feeling shaggy

About a month ago, I had to bring in a rolling pin for work. Today, I brought in a straightening iron – something that most girls would use on their hair. Not me. I will be using it to develop some new air bag technology. Mwahahah!

Old Navy had summer stuff on sale for a dollar this weekend. So I bought a pair of shorts and a tank top. I also bought 2 turtleneck sweaters (dark brown and a dark muted purple), a v-neck sweater (sea foam green), and a short sleeved t-shirt (rose), but those were not as deeply discounted.

I also got some stuff at Barnes and Noble. I loooove their bargain book selection. I found a book of 90 classical piano pieces for $13 (you could expect to normally pay $30-$40) and a book about 6 scientists (Copernicus, Newton, Curie, Einstein, and 2 others I can’t remember but are still important) and their struggles and discoveries.

I cooked dinner for Joe and Angela on Friday night. I made catfish soup, sort of like what they serve at Mi Pueblo near Case, and something I call “hot salad”. It was fresh baby spinach (sans e. coli), warm white rice, with warm stir fried ground turkey, ginger, garlic, green peppers, scallions, and mushrooms. J and A are fun to cook for because they are appreciative and not picky. I made my mom’s best caramel brownie recipe, which is so good that I added it to my personal cookbook.

I finished sewing all the patches for my shower curtain together. Now my problem is that the edges are really uneven and I need to make a hem all the way around. More thinking time is needed. (Besides the unevenness, I think the fabrics look GORGEOUS together and I can’t wait to finish it and hang it up.)

I need a hair cut.

In the very cleanest sense...

I hit a homerun last week at my Thursday night women's league slow pitch softball game. I know I'm not supposed to get too excited about that, all things considered, but it was the first homerun I've hit since I was like 12. And I really got a hold of it. (It helps that we play with the little ball in that league.) My swing is not very conducive to hitting homeruns. My typical basehits are line drives or ground balls that get through the left side of the infield. My line drives occasionally have a little pop and get out pretty well to the outfield. But this was a towering line drive over the left center fielder's head. Very fun :-)

A Favorite Chipotle Promotion

Where's my aluminum foil?

I have a picture of Meredith and myself celebrating a couple years ago in Cleveland. Maybe I can try to post it later :-)

badge, goals, bananas

I got to work today and clipped on my badge and realized that I am wearing the same outfit today that I wore when I got my picture taken for my badge on my first day of work almost 2 years ago. I’m happy to share that the only difference is that I have taken in the waist and hips of those pants by about 2 inches. Yay.

About the time I started working, I undertook “Operation: Get Hot.” It has been a long uphill battle. With a pretty strong confidence level, I can say that I’ve made progress, even though I’m not (but probably never will be) where I want to be. I wear my old badge as a cheerful reminder of how far I’ve come. Rarrr.

All of my sports leagues are wrapping up and my mom asked me yesterday what I’m going to do with myself. That got me thinking and as boring as it sounds, without volleyball and softball to distract me, now I have no excuse for not hitting the gym. I consider winter to have started on 10/1 and it will end on 3/31. (I realize these are completely arbitrary dates that add up to 6 months but I chose them because I pretty much can’t play softball or volleyball outdoors during that time period.) I made a list of goals I’d like to accomplish in the gym by 3/31/07. These mostly include incremental progress on the bench press, timed mile, dumbbell bicep curls, and weight loss. Last night, I ran an 8:57 timed mile on the treadmill. (Do any of the other softball players still submit themselves to timed mile torture???) I know it doesn’t count as a real timed mile but I’m still pretty pleased with it. So I guess the goals are the motivation for the winter workouts, and I know that the harder my self-imposed ass kicking is, the quicker I can achieve my goals and cross them off my list.

Speaking of lists, I love My Name is Earl. And managing my queue on the blockbuster online site.

I saw lots of St. Louis fans wearing red snow caps that say “CARDS” in white capital letters. I think it’d be pretty funny to photoshop a picture of them so that it reads “TARDS.” I’m going to hell for that thought.

