market under glass ticket giveaway

if you know anything about me or my blog you know that i simply LOVE food, and if you don't believe me all you have to do is look at my butt for proof.

so when i was approached by the Cleveland Foodbank, a local nonprofit that does amazing things for our community to be a "celebrity server" for their premier event of the year, Market Under Glass, i did two things:

1) laughed at the idea of being a "celebrity server" then immediately wondered how this "celebrity server" titled could benefit me street cred, i.e. would cute boys think i'm cooler? once i realized that probably wasn't the case i thought... 
2) hey, at least there will be good food at the event, tons of people and it's all for a good cause. sign me up.

Market Under Glass will take place thursday, april 22nd from 6 to 9pm at the Galleria at Erieview. the event benefits the annual Harvest for Hunger campaign, a 21 county food and funds drive coordinated by the Cleveland Foodbank.

over 1,200 guests will spend the evening tasting delicious food, wine and beer from more than 50 cleveland area restaurants like AMP150, Great Lakes Brewing Company, L'albatros, Bar Cento and Shinto, as well as various beverage purveyors.

pre-sale general admission tickets can be purchased online HERE for $85 which entitles you to unlimited food and drinks - there is a $150 VIP ticket option too, including a VIP suite and an after party. tickets are $100 at the door the day of the event.

so who wants to go to Market Under Glass with me?

leave a comment on this post telling me your favorite restaurant in cleveland for your chance to win two (2) tickets to Market Under Glass on thursday, april 22nd - a $200 value!

i'll choose the winner next wednesday april 7th so go 'head and get your comment on.

good luck kids.

new york may be the big apple, but cleveland's still my plum

ok, i love new york city.

the energy, the hustle, the anonymity, the possibilities.

it's contagious.

i arrived in the city saturday afternoon and headed directly to my little sister's harlem apartment (which is amazing by the way), and it's pretty much straight GO from there.

we get ready, we being my sister and our friend jason (the ugly furniture dude), and head to the williamsburg area of brooklyn to the radegast hall and biergarten for my sissy's 27th birthday party. the bar itself was way rad - massive beers, rows of picnic tables and lots of kielbasa and brats to choose from. the crowd was pretty cool too, heavy on the hipsters but still cool.

 scott, monique, sissy, me and jason

it was great getting to meet some of my sister's friends and getting to hang out with the leah's. yes, the leah's - our good friends, both named leah, both greek, and both from canton living in brooklyn. the leah's.


from the beirgarten we walked across the street to this bar called the levee where even in my black top, black skinny jeans, visible tattoo and heels i was the yuppiest person in the bar. this bar puts the hip in hipster and it smelled. at least when you ordered a beer it came with a koozie.

 some awesome graffiti outside of the levee - impressive.

next stop we walked to the cove where some of my sister's friends knew the DJ - and the dance party began. the 90's light techno dance party that is. so random.  

finally we landed at K & M where the DJ was awesome, i was drinking bud heavy and we danced till 4am to jay z. as we stumbled into the cab back to harlem i didn't even mind that this "mainstream girl" smelled like hipster.

jason, sissy, dave and eddie enjoying a jay z dance party USA

after only 5 hours of sleep it was time to get up and start drinking again - yay!

brunch with sissy, jason, brooke, leah m, nina and rachel at calle ocho in the upper west side was glorious. they had this little thing called an unlimited sangria bar - it was amazing. i was pretty hungover from the night before but two glasses of the good stuff later and i was ready for round two, three, four and five.

and that would be a sangria bar...

after a delicious brunch me and sissy, brooke and jason headed to mcaleer's pub for some post sangria beers and then to blondies sports to watch the cavs game. it was at blondies where we got to met up with my friends alymcjew and jewfroblu it was so wonderful to see them!!

by now it was around 7pm and we've been drinking for seven hours and food was required. so we crossed over to the east village where sissy and jason's favorite burger in the city is served at paul's "da burger joint". now while i didn't get a burger i took bites of my sister's and damn was it lovely. i won't make the mistake of not ordering one ever again.

now while paul's had the burgers we didn't order any fries because those would be consumed two doors down at pomme frites. yes, a food joint that only serves pomme frites, it was heavenly and i would like one to be opened in cleveland ASAP.

