I spent a long weekend in Minnesota for a good friend’s wedding this past week, but now I’m back among the heat & humidity, bad drivers, and Tex-Mex. The four days I was there went by way too quickly, and I totally cried when I left. The weather was super, the wedding was absolutely beautiful, I got to see family and a couple of good friends, and meet some amazing new ones too. There was a tiny bit of drama/tension during the wedding events, which is unfortunate, but whatever – it didn’t stop us all from dancing our butts right off at the reception. I’m a little disappointed in myself for not taking many pictures, but I noticed everyone else taking bunches of them, so, hopefully I will get to see them sometime. Look how pretty Jessie is…
Having been around all of these people this last week has made me feel a little gross, because they all have such great style and dress really well. Not that it matters, but I kind of wish I had that. Just sayin’….
We’ve got a few more things to look forward to this summer too. Our Boyd friends are coming to visit at the end of the month, there are tenative plans for camping (which I have yet to tell Erik about), and I’m hoping, hoping, and hoping that Kevin and Mark will come visit us as well – it was mentioned as a possibility. Oh, and we’re moving into a smaller, more expensive (bleh) and downtown-ish apartment at the end of July!
I’m a fan of doing stuff. But I don’t really do a whole lot of stuff. Well, I make a lot of plans to do stuff, but then I never follow through with the stuff I was going to do. For instance: when the creators of Ravlery.com came to a local yarn store – I was like “okay, I’m going to go this”. Guess what? I didn’t. And when I found out there was a Danish Club in Austin – I was so excited to get my invitation to their first event of the year, Fastelavn (a sort of Halloween-like holiday, in February). I RSVP’d ‘Yes’, but then changed it to ‘No’ at the last minute.
So, it’s SXSW week, and I’m making more plans to do things. There are a number of Free, Wristband-not-required events on Friday and Saturday (I think I mentioned some already in my last post). But I took a half day off of work tomorrow so that I could actually do these things! So I tell you – I actually AM going to do some stuff. I’m not going to just say I’m going to go, and then not go.
Speaking of doing things, here are some things that I have done recently:
- Last night I had an amazing dinner at one of the many fine dining establishments in Austin: Z Tejas. I still feel full from that meal.
- On Sunday, we got an awesome new bed. It was a craigslist find – and a lot of people seem to give me a look like “Ew”, when I tell them that. But it’s nice, I swear, you guys. It’s Teak, and it has built in tables & drawers! We got it from a nice Indian family who had bought it at a Danish furniture store in Canada.
- This is more of something that I’m “doing” rather than “have done”. I have a reading problem: I start books and then never finish them. I started Sophie’s World some months back, and never finished it – but I’m really motivated to finally finish it finally. So I’ve been reading it – that’s something that I’ve been doing.
- I knit a sweater! I think that was one of my 101 in 1001 things, so I’ll probably have to update that now.
…Let me pick out your airline ticket!
Husband flew to Minnesota today, and I drove him to the airport this morning before I left on my 2 hour drive to BCS. Normally I leave Austin at 6am, and the ticket that I picked out for him departs at 5:45am. “Perfect”, I thought – I could drop him off and then head on out, and the ticket was relatively cheap. First, me thinking we could pull this off was a mistake. Second, me thinking he only needed to be there a half hour early was a mistake. You’d think I’ve never flown before – I don’t know what I was thinking. We pulled up to the airport with about 25 minutes to spare before his flight was scheduled to depart. Unbeknownst to us, the airline he was flying has a rule that says they won’t let you in if you arrive with less than a half hour before take off. So, he missed his flight. FAIL. Luckily he was able to fly standby on another flight, but this involved about a 7-8 hour layover in Houston. We’re both tired from waking up at 4:30am, and he’s finally on a plane to MSP after a 4 hour travel day turned into a 13 hour travel day. What a crappy day.
