UPDATE

First, update on my homemade laundry detergent project, thanks to Tall Tales from a Small Town.

RAWK!

I mean seriously. First, I found the Super Washing Powder here, but reader DrOlaf tells me you can find sodium carbonate at any pool supply store and that it is called soda ash.

It took me five minutes to make the powder. Actually, not me; my husband grated the soap bar because he was watching me do it slowly and laborously and was all, “OMG. GIVE IT TO ME. YOU WILL BE HERE UNTIL CINCO DE MAYO.”

Aside:  A good way to get your husband to do something you don’t want to do is to do it slowly, with lots of sighing. Pause a moment to wipe the nonexistent sweat from your brow. He will then take over the task and will use the opportunity to feel virile and strong and hunter/gatherery. This housekeeping tip brought to you by Ginny’s Tips For Getting Out of Anything.

Aside #2: A good rule of thumb for such instances is to follow Calvin’s advice, “If you do something wrong the first time, you’ll never get asked to do it again.”

Anyway, so after the soap powder recipe was done, I threw in a load of stinky smelly bath and kitchen towels and for good measure, a couple of socks that if I had left them another day, would have collapsed under the weight of their own stench and committed sockicide.

Verdict? Ridiculously clean socks and towels! No smell at all. Just fresh and clean. And the homemade soap makes your entire laundry area smell fresh and clean, too. Like a natural air freshener.

I am so so so thrilled to take this moment to flip Tide the middle finger.

[flip]

ANSWER!

I’ve been asked about the $21 eyeliner that won’t budge. Gina from My Very Last Nerve told me about this stuff from Bobbi Brown and from the reviews on the site, it is apparently some ladies’ religion.

I haven’t snagged any yet because I need to get to the Macy’s in Monroeville to get it. But I will this week and I’ll let you know if it lives up to the hype. Gina described it to me and explained how once the eyeliner sets, you can’t even rub it off with your finger; it requires soap and water or makeup remover, and since my eyeliner tends to run, I’m dying to try this.  Now to decide between caviar ink and basic black. DECISIONS.

Now I feel like I’ve left the men out. Um. BEER BOOBS DUCT TAPE TOOLS WATCHES SEX ANGELINA JOLIE SPORTS.

That better?

Category: Random | July 28, 2010 | 45 Comments » |

… Randy Baumann!

I got the chance to pose five questions to DVE’s Randy Baumann.

I bet you’re dying to know the answer to this one:

Question: You were gone from the ‘DVE Morning Show from January 18 until February 16. Can I just tell you, it was surreal. People were emailing me. No one knew anything. For a while I seriously thought you were abducted by aliens and they did that time suck thing. I mean, the Bring Randy Baumann Back to DVE Morning Show group on facebook still has 4,600 members! So my question is this. What did you do with yourself all that time you were gone and working out your new contract? Did you hide out? Did you go out of town?

Go read the answer!

Category: Random | July 27, 2010 | 20 Comments » |

Men,

I’m sorry to inform you.

I hope you’ll take it well.

Are you sitting down?

Do you have some smelling salts? Some pearls you can clutch when I break your hearts?

Okay.

Alison Morris is leaving Pittsburgh.

Over at KDKA-TV, reporter Alison Morris will leave the station in early September to take a job closer to home (Long Island) at the Fox station in Hartford, Conn.

A blurb, Rob Owen?! Reduced her to a blurb, did you?

I’ll make it all better. Please have “Wind Beneath my Wings” playing in your head as you view these photos.  Or maybe, “She Bangs.”

(source)

It’s going to be okay, you guys. Group hug.

(h/t Tony and PittCheMBA)

Category: Local media | July 27, 2010 | 42 Comments » |

(video still from WTAE)

Ladies and Gentlemen,

It is my esteemed pleasure to present to you the greatest paragraph to appear in the Post-Gazette since the “rough but entertaining animal sex”:

Officers on their way to the bank robbery call went to the station and arrested him while he waited in the car. He had dye on him, the wig stuffed in the waist of his pants and was still wearing the fake breasts.

If “rough but entertaining animal sex” had a cagematch with this paragraph, my money is on the violent rhino sex.

P.S. I must find this mugshot.

P.P.S. Violent Rhino Sex would make a hell of a band name.

Category: Random | July 26, 2010 | 11 Comments » |

1. My sister Pens Fan, and even the doctor’s wife Princess Aurora, and actually, also Ta-Ta the Grand Poobah, we are the thrifty sistahs in the family.

Tina Fey is not. She will comment to this post that she is indeed thrifty, but there is a giant $700 Banzai slide in her yard that would tell a different story.

I’m not nearly as thrifty as my father, but I definitely have my moments as a coupon-clipping, bargain-hunting master.

I will spend money when things deserve my money. That includes splurging for Cotija cheese even though Giant Eagle charges $10 for a tiny chunk of it. That includes butt-slimming jeans. That includes a $10 spicy drink at Embury in the Strip (although on Saturday, Jonathan Wander treated me.) That includes $21 eye-liner that won’t run. That includes just about anything at IKEA.

And there are certain things that I refuse to spend a lot of money on. $1.50 avocados and $.85 limes make me want to choke a bitch.  Another thing that I refuse to spend a lot of money on? Laundry detergent.

Who the hell does Tide think it is charging as much as they do for soap? Are there gold crystals in Tide now?

I don’t need super-duper, extra-long-lasting fresh-linen and happy sunshine-scented, extra-concentrated, Downy-laced, Febreeze-infused laundry detergent. I just need soap to clean my clothes.

So when I saw this post over at Tall Tales from a Small Town, I was all, “A-HA!”

