Suri's Burn Book

Yesterday, my friend Doro changed my life by sending me the link to Suri's Burn Book.  Many of you are aware of my long-standing obsession with celebritot Suri Cruise . . . and now it's reached a whole new level.

Suri's Burn Book is a tumblr account in which Suri posts pictures of celebs & their kids and comments on them.  And makes fun of her parents, Tom and Katie.  And OMFG is she hilarious.  Exempli gratia:

August 18, 2011

While we’re on the subject of famous Swedes, here is a photo of Elin Nordegren and her two children, Sam and Charlie. This family has become kind of reclusive post-Tiger, but they were recently seen out and about in Miami.

I am disappointed that Sam and I missed each other on our Miami vacations, because I completely approve of her fashion choices—from that fun headband to that slimming belt!—and would have loved to have her over for tea. We also would have a lot to talk about, like having embarrassing fathers and the challenges of having moms who wear denim.

Filed under sam woods charlie woods elin nordegren

HAHA!  Embarrassing fathers and the challenges of having moms who wear denim!!!  Suffice to say I spent quite a bit of time yesterday browsing Suri's files, and will continue to do so via her tumblr and twitter.  I suggest you do the same.

Happy Friday!

I apologize in advance for making fun of my mother

but I can't help it.  Did you read my post yesterday?  Wellll . . . my mama did.  And I received this email yesterday morning, first thing:

Clairey

I just read your blog and I am dead serious--DO NOT GO HANGING OUT WITH MOTORCYCLE GANGS

I'm not kidding.  Do not go to any party of theirs.

Mama

Haven't laughed that hard in a while.

Boots with the Fr

Two things you should know about my nephew, Ethan (my cousin Jennifer's son) to set up this story:

1. He is six years old and working on writing in his class;
2. He's been a hip hop fan since birth.

The other day, Jennifer and her mama (my aunt KK) were driving to our Nana's house with Ethan in his car seat in the back.  Prior to getting in the car, Ethan requested his notebook so that he could use it in the car.

All the way to Nana's, he was quietly scribbling away in his notebook, practicing his writing, except for when he paused to ask, "How do you spell big?"

When they got to Nana's, Jennifer asked Ethan what he'd been working on, and he proudly presented her with this:

Enlarge it if you can't read it.

I don't think Ethan understood why Jennifer burst out laughing . . .

The Solution to Racism in America

While Jennifer was here, she showed me something magical: the following commercial for Red House Furniture in High Point, North Carolina.  I emailed the link to drollgirl immediately, knowing it was up her alley, but then I decided I had to share it with the rest of you.

Videos can be tedious but trust me . . . this one's worth it.

Snobbery

I try REALLY hard not to be a grammar snob.  I totally appreciate colloquial English, and think that proper grammatical structure has virtually no place in spoken language (or, as I've often demonstrated, my blog.  ha!).

But I can't help it.  Drives me batty when I see people putting apostrophes where they don't belong (like in random plural words).  Ex:

"Hello from the Anderson's!"

"Check out these shirt's!"

Anyway, one too many mutterings about how this nonsense makes me want to pull my hair out, and I get an email from my dear friend Brady yesterday saying, "Saw this and immediately thought of you."  He was referring to this letterpress card from Etsy seller shopsaplingpress.  Check out the hilarity:

letterpress card

I'd buy a whole box full if I didn't think I'd alienate all the recipients.  :)

this dude is AWESOME.

Yesterday morning, cartoonist Zach Weiner began getting messages from twitter followers alerting him to the fact that NOM, an anti-gay marriage group, had appropriated one of his images and posted it on their website.  This was the original cartoon:

So what else was a boy to do except change the image to this?

Since NOM had "hotlinked" the image from Zach Weiner's website, whatever Zach changed the image to then appeared on their page.  Here's an awesome screenshot:

Preeeeeeeettttttty hilarious, right?

p.s. you can read more about it here.
p.p.s. I love hanging out in so-cal with my peeps!

Brandon

Perhaps obsessiveness runs in the family.  I myself have not escaped the curse; as you know, I've watched this video about 864 times, lately I can't stop ordering takeout from Currylicious, and let's be honest: I still remember my 7th grade crush's home phone number, for that was the depth of my obsession (notice I said crush--this dream was never realized).


But I think my dad is worse than me.  His most recent obsession?  A termite-sniffing beagle.

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My dad travels a lot for work, and claims that he found an article about "Brandon" in a hotel magazine.  Evidently, Brandon and his owner are the greatest new thing in pest control; the owner walks Brandon through the inside & outside of the house, and Brandon scratches wherever there are termites.  He is allegedly far more effective than humans or machines.  

