I’m going to try to sound positive right now.

Dear Weather,

Really?!

Really, weather?

You’re going to give me over a week of sunny skies and 60+ degree weather in mid-March and then revert back into cold and snow that make my cute little intermountain west town resemble the icy bowels of Hell? Really?

Yes, I believe Hell is cold. It’s my blog, and what I say goes.

I will admit:

Perhaps I was a little premature in my spring cleaning and swimsuit inventory taking. Perhaps I blonded too early in the season. Perhaps in washing my car, I was a tad bit presumptuous.

But for the love of lemonade, turn the beat around, dear weather. I’m tired of complaining about the cold. I want to instead complain about how hot it is in my bedroom and how expensive it is to cool my house and how asinine it is for adults to have to work all summer.

Please? I’m not too proud to beg.

Love always,

hollylynn

i love my life.

so today i get out of work and of course trudge through 6 inches of charming utah powder in my ballet flats. i get it, i'm stupid.

then i make the one mile, 30 minute trek home along with hundreds of other drivers that i swear have been air lifted here from pasadena just this afternoon. i figure it's probably not a good idea to go to salt lake tonight like i had originally planned.

but then i go home and oh, what's this? no power or heat at my place because the roommate who moved out had everything shut off last week and didn't tell me? and even though i had things turned back on and paid the asinine deposits and was told i would be made a priority given the weather, everything was STILL in the off position like my ipod during an airplane landing (that always annoys me)?

yeah.

oh, and my cell phone battery is dying and i've been on hold with the power company for 20 minutes with no sign of a customer service rep helping me in the next year or so?

you get it.

so i use the remaining cell phone battery i've got to illuminate my room enough to locate: cell phone charger, laptop, laptop charger, purse, coat, scarf, boots and any two socks, load everything up and head out.

and i have no food in my house because i only got back from christmas six days ago and hadn't made it to the store yet (again, stupid) and i was planning on having something tasty during my supposed jaunt to salt lake, natch.

no problem, i thought. there is a little caesar's on the way to my friends' house. i'll grab a $5 pizza. and can i tell you i was quite a sight at that little caesar's. picture this:

green sweatpants tucked into my furry brown boots
matching green hoodie (hood ON my head)
remains of today's makeup lining the crevasses of the stress wrinkles around my eyes and mouth
cashmere pashmina draped elegantly about my neck
black pea coat topping it all off
bad attitude seeping from my pores

only, what's this? hollylynn's wallet fell out of her purse somewhere between the illuminated office and the illuminated pizza joint? and she doesn't get any dinner? and hopefully she can find her wallet if/when her power and heat ever are turned on?

suffice it to say, it hasn't been my night.

my dear friends are letting me blog, call the utility company and rant incoherently at their kitchen table while i wait. i love them.

but they don't have tv. and i am missing gossip girl.

don't tell me what i missed.

but i hear aaron rose is gone-zo. and i couldn't be happier.

i hope this post doesn't get me arrested.

i'm from the town with the most high strung airport security system in north america. to be fair, i haven't ever been outside north america and some countries might be more hyper about it...but given the choice of dulles, l.a.x., s.f.o., boston logan, chicago o'hare and lewiston regional, lewiston regional takes the cake in totally out of control security practices.

once, pre-911, i kept setting off the buzzy thingy. i went through. it buzzed. i took out my earrings. it buzzed. i held my breath. it buzzed.

wanna know what was making it buzz? a luggage key in my jeans pocket with a piece of metal the size of one quarter of a very old dime.

c'mon people.

today, it is even more off the scale. i was there today and not only did i have to pay a total of $80 to check my bags round trip (neither here nor there but a pretty slutty charge. i was offended on the ads-on-the-front-page-of-the-newspaper level...it is wrong. have some respect!), but they had one guy working the security line.

he was a slow talker.

the lady in front of me was approximately 90 years old and couldn't take a step without a cane. so what did they do? just took her in the corner and felt her up for a good 5 minutes when she made the buzzy thing go off. probably eventually figured out it was all her titanium joints, sweet lady.

c'mon people.

