31 December, 2009

Nedly Deadly













A very nice song


Venice by Beirut 

30 December, 2009

the blog post my mom told me to write

So my mom calls me last night super excited.  Like, SO excited.  And I'm all, "what's up?"  And she's like, "OK don't get mad." 
Which is always a great way to start talking to me because of course I start getting defensive even before I know what she's going to say.
So I'm like, "OK, i wont, what's up?"
And she's all, "remember you want to be a famous blogger?  well, I have the perfect idea for you.  Why don't you go on this diet I'm reading about in "Body and Soul" and blog about that, and people will read it and you'll give them ideas and inspire them to get on the diet.  People always want to read about other people dieting." 
And I'm like, "Mom.  Why the hell would I ever want to do something as embarrassing as that?" 
And she's like, "RANNA!  It's such a great idea!  You'll be so famous." 
And I'm all, "No way, bye."  I pulled an abrupt, "say goodbye really quickly and hang up before the other person has a chance to say anything" :) 

But then last night when she got home, we decided, just for kicks (after I yelled at her about not wanting to write that sort of blog) that we would do this detox thing she read about in the magazine.  and I thought, "OK what the hell, I guess I'll write about it."  Just this part though.  NOTHING MORE, MOTHER.  

We're not doing one of those intense, "all liquid" sort of detox's.  This one is easier, something that we can ACTUALLY do without messing up and eating solids and then feeling guilty about eating the solid and then deciding, "I messed up today, soooo I'll just eat this and this and this and this, and start again tomorrow."  
Actually, I was pretty cynical about the guidelines for the detox, because 1. first my mom told me that it was an all juice diet with the exception of lunch, but then she told me i could have oatmeal and coffee in the morning 2. my mom has the tendency to mold things in ways that are suitable for her (ie coffee and oatmeal for breakfast).
Lo and behold, once I checked the detox myself, I found that it WAS an all juice diet with the exception of lunch being solids, but in the morning, coffee and oatmeal were not on the menu, but things like, "fennel and apple juice." Blech.  I'm not drinking fennel and apple juice, when I can just as easily make a nice cup of coffee.  Yeah, I straight up told my mom I was never going to give coffee up for anything.  I mean, how can I?  I need coffee in the morning.  I can't do anything without it.  You can't talk to me if I haven't had a coffee; I need it to sustain a level of sanity.  
For the most part though, we were doing it the right way.
So after a breakfast of some sort of juice...honestly, they had a bunch of different options, ranging from fresh apple juice, to beet and carrot juice...but then for lunch, a lean cut of meat with salad and veggies, and then for dinner, some sort of soup.  So tonight my mom made this really bi-mazeh vegetable soup that really needed lemon juice, only we didn't have lemon juice at home, so she tried to make up for it by putting a crapload of tabasco sauce and salt...but it was pretty...not good.  I filled up on edemame..which may not have been part of the detox, but it's healthy!  
But the most important part is to drink a lot of water, which, I already do because I have an insatiable thirst.  Also cups and cups of green tea.  
Oh, funny story about cups and glasses.
One time, we went skiing with our dad, and we stayed at this little bed and breakfast near the ski resort where all the guests ate breakfast together.  So there we were, eating breakfast, and the owner came around and offered everyone coffee.  And there was this young guy staying there with his girlfriend, sort of the ski bum type, and after the owner had served the coffee, this guy was like, "I'll have a glass."  And the owner sort of looked at him with a confused look and was like, "A glass of what?"  and the guy was like, "A glass of coffee."
And I just wanted to yell out, "A GLASS?  A GLASS OF COFFEE?  Who has a glass of coffee?  Clearly its a cup.  Or a mug.  But a glass?  Really?"  A glass of orange juice.  But a cup of coffee.  

So where was I?  Oh yeah, green tea.  Green tea, water, juice, lean meats, salad, veggies, soups.  It's easy enough.  This lasts for three days, and then...we'll my mom hasn't gotten that far.  We'll figure out what the next step is once she thinks about what sort of diet she's willing to go on :) 

I wish I had a glass of ginseng coffee right here, right now.   Also, can someone tell me why Nescafe only sells ginseng coffee in Italy?  

