New York, Part 1

I took that picture myself. Don't recognize it? Well, you're dumb. It's Fifth Avenue. Still clueless? Just look it up already!

I'm writing this post via my cell phone which is busy charging in grand central station. Five hours in the city that never sleeps, and it's dead already.

The train was nice. Except for the hundred degree temperature in the cabin, compounded to 110F due to the larger person sitting on me. I got off the train and hit the shops in herald square. I'm in love with my new dance shoes.

One of my best friends had to sadly spend the day in the library, but she managed to make time to meet me. We grabbed some Max Brenners and sat in Bryant park with her doom (the library) towering over us.

Then I spent a lovely few hours on fifth avenue, gawking as all the chrisrmas decorations went up. I resisted doing extensive Christmas shopping, and instead I decided to change my shoes on a street corner. It was quite exciting. I remember telling my friend once that the test of a true New Yorker is someone who can get their coat on and off while holding a purse and not stopping. I think I am like a VIP New Yorker now or something for my shoe trick.

This afternoon, I'm on my way to grab a bite with old roommates and will hopefully get to see my aunt and uncle who visit the city every year at thanksgiving. Don't worry. More adventures will come soon.

It's wonderful to be back in the city. It's been six months but it quite literally feels like I've never left. I hope that it continues to hit me properly so I don't waste my trip. I won't be back for a while again. Better make it count :)

The Autumn Weeks...

.... have flown by. Even Thanksgiving has come and gone without a fuss. My only excuse for not writing more often is that I've thought the events of the last few weeks too routine to write about. However, considering I always seem to find a million random things to discuss, this is clearly not a good excuse.

Work is pretty good. Things are moving, for the most part, and that's all we can ask for. The semester ends December 21st though, which is incredibly soon. It's hard to believe it's almost been four months already!

One of my dancers brought me a treat last week, too, which pretty much about made my day. I'll have to think of a return gift...

I got a little socializing in the schedule when I met a couple of friends out for dinner/drinks and when I had a couple of friends over for the same. However, I am completely pictureless, so you'll just have to trust me. The only proof I have that I had anyone over is this picture...

Remember that time the plastic knife broke in the brownie...?









Thanksgiving was nice, with the grandparents, though we missed out on the Macy's parade watching and the turkey dinner eating. We had a nice morning brunch instead, and I slept most of the day.

 After the big meal though, my grandfather decided blood pressures ought to be checked. And we had a laugh fest when trying to take photographs.

And my sister got lost in chocolate. It was pretty disgusting.

So the last days of autumn passed in as much blur as this post is. And now I am writing at 5 o'clock in the morning because I have a train to catch.... More soon ;)

Happy Thanksgiving!

Plan!!!!

I have a plan! I have a plan! Announcement, announcement, let's all celebrate! I've been mentally wandering around for months trying to decide on a plan of action for the next few years. And thanks to several factors, including the forcible extraction of a plan from my brain by my friend at dinner last night, I have a plan. However, I'm not ready to share it with you yet. Give me a couple days to fine tune and tell some more people, and I promise I will share.

But Happy FRIDAY! I have a plan! :D

Campaign trail

I live in a battleground state. Poor me. The past few weeks, I have been badgered and berated with campaign posts, campaign ads, campaign mailers, and all things campaign related. Candidates slandering other candidates with photoshop and ridiculous accusations. Regardless of who's voting for whom or who's supporting whom, it's been pretty miserable and pretty tasteless. My favorite (or rather least favorite) campaign mailer featured a picture of President Obama, looking very contemplative, as a train conductor. I forget what it said, but it was something along the lines of a train wreck waiting to happen.... Yup. It was awesome.

Well, everyone, in case you live in a cave and weren't made aware, today is Election Day. Woohoo. I am glad to go out and vote, but let me just say that it is absolutely no one's business who I vote for. So far this post makes me sound like a cynic, and I suppose I'm feeling a bit cynical today. But I'm also feeling pretty positive. I do not for a moment believe that any of the candidates, presidential or congressional, will be superheroes and will fix all or even any of our problems right now. But I am very glad to see so many people exercising their voting rights, even if we seem to be doing it like crusaders for dueling sports teams.

