Irvester Award

As if my ego wasn't already inflated enough after Adriana nominated me for a Leibster Award a few weeks ago, last week, Kristin (who is wonderful, by the way) nominated me for the Ivrester Award!!!!

And really, I'm honored. I mean, you people have never met me, but you know that I don't mess around when it comes to my spirits.

I think that means I'm definitely doing something right, yes?

Yes.

The Rules:

Acknowledge who nominated you

Answer the 10 questions listed below 

Nominate 10 bloggers you think are excellent drinkers. You can't nominate the blog that nominated you 

The Questions:

1. What is your favorite drinking game and why? A lot of people hate it, but I just love Circle of Death. Mostly because I love the Never Have I Ever part. Even though I'm always out super fast. Whatever. 

2. It is your birthday, what is your idea of the perfect evening? Ideally, my birthday would alway be on a Saturday. It would start with mimosas in the morning, champagne in the afternoon, and cocktails with my friends at a fancy bar at night! 

3. Money is no object, what is your go to drink of choice at a bar? Hands down, a Blackbird Julep from this cocktail place in Winston-Salem. IT IS SO GOOD I COULD DIE. 

Can you IMAGINE? I promise, everyone that comes to visit me, I'll take you here!!! For one drink, of course. Then it's $2 PBR the rest of the night. #balleronabudget

4. How many times have you played the game "Edward 40 Hands"? Uh, never. Oh lawd. I think I would die.

5. Take this alcohol screening quiz here, what score did you receive? Only 20% and I think it's REALLY unfair that they accused me of being an alcoholic. I mean really. REALLY THOUGH.

6. What is your favorite memory with Alcohol? Honestly, I couldn't tell you, as there are very few times that I drink for the sole purpose of drinking. But here's a story: one of the first weekends I ever spent with Garrett, we went over to some of his friends house to watch the UNC basketball game. We got an 18 pack of PBR (don't worry, the house was within walking distance!), and we each drank nine. Garrett (and all of his friends) were super impressed that I could keep up with him... he SAYS that's when he fell in love with me, but whooooo knows. =)

7. What is your favorite song about drinking? Or song to drink to? 'Say Ahhh' by Trey Songz. 0% sorry about it.

8. What is your favorite activity to do while drinking (i.e. boating, bowling, golf, trivia, etc.) Apples to Apples and Cards Against Humanity, definitely. They're fun and engaging, but you can still talk to your friends and have time to drink while you play. Also, the answers get funnier as the night goes on. (I've had way too many spilled drinks during Catchphrase.)

9. In your opinion, which is the number one party school in the country and why? Rumor has it that it's WVU. My friends that attended WVU agree.

10. When do you know you have had too much to drink? What are your signals? I get loud. I mean, I'm loud all the time. But if I'm drunk enough, I am LOUD. And animated. And I usually start knocking things over.

The Noms: 
1. Stevie

2. Leslie

3. Candice

4. Adriana

5. Kate

6. Alyssa

7. Jenna

8. Dani

9. Emily

10. Rachel

And since I just can't get enough of that fabulous Kristin, I'm also linking up for Thirsty Thursday!!! 

And finally as a bonus: here are my favorite drinking relates gifs, because why not?

How To Fight With Your Partner: A Helpful Guide

Since Garrett and I have lived apart for the majority of our relationship, we are naturally relationship experts. Here is a handy guide I have compiled on how to effectively (and maturely) argue with your partner.

Step One: Decide that it's time to pick a fight. Hint: A good time for this is when you're doing something totally benign like watching a movie on the couch together.

Step Two: Choose a totally arbitrary topic. For the sake of this post, let's choose a TOTALLY HYPOTHETICAL topic, like whether or not The Guardian movie with Kevin Costner was based on the book of the same name by Nicholas Sparks.

Step Three: When your partner tells you that he happens to like the movie The Guardian, rant about how much you hate it because (spoiler alert) Kevin Costner dies at the end. Throw in how you hate every Nicholas Sparks book because hellooooo, everyone dies in those books, too. (Who peed in your cornflakes, Nick? Seriously.)

Step Four: When your partner calmly tells you that the movie was in fact NOT based on the movie, argue passionately about how it DEFINITELY WAS.

Step Five: Keep arguing this point, even though you don't actually know if the movie is based on the book, you had just always assumed. And also you saw it on the Internet once.

Step Six: No seriously, keep this going for a long time. Even after your partner starts ignoring you because gosh darn it, YOU KNOW THINGS ABOUT THINGS, OKAY? and your partner should KNOW THAT.

Step Seven: When you see that your partner really is just ignoring you, dramatically stomp to the bathroom and slam the door.

Step Eight: Open door again, check to make sure partner saw you slam the door.

Step Nine (a): If he did, YOU WIN!
Step Nine (b): If he didn't, repeat step eight. (This step may be repeated as many times as necessary.)

Step Ten: Continue about your awesome day because ZOMG, You're such a good arguer!!!!

You got all that? Good.

Now go forth and argue! You can thank me later.

(In case you were wondering, the movie was not, in fact, based on the book.)

More Bloggy Thoughts + June Goals

So, the Blog Every Day challenge is over, and I'm still REALLY FREAKIN' PROUD of myself that I did it. Every single day. Being forced to blog every day is freakin' hard, man. I did not like it. BUT - I'm really glad I did it. I learned a lot about what works for me as a blogger.

