funny, smart and important

sam the reflective

2012-01-21T22:30:00.005-06:00

Sam and I go running together and we have a pretty good time. Sometimes we'll go in the morning before work and it's usually still dark out. I worry about my own visibility, wearing black pants and a purple jacket (even with all the reflective features they boast). I've been wanting a reflective vest for a few months now, but just haven't found the right one at the right price. Sam, being much shorter and blacker than I am, is even more of a visibility nightmare. Cars may not be looking for him and he may just blend in with the background. I usually head downtown since the sidewalks are clearer in the winter than anywhere else; downside is that people don't usually expect or look for runners and their black Labs.

Guess who is now more visible at night?

He's my school crossing guard.

Some more Sam:

Having a pretty rough day.

A goofball in the car on the way home from Wisconsin over New Years.

Opening his Christmas present. Hint: It was an antler and what seems to be the most promising non-destructible toy yet.

turn that frown upside down

2012-01-19T21:59:00.004-06:00

Last week was shitty. Our car died and had expensive repairs, which meant I wasn't able to go to Green Bay for Erich and KT's baby shower. Boo.

This week was extra shitty. The car didn't get done until Monday, so we actually paid for it on Monday and that drained our bank account early in the week. A frozen bagel got the best of me, aka, I sunk a dull knife deep into my left ring finger in an attempt to cut in half a frozen bagel (a pre-cut bagel at that). It may have caused more damage than I originally thought. Huzzah!

I remember the end of 2009, thinking I was glad for it to be over because that year sucked. I feel the same way about this January. Let's just skip ahead to February, which is clearly a superior month as I was born during it.

January: Go blow yourself.
February: Don't suck like January.

Bacher out.

food and boots

2012-01-08T11:35:00.004-06:00

Andrew and I went over to a friend's house to make sushi on Friday and I realized two things:

The Asian grocery store by my apartment is AWESOME. Great prices on veggies, a thing of tofu for .99 cents, plus a huge tank of catfish. I am doing as much grocery store shopping there as possible. I don't think they sell peanut butter, though.
I want to move to a bigger apartment (preferably a house/apartment where it's the entire floor of a house) and have a big table to have dinner parties.

I made this dal palak recipe last night, which was so good. A decent amount of spiciness for both Andrew and I; since I usually like this spicier than him, it hit a good middle ground for both of us. As I'm trying to eat less meat overall, Indian food is a good source for recipes. They have so much delicious vegetarian food.

After trying them on in November, I finally bought these boots:

Way to go, christmas money! I've realized I'm less likely to make larger purchases for myself regularly (as opposed to little things frequently that often add up to the price of one of these larger purchases) and instead use gift money/present opportunities to make a larger purchase - boots, running shoes, iPod, etc. When I graduated from college, Erich and KT said their present was either going to be an iPod or all the Scrubs dvds. I chose the iPod because I figured I'd be less likely to buy that on my own as opposed to all the Scrubs dvds (which I have been buying randomly over the past few years or so - usually whenever I see one for sale at a used store). I figure it's good to recognize that about yourself. Plus those boots are hot. I'm excited to wear them.

Ok. Time to go. Bacher out.

irresolute

2011-12-15T10:36:00.005-06:00

I really dislike New Year's resolutions. Maybe since I associate them with falling off after 6 weeks, I don't think they're useful or effective. I always think, "Oh, well that's something the person won't really keep up through March," or that they only half-heartedly want to accomplish it. On the other hand, I don't necessarily think that about goals. I feel a person can set a goal and they have a fairly good chance of achieving it. It's the same thing, just a different word, so I don't know why I have those connotations. Increasingly, I feel the need to reassess and set new goals at year end, which is deliberately something I really didn't do before. Blame it on some type A personality shit.

Last year, I wanted to cook two new recipes a month and learn how to cartwheel. Trying two new recipes a month was pretty successful - here's a catalogue of some recipes I've tried this year and enjoyed. I have some new ones in my recipe folder too. I'm not making an intentional goal to try new recipes this year since I feel it's stuck with me pretty well and I have lots of inspiration to try new recipes. Don't they say it takes 6 weeks for something to become a habit? Well, I think I've got this down. In fact, tonight I'm making roasted butternut squash and bacon pasta.

Cartwheeling? Nope. Still don't know how.

I've got a few I've been kicking around for this next year:

100 books in 2012. I kicked 75 books in 2011's ass (currently on number 102 for 2011) and I think I can do it again next year.
3 half marathons - Green Bay in May, Red, White and Boom in July, and one more in the fall. I wanted to do two last year and only did one, mostly for financial reasons.
Cut out meat one day a week, for health and environmental reasons. Probably Mondays.
Progress on our net worth, specifically through building savings and paying down our smaller debts. I know goals are more likely to be accomplished if there's a specific, measurable goal, but we haven't sat down and figured that out yet. But those are the things I think we can hit, based on some initial calculations.

Good? All right. Bacher out.

a letter i wrote

2011-12-11T15:00:00.002-06:00

Dear [Reverend 1] and [Reverend 2];

Please remove my name from the membership roll.

I feel the need to explain my decision as [church] had been a formative place in my youth. The Methodist Church's stance on gay, lesbian, transgender and bisexual people is completely at odds with my understanding of the world and God's involvement and love of humanity.

The God I know does not want people to completely shut off an important aspect of one's self simply because of whom they love. If we are to be full people, engaged in the community around us, we must be true to ourselves and embrace and love ourselves. By proxy, the institution of the church should accept and welcome the community as full people, some of whom may love people of the same gender.

If we are created in God's image and loved as such, then GLBTQ individuals are created in God's image and loved by God as well. While the Methodist Church finds homosexuality to be incompatible with Christ's teachings, I find the alienation, exclusion and disdain of GLBTQ individuals to be incompatible with Christ's teachings.

The Methodist Church is sorrowfully behind on accepting GLBTQ populations and it's embarrassing to hear that the WI Conference took 4 days to discussion to agree to begin a dialogue on the topic.

Thank you for your stewardship of a church I once called home; however, I cannot be a member of an organization that blatantly discriminates against a class of people and is blind to Jesus' call to welcome and love all people.

Thank you.

P.S. Jesus practiced radical inclusion. I hope you can do the same as a reconciling church.

more sam

2011-12-10T19:41:00.002-06:00

What a silly dog.

Then we decided to watch a video:

I am easily amused.

this is my dog

2011-12-09T20:33:00.004-06:00

Dinnertime.

Setting up the Christmas tree.

Sam hides out behind the tv.

Sam is a careful listener.

The end.

the monies

2011-12-08T14:16:00.002-06:00

So... I turned into a budgeting/financial crazy person today.

I finished breaking down our spending for November compared to our budget, budgeted our Christmas presents, switched the autopay of the remaining bills over to our new credit union, cleaned up my Bank folder on my computer, and made a net worth spreadsheet (including columns to update next year). My spreadsheets are all quite pretty, if I do say so myself. The contents are a little rougher (hello, giant negative net worth), but I suppose in order to get ahead, you have to figure out where you are first.

Don't worry. I resisted color-coding the spreadsheets. Still, I am all over this shit.

Also, Sam is sleeping on the couch next to me and his face and legs are twitching and spasming like he's a robot.

babies and stuff

2011-12-01T20:51:00.003-06:00

A note to the world:

Many people I know are pregnant or have birthed. That's awesome. Babies are cool. I'm especially looking forward to my new nephew, ~~Stormageddon, Dark Lord of All~~ Mason Badass Bacher and have grown fond of watching videos of Hattie (one of the Lincoln Roberts-Days) do things like roll over and be bounced around to silly noises.

However, I am totally content with a gentleman and a dog. We do pretty well, the three of us.

Not that anyone asked... just that babies seem to be all around and in people these days, and they seem super excited about it, whereas I am super excited about the homemade sesame chicken I made for dinner tonight.

That is all.

Book update:
I did get a Kindle. It is awesome. In fact, it increases marital hand-holding a significant percent as now I can lie in bed, hold the Kindle with one hand and hold Andrew's hand with the other. No more rationed hand-holding! I am also at book #95 for the year and 100 looks to be very good. I may even shoot for 104 - an average of 2 books per week.

Purging update:
I'm 95% done with the original purging plan. I used the last bottle this week - buffalo sauce that I poured over chicken wings in the crockpot. I have one bar of soap left, which will probably be opened this weekend. Still working on the tea lights though... there were a lot of those.

All right. Sesame chicken time. Bacher out.

yes, i still love this.

2011-11-18T16:56:00.000-06:00

I laugh-cried again just now.

first world problems

2011-11-14T13:34:00.005-06:00

I think Sam is in another shedding phase. He's dropping hair left and right, usually in clumps on the floor. Yay black dog hair and light brown hardwood floors!

My goal for reading this year was 75 books. I finished my 75th book on October 8, which was Donald Rumsfeld's memoir, Known and Unknown. Blech. Andrew always asks me why I read memoirs from politicians in the Bush administration (Bush, Rumsfeld, Rice, Cheney) if I disagree with their politics so much. It's because they've taken the time to explain their reasoning and the rational behind their decisions and actions and I want to understand why they made those choices. Plus, I've read memoirs from Bill Clinton and Madeline Albright, but there just happens to be a slew of Republican memoirs being published now.

So since I've met my 75 goal, I've upped it t0 100 books in a year. I'm currently at 89 right now so it's very doable. Here's what I've read since September 15:
68. Unbroken, Laura Hillenbrand
69. Not Becoming My Mother, Ruth Reichel
70. Run Like A Girl, Mina Samuels
71. Nice Girls Don’t Get the Corner Office, Lois Frankel
72. Freakonomics, Steven Levitt/Stephen Dubner
73. The Leftovers, Tom Perrotta
74. Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, Jamie Ford
75. Known and Unknown, Donald Rumsfeld
76. To Be a Runner, Martin Dugard
77. Superfreakonomics, Steven Levitt/Stephen Dubner
78. The Greatest Music Stories Never Told, Rick Beyer
79. Devil’s Knot, Mara Leveritt
80. The President and the Assassin, Scott Miller
81. In My Time, Dick Cheney
82. The Violets of March, Sarah Jio
83. Why We Buy, Paco Underhill
84. How I Killed Pluto, Mike Brown
85. Radioactive: Marie and Pierre Curie, Lauren Redniss
86. Secret Daughter, Shilpi Somaya Gowda
87. Killing Kate, Julie Kraemer
88. Blood, Bones & Butter, Gabrielle Hamiliton
89. The Night Circus, Erin Morgenstern

My favorites are Unbroken, The Leftovers, Freakonomics/Superfreaknomics, How I Killed Pluto, Killing Kate, Blood, Bones & Butter and The Night Circus.

Since I read so many books, I usually get a ton out from the library at a time.

I'd like to get a Kindle so I don't have to go to the library every week and also so I don't have to carry multiple books around with me at once, say if I'm almost to the end of a book and think I'll finish it before I get home. It would be a good Christmas present, yes?

But here's the thing: The library doesn't have nearly as many ebooks as it does actual books. I looked at books I've currently requested and it's about 40-50% available in ebooks. Otherwise, Amazon does have a lending library system, but you have to be a special member ($80/year) and you can only borrow one book a month. ONE. That's not reasonable for me. I also don't want to buy ebooks all the time, since those are $12-16 per book. So if I get a Kindle, it might be a half and half thing, where I borrow on Kindle if possible and otherwise get a hard copy. Man, my life is so hard.

Here's pictures of Sam to cheer you up from thinking about all the problems I face in life:

Sam and a lobster treat that Mom and Harry brought back from Maine.

Sam clearly also has a very difficult life as well.

Here's what I'm making for dinner tonight: Crock pot mac and cheese.

And HOLY CRAP. This is double stuffed acorn squash like a fall explosion in your mouth. I highly recommend it:

Ok. Time to go de-dog hair my apartment. I will save all the hair for a homemade pillow for Sam to lay his little doggy head on, since it was his hair in the first place.

Bacher out.

P.S. Oh yeah, Kari is in the country.

pushover

2011-11-03T14:31:00.002-05:00

What's going on with you today?

Not much here... Sam and I are just hanging out.

You can guess who the pushover in this relationship is.

trees, gourds and sprouts. and a car.

2011-10-21T11:32:00.005-05:00

Things going on:

We bought a new car! Huzzah!

Andrew's starting making terrible engine noises on the way back from WI a few weeks back. After checking it out, it was either 1: new engine or 2: new car. Considering the body of his car was in pretty bad shape and we were thinking about getting a new car sometime in the next year anyway... new car it is!

Car shopping is a huge pain in the ass. You spend a lot of time looking on websites to find vehicles in your price and mileage range, then go to the car lot to see that the car is in worse condition than it looked online or that it's been sold already. We were very close to buying a different car and while we were giving the dealer 36 hours to think about putting new tires on it, someone else bought the car. That was disappointing, but I really like the car we bought and it's in great condition and has less miles than the other car. So go us!

Since our evenings were consumed with car researching/test driving/buying for the past two weeks, the house pretty much went to shit. I only finished the last of the Massive Pile of dishes yesterday (it was so massive that it deserves uppercase). It didn't help that we needed to continue to eat, thus adding to the Massive Pile. We also had a Big-Ass Pile of laundry, but we did that on Sunday.

I opened up a retirement account - woo! Considering the economy is shit, I'm in a pretty aggressive fund, hoping that by the time I retire at 88, I'll have enough to pay for a mediocre old folk's farm. I'm not betting that Sam will take care of me in my old age... he seems pretty thankless.

Sam spends a lot of time sitting or trying to sit on our laps.

Ok, that's Dia. I took that to make Sam jealous.

Andrew cut down this big ass tree and we want to make a cutting board from the wood cookie:

For scale.

Although that little shit has been taking bites out of the bark. I found him chewing on a hunk of bark just this morning.

