My Food Network

I don't know if everyone knows this, but I've totally been getting my groove on in the kitchen, and I'm proud of myself. Josh and I prepare these really delicious meals together- and it's all thanks to this great book by Marc Bitman called How to Cook Everything. We make chicken and pork chops and all kinds of things, but some of my favorite things to make are ones that take the least time and preparation. There is this chicken breast that I make which takes less than half an hour, by covering the chicken with chili, lime, salt and pepper, then using the juices to make a reduction sauce, served with pasta and yellow corn. Seriously, it's great.

But recently, I started making this pizza, pictured above. It's a wheat dough, with shredded cheese, red pepper, tomatoes, salt, fresh ground pepper, feta cheeses, olives and anchovies (for Josh.) I bake it for twelve minutes and and broil it for three. And it also takes less than half an hour.

My quiches are pretty great, too. I like putting swiss chard, maple cured bacon, spinach, broccolli, onions, garlic, and whatever cheese we happen to have around. I buy the crust frozen at Hannaford.

Nice View if you Can Get It

Sometimes conversations at my job meander. Five ladies, over worked and underpaid are often eager to not get back to work. We talk about jewelry, our significant others, travel and crazy people. Here's where it started, I think. Someone exposed himself on the bus to one of our temps. She takes my bus. I could've been on that bus, it could've been me. Not only was he showing but he was also touching. I thought it was bad when some man touched my hair, this would've been a million times worse.

On the subject of crazy people not being able to keep it in their pants, by boss tells us this story about her cousin who went on the road with her husband in his big-rig for two months, across the country. She said that you would not believe what people did in their cars when they thought no one else could see them. Women and men naked from the waist down, men pleasuring themselves, women with dildoes, men and women performing oral sex on the driver, the driver pleasuring the passenger. And this happens all the time, apparently. Everyone in the room was pretty disgusted by this, but I thought it was more dangerous than anything else. But it's pretty easy to get turned on in the car, what with all of the bumps and vibrations in the road... these people are putting their safety at risk. If I were them, I'd stop at the nearest rest area and deal with my problems there.

In the meantime, I'm praying that my dad will fix my transmission so I can stop taking that stinking bus.

Hey Lady, Nice Pom Pom

This weekend, we hit the church-fair circuit. My mission: mittens. There are few things that make me more nostalgic for my childhood than a pair of hand-knit, brightly colored mittens. Unfortunately, my upper body is about the size of an adolescent boy, and sometimes my feet fit in little girl shoes from the Gap, but my hands are normal, average lady sized hands that can't squeeze into the brightly colored hats any longer. At the table o' knits, much to my delight however, there were some reasonably cool beret-styled cable knit hats- the gem amongst baby sweaters and afghans. The only problem was the pom-pom. The slate blue hat that I was coveting had the most horrific pom pom made of white, pink and blue yarn. I locked eyes with the grandmother behind the table, who was eyeing me expectantly with her hand close to the cash box. "I sort of like this one..." I trailed off. She replied, "But this pom pom is ruining it, isn't it?" Shocked at how forward she was being and how dead on correct she was, my mouth gaped a few times before I agreed, with a quick save, "But it'd be no big deal to just chop it off." A second woman joined the first at that moment, and I debated, to buy the hat, to not buy the hat, while the second thanked the first for watching the table while she was gone. She said it was no trouble at all then added, "The pom pom completely ruins this hat."
I look to my left, then my right at Andrea and Heather who are clearly as awestruck as I was at one grandma saying to the other, hey, you can't match a pom pom worth shit. Not being able to help myself I blurted, "But I would never have said that." And repeated it twice before lady number two said, "Oh, I didn't make this."

That day I went home with one ugly pom pommed hat, a secret present for Laura's cat, a San Antonio mug, suede boots, black patent leather heels, and a brooch.

Bells Will Be Ringing

So, just in case you were thinking of what to get me for Christmas, here are some ideas from FredFlare.com

Pomegranates

Tonight I bought a bottle of Beaujolais, put some pictures on the wall, and learned that the best way to peel a pomegranate. First, cut off the top, then make shallow cuts down the side, from top to bottom. Then take the fruit and pull it apart, submerged in a bowl of water. I just ate a bowlful of delicious pomegranate seeds! Next: Jason Bateman singing karaoke. Josh is still in Chicago, which means I can watch as many low-brow comedies and chick-flicks as I want!