i was trying to buy a diet coke in the "sterile area" (don't even get me STARTED on that nomenclature. seriously, if the boarding area of an airport is sterile then it would make perfect sense for me to drink out of my dog's water dish.) when the dude made me board instead. it was about 30 minutes before the plane even took off. the plane holds about 18 people and getting to it is about a 4 second travel time walking on the tarmac or jet way or whatever it's called.

c'mon, people.

it was a lot to handle on an empty stomach with no caffeine. having inherited some anxiety from one side of the family and a touch of neurosis from the other, the only prayer in the world i've got is an even blood sugar level. when they announced that there were no peanut butter crackers (only those sick delta airline cookies or peanuts), i about took my quart sized bag of liquids, gels and aerosols and threw it at the flight attendant's head.

but i fell asleep instead.

riddle me this.

so everyone, thanks for your support of the first installment of hollylynn says. the segment needs better branding - i get that. but it was good times, yes?

people seemed to like it.

some people hated it.

hated it, i tell you. and they were too scared to comment. work up that nerve, haters. i'd love to hear a little (respectful) dissenting opinion once in a while here on my little blog.

speaking of hate...how OVER the hills are you by now? 89%? 92%? i don't know why i didn't realize this before, but this is heidi's mad face:

thanks i*heart*you for the photo.

seriously...freaking DUMP SPENCER already.

although the expression kind of reminds me of what chuck bass said after he walked in on his dad and lily van der woodsen having a "business discussion":

"not much future as an actress."

why you hafta do me like that?

dear 30 rock,

what the heck, people?! i have been talking you up to basically everyone i meet, and you let me down. i just hope none of my "investigators" were watching for the first time tonight. talk about embarrassing.

gosh, it would be like bringing a friend to church and having the weird old lady get up and go on a incoherent racist rant before one of the even more expressive congregation members makes his way to the pulpit to perform a rousing rendition of "pour some sugar on me." with bagpipes.

that's what it would be like. i'm not kidding.

last week was actually funny. i have included a recap of that good episode below my signature for your review. please try to live up to this in the future.

disappointed but still committed,

hollylynn

byob

or should i say byodc? meaning of course, bring your own diet coke.

i've mentioned that one of the many reasons i love my job is the coke fridge in the break room that is typically stocked with dc.

we ran out today.

it was hard on us all. i even drank a coke zero (i know, i know). usually, nothing can take diet coke's place. when you want one, you want one. you know? reminds me of a time i was out to eat with a friend who feels similarly at a place that only has pepsi products (how could we not have known?). when my friend asked for a diet coke, we were told that the closest thing they had was diet pepsi. looking up solemnly, he replied,

"just this once."

i was shocked at his defection but it did give me the strength to venture out and order one as well.

i just read this post. i think i have what some members of the medical community may call a "problem."

if so, someone call dr. drew. i might be having some crazy withdrawal side effects tomorrow.

warning:

***this post may or may not contain strong opinions. the city of provo may tar and feather me for voicing these feelings. read at your own risk. if i were really skinny enterprises not responsible for any crying/hurt feelings that may result from reading this post.***

today i made the mistake of leaving the house. i'll be more succinct: i made the mistake of driving within a 2 mile radius of edwards stadium at byu. which by the way is basically impossible not to do if you're trying to get anywhere that matters in utah valley.

if you live in provo/orem, you know exactly what i'm talking about. during the fall on saturdays, you must remain a prisoner in your own home if you wish to escape the byu football fans and the subsequent concentration of redonkulously terrible utah drivers.

they are rabid. they will kill you.

i could not care less about byu football if my heart were surgically removed.

mind you, i respect byu. being mormon my whole life and now living in utah for the past 2 1/2 years, i run into quite a few byu students and graduates. i have to say, i tolerate the majority of them quite well, and am actually rather fond of quite a few of them (most of my current coworkers as well as lots of my friends and even a few relatives). all my byu friends: i like you. i'll keep you.

but byu sports, you and i will never be friends. and you avid byu fans - probably don't bring up football. if you keep this rule, we should be fine.