I just made a batch of acorn squash seeds using my patented "forget about them and remember in a panic" method. They are pretty damn tasty. I'm going to try gnocchi this afternoon.

I bought a pumpkin at the store and made pumpkin puree. I haven't used it for anything yet, so I'm open to suggestions of pumpkin-flavored deliciousness.

I also bought two stalks(? sprouts?) of Brussels sprouts at the farmers market while I was on the way home from a happy hour last week. Impluse purchase? No, never. Not when it comes to Brussels sprouts. We're down to one last serving of sprouts from the two stalks, so that'll be my lunch today.

Ok, there's a finale episode of Project Runway that's calling my name, so time to go cook sprouts and make gnocchi. Bacher out.

camping

2011-10-13T12:49:00.006-05:00

A story in pictures.

(ok, this one is in here because Sam had a leaf hanging from his mouth.)

The end.

how to make perfect roasted squash seeds

2011-10-10T22:47:00.002-05:00

My secret tip to cooking perfect squash/pumpkin seeds?

Rinse/salt the seeds. Put the oven at 200 degrees. Leave the seeds in the oven and literally forget about them. While getting a drink of water before going to bed, realize you forgot the seeds were in the oven and take them out in a panic. Enjoy!

Perfect, seriously.

the chicken and i

2011-09-28T20:30:00.003-05:00

Step one: Get a chicken.

Step two: Cut the chicken apart.

Step three: Make stuff from the chicken for later.

Step four: Eat stuff from the chicken now.

Step five: Repeat.

sam gets excited about popcorn

2011-09-23T17:22:00.001-05:00

One of Sam's favorite foods is popcorn.

You'll notice he body-checks me at 21 seconds and Andrew at 27 seconds.

the fall closet purge

2011-09-22T12:04:00.005-05:00

Purge of 2011 update:

Still have half a bottle of buffalo sauce in my fridge. I gotta use that up, asap. I did, however, use up all the little mini shampoo bottles that I've had for years. Success! I'm slogging through using up the bars of soap, which doesn't go quite so fast.

Another fun purge was getting rid of all my pants.

Seriously, I got rid of every pair of jeans I own. They either 1: didn't fit me or 2: had holes in them or 3: didn't fit me AND had holes in them. After some bargain shopping, sister's closet shopping and regular shopping, I now have 3 pairs of non-holey jeans that all fit. A miracle! (Don't worry, Kari, I only borrowed one pair of jeans because yours are usually too short for me. I think they're too big for you now anyway.)

I also purged some dress pants I really liked. They're black with blue pinstripes that I found on sale at Old Navy. I love the blue pinstripes, but they were just way too baggy and my legs were drowning in all the fabric. My momma did buy me some new pinstripe pants when I was home this weekend, so huzzah for that!

So we'll be making a Goodwill trip in the near future and hopefully getting rid of some junk that's been riding around in Andrew's trunk for months. Let's see if I can convince him to part with the 1950's gas camping grill that he got while cleaning out his grandparent's old house. We've had it for 18 months, never used it (just like his grandparents never used it) and it has just sat around in our apartment and then in his trunk. I say the statute of limitations is up and if we haven't used it yet, we're not going to use it in the future.

We did go to Green Bay this past weekend, which was fun and relaxing. The dogs played around a ton and I think Sam is still recovering from the weekend. I forgot to bring my camera so there are no pictures, unfortunately. Up for this weekend: Andrew's probably going to the Ren Fest with his brother and I'm hitting up a beer fest with Amy.

I did take some pictures of Sam being goofy, but what's different about that?

One of these days, I'm going to stop thinking everything he does is picture-worthy, but unfortunately for you, that day hasn't happened yet.

Bacher out.

i was running.

2011-09-10T13:52:00.004-05:00

I went out for a long run this morning, aiming for 11 miles. It went well; I felt pretty consistent through most of it. I went down to the Midtown Greenway, connected to the Cedar Lake Trail, (which is quickly become one of my favorite running paths), ran along the river, went past Gold Medal park and the Guthrie, then headed back south to my apartment. The scenery is great - you run through woods, through prairies, through urban areas, along a river and over a bridge. Nearly everything you can think of for scenery.

After crossing the river to Northeast, I was chugging along on the path next to the river and there were a lot more people than usual in the area. It seems they were having a 5k race that morning. Which is all fine and dandy, until I realize that the starting line of the race was in my path and the race route went over the river on the Stone Arch Bridge, which was where I wanted to cross back. As I get close to the bridge and the crowd of people, I hear "We're about to begin! One minute until the start of the race!" So I join this race for the first quarter mile across the bridge, then peeled off in the opposite direction to run up a really, big-ass hill.

Other things I've seen while running: A bike accident with an ambulance team, wedding photography, a marching band playing Lady Gaga before the Pride parade, countless crowds for Twins games, some middle aged dude who yelled "Yeah! Yale!" as I wore my Forestry sweatshirt.

Tuesday I took Sam out for his very first run with me. He did very well and wasn't too distracted by squirrels and birds. I took a water bottle to give him water while we ran, which helped him cool down. We did 2.6 miles (including some water breaks) and he was definitely into it. He was speeding up during the last quarter mile to the point where I was sprinting to keep up. I could feel it the next day; it was definitely a good speedy run. I think Sam liked it; after we were done he had lots of energy - almost like his own runner's high - and then he crashed and was tired, tired, tired. We're going to go again on Monday.

The only new picture I have is of a scratch under his eye. He got it from the dog park yesterday; a couple of dogs were rough-housing around with him and one must have got him with their teeth. Sam seems to be fine, so I'm not worried.

It's that spot underneath his right eye. He wouldn't sit still for a picture.

Bacher out.

state parking it

2011-09-05T11:41:00.005-05:00

We went up north yesterday for a day trip to hike around in some woods and visit all the finery Duluth has to offer. It was pretty fun hiking around in the woods; the paths along the river are very hilly and actually look more like hiking than walking along a 10 foot wide grass path in the woods (like some of the other trails at the state park... but they're used for cross country skiing in the winter so they have different needs than the hilly trails).

The first orange leaves I've seen this fall! I was excited.

I was trying to figure out why there was blood by my temple; apparently I squashed and killed a mosquito and Andrew helped me get it out of my hair. Family grooming time!

Sam in the car on the way to the state park.

My tired puppy (from a different day).

Sam sitting on Andrew's lap. We think he had a stomachache from licking out the peanut butter jar this morning.

Fajitas from Friday night. We had a lot of peppers from the farmers market that were threatening to go bad, so fajitas seemed like a good idea.

Frittata for breakfast this morning - pretty good, but I threw in a bunch of veggies to use them up and it made it a super veggie frittata. I think next time I'll focus on less veggies but a stronger flavor combination (as opposed to everything but the kitchen sink).

The end. Bacher out.

great purge of 2011 update

2011-08-25T10:39:00.008-05:00

So I was purging things, specifically stuff in my fridge. Here's how it's going so far:

Half empty marinade bottles - two gone!

Mustard - one gone! Andrew just tossed it. Hopefully out of the recognition that it's crazy to have 4 different types of mustard in our small fridge. Or in any fridge.

Stir fry sauce - one gone! We've been having a lot of stir fry lately and it's been delicious. A little secret: add sesame oil when you cook the vegetables. Delicious.

Salad dressing - both gone! Although we'll be buying more Caesar dressing soon since that's the kind Andrew likes. I'm fine with mixing up balsamic vinegar, olive oil, and a little pepper on the spot for my salads.

Travel shampoo and soap - three gone! First I had to finish my own shampoo, but then I moved on to the little bottles.

Ok friends, I need some motivation. I have my half marathon training plan all figured out for the Monster Dash at the end of October. I'd been running away, hitting all my workouts for about five weeks and now... no motivation to run. My knees have been feeling a little sore/creaky lately and I don't know if that's a running injury or as a result of my stand-up desk at work (it's awesome; everyone should have one), but it's adding to making me not want to run at all. I went out yesterday and my knees were fine, but I don't know. Maybe actually registering for the race will give me the boost I need to get back in the game. Maybe my training plan was a bit too ambitious, ramping up the mileage too far out from the actual race for it to be sustainable for me. Either way, I need to get my head (and feet) back in the game and fast.

Since I know you missed it the last time I posted, here are more Sam pictures:

He was sitting on the couch and the pillow fell over on him and Sam just sat there. It was cute.

He's helping me blog again. What a nosy puppy.

My mom's coming today for the weekend! Maybe she'll help motivate me.

Bacher out.

recipe booking

2011-08-22T15:08:00.002-05:00

Ok, so I like cooking. I won't lie. I also find a lot of recipes online. I had this really bad habit of keeping a browser window open with tabs and tabs of recipes I wanted to try or keeping a post unread in my google reader until I could try it (or until it was in there too long and expired).

Recently I found this really cool website and have been using it to remind myself of all the recipes I want to make. When I find an interesting recipe, I bookmark/"pin" it and the website stores them by pictures, making it easy to browse and remember why I was interested in the first place. It's pretty cool.

Here are my two boards: Recipes to try and Recipes that rock (things I've already made and like)

Food pictures make me hungry.

Bacher out.

more food, more sam

2011-08-08T12:28:00.003-05:00

I used up one of those marinade bottles yesterday and made Baja Chipotle chicken. But we couldn't just eat chicken, could we? What to do, what to do... So I made some spanish rice, but after looking at the box in the store, decided I could make it just as well myself and do it without MSG and other unpronounceable ingredients.

I put brown rice, garlic, diced tomatoes, red pepper and onion, paprika and chili powder into my rice steamer and let it do its magic. I also cut up extra tortillas, baked them on my pizza stone and made chips. Finally, I sauteed green and red peppers, onions and garlic to put over the chicken along with some diced avocado.

Pretty delicious, if you ask Andrew. He was very vocal about his approval for the meal.

I was cleaning up some of my photo folders and found these, which I never posted. So, without further ado, some meals from a few months ago:

Homemade mashed potato pizza based on Pizza Luce's mashed potato pizza.

Walleye, I think? From my grandparents. It's over asparagus and seasoned with salt, pepper, Parmesan cheese and lemon.

Curried chicken with ginger and yogurt along with brown rice and homemade naan.

I felt like a genius and made naan on my pizza stone. It turned out better than when I'd tried it in a pan, leaving it not greasy and with just the right amount of air bubbles. I did the same pizza stone method for making the tortilla chips yesterday. Although I made the naan before we had Sam, so yesterday was a little more difficult to make sure he stayed away from the hot oven door.

Speaking of my puppy, here he is doing one of his favorite things:

Looking out the window.

And he also video chatted with Kari today (although she doesn't like the picture):

Good bye again.

the great purge of 2011

2011-08-06T10:56:00.006-05:00

Over the past few years, my mindset regarding "stuff" has shifted from having it - wanting things to be around in case I want to read/watch/use it - to one of not having. I use the library instead of buying books; I don't randomly buy DVDs anymore; most of the clothes I buy are thrifted and thus cheaper and one less thing for a landfill. I'm much more deliberate about what I buy in general - I'd rather spend money on good food (ingredients and meals) than another DVD I sorta like.

A few months ago and sporadically since then, Andrew and I have done some major spring cleaning and went through our closets, bookcases, dvds, cupboards and purged a TON of stuff. Clothes went to Goodwill (two garbage bags worth) and I FINALLY got rid of my favorite shirt from middle/high school - my 1997 Tator Trot shirt. Seriously, it had more holes than swiss cheese. All of our tupperware definitely has a matching lid now and I got serious about the "one in, one out" policy regarding wedding presents, since I don't need two 8x13 cake pans. We sold several bags worth of books and DVDs to a secondhand store and I have 5 or so books listed on Amazon, trying to sell them for more than the bookstore would buy them.

We cleaned the closet that weekend!

This picture is from yesterday, so the closet cleaning stuck pretty well over the past few months.

We got rid of enough books to clear off one whole shelf plus parts of others:

We also sold enough DVDs to have a whole shelf for game:

Yes, that is one of Sam's toys on the floor... a Target dog that he ripped the stuffing from its guts.

It's been really good to weed out our belongings and get rid of things I know we won't use. Now that we've gone most of our stuff, I'm now beginning to purge some other areas such as... the fridge!

We have 3 half bottles of meat marinade. I'm making meal plans that include using these up.

4 types of mustard! Andrew's responsible for this one since I hate mustard. He keeps bringing some home after his work camping trips.

Two identical bottles of stir-fry sauce. Seriously.

Two nearly empty bottles of salad dressing. I'd been making my own balsamic vinaigrette whenever I wanted dressing, so these got shoved to the back. I'm actively using them up now.

Other things to purge:

Hotel shampoo and soap. I've got a big bag of it and apart from maybe keeping a few bottles for traveling, I'm going to use them all up. I imagine this might take some time, since there's at least a few washings worth in each bottle.

Tea candles! We had a bunch of candles left over from our wedding, including some much larger ones. They were just sitting in the closet and I pulled them out during the original purge back in April. I've been using them up since then and I went through 6-8 of the larger candles and have now started on the tea candles.

Slowly but surely, I'm going to use up all of this extra stuff. It's not quite as fast as bringing it to Goodwill or a secondhand store, but it's much needed. Someday, I'll be able to store the ketchup in the fridge door.

Other things as of late...

I made some cake balls, but only had enough chocolate to cover a third of them. Oh well, they're still delicious.

Sam watching me cook. He often stands there and just watches. Sometimes he's a little further around the corner, just showing half his face. He's such a weirdo.

He likes to sit on people's laps. Regardless of where or how they are sitting.

We sit like this a lot. This was me last weekend after a 9 mile run. I was tired.

Sam before I started writing this post. He wanted to know what I was doing.