my last and final stop of this sunday funday was at dempsey's to meet for the first time a blogger/author named jason mulgrew that i've been reading/internet crushing on since '05.

fact: the whole time we were hanging out i was attempting to be way more sober than i actually was and was probably nervously talking out of my ass or doing the opposite of nervous talking and just shutting my mouth for fear of what would come out.

although, now that i think about it perhaps i did a horrible job of pretending to be sober, i'll have to ask him. i'm sure it was an awesome first impression.... or not.

regardless of my meeting jason eight hours deep into a sunday funday it was cool as hell of him to come out and meet me especially, since he's a famous published author now. his book, everything is wrong with me: a memoir of an american childhood gone, well, wrong came about about a month ago and is laugh out loud funny. having finished it last week i need to tell you all about it, but that's another post in and of itself for later this week.

after recapping all of the above i'm pretty confident that i took full advantage of my two nights in NYC and i can't wait to go back - thanks for hosting me sissy!
 

who's a bad influence? me? never.

freshman year at university of dayton i was matched up with a wonderful random roommate named mary.

we were total opposites in that she was a viola major and actually went to class freshman year while i focused more on not going to class and spending my evenings at the bar. we did have one thing in common though, we liked to smoke lots of cigarettes - along with the rest of our floor, 6 Adele, for that matter.

despite our differences we still got along very well, and i got a kick out of "teaching" her things.

when she came to UD, she had never drank, never had sex, never smoked pot, never wore makeup and never had a boyfriend.

now i don't want to say i was a bad influence on her, but i may or may not have gotten her drunk off of three zima's causing her to puke in our room's sink. not too long after the zima incident mary got a boyfriend, a fellow classically trained musician who was just perfect for her.

we are all adults here, and i don't need to be teaching you about the birds and the bees, but the time soon came when these two consenting adults thought it would be a good idea to start inserting tab A into slot B...

because of this, i had a "talk" with mary about it. telling her to go ahead and take the next step with her boyfriend if she thought they were ready to take the plunge.

the next day we made a trip to the drugstore to buy condoms (because of course our catholic university wouldn't sell them on campus, GASP!). the day of official sexing came and went and the couple was even more in L.O.V.E.

of course i still continued to influence mary throughout the year...

there may have been a couple more drinking incidents, first pot smoking experiences, and more condom buying - if nothing, this classical music playing couple was having LOTS of sex.

a lot more than i was having my freshman year of college, that's for sure.

in a weird way i was proud of my little mary, she was experiencing life, having fun, being a normal college kid.

that is until she got pregnant.

decided to keep the baby, broke up with her boyfriend, dropped out of school and moved back to rural pennsylvania.

um, yeah, no guilt there at all...

to this day i blame myself for taking a 19 year old straight A scholarship student, getting her drunk, buying her condoms and essentially getting her pregnant.

i may as well have gotten her knocked up myself.

but i didn't, she was an adult and not my responsibility..

but still.

it may be horrible, but i still can't help but fondly giggle when i think about mary and our freshman year living situation and all the fun times.

go college.

on that note, have a good weekend, kids - i'm off to NYC for the weekend to visit my sissy!

p.s. mary is currently happy as all heck living in PA with her two sons.

CIFF, wine, and cleveland blog friends

i wanted to come home tonight and write about a a very funny story from my freshman year in college.... but i decided to go out instead so that story is going to have to wait till tomorrow.

tuesday night i kidnapped JV and headed to the cleveland international film festival where we met up with the lovely amelia and checked out the flick the baby formula. we all laughed out loud and all bawled like a baby throughout the film and i would recommend renting it.

i would go into the whole storyline but frankly, i'm a little buzzed up and i think that my synopsis wouldn't do it justice.

moving on.

while we all enjoyed the film, i more so got into the energy of the festival as a whole, as hippy dippy as it sounds it's just effing cool to participate in - not to mention a great event for the city of cleveland.

after the film we all headed to tower230 for some wine and cocktails where JV may or may not have eaten her weight in maraschino cherries and i may or may not have been caught on film by amelia tying said maraschino cherry stems into a knot with my tongue.

you'll have that.

