dear winter,

let’s consider this your last hurrah.

thanks much,

jessica

rumor has it the midwest is in for a bit of snow fall.

it’s officially spring.  almost april.  and we’ve got snow in the forecast.

i’m not happy with this news.

summer, come quickly!

in other news…i melted a junior mint on my crotch today.  not on purpose.

-jess

our plane landed in st louis just after 11pm last night

needless to say, i’m quite dead today, however, before i pass out for a nice long nap, i would like to share some of my trip with you.

not all of it, though, because as they say “what happens in vegas…” well, you know the rest.

going for work is quite different than going with friends, but regardless, it was still a lot of fun.

here are a few shots of our booth WHICH, btw, won the “Best New Exhibitor Booth”….sweet!

^our truck, breaking through the wall of traditional media (also see our pile of old tv’s to the left!)

^some of our banners

^switch liberate your brand!

^paintball aftermath..messy messy messy. (but fun!)

^liberate yourself from the confines of traditional media by shooting up this tv with a paintball gun :)

^yes.  we rock.  go switch!

^ate my first oyster..i also ate my first snail..and just some of the best food i’ve ever eaten in general

^it’s 5 degrees in the red square vodka freezer…so you have to wear a fur coat and hat with flaps

^so you can see how big he is.

^dancing, posing, i’m not sure, but we certainly had fun at rumjungle

^jeannie sported the switch dots to dinner at mon ami gabi (best salmon i’ve ever had, fyi)

so we never saw the sun, and we barely slept (basically we became vampires for 4 days), but we accomplished our mission, and had a lot of fun doing it…

yay switch!

-jess

during our time at the Exhibitor Show, we are required to wear black dickies button up shirts with our dots and logo, and black cargo pants.   (oh and let’s not forget the comfy, BLACK tennis shoes…i’m thinking of packing the chuck’s and seeing if they will make the cut for the show floor)

wait, wait…cargo pants?  i thought those went out of style 3 years ago.  oh yes.  they did, my friend.  which is why i found it to be such a difficult task.  making my mission even more difficult is the fact that i had no desire to invest more than $20 on the pants (which i will most likely never wear again…perhaps they can become my painting costume, though)

no, not cargo shorts, or cargo capris (which did exist in some stores due to the onset of spring), but cargo PANTS.  in black.

after scouring the oldnavy.com, target.com, and multitudes of other online stores, i trekked to the mall in search of the elusive black cargo pants.

after all, how can you really get a feel for a pair of pants without trying them on?

i visited nearly every store in the west county mall.

while shopping for black cargo pants, i also located a number of other key items that i felt i absolutely could not live without: a necklace with an orange feather, pink tennis shoes, a long sleeved purple t-shirt, and a jumbo box of junior mints.

i did not intend to purchase any of these things.  i also wanted to purchase a kayak, but it wouldn’t fit in the car.

finally, our journey led us to jcpenneys.  ahhhh jcpenneys, it’s been a long while since we’ve crossed paths. 

guess what they had hidden away in the back of the juniors’ secion??

oh yes…there they are…black cargo pants.  in my size.  no alterations necessary.  they even make the tush look nice.

 good job, jcpenneys.  i suppose i can always count on you in a bind.

-jessica

until recently, i didn’t know how many or how often people were visiting my blog.  little did i know, quite a few folks are stopping by (despite my low comment count..i’d love to hear from you, by the way)

google analytics has shed much light on the traffic to my happy little blog.

my favorite part is about organic search results (or basically, what they typed in google that led them to me)

i wanted to share a few of the more interesting ones with you:

• i just like cows
• being productive at mcdonalds
• little pubes
• hot librarian pictures
• john mayer pubes
• thug life tattoos
• pube pictures

(apparently if you write just one post about pubes you will generate some traffic…maybe not the kind you wanted, though…)

-jess

this is what engineers are best for:
http://www.octopustap.com/

yes, that’s right…4 beers at one time.  no more waiting in line at the keg…

i don’t even like beer that much…but i like this.

saw it on the news this evening.  thought you might like it too.