Ok. I'm done for today. I start a new job on Thursday. I'll tell you more later. Good bye.

i found this hilarious.

2011-07-29T20:52:00.001-05:00

Motherly disappointment

2011-07-08T18:16:00.000-05:00

My mother says I don't post enough.

Love,
Me.

sam 2.0

2011-05-03T09:46:00.001-05:00

Yup, that's our dog.

sam

2011-04-12T08:01:00.004-05:00

26 and counting

2011-02-11T12:01:00.003-06:00

The perfect birthday card from my mom:

Seriously, woman. Where's my damn pony?

thing i enjoy:

2011-01-31T19:09:00.006-06:00

Brinner.

Kari.

Kari thinking Mom doesn't wash clothes well enough and taking them from her.

Kari being the tallest person in 10 miles around (excluding me).

Kari speaking Spanish to every person she meets, including saying hello to the old ladies in the morning.

Kari pretending to be a shark.

Kari jumping in the pool (not as good as me).

Sitting on the beach with donkeys.

Mom teaching people the bunny hop.

Dogs.

Andrew.

Andrew and dogs.

The end.

just get up and dance

2011-01-21T10:52:00.002-06:00

"Nobody cares if you're not a good dancer. Just get up and dance. The same holds true for racing. Whether first or last, we all cross that same finish line. Just get out there and run."

-Dean Karnazes, Ultrarunner and best-selling author

sharing

2011-01-20T07:52:00.005-06:00

So... How you doin'?

Since Katie shared the books she's read, I will give you mine so far in 2011:

Born to Run, Christopher McDougall
American Wife, Curtis Sittenfeld
Ordinary, Extraordinary People, Condeleezza Rice
Decision Points, George W. Bush

It leans pretty heavily Republican with American Wife (fictional story based on Laura Bush's life), Condi and Bush's memoirs, but don't worry. I'm still liberally liberal. I set a goal of 75 books in 2011 and I started my 6th last night. On track!

Tomorrow, Mom, Harry and I leave for a trip to Honduras. We'll visit Kari, that one girl who is my sister. I fit everything I'm taking in one backpack. It's amazing. I'll share pictures once I get back.

I've recently been turned onto brussels sprouts, specifically their deliciousness when tossed in olive oil, salt and pepper and then roasted. I've always been a fan of sweet potato fries.

So good. For reals. I had a brussels sprouts craving the other day, which is on par with ridiculous. Andrew, after saying he didn't like brussels sprouts, apparently tried them for the first time and has grown to like them.

The only bad part about this situation?

Being forced to share.

the distance

2010-12-19T16:12:00.004-06:00

The distance in question is 13.1. Heck yes, half marathoning it. May 2011.

I'm also thinking this would be awesome, ala Duncan. Lady, come do the one in Minnesota. Or Wisconsin. I hope they take slow people, because I'm slow but I can jump over a fire.

My mail carrier has not been delivering some of my mail, specifically, important letters from my undergrad regarding my loans. So if that's not getting through, what else have I been missing? Way to go, postal service.

I had an epic Cookie Fail last Sunday. They went in like this:

And came out like this:

Don't know what happened... We ate them anyway.

everything is better with corn pt. 2

2010-12-11T18:24:00.003-06:00

Everything is better with corn.

So tasty.

There's been a massive blizzard today, biggest in 20 years or so. Minneapolis is going on 17 inches since it started last night.

Twitter and Facebook have been a source of some interesting names for the snowstorm: snOMG, Snowmaggedon, Blizzard People, snowly shit, etc. Nice work, world.

In this picture, there's two cars stuck turning/going down the cross street. People have been walking in the middle of the street since sidewalks haven't been shoveled.

The buses stopped running and they're advising no travel at all. Even the PLOWS haven't been running since there's so much snow. We stayed in today and watched some Buffy (thanks Katie!).

At least we have a good supply of corn.

revelation

2010-12-10T07:57:00.001-06:00

Everything is better with corn.

Andrew not caring about my brilliant revelation.

a bad day

2010-12-03T07:35:00.004-06:00

Yesterday I had a bad day at work (can we say interpersonal problems? Not with someone in my organization, but someone outside of it, which can be worse). I came home in a bummed out mood but the day was saved though strategic interventions!

First, DDPP! Dance Party always makes me feel better plus I'm one of those people who releases stress through bodily movement. You should have seen me Wednesday at the gym, annoyed from work and then a CNN interview was on about the Smithsonian censoring art. That made me angry even more and you could tell - my strides per minute went up by 20 or so!

After DDPP, I came home and Andrew made me some hot cocoa - with marshmallows, woot.

Even better - it was in my favorite coffee mug...

Star Wars! Princess Leia would know what to do with conflict-causers at work.

I was so hungry after DDPP that I cooked up some sweet potato fries.

So good! I forgot to flip them halfway through so only one side of the wedge got crispy, but it still tasted good.

Bad day saved by dancing, hot cocoa made by a fine gentleman, and yummy sweet potato fries.

thanksgiving

2010-11-27T20:25:00.001-06:00

I thought the breakfast potatoes I made last weekend were very colorful, so I had to take a picture. They're in our cast iron skillet, which for the most part, has been used to make breakfast potatoes.

Fall foods! Mmm, acorn squash and sweet potatoes.

My grandma while finishing cutting up the turkey or getting the stuffing ready. Something food related.

I was at a party last weekend and spent at least 30 minutes listening to other people talk about their dogs. And what classes they were going to put their dogs in for socializing. It was so boring! Am I really at the point in my life where I go to parties and people spend all their time talking about their dogs? I would never be one of those people.

... And then I went to Thanksgiving and spent the whole time taking pictures and videos of my brother's dog.

Oscar is so cute though! I like hearing about Oscar because I know him and his cuteness. Other dogs are weird, though.

Andrew and I set up our Christmas decorations! It took a time consuming 30 minutes, including rearranging the furniture.

Our tree is very red.

The end! Time to go to the gym. I am running and Andrew is swimming. I wish I had a swimsuit for lane swimming as opposed to going to the beach, but a new one is in the plan for some of my Christmas money.

honduras

2010-11-21T23:22:00.002-06:00

This is where I'm going when I visit Kari in Honduras in January. Yes!

the most lopsided haircut ever!

2010-11-14T16:45:00.005-06:00

Pictures! Huzzah!

These are the two pictures I took while camping before my camera battery died:

Get an idea of how cold it was? COLD! The temperature the first night was only 5 or 6 degrees warmer than it is now (33 now, 38 the first night. 48 most of Saturday). That's my extended family: Andrew, my mother-in-law, my brother-in-law, Andrew's two cousins (5 and 3) and his uncle. Andrew and I are planning a trip to the North Shore with some friends in February but this time we're going to go the cabin route. Maybe my battery won't die that weekend and I can actually show you something!

This week's recipes:

Autumn mac and cheese! It had butternut squash and apples roasted in it. My oven did something weird for the second half of the recipe; it was like it stopped heating. At least everything in the dish was pre-cooked. It just needed to congeal together for autumny goodness. See how there's still unmelted cheese on top?

I'm going to try it again at some point. I told Andrew today that I want to eat as much squash as possible before it goes out of season!

I made some venison and black bean chili with venison from my grandparents. It was just ok - maybe since I made some chili verde a few weeks that was utterly fantastic, every chili in comparison is a little lacking. This picture isn't particularly appetizing, but it was a good solid chili. I forgot to take a picture of it before eating!

I got a haircut last Friday that was a disaster! I had to go back and have the dude even it out for me since there was such a large chunk out of the right side. It was noticeably uneven. The end result ended up being shorter than I would have liked, but the good thing about short is that it'll aways grow out. It's much shorter on the sides than I've had it before, making it less of a bob. It's still pretty cute though. In this picture it's a little wet and unstyled after my post-workout shower.

All right, time to go and do some laundry. I just handwashed all my workout clothes and then realized I should have just thrown it in with all the rest of the laundry - oh well!

Before I go: Extra bonus points to the first person who can name the building in the painting on the right in my haircut picture!

here we go!

2010-11-04T21:54:00.003-05:00

Speaking of goal setting...

I'm kind of psyched to participate in Amanda's Holiday Bootie Buster Challenge at Run to the Finish. I've been reading her blog for a few months now and I've enjoyed reading her insights - plus who doesn't like her gratitude journal at the end of all her posts?

I've been on and off with the running for the past few months/weeks. I stopped working at the Y and my rental company's gym closed (rats!), it was too hot for me to run outside (lazy!), I get busy with work (excuses!), etc.

But if I really want to run the Cellcom half marathon in May, I need to start being consistent about building a base before starting increasing my distance. That goes back to tracking my workouts, making the time to get to the gym and sticking with my schedule. Earlier this week, Andrew and I went to the YWCA to redeem our year family membership that I won awhile back. I'm primed for committing to half marathon training - consistent access to a gym, a goal to work towards, a regular schedule I can plan around. I think the HBBC will be exactly the type of additional motivation I need to stay on track.

Mom - whatcha thinking? I bet I can get more points than you!

In the words of Mario... here we go!

80 book update - two months to go!

2010-11-01T17:54:00.003-05:00

60 book update! Well, I've bumped it up to 80 books in 2010. Here are the books from October:

65. The Ghost Map, Steven Johnson
66. Benjamin Franklin, Walter Isaacson
67. Salvation City, Sigrid Nunez
68. The Girl Who Played With Fire, Stieg Larsson
69. Dirty Sexy Politics, Meghan McCain
70. Every Last One, Anna Quindlen
71. Heat Wave, Richard Castle
72. Between Two Worlds, Roxana Saberi
73. Work Hard. Be Nice, Jay Mathews
74. Sex at Dawn, Christopher Ryan, Cacilda Jetha

I really liked The Ghost Map; it's a great nonfiction book about epidemiology and cholera. Makes those stories about cholera in Haiti seem even more pointless - we know how cholera spreads and how to survive it. The only reason people are dying is because of poverty. Plain and simple.

Also liked the Stieg Larsson books. I'm waiting on the last one... hopefully soon! I'm near the top on the waiting list. Every Last One was surprisingly good, also.

I actually really like the majority of the books I read last month. I won't say which one I liked the least because that would be singling it out. It'd be a hard pick; I really like most of them and was indifferent bordering on slight liking for the rest.

So I adjusted my goal from 60 books in 2010 to 80 (I hit 60 on August 31, fyi). I think I'm going to have to adjust it again, just to keep it realistic. I'm already halfway done with book 75, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks.

Or is it tracking now? Am I not motivated by a goal, but has the goal helped form a year-long habit? I mean, I've always been a big reader, but each year I read a little more than the year before. 2007 - 47; 2008 - 53; 2009 - 63; 2010 - upwards of 75. I'd say not being a student, riding the bus, and close proximity to a library have all contributed to this being a banner year in the 50 book challenge.

If only I had this kind of foresight and discipline in all my other goal setting...

north shore

2010-10-25T07:42:00.003-05:00

So we went camping this weekend. It was cold. It was see-your-breath cold. It was 4 layers, hats, gloves, running tights under the pants cold.

There was a good deal of fun, though. Lots of hiking and who knew that the North Shore had so many waterfalls? Not me.

My camera died after two pictures, but I managed to take some more with my phone. Here are some to start you off:

Off to water my plants... they look a little sad and lonely after a weekend away. They should get used to it - next weekend is Green Bay!

some blue sweatpants and a blue swimsuit top

2010-10-12T21:26:00.006-05:00

Let me tell you about the time I dressed as Princess Jasmine for Halloween, circa 1992...

something besides cooking

2010-10-10T10:38:00.006-05:00

Well, the Bittman is good. I had it delivered to my work (so we wouldn't have to pick it up from the post office). It arrived on a busy day and I put it on the open desk space next to mine so I could have more room. Then, about an hour after I came home from work, I sat up and said, "I left the cookbook at work!" Yup, after all my excitement about the cookbook, I left work without the package. I hadn't even opened it and it slipped my mind.

Andrew and I went back to get it, of course, and he got to see our new office space. Before, the office was a windowless cave in a business park. Now, it's a big, bright suite in a building with other social services. The difference is between night and day. I was only in the old office for a few weeks, but it was completely depressing.

The other night we had Amy, Drew, Eric and Nelson over for dinner. Nelson's birthday happened to be a few days earlier so I baked him an apple tart to celebrate (definitely not because we had a lot of apples from going apple picking. Definitely not).

Nelson had also run his first marathon the day before so he totally deserved a birthday tart.

In two weekends, Andrew and I are going camping with a bunch of his family members. I'm pretty excited, if only because it's been ages since I've gone camping.

This is our new tent, a wedding present from his parents. They also found a good price on a sleeping bag and some camping chairs so that gets to come camping with us too! We're going to a state park north of Duluth, which will make it my first trip through Duluth. The leaves will probably be off the trees by then, but it might still be pretty.

I've decided what I want to be for Halloween:

I've always wanted to be Princess Leia but for the past few years my hair hasn't been long enough. Since I've been poor and haven't had a hair cut in months, I'll hold out for a few more weeks in the name of Halloween. I think we might be going to Green Bay for Halloween, if only because the trick-or-treating is better.

I hate the Yankees.

This one's for my mom:

Time to read, put away laundry and dishes, sweep... basically return the apartment to a state of cleanliness. Bacher out!

nerdiness exposed

2010-09-26T22:15:00.004-05:00

So I've been thinking about this for awhile now...

but tonight I finally ordered Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything. Soooo excited. SO excited.

While downtown perusing today, I went into a bookstore and flipped through it for the first time. It's literally a thousand pages and I am going to gush over every one of them. Not only does the book have the basic way to cook a dish, it also suggests variations you can add. It does more than just give you the recipe - in a way, it teaches you how to cook in a manner where you can improvise and add your own ideas. I

How to Cook Everything was on our wedding registry but not purchased so I used one of our gift cards to order it online. I'm so psyched to start cooking from it. I made Andrew's birthday dinner of Chicken Parmesan from one of Bittman's recipes. All right, time to stop geeking out now.