but the icing on the cake came when while walking home from tower city with JV and ran into my new friend angelina who informed my that my blog turned real life friend allison from green dog wine was in crop bistro - cue happiness stemming from FINALLY getting to meet her.

all i know is happy hour is in our very near future.

it was a wonderful evening with great friends in the great city of cleveland.

and now, sleep.

a girl and her blog

i've been thinking about writing this post for a very, very long time....

girl starts blog.

girl's blog eventually starts getting readers, many in fact.

girl continues to blog.

girl gets first pitch from a company to write about something on her now traffic worthy blog.

girl gets excited!

girl writes about things that she thinks are fun and that her readers would enjoy.

the girl also gets some really cool stuff, and gets to go to some really cool events for doing so.

the girl with the blog is happy.

that is until the girl is suddenly spending more time writing and promoting events and products for other people instead of having fun writing for herself...

...which was why the girl started the blog in the first place.

blogging suddenly becomes a chore.

the girl can't manage all the pitches filling up her email inbox and starts to feel guilty when she can't make an event or doesn't feel like writing about something.

the girl just wants to write for herself but the last thing she wants to do is not promote her city, her passions, and her friends.

the girl doesn't want to seem ungrateful...

... but there just aren't enough hours in the day.

"eff this!", the girl says, "this is my blog and i'm taking it back."

the girl starts deleting/turning down pitches.

the girl is going to start writing for herself again.

the girl is happy.

... for now.

this blog is a relationship after all, the longest relationship the girl's ever had, and it just so happens to be evolving.

you'll have that.

___________________________________________________________________

p.s. this doesn't mean that i'm never going to accept a pitch or talk about events/organizations that i enjoy, it just means that i'm going to be a bit more selective. all while NOT feeling guilty if i don't write about something - which is what i'm struggling with the most.

CLE to DC, roadtrip edition.

this past weekend i traveled to washington DC - road tripped to be exact.

to me going on a road trip with someone can tell you a lot about that person.

like if they sleep during the drive or not, if they are a backseat driver, if they are a radio nazi or if they have to pee every hour on the hour, etc.

on the drive from CLE to DC and back with my friends AJP and lara i learned that AJP likes to sing like me, lara isn't allowed to be in charge of getting directions ever again and the only person that has to pee every hour is me.

as for radio nazi there was only one band that AJP and lara wouldn't listen to - the dave matthews band. which sucked because i love him so, but was funny as i threatened them with playing DMB repeatedly - i did trick them into listening to phish and grateful dead. sneaky hippie.

AJP and lara went to DC to run the national half marathon with our friend kerns while i went to visit with my loves lexa and maxie.

the aim was to have it be a "low key" weekend... yup.

with dinner and drinks for all at comet ping pong friday night, it started off kinda low key.

but when lexa and i spent saturday afternoon drinking at alero it became a little less low key. especially when i ordered a pitcher of sangria, and the server began to walk away. we had to stop him because lexa needed to place her order of a pitcher of margaritas still.

the pitcher was just for me...obviously.

four hours of patio drinking later we headed out for the evening meeting up with the rest of the girls and some of their new friends and my old friend patrick. we were out in the adams morgan area and hit up multiple bars all of which i'm too lazy to list here.

the area was fun and the dance party of one i was having was only made better with it became a dance party of two once maxie arrived.

the drive home was beyond easy especially because we took the turnpike instead of the dreaded route 30 - never again.

and now it's monday, i'm back at work, playing catch up like whoa, and counting down the minutes till i hop on a flight to NYC this weekend.

can't. wait.

editors note: yes, i know there aren't any pictures, epic fail on my part ok? guilty as charged.