So I’m going to stick it to the man and try this myself. I already snagged the Fels Naptha bar and the Borax at Giant Eagle and this afternoon I’m heading to Ace Hardware for the Super Washing Powder.

I’ll let you know how it works, but all the reviews I’ve found online are that this stuff works just as good as the super-duper, extra-long-lasting fresh-linen and happy sunshine scented, extra-concentrated … you get the picture. And it costs mere cents per load.

Suck it, Tide.

2. Secret Agent L, whose identity I’ve known since last November (I am a vault), revealed herself on Saturday to be Laura from With Love From Pittsburgh, and the model from my $3,000 Worth of Fug post. She is also the Most High Priestess of Stickers, as well as the Eyetique girl! When does she sleep?

Also, when Laura was introduced, she expertly and confidently sauntered down the middle of the Firehouse lounge, to music, through a sea of people watching her, and I was all, “You know, add a pigeon or two and that would be my hell.”

She is a brave girl.

3. This is a part of a fantastic email I received today by reader Sam, in response to my Burgher Kings and Queens article in the mag:

I suggest that Iron City Beer no longer be deemed a “Pittsburgh” beer, given that it is brewed in Latrobe. (A more than adequate replacement for Rolling Rock, if you ask me.) And nor may Kennywood Park be called a “Pittsburgh” amusement park, as it is in West Mifflin. And Pittsburgh International Airport, yes, should rebrand itself. Truth in advertising. You know.

In addition, all that steel that was produced during the 1800s and 1900s shall no longer be considered “Pittsburgh” steel, as much of it wouldn’t have been possible without the entrepreneurialism of H.C. Frick, founder of H.C. Frick Coal & Coke Co. Frick was a native of the Connellsville, Fayette County area and much of the coal he mined came from mines in Westmoreland and Fayette counties.

Moreover, Pittsburghers also may no longer lay claim to the following: Fred Rogers (Latrobe, and we want his statue returned forthwith), Joe Namath (Beaver Falls, Beaver County), Joe Montana (New Eagle, Washington County), Michael Keaton (Coraopolis), Perry Como (Canonsburg, Washington County, but Pittsburghers may keep his statue and the always-on loop recording of his music, too), Dave Wannstedt (Baldwin, and with family ties to Westmoreland County), and Mike Ditka (Carnegie). And lastly, if the Steelers even so much as think about wind sprinting across the county line at the end of this week, the Rooneys shall be deemed to have forfeited all rights and ownership, whereupon Westmoreland County shall retain the authority to seize and dispose of said assets.

Oh, BRAVO!

4. If you’ve ever been to a Pittsburgh roller derby bout (actually, not Pittsburgh; they have their bouts in the Romp n’ Roll in Glenshaw, so really, how dare they call themselves the Steel City Derby Demons?) and want to buy a gift for the derby girls, here’s your chance. Go see what a three or ten dollar donation would buy for the team.

Here’s the info on their last home bout of the season!

(h/t Mel)

5. Pittsburgh is now on Facebook. Love that the email from Lukey’s Joanna, in which she talks about how Pittsburgh is embracing social media, includes no link to the facebook page or even just the URL (http://www.facebook.com/city.of.pittsburgh) and instead says:

Search City of Pittsburgh – we are identified as a government organization. We have a picture of the City with a banner which includes a City seal.

BRB. Going to create a new facebook page called “City of Pgh” with a profile picture of the city with a banner which includes a city seal. Just to confuse the hell out of people.

P.S. I AM JUST KIDDING. STOP WRITING THE NASTY COMMENT YOU ARE WRITING.

(h/t Charles)

6. Since I posted that Kings of Leon post? Twenty-two more emails, tweets and facebook messages/wall posts telling me about it.

I can’t win!

7. This Pennsylvania Guys parody of Katy Perry’s California Gurls song is priceless:

But they mention Iron City as a Pittsburgh beer. That’s not right.

It’s a LATROBE beer.

(h/t Charles)

8. Troy Polamalu is on twitter now.

Can’t wait for his first DM fail all, “And then I was all, ‘LOL. ALL YOU BITCHES TAKE MY SHOTS.’”

I kid.

A DM fail from Troysus would probably be more, “I can’t make it. I’m praying for the next three hours and then I have church and then I have some sick kids to visit.”

9. I went to Giant Eagle yesterday (for the Fels Naptha and Borax) after having spent the day cleaning Las Velas, then dinner at Hard Rock, then a trip up and down the incline. By the time I hit the Iggle at 7:30 p.m. my hair was all EEK, my face was all EFF, and my clothes were all GAG. So of course the person behind me in line was a reader who happened to recognize me.

Sexy. I has it.

10. It has been forever, but, Burghers, DRINK!

From the Mayor’s office:

Andrew McCutchen and the Pittsburgh Pirates announced today that they have partnered with Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl, the City of Pittsburgh and the Student Conservation Association to compete for the opportunity to receive a $200,000 grant from Pepsi that will move the community forward as part of the Pepsi Refresh Project.

Thanks, Joanna!

Oh, and I missed this one from June 15!

Mayor Luke Ravenstahl announced today that the City and developers have closed the public-private financing package necessary to secure Target’s final commitment to move forward with their store which will border Penn Ave.,

I think Joanna might have a crush on me.

Or she’s hoping I’ll drink myself into a stupor and shut the hell up.

If it’s the former, if she really loves me, she’ll work the Jackpot Phrase into a press release — “Looking forward to moving forward.”

I could pickle my liver.

Category: Ben Roethlisberger, Mayor Ravenstahl, Steelers, The Damn Pigeons, Troy Polamalu | July 26, 2010 | 32 Comments » |