I have a theory on bananas. (I thought I had already written about it but my blog search didn’t turn anything up.) They have a 2-3 day period of their life where they are perfect. I like mine still a little green at the tips. I stopped buying bunches of bananas because they all go through their perfect time at the same time, and besides monkeys, who can eat a bunch of bananas in 2 days? My grocery store strategy now involves buying single bananas from different bunches, taking care that each of the singles are at a varying stage of ripeness. I try to only buy the lonely single bananas and not break up bananas from their families because I’m considerate like that.

gizmos, lifting, remnants

When I visited Meredith in the summer, she had a gizmo from Radioshack that measured the indoor temperature and humidity, outdoor temperature, and featured an atomic clock with a date display and an alarm. I know that God said that thou shall not covet thy friend’s gizmo from Radioshack, but I did.

A couple weeks ago, I found one on sale at a store that will not be named and I can not tell you how much joy this gadget has brought to my life. I now have firm knowledge of the climate conditions in my condo, which is very valuable knowledge during the upcoming cold months while I try to save money on my energy bill. I’ve discovered that my thermostat is only accurate to +/-5 degrees, which in my opinion, really isn’t all that accurate. I’ve also figured out that I wake up hot and sweaty if the thermostat is set to 67-68 degrees (when sleeping under my down comforter). My best sleeping occurs in the 63-66 range. A house set at 62 degrees feels cold. I suppose I could have just bought a more accurate thermostat, but this way, now I can monitor the humidity as well, which is important for my piano and my singing voice (haha!). I also like the idea of having an atomic clock, probably because I’m a nerd and think “atomic” as an adjective means “best.”

Lifting workouts have been pretty fun these days as I transition from trying to do 3 sets of 10-15 reps, into doing higher weights and fewer reps. The other day, a guy was doing bicep curls with 17.5s and I waited for him to finish and then I did bicep curls with 17.5s. (I think he did about a million reps and I only did 8 but STILL.) It’s fun and fulfilling to lift in a way such that you stop when you can’t do anymore. Oh, and I found the best pre-workout food: a piece of fruit, like an apple or orange. It doesn’t upset my stomach but has enough sugar to get me through my workout without me feeling like I’m going to pass out.

I almost never purchase things that I only kind of want. I purchase things that I absolutely need and things that I absolutely want. For the “wanted” items, I usually put them on a list and then shop them out to get the best price and it usually takes at least a week or two of wanting before I actually make a purchase. The only place where this falls apart is when I go to JoAnn’s fabrics. I walk in there and feel like ANYTHING is possible. A couple months ago, they had remnants on clearance.

A little about remnants. Let’s say someone walks in and wants 4 yards of certain fabric. Let’s say there’s 5.5 yards on the bolt of fabric. That person will buy her 4 yards at the regular price and then JoAnn’s employees will take the remaining yard and a half, roll it up, mark the price as 50% off, and put it in the remnant bin, which I will dig through gleefully every time I make a trip in the store. I don’t know why I do this and I don’t know why I enjoy it so much.

So a couple months ago, the remnants were 75% off and I saw a bunch of lovely ones and decided that I would cut them and sew them into a patchwork shower curtain. Yes, I know that stores sell pretty shower curtains for relatively inexpensive. But the one that I am making is distinctly mine. It is exactly what I want. And I enjoy the fun/challenge/tediousness of sewing. And I’ll use any excuse to play with my sewing machine. (BTW, the sewing machine is one of those things that appeared on my “wanted” list for over 2 months before I purchased a reliable name brand from Overstock that had been reconditioned and was wonderfully priced.)

As I said, I bought the fabric months ago (like July?) and have been thinking about how I want to sew it since then. This is how an engineer sews a shower curtain.