CIFF opening night film, TiMER

last night i had the privilege to attend the cleveland international film festival opening film and gala with my friend JV.

as we headed to tower city cinema's i had the general idea of what the opening film, TiMER, was all about.

essentially a revolutionary device has been created that is implanted into your wrist that counts down to the specific moment that you meet your one true love.

it's a science - when the day you meet your soul mate arrives, the moment you make eye contact with him/her your TiMER goes off, as does his/hers alerting both of you that whether it's today or ten years from now, this is the person you are going to be with for all eternity.

it's an interesting concept to say the least.


as a sucker for all things romantic comedy as well as technology geekdom this movie was right up my alley. specifically because much like the protagonist in the film i'm about to turn 30 with zero knowledge or direction of who this mysterious soul mate of mine is, let alone if he even exists.

but i promise you this movie isn't all self reflective bitter old women style - it's actually VERY FUNNY. i don't recall the last time i laughed out loud as much during a screening.

but between all the laughter and awkward jokes you can't help but wonder, if given the opportunity to install a TiMER alerting you of when you're meeting your true love, would you do it?

would it be worth it? would it just cause you to stop looking for love at not, never taking a detour, simply waiting till your TiMER goes off?

would it take all the fun out of it? it being dating, random sex, mystery, flirting, etc

personally i'm torn as to what i would do - as i'm admittedly a hopeless romantic i'm also lazy as all hell and if someone had the ability to tell me who and when i would meet the person i'm supposed to be with i'd probably do it.

what about you? would you get a TiMER?

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st patrick's day in cleveland, 2010

my st. patrick's day festivities were full of fun and friends, how about yours?

my day started with breakfast at my apartment and lots of irish mimosa's (did you watch the video yet?). with stops at HOB, winking lizard for the thunder::tech party, flannery's, map room, dinner at sushi rock (how irish of us), and dancing at the harp i was up drinking from 7:30am to 1:30am.

i also pretty much followed the boys from the county hell around to all their shows (HOB, flannery's and the harp) - i might as well become a groupie now.

some of the t::t crew at winking lizard - jason, christina, K$, salami rose, me, jerbear, and bruce

for company on the smaller side t::t sure has a lot of red haired team members - jerbear, bruce, K$, josh and christina

AJP, me and JV at winking lizard gateway district

the best outfits of the day - salami rose and keith

BEST PICTURE OF THE DAY! that would be slider, ketchup, me, lara, onion and mustard all decked out in their st pat's gear. go tribe!

i can't wait for next year already, for serious.

how to make an irish mimosa

happy st patrick's day, kids!!!

ever want to know how to make an irish mimosa?

you know you do.

well salami rose and i just make this video (at 8am thankyouverymuch) showing you exactly how to - get excited.



have fun today guys, and BE SAFE!

xoxo

a little march vacation never hurt anyone

i'm going to try to not rub in the fact that today is my last day of work this week.

you read that right, i'm off wednesday, thursday and friday.

between st. patrick's day (which is a company paid holiday for me), the CIFF gala, and my DC road trip with AJP and lara, this week/weekend is going to be quite the debacle.

throw in the fact that i'm going to NYC next weekend for my sissy's birthday, have teen's bachelorette party and wedding and muffin's 30th birthday celebration filling up my april and a trip to the kentucky derby for kate's bachelorette party as the cherry on top i'm contemplating how i'm even going to catch my breath.

but i wouldn't have it any other way.

do i maybe wish my wallet wasn't going to be so stressed these upcoming months?

perhaps, but you only live once.

i'm a lucky girl who has the best friends in the world.

now, if i could just trick find a smart man to keep up with me....

weekend fun

i like weekends.

i like driving to pittsburgh.

i like my friends.

i like whiskey.

i like pictures.

i love the cavs.

i hate the celtics.

as i headed to pittsburgh saturday morning for one of my best friends bridal showers the above picture happened.... there's a happy ending though - i just got a warning!! score.

i'm so honored to be in my friend teen's wedding this april, and the next month with the bachelorette party and the wedding itself it's going to be a fun time. from left to right, meet the bridesmaids... lara, me, amie, the bride teen, lee-anna and diva

with much work to do on sunday i drove back to cleveland after teen's wonderful shower in pittsburgh with plans to stay in and "be good" for the remainder of saturday night.

i was swayed a bit...

the grevey sisters! poo poo, norah and ellen at reddstone

the reason for the reddstone get together was my friend drew's 30th birthday. that's drew there rocking sonpal's (dude on the right) sweet, sweet t-shirt

aside from t-shirt modeling drew also had a blast playing DJ with sonpal who was obviously playing good tunes as the following happened...

poo poo rocking the heck out, with MOB and ellen as backup dancers of course...

sunday brought lunch at the greenhouse tavern with salami rose, mark and jill before the cavs vs celtics game.

yes, the cavs won.

literally our entire section (133) tried to get the above sign on the jumbotron throughout the entire game. we danced, we yelled in unison at the cameraman, we chanted, but still no camera action - FAIL. again.

at least the sign salami rose made was cute...

