but it was the opposite of 17.

So, then I pondered being the opposite of 17. Retired. Family Raised. Life lived.

Just when I wasn’t sure what would be more exciting, the little old lady ordered Grey Goose on the rocks. Double.

I wish I could be as bad ass as she was. But, my 30-something self could only manage red wine on a Thursday.

Can’t wait to celebrate life with vodka on the rocks.

Dear Ralphs,

Is this necessary?

I am not even sure this picture truly depicts the scene at Ralph’s last night. It totally looked like the scene in Sex in the City when Carrie and Miranda go out together on Valentine’s Day and you can’t see them through all of the Valentine’s balloons, which prompts Miranda to ask, “Is it just me or is Valentine’s Day on steroids this year?”

Do we really need to put the ENTIRE stock of Valentine’s Day balloons all over the store? How about a little respect for Beyonce’s single ladies. I mean, perhaps you could display one balloon and keep the stock hidden in the back. Who buys balloons for Valentine’s Day anyway? I thought it was all about the chocolates and flowers.

Maybe it’s just that I’m totally out of the spirit of Valentine’s Day. I know that Laef loves me and he knows I love him. And since we’re constantly in the midst of budgeting, we are giving each other hugs for Valentine’s Day.

Speaking of budgeting. Laef recently was informed of a web site called Mint. (HUGE thanks to Nick for alerting Laef to this site. Huge. Perfect. Thanks.)

Mint is my worst enemy. Laef has gone in and linked everything together and calculated how much we should spend on groceries, allowance, entertainment, gas, etc., each month. Oh! The best part is, he gets an email from Mint when we go over one of these categories.

We did awesome in January. Only went over $5 in groceries. We were under in everything else (um, including my allowance). We budgeted for date nights, movies and wedding stuff.

Well, February hasn’t started off quite as well. My sister was in town for the first weekend and it completely threw me off my game. Of course I had to take her to all the hot Hollywood spots on Saturday. But in the midst of our delicious lunch on Robertson Blvd., I get a phone call.

Laef: “Hi!”
Me: “Hi!”
Laef: “Where are you?”
Me: “Eating a delicious grilled artichoke.”
Laef: “Where else are you?”
Me …
Laef: “You’re already over your allowance for February and it’s Jan. 31.”
Me: …

Thank god there’s only 28 days in February. I just might make it through sans any more allowance.

Remember the blog about Laef and I budgeting?

Remember how I said that when Laef is out of town, I tend to go out to eat sushi or grilled artichokes? And that typically those meals run me about $40?

Well, I was gone this weekend and I came home to this:

Let’s just say that it was more than $40.

Disclaimer: The present mentioned below was ordered on 4/30/08 BEFORE allowances went into place. And, it only cost $9.97 plus shipping so who cares anyway. Point being, I haven’t spent anything on random items in the last two days. And I wanted Pinkberry wayyyy bad last night. I refrained. Yay! That’s $5.00 I still have!

Anyway, I digress.

My dark-haired Diva, Missy K., sent me a link to a shirt that I had to have. Good lookin’ out sister.

Within minutes, I had ordered said shirt and it arrived yesterday. Loves it.

This was a rare weekend. We actually went out both nights.

I recently found out that one of my student workers in the SID office from way back lives in Playa Vista (which is all of five miles from Manhattan Beach). She and her husband invited us out for a pre-Cinco de Mayo evening of fun.

The allowance took a big hit. Margaritas add up quickly. But, I think we both agreed that it was well worth it. We met some really cool peeps — Darren and Alicia Cline. Apparently Darren played football at UCLA in the late 90s. While Alicia and I discussed important topics such as “The Hills”, The crazy roommate on the Real World and who our favorite top chef is, Darren provided Laef with the testosterone fix he needed. I think at one point they just walked away and I heard Darren say, “Dude. You can come over anytime.”

My only hope is that they are not swingers. Please let them be normal.

So, despite the fact that I now have $40 of my allowance left and it’s May 4, it was nice to get out of the house and meet people.

By the way, Heather mentioned on an earlier post that for everytime Laef prevents me from spending my allowance, I should owe him a cut. For example, if he keeps me from spending $5 on just one more drink, I owe him $1. Laef loves this idea and says at this point I owe him about five grand.

I started the day with $100 allowance.

Laef and I met up with some peeps for happy hour.