Kthanksbye.  

28 December, 2009

Women, can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em



OK, so officially Stella, our dog, is probably the strangest dog on face of this planet.  Let me tell you about the sequence of events that led to this realization.

Stella has hated Salma for a while.  When she was a puppy, Salma used to tease Stella and do weird things like pull her tail and we were all like, "Salma!  She's a puppy!  Stop doing weird things like that."  But Salma kept on doing strange things and saying things like, "Stupid dog," and you know...things that would make Child Protective Services take Stella away if Stella was a child.  So, Stella hates Salma.  At night, when we are all sitting downstairs watching television, and Stella's ghashang ghashang sitting on the couch, sleeping, minding her own business, THE MOMENT Salma comes downstairs, Stella gets super nervous and jumps off the couch.  If Salma even gets near Stella, Stell starts to growl.  And when Stella growls, it's super scary because she shows us her fangs and she just gets really ugly.

So, we all used to tease Salma about how much Stella hates her, and Salma was getting sort of upset and started to be a little bit nicer to Stella, only it was too late, because Stella loathes Salma already.  And I used to think, "HAH, I win!"

But it's not like that anymore.  As nice as I am to Stella, and really, I'm not just saying that.  I give her SO much love, and I spoil her, and pet her.  Seriously, among the women in this house, I'm really the only one that ever sits down to pet stella.  I say "among the women," because in his defense, Monsieur René is the only person who actually takes care of Stella.  You know, he feeds her and walks her and stuff.  Man, we are GREAT pet owners....oops.

So anyway, Stella has started to growl at me too!  At first, I thought it was just PMS.  I thought, "ok, it's going to be like this for a couple of days, but it will pass.  Just stay nice and stay out of her way."  But then when it didn't go away, I started to get upset.  I mean, all I want to do is pet her, but whenever I get close to her, she starts doing that wolf-like thing and showing me her fangs.  I'm like, "ok, ok, I'm outta here, just don't bite me."

But then I realized, well DUH, of course Stella would turn out like this, she's living in THIS household, isn't she?  I mean, poor Monsieur René was destined to live among the three most volatile women on the face of this planet.  We are relentless.  He never really gets a break, does he?  Because when one of us isn't PMS-ing, the other two are.  And we don't really liked to be touched very much, we like to be left alone.  Poor Monsieur René (and mom, I say this out of love) but sometimes at night, when my mom is lying on the couch watching tv, he comes up to her and tries to hug her or something, and she pulls a straight-up Stella and growls at him.  Well, you know, in the most homosapien sort of way.

Salma just walked into my room, and said, "I'm not volatile, I'm the nicest."  Psshhhhh, bi-atch please.

There you go, Stella has just learned from the best.  So when she growls at us and doesn't let us pet her, we shouldn't get upset, we should just think, "WWWD?"  or "What would we do?"  And that should answer our question.  Because we would do the exact same thing if we were peacefully minding our own business and someone came all up in our grillz.

Go PMS.

27 December, 2009

the one where ranna uses hyperlinks to convey a message

Salma and Neda

You should all be proud.  I'm venturing out and trying new things in the realm of the unknown; I'm experimenting with new technological landscapes.  I've been inspired by my professional bloggers of the world, and one day, I hope to be as tech savvy as them.  For now though, I'm pretty proud that I even figured out how to put music over the video.  Mostly I just wanted an excuse to share this song.  It's called, "One Wing," by Wilco and I'm in love.
Do you know what it means to be in love?  Well I do.  After having listened to this beautiful song, I'm quite familiar with the sentiment.