It all started when my stepmom, sister, and I received this email from Dad:

Kit Kiefer to Amy, me, Kate

show details Jan 18 (9 days ago)

You have to watch the video! Unbelievable!

http://www.pestfree.com/meet-brandon

I couldn't get the video to load, but I figured it was just another one of the billions of dog-related things that he sends us all too frequently, so I shrugged it off.  However, Dad fired back:  YOU MUST SEE IT!  GOOGLE "BRANDON PEST CONTROL!"  So I did, hoping for something amazing.

Well . . . I mean, it is what it is.  I suppose it is mildly entertaining that this dog is so well-trained that he can detect termites.  But my enthusiasm for the whole thing gets me about as for as 0:24 into the video.

But my dad's outta control, y'all.   He's been signing emails to me: 

"Love you! (and Brandon),

Dad"

After fielding a couple phone calls from him just to talk about Brandon, I answered his last one, "Dad, is this call about Brandon?"  To which his answer was, " . . . . yes."

All of us but one have dismissed this as a period of temporary lunacy.  The one who's holding out?  You guessed it--Ignatius.

not a happy camper

Ignatius is pissed that all of Dad's attention is now on another beagle, and one that he's never even met, at that.  Ignatius is supposed to be the star of the show!  Who cares if he can't sniff termites??  

(This next part requires me to confess to y'all that Ignatius has a facebook page.  But by now my dad's sanity has already been discredited, so it should come as no surprise).  

Prior to checking out Ignatius's facebook page in the heat of all this "Brandon" stuff, I figured the funniest part about the whole ordeal was that the beagle's name is "Brandon."  Isn't it funny when pets have totally human names?  Cracks me up.  In any case, then I saw Ignatius's facebook status, and I laughed hard enough to see the value in all this: 

• 
  

  Ignatius R. Kiefer

  Brandon sucks.

  January 22 at 11:53am ·  · Comment
  

Proposition 19: "i was gonna go to church, but then i got hiiiiigh"

Yesterday, when I walked into school with my "I Voted" sticker, I saw one of my students in the main office, and he immediately said:

"Ms. Kiefer, did you vote for that marijuana thing???"

Many of y'all non-Californians know about the proposition on our ballots yesterday that would have legalized (an ounce or less) of marijuana in limited settings (in private homes, or in designated spots for marijuana, such as cannabis clubs).

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Now, I don't smoke weed.  I hate the smell, I hate it when my students come in with glazed red eyes, and I hate smoking anything.  Ugh, just makes me cough and gives me a headache.  And I have to confess that I think stoners are kinda lame, especially when they're over the age of 17.  I mean come on, dude.  I have no problem with people who smoke weed occasionally (I do live in California after all), but I'm a little judgey about those whose lives revolve around the ganja.

That said, I voted for Prop 19, cause I figure, if people are gonna smoke it, we might as well regulate and tax it, cause Lord knows our state could use the money!  I mean, public schools have four furlough days this year.  WTF?!  

But it didn't pass.  In any case, I was talking to my 5th period about the issue yesterday, when GM said this:

"I was in this Big Brother Big Sister program & I had this white dude & I went through his stuff while he was in the shower, & I found some marijuana in this pill bottle up in his drawer.  And he try to tell me he use it for MEDICINE, he be lyin' like hell! I took a piece of it and I gave it to my brother!"

HA!  Tooooo funny.  I mean, it's not legalizing marijuana in limited forms would mean that the world would come to this:

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Geez.

"Outfit Post"

As you all know, Summer has gone through a lot of sadness lately.  So, sometimes we like to make fun of ourselves.  Sometimes, we like to send each other photo documentation of our less fashionable moments.

I sent this to Micaela, and then she wanted in on the action:

Hahaha, I crack myself up.

Yearbook Photos

So today is makeup Picture Day at Balboa, which has me thinking about yearbooks and photos and how such awesome and dreadful moments in our lives are immortalized in yearbooks.  I gotta say, I'm so glad that the yearbook is an old tradition that's stuck around in this electro-age we're living in.

It's so awkward to sit and pose for a camera.  Especially on a strangely short stool with a fake backdrop behind you.

All this thinking about picture-taking, coupled with my chronic procrastination, has made me google yearbook photos.  It's freakin' amazing what's out there, y'all.  Here are some of my favorites:

from

Jeffree Star Best Hair yearbook photo 2003

from

Sadly, I couldn't find the high school yearbook photo for Taylor Kitsch (aka Tim Riggins).  He must have his bases WELL covered.

And here are my high school senior pics:

Ha!  Funny, huh?