Happy Halloween, Part 2.

My most memorable Halloween could have been the year Mandy and I found ourselves in San Fransisco's Castro District. I was dressed as Meg White, Bridget was dressed as a zombie lifeguard and I forget what Mandy was- but it was total chaos. People everywhere. It was like an alternate universe, like a dream, like Hell even. We were surrounded by people decked out in the most serious costumes I'd ever seen. To me, the holiday had always been about jack-o-lanterns and trick-or-treating, and parents were with kids in their parent costumes, and most kids were Power Rangers or Barbie, very mild, non-scary costumes. But in the Castro, there was no telling men from women, young from old- anyone could have been under there. We joined a crowd gathering around this fire-juggler and I turned around to make sure Mandy was still next to me. But instead came face-to-face with this thing. It was a monster, or alien, unlike anything I'd ever seen. It had a long beak-nose, a black face, and was wearing a black nun-like garment concealing it's whole body. Lit by the fireballs, the effect was especially scary. I turned around and tried to forget it, tried to rationalize that it was just a person under there, but couldn't. I could feel it breathing on me. So I grabbed the girls and pushed my way out of there.

But I shouldn't rule out the year that I tried to face my fear of all things scary and see the re-release of The Exorcist. In the dark theater. On Halloween. While it was brave of me to try and see one of the scariest movies ever, it didn't help me face any fear. I drove home doing eighty, convinced that if I drove fast enough nothing that might be following me could catch me. I slept with the light on for the next two nights, and for the next two months I swear to God I could feel my bed shaking.

I really don't like being scared. I am such a scary-cat that I run away from turkeys. Literally. So I was extremely excited to last minute join my friends Erin and Hillary to the College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor to see the Arcade Fire play a secret show. They were, and possibly still are my favorite band, and how appropriate to see them on the night before Halloween, because a lot of their songs were about funerals and death. We got there and took the haunted tour of the College, since there was time to kill before the show. The tour was scary- the campus alone would do the trick, but if was very foggy out that night. You couldn't see two feet past the dock to the water, and they had some girl in a white dress follow us. It was totally scary.

So I was really glad to be home this past Halloween, in no danger of getting scared. Josh was gone, so even though I was home alone, I planned on cooking dinner, showering and watching a non-scary movie. I had just finished the shower part of my night, walking out of the bathroom in only a robe, when someone knocked on the window, hard, frantic and relentless. I jumped three feet in the air, my breath was caught in my chest and my heart skipped two beats. Someone was be getting chased. Someone was murdered and they need me to call 911. It was a trick my some crazed rapist dressed as a werewolf. I ran to the door and opened it, unsure what I'd find... and it was my neighbor, a full grown man dressed as a dinosaur. Holding a drink. He wanted to invite me to his party, but didn't see my doorbell.

Fresh Air

Happy Halloween! Today my mail man or, shall I say, letter carrier asked me what I was going to be for Halloween, and I said that I was going to be home. Josh is gone to Third Coast, a big deal radio conference, so I might have persuaded him to go to a masquerade (free buffet with paid ticket) but instead I'm home. For dinner, braised butternut squash and chicken breast with a lime-cilantro sauce and broiled pita chips, then balancing by checkbook, then I'll spend some quality time on ABC.com.

The best costume of the day had to have been Portland columnist and really cool guy, Justin Ellis.

My new favorite radio program is Fresh Air with Terry Gross. I listen to the show almost every day, either to get me through the three o'clock slump by streaming on New York Public Radio, or on MPBN while I'm making dinner at home. She's got a great laugh, and transitions seamlessly from guests Steve Carell to that outed CIA lady.

The Bearded Lady

In addition to figuring out ways to save money on our heating bill, like which rooms we can turn the radiators off in (bathroom? no. dining room? most likely.) this is what I've been up to:

I saw the Darjeeling Limited, which was just as fantastic as I expected it would be. I'm getting a new neighbor. Josh and I cross dressed for a Halloween party this past weekend. He was the bearded lady and I was the Strongman. He drew a mustache on my face, and I helped him adjust his breasts.

Two weeks ago, I was almost kidnapped, raped and murdered (i.e. took a wrong turn on the trail and was lost for all of, 15 minutes.) The same weekend, for Josh's birthday I wrote him a list of my top 20 favorite memories we've had over the last year and a half. It warmed his cold heart. My sister is getting married and moving to Germany like, now.