Now a 60 book update... I made it past 60 books already! Goal completed! Since there's still a few months left in 2010, I'm altering my goal to 80 books. Right now I've read 64 so it's very do-able.

Here's the last few I finished. Bold are ones I particularly enjoyed:
51. Black is the New White, Paul Mooney
52. Where Men Win Glory, Jon Krakauer
53. So Sexy, So Soon, Diane Levin and Jean Kilbourne
54. Sherlock Holmes and the Rune Stone Mystery, Millett
55. Picking Cotton, Jennifer Thompson-Cannino, Ronald Cotton
56. What Einstein Told His Cook, Robert Wolke
57. Orange is the New Black, Piper Kerman
58. Denial, Jessica Stern
59. What Einstein Told His Cook 2, Robert Wolke
60. The Commitment, Dan Savage
61. The Lacuna, Barbara Kingsolver
62. Remarkable Creatures, Tracy Chevalier
63. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Stieg Larsson
64. Opening Skinner’s Box, Lauren Slater

Right now I'm on Paul Tough's Whatever It Takes about Geoffrey Canada and the Harlem Children's Zone, with Mary Karr's Lit and a book titled Lincoln's Melancholy checked out. Not to mention I still have 27 books on my library request list. Who else is psyched about Mark Twain's autobiography finally being released after 100 years? Or The Ghost Map on the discovery of the spread of cholera and germ theory? Or Meghan McCain's and Tim Gunn's new books?

God, I'm a nerd.

But I am serious about Mark Twain's autobiography. I bet it's going to be awesome.

adventures in cooking: failures

2010-09-26T11:33:00.006-05:00

I like cooking and baking. It's true. Contrary to popular opinion (or what I like to think is a popular opinion), I do not always succeed all of the time. Don't be shocked - it's true. Three examples for you:

Jucy Lucys

I have been trying on and off for over a year to make successful Jucy Lucys. Restaurant worthy Jucy Lucys. I've cooked them too long so all the cheese has already oozed out and then used a George Foreman grill that puts pressure on the burger so that the cheese oozes out. So I've been convinced that a grill pan will change the way I attempt to bungle a Jucy Lucy.

A grill pan! Jucy Lucys! Let's watch and see how I mess it up this time...

Aw, they come apart in the middle! I need to find some better strategy of putting the burgers together. I'll figure it out one of these days.

Next up: Homemade pizza.

But don't I make homemade pizza all the time? Yes. Yes, I do. One of Andrew's friends has coincidentally come over two nights in the last two weeks when I've made pizza and he's convinced it's the only thing we eat.

However, we received a pizza stone as a wedding present (remember all that packaging?) and went out and picked up a pizza peel with which to cook pizza. Friday we made a pizza on the peel, ready to put it in the oven on our new pizza stone and make some delicious pizza...

And it bombed. Bombed terribly. The pizza wouldn't slide off the peel but some of the toppings fell off into the oven. We had to move the pizza onto a pan, a pan I forgot to oil, making it difficult to serve the pizza. Disaster all around.

My Jackson Pollock pizza stone, stained for all eternity with the marks of my failure. I'm going to bake some bread today in an attempt to figure out the best way to work the pizza peel before trying pizza again.

And finally: Pumpkin bread.

The picture doesn't look terrible, but baking it was an ordeal. I mixed the ingredients together in the wrong order (I skimmed the recipe poorly, but in my defense I feel specific things could have been worded differently. Like when you say "mix together dry ingredients" but don't mean sugar, don't write "dry ingredients." Name them if you're not going to include all the dry ingredients listed at the top. But I digress). The cream cheese on the inside wasn't the right softness, making it difficult to spread on top of the batter. The recipe was for 3 mini-loaves and I only have one regular size bread pan so it overflowed on one side. I anticipated this though, and put a pan underneath the bread pan in the oven. It caught the overflow so I didn't have to clean out the oven afterwords - just pick up some of the pizza toppings that fell off that damn peel.

Oh well. I'm going to make granola today and I know that can redeem this weekend of horrible cooking and baking. We also have an acorn squash that's taunting me from the counter. That pumpkin bread recipe used up the last of the brown sugar so I wanted to buy more before eating it. If you're going to do it, might as well do it right.

So... new job: I am the corporate volunteer liaison for the reading program I served at last year. I'm digging it. I spent all Friday morning adapting a powerpoint to use with community volunteers and I felt like a champion. Technically my job is to coordinate volunteer opportunities for the various corporate donors of my program as well as support the current volunteer coordinators at our various sites around the state. I've only been doing it for two weeks, but I enjoy it so far. I miss the kids I worked with at the YWCA, but I'm going to volunteer there once a week - remind myself why I'm doing what I'm doing.

All right, time to go. I'm going for a walk and perusing some of the shops downtown - just looking for now until our finances aren't so touch and go. Picking up some flour and brown sugar for this afternoon's baking - things I know I can't mess up like hummus, salsa and granola. Maybe some Italian bread in an attempt to make the pizza peel love me.

Bacher out.

real adult

2010-09-14T20:12:00.004-05:00

Ok, so I like taking pictures of my food and posting it on here, but some of the blogs I read get a little extreme with the pictures. Seriously, I don't need to see 8 pictures of lettuce. And then washing lettuce. And then the lettuce in a bowl. You get my drift. Anyway.

I feel like a real adult today. I went to work, drank coffee, came home, went for a run and made dinner. Ok, dinner is still in the process since we made homemade pizza and that usually takes some time. Andrew just took it out of the oven and we're probably going to watch some TV on DVD - I'd tell you what it is but it's pretty nerdy and I'm not sure if I want to own up to it.

I'll fill you in on the new job near the end of the week - I've been training and first-day-ing so it's not really representative of the work I'm going to be doing. Don't you just love training meetings?!? Yes? No? Yes?

Pizza! Bacher out.

woo!

2010-09-11T11:20:00.000-05:00

More pictures!

Some homemade granola. I haven't done the math to figure out if making the granola at home saves money compared to the store-bought bulk granola.

We made stir-fry the other night. Here are all the ingredients pre-cooking.

In the pan.

And the final product. I made sure to keep the soy sauce light because I've been accused of dousing prior stir-fries in too much soy. I added my own after plating though.

A wedding present came in the mail the other day and I thought the level of packaging was ridiculous. Here's the first box it came in (paper towels for comparison):

And the second box inside the big box, filled with styrofoam peanuts:

And finally the present itself, a pizza stone (Thanks Sarah and Jean!). True, pizza stones are heavy but that biggest box was just overkill. Talk about unnecessary packaging, Amazon.

I start my new job on Monday - woo!

adventures in cooking: scones, english muffins, pesto and homemade pizza

2010-09-04T11:07:00.006-05:00

Yesterday I spent the afternoon baking and cooking all sorts of things. It was pretty relaxing; not to mention tasting all of my food was delicious.

First up: Lemon blueberry scones!

Andrew made me that latte with our new espresso machine. The scones turned out pretty delicious with one exception: they've got a bit of a salty aftertaste. Why? Oh, maybe because I put in two tsps instead of 1/2 tsp. Way to misread the recipe, me. After I realized what happened, I tried to dig some of the salt out and counteract it with sugar, but there's only so much you can do without starting all over again. All in all, pretty good with the exception of a bit of saltiness.

Next: English muffins!

I had made some of these last week and they turned out really well so I thought I'd try it again. Made for a yummy breakfast sandwich this morning. My only difficulty is transferring the muffin from the pan to the skillet without completely deflating the muffin. I'm trying to get better at that, but I can be clumsy.

Next: Pesto!

Used a bunch of our window sill basil for pesto, but substituted walnuts for pine nuts. You could definitely taste the difference. Jury's still out on if I like the walnuts better than pine nuts. One thing I did before putting everything in the food processor was bruise the basil leaves.

I put the basil leaves in a plastic bag and rolled/crunched over it with a glass (I don't have a rolling pin... sad). It's supposed to bring out the flavor and juices more than just cutting it up with food processor blades.

Finally: Homemade pizza!

We used the pesto as sauce on the pizza. It definitely added an extra zing! We also put Italian sausage, mushrooms, peppers, tomatoes and more basil leaves on as toppings. The pizza recipe is an old family one and usually it's just Italian sausage with a chunked tomato/basil sauce mix. We've been experimenting with extra toppings the more we make it.

See our new espresso machine and magnetic knife strip in the background? Woo! Love the knife strip.

Also, you should be proud that I was hands-off with assembling the pizza and let Andrew do it. I believe at one point someone got angry that I was making frequent suggestions and hovering and just let me do it. But she's in Honduras now. So there.

So good! We ate pizza and watched season 8 of Scrubs. I haven't seen too many of the episodes and as usual, I was laughing my ass off. It's by far one of my favorite TV shows. Always a solid choice, in my opinion. Anyway, there's leftovers so I know what I'm having for lunch - pizza!

Now time to go tackle that sink full of dishes. Pizza mess, you know.

reception!

2010-08-31T11:48:00.003-05:00

she is handsome she is pretty

2010-08-29T10:33:00.000-05:00

My favorite song from last weekend at Irish Fest in Milwaukee. Not my video.

this too shall pass

2010-08-27T10:01:00.004-05:00

I've mentioned before, but I love LOVE Ok Go. I love this video. I love pretty much any song that incorporates a marching band. Reading The AV Club's article on love-at-first-sight art made me think of Ok Go. One of Erich's friends bought their first album because he thought the cover art was cool (I'm not sure if he had heard of them or not... the cover art was the explanation I heard). Loved the it. Bought the second album for Kari for Christmas, but then realized I probably liked them more than she did. Not that she didn't like them, just that I anticipated she was a bigger fan than she actually was. Oops. I won't lie; that's what happened.

Also - The Jerk. I remember watching it when I was a kid and thinking it was so funny. I didn't see it again for years, partially out of the idea that it might not be as good as I remembered, that my memory built it up to epic proportions. When I finally did see it again a few years back, it lived up to my memory, which is saying something.

Hmmm, what else. Today is the reception for family and friends after our wedding earlier this summer. Everyone coming to one place just for Andrew and I. I have a love/hate relationship with being the center of attention. I really don't like blowing out candles while people watch me and sing Happy Birthday (or an equally appropriate song in the public domain). Opening presents at a wedding shower a few weeks ago was equally unnerving. But at the same time, I like parties, especially parties in my honor.

I should go wash dishes before my mom gets here. I don't want her to think that I actually use my kitchen. Use it a lot, by the pile of dishes in the sink.

twins game!!

2010-08-19T11:29:00.006-05:00

Last night we went to a Twins game for Andrew's birthday. Why, wasn't that in mid-July? You're right! I bought the tickets in June and then we had to wait nearly 10 weeks for the actual game. It was a pretty good game, though. Twins won 7-6, which is exciting.

We had pretty good seats, but I think people are right when they say there's not a bad seat in the place. We were actually a lot closer than the picture makes it look - I didn't have to zoom for this picture, if that makes a difference. We also were in a wheelchair row, which meant padded folding chairs. Not too shabby, actually. I get uncomfortable sitting in the same position all the time, so it was easy for me to wiggle around.

Also, Joe Mauer hit his first Target Field home run yesterday! I wore a Joe Mauer shirt because I would leave Andrew in a heart beat for him. And not just because he's a gazillionare - he looks good in a baseball uniform too, if you know what I mean.

The stadium has a pretty good view of the MPLS skyline. It's also close enough to our home that we were able to walk to the game.

I remembered my glasses so I could see the game! I kept squinting at the scoreboard and then realizing that I didn't have to - I couldn't see because I was squinting.

Hands down, my favorite part about the field. I LOVE this sign. If you can't tell what it is, it's two guys shaking hands over a river - Minne and Paul. The sign lights up for a strikeout or run too. I would not be opposed to getting some variation of this at some point in my life, either.

Hopefully we'll be able to make it to another game this season. It was really fun and I'm slowly becoming a bigger baseball fan. Andrew said we couldn't ask for Twins tickets or jerseys on our registry, which I think is bunk. Also, the local stations don't show the games - you have to have cable to watch 99% of Twins games. I even hooked up the TV converter box and pulled the bunny ears out of the closet! All for nothing.

my completely uninteresting story about magazines

2010-08-16T17:00:00.005-05:00

Awhile back I got "free" subscriptions to a running magazine and a bicycling magazine by registering for a race online. They were offered as an incentive for registering through that website, which meant 15 months of the magazines without paying for them. It was nice to get fun mail, not bills, plus they were interesting - I found a really great recipe in one of them; it was motivating when I was training for the Bellin, etc.

However, I checked my bank account today and saw that they automatically renewed for $39 and $32 each. Aw, hell no. I called up and canceled the biking one, since I'm not a huge biker. I was going to cancel the running magazine, then resubscribe through the cheaper deals they have online or as a tear out in the magazine. However, the automatic cancel system offered 6 months for $6, plus a refund of the $39. I'll pay $6 for the magazine - I like it and it really does get me out the door at least once after reading it.

Moral of the story: Check your bank accounts often and look for discounts.

Moral of the story 2: I'm utterly bor(ed)/(ing).

I'm also making bread that needs to rise for 6 hours between mixing and baking. 3 hours to go...

not even close to being the field of cornflowers at dusk

2010-08-14T19:02:00.003-05:00

SOMEBODY told me I should post more (mother!). I find this beautiful.

Litany
Billy Collins

You are the bread and the knife,
the crystal goblet and the wine.
You are the dew on the morning grass
and the burning wheel of the sun.
You are the white apron of the baker,
and the marsh birds suddenly in flight.

