I hate TJ Maxx.

Every time I walk into that store I get sucked into the TJ Maxx trap of buying crap from every different department. I had to take Stan to the airport this morning because he's heading back to L.A. for a week, so I thought I'd go to TJ Maxx to look for a pair of black pumps.
No black pumps, but I did leave with Lolita Lempicka perfume, a throw pillow, new washcloths, and shampoo and conditioner...the red sale stickers always end up speaking to me.

I was pretty stoked to pick up this Ben Sherman yesterday, thanks for finding it Stan!





I'm soooo looking forward to United Blood this year, can't wait to see and hang out with all my friends. The line-up is awesome.

Today Casey and Narine are coming over and we're going to the Dekalb Farmer's Market, my favorite place in the whole wide world. Hoping to stock up on some pistachio baklava...and maybe some chia seed muffins???

Love & X's,
Rachel

I'm pretty much a Starbucks junkie.

Yes, that's me, I'm the woman ordering the "triple grande breve latte with four raw sugars, please". It's delicious, what can I say? If I had a San Francisco coffee shop closer to me I would be ordering from there and supporting the local business instead of feeding the already obese Starbucks chain...oh well, I do what I can.

So I've started looking into going to Barber school sometime this year now that Stan and I are a little bit more financially settled. I've always loved doing hair, I mean I cut and colored all of my friends hair AND my own hair all through high school and college. But the fact is I have no interest in doing womens' hair. I would much rather perfect the art of sharp mens' haircuts, not to mention we could save a fortune on the money-pit that is my husband's head!! Me and Stan talked about opening our own barber shop at some point in the future; super retro 50's with mostly women dressed in full pin-up girl attire. Cool concept, right? We'll see though, I'm definitely interested in getting my barbering license at least.

Stan leaves this Sunday morning to go back to Los Angeles for work, and he won't be back until next Friday night : ( I'm contemplating whether or not I should try to find somebody to ride up with me to Richmond Wednesday to see Skarhead. I've never seen them live before and I really want to! I don't know when I'll have a chance to see them again. That's a lot of gas money for one show though, not to mention we're driving back up there in just a couple weeks for United Blood.

I'm sooo ready for spring! I need some change of weather to get my out of my bad moods...

Love & X's,
Rachel

Ready for summer.

So lately there has been much going on in the lives of Rachel and Stan.
1. Stan received a promotion and a raise (Hooray!), and had to fly out to L.A. last week for training, and has to go back out for another week this coming Sunday.
2. I finally met my brother Tyrone, my dad's son, who's sister found my dad on the internet after 38 years.
3. Me and my mom went to Florida last week for a mini vacation and stayed with my Aunt Mary and Uncle David...AND we went to Epcot Saturday!!

Yesterday was me and Stan's 2-year anniversary. Pretty crazy. It just seems like we've always been married most of the time, but then I can remember our wedding like it was yesterday. It's an amazing thing to be able to say that I happily married to the greatest guy ever. I'm definitely a handful, and I know I can be the biggest pain in the ass, but he loves me despite all of that and he knows how much I love and appreciate him. I did score some awesome anniversary presents. He got me this really simple black leather watch, an X mug from Anthropologie, and this siqqqqq purse from the Vans store out in L.A.