The Red Sox won the World Series, and now I'm not sure what my identity as a fan is.

Pushing Daisies

I've been on a budget. I've even been balancing my checkbook. Part of the plan to conserve funds has been to not go "out" every weeknight and to bring my lunches to work. The first part, staying in, is going pretty awesome. But if Josh in engrossed in a baseball game while playing online games or working, I need a way to amuse myself that doesn't involve spending a whole lot of money. Sometimes I work on personal projects, sometimes I read, sometimes I'll call a friend, but most of the time, I stream television on ABC.com.

You might have heard about this new show on ABC called Pushing Daisies. Before it came out it was widely regarded by critics as one of the best new shows to premier this season (or at least, that's what they were saying when I heard the director interviewed on Fresh Air, I think.)

I can see now that it's because they completely ripped off Amelie, they admitted to totally ripping off Amelie, and I love it. Here are some really specific similarities:

There is a considerable amount of narrating.
Counting things by the years, months, hours and minutes.
In one of the scenes of Pushing Daisies, they used a song FROM the Amelie soundtrack.
The leading ladies have similar cheekbones.
Very bright, saturated colors, and a lot of red.
The espresso machines are the same
The outside of the pie place and the coffee shop are in the same type of corner building.

The Portland Club

I think it's pretty safe to say that my favorite thing is free stuff. Tonight, we went to an open house (with free snacks, deserts and a pasta station) at the Portland Club with food by the Black Tie Catering Co. Not only did I have the most delicious pita chips ever, but there was chocolate mousse in martini glasses. It's nice to hang out with my coworkers, because even though I spend more time with them than anyone else in my life, it's not fun, quality, hangout time. We literally have an office full of women, so we get to chatting often enough. For example, a few weeks ago, there was an owl at my house. Luckily, after seeing the second season of Twin Peaks, I wasn't scared of it because it was no more than six inches tall and therefore could not have possibly been possessed by an evil spirit. I snapped a picture with my camera phone, and when our conversation meandered to my fear of large birds, I happened to mention how there was an owl at my house. For the next fifteen minutes, we went back and forth, my coworkers and I, as to weather or not this little owl perched where the gutter ran out at the base of my house was real or someone was playing a trick. If it was a trick, whoever it was got me really good, because I am still totally convinced that it's real. We might start a once a week happy hour.

At the Movies

It's not every day you get to see a world record!

***

I've been thinking about movies a bit recently, Josh and I just watched the Conversation. He really likes it, and I did too, but I couldn't help but notice how emotionally disconnected the main character was. As the main character was in his favorite movie, Five Easy Pieces. That last scene was completely devastating! It made me wonder about people's favorite movies, and what, if anything, you can tell about a person by what their most beloved films are. I, for example, love the movie Amelie. It's got an amazing soundtrack, the cinematography is incredible, and I am just as sensitive as the main character. She is shy and has a hard time working up the courage to get herself the things she wants, meanwhile being totally adorable and well dressed. But I also like slapstick comedies, and family movies, smart movies and silly. So what if Toy Story is on my top ten list? It was awesome, and everyone knows it. Do I have a favorite animated Disney movie? Absolutely. But that doesn't mean I can't watch an appreciate the Godfather or Dancer in the Dark, it just means I prefer warm, heartfelt, touching stories.

Does this just bring us back to the ever-ominous statement "What really matters is what you like, not what you are like... Books, records, films -- these things matter." Sometimes I feel like my life would be easier if I just still worked at Bull Moose!

My Google Twin

I listen to 400% more public radio than I did two years ago. This morning, on Morning Edition, they were talking about high-price domain names. Like for example, this man owns southie.com, which is a neighborhood in Boston. There are a lot of different organizations in South Boston who'd probably really like to have southie.com as their website, and now they'll have to bid for it. The internet is pretty lucrative! They then moved on to "googling yourself" and how many people find that they have a Google twin, someone with the same name as you. I know for a fact that there are more Amanda Pleaus out there, but I have no Google twin as of now. My boss googled me and the rest of my coworkers and said my results were the most interesting. Here they are:

PRX » Members » Amanda Pleau I joined the Public Radio Exchange (which was free) so that I could listen to a piece of radio my boyfriend made. If you become a member, tell me, and I'll send you the link. As a member, I also get to hear a lot of other radio made by people I don't know, and review them. Mostly, I stick to pieces Josh made and This American Life archives.