Next week is South By Southwest here in Austin, and this is the first time in the two and a half years that I’ve lived in Texas that I will actually be in Austin during this week-long party-time. And though I didn’t purchase a badge, which can run from $550 to $695 (for the music badge only! holy crap!), I’m still hoping I can see and do some sxsw-related activities. There are tons of free events going on during the week – and a lot of them sound pretty cool! I’m greatly looking forward to seeing fellow Twin Citian, Haley Bonar perform at a free Craftster party! (She’s playing two shows tonight in Minneapolis – so go see her if you live there!) I love that they put two awesome things together: crafts & HB. And looky here: a whole sxsw party devoted to Minnesota Bands! It’s Ca$h Moneyapolis. I don’t really get the name, but if it’s Minnesota-related it’s likely that I’ll support it, at least in spirit. There’s also a free show on the 19th with M. Ward and Cold War Kids. I might go to that – I haven’t heard much of M. Ward’s old stuff which is supposedly pretty different from his new stuff, which I kind of like. The whole point of sxsw is to discover new bands that are relatively unknown – since there are a whole fricking ton of them, from all over the world, and I feel kind of lame for not researching more of the bands that I’ve never heard of to find their free shows 
And “free shows” only, of course, because we’re rockin’ a budget right now.
Erik’s gone next week – he’s going to spend some time with his bros in our beloved homestate. I actually have a lot of things planned for the time he’s away (remember all the sxsw stuff I just talked about?), and I don’t think I’ll be that bored. I have dinner plans, walking plans, and tenative haircut plans. I’m set.
I got news from the orthopedic doc today that I can slowly migrate away from wearing that gigantic boot that I was assigned to keep on. My ankle is healing – and I’m thinking I will be able to walk the 5k that I’m signed up for. I realize that you may not want to hear about my medical problems, so I won’t go on about it, but x-rays are just cool – so here:
I got this random text message today just after lunch time.
guy: Why didn’t u come in yesterday. Phillipians 4:13.
I didn’t recognize the #, but thought, “hmm…maybe this actually is meant for me. Was I supposed to go somewhere yesterday and forgot to go wherever it was I was supposed to go? But what about that Bible verse? Is that supposed to mean something?”
Philipians 4:13 says “I can do everything through him who gives me strength”
“Okay, so…I was supposed to go somewhere, and I might have had some reservations about going there, but the Lord would give me strength to go there, where ever it was” ? I couldn’t think of anywhere I was supposed to be.
me: Who is this?
guy: Cj dummy. Phillipians 4:13.
I don’t know a Cj, unless you count the one I went to high school with, who I didn’t even really know at all, and that was years ago. So, you’re just a wrong # guy who appends a bible verse to the end of every single text message you send. Okay then.
me: I don’t think I know a cj, sorry. Wrong #?
guy: Cj in ur history class look up idiot. Phillipians 4:13.
guy: Cj in ur history class look up idiot. Phillipians 4:13.
And, a guy that sends text messages twice in a row, with insults.
me: Dude, trust me, you have the wrong #. My last history class was 6 years ago.
guy: Sorry I do have the wrong #. Phillipians 4:13.
This week was my birthday – and I just wanted to say how grateful I am for everyone that called, texted, messaged, etc. me with a greeting! It’s been a good week. See?
The Good
- Three delicious meals paid for by friends
- Ice cream cake at work
- Cookie cake with my name misspelled
- New Bittman Cookbook and lovely kitchen bowls! Thanks Rebecca & Matt!
- New phone – the G1 Thanks Erik!
- 36 Facebook happy birthdays
- A picnic with Erik planned for Saturday
- A lovely bottle of red wine
The Bad
- Now I am closer to 30 than I am to 20
- My ankle still hurts
EDITED to add the wine
So, it sounds like I might have a stress fracture – thank you, running. It happend almost 2 weeks ago, and it still hurts to walk on. I’m supposed to stay off it as much as possible for another week, so that means no training for my 5k for a while. If it doesn’t heal soon, I may have to get a big, ugly boot put on it. Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that. This is such a bummer I tell you! During the last week I’ve actually been wanting to run – especially on the beautiful days like we’re having today: 73° and sunny. And to add to that, I can feel my jeans becoming tighter…. ugh…
With all this sittin’ I’ve been doing, I have been getting more knitting done. After xmas, I sort of took a knit-break – I think my fingers were tired. But I’ve got about 4 projects going right now, including a sweater – finally!
