Greatest Hits: And the seventh thing I hate the most about you - you make me love you.

Wait Kate, that's not you!  True, but this picture of D and JG
is the 12th hit when you google "puss n boots aggro crag."
Who says this blog isn't doing anything?

So, you may remember (and if you know me you definitely do remember, because I force you to constantly) that Danielle and I won an award.  It was an exciting day.  Nearly as exciting for me as the day Eminem won his Oscar.  In order to accept our award, given by the incomparable Bre of BreBeauty, Danielle and I had to share seven random facts about ourselves.  The resulting string of posts revealed some funny, interesting and really weird tidbits about our lives as wildcats.  This was an especially fun series of posts for me because I learned things about Ms. Festino that I haven't learned over the course of our friendship.  I guess we just don't talk about Puss N Boots very often.  For good reason, apparently.

Enjoy this, somewhat disturbing, look into our lives again here.

xo kate

Dfest: What's new pussycat?

I hate puss n boots. Always have. Always will.

I hated him before he made his appearence in the Shrek film series. And his latin flair in the animated feature only fueled my fiery loathing.

He's a cat. And he wears boots. And he walks upright. And his name is Puss. What is not to hate?

I can't even talk about it. I hate him that much.

Kate: The Crag

I need to own a piece of the Aggro Crag.  Not a want, but a need.

That's right, the Aggro Crag.  As in the "Aggro meaning AGGRESSIVE and crag meaning ROCK" Aggro Crag.  Also known as the Mega Crag or, in some circles, the Super Crag.

The Crag.

For those of you who didn't grow up in the early nineties, or who lived in a hole, the Aggro Crag is the final competitive event on Nickelodeon's sports-theme kids game show, GUTS, hosted by Mike O'Malley, now of Glee fame and Moira "Mo" Quirk, now a head referee in the WNBA. (Okay, I made that up. I don't think Mo did anything after GUTS.)  The three contestants race up the mountain, battling blinding glitter blizzards, avalanches of foam rocks and something called nuclear flying crystals.  The thing was also in a constant cloud of dry ice and seemingly only lit by strobe lights.  Basically it was like a Seaside Heights nightclub.  The Aggro Crag climb was the fifth and final event and worth the most points in the GUTS, serving as the crown jewel in the competition.  As such, the GUTS winner (allegedly) got a glowing trophy designed to look like a piece of the mountain.

Where's this girl now and why isn't
she selling me her piece of the Crag?

Since college, I have been scouring the internet searching for a piece of the Crag.  I'd like it mostly as a conversation piece, you know, something for the coffee table.  I'm not going to lie to you, though, I think it would help with getting dates as well.  Who wouldn't go out with someone who actually owned a piece of the Crag?  Who wouldn't go home with them to see it?  Is this just me?

At any rate, I've spent more hours than I care to admit on eBay searching for someone selling a genuine Crag trophy.  I figured that since GUTS was on for a long time there would be lots of 20-somethings looking to unload their piece of the GUTS empire for some quick cash.  No such luck.  I once saw someone claiming to be selling theirs for $35,000, but that seemed like it must be some sort of trick. (Also, I'm pretty desperate to use genuine Crag-related pick-up lines, but not $35,000 desperate.) Another time I stumble upon (read: search aggressively for) a blog that claimed the contestants on the show did not actually get to keep their piece of the Crag, it was just the same trophy with a different kid holding it every week.  This was a huge disappointment, but I'm not entirely willing to believe it's true.  If anyone has a primary source who has been on GUTS and knows for sure, please, please please tell me.  Until then, I will still search, perhaps in vain, but I will search.

xo kate

Dfest: I've fallen and I can't get up.

I have dislocated my knee seven times. Yep. Seven.

The first time it happened I was a junior in high school. Hair straighteners had not yet reached Stoneham and I was suffering from chronic frizzy hair. This is relevant. I promise.

That fateful day of my dislocation I tried citre shine for the first time. I took a shower, spritzed my whole head, and carefully and slowly blew out my hair. The result was miraculous. My hair was shiny and bouncy and awesome. So bouncy in fact that I couldn't help but jump up and down repeatedly, demonstrating to my sister how amazing my new do was.


Up and down and up down on the recently cleaned hardware floors. And that is when it happened.

I went down. And the knee went out. And the pain shot through my body. And I started screaming.

I went to physical therapy after that, but the knee was never the same.

The last time I dislocated my knee was in September of 2005. It was the first week at my new job. I was getting on the orange line T at Oak Grove and the bell rang and someone came running in behind me and knocked me down. I spilled my coffee, ripped my sweater, and you guessed it, dislocated my knee.

I lay splayed out on the floor of the MBTA car. One leg hanging out by the door. The doors trying to close, but hitting my ankle instead.


Some kind soul hit the emergency button and a female T worker came to my aid.

First, she thoughtfully asked me if I tripped "in my little shoes".

I was wearing flip flops. So I immediately took issue with her tone and insinuation that I was a dumb girl commuting with inappropriate shoes. My flip flops were exceedingly comfortable and practical.

