Phone Randomness

The depths of my phone is a scary place. Most likely this is a similar situation to the depths of my brain.

You never know what you’re going to get.

And because things have been, like OMG SUPER CRAZY, and I can’t seem to put a string of thoughts together, here is a glimpse of random via my iPhone.

When it comes to first dates, I do everything I can to ensure it goes well. Enter my lucky socks:

And they worked!

No wonder I’ve had a string of bad dates. I’ve been wearing the wrong footwear. Who knew?

I also have a few other steps in my predate routine:

Just to make sure my nerves don’t get the best of me. It might not be the most mature solution. But it’s very much the tastiest.

And yes, that is a Tiger Beat with One Direction on the front. Long story. Not now.

Yesterday was a more stressful than usual day at work. Couple that with the fact that I was tired from the night before? Not an ideal situation.

But I have super sweet coworkers. And one practically dragged me out of the office by my hair to treat me to a little caffeine therapy:

Mocha lattes for everyone! She had a coupon. We had both skipped lunch. The 15 minute breather was the best thing we could have done.

After said busy day, grocery shopping still had to happen. Which was frustrating, because I was feeling super lazy.

My compromise was picking up ready-to-eat din din thanks to Trader Joe’s:

I really need to acquire some chopsticks. Like yesterday.

And unless you really want a picture of the burnt piece of toast I just ate, that’s really all to discuss here this morning. Sorry my mind is mush. It’s not my fault. Mostly.

Laters.

Irrational

I have quite a few irrational fears. Clowns. The ice cream man- which may also stem from the same place as the clowns issue does (I’m looking at you, Stephen King). Walmart after dark. Stepping on man-hole covers on the streets because I’m afraid of falling through.

 

Just to name a few.

 

But the most recent one? It came as I became a member of the public transit system.

 

I absolutely hate these things:

 

Not the small turnstiles. Those I can manage. Sure, it’s an art to roll your suitcase through one. But I’ve practiced and become semi-decent at the trick.

It’s the tall ones I fear.

 

Obviously the girl in front of me hates them, too. As shown by her opting for the “emergency exit only” door. You can easily guess which route I took.

 

I mean… come on.

 

What if my bag gets stuck? It’ll get wedged between the two turnstiles and I’ll be stuck forever (which is horrific- as an average sized human being, it’s still a tight fit)! Or killed in some crazy Final Destination-style moment. Because my luck will surely run out one of these days.

 

What if the person behind me pushes too hard? It’ll send me flying out as I get tripped up in the “walk through”.

 

What if I push the wrong way? Does it still work?

 

What do tall people do in these things? Or overweight people?

 

I HAVE SO MANY QUESTIONS!!!!

 

There has got to be a better way.

 

And until these questions are answered, I’ve learned the various paths of least resistance. Also known as which way to walk off the train at my designated stop to avoid the scary death machine if at all possible. Or only use them at stops that are less populated so I know I won’t be shoved through like cattle.

 

Although the turnstile I used last night was not spilling people out everywhere, it still gave me anxiety.

 

We pretend that’s why I needed to be subdued with this:

 

It’s not the only reason. I also heard the damn ice cream truck coming my way. Had to run a half block with my work bag flying behind me.

Stupid Stephen King movies.

 

But I’m safe now. The door was deadbolted and continued to stay that way all night. Because I stayed in. Not so much because of my fears (the ice cream man was long gone by the time it got dark), but because it was either have a relaxing night on the couch or meet up with a guy who asked me out on a date and then decided later on to add “bring a friend and let’s go drink our faces off”.

 

I feel the right choice was made.

What We Have To

My plans last night were a red box and a night in.

The dvd wouldn’t play.

Night officially ruined.

So I made myself a giant cookie, had a glass of wine, and settled for cheap thrills on cable television.

We do what we have to.

I used one of Picky Palate’s recipes for a giant cookie.

It actually makes two nice sized ones, by the way.

Thought I’d fool myself and try to save one for the next day. But, if you’ll remember, there was no movie to distract me. So I ate the second one, too.

Whatever. It was carb loading. And it was essential I stayed in last night. Or so I thought.

Today was supposed to be a 7-miler. But we’re still under heat advisory and I am not waking up before 7:00 on a Saturday. Nope. So I hit the gym.

We do what we have to.

I pulled out 4.7 miles on the tread and another 12 minutes on the elliptical before deciding it might actually be more humid/hot inside the gym than outside. I finished up the day with a 1.5 mile walk outdoors. The breeze and 12-degree drop in weather confirmed it- much nicer outside than in.

