Where I've been...and Merry Christmas!

...well, here, really. But I've neglected the virtual world for several reasons.

1. I took the GRE (yes, after nearly a year of talking about it, I finally just buckled down and did it. It wasn't so terrible after all.)
2. Took a fabulous trip to Florida with the husband and mother - it was a mostly relaxing week with family spiced with one brief segment of fear-facing adventure, but more on that later.
3. Interviewed for and got a new position in training and development at work (yay!), and then did two jobs for a couple of weeks until my replacement could be trained (yeesh).
4. Family time at Thanksgiving - I love family. And cranberry sauce, I love that too.
5. Picked out and put up a Christmas tree. This year that meant me sawing off the bottom of the trunk with a hand saw in my kitchen and getting locked out of the house without shoes on when I went to empty the pine-needle-filled vacuum. (You know, that week it was 2 degrees in Utah? That's when I decided to lock myself out.)
   
6. Edited lots and lots of papers with Steve leading up to finals week.
7. Steve's laptop finally exploded (yes, an actual explosion, including smoke and mysterious black ooze), making us a one-computer family, and during finals week I went completely Internet free after work.
8. Threw a successful surprise party for Steve's graduation (thanks everyone who helped keep it a secret)!

I also stopped doing a lot of things since my last post - like exercising and eating sensibly. Which brings me to my next point - MERRY CHRISTMAS! To prove I have at least mostly found the holiday spirit, here's that tree I worked so hard on. It makes me happy.

Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

This morning I overslept and my favorite pants weren't clean so I was late and I had to wear the black ones that gather lint. I hate being late.

At work I was scheduled to move to a new desk, close to the window, with one short wall and a glorious view of the outside world. They got my PC and phone moved and I had started unloading my boxes when someone showed up with a bunch of tools and informed me no one was allowed to have short walls anymore. I had to stand by and watch the glorious sunlight be slowly and surely obstructed from my seat. I hate dark cubicles.

Then I had to scrunch all my belongings to one corner while they disassembled my entire desk to put up the new walls, even though no one has been sitting there for weeks and they could have made the change long before all my things had been moved in. I had a lot of work to do and none of it got done because I spent most of the day without a desk or computer or phone. I hate wasting time.

When it was finally time for lunch, I was excited to eat a turkey sandwich with honey mustard. I love honey mustard. When I asked for it, the server told me there was no honey mustard today, only plain old mustard. I'm sure they never run out of plain, stinky mustard. I hate plain mustard.

Then I was late for a meeting, my pen ran out of ink, someone ate the last chocolate, and when they moved the shelf in my cubicle all my books fell on the floor.

I finally got my desk back, sat down, and saw that my phone extension had been changed. They changed it back but acted like I didn't know what I was talking about. I hate when people act like you don't know what you're talking about.

When I got home, the house was cold, I remembered I hadn't cooked chicken to make soup, and I had to eat lima beans for dinner. I hate lima beans.

It was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. But I guess some days are like that. Even in Australia.

I did it!

On Saturday I ran the St. George Marathon. It was my first marathon, and I entered the race lottery mostly because I didn't think I'd get in this year. I wasn't really convinced a marathon was something I wanted to do. I love half marathons, but pushing your body 26.2 miles is a whole different level of crazy. I did get in (obviously) and I spent the first two months of training looking for an excuse not to run it. But after running the TOU half in August, I got my race motivation back. I spent the next month worrying that I wouldn't be able to run. (And naturally, because I'm a hypochondriac I found 900 things wrong with myself. I was sure I had a stress fracture when my calf hurt during one run and that I was getting swine flu when my allergies flared up one day.)

I expected a marathon to be hard, but it was even tougher than I expected. I'm kind of proud of that, because I know part of what made it so much more difficult than my past races or training runs was that I pushed myself. So much so that when it was over I didn't have anything left - I just planted myself on a random patch of lawn until I could walk again. But I made my goal of running the whole time - no walking - and I shattered my "reasonable" goal of a 4:15 time. I even broke my "ultimate" goal of 4 hours and finished in 3:53! It was physically painful some of the time and I had to play mental games to keep myself motivated, but I did it. There's such a sense of satisfaction that come from conquering truly tough stuff.