I don’t really know what else to blog about right now – but it had been a while, so I thought I’d write something. Have a lovely day!
The following blog post may come off as some sort of New Year’s resolution, but it’s not, I tell you. It just happens to coincide with the new year. So there.
At the beginning of this month, my friend Rebecca and I signed up for a 5k to take place on April 4th. Do I run? No. Am I even in good shape? Not really. Never having run a race before, I’m not really sure what to expect. But, according to their website, here’s what I should expect: “Fabulous post-race party with mini spa treatments, catered brunch, live music, shopping and more!” Yippee! I can do that. Absolutely I can.
But I mustn’t forget about the whole “race” part of this 5K RACE. So, I’ve started this Couch to 5K plan to help me ease my way into running, since until recently, running a mile for me would probably consist of me walking the entire way, and maybe even stopping at a Starbucks for a grande skinny vanilla latte half way through. The best part about this c25k program, as they call it, is that random people on the interwebs have made podcasts to listen to while you’re doing it, different files that go along with each week of the program – they tell you when to run and when to walk, so you don’t even have to think about it, or time yourself with a stopwatch or something. In the podcast I chose, a masculine robotic voice counts down from 5 to 0, letting me know it’s time to switch it up from a walk to a run, or vise versa. Unfortunately the music in a lot of the podcasts available out there isn’t that great – and I’d eventually like to make my own indie rock n’ roll couch-t0-5k podcast, but I will save that for another time. Until then, I’m using this one. It’s a pretty good mix of a few different genre’s, and it’s the closest I can find to my taste in music.
And to make this whole debacle even more exciting, my friend, Mel, let me buy her Nike+ from her (thanks dude!). I’ve used it twice already, and it’s super neat-o. A sensor attaches to your shoe, and the receiver attaches to your iPod. The sensor talks to the receiver during your workout, keeping tabs on your pace, distance, speed, etc., and keeps the data for uploading later. See my pretty, pretty graphs?
I must’ve walked faster during my second workout, because there’s less variation in speed between my walking and running. But I suppose that’s possible. I had the dog with me too, so maybe a few of the pee-stops contributed to the dips in the first graph. Or maybe it’s just not very accurate. I don’t know. But it’s pretty fun, and I like to see data, you know? So I think I’ll keep using it. I can’t even believe I didn’t know about this Nike+ thing before! I might’ve started using it long ago so I could be all technologically advanced or whatever. Imagine how skinny I could’ve been like months ago?! I must say though, I’m feeling good because of all this.
I guess that’s good for now. I have a wishful-thinking-sxsw blog post in the making, so you should see that sometime soon. Happy New Year!
You have until tomorrow to vote for the top 89 albums of 2008 at the Current, my most favorite and beloved radio station! Do it!
I’ll tell you who I voted for! You get 20 votes, but I only picked 16. I regret not using all 20 votes already
| Haley Bonar | Big Star |
| Conor Oberst | Conor Oberst |
| Stereolab | Chemical Chords |
| The Mountain Goats | Heretic Pride |
| Mason Jennings | In The Ever |
| Sigur Ros | Med Sud i Eyrum Vid Spilum Endalaust |
| Jeff Hanson | Madam Owl |
| Elvis Costello | Momofuku |
| MGMT | Oracular Spectacular |
| Mates Of State | Re-Arrange Us |
| Fleet Foxes | S/T |
| Okkervil River | The Stand Ins |
| The Hold Steady | Stay Positive |
| She & Him | Volume One |
| Vampire Weekend | Vampire Weekend |
| The Ting Tings | We Started Nothing |
And, it is that time of year, so don’t be suprised if you see a few more “top” this and that lists on this blog in the coming weeks….