Just can’t win.

Shoulda waited until tomorrow because there’s a rumor it’s going to be a high in the low 80′s. But tonight will be a long one. My gal pal Mon needs a perk up and what better plan than to see Magic Mike and get some adult beverages after?

We do what we have to.

Until then, I should probably be a good kid.

Iced tea from McDonald’s (shout out to B for letting me borrow her car for the journey) and a salad because absolutely no cooking is going down in my kitchen again until the temps straighten themselves out. It’s a decided new rule.

Stay cool, kids.

Low Profile

Yesterday I didn’t post.

It was Friday the 13th. Seemed safer to just keep a low profile. You just never know when it comes to such things.

Besides, I didn’t have a lot going on. It was a rest day in every which way.

Ever since half marathon training started back in January, I’ve used Friday as a recovery and rest day so Saturday could be super kick-ass.

This seemed smart in theory. Not so sure if it always worked. But I’ve decided to keep up with the trend- even if the race is well behind me.

Plus, after a long week of work, there is nothing better than walking through the door after a stupidly long commute and just collapsing on the couch.

My roommate was not far behind. We bond through our sheer laziness.

At some point, I got hungry. There was chicken defrosting in the refrigerator, or a burrito at my local mexican joint with my name on it.

The cooking of the chicken won out. Mostly because I didn’t feel like putting my shoes back on to venture outside.

Plus, you can’t really walk down the street or into a restaurant with an open glass of wine.

I mean… what if you dropped it?

On top of that, there is quite a bit of food in my refrigerator that needed to be used up. And if I wanted to still have that kick-ass workout this morning, a burrito bomb with extra guac and sour cream might not be overly helpful. Counterproductive, to say the least.

We’ll save that for late-night after-party snackage.

So I was a good little girl and made myself some chicken with a side of brussels sprouts and the last of some sweet potato fries.

Stewie was a little nervous about Friday the 13th, too...

It was then a swift retreat back to the previously mentioned couch to watch The Descendants.

Definitely worthy of all the Oscar attention it got. However, not really a “feel good” movie. Makes sense, being as how it’s about finding out that your comatose wife cheated on you.

Yet worthy of a tear or two.

I know. What is going on with me?

We also rented Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. Since it didn’t get watched last night, we’ll get to it at some point today, I’m sure.

Even if I will probably feel the need to purchase another dead bolt and sleep with the light on for a few days/weeks/whatever.

I’m not mature enough for “R” rated movies.

Balls.

See what I mean?

100 Words- I Stayed In Edition

I stayed in last night.And watched my Red Birds win the World Series.

Red wine to celebrate a victorious cardinal nation. Hell yes.

I also stayed in to rest up for an 8-mile run today.

The pace was kept around 8:45 and I still had energy at the end of the last mile. This makes me feel oh so good about next week’s 15k! (Yes, I was nervous about it.)

Finally, I stayed in so I could be all rested up for tonight.

It IS Halloween weekend afterall…

Remember last year?Let’s see if we can top it…

Happy Weekend!

100 Words- Lethargic Edition

Energy has been lacking for the last few days.

Not sure why. 

I’ve cancelled the last two days of workouts. And sat on my couch instead.

Or laid on my couch. Either/or.

Friends tried to get me out last night.

I politely said I had plans.

With a couple of Red Box movies. And a bottle of wine.A new wine. Because I was feeling mischievious…And leftovers. Because that was a lie. I was actually feeling quite boring.

Hopefully this lethargic feeling goes away. It’s driving me nuts.

Plus my friend will hate if I cancel our run… again. Ugh.

Cooking With Friends

From time to time, I find myself living in excess.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Usually it’s in the form of credit card receipts. Shoes. Chocolate. Wine…

However, this week it’s more of the garden fresh variety.

Thanks to the generosity of my parents, along with my roomie’s mom, we’re accidentally running a farmer’s market out of our kitchen.

So before business zoning becomes an issue, along with the overabundance of food all going bad, B and I decided to do something about it.

Have Megan cook for us!Just kidding. Sort of.

The roomie doesn’t cook often, and I’m a much better baker than cook (let’s be honest), so I told Megan about our hoarding of fresh food and asked if she could help out.

Plus, I offered to bring wine. I think that could be why she agreed.

And that’s how we had a little dinner party on our hands!

