We Hate Snow :(

I got fed up with the puppy trying to eat the Christmas tree and I was feeling kind of grumpy so I took down all the Christmas decorations and the tree. It's nice to have all that space back. 

Puppy training is going slow. Yesterday she didn't have any accidents in the house all day. Today she's had three. It doesn't help that when we take her outside, the neighbor's cat feels the need to come bother us. And apparently she also has a dog, which she left outside yesterday, not on a leash. 

I tried putting her on her leash and walking her to the mailbox this morning. She is apparently terrified of all cars, not just the one she's riding in. A car drove by and she freaked out. So I had to carry her to the mailbox. I did get her to walk back, sort of. 

Later it started raining, so she didn't want to go in the yard to go potty. As the day went on, rain turned into sleet, sleet turned into snow. Right now she's sleeping. I'm watching tv. Waiting for Chris to get home. 

Puppy training is exhausting. Lucky for her, she's adorable:

The Inevitable: Christmas Recap

I suppose it's time to do a "Christmas Recap" for you all. I didn't take many pictures though. Except for puppy. We took her picture lots.

On Christmas Eve we went to my parents house. I dropped Copper off to stay with my mom while my sister, my dad, my grandparents and I went to church. I always say Christmas Eve mass is my favorite. Until I get there and realize it's full of screaming babies and sick people who don't cover their mouths when they sneeze or cough and then try to shake your hand. Ugh. It's kinda hard to concentrate on what's going on during mass when you can barely hear over all the babies and sick people. And I got stuck sitting behind the tallest people there, so I couldn't really see either. Did I mention it was packed? No fun.

Once church was finally over we went back to my parents house. Dinner was mostaccioli, roast beef, salad, veggies, and potato casserole and I don't know what else. I only had the pasta, salad, and potatoes. But it was all delicious. After dinner we dug into the cookies. Not long after that we started opening presents.

We bought my dad moose mugs (like the ones in Christmas Vacation). Those were probably my favorite thing of the night :) We bought my mom a new sweater and got my sister Bridesmaids on dvd. I got a couple scarves, a new necklace, a new tervis cup that Chris isn't allowed to use (hehe) and two new books: Madame Bovary and Anna Karenina. I've got a lot of reading I need to start doing.

Chris got a couple Cardinals coffee mugs and a 2011 World Series iPhone case. Oh and he got double stuff oreos because I'm so mean and won't let him buy them. Whatever. :p

We also got a ton of tupperware and some gift cards. We got one for JC Penney (that's the only decent store in Farmington), one for Buffalo Wild Wings, and one for iTunes.

We drove home later that night. Copper doesn't seem to like car rides--even when you're holding her. She whined on and off most of the way home (and all of the way there).

When we got home, Chris decided it was time for us to open our presents because it was after midnight, so it was already Christmas and he didn't want to wait until morning.

I got him the new Cardinals Saturday jersey. And he got me How the Grinch Stole Christmas (the Dr. Seuss version) and The Great Mouse Detective. And tickets to go see Wicked at the Fox next weekend! (He spent over our limit, but said his ticket didn't count as part of my "present.")

The next morning I woke up to breakfast in bed. Chris made me fried eggs and toast. So Copper snuggled with us while I ate breakfast.

Later we went to Chris's parents' house for brunch. On the way there, Chris put Copper on the floor of the car and she ended up sleeping almost the whole way there. Yay! Unfortunately the puppies didn't get along as well as we'd hoped :( They were just a little too big to play with her I think. And she peed in the house a couple times too. So that was frustrating. She did finally pee outside before we left to go home, thank goodness!

Brunch was delicious. I'm not even sure what everything was...there were cinnamon rolls, and a casserole, and fruit. I don't know what else, but it was all good. Shortly after we opened presents. We got his mom a new pair of flats and the Back to the Future trilogy and we got his dad a blueray player.

Chris got new dress shoes and some shirts and I got a new Vera purse and wallet :) We also got Apple TV. And more gift cards--iTunes, Applebees, Subway, Wendy, and Mcds I think.

Copper slept the whole way home. Thankfully. When we got home Chris set up the Apple TV and I made dinner. I made spaghetti squash with chicken, peas, and alfredo sauce, and some garlic bread. It turned out pretty good.

The Apple TV is awesome. The only problem is our internet. Apparently we have a "data allowance" which we had already gone over for the month, so we couldn't get Netflix to work. This internet situation pisses me off more and more every single day. Data allowance? Isn't that how most data plans with cell phone companies work? My home internet should not.

So while the Apple TV will be awesome, it's kind of useless right now since we mainly got it to watch Netflix and we can't. It's also frustrating that I'm paying $60.00 a month for internet, plus $8.00 a month for Netflix and I can't watch Netflix because of this "data allowance" bullshit.

I swear the second Charter or AT&T becomes available, I will pay whatever fees I have to to get rid of HughesNet and get something better. It is the worst internet service I have ever had.

So aside from the internet issue and the puppy peeing in the house, Christmas was wonderful. I hope you all had a fantastic one as well!

Merry Christmas from Copper (and me)!

Last night I went to the zoo with a few of my cousins to see all the lights. 

It was cold, but not as bad as it's been the past few days. The only animals we saw were the penguins. 

After the lights we went to Houlihan's for dinner and a few drinks. It was nice getting to see everyone and we had a good time. We've decided we're gonna do a float trip next summer, and possibly a trip to the lake as well. 

And now for the BIG news! We got our puppy today! Her name is Copper. She's about 6 weeks old and weighs 8.8 pounds (the lady said she was the biggest lol). She was nervous at first. So far she's only peed in the house once. She's taken quite a few naps too. 

She loves her panda :)

Merry Christmas everyone! 

Christmas Vacation!

This was my office this morning: 

I got to work my half a day today from home! It was fantastic! I did all my work in my pajamas while listening to Christmas music and eating my bowl of cereal. 

After that I worked out. Yes, I actually worked out. I didn't do a whole lot, but I did abs and squats and some push-ups. It was kind of rough. But I did it so that counts for something. Right? 

Then I showered and drove up to St. Louis to get a facial at Chris's work. I'd never had one before. It wasn't what I had expected, but it turned out better than what I thought it would be. It was really relaxing. And the table/bed thing I laid on was heated and that felt incredible. Since my workout my lower back has been bothering me so the heat was nice on my back. 

Now I'm at home watching a movie, waiting for Chris to come home from work so we can go to Pasta House for dinner. I'm so excited for pasta! 

Enjoy your weekend everyone! I'll be posting pics on Sunday of our puppy when we get her! :)

Happy Thursday

So last night I was extremely lazy. I came home and after attempting for the millionth time this week to change my payment method for our internet, I gave up, threw some ravioli in the oven, grabbed a beer, and turned on Gossip Girl. And that was my night.

We have HugesNet for internet and I've never hated anything so much in my life. As much as I hated Charter, I'd gladly switch back if I could. Unfortunately, as of right now, HughesNet is all that's available in our neck of the woods. Literally. There's apparently a state park or something behind our house.