The video was chosen arbitrarily.  Recently, I've been taking so many pictures that I had to put a bulk of old pictures onto my external, and now I'm working with the pictures and videos I've taken over the last few days.  Ergo, Neda and Salma singing.  I have this vision that I want to realize soon, but I need a volunteer who wont mind prancing in the field...or prancing anywhere since I don't really know where we will find a lush field in this sort of weather.
Volunteers?
For some reason I have Parker Posey in mind (well, mostly because I just watched a movie of her's last night..."Broken English," check it out), but uhhh, since I can't very well use her as a volunteer to prance around for me, I have to find someone else.  And so the mission ensues....

Christmas Pictures

I just want to say that I thoroughly enjoyed looking through all of the pictures I took.  At one point, I started laughing because I realized I had this huge smile on my face as I was skimming through them.  Hopefully you'll enjoy them half as much as I did :)  

Also, in other news, I'm very proud to say that after about a week and a half of playing around with "pen tool" on Photoshop, I finally learned how to use it....and now I can't stop.  




















































25 December, 2009

Come on, darling. Lie for Italia!


























duck duck goose

Merry Christmas, everyone.  I hope you the very best in the world, and only the best.

Last night the usually clan came over for Christmas dinner and opening of presents.  Nazy and co, Marc and Sushmita, and Mamman.  My mom made a great dinner of chicken stuffed with goat cheese, sundried tomatoes, and basil with a side of potatoes.  But if you were craving Iranian food, we also had khoresht fesenjoon and rice...just in case.

The dinner was just like any other dinner, Monsieur Rene made strange jokes, my mom laughed at the comments she made, Nazy teased us all...you know, the usseee.

After dinner we ate dessert, a very nice rollet that Salma made herself!  And then we opened presents.  I got some very nice things.  I was pleased.
Parsa got a bunch of Xbox games from my mom, even though we specifically had a conversation the other night about how he has Playstation 3 and NOT Xbox...so he had to return most of his presents.
Aria got clothing and a Scrabble board.
Marc got some clothes and games for Playstation 2...even though he has Playstation 3.
Sushmita got an electrical blanket, cus shes always cold, a set of...pots?  Yeah, something like that, and some other things.
SALMA...salma salma salma.  Salma has been asking my parents for WEEKS now about her presents. And my parents said from the beginning, "a karaoke machine."  But we never believed them.  I mean, whattt.  So random, why would they get a karaoke machine.  But still, they kept saying they got it for her...I think since they knew we wouldn't believe them.
But believe it or not, Salma got a karaoke machine for Christmas.  So random, I know.

So ok, I went upstairs for like 4 minutes, and when  I came downstairs the entire group was in the living room, singing "Like a Virgin."  Of all songs they could sing, "Like a Virgin??" I have it all recorded, and if I ever figure out how to post videos on this blog, I surely will let you see them.  We were all in front of the television singing karaoke for like two hours.  If this isn't a bonding activity, then I really dont know what is.  
Then my mom decided that we had to watch all of her favorite dances from the "So You Think You Can  Dance"  episodes she has recorded on the DVR.  We did that for a while.

All in all, it was a good night.   A great Christmas eve.  Now, we're all going to go see, "Nine."  Salma has been obsessing over this movie for about two months.  The day has finally arrived.  I really hope she's not disappointed.  Because when Salma is upset, we're all upset.

Happy Christmas, Harry.

Happy Christmas, Ron.

23 December, 2009

RanDOME

"Random" has become a pretty popular vocabulary word among my group of friends and immediate family.  Every other statement has a "random" or "randomly" attached to it, even where it doesn't belong.
"Remember its randomly snowing?"
"She randomly went to yoga."
"Random, Ran."
The word has infested our manner of speaking, and without it, I don't know where we would be today.  How would we exist?

So a couple weeks ago Simsim and I were hanging out with our dad, and something came up, and we labeled it as "random."
After a few moments, my dad frowned at us and said, "That's not random.  How is that random?"  And we had to explain to him that while to others said subject may not have been "random," to us, it was the perfect adjective.
After that, Salma and I told all of our friends about our dad's confusion which prompted a good amount of laughter.
And while my mom and Monsieur Rene have fallen victim to using "random" in their daily speech, I never thought it would be uttered from my father's lips.