Megan showed us a few tricks in the kitchen when it comes to breaded eggplant.For the record, I’ve attempted eggplant on two different occasions. Neither of them were overly spectacular. It must be because I didn’t have the 8-lb weights at the time…

As Megan slaved away in the kitchen, Bailey and I took to the outdoors to shuck some corn.When I was a wee little lass, we used to shuck corn from the family garden on my grandma’s front porch steps. It overlooked the pasture (remember that whole thing where I told you I grew up on a cattle farm?).

Things have clearly changed. I now shuck corn on a balcony overlooking downtown Chicago. With a delicious cabernet sauvignon sitting beside me. Weird.

And for the record, I totally made my wine selection on what would be paired well with eggplant. This made me feel very adult-like.

Because usually I just ask the question, “white or red?”

Ok fine, it’s usually “well let’s see what I’ve got in the cabinet.”

Anyway, earlier in the day while chatting about a second side (yes, this is interesting conversation to us), I told Megan we also had a ridiculous amount of green beans and potatoes.

But she stopped me right there and said maybe we should consider a non-veggie side.

Oh yeah… balanced eating… that’s smart.She may not admit it, but I’m pretty sure Megan just wanted to make a cheese sauce.

Cheeeeeessseeeee…..

All in all, everything turned out amazing. And Bailey and I made our way home with full tummies and leftovers. Success!

And now our attentions turn to the massive bag of green beans and overflowing grocery bags of potatoes….

Bound to Happen Eventually

Helllooooo weekend!

Thank goodness you’re here. After all the ”whomp whomp” stories you gave me yesterday, it really does seem like we’ve been ready for this weekend to finally get here. Am I right?

Heck yes I’m right. I’m always right.

After getting HEATED in traffic (seriously, why does a 40-minute drive take 80 minutes once a week?), I destressed with some Jillian Michaels No More Trouble Zones. Pretty sure she’s my new outlet for such things.

My new roomie walked in on the workout.

It was bound to happen.

But not as awkward as you would think.

Or at least for her. I still felt weird doing my sumo squats in front of others. Hopefully it will pass because she sat and watched the workout video as I did it. And ate three hot dogs while doing so. Amazing.

To take the edge off of feeling awkward, I decided to just have wine with dinner.

Whatever. I wanted wine anyway. That was just my justification. If I really needed one.

Dinner actually took some effort because I am a little tired of my 10-minute fallbacks of salad or omelets. Clearly I am in a rut.

Because pizza Friday hasn’t happened in a while, I decided why not?A moldy jar of marinara almost stopped me dead in my tracks on that one. Thank goodness I’m a bit of a pantry hoarder and there was an extra jar laying around. Without the fuzz. Sick.

Anyway, it was fun playing “how many toppings can I get on top of this slice of beer bread pizza dough?”Turns out it’s a lot! Mushrooms, onions, black olives, artichoke hearts and a little cheddar cheese.

It was inhaled during another first for me- we watched Legends of the Fall. Yes, you read correctly. It was my first time fully watching that movie- and it was more because the roommate urged me to. You can pull your jaw off the ground now. I’m aware. It’s shameful. But I was bound to get around to watching it eventually, right?

The movie was ok. I mean, it made me feel horribly depressed- which I think was the point… 

But did no one else think Susannah was a little selfish for never being happy and feeling the need to get with all three brothers? I mean geez… all three? Excessive.

I can’t even get one decent date. And she’s all over an entire family.

Not cool, Susannah.

At least I now have something to dwell on as I head out the door for a run. So that’s something…

Moving Confessions

Today is moving day! Hooray!

Actually, it’s more like “thank God”. Because I’ve been stressing for quite some time. I mean, if you read my post yesterday, you know what my general outlook on life was the last few days.

Don’t worry- I AM quite excited. Excited to finally be living in a walking neighborhood and just in the city of Chicago in general. There are just things I’m going to miss about my ‘burbs…

Like plenty of parking.

And not having to pay $5 an hour for said parking.

My one-bedroom apartment with one mirrored and one blue wall. It had character. And our new landlord won’t let us paint (BOOOOO!).

The workout room (even with all the weirdness that walks through on a regular basis). Though it’s the size of a walk-in closet, I’m not getting a gym membership right away- so I’ll be losing the elliptical and stairmill by the end of this month. Jillian Michaels and I will probably become even better friends. However, I am gonna have to be more mindful of when I’m doing my dvd workouts. Now it’s not a random stranger living below me, but my roommate. With whom I’d like to stay friends with.