I've had a couple people ask me if I was disappointed in having missed qualifying for Boston by mere minutes (well, 13...that's kind of a lot to shave off, but anyway...). I'm totally not. First of all, 3:53 is way better than I ever expected to do and you bet I'm proud of myself. But second, if you qualified for the Boston Marathon, wouldn't you feel like you should run it? I'm glad I ran this one, but I'm definitely not planning to make a habit of it. Now if you're looking for a half-marathon buddy on the other hand...give me a few weeks and let me know :)

Pink ribbon and kissing

OK, so I haven't actually taught a Primary lesson yet, but I'm completely in love with my class. There's nothing like hearing little voices belt out the first verse of "How Firm a Foundation" (yes, they're like 5 years old) to win your heart. We're going to be just fine. Thanks everyone for the kiddo advice. As a side note, this week the kids taught me that parents have to sleep in the same room because their beds are stuck together. And apparently some parents KISS! Oh the scandal.

Finally, I bought pink ribbon for my hair today and am now officially ready for my first-ever marathon (gotta have that bow)!

Help

I was just thinking the other day about how comfortable I've gotten in the grown-up world. It seems like ages since I worked as a nanny (or any kind of babysitter) and the days at the orphanage in Ecuador seem more a part of my college life than my current one. I have a grown-up job, go to a grown-up ward where I teach a grown-up class...and I like it. I've gotten very comfortable in my adult environment.

...and then they called me to teach Primary. And not just the kids who are practically teenagers already, but the ones who just came from Sunbeams (the youngest kids in Primary). They're 5ish (some are 4 I think) and I am feeling way out of my grown-up realm. For someone who babysat as my high school job and immediately after college ran off to Ecuador to teach some more kids, I'm feeling ridiculously new to this kiddo thing.

I used to be really good with kids. A lot of them even listened to me. But all of a sudden I'm afraid I'll be a total failure and my class will be flying off in all directions out of control and when their parents ask them what they learned in Primary they'll just stare at them blankly.

So, um...ideas for calming wild kids (in English)? Best way to bribe a 5 year old? I never thought I'd be the one to ask advice for teaching a class of pre-school aged kids. I mean, I (mostly) successfully wrangled at least 10 at a time in a certain South American country, right? I'm searching desperately for reassurance here, somebody throw me a bone!

Mailbox

Dear St. George Marathon,

BRING IT.

Sincerely,
Kate

For the weather gods, fortune, luck, etc. etc.,

Please don't jinx me for the above throwdown. I'm well aware the outcome of this race rests on a lot more than my ability to run like a crazy person/utter lack of common sense. I'm just sayin', barring any injuries, catastrophic weather, food poisoning, etc...I AM READY.

Hugs and kisses (and whatever else will prevent ridiculous wind or an ankle twist),
Determined Runner Chick

Dear friends I've made from the running club the past couple weeks,

You rock. Thanks for reminding me how fun running is and pushing me to run faster and farther. And for keeping up more than your share of conversation after mile 15 or so to keep my mind off my legs. Keep running, cheering, pushing, and may all you crazies who want to do this in Boston make your goal.

Thank you,
That One Girl You Ran With That One Time

A plea to city planners everywhere

About once a month at work, I spend a couple of hours addressing birthday cards for our employees. This means I get a very close look at hundreds of addresses, mostly in Utah, and I'm noticing an alarming trend. There are several streets/cul-de-sacs/avenues/etc. that are using multiple types of street identification (for lack of a better term). For example, I would expect to see "Horsetail Trail" or "Horsetail Lane," but "Horsetail Trail Lane?" That's just redundant. What gets really ridiculous is when some city planner (or whoever the heck comes up with this stuff) gets all long-winded naming apartment complex roads. And it's even worse when it's so far south that the street number alone is unusually long. And THEN, the complex comes up with some absurd numbering system

For example: 126077 South Wasatch Rim Trail Avenue #13766 - D (not someone's real address but based on an actual pattern). Are you kidding me? It barely fits on the envelope (and looks really weird if the person's name is something tiny like Cal Brown). And are there really 13,766 units in this complex? Doubtful. Even if there were, I don't think adding the letter "D" is really going to help anyone find it.

People. Coming up with a longer name for your street doesn't make you sound richer or smarter or better educated. If we change the above to 126077 S Wasatch Rim #12 will anyone go to bed hungry? I thought not. Based on the...unusual...habits about naming children we see in Utah, I'm thinking this is a regional thing, am I right?

I realize this is kind of a weird thing to be bothered by, but I think it reflects an unfortunate lack of self-restraint in our modern culture of grammar and naming conventions. Also, I don't want to someday have to buy a ridiculously large mailbox just because I live at 543210 West Crimson Sunset View Point Lane Road.