Anyway, if I wasn't in school, I'd go without internet completely and just use my phone for internet when I needed it. But that's not an option right now, so I'm stuck. Blah. If anyone knows of any alternatives that aren't super expensive, I'm open to ideas.

Because of the "storm" or whatever this is, my boss decided instead of coming in for half a day tomorrow, we're just going to work for a few hours from home. Yay! I get to sleep in and not go anywhere tomorrow. I'm so excited. So since we won't be at work tomorrow we had our "holiday lunch" today.

We went to My Daddy's Cheesecake. Love love love that place. Although I have strangely never had cheesecake from there. I got the french dip sandwich and it was delicious. Much better than what I brought--leftover broccoli and a turkey burger (which will probably be my lunch tomorrow).

Driving home pretty much sucked thanks to all this wind. And a truck almost hit me. So that was fun. But I made it home safe and sound. I had to bring in the chair that was on our front porch which was no longer on our front porch. And I also had to go track down our trash can which ended up on the side of the house.

So now I'm just waiting for Chris to get home so we can eat dinner. Probably gonna watch more Gossip Girl until then.

Don't blow away! :)

Weekend Recap: Christmas Shopping

I hope you all had a lovely weekend. I left work Friday and drove up to St. Louis to go to Hot Shots with Chris and a couple of our friends. We had a good time and met some interesting people.

We stayed in St. Louis Friday night so we could get our Christmas shopping done Saturday morning. We got most of it done at the mall and then went to Best Buy. That place was super crowded. Possibly worse than the mall. Not fun. We ran into my parents though and they took us out to lunch at Panera :)

On our way back home after lunch we stopped at Petco to buy our puppy a few things. Mainly chew toys, a leash, candy cane bones, adorable food bowls, etc. We get to pick her up on Sunday and I'm so excited!

One of puppy's new toys :)

Saturday night we stayed home (after a trip to Walmart--booo) and watched a movie and pigged out on pizza.

Chris had to work on Sunday so while he was gone I wrapped all of the presents. I hate wrapping presents, but they turned out alright. Most years someone else ends up wrapping all my presents because I just don't get along well with wrapping paper. I watched Miracle on 34th Street while I wrapped presents. I forgot how much I love that movie.

Presents wrapped and under the tree :)

Yesterday was kind of a crappy Monday, but it got a whole lot better when my boss told me that we're leaving at 4 every day this week, and on Friday, we're only working until noon. Woohoo!

So I got to drive home in semi-daylight (at least for part of the drive) and made pizza casserole for dinner. It turned out delish!

Tonight we're having turkey burgers and I have no idea what else. Dinner will be followed by sitting on the couch watching tv. I'm loving not having homework.

Speaking of school, I got an A on my final paper and an A in the class! Just waiting on my other class now to see what I got. I hate waiting for this stuff. But I'll be a very happy girl if I got A's in both of my classes for my first semester of grad school. :)

Hallelujah!

I'm officially DONE with my first semester of grad school!

Sorry for the brief hiatus I had to take to study and write my paper, but now I'm back! I took my final Monday night and I think I did pretty well. Except I'm almost positive I got a few copyright law questions wrong, because I always do. Blah.

And I turned in my final paper online yesterday. I reread it a dozen times, made changes and tweaks, had Chris read it, I reread it again, and finally, I decided I was finished with it. It was as good as I could possibly make it and it wasn't going to get any better, so I turned it in.

I spent most of my weekend studying. On Sunday we went to my parents' house for my mom's birthday dinner (which she cooked). It was fun. Chris got a glimpse of what Christmas Eve will be like. Organized chaos in my opinion. Everyone yelling and talking over each other. Oh and wine. There's always wine. :)

I only ran once last week. Finals kind of took over all my spare time. Now that I'm finished and have a full month off of school, I plan to start running again after work. Or maybe on my lunch breaks. And I get to start reading books for fun! Yay! I can't wait to finish Les Miserables.

And now for my most important news of all: We're getting a puppy! On December 23 if everything goes well at her vet appointment on the 21. It will be a chocolate labradoodle. But it's more lab than poodle. So it will have short hair and shouldn't shed much, but since it's more lab, we don't have to worry about grooming or anything. 

This may not be the exact puppy we get, but she'll look like this. 

Yay for puppies! And being finished with my first semester of grad school! Have a good one!

The Downside of Living with a Writer

Once they trust your opinion, they will ask you to read everything.

Poor Chris. I had him read the first paper I wrote this semester, and he even helped me come up with a better thesis for it. Got an A.

He read the second paper and told me it was good. Got an A.

The verdict is still out on the third paper, but I feel pretty good about it.

Now I'm working on my final research paper which has to be at least ten pages. He read the four pages I had written last night. It was a little convoluted and confusing and my thesis was pretty unclear. So I decided to rewrite the whole thing. And asked him if he'd read it again. Of course, he said yes, because he's awesome.

I feel bad though. It's not like I'm really writing about things that are extremely interesting. I mean, I personally think they're fairly interesting, but not everyone will think so. And I'm sure he's probably incredibly bored whenever he reads something I've written.

Lucky for him, next semester there won't be any paper writing. It will be lots and lots of poems (hopefully good poems). If only I can make it through next Wednesday. Then I'm officially done for a whole month. I'm so excited.

I plan on working on rewriting some of my previous poems so I can submit them to some literary magazines. I also plan to read as much as possible. I'm going to finish Les Miserables! And also read The Hunger Games (possibly all three books?) and if I have time, I want to reread The Great Gatsby.

Anyone have any big plans for their breaks (if you have one) and/or holidays?

Weekend Recap

Friday night Chris and I went to see Wreck it Ralph. The movie was adorable. The Farmington movie theater? Not so much. I said it was a step up from the dollar theater in St. Charles (this one was cleaner). We had to butter our own popcorn. In what kind of hell do you go to a movie theater and butter your own popcorn?! Farmington, apparently. Chris had to go re-butter our popcorn just before the movie started because the butter didn't get to the bottom half. But like I said, the movie was adorable and I loved it and so that sort of made up for it. 

Saturday was a long day for me. I got up at 7:30 because I need to find and be at the DMV by 8:30 so I could do the registration nonsense for my car and whatnot. Well, I couldn't find it. I drove around for over an hour. GPS couldn't find it. GPS on my phone couldn't find it. I gave up. At some point this week I'm just going to go to the one in Cape because I know where it is. What a pain. 

In the process, however, I found the Farmington Mental Institution and the Farmington Correctional Facility. Fun. After that I went to Plaza Tire to get my oil changed. It took forever. I'm about fed up with that place. I think I'm going to go somewhere else for my next oil change. 

After that I picked up my prescriptions from Walgreens and then went to Walmart to pick up some things for dinner. Unfortunately, we forgot to get the roast out for dinner so it was still frozen. We had brat burgers instead. 

Saturday night after dinner we decorated our tree...which is covered in my ornaments. And we have no tree topper. Fail. And some of the lights don't work. Whatever. we also hung up some other Christmas-y things my mom gave me. And I have adorable penguin towels in the bathroom. :) And in case my grandmother asks, yes, Elvis is on the damn tree. Ugh. 

