Recently in Warm Fuzzies Category

I've had a number of years to think about how I'd write this particular post, and I've considered a bazillion different ways. But now that it is here, I'm going to go with simple and straightforward.

I'm pregnant! We're thrilled. It's a boy. I'm 24 weeks along today, due in February.

So, back in June, eight years almost to the day from when we first started trying, I took a pregnancy test and for the first time ever got that positive result I'd dreamed of for so long. It was six am on a Sunday, but I woke up and could not wait one second longer. And I hardly had to - the word "pregnant" appeared almost immediately! The next day it was confirmed by a blood test, although I have to admit the positive test felt so good I took two more that week, in between getting betas at my doctor's office.

Yes, in the end it came down to IVF. This was pretty much my last-ditch cycle, and I'll talk about the details in a later post, because I do want to share what I think finally worked with anyone who is still trying.

It hasn't been a completely easy road, which is part of the reason I've waited so long to write about it. More about that on another day as well, because today is strictly for happiness and celebrating. The other part is that I'm just so incredibly tired all the time. It's amazing that I'm still awake right now, actually, but the new season of Top Chef is starting, so I'm making a valiant effort to stay up until 11 so I can see it. All the books say that you get a burst of energy in the second trimester, but I say the books are lying liars because I cannot get enough sleep. And apparently this is just what being pregnant is like for me. This is not a complaint, mind you. I'll take being tired.

Mostly, I'm incredibly happy and excited. That alternates with some fairly significant anxiety, but I'm managing it so far.

So, in summary: Pregnant. Yippee! Details to follow in later posts. Because now that I've started talking about this, good luck trying to get me to shut up about it.

I cannot remember a time when I couldn't read. Obviously I wasn't born knowing how to read, so there must have been one, but I really can't remember it. I remember my mom reading to me when I was very small. I remember being in Kindergarten and first grade and being bored out of my mind as we went over phonetics, because I could read and write. Tying my shoes was still a struggle, but I was way ahead of my classmates when it came to reading.

Reading was such a big deal to me that I have a very clear memory of getting my first library card. I was six. We went to the Aspen Hill library and I got my card and checked out a few books. I went home and sat down at the kitchen table in our 1970's yellow, orange and green kitchen, and read that book for three hours straight. It was a Nancy Drew book, The Hidden Staircase, and I was enthralled. I followed it up with a Hardy Boys book, Hunting for Hidden Gold. That was the beginning of my love of mysteries. My dad is a doctor, and his office was near a the hospital thrift shop. I'd go over there and pick up stacks of books for 10 cents a piece, and then sit up in a tree and read them after school. I had all the old Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys books, plus the Bobbsey Twins and Dana Girls and Cherry Ames and Tom Swift. They all solved mysteries, and took trips all over the world. The Bobbsey Twins went to Hawaii, Nancy Drew to Peru, and Cherry Ames went to be a nurse in England to help bomber pilots during WWII. Of course, by doing so, she lost her doctor boyfriend to some girl who knew her place and stayed home, but I thought Cherry was better off with a dashing bomber pilot anyway. Hey, I never claimed to have been reading literary masterpieces, although I read plenty of those too. I was a very well rounded reader. Or, would read anything you put in front of me, take your pick.

I think I discovered fantasy around third grade. My dad gave me The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, no doubt hoping I'd absorb some Christianity through the C.S. Lewis books. I enjoyed the Narnia stories, but completely missed the Christian symbolism. I just thought Aslan was a cool talking lion. Sorry Dad. I also discovered Susan Cooper's The Dark Is Rising books around that time and I loved them. There was magic, true, but also ordinary kids who played a huge part in the stories. Then I found Lloyd Alexander, Madeleine L'Engle, Andre Norton, Katherine Kurtz and Anne McCaffrey. There was a book called The Girl with the Silver Eyes that made a big impression on me. And there's no doubt that Star Wars and Empire Strikes back, while not books, had a huge influence on me loving SciFi/Fantasy stories.

Interestingly enough given how much I enjoy them now, I don't think I read much in the way of vampire stories when I was younger. I remember liking the Count on Sesame Street, but I also remember being terrified by the space vampire on Buck Rogers. Although that may have been related to my other fear of being trapped in small spaces, because they were trapped on a small space ship with the ugly green alien vampire and could not escape. I know I read Dracula in French class at one point (I know, weird right? Maybe we read a French version and an English version?) but that may have been in high school. I was a huge fan of The Hunger and The Lost Boys in high school, so by then I most definitely liked vampires. Of course, that was during my skulking around in black and listening to Bauhaus and the Sisters of Mercy period, so probably not so shocking. Oh! I know! It was in high school that I first read Interview with the Vampire. Maybe that started it.

But I digress. I was rambling on about books and how they've played such a huge role in my life. My point is, I've read all these wonderful stories over the years, and I think I have some stories of my own to tell. Signing up for a writing class is hopefully just the next step on a journey that I can't even remember starting.

On Friday I noticed that my little "Thinking" area in the side bar had gotten sadly out of date. So, seeing as how I was cold, I threw up my little ready for winter to be over rant.

Well, winter is not over, but it was 65 degrees here yesterday. 65! I got to go outside without a coach, which is one of the items I said I wanted. It was awesome. In fact, I'd go so far as to describe it as super awesome. I didn't quite do the Julie Andrews/Sound of Music twirl, but that's pretty much how I felt inside. I love you warm weather.

Of course now I'm tempted to put a request for 10 million dollars in my sidebar. Must not use newfound powers for personal gain. I guess I'll just settle for enjoying the weather again today. It won't be quite as nice, and I'll be stuck inside at work, but maybe I can get out at lunchtime.

What are you wishing for these days?

I've been on vacation for the last eleven days, and I'm not going to lie to you - it was fabulous. I need to invent something and make my fortune or win the lottery right quick, because I think I could come to like a life of leisure.

I packed a lot into those 11 days too. I celebrated Christmas and New Year's with my friends and family. I helped cater a holiday party and while I had fun, I also discovered that it takes a ridiculous amount of work to cater a party. There's one more career I can safely cross off my list. I got up the morning of the party, went to the grocery store to get fresh baguettes, and cooked all day until it was time to shower and head to the party. Then I stood for five more hours, heating food in a cluttered and unfamiliar kitchen, weaving my way through the crowds of people to make sure the table stayed stocked, all the while making pleasant chit chat. I'm glad I did it, but never again.

I saw movies. Slumdog Millionaire was wonderful. Sad and funny and perfectly paced, and I think you should go see it. It deserves to win all sorts of awards.

Deathrace was exactly what I expected it to be. Lots of fast driving, ass kicking and blowing shit up. If that's what you're looking for in a movie, Deathrace will deliver. If you want a believable plot, sensitive characters and aren't willing to suspend disbelief, go watch some other movie, because you will not find any of that nonsense in Deathrace.

And then there was Wall-E. Everyone I knew who saw it this summer raved about it, so I expected to like it, and I did. What a sweet movie! Yes, I cried at a robot love story. That Wall-E is very endearing. You got a problem with that?

I received a lot of cheese as gifts, and when I say a lot, what I mean is an amount so massive I could run a cheese cart at the mall. I'm pretty sure people think I'm exaggerating when I tell them about the cheese, so I'm posting photographic evidence here. Behold the power of cheese:

Not one ounce purchased by me.

I spent countless hours of quality time with John and Seamus, the two most important people in my life. I probably did not spend enough time at the gym, but whatever. I'll get back there tomorrow. I saw more of my mom and my dad than I usually do, and even managed to catch up with some of my friends. I read books and daydreamed and took naps.

It was wonderful, and much needed after what was a very rough time for me over the last few months. For once I completely checked out. No reading email, no worrying about voicemails, no thinking about work stuff at all. There were days where I had no idea whether the stock market was up or down. While I won't say I'm delighted to be heading back to work in the morning - I think I could do with one more week of lounging around before I'd start getting nutty - I am going back refreshed and with a much better attitude. Maybe 2009 won't be a complete disaster after all.

How was your holiday?

If I had sat down to write this post at 9:30, the title probably would have been "...and Christmas can bite me" or something similarly bitter.

My dad is not answering his phone, his voicemail is full, and he's ignoring my text messages. He may or may not be coming for dinner tomorrow night.

My mom pitched a fit last year when I had to deviate from tradition and come over for dinner instead of breakfast. So this year, I did a lot of worrying about making sure we're going over there for breakfast. Naturally, today she got mad at me because we're not coming for dinner. I know we're the only people she'll see on Christmas, and I know she's sad that my brother can't come home for the holiday this year, but I had to put my foot down about that one. I don't see why I should have to come over for breakfast, go elsewhere for hours (and eat while we're at it) and then come back and have dinner. A dinner which she won't want to cook because she doesn't like to make vegetarian food. So I'd have to cook something.

Plus, since Saturday, all I've had left to do Christmas present wise -- aside from baking for family -- is to get copies of two photos made. I went to Target really early on Saturday so it wouldn't be crowded, but unfortunately, there was a woman scanning and cropping 50 different photos and I had to get to Borders, so I gave up after a few minutes and left. Tonight, after sitting in a traffic jam for over an hour to get home, I figured I would just go to Target and get it over with. So I fought my way through the mall traffic, parked a zillion miles away from the store and threaded my way through the crowds of cranky looking parents and overexcited children, only to see that the stupid scanning/printing machine is broken.

Needless to say, I arrived home feeling a little on the frustrated side. I didn't get to work out, I didn't accomplish my errand, and I'm still not finished with presents!

But then I had some dinner and figured I'd get started on the dough for the cookies I'm giving to family. It all has to chill, so I thought I'd mix it up tonight and bake tomorrow. There is just something so incredibly relaxing about measuring and mixing ingredients. By 10, I had achieved a more zen attitude about the state of my Christmas preparations. I'll try to get the photos tomorrow. If I can't, then those two presents will just have to be late. My mom can be pissed at me, or she can get over it, and that's really up to her. And my dad, well, we'll see if he shows up for dinner or not. I'll have food ready either way.

Then I wrapped presents while watching reruns of The Office. I feel so much better now! Thank you magical baking. And Jim Halpert.

Miracle the first: My giddy good mood.
It is silly I know, but kickboxing class makes me very happy. All day on Wednesday I look forward to going, and then I go, and I have fun, and I come home in a great mood. It's a good workout, but it is also a plain ol' good time. Tonight there were only three of us, so the teacher had us try some new things that we don't normally get to do. The jumping kicks were awesome. He's slightly horrified by my crappy punching though. I try, but I'm not keeping my arms close enough to my body when I hit the punching bag or something. Hopefully I'll get better at it at some point.

Miracle the second: quick hair repair
Bonus of curly hair that I just don't appreciate enough: the ability to wet it down and start over. My new haircut has bangs, which are new for me. I'm supposed to sort of pull them straight and sweep/tuck them off to the side. When I get it right, it looks very cute, but I'm still getting used to having them. Today at work I went into the bathroom and noticed that my bangs looked a little weird. I must have pulled an extra clump into the straight bit, because they were too thick. For once though, having curly hair worked in my favor, as I was able to put a little water on the extra bit, scrunch it up to be curly with my fingers, and voila, back to normal looking!

Miracle the third: Christmas spirit...slowly...growing.
With every present I buy, I feel myself getting a little bit more into Christmas. Coming home to my pretty Christmas tree helps too. I'm finally feeling some of that "goodwill toward men" that you expect to feel around this time of year. About damn time, right?

It's after 10, and I've only just sat down after spending the whole day baking, cooking, and cleaning up, both here and at my mom's. I'm tired, I ate too much stuffing, and I haven't had any pie. I don't even want any pie, which is kind of silly when you consider how much time I spent wrestling with the ridiculously uncooperative pie crust this morning. Right now, the only thing that holds any appeal for me is the notion of taking some time sit on the couch and stare at the wall before going to bed.

Please don't take that as whining. We had a nice day and I'm properly thankful for all that is good in my life. I'm just plumb tuckered out, as the pilgrims used to say. No really, they did. Miles Standish was known for it. It was his signature signoff, kind of a pilgrim-era "peace out." He accompanied it with a complicated Puritan gang sign.

I have very dry skin. I have even since high school. A few years ago it went from ridiculously dry to seriously, painfully dry – which I later learned was a symptom of my diabetes. Now that my blood sugar is back under control, the dry has mostly subsided to manageable levels.

My heels proved troublesome though, staying pretty consistently dry. Last winter they started cracking and nothing I tried seemed to help. And I tried it all. Large grained exfoliators and small grained ones…oils…lotions with fruit acids…pumice stones…lotions with coconut…about five different kinds of shea butter…files…every product I came across. Back in June I went in and got a pedicure, and the little tiny Vietnamese woman who did it told me very seriously to ditch all the fancy stuff and give plain old normal Vaseline a try.

Every night since then I’ve been rubbing Vaseline on my heels, and it has beat out every single expensive lotion and potion. After about a month or so, the cracks started to fade, and then the disappeared complete. Here we are, headed into winter and the rest of my skin is getting drier, but my heels are pristine.

Bonus tip: I’ve also started using this stuff on my very dry arms, and it is awesome. I only need to use it about once a week, and it makes a huge difference.

If you want to go see the Twilight movie this weekend, you'd better act fast. My boss and I are planning to go to grab dinner after work on Friday and then go see the movie. She said something about getting tickets today, and I scoffed. Turns out there are showings already sold out! It's a good thing she's a planner, or we'd have been out of luck. Now we're just trying to figure out how early we have to get there so we can get seats together. And taking bets about whether or not people will show up in costumes. Although really, the characters in the book dress like normal people, so I'm not sure what costumes you could wear. Perhaps there will be fangs. Or Team Edward and Team Jacob t-shirts. And no, if you are wondering, I don't have one of those.

Then on the radio driving home tonight they were talking about the movie coming out and how it is the fanatical pre-teen girls that could lead the movie to the top of the box office. The guy called it High School Ventricle. What. ever. I know lots of people my age who love those books. I bet my boss and I won't be the only 37 year olds in the theater. And I suspect that Quantum of Solace will drop off from this past weekend (we saw it. It was ok. Better than some Bond movies, but not nearly as good as Casino Royale was) so it is conceivable that Twilight could do very well. They've got my money already, so they are off to a good start, right?

I am no good at meditating. I've tried it from time to time, because I like the concept of meditation and on top of that, it has health benefits. It never went well. At the end of yoga class, when you're supposed to lie quietly and mindfully in savasana, I'm usually busy thinking about what to have for dinner or composing blog posts in my head. Once I fell asleep, but I don't think that counts as a success.

I just don't have a quiet and restful mind. I'm an automatic multi-tasker. Even when I watch TV, I'm usually doing something else at the same time - reading a book, working on the computer, knitting, whatever. If there is reading material around when I'm not doing anything, or even if I'm doing something like eating, I'm almost compelled to pick it up and read it. This may be a family trait - I've noticed my brother doing the same thing from time to time, and my mom is practically physically incapable of sitting still. It's not necessarily a bad thing, although I do think my inability to shut off my brain contributes to my insomnia.

But yesterday I got a glimpse of what it could be like. This crazy rain storm came up out of nowhere. One minute there were blue skies and puffy clouds and my neighbors were out walking their dogs, and then suddenly it was too dark for me to even see my book (Michael Chabon's Gentlemen of the Road, by the way, which I enjoyed, but did not find completely satisfying. I felt like I had just gotten to know the characters and then the book was over. I wanted more.) and rain was battering the house. The window was open, and I found myself watching the patterns of the rain whipping sideways outside, the leaves swirling through the parking lot, and the trees down the road bending in the fierce wind. I wasn't thinking about anything else, not even "Oh, I should close the window." I just sat there, observing and being for a couple of minutes. It was nice. Relaxing. Who knows if I'll ever do it again, but it was interesting enough that I might actually try.

Tonight I went shopping after work, hitting the Nordstrom Half-Yearly Sale. I like to think of it as doing my part to help the economy. I did quite well, too. I picked up a present I had in mind for someone for $5 less than I had seen it listed at another store. Sadly, Smashbox has discontinued the foundation I like, so I've switched to tinted moisturizer with sunscreen. We'll see how it goes. The all-star purchase of the night was a beautiful new pair of black Cole Haan boots which I got for 40% off. I love buying boots, and I love buying discounted boots even more! Now I just need to find a decent pair of loafers. I don't want patent, I don't want a crocodile pattern, and I don't want loafers that are completely flat. I'm short. I need a little heel.

After the mall I stopped by Linens and Things, which is going out of business. I had high hopes of scoring some bargain towels and sheets, but the place had been totally picked over. All they had left were the ugly colors, and on top of that, they were only discounting sheets and towels by 20%. I was looking to get a deal on high thread count sheets, but they were still ridiculously expensive. I bought some "irregular" high thread counts sheets at the outlet mall one time and got addicted to how soft they are. But damn, they aren't cheap. Anyway, Linens and Things was a huge disappointment to me. I can (and will) do better at Target.

Still, I'm delighted with my new boots, and I've purchased the first Christmas present of the season. Not bad for a rainy Friday night.

On Friday morning I carefully packed the frozen wedding cake into my enormous cooler, padded it with just about every single ice pack Target had in stock, tucked in some spare frosting, and delivered it to someone who was driving up to Massachusetts for the wedding. “It’s out of my hands now!” I declared to anyone who would listen, although the truth was that I was still worried.

On Saturday morning I got up at 4:30 am, showered, informed Seamus that no, we were not going for our walk yet, kissed my sleepy husband goodbye, and hit the road for the airport. Getting up and doing anything that early in the morning is on par with completing a Herculean task for me. I was so very pleased with myself when I pulled into the parking lot at Dulles at 5:58 am for my 7 am flight. Sidenote: This was the first time I've flown without checking baggage since all those liquids rules went in to effect. I was shocked when I realized how small a quart sized bag is. I have curly hair, dammit. I can't use any old shampoo or conditioner, and I need my hair gels and potions. Those do not fit in a quart size bag. So I not only got up at 4:30 am -- I did my hair before I left the house!

Anyway, I landed in Boston and picked up my rental car and took custody of the cake back. I love going to Boston and getting all nostalgic. As I headed up to Rockport, I passed the exits for: my old house in Somerville, the place in Medford where my friends and I spent portions of our senior year of college being degenerates and the reservoir where we used to take our dogs, my grandma’s old house in Wakefield, Peabody, where my Aunt Sally lives now, and Ipswich, where she used to live. Whole chapters of my life played out in those towns, and it makes me happy to reconnect with them, if only by yelling “Hi, Aunt Sally!” as I drove past her exit off of 128.

I’m very pleased to say that the cake survived the ride up to Boston. The freezing and thawing process went ok. And I was successful at thawing the frozen frosting and using it to assemble the tiers and decorate the cake. It totally came out looking like a real wedding cake! See:

Then all I had to do was worry about whether or not the cake would actually taste good. And it did! If I were to make it again (not likely) I’d try to make the strawberry layer a little thicker, but it wasn’t dry, it wasn’t soggy, it didn’t taste like it had been frozen, and it wasn’t stale. Yippee!

The wedding itself was lovely. Jules's dad lives in a state park, and they had the wedding in his yard. It was gorgeous -- sunshine but not too hot, with flowers everywhere. Jules and Mike wrote their own vows, which always makes me cry. And my friend Julie and her husband Mark and their adorable kids were there, which was both awesome and a welcome surprise.

The only drawback was the mosquitos, which were everywhere. I'm so thrilled that two people who so clearly belong together are together. As Julie said in our completely off the cuff toast (because we didn't know we'd be making one!) pretty much as long as we've known Jules, no matter who she was with, or what she was doing, Mike was there, lurking at the back of her heart. May they have a long and happy life together.

The happy couple cutting their cake:

The tall blue cooler in the background that some woman is opening is the infamous cake transport cooler.

I had a blast. It was totally worth all the hard work I put in to the cake, totally worth getting up at 4:30 in the morning, and fun all around.

Now let us never speak of wedding cakes again.

I’ve had quite the busy weekend, with not one, but two barbecues to attend. One of my co-workers had a barbecue/reggae housewarming party on Saturday night. I woke up on Saturday morning hating all of my clothes, so I went out looking for something reggae themed and fun. I found the perfect dress at Ann Taylor Loft – a cute green and yellow and black knit halter top dress. Unfortunately, it was so perfect for a reggae party that someone else showed up wearing the same dress. However, I got there first, so I claimed dress victory. The people I was with said I looked better than the other girl did. Of course, they pretty much had to say that, but let’s just believe them. Co-worker parties can be a tricky prospect, but this one was good. I hung out with co-workers I like quite a bit, met some fun people, had a beer and some unbelievably good salsa, and enjoyed the night.

Today’s barbecue was a whole different kettle of fish, although I have admit that I did wear the reggae dress again. It’s a good dress for a cookout. My bestest pal Laila is in town with her son Noah and her fiancé John, and a bunch of my favorite people got together in honor of their visit. We all descended on my friends Dave and Valerie’s place. They have a nice big yard perfect for kids to run around in, a very fancy grill – complete with mini-fridge – and a kitchen that is made for hanging out, chatting and eating. It was a lovely afternoon. We ate till we were stuffed, and then ate a little more. The kids ran and played, the grownups talked, photos were taken, and a good time was had by all. I’m never sure about posting photos of other people’s kids, so you’ll just have to take my word for it when I tell you that my friends all have remarkably good looking children. I get such a kick out of seeing their faces light up when they say hi, and the way they hand out hugs. I guess they like their Auntie Hillary ok. Even better was hearing Noah calling Dave “Hey, Big Dave” in all seriousness. That’s what we called him in high school. I don’t get to see any of them (the kids or their parents) nearly often enough. I’m very glad we all had time to just be together today.

I took a bunch of photos, most of which did not turn out. I really need to learn to take the time to frame the shot better. But here are two that I like: me, Jules and Laila

And Dave, Mike and Laila's John:

How was your weekend?

