About a month or so again, I was reading an article on CNN about miracle fruit. They are small berries that confuse your taste buds into thinking sour and bitter foods are sweet. This, of course, sounded awesome, so I purchased some miracle fruit tablets off of ThinkGeek.

For food items, we had lemons, limes, strawberries, and sharp cheddar cheese. For drink items, we had a variety of beers (stout beers were supposed to taste chocolatey, from what we had read) such as, Guinness draught, Guinness extra stout, Newcastle, Hefeweizen, and Rouge chocolate stout. We also had cabernet sauvignon, Sauza Gold tequila, cranberry juice, and grapefruit juice.

We all took one tablet each. ThinkGeek’s site said to take half a tablet, but the box said to take a whole one. We weren’t in any danger of running out of them, so we each took a whole one. The tablets weren’t terrible tasting, which was good, since they took a couple minutes to dissolve. Someone said they tasted like Fruit Roll-ups.

Jonathan’s was the first to dissolve, so he decided to try a lime. He said it tasted like it had been coated in sugar.

Kris was next and went for a lemon. He highly approved.

Here is our general summary of each item:
Lemons - Tasted like they had been coated in sugar. Ben thought the lemons were the items that changed the most, and Kris thought they had the most intense flavor.
Limes - Similar to the lemons, although most of us thought the lemons were better. The limes were Jason’s favorite item.
Strawberries - So sweet and a popular item. I said that they were the best strawberries I had ever had. Jason thought they were delicious, and they were Becka’s favorite item.
Sharp cheddar cheese - This was sitting off to the side, so I don’t think most people tried it. Wayne thought it tasted like sweet mozzarella.
Guinness draught - People were divided on this. No one really thought it tasted like chocolate at all. Kris really liked it (but admitted that he really likes Guinness normally). Jason thought the taste changed the least of all the items he tried.
Guinness extra stout - I don’t seem to have any notes for this one, but I’m assuming it was similar to the regular Guinness.
Newcastle - Both Ben and Wayne said this was their favorite of all the beers.
Hefeweizen - Everyone was pretty much in agreement that this was the item that had its taste least affected by the tablets, although Jonathan said it “tastes like coffee, sweet coffee.”
Rouge chocolate stout - This supposedly already had a chocolatey taste, although to us non-beer drinkers, it just tasted like beer normally. This was one of Kris’s favorite items, and Wayne liked it as well.
Cabernet sauvignon - This was interesting and divisive. I normally think most red wines are too bitter, and the tablets made the cab taste sweet. Which was weird. Because if you smelled the wine and then drank it, it didn’t make any sense. But it wasn’t bad, in my opinion. Ben really liked it, but Wayne hated how the sweet taste didn’t fit.
Sauza Gold tequila - I think very few people tried this (I know I was not one of them), but Jonathan did not like it at all.
Cranberry juice - One of the most popular items. It was SO GOOD. Probably my favorite item of the night. Jason said it tasted like fruity syrup.
Grapefruit juice - Kris thought this was the item that changed the most. He thought it tasted like pineapple juice. It was also one of Jonathan’s favorite items. However, it was Ben’s least favorite.

To anyone considering having their own taste tripping party, here are our tips:

• Try all the food items before you try the liquids. We thought the liquids washed our tongues off too much and dulled the effect.
• Lemons, limes, strawberries, and cranberry juice were our must-have items.
• If you don’t like beer normally, the tablets will not make you like it. It still tastes like beer.

Also, make sure you have Tums on hand because of all the acidity in the things you’ll be consuming. (On a side note, we thought Tums tasted like Smarties…)

I think the effect lasted for about 15-20 minutes for most of us.

I hope everyone had a great new year’s celebration. Like last year, Ben and I hosted a party at the house. It. Was. Crazy.

Pretty much, at any given time (minus early on), I could probably only name 60% of the people there.

Casualties included one champagne glass (that I know of), one Xbox 360 memory card (we think maybe someone stepped on it?), one deck of Star Wars playing cards (something was spilled on them), and my entire living room (which was victim to someone shaking a bottle of champagne and then opening it in the middle of the room). And, of course, practically every floor in the house is sticky. And there are a bunch of used fireworks and sparklers laying in my front yard.