'twas a good weekend kids and i hope yours was as well.

____________________________________________________________________

two announcements:

1. only two days left to donate $16 to Providence House to help tuck a baby in tonight.

2. my buddy scott sargent, who is an editor of the cleveland sports blog waiting for next year, has been chosen as a top four finalist in the FSO "Blog Sports Ohio" sports blogger contest. and if you are so obliged, sending an online vote his way this week would be much appreciated because obviously we need a cleveland sports blogger to win... vote as many times as you can!

meat armor and CIFF movie ticket winners

let's all stop ignoring the big white elephant in the room, shall we?

(via latfh.com)

what. the. EFF. is. that?

gives a whole new meaning to the words flank steak doesn't it?

...

um, ok.

moving on.

it's time to announce the winners of my cleveland international film festival ticket voucher giveaway.

congrats to:
- poiseinparma
- rob pitingolo
- joanna m
- kakaty

(i decided to choose four winners instead of three... BONUS!)

if the winners could please email me at clevelandsaplum @ gmail . com their full name and address i'll get your ticket vouchers in the mail ASAP.

and if you didn't win, don't worry - you can still purchase tickets online here. CIFF starts on march 18th and runs till the 28th so check out the showtimes and get yourself to the theater!

____________________________________________________________________

don't forget i'm still raising money for Providence House - donate $16 today to help tuck a baby in tonight!

and to think i thought this never mattered

everyone knows about the whole toilet paper roll over/under debate.

(i first bitched about it on the blog back in january of '08)

its been discussed, its been joked about, it was even turned into a national cottonelle ad campaign/poll and it's well, OLD news.

but not to fear, i have a new question to take the place of the over/under debate.

it's something that i've been taking note of recently in people's homes all undercover like.

when storing your drinking glasses in the cupboard, do you keep them top up or top down?

personally i keep mine top down (chrome spinnin') because i think that it protects the clean glass from getting dust or other random floaty things in it.


now my roommate on the other hand puts the glasses away top up - i.e. you can always tell which one of us most recently unloaded the dishwasher.



so which is it?

drinking glasses stored top up, or top down?

things i *should* be writing about

i should be writing about last friday's happy hour at flannery's with friends, dinner at johnny's little bar, drinks at nauti mermaid and debauchery at barley house and beyond.

i should be writing about how saturday afternoon i saw crazy heart at the capitol theater with my mom and sissy, bought an awesome ring and FINALLY got to meet the famous danielle at room service, and my ridiculously awesome meal at luxe kitchen & lounge.

i should be writing about how saturday night i had an epic solo dance party on the drive from cleveland to canton to get me excited for a night out in NC with my friends from home that took us everywhere from a strip club, to my favorite bar in the world geisen haus where i could drink out of my "sexy lexy" stein, and had me falling asleep as the sun came up.

i should be writing about the oscar watching party we had at my aunt's house sunday night and how good the awards were... but i was sleeping by the time the opening credits even started.

it was a long, unexpectedly random, very fun weekend to say the least, and i should be writing about it.

but instead, i'm going to sleep.

CIFF, providence house, and a big red truck

i'm typing this sunday night from my mother's house in canton, on her old, slower than molasses laptop.

(love you mom!)

my super fast and awesome laptop is in cleveland.