Before I could start cutting or sewing, I planned out how big each of the squares/rectangles would have to be, factored in seam allowances as well as “oops” factors, drew it all out on engineering graph paper, and then randomly assigned the squares numbers that corresponded with swatches of fabric so that the patchwork pattern would look random. I measured and cut the fabric last weekend (took forever) and started sewing as well. The sewing continues. On and on. Without end. But it’s ok because I find it relaxing. So I guess sewing is officially one of my hobbies now. And one day soon, I hope to have a beautiful patchwork shower curtain.

Solo, reality, shoulder pads

I got to sing my first solo at mass on Sunday. I think I did well. I was very nervous and also pretty excited. Probably too excited for Sunday mass…

I like to think that I’m pretty good at my job. Lots of things about my job appeal to me. I like paying attention to details. I like drawing things in CAD. I like speaking Spanish with the Mexican manufacturing engineers. I like doing things with my hands. I like that creating airbags strongly resembles arts and crafts.

At work, I have an idea that the company is helping me patent. It is a very simple idea that should help our customers pass new government-regulated tests. After we did some research on what is already out there, I discovered that our competitors had something similar (but in my mind, different, and very complicated.) I couldn’t believe that their idea would actually work because it was so complex. Last week, I got to see a production version of their idea and then we deployed it. I am humbled by the brilliance of their design. They really nailed it. I’m not sure what else there is to say. Sometimes you go along in life, thinking you’re doing pretty well, maybe even getting a little cocky. And then BOOM! Welcome back to reality. You’re faced with the fact that you’re not nearly as good as you think you are.

Habit update: I was unsuccessful in trying to find my habit for Halloween. So instead, I was a football player at the costume party last weekend and wore all my Fusion gear. I actually kinda like any excuse to wear my shoulder pads around.

Dodge Nitro; Death of a Pedometer

Yesterday I saw a Dodge Nitro while I was driving home from work. That is the first car on the road to have one of my airbags. I got that excited feeling where it feels like my heart went bungee jumping and sort of bounces around up and down in my chest before achieving equilibrium. The same feeling as when you see someone famous at the airport or in a store. Or when gorgeous strangers smile at you and acknowledge that you are staring at them.

I think I dropped my pedometer too many times because it doesn’t accurately record the number of steps I take anymore. That’s kinda sad – it lasted less than 2 weeks. Coincidentally, the health challenge at work (see posting on 10/6) ended yesterday. It lasted just over a week because that’s how long it took one of the teams of ten people to record 830,000 steps. Maybe my pedometer is smart (just like my mp3 player) and said “screw this” and just shut down as soon as the competition was over. I didn’t even get around to calibrating it. I had planned to go out to a high school track and do quarter mile laps at 4 different paces to see what the step counts were for each. Oh well. RIP Cheapo Pedometer. It was fun while it lasted.

team bondage, errr, I mean, bonding

The Fall Sunday softball season is coming to an end. This is sad for me. I’ve been playing with this team since March and it has been a most enjoyable experience. This team has the right level of talent and dedication AND my teammates have great attitudes and seem like they love playing ball. We’re pretty competitive on game day, but not necessarily competitive with each other. I think we have a lot of good solid people (as well as good solid ball players) and I just like being around them. But we never do anything social together. That is, until last weekend.

About 2 weeks ago, we had some leftover money from team fees and someone suggested we have a party and get a keg. As luck would have it, we had a 2pm Sunday doubleheader scheduled for our last regular season games. Before that game started, I told my teammates that I realized we had not partied before but that since we’re all on the competitive side, maybe we could play a team game of flip cup? The team approved, so after our games, we headed to a teammate’s house. He has an awesome house for a team party – a finished basement with a bar and a tap and a nice backyard with a picnic table. Flip cup was taught and we played and were merry and had fun and ate chili and watched football and I just was overwhelmingly satisfied.