This morning I woke up feeling like crap. My headache is still there, lurking, waiting to strike again. My stomach is just a bit off. I'm so tired. And my sinuses are clogged and painful. I really, really didn't want to go to work today. But I sucked it up, showered, got dressed, and was all set to walk out the door when I got the call. Water main break. Office closed. Work from home.

WOO-HOO!

Just last week I said to someone, "if I could just have one day to do some work without a bunch of meetings and interruptions, I could get a bunch of stuff done." And now here it is.

Thanks, universe. I appreciate it.

This past weekend I attended my 15 year college reunion. 15 years! I don’t know how the hell that happened. Forsooth, I am old.

My best pals Jules, Julie and I converged on Wellesley on Friday. Julie brought her almost three month old little girl Nadia, who was snuggly and sweet and adorable and everything you want a baby to be. We stayed in the dorms, which was fun in an uncomfortable plastic mattress, bizarrely flat pillow, communal bathroom sort of way. The dorm they had our class in was right next to the dorm we all lived in our first year, exactly the same, except a mirror image of it.

We had fun sitting in the courtyard looking at our old dorm and trying to pick out the rooms we’d lived in and the 1st floor smoking common room we really lived in for our first year. Not even that new roadrunner computer could calculate how many hours we spent in there, doing everything from debating the meaning of Twin Peaks and Angel Heart to founding our own fake sorority to engaging in deep philosophical discussions about art, politics, history, psychology, fiction to playing marathon games of Othello and Egyptian Rat Screw. Oh, and smoking like chimneys, of course. We all LOVED that line from The Sure Thing that went something like “All those girls at those hoity-toity northeastern colleges want to do is sit around, smoke cigarettes, drink tea and relate.” We were the campus misfits, a bit of a scandal, and considered party girls (only at Wellesley would we have been labeled party girls. It mostly meant that we occasionally had parties instead of studying on Saturday nights. Wild.) and we had the time of our lives.

We settled in to our own niche our sophomore year, and had plenty of fun over the rest of our college years, but there was a special magic to that first year.

As much fun as it was to relive all of those memories, it was even better to see how our friendships have deepened over time. It was also interesting to see how we’ve changed even over the course of the reunions we’ve been to so far. At the five year, we had a crowd, most people were still single, and I think we were drunk almost the entire time. At the ten year, Jules was pregnant and living nearby, so we spent more time at her house than we did on campus. This year, we were content to just hang out. We left campus to go in to the town of Wellesley only twice – once to meet up with a friend of Julie’s and have baked goods for breakfast (if you are ever in Wellesley, I highly, highly recommend the Susu Bakery. Yum-my!) and once to go in search of dinner after the class dinner proved to be lame. They tried to stuff way too many people into too small a dining room, had live music playing way too loudly, and had sub-par vegetarian options. Oh, and it was 98 degrees with no air conditioning. While we were looking for dinner, we also went in search of a six pack of cold beer, but that meant we had to leave Wellesley, which is a dry town. Hello Town Line Liquors of Natick! Glad you found us and our dorky reunion nametags so amusing.

Sunday there was an alumnae parade. We’ve always skipped the parade in the past, but this year we went. I was not necessarily a fan of the parade. For one thing, we were supposed to dress all in white, but I didn’t think we were going, so I hadn’t brought anything appropriate to wear. My friend Carri showed up for it, which was great, because I didn’t think I’d get to see her. It was hot. It seemed sort of poorly organized. But then we got to see the older class members, from 1928, 1933, 1938, 1942 and 1948. They all came at the end, riding in fancy historic cars. And I don’t know, it is hard to explain, but marching along in the parade, hot and miserable and listening to the very loud class of 88 behind us (20 years later, 20 years better!) I couldn’t help but feel a kinship and sense of sisterhood, even with people I don’t know, some of whom I probably wouldn’t even like on a personal level.

So, reunion = very good, overall. Best part, beyond bonding with my buds, would be the development of our new group slogan, which goes “So, I did a half-assed job, and then I left (alternatively, and then I got the hell out.” Your mission, should you choose to accept, is to find as many situations as possible where that saying applies. It is easier and more fun than you might think.

Worst part, probably the questions about whether or not I have kids yet, and the endless paeans to how wonderful motherhood is and how much I’m going to love it. Gosh, I hadn’t thought of that. Of course, the good part was not even having to say a word, and Julie knew I needed a hug.

Most interesting part: one of my former classmates, Stephanie Carbone is a jewelry designer. I really like her stuff, and I think you should check it out at her website: http://www.spacemermaid.com/

These absolutely insane storms rolled through the area this afternoon. I missed most of the show, although I did see it get pitch black outside at 3 p.m. Then I went in to a meeting taking place in an interior conference room, so I didn’t see the storm hit. I did, however, notice when the power went out. After a short period of time hanging out in the office, listening to the melodious chirping of the battery backups and lighting documents with our cell phones, it became clear that the power wasn’t coming back on anytime soon. We closed down at 3:45. I battled my way through a few non-working stoplights, hit the highway and made my way home. I saw a few branches and piles of leaf bits on the road, but that was nothing. Apparently there were trees and wires down all over the place and even two confirmed tornado touch downs. Thankfully, none of the tornadoes were anywhere near where I work or live.

By leaving early, I was able to go to the grocery store, to the bank, get home, look up something on the computer, have a snack, work out, do a load of laundry, take Seamus for a walk and make and eat a nice dinner, all by 8 pm. I don’t usually even get home until 8:30! I didn’t even know what to do with myself and all that extra time. I read a little, I chatted with John a little, I had some extended belly rub/snuggle session with Seamus, watched an episode of the Tudors (Memo to Sir Thomas More: dude, just take the oath and save your life and your family. The king doesn’t want to kill you. But, oh, look, he just did.) Seriously, I know how the story goes, and I’m getting frustrated with the characters, like somehow they are going to act differently. It’s like the way I get all anxious every time I see the movie Apollo 13 – will they make it back to Earth safely? Gosh, I don’t know. And then after the Tudors I still had time to put the laundry away before Top Chef started at 10!

Bizarre. And yet so luxurious. I’ve had a taste of the early to home life, and I like it. It’s totally impractical for me, traffic-wise, schedule-wise and even personal preference-wise. In fact, I’m totally screwed for tomorrow because I still had a good three hours worth of work to do when I left the office this afternoon, but it was a nice change of pace.

I just spent two + hours on the phone with Dell, working on getting new drivers for my desktop which refused to acknowledge the Internet and was pretending not to have an audio card, as well as throwing in some video problems just for kicks.

We went with a Dell because you can get them with XP still, and because John hates Vista with a deep and eduring passion. So far it has been a pretty darn reliable computer, quite unlike our old Dell. But oh, I forgot what a pain it is to resolve problems over the phone. The guy who helped me was really nice and actually pretty resourceful, but what a waste of an evening! I bet Mac users don't have these kinds of problems...

Anyway, these peonies caught my eye at the grocery store over the weekend, and just looking at them makes me happy. Even when my computers are giving me fits. They are the embodiement of a lazy summer day -- so cheeful and pink and drowsy and overblown. I thought the Internet might enjoy them too.

Today was the day of the ten mile race I’ve been training for over the last couple of months. To say that it did not go the way I had hoped is an understatement. In fact, it would have been a complete disaster if it were not for the fact that Becky is a truly wonderful friend. She helped turn the day in to an adventure, rather than a nightmare.

We got off to a rocky start almost immediately. You see, in order to be close to the race and not have to get up at 4 am, we had gotten a hotel room in Crystal City. Becky actually found us a good deal in a nice hotel, so we drove down there last night, went out to dinner, and then watched Enchanted on pay per view before turning in early. After some fiddling with the ridiculously complicated clock radio, I set the alarm for six. This morning it went off, and I got up and started getting ready. A couple of minutes later, Becky pointed out that her phone said it was only 5 am. Yep, the clock was an hour fast. We later determined that this was not my fault. It turns out that today is the day that we would normally have moved the clocks forward one hour, and the over-engineered clock radio had reset itself forward.

But, we figured it out and both got a little extra dozing time in before it was really 6 am. When we got outside to walk to the Metro, we realized it was pouring. Luckily, that faded to mostly drizzle pretty quickly. We got over to the start of the race start fine, and then waited around, freezing and wet for while, but in pretty good spirits. The first three miles went well. We passed the 5K mark feeling fine. And then my knee started to hurt. And not just hurt, but HURT. One of the things I’ve learned as I’ve been running is that various body parts will get sore or achy along the way, but if you just keep going, they usually sort themselves out. Not this time. With every step I ran, my knee hurt more. I finally gave up and started walking. Becky and I came up with a plan – walk from mile five to mile six, and then try running again. And so we did, but when we got to mile six, my knee hurt even more when I tried to run. I could tell right then that I was screwed. It is only thanks to Becky and her kindness of spirit and generosity that I didn’t have a total meltdown/temper tantrum right there. We worked so hard, and we’d already done six miles in the freezing cold windy rain, and we weren’t going to finish on time.

But we pressed on. At mile seven, a nasty blue jacketed lady yelled at us, saying we weren’t going to make the cut off time at our pace, and we’d better get on the bus and get off the course. At that point, we still had 45+ minutes left, for crying out loud. All of the other volunteers who we encountered were unflaggingly positive and supportive, yelling “great job” even as I limped on by, but that lady just sucked. Somewhere around eight miles, my knee started hurting even when I walked fast. It was at this point that I realized not bending my knee was the way to go. We kept on going, me stiff legged and freezing, Becky cheerful and freezing. The police came by and said that everyone who hadn’t finished yet had to move on to the sidewalk, so we did. That last mile was a long, painful, wet, cold slog. All around us they were dismantling the race barricades and picking up volunteers in busses. My internal monolog for the last 1200 meters (I know this because they had signs up at 1200, 800 and 400 meters from the finish line) mostly went like this “Ow, step, ow, step, ow, step.” They were taking apart the finish line when we got there, but we did get there. 2 hours, 29 minutes, 31 seconds. Not the time I hoped for, but I’m really proud that we made it to the end. I could have quit, but I didn’t. Part of me didn’t want to give blue jacketed lady the satisfaction, but part of me just plain wanted to finish. Yes, I’m disappointed by my performance, but I did the best I could do today.

Now I just have to figure out what the hell is wrong with my knee. Bending hurts, but the most painful thing is straightening it after bending. Well, ok the most painful was jolting it by running, but I’m not doing that now. I’m just sitting on the couch.

In summary, just let me say THANKS, BECKY! You rock! In spite of everything, I had a great time today, and that was all because of you. (And even though you said I don’t have to be, I’m sorry).

Today I am celebrating the second annual "I stopped accruing vacation time vacation day." Actually, a quick check of my archives shows that the last time this happened it was in October of 2005, so I guess it is more in the nature of a biennial holiday. I would like to state for the record that I am not some sort of crazy workaholic. I've been with my company eight years now, so I get a bunch of vacation time. When I first started working there I had a lot of debt and no money, which meant I didn't take a lot of time off because I couldn't afford to go anywhere. Thankfully I paid off the debts and I make more money now, so that's no longer the issue. Then I was hoarding vacation days because I thought I was going to get pregnant (ha!) and would need the time for my maternity leave, what with American maternity benefits being as craptacularly miniscule as they are. Clearly that's a need that hasn't come up yet. I am taking a proper vacation this year when we go to England, and then I have my 15 year college reunion, and I'd like to get out to Portland to see my brother, so I will be taking time off . It's just that all of that stuff is happening later this year.

This enforced day off actually turned out to be very well timed. I've had a weird week, and I'm tired and I feel like I'm coming down with a cold. I already celebrated by sleeping in until 7:20 this morning (occasionally surfacing long enough to say "No, Seamus we're not getting up yet") and having a leisurely breakfast of slow cook oatmeal with chocolate chips stirred in at the end. I know - I'm a wild woman. I'm probably also going to make a couple of doctor's appointments, book a time to get my hair cut, and look in to travel insurance for that trip to England. Later, I'm considering a trip to Target. And maybe taking a nap.

Whatever you do today, I hope you have a lovely Friday.

This weekend my training schedule for the ten mile race called for me to run nine miles. Given that eight was a bit of a challenge, I decided to ask for help. In spinning class on Thursday night, I begged my dear friend Becky to do the nine and ten mile training runs with me. Luckily for me, she agreed, and on Saturday morning we set out for a run together. We had gorgeous weather for it - not too hot, pleasantly sunny, nice breeze every once in a while. I ran all the way to the halfway point without stopping to walk, which was the longest continuous stretch of running I've ever done. I did have to stop and walk a couple of times (the ever-patient Becky claims she prefers walking to running really slowly, but she may have just been humoring me) and my legs definitely refused to run at the very end. Still, I felt better than I did even two weeks ago when I ran eight miles. Part of that was the company, I'm sure. Thanks, Becky! Running with you is at least a million times better than running without you. :)

I did develop a blister on my right ring toe (aka the piggy that didn't get any roast beef) around mile seven, which has me a little concerned. I've never gotten blisters from running before. Hopefully it was just a one time event. Last night my knees were killing me and I was so tired that I was falling asleep on the couch by 10:30, but they felt better by mid-morning today. Now I just have sore quad muscles. I skipped working out today to give my body a break. I'm not sure if that was the right thing to do or not, but it felt right.

So, yesterday morning was awesome. Seriously, anyone who needs a confidence boost should sign up for some sort of race. I can't tell you how good it felt to get to the end of nine miles in under two hours. Now I know we'll be able to finish the race within the time limit for sure. I wish I didn't have to stop to walk at all, but I'm pleased with what I've accomplished so far.

Making the day even more awesome was the text message I saw when I got back to my car. My friend Julie had her baby! A little girl. I am so very happy for her and her family.

Next weekend: Ten miles. I'm not sure I had another mile of running in me at the end of the nine miles, but I'm going to give it my best shot.

Wednesdays are rough days for me. I have a lot of time consuming meetings, and I have to edit an article that comes in and has to back out in less than three hours, plus I have to write my own very timely article that cannot be done ahead of time for something else, and coordinate and approve a bunch of other copy. Don't feel too sorry for me though -I dump the whole mess on someone on my team who pulls it together and gets it out the door. Of course I still have to get a lot of other stuff done on top of my special Wednesday projects, so the day is just a wee bit challenging.

It's not unusual for me to drag home late, tired and nursing a headache on Wednesday nights. Typically I collapse onto the couch and stare at Law & Order episodes for a couple of hours. But tonight, well tonight I had Top Chef to look forward to. I know it is silly how much pleasure I take in this show. But it is people competing by cooking food! I love food! And cooking. And debating ingredients, and criticizing (or applauding) the choices the cheftestants make. Oh, and the judges. I adore the guest judges, and judge's table.

So, first impressions: Is it me, or are the chefs swearing more than in past seasons? It's not that I object to the swearing, but the beeping out of the swearing gets kind of old. Of course, there were amusing moments. It didn't have anything to do with food, but "Padma was like, 'Yo, casa motherfuckers.'" has to be my favorite quote of the evening. I was pleased that Stephanie (I think it was Stephanie - it always takes me a couple of episodes to learn their names) won. Curly hair, nice smile, seems sweet, what's not too like? I also like the guy from New Zealand. John and I have dubbed him "the hobbit." Interesting elimination challenge too, having them go head to head cooking classics against each other. I could not believe that the two people who got chicken piccata apparently did not know what chicken piccata really is, and I think it was a little unfair to put soufflés on there. Soufflés are really hard if you don't have a recipe to check proportions! I also totally called the person who ended up going home. See, I'm being vague so as to not be a spoiler, but it was pretty darn clear who messed up their dishes in both the quick-fire and the elimination challenge with fairly basic, un-chefly mistakes.

I'm not sure what I think about the whole "we're a couple" thing with the one pair of chefs. I mean, they may both be fabulous cooks, but it feels a little like stunt casting. We'll see. And no, my problem with it has nothing to do with them being a lesbian couple. If you think that about me, you haven't been paying attention. I will close by saying this: Bravo, the show works the way it is. You don't need stunts or chefs swearing all the time. Just interesting judges, good challenges, and of course, talented chefs. Thanks for giving me a reason to look forward to Wednesdays again for a while.

This morning, when my clock radio went off, I rolled over, and without conscious thought, turned it off. I slept a total of an extra 58 minutes. 58 glorious extra minutes! It wasn't just good - it was full on Tony the Tiger Grrreat. It meant I didn't make my get up early goal for the day and I had to do some rushing around, but it was totally worth it. I felt so much more like me all day today.

In other news, apparently I should complain about the stock market more regularly, since all three of the major indices posted crazy gains today. Yippee! Now let's keep our fingers crossed that they don't all turn around and drop again tomorrow. Slow and steady growth, please. Good for the economy, good for jobs, good for all of us.

And finally, does anyone watch the Biggest Loser? Why didn't they vote anyone off tonight? And how fake was Bob's "Oh my gosh, Mark is back!" act? Also, why are the girls being whiny babies? Yes, it is unfair that men lose more weight and lose it faster than women. In fact, it sucks. But you're ten weeks in to the show - it's not like that is brand new information. Oh, and who do you think would win a cage match between Jillian and Allison Sweeney? Jillian looks tough, but Allison's got all those years as Sami on Days of Our Lives under her belt. That's got to count for something.

It’s been just about two years, give or take a week or two, since my doctor first said “I think you might have diabetes” and my whole life changed. I do a lot of things differently now – take medication, count carbs, think about eating in a whole new way, and most importantly, I think anyway, I exercise regularly. Two years ago I went to yoga classes sometimes and every once in a while did a workout video, and occasionally went for a hike in the woods.

Tonight at spinning class, I had a moment – one of those moments you are convinced are just a myth when you first start exercising – when everything came together and I smiled through my sweat and thought “Sometimes it just feels so fucking good to work out!” I was cruising along through a six minute stretch long interval in my class tonight to the sounds of New Order’s Bizarre Love Triangle and it just all clicked. Later on in that six minute stretch my attention wandered a bit. Bizarre Love Triangle always throws me back to the late high school/early college years, and every time the instructor plays it I start feeling like I should be wearing a baby doll dress, black tights and boots, clutching some sort of fruity cocktail like a Sex on the Beach or a Fuzzy Navel, and dancing with my friend Laila and a bunch of guys who hadn’t admitted they were gay yet.

But I digress, sorry. The point I want to make is this: No matter how far it feels like you have to go to get fit, you can do it. I still have plenty far to go on my personal fitness journey, but I’ve made so much progress over the last two years. And all the advice that you read in magazines and hear from doctors and fitness experts is really very good. If you want to get in better shape, just start working out. The first time you hop on a treadmill or take a class or even just go for a walk, you may have a really hard time with it. Heck, the first 25 times you do it will be hard. But the more you do it, the more it pays off. You could start today, and in three months, you’ll find it has gotten easier, you feel better, and you can do more and more every day. And then it will be two years later, and you’ll be talking about crazy stuff like running 10 miles!

Stuff that actually worked for me:

Build up slowly. I work out most days, but I still have days where I take it easy. In the beginning, I had a lot of those days. The first time I ever got on the elliptical machine (which terrified me for some reason) I was on it less than 10 minutes. I didn’t start running until a good five or six months in to working out. Now, I could have done it sooner than that. I was just trying other stuff first, because I thought I wasn’t a runner.

Get a workout partner. I know having my friend Becky working out with me made a HUGE difference at first as I was building the habit of exercising regularly, and she continues to be a big factor. We challenge each other to try new things (ok, she challenges me more than I challenge her), and there have been plenty of times when I might have wimped out and gone home except that I knew I was meeting her at the gym. Best of all, our friendship has grown and gotten even better since we see each other so much.

Do the cross training thing. I love being in a rut. Love it. But it really is better fitness-wise and staying interested wise if you change your exercise plan up regularly. I now run, take a weights class, use the elliptical, and go to spinning classes, as well as doing videos at home. When the weather is nice, we go for regular hikes with Seamus. I’d like to find a way to work yoga back in to the rotation, but it just doesn’t fit my schedule right now. I want to try kick boxing and horseback riding, and maybe get back in to playing tennis.

Don’t be afraid to say to friends and family “this is a change I have to make for me.” I thought people might make fun of me for my grand plans, but everyone was and is really supportive. That made it much, much easier.

Above all, believe in yourself. If I can go from couch potato to feeling joy in the middle of a workout, you can too. Seriously.

After such a spectacular start, my day didn't really have anywhere to go but up. When I first got to work, I thought I was going to have a crappy day, but then I was pleasantly surprised when both my 10 o'clock and my 11 o'clock meetings went better than expected.

My boss and I exchanged gifts, and she really liked what I got her, which was great. I also really liked what she got me, so it was a nice, even exchange.

My lemon meringue pie was a resounding success. I personally tried Shoofly Pie for the first time, and fell in love. My the Amish have some tasty desserts. First funnel cake, now Shoofly Pie. It's almost enough to make one give barn raising and buggy driving some serious thought.

I did not get nearly enough sleep last night (see baking disasters, below) so I was sure that I was going to be dead on my feet by the time spinning class rolled around. Instead, I got a burst of energy, and had a great class. I suspect the burst may be related to the fact that I only have one more day of work to go until I am off for 11, yes that's e-lev-en days in a row.

And best of all, after spinning class, Becky gave me a present. I wasn't expecting one, so it was a nice surprise, but even better, it is a fabulous present which I love! Check out my new keychain:

He's a bad, bad penguin, but he's trying so very hard to be good :) Isn't he cute?

Thanks again Becky, for an awesome present!

I was ridiculously productive this weekend. I did more Christmas shopping (only one present left to go! I think! I may need to get one more present for my mom, too.), bought myself a dress, stocked up on baking supplies for my annual holiday cookie frenzy, helped my mom purchase and set up her Christmas tree, snuggled in front of the fire with my two favorite guys (human and furry), made a delicious taco dinner, and cleaned up the kitchen.