The lens fell out of Ben’s glasses at one point during the night, and we were sure it would be among the casualties, but, luckily, I found it laying in the middle of the floor.

But, for the most part, I had fun (you know, minus the being upset that everything in my living room is now covered with speckles of stickiness–including all three of my cameras).

So we’re having a little Halloween get-together on Friday night, and I was thinking about renting a couple horror movies to have on in the background. Any suggestions? Ben owns ALL of the Friday the 13th movies already, and it looks like Night of the Living Dead is currently on On Demand. However, I have two copies of Iron Man that Blockbuster Total Access sent me (don’t ask why I have two) that I could exchange for some free rentals (since I haven’t used my October rentals yet), so I’m open to anything.

On Friday night, we went and saw the Blue Man Group again. Ben and I were in the second row on the floor, which was really cool. It’s amazing how they always have the same look of confusion/wonder on their faces and never falter. We got to go to the meet and greet after the show, where we got our pictures taken with each of them. One of them even kissed my cheek to mark me with blue lip prints. After the concert, we went out to the Big Bang down the road to drink and sing along. It was pretty fun. I wish that even one of my good friends (besides Ben) would have been able to come out, but c’est la vie. Though I don’t really understand how it happens every year that the planets will align in such a way to cause all of my friends to be busy on the one day of the year that I really need them.

Saturday, I pulled myself out of bed and spent most of the morning cleaning. The housewarming went well, and several people stopped by. The after party was also fun, and I got to see my friend Michele for the first time in over 3 years, which was really cool. We played Scene It and our team came in a very close second to Ben and Wayne.

So, overall, I guess for one of my birthdays, it was pretty good. Pictures from both parties are up in the photos section.

Probably stupidly, I bought two second row seats and meet-and-greet passes to the Blue Man Group show. So, now in addition to the eight tickets I had, I’ve got two more and backstage passes. Invitations to all the parties are going out as soon as I can drag myself to the post office to buy stamps. So watch your mailbox. Kids are welcome to come to the afternoon housewarming party on the 17th, but you probably don’t want them sticking around past 7:00 or so, since that’s when the after-party is starting. For those who have asked, I am registered at Bed, Bath, & Beyond and have a TargetList at Target, and of course, there’s always my Amazon wish list which I recently updated.

I also (finally) started work on my Halloween costume. I went and bought fabric Tuesday, my wig came in yesterday, and I started cutting the pieces out and realized that I forgot to buy matching thread. So I’ve got to do that today and get a zipper as well. I have to have this done before Saturday night, so no pressure or anything. Unfortunately, I won’t be able to post any pictures or tell you what it is (although some people already know) until after Halloween because I’ve got to keep people at work in the dark.

As far as the house goes, I’ve still got to paint two more rooms, install the laminate, and then get the carpet guys in there. It’s ridiculous how much carpet costs. My mom and I are going to start work on the laminate this weekend. Hopefully we can get a lot of it done, then I can get the hallway and bathroom painted next week maybe and finish up the laminate so the carpet guys can get in there by the end of the month. I wanted to move in before Halloween, but so far it looks like it may be the weekend after Halloween. So that will give me two weeks to get everything put where I want it before the housewarming party. Thankfully, I’ve got a lot of three and four day weekends in November. I need some rest. Then I get to start thinking about Christmas shopping (which I’ve normally already started by this time of year, but I’ve got way too much other stuff occupying my thoughts at the moment).

I’m still trying to figure out this trojan thing. I just saw it pop up for the first time while in Firefox. Best thing to do is disable javascript for now. Or don’t use Windows.

Anywho, I put pictures from Teresa’s birthday party up.

Had a decent turn out. Played Buzz Word and ’90s Trivial Pursuit. The two trays of pigs in a blanket I made were all eaten. Pictures are up, of course.

I’m going back to bed now.

The board game party on Saturday went well, although we only played two games, both of which lasted forever! We’ll be having another one towards the end of February, since we didn’t even get to play Alibi. I forgot to bring my camera to the party so I had to borrow someone else’s camera; therefore, it might be a few days before pictures are up.

The Strokes are coming to Nashville on March 6!! Yay!!

Still job hunting…

Edit: Pictures are now up!