I generally disapprove of drinking games, especially after college, but somehow, this was completely right. The only other drinking game I can think of that I deem appropriate for a softball team get together, is beer pong. I wasn’t that much of a partier at Case but I have some fond memories of beer pong and flip cup. Once at a civil engineering department keg party (in the academic building) I had my ass handed to me in flip cup by the head of the civil engineering department. Oops. I think I also remember losing pretty badly to a tennis player at beer pong. That was pretty embarrassing.

Coffee is my Crack

I’ve been getting headaches recently and I think they’re from coffee withdrawal. I had wonderful vanilla chai creamer that I wanted to finish before it spoiled (which we already established does NOT belong in tea) and then when it was gone, I stopped drinking cold turkey. (Coffee also interferes with my teeth whitening.) The withdrawal has been painful. I remember feeling like this the last couple times I stopped drinking coffee (in Spain, after I moved out, etc.) and I don’t want to have to deal with these feelings again. In my mind, I had two choices: I could be java’s bitch and submit to its effects it has on my life (both good and bad) OR I could swear off drinking it regularly. To protect myself from the pain of withdrawal, I’m making a promise to myself to not drink it for more than 2 days in a row, EVER AGAIN.

Objectively, coffee makes me pretty happy. Unlike some people, I actually like the way it tastes. Drinking a warm beverage is almost always pleasant, especially in the coolness of the morning. I have happy memories associated with coffee drinking. My dad has made coffee every morning for like 40 years and his is the best. When I was little, I remember hearing the clinking of his spoon against the ceramic mug while he stirred his coffee. To me, that sound is like music. And the way he does it has a distinct sound/rhythm that is uniquely his.

So I guess I came to a crossroads. Some people might have just bucked up and bought the coffee maker or budgeted some extra time to stop at Dunkin Donuts every morning. For them, the idea of committing to a lifetime of dependency is no big deal when compared to having to live without that little piece of heaven every morning. They accept the good with the bad. And they can do it without thinking. And they choose to ignore thinking about that day when they might not have their trusty beverage. They forget about the headache that will result. They just use an extra dose of whitestrips.

But I choose to shack up with coffee. I will have it when I feel like it, when the spirit moves me, when I need a little pick-me-up. I will not make a lifetime commitment to it. I will enjoy what it can do for me and take measures to counteract its negative effects. I will keep my distance so that I will not have to deal with the pain of withdrawal again. Amen.

Where is my habit?

We have a new network drive at work where we can drop drawings to get approved into the system. They call the drive “toaster.” While my boss was waiting for drawings to get approved, he let everyone know that “the drawings are stuck in the toaster.” I thought that was amusing.

I’m annoyed with myself for (among other reasons) misplacing my favorite Halloween costume – my nun habit. I have 2 costume parties to go to this weekend and I have no idea where it is. I know I wore it last Halloween because I was looking forward to passing out candy but it turns out no kids trick-or-treat in my ‘hood. So I got dressed up for nothing. I’ve practically turned my place upside down looking for it. I don’t think I let anyone borrow it and I didn’t ever mean to get rid of it. But where it is, no one knows.

When I came back from Vegas and I broke even on betting on 2 NFL games (they were games I “had a hunch” on), I was thinking maybe I could supplement my engineer’s salary by just betting on every game, figuring that I’d do better than .500 on the season. So starting in week 3, I’ve been picking who I think would win each NFL game. In week 3, I went 8-6. In week 4, I went 8-6. In week 5, I went 12-2. I was starting to feel pretty cocky. And then it’s all fallen apart in week 6 (a dismal 4-9). Bah. I guess overall, I’m still ahead in my imaginary betting la-la land, but I think I’m learning an important lesson – betting on pro football is just too risky.