Sadly, I didn't get to check off every item on my weekend list, but I think I stacked the deck against myself by putting too much on it in the first place. I did not get my Christmas cards finished and I did not do laundry. Nor did I get in the good run I was hoping for. They had the heat up way too high at the gym today. I ran one mile and had to quit because I was dying on the treadmill. I happened to notice the thermostat as I left, and it said it was 80 degrees in there. 80 degrees! As I've mentioned before, I overheat pretty easily, so that did not work for me. I also get chilled pretty easily too, so I suppose my body just isn't very good at keeping its temperature regulated. Anyway, I left the gym and worked out to one of my videos at home. It actually occurred to me after I got home that I could have just driven to the other gym and run there, but once I made it home, I could not overcome my house-inertia to get out to the gym a second time. To tell the truth, I was fairly proud of myself for making it down to the basement instead of just going upstairs and taking a nap.

I also really wanted to see the movie I Am Legend, but I'm worried about the story a little bit. Yes, it is the sort of post-Apocalyptic tale that appeals to me, with neat scenes of empty and crumbling Manhattan, and I like Will Smith, but as my friend Becky pointed out, something bad could happen to the dog. In fact, I'm fairly certain something bad does happen to the dog, and I'm not sure I can take it. Leave poor Will Smith alone with his sweet doggie already, stupid vampire/zombie guys! Also, the reason that post-Apocalyptic stories typically interest me, aside from all the "cool" destruction and fish out of water scenarios (deer in the supermarket, having the city/shopping mall/highway all to yourself etc...) is the rebuilding part of the story. You know, the part where there's hope and people forming a new society out of the ashes of the old one. I'm not sure that I'm going to get that with I Am Legend. So we're holding off on it for now.

How was your weekend? Did you see any good movies? Do you think I'm being silly about the dog?

Thanksgiving itself and the run up to it were frenzied and exhausting as usual, what with trying to squeeze a whole week's worth of work in to three days, and cramming in baking a pie and making vegetarian dishes, but the last three days have been wonderful.

For three glorious days I went almost nowhere and did almost nothing. I had some plans for Friday that fell through, and while I was bummed about that at first, it turned out to be for the best. In fact, it was great to be completely obligation-free. I hung out with John and Seamus. We took Seamus for a nice hike in the woods. We tried a new Chinese restaurant and flipped through guidebooks and made plans for our trip to Europe. I read a couple of books. I slept in and took naps. I watched a little TV. I had plenty of spare time to fit in my workouts. I'm very pleased to say that after the last few days I'm feeling more relaxed and refreshed than I've felt in months.

Of course, tomorrow morning it is back to work and the usual grind. But hey, I had three great days. And actually Thanksgiving, while long and tiring, was pretty nice too, so let's make it four great days. Even better, I have a bunch of vacation days I have to use up by the end of the year, so December is going to be chock full of opportunities for me to relax. I'd say the last few days are proof that I'm more than ready for some time off.

But enough about me. How was your Thanksgiving weekend?

John and I saw American Gangster this weekend, and I have to say, I really don't think it lived up to the hype. It wasn't a bad movie. Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe were both great, in fact, but I felt like it never quite paid off. I guess I could see the potential in the story and in the performances, but it didn't come together for me. A movie that is two and a half hours long shouldn't feel like it has gaps in the story for one thing. The reviewer in the Washington Post said that the movie felt like it was 40 minutes long to him. Not me. I was practically falling asleep at the very end. I realize it was a true story, so they couldn't take too many liberties with the facts, but it seems to me that there was a natural tension between the two stories they were telling - Denzel's character's rise to heroin kingpin in Harlem paralleling Russell's cop character's journey to become the head of a drug unit and eventually a prosecutor - that should have put more suspense in the story. All of the elements of a great story were there. It should have been a great movie, but I was disappointed.

If you're looking for a really good gangster movie, I found Eastern Promises much more satisfying. It hasn't gotten nearly the same attention or ad campaign as American Gangster, but I thought it was an excellent movie. It a narrowly focused story about the Russian Mafia set in London. Viggo Mortensen is terrific as Nikolai, a Russian gangster who turns out to not be all that bad after all. Naomi Watts plays a midwife trying to figure out what happened to the Russian teenager who turned up at her hospital and died while giving birth, and who suddenly finds herself in way over her head. Now, this was a movie where you really got a feel for the characters and what drove them. Even though it probably had as much violence as American Gangster, it felt like a quieter, more introspective movie. John and I both really enjoyed it.

I also finally finished reading William Gibson's Spook Country, which I've been picking up and putting down for a couple of weeks now. I kept getting distracted, which is in no way a reflection on the quality of the book. I've just been ridiculously busy. It's funny, because when I'm not reading William Gibson, I always forget just how much I enjoy his writing. And then I pick up one of his books, and I'm reminded that I don't just like his work. I really, really like it. He's got such a spare, yet incredibly descriptive style. You feel like you know his characters and can see the world they inhabit even though he doesn't have any extraneous words floating around in his books. Spook Country is, much like most of his stories, kind of hard to explain. There's an ex-lead singer of a band with a cult following trying to build a career as a journalist. There's an illegal Cuban immigrant clan with ties to Russia and to the CIA. There's a former intelligence officer playing his own games in the post 9-11 era, and there's a current spy type using a junkie to help him track what the Cubans are up to with the former intelligence officer. Oh, and a very rich magazine publisher/ad man/cultural trend developer guy. Each thread of the story starts out separately, but they all converge in the end, with a payoff that was, at least for me, completely unexpected. I think I even liked it better than his last book, Pattern Recognition, and I really liked Pattern Recognition.

So to recap, American Gangster = good, but not as wonderful as everyone says, Eastern Promises = excellent and should be getting more attention than it is, and Spook Country = one of my favorite books I've read this year. And I read a lot, so that's saying something.

Now, I'm looking for something new to read. I've got a stack of books under the coffee table, but I'm also always interested in other people's suggestions. What have you read lately that you liked? Got any movies you want to review? Have at it in the comments.

I had planned to do a fancy pumpkin design this year, perhaps a pirate ship pattern, or a ghost, but John convinced me I should go old school instead.

Hope you get lots of candy and have a fun and spooky Halloween!

Today kind of sucked on many levels, most of which I can't talk about because they are work related. The low point was probably when I started crying in my boss's office. To be clear, this was not my boss's fault. My boss is awesome. I just got overloaded and heard the wrong thing at the wrong time. I'd also like to state, for the record, that usually I adhere to a strict no crying at work policy. There is no crying in baseball (per Mr. Tom Hanks) and there is no crying at work.

Anyway, rather than dwell on the sheer overwhelming craptacularness of my day, I thought I'd try turning each negative into a positive.

So I sat in traffic for a ridiculously long amount of time this morning just because it was raining. I'm grateful I was sitting traffic in my new car, which I love!

So I had a difficult day at work. I'm grateful to have a job that I enjoy and that pays me well. I'm really grateful to have a wonderful team full of people who I like and who do a great job, even when I'm so busy I can barely give them the attention they deserve.

So I got stuck in traffic on my way home at 9 pm because there was an accident. I'm grateful that I left work when I did, because if I had left earlier, I might have been on the road right when the accident happened.

So I got home late. I'm grateful that my husband and doggie were here and happy to see me when I arrived.

So I had a lousy day. I'm grateful for the iPod touch I bought myself as a consolation prize.

When you look at it that way, my day wasn't so bad after all...and it's not all just because I bought myself a fancy new gadget.

How do you turn a bad day around?

Friday went exactly according to my plan. First I went to the Honda dealership to check out the Civic Hybrid. Honda and I did not get off to the greatest start, because I couldn't seem to find anyone to help me at first, but after I wandered the showroom for a couple of minutes I found Vincent, sales guy extraordinaire. I was pleasantly surprised when all he did was make a copy of my driver's license, walk me out to a Civic Hybrid and then hand me the keys, saying I could take the car out for a spin on my own. I decided that meant it would be a good idea to drive home and show the car to John, so that's what I did. It handled nicely, even in the rain, and was comfortable - familiar, since I already own a Civic - but spiffed up and more luxurious. And a Hybrid, of course. After John got a good look at the car, I hopped on the highway for a couple of miles to see how the car handled that, and then zipped back to the dealership. I sat there for a while talking to my new pal Vincent about colors and interior colors while someone looked at my car to assess the trade-in value. They totally tried to lowball me on the trade-in too.

Then it was on to Toyota, conveniently located across the parking lot and on the other side of the BP, where I met sales guy number two, Jeff. Jeff seemed a little confused. It took three tries for him to get the keys to a Prius that even came close to having the right "package" of options for me. Supposedly he's their number one guy, and I have to say, if even the salesmen are having trouble sorting out the packages, it means the packages are too complicated. John and I had done our research online though, so I knew what I wanted. Jeff was not about to hand me the keys and send me on my merry way, however. He was determined to show me each and every feature of the Prius, of which there are many. We went for a test drive together, and then I sat some more and discussed colors with Jeff while the Toyota guys looked at my car to give me a trade-in value. If I was going to get a Prius, I felt pretty strongly that it should be red, but they didn't have any red ones at the dealership. Toyota was fairer on the trade-in assesment, although that may have had something to do with me telling them what I wanted to get for the car, and them thinking they had to beat Honda's offer. Which they did.

And then I came home to eat a very late lunch (looking at cars is very time consuming!) and started making my lists of pros and cons for each car. Both guys had laid out pricing and financing options for me (Honda had a slightly better financing offer than what I had already arranged, but Toyota couldn't even come close) and the cars cost almost exactly the same. The Prius is a fancier car for the money, but I wasn't sure that was what I wanted. So back and forth and back and forth we went, debating the pluses and minuses for each car. It was a little harder for John, because he didn't get to see the Prius. Plus, he was of the opinion that I should wait until next weekend to buy the car because supposedly you get better deals on the last weekend of the month. I was of the opinion that I just wanted to get it done and not have to think about it any more.

And so it was that on Saturday morning I went in to Honda and told them that if they could match the offer that Toyota made me on the trade-in, I'd buy the Civic Hybrid. They tried to lowball me again, but I stood firm, and in the end, they gave me what I wanted. Go me! I resisted all attempts to sell me add-ons, warranties, accessories and simonizing packages, and drove off with my new car early Saturday afternoon. I love it! John loves it, and he has very high standards! And even better, I haven't gotten one single "...but if you'd just waited a few more days..." statements from him. It's so pretty. It is sort of a dark shimmery grey with a blue and off white interior. It has an in-dash CD player, which is new for me, and a jack for an MP3 player, should I ever get that iPod touch I lust after. The Hybrid displays are simple and easy to read, although I'm already getting obsessed with watching the MPG indicator as it changes over the course of driving around. It's a sedan, which is a change from my little coupe, but as I ran errands this morning, I found myself enjoying the extra room. Seamus thinks he's in a palace in the back seat now, and he loves the way he can perch on the armrest between the two front seats if he wants to poke his head up front to say hello.

Why did I choose the Honda? It was a pretty close race, actually. The fact that I've owned two Civics previously weighed pretty heavily in Honda's favor, but I know Toyota cars are quality too. My mom's got close to 300,000 miles on her Land Cruiser, my brother has a Toyota pickup, and my friend Becky has a Forerunner. They are all really nice. The Prius has all sorts of neat gadgets, but it also has a bunch of crap I just don't want. I don't need a backup camera. The touch screen radio/climate controls are neat and space age-y, but felt kind of unnecessary. The beeping (fucking beeping!) while the car is in reverse is just ridiculous. My buddy Jeff claimed it was because the engine is so quiet that people don't realize you are backing up, but that would only make sense if you could hear the noise outside the car. You can't. The whole Smart Key thing - you don't start a Prius with a key, you have the key in your pocket and the car knows it and allows you to start it up when you push the power button - is quite clever, and I can see how it could be handy, but it also feels like one more thing that could easily break or be hacked. I liked the braking gear feature quite a bit, but really all cars have something like that. It's just called a lower gear. I loved that it had a hatchback, and the whole cargo area was really well designed. That was the one thing that almost tipped me toward the Prius, because you can't fold down the seats in the Honda Hybrid. The Hybrid battery is stored between the back seat the trunk area. However, I don't haul around that much in the way of long/tall stuff.

It all came down to this: The Civic Hybrid is basically a normal car that gets really good gas mileage because it has the Hybrid engine and battery. The Prius is basically a whole new lifestyle. Yes, the Prius is cool - perhaps even cooler than my Honda. But all I really wanted was a car that I liked and that would be better environmentally, and I worried that I would get annoyed with a lot of the stuff on the Prius once the novelty wore off. Maybe when I get my next car, Prius. We'll talk again in a few years when John is ready to get his own Hybrid. For now, I've got to go work on my list of excuses to drive places. I love my new car!

P.S. Thanks to Becky for the title idea.

Not only do I get to have a job that I love - I also get to work with the greatest team in the world. Today was Bosses Day, and my team decided to surprise me and take me out to lunch. They know I like Indian food, so they found a great new Indian place near my office. If you're ever at the corner of 355 and Shady Grove Rd, I highly recommend the buffet at Minerva, which is tucked in to the shopping center with the Jerry's. Their palak paneer was tasty without being too spicy, their naan (a key test for any Indian restaurant in my mind) was delicious, and they had a potato and red pepper dish I'd never have before, but that was awesome. Conveniently, I really like all of the people on my team, which meant that we also had entertaining and fun conversation.

When I got back to my office, I discovered they had put a huge piñata of a donkey in my office. It's hard to explain the piñata joke here, but trust me, it was extremely funny, and very much appreciated. My team (well, teams to be precise) rule. I'm so lucky to work with such a wonderful group of people. Happy Bosses Day to all, and to all a good night!

I've done plenty of bitching here about all the times I've gotten screwed out of lunch at work because I'm a vegetarian. Well, today the opposite happened, and I thought I should take a moment to appreciate it.

They brought lunch in to my office for some reason or other, and the AE for my group made sure that there was a vegetarian option for me. And then, because I was in a meeting when lunch was delivered, she took one of the vegetarian sandwiches and stuck it in my office, so I would be sure to get something to eat. It was a really nice thing to do, and it made my day that much better.

Speaking of my job, it is connected to the stock markets, so I pay quite a bit of attention to what they are doing. I've been doing it for so long now that it is completely second nature, but it occurred to me that most people probably aren't hanging on the market's every move like I do. Do you? Were you aware that at one point today the Dow was down 292, but recovered to finish only slightly down? Do you even care? I've lost the ability to tell what is a normal interest level.

I had a big long list of stuff that I wanted to accomplish this weekend. List queen that I am, generally, nothing makes me happier than having a list and getting the stuff on it done. This weekend was different though. Most of those items remain on the list, forlornly waiting for their triumphant cross-off, and yet I am content. For every task I did not complete, I managed to find something else to do that was better.

On Saturday morning John and I got up early and took Seamus for a hike in the woods before it got hot. That wasn't on my list, but it turns out that the park is lovely at 8:00 am, so it was worthwhile. The woods are somehow more still first thing in the morning than they are when we usually go, and the light through the trees is totally different. I think we'll probably do it again sometime.

I didn't vacuum the living room, but I did clean the kitchen. I finished the book I was reading. I took a nap. I went running, which was on the list, but I did not sort out my messy desk. I spent lots of time just relaxing with John and Seamus. That right there is probably enough for me to declare the weekend a success. Perhaps I should start including items like "ejoy hanging out with husband and dog" on my lists.

What was the best part of your weekend?

I'm pleased to say that conference call part deux went much better than yesterday's disaster. It was still no fun, but at least the suckiness factor dropped significantly. I will say that my boss's boss has an impressive ability to cut through the crap. I need to develop that skill.

There's nothing I can do to stop being pissed off at the Democrats or my dad, but I think I've gotten past my weird sensitivity to Nichole Richie being pregnant. Hooray for letting stuff I can't change go.

And, well, that's pretty much my whole day. Wow, what a thrilling life I lead. Hey, wake up!

I've seen a bunch of benefits from losing weight and getting in shape. I'm clearly healthier. My diabetes is under good control. It should be positively affecting my fertility. I've learned what a great stress reliever exercize can be, and how much I can enjoy it. I got to feel the pride and accomplishment of running a 5k.

Good health and touchy-feely happy stuff is all well and good, but I'm not going to lie to you. The best part, the absolute best part is being thinner. I love the fact that people who haven't seen me in a while are amazed at how I look. I love how much more confident it makes me feel. And I love how much easier it is to buy clothes.

I was seriously booked with stuff to do on Saturday, so I didn't have much spare time to do anything. However, one of the things I had to do was go to my friends Dave and Valerie's son's baptism. And before I could do that, I had to find something to wear. I'd been meaning to try to get to a store down by my office all week, but I ended up working late every day, so it just never happend. One of the few drawbacks to Frederick is the lack of good clothes and shoe shopping, but there is an Ann Taylor Loft near my house, which I thought might do. Otherwise I was going to have to try to squeeze in a trip to the mall on my way to DC for the baptism, which would have been complicated.

Pre-weight-loss, a last minute trip to the store like that would have been a nightmare of avoiding styles that didn't work on short, round me, trying not to spend a lot of money on clothes that made me feel unattractive, and hating the size I had to buy, wasting time trying on a bunch of stuff that didn't look good, and generally being miserable. Instead, on Saturday morning I walked in to the store, spent 10 minutes wandering around to see what I liked, tried on two dresses, looked good in them both, and walked out of the store with an outfit that was both cute and baptism-appropriate. And that was 40% off. The whole process took less than half an hour. I felt so good I practically danced my way to the car.

That feeling will most definitely motivate me the next time I turn down a piece of cake, avoid a soda, or drag my tired ass to the gym when I'd rather sit on the couch. So to anyone out there who is struggling to get started losing weight, impatient for results, or looking for a reason to stick with it, take it from me -- it is worth it!

On Friday, John and I went up to Hershey to see the Police play. I was so very excited for this concert. The Police are pretty much my all time favorite band. Liking them pretty much predates all of my other musical favorites -- I liked them before Duran Duran and Depeche Mode (my middle schoole teeny-bopper bands). I liked them before I discovered punk rock, alternative music or really got to like rock n roll or metal. I was thrilled when they announced their reunion tour.

It took us three hours to get there at rush hour. The roads in to Hershey are not equipped for a lot of traffic. And the stadium traffic is not very well organized. I thought John's head was going to explode at the inefficiency of it all. He sets great store in doing things efficiently. And the stadium itself...well, as we were trying to get to our seats, we got trapped in a huge crowd of people in the beer line. It was actually a little bit scary, although that may have just been me. I get claustrophobic. At another point, a woman who was getting crowded and wearing spiked heels stepped backward on to my foot, slicing it open and buising it. But, since it was Pennsylvannia, at least they had funnel cakes.

The concert itself was kind of a disappointment. They got off to a wonderful start, opening with a really good version of Message in a Bottle. The visuals were well done. But Andy Summers seemed out of tune for about half the songs. I didn't even recognize Every Little Thing She Does is Magic at first. And Sting, I'm a huge fan, but man, why the hell can't you play the songs the way you recorded them? I'm not interested in a 10 minute version of Walking in Your Footsteps. I love almost every single one of the Police's songs. I expected to be caught up in the music and carried away. For the most part, I wasn't.

Don't get me wrong. I'm still glad we went, and I would have kicked myself it we hadn't. It was worth seeing them, even if they weren't as good as I thought they would be.

Now for my second review which is much more glowing -- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. No details or spoilers, I promise. I will say it was everything I hoped the last book would be and more. I finished reading the book today and felt satisfied, and happy and content with the way it ended. The is Snape good or evil question was answered. There were happy bits that made me smile, and sad parts that made me cry, and in the end, good triumphed over evil. I loved every minute of it. Go JK Rowling, and thanks for creating such a wonderful series of books.

John comes from a very international family. His mom is British, his dad is German, and he has a whole host of cousins all over the world. They are all very nice, although occasionally we run into cross-cultural divides. I was inadvertently snotty to John’s Auntie Bea when she was here a few weeks ago, answering the question I thought she’d asked, when in fact she wanted to know something different. And I do get the impression sometimes that they are amused by my American enthusiasm and brashness. That’s ok though, because I am amused by their dependence on tea, their overuse of the term brilliant, and their pronunciation of the words aluminum (aluminium), lieutenant (leftenant) and schedule (schedule).

Right now, Auntie Jimmie is visiting from Australia to spend some time with Nora.
Last night, while hanging out with them, we were discussing my exercise schedule, and I mentioned that on Thursday nights, I had spinning class.

Auntie Jimmie was quite enthusiastic about spinning, and said she had a friend in Brisbane who did spinning. I found this a bit surprising, since Auntie Jimmie is probably around 70 years old. However, all of my husband’s relatives have a wide range of friends and acquaintances, so it seemed possible she knew someone who enjoys spinning class.

But then she went on to the me the story of her friend in Ireland’s mother, who would go around picking up bits of wool left behind by sheep on fences in the countryside, which she would then wash and card and spin it in to yarn. Obviously, by this point in the story, I had figured out that we were talking about two completely different activities, so I broke in to gently describe the sort of spinning that I do. I had to act quickly before anyone started thinking I could produce a ball of yarn or something. I’m a slow enough knitter as it is. Can you imagine if I had to create my own yarn, too?

I’m sure this is the most boring blog in the world right now, but this is my life. Get up, go to work, go to the hospice, spend time with my mother in law, come home, eat dinner at 10, try to spend a little quality time with John and Seamus, and then go to bed. Hey, next week I’ll be in Vegas. Maybe I’ll see a celebrity or something.

But I’m not there yet, so this is what you get. Tonight I had a little victory, and since I know there’s a good chance it will be short-lived, I’m going to celebrate while I can. See, I went in to visit Nora with a new strategy and it seems to have worked. When I got there and asked how she was doing today, she said, “You’re going to be angry with me. I want to go home tomorrow.” And I said, “I’m not angry Nora. You know you can’t go home tomorrow. That’s not going to happen.” And then I changed the subject and refused to get into a fight. Amazingly enough, it worked. I don’t know if it will work again, but at least for one night, there was no drama, and just nice conversation.

