Last night I got an email:

Dear Emily:

During a routine review of student records for the MBA.PM program we discovered that you are likely to qualify for graduation at the end of the fall 2008 semester.

Best. Email. Ever.

Ah, if I had all the time (and money) in the world, I'd sign up for this.


You do three races: Surf City (Huntington Beach), Long Beach, and San Francisco, either the full or half marathons, within 2 years. Then you get some kind of finisher's medal and I think a jacket. I would just use it as an excuse to run officially and go to San Francisco.

I was thinking of doing the Surf City half marathon this year instead of the 5k. But at $80 for the half marathon, and $50 for the Long Beach half - seems like a lot of time and money I need to put toward all the other stuff going on lately...

Maybe someday I'll go to England, and buy one of these shirts on the cheap. Cause with the exchange rate and overseas shipping, I think it'd be a $100 shirt. Flying over there myself makes so much more sense.

I've never been a big Jennifer Lopez fan. But she may have just changed my mind.

Can you believe that's her? No makeup, no designer wetsuit ... just doing the triathlon thing. I read all about it on the Daily Mail.

If she keeps it up, I might entirely change my mind. And I still feel guilty for not doing the Danskin triathlon this spring. Think I can get to be a good swimmer by next year?

Can you guess what kind of cupcakes these are?

The other day I got an email from Allure Experts asking me to try some new mascara. Since it had Chanel in the name, I blew it off. I used to be a rabid Allure reader; I bought it every time I went to the store. When they started an online review panel sort of like the Harris Polls I do, I signed up right away. Let's just say ... it sounded better in theory than in practice.

The last time I tried a product, it was Kerastase day and night cream. I had to go to the nearest Sephora (South Coast Plaza) to pick up a sample. I liked it a lot, but at $110 a bottle it's not something I could buy on my pre-MBA budget (it's not sold any more).

Today I got a little puffy envelope in the mail from Allure with a trial of Exceptionnel de Chanel mascara. Now this is how you conduct a trial!

I haven't tried it yet but I'll let you know. It's $28 at Neimann Marcus, so it's not likely I'll be giving up my Maybelline Great Lash any time soon. BTW: it smells awful.

Happy little star-shaped Parisian macaroons ...