A couple weeks ago, I viewed and tried to follow alongwith a pilates video. I was so far away from my element, it was laughable. The focus is breathing, keeping your abs tight, doing slow movements to increase your strength and flexibility. Those are all things that I'm not very skilled at. I know I'd get better if I kept practicing but it just does not appeal to me AT ALL. At its core, I don't think exercise should be a spiritual experience and pilates seems oddly cultlike to me. I think I'd rather run, lift weights, stretch, and then relax on my couch with Sports Illustrated. That's plenty calming.

eyemakeup remover, troubling dreams, and smart mp3 players

Yesterday I walked to the drugstore to buy some necessities. One of them was eye makeup remover. I’ve tried a couple different kinds/types/brands and some just don’t work for me so now I’m kind of particular about what I like. The choices were overwhelming, especially when I didn’t see the brand I got last time. Eye makeup remover is sold with all the other facial cleansers which are organized by brand, not type – so Ponds has their version, Dove has theirs, etc. instead of being able to look at all the eye makeup removers, all the acne cleansers, etc. None of them looked like the kind I use. Just as I felt the heat rising in my face, this old saleslady, who was rather homely, asked me if she could help me. I told her what I was looking for and she recommended a cream from Nivea and told me it was her personal recommendation. I took one look at her and started to protest that I prefer gel and have tried other creams, but she repeatedly insisted that the Nivea is best. Did I really want to take beauty advice from someone who is not beautiful? Isn’t that like sharing baking tips with people who are skinny? Or having a personal trainer who’s overweight? I was not in the mood to argue (I guess I rarely am though) so I bought the stuff and went to the gym and then went home. That night, I tried it, and the saleslady was right. The Nivea cream worked really well. And I can use a tissue instead of a more expensive cotton pad which I had to use with the gel. I consider this to be a lesson learned.

Last night I had the worst dream ever. There was death and bloodshed and so many people I knew who died. I’m trying to not let it ruin my day. Because it only happened in a dream. I had a violent dream about 10 days ago too. Argh.

I have a bunch of mp3s of Spanish dialogue and vocabulary. If I have the energy while working out, I sometimes skip over them in favor of the upbeat workout music that I have loaded alongside the Spanish mp3s. Based on the ratio of Spanish Mp3s to music mp3s, I should be listening to a Spanish one every 7 songs or so when I have the “random” setting selected. For the last 2 weeks, I am rarely hearing a Spanish mp3. And I can’t say that I mind. Is there any way my mp3 player has learned what I like listening to?

Becoming acclimated to bitterness

“If you want to make the world a better place, take a look at yourself and make that change.” Michael Jackson, Man in the Mirror

My recent discovery of coffeemate’s vanilla chai tea creamer has led me to drink more coffee than I normally do. Even when I just drink a cup a day, if I skip a day, I get a headache.

I’m also a pretty regular tea drinker (for about 6 years now) and I like to believe that green mint tea will make me hot. I think I read about its beautifying powers in a book at Barnes and Noble a couple months ago. I ran out of green tea last week and busted out some chai tea (DO NOT ADD CHAI CREAMER TO IT!!!) this week and it tasted awful. Just really really bad. I was sitting at my desk, drinking my tea, and thinking to my self, “this tea is horrible.” But I finished it anyway. And I gave it another shot today and it wasn’t nearly as repulsive. Can taste buds change in a day? Or did I just become acclimated to the bitterness?

Becoming acclimated to bitterness. What an interesting idea. As a general optimist, I thought I was impervious to becoming jaded. Recently I made the painful discovery of how very wrong I was. Not only did I soak up negativity and cynicism like a sponge, once I realized I had reached a saturation point, I found it very difficult to wring myself out. I internalized it and blamed myself and negative self talk prevailed. When I was finally able to step back and be objective about how far I was from myself, I didn’t even recognize the person staring back at me in the mirror. It is a completely unnerving discovery. Things change so subtly. As humans, we learn to deal and adapt and cope. In the process, we end up putting up with more and more.

In the last couple months I’ve noticed that my car shakes really badly at highway speeds. I felt like I was sliding all over exit ramps and my tires were constantly squealing, even when I kept speeds down during turns. My treads were deep enough to pass the penny test and I knew it had been about 40K miles since my last set, but I kept making excuses and putting replacement off. Begrudgingly, I started researching tires and pricing. I was surprised to receive the best quote from my dealer. They put them on while I got my oil changed.