Regardless of your vote,  I hope you made one today. And I pray that we will all work a little bit harder to make this country a wonderful place to live and work. Whoever he is, the president can't do it alone. 

NaNoWriMo time!

Happy November first! It's time for National Novel Writing Month. Who's down?

For almost fifteen years, NaNoWriMo has been an opportunity for budding and fake novelists all over the world. Teachers, bankers, firefighters, hobos, and others gather at their laptops every November 1st for virtual socialization and the beginnings of their long journey to a 50,000 word novel. The novel doesn't have to be good, it just has to be long and have characters. NaNoWriMo, as you can probably guess, is about the journey and the discovery that one can accomplish such great and strange things.

The goal for each participant is a 50,000 words (very) rough novel by midnight on November 30. But having started a new job recently and still adjusting to my (very) hectic schedule, I've set the bar for myself quite low: 5,000 words (a good-lengthed short story). If I start making it to 5,000 quite quickly, I will up the bar; but for right now, this is where it's going to stay.

Anyone else thinking of doing NaNoWriMo? Let me know! I'd love to hear your plans and inspirations. I've got some virtual socialization set-up via Facebook for my friendly NaNoWriMo friends from years gone by who are all over the world at this point. It's the perfect time to catch up. Ironic, perhaps, that I'm planning on wasting time on socialization while frantically typing toward a word count, but around word 4,000, I know I'm going to be dying for person-interaction, virtual, imaginary, or otherwise.

Hurricane Sandy

We're battening down the hatches here in the DCMV today. Hurricane Sandy is already whipping through the neighborhood with winds up to 30 mph. By mid-afternoon, we're expecting hurricane forces to strike. The Federal Government offices have closed, as have all the schools in the area. The chances of trees falling and power outages is large.

I was just on twitter, reading the trending #Sandy, and people in Brooklyn, Atlantic City, and others are already trapped in their high rises from flooding. Sandy's not supposed to land until 4PM.

Since, we'll probably lose power soon, I'm enjoying my electric coffeemaker and laptop while still possible. To all my friends and family, in DC, New York, and beyond: stay inside, stay safe, and I'll see you on the other side.

Running for Charity

As you know October is Breast Cancer Awareness month, and as a tribute most magazine have had huge sections dedicated to cancer education, support, and ideas. I read a motivational suggestion in one magazine (I can't remember exactly which one, but it was either Self or Women's Health). The suggestion was that for every mile you manage in your weekly workout, pledge a dollar to your favorite charity. I've donated to my favorite charities a couple of times a year, but this idea was brilliant. It means that  my donations are smaller, but more frequent. And the more I manage to make it out of this stupid chair, the more I'm giving.

With this in mind, I've decided that Wednesday is "Donation Day". Whatever my mileage for the week is on Wednesday evenings is how much I'm donating. So by yesterday, I had raised $8.50 for my favorite charity. Let's see if I can beat that this week....

What about you? Do you have a giving program for yourself? Or a exercise motivation strategy? Would love to hear them!

Wednesdays and telephone

For some reason on Wednesdays, the NoVa traffic is bad. Now, we're not talking about just typical bad here. It seems that for some reason on Wednesdays, every person and his brother around here hops in his car around 8.30AM and decides to add to his own misery. A drive that ought to take twenty minutes instead takes forty-five, and obviously it's truly a joyful thing.

I heard a rumor once about why Wednesday traffic in the suburbs is particularly atrocious. A friend's husband works contracted to the government and heard that federal employees cannot telecommute on Wednesdays. In fact, he had heard that it was the only day that all employees must physically go into the office. Hence, their explanation for the terrible Wednesday traffic. I asked someone else a few weeks later, and heard a completely different story about federal employees and Wednesdays. I can't remember what that second story was, but it sounded like another game of telephone to me.