I managed to huff out, "No I did not trip, somebody pushed me."

Of course, all of the bystanders in car avoided eye contact. No one owed up to it. Bastards.

She then asked me if I wanted to get off and call an ambulance.

I said no, I just need your help popping the knee back into place. Because of some stupid, but probably smart, liability issues, the T woman told me she wasn't allowed to touch me. So I popped it back in myself. Took a seat. And hobbled off to work.

Lesson: beware citre shine and Oak Grove.

Kate: Hebejebes

Wet paper gives me the hebejebes.  Every single kind of wet paper: magazine pages, printer paper, newspaper, cardstock, post its, construction paper, tissue paper and every other kind of paper you can think of.  I hate the way that it looks and the way that it feels and just generally think that it's completely gross and seriously icky.  Just the mention of a wet piece of paper and I shutter.  Like my sister when someone talks about Robitussin cough syrup. (Danielle does not feel this way about Robitussin.) I don't even like wet paper after it's dried, because that crinkliness just forces me to think about the fact that it was once wet.

My kryptonite.  Just googling this image hurt.

This has been true ever since I was a kid.  I remember in elementary school teachers used to give us single sheets of paper (class newsletters, permission slips, bad kid notes, etc.) to bring home to our parents and the ice pack in my lunch box used to get them wet sometimes.  Ugh.  I literally gag just thinking about having to pull a wet piece of paper out of my backpack.

There are lots of reason to hate working in the summer, but one of my big ones is that during the summer the water bottle that I keep on my desk gets condensation on it and sometimes gets the papers on my desk wet.  And then I have to throw them out.  For real.

I lovelovelove the Metro, the free newspaper that's handed out on the T, because I have a really long commute and it keeps be up to date on the news, celebrity gossip, Boston sports and my horoscope.  It's one of the small joys of spending over an hour on the T each day.  But, on rainy days, sometimes I can't get the Metro because if it gets rain on it not only will I not be able to read it, it will actually ruin my morning.  Wet newspaper is by far the worst kind of wet paper.

This is the kind of thing that makes me believe in reincarnation.  Like, something must have happened to me in a past life that involved wet paper, right?  Perhaps I was buried alive in a pile of wet paper, or got some sort of weird wet paper paper cut... It really makes you think.

xo kate

Dfest: Tastes just like candy

Unlike most, I love the taste of Robitussin DM. It is my favorite part of being sick. I'm struggling with a cold right now, in fact, and I'm loving the regular dose of medicinal-cherry-indescribable-deliciousness known as tussin, as it hits my lips. I'm pretty sure this makes me a freak of nature; the threads that sows the seam of my freak flag. And I'm okay with that.

Kate: The Call of Nature

I'm absolutely obsessed with outdoor showers.  I have been since I was a kid and my family used to rent a house on Cape Cod in the summertime.  It was the perfect experience, coming home from the beach all sandy, sunburnt and sweaty and taking a refreshing shower.  There was also Vidal Sassoon shampoo and conditioner in it and, to this day, that smell reminds me of summers on the Cape.

Perfection.

There's something about showering outside that is just so much better than showering in a house.  I try to recreate the experience in my apartment by opening the window in the shower in the summer.  It's a good substitute when you're unable to get to a real outdoor shower, but I have had a couple unfortunate incidents with bird getting too close for comfort, and once my super, Glenn, was suspended outside fixing something in the apartment above me and inadvertently saw me naked.  It was an awkward moment for both of us but, on the up side, I've gotten great service ever since.

My favorite outdoor showers are those that are enclosed enough for practical use (like you can actually have enough privacy in them that you can really shower and not just practice sexy washing your hair and sucking in in case someone sees you) but are low enough that you could see over it if you tried. About six years ago I went to a friend-of-a-friend's house in Laguna Beach, and the normal shower in their house had a wrap-around cut out at head-height, which gave it the feeling of being an outdoor shower even though it was a part of the normal bathroom.  It's difficult to describe, but it was amazing.  It is one of the only reasons that I'd consider moving to California -- weather that allows for an outdoor/indoor hybrid.

When I someday buy a house, one of the number one things on my list is going to be having an outdoor shower or the possibility of building one.  And once I have it, I'm going to keep Vidal Sassoon shampoo and conditioner in it all the time.

xo kate

And the winner is...

Wildcats, we have some exciting news to share with you.  One of our very favorite bloggers, the talented and fabulous Bre, of BreBeauty, has honored us with a Stylish Blogger Award.  To say that we're thrilled would be an epic understatement.  We are beside ourselves.  Probably obnoxiously so. (Do I now sometimes make my friends and family refer to W&W as my award-winning blog?  Sure.  Am I proud of that?  No.  Well, maybe a little bit.)

In order to accept our award, we have to share with you seven random things about ourselves, and pass the award on to some of our favorite blogs.  Throughout the course of the day, we will post random facts about ourselves and at the end of the day, we'll share with you our favorite blogs.  We hope you enjoy!

THANK YOU SO MUCH BRE! We are so honored to be in your company!