The day I got them, I drove home at highway speeds (on a highway) in the rain. My car didn’t shake when I hit 70, 75 and 80. I felt like my tires were firmly attached to the road, especially when I circled along the exit ramp. There was no squealing, there was no sliding, only peace. Content is being happy with the decisions you make.

It was alarming for me to take a step back and realize how far away I was from contentment. I ignored all the warning signs for so long because they appeared slowly but progressively got worse. I became accustomed to a jarring ride and feeling unsafe. It was hard for me to remember what it was like to drive normally. Having faith that you will arrive at your destination safely will not get you very far. Wanting to arrive safely means nothing. The other things that you’ve done in your life play no roll. It doesn’t matter how good of a person you are, or how good your heart is. Your car doesn’t care. The only way the situation can be fixed is to cut your losses, take some action, and get a new set of tires. And hopefully you do that BEFORE anything gets damaged beyond repair.

Pics from Jenny's wedding

I'm posting these at my own risk. Please don't tell the photographer!

Bridesmaids helping bride into her dress


Bridesmaids before the ceremony at the church


Bridesmaids after the ceremony


So much happiness!


Congrats to Jenny and Ben!

Along the Same Lines as the Darwin Awards...

There are the IgNobel Awards

And in other news...

I brought a rolling pin to work the other day. When was the last time you got to do that? I was out in the shop area with it and one of the guys asked, “Are you gonna make me a pie? I can’t remember the last time I saw a rolling pin…” I thought that was damned funny. I needed it for a crazy special cool project that I’m working on. But it’s over for now (I delivered a day ahead of time!) so the rolling pin will return to one of my bottom kitchen cabinets to sit alone and unused (not unlike its owner). Speaking of other girly things like rolling pins…

About a month after I moved into my condo, the caulking in my shower needed to be fortified. (I like that word.) The directions on my caulk said to use a hairdryer to dry out the area to be caulked. I did not own a hairdryer. So I went out and got one and used it for my caulking job. And it’s sat untouched for almost 2 years in my bathroom cabinet. I think I’m going to bust it out again soon though, to shrink wrap saran wrap from a window kit to keep winter drafts from sneaking through cracks around my windows. What does it say about me that I see a hair dryer as more of a home improvement tool than a beauty tool?

The company I work for acquired some pedometers and they want us to live a healthier more active life. They told us we could have one if we’d participate in a contest. I am soooo excited about my pedometer. I talked before about being a burrito slut (what wouldn’t I do for Chipotle?). I think I’m also a slut for a pedometer. I walked a mile, ran for almost 2, did the elliptical for over 3, and that put me around 10000 steps for the day. When I found out that 12500 is the benchmark for what is considered “highly active,” I was disappointed with my 10K mark. I think I’m most excited about the pedometer because it’s a new way for me to evaluate my workouts/activity/fitness. Always looking for something to freshen up my trips to the gym…

My brother was an engineer but is working as an engineering teacher and wants to be able to teach math and science too. So he is taking classes to get a masters degree. He’s currently taking a physics class and a math class. We’re playing sand volleyball together once a week this fall and he mentioned that he was going to have to do a crazy derivation or integration with a radiation equation for an upcoming test and he had no idea how to do it. I’ve done some insane derivations and batty integrations (reminds me of a classmate’s quote at Case during EMAE 350. “We must explore all other options before resorting to integration.”) and I was pretty sure I had enough of my old texts that I could reference to take a stab at it. So because I am the sickest form of sick, I called my brother after volleyball, got the details of what I needed to do, pranced over to the bookshelf in my basement with my old texts, selected the ones I thought could help, went back upstairs, turned on some baseball, surrounded myself with 5 open textbooks, cuddled up under a flannel blanket on my couch, and wrote out the steps of the integration on a pad of yellow engineering paper. Now I’d be lying if I said that I plowed through it and was able to get through all the steps of the integration to get to the correct answer. Instead, I toiled for about an hour and a half, ended up waving my hands and making up some math, and still got to a roadblock where I could go no further. Then I remembered that I (thankfully) am not in school anymore and went to bed. I still thought about the problem as I was falling asleep though. It brought back bittersweet memories of college. I remembered the joy of the challenge of attacking difficult problems and the camaraderie when we did it as a group. But I also remembered that feeling of a heavy weight always on my shoulders. Never being able to get ahead on my school work. Always having something hanging over my head. Never feeling like I was doing enough. It’s been nice to be away from that for awhile.

