lazy night...

tonight i am going to be lazy. there will be three hours of tv viewing. i might consider washing a dish here or there or throwing some socks in the machine but other than that - me mindlessly staring at the box. happy sigh. and tomorrow is friday. double happy sigh.

when i started weight watchers the first time i didn't tell anyone but e (and maybe one other person) until i had lost 7lbs. for some reason making a big deal about it and putting it all out there seemed like a bad idea. pressure from others, pressure from myself, questions, etc... well, here it is folks i've been journaling and counting the points for three solid days now. all that to say - i've struggled with blogging about it but this is an outlet for me so it seemed wrong not to. we will see.

so far i've dipped into the flex points but i'm cool with that and i'm feeling like i potentially have the bug. you know the bug. but i say potentially because sometimes it only stays temporarily. but i'm going to give it my best because i have 9.6lbs that are really bugging me. not too mention that i've moved back into my pile of clothes to get rid of. luckily i've kept them around because tight, uncomfortable clothes are bad for us emotional eaters.
e is gone and will be gone until the 10th. and i'm doing pretty well. i haven't had a freak out, be mean to him session yet. i've avoided a completely bad food day which i generally give myself one or two of. hopefully i will continue to feel this way over the weekend.

i'm heading back to the counselor tomorrow. not much to report there other than i think it's been great to have an outside sounding board. i've really been pondering the pleaser in me and do i choose to be a martyr. i just need to look out for myself as much as i do for others sometimes - especially my family. speaking of, my mother is going home today. i guess she's doing ok. the last few times i've spoke to her she has been high as a kite.

this quote stuck out to me recently -

"We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then, is not an act, but a habit."
- Aristotle

because i'm a nerd...

and have been visiting www.blufr.com too much. i've stumbled onto this random fact.

Officially the most requested radio song of all time, Sting earns an average of $2000.00 per day in royalties for the song "Every Breath You Take."

i continue to feel overwhelmed...

i want to blog but i just can't find the energy. so i leave you with this...





















Thrush Holmes
Overwhelmed by a series of strange loops and new ideas
oil and mixed media on canvas
48 x 48 inches
2005

a random website

thanks to a visit to my hair lady i have found this fun, random site. really, go visit.

http://www.blufr.com/

today was a really long day - to end my really long week. i had the worst professional experience i've ever had. you would think the academic nerds that i work around would be really intelligent and well behaved - this is not the case. sigh.

tomorrow we are heading to KC and i'm excited to get away. unfortunately e is leaving on monday for two weeks. double sigh.

please someone, can we go to the next chapter...

two thursday observations...

first, don't wear those stupid little ear headsets unless you seriously need to multi-task. when you stop multi-tasking - take it off. it is distracting and you look stupid. don't wear them to professional meetings, don't wear them when you are at dinner with me. i know you think they look cool but they don't .

second, when you are in an office setting and there is community food (ie. donuts). don't decide that it's your right to take them home to your children and assume that i won't eat a day old donut (because i will). unless you bought it - don't take it. didn't we learn this in office etiquette 101.

i think i'm a little cranky today. sorry.

My stomach hurts today. Blah.

Today I got a new monitor at work. And it’s huge. It’s like those crazy televisions that are really wide – you know the widescreen type. Well, that’s what my monitor is now. And I don’t really see the benefit of it being so wide. I know from a designers perspective it’s good because of space but couldn’t you make it proportionally tall. Because look at what my blog looks like on my new monitor. And I think I might be squinting more – I think I’m going to have to play with the screen display a bit more. Since Blogger's photo loader sucks you will have to see it here.

I’m feeling very chaotic these days. Work is crazy. Mostly because we are in a transitional phase and everyone is doing something new. And well Amber is gone and that’s just weird. But my friend Amy is right over the wall so it will make the chatting much easier. Before I was required to walk to chat, now I can just do it at my desk.

I think I’m still managing to keep the weight gain at bay but I can’t get serious about losing the extra 5 lbs I’ve recently gained. I guess on a positive note my new 5 have distracted me from old 5. But I’ve decided that I’m not going to whine about it here because I find that annoying. This is the dialogue - I’m fat and I suck but I’m not going to stop eating cookies. I know what to do and I’ve done it before so the problem is simply my inability to be disciplined and not focus on food so much.

So there.

My mom is in the hospital. She has a staph infection. I’m learning a lot about staph infections. Apparently they are pretty common and healthy people get them fairly frequently. Generally when I hear about staph infections it involves old people in the hospital. Anyway, she is doing ok and hopefully will get to go home in a couple of days.

Speaking of medical conditions - a couple of weeks ago I had physical and my iron levels came back high so I had to give another blood sample yesterday. And what fun that was. For some reason the veins in my arms are very little or hidden so people often have a hard time finding my veins. Well this lady yesterday missed and wiggled the needle around for a few minutes. Oh good times.

I’m just a rambling fool today.

E and I are heading to Kansas City this weekend to see the Dosters. And I am excited. I’m getting out of town and I get to hangout with the best hangout friends I have.