Photo courtesy of Chris, because his phone's camera is better than mine :(

Sunday we woke up and went for a run downtown. Chris ran about a mile and a half with me. I did a total of 3.14 miles. Then we had cinnamon rolls for breakfast (so much for that run). After that we did my least favorite thing in the entire world and went grocery shopping.

In between all this, I did homework all weekend long. It was not fun. Yesterday I turned in one project. All I have left now is my final research paper and to study for a test. So far I've got about 4 pages written and I need a minimum of 10. 

Last night we had race car chicken nuggets, macaroni and cheese, and carrots. In case you're wondering, the dinosaur nuggets are way better than the race cars.  

This morning, my boss and I walked up to the campus health clinic to get our flu shots. This is probably the first time I've had a flu shot in two years. I know for sure I didn't get one last year because I was too sick all the time. My arm is kinda sore from it :(

Anyhoo, enjoy the rest of this rainy Tuesday and the warm weather while it lasts! 

Hydration

I used to hate drinking water when I was younger. I also hated milk and juice. I think I mostly drank tea or soda, especially in high school and a majority of my undergrad.

I'm still not huge on drinking juice, and I really only like milk with certain things, and when it's super cold. But I drink a TON of water now. As I've mentioned before, I drink at least 60 ounces of water a day. During the work week, I probably drink closer to 100 ounces a day (more or less). I'm not quite as good about drinking so much water on weekends, but if we go out to eat, I usually order water rather than a sprite or something else.

I tried that Mio stuff for a while. I like it, and the ones I have tried taste good, but I rarely put them in my water. Chris uses them all the time, but I find that I actually want plain, cold water. I crave it sometimes. There are days where I could have sprite or coffee or tea or whatever else, but the only thing that sounds good to me is water.

I guess after forcing myself to drink water regularly whether I wanted it or not has made me like it a lot more. I also don't feel as well when I don't drink enough water during the day. A lot of people say that drinking a lot of water helps with weight loss and stuff. I can't say that I've ever noticed a difference. Maybe it helps maintain my current weight, but I've never lost weight because of the amount of water I drink.

But like I said, the more water I drink throughout the day, the better I feel. And I usually have better runs when I've had a lot of water. Maybe the whole weight loss things works for people who need to lose more weight than I do. Or maybe it has something to do with your metabolism. I don't know. It could be purely psychological. Who knows? I've read so many different theories on what water does for your body and blah blah blah. I know the basic stuff, and obviously water is important, but I'm not sure about the weight loss theories, or the difference between drinking cold water and room temperature water.

All I know is that I feel better when I've had a lot of water throughout the day. Plus it breaks up the workday a little, getting up for refills (and going to the bathroom lol).

For anyone struggling with trying to drink enough water:
First, get yourself a bottle or mug that has the number of ounces on it. That helps you keep track.
Second, if you don't like plain water, put something like Mio in it. Try to make sure it's low-cal and low-sugar though, otherwise you're not really doing yourself any favors.
I'd also suggest trying to drink it plain every now and then. After a while, you'd be surprised at how amazing water can sound, especially in the summer.

13 Things I'm Thankful for on this Last Day in November

It's the last day of November! If you're on Facebook, you've probably seen tons of people putting daily statuses up for what they're thankful for. It got annoying pretty quickly.

And when you think about it, we should be thankful a lot more often than that. Not just on Thanksgiving, or just for 30 days in November.

I'm not saying you need to tell everyone every day what you're thankful for. The Facebook world doesn't need to know (and I'm guessing most of them don't really care). But it doesn't hurt to think once or twice a day about the things/people you're thankful to have in your life.

I used to keep a daily journal of things I was thankful for. I did it for about 6 months straight before I got lazy.

But, in honor of the season and the fact that I haven't done this in quite a while, here are some things I'm thankful for (in no particular order):

1. It's the last day of November and it's 60 degrees and sunny.

2. Chris, for so so many reasons. Mainly that he's a good cook and so we won't starve to death :)

3. My job. Even though I'm having my little crisis and I don't know what I want to do with my life right now, I'm definitely thankful I have a job at all and that it's something I enjoy (except for the parts involving math and money. Yuck.)

4. My new car. Driving so much every day sucks, but my new car makes it more bearable :)

5. Our home. I love it, despite my complaints about driving and the slow drains.

6. I'm actually happy/excited about the holidays this year. I've already watched 4 Christmas movies, and I'm decorating, and our tree will officially be up and decorated some time this weekend. And I'm excited about that. I'm normally a huge grinch, so this is new/weird for me.

7. The houses that have their Christmas lights up on my drive home. It makes my drive so much more fun and pretty!

8. Being in school. I know I complain about it a lot. It's a lot of work and it's stressful, especially now with finals in a week, but I do enjoy it. Wanna honestly know what my dream job is? To go to school. Full-time. And not have to worry about paying for it or having a job. Just go to school and learn. I like learning. There's so much I want to know. And I really want to study psychology. Kind of kicking myself for not double-majoring in psych and english as an undergrad.

9. Weekends. I can't even begin to describe to you how happy I will be when I leave work today. This week has been so incredibly exhausting. We got home super late Sunday night. I had a late class Monday night. Worked until 10:30 Tuesday night. Got home around 9:30 Wednesday night and had a lot to do, so went to bed late. Last night was the only night we went to bed before 11. Unfortunately I don't get to sleep in tomorrow, but I can take a nap at some point (I hope)!

10. My sister sends me funny pictures throughout the day and they always make me smile/laugh.

11. My mom and dad for allowing me to store about 50% or more of my belongings in their basement at any given time.

12. Christmas break is two weeks away. It will be so amazing to go straight home after work every day for a month. And not have homework to do when I get home. Or anything else. I can watch tv all night. Or read. Or sleep. I plan on reading though. I've got a long list.

13. Did I mention Chris? And how he puts up with me and somehow still loves me? And he's a good cook? And he doesn't get mad at me for leaving my books and papers all over the place? And he eats the food I cook even though it's rarely delicious? And he makes me laugh? Just making sure I covered it all. He's the best. :)

Me and Chris at Thanksgiving

Random Things Thursday: Tuesday

So yesterday I wrote about the TrekDesk instead of telling you all about my Tuesday. In honor of Random Things Thursday, let's talk about Tuesday!

We launched our latest book, Proud to Be: Writing by American Warriors on Tuesday night and it was incredible getting to meet some of the vets who wrote the stories, poems, essays, etc.

We first met at Maggiano's for dinner. It was delicious. It was my second time going there and the experience was just as great as the first. In spite of all the food, I surprisingly didn't overeat. They served it all family-style.

For appetizers we had bread, and salads--one was a caesar and the other had blue cheese and pecans and was delish. Then they brought out bruschetta which was also really good. And then they brought out spinach and artichoke al forno. Also delish.

Then they brought out dinner. Fettucini alfredo was the first out and by far my favorite. I love love love alfredo. There was also chicken marsala (which I didn't try because I'm not a fan of it), some pasta with red sauce and meat balls which was pretty good. Then they brought out salmon. I've never tried salmon before, but I've been wanting to, so I figured might as well try it at a fancy restaurant (for free!). I was surprised by how much I liked it!