Blonde bridge blunder

Earlier this month, Steve and I drove to Arizona for a friend's wedding. We decided to go the Vegas route and check out the strip since I hadn't been there in years (and I probably won't go back for years - I know the rest of Vegas is probably a lovely place, but I maintain the strip is just bizarre...like a cracked-out Disneyland). We stayed the night to break up the drive and early the next morning we headed over Hoover Dam and on to Phoenix.

There was construction everywhere, especially driving near the dam (of course during which time I heard every "dam" joke Steve could concoct) where they are building a new bridge. Steve, having passed that way more often than I have, knew all about the bridge construction. When you read the conversation below, you'll understand why, following said conversation, Steve told me I had to blog it. It's only fair, since I have called out some of his more impressive moments here.

Steve: Wow, that's going to be weird to drive over.
Me: What? The bridge?
Steve: Yep.
Me: Drive on that thing? No way! It's way too steep - they can't have cars drive on that!
Steve: Um...
Me: Seriously! You'd never make it up the side.
Steve: Yeah...so that's the support for the bridge. They're going to put the actual bridge on top.

Oh.

Yep, in my foggy early-morning daze, I thought this was the actual BRIDGE (sorry for the weird angle - we were driving):




Good thing I'm not an engineer. You can see my concern though, were this the actual bridge, yes?

Bragging rights

For what a hard time I give Steve about cooking, I really haven't cooked much lately either (and by "lately" I mean "since we've been married"). We do lots of quick meals, which I don't think can be considered "cooking." So I love it when something I do make becomes a new family favorite.

Thursday night when I came home from girl's camp, I was ready for someone to take me OUT to dinner, so we went to one of my faves, Zupa's. I got my usual - a fruity salad and the Yucatan Chicken Tortilla Soup. Steve tried the soup, but when I offered him more he made a face and said "no thanks."

"You don't like the tortilla soup?"

"Ew. No."

"But you like tortilla soup when I make it."

"YOUR tortilla soup is stinkin' good!"

Did I just out-soup Zupa's? Yes, ladies and gentlemen, at least in the eyes of one man, I did.

Briefly...

• Yay!: Steve doing all the dishes and cleaning the kitchen before I got home.
• Whoops: Realizing he's used one of our nice (and seldom-used) place mats as a dishtowel.
• Wahoo!: Coming home to see the very tidy results of Steve pulling approximately 1.3 million weeds from our yard and mowing the lawn.
• Um...: Coming home to realize he has also pulled the one thriving plant in the yard - a beautiful, purple, flowering...some kind of bushy plant I can't recall the name of. It was glorious though, and had survived from my garden last year. Alas, now no one will believe I actually grew something without killing it.

It's good for me to be reminded about having a sense of humor sometimes. But that plant did NOT look like a weed. . . .I'm just sayin'.

*Warning* lengthy travel post ahead

In spite of my good intentions to keep my blog updated while traveling, there just wasn't enough time to sleep AND write. When there's a contest between sleep and almost anything else...sleep wins. The sad part is I know there are 100 funny stories I probably won't remember. But if I had been sleeping all day and writing all night, there wouldn't have been any stories at all. You see the dilemma.

For those of you who don't know, Steve and I just returned from three wonderful weeks in Europe. Well, the Mediterranean, to be more precise. We spent about a week in northern Italy (Venice to Rome), and the next two between Greece and Turkey (Istanbul and Kusadasi/Ephesus). Since Turkey is part of the Asian continent, that means I doubled the number of continents I've been to in less than 3 weeks!

This was my first trip to Europe. It was also my first trip to a country (or countries) where I don't speak the language. Italian and Spanish are close enough that we did fine, but Greek...that was a bit of an adventure. You know it's going to be rough when the alphabet isn't even the same. I at least managed to learn a few phrases, which is more than I can say for Turkish. After half a week in the country, I was still limited to "hello" and "thank you." (Although I at least mastered the pronunciation enough that one store owner started speaking to me in Turkish. When I just stared back at him blankly, he laughed and said in English, "I thought you were Turkish! You said 'Merhaba'!" Probably just flattering me. It worked.) Luckily, almost everyone we met in Istanbul spoke at least some English.

I'm sure I'll share some more detailed stories in the next week or two, but for now I'll just sum up a few highlights in a lovely bullet list.

• Most memorable piece of art: Hands down, Michelangelo's David. I love art, but I'm not any kind of an expert, so when I heard people talking about what an amazing sculpture this is, I figured I'd think it was cool, but I didn't know if I'd understand enough about it to get the major "wow' factor other people talk about. I was not expecting the reaction I had when I walked into the room. I'm not sure how to describe it, except to say that I just felt like it was perfect and inspired. Art is a lot like writing in that when something is "finished" is sort of arbitrary. There is nothing arbitrary about the David - it is certainly complete and to have added or omitted anything would have diminished it. It's probably good that we weren't allowed to photograph it - no picture could capture what it was like to be in that room.
  