First of all, intentionally planning posts is totally clutch. I know, all of you experienced people are all "Duh, Alyssa. We told you that a hundred times already." I know, I know. But I had to figure that out on my own, okay? Being intentional is key. Planning and queuing posts so they're ready to go live in the mornings is definitely the way to go.
I also figured out that I really need to listen to my instincts and not feel absolutely locked in to blogging. I'm glad I committed to this challenge and did it, but there were days where the LAST thing I wanted to do was figure out something to put on the internet. But I did it anyway. (Sometimes I'm too stubborn for my own good.) It's good to keep a consistent presence, but sometimes I just don't have time for this whole internet thing. And that's totally okay.
Conversely, I've also learned that sometimes I just have to sit down and force myself to really focus on writing. I can claim Writers Block any time that I can't think of anything to post. But once I sit down and really start to focus, I can get together some pretty good stuff. So working on being focused but not overthinking every single little thing is really the key.
Like I said, as exhausting as it was at times, I'm really glad I went for this challenge, and I'm so proud of myself that I got it done.


- Find + Install a new layout - I love mine (and Kelsey is great to work with), but now that my blog is starting to take off a bit, I'd like to get away from the premade fam.
- Go for custom domain - I'm still holding out on this because I'm not sure if I want to switch to Wordpress or not. I keep hearing about how much better it is, but, well... I'm a pansy.
- Focus more on the original goals I established when I started this blog. I make an effort to implement these in my life, but I never talk about them. And if I don't talk about them on the internet, do they really happen? Hmmmmmm.
- Finally post my thoughts about Silver Linings Playbook. This one is silly, but I seriously finished that book a month ago and haven't gotten around to talking about it. (Now I'm kinda waiting because apparently one of the Book Clubs used it this month?)
- Get in on giveaways + co-hosting more linkups.
- Create a media kit.
- BE BETTER AT RETURNING EMAILS.

So that'st that. I'm posting these goals here to hold myself accountable, so feel free to harass me about them throughout the month! I'm sure I'll need it.

Our favorite ladies are back!

Courtesy of BravoTV.com

It's that time again - the New Jersey Housewives are back, and I am PUMPED.

(lol GET IT? New Jersey? Fist pumps? Okay, anyway.)

So let's recap: the last time we saw the ladies at the reunion, things were no good. Teresa was still acting like a petulant two year old (yo girl, when your nine year old daughter is more mature than you, it's time to take a step back, ya dig?) and hurling insults at anyone she could. Jacqueline had revealed that her son had been recently diagnosed with autism and had lost his ability to speak, Kathy was looking to start her own catering company, and Caroline and Dina were no longer speaking.

As far as Teresa and Melissa's relationship goes, it looked like things had started to look up towards the end of season four, but at the season four reunion, we saw that that definitely wasn't the case.

This season will be interesting, because a lot of it is happening almost two years after the events we saw in season three and season four. The season three reunion show, that Jacqueline was so famously absent from, occurred the day after the Posche Fashion Show where Teresa set up the whole stripper situation with that dudebro Angelo.

The season is starting off with coverage of Hurricane Sandy, which I think is interesting because these women live lives that most of us only dream of, but they're prone to the elements just like we are. Is featuring Hurricane Sandy and their efforts to rebuild their lives a nod to the fact that this season will feature the ladies trying to rebuild their relationships? I think it might be.

I'll tell you guys: Teresa is far and away my least favorite housewife. She always has been. To me, it always felt like she was trying to force the appearance of wealth onto the viewers - always making a point to spend large amounts of cash on furniture and her daughters, and saying things like "we can afford to have another baby, so why not?" (We know now that their in vitro treatments were part of the debt that they owed, so you know, they couldn't REALLY afford another baby. But that's irrelevant.) However, from the things that we've been seeing and reading about season five, it looks like she's finally realizing that this belligerent, stubborn, immature attitude is pushing everyone away, and she's working to make amends. Hopefully she and Melissa can finally turn over a new leaf.

There will be more "friends of the housewives" too, but these ladies might cause more trouble than the Housewives themselves: Kim DePaola, Jennifer Dalton, and Penny Drossos. I'll tell you guys: I absolutely HATE Kim D. I don't think she adds anything but drama, and the ladies have enough of that as it is. I don't know much about Jennifer Dalton, other than the fact that she's Teresa's friend, so that could really go either way. The other "friend" is Penny Drossos. I don't know much about her, but she's married to John Karagiorgis, who has filed assault charges against Jacqueline, Chris and Joe Gorga after a fight at -you guessed it- the Posche Fashion Show. Allegedly, he's been harassing the women for several years, so seeing that dynamic play out this season will be interesting to say the least.

And don't worry, all of our favorite Real Kids of New Jersey will be back, too. Lauren is running her store Cafface, Ashley Ashlee and her new nose will be visiting from LA, and it looks like Milania Giudice of "Gimme pizza, you old troll" fame has learned some new dance moves. Because of course she has. Sadly, though, Greg won't be back, as he moved to San Francisco. I won't lie, this news made me question whether or not I even wanted to watch this season. I mean really. Greg is the best.

So I wanna know: Who's your favorite New Jersey housewife? What are you most excited for this season? Do you think the ladies (all of them) will redeem themselves? Do you think Teresa and Melissa  will finally bury the hatchet? Are you judging me yet for being this invested in reality television?