My boss and I left before they served dessert so we could go set up the books. The place was full and several of the vets got up on stage and read their work from the book and then signed books after. I worked on this book from start to finish and I've read everything in it multiple times, but hearing them read aloud was such an awesome experience.

It was midnight when I get home that night. Third late night in a row. Blah. Last night we were in bed by 11. Not super early, but earlier than the past few nights at least.

I've been considering taking real lunch breaks at work to go workout instead of working/blogging through my lunch. Obviously if I take my lunch break and go workout or run, I'll still be working and eating, but I pretty much do that every day anyway.

I just think it might be worth trying because I'm generally either too tired or have too much to do after work/class to workout at home.

Do any of you workout on your lunch breaks? Do you like it? What kind of exercises do you do? 

P.S. If you're interested in purchasing Proud to Be; Writing by American Warriors, you can click on the link above and get it through Amazon.com. It's also available at B&N.com, or through our website: http://www6.semo.edu/universitypress/Proud_to_Be1.htm

Desks

So I got this text from my mom this morning: 

I was intrigued, so I looked it up. It's called TrekDesk. Basically, it's a desk that fits over your treadmill so you can walk and work at the same time. For $450. I foolishly thought, Awesome! A treadmill and a desk for just $450?! Ha. Wrong. That's $450 for the desk. You gotta provide your own treadmill folks. 

I don't own a treadmill for two reasons: 1. They're expensive. 2. I loathe running on treadmills. 

But in a case such as using it with the TrekDesk, you'd be walking rather than running. And you'd be working too. They have some articles on their site about how sitting all day is bad for you, standing all day is only slightly better, moving all day is best. 

As many of you know, I recently got my standing desk put together and have been using it for almost 2 weeks now. I like it. I get strange looks from people (can you imagine walking into an office and seeing people on treadmills?), and my body is still getting used to it, but I like it much, much more than sitting all day. 

My current standing desk

I wish I had a treadmill at home now so I could try something like the TrekDesk out and see how I like it. Actually, I'd rather have a treadmill at work since it seems I spend more time at work/school than at home. 

Alas, I am poor and can afford neither a treadmill nor a TrekDesk for my home or office. But I think it's a cool idea. Maybe someday I'll work in one of those offices where the company pays for stuff like that. After all, healthier employees means you get more work out of them, right? 

If you're interested in the TrekDesk and what it is/does, you can check out their website: http://trekdesk.com/trekdesk

Or like/follow them on Facebook and/or Twitter: https://www.facebook.com/TrekDesk

https://twitter.com/TrekDesk

Quarter-Life Crisis

I had a mini-meltdown in my car last night on my way home from class. Okay, maybe it wasn't so mini. Whatever.

I got an assignment back in class last night and I got a B on it, which isn't really all that bad, and I currently have an A overall. But editing is my JOB, and getting a B on an editing assignment in the class my boss teaches kinda makes me feel like a failure, idiot, and anything else you can come up with. 

The fact that finals are two weeks away probably isn't helping this any. And neither is the fact that I tried to plan out my courses and see just how long it will take me to get my degree. If I continue to take two classes (6 hours) per semester and don't take summer classes, it will be at least spring 2015 before I graduate. Do you have any idea how far away that seems?! That's another 2 and a half to 3 years living in Farmington, driving 3 hours a day, going to class two nights a week. 

So then I decided to see how long it would take if I can take summer classes, and it would end up sometime in 2014ish. Then I decided to see how long it would take if I took summer classes and took 9 hours for a semester or two. Still 2014ish. Mainly because they just don't offer what I need during the summer. 

I don't hate school. I very much dislike some of the classes I have to take and some of the people who teach them. And I dislike how time-consuming it all is. But the main reason is that I have to work and go to school. Which is what most people do. But if I could just go to school, take 9 hours a semester like everyone else and be done in two years, I think I'd like it a whole lot more. And I also really want a degree in psychology. Which would mean more school (and also way more loans). 

I started questioning everything last night. Did I make the right decision going to Semo in the first place? Should I have gone somewhere else? Do I really want to be in school (the answer to that question is yes, by the way)? Am I even hungry now (yes, that was a legitimate question last night--again, the answer was yes)? 

I'll leave out many of the other things I questioned/thought for the sake of being nice. After seeing Yellowcard on Sunday night, I started thinking about how much I miss playing the violin and how I really don't have the time for it anymore. Between work, school, and trying to exercise enough so that I don't get fat, I just don't have the spare time or energy for it. Which is really depressing. And then of course came the inevitable question: could I have been a better violinist? Probably. I know I could have been, and could still be (assuming I had the time to dedicate to it), but I hated the classes I took as a music major my freshman year. So I know that while in my head I still think being a pro violinist would be one of the coolest jobs ever (especially in a rock band), I made the right move when I switched majors.  

Then's there's the stress of writing, which, aside from the blog, I'm doing very little of right now. I've written one or two poems all semester. And they're not great. But I'm doing a creative thesis so I need to be writing constantly. And I need to be revising other poems I've written. I need to be submitting to try and get published. Where am I supposed to find the time and inspiration? 

I'm feeling a little overwhelmed. And kind of angry, mostly at myself because I just don't know what I want. I want my master's. I want to study psychology. I want to move back to St. Louis some day in the not-so-far-away future. I want to not be in debt forever. I want to not have to work and go to school. Obviously, I can't have it all, and very few of those things are real possibilities. 

Am I the only one who doesn't know what the hell I want?

Thanksgiving Weekend Recap

So posts the next couple weeks might be limited since finals are in two weeks. And they'll probably be shorter too. Or longer...depends on how much I'm procrastinating.

Anyhoo, I hope you all had a lovely Thanksgiving. Mine was great. Too much going on all weekend, but it was fun.

I took very few pictures (you should just expect that by now), and I don't have the patience to try to upload them right now.

Wednesday night I made a casserole with chicken, broccoli, and cauliflower. It wasn't too bad. I didn't have all the ingredients, so I'm gonna try it again and maybe it will be just a little bit better. But Chris said he liked it, so I guess it wasn't too terrible ;) And I had leftovers for lunch today and they tasted pretty darn good.

After dinner we watched Elf and ate Christmas Oreos and had strawberry floats.



Thursday we had lunch with my mom's family and dinner with Chris's family. After the screaming babies left, we watched The Grinch (the Dr. Seuss version--the best one!) and then went to bed.



Friday I helped my mom decorate the tree. We also went through a ton of my stuff that was in my parents' basement. They'll be donating at least two big boxes of clothes to the East Coast to the hurricane victims.

Friday night Mom made white chicken chili and it was incredible. It's definitely one of my favorite meals. Afterward, Chris, me, my sister, and my dad watched Christmas Vacation (which is the best Christmas move EVER). And we had homemade popcorn with extra butter. Yum :)

Saturday, I had every intention of going for a run after I dropped Chris off at work. Except that it was 20 degrees and I didn't have clothes warm enough to go run in those conditions. So I got my hair cut and went shopping instead. I bought Chris new shoes and got myself some boots (finally).

