Exquisite Turmoil

The kids went to the doctor on Friday for vaccinations.  They’ve actually had quite a few shots over the course of this year, but this is the first time that Dan was able to go with us (as we scheduled the appointment for after school, whereas previously Anya was only going to half-day school and we made appointments for while Dan was at work).

Getting shots is always a big undertaking.. the kids sob and scream, then we go get ice cream and usually pick out a toy.  Apparently, however, Alex decided that Daddy being along meant he had to be brave.  Firstly, he declares that he is getting his shots first today (normally he and Anya fight and try to make the other go first).

Then, he asks the nurse how many shots he needs to get, and she says two.  So he replies with…

“Two?  Hah, I laugh when I get two shots.”  So she gives him the first shot, and we hear “Waaaaah-ha.. ha.. ha.. hah.”  I wish I had a recording of it.  He so obviously wanted to wail but he forced out the most fake laugh I’ve ever heard.  It was adorable.

I promise a longer post tomorrow (complete with excellent picture of Alex as well as a funny story about him that I forgot to impart earlier), but for now I’m just going to bitch about my toe ;-; I stubbed it walking into the garage barefoot. I didn’t realize that the Warhammer board was parked so close to the door and I slammed my little toe right into it and it huuuuurts x.x It’s all red and owie and there’s blood under the nail and I like to whine. A lot.

On a happy note, I put down a deposit on the rats for the children (who am I kidding, they’re totally for me QQ) and they’ll be coming home sometime between October 10-12. We’ve also decided on an FN 141 cage (which is the best ratty cage around, my husband is so good to me) and I’ll be picking that up on the 11th of this month. Gives me a whole month to sew rat hammocks and other various pieces of rat furniture. Yes, I am going to sew rat hammocks.

Also, I don’t care what anyone thinks about rats / rodents. You simply can’t tell me that those rittens aren’t adorable.

WTB cookies badly, actually >.< but I'm trying so hard to be good. I have no willpower, and therein lies the true problem. I actually have around 1000 calories left in my budget today so I really do need to eat, but if I make a batch of cookies I KNOW that I will want to eat more than the four that I am allowed. I am an absolute glutton and piglet. If I make 24 cookies, I'll seriously want to eat like 12 of them. Hummus and pita also sounds good, but that requires either going to AJs like 30 minutes away (since it's the only grocery store with decent hummus and pita) or going to the Persian Room and spending a fortune (I've got some garbanzo beans and could conceivably make my own but the beans haven't been soaked yet and that takes HOURS). Not to mention, it's not exactly low calorie either. I suppose it sounds stupid to be bitching about the calories when I still have 1000 left, but eating things like what I WANT to eat.. 1000 calories goes in the blink of an eye.

In any case, the original inspiration for this blog was to link this awesome website that calculates the calories in a recipe for you. It’s a hell of a lot more convenient than looking up the ingredients and doing the math myself, so I figured I’d share it in case anyone else is interested.

On a happy note, I had another good run today. We did the “normal run” (that being, as I think I said before, from the house to the end of the road and back) and this time I ran to the end of the road and all the way back to the house. Yesterday I ran to the end of the road and then to the street before our house, so I tacked on another .2 miles. I know, I know, it sounds so negligible.. but I’m really feeling proud of myself and happy right now. I’ve got to take what I can get so that I can stay motivated!

Well, we had a rather nice run today — it was actually the furthest I’ve gone in one stretch (since I got out of the army, at least) without walking.  It was ridiculously slow, but Dan assures me that slow jogging is better than being a little speedier and needing to walk more.  Anyway, here is a picture of me looking hideous after our run.  I am not one of those lucky people, like Dan, who seems to completely lack any blood vessels in the face.  At the first hint of exertion (or heat, cold or basically anything else for that matter) I turn into a little tomato.  Beet.  Radish.  Whatever you feel like calling me.  I’ll stick with tomato since they are tasty and refreshing.