• Best site for historical ruins: This one is tough - we saw a LOT of Greek and Roman ruins. Ephesus definitely stands out though, particularly the Library of Celsus. The Colosseum was, of course, incredible as well, and it was unreal to walk where Paul did - Mars Hill and Ephesus again.
  
  

• Most fun: This is a tough one too. I'll go with crusing around Santorini on a scooter (which we lovingly dubbed Kermit).
  
  

• Most stressful to navigate: Athens. I guess you could also call this one "Most adventurous travel." Inaccurate subway maps, limited information on city-to-city transportation, "information" employees unwilling to help you, stretches of non-functioning railway. Also a slight communication barrier and lots of people who said "I don't know," even though we knew they did. Oh, and even when you have the directions, good luck finding a street sign.

• Most picturesque: This is a toss-up between Venice and Santorini. Venice was beautiful, but a little strange because everyone there is a tourist. It almost felt like a very beautiful and historic Disneyland.
  
  
  

• Most relaxing: Greek islands. After two weeks of running our feet off, it was incredible to cruise around on a scooter without any agenda except finding good beaches and great food.

• Biggest surprise: Geting a 52 Euro bill (about $75) for two plates of sea bass, a Coke and a Fanta. If you order fish charged by weight, be smarter than us and make sure it's in a unit of measurement you understand!

• Biggest food obsession: For Steve, Italian gelato and European Coke. For me, Italian pastries, Greek salad and Fanta.
  
  
  
  

• Least favorite food: Honest-to-goodness Greek yogurt, unflavored. The picture on the container leads me to believe it was sheep yogurt. I will NOT try it again in a few years to see if my taste buds have matured.
  
  
  
  

• Most amazing moment: Sitting between the Haiga Sophia and the Blue Mosque at dusk and hearing the call to prayer from 5 different mosques.
  
  
  
  

• Best sunsets: Santorini.
  

Physics question

We had crepes for dinner on Sunday. A few with ham and turkey (just so we could reasonably call it "dinner") and then several delicious fruit and dessert crepes. At least, I had several. Mmmmmm....

Anyway, I melted semi-sweet chocolate chips on the last crepe I cooked and ate it in the kitchen (because who are we kidding, I am for sure not enough of a grownup to eat in the living room without spilling). I then took the bag of chocolate chips into the living room where we were playing Monopoly with some friends. And that is the full disclosure of my chocolate contact for the evening.

I should note before continuing that I was wearing a mid-calf-length dress so my knees were covered for the duration of the Monopoly carpet-sitting.

When I was getting ready for bed later that night, I found melted chocolate BEHIND MY KNEES. Nowhere else. Not on my hands, not on my dress, not even on my face. Also not on the carpet or the kitchen chairs. Just melted into the creases behind my knees. And it wasn't just a little bit of chocolate. I had to get in the bathtub to wash it off.

Can someone please explain how that's even a little bit possible?

WTH? Again?

For those of you not familiar with Utah slang, "WTH" would be "What the heck?" And before I continue this post, I just want to clarify that I am not pregnant. Because apparently, when your brain totally craps out on you, that's the first thing people assume.

If you've visited SYA before, you may remember a recent post about me leaving 4 hours early for a baby shower less than 5 miles away. (I'm not linking to it, just look down. It's like 2 inches below this.) Well, I've already topped it. And it hasn't even been a month yet.

One of my dearest friends from high school is getting married next month, so a few of our other friends threw a bridal shower for her (naturally). I looked forward all week to seeing Katie and our other high school gal pals. And I had a super cute present for her. So I told Steve to make plans with the guys and planned my day around the shower.

And then on Friday, Steve picked me up from work. We ran some errands, went to dinner, and then he dropped me off at home to hang out with my sister in law while he went out with the guys. And I totally FORGOT to go to the bridal shower. WTH?!

I woke up Saturday morning and saw the invitation on the fridge and that's when it dawned on me. I missed it. Totally, 100 percent failure. I almost cried (yes, that's true and no, for the second time, I am not pregnant).

And that's it, that's the story. I lose :(

It's arrived!

Have we all noticed that SPRING is here? Well my allergies haven't yet...shhhhh....

