Sunday, December 27, 2009

Christmas!

Here is what “Santa” brought me:

A puppy who likes to pee on my floor and chew my moldings and jump off the back of my couch like SuperPup. But she’s a sweet little shelter dog, so we’re working on it.

Some CD’s.

Lots of gift cards (which is awesome because I have muchos libros to buy).

Some clothes (including a great black sweater from my aunt and a black coat from my grandma, both of which I’ve been wearing non-stop, minus laundry day. Because black is my favorite color and they know me so well.) A black belt (not the karate kind) and a black purse from my mom.

Some makeup and jewelry, etc. A great new wallet.

The Twilight Game.

And even though the guy I’m sorta married to but not allowed to talk about online and I had a spending limit for each other, he totally blew it by buying me a new laptop.

I’m so spoiled.

How about you? What did you get for Christmas?

Thursday, December 17, 2009

A Birthday Shout-Out

Happy Thursday!

Just taking some time out from my busy week to wish my other half a Happy Birthday!

The big 3-0.



(sigh)

I’m happy he hit that milestone before me.

If you read and enjoyed One Wish, you can thank him, because when we were struggling college students and madly in lust, it was he who stated:

“I wish you would shut up about writing a book and just do it already.”

(sigh) I heart him.

Sometimes we need that fire lit under our tails. The guy who I’m sorta married to but not allowed to talk about online is that fire.

Happy Birthday!!

Love,
~Leigh~

Monday, December 14, 2009

I *heart* Ballet

Here’s a secret that, if you know anything about me, is no secret:

I want to be a ballerina.

Yes. I do.

See, I don’t think the ballet is even an acquired taste. You either love it, or you don’t. Me? (sigh) I *love* it. It’s my favorite. I love concerts. I love musicians. I love symphonies. I love plays. I love musicals. But I *LOVE* the ballet.

Yesterday, I went to see The Nutcracker Ballet. It’s sort of become a Christmas tradition. I remember my mom taking me when I was younger. This time we took baby girl (who adored it, but that doesn’t surprise anyone who knows that she is really me reincarnated).

(sigh) I love the costumes and the dancers and the snow falling from the rafters and the musicians in the orchestra pit and the dancing and the dancing and the dancing. (sigh)

Yeah, so there’s a very unstable side of me that would probably stay in my seat for hours after Clara appears behind the screen waking up from her dream and rocking her toy nutcracker, sobbing in the chair and occasionally sputtering: “I—I—I l-l-love th-the Ballet!” Yeah. I’m totally mental.

You know why I can’t be a ballerina, though? Because when we were applauding the cast for a job well done, I stood up, lost my balance, and almost fell backwards into my seat. Yeah. I’m not the most coordinated person in the world. My tragic flaw.

For now, I live vicariously:



Fact for your Monday: One of my favorite sounds occurs in the moments before an orchestra begins to play, when they are warming up. Each instrument is playing its own note and the result is this string of tones that doesn’t quite make a legitimate chord, but is sooooo beautiful.

Would you believe YouTube has captured this for me? Well, you should. YouTube Freakin’ Rocks.



(sigh)

Okay. God. Enough Sighing!

The good news is that, even though I don’t have the grace of a dancer, I have the heart of one. In fact, you might just find baby girl and me jammin’ to some Waltz of the Flowers today. We’ll have to fight over who gets to be the Sugar Plum Fairy, though.

Have a great week!

Love,
~Leigh~

Friday, December 11, 2009

We Have a Winner!

I’m thrilled to announce that the winner of the signed copy of One Wish is Groovy Gal! Drop me an email at leighbrescia (at) yahoo (dot) com with your address and who you’d like me to sign the book to and I’ll stick it in the mail for you. Congrats! And thanks to everyone who entered!

You guys had some great ideas for your dream houses. Spiral staircases. Ferris wheels. Ya’ll are awesome. I’m totally down with Liz’s suggestion, though: Pemberley. Especially if one Mr. Darcy comes with. Or maybe I should say if one Colin Firth as Mr. Darcy comes with. Sign. Me. Up. (Le Sigh)



(daydreams)

Happy Friday!

Love,
~Leigh~

Monday, December 7, 2009

Specifications of my Dream House

Since last week was so great (minimal grading!!), I figured I should celebrate by blogging. Of course, I can *never* think of anything witty to post when I need to, and so I sat here and thought and thought and thought and nothing came to mind and I wondered if I should talk about Christmas or books or writing . . . or New Moon/Twilight/vampires/how totally obsessed I am with Edward Cullen. . . .