spooky halloween story

after being out of makeup for a good 8+ weeks (i know, so gross!), i couldn’t take it anymore. i went to the MAC counter for a fresh bottle of hyper real foundation, the greatest foundation of all. i’ve been practicing some slogans for it:

hyper real: the most amazing foundation ever
hyper real: the foundation we will wear in heaven
hyper real: when you wear it no one will know you’re a total mess
hyper real: the foundation that is not made, but is collected when the energy that radiates from serena van der woodsen’s youthful, gorgeous smile is captured and bottled as something we mere mortals can have ourselves for a just 28 american dollars, in an array of warm and cool shades to compliment any skin tone.

i kind of like the last one.

so i’m looking and i don’t see it anywhere. lip quivering, i asked the girl in black with the heavy liquid eyeliner and the flower in her hair, “where is the hyper real?”

“it’s been discontinued,” she told me, a little to cheerfully.

“what?! when?!” i demanded.

“uh…a week ago?”

the rest of this story doesn’t really matter.

i’m languishing, friends. truly sad. i’ve never had a beauty product i love so be discontinued until now. has this ever happened to you? how did you cope?

FAIL.

you may have beat blair waldorf at her own game, chuck bass, but public education is having the worst week ever!

i have been waiting with bated breath all day for jmadd to post this. seriously, people...let's count the usage mistakes, misspellings and superfluous apostrophes here, highlights magazine style. can you find them all?

hint: there are a gajillion.

(i hope it's big enough for you back there in the cheap seats.)

that's what you get...

...when you try to make a buck.

i added ads to my blog in hopes of an extra penny or two, and they were all for eating disorder treatment centers.

talk about judging a book by its cover. just because the title of my blog is "if i were really skinny..." suddenly all my readers have eating disorders? dig deeper, google. look beyond the facade.

it's like i told someone the other day:

i just wish free stuff i got on the internet would work properly.

invasion of the obama texts.

ok. i know that obama is the president of awesome.

but i signed up for his little text messaging thingy so i could be "THE FIRST TO KNOW!" when he picked a running mate.

well i didn't get a text then, but i have been getting them since. it's annoying. ever so slightly.

and there are no instructions for unsubscribe. what gives, obama?

image: https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSBgGx2u_ArRsnyCSSKLtSiRMxKMWeeGQS-RSnu39EnA-uycPHeuygclz16fCZgZcPCGZ6ywijL5gaWXkK_M5YQg4We1nxRDrHjrQ2rJ4CTQe8uYJLXjrNiEUIpUavTMTfvhzb5REi87PP/s1600-h/untitled.bmp

a memo

to: my throat
re: that thing you've been doing

throat:

why have you been doing that thing? that throat thing. you know, the one that makes me sound like a smoker and clear my throat at the most inopportune times?

the rest of my body seems to be virtually mono-free, but you insist on hanging on to the sick.

how can i further support you in your quest for health? please advise.

best,
hollylynn

hollylynn
editor, president, founder and ceo
if i were really skinny enterprises

oh, what’s that?

ahem...the following is a post i wrote today airing grievances (i know, i know...festivus isn't for months) before the nice boys at geek squad helped me connect to the internet.

sorry, did you just ask me how very debilitating it is to have your home internet stop working when the comcast tech comes to set up your home network and then you can't figure out how to get it running again for several days including a weekend? yeah, thought i heard that.

thanks for asking.

seriously, you’re great.

to answer your question, it’s hellacious. i have to stay late at work to take care of all my non-business-related business. i have to save up all my sa-weet blog ideas in my handy dandy notebook during the evenings/weekends/whenevers and pray i remember all the witty nuances i wanted to capture the next day after 5 when i can blog my little heart out, then schedule my posts to come out little by little so it looks natural.

but i do it because i am a woman obsessed.

safety lid?

the other day while going through my purse, i found that the entire travel-sized bottle of aleve that i keep with me just in case had spilled, blue pills littering my bag like jimmies on a cupcake.

kind of funny that a bottle with a cap that's supposed to outsmart children, in the name of safety, can jiggle loose just bouncing around in my purse.