Later that night we went to Fast Eddie's. It was delicious as always. Afterward we went to the casino where the ATM ate Chris's debit card :( That was partially my fault. Oops.

On Sunday we went to Crown Candy for lunch with Chris's parents. Then we did a little more shopping and then headed over to Pop's to see Yellowcard. The opening bands were not all that great. But Yellowcard was amazing. I can't believe that was my first time ever seeing them. Finally! I was disappointed in their shirt selection though. The only shirts I liked, they didn't have my size.

We got home a little before 1am, got a couple hours of sleep, and then back to work this morning. Blah.

As you can see, I didn't run once. Major fail. And I brought clothes to wear for a run this evening before class, but now it's raining. And colder. I'd love to say that it was my fault because I didn't check the weather or something, but I totally did. For last weekend, and for today. None of this was in the forecast when I checked. Ugh. So I'm gonna get coffee instead I think. The forecast for Wednesday says mid-50s, so let's hope that doesn't change!

I have a lot of work to get done in the next two weeks. Yuck. Hopefully I don't get too stressed over it. I have a project due next Monday (which I should have been working on all weekend and didn't) and a paper due in two weeks, plus one final to study for. Piece of cake. Speaking of cake...that sounds delicious.

Enjoy the rest of your Monday everyone!

Weekend Recap, Bruised Knee(cap)

This weekend was not quite as relaxing as I hoped it would be. Nor did it include any of the running I had planned. Oops. Two reasons for that. 1. I slept until about 1pm on Saturday. Again, oops. But it was a glorious sleep. 2. On Sunday we went to St. Louis to go to the Rams game and so I didn't have time to go for a run that morning. 

Friday night we got Taco Bell for dinner, which was not as delicious as my cravings said it would be. Damn. Saturday I slept until 1, then showered, had an apple and peanut butter for lunch and then went shopping. I got two new pairs of flats (which I've been needing for quite a while now). I'm waiting for one of them to come in the mail and I'm getting super impatient and will be kinda upset if I don't get them before Thanksgiving. 

Saturday night instead of cooking like I totally should have, we went to A&W and I got mini corndogs with cheese and I felt like a little kid and it was delicious. We also picked up a couple movies and snacks. We bought Napolean Dynamite for $3 and we also got 1408 and The Santa Clause. 

Sunday we woke up early (boo) and got ready to go to the football game. This was my first NFL game. I'm not a big football fan to begin with, and I'm really not a Rams fan. So it was interesting. We met up with Chris's parents and got some food at a tailgate (which apparently people do everywhere down there). Then we headed back to the dome. We had pretty good seats, so that was nice. 

View from our seats

Unfortunately, the Rams suck and we ended up leaving early (like many others). We had a good time though and I'm glad I got to go, since I'll probably never go to another NFL game again, unless it's free like it was this time :)

Yesterday wasn't so bad--for a Monday. Decent day at work, did quite a bit of editing (my favorite part of my job) and then we had a really short class last night. I went for a run after work. Not my best, but at least I got out there and ran.

Another crappy picture of the bridge on my run. 

We had chicken nuggets and mac n cheese for dinner because we're awesome and after watching a couple episodes of Family Guy, we went to bed. We live such exciting lives. 

I noticed a nice, big bruise on my knee while we were eating dinner last night. It looks slightly better this morning, but I have no idea what it's from. I don't recall running into anything. And my knee does bruise sometimes when I run. That's probably not a good thing, but so far it hasn't given me a ton of pain, so I'm not gonna worry about it. 

Please ignore the pasty-white skin :)

As far as workouts go, well, those aren't going..at all. But I'm running at least twice a week now, which is way more than I was doing before. So that's something. And I'm standing most of the day too, so that seems to be helping.

Not much going on today. I'm gonna try to get a workout in when I get home. In the meantime, I need coffee. 

Also, I forgot to take pictures of my car. So, I'll try to get around to that this weekend among everything else going on. Woo. And maybe I'll just have more pictures for you in general. You never know. :) 

One Month

As of yesterday, Chris and I have officially been living together for a month. And we still love each other :) lol It's taken most of the month to adjust to the longer commutes and such, but I'm finally getting used to it. I'm still exhausted most days, but I'm adjusting. And I've finally started running again.  I ran 2 miles Monday night, and another 2-something miles last night. My pace last night seemed to be a little more accurate at 10:26 rather than the 9-something it was Monday night.

It was super cold last night though. Not fun. But I ran from the parking lot at the English building down to the river and back. I love running by the river. It's so calm and relaxing. I tried to take a picture for you all, but that didn't turn out too well.

Not the greatest picture, but I love it there. It is absolutely the greatest thing about that town. 

I got my paper on Uncle Tom's Cabin back last night and I got an A! Woo! I was so excited! Mainly because I wanted to use parts of that paper in my longer, final paper, but I wanted to make sure I got a good grade on it first lol.

I planned on coming home and working out, but I'm not going to (I know, you guys are all shocked). I started getting a really bad headache on my drive home, so I think I'm just going to try and relax tonight. Maybe get a little homework done, and I'm going to do some laundry and then get to bed early.

This is a picture of the sunrise on my way to work this morning:

One of the few things that makes the drive worthwhile.

Tomorrow night I'll be doing a poetry reading. Lucky for me, Chris found my flash drive (which was right where I left it...) which has just about everything I've written during my undergrad on it. So now I at least have a few decent poems to choose from. Now I have to actually pick a couple. Blah. 

I'll be sure to let you all know how it goes :) 

Ps if you're not following me on Twitter, you should be (I'm getting better about posting pics on there lol). Check it out: @Run_Chata

My New Stand-Up Desk

I finally finished putting together my new desk later in the afternoon yesterday. It was a little bit taller than I wanted, so I adjusted it, and now it's perfect!

This is from when I gave up yesterday. I was so frustrated everything kept falling apart! So I let it sit in the corner. 

Finally, one of my good friends who's working here as a grad student this semester brought me a screwdriver and I got it put together. 

Ta-da!

I did a lot of rearranging the furniture in my office yesterday (and eventually I'm going to get rid of an extra desk just as soon as I'm sure my boss doesn't want to use it for anything).

Finally, I found a spot I liked, next to the window :)

After all the moving and assembling I did yesterday, I decided not to work out when I got home last night. I was exhausted and my arms were really sore. I'm definitely going to go run after work today though. Except I forgot socks, so I'm gonna have to make a trip to Target first. Oops. ;)

We watched The Adjustment Bureau last night. It was a pretty good movie. It wasn't exactly what I had expected from the previews, but I liked it. Chris made Italian beef for dinner last night and it was delicious. We also had salad (which may or may not have gone bad...), and garlic parmesan potatoes. Tonight we're having tacos or something I think. 

This weekend I'm going to attempt cooking chicken in some form or another (which I have never cooked before in my life). I'm also going to try a broccoli and cauliflower casserole recipe I got from Erica's blog a week or so ago. 