And then tonight happened.

As we were driving home after eating dinner at Church St. Pizza and dessert at Cenan Bakery (pause--if this isn't random, then I don't know what is), I started talking about how the other night I started thinking, "what if there's actually an afterlife?"
To which my dad replied, in a rather booming voice, I might add, "Ranna, that is SO random."
And then I started laughing and replied with, "I KNOW but it just popped into my head..."
And my dad said, "It's like, who cares?  Either there is or there isnt.  But you're supposed to live your life NOW so that one day your soul is randomly removed from your body and inserted into a dogs?  How are we supposed to adjust our lives thinking that way?  Are we supposed to start peeing differently?"

Haha, sometimes my dad is randomly funny.  Tonight was one of those nights.

22 December, 2009

The Nava's













today after 8,000 years, Nava Salehi came over to our house to hang out.  I hadn't seen her...probably since this summer, so it was really nice to catch up act goofy with her.  Then, as we were acting goofy, Nava Behnam decided to come over to hang out for a little bit, as well.  That was a treat considering I hadn't seen her either in a while.  Not since...ohh funny story.  Nava and her boyfriend Martin came to the laser clinic one day, and I was talking to them about school and such.
Ranna: What are you studying Nava?
Nava: Physics
Ranna: Cool, what are YOU studying, Martin?
Martin: Physics
Ranna: Oh, coolness, so you guys are just going to be physicians.
Weird looks from the two of them.
Ranna: Oh man, I mean...hahaha...physicists.
And then I felt awkward and idiotic the rest of the time that they were there.
In any case, it was nice to see them and to spend some quality time with my two favorite Nava's.  Of course, I brought out my camera and acted really obnoxious by taking 8 trillion pictures of the two of them.  I didn't put them all up for the reader's sake and theirs :)

21 December, 2009

rannar

Today after two days of being stuck inside the house, we had outsiders come and visit us.  It was the most exciting day.  Neda, Mina, and Rosa, came out of their huts for an afternoon at the burrow.  We did what we do best...nothing.  But we do "nothing" in style.  And from that style came the most amazing photo shoot.  I dont remember where the idea of dressing up like old-time Iranian women came up, but I'm glad it did, because it was oh-so-much fun.  And I'm also glad that I have some of the prettiest friends a gal could ask for, because it makes it all the more fun to take pictures of them :) Enjoy














so i was thinking about these gals and what they mean to me, and i feel like, i feel like, when i'm with them, I feel as comfortable as when I was abroad and the comfort and the love i felt with my friends overseas.  its just so easy to say and be and laugh with these girls.  and i really dont think that anyone from the outside could keep up with us.  seriously, today i stepped back for a second and i was listening to the conversation, and a passerby would not understand what the hell we were talking about half the time.  i mean, rosa literally has to say one word and salma and i burst out in laughter.
it's actually pretty funny at night, because salma is in her room on the computer, and i'm in my room on the computer, and its so obvious when we're talking to rosa because all of a sudden I'll hear a roar of laughter coming from sim's room.  and then rosa will say something and i'll burst out.  tonight it was like a symphony and the conductor kept pointing at salma for laughter on cue and then me, salma, ranna, salma ranna.
sooo, while it was a dreary cold and pretty boring start to the winter holidays, today made up for our ennuie (its a word in english, ennuie?  i dont know).  i hope you enjoy the pictures, i know i do.  i've looked through them all about 2847 times.  and with my new camera i'm taking pictures about a mile a minute.  just today alone i uploaded about 400.  i love my camera.  i cant wait to have my photo sessions with my friends and family as the break progresses.  the only thing thats really missing actually is...well three things..people really...top people really...marion, yasna and thom.  i wish they were here all the time.  i wish that tomorrow i could go over to marions house and take pictures of her smoking until she shot me the look of death and i feared to continue.  but alas, i can't. so i'll just have to make up for it, and busy myself by other means.
if anyone wants their picture taken...you have my card.  call me.