Seven Days: Bosnian Buzz I had two really great, slightly crazy, bosses when I worked at the EuroCafe. And I was more well-fed when I worked there than ever before in my life and to this day still. This Seven Days article quotes me as saying there is too much meat at the cafe, which is funny, because I'm a vegetarian no more.

Getty Images -Search



I think this one speaks for itself. I also have a copy on my refrigerator.

Rebecca Minnick District 1 school committee "Amanda Pleau, who works for the (ahem) and who organizes the Mix Tape Collective of Portland, has offered herself as my campaign manager..." She's actually at a committee meeting as we speak! Yay!

Lewiston School Department--B&W Photography Gallery I'm actually a little bit surprised that this is still here, seeing as though it was put up when I was a junior in high school. This was taken during a really great photography class.


Skip Maine state header navigation Maine.gov State Search ... "Panelists: Nat Lippert, Wiscasset High School; Amy Riddell, Trenton Elementary School; Amanda Pleau, Lewiston High School; Sara Choate, Lewiston High School ..." I was on a panel at a Civil Rights Coalition convention when I was in high school. Our high school planned a Diversity Day, which I think went really well, and we were invited to talk about it. It was especially important for us to be there because of the recent Somalian immigrant influx in the community.


www.myspace.com/quietcity I'm Courtney's hero.

I think this Google experiment sort of becomes a retrospect of my life, who I was in high school, who I was in Vermont, who I am now. And yeah. I met Al Gore.

Wanted: Cheap Fine Jewelry With No Baggage

Ever since I got this office job, I've been much more aware of... bling. For the first time in my life I work at a job where we talk about it. Or at least, all of my coworkers talk about their jewelry and I feel like an irresponsible little kid who can't be trusted with such things of value. One girl can spot a fake diamond. Another does all of her business at one specific jeweler. We talk about how much a man should spend on the ring. I silently decide if the cost of the ring could one day be translated to stay-at-home-mom. Or if someone has a right-hand rock that outshines their engagement rings, it means they got married when they were still kinda poor.Which brings me to the subject of Engagement Rings. It's something that every girl thinks about, because it's something every other girl talks about. The ring is a huge deal. The idea for this post was sparked by a recent trip to Craigslist (like it's a destination.) I recently posted an ad selling my car, and therefore am in need for a car. My search was yielding few results, so I made the rounds and moved on to jobs, furniture, and still not satisfied, for the first time ever I clicked "jewelry." I expected to find some cute, reasonably priced pearls or amber or something. But this is what I found:

wedding band is brand new never worn. never sized. engagement ring is sized to a 4 but can easily be sized back. engagement ring was worn 6 months.

1k gold engagement ring. Never worn. Bought almost 6 years ago for $1800. I bought to give, and never got the chance, and I have been holding it ever since...way to long

Beautiful ring set,great condition, only worn for about 5 months. Paid $500 for set, will sell for $200. I also have the mens Gold band to match for additional $50.00 Size 10

Divorcing and in need of cash. Looking to sell my diamond ring. I believe it is an engagement ring though it was used as my wedding ring.

Band is engraved: "For my love on the day we become one" Will sell as set or individually

This is a gorgeous ring set complete with wedding band. I would love pass this on to someone special for that someone special! And I need the money for college! Call Jessie.

It was shocking and heartbreaking. I was completely unprepared. Deciding what to do with your engagement ring once the engagement was off seemed like life in Sex and the City, not real life. It made me wonder how many engagement rings actually make it to the wedding. Or if the jeweler can tell it's going to be the right fit. Who buys these second-hand rings? Your wedding bands are supposed to be special symbols of your love, a piece of jewelery you'll have to live with for, hopefully, the rest of your life. Not a sweet deal you found on Craigslist (although, I do love a good deal.)

This is a story a friend of mine told me about her coworker. Her coworker is in her early thirties, madly in love with her boyfriend, and at a point in her life where she was ready to get married and start a family. Meanwhile, she's moved in with her boyfriend, to a brand new city, and they start fighting about how she wants to get married and he hasn't proposed. These fights end horribly, with her crying, a lot. But this whole time, her boyfriend has an engagement ring, and is planning a very elaborate, memorable, heartwarming proposal. The first gifts they got for each other were a pair of silver earrings for her and a silver bracelet for him. He went abroad and bought her these earrings with a specific pattern on them that she loved and wore often. Shortly after, she went to a different country and found the same pattern on a bracelet. While they were having this fight over spending the rest of their lives together, he had secretly had the earrings and the bracelet melted and used the silver to make their wedding bands.