You remember that game telephone? One kid whispers a silly sentence in another's ear, then that person passes it along. Each kid passes the whisper around the circle until the final person who's heard it blurts it out; and if the final result even mildly resembles what the first kid whispered oh-so-long ago, then the game has failed miserably. I'm beginning to think that rumors in the suburbs work like this game. People live so far apart, meet only occasionally and by chance in far apart places. There's too much time between whisperings, there's no way the rumors we're getting are quality by the time they reach our ears. Or maybe their higher quality because there's more time for them to be warped....? The point, though, is that we may never know why the traffic is so bad on Wednesday mornings. But if you can suffer through it, you're one step closer to the weekend. 

Running strong

Yesterday at the gym, I did my usual walk-run. Generally, my walk-runs feature a great deal of walking and a minute or two of running, making the ratio difference between the two somewhere around 5:1. In fact, my endurance for running has always been close to zero; at full effort, it might inch up to 0.25. But as I was saying, yesterday. Yesterday, I got on the treadmill as usual but decided to do something a little different.

I was exhausted and late (there was a ton of traffic; didn't get to the gym until like 8PM). I didn't want to spend my usual hour at the gym, so I decided to warm up for a couple of minutes with brisk walking and then run for a minute to kick-start my workout. Then I would walk (around 3.8-4.0 mph) for thirty minutes, hit the elliptical for 5, and be done for the evening. Here's what really happened.

I got on the treadmill. Did the couple of minutes of walking and one minute run. Realized I wasn't dying. So after four minutes rest (walking at 3.8mph), I ran again. I told myself I was only going to run for one minute and begin walking again. But I ran for three. Sans dying. Another four minutes of rest, and I ran again. This occurred several times, until I racked up a running time of ten minutes' worth of my 30 minute walk-run. I think we should switch that: not a walk-run. I've upgraded to a run-walk. Woot!

In ten minutes, I ran a distance of about 0.83 miles. I don't know if you noticed, but that's over my bucket list goal, posted yesterday. Granted, the distance wasn't run all at once, which is indeed my goal, but I'd say it's a step in the right direction, wouldn't you?

As I sit here all lazily in the early morning sunrise, running seems like a breeze. Truth is obviously that that just isn't true, and I need to make sure I can run that half mile straight without a walking rest, but I might be changing the bucket list in light of this fitness that I had no idea I had.

The Year's Bucket List

A long time ago (like several weeks), I wrote that I had decided to make a bucket list for the rest of this year (which is quickly whittling down to the two months mark). Well, here we go!

First, the group of things that was on my New Year's Resolutions list that I haven't gotten to yet *sheepish grin*:
1) Consistently keep your journal
    I think the blog counts, right? Oh wait, I haven't been consistent about that either...
2) Read fifty books
     I'm on 27.... more than halfway with two months to go! Eeep....
3) Memorize a Liszt
    It's either going to be a one-pager, or switched to a Beethoven (which I've got)
4) Build Irish repertoire
    This I've actually accomplished a good deal with....
5) Finish (and get credit for) THESIS
    As I've said, I did one thing! woot!

Second, the group of things that need to be added to the bucket list for 2012:
6) Lose 20 pounds
    I've lost 10 in two months... not bad
7) Run half a mile
    Running, endurance, and strength are a few things I've been working on. A post about this soon, but I'm hoping to be able to run a half a mile without keeling over by December 31st
8) Go snowboarding
    I remember going snowboarding when I was a kid and absolutely loving it. I've decided that snowboarding would be a great hobby (obviously extremely recreational) to pick up/renew. More to come soon.
9) Write a novel
     NaNoWriMo is coming up November 1st. I think I'm going to cut my goal from the 10,000 word goal to something like 5,000. More to come soon! ;)
10) Finish scrapbooking
     I've got years worth of scrapbooking stuff sitting and waiting for me. I've run out of room in the scrapbook I've got, but that's no excuse not to finish. My goal- finish before January 1st so we can keep adding memories next year.

