Shenanigans in Houston

Soooo......I'm leaving Houston in a couple of hours, but before I go, I wanted to catch everybody up on all the cool, fun stuff that happened while I was down here. I tried to keep you posted as it all happened, I really did, but my ungodly workoad (writing two papers up for publiation and trying to get the data collection for two separate projects underway) ate up all of my time. Sorry about that.

Cool thing #1: My sister and I got tattoos!

(click for bigger)

We got them a couple of days ago, but we'd been thinking about it for awhile now. Leila already has a tattoo. They're both variations of the arrows of chaos symbol (which I mostly just think looks cool), so they're from the same family but not identical. Getting it was surprisingly not at all painful, and I think it hurt less than when I used to bleach my hair with industrial strength chemicals to dye it funny colors. I totally psyched myself out, though, right before the guy actually started tattooing me. I'm such a loser.

Cool Thing #2: 3rd Annual Fat Girl Face Off

A couple of years ago, my sister and her friends decided to have an eating contest and dubbed it the Fat Girl Face Off. It's turned into kind of an ordeal around here. Last year, the girls let Jon participate as long as he dressed in drag, and he kicked their asses.

So, who took home the gold for eating a ton of tacos, doughnuts and watermelon?

Sam did! It was a rousing return to form for the 1st annual champion. Which means....

Jon lost. He went from reigning champion to last place. I was his coach and I was truly shamed by his dismal performance. He didn't even bring his C game! I've since dropped him as my athlete and adopted Mandy (who came in at a very close second) who was basically coachless.

Cool Thing #4: Leila finished her scarf!

I made her frolic in the backyard so I could take pictures. I'm very proud.

And finally, Cool Thing #5: IHOP!

Man, I love IHOP. Always have. I met my friend Lisa there for breakfast yesterday. Here she is stealing ketchup from a nearby table:

Everytime I go to IHOP, I order the happy face pancakes from the kids menu. I know it's silly, but those things are tasty. Also, I really believe that few things in life are more fun than getting food that's happy to see you and gleefully eating it, especially when you pour strawberry syrup on it and pretedn it's blood. I guess it awakens a werid Godzilla impulse in me or something.

So that's what happened while I was in Houston. I'm flying to Minneapolis today to hang out with Dani (who the penguin on the sidebar is named after) and go to another of those big socialist thingies.