I'm also going to attempt to make my mom's banana bread, which I've never done on my own, so that should be interesting. And at some point I'm going to bake chocolate chip cookies, because I'm good at that :) 

2 Miles to Start

I went for a run after work yesterday. It was cold :( But I did 2 miles and felt pretty good. I didn't have to stop because my legs hurt, I didn't have to stop because of my asthma. I'm using one of the Hal Higdon 1/2 marathon apps. It says I ran two miles in under 20 minutes and my average pace was 9:46. I'm not quite sure how accurate that is, because I'm a pretty damn slow runner.

The important thing to me though is that I did 2 miles without stopping...except at a stoplight. Boo. Tonight I plan on doing a workout when I get home, and tomorrow I'm going to run after work again. I'm not sure what I'm going to do Thursday. I know I won't be running Friday, so I'm going to try to run Saturday morning and on Sunday too.

I finally got my standing desk! I carried it all the way from my car to my office, and let me tell you, that thing was heavy. And I only dropped it once! lol My arms are pretty sore today from carrying that thing.

 Right now, it is sitting half-assembled in my office because I don't have a screw driver to finish putting it together. And I got really frustrated because the screws it says to use seem way too big. :( Hopefully I will have it assembled by tomorrow. I'm really excited about it, and it's kind of depressing just looking at it sitting in the corner. I also need to move some things around in my office, so maybe I'll do that in between projects since I can't finish the desk.

The main reason I decided I wanted a desk I could stand at was because I now sit almost all freaking day. I sit in my car three hours a day. I sit at my desk for about 9 hours a day. On nights I have class, I sit there for 2-3 hours. On nights I go home after work, I still go home and sit and do homework and stuff for a few hours until bed. In case you weren't adding all that up, that's more than 12 hours per day that I'm sitting.

It's actually kind of painful sometimes to be sitting that much. So I'll be really happy when I get this desk put together. After thinking about it for a while, I remembered that when I worked retail for a few months when I was back at home, I lost quite a bit of weight, and I'm guessing it was partially because I didn't eat quite as much, but also because I was standing 90% of the time when I was there.

I'm not expecting to lose a bunch of weight from standing in one place all day, but maybe it will help, even just a little bit. And really, it will just be nice to stand and work. I really hope I can get it put together soon (without it falling apart, as it has done multiple times already this morning) so I can move all my stuff and get back to work :) I'll post pictures once I get it done!

Weekend Recap: New Car, Family Time, New Casino

I'm not sure if I have a bad memory or that parts of my weekend are so incredibly boring that I can't remember everything I did. But I have no idea what we did Friday night. My guess is watch a movie because we do that at least once a weekend, and probably once or twice during the week too.

On Saturday, I went up to St. Louis to pick up my new car! (And I fail for not having pictures....I was too excited to stand around taking pictures!) It's just as beautiful as I imagined it would be. I LOVE IT. I promise I will have pictures for you by the end of the week. Actually, probably this weekend sometime since I won't be home in the daylight to do it. Boo winter. Saturday was a beautiful, windy day. I picked up my car and then picked up my sister to have lunch with my parents.

Not a healthy lunch, but delicious, so whatever. Then my sister and I went to see our grandparents. My grandpa just came home from the hospital Friday. He looked good, and even came downstairs to see my new car. He approved :) I also got to see one of my uncles while I was there too, which was kind of funny because I was just asking my dad earlier that day about how he was doing. It was nice to visit with him and my grandparents for a while.

After that I took my sister to Target because she's spoiled and obnoxious. I ended up buying her a new shirt instead of a card and gift card to congratulate her on being accepted to Paul Mitchell for cosmetology, which she starts the Monday after Thanksgiving. I'm so excited for her...and looking forward to some free haircuts ;)

We met my parents at church. It was kind of nice going. It's been a while since I've gone. There's only one Catholic church near us in Farmington, and I'm really not sure if I want to go. Still debating that. After church, we headed out to The Cheesecake Factory for my sister's celebratory dinner. It was delicious. I had the Americana Cheeseburger which had a lot of cheese, a lot of pickles (YUM), their "secret sauce" (which is thousand island dressing 99% of the time any restaurant claims to have a "special" or "secret" sauce), and lettuce and tomato and maybe onions. I can't remember but it was delicious. My sister and Chris both had the Macaroni and Cheese Burger. I only had a small bite, but it was good.

Everyone ordered cheesecake. Becky had the Reese's cheesecake, Chris got a pumpkin pecan, and I got red velvet. Mine was okay. Not the best red velvet cheesecake I've ever had. I kind of wish I would have ordered something else, but I probably would have overeaten if I had. I only had half my burger and fries and probably a little less than half of my cheesecake.

After dinner, Chris and I met a couple friends at the Funny Bone. I'm not a huge fan of that place, mainly because of their 2-drink minimum rule. Chris and I both ordered bottled water, and somehow managed to get away with not ordering two more. The comedians were alright. Some of the jokes were really funny, and some were just okay. It's certainly not my favorite way to spend a Saturday night, but we had a good time, and it's nice to change things up now and then.

On Sunday Chris and I went out to breakfast because we didn't have enough milk for anything. No pancakes, no eggs, no cereal. After breakfast we did our grocery shopping. I'm going to try out a new recipe or two this week (one involving chicken which I have never even attempted to cook in my life)...should be interesting. Once we got home we were kinda lazy. We watched some tv, napped, and finally got up and showered so we could go to the new casino in Cape with his parents.

The casino is pretty small in comparison to the ones I've been to in St. Louis. But they had some decent slots. His parents gave us $20, which we lost. We then lost another 30ish. At one point we were back up to almost 20 and we lost that, so we left with about $12. We had fun though. We had dinner at Pilot House in Cape which is probably my most favorite barbecue place ever (and I had my leftover prime rib for lunch today!) His mom even liked it and she's not too big on barbecue.

We got home, baked brownies, and tried to watch a movie, but we got bored, so we watched Family Guy and then went to bed.

If you're wondering, no, I didn't run. I decided to spend a little more time with my family this weekend instead. I am going to run after work today (I swear!). I brought my shoes, tights, jacket, and gloves. Unfortunately, my ipod didn't make it. Not sure what happened to it, but it's just dead. I've tried charging it several times this weekend and for a while it told me the battery was low and needed to be charged. I tried charging it again last night and when I unplugged it this morning before work, it didn't turn on at all. And it didn't turn on when I plugged it into my computer either. I guess I'll have to try and take it to the Apple store and see if they can figure it out. :( I sure hope they can because my car has a fancy ipod port which is awesome and I want to be able to use it! I've decided that if for some reason I'm going to have to replace it, I'm probably just going to buy myself an iPhone instead. But let's hope that doesn't happen.

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend and I'll have more for you tomorrow!

Feeling a Little Bit Inspired

For the first time in a while, I'm finally starting to feel inspired/motivated about running. There have been a lot of races in the past few weeks and I have been reading about them through the various bloggers I follow and all their amazing stories of accomplishment.

Erica ran her first 5k just a week or two ago. It's been a pretty long time since I've run a 5k race. If I remember correctly, the last one I ran with my cousin and a few of her friends was at Queeny Park and it rained the whole time. I don't even know what my time was. Probably not great.