And the most obvious thing I’ll miss is probably being in such close proximity to these girls:If I wanted to bug someone, Annie was a short drive away and Mon was just a matter of cutting through a yard.

It was awesome.

But it’s not like we are all going to stay in the same place forever. Alas, it was my time to leave.

But, to celebrate the awesomeness one more night, Mon and I did what we do best.

Workout and then cancel it out with wine and pizza.

The run was nothing new/crazy/out of sorts. 3 miles at an 8:31 pace. Considering my general “ache” from lifting boxes all week (and crappy mood in general), I’m honestly quite surprised the gym trip happened at all. Because another carload of stuff had to be packed before getting into “relax” mode.

Why does “relax” mode take forever to get to?

Pizza and wine night- I have no idea how many times we’ve gotten together for it. Sometimes planned, sometimes on a whim (Pizza-making from scratch while under the influence is not encouraged, but will still turn out decently well if you happen to try it).

Just make sure you have everything necessary. I bought the pizza dough from Trader Joe’s, but forgot I’d need some flour and a rolling pin (already moved both to the new place) to creat a decent pizza. Mon saved me from buying some flour at the store (do you think she actually has it on hand?) and I got creative with wine bottles:One for rollin’, one for drinkin’. 

Toppings of the night were spinach, black olives, mushrooms and onion:Topped with shredded cheese and a corny red box flick (Just Go With It), and you have one decent night.

I feel like Mon and I will still have many similar nights, but one of  us will be taking the train and we’ll be ordering the pizza from the local joint down the street. Close enough.

If you’d like a little chuckle, here’s a list of things I learned from when I moved two years ago.

Or at least a list of things I should have learned. Clearly I didn’t really learn it all being as how the new place doesn’t have an ice maker (other than me, myself and I), I didn’t downsize- but actually acquire more shit, don’t drink during moving weekend (here I am the morning after wine), and I’m no longer in a one-bedroom (so alas, I will not be able to walk around naked and pee with the door open any longer).

So really… did I even learn anything?

Happy weekend, kiddos! I shall see you on the other side of the city limits sign! 

Where was I going with that?

Happy Friday!!!

Guess what I did last night?

I went to happy hour. In the middle of the week.

I KNOW- rare occurence, right?

Well, there was reason for celebration. Tiffany from Simply Shaka is in town!She seems to be doing a road trip across America these days. So when she contacted me about her plans to wander through the midwest, I was more than excited.

After a few good recommendations and a viewing of online menus, we decided to do a little meetup at Coast Sushi Bar in Bucktown. I’m a sucker for a good BYOB restaurant. Mostly because I don’t really feel the need to pay $6 or 7 for a glass of wine when I can bring an entire bottle that costs that much (ssshhh… don’t tell Tiff I’m a cheap date!). I was the boring one with the Philly roll. Mostly because of a craving for something simple. And I heart avocado (duh).

However, to make up for my blandness, I did go crazy with the wasabi. If you don’t remember- we’re still looking into if my stomach is, in fact, made of steel.

All signs point to “yes”.

Overall, I really liked this place. A wee bit dark (I’m getting old and I can’t see!), but still a relaxing place if you’re just going for relaxation and conversation. Because let’s face it- bars/restaurants where you can’t hear a thing are just silly.

The food was fantastic. The wine was lovely. The conversation was unedited.

What? After reading about each other for months, it’s not hard to jump right into the good stuff.  I really need to wear flip flops more often. Hence the reason I’m awkwardly leaning/hunching.

But it was a fun group of girls- me (obviously), Tiffany, Joanna and Stacie.

After dinner, I got to play hostess for the night:Excuse the boxes everywhere- I’m moving. And I suck at it

We then proceeded to chat past our bedtime. And finally decided to call it a night when every story started ending in “I’m not quite sure where I was going with that…”

Tiffany left this morning to meet up with more girlies and to head home. But I’m glad I got to meet her and know she’ll be visiting again soon. Because seriously… who doesn’t love Chicago? 

*And those of you who asked about my guy friend who is running with me during lunch on occasion…

He’s cute (I don’t have ugly friends- duh) and has a girlfriend. But that’s beside the point- we’ve known each other since freshman year of college and instead of the two of us getting together, we prefer to make fun of each other for hookups of college past.

It’s terrifying how much that kid knows about me…

Enjoy the weekend, kids!