Anyyywaaaay.. just thought I’d post and stroke my own ego since I basically ran from the house to our “normal spot” and back whereas I usually only run to the “normal spot” and then walk back.  Go me.  Or something like that.. /stroke /stroke

NOT FAIR >.< So we went for a run tonight and I had my spiffy little Nike+ monitor thing running.. we finished the run and when I went to sync it, the run didn't show up. Flipping through the iPod, I see that it actually has no record of my run.. Which I completely don't understand because I know that it was keeping track since I was looking at it to check my pace and the distance and stuff.

I guess it doesn't really matter that much, but it's the principle of the thing. What is the point of having it if it is randomly going to decide not to store my data? Meh, I probably shouldn't bitch about it, it's probably because I did something wrong (maybe I unplugged it too quickly after ending the workout, I don't know), but it really irritates me. I'm doing a "challenge" thing on nikeplus.com and now my run won’t be recorded for that (not that it matters for anything, it’s just for fun and personal motivation and not a prize or anything), and it won’t be displayed on my website, etc..

Bah, ah well. Back to painting now, I suppose.

Yep, that’s me — I am the proud owner of a one-track mind. I’m not even sure that women are capable of having one-track minds. I’m pretty certain that our minds just multi-task naturally. Perhaps I should call myself “male minded”, then?

In any case, I picked up the Nike+ insert for my shoe today, as well as an armband. The armband has actually been returned already (I wore it for about twenty minutes sitting at my desk and my hand started to feel clammy and I got dizzy when I stood up), and I’ve ordered a belt from Amazon. Hopefully that will arrive soon, as I’m sure it will be annoying to run without any convenient way to carry my iPod. I imagine that until the belt arrives, I’ll just put the sensor in my shoe and let Dan carry the iPod and I won’t bother listening to any music.

I popped the sensor into my shoe today, actually, and took a five minute stroll around the kitchen (no one to watch Alex so that I could go for anything resembling a run =/) to see how it all worked. You can actually see a little readout of my “workout” on the right side of the screen. It’s pretty cool, although I will say that the road to Nike Plusness has been paved with peril. It took Dan quite a while to get the website tracker thingee working due to some unknown (to me) error and, additionally, the iPod and Nike+ didn’t really feel like playing well together. After getting everything hooked up (which was very easy, just plug and play), iTunes decided that it didn’t want to talk to nikeplus.com and kept throwing errors which spontaneously fixed themselves after about my 500th try. Also, once I recorded a run on my nano iTunes ceased to recognize it when I plugged it in to my computer. Finally I just got fed up and rebooted and it seemed to fix the problem, although I have no idea why (since I definitely rebooted after patching iTunes and my iPod last night).

In any case, I am really looking forward to getting a chance to go for a jog tomorrow (I won’t call it a run, since what I do is definitely too slow to be classified as running). Hopefully my parents will be up for watching the kids so that we can actually log a few miles. I wish I had a babysitter =/

I really well and truly have the greatest husband ever. Either that, or I married the greatest sucker ever. It didn’t even take a day of looking sad to net myself a new iPod Nano! Now I just need to send my sweet darling out after work tomorrow to get me a Nike+ sensor and receiver and I’ll pretty much be set! Dan has pointed out that I don’t really need to wear an armband since the the 3rd generation nanos are solidstate or something, I can wear it on a belt around my waist and not have to worry about it bouncing around too much. Now I just need to figure out how to put a Nike+ tracker on my website or something so that I can feel shamed into working out and running faster, since everyone will be able to see it!

Time to stop procrastinating and get to work! I have to admit, not having internet completely killed my desire to do like.. anything. By the time my family finally all went home, everything was just like blaaaaaaah. I didn’t manage to get ANY painting done and for the first time in so many years that I can’t even recall how long (definitely more than seven years, maybe more than eight) I found myself glued to the television. I’ve never been a big TV watcher and I’d say that over the entire duration of my marriage to Dan, I haven’t watched more than maybe.. 48 hours of TV (movies and this internetless period discounted).