I hope everyone had a great time bringing in yet another year. You can probably tell I did, from the super silly pictures. And don’t ask why my hair is pink now.

So, board game party on the 28th. New games I have are Alibi and Loaded Questions. They are both pretty fun. I wanted to wait till the party to play them, but we are impatient.

I’ve got Mario Kart DS. My friend code is 146091 502849 if anyone wants to add me. I’m having quite a difficult time getting carts unlocked though, so I’m still a little slow. Be gentle.

I got to Chili’s at 9:00, and the hostess told me there was a table with a large group of people that should leave within 15 minutes. In the meantime, we were seated at a booth. I was going to wait till we could move to the table before I ordered any food or anything. In the meantime, some more people showed up and we spilled over onto a table next to the booth. And more people, which didn’t fit. These people were never going to leave that table. Around 11:00, we decide they are never going to leave, and I’m no longer hungry, so I cancel my order of chicken crispers that hadn’t yet arrived that I’d ordered at like 10:00 and go for the cake. They say they are out of cake. The sole reason we went to Chili’s in the first place.

What to do? We decide to call another Chili’s. Luckily, Ashley has the phone number of the Chili’s on the strip stored in her phone. We call them. They have cake but they close at midnight. We decide to place a to-go order, pick it up, and take it to Patrick Sullivan’s with us.

I entrust Jason with my camera and tell him (for whatever reason) to take pictures of the drive there (see, now you understand the pictures in the photo gallery). Ben and I get in the car with Greg and Faith, get the cake, and meet up with everyone at Patrick Sullivan’s.

Now, I had called ahead earlier to make sure that it was okay to go to Patrick Sullivan’s if we had people under 21 with us. They told me it shouldn’t be a problem. But apparently it was, and Greg and Faith had to leave, since Faith was underage.

Also my camera’s batteries had died, so I don’t have any pics of me and the cake. But after that, Jason and Becka left to go to Walgreens and pick me up some more batteries.

I received a preorder of Final Fantasy IV on GBA from Andy, and Jason and Becka got me a book with the rules to every game imaginable in it. I got a cute Presea figurine from Ben and he says something else is coming. All in all, it was a pretty good birthday.

It was a bit of a Final Fantasy VII themed Halloween. We watched “Advent Children” on Friday night, which I really enjoyed. Definitely going to have to get it on DVD.

I’ve got a few pictures up, but my camera’s batteries went dead, so I didn’t get very many. I will definitely put some up when the professional ones come in.

Also put a few pics up from the board game party earlier in the month.

Summer school ends next Friday, and fall semester starts on the 24th. The finish line is almost in sight.

Here’s the ones I promised that Sabrina sent me.

The wedding:

The honeymoon:

Sabrina and Matt’s wedding was beautiful. Pictures are up in the photo gallery, as usual. Brina sent me some of the pictures she had too, and I might get around to posting some of those as well.

My car died last week. Some belt broke and it died on the way to work. Cost me a pretty penny to get it fixed and, therefore, I cannot afford Bonnaroo this year. Chance thinks we should all set up a tent at the Manplex and create our own Bonnaroo. I wonder if we could get Mars Volta to come…

Ben and I will be going to Atlanta on the 25th of this month for Dear Friends - Music from Final Fantasy. That should be pretty cool. I haven’t really played much of the games (hey, I’m working on FFVII!!) but I do enjoy the music a lot.

Then in July I start summer school. Ew. And then in August, fall semester starts. My two month reprieve from school is not long enough. Thankfully I will be graduating in December. That can’t come fast enough. Please donate to my “new car OR buying a house” fund.

We will be playing (among other things) Betrayal at House on the Hill, which you can read about here.

Last Friday night, Ben and I were planning on having a video game party. We set up the Xbox in one room and the Gamecube in the other and prepared for a night full of Mario Party and Fuzion Frenzy. However, after the party had been going on for a few hours, Ben got a call saying it was Sam’s birthday and he hadn’t had a very good one. So Ben pulled together an impromptu surprise party over at his old house. We ended up rushing around to get everything together too quickly and ended up waiting around for Sam for about three hours, hehe. It was pretty cool. We had a few false alarms, but he was really surprised when he got there. Too bad I forgot my camera.