However, you are not the wind in the orchard,
the plums on the counter,
or the house of cards.
And you are certainly not the pine-scented air.
There is just no way that you are the pine-scented air.

It is possible that you are the fish under the bridge,
maybe even the pigeon on the general's head,
but you are not even close
to being the field of cornflowers at dusk.

And a quick look in the mirror will show
that you are neither the boots in the corner
nor the boat asleep in its boathouse.

It might interest you to know,
speaking of the plentiful imagery of the world,
that I am the sound of rain on the roof.

I also happen to be the shooting star,
the evening paper blowing down an alley
and the basket of chestnuts on the kitchen table.

I am also the moon in the trees
and the blind woman's tea cup.
But don't worry, I'm not the bread and the knife.
You are still the bread and the knife.
You will always be the bread and the knife,
not to mention the crystal goblet and--somehow--the wine.

food and a dog

2010-08-07T23:01:00.004-05:00

Dinner from the other night - kind of a "what do we have?" type meal. What was supposed to be tomato sauce ended up being tomato chunks, but that's ok. It's got fresh basil, chicken, broccoli, garlic, and onions (I know! Onions? I hate onions! But they're ok cooked in tomato sauce. Big pieces where I know I'm eating them).

Proof I am incapable of cooking a grilled cheese without burning it. Andrew will have to be the grilled cheese maker for the rest of our lives. Douse it in Franks!

My berry/OJ/banana smoothie to make myself feel better for burning the grilled cheese. We got a new blender/food processor (the Ninja Master Prep) from some of Andrew's relatives and have been making a lot of smoothies, you know, to test it out and make sure it's working. A good percentage of my food intake is smoothie-fied, if you must know. If you like fruit smoothies, put some OJ in it. It's delicious.

Oscar, Erich and KT's dog! He's cute and fun.

The sunset on the way home from a surprise party for my mom's 50th birthday (she's old!).

a little bit of everything

2010-08-02T16:18:00.011-05:00

So... I haven't written anything for awhile. Not because my life has been particularly exciting, because it hasn't. Well, maybe a little bit.

Scones with raisins and nuts.

Chocolate cheesecake for Andrew's birthday! It got a little cracked in the middle - I think if I had taken it out of the oven 3 minutes earlier it wouldn't have cracked... next time.

Chicken Parmesan (with window ledge basil) for Andrew's birthday dinner, recipe from Food Matters by Mark Bittman. We substituted eggplant for mushrooms.

My bruise from giving blood. Pictures are of Day 2 and Day 10. I had the bruise for two weeks, just disappearing before heading east for the JCLorst wedding.

We're not very coordinated. Also, Jake is a fight instigator while Rachel just wants to love.

And then Andrew's high school friends Ross and Linnea got married last weekend, which meant Andrew stood up in the wedding and got to dress classy-like. I enjoyed it.

They really liked those suspenders. I may or may not have encouraged some suspender-action. Your call. Also, I think that's a fantastic picture of Ross (red tie).

Window ledge basil and cilantro! It's doing pretty well in its present condition. I switch between worrying about over-watering and under-watering. They get plenty of sunlight and it's been so hot lately that I've been watering them daily to make sure they don't die. If they die, I can't eat them.

This little cilantro plant didn't turn out too well... I think too much sunlight/heat. Oh well, I can put something else in that pot.

The street broke open and gushed water last week. They're still fixing it (often loudly at 7 AM). There was literally a crack in the street and a bubble of water coming out of it. I don't know how it happened, but it flowed for 24 hours before the city had someone down there. You can see in the picture where the crack is - at a downward angle away from orange vested-dude where the water is shiny.

My DJ set from DDPP last week:

Kari - expect a CD with your package. It's sitting on my counter and I just have to write a letter, burn some CDs, find a present and then mail it. Also, I really wanted to buy a Toy Story 3 padded envelope to send to you, but I thought it might look too fun and someone would steal it.

I am on book 53 for the year, which makes me within sight of my 6o books goal. My last ten books have been Codex, Lev Grossman (Not as good as The Magicians - skip Codex); Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, Barbara Kingsolver (seasonal recipes!); Buying In, Rob Walker; God in the White House, Randall "what I like to call ..." Balmer; Pearl of China, Anchee Min (very good! couldn't get into her Madame Mao book though); Picking Bones From Ash, Marie Mutsuki Mockett (recommend it); Sherlock Holmes and the Red Demon, Larry Millett (Holmes in Minnesota - yes!); The Happiness Project, Gretchen Rubin (enjoyed it); Black is the New White, Paul Mooney (really funny. I want to see more of his stand-up now); Where Men Win Glory, Jon Krakauer (about Pat Tillman's life, death and ensuing military cover up).

Ok. I have to go buy some QTips. I ran out on Saturday and it's hard for me to do without them. They're one of the things I'd bring to a deserted island. Yesterday it was difficult for me to shower and then not QTip my ears. I can't go on like this much longer.

Bacher out.

from the children

2010-07-30T14:26:00.002-05:00

"My grandma treats Mommy like a child!"

"Oh really?"

"Yeah!"

"Who told you that?"

"Uh...."

Last day at the daycare today.

some stuff

2010-06-30T20:27:00.001-05:00

Hehe, we got married.

My windowsill basil tastes and smells delicious. Mmmmmmmm. After I touch it, my hands still smell like basil.

we dance

2010-06-20T16:52:00.001-05:00

We don’t have ideology; we don’t have theology; we dance.
-Shinto monk to Joseph Campbell

registry guilt

2010-06-15T20:12:00.004-05:00

Well, the Bellin Run this weekend happened as planned. I did not run as planned because apparently, my plans were off. Thank you, Nike+. That 6.5 mile run I did last week? 6 miles. Nike+ tracked my 10k at 7.6 miles. So my expectation of running a 10:30 pace? Based on inaccurate numbers. It just meant I had to readjust my expectations. I ran faster than I did last year by 2 minutes, but I still felt I could have done better. I think it's hard to do well when you're standing around for at least 45 minutes before your wave starts. Maybe I'd do better on another 10k.

Andrew and I are getting things ready for our wedding this weekend and the party in August. We had some extra time today before going to a work picnic, so we went to Target and started of thinking of things we'd like on the registry. There's somethings we know for sure (box set of Indiana Jones movies, magnetic knife stripe), but we (especially Andrew) feel conflicted about asking for a bunch of stuff. We already live together and have collected things like dishes, pots and pans, etc. We could register for nicer things, but as a whole, we have no real issue with the things we have. It seems wasteful to register for things we don't really need or would simply like to have because we have the option of having them. I'm surviving perfectly fine without an egg plate so far.

However, people like to bring gifts to weddings and we want to help people celebrate their excitement with us. People coming to the small wedding this weekend have already asked about what they can bring - both in terms of gifts as well as food.

I don't know. My non-materialistic side is brushing up against the idea of going into Target and pointing at stuff I want. Any suggestions for managing feelings of registry guilt?

EDIT:
Of course. As soon as I write out my registry guilt, I head over to A Practical Wedding and Meg offers her lovely, often incredibly useful, advice:

The registry is not about the wedding, the registry is about the marriage. For us, we hope that means a long life with a passel of kids, a ton of family gatherings, and lots of cooking. So for us, that’s what a registry is about – letting our friends and loved ones build that home for us. The registry is like a barn raising.

photos and the like

2010-06-09T20:45:00.003-05:00

View from the living room window looking towards downtown. If you stand on the street, you've got a great view of downtown.

Living room.

Kitchen, showing my favorite part of the apartment - the step up. Also the massive counterspace.

Living room from the entryway.

Bookcase next to the bathroom. YDS diploma.

Also - running the Bellin this Saturday. If last Saturday was anything like this Saturday, I'll be doing just fine.

eh. this is happening in my life.

2010-06-09T14:42:00.002-05:00

Getting married in 10 days. FYI.

New apartment. Pictures soon.

Winding down a year with the MRC. Hazy future, but not too worried yet.

edible future

2010-05-27T08:46:00.006-05:00

Few things:

Picking up keys to my new apartment with Andrew today. Woo hoo! Moving also. :(

Did terrible in my 5k race for work on Saturday. 37 minutes or so, slower than the last 5k I ran in November. It was hillier than I expected, but it was yesterday's run that confused me even more - 9:08 PR mile, 9:45 average pace and a 5k in 29:30 (PR). What? I felt great during my run yesterday, like I could keep going longer even. I suppose you can try to be as consistent as you can, but sometimes you have days like Saturday and sometimes you have days like yesterday.

Pictures of my growing food:

Basil sprouts, in need of repotting.

Cilantro sprouts. They came up, quite literally, Tuesday. All of them except that tall one in the back. I thought they weren't going to sprout and then they all did at once.

Hanging tomato plant.

My big asparagus plants. Going to have to replant them in the ground somewhere... Andrew said his dad might want them, which means he might share with us next spring. Yum.

purging

2010-05-23T13:25:00.004-05:00

Ugh. Today is one of those muggy sort of days. Not super hot, but just humid. I'm thinking of busting out my floor fan, if only so sleeping is actually possible.

Yesterday I helped Andrew's family move his uncle out of the house their family has lived in for 50 years. It's a pretty big house and his grandpa hoarded, meaning that there was a random assortment of plain old stuff - a puppet theater, a 30 year old air conditioner, an unopened box of drop ceiling tiles, 3 or 4 different garbage cans full of stuff, etc etc etc. Certainly makes me want to purge my belongings of things I don't use anymore so I don't have to move them to my new apartment next week.

It's also interesting to see how other families interact. Certainly events like holidays and birthdays, but also how decisions are made and the feel of things. Not necessarily good, bad or better, just different. Although it's made me realize that my family (brother and father in particular) move belongings at breakneck speed, like Genghis Khan's small, fast, effective armies. See: Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World by Jack Weatherford. God, I first read that book 7 years ago but it stuck with me.

Anyway. I'm going to go start my own purge which already includes nearly 2 garbage bags of clothes, 70 books and 15 movies. I tried to be realistic about books I'll read again and books I won't. I probably wasn't as realistic as I could be, but it's a good start. Especially staring down a potential future that doesn't include further research in religion (at least for the next 10 years). Also, will be keeping the book on Genghis Khan. I've read it since that first time 7 years ago so it's a keeper. Keep on the lookout for purged 4 year old homework and college yearbooks.

YDS graduation today - my favorite part of leaving the 'Have. Thinking of you.

anyway

2010-05-17T12:58:00.005-05:00

Last week I was kinda lazy. Between no work Monday, conference Tuesday, speaking at a panel at my undergrad on Thursday, I only ran on Wednesday and then only for a little bit. I could really tell I hadn't done much this week when I went out for a 5 mile run on Saturday. It was hot and I was trudging along, stopping once for water and again to motivate myself to keep it up. I ran around the lake by my house (3.2 miles) on Sunday and my 5k time was significantly slower than usual. Ah, oh well. It's a good lesson to learn, especially approaching the Bellin in 4 weeks. I'm also doing a 5k this Saturday with a team from work so I'd like to beat my last official 5k time from last fall (November - 36 minutes or so). Although that shouldn't be a big problem - even my slow, agonizing 5k yesterday was faster than that.

Andrew and I submitted our application for a new apartment this weekend - hopefully that'll work out and I have some place to live in two weeks. I started going through my belongings and weeding out things I don't read/wear/watch/use anymore and already I have a big, big pile. I was more stringent about getting rid of things this time around so I've got stacks of books, a pile of DVDs that both Andrew and I own and two grocery bags of clothes to pass on. I'm sure I'll find more things as the packing and organizing begins.

I've actually got some good job prospects out there for after I'm done in July (or earlier). It's kinda surprising to mention three different potential places of employment that are actually legitimate. I spoke at a panel of religion majors at my undergrad on Thursday about life-after-a-religion-major. I had a great time and it was nice to be back at Hamline again, sitting in a religion classroom. As someone a few years out of school who still doesn't know exactly what I want to do, I felt like my experience was important to share, especially to kids graduating from college. If I don't have it figured out, then they shouldn't feel pressured to either.

I guess I'm still trying to pull myself out of the mindset that there's ONE CAREER. One job/career that you have for your life. You get the same focus with wedding planning too - THE ONE, THE RING, THE DRESS. Not that I don't think Andrew's perfectly lovely and loveable and in love with him, but honestly, I can't buy into the idea that had we not met, I wouldn't have been able to find happiness because he's THE ONE for me. Like my ring and dress - they're A ring and A dress, things I like but it's not divinely ordained that I wear them. There are lots of options for me, both in terms of wedding apparel and careers.

Anyway.

This is awesome.

days like this

2010-05-01T15:38:00.001-05:00

numbers, data, numbers

2010-04-29T14:49:00.003-05:00

Some numbers for you:

22 (anticipated)/30 days I've either run, biked or dance partied in April
3.51 miles for the longest distance
255 minutes on a bike
30.68 miles run (plus another ~2.8 tomorrow)
6 weeks until the Bellin 10k
3rd month I've kept a training long (is it a routine yet?)

1/10 kids on target in picture naming in the fall
6/11 kids on target in picture naming in the spring*
5/11 kids near target in picture naming in the spring
0/11 kids far from target in picture naming in the spring

1/10 kids on target in rhyming in the fall
5/11 kids on target in rhyming in the spring
4/11 kids near target in rhyming in the spring
2/11 kids far from target in rhyming in the spring

2/10 kids on target in alliteration in the fall
4/11 kids on target in alliteration in the spring
3/11 kids near target in alliteration in the spring
3/11 kids far from target in alliteration in the spring

*Not all the same kids from fall to spring, but mostly the same. Some kids have left, some new kids started and some 3 year olds have moved up to the 4 year old room recently meaning there's nearly an 18 month age range in the room.