It was good. Among other topics, I got hear about how she was an air hostess, and a time she went hitchhiking in Germany, and what it was like going to Trinity College in Dublin. I hope it happens again. This is the way I hope the time she has left can be spent with us.

The good news is, I did not throw up today. My stomach may have been wee bit touchier than usual, but all in all, it behaved. I’ll admit that I felt a bit of a clench as I drove up to the hospice tonight, but tonight’s visit with Nora went pretty well.

In even better news, I had my annual check up today, and my doctor was so complimentary. She congratulated me on how much weight I’ve lost and all the progress I’ve made since last year. There were only three negatives – first, when the nurse was asking me very insistently about about what birth control I use. "None? Not even condoms?" she asked incredulously. I finally said something along the lines of "that's not an issue for me." Then the doctor seemed a little put off by my reluctance to be hopeful that having my diabetes diagnosed and getting it under control has made some difference to my fertility. I remain skeptical. I want to be proven wrong, I really do. If I got pregnant without IVF or IUI, I would be delighted. I just don’t think it is going to happen. And finally, when I realized that the reason the gown they gave me was so enormous was not because I am so very thin, but rather that they make them big for pregnant bellies. That was depressing. I hope I do have a big pregnant belly someday.

The best news of all – a project I’ve been working on since November, the redesign and re-launch of a massive website – is going to be pushed live tomorrow. Oh, sure, there will still be plenty of little clean-up items here and there, but it is finally, finally going to happen.

What was the best part of your day?

It turns out that if you work at it long it enough, you can eventually go from being a couch potato to being one of those psychos who likes exercise. Yes, that’s right, I’ve gone to the dark side. I now not only like working out because of the benefits it provides – lowering stress, getting more fit, losing weight, getting smaller – but also because I’ve come to just plain like it. I realized today that I was really looking forward to going and running at the gym tonight. Part of that is no doubt that I was looking forward to hanging out with my friend Becky, but the rest of it was that I just wanted to move. And when I realized I wasn’t going to make it to the gym, I was actually bummed. I did come home and do a workout video. That’s good too.

So for anyone out there who is just starting to exercise, or just getting back in to exercise, take it from me – it WILL get better. There will be plenty of times when you feel like complete crap. Times when you just want to lie down and die. Times when you finish working out and your arms quiver with exhaustion, and your legs ache and you stumble upstairs to sit on the couch and moan. Keep at it though. It will slowly get better and better until one day you’ll want to do it.

I’m still not Miss Perfectly Fit by any stretch of the imagination. I’ve got plenty of weight left to lose, and even now I still get tired and sore. But apparently I have crossed that magical exercise continental divide and now I’m on the good side of it.

It occurred to me when I made resolutions this year that I might do a better job of sticking to them if I checked back in on them periodically. The first quarter of the year has come to an end. In fact, it flew by so fast that I’m astonished that April is here, but it feels like a natural point for a progress report. Tonight I bring you the first installment of ResolutionWatch 07.

I had 10 resolutions for the year.

And here is how I’ve done so far:

#1, have more of a financial plan…not so much progress on this one. I’ve been sending extra money toward our mortgage each month, and I got a brochure about Roth IRAs, but that’s it. Next resolution, please!

For resolution #2, I’ve been trying very hard to be neater. I’m not sure if John agrees with me or not, but I think I’ve been doing a better job of keeping the kitchen clutter free, and cleaning off the desk in my office and filing away mail each weekend. We reorganized all our books and took a bunch of stuff to Goodwill. And this weekend I put all of our photographs in to albums. That was actually a lot of fun.

#3 was reach out to others more. I’d say I’ve been halfway successful here. It’s a start, but I need to keep working at it.

My 4th resolution was to sign up for a writer’s workshop. I poked around online, and found one that might be interesting. I haven’t actually signed up for anything yet. I’m saving that for the summer. I wouldn’t want to rush through all my resolutions in the first half of the year.

#5 – Work on being a better boss to my employees. Well, I have two more direct reports now than I did in January, but that doesn’t mean I’m any better a boss. Just a busier one. I’d say some days I’m more successful at being a good boss and mentor than others.

#6 is one where I have been very successful. It was do more to help others. In January, I sent a bunch of toys to Children’s Hospital as part of Beth’s Small Change idea. In March, I raised $140 and participated in a bowl-a-thon for Junior Achievement. And February’s donation is a little different. I decided I wouldn’t buy any books in the month of March, and then I would donate all the money I didn’t spend (based on what I did spend on books in February) to a charity. I made it through March without buying any books – way harder for me than it sounds, and I did use a gift card to pick up two books, which may or may not count as cheating – so now I just have to pick the charity.

#7 Write in this blog more frequently. I don’t know. I’m probably posting about the same as I always have. I get busy, I get tired, I get uninspired. I should be more disciplined.

#8 – Worry less about what other people think. Recently, someone at work mentioned that I have a blog in a meeting, and someone else asked me point blank what my url was. I always worry that work people are comparing me to Amy, who is a former co-worker, and obviously a way more popular and successful blogger than I am and finding me lacking. But then I remind myself that I like who I am just fine and I don’t want to be Amalah (although I would love to get the volume of comments she gets. Who wouldn’t? Yes, I know, I’m not supposed to care about comments. Just call me a comment whore.) So, maybe some progress here, and maybe not.

#9 Try new things. Well, I tried a spinning class, and loved it, so that was a success. I still want to try a kick boxing class, but I haven’t made it to one yet. I have a couple of books that go outside my usual genre, but I haven’t read them yet. I will. Soon.

And finally, #10 – finish losing weight already. I still have 20 pounds to lose. You have no idea how badly I want to be done with dieting and into maintaining my weight loss. I’m not there yet. I have lost a couple of pounds since the beginning of the year, but holy crap, it is taking forever. I’m actually starting a six week focused burst on Monday to see if I can get my weight loss speed pushed back up past glacial. It will involve lots of exercise and lots and lots of healthy eating. Not that I don’t eat healthy now, but I could be a little stricter with myself. Particularly if it is only for a six week burst.

Did you make resolutions? How are you doing with them?

John used that phrase in conversation the other day, and it's been stuck in my head ever since, probably because it is also a book title. His auntie Bea is here visiting from London, and the two of them got into a fairly intense philosophical debate about Buddhism when we had dinner with her. As an aside, I love the way British people say Buddhist. They pronounce the "u" just a little bit differently - kind of like the way we say pudding, and the rest of the word is more clipped than the American way. I can't remember the exact context of John's quote, but he was arguing that there is no creation myth in Buddhism - that they believe that life, the universe and everything have always existed. I think some of the more esoteric branches of physics have similar theories; that there was no big bang, but rather the universe just is. Auntie Bea holds that there has to have been a starting point, because humans can't have created themselves. I'm not sure I agree with her logic, but it made for an interesting discussion. The bad news from her visit is that they are putting off the big 50th wedding anniversary party, so we have to postpone our planned trip to Europe. I'm a little bummed about that, but we will go eventually.

Today spring finally arrived in the DC area, and not a moment too soon. Saturday was cold and rainy and dreary and it was all I could do to not hide out in bed all day, alternating between glaring sullenly out the window at the rain and curling up for little cat naps. But this morning the sun showed up and burned off all the mist. We were able to go for a decent hike for the first time in a couple of months, which delighted Seamus. He's such a clever little guy - he knows exactly which road is the road to the park with all the hiking trails - and starts squeaking and wagging when we turn on to it. I also saw the first crocus poking its head out in our back yard. Now I can't wait to spend some quality time in the garden. I have a whole lot of pruning and planting to do.

Happy Spring!

I’m all a-twitter about one of those “only in the Internet age” happenings. It’s so funny, because I never really think all that much about the fact that what I write here is just out there for all the world to see, should they stumble across it. When my first blog got outed at work and I heard that someone’s feelings were hurt because they thought I was writing about them, I felt awful. I never want to write something that would hurt anyone’s feelings. And anyway, I wasn’t actually writing about the person who thought I was writing about them, but that’s not really my point. My point is that while I do try to be careful about that sort of thing here now, I still forget that anyone can find and read this blog.

This time, someone I really did write about found my blog. Back in October I posted about a book I read, Dies the Fire by S.M. Stirling. The other day, the author found my post and left a comment explaining why he had included so much detail about one of the character’s Wicca beliefs, which I had complained about in my review. How cool is that?

I had wandered away from the Internet for a few days, so I didn’t get his email right away, but when I did, and realized just exactly who had left me a comment, I just about fell out of my chair. My first thought was “Oh, crap, I hope I didn’t say anything snotty.” Luckily, I didn’t. It was not the most glowing review I’ve ever given a book, but I did like it, and I think that was clear.

I thought what he had to say was interesting. Of course, he would be the expert, seeing as how he is the one who wrote the book. I emailed him back, taking the time to come up with something slightly better than “Oh my God, you’re like, the writer and stuff!” to say (hopefully). Mostly I’m just happy to have made the connection, however minor, to a writer I like.

I'm still sick and I worked an 11 hour day today, so my current state of my mind is best described as brain dead. I did want to share this with the world, however. I took the country road in to work this morning, which is what I do whenever I have to get in to work early, as I did today. The country road has many benefits, such as not having to sit in traffic and pretty scenery, as well as the occasional drawback, like getting stuck behind farm equipment. But this morning a new element was added in to the mix -- cows having sex. Yep, I'm pretty sure that's what I saw as I drove past one field this morning. I even got a pretty good look at the expression on the one cow's (bull? maybe they were gay cows? Who knows.) face, which I would say was one of extreme concentration. I had no idea cows could focus like that. Perhaps I am immature for noticing -- and giggling -- but it was just such an odd vision to behold as part of my morning commute.

Got any good weird morning drive stories of your own?

I'm still sick. I'm totally overloaded at work and my day completely wore me out. I finally got home at 9:00 tonight, feeling beat down and depressed about any number of topics. But then I was greeted by my loving husband and delighted dancing, wagging little beagle. And I came inside to find that my birthday present from my brother had arrived. See?

And on top of that, the cute little purse I ordered for myself arrived too! Is this not the most perfect spring/summer purse ever?

I know it is silly, but coming home to my guys and getting a couple of books from my brother and a purse turned my day right around. I'm still tired...I'm still sick...but I feel better.

After kind of a rocky start, my 36th birthday turned out to be a lovely day. It was ONE degree in Frederick at 7 am this morning. One. Degree. But by 8 am it was 25 degrees and by 9 am it was 35 degrees, so the day warmed up in my favor. Not that 35 degrees counts as warm. It is just way warmer than one degree. And then there was terrible, hideous traffic, but I eventually got to work. And when I did arrive at my office, there were birthday presents and cupcakes waiting for me at my desk. Then, my team took me out for a really tasty lunch sushi lunch. I had this amazing avocado cucumber roll with two different kinds of sesame seeds. It was very well done.

The calls and emails from friends and family rolled in all day long, which felt great. I had a busy work day so I missed a lot of the calls, which was a shame. But I do get to have fun calling everyone back over the next couple of days.

After work, I picked up dinner from our favorite Indian place (where the owner remarked upon how I've lost weight. Even more reasons to love the India Grill) came home, snuggled in front of the fire, made peanut butter brownie cups and opened presents. I also threw in a twist of making half the brownie cups Rolo cups. I think they'll be delish. I ate a peanut butter one, but that's it. I'm too full to try a Rolo one.

Right now, I feel so grateful for the friends and family that I have. I know I come on here and bitch and moan and whine about all sorts of things, and yes, I have some genuine problems, but underneath it all, I know how lucky I am to have the life I lead, to have the friends I've made, to have the family I've got, and of course, to have the wonderful husband that I have. Thank you, universe.

It's funny -- every time I feel grateful about my life and write a post like this, I always have this nagging feeling like I should spit over my left shoulder and hop three times or make the sign to ward off the evil eye (too bad I have no idea how to ward off the evil eye. I'm not even entirely sure what the evil eye is) or something. Just to clarify, I'm not bragging. I'm appreciating, trying to acknowledge the good in my life, and hoping to let the people who are important to me know how much I value them. Perhaps I'm a little corny, but if you can't be overly reflective and mushy on your birthday, when can you be?

As I have documented plenty here on this blog, I love to bake. Between the diabetes and my attempts to lose weight and trying to be supportive of John’s efforts to lose weight, I haven’t been baking nearly as much as usual. I miss it. And I miss the yummy treats I used to bake. So, in honor of my birthday on Thursday, I’m going to make cookies tomorrow night. Here’s where you come in. To make it a little more fun, I’d like you guys to vote on which cookie you think I should make. The options are:

Crunchy Jumbles: a childhood favorite of mine, these are essentially chocolate chip cookies with less brown sugar and raisins and rice krispies. They are crunchy and jumble-y just as their name implies, and delicious too.

A) Oatmeal Cranberry White Chocolate Chip: This one’s pretty self-explanatory.

B) Classic Chocolate Chip: Can’t go wrong with Nestle Toll House.

C) Peanut Butter Fudge Tarts: You take peanut butter cookie dough and put it into little mini-muffin tins. Then you fill the peanut butter with sweet melted chocolate. It’s pretty darn tasty.

D) Continuing on the peanut butter theme, Peanut Butter Brownie Cups: These are technically not a cookie, but they are pretty close, so I’m including them. You make brownie batter. You put it in full size muffin tins. You drop a Reese’s peanut butter cup in each muffin compartment, and then top with more batter. They kick ass.

E) Oatmeal Chocolate Toffee Squares. The name pretty much says it all. This is an easy to make bar cookie that requires almost no mixing or real effort on my part. Nice and simple.

F) Apple cupcakes. Again, not a cookie, but I felt I should have something fruity, and my only fruit cookie is a pumpkin spice cookie. They are really good, but I’m just not in the mood for them right now. The apple cupcakes, on the other hand, are amazing.

Which option sounds best to you? Vote early, vote often!

I tried my first spinning class tonight. Everyone kept telling me it would be the perfect exercise to help me break through a plateau and take my fitness to a higher level. Plus, Becky has been after me to try a class with her. I wasn't sure about it. Part of me was worried it would be too hard and I'd pass out and fall off the bike, or throw up or something equally humiliating. But it really wasn't that bad. Don't get me wrong - it was hard - good hard! My first clue about what I was really in for was when I got there and Becky said "You made it! I'm so glad. Hey, I brought you a towel and a water bottle because I forgot to tell you that you'd need them." Forgot, or conveniently neglected to mention it so I wouldn't freak out ahead of time? Probably a smart move on her part, since I was already anxious.

Anyway, I got one heck of a workout, and in only 45 minutes too. It was a little intimidating at first, particularly since it was all guys except for Becky, me, and one other woman, but I held my own, I think. And boy did I need that towel and bottle of water. But the class was great. The instructor was easy to follow and played good music. For some reason, the whole spinning room is lit with blacklights, which I don't get. Maybe that keeps it cooler somehow? It certainly made me look linty. So spinning, definitely makes it on to my exercise list.

Now, let's just hope I can walk tomorrow.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm not just one big collection of quirks. I got a bunch of work done on my car today. $500 later it is starting nicely, running smoothly and braking beautifully. I can't really complain, because I beat the hell out of that car on a regular basis, and it has held up extremely well.

Anyway, one of the new parts I got today was a battery. When they switched the old battery out, my preset radio stations all got erased. Now for some reason, I've always been finicky about having the stations on the radio set in order of their call numbers. That all got thrown off a couple of years ago when WHFS suddenly went from being a formerly great alternative station to a Spanish-language station. Seriously sudden - at 10 am they were playing whatever crappy corporate pseudo progressive rock they had been reduced to playing by that point, and by noon they had fired all the DJs and switched to Spanish programming. I was mighty confused when I got in the car after work that day. But it just so happened that around the same time the AM news station that I listen to from time to time got an FM frequency, so I just switched that one in on the HFS button, even though it meant the numbers didn't not ascend properly.

Still, it always kind of bugged me that the stations weren't programmed in to the radio in the proper order, and today I got my chance. Now my stations are all lined up as they should be. I kept hitting the former DC101 button and getting the FM news station instead, but I didn't even mind, because order has returned to the radio button universe once more.

And really, everyone has some little quirk like that, right?

It snowed here today for most of the day, so we went nowhere and did nothing. It was GREAT! I read the whole paper. I lounged around on the couch and just talked with John. I cleaned the kitchen so that it sparkles. John started teaching me how to play chess. I didn’t completely disgrace myself, but I didn’t win either. Let’s just say that my inability to completely grasp exactly how the knights can move around the board may have led to one or two of my pieces being captured when I thought they were safe.

Me: “Heh, heh. I’ll just slide this piece over here, and then I’ll be two moves away from taking his king.”

John: *slides his knight over and takes my piece*

Me: “Hey! Dammit. I forgot the knight could move that way.” Now repeat that scenario a couple of times, and maybe add in me not realizing I was lined up so that a bishop could take my piece too, and you’ll have an idea of how the game went.

But that’s ok. We’ll keep playing and I’ll get better. And then that husband of mine had better watch out.

P.S. The Oscars are making Pan’s Labyrinth look really good. Have you seen it? Did you like it?

Apparently I should make a public list of stuff I want more often. Look at what my sweet husband bought me:

And not only are they absolutely, perfectly, exactly what I would have chosen for myself - I have a couple of Calphalon pans already that I really like - he also got them on eBay at a discount. They're totally new, but I guess they are last year's model or something. If pans have models. Not that I care, since I love my pretty, pretty pans. And I love saving money. It's the perfect combination!

Thank you for my pans, John.

Last Friday my mom sent me a bunch of cookie and cake recipes from my childhood. Naturally, this meant that I had to bake some of the cookies over the weekend. I made Honey Cookies, which are kind of like a spicy sugar cookie with a more mellow undertone. You roll them out and shape them, and the frost them with a buttercream frosting that is thinned down to be more of a glaze. They are delicious. I also made Crunchy Jumbles, which are kind of like chocolate chip cookies, only they have chocolate chips and rice krispies and raisins. They are awesome.

I was delighted to have a cookie flashback, but in an effort to keep from eating all of the cookies, I brought most of them into work. As I made my way down the hall offering them to my colleagues, I noticed a couple of interesting cookie trends. First, almost everyone went for the Crunchy Jumbles over the Honey Cookies, which really surprised me. The Honey Cookies are so cute, and the Crunchy Jumbles are kind of jumbly. They are equally delicious though. Second, while women hem and haw and say "Oh, I really shouldn't" before taking a cookie, men get straight to the point. I could barely get the sentence "Would you like a cookie?" out before getting a resounding yes. They didn't care what kind of cookies I had in my Tupperware boxes, they just knew they wanted at least one. They were more than happy to listen to my little cookie description, but they were planning on accepting a cookie no matter what. Only one guy turned me down, and that was because he'd had devil dogs for breakfast. I think in the future, I will try to react to any cookies that are offered to me in a manly fashion. No guilt, no hesitation, just "yes, cookie please!"

Do you think I could get some sort of research grant to study the difference in gender reactions to freshly baked cookies? It could provide valuable insight into the way men and women make choices in life. Plus, it would be some of the most delicious and enjoyable research ever conducted.

The symphony was really nice. We got off to a bit of a rocky start because my dad showed up late for dinner, which a) pissed me off, as it always does b) meant I spent the whole time worrying about getting the performance on time and c) meant that we had about five minutes in which to scarf down our dinners. Not the most enjoyable meal I’ve had lately, which is a shame, because it was really good food.

But then, then we got to the Strathmore center. If you live in the DC area and have a chance to go to an event there, I highly recommend it. It’s this new performing arts center that they built in Rockville (they call it North Bethesda, but I’m a native. I know Rockville when I see it.) It’s specifically designed to provide excellent acoustics, and it does. It is this lovely blend of very modern lines, soaring ceilings, walls of windows and light wood with art deco touches mixed in at times. We had amazing seats. My dad was thrilled, although I can’t really take credit for it. I found their online seating diagram confusing because the colors in the key didn’t seem to match the colors of the seats. That all worked out for the best since we ended up at the front of a box that was right at stage level. I didn’t even realize I had bought box seats! And we were so close. If we’d had to storm the stage for some reason, we’d have had no problems at all.

The performance itself was very well done. It was the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra playing pieces that were written to go with Shakespeare plays, so they had actors from the Shakespeare Theater doing readings from the plays in between the music. My dad loved it, and I had a very nice time as well. I think it may be his favorite present that I’ve ever given him.

On Saturday I went to see Catch and Release with my friend Becky. Becky is the perfect movie date. She understands that I like to watch the previews, and doesn’t judge me for it. She doesn’t ask stupid questions or make clever comments during the movie, and if there’s crying to be done, she’s crying right along with me. There wasn’t really much crying in Catch and Release though. It was surprisingly funny for a movie that starts with a funeral. Of course, it had Kevin Smith, and I usually think he’s funny. Except for Dogma. Most of that movie was not funny to me, but maybe you have to be Catholic to get it. Anyway, if you like romantic comedies and movies where everyone ends up with the right person in the end, even if you can kind of guess at how it is all going to work out, than Catch and Release is a nice way to spend a couple of hours. Becky and I give it two thumbs up. Plus, it has the guy who plays Bullock on Deadwood. He does way less swearing, jaw clenching and steely-eyed glaring than usual, and looks surprisingly good with no mustache and modern hair.

What was entertaining about your weekend?

Being a grown-up has a multitude of drawbacks. There are bills to pay…mortgages to worry about…hassles with insurance companies…having to get up and go to work when you’d really rather stay in bed and sleep…coming up with a new and interesting idea for dinner for the three thousandth time you cook it…401k’s…and so on and so on.