I think that last week alone I probably watched 40 hours. Maybe more. Definitely at least three hours a day (two hour long episodes of What Not to Wear every day and an hour of Celebrity Fit Club). It kind of makes me sick thinking about exactly how much TV I’ve watched lately. I’ve learned absolutely zip (unless you count the fact that I now know Tempestt Bledsoe is an annoying cow) and haven’t done anything productive at all. If I’d spent as much time painting during this period as I did watching TV, I could have easily finished my Varghulf, my dire wolves, and probably a few of the Blood Knights that Dan bought me for my birthday. So anyway, here is my solemn vow. I’m done with the TV. I’ve been addicted to Celebrity Fit Club like crazy and the last episode of Season Two played today, and they’re starting in on Season Three tomorrow (reruns, of course), and I’m just not going to start watching.

On a less annoyed with myself note, Dan and I have been pretty good about working out lately. I’ve been on a running kick the last two weeks, which is a really nice change of pace. I don’t exactly hate cardio, but I’ve always hated running. I’m an asthmatic and whenever I start running and I start getting short of breath, I begin to have fears of an asthma attack. Quite honestly, I haven’t had one in an extremely long time and I’d about wager money that it is a childhood affliction which I outgrew. I went through basic training, for example, without ever having an attack (I concealed it when I enlisted, actually, since they wouldn’t take me with asthma) and I haven’t had one since that point (and that would have been in 2001). I think that it’s been a bit of a convenient excuse not to run and just stick to walking and extremely pathetic jogging for a long time.

Anyway (and yes, I know it’s pathetic) I’ve done a continuous .5 mile run a few times now, which makes me feel all happy and good. Dan and I even did a 3.5ish mile run / walk to Subway the other night which felt very rewarding. I won’t lie, it was more walking than running and it took somewhere between 45 minutes to an hour, but it still felt really good.

I’ve developed an obsession with the Nike+ system right now and am currently attempting to wheedle Dan into getting me set up with one. The only problem is that I don’t have an iPod nano, I have the 80g video.. and the Nike+ iPod thingee is only compatible with the nano =/ I could get the sportband instead, which doesn’t require an iPod at all, but I just can’t make up my mind as there are pros and cons to either system.

iPod Pros

• Listen to music while running.
• “Power song” button to easily select a song that really gives you a boost when you need inspiration.
• Vocally informs you of things like current distance, pace, calories burned.

iPod Cons

• Need to buy an iPod nano or see if my father will trade his new nano for my video.
• Don’t currently listen to music while running on the street since I always run with Dan and he’s in good shape and just yammers and rambles for the entire time (which is, honestly, more interesting and distracting than music — or it might just be that I’ve conditioned myself over the last six years to tune Dan out and daydream once he starts talking, which is extremely effective at taking my mind off of running).
• Need to wear an armband to hold the iPod. This doesn’t seem like a big deal, however… I have an armband for my video and when I wear it (even just barely tight enough to prevent it from falling off) I feel like it cuts off the circulation in my arm and I get dizzy (probably due to my ridiculously low blood pressure or anemia). It’s possible that the smaller, lighter nano will not cause this problem but I’ll have wasted a large sum of money if I go this route and discover that I can’t wear the armband.

Sportband Pros

• Displays run information on a watch interface so that you can see your progress without needing to listen to it (which would be convenient if I want to listen to Dan instead of music and still see my progress).
• Wears just like a watch and isn’t particularly heavy (I’ve picked one up in a store), and also functions as a watch (as in.. tells time).

Sportband Cons

• Provides no music if I ever manage to work up to a fast enough pace that Dan can’t just ramble with impunity while running with me.
• Costs $60 as opposed to $30 for the iPod addon (meaning it is more expensive if I decide that I want to swap iPods with Dad).

Anyway, that’s all that I can think of for now. Now to hope that I actually get some time to run today. It is curriculum night at school, so I’ll need to head up there. I won’t get a chance to run beforehand since we don’t run until my mother gets home from work (5:30) since she watches the kids for us while we go and I always feel bad asking her to watch them once it starts getting lateish (since she is always in bed by nine and sometimes by eight). Guess I’ll see how she feels once we get back from curriculum night.

