#34: Learn to Snowboard

By nopasanada | Published: January 22, 2012

“Enjoy yourself. It’s later than you think.” ~Chinese Proverb

Spoiler Alert! I’ve been limping around airports all morning stopping every few feet to massage my right hip. For some inexplicable reason my right shoulder is aching as well and then there’s the wrist problem. No matter because I had fun. In every sense of the word I enjoyed, I smiled, played, fell on my butt and kept on keeping on.

Rewind to about a month ago when I ran into a colleague while in the break room to grab eyeglass cleaner and cold medicine. She asked what I had planned for the weekend and I shrugged. Nothing. She looked at me dismayed and said that she figured I’d be going to some amazing party somewhere that no one knew about. No. I was going to do some amazing cleaning and sleeping and I was going to rock my Netflix queue. She shook her head because here I was this 28 year old woman. Childless. Single. Completely free. And I was going to spend my weekend scrubbing my kitchen floor. This could not stand, man. She told me that I really needed to…you know…get out more. To be adventurous. I’d still have fun later, she said, even married with children but it would be a different kind of fun. Right now I have everything at my fingertips and as I write those words I forget how true that is. I get so caught up in the day-to-day and trying to keep my shit together even when my brain doesn’t want to cooperate so I forget about just living. It sounds so cliche but the thing about cliches is that they’re often true. So, I thanked her and the following week I decided that during my trip to Utah for Alt I would go snowboarding.

Now would be a good time to mention that I am a creature of habit. I eat the same things and go to the same restaurants almost everyday to the point where it’s like Cheers and everyone know my name. I have a favorite bartender and a favorite drink. I drive the same route to work. Talk to the same people. I like the routine and with bipolar disorder I need it. That said, I’ve become the most boring person you will ever meet in life. I mean, I know I can make things sound super exciting with all the exclamation points and OMGGUESSWHOIJUSTSAW in the world but damn. Not much is going on over here. For me to step outside of my comfort zone would be all great leap forward and shit. So…I just did it.

I, Heather Barmore, was going to do something I had never done before and was totally fucking terrified of. I did it. It was thrilling. I didn’t, like, become a new person so yeah, during my first run I panicked at the top of the mountain and promptly walked down the side to a lodge and took a shuttle – snowboard in hand – back to the lift but still. I tried. I took a lesson, I got on that snowboard and I made that sucker my bitch and I have a bruise on my ass to prove it.

It was awesome.

*Huge shout out to Solitude Resort and Alt for the lift tickets and good time. And instructor Mike for being very patient and telling me that I looked cool while riding.

Posted in Life List | 3 Comments

“I think I could fall madly in bed with you”

By nopasanada | Published: January 18, 2012

“I think I could fall madly in bed with you.”  ~Author Unknown

The end of the 2011 was lovely and then 2012 came and blew my face off with it’s awfulness. Not real awfulness but the type where things keep piling up and then one day you tell your mother to get the fuck off of you as you hop out of moving car. And then you get to walk a mile in the cold without a coat but your body is heated by so much anger. SO MUCH. And you arrive at the bar and say to Favorite Bartender, “I want to get so drunk that I don’t remember my own name” and he says, “I can help you with that” as he pours 16oz of Tempranillo. It’s not even that much of a story except to say that I spent a solid week telling myself that I was ok physically and have my health and then I’d pop a Klonopin because health is relative. Now it’s over, lessons have been learned and I’m ready to get into the new year but first thing’s first:

Did you watch the Golden Globes Sunday night? No matter but if you did you saw that Idris Elba won best actor for the BBC series Luther. And then I went on and on (in my head, of course) about all of the things I’d like to do to Stringer Bell.

I’m in a coffee shop right now fanning myself because damn, y’all. Just damn.

Which brings me to a discussion I had with colleagues as to who you’d do. You know DO. In the horizontal fashion. I’m usually just a casual observer: I see an actor or anyone for that matter, remark on just how cute/handsome/OH MY GOD LET’S HAVE BABIES they are and then move on about my day. But being forced to really think about who I find totally do-able was far more difficult than I thought it would be. Don’t you love how seriously I take this? Much like everything else in my life who you want to sleep with requires deep thought, concentration and perhaps a Pro/Con list.

Without further ado, here are the dudes (I don’t know how I ended up with only dudes but whatever) I’d…um…yeah:

1. Common
2. Idris Elba
3. Mark Wahlberg
4. Colin Firth
5. James Franco/Mark Ruffalo

Honorable mentions: Bradley Cooper, Salma Hayek, Jake Gyllenhal, Robert Downey, Jr.

Posted in Listy | 6 Comments

That’s What Friends Are For

By nopasanada | Published: December 19, 2011

“If I had to sum up Friendship in one word, it would be Comfort.” ~Terri Guillemets

Me: What will I wear to Utah in January in front of a bunch of design bloggers?