Pumpkin Carving Party

A friend of my hosted a Pumpkin Carving Party on Saturday night. It was such a cute idea, I wish I'd thought of it! I had to work the next morning at 8 o'clock, so I left pretty early before all the pumpkins were finished. But I grabbed some of her pictures to share with you! Check another thing of the Fall Bucket List, and a great idea for next year!

I helped this smart girl who wanted her pumpkin carving to be two hands on a person's rear-end. You can see the finished product in picture number 2. Can you figure out which one it is? ;)

Dukan Dieting

Since two days after I landed in the States two months ago, I've been dieting. No juice cleanses or Drop 10 Fast things. The diet I've been doing my best to follow (I can't just simply say the diet I've been following because, as you will see, it hasn't been that clear cut...) is called the Dukan Diet. Created by French doctor Pierre Dukan, the diet resembles Atkins in it's insistence on the importance of protein over carbohydrates. However, Dukan goes a bit further and makes it simpler. For a few days, one eats nothing but pure protein. No fat, no carbs, no fiber. Nothing but meat (or tofu, etc.). After those first few days, the kick-start for the diet, one alternates days of pure proteins and proteins with vegetables. Dukan lists 100 foods that one can eat in unlimited quantities, prescribes specific exercise and a few tablespoons of oat bran a day (which I've been turning into sweet treats to quell my sweet tooth's insatiable cravings). One follows this second phase of the diet until the desired weight is achieved. Two more relaxed stages of dieting follow, slowly reintroducing the body to the carbohydrates and sugars it has been deprived of, and  viola! For the rest of one's life, one need only commit to having one pure protein day a week forever, and Dukan says the ideal weight will be maintained.

Sounds easy enough, right readers? Think again. For those of you who know me personally, you may realize that I've never cared about my weight. I've never dieted a day in my life before now, and exercise has always been something that happened along the way to other things (dance team, walking around the city on errands, etc.). Something you may not know about me, in fact it's something I'm not sure I realized myself, is that I have a huge and uncontrollable sweet tooth. Well, let me rephrase. I don't have a sweet tooth so much as I crave the comfort and relaxation that I seem to associate with sugar: midnight snacks, tea time, breakfast treats.

Needless to say, with all these diet-crushing habits sitting my personal background, I've broken the diet a few times. I have actually lost about a third of my goal weight, which surprises me a great deal. Having looked and felt the same for about six or seven years, I've grown so accustomed to my weight that I don't think I ever really thought about changing it. So clearly it's possible to change it, and I intend to keep going. But the struggle here is to find a way to get over the sweet treats!!

The key I'm learning is to be sure to treat myself to some down time with Dukan-approved treats at least once a day. If I skip out on this time, I have a much harder time controlling the desire for crazy amounts of sweets for the next day or even next few days!

You may be wondering what are some Dukan-approved treats (or maybe you don't care at all!), and I promise to share some fun recipes and facts in the coming weeks, as you join me along the last few legs of my Dukan journey (at this point I don't care if you're interested; you're coming anyway ;).  But until then, just note a couple of things.

Yep. You can lose weight. Or, if that's not your goal, you can change your eating habits, you can train and gain strength and endurance. You can lead a totally different lifestyle. If I can do it, trust so can anyone. I know it's cliché, but I really didn't think I could. Set a few small goals for yourself, such as adding cardio or stretch class twice a week, and watch as your outlook changes. Who knows? Maybe making those small lifestyle changes with give you the courage and creativity to make lifestyle overhauls. We could all use a little change, right?

 

Rainy Day October Adventures

Sunday, despite the gloom of the day, we all took a drive out to the mountains for a little R&R and a long October drive. Up in the mountains, the clouds made our car disappear into the mist. We were officially part of Brigadoon, and thus when we got home last night, we turned on Brigadoon with Gene Kelly.

There are a couple of more pictures, but I foolishly let someone else take them, which means I am at their mercy for when they decide to upload them and get organized.

We had a lovely day. The night before (Saturday night) we went to Church and out to dinner at a family favorite (an Irish place, surprise!). Sunday morning we woke up and hit the road for the next six hours. We didn't get much exercise, but we covered a lot of ground. Whatever the weather, the foliage was beautiful, and it was nice to get out of the suburbs for the day!