We've made gains in some areas and not in others (the ratios in letter naming remain the same from fall to spring but everyone has gone up at least a little). Some of the kid's scores have been predictable but some have been really suprisingly good. The kid that scored 12, 10, 11, 8 in monthly progress monitoring in picture naming went in and knocked out a 27 (26 is target). I think he just didn't like the controlled aspect of being timed, personally. I knew he could do it and it was irritating that the scores would have been off (used for indication of program's success). But they're not! We're almost done with testing so I should finish up today or tomorrow.

I'm also thinking of half-marathoning it in the fall. Good? Bad? I may want to see how the 10k training goes.

window box to fork

2010-04-19T18:51:00.005-05:00

Well, I don't have pictures of food for you today but something a little better... Food to be! Kari and I repotted some plants last weekend and picked up some seeds and bulbs/roots for planting.

First, my FAVORITE vegetable of all time:

Asparagus!

Kari got a package of asparagus roots that we planted in two different pots. They started out really small as just buds and already these are getting pretty big! They've only been planted for a week so that's huge growth. The package said not to eat the stalks the first season, so I'll get to enjoy some delicious homegrown asparagus next year, if all goes well.

I saw a squirrel checking out the asparagus yesterday and I'm not sure if squirrels eat asparagus, so I yelled "Oy!" to get it to move. I don't know if we'll have to cover the stalks at all to prevent munchers. EDIT: I just saw a squirrel jump down off the roof onto the balcony by the asparagus. The squirrel was eating a cookie, so I think the asparagus will be ok...

Next, our seed box:

Basil!

And my favorite seasoning of all time...

Cilantro! Grow little cilantro seed, grow! I want to eat you!

I'd love some more outside growing space, but we'll just have to wait to see what type of apartment into which I move. Lease is up at the end of May, so it'll be soon.

winners

2010-04-09T13:12:00.002-05:00

We run because it makes us feel like winners, no matter how slow or how fast we go.
-Florence Griffith Joyner and John Hanc, Running for Dummies

FloJo says I'm a winner. Woohoo! Yesterday during my run I tried to haul ass and go a faster pace for the last few laps, but my Nike+ says I was running slower than usual. I took an unusal break in the middle, so maybe that was it. I don't know. It was really frustrating because I kept trying to go faster and the Nike+ felt like it was off. I average about a 10:45 mile, including going faster and slower, but not by much. I'm usually between 10:30 and 11:15. Yesterday at one point, I had a 12:00 pace. What? For actually trying to run faster, it didn't recognize that at all.

I'm faster than I used to be a year ago, which is great. I've realized that running faster means I can cover a larger distance in the same amount of time. Logically makes sense, but it's nice to know I can bang out a two mile run in a bit over 20 minutes.

Here's my workout schedule from this week:
4/5 - run 20 minutes, weights
4/6 - run 27 minutes (2.55 miles)
4/7 - bike 30 minutes
4/8 - run 23 minutes (2.07 miles), weights, DDPP 80 minutes
4/9 - probably bike 30 minutes today

On Saturday, the suggested training has a 2 mile run, but I think I might try to do a 5k distance just to see what kind of time I'd get.

Um.... the end.

penne with asparagus and peppers

2010-04-07T20:29:00.005-05:00

So... the penne with asparagus and peppers was DELICIOUS. So good. I don't even think it was because I was more hungry than usual, just that it was, in fact, incredibly tasty.

Here's the recipe. I only added one red and one yellow pepper and I think two might be a pepper overhaul. Also, I sauteed them instead of charring, but I think I'm going to try charring next time. Just to see the variety in taste. We also didn't peel the asparagus, but c'est la vie. I substituted wheat penne as well, just because I like wheat penne.

Penne with Asparagus and Peppers
servings: 6
1 lb medium asparagus, peeled, tough ends removed and cut into 2" pieces
2 yellow bell peppers, charred, peeled and diced
2 red bell peppers, charred, peeled and diced
1 tsp minced garlic
1 1/2 cups chicken stock
1 tbsp kosher salt plus 1 tsp
3/4 lb penne
1 1/2 tbps minced fresh thyme (couldn't find fresh so used dried)
3/4 cup finely grated Parmigiano Reggiano cheese
2 tbps butter
1/8 tsp grounded black pepper

In a skillet over medium heat, boil asparagus in lightly salted water until it begins to soften, about one minute after the water boils. Drain. Add the peppers and garlic to the skillet and toss one minute. Add the chicken stock, bring to a boil and set aside. Bring six cups of water to a boil in a pot and add one tablespoon of salt. Add the pasta, cook to just before it reaches al dente, and drain. Return to the skillet to medium heat and add the cooked penne and fresh thyme. Stir and simmer five to seven minutes, or until the pasta is al dente. Mix in half the cheese plus the butter, and remaining salt and pepper. Transfer to a bowl and sprinkle with the remaining cheese.

via Bicycling May 2010

Mmm, so good. I also did a decent job of portions and making sure I payed attention to when I was getting full. I picked up Mindless Eating from the library today and it looks interesting. I feel like I've been eating way too fast lately, partially as a result of eating with 3-5 year olds for lunch. Between getting kids to taste the food they don't like and dodging sneezes that fling fish sticks in my face (for real - last week. So disgusted), I feel like I just wolf everything down so I'm ready when they're ready. It's nice to remember what it's like to eat with grown-ups.

I also opened up a bag of French Roast coffee from Alterra today and the beans are so shiny and delicious smelling... it's going to be a good morning tomorrow. Is tomorrow Thursday already? Maybe it's just today, but I'm ready for it to be the weekend again.

adventures in cooking: cherry pie

2010-04-03T19:01:00.005-05:00

I made cherry pie today. I haven't used the recipe before and I'm bringing it to Andrew's family's house for Easter dinner tomorrow. Let's hope it's as good as it looks and smells.

The recipe called for shortening, which I picked up at the store before realizing that shortening is just replacing the butter in a pie crust recipe. I've read Michael Pollen's books and think he makes lots of good points... but I haven't gone off the localvore deep end by any means. I have incorporated the "stay out of the middle of the grocery store" mantra to some extent and think that if you can eat Food A with a long list of unpronounceable ingredients in favor of eating Food B with less ingredients that are actually food, then eat Food B. So unfortunately for the Crisco I just bought, it probably won't be used again in lieu of butter. So apple pie crust recipe, you are my go-to pie crust recipe from now on. FYI.

This week: penne with asparagus and peppers ala Biking magazine. Is anyone else excited that it's asparagus season? <3

another list and other things

2010-03-21T11:16:00.007-05:00

60 books up to this point:

The Family, Jeff Sharlet
The Film Club, David Gilmour
Righteous, Lauren Sandler
Death in a Prarie House, William Drennan
Three Cups of Tea, Greg Mortonson and David Oliver Relin
In Tongues of the Dead, Brad Kelln
Manhunt, James Swanson
The Heroines, Eileen Favorite
Che’s Afterlife, Michael Casey
Slam, Nick Hornby
Things I’ve Learned From Women Who’ve Dumped Me
Her Fearful Symmetry, Audrey Niffenegger
The Hardest Questions Aren’t On The Test, Nathan
Brain Rules, John Medina
Team of Rivals, Doris Kerns Goodwin
Offbeat Bride, Ariel Meadow Stallings
Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell
Shakespeare Wrote For Money, Nick Hornby

I just finished book 18, which means I'm three books ahead of schedule of 5 per month. I really enjoyed Team of Rivals and provided a lot of details about what made Lincoln a great president. He was very gracious in dealing with people, even when they didn't deserve it. At the time, some would say to a fault, but usual it meant that people were very loyal to Lincoln when he needed it. Her Fearful Symmetry got a lot of press as Niffenegger's second novel after The Time Traveler's Wife, but I wasn't as grabbed by it as her first novel. It was an interesting concept, but I couldn't like her main characters. They were too whiny, too unbelievable. It was interesting, but I wouldn't read it again. The Heroines was also kind of annoying.

There haven't really been any fiction books this year that really grabbed me... Hopefully something good will come along soon. I've got Food Rules by Michael Pollen at the library for me right now with some others requested. I've been waiting for Barbara Kingsolver's The Lacuna for months now, along with The Magicians (Grossman), Juliet, Naked (Hornby), and The Abstinence Teacher (Perrotta).

As you can tell from book number 16, there may or may not be a wedding in my future. Well, there will be weddings (5 so far this summer. Seriously?) but I suppose my own is in the works. That's right, another one bites the dust. I mean... whoo hoo marriage? Marriage!

Ok, kidding. I'm pretty psyched about it. The engagement was in talks for awhile but then I kind of jumped the gun and proposed to him on the fly. I ambushed him at the door with a loaf of his grandmother's zucchini bread and asked him before he could get both his boots off.

The big bash will be next year sometime, either spring or fall. Yeah, we've got some concrete details down for sure. We've got to save up some money to get things in motion, but I also think it would be helpful to get an idea of how much we need to save also. Which means a guest list, an idea of where things will be, etc.

I don't know if you know this, but I'm a little bit Type A. Ok, more than a little bit. I'm a Type A in Type B clothes. I've slowly begun to realize it in the past few years, but it shouldn't have been any surprise... I mean, I wrote an 80 page paper in college for fun, went to grad school, organized massive community events on a weekly/monthly basis, serve as president of the leadership team where I currently work, etc. Andrew is considerably less Type A than I am, which is nice but I don't want to feel like I'm running things. I feel like my own personality type will feed into the myths about weddings and "brides" that I despise.

I really hate gender stereotyping and the wedding industry is plagued with it in the worst way. Example: We got our fingers sized at a jewelry store so we could order our rings online. I asked all the questions and did the majority of the talking, but upon leaving, the salesperson shook Andrew's hand and not mine because, of course, he's going to be bankrolling the ridiculous diamond bling (These are our rings, btw. No diamonds).

So while most people expect the lady to plan most or all of the wedding (and go crazy about it), I want ours to be planned with equal input and effort and a fair division of labor. This is where my Type A-ness will be difficult because at times I feel like if I don't do something myself, it won't be done right. Generally, not just in relation to this. Andrew's opinion is important to me so I don't want to steamroll him, but that's my general nature. He knows this already, so it's not like it's a surprise. We'll just have to be careful in navigating it.

I'm intriqued and appalled by the wedding industry in general but I feel like it's watching sausages being made. Except at the end you don't have sausages but a marriage. Maybe? Did that metaphor work? Cross out marriage and put wedding. Marriage will be good, wedding will be the sausage. Except I generally like weddings because there are open bars and dancing. Fine, no sausage metaphor.

I just sneezed 4 times in a row. Allergies? No!

Maybe I'll get my hair cut this afternoon. I've been needing it. I think I last got it cut in November.

Official training for the Belling begins next week. It'll be nice to have some kind of structure to my workouts.

Maybe I'll make something different for dinner tonight. Stop by the grocery store after the proposed haircut?

Time to go blow my nose. Bacher out.

accidentally training

2010-03-08T15:07:00.004-06:00

I've been planning on running the Bellin Run 10k for awhile now; I was tossing around the idea of entering a triathalon but I think I will have to save that for another year. I don't think I can financially afford all of the expenses/upgrades that I would need for that. I have a pair of running shoes, so I'm pretty sure I can swing the Bellin.

I accidentally ran it last year. When I say accidentally, I mean I started with the mindset that I'd run until I got tired, walk a little, then run the rest of the way. Well, I got to mile 4, was feeling good and just kept going. The last quarter mile was about the point my body rebelled against me; I puked during the last block of the race. After puking I kept running though, so whatever.

I mapped out my training for the next few months. I've been logging my exercising just for fun recently. I kind of like seeing it all written out like that. It's on a calendar I keep in a filing cabinet at work, which is where I usually work out. I like having April and May printed off already with my anticipated training written and highlighted. Of course, there's space for what I'll actually do too.

Here's my log from February and the first week of March:
2/2 - run 2 miles, weights
2/3 - run 1 mile, bike 28 minutes mid-high intensity
2/4 - DDPP 1 hour (Dance Dance Party Party)
2/7 - run 2 miles, bike 20 minutes mid intensity
2/8 - run 1 mile, bike 20 minutes
2/10 - run 1.5 miles
2/11 - DDPP 80 minutes
2/17 - bike 30 minutes low intensity
2/18 - bike 25 minutes low intensity
2/19 - run .5 miles, bike 20 minutes mid intensity
2/20 - run/walk 5 miles
2/23 - run 1.5 miles, weights
2/24 - bike 25 minutes
2/25 - bike 25 minutes
3/1 - run 1 mile, bike 30 minutes mid-high intensity
3/2 - bike 30 minutes mid intensity, weights
3/3 - run 1 mile, bike 30 minutes
3/4 - DDPP 60 minutes
3/5 - run .5 mile, bike 30 minutes
3/8 - run 20 minutes, weights

Can you tell when I felt a little sick this past month? (See 2/17 - 2/19) I've been working out pretty consistantly since mid January and I can tell a difference. I get lethargic in the afternoon if I don't exercise; my mind gets fuzzy and I'll waste time online without doing any work. Might as well be doing something productive with that time. My muscles feel stronger and more pronounced in places. I don't exercise with the intention of losing weight but to generally be healthier. I think it's working.

And now, some quotes from my kids:

D: I have to go to the dentist.
Me: Why?
D: I have a booger I have to get out.

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D: Your arm looks like a cookie.
(I have lots of freckles/birth marks on my arms)

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E: Clowns are disgusting because they chew with their mouths open.