The New York City Marathon was canceled due to Sandy and many of the marathoners found other races in the New England area to join in on. Ali and a few of her friends ran the Manchester City Marathon and reading about her experience and seeing all the photos from the race was really cool. They're all so happy and proud of their accomplishments, and overall, they're just happy they got to race at all after NYCM was canceled.

After reading all this, plus others and their excitement for upcoming races, I keep thinking to myself I want to experience a 5k again. I want to run a half marathon next year. And maybe a marathon in the future. 

I want those things. I want to remember how amazing it feels to cross a finish line. I mentioned my reasons for not racing this year in a few previous posts, and a primary one was money. The St. Louis Rock and Roll half marathon that I wanted to run ended up being really expensive. It would have cost me over $100 to run it. And I just didn't have that kind of money earlier this year. I still don't really.

But I've found some shorter races later this year (5 and 10ks) that aren't too expensive, and a half marathon/half marathon relay in March that won't cost me over $90, even if I wait until the day of to register. I'm thinking I can make that one work. Now I just need to start training. Or just running in general.

I'm going to pick up my new car in Stl tomorrow (SO EXCITED!), but I want to try to either get a run in before I leave, or do one while I'm up there. Actually, I'll probably do one while I'm up there since I'll know my way around.

I've also added a Garmin Forerunner 110 to my Christmas list. I'm pretty certain I won't be getting one because they're pretty expensive, but ya never know.

What kind of watches/devices/gps do you guys use when you're running/training? I want something that won't be extremely expensive, but is still useful. And not something too big or bulky. That will drive me nuts. Do you have any future races planned? What kind of training programs do you use?

Needed: Inspiration and Motivation

I've started listening to audiobooks on my drives home from work. We have about 3 more novels to read before the end of the semester, so I figured I'd just listen to them in the car rather than waiting until I got home every night to read on top of other homework.

I'd love to tell you that it's going well. But it's not. I just finished listening to Pudd'nhead Wilson and it was painful. The "actors" were just awful to listen to, and hard to understand sometimes. It was extremely hard to not just turn it off and listen to the radio instead. I'm hoping the next one will go a little better. As discouraging as this experience has been, I did pay for the audiobooks, so I might as well listen to them.

I've agreed to do a poetry reading on November 16, which is next Friday. I don't know why, but it seemed so far away when I agreed to do it (which was just a couple days ago). Now that I've realized I have very little to read at this thing, November 16 might as well be tomorrow. I haven't written any decent poetry in months. I need some inspiration, I just don't know where to get it. One of my good friends was just nominated for a Pushcart Prize, and while I'm extremely excited for her because that's kind of a big deal, it also makes me feel kind of like a slacker and a failure. I haven't even written any poems lately, let alone submit them to any magazines. I need to pick one night a week where I work on doing some writing and eventually send my poems to some magazines.

In addition to my lack of inspiration for writing, I also have no motivation to go run or workout. Part of it may be the fact that I'm exhausted. I'm not really sure why either. Yes, I'm busy and gone some days for about 13-14 hours, but I've been getting as much sleep as possible, and I slept quite a bit this weekend too. By the time I get home, even on days I don't have class, I just don't want to work out. I don't want to do anything, really, but working out has lost its appeal. If I could go home and go straight to bed and not have to do any homework, make dinner, shower, etc. I totally would. I have gotten the urge to go run lately, but I just don't know where to go. And now that it's getting dark so much earlier, I'm reluctant to go for a run, by myself in the dark, when I don't know my way around. Hopefully I get some motivation back soon and I can get myself into a routine.

Me and Cavi

My 2000 Cavalier and I have been through quite a lot this year.

On St. Patrick's Day, I left my windows rolled down (It was in the 70s or 80s and sunny) while my sister and I went to visit a friend's mom in the hospital. While there, it started raining. We came home, ran inside while it was still raining. Around 9pm that night, I was getting ready to leave to meet Chris and I got in my car. The seats were soaked. I had to go back inside and change my pants and then borrow my parents car. It took a couple days to dry that out. And it smelled.

At some point this year, my air conditioner died. This wasn't a big deal until the temps got into the upper 90s and 100s and I was driving back and forth every weekend to St. Louis. It was HOT. At one point, I started bringing a change of clothes to put on when I got where I was going because my clothes were soaked with sweat. Attractive, right? Eventually, we got it fixed, just in time for a couple more weeks of 90-degree temps before things started cooling off around here.

The end of August/ early September was a gigantic pain in the ass. The alternator belt broke. Went and got that fixed. The very next weekend, I blew a tire. I went to get that fixed and they "fixed" the belt again. Go figure. So I had to eventually get a refund (after I got a new debit card, since my debit card number had been stolen). Not long after that, I locked myself out of my car after class one night. My dad had the spare key...in St. Louis. Locksmiths were a joke. One never answered though they claim to have 24-hour service. The other told me I could only pay with cash, and since I didn't have a debit card, that was out of the question. It literally took almost all night, but we finally broke into my car. Poor Cavi suffered some damage though. Cracked the windshield. Effed up the top of the passenger door. Bent the antenna.

When I went to have my car looked at and all that jazz, I found out I need new breaks and the motor mount was messed up. Most recently, my headlights have started acting up. I thought maybe they burnt out, but it would be weird for both to burn out at the same time. I have learned though, that I just need to hold the switch in place for what seems to be about 20 minutes or so, and then they stay on by themselves. Luckily, it's getting lighter earlier in the morning now, so I don't have to use my lights for the majority of my drive to work like I had to before. But now, it also gets dark earlier, so instead of needing my lights at the very end of my drive home after work, I need them almost the entire time. Lucky me.

So, as I said in my last post, I'm getting a new car this Saturday! It's a 2009 Subaru Impreza. It's silver. And the radio is a touch screen. Sweet. And immediately after I texted my sister to tell her what kind of car it was, we both quoted Due Date: "Guess who's got the Subaru Impreza." We are hilarious.

Weekend Recap

So I went and voted today. The first time I voted was in 2008 and I voted absentee. So I was completely unaware that you had to vote at a specific place. And I had no idea where that place was, because, ya know, no one told me. So instead of going before work like I had planned, I had to go to work and look it up and then go. Lame.

But I think I was there less than 20 minutes, so not all bad. I voted, you should vote, and then we should never speak of this again. At least not for the next 4 years. Oh god, could you imagine if we had presidential elections more often?! That just sounds horrifying.

As you've probably noticed, it's been about a week (or exactly a week?) since my last post. I was sick (stayed home, in bed, all damn day on Wednesday). I seriously didn't get out of bed unless it was to pee or eat. I attempted to work on my paper...what a joke. I wrote two paragraphs and then looked it over again a day or two later when I wasn't on a ton of Nyquil. Everything I wrote is just laughable. Awful. So I started over on Friday night. And got the entire thing written by Sunday night (and it's not due until tomorrow!). Might be the first time in a long time I haven't been working on a paper the night before it's due. Feels pretty good to be on top of things for once.