I met my brother Tyrone a few weekends ago, he's in prison down in Sneads, Florida right across the Georgia border. When my dad was 17 he got married to this woman and they had a son right before my dad got drafted into the army...I guess this would've been around 1968. While my dad was gone the woman divorced him and left the state with his son and one of my dad's friends. Never found Tyrone again. So a few months ago Tyrone's sister found my dad on the internet only to tell him that he's in prison for prescription drug fraud, and a bunch of other bogus charges the police and attorneys trumped up against him. My dad immediately got in contact with the prison down there, and as soon as he was approved, he went down to the prison to see Tyrone.
Me and Tyrone started writing each other letters all the time, so it was pretty much like we already knew each other before we met in person. He's the most upbeat and positive person I think I've ever met especially considering his circumstances.
So I guess it's time for Ty's back-story...His step-dad abused him for his entire childhood, beat the crap out of him, locked him in closets, and so on. His wonderful mother stood by and watched all of this take place never lifting a finger in Tyrone's defense. Tyrone now has to take seizure medication daily because of the head trauma that shithead caused from repeatedly hitting him in the head.
His whole childhood his mother and his grandparents told him that the "reason his dad LEFT HIM was because he was a drunk and irresponsible". Now, my dad will be the first to tell you that he experimented with all sorts of drugs when he was younger, but the irony? He never drank!!! And he still doesn't. Fast-forward to today, and Tyrone can't even call his mother from the prison after 7 p.m. because she's wasted out of her mind and belligerent.
Tyrone grew up to be a phenomenal guitar player (just like my dad) and played with all sorts of huge metal bands and did studio work and such. He developed a bad addiction to heavy-duty pain killers which is what landed him in most of the trouble he got into. It all stemmed from a bad motocross accident and he also ended up with a plate and screws in his left wrist (he's also left-handed).
So, obviously he made some bad choices, but the thing that landed him in prison was writing fake prescriptions for pain killers. Now here's the clincher, he ran from the cops so instead of charges for evading police officers they added all this assault on a police officer bullshit among other things. Now, when it came time for his sentencing the ATTORNEY, in cahoots with the police I guess pulled all sort of illegal b.s. and threatened him with thirty years in prison and scaring him into a plea for 15 years. Can you believe that crap? Rapists get out in less than 10! Now not only is that illegal, but he was also medicated when he entered into his plea, which is also illegal! Tyrone has already served 6 years in prison because of it, but for the past couple years he started educating himself by reading books at the Law Library and realized pretty quickly that he had gotten screwed. He has a hearing in March for his appeal and everyone is pretty confident that even if they don't give him an immediate release, that he should be out pretty soon.
He doesn't make any excuses for anything either. He'll be the first one to tell you that he deserved time for his choices, and that he's not sure if he would have ever gotten off the drugs on his own...but 15 years? Now THAT is the true crime. It's amazing how all of the pieces fell into place for us to all become a family, and he is so incredibly happy to have all of us. He talks about how he's never really felt like he had a family until now. He's one of the most humble people I've ever met. Meanwhile his mother tells him over and over and over that he deserves to be where he is and she takes no responsibility whatsoever for his childhood or any of his other problems. What kind of family stands by and watches a person that they love abuse themselves that way? How could you not step in? When he first got sent to prison his mom didn't even speak to him for three years, THREE YEARS. She only got in touch with him after she found out that he was diagnosed with leukemia. He got really sick and had to go through the chemo and everything behind bars. Now he's waiting for a transfer to this other prison in Zephyr Hills, Florida where they have a waste water treatment program, so that he can get the training to work and make a living when he's finally released.
It really puts things into perspective, doesn't it? All of my petty problems seem to be pretty insignificant in this light.
On a lighter note, I did make some delicious blueberry muffins this morning. Why don't I bake and cook more often? I love doing it I just have to start making the time.
This weather blows and it's way too cold...I wish I could go back to Florida and just bring Stan with me!!

Love and X's,
Rachel

Burning bridges.

So first of all, I would like to note that I got my Biohazard beanie in the mail yesterday and I am way stoked about it, pretty sure I'll be wearing it pretty much all the time for the next couple of weeks.

I feel like I'm constantly questioning my "friendships". I mean, what really makes someone your friend? Loyalty in my book has always been at the top of the list. I mean, sure sometimes I can be a bitch, I may speak my mind too much, be too opinionated...etc, etc. But I pretty much stick to my guns all the time, and I'm not wishy-washy. Everything's black and white for me, and I feel like I'm always waiting for people to let me down. No way to go through life, I know, just trust issues.

So here is my full collection of Foundation shirts so far...and counting...

I think it's safe to say that I have the largest female collection of Foundation shirts, eat your hearts our bitches.

I'm off now to make a delicious artichoke pasta salad for me and my hubby for dinner.

Love & X's,

Rachel

Bored out of my skull.

It's been a rather interesting past couple of weeks; never a dull moment in married life.

So a little over two weeks ago there was a bit of an incident at the Bracewar show. After all was said and done, Stan ended up with his hand sliced open from a broken beer bottle.
Rushed him to the E.R. only to spend EIGHT hours there before we finally got to go home.

They had to call a plastic surgeon in who discovered that one of his tendons and some of his nerves had been severed by the broken glass leading to his index finger being totally immobile and without feeling...of course, right?
They had to get a hand transplant surgeon to perform the surgery so they stitched him up with 32 stitches and sent us on our way to wait to schedule his surgery.






Edgeday was the following weekend so in the midst of all of this we had already bought our plane tickets up to Boston to hang out for a long weekend and go to the big Edgeday show.
Honestly, it was nice to get away from everything for a little while. We stayed with Dave and Caitlin who just recently moved into their new place in Salem. It was cool as hell, especially since it's so close to Halloween. Our buddies Meredith and Chris Morgado from New York were also in town for the week and stayed at the house with us. So much fun. The town was so beautiful. Right across the street from their house was this little gem...



Once we got home from Boston it was back to real life and a countdown to Stan's hand surgery last Friday. The surgeon isn't sure if he'll ever have any feeling back in his hand, but with the tendon repair and the physical therapy he should have full use of it again.
Luckily my mom offered to take off work and come sit with me at Emory for his surgery, and I don't know what I would have down without her there. We were there for a grand total of 12 hours! His actual surgery was over in four hours including prepping him and everything, but they held him for an additional eight hours for hell knows what reason.