Bold everything you’ve done:
1. Started your own blog - duh.
2. Slept under the stars
3. Played in a band - 5th grade through my 1st year of college!
4. Visited Hawaii – The plan is to do this over “spring break”
5. Watched a meteor shower - I know I’ve done this, but can’t remember exactly when
7. Been to Disneyland/world
8. Climbed a mountain - I did this in Romania.
9. Held a praying mantis
10. Sang a solo - I sang “Silent Night” in church when I was younger – I really hope there’s not a video of that anywhere, but I think there might be.
11. Bungee jumped
12. Visited Paris
13. Watched a lightning storm at sea
14. Taught yourself an art from scratch
15. Adopted a child
16. Had food poisoning
17. Walked to the top of the Statue of Liberty
18. Grown your own vegetables
19. Seen the Mona Lisa in France
20. Slept on an overnight train
21. Had a pillow fight
22. Hitch hiked
23. Taken a sick day when you’re not ill
24. Built a snow fort
25. Held a lamb
26. Gone skinny dipping
27. Run a Marathon
28. Ridden in a gondola in Venice
29. Seen a total eclipse
30. Watched a sunrise or sunset
31. Hit a home run
32. Been on a cruise
33. Seen Niagara Falls in person
34. Visited the birthplace of your ancestors
35. Seen an Amish community
36. Taught yourself a new language
37. Had enough money to be truly satisfied
38. Seen the Leaning Tower of Pisa in person
39. Gone rock climbing
40. Seen Michelangelo’s David - I’ve seen the fake one that they have in the streets of Florence, but didn’t pay to go inside and see the real deal.
41. Sung karaoke
42. Seen Old Faithful geyser erupt
43. Bought a stranger a meal at a restaurant
44. Visited Africa
45. Walked on a beach by moonlight
46. Been transported in an ambulance
47. Had your portrait painted
48. Gone deep sea fishing
49. Seen the Sistine Chapel in person
50. Been to the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris
51. Gone scuba diving or snorkeling
52. Kissed in the rain
53. Played in the mud
54. Gone to a drive-in theater
55. Been in a movie
56. Visited the Great Wall of China
57. Started a business
58. Taken a martial arts class
59. Visited Russia
60. Served at a soup kitchen
61. Sold Girl Scout Cookies
62. Gone whale watching
63. Got flowers for no reason
64. Donated blood, platelets or plasma
65. Gone sky diving
66. Visited a Nazi Concentration Camp
67. Bounced a check - whoops!
68. Flown in a helicopter
69. Saved a favorite childhood toy
70. Visited the Lincoln Memorial
71. Eaten Caviar
72. Pieced a quilt
73. Stood in Times Square
74. Toured the Everglades
75. Been fired from a job
76. Seen the Changing of the Guards in London
77. Broken a bone – Broke my right arm twice, and my left arm once!
78. Been on a speeding motorcycle
79. Seen the Grand Canyon in person
80. Published a book
81. Visited the Vatican
82. Bought a brand new car
83. Walked in Jerusalem
84. Had your picture in the newspaper - For some scholorship thing
85. Read the entire Bible
86. Visited the White House
87. Killed and prepared an animal for eating - I used to help my friend’s family butcher chickens when I was younger
88. Had chickenpox
89. Saved someone’s life
90. Sat on a jury
91. Met someone famous I told Horatio Sans that I didn’t want my picture with him. And I saw Peter Krausse (Six Feet Under) at the Best Buy in Richfield, MN – but all I did was stare at him.
92. Joined a book club
93. Lost a loved one
94. Had a baby
95. Seen the Alamo in person
96. Swam in the Great Salt Lake
97. Been involved in a law suit
98. Owned a cell phone
99. Been stung by a bee
- Listening to
Watching
The Office
Playing
Reading
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