So, anyway, for all you Gamecube owners, if you haven’t played it already, I recommend “Tales of Symphonia.” Excellent game. It’s a multiplayer RPG, so Ben, Chance, and I have been playing it all together. We’re about 25 hours into it with the end nowhere in sight. I’m not going to give anything away about the plot (although, it’s basically the typical “save the world” theme).

Aside from that game, I’m also currently playing “The Bard’s Tale” on Xbox. Cary Elwes (of Princess Bride and Men in Tights fame) does the voice of the bard, and it’s a pretty good and very humorous game. On Gamecube, I’m playing “Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem” which is good. It’s basically a survival horror game, and the coolest thing about it is you have a sanity meter. If it gets low, you start hallucinating. For example, sometimes your head will just explode or rooms will be upside-down. On PS2, I’m mainly playing “Ico” which is a puzzle game. You play as Ico and you are trying to get the captured princess out of the fortress, but the rooms are all puzzles. It’s pretty cool. I’m stuck, though.

Yes, I have turned into a video game junkie.

Yeah, I know I haven’t written anything in a super long time. I was going to make this great post with all these pictures from New Years, but all the pictures accidentally got deleted. Then I was going to make another great post with the one picture I did have (Kris holding up a sign that reads “I’m sooo sorry”) but I just haven’t found the time to do that yet, so this is all you’re getting.

New Years was pretty cool. Went to a party here in Knoxville, got mildly drunk, beat everyone at Texas Hold ‘Em, drank some champagne, then we drove to Crossville (not me, we had a DD, don’t worry). Unfortunately, we didn’t make it there before midnight (we got there about 12:03), but we almost had two New Years, hehe.

Having a board game party Friday night.

I made stew, grilled cheese sandwiches, garlic bread, and magic cookie bars. Yum. Right as everyone started getting their food, the electricity went out (this is unrelated to the power surges I was having the night before; the entire area was out). So we ate dinner by candlelight. Then we started playing Monopoly. The electricity finally came back on a few hours into the game. And it was a long game. With eight people playing, you don’t really get a lot of properties. Ben finally won.

Some pictures are posted in the usual spot. They aren’t very good because I was taking them in the dark and couldn’t really see what I was aiming at. I also took a few shots of the new apartment and the Christmas tree. We ended up not getting a real one and just putting the fake one up. We still might get a real one later this week.

We arrived at Chuck E. Cheese around 8:00 to find it extemely crowded. We immmediately commandeered a table by the stage that didn’t have a reserved sign on it. It still had balloons and a cake stand from the last party, so we took full advantage of the free festive decorations. Everyone started arriving soon after, and I donned my Happy Birthday tiara. We ate some pizza and watched as the other tables, full of kids having birthdays, demanded Chuck E. and then attacked him when he finally appeared. After all the kids got their birthday stuff out of the way, everyone sang happy birthday to me and I blew out the candles on my cake. I also opened my cards and gifts. Then it was onto the games.

When everyone was done, we pooled all our tickets together. We had 415. Not enough for anything than maybe a tiny basketball or soft mallet. Then they got the idea that I should have this crazy Plasma lamp that cost 4000 tickets. So the tickets we had were subtracted from it and they paid for the rest of it, heh.

After that, it was onto Urban Bar. I wasn’t really in a drinking mood which seemed to upset everyone since I didn’t want to do a shot. They were threatening to pour alcohol down my throat and didn’t understand why I didn’t want to drink on my birthday. Eh. I also managed to knock over the one drink I had and spill it all over the table (see the happy napkin in the pictures). We stayed there until about 1:30 am.

After a bit of discussion, we went over to Chance and Kelly’s house to hang out for a little while. Then we headed over to Fairbanks. The music there was pretty cool and as soon as we got there some random guy asked to borrow our glowsticks and performed for us. That was pretty cool. I need to be proficient in glowstick tricks. There weren’t a whole lot of people dancing and those that were weren’t really all that great. But it was amusing to watch if nothing else. We stayed there till about 5 am.

All in all, I had a pretty good birthday.

Board game party was fun. Pictures are up, as usual.

I just received a notice today that said my rent was going up. Again. I can’t even afford what it is now. Bleh.

Insomnia is not cool.