And finally, tomorrow is the season premiere of Grey's Anatomy. Woo-hoo. Fall is here.

That’s all for now.

more football...

so i keep hearing about all of this ou/oregon hoopla and i found this article. seriously, a death threat. this is one of the many reasons that i despise ou fans.

Instant replay official gets death threat, might resign
By William McCallAssociated Press Writer

PORTLAND, ORE. — The instant replay official whose failure to overturn a bad call led to a narrow Oregon victory over Oklahoma said Monday he feels like he is under siege after threatening phone calls, including a death threat.

Gordon Riese said he would make a decision soon about whether to finish the season, or even whether to return next year.

“I’m struggling with it,” Riese said in an interview at his home. “I feel so bad I missed that call, it’s driving me crazy.”

A former college baseball pitcher in the 1960s who was inducted into the Portland State Hall of Fame in 1997, Riese said he never played football but always enjoyed the game during 28 years as a Pacific-10 Conference official.

“I loved it, I absolutely loved it,” Riese said. But that was before he became an instant replay official. “I’ve felt much, much more pressure as an instant replay official than I ever did on the field,” Riese said.

He said the equipment is not as sophisticated as NFL replay equipment, and does not allow the official to freeze the frame. But Riese lays the blame on himself after replays showed that an onside kick was touched by an Oregon player before it had traveled the required 10 yards. The Ducks went on to score the go-ahead touchdown.

“I can’t sleep, I can’t eat, my blood pressure is skyrocketing,” Riese said, looking haggard and worn as he sat on the front porch of his house.

His wife is a registered nurse, and has been checking his blood pressure every four hours, he said.

Riese said he has stopped answering the phone, and police are investigating the threatening calls while keeping an eye on his neighborhood.

“They not only threatened me, they threatened my wife and kids,” Riese said.

Riese has endured plenty of physical pain in his career. The physical injuries still bother him, occasionally, but not as much as his ruling from the booth last Saturday, Riese said.

monday, monday...

a couple of sundays ago a friend was singing the classic the mamas and the papas song - mostly because i was whining about having to work the next day. well, it got me thinking - at first listen the song sounds somewhat positive about mondays but why i wondered. everyone knows that mondays suck.

Monday Monday, so good to me,
Monday Monday, it was all I hoped it would be
Oh Monday morning, Monday morning couldn't guarantee
That Monday evening you would still be here with me.

Monday Monday, can't trust that day,
Monday Monday, sometimes it just turns out that way
Oh Monday morning, you gave me no warning of what was to be
Oh Monday Monday, how yould cou leave and not take me.

Every other day, every other day,
Every other day of the week is fine, yeah
But whenever Monday comes, but whenever Monday comes
You can find me cryin' all of the time

Monday Monday, so good to me,
Monday Monday, it was all I hoped it would be
Oh Monday morning, Monday morning couldn't guarantee
That Monday evening you would still be here with me.

Every other day, every other day,
Every other day of the week is fine, yeah
But whenever Monday comes, but whenever Monday comes
You can find me cryin' all of the time

Monday Monday, ...

keepin' the happiness alive...

here is my final summation of the flaming lips show...it was like a kid's birthday party with a peace rally tossed in. seriously, it was a really good time.

here comes monday.

friday roundup

this week was looooong and i'm glad to wrap it up.

today i called in sick. something is in the air because i'm a sneezing machine and i had a migraine this morning so i made the call. and then to make my crappy week complete i had a flat tire. and early this week e hurt his back so he wasn't able to change the tire and had to teach me. and $140 later, we have two new front tires. errr...do we have extra tire money laying around...no. and i have eaten so much crap this week it's not even funny.

but my week officially turned around about 10pm tonight. i saw the flaming lips and they made it all better. good times. with lots of confetti and a blow-up santa claus. seriously, it was one of the best/funnest shows i've ever been too.

what is that saying about the pot and the kettle?

Praying for Tom Cruise
Stephen Baldwin says he is praying for Tom Cruise’s soul.

“On the Hollywood list of people I pray for often, Tom Cruise is probably No. 1,” the youngest of the Baldwin brothers told Radar Online. “I’d love to break bread with him and pray with him, and I’d love for the Holy Spirit of God to reveal the truth to him.”

Baldwin also says that Cruise is a “very different guy” from the person he was when they worked together on “Born on the Fourth of July.”

“That regular Joe quality seems to have been lost,” Says Baldwin. “When you buy enough of your own hype, then it’s not who you are anymore.”

The born-again Baldwin has written a book about spirituality, “The Unusual Suspect: My Calling to the New Hardcore Movement of Faith,” but when asked by Radar Online to name the Ten Commandments after much fumbling came up with only six. He was totally stumped when asked to name the seven deadly sins. - www.msnbc.com


Remember that time we met Stephen Baldwin and he thought we were stalking him - yeah, that was a fun time...

Someone is moody today...

I’m going to preface the following statement with – keep your “what’s wrong with you” and “I can’t believe that” comments to yourself – I don’t remember ever seeing Nightmare Before Christmas. Ever. But I am excited to see this – it looks fun.