Of course there are benefits too. We may have to pay a mortgage, but that also means we have our very own house. And while I worry about, well, all sorts of stuff, because that’s the kind of person I am, I also get to live the life I want. I’ll take the responsibilities that go with that. But absolute the best part of being an adult so far is finally getting to a point where I can say to my just-finished-college-and-started-his first-job little brother, “Why don't I pay for a ticket so you can fly home for Christmas?"

What could be better?

The last four days flew by, didn’t they? For me, they were filled with family, and friends and a whole of running around. It was tiring and sometimes trying, but I’ve been working very hard on focusing on being grateful that I have them all in my life. No matter how irritating they can be at times (and my dad alone can take that to a level you would not believe) I know how lucky I am, and I’ll take it.

Thursday was our usual tour de Thanksgiving, where we started the day at my mom’s house, helping her with the cooking, and dropping off Seamus. Then it was on to John’s mom’s house, where we ate the first meal of the day. After hanging out there for bit, we hit the road to John’s dad’s house, where we polished off meal number two. Finally, it was back to my mom’s house for feast number three. I liked that one the best because for dessert we had apple pie. Apple pie made by me, so I knew it would be good, and it was. And I’m very pleased to report that by sticking with very small portion sizes, I did not overeat and kept my blood sugar under control.

I wouldn’t want you to think we neglected my dad – he came out to our house for brunch on Friday. He always says he’s going to bring his girlfriend, but then he never does. I’m not sure what to make of that. And then I went to see Casino Royale with my brother and his girlfriend. I know a lot of people doubted that Daniel Craig was the right choice to be the new Bond, but I thought he did a fine job. My favorite part of Friday was that everyone came to us. I love living out here, but I do get tired of the fact that no one ever wants to come to our house. I think we covered a couple hundred miles on just on Thursday, and then we added a bunch more over the course of the weekend.

Saturday and Sunday brought more driving around and more time with friends and family. Oh, and I discovered that there is no one at the gym at 6 on a Saturday night. It was me, and two other people. I wasn’t completely sure if I liked it or found it creepy. But, my new running shoes continue to amaze and delight me, so that’s something. Somehow now the four days are over and it’s time to go back to work, which really isn’t fair. I think I’m more tired now than I was before I had four days “off”.

Fab Fact #1: My fancy new running shoes? Amazing. I was a little skeptical about whether or not new shoes would make that much of a difference, but wow, they really did. I like the inserts they sold me so much I’m thinking I might go back to get another set for my other shoes.

Fab Fact #2: My weekend starts tomorrow, hopefully somewhere near the time my offices closes at 1. Sure, I have to come home, make vegetarian stuffing, gravy and an apple pie. And then spend Thursday driving all over creation and eating three Thanksgiving meals. But it is still a long weekend, and I’ll take it. Plus I’ll get to see my brother and my friend Mary Pat, which is excellent, because I don’t get to see either one of them nearly often enough.

What’s fabulous in your world?

John’s Auntie Bee and Uncle Bill are having a party to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary in June. And we’re invited. Guess where they live! London! And I think we’re going to go! As you can tell, I’m just a little excited about the idea. But I’ve never been to England, and I’d love to see it. I’m not sure how much time I can take off of work, or how long we can get someone to watch Seamus, but our early plan is to go to the party, spend a couple of days in London, head over to Amsterdam (one of John’s favorite places, and I’ve never been) and then go to Paris for a couple of days (because what could be better than Paris with the love of your life?) And that’s probably enough, because I don’t want to rush through any place. I’ve already been to Paris a couple of times, but I’d love to visit the Sainte Chappelle and Notre Dame again. And Montmartre. I love just walking around Montmartre, breathing in the Paris-ness of it all. Or, we could probably spend a whole week just in England, but John has been to England a gazillion times, and I wouldn’t want him to get bored. Still, there are a ton of castles and cathedrals I’d like to see in England, plus the British Museum, and the Tower of London (which technically is a castle) and Stonehenge and Bath and Glastonbury and, well, lots of places.

Maybe this is why our October vacation went awry…because a fabulous trip to Europe was in our future and we just didn’t know it yet. London, London, London! London, London, London. (To get the full effect, you should know that I’m chanting that in my head, conga-style.)

Plus, a dream and a toaster, too.

When they say that exercise helps with stress, they aren’t kidding. I had a long, crappy day that had me wanting to dive face first into a vat of cookie dough. And then, right at the very end of my day, I got news that made me wish that I belonged to some sort of fancy gym that served cocktails.

Unfortunately, my gym is just the regular fitness oriented type, so instead I met up with Becky and we did 30 minutes on the elliptical and then 35 minutes on the treadmill. And miracle of miracles, I managed to run 2.5 miles in 28 minutes. I’m pretty sure I couldn’t have kept up that pace for an entire hour, but at least I’m getting better.

In slightly older news, I had the oddest dream last night. I was riding on a train to go see the pyramids at Giza with my mom and my brother – and if you know my mom, you know just how silly the notion of her traveling to Egypt is – when our train was attacked by bandits. For some reason, I had our new toaster oven with me, and I was very worried that the bandits were going to take it. Interpret that one, Freud! Exactly what does the toaster signify?

Speaking of our new toaster oven, when did toaster ovens all become super fancy convection ovens with 27 dials and 15 different accessories? I like our sleek new toaster, but even as a fairly basic model, it is more than we need. All I want a toaster oven to do is toast stuff, roast garlic, and heat up the occasional slice of pizza. It does not need to be capable of cooking a meal for 12, provisioning a space shuttle mission or baking a pie.

I don’t know how your Halloween went, but mine was spectacular. Spiderman himself dropped by for a little candy, and he and one of his superhero buddies told me how much they liked my pumpkin.

Admit it. You’re just a little jealous, aren’t you? Don't feel bad. Between my amazing pumking carving skills and my hobnobbing with Spiderman, it's only natural that you feel a little envy. :)

Here it is, Sunday night again. How did my week of vacation go by so quickly?

All in all, especially given that this vacation did not get off to the most auspicious of beginnings, I had a great week. When you have days that are as tightly packed as mine frequently are (between the commute, my job, having to work out, blogging, actually seeing the people who are important to me, and oh yes, sleeping) having a few days in a row with nothing on the schedule turns to be just the ticket.

I was thinking about what I liked best from my at-home vacation, and while I had plenty of fun, it was the time I got to spend with John and Seamus that I enjoyed the most. I think the best night was when I made a fancy all-appetizer dinner, and then we curled up in front of the fireplace downstairs and watched a movie. John built a lovely crackling fire, and then we all snuggled into blankets -- John in his recliner and Seamus and I on our ratty basement couch next to him.

While I suppose we could have had a more officially romantic fire at the beach somewhere, it was just about a perfect night, right here in our very on home. So who needs fancy vacations?

I’m not going to spend my whole vacation sitting around the house. That’s pretty much all I did today, and while sometimes that is nice, I don’t want to waste the whole week doing nothing. Here are a few of the ways I am going to have some fun:

1. carve a pumpkin for Halloween.
2. get a pedicure. And maybe some other spa treatment.
3. read the new books I bought to take on vacation.
4. work on any of the many knitting projects I have in progress.
5. try the cake batter ice cream with Twix bits and hot fudge sauce from Maggie Moos. I know I’m not normally an ice cream eater, but that just sounds good.
6. watch more Felicity.
7. work on some story ideas that John and I have been tossing around. Pick one. Start doing something with it.
8. try to get caught up on the episodes of Heroes, which I want to watch, but haven’t seen yet.
9. clean up my front garden. I like working in the garden, and it is past time for the fall cleanup.
10. actually get around to decoupaging this little wooden chest I’ve had sitting around for months now.
11. vacuum house. this one isn’t fun, but it needs to be done.
12. make a fancy dinner.
13. update my blogroll. This has been on my list for months, but I never seem to get to it.
14. buy a “souvenir” of some sort so we can remember our at-home vacation.
15. go hiking with John and Seamus, if it gets warmer at some point this week.

Got any ideas to add to the list?

We did it! My friend Becky and I ran the Baltimore Race for the Cure today with the local branch of my college alumnae club, which raised a total of $500 for breast cancer research. And it was fun! Who’d have thought I’d ever say that about running? But really the worst part was trying to find everyone at the beginning of the race. Well, that and getting up at 5:40 am. Except for Seamus, who was thrilled that I got up that early. “We’re going for our walk now? Awesome!” Of course, that’s pretty much always his reaction to going outside. John and I managed to get out of the house on time, which is quite a feat for two people who hate mornings as much as we do. We made great time getting to Baltimore, even with having to follow a state trooper for a large chunk of the trip, because who the hell is on the road at 6:30 on a Saturday morning? Everything was going great until we got to the Inner Harbor, where they had all these roads closed off – not the roads that the race ran on, no, no, these were the roads you take to get to the starting line. Because people wouldn’t be trying to get there or anything. But John valiantly fought his way through the traffic and dropped me off at the stadium, where I had instructions to meet the team captain and Becky at the Johnny Unitas statue. Unfortunately, everyone else had the idea to meet there too. All I knew about the team captain was that she had red hair and would be wearing a navy sweatshirt. I wandered around and around asking people if they were Meg. I was really starting to panic, thinking I wouldn’t find her, or Becky, in the crowd, and I wouldn’t have my registration packet, and they wouldn’t let me run and I would have done my training and gotten up early for nothing. So I resolved that one way or another, I was running the race. And then all of a sudden I found Meg (who was wearing a NAVY sweatshirt, not a navy blue sweatshirt) and Becky almost at the exact same time. Becky had been making the same resolution about running no matter what, which just goes to show you why we’re friends.

We didn’t realize how far the meeting point statue was from the starting line, so we actually got there a little bit late and were among the last runners to start. That had me worried, because I am not a fast runner. But we did really well! We passed all sorts of people, and I only had to walk twice. Once was on this really long hill. I tried to make it all the way to the top without slowing down, but I couldn’t quite pull it off. And then again at the very end there was a little rise, and we slowed down for about one minute so I could catch my breath. We don’t know for sure, but we think we were in the 36-40 minute range, which is just fine. And running outside is way more interesting than running on a treadmill. Becky was really the key though. Having her there to help me keep pace and have someone fun to talk to so I didn’t just obsess about running being hard, or getting tired made all the difference in the world. I couldn’t have done it without you, Becky! And everyone was so nice. Even the cops along the route were yelling stuff like “you’re doing great!” and “Looking good!”

And I was just thrilled to finish and do well. Yes, I know there are people out there who can run a 5 k in about a third of the time it took me. Becky said she did one where some guy finished in 16 minutes. Showoff. But a year ago it would have been unthinkable for me to run 3.1 miles. I spent some time thinking about that this morning, because I was almost pathetically proud of myself. Here’s the thing: Before the whole diabetes wakeup call happened, I knew I had let myself get out of shape. Even though I pretended not to care that I had gained weight and was not fit, it bothered me. Somewhere along the way I started listening to that little voice that said “you can’t do stuff like this. It’s too hard. It’s for fit people, not losers like you.” And today I claimed some of my self esteem back…and got to tell that voice to shut the hell up.

I don’t weigh myself on any set schedule. I hop on and off the scale as I feel like it, although I try not to get obsessive about weigh-ins. Well this morning was a hop on morning, and I’m pleased to say that I’ve now lost 30 pounds. I’m halfway to my goal, and it feels really, really good. Good enough to get me downstairs and working out tonight even though I didn’t get home until after 8 pm.

I sill wish the weight loss was happening faster. I certainly won’t break any land speed records for dropping pounds quickly, but I tell myself slow and steady wins the race. Fitness-wise, I’m light years beyond where I was when I started this project back in March. I’ve dropped 4 sizes. Ok, sometimes only three sizes – it depends on the item of clothing. Still, that is excellent progress. I'll just take a moment now to congratulate myself.

I do think I need something to motivate me to keep going strong as we close out the year. Not only do we have the holidays coming up, but I’m also starting a major new project at work, because it just wouldn’t be the fourth quarter if I didn’t have something big happening. This time, though, I will manage to keep exercise and healthy eating in the mix. I just don’t have a choice anymore, no matter what is going on at work. And I will do my usual holiday baking, but I’ll have to cut back on the “quality control” aka eating way too many of the cookies myself. I hereby declare that I want to lose 15 more pounds by the end of the year. That would put me at three-quarters of the way toward my goal, and mean that I had lost enough weight that I would feel ready to go back to the fertility doctor.

I have made my pronouncement. So let it be written. So let it be done!

Tomorrow is Chocolate Day at my office. Chocolate Day is an annual feast where everyone in my company bakes or buys something chocolate and brings it in to a gigantic chocolate buffet they set up in the kitchen. I have been looking forward to this day for months, promising myself that if I worked hard and didn’t eat lots of crap, I would reward myself by making a Decadent Fudge Cake. This cake is amazing, and absolutely perfect for Chocolate Day. It has melted chocolate and chocolate chips and chocolate syrup in it, and then you drizzle it with melted white chocolate and melted chocolate chips. I just finished making the cake and I can tell you this -- I am going to have cake and it is going to be gooood.

Hooray for chocolate day!

My friend Becky and I have signed up to run in the Baltimore Race for the Cure on October 21st. In addition to being my pal, Becky was also instrumental in helping me conquer my fear of the gym, and continues to make my trips to the gym easier and more interesting by joining me on Tuesdays and Thursdays. She also runs on a regular basis, and assures me that I can handle running a 5k. For those not metrically inclined, that works out to 3.1 miles. I regularly do more than that on the elliptical machine, but I think this weekend I’ll hop on the treadmill, just to be sure I really can run that far.

We don’t have to raise money to participate, but I thought I’d mention that we were doing it, and include a link where people can donate, just in case. It is an excellent cause after all, and who am I to stop you from supporting it?

I can see my new body starting to emerge from the fat. I still have a long way to go, but I’m starting to build real muscle tone and I’m slimming down nicely. I love feeling stronger and healthier. I’ve gone from a size 16 to a 10 and sometimes even an 8. That’s single digit sizing! It's very exciting.

I’m stuck wearing suits to work almost all of the time now, because almost none of my work appropriate pants fit anymore. I have to admit, it's a problem I love having. And even though I’ve still got jiggles in some places and bumps in other places that I’d like to be flat, I can see how my body is going to look. I’ve always been short, but now I think I’m going to be small and compact. I’m looking forward to it.

And now I have to get your opinion on something. Tonight while I was at the gym working on said small and compact body, a woman in my yoga class did something which I thought was very rude. I’m not sure that I care, but still, I’m curious to know if other people think she was rude too. After class, as we were all rolling up our mats and putting on our jackets and shoes, this little middle aged woman came over to the woman sitting next to me and said in a very squeaky voice “Hi, I’m Suzy. I see you here every week and I just wanted to introduce myself and say hi.” The other woman seemed a little surprised, but said “Hi, I’m Joyce. Nice to meet you.” And then Suzy turned, looked me dead in the eye, and walked right past me to put her block away. Now I go to that class every week too, and have been for months. Am I wrong, or did I get dissed by squeaky voiced grandma?

I just started watching Felicity. Yes, I know I’m several years late, but for some reason I didn’t watch it when it was on TV. Plenty of people have told me they thought I would like it, though, so when one of my friends at work offered to loan me her season one DVD, I said yes. So I finally got around to watching a few episodes this weekend, and I do like it! But I am confused. Obviously she’s going to hook up with Ben or Noel at one point, and I just can’t decide which one of them I like better. Sometimes I think I prefer Noel, because Ben seems a little full of himself. Plus Scott Speedman, who plays Ben, looks like Scott Stapp, and I hate Scott Stapp. Well, I hate his crappy music anyway. But sometimes, Ben does something sweet or says something that makes me think maybe there is hope for his character after all. Noel is probably more my type, although neither one of them is the bad boy type that I usually go for personally. Hopefully as I watch more episodes, it will get easier to pick a favorite.

Either way, I’m good and hooked on the show now! If you watched Felicity, who was your guy?

I had Friday off of work, so I’ve spent the last three days catching up on my sleep, tucked into a little cocoon of rest and relaxation. I stayed off the Internet, and I barely watched TV. I read a lot. I did stuff around the house. I ran errands. And it was exactly what I needed. I’m feeling much less overwhelmed and much more ready to take on the world again.

One of the places I visited on my rounds of errands was the local hippie food co-op, where I finally tracked down a furniture polish made of beeswax and oil instead of a mess of chemicals that aren’t good for older wood. One of the websites I visited for tips on furniture restoration said that sometimes all an older piece of furniture needs is a good polish with some beeswax, and wow, were they right. I wish I had taken before and after photos, because putting that beeswax on made an impressive difference. Another website has suggested using watercolors to touch up scratches, but that didn’t look at that great in my opinion. The polish, on the other hand, worked miracles.

Behold my beautiful cabinet:

And here’s a close-up so you can see the details on the drawer:

I spent a large chunk of my day today unpacking, washing and drying the china and glassware that is now stored in the cabinet. It all belonged to my great-grandmother, which may conjure up images of ancient family heirlooms, but it seems to be a fairly standard issue 20th century set of china and some depression glass. The china is incomplete – eight dinner plates, eight tiny dessert plates, but only three bowls and seven cups, and of course, a gravy boat, along with various other serving pieces – and not really my taste, as my great-grandmother was partial to flowers and gilt. She liked it a lot, in fact. There’s a second set of dishes, 12 in all, that appear to be part of an older set of china, also with flowers and gilt, but a much less sophisticated design. That’s not to say that there aren’t touches that I like, particularly on the main set of china. The dishes all have an interesting fluted edge to them instead of just being boring and round, and there is a little teal detail painted into the back of the floral design that flirts with your eye in a subtle and interesting way. But what I like best is feeling a connection back through the generations to a woman who died before I was even born.

Well the auction trip was a complete and total success. John’s record and book lots ended up having a number of cool finds, so I retract my previous statement where I referred to it as crap.

We wedged the china cabinet into the trunk and made our way home slowly on the country road, crossing our fingers and hoping we’d get back to the house before I succumbed to carbon monoxide poisoning from the fumes pouring into the back seat through the open trunk (we did have the windows open for fresh air). I had to be back there, see, holding on to our new purchase, watching closely for any signs of movement that might indicate it was coming loose. The emergency plan was that at the first sign of trouble, I would yell, grab on with both hands and fight against the forces of gravity with all my might, and John would immediately pull over and stop the car. It wasn’t a great plan, and I’m glad we didn’t have to put it into action. I may be stronger now after all my working out, but if that cabinet had decided to make a break for it, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have been able to stop it.

Luckily, we made it home without incident. I spend a chunk of the afternoon gently but thoroughly Murphy’s Oil Soaping the cabinet, because it was filthy. It didn’t look all that dirty, but when I went to wipe it down, it was disgusting, which leads me to wonder how much of my furniture is secretly coated in dirt. Given my indifferent housekeeping habits, I’d have to guess that a lot of it is. There was this episode of the British version of Coupling (I think it was Coupling) where the characters had a pact that if one of them died, the other would go to their house and clean up all of their porn before their mother could see it. I don’t need that service, but if I do kick the bucket, if one of my friends would just come clean my house before my mom sees it, that would be great. I wouldn’t want her to be shocked at the state of my bathrooms. Of course, if I’m dead, does it really matter? Does death free us from worrying about what our mom will think? Eh, probably not, at least in my case. My mom’s guilting abilities probably extend beyond the grave.

But I digress. For some reason cleaning that cabinet made me totally morbid, and I actually was thinking about how dirty my possessions might be after I die for part of the time. What the hell is wrong with me? Anyway, we got the cabinet, which is now clean, home, and it has already grown on both of us even more. All it needs is a little touching up, and then a nice polish, and by this time next week, it should be tucked into the corner of my dining room/office, chock full of my great-grandmother’s china. I’ll post a photo once it is ready so everyone can share in its glory.

Thursday night is yoga night. I love yoga as much as I ever have, if not more so. It’s energizing and de-stressing and provides a nice balance to the rest of the exercise that I do. As I get more fit in general, I’m definitely getting better at yoga too. Still, the class is an hour and a half long, and she frequently runs over, which means oftentimes I don’t even get in the car to head home until 8:40. So sometimes on Thursdays I find myself not exactly looking forward to going. I generally do go, because I know I’ll feel good once I get there. And because I’m meeting my friend Becky for class. That tip they always give you in magazine articles about having a workout buddy for extra motivation really is a good one.

Anyway, depending on the day, I either grudgingly or enthusiastically present myself for yoga class. I usually get there a little early because I want to stake out the spot that Becky and I like at the back of the room. Every week there are people who think that they can go in ahead of me, even though they arrived after I did. I know it is going to happen, because they do it every week, but it really bothers me. I find myself getting all competitive, eyeing my fellow yoga attendees warily and edging closer to the studio door as the hip hop aerobics class winds down. I’m practically ready to start throwing elbows. It’s not a very yoga-appropriate attitude, which I guess just proves how very much I need the class. By the end of the class I’m a completely different person – all groovy and relaxed and smiling at everyone – with nary a violent urge in sight. Behold the power of yoga.

Guess how I'm posting this? From my new Sidekick! Yep, I bought it. And I love it! And yes, I know being this excited about being able to post from my phone is silly. I don't care. :)

A large part of my week last week was spent in a series of meetings with people from outside my company. They were interesting meetings, for the most part. Still, I spent a good portion of the time sitting at the table, silently berating myself for letting my boss and her boss do most of the talking, while I sat there, lumplike, contributing nothing of value to the discussion.

In the end, instead of dazzling anyone with my brilliance, I made what I felt were a few common sense suggestions, threw out a couple of basic ideas, chatted a bit, laughed at their Matrix jokes, and had a brief bonding moment with one guy who liked my shoes (yes, those shoes.)

At the end of the day on Friday, my boss’s boss came by and asked me what I had talked to them about when he wasn’t around. “They loved you,” he said “they think you’re great.”