Somebody get this girl a planner

On Saturday, I went to a baby shower for one of my college roommies (because EVERYONE I know is having babies right now - but that's beside the point). I hadn't seen this particular roommie in almost a year, so naturally I planned my day around the 10 a.m. shower. I set my alarm for 9 (you know, just in case I had a particularly late sleep in), but in my early morning grogginess, I set it for 9 a.m. Monday - Friday and didn't even touch the weekend settings.

I woke up at 9:30, noticed the time, and promptly began panicking. I jumped out of bed, sent Steve to run an errand for me, showered fast, wrapped the present (well, put it in a purple bag. Apparently I used all the tissue paper at Christmas or something. Whoops.), waited for Steve to get back with the car, and then dashed like a mad woman out the door. Half way to the car I turned around to get the invitation (and accompanying address). Scanning for the location, I noticed the phrase "from 2 until 4 p.m." Um...what? That's right folks, not only was I not going to be late, I was going to be 4 hours early.

Steve gave me the "you are silly" look, and fair enough, because this isn't the first time that's happened. (Yep, TWO stories in one post! Brace yourselves.)

We went to Cancun on our honeymoon. I knew our flight home left at 7:00 a.m., and since it was an international flight and we had a long shuttle ride to the airport, I scheduled the pickup for 4:45 a.m. We packed everything the night before, showered, and layed our clothes out so all we'd need to do at 4 a.m. was stumble out of bed and put some shoes on.

We arrived at the airport close to 5:30 and got in line to check in for our flight.

"I'm sorry, we don't have you booked on this flight."

"Um...what?" (Maybe that's a common phrase for me. So what?)

After some severe panicking and a bit more research, we discovered that we were, in fact, booked on a flight home, just not that flight (which, btw, wasn't even going to the right state). Our flight left at 11:00 a.m. and we couldn't even check our bags in until two hours before.

Why I was so certain our flight left at 7 is beyond me, but we had to tote our luggage around the tiny Cancun airport for nearly 6 hours. We ended up buying ridiculously overpriced breakfast just so we could sit in the restaurant for a couple of hours. I should mention that because we weren't allowed to check in and clear security yet, there were no chairs. There was floor, and there was ridiculously priced restaurant seating. So after nearly an hour of people looking at us like we were hobos, we opted for the latter.

I was pretty sure any husband of less than a week would contemplate leaving a girl right then and there, but Steve was a good sport about it. We did agree though, that on future vacations HE would be in charge of our travel itinerary.

I have to admit, I thought it was a fluke at the time. But after a repeat performance I'm not so sure. Turns out it might just be...me. Is that a personality flaw? Or can I get away with just being a little quirky?

Welcome to the club part II

One of the quirks I tease Steve about (besides bachelor-style cooking of course) is his tendency to over-explain situations. He's a friendly guy, which is one of his best qualities, but sometimes it leads him to let complete strangers in on a little too much detail.

Once, we were out at a nice dinner and couldn't finish our meal. We both had to get a to-go box and our plates must have looked basically untouched to our waiter. I probably would have said something like, "We weren't as hungry as we thought we were." But Steve, not wanting this man we'd never seen before and will probably never see again to think we didn't like the food, narrated our entire afternoon, including feeding times.

"...and we were really hungry earlier, so we had some sandwiches, and then ended up coming to dinner sooner than we thought..."

Like I said, friendly. He knows the look you get when you've over-explained though. The one that says I'm not really sure why you just told me all that, but I'm too polite to comment about it. And when he gets the look, he invariably turns to me and says, "I over-explained, didn't I?"

A little.

Well, today at work I resolved a minor billing discrepancy that I had mentioned to my boss earlier. I walked all my paperwork down to my boss's desk and proceeded to explain to him exactly what the error had been and how it had been resolved. When I finished and looked up from all my show-and-tell material, the look was unmistakably present.

"Um...that's fine...I trust you to do your job..."

Translation: "I really don't need to know every tiny detail of what you do every day. 'It's resolved' would have been fine and then I could have had those 5 minutes of my life back."

Yup. I have to say though, if it's between being being constantly hovered over (as in my previous work situation), or occasionally getting the look because now I'm trusted with *gasp* my actual job, I'll settle for the latter.

Welcome to the club

Steve used to have a job that involved being on the phone a lot. Apparently, people used to mistake his name for "Pete" rather frequently. I thought this was funny, but secretly thought he probably mumbled or something.

Last week, I was ordering some flowers over the phone. When we got to the part about what the card would say, I told the sales lady what the text should read and then "With love, Steve and Kate."

"Pete and who?"
"No no, Steve and Kate."
"Oh, Steve, short for Steven. OK. Steve and who?"
"Steve and Kate."
"Steve and Pete?"