-jess

so i leave in 11 days and i must say i’m getting pretty pumped about the whole thing

 why am i going back to vegas, you ask?

 well, switch is headed to the 2009 exhibitor show.

ahhh, well, you have no idea what that is…no worries, i didn’t either until i started at switch.

 quick snippit!

“EXHIBITOR 2009 is the 21st annual educational conference and exhibition for exhibit and event marketers. Sponsored by EXHIBITOR magazine, this event is corporate America’s top choice for serious education, hands-on training, new product launches, career networking, and special access to industry experts and thought leaders.”

mayyyybe it sounds boring to you, but i assure you one thing that will NOT be boring is the switch booth.

 intrigued at all?  we’re covering our progress on the booth and explaining our liberation manifesto through our event focused blog “the liberation begins”

it’s pretty sweet, so check it out if you want to see what i’ve been up to at work lately!

 -jess

and every time i pass it i can’t help but giggle.

for your viewing pleasure:

i think i’m going to head to jack in the box now and purchase one of the teriyaki bowls.  i’m serious.

**EDIT** The bowl wasn’t as awesome as the billboard.

-jess

 would love to go see them at sxsw, but unfortunately i will not be making it down to austin any time soon.  ahhhh what a cool place it appears to be.  i will need to check it out for myself.  (sooner than later, please!)

check them out.  i promise you will not be disappointed.

Blind Pilot Myspace

so tonight after work i drove to edwardsville to meet up with my sisters for a little kickboxing action.  first time.  stef bailed, but abby and i made it through.  it was intense.  my muscles feel like slugs and my body is revolting against such activity.

i usually tend to stick to low-impact cardio, but this was much more involved that my normal workout.  i’m glad i made it through, surprised i made it through, maybe, but perhaps when i can barely walk tomorrow i will feel differently.

so what i’m saying is…go to the ymca on esic in edwardsville and get your butt kicked by cardio kickboxing.  even though you’ll feel like a bag of jello afterwards , you’ll feel good.

about to pass out from exhaustion now.  good night.

-jess

The lights here are softer than you’d think
The dim lit peacocks in the trees,
They’re hiding their eyes and their beauty, like me
But if my eyes were on my back
I know what I’d be looking at
Through every shade of brown and green
I didn’t know, I didn’t know it was nothing new
I didn’t know, I didn’t know it was you

blind pilot ~oviedo

yes.  i said pubes…

i thought this would be an appropriate thing to talk about since st. patty’s day is approaching rather quickly.

i’m not irish, by the way.  but sometimes i wish i was.

So there is a place in fairview heights called the “dandy inn irish pub”.  I’ve only been there one time with my old roommate megan.  tasty! (the food, not megan.)

for some reason it always acted as a sort of landmark when i was growing up during our drives from fairview heights to o’fallon.  a halfway mark, maybe.  very irish, green shutters, four leaf clovers, the works.

it never occurred to me to refer to it as anything other than the dandy inn, but my grandmother offered a new point of view that i can’t seem to shake out of my head now and forever after when i pass the dandy inn.

my 60+ year old granny looks at the sign as we sit at a stop-light waiting for it to turn, and slowly reads the sign for my sisters and my mother “dandy inn…irish pube”  the word “pube” was long and drawn out followed by a period of realization by my grandmother.

then she cracked up.  and so did we.  because what else can you do but roll on the floor laughing when your grandma says “pube”.

after approximately 10 minutes of giggling in the car, we finally overcame the uncontrollable laughter only to be surprise attacked again by my grandma’s replay of the situation 15 minutes later.

it’s just a funny thing.  i hope that you can appreciate that.  i hope when i grow old i do not lose my sense of humor.

now i forever will think of irish pubes when i pass the dandy inn.  i’m really okay with that.

anyway– this year, i’m excited for green beer.  i’ve never actually partaken in the holiday aside from wearing a green shirt, or pretending like my undergarments are green/have green on them when i realized i had forgotten the day altogether.

this year i fully intend to participate.

are you in??

-jess

And if our always is all that we gave
And we someday take that away
I’ll be alright if it was just ’til St. Patrick’s Day 

john mayer ~ st patrick’s day