I guess maybe sometimes, being a common sense having, sci-fi/fantasy enjoying, shoe loving girl with a decent level of experience at her job is a good thing. I’ll have to remember that the next time I’m feeling down.

Good news abounds today! I started the morning off with a visit to the former Dr. Negativo, who was really nice and human to me this time. Maybe she just needs a little time to get to know the patient or something, but she was more positive than she has been and even told me a story about her daughter. Plus, my scale and her scale are now only one pound apart. I have decided my clothes probably weigh one pound, which would account for the difference. She congratulated me on my weight loss – now at 23.6 pounds – said my blood sugars have been looking great, and cleared me to get pregnant. I still think I’d like to lose a bit more weight, but it is nice to know it won’t be a health disaster if I (ha!) should happen to get pregnant (double ha!). And just knowing that we could start trying again if we wanted to makes me feel better. Now the timing of the trying is up to me, not someone else. I do want to make sure I can have as healthy a pregnancy as possible though, so I think even though it is tempting, oh so very tempting…not quite yet.

Then this afternoon I quite unexpectedly came into $1,000! Nothing perks up even a good day like finding out extra money is coming your way out of the blue. Of course, I immediately thought about the Sidekick I long for so very much. Nothing has changed since last week. I don’t need one, not even a little bit. I am at a loss to explain why I want one. I think it may have something to do with my sci-fi/fantasy geek side, which loves gadgets, particularly ones that look like they could be used for some sort of futuristic purpose. There is still a part of me that is the little girl who pretended that her parents’ enormous standalone stereo was a spaceship control panel. Of course, John pointed out that what we need way more than an expensive cell phone that we don’t actually need is a china cabinet, and he’s right. We’ve got three boxes of my great-grandmother’s china and Depression glass sitting in our dining room/office because we don’t have any free cabinet space.

But a china cabinet is so not-frivolous, and will cost more than the Sidekick. Also not-frivolous: putting the money in our savings, making an extra payment toward the principal on our mortgage, or putting it toward a Roth IRA. And then there’s the vacation we want to take in October, but I’ve already got money earmarked for that. I’m trying to shut the voice of temptation up and talk myself into the more sensible course of shelling out $50 for one of those Razr phones and then tucking the rest of the money away. Or sticking with my current functional if not fabulous phone a while longer to see if prices start coming down…

…but that devil on my shoulder keeps whispering in my ear…the doctor said you’re ok to try to conceive…you really want that Sidekick…sensible shmenshible…

We’ll see where I end up.

I think this may be the coolest and cleverest viral marketing campaign I have ever seen. I know I called myself an evil marketer last week and bragged a little bit about how I'm good at what I do, but I bow down to the geniuses who thought this up.

Be warned, though. You will have to physically restrain yourself from sending this to everyone you know who has ever mentioned Samuel L. Jackson or Snakes on a Plane.

Guess what? I have excellent news. I am very pleased to say that you are now reading the blog of the new Executive Director of E-Business Development.

My boss told me I was getting a promotion last week, but I’m fairly sure there are still some people from my job who read this site, so I couldn’t say anything until they announced it at work today. Anyway, I’m pretty excited about the promotion. It was a total surprise, but at the same time, I have worked awfully hard, so I’ll say I deserve it! My boss said all sorts of nice things about me, and her boss said nice things about me, and I got a raise. It means a lot to know that they think so highly of me and the work that I do. I’m looking forward to taking on whatever new challenges and responsibilities end up coming my way.

Then today, many of my co-workers offered their congratulations and said even more nice things about me. Plus there’s that whole raise thing I may have mentioned. So as you might imagine, I’m feeling pretty good.

Yippee!

Last night I went to the Legg Mason Tennis Classic (which I sometimes still think of as the Virginia Slims Tennis Classic, because I am old. Do they even still make Virginia Slims?) with my friend Amy and another person from work, who I didn’t know very well, but who turned out to be quite nice.

I had never been to a live tennis match before, and it was so much fun! I’ve always liked watching tennis on TV, and had crushes on such tennis players as Ivan Lendl and Andre Agassi when I was growing up. I was hoping we’d get to see Agassi, but he lost really early on in the tournament. The evening got off to a most excellent start when we hopped in a cab at the Metro rather than waiting in the really long line for the free shuttle bus. Our cab driver was a riot. He kept saying how smart we were to have gotten in his cab, made sure to point out all of the embassies we passed along the way, yelling “Indonesia! Poland!” as we went by, and pulling off a crazy left turn maneuver in front of a huge line of cars at one light. He was a hoot.

And then the tennis match was very cool. Really, I was sitting there watching the match from our excellent – and free, thanks Amy and Amy’s friend who gave her free tickets! – seats, loving every second of it and plotting how I could get up to New York for the US Open. We saw the Moodie-Safin match, which was very exciting, with both sets ending with tie-breakers and then some of the doubles match with the Bryan brothers, who are twins and apparently very good doubles players. I told Amy at the end of the night that between the tennis and her Superman/IMAX idea, she’d have made #1 on my speed dial, if I had speed dial numbers programmed.

In totally unrelated news, but linked in my mind because both of them live in New York and I was thinking about the US Open, I’m apparently kind of a jerk. Or at least not such a great friend, as I had to call TWO of my oldest and closest friends today to apologize for the fact that I completely missed their birthdays. I take birthdays pretty seriously, so I was mortified to have forgotten them. Even worse, it’s not the first time. Damn summer birthdays. I called Mary Pat, whose birthday I actually did remember on her birthday, but I got distracted and forgot to call her, and then I forgot for a week. A week! Not very good best friend from middle school behavior. Anyway, I called her on the way to the Hagerstown Outlets to look for new sneakers. Yes, that’s right, I’ve actually exercised enough to need new sneakers! I hit the sneaker outlets and eventually ended up with two pairs at Reebok. Nike had nothing in a size 6.5, and prices that I can only describe as not very outlet-y. Same for Addidas. Reebok had better prices and a buy one pair get one pair for half price deal, so even though they didn’t have any 6.5’s either, I decided to go for two pairs of size 7’s. I very virtuously did not even look at any non-exercise clothes because I am not buying any clothes until I reach my goal weight, but I do need a few new smaller exercise shirts so I can stop flashing the world when I lean over in yoga class. Once again, I discovered that there weren’t really any bargains to be had, so I hit the road and went to Target, where I got two tank tops with sports bras built in and a t-shirt for what one shirt at the outlet mall would have cost me. Good old Target. But while in Target, I got to thinking about my friend Julie and how I should call her. And then I realized that I should really call her what with her birthday having just happened. I actually briefly hoped that today might be August 3rd, but when I thought I about it, I knew that couldn’t be right. So then I had to come home and call her to apologize for missing her birthday. Sometimes, I just suck.

And finally, on yet another unrelated note, has anyone ever, in the history of making cookies, made Nestle Toll House cookies and gotten 5 dozen cookies in one batch? I made cookies to take to John’s dad tomorrow and I got 4 dozen. I have made chocolate chip cookies a bazillion times, and I always get 4 dozen, and the recipe always claims you’ll get 5. Just wondering if I’m the only one.

▪ Losing weight. When I learned ten minutes before I was supposed to leave for a
party on Saturday that I was supposed to wear more of a cocktail dress than the jeans and tank top I had on, I had options! I was able to go into my closet and pull out a little red number and a pair of slightly trampy black strappy sandals. That would not have been the case a couple of months ago. And while I didn’t look perfect, I didn’t look half bad either.

▪ Aveeno daily radiance lotion with a little bit of self tanner in it. While I don’t have a deep dark tan (or really a tan at all), at least my legs no longer glow brilliantly white like the moon and I was able to go without stockings. And, even better, I had just shaved my legs.

▪ Losing weight part b: John’s enjoyment of the little red dress and slightly trampy black strappy sandals. It is nice to feel sexy again. Not that John has EVER done or said anything to make me feel unattractive. I managed to make myself feel unsexy all on my own.

▪ Caffeine, sweet caffeine. When you don’t have it very often, caffeine can be a huge help the day after you are up WAY past your bedtime [see item # 1, cocktail party and item #3, appreciative husband :)] and need some help to wake the fuck up. (Sorry for the swearing. Bad Santa was on a little while ago, and even though they bleep most of the swearing out, I still know they are saying a swear word every 3.7 seconds, and it is contagious. Kind of like Deadwood.)

▪ Reconnecting with an old friend and discovering you like them as much as you did the last time you saw them, approximately 15 or 16 years ago. Even better, this person is making one of your best friends very happy.

▪ An evening with friends, laughing, talking, retelling old stories and having fun. Explaining to new people all of the connections that tie you together, and realizing just how much you’ve been through with these people and how much they mean to you.

▪ A long, leisurely Sunday with my two favorite people, John and Seamus. What could be better? Even if my little furry con man of a dog tricked me into taking him out tonight when all he wanted to do was smell stuff, not take care of business.

And how was your weekend?

I had a very long, hot, sticky, tiring day today. It started with an hour and a half traffic jam on 270, followed by time spent fighting with the SmartCard machine at the Metro station, trying to convince it to let me add money to it using cash instead of my credit card. Nothing makes you feel more like a rube than not being able to get simple technology to work properly. I stood there all dressed up for the trade show in my little suit, sweating and scanning my card and pushing buttons fruitlessly. Eventually the machine won…or at least, I gave up and used my credit card.

I like going to the trade shows my company participates in. It is fun to talk to our customers, and to interact with co-workers I don’t usually see or talk to on a regular basis. But, oh, is it tiring. You stand, and stand, and stand some more. And this booth has the bonus of being set up in an area with a glass roof, so it was like working in a greenhouse. By four pm, I was worn out, overheated, and my feet really hurt, so I climbed back on the Metro and went back to work. Sitting down, taking my shoes off and cranking the little AC unit in my office has never felt better.

So, I was tired, cranky, and sore footed. But then I went to yoga. I considered skipping it because I was just beat, I think from the heat more than anything, but I didn’t. And I had a great class! I’m still tired, and my feet are still a little on the sore side, but I had forgotten just how energizing and renewing yoga can be. Tonight’s class was hard, but in a good, pushing myself kind of way. It completely defeated the cranky too. Thank goodness for yoga!

P.S. SmarTrip! SmarTrip! Why the hell did I call it a SmartCard? Told you I was tired.

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of someone gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
" 'Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my chamber door;
Only this, and nothing more."

The other day, John was sitting at the computer in the living room when he heard a strange tap, tap tapping. He couldn’t figure out where it was coming from at first, but the noise persisted, and he tracked it down to this little guy:

He’s decided to sit on the transom window over our front door. Sometimes he taps, sometimes he just sits there, looking like he’s watching us, and every once in a while he flies to perch in the tree in our front yard. We haven’t figured out what he wants, but he’s been back every afternoon since. He’s our new little birdy friend.

Those are the two movies I’ve seen this weekend. The Devil wears Prada and a Strawberry Shortcake movie. Two very different end of the spectrum!

On Saturday I ended up babysitting my friend Jules’s little boy Malcolm and my friends Dave and Valerie’s little girl Katya. I was a little intimidated about going from being in charge of zero children to caring for two of them, but I think it went pretty well. Well, except perhaps for John, who is not used to children at all and ended up spending most of the afternoon and evening hiding out in the basement. But they are both sweet, smart and fun kids and for the most part we had a good time.

I had to laugh at myself while we watched the Strawberry Shortcake movie. I’ve obviously have spent too much time watching gangster movies and cynical shows like Deadwood and Rescue Me. At one point in the story Strawberry Shortcake story they go visit a girl who has a cookie machine. Her machine goes all crazy, but they eventually get it sorted out and she sends the shortcake crew on their way with a cookie jar full of cookies. When Strawberry Shortcake goes to eat one, the baker says “Not before lunch” which is no doubt meant to help parents reinforce the no sweets before meals rule. But what did I think? “She knows her cookies are crap and she wants to make sure they are long gone before they eat any of those cookies!” And then later, when they ran into a boy who made them party hats out of foliage, and my first thought was “I bet he’s making those out of poison ivy or something.” There was nothing wrong with the hats though. Their cart rolled in to a river of fudge after that for some reason, but the party hats were incidental to the story.

Then today I went to see The Devil Wears Prada with my friend Becky. It was a cute movie, and we both thought Meryl Sreep did a great job. They did change the story from the book a bit, but it still worked. And for me, it had the bonus of conforming to my expectations. When I thought someone was going to be bitchy, they generally were, unlike that sneaky Strawberry Shortcake.

This morning, for the first time since I got a glucose meter, I completely forgot to check my fasting blood sugar. I got up and walked Seamus, gave him his medicine and his breakfast, and then instead of testing my blood sugar levels, I ate a little breakfast and went back to bed. I didn’t even realize I had forgotten until I work up again. I suppose that shows that I really needed some extra sleep, but I find it particularly amusing that it happened after I spent most of yesterday learning about my diabetes.

In other news, if you were planning to shop at the Frederick Target anytime soon, I’m sorry. I already bought everything in the store, so you’re just going to have to wait until they get to restock. After my sleep-in, I got up and went on a little spree. Among other things, I got a new fan, a new surge protector, new workout videos, hair stuff and a pair of exercise pants. They had so much on sale this week! Much to my delight, the sale items included this cute striped canvas tote bag I’ve been eyeing for months. So I bought that too.

Now I’m doing laundry and trying to get back into work mode so I can take on what is sure to be another long and busy week. I sure hope it is a good one, for me and for you!

I’ve never used the phrase “by Jove” before. Like how I threw it in there all casual? Next up, I’ll be working on referring to someone as “hoss.”

Anyway, the miracle is that I went to the dentist this morning and I do not have any new cavities. I’m not positive, but this may be the first time that has ever happened in my entire life. It is certainly the first time it has happened in my adult life. I guess giving up soda and cutting way back on my sugar consumption has had more than one positive effect on my life.

And then I went to work, where I got to spend about a total of 25 minutes by myself at my desk today. No exaggeration. The rest of the time I was either meeting with someone in my office, answering questions, or meeting with people outside of my office. I even had one meeting that took place in the hallway. I had promised to have some copy ready for someone today, and I had to go back at the end of the day and explain how I hadn’t been in my office for the last six hours, so it wasn’t finished. Which was true, but also just not cool. I hate making excuses. I was proud of myself though, for sticking to my “my health comes first” guns and leaving at 6:45 to go the gym. That’s the way it has to be now. The old Hillary would have stayed at work until 8 or 9 and picked up a pizza and fries on the way home. The new Hillary will get up and go into work early tomorrow instead. I’m building new habits. Healthy ones. And I’m determined to see this through.

So really, a day of firsts all around. (By Jove!)

My new diet and exercise plan seems to be having an effect. Every day for the last few days at work, someone has mentioned my weight loss. I guess people can tell! Some people say my face is getting thinner. Other people notice that my clothes are getting too big. I actually had to buy a belt at Target this weekend, and I may even have to retire a couple of my pairs of pants. I won’t be sorry to say goodbye to my hated fat girl pants. It does put me in sort of an odd position clotheswise, as I skipped a size on the way up. I was in denial, I think, wearing old stretched-out bag lady pants until I could wear them no more, and was forced to jump up two sizes (or go up one size but buy material labeled “stretch.”) Oh, stretch, how you fed my delusions of not having put on that much weight. Much to my joy, those pants are all getting to the point where they are too big to look professional. Woo – and may I add – hoo! However, I’m not all the way back to the next level down in my wardrobe yet, and I’m not going to buy any new clothes until I reach my final weight destination.

I’ll take that problem though, with glee. Just as I’ll happily take all of the comments at work. I think some people are a little worried they are going to offend me, but every single time someone notices, it makes it that much easier to go back to my office and eat baby carrots and sugar snap peas instead of the cake they’re serving at the wedding shower…to drag myself downstairs at night to do an exercise video…or to the gym for a class or a spin on the elliptical machine or the treadmill.

And yes, of course I have all sorts of health reasons to stick with this. It is very important for me to get my blood sugar under control and keep it under control, not just for fertility reasons (although, please, let this be the solution to my fertility problems. Pretty please.) but for my long term health as well. I don’t want to have diabetes, but the fact is, I do. Even if I get down to my absolute perfect weight, I’m still going to have to be careful about portion size, and carbs, and sugar and regular exercise for the rest of my life. Way more careful than the average bear. So as I navigate the tricky waters of coming to terms with what exactly having diabetes means, I’ll take all of the positive reinforcement I can get. And then maybe do a happy little dance in my office.

I’ve been extra busy lately, and also feeling kind of quiet. Seriously, you pack a trip to North Carolina, commuting, working, errand running, exercise, a multitude of TV sweeps episodes and series and season finales and grappling with a life altering medical diagnosis in to one week and let me know how creative and energetic you feel. Plus, my laptop (oh, how I miss you, beloved laptop) is still off at Toshiba getting fixed, so I have to thumb-wrestle John for the control of our remaining computer. And this is kind of embarrassing to admit, but sometimes, I lose at thumb wrestling.

But mostly I’ve just been feeling quiet, which means you’ve been spared a lot of self indulgent whining about how I don’t want to have diabetes, and I don’t like this and I hate pricking my finger to check my blood sugar, and I don’t have good control over my blood sugar and blah, blah, blah, oh-poor-me fucking blah. I’m working on accepting what is and moving on, really I am. I’m just not quite there yet. I am making progress on the acceptance and the control fronts though. I started on Metformin on Friday, and that, plus exercise plus restricting carbs (beans are fine, sandwich rolls not so much, and pasta is somewhere in the middle) seems to be having a positive effect. Of course a) I’m already a vegetarian, and if I keep having to give up foods, I’m going to be left eating nothing but almonds, zucchini and chick peas for the rest of my life and b) I love carbs. After cheese, I think bread, potatoes and pasta are my favorite things. So, wah.

You kind of wish I had just stayed quiet, don’t you?

Anyway, I realized this weekend marks the two year anniversary of when I started my first blog, and I couldn’t let that pass without comment. I can’t believe it has been two years already. And yet I also can’t imagine starting my day without checking in on my friends on my blogroll, exchanging comments, poking around and discovering new and interesting people, and participating in this whole new world I didn’t even know existed three years ago. It’s been a great experience so far, and for so many more reasons than I thought it would. The best part, of course, has been all of the people I’ve met. People of the Internet – you are very cool. Thank you for being a part of my life.

I just got the mail, and in it, finally, is a letter from the oral surgeon explaining why he recommended that I have my tooth pulled with anesthesia. It only took me nine months of phone calls and letters to get them to write this letter. I'm fully aware that my insurance company could still reject the claim, and I'll get stuck with the $200 bill. But the doctor's office dragged their feet over this letter for so long that it became a point of pride that I get it from them. At least now I've got written proof that the anesthesia was necessary. I'll try and savor that for a little while.

I have gardened! And it was good. I spent a ridiculous amount of time wandering around Lowe’s and Home Depot, filled with indecision, trying to pick out the right kind of flowers, because I had no idea what I was doing. And everyone else there seemed to be confidently loading massive amounts of dirt, shrubs, plants, flowers, tools, pavers and mulch into their carts or pickup trucks. There may have been a humiliating incident in Lowe’s where I was tried and failed to load a couple of very heavy bags of dirt into my cart. I could barely lift the bags (3 cubic feet of dirt in each) and every time I got them near the edge of the cart, it would start to roll away. After much effort and a little public swearing, I gave up. I got my dirt though – I made John go back with me and he took care of it. He’s very handy to have around, my husband is. I also did a little research and found out there is a nursery just down the road from my house, in the direction that I never go. The people at the nursery hit the perfect balance between friendly and helpful and letting me poke around on my own to figure out what I wanted. I’ll definitely go back there.

And now the ugly patch near my air conditioner is a lovely spot with two different kinds of dianthus, dwarf coreopsis, some blue flower and salvia. It looks sort of wildflower-y. The yucky sandbox has been transformed into a flower bed with snapdragons in the middle and purple, blue and white flowers and greenery around the edges. Sand weighs at least as much as dirt does, and we had to clear a lot of sand out of there. Now we have to figure out what to do with the sand. John and I tried to take the sand to the dump in Montgomery County twice today, and both times there were cars lined up down the drive and out into the street. I’m not sure what that’s about. And the Frederick County dump is closed on Sundays, so we couldn’t go there. Yes, I know we shouldn’t use the dump for a county we don’t live in. But we were down there helping Jules move into her house (yay, Jules is here ! Sadly, about 40 miles from my house, but I’ll take that over 400 miles) and we thought we’d just drop off the sand along the way. Plus, my family has lived in Montgomery County since 1976, and I don’t think we ever took anything to the dump, not even once. Actually, I believe my mom and my brother once took a tour of the recycling facility at the dump, but that’s not the same as using it for trash. So now I have a car full of trash bags filled with sand and stuffed into boxes to make them easier to carry.

I still have some work to do in the garden, but look at what I've accomplished so far:

Before:

After:

Today I found out that a guy I knew in high school has directed a movie about the Coachella music festival. Which is pretty damn cool when you think about it. He got to make a movie and interview a bunch of interesting bands. It’s the perfect thing for him, as I pretty much remember his only interests being music and filmmaking. Well, that and dating my friend Laila, who is pretty awesome, so that makes sense.

The Zen part is that it didn’t send me into a negative tailspin of “what the hell have I contributed to the world lately?” I’m happy for him. He wasn’t a particularly close friend, but I always liked him and I’m glad he’s been successful. And what’s more, I feel like my time will come. I’m never going to make a movie about the Coachella festival, or any movie about anything for that matter, but I have my own ideas and they’ll come together in their own way and in their own time. That’s not to say that I don’t have to do any work to accomplish some of my more creative goals, but there’s nothing wrong with the fact that I haven’t accomplished them yet.

Zen. Balance. Yep, I like it here.