Um...maybe he wasn't mumbling.

Note to self

Eating graham crackers and chocolate chips for dinner does not make for an early bedtime . . . but it's way more fun than eating vegetables. Don't tell my mom.

J

So (kind of a while ago) on an impulse, I decided to play in one of those blog memes. Clever girl gave me the letter J. So here they are...my favorite things that begin with...

J ackets


I think there's nothing classier than a nice jacket or coat. I wish I were one of those girls who has a beautiful jacket to go with every outfit. I only have one really cute one and I'm envious of the sea of beautiful coats I see in the winter.

J ell-o Pudding




I think Mr. Cosby summed it up. What's not to love about pudding - especially chocolate? Plus, no list of my favorites would be complete without Chocolate (notice its status as a proper noun) getting some face time. I also love this retro commercial :)

J et lag

Not that I particularly enjoy being exhausted, but jet lag means I've traveled somewhere exciting and maybe new. Yay!

J ane Austen



I LOVE Jane Austen's books, and most of the movies made about them. I don't care if they do set false expectations about romance for girls everywhere, I think they should be in every personal library. And I think all men should wear coats like the one Colin Firth wears in A&E's Pride and Prejudice.

J ogging

Which is funny, because I had no idea I liked it until about a year ago - in the middle of training for my first half marathon. I still remember realizing I loved it as I made it past the first three miles of a six-mile run on a beautiful almost spring day. Now I miss it if I go without for very long.

J ack-o-lanterns


Autumn is my favorite season. I love the way the air smells, any baked pumpkin treat, and (naturally) scooping the guts out of a pumpkin. Carving is good too.

J ack Johnson


Job description: singer-songwriter-director-surfer. It just doesn't get any cooler than that. Plus he kicks it with the Obamas. And have you heard the man's voice? Thank you. There's always new music to like, but Jack will always have my heart. (In MUSIC sweetie, obviously. I mean, clearly he's not even cute, right? Ahem.)

J ungles

This one goes with my travel obsession. Trekking through a little piece of the Amazon in huge rubber boots and swinging on a zipline through Jamaica's jungle (ooh - that's a double J - do I get extra points for that?) are two of my favorite travel memories.

J ones Hall

OK, so only a couple of you will follow this one - but freshman year with five fabulous roomies definitely has to make the list. Especially the part where we constantly spoke in {terrible} British accents. What was that about?

And last but CERTAINLY not least...

J uniors!

Not in an upperclassmen kind of way. As in my husband is Steve Jr. and he ABSOLUTELY makes the top ten of any list! (And not just to suck up because I mentioned Jack.) Muah!




OK, so if anyone wants to play, leave a comment and I'll give you a letter. But I'll just go ahead and warn ya that doing this, although fun, made me remember why I usually skip these. It takes like, forever.

He's at it again...

Those of you familiar with My husband vs. the kitchen may be wondering how my other half has stayed out of trouble for so long. Well, this has been a particularly eventful week for him, so you're about to get the update (love you sweetie!). Ready?

• I bought some oranges at the Sunflower Market last week. I didn't realize at the time that they were blood oranges, so Steve didn't get a warning. He took one to school for lunch, peeled it, found the deep red/purple-y inside, panicked and threw the entire orange away. When I came home I got the full, horrified account of the contaminated orange.
• My always romantic hubby got me a dozen roses for Valentine's Day (sorry ladies, he's taken). The packet of flower food says "add to water," but apparently does not specify that you should first remove the food from the packet. I got a lovely bouquet in a glass vase with a floating green and white plastic packet in the water.
• Last but not least, Steve cooked dinner tonight (thank you!). It was spaghetti, which has always been one of his specialties, but tonight he decided to keep it warm while I took a shower (he's romantic AND thoughtful)...by leaving it in the pot on the stove. I was a little surprised when I came downstairs and found it still cooking.
  "You can overcook spaghetti?"
  Apparently. On the plus side, we didn't have to chew our dinner!

To be fair, he also got the highest score in his class on his social psych test, aced two papers last week, and heated up a mean can of spaghetti sauce! Also, neither of us had actually eaten a blood orange prior to this week.

Do you ever have one of those days where all you want in the world is to be on the back balcony of an Ecuadorian house, eating brownie batter and laughing about the orphans you chased around all day?

...probably on my own with that one. Miss you Tasha.

Faux Pas

Yesterday was my cousin's birthday and we had a li'l' family celebration today. When we bought his present, Steve and I decided to hedge our bets and get a gift receipt. So I was feeling so considerate and prepared when he pulled it out of the wrapping paper and when he looked confused by the accompanying paperwork, I just said (maybe a bit smugly) -

"It's a gift receipt."