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Words from the wise, friends.

dance magic dance

2010-03-07T15:38:00.001-06:00

I've not been in a writing mood lately. More to come at some point. Until then...

safely insane

2010-03-02T20:46:00.001-06:00

"Dreaming permits each and every one of us to be quietly and safely insane every night of our lives." - William Dement

via Brain Rules

good night, hot dog

2010-02-03T12:15:00.008-06:00

Things I really love about my kids:

When they're mad, the way they'll say "I don't like that!" to the kid who hurt their feelings, regardless of if they're paying attention

At nap time, I'll make them into hot dogs. Aka, have them lie on half the blanket and use the other half to fold them up (like a hot dog bun). Then I ask what they want on it and they'll say "mustard!" or "ketchup!" or something else. Some of the kids with big imaginations have been asking to be made into cars, police cars, castles, and popcorn. After I've covered them up, I'll say, "Good night, hot dog." It's suuuuper cute.

Sooooo many of the 3 year olds can identify letters - not just first letter of their name, but of their friend's names and my name and in general. It's really, really cool.

When a kid really enjoys a game, I try to make it a little bit harder each time. For some reason, they really like when I hide letters under little paper cups and they have to find them. You know, like in gambling or board walk games? With one boy, it moved from me writing the letters on a white board and him matching them, me saying the letters and him finding them, to him writing the letters and me finding them. I was very impressed and excited about his rapid movement in making the game more difficult for him.

One of the rooms I work in just got a new girl. I've only played literacy games with her a little bit, but I think she's ahead of the game in terms of letter knowledge. Very exciting!

The Boy Who Chooses Not To Talk said something yesterday! Not just said something, but responded to a question. His little brother came into the room for awhile and at one point was toddling off away from the adults. I wanted to call him back over so I asked The Boy what his brother's name was. Surprisingly, he answered. One of the teachers was talking about feelings and he nodded yes when asked if he was a little scared about talking again. I'm wondering if it might be useful to make something (jar, box, etc) that he can talk into to practice. I'll probably ask my co-worker (who has more experience in early childhood education) if she thinks it's a good idea or not. I just like the idea of practicing when no one can hear.

Things I don't like about my kids:

One of them gave me a cold. Jerk.

-----------

In other news, I was passed over by Teaching Program and am now looking into other ways to get my teaching license. My undergrad has a MA in Teaching program that might work, especially since I have all the content credits in English done already. I'm disappointed that I won't be in my own classroom in the fall, but we'll get there somehow. After sitting in on Sarah's classes last Friday, I'm fairly certain I want to teach high school. I suppose none of them will need to be tucked in and called hot dogs, though.

books and books

2010-01-25T19:06:00.004-06:00

Ugh, I just finished a TERRIBLE book. It was faux-Da Vinci Code in that it was a modern-day mystery novel set around a historical document or event. I won't lie; I enjoy them. Their attempts at historical/theological scholarship always start off about half-right but then the author just takes it to a new, completely hypothetical and 99% inaccurate place. The scholar in me hates that but the reader in me can gloss over it if the plot's good enough.

This book, however, was just terrible writing paired with a predictable and not-too-thrilling plot. Really? Running away to Canada is your exciting chase scene? It started off by being set at the Beinecke, Yale's Rare Book and Manuscript museum. It's a fantastic building with a warm sheen to it - the walls are made from 1 1/4" thick marble which allows for amazing lighting.

He didn't describe the building at all, which makes me even wonder if he went to New Haven at all. Argh, authors not doing their research!

Anyway. In Tongues of the Dead - Terrible. Don't even bother. At least I finished it, making it my 6th book of 2010. Next up is Manhunt: The 12-day Chase for Lincoln's Killer by James Swanson. The review I read said that it glorifies John Wilkes Booth, even comparing him to Jesus. Why, oh why do I do this to myself?

payment plans

2010-01-21T12:58:00.005-06:00

My morning:

A girl play acted talking on her phone. Not super unusual, but at one point she "got a call" from her husband. She looked at me and said, "Ugh, my husband is on the other line. Can you hold on for a second?" The girl then walked to a different part of the empty room and stood over there, having a pretend argument (with a lot of attitude) with her pretend husband. Sometimes the way children play astounds me. This is learned behavior and I'm saddened that a 4 year old thinks playing includes fighting with yoru husband on the phone. She also said something about someone being on the line for a payment plan. Kids don't make up these phrases by themselves; they learn them somewhere.

Some of my kids learned "holy shit." As in "Holy shit, I found a card!" I think it's pretty funny but obviously can't show them that. I just ignore it because making a big deal out of it will make it ... well, a big deal. But inwardly I giggle.

My boy who chooses not to speak at school mouthed the word "fall" while we were walking down the steps. I put rhyming words on the stairs so they can step on the rhyme and say it at the same time, which is good reinforcement. Then as we were walking down the hall, he said a few things (which, sadly, I couldn't quite make out) but I knew they were words. It figures he chooses to speak during times when it's loud and you can't quite hear him. He also mouthed "good night" to me as I was covering him up for nap. I'm so close to getting this kid to talk... just a little bit more. I think the biggest deterrant is the other teachers. They make a big deal out of it and send the kid back into his nonverbal shell. He's not going to start talking because he was harassed into it.

I've been doing round 2 of the official benchmarking for kindergarten. Over all the kids have made some great progress - 4 kids weren't getting rhyming enough to even be able to score on the rhyming test in the fall; now all of them have moved beyond that and one girl even scored on target for kindergarten (she moved from none to 12). Letter naming has generally gone up as well; one girl scored 20 in the fall and 10 in the winter, but I think it's not that she stopped learning, just that the test is boring her. We'll see how the rest of them go. I'd like to recommend some changes for the classroom I work in for the next few months, mostly in terms of letter knowledge.

I'm going to be busy for the next few weekends: Erich and Katie come to visit this weeked; I go to Green Bay next weekend; Mom and Harry visit the weekend after that for my birthday. There will probably be some pictures at some point in the future... or not. It'll just be pictures of food.

saturdays

2010-01-16T17:19:00.004-06:00

Somewhere outside my back window, someone is hacking and spitting. I can't see it but can distinctly hear it. Yuck.

This is what I did today and yesterday:

zucchini bread

white bread

yam crisps

salt and vinegar chips

Last week:

broccoli cheese soup

The white bread was a little dense, but I think I had problems with the ratio of liquid to dry ingredients. I'm going to try again soon. Also, I need to figure out how to get my potato slices uniformly thin for chips. Either they're too thick and don't cook all the way through or are too thin and burn. Argh.

Yesterday I had anti-bias training for work through the Anti-Defamation League. It was pretty interesting, but the worst part about diversity training is that the people who participate the least or who dislike it are those who need it the most. People committed to creating and maintaining inclusive atmospheres (in all aspects of life, not just early childhood education) usually are the ones who speak up and offer constructive ways to make classrooms welcoming. Maybe I'm just sick of people who treat other people's work (and presentations) as a joke, boring, annoying, etc.

The other thing was that as MRC members, some of us have very little power over the classroom space. Or we try to do something but aren't understood by our co-workers who haven't received the same training or focus that we have. It often makes our work harder.

Roller derby tonight. I hope people come and bring books.

round and around and up and down

2010-01-10T16:18:00.005-06:00

Today I cleaned the apartment and had to take the trash out. I don't know if you remember my back steps, but this is what they look like.

Imagine that covered in 6 inches of snow, all of which needed to be brushed off in order to even attempt going down the ice-covered steps. When I say ice covered, I mean an inch of rounded ice on every step, bubbling up to fit into the arches of my feet. At the bottom is a van parked a foot away from the last step, meaning that when one walks down the steps with a trash bag, one has to either fall off the steps to the right in the direction of the snow pile or one has to use the van to steady themselves to avoid falling into the snow pile. It is not the easiest thing in the world, taking out the trash in the winter. I suppose I could do what my neighbors do - pile it up outside on the porch next to the back door.

Today I am making broccoli cheese soup from this recipe. I'll let you know how it goes. I've been briefly thinking about seeing if we want to do a MRC cookbook for a social events project.

I wish I knew grammar better.

Sometimes we forget about the painful things in our lives until they ambush us suddenly, unexpectedly. It's like they sense we're doing ok and come back to haunt us.

The most played song on my iTunes is Chubby Checker's "Let's Twist Again" from the Mad Men soundtrack.

Andrew made fun of me because I finally put a picture of us in a frame on my desk. Whatever, he's got a beard.

I had two dreams last night, one that this guy was chasing me and someone else around my dad's house, first just scarily and then with a giant butcher knife. I was hiding in my dad's closet behind all the clothes and shoes (where my mom used to hide christmas presents when we were growing up) and then I decided it'd be better to get into the bathroom and lock the door, but just as I went there he ran around the corner with the butcher knife and stabbed me. I woke up before he stabbed me, though. Then I dreamed that the Catholic House was a cabin in the woods and we all lived in one big room with cots lined up next to one another. It was morning and a bunch of us were just sitting in our beds under the covers talking. My cot was next to Josh's. On the opposite wall was big windows looking out into the woods and it was probably November since there weren't any leaves on the trees but no snow. There was also a big screen tv on the wall that we could watch. For some reason, we also were rounding up Santa Clauses and keeping them in a waist high pen out in the yard, which is illogical since they could easily get out. It was like a deer pen, really. We also went to a museum with Bill Murray.

It always seems that whenever I have a scary dream, no one is there to comfort me. Stupid boyfriend visiting his parents. I suppose that's why I conjured up my Catholic House to make me feel better. And it did.

Last week sometime I also had a dream I lost my running shoes after a race. I looked all around, outside where I took them off where the race ended and inside of the restaurant serving post-race food. Eventually I found them with a bunch of other shoes and race stuff outside the bathrooms.

Honestly, I swear my subconscious just does what it wants.

50/60 books update

2010-01-06T20:44:00.004-06:00

I suppose since it's a new year, I should let everyone (heeey Mom) know how the 50 book project went. Every year I track how many books I read cover to cover and aim to read at least 50. In 2007 the first year I attempted, I fell short by 3 books. In 2008, I read 53 books. In 2009, I read 63 books, my most yet. Here's some numbers on the books for you:

July had the most books with 10
February had the least books with 0, followed by December at 2
74% of the books were read after graduating from YDS
6 books were for academic purposes
9 books on teaching
39 books by women
17 books on feminist/GLBTQ topics or themes
11 books on religion
7 books on race
18,109 pages read

Some recommendations from the year:

Speaking of Faith, Krista Tippett
The Plague of Doves, Louise Erdrich
Loving Frank, Nancy Horan
The Unit, Ninni Holmqvist
A Map of the World, Jane Hamilton

I'd be hard pressed to choose between Loving Frank and The Unit as the favorite for the year. I can't tell you how many times I've referenced Loving Frank (about Frank Lloyd Wright and Mamah Borthwick) in passing conversation, usually ending with "and then they were ax-murdered and the house was set on fire."

For 2010, I've upped my goal to 60. Although I reached that number this year, I was unemployed for several months and went through a lot of books this fall. Although 50 is still ambitious, I would like to continually challenge myself. I'm not sure what the rest of the year looks like, but I'd like to attempt 60 anyway. I've already finished one book - The Family, by Jeff Sharlet.

I'm also contemplating other goals I'd like to achieve this year, but I'm not quite ready to share them yet. It depends on waiting for other people to make decisions about my career. Two weeks from tomorrow!

2009 in photos

2009-12-31T16:18:00.005-06:00

In years past, I've done my pictures by month. Some months have been picture-light and some picture-heavy, so these are just a random sampling. They are arranged (mostly, to my best knowledge) chronologically.

24th birthday

Ran my first 5k.

Ate a big 3lb chocolate bar with friends. And pretended to be Jesus.

Nat got married!

Lived with goofballs.

Got my master's.

Ran my first 10k in my hometown. I showed you, high school gym teachers.

Slow-danced with Jake.

Went to Irish Fest (again).

Baked a lot. Actually, the fall pictures are pretty light and mostly of food.

Went to New Haven for Halloween and dressed up like Lisa.

Had Christmas.

I'd have included pictures of my students, but that's against so many policies I don't even want to test it. They are super fun and make it easy it get up in the morning, however.

2009, good riddance. 2010, bring it on.

4 year old land

2009-12-17T13:50:00.001-06:00

Me: On a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being the best movie ever and 1 being the worst, where would you put The Princess and The Frog?
Annabelle: In my pocket!

Me: What's your favorite type of meat?
Dana: Marshmallows!

beer and sex dishes

2009-12-15T21:19:00.003-06:00

It is December and that means finals. There are endless facebook updates on the status of one's semester, including pages written, pages to go, tests down, etc. Kari had her last day of classes today and has been writing papers upstairs. And for the first time in six years, I haven't a thing to do with it. I guess you could even say 18 years.

It's a little weird. Somewhat relieving, but at the same time, I miss it.

Well, let me clarify. I don't miss the stress of schoolwork. I do miss having something to do on Sunday afternoons. Do you know how much time I wasted on the internet this weekend? A LOT. At least before I knew I had something else I should be doing.

I miss academic rigor. I miss having a thoughtful debate with someone on a regular basis, even if that someone is speaking through the pages of a book. I miss coming up with original arguments and thinking about it enough to argue persuasively one way or the other. And as nice as it has been, I even miss reading with a pencil in my hand.

My brain needed the break. I needed time to extract myself from academia and now, I realize that I just want to spend my days in a classroom. I suppose that's why I'm aiming to teach middle and high school as opposed to the PreK kids I have now (which I love). They're really great and fun, but maybe I need to be challenged right along with my students. Sorry, but I'm not challenged over the difference between a peach and an apple. Critically analyzing material with a group of people is something I really enjoy, oddly enough.

I also miss writing about film. I suppose I have to figure how to include that stimuli in my future careers. I just need to find time and motivation besides my longing, I suppose.

Today in PreK world: We read Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs yesterday. Today I wrote a mad libs about my kids which included food raining from the sky. They liked it, especially when it ends up snowing turkey ears. Tomorrow we're drawing pictures of our stories.