Very Polish, Ugly Balls

When something reminds me of mafia/Sopranos/super Italian, I will refer to it has “Guido-ey.” I wanted to come up with a corresponding term to describe what my family and I did last Friday night. We went to the Polish Cultural Center for dinner, sat around a huge circle table and ate pierogi, guomki (wrong spelling), kielbasa, sauerkraut, and (something like?) nicshtike. We were surrounded by the portraits of Polish individuals who had achieved worldwide fame. Like Nobel Prize winners. All the names were very very Polish. (I have a very Polish last name and my mom’s maiden name was pretty polish too. Both begin with “K” and end with “ski.” Until I was about 10, I thought you always marry someone whose name is a lot like yours.) Anyhow, I think I came up with a phrase to describe last Friday night. UberPolacko. Uber is a German salute to “super” and Polacko is a tribute to the Spanish word “polaco” for “Polish.” UberPolacko. Christmas Eve with my family? UberPolacko. My last name? UberPolacko. Friday night dinner with the family at the Polish Cultural Center? UberPolacko.

I played softball with a new team on Saturday night and the pitcher throws a knuckleball (yes, even though it’s slow pitch). It’s a pretty tough grip so every once in awhile, there’s a wild pitch. I was catching and the umpire was doing a nice job calling balls and strikes. He would say why the ball was a ball. Common reasons for being a ball: Deep, high, low, flat, inside, outside, etc. After a ball that rolled all the way from the pitcher’s hand to the plate, the umpire yells, “Ball, ugly!” I thought that was hilarious.

BFH

I had achieved a really nice shade of whiteness for my teeth by occasionally using whitening strips and gels as well as using whitening toothpaste twice a day. The last time I had my teeth cleaned and examined, the dentist recommended a mouthwash that would toughen up my gums a little. Instead it made my teeth brown. So I stopped using it and have researched the proper way to brush my teeth and am perfecting my technique. I’m still using a manual brush but may upgrade to a power brusher soon. I’m still hoping to get back to the white perfection I had previously attained.

My cooking extravaganza from the weekend included a pot of chicken corn chowder, turkey meatloaf, potato pancakes, a free styling pasta dish (tip: bacon makes everything better), some cookies (except for cookies), and I cut up a couple cantaloupes. I can’t remember the last time I did all that. I’m compiling a cookbook of my favorite recipes. I collect recipes almost like a hobby. I only have to make something once and like it to put it in my cookbook. I’d love to have a specific page here dedicated to shared favorite recipes.

I used my Old Navy coupons (that I found in my pocket in Vegas) last week to buy new jeans (in a new size!), 3 tank tops, running shorts, and striped short sleeved collared shirt. I think my total bill was around $48 but then I had the $20 in coupons and some gift card money. It was a good trip. The fun part is that because I have a sewing machine and I want to pretend that I can tailor my clothes, I get to channel my inner seamstress and try to make the clothes really fit me. Good times. I have a whole pile of new and old clothes that need some sort of sewing attention. I’d like to start tackling that pile this week.