in case you were wondering...

don't speed in highland. don't speed even if you're going with the flow of traffic, don't speed if you're on your way to the hospital, don't speed because you think you won't get caught.

because you will get pulled over.

and die.

errr, get an 82 dollar ticket if you're cited for going 5 over the speed limit. look, just don't go it. ok?* the scientists invented cruise control for a reason.

looks like a lotta ya's were prancing around in the same ignorant bliss i was until a couple weeks ago, give the results of the last skinny poll.

well, now you know.

and remember, dear ones: people first, then money. then things...then...jackets (thanks kristin wiig. that still makes me giggle, even if i did get a speeding ticket)

*special prize if you can name the movie monologue this post is loosely based on.

actually good advice...for once.

i know...yawn. you don't even want to read this because it's about jessica "what i really want is my foundation to match my face" alba. she is boring. i'll give you that.

but today i was on people.com and they were talking about her. the headline, to be exact, was:

Revealed: Jessica Alba's Secret for Losing the Baby Weight!

yep, that was definitely it.

to which i thought, rolling my eyes, 'here comes a bunch of bologna.' mindi, you know what i'm talking about. "i just chase around my kid! that is diet enough for me! and look i'm a size 0!"

but the article actually talked about how she is on this intense low-carb, low-fat diet and does a ton of cardio, core and circuit training 6 days a week.

ok fine.

but i still think you're the most boring woman in hollywood and i think you gave your kid a weird name.

pleeeeeese

i loved that dyson commercial where the british guy says,

"i just think things should work properly."

thanks, british guy. could not agree more. i just think my internet service should work properly. i don't care if it's free...it still should work.

reason #1 i am excited about moving this week: the hope that i will have better (although not free) internet service.

i will let you know when i think of more good reasons...

do you tweet?

i know i sound like i'm 80, but all this technology available to us is starting to confuse me.

also, it's starting to cannibalize itself.

we're on a social media kick at work and i have tried to make myself use twitter...to no avail. this technology. it's overwhelming! in fact, my friend becky who sits in the cube behind me at the office and i were talking about this today, over im. i was probably freaking out about how i haven't tweeted in a week and that all this technology is just too hard, and i said something funny.

me: (freaking out about how i can't handle all this technology)
becky: lol
becky: i just told you out loud that was funny but you couldn't hear me because you have your ear buds in.
me: see?

only there's no rest for the weary. because after complaining about it, what do i do as soon as i come home from work and eat my marshmallow matey dinner? i blog about my technology gripes.

that is if my dang internet will cooperate long enough for me to post anything.

officially bothered.

ok, i'm going to say something right now, and you might want to take a screen capture of it because i'm not sure i've ever said this before and it likely won't happen again in the near future:

i don't know everything.

there, i said it. some issues in this world are complex and i don't really understand them. and unless you're a certain ex boyfriend whose dad works for exxon, you won't understand this any more than i do.

i'm glad someone's pockets are being lined with my gas budget that's now higher than my grocery budget...

d-do you got a first aid kit handy?

i love it when urban music artists spell words when they're "singing." in any other genre of music, the singer would just you know, sing the word. they can do this because in other genres it is perfectly acceptable for a syllable to take up more than one beat. but in a hip-hop tune, that's strictly prohibited.

typically, this just ends up being a good thing though, because it proves that rap artists can spell. the best is danity kane:

can you fix my h-e-a-r-t? cuz it's d-a-m-a-g-e-d.

other more sopistocated peeps spell longer words. like webbie:

i-n-d-e-p-e-n-d-e-n-t do you know what that means?

you know, webbie? i'm not sure that many people listening to your song do know what it means. i for one couldn't even figure out what he was saying the first time i heard the song. i deduced he was talking about independence by using context clues (she got her own house, she got her own car...)

but some artists in a valiant attempt to appear literate fail. and they fail big. like homeboy collaborating with fergie on her solo album. not even sure who it is. but he struggles with spelling:

t, to the a, to the s-t-e-y, girl, you TASTY.

it is tasty, right? tastey? tasty? thanks, spellcheck!