Well, today is definitely not a healthy eating day. I was taken with a desire for pancakes this morning so I whipped up a batch of my favourite buttermilk ones. They’re sooooo good. And simple.

• 3 cups flour, sifted (sift after you measure)
• 3 Tbsp sugar
• 3 tsp baking powder
• 1 1/2 tsp baking soda

Combine your dry ingredients. Then mix in

• 3 cups buttermilk
• 1/2 cup milk
• 3 eggs
• 1/3 cup butter, melted

Make sure that you let your eggs / milk / buttermilk come to room temperature (just set’em on the counter for a half hour) before you add them to the dry ingredients. You’ll get MUCH fluffier pancakes. Also, when you combine the dry / wet ingredients, don’t beat them until all of the lumps are gone. Just mix it up until it’s wet. You WANT a few pockets of flour. It give the pancakes a much more authentic (and tasty) texture.

Dinner tonight is going to be some hotwings. I guess Dan is really in the mood, so hotwings it will be. Those are simple, of course. Just cut the joint between the wing / drumstick and chop the tip off of the wing and throw it out (the tip). Sprinkle the wings and drumsticks with a little salt and pepper. Get your oil (or shortening) nice and hot (350-375) and drop the wings in until they’re nice and golden. Scoop’em out and put them on brown paper bags to drain (the bags work much better than paper towels).

Once they’ve cooled down a tad, coat them with your hot sauce. I like:

• 1/2 cup Frank’s Red Hot sauce
• 4 Tbsp unsalted butter
• 1 Tbsp Tabasco sauce or to taste
• 2 tsp dark brown sugar
• 1 tsp cider vinegar

Just toss all of that in a saucepan on low heat until the butter melts.

Finally, be sure to serve them with THE BEST bleu cheese dressing ever.

• 1 cup mayonnaise
• 2 Tbsp buttermilk
• 1/8 tsp pepper
• 1/8 tsp onion powder
• 1/8 tsp garlic powder

And don’t forget the bleu cheese! I buy a container of crumbles and make a double batch (so 2 cups mayo) and find that’s about the right amount of bleu. If you don’t love bleu as much as Dan does, however, you may want to cut it down. He devours this stuff by the jar full, but I can’t eat it except with wings. Way too bleu cheesy for me. I’m more of a ranch girl ^_^ Just not on my wings!

Anyway, enjoy!

I’m feeling quite happy today. Dan and I have been being very careful with our diet and exercise lately (blame me, want to look extra good when everyone comes out for the big birthday party in August) and, of course, he drops like 5 lbs a day x.x And I.. yanno.. gain weight. Anyway, this morning I was down two lbs from my starting weight (which puts me at 132, for those who are curious to know.. because anyone but Dan reads this :p).

I am planning a delicious feast tonight — we’ll start off with a chilled yogurt soup (with fruit and mustard seeds) and follow it up with lamb kebabs and a dish of spiced garbanzo beans, and then we’ll end the whole meal with some yummy rice pudding. Depending on how much I love the foods, I may or may not post recipes.

In addition to food and weight loss, the guild is doing spectacularly. Last week we downed Netherspite on our first true attempt at him (we attempted him the week before and the instance servers crashed and booted us all out, so I don’t really count that as an attempt). We then proceeded up to Prince and killed him on our second try at him. After that we headed on down to Nightbane (considered by most to be the true boss of Karazhan) and kicked his ass on the first try. Then, this week, we proved it wasn’t a fluke and downed all of them again. Nightbane posed a little bit more trouble this week, but he still went down.

We are also going to make a go at Zul’Aman on Monday (provided we get signups) and see if we can’t down the bear boss. A lot of people seem to have a negative feeling about it, but I’m about 95% certain that the bear *will* die on Monday. After we wipe the floor with his face, we’ll move on to the eagle boss. This will be a bit more iffy (and I hope to god that everyone reads the strat that Dan posted on the forums) as the fight requires a lot of movement and attention to detail. If everyone can keep their acts together, though, I think we’ll be seeing more loot from Zul’Aman ^_^