And then I thought, there should be like, this random blog generator that passes out topics. And then I realized I probably wasn’t the first person in need of this; that there *had* to be one already. And so I yahoo’ed, which I guess is like googled, only I searched from the yahoo home page (googled sounds so much cooler than yahoo’ed) and look what I found: http://blogtap.net/blogtopicgenerator.php

Some of the topics it suggested?

Television series that have gone bad
The most terrifying animal
Pop vs hip hop
The worst ways to die

But none of those really spoke to me. I mean, there’s nothing like welcoming a Monday morning by thinking about all the ways you *don’t* want to go. (Fire. Drowning. Cancer. Suffocating. Car Accident. Well, anything that isn’t in my sleep, I suppose.)

And then it suggested: Specifications of your Dream House. So that’s what I’m going to talk about today. My dream house. Yes, this is so random. Yes, I am totally cheating. But who doesn’t want to fantasize about the house they *could* have, right?

So here goes. . . .

Assuming that money is no object. . . .

There should be a lot of square feet. A LOT of square feet.
I want a huge yard that’s fenced in with rolling hills and some trees and many acres of forest.
I’d like a few horses (and someone to help take care of them).
I want a place in the yard for rescue dogs, because if money was no object I would take in as many homeless, forgotten animals as possible.
I want a garage that holds “several” cars. And cool cars to go in them.
A backyard pool. Someone who will clean it for me.
A pool house.
Beautiful gardens. A gardener to take care of them, because my thumb is seriously charred.
A monster master bedroom/bathroom.
The bathroom floor tile should be heated.
Two circular stairways in the massive foyer.
I’d like a gym. And then I’d like the motivation to actually use it.
I want a mirrored room with hardwood floors for dancing.
A media room for watching movies.
An office to work/write in.
A gorgeous, state of the art kitchen. A chef to use it.
A room for my black baby grand piano. The time to actually play it.
A library. (With those rolling ladders.)
A game room with a pool table.
And finally, I’m partial to French architecture (country/chateaus). Spires and turrets optional.

I’m actually going to move here:



I’m just waiting for it to go on the market.

You can tell I haven’t given this much thought. At all. Thank goodness for random blog topic generators on Monday morning.

How about you? What would your dream home boast? Or maybe you want to move to the Biltmore Estate with me?

I’ll give away a signed copy of ONE WISH (just in time for Christmas!!) to one random commenter either here or LiveJournal. Any age; any town; anyone.

The contest ends Thursday at midnight. I’ll announce a winner on Friday.

Have a Great Week!

Love,
~Leigh~

P.S. Shameless Plug Alert! If you’re looking for a great gift for that teen girl in your life (12-15), I can personally recommend ONE WISH (http://www.amazon.com/One-Wish-Leigh-Brescia/dp/1934813052/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1260198648&sr=8-1) or any of the books over at the 2009 Debs (www.feastofawesome.com).

Friday, December 4, 2009

Friday Five: New Moon Edition

1. So yes, I finally managed to see New Moon yesterday. Did I love it? ABSOLUTELY! I’m always worried about sequels to movies I like, because I feel they’ll never live up to a) my expectations and/or b) the hype. New Moon was Made of Awesome. The End.

2. Instead of a “date night,” the guy I’m sorta married to but not allowed to talk about online ended up letting the little brother tag along with us. The ‘lil bro is on Team Cullen, too, though, so it worked out. Specifically, he’s Team Alice. What can I say? She’s pretty cute.

3. As I grow older . . . wait, that makes me sound ancient. Rewind. The more movies I watch, the more aware I am of various subtleties in films. Especially in terms of writing and cinematography. I really liked not only the effects in New Moon, but some of the camera work as well. My favorite? The scene where the camera circles Bella as the months pass.

4. I practically ate my weight in movie theater popcorn. Then that heavy, sick feeling settled in the pit of my stomach. It’s good that I rarely hit the theater to watch movies (we’re a Blockbuster family), because right now? I don’t care if I ever see another piece of popcorn again.

5. New Moon was awesome. I can’t wait for Eclipse. Stephenie Meyer is brilliant. But that’s me stating the obvious.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

Love,
~Leigh~