Her: What will I wear this weekend? Stupid Christmas.

Me: Don’t you own an LBD, cute tights, stacked heels. Statement necklace in gold…?

Her: ….

Me: I thought you were the expert here! What’s the point of having a best friend who is a stylist. What if you had a Tom Coburn emergency! I’d totally be there for you!

Posted in Humdrum | Leave a comment

Life List #57: Wear Real Red Lipstick

By nopasanada | Published: December 18, 2011

“Beauty, to me, is about being comfortable in your own skin.  That, or a kick-ass red lipstick.”  ~Gwyneth Paltrow

In college I had a professor tell me that I have a presence about me. Something that I give off that forces people to pay attention to me. As such I have spent years hiding in corners and behind plants because I do not thrive well with a lot of attention. In fact I will create a diversion in order to keep your eyes off of me but does it work? Hardly ever. In fact it ends up causing people to gravitate towards me even if I’m busying myself with Socially Awkward Barbie™ tweets. I’ve accepted my plight in this life. And clearly modestly has become my strong suit.

I’ve been over a year trying to find the perfect red lipstick. I don’t know what started it but if you know me at all and how I make decisions it took the full 365 days to find the color and then another two weeks after placing it in my Sephora shopping cart to actually pay. Each time I’d head back to Sephora for a new head for my Clarisonic or my favorite lotion, I’d take note of the red lipstick and promptly ignore. Red lipstick would bring too much attention. More importantly what woman doesn’t look at red lipstick and fear that she will end up looking like a whore? I mean, that right there was the biggest fear: People would think that I’m a hooker. A lady of the night if you will.

I managed to avoid being Hooker-esque.

Good because I actually sported this look for the first time ever to a colleague/former roommate’s holiday party and wouldn’t it be fun if my boss saw me and was all “What happened to your face?” It went over quite well, actually. I got complimented and then a stranger said “Wow…you look amazing. That lipstick was the first thing I noticed.” With that, my night was made.

How I did it: I lined with Sephora ‘real red’ lip liner (lip liner is the most important part of this process, heed these words). Then YSL ‘Rouge Pur Couture SPF 15′ in Rouge Flamme as the lipstick. Finally Nars lip gloss in ‘Scandal’ for a bit of shine.

And voila. Let’s face it. I look pretty hot and it took the attention away from my expanding waist line. No, I’m not pregnant. Just Lexapro fat.

Posted in Life List | 3 Comments

Southwest New York Needs Some Love

By nopasanada | Published: December 13, 2011

“Ironically, rural America has become viewed by a growing number of Americans as having a higher quality of life not because of what it has, but rather because of what it does not have!”  ~Don A. Dillman

 

 

On a trip to the Southern Tier of New York I had a lot of time to think. Think about the weather, what the options might be for dinner, whether or not I should return a statement necklace, if I brought my blush. Clearly the deep, life-changing thoughts that I am prone too. But also the type of thinking one has when faced with miles of nothing; nary a person or a Starbucks or a set of golden arches in sight. Just land. I found myself mesmerized by it’s vastness and reminding myself that yes, I was still in New York State. And that this – with the spaciousness out west to the claustrophobia of the Target in Brooklyn – is why I love this state to my core.

I live in the middle of the state but to those in Queens I might as well live in Montreal. I tell friends who reside on the Upper West Side that I’m going out to Jamestown for work and they furrow their brow. “Where is that?” It’s west. “…” “It’s like Ohio”. “Ohhhhh” they respond. It’s like their heads are so wrapped around the encompassing anything and everything needed on the island of Manhattan that there is nothing outside of the boroughs. People are aware of Albany but quickly poo-poo it away. It’s far, I am told. Upstate is quite the distance and I am admired for making the 2.5 hour train ride into midtown. On one side of the state you have Massachusetts, Connecticut and New England. Head west, first up 87 then west on I-90 and you’ll suddenly find yourself immersed in the Midwest. Beer and sports bars are housed between largely uninhabited industrial buildings. Miles between towns that pride themselves on how well they do their Buffalo wings and Beef on a Weck.

This state is a dichotomy that I find myself more and more mesmerized by as I get older. I like exploring the nooks and cranies of places like Cuba and Olean. I can do Nassau County and SoHo anytime. I enjoy the roots that the Southwestern New Yorkers have put down and the fierceness with which they will and have protected their place. Out there they get no love. Hell, even in Albany people only remember us when a Governor pisses them off. But out there, on the Southern Tier; it’s almost as if you’ve left the state instead of being surrounded by people moving quickly you’re surrounded by serenity. I wonder how much peaceful the residents must feel as I continue to drive westward. I realize that what works about this amazing and diverse state is this: the differences, knowing that wherever you are in this state you will get what you need. And should worse come to worse Canada is just a few hours away.

And have I mentioned that they have cheese?

Posted in This side of the Hudson | 1 Comment