Things I'm REALLY digging right now:

Rian Johnson's The Brother's Bloom



This picture that Whitney shared with me:


The first single from Scarlett Johansson & Pete Yorn's forth-coming album:


Piksi_'s Flickr stream.

And the fact that I FINALLY have seen Season 2 of Flight of the Conchords!

Season 2 Online Premiere - Flight of the Conchords (US Only) from Flight of the Conchords

Where credit is due.

In anticipation of the season premier of Mad Men on Sunday, the past few weeks I've been re-watching seasons 1 and 2. I love this show. It is entertaining, smart, and attractive as hell. One of my greatest delights of the show is watching - and not fast forwarding through - the opening credits. The great song by Aceyalone & RJD2 from their album Magnificent City. (RJD2 is my favorite!!!) The Mad Men credits remind me of the other delightful openers I think are like a feast for the eyes and ears!

Stop. Look. Listen.

There have been many requests for my summer driving mix. If you want a copy, let me know. Here's the track list:

Rhubarbs

Some friends let me borrow something this weekend that was super useful, so in order to thank them, I made one of their favorite pies, strawberry rhubarb. I really hate to give away things that I am making for the first time, so usually I make a miniature version to make sure it is good enough to say, yes I made this. Only, here's the thing, I'm doing a cleanse, and shockingly enough, strawberry rhubarb pie is not on the approved food list. So, I just went on a wing and a prayer and delivered an un-sampled pie. While I was chopping up the rhubarb I tried one of the pieces, and let me tell you, it was the most sour thing I have ever put in my mouth. (I used this recipe for the filling. And they loved the pie.)

As I tried the sour, sour rhubarb I thought of our friends, the Zoroastrians, whose creation myth involves a rhubarb from which the first human couple would be born. When I first heard that, I thought it was crazy -- but no more or less crazy than other creation theories and stories, (maybe a little more crazy...) -- but now that I know rhubarbs are sour, it kind of makes sense that that would be the plant that would provide humanity its beginning.

An open letter to So You Think You Can Dance:

Thank you for bringing back Will, Twitch and Joshua last night! I would like to encourage you to do it as frequently as you desire, in fact, go against your better judgment and bring them back for the remainder of this season, because now that Janette an Ade are gone, I kind of don't care who wins. Thanks!

As an aside, I saw this description of last season's gang, "Thursday night's "So You Think You Can Dance" brought back last season's dancers to perform the four Emmy-nominated routines. What a treat to see last year's faves return! Will now has dreads, Joshua shaved his head, Katee is smokin' hot and Jessica was better than I remembered."

I have to say, that is EXACTLY what I noticed last night as well, although while that blogger said "Will has dreads" I thought, "Wow, Will looks GREAT!" and when he said, "Joshua shaved his head" I thought, "Wow, Joshua looks GREAT!" and when Twitch was on the show I thought, "HOLY HELL, TWITCH IS SO HOT!"

Travel Journal Excerpts 4

June 21, 2009
Sevilla, Spain

Tonight when I went to talk to the hostel desk, the manager said, "Hey Molly. I saw you guys on the news today." "Oh, what'd they say we were wanted for?" "No, seriously, you and Laura and Ashley were on the news. They were doing a story on the heat wave here in Sevilla, and you guys were used as footage." At which point I recalled when I turned to Laura and Ashley and said, "there's a camera filming us. I'm sure they're making a tourism video or something." Apparently, it was the news. One day in Spain and we're on the news.

June 23, 2009
Barcelona, Spain

While driving into the city tonight I noticed a huge building off the road labeled "supermercat." I'm not entirely sure why it took me SO LONG to figure out that it was a super market. I just had this image in my head of a mermaid cat. Like instead of half fish half human, half fish half cat, that could be a pet to a mermaid. Wow. I am ridiculous.

June 26, 2009
Barcelona, Spain

Although I try to keep this as a secret of the most secure variety, I am genuinely an idiot. Today's example: I went to the Renfe Station off of Barcelona's metro stop Sant Someone or other to go to the airport to catch my flight to Santander. I was under the impression that the Barcelona Reus airport Ryanair kept talking about was the Barcelona airport that was 8 miles out of the city. I headed out there on the train and wasted an hour there going from one terminal to another looking for Ryanair. Then in my broken Spanish I asked and learned the disheartening truth. So back to Sant to catch a different train to the suburb of Reus. Now, the timing of this worked out as well as it could have, which I can write because this story has a happy ending, but it was absolutely touch and go for awhile. I got a train ticket to Reus departing in twenty minutes, then rode the hour and twenty minute journey ever-so-impatiently. When I got off, I went searching for a cab - there was only one at the station and someone beat me to it by 20 seconds. Then I met a girl from Tijuana, who had a suitcase, also looking for a way to get to the airport. There was a half an hour break in bus service and that of course was when we needed that bus. We called a cab after trying to hitchhike - my idea - and the cab dropped us off 9 minutes before my flight, and consequently 21 minutes after my ticket said the gate closed. It was amazingly funny listening to her yell at the cab driver to pass other cars, that we were in a hurry, but the cabby just took his time. The ticket desk told me if I could carry on my bag I could try to run for it, so I bid adios to my friend, hoping she could catch her flight to London and ran like hell. I threw my suitcase on the scanner praying they wouldn't search it or be a stickler for the 3 oz rule that I was absolutely breaking with my full size shampoo bottles inside. I was that moron running through the airport because there was no other option. When I got to the gate, they called the plane and I got the ok to run on the tarmac, they were about to close the last door. Here I am, JUST in time to wing my way to the Basque coast, and here comes the perfume cart.

So this is love.

My dear friend Cathleen is getting married next month. One of the things that sealed the deal as far as our friendship goes was when we first started talking dresses she said, "You know Grace Kelly?" To which my friend Analee said, "Does Molly know Grace Kelly?"
I was given the small task of finding shoe ideas to compliment her GK style gown - a task that I have absolutely enjoyed. In my searching I found the perfect pair of shoes. As in, if I were Cathleen I'd throw caution to the wind, and buy them for my wedding and then wear them every single day for the rest of my life, or the life of my knees. Find these beauties here.



Then somehow I stumbled into the occasions dresses at Nordstrom and found this.

My goodness, how much am I in love right now?