But he still looked confused and handed it to me across the table.

"No, I think this is..."

The actual receipt. With the "you saved..." line circled and everything.

Whoops.

When I grow up I wanna be ME!

So I got a new boss this week (officially). It's a good thing, and when I went to my first one-on-one meeting with a new supervisor in a new department, I was feelin' pretty good about life. We talked about my "career history" (is it really called that if you've only had one "real" job before this one?), my new role, etc., without any major drama.

And then he dropped this on me: "Tell me about your career goals. Where do you want to go from here?"

Um...what? When did I forget about that part of life? I was always so sure about stuff like that in high school and college - where I wanted to go, what I wanted to do, etc. But somewhere along the way in real life, I just forgot to think about it.

I realized all this and proceeded to panic. A meeting I was totally in control of 10 seconds earlier suddenly seemed completely overwhelming. I felt my face getting hot, I started sweating in a cold room, and my eyes started to fuzz over. Is that what a panic attack feels like? Job interviews, first dates, final exams...I have survived them all without such an incident, but when someone asks me what I want to be when I grow up I totally lose it. Great.

I gave some kind of answer - I tried to be honest about my ambitions changing and I told him where I thought I wanted to be someday...but it's hard to guess about something like that. I guess the real problem isn't that I don't have goals anymore - 'cause I totally do - just that they're focused somewhere else. The career ambition in me has mellowed with age.

Here's how I could have answered the question, but I'd hate to be irrelevant. I guess I could have at least proved that I DO have goals.

• I wanna be an author. Of books that have nothing to do with the industry I'm in. So you know...whatever help you could give me with that...
  
• I'd like to go back to South America and volunteer again. Will HR experience be beneficial?
• Mastery of the Spanish language. Latin day once a week?
• My secret dream is to arrange flowers for weddings. Do we have a cross-training program for that?
• Have a well-organized, stylish home. Can I use my training budget on feng shui?
• Develop chef-like abilities. Department discount at Sur La Table would be super.
  
• More literary knowledge. Surely reading the works of Dickens is a goal, yes?
  

I guess what I learned is that I really do work to live and not the other way around. But I could probably still use some more concrete goals in the career world. Something a little more specific than "pay the bills" but less ambitious than "run a major multi-million dollar corporation."

That's all. I'll be chewin' on it for a while...you know...since you asked.

For anyone who ever took a Spanish class

Sorry for the commercial - it's short though. Y el video vale la pena. En serio.





Thanks Jess and AJ for introducing us to this sheer fantastico-ness!

Progress thus far

So I just looked over my goals from my New Year's post. Want a progress update? Here it is: No progress. Yep, it's not even February yet and I've failed. I didn't even have the stamina of the New Year's exercisers who cause Steve to avoid the gym until they fizzle out.

On the bright side, here are some things I have accomplished since that post:

• Spent an inordinate amount of time on Facebook, mostly looking at pictures of people I never talk to anymore.
• Watched last week's episode of The Office THREE times. My priorities are in order, yes?
• Rented Mama Mia from Redbox and consequently did a lot of singing in my kitchen (for the record - Soundtrack: yes! Movie: not so much. As Steve said, "James Bond, how far you've fallen.").
• Stalked my favorite blogs approximately 500 times a day, just to make sure I hadn't missed an update. (I hadn't - it's like some kind of blogging famine struck.)
  
• Talked to Hannah on the phone about studying for the GRE. (Hey, talking about it is at least a step in the right direction...right?)
• Realized it's been a VERY long time since I took a math class and that I had forgotten the meaning of the word "hypotenuse." (Do YOU remember? I took a random poll at work and most people didn't.)
• Wikied "hypotenuse." (That's sort of studying...right?)

But failure is the first step to success, right? And who wants to be trendy and jump right on all their goals in January anyway? February is the month for me, I can feel it. Look out standardized testing, here I come!

Hypochondriac little me

Have I mentioned that I'm a bit of a hypochondriac? I am. A teensy bit. The irony is that in all my self-diagnoses, I never once suspected myself of it. I'd probably still be blissfully ignorant if my roommate Alicia hadn't pointed it out my last year of college. Luckily, Alicia is very tactful so when I asked her if she thought I should go to the hospital for a side ache I was sure had to be appendicitis and she said, "You know Kate, I think you might be a bit of a hypochondriac," I took it in stride.