Blog revolution

I haven't added a post to this blog for more than a week, and I'm sure my *ahem* multitude of readers are feeling neglected. But never fear, faithful fans! I am back and promising a beautiful blogging revolution. As usual, work is perpetual and taxing; life is busy and constant. But here on my little plot of internet, we will explore some of the finer points of life together. Right now, I'm stuck in the suburbs, to steal a phrase from the Disney Channel Original Movie. Yet while the suburbs is literally a vacuum in which all sense of excitement or variety evaporated, I'm working hard to rediscover the land of my youth. So, as long as I'm here, we're going to explore the great DCMV as the Diva Abroad would, Bill Bryson-style.

That's all I've got for you tonight. I'm wiped out after a long family adventure day in the rainy October mountains (pictures and more soon!). And tomorrow is my first and longest day of the work week. So we'll all just have to wait a little bit longer for the real start of that blogging frenzy I've promised. I just wanted to post a little something to make sure you all knew (again, I'm speaking to the masses of people reading), that I haven't forgotten you yet ;)

Talk soon! Until then, codladh sámh (sleep well)

Going Pink for October

Happy October! Welcome to the first days of Fall, to the days of falling leaves and apple cider, to the warmth of hot chocolate and cozy sweater, to the chill of crisp breezes, and welcome to Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

All over the country, people are dedicating October to Breast Cancer awareness and fundraising. Join the campaign to turn the internet pink at pinkforoctober.org. Look to participate in the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer in your local area (the big New York City walk can be found here: http://www.avonwalk.org/new-york/). Join in the fight to end the disease, raise awareness, and hope for a future with more birthdays! 

Favorite Things: Little Suburban Pleasures

It's been a good while since I have posted anything here. Don't worry, I haven't forgotten you! The past week has been pretty busy. I attended my first dance class (for myself) in over two years. I met a good friend out on a weeknight before she jet-setted for a year in London (I am a bit jealous of her at this point ;). And I actually left the house on a Friday night and met a friend for dinner and drinks (at Friday's, aren't we classy). In addition to these small social triumphs, I've been hard at work, at home and the office. I'm beginning to gain feeling and, more importantly, motion in my wounded finger. So though it's been stressful, the week seems to be going pretty well so far.

When leaving the city for suburbia, the first thing one notices is the intense lack of socialization on the street. People driving in cars have much less opportunity for interaction (read: people watching) than those walking down crowded streets. Though in both situations, you will often find yourself spending whole days surrounded by people you don't talk to; in suburbia it's a bit different because you can't even see their faces, only their cars. These are my musings for you on this (still dark) Thursday morning, and it's also my explanation for my favorite pictures of the week so far. These pictures seem to completely lack human interaction. Enjoy! :)

The eery moon greeted me as I returned after work last night; the first time driving home from work in the dark.... Summer's officially over.

Rays from my window

I asked my brother to bring me a napkin with dinner. When he folded it and handed it to me, I said that I wanted it folded like a flower. Instead of laughing at me and throwing it in my face, he decided to do this. Flower?

A beautiful downpour driving home the other night (don't worry I took this picture while stopped. Several drivers stopped on the road while someone had trouble turning). The rain was pouring, but it was bright and sunny.

A mini pumpkin on my bedside table, right next to the perfect pumpkin candle.

Sunday morning

Sunday morning is for relaxing. Sunday afternoon is for working. And Sunday evening is for movies and hot chocolate. When one works six days a week, Sunday is the day to get stuff done, but with three hours in the morning dedicated to muffins and sitcoms, it's really hard to get the rest of the day back.... ;)

Journey's end for Mayo and Donegal

Today is the All-Ireland Gaelic Football final. A beautiful teaser article in the Irish Times yesterday acknowledges the legend that is this match.