This is the part where I begrudgingly refrain from posting rings that I like, because I know my boyfriend reads this. And he knows I know. Not going to go there.

Feist - 1 2 3 4

Has anyone seen this? It's a pretty great one-shot video from Feist, who you might know from her recent iPod Nano commercial, or as a member of Broken Social Scene. I've been on a bit of a YouTube binge, and thanks to Josh's sister, we've found a million Flight of the Conchord episodes. If you haven't seen it, they are side-splitting funny.

Hey Chicago

Chicago was... exactly like taking a trip to a really great city to go to a fancy wedding with people you don't know and spending the rest of your time driving around in a full mini van with all of Josh's really loud, Jewish family. It was a great trip. Although I didn't see Oprah or John Cusack or Jeff Tweedy, I did see this crazy giant mirror bean thing. It's in this place called Millennium Park, which is home to a lot of really interesting and accessible art. In fact, it seemed like everywhere we turned there was art. From Frank Lloyd Wright to Picasso to the bean in the park, it was inspiring. But it also forced me to consider Portland, and how lackluster our public art is. I've always thought of Portland as arty, especially for it's size, and there is really no reason why there shouldn't be more public art. Note to self: look up Kevin Donahue's email.

Seeing as though I work in a non-profit that helps wheelchair bound people, it shouldn't have been too shocking to see there was a convention at the hotel of more than a hundred wheelchair confined people zooming and parking everywhere. However, my job is to answer the phone, not hang out with our clients, so I might not be as "PC" as I thought... I told all of my boyfriend's family that it's actually okay to call them "electric chairs" until I realized with horror that electric chairs preform capital punishment, and don't move you from point a to point b.

The majority of the weekend was spent in the minivan with four of Josh's closest relatives, his sister's boyfriend, and myself. It was a seven-passenger minivan. For some reason, every time we had to get in or out of the car, a timely enough process as it was, Josh's father insisted on opening the side doors with his remote control. Every time. Each time the car was in motion, no more than ninety seconds passed without Josh's mom exclaiming, "Look at that!" Which was innocent enough, aside from that no one except the people sitting on the same side of the van could see what she was looking at. I could only see the floor, ceiling, and guardrail from the opposite side. Everyone ooed and aaahed while I pretended not to hear. Everyone in the family, with the exception of maybe his sister, talks at an incredible volume. Additionally, we only ever vaguely knew where we were going. Josh and his father knew the area well enough not to have a map, but not well enough to miss turns and such. At the end of nearly an entire day bound to the backseat, Josh's sister finally pleads, "Mom, every time you say Look at that, Ryan dies a little inside."

The food was incredible. I had swordfish and spaghetti squash for the first time. There were a lot of free drinks, more drinks, frittatas, extremely phallic artichokes, and carrot cake. At a place Josh knew I'd love, which was like the Friendly Toast meets a carnival, I had the most delicious salad. It was delicious. A salad. Salads are not supposed to rock my world, but it kind of did. And it would be a shame to forget to mention my Chicago dog. Like the salad, it had a lot of vegetables. Which I'd rather just, save for the salad.

When I returned to work from my luxurious three-day weekend, there was bad news in the Men's Room. Someone had explosive diarrhea which splattered onto the rim of the bowl, meaning, the part that doesn't get flushed. And let me tell you, there is nothing funnier to try and talk about than someone else's uncontrollable bowel movements. Through the process of elimination, we figured out that it's probably one of the two new temps in the office. Firstly, this hasn't happened since the current staff line-up fell into place. And for the first time in months, there are men in the office. Which means it's got to be one of the two new men in the office. Most of the ladies have been using the Men's Room, due to lack of men. I know it was not any of us, because without asking, everyone offered their willingness to clean up after themselves if they had a poop explosion. My cleaning guy called today to tell us that he make a special trip last night to take care of business.