(missing me.)

that being said you should be reading a recap post of my randomly fun weekend but since i'm working on fred flintstone's laptop i'm going to have to go and post that for you guys tomorrow.

but while you are anxiously waiting for me to write it, don't forget to enter to win one of 3 pairs of movie ticket vouchers to this year's cleveland international film festival by commenting on this here post.

also, don't forget 2.0, that i'm still raising money for the Providence House babies and am nowhere near my goal of 160, $16 dollar donations by March 16th. so if you would be so obliged, please click here or here, or here, or here, to make a one time $16 donation to help tuck a baby in tonight.

oh, and one last thing...

remember my post last thursday about my turfing founder's field on UD's campus with my big red rental pick up truck? well my friend teen emailed me a picture of us in the bed of the truck from 2001 and it pretty much says it all - awesome.

teen and i in the backyard of our junior and senior year house, 520 lowes, having way too much fun pretending to be girls that drive big trucks.

totally normal.

have a good monday kids!

cleveland international film festival - let's go.

when i was approached to be an official blogger for the 34th annual cleveland international film festival i couldn't respond "YES!" to the email fast enough.

being an avid movie goer/fanatic, and having participated in every CIFF since moving to cleveland, i'm a huge fan of the festival and everything it represents.

this year the theme of the festival is, let's go - and that's exactly what i'm looking for clevelanders to do... GO, to the cleveland international film festival.

this year CIFF runs march 18th - 28th at the tower city center in the heart of downtown cleveland. over 150 features and 150 short subjects from more that 80 countries will be shown.

films run from 9am to 10pm daily, with midnight movies on both friday and saturday evenings. you can find the full movie schedule online here.

conveniently, today is the day that CIFF tickets officially go on sale!

you can purchase tickets by going online, calling 1.877.304.FILM or in-person at the ulmer & berne film festival store located in the lobby of tower city cinemas.

but wait, there's more.

i'm giving away three (3) separate pairs of ticket vouchers to this year's CIFF.

simply leave a comment telling me what your favorite childhood movie is and you'll be automatically entered to win two ticket vouchers, a $24 value.

i'll be drawing the winners next wednesday the 10th so there's enough time to get the vouchers out. (note: if you win, i'll be sending you some voucher rules and what not)

well good luck in the contest and i'll be seeing you all at CIFF!


p.s. i simply can't wait till the opening gala (3/18), it's going to be so rad.

save a horse ride a truck

i've always had an infatuation with cars.

you can ask any of my friends how much i love to drive, short or long distance, i'm in one of my happiest places behind the wheel, windows down, music up - way up.

now while i've had many, MANY speeding tickets, i've been lucky to have only been in one very minor accident in my 13 years of driving.

this accident occurred while i was a junior at the university of dayton. i was with a friend and we were driving from flanagan's to the hills (sober), and when i was trying to turn left i ran into a "mom's limo"* on brown street due to an illegally parked car obstructing my view.

no one was hurt, and i wasn't sited, but my car was damaged enough to need three days in the shop.

cue my talking to enterprise rental car coordinating my temporary transportation, and as i was on the phone with the clerk i stated, "i want something FUN!".

cue my filling out the rental paperwork when the clerk informed me that my "FUN!" car would be a pick-up truck. sweet, i thought, thinking i would be getting a smaller pick-up truck like a ford S10.

but when she directed me to my car it was a bright, cherry red, ford F150 extend cab that looked like the car below....


i went from a little nissan sentra to that hot mamma jamma.

obviously my friends and i were going to have some fun with this truck - there were going to be family shot guns a plenty, flat bed rides and ghetto cruises.**

cut to the end of a fabulous saturday night. i was driving my friends and i home in the hot mamma jamma red truck when i reached the part of the ghetto where stonemill dead ended into founders field.

but instead of turning right or left, i looked to my friends poo poo and foxxy who were in the truck with me and said, "i'm gunning it".

like, over founders field.***

pedal down, rubber burned, tire marks left on the grass.

i knew i was going to have "FUN" in this truck.

so what if i may or may not have committed a couple conduct violations in the process, it was college.

and man, it was fun.

___________________________________________________________________

*mom's limo - essentially a driver that gave UD students rides around campus. yeah, i hit a university owned taxi cab.

** ghetto cruise - UD's student housing neighborhood is called "the ghetto", and cruising the ghetto was hands down one of my favorite college pastimes. i may or may not have had a "crush stalking route" - don't judge.