And she was right - it wasn't appendicitis. Indigestion would probably be closer to the truth. I wish I could say that was the first time, but it wasn't. In fact, I can't tell you how many times I've lain awake at night with some kind of stomachache and debated waking up a roommate to take me to the ER. I CAN tell you how many times I've had actual appendicitis: zero.

Anyway, my mom has this medical book from a general medicine class she took. It's probably a bit (or significantly) outdated since it's older than me, but for some reason that book is gospel to me. Any time I get worried about a weird ache or pain, I call my mom. It goes like this:

"Mom, can you get The Book out?"

"The medical book?" (Really she doesn't need to ask. I've never asked about any other one.)

"Yeah. I think I have ________ (insert potentially fatal symptom)."

"OK," (completely unconcerned - after 25 years she knows where this is going) "I'm getting it. What's wrong?"

"Well, I have ______ (insert completely generic and not-likely-to-be-even-remotely-fatal, but COULD possibly be linked to cardiac arrest, symptom)."

"How long has that been going on?"

"At LEAST 20 minutes now."

"Mmmmhmmm. And what other symptoms do you have?"

I explain, she consults The Book (yes, I realize we have the Internet and WebMD now, but The Book just seems so much more...authoritative) and comes back with,

"It sounds like it's probably _______ (insert completely benign diagnosis). But if you pass out or have trouble breathing, you should go to the doctor."

I've developed quite a list of possible diseases, all of which have proved to be unfounded. I mentioned appendicitis (a repeat offender), here are some more.

I thought I had...	It was actually...
A tumor	A really big knot in my back
MS	Two strained leg muscles
Carpal Tunnel	Nothing at all
A parasite	An aversion to lactose (this one was at least something
Diabetes (I think this was the one to tip Alicia off)	Nothing at all.
An allergic reaction to a bee sting	Just a normal bee sting

What I find strange about all of this (and why I never suspected myself to be a hypochondriac), is I rarely go to the doctor. I may contemplate it quite a bit, but the symptoms usually disappear by the time I get around to it. And when I actually have something legitimately wrong with me, I'm sure I don't. Two winters ago when I had bronchitis, for example, I waited weeks to go to a doctor because I was sure it was just a cough and would go away on its own.

Anyway, what prompted this whole foray into my neurotic tendencies is that now that I'm aware of this quirk, I try to be extra cautious not to let my mind run away with minor symptoms. So every once in a while, I think, "Hey, that whole lactose intolerance thing is probably just in my mind. I probably hypochondriac-ed the whole thing up." And I eat some cheesecake to prove it to myself. I did this experiment again on Sunday (you think I would have learned by now) and for the record, it's not in my mind.

Resolute

I realize I'm a few days late with the whole New Year's resolutions thing, but that's life. I was freshly inspired to make some new goals after we talked about self-improvement today in church. Elder Richard G. Scott of the LDS church has encouraged taking the following inventory:

• What are my highest priorities to be accomplished while on earth?
• How do I use my discretionary time? Is some of it consistently applied to my highest priorities?
• Is there anything I know I should not be doing?

I think I am (for the most part at least) clear on my priorities, but the part about discretionary time stung just a little - I'm pretty sure "What Not to Wear" isn't doing much to further most of said priorities (although I am a firm believer that indulging in a guilty pleasure from time to time is healthy). So, here are my "discretionary time" resolutions (#1 should probably be Find more discretionary time - seriously, I don't have much these days so I'll be careful not to be overly ambitious). I'm not posting them to intentionally bore anyone who might read this, but because there's nothing like a little public accountability to motivate me to actually KEEP my resolutions. Feel free to check up on me throughout the year - I can usually use a kick in the pants with stuff like this.

1. School for the non-student: read one non-fiction book each month...or at least every other month (nothing like hedging your goals to guarantee success, right?).
2. More school: study for the GRE. I'm not sure where the next couple of years will take us, but I'd like to go back to school eventually and I want to keep my options open.
3. TAKE the GRE this year. It's been a long time since I took a test. Also, I don't tend to respond well to disappointing scores. Um, yikes.
4. Start WRITING for real - I need to put together a portfolio to apply to the program I'm interested in and I don't think blogging counts. Darn.

That's probably enough for now - I suffer from what I'll call Overwhelm Paralysis. Basically, if I feel like I have too much to do, I just don't do anything (except maybe garner fashion advice I can't afford to follow from Stacy and Clinton or spend way too much time learning about football from my sports-savvy hubby).

I have other goals too - you know, the normal spiritual/exercise/nutrition/budget kinds of things pretty much everyone else wants to do too. I'll post those on my fridge or something and hope that's public enough to keep me on my toes.