I’ve just returned from a wonderful, relaxing, restoring long weekend with my bestest buds from college, Jules, Julie and Ariane. We all converged on Julie’s parents’ vacation house in the Poconos (which was free for us, yay! And thanks Julie and Julie’s parents) because it had been far too long since we all got together. Jules brought her son Malcolm and Julie brought her little boy Ben.

We didn’t do all that much, just played with the kids, who provided hours and hours of entertainment. Malcolm and Ben are so gorgeous, and smart and sweet and such a blast to be around. Malcolm is a little firecracker, two and a half years old and talking up a storm, just like his mama. Ben is 18 months old and has a smile that will melt your heart. One of the cutest things I think I’ve ever seen was the sight of little, blonde, curly-haired Ben meandering through the living room, clutching a tiny Nerf football and singing the Oompa Loompa song. And Malcolm had us all laughing so hard we were crying when he invented this bizarre Bubba Freebie game at dinner.

After the kids went to bed, the four of us just sat around and talked, which was way better than it sounds. There are very few people in the world with whom I can be 100% myself without any reservations, but we speak the same language, the four of us. There’s no pretending or nonsense. We all have the same sense of humor. They get me, and I get them. We talked through each other’s problems, seriously and humorously. Julie, when I was telling her how I couldn’t get an appointment with the diabetes specialist for months “See you in June. And hope you still have your feet!” The answer to my infertility? Crack. I can’t believe I never thought of trying that one. When we weren’t gabbing about current events, we reminisced about our favorite college memories. It was supposed to be a top ten list, but we had so many good times we gave up on trying to number them. I’m pleased to say the great Cow Caper made it pretty high on the list too.

And then today we packed all our stuff up, cleaned the house and headed for our various homes under the chilly grey Van Gogh sky. No offense central and eastern Pennsylvania, but you are kind of boring. Every once in a while I’d come around a curve on 81 and a pretty valley would be spread out in front of me, but for the most part, it was dullsville. The most exciting thing that happened was that I drove through a town called Frackville, which was hysterically funny after a couple of hours of watching bare trees and rocks go by (it’s still winter in most of PA – I didn’t see any green until I hit Harrisburg). Somehow I missed Frackville on the drive up, but today I pictured it as a town composed of Battlestar Galactica fanatics. They all just moved their clocks forward by 60 centars (I think a centar is a minute, right? Or is it a second? Or wait, is it centon? Whatever, you get the idea.) and the SciFi channel is like a local network.

Now I am home, where spring is firmly entrenched. The tree in my front yard has started flowering, and all sorts of blooms are popping up in the front and back gardens. John is playing a computer game and Seamus is snoozing by my side. All is right with my world. So how was your weekend?

23 years ago yesterday, my mom went into labor during dinner. My parents packed me off to the neighbor’s house and promised to call me when my brother was born, even if it was at 3 in the morning. I can very clearly remember sitting in their too-quiet kitchen, trying to focus on doing my homework. Well, he was born at 3, but they held off on calling me for a few hours. And then after school I got to go down to Georgetown University Hospital to meet the small elfin creature who was my longed-for baby brother. He had a smattering of reddish hair, pointy ears, and eyebrows so faint you could hardly see them. We’ve come a long way since then, Tim and I, although it still surprises me sometimes to see him all grown up. He’s got a lot more hair, for one thing, and he’s at least nine inches taller than I am. We’ve always had a good relationship – the 12 year age difference meant that there was no real sibling rivalry between us. And we definitely share the bond of knowing what it was like to grow up in our family. We have the same sense of humor, for the most part, although I’m sad to say he does not share my love of Monty Python. But all in all, he’s turned out to be a great brother and pretty cool person.

I did not manage to catch him in person today to wish him a Happy Birthday. I left him a message, but I also decided to harness the power of the Internet and say: Happy Birthday Tim! I hope 23 is a great year for you.

Love,
Hil

Let the rejoicing begin!

I had a delicious dinner with Jules and Malcolm and Jules’ mom, Jane, and Jules’ stepmom, Pat, and John of course. We went to a pan-Asian place and had many tasty dishes. It was fun to see Malcolm and how much he has grown and changed. He’s still a gorgeous little kid, smart and funny and sweet, (Aunty Hillary got lots of happy birthday hugs, which she loved) but he’s a two year old. He has most definitely learned the word no! The absolute highlight of the meal came when Jules said, “Guess what my big news is” – which threw me a little, because I didn’t know she even had any big news – and told me that come May or June, she’ll be leaving the frozen tundra of New Hampshire behind, and returning to DC. I’m sure we made quite the picture, hugging and crying in the middle of the restaurant. But I miss her, and she misses me, and not just me, she’s got a million other friends here (I don’t want to sound conceited.) It just a lovely cap on a wonderful day. Well, the absolute cap was coming home and opening my presents from John by the fire. I do love him. But it was all tinged by the knowledge that Jules and Malcolm will be here for good soon.

A year ago today I was desperately stressed out and unhappy. It was 20 degrees out and snowing. John’s mother was very ill and in the hospital on a respirator. I had just started seeing an RE, finally admitting that I have a fertility problem. My boss had just announced she was leaving the company and that someone who I thought hated me was going to be my new boss. And the majority of my friends and co-workers completely forgot my birthday.

Now, a year later, I am happy. I love my husband, my Seamus and the life we have together. I have the home I’ve longed for. I have wonderful friends. My job is great. Right now, it is in the 50’s and sunny outside. John’s mom is doing well. My new boss not only doesn’t hate me, but has become my friend. And just gave me the most gorgeous flowers for my birthday! As well as some nice presents. I also got some excellent soup bowls and a soup cookbook by my favorite vegetarian cookbook lady (seriously, I call her my cookbook soul mate) from the fabulous Mackenzie, and a lovely flowering plant in a pretty ceramic pot from the wonderful Sara. I’m going out to lunch with my team, and I’ve heard rumors of cake! Tonight, I’m going out to dinner with John and my pal Jules and her son Malcolm, who arrive in town today. I can’t wait to see them.

Life is good. I feel lucky. And loved. And lucky again. Happy Birthday to me.

I have to give a presentation tomorrow morning at work. It’s mostly an update on what my team has been doing recently and some of the big projects we have on the horizon, but still, I’m just a little bit nervous about it. Public speaking isn’t really my bag, baby. Anyway, not only is John going to get up early to walk Seamus so I don’t have to rush or worry about getting to work on time, but the two of them just sat through my whole talk.

John offered a couple of very useful pointers, and Seamus rolled on to his back and requested a belly rub. Now I feel prepared for just about anything, from questions from the audience (ably portrayed by my talented husband) to loud noises (the fire kept popping as I was talking) to distractions (although the chances of someone requesting a belly rub in the meeting tomorrow seem slim).

Thanks to my two best guys.

Last night the video card connector on my less than three month old computer died. Not the video card itself, at least I think not, but the stupid little plug. I partially blame myself for this one because until two weeks ago I had a nine year old monitor that worked if you plugged it in and braced it against the wall. Or jiggled the cord just right. And then it died, and no amount of pushing or jiggling would get it to work again, so we bought a new monitor. Unfortunately, I think all that jiggling and bracing damaged the pinholes that you plug the video cable in with, and last night, it just up and died too.

So I took the computer in to Best Buy this morning to see if they could replace the connector. They run ads about their stupid Geek Squad all the time, and this seemed like the perfect instance in which to use them. First I had to waste a bunch of time standing around while about five of the Geek Squad guys ignored me completely, pulling out their Treos and making notes or getting involved in intense conversations with each other. Then I got one guy’s attention, only to have him explain that they would only work on my computer if I had a service contract. I say Best Buy is missing a HUGE opportunity here. I would have paid for them to fix the damn thing because it was convenient, but apparently they are too good for my money. At least he was nice enough to confirm my theory that I could just buy a new video card (the old one was kind of crappy anyway) and install it in one of the open slots and that would take care of the problem. I wasn’t sure if that would work because I couldn’t pull out the old video card – it is an integrated chip and it is connected to a bunch of other stuff I didn’t want to mess with.

Anyway, I managed to pick out the right video card and get home and successfully install it, earning myself super genius status for just a little while.

And then the weirdest coincidence happened. I was looking out my front window, and who should I see leaving my next door neighbor’s house but two of the Geek Squad losers who so studiously pretended they couldn’t see me earlier in the day. I was tempted to run out and do some bizarre victory dance as they got in their Geekmobile,but I restrained myself. We super geniuses have to behave with some decorum after all.

I got two important projects that have been on my team’s list for months started. I also wrote two pieces of copy that turned out really well. I don’t get to write as much copy as I used to so it was nice to have the time to sit down and come up with copy that was nice and tight and did exactly what I wanted it to do. Which has not been happening around these parts lately. I actually wrote two separate posts last night and ended up not liking either one, which meant you guys got nothing. But hey, now I’m on a roll! Well, maybe not. This is not the most exciting or interesting thing I’ve ever written. However if you want to know anything about Google, I’m your girl. Plus, there was a new episode of Veronica Mars on tonight. Yes, that’s right – TV makes me happy. Don’t judge me.

Anyway, given the amount of whining I do here on a regular basis, I thought I should take a moment to acknowledge a good day.

John and I got up early this morning and went to an auction. I was a little nervous about going, but it was actually a lot of fun. It’s run by this good ol’ boy who goes around to estate sales and then holds auctions a couple of times a month in the barn on his property. He’s a real auctioneer who gets up and does the sing-song auction talk to get bids, tells jokes, and has a good time. His whole family helps out and they sell homemade soups and snacks, too. John picked up a couple of items he’s going to sell on eBay, but we’re definitely going back when we have more money to spend. They had furniture and a couple of handmade quilts that were quite nice, and they sold for hardly anything at all. This is the way I’m hoping to get my hands on a china cabinet without spending a thousand dollars. John’s mom has one that I like which she’s offered to us, but she’s still using it, and I have a feeling that John’s sister might raise a fuss if we take it. And I saw a bunch of really lovely quilts when I was in Asheville last year, but they all cost hundreds of dollars, which I can’t afford. I do have a quilt that my great-grandmother made, but I’d like to have one or two more.

Then I went down to meet my friend Becky for a movie and dinner to celebrate her birthday. Happy Birthday Becky! We saw Brokeback Mountain, which I really liked. It was depressing, but good. And beautifully shot. I don’t know if they actually filmed the movie in Wyoming, but the mountains are gorgeous. It could have been Wyoming, I suppose. I thought the Grand Tetons were spectacular when John and I drove through Wyoming. Anyway, the acting was excellent. The movie tells the story of a complex, long-term relationship in a simple, spare way. And Jake Gyllenhal and Heath Ledger are hot, separately and together.

I also ran into this girl Eden who I was pretty good friends with in high school, but who I had completely lost touch with. Sadly, she couldn’t have been less interested in talking to me. Well, I suppose she could have outright snubbed me, but instead all she asked was what movie I was going to see, said she was going to see Brokeback Mountain too and then she took off with her mom into the theater. I guess that’s better than getting into an awkward long discussion where I discover that we have absolutely nothing in common anymore, but it felt weird. Oh well. All in all, it was a very fun Sunday.

Where was I when last we spoke? Oh yes, getting ready for that last day of work before my vacation. My office closed at 1, but I was there until 8. And then I went Christmas shopping. Saturday was chock-full of baking (three kinds of cookies, one very fancy cake and a lasagna) present wrapping, and dinner with my dad. The dinner actually went spectacularly well by Christmas with my dad standards. Sunday was a blur of family, presents and driving from house to house to house – exhausting, but not bad. Plus, I got all sorts of great presents and then some. Top prize goes to my brother, who totally surprised us with a DVD player. It is sleek and silver and matches our fancy TV in the living room, and I’m sure we will enjoy it very much, just as soon as we figure out how to hook it up properly.

The last two days have been all about relaxing. I’m really enjoying not having to go to work right now. I think I’ll eventually get bored, but I could definitely use a couple of weeks of this. Yesterday I spent most of my day lazing about on the couch, reading one of my Christmas books. I took an extra luxurious shower, exfoliated, moisturized and deep conditioned my hair. And then I watched a little TV, read some more, and went to bed. It was a lovely day, aside from the fact that John wasn’t feeling very well.

Today I got up, walked Seamus, went back to bed for a couple of hours, and then eventually headed out to go see The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe with my brother. I quite enjoyed it. Tilda Swinton was very impressive as the White Witch – cold, imperious and terrifying. The story wasn’t quite as exciting as I remember it being, but it has been about 25 years since I read the books, so I’m probably judging by slightly different criteria. Let’s just pause for a moment while I wait for the shock of being old enough to have been able to read anything 25 years ago to pass. How the hell did that happen? Wow.

Up next, having John’s mom, sister, her husband, and their kids over for dinner tomorrow. And more relaxing, hopefully including a massage and a pedicure.

I hope you are all having a nice week too.

…one day left until my vacation starts! Video shoot number two went off today without a hitch, which was nice. Work presents were distributed and received and no less than three people suggested that I ditch this whole marketing director gig and take up baking cookies for a living. The big crowd pleaser wasn’t even my special chocolate chip cookies, but my oatmeal cranberry white chocolate chip ones. This is most likely because there were fewer of the fancy chocolate chip cookies due to an unfortunate burning incident. I was so excited thinking that Cookie Madness 2005, part one would go more quickly that previous baking marathons due to the fact that I have two ovens. But it turns out that the top oven heats unevenly and unreliably and burns the precious, precious cookies. Oh well.

And tomorrow is supposed to be a half day at work, although I would rate my chances of getting out of the office 1 p.m. as slim to none. That’s ok though. I’ll line up all of the ducks so that my work is covered while I am out, no one gets unfairly burdened, and I don’t have to think about work at all for 10, yes, 10 days.

Then I have to pick up some brown sugar at the grocery store for Cookie Madness, part two, round up a couple of last minute little presents (I could have gone tonight, but I thought I’d give getting home before 9 p.m. one night this week a try), and then it’s laissez les bon temps roulez! Or really, clean the house, bake cookies, wrap presents, bake a cake and make lasagna, but those could be bons temps. Well, except for the cleaning.

Friday I took the day off to go Christmas shopping. I do not do well when the malls get all crowded and noisy around Christmas, so I usually take a weekday off in December and try to take care of my in-person shopping in one big swoop. Unfortunately, this year, taking the day “off” meant I had a conference call from 9 to 9:30, ate breakfast, took a shower, logged back in around 10:30, and worked until 12:30. Obviously my definition of not working isn’t quite what it should be.

So I drove down to the mall hours later than I meant to, and shopped. But it was frustrating, because I just wasn’t finding anything I wanted to give to people, and I started feeling grinchy. So I left and went to Barnes & Noble, where I ran into my mom, which made it difficult for me to buy her a present! But I had a nice time with her, picking out books for my friends’ kids. And by getting up early both yesterday and today, I managed to get most of the presents I needed to buy. I just have to get something for my dad, my boss, and my brother. And one more thing for John, which I tried to buy today with no luck. Attention independent store owners: opening before noon on the Sunday before Christmas is a good idea, if, for example, you want to make money.

In other Christmas related news, did you know that if you wait until a week before Christmas to buy your Christmas tree, you will be able to get a really nice one for only $15? And a bunch of lights and ornaments at a discount as well. John and I never got a tree in our apartment because there wasn’t a good place to put one up, but I was determined to get one for our house. So we got one today and I spent a very pleasant afternoon decorating it. Well, first I put the lights on too early and had to redo them after the branches settled down, but other than that, it went very well, and the tree looks lovely. And John finally got a chance to hang up his treasured AC/DC ornament (in a place of honor, of course).

So, I just have to finish shopping, wrap presents bake about 800 cookies, one cake and one Christmas Eve dinner for my dad, and I’ll be ready for Christmas. And get through two video shoots, fit in a whole week of work and get a bunch of stuff done early in preparation for being on vacation the week between Christmas and New Year’s. Sure, I can do that. At least I’m feeling more in the holiday mood.

I worked from home today, which was great, and also not so great.

Bonus: At 9:00, I put down the paper, walked around the couch and sat down at my computer. Take that 270, you traffic clogged nightmare!

Bummer: By 9:02, I was wondering why the remote login wasn’t working. After getting two people to restart my computer for me (a task that required them to find someone to open my locked office for them), and two calls to IT (who suggested I try logging on under my maiden name, because I’ve only been married for three and a half years now!) I finally got logged on to my computer at work. I still don’t know how I did it. The IT guys are very nice, but I think they think I’m an idiot.

Bonus: With fewer interruptions, I got a ton of work done.

Bummer: With fewer interruptions, I worked pretty much nonstop all day. No chatting with coworkers, no poking around online at lunch, no goofing off at all!

Bonus: Lunch was a delicious grilled cheese sandwich prepared by me, just the way I like it.

Bummer: With the kitchen right there and no distractions, I was tempted to go grab a snack every 15 minutes. I didn’t. But I was tempted.

Bonus: 2:30 belly rub break with one Seamus hound. Don’t get to do that at the office.

Bummer: Tripping over the dog and totally wiping out while running for the phone. See, I was eating my grilled cheese sandwich when the phone rang, and there is no phone in the living room. Just yesterday Mr. Seamus proved that he is not to be trusted with food on the coffee table when he made off with a whole stick of butter (although it was hysterical to see him clutching the butter in his paws and gnawing on it) so I couldn’t just leave the sandwich in the living room. But because I had the sandwich in my hand, he would not get the hell out of the way, and down I went. I did manage to get to the phone at least.

Bonus: I spent the day barefoot, dressed in yoga pants and a 15 year old hoodie, with my hair in a ponytail.

Bummer: There is no downside to that.

All in all, working from home was nice. Dress code joy and my delight in the lack of a commute aside, I don’t think I’d want to do it every day. But today was a good day.

I discovered a new talent today. I’m just full of surprises that way. I attended a team-building workshop at work, and one of the exercises we had to do involved pretending you were on a plane that crashed in the Amazon. You had to prioritize a list of items that were on the plane, and then build a consensus with the rest of your team about where each object should rank on the list. Everyone had a different idea about what was important, but I managed the best score in the entire class. So apparently I’m a handy person to have around in the event of a plane crash in the Amazon. Of course, I was something of a failure at the actual exercise as I had the highest individual score, but didn’t try hard enough to convince my group of my ideas, so we failed to achieve “synergy” which I believe was the whole point. Oh well. At least I have the best chance of making it out of the jungle alive.

I’ve been feeling a bit neglected by some of my friends lately. Nothing serious, as I know they are all as busy as I am, if not more. They have no more time to ring my phone off the hook than I do theirs. But one friend in particular had ignored a couple of emails I sent her, and I thought maybe she was mad at me for some reason. Or that she had gotten tired of me and my infertility, as one of the emails I sent her had been about that. Well, she can’t be as tired of it as I am, I thought.

Anyway, to get to the point, I called her this week because her son just turned two. And it turns out that she’s been having a really hard time of it lately, and needed to hear from her friends just as much as I do. We talked for a while, and then talked again some more yesterday, and I think she is feeling better. I know I am. And I’m going to stop sitting around feeling sorry for myself and imagining what other people are thinking, particularly people who I know love me.

Zoot had her baby today! I’m so excited and happy for her. She’s the first person I ever really talked to about my infertility, after one of her TTC posts, and now she has a little baby girl. Even though we had completely different problems, it gives me hope to see her succeed.

Welcome to the world, NikkiZ!

Friday I observed the first-annual “benefits notified me I was no longer accruing vacation time” holiday. While this is a holiday I don’t plan to repeat – I’ve already scheduled a bunch of days off through the end of the year – it was a most enjoyable day. John and I rented a van and picked up our new coffee table at the warehouse and then went down to get a dresser and a desk he had stored his mom’s house.

I’m typing this on my laptop at our fabulous new coffee table right now as a matter of fact, with Seamus curled up next to me on the couch. It’s a very comfy way to spend an evening.

On Saturday I finally got my act together and went to join a gym so I can start taking yoga classes again. I was planning to go to my first class today, but then John pointed out that I might be trying to do a little too much since his sister and her husband and their two kids were coming over for brunch. And he was right, as I spent most of the morning running around cleaning and straightening. I don’t understand how this house gets so dusty. Yet another thing I have to learn to do -- realize when I'm trying to cram in too much.

The brunch was a smashing success. I made Belgian waffles with a toppings bar, and it was delicious, which was good, as I was worried the whole brunch was going to be disaster. First of all, John and his sister have managed to not fight for her entire visit, so they were due. And then when I got the obligatory “we’re running late” phone call from the car, it sounded like they were fighting. But it must have all gotten sorted out by the time they got here, and even better, John and Anna did not fight, my nephew was cute and my niece was smiley and sweet.

I hope you all had a nice weekend too. Now back to the grind.

The last three days have been lovely. Exactly what I needed, even if it was cold and rainy most of the time. The kind of windy rain that makes umbrellas useless and leaves your pants soaked below the knee, which mostly made me want to stay inside. And also made me want to buy two more new tires after a couple of scary no-traction incidents while driving in the rain. So I got new tires. I read a book. John and I saw A History of Violence, which was good. You never know with David Cronenberg, but I liked this one. Of course, I like Viggo Mortensen. He has such an expressive face.

It was so nice to have time to sleep in, to relax, to take care of errands and stuff around the house. The house is really coming together and just being here makes me happy. I’m definitely a fan of the new leaf. Hopefully I can stick with it long enough for the changes to become my new routine. Less working late, more time at home, more healthy habits, more time for a life outside work and more fun! Now, time to get ready for Monday.

My boss is back from her honeymoon! We’re picking a new hire from the candidates we have by the end of the week! And the massive project that I was working on for the last two weeks is mostly over. Not completely, but Thursday was the big day. And while we hit a couple of technical snags – that were 100% out of my control – apparently my grace under pressure made a good impression. On top of all of the hard work I put in to make the project a success. Of course, little do they know that while I was all cool and damage control and springing in to action on the outside, in my head, I was mostly yelling “fuck, fuck, fuck!”