When I asked a girl to name a type of liquid or drink, she said, "Beer."
I rephrased, "What's your favorite thing to drink?"
She thought a second, then said, "Beer."
"Something else," I asked.
"Juice!"

Finally.

I also started assisting in a ESL class at the learning center down the street from the Y. Tuesdays I assist in an intermediate class and Wednesdays I'll be leading a conversation class. More on that later, but today in the intermediate class we talked about food. To the question "How many vegetarian dishes are there on the menu?," one student answered, "sex dishes" (six dishes). Not the usual answer I'd get from my PreK kids, but after the beer this morning .... maybe not.

my children

2009-12-09T13:42:00.002-06:00

A bit from my 4 year old co-workers:

David*: I watched a movie and a boy got a BB gun for Christmas!
Me: Did he shoot his eye out?
David stares at me for 10 seconds, then: How did you KNOW that?!?

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Eliza*: Did you know that George Washington was a friendly ghost?
Me: Oh, really?
Eliza: A friendly ghost who teaches kids how to color!

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Jason*: How do I look today? (strikes a pose)
Me: Good.
Jason: Cool?
Sara*: Handsome.
(Jason wiggles about)

*Instead of calling them random child, I'm starting to use psuedonyms. I only work with so many kids and sometimes the same kid says funny stuff repeatedly.

bulletpoints on my life

2009-12-06T19:45:00.003-06:00

Brief notes:

It is December. How did that happen?
Someone called me their fearless leader in an email recently. I suppose it's true.
Although my day-to-day activities and demeanor was good to fun, 2009 as a whole was stupid. I officially declare it to be 2010 and to leave this decade, and in particular this year, behind.
Sometimes I worry I get in over my head in commitments. Not that I'm feeling particularly stressed at the moment, but I list my activities and wonder if I'm doing too much. Or if I'm not giving my all to what I'm doing. But I feel like I am giving my best and that it's not too much, so who knows.
Natalie might visit next weekend!
My interview with Prestigious Teaching Program went very well. Suprisingly well. Shockingly well. Unexpectedly well. An unprecedented little to no awkwardness. A good sign or is it throwing me off my game?
Most of my kids made minimal to large gains in their targeted literacy skills this month. Whoo hoo! Some tested lower than what they did at the beginning of the year. Not sure what's up there. Was the first test particularly good? Is this one particularly bad? I think one of them has come to associate doing anything with me as not fun and always complains about playing games with me. Fine, kid. Don't learn how to read then.
Just kidding. I've got to figure out how to reach him.

who i am and what i need

2009-11-26T11:42:00.001-06:00

I enjoy these. Especially this one:

…who I am, and what I need, these are things I have to find out myself.
—Chinua Achebe, writer

Also, yesterday I hula-hooped for longer than I had in probably 15 years. It was fun.

my cloud of thoughts

2009-11-15T21:17:00.003-06:00

From time to time, I space out and look at the Facebook page of people from high school. Mostly people I know peripherally but those who have gotten married, had babies and/or bought houses.

I'm still really wary and a little judgmental of them, especially of their mass photo postings (but that's another issue with oversharing all together). I don't know; it's just such a foreign idea to me. But then at the same time, there are people much closer to me making the same decisions and yet I'm ok with that. Maybe it's because I know them well enough to approve of their choices. Or to know that even if it's not something I want now, it's something good for them.

I suppose it's no surprise that I fall into another Facebook baby photo-ing the day I make my first student loan payment. I had to dig through the pile of crap in my corner and move my Yale diploma to reach my shoebox of loan statements.

Seriously, my Yale diploma is literally sitting in the corner gathering dust.

In other worlds, I'm organizing a 5k run for the spring. I suppose I wouldn't be able to do that without my YDS experiences, so maybe that diploma isn't just gathering dust. Tomorrow I'm scheduling my interview with a well-known teaching program, a program I wouldn't be interested in and probably not a good candidate for without YDS and its influence.

I guess my point is that I would not have guessed this is where I'd be five years ago.

I still feel like I'm in a point of transition, but a very slooooooow transition, one fraught with stresses of making ends meet and making sure my kids are prepared for kindergarten. It's a carefully constructed transition. It's precise. It's stagnant yet always moving. Slow enough that I'm beginning to feel comfortable in the changing, yet antsy for rapid change. At the same time, it's already November and I don't know if my kids know anything more than they did at the beginning of the year.

Does any of this make sense?

Here's what I'm trying to say: From the briefest glimpse at lives long lost and removed from my own, it looks like people have their "stuff" together, whatever that "stuff" may be. And I still feel adrift at sea, trying to find my bearings while feeling the need to justify an experience that fundamentally changed me yet has produced little outside materialization of that.

I know pictures lie and life is endlessly complicated for everyone. And yet, it just looks so simple and wrapped up neatly with a bow in ways that my messy and in-need-of-explanation life cannot. And those closest to me making those same decisions also have explanation-worthy lives because I've heard and lived through the explanations. So it's ok.

Does any of this make sense?

feeling good

2009-11-14T16:36:00.002-06:00

They played this last night at the one year anniversary of Dance Party.

Weekends are now when I get to wear clothes with holes in them. I also wear sweaters to work. I also have my first loan payment due in a few days. My, aren't we growing up fast.

my weekend in pictures and me yelling at a woman on the street

2009-11-08T20:29:00.004-06:00

Some of the events of the weekend:

Saturday night I went to sleep at 9:30, woke up when the neighbors went to the bar, woke up when they came back from the bar, considered yelling at them and/or calling in a noise complaint, lay in bed angry and pissed off but doing nothing until they went inside and I eventually fell asleep. In other news, I turned 90.

5k! I kept up with the pace of the race I ran on October, which is good. It was a small race, which means that I came in last. I am a-ok with this because it wasn't like I was super slow... I was just the slowest of the runners. I'm comfortable enough with myself and my running that it doesn't matter to me.

Pumpkin pie! Homemade crust and filler. Yum.

I had leftover pumpkin mash from the pie, thus ... Pumpkin bread!

Homemade pumpkin pie and bread means ... Pumpkin seeds!

An angry and hesitant shared picture of tortilla soup!

Kari and I were walking back from the bus and a woman came riding up on her bike beside us, talking about how crappy men are and how unlucky in love she is. We mumbled in agreement, etc, and thought we left her behind us. Then she rode up again and started talking about how men are wusses and pansies and girls when they don't do their "job" (whatever that is). I told her I didn't appreciate her comparing weak men to women, saying that it put women in a hierarchy under men. Well, I said it less academically. Eventually we ended up shouting and she called us lesbians, and then somehow I ended up yelling across the SA gas area, "'Man up' is not an acceptable term!" At that point, I became the yelling lady and the circle was complete. The student became the teacher.

Honestly, I started talking back to her because I've had enough with people not living their beliefs. I believe in gender equality, even - especially - in language. How we speak and the words and idioms we use reveals our inner biases and beliefs. Inclusive language in church is another fine example of this exact thing. All in all, I just didn't want to think later, "Why didn't I say anything?" Casual sexism is sexism is sexism.

The End! Now off to take a pumpkin mush bath with my pumpkin shampoo...

the happy couple

2009-11-03T07:03:00.004-06:00

In the morning when I choose to get dressed, sometimes I consider dressing nicer so I can go straight from one job to the other. The unfortunate side effect is that sometimes I go to work at the restaurant with bits of child drool and marker on my clothes. Otherwise it's worked out ok.

I've been fast-tracked for an in-person interview with Teach For America. More to come closer to December, but it's exciting news.

The happy couple and the happy couple.

people are hungry

2009-10-26T22:12:00.004-05:00

I'm tired of people spending ridiculous amounts of money on non-essentials. I'm looking at you, 100k wedding and $700 shoes.

There are people who cannot afford food or shelter. Where are our priorities?

The things we could fix and the people we could feed if we stopped being so self-centered. I'm guilty of it too.

We've got to get past it, though. People are hungry.

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More on my life later.

comfortable

2009-10-13T20:52:00.003-05:00

I did adult things today. I got to work at 8, worked all day, went to the library over lunch and finished a book I was reading, worked till 5 and then worked out until 6, bought apples, peppers, peanuts, and an acorn squash from the farmer's market, and then took the bus home.

I'm slowly beginning to adjust to life outside of school, especially an "adult" existence past the three summer months I'm used to. All of my 9-5 jobs before have been summer long, so we'll see how it goes past 90 days. I was reading up on some leadership trainings and one of them talked about a 100 day performance review. I mean, the media focuses on a president's first 100 days in office, so why shouldn't we also? I know some jobs have 90 day performance reviews, but mine really doesn't. We're just starting to evaluate the kids and figure out who/what we need to target, so it's still somewhat of a transitional time. However, that doesn't mean we shouldn't see where we're weakest and try and make that a stronger area.

Anyway. I feel old, but in an ok way. A way with which I'm comfortable.

Also - two posts in one day! How bizarre.

jake's honey

2009-10-13T07:02:00.005-05:00

The sun is rising over the trees out my tiny, tiny window. It'd be pretty if I could see it better... well, I suppose it is pretty.

I ran the Historic Riverfront 5k this weekend, took two minutes off my 5k split time from the Bellin and 1 minute off my pace. I suppose my Bellin time isn't totally accurate of what I could do at the beginning of the summer because I was running a 10k and saved some of my energy for the second half - but it's still not bad. Go me!

For breakfast I'm eating oatmeal with honey from Jake's farm plus a cup of Alterra Sumatra coffee. Yum.

It's IDGI testing this week on my preschoolers. There seems to be no middle ground in the kid's results. They're either already on target/way past target or testing so low I can't even administer the test and count those scores. We assess kids with things like rhyming (pointing to pictures that rhyme), letter naming, picture naming, alliteration (pointing to pictures that start with the same letter) and letter sounds. At least now I know who to work with, what to do, etc. There's another testing period in the winter, so we'll see how it goes.

No pies as of lately, but I'm making one for MSD weekend. That's Mother, Sister, Daughter weekend for those of you out of the know. I've missed it two years running, but I'm back! Woo!

apples and overshare

2009-10-06T19:09:00.006-05:00

I love fall. It's probably one of my top 4 favorite seasons. I love crisp air, apples, pumpkins, pies of each variety, scarves, and the not hot, not cold weather.

What I don't love is pictures of random people from my past on Facebook, nuzzled against each other with a bushel of apples. Seriously? Maybe I'm just getting to the point where I don't feel like oversharing online (says the woman writing a blog), but that picture was just ridiculous. I considered posting it here with the faces marked out, but I restrained myself.

Instead, I'll post pictures of the apple pie I made from scratch a few weeks ago:

Notice I didn't feel compelled to cuddle with anything while making these pies, nor to take pictures of it and post it up in a disgusting manner.

Obviously the only thing I love here is cooking and pie, not exhibitionism.

dirt everywhere

2009-09-25T20:26:00.006-05:00

Rachel says I write too infrequently. Here's another post to appease her.

I went to a MRC training in St. Paul today, not too far from Andrew's place. It was easier to stay overnight there and bike the two miles from his place as opposed to get up early and bus for an hour. I didn't think to check the weather forecast, but when I left the training at 3:45, everything was wet and still a little misty. I thought about taking the bus home, but I thought I'd give it a shot. I hadn't biked to work the two days before and missed Dance Party yesterday, so I felt kinda shitty and lethargic since I hadn't gotten physical activity.

I got so wet and so dirty on the 9 mile bike ride home, but it was really really really really fun. I sped past blocks and blocks of cars on Snelling waiting to get on 94, flew down the giant hill on Marshall and sped over the Mississippi into Minneapolis, and stopped on the Greenway bridge to snap this picture:

And these of my dirty legs:

It was a good rainy Friday afternoon.

Also, I love American Routes. It makes working at 8 am Sundays totally worth it. That is all.

bigger mustache

2009-09-23T21:01:00.002-05:00

I'm scheming again.

I think I would like to have a secondary teaching license. The question now is how to go about obtaining one. Some potential options include Teach for America, St. Paul or Milwaukee Teaching Fellows, a MA in Education/licensing from Hamline or the U, pushing down a current teacher in a high school parking lot and stealing theirs, etc. The "earn while you teach" programs of TFA or SPTF/MTF are pretty competitive, but it'd get me in a classroom the quickest and on my way to having a full teaching license.

It wasn't too long ago that I was regularly sending out resumes so it seems a bit weird to be applying for programs just a month into my current one. I'm enjoying what I'm doing; it's just that PreK isn't my ideal age group. The kids are incredibly fun, but I would really love to work with high school or middle school age.

However, Bill Cosby was right - kids DO say the darndest things:

"My mom's boyfriend is Michael Jackson."
"What do YOU know about Star Wars? I want to be Luke Skywalker!" "I want to be Darth Vaber!" "YOU'RE MY DAD! I'm going to chop your head off!"
"You look like my dad except he has a bigger mustache."

things i like:

2009-09-15T17:02:00.002-05:00

Things I like:

-the Greenway around 4:45 or 5:00. I bike home facing west, the setting sun in my face while people whiz past in either direction.

-sweet corn from the farmer's market. Recipes in local magazines on organic food.

-reading books about apple orchards, knowing we're going to take the kids to one in a few weeks. Trying to reinforce the vocab of apples, apple orchard, applesauce, picking an apple so they can use it when we go.

-frequent flier miles. I'm going to New Haven in October with mine.

-homemade sun dried tomatoes. Took 7+ hours in the oven, but they're delicious.

-60 cent gelato.

things of note:

2009-08-29T16:43:00.003-05:00

1. The kids at my work LOVE Michael Jackson.
2. I had a dream last night that I was wearing clerical garb, but in my dream I also made sure to note that I was "just a deacon."
3. I look like a Target employee in my red MRC polo.
4. We went to the Humane Society to look at cats today. I still want one.