Speaking of Christmas – I have purchased our airline tickets to NYC for December 3-8th. I have fully committed and that means that I could potentially be eating ramen noodles for the next few months as a way to save more money. BUT I am so excited. And let’s be honest, ramen will curb my weight gain.

Last night’s drawing class was exhausting. I don’t know what you would call what we were doing – our professor set up a display of shapes and we had to draw it using a straight edge for angles and distance. Holy moly. The first half of the class I was completely freaking out because the only two drawings I could see on other easels were really good (one guy is completely in the wrong class) and I thought I was doing horrible. So I told myself that this was for fun, I had nothing to prove and just to keep going. Worse case scenario – I could drop or audit the class. But then we took a break and I realized 80% of the class was equally as challenged as me.

The last half of the class we had to draw something to turn in. And I think I did ok. Cubes and shading are quite the challenge for me but I am feeling a bit more confident.

Seriously though – it was exhausting.

Today we are having Amber’s going away / good luck celebrations. Cake and Ted’s Escondido. Mmmmmm…mmmmm…good. Some of you may have In-n-Out, the beach, swmmin' pools and movies stars but at least I still have Ted's.

five years later...

posting something today and not mentioning that it's september 11th just seems wrong. but i don't know what to say - nothing i type is capable of expressing what i feel.

so much sadness, fear and pride. then and now.

gee.

this is truly dedication to one's cause...

SAN SALVADOR (Reuters) - Four prisoners in an El Salvador' jail hid cellphones, a phone charger and spare chips in their bowels so they could coordinate crimes from their cells, prison officials said on Wednesday.

The four men, all gang members, wrapped their phones and accessories in plastic and inserted them into their rectums "far enough to reach their intestines," Ramon Arevalo, director of the maximum security Zacatecoluca prison, said

Arevalo said the ruse was discovered during X-ray examinations following six weeks of investigations.

The men, members of the ultra-violent Mara Salvatrucha street gang and the first in El Salvador known to go to such lengths to make phone calls in jail, used the cellphones to manage robberies, blackmail and murders outside, Arevalo said.

The Zacatecoluca prison -- some 40 miles east of the capital San Salvador and currently home to 337 inmates -- goes by the nickname "Zacatraz," after the famously secure U.S. island penitentiary Alcatraz.

the silver lining.

half of my support system at work is leaving. her name is amber. and i will miss her. she has a new wonderful job and managed to make it over the professional hump into management. i'm very excited for her but as i mentioned she is half of my two woman support system.

but the silver lining is. today i was promoted to her position which means i have a higher number on my title and a higher salary. so all is not lost.

i've been rethinking my tv mom and i'm changing her to loralei gilmore because she's fun, has great clothes, super thin and makes me laugh. and maybe just possibly being her daughter i would have inherit her skinny legs and good taste in clothes.

e is coming home tomorrow and i'm super excited. he will be home all weekend.

tomorrow i also go back to see my counselor. sigh.

once upon a time.

There once was a girl named Christie who lost 30lbs. Christie was good and she maintained this weight loss for two long wonderful years. Then she decided to train and complete a half-marathon. Unfortunately while training she ate anything and everything she wanted. And as any good fat girl would do after completing the race she stopped running and continued eating. 4 months and 5lbs later she is attempting to regain control of her eating. And it sucks.

As I enter my new phase of seeing a counselor, I thought it would be interesting to pose a question about a subject that will likely come up often in my sessions – my mother.

I stole this question from here.

If you could trade your mom for any TV character mom, who would it be?

Sidebar: This question is for people who have dysfunctional mother/child relationships. If you have a great relationship with your ma, then we don't want to hear about it.

I’m thinking Claire Huxtable.

blah, blah, blah football...

well from what i hear today is the beginning of the college football season. all week long i've been hearing annoying little ou and osu comments. i don't know why but college football fans just bug the crap out of me. and today at sonic the woman who gave me my drink says, "well your car is the right color" with a little giggle and look that says we ou fans need to stick together. yes, my car is maroon but it has nothing to do with that obnoxious school in norman. geez.

and apparently the state has been released from the throes of hell. it is a lovely 76 degrees. ahhh.

e had in-n-out today and i hate him.

yesterday i went to see the counselor. he is a very tall black man who once played college and professional football. we are very different but i like him and i think i will go back. here are a few things i learned yesterday -

- i am like an onion. many, many layers of oddities.
- my mother has made me crazy and i MUST learn to deal with her instead of skirting my emotions. really this means i need to be more honest and not be such a people pleaser.
- i need to develop more of an emotional support system with others.
- i spend way too much time in my head, likely making things far worse than they really are.

sigh. i only cried a little and am feeling pretty good about things. i'm sure there will be much moaning and groaning to come here at my trusty blog.

random email from my mother

i'm not going to post the email but am posting a link to the information. my favorite part of the email was the addition of the text "another reason to shop at target." i'm not sure if that was a comment by my mother or someone else but it made me want to ask the question - are you familiar with issac mizrahi, the poster child for target?

Wal-Mart asks for, and receives, permission to join homosexual marriage group