The Puppetmaster

Nearly every time I hear an artist explain their work, they're totally full of shit. This is probably because of my short art school stint where I basically paid the school thousands of dollars to listen to other student recite a lot of bullshit. Okay, but, since cynicism isn't really my thing, here's a fun video to watch:



I think everyone could use a little Dancy-Dance time. Also, I don't think I've ever been so attracted to Elijah Wood. When did he become a dancing indie rocker?

When perusing bookstores, videostores, and musicstores, I tend to get really overwhelmed, essentially trying to recall all of the times I've thought "hey, I should pick that up." On numerous occasions, I've walked into Videoport, and left after forty minutes of walking up and down the aisles thinking, "well, it's tough and triassic day, so I really should get a classic or an action, but I've been feeling like my foreign film library needs to be broadened, but what I really want is a Sex and the City, even though I shouldn't because I've seen every episode twelve times" and eventually leaving the store with nothing. Today at Borders was almost the same story. But I held out, waiting for some kind of sign... and it ended up being, "Children authors writing for Adults" which is where the Best of Roald Dahl was, and I'm intensely happy about my purchase.

Leaving for Chicago in T-minus five and a half hours. Maybe I'll get some sleep and hopefully I'll meet Oprah.

Hotels, Motels and Backseats

I have to go on a business trip this weekend. I'll spare you the details. My job has this policy in place that states you aren't allowed to commute more than two hours to an event and drive back the same day. It also has a policy in place that you can't stay in a motor inn, it has to be a hotel, with hallways. But it can't cost more than a hundred dollars. There are a lot of rules. While I'm packing for Labor Day weekend in scenic Bangor, I'll be thinking of the difference between motels and hotels.

Growing up, trips were few and far between. And therefore very exciting. Sleeping in a bed other than my own, in a place I'd never seen before was like the thrill of my ten year old life. Running down the long hallway, jumping on the bed, an ice machine and free breakfast, who could ask for anything more? But then, as an adult, I realized that there is something uncomfortable about the sterile-ness of hotel rooms. Everything is tucked in and wrapped up, and although I'd rather know that everything is clean and sanitary, I feel a little weird. I've stayed in more motels than hotels because it's more cost effective, but it also feels a little more like home. More friendly, the front desk has a cat, and a don't feel guilty if the room service sees my bottle of booze because they would do the same if they were me. I grew up in a house with wood paneling, so it sort of feels like home. So although it will be nice to have a bathroom with a mirror which will let me see 360 degrees of my naked body when I get out of the shower, and five different types of product for the shower, I really don't mind the cheap motel.

Which reminds me, the first time I stayed up all night was at Foxwoods Hotel and Casino. I was 16, didn't drink and couldn't gamble. There were four of us- two girls, two guys and two beds. It would've been very childish to insist on sharing a bed with my girl friend to avoid facing rejection of either of the boys, so I just decided to stay up all night. The hotel room at Foxwoods had the most powerful toilet I've ever seen in my life. It was like WOOSH!

The most momentous overnight of my life was not in either a motel or a hotel. It was that night the girls and I slept in the backseat of the car, on the side of the road, somewhere between Rhode Island and Connecticut, after seeing the most amazing Thursday show. I was underage, and my mom still doesn't know.

Meanwhile, look at the great website that I just found for this bed and breakfast in Montreal: http://www.lesimone.com/en/index.htm

Interlock Wrap Dress

My least favorite thing is seeing something in a store, but not on their website. Or seeing something on the website, and it's not in the store. But most of all, I can't stand it when you see a cute dress/shoe/earring in a magazine and then it's nowhere to be found either in the store or on the website!

My NEW favorite thing is posting things that I find (and buy) in this blog.

Simpsons!

Look! I'm a Simpson!

The Oob

At Old Orchard Beach today, I really wanted to eat a lot of fried foods, then not wait 20 minutes before running into to ocean for a swim, then whip Josh's butt at some games at the arcade, then have a margarita at some overpriced touristy place. But I had one slice of pizza, one soda, rode the log flume once (which is nothing compared to the log flume at Funtown, and I don't even want to talk about missing Canobie Lake Park this season, again) and beat Josh at SkiBall twice, which is unusual.

Tourist traps really work. It's really a trap. I love walking into a store and seeing a million things with "Maine" written on them and I want nothing more than a T-shirt with a lobster on it. Everything is so ketch and cheap! Who wouldn't love it? In Bar Harbor last weekend, I got this, and it was only $29.