Saturday we had dinner at Chris's parents' house for his mom's birthday. I met his sister and his nieces for the first time. They're adorable and their pictures are now hanging on our fridge. I do believe I have confirmed that I'm just not really a baby person. They freak me out. I have these awful visions of me as a mother...on one hand, they are kind of hilarious, on the other, I may or may not end up in a mental institution. Just kidding. Sort of. Maybe I'll just adopt a couple four year olds. They're old enough to eat normal food, they're potty-trained, and you don't have to baby-talk them, which I am literally incapable of. I feel like the biggest effing idiot talking to babies/young children. I'm totally gonna get "Mother of the Year" someday. In all seriousness though, his nieces are cute. Did I hold the baby? Absolutely not. Chris did and I sat next to him and his mom took a picture. That's about as close as we got.

Anyhoo. I also got wonderful news that I'm getting a new car this weekend! I'm super excited. I will have a post later this week completely dedicated to my current car, and the new one. And I'll be taking lots of pictures Saturday when I pick it up. I can't freaking wait. It will be so nice to drive a car with working headlights (I have to hold them in place for about 20 minutes of my drive before they'll stay on). The only downside is that me getting this car means that we will be very poor for quite a while. But I'm pretty sure we'll always be poor, so I guess we might as well get used to it.

I have yet to go for a run in our new neighborhood. There really aren't any "ideal" places to do so near where our house is. One of these days I'll go find a park or something. Eventually. And my workouts have been pretty nonexistant. I was sick for a few days, and it's just impossible to work out when you're sneezing and blowing your nose and you can't breathe and your throat hurts. Then I had a lot of homework. I pretty much spent all of my weekend doing homework. Kinda sucked, but I got it all done, so at least I was productive. Gonna try to start working out this week though. I need to get myself back on track, even if I'm not out there running.

I'll have more this week on cars, listening to my audiobooks, etc.
Make it a good one!

Spoke Too Soon

For the past few months, I have done a fairly good job of avoiding getting sick (minus that UTI). I take my vitamins, make sure I get plenty of vitamin C, drink a lot of water (anywhere between 60 and 100 ounces a day), eat fruits and vegetables, exercise when I can. I was just thinking all of that to myself the other day, amazed that what I was doing was actually working, and hoping that there would be a possibility of me not getting sick (or at least not getting sick as often) this winter.

Yesterday I had kind of a scratchy throat. Nothing major, so I assumed it was allergies and kept drinking my water. By the time I got off work yesterday, it hurt to swallow. Overall, I still felt okay though. So I went to Barnes & Noble, grabbed a coffee, did some shopping, and then went to class. I was exhausted less than half way through. That caffeine did nothing for me. My sore throat was worse.

I got home and Chris had made chili. It was spicy and delicious (although a little too hot temperature-wise...I burnt my tongue :/ ), just how I like it. I only ate about half of a bowl though. My throat hurt more and I don't know if it was the spiciness that was making it worse or just eating in general (probably a little of both). I felt bad I didn't eat more.

I went to bed and woke up several times in the middle of the night sneezing and coughing. Not a good sign. Woke up this morning pretty much the same way except everything hurts now. My throat hurts. My eyes hurt. My head hurts. My nose hurts. I'm cold. I'm out of kleenex and am now using regular toilet paper every time I have to blow my nose (which makes my nose hurt worse).

I don't have an appetite (had to force myself to eat a banana for breakfast this morning) and I'm forcing myself to drink water...barely. I'm really bad about not getting enough fluids when I'm sick. I'm extremely thankful I don't have class the rest of the week. Hopefully I can get some rest and get over whatever this is quickly.

As I was thinking all those nice things the other day about how healthy I had been, I was also thinking to myself that I should probably get a flu shot this year since I didn't get one last year and that could possibly be why I got sick so much. But, you can't get a flu shot if you're sick. So I never got one last year because I was sick every few weeks. I was never not sick long enough to be able to get one.

I'm hoping this will pass and I can go get a flu shot. Not that getting a flu shot will keep me from getting sick at all, but hopefully it will keep me from getting sick so often.

Right now I'd give anything to be in bed with some soup and a grilled cheese. And enough medicine to let me sleep and breathe and all that good stuff.

What kind of things do you all do when you're sick to make you feel better?

Beginning of Halloween Activities

I didn't run this weekend like I had planned to :( I slept in way later than I planned to on Saturday (almost until 11 am) but I'm thinking I needed it because I was exhausted last week.

So I woke up, cleaned, made myself lunch, watched a movie, and then headed to JC Penny to look for a shirt for my Halloween costume for the party we're going to this Friday. Got it on clearance for $14. I also found the most amazing coat ever there and I really want to go buy it. Plus I don't have a nice winter coat so I'm going to have to buy one soon. After that I went to Walmart (bleh) to buy the other part of my costume. So my costume total was about $15. All I had to do was a little sewing when I got home and it's ready to go!

I made spaghetti squash for dinner Saturday night with ground turkey, broccoli, peas, and a red sauce. Can't say that it was my best, but Chris said it was good (at least I think he did...I could just be making that up to make myself feel better) so I'll take it.

After dinner we headed up to St. Louis to go to the haunted house at the Lemp Brewery. I was super excited because I've always wanted to go there (supposedly the mansion is really haunted, but I wanted to go just for the history of it). The haunted house part was in one of the caves under the brewery and I thought that was awesome because I've always wanted to go down there (there are supposedly several caves and tunnels under the brewery and mansion).

Waiting in line in the cold sucked. But it was pretty awesome inside. The actors aren't allowed to touch you, but some of them got super close and I didn't like that. It didn't really scare me, but it was kind of annoying. And I don't like to be touched. Or breathed on for that matter, and most of these people had cough drops and I hate that smell. Yuck. I think the scariest part of all haunted houses (or being home alone...) is the loud noises. It's not the people in masks or makeup or what they say to you. It's the banging on the walls, the sound of drills and saws, etc. So was I scared? Yes. But it wasn't the kind of scary that keeps you up all night or gives you nightmares. It was fun.

I really want to go back there some other time to do a tour of the mansion (which is now a bed and breakfast) and the brewery. I think it'd be so cool to see all that stuff (especially the underground parts, minus all the "haunted" decorations and whatnot). I love stuff like that. The history behind really old houses and buildings and the people who lived there.

Sunday morning we slept until 8:30ish. We decided on pancakes for breakfast, but neither one of us knew exactly how to make them... So we looked up a recipe and went with it. They didn't look too pretty, but they were delicious and that's all that matters :)

Chris's parents came down and his dad tried to get our dryer working. No such luck. It appears to be an electrical problem. :( Then we had BWW for lunch and then Chris and I went grocery shopping. We went to Walmart first and I was super grumpy the entire time because everyone who shops there is a moron and I hate them. Then we went to the other grocery store in town to get our produce (I will never buy produce at Walmart--it SUCKS).

We took a nap when we got home and then had cereal for dinner because neither one of us felt like cooking. After dinner we decided to carve our pumpkin. To say that didn't go too well is probably an understatement. Our pumpkin looks like it has down syndrome. :( After that, we lit some of our halloween candles (and put one in the pumpkin) and we had caramel apples and watched Young Frankenstein. I love that movie :)

Our little downs syndrome pumpkin--we love him :)

We are super talented at pumpkin carving!