*** founders field - the former field on UD's campus where rugby and many of the club sports were played. i.e. a big 'ol field of grass.

crooked river gaming: weaving the new casino into cleveland's existing urban fabric

whether you are for or against gambling in ohio, this past november issue 3 passed, which allows for a number of casino complexes (4) to be built in ohio.

more importantly one is going to be built here in cleveland.

personally, i couldn't be more excited about it. i voted yes on the issue and i'm confidant that we as clevelanders are going to do it right - right on the lakefront.

and it's organizations like the Cleveland Coalition that solidify my confidence in clevelanders creating a seamless transition into this new entertainment venture.
the Cleveland Coalition's focus is on creating a sustainable, vibrant community for everyone to live in while empowering citizens to take action through their philosophy: Educate. Collaborate. Act.

with these thoughts in mind the Cleveland Coalition decided to put together a series of positive events called, Crooked River Gaming: Weaving the New Casino Into the Cleveland's Existing Urban Fabric.

this series of events is essentially the first open forum discussion on the casino plan.

it's not about the politics of it all, it's not about whether you are for or against them coming - it's too late for that, it's happening. it's about having a discussion as to how we can make the casino successful, not only for the owner/operator but for the city of cleveland and northeast ohio as a whole.

this friday, march 5th, from 5 to 7:30pm at The City Club, the first FREE Crooked River Gaming event is going to take place to discuss what having a casino in cleveland is really going to mean.

the Cleveland Coalition team consisting of, Ahmed Abonamah, Jason Bristol, Fran DiDonato, David Jurca, Nick Martin, Beth Sebian, Gauri Torgalkar, Graham Veysey and Eric Wobser have gather a VERY impressive panel for friday's event.

Thomas V Chema - President, Hiram College

Christopher Diehl - Architect, Assoc. Professor at Kent State

Len Komoroski - President, Cavaliers/Quicken Loans Arena

David Schwarz - President and CEO of David M. Schwarz Architects, Inc.

moderator: Eric Wellman - Host of Morning Edition on 90.3 WCPN Ideastream

for more information on this event, or additional events in the future, check out the Cleveland Coalition facebook page or website, and to attend this free event please RSVP to rsvp@clevelandcoalition.org

too lazy to blog so i vlogged

i recorded the video below last night right after i got home from the gym because i realized that i had absolutely ZERO brain capacity to write a blog for today.

so instead, i took the "easy" way out and recorded a vlog of myself sans makeup, grubby t-shirt, and showing my tired eyes.

but do i care how bad i look? not particularly, y'all know i can look good when i want.

i care more about having to give up my blackberry curve to my new HTC google android phone.

you'll see, just watch - apparently i'm traumatized.





so what should i do with my old blackberry?

jump back ball 2010

the PlayhouseSquare event, Jump Back Ball, that i've been talking about here on the plum for awhile now finally took place saturday night.

and i'm happy to report that this year's event lived up to the hype yet again. the crowd was fantastic, the people watching was unparalleled, drinks were a flowing from an ice luge, and dancing on stage was accomplished.

actually, i'm pretty sure i acted like jump back ball was my party. as i was basically just wandering around literally greeting people, chatting,and making sure everyone was having a great time but never really knowing where the friends i came with were until suddenly they were by my side.

one thing i didn't expect that happened at the party was so many wonderful people coming up to me saying that they are a fan of this blog. it's surreal every time that happens and i don't think i'll ever get used to being recognized.

but, not gonna lie here, it's pretty damn flattering every time it happens - and to the new friends that came up to me, i'm glad you did!

let's look at some pictures, shall we?

i know this pic is totally overexposed but it's one of the few group of girls shots i have. l to r: lzone, charity, moe, beaver, me, muffin and court

martha, cubby, hatchel and court in their sunday best

moe, janet and marc dancing on the state stage

a shot of the dance floor, i.e. the state theater stage, taken from the band stage. see my friend janet taking a pic in the front of this pic? look below...

that would be moe and myself on stage with the spazmatics.... right before we got kicked off stage.

the magnificent state theater lobby, so beautiful! miserable city my ass... also, i told you guys there would be a ton of people there.

martha, me and MOB who works for PlayhouseSquare, hence her rocking the tshirt at the end of the night

muffin, me, beaver and martha towards the end of the night

now that ladies and gentlemen is what you call at PAR-TAY! is it sad that i'm already looking forward to next year? nope.

hope you all had a great weekend, and surprise, it's march already!