Journey's end for Mayo and Donegal

iPod

I can't remember if I told you this already, and I'm too lazy this morning to go back to old posts and check. But I left my iPod on the flight from Ireland to London last month. I didn't realize it until four hours later when I sat in my seat for the flight to the States. I made a quick dashing text message to a new friend I'd met in Ireland a few days before with my email address and my flight number explaining what happened. He called the airline, but they'd already closed for the weekend. But he was also kind enough to forward me some numbers to try on Monday morning. I woke up early Monday, called London, and learned that someone had turned in my iPod. So we started working on getting it shipped to the US.

Six weeks and a lot of money and frustration later, my iPod was finally shipped. I received it the other day, and I really just couldn't believe it. After such long negotiations with every international courier company that exists, I didn't think I'd ever get it back!! But here it is, at long last. And for once, I can't wait to go to the gym! ;)

It arrived the same evening as my beautifully wrapped tea order from Barry's Tea of Cork, Ireland. So it was really just all in all a wonderful day!

Favorite Things

Another week has come and gone, and I ruminate about some things that made me happy this week.

Finally shipping the jersey off to my friend... but one last picture. Ballet in Cork!

 So much sugar and I shouldn't have had it, but I finally found the most delicious equivalent of the irreplaceable Nesquik of the Caribbean!

Finally getting some work done...

The beginnings of a new Autumn Inspirations board.

The absence of the battle-wound bandage and the recovery of movement in most of my hand. Priceless.

Perfect Pumpkin Candle

P.S. We finally found a perfect pumpkin candle to replace my favorite but impossible to find Slatkin & Co. "Pumpkin Patch".

It's also called "Pumpkin Patch" and is made by time&again (Found here: www.timeandagain.com/candles.php). It even has a crackling wick! How fancy!

Local explorations

Today my mother  and I went exploring again, but this time instead of heading out of town, we decided to re-explore our own hometown. We hit up the vintage, the consignment, the gift, and the artisan shops all over town, concluding in a delicious burger at the neighborhood "gourmet burger joint". Who knew that our town held so many treasures?

Unfortunately, two things happened (well, one happened and one rather didn't happen). Firstly, I slammed my own finger into the car door, which though not broken, required a rather grisly procedure at the urgent care center (so you see, we really got all of the local experience today!). Well that was a bit of a damper on the day. And secondly, I took almost no pictures, so I am a terrible blogger today. A true blogger ought to have her camera snap-ready at all times. But the lovely, albeit adventurous and partially traumatic, morning was supplemented by a good book, a lovely cuppa, and a sunset squat with the family. So now, I'm off to sleep away the throbbing of my finger and dream of all the chocolate birthday cake that I shouldn't have eaten (but did) this weekend. Any way, I hope you'll forgive me and all of my typos today as I hack this post out one-handedly.

Burgers on salad?? Yummy!

My gruesome (and excruciatingly inconvenient) wound

Surprise!

For my sister's big birthday on Saturday, I decided I'd try to throw her a surprise party. It's something we always joked about when we were little, and it suddenly occurred to me one day last month that now might be a good time to try it out. I contacted one of her best friends who helped me with the guest list and the keep-the-secret-and-distract-the-birthday-girl part. With ten of her close friends in the kitchen, my sister walked in with the perfect surprised face. Unfortunately, earlier that day we had been randomly hit by a terrible thunderstorm and a small tornado that knocked down trees to every route to my house. All of her friends had had to walk about half a mile to get to our house and sit in the dark for an hour waiting for the birthday girl to show up. But even powerless and soaking wet, they all showed up and we had a great time! It was quite the adventurous birthday. I think the storm made the surprise even more impressive...

Surprise!!

Favorite Things

Good morning! While the rest of the world sleeps, I'm up early for work again. But after a long week, tomorrow I'll be off and updating my blog for you :) Until then, here are somethings that are making me smile this week.

Going through recipe books for ideas

 Late summer blooms

Pumpkin Spice soap

Weekend horseback riding

I also finally have a matching dance outfit (that's right, a skirt and leotard that are the same color!!), but I keep forgetting to take a picture. I promise to get one up tomorrow though :)