But anyway, as I wrap up big project #1, and segue in big project #2, I’ll be around the ol’ blog a lot more. I’ve had a couple of days to get some sleep, relax, get started on the pile of People, US Weeklies, and InStyles that my coworkers passed along to me and hang out with John and Seamus. Oh, and I bought a cool old-timey globe at Target.

Events that I would have discussed if I had time:
1. Why is anyone surprised/does anyone care that Kate Moss did some coke with her rock star boyfriend? I don’t know why that is news. And I don’t think much of all of those companies dropping her over this. Not that Burberry or Chanel are going to notice the sudden lack of my patronage.

2. The dinner with my in-laws went very well. John and his sister did not get in a fight, everyone seemed to enjoy the food, my nephew is delightful and my niece is adorable. And no one tried to open the messy linen closet.

3. Never assume that vegetarians eat fish. For the love of God, please stop assuming that! The next person who says “can’t you just eat the tuna?” to me runs a serious risk of getting punched in the face. Ok, not really. I’ve never punched anyone in the face, and I don’t intend to start now. But it is frustrating.

4. The level of dissatisfaction that I feel due to the fact that so many of my friends are so far away.

5. How great John has been while I’ve had all of this craziness at work.

Momentous decisions made by me:

1. I’m taking a break from fertility treatments for a little while. The other night I found myself crying as I walked Seamus, practically sobbing at the thought of starting the next cycle. And yet I still fretted about giving myself a break for about five days before bringing it up with John. What’s wrong with me, I wondered. If I want a baby so badly (and I do) why do I struggle with the fertility treatments so much? If I take a month off, and that is the month that it would finally happen, will I never get pregnant? And so on. Luckily for me, John does not think I am crazy. He agrees with all of my reasons for taking a break. It is so stressful for both of us, and I feel about 100 times better now that we’ve made the decision. Maybe even 200 times better. The treatments are hard on my body, and they seem to be making things worse in some ways. I need to do the things I can do to make my fertility better before I go through all of that again. So, I’m going to lose some weight. And take vitamins. As is John. I’m going to work on reducing my anxiety and stress – get back to doing yoga regularly and actually make some of the changes that I said I would make at work. And we’ll see how I feel in a month or two, or even three.

2. I finally picked a coffee table. Soon our living room will be complete! And it was really cheap, too.

3. There is no three…aren’t one and two momentous enough?

Yeah…I’ve pretty much got nothing to say. I could do the whole self-pitying whiny post thing, but frankly, I’m not in the mood to listen to whining (even my own), and you probably aren’t either. So I think I’ll just spare you the details and go with the summary: I had a rough day. Then I came home. Now my beloved husband and dog are making it better. They are the best.

And as of tonight, I’ve got one mystery satisfactorily resolved on Veronica Mars, with the big reveal – who killed Lily Kane – coming up next week. Plus, I just ate some pudding. Things are looking up – just in time for bed! But I remain hopeful that tomorrow will be a better day.

Guess where I'm posting this from...finally!! That's right, my laptop is actually connected to the Internet. Of course, I can't take credit for it. We had my mom, my brother and my brother's girlfriend Erin over for dinner, and I asked him if he could take a look. I had tried and failed so many times. So he tried, and failed, and tried, and called Linksys and then called Linksys again, and after much hard work and frustration, got it to work.

So, yay!! And thanks, Tim, for making my wireless network work, and for helping me feel like less of an idiot. I was starting to wonder if this was one of those generational things, like Mom and Dad not getting that you had to hit play and record to use the VCR.

People of the Internet, you are awesome. It may not seem like a big deal to you, but it is to me. Your comments and emails of support really help keep me from running and hiding in a cave somewhere.

My doctor sent me for bloodwork today to confirm that I had ovulated, so we just have to wait and see what happens. Well, and there will probably be more bloodwork along the way, because that is what I do now. I'm glad the intensive part is over, though. Perhaps I can get back to some semblance of a normal life. And you know, write posts about my teeth or something.

Well, really 10 p.m. confessions, but that doesn’t have the same ring to it as far as a title goes, does it? Anyway – want to know a secret?

I feel almost like I’m going to jinx something by saying this, but lately, I’m happy. Really, really happy. To the point where I’ve actually started wondering if something huge and bad is lurking around the corner, because everything is so good right now. I’m so in love with my husband, and it feels like our relationship gets stronger and better every day. Settling in to our home has given me a sense of peace and balance that I didn’t even know I was missing. And I just feel...good.

Of course, there are still things that worry me. My continuing infertility, for one, but I have to believe that is going to work out eventually. Work has been a bit of a challenge lately, but I’d rather be challenged than bored. My friend Laila moved back to San Francisco last week, and I miss her and her little boy Noah already. I miss Jules and Julie and Ariane and Mary Pat and wish they weren’t so far away, but I have friends here too. I’m still obsessing about whether or not to spend the money to get a laptop, and if I do, whether or not to spend the extra money to get a Powerbook. When I manage to look outside of my own petty concerns, I get down about the state of the world – children starving to death every three seconds, bombs going off in London, bombs going off in Iraq every day, which no one seems to care about at all.

Even so, underneath it all, I’m happy. And I guess I wanted to acknowledge it here, to say to you, to the universe, to whomever – I recognize what I have, and I’m grateful.

Sorry for the looong interval with no posting – work has been crazy with a capital “K” lately. I’ve been getting home so late there’s mostly only been time for dinner, a quick walk with the hound, and then half an hour of lying on the couch moaning at John before I head off to bed.

But now the weekend is here, and I’m feeling relaxed, refreshed and rejuvenated! It’s been a good couple of days. Yesterday I had a lovely lunch with the Cactus-Fishes, who are every bit as fun, funny and nice in person as you’d expect them to be from their sites. I was worried that it would be a little awkward, meeting online people in the real world, but I really enjoyed it. Hopefully they had as much fun as I did.

Then I hit the outlet mall, which was insanely crowded, and not as bargain-filled as I had hoped it would be. When I go to the outlet mall, I want deals, not $137 shoes and $700 coffee tables – Cole Haan, Restoration Hardware – I’m looking in your direction. I did manage to find a pair of curtains that are almost the same shade of green as my comforter cover, so my bedroom is finally blessedly dark. According to John, “it’s like the Bat Cave in there.” Bat Cave is what I was going for. Hopefully now Seamus will stop waking up as soon as the sun comes up.

I got home in time to catch some of the best acts at Live8, including the Who and most excitingly, Pink Floyd. I called that they would play Money, and John accurately predicted that they would play Wish You Were Here. Amazingly, MTV even managed to hold off on breaking in and ruining it until the very end! It was very cool to see.

Today we’ve been focusing on getting house stuff done. We finally found the right combination of furniture for the basement, so we’ve been assembling and rearranging stuff in the family room. It’s really coming together, and is actually a usable room now! Before it was mostly full of piles of books and you had to sit on the floor, or perch on the corner of the couch. Now we just have to find a coffee table and a china cabinet and the house will be pretty much set, furniture-wise.

The best part of this weekend though, is the extra day. Instead of work, tomorrow I’ll do some more relaxing, and then head down to my mom’s for a cookout in the early afternoon. Except she told me this morning that she doesn’t feel like scrubbing the grill, so she’s going to make pasta instead. So it is really more of a 4th of July pasta dinner, I guess. Doesn’t matter. Just so long as I get that extra day off!

We’re officially homeowners! And we’ve finally – finally! – gotten all of our crap out of our old place and into the new one. I’m smelly, covered in bruises and scrapes, and completely exhausted…but I’m also so very happy. I love our new house. I love our new neighborhood. I love everything. Except moving. I’m done with that, please.

The last five days have been quite an adventure. The whole closing thing went fine, although I have to admit I was convinced that something was going to go wrong right up until the last minute. I was so relieved that when we were driving home from the settlement, I actually started crying! And then the moving began. All I’ll say about that is this:

1. There may have been an incident involving a U-Haul cargo van getting stuck in the mud. An incident followed by a frantic call to a tow truck guy who said “Where are you? Oh, Blahblah Rd. You tried to drive down behind the apartments there, didn’t you? Yeah, I’ve been there before.” All hail Bill, the tow truck guy, who saved the day.

2. We got movers for the furniture. It was a little weird, because you just sit there and watch them do all the work. It was also awesome, because you just sit there and watch them do all the work! Next time, we’re getting movers for everything.

3. Thank goodness for my family. They make me crazy sometimes, but they really came through for us this weekend. We’d probably still be down at the old place cleaning and hauling stuff out of it if it weren’t for all the help my family gave us over the last few days. I’d be on the verge of a nervous breakdown, and John would probably be ready to run away and live in a cave.

4. If the person who left a message on my voicemail at my new phone number reads this, I’m not ignoring you! I told Verizon I didn’t want voicemail. They set it up anyway. I don’t have the number or the code to check the messages, and Verizon doesn’t provide customer service on the weekends. I’ll get it tomorrow, I promise!

I’m insanely busy at work.

I’m ridiculously busy at home.

I don’t have time to write.

I don’t have time to read or comment on anyone else’s blog.

I don’t even have any time to call or email my friends.

And today I was completely derailed by an effective time management seminar at work. Don’t you just love the irony?

But, tonight John was discussing one of his favorites, Maddox, with my brother, and said to me “he’s like you, he hasn’t posted in forever” which I took as a hint. Plus, tomorrow is my one year blogiversary. I couldn’t let that go by! I can’t believe it has been a whole year already. Blogging has turned out to be so much more than I ever thought it would be. I’ve “met” so many interesting, friendly and supportive people. Seriously, check out my blogroll. There are some amazingly talented and creative individuals out there, and my contact with them has definitely enhanced my life. I hope I’ve contributed something worthwhile here and there along the way.

Anyway, the insanity will end soon, and I’ll be back to my old self again. This time next week, we’ll officially be homeowners. We’ll be getting ready to spend our last night in the apartment before the movers come. It’s almost here!

So mostly, I’ve been working. If I’m not working, I’m packing, And if I’m not packing, I’m knitting that blanket for my new niece. Then there’s the fun of running to the doctor every 15 minutes so she can check how I’m responding to the medicine (so far, so good), worrying about moving details and fending off my landlord, who wants to start showing the place to prospective buyers. Which he really doesn’t want to do until we fix the huge holes that Seamus dug in the carpet and wall next to the door. Except, of course, he doesn’t know about the huge holes, because why would we tell him about them?

I also managed to fit in a little Mother’s Day celebration with my mom. I took her to brunch at this restaurant she likes. And while we were there, who should I see but my unattainable high school crush, Will L. When I first realized who it was, I actually got that flustery, excited feeling in my stomach for about 7 seconds, before I remembered that a) I’m not 14 anymore and b) I’m not interested, seeing as how I’m happily married and all. I guess it was just a knee-jerk reaction. I hadn’t thought of him in years! He looked pretty much the same, and yet at the same time he didn’t. He had a little boy with him, so I guess he’s a dad. It’s so weird to think of the uber-cool, punk-rock rebel guy I knew as just another suburban dad taking his wife to Clyde’s for Mother’s Day.

My mom thought I should go over and say hi, but I didn’t want to. I have nice memories of the guy. He must have known I had a crush on him, but he was never a jerk about it. In fact, in some ways, his influence on me in my impressionable years (bad boy upperclassman, creative guy, musician) must have predisposed me to think favorably of John (slightly older, definite bad boy, creative guy, former lead singer in a band, and better looking to boot). Anyway, I figured why ruin those memories for two minutes of awkward conversation? So I stayed at my table. I do feel a wave of high school nostalgia coming on though.

I wish I had time to post separately about all of these topics, but I don’t. Perhaps I should switch to the Television Without Pity style where I give you short recaps right away and then post a longer writeup later! Anyway, here are just a few of the events of the last few days.

1. My niece has arrived! No, I have not finished knitting her baby blanket yet. I have, however, purchased one very adorable outfit for her and a Winnie the Pooh racing car set for my nephew. My niece’s name is Josephine Nora Marguerite, and she was born weighing 8 pounds, 4 ounces in the middle of a snowstorm in Colorado last week. My poor sister-in-law went to the hospital in labor, got sent home because her contractions slowed down, and then barely made it back in time to have Josephine in the hospital. It sounds like it was quite scary at times, but it all turned out ok in the end. And my sister-in-law has a hell of a birth story to tell now.

2. John and I bought couches for our new living room. I have learned that furniture salesmen (and women) can be quite scary. You walk in the store, and they swoop down like vultures! The guy who got our business had really good prices and left us the fuck alone so we could make up our minds. Our new couches aren’t very exciting looking, but they are nice and comfortable. Now we’re on to discussing paint colors. That’s where I will get to be bold.

3. Laila and I went to dinner and to see the movie Sin City. That is one sick and disturbing movie. I have seen some fairly twisted and violent movies in my time, but this one had several scenes that really got to me. I didn’t hate it, but I kind of wish I hadn’t seen it. Also, Elijah Wood’s character seriously creeped me out. I hope this doesn’t ruin the Lord of the Rings movies for me.

4. I learned that fertility drugs are not covered by insurance. Was it naïve for me to think they would be? I don’t know. I think they should be, but then again, I’m one of those crazy pinko types who believe we should have socialized medicine. Not only are the drugs not covered, they are damn expensive. So everybody please root for my left ovary to respond to the drugs. That’s L-E-F-T. I’m working on some sort of left ovary gang sign people can flash to encourage it to respond – I’ll let you know how that works out.

Also, just in case we can’t depend on the left ovary, has anyone used drugstore.com? Their prices for the same drugs are quite a bit lower than my local pharmacy, and I’d like to be prepared for next time.

5. And finally, I took the “what type of Jedi are you?” quiz, and I am happy to announce that I am a Yoda-like Jedi Master. Not Yoda though. I’m short, but not that short – and not green. May the force be with you all.

• I owe all of you huge thank-yous. The comments, emails and in Laila’s case, phone call and shopping therapy plan, that I received in response to my last post were wonderful. Your support gave me the boost I desperately needed. For now, I’m just going to focus on the diagnostics, and try not to freak out so much about what comes next. So, thank you. You all rock!

• Speaking of infertility, ancient Chinese wisdom may hold the answer to my problems. I went out dinner with my friend Becky on Tuesday night and got this fortune “You are a happy man.” Now there’s an angle we hadn’t considered – that I’m actually a man, baby.

• The house I liked so much sold. Sigh. The good news is another house on the same street just went on the market. We’re going to go see it tomorrow at lunch time, along with two others in the same basic area. It’s nerve wracking, but exciting too.

Hope everyone has a good weekend!

Finally, things are looking up. I’m slowly getting over the hideous cold of death. Monday I was possessed by an overwhelming urge to lie down all the time. This was fine at home – and for once my poor housekeeping skills paid off, as there was a convenient pile of clothes available when I actually did lie down on the floor at one point – but not so great at work. But now I am almost back to my old self. And just in time too, since I’m headed up to New York to see my friend Julie and meet her little boy Ben for the first time. It's going to be great.

In other good news, I have had time to adjust to the changes at work that had me completely freaked out, and I’ve realized everything is going to be ok. And in even better news, John’s mom got out of the hospital today. And finally, we have gotten all of our down payment money together, so the house buying process will really be getting moving as soon as I get back from New York.

Life is good. Yippee!

As it turns out, my day picked up. The snow stopped, although it is 50 degrees colder out now than it was yesterday. You know what is sad? I am not exaggerating even a little bit in that sentence. It was 70 yesterday and it is 20 degrees out with a wind chill below zero right now. That is fucked up.

My boss took me out to lunch and talked me off the ledge about the huge organizational changes that had me so down. I still have my doubts, but I am trying to be positive.

My coworkers realized they forgot my birthday and made up for it with a hastily purchased – and delicious – chocolate mousse cake and singing.

My brother called to wish me a happy birthday.

My friend Laila called to wish me a happy birthday. She’s trying to arrange spa day for us this weekend. Preferably at a spa that includes Valium in their treatments.

The lovely Becky emailed me with birthday wishes, and plans to go out for lunch or dinner.

Many fine fellow bloggers commented or emailed to say happy birthday.

And my wonderful, wonderful husband bought groceries, picked up takeout (vegetable tempura sushi, yum!) and is walking the dog right now so that I don’t have to go out in the insane cold on my birthday. And as if that wasn’t enough, I got presents too.

And the rest of my evening involves plans to snuggle on the couch with John and Seamus and watch Deadwood. So perhaps I gave up on this birthday a little too early.

Am still very busy with the seemingly endless family holiday marathon. Plus, I ended up sleeping for close to 12 hours (with a short one-hour break to walk and feed Seamus)in an attempt to recover from the craziness of Friday and Saturday.

But, I wanted to say Merry Christmas to all my blog friends.

And share with you the highlight of my day yesterday -- a combination of words that I am absolutely sure have never been said together before, and that are unlikely to be repeated -- uttered by one of John's step relatives after opening one of his presents.

"Aw, snap! Edgar Allan Poe, my favorite!"

Gotta love those southern Maryland teenagers

I've been working on this huge project for work. Huge! It was supposed to be done about a week and a half ago, but the more realistic deadline was last Wednesday. And I just couldn't finish it. I kept getting interrupted. And then I started obsessing over getting it perfect, which was ridiculously unproductive.

I lay in bed at night fretting over the fact that the report was overdue and worrying that I wasn’t doing it right. I wrote and rewrote sections and rearranged the order of the copy way too many times. I got behind on other projects and emails and phone calls to friends. And I wasn’t getting any closer to being done.

So yesterday I issued myself an ultimatum: Finish the report and get it in today...no matter what. And I did it! I had to stay at work until 8:45, and I'll probably have to do a second draft, but it is finished. And I am so happy I could do an "I'm done" can-can.

Now on to the 21 other items on my priorities list for this week...but not until tomorrow. :)

I considered going for the ironic, hipster William S. Burroughs-type post “Thanks for the last and greatest betrayal of the last and greatest of human dreams.” Because, as you all know, I’ve got some problems with the way this country is going.

I considered putting together a list of all the reasons I have to be thankful…and there are many.

I considered a list of facts from my day: number of delicious apple pies made by me (1)… number of disputes with my mom about my vegetarianism (1, but minor)…amount of stuffing consumed by me (truly massive)…my dislike for my sister-in-law’s husband (growing)…my enjoyment of my adorable nephew (also growing)…number of ignorant and racist comments uttered by southern Maryland step-relatives (0! For once!)…and so on.

I considered a straightforward summary of my day –- lots of family, lots of driving, but in the end, actually better than I thought it would be. Although, we’re only done with half of the family at this point. We’ve still got John’s mom and my dad to deal with tomorrow, and my dad is quite the wild card.

But in the end, I decided just to say:

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! I hope your day was filled with the people you love and good food just like mine.

Last night I stopped to get groceries on the way home. I have new love, by the way. Apple Pecan pound cake. Curse you Whole Foods and your clever marketing ploy of putting out samples of your baked goods. This time, you got me with the pound cake and Tuscan bread.

Anyway, as I was leaving there was a man in the parking lot in a big old Cadillac, playing Over the Rainbow on some sort of horn. The notes soared out over the parking lot, lifting my mood and transforming my mundane loading of groceries into the car into a perfect moment. I've decided I'd like to have live musicians follow me around playing music where ever I go. It would be like my own personal life soundtrack.

I just moved into a great new office at work. It is close to twice the size of my old office, and has three (three!) windows. My old office only had two, and a big ol’ pillar in the middle. I don’t know how I got so lucky. So anyway, I’ve been busy with packing and unpacking, missing bookcases and floor plans the movers didn’t bother to follow and an inability to connect to the network. I seem to have some sort of network-connection-destroying magnetic field, as I go through network cards and cables with an alarming frequency. I’m starting to get a rep with IT.

But I’m all settled in now, and super-organized since my new, bigger office came with a new, bigger filing cabinet. And I managed to swipe a new guest chair to replace my old, mismatched, broken wheel guest chair with a matching, fully-operational chair.

Yep, "appropriating" office furniture abandoned in the move is what I do for kicks these days. Can you stand the excitement that is my life?

Yep, my glorious jury service ended in a mistrial. We were totally deadlocked, with six not guiltys, four guiltys and two undecideds. It was a much more interesting experience than I thought it would be. I also had no trouble making up my mind, as I had feared I might. There was reasonable doubt all over the place. To be fair, the prosecutor didn't have a great case to begin with. I don't know why they brought it to trial at all. Even the judge said he wasn't surprised by the outcome.

But I'm done, and I can return to my normal life. And here's what has been happening in my normal life:

My friend Carri recently got engaged on a trip to Italy (very romantic!), and is getting married at the end of this year. I'm excited for her. Congratulations, Carri!

My friend Julie, you know, the one whose baby blanket I haven't even started yet? She had her baby at 4 a.m. A boy, 6 lbs, 10 oz. They named him Benjamin Ari (not sure of the spelling). Ari means lion and is in memory of our friend Leo who died last year, which made me cry just a little bit. Naturally I had to run to Buy Buy Baby to buy presents after work. After much obsessing I got the cutest little sleeper with an elephant on it and a rattle that looks like a turtle. Congratulations Julie and Mark! And welcome to the world Benjamin Ari!

And then I got home to learn that while they have figured out why I had no hot water this morning, they haven't fixed the problem. I cannot stand cold showers. So I didn't get to take a real shower this morning, and I won't get to take one tomorrow morning either. Just the hasty rinse and splash as my teeth start chattering. Luckily, the blog doesn't have smell-o-vision, so you all are safe if I get stinky.

I had my second yoga class tonight, and I really love it!

The class is an hour and 15 minutes long, and I haven't gotten bored at all. In fact, I've been surprised each time when we got to the end of the class and it was time for the relaxation part.

I just feel good when I'm done. My body feels stretched and relaxed and energized all at the same time. My abs are really getting a workout, which they need. And it definitely helps with the stress.

So far, I have to say, I highly recommend yoga.