Only it’s not so happy in Manhattan Beach. We ventured away from the Pizzeria (which has $5 pitchers) to go to Shellback, which is essentially Taylors with a view of the ocean.

Anyway, we got there at 7:15 p.m. so we missed happy hour by 15 minutes.

One of Laef’s friends left to go have dinner with her boyfriend. At 9:15 p.m. the other one went to move her car out of a lot that was to close at 9:30. She called from her car and said that she couldn’t find a spot and was just going to go home. SUCH an Aross move.

Needless to say, Laef and I were stuck with a giant pitcher of beer and the tab. To be fair, one of the girls left a $20. But the bill was $50 with tip. We had four pitchers.

That does not come out of our allowances. We have a few going out nights budgeted for the month.

However, on the walk home I tried to get Laef to go into at least two other bars. I said I wanted one more drink and that I’d pay with my allowance.

He just kept walking.

Total allowance left on May 3: $100.

Ugh.

My addictions to Target, Sushi, Friday night glasses of wine (glasses that cost more than the bottles I buy at the store, btw)and weekly trips to Ralphs for groceries are about to be phased out.

It’s hard to say which part will be the hardest, but if I had to guess it’d be my trips to Fusion Sushi when Laef is out of town. I usually settle in with my magazine, order a bunch of different things and cap it off with a large hot sake. It brings me so much joy! However, it’s usually at least $40 (even when I’m by myself.) So, three or four trips to Sushi during the month is almost $200. Granted, I’m not having as much fun as some other sushi patrons…

Now. On to my Friday night pleasures. The weeks are long and stressful. I get harped on for various reasons ranging from why copies aren’t dark enough to why I didn’t read all 100 emails to my boss over the phone.

Anyway, it’s nothing that drives me to drink in the way that my last job did, but the thought of Friday night rolling around and not having to deal with traffic or the hum of the fluorescent lights in my office for two days makes me SO GIDDY!

Again, Laef has been on travel most weekends over the past few months, so I usually pick a place that looks nice to have a Friday night glass of wine. One night I went to Coco Noche because their specialties are wine and chocolate.

No matter, I think my tab was still around $40. (I really hope Laef is not reading this). I liked it and it was good, but I’m not kidding when I say the items on the tapas menu must have weighed in at .000245 oz each. They were tiny.

A couple of Friday’s ago, I went to Salt Creek Grill because I love their grilled artichoke. I was enjoying a glass of wine and an artichoke by myself when a 65 year old man came over to my table and sat down.

Drunk man: “Can I join you for conversation?”

Me: (In my head — What the fuck am I supposed to say to that?) Out Loud – “Uh. Sure.”

So, as you might imagine, it is very awkward. He says his name is Robert. He has had four rum and cokes. He is married. But his wife does not like to come out with him (I wonder why). He usually just goes home and plays games on the computer.

This is when I panic. Am I looking at a 65 year old WoW player? Is this what my future holds? So, I bravely ask him about his computer game and he says he plays Civ. For those of you that don’t know, that’s Civilization. Another computer game that will eat up your entire life before you know it. He says that WoW is “too fast” and that he can’t keep up so much.

OK, the point is, here’s me, on a Friday night having a WoW/Civ conversation with a drunk old man. It kept me in and out of trouble the rest of the weekend. I was not feeling venturing out for glasses of wine or yummy appetizers by myself.

And, even though I didn’t finish my artichoke or wine because I had to escape, that was another $30 or something.

So on top of my random restaurant runs, I tend to make trips to Ralphs at least three times a week. The intent is to pick up a few items for lunches — fruit, yogurt, lunch meet. Except that I can’t ever get out of there without getting an US Weekly or a bottle of wine or some kind of delicious cheese or other random goodies that we really don’t need.

I have been pretty good about avoiding Target as I know better.

Laef — who could honestly go an entire month spending no more than $2 on anything — has actually not gone of the deep end with my spending just yet. But, he did take the liberty of adding up all said such pleasure and pointing out exactly how much I can spend in one month with nothing to show for it.

We have decided to meet in the middle and May will be the first month where I have an allowance. And, I’m committed to this plan because I would prefer to own a house and do other grown up things by the time I’m 40.

So, I will keep you all posted on my progress. I will only be listing things that I bought that I could have survived without. Things like gas and groceries (minus smut magazines) don’t count.

May 1
1. I bought a candy bar for 65 cents. Technically, I am not sure I could have survived without it, but that’s up for debate.