Another downside is that he's going to be in this hard splint for anywhere between two to three months.
It's a lot to deal with but I think we're both coping pretty well.
We'd rather move forward and deal with the situation than sit around and feel sorry for ourselves.
Stan had to fly out Sunday to LA for a few days for work so I'm here trying to pass the time.
So far I have rearranged all of our bedroom furniture, scrubbed all three bathrooms, vacuumed the entire upstairs, dusted, done laundry...I'm running out of things to clean and organize.

I have also polished off the last of my mom's spaghetti and meatballs : (

My life will never be the same...

Since I had this delicious little piece of heaven from "Flip"; it's a Nutella milkshake with toasted marshmallows on top...



Beforehand I ordered this delicious smoked salmon "burger" topped off with an arugula salad tossed in some vinagrette and then some spiced cream cheese spread. This place is not cheap by any means, but totally worth the money and the wait. They have something called an rBQ burger also that's topped with coleslaw AND beef brisket...that was the one Stan order (big surprise I know).





We just recently bought our plane tickets to Boston for Edgeday, and we are beyond excited. Personally I've never been to Boston, Stan's been several times over the years but this will be my first time. We're staying with Caitlin and Dave and I can't wait to hang out with our Yankee friends and some of my favorite straight-edge ladies.


Tomorrow we're going to the annual Greek festival in Atlanta with my mom and my little sister...more delicious food.

Is it bad that I'm already thinking about my next meal or snack before I've even finished the previous one???

It really never stops raining.

I used to be such a burning example,
I used to be so original.
I used to care, I was being cared for.
Made sure I showed it to those that I love.

I used to sleep without a single stir,
'Cause I was about my Father's work.

Well take me out tonight,
The ship of fools I'm on will sink.
I'm my own stone around my neck,
Be my breath, there's nothing I wouldn't give.

I used to pray when God was listening.
I used to make my parents proud.
I was the glue that kept my friends together,
Now they don't talk and we don't go out.
I used to know the name of every person I kissed.
Now I made this bed and I can't fall asleep in it.

Take me out tonight,
The ship of fools I'm on will sink.
I'm my own stone around my neck.
Be my breath, there's nothing I wouldn't give.

Throw me that lifeline,
The ship of fools I'm on will sink.
I'm my own stone around my neck.
Be my breath, there's nothing I wouldn't give.

.........

So last week I celebrated my 23rd birthday...wierd.
I'm not comfortable with getting older.
My parents got me this bad-ass pumpkin cheesecake ice cream cake.
Delicious.


My hubby got me this awesome Rosie The Riveter wallet and a pretty two-tone necklace with a dagger pendant on it. He also brought me flowers.


The Foundation/Have Heart show was the night of my actual birthday.
So much fun.
It was packed with out-of-towners, too.
Me, Stan, and Aaron headed up to Raleigh Friday around 1:00 to go to Foundation and Have Heart's show there.
Lots of yelling, lots of hitting, some crying...good times.



Drove to Richmond after the Raleigh show and stayed with my girl Natalie Friday night!
I wish she lived here so she could hang out with me all the time.
We need more cool girls in Atlanta.
Hung out all day Saturday in Richmond and did some shopping.
We went to Down To Nothing's show at Alley Katz Saturday night.
That was sick; kids were going nuts for them.



Stan picked up these vintage '82 Levis at a store in Careytown for $18 bucks that just HAPPENED to be his size. He was stoked.


And I was stoked about these Nikes I picked up for $30 at Need Supply Co.
So cute! I've never seen any like these before.

Been a while.

I've been slacking on this thing so bad.

Let's see...This Is Hardcore was the most fun I've had in a while. We spent some time in Richmond on our way up and our way back down so we got to hang out with the Richmond-heads as well.
We caught the Bracewar record release in Richmond on the way up. Fire and Ice, Swamp Thing, and Naysayer also played. I think Naysayer is one of my new favorite bands right now.


Philadelphia was so much fun. We had myself, Stan, Teddy, Aaron, Tim, and Champ all packed into our hotel room in Chinatown. Our hotel was on top of a WaWa so we were all pretty stoked.
Spent the majority of the weekend with Caitlin which was awesome; I forget how much I miss having females to talk to and hang out with.
Scored all this shit at TIH, not counting the shirts we bought.


Last weekend we went up to North Carolina for Stan's grandfather's wedding. We had a blast hanging out with Madison, our niece. Little kids are so much more fun than grown-ups.
Here's me doing a magic trick.


I also picked this up for myself...


And Stanley picked this up...


Been listening to the new Lewd Acts...shit is AWESOME. Listen to it if you haven't yet.

Fed Up.

I'm at my wits' end.
People are full of shit, that's the only thing that you can count on.
Fuck it.
All I need is my husband and my dragon.

Leaving for This Is Hardcore on Thursday with Stan and Aaron.
Couldn't be more stoked!