I had to make my ON selections rather hastily. I prefer to shop on weekday evenings instead of the weekends. The clearance racks seem to be in better order and it’s just less of a circus. I’ve shopped there enough to figure out that ON turns the music off in their dressing rooms about 5 minutes before they close. On Thursday night when the music went off, I had a huge pile of things I was trying to make up my mind on. I ended up buying a halter that I returned on Sunday. While I was waiting in an extremely long line (stupid weekend lines) to return it, in front of me in line, there was a woman wearing black spandex hot pants, a black spandex low cut shirt, and heels. She had dyed blond hair (with some darker roots showing), a nice tan, and huge gozangas. She sort of reminded me of the guests that Jerry Springer has on his “People Mistake My Mom for a Stripper” episode except she was probably prettier. Anyhow, I’m not used to seeing people dressed like that in real life. Especially not people who are out with their husband and two kids buying a boatload of clothes at Old Navy. It was all very bizarro. That, in and of itself, I can handle. What I can’t handle is when her 2 bratty kids started acting up and neither of the parents did anything to get make them behave. I’m not a parent so I can’t really understand what it takes to discipline a child but I just don’t understand why parents bring their kids out into public if the kids have no idea how to behave. Just a pet peeve of mine.

I was in the model shop area at work yesterday. I tend to feel a little uneasy in that environment because I'm a girl and I never played with tools growing up. This one time, in advanced shop class at Case (EMAE290?), I cried, but I guess that's a story for another time. Yesterday, we were looking for the largest vise we could find and when we couldn’t find one, the guy I was working with mumbled under his breath, “I need a BFH…” I asked him what that stood for and he told me it means a Big F-ing Hammer. Ryry confirmed that this is part of the standard lexicon in a shop area. Who whudda thunk?

Achieved a new low weight today. I stood on the scale an extra 5 seconds this morning to savor it. Going in with the attitude, “today is the heaviest weight I will ever be” is providing much comfort. I’m trying force myself to believe that the numbers I saw 2, 6, 12 months ago, will never be see again. Rarrrr.

Along that same line, when I buy clothes for myself, I often think about the poor, malnourished children who are sewing them in sweatshops in Malaysia. I wonder if they ever hold them up to their boney bodies and think, “do people this big really exist?”

CFD and workout hunger

Headline from MSN:
"The secret, exciting lives of engineers"
http://encarta.msn.com/encnet/departments/adultlearning/?article=EngineersDoWhat>1=8648

Before I clicked on the link, my first thought was that someone on MSN had found my blog. My second thought was that Ryan had sold his pilot and we engineers would finally get our chance at sitcom stardom. After reading the article, I thought to myself, “Well, being an airbag research and development engineer is fun too. Maybe they should interview me.” Then I clicked a link from the article about how much money engineers make and got pissed because I am being paid at the peon percentile for my occupation. Oh well, you can’t have everything. And it’s hard to put a price tag on liking your work and being excited about going to work everyday. Or at least, most days. Or even less, not hating your job. I just hope I get to keep my job.

Today at work I was doing some number crunching for my pet project which is a concept I’m patenting. Sooooo fun. I made some observations and then wanted to figure out how to explain them mathematically. So I tried a bunch of things and wasn’t having any success and then re-ran the numbers a couple times and finally got almost exactly what I was looking for. I ended up titling the results, “A Crude Calculation” because the numbers are so rough. But I also considered calling it a “Poor man’s CFD study” (Computational Fluid Dynamics for the non-nerds), a “Dumb Girl’s CFD”, or “CFD for Dummies.” But calling it CFD is a bit of a stretch as it is…

Last night on the treadmill, it had been over 2.5 weeks since my last workout at the gym. Oops. I was busy playing softball and going to Vegas and being sick. Oddly enough, I also hit a new low weight last week (the lowest I’ve been in about 2 years). But I promise it wasn’t from being sick. I think it was from tricking my body into thinking that I was going to work out, so my metabolism was accelerated (not retarded), but then I wasn’t all that hungry, because I hadn’t worked out. Working out makes me really really hungry. Like, gnaw off my arm hungry. I think I’m disciplined enough to keep working out but I don’t know how to battle hunger very well. Especially with all the food from Sunday’s cooking extravaganza in my fridge.