I can now claim...

that there are pictures of me floating around on the internet.

Here are some SF Carnval pics, thanks to Juan Carlos Pometta Betancourt

Here comes the L.A.W. float down Mission street.

Yours truly third from the front.

Singing to J.Lo and, it seems, about to both a)lose my top and b)hurl.

Let's Get Loud!

Check out those falsies (eyelashes, that is)

Our fearless leader, Jaime. Also find him here.

El Brasileno, Sidney

Brasilian Birds in their Cage

The Girls who drank all the Jack Daniels, prior to starting the parade

[I didn't post any of the more scandalous shots here, but if you click on any of the above links, you can scroll through about 600 Carnaval pictures, about 50 of which are ours--just look for the red and gold.]

(side note)

[Is it just me, or are the ads on my blog really funny right now? "Looking for a girlfriend?"; "Date sexy rich singles"; "How to get your ex back"; and "Find a girlfriend". if there was only an ad that would read: "how to not be chickens*%t when it comes to casually handing your business card to a friend whom you'd like to see again, but apparantly he's too chickens*%t to ask for your number"]

Celia Cruz said it best

"La vida es un carnaval". That was my theme for a 'salsariffic' weekend.

San Francisco Carnaval 2005 was this past weekend. Talk about a BLAST! I have never been part of such a wild-crazy-fun-amped up-energy-driven event. Seriously.

First off, I am SO proud of our Latin American Workout float. It looked awesome. All red and gold and shiny in the bright sunlight. And a cage mechanism which opened up to reveal scantily clad Brazilians inside -- the photographers went NUTS! I have NO problem saying that had it not been for the efforts of a select few (myself included), that our firey float would never have made it to the parade. Lots of blood, sweat and yes, even tears went into that thing. And what took us days and days to build, took only 2 hours to take down. If I can ever figure out how to post a picture, I'll do so.

Secondly, our costumes: gorgeous. Sparkly, spangly, sexy, red/gold/yellow/orange concoctions of carnaval festiveness. Thanks to Estella, who worked day and night -- up until 6:30 a.m. on the day of the parade. We were on fire, as it were.

Thirdly, our music was *hot*, with DJ Bosco (Friday night regular at Jillian's) mixing our routine numbers with salsa and raeggaeton on the front truck while Victor kept it live on our second truck, playing the congas, djembe, shekere and surdo.

I have to also mention the CROWD of people who were lining the streets to see the parade. It was great fun to play off of them -- dancing, singing and flirting with the party-goers, all out to celebrate in the warm sunshine.

The only drawbacks from the whole experience? A slight headcold and the fact that I have Jennifer Lopez' "Let's get loud" playing over and over and over and over again in my head.
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MUSIC TAG (sorry about the delay, Jen....)

Total volume of music files on my computer: 939 bytes. Yeah, not much. Those of you who know me, know how lo-tech I can be.

Last CD I bought: Wellllll.....I can never buy *just one* at a time. The last few I bought: "Llegan...Van Van"; Madeleine Peyroux; and a 2005 Raeggaeton hits compilation.

Song playing right now: Well, if you read the entire post, you would know that the soundtrack of my brain is currently "Let's get loud" by J. Lo. .

5 songs I listen to a lot, or that mean a lot to me:

1. "Politik" by Coldplay (A rush of blood to the head). I just really love this song.

2. The entire Joshua Tree album and Simon and Garfunkles' greatest hits. COUNTLESS hours of my existence - esp. during high school - spent listening to these with my friend Ty. Seriously. Over and over and over.

3. "Dos Gardenias" from the Buena Vista Social Club self-titled album. Beautiful song. The whole album, in fact, is perfect to play while cooking.

4. "I will survive," Cake's version. Rock-out funky, yo. This was my theme song my sophomore year of college.

5. "In your eyes" by Peter Gabriel. This is just my all-time favorite song. Ever.

I'm supposed to pass this on to 5 people. But all the people with blogs whom I know have already done this. So, if you're out there in cyberspace reading this and feel like continuing the meme, go for it!

MY EARS ARE RINGING

...in as good a way as is possible, if one is going to indeed have ringing ears, thanks to this guy and also him.

Thanks to all my peeps who turned up at the club. We had a blast!

And, as always, more drama unfolds (but not in a bad way) in the whole ex-capade (I've been listening to Janet, can you tell?

AND she had the cutest shoes EVER!

I finally got to spend some *quality* time with H, P's new girlfriend, at the opera tonight.

We talked during intermission, and then again backstage while we waited for everyone to get out of costume.

The biggest tragedy about the whole situation? Under different circumstances, H and I would totally be friends. She's really cool. Go figure.

However, P did mangage to piss me off tonight.

H was in the bathroom when the man himself comes out of the dressing room. He proceeds to introduce me as his "ex" to a couple of people. (I was like, okay....). Then, as a nicely juxtaposed comparaison, cue the "Baby, come meet these people" directed to H.

Talk about feeling like chopped liver. Boooooooooooo.

My brother would totally kick his ass for that. HA!

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In other news, I met up with Giovanni yesterday for the first time. We meet at *$ and then went and had a beer. It was...interesting. Jury's still out.

Ever wondered...

...what you're worth? As in, if someone had to purchase you?

I bet you're all thinking this is going to be one serious post.

Not!

I was working as a temp for the nice people over at SHD for the last few months. This week was my first official 'non temp' job. I was hired over at the Fund. Now, basically, SHD gets paid because I was hired. They sold me. Seriously. I saw the invoice (I pay all the bills)!

My purchase price was $7,000.00. However, probably since I am available only in limited quantity, they slashed the price and let me go for $5,000.00.

BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE!

I also come with (no kidding) a "one-year guarantee". Funny, eh?
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In other news....
I met my ex's new girlfriend last night. He swung by to pick up this package from his mom at my house (he doesn't have an address at the moment) and she was in the car. He's all, "hey, do you wanna come meet my girlfriend?"

I looked at him, and I KNOW I had some sort of funny, pained, and slightly panicky expression on my face. But I couldn't stop myself, I said "ummmm...sure?"

So, we go to the car, where H proceeds to give me the one over before pro-offering her hand. P joked that perhaps the two of us could exchange notes (Lucky me, I get to see her again on Sunday when I go see Madame Butterfly).

I don't know if she knows that I'm "the republican" aka the ex-girlfriend who voted for Bush. But I sure know who she is, and damned if there wasn't a twinge of jealousy that reared its ugly head deep down inside of me last night.

All I have to say is I'm gonna look good when I go to the opera Sunday night. HA. Is that really so wrong? nahhhhhhh.

Being an adult is not for wimps.