If I had a hammer...

I was talking to Momma Pinney the other night about our upcoming annual trip to Carpinteria (the beach town where she grew up in CA). Last year my brother-in-law Chris serenaded us all with his ukulele and folk songs. So this year, Mom thought it would be a good idea for the rest of us to be prepared so we can all sing along too! She suggested that I purchase the CD The Very Best of Peter, Paul, and Mary. So I did. And I listened to it. ALL of it. And it should have been no surprise to me when all day today I had a Peter, Paul and Mary song stuck in my head. The song was "If I Had a Hammer". All day long I was singing the hammer song, under my breath, at my desk, on the subway, tapping my foot in a staff meeting. SO, I thought I would blog about it. Here is a clip of the song below. But BEWARE! It sticks!

New York Garden...

I went out to sit on my hammock today on the terrace at 45 Wall 1617 (my old apartment) when I stumbled across this enormous weed growing 2 feet tall out of an accumulation of city filth and a mossy grate covered in, yes, cigarette butts (the people on the terrace above drop the butts on our terrace). I turned to Brenda and said "what is this nasty weed! You need to do something about that." To which she replied... "What, this? This is my garden!"

So I thought I would let you all know what a "New York garden" looks like, picture taken on my camera phone.

Chinese food in Battery Park

So last night some friends and I got together and headed to Battery Park for some Chinese food! It was a really fun night, we had lots of delicious food right on the Hudson River. We had a view of the statue of liberty and boats passing. Here we are:
From L to R: Rich, Sara, Mark, Courtnie, Brenda, Gabe, me

When they brought us fortune cookies, they came amidst a pile of freshly cut oranges... Here was an attempt by Rich and me to take a picture...
Here's when he suddenly tried to KISS me with his orangey mouth! I was laughing so hard...
We finally got an okay pic...

On the way home, we got caught in a torrential downpour! Literally, everyone ducked off the street and under overhangs. Luckily I brought my umbrella! I was still drenched from my knees down, and everything else was pretty wet too. Gotta love New York!

Pics from Harbor Cruise!

So, all the YSA's in the area recently went on a Harbor Cruise around Manhattan, and it was a blast! Here are a couple pics from the night...
Here's Heidi, me and Brenda! We're all in book club/pancake club together. Some other friends...
Back L: Plessie, Becky, Heidi, me and Alan
Front L: Ashley (my roommate) and Alicia
Funny story... Alan was friends with Courtney's husband Matt at BYU! Totally random, when Matt was in NYC he saw Alan in my ward and introduced us- and now we're friends. :) And PS, I'm totally standing on my tippy tip toes in this picture, he's SUPER tall!

Pilates is a girl's best friend...

So yesterday Brenda and I decided it might be a good idea to do some yoga! It's relaxing, and sort of exercise. So Brenda agreed we should do one of my Yoga videos. Only when we actually got to doing it, for some reason Pilates was the DVD we decided to pop in. WELL, pilates (or Pie-law-tees as I like to say though Shelby always corrects me that it should be pronounced Pill-ah-tees) it's a bit more active than yoga, especially when the intent is to relax. So for 30 minutes we tried to do this....

But probably did more of this...
I was alerted of our mistake today in an email from Brenda entitled "Bad Idea". It said, "My seat hurts. I think it is bruised. No more rolling on the floor - ever."

Marriage...

I would like to congratulate my dear sister Jana who just got married this past weekend to Jim in Utah! It was a beautiful wedding, and she looked absolutely stunning!

This wedding marks a unique event within my family, making my personal position quite the rarity. 6 out of the 8 kids have been married off! That leaves me and my brother Jon, the last remaining single Pinney siblings.

If you'd like to know more about Jon, his myspace page is www.myspace.com/jonpinney. He is an aspiring pop star, very talented, and an all around good guy. And, as I just mentioned, available. :)

Will you go out with me?

So last night, I had just been g-chatting with a friend of mine, Kyle, who is in the Philippines volunteering for the summer, and I was sitting on my bed, can't remember what I was doing, and I get a phone call from a "No Name" number. I answered it, almost by saying "this is Ashley" just in case it was work related, but I thought against it at the last minute and said "Hellllllo?" To which someone on the other end said "Hi, is this Ashley?" and I said "yes it is" and they said "Hi, this is Larry, I got your name from Brian in the ward, and he said we should go on a date together." ... !!! ... I was like, "who's Brian?" and I think the guy said "Brian Smith" and I was like "I don't think I know him..." and then the guy was like "well, he said he thought you and I should go on a date together, do you want to go out next Friday?" I have to tell you, the guy sounded very strange, and I was really nervous, and I didn't know what to say, and I was like, "uhh....?" and then the guy kept talking about why we should go on this date, and I really thought someone out there must hate me to give a crazy person my number, and then the guy's voice started to sound familiar, and as he rambled on and on, he finally asked me a question again, "what do you think?" and I said "Larry, you sure do sound a lot like my friend Kyle..." and the guy was like "I don't know anyone named Kyle, my name's Larry, so, do you want to go out next Friday?" And I thought for a second then said "I would love to!" To which Kyle burst out laughing, and said "you recognized my voice! I can't believe you knew it was me!" He played it so well. He got me good.